with Franklin, then ambassador at Paris, and John Adams, plenipotentiary in Holland, were named joint commissioners to treat of peace with Great Britain, whenever that power should be disposed to listen to terms.

These three ministers accordingly took their sta tion in Paris, and continued there till they signed the general pacification, which guaranteed the independence of their native country in 1783.

Few of the promoters of liberty in the United States have ranked higher than Mr. Jay, ever since he came into public life; and none, except the presidents under the new constitution, have held more exalted stations. As soon as he returned to America, after signing the treaty, the place of minister for foreign affairs became vacant, by the resignation of Chancellor Livingston; and Mr. Jay was named to that office. This he held until the present constitution of the United States was framed and organized in the year 1789.

By that well-known declaration of the will of a Sovereign people, the legislative, executive, and judiciary departments were separated from each other, and rendered as independent as the nature of government will admit. George Washington was elected President of the United States, with power" by and with the advice and consent of the senate," to appoint all officers to the executive and judiciary functions. Mr. Jay was, on this occasion, named chief justice, which place he filled with great dignity and general satisfaction, till the year

1794, when Mr. Washington sent him as envoyextraordinary to the court of London.*

* It may be desirable, at the present period, to state the complaints urged by Mr. Jay, in a memorial addressed to Lord Grenville, July 30, 1794. It is to be wished that the existing differences could be as easily adjusted.

1. That a great number of American vessels had been irregu larly captured, and improperly condemned, by certain of his Britannic Majesty's officers and judges.

2. That in various instances, the parties aggrieved were deprived of the benefit of appeal, and in others, of the power of claiming their property.

3. That as the vessels and property, taken and condemned, had been sold and divided, the United States can alone look to his Majesty for reparation.

4. That as the expences and delays attending litigated suits are so grievous, and the distance of Britain from America so great, a new, more summary, and less expensive method of proceeding has become necessary.

5. That it may be equally expedient, necessary, and just, to revise and correct the sentences of the courts of Vice-admiralty.

6. That the irregularities before-mentioned, extend not only to the capture and condemnation of American vessels and property, as well as unusual personal severities, but even to the impressment of American citizens, to serve on board of armed› vessels. Signed J. J.

On November 19, 1794, a "Treaty of Amity, Commerce, and Navigation," between his Majesty and the United States of America, was signed by Lord Grenville, Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, on the one part, and the Honourable John Jay, Envoy-Extraordinary from the above States, on the other. Soon after this, Mr. Jay returned to America, and as the President(General Washington) had been blamed for employing a chief justice on a diplomatic mission, the accusation was in some degree obviated by a speedy resignation on the part of that magis

trate.

On his return to his native country in 1795, he resigned his place as chief justice, and was soon after elected governor of the state of New York, which place he held by re-election during six years, when he expressed a wish not to be re-chosen, and declared his intention never to occupy any other public station, which resolution he has since adhered to.

His health is now infirm; he has taken a religious turn of mind, and it is said is writing something on the Prophecies. His wife (who has been some time dead) was a remarkably sensible, welleducated, and amiable woman, daughter of the late governor William Livingston of New Jersey.

MR. GEORGE DEMPSTER.

THE people of Scotland possess a character peculiar to themselves. This arises out of the nature of their government; the peculiarity of their laws, and the genius of their social institutions. No nation of Europe can exhibit a greater simplicity of manners, so great a portion of austerity in respect to religion, or such excellent, numerous, and economical institutions, for the education of youth.

Until lately, the connexion between the landlord and tenant, particularly in the highlands, was not mercenary, but patriarchal; and there is still something peculiar in the habits, manners, and notions of those who inhabit those alpine regions. Be

tween that portion of the kingdom and the other, which is still denominated the low lands, a line of demarcation, both moral and physical, appears to have been drawn. On the one side was science, fertility, and cultivation; on the other (we mean to be understood generally) ignorance, poverty, sterility, a barbarous dialect, and a dress romantic in its appearance, but wholly unfitted for the climate. Thus, neither approximation nor one system of jurisprudence could produce unity.

common

To make a nation happy, property ought to be secure, and justice both expeditious and certain: but this was in some measure precluded by the adoption of the Imperial code; and although, according to Lord Kaimes, and indeed by the concurring testimony of all respectable authorities, the trial by jury, in civil cases, formed a part of the ancient municipal institutions, yet it had been suffered to sink into disuse, and was only adverted to occasionally in the barbarous phraseology of the lawyers.* If to this it be added, that the discretion of the Lord Advocate, an officer nominated and dismissed at pleasure by the executive power, stood in the place of a grand jury, that the magistrates of the inferior tribunals,† were usually appointed by the influence of the leading noblemen in the counties where they exercised their functions, and that the supreme tri

It is usually mentioned under the obscure term of "a competition of brieves."

The sheriffs depute and substitute.

bunal, in virtue of what it was pleased to designate the nobile officium, claimed a kind of concurrent jurisdiction with the legislature, and even arrogated in some instances a superiority, an Englishman will be filled with wonder and astonishment that such a system could have survived the union.

It is but recently too, that the feudal system has spent its rage, and subsided into an appearance of order. Until of late, also, there were but two classes of men, the rich and the poor, a middle order being still wanting. This, however, has in some measure been introduced within the memory of many men now living, by commerce, manufactures, and an improved system of agriculture.

These peculiarities, superadded to the genius of the ancient government, gave a certain cast to the inhabitants of the northern portion of the island. Correct in point of morals, excelling in all the various branches of education and literature, addicted alike to the sciences and the belles lettres, in full possession of all the elegant accomplishments which adorn life, they were still destitute of that liberty which makes existence desirable. Accustomed to fight for upwards of a century, to secure the pretensions of a particular family, they cared but little about the attainment of their own rights; and even anterior to the union, when they possessed a separate parliament, the Commons, by sitting in the same house with the Peers, were overawed so as to be rendered incapable of either the assumption, or the exercise of their own peculiar privileges.