ARCHIBALD CRAWFORD.

ARCHIBALD CRAWFORD, a writer of prose and poetry of considerable merit, was born at Ayr in 1785. In his ninth year, left an orphan, he was placed under the care of a brother-in-law, a baker in London. With a limited education at school, his ardent love of literature and powerful memory enabled him to become conversant with the works of the more distinguished British authors, as well as the best translations of the classics. At the expiry of eight years he returned to Ayr, and soon after entered the employment of Charles Hay, Esq., of Edinburgh, in whose service he continued during a course of years. In honour of a daughter of this gentleman, who had shown him much kindness during a severe attack of fever, he composed his song of "Bonnie Mary Hay," which, subsequently set to music by R. A. Smith, has become extremely popular. He was afterwards in the employment of General Hay of Rannes, with whom he remained several years. At the close of that period he was offered by his employer an ensigncy in the service of the Honourable East India Company, which he declined. In 1810 he opened a grocery establishment in his native town; but, with less aptitude for business than literature, he lost the greater part of the capital he had embarked in trade. He afterwards exchanged this business for that of auctioneer.

The literary inclinations of his youth had been assiduously followed up, and his employers, sympathising with his tastes, gave him every opportunity, by the use of their libraries, of indulging his favourite studies. With the exception of some fugitive pieces, he did not however seek distinction as an author till 1819, when a satirical poem entitled "St James's in an uproar," appeared anonymously from his pen. This composition, intended to support the extreme political opinions then in vogue, exposed to ridicule some leading persons in the district, and was attended with the temporary apprehension and menaced prosecution of the printer. To the columns of the Ayr and Wigtonshire Courier he now began to contribute a series of sketches, founded on traditions in the West of Scotland; and these, in 1824, he collected into a volume, with the title, "Tales of a Grandmother," which was published by subscrip tion. In the following year the tales, with some additions, were published, in two duodecimo volumes, by Constable & Co.; but the subsequent insolvency of the publishing firm deprived the author of the profits of the sale. With two literary coadjutors, he started a weekly serial at Ayr, entitled The Correspondent, but the publication, in the course of a few months, was abandoned. A similar periodical, under the designation of The Gaberlunzie, appeared under his management in 1827, and extended to sixteen numbers. He latterly contributed articles in prose and verse to the Ayr Advertiser newspaper. His death took place at Ayr on the 6th January 1843, in his 58th year. To a hearty, social nature, he added strong intellectual capacities, and considerable dramatic power. His second son, Mr William Crawford, attained distinction as an artist.

THE author of "Legal Lyrics," a small volume of humorous songs, printed for private circulation, George Outram was born in the vicinity of Glasgow in 1805. His father, a native of England, was partner and manager in the Clyde Iron Works. In 1827 he was called to the Scottish bar, and practised for some years as an advocate. To the character of an orator he made no pretensions, but he evinced great ability as a chamber counsel. He accepted, in 1837, the editorship of the Glasgow Herald, and continued the principal conductor of that journal till the period of his death. He died at Rosemore, on the shores of the Holy Loch, on the 16th September 1856, in his fifty-first year. His remains were interred in Warriston Cemetery, Edinburgh.

Of a most retiring disposition, Mr Outram confined his intercourse to a limited circle of friends, by whom he was esteemed for his genial worth and interesting conversation. By the late Lord Cockburn he was especially beloved. He has left in MS. several interesting songs, which are likely to be published by his executors. The late celebrated General Sir James Outram was his cousin-german.

She's crined awa' to bane an' skin,

But that it seems is nought to me;
She's like to live, although she's in
The last stage o' tenuity.

She munches wi' her wizen'd gums,
An' stumps about on legs o' thrums,
But comes-as sure as Christmas comes-
To ca' for her annuity.

She jokes her joke, an' cracks her crack,
As spunkie as a growin' flea;
An' there she sits upon my back
A livin' perpetuity.
She hurkles by her ingle side,

An' toasts an' tans her wrinkled hide;
Wha kens how long she yet may bide
To ca' for her annuity?

I read the tables drawn wi' care
For an Insurance Company;
Her chance o' life was stated there
Wi' perfect perspicuity.
But tables here, or tables there,
She's lived ten years beyond her share;
An's like to live a dozen mair

To ca' for her annuity.

I gat the loon that drew the deed,
We spell'd it ower right carefully;
In vain he yerk'd his souple head
To find an ambiguity.
It's dated, tested, a' complete-
The proper stamp, nae word delete;
And diligence, as on decreet,

May pass for her annuity.

I thought that grief might gar her quit―
Her only son was lost at sea;
But aff her wits behuved to flit,
An' leave her in fatuity.

She threeps, an' threeps he's livin' yet
For a' the tellin' she can get;
But catch the doited wife forget
To ca' for her annuity!

If there's a sough o' cholera

Or typhus, wha sae gleg as she!
She buys up baths, an' drugs, an' a',
In siccan superfluity!

She doesna need-she's fever proof-
The pest walked o'er her very roof;
She tauld me sae, and then her loof
Held out for her annuity.

Ae day she fell, her arm she brak',
A compound fracture as could be;
Nae leech the cure wad undertak',

Whate'er was the gratuity.
It's cured! she handles't like a flail,
It does as weel in bits as hale;
But I'm a broken man mysel'

Wi' her and her annuity.

Her broozled flesh and broken banes
Are weel as flesh and banes can be;
She beats the taeds that live in stanes
An' fatten in vacuity!

They die when they're exposed to air,
They canna thole the atmosphere;
But her! expose her onywhere,
She lives for her annuity!

The water-drap wears out the rock
As this eternal jade wears me;
I could withstand the single shock,
But not the continuity.
It's pay me here, an' pay me there,
An' pay me, pay me evermair;
I'll gang demented wi' despair;
I'm charged for her annuity!

JOHN PARK was born at Greenock about the year 1805. He was educated at the grammar school of his native place, and at the Universities of Glasgow and Aberdeen. Licensed as a probationer of the Scottish Church, he was in 1831 preferred to the pastorate of Rodney Street Presbyterian Church, Liverpool. Having ministered at Liverpool for eleven years, he was in 1843 presented by the Duke of Buccleuch to the parish of Glencairn, Dumfriesshire. On a vacancy occurring in the first charge at St Andrews, by the decease of Principal Haldane in March 1854, he was selected by the congregation to fill the office, and was admitted to the charge in September. At the same period he received the degree of D.D. from the University of St Andrews. In his important ministerial sphere at St Andrews, Dr Park obtained remarkable acceptance; his discourses, pervaded by enlightened views of Divine truth, attracted large audiences, and he was beloved for his genial manners in private society. Dr Park died suddenly on the 8th April 1865. He was not more distinguished as an accomplished theologian and eloquent preacher, than as an ingenious and most effective musician. He performed with much skill on different instruments, and several

of his musical compositions are said to equal the higher efforts of the great masters. Of these compositions, a selection of ninety were, after his decease, sold to Mr Ramsden of Leeds, who is producing a proportion of them annually. They include music to words by Wordsworth, Shelley, and Tennyson, besides unpublished songs written by himself.

Unambitious of literary reputation, Dr Park did not seek the honours of authorship. Several sacred lyrics from his pen were published anonymously. A volume of his "Lectures and Sermons" appeared soon after his decease. The following song, the most extensively popular of several written to the same chorus, was composed by him, when he was a student at Aberdeen College, about the year 1826. In communicating a copy to the editor of this work in December 1855, Dr Park wrote, "The air is old. I heard it whistled by a fellow-student at Aberdeen, and tried these words for it. The only words he could give me as old ones, were

O an' I were where Gadie rins,

Where Gadie rins, where Gadie rins,

O an' I were where Gadie rins,

At the back o' Benochie;

but he told me that a Scottish officer in Egypt had been much affected and surprised on hearing a soldier's wife crooning the song to herself, and this, I believe, was the hint upon which I tried the verses. The air is undoubtedly old, from its resemblance to several Gaelic and Irish airs. I have been surprised-though it would be affectation not to say agreeably surprised-by the interest which has been felt in connection with this trifle."

It may be added that Dr Park's nephew, Mr Allan Park Paton, of Greenock, is well known for his literary and poetical tastes. Besides two volumes of meritorious verse, he has published "The Web of Life, a Tale," a work on Alexander Wilson the poet and ornithologist, and other esteemed compositions.