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surely command some peculiar regard when viewed in so elevated and important a station; especially as it shone not in ecclesiastical, but military life, where the temptations are so many, and the prevalency of the contrary character so great, that it may seem no inconsiderable praise and felicity to be free from dissolute vice, and to retain what in most other professions might be esteemed only a mediocrity of virtue. It may surely, with the highest justice, be expected that the title and bravery of Colonel Gardiner will invite many of our officers and soldiers, to whom his name has been long honourable and dear, to peruse this account of him with some peculiar attention; in consequence of which, it may be a means of increasing the number, and brightening the character, of those who are already adorning their office, their country, and their religion; and of reclaiming those who will see rather what they ought to be, than what they are. On the whole, to the gentlemen of the sword I would particularly offer these Memoirs, as theirs by so distinguished a title; yet I am firmly persuaded there are none whose office is so sacred, or whose proficiency in the religious life is so advanced, but they may find something to demand their thankfulness, and to awaken their emulation.

SECT. 5. Colonel James Gardiner, of whom we write, was the son of Captain Patrick Gar. diner, of the family of Torwood-head, by Mrs. Mary Hodge, of the family of Gladsmuir. The captain, who was master of a handsome estate, served many years in the army of King William and Queen Anne, and died abroad with the British forces in Germany, quickly after the battle of Hochstet, through the fatigues he underwent in the duties of that celebrated campaign. He had a company in the regiment of foot, once commanded by Colonel Hodge, his valiant brotherin-law, who was slain at the head of that regiment (my memorial from Scotland says) at the battle of Steenkirk, which was fought in the year 1692.

SECT. 6. Mrs. Gardiner, our colonel's mother, was a lady of a very valuable character; but it pleased God to exercise her with very uncommon trials: for she not only lost her husband and her brother in the service of their country, as before related, but also her eldest son, Mr. Robert Gardiner, on the day which completed the 16th year of his age, at the siege of Namur in 1695. But there is great reason to believe God blessed these various and heavy afflictions, as the means of forming her to that eminent degree of piety

which will render her memory honourable as long as it continues.

SECT. 7. Her second son, the worthy person of whom I am now to give a more particular account, was born at Carriden in Linlithgowshire, on the 10th of January, A. D. 1687-8; the memorable year of that glorious revolution which he justly esteemed among the happiest of all events. So that when he was slain in the defence of those liberties which God then by so gracious a Providence rescued from utter destruction, i. e. on the 21st of September, 1745, he was aged 57 years, eight months, and 11 days.

SECT. 8. The annual return of his birthday was observed by him, in the latter and better years of his life, in a manner very different from what is commonly practised: for, instead of making it a day of festivity, I am told, he rather distinguished it as a season of more than ordinary humiliation before God; both in commemoration of those mercies which he received in the first opening of life, and under an affectionate sense, as well of his long alienation from the great Author and support of his being, as of the many imperfections which he lamented, in the best of his days and services.

SECT. 9. I have not met with many things

remarkable concerning the early years of his life, only that his mother took care to instruct him with great tenderness and affection in the principles of true Christianity. He was also trained up in human literature at the school at Linlithgow, where he made a very considerable progress in the languages. I remember to have heard him quote some passages of the Latin classics very pertinently; though his employment in life, and the various turns which his mind took under different impulses in succeeding years, prevented him from cultivating such studies.

SECT. 10. The good effects of his mother's prudent and exemplary care were not so conspicuous as she wished and hoped, in the younger part of her son's life; yet there is great reason to believe they were not entirely lost. As they were probably the occasion of many convictions, which in his younger years were overborne; so I doubt not, that when religious impressions took that strong hold of his heart which they afterwards did, that stock of knowledge which had been so early laid up in his mind was found of considerable service. And I have heard them make the observation, as an encouragement to parents, and other pious friends, to do their duty, and

to hope for those good consequences of it which may not immediately appear.

SECT. 11. Could his mother, or a very religious aunt (of whose good instructions and exhortations I have often heard him speak with pleasure), have prevailed, he would not have thought of a military life; from which, it is no wonder, these ladies endeavoured to dissuade him, considering the mournful experience they had of the dangers attending it, and the dear relatives they had lost already by it. But it suited his taste; and the ardour of his spirit, animated by the persuasions of a friend, who greatly urged it*, was not to be restrained. Nor will the reader wonder that, thus excited and supported, it easily overbore their tender remonstrances, when he knows that this lively youth fought three duels before he attained to the stature of a man; in one of which, when he was but eight years old, he received from a boy, much older than himself, a wound in his right cheek, the scar of which was always very apparent. The false sense of honour which instigated him to it, might seem indeed something excusable in those unripened years, and considering the profession

* I suppose this to have been Brigadier General Rue, who had from his childhood a peculiar affection for him.

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