WILLIAM PORTER ESQ.

By the Right Honourable Lord St. Helens.

the Gentleman's Magazine of May, 1815.

From

"DIED in Upper Norton Street, William Porter Esq. The virtues and talents of this most respectable gentleman will be long remembered by all who had the pleasure of knowing him in public or private life. He was educated at the University of Edinburgh, and was early distinguished. In his 22nd year he went to London, and was there chosen to accompany Dr. Dumaresque, LL.D. to St. Petersburg, where the Empress Catherine the Second, in 1764, had requested by her Ambassador that the Government of Great Britain would assist her Majesty, by sending two gentlemen of literary taste and talents to aid her in forming the Imperial Academy, which her Majesty had built at St. Petersburg. Dr. Dumaresque was a native of Jersey, and a very accomplished scholar in modern and ancient languages. He was thirty-five years of age. Mr. Porter was only twenty-two years old, but had brought a high character from the University of Edinburgh. They were most graciously received by the Empress and her ministers at St. Petersburg, where Mr. Porter soon acquired the Russian lan

guage, and wrote and spoke like a native; also the German. He proceeded with Dr. Dumaresque to establish the members and rules of the Imperial Academy. He was greatly respected and esteemed by all the most distinguished society, and was very much with the Corps Diplomatique, and all the Ambassadors from London. The Empress and her Ministers offered a good salary to Dr. Dumaresque and Mr. Porter, if they, or one of them, would fix permanently at St. Petersburg, and superintend the Academy. Meantime Mr. Porter was urged to enter into commercial life at that city, where for many years he enjoyed prosperity; but by severe losses in 1793, and again in 1800, Mr. Porter was deprived of all he had formerly gained. But his integrity and honour were unblemished; which was fully proved by the united friendship and respect expressed for him, not only by his commercial friends, but also by many persons of rank who had the pleasure of his friendship in Russia, by which Mr. Porter procured the very respectable appointment to be one of his Majesty's Commissioners of the Revenue in Scotland, with full confidence in his most upright and honourable conduct and principles. Mr. Porter married the sister of the late Joseph Ewart, Esq. his Majesty's late Minister Plenipotentiary at Berlin.

A LETTER

From the Rev. John Ewart to his son, Dr. John Ewart, M. D. at Bath, Jan. 5, 1795.

MY DEAR SON,

Troquire.

I rejoice to hear of your health and agreeable prospects at Bath, but am fully aware that time only can establish you, or any most able physician there. Your good talents and temper will gain to you many friends, above all, that firm integrity of heart, which I prize above all other advantages. Your account of your hospital, and the improvements of it are very interesting. By the good works of charity you will get the blessing of God, and the favour of mankind. Your education gives you ample advantages; yet I only reckon education as a fine and most important varnish, by which a carriage must be painted, though the wood and the iron are far more essential to carry you over the mountains: not that I mean to depreciate the great benefit of education by the good habits and principles it can plant; yet all the high and original excellence of the understanding, the heart, and the temper, are from God Almighty only, who has been pleased to give such blessings as

various in degrees, as is the human countenance. He has also prepared for all his creatures various situations both in this world, and in the world to come. You were early taught the most important of all wisdom by your most excellent mother, reading to her the Scriptures, and particularly the New Testament, from four years old to seven years; your good memory was thereby stored with most essential information, before you went to the worthy Dr. Chapman's school at Dumfries, at seven years of age, to learn Latin and Greek. Your English reading of history, &c. all at home before that age, was greatly in your favour; by your mother so superior: and our books all the winter evenings are read here as formerly. We are now reading Sully's Memoirs, the faithful friend of his dear master, Henry the Fourth of France, and where he says, "By early habits of uniform economy, he had not only preserved all pecuniary independence to himself, void of meanness or parsimony; but also had infinite happiness by being able to assist the occasional wants of his kind, very generous, and royal master, who was sometimes wholly exhausted in his finances, before he gained the throne." Alas! his reign was short. After the fatal death of the King, the good and distinguished Duc de Sully retired to his farm, and lived en philosophe in rural life, a most sincere Christian. He attained very old age, and was an example of wisdom and virtue, such as the President Montesquieu also was at his country-seat, near Bourdeaux.

You will not have time, perhaps, to read long letters, yet the importance of economy so recommended by the Duc de Sully, led me to say much; as in fact economy is the parent of all that is happiness or liberality in life. Pecuniary arrangement is the guardian of virtue and honor.

May God bless you with all these good things: your mother and sisters send you their love, With your affectionate father,

JOHN EWART.

P.S. We are thankful your sister and good Colonel Hamilton are got home from the Continent and Geneva, in such dreadful times in France.