[We published, in the Eclectic Magazine for February, an elaborate article on this subject from the North British Review, attributed to the pen of Sir David Brewster, which claimed the distinction of Junius' name for a new candidate. The following brief reply of the Athenæum effectually disposes of the argument, and will be read, by those who recall the former article, with deep interest.-ED.]

AN examination of the evidence brought forward, from time to time, since 1812, in favor of the several claims of Sackville, Boyd, Francis, Barré, and others, to be considered as the writer of Junius's Letters; with facts and arguments in favor of a new claimant, Mr. Lauchlin Macleane. The review is understood to have been written by a gentleman whose opinion on any subject is entitled to respectful consideration-indeed, we need not hesitate to say by Sir David Brewster, for the facts adduced in respect to Lauchlin Macleane are conclusive on that point.

It is not our intention to slay the slain, or generally to criticise the critic. We shall confine ourselves to a consideration of the evidence brought forward by him in favor of

Mr. Lauchlin Macleane.

Some years since it was incidentally mentioned in Cooke's "History of Parties," and subsequently confirmed by paragraphs in the newspapers, that Sir David Brewster, in turning over old family papers, had stumbled on evidence all but conclusive that Mr. Lauchlin Macleane was the writer of Junius's Letters. That evidence is now before us; and we will at once submit it for consideration, with such comment as suggests itself:

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shall follow your advice, my dear sir, implicitly. The feelings of the man are not fine, but he must be chafed into sensation.' This and other similar passages were shown to Mr. Macpherson of Belleville, who recollected that the name of Macleane was mentioned in Galt's life of West, in connection with that of Junius. A copy of the book was immediately sent for, when to the great surprise of the parties the following passage was discovered: An incident,' says Mr. Galt, of a curious nature has brought him (Mr. West) to be a specting the mysterious author of the celebrated party, in some degree, in the singular question reletters of Junius. On the morning that the first of these famous invectives appeared, his friend, Governor Hamilton, happened to call; and inquiring the news, Mr. West informed him of that bold and daring epistle. Ringing for his servant at the brought in. Hamilton read it over with great atsame time, he desired the newspaper to be tention; and when he had done, laid it on his knees in a manner that particularly attracted the notice of the painter, who was standing at his easel. This letter,' said Hamilton, in a tone of vehement feeling, is by that dd scoundrel, Macleane.' 'What Macleane?' inquired Mr. fellow who attacked me so violently in the PhilaWest. 'The surgeon of Otway's regiment; the delphia newspapers on account of the part I felt it to be my duty to take against one of the officers. This letter is by him. I know these very words; I may well remember them; and he read over several phrases and sentiments which Macleane employed against him. Mr. West then informed the Governor that Macleane was in the country, and that he was personally acquainted with him. He came over,' said Mr. West,' with Colonel Barré, by whom he was introduced to Lord Shelburne, (afterwards Marquis of Lansdowne,) and is at present private secretary to his lordship.' This remarkable anecdote, taken in connection with the casual discovery of Macleane's letters, induced Sir David Brewster to enter upon an inquiry foreign to his own studies, but not without an interest to those who like himself were admirers of the writings of Junius. In this inquiry he has been engaged for nearly thirty years; and though he does not pretend to have

we have shown,] was sent, in 1745 or 1746, from a school near Belfast to Trinity College, Dublin, where he became acquainted with Burke and Goldsmith. He afterwards went to Edinburgh to study medicine; and on the 4th of January, 1756, he was introduced by Goldsmith to the Medical Society, of which he became a member."

Here mistakes are obvious. Macleane could not have been introduced by Goldsmith to the Medical Society of Edinburgh in 1756, because Goldsmith had left Edinburgh two years before.. The dates of his letters prove that he was at Leyden in April, 1754. This, we presume, is a typographical error; and indeed the paper is printed so carelessly that we always fear to mistake mere printer's blunders for substantive and grave errors by the writer; and yet the substantive and grave errors of the writer make it a question whether we are quite justified in thus letting him escape at the expense of the printer.

We are now told that

"After completing his medical course, he obtained the degree of M.D. on the 6th August, 1755; and sometime after this he entered the army as surgeon to Otway's regiment, (the 35th.)

We have not been able to learn if Macleane was

in any of the expeditions to North America which were fitted out in 1757 or 1758; but we know [We do not know] that he accompanied the celebrated expedition in 1759, when Wolfe fell on the heights of Abraham, and the command of the British troops devolved upon Brigadier-General Townshend. Major Barré and his countryman Macleane shared in the dangers and honors of that eventful day. * * * Brigadier-General Townshend was unpopular in the army, and particularly obnoxious to Barré and Macleane, and the other friends of Wolfe. * ** * Irritated by this selfish and ungenerous conduct, the friends of Wolfe, and who could they be but Barré or Macleane, drew up and published, in 1760, the celebrated letter to a Brigadier-General, already mentioned, which so clearly resembles in its temper and style, and sentiments, the letters of Junius. If Junius, therefore, wrote this letter, all the arguments of Mr. Britton in favor of Barré's being the author of it, and therefore Junius, are

equally applicable to Macleane; and if we have proved that Barré could not be Junius, it follows that, under these assumptions, Macleane is entitled to that distinction. This conclusion we may fairly corroborate by a reference to one of the miscellaneous letters signed A Faithful Monitor, and ascribed to Junius, although there is no sufficient evidence that he wrote it. But as it is possible, and to a certain degree probable, that it may prove genuine, we are entitled to add this indeterminate quantity to our argument."

We shall not stop to ascertain the value of this indeterminate quantity; what we want

'

Early in 1761 General Monckton was appointed governor of New York, and in December force for the reduction of Martinique. Otway's of the same year he left that city with a strong regiment was part of the eleven battalions which went from New York for this purpose, and Macleane accompanied the general as his private secretary. The English fleet rendezvoused at Barbadoes, came before Martinique on the 7th January, 1762, and obtained possession of it on the 4th West India Islands, and the peace of 1762 which February. After the reduction of the French followed it, the regiments to which Barré and Macleane belonged were disbanded. We have not been able to obtain much information about Macleane after the taking of Martinique. He seems to have settled in Philadelphia as a physician, and to have remained there for some years. A gentleman in Philadelphia mentions Dr. Laughlin Macleane and his lady as acquaintances of his grandfather, and visitors at his house someter (Mrs. Macleane) rarely missed a day, when the weather was favorable, of calling upon her countrywoman, my grandmother.' Prior informs us, that when in Philadelphia Macleane acquired great medical reputation, followed by its common attendant, envy, from the less forIn 1766, Macleane met Barry, the painter, at Paris."

time between 1761 and 1766.' * *

tunate of his brethren. * *

'The lat

* *

Mr.

Now, not to delay or perplex the argument by asking questions however pertinent not even to comment on such extraordinary opinions as that no friend of Wolfe's, in a whole discontented army, could have written a pamphlet against Townshend save either Macleane or Barré, although Townshend himself accused and challenged another man for having written it or got it written-no, nor to correct obvious and palpable errorslet us assume the above statement to be true; and then consider, where was the interval of " some years, between 1761 and 1766, during which Macleane practised as a physician at Philadelphia, exciting the envy of the profession, and enabling Mrs. Macleane to pay her daily respects to " my grandmother," according to the memoirs of the Pennsylvanian ?—or, according to Sir David, within even narrower limits—that is, between the peace of 1762 and 1766 when Barry met him in Paris.

Time, as the reader will observe, is an important element in these calculations, yet Sir David must bate us a year or two even of this limited interval; for it was in 1765, not

in 1766, that Barry met Macleane in Paris; | and we know, from the Parliamentary History, that Dr. Musgrave met him there in 1764-and, from Macleane's own statement in the House of Commons, that he went to Paris in April of that year. The interval is thus reduced to an interval of 66 some months," rather than of "some years"-during which he made a fortune in Martinique, invested it in Grenada, returned to England, and visited Paris. "Not able to obtain much information about Macleane after the taking of Martinique!" Why, if Sir David would ensure us but a tythe of the fame which he has so justly won for the least of his discoveries, we would make out for him a diary of Macleane's scrambling, scheming, intriguing, gambling existence, from the hour when he embarked from Martinique to the day on which he perished on board the Swallow.

But the whole story, including the services under Wolfe, and all the prolific assumptions which follow, may be disposed of in a paragraph; for we can state, on the authority of official records, that Lauchlin Macleane was never surgeon of Otway's regiment; that Thomas Williams was appointed surgeon to the regiment on the 22d of March, 1747, and held the appointment until the 1st of June, 1762, when he was superseded by George Hugonen; further, that there was no officer of that name in the Thirty-fifth, or any other regiment, either in the year 1767 or 1768.

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What now becomes of the assertion of Governor Hamilton, that the letters of Junius were certainly written by that "d-d scoundrel," the surgeon of Otway's regiment?" What is to become of the letter to a Brigadier-general of the hatred to Townshend as a stimulating power-and of one-half of the other personal feelings which, like "the legacy," serve, we are told, to identify Macleane as Junius? If the identity of the pamphleteer and Junius be proved-if the pamphlet-writer must have served under Wolfe at Quebec-and if, as Sir David intimates, the pamphlet must have been written either by Barré or Macleane, we think Mr. Britton may reverse the conclusion at which Sir David arrives, and fairly say, "it follows that, under these assumptions, Barré is entitled to that distinction." But as Mr. Britton, like the churchwarden's wife, is but mortal, we think it well to remind him that these are "assumptions."

We shall not revive all the charges which were, at one time or another, preferred against Macleane; but we may receive as

substantially true the admissions of his friends-in some instances of his brother. From these and other sources, we collect that Macleane married while at Edinburgh a woman of good family but of small fortune; that in the autumn of 1755 or spring of 1756 he went to America, and settled at Philadelphia; his friends say as a physician, but as they admit he had a partner, it seems not improbable that he also kept a “drugstore," or, as we should call it, an apothecary's shop-which was the assertion of his adversaries. That he went out with any military or civil appointment does not appear.

In 1761 General Monckton was appointed to the command of the expedition against Martinique; and then, for the first time, Macleane became connected with the army— not as surgeon of Otway's regiment not as an officer holding his Majesty's commissionbut as secretary, or commissary, or contractor, receiving his appointment, whatever it was, from the general. His friends said that Monckton entertained so high an opinion of Macleane that, to secure the best and abundance for the troops, he gave him a contract for the supply of everything to the army; that Macleane, flattered by the good opinion of so distinguished a person, abandoned a profession in which he had succeeded to the utmost of his wishes, to share the general's fortune; and with such disinterestedness that, contrary to the usual issue of such contracts, he lost several thousand pounds of his private fortune by his engagements. It is, however, admitted that the general amply rewarded him, by conferring on him the very best civil offices at his disposal; and that Macleane made an ample fortune, which he beneficially invested in the purchase of large estates in Grenada.

Other reasons were assigned, and perhaps correctly, for Macleane's leaving Philadelphia; but with his motives we are in no way concerned. Macleane, we believe, returned to England in the autumn of 1763. In 1764 and 1765 he resided principally in Paris, and the Burkes gave Barry the painter a letter of introduction to him; and Barry says, "Nothing could equal the warmth and affection I met with in Mr. Macleane." On the 7th of October, 1766, William Burke informs Barry, "Your friend Macleane is this day made an under Secretary of State, so that we are laborers in the same vineyard."

"Macleane," says Sir David, "had now embarked on a political career which must have led