Robertson

“ Intending to devote himself to study, Robertson entered Corpus Christi College, Cambridge, but in 1833 ill-health compelled him to retire to the Isle of Wight, where he attempted to arrange his business affairs. Obliged to earn a livelihood, he settled in London in 1834. ”

“ Major Robertson, a woman of slight make, great beauty, and remarkable energy, courage, and sense (she told me the story herself) , on going up to her bedroom at night—there being no one in the house but a servant-girl, in the ground floor—saw a portion of a man's foot projecting from under the bed. She gave no cry of alarm, but shut the door as usual, set down her candle, and began as if to undress, when she said aloud to herself, with an impatient tone and gesture, "I've forgotten that key again, I declare;" ”

“ In 1848 he was elected by the students lord rector of Marischal College and university of Aberdeen, and received the degree of LL.D. He died suddenly, from a stroke of apoplexy, at his house in Drummond Place, Edinburgh, on 10 Jan. 1855, aged 60. He was buried in West Church burying-ground, Edinburgh, on the 15th of the same month. A marble tablet was erected to his memory in St. Giles's Church. Robertson was an able and energetic advocate, of strong natural abilities and vigorous common-sense. ”

“ Robertson had halted the oxen and jumping from the waggon-box strode forward and met Hans, who began to speak with him, twitching his hat in his hands. Gradually as the tale progressed, I saw the Captain’s face freeze into a mask of horror. Then he began to argue and deny, then to weep—oh! it was a terrible sight to see that great man weeping over those whom he had lost, and in such a fashion. ”

“ Robertson was always an outspoken opponent of ‘Disruption’ principles, and afterwards became leader of the moderate party in the church of Scotland. In 1843 he was appointed a member of the poor-law commission, whose report was issued in 1844.
In October 1843 Robertson became professor of divinity and church history in the university of Edinburgh, as well as secretary to the bible board (or, as the commission reads, ‘Secretary for Her Majesty's sole and only master printers in Scotland’) . ”

“ For three years Robertson remains in London and Liverpool, advisor to the Company. “If you cannot hire Orkneymen, get Frenchmen from Quebec as the Nor’Westers do,” he advises. “Fight fire with fire! Your Orkneymen are too shy, shy of breaking the law in a lawless land, shy of getting their own heads broken! Hire French bullies! ”

“ The subject of the discussion pleased Robertson immensely, of course, but he was outraged at the middle-class narrowness of his elders' views. He got up languidly, put on his cap, and standing by the door, pronounced judgment.
"All women," said little Robertson the Soph., "belong to the Trade, more or less, in one way or the other. I won't go so far as to say that every woman has her price, only I have never met one who hadn't!"
Neale and Gregg gazed at him spell-bound. He turned away, calling airily over his shoulder, "Well, ta! ta! A May night's no time for debates. ”

“ Eustace asked.
"I shouldn't say he could," Robertson replied, "but it looks as if he did. How could a man swarm a post with a sleeping child in his arms?"
"Black-fellows are dreadfully clever," said Kate.
"Hush," said Mrs. Robertson, "the poor lady is coming to herself. Don't let her hear you talking like that. Oh dear, how will she bear it?" ”

“ In August 1767 Robertson removed to London, where he attracted some notice. An overture for the employment of his pen in the service of the government was met by the rejoinder ‘Give me truth and I will write.’ He presented a copy of his ‘Attempt’ to the university of Glasgow (there is now no copy in the university library) , and received from the senatus the degree of D.D. (21 Jan. 1768) . Shortly afterwards the mastership of the Wolverhampton grammar school was bestowed upon him by the Merchant Taylors' Company; the salary was only 70l. a year, out of which for five years a pension of 40l. ”

“ A brave, finished, clear-eyed image of such properties as the last-named, in particular, our already-mentioned Alexander Robertson, a faint and diminished replica of whose picture (the really fine original, as I remember it, having been long since perverted from our view) I lately renewed acquaintance with in a pious institution of his founding, where, after more than one push northward and some easy accommodations, he lives on into a world that knows him not and of some of the high improvements of which he can little enough have dreamed. ”

“ In December 1805 Robertson was appointed miniature-painter to H.R.H. the Duke of Sussex, and in February 1807 obtained the privilege of going to Windsor and painting portraits of the Prince of Wales and other members of the royal family. Robertson was in 1807 one of the founders and the first secretary of the short-lived society known as the Associated Artists in Watercolours. He became a leader among the Scottish residents in London. ”

“ Wake County, North Carolina, since his boyhood. Robertson was twenty-eight years old when, in 1770, he rode over the hills to Watauga. We can imagine him as he was then, for the portrait taken much later in life shows the type of face that does not change. It is a high type combining the best qualities of his race. Intelligence, strength of purpose, fortitude, and moral power are there; they impress us at the first glance. At twenty-eight he must have been a serious young man, little given to laughter; indeed, spontaneity is perhaps the only good trait we miss in studying his face. ”

“ It is not history, it is imagination. He who describes what he never saw, draws from fancy. Robertson paints minds as Sir Joshua paints faces in a history-piece: he imagines an heroic countenance. You must look upon Robertson's work as romance, and try it by that standard. ”

“ The bells were ringing and the doors were open, while the people were coming into the church. Robertson watched his opportunity, and, suddenly springing up, got over the pew into the passage that led in to the door in the Parliament Close, and, no person offering to lay hands on him, made his escape in a moment—so much the more easily, perhaps, as everybody's attention was drawn to Wilson, who was a stronger man, and who, attempting to follow Robertson, was seized by the soldiers, [78] and struggled so long with them that the two who at last followed Robertson were too late. ”

“ Robertson." He held his hand over the mouthpiece and grinned at me. "They are ready to have a stroke. This man I'm talking to has no more authority than a jackrabbit, and he knows it. He wants to check with his boss, and call us back later. All right with you, Mr. Robertson?"
I laughed out loud, and he clamped the mouthpiece tighter. "I think so, Mr. W. W. Wakefield. As long as he puts the heat on that merger."
He went back on the telephone. "Mr. Robertson thinks he might be able to wait a trifle longer. ”

“ He had called upon George Robertson's few family connections in London, but they knew very little about that gentleman, excepting that when very young he had gone to America to seek his fortune; that in time he had married a well-to-do young American lady and had then come back to settle in England; that he soon had lost everything, being very reckless and unfortunate in business; that his wife, in her poverty, had received help from somebody travelling in Prussia ”

“ Once 'Gene Frady tripped on a root and fell headlong, pitching his torch into the dry duff a man's length before him. There was a rush to stamp out the incipient fire, the autumn terror of the forests, before any one lent a hand to help the fallen. Robertson went half-way up his leggings in a spring, and stood swearing fiercely, while the rest jeered at him and ordered him to move on before he muddied up a good drinking-place. ”

“ A critical organ, the [old] ‘Edinburgh Review,’ started by this society in 1755, was conducted with a causticity which proved fatal to its existence. In another fashion, during the following year (1756–7) , Robertson showed himself a champion of liberalism. He supported his friend John Home [q. v.] when the general assembly condemned Home for having written and produced a stage-play. Home had already supported Robertson in advocating the rights of the lay patrons. ”

“ Robertson expatiated on the character of a certain nobleman; that he was one of the strongest-minded men that ever lived; that he would sit in company quite sluggish, while there was nothing to call forth his intellectual vigour; but the moment that any important subject was started, for instance, how this country is to be defended against a French invasion, he would rouse himself, and shew his extraordinary talents with the most powerful ability and animation. JOHNSON. 'Yet this man cut his own throat. The true strong and sound mind is the mind that can embrace equally great things and small. ”

“ Lastly, Robertson, after making the emperor perform in his shroud, lays him in his coffin, where, after joining in the prayers for the rest of his own soul, not yet departed, he is left by the monks to his meditations!—Where Robertson got all these particulars it would not be easy to tell; certainly not from the authorities cited at the bottom of his page.
[328] "Et j'assure que le cœur nous fendait de voir qu'un homme voulût en quelque sorte s'enterrer vivant, et faire ses obsèques avant de mourir." Gachard, Retraite et Mort, tom. ”

“ ROBERTSON, WILLIAM (1721–1793) , historian, eldest son of William Robertson, was born in the manse of the parish of Borthwick, Midlothian, on 19 Sept. 1721. His father, the son of William Robertson of Brunton, was descended from the Robertsons of Gladney in Fifeshire, a branch of the Robertsons of Struan or Strowan in Perthshire [see art. Robertson, Alexander] (Douglas, Baronage of Scotland, 1798, pp. 407, 413, 414) . ”

“ Forbes Robertson’s neighbours are George Grossmith and his brother Weedon, Mr. and Mrs. Seymour Hicks, Lady Monckton, “Anthony Hope,” and many well-known judges, aldermen, solicitors, and architects.
In the old home in Bloomsbury the artistic family of Forbes Robertson was reared. Johnston, as we know, suddenly neglected his easel for the stage; his sister Frances took up literature as a profession; and his brothers, known as Ian Robertson and Norman Forbes, both adopted the theatrical profession. So the Robertsons may be classed among the theatrical families. ”

“ Dr Robertson said, 'it was now full time to make such a collection as Dr Johnson suggested; for many of the people who were then in arms, were dropping off; and both Whigs and Jacobites were now come to talk with moderation.' Lord Elibank said to him, 'Mr Robertson, the first thing that gave me a high opinion of you, was your saying in the Select Society, [Footnote: A society for debate in Edinburgh, consisting of the most eminent men.] while parties ran high, soon after the year 1745, that you did not think worse of a man's moral character for his having been in rebellion. ”

“ Robertson wasted his strength very often in small controversies, such as Sunday observance, and the unfortunate fact that he had no sense of humor often led him to take seriously and regret childishly, and answer bitterly, criticisms which were not worth thinking about and critics wholly unworthy of his steel. ”

“ John Robertson, author of "The Toom Meal Pock," a humorous song which has long been popular in the west of Scotland, was the son of an extensive grocer in Paisley, where he was born about the year 1770. He received the most ample education which his native town could afford, and early cultivated a taste for the elegant arts of music and drawing. Destined for one of the liberal professions, the unfortunate bankruptcy of his father put an effectual check on his original aspirations. ”

“ He was simply one of the representatives of the family of “strong men,” of whom examples are still to be seen doing marvellous feats all over the earth.
For the rest, he was dead and broken up by those Amahagger blood-hounds before I could examine him, or his body-armour either, and there was an end of him and his story. But when I looked at the corpse of poor Robertson, which I did as we buried it where he fell, and saw that though so large and thick-set, it was cleft almost in two by a single blow of Rezu’s axe, I came to understand what the might of this savage must have been. ”

“ As the Indian closed the door behind them the officer said to Robertson: "This is like the last act in a Third Avenue melodrama."
"Life has a liking for such plays," answered Robertson. As they left the Hanbury mansion the clock of Grace Church struck midnight. Robertson glanced down Broadway once more and saw that the long thoroughfare was almost deserted; only here and there the bluish-white light from the electric lamps shone on the bayonets of the sentinels patrolling up and down at long intervals. ”

“ Robertson had all along advocated fighting fire with fire; employing French wood-runners instead of timorous Orkneymen, and forcing the proud Nor’Westers to sue for union by invading the richest field of furs—Athabasca, far beyond the limits of Red River. And here was Robertson carrying out his aggressive policy, with “fighting John Clarke” of Astor’s old company as second in command. ”

“ I am exceedingly sorry that we brought you over from America and then are compelled to terminate your engagement so soon, but in your present condition—"
Mr. Robertson flung out his hands with an eloquent gesture.
"Well, look here; I'll give up my dance—that does shake me a bit, I'll grant; but you must let me sing the new song—you really must; I'm a nailer at it and I'll wrap up! My cough will soon go: give me another chance!"
Her cheeks were flushed with excitement and her eyes were sparkling—she really did not look so very ill this morning ”