The Publishers of the "Standard Novels" are happy to state that they have been able to add to the novel of " Discipline," in the present Number, the whole of Dr. Brunton's Memoir and Correspondence of the Authoress. They have ascertained, however, that the addition of the fragment entitled "Emmeline," as originally intended, would have rendered the Volume inconveniently bulky. New Burlington Street, June 1. 1832. BOLLEIAN P 25 JUL 1952 LIBRARY MEMOIR. IMMEDIATELY after Mrs. Brunton's death, various eloquent tributes were paid to her memory in the newspapers of Edinburgh. Her literary friends, however, have expressed a strong wish, that some more detailed memoir should be prepared; not so much for recording the occurrences of a very uneventful life, as for exhibiting the history of her mind, and her habits of composition. With that wish I have willingly complied. It has been for twenty years my happiness to watch the workings of that noble mind-my chief usefulness to aid its progress, however feebly. Nothing is more soothing to me now, than to dwell on the remembrance of her nothing more dear, than to diffuse the benefit of her example. I know that I shall perform the task very inadequately. Were I better qualified than I am for its discharge, the relation which I bore to her makes it needful for me to repress feelings, upon which any other biographer would have dwelt with delight. But if I can make her memory useful to one of her fellow-creatures, this is the only consideration which her sainted spirit would prize. MARY BALFOUR was the only daughter of Colonel Thomas Balfour of Elwick, a cadet of one of the most respectable families in the county of Orkney. Her mother was Frances Ligonier, only daughter of Colonel Ligonier of the 13th dragoons. Mary was born in the island of Burra in Orkney, 1st of November, 1778. Her early education was not conducted on any regular plan. Her father, himself a man of extraordinary talents |