Record

CollectionGB 0231 University of Aberdeen, Special Collections
LevelItem
Ref NoMS 30/2/612
TitleRobert Arbuthnot to James Beattie from Edinburgh
Date14 January 1790
Extent1 Item
Administrative HistoryRobert Arbuthnot [1728-1803] was a member of a distinguished Jacobite/ Episcopalian family. He was brought up and later owned Haddo-Rattray House, north of Peterhead. He was a merchant and then a banker in the firm of Arbuthnot and Guthrie, which failed in 1772. He then moved to Edinburgh where he bacame secretary of the Board for the Encouragement of Manufacturies and Fisheries in Scotland. He befriended Beattie after Beattie moved to Aberdeen in 1758, and became for some years his principal poetic adviser and promoter. He negotiated on Beattie's behalf and often in conjuction with Sir William Forbes, with the booksellers over several of the publications
DescriptionSuggestions concerning details of Addison edition. Reference to Philips and 'Distressed mother'. Sir John Sinclair praised Beattie's writings. Arbuthnot wants James Hay Beattie to finish and publish didactic poem. Would bring honour and do him good, in view of his modesty and diffidence
Access StatusOpen
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