In testimony of the Magistrates' and Council's respect for his high character as a statesman, and for his eminent services in administering the financial affairs of the nation.
"In the history of the University of Edinburgh we may clearly trace the national character of Scotland. We find there all that hardy energy, that gift of extracting much from little, and husbanding every available provision-of supplying the defects of external appliances and means from within by the augmented effort and courage of man, that power to make an uncongenial climate smile and a hungry soil teem with all the bounties of providence, which have given Scotland a place and a name among men so far beyond what was due to her geographical extent or to her natural resources."
(This passage is from his Rectorial Address to the University of Edinburgh, 1860.)