Dear Sir

I rejoice at D^r Ramsays recovery & hope to hear it confirmed by his own pen. I am also extremely glad to hear that M^r Low’s M.S. is safe. I hope to help him with some materials for his historic part which shall pass thro’ y^r hands. As to the drawings I keep them as his most valuable gift to me, to be used as occasion may require.¹

You will oblige me much by calling with my complim^ts on M^r Macgovan & beg a sight of his celt see my Tourp.241. & observe if it had not been gilt as I say: for I find it doubted.²

anything you are kind enough to send, must go to M^r Middleton’s chambers opposite the church in the Temple London.

I shall in the course of the year have occasion to consult M^r Elliot about a book of travels thro’ the remoter part of Scotland illustrated with most curious prints, which I patronise for the benefit of the author.³ I wish by the affected silence respecting me in the late publications by y^r countrymen that my name grows unpopular. for I have seen of late more than one in which I am sure I had some clame of merit.

I am
Dear Sir
y^r faithful humble Serv^t

Tho. Pennant

Downing Oct^r 9^th 1778.

how go on the Scotch maps?⁴

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Editorial notes

1. Pennant would use several of Low's drawings as plates in his Arctic Zoology (London:1784): see plates III-V.
2. On the above page of his Tour in Scotland 1772 Part II (1776), Pennant describes an axehead or 'brazen celt finely gilt' that he had seen in a cabinet of curiosities belonging to Macgowan while in Edinburgh.
3. Charles Cordiner's Antiquities and Scenery of the North of Scotland, in a Series of Letters to Thomas Pennant (London: 1780): see Pennant's previous letters of 17 January and 4 September.
4. Possibly a reference (among other works) to John Ainslie's Travelling map of Scotland (Edinburgh: 1783), which Pennant appears to acknowledge receiving a draft of in his following letter of 18 October.