Notes and Queries, Number 188, June 4, 1853 | Page 8

after the king's death in 1649. If therefore Scrymgeour's
MSS. were among these, it is possible that they may yet be traced, for

they would be sold with Young's own, after his death in 1652. This
occurred on the 7th of September, rather suddenly, and he left no will,
and probably gave no directions about his MSS. and library, which
were sold sub hastâ, probably within a few months after his death, and
with them any of the MSS. which he may have taken from the King's
Library, or may have had in his possession belonging to others. Smith
says that he had seen a large catalogue of MSS. written in Young's own
hand. Is this catalogue extant? Patrick Young left two daughters,
co-heiresses: the elder married to John Atwood, Esq.; the younger, to
Sir Samuel Bowes, Kt. A daughter of the former gave to a church in
Essex a Bible which had belonged to Charles I.; but she knew so little
of her grandfather's history that she described him as Patrick Young,
Esq., library keeper to the king, quite unconscious that he had been
rector of two livings, and a canon and treasurer of St. Paul's. Perhaps,
after all, the designation was not so incorrect, for though he held so
many preferments, he never was in priest's orders, and sometimes was
not altogether free from suspicion of not being a member of the Church
of England at all, except as a recipient of its dues, and of course, a
deacon in its orders.
But it may be worthy of note, as affording another clue by which,
perchance, to trace some of Scrymgeour's MSS., that Sir Thomas
Bowes, Kt., who was Sir Symonds D'Ewes's literary executor,
employed Patrick Young to value a collection of coins, &c., among
which he recognised a number that had belonged to the king's cabinet,
and which Sir Symonds had purchased from Hugh Peters, by whom
they had been purloined. Young taxed Peters with having taken books,
and MSS. also, which the other denied, with the exception of two or
three, but was not believed. I do not know what relation Sir Thomas
Bowes was to Sir Samuel, who married Young's second daughter, nor
to Paul Bowes, who edited D'Ewes's Journals in 1682. It is quite
possible that some of Scrymgeour's MSS. may have fallen into
D'Ewes's hands, may have come down, and be recognisable by some
mark.
As to Scrymgeour's books, it is probable that they were deposited in
Peter Young's house of Easter Seatoun, near to Arbroath, of which he

obtained possession about 1580, and which remained with his
descendants for about ninety years, when his great-grandson sold it,
and purchased the castle and part of the lands of Aldbar. That any very
fine library was removed thither is not probable, especially any bearing
Henry {548} Scrymgeour's name; and for this reason, that Thomas
Ruddiman was tutor to David Young, and was resident at Aldbar, and
would hardly have failed to notice, or to record, the existence of any so
remarkable a library as Scrymgeour's, or even of Sir Peter Young's,
who was himself an ardent collector of books, as appears from some of
his letters to Sir Patrick Vans (recte Vaux) which I have seen, and as
might be inferred from his literary tastes and pursuits. There is perhaps
reason to believe that Sir Peter's library did not descend in his family
beyond his eldest son, Sir James Young, who made an attempt to
deprive the sons of his first marriage (the elder of whom died in infancy)
of their right of succession to their grandfather's estates, secured to
them under their father's marriage contract, and which attempt was
defeated by their uncle, Dr. John Young, Dean of Winchester (sixth son
of Sir Peter), who acquired from Lord Ramsay, eldest son of the Earl of
Dalhousie, part of the barony of Baledmouth in Fife. Dean Young
founded a school at St. Andrew's, on the site of which is now built Dr.
Bell's Madras College.
Sir Peter Young the elder, knighted in 1605, has been sometimes
confounded with his third son, Peter, who received his knighthood at
the hands of Gustavus Adolphus, on the occasion of that king being
invested with the Order of the Garter.
Another fine library (Andrew Melville's) was brought into Scotland
about the same time as Scrymgeour's; and it is creditable to the
statesmen of James's reign that there was an order in the Scotch
exchequer, that books imported into Scotland should be free from
custom. A note of this order is preserved among the Harleian MSS. in
the British Museum; but my reference to the number is not at hand.
DE CAMERA.
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