Note 701 — Chapter V

‘He was sent to a mercantile house at Bristol in 1734; but he found the drudgery of this employment intolerable, and he retired to Rheims.’ Brougham's Life of Hume, Glasgow, 1856, p. 169. See also Ritchie's Life of Hume, p. 6. In Roberts' Memoirs of Hannah More, 2d ed. 1834, vol. i. p. 16, it is said that ‘two years of his life were spent in a merchant's counting-house in Bristol, whence he was dismissed on account of the promptitude of his pen in the correction of the letters intrusted to him to copy.’ The latter part of this story is improbable; the former part is certainly incorrect; since Hume himself says, ‘In 1734, I went to Bristol, with some recommendations to eminent merchants, but in a few months found that scene totally unsuitable to me. I went over to France, with a view of prosecuting my studies in a country retreat.’ Own Life, p. v.