Thus, the tenth Earl of Buchan brought up a numerous family of children, one of whom afterwards rose to be Lord Chancellor of England, upon an income not exceeding two hundred a year.  It is not the amount of income, so much as the good use of it, that marks the true man; and viewed in this light, good sense, good taste, and sound mental culture, are among the best of all economists.

The late Dr. Aiton said that his father brought up a still larger family on only half the income of the Earl of Buchan.  The following dedication, prefixed to his work on “Clerical Economics,” is worthy of being remembered:  “This work is respectfully dedicated to a Father, now in the eighty-third year of his age, who, on an income which never exceeded a hundred pounds yearly, educated, out of a family of twelve children, four sons to liberal professions, and who has often sent his last shilling to each of them, in their turn, when they were at college.”

The author might even cite his own case as an illustration of the advantages of thrift.  His mother was left a widow, when her youngest child—­the youngest of eleven—­was only three weeks old.  Notwithstanding a considerable debt on account of a suretyship, which was paid, she bravely met the difficulties of her position, and perseveringly overcame them.  Though her income was less than that of many highly paid working men, she educated her children well, and brought them up religiously and virtuously.  She put her sons in the way of doing well, and if they have not done so, it was through no fault of hers.

Hume, the historian, was a man of good family; but being a younger brother, his means were very small.  His father died while he was an infant; he was brought up by his mother, who devoted herself entirely to the rearing and educating of her children.  At twenty-three, young Hume went to France to prosecute his studies.  “There,” says he, in his Autobiography, “I laid down that plan of life which I have steadily and successfully pursued.  I resolved to make a very rigid frugality supply my deficiency of fortune, to maintain unimpaired my independency, and to regard every object as contemptible, except the improvement of my talents in literature.”  The first book he published was a complete failure.  But he went on again; composed and published another book, which was a success.  But he made no money by it.  He became secretary to the military embassy at Vienna and Turin; and at thirty-six he thought himself rich.  These are his own words:  “My appointments, with my frugality, had made me reach a fortune which I called independent, though most of my friends were inclined to smile when I said so:  in short, I was now master of near a thousand pounds.”  Every one knows that a thousand pounds, at five per cent., means fifty pounds a year; and Hume considered himself independent with that income.  His friend Adam Smith said of him:  “Even in the lowest state of his fortune, his great and necessary frugality never hindered him from exercising, upon proper occasions, acts both of charity and generosity.  It was a frugality founded not on avarice, but upon the love of independency.”