On the first page of the manuscript is a note by John Lee to the effect that 'The following is a literal copy of a Manuscript of Dr Carlyle written a few months before his death in the year 1805'. From the notes in the 1910 edition of the ‘Autobiography’, it appears that John Hill Burton used this or an identical copy. The manuscript records in rambling fashion various events in Alexander Carlyle's life between the years 1723 and 1737. On page 71 there is a supplement to the original 'Recollections', transcribed by Lee and bearing a note by him, 'This part was written in Summer 1805'. It records, with digressions, events in Carlyle's life which took place in 1738. Hill Burton quotes sparingly from it in his 'Supplementary Chapter' to the ‘Autobiography’.