DR HELEN Cargill Thompson squeezed the bronze sculpture of her ''Dug'' tightly yesterday, knowing that it was going to a good home.

Behind them was ''The Cratur'' which, she insisted, reminded her of a Glaswegian the morning after the night before. He too would have taken some comfort from the knowledge that his long-term future had been assured.

The two works of art, by Shona Kinloch and Peter Thomson, are among a collection of almost 350 amassed over the past 15 years by Dr Cargill Thompson, and valued as being worth at least #250,000.

In an unusual move, she has decided to gift almost all of it to Strathclyde University in Glasgow, where she worked for 30 years as a librarian before her retirement last year.

Over the years she never married, but pursued her one great passion - viewing and collecting art. She started in earnest in 1985 ''when Maggie Thatcher brought income tax down'' and she had ''some spare money''.

Her love for art began as a child on wet Sunday afternoons when, with other family members, she rampaged round the art galleries of Glasgow.

Her family had arrived in the city just before the outbreak of the Second World War from Burma, where she and her two brothers were born and her father worked as a merchant trader.

''There were art collections to see in Glasgow and, when we were on holiday abroad, one went to look at those. One had pictures at home as well,'' she recalled yesterday.

Dr Cargill Thompson, 66, came to librarianship at Strathclyde after 10 years as a research scientist, having earlier gained a PhD at Edinburgh University and a physiology degree at St Andrews.

She is a member of an eminent West of Scotland family. Her younger brother, John, who died last month, was a playwright, while her older brother was a professor of ecclesiastical history at King's College, London. Her great grand uncle founded Burmah Oil.

However, she said it was her thrifty nature which helped her to afford her collection.

''I only used public transport. I always avoided using taxis because that would have meant there wouldn't be any money to buy the pictures,'' she admitted.

''I collected right across the board. But the policy decision I made was to buy youngsters, almost all of them from the West of Scotland. You can buy one picture for #5000 or you can buy 10 pictures at #500, which is why there are so many.''

She appeared non-plussed yesterday when helping to apply the finishing touches at the university's Collins Gallery, where final preparations were under way for an exhibition of 140 of the works she donated.

They include important pieces by several well-known artists including Peter Howson, Avril Paton, James McDonald, and Neil MacPherson.

''I had been lending works to the university for exhibition for about 10 years. Now that I was retired, I knew by gifting them to the university that I couldn't be accused of bribing the establishment or trying to curry favour,'' Dr Cargill Thompson said.

''I didn't want the paintings to be stacked 10-deep around the walls of my home. I am one of these people who prefers to know where my money has gone, rather than the bottomless pit of the Treasury.

''In a sense, my money has gone supporting the kids. It is now giving Strathclyde University, which desperately needs some family silver, a little of that. It is not on the lines of the Hunterian at Glasgow University. That is right outside my scheme of money.''

Strathclyde University officials have estimated the worth of the entire donation at about #250,000. However, the true value may never be known. A condition of the handover, the legal complexities of which have still to be finalised, lays down that the art works should never be sold.

Dr Cargill Thompson, whose home in Glasgow's West End is a fine example of Edwardian design, plans to continue visiting as many art exhibitions in an around the city as possible where she says she has always had ''a whale of a time''.

She will also continue to look after the library of the Glasgow and West of Scotland Family History Society, which she enjoys greatly.

Collins Gallery curator Laura Hamilton said Dr Cargill Thompson's donation had increased the university's collection of fine art by one-third and had provided it with work which it could otherwise never have afforded.

She added: ''In the current climate, where countless numbers of galleries and museums throughout the UK are struggling to stay open, it is extraordinary for the University of Strathclyde to receive a gift like this.''

She said the entire collection would be displayed throughout the university's campus buildings and recalled each year for an exhibition.

The Collins Gallery exhibition opens to the public today and runs until November 18.