By the recommendation of a number of their friends and agents, Messrs Chambers have been induced to reprint a selection of the principal original articles of their Journal; in order that such individuals as might desire to possess those articles in a portable shape, distinct from the mass of compilations and extracts with which they were accompanied in the numbers, might be gratified in their wish; and in order that this new series of Essays, in which an attempt has been made, almost for the first time, to delineate the maxims and manners of the middle ranks of society, might have an opportunity, in the shape of a book, of attracting the attention of those by whom it might be overlooked in its original form and progressive mode of publication.

The articles embodied in the present volume are chiefly selected from the forty earliest numbers of the Journal. Should it be favourably received, the authors will probably, from time to time, throw further selections into the same form.

Edinburgh, February 12, 1834.

OF

CHAMBERS’S JOURNAL.

LADY JEAN.—A Tale.

The Earl of Wigton, whose name figures in Scottish annals of the reign of Charles the Second, had three daughters, named Lady Frances, Lady Grizel, and Lady Jean—the last being by several years the youngest, and by many degrees the most beautiful. All the three usually resided with their mother at the chief seat of the family, Cumbernauld House, in Stirlingshire; but the two eldest were occasionally permitted to attend their father at Edinburgh, in order that they might have some chance of obtaining lovers at the court held there by the Duke of Lauderdale, while Lady Jean was kept constantly at home, and debarred from the society of the capital, lest her superior beauty might interfere with, and foil, the attractions of her sisters, who, according to the notion of that age, had a sort of right of primogeniture in matrimony, as well as in what was called heirship.

It may be easily imagined that while the two marriageable ladies were enjoying all the delights of a third flat in one of the closes of the Canongate, spending their days in seeing beaux, and their nights in dreaming of them, Lady[Pg 2] Jean led no pleasant life amidst the remote and solitary splendours of Cumbernauld, where her chief employment was the disagreeable one of attending her mother, a very infirm and querulous old dame, much given (it was said) to strong waters. At the period when our tale opens, Lady Jean’s charms, though never seen in the capital, had begun to make some noise there; and the curiosity excited respecting them amongst the juvenile party of the vice-regal court, had induced Lord Wigton to confine her ladyship even more strictly than heretofore, lest, perchance, some gallant might make a pilgrimage to his country-seat in order to behold her, and, from less to more, induce her to quit her retirement, in such a way as would effectually discomfit his schemes for the pre-advancement of his elder daughters. He had been at pains to send an express to Cumbernauld, ordering Lady Jean to be confined to the precincts of the house and the terrace-garden, and to be closely attended in all her movements by a trusty domestic. The consequence was, that the young lady complained most piteously to her deaf old lady-mother of the tedium and listlessness of her life, and wished with all her heart that she were as ugly, old, and happy as her sisters.

Lord Wigton was not insensible to the cruelty of his policy, however well he might be convinced of its advantage and necessity; he loved his youngest daughter more than the rest; and it was only in obedience to what he conceived to be the commands of duty, that he subjected her to this restraint. His lordship, therefore, felt anxious to alleviate in some measure the desagremens of her solitary confinement; and knowing her to be fond of music, he had sent to her by the last messenger a theorbo lute, with which he thought she would be able to amuse herself in a way very much to her mind—not considering that, as she could not play upon the instrument, it would be little better to her than an unmeaning toy. By the return of his messenger, he received a letter from Lady Jean, thanking him for the theorbo, but making him aware of his[Pg 3] oversight, and begging him to send some person who could teach her to play.

The earl, whose acquirements in the philosophy of politics had never been questioned, felt ashamed of having committed such a solecism in so trivial a matter; and, like all men anxious to repair or conceal an error in judgment, immediately ran into another of ten times greater consequence and magnitude: he gratified his daughter in her wish.

The gentry of Scotland were at that time in the custom of occasionally employing a species of servants, whose accomplishments and duties would now appear of a very anomalous character, though at that time naturally arising from the peculiar situation of this country, in respect to its southern neighbour. They were, in general, humble men who had travelled a good deal, and acquired many foreign accomplishments; who, returning to their native country after an absence of a few years, usually entered into the service of the higher class of families, partly as ordinary livery-men, and partly with the purpose of instructing the youth of both sexes, as they grew up and required such exercises, in dancing, music, writing, &c., besides a vast variety of other arts, comprehended in the general phrase of breeding. Though these men received much higher wages, and were a thousand times more unmanageable than common serving-men, they served a good purpose in those days, when young people had scarcely any other opportunities of acquiring the ornamental branches of education, except by going abroad. It so happened, that not many days after Lord Wigton received his daughter’s letter, he was applied to for employment by one of these useful personages, a tall and handsome youth, apparently five-and-twenty, with dark Italian-looking features, a slight moustache, and as much foreign peculiarity in his dress as indicated that he was just returned from his travels. After putting a few questions, his lordship discovered that the youth was possessed of many agreeable accomplishments;[Pg 4] was, in particular, perfectly well qualified to teach the theorbo, and had no objection to entering the service of a young lady of quality—only, with the proviso that he was to be spared the disgrace of a livery. Lord Wigton then made no scruple in engaging him for a certain period; and next day saw the youth on the way to Cumbernauld, with a letter from his lordship to Lady Jean, setting forth all his good qualities, and containing among other endearing expressions, a hope that she would both benefit by his instructions, and be in the meantime content on their account with her present residence.

Any occurrence at Cumbernauld, of higher import than the breaking of a needle in embroidering, or the miscarriage of a brewing of currant wine, would have been quite an incident in the eyes of Lady Jean; and even to have given alms at the castle-gate to an extraordinary beggar, or to see so much as a stranger in the candle, might have supplied her with amusement infinite, and speculation boundless. What, then, must have been her delight, when the goodly and youthful figure of Richard Storie alighted one dull summer afternoon at the gate, and when the credentials he presented disclosed to her the agreeable purpose of his mission! Her joy knew no bounds; nor did she know in what terms to welcome the stranger: she ran from one end of the house to the other, up stairs and down stairs, in search of she knew not what; and finally, in her transports, she shook her mother out of a drunken slumber, which the old lady was enjoying as usual in her large chair in the parlour.

Master Richard, as he was commonly designated, soon found himself comfortably established in the good graces of the whole household of Cumbernauld, and not less so in the particular favour of his young mistress. Even the sour old lady of the large chair was pleased with his handsome appearance, and was occasionally seen to give a preternatural nod and smile at some of his musical exhibitions, as much as to say she knew when he performed well, and[Pg 5] was willing to encourage humble merit. As for Lady Jean, whose disposition was equally lively and generous, she could not express in sufficiently warm terms her admiration of his performances, or the delight she experienced from them. Nor was she ever content without having Master Richard in her presence, either to play himself, or to teach her the enchanting art. She was a most apt scholar—so apt, that in a few days she was able to accompany him with the theorbo and voice, while he played upon an ancient harpsichord belonging to the old lady, which he had rescued from a lumber room, and been at some pains to repair. The exclusive preference thus given to music, for the time, threw his other accomplishments into the shade, while it, moreover, occasioned his more constant presence in the apartments of the ladies than he would have been otherwise entitled to. The consequence was, that in a short time he almost ceased to be looked upon as a servant, and began gradually to assume the more interesting character of a friend and equal.

It was Lady Jean’s practice to take a walk prescribed by her father, every day in the garden, on which occasions the countess conceived herself as acting up to the letter of her husband’s commands, when she ordered Master Richard to attend his pupil. This arrangement was exceedingly agreeable to Lady Jean, as they sometimes took out the theorbo, and added music to the other pleasures of the walk. Another out-of-doors amusement, in which music formed a chief part, was suggested to them by the appropriate frontispiece of a book of instruction for the theorbo, which Master Richard had brought with him from Edinburgh. This engraving represented a beautiful young shepherdess, dressed in the fashionable costume of that period—a stupendous tower of hair hung round with diamonds, and a voluminous silk gown with a jewel-adorned stomacher, a theorbo in her arms and a crook by her side—sitting on a flowery bank under a tree, with sheep planted at regular distances around her. At a little distance appeared[Pg 6] a shepherd with dressed hair, long-skirted coat, and silk stockings, who seemed to survey his mistress with a languishing air of admiration, that appeared singularly ridiculous, as contrasted with the coquettish and contemptuous aspect of the lady. The plate referred to a particular song in a book, entitled “A Dialogue betwixt Strephon and Lydia, or the Proud Shepherdess’s Courtship,” the music of which was exceedingly beautiful, while the verses were the tamest and most affected trash imaginable. It occurred to Lady Jean’s lively fancy, that if she and her teacher were to personify the shepherdess and shepherd, and thus, as it were, to transform the song to a sort of opera, making the terrace-garden the scene, not a little amusement might be added to the pleasure she experienced from the mere music alone. This fancy was easily reduced to execution; for, by seating herself under a tree, in her ordinary dress, with the horticultural implement called a rake by her side, she looked the very Lydia of the copper-plate; while Richard, standing at his customary respectful distance, with his handsome person, and somewhat foreign apparel, was a sufficiently good representation of Strephon. After arranging themselves thus, Master Richard opened the drama by addressing Lady Jean in the first verse of the song, which contained, besides some description of sunrise, a comparison between the beauties of nature at that delightful period, and the charms of Lydia, the superiority being of course awarded to the latter. Lady Jean, with the help of the theorbo, replied to this in a very disdainful style, affecting to hold the compliments of lovers very cheap, and asseverating that she had no regard for any being on earth besides her father and mother, and no care but for these dear innocent sheep (here she looked kindly aside upon a neighbouring bed of cabbages), which they had entrusted to her charge. Other verses of similar nonsense succeeded, during which the representative of the fair Lydia could not help feeling rather more emotion at hearing the ardent addresses of Strephon than was strictly consistent with her[Pg 7] part. At the last it was her duty to rise and walk softly away from her swain, declaring herself utterly insensible to both his praises and his passion, and her resolution never again to see or speak to him. This she did in admirable style, though, perhaps, rather with the dignified gait and sweeping majesty of tragedy-queen, than with any thing like the pettish or sullen strut of a disdainful rustic; meanwhile Strephon was supposed to be left inconsolable. Her ladyship continued to support her assumed character for a few yards, till a turn of the walk concealed her from Master Richard; when, resuming her natural manner, she turned back, with sparkling eyes, in order to ask his opinion of her performances; and it was with some confusion, and no little surprise, that on bursting again into his sight, she discovered that Richard had not yet thrown off his character. He was standing still, as she had left him, fixed immovably upon the spot, in an attitude expressive of sorrow for her departure, and bending forwards as if imploring her return. It was the expression of his face that astonished her most; for it was not at all an expression appropriate to either his own character or to that which he had assumed. It was an expression of earnest and impassioned admiration; his whole soul seemed thrown into his face, which was directed towards her, or rather the place where she had disappeared; and his eyes were projected in the same direction, with such a look as that perhaps of an enraptured saint of old at the moment when a divinity parted from his presence. This lasted, however, but for a moment; for scarcely had that minute space of time elapsed, before Richard, startled from his reverie by Lady Jean’s sudden return, dismissed from his face all trace of any extraordinary expression, and stood before her (endeavouring to appear) just what he was, her ladyship’s respectful servant and teacher. Nevertheless, this transformation did not take place so quickly as to prevent her ladyship from observing the present expression, nor was it accomplished with such address as to leave her[Pg 8] room for passing it over as unobserved. She was surprised—she hesitated—she seemed, in spite of herself, conscious of something awkward—and finally she blushed slightly. Richard caught the contagion of her confusion in a double degree; and Lady Jean, again, became more confused on observing that he was aware of her confusion. Richard was the first to recover himself and speak. He made some remarks upon her singing and her acting—not, however, upon her admirable performance of the latter part of the drama; this encouraged her also to speak, and both soon became somewhat composed. Shortly afterwards they returned to the house; but from that moment a chain of the most delicate yet indissoluble sympathies began to connect the hearts of these youthful beings, so alike in all natural qualities, and so dissimilar in every extraneous thing which the world is accustomed to value.

After this interview there took place a slight estrangement between Master Richard and Lady Jean, that lasted a few days, during which they had much less of both conversation and music than for some time before. Both observed this circumstance; but each ascribed it to accident, while it was in reality occasioned by mutual reserve. Master Richard was afraid that Lady Jean might be offended were he to propose any thing like a repetition of the garden drama; and Lady Jean, on her part, could not, consistently with the rules of maidenly modesty, utter even a hint at such a thing, however she might secretly wish or long for it. The very consciousness, reciprocally felt, of having something on their minds, of which neither durst speak, was sufficient to produce the said reserve, though the emotions of “the tender passion” had not come in, as they did, for a large share of the cause.

At length, however, this reserve was so far softened down, that they began to resume their former practice of walking together in the garden; but though the theorbo continued to make one of the party, no more operatic performances took place. Nevertheless, the mutual affection[Pg 9] which had taken root in their hearts experienced on this account no abatement, but, on the contrary, continued to increase. As for Master Richard, it was no wonder that he should be deeply smitten with the charms of his mistress; for ever as he stole a long, furtive glance at her graceful form, he thought he had never seen, in Spain or in Italy, any such specimens of female loveliness; and (if we may let the reader as far into the secret) he had indeed come to Cumbernauld with the very purpose of falling in love. Different causes had operated upon Lady Jean. Richard being the first love-worthy object she had seen since the period when the female heart becomes most susceptible—the admiration with which she knew he beheld her—his musical accomplishments, which had tended so much to her gratification—all conspired to render him precious in her sight. In the words of a beautiful modern ballad, “all impulses of soul and sense had thrilled” her gentle and guileless heart—

had exercised their tender and delightful influence over her; like a flower thrown upon one of the streams of her own native land, whose course was through the beauties, the splendours, and the terrors of nature, she was borne away in a dream, the magic scenery of which was alternately pleasing, fearful, and glorious, and from which she could no more wake than could the flower restrain its course on the gliding waters. The habit of contemplating her lover every day, and that in the dignified character of an instructor, gradually blinded her in a great measure to his humbler quality, and to the probable sentiments of her father and the world upon the subject of her passion. If by any chance such a consideration was forced upon her notice, and she found occasion to tremble lest the sentiments in which she was so luxuriously indulging should[Pg 10] end in disgrace and disaster, she soon quieted her fears, by reverting to an idea which had lately occurred to her—namely, that Richard was not what he seemed. She had heard and read of love assuming strange disguises. A Lord Belhaven, in the immediately preceding period of the civil war, had taken refuge from the fury of Cromwell in the service of an English nobleman, whose daughter’s heart he won under the humble disguise of a gardener, and whom, on the recurrence of better times, he carried home to Scotland as his lady. This story was then quite popular, and at least one of the parties still survived to attest its truth. But even in nursery tales Lady Jean could find examples which justified her own passion. The vilest animals, she knew, on finding some beautiful dame, who was so disinterested as to fall in love with them, usually turned out to be the most beautiful princes that ever were seen, and invariably married and made happy the ladies whose affection had restored them to their natural form and just inheritance. Who knows, she thought, but Richard may some day, in a transport of passion, throw open his coat, exhibit the star of nobility glittering on his breast, and ask me to become a countess?

Such are the excuses which love suggests to reason, and which the reason of lovers easily accepts; while those who are neither youthful nor in love wonder at the hallucination of their impassioned juniors. Experience soon teaches us that this world is not one of romance, and that few incidents in life ever occur out of the ordinary way. But before we acquire this experience by actual observation, we all of us regard things in a very different light. The truth seems to be, that, in the eyes of youth, “the days of chivalry” do not appear to be “gone;” our ideas are then contemporary, or upon a par with the early romantic ages of the world; and it is only by mingling with mature men, and looking at things as they are, that we at length advance towards, and ultimately settle down in, the real era of our existence. Was there ever yet youth who did[Pg 11] not feel some chivalrous impulses—some thirst for more glorious scenes than those around him—some aspirations after lofty passion and supreme excellence—or who did not cherish some pure first-love, that could not prudentially be gratified?

The greater part of the rest of the summer passed away before the lovers came to an eclaircissement; and such, indeed, was their mutual reserve upon the subject, that, had it not been for the occurrence of a singular and deciding circumstance, there appeared little probability of this ever otherwise taking place. The Earl of Home, a gay and somewhat foolish young nobleman, one morning after attending a convivial party where the charms of Lady Jean Fleming formed the principal topic of discourse, left Edinburgh and took the way to Cumbernauld, on the very pilgrimage, and with the very purpose which Lord Wigton had before anticipated. Resolved first to see, then to love, and lastly to run away with the young lady, his lordship skulked about for a few days, and at last had the pleasure of seeing the hidden beauty over the garden wall, as she was walking with Master Richard. He thought he had never seen any lady who could be at all compared to Lady Jean, and, as a matter of course, resolved to make her his own, and surprise all his companions at Edinburgh with his success and her beauty. He watched again next day, and happening to meet Master Richard out of the bounds of Cumbernauld policy, accosted him, with the intention of securing his services in making his way towards Lady Jean. After a few words of course, he proposed the subject to Richard, and offered a considerable bribe, to induce him to work for his interest. Richard at first rejected the offer, but immediately after, on bethinking himself, saw fit to accept it. He was to mention his lordship’s purpose to Lady Jean, and to prepare the way for a private interview with her. On the afternoon of the succeeding day, he was to meet Lord Home at the same place, and tell him how Lady Jean had received his[Pg 12] proposals. With this they parted—Richard to muse on this unexpected circumstance, which he saw might blast all his hopes unless he should resolve upon prompt and active measures, and the Earl of Home to enjoy himself at the humble inn of the village of Cumbernauld, where he had for the last few days enacted the character of “the daft lad frae Edinburch, that seemed to ha’e mair siller than sense.”

On the morning of the tenth day after Master Richard’s first interview with Lord Home, that faithful serving-man found himself jogging swiftly along the road to Edinburgh, mounted on a stout nag, with the fair Lady Jean seated comfortably on a pillion behind him. It was a fine morning in autumn, and the road had a peculiarly gay appearance from the multitude of country-people, mounted and dismounted, who seemed also hastening towards the capital. Master Richard, upon inquiry, discovered that it was the market-day, a circumstance which seemed favourable to his design, by the additional assurance it gave him of not being recognised among the extraordinary number of strangers who might be expected to crowd the city on such an occasion. The lovers approached the city by the west, and the first street they entered was the suburban one called Portsburgh, which leads towards the great market-place of Edinburgh. Here Richard, impatient as he was, found himself obliged, like many other rustic cavaliers, to reduce the pace of his horse to a walk, on account of the narrowness and crowded state of the street. This he felt the more disagreeable, as it subjected him and his interesting companion to the close and leisurely scrutiny of the inhabitants. Both had endeavoured to disguise every thing remarkable in their appearance, so far as dress and demeanour could be disguised; yet, as Lady Jean could not conceal her extraordinary beauty, and Richard had not found it possible to part with a slight and dearly-beloved moustache, it naturally followed that they were honoured with a good deal of staring. Many an urchin upon the[Pg 13] street threw up his arms as they passed along, exclaiming “Oh! the black-bearded man!” or, “Oh! the bonnie leddie!”—the men all admired Lady Jean, the women Master Richard—and many an old shoemaker ogled them earnestly over his half-door, with his spectacles pushed up above his dingy cowl. The lovers, who had thus to run a sort of gauntlet of admiration and remark, were glad when they reached an inn, which Richard, who was slightly acquainted with the town, knew to be a proper place for the performance of a half-merk marriage. They alighted, and were civilly received by an obsequious landlady, who conducted them into an apartment at the back of the house. There Lady Jean was for a short time left to make some arrangements about her dress, while Richard disclosed to the landlady in another room the purpose upon which he was come to her house, and consulted her about procuring a clergyman. The dame of the house, to whom a clandestine marriage was the merest matter of course, showed the utmost willingness to facilitate the design of her guests, and said that she believed a clerical official might be procured in a few minutes, provided that neither had any scruples of conscience, as “most part of fouk frae the west had,” in accepting the services of an Episcopal clergyman. The lover assured her that, so far from having any objection to “a government minister,” for so they were sometimes termed, he would prefer such to any other, as both he and his bride belonged to that persuasion. The landlady heard this declaration with complacency, which showed that she loved her guests the better for it; and told Richard that, if he pleased, she would immediately introduce to him the Dean of St Giles, who, honest man, was just now taking his meridian in the little back garret parlour, along with his friend and gossip, Bowed Andrew, the waiter of the West Port. To this Richard joyfully assented, and speedily he and Lady Jean were joined in their room by the said dean, a squat little gentleman, with a drunken but important-looking face, and an air of consequentiality[Pg 14] even in his stagger, that was partly imposing and partly ridiculous. He addressed his clients with a patronising simper, of which the effect was grievously disconcerted by an unlucky hiccup, and in a speech which might have had the intended tone of paternal and reverend authority, had it not been smattered and degraded into shreds by the crapulous insufficiency of his tongue. Richard cut short his ill-sustained attempts at dignity, by requesting him to partake of some liquor. His reverence almost leaped at the proffered jug, which contained ale. He first took a tasting, then a sip—shaking his head between—next a small draught, with a still more convulsion-like shake of the head; and lastly, he took a hearty and persevering swill, from the effects of which his lungs did not recover for at least twenty respirations. The impatient lover then begged him to proceed with the ceremony, which he forthwith commenced in presence of the landlady and the above-mentioned Bowed Andrew; and in a few minutes, Richard and Lady Jean were united in the holy bands of matrimony.

When the ceremony was concluded, and both the clergyman and the witnesses had been satisfied and dismissed, the lovers left the house, with the design of walking forwards into the city. In conformity to a previous arrangement, Lady Jean walked first, like a lady of quality, and Richard followed closely behind, with the dress and deportment of her servant. Her ladyship was dressed in her finest suit, and adorned with her finest jewels, all which she had brought from Cumbernauld on purpose, in a mail or leathern trunk—for such was the name then given to the convenience now entitled a portmanteau. Her step was light, and her bearing gay, as she moved along—not on account of the success which had attended her expedition, or her satisfaction in being now united to the man of her choice, but because she anticipated the highest pleasure in the sight of a place whereof she had heard such wonderful stories, and from a participation in[Pg 15] whose delights she had been so long withheld. Like all persons educated in the country, she had been regaled in her infancy with magnificent descriptions of the capital—of its buildings, that seemed to mingle with the clouds—its shops, which apparently contained more wealth than all the world beside—of its paved streets (for paved streets were then wonders in Scotland)—and, above all, of the grand folks who thronged its Highgates, its Canongates, and its Cowgates—people whose lives seemed a perpetual holiday, whose attire was ever new, and who all lived in their several palaces. Though, of course, Edinburgh had then little to boast of, the country people who occasionally visited it did not regard it with less admiration than that with which the peasantry of our own day may be supposed to view it now that it is something so very different. It was then, as well as now, the capital of the country, and, as such, bore the same disproportion in point of magnificence to inferior towns, and to the country in general. In one respect, it was superior to what it is at the present day—namely, in being the seat of government and of a court. Lady Jean had often heard all its glorious peculiarities described by her sisters, who, moreover, sometimes took occasion to colour the picture too highly, in order to raise her envy, and make themselves appear great in their alliance and association with so much greatness. She was, therefore, prepared to see a scene of the utmost splendour—a scene in which nothing horrible or paltry mingled, but which was altogether calculated to awe or to delight the senses.

Her ladyship was destined to be disappointed at the commencement, at least, of her acquaintance with the city. The first remarkable object which struck her eye, after leaving the inn, was the high bow, or arch, of the gate called the West Port. In this itself there was nothing worthy of particular attention, and she rather directed her eyes through the opening beneath, which half[Pg 16] disclosed a wide space beyond, apparently crowded with people. But when she came close up to the gate, and cast, before passing, a last glance at the arch, she shuddered at the sight then presented to her eyes. On the very pinnacle of the arch were stuck the ghastly and weatherworn remains of a human head, the features of which, half flesh half bone, were shaded, and rendered still more indistinctly horrible by the long dark hair, which hung in meagre tresses around them. “Oh, Richard, Richard!” she exclaimed, stopping, and turning round, “what is that dreadful looking thing?” “That, madam,” said Richard, without any emotion, “is the broken remnant of a west country preacher, spiked up there to warn his countrymen who may approach this port, against doing any thing to incur the fate which has overtaken himself. Methinks he has preached to small purpose, for yonder stands the gallows, ready, I suppose, to bring him some brother in affliction.” “Horrible!” exclaimed Lady Jean; “and is this really the fine town of Edinburgh, where I was taught to expect so many grand sights? I thought it was just one universal palace, and it turns out to be a great charnel-house!” “It is indeed more like that than any thing else at times,” said Richard; “but, my dear Lady Jean, you are not going to start at this bugbear, which the very children, you see, do not heed in passing.” “Indeed I think, Richard,” answered her ladyship, “if Edinburgh is to be all like this, it would be just as good to turn back at once, and postpone our visit till better times.” “But it is not all like this,” replied Richard; “I assure you it is not. For heaven’s sake, my lady, move on. The people are beginning to stare at us. You shall soon see grand sights enough, if we were once fairly out of this place. Make for the opposite corner of the Grassmarket, and ascend the street to the left of that horrible gibbet. We may yet get past it before the criminals are produced.”

Thus admonished, Lady Jean passed, not without a shudder, under the dreadful arch, and entered the spacious[Pg 17] oblong square called the Grassmarket. This place was crowded at the west end with rustics engaged in all the bustle of a grain and cattle market, and at the eastern and most distant extremity with a mob of idlers who had gathered around the gibbet, in order to witness the awful ceremony that was about to take place. The crowd, which was scarcely so dense as that which attends the rarer scene of a modern execution, made way on both sides for Lady Jean as she moved along; and wherever she went, she left behind her a wake, as it were, of admiration and confusion. So exquisite and so new a beauty, so splendid a suit of female attire, and such a stout and handsome attendant—these were all alike calculated to inspire reverence in the minds of the beholders. Her carriage at the same time was so steady and so graceful, that no one could be so rude as to interrupt or disturb it. The people, therefore, parted when she approached, and left a free passage for her on all sides, as if she had been an angel or a spirit come to walk amidst a mortal crowd, and whose person could not be touched, and might scarcely be beheld—whose motions were not to be interfered with by those among whom she chose to walk—but who was to be received with prostration of spirit, and permitted to depart as she had come, unquestioned and unapproached. In traversing the Grassmarket, two or three young coxcombs, with voluminous wigs, short cloaks, rapiers, and rose-knots at their knees and shoes, who, on observing her at a distance, had prepared to treat her with a condescending stare, fell back, awed and confounded, at her near approach, and spent the gaze, perhaps, upon the humbler mark of her follower, or upon vacancy.

Having at length passed the gibbet, Lady Jean began to ascend the steep and tortuous street denominated the West Bow. She had hitherto been unable to direct any attention to what she was most anxious to behold—the scenic wonders of the capital. But having now got clear of the crowd, and no longer fearing to see the gallows, she[Pg 18] ventured to lift up her eyes and look around. The tallness and massiveness of the buildings, some of which bore the cross of the Knights Templars on their pinnacles, while others seemed to be surmounted or overtopped by still taller edifices beyond, impressed her imagination; and the effect was rendered still more striking by the countless human figures which crowded the windows, and even the roofs of the houses, all alike bending their attention, as she thought, towards herself. The scene before her looked like an amphitheatre filled with spectators, while she and Richard seemed as the objects upon the arena. The thought caused her to hurry on, and she soon found herself in a great measure screened from observation by the overhanging projections of the narrower part of the West Bow, which she now entered. With slow and difficult, but stately and graceful steps, she then proceeded, till she reached the upper angle of the street, where a novel and unexpected scene awaited her. A sound like that of rushing waters seemed first to proceed from the part of the street still concealed from her view, and presently appeared round the angle the first rank of an impetuous crowd, who, rushing downward with prodigious force, would certainly have overwhelmed her delicate form, had she not dexterously avoided them, by stepping aside upon a projecting stair, to which Richard also sprung, just in time to save himself from a similar fate. From this place of safety, which was not without its own crowd of children, women, and sage-looking elderly mechanics, with Kilmarnock cowls, both in the next moment saw the massive mob rush past, like the first wave of a flood, bearing either along or down every thing that came in their way. Immediately after, but at a more deliberate pace, followed a procession of figures, which struck the heart of Lady Jean with as heavy a sense of sorrow as the crowd had just impressed with terror and surprise. First came a small company of the veterans of the city-guard, some of whom had perhaps figured in the campaigns of Middleton and Montrose, and[Pg 19] whose bronzed inflexible faces bore on this melancholy occasion precisely the same expression which they ordinarily exhibited on the joyful one of attending the magistrates at the drinking of the king’s health on the 29th of May. Behind these, and encircled by some other soldiers of the same band, appeared two figures of a different sort. One of them was a young-looking, but pale and woe-worn man, the impressive wretchedness of whose appearance was strikingly increased by the ghastly dress which he wore. He was attired from head to foot in a white shroud, such as was sometimes worn in Scotland by criminals at the gallows, but which was, in the present instance, partly assumed as a badge of innocence. The excessive whiteness and emaciation of his countenance suited well with this dismal apparel, and, with the wild enthusiasm that kindled in his eyes, gave an almost supernatural effect to the whole scene, which rather resembled a pageant of the dead than a procession of earthly men. He was the only criminal; the person who walked by his side, and occasionally supported his steps, being—as the crowd whispered around, with many a varied expression of sympathy—his father. The old man had the air of a devout Presbyterian, with harsh, intelligent features, and a dress which bespoke his being a countryman of the lower rank. According to the report of the bystanders, he had educated this his only son for the unfortunate Church of Scotland, and now attended him to the fate which his talents and violent temperament had conspired to draw down upon his head. If he ever felt any pride in the popular admiration with which his son was honoured, no traces of such a sentiment now appeared. On the contrary, he seemed humbled to the very earth with sorrow; and though he had perhaps contemplated the issue now about to take place, with no small portion of satisfaction, so long as it was at a distance and uncertain, the feelings of a father had evidently proved too much for his fortitude when the event approached in all its dreadful reality. The emotions perceptible in that[Pg 20] rough and rigid countenance were the more striking, as being so much at variance with its natural and characteristic expression; and the tear which gathered in his eye excited the greater commiseration, in so far as it seemed a stranger there. But the hero and heroine of our tale had little time to make observations on this piteous scene, for the train passed quickly on, and was soon beyond their sight. When it was gone, the people of the Bow, who seemed accustomed to such sights, uttered various expressions of pity, indignation, and horror, according to their respective feelings, and then slowly retired to their dens in the stairs and booths which lined the whole of this ancient and singular street.

Lady Jean, whose beautiful eyes were suffused with tears at beholding so melancholy a spectacle, was then admonished by her attendant to proceed. With a heart hardened to all sensations of wonder and delight, she moved forward, and was soon ushered into the place called the Lawnmarket, then perhaps the most fashionable district in Edinburgh, but the grandeur and spaciousness of which she beheld almost without admiration. The scene here was however much gayer, and approached more nearly to her splendid preconceptions of the capital than any she had yet seen. The shops were, in her estimation, very fine, and some of the people on the street were of that noble description of which she had believed all inhabitants of cities to be. There was no crowd on the street, which, therefore, afforded room for a better display of her stately and beautiful person; and as she walked steadily onwards, still ushed (for such was then the phrase) by her handsome and noble-looking attendant, a greater degree of admiration was excited amongst the gay idlers whom she passed, than even that which marked her progress through the humbler crowd of the Grassmarket. Various noblemen, in passing towards their homes in the Castle Hill, lifted their feathered hats and bowed profoundly to the lovely vision; and one or two magnificent dames, sweeping[Pg 21] along with their long silk trains, borne up by livery-men, stared at or eyed askance the charms which threw their own so completely into shade. By the time Lady Jean arrived at the bottom of the Lawnmarket, that is to say, where it was partially closed up by the Tolbooth, she had in a great measure recovered her spirits, and found herself prepared to enjoy the sight of the public buildings, which were so thickly clustered together at this central part of the city. She was directed by Richard to pass along the narrow road which then led between the houses and the Tolbooth on the south, and which, being continued by a still narrower passage skirting the west end of St Giles’s church, formed the western approach to the Parliament Close. Obeying his guidance in this tortuous passage, she soon found herself at the opening or the square space, so styled on account of its being closed on more than one side by the meeting-place of the legislative assembly of Scotland. Here a splendid scene awaited her. The whole square was filled with the members of the Scottish Parliament, barons and commons, who had just left the house in which they sat together—with ladies, who on days of unusual ceremony were allowed to attend the house—and with horses richly caparisoned, and covered with gold-embroidered foot-cloths, some of which were mounted by their owners, while others were held in readiness by footmen. All was bustle and magnificence. Noblemen and gentlemen in splendid attire threaded the crowd in search of their horses; ladies tripped after them with timid and careful steps, endeavouring, by all in their power, to avoid contact with such objects as were calculated to injure their fineries; grooms strode heavily about, and more nimble lacqueys jumped every where, here and there, some of them as drunk as the Parliament Close claret could make them, but all intent on doing the duties of attendance and respect to their masters. Some smart and well-dressed young gentlemen were arranging their cloaks and swords, and preparing to leave the square on foot by the passage[Pg 22] which had given entry to Master Richard and Lady Jean.

At sight of our heroine, most of these gallants stood still in admiration, and one of them, with the trained assurance of a rake, observing her to be beautiful, a stranger, and not too well protected, accosted her in a strain of language which caused her at once to blush and tremble. Richard’s brow reddened with anger, as he hesitated not a moment in stepping up and telling the offender to leave the lady alone, on pain of certain consequences which might not prove agreeable. “And who are you, my brave fellow?” said the youth, with bold assurance. “Sirrah!” exclaimed Richard, so indignant as to forget himself, “I am that lady’s husband—her servant, I mean;” and here he stopped short in some confusion. “Admirable!” exclaimed the other. “Ha! ha! ha! ha! Here, Sirs, is a lady lacquey, who does not know whether he is his mistress’s servant or her husband. Let us give him up to the town-guard to see whether the black-hole will make him remember the real state of the case.” So saying, he attempted to push Richard aside, and take hold of the lady. But he had not time to touch her garments with so much as a finger, before her protector had a rapier flourishing in his eyes, and threatened him with instant death, unless he desisted from his profane purpose. At sight of the bright steel, he stepped back one or two paces, drew his own sword, and was preparing to fight, when one of his more grave associates called out, “For shame, Rollo!—with a lady’s lacquey, too, and in the presence of the duke and duchess! I see their royal highnesses, already alarmed, are inquiring the cause of the disturbance.” It was even as this gentleman said, and presently came up to the scene of contention some of the most distinguished personages in the crowd, one of whom demanded from the parties an explanation of so disgraceful an occurrence. “Why, here is a fellow, my lord,” answered Rollo, “who says he is the husband of a lady whom he attends as a livery-man, and a lady, too, the bonniest,[Pg 23] I dare say, that has been seen in Scotland since the days of Queen Magdalen!” “And what matters it to you,” said the inquirer, who seemed to be a Judge of the Session, “in what relation this man stands to his lady? Let the parties both come forward, and tell their ain tale. May it please your royal highness,” he continued, addressing a very grave dignitary who sat on horseback behind him, as stiff and formal as a sign-post, “to hear the declaratur of thir twa strange incomers. But see—see—what is the matter with Lord Wigton?” he added, pointing to an aged personage on horseback, who had just pushed forward, and seemed about to faint, and fall from his horse. The person alluded to, at sight of his daughter in this unexpected place, was in reality confounded, and it was some time before he mastered voice enough to ejaculate, “O, Jean, Jean! what’s this ye’ve been about? or what has brocht you to Edinburgh?” “And Lord have a care o’ us!” exclaimed at this juncture another venerable peer, who had just come up, “what has brocht my sonsie son, Ritchie Livingstone, to Edinburgh, when he should have been fechtin’ the Dutch by this time in Pennsylvania?” The two lovers, thus recognised by their respective parents, stood with downcast looks, and perfectly silent, while all was buzz and confusion in the brilliant circle around them; for the parties concerned were not more surprised at the aspect of their affairs, than were all the rest at the beauty of the far-famed but hitherto unseen Lady Jean Fleming. The Earl of Linlithgow, Richard’s father, was the first to speak aloud, after the general astonishment had for some time subsided; and this he did in a laconic though important query, which he couched in the simple words, “Are you married, bairns?” “Yes, dearest father,” said his son, gathering courage, and coming close up to his saddle-bow; “and I beseech you to extricate Lady Jean and me from this crowd, and I shall tell you all when we are alone.” “A pretty man ye are, truly,” said the old man, who never took any thing very seriously to heart, “to be staying at[Pg 24] hame, and getting yourself married, all the time you should have been abroad, winning honour and wealth, as your gallant grand-uncle did wi’ Gustavus i’ the thretties! Hooever, since better mayna be, I maun try and console my Lord Wigton, who, I doot, has the worst o’ the bargain, ye ne’er-do-weel!” He then went up to Lady Jean’s father, shook him by the hand, and said, “that though they had been made relations against their wills, he hoped they would continue good friends. The young people,” he observed, “are no that ill matched; and it is not the first time that the Flemings and the Livingstones have melled together, as witness the blithe marriage of the Queen’s Marie to Lord Fleming, in the feifteen saxty-five. At any rate, my lord, let us put a good face on the matter, afore they glowering gentles and whipper-snapper duchesses. I’ll get horses for the two, and they’ll join the ridin’ down the street; and deil hae me if Lady Jean disna outshine them, the hale o’ them!” “My Lord Linlithgow,” responded the graver and more implacable Earl of Wigton, “it may set you to take this matter blithely; but, let me tell you, it’s a muckle mair serious affair for me. What think ye am I to do wi’ Kate and Grizzy noo?” “Hoot, toot, my lord,” said Linlithgow, with a sly smile, “their chance is as gude as ever it was, I assure you, and sae will every body think that kens them. I maun ca’ horses though, or the young folk will be ridden ower, afore ever they do mair gude, by thae rampaugin’ young men.” So saying, and taking Lord Wigton’s moody silence for assent, he proceeded to cry to his servants for the best pair of horses they could get; and these being speedily procured, Lord Richard and his bride were requested to mount; after which, they were formally introduced to the gracious notice of the Duke and Duchess of York, and the Princess Anne, who happened to attend Parliament on this the last day of its session, when it was customary for all the members to ride both to and from the house in an orderly cavalcade. The order was now given to proceed, and the lovers were[Pg 25] soon relieved, in a great measure, from the embarrassing notice of the crowd, by assuming a particular place in the procession, and finding themselves confounded with more than three hundred equally splendid figures. As the pageant, however, moved down the High Street, in a continuous and open line, it was impossible not to distinguish the singular loveliness of Lady Jean, and the gallant carriage of her husband, from all the rest. Accordingly, the very trained bands and city-guard, who lined the street, and who were, in general, quite as insensible to the splendours of the Riding, as are the musicians in a modern orchestra to the wonders of a melo-drama in its fortieth night—even they perceived and admired the graces of the young couple, whom they could not help gazing after with a stupid and lingering delight. From the windows, too, and the stair-heads, their beauty was well observed, and amply conjectured and commented on; while many a young cavalier endeavoured, by all sorts of pretences, to find occasion to break the order of the cavalcade, and get himself haply placed nearer to the exquisite figure of which he had got just one killing glance in the square. Slowly and majestically the brilliant train paced down the great street of Edinburgh, the acclamations of the multitude ceaselessly expressing the delight which the people of Scotland felt in this sensible type and emblem of their ancient independence. At length they reached the court-yard of Holyrood-house, where the duke and duchess invited the whole assemblage to a ball, which they designed to give that evening in the hall of the palace; after which, all departed to their respective residences throughout the town, Lords Wigton and Linlithgow taking their young friends under their immediate protection, and seeking the residence of the former nobleman, a little way up the Canongate. In riding thither, the lovers had leisure to explain to their parents the singular circumstances of their union, and address enough to obtain unqualified forgiveness for their imprudence. On alighting at Lord Wigton’s house, Lady[Pg 26] Jean found her sisters confined to their rooms with headaches, or some such serious indisposition, and in the utmost dejection on account of having been thereby withheld from the riding of the Parliament. Their spirits, as may be supposed, were not much elevated, when, on coming forth in dishabille to welcome their sister, they found she had had the good fortune to be married before them. Their ill luck was, however, irremediable; and so, making a merit of submitting to it, they condescended to be rather agreeable during the dinner and the afternoon. It was not long before all parties were perfectly reconciled to what had taken place; and by the time it was necessary to dress for the ball, the elder young ladies declared themselves so much recovered as to be able to accompany their happy sister. The Earl of Linlithgow and his son then sent a servant for proper dresses, and prepared themselves for the occasion without leaving the house. When all were ready, a number of chairs were called to transport their dainty persons down the street. The news of Lady Jean’s arrival, and of her marriage, having now spread abroad, the court in front of the house, the alley, and even the open street, were crowded with people of all ranks, anxious to catch a passing glimpse of the heroine of so strange a tale. As her chair was carried along, a buzz of admiration from all who were so happy as to be near it, marked its progress. Happy, too, was the gentleman who had the good luck to be near her chair as it was set down at the palace gate, and assist her in stepping from it upon the lighted pavement. From the outer gate, along the piazza of the inner court, and all the way up the broad staircase to the illuminated hall, two rows of noblemen and gentlemen formed a brilliant avenue as she passed along, while a hundred plumed caps were doffed in honour of so much beauty, and as many youthful eyes glanced bright with satisfaction at beholding it. The object of all this attention tripped modestly along in the hand of the Earl of Linlithgow, acknowledging, with many a graceful flexure and undulation[Pg 27] of person, the compliments of the spectators. At length the company entered the spacious and splendid room in which the ball was to be held. At the extremity opposite to the entry, upon an elevated platform, sat the three royal personages, all of whom, on Lady Jean’s introduction, rose and came forward to welcome her and her husband to the entertainments of Holyrood, and to hope that her ladyship would often adorn their circle. In a short time the dancing commenced; and amidst all the ladies who exhibited their charms and their magnificent attire in that captivating exercise, who was, either in person or dress, half so brilliant as Lady Jean?

I only quote this popular expression from a very popular play, in order to warn my juvenile friends against being too much impressed by it. It is a fatal error running through nearly the whole mass of our fictitious literature, that parents are represented as invariably adverse, through their own cruel and selfish views, to the inclinations of their children: either the glowing ambition and high spirit of the boy is repressed by the cold calculations of his father, who wishes him to become a mere creature of the counting-room and shop like himself; or the romantic attachment of the girl to some elegant Orlando, procures her a confinement to her chamber, with no other alternative than that of marrying a detestable suitor, whom her father prefers to all others on account of his wealth. Then, the boy always runs away from his father’s house, and, by following his own inclinations, acquires fortune and fame; while the girl as invariably leaps a three-pair-of-stairs window, and[Pg 28] is happy for life with the man of her choice. The same dangerous system pervades the stage, where, I am sorry to remark, every vicious habit of society, and every impropriety in manners and speech, is always sure to be latest abandoned.

I warn my juvenile readers most emphatically against the fallacy and delusion which prevails upon this subject. Fathers, as a class, have not flinty hearts, nor is it their wish or interest, in general, to impose a cruel restraint upon their children. Young people would do well to examine the circumstances in which they stand in regard to their parents and guardians, before believing in the reality of that schism which popular literature would represent as invariably existing between their own class and that of their natural protectors. The greater part, I am sure, of my young friends, must have observed, that, so long as they can remember, they have been indebted for every comfort, and for a thousand acts of kindness and marks of affection, to those endeared beings—their father and mother. The very dawning light of existence must have found them in the enjoyment of many blessings procured to them solely by those two individuals. From them must have been derived the food they ate, the bed they lay on, the learning at school which enabled their minds to appreciate all the transactions and all the wisdom of past times, and, greatest blessing of all, the habits of devotional exercise which admitted them to commune with their almighty Creator. Surely it is not to be supposed that, at a certain time, the kindness and friendship of these two amiable persons is all at once converted into a malignant contrariety to the interests of their children. Is it not far more likely, my dear young friends, that they continue, as ever, to be your well-wishers and benefactors: and that the opposition which they seem to set up so ungraciously against your inclinations, is only caused by their sense of the dangers which threaten you in the event of your being indulged? It may appear to you that no such danger exists: that your parents[Pg 29] are actuated by narrower and meaner views than your own, or that they do not allow for the feelings of youth. But they are in reality deeply concerned for the difference of your feelings from theirs; they sympathise with them in secret, from a recollection of what were their own at your period of life; but know, from that very experience of your feelings, and of their result, that it is not good for you that they should be indulged. You are, then, called upon—and I do so now in the name of your best feelings, and as you would wish for present or future happiness—to trust in the reality of that parental tenderness which has never, heretofore, known interruption, and in the superiority of that wisdom with which years and acquaintance with the world have invested your parents.

Perhaps, my young friends, you may have perceived, even in the midst of your childish frolics and careless happiness, that your parents were obliged to deny themselves many indulgences, and toil hard in their respective duties, in order to obtain for you the comforts which you enjoy. You may have perceived that your father, after he had returned home from his daily employment, could hardly be prevailed upon to enter, as you wished, into your sports, or to assist you with your lessons, but would sit, in silent and abstracted reflection, with a deep shade of care upon his brow. On these occasions, perhaps, your amiable and kind protector is considering how difficult it is, even with all his industry, and all his denial of indulgences to himself, to procure for you an exemption from that wretchedness in which you see thousands of other children every day involved. But though many are the cares which your parents experience, in the duty of rearing you to manhood, there is none so severe or so acute as that which comes upon them at the period of your entering into life. Heretofore, you were simple little children, with hardly a thought beyond the family scene in which you have enjoyed so many comforts. Heretofore, with the exception of occasional rebukes from your parents, and trifling quarrels with your[Pg 30] brothers and sisters, you have all been one family of love, eating at the same board, kneeling in one common prayer, loving one another, as the dearest of all friends. But now the scene becomes very different. You begin to feel, within yourselves, separate interests, and each thinks himself best qualified to judge for himself. At that moment, my young friends, the anxiety of your parents is a thousand times greater than it ever was before. Your father, probably, is a man of formed habits and character; he occupies a certain respectable station in the world; he has all his life been governed by certain principles, which he found to be conducive to his comfort and dignity. But though he has been able to conduct himself through the world in this satisfactory manner, he is sensible, from the various and perhaps altogether opposite characters which nature has implanted in you, that you may go far wide of what have been his favourite objects, and perhaps be the means of impairing that respectability which he, as a single individual, has hitherto maintained. It is often observed in life, that children who have been reared by poor but virtuous parents, as if their minds had received in youth a horror for every attribute of poverty, exert themselves with such vigorous and consistent fortitude, as to end with fortune and dignity; while the children, perhaps, of these individuals, being brought up without the same acquaintance with want and hardship, are slothful through life, and soon bring back the family to its original condition. If you then have been reared in easy circumstances, you may believe what I now tell you, that your approach to manhood or womanhood will produce a degree of anxiety in the breasts of your parents, such as would, if you knew it, make your very heart bleed for their distress, and cause you to appear as monsters to yourselves if you were to act in any great degree differently from what they wished.

How much, then, is it your duty, my young friends, to treat the advices and wishes of your parents, at this period of life, with respect, knowing, as you do, that the future[Pg 31] happiness of those dear and kind beings depends almost solely upon your conducting yourselves properly in your first steps into life! Should you be so unfortunate as to be beguiled into bad company, or to contract a disposition to indulgences which are the very bane of existence, and the ruin of reputation, what must be the agony of those individuals who have hitherto loved and cherished you, and indulged, perhaps, in very different anticipations! On the contrary, should you yield respect, as far as it is in your nature, to the maxims which your father has endeavoured to impress, with what delight does he look forward to your future success—with what happy confidence does he rely upon your virtuous principles! And may there be no happiness to you, in contemplating the happiness which you have given to him? Yes, much, I am sure, and of a purer kind than almost any which earthly things can confer upon you here below.

I have one word to add, and it is addressed to the female part of my juvenile readers. Exactly as parents feel a concern for the first appearance of their sons in the business of life, so do they experience many anxious and fearful thoughts respecting the disposal of their daughters in matrimony. Wedded life, I may inform them, is not the simple matter which it appears prospectively in early and single life. As it involves many serious duties and responsibilities, it must be entered upon with a due regard to the means—above all things, the pecuniary means—of discharging these in a style of respectability, such as may be sufficient to support the dignity of the various connexions of the parties. It is, therefore, necessary that no person of tender years (this is most frequently the lot of the female) should contract the obligations of matrimony, without, if possible, the entire sanction of parents or other protectors. The people of this country happen to entertain, upon this subject, notions of not so strict a kind as are prevalent in most other nations. In almost all continental and all eastern countries, the female is reared by her friends as the destined bride of[Pg 32] a particular individual, and till her marriage she is allowed no opportunity of bestowing her affections upon any other. The custom is so ancient and so invariable, that it is submitted to without any feeling of hardship; and as prudence is the governing principle of the relations, the matches are generally as happy as if they were more free. Perhaps such a custom is inapplicable to this country, on account of our different system of domestic life; but I may instance it, to prove to my fair young readers, that the control of parents over their choice of a husband ought to be looked upon as a more tolerable and advantageous thing, than their inclinations might be disposed to allow, or our popular literature represents it to be.

The war carried on in Scotland, by the friends and enemies of Queen Mary, after her departure into England, was productive of an almost complete dissolution of order, and laid the foundation of many feuds which were kept up by private families and individuals long after all political cause of hostility had ceased. Among the most remarkable quarrels which history or tradition has recorded as arising out of that civil broil, I know of none so deeply cherished, or accompanied by so many romantic and peculiar circumstances, as one which took place between two old families of gentry in the neighbourhood of Edinburgh. Stephen Bruntfield, laird of Craighouse, had been a zealous and disinterested partisan of the queen. Robert Moubray of Barnbougle was the friend successively of Murray and Morton, and distinguished himself very highly in their cause. During the year 1572, when Edinburgh castle was maintained[Pg 33] by Kirkaldy of Grange in behalf of the queen, Stephen Bruntfield held out Craighouse in the same interest, and suffered a siege from a detachment of the forces of the regent, commanded by the laird of Barnbougle. This latter baron, a man of fierce and brutal nature, entered life as a younger brother, and at an early period chose to cast his fate among the Protestant leaders, with a view of improving his fortunes. The death of his elder brother in rebellion at Langside, enabled the Regent Murray to reward his services with a grant of the patrimonial estate, of which he did not scruple to take possession by the strong hand, to the exclusion of his infant niece, the daughter of the late proprietor. Some incidents which occurred in the course of the war had inspired a mutual hatred of the most intense character into the breasts of Bruntfield and Moubray; and it was therefore with a feeling of strong personal animosity, as well as of political rancour, that the latter undertook the task of watching the motions of Bruntfield at Craighouse. Bruntfield, after holding out for many months, was obliged, along with his friends in Edinburgh castle, to yield to the party of the regent. Like Kirkaldy and Maitland of Lethington, he surrendered upon a promise of life and estate; but while his two friends perished, one by the hand of the executioner, the other by his own hand, he fell a victim to the sateless spite of his personal enemy, who, in conducting him to Edinburgh as a prisoner, took fire at some bitter expression on the part of the captive, and smote him dead upon the spot.

Bruntfield left a widow and three infant sons. The lady of Craighouse had been an intimate of the unfortunate Mary from her early years; was educated with her in France, in the Catholic faith; and had left her court to become the wife of Bruntfield. It was a time calculated to change the natures of women, as well as of men. The severity with which her religion was treated in Scotland, the wrongs of her royal mistress, and finally the sufferings and death of her husband, acting upon a mind naturally enthusiastic, all[Pg 34] conspired to alter the character of Marie Carmichael, and substitute for the rosy hues of her early years, the gloom of the sepulchre and the penitentiary. She continued, after the restoration of peace, to reside in the house of her late husband; but though it was within two miles of the city, she did not for many years re-appear in public. With no society but that of her children, and the persons necessary to attend upon them, she mourned in secret over past events, seldom stirring from a particular apartment, which, in accordance with a fashion by no means uncommon, she had caused to be hung with black, and which was solely illuminated by a lamp. In the most rigorous observances of her faith, she was assisted by a priest, whose occasional visits formed almost the only intercourse which she maintained with the external world. One strong passion gradually acquired a complete sway over her mind—Revenge—a passion which the practice of the age had invested with a conventional respectability, and which no kind of religious feeling, then known, was able either to check or soften. So entirely was she absorbed by this fatal passion, that her very children, at length, ceased to have interest or merit in her eyes, except in so far as they appeared likely to be the means of gratifying it. One after another, as they reached the age of fourteen, she sent them to France, in order to be educated; but the accomplishment to which they were enjoined to direct their principal attention was that of martial exercises. The eldest, Stephen, returned, at eighteen, a strong and active youth, with a mind of little polish or literary information, but considered a perfect adept at sword-play. As his mother surveyed his noble form, a smile stole into the desert of her wan and widowed face, as a winter sunbeam wanders over a waste of snows. But it was a smile of more than motherly pride: she was estimating the power which that frame would have in contending with the murderous Moubray. She was not alone pleased with the handsome figure of her first-born child; but she thought with a fiercer and faster joy upon the appearance[Pg 35] which it would make in the single combat against the slayer of his father. Young Bruntfield, who, having been from his earliest years trained to the purpose now contemplated by his mother, rejoiced in the prospect, now lost no time in preferring before the king a charge of murder against the laird of Barnbougle, whom he at the same time challenged, according to a custom then not altogether abrogated, to prove his innocence in single combat. The king having granted the necessary licence, the fight took place in the royal park, near the palace; and, to the surprise of all assembled, young Bruntfield fell under the powerful sword of his adversary. The intelligence was communicated to his mother at Craighouse, where she was found in her darkened chamber, prostrate before an image of the Virgin. The priest who had been commissioned to break the news, opened his discourse in a tone intended to prepare her for the worst; but she cut him short at the very beginning with a frantic exclamation—“I know what you would tell—the murderer’s sword has prevailed, and there are now but two instead of three, to redress their father’s wrongs!” The melancholy incident, after the first burst of feeling, seemed only to have concentrated and increased that passion by which she had been engrossed for so many years. She appeared to feel that the death of her eldest son only formed an addition to that debt which it was the sole object of her existence to see discharged. “Roger,” she said, “will have the death of his brother, as well as that of his father, to avenge. Animated by such a double object, his arm can hardly fail to be successful.”

Roger returned about two years after, a still handsomer, more athletic, and more accomplished youth than his brother. Instead of being daunted by the fate of Stephen, he burned but the more eagerly to wipe out the injuries of his house with the blood of Moubray. On his application for a licence being presented to the court, it was objected by the crown lawyers, that the case had been already closed by mal fortune of the former challenger. But while this[Pg 36] was the subject of their deliberation, the applicant caused so much annoyance and fear in the court circle, by the threats which he gave out against the enemy of his house, that the king, whose inability to procure respect either for himself or for the law is well known, thought it best to decide in favour of his claim. Roger Bruntfield, therefore, was permitted to fight in barras with Moubray; but the same fortune attended him as that which had already deprived the widow of her first child. Slipping his foot in the midst of the combat, he reeled to the ground, embarrassed by his cumbrous armour. Moubray, according to the barbarous practice of the age, immediately sprang upon and despatched him. “Heaven’s will be done!” said the widow, when she heard of the fatal incident; “but gratias Deo! there still remains another chance.”

Henry Bruntfield, the third and last surviving son, had all along been the favourite of his mother. Though apparently cast in a softer mould than his two elder brothers, and bearing all the marks of a gentler and more amiable disposition, he in reality cherished the hope of avenging his father’s death more deeply in the recesses of his heart, and longed more ardently to accomplish that deed than any of his brothers. His mind, naturally susceptible of the softest and tenderest impressions, had contracted the enthusiasm of his mother’s wish in its strongest shape; as the fairest garments are capable of the deepest stain. The intelligence, which reached him in France, of the death of his brothers, instead of bringing to his heart the alarm and horror which might have been expected, only braced him to the adventure which he now knew to be before him. From this period, he forsook the elegant learning which he had heretofore delighted to cultivate. His nights were spent in poring over the memoirs of distinguished knights—his days were consumed in the tilt-yard of the sword-player. In due time he entered the French army, in order to add to mere science that practical hardihood, the want of which he conceived to be the cause of the death of his brothers.[Pg 37] Though the sun of chivalry was now declining far in the occident, it was not yet altogether set: Montmorency was but just dead; Bayard was still alive—Bayard, the knight of all others who has merited the motto, “sans peur et sans reproche.” Of the lives and actions of such men, Henry Bruntfield was a devout admirer and imitator. No young knight kept a firmer seat upon his horse—none complained less of the severities of campaigning—none cherished lady’s love with a fonder, purer, or more devout sensation. On first being introduced at the court of Henry the Third, he had signalised, as a matter of course, Catherine Moubray, the disinherited niece of his father’s murderer, who had been educated in a French convent by her other relatives, and was now provided for in the household of the queen. The connection of this young lady with the tale of his own family, and the circumstance of her being a sufferer in common with himself by the wickedness of one individual, would have been enough to create a deep interest respecting her in his breast. But when, in addition to these circumstances, we consider that she was beautiful, was highly accomplished, and, in many other respects, qualified to engage his affections, we can scarcely be surprised that that was the result of their acquaintance. Upon one point alone did these two interesting persons ever think differently. Catherine, though inspired by her friends from infancy with an entire hatred of her cruel relative, contemplated, with fear and aversion, the prospect of her lover being placed against him in deadly combat, and did all in her power to dissuade him from his purpose. Love, however, was of little avail against the still more deeply-rooted passion which had previously occupied his breast. Flowers thrown upon a river might have been as effectual in staying its course towards the cataract, as the gentle entreaties of Catherine Moubray in withholding Henry Bruntfield from the enterprise for which his mother had reared him—for which his brothers had died—for which he had all along moved and breathed.

[Pg 38]

At length, accomplished with all the skill which could then be acquired in arms, glowing with all the earnest feelings of youth, Henry returned to Scotland. On reaching his mother’s dwelling, she clasped him, in a transport of varied feeling, to her breast, and for a long time could only gaze upon his elegant person. “My last and dearest,” she at length said, “and thou too are to be adventured upon this perilous course! Much have I bethought me of the purpose which now remains to be accomplished. I have not been without a sense of dread lest I be only doing that which is to sink my soul in flames at the day of reckoning; but yet there has been that which comforts me also. Only yesternight I dreamed that your father appeared before me. In his hand he held a bow and three goodly shafts—at a distance appeared the fierce and sanguinary Moubray. He desired me to shoot the arrows at that arch traitor, and I gladly obeyed. A first and a second he caught in his hand, broke, and trampled on with contempt. But the third shaft, which was the fairest and goodliest of all, pierced his guilty bosom, and he immediately expired. The revered shade at this gave me an encouraging smile, and withdrew. My Henry, thou art that third arrow, which is at length to avail against the shedder of our blood. The dream seems a revelation, given especially that I may have comfort in this enterprise, otherwise so revolting to a mother’s feelings.”

Young Bruntfield saw that his mother’s wishes had only imposed upon her reason; but he made no attempt to break the charm by which she was actuated, being glad, upon any terms, to obtain her sanction for that adventure to which he was himself impelled by feelings considerably different. He therefore began, in the most deliberate manner, to take measures for bringing on the combat with Moubray. The same legal objections which had stood against the second duel were maintained against the third; but public feeling was too favourable to the object to be easily withstood. The laird of Barnbougle, though somewhat[Pg 39] past the bloom of life, was still a powerful and active man, and, instead of expressing any fear to meet this third and more redoubted warrior, rather longed for a combat which promised, if successful, to make him one of the most renowned swordsmen of his time. He had also heard of the attachment which subsisted between Bruntfield and his niece; and, in the contemplation of an alliance which might give some force to the claims of that lady upon his estate, found a deeper and more selfish reason for accepting the challenge of his youthful enemy. King James himself protested against stretching the law of the per duellum so far; but, sensible that there would be no peace between either the parties or their adherents till it should be decided in a fair combat, he was fain to grant the required licence.

The fight was appointed to take place on Cramond Inch, a low grassy island in the Frith of Forth, near the castle of Barnbougle. All the preparations were made in the most approved manner by the young Duke of Lennox, who had been the friend of Bruntfield in France. On a level spot, close to the northern beach of the islet, a space was marked off and strongly secured by a paling. The spectators, who were almost exclusively gentlemen (the rabble not being permitted to approach), sat upon a rising ground beside the enclosure, while the space towards the sea was quite clear. At one end, surrounded by his friends, stood the laird of Barnbougle, a huge and ungainly figure, whose features displayed a mixture of ferocity and hypocrisy, in the highest degree unpleasing. At the other, also attended by a host of family allies and friends, stood the gallant Henry Bruntfield, who, if divested of his armour, might have realised the idea of a winged Mercury. A seat was erected close beside the barras for the Duke of Lennox and other courtiers, who were to act as judges; and at a little distance upon the sea lay a small decked vessel, with a single male figure on board. After all the proper ceremonies which attended this strange legal custom had been gone[Pg 40] through, the combatants advanced into the centre, and, planting foot to foot, each with his heavy sword in his hand, awaited the command which should let them loose against each other, in a combat which both knew would only be closed with the death of one or other. The word being given, the fight commenced. Moubray, almost at the first pass, gave his adversary a cut in the right limb, from which the blood was seen to flow profusely. But Bruntfield was enabled, by this mishap, to perceive the trick upon which his adversary chiefly depended, and, by taking care to avoid it, put Moubray nearly hors de combat. The fight then proceeded for a few minutes, without either gaining the least advantage over the other. Moubray was able to defend himself pretty successfully from the cuts and thrusts of his antagonist, but he could make no impression in return. The question then became one of time. It was evident that, if no lucky stroke should take effect beforehand, he who first became fatigued with the exertion would be the victim. Moubray felt his disadvantage as the elder and bulkier man, and began to fight most desperately, and with less caution. One tremendous blow, for which he seemed to have gathered his last strength, took effect upon Bruntfield, and brought him upon his knee, in a half-stupified state; but the elder combatant had no strength to follow up the effort. He reeled towards his youthful and sinking enemy, and stood for a few moments over him, vainly endeavouring to raise his weapon for another and final blow. Ere he could accomplish his wish, Bruntfield recovered sufficient strength to draw his dagger, and thrust it up to the hilt beneath the breastplate of his exhausted foe. The murderer of his race instantly lay dead beside him, and a shout of joy from the spectators hailed him as the victor. At the same instant, a scream of more than earthly note arose from the vessel anchored near the island: a lady descended from its side into a boat, and, rowing to the land, rushed up to the bloody scene, where she fell upon the neck of the conqueror, and pressed him, with[Pg 41] the most frantic eagerness, to her bosom. The widow of Stephen Bruntfield at length found the yearnings of twenty years fulfilled—she saw the murderer of her husband, the slayer of her two sons, dead on the sward before her, while there still survived to her as noble a child as ever blessed a mother’s arms. But the revulsion of feeling produced by the event was too much for her strength; or, rather, Providence, in its righteous judgment, had resolved that so unholy a feeling as that of revenge should not be too signally gratified. She expired in the arms of her son, murmuring “Nunc dimittis, Domine,” with her latest breath.

The remainder of the tale of Bruntfield may be easily told. After a decent interval, the young laird of Craighouse married Catherine Moubray; and as the king saw it right to restore that young lady to a property originally forfeited for service to his mother, the happiness of the parties might be considered as complete. A long life of prosperity and peace was granted to them by the kindness of Heaven; and at their death, they had the satisfaction of enjoying that greatest of all earthly blessings, the love and respect of a numerous and virtuous family.

“The Passing Crowd” is a phrase coined in the spirit of indifference. Yet, to a man of what Plato calls “universal sympathies,” and even to the plain ordinary denizens of this world, what can be more interesting than “the passing crowd?” Does not this tide of human beings, which we daily see passing along the ways of this world, consist of persons animated by the same spark of the divine essence, and partaking of the same high destinies with ourselves? Let us stand still but for a moment in the midst[Pg 42] of this busy and seemingly careless scene, and consider what they are or may be whom we see around us. In the hurry of the passing show, and of our own sensations, we see but a series of unknown faces; but this is no reason why we should regard them with indifference. Many of these persons, if we knew their histories, would rivet our admiration by the ability, worth, benevolence, or piety, which they have displayed in their various paths through life. Many would excite our warmest interest by their sufferings—sufferings, perhaps, borne meekly and well, and more for the sake of others than themselves. How many tales of human weal and woe, of glory and of humiliation, could be told by those beings, whom, in passing, we regard not! Unvalued as they are by us, how many as good as ourselves repose upon them the affections of bounteous hearts, and would not want them for any earthly compensation! Every one of these persons, in all probability, retains in his bosom the cherished recollections of early happy days, spent in some scene which “they ne’er forget, though there they are forgot,” with friends and fellows who, though now far removed in distance and in fortune, are never to be given up by the heart. Every one of these individuals, in all probability, nurses still deeper in the recesses of feeling, the remembrance of that chapter of romance in the life of every man, an early earnest attachment, conceived in the fervour of youth, unstained by the slightest thought of self, and for a time purifying and elevating the character far above its ordinary standard. Beneath all this gloss of the world—this cold conventional aspect, which all more or less present, and which the business of life renders necessary—there resides for certain a fountain of goodness, pure in its inner depths as the lymph rock-distilled, and ready on every proper occasion to well out in the exercise of the noblest duties. Though all may seem but a hunt after worldly objects, the great majority of these individuals can, at the proper time, cast aside all earthly thoughts, and communicate directly with the Being whom their fathers have[Pg 43] taught them to worship, and whose will and attributes have been taught to man immediately by Himself. Perhaps many of these persons are of loftier aspect than ourselves, and belong to a sphere removed above our own. But, nevertheless, if the barrier of mere worldly form were taken out of the way, it is probable that we could interchange sympathies with these persons as freely and cordially as with any of our own class. Perhaps they are of an inferior order; but they are only inferior in certain circumstances, which should never interpose to prevent the flow of feeling for our kind. The great common features of human nature remain; and let us never forget how much respect is due to the very impress of humanity—the type of the divine nature itself! Even where our fellow creatures are degraded by vice and poverty, let us still be gentle in our judging. The various fortunes which we every day see befalling the members of a single family, after they part off in their several paths through life, teach us that it is not to every one that success in the career of existence is destined. Besides, do not the arrangements of society at once necessitate the subjection of an immense multitude to humble toil, and give rise to temptations, before which the weak and uninstructed can scarcely escape falling? But even beneath the soiled face of the poor artizan, there may be aspirations after some vague excellence, which hard fate has denied him the means of attaining, though the very wish to obtain it is itself ennobling. The very mendicant was not always so; he, too, has had his undegraded and happier days, upon the recollection of which, some remnant of better feeling may still repose.

These, I humbly think, are reasons why we should not look with coldness upon any masses of men with whom it may be our lot to mingle. It is the nature of a good man to conclude that others are like himself; and if we take the crowd promiscuously, we can never be far wrong in thinking that there are worthy and well-directed feelings in it as well as in our own bosoms.

Never, perhaps, did any city, upon the approach of a foreign enemy, betray such symptoms of consternation and disorder, as did Edinburgh, on the 16th of September 1745, when it was understood that Prince Charles Edward, with his army of Highlanders, had reached a village three miles to the westward, unresisted by the civic corps in which the hapless city had placed its last hopes of defence. A regiment of dragoons, which had retreated on the previous day from Stirling, and another which happened to be encamped near Edinburgh, having joined their strengths to that of the town-guard and volunteers, had that forenoon marched boldly out of town, with the determined purpose of opposing the rebels, and saving the town; but after standing very bravely for a few hours at Corstorphine, the spectacle of a single Highlander, who rode up towards them and fired off his pistol, caused the whole of these gallant cavaliers to turn and fly; nor did they stop till they had left Edinburgh itself twenty miles behind. The precipitate flight of regular troops was the worst possible example for a body of raw, undisciplined citizens, who were too much accustomed to the secure comforts of their firesides, to have any relish for the horrors of an out-of-doors war with the unscrupulous mountaineers. The consequence was, that all retreated in confusion back to the city, where their pusillanimity was the subject of triumphant ridicule to the Jacobite party, and of shame and fear to the rest of the inhabitants.

In this dilemma, as band after band poured through the West Port, and filled the ample area of the Grassmarket, the magistrates assembled in their council chamber, for the purpose of “wondering what was to be done.” The result of their deliberations was, that a full meeting of the inhabitants should be held, in order that they might be enabled to shape their course according to the general[Pg 45] opinion. Orders were immediately given to this effect, and in the course of an hour, they found a respectable assemblage of citizens, prepared, in one of the churches of St Giles’s, to consider the important question of the defensibility of the town.

The appearance of the city, on this dreadful afternoon, was very remarkable, and such as we hope it will never again exhibit. All the streets to the west of St Giles’s were crowded with citizen volunteers, apparently irresolute whether to lay down their arms or to retain them, and whose anxious and crest-fallen looks communicated only despair to the trembling citizens. The sound of hammers was heard at the opening of every lane, and at the bottoms of all important turnpike stairs, where workmen were busied in mounting strong doors, studded thickly with nails, moving on immense hinges, and bearing bolts and bars of no ordinary strength—the well-known rapacious character of the Highlanders, not less than their present hostile purpose, having suggested this feeble attempt at security. The principal street was encumbered with the large, tall, pavilion-roofed family carriages of people of distinction, judges, and officers of the crown, which, after being hastily crammed with their proper burdens of live stock, and laden atop with as much baggage as they could carry, one after another wheeled off down the High Street, through the Netherbow, and so out of town. A few scattered groups of women, children, and inferior citizens, stood near that old-accustomed meeting place, the Cross, round the tall form of which they seemed to gather, like a Catholic population clinging to a sacred fabric, which they suppose to be endowed with some protecting virtue.

At the ordinary dinner hour, when the streets were as usual in a great measure deserted, and while the assemblage of citizens were still deliberating in the New Church aisle, the people of the High Street were thrown into a state of dreadful agitation, by a circumstance which they witnessed from their windows. The accustomed silence[Pg 46] of “the hollow hungry hour” was suddenly broken by the clatter of a horse’s feet upon the pavement; and on running to their windows, they were prodigiously alarmed at the sight of one of their anticipated foes riding boldly up the street. Yet this alarm subsided considerably, when they observed that his purpose seemed pacific, and that he was not followed by any companions. The horseman was a youth apparently about twenty years of age, with a remarkably handsome figure and gallant carriage, which did not fail in their effect upon at least the female part of the beholders. The most robust Highland health was indicated in his fair countenance and athletic form: and, in addition to this, his appearance expressed just enough of polish not to destroy the romantic effect produced by his wild habiliments and striking situation. The tight tartan trews showed well upon a limb, of which the symmetry was never equalled by David Allan, the national painter, so remarkable for his handsome Highland limbs, and of which the effect, instead of being impaired by the clumsy boot, was improved by the neat brogue, fastened as it was to the foot by sparkling silver buckles. He wore a smart round bonnet, adorned with his family cognisance—a bunch of ivy—and from beneath which, a profusion of light brown tresses, tied with dark ribbons, flowed, according to the fashion of the time, about half way down his back. He carried a small white flag in his hand, and bore about his person the full set of Highland arms—broadsword, dirk, and two silver-mounted pistols. Many a warm Jacobite heart, male and female, palpitated at sight of his graceful figure, and a considerable crowd of idle admirers, or wonderers, followed him up the broad noble expanse of the High Street.

By this crowd, who soon discovered that his purpose was the delivery of a letter from the chevalier to the magistrates, he was ushered forward to the opening of a narrow passage, which in those days led through a pile of buildings called the Luckenbooths, towards the door of[Pg 47] Haddo’s Hole Church, a passage called in the old Scottish language a stile, which, moreover, was traversed in 1628 by King Charles the First, when he went to open the Scottish Parliament in the High Tolbooth. Here the Highlander dismounted, and after throwing his bridle over the hook at a saddler’s door close to the corner of the stile, was led forward into the lobby of the church, from which the hum of active discussion was heard to proceed. On requesting to be introduced to the magistrates, he was informed, by an official wearing their livery, that the church was so very much crowded, that “there would be nae possibility of either getting him in to see the magistrates, or the magistrates out to see him,” but that his letter might be handed into them over the heads of the crowd. To this expedient the messenger consented, and accordingly it was immediately put in execution. In a few moments after it had left the keeper’s hands, a dead silence seemed to fall upon the company, and, after a renewed tumult and a second silence, those who stood in the lobby heard a voice reading a few words aloud, apparently those of the letter. The voice was, however, interrupted in a few seconds by the clamour of the whole assembled people, who presently rose in confusion, and made a tumultuous rush towards the door. On hearing and observing these alarming symptoms, the city officer, with inconsiderate rashness, thought it his duty to seize the author of so much supposed mischief, and accordingly made a dash at the stranger’s collar, calling upon the town-guardsmen present to close in upon him, and intercept his retreat. But the prompt and energetic Highlander was not to be so betrayed. With a bound like the first movement of the startled deer, he cleared the lobby, and made for his horse. Two dragoons standing without, and who, observing the rush from the door, threw themselves in the stranger’s way, were in the same instant felled to the ground; and before any other person could lay hands upon him, the maltreated messenger threw himself upon his horse, drew his sword, and in a[Pg 48] transport of rage shouted defiance to all around. Whirling his weapon round his head, he stopped a few seconds amidst the terrified crowd; and then, striking spurs into his horse’s sides, rode along the street, still vociferating loud defiances to all the detached military parties which he met. No attempt, however, was made to prevent his escape, or to offer him farther violence. One symptom of offensive warfare alone occurred, and that originated in an accident; for an old guardsman, who was overturned on the causeway by the brush of the passing steed, could not help discharging his redoubted piece; the shot, however, doing no other harm than winging a golden peacock, which overhung the window of a fashionable milliner in the fourth flat of the Luckenbooths. After clearing the narrow defile of the Luckenbooths, and getting into the full open street, the Highland cavalier for once turned round, and, with a voice broken by excess of indignation, uttered a thundering malediction against all Edinburgh for its breach of the articles of war, and a challenge to the prettiest man in it who would meet him upon honourable terms. He then galloped briskly down the High Street, still brandishing his broadsword, the people making way for him on all sides, by running down the numerous alleys leading from the street, and terminated his daring exploit, unscathed and undaunted, by passing out at the Netherbow Port, of which the enormous folding doors, like the turnpikes in John Gilpin, flew open at his approach.

It is irrelevant to our purpose to describe the consternation under which the inhabitants of Edinburgh passed the whole of that evening and night, or the real terror which next morning seized them, when they understood that the insurgents were in possession of the town. Moreover, as it would not be proper to encumber our narrative with well-known historical details, we shall also pass over the circumstances in this remarkable civil war which followed upon the capture of the city, and content ourselves with relating the simple events of a love tale, in which the hero[Pg 49] just introduced to the notice of our readers acted a conspicuous part.

About a month after the rebels had entered Edinburgh, and while Prince Charles Edward was still fondly lingering in the palace which had sheltered so many of his ancestors, a young gentlewoman, named Helen Lindsay, the daughter of a whig writer to the signet in Edinburgh, was one fine October evening taking a solitary walk in the King’s Park. The sun had gone down over the castle, like the fire-shell dropping into a devoted fortress, and the lofty edifices of the city presented, on the eastern side, nothing but dark irregular masses of shade. The park, which a little before had been crowded with idle and well-dressed people, waiting perhaps for a sight of the prince, was now deserted by all except a few Highland soldiers, hurrying to or from the camp at Duddingston, and by the young lady above mentioned, who continued, in spite of the deepening twilight, to saunter about, seeming to await the hour of some assignation. As each single Highland officer or group passed this lady, she contrived to elude their observation by an adroit management of her plaid; and it was not till the gathering darkness rendered her appearance at such a time and place absolutely suspicious, that at length one gallant mountaineer made bold to accost her. “Ah, Helen!” he exclaimed, “how delighted am I to find you here; for I expected you to be waiting at the bottom of the Walk—and thus I see you five minutes sooner than I otherwise would have done!” “I would rather wait near the palace than at that fearsome place, at this time o’ nicht, William,” said the young lady; “for, let me tell you, you have been a great deal later o’ comin’ than you should have been.” “Pardon me, my angel!” answered the youth; “I have been detained by the prince till this instant. His royal highness has communicated to me no very pleasant intelligence—he is decisive as to our march commencing on the morning after to-morrow, and I am distracted to think of parting with you. How shall I—how can I part with[Pg 50] you?” “Oh! never mind that, Willie,” cried the lady, in a tone quite different from his, which was highly expressive of a lover’s misery; “if your enterprise prove successful, and you do not get your head broken, or beauty spoilt, you shall perhaps be made an earl, and marry some grand English countess; and I shall then content myself with young Claver the advocate, who has been already so warmly recommended to me by my father, and who would instate me to-morrow, if I chose, as his wedded wife, in the fine house he has just bought in Forrester’s Wynd.” “To the devil with that beast!” cried the jealous lover in Gaelic. “Do you think, Helen, that I could ever marry any one but you, even though it were the queen on the throne? But perhaps you are not so very resolute in your love matters, and could transfer your affections from one object to another as easily and as quickly as you could your thoughts, or the glance of your eyes!” “Ah, Willie, Willie,” said the lady, still in a jocular tone, “I see you are a complete Hielanter—fiery and irritable. I might have kenned that the first moment I ever saw ye, when ye bravadoed a’ Edinburgh, because a silly toon-officer tried to touch ye. Wad ye flee up, man, on your ain true love, when she merely jokes ye a wee?” “Oh! if that be all, Helen,” said the youth humbly, “I beg your grace. Yet, methinks, this is no time for merriment, when we are about to part, perhaps for ever. How, dearest Helen, do you contrive to keep up your spirits under such circumstances?” “Because,” said the young lady, “I know that there is no necessity for us parting, at least for some time to come; for I am willing to accompany you, if you will take me, to the very world’s end. There’s sincerity and true love for you!” Surprised and delighted with this frank offer, the lover strained his mistress passionately to his bosom, and swore to protect her as his lawful wife till the latest moment of his existence. “You shall travel,” he said, “in my sister Lady Ogilvie’s carriage, and be one of the first British ladies to attend the prince’s levee in St James’s at[Pg 51] Christmas. Our marriage shall be solemnized at the end of the first stage.” The project was less than rational; but when was reason any thing to love? Many avowals of mutual attachment passed between the parties; and, after projecting a mode of elopement, they parted—William Douglas taking the road for the camp at Duddingston, and Helen Lindsay hastily returning to the town.

The morning of the 1st of November broke drearily upon Edinburgh, showing a dull frosty atmosphere, and the ground covered with a thin layer of snow. It was the morning of the march; and here and there throughout the streets stood a few bagpipers, playing a reveillé before the lodgings of the great officers of the clans. One or two chiefs were already marching down the street, preceded by their pipers, and followed by their men, in order to join the army, which was beginning to move from Duddingston. The Highland guard, which had been stationed, ever since the chevalier’s arrival, at the Weigh-house, was now leaving its station, and moving down the Lawnmarket to the merry sound of the bagpipe, when a strange circumstance occurred.

Just as the word of command had been given to the Weigh-house guard, the sash of the window in the third floor of an adjacent house was pushed up, and immediately after, a female figure was observed to issue therefrom, and to descend rapidly along a rope towards the pavement below. The commander of the guard no sooner perceived this, than he sprang forwards to the place where the figure was to alight, as if to receive her in his arms; but he did not reach it before the lady, finding the rope too short by several yards, dropped with a slight scream upon the ground, where she lay apparently lifeless. The officer was instantly beside her—and words cannot describe the consternation and sorrow depicted in his face, as he stooped, and with gentle promptitude lifted the unfortunate lady from the ground. She had fainted with the pain of what soon turned out to be a broken limb; and as she lay over[Pg 52] the Highlander’s arm, her travelling hood, falling back from her head, disclosed a face which, though exquisitely beautiful, was as pale and expressionless as death. A slight murmur at length broke from her lips, and a tinge of red returned to her cheeks, as she half articulated the word “William.” William Douglas, for it was he, hung over her in silent despair for a few moments, and was only recalled to recollection when his men gathered eagerly and officiously around him, each loudly inquiring of the other the meaning of this strange scene. The noise thus occasioned soon had the effect of bringing all to an understanding; for the father of the lady, in a nightcap and morning gown, was first observed to cast a hurried glance over the still open window above, and was soon after in the midst of the group, calling loudly and distractedly for his daughter, and exclaiming vehemently against the person in whose arms he found her, for having attempted to rob him of his natural property. Douglas bethought himself for a moment, and, calling upon his men to close all round him and the lady, began to move away with his beloved burden, while the old gentleman loaded the air with his cries, and struggled forward with the vain intention of rescuing his daughter. The lover might soon have succeeded in his wishes, by ordering the remonstrant to be withheld, and taken home by his men; but he speedily found that to take away his mistress in her present condition, and without the means of immediately relieving her, would be the height of cruelty; and he therefore felt himself reluctantly compelled to resign her to the charge of her parent, even at the risk of losing her for ever. Old Mr Lindsay, overjoyed at this resolution, offered to take his daughter into his own arms, and transport her back to the house; but Douglas, heeding not his proposal, and apparently anxious to retain his mistress as long as he could, saved him this trouble, by slowly and mournfully retracing his steps, and carrying her up stairs to her bedchamber—his company meanwhile remaining below. He there discovered that Helen had been[Pg 53] locked up by her father, who had found reason to suspect her intention of eloping, and that this was what occasioned her departure from the mode of escape previously agreed upon. After depositing her still inanimate person carefully on a bed, he turned for a moment towards her father, told him fiercely that if he exercised any cruelty upon her in consequence of what had taken place, he should dearly rue it; and then, alter taking another silent, lingering, farewell look of his mistress, left the house in order to continue his march.

After this, another and longer interval occurs between the incidents of our tale; and this may perhaps be profitably employed in illustrating a few of the circumstances already laid partially before the reader. William Douglas was a younger son of Sir Robert Douglas of Glenbervie, the celebrated antiquary, and had been bred to the profession of a writer, or attorney, under the auspices of a master of good practice in Aberdeen. Being, however, a youth of sanguine temperament and romantic spirit, he did not hesitate a moment, on hearing of the landing of the chevalier, to break his apprenticeship, just on the point of expiring, and set off to rank himself under the banners of him whom he conceived entitled to the duty and assistance of all true Scotsmen. In consideration of his birth, and his connection with some of the very highest leaders in the enterprise, he was appointed aide-de-camp to the prince, in which capacity he had been employed to communicate with the city in the manner already described. As he rode up the High Street, and, more than that, as he rode down again, he had been seen and admired by Helen Lindsay, who happened to be then in the house of a friend near the scene of his exploit. Soon after the Highland army had taken possession of the city, they had met at the house of a Jacobite aunt of the young lady, and a passion of the tenderest nature then took place between them. To her father, who was her only surviving parent, this was quite unknown till the day before the departure of the Highlanders,[Pg 54] when some circumstances having roused his suspicions, he thought it necessary to lock her up in her own room, without, however, securing the window—that part of a house, so useful and so interesting above all others to youthful lovers, the chink of Pyramus and Thisbe not excepted. It only remains to be stated, that though the young lady recovered from the effects of her fall in a few weeks, she did not so soon recover from her disappointment, and she was doomed to experience a still greater affliction in the strange look with which she was afterwards regarded by her father and all her own acquaintance.

William Douglas performed an active part in all the scenes of the rebellion, and finally escaped the perils of Culloden almost without a wound. He fled to his father’s house, where he was received joyfully, and concealed for upwards of a twelvemonth, till the search of the royal troops was no longer dangerous. His father frequently entreated him to go abroad, but he would not consent to such a measure; and at last, it being understood that government had passed an “act of oblivion” in regard of the surviving rebels, he ventured gradually and cautiously to appear again in society. All this time he had never communicated with Helen Lindsay, but his thoughts had often, in the solitude of his place of hiding, turned anxiously and fondly towards her. At length, to the surprise of his father, he one day expressed his desire of going to Edinburgh, and setting up there as a writer—the profession to which he had been educated, and for which he could easily complete his qualifications. Sir Robert was by no means averse to his commencing business, but expressed his fears for the safety of his son’s person in so conspicuous a situation in the capital, where the eyes of justice were constantly wide open, and where he would certainly meet with the most disagreeable recognitions. The lover overruled all these obstructions, by asking the old gentleman whether he would wish to see his son perish in the West Indies, or become a respectable and pacific member of society[Pg 55] in his own country; and it was speedily arranged that both should set out for Edinburgh, in order to put the youth’s purpose in execution, so soon as he should procure his indenture from his late master. In this no difficulty was experienced; and in a few weeks the aged baronet set forth, accompanied by his son, on horseback, towards the city, which contained all the latter held dear on earth.

On arriving at an inn in the Canongate, the first thing Sir Robert did, was to send a card to his cousin, the Earl of ——, informing his lordship of his arrival, and begging his company that evening at his hotel. The earl soon made his appearance, heartily welcomed the old gentleman to Edinburgh, and was introduced to young William. His lordship was sorry, however, that he could not stay long with them, as Lady —— was to have a ball that evening, where his presence was, of course, indispensable. He begged, however, to have the pleasure of their company at his house so soon as they could dress, when he would endeavour to entertain them, and, moreover, introduce his young kinsman to the chief beauties of Edinburgh. When he was gone, Sir Robert, alarmed at the idea of his son entering at once into an assemblage where many would remember his face, attempted to dissuade him from attending the ball, and offered to remain all the evening with him in the inn. But William insisted upon going, holding all danger light, and representing to his father, that, even though he were recognised, no one, even an enemy, would think of discovering him, that being generally held as a sin of the deepest dye. The truth was, that the earl’s mention of beauties put him in mind of Miss Lindsay, and inspired him with a notion that she would be of the party, and that he might have an opportunity of renewing his acquaintance with her, which he could not easily procure otherwise. Both, therefore, prepared themselves for the ball, and, in a short time, set off in two chairs for Gray’s Close, in which the earl’s house was situated.

That fine old spacious alley was found to be, on the present[Pg 56] occasion, as splendid as it was possible for any close in Auld Reekie to be, under the double advantages of fashion and festivity. Two livery-men stood at the head with torches, and served as a beacon to mark to the gathering company the entrance of the strait into which they had to steer their way. Between the head of the lane and the vestibule of his lordship’s house, other servants were planted with torches, so as to form an avenue of lights, along which the guests were ushered. All the guests, as they successively arrived, were announced at the head of the stair by a servant—a custom recently adopted from London, and of little service in Edinburgh, where all people knew each other by sight. It served, however, on the present occasion, to procure for Sir Robert and his son, immediately on their entering the room, a general and instantaneous attention, which they would rather have dispensed with, and upon which they had not calculated. Both gentlemen were personally presented by their kinsman, the earl, to many persons of distinction of both sexes, among whom Sir Robert (though he had been for twenty years estranged in a great measure from society, in the prosecution of his studies, and the management of his gout) soon recognised and entered into conversation with some old friends, while his son set himself to observe if Miss Lindsay was in the room. She was not present; but, as company continued still to arrive, he entertained hopes that she would yet make her appearance. Disengaging himself, therefore, from his father, he withdrew to a corner of the room, where he might see, without being easily perceived by any person entering; and there, in silence and abstraction, he awaited her probable arrival. Some minutes had elapsed after the last announcement; and, in the idea that all were assembled, the earl had stood up at the head of a long double line of powdered beaux, and ladies with enormous hoops and high head-dresses, in order to lead off the first dance, when William Douglas heard the name of Mr and Miss Lindsay proclaimed at the[Pg 57] head of the stair, and presently after saw an old precise-looking gentleman lead into the room the elegant figure of his long-lost mistress. He saw no more for some time; for, while his blood rushed upwards to the heart in tumultuous tide, a dimness came over his eyes, and obscured even the brilliant chandeliers that hung over the company. On recovering his powers of observation, the dance was done, and the floor cleared of its revellers, who now sat all round in full view. Some of the ladies were fanning themselves vehemently with their large Indian fans; others were listening, with head awry, to the compliments of their partners; not a few were talking and coquetting with the gentlemen near them, and a great portion were sitting demurely and stiffly in groups, like hedgerow elms, under the awful patronage of their mothers or protectresses: all were companionable and looked happy, except one—a silent and solitary one—who, less attractively dressed than any of the rest, yet more beautiful than them all, sat pensively apart from the throng, apparently taking little interest in what was going on. Douglas needed no one to inform him that this was Helen Lindsay, though she was very different from the vivacious, sparkling girl she had been eighteen months before. He was shocked at the change he observed, and hastened to discover the cause, by inquiring of a silly-looking young man near him who she was. “Oh! that is Miss Lindsay,” quoth the youth, who was no other than her ancient admirer, Claver, “said to be the prettiest girl in Edinburgh, though Miss Pringle for my money—her you see with a flame-coloured sack, sitting next to the Lord Justice Clerk. To be sure, Miss Lindsay is not what she has been. I was once thought in love with her (here he simpered), but she was one morning found on the tramp with a rebel officer, who is said to have been hanged, and she has never since then held up her head as she used to do; for, indeed, let me tell you, some of our great dames here affect to hold up their noses at her adventures; so that, what with a lippit character and a hanged sweetheart, you see[Pg 58] she looks somewhat dismal on it.” Douglas durst make no farther inquiries, but shrunk back in the seclusion and concealment afforded by a corner of the room, from whence he continued, for some time longer, to watch his unhappy mistress—his father, in the meantime, completely taken off his hands by a spectacled old maiden of quality, who had engaged him in a genealogical disquisition. By watching his opportunities, he contrived to place himself almost close beside his mistress, without being observed, and, gradually making still nearer approaches, he had at last the happiness of finding himself upon the very next seat to her’s. Whatever change disappointment and woe had wrought in her, it did not amount to a fourth of that which William had achieved in himself by a change of clothes, and taming down, to the expression of domestic life, a visage which had showed somewhat fierce and soldierly in the days of his acquaintance with Miss Lindsay. Instead of his former gallant and robust air, he was now pale and elegant; and though his eye still retained some of its fire, and his lip its wonted curve, the general change was such, and, moreover, the circumstances under which he was now seen were so different from those which surrounded and characterised him, that before any but a lover’s eye, he might have passed without recognition. As the case was, Miss Lindsay discovered him at the first glance, and with difficulty suppressing a scream, had nearly fainted with excessive emotion. In the words of Scotland’s national poet—

But she expressed no farther emotion. With presence of mind which was not singular in those times of danger, she instantly recovered her tranquillity, though her eyes could not but express that she half-believed herself to be in the presence of a being out of this world. One affectionate look from William sufficed to put her alarm on that score to rest; but she continued to feel the utmost apprehension respecting[Pg 59] his safety, as well as a multitude of other confused emotions, which fast awakened in her heart, as from his imaginary grave, where they had long been buried, and thronged tumultuously through her breast. A few words, heard by no ears but hers, stealing under cover of the noise made by the music and the dancers, like the rill under a load of snow, conveyed to her the delightful intelligence that he was still alive and her lover, and that he was come thus late, when the days of peril seemed past, and under happier auspices than before, to claim her affections. When the dancers next arose upon the floor, he respectfully presented his hand, and led her, nothing loath, into the midst of the splendid assemblage, where Lord ——, bustling about as master of the ceremonies, assigned them an honourable place, in spite of the surprised looks and reprobatory winks of not a few matrons as well as young ladies. The handsome and well-matched pair acquitted themselves to the admiration of the whole assemblage, except the censorious and the envious; and when they sat down together upon the same seats from which they had risen, the speculation excited among the whole throng by the unexpected appearance of such a pair, was beyond all precedent in the annals of gossip.

Not long after, supper was announced, and the company left the dancing-room in order to go down stairs to the apartment where that meal was laid out. A ludicrous circumstance now occurred, which we shall relate, rather because it formed a part of the story, as told by our informant, than from any connection it has with the main incident.

Sir Robert had all this time been so earnestly engaged in the genealogical discussion alluded to, that, interesting as the word supper always is on such occasions to those not given to dancing alone, he did not hear it. It was not till all were gone that he and the old spectacled lady discovered at what stage of the proceedings they were arrived. Recollecting his old-fashioned politeness, however, in proper time, the venerable antiquary made his congé, and offered[Pg 60] his hand to the tall, stiff, and rigid-looking dame, in order to escort her, more majorum, down stairs. Sir Robert was a man somewhat of the shortest, and, moreover, of the fattest, while a gouty foot, carefully swaddled, gave an infirm and tottering air to his whole person. As they moved along, the two antiques would have reminded one of Sancho Panza leading the distressed old spectacled duenna through the dark labyrinths of the duke’s castle. Thus they went along the room, down the earl’s narrow spiral stair, and through an ill-lighted passage, he cringing and limping, as gouty men are wont, and she sailing along, erect and dignified, after the manner of an old maid of 1750, who had seen good company at the Hunters’ Balls in Holyrood House. Now, it so happened that a servant, or, as some editions have it, a baker, had set down a small fruit pasty, contained in an oval dish, in a dark corner of the passage, intending immediately to return from the supper-room, to which he had carried some other dishes, in order to rescue it from that dangerous situation—to which, indeed, he had been compelled to consign it, on finding that his hands were already over-engaged. Before he returned, as ill luck would have it, Sir Robert’s gouty and clouty foot alighted full in the middle of the pasty, and stuck in it up to the ancle—perfectly unconscious, however, in its swaddlings, of having so shod itself, so that the good baronet walked on with it into the room. What was his surprise, and what the mirth of the company, and what the indignation of the old duenna, on finding that she shared in the ridicule of her esquire, may perhaps be imagined, but cannot be adequately described. Suffice it to say, that the whole assemblage were so delighted with the amusing incident, that not one face exhibited any thing of gloom during the subsequent part of the evening; and even the young ladies were tempted to forget and forgive the good fortune of Miss Lindsay, in having, to all appearance, so completely secured a first-rate lover.

Our tale now draws to a conclusion, and may be summed[Pg 61] up in a few words. William Douglas soon settled in business as a writer to the signet, and found no obstacle on the part of either his parent or his mistress in uniting himself to that amiable young lady. It was known to a few, and suspected by more, that under the decent habit he now wore was concealed the very person who knocked down two of Gardener’s dragoons in the Luckenbooths, and braved all Edinburgh to single combat. But he was never molested on this account; and he therefore continued to practise in the Court of Session for upwards of half a century, with the success and with the credit of a respectable citizen.

There is an allegory in the Spectator, called, if I recollect rightly, “The Mountain of Miseries.” It narrates how the human race were once summoned by a good Genius to a particular spot, and each permitted to cast down the misery which most afflicted him, taking up some one which had belonged to a fellow-creature, and which he thought he should be more able to endure. Some cast down diseased limbs, some bad wives, and so forth; but the end of the story is, that after the exchange had been made, all felt themselves a great deal more uneasy under their adopted evils than they had ever felt under their natural ones, and, accordingly, had to petition the Genius for permission to take back each his own proper original misery. I have often thought that the practice of removing from one house to another, in the hope of finding better ease and accommodation, was not much unlike this grand general interchange of personal distresses; and often on a Whitsunday[Pg 62] in Scotland, when I have seen people flying in all directions with old tables and beds, that would have looked a great deal better in their native homes than on the street, I have mentally compared the scene to that which is so graphically described by Addison.

The English, it seems, are not much of a removing people. When a Southron once settles himself down in a house, he only quits it with the greatest reluctance. No matter for an increasing family—no matter for bettered circumstances—no matter for the ambition of wife or daughters to get into a genteeler neighbourhood. An Englishman has naturally a strong feeling about his house: it is his castle, and he never will abandon the fort so long as he can possibly retain it. Give him but a few years’ associations to hallow the dwelling—let him have been married in it, and there spent the years of the youth of his children; and sooner than part from the dear little parlour where he has enjoyed so many delightful evening scenes, with his young spouse and his happy infants around him, he would almost part with life itself. An Englishman gets accommodated to all the inconveniences of his house, however great, as naturally as the fish with its shell, however tortuous. Some strange angularity in his vestibule, which nearly throws you down every time you visit him, may appear to you a most disagreeable crook in his lot, and one that ought to make the house intolerable to him; but, ten to one, he looks upon it as only an amiable eccentricity in the plan of the mansion, and, so far from taking ill with it, would feel like a fish out of water if it were otherwise.

The Scotch, on the contrary, are an eminently migratory people. They never are three months in any house till they wish that the annual term were once more at hand, when they might remove to another. There is no day in the year so important in their eyes as Whitsunday, when almost the whole population of every considerable town is found to be on the move, exchanging houses with each other. This is a curious feature in the people, and[Pg 63] seems as if it only could be accounted for by supposing that the nation is totally deficient in the phrenological organ called inhabitiveness. It is all to no use that experience is constantly showing how vain are their expectations of better lodging. Every disappointment seems to give them but a keener relish for a new attempt.

The fact is this: A family always enters upon a new house in a state of high hope as to its accommodations. So long as the recollection of their deserted abode is still fresh, the new house appears a paradise; for, mark, it has been selected on the express account of its not being characterised by any one of the inconveniences alleged against the old. By and bye, however, its own peculiar evils are felt; and, long before Candlemas day, it has been found as disagreeable as the other. Then a new one is selected, which, in its turn, is declared as bad as any. So far as my observation has extended, the itch for removing more generally prevails among the female than the male department of the population. Husbands in general are too little in the house ever to fall out of conceit with it; but the wife, as the more domestic creature, has full opportunity to observe and feel its defects; and she it is who most frequently urges and achieves the removal. There are various things about a house in which the husband can never see any importance, or feel any interest, but which appear to the wife as each the most cardinal of all cardinal points. One of these, for instance, is a back-green. “A back-green!” let the words be pronounced with a solemnity befitting their awful import. Often, when a house has seemed to the husband all that could be desired, he has been thrust out of it, whether he would or not, all on account of a thing which was as inexplicable to him as the mysteries of the Chinese faith—a back-green. Perhaps you hear some day that your back-green lies totally out of the sun, or that the right use to it is shared by some disagreeable neighbours, or is naught for some other equally intelligible reason. But you learn no more, and next Whitsunday you find yourself[Pg 64] in the horrors and agonies of a removal to some distant part of the town, all on account of a little space of ground, of which you never yet could guess the use or purpose. Very often you are removed from a comfortable and every way excellent house, because it wants a back-green, and taken to one every way inferior, and, indeed, utterly wretched, but which, in the eyes of your sweet spouse, is rendered equal to a palace—because it has a back-green. I would advise all husbands to keep a sharp look-out after the back-greens, as well as several other things, which I shall point out to them.

Let us suppose a case of proposed removal in the middle walks of life. You are, say, the father of a rather numerous family, living very contentedly in a flat in not the least dense part of the town. For a long time there have been grumblings, like distant thunder among the mountains; but you have never yet heard any very strong reason urged why you should remove. At length, about the New Year, these mutterings begin to get voice; and your wife, some quiet evening, after all the young people are gone to bed, opens a sudden and most tremendous attack upon you, respecting the necessity of no longer keeping the children pent up in this small dwelling, so far from any play-ground or fresh air. And, really, she does not think it is good for her own health that you should live any longer here. She has plenty of exercise, she acknowledges, but no air. It is so far from public walks, that it makes a toil of a pleasure before they can be reached. And then, no place whatsoever to dry the clothes. Your own shirts are never properly seen to, being only hung in an open garret, where they are exposed to all the smoke of the town; at least, all that chooses to come in at the skylights. And there is no such thing as a servant’s bed-room in this house. The girl, I assure you, has her own complaints as to the hardship of being obliged to sleep in that den above the kitchen door. And as for the stair, is it not a thoroughfare to all the scum of the town? Some of the neighbours, I assure[Pg 65] you, are no better than they should be, if all tales be true. There is even an old man in the garret who is supposed to live by Burking. The fact is, we would now require an additional bed-room for the boys—&c. &c.

Lectured up to removing point, you consent, unhappy man! to leave your shop some forenoon, in order to take a walk with your wife about the outskirts of the town, in search of a more airy, more spacious, and more genteel abode. You are dragged “by the lug and the horn,” as shepherds say, through multitudes of those “delightful small self-contained houses,” which offer, “within twenty minutes’ walk of the college,” all the elegancies of Heriot Row and Great King Street, at a tithe of the rent. You find them all as like each other in the interior as if they had been made on the principle of chip-boxes; but yet, to your wife, each seems to have its own peculiar merits. One excels in the matter of a lobby; another has an extra closet; a third affords a superior view from the drawing-room windows; and a fourth—O merit above all merits!—transcends its fellows in the article of a back-green. Every thing, however, is inspected—every thing is taken into the general account; and the result of the whole is, that though the rent is ten pounds higher, and the dining-room a thought less than in your present abode, you must remove. The carpets, with a very little eeking and clipping, will all suit. Your sideboard, of which your spouse has a measure in her reticule, will exactly answer the recess devoted to it. The jack in the kitchen answers to a tee; and even the scraper at the door has something about it that is singularly appropriate, as if the builder at the very first had designed to take the measure of your foot. All things appear, in the showing of your good dame, to be so remarkably answerable and proper, that you half believe it to be a matter of destiny, and, in completing your arrangements, hardly bargain so much with the landlord as with Fate.

During the spring months which elapse before the day[Pg 66] of removal, you live in a state of dreamy bliss respecting your new house. Almost every fine morning you rise about seven for a walk, and, by a strange chance, you invariably take the house of promise in your way, and enjoy a survey of its external excellencies. When you observe, from the closed shutters, that its present occupants, so far from being agog about it like yourself, are snugly snoozing in their beds, you wonder at their indifference. If you were they, you would have been up hours ago, enjoying the air in the back-green, or playing the king of the Vandals in the front-plot. What a pity to see that splendid ruin of a rhododendron drooping in that fashion! What a shame to pay so little attention to the boxwood! At length, the 25th of May arrives. You transfer yourself to the now vacated tenement, pitying with all your heart the stupid people who have left it. For a time, a kind of honeymoon delirium pervades the household. You certainly do find some pleasure in contemplating from your drawing-room windows the cattle in the neighbouring grass-park, even though sensible all the time that they are only kept there in petto by the exterminating butcher at the end of “the Row.” Your wife, too, reposes upon the joys of her back-green with a gratulation of spirit that seems as if it could never know an end. And while the servant girl rejoices in a chamber to herself, your boys have sport unceasing in pasting over the kitchen door with pictures and excellent new songs. But all this only holds good while summer lasts—summer, during which no house ever appears inconvenient or disadvantageous. By and bye comes the winter of your discontent. The views from the window are no longer fair; the back-green, which already in autumn had begun to lose its character as a play-ground, in consequence of the swarms of creeping things, which covered the walls in such a way as if they had a design to form a living entomological museum, and so fairly frightened the children into the house, is now a sink of mud and melting snow; the serving-wench finds that it was better to sleep[Pg 67] in “that den above the kitchen door”—in so far as the said den was very “cosey”—than to lie in a chamber under the slates, exposed to the malevolence of the elements in all its shapes. You find, too, that in the short days it is not very agreeable to walk several times to and from town in the dark, through a district which, in the language of house-proprietors, “has the advantage of being out of the bounds of police.” The phrase, “within twenty minutes’ walk of the College,” appears to you as only calculated for the faculties of some itinerating prodigy, in as much as it never takes you less than twice the time. The worthy housewife herself, after long suffering in secret, and great reluctance to confess her counsel wrong, has to complain at last of “the distance from the market,” which obliges her to buy every thing from small dealers in the neighbourhood, who necessarily must make up for uncertain custom by “two prices.” No getting so much as a pennyworth of vegetables without sending for it nearly a mile; and then “that creature Jenny,” there is no sending her out, you know, even upon the shortest errand, but she stays an hour. When we want even so much as change for a shilling, there is no getting it nearer than Port Hopetoun, which is half a mile away. Then we are such a distance from the kirk. It is only in fine weather we are able to get that length, and at most only once in the day. I declare, if we stay here much longer, we shall become absolute heathens. Although, to be sure, we pay less taxes in this out-of-the-way place than we did before, have we not lost a washing-tub, from there being no police? And then, is there not a toll-bar betwixt us and the town, at which we must pay one shilling every time we have to go out or come home in a coach? And, above all things, we are cut off here from all our friends and acquaintances. We do not know a soul nearer hand than the Duncans, who live at the back of the Meadows. And there is no dropping in here, in an easy way, upon a forenoon call, but the people, when they reach us, are so much fatigued[Pg 68] with the distance, that they must be asked to stay to dinner: and the case ends, perhaps, with the good man being obliged to walk three miles home with a young lady at twelve o’clock at night! Only think of that! No, no, this cold, outlandish, genteel place, will never do. Give me a good front door in the New Town, “with all the conveniences,” and I’ll leave such places as this to them that like them better.

When once a resolution is formed to leave a house, it is amazing how many holes are picked in its character, many of them literal. The wind gets in at a hundred places; we can see daylight through stone walls and double-deafened ceilings. Then, there is such a draught up the staircase, and into the best bed-room, that positively there is no enduring it. I think another six months of this house would fairly make an end of me. It’s not a house for tender folk. You might sometimes as well sit in the open street, as by the fireside. You burn your shins, and all the time your back is freezing. Upon my word, I think we should save all the difference between this and a front door in doctors’ bills!

A front door is then determined upon; and you think you have at length, by a little stretch of your purse, reached the very perfection of comfort. But alas! “fronti nulla fides,” which is as much as to say, there is no reliance to be placed on a front door. It is true, you escape all the evils of your former habitation, and that nothing can match your back kitchen as a convenience to the servants. But then the family living above you has twice your number of children; and these imps seem to do nothing whatever the whole day long, from six in the morning till seven at night, but run pat, pat, pat, along the floors overhead, till they almost drive you mad, non vi sed sæpe cadendo. Even the charms of a back-green, or a superior scullery, will not stand against this; and so you determine at last to go to an upper flat in the same neighbourhood, where you may have the pleasure of tormenting some person below with[Pg 69] your children, without the risk of being at the same time tormented yourself. The last selection is made upon moderate and prudent principles; but yet hope is also even here upon the wing. The house has no pretensions to style or external gentility, but yet “Edwin was no vulgar boy.” The stair is remarkably spacious and well lighted, and has, further, the advantage of a door at the bottom, which can be opened by any inhabitant, by means of a pulley, without the necessity of descending to the bottom. In fact, it is what I would call a genteel stair. “The Stevensons” live in the first flat. The kitchen door has a nice hole at the lower corner for the cat; and what a delightful place there is by the side of the fire for the lamp, or where we could keep our salt dry in a pig! The request of the Regent Earl of Mar, as inscribed on the front of his house at Stirling,

comes powerfully into force in all cases where the tenant is just entering upon his house. As in the other case every fault is exaggerated, and made the subject of congratulatory disgust, so in this, every fault is extenuated. “The ceilings are a little contracted, I see, by the roof.” “Oh! a wee thought coomceyled—a very small matter; these rooms are only intended for the children. We have some capital public rooms at the back, looking into the Queen Street gardens, and have a little peep of the sea in the distance.” “Upper flats,” observes your Malagrowther friend, “are very apt to smoke.” “Oh! not at all, I assure you. But I have been assured that Dr Bonnyman cured this house entirely some years ago, and since then there has never been a single puff of smoke.” “Your nursery is in the garret; don’t you think the children will feel it rather cold?” “Oh, the most comfortable nursery in the world; and see, only see, what a nice door there is at the top of the garret stair to prevent the bairns from tumbling down!” “I am sorry, however, to see a green-wife established so close beneath[Pg 70] the door, at the bottom of your common stair.” “Oh, Sir, but consider the convenience of the greens.” In fact, there is no peculiarity about the house, however trifling, but, in the eyes of a new tenant, it will seem a beauty, as in those of a departing one it will constitute a disgrace. And this is just the philosophy of the question, and the real cause why there is so much useless tossing and tumbling of old furniture on each 25th of May.

The industrious classes of the middle rank are, on the one hand, attracted onwards to wealth and respectability, by contemplating men, formerly of their own order, who having, as the saying is, feathered their nests, now lie at ease, a kind of conscripti patres; while they are, on the other hand, repelled from the regions of poverty and disgrace by the sight of a great many wretched persons, who having, under the influence of some unhappy star, permitted their good resolutions of industry and honour to give way, are sunk from their former estate, and now live—if living it can be called—in a state of misery and ignominy almost too painful to be thought of. There may be a use in this—as there is a use for beacons and buoys at sea. But oh, the desolation of such a fate! As different as the condition of a vessel which ever bends its course freely and gallantly over the seas, on some joyous expedition of profit or adventure, compared with one which has been deprived of all the means of locomotion, and chained down upon some reef of rocks, merely to tell its happier companions that it is to be avoided; so different is the condition of a man still engaged in the hopeful pursuits of life, and one who has lost all its prospects.

The progress of men who live by their daily industry,[Pg 71] through this world, may be likened, in some respects, to the march of an army through an enemy’s country. He who, from fatigue, from disease, from inebriety, from severe wounds, or whatever cause, falls out of the line of march, and lays him down by the wayside, is sure, as a matter of course, to be destroyed by the peasantry; once let the column he belongs to pass on a little way ahead, and death is his sure portion. It is a dreadful thing to fall behind the onward march of the world.

Victims—the word placed at the head of this article—is a designation for those woe-begone mortals who have had the misfortune to drop out of the ranks of society. Every body must know more or less of victims, for every body must have had to pay a smaller or greater number of half-crowns in his time to keep them from starvation. It happens, however, that the present writer has had a great deal to do with victims; and he therefore conceives himself qualified to afford his neighbours a little information upon the subject. It is a subject not without its moral.

A victim may become so from many causes. Some men are wrong placed in the world by their friends, and ruin themselves. Some are ill married, and lose heart. Others have tastes unsuited to the dull course of a man of business, as for music, social pleasures, the company of men out of their own order, and so forth. Other men have natural imperfections of character, and sink down, from pure inability to compete with rivals of more athletic constitution. But the grand cause of declension in life is inability to accommodate circumstances and conduct.

Suppose a man to have broken credit with the world, and made that treaty of perpetual hostility with it, which, quasi lucus a non lucendo, is called a cessio bonorum—what is he to do next? One thing is dead clear: he no more appears on Prince’s Street or the bridges. They are to him as a native and once familiar land, from which he is exiled for ever. His migrations from one side of the town to the other are now accomplished by by-channels,[Pg 72] which, however well known to our ancestors, are in the present day dreamt of by nobody, except, perhaps, the author of the Traditions of Edinburgh. I once came full upon a victim in Croftangry, a wretched alley near the Palace of Holyrood House; he looked the very Genius of the place! But the ways of victims are in general very occult. Sometimes I have altogether lost sight of one for several years, and given him up for dead. But at length he would re-appear amidst the crowd at a midnight fire, as salmon come from the deepest pools towards the lighted sheaf of the fisherman, or as some old revolutionary names that had disappeared from French history for a quarter of a century, came again above board on the occasion of the late revolution at Paris. At one particular conflagration, which happened some years ago, I observed several victims, who had long vanished from the open daylight streets, come out to glare with their bleared eyes upon the awful scene—perhaps unroosted from their dens by the progress of the “devouring element.” But—what is a victim like?

The progress of a victim’s gradual deterioration depends very much upon the question, whether he has, according to the old joke, failed with a waistcoat or a full suit. Suppose the latter contingency: he keeps up a decent appearance for some months after the fatal event, perhaps even making several attempts to keep up a few of his old acquaintance. It won’t do, however; the clothes get worn—threadbare—slit—torn—patched—darned; let ink, thread, and judicious arrangement of person, do their best. The hat, the shoes, and the gloves, fail first; he then begins to wear a suspicious deal of whitey-brown linen in the way of cravat. Collars fail. Frills retire. The vest is buttoned to the uppermost button, or even, perhaps, with a supplementary pin (a pin is the most squalid object in nature or art) at top. Still at this period he tries to carry a jaunty, genteel air; he has not yet all forgot himself to rags. But, see, the buttons begin to show something like new moons at one side; these moons become full; they change; and then[Pg 73] the button is only a little wisp of thread and rags, deprived of all power of retention over the button-hole. His watch has long been gone to supply the current wants of the day. The vest by and bye retires from business, and the coat is buttoned up to the chin. About this period, he perhaps appears in a pair of nankeen trousers, which, notwithstanding the coldness of the weather, he tries to sport in an easy, genteel fashion, as if it were his taste. If you meet him at this time, and inquire how he is getting on in the world, he speaks very confidently of some excellent situation he has a prospect of, which will make him better than ever; it is perhaps to superintend a large new blacking manufactory which is to be set up at Portobello, and for which two acres of stone bottles, ten feet deep, have already been collected from all the lumber-cellars in the country; quite a nice easy business; nothing to do but collect the orders and see them executed; good salary, free house, coal, candle, and blacking; save a pound a-year on the article of blacking alone. Or it is some other concern equally absurd, but which the disordered mind of the poor unfortunate is evidently rioting over with as much enjoyment as if it were to make him once more what he had been in his better days. At length—but not perhaps till two or three years have elapsed—he becomes that lamentable picture of wretchedness which is his ultimate destiny; a mere pile of clothes without pile—a deplorable—a victim.

As a picture of an individual victim, take the following:—My earliest recollections of Mr Kier refer to his keeping a seed-shop in the New Town of Edinburgh. He was a remarkably smart active man, and could tie up little parcels of seeds with an almost magical degree of dispatch. When engaged in that duty, your eye lost sight of his fingers altogether, as you cease to individualise the spokes of a wheel when it is turned with great rapidity. He was the inventor of a curious tall engine, with a peculiar pair of scissors at top, for cutting fruit off trees. This he sent through Prince’s Street every day with one of his boys, who[Pg 74] was instructed every now and then to draw the string, so as to make the scissors close as sharply as possible. The boy would watch his men—broad-skirted men with top-boots—and, gliding in before them, would make the thing play clip. “Boy, boy,” the country gentleman would cry, “what’s that?” The boy would explain; the gentleman would be delighted with the idea of cutting down any particular apple he chose out of a thickly laden and unapproachable tree; and, after that, nothing more was required than to give him the card of the shop. Mr Kier, however, was not a man of correct or temperate conduct. He used to indulge even in forenoon potations. Opposite to his shop there was a tavern, to which he was in the habit of sending a boy every day for a tumbler of spirits and water, which the wretch was carefully enjoined to carry under his apron. One day the boy forgot the precaution, and carried the infamous crystal quite exposed in his hand across the open and crowded street. Mr Kier was surveying his progress both in going and returning; and when he observed him coming towards the shop, with so damnatory a proof of his malpractices holden forth to the gaze of the world, he leaped and danced within his shop window like a supplejack in a glass case. The poor boy came in quite innocently, little woting of the crime he had committed, or the reception he was to meet with, when, just as he had deposited the glass upon the counter, a blow from the hand of his master stretched him insensibly in a remote corner of the shop, among a parcel of seed-bags. As no qualities will succeed in business unless perfectly good conduct be among the number, and, above all things, an absence from tippling, Kier soon became a victim. After he first took to the bent, to use Rob Roy’s phrase, I lost sight of him for two or three years. At length I one day met him on a road a little way out of town. He wore a coat buttoned to the chin, and which, being also very long in the breast, according to a fashion which obtained about the year 1813, seemed to enclose his whole trunk from neck to groin. With the[Pg 75] usual cataract of cravat, he wore a hat the most woe-begone, the most dejected, the most melancholy I had ever seen. His face was inflamed and agitated, and as he walked, he swung out his arms with a strange emphatic expression, as if he were saying, “I am an ill-used man, but I’ll tell it to the world.” Misery had evidently given him a slight craze, as it almost always does when it overtakes a man accustomed in early life to better things. Some time afterwards I saw him a little revivified through the influence of a new second-hand coat, and he seemed, from a small leathern parcel which he bore under his arm, to be engaged in some small agency. But this was a mere flash before utter expiration. He relapsed to the Cowgate—to rags—to wretchedness—to madness—immediately after. When I next saw him, it was in that street, the time midnight. He lay in the bottom of a stair, more like a heap of mud than a man. A maniac curse, uttered as I stumbled over him, was the means of my recognising it to be Kier.

The system of life pursued by victims in general, is worthy of being inquired into. Victims hang much about taverns in the outskirts of the town. Perhaps a decent man from Pennycuik, with the honest rustic name of Walter Brown, or James Gowans, migrates to the Candlemaker Row, or the Grassmarket, and sets up a small public house. You may know the man by his corduroy spatterdashes, and the latchets of his shoes drawn through them by two pye-holes. He is an honest man, believing every body to be as honest as himself. Perhaps he has some antiquated and prescribed right to the stance of a hay-stack at Pennycuik, and is not without his wishes to try his fortune in the Parliament House. Well, the victims soon scent out his house by the glare of his new sign—the novitas regni—and upon him they fall tooth and nail. Partly through simplicity, partly by having his feelings excited regarding the stance of the hay-stack, he gives these gentlemen some credit. For a while you may observe a flocking of victims[Pg 76] toward his doorway, like the gathering of clean and unclean things to Noah’s ark. But it is not altogether a case of deception. Victims, somehow or other, occasionally have money. True, it is seldom in greater sums than sixpence. But then, consider the importance of sixpence to a flock of victims. Such a sum, judiciously managed, may get the whole set meat and drink for a day. At length, when Walter begins to find his barrels run dry, with little return of money wherewithal to replenish them, and when the joint influence of occasional apparitions of sixpence, and the stance of the hay-stack at Pennycuik, has no longer any effect upon him, why, what is to be done but fly to some other individual, equally able and willing to bleed?

One thing is always very remarkable in victims, namely, their extraordinary frankness and politeness. A victim might have been an absolute bear in his better days; but hunger, it is said, will tame a lion, and it seems to have the same effect in subduing the asperities of a victim. Meet a victim where you will—that is, before he has become altogether deplorable—and you are amazed at the bland, confidential air which he has assumed; so different, perhaps, from what he sported in better days. His manner, in fact, is most insinuating—into your pocket; and if you do not get alarmed at the symptoms, and break off in time, you are brought down for half a crown as sure as you live. Victims keep up a kind of constant civil war with shops. They mark those which have been recently opened, and where they see only young men behind the counter. They try to establish a kind of credit of face, by now and then dropping in and asking, in a genteel manner, for a sight of a Directory, or for a bit of twine, or for “the least slip of paper,” occasionally even spending a halfpenny or a penny in a candid, honourable way, with all the air of a person wishing to befriend the shop. In the course of these “transactions,” they endeavour to excite a little conversation, beginning with the weather, gradually expanding to a remark upon the state of business; and, perhaps, ending[Pg 77] with a sympathising inquiry as to the prospects which the worthy shopkeeper himself may have of succeeding in his present situation. At length, having laid down what painters call a priming, they come in some day, in a hurried fiddle-faddle kind of way, and hastily and confidentially ask across the counter, “Mr——[victims are always particular in saying Master], have you got such a thing as fourpence in ha’pence? I just want to pay a porter, and happen to have no change.” The specification of “fourpence in ha’pence,” though in reality nonsense, carries the day; it gives a plausibility and credit-worthiness to the demand that could not otherwise be obtained. The unfortunate shopkeeper, carried away by the contagious bustle of the victim, plunges his hand, quick as thought, into the till, and before he knows where he is, he is minus a groat, and the victim has vanished from before him—and the whole transaction, reflected upon three minutes afterwards, seems as if it had been a dream.

The existence of a victim is the most precarious thing, perhaps, in the world. He is a man with no continuing dinner-place. He dines, as the poor old Earl of Findlater used to say, at the sign of the Mouth. It is a very strange thing, and what no one could suppose a priori, that the necessitous are greatly indebted to the necessitous. People of this sort form a kind of community by themselves, and are more kind to each other mutually than is any other particular branch of the public to them as a class. Thus, the little that any one has, is apt to be shared by a great many companions, and all have a mouthful. The necessitous are also very much the dupes of the necessitous: they are all, as it were, creatures of prey, the stronger constantly eating up the weaker. Thus, a victim in the last stage preys upon men who are entering the set; and all prey more or less upon poor tradesmen, such as the above Walter Brown or James Gowans, who are only liable to such a spoliation because they are poor, and anxious for business. We have known a victim, for instance, who had long passed the condition[Pg 78] of being jail-worthy, live in a great measure upon a man who had just begun a career of victimization by being thrown into jail. This creature was content to be a kind of voluntary prisoner for the sake of sharing the victuals and bed of his patron. It would astonish any man, accustomed, day after day, to go home to a spread table at a regular hour, to know the strange shifts which victims have to make in order to satisfy hunger—how much is done by raising small hard-wrung subsidies from former acquaintance—how much by duping—how much by what the Scotch people very expressively call skeching—how much by subdivision of mites among the wretches themselves. Your victim is often witty, can sing one good comic song, has a turn for mimicry, or at least an amusing smack of worldly knowledge; and he is sometimes so lucky as to fall in with patrons little above himself in fortune, but still having something to give, who afford him their protection on account of such qualifications.

By way of illustrating these points, take the following instances of what may be called the fag-victim.

Nisbet of ——, in Lanarkshire, originally a landed gentleman and an advocate at the Scottish bar, was a blood of the first water in the dissolute decade 1780-90, when, if we are to believe Provost Creech, it was a gentleman’s highest ambition, in his street dress and manner of walking, to give an exact personation of the character of Filch in the Beggars’ Opera. Nisbet at that period dressed a good deal above Filch, however he might resemble him in gait. He had a coat edged all round with gold lace, wore a gold watch on each side (an extravagant fashion then prevalent), and with his cane, bag-wig, and gold-buckled shoes, was really a fine figure of the pre-revolutionary era. His house was in the Canongate—a good flat in Chessels’s Court—garrisoned only by a female servant called Nanny. Nisbet at length squandered away the whole of his estate, and became a victim. All the world fell away from him; but Nanny still remained. From the entailed family flat[Pg 79] in Chessels’s Court, he had to remove to a den somewhere about the Netherbow: Nanny went with him. Then came the period of wretchedness: Nanny, however, still stuck fast. The unfortunate gentleman could not himself appear in his woe-begone attire upon those streets where he had formerly shone a resplendent sun; neither could he bring his well-born face to solicit his former friends for subsidies. Nanny did all that was necessary. Foul day and fair day, she was to be seen gliding about the streets, either petitioning tradesmen for goods to her master on credit, or collecting food and money from the houses of his acquaintance. If a liquid alms was offered, she had a white tankard, streaked with smoky-looking cracks, for its reception; if the proffered article was a mass of flesh, she had a plate or a towel. There never was such a forager. Nisbet himself used to call her “true and trusty,” by way of a compliment to her collective powers; and he finally found so much reason to appreciate her disinterested attachment, that, on reaching the usual fatal period of fifty, he made her his wife! What was the catastrophe of their story, I never heard.

The second, and only other instance of the fag-victim which can be given here, is of a still more touching character than the above, and seems to make it necessary for the writer of this trifling essay to protest, beforehand, against being thought a scoffer at the misery of his fellow creatures. He begs it to be understood, that, however light be the language in which he speaks, he hopes that he can look with no other than respectful feelings upon human nature, in a suffering, and, more especially, a self-denying form.

Some years ago, there flourished, in one of the principal thoroughfares of Edinburgh, a fashionable perfumer, the inheritor of an old business, and a man of respectable connections, who, falling into dissolute habits, became of course very much embarrassed, and, finally, “unfortunate.” In his shop,

[Pg 80]

a man, at the time of his master’s failure, advanced to nearly middle life, but who, having never been any where else since he was ten or twelve years of age, than behind Finlay’s counter—Sundays and meal-hours alone excepted—was still looked upon by his master as “the boy of the shop,” and so styled accordingly. This worthy creature had, in the course of time, become as a mere piece of furniture in the shop; his soul had fraternized (to use a modern French phrase) with his situation. The drawers and shottles, the combs, brushes, and bottles, had entered into and become part of his own existence; he took them all under the wide-spreading boughs of his affections; they were to him, as the infant to the mother, part of himself. He was on the best terms with every thing about the shop; the handles of all things were fitted to his hand; every thing came to him, to use a proverbial expression of Scotland, like the bowl of a pint-stoup. In fact, like a piece of wood placed in a petrifying spring, this man might be said to have been transfigured out of his original flesh and blood altogether, and changed into a creature participating in the existence and qualities of certain essences, perfumes, wigs, pomades, drawers, wig-blocks, glass cases, and counters forming the materiel of Mr Finlay’s establishment. Such a being was, as may be supposed, a useful servant. He knew all the customers; he knew his master’s whole form of practice, all his habits, and every peculiarity of his temper. And then the fidelity of the creature; but that was chiefly shown in the latter evil days of the shop, and during the victimhood of his master. As misfortune came on, the friendship of master and man became more intensely familiar and intimate than it had ever been before. As the proudest man, met by a lion in the desert, makes no scruple to coalesce with his servant in resisting it, so was Finlay induced, by the devouring monster Poverty, to descend to the level, and make a companion, of his faithful “boy.” They would at last go to the same tavern together, take the same Sunday walks—were, in reality, boon companions. In all Finlay’s[Pg 81] distresses, the “boy” partook; if any thing “occurred about a bill,” as Crabbe says, it was the “boy” who had the chief dolour of its accommodation; he would scour the North and South Bridges, with his hat off, borrowing small silver a l’improviste, as if to make up change to a customer, till he had the necessary sum amassed. The “boy” at length became very much demoralised: he grew vicious towards the world, to be the more splendidly virtuous to his master: one grand redeeming quality, after the manner of Moses’ serpent, had eaten up all the rest. It were needless to pursue the history of the shop through all its stages of declension. Through them all the “boy” survived, unshaken in his attachment. The shop might fade, grow dim, and die, but the “boy” never. The goods might be diminished, the Duke of Wellington might be sold for whisky, and his lady companions pawn their wigs for mutton pies; but the “boy” was a fixture. There was no pledging away his devoted, inextinguishable friendship. The master at last went to the Canongate jail—I say went to, in order to inform the sentimental part of mankind that imprisonment is seldom done in the active voice, people generally incarcerating themselves with the most philosophical deliberation, and not the least air of compulsion in the matter. The shop was still kept open, and the “boy” attended it. But every evening did he repair to the dreary mansion, to solace his master with the news of the day, see after his comforts, and yield up the prey which, jackall-like, he had collected during the preceding four-and-twenty hours. This prey, be it remarked, was not raised from the sale of any thing in the shop. Every saleable article had by this time been sold. The only furniture was now a pair of scissors and a comb, together with the announcement, “Hair-cutting rooms,” in the window. By means of these three things, however, the “boy” contrived generally to fleece the public of a few sixpences in the day; and all these sixpences, with the exception of a small commission for his own meagre subsistence, went to his master at the Canongate[Pg 82] jail. Often, in the hour between eight and nine in the evening, have they sat in that small dingy back-room behind the large hall, enjoying a bottle of strong ale, drunk out of stoneware tumblers—talking over all their embarrassments, and speculating how to get clear of them. Other prisoners had their wives or their brothers to see after them; but we question if any one had, even in these relations of kindred, a friend so attached as the “boy.” At length, after a certain period, this unfortunate tradesman was one evening permitted to walk away, arm in arm, with his faithful “young man,” and the world was all before them where to choose.

For a considerable period all trace of the attached pair is lost. No doubt their course was through many scenes of poignant misery; for at the only part of their career upon which I have happened to obtain any light, the “boy” was wandering through the streets of Carlisle, in the dress and appearance of a very old beggar, and singing the songs wherewith he had formerly delighted the citizens of Edinburgh in Mrs Manson’s or Johnnie Dowie’s, for the subsistence of his master, who, as ascertained by my informant, was deposited in a state of sickness and wretchedness transcending all description, in a low lodging-house in a back street. Such is the fag-victim, following his master

and such, I may add, are the virtues which sometimes adorn the most vicious and degraded walks of life, where, to the eyes of ordinary observers, there appears no redeeming feature whatsoever.

One of the most important concerns of young people is, the management of themselves in respect of what are called “acquaintances.” To have many friends is desirable, in a world where men are generally thrown so much upon their own resources. But there is a distinction between the friendship of a certain number of respectable persons, who are only ready to exert themselves for us when called upon, and the acquaintance of a circle of contemporaries, who are perpetually forcing themselves upon our company for the mere purpose of mutual amusement. Taking the words in their usual signification, a young man ought to wish for many friends, but few acquaintances. There is something in the countenance of a companion that cheers and supports the frailty of human nature. One can speak and act more boldly with a friend by his side, than when alone. But it is the good fortune of men of strong character, and it ought to be the object of every one, to act well and boldly by himself. One thing young people may be assured of, almost all the great services which enlightened men have done for their race, were performed alone. There was but one man, not two, at the discovery of the Compass, of the Copernican System, of the Logarithms, and of the principle of Vaccination. To descend to lesser things, ask any man who has risen in worldly fortune, from small beginnings to great wealth and honour, how he contrived to do so, and you will find that he carved it all out for himself with his own hand. He will in all probability inform you that he has reached the honourable station in society which he now maintains, chiefly by narrowing the circle of his “private acquaintances,” and extending that of his “public relations,” most likely adding, that had he on all occasions “consulted” the persons with[Pg 84] whom he happened to be acquainted, as to his designs, he would, by every calculation, have been still in the same obscure insignificant situation he once was. The truth is, it is only when alone that we have the ability to concentrate our minds upon any object; and it is only when things are done with the full force of one mind qualified for the purpose, that they are done well.

It is the misfortune of young people, before they become fully engaged in the relations of life and business, that they look too much to “acquaintances” for encouragement, and make the amusement which “acquaintances” can furnish too indispensable. The tender mind of youth is reluctant, or unable, to stand alone; it needs to be one of a class. Hence, the hours which ought to be spent in the acquisition of that general knowledge which is so useful in after life, and which can only be acquired in the vacant days of youth, are thrown away in the most inglorious pursuits; for “acquaintances” are seldom the companions of study, or the auxiliaries of business, but most generally the associates of a debauch, the fellow-flutterers upon the Mall, the companion-hounds in the chase of empty pleasure. It is amazing how much a youth can endure of the company of his principal “acquaintance.” Virgil’s expression, “tecum consumerer ævo,” is realised in his case; for he veritably appears as if he could spend his whole life in the society of the treasured individual. At the approach of that person, every other matter is cast aside; the most important business seems nothing in contrast with the interchange of a smile or a jest with this duplicate of himself. The injunctions of the most valued relations—even of father and mother—are scattered to the winds, if they are at variance with the counsels or conduct of this precious person, whom, after all, he perhaps met only last week at a club. The power of an “acquaintance” of this kind, for good or evil, over the mind of his friend, is so very great, that it may well give some concern to those who are really interested in the prospects of youth. But every effort to redeem a victim[Pg 85] from the fascination, will be in vain, unless his natural or habitual goodness be shocked by the further exposure of the “acquaintance’s” character. The only safeguard, therefore, against this mighty evil, is, previously to accustom youth to depend much upon themselves, and to endeavour to infuse into them a sufficient degree of moral excellence, to be a protection to them against the worst vices which “acquaintances” may attempt to impart to them.

There is a possibility, however, that the “acquaintance” may be no worse than his fellow, and yet the two will do that together which they could not do singly. Virtue is, upon the whole, a thing of solitude: vice is a thing of the crowd. The individual will not dare to be wicked, for the responsibility which he knows must be concentrated upon himself; while the company, feeling that a divided responsibility is hardly any responsibility at all, is under no such constraint. There is much edification to the heart of the thoughtless and wicked in the participation of companions; and even in large associations of honourable men for honourable purposes, there is often wanting that fine tone of feeling which governs the conduct of perhaps each individual in the fraternity. Thus, an excessive indulgence in the company of “acquaintances” is to be avoided, even where these “acquaintances” are not inferior in moral worth to ourselves. There is an easy kind of morality much in vogue among a great body of people, that “what others do we may do,” as if higher standards had not been handed down by God himself from heaven, or constructed in the course of time by the wise and pure among men. This morality comes strongly into play among youth in their intercourse with contemporaries; and as it is always on rather a declining than an advancing scale, it soon leads them a great way down the paths of vice.

It will be found, in general, that a considerable degree of abstinence from this indulgence is required, even to secure the most ordinary degree of success in life. But[Pg 86] if great things be aimed at, if we wish to surpass our fellows by many degrees, and to render ourselves honourably conspicuous among men, we must abjure “acquaintances” almost entirely. We must, for that purpose, withdraw ourselves from all temptation to idle and futile amusement—we must, in the words of a great poet, “shun delights, and live laborious days.”

Subjects of conversation are sometimes exceedingly difficult to be had. I have known many a company of well-dressed men and women feel themselves most awkwardly situated for want of something to talk about. The weather, which is said to be a never-failing subject, cannot hold out above a few minutes at a time. It will stand a round or two rounds, but not more. It is then knocked up for the evening, and cannot with decency be again brought forward. Being thus disposed of, the subject of “news” is introduced; but, as a matter of course, there being no “news stirring,” “not a word,” “nothing in the papers,” that subject is soon also dispatched. If there happen to be any very remarkable occurrence worth talking of, what a blessing it is on such occasions! It is food for the company a whole night, and may be again and again brought above board for their amusement. But it much more frequently happens that there is no exciting event to talk about, and then the condition of the company is truly miserable. There being ladies present, or there being two factions in the room, politics are proscribed. Every attempt at getting up a topic failing, the company look into the fire, or in each other’s faces, or begin to examine with much interest the pattern of the carpet; and the silence which ensues is truly terrific. A slight whisper is the only sound[Pg 87] in the apartment, and is caught at or watched by the company, for it may chance to be the commencement of a conversation in which they may join, without exciting particular attention. But it, too, dies away. It was only a passing under-current of remark between the two married ladies in the blue and white turbans, on the dearth of coals, the difficulty of getting good servants, or the utility of keeping children muffled in flannel nightgowns from October till March. At length some good soul makes an effort to brush away his diffidence. He projects a remark across the room towards the little man with the smirking countenance, about Mr This or Miss That, or Signor Such-a-thing, who are at present enlivening the town with their exhibitions. The remark is in itself a very ordinary remark, but it has its use: it quickens the intellects of those who hear it, and the tongues of a number of individuals are set a-going upon the subject of theatrical amusements, singing in the Assembly Rooms, Pasta, Paganini, and private parties, so that the original remark is lost sight of, and the company go on pretty well with what it has produced for perhaps half an hour. All these topics being exhausted, another horrible silence ensues. The company again look into the fire, or in one another’s faces, and once more examine the carpet. What is to be said next? All think upon saying something, yet nobody speaks. The national mauvaise honte is now displayed to the height of its perfection. The agony of the company, however, approaches its crisis. The awful stillness is broken, and in a most natural and unexpected manner. The young man in the starched cravat sitting in a corner of the room, near the end of the piano, who has been thinking what he should say or do for the last half hour, takes heart of grace; he rises and snuffs the candles, going through the self-imposed duty in as neat and elegant a style as he can possibly affect. The snuffing of the candles is an operation which every member of the company has seen performed ten thousand times; but it affords interest for even the ten thousandth and first time. It[Pg 88] may not intrinsically be worth heeding, yet, in a case of this nature, it is of very great importance. It suggests a new theme, and that is exactly what was wanted, for one subject invariably leads to the discussion of half a dozen others. The operation of snuffing the candles, therefore, induces some one to remark, how beautiful gas-light is. Then this brings on a disquisition on the danger of introducing it into private houses; its cost in comparison with oil is next touched upon; then follows an observation about the last illumination; which leads to reminiscences of similar displays on the occasions of the great naval victories—the victories lead to Nelson—Nelson to his biographer, Southey—Southey to poetry—poetry to Byron—and Byron to Greece. This whirl of conversation, however, also runs out; an accident jars it, and it is all over. Suddenly the speakers pause, as if they had received a galvanic shock; one small voice is alone left prominent above the silence; but finding itself unsupported, it is immediately lowered to a whisper, and the whisper subsides to a dead silence.

I have often pitied the host or hostess on occasions of this nature, but I could not help blaming them for not providing against such dismal pauses in the conversation of their parties. To guard against these occurrences, I would recommend them to bring forward what I have remarked to be never-failing sources of conversational entertainment, namely, a tolerably good-looking cat, a lapdog, or a child. The last is the best. It ought to be about two years of age, and be able to walk. If adroitly played off, or permitted to play, it will amuse the party for an hour at least. It must be placed on the hearth-rug, so as to attract all eyes; and while in the room, no other subject will be thought of. Any endeavour to draw off attention, by the relation of some entertaining anecdote, will be deemed sedition against the majesty of the household. If a cat, a dog, or an interesting child, cannot be conveniently had, I would advise the invitation of some one who has a loud voice, and the happy effrontery of speaking incessantly,[Pg 89] however ridiculously, on all subjects,—a person who can speak nonsense to any extent, and has the reputation of being a most agreeable companion. This man is of vast use in introducing subjects; for he has no diffidence or modesty, and has a knack of turning every observation to account. His voice also serves as a cover to much by conversation; there being hundreds who would speak fluently enough, provided a bagpipe were kept playing beside them, or who could have their voices drowned by some other species of noise. The loud and voluble talker is therefore an excellent shelter for those of weaker nerves, and will be found a useful ingredient in all mixed companies.

The difficulty of starting subjects of conversation, as well as the difficulty of sustaining them, is often as observable when two acquaintances meet on the street, as when a roomful of company is collected. The unhappy pair exhaust all that they can remember they ought to say to each other in the space of a minute and a half, and another minute may be consumed in going through the process of taking a pinch of snuff; the next half minute is spent in mutual agony. Neither knows how to separate. As the only chance of release, one of the parties at last brings in a joke, or what is meant to be such, to his aid. The other, of course, feels bound to laugh, and both seizing the opportunity, escape in different directions under cover of the witticism.

“Oh, he’s a sicker ane!” is a phrase used in Scotland in reference to that class of people who make excessively sure about every thing, and are in no manner of means to be imposed upon. I style such persons Secure Ones, in order[Pg 90] to be intelligible to southern as well as northern readers. Every body must know a certain class of secure ones by the timid cautiousness and exactness of their behaviour; by the trim, unostentatious propriety of their external aspect. There is a lambs’-woollery comfort and a broad-cloth completeness about this sort of secure one, that nobody can mistake; he even seems to have made the number of buttons in his vest, and the height to which that garment is buttoned up, a matter of accurate calculation. He could not go abroad under less than a certain press of flannel and great-coat for the world; and you might almost as soon expect to meet him without his left arm as minus the silk umbrella under it. (He carries the latter part of himself, or fifth limb, at an angle of about sixty degrees to the horizon, the handle down behind, and the point forked up in front.) When he observes any part of the pavement railed off, in order to save the passengers all danger from an occasional pelleting of stones and bits of plaster which the slaters or chimney-doctors are producing from above, he deploys into the street a good way before coming up to the actual rail or rope, and, in passing, takes care to sweep several good yards beyond the utmost range of shot. “Don’t like these things coming peppering down that way; might almost dislocate one’s shoulder if they were to fall upon it; perhaps we had better go over to the other side of the street altogether. No need, you know, for running into unnecessary danger.” When a secure one ascends a stair, he goes step after step monotonously on, performing every move of his feet with a sound, conscientious deliberation, and seems determined upon doing full justice to every landing-place. He holds firmly, however unnecessarily, by the baluster, since the baluster is there, and he has an obvious satisfaction in the slight pant which he thinks himself entitled to get up on the occasion. The secure one always shuts a door carefully behind him. He takes off his hat softly, with a regard at once to the smooth economy of his hair, and the pile of his chapeau.[Pg 91] He has a maxim that the hat should be first raised and loosened from behind, where it slides up along the glossy hair, not from the front, where it encounters a comparative obstruction from the fleshy brow. He lays down his gloves neatly on the top of each other, and hangs up his hat with an air of carefulness truly exemplary. The secure one is a bit of an epicure. When out in the forenoon, he would not for any consideration take lunch or wine. “Madam, would you have me spoil my appetite for dinner?” This appetite he nurses and cherishes in the course of his saunterings between two and five, as carefully as a miser doting over his heap. He holds a telegraphic communion with his inner man that passeth show; he coquets and dallies with his stomach; every indescribable symptom is taken into account, and forms the subject of unexpressed congratulation. “Dear tender flowers of appetite, it would be sacrilege, or worse, to nip ye in the bud, by powdering over you the baneful dew of a glass of Bucellas, or the still more odious blight of a basin of mulligatawny. No, I will coax you, and protect you, and travel for you, in faithful love and kindness, even until ye shall be fully fattened up for slaughter at five o’clock.” When the secure one sits down to table, he painsfully and not unostentatiously (to himself) relieves the one lowest button of his vest from the thrall of button-hole, and with equally deliberate care arranges a napkin over the front of his person. Dinner is a sacred ceremony, and requires its canonicals. Being fully acquainted with the whole planisphere of the table, he takes an exactly proportioned quantity of each article, so as ultimately to have enjoyed each in its exact proportion of merit, and to have precisely enough out of the whole. A secure one is frequently an old respectable unmarried gentleman, residing with a single servant—Jenny—in a “self-contained” house about Stockbridge or Newington. Knowing the distance at which he lives from the mercantile parts of the town, he takes care never to want what he calls a pound of change,[Pg 92] as well as a small stock of copper—at least the value of a shilling—observing also that the change is not unmixed with sixpences, so that when any shopkeeper’s boy calls for payment of an account, or to take back the purchase-money of any article he has bought that day in town, he may not have to trouble [i. e. trust] the messenger with the duty of obtaining change for a bank note, which would tend to occasion a more than necessary answering of the bells at the door, besides keeping him in an agony of fiddle-faddle till the little affair was settled. Jenny, who has been so long in his service as to have become almost as secure as himself, never opens the door o’ nights without putting on the chain; and she has a standing order against all parleying with beggars, or poor women who sell tapes and such things out of baskets. The secure one regards few creatures in this world with a more jealous or malignant eye than these personages. “Why, Sir, they want nothing but to make an opportunity of stripping the lobby or the kitchen!” And such a story he can tell of a missing hat-brush! “A woman seen that morning going about—sold a pair of garters to the maid-servant three doors off at ten—front door had been left open for a minute, not more, while Jenny ran after me with something I had forgot—and in that time—it could have been at no other—the deed was done. A hat-brush I had just got with my last hat at Grieve and Scott’s; had a thing that screwed in at the one end, so that it was a stretcher also; cost four and sixpence, even taking the hat along with it.” And the secure one, without any premeditated hard-heartedness, thinks nothing of making such an incident apologize to himself for an habitual shutting of his door and his heart against the poor for the next twelvemonth. There is never any imperfection in the externe of the secure one. He bears about him a certain integrality of look that fills and satisfies the eye. From his good well-brushed waterproof beaver, all along down by his roomy blue coat, drab well-fledged, amply-trousered limbs, and so down to his double[Pg 93] shoes, not omitting such points as his voluminous white neckcloth without collar, his large Cairngorm brooch, which looks as if a dish of jelly had been inverted into his bosom, and his heavy, pursy bunch of seals dangling, clearly defined and well relieved, from the precipice of belly—every thing betokens the secure one. Clothes are not so much clothes with him as they are a kind of defensive armour! The truth is, the secure one lives in a state of constant warfare with the skiey influences. The chief campaign is in winter. Instead of entering the field, like Captain Bobadil, about the tenth of March, he opens the trenches towards the twenty-fourth of October. He then invests himself with a cuirass of wool almost thick enough to obstruct the passage of a cannon-ball. For months after, he remains in arms, prepared to stand out against the most violent attacks of the enemy, and, in reality, there is hardly any advantage to be got of the secure one by fair open storms or frosts. He bears a charmed life against all such candid modes of warfare. He cannot be overthrown in a pitched battle. It is only ambuscade draughts through open windows, and other kinds of bush-fighting, that ever are of any effect against him. Like Hector in the armour of Patroclus, he is invulnerable over almost all his whole person; but an arrowy rheumatism, like the spear of Achilles, will sometimes reach him through a very small chink. Like the mighty Achilles himself, he is literally proof, perhaps, against every thing but what assails him through the very lowest part of his person—he can stand every thing but wet feet. There is an instance on record of his having once been laid by the heels for three months, in consequence of sitting one night in the pit of the Theatre with a slightly damp umbrella between his knees. He was just about to get entirely better of this disorder, when all at once he was thrown back for six weeks more, by reason, as he himself related, of his having changed the wear (in his sick-chamber) of a silk watch-riband for a chain! “All from the imprudence of that rash girl Jenny, who[Pg 94] thought the riband a little shabby, and put on the chain instead. Why, Sir! a thick double riband, more than an inch broad; only conceive what a material addition it must have been to my ordinary clothing!” The chain, he might have added, was apt to be worse than nothing, for it was of irregular application, tattooing his person, as it were, with a minutely decussated exposure, so that the cold was likely to have struck him as with the teeth of a comb! The secure one has an anxiety peculiar to himself on the subject of easy-chairs, nightgowns, and slippers. The easy-chair must be exact in angle to a single minute of a degree; the nightgown must be properly seen to in respect of fur and flannel; the slippers must every night be placed for him at the proper place; and if Jenny has been so inattentive as to place the left one on the right of the other, he feels himself not a little discomposed. The secure one is most pestilently and piquantly accurate about all things. He loves to arrange, and arrange, and arrange, and over again arrange and settle all the preliminaries and pertinents of any little matter which cannot reasonably be done but one way. If he wishes, for instance, to confer with an upholsterer respecting some alteration in the above easy-chair, he first calls one forenoon, and inflicts an hour’s explanation upon the unhappy man of wood—who is not all a man of wood, otherwise he would, in such a case, be happy. It does not in the least matter at what hour the tradesman should come to see this chair, for the secure one is to be at home the whole day. Yet the very liberty at which he stands produces a difficulty. It would be charity in Providence, by any interference, “to give him not to choose.” “Say eleven; I shall then be quite disengaged—will that hour suit you? Or make it any other hour—say twelve—or say half-past eleven—half-past would do very well.” [He recollects that he seldom gets the whole fiddle-faddle of feeding the canaries over by half-past.] “Suppose it were a quarter to twelve; that would answer me better still. I may, perhaps, take a walk out[Pg 95] at mid-day; would a quarter to twelve do? Or I might hurry the canaries, and then the half-past might do. I dare say half-past will do best after all; mind half-past eleven,” &c. &c. The man comes, and the business of the chair is entered into. The whole affair is most amply canvassed. The secure one sits down in it, and gives a lecture in a very ex-cathedra style upon all its properties and defects. He complains of the back reclining a little too much back, or the bottom showing too little bottom, or some other fault equally inappreciable; and the upholsterer sees at once that the secure one only complains of this, as he is apt to do of other things, for the very uneasiness arising from its over-easiness.

The fact is, the secure one has brought every appliance of life to such an absolute exactitude and perfection, that, having no longer any thing to give him pain, he becomes quite wretched. Secureness, it is evident, may go too far. We may become actually frightened in this world at our own caution. We may be shocked by the very unimpeachability of our own virtue. We may become miserable through the extremity of our happiness. In the same manner the secure one, when he has “got all things right,” as he would say, finds himself, to his great disappointment, just at the threshold of woe and evil. He has exactly got time to set his house in order, before the proper consequence of such an event befalls him; and he expires at the very moment when he has just completed his preparations to live.

There is another order of secure ones, whose carefulness refers rather to their wealth than their health. There is an awful inviolability of pocket about such men—a provoking guardedness against all the possible appeals of friendship, and all the impulses of benevolence. Such men look as if they were all stanchioned over. La Pucelle itself was not more perfectly fortified than their breeches. A poorer man is apt to feel in their presence as if he were[Pg 96] under an indictment for an intention either to beg or borrow, or, perhaps, to steal from them. He sees something criminative against himself in every impregnable-looking button. Secure ones of this class, perhaps, are bachelors under forty—careful, circumspect men, that have passed through the ordeal of a thousand evening parties without ever being in the least danger. They abstain from marrying, from very fear lest any advantage should be got of them. They cannot enter into the slightest intercourse with a young lady, without letting it appear that they are perfectly on their guard. The most undesigning girl, like the above poor man, feels in their presence as if she were liable to be construed into an absolute “drapery miss.” He is always quite civil, but that is from his very secureness: he knows he is in no danger. An experienced woman gives up a man of this kind at first sight. She sees he is cook’s meat, i. e. that he is to marry a middle-aged kitchen woman at fifty, upon the ground of her proficiency in preparing a beef-steak. The general feeling of the sex regarding this sort of secure one is, “Confound the fellow! does he think that any one cares for him, or would take him though he were willing?”

The secure one, however, does not appear ever to suppose that the ladies have a veto in proposals of marriage. He looks upon them all as a class so eager on capturing and entrapping men, that it never enters into his head that there is such a thing as a rejected offer. The man he considers to be the passive and accepting party; the lady is the besieging enemy, and he is the fortress; the marriage takes place only if he chooses. It may be supposed, then, what would be the state of a secure one’s mind, if he were to relent some fine day in a fit of generosity (a thing only to be supposed in the event of his becoming fey), and in a liberal, candid, honourable manner, offer his hand to a young lady of little fortune, whom he was disposed to think suitable on the score of personal merit alone, but who having some prior attachment to a[Pg 97] man one-half as old, and twice as generous, was under the necessity of only thanking him for the honour. The cook or any thing after that! And how the whole sex would rejoice in his calamity!! “A fellow, forsooth, that has been a living insult to the tribe of womankind all his days. He is well served.”

There is another kind of secure one, considerably different in circumstances from the above—a married man about sixty, with a large family, in which there are several grown daughters. These girls are constantly under his eye. At church he puts them into a pew, and sits down at the door himself, as if he were a kind of serpent guarding the Hesperian fruit. To the eyes of hundreds of young men under twenty, who are not yet considered to be sufficiently settled in the world to marry, these young ladies seem unapproachable as the top of the steeple. They look as if they were absolutely walled round with jealous and secure paternity. One after another they are taken off by middle-aged cousins and other distant relations, about whose “respectability” there can be no doubt; and the young men in the back pew sigh to see that the family is determined upon being self-contained. For it is one of those families, perhaps, who enjoy the credit of a great deal of vague, and not very strictly apportioned wealth, under the clause, “There’s plenty o’ siller amang them;” and who seem as if they would consider the admission of a stranger into the circle as a thing of some danger, however “respectable” he might appear.

It was formerly the fashion in Scotland for every father of a family to take all the people under his care along with him to church, leaving the house locked up till his return. No servant was left to cook the dinner, for it was then judged improper to take a dinner which required cooking. Neither, except in the case of a mere suckling, was it considered necessary to leave any of the children; every brat about the house was taken to church also; if they did not understand what was said by the minister, they at least did not prevent[Pg 101] the attendance of those who did; and moreover—and this was always a great consideration—they were out of harm’s way. One Sunday, in autumn 1719, Sir John Swinton of Swinton, in Berwickshire, was obliged to omit his little daughter Margaret from the flock which usually followed him to church. The child was indisposed with some trifling ailment, which, however, only rendered it necessary that she should keep her room. It was not considered requisite that a servant should be left behind to take charge of her, for she was too sagacious a child to require any such guardianship; and Sir John and Lady Swinton naturally grudged, with the scruples of the age, that the devotions of any adult member of their household should be prevented on such an account. The child, then, was left by herself in one of the upper bed-rooms of the old baronial mansion of Swinton, no other measure being taken for her protection than that of locking the outer door.

For a girl of ten years of age, Margaret Swinton was possessed of much good sense and solidity of character. She heard herself doomed to a solitary confinement of six hours without shrinking; or thought, at least, that she would have no difficulty in beguiling the time by means of her new book—the Pilgrim’s Progress. So long as the steps and voices of her kindred were heard about the house, she felt quite at her ease. But, in reality, the trial was too severe for the nerves of a child of her tender age. When she heard the outer door locked by the last person that left the house, she felt the sound as a knell. The shot of the bolt echoed through the long passages of the empty house with a supernatural loudness; and, next moment after, succeeded that perceptible audible quiet, the breath-like voice of an untenanted mansion, which, like the hum of the vacant shell, seems still as if it were charged with sounds of life. There was no serious occasion for fear, seeing that nothing like real danger could be apprehended; nor was this the proper time for the appearance of supernatural beings: yet the very loneliness of her situation, and the speaking stillness of all[Pg 102] around her, insensibly overspread her mind with that vague negative sensation which is described by the native word eeriness. From her window nothing was visible but the cold blue sky, which was not enlivened by even the occasional transit of a cloud. By and by the desolating wind of autumn began to break upon the moody silence of the hour. It rose in low melancholy gusts, and, whistling monotonously through every chink, spoke to the mind of this little child, of withering woods, and the lengthened excursions of hosts of leaves, hurried on from the scene of their summer pride into the dens and hollows where they were to decay. The sound gradually became more fitful and impetuous, and at last appeared to her imagination as if it were the voice of an enemy who was running round and round the house, in quest of admission—now and then going away as if disappointed and foiled, and anon returning to the attack, and breathing his rage and vexation in at every aperture. She soon found her mind possessed by a numerous train of fantastic fancies and fearful associations, drawn from the store of nursery legends and ballads which she was in the habit of hearing night after night, at the fireside in the hall, and which were infinitely more dreadful than the refined superstitions of modern children. She thought of the black bull of Norway, which went about the world destroying whatever of human life came within its reach; of the weary well at the World’s End, which formed the entrance into new regions, from whence no traveller ever returned; and of the fairies or good neighbours, a small green-coated race of supernatural creatures, who often came to the dwellings of mortals, and did them many good and evil turns. She had been told of persons yet alive, who in their childhood had been led away by these fays into the woods, and fed for weeks with wild berries and the milk of nuts, till at length, by the po’orfu’ preaching of some great country divine, they were reclaimed to their parents, being in such cases generally found sitting under a tree near their own homes. She had heard of a queen of these people—the[Pg 103] Queen of Elfinland—who occasionally took a fancy for fair young maidens, and endeavoured to wile them into her service; and the thought occurred to her, that, as the fairies could enter through the smallest aperture, the house might be full of them at this moment.

For several hours the poor child suffered under these varied apprehensions, till at last she became in some measure desperate, and resolved at least to remove to another part of the house. The parlour below stairs commanded from its window a view of the avenue by which the house was approached; and she conceived that, by planting herself in the embrasure of one of those windows, she would be at the very border of the eerie region within doors, and as near as possible to the scene without, the familiarity of which was in itself calculated to dispel her fears. From that point, also, she would catch the first glimpse of the family returning from church, after which she would no longer be in solitude. Trying, therefore, to think of a merry border tune, she opened her own door, walked along the passage—making as much noise as she could—and tramped sturdily and distinctly down stairs. The room of which she intended to take possession was at the end of a long passage leading from the back to the front of the house. This she traversed slowly—not without fear of being caught from behind by some unimaginable creature of horror; an idea which, on her reaching the chamber door, so far operated upon her, that, yielding to her imaginary terrors, and yet relying for safety upon getting into the parlour, she in the same moment uttered a slight scream and burst half joyfully into the room. Both of these actions scarcely took up more than the space of a single moment, and in another instant she had the door closed and bolted behind her. But what was her astonishment, her terror, and her awe, when, on glancing round the room, she saw distinctly before her, and relieved against the light of the window, the figure of a lady, in splendid apparel, supernaturally tall, and upon whose countenance was depicted[Pg 104] a surprise not less than her own! The girl stood fixed to the spot, her breath suspended, and her eyes wide open, surveying the glorious apparition, whose beauty and fine attire, unlike aught earthly she had ever seen, made her believe it to be an enchanted queen—an imaginary being, of which the idea was suggested to her by one of the nursery tales already alluded to. Fortunately, the associations connected with this personage were rather of a pathetic than an alarming character; and though she still trembled at the idea of being in the presence of a supernatural object, yet as it was essentially beautiful and pleasing, and supposed to be rather in a condition of suffering than in the capacity of an injurer, Margaret Swinton did not experience the extremity of terror, but stood for a few seconds in innocent surprise, till at length the vision completely assured her of its gentle and pacific character, by smiling upon her, and, in a tone of the most winning sweetness, bidding her approach. She then went forward, with timid and slow steps; and becoming convinced that her enchanted queen was neither more nor less than a real lady of this world, soon ceased to regard her with any other sentiment than that of admiration. The lady took her hand, and addressed her by name—at first asking a few unimportant questions, and concluding by telling her that she might speak to her mother of what she had seen, but by no means to say a word upon the subject to any other person, and that under pain of her mother’s certain and severe displeasure. Margaret promised to obey this injunction, and was then desired by the lady to go to the window, to see if the family were yet returning from church. She did so, and found that they were not as yet in sight; when, turning round to give that information to the stranger, she found the room empty, and the lady gone. Her fears then returned in full force, and she would certainly have fainted, if she had not been all at once relieved by the appearance of the family at the head of the avenue, along which the dogs—as regular church-goers as their master—ran barking[Pg 105] towards the house, gratifying her with what she afterwards declared to have been the most welcome sounds that ever saluted her ear.

Miss Swinton, being found out of her own room, was sharply reprimanded by her mother, and taken up stairs to be again confined to the sick-chamber. But before being left there, she found an opportunity of whispering into her mother’s ear, that she had seen a lady in the low parlour. Lady Swinton was arrested by the words, and, immediately dismissing the servant, asked Margaret, in a kindly and confidential tone, what she meant. The child repeated, that in the low parlour she had seen a beautiful lady—an enchanted queen—who had afterwards vanished, but not before having exacted from her a promise that she would say nothing of what she had seen, except to her mother. “Margaret,” said Lady Swinton, “I see you have been a very good girl; and since you are so prudent, I will let you know a little more about this enchanted queen, though her whole story cannot properly be disclosed to you at present.” She then conducted Margaret back to the parlour, pushed aside a sliding panel, and entered a secret chamber, in which the child again saw the tall and beautiful woman, who was now sitting at a table with a large prayer-book open before her. Lady Swinton informed the stranger, that, as Margaret had kept her secret so far according to her desire, she now brought her to learn more of it. “My dear,” said her ladyship, “this lady is unfortunate—her life is sought by certain men; and if you were to tell any of your companions that you have seen her, it might perhaps be the cause of bringing her to a violent death. You could not wish that the enchanted queen should suffer from so silly an error on your part.” Margaret protested, with tears, that she would speak to none of what she had seen; and after some farther conversation, she and her mother retired.

Margaret Swinton never again saw this apparition; but some years afterwards, when she had grown up, and all fears[Pg 106] respecting the unfortunate lady were at an end, she learned the particulars of her story. She was the Mrs Macfarlane alluded to in the motto to this paper; a person whose fatal history made a noise at the time over all Britain, and interested alike the intelligent and the ignorant, the noble and the mean.

Mrs Macfarlane was the only daughter of a gentleman of Roxburghshire, who had perished in the insurrection of 1715. An attempt was made by his surviving friends to save the estate from forfeiture, so that it might have been enjoyed by his orphan daughter, then just emerged into womanhood. But almost all hope of that consummation was soon closed, and, in the meantime, the unfortunate young lady remained in a destitute situation. The only arrangement that could be devised by the generosity of her friends, was to permit her to reside periodically for a certain time in each of their houses—a mode of subsistence from which her spirit recoiled, but to which, for a little while, she was obliged to submit. It was while experiencing all the bitter pangs of a dependent situation, encountered for the first time, and altogether unexpectedly, that Mr Macfarlane, a respectable and elderly law agent, who had been employed by her father, came forward and made an offer of his hand. Glad to escape from the immediate pain of dependency, even at the hazard of permanent unhappiness, she accepted the proposal, although her relations did every thing they could to dissuade her from a match so much beneath her rank. The proud spirit of Elizabeth Ker swelled almost to bursting, when she entered the dwelling of her low-born husband; and the humble marriage-feast which was there placed before her, seemed in her eyes as the first wages of her degradation. But her own reflections might have been endured, and in time subdued, if they had not been kept awake by the ungenerous treatment which she received from all her former friends. The pride of caste was at this period unbroken in Scotland, and it rigorously demanded the exclusion of “the doer’s wife” from all the circles in which[Pg 107] she had previously moved. The stars made a conspiracy to banish the sun. If Mrs Macfarlane had been educated properly, she would have been able to repel scorn with scorn, and, in these tergiversations of the narrow-spirited great, would have only seen their degradation, not her own. But under her deceased mother, a scion of a better house than even her father’s, she had grown up in the full participation of all the ridiculous notions as to caste, and of course was herself deeply sensible of the advantages she had forfeited. Rendered irritable in the highest degree by consciousness of her own loss, she received every slight thrown upon her by society into her innermost heart, where it festered and fed upon her very vitals. She found that she had fallen, that the step was irretrievable; and as factitious degradation, imposed by the forms of society, always in a short time becomes real, her character suffered a material deterioration. She took refuge from offended self-love in a spirit of hatred and contempt for her fellow-matrons, and began to entertain feelings from which, in earlier and happier years, she would have shrunk as from actual crime.

There was at least one branch of the better sort of Edinburgh society which never manifested any disinclination to her acquaintance. This was the class of loose young men of good birth, who daily paraded at the Cross with flowing periwigs and glancing canes, and nightly drowned their senses in a vulgar debauch, from which they occasionally awoke in the morning with the duty of settling scores by a rencontre in St Ann’s Yards, or at St Leonard’s Crags. This set of brawlers, the proper successors of those drunken cavaliers who disgraced a preceding age, subsisted in a state of pure antagonism to the stayed and decorous habits of the general community; many of them were literally the children of cavaliers, and indebted in a great measure for their idle way of life to the circumstances of the government, which dictated an exclusive distribution of its patronage among its own adherents, and of course left the poor Jacobites[Pg 108] exposed to all the temptations of idleness. Dicing and golfing were the employments of their forenoons; in the evening they would stagger from table into Heriot’s Green, or Lady Murray’s garden in the Canongate, where they would make a point of staring out of countenance such sober citizens and their daughters as ventured to frequent those fashionable promenades. According to a Presbyterian writer of the day, they sent to London regularly for the last fashions and the newest oaths; but perhaps the latter part of the report is only a scandal. If such personages were to revive now-a-days, and appear some forenoon among the modern beaux esprits of Prince’s Street, they would be looked upon, with their long wide-skirted coats, and buckles, and cravats, as a set of the most solemn looking gentlemen; but in their own time, there were no ideas associated with them but those of reckless, hot-headed youth, and daily habits the most opposite to those of decency and virtue.

Mrs Macfarlane, while she sunk from the society of gentlewomen of her own rank, still retained such acquaintance as she had ever happened to possess, of their wild sons and brothers. With them, she was in her turn an object of great interest, on account of her transcendant beauty, or rather its fame—for the fame with such persons is of far more importance than the reality. It was not disagreeable to Mrs Macfarlane, when she walked with her husband on the Castle Hill, and found herself passed with dry recognition by persons of her own sex, to be made up to by some long-waisted Sir Harry Wildair, who, in language borrowed from Congreve or Farquhar, protested that the sun was much aided in his efforts to illuminate the world by the light of her eyes. A rattle of the fan was the least favour that could be dispensed in reward for such a compliment; and then would ensue a conversation, perhaps only interrupted by a declaration from Mr Macfarlane, that he felt the air getting rather cold, and was afraid to stay out any longer on account of his rheumatism.[Pg 109] The society of these fops was never farther encouraged by Mrs Macfarlane; indeed, it was only agreeable to her in public places, where it consoled her a little for the ungenerous slights of more respectable persons. Yet it had some effect upon her reputation, and was partly the cause of all her misfortunes.

About two years after the insurrection of 1715, the host of Edinburgh fops received an important accession in Mr George Cayley, a young English gentleman, who was sent down as one of the commissioners upon the forfeited estates. Cayley brought with him a considerable stock of cash, an oath of recent coinage, said to be very fashionable in Pall Mall, and a vest of peculiar cut, which he had lately got copied at Paris from an original belonging to the Regent Orleans. As he also brought a full complement of the most dissolute personal habits, he might be considered as recommended in the strongest manner to the friendship of the native beaux; if, indeed, his accomplishments were not apt rather to produce displeasure from their superiority. Some days after his arrival, he was introduced to Mrs Macfarlane, to whom he was an object of some interest on account of his concern in the disposal of her father’s estate. If she felt an interest in him on this account, he was not the less struck by her surpassing beauty and elegant manners, which appeared to him alike thrown away upon her husband, and the city in which she dwelt. He rushed home from the first interview in a state of mind scarcely to be imagined. That such a glorious creature should squander her light upon the humble house of an attorney, when she seemed equally fit to illuminate the halls of a palace, was in his eyes a perversion of the designs of nature. He wished that it was in his power to fly with her away—away from all the scenes where either was known, to some place far over this world’s wilderness, where every consciousness might be lost, except that of mutual love. Over and over again he deplored the artificial bonds imposed by human laws, and protected by the virtuous part of the human[Pg 110] race, by which hearts the most devoted to each other were often condemned to eternal separation. His heart, he found, was possessed by sensations such as had never before moved it. It worshipped its object as a kind of idol, instead of, as formerly, regarding it as a toy. He flung himself in idea before the shrine of her splendour, in breathless, boundless, despairing passion.

It is probable that if Cayley had been fortunate enough to meet Mrs Macfarlane before she was married, he might have been inspired with an attachment equally devoted, and which, being indulged innocently, might have had the effect of purifying him from all his degrading vices, and raising him into a worthy member of society. As it was, the passion which, in proper circumstances, is apt to refine and humanise, only lent a frantic earnestness to his usual folly. He made it his endeavour to obtain as much of her society as possible—an object in which he was greatly favoured by his official character, which caused him to be treated with much less coolness by Mr Macfarlane than was otherwise to have been expected. That individual had not altogether lost hope of regaining the property to which his wife was entitled, and he therefore met Mr Cayley’s advances with more than corresponding warmth, every other sentiment being for the time subordinate to this important object. The young Englishman, in order to cultivate this delightful intimacy with the greater convenience, removed from his former lodgings to a house directly opposite to Mrs Macfarlane’s, in the High Street, where, at such times as a visit was out of the question, he would sit for hours watching patiently for the slightest glimpse of her through the windows, and judging even a momentary gleam of her figure within the dim glass as an ample compensation for his pains. He now became much less lively than before—forsook, in some measure, the company of his gay contemporaries—and seemed, in short, the complete beau ideal of the melancholy, abstracted lover. It was his custom to spend most of his evenings in Mrs Macfarlane’s house; and,[Pg 111] except during those too quickly flying hours, time was to him the greatest misery. Existence was only existence in that loved presence; the rest was a state of dormancy or watchfulness only to be spent in pain. If he applied at all to the business for which he was commissioned by the government, it was only to that part of it which related to the inheritance of Mrs Macfarlane, in order that he might every night have an excuse for calling upon that lady, to inform her of the progress he was making in her cause. His attachment in that quarter was soon whispered abroad in society; and while it served as a grateful theme for the tongues of Mrs Macfarlane’s former compeers, the favour with which he seemed to be received was equally the subject of envy to the young men, few of whom had ever found much countenance in her house, for want of something to recommend them equally to her husband.

Scarcely any thing is calculated to have so deteriorating an effect upon the mind as the constant fret of an unlawful passion. In every one of the clandestine and stealthy operations by which it is sought to be gratified, a step is gained in the downward descent towards destruction. Cayley, who was not naturally a man of wicked dispositions, and who might have been reclaimed by this passion, had it been virtuous, from all his trivial follies, gradually became prepared, by the emotions which convulsed his bosom, for an attempt involving the honour of his adored mistress, and, consequently, her whole happiness in life, as well as that of many innocent individuals with whom she was connected. This he now only waited for an opportunity of carrying into effect, and it was not long ere it was afforded.

Called by the urgent request of a Highland client, Mr Macfarlane had left town somewhat suddenly, and was not expected to return for upwards of a week. During his absence, Mrs Macfarlane endeavoured to repress the attentions of Mr Cayley as much as possible, from a sense of propriety, and contented herself with a kind of society—dumb, yet eloquent—which she felt to be much more fit[Pg 112] for her situation—the society of her infant child. One evening, however, as she sat with her tender charge hushed to sleep upon her bosom, Mr Cayley was unexpectedly ushered in, notwithstanding that she had given directions for his exclusion after a certain hour, now past. To add to her distress, he appeared a little excited, as she thought, by liquor, but, in reality, by nothing but the burning and madly imprudent passion which had taken possession of him. He sat down, and gazed at her for a few moments without speaking, while she remonstrated against this unseasonable intrusion. She then rung her bell, in order to chide her servant for disobedience of her orders; but Mr Cayley tranquilly told her, that he had taken the liberty of sending the girl away upon an errand.

“In the name of heaven,” said the lady, “what do you mean?”

“I mean, my dear Madam,” answered he, “to have a little conversation with you upon a subject of great importance to us both, and which I should like to discuss without the possibility of interruption. Know, Madam, that, ever since I first saw you, I have fondly, madly loved you. You are become indispensable to my existence; and it depends upon you whether I shall hereafter be the most happy or the most miserable of men.”

“Mr Cayley,” cried the lady, “what foolery is this? You are not in your senses—you have indulged too much in liquor. For heaven’s sake, go home; and to-morrow you will have forgot that such ideas ever possessed your brain.”

“No, never, my angel!” cried he, “can I forget that I have seen and loved you. I might sleep for ages; and, if I awakened at all, it would be with your image imprinted as strongly as ever upon my heart. You now see a man prepared for the most desperate courses in order to obtain you. Listen for a moment. In the neighbourhood, a coach stands ready to carry us far from every scene where you have hitherto been known. Consent, and I procure[Pg 113] for you (which is now within my power) a reversal of your father’s attainder. You shall again possess the domains where your fathers for ages back have been held in almost regal veneration, and where you spent the pleasant years of your own youth. Deny me, and to-morrow your reputation is blasted for ever. The least plausible tale, you well know, would be received and believed by society, if told respecting Mrs Macfarlane.”

“Profligate wretch!” exclaimed the unfortunate lady; “can I believe my ears when they tell me that such wickedness exists in a human bosom? Look, Sir, at this infant—were there no principles of virtue within me to dictate a contemptuous rejection of your proposals, do you think that I could leave this innocent to pine and die under the cold neglect of strangers, or to survive to a less blessed life with the stigma of a disgraced mother fixed for ever upon her? Were I the basest woman that ever lived, as you seem to think me, would nature permit so awful a violation of her laws? Could I leave my child, and not next moment be struck dead by fire from heaven for my crime? The alternative, indeed, is awful. Well you know the point upon which I am most easily affected. Base, however, as you avow yourself, I cannot yet suppose that you could be guilty of a trick so worthy of the devil himself, as to blast the reputation, where you could not fix the real cause of infamy.”

“Do not flatter yourself too much on that score,” rejoined Cayley; “you do not now see a man actuated by ordinary principles. I am tortured and confounded by an impetuous passion, which you have excited. If you take from me all hope of a consent to my first proposal, I must endeavour to bring you into my power by the second. To-morrow, did I say? Nay, I will go this night, and tell every man I know that you are the slave of my passion. Not a lady in Edinburgh but will know of it to-morrow before she has left her pillow. You will then, I think, see[Pg 114] the necessity of consenting to the scheme of flight which I now put into your power.”

He pronounced these words in such a disordered and violent manner, that the unhappy lady sat for some time unable to reply. She hardly recovered her senses till she heard the outer door clang behind him, as he went upon the demoniac purpose which he had threatened.

The first place that Mr Cayley went to was John’s Coffeehouse, a fashionable tavern in the Parliament Square, where he found a large group of his dissolute young friends, drinking claret out of silver stoups. The company was in an advanced stage of intoxication and riot, very much to the annoyance, apparently, of a few smaller knots of decent citizens, who were indulging in some more moderate potations after the fatigues of the day, and endeavouring to understand as much as they could of the London Intelligencer, the Flying Post, and other little sheets of news which lay upon the various tables. “Well, Cayley,” cried one of the young roisterers, “come and tell us how you are getting on now with the fair lady over the way—husband not at home—must be making great advances, I suppose?” “Make yourself quite at ease on that subject; I am so, I assure you.” This he said in so significant a tone, that it was at once understood. A flood of raillery, however, was immediately opened upon him; no one would believe what he said, or rather implied; and thus, as they designed, he was drawn to make much more explicit declarations of his supposed triumph. No attempt was made by himself or others to conceal the subject of their conversation from the rest of the individuals present. It was understood distinctly by the sober citizens above mentioned, some of whom shrugged their shoulders, knocked their cocked hats firmly down upon their heads, took staff in hand, and strode consequentially and indignantly out of the room. As Cayley had predicted, the whole affair was blazoned abroad before next morning.

[Pg 115]

Mrs Macfarlane, as might be supposed, enjoyed little sleep after the agitations of the preceding evening. She could hardly believe that anything so wicked as what had been threatened by Mr Cayley could be perpetrated by a being in human shape; but yet, recollecting the extraordinary state in which he seemed to be, she could not altogether assure herself of the contrary. In the forenoon she went to pay a visit in a distant part of the town; and she could not help remarking, that while she seemed to have become an object of additional interest to the male sex, the ladies, even those with whom she had formerly been on terms of civil recognition, averted their eyes from her, with an expression, as she thought, of contempt.

The lady upon whom she called received her in the coldest manner, and, on an explanation being asked, did not hesitate to mention what she had heard as the town’s talk that morning, namely, that Mr Cayley professed himself to be her favoured lover. The unfortunate lady burst into a passion of tears and lamentations at this intelligence, protested her innocence a thousand times, and declared herself to be only the victim of a profligate; but still she saw that she did not produce an entirely exculpatory effect upon the mind of her friend. She went home in a state of distress bordering on despair. Her early misfortunes through the severity of the government; her dependent situation in the houses of her kinsfolk; her unhappy marriage to a man she could never love; and, finally, the cruel coldness with which she had been treated by her former friends in the days of her depression, all recurred upon her mind, and united with the more awful grief which had now overtaken her, prepared her mind for the most desperate resolutions.

Early in the afternoon she sent a note to Mr Cayley, requesting, in the usual terms, the favour of his company. The receipt of her billet threw him into transports of joy, for he believed that his scheme had already taken effect, and that she was now prepared to accede to his proposals.[Pg 116] He therefore dressed himself in his best style, and at the proper hour (he felt too secure of his prey to go sooner) walked across the street to his appointment. He was shown into a room at the back of the house, where he had never before been, and where there was little furniture besides a picture of Mrs Macfarlane, painted by Sir John Medina, an Italian artist who long practised his trade at the Scottish capital. This portrait, which he began to gaze upon with all the enthusiasm of a lover, represented his mistress in a style and manner strikingly beautiful. The utmost serenity, united with the utmost innocence, shone in those sweetly noble features. The fair open brow glowed like the summer sky, calmly and cloudlessly beautiful. The eyes shone with the lustre of gladness and intelligence, and the whole expression was resolved into an exquisite and killing smile. The lover stood in a sort of transport before this image of all he held dear on earth, as if he were yielding to an idolatrous contemplation of its extraordinary loveliness, when the door was opened—and behold the original! Instead of the voluptuous smile which shone on the canvass of Medina, a Beautiful Fury stood before him—a Hecate not yet grown old. He started with horror; for not only did she bear in her countenance the most threatening ensigns of passion, but she carried in her hand two large pistols, one of which she held extended to him, while with the other hand she locked the door behind her, at the same time keeping a watchful and glaring eye upon her victim.

“Wretch,” she said, “you have ruined one who never did you wrong. You have destroyed me as completely as if you had stretched me lifeless beneath your hand. More than this, you have rendered others who are dear to me unhappy for ever. My child—you have deprived her of the nurture of a mother; you have fixed upon her name a stain which will never be washed out. And yet for all this, society, cruel as it is to the victims, provides no punishment—hardly even any censure—to the criminal. Were it[Pg 117] now my will to permit you, you might walk away scatheless from the fair scene you have ravaged, with nothing to disturb your triumph, but the lamentations of so many broken hearts. You shall not, however, enjoy this triumph—for here you shall die!”

Cayley had stood for a few moments, gazing alternately at her face and at the weapon she held extended towards him. He heard her address as if he had heard it not. But at the last word, he recovered a little of his presence of mind, and made an effort to approach her. She at that moment fired, but without effect. The effort of drawing the trigger had depressed the muzzle of the weapon, and the ball entered the floor at his feet. She lost not an instant to present and fire the other, the shot of which penetrated his breast, and he fell next moment before her, with but one indistinct murmur of agony—and then all was still.

One brief embrace to her child—a moment at the toilet to arrange her travelling dress, which she had previously prepared, and the beautiful murderess was ready to fly. She instantly left town for the south, and, as already mentioned, received shelter and concealment in the house of her distant kinsman, Sir John Swinton. How long she was there protected, is not known, but it was probably as long as the search of justice continued to be in the least eager. It was always understood, by those aged persons who knew her story, and from whom the preceding facts have chiefly been derived, that she ultimately escaped to some remote continental state, where she was supported by contributions from her relations. So closes one of the most tragical tales that stain the domestic annals of Scotland during the last century.

Side by side with victims, might be placed the kindred species downdraughts, who are only different from the accident of their having friends who will rather be weighed down by them to the very earth—to the grave itself—than permit them to sink by themselves. The downdraught is in reality a victim, and one of the darkest shade, being generally a person totally worthless in character, and abandoned in habits; but then he has not altogether cut the cables which bound him to his native grade in society—he has not all forgot himself to disgrace—he is still domesticated with his friends—he has a mother, or a wife, or a brother, or a sister, or perhaps an old aunt, who will try to keep him in food and clean linen, and, having lost all hope of his ever being actively good, will do anything for him, if he will only preserve a neutrality, and not be positively evil. He is a victim in appearance (always excepting the clean shirt), but he enjoys the happy superiority over that class, of having an open door to fly to when he pleases, and either a kind relation, who considers him “only a little wild in the meantime,” or else one who, for the sake of decent appearances, will endeavour to patch up all his peccadiloes, and even be tyrannised over by him, rather than shock society by an open rupture. The personal tendencies of a downdraught to victimization are strong as the currents of the great deep, but he is withheld from it by others. He has always some anchorage or other upon decent life, to keep him back from the gulf to which he would otherwise hurry on. In many cases, the very kindness and indulgence of friends was the original cause of his becoming a downdraught. He had every thing held to his head. He was encouraged in his pretences of headaches as an excuse for staying away from school. When afterwards an apprentice, he was permitted to break off,[Pg 119] on the score of being compelled to put on fires and sweep out the shop. Or, perhaps, it was from none of those causes. Possibly, he was just one of those persons who seem to be totally destitute of all perception of the terms upon which men are permitted to exist in this world; that is, that they are either to be so fortunate as to have “their fathers born before them,” so that they may accede to wealth without exertion, or must else do something to induce their fellow-creatures to accord them the means of livelihood without beggary. That many persons are really born without this great leading faculty, is unfortunately but too indisputable; and, assuredly, they are as proper inmates for a lunatic asylum as more frantic madmen; for what is the use of reason, or even of talent, without the desire of exerting it, either in one’s own behalf, or in behalf of mankind? The terms of existence we allude to are expressed in the text of Scripture, “By the sweat of thy brow thou shalt earn thy bread;” so that the man must be considered a kind of heretic, as well as a fool, who will not, or can not, understand them. Yet the fact is so, that many men arrive at maturity with either a sense of these conditions of life, more or less imperfect, or no sense of them at all. They perhaps conceive themselves to be born to keep down the pavement of Prince’s Street with boots one inch and a half deep in the heel, or to fumigate the air of that elegant street with cigars at three shillings per dozen; but that is the utmost extent to which their notions of the purposes of life ever extend. These men, of course, are predestined downdraughts. We see them already with our mind’s eye, exhausting the kindness and patience of a brother, or a wife, yea almost of a mother, with their idle and dissolute habits—dragging those relations slowly but surely down into misery and disgrace—and only in the meantime saved from being kicked out of doors, as they deserve, not by any regard for merits of their own, for they have none, but by the tenderness of those relations for their own reputation.

[Pg 120]

A decent citizen, of the name of Farney, retired about five-and-twenty years ago from active life, and, planting himself in a neat villa a little way beyond the southern suburbs of Edinburgh, resolved to do nothing all the rest of his life but enjoy the ten or twelve thousand pounds which he had made by business. He was a placid, inoffensive old man, only somewhat easy in his disposition, and, therefore, too much under the control of his wife, who unfortunately was a person of a vulgarly ambitious character. The pair had but one child—a daughter, Eliza Farney—the toast of all the apprentices in the South Bridge, and really an elegant, and not unaccomplished young lady. The only object which Mr and Mrs Farney now had in life, besides that of enjoying all its comforts, was the disposal of this young lady in marriage. Whenever there is such a thing as ten thousand pounds connected with the name of a young lady, there is generally a great deal more fuss made about it than when the sum is said to exist in any other shape or circumstances. It is important in the eyes of all the young men who think themselves within shot of it. It is important in the eyes of all the young women who have to lament that they do not possess similar advantages. It is important in the eyes of all the fathers and mothers of sons, who think themselves within range of it. And, lastly, it is important, immensely important indeed, in the eyes of parties, young lady, mother and father, sister or brother, who have anything to say in the disposal of it. Money in this shape, one would almost think, is of a different value from money in any other: the exchange it bears against cash in business, or cash in the prospect of him who knows he can win it, is prodigious. At the very lowest computation, a thousand pounds in the purse of a young lady is worth ten thousand in the stock of a man of trade. Nay, it is astonishing what airs we have known a few hundred pounds of this kind put on in respect, or rather disrespect, of decent people, who were almost winning as much in the year. In fact, the fiddle-faddle about the[Pg 121] disposal of an heiress is a great farce, and never fails to put either the parties concerned in the disposal, or else the candidates for the acquisition, into a thousand shabby and selfish attitudes. It is hard to say if the young lady herself is the better for it all. The only certain effect of her possessing a fortune, is, that it deprives her of ever having the pleasing assurance, given to most other women, that she is married for her own sake alone. Sincere love is apt to retire from such a competition, through the pure force of modesty, its natural accompaniment; and the man most apt to be successful is he who, looking upon the affair as only a mercantile adventure, pursues it as such, and only hopes to be able to fall in love after marriage.

It happened that Eliza Farney was loved, truly and tenderly loved, by a young man of the name of Russell, whose parents had been acquainted with the Farneys in their earlier and less prosperous days, but were now left a little behind them. Young Russell had been the playmate of Eliza in their days of childhood; he had read books with her, and taught her to draw, in their riper youth; and all the neighbours said, that, but for the brilliant prospects of Miss Farney, she could not have found a more eligible match. Russell, however, was still but the son of a poor man. He was himself struggling in the commencement of a business, which he had begun with slender means, in order to sustain the declining fortunes of his parents. His walk in life was much beneath the scope of his abilities, much beneath his moral deserts; but, under a strong impulse of duty, he had narrowed his mind to the path allotted to him, instead of attempting to do justice to his talents by entering upon any higher and more perilous pursuit. Thus, as often happens, an intellect and character, which might have brightened the highest destinies, were doomed to a sphere all unmeet for them, where they were in a manner worse than lost, as they only led to a suspicion which was apt to be unfavourable to the prospects of their possessor, namely, that he was likely to[Pg 122] be led, by his superior tastes, into pursuits to which his fortune was inadequate, or into habits which would shipwreck it altogether. Russell looked upon Eliza Farney, and despaired. He saw her, as she advanced into womanhood, recede gradually from his sphere in society, and enter into one more suitable to her father’s improving fortunes, into which it was not for him to intrude. Eliza had, perhaps, entertained at one time a girlish fondness for him; but it was not of so strong a character as to resist the ambitious maxims of her mother, and the sense of her own importance and prospects, which began to act upon her in her riper years.

Some appearance of coldness, which he saw, or fancied he saw, in her conduct towards him, caused his proud and pure nature to shrink back from the vulgar competition which he saw going forward for the hand of “the heiress.” It was not that the fondest wishes of his heart were met with disappointment—perhaps he could have endured that—but he writhed under the reflection, that external circumstances should separate hearts that once were allied, and that no conscious purity of feeling, no hope of hereafter distinguishing himself by his abilities, was of avail against the selfish and worldly philosophy which dictated his rejection. It was only left for him to retire into the chambers of his own thoughts, and there form such solemn resolutions for improving his circumstances and distinguishing his character, as might hereafter, perhaps, enable him to prove to the cold being who now despised him, how worthy, how more than worthy, perhaps, he was of having enjoyed her affections, even upon the mean calculations by which he was now measured and found wanting.

The mother, to whom this rupture was chiefly owing, now applied herself heartily to the grand task of getting her daughter “properly disposed of.” Every month or so, her house was turned topsy-turvy, for the purpose of[Pg 123] showing off the young lady in gay assemblies. Care was taken that no one should be invited to these assemblies who was merely of their own rank. Unless some capture could be made in a loftier, or what appeared a loftier circle, it was all as nothing. The human race hang all in a concatenation at each other’s skirts, those before kicking with all their might to drive off those behind them, at the same time that they are struggling might and main, despite of corresponding kicks, to hold fast, and pull themselves up by means of their own predecessors. This is particularly the case where a mother has a daughter to dispose of with the reversion of a few thousands. Money under these circumstances, as already explained, would be absolutely thrown away if given only to a person who estimated it at its ordinary value; it must be given to one who will appreciate it as it ought to be, and sell pounds of free-will and honourable manhood for shillings of the vile dross. At length, at a ball held in the Archers’ Hall—a kind of Almack’s in the east—the very man was met with—a genteel young spark, said to be grand-nephew to a baronet in the north, and who was hand in glove with the Greigsons, a family of quis quis gentility in the New Town, but who loomed very large in the eyes of a person dwelling in the south side. This fellow, a mere loose adventurer, whose highest destiny seemed to be to carry a pair of colours if he could get them, and who positively had no claims upon consideration whatsoever, except that he kept a decent suit of clothes upon his back, and was on terms of intimacy with a family supposed to belong to the haut ton—this poor unanealed wretch, recommended by impudence and a moustache, which he amiably swore he would take off when married, gained the prize from which the modest merit of Russell was repelled. In a perfect fluster of delight with the attentions he paid to her daughter, terrified lest he should change his mind, or any unforeseen event prevent the consummation so devoutly to be wished, the managing mother presented no obstruction to the courtship.[Pg 124] “Such a genteel young man!” she would say to her husband. “He is greatly taken out in good company. Just the night before last, he was at the Honourable Mrs ——’s party in Oman’s Rooms. He danced with Miss Forster, the great heiress, who, they say, is distractedly in love with him. But he says she has naething like the elegant carriage o’ our ’Liza. Indeed, between you and me, says he, jokingly, to me the other day, she’s splay-footed. He could make his fortune at once, you see, however, and I’m sure it’s really extraordinary o’ him to particulareese the like o’ us in the way he’s doing”—and so forth. The old man sat twirling his thumbs and saying nothing, but having his own fears all the time that all was not really gold that glittered. He was, however, one of those people who, upon habit and principle, never say a single word about any speculative thing that is proposed to them, till the result has been decided, and then they can tell that they all along thought it would turn out so. It was untelling the prescience and wisdom that old Farney believed himself to be thus possessed of. Suffice it to say, the managing mother, within the month, made out a mittimus of destruction in favour of her daughter, Eliza Farney, spinster, consigning her to the custody of William Dempster, Esq., blackguard by commission, and downdraught by destiny.

The fortune of Miss Farney was not exactly of the kind that suited Mr Dempster’s views. It was only payable after the death of her father. Mr Dempster, therefore, saw it to be necessary to take expedients for obtaining the use of it by anticipation. He commenced a large concern in some mercantile line, obtaining money in advance from the old gentleman, in order to set the establishment on foot. He also procured his signature to innumerable bills, to enable him to carry it on. The business, in reality, was a mere mask for obtaining the means of supporting his own depraved tastes and appetites. There was hardly any kind of extravagance, any kind of vice,[Pg 125] which he did not indulge in at the expense of old Farney. The result was what might be expected from such premises. Exactly a twelvemonth after the marriage, Dempster stopped payment, and absconded without so much as even taking leave of his wife. His folly and profligacy together had already absorbed the whole fortune with which Mr Farney had retired from business, besides a good deal more for which the unfortunate old man was security. He was in consequence totally ruined, left destitute in old age, without the least resource; while the young elegant female, who a short year before was the admiration and envy of glittering circles, had just become a mother, upon the bed which only waited for her convalescence to be sold for behoof of her husband’s creditors.

Farney found refuge—and considered himself most fortunate in finding it—in a beneficiary institution for decayed citizens, of which he had himself, in better days, been one of the managers, but which he did not live long to enjoy. His wife, about the same time, died of one of those numberless and varied diseases which can only be traced to what is called a broken heart. The daughter—the unhappy, and, in a great measure, guiltless victim of her wretched ambition—had no eventual resource, for the support of herself and her infant, but to open a small school, in which she taught female children the elements of reading, writing, and sewing. The striking infelicity of her fate, joined to her own well-known taste and industrious habits, in time obtained for her considerable patronage in this humble occupation; and she would eventually have been restored to something like comfort, but for the unhallowed wretch whose fate had become identified with her own. Where this fellow went, or how he subsisted, for the three years during which he was absent, no one ever knew. He was heard to talk of the smugglers in the Isle of Man, but it can only be surmised that he joined that respectable corps. One day, as Mrs Dempster sat in the midst of her little flock of pupils, the door was opened, and in crawled her[Pg 126] prodigal husband, emaciated, travel-worn, and beggar-like, with a large black spot upon one of his cheeks, the result of some unimaginably low and scoundrelly brawl. The moment she recognised him, she fainted in her chair; the children dispersed and fled from the house, like a flock of chickens at sight of the impending hawk; and when the unfortunate woman recovered, she found herself alone with this transcendant wretch, the breaker of the peace of her family, the murderer of her mother. He accosted her in the coolest manner possible, said he was glad to see her so comfortably situated, and expressed an anxiety for food and liquor. She went with tottering steps to purvey what he wanted; and while she was busied in her little kitchen, he sat down by her parlour fire, and commenced smoking from a nasty black pipe, after the manner of the lowest mendicants. When food and drink were set before him, he partook of both with voracious appetite. Mrs Dempster sat looking on in despair, for she saw that the presence of this being must entirely blight the pleasant scene which her industry had created around her. She afterwards said, however, that she could have perhaps overlooked all, and even again loved this deplorable wretch, if he had inquired for his child, or expressed a desire to see him. He did neither—he seemed altogether bent on satisfying his own gross appetites. After spending a few hours in sulky unintermitted smoking and drinking, he was conveyed to a pallet in the garret, there to sleep off his debauch.

It were needless to go through all the distressing details of what ensued. Dempster henceforth became a downdraught on his wife. This forlorn woman often confessed to her friends that she was perfectly willing to support her husband, provided he would be but content with the plain fare she could offer him, and just walk about and do nothing. But he was not of a temper to endure this listlessness. He required excitement. Instead of quietly spending his forenoons in the arbour, called the Cage, in the[Pg 127] Meadows, among decayed military pensioners, and other harmless old men, he prowled about the crowded mean thoroughfares, drinking where he could get liquor for nothing, and roistering in companies of the most debased description. He incurred debts in all directions on the strength of his wife’s character, and she was necessarily compelled to liquidate them. The struggles which she at this time made were very great. Like the mother of Gray the poet, she endured all kinds of ill usage, and persevered under every difficulty to give her son a respectable education, in order that he might have an opportunity of wiping away the stains of his father’s vices, and be a comfort to his mother in the decline of life. To do this, and at the same time continue paying the vile debts of her profligate husband, was altogether impossible. She exhausted the beneficence, and even tired the pity of her friends. It need hardly be mentioned, that the creditors of a husband have an undeniable claim upon the effects of his wife. It unfortunately happened that the wretches with whom Dempster contracted his debts, were as worthless as himself. After draining every resource which his wife could command, he summed up his villainy by giving a promissory note for fifteen pounds to one of his lowest associates. It is supposed that he struck the bargain for a couple of guineas, for with this sum he again absconded from Edinburgh, and, taking his way to Greenock, shipped himself on board of a vessel for America. At first, his wife was thankful for the relief; she again breathed freely; but her joy was soon turned into mourning. The promissory note made its appearance; she had just scraped up and paid her rent; she had not therefore a farthing in the world. In a fortnight, the whole of her effects were sold upon distraint. She was turned to the street a second time, almost bent to the dust with the burden of her miseries. The first night she received shelter in the house of a respectable “much-tried” widow, who was the only person she could freely speak to about her destitute condition. Next day,[Pg 128] by the advice of this good woman, she took a room in the neighbourhood, and endeavoured to gather together her pupils, who, it seems, did not desert her, but took a deep interest in her misfortunes. She had also the good fortune to get her boy into one of the educational hospitals, and she therefore expressed herself thankful for the mercies she still received.

An interval of many years now occurs in the story of Mrs Dempster, during which she heard nothing of her husband, except a rumour that he was drowned on a lumbering excursion in the rapids of the St Lawrence. Through the influence of her pitiable tale and real merit, she obtained the situation of superintendant of a large public seminary for young ladies in a country town. Here she lived in peace, comfort, and honour, for some years, till she had almost forgot that ever such a wretch as Dempster existed. What was her horror one day, when, as she was entertaining a large party of respectable people at tea, the demon of her fate stood once more before her, not the mere squalid beggar which he formerly appeared, but a concentration of blackguardism and shabbiness, of utterly ruined and broken-down humanity, such as was never perhaps surpassed, even in the sinks of London and Parisian vice. There was now more than mendicancy in his aspect—there was robbery, murder, and every kind of desperate deed. The wan face, blackened and battered with bruises and wounds—the troubled eye, bespeaking the troubled spirit—the ropy, sooty attire, through which peeped the hardly whiter skin—the feet bare, and ulcerated with walking—every thing told but one tale of unutterable sin and misery. The guests shrunk aghast from this hideous spectre, and the hostess shrieked outright. Little regarding the alarm which he had occasioned, he exclaimed, in a hollow and scarcely earthly voice, “Give me meat—give me drink—give me clothing—I am destitute of all; there you sit in enjoyment of every luxury, while your husband, who is flesh of your flesh, has not known what it is to eat heartily, or to be[Pg 129] covered from the piercing wind, for weeks and months. Shrink not from me. Wretched as I seem, I am still your husband. Nothing on earth can break that tie. Meat, I say—drink—I am in my own house, and will be obeyed. For you, gentles, get you gone; your company is not now agreeable.” The company dispersed without farther ceremony, leaving the unhappy woman alone with her husband.

Next day, the stranger appeared abroad in a decent suit of clothes, and Mrs Dempster seemed to have recovered a little of her equanimity. Every sacrifice, however, which she could make for this wretch, was in vain, or only encouraged him to demand greater indulgences. An unlimited supply of liquor in his own house would not satisfy him. He required large sums wherewith to treat all the canaille of the town. Entreaties, indulgences, every thing that could be devised to gratify him, were unavailing to impress him with a sense of his wife’s situation. He intruded his unhallowed front into her school, and insulted her before her pupils. Those who laughed at his antics he would seize by the shoulders, and turn out of doors. He had also a most perverse desire of pushing himself into her presence, whenever he thought she was conversing with any of her employers, before whom an observance of propriety and decorum was most particularly necessary. Indeed, he just delighted to do exactly what his wife wished him not to do, the grand object of his low mind being to show how much he had her comfort and welfare in his power. At length, with every feeling of respect for Mrs Dempster, her employers, the magistrates, found it necessary to inform her, that they could not permit her to retain the school any longer under such circumstances, as it was threatened with utter annihilation by the gradual diminution of the number of pupils. She proposed to her husband to allow him regularly the full half of her earnings, if he would only stay in some other place, and never again intrude upon her. But he scorned to be bought off, as he said. He insisted rather upon her giving up the school, and accompanying[Pg 130] him to Edinburgh, where, with the little sum she had saved, and what besides they could raise by the sale of her superfluous furniture, he would enter into business on his own account, and she should never again be obliged to work for either herself or for him. The poor woman had no alternative. She was compelled to abandon the scene, where for so many years she had enjoyed the comforts of life and the respect of society, in order to be dragged at the chariot wheels, or rather at the cart’s tail, of her husband’s vices and fortunes, through scenes to which she shuddered to look forward.

In the capital, Dempster’s design of entering into business, if he ever seriously entertained it, was no more talked of. Fleshed once again with a taste of his former indulgences, he rushed headlong into that infamous career, which already had twice ended in voluntary banishment. His wife’s finances were soon exhausted; but, with the barbarity of a demon taskmaster, he would every day leave her with a threat, which she but too well knew he would execute, of beating her, if she should not be able to produce next morning a sum necessary for the gratification of his wretched appetites. It was now in vain to attempt that mode of subsistence by which she had hitherto supported herself. So long as she was haunted by this evil genius, that was impracticable. By the interest, however, of some of her former friends, she obtained a scanty and precarious employment for her needle, by which she endeavoured to supply the cravings of her husband, and her own simpler wants. From morning early, through the whole day, and till long after midnight, this modest and virtuous woman would sit in her humble lodging, painfully exerting herself at a tedious and monotonous task, that she might be able to give to her husband in the morning that sum, without which she feared he would only rush into greater mischief, if not into absolute crime. No vigils were grudged, if she only had the gratification at last of seeing him return. Though he often staid away the whole night,[Pg 131] she never could permit herself to suppose that he would do so again, but she would sit bending over her work, or, if she could work no more from positive fatigue, gazing into the dying embers of her fire, watching and watching for the late and solitary foot, which, by a strange exertion of the sense, she could hear and distinguish long ere any sound would have been perceptible to another person. Alas, for the sleepless nights which woman so often endures for the sake of her cruel helpmate! Alas, for the generous and enduring affection which woman cherishes so often for the selfish heart by which it is enslaved!

A time at length arrived when the supplies purveyed by Mrs Dempster from her own earnings were quite incompetent to satisfy this living vampire. She saw him daily rush from her presence, threatening that he would bring her to the extremity of disgrace by the methods he would take to obtain money. She lived for weeks in the agonising fear that the next moment would bring her news of some awful crime committed by his hand, and for which he was likely to suffer the last penalty of the law. She hardly knew who or what were his associates; but occasionally she learned, from mutterings in his sleep, that his practices were of the most flagitious and debased kind. He seemed to be the leader or director of a set of wretches who made a livelihood by midnight burglary. At length, one day he came home at an unusual hour, accompanied by three strangers, with whom he entered into conversation in the next room. Between that apartment and the room in which he was sitting, there was a door, which, being never used, was locked up. Through the thin panels, she overheard a scheme laid for entering the house of ——, a villa in the neighbourhood, in order to rob the tenant, whom they described as a gentleman just returned from the East Indies, with a great quantity of plate and other valuables. One of the persons in conference had visited the house, through the kindness of a servant, to whom he had made up as a sweetheart; and he therefore was able[Pg 132] to lead the attack through such a channel as rendered success almost certain. “The nabob,” said this person, “sleeps in a part of the house distant from the room in which his boxes are for the present deposited. But should he attempt to give us any disturbance, we have a remedy for that, you know.” And here the listener’s blood ran cold at hearing a pistol cocked. From all that she could gather, her husband was only to keep watch at the outside of the house, while the rest should enter in search of the booty. It is impossible to describe the horror with which she heard the details of the plot. Her mind was at first in such a whirl of distracted feeling, that she hardly knew where she stood; but as the scheme was to be executed that very evening, she saw it necessary to exert herself quickly and decisively, and, therefore, she immediately went to the house of a friend, and wrote an anonymous note to the person most concerned, warning him of a design (she could use no more specific language) which she knew was entertained against a certain part of his property, and recommending him to have it removed to some more secure part of his house. To make quite sure of this note being delivered in time, she took it herself to the gate, and left it with the porter, whom she strictly enjoined to give it immediately into the hands of his master. She then went home, and spent an evening of misery more bitter than the cup of death itself. She had formerly passed many a lonely night at her cheerless fireside, while waiting for the return of her wretched husband; but she never spent one like this. When she reflected upon the happiness of her early days, and the splendid prospects which were then said to lie before her, and contrasted them with the misery into which she had been so suddenly plunged, not by any fault of her own, but, as it appeared, by the mere course of destiny, she could have almost questioned the justice of that supreme power, by which she piously believed the concerns of this lower world to be adjusted. What dire calamities had sprung to her from one unfortunate[Pg 133] step! What persecutions she had innocently endured! How hopeless was her every virtuous exertion against the perverse counteraction of a being from whom society could not permit her to be disjoined! And, finally, what an awful outburst of wretchedness was at this moment, to appearance, impending over her! Then she recalled one gentle recollection, which occasionally would steal into her mind, even in her darkest hours, and fill it with an agreeable but still painful light—the thought of Russell—Russell, the kind and good, whom, in a moment of girlish vanity, she had treated harshly, so that he vanished from her presence for ever, and even from the place where he had suffered her scorn. Had fate decreed that she should have been united to that endeared mate of her childhood, how different might have been her lot!—how different, also, perhaps, might have been his course of life!—for she feared that her ungenerous cruelty had also made shipwreck of his noble nature. These meditations were suddenly disturbed by the entrance of Dempster, who rushed into her room, holding a handkerchief upon his side, and, pale, gory, and breathless, fell upon the ground before her. Almost ere she had time to ascertain the reality of this horrid vision, quick footsteps were heard upon the stair. The open door gave free admission, and in a moment the room was half filled with watchmen, at the head of whom appeared a middle-aged gentleman, of a prepossessing though somewhat disordered exterior. “This,” he exclaimed, “is the villain; secure him, if he be yet alive, but I fear he has already met the punishment which is his due.” The watchmen raised Dempster from the ground, and, holding his face to the light, found that the glaze of death was just taking effect upon his eyes. The unhappy woman shrieked as she beheld the dreadful spectacle, and would have fallen upon the ground if she had not been prevented by the stranger, who caught her in his arms. Her eyes, when they first re-opened, were met by those of Russell.

[Pg 134]

It would be difficult to describe the feelings with which these long-severed hearts again recognised each other, the wretchedness into which she was plunged, by learning that her well-intended efforts had unexpectedly led to the death of her husband, or the returning tide of grateful and affectionate emotion which possessed his bosom, on being informed that those efforts had saved his life, not to speak of the deep sensation of pity with which he listened to the tale of her life. A tenderer feeling than friendship was now impossible, and, if it could have existed, would have hardly been in good taste; but Russell, now endowed with that wealth which, when he had it not, would have been of so much avail, contented himself to use it in the pious task of rendering the declining years of Eliza Farney as happy as her past life had been miserable.

In the course of a ramble through the western part of Fife, I descended one evening upon the ancient burgh of Culross, which is situated on a low stripe of land beside the sea-shore, with a line of high grounds rising behind it, upon which are situated the old abbey church and the ruins of a very fine mansion-house, once the residence of the lords of the manor. On stepping forth next morning from the little inn, I found that the night had been stormy, and that the waves of the Forth were still rolling with considerable violence, so as to delay the usual passage of the ferry-boat to Borrowstouness. Having resolved to cross to that part of the opposite shore, I found that I should have ample time, before the boat could proceed, to inspect those remains of antiquity, which now give the burgh almost its only importance in the eyes of a traveller. The state of the atmosphere was in the highest degree calculated to increase[Pg 135] the interest of these objects. It was a day of gloom, scarcely different from night. The sky displayed that fixed dulness which so often succeeds a nocturnal tempest; the sea was one sheet of turbid darkness, save where chequered by the breaking wave. The streets and paths of the little village-burgh showed, each by its deep and pebbly seam, how much rain had fallen during the night; and all the foliage of the gardens and woods around, as well as the walls of the houses, were still drenched with wet. Having secured the services of the official called the bedral, I was conducted to the abbey church, which is a very old Gothic structure, but recently repaired and fitted up as a parochial place of worship. It was fitting, in such a gloomy day, to inspect the outlines of abbots and crusaders which still deck the pavement of this ancient temple; and there was matter, perhaps, for still more solemn reflection in the view of the adjacent mansion-house. Culross Abbey, as this structure is called, was finished so lately as the reign of Charles the Second, and by the same architect with Holyrood House, which it far exceeded in magnificence. Yet, as the premature ruin of youthful health is a more affecting object than the ripe decline of age, so did this roofless modern palace, with the wallflower waving from its elegant Grecian windows, present a more dismal aspect than could have been expected from any ruin of more hoary antiquity. The tale which it told of the extinction of modern grandeur, and the decline of recently flourishing families, appealed more immediately and more powerfully to the sympathies than that of remote and more barbarous greatness, which is to be read in the sterner battlements of a border tower, or an ancient national fortress. The site had been chosen upon a lofty terrace overlooking the sea, in order that the inmates might be enlivened by the ever-changing aspect of that element, and the constant transit of its ships; but now all useless was this peculiarity of situation, except to serve to the mariner as a kind of landmark, or to supply the more contemplative voyager with[Pg 136] the subject of a sigh. With a mind attuned by this object to the most melancholy reflections, I was conducted to what is called an aisle or burial vault, projecting from the north side of the church, and which contains the remains of the former lords of Culross. There images are shown, cut in beautiful Italian marble, of Sir —— Bruce, his lady, and several children, all of which must have been procured from the Continent at a great expense; for this honourable knight and his family flourished in the early part of the seventeenth century, when no such art was practised in Scotland. The images, however, and the whole sepulchre, had a neglected and desolate appearance, as may be expected by the greatest of personages, when their race has become unknown at the scene of their repose. In this gloomy chamber of the heirless dead, I was shown a projection from one of the side-walls, much like an altar, over which was painted on the wall the mournfully appropriate and expressive word “Fuimus.” Below was an inscription on a brass plate, importing that this was the resting place of the heart of Edward Lord Bruce of Kinloss, formerly proprietor of the princely estate of Culross; and that the story connected with it was to be found related in the Guardian, and alluded to in Clarendon’s History of the Great Rebellion. It was stated that the heart was enclosed in a silver case of its own shape, which had reposed here ever since it ceased to beat with the tide of mortal life in the year 1613, except that it was raised from its cell for a brief space in 1808, in the course of some repairs upon the sepulchre. As I had a perfect recollection of the story told by Steele, which indeed had made a deep impression upon me in boyhood, it was with no small interest that I beheld the final abode of an object so immediately connected with it. It seemed as if time had been betrayed, and two centuries annihilated, when I thus found myself in presence of the actual membrane, in bodily substance entire, which had, by its proud passions, brought about the catastrophe of that piteous tale. What! thought[Pg 137] I, and does the heart of Edward Bruce, which beat so long ago with emotions now hardly known among men, still exist at this spot, as if the friends of its owner had resolved that so noble a thing should never find decay? The idea had in it something so truly captivating, that it was long ere I could quit the place, or return to the feelings of immediate existence. The whole scene around, and the little neglected burgh itself, had now become invested with a fascinating power over me; and I did not depart till I had gathered, from the traditions of the inhabitants, the principal materials of the following story, aiding them, after I had reached home, by reference to more authentic documents:—

Edward Lord Bruce of Kinloss, the second who bore the title, was the son of the first lord, who is so memorable in history as a serviceable minister to King James the Sixth during the latter years of his Scottish reign, having been chiefly instrumental, along with the Earl of Mar, in smoothing the way for his majesty’s succession to Queen Elizabeth. After the death of his father, the young Lord Bruce continued, along with his mother, to enjoy high consideration in the English court. He was a contemporary and playmate of Henry Prince of Wales, whom he almost equalled in the performance of all noble sports and exercises, while, from his less cold character, he was perhaps a greater favourite among those who were not prepossessed in favour of youthful royalty. There was not, perhaps, in the whole of the English court, any young person of greater promise, or more endearing qualities, than Lord Bruce, though, in respect of mere external accomplishments, he was certainly rivalled by his friend Sir George Sackville, a younger son of the Earl of Dorset. This young gentleman, who was the grandson of one poet,[1] and destined to be the grandsire of another,[2] was one of those free and dashing spirits, who,[Pg 138] according to the accounts of contemporary writers, kept the streets of London in an almost perpetual brawl, by night and by day, with their extravagant frolics, or, more generally, the feuds arising out of them. His heart and genius were naturally good, but the influence of less innocent companions gradually betrayed him into evil habits; and thus many generous faculties, which might have adorned the highest profession, were in him perverted to the basest uses. It was often a subject of wonder that the pure and elevated nature of young Lord Bruce should tolerate the reckless profligacy of Sackville; but those who were surprised did not take a very extended view of human nature. The truth is, that real goodness is often imposed upon by vice, and sees in it more to attract and delight than it does in goodness similar to itself. The gentle character of Bruce clung to the fierce and turbulent nature of Sackville, as if it found in that nature a protection and comfort which it needed. Perhaps there was something, also, in the early date of their intimacy, which might tend to fix the friendship of these dissimilar minds. From their earliest boyhood they had been thrown together as pages in the household of the prince, where their education proceeded, step by step, in union, and every action and every duty was the same. It was further remarked, that, while the character of Bruce appeared always to be bolder in the presence of Sackville than on other occasions, that of Sackville was invariably softened by juxtaposition with Bruce; so that they had something more like a common ground to meet upon than could previously have been suspected.

When the two young men were about fourteen, and as yet displayed little more than the common features of innocent boyhood, Sackville was permitted by his parents to accompany Bruce on a summer visit to the paternal estates of the young nobleman in Scotland. There they enjoyed together, for some weeks, all the sports of the season and place, which seemed to be as untiring as their own mutual friendship. One day, as they were preparing to go out a-hunting,[Pg 139] an aged woman, who exercised the trade of spaewife, or fortune-teller, came up to the gate. The horses upon which they had just mounted were startled by the uncouth appearance of the stranger, and that ridden by Sackville was so very restive as nearly to throw him off. This caused the young Englishman to address her in language of not the most respectful kind; nor could all the efforts of Lord Bruce, who was actuated by different feelings, prevent him from aiming at her once or twice with his whip.

“For heaven’s sake, Sackville,” said Lord Bruce, “take care lest she make us all repent of this. Don’t you see that she is a spaewife?”

“What care I for your spaewives?” cried Sackville. “All I know is, that she is a cursed old beggar or gipsy, and has nearly caused me break my neck!”

“I tell you she is a witch and a fortune-teller,” said his gentler companion; “and there is not a man in the country but would rather have his neck broken than say any thing to offend her.”

The woman, who had hitherto stood with a face beaming with indignation, now broke out—

“Ride on to your hunting, young man,” addressing Sackville; “you will not have the better sport for abusing the helpless infirmities of old age. Some day you two will go out to a different kind of sport, and one only will come back alive; alive, but wishing that he rather had been doomed to the fate of his companion.”

Both Sackville and Bruce were for the time deeply impressed with this denunciation, to which the superstitious feelings of the age gave greater weight than can now be imagined; and even while they mutually swore that hostility between them was impossible, they each secretly wished that the doom could be unsaid. Its chief immediate effect was to deepen and strengthen their friendship. Each seemed to wish, by bestowing more and more affection upon his companion, at once to give to himself a better[Pg 140] assurance of his own disposition to quarrel, and to his friend a stronger reason for banishing the painful impression from his mind. Perhaps this was one reason—and one not the less strong that it was in some measure unconscious—why, on the separation of their characters in ripening manhood, they still clung to each other with such devoted attachment.

In process of time, a new and more tender relation arose between these two young men, to give them mutually better assurance against the doom which had been pronounced upon them. Lady Clementina Sackville, eldest daughter of the Earl of Dorset, was just two years younger than Sir George and his friend, and there was not a more beautiful or accomplished gentlewoman in the court of Queen Anne. Whether in the walking of a minuet, or in the personation of a divine beauty in one of Ben Jonson’s court masks, Lady Clementina was alike distinguished; while her manners, so far from betraying that pride which so often attends the triumphs of united beauty and talent, were of the most unassuming and amiable character. It was not possible that two such natures as those of Lord Bruce and Lady Clementina Sackville should be frequently in communion, as was their case, without contracting a mutual affection of the strongest kind. Accordingly, it soon became understood that the only obstacle to their union was their extreme youth, which rendered it proper that they should wait for one or two years, before their fortunes, like their hearts, should be made one. It unfortunately happened that this was the very time when the habits of Sir George Sackville made their greatest decline, and when, consequently, it was most difficult for Bruce to maintain the friendship which hitherto subsisted between them. The household of Lord Dorset was one of that sober cast, which, in the next age, was characterised by the epithet puritanical. As such, of course, it suited with the temper of Lord Bruce, who, though not educated in Scotland, had been impressed by his mother with the grave sentiments[Pg 141] and habits of his native country. Often then did he mourn with the amiable family of Dorset over the errors of his friend; and many was the night which he spent innocently in that peaceful circle, while Sir George roamed about, in company with the most wicked and wayward spirits of the time.

One night, after he had enjoyed with Lady Clementina a long and delightful conversation respecting their united prospects, Sir George came home in a state of high intoxication and excitement, exclaiming loudly against a Scotch gentleman with whom he had had a street quarrel, and who had been rescued, as he said, from his sword, only by the unfair interference of some other “beggarly Scots.” It was impossible for a Scotsman of Bruce’s years to hear his countrymen spoken of in this way without anger; but he repressed every emotion, till his friend proceeded to generalise upon the character of these “beggarly Scots,” and extended his obloquy from the individuals to the nation. Lord Bruce then gently repelled his insinuations, and said, that surely there was one person at least whom he would exempt from the charge brought against his country. “I will make no exemptions,” said the infatuated Sackville, “and least of all in favour of a cullion who sits in his friend’s house, and talks of him puritanically behind his back.” Bruce felt very bitterly the injustice of this reproach; but the difficulty of shaping a vindication rendered his answer more passionate than he wished; and it was immediately replied to by Sackville with a contemptuous blow upon the face. There, in a moment, fell the friendship of years, and deadly gall usurped the place where nothing before had been but “the milk of kindness.” Lady Clementina, to whom the whole affair seemed a freak of a hurried and unnatural dream, was shocked beyond measure by the violence of her brother; but she was partly consoled by the demeanour of Bruce, who had the address entirely to disguise his feelings in her presence, and to seem as if he looked upon the insult as only a frolic. But though he[Pg 142] appeared quite cool, the blow and words of Sackville had sunk deep into his soul; and after brooding over the event for a few hours, he found that his very nature had become, as it were, changed. That bitterest of pains—the pain of an unrequited blow—possessed and tortured his breast; nor was the reflection that the injurer was his friend, and not at the time under the control of reason, of much avail in allaying his misery. Strange though it be, the unkindness of a friend is the most sensibly felt and most promptly resented; and we are never so near becoming the irreconcilable enemies of any fellow-creature, as at the moment when we are interchanging with him the most earnest and confiding affection. Similar feelings possessed Sackville, who had really felt of late some resentment at Lord Bruce, on account of certain references which had been made by his parents to the regret expressed by this young nobleman respecting his present course of life. To apologise for his rudeness was not to be thought of; and, accordingly, these two hearts, which for years had beat in unison, became parted at once, like rocks split by one of the convulsions of nature, and a yawning and impassable gulf was left between.

For some weeks after, the young men never met; Sackville took care never to intrude into the family circle, and Bruce did not seek his company. It appeared as if the unfortunate incident had been forgotten by the parties themselves, and totally unknown to the world. One day, however, Bruce was met in Paul’s Walk by a young friend and countryman, of the name of Crawford, a rambling slip of Scottish nobility, whose very sword seemed, from the loose easy way in which it was disposed by his side, to have a particular aptitude for starting up in a quarrel. After some miscellaneous conversation, Crawford expressed his regret at a story which had lately come to his ears, respecting a disagreement between Sackville and Bruce. “What!” he said, “one might have as well expected Castor and Pollux to rise from their graves and fall a-fighting,[Pg 143] as that you two should have had a tussle! But, of course, the affair was confined merely to words, which, we all know, matter little between friends. The story about the batter on the face must be a neat figment clapped upon the adventure by Lady Fame.”

“Have you indeed heard,” asked Bruce, in some agitation, “that any such incident took place?”

“Oh, to be sure,” replied his companion; “the whole Temple has been ringing with it for the last few days, as I am assured by my friend Jack Topper. And I heard it myself spoken of last week to the west of Temple Bar. Indeed, I believe it was Sackville himself who told the tale at first among some of his revellers; but, for my part, I think it not a whit the more true or likely on that account.”

“It is,” said Bruce, with deep emotion, “too true. He did strike me, and I, for sake of friendship and love, did not resent it. But what, Crawford, could I do in the presence of my appointed bride, to right myself with her brother?”

“Oh, to be sure,” said Crawford, “that is all very true as to the time when the blow was given; but then, you know, there has been a great deal of time since. And, love here or love there, people will speak of such a thing in their ordinary way. The story was told the other day in my presence to the French ambassador; and Monsieur’s first question was, ‘Doth the man yet live?’ When told that he was both living and life-like, he shrugged his shoulders, and looked more than I can tell.”

“Oh, Crawford,” said Bruce, “you agonise me. I hoped that this painful tale would be kept between ourselves, and that there would be no more of it. I still hoped, although tremblingly, that my union with the woman I love would be accomplished, and that all should then be made up. But now I feel that I have been but too truly foredoomed. That union must be anticipated by a very different event.”

[Pg 144]

“You know best,” said the careless Crawford, “what is best for your own honour.” And away he tripped, leaving the flames of hell in a breast where hitherto every gentle feeling had resided.

The light talk of Crawford was soon confirmed in import by the treatment which Bruce began to experience in society. It was the fashion of the age that every injury, however trifling, should be expiated by an ample revenge; that nothing should be forgiven to any one, however previously endeared. Accordingly, no distinction was made between the case of Bruce and any other; no allowance was made for the circumstances in which he stood respecting the family of his injurer, nor for their former extraordinary friendship. The public, with a feeling of which too much still exists, seemed to think itself defrauded of something which was its right, in the continued impunity of Sackville’s insolence. It cried for blood to satisfy itself, if not to restore the honour of the injured party. Bruce, of course, suffered dreadfully from this sentiment wherever he appeared; insomuch that, even though he might have been still disposed to forgive his enemy, he saw that to do so would only be to encounter greater misery than could accrue from any attempt at revenge, even though that attempt were certain to end in his own destruction.

It happened that just at this time Bruce and Sackville had occasion, along with many other attachés of the court, to attend the Elector Palatine out of the country, with his newly-married bride, Elizabeth, the daughter of the king and queen. The two young men kept apart till they came to Canterbury, where, as the royal train was viewing the cathedral, it chanced that they saw each other very near. The elector, who knew a little of their story, immediately called Sackville up to him, and requested his sword, enjoining him, at the same time, in a friendly manner, to beware of falling out with Bruce so long as he was in attendance upon the court. His highness said, farther, that he had heard his royal father-in-law speak of their quarrel, and[Pg 145] express his resolution to visit any transgression of the laws by either of them with his severest displeasure. Sackville obeyed the command of the elector, and withdrew to a part of the cortege remote from the place where Bruce was standing. However, it happened, that, in surveying the curiosities of that gorgeous architectural scene, they came to the monument of a Scottish crusader, who had died here on his way back from the Holy Land. Sackville muttered something respecting this object, in which the words “beggarly Scot” were alone overheard by Bruce, who stood at no great distance, and who immediately recriminated by using some corresponding phrase of obloquy applicable to England, to which Sackville replied by striking his former friend once more upon the face. Before another word or blow could pass between them, a number of courtiers had rushed forward to separate them, and they were immediately borne back to a distance from each other, each, however, glaring upon the other with a look of concentrated scorn and hate. The elector thought it necessary, after what had taken place, that they should be confined for a time to their apartments. But no interval of time could restore amity to those bosoms where formerly it had reigned supreme. It was now felt by both that nothing but blood could wipe out the sense of wrong which they mutually felt; and, therefore, as the strictness of the king regarding personal quarrels rendered it impossible to fight in Britain, without danger of interruption, Bruce resolved to go beyond seas, and thence send a challenge requesting Sackville to follow him.

In forming this purpose, Bruce felt entirely like a doomed man. He recollected the prediction of the old woman at Culross Abbey, which had always appeared to him, somehow, as implying that Sackville should be the unhappy survivor. Already, he reflected, the least probable part of the prediction had been fulfilled by their having quarrelled. Under this impression, he found it indispensable to his peace that he should return to London, and take[Pg 146] leave of two individuals in whom he felt the deepest interest—his mother and his once-intended bride. Notwithstanding the painful nature of his sensations, he found it would be necessary to assume a forced ease of demeanour in the presence of these beloved persons, lest he should cause them to interpose themselves between him and his purpose. The first visit was paid to his mother, who resided at his own house. He had received, he said, some news from Scotland, which rendered it necessary that he should immediately proceed thither; and he briefly detailed a story which he had previously framed in his own mind for the purpose of deceiving her. After having made some preparations for his journey, he came to take leave of her; but his first precautions having escaped from his mind during the interval, his forehead now bore a gloom as deep as the shade of an approaching funeral. When his mother remarked this, he explained it, not perfectly to her satisfaction, but yet sufficiently so to avert farther question, by reference to the pain of parting with his mistress on a long and dangerous journey, when just about to be united to her for life. As he pronounced the words “long and dangerous journey,” his voice faltered with tenderness; but there was so much truth in the real meaning of the phrase (however little there might be now), that no metaphorical interpretation occurred to the mind of Lady Bruce. He even spoke of his will without exciting her suspicions. There was but one point in it, he said, that he thought it worth while to allude to. Wherever or whensoever it might please fate to remove him from the coil of mortal life, he wished his mother, or whoever might survive him, to recollect that his dying spirit reverted to the scenes of his infancy, and that his heart wished in life that it might never in death be parted from that spot. These words, of course, communicated to Lady Bruce’s spirit that gravity which the mention of mortal things must ever carry; but yet nothing seemed amiss in what she heard. It was not till after she had parted with her son—not till she felt the blank impression[Pg 147] of his last embrace lingering on her bosom, and thought of him as an absent being, whom it would be long before she saw again—that his final words had their full force upon her mind. Those words, like a sweet tune heard in a crowd with indifference, but which afterwards in solitude steals into and melts the soul, then revived upon her mind, and were pondered upon for days afterwards with a deep and unaccountable sadness of spirit.

It now only remained that he should take leave of his mistress. She was in the garden when he arrived, and no sooner did she obtain a glimpse of his person, than she ran gaily and swiftly towards him, with a face beaming with joy, exclaiming that she had such good news to tell him as he had not ever heard before. This turned out, upon inquiry, to be the permission of her father that their nuptials should take place that day month. The intelligence fell upon Bruce’s heart like a stab, and it was some moments ere he could collect himself to make an appropriate answer. Lady Clementina observed his discomposure, and, with a half-alarmed feeling, asked its cause. He explained it as occasioned by regret for his necessary absence in Scotland, to which he was called by some very urgent business, so as to render it necessary that the commencement of their mutual happiness should be put off for some time longer. “Thus,” he said, “to be obstructed by an affair of my own, after all the objections of others had been removed with so much difficulty, is particularly galling.” The disappointment of the young lady was more deeply felt than it was strongly expressed. She was reassured, however, by a fervent and solemn promise from her lover, that, as soon as possible, he would return to make her his own. After taking leave of her parents, he clasped her in one last fond embrace, during which every moment seemed an age of enjoyment, as if all the felicity of which he was about to be defrauded had been concentrated and squandered in that brief space. At one moment, he felt the warm pressure of a being beloved above all earthly objects, and from whom[Pg 148] he had expected a whole life of happiness; at another, he had turned away towards the emptiness of desolation, and the cold breath of the grave.

One hour did he give to reflection upon all he left behind—an hour such as those which sometimes turn men’s hair gray—the next, and all after it, he devoted to the enterprise upon which he was entering. Crawford, whom he requested to become his second, readily agreed to accompany him for that purpose; and they immediately set out for the Netherlands, leaving a challenge for Sackville in the hands of a friend, along with directions as to the proposed place of meeting.

The remainder of this lamentable tale may be best told in the words of Sir George Sackville. That unhappy young man, some months after the fatal tragedy, wrote an account of it to a friend, for the purpose of clearing himself from certain aspersions which had been cast upon him. The language is somewhat quaint, but it gives a more forcible idea than could otherwise be conveyed of the frenzied feelings of Bruce, under the wrongs which he had suffered from his antagonist, as well as of the actual circumstances of the combat.

“——We met at Tergosa, in Zealand, it being the place allotted for rendezvous; he being accompanied with one Mr Crawford, a Scotch gentleman, for his second, a surgeon, and a man. There having rendered himself, I addressed my second, Sir John Heidon, to let him understand that now all following should be done by consent, as concerning the terms whereon we should fight, as also the place. To our seconds we gave power for their appointments, who agreed we should go to Antwerp, from thence to Bergen-op-Zoom, where in the midway but a village divides the states’ territories from the archduke’s. And there was the destined stage, to the end that, having ended, he that could might presently exempt himself from the justice of the country, by retiring into the dominion not offended. It was farther concluded, that, in case any[Pg 149] should fall or slip, that then the combat should cease, and he whose ill-fortune had subjected him, was to acknowledge his life to have been in the other’s hands. But in case one party’s sword should break, because that could only chance by hazard, it was agreed that the other should take no advantage, but either then be made friends, or else upon even terms go to it again. Thus these conclusions being each of them related to his party, was by us both approved, and assented to. Accordingly, we embarked for Antwerp. And by reason, as I conceive, he could not handsomely, without danger of discovery, had not paired the sword I sent him to Paris; bringing one of the same length, but twice as broad; my second excepted against it, and advised me to match my own, and send him the choice, which I obeyed; it being, you know, the privilege of the challenged to elect his weapon. At the delivery of the swords, which was performed by Sir John Heidon, it pleased the Lord Bruce to choose my own, and then, past expectation, he told him that a little of my blood would not serve his turn; and, therefore, he was now resolved to have me alone, because he knew (for I will use his own words) ‘that so worthy a gentleman, and my friend, could not endure to stand by and see him do that which he must, to satisfy himself and his honour.’ Therefore, Sir John Heidon replied, that such intentions were bloody and butcherly, far unfitting so noble a personage, who should desire to bleed for reputation, not for life; withal adding, he thought himself injured, being come thus far, now to be prohibited from executing those honourable offices he came for. The lord, for answer, only reiterated his former resolutions; whereupon Sir John, leaving him the sword he had elected, delivered me the other, with his determinations. The which, not for matter but manner, so moved me, as though to my remembrance I had not for a long while eaten more liberally than at dinner, and therefore unfit for such an action (seeing the surgeons hold a wound upon the full stomach more dangerous than otherwise), I requested my[Pg 150] second to certify him I would presently decide the difference, and therefore he should presently meet me on horseback, only waited on by our surgeons, they being unarmed. Together we rode, but one before the other some twelve score paces, for about two English miles; and then passion having so weak an enemy to assail as my discretion, easily became the victor, and, using his power, made me obedient to his commands. I being verily mad with anger that the Lord Bruce should thirst after my life with a kind of assuredness, seeing I had come so far and needlessly to give him leave to regain his lost reputation, I bade him alight, which with willingness he quickly granted, and there in a meadow, ancle deep in water at the least, bidding farewell to our doublets, in our shirts began to charge each other; having afore commanded our surgeons to withdraw themselves a pretty distance from us, conjuring them, besides, as they respected our favours, or their own safeties, not to stir, but suffer us to execute our pleasure; we being fully resolved (God forgive us!) to dispatch each other by what means we could. I made a thrust at my enemy, but was short, and, in drawing back my arm, I received a great wound thereon, which I interpreted as a reward for my short shooting; but in my revenge, I pressed into him, though I then missed him also, and received a wound in my right pap, which passed level through my body, and almost to my back. And there we wrestled for the two greatest and dearest prizes we could ever expect trial for—honour and life. In which struggling, my hand, having but an ordinary glove upon it, lost one of her servants, though the meanest. But at last breathless, yet keeping our hold, there passed on both sides propositions of quitting each other’s swords. But when amity was dead, confidence could not live, and who should quit first was the question, which on neither part either would perform; and restriving again afresh, with a kick and a wrench I freed my long captive weapon, which incontinently levying at his throat, being master still of his, I demanded if he would[Pg 151] ask his life, or yield his sword, both which, though in that imminent danger, he bravely denied to do. Myself being wounded, and feeling loss of blood, having three conduits running on me, which began to make me faint, and he courageously persisting not to accede to either of my propositions, through remembrance of his former bloody desire, and feeling of my present estate, I struck at his heart, but, with his avoiding, missed my aim, yet passed through the body, and drawing out my sword, repassed it again through another place, when he cried, ‘Oh! I am slain!’ seconding his speech with all the force he had to cast me. But being too weak, after I had defended his assault, I easily became master of him, laying him on his back—when being upon him, I redemanded if he would request his life; but it seemed he prized it not at so dear a rate to be beholden for it, bravely replying, ‘He scorned it.’ Which answer of his was so noble and worthy, as I protest I could not find in my heart to offer him any more violence, only keeping him down until at length his surgeon afar off cried, ‘He would immediately die, if his wounds were not stopped.’ Whereupon I asked if he desired his surgeon should come, which he accepted of; and so, being drawn away, I never offered to take his sword, accounting it inhuman to rob a dead man, for so I held him to be. This thus ended, I retired to my surgeon, in whose arms, after I had remained a while, for want of blood, I lost my sight, and withal, as I then thought, my life also. But strong water and his diligence quickly recovered me; when I escaped a great danger; for my lord’s surgeon, when nobody dreamt of it, came full at me with his lord’s sword; and had not mine with my sword interposed himself, I had been slain by those base hands; although my Lord Bruce, weltering in his blood, and past all expectation of life, conformable to all his former carriage, which was undoubtedly noble, cried out, ‘Rascal, hold thy hand!’ So may I prosper, as I have dealt sincerely with you in this relation.

“Louvain, September 8, 1613.”

[Pg 152]

Such is the melancholy story of Edward Lord Bruce, a young nobleman, who, but for a false point of honour, arising from the incorrect judging of the world, might have lived to make many fellow-creatures happy, and adorn the annals of his country. The sacred griefs of those to whom he was most peculiarly endeared, it would be vain to paint. A mistress who wore mourning, and lived single for his sake all the rest of her life—a mother, who survived him only to mourn his irreparable loss—upon such holy sorrow it is not for me to intrude. It may be only mentioned, that the latter individual, recollecting the last parting words of her son, caused his heart to be embalmed, and brought to her in a silver case (the body being buried in the cathedral of Bergen-op-Zoom), and carried it with her to Culross, where she spent the remainder of her life in gloomy solitude, with that object always before her upon her table. After her death, it was deposited in the family vault already described, where it has ever since remained, the best monument of its own fatal history.

All men are not agriculturists, horticulturists, or arboriculturists; but yet almost all men are cultivators. By this it is meant that men in general cultivate, or coax, or unduly appreciate and fondle, some particular feature of their persons, or else, perhaps, some integument connected with their persons, to such a degree as to be rather conspicuous, while to every thing else they only give the ordinary degree of attention. There are many features of human nature which remain to be detected and described; and this is one—Cultivations. So far as I am aware, no one ever thought of pointing it out to mankind: the subject of cultivation has hitherto remained totally uncultivated. So it shall be no longer.

[Pg 153]

Hair, as the only part of the person which actually grows like a vegetable, is naturally a large subject of cultivation. The Cavaliers long ago cultivated love-locks, which they kept hanging down in graceful fashion from their temples. These locks, or curls, are now changed for tufts or bunches of hair, which the young men cultivate at the same place, and are ever shaking up and tedding, exactly as if it were a crop of hay instead of hair. Mark a modern beau as he walks along the street, and you will observe at one glance that the principal part of the man—the heart—the sensorium—the cynosure—the point from which all the rest evolves—the root of the man, in short, is the tuft under the right rim of his hat. All the rest of him is a mere pendulum, vibrating from this axis. As he walks along, he hardly feels that any other part of him is in existence, besides that. But he feels his tuft most intensely. Thought, feeling, every thing, lies concentrated in that: head, body, and limbs, are all alike mere members devolved from it. If you were to cut off the side-bunch of a modern beau in his sleep, he would, for the time, be utterly ruined. It would be like the polypus, deprived of every thing but a single leg; and he would require several months of dormant existence—that is, retirement from the streets—to let the better part of him grow out again from the worse, which had remained behind. Let not the demure Puritan, however, think that the joke lies all against the gay Cavalier or beau. There may be as much of the sin of cultivation in the stroked and glossy hair of the Roundhead or plain man, as in the love-locks and bunches of their antipodes in sentiment. I have seen some men, who affected to be very unaffected, cultivate a peak on the top and centre of their brows as sedulously, and with as much inward gratulation on account of it, as ever I saw a dandy cultivate a tuft, or train a side-curl. It must be understood that there are cultivations of a negative character, as well as of a positive, and he who is guiltless of cultivation in his heart is alone guiltless. Next to curls stand whiskers. What a[Pg 154] field of cultivation have we there! The whisker is a bounty of nature, which man does not like to refuse taking advantage of. The thing presses upon him—it is there; and to put it altogether aside, except upon the demand of temporary fashion, is scarcely to be thought of. Some men, however, are more able to resist the demon of whiskers than others. There are some men so prone to the temptations of this fiend, that they enlarge and enlarge their field of cultivation, by small and imperceptible degrees, till at length the whole chin falls a prey, excepting, perhaps, a small bit about the mouth, just enough to preserve the cultivator within the pale of the Christian church. Sometimes the Whisker Fiend makes an insidious advance or sally up towards the corners of the mouth; and there—in those small creeks or promontories—does the sin of cultivation invariably flourish more proud and rampant than any where else. The whisker of the cheek is a broad, honest, candid, downright cultivation, but that down about the corners of the mouth is a sly and most impish one—a little pet sin, apt to beset its cultivator in a far less resistible fashion than any other; and it may indeed be said, that he who has given himself fairly up to this crime is almost beyond redemption.

There are some men who cultivate white hands, with long fair nails. For nothing else do they care very particularly—all is well, if only their hands be neat. There is even a ridiculous notion that elegant hands are the most unequivocal test of what is called good birth. I can say, for my own part, that the finest hands I ever saw belonged to a woman who kept a butcher’s shop in Musselburgh. So much for the nonsense about fine hands. Then there is a set of people who cultivate a ring on a particular finger—evidently regretting, from their manner of managing it, that the South Sea fashion of wearing such ornaments in the nose has not ever come into this country. Some men cultivate neat ebony canes with golden heads, which, they tell you, cost a guinea. Some cultivate a lisp. A[Pg 155] few, who fall under the denomination of stout gentlemen, rejoice in a respectable swell of the haunch, with three wrinkles of the coat lying upon it in majestic repose. Some cultivate a neckcloth—some a shirt-breast—some a jewelled pin, with a lesser pin at a little distance, which serves to it as a kind of anchor. There has also of late been a great fashion of cultivating chains about the waistcoat. Some only show about two inches of a gold or silver one between the buttons and the pocket; others, less modest, have themselves almost laced round and round with this kind of tracery. There is also to be detected, occasionally, a small patch of cultivation in the shape of a curious watch-key or seal, which depends from part of the chain, and is evidently a great pet. A not uncommon subject of cultivation is a gold watch.

There is a class who cultivate silk umbrellas. It is a prevalent idea among many men that a silk umbrella is an exceedingly genteel thing. They therefore have an article of this kind, which they are always carrying in a neat careful manner, so as to show that it is silk. They seem to feel as if they thought all right when they have their silk umbrella in their hand: it is a kind of patent of respectability. With a silk umbrella they could meet the highest personages in the land, and not be abashed. A silk umbrella is, indeed, a thing of such vast effect, that they would be content to go in humble guise in every other respect, provided they only had this saving clause to protect them. Nay, it is not too much to suppose them entertaining this belief, that five-and-twenty shillings put forth on a good silk umbrella produces as much value in dignity as five pounds spent upon good broad-cloth. How some men do fondle and cultivate silk umbrellas!

There is a species of cultivators who may in some cases be very respectable, and entitled to our forbearance, but are, in others, worthy of a little ridicule. I mean the health-seekers; the men who go out at five in the morning to cultivate an appetite, and regularly chill every sharp-set[Pg 156] evening party they attend, by sitting like Melancholy retired, ostentatiously insisting that they “never take supper.” When a health-seeker takes a walk, he keeps his coat wide open, his vest half open—seems, in short, to woo the contact of the air—and evidently regrets very much that he cannot enjoy it in the manner of a bath. As he proceeds, he consumes air, as a steam-boat consumes coal; insomuch that, when he leaves the place, you would actually think the atmosphere has a fatigued and exhausted look, as if the whole oxygen had been absorbed to supply his individual necessities. Wherever this man goes, the wind rises behind him, by reason of the vacuum which he has produced. He puffs, pants, fights, strives, struggles for health. When he returns from his morning walk, he first looks in the glass to congratulate himself on the bloom which he has been cultivating in his cheek, and thereafter sits down to solace the appetite which he finds he has nursed into a kind of fury. At any ordinary time, he could spring from his bed at nine o’clock, and devour four cups of tea, with bread, ham, eggs, and haddocks, beyond reckoning. But he thinks it necessary to walk four hours, for the purpose of enabling himself to take eight cups, and a still more unconscionable proportion of bread, ham, eggs, and haddocks. He may be compared, in some measure, to the fat oxen which are sometimes shown about as wonders, though apparently there is nothing less wonderful, the obvious natural means being taken. These oxen, if left to themselves in a good park, would become very respectable oxen—a little en-bon-point, perhaps, but no more. But, being treated otherwise, they are rendered unnecessarily fat and unwieldy; and so it is with the appetite of the health cultivator.

Cultivations, it will thus be observed, is a subject of vast extent, and of great importance, not only to the landed interest, but to all the other interests of the country. I should be glad to treat it at full length in a separate volume, for which, I doubt not, ample materials might be found. But I must content myself with giving it in the[Pg 157] meantime only a kind of topping, as the farmers say; and perhaps I may return to it next harvest.

Nothing is more common in the middle ranks of life than to find housewives taking what may be called fits of thrift. Though sensible women in their way, excellent advisers and charming gossips, and though by no means spenders on a great scale, they have no enduring principle of economy, but are only frugal by fits and starts. They take qualms of thriftiness now and then—sometimes from reading a string of plausible receipts for cookery on a cheap scale, or from being struck with the excellent arrangements in the household of a friend, who tells her that, by managing in such and such a manner, salting all her own beef, and making all her own preserves, she has, one way and another, saved a good deal of money, which is really a thing of some consequence in these bad times, when so little is coming in. This chronic frugality is common to single ladies, under as well as above one-and-twenty, and to married ladies with large families. The fits have different tendencies, although the prevailing symptoms are the same. Occasionally the furor seizes one single young lady in a family of sisters; and I have seen that it comes on most commonly in the spring. In such cases the disease perhaps takes the direction of butter and eggs. Some day about the month of April or May, and when breakfast is on the table, the young lady begins to make observations on the dearth and rancidity of the butter. “I declare for my part,” says she, “we have been poisoned for the last six months with that stuff that we get from the woman who keeps the little shop in the area on the opposite side of the street. You know it was only out of pity to her when her[Pg 158] husband was burnt to death at the distillery, that we said that we would take some small things from her; but you see she does not keep wholesome articles; and really, in my opinion, it is high time we were looking about for something we can trust to.” With this sort of discourse the young notable opens the plan of her campaign. She says she is resolved to rise every morning at seven, and go with a basket herself to the market. The mornings, she says, are now greatly lengthened out, and, besides saving a penny a pound on the butter, and getting a better article, she is confident the walk will prove of great benefit to her health. It may always be observed, that the husband, father, or elder brother of the notable, never makes any objections when such schemes of saving are propounded. They know intuitively that the whole is a delusion, which will work itself off in a week or two; that the same disease has visited the family once every year about the same period ever since they can recollect, and that it will now, as formerly, only furnish a little harmless temporary excitement in the house. Armed with a negative approval from these relations, together with a pound note, the young notable starts next Saturday morning between seven and eight o’clock; and after taking half an hour to array herself in an undress, studiously selecting for the occasion a shabbyish shawl, and a pair of shoes that she puts on, only on “bad days,” also a straw bonnet faded both in the material and in the riband, she sallies forth with her basket to the market. With what an air of knowingness she goes from cart to cart, examining, and tasting, and smelling their contents! How she tries to elicit, by cross-questioning the man in the sky-blue coat, or the blowsky girl in the dimity head-gear, sitting amidst their savoury boxes with leather hinges, every particular in the history of the butter; where and when it was made, and why it happens to be up this morning, and so forth. How she wanders amidst the egg women, holding up the eggs between her and the light, asking if they be sure they are not Orkney eggs, and what their[Pg 159] probable age may be? What with toiling up and down the market for three quarters of an hour, and beating down the prices in a most exemplary manner, she at last accomplishes her purchases, and brings home her cargo of native produce. When you come down to breakfast, you will be at once reminded of what has been going on, by the air of superiority and triumph assumed by Miss Notable. She thinks that by rising an hour sooner than any body else, and saving, as she thinks, the sum of twopence, she has purchased the character of a thrifty personage, and, consequently, is entitled to look down upon the whole house. There is no end to her account of how she managed to find out the best butter in the cart, and how she higgled the man out of a halfpenny in the pound. When she places a slice of this extraordinary butter before you, she takes care to show you how fresh the colour is, and waits with impatience to hear your expected, and not to be dispensed with, praise of its taste. The butter she has bought is, in fact, her pet for the whole week. She considers it as her butter: and if any visitor slight it, by not paying it the necessary compliments, he is of course not indebted to her for any future invitation to the house.

A fit of thrift of this nature lasts generally three or four weeks, seldom more. I have seen it continue a fortnight in tolerable strength; it then declines, and wears off towards the fourth Saturday. The decline of this household disease is as amusing in its way as its increase. The young lady begins to find, that, so far from improving her health or strength by such morning exercise, she only “makes herself out,” and is unfit to do any thing else the whole day. And then it is, after all, only to save a few halfpence. She also finds that her purchases do not always turn well out, and that she cannot coax her father, or the rest of them, to be perpetual admirers of her butter and eggs. As a get-off, she commences an eulogy on her butter, which, she says, is sold by a man in Rose Street—a person who was once a farmer, but was reduced by misfortunes to open a[Pg 160] small shop in the town, and sell dairy produce. This man she says, is experienced in butter, and imports every week as much as will serve a dozen families. She has made interest with him through the servant to be counted one of his regular customers, and he will supply the family at all times exactly at the market price, not a farthing more. This new plan helps greatly as a solace to the conscience in abandoning her morning airings with her basket and dishabille; and so she gradually subsides into the ordinary routine of domestic arrangements.

The married notable is subject to fits of thrift in a greater or less degree about the months of October and November. Some day at dinner, when there happens to be rather a poorish leg of lamb on the table, and not much else, she opens her attack by saying, in a peevishly authoritative manner, that really the family has been long enough on fresh meat; that, for her part, the lamb that they have had so often does not agree with her, and that she would rather prefer a good salt herring. “Mrs Lockhart has just been telling me that the doctor has advised them to eat twice or thrice a-week a piece of salt meat—that is to say, a piece of beef newly powdered, just the fresh taste off it, and hardly having the appearance of the saltpetre at the bone; and I do think that we cannot do better than just follow such a sensible man’s advice, and get two or three pieces next Wednesday for salting—you know it will be a great saving of money.” The drift of all this is, that the husband shall forthwith exhibit on the table a couple of twenty shilling notes; but as he knows that these handy pieces of paper are sometimes not very easily got, he perhaps tries to throw an obstacle or two in the way of the salting project, and, for instance, mentions that his wife has no convenience for curing beef. “You observe,” says he, “it requires a tub, or something of that sort, and, besides, there is a great knack in curing the meat thoroughly; and if you do not take care, you will spoil the whole.” As a matter of course, these or similar observations cannot hold[Pg 161] good in the face of a wife under a fit of thrift. All you can say is borne down, and the money is at length consigned with a groan to the steel purse of the good lady, who, next day—for she is in the fidgets till her purpose is executed—sets out in her muff and shawl (the first time for the season) on an expedition, first to lay in her beef, and then to buy a sufficient and commodious salting can. Well, the can, that darling object of a notable’s ambition, is purchased. The beef is salted; and the goodman and his family are shortly put on salt meat, whether they like such fare or otherwise. The thrifty lady all this time takes care, on every occasion, to show off her beef as well worthy of being tasted by visitors; and the short and long of it is, that the said beef is eaten up in half the time it is expected to last; fresh meat begins to show itself more frequently at your table, and the fit is put aside till another opportunity occurs of playing it off.

These are very ordinary instances of fits of thrift, but there are hundreds of the same description which I could mention. Sometimes the fit takes the direction of a new gown for going out with on bad days, to save others of a better sort; at another time it is “a house gown,” as “really my best black silk one is absolutely getting wasted with having to go so often into the kitchen.” Occasionally it is the hiring of two maid-servants, “so that the washings need not any longer be given out;” at other times it is the buying of a crumb-cloth, to save the carpet, or the purchasing of loads of old china and crockery at auctions. I have seen all the ladies in the house manifest this frenzy by working their own lace, or painting pictures which had to be hung in dear gilded frames. Again, I have noticed it in great vigour in a family in town resolving to have a garden, so as to grow their own vegetables. It comes on very frequently in a desire to dye old ribands, or feathers, or “dress” shawls; in which case the lady who is affected sets out on a voyage of discovery through all the obscure courts and alleys about the town, seeking for some old[Pg 162] woman whom they have heard of as being “the best” at these processes of renovation. It may be remarked, that the fit visits the nation, like an epidemic, towards the end of July. Almost every house in the kingdom is then thrown into an uproar by the ladies, young and old, confederating to manufacture gooseberry jam or currant jelly. Such a requisition is there then in all quarters for “brass pans,” and such a deal of money is spent in this popular confectionary! At the approach and during the continuance of the epidemic, the husbands very wisely make no remonstrance, well knowing that such would be utterly thrown away. “You know, my dear,” would say the thrifty spouse, “we shall require at least two dozen pints this season; for nothing is more useful in a house, in case of colds; and you will remember how much good a spoonful or two did little George last February, when we thought he was going to take the fever; indeed, the doctor said it had been the very saving of his life.” Nothing, of course, can withstand an appeal to such authority; so the money is disbursed for the purchase of the fruit and other materials, although the goodman never can exactly see now some pounds’ worth of jelly should be laid up in store, all for the sake of needing two tea-spoonfuls.

Sometimes the family is so unfortunate as to get an oven, and a particularly economical Miss undertakes to bake what is called family bread. A great saving is expected from this source; but it soon turns out that so much of the article is given away to friends, as a kind of curiosity, or to impress them with a sense of the economy practised in the house, that a great deal more is lost than gained by the novelty. In fact, it always turns out, as in the case of the Vicar of Wakefield and his thrice notable spouse, that these chronic economists are not observed to make their husbands any richer by their contrivances, so much is lost by the expense of the experiment, compared with what is gained by the short duration of the practice.

The village of Daldaff lay in a nook of the hills, in one of the most rural districts of Scotland. Far from any of the great thoroughfares, or any of the large manufacturing towns, it continued, down even to the beginning of the present century, to be one of the most entire specimens in existence of all that a Scotch village used to be. Its situation was a deep hollow, upon the banks of a mountain stream, and it looked from some points of view as if a parcel of children’s toy-houses had been shaken promiscuously in a bowl, and suddenly fixed in the way they happened to arrange themselves at the bottom. It was all a confused mixture of gray old walls and brown thatch, with green gardens, and arbours, and mountain-ash trees. When you looked down from any of the surrounding heights, you wondered how communication was carried on amongst neighbours, or how strangers found an entrance into the village; for you saw no trace of streets, paths, or ways. It was only when you descended into the place, that you saw here and there a narrow road threading its way among the houses, somewhat after the manner of the puzzle called the walls of Troy. Most of the little dwellings had a long stripe of garden, running from behind them up the hill; other houses had their sides or backs placed close against the bank, so that you might have walked off the ground upon their roofs without perceiving it—while the gardens spread downwards before them, like aprons. These gardens bore large beds of refulgent cabbages, with gooseberry bushes between; and always in some sunny and sheltered place there were a few bee-hives, the tops of which were kept warm either with a crown of straw or a mantle of turf. At morning hour you would have seen the honest weavers, who peopled most of the houses, busying themselves in[Pg 164] delving and dibbling in these little patches of ground. During the long day, perhaps nothing of life was to be seen about them, except the circumspect and decent hen walking up the avenue with her chirping brood, or the cock flapping his wings from the top of the wall, and crowing a defiance to some distant foe of his own kind: or the bees, as they one by one made themselves visible out of the universal sunniness, in the immediate shadow of the hive. At night, however, the weaver would be seen walking forth with his pipe in his mouth, his Kilmarnock cowl brushed back from his forehead, and his clothes loose at the knees, to observe the growth of the berries, or pull a bunch of lily-oak for his children, who came prattling behind him; or to hold converse through the evening stillness with a neighbour perhaps four gardens off, respecting the last proceedings of “that dreedfu’ fallow, Bonyparty.” When standing in the centre of the village, you might have almost been persuaded that there was no other place in the world. The rim of the horizon was within two hundred yards of the eye all round, and nothing besides was to be seen but the contracted sky. On the top of the bank, in one direction, stood the church, with its little docked steeple, and its body-guard of old trees. In another direction there was a peep of the turrets of an old half-ruined mansion-house, which had not been occupied for many years, except by the spirit of a murdered man, which was understood to occupy a particular room, and always went by the horribly descriptive name of Spotty. Beyond the edge of the surrounding banks, the country swept downwards in extensive flats, generally sterile, but here and there showing fine spots of pastoral green. Over these downs, groups of children would sometimes be seen rambling hand in hand, in those adventurous journeys of half a mile from home, which children are so fond of taking; sometimes talking to each other of the novelties of the created world, which were every now and then striking their eyes and their imaginations; at other times pondering in silent and infantine abstraction[Pg 165] on the beauty of the gowans which grew by their sides, and in the bosoms of which, as they gazed into them, they saw, reflected as in a mirror, their own fairness and innocence. There, also, while the wind even of summer carried its chill, the little neat-herd boy would be seen sitting on the leeward side of the green knoll, with his sister by his side, and a plaid drawn all around them, their arms laced round each other’s necks, and their cheeks laid close together, as both read from the same tattered story book, or partook of the same pease-bread and milk, which served as their afternoon meal. Within the village all was primeval simplicity. The houses already mentioned were arranged without the least regard to each other’s convenience—some back to back, some shoulder to shoulder, but as generally front to back, and shoulder to front. The white manse sat half way up the bank, overlooking the whole, like an idol presiding over a crowded group of worshippers. On what might be considered the principal thoroughfare in the village, stood the inn, a house distinguished from all the rest, by its being two stories in height, not to speak of the still more remarkable distinction of a hanging sign, on which was painted something dark and grim, meant for a black bull, besides the frequent apparition of a carrier’s cart resting with its beams high and rampant into the air. Another house, rather better than the rest, was occupied by “a merchant,” a man originally a haberdashery pedlar, but who, having here at last set up his ellwand of rest, dealt not only in women’s attire, but in a thousand things else besides, as if he had been

Then there was the modest tenement of Luckie Smytrie, with its window of four panes, showing to the passing traveller two biscuits on edge, and as many dark green bottles filled with comfits; while within, if you had chosen to enter, you would have found at one end of the room in which the decent woman lived, a large cupboard and a small table forming her mercantile establishment for the[Pg 166] sale of all kinds of small wares. Were you to lounge a little in this humble retreat of commerce, you might see children coming in every now and then asking for such things as an ounce of soap, a quarter of an ounce of tea, a halfpenny-worth of whipcord, or, perhaps (what would astonish you most of all), change of a penny—viz. two halfpence. Luckie Smytrie was a woman who had experienced great trials in early life, had had husbands killed by accidents, sons enlisted for soldiers and slain in battle, and daughters that died in the morn and liquid dew of youth, innumerable. Her shop was therefore patronised by all the villagers, to the prejudice, in some articles, of the more ambitious establishment of the retired packman; but yet the old woman, like all shopkeepers who have little rivalry, was as much offended at losing any partial or occasional custom in favour of that individual, as if she had had a far stronger and more prescriptive right to the business of the place. For instance, you might see a boy come in with a small cotton handkerchief in his hand, and say that his mother had sent him for a halfpenny-worth of thread, matching with that piece of attire, which she wished to hem. To which Mrs Smytrie would respond, in a cool voice, but intended to convey the most cutting sarcasm, “Gang back, hinny, and tell your mother that it would be far better to get her thread where she got her napkin.” Or, perhaps, it was an order for bread on a Sunday evening, from some one who had had an unexpected crowd of visitors at tea. The request was then put in the following terms:—“Mrs Smytrie [on other occasions it was plain Tibbie], my mother has her compliments t’ye, and she wad be muckle obleeged for twa tippeny bricks (loaves), as there’s some folk come upon her to their four-hours that she didna expeck.” To the which Mrs Smytrie would answer, in the same cruelly tranquil voice, “Tell your mother, my woman, that she had better get her bread on the Sabbath night where she gets’t on the Saturday’t e’en,” well knowing all the while that the shop referred to was not open, and that there was no other besides her own in the whole[Pg 167] village, or within ten miles round. Perhaps a child would come in for a halfpenny-worth of paper, namely, writing-paper; but Mrs Smytrie, mistaking the word, would set about the elaborate ceremony of weighing out what she supposed the required quantity of pepper. The boy would look on, not knowing what to think of it, till at last he was roused from his reverie by having a neat little conical parcel, with a twist at the point, presented to him instead of the roll of paper which he had expected. He would then murmur out, with a ludicrous mixture of stupidity and terror, “It was paper I was wanting;” at which the old widow would break out with the anticipated torrent of invective, “Hech! dyted thing, could ye no speak plainer? What for did ye let me be makin’ up the pepper for ye, and no tell me it was paper? Niff-naffin!” There was hardly any other house in the village in the least distinguished from its fellows. The most of them were occupied by a race of decent weavers—for this, indeed, was the staple employment of Daldaff. Through almost every lattice you heard the constant sound of the shuttle and lay, mixed with the voices of the honest operatives, as they sung at their work. In a preceding age, the village contained only three or four of this class of men, who employed themselves in weaving the homely woollen cloth and sheeting which were then used by the country people, being formed out of materials supplied immediately by themselves. But these kinds of manufacture had, in a great measure, given way in favour of the lighter fabrics of Glasgow. Cottons were now supplied from that immense mart, to be woven into showy webs; and as the trade offered far superior remuneration to what had ever been known in the village, not only the old serge-weavers had changed the one employment for the other, but a vast flock of their sons and connexions, and many of the country people around, had rushed into it, so that the primitive little village of Daldaff became neither more nor less than a kind of colony or dependency of the great western capital.

[Pg 168]

This revolution was at first productive of a great increase of comfort in the village, without materially altering the primeval virtues of its inhabitants. Old men began to lay by blue bonnets in favour of hats. A few old hereditary black coats, which had been worn from youth to age, were at last rescued from the twilight of a Sabbath fame, and consigned ungrudgingly to a general use throughout the week. Young men began to abandon hodden gray for Galashiels blue; young women got straw bonnets to cover locks heretofore exposed in cockernonnies, and there were two if not three green gauze veils in the village. In respect of domestic economy, almost every housewife had the pot on three times a-week, so that third day’s kail was beginning to be a thing almost unknown. Tea was also intruding its outlandish face into scenes where bread and milk was erst the only luxury. Some of the husbands held long out against it, but at length they almost all sneaked into a liking for it, and no more thought of wanting it at the end of their day’s work, than they thought of wanting their halesome porridge at the beginning. It was sometimes lamented by the excellent old minister, that family worship was a usage not favoured by this change of circumstances; but still, both at nine in the morning, and about the same hour in the evening, you might have heard, in passing some of the houses, either the rude and tremulous psalmody raised by the father of the household, or the low and earnest prayer which he was pouring forth, with his knees and those of all his family resting upon his clay floor. Then all the good old sports were kept up. The boys, instead of being confined, like those of larger manufacturing towns, in unhealthy cotton mills, were permitted at all hours, except those during which they were engaged at school, to play at the golf and shinty, or at bows and arrows, upon the common haugh by the burn side, or else to roam farther a-field in search of birds’ nests, or to harry the crows in the woods. On the same haugh, in the summer evenings, after work was done, the young men would be seen “putting the stane,”[Pg 169] or playing at “the pennystanes” (quoits), or perhaps amusing themselves with the more energetic game of football, while their cowled fathers would walk forth to sympathise in and judge of their feats, and enjoy a hearty unmeasured laugh at every unharming “mischanter” which might befall them. Thither also would repair the trig shortgowned lass, just newly “redd up,” as she would style it, her curls shining in their recent release from paper, over a face to which a good washing had lent a richer glow, and her tout-ensemble in every respect greatly improved—as female figures, somehow or other, always are—by being seen in the declining light of the golden eve. There, while the young of the different sexes interchanged their joke and their gibe, and the old raised the still heartier laugh at every feat in the game, and children shouted and dogs barked from the mere contagion of joy, while, moreover, the sun sent his last rich rays through the trees above the village, whence the

there a stranger might have supposed that happiness had found her last abode on earth, ere for ever winging her flight to her native skies.

Many villages in Scotland enjoy a humble local fame for some particular custom or sport, which is understood to reign there in supremacy over all others. If Daldaff was celebrated for any form of fun more than another, it was for curling—a sport peculiar to Scotland, and which may be best described to southern readers, by the simple statement, that it employs large smooth stones upon the ice, much after the manner of bowls upon a bowling-green. The game can only be practised after a very hard frost, as it requires the strongest ice to bear the numbers who usually assemble either to play or look on. Curling is a game relished so keenly in Scotland, that, like other common appetites, it levels all distinctions of station and rank. In a rural and thinly-peopled district like that around Daldaff, the laird might be seen mingling with not only his farmers,[Pg 170] but his cottagers, interchanging the broad jest at his own failures, and giving applause wherever it was due. The minister might also be seen driving his stone with as much anxiety of eye as any one, and occasionally, perhaps, envying the good fortune of an unlettered peasant, whom, on another occasion, he would have to chide for his backwardness in the Single Catechism. Daldaff was fortunately situated for this game, as, less than a mile below the village, the mountain stream spread out into a little lake sufficient to have afforded room for half a dozen “rinks.” There one Saturday afternoon the people of Daldaff had a bonspiel, or grand contest, with the inhabitants of the adjacent parish of Sarkinholm, who had long disputed with them the palm of superiority. A bonspiel is not appointed to take place every day; neither is Saturday like any other day of the week. Hence, although an unfortunate thaw was just commencing, the disputants resolved to have out their game, trusting that the ice would at least last long enough to do their turn. Notwithstanding the unfavourable state of the ice, the bonspiel passed off with great eclat. Nearly all Daldaff and Sarkinholm were collected to witness the sport; and the certaminis gaudia, or joys of the combat, were felt perhaps as keenly in the hearts of the women and children of these respective places, as in those of the curlers themselves. Before the game was done, the men were standing inch deep in water, and the stones, as they came up to the rink, sent the spray high into the air before them, like shavings from a joiner’s plane. The short day of January was also drawing very near to a close, and a deep dark cloud had settled down upon the mountains to the west, betokening a thorough change in the weather. At length victory declared itself in favour of Daldaff, and the parties “quat their roaring play,” to betake themselves to their respective homes. All in a short time had left the place, except a small band of boys and girls, who continued to enjoy a pair of slides on a somewhat higher and drier part of the ice.

The rivulet connected with this little lake was one of[Pg 171] those which, rising in a large basin of hilly country, are liable to be swelled occasionally in a very short space of time, so that, though at one hour they may scarcely show a rill among the channel-stones, they are the next raging like a large and impetuous river. On the present occasion, being fed by the cloud just spoken of, it came down in one of its most awful forms, and in one instant broke up the ice upon the peaceful lake with a noise like thunder. The children who had been sliding, though they scarcely had a moment of warning, escaped from the ice—all except one, Susan Hamilton, the daughter of the leading manufacturer in the village. She had been the last to approach a gulf which had been leaped by all the rest, and, her heart failing her at the moment, she was immediately carried off from the land upon a large board of ice. What had lately been the solid surface of the lake was now gathered in a large glacier of peaky fragments at the bottom, while all around the water was extending far beyond its usual limits. Susan Hamilton was soon drifted down to this mass of ice, where, from the top of a lofty pinnacle, she cried loudly for help, which, however, was every moment becoming more difficult to be rendered. The most of her companions had fled in childish terror to the village; but as the danger was instant, there seemed little chance of rescue from that quarter. Fortunately a young man who had accompanied some friends to Sarkinholm happened to be returning to Daldaff, and, hearing cries of distress, rushed up to the spot. Though the twilight was now deepening, he perceived the situation of the child, and being perfectly acquainted with the ground, he immediately resolved upon a plan of rescue. A large board of ice happened to be lying in a creek near the place where he stood. Upon this he fearlessly embarked, and, guiding it by means of his curling-brush, he soon reached the iceberg to which Susan Hamilton was clinging. Having prevailed upon her to leap down into his arms, he placed her carefully on board his icy raft, and then steered back towards the shore, where by this time[Pg 172] a few of the villagers, including the child’s father, were collected. He was so fortunate as to return in safety, and had the satisfaction—which Bishop Burnet considered to be the greatest on earth—of rendering a man truly happy. The joy of the father was speechless; but the other villagers raised a shout of admiration in honour of his heroic conduct. Nor was the general feeling abated, when, immediately after he had regained the shore, the vast glacier, loosed from its confinement at the bottom of the lake, was precipitated down the channel of the stream, where it tumbled and dashed along with the resistless force of rocks thrown down a hill-side, and the noise of a hurricane in a forest. It was seen that if he had hesitated but for a minute to adventure upon his perilous task, the child must have perished, almost before her father’s eyes.

James Hamilton, who had this evening experienced the opposites of extreme agony and extreme happiness, was only a mere long-headed specimen of the weavers of Daldaff. Having saved a little money, and acquired a reputation for prudence and honesty, he had been able, when the Glasgow work was first introduced into the village, to get himself appointed by a manufacturing house in that city as agent for supplying employment to his brethren; and as he not only enjoyed a commission upon the labours of his neighbours, but also kept a number of looms going upon his own account, he might be considered the most prosperous man in the village. He had been married for many years, but was blessed with only one child, the fair young girl who was rescued from death in the manner above described. He was one of those individuals, who, though entitled to praise for their correct dealings and sagacious conduct in life, are yet apt to excite dislike by their contenting themselves too exclusively with those properties, and not showing enough of the amenity and friendliness of disposition, by which alone society at large is rendered agreeable. You could always make sure that James Hamilton would do you no wrong, but you were also impressed[Pg 173] with the certainty that neither would he do you any good; and if it be possible that there can be an excess of circumspection and prudence, he erred in that excess. Rarely giving way to feeling himself, he could hardly believe that it existed in others, or, if he did acknowledge its existence, he despised it as only the symptom of an unworldly character. Even on seeing a single and beloved child rescued from destruction, though he could not repress the first gush of grateful and joyful emotion, he almost immediately after relapsed into his usual coldness, and seemed to chide himself for having been betrayed into that excitement.

Adam Cuthbertson, who had done for him almost the greatest service that one man could do to another, was the son of a poor widow in Sarkinholm, and now resided with a relation at Daldaff, under whom he was acquiring the universal craft of the district. Though graced with only a very limited education, and condemned to almost unceasing toil, Adam was a youth of some spirit and ingenuity. An old black buke of Scotch songs lay constantly on the beam at his left hand, and the rush of the shuttle and the dunt of the lay went in unison with as clear a pipe as ever lilted up the notes of our national minstrelsy. It was even whispered that Adam had himself composed a few songs, or there were at least certain ditties which the lasses of Daldaff might occasionally be heard singing at their washings on the haugh, and which were privately attributed to his pen—though, it is to be remarked, his modesty would never permit him to confess the soft impeachment. Adam also contrived to obtain some scientific books, which he pored over at night by his uncle’s fireside, or, in summer, beneath a little bower which he had constructed in the garden. He was thought to be less steady at his work than some duller lads, and the case was not mended by a particular improvement which he had carried into effect upon the machinery of his loom. Although he practically demonstrated that he could work more with the same trouble[Pg 174] by means of this alteration, the old workmen only shook their heads at it, and wished he might work as much with it in the long-run. It happened one day, that, as he was dressing his web with the brushes, he lost his balance by mere accident, and fell head foremost through the white expanse before him, producing, of course, irremediable ruin. “Ay, ay,” remarked some of the old stagers, “I never thought ony gude would come o’ thae improvements. Wha ever heard o’ ony ordinar workman playing sic a plisky?” Others, less disposed to observe the strict doctrines of causation, would ask what else could be expected of “that newfangled way o’ working the hiddles.” The very minister, honest man, was heard to hazard a quiet witticism on the subject, not from any ill-will towards his young parishioner, but just because the joke could hardly be avoided: “I was aye jalousing,” said the worthy divine one day to his elder, James Hamilton, “that Yedie wad some day or other fa’ through his wark.” It is to be mentioned with regret that Hamilton, notwithstanding his obligations to the young man, was one of those who regarded his frank-spirited character and forward genius with least favour. This did not appear to be solely the result of the opposition of their characters. Hamilton, who, in any circumstances, would have been sure to disapprove of the qualities manifested by Adam Cuthbertson, appeared almost to have contracted an additional dislike for him, on account of the very obligation which ought to have made him his friend. He seemed to dread the claims which the rescue of his child might establish, and acted as if he thought it necessary to give as little encouragement to those claims as possible.

There was, however, one individual who did full justice both to the superior character and the gallant achievement of Cuthbertson. This was Susan Hamilton, the fair young girl whom he had saved. Susan at the time of her rescue was too young to regard her deliverer with any other feeling than that of grateful respect. But as she advanced towards womanhood, the childish feeling of awe with which she[Pg 175] had always beheld him when they chanced to meet, became gradually exchanged for a sentiment of a softer and tenderer character, though not less bashful and abased. Adam’s feelings towards her experienced a similar change. Ever after the day when he saved her life, he had taken rather more interest in that fair head and those sweet blue eyes, than in the features of any other child of the same age whom he saw tripping to school. But this feeling was merely one of circumstances. It solely referred to the adventure by which he had been so happy as to restore her to the arms of her father. Susan, however, in a very few years, ceased to be a little girl tripping to school. Her figure became considerably taller, and more attractive. Her blue eyes became filled with deeper and more thoughtful meanings. Her cheek, when she approached her deliverer, assumed a richer hue; and her voice, when it addressed him, surprised him with new tones. Sometimes he would hardly permit himself to think that she was in the least different from what she had been. He would still speak to her as a man addressing a child. But after they had parted, he would feel his soul troubled with a delight he had never before experienced. He would feel, though he did not think, that she was different. Need any more be said than that he in time found himself at once loving and beloved? The sun never set with a richer glow, nor did the flowers ever give out a richer perfume, than on the evening, when, in the woods of Craigcross, Adam Cuthbertson and Susan Hamilton first confessed their mutual attachment.

But fate was adverse to the passion of these amiable beings. James Hamilton, with all his homely wisdom, had so far given way to a wretched ambition as to wish his daughter to match in a sphere above his own rank. Laird Ganderson, of Windigate, had marked out Susan at church as a very proper person to undertake the management of his household, an office just become vacant in consequence of the death of his mother. Being arrived at the full and perfect age of forty-seven years, the beauty of the young[Pg 176] lady was perhaps a smaller consideration with the laird, than the contiguity of a few fields lately purchased by her father, to his own somewhat dilapidated property. He therefore made some overtures to James Hamilton, which that individual listened to in a manner far from unfavourable. It was soon made up between them that Susan was to become Mrs Ganderson: all that remained to be done was to gain the approbation of the young woman herself towards the scheme. Susan, who, in addition to many better qualities, possessed a gift of rustic humour, endeavoured to convey her sentiments to the laird in a delicate way, by one evening frying him a dish of sliced peats instead of Scotch collops; but the laird took it all as a good joke, and said he only liked her the better for her waggery. In fact, being anxious to have her only on the ordinary principles of a mercantile speculation, he was not to be turned aside by any nice delicacy, any more than he would have been prevented from buying a horse at a fair, by the animal showing a reluctance to part with its former proprietor. On the other hand, Cuthbertson felt in a manner entirely different. A taunt which he received one night from the father, respecting the narrowness of his circumstances and prospects, determined him to quit Daldaff in search of fortune, taking no care but first to interchange with Susan a vow of eternal fidelity.

For one full year Susan was enabled to parry the addresses of the laird and the entreaties of her father. The former spent a great part of every day at James Hamilton’s, where he smoked incessantly, or, if he ceased at all, it was only to ask for liquor, or to utter a ribald jest. By this familiarity he only rendered himself the more intolerable to Susan. But it had a different effect upon the father. The laird became so thoroughly ingratiated with that individual, that there was no exertion of friendship which Hamilton would not make in his behalf. In fact, in order to secure to his daughter the eclat of being lady of Windigate, he was understood to have compromised all that he[Pg 177] was worth in the world in securities for the behoof of his future son-in-law, whose fortune was suspected to be in no very flourishing condition. The unfortunate weaver exemplified a very common failing in the most sagacious characters, namely, a disposition, after a whole lifetime of prudence, to give way to some notably ridiculous error, which is rendered unalarming to them from its being totally different in character and tendency from any that they have been accustomed to avoid.

At length came evil days. Owing to some turn of affairs in the progress of the war, cotton-weaving experienced a severe shock, by which many of the best Glasgow houses were materially damaged, and thousands of operatives throughout the country were thrown out of work. The very respectable establishment for which Hamilton had long acted as agent, lingered for a time in existence, and was able occasionally to send a small scantling of work, hardly enough to employ a tenth part of the population of the village. When the carrier was expected to come with these small supplies, numbers of poor men, attended by their wives and children, all of whom were alike unemployed, would go out for miles to meet the eagerly expected vehicle, to learn how much work was brought, and what prospect there was of more. On the small bag being opened by Hamilton, and perhaps only three webs being displayed, the grief of the poor people was beyond all description. The married men would then, by Hamilton’s directions, draw lots for those precious morsels of employment. While this process went forward, what eager breathless hope in the faces of both men and women, tempered, at the same time, by a religious sense of the misery which each man knew that his own success would inflict upon some equally deserving neighbour! What despair was depicted in each honest homely face, as it turned from the fatal lottery, upon the unhappy family group, which, more eagerly than himself, had watched the result of his throw! With what joy, mingled with sad sympathies for the rest, would the successful man bear[Pg 178] home his load, though he knew that the price of his labour would hardly be sufficient to supply the food necessary to support him, even though he were to work sixteen hours a-day! At length, towards winter, even these wretchedly insufficient supplies were stopped. Hamilton’s employers, after every effort to keep themselves afloat, were obliged to give way also; and, consequently, the Daldaff agency became at once a dead letter. People talk of the exemption of the present generation from disasters by fire and sword, which so frequently befell their ancestors; but what calamity was ever inflicted upon the poor, even in the most lawless days of past history, equal to the desolation which is now so often occasioned in a large district, by a total cessation of the staple employment? The cots which gave shelter to our ancestors, were rebuilt in three days, after even the most savage invasion; the herds, which had been gathered off to some place of security, were restored to their indestructible pastures. The calamity, if unaccompanied by severe loss of life, must have been only, in general, an exciting adventure. But what retreat, what consolation is there for the hordes of poor artizans, who, by some commercial accident, arising, perhaps, from the imprudence of a few merchants, or some political or warlike movement, are deprived of the customary weekly pittance? It may be relied on, that such disasters exceed in measure of sorrow almost any kind of historical distress, except those of plague or famine. No other accident but these last ever introduced such coldness to the poor man’s hearth, such despair to his heart, or made him regret with so bitter a pang that he had others to care for besides himself.

Amidst the public calamity, one of a most grievous nature overtook the father of our heroine. The affairs of the laird, which had long been desperately out of order, and for some time were only sustained by the aid of his intended father-in-law, came to a complete stand-still; and, the whole wealth of James Hamilton being engaged[Pg 179] in securities, he was at once reduced to the condition in which he had entered life. The stroke at first seemed likely to be fatal. Thus to lose the whole earnings of a laborious life—to forfeit, at the eleventh hour, by one miserable piece of imprudence, all the honours of the wisely spent day, was more, almost, than he could bear. He had, however, two comforters in his affliction—the worthy old minister, who in these calamitous times had been a succouring angel to his flock—and his daughter, an angel of a still more gracious kind, who, forgetting all the severities with which she had been treated, and thinking only of his present affliction, applied herself to the sacred task of soothing his wounded mind, and inspiring him with hopes of better times. The change of his circumstances produced a complete change in the mind of Hamilton. Having no longer wealth to care for, the jealous sentinels with which he had guarded it were withdrawn. The crust of worldly selfishness was broken off his character, and all its better affections were again called into free play. His eyes were now opened to the wickedness of which he had been guilty, in endeavouring to force the affections of his daughter, and he only wished that he were again as he had been a twelvemonth before, in order to make her happy with the man of her heart.

Weeks of partial famine passed on, and now the distresses of the villagers were suddenly doubled by the premature commencement of a very severe winter. With the exception of their small patches of potatoes and garden vegetables, there seemed hardly any resource for them during the whole winter. The minister, whose own income was exhausted in providing for their wants, thought it necessary, under these distressing circumstances, to call them all together, and join them in one solemn exercise of humiliation appropriate to the occasion. Just as this was concluded, a boy belonging to an inn about ten miles distant upon the Glasgow road, arrived, after a toilsome journey through the snow, and gave the joyful news that a cart[Pg 180] filled with webs was storm-stayed at his master’s house, on its way to the village, the trade having suddenly experienced a slight revival. Transported with this intelligence, though no one could guess by whom the work could have been sent, they one and all resolved to proceed to Redcraigs, where the cart was lying, and aid in clearing a way for it through the snow. Every spade and semblance of a spade was then put in requisition, and the half of the bannocks in the village were brought forward, without the least regard to individual property, to provision the troop of pioneers. Thirty men set out early next morning on this expedition, graced with the blessings and prayers of all who saw them depart.

The snow, it was found, had only fallen to the depth of three feet, but it was drifted in many hollow parts of the road to six times that depth, so as to present an insurmountable obstacle to the progress of a cart. At all those places the weavers exerted themselves as they advanced to clear away the gelid heaps. The toil was most severe; but what these poor starved men wanted in strength, they made up by zeal—that zeal, above all others, which is inspired by the wish of answering the clamour of a hungry family circle with the necessary bite. The thought that work was before them, that money would again be procured, and, for that money, food to supply “the bairns at hame,” nerved every arm with superhuman energy; and as the country people every where lent a willing, though less enthusiastic assistance, the party had before mid-day cleared their way to Redcraigs. What was their surprise on being met there by their friend Adam Cuthbertson, of whom they had not heard ever since he left Daldaff, and who now informed them, with ineffable pleasure beaming in his eyes, that he had been the happy means of procuring them this supply of work. He had entered, he said, into the service of a manufacturer at Glasgow, and having divulged to him a plan of improving the loom, had been advanced to a very onerous place of trust in the factory. His employer[Pg 181] having weathered on till the present revival of trade, he had used the little influence he had, to get his old master, of whose misfortunes he had heard, appointed to an agency, and was favoured with one of the very first parcels of work that was to be had, which he was now conveying to the relief of his old friends at Daldaff. “Let us on now, my friends,” cried Adam; “and, before night is far spent, we shall be able to tell the women and the bairns that the bad times are now blown by, and that every one will get his porridge and his broth as he used to do.” The cavalcade then set forward, the cart drawn by three horses in line, and every man more ready than another, either to clear away the drifted heap that lay before it, or to urge it with his desperate shoulder over every such impediment that might happen to be left. Though the way was long, and the labour severe, and the strength of the poor weavers not very great, yet every eye and voice maintained its cheerfulness, and the song, the jest, and the merry tale, were kept up to the very last. The wintry sun had set upon the snowy hills ere the procession came within sight of Daldaff; yet all the women and children were collected at the Loanbraehead, near the village, to see it approach; and when the cart was first discerned turning a neighbouring height, with its large attendant train, a shout of natural joy arose through the clear air, such as might burst from those who gaze from the shore upon a wreck, and see the crew, one by one, make their escape from destruction. James Hamilton was there, though much reduced by a recent illness; and the joy which seized him on being informed by the workmen of his appointment, was almost too much for his frame. He looked in vain, however, for Cuthbertson, to pour before him the thanks of a repentant spirit. That excellent young man had eluded the observation of all, and, diving through some of the lanes of the village, had taken refuge in the house of his uncle. He found that much as he had longed to see gladness once more restored to these poor villagers, he could not[Pg 182] endure the scene at last. He had therefore escaped from their gratitude; and it was not till Hamilton sought him in his old lodgings, that he was at length discovered. The old man took him warmly by the hand, which he did not quit, till, leading him to his own house, he deposited it in that of his fair daughter. “Susan Hamilton,” said he, “twice have you been saved by this good youth; you are now fairly his own property—you are no longer mine. May you both be happy!”

Our readers will perhaps recollect a former article, in which we treated of the subject of removals—that is to say, the practice so general in Scotland (though otherwise in England) of shifting almost every year from one house to another, in a constant expectation of finding the TO KALON, as the Greeks call it, or, as we shall rather style it, the QUITE THE THING of house accommodation, which, however, is discovered at one year’s end to be exactly as remote as it was a twelvemonth before, and still, like general happiness, is “on before”—far looming over the horizon, like a vessel bound for some distant part of the globe, and not to be caught or overtaken, let us speed after it as we may. We have heard various individuals acknowledge that there were some good home truths in that article, though we rather believe the housewives in general were surprised at our blindness to the beauties of a good back-green. Let that be as it may, there was one thing in which that article was totally deficient—to wit, an account of the particular horrors of removing day itself, or, as we in Scotland call it, flitting day—a day styled in the calendar Whitsunday, and dedicated to we don’t know what sacred use, but which, without regard to its sacred use, whatever[Pg 183] that may be, we think men might wish that, above all others, it were fairly blotted out of the calendar—expunged from the very year itself—utterly annihilated and forgotten, because of the unhappy secular use to which it has been put from time immemorial. The 25th of May, or Whitsunday old style, is indeed a day of peculiar agony amongst us. It is a day consecrated to the disruption of all local ties, to the rending of every kind of pleasant association, to the discomfiture of all the household goods. The very week in which it occurs, is black with its atmosphere of pain.

It may be surprising to persons unacquainted with Scotland, that the people should be so fond of removing, since the day on which that event takes place is apt to be so very disagreeable. They might as well wonder that people should ever marry, when they know so very well that the charge of a family is apt to be burdensome. Candlemas day, on which people take their houses, is a day of heedless joy, a day of fond and delirious anticipation; and Whitsunday is to it what execution-day is to the particular time when an unfortunate man was tempted to enrich himself at some other body’s expense. “On Wednesday I killed my wife, on Saturday I was hanged,” as the child’s rhyme goes: no one can doubt that Wednesday was in this case a very pleasant day, whatever might be the state of the honest man’s feelings at the end of the week. So it is with Candlemas and Whitsunday. On the former of these days we are actuated by a spirit of spite and dissatisfaction with our present abode; it is every thing that is disagreeable, and we must at all hazards get quit of it. Accordingly, the taking of another, and, as we think, better habitation, naturally appears as the opening of a haven of relief, and, of course, we have a great deal of either positive or negative pleasure in the day. Nor is this satisfaction confined to the day on which the new house is leased: it extends up to the very commencement of that week of suffering which involves Whitsunday—up to the[Pg 184] first material disarrangement of furniture preparatory to removal. During the time which elapses between the leasing of the new habitation and our removal to it, we abandon all care for our present abode. Any thing that goes wrong about it must just remain so. If a lock were required for the door, we would scarcely put ourselves to the trouble of getting it, but remain content with some provisional system of security, such as putting a table behind it. A large piece of plaster might fall down from the ceiling, or half of the floor of the dining-room sink into the kitchen—a whole gable or side-wall, almost, might fall away, but we would never think of troubling ourselves with any attempt at repairs. It is a horrid house at any rate, and, for all the time we are to be in it, it does not matter. We’ll soon be getting into our nice new house, and I’ll warrant you no plaster will fall down from the ceiling there, nor either floor or gable give way. Every thing will be right when we get to —— Street. The house, under this system of feeling, begins to wear a desolate look. Every thing is permitted, according to the old Scottish phrase, just to hang as it grows. The whole bonds of household discipline are relaxed. The servants, who are to be changed too perhaps, as well as the house, begin to do things any way, and yet the mistress hardly chides them. The fact is, she has given up all idea of comfort in the condemned house, and lives entirely on the hope of seeing every thing trig in her new abode. She would make no great complaint, as we verily believe, if the servants obliged her by their carelessness to spend all the remaining part of the lease up to her knees in water. Every thing will be right when we get to —— Street, so we’ll just put up with it. Every now and then one of the children comes in, like the messengers in Macbeth, to tell her of the progress of mischief. One has to mention, that a boy throwing stones has just broken two panes in the drawing-room window, the lower chess having been up at the time. No matter; all will be right when we get to —— Street. Another “cream-faced[Pg 185] loon” rushes in to say, that the girls in the kitchen have just broken down the grate, and snapped the poker in two. No matter; all will be right when we get to —— Street. Nay, it is not too much to suppose that, although she were told of the house having just begun to sink into the earth, she would take it all with the most philosophic coolness, and console herself for every present mishap by a reference to the joys which are to be experienced in that home of promise. The prospect of a removal, it will be observed, is thus enough even to revolutionise human nature. People abandon their most cherished objects of care, and disregard that of which they are in general most solicitous, under the influence of this prospect. Like the pilgrim of Bunyan (not to speak it profanely), they thrust their fingers in their ears, in order to shut out all lateral subjects of thought, and rush on—on—on towards the new house.

At last the throes of actual removal begin to be felt, and, for the time, all happy anticipation is deadened within us. You have long ago ascertained, by a ceremonious call upon the present tenants of your new mansion, that they cannot remove an hour before Whitsunday at noon, which gives you the comfortable assurance that your flitting will be, like a sharp fever, soon over. The lady who is coming to your house soon after makes a ceremonious call upon you, and ascertains, of course, that you can only remove at that hour also. If matters should happen otherwise—if you are either going to a house altogether new, or to one which can be vacated a short while before the term-day, then what a convenience it is!—we shall have the painters in, and get it all put to rights before we flit a single stick; and after it is all right, we shall remove quite at our leisure. By this plan we shall not only avoid the risk of breaking things, which is always the case in a hurried flitting, but we shall get porters and carters a great deal cheaper, for these fellows, you know, charge three wages on the actual term-day, when every body is flitting. But if it should happen, as above mentioned, that you are limited to a few[Pg 186] hours, so that your furniture, as it goes out, will meet the furniture of another person coming in, and, as it goes in, will meet, in tug of war, that of another person coming out, then the blessed anticipation of your future comforts in “that nice house” reconciles you to every thing, and you make yourself think that, after all, it is better, when one is flitting, to have it all over in the shortest possible space of time.

Sometimes, even when you have a vantage space, you are strangely jockeyed out of it before you are aware. Say the house is to be painted before you go into it. Being quite at your ease, you are satisfied that the painters are engaged about two months before the term. You know very well that these men are the greatest of all rascals; that, indeed, they have no other principle within them but just to put people to as much trouble as possible. But two months! that must surely be sufficient. Well, the painters come all this time before the term, and, like the ancient Spanish navigators, take possession of a newly-discovered country, mark the job for their own, by planting a nasty pail in one room, and setting up a brush on end against the wall in another. You look in about a week after, and see the pail and the brush in statu quo: the fellows have as yet done nothing but taken seisin.[3] You think this is not just quite right, and calling in a cool easy way at the master’s as you go home, express your wish that the job should be immediately proceeded with, being anxious to get into the house as long before the term as possible. The painter is all politeness, and promises to put men upon the house next morning, so that it will be got ready for your reception in no time—by which he appears to mean a space of time so brief as not to be worth defining, but which you eventually find to have signified that the job would be finished not at all in time. As you come home to your dinner next afternoon,[Pg 187] you take a turn that way to see how “the men” are getting on. The house is as empty and desolate as ever; but, from a change in the relative situations of the pail and the brush, you see that they have been there. On inspecting things more minutely, you find that one bed-room has been washed down, and is now, to use a kitchen phrase, swimming. Well, this is a beginning, you think. “The men” have been doing what they could to-day, and to-morrow they would be a good way advanced. On this supposition, you take no more thought about the house for three or four days more, when, dropping in as before, you have the satisfaction of seeing that there is another pail, and that the ceiling of the dining-room has been whitewashed. Still, dilatory as the rascals evidently are, you hardly think there is a sufficient casus fœderis, or breach of treaty, to entitle you to go and blow up the polite man at head-quarters. You suffer for another day; and then, dropping in again, you find a little Flibbertigibbet of a boy exerting himself with his tiny arms to whitewash the ceiling of the parlour. Well, my boy, where are “the men?” This is your question; but for answer you only learn that there have never been any men in the matter—nobody has ever been here but Flibbertigibbet himself. You feel, at this intelligence, almost as much bewildered and obfusculated as George the Second was when he asked an Irish sergeant at a review after the seven years’ war, where was the —— regiment? and was answered, “Please your majesty, I’se the —— regiment;” the Hibernian being in reality the only man that had survived the last campaign. Is this the men, you say to yourself, that Mr —— promised to put upon the house? You go of course instantly, and, Mr —— being, by his own good fortune, from home, you leave a note for him, expressed in such terms as you are sure must bring him to his senses, if any thing will. Dropping in next day to see the effect, your ire is soothed at finding three men at work besides Flibbertigibbet, and every thing seems going on so well, that you trouble them no more for[Pg 188] a week. But it is needless to pursue this painful theme any farther. Suffice it to say, that, having once got these artists into the house, you feel by and by as if they were never again to be got out; you fear that, contrary to the catastrophe of the well-known jest, there will be no letting go the painter. Their pails, and buckets, and brushes, and all their slopery, are just as rife in the house a week before the term as they were a month earlier; and still to every remonstrance Mr —— replies, that all he can do is to put on more men next Monday morning. It is all you can do, perhaps, to get the odious varlets trundled out, “pots and all,” on the very day before you are compelled to remove; so that, instead of having ample scope and verge enough, as you expected, you find that you will be just as much hurried and flurried as if you had been going to a house not previously vacated.

Well, whatever be the foregoing circumstances, flitting day at last arrives in all its horrors. The lady of the household has for several days been storing all kinds of small things by into drawers and boxes, that they might the more safely be transported, so that the family finds itself already deprived of the half of those things which are necessary to comfort, and the whole of what minister to luxury. Your shaving-box is amissing two mornings before flitting day, and has to be fished up, like a “drowned honour,” from the bottom of some abyss of well-regarded trifles. When you come home to dinner on flitting day eve, it is any money for a boot-jack. You take your meals that evening without table-cloths; and unless you can bring down your proud stomach to a brown kitchen bowl, any thing like a comforting drink is out of the question. The crepuscular anguish of the day is already felt. You go to your bed that night off an uncarpeted floor, and in the midst of all kinds of tubs covered up with packsheet, and looking-glasses swaddled up in linen. If you get a nightcap, you may consider yourself lucky above all mortal men. You go to bed, but sleep there is none, for you have to rise[Pg 189] next morning long before the usual hour, and the anticipatory sense of what you have to go through that day fills every nook and cranny of your mind. You awake to a rush of children and servants on the stairs; and though you exert every nerve of your memory to recollect the new geography of things in the room, it is ten to one but you stumble over some tub or chest in the dark, where you thought no tub should be; and, upon the whole, the feeling with which you thrust your poor cold distressed shanks into your vestments, is not much short of that which must possess a man about to walk to the scaffold. A breakfast composed of every thing but the proper materials, and taken out of every thing but the proper vessels, collects such a group of shabby slatternly figures as you did not before think yourself husband, or father, or master to. The meal is gulped in agonies of haste, for the carts were to be at the door at seven exactly, and it is now within a few minutes of the hour. Well, the carts come; one by one are your household goods displaced and packed up on those vehicles. Grates are placed on the breadth of their backs at the bottom, by way of ballast. Then mattresses go over them, to make an agreeable flooring for other things. Tables are tumbled a-top, with their legs reared high in the air, like cart-horses enjoying themselves in their Sunday pastures; and to the ropes with which the heaps are bound down, are attached fry-pans, children’s toys, and other light articles, all by way of garnishing. Though far above such things in general, you are obliged on this occasion to see after very mean details, lest your property should suffer some dreadful damage. The more delicate articles are necessarily entrusted to porters or other serviceable individuals, who carry them separately to your new house. “The boys,” glad to escape the school for a day, are employed, to their great satisfaction, in transporting single things, “which don’t break;” and the servants see after certain baskets of crystal and crockery, “which do.” To see all things properly disposed of—each to the individual best[Pg 190] fitted for it—is your business, and no easy one it is. At length, after every thing is fairly packed off, the lady and yourself walk away together, the cat following in a pillow-slip under the charge of your second eldest daughter.

Before three in the afternoon, the whole of your furniture, broken and whole, has been thrust, higglety-pigglety, into your new house, where you find all things in the most chaotic state of confusion. Kitchen things repose in the dining-room; drawing-room chairs are deposited in the kitchen; and a huge chest of drawers stands in the vestibule, with a shoulder thrust so far out into the fair way as to render it almost impossible to pass. The kitchen grate is only to be built in after six o’clock in the evening, when the masons are released from their day’s work; so there is no possibility of cooking any thing. A provisional arrangement is therefore made on this point. You, and your wife, and your children, and all your assistants, bivouac in some shabby parlour, and regale yourselves (absit elegantia) with rolls and porter. Henry, your eldest son, who has wrought like a Turk all day, leads the feast with his coat off, and the scene can only be compared to a rough-and-tumbling in the back woods of America. No ceremony as to knives. Rolls, and even large loaves, are torn through the middle, and large mouthfuls dug out from the mass by the thumb or forefinger. The liquor goes round in some ordinary vessel, never before appropriated to such a purpose, and all feeling of discomfort being stolen away by the novelty and strong natural feeling of the occasion, the jest and laugh abound. Even in the midst of all the disarray, great hopes and expectations are expressed regarding the new mansion. Such capital high ceilings! Such a broad elegant lobby! So different from that dismal hole we have left! Or, if the ceilings are low, and the lobby narrow, while in the former house they were the reverse, the contrast is drawn in reference to some other points where superiority is indisputable, while the demerits of the new abode are cast discreetly into shade, only to be brought out[Pg 191] and complained of at the approach of next Candlemas. You either have left a good view from the windows, or you are entering upon one. Suppose your former house, being in the centre of the town, had hardly any view, then your wife thus comments upon it:—“Such a dark confined place! Nothing to be seen from the windows, but the opposite houses, or else the chimney-stalks and old wives. Now, here we are quite in the country. The drawing-room commands Fife and North Berwick Law, and even from the bed-rooms we catch a great lump of the Dalmahoy hills. If we just step to the end of the house, we are into the fields; and then we’ll be so very quiet here, compared with what we were. Not a carriage or a cart passing from morning till night. We’ll get some rest at last; and truth to tell, my health is in great need of it. How truly delightful thus to get fairly out of that black, smoky, noisy town, to a place where we can enjoy all the pleasures of the country, and yet be within reach of every convenience of the city! And just consider how much benefit the walk must be to your own health. We formerly lived so near your place of business, that you got no exercise at all, seeing that I never could prevail upon you to take a walk on purpose. But here you must walk, and the good it must do you will be visible in a week’s time,”—&c. &c. &c. If the case has been totally the reverse, you are addressed as follows:—“How delightful to get fairly away from that cold, out-of-the-world, dull place, and once more feel ourselves snug in the town! We’ve no prospects here from the windows; but, ’deed, when folk have prospects, I never see that they make much use of them. For my part, I never looked out of the drawing-room windows once in the month; for what are the Fife hills or North Berwick Law after one has once seen them? [What philosophy we have here!] And then, what good did we get from the garden? It was just a fash to keep right; and I’m sure, when we had paid the gardener, we did not make a penny off the vegetables. Now, here, although there be little prospect[Pg 192] from any of the windows, we’re at least a great deal better protected from the wind. If we have not a garden of our own, have we not the green market almost at the door? And such a weary distance you had to walk every day! No more of that now. Here, when you want a walk, you can take one; and when you don’t like, you can let it alone. Walks are very well, perhaps, in good summer weather; but I’ve no idea of seeing you plash through a long dirty road twice every day through the whole winter. Whenever we want either a walk or a prospect, we’ll get it in the Queen Street gardens; for you know Mrs —— has told me that we may have her key whenever we like. In our old ill-contrived house, we had no place to put any thing off our hand; not so much as a cupboard in the whole house; but now, you see, we have as many presses as rooms, and a capital cellar for coals and lumber. And how near we are here to all the best shops! If it were for nothing but the convenience of getting tea-bread at a minute’s warning from Mr Littlejohn, the baker, whenever any person calls upon us in the evening, it would have been worth while to remove to this house. The lass likewise tells me that there is a very obliging woman, quite at hand, who keeps a mangle for the use of the neighbourhood, which will be a great convenience to the family; and that she will take in hand to supply us with milk or cream at any hour of the day,”—&c. &c. &c. Thus, it will be observed, neither the spirit of discontent nor the spirit of hope is ever without material for feeding its particular necessities.

You have now got fairly into your new house, bag and baggage. It is after the manner, however, of a certain pound of comfits which a carrier once brought from a city confectioner to a country customer. The paper bag having proved insufficient in the journey, the contents had dispersed themselves throughout all the other packages in the cart. Every parcel, and bag, and box, had to be shaken clear of the lurking carvy, till, the whole of the bulky articles[Pg 193] having been discharged and laid off, the little white particles were found at the bottom mingled with straws, fragments of rope, and paper, and all other kinds of trash. The whole having been swept out, however, the honest old carrier brought them to the owner in a large platter, saying, with the air of a man who has relieved his conscience of some uncommon weight, “Here they are, mistress; ye hae them a’ for me.” Just like the comfits are all your goods and chattels—your ox, and your ass, and your children, and your every thing else—the whole are there; but in such a state! Perhaps, to add to your distresses, you have to delay putting the principal rooms to rights till the painters have to be with you. This, of course, adjourns the termination of your agonies sine die. Perhaps, about three months after, when you have battled the rascals out of one room into another, much after the manner of the siege of St Sebastian, you get at last into the enviable attitude “as you were,” resolving of course never again to remove as long as you live, but still as ready before next 2d of February to take that step as ever.

The common feeling respecting debtors and creditors is very erroneous, and, as is common with popular fallacies, it imposes with double force upon the young and inexperienced. Debtors are represented in all works of fiction, and in the ordinary language of a large portion of society, as a set of amiable, unfortunate, and most interesting persons: Creditors, on the other hand, as an unmingled generation of execrable wretches, with a hardness of heart that would not disgrace an executioner, and indeed only one remove from another stony class of men, the much misrepresented jailers. Now, the person who writes this[Pg 194] article has known many debtors and creditors, and he can say that, in by far the most of cases, the latter were the better class of men. He alludes, of course, not to commercial men at large, who are in their own persons, in general, as much of the one thing as the other, but to cases where the creditor is a tradesman, and the debtor a customer; that is, where the debt is not incurred in the intercourse of business, but for the personal use and benefit of the debtor. In these cases, so far from the creditor being an unfeeling and relentless tyrant, as he is generally represented, he is only the indignant victim of the imprudence or guilt of the debtor. The latter may be an amiable and interesting person, for we often find these characteristics united to consummate folly and disregard of the rights of others. But the young must beware how they set down debtors, in a class, as purely estimable and entitled to sympathy, while they at the same time look upon creditors as only ruthless persecutors, worthy of the bitterest execration. They may depend upon it, that no notion could be more erroneous, no error more apt to be fatal to them in their course through life. They must be informed that to incur debt for their own gratifications, without the ability to discharge it, is just another thing for selling themselves as slaves to their creditors. After doing so, they are no longer entirely free: part of themselves becomes the property of another, and thus they lose the respect of the world, which cannot see one man indulge in enjoyments at the expense of his fellow, without thinking of him very meanly. The incurring of debt for personal gratification is odious, for many reasons. In the first place, it violates that rule of nature which appoints every man to work for himself, and only enjoy as he works. It also tends to occasion the ruin of innocent persons. Creditors are not invariably rich, as one would suppose them to be, from reading novels. They are more frequently poor, industrious persons, who, in losing money by their debtors, are apt to be made debtors themselves, and thereby ruined. In fact, the case stands generally[Pg 195] thus: An idle or extravagant person procures support for his bad appetites, and is enabled to show himself off as a very fine fellow, at the expense of a humble-minded honest trader, who confines himself constantly to his business, and forbids himself almost every indulgence, in order that he may be able to pay every one to whom he is indebted, and discharge all the other duties of a good citizen. Now, if young people will bring their naturally generous feelings to bear upon this point, they will see that the debtor, and not the creditor, is alone worthy of execration. And they may be assured, that, where creditors show a severity to their debtors, it is generally either merited by the latter, or is dictated by a justifiable consideration of the danger into which they are thrown by the non-payment of the money which is their due, and which they may be owing in their turn to some other person.

In every rule there are exceptions; but it is necessary to guard against the breaking down of great rules by allowing for trifling exceptions. Because good men sometimes incur debt, and become insolvent, through no fault of theirs, we must not infringe upon the majesty of the great maxim, that debt ought to be paid, and that its non-payment is an evil. Young people, if they wish to prosper in the world, will do well not to excuse all contraction of debt for the sake of the few who contract it innocently. They must have it impressed forcibly upon their minds, that every pleasure in which they indulge themselves, without the reasonable prospect of paying for it, though it be but to the amount of one penny, is a step in error, and apt to be the beginning of their destruction. They must have it impressed upon their minds, that no man of good feelings can enjoy the least comfort, if he be not conscious of working for, or being honestly come into the possession of, fully as much as he spends. To persist in living beyond our incomes, is to live a life of dishonesty; and to subsist on the industry of relatives, as is sometimes the case with the idle and the dissolute, is worse still, for it involves an excessive[Pg 196] meanness of spirit, ingratitude, and hard-heartedness—thus adding depth to the crime, and will be sure to be visited some day with feelings of anguish and remorse.

A predominating error among the junior classes of society, is a disinclination to wait for a short time till they be enabled to compete in the enjoyment of luxuries with others they see around them, and who, it is more than probable, have toiled long and painfully before they arrived at their present apparently prosperous condition. This impatience of reaching a certain height in the ladder of fortune, without taking deliberation to mount a number of preliminary and difficult steps, cannot, indeed, be sufficiently reprehended, where it occurs, as it leads to that fatal resource of incurring debts never to be paid, and that supposed harshness of creditors, which a disordered process of reasoning brings into view. I would here tenderly admonish the youthful part of the community to refrain from indulgences they cannot honestly command. Let them believe one who has had some experience, when he tells them that there is not the least chance of the world running away from them; that the present generation of grown men will not consume all earthly enjoyments, but will leave a boundless variety of everything which can please the senses, or gratify an honourable ambition. They need, therefore, be in no hurry whatever, and take time to build their fortune on a firm and secure basis. The rising generation cannot lay these things sufficiently to heart. They cannot be sufficiently taught, that suffering under the consequences of imprudently-incurred debts does not necessarily make them heroes—is not entitled to unmingled sympathy, no more than a robber at the gallows is a martyr; but that, while pity is perhaps due to them, as to all who err in this frail world, the larger share of sympathy ought to be bestowed on their unfortunate victims, the creditors, whose families may be suffering from their criminal follies, and who are apt to be by far the better and honester men.

“Pray, do call in an easy way some evening, you and Mrs Balderstone; we are sure to be at home, and shall be most happy to see you.” Such is the kind of invitation one is apt to get from considerably intimate acquaintances, who, equally resolved against the formality and the expense of a particular entertainment on your account, hope to avoid both evils by making your visit a matter of accident. If you be a man of some experience, you will know that all such attempts to make bread and cheese do that which is more properly the business of a pair of fowls, end in disappointment; and you will, therefore, take care to wait till the general invitation becomes a particular one. But there are inexperienced people in this world who think every thing is as it seems, and are apt to be greatly deceived regarding this accidental mode of visiting. For the sake of these last, I shall relate the following adventure:—

I had been remarkably busy one summer, and, consequently, obliged to refuse all kinds of invitations, general and particular. The kind wishes of my friends had accumulated upon me somewhat after the manner of the tunes frozen up in Baron Munchausen’s French horn; and it seemed as if a whole month would have been necessary to thaw out and discharge the whole of these obligations. A beginning, however, is always something; and, accordingly, one rather splashy evening in November, I can’t tell how it was, but a desire came simultaneously over myself and Mrs Balderstone—it seemed to be by sympathy—of stepping out to see Mr and Mrs Currie, a married pair, who had been considerably more pressing in their general invitations than any other of our friends. We both knew that there was a cold duck in the house, besides a bit of cheese just sent home by Nicholson, and understood to be more than excellent. But, as the old Scots song says, the tid[Pg 198] had come over us, and forth we must go. No sooner said than done. Five minutes more saw us leaving our comfortable home, my wife carrying a cap pinned under her cloak, while to my pocket was consigned her umbrageous comb. As we paced along, we speculated only on the pleasure which we should give to our kind friends by thus at last paying them a visit, when perhaps all hope of our ever doing so was dead within them. Nor was it possible altogether to omit reflecting, like the dog invited by his friend to sup, upon the entertainment which lay before us; for certainly on such an occasion the fatted calf could hardly expect to be spared.

Full of the satisfaction which we were to give and receive, we were fully into the house before we thought it necessary to inquire if any body was at home. The servant girl, surprised by the forward confidence of our entrée, evidently forgot her duty, and acknowledged, when she should have denied, the presence of her master and mistress in the house. We were shown into a dining-room as clean, cold, and stately as an alabaster cave, and which had the appearance of being but rarely lighted by the blaze of hospitality. My first impulse was to relieve my pocket, before sitting down, of the comb, which I thought was now about being put to its proper use; but the chill of the room stayed my hand. I observed, at the same time, that my wife, like the man under the influence of Eolus in the fable, manifested no symptom of parting with her cloak. Ere we could communicate our mutual sensations of incipient disappointment, Mrs Currie entered with a flurried, surprised air, and made a prodigious effort to give us welcome. But, alas! poor Mr Currie; he had been seized in the afternoon with a strange vertigo and sickness, and was now endeavouring, by the advice of Dr Boak, to get some repose. “It will be such a disappointment to him when he learns that you were here, for he would have been so happy to see you. We must just entertain the hope, however, to see you some other night.” Although the primary idea in[Pg 199] our minds at this moment was unquestionably the desperatio cibi—the utter hopelessness of supper in this quarter—we betrayed, of course, no feeling but sympathy in the illness of our unfortunate friend, and a regret for having called at so inauspicious a moment. Had any unconcerned person witnessed our protestations, he could have formed no suspicion that we ever contemplated supper, or were now in the least disappointed. We felt anxious about nothing but to relieve Mrs Currie, as soon as possible, of the inconvenience of our visit, more especially as the chill of the room was now piercing us to the bone. We therefore retired, under a shower of mutual compliments and condolences, and “hopes,” and “sorries,” and “have the pleasures;” the door at last slamming after us with a noise which seemed to say, “How very glad I am to get quit of you!”

When we got to the street, we certainly did not feel quite so mortified as the dog already alluded to, seeing that we had not, like him, been tossed over the window. But, still the reverse of prospect was so very bitter, that for some time we could hardly believe that the adventure was real. By this time we had expected to be seated snug at supper, side by side with two friends, who, we anticipated, would almost expire with pleasure at seeing us. But here, on the contrary, we were turned out upon the cold inhospitable street, without a friend’s face to cheer us. We still recollected that the cold duck remained as a fortress to fall back upon; but, being now fairly agog in the adventure, the idea of returning home, re infecta, was not to be thought of. Supper we must have in some other house than our own, let it cost what it may. “Well,” said Mrs Balderstone, “there are the Jacksons! They live not far from this—suppose we drop in upon them. I’m sure we have had enough of invitations to their house. The very last time I met Mrs Jackson on the street, she told me she was never going to ask us again—we had refused so long—she was going, she said, just to let us come if we liked, and when we liked.” Off we went, therefore, to try the Jacksons.

[Pg 200]

On applying at the door of this house, it flew open, as it were, by enchantment, and the servant girl, so far from hesitating like the other, seemed to expect no question to be asked on entrée. We moved into the lobby, and inquired if Mr and Mrs Jackson were at home, which was answered by the girl with a surprised affirmative. We now perceived, from the pile of hats and cloaks in the lobby, as well as a humming noise from one of the rooms, that the Jacksons had a large company, and that we were understood by the servant to be part of it. The Jacksons, thought we (I know my wife thought so, although I never asked), give some people particular invitations. Her object was now to make an honourable retreat, for, although my dress was not entirely a walking one, and my wife’s cap was brought with the prospect of making an appearance of dress, we were by no means fit to match with those who had dressed on purpose for the party, even although we were asked to join them. Just at this moment, Mrs Jackson happened to cross the lobby, on hospitable thoughts intent, and saw us, than whom, perhaps, she would rather have seen a basilisk. “Oh, Mrs Balderstone, how do you do? How are you, Mr Balderstone? I’m so delighted that you have come in this easy way at last. A few of the neighbours have just dropped in upon us, and it will be so delightful if you will join them. Come into this room and take off your bonnet; and you, Mr Balderstone, just you be so good as step up to the drawing-room. You’ll find numbers there that you know. And Mr Jackson will be so happy to see you,”—&c. All this, however, would not do. Mrs Balderstone and I not only felt a little hurt at the want of speciality in our invitations to this house, but could not endure the idea of mingling in a crowd better dressed and more regularly invited than ourselves. We therefore begged Mrs Jackson to excuse us for this night. We had just called in an easy way in passing, and, indeed, we never attended ceremonious parties at any time. We would see her some other evening, when she was less[Pg 201] engaged—that is to say, “we would rather see you and Mr Jackson at Jericho than darken your doors again.” And so off we came, with the blandest and most complimentary language upon our tongues, and the most piqued and scornful feelings in our hearts.

Again upon the street—yea, once again. What was to be done now? Why, said Mrs Balderstone, there is excellent old Mrs Smiles, who lives in the next street. I have not seen her or the Misses Smiles for six months; but the last time they were so pressing for us to return their visit (you remember they supped with us in spring), that I think we cannot do better than take this opportunity of clearing scores.

Mrs Smiles, a respectable widow, lived with her five daughters in a third floor in —— Street. Thither we marched, with a hope, undiminished by the two preceding disappointments, that here at length we would find supper. Our knock at Mrs Smiles’s hospitable portal produced a strange rushing noise within; and when the servant appeared, I observed in the far, dim vista of the passage, one or two slip-slop figures darting across out of one door into another, and others again crossing in the opposite direction; and then there was heard a low anxious whispering, while a single dishevelled head peeped out from one of the doors, and then the head was withdrawn, and all was still. We were introduced into a room which had evidently been the scene of some recent turmoil of no ordinary kind, for female clothes lay scattered in every direction, besides some articles which more properly belong to a dressing-room. We had not been here above a minute, when we heard our advent announced by the servant in an adjoining apartment to Mrs Smiles herself, and some of her young ladies. A flood of obloquy was instantly opened upon the girl by one of her young mistresses—Miss Eliza, we thought—for having given admission to any body at this late hour, especially when she knew that they were to be up early next morning to commence their journey, and had still a great many of[Pg 202] their things to pack. “And such a room you have shown them into, you goose!” said the enraged Miss. The girl was questioned as to our appearance, for she had neglected to ask our name; and then we heard one young lady say, “It must be these Balderstones. What can have set them a-gadding to-night? I suppose we must ask them to stay to supper, for they’ll have come for nothing else—confound them! Mary, you are in best trim; will you go in and speak to them till we get ourselves ready? The cold meat will do, with a few eggs. I’m sure they could not have come at a worse time.” Miss Mary accordingly came hastily in after a few minutes, and received us with a thousand protestations of welcome. Her mother would be so truly delighted to see us, for she had fairly given up all hope of our ever visiting her again. She was just getting ready, and would be here immediately. “In the meantime, Mrs Balderstone, you will lay by your cloak and bonnet. Let me assist you,”—&c. We had got enough, however, of the Smileses. We saw we had dropped into the midst of a scene of easy dishabille, and surprised it with unexpected ceremony. It would have been cruel to the Smileses to put them about at such a time, and ten times more cruel to ourselves to sit in friendly intercourse with a family who had treated us in such a manner behind our backs. “These Balderstones!” The phrase was wormwood. My wife, therefore, made up a story to the effect that we had only called in going home from another friend’s house, in order to inquire after the character of a servant. As Mrs Smiles was out of order, we would not disturb her that evening, but call on some other occasion. Of course, the more that we declaimed about the impossibility of remaining to supper, the more earnestly did Miss Smiles entreat us to remain. It would be such a disappointment to her mother, and still more to Eliza and the rest of them. She was obliged, however, with well-affected reluctance, to give way to our impetuous desire of escaping.

Having once more stepped forth into the cold blast of[Pg 203] November, we began to feel that supper was becoming a thing which we could not much longer, with comfort, trust to the contingency of general invitations. We therefore sent home our thoughts to the excellent cold duck and green cheese which lay in our larder, and, picturing to ourselves the comfort of our parlour fireside, with a good bottle of ale toasting within the fender, resolved no more to wander abroad in search of happiness, unless there should be something like a certainty of good fare and a hearty welcome elsewhere.

Thus it is always with general invitations. “Do call on us some evening, Miss Duncan, just in an easy way, and, pray, bring your seam with you, for there is nothing I hate so much as ceremonious set calls,” is the sort of invitations you will hear in the middle ranks of life, given to some good-natured female acquaintance, while you yourself, if a bachelor, will in the same way be bidden to call “just after you are done with business, and any night in the week; it is all the same, for you can never catch us unprepared.” The deuce is in these general invitations. People give them without reflecting that they cannot be at all times ready to entertain visitors; cannot be so much as at home to have the chance of doing so. Other people accept and act upon them, at the risk of either putting their visitors dreadfully about, or receiving a very poor entertainment. The sudden arrival of an unexpected guest who has come on the faith of one of these delusive roving invitations, indeed, in many instances, disorganises the economy of a whole household. Nothing tries a housewife so much. The state of her larder or cupboard instantaneously flashes on her mind; and if she do not happen to be a notable, and, consequently, not a regular curer of beef, or curious in the matter of fresh eggs, a hundred to one but she feels herself in an awkward dilemma, and, I have no doubt, would wish the visitor any where but where he is. The truth is, by these general invitations you may chance to arrive at a death or a marriage, a period of[Pg 204] mourning or rejoicing, when the sympathies of the family are all engaged with matters of their own.

If people will have their friends beside them, let them, for the sake of all that is comfortable, give them a definite invitation at once; a general invitation is much worse than no invitation at all; it is little else than an insult, however unintentional; for it is as much as to say that the person is not worth inviting in a regular manner. In “good” society, a conventional understanding obtains in the delicate point of invitations; there is an established scale of the value of the different meals adapted to the rank of the invited. I advise all my friends to follow this invaluable code of civility. By all means let your invitations have a special reference to time. On the other hand, if a friend comes plump down with a request that you will favour him with your company at a certain hour of the day, why, go without hesitation. The man deserves your company for his honesty, and you will be sure to put him to no more trouble than what he directly calculates on. But turn a deaf ear, if you be wise, to general invitations; they are nets spread out to ensnare your comfort. Rather content yourself with the good old maxim, which somebody has inscribed over an ancient doorway in one of the old streets of Edinburgh, Tecum Habita—Keep at Home.

It is a very general impression that the system of auricular confession was given up at the Reformation. Such is by no means the case; every man and mother’s son in the country still keeps his confessor. By this epithet, it may be guessed, I mean that chief and most particular friend whom every man keeps about him—who stands his best man when he is married, and becomes his second when he[Pg 205] fights a duel—his double, in short, or second self—a creature whom you almost always find with him when you call, and who either walks under his arm in the street, or is found waiting for him while he steps into some neighbouring shop, or, as the case may happen, is waited for by him.

I make bold to say, there is not a trader any where who does not keep his confessor. The creature haunts the shop, till he almost seems the Genius of the Place, to the grievous prepossession of newspapers, and, what is more intolerable still, to the exclusive occupation of the ear of the worthy shopkeeper himself. The evening is the grand revel-time for confessors of this genus. Between eight and nine, you see them gathering to the shops of their respective victims, like fowl to roost. As you pass about nine, you observe, on looking in, that the discipline and rigour of shop-life has dissolved. Master, men, and boys, feel the approach of the moment of emancipation, with a peculiar salience of thought, alternating with a deep and tranquil delight. The confessor reigns in the spirit of this glorious hour, and his laugh, and his joke, and his news, and his proffered pinch, are listened to, re-echoed, and partaken of by his devotee, with a pleasure of the keenest nature, and ominous, you may make sure, of oysters and gin punch on the way home.

In some shops, confessors cluster like grapes over a vintner’s door. They block up the way of custom; and it is evident, in many cases, that the devotee would rather lose the chance of a penny from a customer, by omitting opportunities of attack, temptation, and inveiglement, than lose the joke that is passing in the merry circle of his confessors, which his ear drinks in as a precious aside, while he only can spare a mere fragment of his attention—a corner of one auditory organ—the front shop of his mind—to the real business before him. In some shops, confessors get no encouragement before dinner. The broad eye of garish day, in those fastidious establishments, could no[Pg 206] more endure such a walking personification of idle gossip, than a ball-room, at high twelve, could tolerate the intrusion of a man in a short coat, with a pen stuck in his ear. But this is by no means the general case; and even in some instances, where the front shop will not admit of such an appendage, ten to one but, if the premises were well ransacked, you would find a specimen of the class snug in some out-of-the-way corner, filling up the greater part of his time with a newspaper, but every now and then resorted to by his votary, in the intervals of actual employment, like an Egeria receiving the visits of a Numa, and no doubt administering equally precious counsel.

The more common position of a shopkeeper’s confessor is a chair opposite the door, whence he may command a view of all that passes on the street, with a full front inspection of every individual that makes bold to enter. Into this chair the confessor invariably glides as a matter of course. There he sits down, and, throwing one limb over the other, considers himself entitled to inflict his company upon the unhappy shopkeeper for any length of time. He notices, as if he were not noticing, all that goes on in the premises. Not an order is given for goods, not a payment made, or a pennyworth sold, but it is seen, and very likely made the subject of after comment. It is of no consequence to the confessor what description of customers enter the place. Were a princess of the blood to come in, he would keep his seat and his countenance equally unmoved, and a whole band of ladies, driven in to escape a shower of rain, will not stir him from the chair, to which he seems nailed, like the marble prince of the Black Islands, in the Arabian Nights’ Entertainments. The customers very naturally feel disinclined to patronise a shop which is thus, as it were, haunted by an evil spirit. “Oh, how I do hate to enter that shop of Mr Such-a-thing,” says one young lady to another, “for every thing you do or say is noticed by that odious person who is always lounging there.” And in this manner Mr Such-a-thing loses his business,[Pg 207] almost without the possibility of recalling it. He longs to discover a means of disposing of the confessor, but he finds a great difficulty in accomplishing his purpose. He is disinclined to be churlish to a person to whom he has confessed himself for years. Still he makes an effort. He grows cool in his civility, and makes a point of being always busy on his arrival. Perhaps he has the good luck, at length, to shake off this pest of his premises; but it is more than probable that he submits to the terrific infliction for life, his confessor only leaving him when he is fairly in his grave. I once knew a dreadful case of confessorship, in which the shopkeeper had the hardihood to expel his visitant, and by a plan so ingenious that I think it worth while to advert to it. The shop contained four chairs, including the confessional, which stood opposite the door. One day when the confessor arrived, and, as usual, proceeded to his seat, he was a little surprised in remarking that it was filled to a pretty good height with parcels of some kind or other. But as this appeared naturally enough to be caused by a press in the stock of goods, no observation took place regarding it, and another chair was selected. However, next day when he again appeared, another chair was found covered up in a similar manner. The following day, he even found a third filled with parcels; and on the fourth day the whole were thus engaged. The confessor now saw that a conspiracy had been formed to destroy his functions, and to expel him from his ancient settlements. Like the unhappy antediluvians, who, as the flood arose, were driven from one spot of earth to another, and at last did not find a dry piece of ground whereon to rest their foot, so the unhappy confessor had been driven from chair to chair, till at last he could not discover a place whereon he could plant himself. A pang of vexation shot through his heart; a gleam of mingled shame and indignation passed over his countenance; and, with a last look of despair, he burst from the shop, and “ne’er was heard of more.”

It must be allowed that some men do not stand so much[Pg 208] in need of confessors, or do not indulge so much in them, as others; but, upon the whole, it may be taken as a general rule, that no man can altogether do without such an official. In the fair on-going business of life, one acts suo more solito, according to one’s regular custom of trade, or by the common rules of the world. But occasions occur, where common practice does not furnish a rule. You are in love, and wish to interest a friend in your passion; you are about to marry, and require information about arrangements, and also some one to stand beside you, and pull off your glove, preparatory to the ceremony; you have a quarrel, and need a third party to tell you that you are in the right; you are about to enter into some commercial or other enterprise a little beyond your usual depth, and find it necessary to fortify your resolution by the sanction of a friend; or you write a poem or a novel, and require to have somebody to read the manuscript, and tell you that it is sure of success. In all these cases, the confessor is indispensable. Without him, you would be crossed in love; get stranded in the straits of matrimony; permit yourself, after giving offence and insult, to let off the object of it with impunity for his remonstrance; break down in your new business scheme; and let your manuscript waste its sweetness on the desert scrutoire. But with him all goes smooth.

Upon the whole, it is better that one’s confessor should be a little poorer, as well as a little more plausible in speech, than one’s self: he ought to be a man to whom meat and drink are things of some account—a broken-down Scotch licentiate—an author who has published respectable books which have never sold; in short, some idle, poor, servile individual, to whom it is of the last importance to get a good grazing ground in the back premises of a substantial trader, upon whom he may revenge that partiality of fortune, which decrees all the real comforts of life to the mercantile and common-place, while the real “clever fellows” starve.

[Pg 209]

But, after all, it must be allowed that there is a great deal of confessorship in the world, independent of a regard to cake and pudding. It is in many cases simply a fascination exerted over one mind by another; in others, the result of that very common failing, the want of confidence in one’s own resources. Young men—by which, I mean men in the mason-lodge time of life, say between twenty and five-and-twenty—are most apt to indulge in confession. They think friends all in all, and for friends would give up every thing. All business and duty is to them an episode, only consented to because it is unavoidable; while the enjoyment of the countenance of their friends seems the main and true concern of life. Then are the joys of confession truly relished. Then does the vampire confessor suck deepest into the vitals of his devotee. Happy delusion—sweet morning dream—alas! too certain to awake to the conviction that it is “but a dream!”

The monstrous absurdity, that there is a principle in the economy of nature by which population increases beyond the means of support, has been stated by men eminent in various departments of political economy, and countenanced by individuals in whom the soundest reasoning and farsightedness might have been expected. There is not a principle in nature having a tendency to increase population beyond the means of subsistence, or to overpeople the world. To suppose that there is, is to impugn the magnificent designs of the Creator, and to call in question his vigilant and ever-sustaining providence. When the globe which we inhabit, and all that it sustains in the animal and vegetable kingdoms, was called into existence, and sent[Pg 210] forth fresh from the hands of its Divine Constructor, certain fixed principles were ordained and put into unintermitting action, by which all were to be sustained, and prevented alike from coming to a stand, or into collision. These principles involved the production and reproduction of food for man and beast through an incalculable series of ages; and this process of production was left to be excited or retarded in a great measure by man, for whose convenience all subordinate parts were organised, and by whose thinking faculties the increase or decrease of food was apparently to be proportioned. In a word, it was left to our free-will whether to cultivate the soil, or leave it in its rude and unproductive condition.

It has happened in the course of some five or six thousand years after the creation of the world, that a small island, lying in the seas which border on the northern part of Europe—a spot of earth so comparatively small that it may be traversed from one end to the other in the space of little more than a week—has, by the artificial state of its society, and a concourse of injudicious regulations, increased in its population to about seventeen millions of inhabitants; and because, as must necessarily be the case from the influence of these regulations, a number of the people are in impoverished circumstances, and are not so well fed as their neighbours, it has, forsooth, pleased a few men in this large mass of humanity to impeach the God of the universe, and to tell us that He creates millions of thinking beings only to put them to death by starvation.

To show the utter fallacy of this detestable theory, I need only bring under your notice two simple facts, in which all such vicious and shallow-minded reasoning finds an insurmountable obstacle to its establishment. It is a great, a comforting, and an undeniable fact, that there are immense tracts of land, islands, and even continents, which till this hour are lying in nearly their primeval state, with the soil untouched since the beginning of the world. So boundless are these almost uninhabited territories, so capable[Pg 211] are they of sustaining human life, that, if the proper means were used, they would yield food, clothing, and a place of residence to more people than all that the ancient settlements of the human race at present contain. They could hold all the existing population of the earth, and not be filled. Canada itself could receive and maintain the whole of the population of Europe; and the seventeen millions of human beings belonging to the little island which has raised such alarm, might be transported to the banks of one of the mighty rivers in the United States, and it would hardly be known that they had taken up their residence in the country. “Send us over your whole population (says an American writer); we have plenty of room for you all, and a hundred millions more.” But such a gratifying fact as this gives but a faint idea of the vastness, the capabilities of the world beyond the waters of the Atlantic. In one of the numbers of the Journal, I presented the account given by the ingenious naturalist Audubon, of the wild pigeons of America. Have my readers any recollection of the extraordinary number of these animals, and the calculation made regarding the quantity of their daily food? Let me here repeat and extend the calculation. The number of pigeons seen on the wing by Audubon, as computed by allowing two pigeons to the square yard, was one billion, one hundred and fifteen millions, one hundred and thirty-six thousand, and “as every pigeon (says he) daily consumes fully half a pint of food, the quantity necessary for supplying this vast multitude must be eight millions seven hundred and twelve thousand bushels per day.” The species of food used is the produce of the trees. We thus find, that by a moderate calculation a single flock of pigeons in the back woods of America consumes in one day as great an amount of food, whether by weight or measure, as would support the whole seventeen millions of people in Great Britain for at least a week. The mind is lost in wonder in contemplation of so magnificent a fact. The faculty of thought is bewildered in pondering on so[Pg 212] striking an instance of the astonishing bounty of the great Author of Nature in providing for the wants of his creatures. Where, where, may we then ask, have the predicters of famine been examining the sources of food for man? On what have their eyes and their thoughts been fixed, that they have passed over this prospect of inexhaustible plenty? It would seem that they have never looked beyond the confines of that little spot of land in the ocean, which I have alluded to, and whose superabundant thousands require only to be transferred to that division on the earth’s surface holding out food, raiment, and residence for their gratuitous acceptance, in order that society may right itself.

The above is the first fact I have to offer in the elucidation of this important question; and I maintain, in direct opposition to those who have taken a contrary view of the subject—among whom I am sorry to include persons otherwise distinguished for the clearness and comprehensiveness of their views of the social compact—that until the whole earth has been peopled, and until it can hold no more, it cannot rationally be said that the means of subsistence are inadequate for the wants of the population. These means are no more inadequate than that the produce of a kitchen-garden is insufficient to support the family to which it belongs; and if this family be prevented from seeking its subsistence beyond its garden walls, and so be half starved, their miserable case is exactly parallel with that of this over-populated island. Remove, I would say, all restrictions of a certain description; do not unnaturally foster population either in a particular part of the country, or at a particular time; LET MANKIND ALONE: and, in the same manner that fluids find their level, so will the redundant population of Great Britain and Ireland be profitably dispersed over territories hitherto untrodden by the footsteps of civilised men.

My second fact is more hypothetical, but not less obvious to our understanding. It is an old proverbial expression,[Pg 213] that “necessity is the mother of invention.” Now, in this sentiment we discover one of the wisest provisions of Providence. It is only by necessity that mankind, in a savage state, are compelled to hunt, or otherwise toil, for their subsistence. The same feeling predominates through all the ramifications of civilised society. In proportion as the necessities of men spur them on to seek out new means of subsistence, so do these new means of subsistence open upon their view. If we cast a retrospective glance upon those steps which society has traced from its infancy to manhood—from a state of barbaric rudeness to a condition of luxury and splendour—we invariably find that all improvements have originated in the wants of the people; and that, in proportion as they increased in number, so did they whet their invention, and contrive additional means of support. It is from this cause that Scotland, for instance, had no greater overplus of food when it had only a million of inhabitants than it has now, when it supports nearly three times the number. Nay, it had much less food in proportion when it had only a million of people; and hence it is proved that mankind, by their inventions and improvements, greatly increase the means of support beyond the point at which they formerly stood. The power of seeking out, or inventing, new means of subsistence, just as the old ones are perceived to be inadequate, has been actively at work since the beginning of time, and will operate for the benefit of our race as long as sun and moon endure. It is in the exercise of this transcendent faculty of the human mind that we see the beneficence of the Creator in providing unseen means of subsistence; and it is in it that we find the cheering hope, that at no period, however distant, even when the whole earth shall have been covered with inhabitants, shall mankind languish for lack of food. As they go on increasing in number, so will they go on perfecting their contrivances; every succeeding generation may labour under some new difficulty, but so will it be endowed with the faculty of releasing itself from it.

Theatricals are said to be losing public favour in almost every place where they are known, and public writers are puzzled to account for it.

When the buckle-trade declined some years ago, the cause was at once seen to be the ascendency of buttons. But it would appear that the cause of the decline of theatricals, though almost equally obvious, is more a subject of dispute. It is only so because the subject is larger, and composed of more parts. We think, however, that a little discussion will suffice to show, with equal clearness, what causes the failure of dramatic amusements, as a part of the great system of public entertainment.

Taking the middle of the last century as a period when dramatic exhibitions were generally well attended, let us inquire what there was in the condition and circumstances of the theatre at that period to have rendered this a matter of course. We reply at once, that plays were then as well written, as well got up, and as well acted, as any picture was then painted, or any novel or poem written. The drama was at that time on a perfect level with, or perhaps even superior to, the current literature of the day, or any other instrument of public amusement which existed. Nor was it beneath the standard of the general manners of society. It exhibited, in a gross enough manner, the vices of the age; but the people whose vices were exhibited were rendered insensible by those very vices to the grossness of the scene.

The theatre is now in quite a different condition from what it was in then. Whether owing to the want of legislative enactments, which might encourage literary men in writing for the theatre, or to some other cause, our dramatic entertainments are now of a character much beneath or behind the age. Our acting plays are either the old stock, displeasing us with the exhibition of obsolete vices; or modern trash, full of exaggerated character and sentiment,[Pg 215] trusting for success, perhaps, to romantic scenery and machinery; or literal transcripts of nursery fables. Our drama, overlooking some better qualities, is, in a great measure, a compound of childishness, indecency, buffoonery, and, to no small extent, of profanity; in every point of view fifty years in taste behind our current fictitious literature, which, in itself, is susceptible of great amendment.

In Great Britain the drama has always appealed to the less serious and virtuous part of the community. At the time of the civil war, and after the re-establishment of the theatre at the Restoration, it was altogether a Cavalier thing, and, like the Cavalier party in general, too apt to make debauchery a mark of rectitude in politics. This character it has never entirely shaken off. With the exception of a certain number of mawkish and tawdry aphorisms scattered over our modern plays, they still maintain, in some measure, their old war against the decencies and proprieties of life. The truth is, the theatre has become so exclusively resorted to by a less serious part of the community, that it could hardly attempt to conciliate the other class, lest, in the vain effort, it lose the customers it has.

If the players thus produce an article of entertainment inferior both in talent and in taste to the other things which compete for the business of amusing the public, it is not to be wondered at that their houses are deserted. For the crown which at present purchases a night’s entertainment at the theatre to one member of a family—an entertainment partly childish, perhaps, and almost certain to be somewhat immoral—that whole family can be supplied for a whole month with the best literary productions of the day from a circulating library, or it can purchase a single volume, which not only gives it rational entertainment and instruction for several nights, but remains a constant and ready instrument for repeating this entertainment and instruction whenever it is required. If we coolly reflect on the respective reputations which the drama and literature[Pg 216] bear in the world, we will find that only a certain number of people wish well to the former, while the latter is an object of almost universal attachment and national pride. The fact is, that the drama has shut itself out by its own misconduct from the sympathies of half the public, if not a much larger portion. It is still dabbling in the low vices and mean order of feelings which prevailed in the reign of George the Second, or else in the nursery tales which lulled our cradles; while literature, shooting far ahead, is replete with the superior virtues and extensive benevolences of the present age. And not only does literature compete with the stage. Music, and other accomplishments of private life, are also now resorted to, for the purpose of furnishing an innocent amusement to the family circle—an amusement less attractive, perhaps, than the theatre, which, with all its errors, has still a powerful inherent charm, but preferred, nevertheless, as making up in simplicity, harmlessness, and cheapness, what it wants in the power of excitement.

When we speak of the stupidity and bad taste of the plays, we do not enumerate all the disadvantages of the theatre. As if every thing connected with the establishment were doomed to be of the same order, we find the players also exciting disgust in all well-regulated minds by the strange code of morality which they have been pleased to set up for themselves. Of course, we do not shut our eyes to the numerous instances of respectable and well-behaved actors, which occur nowhere, perhaps, so frequently as in the minor capital which we inhabit. But, as we remarked in a former paper, we must not have great generalities ruined or broken down by unimportant exceptions. Taken as a whole, the players are a more dissolute fraternity than the members of any other profession; while some of them, ranking as the very highest in professional merit, commit transcendent breaches of the most sacred moral laws, as if to show how independent they are of all the rules of decent society. We would not gratify the[Pg 217] wretched vanity which perhaps is one of the principal causes of those errors, by mentioning particular cases; but they are too notorious to require being specified. It is sometimes set forward as a plea for the extenuation of those offences, that the life of a player is more beset with temptations than any other. But what an argument is here against the whole system of play-acting! Another plea is, that the public has no business with any thing but the public appearance of a player—has no right to think of their private lives; as if a person doing all he can to destroy the safeguards of domestic happiness by action and example, were to be equally well treated by society, as a person who does what is in his power to contribute to its happiness. Society must, in the eyes of these pleaders, be a slavish thing indeed, if it is supposed that it must patiently submit to every insult and injury which it may please the sublime caprice of a buffoon to inflict upon it. And is the player judged less leniently than an offender in any other walk of life? When a tradesman commits an outrage on public decency, is he cherished on account of it by society? Is he not scouted for it, exactly as the player is, or, we should rather say, ought to be—for it can hardly be said that he is ever condemned for his offences by the regular friends of the stage, though the theatre is, on his account, still more resolutely abstained from by the good, who abstained from it before.

If the players thus debase themselves by the impurity of their lives, and thereby render themselves unfit to be looked upon or listened to by the majority of society—if they continue to represent dramas suited to the taste of a past age, or else adapted only to the sympathies of children—if they persist in retaining about their whole system vicious forms of speech, indelicate gestures, and a code of moral feeling and action, all of which have long been pronounced intolerable in good society, how can they expect their theatres to be so prosperous as they once were, more especially when purer and better modes of entertainment are every[Pg 218] where rising into competition with them? The person who pens these thoughts is by no means an enemy to theatricals in the abstract. With the most respectful deference to those who see in dramatic entertainments an express hostility to the divine law, he retains the conviction that they might be rendered as good and innocent a means as any other for producing that great end—the diversion of the public mind by amusement from the follies and vices of absolute vacuity. He does not consider the theatre, or any other amusement, so much with a reference to the good which it may do, as with respect to the evil which it may prevent. It is clear, however, that the really good and pure can never become the friends of the theatre, so long as it remains unreformed. There must be a combination among the virtuous actors to exclude the vicious from their body. A number of antiquated and absurd fashions of the stage must be brought nearer to the standard of ordinary natural life. And the best literary men of the day must be encouraged by legislative enactments to produce a crop of new plays with a stronger moral bent than the generality of those now existing. Till all this is done, and the theatre become as noted in public fame for a friendliness to what is good, as it has hitherto been for the reverse, it must be content to occupy its present degraded place amongst our prevailing modes of public entertainment.

If you be a person that have lived for a long time in any large town, you must have ere this felt the dreadful inconvenience of knowing and being known by every body. The courtesy of society demands that, on meeting any one in the street, of whom you have the slightest acquaintance,[Pg 219] you must not “affect to nod,” like Alexander, but give a real bona fide nod, or, if you please, a bow, as a mark of respect or regard—a practice which leads to a thousand disagreeable sensations in the day, till at last you almost resolve that your progress shall be like that of a British war-chariot—CUTTING right and left, without regard to man, woman, or child. It is not that you have any abstract disinclination to pay this tribute to friendship; it is the frequency and the iteration of the thing that annoys you. You could tolerate, perhaps, a certain number of nods in the day—I would willingly compound for twenty—and it would be all very well if you only met a friend on the street once in the month or so. But this is not the way of it: you cannot be abroad two hours (supposing that you are of long standing in the town) without meeting fifty people and upwards, to whom you must “vail your haughty head,” and, what is worst of all, the half of these are people whom you met and nodded to yesterday, and the day before, and every day before that again, back to the creation of the world. With many of these persons, your acquaintance at first was of the very slightest nature. You met the man in a steam-boat, and had your respective names mentioned by a friend. You left a room one day as he was entering, and you were introduced, and, after exchanging only three words, made a friendly bow to each other, and parted. Perhaps he was introduced to you passingly on the street by some person to whom you had been introduced several years before, in the same transient way, by an individual whose acquaintance of you was originally of so slight a character that you had even then forgot for some years how it commenced. Your reminiscences upon the whole subject are a Generation of Shadows, traced back to Nothing. Possibly you sat next to him one night, “consule Planco,” at a mason-lodge, and to this blessed hour have never so much as learned his name. When it happens that you do not see or meet these acquaintances for six months after your first rencontre, the[Pg 220] affair has by that time got cool enough to justify you mutually in cutting each other. But in most cases it happens quite differently. On the very morning, perhaps, after having scraped acquaintance with a merry fellow in some promiscuous company, you meet him going abroad, like yourself, to his place of business. As nothing of the world, or its concerns, has as yet got between you and your recollections of last night’s conviviality, you pull up with him for a minute, shake hands, laugh cordially in each other’s faces, hope each other is quite well after yesternight’s business, remark what a deal of fun there was, what a deuced funny fellow that was who sung the comic songs, and so forth; and then, with another cordial shake of each other’s hands, you part off, each to the serious duties of the day. Unfortunately, it happens that this new acquaintance of yours has to go to his place of business exactly at the same time in the morning with yourself, and that your places of residence and business are co-relatively in opposite situations. It is, therefore, your doom to cross each other’s path regularly every morning at ten minutes before ten, for all the rest of your natural lives. Your eyes begin to open upon this appalling fact on the second day. You meet your man then, exactly at the same spot as on the morning before; when, the conviviality of the penult evening being totally spent, both in respect of its effect on your mind, and as a subject of conversation, you stand in an agony of a minute’s duration, talking to each other of you know not what, till, fortunately, perhaps, a friend comes up who is going your way, and you hook yourself upon him, and take a hurried leave of your new acquaintance. Next morning you content yourself with shaking your friend by the hand cordially without stopping. Next morning, again, the affair has degenerated into a laughing nod. Next, it is an ordinary nod; at which point it continues ever after, till it is evident to both of you, as you approach each other, that you are beginning to be fairly tired of existence, and wish, mutually, that it were all well over with you, so far as this[Pg 221] breathing world is concerned, and the whole affair hushed up in the silence of the grave.

It is not alone in the monotony of this system of recognition that the misery lies. You are also put to a great deal of pain and difficulty, in many cases, by the rank of the individuals to be recognised. Every man of the world has occasion to be brought into contact now and then with persons superior to himself, but who do not scruple to make themselves familiar with him in his own house or place of business. Now, the plague is, how to treat these people on the street. If their rank be very far above your own, the case is comparatively easy; for a bow, with an elevation of the hat, is readily awarded on your part, and graciously received on his. But should his place in society be just a little above your own, or such as you expect to attain very speedily—or should he be just a little longer started in the general race of prosperity than yourself—then it is perplexing indeed. Man has no antipathy to the brother worms who are so far beneath his own level as never to be brought into contrast with him. A nobleman is quite at his ease with his tailor. But it is very different with the individuals who are just a little lower than ourselves, and liable to be confounded with us. We could tolerate the profanum et ignobile vulgus itself, rather than the people whose manners and circumstances in life are but one step beneath our own. Hence, one is liable to perpetual grievances on the street, through, what he thinks, the forwardness of some people, and the haughtiness of others. Alternately cutting and cut, on he goes, in a state of unhappiness beyond all description. Sometimes he avoids recognizing, through fear of its being offensive, a person who was fondly anxious to have his nod, and takes it very ill that he does not get it. Sometimes he is in the reverse predicament, and proffers a condescending bow, or intends to do so, to one who, putting quite a different construction on their respective degrees of consequence, coolly overlooks him.

In short, what with one thing and another, walking on[Pg 222] the street is an exceedingly disagreeable exercise. For my part, having been long connected with the city I inhabit, I am obliged to take a thousand ingenious expedients in order to get along with any degree of comfort. For one thing, I would sooner walk some miles barefooted over broken glass, than parade on the principal streets of the city at high twelve. If I were to attempt a passage that way, I might go as I have been told Oechlenschlager the Danish poet does through the streets of Copenhagen, my hat in my hand, and my body in a perpetual inclination. I have to seek all possible kinds of by-ways, through alleys profound and obscure; and when I cross a thoroughfare, it is with the same dogged straight-forward look with which a man swims across a dangerous river. When I do happen, in a moment of facility or confidence, to venture upon an open street, I have all kinds of expedients for avoiding and diminishing the pains of recognition. When you see an acquaintance approaching, you must consider the relative circumstances. Much depends on the place of meeting—much on the time—much on the crowded or empty state of the streets, and much, of course, on the degree of your intimacy with him, and the distance of time since you last met. If it be a vacant street, and not a business time of the day, and six months since you last met him, you are in for a quarter of an hour’s palaver as sure as you live, and hardly even a parting then, unless you can either of you manage to get up a good witticism, under cover of which you may escape. If the street be crowded, and the time a busy one, you are tolerably safe, even although it should have been a twelvemonth since you met before. In this case, you fly past with a hurried nod, which seems to say, “We are busy just now, but will have another opportunity of stopping to speak.” This is a nod of adjournment, as it were, and it is one of great satisfaction to both parties, for both argue, of course—though they don’t put that into the nod—that, as it is a twelvemonth since they last met, it may be another before[Pg 223] they meet again. Should you meet a man in a vacant street, even in the busiest part of the day, then the former circumstance annuls the latter, and you must stand and deliver, even although you be too late for an appointment of the most interesting character. On the other hand, if you meet your man in the leisurely part of the day, in a crowded street, you get off with a nod, pretending to yourself that you are carried away by the current. Sometimes you may not take advantage of your good fortune in this last case, but so bring it about that you get into collision with your friend, and begin a conversation. In this case, even although you have only asked him how he does—not caring in the least what he has to answer—and though you positively have not another idea to interchange with him, he finds it necessary to disengage himself from the throng in order to reply. You now get upon the curb-stone, or upon the causeway, where, of course, you have no more advantage from the crowded state of the street than a fish has of a river after it has been thrown upon the bank. You are now in the same predicament as if you had met your friend in the same cool part of the day in a perfectly empty street, and therefore, when he has answered your precious question as to his health, you are as fairly in for a quarter of an hour of wretched, bald, wishy-washy conversation about all kinds of nothings that you don’t care one farthing about, as ever you were in your life. The only thing that can now save you is either a joke to laugh yourselves asunder upon, a crowd raised at a distant part of the street by some such matter as a child ridden over by a coach, or else, what is not a bad means of separation, though sometimes dangerous, you cut off one grievous encumbrance by taking on another; that is, you see another friend coming up your way, and, pretending you have something to say to him, shake off the old love and take on with the new: in which case it is not improbable that you spend longer time at the end of the street with this last individual than you might have had to spend with the former one if you had continued with him,[Pg 224] and only given the other man a passing nod; but, of course, that is all the fortune of war, and, having done what seemed best under the circumstances, you must rather blame fate than your own imprudence. Consider well, however, in such a case, whether you are likely to get soonest off with the new or the old love; for if you take on with a bore of ten minutes’ power, in order to get off with one of only five, merely because he is going your way, and promises no interruption in the first instance, you may only fall into Scylla, seeking to avoid Charybdis.

After all, as in every matter arising from the affairs of this world, a great deal of our happiness, so far as it is concerned by the system of recognition, lies with ourselves. If we are prudent, and take counsel from experience, we may avoid much of this nodding and bowing misery which would otherwise fall to our share. A man, for instance, should not be always goggling and staring about him; otherwise he will be sure to fall in with flying nods, which he could as well dispense with, if he does not even hit some person, perhaps, on the other side of the way, who, not having seen him for a long time, thinks it is duty—Lord confound him!—to come across the Hellespont of mud, and shake the spirits out of him with half an hour of tediousness and common-place. When you debouch from your door, never look along the street in the direction you are not to travel, or ten to one but you see some one who, having the infelicity, poor devil, to catch your eye, must put himself on to a canter to come up to you; and so you get mutually entangled, perhaps for half the day. I give this caution with a particular emphasis; for I have observed that nine out of every ten men look back in the way described, as if it were one of the involuntary motions or inclinations of human nature. As you are walking along, never cast your regards upon any one coming obliquely across the street, or in all probability you are shot dead by an eye of your acquaintance, which, if it had not hit you, would have passed on innocuous. The[Pg 225] eye is the principal mischief in all these cases. A man is often snared by that part of him, and dragged a hundred yards along a dirty street, for all the world like a silly salmon hooked by the nose, and laid, after half a mile of tugging and hauling, exhausted on the shore. Keep your eye well to yourself, and you are tolerably safe; for of this you may be assured, no man will come up to attract your attention, unless he be a country cousin, who was just looking about for you. Every mother’s son of them is actuated by the same principles with yourself, and is glad to escape all the nodding he can. So reciprocal is this feeling, that many persons whom you are taking means to avoid, will, if you observe them narrowly, be found to be doing all they can to assist in the process. If you pretend, for instance, that you cannot see that gentleman there coming aslant the way, on account of the intense brightness of the sun, you will see out at the tail of your eye that he is pretending to be as much put about by the sunshine as yourself, and is doing all he can to shade his eyes from Phœbus and you, exactly in the same fashion with yourself. If you walk, as you ought to do, with your eyes fixed below what painters call the point of sight, but suddenly raise them for a moment, in order to look about you, it is ten to one but you see your very bosom friend—your confessor—the man whom you wear in your heart of hearts—in the act of sneakingly withdrawing his eye from your countenance, for the purpose of getting past you unnoticed. Take no scorn on account of these things, but put it all down rather to the strength of friendship; for can there be any stronger test of that sentiment, than the desire of saving those whom we love from any thing that is disagreeable to them?

It has been already remarked, that if you be in the regular habit of meeting and nodding to a person every now and then, the system is kept up till death do you part. On the other hand, if you can avoid seeing a person for some considerable time, the nod becomes efféte, and you[Pg 226] ever after see, as if you saw not, each other. Sometimes, however, one gets a great relief in the midst of a fixed and hopeless nodding acquaintance, by happening to meet once more at the social board in some friend’s house, when you re-invigorate the principle, gather fresh intimacy, and perhaps, after all, take refuge from the unnecessary monotony of nodding terms in a serious friendship.

If you can help yourself by this means, it may be all very well, though certainly it is rather hard that one should be forced into an intimacy with a man merely because he crosses your path rather oftener than the most of your other slight acquaintances. The best way, however, to lessen this part of the evils of life, is to walk with as little circumspection as possible. So ends my preachment about Recognitions.

Jock Colquhoun was a clever journeyman painter of the famous Old Town of Edinburgh, very much given, unfortunately, to Saturday evening potations, which was the cause why he never found himself, poor fellow, any richer one Monday than another, and generally lived during the rest of the week in, to say the least of it, a very desultory manner. Jock was a long slip of a lad, with a bright intelligent face and a wofully battered hat, and the whole man of him was encased, from neck to heel, in one glazed suit—I was going to say, of clothes, but I should rather say, of oil-paint; for, to tell the truth, his attire consisted rather more of the one material than the other. He was universally reputed as a very clever workman; but, then, every body said, what matters it that he can make five shillings a-week more than any of his fellow-journeymen, if he is sure every Saturday, when he gets his wages, to go upon the scuff, and so pass the half of the week in spending, not in gaining? Jock, however, had many good points about him; and it was, perhaps, less owing to his own dispositions than to the influence of evil company, that he got into such bad habits. He was such a good fellow that he would at any time part his money with an old crony out of bread, or treat to a can or a bottle any working brother who had got through his money a little before him, and who happened to feel rather dry upon some sunshiny Wednesday. In his profession he was matchless at all superior kinds of work. If his employers had any thing to do that required an extraordinary degree of taste or dexterity, Jock was set to it, and he invariably managed it (beer and whisky aside) to their entire satisfaction. Jock might have long ago been foreman to his masters: nay, he might have set up as a general artist, and, with perseverance equal to his talent, would have[Pg 228] been sure to do well. But gill-stoups were his lions in the way, and the deceitfulness of drink had beset him; and Jock, from year to year, was just the same glazed and battered, but withal rather spruce-looking fellow, as ever.

It would have been altogether impossible for any such man as Jock to carry on the war, if he had not had one howff,[4] above all others, where he enjoyed a little credit. This was an eating-house in the Canongate, kept by one Luckie Wishart, a decent widow of about forty, with four or five children, who had been pleased to cast an eye of particular favour upon the shining exterior of our hero. A pot sable upon a ground argent pointed out this house to the passers by, even if they had not been informed of its character by the savoury steam which always proceeded from it between the hours of one and five P. M., and certain spectral and unfinished pies which ran in a row along the sole of her little window, level with the street, as well as a larger display of the same article on a board half way down her somewhat steep and whitewashed stair. Luckie Wishart also sold liquors; but she was far too respectable a person to let Jock spend his wages at one bouse in her house. She always, as she said, shanked him off, whenever he came there of a Saturday night, and it was only when his pockets were empty, and no provisions to be had for the working days of the week, that he resorted to her. Generally about the Tuesdays, Jock came briskly down into her culinary Tartarus, quite sobered and hungry, sending his voice briskly along the passage before him, as if defending himself by anticipation from a shower of reproaches which he knew she would bestow upon him:—“Nothing of the kind,” he would cry; “nothing of the kind—all a mistake—’pon my honour.” There was generally, it may be supposed, fully as much scolding and railing as he could have anticipated; but the end of the jest always was, that Jock got snug into some corner of Luckie’s[Pg 229] own particular den, where he was regaled with a plate of something or other, garnished always with a few last words of rebuke from the lady, like the droppings after a thunderstorm, which he always contrived, however, to stomach with his beef, without manifesting any very great degree of irritation. There is something ominous in the act of drawing in one’s stool at the fireside of a comfortable widow. It is apt to make a young man feel rather ticklish, even although he may never have thought of her before, except as a good cook. So it was with Jock, and the idea might have been fatal to his visits to Luckie Wishart’s (for, to speak the truth, she was no great beauty), if dire hunger, which tames lions, had not absolutely compelled him to continue the practice. In general, when Jock came in with his week’s gains, he flung a few shillings upon the dresser, as part payment of what he had ate and drank during the past few days, reserving the rest for the bouse-royal. But, notwithstanding all these occasional deposits to account, his score got always the longer the longer, until it at last went fairly off at the bottom of a cupboard door, and had to be “brought forward” on the end of a chest of drawers.

“That’s a shocking bad hat you’ve got,” said Luckie to him one day, without any idea that she was anticipating a favourite English phrase by some years. “Of course, there’s nae chance of such a drucken blackguard as you ever being able to buy a new ane. But what wad you say, John, if I were to gie ye ane mysel’?”

“I would say, much oblige t’ye, ma’am,” answered Jock, now for the first time in his life called by his proper Christian name.

“Here is one, then,” said the widow, and at the same time produced a decent-looking chapeau, which, she said, had belonged to him that was away—meaning her late husband—and had only been three times on his head at the kirk, when, puir man, he was carried without it to the kirk-yard.

[Pg 230]

Jock accepted the hat with great thankfulness, and made his old one skimmer into Luckie’s fire, where, it is needless to say, it was speedily roasted in its own grease.

“Dear sake, Jock, man,” said Mrs Wishart, some days afterwards, “what kind o’ a landlady hae ye got at hame? She maun be nae hand at the shirts, I reckon; for fient a bit can ane ken ye on a Monday frae what ye are on a Saturday. Ye may be as touzly as ye like i’ the outside o’ your claes, but I wad aye like to see a man decent-like next the skin.”

“Deed, mistress,” said Jock, “to let ye into a secret, I have nae great stock o’ linen, and whiles Mrs Ormiston’s a wee hurried in getting a shirt ready for me. I’m a gude deal between the hand and the mouth in that respect.”

“Ye’re just the greatest ne’er-do-weel ever I kenned,” replied Mrs Wishart; “but yet, reprobate as ye are, I canna think o’ seeing ye gaun that gate frae ae week’s end to anither. Here’s four gude shirts that I hae unco little use for now-a-days. Better ye should wear them, than that they should gang to the moths. Tak them hame wi’ ye, man, and mak yoursel’ something trig, and dinna gang to think that I’m aye to be gi’ing ye the buffet without the bite.”

Jock did as he was bid, and towards the end of the week Luckie Wishart asked him “if he ever thought o’ taking a walk on a Sunday evening wi’ his lass to Restalrig, to treat her wi’ curds and cream, or ony thing o’ that kind?”

“Oh, I daresay I have, mistress,” said Jock, “in my day. But,” added he, looking askance at his resplendent sleeves, “somehow or other I’ve fallen out of a suit of Sunday claes, and, of course, nae lass ’ll gang wi’ a chiel like a beggar.”

“Weel, Jock,” said the lady, “I think ye canna do better than just step into my auld gudeman’s claes bodily, and let us hae nae mair wark about it.”

This was accompanied with a look so significant, that[Pg 231] Jock could not pretend to misunderstand it. He all at once felt as if the stool which he had drawn in towards the fireside was burning under him, while all the burnished covers on the opposite wall looked like so many moons dancing in troubled water. “Od, mistress,” he stammered out, “are ye serious?”

“Ay, that I am,” answered she; “and dinna let your modesty wrang ye, my man, an’ ye be wise. Ye see every thing here ready to your hand; and if ye just be steady a bit, as I’m sure ye will be, wi’ me to look after baith your meat and your winnings, ye may be the snuggest painter lad in the town. What wi’ what ye can make, and what wi’ what I can make, we’ll be very weel, or I’m muckle mista’en.”

“But, Luckie,” said Jock, “I maun get my ain consent first; and that, I’m feared, it’ll not be sae easy to get. There was a lass ——”

“Oh, very weel, John,” said Mrs Wishart; “of course ae man may lead a horse to the water, but twenty winna gar him drink. There’s some folk that dinna ken what’s gude for them, and ye’re ane o’ them. But see, lad,” she added, opening up the cupboard door, “what a score ye hae here! Twa pounds fifteen shillings and eightpence. When will ye be gaun to pay that?”

“I suppose I maun pay’t when I can,” said Jock, striding sturdily up stairs into the street.

Next day he was served with a summons to the sheriff’s court for two pounds fifteen shillings and eightpence, and as he never appeared to dispute the claim, a writ was allowed against him, warranting either the incarceration of his person, or the distraining of his goods. Goods Jock had none; his person therefore came into immediate request among certain individuals of whose companionship he was not ambitious. It would be vain to tell all the strange miracles by which he was enabled for some weeks to elude the pursuit instituted against him. Sometimes as the officers were entering at the door, he was escaping[Pg 232] by the back window. Once he had to drop himself down two stories into an alley. At another time, he sprang across a gulf about ten feet wide, between two garret windows, nine floors from the ground. This course of life could not continue long. He could not get rest any where to pursue his ordinary business, and of course he soon found himself upon very short allowance both as to meat and drink. Just at this crisis, Jock heard of an expedition which was about to sail from Leith, for the purpose of colonising Poyais, and through the intervention of an old chum, who was going thither, he was permitted to join the corps. On the night before the vessel was to sail, he skulked down to Newhaven, and got on board along with the family of his friend. He now, for the first time during three weeks, found himself, as he thought, safe from the avenging persecution of Luckie Wishart. For one happy night he slept amidst a parcel of sacks in a corner of the cabin, surrounded on all hands by squalid and squalling children, whose cries, however, were nothing to the dread which he had recently entertained for the fell Dido of the Canongate. Next morning, the sun rose bright, the sails were set loose, the heart of every man on board beat high with hope, and Jock’s bosom’s lord sat lightly on his throne—when, oh manacles and fetters! a boat came alongside, containing a whole bevy of sheriff’s officers. Jock now thought that it was all over with him; for, simple man, he believed that he was the sole individual in request. The case, however, was quite different. On a demand being made for admission into the vessel, the whole of the passengers, with one consent, raised their voices against it. “What! let these fellows in!—as well give up the whole expedition!” The officers pleaded to have at least a representative sent on board, to show their case to the captain, which, after a great deal of difficulty, was consented to. One messenger was accordingly hoisted on board, and proceeded to call the names of the persons for whom they had captions—Jock Colquhoun among the number. But[Pg 233] personalities of this kind were not to be endured. The passengers rose in absolute mutiny against the captain, demanded that he should instantly proceed on the voyage, even although one member of the expedition was yet to join; and as they feared to let the boat once more approach the vessel, they insisted that the messenger should be retained where he was, and carried out to Poyais and back again, as a punishment for his temerity. It was a mad affair altogether, and so small an addition to the general frenzy was of little moment. So the boatswain, or somebody else, “gave the dreadful word,” and, notwithstanding all the remonstrances of the detenú, which were both loud and vehement, the lessening boat of the officers was soon seen unwillingly rowing to land, while, instead of any white hand to wave adieu to those on board, the fist of big Pate Forsyth, the chief of the fraternity, was observed shaking in impotent rage over the stern, as much as to say to the captain, “If ever you come back to Leith, ye ken what ye’ll get.”

Jock soon found himself tolerably comfortable in his new situation. He had, no doubt, come on board without much luggage, and he was still the same greasy Pict as ever in respect of his attire. But then he was not, after all, much behind his neighbours; for if ever a fit garrison for the care of Adullam was collected since the days of King David, it was this ship’s company. The whole set resembled a troop of strolling players, going to act a grand historical drama in some country town. A gentleman in tartan trousers was to be a kind of Cincinnatus, alternating between the plough and the cares of state. A young lad, in a blue bonnet, was to be Chamberlain, and Supreme Director of Literature and the Arts. Another carried with him all the materials of a bank, except credit and specie. The other characters and properties, to speak theatrically, were all on the same scale; and if a state could have been founded as easily as a castle of cards is built, or a puppet-show set in motion, Poyais could have immediately taken[Pg 234] its place among the nations of the earth. In such a system it was easy to find a place for Jock. The Chamberlain was good enough to divest himself, in favour of this new friend, of that part of his commission which referred to the fine arts. Jock was therefore styled from this day forward, Director Colquhoun; and every one, including himself, agreed that the case could have only been improved, if he had happened to have any paints. However, nobody pretended to doubt that, so far as the fine arts could be cultivated without materials, Mr Colquhoun would prove himself an efficient member of the corps.

The voyage was a pleasant one, and during the whole time nothing was to be heard in the vessel but pæans of homage and gratitude to the Cazique Macgregor, who had sent them out to take possession of his territories. The only individual who did not partake of the general joy was the poor detenú, whose long gaunt person did not agree with a tropical climate, and who, therefore, sickened, and threatened to die before reaching the land. It was in vain that the Chamberlain promised to make him Lord High Constable of the Kingdom, if he would only keep up his spirits. Like the poor sparrow, who, in its last moment, refuses the very finest crumbs held to its mouth, he said it was all humbug to make him these offers, when it was clear he could never live in such a hot part of the world as this. He would lay his death, he said, to their door, and, if at all possible, he would be sure to haunt them after death. To the great grief of the company, the unfortunate messenger died on the very day when they cast anchor off the shores of Poyais.

About seventy or eighty individuals, from the Old Town of Edinburgh—forming the staff of a great empire—now landed on a flat bushy part of the Mosquito Territory—ominous name!—in the Bay of Honduras, with the expectation of immediately falling into the enjoyment of all the luxuries and pleasures which this world can bestow. They were, indeed, somewhat surprised to find that every thing[Pg 235] was still in its primeval state, and that even their houses were as yet to be built. However, having found one small opening in the forest of brushwood, they established themselves there, with such goods and chattels as they had; and their first duty was to give a decent burial to the detenú, whose body they had brought ashore for that purpose. A grave having been dug, the Chamberlain, assuming the character of High Priest of the Kingdom, for want of a better, mounted an old shirt over his clothes, by way of sacerdotal vestment, and proceeded to read the funeral service of the church of England over the body. In the very middle of the most solemn part of this ceremony, a large bird, with a curious beaky face, somewhat resembling that of the deceased, alighted upon a tree immediately above the funeral group, and cried, with a loud shrill voice, what was interpreted by all present (with the aid, no doubt, of a stricken conscience) into the phrase, “Pay your debt!”

The colonists saw and heard with terror, believing that the spirit which had lately animated the body before them was now addressing them in character, according to his threat before death; and, but for the protection which daylight always gives to the superstitious, the whole set, including both the civil and military departments of the state, would have fled from the spot. The Chamberlain saw the nature of the case, and drew hurriedly towards a conclusion; but yet, at every brief pause of his voice, there still came in the ear-piercing cry, “Pay your debt!” Before the grave had been closed, another and another bird of the same species drew towards the spot, and each lifted up his voice to the same tune—“Pay your debt”—“Pay your debt”—“Pay your debt”—till the whole forest seemed possessed by one spirit, and the ghost of the sheriff’s officer appeared to the distracted senses of the settlers to have dispersed itself into a whole legion of harpies. The fact was, that the birds were brought forth by the coolness of the evening, according to their usual habits,[Pg 236] and were now innocently amusing themselves with their accustomed cry, without the least idea of any personality towards the Poyaisians. The Chamberlain of the colonists, who had learned from books of travels that many American birds uttered something like a sentence of English as their habitual cry, endeavoured to assuage the alarm of his companions; but, nevertheless, a very general sense of terror remained.

“It may be all very true,” said Jock Colquhoun, “that the birds of this country have each a particular word to say; but, od, it’s gayan queer that the Poyais bird should have pitched upon a thing that jags our consciences sae sair.”

The first night was spent in a very uncomfortable manner. To a day of intense heat succeeded a cold dewy night, which struck the limbs of the unprotected settlers with such severe cramps, that hardly a man could stir next morning. Their sleep, moreover, was broken occasionally by the cry of “Pay your debt!” which a few of their feathered friends kept up at intervals all night. Next day, instead of setting about the erection of their metropolis and sea-port, as was intended, they had to attend each other’s sick-beds. Before night several of the women and children had expired. Next day, and the next again, the same sickness continued; and in less than a week, half their number were under the earth. Jock, who had fortunately escaped every mishap except a rheumatic shoulder, now began to think how much more comfortable he would have been in Luckie Wishart’s laigh shop in the Canongate of Edinburgh, than he was on this inhospitable coast, where there was no prospect of raising so much as a potato for a twelvemonth. “What a fool I was,” said he, “not to make my quarters good there, as the honest woman proposed! Oh, to be walking wi’ her down the King’s Park on a Sunday nicht, even wi’ a’ the five bairns running after us! I’se warrant the gardens at Restalrig hae nae birds about the bushes that tell folk to pay their debt; naething[Pg 237] o’ the kind there, unless it be the boord, black letters on a white ground, that says, ‘Pay on delivery.’”

Hardship had now dispelled from every mind the magnificent ideas with which they had hitherto been inspired. If the vessel had yet remained on the coast, the whole of the surviving company, prime minister and all, would have willingly exchanged their brilliant appointments under the Cazique for a snug berth on board. But it had departed immediately after landing them; and there only remained the chance that some other vessel would pass that way, and take pity on their distress. This, fortunately, happened in the course of a few days. A vessel bound to Belize came along the shore, and, on a signal from the unfortunate Poyaisians, sent a boat to inquire into their case. As only a few remained alive, it was soon arranged that they should be carried to the port for which the vessel was bound. With grateful and subdued hearts, and casting many a mournful glance towards the graves of their friends, the small remnant of the Poyais expedition betook themselves to the boat, and sailed off to the vessel. As a sort of parting admonition, a bird came up at the moment of their departure from the land, and, pronouncing one shrill, clear “Pay your debt!” flew off into the interior.

It were needless to relate the various hardships and adventures which befel Jock Colquhoun before he regained his native shore. Be it enough, that he immediately sought the cozy den of Luckie Wishart, and paid his debt in the way originally desired by the lady, who, under the name of Mrs Colquhoun, continued for many years, with the assistance of her reformed husband, to regale the good people of the Canongate.

“A flichty chield,” she used to remark to her female friends, “was whyles the better o’ finding the grund o’ his stamack.”

[Pg 238]

I may begin with the question of Henry the Fourth of France, when found by an ambassador at romps with his children, “Are you a father?” If you are, we may go on with the game—if not, you must pass to the next article. A curious thing it is, this same fact, that children in general are only interesting in the eyes of those who are parents, while brats in particular are held as pests by all but their immediate father and mother. Some lightheaded author has compared the rush of children which takes place at the conclusion of family dinners, to the incursion of the Goths and Vandals. Perhaps it is all true, that children out of place are not agreeable; but is any thing agreeable that is out of place? Children, abstracted from the homely details of their management, and the anxiety which they always occasion, are a delightful study—a study, I maintain, fitted alike to engage the speculations of the philosophic, and the affections of the benevolent, mind. I cannot, I must say, form the idea of a man of extended views and sympathies, who does not like children.

Among the grown-up part of mankind, there is always abundance of envy, hatred, and all uncharitableness. This fact I consider with reference to the circumstances in which men are placed, and I plainly conceive that where existence is only to be supported by an unceasing struggle, and where self-love is so perpetually receiving injury, it is needless to expect that men should be much better than they are. In children, however, we see no possibility of any rivalship: they are a harmless little people at this moment, and we run no chance of being jostled by them in our course of life, for many years to come. There is, therefore, no reason for envy, hatred, or uncharitableness with them. On the contrary, in our intercourse with children, our self-love is undergoing a perpetual compliment.[Pg 239] The appeal which they are constantly making from their own silently-confessed weakness, to our tacitly-acknowledged strength, soothes and delights us. A fellow-creature lies unconsciously abandoned to our mercy—unconsciously unable to resist. It asks for nothing, for it cannot; but it does not expect harm. There is the charm. It imputes to us none of our original sins of envy, hatred, and uncharitableness, but seems to take it for granted that we are blanch and stainless like itself. It puts forth its little arms to us, with a perfect confidence in our gentler and better nature, and we feel it impossible to be evil when we are so sincerely understood to be good. We give, then, the love and faith that are demanded, and press the offenceless type of our original and perfect nature, with all the hues and all the odours of paradise rife around it, to our heart of hearts.

The whole external deportment of a child is delightful. Its smile—always so ready when there is no distress, and so soon recurring when that distress has passed away—is like an opening of the sky, showing heaven beyond. Tales are told of murderers, who, after revelling in the blood of many adults, were at length arrested by the smile of a child, and suddenly became innocent, because they were supposed to be so. The grasp of its little hand around one of our fingers—its mighty little crow when excited by the playfulness of its nurse—its manful spring upon the little woolpack legs that refuse to bear its weight—are all traits of more or less pleasantness. Then, the eye of a child—who can look unmoved into that “well undefiled,” in which heaven itself seems to be reflected? Whether the gem be of sweet pellucid blue, or of the mysterious and unsearchable black, what meanings unexpressed, unintelligible, reside within! the germ of a whole life of feelings and ideas. Human nature is familiar in all its bearings to most men; yet how novel does every symptom of it appear, as first shown forth by a child! Every little imperfect function—every step in the attainment of physical power—every new trait of intelligence, as they one by one[Pg 240] arise in the infantine intellect, like the glory of night, starting star by star into the sky, is hailed with a heart-burst of rapture and surprise, as if we had never known any thing so clever or so captivating before. The point thus gained is never lost. The darling child is reminded perpetually of the idea he lately seemed to comprehend, or of the word he seemed nearly able to pronounce, or of the little action he attempted to perform; and thus the whole of his little stock of accomplishments is carefully kept together, liable to a constant increase. Hosannas of affection celebrate every step of his progress towards maturity, and fresh blessings are showered upon his holy and harmless head, for every manifestation of the presence of the godlike mind. Nor is this interest in his advance confined to those whose daily joy it is to fold him to the beatings of a kindred heart. Almost every one who has occasion to observe the march of infant intellect feels an instinctive satisfaction in the contemplation. It seems, indeed, to be part of the grand and wise design, that all the mature of the human race should be concerned respecting the progress of the young: it is the silent working of nature towards the general good. Without a principle of this kind constantly at work—and it is always at work, in the attentions of the reflecting and grave, as well as in the apparently senseless prattle of the nurse—the moral world would be in danger of standing still.

The love of parents for their children—so far as it is not a sentiment arising from the contemplation of beauty, or innocence, or helplessness—is a kind of self-love. Yet no one ever thinks of imputing to a parent, as a fault, that he has a high appreciation of his children. The truth is, though in one sense self-love, it is, in another, the most generous and self-abandoning feeling in nature. The world is also aware instinctively, that the fondness of parents for their children is necessary for their protection and education; and, therefore, if there were no other palliation of the passion, it would at least be convenient. In virtue of[Pg 241] these excuses, a parent can indulge in all the pleasures of the most intense, devoted, devouring, self-appreciation, and yet have none of the usual reproach attending it. He can admire himself in his children, to a greater extent than ever did Narcissus in the fountain, and yet there is no chance that he changes into a daffodil. He can call himself every pretty name in the nurse’s vocabulary, and yet no one will ever accuse him of flattering his own person. He may fondle and hug himself till his miniature counterpart loses both breath and patience; he may expend upon his little self a thousand compliments and praises; and yet it will never be insinuated that Mr —— is on uncommonly good terms with Mr ——. This, it must be remarked, is one of the compensations allowed by Providence for the anxiety and pains attendant upon the keeping of a child.

It is a very common impression among those who are practically unacquainted with children, that there is an immense deal of trouble incurred in their management. There is, no doubt, much trouble, but there is also much to alleviate it. Women, to whom, as mothers or as nurses, this trouble chiefly falls, are rarely heard to complain of it. The labour is either kindly and agreeable in itself, or it is rewarded by the generous pleasure of knowing that those are helped who cannot help themselves. There are few duties, it may be said, by which women appear to feel less oppressed, than the labour of managing children. What is very strange, it seems equally lightsome to the hired attendant as to the mother herself. There appears to be a general feeling among women that the neglect of, or the least cruelty, to a child, is the most monstrous offence in nature: it is the high treason of the sex. In the more refined circles of society, where it is convenient to employ deputies, this certain kindness of every female heart towards a child is very fortunate: in the lower circles it is still more so. There many mothers are compelled to depend much upon the good-will of neighbours for the attentions necessary to their families. The infant is, indeed, in[Pg 242] some measure the protegé of a little vicinity, rather than of any individual. It is handed about from one hand to another, and kept for a little by each, so as to enable the mother to attend to other duties that are still more indispensable—such as the preparation of her family meals, or, perhaps, the work necessary for obtaining them. There is in this no danger for the child, and not much obligation for the parents. The poor are in the constant practice of performing acts of kindness to each other: they are their own best friends; and their condition would be quite insupportable if it were otherwise. The attentions, therefore, which one neighbour bestows upon another’s child, are felt as a very slight burden by the particular party obliging, while the aggregate of many such little favours forms an immense relief to the mother. Then, every one knows that if the case were her own, as it perhaps may be, the individual whom she now obliges would be ready and glad to oblige her in turn. If the trouble of managing children had in it any thing really disagreeable, this universal system of mutual serviceableness could never obtain among the poor.

It is surprising how much children tend to humanise and soften the stern scene of general life. The man who is so fortunate as to possess one or more children, finds it less easy to be wicked than if he had none; and, however evilly disposed any man may be, he will hardly give way to his wicked tendencies in the presence of his children. There is something holy in a child. Its innocence puts it in association with all gentle and devout feelings; and scarcely any parent will venture deliberately to contaminate the bright image of heavenly purity, which the Father of heaven has himself placed under his charge. Even the infidel can never form the wish that his child should be the same; he may dare many things, upon the peril of his own soul, but he cannot dare to hazard the soul of his child. His own mind may be torn by the demons of doubt and error, but he will keep his child steadfast if he can, melting[Pg 243] nightly at the infantine prayer, which he cannot offer up himself. If a parent has been imprudent, and now suffers the bitter effects of his folly, in misfortunes which have exposed him to the contempt of mankind, here still is a resource. He can steal by night to the couch of his children, and, beside the unconscious babes, whose fate hangs all upon his, and who yet reprove not, in their silent innocence, the guilt which has exposed them to misery, weep himself into good resolutions, and into comfort.

One of the chief sources of a parent’s pleasure in contemplating children, lies in the prospects which it is impossible to avoid forming regarding their future lives. No parent ever contemplates an unhappy fate for his child: all the look-forward is sunny as its own sweet eyes—stainless as its uncorrupted heart. There is even hardly any parent who rests content with hoping that his children will be as fortunate and as happy as himself. They must be much more so: they must reach heights of distinction far above any he had ever presumed to expect for himself. To the parent who has occasion to lament his unhappy circumstances in life, what treasured consolation there is in these fond imaginings! The father, as he broods moodily over enterprises blighted, and a spirit confined for immediate bread to some narrow scene of action unworthy of its energies—one casual glance alights upon the fair brow of his child, the bitter present gives way to the glorious future, and all his own griefs are repaid by the prospective happiness of his offspring. The mother who looks back to the comforts of an early home, unhappily exchanged for a scene of care and woe, feels, as she bends over her unconscious infant, her former happiness arise in the prospects of that endeared being, and is for the time consoled. It is this habit of forming flattering anticipations respecting the fates of our children, that renders the loss of them in infancy so very severe a calamity. In reality, the life of a child is of little value: it has as yet cost little, either in care or expense; and, unless in particular circumstances,[Pg 244] it holds but an unimportant place in society. Yet it is in this very want of all probation of its value that the poignancy of the loss chiefly lies. We lament it, not at all for what it was at the time of its death, but for what it might have been, if it had been spared. We often find that the loss of an infant is lamented with a more violent and unappeasable grief than that of an adult; and this is simply because, in the one case, the damage is ascertained, and forms but one distinct idea; while in the other it is arbitrary, vast, beyond imagination. A child is, in one sense, a dangerous possession: it is apt to warp itself into the vitals of our very soul; so that, when God rends it away, the whole mental fabric is shattered. It should always, then, be borne in mind, that life is the more uncertain the nearer its commencement, and that the beings we are disposed to appreciate most are just those whom we are most apt to lose.

The feelings of a parent, regarding a child in dangerous sickness, are beautifully expressed in the following poem, which will surprise many readers into tears:—[5]

When a scene like this is closed by death, what an extinction of hopes! No parent, it may be remarked, ever thinks he can spare a child. Whatever be the number of his family, he is almost sure to be afflicted to exactly a certain degree by the loss of any individual infant; for simply this reason, that every one has established its own claim to his affections, by some peculiar trait of its appearance or character. It is a lovely and admirable trait of human nature, that the parent is rather apt to appreciate the lost child above all the rest. The impossibility of a realization of his hopes regarding that infant, just makes all those hopes the brighter, so that the twilight of the child’s dead existence is more splendid than the broad day of its living life. The surviving babes are all more or less connected with the common-place of this world—the homeliness of nature; but that fair-haired innocent, which went to its place in the blush and dawn of its faculties, what might it not have been? Then, the stirring grief of parting with that face that was our own—that more than friend, though but an infant—to break off all the delightful ties of prattling tenderness, that had bound us, even in a few months, to that gentle form for ever! A sorrow like this is long in being altogether quenched; it comes in soft gushes into the heart for many future years, and subdues us in the midst of stronger and sterner feelings. The image lives always before us in unchanging infancy, and beauty, and innocence; it ever seems to be walking in our eyes, as of yore, with its bright curling hair, and its lightsome carol; and we long for heaven, that we may enjoy that no small portion of its pleasures—a restoration to the company of that mortal angel which has been reft away.

[Pg 246]

There is a certain class of people who take every opportunity of sneering at their neighbours for indulging in the “folly” of drinking tea, which they tell you is poisonous, and for the use of which the Chinese, as they say, make a point of laughing at us. I have generally remarked, that those who in this manner condemn the use of tea are themselves addicted to the drinking of intoxicating liquids of some kind or other, and that, in most instances, they are not a bit more healthful or more innocent than the unhappy tea-drinkers whom they affect to pity. In the way that tea is usually made, with a large mixture of sugar and cream, both which ingredients are highly nutritious, it is fully more salutary, and a great deal more refreshing, than any other light liquid that could be poured into the stomach. With all due deference to Cobbett, milk, even entirely divested of its creamy particles, is heavy; and though it may be used with advantage as a meal, when work is done in the open air, it can never suit the appetites of the great mass of the people, who are confined by sedentary employments. Milk is the food of men in a rude state, or in childhood; but tea or well-made coffee is their beverage in a state of civilisation. It would seem that the civilised human being must use a large quantity of liquid food. Perhaps solid meat is more nutritious; but there are cases in which a small degree of nutriment is quite sufficient. A lady or a gentleman of sedentary habits does not require to feed like a ploughman, or a fancy man training for a pedestrian excursion. They can subsist in a healthful state with a small quantity of solid food, but they do not do well unless with a large quantity of liquids, and these of a light quality. Good beer has been recommended as a substitute for tea; but beer is at the best a cold ungenial drink, except to robust people who have much exercise. Beer may[Pg 247] certainly be made almost as light as water itself, but in that case it is filled with gaseous matter or confined air, and it cannot be drunk with comfort as a simple refreshment.

It will always be remembered that there are different kinds of tea, and that some are more salutary than others. Green tea ought by all means to be avoided by persons of weak nerves. Black tea is the preferable for general use, and, if properly made, will prove anti-spasmodic, and relieve pains or cramps in the bowels. In some instances tea does not suit the particular state of the stomach, and it should then be abandoned, the taste naturally pointing out when it should be taken. But no species of prepared fluid seems so suitable to the palates and the stomachs of the people of this country. No kind of drink is so refreshing after a journey or fatigue as tea. It restores the drooping spirits, and invigorates the frame for renewed exertion. No other kind of liquid with which we are acquainted has the same remarkable influence morally and physically. Fermented or distilled liquors, taken under the same circumstances, either induce intoxication or sleep. It is preposterous to say that tea is poisonous. As there is an astringency in its properties, I believe it would be most injurious were we to live upon nothing else, or drink it as a tincture. But who does either? As it happens to be prepared and used, it answers merely as a refreshing and pleasing drink, either to the solid bread and butter taken along with it, or after a recent dinner of substantial viands. How idle it is to say that this harmless beverage is ruining the constitutions of the people of this country! The very reverse can be demonstrated. The inhabitants of Britain use nearly twenty-seven millions of pounds weight of tea annually, which is about one pound nine ounces on an average for every individual. From thirty to forty years ago they used a great deal less than the half of this quantity, yet the average length of human life has been greatly extended since that period. The English and Scotch now use more tea than all the rest of Europe[Pg 248] put together, and yet they are the healthiest nation on the face of the earth. The North Americans are also great tea-drinkers, and human life among them is of nearly an equal value. Who would for a moment compare the thin wretched wines of France and Germany, or the sour krout of Russia, to the “comfortable” tea of Great Britain, and who would lose time in calculating the different effects of these liquids on the constitution?

Tea has other excellent properties. At this present moment it is putting down the pernicious practice of dram-drinking, and evidently limiting the extent of after-dinner potations. It seems to be impossible that a regular drinker of tea can be a lover of ardent spirits; and it is generally observed, that, as a man (or woman either) slides into the vice of tippling, he simultaneously withdraws from the tea-table; so true it is that the brutalised feelings of the drunkard are incompatible with the refined sentiments produced by

It is hence to be wished that tea, or some other equally simple prepared fluid, should be still more brought into use. Do not let it be urged as an objection, that tea is expensive; for even under its excessive dearth, compared with its original cost, it is the cheapest beverage in use. With respect to price, it should not be placed against water or milk. It comes in place of some other indulgence—intoxicating liquors for instance—respecting the price of which we never heard any complaints from the lower walks of life. Tea is thus not entirely a superfluity. The clamours as to its fostering habits of evil and light speaking, are so antiquated as hardly to deserve notice. Formerly, when tea was exclusively a luxury among women, the tea-table was perhaps the scene where scandal was chiefly discussed. But while I suspect that the same amount of scandal would have been discussed if there had been no tea-tables whatever, I must observe, that tea is now partaken of under greatly different circumstances.[Pg 249] From being the favourite indulgence only of women, it is now an ordinary domestic meal, and there is no more disposition to draw forth the failings of our neighbours over tea than over roast beef or punch, at seven o’clock any more than at five. In the upper classes of society, what with late dinners, routs, and frivolities of every description, tea-drinking may be put aside as a vulgarism; but as being, in point of fact, a powerful agent in humanising the harsh feelings of our nature, and cultivating the domestic affections, I trust it will long hold a place in the dietetics of the respectable middle and lower classes of Great Britain.

We meet with numerous rules for the conduct of young newly-married women of all ranks; and if the world is not filled with good wives, it certainly is not because there is any want of matronly counsel for their guidance. But though the happiness of the conjugal state depends at least as much upon the behaviour of the husband as on that of the wife, there has not, as far as we are aware, been hitherto promulgated any code of instructions for the use of the former. Our literature abounds with narrations which exhibit the dutifulness and affection of women to husbands unworthy of them, who repaid tenderness with brutality, nor relented till those whose every amiable feeling they ought to have cherished and rewarded with their love, either sank broken-hearted, or, grown desperate, became even more abandoned and profligate than themselves. The man is to blame in nine cases out of ten where an alliance proves unhappy. In the lower ranks, especially, it is too often a want of prudence on his part that renders so many families wretched. Of the multitudes[Pg 250] of those who have wasted character, health, and means, in intemperance, there is but a small proportion who might not have preserved respectability by listening to the admonitions of their wives. Yet, with these numerous and undeniable facts before the world, no writer thinks of preventing such evils by pointing out and enforcing the duties of the party from whose misconduct they chiefly spring. A small portion of our columns, therefore, will not be unprofitably bestowed on a subject of so much importance.

In order to secure the felicity of the married state, a husband must, in the first place, endeavour to secure the perfect confidence of his wife. He must banish every thing repulsive from his manner towards her, and live with her on such easy and friendly terms that she may never be discouraged from communicating with and consulting him on every affair, whether it be in the lesser or the greater concerns of life. If a wife do not find at home sympathy with her afflictions, cares, and anxieties, she will seek it abroad—she will detail her griefs to some acquaintance, to whom she will go for advice in matters of difficulty, and, perhaps, in matters of delicacy, which cannot properly be appreciated by a stranger, and therefore ought not to be entrusted to the ear of one. The happiness of the family will thus be made to depend in a great measure on a person not a member of it, who, whatever be her prudence, is not intimately interested in the preservation of its peace, and who is more likely to take a side and encourage feelings of animosity than to inculcate the duty of mutual forbearance.

The husband’s duty must therefore be to establish in the mind of his partner an entire reliance on his affection, and a thorough persuasion that he is disposed to the full amount of his power to promote her comfort. Let him not think it beneath him to take an interest in her domestic arrangements: by showing that he does so, he will make her sensible that her efforts to render home pleasing are not unappreciated; her labour for that end will be redoubled,[Pg 251] and yet prove more light to her. As he must be abroad the greater part of the day, let him not deprive her of his company in the hours of leisure that business leaves him. A man cannot altogether seclude himself from the world in the bosom of his family; neither can he always carry his wife along with him: but he must not for a light reason allow himself to be detained from her society. A woman’s hours are often lonely; and after she has bestowed her whole cares for a day to set her house in order, and anxiously awaits her husband’s return, in the hope of enjoying a few hours of mutually endearing converse by the cheerful hearth, if she have to watch every approaching footstep in vain, it is a cruel disappointment. One of the greatest sins which the husband can commit, is that of making a practice of staying out late at night, which, though not reckoned among the usual catalogue of crimes against social life, is one of those most worthy of reprobation. The mental anguish endured by many excellent wives from this infamous practice, no one can picture unless he have witnessed it. There, by the lonely hearth—the fire sunk to a cinder and a mass of ashes—the candle verging to its close in the socket—the dingy silent apartment strewed with the toys and furniture of the children, sent hours since to bed—there, in the midst of this domestic wilderness sits the drooping, desponding, almost broken-hearted wife, counting the hours, and conning over in her wearied mind the numbers of times she has been so deserted, and foreseeing the still greater misery which awaits her by such a course of profligacy in her husband. And for what, may we ask, has the master of the household thus deserted his home?—the company of hollow friends, idle acquaintances, perhaps drunkards or gamblers, whose witless jocularity forms the temptation to abandon a good name, fortune, worldly respectability, and self-esteem. None but the wife who has endured trials of this nature can properly understand the horrors resulting from such a life of folly and dissipation.

[Pg 252]

Every reader must be delighted with the beautiful excuse, which, among others, Sir Thomas More makes why he did not publish his Utopia sooner. It shows us how important that great man considered an attentive performance of the minor duties of life to be. “Seeing that almost the whole of the day is devoted to business abroad, and the remainder of my time to domestic duties, there is none left for myself—that is, for my studies. For, on returning home, I have to talk with my wife, prattle with my children, and converse with my servants: all which things I number among the duties of life; since, if a man would not be a stranger in his own house, he must, by every means in his power, strive to render himself agreeable to those companions of his life whom nature has provided, chance thrown in his way, or that he has himself chosen.”

The husband must not accustom himself to form resolutions, and, without previously consulting his wife, make a sudden declaration of his purposes, in the same way as he would casually mention to a neighbour a plan, the execution of which he is just on the point of commencing. Even although such resolutions may be come to in a spirit of wisdom, to determine upon any measure without her participation argues a want of confidence in her affection and judgment, and cannot fail greatly to distress and discourage her. Granting that there are some matters of which the husband is the most competent judge, and that his wife cannot aid or improve his schemes, still she ought to be made acquainted with them, and the reasons for them, as far as possible; for it is only proper that the wife should be admitted to the satisfaction of knowing what is expected to produce advantage to her husband. As to what some write, that women are not fit to be entrusted with great affairs, it may have been true in the cases which gave occasion to the remark, where the object involved a course of crooked policy, or where the ear to which the secret was committed was that of a female from whom fidelity[Pg 253] was scarcely in any case to be expected. If a man’s designs be bad, the best way for success in them is to make the disclosure to nobody—least of all to women; to whom, if they be depraved, how can he trust? and if they be not thoroughly hardened in wickedness, how much less can he trust to them, seeing that, being of much tenderer consciences than men, they are always more ready to relent! But if he would make his way in the world by fair and honest practices, a husband can have no better counsellor than his wife: her stretch of understanding may not be so masculine as to embrace the subject in all its more important bearings, but, in the lesser details of management, her advice may prove invaluable.

Without a constant and unreserved interchange of sentiments, a constant and perfect cordiality cannot be maintained; and then, indeed, when things are communicated only by fits and starts, and perhaps never more than half explained, leaving an impression that her discretion is distrusted, the wife will be more apt to carry them abroad, to endeavour, by the help of other wits than her own, to penetrate what is concealed, and in the hope of finding, in the sympathy of others, consolation for the want of confidence with which she is treated at home. It is thus that a man becomes by degrees “a stranger in his own house.” His domestic behaviour is observed with the same distant caution with which his conduct in public is scrutinised; and as in all likelihood he does not take the same pains to produce a favourable impression, and is not equally on his guard to obviate misinterpretations of what he says and does, he must appear proportionably less amiable; and as the endearments of domestic life are in consequence withdrawn, the bad effects of his unsocial humour are at last felt in his own discomfort.

“Those that are curious observers of mankind,” says a Christian philosopher, who is not so generally known as might be expected from the excellence of his writings, “love to consider them in the most familiar lights. When men[Pg 254] are abroad, they choose to appear (whatever they really are) to the best advantage; but at home, their minds, as well as their persons, are in a perfect undress and dishabille. The world is the great theatre on which they act a part; but, behind the scenes, they may be seen in their proper persons, without any studied appearances. Our domestic behaviour is, therefore, the main test of our virtue and good nature. In public, we may carry a fair outside; our love may be not without dissimulation nor our hatred without disguise; but at home, Nature, left to itself, shows its true and genuine face, with an unreserved openness, and all the soul stands forth to view, without any veil thrown over it. There we see men in all the little and minute circumstances of life, which, however they may be overlooked by common observers, yet give a man of discernment a truer opening into a man’s real character, than the more glaring and important transactions of it, because, as to these, they are more upon their guard—they act with more of caution and of art than of plain simple nature. In short, our good or ill breeding is chiefly seen abroad, our good or ill nature at home. It were to be wished that we had more family pieces preserved and transmitted down to us. The good public magistrate is of use to few only; but the prudent and affectionate father of a family is of a more general and extensive influence. For my part, I more admire Cornelius, the centurion, for that short sketch of his character, viz. that he was a devout man, and one that feared God, with all his house, than if he had been represented as the most victorious general that had enlarged the bounds of the Roman empire; for we learn from it this useful lesson—that the influence of a pious example, like the precious ointment from Aaron’s beard, descends downwards from the head of the family, diffuses itself over the main body, till it reaches the very skirts—the lowest members of it.”

Before saying a word upon the subject, I must make an apology similar to that presented by honest Andro Symson, episcopal minister of a Galloway parish before the Revolution, when, in singing the praises of Sir David Dunbar of Baldoon, he says, his muse

As good Andro’s congregation of one required to be spoken of in the plural, so do my friends THEY need to be mentioned in the singular number. The truth is, THEY is a collective ideality, a most potent plural unit, who does a great many remarkable things in the world, without ever being called to account for them, and without any body knowing very distinctly who or what he is. I venture to say, that hardly a subject of his Majesty does not, day by day, refer events and deeds to the agency of THEY, and yet never has presumed, to this blessed hour, to consider who this mysterious personage—this great unknown—this finer spirit than Ariel—can be. In very truth, he is a most impalpable being, and susceptible of a wonderful variety of shapes. There is no height of greatness, and no depth of degradation, which he may not arrive at. Sometimes one would suppose that he is the government itself—sometimes, only a town council. One of THEY’S employments is the disposal of criminals. “Are THEY going to hang this fellow?” one man will ask another. “Perhaps THEY will only banish him,” is the probable answer. If the culprit be not decently and humanely hanged, the people get dreadfully enraged at THEY, and look as if they would almost tear his eyes out. They also has a great deal to do in public works. “Why did THEY make the road so crooked?” “They have put up a very absurd set of street lamps, I see.” “What, in wonder’s[Pg 256] name, do THEY mean by building a temple up there, like a boy’s peerie, or an hour-glass?” Then THEY is the author of all kinds of rumours and surmises. “They say—what say they—let them say!” is an inscription on a wall within Aberdeen Cathedral four hundred years old; and I do not doubt that THEY would have given currency to scandals regarding the mother of mankind herself, in Paradise, if there had been any other lady to tell them to—or if THEY had then existed. Old newspapers say, “They write from St Petersburg that the Empress Catharine is about to fit out an armament for the Caspian.” “They talk at Rome of a change of councils in the Vatican.” Modern quidnuncs are also filled to the brim with things which THEY has been circulating. “They are now making out Lord —— to be non compos.” “They will have a marriage to be on the tapis between So-and-So and So-and-So;” personages, by the way, who claim a sort of kindred with THEY, and certainly are of imagination all compact. They is sometimes admired for his power, sometimes blamed for his stinginess. “They used to write capital solid books long ago.” “They used Burns very ill when he was alive.” It certainly was bad of THEY to treat Burns so scurvily; but unfortunately the fellow is so utterly impersonal, that we blame without knowing what we are doing.

They has a great deal to do with the naming of things. He may be called, in arithmetical language, the Grand Denominator. Indeed, I do not believe that Adam himself named more things than THEY. “What do THEY call this place?” one will ask a coachman, on nearing a town, village, or gentleman’s seat. “They call it Ashbourne,” or whatever else, is the reply. “What do THEY call ye?” is the ordinary question of a rustic boy to his unknown companion, and so forth. They is also the grand censor of all things which happen in the world. “I will not do this, for what would THEY say of me?” is a common expression, when a man hesitates upon some[Pg 257] equivocal step. He may be convinced, from irrefragable data, of the propriety of what he contemplates: but then he could not convince THEY of it, and, of course, in these circumstances, he must let the scheme drop. They thus prevents many things that would be bad, many things that would be only strange, and many things that would certainly be good, if he could be convinced of it. A most uncompromising fellow is this THEY! He knows very well that he cannot enter into another man’s bosom, to see all the various reasons and tendencies which lead him towards the thing he aims at; but, nevertheless, presuming that he is quite omniscient, or at least fully as well acquainted with every other particular man’s business as his own, he never hesitates to give a decided contradiction to any proposal he is not, at first sight, pleased with. Many are the good original schemes which THEY has spoilt, from a hasty conclusion without premises.

They, also, amidst all his multitudinous and most Protean varieties of character, is a general scapegoat for all the mischief that is done in a household. “I see THEY have cracked that decanter.” “They have at last made an end of the globe in the lobby.” Or, as I once heard said by the lady of a house afflicted with a breaking woman-servant, “I declare THEY have broken the very kitchen poker!”—a compound fracture, too, it was. Such are a few of the doings of THEY in his household capacity; and it must be owned that in this light he is very great, and often comes above-board. The grandest aspect, however, in which THEY ever appears, is when he stands up as a representative of the government of the country. “They are going, I see, to bring us into a war with France.” “They intend, it seems, to resume cash payments at the Bank.” No matter whether the affair refers to privilege or prerogative; no matter for the claims of the particular officer under whose hands it ought to fall; King, Lords, Commons, Treasury, Admiralty, and Horse Guards—all melt, like mixed colours, into the single white light of[Pg 258] THEY! Things may be different under the Reform Bill; but, heretofore, there has hardly been any precise government but THEY. They crowns the king—signs the orders of council—passes all bills through the legislature that will go through—fits out armies, and rigs fleets—makes war, and concludes peace—is church and state—Swing and the Press. They is a being of past history, and of present existence—a tyrant, or the people. They is the great despot pronoun of the world!

Owing to the different merits of the different members of a family, and in some measure, also, to the various chances which are vouchsafed to them of bettering their circumstances, we generally see that, though they all begin alike, some go up and some go down in life, so that in the long-run the family, or at least its second generation, is scattered over nearly the whole surface of society, from its top to its bottom. The case may seem startling; but it is our belief that there is hardly any person, be his own situation ever so exalted, who has not relations, and near relations too, in the very lowest walks of life—not only in the condition of servants, perhaps, for that is decent, and, in its way, respectable, but in the most degraded state to which human nature can well be reduced.

In the same way, almost all of us have kinsfolk a little higher in the scale than ourselves, or whom we think so—it is all one. Now, it is quite amazing how accurate our genealogical knowledge becomes respecting one of these individuals, compared with its equally surprising ignorance regarding those who have not been so fortunate. When a cousin or half grand-uncle rises above our level, he rises[Pg 259] into a blaze of light, which enables us to trace our connection with him as plainly as we run our eye along the string of a boy’s kite. But when a poor nephew or grand-nephew descends into poverty and contempt, he seems like a plummet submersed in the ocean, where, though we may occasionally feel him tugging at the bottom of the line, we are totally unable to trace the line itself. We are always most laudably ready to exchange the civilities of life and the affections of kindred with the cousin who has, in the first place, convinced us of his merit by thatching himself well over with bank-notes. It is pleasant to go and dine at a kinsman’s house, where we know that our entertainment can be furnished without any distress to our worthy host. But really it is a totally different case to intrude upon a scene where our poor friend is doing his best, with the tears in his eyes, to satisfy the cravings of his family with, perhaps, a very homely meal. Humanity in that case demands that we should rather stay away, for we know he does not like to be seen in his poor state. And then, too, how easily we can put up with the eccentricities of a wealthy relation, even though they may sometimes gall our pride a little: how strangely liable, on the other hand, are we to fall out with the poor unfortunates below us! On the day after having been regaled to the uttermost excess by our wealthy friend, we will quarrel with the poor one for having drunk a single glass of some plebeian fluid. With the former, nothing—with the latter, every thing, is a fault. The imperfections of the poor are yawning and palpable as their own rags: those of the rich are as smooth as broad-cloth can make them. The truth is, our senses can tolerate almost any odious or improper thing that is found in a scene above our usual grade in the world. We never know enough of it to be able to measure its real odiousness, or it is disguised by the cordial appliances which we always have ready for the sores of the great. But the vices, nay, the smallest foibles of the lowly, come before our senses so bare, so beggarly, so unanealed, and,[Pg 260] moreover, they are so immediately followed by that additional wretchedness which wealthy error escapes, that we have no excuse for them. Hence we generally find, that we have shaken off the most of our poor relations on account of some trivial cause of offence, which we find it necessary, however, to be always nursing in our minds, in order to sustain us in the conviction that the breach of treaty—the casus fœderis—was sufficient.

There is one very obvious mark of the individual who despises poor relations—a perpetual reference to rich ones. Some people are constantly bringing in allusions to “my cousin Mr This,” and “my uncle Mr That,” and even to more remote relations, such as “my great-grandmother the Countess of Somewhere.” A few are so very silly as to tell, in the newspaper announcement of their marriage, that their bride, besides being daughter to this or that plain esquire, is “grand-niece to General So-and-So,” or “cousin to Mr Such-a-Thing, secretary of state.” These announcements are an impertinence fit for the interference of the legislature—or the police. If people have exalted relations, let them enjoy them as much as they can within themselves, but do not let them be perpetually presenting this odious little piece of vanity before others, who not only are not interested in it, but are perhaps reminded by it that they have no fine relations themselves. To be always thus singling out a relation from all the rest, and holding him up in connection with ourselves, is a direct injury to him, in so far as we are thus trying to exalt ourselves at his expense—an indirect insult to our kindred in general, whom we leave out of view, and a nuisance to all before whom we thus exhibit our own poverty of soul. It is a cultivation of the most odious character, and necessarily suggests to every thinking person, that in exact proportion to our homage to the great persons of our family must be our haughtiness and severity to the humble. The people addicted to this vice of conversation are evidently satisfied in their own minds that they are talking very fine, and exciting[Pg 261] no feeling in their hearers but admiration and respect; but in reality they are always scouted and ridiculed, even to the degree of being honoured with a nickname, carved, perhaps, out of the favourite phrase.

A really good and philosophical spirit will neither plume himself upon his more fortunate, nor despise his less fortunate, relations. He will modestly rejoice in the success of the former, and take care, by avoiding the appearance of intrusiveness on the one hand, and splenetic and pettish jealousy on the other, to afford no reason for the fortunate individual to feel incommoded by the connection, and, consequently, to endeavour to shake it off. To those who are less fortunate than himself, he will be as encouraging and kind as his circumstances render prudent or decent, neither manifesting that vulgar pride which tries needlessly to make a kind of virtue out of a low origin, nor that still more pitiable vanity which denies all inferior kindred, and seeks, at the expense of real dignity, the eclat of a few “great friends.” We allow there is a general difficulty in the case. Friends in different worldly circumstances are like positive and negative clouds in electricity: there is a constant tendency in the poor to an equalization, which is not relished by the parties whose pockets are charged positively. But human nature should be always contending with its weaknesses, and, though full confiding friendship is not perhaps to be expected, there may still be a sufficient interchange of kindness to lighten, in no small degree, the general burden of life.

In country churchyards in Scotland, and perhaps in other countries also, there is always a corner near the gateway, which is devoted to the reception of strangers, and is distinguished[Pg 262] from the rest of the area by its total want of monuments. When you inquire of the passing peasant respecting this part of the burial-ground, he tells you that it is the corner for strangers, but never, of course, thinks that there is or can be any sentiment in the matter. To me, I must confess, this spot is always more interesting than any other, on account of the more extended scope which it gives to those feelings with which one surveys a churchyard. As you wander over the rest of the ground, you see humble memorials of humbler worth, mixed perhaps with the monuments of rank and wealth. But these tell always a definite tale. It is either the lord or the tenant of some of the neighbouring fields, or a trading burgher, or perhaps a clergyman; and there is an end of it. These men performed their parts on earth, like the generality of their fellows, and, after figuring for a space on the limited arena of the parish or the district, were here gathered to their fathers. But the graves of the strangers! what tales are told by every undistinguished heap—what eloquence in this utter absence of epitaphs!

There can be no doubt that the individuals who rest in this nook belonged, with hardly the possibility of an exception, to the humbler orders of the community. But who will say that the final sufferings and death of any individual whatsoever are without their pathos? To me, who have never been able to despise any fellow-creature upon general considerations, the silent expressive stories related by these little heaps, possess an interest above all real eloquence. Here, we may suppose, rests the weary old man, to whom, after many bitter shifts, all bitterly disappointed, wandering and mendicancy had become a last trade. His snow-white head, which had suffered the inclemency of many winters, was here at last laid low for ever. Here also the homeless youth, who had trusted himself to the wide world in search of fortune, was arrested in his wanderings; and, whether his heart was as light and buoyant as his purse, or weighed down with many privations and[Pg 263] disappointments, the end was the same—only in the one case a blight, in the other a bliss. The prodigal, who had wandered far, and fared still worse and worse, at length returning, was here cut short in his better purpose, far from those friends to whom he looked forward as a consolation for all his wretchedness. Perhaps, when stretched in mortal sickness in a homely lodging in the neighbouring village, where, though kindness was rendered, it was still the kindness of strangers, his mind wandered in repentant fondness to that mother whom he had parted with in scorn, but for whose hand to present his cup, and whose eye to melt him with its tenderness, he would now gladly give the miserable remains of his life. Perhaps he thought of a brother, also parted with in rage and distrust, but who, in their early years, had played with him, a fond and innocent child, over the summer leas, and to whom that recollection forgave every thing. No one of these friends to soothe the last moments of his wayward and unhappy life—scarcely even to hear of his death when it had taken place. Far from every remembered scene, every remembered face, he was doomed here to take his place amidst the noteless dead, and be as if he had never been. Perhaps one of these graves contains the shipwrecked mariner, hither transferred from the neighbouring beach. A cry was heard by night through the storm which dashed the waves upon the rocky coast; deliverance was impossible; and next morning, the only memorial of what had taken place was the lifeless body of a sailor stretched on the sand. No trace of name or kin, not even the name of the vessel, was learned; but, no doubt, as the villagers would remark in conveying him to the Strangers’ Nook, he left some heart to pine for his absence, some eyes to mourn for him, if his loss should ever be ascertained. There are few so desolate on earth as not to have one friend or associate. There must either be a wife to be widowed, or a child to be made an orphan, or a mother to suffer her own not less grievous bereavement.[Pg 264] Perhaps the sole beloved object of some humble domestic circle, whose incomings and outgoings were ever pleasant, is here laid low, while neither can the bereaved learn aught of the fate and final resting-place of their favourite, nor can those who kindly, but without mourning, performed his last offices, reach their ears with the intelligence, grateful even in its pain, of what had been done to his remains; here the energies which had battled with the waves in their hour of night, and the despair whose expression had been wasted upon the black tempest, are all stilled into rest, and forgotten. The storm is done; its work has been accomplished; and here lies the strange mariner, where no storms shall ever again trouble him.

Such are the imaginings which may arise in contemplating that neglected nook in our churchyards which is devoted to the reception of strangers. The other dead have all been laid down in their final beds by long trains of sorrowing friends. They rest in death in the midst of those beloved scenes which their infancy knew, and which were associated with every happiness, every triumph, every sorrow, which befel them. The burns in which they had “paidlet” when they were children, run still in their shining beauty all around and about their last resting-place; the braes over which they wandered hand in hand, “to pu’ the gowans fine,” still look down in all their summer pride upon the fold into which they have at last been gathered for eternity. But the homeless strangers! they died far from every endeared scene. The rills were not here like those which they had known; the hills were different too. Instead of the circle of friends, whose anticipated grief tends so much to smooth the last bed of suffering man, the pillow of the homeless was arranged by strangers: they were carried to the burial-ground, not by a train of real mourners, anxious to express their respect and affection for the departed, but by a few individuals, who, in so doing, complimented human nature in general, but not the individual. To the other graves there was also some one[Pg 265] to resort afterwards, to lament the departure of those who lay below. The spot was always cherished and marked by at least one generation of kind ones; and, whether distinguished by a monument or not, it was always a greater or less space of time before the memory of the deceased entirely perished from its place. Still, as each holy day came round, and the living flocked to the house of prayer, there was always some one to send a kind eye aside towards that little mound, and be for a moment moved with a pensive feeling, as the heart recalled a departed parent, or child, or friend. But the graves of the strangers! all regard was shut out from them as soon as they were closed. The decent few who had affected mourning over them had no sooner turned away than they were at once forgotten. That ceremony over, their kind had done with them for ever. And so, there they lie, distinguished from the rest only by the melancholy mark that they are themselves undistinguished from each other; no eye to weep over them now or hereafter, and no regard whatsoever to be paid to them till they stand forth, with their fellow-men, at the Great and Final Day.

Except on particular grounds of demerit. This is a maxim which it would be well if the world would pay more attention to.

There are many people—very good people, too—who have a habit of speaking contemptuously or lightly of almost every body but themselves. There are still more who do not seem to consider it necessary to treat the absent with the least respect, but, to use the words of a modern writer, are remarkably candid in owning and showing up the faults of their neighbours.

[Pg 266]

These, I think, are detestable practices of human nature—the issue of its weakness rather than its strength.

When I think of a great and good character, I cannot conceive that he has a habit of depreciating the respect due to his absent friends, or of treating any of his fellow-creatures with scorn, unless for some specific delinquency. Such a person will be already too secure of his own reputation to seek to raise it at the expense of others. He will be able to take an enlarged view of human society, and, seeing that the condition of all men is in a great measure accidental, or at least moulded greatly by circumstances, will not despise any man on account of his mere place in the general system, but, on the contrary, give him respect in proportion to his good conduct in that place, whatever it may be. Such a man, also, will have too much respect for himself, to use language at any time which he would be ashamed to own at another time. He would not indulge in a tone of levity or rancour respecting any man, on whose entrance accidentally into the room he would have to alter his style, and hypocritically offer him the usual courtesies of society.

It happens, however, that all men are more or less remote from the greatness and goodness of this ideal character. We are, as yet, only in a state of comparative approximation to those qualities; hence we find that nearly all are alike given to speak slightingly of each other. There are two grand causes at the bottom of this—Selfishness and Thoughtlessness. The former gives us such an intense appreciation of ourselves, and of the rank we hold in society, that we speak and think as if every man and every class beneath us were too mean to be entitled to the least respect; we look upon the whole as a degraded caste, whose very existence must only be acknowledged indirectly, as a thing we have become acquainted with by seeing it at a distance, not by having ever come in contact with it. In this view of society our ordinary literature is very apt to confirm us. The key-note is there struck always in alt.[Pg 267] The whole strain of the work, its characters, its philosophy, its manners, are presumed to be something above the common level; for literary men are still, after all, very much the slaves of the great which they used to be. If the writer describes humble life at all, he describes it as seen by a bird’s-eye view from some lofty station—not as seen by a person who mingles in it, and partakes of its sympathies. Even the middle ranks of the community, who in this country form the great mass of readers, and from which, moreover, almost all literary men arise, have no literature of their own: they have to read a literature which has been calculated for the sphere above them, and in which, of course, their sympathies must be of an imperfect character. And thus, after all that has been done, it still appears a desideratum that there should be both a literature and a philosophy for the human race.

Then, as to thoughtlessness, as a cause for this universally mutual contempt. It must be admitted, I should think, that if we only took a proper consideration of the noble destiny which all partake in common with ourselves, both in respect to the grand moral ends of this life, and the more sublime prospects for the future, we would hardly think meanly of any one, except, as before mentioned, on account of some specific worthlessness. For my part, I wonder how any man can dare to despise a fellow-creature upon other grounds. Is it difference of tongue, of rank, of personal character, of external manners, that makes you despise any one? What, I would ask, are all these distinctions to the great fellowship of our common humanity—the social end which we are working to as parts of a great community—as parts of a glorious world, or the general destiny which awaits us at the close of this brief life? Reflect upon these things before you permit yourself to think lightly of a fellow-creature; or, if these things are of no avail with you, consider what you are yourself, that you thus scorn another. I must say that I have often observed the most contemptible man to be the most contemptuous.[Pg 268] There are some men who hardly make any other pretension to the respect of the world, than in so far as they profess to treat every thing cavalierly. But as he who sheds blood must submit to have his blood shed by others, so are these men at length detected, and tossed, as they deserve, in a blanket of their own weaving. Individuals may be assured that it is not by proclaiming a war of contempt against the world, or any large number of its members, that a comfortable situation is to be gained for themselves.

There is a good old national proverb, which tells us that the king’s errand may come in the pedlar’s road—that is to say, a very lofty man may occasionally have to take a favour from one in humble life. This is no mere flattering unction applied by the common people to themselves. It breathes the very spirit of an enlarged and humane philosophy. It tells us that all ranks of men are in reality dependent upon each other, and that every one, filling its proper place, is entitled to its proportion of regard from the rest. Treating the expression in its more limited sense, it instructs us that, in the prospect of our being occasionally obliged to accept of favours from very mean hands, we should never treat any person beneath us with disrespect—as, otherwise, with what grace can we accept of such a favour? On this point I take the liberty to relate a simple anecdote, as told to me some years ago, in illustration of the subject of this essay, by the individual chiefly concerned—the wife of a shopkeeper in a country town in the north of Scotland.

“In —— there lived a poor woman, named Peggy Williamson, a kind of washerwoman, whom every body looked upon as a wretched creature. This despised and not very reputable person had a son, who on one occasion was taken up by the town-officers for some trifling offence, and would have been thrown into prison, if I had not thought the case rather a hard one, and interceded with the magistrate in his behalf. Peggy, with all her faults,[Pg 269] was not ungrateful; she came to me, and said she never would forget my kindness.

“A long time after this, in consequence of a particular calamity, my husband’s affairs got into a very hopeless state. I was attending the shop one bleak November day. Few customers were coming in, or likely to come in, and our prospects were gloomy and dull as the atmosphere itself. I never, indeed, since we began business, saw a day when things seemed less promising. The whole street—the whole town—appeared deserted. All was desolate, cold, and wintry; and with the dread of utter ruin impending over us, you may suppose that our spirits were not very good. Well, just while we were in this dolorous state, in came my old friend Peggy Williamson, accompanied by a country girl, who, she said, wanted to provide herself with a number of our wares, being about to be married. This person expended six or eight pounds with us, and we could not help feeling it as a kind of godsend. It was, however, the result of my having at one time done a just, for I can hardly call it a kind, action, to a person whom the most of people despised. Peggy, who was not perhaps aware of the full extent to which we appreciated her good offices, told me very modestly, as she left the shop with her friend, that she was glad to have had it in her power to recommend any body to us for goods, ‘as she never could forget my kindness to Tam.’ I thus satisfied myself, not only that an act of ordinary benevolence is likely to produce its reward where it is least expected, but that some good feeling may exist even in those characters, whom on ordinary principles we may be most inclined to despise.”

Let us judge, then, or at least let us always be inclined to judge, with tenderness, both of persons and of things. Let us not take our impressions of the characters of our fellow-creatures from the little obvious fault or foible which lies upon the surface, and affords, of course, the subject of largest discourse to the superficial; but, dashing aside[Pg 270] the weeds which mantle the surface of the character, ascertain the extent and sweetness of the clear water beneath. It is of great importance to men, but especially to young men, to acquire a power of judging correctly and definitely of every thing. They must learn to estimate every thing relatively, and not be prevented from allowing merit, even where it exists in the smallest quantities, by its being mingled with a larger proportion of less worthy qualities. We often find one kind of merit denied, because it is not another. A man of untutored genius is sneered at because he wants learning. A learned man is termed a stupid dunce or a pedant, because he wants genius. The writer of an unpretending narrative is described by some of his invidious fellows as no Hume, or Gibbon, or Robertson. An industrious tradesman is ridiculed as a mere plodder; a farmer is laughed at because he is only acquainted with country affairs. Glasgow is condemned as deficient in the refined professional and literary classes of inhabitants, who reside in Edinburgh; and Edinburgh is scouted for its being “not at all a place of business.” These are vicious habits of thought and speech—if thought there can be in what argues a total absence of every thing like reason.

This is a glorious principle for the industrious and trading classes of the community, and yet the philosophy of it is not perhaps understood so well as it ought to be.

There is hardly any thing more common in the country than to hear men spoken of who originally, or at some period of their lives, were rich, but were ruined by “security”—that is, by becoming bound to too great an extent for the engagements of their neighbours. This must arise[Pg 271] in a great measure from an imperfect understanding of the question; and it therefore seems necessary that something should be said in explanation of it.

I would be far from desiring to see men shut up their hearts against each other, and each stand, in the panoply of his own resolutions, determined against every friendly appeal whatsoever. It is possible, however, to be not altogether a churl, and yet to take care lest we be tempted into an exertion of benevolence, dangerous to ourselves, while it is of little advantage to our friends.

Notwithstanding the many ties which connect a man with society, he nevertheless bears largely imprinted on his forehead the original doom, that he must chiefly be dependent on his own labour for subsistence. It is found by all men of experience, that, in so far as one trusts to his own exertions solely, he will be apt to flourish; and, in so far as he leans and depends upon others, he will be the reverse. Nothing can give so good a general assurance of well-doing as the personal activity of the individual, day by day exerted for his own interest. If a man, on the contrary, suddenly finds, in the midst of such a career, a prospect of some patronage which seems likely to enrich him at once, or if he fails into the heritage of some antiquated claims to property or title, which he thinks it necessary to prosecute, it is ten to one that he declines from that moment, and is finally ruined. The only true way to make a happy progress through this world, is to go on in a dogged, persevering pursuit of one good object, neither turning to the right nor to the left, making our business as much as possible our pleasure, and not permitting ourselves to awake from our dream of activity—not permitting ourselves to think that we have been active—till we suddenly find ourselves at the goal of our wishes, with fortune almost unconsciously within our grasp.

Now, it is a most violent and unhappy disturbance of this system, to be always poking about after large favours[Pg 272] from friends, whether for the purpose of adding fuel to what we think a good fire, or preserving a bad one from extinction. All that is obtained in this way is obtained against the very spirit of correct business, and is likely to be only mischievous to both parties. In the first place, it is probable that we shall not make such a good use of money got thus in a slump, without being painfully and gradually won, as of that which is the acquisition of our own daily industry. Then, it is always a presumption against a man that he should require such subsidies; and, accordingly, his commercial reputation is apt to suffer from every request he makes. Next, to consider the case in reference to the friend from whom the demand is made, it is obviously a most unfair thing, that, when men find it so necessary to be cautious in adventuring money on unusual risks, even for their own interest, and are, in such circumstances, so strongly called upon to make themselves acquainted with every circumstance of the case before venturing—when, moreover, they only do so in the prospect of an unusual profit—I say it is unfair, that, when they only adventure money on their own account under these circumstances, they should be called upon occasionally to adventure it for the profit of a friend, without knowing any thing of the likelihood of its turning out well, without being able to take any of those expedients which they would use in their own case for insuring its eventual re-appearance, without the least chance of profit to compensate the risk—trusting the whole, in fact, to the uncertain and hidden sea of another man’s mind, when perhaps they would not trust it upon their own, with a full knowledge of soundings, tide, wind, and pilotage. Men may grant such favours, from their dislike to express such a want of confidence in a friend as a refusal is supposed to intimate. But this proceeds upon the erroneous principle that the refusal indicates want of confidence. In reality, it ought only to be held as indicating a want of confidence in the particular line of use upon which it is to be adventured. When the man now[Pg 273] wanting the loan of money expresses himself as certain to reproduce it at the proper time, he pledges too much of his honour; for there cannot be a stronger proof of the unlikelihood of his having money then than his wanting it now, so that the uncertainty of the reproduction of the sum could never be greater. The person from whom it is demanded is entitled, therefore, to take care that the petitioner is not deceiving both himself and the individual whom he wishes to supply his necessities.

Humanity—kindred—friendship—have many claims; and these will always be considered and answered by a man of good feelings. All that is here contended for, is the inconsistency of a system of large accommodations with just business, as well as with the real interests of either of the two parties concerned. Upon the whole, a man will not only be obliging himself in the best manner, but he will also be obliging society in a higher degree than he otherwise could do, if he simply looks well after himself, so that he never requires a favour. Let no man be unduly alarmed at the outcry of “selfishness;” it is the only principle which can ever become nearly general, and therefore the only one which can be equal or impartial in its action. When this cry is raised, let the petitioned party always take pains to consider whether he in reality is the selfish person—whether the odium of that bad feeling does not indeed rather lie with the petitioner, who is content, for the purpose of saving himself some present inconvenience, or otherwise advantaging himself, to bring a portion of his friend’s substance into hazard—for hazard, of course, there always is, whenever money leaves the possession of its owner, and in hardly any kind of adventure is it ever in greater peril than when lent, or engaged for, in this manner, without the prospect of a profit. It is, in a great measure, a mere error arising from want of reflection, to suppose that there can only be inhumanity on the part of the individual who refuses to lend or become bound. Inhumanity, of course, there may often be in such refusals; but is there to be no[Pg 274] sympathy, on the other hand, for the friend betrayed? Are we only to have pity for the man who wants money—no matter through what causes he wants it—in March, and none for him who is called upon to undertake the risk of having to pay it in June, to his grievous inconvenience? Does pity only acknowledge the present tense, and not the future? Is it so silly a passion that it only feels for the present wants of an individual who goes a-borrowing, and has no regard to the contingent sorrows of him who, without fault of his own, but with every merit to the contrary, is beguiled into a ruin he did not purchase, in the ineffectual attempt, perhaps, to save one who, supposing him to be personally as worthy, was at least the only person with whom blame, if blame there be, can in such a case be said to rest?

Summary.—Fortune is most easily and most certainly to be won by your own unaided exertions. Therefore, depend as little as possible upon prospects of advantages from others, all of whom, you will find, have enough ado with themselves. Be liberal, affable, and kind; but, knowing that you cannot do more injury to society than by greatly injuring yourself, exercise a just caution in giving way to the solicitations of your friends. Never be too ready to convince yourself that it is right to involve yourself largely, in order to help any person into a particular station in society; rather let him begin at the bottom, and he will be all the better fitted for his place, when he reaches it, by having fought his way up through the lower stages.

The most fallacious ideas prevail respecting leisure. People are always saying to themselves, “I would do this, and I would do that, if I had leisure.” Now, there is no condition in which the chance of doing any good is less than in the condition of leisure. The man fully employed may be able to gratify his good dispositions by improving himself or his neighbours, or serving the public in some useful way; but the man who has all his time to dispose of as he pleases, has but a poor chance, indeed, of doing so. To do increases the capacity of doing; and it is far less difficult for a man who is in a habitual course of exertion to exert himself a little more for an extra purpose, than for the man who does little or nothing to put himself into motion for the same end. This is owing to a principle of our moral nature, which is called the vis inertiæ, literally, the strength of inactivity, but which I will explain at once to unlearned persons, by reminding them, that, to set a common child’s hoop a-going in the first place, requires a smarter stroke than to keep it in motion afterwards. There is a reluctance in all things to be set a-going; but when that is got over, then every thing goes sweetly enough. Just so it is with the idle man. In losing the habit, he loses the power of doing. But a man who is busy about some regular employment for a proper length of time every day, can very easily do something else during the remaining hours; indeed, the recreation of the weary man is apt to be busier than the perpetual leisure of the idle. As he walks through the world, his hands hang unmuffled and ready by his side, and he can sometimes do more by a single touch in passing, than a vacant man is likely to do in a twelvemonth.

All this is exemplified fully in the actual practice of life. Who, I would ask, compose the class who perform most[Pg 276] of the business of public charity? It is not those who are highly endowed with wealth and leisure. It is not in general those whom wealth has placed at ease, but the class of well-employed traders and manufacturers, who, to appearance, are entirely engrossed by their own concerns. These men will snatch an occasional hour from their well-employed lives—perhaps an hour that ought to be devoted to relaxation—and do you more real work in that time than an idle man would accomplish in the half of his yaw-yaw existence. What is curious, if you place the busy trader on the shelf, as no longer requiring to work for his subsistence, he immediately loses the power of doing these little superfluous acts of goodness. In getting out of the way of all exertion, he becomes unable to do any thing, even when he wishes it. On the same principle, men never give a job to a lawyer or any body else, who is not pretty well occupied. And this is from no irrational homage to the name of the man, as is sometimes thought; it is because the man who does much is most likely to do more, and most likely to do it well.

Let no man, then, cry for leisure in order to do any thing. Let him rather pray that he may never have leisure. If he really wishes to do any good thing, he will always find time for it, by properly arranging his other employments. The person who thus addresses the public has acquired the power of doing so, such as it is, not by having had a great deal of time at his own disposal, but solely by ravishing the inglorious hours which the most of men spend in unprofitable and unenjoyed pleasures, and employing them in the cultivation of his mind. There is an anecdote told of a French author of distinction, who by regularly employing, in a few jottings, the five minutes which his wife caused him to wait every day while she dressed for dinner, at last formed a book; certainly not the least meritorious of his works. Hazlitt also remarks, that many men walk as much idly upon Pall Mall in a few years, as would carry them round the globe. In fact, it may be said that to ask for[Pg 277] leisure or time to do any ordinary thing, is equivalent to a confession that we are indifferent about doing it.

It is very fair that the busy man should be at ease at last. It is often the object for which he works. Neither can it be allowed that there is any absolute claim upon the wealthy to exert themselves for the good of the community. Wealth must be enjoyed as the possessor pleases, or it is no longer wealth, and one of the objects of industry is taken away. But it would be of vast importance—both to the wealthy idle themselves and to the community—if their tastes could oftener be directed to some beneficial employment within the range of their abilities and influence. It is a shame to those who are entirely at their own disposal, that almost all the general good that is done in the world is done by those who are already overworked. It might rather be expected that the affluent, who have no particular business of their own to attend to, should devote themselves to the general good. This is the more particularly to be expected, when we observe the worse than trifles upon which idle opulence generally employs itself. If actual vice be avoided, the most contemptible frivolities and paltry amusements are sought after, for the purpose of—disgraceful word!—killing time. Sometimes we find the universal necessity of doing something, taking a good direction, or one at least rather on goodness’ side. The female part of the affluent world are often found to be actively benevolent; and nothing can be more laudable. But the ells of idle humanity, that every day walk the street in vain, are beyond all mensuration. Now, I am convinced that if these leisurely persons only once fell into the way of employing themselves for some good end, they would find themselves far more comfortable than they are at present. They would suddenly feel the inspiration of a worthy purpose of existence. They would feel the self-importance of active exertion—the majesty of industry; that lofty feeling which even the hard-working housewife feels in increased proportion amidst the sloperies of a washing[Pg 278] Saturday, and which gives to the early riser his right to taunt and look down upon all the recumbent part of mankind. The gentlemen must think of it. They must up and be doing. It is, I repeat, a disgrace to them, in this universally busy scene, to let all the laurels of charity and kindness be carried away by those who have enough ado to obtain their own subsistence.

It is very certain that all men are not born to be Franklins; and, likewise, that if any considerable number of such persons were to arise, their utility and their distinction would be diminished. There is a good old proverb, however—“aim at a silk gown, and you may get a sleeve of it;” which may be followed out, both to the advantage of individuals and to the benefit of the community.

First, there is one great maxim that no youth should ever want before his eyes, namely, that hardly any thing is beyond the attainment of real merit. Let a man set up almost any object before him on entering life, and, if his ambition be of that genuine kind which springs from talent, and is not too much for his prudence, there is a strong chance in his favour that a keen and steady pursuit of the object will make him triumph at last. It is very common, when the proposal of a young man’s entry into life is discussed, to hear complaints as to the pre-occupation of every field of adventure by unemployed multitudes. There may occasionally be some cause for this; but the general truth is undeniable, that, in spite of every disadvantage, men are rising daily to distinction in every profession—the broadest shoulders, as usual, making their way best through the crowd. It is the slothful and the fearful that generally make such complaints; and they obviously do so in order to assure themselves that they are not altogether wrong in continuing to misspend their time. When we hear of the overcrowded state of any proposed profession, we are apt to overlook that an immense proportion of those engaged in it are destined, by the weakness of their character, and want of specific qualifications, to make no way for themselves, and must soon be the same, so far as rivalry is concerned, as if they had never entered it. If the entrant, then, has only a well-grounded confidence in his own[Pg 280] powers of exertion and perseverance, he need hardly be afraid to enter any profession. With the serious desire of well-doing at heart, and some tolerable share of ability, he is sure very soon to get ahead of a great proportion of those already in the field. Only let him never despair—that is, tell himself it is all in vain, in order that he may become idle with a good conscience—and there is hardly any fear of him.

The present writer entertains some different ideas respecting original humility of circumstances from what are generally prevalent. The common notion is, that humble circumstances are a great obstruction at the outset of life, and that the more difference between a man’s origin and his eventual condition, the greater is the wonder, and the greater his merit. Since it appears, however, that so large a proportion of distinguished men were poor at the beginning, a question may naturally arise, are not men just the more apt, on that account, to become eminent? Although we are all familiar as possible with instances of fortunes made from nothing, it will be found, on recollection, that cases are comparatively rare of men who began with fortunes having ended by greatly increasing them. Many a poor boy has made twenty thousand pounds before he was forty years of age; but few who had ten thousand at the age of majority are found to double it with their years. Here—here is a reason for hope. The fact is, large sums are not to be acquired without an appreciation and an understanding of the meanest financial details. To make pounds, we must know the value of shillings; we must have felt before how much good could sometimes be done, how much evil could sometimes be avoided, by the possession of a single penny! For want of this knowledge, the opulent youth squanders or otherwise loses more, perhaps, than he gains. But he who has risen from the ranks knows the value and powers of every sum, from the lowest upwards, and, as saving is the better part of the art of acquiring money, he never goes back a step—his whole march[Pg 281] is ONWARD. At the very worst, it is only a question of time. Say one man begins at twenty with a good capital, and another at the same age with none. For want of experience, and through other causes above mentioned, it is not likely that the former person has made much advance within the first ten years. Now, ten years is an immense space to the individual who only commenced with good resolutions. In that time, if he has not accumulated actual money, he may quite well have secured good reputation and credit, which, prudently managed, is just money of another kind. And so, while still a young man, he is pretty much upon a par with him who seemed to start with such superior advantages. In fact, fortune, or original good circumstances, appear to the present writer as requisites of a very unimportant character, compared with talent, power of application, self-denial, and honourable intentions. The fortunate—to use the erroneous language of common life—are selected from those who have possessed the latter indispensable qualifications in their best combinations: and as it is obvious that young men of fortune (necessarily the smaller class) have only a chance, according to their numbers, of possessing them, it follows, as a clear induction, that the great mass of the prosperous were originally poor.

Talent.—It is a common cry that those who succeed best in life are the dullest people, and that talent is too fine a quality for common pursuits. There cannot be a greater fallacy than this. It may be true that some decidedly stupid people succeed through the force of a dogged resolution, which hardly any man of superior genius could have submitted to. But I am disposed to dispute, in a great measure, the existence of talent, where I do not find it at once productive of superior address in ordinary affairs, and attended by a magnanimity which elevates the possessor above all paltry and vicious actions. The genius which only misleads its possessor from the paths of prudence, or renders him a ridiculous and intolerable member of society, is[Pg 282] too much allied to Bedlam to be taken into account; and in reality, there is nowhere so much of what is called genius as in the madhouses.[6] The imputation of dulness to a man who has prospered in life, will be found by impartial inquirers, in nine cases out of ten, to be a mere consolatory appliance to the self-love of one who has neither had the talent nor the morality to prosper in life himself. Let every man, then, who possesses this gift, rejoice in it with all his heart, and seek by every means to give it proper guidance and direction.

Application is another of the indispensable requisites. Detached efforts, though they may individually be great, can never tell so well in the aggregate as a regular and constant exertion, where the doings of one day fortify and improve the doings of the preceding, and lead on with certainty to the better doings of the next. It is not economical to work by fits and starts; more exertion is required, by that system, for a certain end, than what is necessary in the case of a continuous effort, and thus the irregular man is apt to fall far behind his rivals. Men of ability are apt to despise application as a mean and grubbing qualification—which is only a piece of overweening self-love on their part, and likely to be the very means of frustrating all the proper results of their ability. On the other hand, the industrious man is apt to despair for want of ability—not seeing that the clever fellows are liable to the weakness we describe, which causes them to be constantly giving way in the race to mere plodders. Besides, while few faults are more common than an over-estimation of one’s self, it is equally obvious that many men only discover their abilities by chance, and that all of us possess latent powers, which might be turned to good account, if we only knew and had confidence in them. No man, therefore, should be too easily dashed on the subject of his abilities.[Pg 283] He should try, and, with the aid of a persevering industry, he may do wonders such as he never dreamt of.

Self-Denial.—Perhaps among all the qualifications which, in a combined form, lead to fortune, none is more absolutely indispensable than this. A man may have talent, may have application, both in abundance; but if he cannot resist vulgar temptations, all is in vain. The Scotch, as a nation, are characterised immensely by self-denial, and it is the main ground of their prosperity both at home and abroad. It is one of the noblest of the virtues, if not, indeed, the sole virtue which creates all the rest. If we are obliged at every moment to abandon some sacred principle in order to gratify a paltry appetite; if the extensive future is perpetually to be sacrificed for the sake of the momentary present; if we are to lead a life of Esau-like bargains from the first to the last—then we are totally unfit for any purpose above the meanest. Self-indulgence makes brutes out of gods; self-denial is the tangent line by which human nature trenches upon the divine. Now, self-indulgence is not inherent except in very few natures; it is almost invariably the result of “evil communications” in youth, and generally becomes a mere use or habit. The most of error arises from the contagion of example. A youth at first debauches himself because he sees others do it; he feels, all the time, as if he were sacrificing merely to the glory of bravado; and there is far more of martyrdom in it than is generally supposed. But though a person at first smokes in order to show how much disgust he can endure, he soon comes to have a real liking for tobacco. And thus, for the paltriest indulgences, which only are so from vicious habit, and perhaps, after all, involve as much dissatisfaction as pleasure, we daily see the most glorious and ennobling objects cast, as it were, into hell-fire.

We are by no means hostile to all amusement. The mass of men require a certain quantity of amusement almost as regularly as their daily food. But amusement may[Pg 284] be noxious or innocent, moderate or immoderate. The amusements which can be enjoyed in the domestic circle, or without company at all, are the safest; there is great danger in all which require an association of individuals to carry them into effect. Upon the whole, a multitude of bosom friends is the most pernicious evil that ever besets a man in the world. Each becomes a slave to the depraved appetites of the rest, and is at last ulcerated all over with their various evil practices. At the very best, he is retarded to the general pace, and never finds it possible to get a single vantage hour, in order to steal a march upon his kind.

Honourable Intentions are also indispensably necessary. The reverse is simply want of sense and understanding; for it is obvious to every one who has seen the least of human life, that infinitely more is lost in reputation and means and opportunities of well-doing, by an attempt to gain an undue advantage, than what can in general cases be gained. If we had to live only for a short time certain, trickery might be the most expedient course, so far as this world is concerned; but if a man contemplates a life above a single twelvemonth, he will endeavour, by the guarded correctness of his actions, to acquire the good character which tends so much to eventual prosperity. The dishonest man, in one sense, may be termed the most monstrous of all self-flatterers; he thinks he can cheat the whole of the remaining part of mankind—which certainly is no trifling compliment. He soon finds, however, that he was seen through all the time by those whom he thought mere children, and his blindness and silly arrogance receive their deserved punishment. Even where the depravity may be of a very slight kind, it is alike in vain. In ordinary transactions, the one party deals with the other exactly according to his character; if the one be in general disposed to overreach, the other is just proportionably on his guard; so that there is no result but trouble, and a bad name. One thing should be strongly[Pg 285] impressed upon such persons: they are far more generally understood and watched than they are aware of; for the world, so long as it can simply take care of itself without much difficulty, is not disposed to adopt the dangerous task of a monitor. The police-officer knows of many rogues whom he passes every day on the street; he never lays hold of any, unless for some particular offence.

Such are the principal qualities necessary for advancement in life, though any one of them, without much or any of the other, will, if not counteracted by negative properties, be sure to command a certain degree of success. He who is about to start in the race would do well to ponder upon the difficulties he has to encounter, and make up a manful resolution to meet them with a full exertion of all his powers. To revert to the general question—what is it that enables one man to get in advance of his fellows? The answer is obvious: it can only be his doing more than the generality of them, or his enduring more privation than they are generally inclined to do [that is, self-denial], in order that he may acquire increased power of doing. The fault of most unsuccessful persons is their want of an adequate idea of what is to be done, and what is to be endured. They enter business as into a game or a sport, and they are surprised, after a time, to find that there is a principle in the affair they never before took into account—namely, the tremendous competition of other men. Without being able to do and suffer as much as the best men of business, the first place is not to be gained; without being able to do and suffer as much as the second order of men of business, the second place is not to be gained; and so on. New candidates should therefore endeavour to make an estimate of the duties necessary for attaining a certain point, and not permit themselves to be thrown out in the race for want of a proper performance of those duties. They should either be pretty certain of possessing the requisite powers of exertion and endurance, or aim at a lower point, to which their powers may seem certainly adequate.

[Pg 286]

It is a prevailing notion, that people are all so exclusively engrossed with their own concerns in this world, as to have no time or opportunity to take the least interest in those of their neighbours. No idea could be more mistaken. The truth is, a great many people—perhaps a third of the population of large towns, and three-fourths of those in small ones—are far more anxious about the concerns of their neighbours than about their own. In fact, society in this respect resembles the ape department in a menagerie, where, it is said, every individual chatterer neglects his own pan of meat (opposite his cage), and stretches with all his might to reach the mess of some distant companion in captivity, who, on his part, tries, with equal straining and exertion, to rob some other friend. The case, however, differs immensely as to intention. The monkeys, as we seriously believe, act thus from a wish to eat all the neighbouring pans of meat in the first place, after which they think it will be time enough to attend coolly to their own. But human beings look after each other’s morals and worldly prosperity through the most generous impulses. They think it selfish to be always attending to their own affairs, and that it would be an utter defiance of the greatest law of nature, if they were only to look after themselves. Our own business requires, perhaps, the first attention, but common justice to our race demands that all our spare time, at least, should be devoted to a supervision of the concerns of other people, and a surveillance of their moral conduct. We are to love our neighbours as ourselves, and, in order to testify that we love them, we are to do as we do with children, castigate them properly whenever they misbehave.

It is lamentable to think how negligent some large classes of society are respecting the affairs of their neighbours. In large cities, the more actively engaged citizens go on from[Pg 287] year to year in the pursuit of their own advantage, never casting a single thought upon their next-door neighbours, unless, perhaps, to make a transient inquiry into the state of their credit. Is it not fortunate, that, while the men are thus apt to get wrapped up in their own sordid interests, the fairer and more generous part of the race are still in general sufficiently at leisure to see after their neighbours? What would society do without these amiable controllers-general?—or what would society do, if these amiable controllers were to get so much engaged too, as to have no time for the affairs of their friends? It is dreadful even to think of such a calamity. How many poor improvident wretches would, in such an event, be left to sink or swim as chance directed! How naughty the world at large would become!

Let us contemplate the delightful picture of one of these friends of society. She is generally a person very much at leisure; for without leisure, that natural preference of our own concerns to those of others precludes all exertion of the faculty: she is also, in general, placed in a tolerably secure position in the world, whence she may survey, with compassionate and patronising eyes, the poor strugglers beneath her. Virtuous she is, as virtuous can be; that is to say, she is altogether beyond temptation. Herself and all her own immediate friends have been fortunate; therefore she has a kind of prescriptive title to speak freely of the misfortunes of others. It is incredible what exertions this amiable person will make to procure data for her remarks, or, to speak more properly, grounds whereon she may proceed in her benevolent exertions. Charity being an excuse for every thing, she will even descend so far from her dignity as to institute inquiries, through servants and children, into the concerns of those persons whom she has taken under her patronage. Her own Betty, having the same turn with herself, takes frequent opportunities of visiting the kitchens of her friends; and all the remarks that the girl has been able to make upon[Pg 288] the external state of things there, and all the prattle she has been able to pick up from the servants in that house, is brought home and faithfully detailed to her mistress, who accidentally, for that purpose, opens a conversation with her. Nor is this all. Through the impulse of her benevolent wishes, the good lady will often take information from her servant, which she has learned from another servant, respecting the concerns of a family in which that other servant has perhaps a sister or a friend; her sincere desire of doing good being so strong as to reconcile her to every possibility of misrepresentation, which a story may be supposed to undergo in its progress through so many mouths. It is also to be observed, that she is not exclusively attentive to the concerns of those whom she actually knows. The acquaintances of her acquaintances, and their acquaintances again, even to the third generation, she will inquire about with equal solicitude; and if she knows any thing disagreeable connected with your friends, or any thing that might be thought to unfit them for your acquaintance, she always very kindly lets you hear of it, so that you may be quite upon your guard.

“What do you think?” the talk, perhaps, thus proceeds; “they say she is such a fine lady that she never enters her kitchen: she never knows any day what is to be for dinner: all that kind of thing she leaves to her servants. And such quantities of company they keep! Hardly a night but what there are more or less visitors. A neighbour of ours, Mrs Blackwell, has an aunt who lives opposite them; and she says that the racket is without end. I’m sure I was just saying to our goodman the other day, that if we were to go on in such a way [be it marked, the speaker is reputed to be in infinitely better circumstances than the party commented on], we could not go on long. Puir young things! I’m greatly concerned about them—although, to be sure, it’s not my business. I was at the school with her mother, and I would like to see them keep right, if it were possible. Young[Pg 289] folk are often newfangled about things at first. They think every body that they see is their friend—and its ‘this one, come to your supper,’ and ‘that one, come to your dinner,’ as if they could not get past it. When they come to my time o’ life, they’ll not be sae flush.”

“They say she’s highly accomplished,” thus runs another strain of remarks; “plays on the piano-forte and harp—draws—speaks French and Italian. That would be all very well if he had a fortune to keep it up; but a poor man’s wife! Commend me to a woman that can darn her husband’s stockings, and help to get ready his dinner. I think there’s naething like a gude plain education—reading, writing, and sewing—what mair does a woman need? The goodman and I were often advised to send our girls to learn music, but I never thought it their station. It just puts a parcel o’ nonsense into a girl’s head. Our lasses never learned ony thing but what they could mak a gude use o’; while, there’s Mary Foster does nothing but read novells from morning till night; she’s one o’ your fine misses. If our girls were to bring a novell into our house, I would put it at the back of the fire, though there was na another novell i’ the world.”

It is said that in nunneries, where there is neither vice, nor the possibility of it, the ladies, if unable to talk real scandal, make up for it by censorious remarks upon the most trifling foibles in their companions, or upon the most unimportant failures in the performance of the most unimportant duties. If a holy sister has been observed to smile at a wrong moment, if she has miscounted a bead, or tripped in her gown while walking in a procession, there is as much prattle about it as if she had committed a real offence. Just so, in a country town, every trivial incident becomes a subject of comment for those amiable people who make a point of attending to every body’s business but their own. The consequence is, that every person moves in a country town as if he were upon an ambuscading party: he sends by stratagem for every necessary of life[Pg 290] which he requires: he takes all kinds of by-ways and back roads to escape observation, and cannot so much as cross the street without fearing he will be circumvented. Any thing like a good round thumping impropriety is hailed in such a place like rain in a drought. The most of the matters of remark are very small deer, hardly worth hunting down. When one of a more important character arises, it is quite a godsend. Suppose, for instance, the failure of some unfortunate merchant, who has been ruined by mere simplicity of character. The country people, somehow, have a most exaggerated idea of the mischiefs of bankruptcy. A bankrupt, in their eyes, is a person of distinguished criminality—almost enough to make him be regarded as a world’s wonder. In proportion, therefore, to their previous remarks for the edification of the unhappy man, is their wholesome severity afterwards. They are surprised to find that, after such an event, he still bears the ordinary shape of a human being—that he has not become signalised by some external transfiguration, of a kind sufficiently awful to indicate his offence. Another thing they are astonished at—that the family of a bankrupt should continue to have the usual appetites of human beings—that they should not, indeed, have altogether ceased to eat, drink, or sleep. The following is very nearly a conversation which really occurred, on such an occasion, in a somewhat humble rank of mercantile life.

“Weel, hae ye heard the news?”

“What news, woman?”

“Ou, hae ye no heard it?—James Sinclair’s shop’s no open this mornin’—that’s a’.”

“Aih, weel, has it come to that at last? I aye thought it. It was easy seeing yon could na stand lang. Sic ongauns as they had for a while—sic dresses—sic parties! But every thing comes to its level at last. I wonder folk dinna think shame to gang on sae wi’ other folk’s siller. It’s a perfect black-burning disgrace. And she’s just as muckle to blame as him. There was hersell, just last Sunday[Pg 291] eight days, at the kirk wi’ a new pelisse and a bannet, and the laddies ilk ane o’ them wi’ new leather caps. I’se warrand there was nae bannocks ever seen in their house—naething but gude wheat bread. Whenever a bairn whinged for a piece, it buid to get a shave o’ the laiff. Atweel, her grandfather, auld George Morrison, was na sae ill to serve. Mony a claut o’ cauld parritch he gat frae my aunty Jess, and was thankfu’ to get them.”

“Na, but, woman, I saw Jamie himsell gaun up the street this mornin’, and a superfine coat on his back just the same as ever. Na, the lass was seen this forenoon getting a leg o’ lamb—a fifteenpence leg it was, for our Jenny got the neebor o’t—the same as if naething ava had happened. But, of course, this’ll no gang on lang. They’ll be roupit out, stab and stow, puir thochtless creatures; and I’m sure I dinna ken what’s to come o’ them. She has nae faither’s house to gang back to now. They’ll hae to set up some bit sma’ public, I reckon.”

“Heaven keep us a’ frae extravagance—I had never ony brow o’ that new plan she had o’ pitting black silk ribands round the callants’ necks, instead o’ cotton napkins.”

Such are a few of the remarks of our good friends the controllers-general of society; and we are very sure that few people alive but what must look upon them as a most useful, most exemplary, and most benevolent class of persons.

Next to a thorough grounding in good principles, perhaps the thing most essential to success in life is a habit of communicating easily with the world. By entering readily into conversation with others, we not only acquire information by being admitted to the stores which men of various modes of thinking have amassed, and thereby gain an insight into[Pg 292] the peculiarities of human character, but those persons into whose society we may be accidentally thrown are gratified to think that they have been able to afford instruction. Seeing that we appreciate their favourite subject, they conceive a high opinion of our penetration, and not unfrequently exert themselves wonderfully to promote our interests. Men in business, particularly, who have this happy turn of being able to slide as it were into discourse, and to throw it into that train which is best suited to the capacities and humours of others, are wonderfully indebted to it for the run of customers it entices to their shops. A stately, grave, or solemn manner, is very inappropriate in measuring stuffs by the yard; and though a man be penetrated by the deepest sense of gratitude, if his bow be stiff, and his countenance not of a relaxing cast, he makes not half so favourable an impression as another who may not perhaps be a more deserving person in the main, but has a more graceful method of acknowledging his obligations. It is astonishing, too, at how cheap a rate good-will is to be purchased. An insinuating way of testifying satisfaction with the pleasantness of the weather, is often a very effectual way of extending popularity; it is regarded as an act of condescension when addressed to some, while with others it is received as the indication of a happy temperament, which is at all times attractive. A person who “has little to say,” or, in other words, who does not deign to open his mouth except when it is indispensably necessary, never proves generally acceptable. You will hear such a one described as “a very good sort of man in his way;” but people rather avoid him. He has neither the talent of conversing in an amusing vein himself, nor of leading on others to do so; and they are only the arrantest babblers who are contented with an inanimate listener. I remember a striking example of the various fortune of two persons in the same profession, who happened to be of those different dispositions.

Two pedlars made their rounds in the same district of[Pg 293] country. The one was a tall, thin man, with a swarthy complexion. Nothing could exceed this fellow’s anxiety to obtain customers; his whole powers seemed to be directed to the means of disposing of his wares. He no sooner arrived at a farm-house than he broached the subject nearest his heart—“Any thing wanted in my line to-day?” He entered into a most unqualified eulogium on their excellency; they were all unequalled in fineness; he could sell them for what might be said to be absolutely nothing; and as for lasting, why, to take his word for it, they would wear for ever. He chose the table where the light was most advantageous, proceeded immediately to undo the labyrinth of cord with which his goods were secured, and took the utmost pains to exhibit their whole glories to the eyes of the admiring rustics. If the farmer endeavoured to elicit from him some information concerning the state of the crops in the places where he had been travelling, he could only afford a brief and unsatisfactory answer, but was sure to tack to the tail of it the recommendation of some piece of west of England cloth which he held in his hand ready displayed. Nay, if the hospitality of the good wife made him an offer of refreshment before he entered upon business, he most magnanimously, but unpedlar-like, resisted the temptation to eat, animated by the still stronger desire to sell. There was no possibility of withdrawing him for a moment from his darling topic. To the master he said, “Won’t you buy a coat?”—to the mistress, “Won’t you buy a shawl?”—to the servant girls, “Won’t you buy a gown a-piece?” and he earnestly urged the cowherd to purchase a pair of garters, regardless of the notorious fact that the ragged urchin wore no stockings. But all his efforts were ineffectual; even his gaudiest ribands could not melt the money out of a single female heart; and his vinegar aspect grew yet more meagre as he restored each article untouched to his package.

The rival of this unsuccessful solicitor of custom was a short, squat man, fair-haired and ruddy. He came in with[Pg 294] a hearty salutation, and set down his pack in some corner, where, as he expressed himself, it might be “out of the way.” He then immediately abandoned himself to the full current of conversation, and gave a detail of every particular of news that was within his knowledge. He could tell the farmer every thing that he desired to know—what number of corn-stalks appeared in the barn-yards wherever he had been, and what quantity of grain still remained uncut or in shock, and he took time to enumerate the whole distinctly. He was equally well prepared in other departments of intelligence, and so fascinating was his gossip, that, when the duties of any member of the family called them out of hearing, they were apt to linger so long, that the goodwife declared he was “a perfect offput to a’ wark.” This, however, was not meant to make him abate of his talkative humour; and neither did he: the whole budget was emptied first, and he received in turn the narratives of all and sundry. Then came the proposal from some of those whom he had gratified with his news, to “look what was in the pack.” The goods were accordingly lugged from their place of concealment, and every one’s hand was ready to pick out some necessary or some coveted piece of merchandise. The master discovered that, as he would be needing a suit ere long, it was as well to take it now. The mistress was just waiting for Thomas coming round to supply herself with a variety of articles, “for,” quoth she, “mony things are needit in a house.” The servants exhorted each other to think whether they did not require something, for it was impossible to say when another opportunity of getting it might occur. The ellwand was forthwith put into diligent requisition, the scissors snipt a little bit of the selvage, and an adroit “screed” separated the various cloths from the rapidly diminishing webs. The corners of many chests gave up their carefully-hoarded gains, with which cheap remnants were triumphantly secured. In the midst of this transfer of finery, the poor herd-boy looked on with a countenance[Pg 295] so wofully expressive of the fact that he had not a farthing to spend, that some one took compassion on him, and, having laid out a trifling sum, had the satisfaction of making him perfectly happy with the equivalent, flinging it into his unexpectant arms, and exclaiming, “Here, callant, there’s something for you!” What a multiplicity of pleasing emotions had this trader the tact of calling into exercise, all of them redounding tenfold to his own proper advantage! It was impossible to say whether he cultivated his powers of talk from forethought, as knowing that they would produce a crisis favourable to his own interests, or if he indulged in them because gossiping was congenial to his own disposition. He had a sharp eye enough to what is called the main chance; but at the same time he did not possess that degree of intellectual depth which we might expect to find in one who could calculate upon exciting the purchasing propensities by a method so indirect. Most probably, therefore, his success in business was more the result of an accidental cast of mind than of wisdom prepense, or any aptitude beyond common for the arts of traffic, as considered by themselves.

Such, also, in most cases, is that talent which gets the name of “a fine turn for business.” The possessor exerts his powers of pleasing, alike when engaged in the concerns of his profession, and in society when there is no object to serve but that of passing time agreeably. His engaging address is productive of commercial advantages, but it is not a thing acquired and brought into exercise solely for that end. Some people, no doubt, finding themselves to have a prepossessing manner, do employ it systematically to promote their views of business; but by far the greater number employ it because they have it, and without reference to the pecuniary profit that may accrue. The pecuniary profit, however, follows not the less as its consequence; and we have the satisfaction of seeing urbanity of manners almost uniformly rewarded by attaining to easy circumstances, while the man of a gruff unsocial humour[Pg 296] has usually to maintain a hard struggle with fortune. The mere packing of knowledge into the heads of children is not the only thing required to ensure their future respectability and happiness—the qualities of the heart also demand the fostering care of the instructor; and since so much depends on their temper and behaviour to those around them, parents cannot be too assiduous in the cultivation of affability, the possession of which virtue is the grand secret that confers “a fine turn for business.”

The taking of a shop, whether to set up a new business or translate an old one, is always a matter of deep and anxious concernment. On such an occasion, one generally gets into a state of fidgetiness and perplexity, which is felt to be far from disagreeable. A sentiment of unwonted enterprise rises in his mind. He is going, he thinks, to do a great thing—at least something beyond the usual range of commercial existence. In the first place, he pays a few sly and solitary visits to the place—not that he goes in to look about him—no, no; he is not for some time up to that point. He tries first how the premises look when simply walked past as if by an unconcerned passenger. As he passes, he casts an affectedly careless glance at the door and windows, taking care, however, to receive as deep an impression as possible of the whole bearing and deportment of the place. After walking to a sufficient distance, he turns and walks back, and sees how it looks when approached from a different point of the compass. Then he takes a turn along the other side of the street, or perhaps, if afraid to excite observation (and if the place be in Edinburgh), goes up a common stair, and takes a deliberate and secure observation from a window. His[Pg 297] feeling is almost exactly the same as that of a lover making observations of a mistress, whose figure he wishes to ascertain before getting too deeply in love with her to put correct judgment out of the question. As, in the one case, stature is perhaps considered, complexion and outline of face duly weighed, and possibly some very modest inquiries instituted as to what Master Slender calls “possibilities,” so, in the other, does the shop-inspector consider all the particulars of the aspect and likelihood of the contemplated premises. Shops, it must be understood, have characters, exactly like human beings. Some have an open, generous, promising countenance, while others have a contracted, sinister, louring expression of phiz, according to the quantity of mason-work there may be in front. Some are of a far more accessible character than others, with a kind of facilis descensus in the entry that is in the highest degree favourable to custom. People can hardly avoid falling into such shops as they pass along the streets, for positively they gape like so many Scyllas for your reception, and goodwives, who, like Roderigo, have put money in their purses, are caught like so many rats without thinking of it. There are others, I grieve to say, with such a difficulty of entrance, either from a narrow door, a shut door, an elevation of the pavement, or a certain distance from the thoroughfare, that it requires an absolute determination to purchase such and such articles in such and such shops—a full animus emendi, as lawyers would say—to overcome the obstacle. Perhaps it does not matter for some businesses, which are not much overrun with competition, that they should be carried on in shops of this kind. If there be only one music-seller in the town, he might have his boutique in a twelfth story, and yet he would be sure to get all the natural custom of the place; but in the case of one out of some five hundred haberdashers, or some two thousand grocers, it is absolutely imperative that he should be established in some place with a fatal facility of access. In all cases, there is a combination of qualities in shops, as[Pg 298] well as in men and women. There is something indescribable about it; but an experienced eye, pretty well acquainted with the characters of the streets [this is another subject] and parts of streets, could almost in a moment decide upon the probabilities of any given shop in a large city. He would combine in an instant in his own mind the various qualities, and, counting them into each other after the manner of Lieutenant Drummond, but by a figureless kind of arithmetic, assign at once the exact value of the shop to any class of traders. And shops have characters, too, in another sense of the word—that is, they have reputations. Let a shop have all the apparent advantages in the world, yet, if it be a shop in which several persons have committed faux pas in business, it is naught. We often see an excellent shop thus lose caste, as it were, and become of hardly any value to its proprietor. Suppose some one has failed in it between terms, and deserted it: then do all the bill-stickers come in the first place, and paste it over with huge placards from top to bottom, exactly as a man drowned in the sea, however fine a fellow he may have been, gets encased in a few days in barnacles and shell-fish, the conchological part of the world taking that opportunity to show their contempt for the human. Though the character of the shop is not yet, perhaps, at its worst, yet, as it happens to remain unleased over the next term, the despairing landlord, some time in September or October, begins to let it “by the month or week” to all kinds of nameless people, who die and make no sign, such as men that show orreries, or auctioneers selling off bankrupt stocks, till at last it is as hopeless to think of getting a good tenant into it, as for a man with a bad character to expect a good place in the Excise. The shop is marked for ever; and unless, like the man in the Vicar of Wakefield, it can get a thoroughly new face and form, it has no chance whatsoever of resuming its place in the first rank of shops.

After having completely made up his mind to take a particular[Pg 299] shop, he goes and asks advice. His confessor[7] readily consents to take a walk with him in that direction, and give his candid opinion upon the subject. The two walk arm in arm past the premises, the confessor alone looking, lest, in endeavouring to observe, they should themselves be observed. “I’ll tell you what,” says the confessor, “I like that shop very much. If the rent be at all suitable, I think you might do very well in it.” It is then proposed that the confessor should step in to inquire the rent; for though there be equal reasons why each should not expose himself as being on the outlook for a shop, the person not actually concerned has always least reluctance to submit to that disadvantage, being borne up, it would appear, by a conscious absence of design, while the guilt of the other would be betrayed by his first question. If the confessor reports favourably, then the individual who wants the premises ventures in himself, inspects the accommodations, and makes farther inquiries. The two afterwards retire together, and have a deep and serious consultation upon the subject.

In the deliberations of a person about to enter life in this way, there is always much that is extravagant, and much that is vague. I never yet knew it fail, that, if there was success at all, it arose from different sources from those which had been most securely calculated upon as likely to produce it. Suppose it is a business for the supply of some ordinary necessary of life: the novice reckons up almost all the people he knows in different parts of the town, as sure to become his customers; he expects, indeed, hardly any other kind of support. It is found, however, when he commences, that one friend is engaged in one way, and another in another, so that, with the exception, perhaps, of some benevolent old lady, who sends occasionally to buy a few trifles from him upon principle, all is waste and barren where he expected to reap a plentiful harvest. He[Pg 300] finds, however, on the other hand, that he gets customers where he did not expect them. People seem to rise out of the earth, like the men of Cadmus, to buy from him. The truth is, he is resorted to by those who are disengaged at the time, and to whom his shop is convenient; and all the good-will of all the friends in the world will not get over, for his sake, the difficulty of some engagement elsewhere, or the inconvenience of distance.

It is also a very remarkable thing of people about to enter upon such an enterprise as we are now describing, that they often overlook the most important considerations of all and pay a very minute attention to trifles and things by the by. They perhaps fail to observe that there is not nearly enough of population around them to justify their setting up a particular business; but they fully appreciate and lay great stress upon the circumstance of having a water-pipe in the back room, by which they may be enabled to wash their hands at any time of the day. They may neither have capital nor range of intellect for the business; but they are top-sure that the woman who sells small wares in the area will supply them with a light for the fire every morning. The shop may be unsuitable in many important respects; but nothing could be better in its way than the place for a sign above the door. Even where every matter of real consequence is well weighed and found answerable, there is generally a fussy and festering anxiety about details, accompanied, in the sensations of the principal party, by peculiar dryness of mouth and excoriation of thought-chewed lip. Matters may be such that a confessor, with all the evil-foreboding qualities of a stormy-peterel, could not see a single flaw in the prospect; yet it is amusing in such cases to hear the intending trader laying as much stress upon the peculiar situation of a fire-place in the back room, or the willingness of the landlord to supply a padlock to the door, as if in these things, and in nothing else, lay all his hopes of profit and eventual respectability in life.

[Pg 301]

Suppose, however, that, after all kinds of fond and dreamy calculations, the shop has been taken and opened. I think there can hardly, for some time, be a more interesting sight to a benevolent on-looker, than the young and anxious trader. The shop almost throws itself out at the windows to attract the observation of the passer by. The youth himself stands prompt and alert behind his counter, never idling for a moment, nor permitting his shopboy to idle, but both busy, cutting, and brushing, and bustling about, whether there be any thing to do or not. If but an old lady be seen looking up at the window, or glancing in through the avenue of cheap prints that forms the doorway, what an angler-like eagerness in the mind of the trader that she would but walk in!—nothing more required—were she once within the shop, no fear but she is well done for. And when any body does go in to buy any thing, what a readiness to fly upon the article wanted—with what serviceable rapidity of finger is the parcel unbound—how polite and impressé the manner in which the object is presented and laid out for inspection—what intense gratitude for the money wherewith it is paid! With what a solicitous air is a card finally put into your hand as a memorandum of the place!—a proceeding only the more eloquent when not accompanied by an actual request for your farther custom.

In a large city, advertising is necessarily resorted to as one of the modes, if not almost the only mode, of forming a business. Here it is obvious that a mere modest statement of the case will not do. Something must be said, to make the setting up of the new shop appear in the character of an event. The public attention must be arrested to the circumstance, as if it were a matter of public concernment. It must appear as if the interest of the community, and the interest of the shopman, were identified. No good bargains, no certainty of good articles, no safety of any kind, any where else. Such is the strain of his advertisements, which, though they make the judicious grieve, make a vast number of other people, and even some of the[Pg 302] judicious, buy. The secret is this: A warm and highly coloured style is necessary with a new shopkeeper, to meet and counteract the indifference of the public towards his concerns. If he put forth a cool schedule of his goods and chattels, it does nothing for him, because it does not single him out from the great herd. But if he uses a striking and emphatic phraseology, and even mixes a little extravagance in the composition, it is apt to fix attention to him and his shop; and the people, being so warmly solicited, go to try. Again (and here, perhaps, lies the better part of the thing), the frequency and fervour of his advertisements at least convey the impression that he is anxious for business, and ready and willing to execute it; and as people like to deal with such persons, he is apt to be resorted to on that account, if upon no other. Frequent advertising is, upon the whole, a mark rather of a want of business, than of that kind of respectability which consists in the enjoyment of a concern already in full operation and productiveness; but with beginners, it is quite indispensable.

The difficulty of establishing a new business is fortunately got over in a small degree by a certain benevolent principle in human nature—a disposition to encourage the efforts of the young. Some people act so much under this sentiment, or have such an appetite for the sincere thanks of the needy, that they go to hardly any shops but those of new beginners. The sight of a haberdasher’s shop, in its first and many-coloured dawn, with prints, and ribands, and shop-bills, flying in all directions—or of a provision shop, where hams project their noses into the very teeth, almost, of the passer by, and cheeses lie gaping with a quarter cut out, as if ready to eat rather than to be eaten—or of a bookseller’s shop, where every fresh and trig volume upon the counter seems as if it would take the slightest hint of your will, and, starting up, pack itself off, without any human intervention whatsoever, to your lodgings—is irresistible to these people. They must go in, whether[Pg 303] they want any thing or not, and, after buying some trifle as an earnest of future custom, get themselves delighted with a full recital of all the young trader’s feelings, and prospects, and capabilities, which he is ready to disclose to any one that will lay out sixpence, and appear to take an interest in his undertaking. If the customer be an old lady, she is interested in his youth, and inquires whether he be married or not. If not, then she wants him to get on well, so that he may soon be able to have a wife; if he be, and have children, then she sympathises but the more keenly; she thinks how much human happiness depends upon the success or failure of his undertaking—how one fond soul will watch with intense anxiety the daily progress of the business, taking an interest in almost every penny that comes in, and how many little mouths unconsciously depend upon what is done here, for the fare which childhood so much requires and so truly enjoys. She goes away, resolved to speak of the shop to all she knows, and perhaps in two or three days she is able to bring in a flock of young ladies who want various articles, and who, recommending the new beginner to others, aid materially in making up the steady business, which, with economy, perseverance, and suitable personal qualities, he at length acquires.

The population of a large town is perpetually receiving accessions from the country—not for the purpose of increasing the aggregate of inhabitants, but to supply the waste of existence which takes place in such a scene, and to furnish a better selection for the peculiar offices and business of a city than what could be obtained from the successive generations of the ordinary inhabitants. Nothing[Pg 304] can be more clear than that the youths born and bred in a large city have a less chance to establish themselves in its first-rate lines of business, than the lads who come in from the country as adventurers; the fact being, that the latter are a selection of stirring clever spirits from a large mass, while only the same proportion of the former are likely to possess the proper merit or aptitude. Besides, the town-bred lad is apt to have some points of silly pride about his status in society; he cannot do this and he cannot do that, for fear of the sneers of the numerous contemporaries under whose eyes he is always walking. But the gilly, hot from Banff or Inverness, who comes into the town, “with bright and flowing hair,” rugging and riving for a place in some writer’s office, or elsewhere—why, the fellow would push into the most sacred parts of a man’s house, like Roderick Random, and at the most unconscionable hours, in search of some prospective situation; and when he has got it, what cares he about what he does (within honesty) in order to advance himself, seeing that all whoever knew him before are on the other side of the Grampians. Thus, the sons of the respectable people of large cities are constantly retiring from the field—some to the East Indies, some to the West—some evanish nobody knows how—while their places are taken by settlers from all parts of the country, whose children, in their turn, give way to fresh importations. Then, there is a constant tide towards the capital, of all kinds of rural people, who, having failed to improve their fortunes in the country, are obliged to try what may be done in the town. A broken-down country merchant sets up a grocery shop in some suburb—a farmer who has been obliged to relinquish his dulcia arva, sets up an hostelry for carriers, and so forth. Every recurrence of Whitsunday and Martinmas sends in large droves of people on the tops of heavy carts, to pitch their camps in Edinburgh; many of them with but very uncertain prospects of making a livelihood when they get there, but yet the most of them astonished a year or two after to find that they are still living,[Pg 305] with the children all at the school as formerly, although, to be sure, the “reeky toun” can never be like the green meadows and dear blue hills which they have left behind in Menteith, or Ayrshire, or Tweeddale. What change, to be sure, to these good people, is the close alley of the Old Town of Edinburgh, the changeless prospect of house tops and chimneys, and the black wall opposite to their windows, ever casting its dark shade into their little apartments, for the pleasant open fields in which they have sown and reaped for half a lifetime, and where every little rustic locality is endeared to them by a thousand delightful recollections! But yet it is amazing how habit and necessity will reconcile the mind to the most alien novelties. And, even here, there are some blessings. The place of worship (always an important matter to decent country people in Scotland) is perhaps nearer than it used to be. Mr Simpson’s chapel in the Potterrow is amazingly convenient. Education for the children, though dearer, is better and more varied. There is also a better chance of employment for the youngsters when they grow up. Then Sandy Fletcher, the —— carrier, goes past the door every Wednesday, with a cart-load of home reminiscences, and occasionally a letter or a parcel from some friend left at the place which they have deserted. By means of this excellent specimen of corduroyed honesty and worth, they still get all their butter and cheese from the sweet pastures of their own country side, so that every meal almost brings forward some agreeable association of what, from feeling as well as habit, they cannot help still calling home. Then it is always made a point with them to plant themselves in an outskirt of the town, corresponding to the part of the country from which they come, and where they think they will have at least a specimen of the fresh air. A Clydesdale family, for instance, hardly ever thinks of taking a house (at least for the first year or two) any where but in the Grassmarket, or about Lauriston, or the Canal Basin. People from East Lothian harbour about the[Pg 306] Canongate. Bristo Street and the Causewayside are appropriated indefeasibly to settlers from Selkirkshire and Peeblesshire. Poll the people thereabouts, and you will find a third of them natives of those two counties. In fact, the New Town, or any thing beyond the Cowgate, is a kind of terra borealis incognita to folk from the south of Scotland. They positively don’t know any thing about those places, except, perhaps, by report. Well, it must certainly be agreeable, if one is banished from the country into a town, at least to dwell in one of the outlets towards that part of the country; so that the exile may now and then cast his thoughts and his feelings straight along the highway towards the place endeared to him; and if he does not see the hills which overlook the home of his heart, at least, perhaps, hills from which he knows he can see other hills, from which the spot is visible—the long stages of fancy in straining back to the place

There is one other grand source of comfort—in fact, an indispensable convenience—to people from the country living in a large city, namely, Consuls. Every person in the circumstances described must be familiar with the character and uses of a Consul, though perhaps they never heard the name before. The truth is, as from every district of broad Scotland there are less or more settlers of all kinds of ranks and orders, so among these there is always one family or person who serves to the occasional visitors from that part of the country, as well as to the regular settlers, all the purposes which a commercial Consul serves in a foreign port. The house of this person is a howff, or place of especial resort, to all and sundry connected with that particular locality. It is, in fact, the Consul-house of the district. Sometimes, when there is a considerable influx from a particular place, there is a Consul for almost every order of persons connected with that place, from the highest to the lowest. The Consul is a person—generally an old lady—of great kindliness of disposition, and who[Pg 307] never can be put about by a visit at any time upon the most vaguely general invitation. Generally, a kind of open table—a tea-table it is—is kept every Sunday night, which is resorted to by all and sundry, like an “at home” in high life; and though the Consul herself and some of her family sit on certain defined and particular chairs during the whole evening, the rest are tenanted by relays of fresh visitors almost every hour, who pay their respects, take a cup, and, after a little conversation, depart. In general, the individuals resorting to these houses are as familiar with every particular of the system of the tea-table—yea, with every cracked cup, and all the initials upon the silver spoons—as the honest Consul herself. Community of nativity is the sole bond of this association, but hardly any could be stronger. A person from the country takes little interest in the gossip of the city, important as it may sometimes be. He likes to hear of all that is going on in the little village or parish from which he has been transplanted. All this, and more, he hears at the house of the Consul for that village, or parish, the same as you will be sure to find a London newspaper in the house of the British resident at Lisbon. Any death that may have happened there since his last visit—any birth—any marriage—any anything—he gets all in right trim at the Consul-house, with all the proper remarks, the whole having been imported on Thursday in the most regular manner by the carrier, or else on some other day by a visitant, who, though only a few hours in town, was sure to call there. At the Consul-house you will hear how the minister is now liked—who is likely to get most votes in the coming election—from whom Mrs —— bought her china when she was about to be married—and the promise of the crops, almost to a sheaf or a potato. But the topics are of endless variety. One thing is remarkable. The most determined scandal is bandied about respecting their ancient neighbours; and yet they all conspire to think that there is no sort of people to be compared with them in the mass. They will let[Pg 308] nobody talk ill of them but themselves. There is sometimes a considerable difference in the characters and ranks of the individuals who frequent a Consul-house. Perhaps you find, among persons of higher degree and more dignified age, apprentice lads, who, being the children of old acquaintances of the Consul, are recommended by their mothers to spend their Sunday evenings here, as under a vicarial eye of supervision, and being sure to be out of harm’s way in the house of so respectable a person. These stolid youths, with their raw untamed faces, form a curious contrast, occasionally, to the more polished individuals who have been longer about town, such as writers’ clerks or licentiates of the church. Possibly they will sit you out five mortal hours in a Consul-house, without ever speaking a word, or even shifting their position on their chairs, staring with unvaried eyes, and hands compressed between knees, right into the centre of the room, and hearing all that is going on as if they heard not. At length the young cub rises to go away, and the only remark is, “Well, Willie, are you going home? Good-night.” After which, the Consul only remarks to the adults around her, “That’s ane o’ John Anderson’s laddies—a fine quiet callant.” But this holds good only respecting Consuls in a certain walk of life. There are houses where people of very high style, from a particular district, are wont to call and converse; and there are dens in the inferior parts of the town, to which only serving girls or boys (there is no rank among boys) resort. Every place, every rank, has its Consul. And not only is the Consul valuable as an individual who keeps a Sunday evening conversazione. She actually does a great deal of business for the particular district which she represents. If a townswoman wants a gown dyed, or to obtain swatches of some new prints, or to purchase any peculiar article which requires some address in the purchasing, then is the Consul resorted to. A little square inexplicable epistle, with not nearly enough of fold to admit a wafer, and the phrase “for goods” on the[Pg 309] corner, supposed to be a kind of shibboleth that exempts letters from the laws of the Post-office, comes in with the carrier, requesting that Mrs —— will be so good as go to this or that shop, and do this and that and t’other thing, and send the whole out by return of Pate Fairgrieve, and the payment will be rendered at next visit to town. Thus the Consul is a vast commission-agent, with only this difference, that she makes nothing by it to compensate her immense outlay of capital. The duties, however, of the Consulate are their own reward; and we doubt if Brutus, who first assumed the office, bore it with a prouder head or more satisfied heart, than many individuals whom we could point out. Henceforth, we do not doubt, people will refer to the days when such and such a person was Consul for their native village, in a style similar to the ancient chronology of Rome; and “Consule Tullo” itself will not be more familiar or more memorable language, than “in the Consulate [shall we so suppose?] of Mrs Bathgate!”

The exact balance of favours in ordinary acquaintanceship is a matter very difficult to be adjusted. Sometimes people think they are giving more entertainments than they get, and on other occasions you would suppose that they are mortally offended at their friends for not coming oftener to eat of their meat and drink of their cup. It is hard to say whether a desire of reserving or of squandering victuals predominates; for though one would argue that it is more natural to keep what one has than to give it away for nothing, yet, to judge by the common talk of the world, you are far more likely to give offence by coming too seldom than by coming too often to the tables of your friends. From this cause, I have often been amused to hear people,[Pg 310] about whose company I was not very solicitous, making the most abject apologies for having visited me so seldom of late, but promising to behave a great deal better for the future—that is to say, to give me henceforward much more of what I never desired before, even in the smallest portions.

But this kindness of language is not confined to the party threatening a visit: the party threatened is also given to use equally sweet terms of discourse. “Really, you have been a great stranger lately. We thought we never were to see you again. What is there to hinder you of an evening to come over and chat a little, or take a hand with the Doctor and Eliza at whist? We are always so happy to see you. I assure you we are resolved to take it very ill; and if you don’t repay our last visit, we will never see you again.” With an equally amiable sincerity, the shocking person with whom you have been long quite tired, having ceased to gain any amusement or any eclat from the acquaintance, replies, “I must confess I have been very remiss. Indeed, I was so ashamed of not having called upon you for such a length of time, that I could not venture to do it. But, now that the ice is broken, I really will come some night soon. You may depend upon it.” And so the two part off their several ways, the one surprised at having been betrayed into so many expressions of kindness towards an individual about whom he or she is quite indifferent, and the other, either benevolently resolving, in the simplicity of his heart, to pay the promised visit, or as much surprised at having been brought into circumstances where he was reduced to make such a promise—which, however, as he is sure to forget it in a few minutes, is a matter of very little moment. If these, however, be the puzzlements which beset a town acquaintanceship, ten times more difficult is it to adjust the mutual rights and balance of advantages appertaining to one in which the one party is of the town, and the other of the country. In most such cases, either the one party or the[Pg 311] other has great and real cause of complaint. For example, a citizen of tolerable style, who has been confined to some laborious employment all the year round, amidst gas-light within doors, and a foggy and smoky atmosphere without, with what delight does he throw himself into the country some fine sunshiny day in September, for the purpose of paying a long-promised visit of three days to a country friend! He is received with boundless hospitality. The best bed-room, situated in that part of the house where you generally find a city drawing-room, is aired and provided in the most agreeable manner for his accommodation. The goodman rides about with him all day, and dines and drinks with him all night, except during those intervals when the lady or her daughters solace him with tunes on the piano, learned many years ago at a boarding-school in town. The whole house, in fact, from the worthy agriculturist-in-chief to the chicken that has latest chipped in the barn-yard, are at his service, and he drinks in health, and rapture, and a taste for natural objects, every hour. The three days are imperceptibly elongated to as many weeks, till at last he has become just like one of the family, calls the lady goodwife, and the daughters by their abbreviated Christian names, and is a very brother and more to his excellent entertainer. At length, replenished with as much health as will serve him through a whole twelvemonth of city life, rosy in cheek and in gill, sturdy as a pine on the hills, and thickened immensely about the centre of his person, he finds it necessary to take his leave. The whole of the worthy ruralists gather about him, and, as if not satisfied with what they have already done for him while he was in their presence, load him with other acts of kindness, the effect of which is only to be experienced on the way, or after he has reached his own home. If he could carry a ewe cheese on each side, like the bottles of John Gilpin, they would have no objection to give them. In fact, there is no bounds to the kindness, the sincere heartfelt kindness, of these people, except his capacity or willingness to receive.[Pg 312] Of course, he feels all this most warmly for the time; and while the impression is strong upon him, he counter-invites right and left. The goodman is never to be a day in town without coming to take pot-luck. The ladies are to come in next winter, on purpose, and have a month of the amusements of the town, residing in his house. Any of their friends whatsoever, even unto the fourth generation, or no generation at all, he will be delighted to see, whenever they are in the city. He throws himself, his bosom, his house—all, all, open to them. But what is the real result of all this? He goes back to town, and resumes the serious labours of his profession. The roses fade from his cheeks, and gratitude from his heart. Some day, when he is up to the ears in a mysterious green box, like a pig in his trough, or a pullet in a well; or perhaps some day as he is rushing swiftly along the streets, intent upon some piece of important business, his city eyes awake upon a vision of the country, in the shape of that very friend who so lately was rendering him so many acts of kindness. The case is felt at once to be a scrape;—however, he must make the best of it. With almost breathless apprehension, he asks Mr Goodman what stay he is going to make in town. What joy!—he goes within an hour to Falkirk tryst! But, ah! this is but a short relief. He comes back the day after to-morrow, and can then spend a day. Well, a day it must be: it is all settled in a moment, and, three minutes after having entered the house, Mr Goodman finds himself shaken by the hand out at the door, which is closed behind him ere he can well believe that he has as yet seen his city friend. He walks a little way in a confused state of mind, hardly able to say distinctly that he is himself, or that his late guest is the identical good fellow he seemed to be three months ago. The whole appears a dream, and he thinks it must be hours since he entered the house, though it is only minutes. Falkirk tryst over, he comes back, and, at the appointed hour, attends his city acquaintance, who, meanwhile, having[Pg 313] consulted with his spouse, has taken the opportunity, since there was to be a dinner at any rate, to invite all the stiff people he knows, in order to pay off his old debts. The honest agriculturist gets a place among the rest, perhaps a good one, but in such a scene he finds no entertainment, and hardly gets a word of conversation with his friend during the whole evening. At the proper hour he rises to take his leave among the rest. The host inquires when he leaves town—this is always a leading question for a country friend—hears, to his unspeakable comfort, that it is to be by the morning coach—and so good-night. Of course, after this, there is little inducement for Mr Goodman to send his daughters to spend a month in the house of his city friend. The girls, however, do come in somehow or other, and are living with some other person on a visit, when one day, walking along the most crowded and fashionable street, they meet their father’s friend arm in arm with his wife. Seeing that they have first perceived him, he runs forward in the kindest manner, and, after introducing them to his partner, inquires after every particular individual left at home. Some miscellaneous talk ensues, and then, just at the skirts of the conversation, when they are hovering on the point of separation, he throws in, “You will be sure to see us some evening before you leave town.” And then—and then there is no more about it.

A varied case often occurs as follows:—A young lady of perfect accomplishments, though of the middle ranks of life, happens to be particularly convenient to a neighbouring family of gentry in the country, where she is constantly invited by them, and becomes the bosom friend of all the young ladies, but only because her accomplishments are useful to them as a means of spending their time. But this acquaintance, though of use in the country, and there felt as involving no risk of dignity, becomes inconvenient when the parties happen to meet in town. The high-born demoiselle, who elsewhere would have rushed into the[Pg 314] arms of her humble but ingenious friend, now tamely shakes her hand, and, with cold complaisance, addresses her thus: “Mamma is keeping no company this winter, but I dare say she would be glad to see you some evening to tea: and—good-morning.” Such is the world!

It is well known in Scotland that the road from Edinburgh to Dundee, though only forty-three miles in extent, is rendered tedious and troublesome by the interposition of two arms of the sea, namely, the Friths of Forth and Tay, one of which is seven, and the other three miles across. Several rapid and well-conducted stage-coaches travel upon this road; but, from their frequent loading and unloading at the ferries, there is not only considerable delay to the travellers, but also rather more than the usual risk of damage and loss to their luggage. On one occasion it happened that the common chances against the safety of a traveller’s integuments were multiplied in a mysterious, but most amusing manner—as the following little narrative will show.

The gentleman in question was an inside passenger—a very tall man, which was so much the worse for him in that situation—and it appeared that his whole baggage consisted of a single black trunk—one of medium size, and no way remarkable in appearance. On our leaving Edinburgh, this trunk had been disposed in the boot of the coach, amidst a great variety of other trunks, bundles, and carpet bags, belonging to the rest of the passengers.

Having arrived at Newhaven, the luggage was brought forth from the coach, and disposed upon a barrow, in order that it might be taken down to the steam-boat which was[Pg 315] to convey us across. Just as the barrow was moving off, the tall gentleman said,

“Guard, have you got my trunk?”

“Oh, yes, sir,” answered the guard; “you may be sure it’s there.”

“Not so sure of that,” quoth the gentleman; “whereabouts is it?”

The guard poked into the barrow, and looked in vain among the numberless articles for the trunk. At length, after he had noozled about for two or three minutes through all the holes and corners of the mass of integuments, he drew out his head, like a terrier tired of earthing a badger, and seemed a little nonplussed.

“Why, here it is in the boot!” exclaimed the passenger, “snug at the bottom, where it might have remained, I suppose, for you, till safely returned to the coach-yard in Edinburgh.”

The guard made an awkward apology, put the trunk upon the barrow, and away we all went to the steam-boat.

Nothing farther occurred till we were all standing beside the coach at Pettycur, ready to proceed on our journey through Fife.

Every thing seemed to have been stowed into the coach, and most of the passengers had taken their proper places, when the tall gentleman cried out,

“Guard, where is my trunk?”

“In the boot, sir,” answered the guard; “you may depend upon that.”

“I have not seen it put in,” said the passenger, “and I don’t believe it is there.”

“Oh, sir,” said the guard, quite distressed, “there can surely be no doubt about the trunk now.”

“There! I declare—there!” cried the owner of the missing property; “my trunk is still lying down yonder upon the sands. Don’t you see it? The sea, I declare, is just about reaching it. What a careless set of porters![Pg 316] I protest I never was so treated on any journey before.”

The trunk was instantly rescued from its somewhat perilous situation, and, all having been at length put to rights, we went on our way to Cupar.

Here the coach stops a few minutes at the inn, and there is generally a partial discharge of passengers. As some individuals, on the present occasion, had to leave the coach, there was a slight discomposure of the luggage, and various trunks and bundles were presently seen departing on the backs of porters, after the gentlemen to whom they belonged. After all seemed to have been again put to rights, the tall gentleman made his wonted inquiry respecting his trunk.

“The trunk, sir,” said the guard, rather pettishly, “is in the boot.”

“Not a bit of it,” said its owner, who in the meantime had been peering about. “There it lies in the lobby of the inn!”

The guard now began to think that this trunk was in some way bewitched, and possessed a power, unenjoyed by other earthly trunks, of removing itself or staying behind, according to its own good pleasure.

“The Lord have a care o’ us!” cried the astonished custodier of baggage, who, to do him justice, seemed an exceedingly sober and attentive person. “The Lord have a care o’ us, sir! That trunk’s no canny.”[8]

“It’s canny enough, you fool,” said the gentleman sharply; “but only you don’t pay proper attention to it.”

The fact was, that the trunk had been taken out of the coach and placed in the lobby, in order to allow of certain other articles being got at which lay beneath. It was now once more stowed away, and we set forward upon the remaining part of our journey, hoping that there would be[Pg 317] no more disturbance about this pestilent member of the community of trunks. All was right till we came to the lonely inn of St Michael’s, where a side-road turns off to St Andrew’s, and where it happened that a passenger had to leave us to walk to that seat of learning, a servant having been in waiting to carry his luggage.

The tall gentleman, hearing a bustle about the boot, projected his immensely long slender body through the coach window, in order, like the lady in the fairy tale, to see what he could see.

“Hollo, fellow!” cried he to the servant following the gentleman down the St Andrew’s road; “is not that my trunk? Come back, if you please, and let me inspect it.”

“The trunk, sir,” interposed the guard, in a sententious manner, “is that gemman’s trunk, and not yours: yours is in the boot.”

“We’ll make sure of that, Mr Guard, if you please. Come back, my good fellow, and let me see the trunk you have got with you.”

The trunk was accordingly brought back, and, to the confusion of the guard, who had thought himself fairly infallible for this time, it was the tall man’s property, as clear as brass nails could make it.

The trunk was now the universal subject of talk, both inside and outside, and every body said he would be surprised if it got to its journey’s end in safety. All agreed that it manifested a most extraordinary disposition to be lost, stolen, or strayed, but yet every one thought that there was a kind of special providence about it, which kept it on the right road after all; and, therefore, it became a fair subject of debate, whether the chances against, or the chances for, were likely to prevail.

Before we arrived at Newport, where we had to go on board the ferry steam-boat for Dundee, the conversation had gone into other channels, and, each being engaged about his own concerns, no one thought any more about[Pg 318] the trunk, till just as the barrow was descending along the pier, the eternal long man cried out,

“Guard, have you got my trunk?”

“Oh, yes,” cried the guard very promptly; “I’ve taken care of it now. There it is on the top of all.”

“It’s no such thing,” cried a gentleman who had come into the coach at Cupar; “that’s my trunk.”

Every body then looked about for the enchanted trunk; the guard ran back, and once more searched the boot, which he knew to have been searched to the bottom before; and the tall gentleman gazed over land, water, and sky, in quest of his necessary property.

“Well, guard,” cried he at length, “what a pretty fellow you are! There, don’t you see?—there’s my trunk thrust into the shed like a piece of lumber!”

And so it really was. At the head of the pier at Newport there is a shed, with seats within, where people wait for the ferry-boats; and there, perdu beneath a form, lay the enchanted trunk, having been so disposed, in the bustle of unloading, by means which nobody could pretend to understand. The guard, with a half-frightened look, approached the awful object, and soon placed it with the other things on board the ferry-boat.

On our landing at Dundee pier, the proprietor of the trunk saw so well after it himself, that it was evident no accident was for this time to be expected. However, it appeared that this was only a lull to our attention. The tall gentleman was to go on to Aberdeen by a coach then just about to start from Merchant’s Inn; while I, for my part, was to proceed by another coach, which was about to proceed from the same place to Perth. A great bustle took place in the narrow street at the inn door, and some of my late fellow-travellers were getting into the one coach, and some into the other. The Aberdeen coach was soonest prepared to start, and, just as the guard cried “all’s right,” the long figure devolved from the window, and said, in an anxious tone of voice,

[Pg 319]

“Guard, have you got my trunk?”

“Your trunk, sir!” cried the man; “what like is your trunk?—we have nothing here but bags and baskets.”

“Heaven preserve me!” exclaimed the unfortunate gentleman, and burst out of the coach.

It immediately appeared that the trunk had been deposited by mistake in the Perth, instead of the Aberdeen coach; and unless the owner had spoken, it would have been, in less than an hour, half way up the Carse of Gowrie. A transfer was immediately made, to the no small amusement of myself and one or two other persons in both coaches who had witnessed its previous misadventures on the road through Fife. Seeing a friend on the Aberdeen vehicle, I took an opportunity of privately requesting that he would, on arriving at his destination, send me an account by post of all the further mistakes and dangers which were sure to befall the trunk in the course of the journey. To this he agreed, and, about a week after, I received the following letter:—

END OF THE VOLUME.

Printed by W. and R. Chambers,
19, Waterloo Place, Edinburgh.