My father coloured, but would not seem to hear this. Much more there was of careless and disrespectful in the stranger's manner and tone of conversation; so that though I know my father's prejudices in favour of rank and birth, and though I am aware his otherwise masculine understanding has never entirely shaken off the slavish awe of the great, which in his earlier days they had so many modes of commanding, still I could hardly excuse him for enduring so much insolence-such it seemed to be-as this self-invited guest was disposed to offer to him at his own table. One can endure a traveller in the same carriage, if he treads upon your toes by accident, or even through negligence; but it is very different when, knowing that they are rather of a tender description, he continues to pound away at them with his hoofs. In my poor opinion-and I am a man of peace-you can, in that case, hardly avoid a declaration of war. I believe my father read my thoughts in my eye; for, pulling out his watch, he said, "Half past four, Alan-you should be in your own room by this timeBirrenswork will excuse you." 39 Our visiter nodded carelessly, and I had no longer any pretence to remain. But as I left the room I heard this Magnate of Nithesdale distinctly mention the name of Latimer. I lingered; but at length a direct hint from my father obliged me to withdraw; and when, an hour afterwards, I was summoned to partake of a cup of tea, our guest had departed. He had business that evening in the High Street, and could not spare time even to drink tea. I could not help saying, I considered his departure as a relief from incivility. 'What business has he to upbraid us," I said, "with the change of our dwelling from a more inconvenient to a better quarter of the town? What was it to him if we chose to imitate some of the conveniences or luxuries of an English dwelling-house, instead of living piled up above each other in flats? Have his patrician birth and aristocratic fortunes given him any right to censure those who dispose of the fruits of their own industry, according to their own pleasure?" My father took a long pinch of snuff, and replied, "Very well, Alan; very well indeed. I wish Mr. Crossbite or Counsellor Pest had heard you; they must have acknowledged that you have a talent for forensic elocution; and it may not be amiss to try a little declamation at home now and then, to gather audacity and keep yourself in breath. But touching the subject of this paraffle of words, it's not worth a pinch of tobacco. D'ye think that I care for Mr. Herries of Birrenswork more than any other gentleman who comes here about business, although I do not care to go tilting at his throat, because he speaks like a gray goose as he is? But to say no more about him, I want to have Darsie Latimer's present direction; for it is possible I may have to write the lad a line with my own hand-and yet I do not well know -but give me the direction at all events.' I did so, and if you have heard from my father accordingly, you know more, probably, about the subject of this letter than I who write it. But if you have not, then shall I have discharged a friend's duty, in letting you know that there certainly is something afloat between this disagreeable Laird and my father, in which you are considerably interested. Adieu! and although I have given thee a subject for waking dreams, beware of building a castle too heavy for the foundation; which, in the present instance, is barely the word Latimer occurring in a conversation betwixt a gentleman of Dumfriesshire and a W. S. of Edinburgh-Cætera prorsus ignoro. LETTER VI. DARSIE LATIMER TO ALAN FAIRFORD. [In continuation of Letters III. and IV.] ray of the morning sun was likely to reach it till it should rise high in the horizon. Looking up the dell, you saw a brawling brook issuing in foamy haste from a covert of underwood, like a racehorse impatient to arrive at the goal; and, if you gazed yet more earnestly, you might observe part of a high waterfall glimmering through the foliage, and giving occasion, doubtless, to the precipitate speed of the brook. Lower down, the stream became more placid, and opened into a quiet piece of water, which afforded a rude haven to two or three fishermen's boats, then lying high and dry on the sand, the tide being out. Two or three miserable huts could be seen beside this little haven, inhabited probably by the owners of the boats, but inferior in every respect to the establishment of mine host, though that was miserable enough. I had but a minute or two to make these observations, yet during that space my companion showed symptoms of impatience, and more than once shouted, Cristal-Cristal Nixon," until the old man of the preceding evening appeared at the door of one of the neighbouring cottages or outhouses, leading the strong black horse which I before commemorated, ready bridled and saddled. My conductor made Cristal a sign with his finger, and, turning from the cottage door, led the way up the steep path or ravine which connected the sequestered dell with the open country. Had I been perfectly aware of the character of the road down which I had been hurried with so much impetuosity on the preceding evening, I greatly question if I should have ventured the descent; for it deserved no better name than the channel of a torrent, now in a good measure filled with water that dashed in foam and fury into the dell, being swelled with the rains of the preceding night. I ascended this ugly path with some difficulty, although on foot, and felt dizzy when I observed, from such traces as the rains had not obliterated, that the horse seemed almost to have slid down it upon his haunches the evening before. My host threw himself on his horse's back, without placing a foot in the stirrup-passed me in the peril ous ascent, against which he pressed his steed as if the animal had had the footing of a wildcat. The water and mud splashed from his heels in his reckless course, and a few bounds placed him on the top of the bank, where I presently joined him, and found the horse and rider standing still as a statue; the former panting and expanding his broad nostrils to the morning wind, the latter motionless, with his eye fixed on the first beams of the rising sun, which already began to peer above the eastern horizon, and gild the distant mountains of Cumberland and Liddesdale. He seemed in a reverie, from which he started at my approach, and putting his horse in motion, led the way at a leisurely pace, through a broken and sandy road, which traversed a waste, level, and uncultivated tract of downs, intermixed with morass, much like that in the neighbourhood of my quarters at Shepherd's Bush. Indeed the whole open ground of this district, where it approaches the sea, has, except in a few favoured spots, the same uniform and dreary character. Advancing about a hundred yards from the brink of the glen, we gained a still more extensive command of this desolate prospect, which seemed even more dreary, as contrasted with the opposite shores of Cumberland, crossed and intersected by ten thou sand lines of trees growing in hedge-rows, shaded with groves and woods of considerable extent, and animated by hamlets and villas, from which thin clouds of smoke already gave sign of human life and human industry. My conductor had extended his arm, and was pointing the road to Shepherd's Bush, when the step of a horse was heard approaching us. He looked I TOLD thee I walked out into the open air with my sharply around, and having observed who was apgrave and stern landlord. I could now see more per-proaching, proceeded in his instructions to me, plantfectly than on the preceding night the secluded glen, in which stood the two or three cottages which appeared to be the abode of him and his family. It was so narrow, in proportion to its depth, that no ing himself at the same time in the very middle of the path, which, at the place where we halted, had a slough on the one side, and a sand-bank on the other. "Be assured I will take none at the hand of any man, whether his hat be cocked or broad-brimmed," answered the fisherman. "I tell you in fair terms; Joshua Geddes, that you and your partners are using unlawful craft to destroy the fish in the Solway by stake-nets and wears; and that we, who fish fairly, and like men, as our fathers did, have daily and yearly less sport and less profit. Do not think gravity or hypocrisy can carry it off as you have done. The world knows you, and we know you. You will destroy the salmon which make the livelihood of fifty poor families, and then wipe your mouth, and go to make a speech at Meeting. But do not hope it will last thus. I give you fair warning, we will be upon you one morning soon, when we will not leave a stake standing in the pools of the Solway; and down the tide they shall every one go, and well if we do not send a lessee along with them." "Friend," replied Joshua, with a constrained smile, "but that I know thou dost not mean as thou say'st, I would tell thee we are under the protection of this country's laws; nor do we the less trust to obtain their protection, that our principles permit us not, by any act of violent resistance, to protect ourselves." All villanous cant and cowardice," exclaimed the fisherman, "and assumed merely as a cloak to your hypocritical avarice." Nay, say not cowardice, my friend," answered the Quaker, "since thou knowest there may be as much courage in enduring as in acting; and I will be judged by this youth, or by any one else, whether there is not more cowardice-even in the opinion of that world whose thoughts are the breath in thy nostrils-in the armed oppressor, who doth injury, than in the defenceless and patient sufferer, who endureth it with constancy." "I will exchange no more words with you on the subject," said the fisherman, who, as if something moved at the last argument which Mr. Geddes had used, now made room for him to pass forward on his journey. "Do not forget, however," he added, "that you have had fair warning, nor suppose that we will accept of fair words in apology for foul play. These nets of yours are unlawful-they spoil our fishingsand we will have them down at all risks and hazards. I am a man of my word, friend Joshua." "I trust thou art," said the Quaker; "but thou art the rather bound to be cautious in rashly affirming what thou wilt never execute. For I tell thee, friend, that though there is as great a difference between thee and one of our people, as there is between a lion and a sheep, yet I know and believe thou hast so much of the lion in thee, that thou wouldst scarce employ thy strength and thy rage upon that which professeth no means of resistance. Report says so much good of thee, at least, if it says little more." "Time will try," answered the fisherman; "and hark thee, Joshua, before we part, I will put thee in the way of doing one good deed, which, credit me, is better than twenty moral speeches. Here is a stranger youth, whom heaven has so scantily gifted with brains, that he will bewilder himself in the Sands, as he did last night, unless thou wilt kindly show him the way to Shepherd's Bush; for I have been in vain endeavouring to make him comprehend the road thither-Hast thou so much charity under thy simplicity, Quaker, as to do this good turn?" Nay, it is thou, friend," answered Joshua, "that dost lack charity, to suppose any one unwilling to do so simple a kindness." "Thou art right-I should have remembered it can cost thee nothing. Young gentleman, this pious pattern of primitive simplicity will teach thee the right way to the Shepherd's Bush-ay, and will himself shear thee like a sheep, if you come to buying and selling with him." He then abruptly asked me how long I intended to remain at Shepherd's Bush. I replied I was at present uncertain-as long, probably, as I could amuse myself in the neighbourhood. "You are fond of sport?" he added, in the same tone of brief inquiry. I answered in the affirmative, but added, I was totally inexperienced. Woll "Perhaps if you reside here for some days," he said, we may meet again, and I may have the chance of giving you a lesson." Ere I could express either thanks or assent, he turned short round with a wave of his hand, by way of adieu, and rode back to the verge of the dell from which we had emerged together; and as he remained standing upon the banks, I could long hear his voice while he shouted down to those within its recesses. Mean while the Quaker and I proceeded on our journey for some time in silence; he restraining his sober-minded steed to a pace which might have suited a much less active walker than myself, and looking on me from time to time with an expression of curiosity, mingled with benignity. For my part, I cared not to speak first. It happened I had never before been in company with one of this particular sect, and, afraid that in addressing him I might unwittingly infringe upon some of their prejudices or peculiarities, I patiently remained silent. At length he asked me, whether I had been long in the service of the Laird, as men called him. I repeated the words "in his service?" with such an accent of surprise, as induced him to say, “Nay, but, friend, I mean no offence; perhaps I should have said in his society-an inmate, I mean, in his house?" "I am totally unknown to the person from whom we have just parted," said I, "and our connexion is only temporary-He had the charity to give me his guidance from the Sands, and a night's harbourage from the tempest. So our acquaintance began, and there it is likely to end; for you may observe that our friend is by no means apt to encourage familiarity." 66 So little so," answered my companion, "that thy case is, I think, the first in which I ever heard of his receiving any one into his house; that is, if thou hast really spent the night there." "Why should you doubt it?" replied I; "there is no motive I can have to deceive you, nor is the object worth it." "Be not angry with me," said the Quaker; "but thou knowest that thine own people do not, as we humbly endeavour to do, confine themselves within the simplicity of truth, but employ the language of falsehood, not only for profit, but for compliment, and sometimes for mere diversion. I have heard various stories of my neighbour; of most of which I only believe a small part, and even then they are difficult to reconcile with each other. But this being the first time I ever heard of his receiving a stranger within his dwelling, made me express some doubts. I pray thee let them not offend thee." "He does not," said I, "appear to possess in much abundance the means of exercising hospitality, and so may be excused from offering it in ordinary cases. "That is to say, friend," replied Joshua, "thou hast supped ill, and perhaps breakfasted worse. Now my small tenement, called Mount Sharon, is nearer to us by two miles than thine inn; and although going thither may prolong thy walk, as taking thee off the straighter road to Shepherd's Bush, yet methinks exercise will suit thy youthful limbs, as well as a good plain meal thy youthful appetite. What say'st thou, my young acquaintance?" "If it puts you not to inconvenience," I replied; for the invitation was cordially given, and my bread and milk had been hastily swallowed, and in small quantity. "Nay," said Joshua, tr use not the language of compliment with those who renounce it. Had this poor courtesy been very inconvenient, perhaps I had not offered it." "I accept the invitation then," said I, "in the same good spirit in which you give it." The Quaker smiled, reached me his hand, I shook it, and we travelled on in great cordiality with each other. The fact is, I was much entertained by contrasting in my own mind, the open manner of the kind-hearted Joshua Geddes, with the abrupt, dark, and lofty demeanour of my entertainer on the preceding evening. Both were blunt and unceremoni ous; but the plainness of the Quaker had the character of devotional simplicity, and was mingled with the more real kindness, as if honest Joshua was desirous of atoning, by his sincerity, for the lack of external courtesy. On the contrary, the manners of the fisherman were those of one to whom the rules of good behaviour might be familiar, but who, either from pride or misanthropy, scorned to observe them. Still I thought of him with interest and curiosity, notwithstanding so much about him that was repulsive; and I promised myself, in the course of my conversation with the Quaker, to learn all that he knew on the subject. He turned the conversation, however, into a different channel, and inquired into my own condition in life, and views in visiting this remote frontier. I only thought it necessary to mention my name, and add, that I had been educated to the law, but finding myself possessed of some independence, I had of late permitted myself some relaxation, and was residing at Shepherd's Bush to enjoy the pleasures of angling. I do thee no harm, young man," said my new friend, “in wishing thee a better employment for thy grave hours, and a more humane amusement (if amusement thou must have) for those of a lighter character." "You are severe, sir," I replied. "I heard you but a moment since refer yourself to the protection of the laws of the country-if there be laws, there must be lawyers to explain, and judges to administer them." Joshua smiled, and pointed to the sheep which were grazing on the downs over which we were travelling. "Were a wolf," he said, "to come even now upon yonder flocks, they would crowd for protection, doubtless, around the shepherd and his dog; yet they are bitten and harassed daily by the one, shorn, and finally killed and eaten by the other. But I say not this to shock you; for, though laws and lawyers are evils, yet they are necessary evils in this probationary state of society, till man shall learn to render unto his fellows that which is their due, according to the light of his own conscience, and through no other compulsion. Mean while, I have known many righte ous men who have followed thy intended profession in honesty and uprightness of walk. The greater their merit, who walk erect in a path which so many find slippery." "And angling," said I, "you object to that also as an amusement, you who, if I understand rightly what passed between you and my late landlord, are yourself a proprietor of fisheries?" "Not a proprietor," he replied, "I am only, in copartnery with others, a tacksman or lessee of some valuable salmon-fisheries a little down the coast. But mistake me not. The evil of angling, with which I class all sports, as they are called, which have the sufferings of animals for their end and object, does not consist in the mere catching and killing those animals with which the bounty of Providence hath stocked the earth for the good of man, but in making their protracted agony a principle of delight and enjoyment. I do indeed cause these fisheries to be conducted for the necessary taking, killing, and selling the fish; and in the same way, were I a farmer, I should send my lambs to market. But I should as soon think of contriving myself a sport and anuse ment out of the trade of the butcher as out of that of the fisher." We argued this point no further; for though I thought his arguments a little too high-strained, yet as my mind acquitted me of having taken delight in aught but the theory of field-sports, I did not think myself called upon stubbornly to advocate a practice which had afforded me so little pleasure. We had by this time arrived at the remains of an old finger-post, which my host had formerly pointed out as a landmark. Here, a ruinous wooden bridge, supported by long posts resembling crutches, served me to get across the water, while my new friend sought a ford a good way higher up, for the stream was considerably swelled. LETTER VII. THE SAME TO THE SAME. [In continuation.] As I paused for his rejoining me, I observed an angler at a little distance pouching trout after trout, as fast almost as he could cast his line; and I own, in spite of Joshua's lecture on humanity, could not but envy his adroitness and success, so natural is LITTLE BENJIE, with the pony, having been sent off the love of sport to our minds, or so easily are we on the left side of the brook, the Quaker and I sauntaught to assimilate success in field-sports with ideas tered on, like the cavalry and infantry of the same of pleasure, and with the praise due to address and army occupying the opposite banks of a river, and agility. I soon recognised in the successful angler observing the same line of march. But, while my little Benjie, who had been my guide and tutor in that worthy companion was assuring me of a pleasant gentle art, as you have learned from my former let-greensward walk to his mansion, little Benjie, who ters. I called-I whistled-the rascal recognised me, had been charged to keep in sight, chose to deviate and, starting like a guilty thing, seemed hesitating from the path assigned him, and, turning to the right, whether to approach or to run away; and when he led his charge, Solomon, out of our vision. determined on the former, it was to assail me with a loud clamorous, and exaggerated report of the anxiety of all at the Shepherd's Bush for my personal safety; how my landlady had wept, how Sam and the ostler had not the heart to go to bed, but sat up all night drinking-and how he himself had been up long before daybreak to go in quest of me. "And you were switching the water, I suppose," said I, "to discover my dead body?" This observation produced a long "Na-a-a" of acknowledged detection; but, with his natural impudence, and confidence in my good-nature, he immediately added, "that he thought I would like a fresh trout or twa for breakfast, and the water being in such rare trim for the saumon raun,* he couldna help taking a cast.' The villain means to mount him!" cried Joshua, with more vivacity than was consistent with his profession of passive endurance. I endeavoured to appease his apprehensions, as he pushed on, wiping his brow with vexation, assuring him, that if the boy did mount, he would, for his own sake, ride gently. "You do not know him," said Joshua rejecting all consolation; "he do any thing gently!-no, he will gallop Solomon-he will misuse the sober patience of the poor animal who has borne me so long! Yes, I was given over to my own devices when I ever let him touch the bridle, for such a little miscreant there never was before him in this country!" He then proceeded to expatiate on every sort of rustic enormity of which he accused Benjie. He had While we were engaged in this discussion, the hon- been suspected of snaring partridges was detected by est Quaker returned to the farther end of the wooden Joshua himself in liming singing birds-stood fully bridge to tell me he could not venture to cross the charged with having worried several cats, by aid of a brook in its present state, but would be under the ne- lurcher which attended him, and which was as lean, cessity to ride round by the stone bridge, which was and ragged, and mischievous, as his master. Finally, a mile and a half higher up than his own house. He Benjie stood accused of having stolen a duck, to hunt was about to give me directions how to proceed with-it with the said lurcher, which was as dexterous on out him, and inquire for his sister, when I suggested water as on land. I chimed in with my friend, in to him, that if he pleased to trust his horse to little order to avoid giving him farther irritation, and deBenjie, the boy might carry him round by the bridge, clared, I should be disposed, from my own experience, while we walked the shorter and more pleasant to give up Benjie as one of Satan's imps. Joshua road. Geddes began to censure the phrase as too much exaggerated, and otherwise unbecoming the mouth of a reflecting person; and, just as I was apologizing for it, as being a term of common parlance, we heard certain sounds on the opposite side of the brook, which seemed to indicate that Solomon and Benjie were at issue together. The sand-hills behind which Benjie seemed to take his course, had concealed from us, as doubtless he meant they should, his ascent into the forbidden saddle, and putting Solomon to his mettle, which he was seldom called upon to exert, they had cantered away together in great amity, till they came near to the ford from which the palfrey's legitimate owner had already turned back. Joshua shook his head, for he was well acquainted with Benjie, who, he said, was the naughtiest varlet in the whole neighbourhood. Nevertheless, rather than part company, he agreed to put the pony under his charge for a short season, with many injunctions that he should not attempt to mount, but lead the pony (even Solomon) by the bridle, under the assurances of sixpence in case of proper demeanour, and penalty that if he transgressed the orders given him, verily he should be scourged." Promises cost Benjie nothing, and he showered them out wholesale; till the Quaker at length yielded up the bridle to him, repeating his charges, and enforcing them by holding up his forefinger. On my part, I called to Benjie to leave the fish he had taken at Mount Sharon, making, at the same time, an apologetic countenance to my new friend, not being quite aware whether the compliment would be agreeable to such a condemner of field-sports. He understood me at once, and reminded me of the practical distinction betwixt catching the animals as an object of cruel and wanton sport, and eating them as lawful and gratifying articles of food after they were killed. On the latter point he had no scruples; but, on the contrary, assured me, that this brook contained the real red trout, so highly esteemed by all connoisseurs, and that, when eaten within an hour of their being caught, they had a peculiar firmness of substance and delicacy of flavour, which rendered them an agreeable addition to a morning meal, especially when earned, like ours, by early rising, and an hour or two's wholesome exercise. But to thy alarm be it spoken, Alan, we did not come so far as the frying of our fish without farther adventure. So it is only to spare thy patience, and mine own eyes, that I pull up for the present, and send thee the rest of my story in a subsequent letter. Here a contest of opinions took place between the horse and his rider. The latter, according to his instructions, attempted to direct Solomon towards the distant bridge of stone; but Solomon opined that the ford was the shortest way to his own stable. The point was sharply contested, and we heard Benjie gee-hupping, tchek-tcheking, and, above all, flogging in great style; while Solomon, who, docile in his general habits, was now stirred beyond his patience. made a great trampling and recalcitration; and it was their joint noise which we heard, without being able to see, though Joshua might too well guess, the cause of it. Alarmed at these indications, the Quaker began to shout out, "Benjie-thou varlet!-Solomon-thou fool!" when the couple presented themselves in full drive, Solomon having now decidedly obtained the better of the conflict, and bringing his unwilling rider in high career down to the ford. Never was there anger changed so fast into humane fear, as that of my good companion. "The varlet will be drowned!" he exclaimed--"a widow's son!-her only son!-and drowned!-let me go"- -And he struggled with me stoutly as I hung upon him, to prevent him from plunging into the ford. The bait made of salmon-row salted and preserved. In a I had no fear whatever for Benjie; for the blackswollen river, and about the month of October it is a most guard vermin, though he could not manage the refractory horse, stuck on his seat like a monkey. So deadly bait. lomon and Benjie scrambled through the ford with little inconvenience, and resumed their gallop on the other side. It was impossible to guess whether on this last occasion Benjie was running off with Solomon, or Solomon with Benjie; but, judging from character and motives, I rather suspected the former. I could not help laughing as the rascal passed me, grinning betwixt terror and delight, perched on the very pommel of the saddle, and holding with extended arms by bridle and mane; while Solomon, the bit secured between his teeth, and his head bored down betwixt his fore-legs, passed his master in this unwonted guise as hard as he could pelt. "The mischievous bastard!" exclaimed the Quaker, terrified out of his usual moderation of speech"the doomed gallows-bird!-he will break Solomon's wind to a certainty." greatly excelled any thing of the kind which had been attempted in the neighbourhood. If there was a little vanity in the complacent smile with which Joshua Geddes saw me gaze with delight on a scene so different from the naked waste we had that day traversed in company, it might surely be permitted to one, who, cultivating and improving the beauties of nature, had found therein, as he said, bodily health and a pleasing relaxation for the mind. At the bottom of the extended gardens the brook wheeled round in a wide semicircle, and was itself their boundary. The opposite side was no part of Joshua's domain, but the brook was there skirted by a precipitous rock of limestone, which seemed a barrier of Nature's own erecting around his little Eden of beauty, comfort, and peace. "But I must not let thee forget," said the kind Quaker, "amidst thy admiration of these beauties of little inheritance, that thy breakfast has been a light one." I prayed him to be comforted-assured him a brush-our ing gallop would do his favourite no harm-and reminded him of the censure he had bestowed on me a minute before, for applying a harsh epithet to the boy. But Joshua was not without his answer;-"Friend youth," he said, "thou didst speak of the lad's soul, which thou didst affirm belonged to the enemy, and of that thou couldst say nothing of thine own knowledge; on the contrary, I did but speak of his outward man which will assuredly be suspended by a cord, if he mendeth not his manners. Men say that, young as he is, he is one of the Laird's gang." "Of the Laird's gang!" said I, repeating the words in surprise-"Do you mean the person with whom I slept last night?--I heard you call him the Laird-Is he at the head of a gang ?" "Nay, I meant not precisely a gang," said the Quaker, who appeared in his haste to have spoken more than he intended-"a company, or party, I should have said; but thus it is, friend Latimer, with the wisest men, when they permit themselves to be perturbed with passion, and speak as in a fever, or as with the tongue of the foolish and the forward. And although thou hast been hasty to mark my infirmity, yet I grieve not that thou hast been a witness to it, seeing that the stumbles of the wise may be no less a caution to youth and inexperience than is the fall of the foolish." This was a sort of acknowledgment of what I had already begun to suspect-that my new friend's real goodness of disposition, joined to the acquired quietism of his religious sect, had been unable entirely to check the effervescence of a temper naturally warm and hasty. Upon the present occasion, as if sensible he had displayed a greater degree of emotion than became his character, Joshua avoided farther allusion to Benjie and Solomon, and proceeded to solicit my attention to the natural objects around us, which increased in beauty and interest, as, still conducted by the meanders of the brook, we left the common behind us, and entered a more cultivated and enclosed country, where arable and pasture ground was agreeably varied with groves and hedges. Descending now almost close to the stream, our course lay through a little gate, into a pathway, kept with great neatness, the sides of which were decorated with trees and flowering shrubs of the hardier species; until, ascending by a gentle slope, we issued from the grove, and stood almost at once in front of a low but very neat building, of an irregular form; and my guide, shaking me cordially by the hand, made me welcome to Mount Sharon. The wood through which we had approached this little mansion was thrown around it both on the north and north-west, but, breaking off into different directions, was intersected by a few fields, well watered and sheltered. The house fronted to the south-east, and from thence the pleasure-ground, or, I should rather say, the gardens sloped down to the water. I afterwards understood that the father of the present proprietor had a considerable taste for horticulture, which had been inherited by his son, and had formed these gardens, which, with their shaven turf, pleached alleys, wildernesses, and exotic trees and shrubs, So saying, Joshua conducted me to a small sashed door, opening under a porch amply mantled by honeysuckle and clematis, into a parlour of moderate size; the furniture of which, in plainness and excessive cleanliness, bore the characteristic marks of the sect to which the owner belonged. Thy father's Hannah is generally allowed to be an exception to all Scottish housekeepers, and stands unparalleled for cleanliness among the women of Auld Reekie; but the cleanliness of Hannah is sluttishness, compared to the scrupulous purifications of these people, who seem to carry into the minor decencies of life that conscientious rigour which they affect in their morals. The parlour would have been gloomy, for the windows were small and ceiling low; but the present proprietor had rendered it more cheerful by opening one end into a small conservatory, roofed with glass, and divided from the parlour by a partition of the same. I have never before seen this very pleasing manner of uniting the comforts of an apartment with the beauties of a garden, and I wonder it is not more practised by the great. Something of the kind is hinted at in a paper of the Spectator. As I walked towards the conservatory, to view it more closely, the parlour chimney engaged my attention. It was a pile of massive stone, entirely out of proportion to the size of the apartment. On the front had once been an armorial scutcheon; for the hammer, or chisel, which had been employed to deface the shield and crest, had left uninjured the scroll be neath, which bore the pious motto, "Trust in God.” Black-letter, you know, was my early passion, and the tombstones in the Grayfriars' Churchyard early yielded up to my knowledge as a decipherer what little they could tell of the forgotten dead. Joshua Geddes paused when he saw my eye fixed on this relic of antiquity. 16 Thou canst read it ?" he said. I repeated the motto, and added, there seemed vestiges of a date. It should be 1537," said he; "for so long ago, at the least computation, did my ancestors, in the blinded times of Papistry, possess these lands, and in that year did they build their house." "It is an ancient descent," said I, looking with respect upon the monument. "I am sorry the arms have been defaced." It was perhaps impossible for my friend, Quaker as he was, to seem altogether void of respect for the pedigree which he began to recount to me, disclaiming all the while the vanity usually connected with this subject; in short, with the air of mingled melancholy, regret, and conscious dignity, with which Jack Fawkes used to tell us, at College, of his ancestor's unfortunate connexion with the Gunpowder-Plot. "Vanity of vanities, saith the preacher,"-thus harangued Joshua Geddes of Mount Sharon;-"if we ourselves are nothing in the sight of Heaven, how much less than nothing must be our derivation from rotten bones and mouldering dust, whose immortal spirits have long since gone to their private account! Yes, friend Latimer, my ancestors were renowned among the ravenous and bloodthirsty men who then dwelt in |