CHAPTER XVI.

Our Polly is a sad slut, nor heeds what we have taught her; I wonder any man alive will ever rear a daughter;

For when she's drest with care and cost, all tempting fine and gay,

As men should serve a cucumber, she flings herself away. BEGGAR'S OPERA.

AFTER the death of Mr Bertram, Mannering had set out upon a short tour, proposing to return to the neighbourhood of Ellangowan before the sale of that property should take place. He went, accordingly, to Edinburgh and elsewhere, and it was in his return towards the southwestern district of Scotland, in which our scene lies, that, at a post-town about a hundred miles from Kippletringan, to which he had requested his friend, Mr. Mervyn, to address his letters, he received one from that gentleman, which contained

rather unpleasing intelligence. We have assumed already the privilege of acting a secretis to this gentleman, and therefore shall present the reader with an extract from this letter.

"I beg your pardon, my dearest friend, for the pain I have given you, in forcing you to open wounds so festering as those your letter referred to. I have always heard, though erroneously perhaps, that the attentions of Mr Brown were intended for Miss Mannering. But, however that were, it could not be supposed that in your situation his boldness should escape notice and chastisement. Wise men say, that we resign to civil society our natural rights of self-defence, only on condition that the ordinances of law should protect us. Where the price cannot be paid, the resignation takes no place. For instance, no one supposes, that I am not entitled to defend my purse and person against a highwayman, as much as if I were a wild Indian, who

owns neither law nor magistracy. The. question of resistance, or submission, must be determined by my means and situation. But if, armed and equal in force, I submit to injustice and violence from any man, high or low, I presume it will hardly be attributed to religious or moral feeling in me, or in any one but a quaker. An aggression on my honour seems to me much the same. The insult, however trifling in itself, is one of much deeper consequence to all views of life than any wrong which can be inflicted by a depredator on the highway, and redress is much less in the power of public jurisprudence, or rather it is entirely beyond its reach. If any man chusest to rob Arthur Mervyn of the contents of his purse, if he has not means of defence, or the skill and courage to use them, the assizes at Lancaster or Carlisle will do him justice by tucking up the robber :— Yet who will say I am bound to wait for this justice, and submit to being plundered in the first instance, if I have myself the

means and spirit to protect my own property? But if an affront is offered to me, submission to which is to tarnish my character for ever with men of honour, and for which the twelve judges of England, with the chancellor to boot, can afford me no redress, by what rule of law or reason am I to be deterred from protecting what ought to be, and is, so infinitely dearer to every man of honour than his whole fortune? Of the religious views of the mat ter I shall say nothing, until I find a reverend divine who shall condemn self-defence in the article of life and property. If its propriety in that case be generally admitted, I suppose little distinction can be drawn between defence of person and goods, and defence of reputation. That the latter is liable to be assailed by persons of a different rank in life, untainted perhaps in morals, and fair in character, cannot affect my legal right of self-defence. I may be sorry that circumstances have engaged me in personal strife with

such an individual; but I should feel the same sorrow for a generous enemy who fell under my sword in a national quarrel. I shall leave the question with the casu ists, however, only observing, that what I have written will not avail either the professed duellist, or he who is the aggressor in a dispute of honour. I only presume to exculpate him who is dragged into the field by such an offence, as, submitted to in patience, would forfeit for ever his rank and estimation in society.

"I am sorry you have thoughts of settling in Scotland, and yet glad that you will still be at no immeasurable distance, and that the latitude is all in our favour. To move to Westmoreland from Devonshire might make an East Indian shudder but to come to us from Galloway or Dumfries-shire, is a step, though a short one, nearer the sun. Besides, if, as I suspect, the estate in view be connected with the old haunted castle in which you played the astrologer in your northern tour some