house" are true as a general expression, but there was, as in all human affairs, the exception, which proves the rule. Unlet houses, or houses where there was death or serious sickness, were not lighted up. In such cases, two men with flambeaux were stationed on the doorstep. This was a wise, indeed a necessary precaution. The youthful glazier was out that night with his wallet of stones, and woe to the windows of the houses that showed no light. As we little people were being led up towards Princes Street, we laughed with the malicious glee of childhood when now and again was heard the crash, that told of window-panes broken by the dozen, and perhaps with even greater glee in one instance, when the windows of a house received their volley, just as the men with the flambeaux were coming down the street; too late in taking up their stand to save their employer's glass. Of course we were naughty, and I doubt not we were told so, although I cannot recall it; for a child's memory for rebuke is perhaps the least easy to bring up, unless there is the symbol of a cuff or a slap, or worse, to stimulate recollection. But that we did enjoy the crashes is something indelible on memory's tablet.

Of the greater illumination devices, some are still remembered, particularly those of the banks and clubs come up before me. We walked far and we gazed long, without any appreciation of how time was passing, so delightful was it to a child to

QUEEN VICTORIA'S FIRST VISIT

see so much brilliancy. But, it was neither the splendour of the devices, nor the bright shining of the candle-lighted streets, that excited my infant surprise to its highest degree that night. When we reached home, the governess held out her watch to me I had begun to learn clock-reading -and my eyes opened wide, and a cry of "Oh!" escaped my lips. It was ten minutes past ten, and to me the idea of being out of bed till such an hour seemed overwhelming as an event-something that to my small mind was inconceivable. And so ended the first great public day of my life. If my recollections, though vivid, err in any substantial particular, it is a melancholy comfort to know that there must be few left who could correct me, and if they didattempt to do so, I might well meet them by saying that their memory was at fault and not mine. At least we would agree that, apart from details, it was a great and a glorious day at the opening of a great and glorious reign.

When Her Majesty visited Holyrood, she and the Prince inspected the historical rooms without any ceremony, dispensing with the attendance of their suite. They were duly shown the supposed stains of Rizzio's blood at the top of the staircase, down which his body was thrown. When the bed of Queen Mary was pointed out by the old woman who attended to visitors, the Queen put out her hand to examine the silk hangings, and was immediately rebuked by a voice saying, "Ye're no

to titch." "But," said the Queen, "you took it in your own hand just now." The sharp reply was, "Aam allooed to titch it, but naebuddy else is allooed to titch it," so the Queen, smiling to the Prince, kept back her hand. I heard this detailed shortly after it occurred, with my "little pitchers" ears, so can repeat it with a good conscience as a permissible bit of hearsay. One may wonder if the sour caretaker ever learned who it was that she had snubbed, and if so, how she felt.

It is amusing to notice that in the detailed narrative of this visit of the Queen to Scotland, it was thought worth while to announce as an amazing circumstance, that the Edinburgh and Glasgow Railway had conveyed 1175 visitors from Glasgow and the West on the occasion. Sucha figure is now of everyday occurrence. How little was the revolution that was to take place in public transit by the introduction of the iron road foreseen then! The possibilities and probabilities did not enter the public mind. Lord Cockburn, one of the most intelligent and far-seeing citizens of his time, thought he was giving the free rein to prophecy when he said in his Journal under year 1835:

"In twenty years London will probably be within fifteen hours by land of Edinburgh, and every other place will be shaking hands, without

SHORT-SIGHTED VIEWS

making a long arm, with its neighbour of only a county or two off."

It was about the same time, or not much before it, that a Quarterly Review, sneering at railroads, declared its readiness to back Father Thames against the Greenwich Railway for speed travelling!

About the time of my birth, or shortly after, a special Parliamentary Committee sat to consider some railway questions. One of these was: "What is the route to be taken by the single line to be made into Scotland?" And there was no one sitting on the committee, no engineer or promoter-witness, into whose head it entered as a thought conceivable that there could ever be more than one railway line, and that a single one, into Scotland. This I heard stated by Mr. Gladstone in the House of Commons in 1887, in a debate on the proposed Channel tunnel, in which he made one of the most interesting speeches I have ever listened to. At the time when he made this speech, instead of one single line there were three double lines into Scotland, on which twenty-four fast express trains ran daily between London and Edinburgh, and many others from the large towns of England.

The above facts are recorded, as relating to my childhood's time, to indicate how little the possibilities of a new invention are appreciated. The Edinburgh citizen will realise this by a concrete

example. When the Caledonian line was being surveyed, the proper direction for it was, beyond all doubt, by Penicuik and Biggar valley. But one who had been employed as a young engineer in the laying of it out, assured me that it was not then conceived to be possible to ascend Liberton hill without the aid of a fixed engine and a rope, and that thisled, among other causes, to preference being given to the route which went through the Carnwath Bog-of all places in the world-in which an engine was swallowed up shortly after the line was opened, only the end of the funnel remaining visible.

Another curious fact illustrating the fear of gradients, is that the East Coast line from Edinburgh to London was so laid off along the line of the old post road, that the traveller who supposes he is going southwards to London is, when he has travelled 28 miles, and reaches Dunbar, 2 miles north of Edinburgh from whence he started.

Although it takes me out of Edinburgh, it may interest the reader to get an idea of travelling in the early Forties, if I say a few words about my first railway journey, when I was five years old. My father had to go to Madeira with a delicate half-sister of mine, and he took my own sister and me to London, to live with my uncle, the AdjutantGeneral, during his absence. Well do I remember the excitement as we watched for the railway omnibus that was to take us to Haymarket ter