"Lady Juliana, not understanding a word he said, sat silently, wondering at her husband's curiosity respecting such a wretched looking place.

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Impossible! you must be mistaken, my lad: why, what's become of all the fine wood that used to surround it?'

"Gin you mean a wheen auld firs, there's some o' them to the fore yet,' pointing to two or three tall, bare, scathed Scotch firs, that scarcely bent their stubborn heads to the wind, that now began to howl around them.

"I insist upon it that you are mistaken; you must have wandered from the right road,' cried the now alarmed Douglas in a loud voice, which vainly attempted to conceal his agitation.

"We'll shune see that,' replied the phlegmatic Scot."

Their introduction to the inhabitants of this goodly mansion is as follows.

"It was a long, narrow, low-roofed room, with a number of small windows, that admitted feeble lights in every possible direction. The scanty furniture bore every appearance of having been constructed at the same time as the edifice; and the friendship thus early formed still seemed to subsist, as the high-backed worked chairs adhered most pertinaciously to the grey walls, on which hung, in narrow black frames, some of the venerable ancestors of the Douglas family. A fire, which appeared to have been newly kindled, was beginning to burn, but, previous to shewing itself in flame, had chosen to vent itself in smoke, with which the room was completely filled, and the open windows seemed to produce no other effect than that of admitting the rain and wind.

"At the entrance of the strangers, a flock of females rushed forwards to meet them. Douglas good humouredly submitted to be hugged by three long chinn'd spinsters, whom he recognized as his aunts; and warmly saluted five awkward purple girls he guessed to be his sisters; while Lady Juliana stood the image of despair, and, scarcely conscious, admitted in silence the civilities of her new relations; till, at length, sinking into a chair, she endeavoured to conceal her agitation by calling to the dogs, and caressing her mackaw.

"The Laird, who had been hastily summoned from his farming operations, now entered. He was a good-looking old man, with something the air of a gentleman, in spite of the inelegance of his dress, his rough manner, and provincial accent. After warmly welcoming his son, he advanced to his beautiful daughter-in-law, and taking

At breakfast, next morning, the following scene occurs.

"Here Miss Grizzy sunk back in her chair, overcome with horror; and Miss Nicky let fall the tea-pot, the scalding contents of which discharged themselves upon the unfortunate Psyche, whose yells, mingling with the screams of its fair mistress, for a while drowned even Miss Jacky's oratory.

"Oh! what shall I do?' cried Lady Juliana, as she bent over her favourite: • Do send for a surgeon; pray, Henry, fly! Do fetch one directly, or she will die; and it would quite kill me to lose my darling. Do run, dearest Harry!'

absurd? there's no surgeon within twenty "My dear Julia, how can you be so

miles of this.'

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No surgeon within twenty miles!' exclaimed she, starting up. How could you bring me to such a place! Good God! those dear creatures may die; I may die myself before I can get any assistance!'

"Don't be alarmed, my dearest niece,' said the good Miss Grizzy; we are all doctors here. I understand something of physic myself; and our friend Lady Maclaughlan, who, I dare say, will be here presently, is perfect mistress of every disease of the human frame.'

"Clap a cauld potatae to the brute's tae,' cried the old Laird gruffly.

"I've a box of her scald ointment that will cure it in a minute.'

"If it don't cure, it will kill,' said Mr Douglas, with a smile.

"Brother,' said Miss Jacky, rising with dignity from her chair, and waving her hand as she spoke Brother, I appeal to you, to protect the character of this most amiable respectable matron from the insults and calumny your son thinks proper to load it with. Sir Samson Maclaughlan is your friend; and it therefore becomes your duty to defend his wife.'

"Troth, but I'll hae aneugh to do, if I am to stand up for a' my friens' wives,' said the old gentleman. But, however, Archie, you are to blame: Leddy Maclaughlan is a very decent woman; at least, as far as I ken, though she is a little free in the gab; and, out of respect to my auld friend Sir Sampson, it is my desire that you should remain here to receive him, and that you trait baith him and his lady discreetly.'

"This was said in too serious a tone to

would be sea-sick, and grow so yellow, and so ugly, that when he came back she should never have any comfort in him again. "Henry, who had never doubted her readiness to accompany him, immediately hastened to assuage her anguish, by assuring her that it had always been his intention to take her along with him.

"That was worse and worse. She wondered how he could be so barbarous and absurd, as to think of her leaving all her friends, and going to live amongst savages. She had done a great deal in living so long contentedly with him in Scotland; but she never could, nor would make, such another sacrifice. Besides, she was sure poor Courtland could not do without her; she knew he would never marry again; and who would take care of his dear children, and educate them properly, if she did not. It would be too ungrateful to desert Frederick, after all he had done for them.

The pride of the man, as much as the affection of the husband, was irritated by this resistance to his will; and a violent scene of reproach and recrimination terminated in an eternal farewell."

So much for marriage the first. The basis on which it was founded accounts sufficiently for the result.

At the beginning of volume the second, we find that, in due course of inheritance, the heroine-ship of the book has passed to one of the daughters of Lady Juliana-of course, the deserted one, who had been left for education among her relations in the Highlands. This young lady enjoys the inestimable advantage of being brought up in the most rational and virtuous manner possible, under the direction of a perfect paragon of aunts. The author takes many sly opportunities of contrasting the excellent system of Mrs Douglas, with that pursued by her sisters-in-law, the venerable spinsters of Glenfern Castle. The following account of the religion and morals of the belles who benefit by their precepts, is evidently from the life. "To attend the parish church, and remember the text; to observe who was there, and who was not there; and to wind up the evening with a sermon stuttered and stammered through by one of the girls (the worst reader always piously selected, for the purpose of improving their reading,) and particularly addressed to the Laird, openly and avowedly snoring in his armchair, though at every pause starting up with a peevish Weel?this was the sum total of their religious duties. Their moral virtues were much upon the same scale; to knit stockings, scold servants, cement china, trim bonnets, lecture the poor, and look up to Lady Maclaughlan, comprised

nearly their 'whole code. But these were the virtues of ripened years and enlarged understandings; what their pupils might hope to arrive at, but could not presume to meddle with. Their merits consisted in being compelled to sew certain large portions of white work; learning to read and write in the worst manner; occasionally wearing a collar, and learning the notes on the spinnet. These acquirements, accompanied with a great deal of lecturing and fault-finding, sufficed for the first fifteen years; when the two next, passed at a provincial boardingschool, were supposed to impart every graceful accomplishment to which women could attain."

Miss Mary Douglas grows up as beautiful and as accomplished as could be wished, till about the age of sixteen years;-at that time, the old laird of Glenfern's funeral procession is perceived by a second-sighted person in the vicinity, and the real ceremony, of course, follows close on the heels of the visionary one. Mary's health from this time begins to droop, and all the domestic materia medica having in vain been exhausted, it is at last agreed that she shall be sent to visit her mother, for the benefit of the milder air of the south of England. Her uncle, Major Douglas, attends her as far as Edinburgh.

Miss Douglas is, like all other strangers, delighted with this metropolis. The morning after her arrival, her uncle and she walk round the Calton Hill, and inspect the new walks, prisons, and hermitage. One of the bailies(alas! fuimus Troes, fuit ingens gloria Dardanidum!)-who appears to haunt this beautiful spot like a tutelary genius, explains to them the merits of all the improvements, and concludes with proposing a visit to Lord Nelson's monument.

"And noo,' said the Bailie, will ye step up to the monument, and tak a rest and some refreshment?'

"Rest and refreshment in a monument!' exclaimed Mr Douglas. Excuse me, my good friend, but we are not inclined to bait there yet a while.'

"The Bailie did not comprehend the joke; and he proceeded in his own drawling hum-drum accent, to assure them, that the monument was a most convenient place.

"It was erected in honour of Lord Neilson's memory,' said he, and is let aff to a pastry cook and confectioner, where you can always find some trifles to treat the ladies, such as pies and custards, and berries, and these sort of things: but we passed an order in the cooncil, that there should be naething of a spirituous nature introdu

ced; for, if ance spirits got admittance, there's no saying what might happen.'

"This was a fact which none of the party were disposed to dispute; and the Bailie, triumphing in his dominion over the spirits, shuffled on before to do the honours of this place, appropriated at one and the same time to the manes of a hero, and the making of minced pies. The regale was admirable, and Mary could not help thinking times were improved, and that it was a better thing to eat tarts in Lord Nelson's Monument, than to have been poisoned in Julius Cæsar's."

We have reason to suspect that the bailie did not, upon this occasion, reveal all the secrets of the Nelson club, which assembles in this singular house of call, and at whose meetings he himself presides, at times, with so much success. But it would be ungenerous, at the present moment, to take any severe notice of the slips of the "fallen great."

Their next visit is to the aerial habitation of Mrs Violet Macshake, a great-grand-aunt" of our heroine. This venerable personage still occupies her old quarters on the Castle Hill.

"They had now reached the airy dwelling where Mrs Macshake resided, and having rung, the door was at length most deliberately opened, by an ancient, sour-visaged, long-waisted female, who ushered them into an apartment, the coup d'œil of which struck a chill to Mary's heart. It was a good-sized room, with a bare sufficiency of small-legged dining-tables, and lank haircloth chairs, ranged in high order round the walls. Although the season was advanced, and the air piercing cold, the grate stood smiling in all the charms of polished steel; and the mistress of the mansion was seated by the side of it in an arm-chair still in its summer position. She appeared to have no other occupation than what her own meditations afforded; for a single glance sufficed to shew, that not a vestige of book or work was harboured there. She was a tall, large-boned woman, whom even Time's iron hand scarcely bent, as she merely stooped at the shoulders. She had a drooping snuffy nose-a long turned up chin small quick gray eyes, and her face projected far beyond her figure, with an expression of shrewd restless curiosity. She wore a mode (not à-la-mode) bonnet, and

For the benefit of posterity let it be known, that we have penned this critique this present Saturday the 6th of June 1818, the very day on which the Court of Session pronounced their first interlocutor, disfranchising the city of Edinburgh, and reducing her bailies to the station of common men. "Alas, the provost-less city!"

cardinal of the same; a pair of clogs over her shoes, and black silk mittens on her

arms.

"As soon as she recognised Mr Douglas, she welcomed him with much cordiality, shook him long and heartily by the hand, patted him on the back,-looked into his face with much seeming satisfaction,-and, in short, gave all the demonstrations of gladness usual with gentlewomen of a certain age. Her pleasure, however, appeared to be rather an impromptu than a habitual feeling; for, as the surprise went off, her visage resumed its harsh and sarcastic expression, and she seemed eager to efface any agreeable impression her reception might have excited.

An wha thought o' seein you enow?" said she in a quick gabbling voice; what's brought you to the toon? are ye come to spend your honest faither's siller, e'er he's weel cauld in his grave, puir man?'

"Mr Douglas explained that it was upon account of his niece's health.

"Health!" repeated she, with a sardonic smile, it wad mak an ool laugh to hear the wark that's made aboot young fowk's health noo-a-days. I wonder what ye're aw made o',' grasping Mary's arm in her great bony hand; a wheen puir feckless windlestraes-ye maun awa to Ingland for yere healths. Set ye up! I wunder what cam o' the lasses i' my time, that bute to bide at hame? And whilk o' ye, I sude like to ken, 'll ere leive to see ninetysax, like me.-Health! he, he !'

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Mary, glad of a pretence to indulge the mirth the old lady's manner and appearance had excited, joined most heartily in the laugh.

"Tak aff yere bannet, bairn, and let me see yere face; wha can tell what like ye are wi' that snule o' a thing on yere head.' Then, after taking an accurate survey of her face, she pushed aside her pelisse→→

Weel, it's ae mercy, I see ye hae neither the red heed, nor the muckle cuits o' the Douglases, I ken nae whuther yer faither had them or no. I ne'er set een on him: neither him nor his braw leddy thought it worth their while to speer after me; but I was at nae loss by aw accounts.'

"You have not asked for any of your Glenfern friends,' said Mr Douglas, hoping to touch a more sympathetic chord.

Time eneugh-wull ye let me draw my breath, man? fowk canna say aw thing tu, a Scotch lass wad nae serr ye.--An yere at ance. An ye bute to hae an Inglish wife wean, I'se warran', it's ane o' the warld's wonders; it's been unca lang o' cumminhe, he !'

"He has begun life under very melancholy auspices, poor fellow!' said Mr Douglas, in allusion to his father's death.

"An wha's faut was that? I ne'er heard tell the like o't, to hae the bairn kirsened an' its grandfather deein !-But fowk

are naither born, nor kirsened, nor do they wad or dee as they used to du;-aw thing's changed.'

"You must indeed have witnessed many changes,' observed Mr Douglas, rather at a loss how to utter any thing of a conciliatory nature.

"Changes!-weel a waat, I sometimes wunder if its the same waurld, an if it's my ain heed that's upon my shoothers.' "But with these changes, you must also have seen many improvements?' said Mary in a tone of diffidence.

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Impruvements!' turning sharply round upon her, what ken ye about impruvements, bairn? A bonny impruvement or ens no, to see tyleyors and sclaters leavin whar I mind Jewks and Yerls.-An that great glowrin new toon there,' pointing out of her windows, whar I used to sit and luck oot at bonny green parks, and see the coos milket, and the bits o' bairnys rowin an tummlin, an the lasses trampin i' their tubs What see I noo but stane an lime, an stoor an dirt, an idle chiels, and dinket oot madams prancin'.-Impruvements indeed!'

Mary found she was not likely to advance her uncle's fortune by the judiciousness of her remarks, therefore prudently resolved to hazard no more. Mr Douglas, who was more au fait to the prejudices of old age, and who was always amused with her bitter remarks, when they did not touch himself, encouraged her to continue the conversation by some observation on the prevailing manners.

"Mainars!' repeated she, with a contemptuous laugh, what caw ye mainers noo, for I dinna ken; ilk ane gangs bang in till their neebor's hooss, and bang oot o't as it war a chynge hooss; an as for the maister o't, he's no o' sae muckle vaalu as the flunky ahint his chyre. I' my grandfather's time, as I hae heard him tell, ilka maister o' a faamily had his ain sate in his ain hooss aye, an sat wi' his hat on his heed afore the best o' the land, an had his ain dish, an was aye helpit first, an keepit up his owthority as a man sude du. Paurents war paurents then-bairnes dardna set up their gabs afore them than as they du noo. They ne'er presumed to say their heeds war their ain i' thae days-wife an servants, reteeners an' childer, aw trummelt i' the presence o' their heed.'

"Here a long pinch of snuff caused a pause in the old lady's harangue; but after having duly wiped her nose with her coloured handkerchief, and shook off all the particles that might be presumed to have lodged upon her cardinal, she resumed—

"An' nae word o' ony o' your sisters gawn to get husbands yet? They tell me they're but coorse lasses: an' wha'll tak illtarred tocherless queans, when there's walth o' bonny faces an' lang purses i' the market-He, he!' Then resuming her scrutiny of Mary- An' I'se warren ye'll be lucken

for an Inglish sweetheart tu; that'll be what's takin ye awa to Ingland.'

"On the contrary,' said Mr Douglas, seeing Mary was too much frightened to answer for herself On the contrary, Mary declares she will never marry any but a true Highlander; one who wears the dirk and plaid, and has the second-sight. And the nuptials are to be celebrated with all the pomp of feudal times; with bagpipes, and bonfires, and gatherings of clans, and roasted sheep, and barrels of whisky, and

"Weel a wat an' she's i' the right there," interrupted Mrs Macshake, with more complacency than she had yet shewn. They may caw them what they like, but there's nae waddins noo. Wha's the better o' them but innkeepers an' chise-drivers? I wud nae count mysel married i' the hiddlins way they gang aboot it noo.'

"I daresay you remember these things done in a very different style?' said Mr Douglas.

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"I dinna mind them whan they war at the best; but I hae heard my mither tell what a bonny ploy was at her waddin. I canna tell ye hoo mony was at it; mair nor the room wad haud, ye may be sure, for every relation an' freend o' baith sides war there, as weel they sude; an' aw in full dress: the leddies in their hoops round them, an' some o' them had sutten up aw night till hae their heeds drest; for they hadnae thae pooket-like taps ye hae noo,' looking with contempt at Mary's Grecian contour. An' the bride's goon was aw shewed ow'r wi' favors, frae the tap doon to the tail, an' aw roond the neck, an' aboot the sleeves; an' as soon as the ceremony was ow'r, ilk ane ran till her an' rugget an' rave at her for the favors, till they hardly left the claise upon her back. Than they did nae rin awa as they du noo, but sax an thretty o' them sat doon till a graund denner, an' there was a ball at night, an' ilka night till Sabbath cam roond; an' than the bride an' the bridegroom, drest in their waddin suits, an' aw their freends in theirs, wi' their favors on their breests, walkit in procession till the kirk. An' was nae that something like a waddin? It was worth while to be married i' thae days-He, he!'

"The wedding seems to have been admirably conducted,' said Mr Douglas, with much solemnity. The christening, I presume, would be the next distinguished event in the family?'

"Troth, Archie-an' ye sude keep your thoomb upon kirsnins as lang's ye leeve; yours was a bonnie kirsnin or ens no! I hae heard o' mony things, but a bairn kirsened whan its grandfaither was i' the deed-thraw, I ne'er heard tell o' before."— Then observing the indignation that spread over Mr Douglas' face, she quickly resumed, An' so ye think the kirsnin was the neist ploy ?-He, he! Na; the cryin was a ploy, for the leddies did nae keep themsels up than as they du noo; but the