ch, but an English mason, who, when engaged,
at the instance of a bereaved widower, in recording on his wife's
tombstone that a "virtuous woman is a _crown_ to her husband," corrupted
the text, in his simplicity, by substituting "5s." for the "_crown_."
But even Scotch masons do make odd enough mistakes at times, especially
in the provinces; and I felt it would be something gained could I but
get an opportunity of showing the Inverness public that I had at least
English enough to avoid the commoner errors. My verses, thought I, are
at least tolerably correct: could I not get some one or two copies
introduced into the poet's corner of the _Inverness Courier_ or
_Journal_, and thus show that I have literature enough to be trusted
with the cutting of an epitaph on a gravestone? I had a letter of
introduction from a friend in Cromarty to one of the ministers of the
place, himself an author, and a person of influence with the proprietors
of the _Courier_; and, calculating on some amount of literary sympathy
from a man accustomed to court the public through the medium of the
press, I thought I might just venture on stating the case to him. I
first, however, wrote a brief address, in octo-syllabic quatrains, to
the river which flows through the town, and gives to it its name;--a
composition which has, I find, more of the advertisement in it than is
quite seemly, but which would have perhaps expressed less confidence had
it been written less under the influence of a shrinking timidity, that
tried to reassure itself by words of comfort and encouragement.

I was informed that the minister's hour for receiving visitors of the
humbler class was between eleven and twelve at noon; and, with the
letter of introduction and my copy of verses in my pocket, I called at
the manse, and was shown into a little narrow ante-room, furnished with
two seats of deal that ran along the opposite walls. I found the place
occupied by some six or seven individuals--more than half their number
old withered women, in very shabby habiliments, who, as I soon learned
from a conversation which they kept up in a grave under-tone, about
weekly allowances, and the partialities of the session, were paupers.
The others were young men, who had apparently serious requests to prefer
anent marriage and baptism; for I saw that one of them was ever and anon
drawing from his breast-pocket a tattered copy of the Shorter Catechism,
and running over the questions; and I ove