r him, "May the
Lord keep me from the devil's and _that_ man's grasp."

We have now only to add, that the protection promised by Cromwell to
Lady Rae for her husband was duly made out, and delivered to her. We
need not say that it was found to be a perfectly efficient document.

THE DIAMOND EYES.

When I entered Edinburgh College the students were tolerably free from
any of those clubs or parties into which some factitious subject--often
a whim--divides them. In the prior year the spirit of wager had seized a
great number of them with the harpy talons of the demon of gambling,
giving rise to consequences prejudicial to their morals, as well as to
their studies. A great deal of money among the richer of them changed
hands upon the result of bets, often the most frivolous, if not
altogether ridiculous. Now, we are not to say that, abstracted from the
love of money, the act of betting is unqualifiedly bad, if rather we may
not be able to say something for it, insomuch as it sometimes brings
out, and stamps ingenuity or sagacity, while it represses and chastises
arrogance. But the practice at the College at that time was actually
wild. They sought out subjects; the aye and the no of ordinary converse
was followed by the gauntlet, which was taken up on the instant; and
they even had an umpire in the club, a respectable young man of the name
of Hawley, who was too wise to bet himself, but who was pleased with the
honour of being privileged to decide the bets of the others.

In the heat of this wild enthusiasm, it happened that two of these
youths, one called Henry Dewhurst, and the other Frank Hamilton, were
walking on the jetty which runs out from the harbour of Leith a full
mile into the Forth. Dewhurst was the son of a West India planter, who
allowed him L300 a year, every penny of which was spent in paying only a
part of his bills long before the year was done; one of which bills I
had an opportunity of seeing, to my wonder--how any one could eat L15
worth of tarts and sweetmeats in the course of not many months! Hamilton
was the son of a west country proprietor, and enjoyed the privilege of
using, to his ruin, a yearly allowance of L250. In the midst of their
sauntering they hailed two of their friends,--one Campbell, a sworn
companion of the young West Indian; and the other Cameron, as closely
allied to Hamilton;--all the four being, as the saying goes, "birds of a
feather," tossing their wings in the gale of