workshop of the Portsoy lapidary, Mr.
Clark, and examining under cover his polished specimens, of which I
purchased for a few shillings a characteristic and elegant little set.
Portsoy is peculiarly rich in minerals; and hence it reckons among its
mechanics of the ordinary class, what perhaps no other village in
Scotland of the same size and population possesses,--a skilful lapidary.
Mr. Clark's collection of the graphic granites, serpentines, and talcose
and mica schists, of the district, with their associated minerals, such
as schorl, talc, asbestos, amianthus, mountain cork, steatite, and
schiller spar, will be found eminently worthy a visit by the passing
traveller.

I made several inquiries in the village, though not, as it proved, in
the right direction, regarding a poor old lady, several years dead, of
whom I had known a very little considerably more than a quarter of a
century before, and whose grave I would have visited, bad as the night
was, had I met any one who could have pointed it out to me. But
ungrateful Portsoy seemed to have forgotten poor Miss Bond, who, in all
her printed letters and little stories, so rarely forgot _it_. Have any
of my readers ever seen the work (in two slim volumes), "Letters of a
Village Governess," published in 1814 by Elizabeth Bond, and dedicated
to Sir Walter Scott? If not, and should they chance to see, as I lately
did, a copy on a stall (with uncut leaves, alas! and selling dog cheap),
they might possibly do worse things than buy it.[12]

With better weather I could have spent a day or two very agreeably in
Portsoy and its neighborhood; but the rain dashed unceasingly, and made
exploration under the cover of the umbrella somewhat resemble that of a
sea-bottom under cover of the diving-bell. I could see but little at a
time, and the little imperfectly. Miss Bond, in her "Letters," refers,
in her light, pleasing style, to what in more favorable circumstances
_might_ be seen. "My troop of _light infantry_," she says, "keeps me so
well employed here during the day, that the silence and repose of the
evening is very delightful. In fine weather I walk by the sea-side, and
scramble among the rugged rocks, many of which are inaccessible to human
feet, forming a fine retreat for foxes. These animals often may be seen
from the heights, sporting with their cubs in perfect safety. This day I
went to see the works of an old _virtuoso_, who turns in marble, or
rather granite [serpentine]