on, Mr. Innes, the school-master, was unanimously
elected to that honour. He was a hard-featured, sententious, snuffy
individual, of some learning, and great respectability.

I omit the political talk with which their intercommunications began;
for however interesting at the time is the scaffolding by which existing
institutions arise, the poles and beams when gathered again in the
builder's yard are scarcely a subject for the artist.

The first to lead the way towards matters of nearer personality was
William MacGregor, the linen manufacturer, a man who possessed a score
of hand-looms or so--half of which, from the advance of cotton and the
decline of linen-wear, now stood idle--but who had already a sufficient
deposit in the hands of Mr. Thomson the banker--agent, that is, for the
county-bank--to secure him against any necessity for taking to cotton
shirts himself, which were an abomination and offence unpardonable in
his eyes.

'Can ye tell me, Mr. Cocker,' he said, 'what mak's Sandy, Lord Rothie,
or Wrathy, or what suld he be ca'd?--tak' to The Bothie at a time
like this, whan there's neither huntin', nor fishin', nor shutin', nor
onything o' the kin' aboot han' to be playacks till him, the bonnie
bairn--'cep' it be otters an' sic like?'

William was a shrunken old man, with white whiskers and a black wig, a
keen black eye, always in search of the ludicrous in other people, and a
mouth ever on the move, as if masticating something comical.

'You know just as well as I do,' answered Mr. Cocker, the Marquis of
Boarshead's factor for the surrounding estate. 'He never was in the way
of giving a reason for anything, least of all for his own movements.'

'Somebody was sayin' to me,' resumed MacGregor, who, in all probability,
invented the story at the moment, 'that the prince took him kissin'
ane o' his servan' lasses, and kickit him oot o' Carlton Hoose into the
street, and he canna win' ower the disgrace o' 't.'

''Deed for the kissin',' said Mr. Thomson, a portly, comfortable-looking
man, 'that's neither here nor there, though it micht hae been a duchess
or twa; but for the kickin', my word! but Lord Sandy was mair likly to
kick oot the prince. Do ye min' hoo he did whan the Markis taxed him
wi'--?'

'Haud a quaiet sough,' interposed Mr. Cruickshank, the solicitor;
'there's a drap i' the hoose.'

This was a phrase well understood by the company, indicating the
presence of some one unknown, or unfit to be trus