he parish school afforded, he had settled me, now in my
seventeenth year, at the University.

Youth is the season of warm friendships and romantic wishes and hopes.
We say of the child, in its first attempts to totter along the wall, or
when it has first learned to rise beside its mother's knee, that it is
yet too weak to stand alone; and we may employ the same language in
describing a young and ardent mind. It is, like the child, too weak to
stand alone, and anxiously seeks out some kindred mind on which to lean.
I had had my intimates at school, who, though of no very superior cast,
had served me, if I may so speak, as resting-places, when wearied with
my studies, or when I had exhausted my lighter reading; and now, at St.
Andrew's, where I knew no one, I began to experience the unhappiness of
an unsatisfied sociality. My schoolfellows were mostly stiff, illiterate
lads, who, with a little bad Latin and worse Greek, plumed themselves
mightily on their scholarship; and I had little inducement to form any
intimacies among them; for, of all men, the ignorant scholar is the
least amusing. Among the students of the upper classes, however, there
was at least one individual with whom I longed to be acquainted. He was
apparently much about my own age, rather below than above the middle
size, and rather delicately than robustly formed; but I have rarely seen
a more elegant figure or more interesting face. His features were small,
and there was what might perhaps be deemed a too feminine delicacy in
the whole contour; but there was a broad and very high expansion of
forehead, which, even in those days, when we were acquainted with only
the phrenology taught by Plato, might be regarded as the index of a
capacious and powerful mind; and the brilliant light of his large black
eyes, seemed to give earnest of its activity.

"Who, in the name of wonder, is that?" I inquired of a class-fellow, as
this interesting-looking young man passed me for the first time.

"A clever, but very unsettled fellow from Edinburgh," replied the lad;
"a capital linguist, for he gained our first bursary three years ago;
but our Professor says he is certain he will never do any good. He cares
nothing for the company of scholars like himself; and employs
himself--though he excels, I believe, in English composition--in writing
vulgar Scotch rhymes, like Allan Ramsay. His name is Robert Ferguson."

I felt, from this moment, a strong desire to rank among the