ng the papers of the Cardinal Duke of York, and
reporting what is fit for publication. This makes it plain that the
Invisible[352] neither slumbers nor sleeps. The toil and remuneration
must be Lockhart's, and to any person understanding that sort of work
the degree of trust reposed holds out hope of advantage. At any rate, it
is a most honourable trust, and I have written in suitable terms to Lord
Aberdeen to express my acceptance of it, adverting to my necessary
occupations here, and expressing my willingness to visit London
occasionally to superintend the progress of the work. Treated myself,
being considerably fagged, with a glass of poor Glengarry's
super-excellent whisky and a cigar, made up my Journal, wrote to the
girls, and so to roost upon a crust of bread and a glass of small beer,
my usual supper.

_July_ 6.--I laboured all the morning without anything unusual, save a
call from my cousin, Mary Scott of Jedburgh, whom I persuaded to take
part of my chaise to Abbotsford on Saturday. At two o'clock I walked to
Cadell's, and afterwards to a committee of the Bannatyne Club.
Thereafter I went to Leith, where we had fixed a meeting of _The Club_,
now of forty-one years' standing.[353] I was in the chair, and Sir Adam
croupier. We had the Justice-Clerk, Lord Abercromby, Lord Pitmilly, Lord
Advocate, James Ferguson, John Irving, and William Clerk, and passed a
merry day for old fellows. It is a curious thing that only _three_ have
died of this club since its formation. These were the Earl of Selkirk;
James Clerk, Lieutenant in the Navy; and Archibald Miller, W.S. Sir
Patrick Murray was an unwilling absentee. There were absent--Professor
Davidson of Glasgow, besides Glassford, who has cut our society, and
poor James Edmonstoune, whose state of health precludes his ever joining
society again. We took a fair but moderate allowance of wine, sung our
old songs, and were much refreshed with a hundred old stories, which
would have seemed insignificant to any stranger. The most important of
these were old college adventures of love and battle.

_July_ 7.--I was rather apprehensive that I might have felt my unusual
dissipation this morning, but not a whit; I rose as cool as a cucumber,
and set about to my work till breakfast-time. I am to dine with
Ballantyne to-day. To-morrow with John Murray. This sounds sadly like
idleness, except what may be done either in the morning before
breakfast, or in the broken portion of the day