n excellent man, and is an important thing to me, as it
saves both my eyesight and nerves, which last are cruelly affected by
finding those "who look out of the windows" grow gradually darker and
darker.[420] Rode out, or more properly, was carried out, into the woods
to see the course of a new road, which may serve to carry off the
thinnings of the trees, and for rides. It is very well lined, and will
serve both for beauty and convenience. Mr. Laidlaw engages to come back
to dinner, and finish two or three more pages. Met my agreeable and
lady-like neighbour, Mrs. Brewster, on my pony, and I was actually
ashamed to be seen by her.

"Sir Dennis Brand, and on so poor a steed."[421]

I believe detestable folly of this kind is the very last that leaves us.
One would have thought I ought to have little vanity at this time o'
day; but it is an abiding appurtenance of the old Adam, and I write for
penance what, like a fool, I actually felt.

_January_ 19.--Wrote on by Mr. Laidlaw's assistance. Things go bobbishly
enough; we have a good deal finished before dinner. Henry Scott comes to
dine with me _vis-a-vis_, and we have a grand dish of politics. The
friends of old Scotland want but a signal. A certain great lawyer says
that if Sir W.S. wrote another _Malachi_ it would set more men on fire
than a dozen associations. This almost tempts me. But the canny lad says
moreover that to appeal to national partiality, _i.e._ that you should
call on Scotsmen to act like Scotsmen, is unfair, and he would be sorry
it was known he, late and future placeman, should encourage such paw-paw
doings. Yet if Sir W.S. could be got to stand forlorn hope, the legal
gentleman would suggest, etc. etc. Suggest and be d--d. Sir W.S. knows
when to [doff] his bonnet, and when to cock it in the face of all and
sundry. Moreover, he will not be made a cat's-paw of, look you now.

_January_ 20.--Wrought all morning; a monstrous packet of letters at
mid-day. Borrow honest Laidlaw's fingers in the evening. I hope his pay
will recompense him: it is better than "grieve-ing" or playing
Triptolemus.[422] Should be, if I am hard-working, 100 guineas, which,
with his house, cow, and free rent, would save, I believe, some painful
thoughts to him and his amiable wife and children. We will see how the
matter fudges. Almost finished the first volume.

_January_ 21.--James Ballantyne in ecstasies at our plan of an
amanuensis. I myself am sensible that my fingers