on pottered away about Persia and India, and I fell asleep by the
fireside. Here is a fine spate of work--a day diddled away, and nothing
to show for it! I must write letters now, there is nothing else for it.
But--yaw--yaw--I must take a nap first. I had a letter from Jem
Ballantyne, plague on him! full of remonstrance, deep and solemn, upon
the carelessness of _Bonaparte_. The rogue is right too. But as to
correcting my style to the

"Jemmy jemmy linkum feedle"

tune of what is called fine writing, I'll be d----d if I do. Drew L12 in
favour of Charles for his Irish jaunt; same time exhorted him to make
himself as expensive to Walter, in the way of eating and drinking, as he
could. Mr. and Mrs. Impey arrived to dinner.

_September_ 7.--Mr. Bruce, the bastinadoed, left us this morning
promising wine from Shiraz and arms from India. From our joint
observation he must be a half-caste, probably half an Arab. He told us
of his having been taken by pirates in the Arabian Gulf, and having
received two thousand bastinadoes on the soles of his feet, after which
he was buried in a heap of dung by way of cure. Though the matter was
certainly serious enough to the sufferer, yet it excited our suppressed,
or scarce suppressed, mirth. Alas! let never traveller tell any distress
which borders on the ludicrous if he desires to excite the sympathy of
the audience.

Another thing he mentioned was the mode of seasoning timber for
shipbuilding in the Arabian Gulf. They bury it in the sand within
water-mark, and leave it exposed to the flux and reflux of the tide for
six months at least, but often for twelve or eighteen. The tendency to
vegetation which produces the dry-rot is thus prevented effectually, and
the ships built of this wood last for twenty years.

We drove to Ashestiel in the morning, after I had written a good task,
or nearly so (nay, I lie, it wanted half a page), and passed a pleasant
day. Terry read _Bobadil_ in the evening, which he has, I think,
improved.

_September_ 8.--I have rubbed up, by collation with Mr. Impey, Sir
Frederick Adam's idea of the Greeks. He deeply regrets the present war
as premature, undertaken before knowledge and rational education had
extended themselves sufficiently. The neighbourhood of the Ionian
Islands was fast producing civilisation; and as knowledge is power, it
is clear that the example of Europeans, and the opportunities of
education thereby afforded, must soon have given them