it with a good conscience, all being well forward in the duty
line. After tea I worked a little longer. On the whole finished four
leaves and upwards--about a printed sheet--which is enough for one day.

_August_ 18.--Finished about five leaves, and then out to the wood,
where I chopped away among the trees, laying the foundation for future
scenery. These woods will one day occupy a great number of hands. Four
years hence they will employ ten stout woodsmen almost every day of the
year. Henry and William Scott (Harden) came to dinner.

_August_ 19.--Wrote till about one, then walked for an hour or two by
myself entirely; finished five pages before dinner, when we had Captain
and Mrs. Hamilton and young Davidoff, who is their guest. They remained
with us all night.

_August_ 20.--I corrected proofs and wrote one leaf before breakfast;
then went up to Selkirk to try a fellow for an assault. The people there
get rather riotous. This is a turbulent fierce fellow. Some of his
attitudes were good during the trial. This dissipated my attention for
the day, although I was back by half-past two. I did not work any more,
so am behind in my reckoning.

_August_ 21.--Wrote four pages, then set out to make a call at
Sunderland Hall and Yair, but the old sociable broke down before we had
got past the thicket, so we trudged all back on foot, and I wrote
another page. This makes up the deficiency of yesterday.

_August_ 22.--I wrote four or five leaves, but begin to get aground for
want of Indian localities. Colonel Ferguson's absence is unlucky, and
half-a-dozen Qui Hi's besides, willing to write chits,[22] eat tiffin,
and vent all their Pagan jargon when one does not want to hear it; and
now that I want a touch of their slang, lo! there is not one near me.
Mr. Adolphus, son of the celebrated counsel, and author of a work on the
_Waverley Novels_,[23] came to make me a visit. He is a modest as well
as an able man, and I am obliged to him for the delicacy with which he
treated a matter in which I was personally so much concerned. Mr. and
Mrs. Hamilton asked us to breakfast to-morrow.

_August_ 23.--Went to breakfast at Chiefswood, which, with a circuitous
walk, have consumed the day. Found, in the first place, my friend Allan,
the painter, busy about a picture, into which he intends introducing
living characters--a kind of revel at Abbotsford. Second, a whimsical
party, consisting of John Stevenson, the bookseller, Peter Buchan fr