m to help at the summer Occasion." {1}

While they were thus reviewing, in their way, the first epistle of the
Doctor, the betherel came in to say that Meg and Tam were at the door.
"Oh, man," said Mr. Daff, slyly, "ye shouldna hae left them at the door
by themselves." Mr. Craig looked at him austerely, and muttered
something about the growing immorality of this backsliding age; but
before the smoke of his indignation had kindled into eloquence, the
delinquents were admitted. However, as we have nothing to do with the
business, we shall leave them to their own deliberations.

CHAPTER II--THE VOYAGE

On the fourteenth day after the departure of the family from the manse,
the Rev. Mr. Charles Snodgrass, who was appointed to officiate during the
absence of the Doctor, received the following letter from his old chum,
Mr. Andrew Pringle. It would appear that the young advocate is not so
solid in the head as some of his elder brethren at the Bar; and therefore
many of his flights and observations must be taken with an allowance on
the score of his youth.

LETTER IV

_Andrew Pringle_, _Esq._, _Advocate_, _to the Rev. Charles Snodgrass_
LONDON.

MY DEAR FRIEND--We have at last reached London, after a stormy passage of
seven days. The accommodation in the smacks looks extremely inviting in
port, and in fine weather, I doubt not, is comfortable, even at sea; but
in February, and in such visitations of the powers of the air as we have
endured, a balloon must be a far better vehicle than all the vessels that
have been constructed for passengers since the time of Noah. In the
first place, the waves of the atmosphere cannot be so dangerous as those
of the ocean, being but "thin air"; and I am sure they are not so
disagreeable; then the speed of the balloon is so much greater,--and it
would puzzle Professor Leslie to demonstrate that its motions are more
unsteady; besides, who ever heard of sea-sickness in a balloon? the
consideration of which alone would, to any reasonable person actually
suffering under the pains of that calamity, be deemed more than an
equivalent for all the little fractional difference of danger between the
two modes of travelling. I shall henceforth regard it as a fine
characteristic trait of our national prudence, that, in their journies to
France and Flanders, the Scottish witches always went by air on
broom-sticks