eason, there was
a breach in the observance of this time-honoured custom.

As the ringing of the bell ceased, the gate unclosed, and the Doctor came
forth. He was of that easy sort of feather-bed corpulency of form that
betokens good-nature, and had none of that smooth, red, well-filled
protuberancy, which indicates a choleric humour and a testy temper. He
was in fact what Mrs. Glibbans denominated "a man of a gausy external."
And some little change had taken place during his absence in his visible
equipage. His stockings, which were wont to be of worsted, had undergone
a translation into silk; his waist-coat, instead--of the venerable
Presbyterian flap-covers to the pockets, which were of Johnsonian
magnitude, was become plain--his coat in all times single-breasted, with
no collar, still, however, maintained its ancient characteristics;
instead, however, of the former bright black cast horn, the buttons were
covered with cloth. But the chief alteration was discernible in the
furniture of the head. He had exchanged the simplicity of his own
respectable grey hairs for the cauliflower hoariness of a PARRISH {3}
wig, on which he wore a broad-brimmed hat, turned up a little at each
side behind, in a portentous manner, indicatory of Episcopalian
predilections. This, however, was not justified by any alteration in his
principles, being merely an innocent variation of fashion, the natural
result of a Doctor of Divinity buying a hat and wig in London.

The moment that the Doctor made his appearance, his greeting and
salutation was quite delightful; it was that of a father returned to his
children, and a king to his people.

Almost immediately after the Doctor, Mrs. Pringle, followed by Miss Mally
Glencairn and Miss Isabella Tod, also debouched from the gate, and the
assembled females remarked, with no less instinct, the transmutation
which she had undergone. She was dressed in a dark blue cloth pelisse,
trimmed with a dyed fur, which, as she told Miss Mally, "looked quite as
well as sable, without costing a third of the money." A most matronly
muff, that, without being of sable, was of an excellent quality,
contained her hands; and a very large Leghorn straw bonnet, decorated
richly, but far from excess, with a most substantial band and bow of a
broad crimson satin ribbon around her head.

If the Doctor was gratified to see his people so gladly thronging around
him, Mrs. Pringle had no less pleasure also in her thric