y inserting his forefinger under his
bob-wig, in order to rub his temple and aid his invention; 'he is no
figure for the fore-bar to see without laughing; but how to get rid
of him? To speak sense, or anything like it, is the last thing he will
listen to. Stay, aye,--Alan, my darling, hae patience; I'll get him off
on the instant, like a gowff ba'.'

So saying, he hastened to his ally, Peter Drudgeit, who on seeing him
with marks of haste in his gait, and care upon his countenance, clapped
his pen behind his ear, with 'What's the stir now, Mr. Saunders? Is
there aught wrang?'

'Here's a dollar, man,' said Mr. Saunders; 'now, or never, Peter, do me
a good turn. Yonder's your namesake, Peter Peebles, will drive the swine
through our bonny hanks of yarn; get him over to John's Coffeehouse,
man--gie him his meridian--keep him there, drunk or sober, till the
hearing is ower.' [The simile is obvious, from the old manufacture of
Scotland, when the gudewife's thrift, as the yarn wrought in the winter
was called, when laid down to bleach by the burn-side, was peculiarly
exposed to the inroads of pigs, seldom well regulated about a Scottish
farm-house.]

'Eneugh said,' quoth Peter Drudgeit, no way displeased with his own
share in the service required, 'We'se do your bidding.'

Accordingly, the scribe was presently seen whispering in the ear of
Peter Peebles, whose response came forth in the following broken form:--

'Leave the court for ae minute on this great day of judgement? not I, by
the Reg--Eh! what? Brandy, did ye say--French brandy?--couldna ye fetch
a stoup to the bar under your coat, man? Impossible? Nay, if it's clean
impossible, and if we have an hour good till they get through the single
bill and the summar-roll, I carena if I cross the close wi' you; I am
sure I need something to keep my heart up this awful day; but I'll no
stay above an instant--not above a minute of time--nor drink aboon a
single gill,'

In a few minutes afterwards, the two Peters were seen moving through the
Parliament Close (which new-fangled affectation has termed a Square),
the triumphant Drudgeit leading captive the passive Peebles, whose legs
conducted him towards the dramshop, while his reverted eyes were
fixed upon the court. They dived into the Cimmerian abysses of John's
Coffeehouse, [See Note 5.] formerly the favourite rendezvous of the
classical and genial Doctor Pitcairn, and were for the present seen no
more.

Relieved from