of the country which
I am forbidden to tread, I resemble the poor tethered horse, which, you
may have observed, is always grazing on the very verge of the circle to
which it is limited by its halter.

Do not accuse me of romance for obeying this impulse towards the South;
nor suppose that, to satisfy the imaginary longing of an idle curiosity,
I am in any danger of risking the solid comforts of my present
condition. Whoever has hitherto taken charge of my motions has shown me,
by convincing proofs more weighty than the assurances which they have
witheld, that my real advantage is their principal object. I should be,
therefore, worse than a fool did I object to their authority, even when
it seems somewhat capriciously exercised; for assuredly, at my age, I
might--intrusted as I am with the care and management of myself in every
other particular--expect that the cause of excluding me from England
should be frankly and fairly stated for my own consideration and
guidance. However, I will not grumble about the matter. I shall know the
whole story one day, I suppose; and perhaps, as you sometimes surmise, I
shall not find there is any mighty matter in it after all.

Yet one cannot help wondering--but plague on it, if I wonder any
longer, my letter will be as full of wonders as one of Katterfelto's
advertisements. I have a month's mind, instead of this damnable
iteration of guesses and forebodings, to give thee the history of a
little adventure which befell me yesterday; though I am sure you will,
as usual, turn the opposite side of the spyglass on my poor narrative,
and reduce, MORE TUO, to the most petty trivialities, the circumstance
to which thou accusest me of giving undue consequence. Hang thee, Alan,
thou art as unfit a confidant for a youthful gallant with some spice
of imagination, as the old taciturn secretary of Facardin of Trebizond.
Nevertheless, we must each perform our separate destinies. I am doomed
to see, act, and tell; thou, like a Dutchman enclosed in the same
diligence with a Gascon, to hear, and shrug thy shoulders.

Of Dumfries, the capital town of this county, I have but little to say,
and will not abuse your patience by reminding you that it is built on
the gallant river Nith, and that its churchyard, the highest place of
the old town, commands an extensive and fine prospect. Neither will I
take the traveller's privilege of inflicting upon you the whole history
of Bruce poniarding the Red Comyn in t