mail-coaches, upon one of the most
sequestered spots in the Middle Ward of Clydesdale. The house was
old and dilapidated, and looked sorry for itself, as if sensible of
a derogation; but the sign was strong and new, and brightly painted,
displaying a heraldic shield (three shuttles in a field diapre), a web
partly unfolded for crest, and two stout giants for supporters, each one
holding a weaver's beam proper. To have displayed this monstrous emblem
on the front of the house might have hazarded bringing down the wall,
but for certain would have blocked up one or two windows. It was
therefore established independent of the mansion, being displayed in an
iron framework, and suspended upon two posts, with as much wood and
iron about it as would have builded a brig; and there it hung, creaking,
groaning, and screaming in every blast of wind, and frightening for five
miles' distance, for aught I know, the nests of thrushes and linnets,
the ancient denizens of the little glen.

When I entered the place I was received by Christie Steele herself, who
seemed uncertain whether to drop me in the kitchen, or usher me into
a separate apartment, as I called for tea, with something rather more
substantial than bread and butter, and spoke of supping and sleeping,
Christie at last inducted me into the room where she herself had been
sitting, probably the only one which had a fire, though the month was
October. This answered my plan; and as she was about to remove her
spinning-wheel, I begged she would have the goodness to remain and make
my tea, adding that I liked the sound of the wheel, and desired not to
disturb her housewife thrift in the least.

"I dinna ken, sir," she replied, in a dry, REVECHE tone, which carried
me back twenty years, "I am nane of thae heartsome landleddies that can
tell country cracks, and make themsel's agreeable, and I was ganging to
put on a fire for you in the Red Room; but if it is your will to stay
here, he that pays the lawing maun choose the lodging."

I endeavoured to engage her in conversation; but though she answered,
with a kind of stiff civility, I could get her into no freedom of
discourse, and she began to look at her wheel and at the door more
than once, as if she meditated a retreat. I was obliged, therefore, to
proceed to some special questions; that might have interest for a person
whose ideas were probably of a very bounded description.

I looked round the apartment, being the same in wh