didate in case of an expected election, and saw no
amusement in the duties of a road trustee, a commissioner of supply, or
even in the magisterial functions of the bench. I had begun to take some
taste for reading; and a domiciliation in the country must remove me
from the use of books, excepting the small subscription library, in
which the very book which you want is uniformly sure to be engaged.

I resolved, therefore, to make the Scottish metropolis my regular
resting-place, reserving to myself to take occasionally those excursions
which, spite of all I have said against mail-coaches, Mr. Piper has
rendered so easy. Friend of our life and of our leisure, he secures by
dispatch against loss of time, and by the best of coaches, cattle, and
steadiest of drivers, against hazard of limb, and wafts us, as well as
our letters, from Edinburgh to Cape Wrath in the penning of a paragraph.

When my mind was quite made up to make Auld Reekie my headquarters,
reserving the privilege of EXPLORING in all directions, I began to
explore in good earnest for the purpose of discovering a suitable
habitation. "And whare trew ye I gaed?" as Sir Pertinax says. Not to
George's Square--nor to Charlotte Square--nor to the old New Town--nor
to the new New Town--nor to the Calton Hill. I went to the Canongate,
and to the very portion of the Canongate in which I had formerly been
immured, like the errant knight, prisoner in some enchanted castle,
where spells have made the ambient air impervious to the unhappy
captive, although the organs of sight encountered no obstacle to his
free passage.

Why I should have thought of pitching my tent here I cannot tell.
Perhaps it was to enjoy the pleasures of freedom where I had so long
endured the bitterness of restraint, on the principle of the officer
who, after he had retired from the army, ordered his servant to continue
to call him at the hour or parade, simply that he might have the
pleasure of saying, "D--n the parade!" and turning to the other side to
enjoy his slumbers. Or perhaps I expected to find in the vicinity some
little old-fashioned house, having somewhat of the RUS IN URBE which
I was ambitious of enjoying. Enough: I went, as aforesaid, to the
Canongate.

I stood by the kennel, of which I have formerly spoken, and, my mind
being at ease, my bodily organs were more delicate. I was more
sensible than heretofore, that, like the trade of Pompey in MEASURE FOR
MEASURE,--it did in some sort