from a sense that my friend was the most valuable
depository of Scottish traditions that was probably now to be found.
This was a subject on which my mind was so much made up that, when I
heard her carry her description of manners so far back beyond her
own time, and describe how Fletcher of Salton spoke, how Graham of
Claverhouse danced, what were the jewels worn by the famous Duchess of
Lauderdale, and how she came by them, I could not help telling her I
thought her some fairy, who cheated us by retaining the appearance of a
mortal of our own day, when, in fact, she had witnessed the revolutions
of centuries. She was much diverted when I required her to take some
solemn oath that she had not danced at the balls given by Mary of Este,
when her unhappy husband occupied Holyrood in a species of honourable
banishment; [The Duke of York afterwards James II., frequently resided
in Holyrood House when his religion rendered him an object of suspicion
to the English Parliament.] or asked whether she could not recollect
Charles the Second when he came to Scotland in 1650, and did not possess
some slight recollections of the bold usurper who drove him beyond the
Forth.

"BEAU COUSIN," she said, laughing, "none of these do I remember
personally, but you must know there has been wonderfully little change
on my natural temper from youth to age. From which it follows, cousin,
that, being even now something too young in spirit for the years which
Time has marked me in his calendar, I was, when a girl, a little too
old for those of my own standing, and as much inclined at that period
to keep the society of elder persons, as I am now disposed to admit the
company of gay young fellows of fifty or sixty like yourself, rather
than collect about me all the octogenarians. Now, although I do not
actually come from Elfland, and therefore cannot boast any personal
knowledge of the great personages you enquire about, yet I have seen
and heard those who knew them well, and who have given me as distinct
an account of them as I could give you myself of the Empress Queen, or
Frederick of Prussia; and I will frankly add," said she, laughing and
offering her BONBONNIERE, "that I HAVE heard so much of the years which
immediately succeeded the Revolution, that I sometimes am apt to confuse
the vivid descriptions fixed on my memory by the frequent and animated
recitation of others, for things which I myself have actually witnessed.
I caught myself but y