uncils of the kingdom. The old close burgh system, with all its
abuses, ceased for ever, save in its remains--monumental debts,
and everlasting leases of town lands, granted on easy terms to
officials and their friends; and droll recollections, like those
embalmed by Galt in our literature, of solid municipal feasting, and
not so solid municipal services,--of exclusive cliqueships,
misemployed patronages, modest self-elections,--in short, of a
general practice of jobbing, more palpable than pleasant, and that
tended rather to individual advantage than corporate honour. The old
men retired, and a set of new men were elevated by newly-created
constituencies into their vacated places, to be disinterested on
dilapidated means, and noisy on short commons. The days of long and
heavy feasts had come to a close, and the days of long and heavy
speeches succeeded. No two events which this world of ours ever
saw, led to so vast an amount of bad speaking as the one Reform
Bill that swept away the rotten burghs, and the other Reform Bill
that opened the close ones. By and by, however, it came to be seen
that the old, privileged, self-elected class were succeeded in many
instances by a class that, though elected by their neighbours, were
yet not quite like their neighbours. Their neighbours were men
who, with their own personal business to attend to, had neither
the time nor the ambition to be moving motions or speaking speeches
in the eye of the public, and who could not take the trouble to
secure elections by canvassing voters. The men who had the time, and
took the trouble, were generally a class ill-hafted in society, who
had high notions of reforming everything save themselves, and of
keeping right all kinds of businesses except their own. The old
state of things was, notwithstanding its many faults, a state under
which our Scotch burghers rose into consideration by arts of
comparative solidity. A tradesman or shopkeeper looked well to his
business,--became an important man in the market-place and a good
man in the bank,--increased in weight in the same proportion that
his coffers did so, and grew influential and oracular on the
strength of his pounds sterling per annum. With altered times,
however, there arose a new order of men,--

'The wits of Charles found easier ways to fame.'

It was no longer necessary to spend the greater part of a lifetime in
acquiring money and character: a glib tongue, a few high professions
of