was travelling in
Scotland, and in Edinburgh I met some friends and inquired for an old
lady whom I had known as a child. I found that she was living at a place
called Aberladye, on the seacoast. I decided to go to see her, and was
directed to take the train to Dreme Station, and there I should find a
conveyance to take me to Aberladye. When I arrived the conveyance was
filled with local travellers and I started to walk three and a half
miles to my friend. After I had gone about half a mile I passed by a
magnificent entrance to a fine estate. Soon after this I heard a
carriage coming, and when it caught up to me the gentleman who was
driving in the dog-cart pulled up and asked if I was going to Aberladye
and invited me to take a lift. I thanked him and mounted beside him. He
asked where I wanted to go. I told him to Rose Cottage, when we entered
into general conversation. He learned that I was from China, so we had
quite a pleasant time, and, arriving opposite to Rose Cottage, he pulled
up and graciously pointed to the house, bade me good-bye, and hoped we
might meet again.

I went up to the door and rang the bell, and the old lady herself
answered it all in a flutter, as she had seen me set down from the trap,
which was driven by Lord Rosebery himself. Well, I asked if Mrs.
McKippen lived there. She replied, "Yes; I am she." I said, "Perhaps
you don't remember me?" She said, "No; but I know your voice." I told
her that I was Arthur Knights. "Aye, laddie," she cried, "I heard that
you was drowned at sea twenty-five years ago." Well, I need hardly say
that I was welcome to her and her husband, who was a retired business
man. Poor old gentleman, he cried as a child when she told him of my
taking the trouble to come and see her, and how when I was a small boy
at a juvenile party I was sore distressed by my dancing slippers being
too big and that they kept slipping off. Then she came to the rescue and
took me to one side and stitched them to the heel of my stocking to
enable me to have a good time.

I spent a couple of days with my friends and then went on my way, and I
have often wondered whether that lady could possibly have connected my
manhood voice with that of my childhood.

An Incident of the Great Taiping Rebellion.

In the latter part of 1862 I left Shanghai on my usual voyage to Hankow.
This port is six hundred miles up the Yangtse River. After we had got
about sixty miles up the river, which is here a