portion of the difficulties and distresses of his own and his brother's
early boyhood (the interesting story has lately become generally known
by the publication of their memoirs); and I then found it very difficult
to swallow my dinner, and my tears, while listening to him, so deeply
was I affected by his simple and touching account of the cruel struggle
the two brave lads--destined to become such admirable and eminent
men--had to make against the hardships of their position. I remember his
describing the terrible longing occasioned by the smell of newly baked
bread in a baker's shop near which they lived, to their poor,
half-starved, craving appetites, while they were saving every farthing
they could scrape together for books and that intellectual sustenance of
which, in after years, they became such bountiful dispensers to all
English-reading folk. Theirs is a very noble story of virtue conquering
fortune and dedicating it to the highest purposes. I used to meet the
Messrs. Chambers at Mr. Combe's house; they were intimate and valued
friends of the phrenologist, and I remember when the book entitled
"Vestiges of Creation" came out, and excited so great a sensation in the
public mind, that Mr. Combe attributed the authorship of it, which was
then a secret, to Robert Chambers.

Another Edinburgh friend of ours was Baron Hume, a Scottish law
dignitary, a charming old gentleman of the very old school, who always
wore powder and a pigtail, knee-breeches, gold-buckles, and black silk
stockings; and who sent a thrill of delight through my girlish breast
when he addressed me, as he invariably did, by the dignified title of
"madam;" though I must sorrowfully add that my triumph on this score was
considerably abated when, on the occasion of my second visit to
Edinburgh, after I had come out on the stage, I went to see my kind old
friend, who was too aged and infirm to go to the theater, and who said
to me as I sat on a low stool by his sofa, "Why, madam, they tell me you
are become a great tragic actress! But," added he, putting his hand
under my chin, and raising my face toward him, "how am I to believe that
of this laughing face, madam?" No doubt he saw in his memory's eye the
majestic nose of my aunt, and my "visnomy" under the effect of such a
contrast must have looked comical enough, by way of a tragic mask. By
the bye, it is on record that while Gainsborough was painting that
exquisite portrait of Mrs. Siddons which is no