but which is, if not the main matter itself, at least germain to itinasmuch as that, in my eyes, this Patent Redpath would be valueless, as if it still lay unshaped and undug in the mine, mould-mixed and unfiltered ore, were it not stamped with a worth, above all value and above all price merely mercantile, by a die in the hand of friendship. Sir, you have my best thanks.

Shepherd. Mercy on us! what a moovin' o' mooths! and crunchin o' teeth! and smacking o' tongues! and lickin' o' lips! and dechtin' o' gabs wi' the rim o' the table-claith! I'm no sure if that last manœuvre be athegether legitimate; but tooils aye drap aff a body's knees, and ane's apt, in lootin' for them, to break their head again' the table, as it's reascendin' intil the upper warld; whereas, the rim o' the table-claith's aye ready at haun, sae there's really nae excuse for ony gentleman wi' a creeshy chin at a Noctes. What are ye devoorin, Mr. John Knox?

Shepherd. These are the twa best things ye hae uttered the nicht. North. Is it a true bill, James, that you have had hydrophobia? Shepherd. A fearsome fit o' it, sir, no o' the mere feegurative sort, Sic as reigns at a Noctes, but bonny feedy, bodily, flesh and blude, bane and sinny convulsions.

North. I did not believe, my dear James, there ever could have existed a dog in all this world so mad as to bite the Shepherd.

Shepherd. A mad dog does na ken a Hogg frae a hoolet. The optic nerves o' his een are a' diseased,-as ye may weel see, gin ye hae courage to examine sic pupils, and they dootless distrack the cretur's sowl within him wi' hideous apparitions o' his ain maister, in the shape o' the deevil, wi' a pitchfork gaun to pin him up again' the barn door.

Seward. Buller, how picturesque !

Buller. The great Poet of Hydrophobia!—(Inspecting an empty pint-pot.) These pint-pots are deceivers ever-they fill the hand, but they baulk the mouth. Offley must really be written to-they a'n't full measure.

Seward. If Offley's pots be pigmyfied-then there is no trust in An honester fellow breathes not vital air.

man.

J. Ballantyne (to BANDY, SQUINTUM, and PECH.)

And be those juggling fiends no more believed,
That palter with us in a double sense,

That keep the word of promise to our ear,
And break it to our hope."

Shepherd. The verra bit weans that used to ride on his back, wi'

their arms roun' his neck, and sometimes kissin' the verra chowks o' him, seem then to the distracked dowg to be sae mony demons, a' glowerin' and girnin' at him, wi' red-het pokers in their talons, threatenin' him wi' the death o' Edward the Second in Berkeley Castle. Wee Jamie himsel'--though certes a bit angel o' light-seemed to Hector's ain Oe, when he gaed mad, a verra inp o' hell. No wunner he tries to bite. But in the last stage o' the disease-he can only snap-snap-snap-for his unner jaw has arnaist lost a' its poor,-his puir tongue's hingin' out,-his flew a' smeared wi' slaver, his hide rouch and tawted, wi' a' the hair stannin' on end like the feathers o' a frieslan', his lugs like sere leaves, owre feeble even to flap,-his tail nae mair "hingin' owre his hurdies wi' a' swirl,"—his unhappy hurdies— but mire-woven and a' draggled wi' dirt;—and there he gangs stoiterin’ frae ae side o' the road to the tither, and wae's me! aften stacherin' quite doited intil the ditch,-noo and then emitten' a sort o' short snoke o' a sneevil frae his rinnin' nose,--for to bark noo has lang been beyont his abeelities, puir fellow! let him try't as he may, though ance he could bark, walkin' about the house a' nicht on the watch trampers stravagin' through the kintra at untimeous hours, after nae gude, aye, could ance bark, O'Bronte, like your verra sell; and never, oh! never be his doom yours! A rueful spectacle, Mr. North, to them that kent him when he was wice, and eneuch to break any Christian heart that kens hoo he used to lie during the evenings on the hearth, "beside the ingle blinkin' bonnily" in the midst o' the sma' household, hearkenin' and unnerstaunin' a' that was said,-and hoo he used, God pity him, as regular as clock-work, to loup up upon the coverlet on the wide chest-bed, and fa' into a watchfu' sleep at the bairn's feet! James Ballantyne (much affected).

"And from mine eyelids wipe the tears
That sacred pity hath engendered."

Shepherd. A' the parish wi' pitchforks are at his heels. In the haunted glimmer o' his blindness, the puir possessed colley misses the brig, and the rinnin stream seems to his red een a pool o' blude. He daurna-he canna-lowp in to soom for his life-for the Hydrophobia is stronger than his dim dread o' his fellow-creturs, and shiverin' and shudderin', and yowlin' as if he had fa'n intil a bon-fire or a biler o' bilin' water, he cowps owre, sticket and shotten wi' a hunder prongs and a thousan' bullets, in convulsions o' the dead-thraws. A' the while women and weans are seen tossin' their arms, and heard shriekin', frae hill-taps and wundows o' houses wi' stecket doors, and the boughs o' trees till Luath lies still at last, covered wi' a rickle o' cruel stanes, only a bit o' his skin here and there seen through,—and then, to be sure, there is a wailin' o' weans, both callants and lassies, to think that

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colley should hae been killed, wha used to gang wi' them to the verra kirk on the Sabbaths, and, till God had allowed him till gang mad, had never offered to bite onybody but neerdoweels, a' his born days! Grown-up folks are a' feared to bury him-but-I'm tellin' a true story-wee Jamie and his feres, in their grief, ware na sae cowardly, and, placing the dead body on a haun-barrow, they moved awa' wi't in funeral procession-heaven bless them-and haein howkit a hole, buried their beloved Luath aneath a green brae, and laid a flat stane on him frae,the channel o' the Yarrow, just as if he had been a Christian interred in a kirkyard!

Mullion. Now, Jamie, yourself in hydrophobia.

Shepherd. Na. I shanna-for nae ither reason—just because—wi' that girnin' gab-you asked me-Moolyon. You've nae bizziness till be impedent. In a' Mr. North's banter-even when at the waurstthere's sic a visible and audible speerit o' amity and respect, that I can thole amaist ony nonsense frae him—though my face, at chance times, wull grow a wee red—at least a wee het; but hoo daur ye preshume to imagine that I will thole a thimmlefu' o' impertinence frae the likes o' you, wha I aften think, are sairly out o' your ain place in a Noctes, and would be seen to far mair advantage in your natural sphere, your ain provision-warehouse, ye bardy body, in the Lawnmarket! As Joe says, "Take your change out o' that!"

Mullion (aside to his next-chair neighbour). He's gettin' fou.

Shepherd. What's that you're sayin', sir? nane o' your whusperin'! The man that whuspers in company should be smothered, pitten intil a tea-chest, and sent aff to Doctor Knox.* The maist disgustfu'est trick about a whisperer is, that a' the while he's whusperin' intil anither's ear something about you, the coof, though cunnin' and crafty aneuch, for ordinar, forgets that ye may be observin' his mean motions, and senselessly keeps keekin' up at you, every noo and then, wi' the odious tail o' his ee, joggin' wi' his loathsome elbow him he's forcin' to commit a breech o' gude mainners in listenin' for ae single instant to his sickenin' insiniations-till he is recalled to a sense o' the awkwardness o' his situation, and the enormity o' his sin, by a jug o' water just aff the bile, sent wi' a bash intil his face, and a blatter again the wa' ahint him, and deevil tak him but he wou'd hae been cheep o't, had he been brained! Faith-I'm rather ruffled-come, my dear Delta-for you are aye the gentleman-by some pleesant observation-as Milton, I think, says, or something like it-for I hate a correck quotation

"Smooth the down o' my ravin darkness till it smile."

Delta. Let me feel your pulse, my dear sir.

Mixed up in the horrible and murderous transactions of Burke and Hare, the resurrection mer, as fully discussed in the preceding volume.-M.

(DELTA takes out his gold stop-watch, a keepsake from CHRISTOPHER—a memorial of friendship--and mark of gratitude to him, the Pain-reliever-presented to the Poet by NORTH at the termination of a fit of gout in the stomach, which, but for Mr. Moir, had certainly proved fatal.)

A hundred and ten-a hundred-ninety-eighty-seventy-five-sixtyeight. Now you will do-my dear James. The circulation is restored to its former currency.

Shepherd. Faith-I'm glad to hear't. For Peel's Bill has been the ruin o' the kintra. I kenna what would hae become o' Scotland had the government extended till it the expiration o' the sma' notes.

North. My dearest Delta, it has long delighted me to see you and our friend there, whom we have christened by the somewhat heathenish name of the Modern Pythagorean-strewing the paths, and adorning the pursuits of your profession-in the olden time often so strewed and adorned-witness Garth, Armstrong, Arbuthnot, Akenside, Glyn, and many other men of poetical powers, or otherwise fine genius-with the flowers of literature.

Delta. I have long since dismissed from my mind, my dear sir, ary misgivings on that subject. Your judgment, and that of other enlightened men, have confirmed my own, that such occasional relaxation, as the study of elegant literature affords, from the not unsevere and rarely intermitting labours of a profession, of which I conscientiously endeavour to discharge the duties, to the best of my skill and knowledge, so far from either incapacitating or disinclining my mind for such labours and such duties, does greatly strengthen both its moral and intellectual energies; and I am happy-heaven forefend I should say I were proud to believe that in my own circle those occasional relaxations, so far from being disapproved, or their fruits despised, have been thought to add to the respectability of my character. My name in literature I know is humble-but such as my reputation is, I am satisfied with it. My ambition lies elsewhere-it is in my profession.

North. Your name in literature is not humble-it is high; and all who have heads to know, and hearts to feel, what true poetry is, acknowledge Mr. Moir to be a poet. It is a delightful thought to me, sir, to think, that your fine native genius offered almost its first fruits to the work which I occasionally overlook, and in which I now take an almost fatherly interest. It is now enriched with many gems of your ripened and matured imagination,—and no Number can ever be unworthy of the name of Maga that is graced with the signature of Delta.

Shepherd. The Triangular Bard-though I houp the nicht, that "round as a neep he'll gang toddlin' hame."

North. Heavens! can any studies be idle in a physician-in a medical man-that inevitably lead to elevation of spirit, breathing into

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it tenderness and humanity? Will he be a less thoughtful visitant at the sick or dying bed, who from such studies has gathered knowledge of all the beatings of the human heart, and all the workings of the human imagination, at such times so wild and so bewildering, aye, often even beyond the range of poetry, in those delirious dreams?

Shepherd. That's a truth. In the ancient warld, was na there but ae god for poetry, music, and medishin? and the ancients, tak ma word for't, saw far intill the mysterious connexions o' things in Natur. Owre mony folk noo-a-days, forgets that the alliance atween sowle and body's stricker-though no unlike it-than that atween church and state. Let doctors learn a' they can o' baith--and hoo they are to do that without leeterature, philosophy, and poetry, as weel's anatomy and mere medishin, surpasses my comprehenshun. Some doctors practeeze by a sort o' natural rumblegumshun, without ony knowledge either o' leeterature or ony thing else; and that accoonts for some itherwise unaccoontable kirkyards.

North. No persons of the slightest sense will for a moment suffer themselves to be misled into such a gross delusion. Your mere professional man-in the narrowest sense of that much misused word-is a man utterly destitute of all knowledge that will not go into a pillbox. He is, in truth, little better than a practitioner on the purses of his patients. But such practitioners it is, and such patients, who would revile at literature as worse than idle or useless as pernicious -in a follower of Galen, Hippocrates, or Esculapius. Are they, pray, the followers of these immortals? Much in the same way as a dungcart drawn by a single horse, which might probably perform the distance from London to Edinburgh in a month, may be said to follow his Majesty's most gracious mail-coach, which now does it in about forty hours.

Shepherd. Mr. Blackwood, allow me to say, that I defy a' Scotland to hae produced another chairman as gude's yoursel'. You've lett'n the current o' conversation wind awa' intil a thoosan' channels, without ostentatiously direckin't-you hae had a pleasant and polite word to say to every body about ye-your wits hae never for ae meenit gane a wool-gatherin' out o' the Saloon-you hae been ready wi' your smile, your lauch, and your guffaw—and instead o' wushin' to show aff yoursell, hae been desirous to bring out ithers, no dootin' that a' the kimpany would feel that you was in your delicht doin' your duty, and to say naethin' about the gled's ee and the deacon's haun' wi' which ye aye took care to push roun' the bottles, I'm sair mistaen if I hinna drawn the pictur, wi' a few bauld strokes, o' the best o' a' possible landlords.

Omnes. True-true-true-true-true-true!

Buller. (Rising and turning to MR. NORTH, and then to Mr. BLACKWOOD.) Mr. North, Gentlemen, I rise to propose, with all the