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"All hail, my lord; hail to thee, Thane of East

Neither Mary's volubility nor William's tender | purpose which had induced him so quietly to accept silence could elicit more from him than this, that he it from his brother, and which had taken him pricould not settle down idly in England, and that vately to Mr. Sheepskins. The change in his therefore he meant to make work for himself in thoughts, likes, and pursuits was so great that he felt Australia; and after an hour's chat, he left them, he could not settle in England, where he could not promising to call for William next day. As soon as quite free himself from old associates, so he deterthe door was shut on him, Mary, with a courtly rev-mined to emigrate. But when on board - his great erence, went up to her husband, saying, purpose achieved he sank into a silent condition; he did not appear unhappy, but soon prostration of the body followed on that of the mind, and he died before the ship reached its destination. Doubtless all was well with him. He had during the last four months striven to repair the evils of his youth. As far as he could, he had worked justice on himself; and now he could begin again in a country less known to him than Queensland even, and where it is hoped he would make use of the experience so dearly bought in this world.

wood!"

"What do you mean?"

"Don't you see," she said, "that John means to give you back the place?"

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Mary, your wits are going, from your hankering so much for those fair acres. What do you mean?" "O, nothing," she said, poutingly. I was only prophesying."

But the news of his death, a few months afterwards, gave William a melancholy assurance that he was really the rightful owner.

The next day John did not appear as he had promised, but sent to fetch his brother to his hotel, By leaving the estate to his nephew, and by givwhence they went down together to the ship. They ing his brother only a life interest in it, John prewere both rather silent, though John assumed a light-vented William from getting rid of it on any plea. heartedness in talking of his prospects. As the hour drew near for William to leave the vessel, he wondered that his brother had no last words to give of directions about his property. "John," he said aloud," of course you have put all your affairs into Sheepskins's hands? I ask, because with your sudden departure I shall be glad to know that your property is in good care.

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"O yes, Sheepskins knows everything I want done."

At the last moment, as William was leaving the ship, John called to him, "O William, give this parcel to your eldest boy as a remembrance from his uncle."

And thus the brothers parted.

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Thus it was that the youngest son of Sir John Williams became "William Williams, Esq., Q. C., of Eastwood Park, County Herts."

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The question is left to the reader to answer, Was it by mere chance that these circumstances occurred, or was there an overruling Intelligence at work, who out of confusion brought order, and made contradictory laws subservient to one great end?

A LOST ART.

AMONG the many wrongs that I suffered during my school-time - a period which it is only the poets who venture to misrepresent as agreeable—I set down as the most mischievous this wrong, that my handwriting was ruined. The seminary at which I was a pupil was unfortunately a Classical or Fashionable one. No young gentleman was supposed to be in a position that so vulgar an accomplishment as caligraphy could possibly become necessary to him in after-life. If you gave them the ideas and a dictionary, there were few of us who had not the "faculty divine" of constructing Latin verses ; but as for the hand in which they were transcribyou might think it had been an ingenious effort of our little toes. In a school preparatory for Eton, however, such learning as how to write was no more to be expected than the art of book-keeping by double entry, and therefore parents and guardians were not disappointed. Once in a term, indeed, we each indited an epistle to our friends at home, under the surveillance of Dr. Swishem and his crew of ushers; but it was felt on all hands to be a very unsuccessful affair. The composition, it is true, was elaborate and ornate, and about as unlike what a boy would write, if left to himself, as can be conceived.

She spoke with such wild excitement that he undid the outer string and paper, after which he came to an inner cover sealed. Then even the philosopher became puzzled as he opened a large piece of parched, ment. What excited him seemed to quiet Mary. She sank on a chair, gasping out, "Read it!" He read it to himself, so she got up to look over him. There was a long pause, and then William cried for the first time since he left the nursery.

"The noble fellow, the poor, noble-hearted fellow! Mary, we never did him justice! This is another deed of gift. John has hereby given the estate to our eldest boy; but I am to enjoy it during my life; or as he has worded it, he has given Eastwood in fee to Laurence with an usufructuary interest to me for life. Wife, there is a stronger will than mine at work in this matter."

It is needless to tell the reader that a letter, expressing William's appreciation of his brother's generosity, was sent to John by the next mail; but it never reached him. The great vicissitudes of the past year, the changes in his circumstances (greater within than even without) working on a frame weakened by years of hard living, had been too much for him.

As long as the excitement of returning the estate to William lasted, he kept up. This intention of dispossessing himself of Eastwood was the

MY DEAR [M. or P.]-I write to inform you that the school-term will be completed on the 29th inst., upon which day please to make arrangements for sending for me, if you can conveniently. Dr. and Mrs. Swishem request me to convey to you their best compliments. Hoping you are in good health, I remain, dear [M. or P.], your Affectionate Son.

It would not be credited by Messrs. Piesse and Lubin, perfumers, how execrably those “holiday letters" were permitted (in so fashionable a seminary) to smell of india-rubber. But the fact is, that

Every Saturday,

March 31, 1866]

A LOST ART.

case of a very flagrant outrage,swigging the Docnot only had the parallel lines, without which our communications would have been more or less diag-tor's table "ale" (it never wore Mr. Bass's triangle, onal, to be rubbed out, but also an immense amount I am certain) upon the sly, I say, in the case of of dirt, produced by tears, perspiration, jacket-cuffs, that depraved young gentleman, Maltworm minor, and other matters all incident to this tremendous I have known an imposition of Two Thousand Lines There was not much in common between Dr. ordeal; not to mention that half a dozen blades of of the poet Virgil to be set in punishment. penknives were used up in the work of erasures. The delicate manner (we called it "gingerly") S. (who was a foolish little round man, given up How our fingers scurin which the second r in "arrangements" (omitted to heraldry) and the bard of Mantua, but they in the original) was inserted by the Doctor himself, were always hereby connected in our minds, and in as good an imitation of the writer's own style as hated with an equal rancor. his sense of propriety would permit, and the final ried over those odious hexameters, until they grew What flourish in which the signature was enveloped, as at stiff and sore, and refused to form the letters! the conclusion of some pyrotechnic display, were How we scratched and scrawled, and dug into the efforts which would have excited our admiration, if paper, with those execrable steel pens! boys had such a tribute to give. They were really strange inventions were made use of (though never wonderful to us, most of whose native hieroglyphics patented) to shorten the cruel mechanical toil - by tying half a dozen pens together, and would have defied the subtilty of Colonel Rawlinson surely almost as bad as the Crank of our model or any other decipherer who had been only accus- prisonstomed to deal with cuneiform inscriptions. I say imputing the vice of repetition where our author In short, although of the positive results of my most of us, because some of us had been very respect- had never been suspected of it before! able writers before we came to Dr. Swishem's, and boast (for I soon forgot how to compose Latin owed our subsequent failure entirely to him and his education at Minerva Lodge I have but little to system. verses), that little was more than balanced by the fact, that my handwriting was utterly ruined by its Imposition system. Excessive speed was the only virtue which it nourished in the way of penmanship; we soon got to write "running-hands." But as for the art of writing, as a means of communicating information to others, it lapsed altogether, and was lost from amongst us, as completely as the method of staining glass is said to have disappeared from the whole human family.

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I myself, for instance, remember the time in my early boyhood when I could read with tolerable ease any sentence that I had once written, no matter though forty-eight hours might have intervened; whereas, as an adult, such a feat has been utterly impossible. The learned sergeant in the Pickwick Papers, who is described as so indifferent a penman that his best efforts could only be read by his clerk, his moderate ones by himself, and his usual ones by neither, was yet better than I; for after a day and night have elapsed, I can make absolutely nothing Caligraphic Mysof my own writing. It was a tery" long before the Stereoscopic Company patented theirs; and were it not for my wife, to whom the gift of interpretation has been revealed, and who copies out all my manuscripts for the press, the general public would know nothing of their favorite author. But stay, I am anticipating. It was never supposed at Minerva Lodge that any pupil would subsequently so far degrade himself, and it, as to endeavor to make a living by his pen. The possi-to do my revered masbility of such a misfortune never entered into the Doctor's brain. ter justice We were all country gentlemen's sons, and it was hoped that we should remain in that position of life in which it had pleased Providence to start us.

--

But even a country gentleman has sometimes to
write an invitation, and even an Address to his Con-
stituents, if he aspires to sit in St. Stephen's (and
does not get it written by somebody else), and there-
fore I contend that Dr. Swishem should have taught
us how to write. Perhaps he imagined, as the ad-
vocates of classical education maintain in the case
of History, Geography, and the Modern Languages,
that Writing is too contemptible a subject for the
intellect of youth to grapple with, and may be safely
But, at all events,
left for subsequent acquisition.
he need not have spoiled "the hands" of those
who had hands. This, however, was effected most
completely by his system of punishment by Impo-
sitions. If I was caught "out of bounds," or eat-
ing sausages in bed, or putting slate-pencil into a
keyhole, or (worse than all) if nature, overburdened
by an early dinner, gave way during the Doctor's
sermon, and I fell asleep at church, there ensued
an imposition; that is, I was compelled to copy out,
from a classical author, a certain amount of lines,
varying from a hundred to one thousand. In the

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Spirit-hands," to judge from the few specimens of the penmanship of the other world with which we have been favored, are not particularly adapted for are as copperplate setting "copies," and, indeed, much remind one of the wanderings of a spider, recently escaped from an ink-pot; but "spirit-hands specimens of caligraphy compared to my hand. To people who can't spell, a bad handwriting is some advantage; for in cases of doubt-such as, whether the i or the e come first in Believe or Receive they have only to make their customary scrawl, and the possible error becomes undiscoverable; but the nature of my profession has compelled me to acquire this accomplishment (no thanks to Dr. Swishem), There was one person who discovered ground for and I have rarely any occasion for concealment. He was a gentleman who lived a life of leiscongratulation upon this my shortcoming, and only one. The first day upon ure, and he confessed that my letters gave him greater pleasure than those of other friends, because they "lasted him so long." a dozen perusals, a glimmering of what was intended which he received one, he would discover, after half to be conveyed; the next day, some interesting detail would crop out; and by the end of a week, if some sentence did not emerge with a flash which altered the entire complexion of the affair, he found himself (with the assistance of his family, and any ingenious friend who happened to be enjoying his hospitality) in possession of all that I had wished to one. When my wife was unable to copy my deathsay. But this gentleman's case was an exceptional less works, the compositors murmured and rebelled. They only knew English, they said; not Sanscrit. My Essay on the Assyrian Bull, for instance, with 66 erasures some Remarks on its Treatment under Rinderpest, as suggested by Nineveh "Friezes," cost my publisher seventy pounds in printer's charges for

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The head

And he spoke within the mark, for before I left his establishment, cured, I had to take eighteen. I consider that if the law of England was framed upon equitable principles, it would enable me to "recover" the sum of four pounds ten shillings from the executors of the late Dr. Swishem; but I need not say that such is not the case.

and alterations " alone. I am so ashamed of my "Don't believe it, sir," returned he. "I have had own performance, that I dare not save my fingers hundreds of adult pupils, who all write like this— by employing a multiplying machine," even for only certainly not quite so badly. Not one schoolbusiness-letters. My small children make me blush boy out of ten who has been brought up on classical for my inferiority, when they show me their "pot-principles can write a legible hand. hooks and hangers," and I shall not easily forget that masters ought to be flogged all round." moment of embarrassment, when one of them, in "Or even where the boys are flogged," suggested the absence of her governess, asked me to set her I; but he did n't understand this allusion. "a copy." "Dear papa, please write me out a line "You will require to take a dozen lessons instead of Rs." I could as easily have written down the of six, sir," continued he, severely. genealogy of Pharaoh, king of Egypt. Even the two ingenious "blind men at the post-office were unable to decipher me except by mutual consultation. My envelopes took ten times the period that other Illegibles did in passing through their hands. They doubtless puzzled over the efforts of all those who had, like myself, been educated at Minerva Lodge, but the profession of literature the trade My friends, of course, with the exception of the of the constant scribbler - had in my case so thor- Gentleman of Leisure, were delighted with the reoughly completed the evil which Impositions had sult attained; and the compositors who have the begun, that I was facile princeps among even them: pleasure of setting up this paper can scarcely believe the most infamous of all bad writers. Literature their eyes. But I am by no means altogether freed needs have no such effect as this, if the previous from the consequences of my late deformity (for training has been good. Some foolish persons think that's the very word). A most respectable tradesit is a mark of genius to write ill, but this is a great man, to whom I gave my first check after this wonmistake. I look over my own epistolary treasures, drous change, was, upon presenting it in person at and see with shame how quite otherwise is the case. my banker's, at once taken into custody upon the Place aux dames. This neat little microscopic charge of forgery. He has brought an action against hand, every letter of which is legible, belongs to the the firm for defamation of character, and I am subauthoress of Our Village; and these bold and well-poenaed as a witness in the Central Criminal Court. formed lines are from the same fingers which wrote My old check-book will be there produced, and the Deerbrook and the Crofton Boys. signatures (?) contrasted with the way which I have recently acquired - including a beautiful flourish like an Eagle of subscribing my name. It will not, therefore, be necessary to humiliate myself by further confessions, since, for the culmination of this sad history, readers may consult the public papers for themselves.

This free and manly hand (the best I know) is that which set down the Domestic Annals of Scotland; and this, perhaps the next best, so firm, distinct, and yet so flowing, is the same which has moved mankind at will to tears and laughter, from the days of Pickwick until now. To judge by this bold running-hand, the Woman in White was no Dead Secret to the printer; and here is the clear legible work of those dead fingers which shall paint, alas! no Colonel Newcomes for us any more.

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THE BROOCH OF BRUCE.

THE Highland plaid, called the breacan-feile, or Had I possessed the genius of all these writers "checkered covering," was, originally, a far more combined, I should yet have been as one who important article of dress than it is at the present preaches in an unknown tongue, edifying no Reader day, forming, in fact, the chief portion of the cos(and least of all "the Reader" who is employed by tume. Professor Cosmo Innes would appear to disthe printer), but for the fair Interpretess of whom I believe the antiquity of the Highland checkered have spoken; and even she was useless to me in dress, and is hard upon "the man of fashion who some things. There are letters which one cannot can afford to ape the outlaw of the melodrama." get one's wife to write for one; and my correspond- But General Stewart says that "in the toilet of ents grew rebellious, and threatened to cut off all a Highlander of fashion," the arrangements of the communication with one who gave them so much plaid were of the greatest consequence. It had a trouble. A business-friend in the city, declaring length of four yards and a breadth of two, and was that "my telegraph-hand was much better than so folded that it covered the body and came down my writing-hand," insisted upon hearing from me to the knee, being confined round the waist by a by the wires only. Finally, a "round-robin" was belt, except in wet weather, when it could be adaddressed to me from the members of my own fam-justed so as to shelter the whole person. When the ily, requesting that I should take writing-lessons of wearer required the free use of both his arms, the a professor, and enclosing thirty shillings to defray plaid was fastened across the breast by a bodkin or his charges for the first six lessons. I make it a rule brooch; but when the right arm only was left bare, never- under any circumstances to return peo- the brooch was worn on the left shoulder. The ple's money, and, at the same time, I am too well-brooch was circular in its shape, and was frequently principled not to apply what I receive to the pur-adorned with crystals, cairn-gorms, and precious pose for which it is intended. At the age of forty-stones; while its silver rim was engraved with varifive, therefore, I began to learn that science which I ous devices and mottoes. Martin mentions some had acquired at eight years old, and lost during my" of one hundred merks value, with the figures of residence at Minerva Lodge. various animals curiously engraved.”

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Impositions, eh?" remarked the Professor as soon as he set eyes upon a specimen of what the painters would call my "latest style."

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These Highland brooches were preserved as family heir-looms, and were treasured with a superstitious care. Their resemblance to the Roman fibula seems to have greatly impressed the mind of Wordsworth, who, in the brooch and plaid (worn

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kilt-wise), could see vestiges of the earliest history
of the people, and their communications with the
Roman invaders. He says that, before Columba's
visit,

was not unknown
The clasp that fixed the Roman gown;
The Fibula, whose shape, I ween,
Still in the Highland Broach is seen."

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ered in his opponent his friend General Douglas, who was also a fugitive. Then they came down to Ugadale, on the eastern shore, and gained admittance at the house of one Mackay, who was entertaining his friends at a merry-making, and who welcomed them with Highland hospitality, compelling Bruce to drink a quaigh of usquebangh, saying, "I am king in my own house." Then Mackay gave them their The Brooch of Lorn, that "brooch of burning beds and breakfasts, and took them up Beinn-angold," is historical, and forms the subject of the min- tuire, in order to show them the way to the western strel's song at the feast of the Lord of the Isles. It coast of Cantire. Then Bruce disclosed himself, and was at the defeat at Dalree, in Breadalbane, in promised that when he had regained his throne he 1306, that Bruce, being hotly pursued by one of the would grant Mackay any favor that he should ask of Macdougals of Lorn, slew him with his battle-axe, him; whereupon Mackay replied, that if he had the but left in his death-grasp his plaid and brooch. two farms of Ugadale and Arnicle, he should be as This brooch was carefully preserved at Dunolly happy as a king. Bruce promised him this, and Castle, where it was said to have been lost at the bade him farewell at the spot still called Cross Mhic burning of the Castle in the seventeenth century, and Caidh, or "the Cross of Mackay," telling him to a statement to this effect is made by Sir Walter Scott, come and see him in Edinburgh whenever he should in the notes to his poem, and also by General Stew-perceive a bonfire blazing on a certain hill in Galloart, in his "Sketches" (ii. 442). This, however, is way. Mackay did so, and received from the king erroneous, for the brooch is still preserved by Ad- the title-deeds of the two farms; and when he demiral Macdougal, at Dunolly House, and an illustra-clined drinking a goblet of wine, Bruce constrained tion of it is given in the last edition (1864) of Pro- him, reminding him that he, in his turn, was king in

fessor Wilson's "Prehistoric Annals."

Another brooch of Bruce, but acquired in a friendly instead of a hostile manner,* has also been preserved to the present day. The brooch is very large and handsome; the central stone is a fine cairn-gorm, surrounded with Scotch pebbles, set in silver, much tarnished by age. Within the brooch the letters F. M. K. are rudely marked, being the initials of Farracher Mac Kay, to whom Bruce gave the brooch. The clan of the Mackays of Ugadale was one of ten of the second class of vassals of the Isles; and Gregory mentions that Gilchrist Mac Imar Mackay had a grant of lands in Cantire from King Robert Bruce, and " that from him were descended the Mackays of Ugadale, who, after the forfeiture of the Lord of the Isles, attached themselves to the Macdonalds of Islay."

The history of this brooch given by Bruce to Mackay is a curious page in the romantic annals of royal fugitives. According to Cantire tradition, in those days when King Robert Bruce was a fugitive, and had a price set upon his head, he was nigh perishing from hunger and fatigue during a night passed upon the bleak mountain of Sliobhghoil, in North Argyleshire, but was kept warm by a goat who also refreshed him with her milk, in grateful remembrance of which he afterwards made a law that forbade the poinding (or pounding) of a goat. The next morning he walked on to Cantire, South Argyleshire, and met a beggar-man, who gave him a little meal, which the king mixed with water in the heel of his shoe, and ate heartily, saying, "Hunger is a good cook; it is bad to slight food; barley-meal brose out of my shoe is the best food that ever I used." Then he came on to Cantire's monarch of mountains 2,170 feet high-Beinn-an-tuirc, "the wild boar's mountain," so called because Diarmid had there slain the dreaded boar, and had lost his own life through the jealousy of Fingal.

So

Bruce wandered in the forest of Bunlaradh, where he met a man who would not tell who he was. they fought; and when they had fought till they were exhausted, they agreed that it was pitiful work, and that it would be better for them to tell their names. Whereupon they did so, and Bruce discov

Now in the possession of Captain Hector Macneal, of Ugadale and Lossit, in Cantire.

his own house.

Such, told briefly, is the purport of the popular stories relating to Bruce and Mackay that I collected on the spot in 1860, and which were published in the following year in my "Glencreggan"; and in these, as will have been seen, no mention is made of a brooch. Further inquiries on this subject, made during the five past years, have put me in possession of fresh particulars relating to this story, which have not hitherto been published. A Cantire laird tells me: I believe the true version of this story to be as follows, and this I had from old John Macdougall of Killmaluaig, and the late Ugadale so far confirmed it; moreover, the tenure of the Ugadales further vouches for the truth of the story. It would appear, then, from this version of the story, that the king slept at Killmaluaig, a farm (now belonging to Glencreggan) of which Mackay was then tenant. The king was in disguise, and was hospitably entertained by Mackay, who spoke strongly against the him to the ferry for Arran. Mackay not only could Bruce. The king asked Mackay if he could direct do so, but offered to escort him on his way in the morning. They started accordingly, and rested where a stone now marks the spot on the hill of Arnicle, which is still the property of the Ugadales. From this spot Mackay pointed out to the king certain crown-lands, namely, the lands of Arnicle. They proceeded on their journey, and came to Ugadale, which was also pointed out as crown-lands. At length they came to the ferry, where the king sat down on a stone where, after thanking Mackay for his hospitality, and giving him his brooch as a farewell token, he declared to him who he was. This put poor Mackay in a great fright, from which, however, he was soon relieved by the king telling him that he need not fear, for that he had entertained him hospitably as a stranger, and that, if he should succeed in obtaining his rights, he would give unto him those crown-lands of Ugadale and Arnicle. The king afterwards carried his promise into effect, and the lands are now held on the obligation of entertaining the sovereign on coming to Cantire.

which is still shown

and

In this version of the story, General Douglas disappears into his original mythical mists, and there

* "Glencreggan, or a Highland Home in Cantire."

THE MINISTER'S SANDY AND JESS.

1. WHAT SANDY WAS TO BE.

SANDY, Mr. Stewart the minister of Clovenford's only son, was to be a minister like his father and grandfather, who had both wagged their heads in pulpits before him. Second-sight had seen him in a Geneva gown and pair of bands from the time he wore long-clothes and bibs.

are other slighter variations that can surprise no one | tire, where lic the bodies of "the mighty Somerled," who observes how rapidly even historical facts be- and of his descendant Angus Oig Macdonald, the come incrusted with fable. A Cantire correspond- "Ronald" of "The Lord of the Isles," who, with ent, to whom kinship to Bruce's Mackay has afford- his "men of Argile and Kintyr," as Barbour says ed peculiar means of information, has given me a in his poem of "The Brus," gave his king such version of the story in which some new and inter-important aid in the fight at Bannockburn, and esting particulars will be found. He says, that when who had also entertained him in his wanderings at Bruce had entered Mackay's house, the farmer of his castle at Saddell. fered him a seat at the supper-table. Bruce refused it; whereupon Mackay, bent upon hospitality, said that he must be seated, when Bruce replied, "Must is a word for kings to use to their subjects." On which Mackay said, "Every man is a king in his own house." When, on the morrow, Mackay had escorted his guest on his way, "Bruce presented his entertainer with the massive and curious silver brooch which is now in the possession of the laird of Ugadale," and asked him as to his position and prospects, and what would be the greatest boon that could be conferred upon him. Mackay's reply was, "To be possessor of the land that I now farm as tenant." According to this version of the story, Bruce did not disclose himself to Mackay at this interview; but, when he "enjoyed his ain again," sent for the farmer to court, and there desired him | to be seated. On Mackay's hesitating to do this, Bruce said, "Every man is a king in his own house"; whereupon Mackay recollected the occasion on which he himself had used the words, and then recognized the stranger whom he had befriended in the person of his king, who then presented him with the two farms of Ugadale and Árnicle in perpetuity. The original grant is still preserved. It is a piece of sheepskin, three inches square, bearing the words, "I, Robert the First, give the lands of Ugadale and Arnicle to McKay and his heirs forever. On this grant the family held the lands till the reign of James IV., when it was formally confirmed by a crown-charter.

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The spot at Arnicle where Bruce and Mackay parted is marked by a cairn, on which was an inscription, which, according to tradition, recorded the history of the event, but it is now illegible. | The glen still bears the name of Mackay's Glen. Ugadale is still a farm-house, as the Macneals reside at Lossit Park, near Campbelton. The late Laird of Ugadale was prevented from claiming his right to entertain his Sovereign, when the Queen visited Cantire, Sept. 17th, 1847, as she did not leave her yacht, which was moored for the night in Campbelton harbor. It was publicly stated by Douglas Jerrold that, on this occasion, the Provost sent the bell-man round the town to announce that "the Queen is now in the Loch!" though the real words are reported to have been, "the Queen's ships are now in the Loch." But even if the proclamation was made as reported, it was not a greater blunder than that which occurred at the Queen's visit to Aberdeen, when one of the announcements to the public was, "Her Majesty is now in the Dock."

The Mackays retained possession of Ugadale and Arnicle till the end of the seventeenth century, when the estate passed into the hands of the Macneals, of Tirfergus and Lossit, by the marriage of Torquil, a younger son of Lauchlan MacNeill Buy, of Tirfergus, with Barbara Mackay, heiress of Ugadale, from whom the present laird and possessor of Bruce's brooch, Captain Hector Macneal, is lineally descended. The grave of Mackay, to whom Bruce gave the brooch and lands, is pointed out among the many interesting gravestones that crowd the old burial-ground of Saddell Monastery, Can

With the great end in view, many a day Sandy came in fear and trembling from making bour-tree mills on the Hare Water, and playing shinty with his sister Jess and the neighboring farmers' sons on the country roads, to construe his Cæsar or his Sallust in the minister's little brown bedroom.

Fifty years ago, Mr. Stewart was a Tory and an autocrat in rusty black, walking over his parish, not unlike Dr. Johnson, in snuff-brown, taking a turn down Fleet Street. The minister had made a love marriage. Mrs. Stewart had been an orphan, with a very slender patrimony,-a parlor boarder of the Miss Allardyces, the old ladies who from time immemorial had kept the boarding-school in the neighboring town of Woodend. Mr. Stewart had met his fate at a Woodend subscription ball, when it was customary for ministers to carry to balls their white neckcloths and silver shoe-buckles as a testimony in favor of innocent enjoyment, and as a protest against Dissent and Jacobinism. There he succumbed in a single evening to Miss Jean Clephane's dancing, though he did not dance a step himself.

The marriage was a happy one. Mrs. Stewart paid the minister loving homage as the greatest and best of men, and called him ford and master to the extent of keeping her bedroom scrupulously free for his study, and spending the choicest of her accomplishments in needlework on the plated frills of his shirts and the open-work of his bands. Mr. Stewart was tender to his wife, brought home what he supposed her taste in gaudy caps and spencers, as connubial gifts, on the striking of the fiars and the meetings of Presbytery, Synod, and Assembly; took notice of her pets, her flowers, her work,

In his turn,

for Mrs. Stewart was almost as great in knitted bed-covers, tent-stitch-worked chairs, and cambric flowers, as Mrs. Delany; humored her in her habits, squiring her three evenings a week in summer, when she walked with her shawl over her head to the Kames, to see the sun set behind the Beld Law, until the servants and the country-people called the beaten footpaths through the corn and the clover the Minister and the Leddy's Walk.”

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The manse children consisted of Sandy and Jess; and it was a common remark with regard to the two, that Sandy should have been Jess, and Jess Sandy.

Sandy was not a scapegrace and a numskull. He was a bonnie laddie, very like his mother both in her sweet, fair, sunshiny face, and her sanguine, sensitive, imaginative temperament. He was a shade thoughtless as regarded a divinity studied in prospective, with a greater bent for drawing on the

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