fondant-all, except the first, were immediately returned unopened. He, too, seemed to have become a maniac-his dress and figure were disordered, his words rash and violent, and his voice hoarse and broken. The farmer's arrival, however, acted like a charm; he seemed to have awaked from a dream, and gained over his feelings so sudden and powerful a mastery, that the poor unsuspecting man was confirmed in the opinion I have mentioned, and pitying his distress, engaged to intercede for him with his daughter. Who will not pause to pity him in the fulfilment of such a task? Whose heart will not bleed for the poor victim whom he solicited? He came back at length, bewildered and displeased at her pertinacity, while she still remained resolute in declining to admit Montgomery in defiance of all importunities. At length, exhausted and despairing of success, the latter absented himself wholly from the cottage, though he long continued to hover about at some distance, under the vain expectation of accidentally crossing her path. The friend at whose house he was a visiter, and to whom he betrayed no desire to move, though his originally-intended limits were now more thon trebled, could not but observe his forlorn and dispirited state of mind, which, indeed, it needed but a glance at his haggard check and sunken eye, to ascertain. Too delicate to probe a wound which appeared so deep and irritable, he resorted rather to every kind artifice and design, which might have the effect of reviving and awakening him from the deplorable condition into which his every faculty had fallen. Among the rest, he invited company to his house, and courted the society of all the neighbouring gentry, to whose advances, as a stranger, he had been until now, considered unaccountably distant; and it was in the round of gaiety that ensued, that Montgomery met, for the first time, the former friend of his Mary, who seemed, as it were, the very soul and arbitress of all that was mirth ful and happy. Worn and lethargic as he was, he could not help being attracted by such a brilliant display of charms; and his anxious friend was soon delighted to remark, that in her society he appeared to shake off much of the torpor which had so long preyed on him, as the opportunities of meeting her seemed to multiply with an almost fated accuracy. Surprising and inconsistent, with that morbid and painful state of feelings I have described, as the next passage of his history would appear, let no man, I would say, presume to decide on the hidden motives, the inner workings of a fellow-creature, however open his external conduct to censure or dislike. For myself, I would fain see the sunny side of each fleeting picture, and I am satisfied, with regard to Montgomery, that during the latter part of his intimacy with Mary, he had been perfectly honourable in his intentions, whatever mysterious fatality seemed to have hung over its issue; that his grief and melancholy, when that intimacy was broken off, were equally unaffected; and that it was not owing to heartless indifference, but to na. tural fickleness and instability, and to the ardent spirits and warm constitution of his youth, that he soon was seen to be inspired with equal devotion to another, and as fair an object. As for Bessy, she too had recovered from the shock her friendship had sustained, although the latter feeling remained still undiminished; and we have already noticed the number and power of the fascinations which now newly beset her. In a word, Montgomery was formed to be the bane of two gentle creatures, with respect to whom, whether we look to their personal charms, their intellectual attractions, the innocence in which he found them, or their unalterable attachment to each other; it would be difficult to decide which would be the object of the greater interest and admiration. Yes, is it not, after all, nearly incredible when we recur to the circumstances of this little tale from the commencement, that in the course of four months from the hour when he parted with Mary, her recollection was now almost effaced, at least from the seat of his deeper emotions, and he found himself day after day engaged in attentions as assiduous to another, as he had so lately practised with un wearied zcal towards her? Nor was Bessy long insensible of his addresses, and, though her playful and innocent coquetry left him for a considerable period in doubt as to the state of her feelings towards him; yet, this very coquetry seemed destined to produce a result fatal to herself, as it roused him the more effectually from the languor which had oppressed him, awoke in him an interest and excitement, and elicited numberless fascinations which might have remained unnoticed had her manners been more distant and formal on the one hand, or had she seemed on the other, more easy and open to conquest. As it was, each soon received a sensible impression from the other's attractions, and looked for. ward with delight from day to day to the renewal of their intercourse. Montgomery, with his usual tact, won the good-will even of the cold Mr. Bell, and began to be looked upon as a constant visiter at his house. His daughter was seldom absent; and, as before, with her early friend, their recreations and pursuits became the same, and as he walked or rode by her side, with admirable versatility of talent he accommodated his thoughts and feelings to hers, and was now as light and gay in his topics of conversation with Bessy, as he had been grave and speculative with Mary. At length, a lawsuit in which he was engaged, demanded his presence in England within the course of a few days, and he determined, though with considerable compunction, to sound Miss Bell's feelings, and, should he find them propitious, to make an immediate declaration of his own. This important step he reserved for his last day in the country, and on the morning previous engaged to accompany the fair object of his now-undivided passion in her usual ride. For the first time, and he now remarked it with deep uneasiness, she led the way toward farmer Gray's cottage. Of her former intimacy with his daughter, Montgomery, by some strange chance, had never heard. Each of them perhaps, had thought of it as a painful subject, and one, too sacred, it might be, to be intruded on a stranger's attention. But the reaction of restrained feeling is often more lively than its original force, and on this occasion as the pretty farm-house at the foot of the mountain came suddenly in view, Bessy was as instantaneously overcome, and bursting into tears, "There," she exclaimed, " even there lives one who is dearest to me on earth!" What? Mary? stammered Montgomery, and, but that his companion was herself so touched at that bitter moment, his guilty confusion could never have passed unobserved. Little did either imagine that the pitiable subject of the thoughts of each, was at that same instant gazing from a shrubbery on the road side, and, after a long wild stare, reeled and fell to the ground! They had paused for some time involuntarily, Bessy yielding to pathetic and sad remembrances, while Montgomery's heart was nearly rent asunder by a thousand maddening and conflicting emotions; at length they, each as involuntarily, turned their horses' heads, and pursued their way homeward in melancholy and ill-omened silence. He was engaged for the same evening to meet a large party at Mr. Bell's, and it was not until they sat together at dinner that almost a syllable was interchanged between them; even then it cost an effort on both sides. The company observed it, and rallied each on their depression, and Bessy was ere long again the centre and attraction of all cheerfulness. Montgomery still maintained a gloomy taciturnity, for which the frightful convulsions of his mind that morning but too truly accounted. Bessy herself was surprised, when it no longer seemed to originate in compliment to her own feelings; but still following the bent of a fond woman's credulity, she gave it the flattering interpretation of extreme regret at his early intended absence. The ladies had long retired, and Montgomery had forti fied himself with deep and long potations, ere he found it po sible to gain even an artificial excitement. Under such influence, he at length appeared in the drawing room, and hastening again to Bessy's side, he lavished on her, to an extravagent excess, all the flattery and compliment of which he was so finished a master. He led her to the piano-forte, hung over her chair, mingled his manly voice with her own sweet thrilling notes, and during each pause whispered in the cause which might have reduced Montgomery to such a her ear his fixed and unalterable devotion. fearful situation. They were, after some time, induced by the delighted audience, to attempt a celebrated duet, the most difficult they had yet performed, and peculiarly expressive of tender and impassioned sentiments. It was in the midst of this, and when Montgomery was taking his part with exquisite taste and masterly skill, that a servant slipped into his hand a note which had been just delivered to him. He held it with the air of one totally abstracted in his occupation until it was Bessy's turn to respond, as she did with power equal to his own: then he ventured to snatch one hasty glance at its superscription. It seemed to contain a deadly spell his very reason appeared to fail him-he staggered to the door, to the astonishment of all present, and seizing his hat, and seeming to fly from their attentions, rushed with the speed of madness to the stable-yard, mounted his saddled horse, and galloped furiously away. Can it be doubted from whom that communication came? The beautiful characters were but too well known to him, and the words, which he himself read not till the next dawn, were the following :-" Unhappy man! as thou wouldst yet hope for mercy for all thy accumulated guilt, ensnare not by thy wiles another victim, in addition to the lost MARY. Often after that night, did Montgomery curse the perfections of the animal which carried him, that he dashed him not to atoms on the rough roads which he passed. On, on he rode, pushing him at the height of his speed, nor pulled a rein till he arrived at Farmer Gray's cottage. It was already an hour past midnight, when he paused, scarce knowing where he was, and having come so far without fixed purpose or intent. All around was calm and quiet, in awful contrast to the tumult that raged within him. The farmer and his household had long retired to rest; yet there was one sleepless being within that heard the horse, and guessed at its rider. It was a moment of fearful excitement, and having almost mechanically led the reeking animal to a stall, he struck his hand against his forehead, and endeavoured to regain the composure which he appeared to have utterly lost. That he soon found was, at the moment, hopeless; and fearful of himself, frantic and distracted as he was, he determined to await the morning ere he sought admission at the cottage. He wandered round the environs of the farm, and as each familiar spot recurred to his eye beneath the clear moonlight, which he had trod so often with the lost, the loving Mary, he imprecated the deepest curses upon his own devoted head. At length the night clouded, as if in unison with his thoughts, the moon disap. peared from the heavens, the storm rose apace, the rain descended thick, drifting, and violent. Involuntarily he bared his head and bosom to its assaults, and felt, for the moment, the first relief from frenzy. But in its place came reason, once more calm and cool, and he felt he had but awakened to a clearer sense of his misery. The lightning began to flash, and as its transitory brightness aided the grey glimmering of morning, he traced the expressions of the spasmodic shudder—a gravelike chill—and, staggering to a apost forgotten note. Deadly sickness came over himne stable door, he sunk senseless beneath his steed upon the straw. The farmer was, as usual, the first astir, and on going out Wa as surprised to see that door but half.closed. Не entered hastily, and was horror-smitten at the spectacle withi, n. There lay Montgomery, as if in the grasp of a and violent death, his throat and breast still bare, his cruel to His horse might have taken fright, and fled to a haunt once so familiar. He might have been attacked by ruthans, with whom the forest was said occasionally to abound, and fled for protection to his house, whilst the violence of their assaults, or the exhaustion of fatigue, would account for his having been found insensible. These, and a thousand such accidents, his imagination speedily suggested; but they were soon discarded successively, and as it were by instinct; his fears settled finally on the truth-that all he saw was connected, though he guesed not how, with the interests of his beloved daughter. Instantly he sought her chamber. She heard, with little surprise, that Montgomery was in the house; but was deeply shocked to learn his pitiable condition. She accompanied her father to his bedside, and along with him watched over the wretched being it contained, with a deep intensity of emotion, until a long-drawn sigh and violent contortion at length betokened his reviving sense, and then, in bitterness and misery, she glided back to her own apartment. The farmer, in the meantime, had resumed his painful reverie. During the last three months he had laboured under continual anxiety and doubt, concerning the lovers' u accountable separation, and had latterly yielded to dark suspicions as to the purity of Montgomery's intentions, whose unworthiness he believed his daughter might have earlier detected, and acted accordingly. Even his present compassion could not prevent their growing form; and it is not then to be wondered at, that when at length the patient opened his eyes, and rolled them wildly round ere be could recollect and account for his present situation, which he finally testified by grasping convulsively the hand of his kind physician, that the latter replied to his wistful look, by saying abruptly, "Mr. Montgomery, I am a plain-spoken man, and you must not be offended by my asking, what brought you here? or rather, was it to marry my daughter that you came ?" "Marry her!" exclaimed the unhappy young manand oh i'if you have a heart, but prevail on her this hour "Marry, did you say?—yes, yes !—it was to marry her— -to-morrow-or the next day-or when and where she pleases!" The farmer was at once disarmed of every angry feeling, and all again was the tenderest and most attentive kindness. Finally, he undertook to gain for him an interview with his daughter, and left him for that purpose; while Mont gomery, whose powerful constitution had already rallied considerably, made the necessary preparations in case his request should be granted. And, after a long interval, it was so. Wrought up te, the highest pitch of excitement, he received and obeyed the summons-and they met. But alas! how changed wai, he had once known and loved, in the beauty of opening we the fair creature before him, from the bright young beingmanhood, in the charms of happy innocence, in the spring. day of health and hope, almost a stranger to care, and pre sessing within herself a world of fascination, and of peace, Now that cheek was lighted up as brilliantly as ever, but it was hectic flush; that eye was as bright, but with the with the wan pallor of death. glaze of disease; that brow was as eminently fair, but What passed during that sad interview never transpired to any. His voice had been elevated in the various tones sobs were heard distinctly through the cottage. She had supplication, of passion, and of anguish; even his bitter always spoken in the lowest accents of calm resolution and collected dignity. At length there was a long pause there was one heart-breaking groan-the door opened, and Mont face distorted, his hands clenched, and his hair damp and of dishevelled. On closer examination, the farmer was rejoiced discover that life yet remained and being somewhat killed in surgery, a power which his retired situation often called into practice he bore his patient to the cottage, and having bled him freely, used every means to recal the existgomery rushed to the stable, and, having thrown himself ence which seemed so fast ebbing. Nor were they long without effect; and whilst he bent over him, anxiously watching their progress, and having administered a gentle opiate, laid him in his own bed, and sat him down by the side, he gave up his mind to innumerable conjectures upon for a post-chaise, and took the road to Dublin. There on his horse, galloped furiously to Omagh, called wildly were no tidings of him afterward for many a week, save a hasty note to his friend, apologizing for his abrupt de parture. It were idle to detail the innumerable conjectures and rumours in the neighbourhood concerning his strange conduct the preceding evening, and his sudden and mysterious disappearance. Idler far were the hope of describing the woful feelings of the terrified, the forsaken Bessy. She had just learnt what it was to love, and be beloved, when the cup of happiness was dashed from her lips; she had just felt the full brightness of the vision, when it vanished from her straining gaze. It was in the noon of the 20th August, one year from the day on which he had first seen Mary-and during that short year what misery had he not wrought for himself and others?—that Frederick Montgomery arrived in Omagh, having ridden by casy stages from the metropolis. He was much and visibly changed. His face had lost its former sweet expression, his cheek was pale, his lip colourless, his eye was wilder than before, and his brow wore the ravages of illness, and the traces alike of harrowing affliction and deep despair. What had brought him thither he dared not to ask himself. Could it be to look once more on the waste, the ruin he had made? He partook of some refreshment, and prepared to resume his lonely way. As he waited the appearance of his horse, the church-bell threw sullenly on the air its awful lament of death. He listened calmly for a moment, then burying his face in his hands, yielded himself up to the succession of bitter emotions that those sounds inspired; and the groom had summoned him thrice ere he started from his sad reverie. He mounted, rode slowly up the street, and saw the mournful paraphernalia of mortality enter the church-yard as he was about to pass. Under an involuntary impulse he paused, and moved after the sorrowful crowd toward the gate. He thought he heard some whispers of his name in the procession, but was too deeply abstracted to listen with much attention. At length he reached the gate-there was, immediately within, a newly dug grave, and the coffin was being lowered from the hearse. As he gazed almost unconciously around -suddenly, like the lightning's flash-he caught the chief mourner's eye-that chief mourne rwas Farmer Gray, and in that glance what was there not conveyed! It seemed to pierce him to the heart, and turning round instantaneously, he fled with the mad speed of the criminal, down the precipitate bill, and whither ?-and wherefore? . That terrible evening, Bessy was sitting in a little arbour which Montgomery's hands and her own had raised in happier days, and she looked on the last beams of the setting sun, and thought how the wit and merriment of which she with a paper she held, while her eye glanced from line to AN OLD SCOTTISH TOUN. CRAWFORD, in the parish of Crawford, afforded, thirty years ago, a good picture of a toun in the intermediate stage between feudalism and the modern degree of civilization. It consisted, or was the centre of above twenty freedoms, holden by a certain tenure off the Crawfords and Douglases, the former superiors of the parish and country. Each freedom consisted of four or five acres, parcelled out here and there; as in England, about the the same period, a tenant on a manor, had his wheat soil in one place, his barley field, and ground for peas in another, scattered here and there, a bit of each kind being allotted to equalize the holdings of the different tenants. The proprietors of the freedoms of Crawford were named Lairds, and their wives Ladies. They enjoyed the right of common hill pasture for a certain number of cattle, sheep, and horses. The little statesmen of Westmorland are still in much the same condition. In Crawford, there was an inferior caste who only feud ground for a hut and a kail-yard. This rural commonwealth was governed by a Birley-Court, in which every The great Laird had a vote, or, in his absence, his tenant. business of this legislative assembly and executive body, was to settle disputes about the number of animals the several Lairds were entitled to graze on the common pas. ture. Like more celebrated assemblies, it was chiefly remarkable for the noise which attended its deliberations. It was held weekly, and a regular adjournment was made to the village ale-houses, the Brookeses and Boodles of Craw. ford to wit. Once a-year, about Martinmas, when a cow or a few sheep were sold, each member cleared his annual club-score. The Lairds and their tenants were not troublesome, or new fangled about improvements, though, when convenient, they generally threw the dung out of the byres upon the fields; but if any new-fashioned farmer offered to purchase it, that was so much money gained, and" a bird in hand was worth two in a bush." The Lairds of Crawford were a contrast to the blood-mounted, wine-bibbing gentleman-farmer of a generation later. What a contrast in their habits and modes of cultivation! The old people best-spoke of the easy life, and the easy mind of the former times, as making the most striking difference in their condition. was then the mistress were now as faint and evanescent as Suddenly there was a step-there was a vioce, and in another instant she was folded in the arms of Montgomery! It was a long-an impassioned, as it had been an involuntary caress. At length it was over, and tears, while they relieved her, prevented her for a while from observing the ghastly, the frantic expression of him who still wildly gazed upon her. But it could not be longer unnoticed, and terrified and horror-struck_" What means that look?" she exclaimed. "Oh, dearest Frederick, you have never yet recovered from the shock of that awful night," and she burst into a new passion of tears. "In truth," he replied slowly, and gasping for breath, "in truth it was a fearful shock; and the next day"-he paused, and added convulsively-" the next day I was to have asked you to marry me. Oh, Bessy! dearest, beloved, would you have been the wife of the "Murderer" he would have added, but he sunk powerless on the ground. I remember hearing an old farmer tell that the site of a particular cow-house of a farm on the banks of Dollar Burn, was especially valued, some fifty years ago, as it afforded such facility for shovelling off the deep.-Editor. After a considerable interval he revived. A servant was chafing his temples. Bessy stood near, intensely occupied dung into the rapid rivulet, when it became somewhat more than knee THE LONDON NEWSMAN. About this season, certain rhyming effusions, leading through a great variety of metres to the same conclusions, draw notice to our news deliverers, the boys, or technically, devils of the different newspaper offices. Their duties | are light, and their system crude, compared with that of the well-organized newsmen of London. As the anticipated abolition of the taxes on knowledge, will at once ap proximate our system to that of the metropolis, and give rise to a new order in the FOURTH ESTATE, it may be curious to view this branch of the statistics of the press. It is detailed by Mr. Hone, and no better authority could be obtained: serves for the country, and the forwarding of them to the post office in Lombard Street, or in parcels for the mails, and to other coach offices. The Gazette nights, every Tuesday and Friday, add to his labours the publication of second and third editions of the evening papers is a super. addition. On what he calls a regular day,' he is fortu nate if he find himself settled within his own door by seven o'clock, after fifteen hours of running to and fro. It is now only that he can review the business of the day, enter his fresh orders, ascertain how many of each paper he will require on the morrow, arrange his accounts, provide for the money he may have occasion for, eat the only quiet meal he could reckon upon since that of the evening before, and 'steal a few hours from the night' for needful rest, before he rises next morning to a day of the like incessant occupation; and thus from Monday to Saturday he labours every day. The newsmen desires no work but his own to prove Sunday no Sabbath,' for on him and his brethren devolves the circulation of upwards of fifty thousand Sunday papers in the course of the forenoon. His Sunday dinner is the only meal he can insure with his family, and the short remainder of the day, the only time he can enjoy in their s ciety with certainty, or extract something from, for more serious duties or social converse. "All the year round, and every day in the year, the newsman must rise soon after four o'clock, and be at the newspaper offices to procure a few of the first morning papers allotted to him, at extra charges, for particular orders, and despatch them by the early coaches.' Afterwards, he has to wait for his share of the 'regular' publication of each paper, and he allots these as well as he can among some of the most urgent of his town orders. The next publication at a later hour is devoted to his remaining customers; and he sends off his boys with differ"The newsman's is an out-of-door business at all seasons, ent portions according to the supply he successively re- and his life is measured out to unceasing toil. In all ceives. Notices frequently and necessarily printed in dif-weathers, hail, rain, wind, and snow, he is daily constrained ferent papers, of the hour of final publication the preceding day, guard the interests of the newspaper proprietors from the sluggishness of the indolent, and quicken the diligent newsman. Yet, however skilful his arrangements may be, they are subject to unlooked-for accidents. The late arrival of foreign journals, a Parliamentary debate unexpectedly protracted, or an article of importance in one paper exclusively, retard the printing and defer the newsman. His patience, well-worn before he get his last papers,' must be continued during the whole period he is occupied in delivering them. The sheet is sometimes half snatched before he can draw it from his wrapper; he is often chid for delay when he should have been praised for speed; his excuse, All the papers were late this morning,' is better heard than admitted, for neither giver nor receiver has time to parley; and before he gets home to dinner, he hears at one house that Master has waited for the paper these two hours;' at another, Master's gone out, and says if you can't bring the paper earlier, he won't have it at all;' and some ill-conditioned master,' perchance, leaves positive orders,' Don't take it in, but tell the man to bring the bill, and I'll pay it and have done with him.' "Besides buyers, every newsman has readers at so much each paper per hour. One class stipulates for a journal always at breakfast; another, that it is to be delivered exactly at such a time; a third, at any time, so that it is left the full hour; and among all of these there are malcontents, who permit nothing of time or circumstance' to interfere with their personal convenience. Though the newsman delivers, and allows the use of his paper, and fetches it, for a stipend not half equal to the lowest paid porter's price for letter-carrying in London, yet he finds some, with whom he covenanted, objecting, when it is called for, I've not had my breakfast' The paper did not come at the proper time'-' I've not had leisure to look at it yet'' It has not been left an hour'-or any other pretence equally futile or untrue, which, were he to allow, would prevent him from serving his readers in rotation, or at all. If he can get all his morning papers from these customers by four o'clock, he is a happy man. "Soon after three in the afternoon, the newsman and some of his boys must be at the offices of the evening papers; but before he can obtain his requisite numbers, he must wait till the newsmen of the Royal Exchange have received theirs for the use of the merchants on 'Change. Some of the first he gets are hurried off to coffee-houses and tavernkeepers. When he has procured his full quantity, he supplies the remainder of his town customers. These disposed of, then comes the hasty folding and directing of his re to the way and the fare of a wayfaringman. He walks, or rather runs, to distribute information concerning all sorts of circumstances and persons, except his own. He is unable to allow himself, or others, time for intimacy; and, there fore, unless he had formed friendships before he took up his servitude, he has not the chance of cultivating them save with persons of the same calling. He may be said to have been divorced, and to live separate and apart' from society in general: for, though he mixes with every body, it is only for a few hurried moments, and as strangers do in a crowd. "The losses and crosses to which newsmen are subject, and the minutiae of their laborious life, would form an instractive volume. As a class of able men of business, their importance is established by excellent regulations, adapted to their interests and well-being; and their numerous society includes many individuals of high intelligence, integrity, and opulence. NEW YEAR'S GIFTS.-The custom of New Year's Gifts is very ancient, and was formerly carried to a great extent. The sovereign used to accept gifts from his courtiers and principal favourites, and was also in the habit of making presents to certain individuals; the Prince, however, always taking care that the presents he received greatly exceeded in value those which he gave. It is recorded of Bishop Latimer, that on one occasion he presented to his master Henry VIII., instead of a sum in gold for a New Year's Gift, a New Testament, with the leaf folded down at Hebrews, ch. xiii. v. 4,-on reference to which the King found a text well suited as an admonition to himself. Queen Elizabeth supplied herself with wardrobe and jewels principally from New Year's Gifts. Dr. Drake has given a list of some of these presents; amongst the items we find the following :-" Most of the Peers and Peeresses of the Realm, the Bishops, the Chief Officers of State, her Majesty's Household, even as low as the master of the pantry and head cook, all gave her Majesty a Christmas-box-consisting either of a sum of money, jewels, trinkets, or wearing apparel. The Archbishop of Canterbury usually gave L.40, the Archbishop of York L.30, and the other Prelates from L.10 or L.20. The Peers gave in the same proportion; whilst the Peeresses presented rich gowns, petticoats, shifts, stockings, garters, &c. Her physician presented her with a box of foreign sweetmeats; and from her apothecary she received a box of ginger-candy, and a box of green ginger. Ambroise Lupo gave her a box of lutestrings; and Smith, the royal dustman, presented her Majesty with two bolts of cambric." COBBETT ON SCOTLAND. In fulfilment of my promise to my London readers, I have now placed in my shop, at Bolt Court, an assortment of apples, which were grown on the beautiful banks of the Clyde, which, the reader will please to observe, is nearly about the centre of Scotland. These apples were all grown in the orchard of Mr. Hamilton of Dalzell; and, though they have been at Glasgow, at sea, and lying in London unpacked (all put together) ever since the first of November, I think they could now challenge Covent Garden! I shall let these apples remain in my shop for eight or ten days, or more; and I have also placed there a Dunlop cheese, Dunlop being a village in Ayrshire famous for making cheese; and, I have no scruple to say that this cheese, which is about half a hundred weight, is, pound for pound equal in quality to any cheese from Cheshire, Gloucestershire, or Wiltshire. There is nothing like seeing things with our own eyes. I cannot bring up Scotland itself, and exhibit it at Bolt Court, but I can exhibit these indubitable proofs of the goodness and productiveness of the soil of that country; and of the virtue and sense of its people I have, in my tour, put upon record proofs enough. As I have, in different numbers of the Register, inserted the greater part of this tour, I now insert the following: the title, dedication, and preface to the volume, which will be published on Thursday next, the 10th inst. And thus I shall, as far as I am able, have done justice to a country and a people, who have been more, and more unjustly, misrepresented than any country and people upon the face of the earth. I am now endeavouring to do. Were it possible that either this statement of motives, or that any part of the work itself, could be, by even the most perverse of human beings, ascribed to any desire on my part to curry favour with the Scotch, or to any selfish desire whatsoever; were this only possible, I am afraid that I should not have had the courage to make this statement; but, as this is completely impossible, I make it as being the just due of the people of Scotland, for whose well-being, whose honour, whose prosperity, whose lasting peace and happiness, I have as great a regard as I have for the wellbeing, prosperity, and happiness of those who inhabit the spot where I myself was born. THE WINE TREE. ""Tis the Vine! 'tis the Vine!" said the cup-loving boy, And call'd the young Genii of Wit, Love, and Joy, The fruit was full grown; like a ruby it flam'd, First, fleet as a bird, to the summons Wit flew, "'Tis the Vine! 'tis the Vine !" hills and valleys reply ; Next, Love, as he lean'd o'er the plant to admire From his rosy mouth sent such a breath of desire, Oh! never did flower of the earth. sea, or sky, Last Joy, without whom even Love and Wit die, "Tis the Vine! 'tis the Vine!" laughing myriads resound; [We need scarcely tell that the author of these gay verses is Moore. They are taken from " Evenings in Greece," a musi MATTHEWS THE SMUGGLER. The motives as to the making of this publication are, to communicate to every body, as far as I am able, correct notions relative to Scotland; its soil; its products; its state, as to the well-being or ill-being of the people; but, above all things, it is my desire to assist in doing justice to the character, political as well as moral,.public as well as private, national as well as social, of our brethren in that very much misrepresented part of the kingdom. This is a duty particularly incumbent on me; for, though I never have carried my notions of the sterility and worthlessness of Scotland, and of the niggardly character of its inhabitants, to the extent which many others have; though I have, in reprobating the conduct of the "booing" pro-consular feelosofers, always made them an exception to the people of Scotland; though I have al-cal work, to which he contributes the poetry.] ways done this, still, I could not prevent myself from imbibing, in some degree, the prejudices, which a long train of causes, beginning to operate nearly a thousand years ago, have implanted in the minds of Englishmen; though for Matthews had been legally denounced for many When I found myself in the cabin with the bold outlaw I had intimately known, for many years, such great numbers of Scotchmen, for whom I had the greatest regard, not but admire the thorough indifference to possible conse daring and successful contests with the Revenue-I could still the prejudices, the false notions, lay lurking in my quences which this singular personage exhibited. He knew mind; and in spite of my desire always to do justice to wards everybody, the injustice would slip out, even with the station, and that they had been apprized he had sailed that several men of war were at the moment cruising on out my perceiving it. In any other man been of some importance that these erroneous notions the owners to effect the landing-yet he laughed and drank would have from Flushing, and that this coast was the spot selected by should be corrected; but, in me, whose writings I might fairly presume extended to every part of the civilized as gaily as I should in a club-house, and despatched the world, it became of very great importance; and it became messages which were occasionally brought down with permy bounden duty to do that justice, which I have endea-ploits; and the scene was admirably in keeping. Around fect nonchalance. He spoke principally of his own exvoured to do in the following pages; and to make, by a true statement of facts derived from ocular proof, that atonement for past errors which I have in these pages endeavoured to make. in arm-racks, and cutlasses and tomahawks were susthe cabin, muskets, pistols, and blunderbusses were secured pended from the bulk-heads. His had been a wild career; and though not passed the middle age, his life teemed From how many pairs of lips have I heard the excla-with "perilous adventure." I was so much amused with mation: "Good God! who would have thought that Scotland was such a country! What monstrous lies we have been told about that country and people!" And, which has pleased me exceedingly, not one man have I met with to whom the discovery does not seem to have given delight. If I had before wanted a motive to give further extension to my account of Scotland, these exclamations would have been motives sufficient; for they would have proved, that bare justice demanded that which, by this publication, his varied narratives of brave attempts and desperate successes, that the second hour slipped away before I rose and took my departure. On regaining the deck, the hurry of the business was over. The contraband cargo had been replaced by stone ballast; for, by previous arrangement, each boat brought a quantity of shingle from the beach, and hence the smuggler was already in trim, and ready to stand out to sea. This notorious vessel was considered in size and sailing superior to any of a similar class, and her |