fortune is a snug thing for an old bachelor. On the fastday, when the tokens of admission came to be distributed, I did well enough. I crushed down the stair near the latter end of the crowd, and stood decently in the area, holding my hat in my hand, and waiting as it were my turn. My saintly charmer saw this, and eyed me with looks of heavenly complacency; but when I came opposite to the front door, I slid quietly off, and was never missed. On the Sabbath following, I was not so fortunate when the sacred elements came to be distributed. Until after the first table was served, all went well enough, it having been filled up from the beginning by such of the common people as had not seats of their own. But it was, and is still a custom in our parish, (as absurd a one as can well be) that the gentry, as the country people call them, go all into the second table; and there did my charmer go, and there it behoved me to have been also. But there I was not; being obliged, from my disregard of church-discipline, to sit cocking up in the corner of the front gallery all alone. I was not wont to regard this much, as I had some neighbours in the parish, and particularly in the eastern gallery, opposite to me, I could distinctly perceive one in each corner; but I was all by myself, there not being one of the same station near me; and to make the matter worse, the precentor, as he bawled out the following line, looked full at me,"Be side thee there is none!"

Sinners are always caught in the net, some time or other, which they themselves have prepared. The worst thing of all, my betrothed was so placed at the table, that her eye was fixed on me. She could not lift it but she saw me, and great was the perplexity which that eye manifested. I saw she knew not what to make of it; but, as I suspected, attributed it to the contempt of ordinances. She returned to Moffat in a post-chaise on the Monday evening, and I did not see her till toward the end of the week, when I again visited her. She

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had not got to the ground of the matter; but, suspecting me of infidelity, she entertained me with a long lecture on the truths of Christianity. I soon convinced her, that I had no doubts to be removed on that subject. Why then do you not come forward at the sacrament, like other people ?" said she. I never was so sore nonplused in my life, and could not answer a word. I did not like to tell a lady the plain truth, and had no tale ready to bring myself off-my face grew red, and I had no other shift but to take out my handkerchief on pretence to wipe it. "Why, ma'am," says I, " it is excessively warm in this room; do you not think it would be as well to open one of the windows?" Certainly, if you wish it, sir," said she. I opened the window, thrust out my head, and said, "Bless me! how empty Moffat is at such a delightful season!" " Mr Cochrane !" exclaimed the lady, "what is the matter with you? Are you raving? I was talking to you of the bread of life, and the water of life, and asking your objec tions to the partaking of these; and you answer me, • Bless me, how hot it is! how empty Moffat is!' What does this mean? When the relation in which we stand to one another is considered, I surely have a right to inquire into this most important of all concerns. Good Lord! if such a thing were to be, as that I should give up myself to lie in the arms of a castaway-a child of perdition, to whom it was predestined to go to hell-and then the iniquity of the father visited on my children!-I tremble to think of it. Tell me, then, my dear Mr Cochrane, and tell me truly, what is it that keeps you back from this ordinance ?”

"Why, ma'am, really, ma'am," said I-" Hem-it is rather a delicate subject; but, in truth, ma'am, it is the minister and elders who keep me back." She turned up her eyes, and spread her hands towards heaven. "I see it all!-I perceive

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'you are then an outcast

it all!" cried she, in holy wrath ; from the visible church-an alien to the commonwealth of

C c

Israel-you are groaning under scandal, and sins not wiped away; and to ask my hand while in that state! How could I have set up my face among my religious acquaintances in town? How could I ever have looked the reverend and devout David Dagain in the face, or kneeled at a family ordinance with the Smiths, the Irvings, or the inspired H—— G——————— ? And how should I have got my children, my offspring, initiated into the Christian Church? To have been obliged to take the vows on myself, and hold up the dear sweet innocents in my own arms! Oh! the snares, the shame, and the participation in iniquity, that I have thus providentially escaped-and all by attending to my religious duties! Let it be a warning to all such as deride them. Mr Cochrane, either go and submit to the censures of your mother church, for your flagrant and gross immoralities, and be again admitted as one of her members, and a partaker of all her divine ordinances, or never see my face again.”

"I shall certainly conform to this friendly injunction for your sake, my dear," said I; "though the alternative may be severe, it must nevertheless be complied with. In the mean time, I must bid you a good morning." Then, bowing most respectfully, I left the room, fully determined which side of the alternative to choose.

From that time forth, I never saw my saintly dame any more; but I got one or two long letters from her, apparently intended to renew our acquaintance, as they were filled up with protestations of esteem, and long sentences about the riches of free grace, which I never read. I had got quite enough of her; for, to say the truth, though I believe it is a fault in me, I have an aversion to those ladies who make extravagant pretensions to religion, and am more afraid of them than any set of reformers in the realm.

Being determined that I would not stand up in my native parish church before a whole congregation, to every one of

whom I was personally known, not only to be rebuked, but to hear the most gross and indelicate terms mouthed as applying to my character, and that with an assured gravity of deportment, which makes the scene any thing but impressive, save on the organs of risibility, or the more heart-felt inspirations of loathing. And as my nature could not submit to this, I was obliged to forego the blessings of a devout wife and an independent fortune. Thus it was that I lost my fourth and last mistress; namely, because I would not mount the stool of repentance.

Whenever I recounted any of these adventures to my social companions, I remarked that they generally amused them in no ordinary degree. It was this that determined me to make a copy of them, as near to the truth of the circumstances as my memory serves me, and to send them to you, as you are so fond of all narratives that tend to illustrate Scottish manI have thought it proper to change two or three of the real names; but the adventures are known to so many in the south-west of Scotland, that every individual concerned will be readily recollected; for, saving one gentleman, all the rest, as far as I know, are still alive.

ners.

1

COUNTRY DREAMS AND APPARITIONS.

No I.

JOHN GRAY O' MIDDLEHOLM.

THERE was once a man of great note, of little wit, some cunning, and inexhaustible good nature, who lived in the wretched village of Middleholm, on the border of Tiviotdale, to whom the strangest lot befell, that ever happened to a poor man be

fore. He was a weaver to his trade, and a feuar; about six feet four inches in height; wore a black coat with horn buttons of the same colour, each of them twice as broad and thick as a modern lady's gold watch. This coat had wide sleeves, but no collar, and was all clouted about the elbows and armpits, and moreover the tails of it met, if not actually overlapped each other, a little above his knee. He always wore a bonnet, and always the same bonnet, for aught that any one could distinguish. It was neither a broad nor a round bonnet, a Highland bonnet nor a Lowland bonnet, a large bonnet nor a small bonnet; nevertheless, it was a bonnet, and a very singular one too, for it was a long bonnet, shaped exactly like a miller's meal-scoop. He was altogether a singular figure, and a far more singular man. Who has not heard of John Gray, weaver and feuar in Middleholm?

very bad one;

She was what

John had a garden, which was a middling good one, and would have been better, had it been well sorted; he had likewise a cow that was a very little and a but he had a wife that was the worst of all. an author would call a half-witted inconsiderate woman; but the Middleholm wives defined her better, for they called her “a tawpie, and an even-down haverel." Of course John's purse was very light, and it would never throw against the wind; his meals were spare and irregular, and his cheek-bones looked as if they would peep through the face. It is impossible for a man to be in this state without knowing the value of money, or at least regretting the want of it. His belly whispers to him every hour of the day, that it would be a good thing to have; and when parched with drought of an evening, and neighbours are going into the alehouse to enjoy their crack and their evening draught, how killing the reflection, that not one penny is to spare! It even increases a man's thirst, drying the very glands of his mouth to a cinder.