a first-rate fellow-as kind a soul indeed as ever graced an honourable profession-seemed for once to have pitched aside his papers, and covered more than four sides of creamlaid quarto with the well-known characters which, many a time, I had transcribed into the letter-book. It is strange how old associations continue to affect us. The time had been when a letter addressed by Mr Shearaway to myself would have been opened with some awe and solicitude; and when I found upon my table a letter with the well-remembered superscription, something of the same feeling came over me, notwithstanding the change in our relationship. But as Mr Shearaway's communication had an important effect upon my fortunes, I must take the liberty of postponing it for the initiative of another chapter.

CHAPTER VIII.

A MYSTERIOUS ADVERTISEMENT.

MY DEAR LAD"- thus wrote Mr Shearaway-“I was truly glad to receive tidings of you, and more especially from your own hand. For though you have been long away from us, you are by no means forgotten, at least by me; and I have often caught myself wondering, when I ought to have been doing something else (possibly attending to a sermon), what on earth had become of Norman Sinclair, the steadiest lad I ever had in hand, but also the queerest in so far as regarded his notions for the future. For a time I heard something about you from your old guardian, Ned Mather; but he became tired of Edinburgh, where his acquaintances were gradually dying out, and about three years ago settled down in some remote part of Galloway, where good fishing is to be had, since when he has given no token of existence. I always thought that you would make a spoon or spoil a horn (which, by the way, is but a stupid proverb, because if you don't make a spoon, the horn of course must be spoiled);

but you know very well what I mean; and I really am delighted to hear that you have got on so well, and prophesy even better things for the time to come.

"With regard to that poor demented creature, Jamie Littlewoo, it will be my duty to tell his father what you have communicated, and to concert measures for saving the idiot from absolute ruin. I am the more bound to do this, because it was partly through my advice that he was sent to London, for giving which I am now like to eat my fingers from vexation. But I did it all for the best. We could make nothing of him here. He could neither settle down in the office, nor study for the bar, but took up with idle officers. and dissipated ne'erdoweels, of whom it can hardly be said that they were fruges consumere nati, seeing that, for the most part, they subsisted entirely upon drink. What could we do with a lad who would neither read nor work, and never came home to his bed until three o'clock in the morning? I thought the best thing was to send him away from such graceless company, and to get him a situation where, at all events, he would be compelled to attend for certain hours; but it would seem from your account that he has louped from the frying-pan into the fire, and got into the hands of the Jews, for whose conversion I would sincerely pray, and even cheerfully subscribe, if I thought that on becoming Christians they would cease to be discounters of bills. Mr Littlewoo must just make up his mind to advance whatever is necessary to clear his gowk of a son. His case is a hard

VOL. II.

I

one, for I don't think he has saved much, having an expensive family. What with dinners and balls and pic-nics (in spite of which none of the Misses have got married), they must have muddled away an awful deal of money. I know I should not like to have to pay the haberdasher's account for the last twelvemonth.

"It will not be necessary that I should write to James Littlewoo immediately, as I expect to be in London in the course of a fortnight, when I shall ascertain the amount of his liabilities, and consider how they may be discharged. I should not have thought of coming to London at this season of the year; but, like every one else, I have got mixed up in railway matters, and have to look after the interests of some clients in a bill which is now depending in Parliament. This railway mania is the most extraordinary movement that I can recollect. It has taken possession of well-nigh everybody in Edinburgh. Advocates, writers, doctors, citizens, subscribe for hundreds of shares in every new line that is projected, and these come out often at the rate of seven in the day. Nobody thinks it worth while to consider where the money for making all these expensive works is to be found. It is enough if they can scrape together sufficient cash to pay the first deposit; for then they get scrip in exchange for their certificates, and, as the market presently stands, all kinds of scrip are at a premium. But the end cannot help being disastrous. I am greatly grieved by the infatuation of some personal friends of my own, who have gone in dreadfully

deep; but wilful men will have their way, and they would not listen to my preaching though I had the gift of Moses and the prophets. Glasgow is fully worse than Edinburgh. The chappies are as greedy as gleds, but there will be long faces among them when the day of reckoning arrives.

"By the way, did you receive a letter which I addressed to you rather more than a year ago, at Vienna, where I understood you were residing? I rather suppose not, because, as it related to a matter of business, you would naturally have replied. It contained an advertisement which I cut from the Times newspaper, thinking that it might refer to you, and I kept a copy of it which I now enclose. The advertisement was repeated several times, and then withdrawn. I would have written at once to the London solicitors whose names are given, and who are men of high respectability; but, to say the truth, I was not sure as to your father's rank in the army, and the number of his regiment. My excellent old friend, Dr Buchanan, your uncle, never spoke much about him; and I was apprehensive of committing a mistake, as once occurred when I lodged a claim for a client, in answer to an advertisement for the heirs of the deceased Captain Colin Campbell. Not that your name is quite as common as the other, at least out of Caithness, but I could not depone to the identity. I also sent a copy of the enclosed to Mather; but got no answer, Ned being notoriously a wretched hand at the pen. It is, however, possible that he may have applied on your behalf