se I could not help it! I say, old one,
what is the name of this river?"

"Hout! I now see what you was greeting at--at your ain ignorance, nae
doubt--'tis very great! Weel, I will na fash you with reproaches, but
even enlighten ye, since you seem a decent man's bairn, and you speir a
civil question. Yon river is called the Tweed; and yonder, over the
brig, is Scotland. Did ye never hear of the Tweed, my bonny man?"

"No," said I, as I rose from the grass, and proceeded to cross the bridge
to the town at which we had arrived the preceding night; "I never heard
of it; but now I have seen it, I shall not soon forget it!"

CHAPTER VII

The Castle--A Father's Inquiries--Scotch Language--A Determination--Bui
hin Digri--Good Scotchman--Difference of Races--Ne'er a Haggis--Pugnacious
People--Wha are Ye, Man?--The Nor Loch--Gestures Wild--The Bicker--New
Town Champion--Wild-Looking Figure--Headlong.

It was not long before we found ourselves at Edinburgh, {69a} or rather
in the Castle, into which the regiment marched with drums beating, colour-
flying, and a long train of baggage-waggons behind. The Castle was, as I
suppose it is now, a garrison for soldiers. Two other regiments were
already there; the one an Irish, if I remember right, the other a small
Highland corps.

It is hardly necessary to say much about this Castle, which everybody has
seen; on which account, doubtless, nobody has ever yet thought fit to
describe it--at least that I am aware. Be this as it may, I have no
intention of describing it, and shall content myself with observing, that
we took up our abode in that immense building, or caserne, of modern
erection, which occupies the entire eastern {69b} side of the bold rock
on which the Castle stands. A gallant caserne it was--the best and
roomiest that I had hitherto seen--rather cold and windy, it is true,
especially in the winter, but commanding a noble prospect of a range of
distant hills, which I was told were "the hieland hills," and of a broad
arm of the sea, which I heard somebody say was the Firth of Forth.

My brother, who, for some years past, had been receiving his education in
a certain celebrated school in England, was now with us; and it came to
pass, that one day my father, as he sat at table, looked steadfastly on
my brother and myself, and then addressed my mother:--"During my journey
down hither, I have lost no opportunity of making inquiries about these
people, the Sco