" My young friend had, I knew,
several admirers--men who were younger and dressed better, and who, as
they had all chosen the liberal professions, had fairer prospects than
I; and as for the item of good looks, had she set her affections on even
the least likely of them, I could have addressed him, with perfect
sincerity, in the words of the old ballad:--

"Nae wonder, nae wonder, Gil Morrice,
My lady lo'es ye weel:
The fairest part o' my body
Is blacker than thy heel."

Strange to say, however, much about the time that I made my discovery,
my young friend succeeded in making a discovery also;--the maid's
husband shared on her part the same fate as the bachelor's wife did on
mine; and her visits to the churchyard suddenly ceased.

A twelvemonth had passed ere we succeeded in finding all this out; but
the young lady's mother had seen the danger somewhat earlier; and
deeming, as was quite right and proper, an operative mason no very
fitting mate for her daughter, my opportunities of meeting my friend at
_conversazione_ or tea-party had become few. I, however, took my usual
evening walk through the woods of the Hill; and as my friend's
avocations set her free at the same delightful hour, and as she also was
a walker on the Hill, we did sometimes meet, and witness together, from
amid the deeper solitudes of its bosky slopes, the sun sinking behind
the distant Ben Wevis. These were very happy evenings; the hour we
passed together always seemed exceedingly short; but, to make amends for
its briefness, there were at length few working days in the milder
season of which it did not form the terminal one;--from the
circumstance, of course, that the similarity of our tastes for natural
scenery led us always into the same lonely walks about the same
delicious sun-set hour. For months together, even during this second
stage of our friendship, there was one interesting subject on which we
never talked. At length, however, we came to a mutual understanding. It
was settled that we should remain for three years more in Scotland on
the existing terms; and if during that time there should open to me no
suitable field of exertion at home, we should then quit the country for
America, and share together in a strange land whatever fate might be in
store for us. My young friend was considerably more sanguine than I. I
had laid faithfully before her those defects of character which rendered
me a rather inefficient ma