nk the health of "Gentle Will," saw him off, and went in
to pay the reckoning. What did he know of the price of wine! It took
exactly every penny he had; I doubt not, most boys, knowing that the
landlord knew them, would have either paid a part, or asked him to score
it up. This was not his way; he was too proud and shy and honest for
such an expedient. By this time, what with discussing Shakspeare, and
witnessing his master's leisurely emptying of that bottle, and releasing
the

"Dear prisoned spirits of the impassioned grape,"

he found he must run for it to Edinburgh, or rather Leith, fourteen
miles; this he did, and was at the pier just in time to jump into the
Elie pinnace, which was already off. He often wondered what he would
have done if he had been that one moment late. You can easily pick out
the qualities this story unfolds.

His nature, capable as it was of great, persistent, and indeed dogged
labor, was, from the predominance of the nervous system in his
organization, excitable, and therefore needed and relished
excitement--the more intense the better. He found this in his keen
political tastes, in imaginative literature, and in fiction. In the
highest kind of poetry he enjoyed the sweet pain of tears; and he all
his life had a steady liking, even a hunger, for a good novel. This
refreshed, lightened, and diverted his mind from the strain of his
incessant exegesis. He used always to say that Sir Walter and Goldsmith,
and even Fielding, Miss Edgeworth, Miss Austen, and Miss Ferrier, were
true benefactors to the race, by giving such genuine, such secure and
innocent pleasure; and he often repeated with admiration Lord Jeffrey's
words on Scott, inscribed on his monument. He had no turn for gardening
or for fishing or any field sports or games; his sensitive nature
recoiled from the idea of pain, and above all, needless pain. He used to
say the lower creation had groans enough, and needed no more burdens;
indeed, he was fierce to some measure of unfairness against such of his
brethren--Dr. Wardlaw, for instance[19]--as resembled the apostles in
fishing for other things besides men.

[19] After a tight discussion between these two attached friends,
Dr. Wardlaw said, "Well, I can't answer you, but fish I must
and shall."

But the exercise and the excitement he most of all others delighted in,
was riding; and had he been a country gentleman and not a clergyman, I
don't think he could hav