nk may be
necessary in giving you an account of your other schoolfellows.

Thus saying, Dominie Grierson, taking up his three-cornered hat and
silver-mounted walking-stick, stalked out of the room. And, as people
generally like to have some idea of the sort of person who is telling
them a story, I shall here describe to them the appearance of Mr
Grierson. He was a fine-looking old man, about five feet nine inches
high; his age might be about threescore and fifteen, and he was a
bachelor. His hair was as white as the driven snow, yet as fresh and
as thick as though he had been but thirty. His face was pale. He could
not properly be called corpulent, but his person had an inclination
that way. His shoes were fastened with large silver buckles; he wore a
pair of the finest black lamb's-wool stockings; breeches of the same
colour, fastened at the knees by buckles similar to those in his
shoes. His coat and waistcoat were also black, and both were
exceedingly capacious; for the former, with its broad skirts, which
descended almost to his heels, would have made a greatcoat now-a-days;
and in the kingly flaps of the latter, which defended his loins, was
cloth enough and to spare to have made a modern vest. This, with the
broad-brimmed, round-crowned, three-cornered hat, already referred to,
a pair of spectacles, and the silver-mounted cane, completed the
outward appearance of Dominie Grierson, with the exception of his
cambric handkerchief, which was whiter than his own locks, and did
credit to the cleanliness of his housekeeper, and her skill as a
laundress.

In a few moments he returned, with Sandy's letter and other papers in
his hand, and, helping himself to another glass of wine, he rubbed the
glass of his spectacles with his handkerchief, and said--

"Now, doctor, here is poor Sandy's letter; listen, and ye shall hear
it."--

"_Edinburgh, June 10, 17--_

"HONOURED SIR,--I fear that, on account of my not having written to
you, you will ere now have accused me of ingratitude; and when I
tell you that, until the other day, I have not for months even
written to my mother, you may think me undutiful, as well as
ungrateful. But my own breast holds me guiltless of both. When I
arrived here, I met with nothing but disappointments, and those I
found at every hand. For many weeks I walked the streets of this
city in despair, hopeless as a fa