roach next day with my tale of the drovers,
and whom I yet wished to please? I stooped in turn.

"A chevron," I said; "on a chief three mullets? Looks like Douglas, does
it not?"

"Yes, sir, it does; you are right," said he: "it _does_ look like
Douglas; though, without the tinctures, and the whole thing being so
battered and broken up, who shall venture an opinion? But allow me to be
more personal, sir. In these degenerate days I am astonished you should
display so much proficiency."

"O, I was well grounded in my youth by an old gentleman, a friend of my
family, and I may say my guardian," said I; "but I have forgotten it
since. God forbid I should delude you into thinking me a herald, sir! I
am only an ungrammatical amateur."

"And a little modesty does no harm even in a herald," says my new
acquaintance graciously.

In short, we fell together on our onward way, and maintained very
amicable discourse along what remained of the country road, past the
suburbs, and on into the streets of the New Town, which was as deserted
and silent as a city of the dead. The shops were closed, no vehicle ran,
cats sported in the midst of the sunny causeway; and our steps and
voices re-echoed from the quiet houses. It was the high-water, full and
strange, of that weekly trance to which the city of Edinburgh is
subjected: the apotheosis of the _Sawbath_; and I confess the spectacle
wanted not grandeur, however much it may have lacked cheerfulness. There
are few religious ceremonies more imposing. As we thus walked and talked
in a public seclusion the bells broke out ringing through all the bounds
of the city, and the streets began immediately to be thronged with
decent church-goers.

"Ah!" said my companion, "there are the bells! Now, sir, as you are a
stranger I must offer you the hospitality of my pew. I do not know
whether you are at all used with our Scottish form; but in case you are
not I will find your places for you; and Dr. Henry Gray, of St. Mary's
(under whom I sit), is as good a preacher as we have to show you."

This put me in a quandary. It was a degree of risk I was scarce prepared
for. Dozens of people, who might pass me by in the street with no more
than a second look, would go on from the second to the third, and from
that to a final recognition, if I were set before them, immobilised in a
pew, during the whole time of service. An unlucky turn of the head would
suffice to arrest their attention. "Who is that?"