concerning the lands that were coming on to be out of
lease, I set myself to constrain Mr M'Lucre to give up the guildry, as it
were, of his own free-will; and what helped me well to this, was a rumour
that came down from London, that there was to be a dissolution of the
parliament.

The same day that this news reached the town, I was standing at my shop-
door, between dinner and tea-time. It was a fine sunny summer afternoon.
Standing under the blessed influence of the time by myself at my shop-
door, who should I see passing along the crown of the causey, but Mr
M'Lucre himself and with a countenance knotted with care, little in
unison with the sultry indolence of that sunny day.

"Whar awa sae fast, dean o' guild?" quo' I to him; and he stopped his
wide stepping, for he was a long spare man, and looting in his gait.

"I'm just," said he, "taking a step to the provost's, to learn the
particulars of thir great news--for, as we are to hae the casting vote in
the next election, there's no saying the good it may bring to us all gin
we manage it wi' discretion."

I reflected the while of a minute before I made any reply, and then I
said--

"It would hae nae doubt of the matter, Mr M'Lucre, could it be brought
about to get you chosen for the delegate; but I fear, as ye are only dean
of guild this year, that's no to be accomplished; and really, without the
like of you, our borough, in the contest, may be driven to the wall."

"Contest!" cried the dean of guild, with great eagerness; "wha told you
that we are to be contested?"

Nobody had told me, nor at the moment was I sensible of the force of what
I said; but, seeing the effect it had on Mr M'Lucre, I replied,--

"It does not, perhaps, just now do for me to be more particular, and I
hope what I have said to you will gang no further; but it's a great pity
that ye're no even a bailie this year, far less the provost, otherwise I
would have great confidence."

"Then," said the dean of guild, "you have reason to believe that there is
to be a dissolution, and that we are to be contested?"

"Mr M'Lucre, dinna speer any questions," was my answer, "but look at that
and say nothing;" so I pulled out of my pocket a letter that had been
franked to me by the earl. The letter was from James Portoport, his
lordship's butler, who had been a waiter with Mrs Pawkie's mother, and he
was inclosing to me a five-pound note to be given to an auld aunty that
was in need. But the dea