of frenzy; and he set down to inheritance from his
favourite my own becoming treatment of himself. On our walks abroad,
which soon became daily, he would sometimes (after duly warning me to
keep the matter dark from "Aadam") skulk into some old familiar
pot-house, and there (if he had the luck to encounter any of his veteran
cronies) he would present me to the company with manifest pride, casting
at the same time a covert slur on the rest of his descendants. "This is
my Jeannie's yin," he would say. "He's a fine fallow, him," The purpose
of our excursions was not to seek antiquities or to enjoy famous
prospects, but to visit one after another a series of doleful suburbs,
for which it was the old gentleman's chief claim to renown that he had
been the sole contractor, and too often the architect besides. I have
rarely seen a more shocking exhibition: the brick seemed to be blushing
in the walls, and the slates on the roof to have turned pale with shame;
but I was careful not to communicate these impressions to the aged
artificer at my side; and when he would direct my attention to some
fresh monstrosity--perhaps with the comment, "There's an idee of mine's;
it's cheap and tasty, and had a graand run; the idee was soon stole, and
there's whole deestricts near Glesgie with the goathic addeetion and
that plunth," I would civilly make haste to admire and (what I found
particularly delighted him) to inquire into the cost of each adornment.
It will be conceived that Muskegon capitol was a frequent and a welcome
ground of talk. I drew him all the plans from memory; and he, with the
aid of a narrow volume full of figures and tables, which answered (I
believe) to the name of Molesworth, and was his constant
pocket-companion, would draw up rough estimates and make imaginary
offers on the various contracts. Our Muskegon builders he pronounced a
pack of cormorants; and the congenial subject, together with my
knowledge of architectural terms, the theory of strains, and the prices
of materials in the States, formed a strong bond of union between what
might have been otherwise an ill-assorted pair, and led my grandfather
to pronounce me, with emphasis, "a real intalligent kind of a chield."
Thus a second time, as you will presently see, the capitol of my native
State had influentially affected the current of my life.
I left Edinburgh, however, with not the least idea that I had done a
stroke of excellent business for myself, and singly
|