eedy and long is all that I
require; for all things else I shall take my chance. Though I have been
so impertinent to your book, I nevertheless hope and expect you'll send
it to me. Combie [1] and his daughter (or Mare, as you call her) are
coming to town about this time, as I'm informed, and you may easily
contrive to catch them (wild as they are) and send it by them, for
there's no judging what a picture will be like from a mere pen-and-ink
outline--if that won't do, is there not a coach or a carrier? One thing
let me entreat of you: if we engage in this undertaking, let it be kept
a profound secret from every human being. If I was suspected of being
accessory to such foul deeds, my brothers and sisters would murder me,
and my father bury me alive--and I have always observed that if a secret
ever goes beyond those immediately concerned in its concealment it very
soon ceases to be a secret."

[1] Lady Juliana.

[2] Glenfern. Dunderawe Castle, on Loch Fyne, was in Miss Ferrier's mind
when she drew this sketch of a "solitary Highland dwelling."

Again she writes to her friend and copartner in her literary work:--

"I am boiling to hear from you, but I've taken a remorse of conscience
about Lady Maclaughlan and her friends: if I was ever to be detected, or
even suspected, I would have nothing for it but to drown myself. I mean,
therefore, to let her alone till I hear from you, as I think we might
compound some other kind of character for her that might do as well and
not be so dangerous. As to the misses, if ever it was to be published
they must be altered or I must fly my native land."

[1] Campbell of Combie.

Miss Clavering writes in answer:--

"ARDENCAPLE CASTLE,
_Sunday Morning.-_

"First of all I must tell you that I approve in the most signal manner
of Lady Maclaughlan. The sort of character was totally unexpected by me,
and I was really transported with her. Do I know the person who is the
original? The dress was vastly like Mrs. Damer, [1] and the manners like
Lady Frederick. [2] Tell me if you did not mean a touch at her. I love
poor Sir Sampson vastly, though it is impossible, in the presence of his
lady, to have eyes or ears for anyone else. Now you must not think of
altering her, and it must all go forth in the world; neither must the
misses upon any account be changed. I have a way now of at least
offering it to publication by which you never can be discovered. I will
tell the person that I wrote