left Glenbogie, on the evening of his departure, he wrote a
second letter to Miss Docimer, as follows;--

DEAR COUSIN IM,

Here I am at Glenbogie, and here I have been for a week,
without doing a stroke of work. The father still asks "of
his house and his home," and does not seem to be at all
affected by my reference to the romantic grandeur of my
own peculiar residence. Perhaps I may boast so far as to
say that I have laughed on the lass as successfully as did
Allan-a-Dale. But what's the good of laughing on a lass
when one has got nothing to eat. Allan-a-Dale could pick
a pocket or cut a purse, accomplishments in which I am
altogether deficient. I suppose I shall succeed sooner or
later, but when I put my neck into the collar I had no
idea that there would be so much up-hill work before me.
It is all very well joking, but it is not nice to be asked
"of your house and your home" by a gentleman who knows
very well you've got none, and is conscious of inhabiting
three or four palaces himself. Such treatment must be
described as being decidedly vulgar. And then he must know
that it can be of no possible permanent use. The ladies
are all on my side, but I am told by Tringle mere that
I am less acceptable than old Traffick, who married the
other girl, because I'm not the son of Lord Boardotrade!
Nothing astonishes me so much as the bad taste of some
people. Now, it must all be put off till Christmas, and
the cruel part is, that one doesn't see how I'm to go on
living.

In the meantime I have a little time in which to amuse
myself, and I shall turn up in about three weeks at Merle
Park. I wish chiefly to beg that you will not dissuade me
from what I see clearly to be a duty. I know exactly your
line of argument. Following a girl for her money is, you
will say, mercenary. So, as far as I can see, is every
transaction in the world by which men live. The judges,
the bishops, the poets, the Royal academicians, and the
Prime Ministers, are all mercenary;--as is also the man
who breaks stones for 2_s._ 6_d._ a-day. How shall a man
live without being mercenary unless he be born to fortune?
Are not girls always mercenary? Will she marry me knowing
that I have nothing? Will you not marry some one whom
you will probably like much less simply because he will
have something for you to eat and drink? Of cou