estate of St. Ronan's, which is now at nurse,
and thriving full fast; especially since some debts, of rather an
usurious character, have been paid up by Mr. Touchwood, who contented
himself with more moderate usage.

On the subject of this property, Mr. Mowbray, generally speaking, gave
such minute directions for acquiring and saving, that his old
acquaintance, Mr. Winterblossom, tapping his morocco snuff-box with the
sly look which intimated the coming of a good thing, was wont to say,
that he had reversed the usual order of transformation, and was turned
into a grub after having been a butterfly. After all, this narrowness,
though a more ordinary modification of the spirit of avarice, may be
founded on the same desire of acquisition, which in his earlier days
sent him to the gaming-table.

But there was one remarkable instance in which Mr. Mowbray departed from
the rules of economy, by which he was guided in all others. Having
acquired, for a large sum of money, the ground which he had formerly
feued out for the erection of the hotel, lodging-houses, shops, &c., at
St. Ronan's Well, he sent positive orders for the demolition of the
whole, nor would he permit the existence of any house of entertainment
on his estate, except that in the Aultoun, where Mrs. Dods reigns with
undisputed sway, her temper by no means improved either by time, or her
arbitrary disposition by the total absence of competition.

Why Mr. Mowbray, with his acquired habits of frugality, thus destroyed
a property which might have produced a considerable income, no one could
pretend to affirm. Some said that he remembered his own early follies;
and others, that he connected the buildings with the misfortunes of his
sister. The vulgar reported, that Lord Etherington's ghost had been seen
in the ball-room, and the learned talked of the association of ideas.
But it all ended in this, that Mr. Mowbray was independent enough to
please himself, and that such was Mr. Mowbray's pleasure.

The little watering-place has returned to its primitive obscurity; and
lions and lionesses, with their several jackals, blue surtouts, and
bluer stockings, fiddlers and dancers, painters and amateurs, authors
and critics, dispersed like pigeons by the demolition of a dovecot, have
sought other scenes of amusement and rehearsal, and have deserted ST.
RONAN'S WELL.[II-12]

FOOTNOTE:

[II-12] Note III.--Meg Dods.

AUTHOR'S NOTES.

Note I., p. 202.

There wer