intings, and especially of prints, which
last he left to the Adelaide Art Gallery. He was a close friend of my
brother John's until the death of the latter. One always enjoys meeting
with Adelaide people in other lands, and comparing the most recent
items of news. I went to Dumfries according to promise, and spent many
days with my old friend Mrs. Graham, but stayed the night always with
her sister, Mrs. Maxwell, wife of a printer and bookseller in the town.
Dumfries was full of Burns's relies and memorials. Mr. Gilfillan had
taken the likeness of Mrs. Burns and her granddaughter when he was a
young man, and Mrs. Maxwell corresponded with the granddaughter. It was
also full of associations with Carlyle. His youngest sister, Jean the
Craw, as she was called on account of her dark hair and complexion was
Mrs. Aitkin, a neighbour and close friend of Mrs. Maxwell. I was taken
to see her, and I suppose introduced as a sort of author, and she
regretted much that this summer Tom was not coming to visit her at
Dumfries. She was a brisk, cheery person, with some clever daughters,
who were friends of the Maxwell girls. When the Froude memorials came
out no one was more indignant than Jean the Craw--"Tom and his wife
always understood each other. They were not unhappy, though after her
death he reproached himself for some things."

I found that my friend had just as much to do from morning to night as
she could do, and I hoped with a great hope that "Uphill Work" would be
published, and all the world would see how badly capable and
industrious women were paid. I fancied that a three-volume novel would
be read, marked, and inwardly digested by everybody! But Mrs. Graham
was appreciated by the matron, the doctors, and by the people of
Dumfries, as she had not been in the village of Kirkbeen. Her
picturesque descriptions of life in the various colonies interested
home-staying folk, for she had the keenest observing faculties. There
was an old cousin of Uncle Handyside's who always turned the
conversation on to Russia, where he had visited successful brothers;
but his talk was not incisive. My cousin Agnes asked me when I supposed
this visit was paid, and I said a few years ago, probably, when she
laughed and said--"Nicol Handyside spent six weeks in Russia 30 years
ago, and he has been talking about it ever since." One visit I paid in
Edinburgh to an old lady from Melrose, who lived with a married
daughter. She had always been very d