ad only New Year's Day. Saturday was only a
half-holiday. We all had a holiday for Queen Victoria's coronation, and
I went with a number of school fellows to see Abbotsford, not for the
first time in my life.

Two mail coaches--the Blucher and the Chevy Chase--ran through Melrose
every day. People went to the post office for their letters, and paid
for them on delivery. My two elder sisters--Agnes, who died of
consumption at the age of 16, and Jessie, afterwards Mrs. Andrew
Murray, of Adelaide and Melbourne, went to boarding school with their
aunt, Mary Spence, lit Upper Wooden, halfway between Jedburgh and
Kelso. Roxburghshire is rich in old monasteries. The border lands were
more safe in the hands of the church than under feudal lords engaged in
perpetual fighting, and the vassals of the abbeys had generally
speaking, a more secure existence. Kelso. Jedburgh, and Dryburgh Abbeys
lay in fertile districts, and I fancy that when these came into the
hands of the Lords of the congregation, the vassals looked back with
regret on the old times. I was not sent to Wooden, but kept at home,
and I went to a dayschool called by the very popish name of St. Mary's
Convent, though it was quite sufficiently Protestant. My mother had the
greatest confidence in the lady who was at the head of it. She had been
a governess in good situations, and had taught herself Latin, so that
she might fit the boys of the family to take a good place in the
Edinburgh High School. She discovered that she had an incurable
disease, a form of dropsy, which compelled her to lie down for some
time every day, and this she considered she could not do as a
governess. So she determined to risk her savings, and start a boarding
and day school in Melrose, a beautiful and healthy neighbourhood, and
with the aid of a governess, impart what was then considered the
education of a gentlewoman to the girls in the neighbourhood. She took
with her her old mother, and a sister who managed the housekeeping, and
taught the pupils all kinds of plain and fancy needlework. She
succeeded, and she lived till the year 1866, although most of her
teaching was done from her sofa. When my mother was asked what it was
that made Phin so successful, and so esteemed, she said it was her
commonsense. The governesses were well enough, but the invalid old lady
was the life and soul of the school. There were about 14 boarders, and
nearly as many day scholars there, so long as there was no co