ming a volunteer, I did it, I can assure this gentleman, from no unworthier motive than choice; for as to the flattery and falsehood I might unhappily imbibe of a sea-faring life, it could only reach me through the volumes I have, seemingly too often, spent an idle hour with. That I was complete ly a novice in the whole matter, how ever," added he, sighing, and surveying his clothes," needs no other confirmation than my present appearance before you."

"True, true, my lad," replied the Captain, softened, and hastily interrupting him, " your clothes are battered and cut-up enough, to be sure but that's nothing, for the wind will soon come round again in that quarter, if you behave well-at least, I should hope so. Are your parents living, Davies ?"

"So far as my knowledge extends, I believe they are, sir."

"You believe they are, sir?" echo ed the Captain, with surprise; while his Lieutenant, with the affected calmness of a victorious soothsayer, looked still harder in the abashed youth's face, exclaimed, "D-n me, that beats cock-fighting!"

"Pshaw!" said the Captain to himself, leaving the capstan, and pacing the quarter-deck with hurried steps. "Highgate's completely at fault, as Toddrell said. The fellow's a regular drilled darby-ringer after all! and yet," continued he, carefully surveying Edward, "who would have thought it?" Then stepping up in front of the astonished Davies, he said, with considerable severity, "Did you not tell me just now, fellow, that you were born in Edinburgh ?"

"I certainly did, sir," answered Edward, calmly, "but I never said that my parents resided there."

"Well, well, be it so," cried Captain Farrell, coolly, but somewhat sarcastically; and, pray, where are you now pleased to say they reside? for, remember, you believe they are still alive."

The young man looked embarrassed, blushed deeply, and, though the question was eagerly repeated by Lieutenant Toddrell, continued silent.

"What, does it clinch at last, my lad?" cried the Lieutenant; "D-n me, but I thought as much,"-and commenced a walk in his turn.

"Hark'ee, fellow," said Captain

Farrell, with a mixture of anger and contempt, "from what I had myself seen and learnt of you from this paper, I was fool enough to feel friendly inclined towards you-but that is now over. 'Tis true, we are entire strangers to one another, and yet I cannot help thanking God that you don't belong where I command-for I hate a suspicious character, to say no worse of you, as I hate the devil. Before you go, however, take a friend's advice for once, and bethink yourself better before you venture again to answer such questions on a quarter-deck, otherwise you will stand a fair chance of paying the gangway a visit.-Remember this, and so farewell-you are at liberty to depart."

Edward, whose face had been an alternate deep-flushing red and an ashy paleness, while the Captain was speaking, still stood, however, apparently absorbed in the most painful feelings. Twice he essayed to speak, but his tongue denied its office; and it was only by a desperate effort, on a second order to depart, that he was able to utter, in a tremulous voice, “I obey you, sir, and I do so with deep regret; for I leave you under impressions, which, I would fain flatter myself, are as disagreeable to you as they are infamous to me. Believe me -believe me-they have not the smallest foundation in truth.”

"Then, why not be as honest as you talk of," said the Captain, more coolly, "and answer me a common question in a common way, without resorting to that paltry, shuffling, quibbling manner, to which I cannot help thinking, you've had too much occasion to resort to lately? If you think, my lad, such a stale trick will serve in the least to conceal you, you are mightily mistaken;-for, were such a thing at all worth my trouble, I could tell you in a moment what you are. There are thousands of such fellows as you in the service already-for whom I would not give one straw in comparison of the bold and fearless scoundrel, who honestly hoists his flag and lets every body know that he is one."

"I must confess, sir,” replied the youth, with great humility," considering my present appearance, and the associates amongst whom you found me, that your suspicions are perfectly reasonable, though, as applying to me, I solemnly assure you, they are per

fectly unjust; for I will proudly repeat, I am not what you think me. I could as easily as fearlessly lay every event of my life before you-but-you must excuse me-No-it may not be at this time; nor is it at all necessary that I should bring needless degrada tion on highly respected names by associating them with such a despicable being as a man-of-war's man.'

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Very well, young man," cried Captain Farrell, very well, take your own way of it, and content yourself; for your concerns you know are nothing to me, and I have something else to do than stand here prating with you. I must tell you, however, that I think you are a queer one, and no better, I doubt me much, than you ought to be. You may leave me.”

So saying, Captain Farrell turned on his heel, and walked towards his officers, leaving poor Davies to join his bandit companions in a state of mind far from being enviable.

"Well, sir," said Toddrell, “don't you think poor Ralph's headpiece is in a sad taking? An unaccountable, forsooth! Pray God all our matters were as easy to be accounted for as that fellow-who is a smartlad enough, but who, no doubt, is some barber's clerk ashore, who has bilked his tailor, and run for it. However, I'm really sorry for Highgate, poor fellow! for

he gets to leeward so very rapidly, that, d-n me, if I don't think the little brain he ever had is leaving him fast; and if God and the Admiralty spare him a few years more of the first fiddle of a guardo, he'll get as muddled, and crank, and pompously stupid, as a port-admiral, or a dock-yard commissioner."

Here Toddrell's laughter overcame his wit, and he bayed away, as our Campbell says, "both long and loud," to the great admiration of all his juniors, who joined him as a chorus with great glee. Captain Farrell's gravity, however, and his utterance of a peevish pshaw! soon abridged the view of their well scrubbed teeth, and put their merry muscles in a more decorous and business-like form. Leaving them, therefore, more sedately making various remarks on the unexampled strength of that Scottish genius, whose magic pencil make such paltry fragments as the Fern Islands, objects of such high interest in the literary world, and the juniors busied in taking observations of the headlands of the beautiful coast of Northumbria-the saucy Whippersnapper nimbly walking through it meanwhile-we will conclude for the present, content with having introduced our man-of-war's man, how ever inauspiciously, to the notice of our readers.

S.

On the morning after the Coronation, I found myself in a very disjasked state, being both sore in lith and limb, and worn out in my mind with the great fatigue I had undergone, together with a waff of cold that had come upon me, no doubt caused by that disaster of the thunder plump that drookit me to the skin, as I have rehearsed at length in the foregoing chapter. I was thereby constrained to keep my lodgings for a day; and Mrs Damask was wonderful attentive, and sparing in no pains to get me pleased and comfortable. However, by and by, I came to my ordinar, and then I went about to see the sights, being, in

the meantime, much solaced with oc casional visitations from that most worthy divine, Dr Pringle. He was indeed to me a friend among strangers, in that foreign land of London, and took a pleasure in letting me know, from his past experience, what was most becoming of notice and observation.

The first place of note that I went to see, was the Gardens of Vauxhall; and I had for my companion, Mr Ettle, a Greenock gentleman, that I had dined with in the house of Mr Tartan, my friend and correspondent in that town. He was a busy man, seeing all sort of things. I trow no grass grew beneath his feet on the plainstanes of London;

for he considered it his duty, having come to visit the metropolis as a party of pleasure, to spare no trouble in compassing the ends of his journey.

Going with Mr Ettle to the masquerade at Vauxhall, ilk in a domino, which is just like a minister's gown, and with black false faces on, when we were paying our money at the door for admittance, we saw before us a little, fat, and round lady, and a gentleman in the same guise and garb as ourselves; and following them in, the lady, when she beheld the lamps and bowers and arbours, cried out with a shrill voice of admiration, Eh, Gordon's Loan, Prussia Street! Sawney Sowans, what's tat? was ever sic a sight seen!" By the which ejaculation, we discerned that this was a Paisley woman, and Mr Ettle said he knew them well, they being no other than Mr and Mrs Sowans from that town. -"We'll get some fun out of them, so keep close at their heels," said he. With that we walked behind them listening to their discourse, and to every" Gordon's Loan, Prussia Street," with which the mistress testified her wonderment at the ferlies of the place. "I'm confoundit, Sawney Sowans," said she, “at the lights and lamps. Eh! Gordon's Loan, Prussia Street! luk up, luk up, can yon be booits too?" and she pointed to the starns in the firmament with a jocosity that was just a kittle to hear.

By and by, after parading from one part of the gardens to another, harkening to the music here, and looking to ladies and gentlemen dancing there, we entered into a most miraculous round room, with divers other halls and places, as if built up by a Geni, and stood before a batch of foreign musicants, that were piping on the Pan's pipe, nodding their heads in a most methodical manner, and beating drums and triangles at the same time. Mr and Mrs Sowans were just transported to see this, and the gudeman said to her, as he turned to go away, "It's all in my eye." "What's a' in your eye" quo' she." Its just clockwork," said he ; at which she gave a skirl of pleasure, and cried "Na, na, gudeman, ye're glammer'd there, for they're living images of human creatures like oursels."

The crowd had now assembled in great numbers. In going out of one room into another the mistress was divided from cleeking with her husband,

and Mr Ettle seeing this, pushed in and kittled her under the oxster—“())Sawney Sowans o' Paisley, whar are ye? Come here, come here, for a man's meddling wi' me."-The which shout of terrification caused a loud uproar of laughter, that was just a sport to enjoy. But after it, Mr Ettle made himself known as a friend, for Mrs Sowans was sincerely frightened, and it behoved him to pacify her, by telling that what he had done was but a masquerading for diversion. Some exchange of discourse anent London and the crowning of the King then ensued, and Mr and Mrs Sowans, telling where they bided, invited both me and Mr Ettle to come and see them in their lodgings, the mistress saying in her couthy way to me, "I hope, Mr Duffle, ye'll no neglec to gie me a ca' before ye lea the toon;" which I promised with meikle good will, for Mrs Sowans is in the main a decent woman, and no given to hide her pedigree, as was shewn by her to the minister of the parish when the maister bigget his new house. "I can sit at the window," said Mrs Sowans," and see sax houses where I was in servitude, and no ane o' them a' half so good or so bein as my ain.”

When we had paraded, as I have said, for a season, we then went into an alcove and had a small bowl of punch; and here I must notice an uncivil thing on the part of Mr Ettle, for when I was sitting resting myself he slipped away out, and left me my leaful lane. Where he went, and who he forgathered with, he kens best himsel, for I never saw hilt or hair of him more that night. So I began to grow eerie at being solitary in an unkent multitude, and coming to the yett of the gardens, hired a hackney that took me home to Mrs Damask's in perfect safety, by half an hour past eleven o'clock. The mistress marvelled at seeing me so soon from Vauxhall, and thought I had surely met with some great misfortune, either in purse or person, and could not divine how it was possible that I could be uneasy at Vauxhall.

The night following I went to hear the music in the Opera-a most suprising playhouse, and I sat down beside Mr Ettle, whom I saw in the pit. I had not, however, been long there when a most beautiful and fine lady came and clinkit herself to my side, saying, "Eh! save's, Mr Duffle, what's brought you frae the Sautmarket to

London? and how's Mrs M'Leckit?" -I was, as may well be supposed, in a consternation at this cordiality from a personage that was a match for a countess, and looked for a space of time in amazement:-" Do ye no ken me," cried the madam, I'm Jenny Swinton, that was wee lass to your neighbour Mr Sweeties."-And sure enough it was the same glaikit girlie. She had a misfortune that she gied the wyte o' to some o' our neer-doweel gentlemen; but after this she fell into an open course of immorality, till she made Glasgow o'er het to hold her. Then she went into Edinburgh; and syne, having gathered some lady-like cleeding, she spoused her fortune, and set out to try her luck in London, where, as I could learn,

she was well treated as an innocent country maiden both by lords and gentlemen of high degrees. To do the poor creature justice, however, I am bound to say she was very glad to see me, and requested me very warmly to come to her house in London Street, and take my tea with her. And Doctor Pringle, to whom I mentioned the adventure next day, advised me to go, and offered himself to accompany me, in the hope that by our exhortations Jenny might be persuaded to eschew the error of her way. But I had a notion that the invitation was all a trick of Mr Ettle's, to draw me into a situation with this strange woman; for they seemed to be very thick thegither, though he pretended that he didna ken her.

THE more I saw of the great Tarshish, my spirit was filled with wonder, and borne onward with a longing for new things. Finding it was not convenient to go home for my dinner, when I was in a distant part of the town, I dropped into the nearest coffeehouse, when I felt an inclination to eat, and by this means I sometimes forgathered with strange persons, deeply read in the mysteries of man.Among others, I one day, when I felt the wonted two o'clock pinkling in my belly, stepped into an eating-house, to get a check of something, and sat down at a table in a box where an elderly man, of a salt-water complexion, was sitting. Having told the lad that was the waiter what I wanted, I entered into discourse with the hard-favoured stranger. His responses to me were at first very short, and it seemed as if he had made up his mind to stint the freedom of conversation. But there was a quickened intelligence in his eye, which manifested that his mind neither slumbered nor slept. I told him that I was come on purpose to inspect the uncos in London, and how content I was with all I saw ;and my continued marvel at the great apparition of wealth that seemed to abound everywhere. "I think," said I," that its only in London a man can see the happiness of the British nation." "And the misery," was his reply. This caustical observe led to fur ther discant anent both sides of the question, until he opened up, and

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showed that his reserve was but a resolution-not habitual, nor from the custom of his nature. "The least interesting things about this town," said he, "to a man who looks deeper than the outside of the packing-case of society, are the buildings,-the wealth, and the appearance of the people. The pre-eminence of London consists in the possession of a race of beings that I call the Effigies.They resemble man in action and external bearing; but they have neither passions, appetites, nor affections;without reason, imagination, or heart, they do all things that men do, but they move onward to the grave, and are covered up in the parent and congenial clay with as little regret by those who knew them best, as you feel for the fate of that haddock you are now about to eat."

"And what are the things?" was my diffident answer. "Why," says he, "they are for the most part foundlings of fortune,-beings without relations adventurers, who at an early period of life, perhaps begged their way to London, and have raised themselves, not by talent or skill, but by a curious kind of alchemy, into great riches. I have known several. They are com monly bachelors,-bachelors in the heart. They live in a snug way,have some crony that dines with them on Sunday, and who knows as little of their affairs as of their history. The friendship of such friends usually commences in the Hampstead or Hack

ney stages, and the one is commonly a pawnbroker and the other a banker. The professions of such friendshipless friends are ever intrinsically the same, nor can I see any difference between the man who lends money on bills and bonds, and him who does the same thing on the widow's weddingring, or the clothes of her orphans. They both grow rich by the expedients of the necessitous or the unfortunate. They make their money by habit, without motive, and they bequeath it to some charity or public character, merely because they are by the force of custom required to make a will.-I am a traveller, I know something of all the principal cities of Europe, but in no other has the Effigian species any existence. Their element consists of the necessities of a commercial community, which embraces all the other vicissitudes to which mankind are ordinarily liable.

"One of the most decided, the purest blood of the Effigies, was the late old Joe Brianson. Whether he begged or worked his way to London is disputed; but he commenced his career as a porter.No one ever heard him mention the name of any of his kin; perhaps he had some good reason for the concealment.-The first week he saved a crown, which he lent to a brother bearer of burdens who was in need, on condition of receiving six shillings on the Saturday following. In the course of the third week after his arrival, he was worth one pound sterling-and he died at the age of 73, leaving exactly a million, not taking out of the world one idea more than he brought into London fifty-six years before; and yet the history of Joe would be infinitely more interesting and important than that of all the men of fame and genius that ever existed. For although he was, in the truest sense of the times, a usurious huncks, he was never drawn into one transaction against the statutes.-I knew him well in my younger years, for I had often occasion to apply to him. I was constituted somewhat differently, and without being so good a member of society, I do not say much for myself when I affirm that I was a betJoe was most faithful to his word his promise was a bond; but like a bond, it always contained a penalty. "If this bill," he used to say, is not pointedly taken up, "I

ter man.

promise you it will be heard of;" and when it was not taken up, it was heard of, and that too with a vengeance. He never gave a groat in charity, because he never had one to give. He lived all his days as literally from hand to mouth as when he entered London without a penny. If you wanted a bill discounted, he never did it off-hand. He had all his own cash previously put out at usury, and was obliged to apply to his bankers. They got at the rate of five per cent. per annum. Joe agreed to sell some article of merchandize to his customer,-and the price he put on it left him not less in general than five per cent. per month, upon the principal of the bill discounted. But the wealth he thus gathered, might almost be said to have been unblest, for it brought him no new enjoyment. At the age of three score, and possessed of half a million, he was taken ill with vexation in consequence of a clerk dying insolvent, who had been in his service three and twenty years, and to whom he had discounted a bill for twenty pounds in anticipation of his salary; the poor man being at the time under the necessity of submitting to an operation for the stone.

"Joe married when he was about fifty. His wife was the daughter of a man with whom he had formed an acquaintance in the Islington stage-coach. She was beautiful and accomplished, and beloved by a handsome young butcher; but educated at a fashionable boarding-school, the butcher's trade was unsavoury to her imagination. Her own father was a nightman-a dealer in dung-hills. There is some difference between a banker and a butcher; and old sordid Joe was on that account preferred to the young butcher by the nightman's daughter. They begat a son and a daughter. The former, at the age of twenty-two, was elected into Parliament by his father's purse. The latter, at the age of nineteen, was married by the same potentiality to an Earl. Joe died-his son and daughter put their servants into mourning when he ceased to discount, and in less than three months after gave them new liveries, in honour of their mother's second marriage. There are no such beings as these in any other capital of Europe, and yet they are common in London. Father, mother, son, and daughter, belong to