516 RODERICK, THE FAIR-HAIRED. 



Having nearly attained to his journey's limits, objects, long familiar 

 to former observation, successively invited Roderick's gaze, like the 

 land-mark to the mariner, as he first descries the bold blue promon- 

 tories of his native shore. Every shrub and tree, from the sheltering 

 thorn to the gnarled oak was hallowed by reminiscences, whence the 

 emotions of his spirit derived an answering sympathy and tone. The 

 steeple of Starvitout, surrounded by flickering squadrons of uproarious 

 daws, splendidly uprose like a giant in his strength ; and at a little 

 distance from it the public seminary, where the learned languages 

 are taught in purity and ease, and the morals of its teachers and pupils 

 corrected by the castigating staff of the Laird of Ragmore ; next was 

 seen the court-house., that arena so ripe with the conflicts of insatiable 

 Highland litigants, who, having consigned the claymore to self- 

 destruction, rely for revenge on the law's award, which is marked by 

 a loss of "siller," and not of life. Arrived at the approach to the 

 "glide town," a hue and cry was bruited all round, that a stranger 

 had entered, when doors, casements, attics, and alleys, became instantly 

 peopled with stupid, staring spectators of every grade, from the kilted 

 dealer in sulphur and broad-cloth, down to the raw-boned " gilly," 

 whose only ideas of civilized existence were derived from the occa- 

 sional appearance of a passing traveller. Crossing a rickettv old 

 fabric, endued with the fearful responsibilities of a bridge, where a 

 toll had long been levied to defray the charge of drains and " snishen," 

 ab sederunts of the town council, the fond, the fair, the long-ex- 

 pected termination of Roderick's toils the Eden of his bliss, and El 

 Dorado of his happiness bore in view. A hand was distinctly seen 

 to rest upon a window-sill, which, exciting the tenderest sensations of 

 one naturally vivacious and keen, he kissed at, smiled upon, and 

 waved to, until on nearer approach he discovered the hand to be the 

 withered member of old Granny Mac Sillergrip, laid out to catch a 

 little warmth in the sun. Arrived at the mansion, Roderick dis- 

 mounted, and announced himself to the porter, a whity-brown-faced 

 savage, who sometimes also acted as the Laird's amanuensis, purveyor 

 of scandal to the ladies, and conscience-keeper to the family at large, 

 who had aforetime qualified himself by a few months' study at the 

 University of Aberdeen, where he had picked up as much tolerable 

 broken English as enabled him to carry on his vocation with a degree 

 of success, creditable to him as a " stitchet minister" from the alma 

 mater of that renowned city. 



In a moment the fellow returned from Mac Sillergrip, his master, 

 intimating, with an Aberdeen air and bow, the desire of that gentle- 

 man to see Roderick in the drawing-room. On his admission he 

 discovered the family seated all round, occupied with their various 

 pursuits and pastimes, namely, the laird scrutinizing his leases and 

 debentures; his daughters conning over the last new rondo; his 

 sister, Miss Helen, exploring the " Whole Duty of Man ;" and old 

 granny Mac Sillergrip employed like another Omphale at her distaff, 

 half smothered in orts, and begriming the Turkey carpets, and 

 other costly furniture, with her refuse of flax; whilst the sorrowing, 

 meek, neglected, unprotected, and miserable creature, Mac Sillergrip's 

 degraded wife, sat brooding over her sorrows in silence, exposed to the 



