200 BUSINESS, RECREATION ; SUNSHINE, SHADOW. 



accompany a party of friends fly-catching or fly-fishing. 

 During a solitary excursion in 1835, he wrote the follow- 

 ing letter to his little daughter : 



" The Buen, Fetteecairn, 

 Monday night, 2lst Sept. 1835. 



" My dear Lassie, — I am sure you will be glad to hear 

 that I will be home in two or three days. The chief 

 pleasure in going from home is the coming back again. 

 What rounds of the garden we will have, and how happy 

 mamma will be, and how Corby will jump for joy ! I 

 daresay the leaves are now growing yellow in the face and 

 will soon tumble to the ground, and then, till a little frost 

 comes, everything will look wet and dirty. Never mind, 

 there are plenty of coals at the canal, and we will keep 

 good fires, and have plenty of fun within doors. Mamma 

 says there has been very bad weather since I went away, 

 but on the whole it has been good here. To-morrow we 

 are to take a long drive to Loch Lee, which is about fifteen 

 miles from this. In that part of the country, almost a 

 hundred years ago, an old woman hanged herself, and the 

 custom is, when any one commits suicide, to bury them 

 where the lands of two lairds meet. Well ! they tried to 

 carry this woman there, though it is a long way off among 

 the hills. A storm of snow came on — they were all like to 

 perish with cold and hunger ; so, long before they came to 



