352 MAN OF SCIENCE. 



a print to which he directed my attention the print 

 which was the subject of conversation when the boy 

 Walter Scott met Robert Burns. As I returned I found 

 Hugh Miller standing by Robert Bruce's sword, which 

 had been placed in an upright position in the centre of 

 the gallery. He measured it, and then, turning to me, 

 recited from the " Lord of the Isles " the lines referring 

 to it. Lord Elgin had sent the sword, and Ave were speak- 

 ing of his being of the same family as the King, when 

 Hugh Miller told the story of the old Scotch lady of the 

 name, who, on being asked if she was of King Robert 

 Bruce's family, answered that the King was of her family. 



1 On one of the first days of December my sister and 

 I went down to Portobello to call for Mrs Miller. We 

 met him at the gate of Shrubmount, and he came into 

 the drawing-room and remained while we were there. 

 We thought him looking well, and remarked to each 

 other afterwards that there was an increase of dignified 

 ease in his manner, as of a man assured of his position. 



' He showed us a stag's horn, found in the bank of a 

 burn that flows into the Solway, which a friend had sent 

 him. The burn, swollen by the rains in October, had 

 carried away some of the soil from the bank, and the 

 horn was seen sticking out from it. Though it was not 

 whole, from what remained it was evident that it had 

 belonged to a stag of at least sixteen tynes. This con- 

 firmed an opinion he had for some time formed, that 

 before the British deer had been driven by man to the 

 higher and poorer districts of the country, they had 

 been a larger race. Lord Kinnaird, to whom he had 

 shown it some days before, had mentioned another con- 

 firmatory fact. A friend of his in England, who had 

 very much enlarged his deer-park, found that his deer 

 were developing larger horns than usual. We spoke of 



