132 THE JOURNEYMAN. 



I though conscious that by so doing he will lay himself 

 open to merited censure/ that on the first four Sundays 

 after his arrival he absented himself from church and 

 ' strolled through the streets of Leith and Edinburgh ; ' 

 that the fifth was occupied in scaling Arthur's Seat and 

 viewing the city and adjacent country from its summit ; 

 and that ' a few more ' were passed in the company of 

 some townsmen of his own, who, ' Cameronian-like, pre- 

 ferred the open air to a church/ The impressions 

 formed in this leisurely survey of Edinburgh are de- 

 scribed at some length to his uncles, and they set before 

 us the Hugh Miller of twenty-one, with a distinctness 

 so vivid and a simplicity so naive, that we feel still more 

 strongly than before how completely the profound re- 

 flective vein of the autobiography prevents us from 

 realizing what the writer was at the various stages of his 

 career. 



The fervour of his nationality is one of the first things 

 which attracts our notice. ' Holyrood House/ he says, 



I 1 viewed with the same emotion which a pilgrim feels 

 when prostrating himself before the shrine of a favourite 

 saint. With this building, long before I saw it, I had 

 connected associations of a high and venerable character, 

 but I was not prepared for the sudden, the spontaneous 

 burst of enthusiasm, which rose from my very soul when 

 I stood fronting the gateway and saw the arms of Scot- 

 land, as if it was still an independent kingdom, frowning 

 in the grey stone, and directly above them, the crown of 

 her ancient kings. It was no time to sum up the ad- 

 vantages which we derive from the union the very 

 thought of it was revolting, and I looked upon the sen- 

 tinel who paced before the door as one who had no 

 business there. I have often heard of classic and of holy 

 ground ; to me the space upon which this pile stands is 



