102 NIMROUS NORTHERN TOUR. 



expenses. A strict economy must have been observed here, the 

 amount being much under the general calculation ; and this in- 

 duced me to ask what were the disbursements of the present 

 establishment, independent, of course, of the duke's own stud ? 

 Williamson's answer, I confess, surprised me. " They do not," 

 said he, " exceed i$oo per annum, including all charges ; but a 

 great advantage is gained by going to market for everything with 

 cash in hand. It is by attention to what appear little matters 

 that the great saving is effected. Now I know a gentleman who 

 never returns the empty sacks. Was ever such a thing heard 

 of/ continued he, with a strong emphasis on his words " was 

 there ever such a thing heard of&$ a person not returning the 

 empty sacks ?" 



We were now got into the second glass of whiskey toddy. 

 " Ferintosh, Mr. Williamson, I presume," said I, " for it is most 

 excellent liquor !" " If you will look on the head of the cork," 

 he replied, " you will know as much of it as I do ;" and there I 

 found, very intelligibly impressed on black wax, the following 

 words Who the devil sent you this ? All the remark that I 

 made on this curious inscription was that I cared not who the 

 devil sent me some of the same sort nay, if it was the devil 

 himself I would forgive him ; for better no man has tasted.. 

 How different, said I to myself, from those 



"Most poisonous compounds 



Which are the movers of a languishing death ; 

 But, though slow, deadly !" 



I have ever considered really good whiskey the most whole- 

 some spirit that is drunk by man, and I found no more effect, on 

 my arrival at Kelso to a seven o'clock dinner, from these two 

 glasses of pretty stiff whiskey toddy than I should have found 

 had I been only drinking small beer. Perhaps not so much ;; 

 for small beer and Scotch night air are not well agreed. I have 

 however, reason to believe that a second glass of whiskey toddy 

 is not often indulged in by Williamson. He is not only a 

 remarkably sober man himself, but drunkenness, he told me, is 

 a fault he never looks over even once, in any man belonging to 

 his department of the duke's establishment, whatever good 

 qualities the delinquent may possess. Perhaps he is right ; for 

 inasmuch as the doctrine of evil communication corrupting good 

 manners is no less true in philosophy than in religion, it must 

 surely be allowed to be applicable to the stable and kennel. 



But it is surely now time that the minister's mare and Nimrod 

 should be on their return to Kelso ; and particularly so as a thick 



