NIM ROD'S NORTHERN TOUR. 237 



"Oh," said he, "we have plenty to do, we will go and see my 

 friend, Piper, the great coach proprietor, and all his swell drags ; 

 and when we have done with them, we shall have ' swells ; of 

 another sort to see those walking Prince's Street, the Bond 

 Street of this place, amongst whom no doubt you will see some 

 of your friends. Then we must go to Blackwood's, and hear the 

 news there, where you will be sure to find the Professor (Wilson) 

 about an hour before his dinner, and some others of your literary 

 acquaintance." 



Our visit to friend Piper was most satisfactory, and in more 

 ways than one, for, after seeing his drags, and hearing the de- 

 tails of his immense coaching establishment he horses seven 

 mails, and ten coaches it ended in our partaking of a most 

 excellent dinner, for which we did not "pay the piper" in other 

 words, he asked us to dine with him, when independently of 

 " most excellent " fare, and a hearty welcome, we met a very 

 agreeable party of his friends. And in defiance of the maxim 

 of the old ones, that the table the sacred altar of friendship 

 and hospitality, Qfriuv Stiov (3a)fi6v KCH Ztviuv, as Plutarch calls it 

 should be held sacred, and that it is a crime to dishonour it by 

 improper behaviour when at it, or. by a too minute recapitulation 

 of some matters relating to it when we have left it, I cannot 

 persuade myself to forego the recital of one capital anecdote, 

 given to us over Mr. Piper's mahogany, by Mr. Allan, brother to 

 the very celebrated historical painter, of that name, a name 

 which has reflected honour upon Scotland. The story was this, 

 but it will lose more than half its richness from the absence of 

 the provincial dialect, as well as the full vein of humour in which 

 it flowed from his lips, which it is not in the power of the pen to 

 supply : one of these new-fashioned ranting preachers of the 

 present day, with whom declamation passes for eloquence, and 

 (too often, I fear) cant for religion, was so much delighted at find- 

 ing that for three successive Sundays, he had drawn tears from 

 an old woman in his congregation, that he solicited an interview 

 with her, when the following conversation ensued. " Pray, my 

 good woman," said he, " tell me what part of my three last ser- 

 mons went so near to your heart, as to draw forth such a plentiful 

 flow of tears, as I was pleased to perceive you shed." Her 

 answer was to this effect, for I despair of giving it in the original 

 " That having been deprived during the last three years of the 

 valuable services of her husband, who had died, her only means 

 of support arose from those of a donkey, and he was now dead. 

 That the poor animal was a great favourite of both of them, and 

 that they never approached his stable but he manifested his affec- 

 tion for them by one of his loudest brays ; and, finally, that the 



