CHAPTER II 



' I view yon Empress of the North 

 Sit on her hilly throne.' 



SCOTT. 



IN EDINBURGH THE CROMARTY BANK 



HE had not long to experience what Gilbert Burns 

 said was to his brother the saddest of all sights, that of 

 a man seeking work. He had called on the town-clerk 

 to see whether some means could be devised of setting 

 himself free from the property when, on mentioning his 

 occupation, he was not only told the prospect of a sale 

 was not so hopeless as he had expected, but was intro- 

 duced to a builder erecting a mansion-house in the 

 south of Edinburgh. He lodged in the village of 

 Niddry Mill, and found his experience of life among 

 metropolitan labourers the very reverse of favourable. 



His not very high opinion of the working classes, for, 

 as we shall see, Miller remained a Whig to the last with 

 a wholesome horror for Radicals and Chartists, was 

 doubtless due to the circumstances under which he 

 found himself, and not to any feeling of superiority on 

 his part. The social condition of the working classes 

 was then on the eve of transition, and the organisation 



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