CHAP. IV.] ADOLESCENCE 1844 TO 1847. 83 



should be. Miss Cay meanwhile was writing letters, 

 or finishing some drawing of Lincluden or New Abbey 

 (where they had lately been) , and James would flit to 

 and fro between the little den, where his books and 

 various apparatus lived, and the drawing-room, 1 where 

 his father sat in the arm-chair, with Tobs on knee. 

 Ever and anon we boys would escape out of doors and 

 have a run in the field or the garden, or a bout with 

 the d 1. So the morning would pass till an early 

 luncheon, after which Tobin must do his various tricks ; 

 then, if the men were busy, James would himself har- 

 ness Meg, the Galloway pony, for the drive of the 

 afternoon. After dinner and Toby's second perform- 

 ance, and another turn at the deil, there would be 

 something more to see Cousin Jemima's drawings, 

 recent diagrams or other inventions of his own, the 

 magic discs, etc. etc., the charm of the whole consist- 

 ing in the flow of talk, incessant, but by no means 

 unbroken, 



" Changing, hiding, 

 Doubling upon itself, dividing," 



of which neither of us ever tired. On Sunday there 

 was the drive to Corsock Church (where the absolute 

 gravity of his countenance was itself a study), 2 and the 

 walk home by the river, past the Kirk pool, renowned 

 for bathing, with conversations of a more earnest kind, 



1 The present dining-room. 



2 At church he always sat preternaturally still, with one hand 

 lightly resting on the other, not moving a muscle, however long the . 

 sermon might be. Days afterwards he would show, by some remark, 

 that the whole service, whether good or bad, had been, as it were, 

 photographed upon his mind. 



