cuap.xvi.}] Traps at Tarlaer. 321 
When she proposed doing so, he asked the reason. “Oh!” 
she replied, “just to keep ye company, and to help ye.” 
Accordingly she went with him. While at Huntly, he felt 
his old craving for nature returning upon him. He wished 
to go out and search the woods, the mosses, and the burns, 
as before; but his wife never left him. 
Whenever he indicated an intention of penetrating a 
hedge or leaping a wall, she immediately interfered. The 
* hedge would tear his clothes, and she could not accompany 
him in jumping dikes. He demurred, and said: that if he 
went across he would ‘‘come back again.” But that did 
not suit her purpose, and she would not let him go. As 
evening approached, she said, “ We’ll awa back noo.” He 
protested that he would rather stay out. ‘“ No, no,” said 
she, “I’m no gaun intill a hole oe a wild beast ; and, be- 
sides, the nicht air would kill me.” In fact, as he ticeynttl 
observed, “‘he had fallen into the hands of the Philistines.” 
_Edward still took pleasure in wandering along the coast, 
and surveying the scenes of his former exploits. One day 
he took a friend round to Tarlair, to look at the rock from 
which he had fallen. Standing on the high ground above 
the shore, and looking down upon the rock: -pools beneath 
the promontory, he observed: “I set many of my traps 
down there. I filled them with sea-weed, and sometimes 
with a piece of dead fish. The sea came in and filled my 
traps, and sometimes brought in many rare crustacea. I 
set my traps along the coast for about ten miles, from Port- 
soy to Melrose Head. Many a time have I scrambled 
among these rocks. But when I took ill, and the inflam- 
mation went to my brain, I had to leave all my traps, and 
there they are still.” 
“ What a fine chance that will be for some future ichthy- 
ologist,” said his friend; “ he will find the traps ready-made, 
and perhaps full of new species of crustaceans!” ‘“ Weel,” 
said Edward, “it may be sae; but I dinna think there’ll be 
_sic a feel as me for mony a lang year to come!” 
14* 
