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serve for a week after his departure. He then spent as much money as he possibly could spare, in purchasing a stock of sugar and tea for Miss Geddes; as likewise a few drugs, which she occasionally required for a particular malady to which she was subject. On the day when he and his fellow-prisoners were appointed to march, it happened that Miss Geddes was confined to bed with this indisposition a circumstance that added greatly to his distress. Ah, pauvre Mademoiselle," said he, as with his own hand he mixed and brought forward her medicine, "je suis bien fache at your maladie—that is, I am not vat you call fashed, but I am sorry-I am penetre with grief, that I should have to leave you on your bed of indisposition. Come now-prenez votre medicine, and make yourself betHere is de cup; and I vil leave it on de little table, and you must take von other teaspoonful in two hours more, and de good fille, Peggy Dickson, down stairs, she say she vil come soon and see if you vant any thing. I have myself taken de dirty vater away, and swept in de hearthstone, and now let me put in de clothes at your back, and make you comfortable. One kiss, Mademoiselle-now-adieuGod bless you for ever—adieu !" And they separated, with tears more bitter, perhaps, than any ever shed by youthful lovers when parting to meet no more.

ter.

About two months after the departure of Monsieur Mollin, his friends at Cairnton received a letter from him, informing them that he had got back to his native city of Bourdeaux, where he had the satisfaction to find that he had recently been left heir to a small property, which promised to maintain him in comfort during the remainder of his life. He was distressed, however, to learn that hardly any of his relations were alive. The only one in whom he felt the least interested was a young girl, who had for some years been an orphan the daughter of a niece who had once been his favourite, and a person, as he described her, of the most agreeable properties-quite fitted, he said, to become, in a few years, the wife of his young friend

Thomas, provided they had an opportunity of seeing each other. He complained, however, of the change that had taken place in his absence, the effect of which was to render his native country far less kindred to him than even Scotland; and "it is not impossible," he added, "that I may come back to Cairnton, and spend the remainder of my days with you."

his arm.

This was destined to be the actual consummation of his story. About six months after having left his humble lodging at Cairnton, Monsieur Mollin re-appeared on the street, with a sprightly young Frenchwoman leaning on Quite disappointed with his native country and its new regime, he had made up his mind to return to the quiet little Scottish burgh, where he had spent so many happy years, and where dwelt almost the only two individuals of his race in whom he felt the slightest interest. The joy of the Geddesses, as may be supposed, was boundless, more especially as Monsieur Möllin took an early opportunity of declaring his intention to complete the education of his friend Thomas, and push him forward in the profession he originally contemplated. In a few days the whole of the little party was established in a neat house in the suburbs, where it soon became apparent, to the delight of the benevolent Frenchman, that his niece and Thomas were exceedingly taken up about each other. In the process of time, the young man obtained a manse, and Eloise as his companion in its occupancy; and the latter days of Mollin and Miss Geddes have been spent in serenity and happiness.

TURNERS.

"TURNERS", are a class of people, so called because they regularly take what they call a turn every Sunday afternoon before dinner. They are a middle-aged order of men, married and unmarried; and you may always know them at a distance, even when they mingle in the crowds of the emptying churches, by their faces rendered rosy with the country air, their shoes somewhat dusty or muddy, and the breasts of their coats blown back over their shoulders, as if they were anxious to receive as much of the air as possible. The turner is confined all the week by some sedentary employment, to which he sits down every day regularly at ten o'clock-having first opened, with a neat and adroit jerk, the lowest button of his waistcoat-and from which he does not rise till four, after which he takes a constitutional walk till five. The arrear of exercise and air which has been gathering during the week, he pays off by one good "turn" on the Sunday afternoon, having first heard the forenoon sermon-or perhaps not-in some respectable church, such as St Giles's, which always presents ample scope and verge enough for a great number of what may be called skirmishing church-goers. Say he has been indulging a little on the Saturday night; perhaps a brother turner drops in upon him next forenoon, exactly out of time for sermon, and finds him, as the bells are just ringing in, beginning to reach his arms out of bed, and calling for breakfast. In one hour after that date, the two are seen dropping out at the bottom of the King's Park, on the way to Portobello. We say no more. They return about four, and falling into the ranks of the churchgoing people, may be singled out, secure as they think themselves, by the features we have described. But we

must look back to the turners and the turner system of thirty years since.

Suppose the High Street of Edinburgh, on a Sunday

forenoon about that period-a fine summer Sunday-the sun throwing a deep black shade on the south side of the street, and brilliantly illuminating the north side; the bells of St Giles's just beginning to stagger to a cessation; Dr Blair past in his gown; only a few decent citizens, with their wives and children, remaining unchurched; these evidently about to disappear off the street altogether. A small group of middle-aged respectable Lawnmarketeers, who have hitherto been standing at the Cross, as if intending to go into church themselves, begin to observe that the streets are getting so empty as to make their appearance a little conspicuous. When the bell ceases entirely, they start a little, as if taken by surprise, and muttering something about being too late, psalms begun, and so forth, pull out their watches to see if they are exact with the town clock, cast a few affectedly careless glances around them, and then begin to sidle away in different directions, some apparently towards the Tron, others towards St Giles's. They never reach those places, howThey are absorbed in closes and stairs upon the way. In about half an hour, if you were stationed about the Meadow Walk or Bruntsfield Links, you would see the same figures come oozing out at different exits from the town, and meet at the Golf-House, or at the Cage, or other place of rendezvous, and then proceed, in full band, in the direction of Currie or the Hunters' Tryste. About one o'clock, Mr J-L- might be seen cooling it through Straiton, in the midst of a slow procession of bellied men, his hat and wig perhaps borne aloft on the end of his stick, and a myriad of flies buzzing and humming in the shape of a pennon, from behind his shining pow. Perhaps Captain B, of the town-guard, is of the set; he has a brother a farmer about Woodhouselee, and they intend to call there, and be treated to a check of lamb, or something of that kind, with a glass of spirits and water, for really the day is very warm." The talk is of Sir Ralph Abercromby and General Bruce, and the Duke of York and

ever.

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the Texel; or, more interesting subject still, the last week's proceedings of the Edinburgh volunteers in the Links. These fat men, who not only sleep o' nights, but almost o' days too, are all serjeants and corporals in the regiment, though, of course, they employ real veteran serjeants to run about planting the little flags to march by, and other matters of duty; it being as much as they can do to go through the regular business of the drill.

"'Pon my honour," says one, "it was too bad of Justice-Clerk Hope to keep us so long upon the ground on Thursday. Two mortal hours. I thought I should have fainted with the fatigue and the heat together. I declare, when we all rushed afterwards into the Golf-House to get a draught of porter, I think I drank a whole bottle before ever I felt the taste of it. It was all spent upon the mere aridity of the soil."

"It was a terrible drill, indeed," remarks another. "I heard Lieutenant Beveridge himself say, that he never knew one so fatiguing; Captain Jardine was quite at a loss to know what his lordship meant. That hopping body

who was my rear-rank man, tramped down the heel of my shoe at the beginning of the drill, and I had to march all the time in that state; I thought I should have died of the pain of it."

"But what do you think Lord Cathcart said of us,” asks another, "after our last review? Why, he said that with five hundred such troops he would not be afraid to meet the charge of three thousand Frenchmen," *

The turners do not countenance newfangled flashy houses of entertainment, which spring up by the wayside every now and then, and after a year or two sink again into another state of existence. They are attached to old,

* This was said by different officers of every militia regiment raised during the French war. It was a pickled phrase for review-days, and, we need not remark, had little reference to the real merit of any particular corps of which it was said.

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