afterward became the Duchess of Gordon, was seen riding a sow up the
High Street, while her sister Eglantine (afterwards Lady Wallace of

Craigie) thumped lustily behind with a stick.'
No wonder, in view of all this, that King James VI., when about to

bring home his `darrest spous,' Anne of Denmark, wrote to the
Provost, `For God's sake see a' things are richt at our hame-coming;

a king with a new-married wife doesna come hame ilka day.'
Had it not been for these royal home-comings and visits of

distinguished foreigners, now and again aided by something still
more salutary, an occasionaloutbreak of the plague, the easy-going

authorities would never have issued any `cleaning edicts,' and the
still easier-going inhabitants would never have obeyed them. It was

these dark, tortuous wynds and closes, nevertheless, that made up
the Court End of Old Edinbro'; for some one writes in 1530, `Via

vaccarum in qua habitant patricii et senatores urbis' (The nobility
and chief senators of the city dwell in the Cowgate). And as for

the Canongate, this Saxon gaet or way of the Holy rood canons, it
still sheltered in 1753 `two dukes, sixteen earls, two dowager

countesses, seven lords, seven lords of session, thirteen baronets,
four commanders of the forces in Scotland, and five eminent men,'--

fine game indeed for Mally Lee!
`A' doun alang the Canongate

Were beaux o' ilk degree;
And mony ane turned round to look

At bonny Mally Lee.
And we're a' gaun east an' west,

We're a' gaun agee,
We're a' gaun east an' west

Courtin' Mally Lee!'
Every corner bristles with memories. Here is the Stamp Office

Close, from which the lovely Susanna, Countess of Eglinton, was wont
to issue on assembly nights; she, six feet in height, with a

brilliantly fair complexion, and a `face of the maist bewitching
loveliness.' Her seven daughters and stepdaughters were all

conspicuously handsome, and it was deemed a goodly sight to watch
the long procession of eight gilded sedan-chairs pass from the Stamp

Office Close, bearing her and her stately brood to the Assembly
Room, amid a crowd that was `hushed with respect and admiration to

behold their lofty and graceful figures step from the chairs on the
pavement.'

Here itself is the site of those old assemblies, presided over at
one time by the famous Miss Nicky Murray, a directress of society

affairs, who seems to have been a feminine premonition of Count
d'Orsay and our own M'Allister. Rather dull they must have been,

those old Scotch balls, where Goldsmith saw the ladies and gentlemen
in two dismal groups divided by the length of the room.

`The Assembly Close received the fair--
Order and elegance presided there--

Each gay Right Honourable had her place,
To walk a minuet with becoming grace.

No racing to the dance with rival hurry,
Such was thy sway, O famed Miss Nicky Murray!'

It was half-past nine in the evening when Salemina and I drove to
Holyrood, our humble cab-horse jogging faithfully behind Lady

Baird's brougham, and it was the new experience of seeing Auld
Reekie by lamplight that called up these gay visions of other days,-

-visions and days so thoroughly our mental property that we could
not help resenting the fact that women were hanging washing from the

Countess of Eglinton's former windows, and popping their unkempt
heads out of the Duchess of Gordon's old doorway.

The Reverend Ronald is so kind! He enters so fully into our spirit
of inquiry, and takes such pleasure in our enthusiasms! He even

sprang lightly out of Lady Baird's carriage and called to our
`lamiter' to halt while he showed us the site of the Black Turnpike,

from whose windows Queen Mary saw the last of her kingdom's capital.
"Here was the Black Turnpike, Miss Hamilton!" he cried; "and from

here Mary went to Loch Leven, where you Hamiltons and the Setons
came gallantly to her help. Don't you remember the `far ride to the

Solway sands?'"
I looked with interest, though I was in such a state of delicious

excitement that I could scarce keep my seat.
"Only a few minutes more, Salemina," I sighed, "and we shall be in

the palace courtyard; then a probablehalf-hour in crowded dressing-
rooms, with another half-hour in line, and then, then we shall be

making our best republican bow in the Gallery of the Kings! How I
wish Mr. Beresford and Francesca were with us! What do you suppose

was her real reason for staying away? Some petty disagreement with
our young minister, I am sure. Do you think the dampness is taking

the curl out of our hair? Do you suppose our gowns will be torn to
ribbons before the Marchioness sees them? Do you believe we shall

look as well as anybody? Privately, I think we must look better
than anybody; but I always think that on my way to a party, never

after I arrive."
Mrs. M'Collop had asserted that I was `bonnie eneuch for ony court,'

and I could not help wishing that `mine ain dear Somebody' might see
me in my French frock embroidered with silver thistles, and my

`shower bouquet' of Scottish bluebells tied loosely together.
Salemina wore pinky-purple velvet; a real heather colour it was,

though the Lord High Commissioner would probably never note the
fact.

When we had presented our cards of invitation at the palace doors,
we joined the throng and patiently made our way up the splendid

staircases, past powdered lackeys without number, and, divested of
our wraps, joined another throng on our way to the throne-room,

Salemina and I pressing those cards with our names `legibly written
on them' close to our palpitating breasts.

At last the moment came when, Lady Baird having preceded me, I
handed my bit of pasteboard to the usher; and hearing `Miss

Hamilton' called in stentorian accents, I went forward in my turn,
and executed a graceful and elegant, but not too profound curtsy,

carefully arranged to suit the semi-royal, semi-ecclesiastical
occasion. I had not divulged that fact even to Salemina, but I had

worn Mrs. M'Collop's carpet quite threadbare in front of the long
mirror, and had curtsied to myself so many times in its crystal

surface that I had developed a sort of fictitious reverence for my
reflected image. I had only begun my well-practised obeisance when

Her Grace the Marchioness, to my mingled surprise and embarrassment,
extended a gracious hand and murmured my name in a particularly kind

voice. She is fond of Lady Baird, and perhaps chose this method of
showing her friendship; or it may be that she noticed my silver

thistles and Salemina's heather-coloured velvet,--they certainly
deserved special recognition; or it may be that I was too beautiful

to pass over in silence,--in my state of exaltation I was quite
equal to the belief.

The presentation over, we wandered through the spacious apartments,
leaning from the open windows to hear the music of the band playing

in the courtyard below, looking at the royal portraits, and chatting
with groups of friends who appeared and reappeared in the throng.

Finally Lady Baird sent for us to join her in a knot of personages
more or less distinguished, who had dined at the palace, and who

were standing behind the receiving party in a sort of sacred group.
This indeed was a ground of vantage, and one could have stood there

for hours, watching all sorts and conditions of men and women bowing
before the Lord High Commissioner and the Marchioness, who, with her

Cleopatra-like beauty and scarlet gown, looked like a gorgeous
cardinal-flower.

Salemina and I watched the curtsying narrowly, with the view at
first of improving our own obeisances for Buckingham Palace; but

truth to say we got no added light, and plainly most of the people
had not worn threadbare the carpets in front of their dressing-

mirrors.
Suddenly we heard a familiar name announced, `Lord Colquhoun,' a

distinguished judge who had lately been raised to the peerage, and
whom we often met at dinners; then `Miss Rowena Colquhoun'; and then

in the midst, we fancied, of an unusual stir at the entrance door--
'Miss Francesca Van Buren Monroe.' I involuntarily touched the

Reverend Ronald's shoulder in my astonishment, while Salemina lifted
her tortoise-shell lorgnette, and we gazed silently at our recreant

charge.