foundered at their anchors, and that all on board perished.

The day being now Sabbath, and the whole town idle, every body in a
manner was down on the beach, to help and mourn as the bodies, one

after another, were cast out by the waves. Alas! few were the
better of my provident preparation, and it was a thing not to be

described, to see, for more than a mile along the coast, the new-
made widows and fatherless bairns, mourning and weeping over the

corpses of those they loved. Seventeen bodies were, before ten
o'clock, carried to the desolated dwelling of their families; and

when old Thomas Pull, the betheral, went to ring the bell for public
worship, such was the universal sorrow of the town, that Nanse

Donsie, an idiot natural, ran up the street to stop him, crying, in
the voice of a pardonable desperation, "Wha, in sic a time, can

praise the Lord?"
CHAPTER XXV--THE SUBSCRIPTION

The calamity of the storm opened and disposed the hearts of the
whole town to charity; and it was a pleasure to behold the manner in

which the tide of sympathy flowed towards the sufferers. Nobody
went to the church in the forenoon; but when I had returned home

from the shore, several of the council met at my house to confer
anent the desolation, and it was concerted among us, at my

suggestion, that there should be a meeting of the inhabitants called
by the magistrates, for the next day, in order to take the public

compassion with the tear in the eye--which was accordingly done by
Mr Pittle himself from the pulpit, with a few judicious words on the

heavy dispensation. And the number of folk that came forward to
subscribe was just wonderful. We got well on to a hundred pounds in

the first two hours, besides many a bundle of old clothes. But one
of the most remarkable things in the business was done by Mr

Macandoe. He was, in his original, a lad of the place, who had gone
into Glasgow, where he was in a topping line; and happening to be on

a visit to his friends at the time, he came to the meeting and put
down his name for twenty guineas, which he gave me in bank-notes--a

sum of such liberality as had never been given to the town from one
individual man, since the mortification of fifty pounds that we got

by the will of Major Bravery that died in Cheltenham, in England,
after making his fortune in India. The sum total of the

subscription, when we got my lord's five-and-twenty guineas, was
better than two hundred pounds sterling--for even several of the

country gentlemen were very generous contributors, and it is well
known that they are not inordinately charitable, especially to town

folks--but the distribution of it was no easy task, for it required
a discrimination of character as well as of necessities. It was at

first proposed to give it over to the session. I knew, however,
that, in their hands, it would do no good; for Mr Pittle, the

minister, was a vain sort of a body, and easy to be fleeched, and
the bold and the bardy with him would be sure to come in for a

better share than the meek and the modest, who might be in greater
want. So I set myself to consider what was the best way of

proceeding; and truly upon reflection, there are few events in my
history that I look back upon with more satisfaction than the part I

performed in this matter; for, before going into any division of the
money, I proposed that we should allot it to three classes--those

who were destitute; those who had some help, but large families; and
those to whom a temporality would be sufficient--and that we should

make a visitation to the houses of all the sufferers, in order to
class them under their proper heads aright. By this method, and

together with what I had done personally in the tempest, I got great
praise and laud from all reflecting people; and it is not now to be

told what a consolation was brought to many a sorrowful widow and
orphan's heart, by the patience and temperance" target="_blank" title="n.节制；节欲；戒酒">temperance with which the fund

of liberality was distributed; yet because a small sum was reserved
to help some of the more helpless at another time, and the same was

put out to interest in the town's books, there were not wanting
evil-minded persons who went about whispering calumnious innuendos

to my disadvantage; but I know, by this time, the nature of the
world, and how impossible it is to reason with such a seven-headed

and ten-horned beast as the multitude. So I said nothing; only I
got the town-clerk's young man, who acted as clerk to the committee

of the subscription, to make out a fair account of the distribution
of the money, and to what intent the residue had been placed in the

town-treasurer's hand; and this I sent unto a friend in Glasgow to
get printed for me, the which he did; and when I got the copies, I

directed one to every individual subscriber, and sent the town-
drummer an end's errand with them, which was altogether a proceeding

of a method and exactness so by common, that it not only quenched
the envy of spite utterly out, but contributed more and more to give

me weight and authority with the community, until I had the whole
sway and mastery of the town.

CHAPTER XXVI--OF THE PUBLIC LAMPS
Death is a great reformer of corporate bodies, and we found, now and

then, the benefit of his helping hand in our royal burgh. From the
time of my being chosen into the council; and, indeed, for some

years before, Mr Hirple had been a member, but, from some secret and
unexpressed understanding among us, he was never made a bailie; for

he was not liked; having none of that furthy and jocose spirit so
becoming in a magistrate of that degree, and to which the gifts of

gravity and formality make but an unsubstantial substitute. He was,
on the contrary, a queer and quistical man, of a small stature of

body, with an outshot breast, the which, I am inclined to think, was
one of the main causes of our never promoting him into the

ostensible magistracy; besides, his temper was exceedingly brittle;
and in the debates anent the weightiest concerns of the public, he

was apt to puff and fiz, and go off with a pluff of anger like a
pioye; so that, for the space of more than five-and-twenty years, we

would have been glad of his resignation; and, in the heat of
argument, there was no lack of hints to that effect from more than

one of his friends, especially from Bailie Picken, who was himself a
sharp-tempered individual, and could as ill sit quiet under a

contradiction as any man I ever was conjunct with. But just before
the close of my second provostry, Providence was kind to Mr Hirple,

and removed him gently away from the cares, and troubles, and the
vain policy of this contending world, into, as I hope and trust, a

far better place.
It may seem, hereafter, to the unlearned readers among posterity,

particularly to such of them as may happen not to be versed in that
state of things which we were obligated to endure, very strange that

I should make this special mention of Mr Hirple at his latter end,
seeing and observing the small store and account I have thus set

upon his talents and personalities. But the verity of the reason is
plainly this: we never discovered his worth and value till we had

lost him, or rather, till we found the defect and gap that his death
caused, and the affliction that came in through it upon us in the

ill-advised selection of Mr Hickery to fill his vacant place.
The spunky nature of Mr Hirple was certainly very disagreeable often

to most of the council, especially when there was any difference of
opinion; but then it was only a sort of flash, and at the vote he

always, like a reasonable man, sided with the majority, and never
after attempted to rip up a decision when it was once so settled.

Mr Hickery was just the even down reverse of this. He never, to be
sure, ran himself into a passion, but then he continued to speak and

argue so long in reply, never heeding the most rational things of
his adversaries, that he was sure to put every other person in a

rage; in addition to all which, he was likewise a sorrowful body in
never being able to understand how a determination by vote ought to

and did put an end to every questionableproceeding; so that he was,
for a constancy, ever harping about the last subject discussed, as

if it had not been decided, until a new difference of opinion arose,
and necessitated him to change the burden and o'ercome of his

wearysome speeches.
It may seem remarkable that we should have taken such a plague into

the council, and be thought that we were well served for our folly;
but we were unacquaint with the character of the man--for although a

native of the town, he was in truth a stranger, having, at an early
age, espoused his fortune, and gone to Philadelphia in America; and

no doubt his argol-bargolous disposition was an inheritance
accumulated with his other conquest of wealth from the mannerless

Yankees. Coming home and settling among us, with a power of money,
(some said eleven thousand pounds,) a short time before Mr Hirple

departed this life, we all thought, on that event happening, it
would be a very proper compliment to take Mr Hickery into the