THE

ANTIQUARY.

CHAPTER I.

"Go call a coach, and let a coach be call'd, And let the man who calleth be the caller; And in his calling let him nothing call,

But Coach! Coach! Coach! O for a coach, ye gods !" Chrononhotonthologos.

Ir was early in a fine summer's day, near the end of the eighteenth century, when a young man, of genteel appearance, having occasion to go towards the northeast of Scotland, provided himself with a ticket in one of those public carriages which travel between Edinburgh and the

Queensferry, at which place, as the name implies, and as is well known to all my northern readers, there is a passage-boat for crossing the Firth of Forth. The coach was calculated to carry six regular passengers, besides such interlopers as the coachman could pick up by the way, and intrude upon those who were legally in possession. The tickets, which conferred right to a seat in this vehicle of little ease, were dispensed by a sharp-looking old dame, with a pair of spectacles on a very thin nose, who inhabited a "laigh shop," anglicé, a cellar, opening to the Highstreet by a strait and steep stair, at the bottom of which she sold tape, thread, needles, skeans of worsted, coarse linen cloth, and such feminine gear, to those who had the courage and skill to descend to the profundity of her dwelling, without falling headlong themselves, or throwing down any of the numerous articles which, piled on each side of the descent, indicated the profession of the trader below.

The written hand-bill, which, pasted on a projecting board, announced that the Queensferry Diligence, or Hawes Fly, departed precisely at twelve o'clock on Tuesday, the fifteenth July, 17-, in order to secure for travellers the opportunity of passing the Firth with the flood-tide, lied upon the present occasion like a bulletin ; for although that hour was pealed from Saint Giles's steeple, and repeated by the Tron, no coach appeared upon the appointed stand. It is true, only two tickets had been taken out, and possibly the lady of the subterranean mansion might have an understanding with her Automedon, that, in such cases, a little space was to be allowed for the chance of filling up the vacant places or the said Automedon might have been attending a funeral, and be delayed by the necessity of stripping his vehicle of its lugubrious trappingsor he might have staid to take a halfmutchkin extraordinary with his crony

THE

ANTIQUARY.

CHAPTER I.

"Go call a coach, and let a coach be call'd, And let the man who calleth be the caller; And in his calling let him nothing call,

But Coach! Coach! Coach! O for a coach, ye gods!" Chrononhotonthologos.

Ir was early in a fine summer's day, near the end of the eighteenth century, when a young man, of genteel appearance, having occasion to go towards the northeast of Scotland, provided himself with a ticket in one of those public carriages which travel between Edinburgh and the