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 honour to our family." The clergyman saw that the laird, though he sorrowed, did not sorrow like those without hope.

At the desire of the old gentleman, he wrote to Hamilton an account of these events, and urged him to lose no time in repairing to Scotland. The laird was willing and ready to resign to him three-fourths of the estate and personal property. The former, by the rise of rents, was now upwards of six thousand a-year; the latter, by the œconomy of Etterick, added to the fortune of the Sourkrouts, was at least forty thousand pounds. This was the substance of the letter that was sent to our hero.

The morning on which it arrived in London, Hamilton received, by appointment, a bookseller, who was come to make a bargain with him, concerning a work of three volumes 8vo. The bookseller was strictly honest, but very