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 a thousand times better entrusted with them than with peddling lawyers and thick-skulled country gentlemen."

Such were the ruminations of Major Miles Bellenden, which were terminated by John Gudyill (not more than half-drunk) taking hold of his bridle, and assisting him to dismount in the rough paved court of Tillietudlem.

"Why, John," said the veteran, "what devil of a discipline is this you have been keeping? You have been reading Geneva print this morning already."

"I have been reading the Litany," said John, shaking his head with a look of drunken gravity, and having only caught one word of the major's address to him; "life is short, sir; we are flowers of the field, sir,—hiccup—and lilies of the valley."

"Flowers and lilies? why, man, such carles as thou and I can hardly be called old hemlocks, decayed nettles, or withered rag-weed; but I suppose you think that we are still worth watering."