Another instance of the anxiety for early news is exhibited in a practice which prevailed in Glasgow about fifty years ago. The Glasgow merchants were deeply interested in shipping and other news coming from Liverpool. The mail at that period arrived in Glasgow some time in the afternoon during business hours. A letter containing quotations from Liverpool for the Royal Exchange was due in the mail daily. This letter was enclosed in a conspicuously bright red cover, and it was the business of the post-office clerk, immediately he opened the Liverpool bag, to seize this letter and hand it to a messenger from the Royal Exchange who was in attendance at the Post Office to receive it. This messenger hastened to the Exchange, rang a bell to announce the arrival of the news, and forthwith the contents of the letter were posted up in the Exchange. The merchants who had offices within sound of the bell were then seen hurrying to the Exchange buildings, to be cheered or depressed as the case might be by the information which the mail had brought them. A clever instance of how the possession of early news could be turned to profitable account in the younger days of the century is recorded of Mr. John Rennie, a nephew of his namesake the great engineer, and an extensive dealer in corn and cattle. His headquarters at the time were at East Linton, near Dunbar. "At one period of his career Mr. Rennie habitually visited London either for business or pleasure, or both combined. One day, when present at the grain market, in Mark Lane, sudden war news arrived, in consequence of which the price of wheat immediately bounded up 20s., 25s., and even 30s. per quarter. At once he saw his opportunity and left for Scotland by the next mail. He knew, of course, that the mail carried the startling war news to Edinburgh, but he trusted to his wit to outdo it by reaching the northern capital first. As the coach passed the farm of Skateraw, some distance east of Dunbar, it was met by the farmer, old Harry Lee, on horseback. Rennie, who was an outside passenger, no sooner recognised Lee than he sprang from his seat on the coach to the ground. Coming up to Lee, Rennie hurriedly whispered something to him, and induced him to lend his horse to carry Rennie on to East Linton. Rennie, who was an astonishingly active man, vaulted into the saddle, and immediately rode off at full gallop westwards. The day was a Wednesday, and, as it was already 11 o'clock forenoon, he knew that he had no time to lose; but he was not the stamp of man to allow the grass to grow under his feet on such an important occasion. Ere he reached Dunbar the mail was many hundred yards behind. At his own place at East Linton he drew up, mounted his favourite horse "Silvertail," which for speed and endurance had no rival in the county, and again proceeded at the gallop. When he reached the Grassmarket, Edinburgh--a full hour before the mail,--the grain-selling