The various lodgings of my bachelor days was never quite of the conventional sort. The Cambuslang quarters certainly were not. The house was large and old-fashioned. Originally it had been two smallish houses: the two front doors still remained side by side, but only one was used. The rooms on the ground floor were small, the original building composed of one storey only, but another had been added of quite spacious dimensions. We had two excellent, large well-furnished rooms upstairs. The landlady was an interesting character and so was her husband. She was Irish, he Scotch; she about seventy years of age, he under fifty; she ruddy, healthy, hearty, good-looking; he, pale, nervous, shy, retiring. But on the last Thursday of each month he was quite another man. On that day he went to Glasgow to collect the rents of some small houses he owned; and generally came home rather "fou" and hilarious, when the old lady would take him in hand, and put him to bed. They had an only child, a son, a grown up man, an uncouth ill-looking ungainly fellow, who did no work, smoked and loafed about, but was the idol of his mother. He resembled neither parent in the least, and, except that such vagaries of nature are not unknown, it might have been supposed that some cuckoo had visited the parental nest. A gaunt, hard-featured domestic completed this interesting family, and she was uncommon too. By no means young, what Balzac calls "a woman of canonical age," she resembled Pere Grandet's tall Nanon. Like Nanon, she had been the devoted servant of the family for nearly a quarter of a century, and like her, had no interest outside that of her master and mistress. She was always working, rarely went out, spoke little, but ministered to the wants of Tom and myself, and waited on us with unremitting attention. Despite all drawbacks, however, they were fine lodgings. The old lady was a wonderful cook and had all the liberality of her race. New Year's Day, the great Scotch holiday, Tom and I spent in Edinburgh, and returned much impressed with its stately beauty.