It was a large, old-fashioned house, which had seen better days, and stood on a steep sloping hill, commanding a beautiful view of Edinburgh. The grand old mountain loomed in the distance, and the bright Forth, with all its wealth of white sails, glittered in the rays of the declining sun. “What a delightful situation!” exclaimed Flora, as her eye ranged over the beautiful scene. “Ay, ’tis a bonnie place,” said Mr. Gregg, greatly exalted in his own eyes, as master of the premises;—“an’ very healthy for the bairns. I often walked past this old house when I was but a ’prentice lad in the High-street, o’ Sunday afternoons, and used to peep through the pales, and admire the old trees, an’ fruits, an’ flowers; an’ I thought if I had sic a braw place of my ain, I should think mysel richer than a crow’ed king. I was a puir callant in those days. It was only a dream, a fairy dream; yet here I am, master of the auld house, and the pretty gardens. Industry and prudence, my dear madam—industry and prudence, has done it all, and converted my air-built castle into substantial brick and stane.” Flora admired the old man’s honest pride. She had thought him coarse and vulgar, while in reality he was only what the Canadians term _homely_; for his heart was brimful of kindly affections and good feeling. There was not a particle of pretence about him,—of forced growth or refined cultivation; a genuine product of the soil, a respectable man in every sense of the word. Proud of his country, and doubly proud of the wealth he had acquired by honest industry. A little vain and pompous, perhaps, but most self-made men are so: they are apt to overrate the talents which have lifted them out of obscurity, and to fancy that the world estimates their worth and importance by the same standard as they do themselves. In the house, they were introduced to Mrs. Gregg, who was just such a person as her husband had described: a cheerful, middle-aged woman, very short, very stout, and very hospitable. Early as it was, the tea-table was loaded with good cheer. Large strawberries preserved whole, and that pet sweetmeat of the Scotch, orange marmalade, looked tempting enough, in handsome dishes of cut glass, flanked by delicious home-made bread and butter, cream, cheese, and sweet curds. A tall, fine-looking woman, very gaily dressed, was presented to the Lyndsays as Mrs. M’Nish, a married daughter. Her husband was a loud-voiced, large-whiskered consequential-looking young man, whose good humour and admiration of himself, his wife, his father and mother-in-law, and the big house, appeared inexhaustible. His young wife seemed to look upon him as something super-human; and to every remark she made, she appealed to Wullie, as she called him, for his verdict of approval.