The new mansion is a couple of miles from his parental Cottage; but not a week, indeed seldom half that time, elapses, without a visit to that dear dwelling. They likewise not unfrequently visit him--for his wife is dear to them as a daughter of their own; and the ancient couple delight in the noise and laughter of his pretty flock. Yet the son understands perfectly well that the aged people love best their own roof--and that its familiar quiet is every day dearer to their habituated affections. Therefore he makes no parade of filial tenderness--forces nothing new upon them--is glad to see the uninterrupted tenor of their humble happiness; and if they are proud of him, which all the parish knows, so is there not a child within its bounds that does not know that Mr Airlie, the rich gentleman from India, loves his poor father and mother as tenderly as if he had never left their roof; and is prouder of them, too, than if they were clothed in fine raiment, and fared sumptuously every day. Mr Airlie of the Mount has his own seat in the gallery of the Kirk--his father, as an Elder, sits below the pulpit--but occasionally the pious and proud son joins his mother in the pew, where he and his brothers sat long ago; and every Sabbath one or other of his children takes its place beside the venerated matron. The old man generally leaves the churchyard leaning on his Gilbert's arm--and although the sight has long been so common as to draw no attention, yet no doubt there is always an under and unconscious pleasure in many a mind witnessing the sacredness of the bond of blood. Now and then the old matron is prevailed upon, when the weather is bad and roads miry, to take a seat home in the carriage--but the Elder always prefers walking thither with his son, and he is stout and hale, although upwards of threescore and ten years. Walter, the second son, is now a captain in the navy, having served for years before the mast. His mind is in his profession, and he is perpetually complaining of being unemployed--a ship--a ship, is still the burden of his song. But when at home--which he often is for weeks together--he attaches himself to all the ongoings of rural life, as devotedly as if a plougher of the soil instead of the sea. His mother wonders, with tears in her eyes, why, having a competency, he should still wish to provoke the dangers of the deep; and beseeches him sometimes to become a farmer in his native vale. And perhaps more improbable things have happened; for the captain, it is said, has fallen desperately in love with the daughter of the clergyman of a neighbouring parish, and the doctor will not give his consent to the marriage, unless he promise to live, if allowed, on shore. The political state of Europe certainly seems at present favourable to the consummation of the wishes of all parties.