It were needless to relate the various hardships and adventures which befel Jock Colquhoun before he regained his native shore. Be it enough, that he immediately sought the cozy den of Luckie Wishart, and _paid his debt_ in the way originally desired by the lady, who, under the name of Mrs Colquhoun, continued for many years, with the assistance of her reformed husband, to regale the good people of the Canongate. “A flichty chield,” she used to remark to her female friends, “was whyles the better o’ finding the grund o’ his stamack.” FOOTNOTES: [4] Alehouse of particular resort. CHILDREN. I may begin with the question of Henry the Fourth of France, when found by an ambassador at romps with his children, “Are you a father?” If you are, we may go on with the game—if not, you must pass to the next article. A curious thing it is, this same fact, that children in general are only interesting in the eyes of those who are parents, while brats in particular are held as pests by all but their immediate father and mother. Some lightheaded author has compared the rush of children which takes place at the conclusion of family dinners, to the incursion of the Goths and Vandals. Perhaps it is all true, that children out of place are not agreeable; but is any thing agreeable that is out of place? Children, abstracted from the homely details of their management, and the anxiety which they always occasion, are a delightful study—a study, I maintain, fitted alike to engage the speculations of the philosophic, and the affections of the benevolent, mind. I cannot, I must say, form the idea of a man of extended views and sympathies, who does not like children.