"And then the brutes are turned mercenary, madam," said Mr. Touchwood, "I remember when a Scottishman would have scorned to touch a shilling that he had not earned, and yet was as ready to help a stranger as an Arab of the desert. And now, I did but drop my cane the other day as I was riding--a fellow who was working at the hedge made three steps to lift it--I thanked him, and my friend threw his hat on his head, and 'damned my thanks, if that were all'--Saint Giles could not have excelled him." "Weel, weel," said the banker, "that may be a' as you say, sir, and nae doubt wealth makes wit waver; but the country's wealthy, that cannot be denied, and wealth, sir, ye ken"---- "I know wealth makes itself wings," answered the cynical stranger; "but I am not quite sure we have it even now. You make a great show, indeed, with building and cultivation; but stock is not capital, any more than the fat of a corpulent man is health or strength." "Surely, Mr. Touchwood," said Bindloose, who felt his own account in the modern improvements, "a set of landlords, living like lairds in good earnest, and tenants with better housekeeping than the lairds used to have, and facing Whitsunday and Martinmas as I would face my breakfast--if these are not signs of wealth, I do not know where to seek for them." "They are signs of folly, sir," replied Touchwood; "folly that is poor, and renders itself poorer by desiring to be thought rich; and how they come by the means they are so ostentatious of, you, who are a banker, perhaps can tell me better than I can guess." "There is maybe an accommodation bill discounted now and then, Mr. Touchwood; but men must have accommodation, or the world would stand still--accommodation is the grease that makes the wheels go." "Ay, makes them go down hill to the devil," answered Touchwood. "I left you bothered about one Ayr bank, but the whole country is an Air bank now, I think--And who is to pay the piper?--But it's all one--I will see little more of it--it is a perfect Babel, and would turn the head of a man who has spent his life with people who love sitting better than running, silence better than speaking, who never eat but when they are hungry, never drink but when thirsty, never laugh without a jest, and never speak but when they have something to say. But here, it is all run, ride, and drive--froth, foam, and flippancy--no steadiness--no character." "I'll lay the burden of my life," said Dame Dods, looking towards her friend Bindloose, "that the gentleman has been at the new Spaw-waal yonder!" "Spaw do you call it, madam?--If you mean the new establishment that has been spawned down yonder at St. Ronan's, it is the very fountain-head of folly and coxcombry--a Babel for noise, and a Vanity-fair for nonsense--no well in your swamps tenanted by such a conceited colony of clamorous frogs."