Hours passed, during which, in the absence of Burke, who would appear in due time, the two females were feminine, for they were engaged in acts which, as the natural work of their instincts, constitute so far the difference between the sexes; nor was the friendship which these acts were calculated to cement and strengthen to be weakened, in the estimation of the guest, by the arrival, in the evening, of Burke and Hare, and the latter's wife--a jolly crew, who could render compatible, again as so often before, the orgies of a wild mirth with the foreseen doom of the one round whom these orgies were celebrated. When these parties entered, there were in the house a person of the name of Gray and his wife, who had been for some time lodgers with Burke. It was necessary that these persons, who could not be trusted, should not sleep there that night, and Burke accordingly went out to seek lodgings for them, whereupon, at a certain hour, they departed, taking with them some suspicion that their banishment from their quarters did not quadrate with the excuse that a wandering beggar, albeit represented as a relative, should take their place, if they had not some other grounds, derived from particular observations, to lead them to a thought which was destined to be the original spark to raise into conflagration a long collected mass of rottenness. On the departure of the Grays, the saturnalia preceding the sacrifice commenced, and the scene was too fraught with enjoyment for the females, always ready for scenes of excitement, to be absent. The inevitable whisky was brought, and the poor stranger, to whom it would be as warmth to a heart cold enough from poverty and privations, must partake. And now there was to be one of those apparent inconsistencies which the one string of catgut exhibits in every day of our lives. If the joyous scene was to finish by the death of her around whom, and for whom, it was celebrated, surely the more remote it was kept from observing eyes the safer; so says prudence, but prudence forgets that she belongs exclusively to the natural and the rational, and like all reasoners who argue from _egoism_ to _tuism_, she expects abnormals to follow her maxims, which appear to them to be as abnorm as they are to her. So while their spirits are up, as well from the stimulant of drink as from that of the coming sacrifice, they go, whither the destined victim had preceded them, into the neighbouring apartment, occupied by a Mrs Connoway. There the scene was continued, or rather begun afresh. More drink was brought by M'Dougal, and the enjoyment was elevated into the altitudes of dithyrambism. Songs were sung, accompanied by a chorus of hoarse, broken voices, among which the _tremula_ of the "brisk" little old woman mixed its quavers, till at length they all rose and danced. This scene continued for a considerable time, when they left. It was now eleven o'clock, and they were all again in their old quarters.