On a cold, drizzly morning we start, in a substantial stage-coach, well lined with cushions inside, for the ancient town of Peebles, which lies to the south of Edinburgh, some twenty-five miles or more. The 'outsides' are wrapped in cloaks and overcoats, and literally covered in with umbrellas; and from their earnest talking seem to be tolerably comfortable. The "Scottish mist," cold and penetrating, would soon reach the skin of an unsheltered back; all hands, therefore, and especially the driver in front, and the guard behind, are muffled to the neck with cravats and other appliances. Eyes and mouth only are visible, not indeed to the passers by, but to the denizens of the stage-coach, who cling together for warmth and sociability. Our travelling companions inside are a Dominie from Auchingray, fat as a capon, with face round, sleek and shiny, little gray eyes glancing beneath a placid forehead, and indicating intelligence and good nature; and a south-country laird, a large, brawny man, with a huge face and huger hat, corduroy breeches and top boots, a coat that nearly covers the whole of his body, and a vest of corresponding dimensions. A mighty cravat is tied neatly around his capacious throat, and a couple of large gold seals dangle from beneath his vest. In addition to these two, a little man, thin and wrinkled, but with a clear, quick, restless eye, is sitting in the corner, squeezed into a rather straight place by the laird and the dominie. From his appearance and conversation, we should take him to be a lawyer. With some little difficulty we get into conversation, but once set agoing, it jogs on at a pretty fair pace. Insensibly it glides into politics, and becomes rather lively. The lawyer is evidently a whig, the laird a tory of the old stamp, and the dominie neither the one nor the other, but rather more of a tory than anything else, as he is dependent, in some sense, upon 'the powers that be.' "For my part," says the laird, taking hold of his watch-seals, and twirling them energetically, "I do not believe in your two-faced radicals, who have more impudence in their noddles than money in their pockets, and who go routing about the country, crying up democracy and all that sort of stuff, to the great injury of her majesty's subjects." "But, my dear sir," replies the lawyer, "you forget that money is not the _summum bonum_ of human life, and that the gentlemen to whom you refer are not impudent radicals, but clear-headed and patriotic whigs."