every thing else appeared double, and then trotted off to beg a share of the honour and emolument. If a tax or a scarcity pressed sore upon the people, those persons were at their dining again, partly with a view of diminishing the quantity of provision that might fall into the hands of the enemy; partly because themselves are ever more courageous in their cups; and partly because a report of their doings at a dinner would sound much better than a report of their doings any where else. Men who had thus from time immemorial rested not only their civic and their political importance, but almost their civic and political existence, upon their capacity for dining, in whom it was most likely the greatest wisdom to do so, could not be expected to let his Majesty eat his venison and drink his _Glenlivet_ (which unfortunately had been both furnished by a Whig) at his ease in Dalkeith-House, but would needs have him see with his own eyes with what zeal they could cut into a buttock of beef, and with what alacrity they could drain a goblet of wine, for the glory and the establishment of his throne. Accordingly, as the following Sunday would be a day of rest, the civic and other authorities in the Athens resolved that a feast of fat things should be furnished forth in the great hall of the Athenian Parliament House, upon Saturday the 24th of August. In preparing the hall for this occasion, not only had the whole of the Athens been spoiled of its decorations, but they had been forced to borrow largely at all the loyal houses in the vicinity. And as it was in old times the custom for every guest at the humbler Scottish parties to be provided with his own spoon, his own knife, and his own pair of five-pronged forks, so upon the present occasion it might be said, that each noble or loyal visiter lent his ice-pail or his pepper-box. This hall, which is as it were the vital principle of the Athens, the place where the tongues of all her speakers are loosed, the pockets of all her quibblers filled, the curiosity of all her gossips gratified, and the eyes and wishes of all her fair directed--was made more gay than ordinary for the occasion; and in the selection of guests, so far as that could be controlled, care was taken that none should be present who could in any wise eclipse in wisdom, or in elegance, the loyal lords of Scotland and of the Athens. Feasting, however motley and contrasted the feasters, is not a subject to be written about, but, as is perhaps the case with music and with painting, it is a mere matter of temporary sensation. Still, however, those who know the strange materials out of which an Athenian corporation is formed, (and I shall tell those who do not know by and by,) can easily conceive what an ungainly breadth of delight the lower extremities of that corporation would feel in being allowed to gorge themselves till their buttons were starting again, in the very presence of the King. It was pleasing for them, too, to