And hereupon the rascal looked about him, as if afraid to speak out, and, in a low voice, gave us to understand that he had just met an awesome sight: it rowed owre the body, and owre the body, and rumbled away down the linn into the miller's house yonder. It was for a' the warl' like a whean corn-sacks, dyed black, and clinking ane against anither. "Why, man, corn sacks dinna clink." "Maybe no; but the deil's sacks are different. I reckon they wadna stand fire, unless they clinked." There was no resisting this logic; so our informant was desired to show us the direction in which the apparition had gone. He pointed to a glen or linn on Hermitage Water, and to a light which flitted before us, appearing and disappearing at intervals. Down the glen we instantly rushed, through some brushwood, and along a narrow pass. When we had reached the mill-steading, the light had disappeared; and, on investigation, our informant likewise. We found the miller still at work, and not a little surprised at our untimely and really unwelcome visit. It was manifest now, that we had been imposed upon by the knowing urchin, who, to give time for escape to the illicit traders, had trumped up the ghost story, well knowing that a direct information might have been suspected. In a word, we were completely out; and, where the distillers betook themselves, whether across the Border, or into some of the almost inaccessible mountains of Eskdalemuir, remains to this day a secret. However, I had made my market, and earned additional patronage by a chance adventure, which was quite in my uncle's way, and gave me assurance that, by pursuing a similar course in future, I should undoubtedly prosper. My next advantageous hit was made at Moffat. To this favourite resort of the invalid, the idle, and the wealthy, there had been added this season a dinner, given by the advocates in Edinburgh to the future _author_ of the poems of Ossian. Macpherson had just published some fragments of the Gaelic poetry, and had excited the attention of the learned world, by his announcing that, if he had the means, he would collect through the Highlands many larger and more valuable works of Ossian and other bards. I had been lucky enough to have purchased, when at Glasgow, a cheap remnant of the Macpherson tartan, having heard that it would take in England--but I was mistaken; and I could not prevail upon a single gentleman or lady of any note, betwixt Carlisle and Manchester, to patronise it.