contained all colours within its sphere, and which was kept only to be handled and admired. Tops were there, too, from polished little beauties with shining steel tips, which were intended only for amusement, and were spun with fine white cord, to unadorned, massive, vicious-looking warriors with sharpened projecting points, which were intended for the battlefield, and were spun with rough, strong twine, and which, dexterously used, would split another top from head to foot as when you slice butter with a knife. Her stock of kites in the season was something to see, and although she did not venture upon cricket-bats, which were sold by the hair-dresser, nor cricket-balls, she had every other kind of ball--solid gutta-percha balls, for hasty games in the "breaks," white skin-covered rounder balls, and hollow india-rubber balls, which you could fill with water at the lade, and then use with much success as a squirt. Girls, we noticed, employed this "softie" in silly games of their own, trying whether they could make it rebound a hundred times from the ground, but we had no doubt about its proper use in the purposes of Creation. And Mrs. McWhae--peace to her ashes!--provided all things in meat and drink which a boy could desire; unless, of course, on some great occasion he wished to revel imperially--then he went to Fenwick's rock-shop, where generations have turned their eager feet, and beyond which nothing is left to desire. Fenwick's, however, was rather for our fathers than for ourselves, and we were almost content with Mrs. McWhae, where you could get ginger-beer of her own making at a penny a bottle, better than that which they sold at the _Muirtown Arms_ at sixpence; and treacle-beer also at a penny, but in this case the bottle was double the size and was enough for two fellows; and halfpenny rolls, if you were fiercely hungry and could not get home to dinner, so tough that only a boy's teeth could tear them to pieces; and tarts, so full that it required long skill to secure every drop of the jam, and your fingers were well worth licking afterwards; and peppermint balls of black and white, one of which would keep your mouth sweet for an hour of Latin--that is, if you only sucked gently and didn't crunch. But the glory of the establishment was the "gundy." There was a room behind the shop where Mrs. McWhae, who was a widow, elderly and not prepossessing, lived and slept, and dressed herself, and cooked her food, and, perhaps, on rare occasions, washed, and there she prepared her tempting meats and drinks for the Seminary. We lived in a pre-scientific age, and did not go curiously into the origin of things, being content to take the Creation as it stood, and to use the gifts of the gods in their finished form. But I believe that "gundy" was made of the coarsest and cheapest sugar, which our hostess boiled to a certain point, and then with her own fair hands, which it was said she wetted with her lips, drew out and out, till at last, by