separate outer building, were exposed to the assault of burglars. He read all the recent stories of house robberies. He believed that one night, lately, an actual attempt to break in upon his Museum had been made. Visions of ticket-of-leave men, prowling about his premises, haunted him by day and by night. The revolver, which lay nightly near him, was not enough; a broad-bladed dagger was kept beside it; whilst behind him, at his bed head, a claymore stood ready at hand. A week or so ago, a new and more aggravated feature of cerebral disorder showed itself in sudden and singular sensations in his head. They came only after lengthened intervals. They did not last long, but were intensely violent. The terrible idea that his brain was deeply and hopelessly diseased,--that his mind was on the verge of ruin,--took hold of him, and stood out before his eye in all that appalling magnitude in which such an imagination as his alone could picture it. It was mostly at night that these wild paroxysms of the brain visited him; but up till last Monday he had spoken of them to no one. A friend who had a long conversation with him on the Thursday of last week, never enjoyed an interview more, or remembers him in a more genial mood. On the Saturday forenoon another friend from Edinburgh found him in the same happy frame. As was his wont when with an old friend with whom he felt particularly at ease, he read or recited some favorite passages, repeating, on this occasion, with great emphasis, that noble prayer of John Knox,[1] which, he told his friend, it had been his frequent custom to repeat privately during the days of the Disruption. On the forenoon of Sunday last he worshipped in the Free Church at Portobello; and in the evening read a little work which had been put into his hands, penning that brief notice of it which will be read with melancholy interest as his last contribution to this journal. About ten o'clock on Monday morning he took what with him was an altogether unusual step. He called on Dr. Balfour, in Portobello, to consult him as to his state of health. "On my asking," says Dr. Balfour, in a communication with which we have been favored, "what was the matter with him, he replied, 'My brain is giving way. I cannot put two thoughts together to-day. I have had a dreadful night of it; I cannot face another such. I was impressed with the idea that my Museum was attacked by robbers, and that I had got up, put on my clothes, and gone out with a loaded pistol to shoot them. Immediately after that I became unconscious. How long that continued, I cannot say; but when I awoke in the morning I was trembling all over, and quite confused in my brain. On rising I felt as if a stiletto was