I am cured of my home-sickness for Fleet-street.
I don't want to see Fleet-street or London any
more; for the Cockney spirit has gone clean
out of me, and I am once more a true Scot.
When I shall have to tear myself away, I know
I shall "greet" (most expressive Scotch word
for weep, past tense "grat") like a laddie
going back to school.

The influence of Scotch music is quite as
powerful as the influence of Scotch whisky. It
intoxicates, makes delirious. A dear old lady
whom I love plays Scotch tunes to me, as few
in Scotland can play them, and I am immediately
possessed by a spirit of disloyalty towards the
reigning House of Hanover. I want to put my
foot on the table, flourish a claymour, and shout
for Charlie; albeit I know in my heart—no, not
my heart, my head—that Charlie was a poor
weak washed-out Frenchified creature, who
shivered in his kilt, and did not understand a
word of Gaelic. Yet here am I indignantly
demanding of the circumambient air, "Wha wadna
fecht for Charlie? Wha wadna follow him,
King of the Heelan-hearts, bonnie Prince
Charlie?" And twenty times a day I am going
"ower the water, and up the brae, and ower the
water to Charlie.'' Toujours Charlie! Wonderful
is the power of music and song, and see what
music and song did for Charlie. They made him
the idol of a people, their darling, their darling,
the gay chevalier, when he was in reality a very
indifferent young man. The events of the 'Forty-
five offer a very remarkable illustration of the
force of the saying, "Let me write the songs of
my country, and I care not who makes the laws."
Jacobite songs set all the laws at defiance, and
very nearly set Charlie down in Geordie's chair.
How lucky for Charlie and for us that it was
only "very nearly!" If Charlie had got "his
ain again," we might not now be thinking of
him as all that was bonny and brave and chivalrous;
and we might not now be boasting of our
free institutions and enlightened times. As it is,
we can afford to look back to him through a haze
of sentiment, and regard him cheaply and
pleasantly in the abstract. I can still read Lord
Mahon's rose-coloured history, and believe in
Charlie; nay, I can hope and wish against the
happily accomplished fact, that he may win the
battle of Culloden. It is highly honourable to
the feelings of the Scottish people that, while
there are none more loyal to the House of
Hanover, they still keep a corner in their hearts
for the beautiful idea which found its personification
in Charles Stuart.

A quaint old custom is still preserved in this
little town of Banff. Every morning at five
o'clock the town-drummer parades the streets,
and beats a réveillé—a reminder to the housemaids
and 'prentice-boys that it is time to rise.
An English drum says, "Rub-a-dub rub-a-dub
rub-a-dub dub dub;" but a Scotch drum, speaking
in its native language, says, "Peter-Dick
Peter-Dick Peter-Dick peat-stack." These words
had not been in my mind for more than twenty
years; but they come back to me now in my sleep
as the sound of the drum mingles with my dreams.
The drum gives a new turn to my dreaming, and
I am in great trouble about a proposition in
Euclid, which I shall have to demonstrate next
morning at school; and presently I hear dear
old aunty's voice calling me to rise, and I awake
to the sad remembrance that aunty's voice has
been hushed in death many a year; that I have
more difficult problems to solve than those of
Euclid, and that I have to furnish my pockets
with other things than peg-tops and marbles.

The great "sensations" of the day in this little
town used to be the arrival and departure of the
mail-coach; but the railway has run the coach
off the road, and the only sensation is the Peter-Dick
Peter-Dick Peter-Dick peat-stack of the
town-drummer. All public announcements,
advertisements, articles lost and found, are made
by tuck of drum. When I want to know
what is going on in the town, I open the window
and listen to the drummer. And one thing I
find to be always going on—Revivalism. Every
evening of the week there is a meeting for
religious exercises in the Masons' Hall, and Peter-
Dick is instructed to inform us that "all classes
are invited to attend." This is the only evening's
entertainment which the town affords, and the
pious inhabitants flock to the Masons' Hall, as
sinful Londoners flock to the theatre. In my
young days, wandering players visited the town
and did very well; but players must not show
their faces in Banff now. Nothing "profane" is
tolerated, except music, and that must be Scotch.

I attended a revival meeting one Sunday evening,
and I will relate briefly what I heard and
saw. The appetite of the people for religious
exercises seemed to be insatiable. Being in
Banff, I did as Banff did, and went to church
three times a day. We came out of the free kirk
at eight o'clock in the evening, and immediately
turned in to the St. Andrew's Hall to hear more
preaching. I could not help the irreverent
thought passing through my unchastened mind
that we were all going upon the religious
"drunk," rolling from one spiritual dram-shop
to another. The hall filled very rapidly with the
congregation of the free kirk, and in a quarter of
an hour it was crammed to suffocation. A hymn
was given out, and the people began to sing.
Each verse began with:

                       O, revive us, O, revive us.

And they sang at least twenty verses, the fervour
of the singers increasing with each verse, until
the chorus became a wild savage scream. The
heat, the oppressive atmosphere of the hall, and
the impression, which I could not resist, that I
was in the midst of a mob of maniacs, made me
feel nervous and faint, and I was obliged to leave
my seat and make my way to the door. If I had
not done so, I am sure I should have fainted,
which would probably have been taken to denote
my conversion and revival. I feel justified in
saying this, for on reaching the door, and peeping