OF THAT ILK. BY THE AUTHOR OF “ANNALS OF THE PARISH," &c. IN THREE VOLUMES. VOL. I. EDINBURGH: PRINTED FOR WILLIAM BLACKWOOD, EDINBURGH; AND T. CADELL, STRAND, LONDON. 249.5.286. SIR ANDREW WYLIE. CHAPTER I. THE COTTAGE. SIR ANDREW WYLIE, like the generality of great geniuses, was born and bred in very humble circumstances. By the early death of both his parents, he was consigned in infancy to the care of his maternal grandmother, Martha Docken, one of those clashan carlins who keep alive, among the Scottish peasantry, the traditions and sentiments which constitute so much of the national character. This old woman resided in the hamlet of Stoneyholm, in the shire of Ayr. Her sole breadwinner was her spinning-wheel, and yet she was cheerfully contented with her lot; for it had pleased Heaven to bless her with a blithe spirit, and a religious trust in the goodness of Providence. The furniture of her cottage, in addition to Andrew's cradle, and that was borrowed, consisted of one venerable elbow-chair, with a tall perpendicular back curiously carved, a family relic of better days, enjoyed by her own or her husband's ancestors; two buffet-stools, one a little larger than the other; a small oaken claw-foot table; her wheel, a hand-reel, a kail-pot, and a skillet, together with a scanty providing of bedding, and a chest that was at once coffer, wardrobe, and amrie. Behind the house she had a patch of some five or six falls of ground for a garden, which she delved and planted herself, and the rent she paid for the whole was ten shillings per annum. The gathering of this sum, after she received the heavy handful of Andrew, a weak and ailing baby, required no little care. But instead of repining at the burden, she often declared to the neighbours that he was "great company, and though at times a wee fashous, he is an auld farent bairn, and kent a raisin frae a black clok before he had a tooth; putting the taen in his mouth wi' a smirk, but skrieghing like desperation at the sight o' the ither." During the summer of the first year after Andrew had been brought home to her, she was generally seen sitting with her wheel, basking in the sun, at the gable of her cottage, with her grandson at her side in her biggest stool, turned upside down, amusing himself with the cat. Andrew was a small and delicate child, but he grew apace, and every day, in the opinion of his grandmother, improved in his looks. “His een,” as she said to her kimmers while she dandled him at the door as they stopped to speak to her in passing, "are like gowans in a May morning, and his laugh's as blithe as the lilt o' the linty." Philosophers in these expressions may discover the fond anticipations of hopeful affection, looking forward to a prosperous fortune for the child; but Andrew, for a long time, shewed no indications of possessing any thing in common with the talents that are usually supposed requisite to ensure distinction or riches. In his boyhood, how |