"
"Freely given, my lord," said I. "And with regard to what has
fallen from yourself, I will give it for an long as it shall please
God to spare your days."
"You will observe," he said next, "that I have made no employment
of menaces."
"It was like your lordship's nobility," said I. "Yet I am not
altogether so dull but what I can perceive the nature of those you
have not uttered."
"Well," said he, "good-night to you. May you sleep well, for I
think it is more than I am like to do."
With that he sighed, took up a candle, and gave me his conveyance
as far as the street door.
CHAPTER V--IN THE ADVOCATE'S HOUSE
The next day, Sabbath, August 27th, I had the occasion I had long
looked forward to, to hear some of the famous Edinburgh preachers,
all well known to me already by the report of Mr Campbell. Alas!
and I might just as well have been at Essendean, and sitting under
Mr. Campbell's worthy self! the turmoil of my thoughts, which dwelt
continually on the interview with Prestongrange, inhibiting me from
all attention. I was indeed much less impressed by the reasoning
of the divines than by the spectacle of the thronged congregation
in the churches, like what I imagined of a theatre or (in my then
disposition) of an assize of trial; above all at the West Kirk,
with its three tiers of galleries, where I went in the vain hope
that I might see Miss Drummond.
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