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The Ayrshire Legatees, or, the Pringle family by John Galt
page 36 of 165 (21%)
the town. In our way through the city he showed us the Temple Bar,
where Lord Kilmarnock's head was placed after the Rebellion, and
pointed out the Bank of England and Royal Exchange. He said the
steeple of the Exchange was taken down shortly ago--and that the
late improvements at the Bank were very grand. I remembered having
read in the Edinburgh Advertiser, some years past, that there was a
great deal said in Parliament about the state of the Exchange, and
the condition of the Bank, which I could never thoroughly
understand. And, no doubt, the taking own of an old building, and
the building up of a new one so near together, must, in such a
crowded city as this, be not only a great detriment to business, but
dangerous to the community at large.

After we had driven about for more than two hours, and neither seen
lions nor any other curiosity, but only the outside of houses, we
returned home, where we found a copperplate card left by Mr. Argent,
the colonel's agent, with the name of his private dwelling-house.
Both me and Mrs. Pringle were confounded at the sight of this thing,
and could not but think that it prognosticated no good; for we had
seen the gentleman himself in the forenoon. Andrew Pringle, my son,
could give no satisfactory reason for such an extraordinary
manifestation of anxiety to see us; so that, after sitting on thorns
at our dinner, I thought that we should see to the bottom of the
business. Accordingly, a hackney was summoned to the door, and me
and Andrew Pringle, my son, got into it, and told the man to drive
to second in the street where Mr. Argent lived, and which was the
number of his house. The man got up, and away we went; but, after
he had driven an awful time, and stopping and inquiring at different
places, he said there was no such house as Second's in the street;
whereupon Andrew Pringle, my son, asked him what he meant, and the
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