back her chair with a bounce, streaking down her gown at the same
time with both her hands, added, "No wonder that a judgment is upon
the land, when we hear of money-changers in the temple." Miss Mally
Glencairn, to appease her gathering wrath and holy indignation, said
facetiously, "Na, na, Mrs. Glibbans, ye forget, there was nae
changing of money there. The man took the whole guineas. But not
to make a controversy on the subject, Mr. Snodgrass will now let us
hear what Andrew Pringle, 'my son,' has said to him":- And the
reverend gentleman read the following letter with due
circumspection, and in his best manner:-


LETTER X


Andrew Pringle, Esq., to the Reverend Charles Snodgrass

My Dear Friend--I have heard it alleged, as the observation of a
great traveller, that the manners of the higher classes of society
throughout Christendom are so much alike, that national
peculiarities among them are scarcely perceptible. This is not
correct; the differences between those of London and Edinburgh are
to me very striking. It is not that they talk and perform the
little etiquettes of social intercourse differently; for, in these
respects, they are apparently as similar as it is possible for
imitation to make them; but the difference to which I refer is an
indescribable something, which can only be compared to peculiarities
of accent. They both speak the same language; perhaps in classical
purity of phraseology the fashionable Scotchman is even superior to
the Englishman; but there is a flatness of tone in his accent--a