that family pride, which had exhorted tears from his widowed and
almost indigent mother, when she saw herself obliged to consign him to
a line of life inferior, as her prejudices suggested, to the course
held by his progenitors. Yet, with all this aristocratic prejudice,
his master found the well-born youth more docile, regular, and
strictly attentive to his duty, than his far more active and alert
comrade. Tunstall also gratified his master by the particular
attention which he seemed disposed to bestow on the abstract
principles of science connected with the trade which he was bound to
study, the limits of which were daily enlarged with the increase of
mathematical science.

Vincent beat his companion beyond the distance-post, in every thing
like the practical adaptation of thorough practice, in the dexterity
of hand necessary to execute the mechanical branches of the art, and
doubled-distanced him in all respecting the commercial affairs of the
shop. Still David Ramsay was wont to say, that if Vincent knew how to
do a thing the better of the two, Tunstall was much better acquainted
with the principles on which it ought to be done; and he sometimes
objected to the latter, that he knew critical excellence too well ever
to be satisfied with practical mediocrity.

The disposition of Tunstall was shy, as well as studious; and, though
perfectly civil and obliging, he never seemed to feel himself in his
place while he went through the duties of the shop. He was tall and
handsome, with fair hair, and well-formed limbs, good features, well-
opened light-blue eyes, a straight Grecian nose, and a countenance
which expressed both good-humour and intelligence, but qualified by a
gravity unsuitable to his years, and which almost amounted to
dejection. He lived on the best of terms with his companion, and