'What business has he to upbraid us,' I said, 'with the change of our dwelling from a more inconvenient to a better quarter of the town?
What was it to him if we chose to imitate some of the conveniences or luxuries of an English dwelling-house, instead of living piled up above each other in flats?
Have his patrician birth and aristocratic fortunes given him any right to censure those who dispose of the fruits of their own industry, according to their own pleasure ?' My father took a long pinch of snuff, and replied, 'Very well, Alan; very well indeed.

I wish Mr.Crossbite or Counsellor Pest had heard you; they must have acknowledged that you have a talent for forensic elocution; and it may not be amiss to try a little declamation at home now and then, to gather audacity and keep yourself in breath.

But touching the subject of this paraffle of words, it's not worth a pinch of tobacco.

D'ye think that I care for Mr.Herries of Birrenswork more than any other gentleman who comes here about business, although I do not care to go tilting at his throat, because he speaks like a grey goose, as he is?
But to say no more about him, I want to have Darsie Latimer's present direction; for it is possible I may have to write the lad a line with my own hand--and yet I do not well know--but give me the direction at all events.' I did so, and if you have heard from my father accordingly, you know more, probably, about the subject of this letter than I who write it.
But if you have not, then shall I have discharged a friend's duty, in letting you know that there certainly is something afloat between this disagreeable laird and my father, in which you are considerably interested.
Adieu! and although I have given thee a subject for waking dreams, beware of building a castle too heavy for the foundation; which, in the present instance, is barely the word Latimer occurring in a conversation betwixt a gentleman of Dumfriesshire and a W.S.of Edinburgh--CAETERA PRORSUS IGNORO.
LETTER VI DARSIE LATIMER TO ALAN FAIRFORD (In continuation of Letters III and IV.) I told thee I walked out into the open air with my grave and stern landlord.

I could now see more perfectly than on the preceding night the secluded glen in which stood the two or three cottages which appeared to be the abode of him and his family.
It was so narrow, in proportion to its depth, that no ray of the morning sun was likely to reach it till it should rise high in the horizon.
Looking up the dell, you saw a brawling brook issuing in foamy haste from a covert of underwood, like a race-horse impatient to arrive at the goal; and, if you gazed yet; more earnestly, you might observe part of a high waterfall glimmering through the foliage, and giving occasion, doubtless, to the precipitate speed of the brook.