devoted to his profession, but he, too, was not without his
romances, and even vagaries. He loved a story, was a fine teller
of stories, used to sit at night and spin the most wondrous yarns,
a man of much reserve, yet also of much power in discourse, with an
aptness and felicity in the use of phrases - so much so, as his son
tells, that on his deathbed, when his power of speech was passing
from him, and he couldn't articulate the right word, he was silent
rather than use the wrong one. I shall never forget how in these
early morning walks at Braemar, finding me sympathetic, he unbent
with the air of a man who had unexpectedly found something he had
sought, and was fairly confidential.

On the mother's side our author came of ministers. His maternal
grandfather, the Rev. Dr Balfour of Colinton, was a man of handsome
presence, tall, venerable-looking, and not without a mingled
authority and humour of his own - no very great preacher, I have
heard, but would sometimes bring a smile to the faces of his
hearers by very naive and original ways of putting things. R. L.
Stevenson quaintly tells a story of how his grandfather when he had
physic to take, and was indulged in a sweet afterwards, yet would
not allow the child to have a sweet because he had not had the
physic. A veritable Calvinist in daily action - from him, no
doubt, our subject drew much of his interest in certain directions
- John Knox, Scottish history, the '15 and the '45, and no doubt
much that justifies the line "something of shorter-catechist," as
applied by Henley to Stevenson among very contrasted traits indeed.

But strange truly are the interblendings of race, and the way in
which traits of ancestors reappear, modifying and transforming each
other. The gardener knows what can be done by grafts and buddings;