December 16th, 1825.

It is not to be told how it rejoices me to hear from my beloved children, and among them, from you, my love. I had quite a harvest of tidings from my absentees, on the day which brought your last. F wrote to me, and Csent a few lines, and in the forenoon I had a letter from J▬▬; and a day before from D.

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I am just now engaged in reading a very interesting work, Gilly's Excursion to the Valleys of the Vaudois in Piedmont." These excellent and persecuted Protestants, are more like the Primitive Christians, than any other Christian community now existing. There was a time when the Episcopal Church in Scotland resembled them in affliction, as it now resembles them in being only tolerated. I hope that this pleasing work will be the means of making these poor people more known, and produce some collection for them. The pension which England allowed them was withdrawn in 1797, when they became subjects of the French invaders of Italy, and since the restoration of the king of Sardinia, has not been restored. Would that such a man as who is said to have laid out nearly half a million of money in improvements and embellishments at would find it in his heart to lay out some of his countless wealth to relieve the miseries of the parents of Reformation. Our

Wickliffe learned from the Vaudois or Waldenses. They were pensioned by Cromwell, but when Charles II. came to the throne, the pension was lost. Dissipation and self-indulgence are dreadful hardeners of the heart. Pray, read Gilly's book. This history exhibits the bigotry of the Romish Church in a most instructive manner. The inconsistency of asking for what they please to call emancipation, while Protestants are thus treated in a Roman Catholic country, is evident. However they may deceive others; however they may even deceive themselves,-political power is the object at which the Romanists aim; and this book shows how they use such power when they have it. It is nonsense to talk of toleration; of that the Irish Catholics have as much as any set of Christians can desire, and much more than they allow to others in those countries where their corruptions are established. But they must be the dominant Church, or they will not be contented and that, I trust, will never be granted to them.

I am indebted to the kindness of L- for the possession of a most interesting pamphlet, "Letters of a Protestant Layman." I have also read Philpott's letters to Charles Butler. He takes a course much like that of the Protestant layman, and establishes every step on the authority of the decrees of the Council of Trent, or some other Catholic document of acknowledged credit with the Romanists themselves. But like

M--y's little playthings, you may throw them down, but unless you hold them down, they are up on their bottoms again as pert as ever, and as confident as if they had never been beaten.

If

One little word of two syllables in the last sentence leads me to a more amusing subject, even dearest little M- -y himself. I wish much to see him, and at the same time, I am almost afraid to see him, for he and I shall probably be great friends, and I shall not like parting with him. Tell that I have a notion that in the Habeas Corpus act, there is a clause, entitled in the margin, Habeas Corpus nepotis." You may have the body or person of a grandchild,-empowering a grandfather of ten grandchildren to detain any one of them at his pleasure with him. there is not such a clause, I will speak to the Parliament, as the Mayor of Oxford said, and have a law made for the purpose. As the history of this Mayor of Oxford is curious, I will set it down for's instruction when he becomes an active magistrate in-shire. -shire. The Mayor was an old friend of mine, of whom I have bought many a pair of stockings. One day was brought before his Worship, a man accused of breaking into a neighbour's garden, and stealing thence a large quantity of fine ripe gooseberries. His worship was very wroth. He said to his clerk, "Fetch down from that there shelf, Burns' Justice and Blackstone's Cotemporaries. Now, sir, (O you rascal, I'll punish you) now, sir, look out Goose

berry, look out Gooseberry, (I'll punish you, you-)." The clerk looked through the index of each book. "Please your worship, there's no Gooseberry here-I can't find Gooseberry." The Mayor looked himself, but Gooseberry was not to be found! "Ah!" said the Mayor, "you've escaped this time-but I shall speak to the Parliament, and I'll take care a law shall be made, and I'll have no stealing of gooseberries for the future." Now this is all true,—and it is true, that the said Mayor was met in the meadows at Oxford taking a walk. "How d'ye do, Mr Mayor ?" "Pretty well, I thank ye, but I was very ill yesterday; so I took an exotic-and I am now taking a spontaneous walk"-meaning, it was conjectured, solitary, for his worship was alone.

His

I am to have a private confirmation to-morrow. One of the persons to be confirmed is a young man who has interested me a good deal. family are Quakers. He has been some time under the care of Mrs C. Reading and reflection have brought him to the point; and I baptized him at the age of nineteen yesterday. He passed an hour with me to-day, and I hope to see more of him. He attends the chapel regularly. I have thought you would be interested in this little anecdote, and therefore tell it. I once baptized a young Baptist at twenty-five years of age. He became a very pious and serious man. I hope the same of this convert from Quakerism. The baptism of an adult is,

to me, most particularly solemn and affecting. If this youth, by the grace of God, persevere in the good course which he has commenced, he will look back with enviable feelings to the solemnity, at which, in the full persuasion of his mind, having inquired, and prayed, and decided, he put on Christ. In a long conference which I had with him two days before his baptism, I found it a delicate matter to show him, as I was desired to do, the errors of the worthy people with whom he is so closely connected. However it was a conference rather to confirm the views which he had adopted, than to persuade him by disputation to adopt them, and my task was easier

on that account.

Edinburgh, December 30, 1825.

MY BELOVED DAUGHTER,

This will present itself to you, I hope, on the first post-day in the new year, and, with itself, the assurance of my sincerest prayers for every blessing on you and your excellent husband and your dear children. In these prayers all your friends assembled here cordially unite with me.

I hope that you are perfectly restored to tranquillity since your unpleasing visit of thieves. The worst part of the story is, I think, the conviction, which appears to us unavoidable, that some persons well acquainted with your pre