Volume 1 - Electric Scotland

ELLERAY. 277
resolved upon coming back to Kendal yesterday morning, so as
to catch the mail, but the Professor and Mrs W. insisted so
much upon my staying another day, that I was at last obliged
to yield : you will say I would not require much pressing, but I
do assure you I wanted above all things to get on, I am so
anxious to be in London and then to get back to you all
again.
After breakfast yesterday morning the Professor and I
walked to Bowness, about a mile and a half, where his boat
The Endeavour, lies. You never saw such a boat—it is beauti-
ful. We got on board before twelve, and sailed about on the
lake till near four o'clock. It was quite delightful. The Professor
would have been sadly mortified if I had gone away
without sailing in his boat, which is quite the boast of all the
Lakes.
Tell Alex, to tell Mr Lockhart that the Professor is in great
spirits about the Magazine and everything else :
he is to write
to him to-day or to-morrow. I have just breakfasted at Kendal,
and the coach is waiting.
The alarm of Hunt's action, which the Professor
was prepared to meet so manfully, seems to have
passed over without result ; but now another shadow
appeared on his path, a much more serious incident of a
similar kind, and one which overwhelmed Wilson with
horror and dismay : the utmost weight of poetic justice
seemed about to overtake and almost crush the reck-
less performer of so many hasty and unconsidered acts.
The ' Noctes ' was perhaps the most dangerous medium
which could have been invented for men of impulses
so rash and utterances so free. And in one of these
lively dialogues it so happened that reference was
made to two persons in the usual slashing way. One
of these was a certain hot-headed Irish squire called
Martin, who had made himself remarkable by some
eccentric appearances at the London police courts.