Volume 1 - Electric Scotland

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printer's devils. 293
to wait one minute. My belief is, from his own avowal, that
he was not kept ten minutes, or rather not five.
One does not hear, unfortunately, what the result
was of the examination in the back-shop ;
but without
further evidence, and without any blame to John, we
feel inclined to give our vote in favour of the boy.
The following must have been written in a gayer
mood :
Do your orders to all the devils on no account to call at any
time on me without giving me an opportunity of confabulating
with their demonships. The system of giving in parcels and
flying ofif without an answer has again begun, and is too
much by far for my temper. The imp whom I caught last
night in the act of evanishment promised to haunt me this
morning at seven, but I smell no brimstone. Nevertheless " by
the pricking of my thumbs " I feel his approach, and here
he is.
Set up the accompanying MSS. immediately.
The Professor's proceedings evolved in the minds of
the Blackwood family in general a distrust of literary
punctuality which has scarcely died out in the third
generation. The now much diminished band who
fought under the banner of John Blackwood will
remember the twinkle in his eye with which, quite
irrespective of fact, he would suggest to his contrib-
utors to "remember that this was a short month,"
while at the same time prepared to meet any delay
with a laugh and a ready excuse for the guilty writer,
which must also have been a development from the
much-tried patience of his father. I myself remember
in the sixties to have been in the condition of Wilson,
having " done jiothing," on the 20th of the month, to
the next number of a story then running in the