"Do you happen to know a family of Lindsays, in Georgestreet,
Mr. Dundas?"
"Lindsays? yes, perfectly well. Do you know them?"
"No; but I am very much interested in one of the family. Is the old lady living?"
"Yes, certainly; not very old, either not above sixty, or sixty-five; and as hale and alert as at forty. A very fine old lady."
"A large family?"
"Oh, no; Mr. Lindsay is a widower this some years, with no children; and there is a widowed daughter lately come home Lady Keith; that's all."
"Mr. Lindsay that is the son?"
"Yes. You would like them. They are excellent people excellent family wealthy beautiful country-seat on the south bank of the Esk, some miles out of Edinburgh; I was down there two weeks ago entertain most handsomely and agreeably, two things that do not always go together. You meet a pleasanter circle nowhere than at Lindsay's."
"And that is the whole family?" said Mrs. Gillespie.
"That is all. There were two daughters married to Americans some dozen or so years ago. Mrs. Lindsay took it very hard, I believe, but she bore up, and bears up now, as if misfortune had never crossed her path, though the death of Mr. Lindsay's wife and son was another great blow. I don't believe there is a gray hair on her head at this moment. There is some peculiarity about them, perhaps some pride, too; but that is an amiable weakness," he added, laughing, as he rose to go: "Mrs. Gillespie, I am sure will not find fault with them for it."