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Remember the word I told you in the Saltmarket, for I never mention names when I take the road." When we sailed at daybreak next morning I had the glow of satisfaction with my own doings which is a safe precursor of misfortunes. I had settled my business with the Free Companions, and need look for no more trouble on that score.

They could discover no trace of Lancaster; and as to the house in the Saltmarket, there was not the slightest evidence of any connection whatever between its mistress, or any other of its inmates, and either the robber or the robbery. The police indeed searched the house; but of course to no purpose.

These were in the Saltmarket, close on the river front, and to reach them I went by the short road through the Friar's Vennel. It was an ill-reputed quarter of the town, and not long before had been noted as a haunt of coiners; but I had gone through it often, and met with no hindrance.

That and her bible was all I had of her belongings. Where the rest had gone, a number of pawn tickets told. I was in a hurry to be off and telling the woman I was going to try the country I bade her goodbye. She said, God help you, poor boy, and kissed my cheek. The bells at the Cross were chiming out, The blue bells of Scotland, when I turned the corner at the Saltmarket.

The house in the Saltmarket, which I also described as well as I could, they knew at once, saying it was one of the most infamous dens in the city. The men now promised that they would use every exertion in their power to recover my money, but gave me to understand that there was little or no hope of success. The event justified their anticipations.

Yet New York has a district called the Five Points, fertile in crime, fever, and misery, which would scarcely yield the palm for vice and squalor to St. Giles's in London, or the Saltmarket in Glasgow. A collection of dwellings called the Mud Huts, where many coloured people reside, is also an unpleasing feature connected with the city.

It was left to me, therefore, to do honour to our landlord's hospitable cheer to his tea, right from China, which he got in a present from some eminent ship's-husband at Wapping to his coffee, from a snug plantation of his own, as he informed us with a wink, called Saltmarket Grove, in the island of Jamaica to his English toast and ale, his Scotch dried salmon, his Lochfine herrings, and even to the double-damask table-cloth, "wrought by no hand, as you may guess," save that of his deceased father the worthy Deacon Jarvie.

Having reached the street just named, I proceeded downwards, still heedless of my way, until I found myself in the Saltmarket, the scene of my late disaster.

"There is a house in the Saltmarket, which, on the rare occasions I do go to a tavern, and that is chiefly for a sight of the papers, I always frequent. They are decent, respectable people. So we'll go there, if you please; that is, if it be quite the same to you." I said it was, and that I would cheerfully accompany him wherever he chose.

This point settled, we proceeded to the Saltmarket; when my friend, who, by the way, had now told me that his name was Lancaster, conducted me up a dark, dirty-looking close, and finally into a house of anything but respectable appearance.