touches here and there; for these were passing blossoms; the true bloom of his imagination was not till a period considerably later. Whether it was that his powers would have come out at any rate, and though a little less rapidly than in the case of some, yet surely; or that the great spiritual convulsion he underwent unloosened the faculties of his being, and gave them a scope and aim which drew them forth definitely and to the full, certainly the rapidity and power with which, after the great change, his intellectual qualities, no less than his religious principles, unfolded themselves, and often in unexpected directions, were remarkable. Besides, to the end his mind was growing. His was a mind that would not have ceased to grow. When he died it had just lately put forth some new blossoms. In regard to his classical knowledge, it was respectable. I mean that, without being more, it was quite respectable as things are with us in Scotland in this department. And, altogether, in these college days, his fellow-students had a strong sense of, and a great respect for, his abilities, and formed high expectations of his future career. He attended the university five sessions.

His cousin, with whom in his childhood he had tried to read aloud the history of Joseph and failed, had been married to Mr. Ebenezer Thomson, Glasgow; and with them the two brothers were boarded during their first two sessions at college. Mr. Thomson, who died many years ago, seems, from all accounts of him, to have been a man of the choicest Christian spirit. He dealt very faithfully and affectionately by the souls of the two lads. John had great love and veneration for his memory, and often spoke to me of the earnest instructions of that excellent man. Mr. Thomson attended the ministry of the late Dr. Beattie, of the United Secession Congregation, Gordon Street; the brothers accompanied him, and also attended the doctor's class. Dr. Beattie's preaching-full of solid practical truth, given forth clearly and strongly-repeatedly shook the conscience and the spirit of young John Maclaren; shook, that was all; yet it was much-another drawing by the hand of

God, who at last drew him entirely to Himself. I have heard him speak of the peculiar solemnity and power, yea, what was to him at the time, awfulness of some of Dr. Beattie's sermons. At the "Disruption," his mother returned to the church of her old pastor, Dr. Stark, who by this time had a colleague, the Rev. John Edmond, now of Islington, London. The two brothers joined the church together, under the care of Mr. Edmond. This seems to have been in the summer of 1844. To both his ministers at Dennyloanhead he was, as we shall see, very strongly attached.

We have now to turn, ere we close this introductory chapter, already unexpectedly long, to notice very shortly a new and important phase of his early life. Owing to his mathematical eminence he was recommended, by the Professor of Mathematics, as a tutor, first to a gentleman's family in West Meath, Ireland, and next to Sir H- W- -'s family in the north of England. He spoke to me principally of his residence in the latter family, in which he continued longer than in the other. He went to it in the beginning of 1846, being then between nineteen and twenty years of age, and was there about a year and a-half. It was an old family, and was connected with certain branches of the nobility of England. He was treated in it with great respect. Whatever company was present he was one. It can be at once seen how important an influence his residence here must have exerted upon him at that period of opening manhood. It was one of those arrangements of God's Providence in regard to him which largely prepared him for after usefulness. I imagine, indeed, that it would cost little to a nature such as his to associate with the highest he might meet with; but still he here acquired a quiet ease of manner, and became habituated to a demeanour which gave fitting expression to his own noble and manly character, and was of much advantage to him in his subsequent years. But this, though not unimportant, was yet of less importance: his tastes and sympathies were enriched and extended. It was indeed a considerable step from the farm-servants

at Dunipace Mills, among whom he had once found his ideal, to the society at Hall; and it was an immense advantage to him that he could and did sympathize perfectly with both classes, and with all between. He was not the person to root out of him any old true human sympathy. There was not that littleness about him; and all those human sympathies which twined themselves around his young nature ever flourished green, and with peculiar vigour and beauty, about his heart. No person did ever take up with him, from the soil from which he sprang, more of what was truest and best about it; or did take to him, more naturally and well, whatever cultivation and adornment after years might bring to him. There were not wanting some of highly cultivated minds in the society in which he at this time mingled. He used to speak with special respect of a noble lady then in widowhood. There is now by me a letter from her accompanying a present of books to him, which manifests a devout interest in the career which opened before him as a minister of the Gospel, and displays high and earnest qualities of mind and heart, which could not fail to command his esteem. He met also uncultivated minds. It not seldom happens that a Scottish youth, brought up in some quiet country nook, takes with him, on that very account, into some widely-different sphere, an eye all the more keenly observant of the new characters and doings around him. And with shrewd observance did his eye look and learn. He saw, of course, poor enough displays; nor was it without use to him, as we shall soon see, that he did so. It would not be uninstructive, were it right, to give some of his life-like portraits, particularly the portrait with its adjuncts of one man then blazing in the zenith of England, but now deservedly and for ever quenched. The superfluous vigour of our tutor's wits used to be exerted on a certain curate, to whom he would demonstrate, and with what a brawny logic those who knew him will understand, the necessary and speedy downfall of the Established Church; and the combat used to end with the man taking to himself the comfort, which was kindly allowed

him, that the church would probably last his day, or that, at least, the liferent interest of the present occupants would be secured.

And here we must conclude this early phase of John Maclaren's life. Certain great consequences that were gathered out of it belong rather to the all-determining period which occupies the following chapter.

CHAPTER II.

THE GREAT CHANGE.

In the beginning of August, 1848, John Maclaren, then twenty-two years of age, came to Edinburgh to attend the Divinity Hall of what had then become the United Presbyterian Church, by the union of the Secession and Relief churches. Up to that time I had not known him even by sight. Behind him at college, I had yet, on account of his delay in entering the Hall, attended it for two sessions before him; and save by report I had no knowledge of him. A fame of his ability came up to the Hall before him; and I well remember that I was greatly interested to see him. And this was his personal appearance: Tall he was beyond most men, cleanlimbed and athletic, with dark brown hair, light-coloured eyes, features somewhat long, strongly marked, and cleanly cut, and with a broad and ample brow. His face was expressive of great strength and resolution, and, along with his whole bearing, told of great force and fulness of life. His temperament would, I suppose, have been called a mixture of the bilious and the nervous. His hair was something peculiar,-soft and glossy as it looked, it yet turned out, when touched, to be fibres of a thickness and a strength such as I suppose have seldom grown upon a human head. His voice, while capable of much softness, was yet of vast strength. His character, when first I saw him, seemed to me repellant. There

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had grown about him a cause for this, as we shall see. Bold he was, as it appeared to me, and overbearing, hardy in his speech, rather reckless in his manner, and somewhat dangerous to meddle with. His whole airto which his cut of clothing, not very like that of a divinity student, corresponded-made him appear somewhat exotic in the Hall. He was a great smoker withal. As he had just entered the junior, while I had been transferred to the senior Hall, we very seldom met. When he came up to the Hall of 1849 there appeared in him, to every one who observed him, an extraordinary change. There was about him a deep, quiet, composed gentleness, humility, and lovingness, which was exceedingly impressive, and seemed to rest upon some immense and profound foundation within him. It was not till the close of the Hall of that year that we had anything of special intercourse. He had gone up before the time of the closing lecture in order to get the certificates of the students signed; for he had been chosen "Censor" of the junior Hall by the unanimous vote of his fellowstudents. Being also somewhat early, I found him standing at the door, and we had a short walk together. On starting, he and another junior student bade each other good-bye in a manner so affectionate that I remarked the circumstance to him, when he replied that he had formed some friendships of the closest nature, from which, during the past session, he had derived the greatest benefit, and of that very kind he needed, from the peculiar temptations connected with the classes. Whereupon began a friendship between us, of a kind which made me acquainted with all that had already agitated his spiritual nature, and with everything of any importance in his after history to its earthly close. A very extraordinary change had taken place within him between these two sessions of the Hall, and this great change we have now to look at.

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It turned out that his residence in Ireland and England had been fraught to him with great danger. advantage to him, indeed, even this proved to be; for it led very directly to, and hastened on, the great crisis of