"
Master George Heriot cast a long look after the two young noblemen,
who had now walked down the alley arm-in-arm, and at length said, "He
hath not, indeed, misplaced his confidence, as your lordship well and
truly says--but, nevertheless, he is not in the right path; for it
behoves every man to become acquainted with his own affairs, so soon
as he hath any that are worth attending to."
When he had made this observation, they applied themselves, with the
scrivener, to look into various papers, and to direct in what manner
writings should be drawn, which might at once afford sufficient
security to those who were to advance the money, and at the same time
preserve the right of the young nobleman to redeem the family estate,
provided he should obtain the means of doing so, by the expected
reimbursement from the Scottish Exchequer, or otherwise. It is
needless to enter into those details. But it is not unimportant to
mention, as an illustration of character, that Heriot went into the
most minute legal details with a precision which showed that
experience had made him master even of the intricacies of Scottish
conveyancing; and that the Earl of Huntinglen, though far less
acquainted with technical detail, suffered no step of the business to
pass over, until he had attained a general but distinct idea of its
import and its propriety.
They seemed to be admirably seconded in their benevolent intentions
towards the young Lord Glenvarloch, by the skill and eager zeal of the
scrivener, whom Heriot had introduced to this piece of business, the
most important which Andrew had ever transacted in his life, and the
particulars of which were moreover agitated in his presence between an
actual earl, and one whose wealth and character might entitle him to
be an alderman of his ward, if not to be lord mayor, in his turn.
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