Languages & literature > Aurus clavus, or, The adventures of a gold trinket, supposed to have been written by itself

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If he had a few pounds in his possession—he
cared not how he procured them—he imagined
he would yet do well. He now only wished for
some opportunity of gaining the object of his
desire, and about six o’clock he descended the
hill, crossed the park, and in a few minutes
was on the caster road to Leith. The caster
road to Leith was neither so public nor so good
a walk as it now is ; it was very private ; and,
with the exception of a small public house,
there was not a habitation between the village
of Quarrelholes and the Links of Leith. Thomas
was about half way down the road, when he
saw a tall venerable-looking gentleman slowly
stepping towards the city. In his right hand
he held a long gold-headed cane, and in his left
he carried a small leathern portmanteau, and
seemed from his appearance to have recently ar¬
rived by the ferry-boat from the Fife side.
On a nearer approach, my master knew him
to be one of the city clergymen, and supposed
that the reverend gentleman had just returned
from visiting some country clergyman, whom
he had probably been assisting in his official
character. In'so far he was correct, for he had
been at Perth assisting a reverend brother at a