The Scots, with a
vigilance of jealousy which never goes to sleep, always suspect
that an Englishman despises them for their poverty, and to convince
him that they are not less rich than their neighbours, are sure to
tell him a price higher than the true.
When Lesley, two hundred
years ago, related so punctiliously, that a hundred hen eggs, new
laid, were sold in the Islands for a peny, he supposed that no
inference could possibly follow, but that eggs were in great
abundance. Posterity has since grown wiser; and having learned,
that nominal and real value may differ, they now tell no such
stories, lest the foreigner should happen to collect, not that eggs
are many, but that pence are few.
Money and wealth have by the use of commercial language been so
long confounded, that they are commonly supposed to be the same;
and this prejudice has spread so widely in Scotland, that I know
not whether I found man or woman, whom I interrogated concerning
payments of money, that could surmount the illiberal desire of
deceiving me, by representing every thing as dearer than it is.
From Lochbuy we rode a very few miles to the side of Mull, which
faces Scotland, where, having taken leave of our kind protector,
Sir Allan, we embarked in a boat, in which the seat provided for
our accommodation was a heap of rough brushwood; and on the twenty-
second of October reposed at a tolerable inn on the main land.
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