tremble at a neighbour’s whisper.  A man may say what he likes on a public platform,—­he may publish whatever opinion he chooses,—­but he dare not wear a peculiar fashion of hat on the street.  Eccentricity is an outlaw.  Public opinion blows like the east wind, blighting bud and blossom on the human bough.  As a consequence of all this, society is losing picturesqueness and variety,—­we are all growing up after one pattern.  In other matters than architecture past time may be represented by the wonderful ridge of the Old Town of Edinburgh, where everything is individual and characteristic:  the present time by the streets and squares of the New Town, where everything is gray, cold, and respectable; where every house is the other’s alter ego.  It is true that life is healthier in the formal square than in the piled-up picturesqueness of the Canongate,—­quite true that sanitary conditions are better observed,—­that pure water flows through every tenement like blood through a human body,—­that daylight has free access, and that the apartments are larger and higher in the roof.  But every gain is purchased at the expense of some loss; and it is best to combine, if possible, the excellences of the old and the new.  By all means retain the modern breadth of light, and range of space; by all means have water plentiful, and bed-chambers ventilated,—­but at the same time have some little freak of fancy without,—­some ornament about the door, some device about the window,—­something to break the cold, gray, stony uniformity; or, to leave metaphor, which is always dangerous ground,—­for I really don’t wish to advocate Ruskinism and the Gothic,—­it would be better to have, along with our modern enlightenment, our higher tastes and purer habits, a greater individuality of thought and manner; better, while retaining all that we have gained, that harmless eccentricity should be respected,—­that every man should be allowed to grow in his own way, so long as he does not infringe on the rights of his neighbour, or insolently thrust himself between him and the sun.  A little more air and light should be let in upon life.  I should think the world has stood long enough under the drill of Adjutant Fashion.  It is hard work; the posture is wearisome, and Fashion is an awful martinet, and has a quick eye, and comes down mercilessly on the unfortunate wight who cannot square his toes to the approved pattern, or who appears upon parade with a darn in his coat, or with a shoulder-belt insufficiently pipe-clayed.  It is killing work.  Suppose we try “standing at ease” for a little!