“Your letter found me in this quiet corner, and while
it always gives me pride and pleasure to hear from you, I am truly concerned at
Constable’s unaccountable
delays. I suppose that, in the hurry of his departure for London, his promise
to write to Mr Struthers had escaped; as
for any desire to quit his bargain, it is out of the question. If Mr
Struthers will send to my house in Castle Street, the manuscript
designed for the press, I will get him a short bill for the copy-money the
moment Constable returns, or perhaps before he comes down.
He may rely on the bargain being definitively settled, and the printing will, I
suppose, be begun immediately on the great bibliopolist’s return; on
which occasion I shall have, according to good old phrase, ‘a crow to
pluck with him, and a pock to put the feathers in.’ I heartily
wish we could have had the honour to see Miss
Agnes and you at our little farm, which is now in its glory—all
the twigs bursting into leaf, and all the lambs skipping on the hills. I have
been fishing almost from morning till night; and Mrs
Scott, and two ladies our guests, are wandering about on the
banks in the most Arcadian fashion in the world. We are just on the point of
setting out on a pilgrimage to the ‘bonny bush, aboon
Traquhair,’ which I believe will occupy us all the
| 176 | LIFE OF SIR WALTER SCOTT. |
“P.S. We quit our quiet pastures to return to Edinburgh on the 10th. So Mr Struthers’ parcel will find me there, if he is pleased to intrust me with the care of it.”
