“It will give me the most sincere pleasure to receive
any token of your friendly remembrance, more especially in the shape of a
romance of knight-errantry. You know so well how to furbish the arms of a
preux chevalier, without converting him à la Tressan into a modern light dragoon, that
my expectations from Palmerin are very high, and I have given directions to have him
sent to this retreat so soon as he reaches Edinburgh. The half-guinea for
Hogg’s poems was duly received. The uncertainty
of your residence prevented the book being sent at the time proposed—it shall
be forwarded from Edinburgh to the bookseller at Carlisle, who will probably
know how to send it safe. I hope very soon to send you my Life of Dryden, and eke my last Lay—(by the way, the former ditty was only proposed as the lay of
the last Minstrel, not his last
fitt). I grieve that you have renounced the harp; but still I confide, that,
having often touched it so much to the delight of the hearers, you will return
to it again after a short interval. As I don’t much admire compliments,
you may believe me sincere when I tell you, that I have read Madoc three times since my first cursory
perusal, and each time with increased admiration of the poetry. But a poem
whose merits are of that higher tone does not immediately take with the public
at large. It is even possible that during your own life—and may it be as long
as every real lover of literature can wish—you must be contented with the
applause of the few whom nature has gifted with the rare taste for
discriminating in poetry. But the mere Readers of verse must one day come in,
and then Ma-
| LETTERS TO SOUTHEY—1807. | 129 |
“Many thanks for your invitation to Keswick, which I hope to accept, time and season permitting. Is your brother with you? if so, remember me kindly. Where is Wordsworth, and what doth he do? I wrote him a few lines some weeks ago, which I suspect never came to hand. I suppose you are possessed of all relating to the Cid, otherwise I would mention an old romance, chiefly relating to his banishment, which is in John Frere’s possession, and from which he made some lively translations in a tripping Alexandrine stanza. I dare say he would communicate the original, if it could
* The ballad of Queen Orraca was first published in the Edinburgh Annual Register for 1808. |
| 130 | LIFE OF SIR WALTER SCOTT. |
