“I write under some anxiety for your interest, though I sincerely hope it is groundless. The devil or James Gibson* has put it into Lord Lauderdale’s head to challenge your annuity in the House of Lords on

* James Gibson, Esq. W.S. (now Sir James Gibson Craig of Riccarton, Bart.), had always been regarded as one of the most able and active of the Scotch Whigs—whose acknowledged chief in those days was the Earl of Lauderdale.

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account of your non-residence, and your holding a commission in the militia. His lordship kept his intention as secret as possible, but fortunately it reached the kind and friendly ear of Colin Mackenzie. Lord Melville takes the matter up stoutly, and I have little doubt will carry his point, unless the whole bill is given up for the season, which some concurring opposition from different quarters renders not impossible. In that case, you must, at the expense of a little cash and time, shew face in Edinburgh for a week or two and attend your office. But I devoutly hope all will be settled by the bill being passed as it now stands. This is truly a most unworthy exertion of private spite and malice, but I trust it will be in vain.”

“Edinburgh, June 12th.

“Dear Tom,

“I have the pleasure to acquaint you that I have every reason to believe that the bill will pass this week. It has been committed; upon which occasion Lord Lauderdale stated various objections, all of which were repelled. He then adverted to your case with some sufficiently bitter observations. Lord Melville advised him to reserve his epithets till he was pleased to state his cause, as he would pledge himself to show that they were totally inapplicable to the transaction. The Duke of Montrose also intimated his intention to defend it, which I take very kind of his Grace, as he went down on purpose, and declared his resolution to attend whenever the business should be stirred. So much for

‘The Lord of Graham, by every chief adored, Who boasts his native philabeg restored.’” *

* These lines are slightly altered from the Rolliad, p. 308. The Duke had obtained the repeal of an act of Parliament forbidding the use of the Highland garb.

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The next letter is addressed to an old friend of Scott’s, who, though a stout Whig, had taken a lively interest in the success of his brother’s parliamentary business.

I conclude the affair of Thomas Scott with a brief extract from a letter which his brother addressed to him a few weeks later:—“Lord Holland has been in Edin-

* A copy of the Guerras Chiles de Granada.

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burgh, and we met accidentally at a public party. He made up to me, but I remembered his part in your affair, and cut him with as little remorse as an old pen.” The meeting here alluded to occurred at a dinner of the Friday Club, at Fortune’s Tavern, to which Lord Holland was introduced by Mr Thomas Thomson. Two gentlemen who were present, inform me that they distinctly remember a very painful scene, for which, knowing Scott’s habitual good-nature and urbanity, they had been wholly unprepared. One of them (Lord Jeffrey) adds, that this was the only example of rudeness he ever witnessed in him in the course of a lifelong familiarity. I have thought it due to truth and justice not to omit this disagreeable passage in Scott’s life, which shows how even his mind could at times be unhinged and perverted by the malign influence of political spleen. It is consolatory to add, that he enjoyed much agreeable intercourse in after days with Lord Holland, and retained no feelings of resentment towards any other of the Whig gentlemen named in the preceding correspondence.*

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While these disagreeable affairs were still in progress, the poem of the Lady of the Lake was completed. Scott was at the same time arranging the materials, and superintending the printing, of the collection entitled “English Minstrelsy,” in which several of his own minor poems first appeared, and which John Ballantyne and Co. also published in the summer of 1810. The Swift, too, (to say nothing of reviews and the like), was going on; and so was the Somers. A new edition of the Minstrelsy of the Scottish Border was moreover at press, and in it the editor included a few features of novelty, particularly Mr Morritt’s spirited ballad of the Curse of Moy. He gives a lively description of his occupations in the following letter addressed to that gentleman:—

Early in May the Lady of the Lake came out—as her two elder sisters had done—in all the majesty of quarto, with every accompanying grace of typography, and with,

* Scott alludes to some translations of Italian poetry which he had wished for Mr Morritt’s permission to publish in the “English Minstrelsy.”

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moreover, an engraved frontispiece of Saxon’s portrait of Scott; the price of the book, two guineas. For the copyright the poet had nominally received 2000 guineas, but as John Ballantyne and Co. retained three-fourths of the property to themselves (Miller of London purchasing the other fourth), the author’s profits were, or should have been, more than this.

It ought to be mentioned, that during the progress of the poem his feelings towards Constable were so much softened, that he authorized John Ballantyne to ask, in his name, that experienced bookseller’s advice respecting the amount of the first impression, the method of advertising, and other professional details. Mr Constable readily gave the assistance thus requested, and would willingly have taken any share they pleased in the adventure. The property had been disposed of before these communications occurred, and the triumphant success of the coup d’essai of the new firm was sufficient to close Scott’s ears for a season against any propositions of the like kind from the house at the Cross; but from this time there was no return of any thing like personal ill-will between the parties. One article of this correspondence will be sufficient.

Mr Robert Cadell, the publisher of this Memoir, who was then a young man in training for his profession in Edinburgh, retains a strong impression of the interest which the Lady of the Lake excited there for two or three months before it was published. “James Ballantyne,” he says, “read the cantos from time to time to select coteries, as they advanced at press. Common fame was loud in their favour; a great poem was on all hands anticipated. I do not recollect that any of all the author’s works was ever looked for with more intense anxiety, or that any one of them excited a more extraordinary sensation when it did appear. The whole country rang with the praises of the poet—crowds set off to view the scenery of Loch Katrine, till then comparatively unknown; and as the book came out just before the season for excursions, every house and inn in that neighbourhood was crammed with a constant succession of visitors. It is a well-ascertained fact, that from the date of the publication of the Lady of the Lake the posthorse duty in Scotland rose in an extraordinary degree, and indeed it continued to do so regularly for a number of years, the author’s succeeding works keeping up the enthusiasm for our scenery which he had thus originally created.”

I owe to the same correspondent the following details:—“The quarto edition of 2050 copies disappeared in-

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stantly, and was followed in the course of the same year by four editions in octavo, viz. one of 3000, a second of 3250, and a third and a fourth each of 6000 copies; thus, in the space of a few months, the extraordinary number of 20,000 copies were disposed of. In the next year (1811) there was another edition of 3000; there was one of 2000 in 1814; another of 2000 in 1815; one of 2000 again in 1819; and two, making between them 2500, appeared in 1825: Since which time the Lady of the Lake, in collective editions of his poetry, and in separate issues, must have circulated to the extent of at least 20,000 copies more.” So that, down to the month of July, 1836, the legitimate sale in Great Britain has been not less than 50,000 copies.

I have little to add to what the Introduction of 1830, and some letters already extracted have told us, concerning the history of the composition of this poem. Indeed the coincidences of expression and illustration in the Introduction and those private letters, written twenty years before, are remarkable. In both we find him quoting Montrose’s lines, and in both he quotes also “Up wi’ the bonnie blue bonnet,” &c. In truth, both letters and Introduction were literal transcripts of his usual conversation on the subject. “A lady,” he says, “to whom I was nearly related, and with whom I lived during her whole life on the most brotherly terms of affection, was residing with me (at Ashestiel) when the work was in progress, and used to ask me what I could possibly do to rise so early in the morning. At last I told her the subject of my meditations; and I can never forget the anxiety and affection expressed in her reply. ‘Do not be so rash,’ she said, ‘my dearest cousin. You are already popular—more so perhaps than you yourself will believe, or than even I or other partial friends can fairly allow to your merit. You

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stand high do not rashly attempt to climb higher and incur the risk of a fall; for, depend upon it, a favourite will not be permitted even to stumble with impunity.’ I replied to this affectionate expostulation in the words of Montrose:

‘He either fears his fate too much, Or his deserts are small, Who dares not put it to the touch, To win or lose it all.’

‘If I fail,’ I said—for the dialogue is strong in my recollection, ‘it is a sign that I ought never to have succeeded, and I will write prose for life: you shall see no change in my temper, nor will I eat a single meal the worse. But if I succeed—

‘Up wi’ the bonnie blue bonnet, The dirk and the feather an’ a’!

“Afterwards I showed my critic the first canto, which reconciled her to my imprudence.”—The lady here alluded to was no doubt Miss Christian Rutherford, his mother’s sister, who, as I have already mentioned, was so little above his age, that they seem always to have lived together on the terms of equality indicated in her use of the word “cousin” in the dialogue before us. She was, however, about as devout a Shakspearian as her nephew, and the use of cousin, for kinsman in general, is common to all our elder dramatists.*

He says, in the same essay, “I remember that about the same time a friend started in to ‘heeze up my hope,’ like the minstrel in the old song. He was bred a farmer, but a man of powerful understanding, natural good taste, and warm poetical feeling, perfectly competent to supply the wants of an imperfect or irregular education. He was a passionate admirer of field sports, which we

* Thus Lady Capulet exclaims, on seeing the corpse of Tybalt, “Tybalt, my cousin! oh! my brother’s child!”

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often pursued together. As this friend happened to dine with me at Ashestiel one day, I took the opportunity of reading to him the first canto of the Lady of the Lake, in order to ascertain the effect the poem was likely to produce upon a person who was but too favourable a representative of readers at large. His reception of my recitation, or prelection, was rather singular. He placed his hand across his brow, and listened with great attention through the whole account of the stag-hunt, till the dogs throw themselves into the lake to follow their master, who embarks with Ellen Douglas. He then started up with a sudden exclamation, struck his hand on the table, and declared in a voice of censure calculated for the occasion, that the dogs must have been totally ruined by being permitted to take the water after such a severe chase. I own I was much encouraged by the species of reverie which had possessed so zealous a follower of the sports of the ancient Nimrod, who had been completely surprised out of all doubts of the reality of the tale.” Scott adds—“Another of his remarks gave me less pleasure. He detected the identity of the king with the wandering knight, Fitz-James, when he winds his bugle to summon his attendants. He was probably thinking of the lively but somewhat licentious old ballad in which the dénouement of a royal intrigue” [one of James V. himself by the way] “takes place as follows:—

He took a bugle from his side, He blew both loud and shrill, And four-and-twenty belted knights Came skipping owre the hill.

‘Then he took out a little knife, Let a’ his duddies fa’, And he was the bravest gentleman That was amang them a’. And we’ll go no more a roving’, &c.

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“This discovery, as Mr Pepys says of the rent in his camlet cloak, ‘was but a trifle, yet it troubled me;’ and I was at a good deal of pains to efface any marks by which I thought my secret could be traced before the conclusion, when I relied on it with the same hope of producing effect with which the Irish postboy is said to reserve a ‘trot for the avenue.’”

I believe the shrewd critic here introduced was the poet’s excellent cousin, Charles Scott, now laird of Knowe-south. The story of the Irish postilion’s trot he owed to Mr Moore.

In their reception of this poem, the critics were for once in full harmony with each other, and with the popular voice. The article in the Quarterly was written by George Ellis; but its eulogies, though less discriminative, are not a whit more emphatic than those of Mr Jeffrey in the rival Review. Indeed, I have always considered this last paper as the best specimen of contemporary criticism on Scott’s poetry; and I shall therefore indulge myself with quoting here two of its paragraphs:—

“There is nothing in Mr Scott of the severe and majestic style of Milton—or of the terse and fine composition of Pope—or of the elaborate elegance and melody of Campbell—or even of the flowing and redundant diction of Southey,—but there is a medley of bright images and glowing, set carelessly and loosely together a diction tinged successively with the careless richness of Shakspeare, the harshness and antique simplicity of the old romances, the homeliness of vulgar ballads and anecdotes, and the sentimental glitter of the most modern poetry—passing from the borders of the ludicrous to those of the sublime—alternately minute and energetic—sometimes artificial, and frequently negligent, but always full of spirit and vivacity—abounding in images that are striking at first sight to minds of every contexture—and never expressing a sentiment which it can cost the most ordinary reader any exertion to comprehend. Upon the whole, we are inclined to think more highly of the Lady of the

* Introduction to the Lady of the Lake—1830.

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Lake than of either of its author’s former publications. We are more sure, however, that it has fewer faults, than that it has greater beauties; and as its beauties bear a strong resemblance to those with which the public has been already made familiar in these celebrated works, we should not be surprised if its popularity were less splendid and remarkable. For our own parts, however, we are of opinion, that it will be oftener read hereafter than either of them; and that if it had appeared first in the series, their reception would have been less favourable than that which it has experienced. It is more polished in its diction, and more regular in its versification; the story is constructed with infinitely more skill and address; there is a greater proportion of pleasing and tender passages, with much less antiquarian detail; and, upon the whole, a larger variety of characters, more artfully and judiciously contrasted. There is nothing so fine, perhaps, as the battle in Marmion—or so picturesque as some of the scattered sketches in the Lay; but there is a richness and a spirit in the whole piece which does not pervade either of those poems—a profusion of incident, and a shifting brilliancy of colouring, that reminds us of the witchery of Ariosto and a constant elasticity, and occasional energy, which seem to belong more peculiarly to the author now before us.”

“It is honourable to Mr Scott’s genius that he has been able to interest the public so deeply with this third presentment of the same chivalrous scenes; but we cannot help thinking, that both his glory and our gratification would have been greater, if he had changed his hand more completely, and actually given us a true Celtic story, with all its drapery and accompaniments, in a corresponding style of decoration. Such a subject, we are persuaded, has very great capabilities, and only wants to be introduced to public notice by such a hand as Mr Scott’s, to make a still more powerful impression than he has already effected by the resurrection of the tales of romance. There are few persons, we believe, of any degree of poetical susceptibility, who have wandered among the secluded valleys of the Highlands, and contemplated the singular people by whom they are still tenanted with their love of music and of song—their hardy and irregular life, so unlike the unvarying toils of the Saxon mechanic—their devotion to their chiefs—their wild and lofty traditions—their national enthusiasm—the melancholy grandeur of the scenes they inhabit—and the multiplied superstitions which still linger among them without feeling that there is no existing people so well adapted for the purposes of poetry, or so capable of furnishing the occasions of new and striking inventions.

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“We are persuaded, that if Mr Scott’s powerful and creative genius were to be turned in good earnest to such a subject, something might be produced still more impressive and original than even this age has yet witnessed.”*

The second of these paragraphs is a strikingly prophetic one; and if the details already given negative the prediction of the first,—namely, that the immediate popularity of the Lady of the Lake would be less remarkable than that of the Lay or Marmion had been—its other prediction, that the new poem would be “oftener read hereafter than either of the former,” has, I believe, proved just. The Lay, if I may venture to state the creed now established, is, I should say, generally considered as the most natural and original, Marmion as the most powerful and splendid, the Lady of the Lake as the most interesting, romantic, picturesque, and graceful of his great poems.

Of the private opinions expressed at the time of its first publication by his distinguished literary friends, and expressed with an ease and candour equally honourable to them and to him, that of Mr Southey was, as far as I know, the only one which called forth any thing like a critical reply; and even here, more suo, he seems glad

* It may interest the reader to compare with this passage a brief extract from Sir James Mackintosh’s Indian Diary of 1811:— “The subject of The Lady,” says he, “is a common Highland irruption, but at a point where the neighbourhood of the Lowlands affords the best contrast of manners—where the scenery affords the noblest subject of description—and where the wild clan is so near to the Court, that their robberies can be connected with the romantic adventures of a disguised king, an exiled lord, and a high-born beauty. The whole narrative is very fine. There are not so many splendid passages for quotation as in the two former poems. This may indeed silence the objections of the critics, but I doubt whether it will promote the popularity of the poem. It has nothing so good as the Address to Scotland, or the Death of Marmion.”—Life of Mackintosh, v. ii. p. 82.

LETTER TO MR SOUTHEY.

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to turn from his own productions to those of his correspondent. It will be seen that Mr Southey had recently put forth the first volume of his history of Brazil; that his Kehama was then in the Ballantyne press; and that he had mentioned to Scott his purpose of writing another poem under the title of “Don Pelayo” which in the issue was exchanged for that of “Roderick the Last of the Goths.”

George Ellis having undertaken, at Gifford’s request, to review the Lady of the Lake, does not appear to have addressed any letter to the poet upon the subject, until

* This amiable gentleman, author of the History of Durham, in three volumes folio,—one of the most learned as well as interesting works of its class,—was an early and dear friend of Scott’s. He died at the family seat of Mainsforth, near Durham, 11th February 1834, in his 55th year.

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after his article had appeared. He then says simply, that he had therein expressed his candid sentiments, and hoped his friend, as great a worshipper as himself of Dryden’s tales, would take in good part his remarks on the octosyllabic metre as applied to serious continued narrative. The following was Scott’s reply:—

Mr Ellis recurs to the octosyllabic measure of the Lady of the Lake in his next letter. “I don’t think,” says he, “after all the eloquence with which you plead for your favourite metre, that you really like it from any other motive than that sainte paresse—that delightful indolence which induces one to delight in doing those things which we can do with the least fatigue. If you will take the trouble of converting Dryden’s Theodore and Honoria (a narrative, is it not?) into Hudibrastic measure, and after trying this on the first twenty lines you feel pleased with the transformation, I will give up the argument; although, in point of fact, I believe that I regret the variety of your own old stanza, much more than the absence of that heroic measure, which you justly remark is not, without great difficulty, capable of being moulded into sentences of various lengths. When, therefore, you give us another poem, pray indulge me with rather a larger share of your ancient dithyrambics.”

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Canning, too, came to the side of Ellis in this debate. After telling Scott that “on a repeated perusal” he had been “more and more delighted” with the Lady of the Lake, he says “But I should like to see something a little different when you write next. In short, I have sometimes thought (very presumptuously) that partly by persuasion, and partly by shewing the effect of a change of dress of a fuller and more sweeping style upon some of your favourite passages, I could induce you to present yourself next time in a Drydenic habit. Has this ever occurred to you, and have you tried it, and not liked yourself so well?” We shall see by and by what attention Scott gave to these friendly suggestions.

Of the success of the new poem he speaks as follows in his Introduction of 1830:—“It was certainly so extraordinary as to induce me for the moment to conclude that I had at last fixed a nail in the proverbially inconstant wheel of Fortune. I had attained, perhaps, that degree of public reputation at which prudence, or certainly timidity, would have made a halt, and discontinued efforts by which I was far more likely to diminish my fame than to increase it. But—as the celebrated John Wilkes is said to have explained to King George the Third, that he himself, amid his full tide of popularity, was never a Wilkite—so I can with honest truth exculpate myself from having been at any time a partisan of my own poetry, even when it was in the highest fashion with the million. It must not be supposed that I was either so ungrateful, or so superabundantly candid, as to despise or scorn the value of those whose voice had elevated me so much higher than my own opinion told me I deserved. I felt, on the contrary, the more grateful to the public, as receiving that from partiality which I could not have claimed from merit: and I endeavoured

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to deserve the partiality by continuing such exertions as I was capable of for their amusement.”

James Ballantyne has preserved in his Memorandum an anecdote strikingly confirmative of the most remarkable statement in this page of Scott’s confessions. “I remember,” he says, “going into his library shortly after the publication of the Lady of the Lake, and finding Miss Scott (who was then a very young girl) there by herself I asked her ‘Well, Miss Sophia, how do you like the Lady of the Lake?’ Her answer was given with perfect simplicity ‘Oh, I have not read it; papa says there’s nothing so bad for young people as reading bad poetry.’”

In fact, his children in those days had no idea of the source of his distinction—or rather, indeed, that his position was in any respect different from that of other Advocates, Sheriffs, and Clerks of Session. The eldest boy came home one afternoon about this time from the High School, with tears and blood hardened together upon his cheeks. “Well, Wat,” said his father, “what have you been fighting about to-day?” With that the boy blushed and hung his head, and at last stammered out—that “he had been called a lassie.” “Indeed!” said Mrs Scott, “this was a terrible mischief to be sure.” “You may say what you please, mamma,” Wat answered roughly, “but I dinna think there’s a waufer (shabbier) thing in the world than to be a lassie, to sit boring at a clout.” Upon further enquiry, it turned out that one or two of his companions had dubbed him The Lady of the Lake, and the phrase was to him incomprehensible, save as conveying some imputation on his prowess, which he accordingly vindicated in the usual style of the Yards. Of the poem he had never before heard. Shortly after, this story having got wind, one of Scott’s

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colleagues of the Clerks’ Table said to the boy—“Gilknockie, my man, you cannot surely help seeing that great people make more work about your papa than they do about me or any other of your uncles—what is it, do you suppose, that occasions this?” The little fellow pondered for a minute or two, and then answered very gravely—“It’s commonly him that sees the hare sitting.” And yet this was the man that had his children all along so very much with him. In truth, however, young Walter had guessed pretty shrewdly in the matter, for his father had all the tact of the Sutherland Highlander, whose detection of an Irish rebel up to the neck in a bog, he has commemorated in a note upon Rokeby. Like him, he was quick to catch the sparkle of the future victim’s eye; and often said jestingly of himself, that whatever might be thought of him as a maker (poet), he was an excellent trouveur.

Ballantyne adds:—“One day, about this same time, when his fame was supposed to have reached its acmé, I said to him—‘Will you excuse me, Mr Scott, but I should like to ask you what you think of your own genius as a poet, in comparison with that of Burns?’ He replied ‘There is no comparison whatever—we ought not to be named in the same day.’ ‘Indeed!’ I answered, ‘would you compare Campbell to Burns?’ ‘No, James, not at all—If you wish to speak of a real poet, Joanna Baillie is now the highest genius of our country.’ But, in fact,” (continues Ballantyne) “he had often said to me that neither his own nor any modern popular style of composition was that from which he derived most pleasure. I asked him what it was. He answered Johnson’s; and that he had more pleasure in reading London, and The Vanity of Human Wishes, than any other poetical composition he could mention; and I think I never saw his countenance more indicative

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of high admiration than while reciting aloud from those productions.”*

* In his Sketch of Johnson’s Life (Miscellaneous Prose Works, vol. iii. p 264) Scott says—“The deep and pathetic morality of the Vanity of Human Wishes, has often extracted tears from those whose eyes wander dry over pages professedly sentimental.” And Lord Byron, in his Ravenna Diary (1821), has the following entry on the same subject, “Read Johnson’s Vanity of Human Wishes,—all the examples and mode of giving them sublime, as well as the latter part, with the exception of an occasional couplet. ’Tis a grand poem—and so true!—true as the 10th of Juvenal himself. The lapse of ages changes all things—time—language—the earth—the bounds of the sea—the stars of the sky, and every thing about, around, and underneath man, except man himself, who has always been, and always will be, an unlucky rascal. The infinite variety of lives conduct but to death, and the infinity of wishes lead but to disappointment.” (Life and Works, vol. v. p. 66). Yet it is the cant of our day, above all of its poetasters, that Johnson was no poet. To be sure, they say the same of Pope—and hint it occasionally even of Dryden.