| [ 45 ] |
My wife and I spent the summer of 1827, partly at a sea-bathing
place near Edinburgh, and partly in Roxburghshire; and I shall, in. my account of the
sequel of this year, draw, as it may happen, on Sir
Walter’s Diary, his letters, the memoranda of friendly visiters, or my
own recollections. The arrival of his daughter and her children at Portobello was a source
of constant refreshment to him during June; for every other day he came down and dined
there, and strolled about afterwards on the beach; thus interrupting, beneficially for his
health, and I doubt not for the result of his labours also, the new custom of regular
night-work, or, as he called it, of serving double-tides. When the Court released him, and
he returned to Abbotsford, his
| 46 | LIFE OF SIR WALTER SCOTT. |
The Chronicles of the
Canongate proceeded pari passu with
these historical tales; and both works were published before the end of the year. He also
superintended, at the same time, the first collection of his Prose Miscellanies, in six volumes 8vo—several
articles being remodelled and extended to adapt them for a more permanent sort of existence
than had been originally thought of. Moreover, Sir
Walter penned, that autumn,
| ST ANDREWS—JUNE, 1827. | 47 |
The Blair-Adam Club, this year, had their headquarters at Charleton, in Fife—the seat of the founder’s son-in-law, Mr Anstruther Thomson; and one of their drives was to the two ancient mansions of Ely and Balcasky. “The latter,” says Sir Walter in his Diary, “put me in mind of poor Philip Anstruther, dead and gone many a long year since. He was a fine, gallant, light-hearted young sailor. I remember the story of his drawing on his father for some cash, which produced an angry letter from old Sir Robert, to which Philip replied, that if he did not know how to write like a gentleman, he did not desire any more of his correspondence. Balcasky is much dilapidated; but they are restoring the house in the good old style, with its terraces and yew hedges.”
Another morning was given to St Andrews, which one of the party had never before visited. “The ruins,” he says, “have been lately cleared out. They had been chiefly magnificent from their size, not their richness in ornament.† I did not go up to St Rule’s Tower, as on former occasions; this is a falling off, for when before did I remain sitting below when there was a steeple to be ascended? But the rheumatism has begun to change
* See Miscellaneous Prose Works (edition 1836) vol. xxi. † I believe there is no doubt that the Metropolitan Cathedral of St Andrews had been the longest in Europe—a very remarkable fact, when one thinks of the smallness and poverty of the country. It is stated, with minute calculations, and much exultation, by an old Scotch writer—Volusenus (i. e. Wilson) in his once celebrated treatise—De Tranquillitate Animi. |
| 48 | LIFE OF SIR WALTER SCOTT. |
On the 22d of July his Diary bears the date of Minto. He then says “We rubbed up some recollections of twenty years
ago, when I was more intimate in the family, till Whig and Tory separated us for a
time. By the way, nobody talks Whig or Tory just now, and the fighting men on each side
go about muzzled and mute, like dogs after a proclamation about canine madness. Am I
sorry for this truce or not Half and half. It is all we have left to stir the blood,
this little political brawling. But better too little of it than too much. Here I have
received news of two deaths at once; Lady Die
Scott, my very old friend, and Archibald
Constable, the bookseller.”—He adds next day—“Yes!
they are both, for very different reasons, subjects of reflection. Lady Diana
Scott, widow of Walter Scott of
Harden, was the last person whom I recollect so much older than myself,
that she kept always at the same distance in point of age, so that she scarce seemed
older to me (relatively) two years ago, when in her ninety-second year, than fifty
years before. She was the daughter (alone remaining) of Pope’s Earl of Marchmont,
and, like her father, had an acute mind, and an eager temper. She was always kind to
me, remarkably so indeed when I was a boy.—Constable’s death
might have been a most important thing to me if it had happened some years
| DEATH OF CONSTABLE—JULY, 1827. | 49 |
Constable’s spirit had been effectually broken
by his downfall. To stoop from being primus absque
secundo among the Edinburgh booksellers, to be the occupant
| 50 | LIFE OF SIR WALTER SCOTT. |
About this time the rumour became prevalent that Mr Canning’s health was breaking up among toils and mortifications of another order, and Scott’s Diary has some striking entries on this painful subject. Meeting Lord Melville casually at the seat of a common friend towards the end of July, he says, “I was sorry to see my very old friend, this upright statesman and honourable gentleman, deprived of his power, and his official income, which the number of his family must render a matter of importance. He was cheerful, not affectedly so, and bore his declension like a wise and brave man. Canning said the office of Premier was his by inheritance; he could not, from constitution, hold it above two years, and then it would descend to Peel. Such is ambition! Old friends forsaken—old principles changed—every effort used to give the vessel of the State a new direction, and all to be Palinurus for two years!”
Of the 10th of August—when the news of Mr
Canning’s death reached Abbotsford—and the day following, are these
entries: “The death of the Premier is announced—late George
Canning—the witty, the accomplished,
| DEATH OF CANNING—AUGUST, 1827. | 51 |
“August 11.—Wrote nearly five pages; then
walked.
| 52 | LIFE OF SIR WALTER SCOTT. |
He received, about this time, a third visit from Mr J. L. Adolphus. The second occurred in August 1824, and since that time they had not met. I transcribe a few paragraphs from my friend’s memoranda, on which I formerly drew so largely: He says—
“Calamity had borne heavily upon Sir
Walter in the interval; but the painful and anxious feeling with which a
friend is approached for the first time under such circumstances, gave way at once to
the unassumed serenity of his manner. There were some signs of age about him which the
mere lapse of time would scarcely have accounted for; but his spirits were abated only,
not broken; if they had sunk, they had sunk equably and gently. It was a declining, not
a clouded sun. I do not remember, at this period, hearing him make any reference to the
afflictions he had suffered, except once, when, speaking of his Life of
| MR ADOLPHUS—AUGUST, 1827. | 53 |
“I was much struck by a few words which fell from him on this subject a short time afterwards. After mentioning an accident which had spoiled the promised pleasure of a visit to his daughter in London, he then added, ‘I am like Seged, Lord of Ethiopia, in the Rambler, who said that he would have ten happy days, and all turned to disappointment. But, however, I have had as much happiness in my time as most men, and I must not complain now.’ I said that, whatever had been his share of happiness, no man could have laboured better for it. He answered, ‘I consider the capacity to labour as part of the happiness I have enjoyed.’
“Abbotsford was not much altered since 1824. I had then seen
it complete even to the statue of Maida at the door, though
in 1824 old Maida was still alive, and now and then raised a
majestic bark from behind the house. It was one of the little scenes of Abbotsford life
which should have been preserved by a painter, when Sir
Walter strolled out in a sunny morning to caress poor Maida, and condole with him upon being so ‘very
frail;’ the aged hound dragging his gaunt limbs forward, painfully, yet
with some remains of dignity, to
| 54 | LIFE OF SIR WALTER SCOTT. |
“The greatest observable difference which the last three years had made in the outward appearance of Abbotsford, was in the advanced growth of the plantations. Sir Walter now showed me some rails and palisades, made of their wood, with more self-complacency than I ever saw him betray on any other subject. The garden did not appear to interest him so much, and the ‘mavis and merle’ were, upon principle, allowed to use their discretion as to the fruit. His favourite afternoon exercise was to ramble through his grounds, conversing with those who accompanied him, and trimming his young trees with a large knife. Never have I received an invitation more gladly than when he has said, ‘If you like a walk in the plantations, I will bestow my tediousness upon you after one o’clock.’ His conversation at such times ran in that natural, easy, desultory course, which accords so well with the irregular movements of a walk over hill and woodland, and which he has himself described so well in his Epistle to Mr Skene.* I remember with particular pleasure one of our walks through the romantic little ravine of the Huntly-Burn. Our progress was leisurely, for the path was somewhat difficult to him. Occasionally he would stop, and, leaning on his walking-stick and fixing his eyes on those of the hearer, pour forth some sonorous stanza of an old poem applicable to the scene, or to the last subject of theconversation. Several times we paused to admire the good taste, as it seemed, with which his great Highland staghound Nimrod always displayed himself on those prominent points of the little glen, where his figure, in combination with the
* See Poetical Works, Vol, VII., p. 182. |
| ADOLPHUS—AUGUST, 1827. | 55 |
“A substitute for walking, which he always very cheerfully
used, and which at last became his only resource for any distant excursion, was a ride
in a four-wheeled open carriage, holding four persons, but not absolutely limited to
that number on an emergency. Tame as this exercise might be in comparison with riding
on horseback, or with walking under propitious circumstances, yet as he was rolled
along to Melrose, or Bowhill, or Yair, his spirits always freshened; the air, the
sounds, the familiar yet romantic scenes, wakened up all the poetry of his thoughts,
and happy were they who heard it resolve itself into words. At the sight of certain
objects for example, in passing the green foundations of the little chapel of Lindean,
where the body of the ‘Dark Knight of Liddesdale’ was deposited, on its way
to Melrose, it would, I suppose, been impossible for him, unless with a companion
hopelessly unsusceptible or pre-occupied, to forbear some passing comment, some harping
(if the word may be favourably used) on the tradition of the place. This was, perhaps,
what he called ‘bestowing his tedious-
| 56 | LIFE OF SIR WALTER SCOTT. |
“Some days of my visit were marked by an almost perpetual confinement to the house; the rain being incessant. But the evenings were as bright and cheerful as the atmosphere of the days was dreary. Not that the gloomiest morning could ever be wearisome under a roof where, independently of the resources in society which the house afforded, the visiter might ransack a library, unique, I suppose, in some of its collections, and in all its departments interesting and characteristic of the founder. So many of the volumes were enriched with anecdotes or comments in his own hand, that to look over his books was in some degree conversing with him. And sometimes this occupation was pleasantly interrupted by a snatch of actual conversation with himself, when he entered from his own room, to consult or take away a book. How often have I heard with pleasure, after a long silence, the uneven step, the point of the stick striking against the floor, and then seen the poet himself emerge from, his study, with a face of thought but yet of cheerfulness, followed perhaps by Nimrod, who stretched his limbs and yawned, as if tired out with some abstruse investigation.
“On one of the rainy days I have alluded to, when walking at
the usual hour became hopeless, Sir Walter asked me
to sit with him while he continued his morning occupation, giving me, for my own
employment, the publications of the Bannatyne Club. His study, as I recollect it, was
strictly a work-room, though an elegant one. It has been fancifully decked out in
| ADOLPHUS—AUGUST, 1827. | 57 |
| 58 | LIFE OF SIR WALTER SCOTT. |
‘I’ve seen Tweed’s silver streams, glittering in the
sunny beams, Turn drumly and dark, as they roll’d on their way.’ |
“Those who have seen Abbotsford will remember that there is at the end of the hall, opposite to the entrance of the library, an arched door-way leading to other rooms. One night some of the party observed that, by an arrangement of light, easily to be imagined, a luminous space was formed upon the library door, in which the shadow of a person standing in the opposite archway made a very imposing appearance, the body of the hall remaining quite dark. Sir Walter had some time before told his friends of the deception of sight (mentioned in his Demonology) which made him for a moment imagine a figure of Lord Byron standing in the same hall.* The discoverers of the little phantasmagoria which I have just described, called to him to come and see their ghost. Whether he thought that raising ghosts at a man’s door was not a comely amusement, or whether the parody upon a circumstance which had made some impression upon his own fancy was a little too strong, he certainly did not enter into the jest.
|
* See Scott’s Letters on Demonology and Witchcraft, p. 38. |
| GENERAL GOURGAUD—AUGUST, 1827. | 59 |
“On the subjects commonly designated as the ‘marvellous,’ his mind was susceptible, and it was delicate. He loved to handle them in his own manner and at his own season, not to be pressed with them, or brought to any thing like a test of belief or disbelief respecting them. There is, perhaps, in most minds, a point more or less advanced, at which incredulity on these subjects may be found to waver. Sir Walter Scott, as it seemed to me, never cared to ascertain very precisely where this point lay in his own mental constitution; still less, I suppose, did he wish the investigation to be seriously pursued by others. In no instance, however, was his colloquial eloquence more striking than when he was well launched in some ‘tale of wonder.’ The story came from him with an equally good grace, whether it was to receive a natural solution, to be smiled at as merely fantastical, or to take its chance of a serious reception.”
About the close of August Sir
Walter’s Diary is chiefly occupied with an affair which, as the reader
of the previous chapter is aware, did not come altogether unexpectedly on him. Among the
documents laid before him in the Colonial Office, when he was in London at the close of
1826, were some which represented one of Buonaparte’s attendants at St Helena, General Gourgaud, as having been guilty of gross unfairness, giving the
English Government private information that the Emperor’s complaints of ill-usage
were utterly unfounded, and yet then, and afterwards, aiding and assisting the delusion in
France as to the harshness of Sir Hudson Lowe’s
conduct towards his captive. Sir Walter, when using these remarkable
documents, guessed that Gourgaud might be inclined to fix a personal
quarrel on himself; and there now appeared in the newspapers
| 60 | LIFE OF SIR WALTER SCOTT. |
Diary.—“August 27.—A singular letter from a lady, requesting me to father a novel of hers. That won’t pass. Cadell transmits a notice from the French papers that Gourgaud has gone, or is going, to London; and the bibliopolist is in a great funk. I lack some part of his instinct. I have done Gourgaud no wrong. I have written to Will Clerk, who has mettle in him, and will think of my honour, as well as my safety.”
“I am about to claim an especial service from you in
the name of our long and intimate friendship. I understand, from a passage in
the French papers, that General Gourgaud
has, or is about to set out for London, to verify the
facts averred concerning him in my history of Napoleon. Now, in case of a personal appeal to me, I
have to say that his confessions to Baron
Sturmer, Count Balmain,
and others at St Helena, confirmed by him in various recorded conversations
with Mr Goulburn, then Under Secretary
of State—were documents of a historical nature which I found with others in the
Colonial Office, and was therefore perfectly entitled to use. If his language
has been misrepresented, he has certainly been very unfortunate; for it has
been misrepresented by four or five different people to whom he said the same
things, true or false he knows best. I also acted with delicacy towards him,
leaving out whatever related to his private quarrels
| GOURGAUD—WILLIAM CLERK. | 61 |
“After all, the matter may be a Parisian
on dit. But it is best to be
prepared. The passages are in the ninth volume of the book. Pray look at them.
I have an official copy of the principal communication. Of the others I have
abridged extracts. Should he desire to see them, I conceive I cannot refuse to
give him copies, as it is likely they may not admit him to the Colonial Office.
But if he asks any apology or explanation for having made use of his name, it
is my purpose to decline it and stand to consequences. I am aware I could march
off upon the privileges of literature, and so forth, but I have no taste for
that species of retreat; and if a gentleman says to me I have injured him,
however captious the quarrel may be, I certainly do not think, as a man of
honour, I can avoid giving him satisfaction, without doing intolerable injury
to my own feelings, and giving rise to the most malig-
| 62 | LIFE OF SIR WALTER SCOTT. |
Diary.—“September 4.—William Clerk quite ready and willing to stand my friend if Gourgaud should come my road. He agrees with me that there is no reason why he should turn on me, but that if he does, reason or none, it is best to stand buff to him. It appears to me that what is least forgiven in a man of any mark or likelihood, is want of that article blackguardly called pluck. All the fine qualities of genius cannot make amends for it. We are told the genius of poets, especially, is irreconcilable with this species of grenadier accomplishment. If so, quel chien de genre!
“September 10.—Gourgaud’s wrath has burst forth in a very distant clap of thunder, in which he accuses me of contriving, with the Ministry, to slander his rag of a reputation. He be d——d for a fool, to make his case worse by stirring. I shall only revenge myself by publishing the whole extracts I made from the records of the Colonial Office, in which he will find enough to make him bite his nails.
“September 17.—Received from James Ballantyne the proofs of my Reply, with some
cautious balaam from mine honest friend, alarmed by a Highland colonel, who had described
Gourgaud as a mauvais
garçon, famous fencer, marksman, and so forth. I wrote, in
answer, which is true, that I hoped all my friends would trust to my acting with proper
caution and advice; but that if I were capable, in a moment of weakness, of doing any thing
short of what my honour demanded, I
| GENERAL GOURGAUD. | 63 |
“Sir, I observed in the London papers which I received yesterday, a letter from General Gourgaud, which I beg you will have the goodness to reprint, with this communication and the papers accompanying it.
“It appears, that the General is greatly displeased, because, availing myself of formal official documents, I have represented him, in my Life of Buonaparte, as communicating to the British Government and the representatives of others of the Allied Powers, certain statements in matter, which he seems at present desirous to deny or disavow, though in what degree, or to what extent, he has not explicitly stated.
“Upon these grounds, for I can discover no other,
General Gourgaud has been pleased to
charge me, in the most intemperate terms, as the agent of a plot, contrived by
the late British Ministers, to slander and dishonour him. I will not attempt to
imitate the General either in his eloquence or his invective, but confine
myself to the simple fact, that his accusation against me is as void of truth
as it is of plausibility. I undertook, and carried on, the task of writing the
Life of Napoleon Buonaparte, without the least
intercourse
| 64 | LIFE OF SIR WALTER SCOTT. |
“The papers relating to General Gourgaud and his communications were not pointed out to me by any one. They occurred, in the course of my researches, like other pieces of information, and were of too serious and important a character, verified as they were, to be omitted in the history. The idea that, dated and authenticated as they are, they could have been false documents, framed to mislead future historians, seems as absurd, as it is positively false that they were fabricated on any understanding with me, who had not at the time of their date the slightest knowledge of their existence.
“To me, evidence, ex
facie the most unquestionable, bore, that General Gourgaud had attested certain facts of
importance to different persons, at different times and places; and it did not,
I own, occur to me that what he is stated to have made the subject of grave
assertion and attestation, could or ought to be received as matter of doubt,
because it rested only on a verbal communication made before responsible
witnesses, and was not concluded by any formal signature of the party. I have
been
| GENERAL GOURGAUD—SEPT. 1827. | 65 |
“At the same time, in availing myself of these documents, I felt it a duty to confine myself entirely to those particulars which concerned the history of Napoleon, his person and his situation at St. Helena; omitting all subordinate matters in which General Gourgaud, in his communications with our Ministers and others, referred to transactions of a more private character, personal to himself and other gentlemen residing at St. Helena. I shall observe the same degree of restraint as far as possible, out of the sincere respect I entertain for the honour and fidelity of General Gourgaud’s companions in exile, who might justly complain of me for reviving the memory of petty altercations; but out of no deference to General Gourgaud, to whom I owe none. The line which General Gourgaud has adopted, obliges me now, in respect to my own character, to lay the full evidence before the public—subject only to the above restriction—that it may appear how far it bears out the account given of those transactions in my History of Napoleon. I should have been equally willing to have communicated my authorities to General Gourgaud in private, had he made such a request, according to the ordinary courtesies of society.
“I trust that, upon reference to the Life of Napoleon, I shall be
found to have used the information these documents afforded with becoming
respect to private feelings, and, at the same time, with the courage and
candour due to the truth of history. If I were capable of failing in either
respect, I should despise myself as much, if possible, as I do the resentment
of General Gourgaud. The
historian’s task of exculpation is of course ended, when he has published
authorities of apparent authenticity. If General Gourgaud
shall undertake to prove that the subjoined documents are false and forged,
| 66 | LIFE OF SIR WALTER SCOTT. |
“There is indeed another course. General Gourgaud
may represent the whole of his communications as a trick played off upon the
English Ministers, in order to induce them to grant his personal liberty. But I
cannot imitate the General’s disregard of common civility so far as to
suppose him capable of a total departure from veracity, when giving evidence
upon his word of honour. In representing the Ex-Emperor’s health as good,
his finances as ample, his means of escape as easy and frequent, while he knew
his condition to be the reverse in every particular, General Gourgaud must have been sensible, that
the deceptive views thus impressed on the British Ministers must have had the
natural effect of adding to the rigours of his patron’s confinement.
Napoleon, it must be recollected,
would receive the visits of no English physician in whom Sir Hudson Lowe seemed to repose confidence,
and he shunned, as much as possible, all intercourse with the British. Whom,
therefore, were Sir Hudson Lowe and the British Ministers
to believe concerning the real state of his health and circumstances, if they
were to refuse credit to his own aide-decamp, an officer of distinction, whom
no one could suppose guilty of slandering his master for the purpose of
obtaining a straight passage to England for himself, instead of being subjected
to the inconvenience of going round by the Cape of Good Hope? And again, when
General Gourgaud, having arrived in London, and the
purpose of his supposed deception being fully attained, continued to represent
Napoleon as feigning poverty whilst in affluence,
affecting illness whilst in health, and possessing ready means of escape whilst
he was com-
| GENERAL GOURGAUD—SEPT. 1827. | 67 |
“It is no concern of mine, however, how the actual truth of the fact stands. It is sufficient to me to have shown, that I have not laid to General Gourgaud’s charge a single expression for which I had not the most indubitable authority. If I have been guilty of over credulity in attaching more weight to General Gourgaud’s evidence than it deserves, I am well taught not to repeat the error, and the world, too, may profit by the lesson. I am, Sir, your humble servant,
To this letter Gourgaud made a fiery rejoinder; but Scott declined to prolong the paper war, simply stating in Ballantyne’s print that “while leaving the question to the decision of the British public, he should have as little hesitation in referring it to the French nation, provided the documents he had produced were allowed to be printed in the French newspapers, from which hitherto they had been excluded.” And he would indeed have been idle had he said more than this, for his cause had been taken up on the instant by every English Journal, of whatever politics, and The Times thus summed up its very effective demolition of his antagonist:—
“Sir Walter
Scott did that which would have occurred to every honest man, whose
fair-dealing had violent imputations cast upon
| 68 | LIFE OF SIR WALTER SCOTT. |
Sir Walter’s family were, of course, relieved from
considerable anxiety, when the newspapers ceased to give paragraphs about General Gourgaud; and the blowing over of this alarm was
particularly acceptable to his eldest daughter, who
had to turn southwards about the beginning of October. He himself certainly cared little or
nothing about that (or any similar) affair; and if it had any effect at all upon his
spirits, they were pleasurably excited and stimulated. He possessed a pair of pistols taken
from Napoleon’s carriage at Waterloo, and
presented to him, I believe, by the late Honourable Colonel James Stanhope, and he said he
designed to make use of them, in case the controversy should end in a rencounter, and his
friend Clerk should think as well as he did of their
fabric. But this was probably a jest. I may observe that I once saw Sir
Walter shoot at a mark with pistols, and he acquitted himself well; so
| BLYTHSWOOD—COREHOUSE. | 69 |
Before Gourgaud fell quite asleep, Sir Walter made an excursion to Edinburgh to meet his friends, Mrs MacLean Clephane and Lady Northampton, with whom he had some business to transact; and they, feeling, as all his intimate friends at this time did, that the kindliest thing they could do by him was to keep him as long as possible away from his desk, contrived to seduce him into escorting them as far as Greenock on their way to the Hebrides. He visited on his return his esteemed kinsman, Mr Campbell of Blythswood, in whose park he saw, with much interest, the Argyle Stone, marking the spot where the celebrated Earl was taken prisoner in 1685. He notes in his Diary, that “the Highland drovers are still apt to break Blythswood’s fences to see this Stone;” and then records the capital turtle, &c. of his friend’s entertainment, and some good stories told at table, especially this: “Prayer of the minister of the Cumbrays, two miserable islands in the mouth of the Clyde: ‘O Lord, bless and be gracious to the Greater and the Lesser Cumbrays, and in thy mercy do not forget the adjacent islands of Great Britain and Ireland.’ This is nos poma natamus with a vengeance.”
Another halt was at the noble seat of his early friend Cranstoun, by the Falls of the Clyde. He
says:—“Cranstoun and I walked before dinner. I never
saw the Great Fall of Corra Linn from this side before, and I think it the best point
perhaps; at all events, it is not that from which it is usually seen; so Lord
Corehouse has the sight, and escapes the locusts. This is a superb
place. Cranstoun has as much feeling about improvement as other
things. Like all new improvers, he is at
| 70 | LIFE OF SIR WALTER SCOTT. |
On returning from this trip, Scott found an invitation from Lord and Lady Ravensworth to meet the Duke of Wellington at their castle near Durham. The Duke was then making a progress in the north of England, to which additional importance was given by the uncertain state of political arrangements;—the chance of Lord Goderich’s being able to maintain himself as Canning’s successor seeming very precarious—and the opinion that his Grace must soon be called to a higher station than that of Commander of the Forces, which he had accepted under the new Premier, gaining ground every day. Sir Walter, who felt for the Great Captain the pure and exalted devotion that might have been expected from some honoured soldier of his banners, accepted this invitation, and witnessed a scene of enthusiasm with which its principal object could hardly have been more gratified than he was.
Diary.—“October 1.—I set about work
for two hours, and finished three pages; then walked for two hours; then home, adjusted
sheriff processes, and cleared the table. I am to set off to-morrow for Ravensworth Castle,
to meet the Duke of Wellington; a great let-off, I
suppose. Yet I would almost rather stay, and see two days more of Lockhart and my daughter, who will be off before my
| RAVENSWORTH—DURHAM. | 71 |
“October 2.—Set out in the morning at seven, and reached Kelso by a little past ten with my own horses. Then took the Wellington coach to carry me to Wellington—smart that. Nobody inside but an old lady, who proved a toy-woman in Edinburgh; her head furnished with as substantial ware as her shop, but a good soul, I’se warrant her. Heard all her debates with her landlord about a new door to the cellar and the propriety of paying rent on the 15th or 25th of May. Landlords and tenants will have different opinions on that subject. We dined at Wooler, where an obstreperous horse retarded us for an hour at least, to the great alarm of my friend the toy-woman. N. B. She would have made a good feather-bed if the carriage had happened to fall, and her undermost. The heavy roads had retarded us near an hour more, so that I hesitated to go to Ravensworth so late; but my goodwoman’s tales of dirty sheets, and certain recollections of a Newcastle inn, induced me to go on. When I arrived, the family had just retired. Lord Ravensworth and Mr Liddell came down, however, and both received me as kindly as possible.
“October 3.—Rose about eight or later.
My morals begin to be corrupted by travel and fine company. Went to Durham with
Lord Ravensworth betwixt one and two. Found the
gentlemen of Durham county and town assembled to receive the Duke of Wellington. I saw several old friends, and with difficulty
suited names to faces, and faces to names. There were Dr
Philpotts, Dr Gilly, and his
wife, and a world of acquaintance,—among others, Sir Thomas
Lawrence; whom I asked to
| 72 | LIFE OF SIR WALTER SCOTT. |
‘Lords and Dukes, and noble Princes, All the pride and flower of Spain.’ |
* Admiral Sir John Beresford had some few years before this commanded on the Leith station when Sir Walter and he saw a great deal of each other—“and merry men were they.” |
| DURHAM CASTLE—OCT. 3, 1827. | 73 |
In writing to me next day, Sir Walter says, “The dinner was one of the finest things I ever saw; it was in the old Castle Hall, untouched, for aught I know, since Anthony Beck feasted Edward Longshanks on his way to invade Scotland.* The moon streamed through the high latticed windows as if she had been curious to see what was going on.” I was also favoured with a letter on the subject from Dr Philpotts (now Bishop of Exeter), who said, “I wish you had witnessed this very striking scene. I never saw curiosity and enthusiasm so highly excited, and I may add, as to a great part of the company, so nearly balanced. Sometimes I doubted whether the hero or the poet was fixing most attention—the latter, I need hardly tell you, appeared unconscious that he was regarded differently from the others about him, until the good Bishop rose and proposed his health.” Another friend, the Honourable Henry Liddell, enables me to give the words (“ipsissima verba”) of Sir Walter in acknowledging this toast. He says:—“The manner in which Bishop Van Mildert proceeded on this occasion will never be forgotten by those who know how to appreciate scholarship without pedantry, and dignity without ostentation. Sir Walter had been observed throughout the day with extraordinary interest I should
* The warlike Bishop Beck accompanied Edward I. in his Scotch expedition, and if we may believe Blind Harry, very narrowly missed having the honour to die by the hand of Wallace in a skirmish on the street of Glasgow. |
| 74 | LIFE OF SIR WALTER SCOTT. |
The Diary continues—
“Mrs Van Mildert held a sort of drawing-room after we rose from table, at which a great many ladies attended. After this we went to the Assembly-rooms, which were crowded with company. Here I saw some very pretty girls dancing merrily that old-fashioned thing called a country-dance, which Old England has now thrown aside, as she would do her creed, if there were some foreign frippery offered instead. We got away after midnight, a large party, and reached Ravensworth Castle—Duke of Wellington, Lord Londonderry, and about twenty besides about half-past one. Soda water, and to bed by two.
“October 4.—Slept till nigh
ten—fatigued by our toils of yesterday, and the unwonted late hours. Still too early
for this Castle of Indolence, for I found few of last night’s party yet
appearing. I had an opportunity of some talk with the Duke. He does not consider Foy’s
book as written by himself, but as a thing got up perhaps
| RAVENSWORTH CASTLE—OCT. 4, 1827. | 75 |
“What is called great society, of which I have seen a good
deal in my day, is now amusing to me, because from age and indifference I have lost the
habit of considering myself as a part of it, and have only the feelings of looking on
as a spectator of the scene, who can neither play his part well nor ill, instead of
being one of the dramatis personæ; so,
careless what is thought of
| 76 | LIFE OF SIR WALTER SCOTT. |
“Our party went to-day to Sunderland, when the Duke was brilliantly received by an immense population, chiefly of seamen. The difficulty of getting into the rooms was dreadful—an ebbing and flowing of the crowd, which nearly took me off my legs. The entertainment was handsome; about two hundred dined, and appeared most hearty in the cause which had convened them—some indeed so much so, that, finding themselves so far on the way to perfect happiness, they e’en would go on. After the dinner-party broke up, there was a ball, numerously attended, where there was a prodigious anxiety discovered for shaking of hands. The Duke had enough of it, and I came in for my share; for, though as jackall to the lion, I got some part in whatever was going. We got home about half-past two in the morning, sufficiently tired.”
Some months afterwards, Sir Cuthbert Sharp, who had been particularly kind and attentive to Scott when at Sunderland, happened, in writing to him on some matter of business, to say he hoped he had not forgotten his friends in that quarter. Sir Walter’s answer to Sir Cuthbert (who had been introduced to him by his old and dear friend Mr Surtees of Mainsforth) begins thus,—
|
“Forget thee? No! my worthy fere!
Forget blithe mirth and gallant cheer!
Death sooner stretch me on my bier!
Forget thee? No.
|
|
“Forget the universal shout
When ‘canny Sunderland’ spoke out—
A truth which knaves affect to doubt—
Forget thee? No.
|
| SUNDERLAND—OCT. 4, 1827. | 77 |
|
“Forget you? No—though now-a-day
I’ve heard your knowing people say,
Disown the debt you cannot pay,
You’ll find it far the thriftiest way—
But I?—O no.
|
|
‘Forget your kindness found for all room,
In what, though large, seem’d still a small room,
Forget my Surtees in a ball-room—
Forget you? No.
|
|
“Forget your sprightly dumpty-diddles,
And beauty tripping to the fiddles,
Forget my lovely friends the Liddells—
Forget you? No.
|
“So much for oblivion, my dear Sir C., and now, having dismounted from my Pegasus, who is rather spavined, I charge a-foot, like an old dragoon as I am,” &c. &c.
“Diary.—October 5—A quiet day at Ravensworth Castle, giggling and making giggle among the kind and frankhearted young people. The Castle is modern, excepting always two towers of great antiquity. Lord R. manages his woods admirably well. In the evening plenty of fine music, with heart as well as voice and instrument. Much of this was the spontaneous effusions of Mrs Arkwright (a daughter of Stephen Kemble), who has set Hohenlinden, and other pieces of poetry to music of a highly-gifted character. The Miss Liddells and Mrs Barrington sang ‘The Campbells are coming,’ in a tone that might have waked the dead.
“October 6.—Left Ravensworth this morning, and travelled as
far as Whittingham with Marquis of Lothian. Arrived
at Alnwick to dinner, where I was very kindly
| 78 | LIFE OF SIR WALTER SCOTT. |
“October 7.—This morning went to church, and heard an excellent sermon from the Bishop of Worcester; he has great dignity of manner, and his accent and delivery are forcible. Drove out with the Duke in a phaeton, and saw part of the park, which is a fine one lying along the Alne. But it has been ill planted. It was laid out by the celebrated Brown, who substituted clumps of birch and Scottish firs for the beautiful oaks and copse which grow no where so freely as in Northumberland. To complete this the late Duke did not thin, so the wood is in a poor state. All that the Duke cuts down is so much waste, for the people will not buy it where coals are so cheap. Had they been oak-coppice, the bark would have fetched its value; had they been grown oaks, the sea-ports would have found a market. Had they been larch, the country demands for ruder purposes would have been unanswerable. The
* Dr Cornwall. |
| ALNWICK CASTLE—OCT. 1827. | 79 |
“We came by the remains of an old Carmelite Monastery, which form a very fine object in the park. It was finished by De Vesci. The gateway of Alnwick Abbey, also a fine specimen, is standing about a mile distant. The trees are much finer on the left side of the Alne, where they have been let alone by the capability villain. Visited the enceinte of the Castle, and passed into the dungeon. There is also an armoury, but damp, and the arms in indifferent order. One odd petard-looking thing struck me.—Mem. to consult Grose. I had the honour to sit in Hotspur’s seat, and to see the Bloody Gap, a place where the external wall must have been breached. The Duchess gave me a book of etchings of the antiquities of Alnwick and Wark worth from her own drawings. I had half a mind to stay to see Warkworth, but Anne is alone. We had prayers in the evening read by the Archdeacon.”*
On the 8th Sir Walter reached Abbotsford, and forthwith resumed his Grandfather’s Tales, which he
* Probably Mr Archdeacon Singleton. |
| 80 | LIFE OF SIR WALTER SCOTT. |
‘For treason, d’ye see, Was to them a dish of tea, And murder bread and butter.’” |
Such was his life in autumn 1827. Before I leave the period, I must
note how greatly I admired the manner in which all his dependents appeared to have met the
reverse of his fortunes—a reverse which inferred very considerable alteration in the
circumstances of every one of them. The butler,
instead of being the easy chief of a large establishment, was now doing half the work of
the house, at probably half his former wages. Old
Peter, who had been for five-and-twenty years a dignified coachman, was now
ploughman in ordinary, only putting his horses to the carriage upon high and rare
occasions; and so on with all the rest that remained of the ancient train. And all, to my
view, seemed happier than they had ever done before. Their good conduct had given every one
of them a new elevation in his own mind—and yet their demeanour had gained, in place of
losing, in simple humility of observance. The great loss was that of William Laidlaw, for whom (the estate being all but a
fragment in the hands of the trustees and their agent) there was now no occupation here.
The
| AUTUMN, 1827. | 81 |
All this warm and respectful solicitude must have had a preciously
soothing influence on the mind of Scott, who may be said
to have lived upon love. No man cared less about popular admiration and applause; but for
the least chill on the affection of any near and dear to him he had the sensitiveness of a
maiden. I cannot forget, in particular, how his eyes sparkled when he first pointed out to
me Peter Mathieson guiding the plough on the haugh:
“Egad,” said he, “auld Pepe (this was the children’s name for their good
friend)—auld Pepe’s whistling at his
darg. The honest fellow said, a yoking in a deep field would do baith him and the
blackies good. If things get round with me, easy shall be
Pepe’s cushion.” In general, during that
autumn, I thought Sir Walter enjoyed much his usual spirits; and
often, no doubt, he did so. His Diary shows (what perhaps many of his intimates doubted
during his lifetime) that, in spite of the dignified equanimity which characterised all his
conversation with mankind, he had his full share of the delicate sensibilities, the
mysterious ups and downs, the wayward melancholy, and fantastic sunbeams of the poetical
temperament. It is only with imaginative minds, in truth, that sorrows of the spirit are
enduring. Those he had encountered were veiled from the eye of the world, but they lasted
with his life. What a picture have we in his entry about the Runic letters he had
| 82 | LIFE OF SIR WALTER SCOTT. |
There is one entry of that Diary for the period we are leaving, which paints the man in his tenderness, his fortitude, and his happy wisdom:—“September 24.—Worked in the morning as usual, and sent off the proofs and copy. Something of the black dog still hanging about me; but I will shake him off. I generally affect good spirits in company of my family, whether I am enjoying them or not. It is too severe to sadden the harmless mirth of others by suffering your own causeless melancholy to be seen; and this species of exertion is, like virtue, its own reward; for the good spirits, which are at first simulated, become at length real.”
The first series of Chronicles of the Canongate (which title supplanted that of “The Canongate Miscellany, or Traditions of the
Sanctuary”)—was published early in the winter. The contents were,
the Highland Widow, the Two Drovers, and the Surgeon’s Daughter—all in their styles excellent,
except that the Indian part of the last does not well harmonize with the rest; and certain
preliminary chapters which were generally considered as still better than the stories they
introduce. The portraiture of Mrs Murray Keith,
under the name of Mrs Bethune Baliol, and that of
Chrystal Croftangry throughout, appear to me
unsurpassed in Scott’s writings. In the former, I
am assured he has mixed up various features of his own beloved mother; and in the latter,
there can be no doubt that a good deal was taken from nobody but himself. In fact, the
choice of the hero’s residence, the original title of the book, and a world
| CHRYSTAL CROFTANGRY. | 83 |
| 84 | LIFE OF SIR WALTER SCOTT. |
“October 31.—Just as I was merrily cutting away among my trees, arrives Mr Gibson with a very melancholy look, and indeed the news he brought was shocking enough. It seems Mr Abud, the same who formerly was disposed to disturb me in London, has given positive orders to take out diligence against me for his debt. This breaks all the measures we had resolved on, and prevents the dividend from taking place, by which many poor persons will be great sufferers. For me the alternative will be more painful to my feelings than prejudicial to my interests. To submit to a sequestration, and allow the creditors to take what they can get, will be the inevitable consequence. This will cut short my labour by several years, which I might spend, and spend in vain, in endeavouring to meet their demands. We shall know more on Saturday, and not sooner. I went to Bowhill with Sir Adam Ferguson to dinner, and maintained as good a countenance in the midst of my perplexities as a man need desire. It is not bravado; I feel firm and resolute.
“November 1.—I waked in the night and
lay two hours in feverish meditation. This is a tribute to natural feeling. But the air
of a fine frosty morning gave me some elasticity of spirit. It is strange that about a
week ago I was more dispirited for nothing at all, than I am now for perplexities which
set at defiance my conjectures concerning their issue. I suppose that I, the Chronicler
of the Canongate, will have to take up my residence in the Sanctuary, unless I prefer
the more airy residence of the Calton Jail, or a trip to the Isle of Man. It is to no
purpose being angry with Abud or
Ahab, or whatever name he delights in. He is seeking his own,
and thinks by these harsh measures to render his road to it more speedy.—Sir Adam Ferguson left
| CHRYSTAL CROFTANGRY. | 85 |
“November 2.—I was a little bilious this night no wonder. Had sundry letters without any power of giving my mind to answer them—one about Gourgaud with his nonsense. I shall not trouble my head more on that score. Well, it is a hard knock on the elbow; I knew I had a life of labour before me, but I was resolved to work steadily; now they have treated me like a recusant turnspit, and put in a red-hot cinder into the wheel alongst with me. But of what use is philosophy—and I have always pretended to a little of a practical character—if it cannot teach us to do or suffer? The day is glorious, yet I have little will to enjoy it; yet, were a twelvemonth over, I should perhaps smile at what makes me now very serious. Smile!—No—that can never be. My present feelings cannot be recollected with cheerfulness; but I may drop a tear of gratitude.
“November 3.—Slept ill, and lay one hour longer than usual in the morning. I gained an hour’s quiet by it, that is much. I feel a little shaken at the result of to-day’s post. I am not able to go out. My poor workers wonder that I pass them without a word. I can imagine no alternative but the Sanctuary or the Isle of Man. Both shocking enough. But in Edinburgh I am always on the scene of action, free from uncertainty, and near my poor daughter; so I think I shall prefer it, and thus I rest in unrest. But I will not let this unman me. Our hope, heavenly and earthly, is poorly anchored, if the cable parts upon the stream. I believe in God, who can change evil into good; and I am confident that what befalls us is always ultimately for the best.
| 86 | LIFE OF SIR WALTER SCOTT. |
“November 4.—Put my papers in some order, and prepared for the journey. It is in the style of the Emperors of Abyssinia, who proclaim—Cut down the Kantuffa in the four quarters of the world, for I know not where I am going. Yet, were it not for poor Anne’s doleful looks, I would feel firm as a piece of granite. Even the poor dogs seem to fawn on me with anxious meaning, as if there were something going on they could not comprehend. They probably notice the packing of the clothes, and other symptoms of a journey.
“Set off at twelve, firmly resolved in body and mind. Dined at Fushie Bridge. Ah! good Mrs Wilson, you know not you are like to lose an old customer!*
“But when I arrived in Edinburgh at my faithful friend, Mr Gibson’s—lo! the scene had again changed, and a new hare is started,” &c. &c.
The “new hare” was this. It transpired in the very nick of time that a suspicion of usury attached to these Israelites without guile, in a transaction with Hurst and Robinson, as to one or more of the bills for which the house of Ballantyne had become responsible. This suspicion, upon investigation, assumed a shape sufficiently tangible to justify Ballantyne’s trustees in carrying the point before the Court of Session; but they failed to establish their allegation. The amount was then settled—but how and in what manner was long unknown to Scott. Sir William Forbes, whose banking-house was one of Messrs Ballantyne’s chief creditors, crowned his
* Mrs Wilson, landlady of the inn at Fushie, one stage from Edinburgh,—an old dame of some humour, with whom Sir Walter always had a friendly colloquy in passing. I believe the charm was, that she had passed her childhood among the Gipsies of the Border. But her fiery Radicalism latterly was another source of high merriment. |
| CHRONICLES OF THE CANONGATE PUBLISHED. | 87 |
I ought not to omit that as soon as Sir Walter’s eldest son heard of the Abud business, he left Ireland for Edinburgh; but before he reached his father the alarm had blown over.
This vision of the real Canongate has drawn me away from the Chronicles
of Mr Croftangry. The scenery of his patrimonial
inheritance was sketched from that of Carmichael, the ancient and now deserted mansion of
the noble family of Hyndford; but for his strongly Scottish feelings about parting with his
land, and stern efforts to suppress them, the author had not to
go so far a-field. Christie Steele’s brief
character of Croftangry’s ancestry too, appears
to suit well all that we have on record concerning his own more immediate progenitors of
the stubborn race of Raeburn: “They werena ill to the poor folk, sir, and that is
aye something; they were just decent bien bodies. Ony poor creature that had face to
beg got an awmous, and welcome; they that were shamefaced gaed by, and twice as
welcome. But they keepit an honest walk before God and man, the Croftangrys, and as I
said before, if they did little good, they did as little ill. They lifted their rents
and
| 88 | LIFE OF SIR WALTER SCOTT. |
These Chronicles were not received with exceeding favour at the time;
and Sir Walter was a good deal discouraged. Indeed he
seems to have been with some difficulty persuaded by Cadell and Ballantyne, that it would
not do for him to “lie fallow” as a novelist; and then, when he in compliance
with their entreaties began a Second Canongate Series, they were both disappointed with his
MS., and told him their opinions so plainly, that his good-nature was sharply tried. The
Tales which they disapproved of, were those of “My Aunt Margaret’s Mirror,” and “The Laird’s Jock;” he
consented to lay them aside, and began St Valentine’s
| NOVEMBER, 1827. | 89 |
Diary—“Edinburgh, November 6.—Wrought upon an introduction to the notices which have been recovered of George Bannatyne, author or rather transcriber of the famous Repository of Scottish Poetry, generally known by the name of the Bannatyne MS. They are very jejune these same notices—a mere record of matters of business, putting forth and calling in sums of money, and such like. Yet it is a satisfaction to know that this great benefactor to the literature of Scotland had a prosperous life, and enjoyed the pleasures of domestic society, and, in a time peculiarly perilous, lived unmolested and died in quiet.”
He had taken, for that winter, the house No. 6, Shandwick Place, which
he occupied by the month, during the remainder of his servitude as a Clerk of Session. Very
near this house, he was told a few days after he took possession, dwelt the aged mother of his first
love—the lady of the Runic characters—and he
expressed to his friend Mrs Skene a wish that she
should carry him to renew an acquaintance which seems to have been interrupted from the
period of his youthful romance. Mrs Skene complied with his desire,
and she tells me that a very painful scene ensued, adding, “I think it highly
probable that it was on re-
| 90 | LIFE OF SIR WALTER SCOTT. |
“November 7.—Began to settle myself this morning, after the hurry of mind and even of body which I have lately undergone.—I went to make a visit, and fairly softened myself, like an old fool, with recalling old stories, till I was fit for nothing but shedding tears and repeating verses for the whole night. This is sad work. The very grave gives up its dead, and time rolls back thirty years to add to my perplexities. I don’t care. I begin to grow case-hardened, and, like a stag turning at bay, my naturally good temper grows fierce and dangerous. Yet what a romance to tell,—and told, I fear, it will one day be. And then my three years of dreaming, and my two years of wakening, will be chronicled, doubtless. But the dead will feel no pain.
“November 10.—Wrote out my task and little more. At twelve o’clock I went again to poor Lady —— to talk over old stories. I am not clear that it is a right or healthful indulgence to be ripping up old sores, but it seems to give her deep-rooted sorrow words, and that is a mental bloodletting. To me these things are now matter of calm and solemn recollection, never to be forgotten, yet scarce to be remembered with pain. We go out to Saint Catherine’s to-day. I am glad of it, for I would not have these recollections haunt me, and society will put them out of my head.”
Sir Walter has this entry on reading the Gazette of the battle of
Navarino:—“November 14.—We have
| NOVEMBER, 1827. | 91 |
A few days afterwards he received a very agreeable piece of
intelligence. The King had not forgotten his promise
with respect to the poet’s second son; and Lord
Dudley, then Secretary of State for the Foreign Department, was a much
attached friend from early days—(he had been partly educated at Edinburgh under the roof of
Dugald Stewart)—his lordship had therefore been
very well disposed to comply with the royal recommendation. “November 30.—The great pleasure of a letter from Lord
Dudley, informing me that he has received his Majesty’s commands
to put down the name of my son Charles for the
first vacancy that shall occur in the Foreign Office, and at the same time to acquaint
me with his gracious intentions, which were signified in language the most gratifying
to me. This makes me really feel light and happy, and most grateful to the kind and
gracious sovereign who has always shown, I may say, so much friendship towards me.
Would to God the King’s errand might lie in the cadger’s
gait, that I might have some better way of showing my feelings than merely by
a letter of thanks, or this private memorandum of my gratitude. Public affairs look
awkward. The present Ministry are neither Whig nor
| 92 | LIFE OF SIR WALTER SCOTT. |
The settlement of Charles Scott
was rapidly followed by more than one fortunate incident in Sir
Walter’s literary and pecuniary history. The first Tales of a Grandfather appeared early in December, and
their reception was more rapturous than that of any one of his works since Ivanhoe. He had solved for the first time the
problem of narrating history, so as at once to excite and gratify the curiosity of youth,
and please and instruct the wisest of mature minds. The popularity of the book has grown
with every year that has since elapsed; it is equally prized in the library, the boudoir,
the schoolroom, and the nursery; it is adopted as the happiest of manuals, not only in
Scotland, but whereever the English tongue is spoken; nay, it is to be seen in the hands of
old and young all over the civilized world, and has, I have little doubt, extended the
know-
| TALES OF A GRANDFATHER—DEC. 1827. | 93 |
The question as to the property of the Life of Napoleon and Woodstock having now been settled by the arbiter (Lord Newton) in favour of the author, the relative affairs of Sir Walter and the creditors of Constable were so simplified, that the trustee on that sequestrated estate resolved to bring into the market, with the concurrence of Ballantyne’s trustees, and without further delay, a variety of very valuable copyrights. This important sale comprised Scott’s novels from Waverley to Quentin Durward inclusive, besides a majority of the shares of the Poetical Works.
Mr Cadell’s family and private friends were
extremely desirous that he should purchase part at least of these copyrights; and Sir Walter’s were not less so that he should seize this
last opportunity of recovering a share in the prime fruits of his genius. The relations by
this time established between him and Cadell were those of strict
confidence and kindness; and both saw well that the property would be comparatively lost,
were it not secured, that thenceforth the whole should be managed as one unbroken concern.
It was in the success of an uniform edition of the Waverley novels, with prefaces and notes by the
author, that both anticipated the means of finally extinguishing the debt of Ballantyne and Co.; and, after some demur, the trustees of
that house’s creditors were wise enough to adopt their views. The
| 94 | LIFE OF SIR WALTER SCOTT. |
The Diary says:—“December 17.—Sent off the new beginning of the Chronicles to Ballantyne. I hate cancels, they are a double labour. Mr Cowan, trustee for Constable’s creditors, called in the morning by appointment, and we talked about the sale of the copyrights of Waverley, &c. It is to be hoped the high upset price fixed (L.5000) will
‘Fright the fuds Of the pock-puds.’ |
| DECEMBER, 1827. | 95 |
“December 20.—Anent the copyrights—the pock-puds were not frightened by our high price. They came on briskly, four or five bidders abreast, and went on till the lot was knocked down to Cadell at L.8500; a very large sum certainly, yet he has been offered profit on it already. The activity of the contest serves to show the value of the property. On the whole I am greatly pleased with the acquisition.”
Well might the “pockpuddings”—the English booksellers—rue their timidity on this day; but it was the most lucky one that ever came for Sir Walter Scott’s creditors. A dividend of six shillings in the pound was paid at this Christmas on their whole claims. The result of their high-hearted debtor’s exertions, between January 1826 and January 1828, was in all very nearly L.40,000. No literary biographer, in all likelihood, will ever have such another fact to record. The creditors unanimously passed a vote of thanks for the indefatigable industry which had achieved so much for their behoof.
On returning to Abbotsford at Christmas, after completing these
transactions, he says in his Diary:—“My reflections in entering my own gate to-day
were of a very different and more pleasing cast, than those with which I left this
place about six weeks ago. I was then in doubt whether I should fly my country, or
become avowedly bankrupt, and surrender up my library and household furniture, with the
liferent of my estate, to sale. A man of the world will say I had better done so. No
doubt, had I taken this course at once, I might have employed the money I have made
since the insolvency of Constable and Robinson’s houses in compounding my debts. But I
could not have slept sound as I now can, under the comfortable impression of receiving
the thanks of my creditors, and the conscious feeling of
| 96 | LIFE OF SIR WALTER SCOTT. |
And again, on the 31st December, he says:—
“Looking back to the conclusion of 1826, I observe that the last year ended in trouble and sickness, with pressures for the present and gloomy prospects for the future. The sense of a great privation so lately sustained, together with the very doubtful and clouded nature of my private affairs, pressed hard upon my mind. I am now restored in constitution; and though I am still on troubled waters, yet I am rowing with the tide, and less than the continuation of my exertions of 1827 may, with God’s blessing, carry me successfully through 1828, when we may gain a more open sea, if not exactly a safe port. Above all, my children are well. Sophia’s situation excites some natural anxiety; but it is only the accomplishment of the burden imposed on her sex. Walter is happy in the view of his majority, on which matter we have favourable hopes from the Horse-Guards. Anne is well and happy. Charles’s entry on life under the highest patronage, and in a line for which, I hope, he is qualified, is about to take place presently.
“For all these great blessings it becomes me well to be thankful to God, who, in his good time and good pleasure, sends us good as well as evil.”
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