“I wish I were able to pay in better value the debt which I have contracted with your Lordship, by being the unconscious means of depriving you of Mr Greenshields sooner than had been meant. It is a complicated obligation, since I owe a much greater debt to Greenshields for depriving him of an invaluable op-

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portunity of receiving the advice, and profiting by the opinions of one whose taste for the arts is strong by nature, and has been so highly cultivated. If it were not that he may again have an opportunity to make up for that which he has lost, I would call the loss irreparable.

“I may speak with more confidence of the artist than of the figure. Mr Greenshields seems to me to be one of those remarkable men who must be distinguished in one way or other. He showed during my conversation with him sound sense on all subjects, and considerable information on such as occupied his mind. His habits, I understand, are perfectly steady and regular. His manners are modest and plain, without being clownish or rude, and he has all the good-breeding which nature can teach. Above all, I had occasion to remark that he had a generous and manly disposition above feeling little slights, or acts of illiberality. Having to mention some very reasonable request of his which had been refused by an individual, he immediately, as if to obliterate the unfavourable impression, hastened to mention

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several previous instances of kindness which the same individual had shown to him. His mind seems to be too much bent upon fame to have room for love of money, and his passion for the arts seems to be unfeignedly sincere.

“Like all heaven-born geniuses, he is ignorant of the rules which have been adopted by artists before him, and has never seen the chefs-d’œuvre of classical time. Such men having done so much without education, are sometimes apt either to despise it, or to feel so much mortification at seeing how far short their efforts fall of excellence, that they resign their art in despair. I do think and hope, however, that the sanguine and the modest are so well mixed in this man’s temper, that he will study the best models with the hope of improvement, and will be bold, as Spencer says, without being too bold. But opportunity of such study is wanting, and that can only be had in London. To London, therefore, he should be sent if possible. In addition to the above, I must remark, that Mr G. is not master of the art of tempering his clay, and other mechanical matters relating to his profession. These he should apply to without delay, and it would probably be best, having little time to lose, that he should for a while lay the chisel aside, and employ himself in making models almost exclusively. The transference of the figure from the clay to the marble is, I am informed by Chantrey, a mere mechanical art, excepting that some finishing touches are required. Now it follows that

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Greenshields may model, I dare say, six figures while he could only cut one in stone, and in the former practice must make a proportional progress in the principles of his art. The knowledge of his art is only to be gained in the studio of some sculptor of eminence. The task which Mr G. is full of at present seems to be chosen on a false principle, chiefly adopted from a want of acquaintance with the genuine and proper object of art. The public of Edinburgh have been deservedly amused and delighted with two figures in the character of Tam O’Shanter and his drunken companion Souter Johnny. The figures were much and justly applauded, and the exhibition being of a kind adapted to every taste, is daily filled. I rather think it is the success of this piece by a man much in his own circumstances, which has inclined Mr Greenshields to propose cutting a group of grotesque figures from the Beggars’ Cantata of the same poet. Now, in the first place, I suspect six figures will form too many for a sculptor to group to advantage. But besides, I deprecate the attempt at such a subject. I do not consider caricature as a proper style for sculpture at all. We have Pan and his Satyrs in ancient sculpture, but the place of these characters in the classic mythology gives them a certain degree of dignity. Besides this, “the gambol has been shown.” Mr Thom has produced a group of this particular kind, and instead of comparing what Greenshields might do in this way with higher models, the public would certainly regard him as the rival of Mr Thom, and give Mr Thom the preference, on the same principle that the Spaniard says when one man walks first, all the rest must be his followers. At the same time I highly approved of one figure in the group, I mean that of Burns himself. Burns (taking his more contemplative moments) would indeed be a noble study,

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and I am convinced Mr G. would do it nobly as, for example, when Coila describes him as gazing on a snowstorm,—

‘I saw grim Nature’s visage hoar, Strike thy young eye.’

I suppose it possible to represent rocks with icicles in sculpture.

“Upon the moment I did not like to mention to Mr G. my objections against a scheme which was obviously a favourite one, but I felt as I did when my poor friend John Kemble threatened to play Falstaff. In short, the perdurable character of sculpture, the grimly and stern severity of its productions, their size too, and their consequence, confine the art to what is either dignified and noble, or beautiful and graceful: it is, I think, inapplicable to situations of broad humour. A painting of Teniers is very well it is of a moderate size, and only looked at when we choose; but a group of his drunken boors dancing in stone, as large as life, to a grinning fiddler at the bottom of a drawing-room would, I think, be soon found intolerable bad company.

“I think, therefore, since Mr Greenshields has a decided call to the higher and nobler department of his art, he should not be desirous of procuring immediate attention by attempting a less legitimate object. I desired Mr Lockhart of Milton to state to Mr G. what I felt on the above subject, and I repeat it to you, that, if I am so fortunate as to agree in opinion with your Lordship, you may exert your powerful influence on the occasion.

“I have only to add that I am quite willing to contribute my mite to put Mr Greenshields in the way of the best instruction, which seems to me the best thing which can be done for him. I think your Lordship will

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hardly claim another epistolary debt from me, since I have given it like a tether, which, Heaven knows, is no usual error of mine. I am always, with respect, my dear Lord, your Lordship’s most faithful and obedient servant,

“I have had your letter several days, and only answer just now, not, you may believe, from want of interest in the contents, but from the odd circumstance of being so much afflicted with chilblains in the fingers, that my pen scrambles every way but the right one. Assuredly I should receive the character of the most crabbed fellow from those modern sages who judge of a man from his handwriting. But as an old man becomes a child, I must expect, I suppose, measles and smallpox. I only wish I could get a fresh set of teeth. To tell you the truth, I feel the advance of age more than I like, though my general health is excellent; but I am not able to walk as I did, and I fear I could not now visit St Kevin’s Bed. This is a great affliction to one who has been so active as I have been, in spite of all disadvantages. I must now have a friendly arm, instead of relying on my own exertions; and it is sad to think I shall be worse before I am better. However, the mild weather may help me in some degree, and the worst is a quiet pony (I used to detest a quiet pony), or perhaps a garden-chair. All this does not prevent my sincere sympathy in the increase of happiness, which I hope Miss Fanny’s marriage will afford to herself, and you, and all who love her. I have not had the same opportunity to know her merits as those of my friends Mrs Butler and Mrs Fox; but I saw enough of her (being your sister) when at Dublin, to feel most sincerely interested in a young person whose exterior is so amiable.

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In Mr Wilson you describe the national character of John Bull, who is not the worst of the three nations, though he has not the quick feeling and rich humour of your countrymen, nor the shrewd sagacity, or the romantic spirit of thinking and adventuring which the Scotch often conceal under their apparent coldness, and which you have so well painted in the M’Leod of your Ennui. Depend upon it, I shall find Russell Square when I go to London, were I to have a voyage of discovery to make it out; and it will be Mr Wilson’s fault if we do not make an intimate acquaintance.

“I had the pleasure of receiving, last autumn, your American friend Miss Douglas, who seems a most ingenious person; and I hope I succeeded in making her happy during her short visit at Abbotsford; for I was compelled to leave her to pay suit and service at the Circuit. The mention of the Circuit brings me to the horrors which you have so well described, and which resemble nothing so much as a wild dream. Certainly I thought, like you, that the public alarm was but an exaggeration of vulgar rumour; but the tragedy is too true, and I look in vain for a remedy of the evils, in which it is easy to see this black and unnatural business has found its origin. The principal source certainly lies in the feelings of attachment which the Scotch have for their deceased friends. They are curious in the choice of their sepulchre, and a common shepherd is often, at whatever ruinous expense to his family, transported many miles to some favourite place of burial which has been occupied by his fathers. It follows, of course, that any interference with these remains is considered with most utter horror and indignation. To such of their superiors as they love from clanship or habits of dependance, they attach the same feeling. I experienced it when I had a great domestic loss; for I

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learned afterwards that the cemetery was guarded, out of good will, by the servants and dependants who had been attached to her during life; and were I to be laid beside my lost companion just now, I have no doubt it would be long before my humble friends would discontinue the same watch over my remains, and that it would incur mortal risk to approach them with the purpose of violation. This is a kind and virtuous principle, in which every one so far partakes, that, although an unprejudiced person would have no objection to the idea of his own remains undergoing dissection, if their being exposed to scientific research could be of the least service to humanity, yet we all shudder at the notion of any who had been dear to us, especially a wife or sister, being subjected to a scalpel among a gazing and unfeeling crowd of students. One would fight and die to prevent it. This current of feeling is encouraged by the law which, as distinguishing murderers and other atrocious criminals, orders that their bodies shall be given for public dissection. This makes it almost impossible to consign the bodies of those who die in the public hospitals to the same fate; for it would be inflicting on poverty the penalty which, wisely or unwisely, the law of the country has denounced against guilt of the highest degree; and it would assuredly deprive all who have a remaining spark of feeling or shame, of the benefit of those consolations of charity of which they are the best objects. If the prejudice be not very liberal, it is surely natural, and so deeply-seated, that many of the best feelings must be destroyed ere it can be eradicated. What then remains? The only chance I see is to permit importation from other countries. If a subject can be had in Paris for ten or twenty francs, it will surely pay the importer who brings it to Scotland. Something must be

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done, for there is an end of the Cantabit vacuus,* the last prerogative of beggary, which entitled him to laugh at the risk of robbery. The veriest wretch in the highway may be better booty than a person of consideration, since the last may have but a few shillings in his pocket, and the beggar, being once dead, is worth ten pounds to his murderer.

“The great number of the lower Irish which have come over here since the peace, is, like all important occurrences, attended with its own share of good and evil. It must relieve Ireland in part of the excess of population, which is one of its greatest evils, and it accommodates Scotland with a race of hardy and indefatigable labourers, without which it would be impossible to carry on the very expensive improvements which have been executed. Our canals, our railroads, and our various public works are all wrought by Irish. I have often employed them myself at burning clay, and similar operations, and have found them as labourers quiet and tractable, light-spirited, too, and happy to a degree beyond belief, and in no degree quarrelsome, keep whisky from them and them from whisky. But most unhappily for all parties they work at far too low a rate; at a rate, in short, which can but just procure salt and potatoes; they become reckless, of course, of all the comforts and decencies of life, which they have no means of procuring. Extreme poverty brings ignorance and vice, and these are the mothers of crime. If Ireland were to submit to some kind of poor-rate—I do not mean that of England—but something that should secure to the indigent their natural share of the fruits of the earth, and enable them at least to feed while others are feasting—it would, I cannot doubt, raise the character of the lower orders, and deprive them of that recklessness of

* Cantabit vacuus coram latrone viator.—Juvenal.

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futurity which leads them to think only of the present. Indeed, where intoxication of the lower ranks is mentioned as a vice, we must allow the temptation is well-nigh inevitable; meat, clothes, fire, all that men can and do want are supplied by a drop of whisky, and no one should be surprised that the relief (too often the only one within the wretches’ power) is eagerly grasped at.

“We pay back, I suspect, the inconveniencies we receive from the character of our Irish importation, by sending you a set of half-educated, cold-hearted Scotchmen to be agents and middle-men. Among them, too, there are good and excellent characters, yet I can conceive they often mislead their employers. I am no great believer in the extreme degree of improvement to be derived from the advancement of science; for every study of that nature tends, when pushed to a certain extent, to harden the heart, and render the philosopher reckless of every thing save the objects of his own pursuit; all equilibrium in the character is destroyed, and the visual force of the understanding is perverted by being fixed on one object exclusively. Thus we see theological sects (although inculcating the moral doctrines) are eternally placing man’s zeal in opposition to them; and even in the practice of the bar, it is astonishing how we become callous to right and wrong, when the question is to gain or lose a cause. I have myself often wondered how I became so indifferent to the horrors of a criminal trial, if it involved a point of law. In like manner, the pursuit of physiology inflicts tortures on the lower animals of creation, and at length comes to rub shoulders against the West Port. The state of high civilisation to which we have arrived, is perhaps scarcely a national blessing, since, while the few are improved to the highest point, the many are in proportion tantalized

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and degraded, and the same nation displays at the same time the very highest and the very lowest state in which the human race can exist in point of intellect. Here is a doctor who is able to take down the whole clock-work of the human frame, and may in time find some way of repairing and putting it together again; and there is Burke with the body of his murdered countrywoman on his back, and her blood on his hands, asking his price from the learned carcass-butcher. After all, the golden age was the period for general happiness, when the earth gave its stores without labour, and the people existed only in the numbers which it could easily subsist; but this was too good to last. As our numbers grew our wants multiplied, and here we are contending with increasing difficulties by the force of repeated inventions. Whether we shall at last eat each other, as of yore, or whether the earth will get a flap with a comet’s tail first, who but the reverend Mr Irving will venture to pronounce?

“Now here is a fearful long letter, and the next thing is to send it under Lord Francis Gower’s omnipotent frank.* Anne sends best compliments; she says she had the honour to despatch her congratulations to you already. Walter and his little wife are at Nice; he is now major of his regiment, which is rapid advancement, and so has gone abroad to see the world. Lockhart has been here for a week or two, but is now gone for England. I suspect he is at this moment stopped by the snow-storm, and solacing himself with a cigar somewhere in Northumberland; that is all the news that can interest you. Dr and Mrs Brewster are rather getting over their heavy loss, but it is still too visible on their brows, and that broad river lying daily before them is a

* Lord F. G. was Secretary for Ireland, under the Duke of Wellington’s Ministry.

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sad remembrancer. I saw a brother of yours on a visit at Allerley;* he dined with us one day and promised to come and see us next summer, which I hope he will make good.—My pen has been declaring itself independent this last half hour, which is the more unnatural, as it is engaged in writing to its former mistress.†—Ever yours affectionately.

Diary, “Feb. 23.—Anne and I dined at Skene’s, where we met Mr and Mrs George Forbes, Colonel and Mrs Blair, George Bell, &c. The party was a pleasant one. Colonel Blair told us that at the commencement of the battle of Waterloo, there was some trouble to prevent the men from breaking their ranks. He expostulated with one man—‘Why, my good fellow, you cannot propose to beat the French alone? You had better keep your ranks.’ The man, who was one of the 71st, returned to his place, saying, ‘I believe you are right, sir, but I am a man of a very hot temper.’ There was much bonhommie in the reply.

“February 24.‘Snowy miserable morning. I corrected my proofs, and then went to breakfast with Mr

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Drummond Hay, where we again met Colonel and Mrs Blair, with Thomas Thomson. We looked over some most beautiful drawings which Mrs Blair had made in different parts of India, exhibiting a species of architecture so gorgeous, and on a scale so extensive, as to put to shame the magnificence of Europe; and yet, in most cases, as little is known of the people who wrought these wonders as of the kings who built the Pyramids. Fame depends on literature, not on architecture. We are more eager to see a broken column of Cicero’s villa, than all these mighty labours of barbaric power. Mrs Blair is full of enthusiasm. She told me, that when she worked with her pencil she was glad to have some one to read to her as a sort of sedative, otherwise her excitement made her tremble, and burst out a-crying. I can understand this very well. On returning home, I wrought, but not much—rather dawdled and took to reading Chambers’s Beauties of Scotland, which would be admirable if they were accurate. He is a clever young fellow, but hurts himself by too much haste. I am not making too much myself I know—and I know, too, it is time I were making it—unhappily there is such a thing as more haste and less speed. I can very seldom think to purpose by lying perfectly idle, but when I take an idle book, or a walk, my mind strays back to its task, out of contradiction as it were; the things I read become mingled with those I have been writing, and something is concocted. I cannot compare this process of the mind to any thing save that of a woman to whom the mechanical operation of spinning serves as a running bass to the songs she sings, or the course of ideas she pursues. The phrase Hoc age, so often quoted by my father, does not jump with my humour. I cannot nail my mind to one subject of contemplation, and it is by nourishing two trains of ideas that I can bring one into order.

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“February 28.—Finished my proofs this morning; and read part of a curious work, called Memoirs of Vidocq; a fellow who was at the head of Buonaparte’s police. It is a picaresque tale; in other words, a romance of roguery. The whole seems much exaggerated, and got up; but I suppose there is truth au fond. I came home about two o’clock, and wrought hard and fast till now—night. I cannot get myself to feel at all anxious about the Catholic question. I cannot see the use of fighting about the platter, when you have let them snatch the meat off it. I hold Popery to be such a mean and depraving superstition, that I am not sure I could have found myself liberal enough for voting the repeal of the penal laws as they existed before 1780. They must, and would, in course of time, have smothered Popery; and, I confess, I should have seen the old lady of Babylon’s mouth stopped with pleasure. But now, that you have taken the plaster off her mouth, and given her free respiration, I cannot see the sense of keeping up the irritation about the claim to sit in Parliament. Unopposed, the Catholic superstition may sink into dust, with all its absurd ritual and solemnities. Still it is an awful risk. The world is, in fact, as silly as ever, and a good competence of nonsense will always find believers. Animal magnetism, phrenology, &c. &c., have all had their believers, and why not Popery? Ecod! if they should begin to make Smithfield broils, I do not know where many an honest Protestant could find courage enough to be carbonadoed? I should shrink from the thoughts of tar-barrels and gibbets, I am afraid, and make a very pusillanimous martyr. So I hope the Duke of Wellington will keep the horned beast well in hand, and not let her get her leg over the harrows.

“March 4.—At four o’clock arrives Mr Cadell, with his horn charged with good news. The prospectus of

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the Magnum, although issued only a week, has produced such a demand among the trade, that he thinks he must add a large number of copies, that the present edition of 7000 may be increased to meet the demand; he talks of raising it to 10,000 or 12,000. If so, I shall have a powerful and constant income to bear on my unfortunate debts for several years to come, and may fairly hope to put every claim in a secure way of payment. Laidlaw dined with me, and, poor fellow, was as much elated with the news as I am, for it is not of a nature to be kept secret. I hope I shall have him once more at Kaeside to debate, as we used to do, on religion and politics.

“March 6.—Made some considerable additions to the Appendix to General Preface. I am in the sentiments towards the public that the buffoon player expresses towards his patron—

“Go tell my good Lord, said this modest young man, If he will but invite me to dinner, I’ll be as diverting as ever I can— I will, on the faith of a sinner.’

I will multiply the notes, therefore, when there is a chance of giving pleasure and variety. There is a stronger gleam of hope on my affairs than has yet touched on them; it is not steady or certain, but it is bright and conspicuous. Ten years may last with me, though I have but little chance of it.

“March 7.—Sent away proofs. This extrication of my affairs, though only a Pisgah prospect, occupies my

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mind more than is fitting; but without some such hopes I must have felt like one of the victims of the wretch Burke, struggling against a smothering weight on my bosom, till nature could endure it no longer.

“March 8.—Ballantyne, by a letter of this morning, totally condemns Anne of Geierstein. Third volume nearly finished—a pretty thing, truly, for I shall be expected to do all over again. Great dishonour in this, as Trinculo says, besides an infinite loss. Sent for Cadell to attend me to-morrow morning, that we may consult about this business.—Peel has made his motion on the Catholic question with a speech of three hours. It is almost a complete surrender to the Catholics, and so it should be, for half measures do but linger out the feud. This will, or rather ought to satisfy all men who sincerely love peace, and, therefore, all men of property. But will this satisfy Pat, who, with all his virtues, is certainly not the most sensible person in the world? Perhaps not; and if not, it is but fighting them at last. I smoked away, and thought of ticklish politics and bad novels.

“March 9.—Cadell came to breakfast. We resolved in privy council to refer the question whether Anne of G—n be sea-worthy or not to further consideration, which, as the book cannot be published, at any rate, during the full rage of the Catholic question, may be easily managed. After breakfast I went to Sir William Arbuthnot’s,* and met there a select party of Tories, to decide whether we should act with the Whigs, by adopting their petition in favour of the Catholics. I was not free from apprehension that the petition might be put

* This gentleman was a favourite with Sir Walter—a special point of communion being the Antiquities of the British Drama. He was Provost of Edinburgh in 1816-17, and again in 1822, and the King gracefully surprised him by proposing his health, at the Banquet in the Parliament House, as “Sir William Arbuthnot, Baronet.”

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into such language as I, at least, should be unwilling to homologate by my subscription. The Solicitor was voucher that they would keep the terms quite general; whereupon we subscribed the requisition for a meeting, with a slight alteration, affirming that it was our desire not to have intermeddled, had not the anti-Catholics pursued that course; and so the Whigs and we are embarked in the same boat—vogue la galère.

“Went about one o’clock to the Castle, where we saw the auld murderess Mons Meg* brought up in solemn procession to reoccupy her ancient place on the Argyle battery. The day was cold, but serene, and I think the ladies must have been cold enough, not to mention the Celts, who turned out upon the occasion, under the leading of Cluny Macpherson, a fine spirited lad. Mons Meg is a monument of our pride and poverty. The size is enormous, but six smaller guns would have been made at the same expense, and done six times as much execution as she could have done. There was immense interest taken in the show by the people of the town, and the numbers who crowded the Castle-hill had a magnificent appearance. About thirty of our Celts attended in costume: and as there was a Highland regiment for duty, with dragoons and artillerymen, the whole made a splendid show. The style in which the last manned and wrought the windlass which raised Old Meg, weighing seven or eight tons, from her temporary carriage to that which has been her basis for many years, was singularly beautiful as a combined exhibition of skill and strength. My daughter had what might have proved a frightful accident. Some rockets were let off, one of which lighted upon her head, and set her bonnet on fire. She neither screamed nor ran, but quietly per-

* See ante, Vol. v. p. 221.

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mitted Charles Sharpe to extinguish the fire, which he did with great coolness and dexterity. All who saw her, especially the friendly Celts, gave her merit for her steadiness, and said she came of good blood. My own courage was not tried, for being at some distance escorting the beautiful and lively Countess of Hopetoun, I did not hear of the accident till it was over.

“In the evening I presided at the annual festival of the Celtic Club. I like this Society, and willingly give myself to be excited by the sight of handsome young men with plaids and claymores, and all the alertness and spirit of Highlanders in their native garb. There was the usual degree of excitation excellent dancing, capital songs, a general inclination to please and to be pleased. A severe cold caught on the battlements of the Castle prevented me from playing first fiddle so well as on former occasions, but what I could do was received with the usual partiality of the Celts. I got home fatigued and vino gravatus about eleven o’clock. We had many guests, some of whom, English officers, seemed both amused and surprised at our wild ways, especially at the dancing without ladies, and the mode

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of drinking favourite toasts, by springing up with one foot on the bench and one on the table, and the peculiar shriek of applause, so unlike English cheering.

“Come, a little flourish on the trumpet. Let us rouse the Genius of this same red mountain—so called, because it is all the year covered with roses. There can be no difficulty in finding it, for it lies towards the Caspian, and is quoted in the Persian Tales. Well, I open my ephemerides, form my scheme under the suitable planet, and the Genius obeys the invitation and appears. The Gnome is a misshapen dwarf, with a huge jolter-head like that of Boerhaave on the Bridge,† his limbs and body

* Genesis, chap. ii. v. 18. † This head may still be seen over a laboratory at No. 100 of

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monstrously shrunk and disproportioned. ‘Sir Dwarf,’ said I, undauntedly, thy head is very large, and thy feet and limbs somewhat small in proportion.’ ‘I have crammed my head, even to the overflowing, with knowledge; and I have starved my limbs by disuse of exercise and denial of sustenance!’ ‘Can I acquire wisdom in thy solitary library?’ ‘Thou mayest!’ ‘On what condition?’ ‘Renounce all gross and fleshly pleasures, eat pulse and drink water, converse with none but the wise and learned, alive and dead.’ ‘Why, this were to die in the cause of wisdom!’ ‘If you desire to draw from our library only the advantage of seeming wise, you may have it consistent with all your favourite enjoyments.’ ‘How much sleep?’ ‘A Lapland night—eight months out of the twelve.’ ‘Enough for a dormouse, most generous Genius—a bottle of wine?’ ‘Two, if you please; but you must not seem to care for them—cigars in loads, whisky in lushings—only they must be taken with an air of contempt, a flocci-pauci-nihili-pili-fication of all that can gratify the outward man.’ ‘I am about to ask you a serious question—when one has stuffed his stomach, drunk his bottle, and smoked his cigar, how is he to keep himself awake?’ ‘Either by cephalic snuff or castle-building.’ ‘Do you approve of castle-building as a frequent exercise?’ ‘Genius—Life were not life without it—

‘Give me the joy that sickens not the heart, Give me the wealth that has no wings to fly.’

‘Author.—I reckon myself one of the best aerial architects now living, and Nil me pœnitet.’ Genius.—‘Nec est cur te pœniteat. Most of your novels had previously been

the South Bridge, Edinburgh.—N.B. There is a tradition that the venerable busto in question was once dislodged by “Colonel Grogg” and some of his companions, and waggishly planted in a very inappropriate position.

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subjects for airy castles.’ Author.—‘You have me—and moreover a man derives experience from such fanciful visions. There are few situations I have not in fancy figured, and there are few, of course, which I am not previously prepared to take some part in.’ Genius.—‘True, but I am afraid your having fancied yourself victorious in many a fight, would be of little use were you suddenly called to the field, and your personal infirmities and nervous agitations both rushing upon you and incapacitating you.’ Author.—‘My nervous agitations! down with them!—

“Down down to Limbo and the burning lake! False fiend avoid!— So there ends the tale, with a hoy, with a hoy, So there ends the tale with a ho. There’s a moral—if you fail To seize it by the tail, Its import will exhale, you must know.

“March 19.—The above was written yesterday before dinner, though appearances are to the contrary. I only meant that the studious solitude I have sometimes dreamed of, unless practised with rare stoicism, might perchance degenerate into secret indulgences of coarser appetites, which, when the cares and restraints of social life are removed, are apt to make us think, with Dr Johnson, our dinner the most important event of the day. So much in the way of explanation, a humour which I love not. Go to. I fagged at my Review on Ancient Scottish History, both before and after breakfast. I walked from one o’clock till near three. I make it out rather better than of late I have been able to do in the streets of Edinburgh, where I am ashamed to walk so slow as would suit me. Indeed nothing but a certain suspicion, that once drawn up on the beach, I would soon break up, prevents my renouncing pedestrian exer-

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cises altogether, for it is positive suffering, and of an acute kind too.

“May 26.—Sent off ten pages of the Maid of the Mist this morning with a murrain:—But how to get my catastrophe packed into the compass allotted for it?

‘It sticks like a pistol half out of its holster, Or rather indeed like an obstinate bolster, Which I think I have seen you attempting, my dear, In vain to cram into a small pillow-beer.’

There is no help for it—I must make a tour de force, and annihilate both time and space.

“March 28.—In spite of the temptation of a fine morning, I toiled manfully at the Review till two o’clock, commencing at seven. I fear it will be uninteresting, but I like the muddling work of antiquities, and, besides, wish to record my sentiments with regard to the Gothic question. No one that has not laboured as I have done on imaginary topics can judge of the comfort afforded by walking on all fours, and being grave and dull. I dare say, when the clown of the pantomime escapes from his nightly task of vivacity, it is his especially to smoke a pipe and be prosy with some good-natured fellow, the dullest of his acquaintance. I have seen such a tendency in Sir Adam Ferguson, the gayest man I ever knew; and poor Tom Sheridan has complained to me on the fatigue of supporting the character of an agreeable companion.

“April 3.—Both Sir James Mackintosh and Lord Haddington have spoken very handsomely in Parliament of my accession to the Catholic petition, and I think it has done some good; yet I am not confident that the measure will disarm the Catholic spleen nor am I entirely easy at finding myself allied to the Whigs even in the instance where I agree with them This is witless prejudice, however.

DIARY—APRIL, 1829.

189

“April 9.—I have bad news of James Ballantyne. Hypochondria, I am afraid, and religiously distressed in mind.

“April 18.—Corrected proofs. I find J. B. has not returned to his business, though I wrote to say how necessary it was. My pity begins to give way to anger. Must he sit there and squander his thoughts and senses upon dowdy metaphysics and abstruse theology, till he addles his brains entirely, and ruins his business?—I have written to him again, letter third, and, I am determined, last.

“April 20.—Lord Buchan is dead, a person whose immense vanity, bordering upon insanity, obscured, or rather eclipsed, very considerable talents. His imagination was so fertile, that he seemed really to believe the extraordinary fictions which he delighted in telling. His economy, most laudable in the early part of his life, when it enabled him, from a small income, to pay his father’s debts, became a miserable habit, and led him to do mean things. He had a desire to be a great man and a Mæsenas—a bon marché. The two celebrated lawyers, his brothers, were not more gifted by nature than I think he was, but the restraints of a profession kept the eccentricity of the family in order. Henry Erskine was the best-natured man I ever knew, thoroughly a gentleman, and with but one fault. He could not say no, and thus sometimes misled those who trusted him. Tom Erskine was positively mad. I have heard him tell a cock-and-a-bull story of having seen the ghost of his father’s servant, John Burnet, with as much gravity as if he believed every word he was saying. Both Henry and Thomas were saving

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men, yet both died very poor. The latter at one time possessed L.200,000; the other had a considerable fortune. The Earl alone has died wealthy. It is saving, not getting, that is the mother of riches. They all had wit. The Earl’s was crack-brained, and sometimes caustic; Henry’s was of the very kindest, best-humoured, and gayest sort that ever cheered society; that of Lord Erskine was moody and muddish. But I never saw him in his best days.

“April 25.—After writing a heap of letters, it was time to set out for Lord Buchan’s funeral at Dryburgh Abbey. The letters were signed by Mr David Erskine, his Lordship’s natural son; and his nephew, the young Earl, was present; but neither of them took the head of the coffin. His Lordship’s burial took place in a chapel amongst the ruins. His body was in the grave with its feet pointing westward. My cousin, Maxpopple,* was for taking notice of it, but I assured him that a man who had been wrong in the head all his life would scarce become right-headed after death. I felt something at parting with this old man, though but a trumpery body. He gave me the first approbation I ever obtained from a stranger. His caprice had led him to examine Dr Adam’s class when I, a boy of twelve years old, and then in disgrace for some aggravated case of negligence, was called up from a low bench, and recited my lesson with some spirit and appearance of feeling the poetry—(it was the apparition of Hector’s ghost in the Æneid)—which called forth the noble Earl’s applause. I was very proud of this at the time. I was sad from

* William Scott, Esq.—the present Laird of Raeburn—was commonly thus designated from a minor possession, during his father’s lifetime. Whatever, in things of this sort, used to be practised among the French noblesse might be traced, till very lately, in the customs of the Scottish provincial gentry.

ANNE OF GEIERSTEIN—MAY, 1829.

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another account—it was the first time I had been among those ruins since I left a very valued pledge there. My next visit may be involuntary. Even God’s will be done—at least I have not the mortification of thinking what a deal of patronage and fuss Lord Buchan would bestow on my funeral.* Maxpopple dined and slept here with four of his family, much amused with what they heard and saw. By good fortune, a ventriloquist and parcel juggler came in, and we had him in the library after dinner. He was a half-starved wretched looking creature, who seemed to have eat more fire than bread. So I caused him to be well-stuffed, and gave him a guinea—rather to his poverty than to his skill—and now to finish Anne of Geierstein.”

“I have a commission for you to execute for me, which I shall deliver in a few words. I am now in possession of my own copyrights of every kind, excepting a few things in Longman’s hands, and which I am offered

* Some little time before his death, the worthy Sheriff-substitute of Jedburgh received a complete set of his friend’s works, with this inscription:—“To Robert Shortreed, Esq., the friend of the author from youth to age, and his guide and companion upon many an expedition among the Border hills, in quest of the materials of legendary lore which have at length filled so many volumes, this collection of the results of their former rambles is presented by his sincere friend, Walter Scott.”

THE OPUS MAGNUM, &c.—1829.

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on very fair terms—and a fourth share of Marmion, which is in the possession of our friend Murray. Now, I should consider it a great favour if Mr Murray would part with it at what he may consider as a fair rate, and would be most happy to show my sense of obligation by assisting his views and speculations as far as lies in my power. I wish you could learn as soon as you can Mr Murray’s sentiments on this subject, as they would weigh with me in what I am about to arrange as to the collected edition. The Waverley Novels are doing very well indeed.

“I put you to a shilling’s expense, as I wish a speedy answer to the above query. I am always, with love to Sophia, affectionately yours,

“Mr Lockhart has this moment communicated your letter respecting my fourth share of the copyright of Marmion. I have already been applied to by Messrs Constable, and by Messrs Longman, to know what sum I would sell this share for—but so highly do I estimate the honour of being even in so small a degree the publisher of the author of the poem—that no pecuniary consideration whatever can induce me to part with it.

“This share has been profitable to me fifty-fold beyond what either publisher or author could have anticipated, and, therefore, my returning it on such an occa-

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sion you will, I trust, do me the favour to consider in no other light than as a mere act of grateful acknowledgment for benefits already received by, my dear Sir, your obliged and faithful servant,