‘How happily the days of Thalaba went by!’
‘How happily the days of Thalaba went by!’
‘How happily the days of Thalaba went by!’
‘How happily the days of Thalaba went by!’
After this period, Laidlaw commenced householder, entering on extensive farming experiments; and, so long as the war lasted and high prices prevailed, his schemes promised to be ultimately successful. But with peace came a sudden fall in the market value of corn. He struggled on with adverse circumstances for a twelvemonth, till capital and credit failed, and he was obliged to abandon his lease.
In the summer of 1817, we find him at Kaeside, on the estate of Abbotsford. At first, this seemed a temporary arrangement. The two friends had kept up a constant intercourse after Scott’s visit to the Yarrow in 1802. Presents of trout and blackcock from the country, and return presents of books from Castle Street, in Edinburgh, were interchanged; and, when Laidlaw’s evil day was at hand, Scott said: ‘Come toAbbotsford, and help me with my improvements. I can put you into a house on the estate—Kaeside—and get you some literary work from the Edinburgh publishers.’ The offer was cheerfully accepted, and the connection became permanent. Scott had then commenced building and planting on a large scale; and the same year he made his most extensive purchase—the lands of Toftfield, for which he gave £10,000.
‘I have more than once—such was his modesty’—said Laidlaw, ‘heard Sir Walter assert that had his father left him an estate of £500 or £600 a year, he would have spent his time in miscellaneous reading, not writing. This, to a certain extent, might have been the case; and had he purchased the property of Broadmeadows, in Yarrow, as he at one time was very anxious to do, and when the neighbourhood was in the possession of independent proprietors, the effect might have been the same. At Abbotsford, surrounded by little lairds, most of them ready to sell their lands as soon as he had money to advance, the impulse to exertion was incessant; for the desire to possess and to add increased with every new acquisition, until it became a passion of no small power. Then came the hope to be a large landed proprietor, and to found a family.’
When the poet was in Edinburgh attending to his official duties as Clerk of Session, he sighed for Abbotsford and the country, and took the liveliest interest in all that was going on under the superintendence of his friend. Passages like the following remind us of the writings of Gilpin and Price on forest and picturesque scenery:
‘George must stick in a few wild-roses, honeysuckles, and sweet-briers in suitable places, so as to produce theluxuriance we see in the woods which Nature plants herself. We injure the effect of our plantings, so far as beauty is concerned, very much by neglecting underwood.... I want to know how you are forming your glades of hard wood. Try to make them come handsomely in contact with each other, which you can only do by looking at a distance on the spot, then and there shutting your eyes as you have done when a child looking at the fire, and forming an idea of the same landscape with glades of woodland crossing it. Get out of your ideas about expense. It is, after all, but throwing away the price of the planting. If I were to buy a picture worth £500, nobody would wonder much. Now, if I choose to lay out £100 or £200 to make a landscape of my estate hereafter, and add so much more to its value, I certainly don’t do a more foolish thing. I mention this, that you may not feel limited so much as you might in other cases by the exact attention to pounds, shillings, and pence, but consider the whole on a liberal scale. We are too apt to consider plantations as a subject of the closest economy, whereas beauty and taste have even a marketable value after the effects come to be visible. Don’t dot the plantations with small patches of hard wood, and always consider the ultimate effect.’
It is pleasant to see from the Laidlaw manuscripts with what alacrity and zeal the noble friends of the poet came forward with kindly contributions. The Duke of Buccleuch sent bushels of acorns; the Earl of Fife presented seed of Norway pines; Lord Montagu forwarded a box of acorns and a packet of lime-seed. One arboricultural missive to the factor says: ‘I send the seeds of the Corsican pine, got with great difficulty,and also two or three of an unknown species which grows to a great height on the Apennines. Dr Graham says they should be raised in mould, finely prepared, under glass, but without artificial heat.’ A box of fine chestnuts came from Lisbon: the box was sent on from Edinburgh to Abbotsford unopened, and before Laidlaw heard of them, the chestnuts were peeled, and rendered useless for planting. ‘Confound the chestnuts, and those who peeled them!’ exclaimed Scott; ‘the officious blockheads did it by way of special favour.’ One object was to form at the top of the dikes an impenetrable copse or natural hedge or verdurous screen—the poet uses all the epithets (Milton has ‘verdurous wall’); and for this purpose there were sent from Edinburgh 3000 laburnums, 2000 sweet-briers, 3000 Scotch elms, 3000 horse-chestnuts, loads of hollies, poplars for the marshy ground, and filberts for the glen. The graceful birch-tree, ‘the lady of the wood,’ was not, of course, neglected. ‘I am so fond of the birch,’ writes the poet; ‘and it makes such a beautiful and characteristic underwood, that I think we can hardly have too many. Besides, we may plant them as hedges.’ He purchased at this time about 100,000 birches. Mr Morritt of Rokeby writes to a friend: ‘He (Scott) tells me he never was so happy in his life as in having a place of his own to create. In this Caledonian Eden, he labours all day with his own hands; though, since the Fall, he and his wife will not find many luxuriant branches to prune in Ettrick Forest I sent him a bushel of Yorkshire acorns, which, except docks and thistles, are, I believe, likely to be in three years the largest vegetables upon the domain.’9
‘There are many little jobs about the walks,’ writesthe busy and happy laird, ‘which, though Tom Purdie contemns them, are not less necessary towards comfort: a seat or two, for example, and covering any drains, so as to let the pony pass. In the front of the old Rispylaw (now Anne’s Hill) is an old quarry, which, a little made up and accommodated with stone seats and some earth to grow a few honeysuckles and sweet-briers, would make a very sweet place. Many of the walks willthole’ [bear] ‘a mending; for instance, that to the thicket might be completely gravelled, as Mrs Scott uses it so much.’
Here the kindly, loving nature of the man peeps out. To Tom himself, Scott writes in a big, plain, round hand:
‘As Mrs Scott comes out on the 22d, and brings some plants to cover the paling of the court, you must have a border of about a spade’s breadth and a spade’s depth dug nicely, and made up with good earth and a little dung, all along in front of the paling, and along the east end of it. She will bring the plants from Edinburgh, so they can be put into the ground the evening she arrives.’
Afterwards, as years ran on, a thread of business was intermixed with the rural pleasure. The poet began to calculate on the probable return from the woods, not omitting the value of the bark used for tanning purposes.
‘Dear Willie—How could you be such a gowk’ [fool] ‘as to suppose I meant to start a hare upon you by my special inquiries about the bark? I am perfectly sensible you take more care of my affairs than you would of your own; but anything about wood or trees amuses me, and I like to enter into it more particularlythan into ordinary farming operations. In particular, this of drying and selling our bark—at present a trifle—is a thing which will one day be of great consequence, and I wish to attend to the details myself. I think it should not be laid on the ground, but dried upon stools made of the felled wood; and if you lay along these stools the peeled trees, and pile the bark on them, it will hide the former from the sun, and suffer them to dry gradually. I have been observing this at Blair-Adam. I have got a new light on larch-planting from the Duke of Athole’s operations. He never plants closer than eight feet, and says they answer admirably. If this be so, it will be easy to plant our hill-ground. Respecting the grass in the plantations, I have some fears of the scythe, and should prefer getting a host of women with their hooks, which would also be a good thing for the poor folks.’ [Another touch of the poet’s kindly nature.] ‘Tom must set about it instantly. He is too much frightened for the expense of doing things rapidly, as if it were not as cheap to employ twelve men for a week as six men for a fortnight.—Yours,W. S.’
‘Dear Willie—How could you be such a gowk’ [fool] ‘as to suppose I meant to start a hare upon you by my special inquiries about the bark? I am perfectly sensible you take more care of my affairs than you would of your own; but anything about wood or trees amuses me, and I like to enter into it more particularlythan into ordinary farming operations. In particular, this of drying and selling our bark—at present a trifle—is a thing which will one day be of great consequence, and I wish to attend to the details myself. I think it should not be laid on the ground, but dried upon stools made of the felled wood; and if you lay along these stools the peeled trees, and pile the bark on them, it will hide the former from the sun, and suffer them to dry gradually. I have been observing this at Blair-Adam. I have got a new light on larch-planting from the Duke of Athole’s operations. He never plants closer than eight feet, and says they answer admirably. If this be so, it will be easy to plant our hill-ground. Respecting the grass in the plantations, I have some fears of the scythe, and should prefer getting a host of women with their hooks, which would also be a good thing for the poor folks.’ [Another touch of the poet’s kindly nature.] ‘Tom must set about it instantly. He is too much frightened for the expense of doing things rapidly, as if it were not as cheap to employ twelve men for a week as six men for a fortnight.—Yours,
W. S.’
In the matter of dwellings for the small tenants and labourers, the laird of Abbotsford was equally careful and considerate. ‘I think stone partitions would be desirable on account of vermin, &c. If their houses are not comfortable, the people will never be cleanly. For windows I would much prefer the cast-iron lattices, turning on a centre, and not made too large. These windows being in small quarrels, or panes, a little breach is easily repaired, and saves the substitute of a hat or clout through a large hole. Certainly the cottagesshould be rough-plastered.’ Perhaps the little iron lattices were as much preferred for their antique, picturesque associations as for their utility—‘something poetical,’ as Pope’s old gardener said of the drooping willow; and the aged minstrel’s hut near Newark Tower, it will be recollected, had such a window:
‘The little garden hedged with green,A cheerful hearth and lattice clean.’
‘The little garden hedged with green,A cheerful hearth and lattice clean.’
‘The little garden hedged with green,A cheerful hearth and lattice clean.’
‘The little garden hedged with green,
A cheerful hearth and lattice clean.’
When times were hard and winter severe, he thought of the firesides of the labourers:
‘Dear Sir—I have your letter, and have no doubt in my own mind that a voluntary assessment is the best mode of raising money to procure work for the present sufferers, because I see no other way of making this necessary tax fall equally upon the heritors.... I shall soon have money, so that if you can devise any mode by which hands can be beneficially employed at Abbotsford, I could turn £50 or £100 extra into that service in the course of a fortnight. In fact, if it made the poor and industrious people a little easier, I should have more pleasure in it than in any money I ever spent in my life.—Yours, very truly,W. S.’
‘Dear Sir—I have your letter, and have no doubt in my own mind that a voluntary assessment is the best mode of raising money to procure work for the present sufferers, because I see no other way of making this necessary tax fall equally upon the heritors.... I shall soon have money, so that if you can devise any mode by which hands can be beneficially employed at Abbotsford, I could turn £50 or £100 extra into that service in the course of a fortnight. In fact, if it made the poor and industrious people a little easier, I should have more pleasure in it than in any money I ever spent in my life.—Yours, very truly,
W. S.’
The same year, which was a period of some excitement and discontent, he writes to Laidlaw:
‘I am glad you have got some provision for the poor. They are the minors of the state, and especially to be looked after; and I believe the best way to prevent discontent is to keep their minds moderately easy as to their own provision. The sensible part of them may probably have judgment enough to see that they could get nothing much better for their class in general by anappeal to force, by which, indeed, if successful, ambitious individuals might rise to distinction, but which would, after much misery, leave the body of the people just where it found them, or rather much worse.... Political publications must always be caricatures. As for the mob of great cities, whom you accuse me of despising too much, I think it is impossible to err on that side. They are the veryriddlingsof society, in which every useful cinder is, by various processes, withdrawn, and nothing left but dust, ashes, and filth. Mind, I mean the mob of cities, not the lowest people in the country, who often, and, indeed, usually, have both character and intelligence.’
Again:
‘I think of my books amongst this snow-storm; also of the birds, and not a little of the poor. For benefit of the former, I hope Peggy throws out the crumbs; and a corn-sheaf or two for the game would be to purpose, if placed where poachers could not come at them. For the poor people, I wish you to distribute five pounds or so among the neighbouring poor who may be in distress, and see that our own folks are tolerably off.’
Scott introduced his friendly factor toBlackwood’s Magazine, and Laidlaw used to compile for it a monthly chronicle of events, besides occasionally contributing a descriptive article, which the ‘Great Magician’ overhauled previous to its transmission. There was, in the autumn of 1817, a great combustion in Edinburgh about theChaldee Manuscript, inserted in the magazine for October. An edition of two thousand copies was soon sold, and fifteen hundred more were printed; so Blackwood writes to Scott. ‘He was dreadfully afraid,’ says Laidlaw, ‘that Mr Scott would be offended; and so hewould, he says, were it not on my account.’ The Ettrick Shepherd (who was the original concocter of the satire) was also alarmed. ‘For the love of God, open not your mouth about theChaldee Manuscript,’ he writes to Laidlaw. ‘There have been meetings and proposals, and an express has arrived from Edinburgh to me. Deny all knowledge, else, they say, I am ruined,’ &c. This once famous production is so local and personal that, although it is now included in Professor Wilson’s works, it is almost unknown to the present generation. The subject is a bookseller’s quarrel, a contest between the rival magazines of Blackwood and Constable, and it is one of the most harmless of all the parodies couched in Scriptural phraseology. Professor Ferrier, the editor of Wilson’s works, says it is quite as good, in its way, as Swift’sBattle of the Books; but this is a monstrous delusion. There are some quaint touches of character in the piece. It may be compared to the parodies by Hone; but it is a sort of profanation to place it on a level with the classic satire of Swift.
It is never too late to do justice. In one of these magazine missives, written in January 1818, Blackwood refers to the Ettrick Shepherd. ‘If you see Hogg, I hope you will press him to send me instantly hisShepherd’s Dog, and anything else. I received hisAndrew Gemmells; but the editor is not going to insert it in this number.’ [Had Ebony really an editor, or was he not himself the great sublime?] ‘I expected to have received from him the conclusion of theBrownie of Bodsbeck; there are six sheets of it already printed.’
Now, the latter part of this extract seems distinctly to disprove a charge which Hogg thoughtlessly broughtagainst Mr Blackwood. His novel, theBrownie of Bodsbeck, was published in 1818, and he suffered unjustly, as he states in his autobiography, with regard to that tale, as it was looked upon as an imitation of Scott’sOld Mortality. It was wholly owing to Blackwood, he asserts, that his story was not published a year sooner; and he relates the case as a warning to authors never to intrust booksellers with their manuscripts. But the fact is,Old Mortalitywas published in December 1816; and we have Blackwood, in the above letter to Laidlaw, stating that he had not, in January 1818—more than a twelvemonth afterwards—received the whole of the ‘copy’ of theBrownie of Bodsbeck. How could he go to press with an unfinished story? How make bricks without straw? The accusation is altogether a myth, or, to use one of the Shepherd’s own expressions, ‘a mere shimmera’ [chimera] ‘of the brain.’
Of Hogg’s prose works, Scott writes: ‘Truly, they are sad daubing, with, here and there, fine dashes of genius.’ Thedaubingis chiefly seen in the dialogues and attempts at humour; thegeniusappears in the descriptions of pastoral or wild scenery, as in the account of the ‘Storms,’ and in the fine introduction to theBrownie of Bodsbeck, and in some of the delineations of humble Scottish life and superstition. Hogg is as true and literal as Crabbe. His peasants always speak and think as peasants; but he gives us, sometimes, coarse and poor specimens. It is certain, however, that, even in the worst of his stories, there are gleams of fancy—‘fairy blinks of the sun’—far above the reach of writers immensely his superiors in taste and acquirements.
There was another person in whom Scott was interested with reference to the slashing articles inBlackwood’s Magazine. He writes to Laidlaw: ‘So they let poor Charles Sharpe alone, they may satirise all Edinburgh, your humble servant not excepted.’ Charles Kirkpatrick Sharpe, with his antiquarian tastes, personal oddities, and aristocratic leanings, was a special favourite with Scott. He was a kind of Scotch Horace Walpole (so considered by his illustrious friend), but much feebler; perhaps stronger with the pencil, but infinitely weaker with the pen. His celebrated sketch of the ‘Inimitable Virago,’ or Queen Elizabeth dancingdisposedly, as described by the Scotch ambassador, Sir James Melville, was esteemed by Scott as an unrivalled production. It is highly ludicrous and effective as a picture, but is too extravagant to serve even as a caricature representation of Elizabeth. Neither face nor figure has any resemblance. Hogarth, in his etching of old Simon Lord Lovat of the ’45, seems, by a happy stroke of genius, to have hit the true medium in works of this class. He preserved the strong points in personal appearance and character—combining them with irresistible humour and drollery of expression.
Here is another scrap:
‘I am glad to send you Maga, which continues to be clever. I hope for two or three happy days on the brae-sides about the birthday’ [the king’s birthday, June 4]. ‘Blackwood has been assaulted by a fellow who came from Glasgow on purpose, and returned second-best. The bibliopole is like the little French lawyer, who never found out he could fight till he was put to it, and was then for cudgelling all and sundry. You never saw anything so whimsical.
‘I think often, of course, about my walks; and I am sickening to descend into the glen at the little waterfallby steps. We could cut excellent ones out where the quarry has been. It is the only way we shall ever make what Tom Purdie calls aneat job; for a deep descent will be ugly, and difficult to keep. I would plant betwixt the stair and the cascade, so as to hide the latter till you came down to the bottom.’
Visitors now began to appear at Abbotsford, an increasing stream every season from 1817 to 1825. They consisted of persons of rank and fashion, literary men and artists of all nations, who travelled to the Tweed to pay homage to the poet. There was no envy or jealousy with the Great Minstrel. Indeed, with the single exception of Byron, his position was such that he had no cause to fear any rival, and he could afford to throw largess to the crowd. All were welcome at Abbotsford. Washington Irving has described the cordial reception he experienced on the occasion of his visit in 1817, and Laidlaw thus notes the event:
‘We had a long walk up by the glen and round by the loch. It was fine sunshine when we set out, but we met with tremendous dashing showers. Mr Irving told me he had a kind of devotional reverence for Scotland, and most of all for its poetry. He looked upon it as fairy-land, and he was beyond measure surprised at Mr Scott, his simple manners and brotherly frankness. He was very anxious to see Hogg, and said that several editions of Hogg’s different poems had been published in America.’
Irving always regretted that he had not met with the Shepherd. Such a meeting could not have failed to give infinite pleasure to both. The gentle manners and literary enthusiasm of the American author would at once have attached the Shepherd; while the rusticfrankness, liveliness, and perfect originality of Hogg possessed an indescribable attraction and charm which the other would have fully appreciated. Many years after this period, Hogg retained a careless brightness of conversation and joyous manner which were seen in no other man. The union of the shepherd and the poet formed a combination as rare and striking as that of the soldado with the divinity student of Marischal College, in the person of the renowned Dugald Dalgetty.
One day, after Hogg had been in London—and ‘The Hogg,’ as Lockhart said, ‘was the lion of the season’—Allan Cunningham chanced to meet James Smith of theRejected Addressesat the table of the great bibliopole, John Murray. ‘How,’ said Smith, aloud, to Allan, ‘how does Hogg like Scotland’s small cheer after the luxury of London?’ ‘Small cheer!’ echoed Allan; ‘he has the finest trout in the Yarrow, the finest lambs on its braes, the finest grouse on its hills, and, besides, he as good as keeps asma’ still’ [smuggled whisky]. ‘Pray, what better luxury can London offer?’ All these sumptuosities the Shepherd cheerfully shared with the wayfarers who flocked to Altrive Cottage.
Another visitor at Abbotsford during the season of 1817, was Lady Byron. ‘I have had the honour,’ says Laidlaw, ‘of dining in the company of Lady Byron and Lord Somerville. Her ladyship is a beautiful little woman with fair hair, a fine complexion, and rather large blue eyes; face not round. She looked steadily grave, and seldom smiled. I thought her mouth indicated great firmness, or rather obstinacy. Miss Anne Scott and Lady Byron rode to Newark.’ After the date of this visit by Lady Byron, Laidlaw says he had many conversations with Scott concerning the life and poetryof Byron. ‘He seemed to regret very much that Byron and he had not been thrown more together. He felt the influence he had over his great contemporary’s mind, and said there was so much in it that was very good and very elevated, that any one whom he much liked could, as he (Scott) thought, have withdrawn him from many of his errors.’
All went on smoothly and gaily at Abbotsford. Every year had added to the beauty of the poet’s domain, and to the richness of his various collections and library. His opinion of Gothic architecture is thus expressed: ‘I have got a very good plan from Atkinson for my addition, but I do not like the outside, which is modern Gothic, a style I hold to be equally false and foolish. Blore and I have been at work toScotifyit, by turning battlements into bartisans, and so on. I think we have struck out a picturesque, appropriate, and entirely new line of architecture.’ Abbotsford must certainly be considered picturesque, but it is a somewhat incongruous, ill-placed pile; and without the beautiful garden-screen in front, the general effect would be heavy.
In the Waverley Novels, then appearing in that marvellously rapid succession which astonished the world, there was an ample reservoir of wealth, if it had been wisely secured, as well as of fame. But an alarming interruption was threatened by the illness of the novelist. His malady—cramp of the stomach, with jaundice—was attended with exquisite pain; but in the intervals of comparative ease his literary labours were continued; and it certainly is an extraordinary fact in literary history that under such circumstances the greater part of theBride of Lammermoor, the whole of theLegend of Montrose, and almost the whole ofIvanhoewere produced. The novelist lay on a sofa, dictating to John Ballantyne or to Laidlaw; chiefly to the latter, as he was always at hand, whereas Ballantyne was only an occasional visitor at Abbotsford. Sometimes, in his most humorous or elevated scenes, Scott would break off with a groan of torture, as the cramp seized him, but when the visitation had passed, he was ever ready gaily to take up the broken thread of his narrative and proceedcurrente calamo. It was evident to Laidlaw that before he arrived at Abbotsford (generally about ten o’clock) the novelist had arranged his scenes for the day, and settled in his mind the course of the narrative. Thelanguagewas left to the inspiration of the moment; there was no picking of words, no studiedcuriosa felicitasof expression. Even the imagery seemed spontaneous. Laidlaw abjured with some warmth the old-wife exclamations which Lockhart ascribes to him—as, ‘Gude keep us a’’—‘The like o’ that!’—‘Eh, sirs! eh, sirs!’ But he admitted that while he held the pen he was at times so deeply interested in the scene or in the development of the plot, that he could not help exclaiming: ‘Get on, Mr Scott, get on!’ on which the novelist would reply, smiling: ‘Softly, Willie; you know I have to make the story,’ or some good-humoured remark of a similar purport. It was quite true, he said, that when dictating some of the animated scenes and dialogues inIvanhoe, Scott would rise from his seat and act the scene with every suitable accompaniment of tone, gesture, and manner. Both the military and dramatic spirit were strong in him—too strong even for the cramp and calomel! The postscript to a short business letter from Edinburgh, June 14, 1819, refers to this business of dictation. ‘Put your fingers in order, and buy yourselfpens!—I won’tstandthe expense of your quills, so pluck the goose ’a God’s name!’ And it was plucked on this occasion to record the sorrows of the Bride of Lammermoor.
According to Mr Laidlaw, Scott did not like to speak about his novels after they were published, but was fond of canvassing the merits and peculiarities of the characters while he was engaged in the composition of the story. ‘He was peculiarly anxious,’ says Laidlaw, ‘respecting the success of Rebecca inIvanhoe. One morning, as we were walking in the woods after our forenoon’s labour, I expressed my admiration of the character, and, after a short pause, he broke out with: “Well, I think I shall make something of my Jewess.” Latterly, he seemed to indulge in a retrospect of the useful effect of his labours. In one of these serious moods, I remarked that one circumstance of the highest interest might and ought to yield him very great satisfaction—namely, that his narratives were the best of all reading for young people. I had found that even his friend Miss Edgeworth had not such power in engaging attention. His novels had the power, beyond any other writings, of arousing the better passions and finer feelings; and the moral effect of all this, I added, when one looks forward to several generations—every one acting upon another—must be immense. I well recollect the place where we were walking at this time—on the road returning from the hill towards Abbotsford. Sir Walter was silent for a minute or two, but I observed his eyes filled with tears.... I never saw him much elated or excited in composition but one morning, out of doors, when he was composing that simple but humorous song,Donald Caird. I watched him limping along at goodfive miles an hour along the ridge or sky-line opposite Kaeside, and when he came in, he recited to me the fruits of his walk. His memory was an inexhaustible repertory, so that Hogg, in his moments of super-exaltation and vanity, used to say that if he had theshirra’smemory he would beat him as a poet!’
The memory of Sir Walter Scott was vast, but inexact. In this respect he was inferior to Macaulay or Sir James Mackintosh. In quoting poetry, Sir Walter was seldom verbally correct, and sometimes the harmony of the verse suffered. The two famous lines of Milton’sComus:
‘The aery tongues that syllable men’s names,On sands, and shores, and desert wildernesses,’
‘The aery tongues that syllable men’s names,On sands, and shores, and desert wildernesses,’
‘The aery tongues that syllable men’s names,On sands, and shores, and desert wildernesses,’
‘The aery tongues that syllable men’s names,
On sands, and shores, and desert wildernesses,’
are thus given in theLetters on Demonology:
‘The aery tongues that syllable men’s names,On shores, in desert sands, and wildernesses.’
‘The aery tongues that syllable men’s names,On shores, in desert sands, and wildernesses.’
‘The aery tongues that syllable men’s names,On shores, in desert sands, and wildernesses.’
‘The aery tongues that syllable men’s names,
On shores, in desert sands, and wildernesses.’
Thomas Campbell used to relate, as an instance of Sir Walter’s extraordinary memory, that he read to him his poem ofLocheil’s Warningbefore it was printed; after which his friend asked permission to read it himself. He then perused the manuscript slowly and distinctly, and on returning it to its author, said: ‘Campbell, look after your copyright, for I have got your poem.’ And he repeated, with very few mistakes, the whole sixty lines of which the poem (which was subsequently enlarged) then consisted.
Hogg was generally exalted and buoyant enough. On one occasion we find him writing to Laidlaw: ‘I rode through the whole of Edinburgh yesterday in a barouche by myself, having four horses and two postillions! Never was there a poet went through it beforein such style since the world began!’ We may exclaim with Johnson on the amount of Goldsmith’s debts, ‘Was ever poet so trusted before!’
In the midst of his business details and directions, Scott’s peculiar humour and felicity of illustration are perpetually breaking out. Of a neighbouring county magnate he says: ‘I have heard of a Christian being a Jew, but our friend is the essence of a whole synagogue.’ His relation of the simplest occurrence is vivid and characteristic. A high wind in Edinburgh, in January 1818, he thus notices: ‘I had more than an anxious thought about you all during the gale of wind. The Gothic pinnacles were blown from the top of Bishop Sandford’s Episcopal chapel at the end of Princes Street, and broke through the roof and flooring, doing great damage. This was sticking the horns of the mitre into the belly of the church. The devil never so well deserved the title of Prince of the power of the air, since he has blown down this handsome church, and left the ugly mass of new building standing on the North Bridge.’ One incidental remark illustrates the deception men often practise on themselves: ‘I have not,’ he says, ‘a head for accounts, and detest debt. When I find expense too great, I strike sail, and diminish future outlay, which is the only principle for careless accountants to act upon.’ Happy would it have been for him if his practice had corresponded with his theory!
The year 1820 was, in the family calendar of the poet, one of peculiar interest and importance. It was the year in which his eldest daughter was married; the year in which he received the honour of the baronetcy; and the year in which he sat to Chantrey for his bust—that admirable work of art which has madehis features familiar in every quarter of the globe. He sat also this year to Sir Thomas Lawrence. ‘The king,’ he writes, ‘has commanded me to sit to Sir Thomas Lawrence for a portrait, for his most sacred apartment. I want to have inMaida’ [his favourite deer-hound], ‘that there may be one handsome fellow of the party.’ Late in life, Sir Walter sat to Lawrence Macdonald the sculptor, and Laidlaw says of the artist and his work:
‘We were much pleased with some days of Macdonald the sculptor, who modelled Sir Walter while he was dictating to me. Macdonald’s model was in a higher style of art than Chantrey’s, and from that cause, had not so much character. Macdonald confessed this was not so much his object. It was a faithful likeness, nevertheless, but not so familiar. For the same reason, he would not take the exact figure of the head, which is irregular. Chantrey likewise declined to shew this, which the phrenologists will probably regret.’
Mr Lawrence Macdonald still lives to delight his friends, and pursue his art in Rome, where he has long resided. He has no recollection of the ‘irregularity,’ referred to. Laidlaw knew nothing of art, and by ‘high style,’ he probably meant an idealised likeness—a look to ‘elevate and surprise.’ The extreme length of the upper lip was a personal characteristic of Sir Walter, which he was glad to see artists reduce, and which none of the portraits fully represents. It is by no means uncommon among the stalwart men of the Border, but is unquestionably a defect as respects personal appearance. The Stratford bust of Shakspeare, it will be recollected, has the same long upper lip, as well as the memorable high forehead, that distinguished Scott. Of Chantrey, Laidlaw writes:
‘I met at breakfast Chantrey the sculptor, a real blunt, spirited, fine Yorkshireman, with great good-humour, and an energy of character about him that would have made his fortune—and a great one—had he gone to London as a tailor. He killed a fine salmon in the Tweed, and led another a long time, but let it go among the great stones and cut his line. Colonel Ferguson said he believed he would rather have given his best statue than lost the fish.’
Chantrey was an enthusiastic angler.
The baronetcy was a step of rank which Sir Walter said was the king’s own free motion, and none of his seeking. To a lady whom he highly esteemed—the late Hon. Mrs Stewart Mackenzie of Seaforth—he wrote:
‘The circumstance of my children being heirs to their uncle’s fortune, relieved me in a great degree of the chief objection to accepting with gratitude what was so graciously offered, namely, that which arose from a more limited income than becomes even the lowest step of hereditary rank.... Mr Lockhart, to whom Sophia is now married, is the husband of her choice. He is a man of excellent talents, master of his pen and of his pencil, handsome in person, and well-mannered, though wanting that ease which theusage du mondealone can give. I like him very much; for having no son who promises to take a literary turn, it is of importance to me, both in point of comfort and otherwise, to have some such intimate friend and relation, whose pursuits and habits are similar to my own—so that, upon the whole, I trust I have gained a son instead of losing a daughter.’10
Early next year (1821), Scott was in London, and on February 16, took place the unfortunate duel, in which John Scott, editor of theLondon Magazine, fell. The antagonist of John Scott was Mr Christie, a barrister, the friend of Lockhart. ‘I have had much to plague me here,’ writes Sir Walter, ‘besides the death of John Scott, who departed last night; so much for being slow to take the field!’ And in another letter he recurs to the subject: ‘The death of my unlucky namesake, John Scott, you will have heard of. The poor man fought a most unnecessary duel to regain his lost character, and so lost his life into the bargain.’ The loss of life was chiefly owing to the blundering of John Scott’s second in the duel, who permitted a second fire to take place after Mr Christie had discharged his pistol down the field.
The visit of King George IV. to Scotland in 1822, was an event sure to call forth the enthusiastic loyalty of Sir Walter. His Majesty’s personal attentions, besides the distinction of the baronetcy, elicited his warmest gratitude, and, in addition, all his fervid nationality and veneration for the throne were kindled on this occasion. To see the king in the ancient palace of Holyrood, was itself an incident like the realisation of a dream. The whole city was in a state of frantic excitement: ‘Edinburgh is irrecoverably mad,’ said Scott. To Laidlaw, the chivalrous poet writes:
‘Dear Willie—You are quite right in your opinion of Saunders. He never shewed himself a more true-blooded gentleman. The extreme tact and taste of all ranks has surprised the king and all about him. No rushing or roaring, but a devoted attachment, expressedby a sort of dignified reverence, which seemed divided betwixt a high veneration for their sovereign and a suitable regard for themselves. I have seen in my day many a levee and drawing-room, but none so august and free from absurdity and ridicule as those of Holyrood. The apartments also, desolate and stripped as they have been, are worth a hundred of Carlton or Buckingham House; but the singular and native good-breeding of the people, who never saw a court, is the most remarkable of all. The populace without, shew the same propriety as the gentles within. The people that our carriages passed amongst to-day were all full of feeling, and it was remarkable that, instead of huzzaing, they shewed the singular compliment of lifting up their children to see them—the most affecting thing you ever witnessed. When Saunders goes wrong, it must be frommalice prepense; for no one knows so well how to do right. Mamma (Lady Scott), Sophia, and Anne were dreadfully frightened, and I, of course, though an old courtier, in such a court as Holyrood, was a good deal uneasy. The king, however, spoke to them, and they were all kissed in due form, though they protest they are still at a loss how the ceremony was performed. The king leaves on Wednesday, to my great joy, for strong emotions cannot last. He has lived entirely within doors. To-morrow, I suppose, there is a dinner-party at Dalkeith, as I am commanded there, but it is the first. I have had, from over-exertion and distress of mind, a strong cutaneous eruption in my legs and arms. You would think I had adopted the national musical instrument to regale his Majesty; but, seriously, I believe I should have been ill but for the relief Nature has been pleased to afford me in thisungainly way. Fortunately, my hands and face are clear.W. S.’
‘Dear Willie—You are quite right in your opinion of Saunders. He never shewed himself a more true-blooded gentleman. The extreme tact and taste of all ranks has surprised the king and all about him. No rushing or roaring, but a devoted attachment, expressedby a sort of dignified reverence, which seemed divided betwixt a high veneration for their sovereign and a suitable regard for themselves. I have seen in my day many a levee and drawing-room, but none so august and free from absurdity and ridicule as those of Holyrood. The apartments also, desolate and stripped as they have been, are worth a hundred of Carlton or Buckingham House; but the singular and native good-breeding of the people, who never saw a court, is the most remarkable of all. The populace without, shew the same propriety as the gentles within. The people that our carriages passed amongst to-day were all full of feeling, and it was remarkable that, instead of huzzaing, they shewed the singular compliment of lifting up their children to see them—the most affecting thing you ever witnessed. When Saunders goes wrong, it must be frommalice prepense; for no one knows so well how to do right. Mamma (Lady Scott), Sophia, and Anne were dreadfully frightened, and I, of course, though an old courtier, in such a court as Holyrood, was a good deal uneasy. The king, however, spoke to them, and they were all kissed in due form, though they protest they are still at a loss how the ceremony was performed. The king leaves on Wednesday, to my great joy, for strong emotions cannot last. He has lived entirely within doors. To-morrow, I suppose, there is a dinner-party at Dalkeith, as I am commanded there, but it is the first. I have had, from over-exertion and distress of mind, a strong cutaneous eruption in my legs and arms. You would think I had adopted the national musical instrument to regale his Majesty; but, seriously, I believe I should have been ill but for the relief Nature has been pleased to afford me in thisungainly way. Fortunately, my hands and face are clear.
W. S.’
And Laidlaw, writing to a friend, gives some further particulars:
‘Sir Walter was very full of the king for a while, but we went up Ettrick, and I have seen but little of him since. He had serious work with the English noblemen in the king’s train, who did not seem to wish that Scotland should shew off as an independent kingdom, which, by the articles of the Union, was provided for in the event of the king’s coming to Edinburgh. They wanted all to be done according to English form, as was the case in Ireland, but he settled them. They proposed, too, that the Highland guard (indeed they objected to the guard altogether) should have the flints taken from their pistols! A deputy, Colonel Stevenson, had the management, and corresponded with Sir Walter; and as he was to dine at Castle Street with a number of the Highland chiefs, Sir Walter proposed that the colonel should speak to them on the subject. After they were a little warmed with wine, Sir Walter addressed Stevenson, who sat beside him, saying he had better now propose what he had mentioned before. The Highlanders had got to telling old stories, and were in high spirits; they were, of course, in full dress. Colonel Stevenson said he saw now that he had mistaken the sort of people beside him; and on Sir Walter pressing him (rather slyly) to proceed, he declared he would rather not.
‘The king was greatly surprised and affected with the behaviour of the people on Sunday. They did not cheer as usual, but took off their hats and bowed as they passed along. He expressed himself strongly toSir Walter about this. Sir Walter said the verses of the cavalier to his mistress might be applied to the people:
“Yet this inconstancy is suchAs you too shall adore;I could not love thee, dear, so much,Loved I not honour more.”
“Yet this inconstancy is suchAs you too shall adore;I could not love thee, dear, so much,Loved I not honour more.”
“Yet this inconstancy is suchAs you too shall adore;I could not love thee, dear, so much,Loved I not honour more.”
“Yet this inconstancy is such
As you too shall adore;
I could not love thee, dear, so much,
Loved I not honour more.”
I found the lines were by Lovelace, addressed to his Lucasta, on his going to the wars. The king witnessed an incident that seemed, as Sir Walter said, to have made a deep impression on his mind. As he came along the Calton Hill road, the crowd made a rush down hill towards the royal carriage, and the king saw a child fall. Had it been in London, he said, the child would have been trampled to death, and he expected nothing else. But in a moment there was a loud cry of “Stop!” and five or six men linked themselves together arm-in-arm, and set themselves to keep off the crowd, standing like an arch; then a man stepped before them and lifted the boy, and held him up above the crowd, to shew that he was not hurt. Sir Walter heard the king relate this incident twice.’
In the autumn of 1825, Sir Walter visited Ireland, and thus, in homely confidential style, records his impressions:
‘My dear Willie—I conclude you are now returned, with wife and bairns, to Kaeside, and not the worse of your tour. I have been the better of mine; and Killarney being the extreme point, I am just about to commence my return to Dublin, where I only intend to remain two or three days at farthest. I should like to find a line from you, addressed “Care of David Macculloch, Esq., Cheltenham,” letting me know howmatters go on at Abbotsford—if you want money (as I suppose you do), and so forth.‘I have every reason to make a good report of Ireland, having been received with distinction, which is flattering, and with warm-hearted kindness, which is much better. I am happy to say the country is rapidly improving every year, which argues the spirit that is afloat, and indicates that British capital is finding its way into a country where it can be employed to advantage. The idea of security is gaining ground even in those districts which are, or rather were, the most unsettled, and plenty has brought her usual companion content, in her hand. But the public peace is secured chiefly by large bodies of armed police, called by the civil term of constables, but very unlike the Dogberries of England, being, in fact, soldiers on foot and horse, well armed and mounted, and dressed exactly like our yeomen. It is not pleasant to see this, but it is absolutely necessary for some time at least; and from all I can hear, the men are under strict discipline, and behave well. They are commanded by the magistracy, and are very alert.‘The soil is in most places extremely rich, but cultivation is not as yet well understood. That accursed system of making peats interferes with everything; and I have passed through whole counties where a very noble harvest, ripe for the sickle, was waiting for the next shower of rain; while all the population who should cut were up to the midst in bogs. Not a single field of turnips have I seen, owing probably to the same reason.‘The political disputes are of far less consequence here than we think in Britain; but, on the whole, itwould be highly desirable that the Catholic Bill should pass. It would satisfy most of the higher classes of that persuasion, who seem much inclined to form a sort of Low Church, differing in ceremonies more than in essential points from that of the English Church. I mean they would do this tacitly and gradually. The lower class will probably continue for a long time bigoted Papists; but education becoming general, it is to be supposed that popery, in its violent tenets, will decline even amongst them. By the way, education is already far more general than in England. I saw in the same village four hundred Catholic children attending school, and about two hundred Protestants attending another. The peculiar doctrines of neither church were permitted to be taught; and there were Protestants amongst the Papist children, and Papists among the Protestant.‘The general condition of the peasantry requires much improvement. Their cabins are wretched, and their dress such a labyrinth of rags, that I have often feared some button would give way, and shame us all. But this is mending, and the younger people are all more decently dressed, and the new huts which are arising are greatly better than the old pigsties. In short, all is on the move and the mend. But as I must be on the move myself, I must defer the rest of my discoveries till we meet. We have in our party, Anne, Lockhart, Walter and his wife, and two Miss Edgeworths, so we are a jolly party. Will you shew this to Lady Scott? I wrote to her two days since.—Always truly yours,Walter Scott.‘Killarney,8th August.’
‘My dear Willie—I conclude you are now returned, with wife and bairns, to Kaeside, and not the worse of your tour. I have been the better of mine; and Killarney being the extreme point, I am just about to commence my return to Dublin, where I only intend to remain two or three days at farthest. I should like to find a line from you, addressed “Care of David Macculloch, Esq., Cheltenham,” letting me know howmatters go on at Abbotsford—if you want money (as I suppose you do), and so forth.
‘I have every reason to make a good report of Ireland, having been received with distinction, which is flattering, and with warm-hearted kindness, which is much better. I am happy to say the country is rapidly improving every year, which argues the spirit that is afloat, and indicates that British capital is finding its way into a country where it can be employed to advantage. The idea of security is gaining ground even in those districts which are, or rather were, the most unsettled, and plenty has brought her usual companion content, in her hand. But the public peace is secured chiefly by large bodies of armed police, called by the civil term of constables, but very unlike the Dogberries of England, being, in fact, soldiers on foot and horse, well armed and mounted, and dressed exactly like our yeomen. It is not pleasant to see this, but it is absolutely necessary for some time at least; and from all I can hear, the men are under strict discipline, and behave well. They are commanded by the magistracy, and are very alert.
‘The soil is in most places extremely rich, but cultivation is not as yet well understood. That accursed system of making peats interferes with everything; and I have passed through whole counties where a very noble harvest, ripe for the sickle, was waiting for the next shower of rain; while all the population who should cut were up to the midst in bogs. Not a single field of turnips have I seen, owing probably to the same reason.
‘The political disputes are of far less consequence here than we think in Britain; but, on the whole, itwould be highly desirable that the Catholic Bill should pass. It would satisfy most of the higher classes of that persuasion, who seem much inclined to form a sort of Low Church, differing in ceremonies more than in essential points from that of the English Church. I mean they would do this tacitly and gradually. The lower class will probably continue for a long time bigoted Papists; but education becoming general, it is to be supposed that popery, in its violent tenets, will decline even amongst them. By the way, education is already far more general than in England. I saw in the same village four hundred Catholic children attending school, and about two hundred Protestants attending another. The peculiar doctrines of neither church were permitted to be taught; and there were Protestants amongst the Papist children, and Papists among the Protestant.
‘The general condition of the peasantry requires much improvement. Their cabins are wretched, and their dress such a labyrinth of rags, that I have often feared some button would give way, and shame us all. But this is mending, and the younger people are all more decently dressed, and the new huts which are arising are greatly better than the old pigsties. In short, all is on the move and the mend. But as I must be on the move myself, I must defer the rest of my discoveries till we meet. We have in our party, Anne, Lockhart, Walter and his wife, and two Miss Edgeworths, so we are a jolly party. Will you shew this to Lady Scott? I wrote to her two days since.—Always truly yours,
Walter Scott.
‘Killarney,8th August.’
The brilliance of Abbotsford had now reached itsculminating point. The commercial crisis of 1825–26 was close at hand, and the first note of the alarm and confusion in the money-market suspended all improvements, and occasioned intense anxiety to Sir Walter. We add two letters as supplementing Lockhart’s narrative:
‘My dear William—The money-market in London is in a tremendous state, so much so that, whatever good reason I have, and I have the best, for knowing that Constable and his allies, Hurst and Robinson, are in perfect force, yet I hold it wise and necessary to prepare myself for making good my engagements, which come back on me suddenly, or by taking up those which I hold good security for. For this purpose I have resolved to exercise my reserved faculty to burden Abbotsford with £8000 or £10,000. I can easily get the money, and having no other debts, and these well secured, I hold it better to “put money in my purse,” and be a debtor on my land for a year or two, till the credit of the public is restored. I may not want the money, in which case I will buy into the funds, and make some cash by it. But I think it would be most necessary, and even improper not to be fully prepared.‘What I want of you is to give me a copy of the rental of Abbotsford, as it now stands, mentioning the actual rents of ground let, and the probable rents of those in my hand. You gave me one last year, but I would rather have the actual rents, and as such business is express, I would have you send it immediately, and keep it all as much within as you think fair and prudent. Your letter need only contain the rental, and you maywrite your remarks separately. I have not the slightest idea of losing a penny, but the distrust is so great in London that the best houses refuse the best bills of the best tradesmen, and as I have retained such a sum in view of protecting my literary commerce, I think it better to make use of it, and keep my own mind easy, than to carry about bills to unwilling banks, and beg for funds which I can use of my own. I have more than £10,000 to receive before Midsummer, but then I might be put to vexation before that, which I am determined to prevent.‘By all I can learn, this is just such an embarrassment as may arise when pickpockets cry “Fire!” in a crowd, and honest men get trampled to death. Thank God, I can clear myself of themêlée, and am not afraid of the slightest injury. If the money horizon does not clear up in a month or two, I will abridge my farming, &c. I cannot find there is any real cause for this; but an imaginary one will do equal mischief. I need not say this is confidential.—Yours truly,Walter Scott.‘16th December[1825],Edinburgh.’
‘My dear William—The money-market in London is in a tremendous state, so much so that, whatever good reason I have, and I have the best, for knowing that Constable and his allies, Hurst and Robinson, are in perfect force, yet I hold it wise and necessary to prepare myself for making good my engagements, which come back on me suddenly, or by taking up those which I hold good security for. For this purpose I have resolved to exercise my reserved faculty to burden Abbotsford with £8000 or £10,000. I can easily get the money, and having no other debts, and these well secured, I hold it better to “put money in my purse,” and be a debtor on my land for a year or two, till the credit of the public is restored. I may not want the money, in which case I will buy into the funds, and make some cash by it. But I think it would be most necessary, and even improper not to be fully prepared.
‘What I want of you is to give me a copy of the rental of Abbotsford, as it now stands, mentioning the actual rents of ground let, and the probable rents of those in my hand. You gave me one last year, but I would rather have the actual rents, and as such business is express, I would have you send it immediately, and keep it all as much within as you think fair and prudent. Your letter need only contain the rental, and you maywrite your remarks separately. I have not the slightest idea of losing a penny, but the distrust is so great in London that the best houses refuse the best bills of the best tradesmen, and as I have retained such a sum in view of protecting my literary commerce, I think it better to make use of it, and keep my own mind easy, than to carry about bills to unwilling banks, and beg for funds which I can use of my own. I have more than £10,000 to receive before Midsummer, but then I might be put to vexation before that, which I am determined to prevent.
‘By all I can learn, this is just such an embarrassment as may arise when pickpockets cry “Fire!” in a crowd, and honest men get trampled to death. Thank God, I can clear myself of themêlée, and am not afraid of the slightest injury. If the money horizon does not clear up in a month or two, I will abridge my farming, &c. I cannot find there is any real cause for this; but an imaginary one will do equal mischief. I need not say this is confidential.—Yours truly,
Walter Scott.
‘16th December[1825],Edinburgh.’
‘The confusion of 1814 is a joke to this. I have no debts of my own. On the contrary, £3000 and more lying out on interest, &c. It is a little hard that, making about £7000 a year, and working hard for it, I should have this botheration. But it arises out of the nature of the same connection which gives, and has given me, a fortune, and therefore I am not entitled to grumble.’