of an antiquarian book-printing association called the Bannatyne Club, the chairmanship of an oil-gas factory, and so forth. He had no inclination to thrust himself into such situations, but having been drawn into them, he set about the business which they involved with all the requisite zeal, and with a marvellous amount of skill, good temper, and judgment. The common-sense and sagacity which he exhibited in the performance of these duties, form, perhaps, a greater distinction between Scott and the generality of literary men than even his transcendent genius.

He had at this time, when the writer of these pages first knew him, the appearance of a respectable elderly countrygentleman. Tall, robust, and rather handsome in person, he was deformed by the shortness of his right limb, the foot of which only touched the ground at the toes, while he rocked from side to side on the support of a stout walkingcane, which he moved along with the foot, and put down at the same time. While living in town, he wore a common black suit; in the country, he had gray trousers, a short green jacket, and a white hat. The public is made familiar with his face by numberless portraits; it is only necessary to mention that at this time it was ruddy with the glow of health, and at the same time somewhat venerable from his thin gray hair. The countenance and quick gray eye usually had a common-world expression, but of a benevolent kind. All was changed, however, when he told anything serious, or recited a piece of ballad poetry; he then seemed to become a being of a totally different grade and sphere. A visitor to Abbotsford, seeing how much Scott's time was occupied with lion-hunters and with his work-people, asked him how he was ever able to write while in the country. 'I know,' he said, 'that you contrive to get a few hours in your own room, and that may do for the mere pen-work;

but when is it that you think?' 'Oh,' said Scott, 'I lie simmering over things for an hour or so before I get up, and there is the time I am dressing to overhaul my halfsleeping, half-waking projet de chapitre, and when I get the paper before me, it commonly runs off pretty easily. Besides, I often take a doze in the plantations, and while Tom marks out a dyke or a drain as I have directed, one's fancy may be running its ain riggs in some other world.'

It has been hinted that Scott's eldest son, Walter, had become an officer in a hussar regiment. This youth, in 1825, wedded a young heiress, Miss Jobson, much to the satisfaction of his father, who, in the marriage-contract, placed against the young lady's fortune a settlement of the estate of Abbotsford upon his son, reserving only his own liferent. He declared that he thus parted with the property of his lands with more pleasure than he ever derived from the acquisition or possession of them. He at the same time expended £3500 in purchasing a company for his son. It was now that the great poet might be considered as at the height of his fortunes. His career had hitherto been an almost uninterrupted series of prosperous and happy events; he had risen from the briefless barrister to the head of the literary world, a title, and the possession of a landed fortune, with the prospect of leaving a race of gentry to follow him. Alas! even while thus triumphantly exalted, the ground was hollow beneath his feet, and a sad prostration was approaching.

Keeping this reverse for its proper place, it is right here to mention that the novels had fallen off somewhat in popularity since The Monastery. The author was not made aware of this fact; but he nevertheless felt the necessity of varying his themes as much as possible, in order to preserve

the public favour. Hence his shifting ground to England and France, and his attempt, in St Ronan's Well, to depict the society of the modern world. Latterly, he bethought him that history was a field of some promise, and he was disposed to enter it.

It was now (June 1825) that Mr Constable, moved by some examples of popular publishing in London, adopted the idea that that trade had never been conducted on right principles, seeing that it sought customers only in the more affluent classes, while the masses were left to regard books as luxuries beyond their reach. He projected a periodical issue of volumes, at a comparatively low price, to consist of reprints of approved copyright works belonging to his house, mingled with original works; and claiming and obtaining the support of Scott, it was arranged that the Waverley Novels should reappear in this cheap form, alternated at starting with the volumes of a Life of Napoleon Bonaparte, to be composed for the purpose by the same author. Thus was Scott set down, in 1825, to the history of one whose career he had beheld, while it lasted, with the strongest sentiments of reprobation and hatred, feeling, as he did, that the French emperor was the public enemy of England in the first place, and all Europe in the second. It was at first intended that the work should consist of four volumes, or less than a half of what it ultimately became. Just before going seriously into his task, he paid a visit to his son in Ireland, where he was received and entertained with the greatest enthusiasm by all classes-to his own surprise, as he had regarded the Irish as not a reading people. The contrast between the elegant mansions of the gentry in which he lived, with the misery of the houses of the general population, awoke painful feelings in his mind; but upon the whole, he much enjoyed his tour in Ireland.

In the later part of 1825, a second domestic change took place. His eldest daughter, Sophia, had been married in 1820 to Mr J. G. Lockhart, a young barrister, destined to be the biographer of his father-in-law, and editor of the Quarterly Review. Hitherto, the young couple had lived in his immediate neighbourhood, both in town and country. He delighted in the ballads which Mrs Lockhart sang to him with the accompaniment of her harp; he found Mr Lockhart a useful adviser in literary matters, and a most agreeable companion; and he felt the tenderest interest in their eldest child, called John Hugh, or, familiarly, 'Hugh Littlejohn,' whose fatal delicacy of constitution only heightened the affection he was otherwise fitted to excite. In consequence of an offer of the editorship of the Quarterly Review, Mr Lockhart removed to London with his family, by which Scott's family circle was of course much contracted. This, however, was but a trifling evil compared with others which were about to befall the hitherto fortunate author of Waverley.

CHAPTER IX.

MISFORTUNES BRAVELY BORNE.

HE years 1824 and 1825 were distinguished by an extraordinary mania for speculation, the consequence of which was, that, towards the close of the latter year, a scarcity of money

began to be generally felt. A tightening of this kind always of course tells severely upon men who have been keeping up their trade by means of fictitious bills; and of this class, it now appeared, were Archibald Constable and Company. The leading member of this firm

had been fortunate in the proprietorship of the Edinburgh Review, and the publishing of many of the works of Scott. Naturally grand in his ideas, and of an aspiring temper, at the same time that he despised, and in practice wholly overlooked, common mercantile calculations, he had come to conduct business in a manner which usually leads to ruin. We have seen that the bookselling concern of Scott -John Ballantyne and Company-was indebted to him for some important assistance in enabling it to wind up; the printing concern-James Ballantyne and Company-was also indebted to him for a vast amount of business; while Scott, more personally, was so imprudent as to take bill payments from him for works as yet unwritten, that he might help out his equally imprudent purchases of land. By these means, it came about very naturally that the name of James Ballantyne and Company-that is, Sir Walter Scott-was lent to Constable and Company for the raising of large sums amongst the banks. Scott, venerating the supposed sagacity of Constable, recked not of the danger of this traffic. Constable himself, inflated with a high sense of the literary property and stock which he held, regarded himself as a rich man, notwithstanding the large borrowings to which he condescended. James Ballantyne, venerating both, easy of nature, and unprepared by education or habit to keep a rigid supervision over business matters, gave no alarm regarding the immense compromise of his own and his friend's name.

These explanations serve so far; for what more is necessary, it must, we fear, be admitted that the whole group of persons concerned in the poems and novels, including the mighty Magician himself, were naturally enough intoxicated to a certain degree by a literary success so infinitely exceeding all precedent. All of them, except

H