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Memoirs of the Life of Sir Walter Scott, Bart

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Memoirs of the Life of Sir Walter Scott, Bart * a MEMOIRS OF THE LIFE OF SIR WALTER SCOTT, BART. BY J. G. LOCKHART VOL. II. BOSTON: V OTIS, BROADERS, AND COMPANY. 1837 CONTENTS OF THE SECOND VOLUME CHAPTER I. Page. Contributions to the Edinburgh Review—Progress of the Tristrem—and of the of the Last Minstrel—Visit of Wordsworth—Publication of " Lay Sir Tristrem."—1803-1804, 1 CHAPTER II. Removal to Ashestiel—Death of Captain Robert Scott—Mungo Park— Completion and Publication of the Lay of the Last Minstrel—1804-1805, 26 CHAPTER III. with — of Partnership James Ballantyne Literary Projects 5 Edition the British Poets Edition of the ; Ancient English Chronicles, &c. &c— Edition of Dryden undertaken—Earl Moira Commander of the Forces in Scotland—Sham Battles—Articles in the Edinburgh Review—Com- mencement of Waverley—Letter on Ossian—Mr. Skene's Reminis- cences of Ashestiel—Excursion to Cumberland—Alarm of Invasion— Visit of Mr. Southey—Correspondence on Dryden with Ellis and Words- worth— 180o ; 54 CHAPTER IV. Affair of the Clerkship of Session—Letters to Ellis and Lord Dalkeith— Visit to London—Earl Spencer and Mr. Fox—Caroline, Princess of Wales—Joanna Baillie—Appointment as Clerk of Session—Lord Mel- ville's Trial—Song on his Acquittal—1806, 86 CHAPTER V. Dryden—Critical Pieces—Edition of Slingsby's Memoirs, &c.—Mar'mion begun—Visit to London—Ellis—Rose—Canning—Miss Seward—Scott Secretary to the Commission on Scotch Jurisprudence—Letters to Southey, &c.—Publication of Marmion—Anecdotes—The Edinburgh Review on Marmion—1806-1808, 107 CHAPTER VI. Edition of Dryden published—And criticised by Mr. Hallam—Weber's —Editions of Carleton's Memoirs Romances Quecnlioo-hall ; Captain ; of Robert Earl of The Sadler The Memoirs Cary, Monmouth ; Papers 3 and the Somers' Tracts—Edition of Swift begun—Letters to Joanna Baillie and George Ellis on the affairs of the Peninsula—John Struthers —James Hogg— Visit of Mr. Morritt—Mr. Morritt's Reminiscences of Ashestiel—Scott's Domestic Life— 1808, 142 iv CONTENTS. CHAPTER VII. Page. Quarrel with Messrs. Constable and Hunter—John Ballantyne established as a Bookseller in Edinburgh—Scott's Literary Projects—The Edin- burgh Annual Register, &c.—Meeting of James Ballantyne and John Murray—Murray's Visit to Ashestiel— Politics—The Peninsular War— Project of the Quarterly Review—Correspondence with Ellis, Gifford, Morritt, Southey, Sharpe, &c—1803-1809, 168 CHAPTER VIII. Case of a Poetical Tailor condemned to death at Edinburgh—His Letters to Scott—Death of —Scott in London—Mr. Morrilt's description " " Camp of him as a lion in town—Dinner at Mr. Sotheby's—Coleridge's Fire, Famine and — Review started—First Visit to ; Slaughter The Quarterly Rokeby—The Lady of the Lake begun—Excursion to the Trossachs and Loch Lomond—Letter on Byron's English Bards and Scotch Re- viewers —Death of Daniel Scott—Correspondence about Mr. Canning's Duel with Lord Castlereagh—Miss Baillie's Family Legend acted at Edinburgh—Theatrical Anecdotes—Kemble—Siddons—Terrv—Letter on the Death of Miss Seward—1309-1810, .' 199 CHAPTER IX. Affair of Thomas Scott's Extractorship discussed in the House of Lords— Speeches of Lord Lauderdale, Lord Melville, &c.—Lord Holland at the Friday Club—Publication of the Lady of the Lake—-Correspondence concerning Versification with Ellis and Canning—The Poem criticised by Jeffrey and Mackintosh—Letters to Southey and Morritt—Anecdotes from James Ballantyne's Memoranda—1810, 227 CHAPTER X. First Visit to the Hebrides—Stafl'a—Skye—Mull—lona, &c.—The Lord of the Isles projected—Letters to Joanna Baillie—Southey—and Mor- ritt—1810, 249 CHAPTER XL Life of Miss Seward—Waverley resumed—Ballantyne's Critique on the First Chapters of the Novel—Waverley again laid aside—Unfortunate of John and Co. of the Tix- Speculations Ballantyne ; History Culdees ; all Poetry; Beaumont and Fletcher; Edinburgh Annual Register, &c. —Scott's Essay on Judicial Reform—His scheme of going to India— Letters on the War in the Peninsula—Death of Lord President Blair— • and of Lord Melville—Publication of the Vision of Don Roderick— The Inferno of Altesidora, &c—1810-1311, 262 CHAPTER XII. of New arrangement concerning the Clerks Session—Scott's First Pur- chase of Land—Abbotsford &c.—Joanna Baillie's ; Turn-Again, Orra, &c.—Death of James Grahame—And of John Leyden—1811, 282 MEMOIRS OF THE LIFE OF SIR WALTER SCOTT. CHAPTER I. CONTRIBUTIONS TO THE EDINBURGH REVIEW—PROGRESS OF THE TRISTREM — AND OF THE LAY OF THE LAST MINSTREL — VISIT OF WORDSWORTH — PUBLICATION OF " SIR TRISTREM." — 1803-1804. " " Shortly after the complete Minstrelsy issued from the press, Scott made his first appearance as a reviewer. The Edinburgh Review had been commenced in October, 1802, under the superintendence of the Rev. Sidney Smith, with whom, during his short residence in Scotland, he had lived on terms of great kindness and familiarity. Mr. Smith soon resigned the editorship to Mr. Jeffrey, who had by this time been for several years among the most valued of Scott's friends and at the bar the new companions ; and, journal being far from committing itself to violent politics at the outset, he appreciated the brilliant talents regularly en- gaged in it far too highly, not to be well pleased with the opportunity of occasionally exercising his pen in its service. His first contribution was, I believe, an article on Southey's Amadis of Gaul, included in the number for October, 1803. Another, on Sibbald's Chronicle of Scottish Poetry, ap- peared in the same number:—a third, on Godwin's Life of Chaucer; a fourth, on Ellis's Specimens of Ancient Eng- vol. II. 1 2 LIFE OF SIR WALTER SCOTT. lish and a on the Life and Works of Chatter- Poetry ; fifth, ton, followed in the course of 1804.* During the summer of 1803, however, his chief literary " " still the Tristrem and I shall labor was on ; presently give some further extracts from his letters to Ellis, which in he continued his will amply illustrate the spirit which researches about the Seer of Ercildoune, and the interrup- tions which these owed to the prevalent alarm of French invasion. Both as Quarter-master of the Edinburgh Light- horse, and as Sheriff of the Forest, he had a full share of the responsibility in the warlike arrangements to which authorities of Scotland had at been roused nor were length ; the duties of his two offices considered as strictly compati- ble by Francis Lord Napier, then Lord-lieutenant of Sel- kirkshire for I find several letters in which his ; Lordship complains that the incessant drills and musters of Mussel- burgh and Portobello prevented the Sheriff from attending county meetings held at Selkirk in the course of this sum- mer and autumn, for the purpose of organizing the trained bands of the Forest, on a scale hitherto unattempted. Lord Napier strongly urges the propriety of his resigning his connection with the Edinburgh troop, and fixing his summer residence some where within the limits of his he so far as to that if proper jurisdiction ; nay, goes hint, these suggestions should be neglected, it must be his duty to state the case to the Government. Scott could not be all inva- induced, (least of by a threat,) while the fears of sion still prevailed, to resign his place among his old com- " of " the brand but he seems to have panions voluntary ; presently acquiesced in the propriety of the Lord-Lieuten- ant's advice respecting a removal from Lasswade to Ettrick Forest. The following extract is from a letter written at Mussel- burgh, during this summer or autumn : — " Miss Seward's acceptable favor reaches me in a place, and at a time, of great bustle, as the corps of voluntary cavalry to which 1 Scott's contributions to our periodical literature have been, with some trivial exceptions, included in the recent collection of his Miscel- laneous Prose Writings. LETTER TO MISS SEWARD. 3 I is belong quartered for a short time in this village, for the sake of (1 liiling and discipline. Nevertheless, had your letter announced the name of the took the trouble gentleman who of forwarding it, I would have made it my business to find him out, and to prevail on him, if possible, to spend a day or two with us in quarters. are here a We assuming very military appearance. Three regi- ments of with a militia, formidable park of artillery, are encamped just by us. The Edinburgh troop, to which I have the honor to be consists quarter-master, entirely of young gentlemen of family, and is, of course, admirably well mounted and armed. There are oth- er four troops in the regiment, consisting of yeomanry, whose iron faces and muscular forms announce the hardness of the climate against which they wrestle, and the powers which nature has given them to contend with and subdue it. These corps have been easily raised in Scotland, the farmers being in general a high- spirited race of men, fond of active exercises, and patient of hard- ship and fatigue. For myself, I must own that to one who has, like myself, la tete un peu exaltee, the pomp and circumstance of war gives, for a time, a very poignant and pleasing sensation. The imposing appearance of cavalry, in particular, and the rush which marks their onset, appear to me to partake highly of the sublime. Perhaps I am the more attached to this sort of sport of swords, be- cause my health requires much active exercise, and a lameness contracted in childhood renders it inconvenient for me to take it otherwise than on — horseback. I have, too, a hereditary attachment to the animal not, I flatter myself, of the common jockey cast, but because I regard him as the kindest and most generous of the subordinate tribes.
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