THE CHRONICLES OF THE CANONGATE AND OTHER TALES
The remaining tales of the Waverley Novels require only brief mention.
There is but little in them of the 'Country of Sir Walter Scott,' and
scarcely more of the author himself. They are the final efforts of a
man whose extraordinary buoyancy of youthful spirit is at last
beginning to sink beneath a burden too great for human endurance. To
begin at fifty-five the uninspiring task of 'paying for dead horses'
the vast sum of £117,000, an amount which few men are able to earn by
honest labour in all the days of their lives, required a superb courage
which only Scott's high sense of honour could have sustained. Scarcely
had the resolve been made when a second crushing blow fell with a force
more stunning than the first. His beloved wife, the companion of
thirty years, was taken away at the hour of his greatest need. She who
could relieve the tedium of his toil by slipping quietly into the room
to see if the fire burned, or to ask some kind question, was no longer
present to comfort him. He felt a paralyzing sense of loneliness and
old age, which even the devotion of his daughter Anne could not
relieve. To continue the awful grind of writing for money--for
something which he could not enjoy nor save for any cherished purpose,
but must surrender at once to others--required an almost superhuman
exertion of will power. His health began to fail. Headaches and
insomnia, added to rheumatism, {388} caused him great distress. His
early lameness became intensified and made walking so painful that he
had to abandon what had been his favourite form of exercise. The once
vigorous frame had prematurely worn out under the strain imposed upon
it. Scott had become an aged man at less than threescore years. Yet
in these years of disappointment, grief, and physical pain he produced
an amount of work of which an ordinary man might well be proud had it
represented a lifetime of toil. From 1826, the year of Constable's
failure, to 1831, this man of iron will produced no less than forty[1]
volumes, besides fifteen important reviews, essays, etc., and in
addition supervised the publication of his complete prose writings and
the Waverley Novels, preparing for the latter a series of exhaustive
introductions and notes.
I have anticipated a little by devoting a separate chapter to 'The Fair
Maid of Perth' which appeared as {389} the Second Series of the
'Chronicles of the Canongate' in 1828. The 'First Series' was
published in 1827 and comprised 'The Two Drovers,' 'The Highland
Widow,' and 'The Surgeon's Daughter.' To many the chief interest lies
in the Introduction. When the work was first projected, Scott thought
of preserving his incognito by conceiving the tales to be the work of
one Chrystal Croftangry, an elderly gentleman who had taken quarters
for a time within the Sanctuary, as the immediate vicinity of Holyrood
was called. Here, as in the famous Alsatia of London, debtors were
safe from arrest. Scott at one time feared that the importunities of a
certain relentless creditor might force him to take refuge in the
Sanctuary. On November 1, 1827, he made this entry in his Journal: 'I
waked in the night and lay two hours in feverish meditation ... I
suppose that I, the Chronicler of the Canongate, will have to take up
my residence in the Sanctuary, unless I prefer the more airy residence
of the Colton Jail, or a trip to the Isle of Man.' Fortunately this
creditor was silenced by Scott's generous friend, Sir William Forbes,
who privately paid the claim out of his own pocket.[2]
There is much in Mr. Croftangry's lengthy biography to remind one of
Sir Walter himself. He finds pleasure in visiting the Portobello sands
to see the cavalry drill, suggesting at once the young quartermaster of
the Edinburgh Volunteers, who rode a black charger up and down the
sands while he composed some of the most spirited stanzas of 'Marmion.'
He delights to spend the wet mornings with his book and the pleasant
ones in strolling upon the Salisbury Crags--just as Walter, {390} the
high-school boy and college student loved to do. In Mrs. Bethune
Baliol, the genial old lady who assists Mr. Croftangry in his literary
speculations, we have a kindly reference to a dear friend of the
author--Mrs. Murray Keith, who died at eighty-two years of age, 'one of
the few persons whose spirits and cleanliness, and freshness of mind
and body made old age lovely and desirable.'
The volume is still more interesting because it contains Scott's first
printed acknowledgment of the authorship of the Waverley Novels and
gives an insight into some of the original suggestions of both
characters and scenery. It also contains an account of the Theatrical
Fund Dinner held in Edinburgh in February, 1827, in which Scott was
publicly referred to as the author of the Waverley Novels and
acknowledged in the presence of three hundred gentlemen the secret
which he had hitherto confided to only twenty.
'The Highland Widow' is a story of that wild but beautiful portion of
Argyllshire of which Loch Awe is the chief attraction. Dumbarton
Castle, where the widow's unfortunate son bravely paid with his life
for the mistaken teachings and indiscretions of his mother, is a
conspicuous object on the right bank of the Clyde, a few miles below
Glasgow. It stands on a high rock, the circumference of which at the
base is fully a mile. It is still maintained as one of the defences of
Scotland, in accordance with the Treaty of Union.
'The Two Drovers' is an excellent short story picturing the life of
those men who drove their cattle from the {391} Highlands about Doune,
to the markets of Lincolnshire or elsewhere in England, making the
entire journey on foot, sleeping with their droves at night in all
kinds of weather and enduring many hardships.
'The Surgeon's Daughter,' though it opens in one of the midland
counties of Scotland, is chiefly a story of India, and the scenery is
therefore not a part of Scott's Country, for he never saw it. The good
old doctor, Gideon Grey, was, however, an old friend who lived in
Selkirk, Dr. Ebenezer Clarkson, one of those hard-working country
doctors who often combine, 'under a blunt exterior, professional skill
and enthusiasm, intelligence, humanity, courage, and science.'
'Anne of Geierstein,' though sharply criticized by James Ballantyne and
regarded by the author himself as a task which he hated, is
nevertheless a wonderful work of imagination, in which the old-time
genius is clearly manifest. Lockhart points out the power, which Scott
retained in advanced years, of depicting 'the feelings of youth with
all their original glow and purity,' and says that nowhere has the
author 'painted such feelings more deliciously' than in certain
passages of 'Anne of Geierstein.' He assigns as a reason the fact that
Scott always retained in memory the events of his own happy life, and
besides 'he was always living over again in his children, young at
heart whenever he looked on them.'
Though admittedly erroneous in certain historical details, the volume
contains some wonderful descriptions of scenery. Scott never visited
Switzerland, where {392} the chief interest of the story lies, but
seemed to have an instinctive grasp of its charm, which he accounted
for by saying, 'Had I not the honour of an intimate personal
acquaintance with every pass in the Highlands; and if that were not
enough, had I not seen pictures and prints _galore_?' The story opens
at the village of Lucerne, and the Lake of the Four Cantons, beneath
the shadow of the awe-inspiring Mount Pilatus. Those who have
travelled from this point to Bâle, and thence down the Rhine to
Strasburg, should have a fairly good idea of the scenery of the
novel--better, perhaps, than the author himself. Charles of Burgundy,
whose character and career had made a strong impression upon Scott
through the pages of Philippe de Comines, appears once more, and the
novel closes with his defeat at Nancy and tragic death in a half-frozen
swamp, the victim of the traitorous Campo-basso. The story of King
René and the events at Aix in Provence was an afterthought, woven into
the tale at the suggestion of James Skene, who supplied the necessary
details.
'Count Robert of Paris' is a tale of Constantinople, a city which Scott
had not visited. The difficulties under which it was written may be
judged from such expressions in the Journal as these: 'My pen stammers
egregiously and I write horridly incorrect'; 'The task of pumping my
brain becomes inevitably harder'; 'My bodily strength is terribly gone;
perhaps my mental also.' The spirit which enabled him to persevere in
spite of Cadell and Ballantyne, who were again criticizing severely,
may be seen from these lines: 'But I will fight it out if I can. It
would argue too great an attachment {393} of consequence to my literary
labours to sink under critical clamour. Did I know how to begin, _I
would begin again this very day, although I knew I should sink at the
end._'
In spite of the doctor's advice, he kept on with his dictation--for he
could no longer use the pen--and finished 'Count Robert' amidst a
frightful sea of troubles. He had suffered three or four strokes of
apoplexy or palsy, and had experienced daily tortures from cramp,
rheumatism, and increasing lameness. Yet in the midst of all this
affliction he thought of his creditors and said repeatedly to Lockhart,
'I am very anxious to be done, one way or another, with this "Count
Robert," and a little story about the "Castle Dangerous"'--thus to the
last continuing the old trick of starting a new story before its
predecessor was finished. He even resumed his youthful practice of
going in search of material, and actually undertook an excursion to
Douglas in Lanarkshire, where he examined attentively the old
ivy-covered fragment of the original castle, the ruins of the old
church, and the crypt of the Douglases, filled with leaden coffins. He
even talked with the people of the village, after his old-time fashion,
and gathered such legends as they could remember. He was now on
familiar ground and speedily finished the latest story, bringing 'Count
Robert' to a close about the same time. The two were published in
November, 1831, as the Fourth Series of 'Tales of My Landlord.' These
volumes completed the literary labours of Sir Walter, except that he
continued to work a little at his notes and introductions, but at last
he took the advice of his friends and agreed to do no more work of an
exacting {394} nature. A journey to the Continent followed, including
a visit to Malta, but in the following year he was glad to return to
his beloved Abbotsford. On the 21st of September, 1832, lying in the
dining-room of the mansion which his industry and courage had saved to
his family, and listening to the rippling of his beloved river Tweed,
the brave and honourable as well as honoured writer, breathed his last.
He had fought a good fight and died in the belief that he had won. And
so he had. For although the debt was not entirely paid, the subsequent
sale of copyrights realized enough to satisfy all claims. Scott's
sense of honour and superb courage had won a glorious victory.
[1] The volumes were:--
Woodstock . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3 volumes
Life of Napoleon Buonaparte . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9
Chronicles of the Canongate, First Series,--comprising
The Two Drovers, The Highland Widow, and The Surgeon's
Daughter . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2
Tales of a Grandfather . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12
Chronicles of the Canongate, Second Series--The Fair
Maid of Perth . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
Anne of Geierstein . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
A History of Scotland . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2
The Doom of Devorgoil and Auchindrane . . . . . . . . . . . . 1
Letters on Demonology and Witchcraft . . . . . . . . . . . . 1
Tales of My Landlord, Fourth Series,--Count Robert of
Paris, and Castle Dangerous . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4
__
40
Three short stories, which Ballantyne objected to including in the
Canongate Chronicles, were printed in The Keepsake. These were 'My
Aunt Margaret's Mirror,' 'The Tapestried Chamber,' and the 'Death of
the Laird's Jock.'
[2] See Chapter V, _Rokeby_, page 95.
{395}