INSANITY OF HENRY WEBER. -- LETTERS ON THE ABDICATION OF
NAPOLEON, ETC. -- PUBLICATION OF SCOTT'S LIFE AND EDITION OF
SWIFT. -- ESSAYS FOR THE SUPPLEMENT TO THE ENCYCLOPÆDIA
BRITANNICA. -- COMPLETION AND PUBLICATION OF WAVERLEY
1814
I have to open the year 1814 with a melancholy story. Mention has
been made, more than once, of Henry Weber, a poor German scholar,
who escaping to this country in 1804, from misfortunes in his own,
excited Scott's compassion, and was thenceforth furnished, through
his means, with literary employment of various sorts. Weber was a
man of considerable learning; but Scott, as was his custom, appears
to have formed an exaggerated notion of his capacity, and certainly
countenanced him, to his own severe cost, in several most
unfortunate undertakings. When not engaged on things of a more
ambitious character, he had acted for ten years as his protector's
amanuensis, and when the family were in Edinburgh, he very often
dined with them. There was something very interesting in his
appearance and manners: he had a fair, open countenance, in which
the honesty and the enthusiasm of his nation were alike visible; his
demeanor was gentle and modest; and he had not only a stock of
curious antiquarian knowledge, but the reminiscences, which he
detailed with amusing simplicity, of an early life chequered with
many strange-enough adventures. He was, in short, much a favorite
with Scott and all the household; and was invited to dine with
them so frequently, chiefly because his friend was aware that he had
an unhappy propensity to drinking, and was anxious to keep him away
from places where he might have been more likely to indulge it. This
vice, however, had been growing on him; and of late Scott had found
it necessary to make some rather severe remonstrances about habits
which were at once injuring his health, and interrupting his
literary industry.
[Illustration: J. B. S. MORRITT
_From the painting by Sir M. A. Shee_]
They had, however, parted kindly when Scott left Edinburgh at
Christmas, 1813,--and the day after his return, Weber attended him
as usual in his library, being employed in transcribing extracts
during several hours, while his friend, seated over against him,
continued working at the Life of Swift. The light beginning to fail,
Scott threw himself back in his chair, and was about to ring for
candles, when he observed the German's eyes fixed upon him with an
unusual solemnity of expression. "Weber," said he, "what's the
matter with you?" "Mr. Scott," said Weber, rising, "you have long
insulted me, and I can bear it no longer. I have brought a pair of
pistols with me, and must insist on your taking one of them
instantly;" and with that he produced the weapons, which had been
deposited under his chair, and laid one of them on Scott's
manuscript. "You are mistaken, I think," said Scott, "in your way of
setting about this affair--but no matter. It can, however, be no
part of your object to annoy Mrs. Scott and the children; therefore,
if you please, we will put the pistols into the drawer till after
dinner, and then arrange to go out together like gentlemen." Weber
answered with equal coolness, "I believe that will be better," and
laid the second pistol also on the table. Scott locked them both in
his desk, and said, "I am glad you have felt the propriety of what I
suggested--let me only request further, that nothing may occur while
we are at dinner to give my wife any suspicion of what has been
passing." Weber again assented, and Scott withdrew to his
dressing-room, from which he immediately despatched a message to one
of Weber's intimate companions,--and then dinner was served, and
Weber joined the family circle as usual. He conducted himself with
perfect composure, and everything seemed to go on in the ordinary
way, until whiskey and hot water being produced, Scott, instead of
inviting his guest to help himself, mixed two moderate tumblers of
toddy, and handed one of them to Weber, who, upon that, started up
with a furious countenance, but instantly sat down again, and when
Mrs. Scott expressed her fear that he was ill, answered placidly
that he was liable to spasms, but that the pain was gone. He then
took the glass, eagerly gulped down its contents, and pushed it back
to Scott. At this moment the friend who had been sent for made his
appearance, and Weber, on seeing him enter the room, rushed past him
and out of the house, without stopping to put on his hat. The
friend, who pursued instantly, came up with him at the end of the
street, and did all he could to soothe his agitation, but in vain.
The same evening he was obliged to be put into a strait-waistcoat;
and though in a few days he exhibited such symptoms of recovery that
he was allowed to go by himself to pay a visit in the north of
England, he there soon relapsed, and continued ever afterwards a
hopeless lunatic, being supported to the end of his life, in June,
1818, at Scott's expense, in an asylum at York.
The reader will now appreciate the gentle delicacy of the following
letter:--
TO J. B. S. MORRITT, ESQ., ROKEBY, GRETA BRIDGE.
EDINBURGH, 7th January, 1814.
Many happy New Years to you and Mrs. Morritt.
MY DEAR MORRITT,--I have postponed writing a long while, in hopes to
send you the Life of Swift. But I have been delayed by an odd
accident. Poor Weber, whom you may have heard me mention as a sort of
grinder of mine, who assisted me in various ways, has fallen into a
melancholy state. His habits, like those of most German students, were
always too convivial--this, of course, I guarded against while he was
in my house, which was always once a week at least; but unfortunately
he undertook a long walk through the Highlands of upwards of 2000
miles, and, I suppose, took potations pottle deep to support him
through the fatigue. His mind became accordingly quite unsettled, and
after some strange behavior here, he was fortunately prevailed upon to
go to **** who resides in Yorkshire. It is not unlikely, from
something that dropped from him, that he may take it into his head to
call at Rokeby, in which case you must parry any visit, upon the score
of Mrs. Morritt's health. If he were what he used to be, you would be
much pleased with him; for besides a very extensive general
acquaintance with literature, he was particularly deep in our old
dramatic lore, a good modern linguist, a tolerable draughtsman and
antiquary, and a most excellent hydrographer. I have not the least
doubt that if he submits to the proper regimen of abstinence and
moderate exercise, he will be quite well in a few weeks or days--if
not, it is miserable to think what may happen. The being suddenly
deprived of his services in this melancholy way, has flung me back at
least a month with Swift, and left me no time to write to my friends,
for all my memoranda, etc., were in his hands, and had to be
new-modelled, etc., etc.
Our glorious prospects on the Continent called forth the
congratulations of the City of Edinburgh among others. The Magistrates
asked me to draw their address, which was presented by the Lord
Provost in person, who happens to be a gentleman of birth and
fortune.[46] The Prince said some very handsome things respecting the
address, with which the Magistrates were so much elated, that they
have done the genteel thing (as Winifred Jenkins says) by their
literary adviser, and presented me with the freedom of the city, and a
handsome piece of plate. I got the freedom at the same time with Lord
Dalhousie and Sir Thomas Graham, and the Provost gave a very brilliant
entertainment. About 150 gentlemen dined at his own house, all as well
served as if there had been a dozen. So if one strikes a cuff on the
one side from ill-will, there is a pat on the other from kindness, and
the shuttlecock is kept flying. To poor Charlotte's great horror, I
chose my plate in the form of an old English tankard, an utensil for
which I have a particular respect, especially when charged with good
ale, cup, or any of these potables. I hope you will soon see mine.[47]
Your little friends, Sophia and Walter, were at a magnificent party on
Twelfth Night at Dalkeith, where the Duke and Duchess entertained all
Edinburgh. I think they have dreamed of nothing since but Aladdin's
lamp and the palace of Haroun Al-Raschid. I am uncertain what to do
this spring. I would fain go on the Continent for three or four weeks,
if it be then safe for non-combatants. If not, we will have a merry
meeting in London, and, like Master Silence,
"Eat, drink, and make good cheer,
And praise heaven for the merry year."[48]
I have much to say about Triermain. The fourth edition is at press.
The Empress Dowager of Russia has expressed such an interest in it,
that it will be inscribed to her, in some doggerel sonnet or other, by
the unknown author. This is funny enough.--Love a thousand times to
dear Mrs. Morritt, who, I trust, keeps pretty well. Pray write soon--a
modest request from
WALTER SCOTT.
The last of Weber's literary productions were the analyses of the
Old German Poems of the _Helden Buch_, and the _Nibelungen Lied_,
which appeared in a massive quarto, entitled Illustrations of
Northern Antiquities, published in the summer of 1814, by his and
Scott's friend, Mr. Robert Jameson. Scott avowedly contributed to
this collection an account of the Eyrbiggia Saga, which has since
been included in his Prose Miscellanies (Vol. V., edition 1834); but
any one who examines the share of the work which goes under Weber's
name will see that Scott had a considerable hand in that also. The
rhymed versions from the Nibelungen Lied came, I can have no doubt,
from his pen; but he never reclaimed these, or any other similar
benefactions, of which I have traced not a few; nor, highly curious
and even beautiful as many of them are, could they be intelligible,
if separated from the prose narrative on which Weber embroidered
them, in imitation of the style of Ellis's Specimens of Metrical
Romance.
The following letters, on the first abdication of Napoleon, are too
characteristic to be omitted here. I need not remind the reader how
greatly Scott had calmed his opinions, and softened his feelings,
respecting the career and fate of the most extraordinary man of our
age, before he undertook to write his history.
TO J. B. S. MORRITT, ESQ., PORTLAND PLACE, LONDON.
ABBOTSFORD, 30th April, 1814
"Joy--joy in London now!"--and in Edinburgh, moreover, my dear
Morritt; for never did you or I see, and never again shall we see,
according to all human prospects, a consummation so truly glorious, as
now bids fair to conclude this long and eventful war. It is startling
to think that, but for the preternatural presumption and hardness of
heart displayed by the arch-enemy of mankind, we should have had a
hollow and ominous truce with him, instead of a glorious and stable
peace with the country over which he tyrannized, and its lawful ruler.
But Providence had its own wise purposes to answer--and such was the
deference of France to the ruling power--so devoutly did they worship
the Devil for possession of his burning throne, that, it may be,
nothing short of his rejection of every fair and advantageous offer of
peace could have driven them to those acts of resistance which
remembrance of former convulsions had rendered so fearful to them.
Thank God! it is done at last: and--although I rather grudge him even
the mouthful of air which he may draw in the Isle of Elba--yet I
question whether the moral lesson would have been completed either by
his perishing in battle, or being torn to pieces (which I should
greatly have preferred), like the De Witts, by an infuriated crowd of
conscripts and their parents. Good God! with what strange feelings
must that man retire from the most unbounded authority ever vested in
the hands of one man, to the seclusion of privacy and restraint! We
have never heard of one good action which he did, at least for which
there was not some selfish or political reason; and the train of
slaughter, pestilence, and famine and fire, which his ambition has
occasioned, would have outweighed five hundredfold the private virtues
of a Titus. These are comfortable reflections to carry with one to
privacy. If he writes his own history, as he proposes, we may gain
something; but he must send it here to be printed. Nothing less than a
neck-or-nothing London bookseller, like John Dunton of yore, will
venture to commit to the press his strange details uncastrated. I
doubt if he has _stamina_ to undertake such a labor; and yet, in
youth, as I know from the brothers of Lauriston, who were his
school-companions, Buonaparte's habits were distinctly and strongly
literary. Spain, the Continental System, and the invasion of Russia he
may record as his three leading blunders--an awful lesson to
sovereigns that morality is not so indifferent to politics as
Machiavelians will assert. _Res nolunt diu male administrari._ Why can
we not meet to talk over these matters over a glass of claret? and
when shall that be! Not this spring, I fear, for time wears fast away,
and I have remained here nailed among my future oaks, which I measure
daily with a foot-rule. Those which were planted two years ago begin
to look very gayly, and a venerable plantation of four years old looks
as _bobbish_ as yours at the dairy by Greta side. Besides, I am
arranging this cottage a little more conveniently, to put off the
plague and expense of building another year; and I assure you, I
expect to spare Mrs. Morritt and you a chamber in the wall, with a
dressing-room and everything handsome about you. You will not
stipulate, of course, for many square feet.--You would be surprised to
hear how the Continent is awakening from its iron sleep. The utmost
eagerness seems to prevail about English literature. I have had
several voluntary epistles from different parts of Germany, from men
of letters, who are eager to know what we have been doing, while they
were compelled to play at blind man's buff with the _ci-devant
Empereur_. The feeling of the French officers, of whom we have many in
our vicinity, is very curious, and yet natural.[49] Many of them,
companions of Buonaparte's victories, and who hitherto have marched
with him from conquest to conquest, disbelieve the change entirely.
This is all very stupid to write to you, who are in the centre of
these wonders; but what else can I say, unless I should send you the
measure of the future fathers of the forest? Mrs. Scott is with me
here--the children in Edinburgh. Our kindest love attends Mrs.
Morritt. I hope to hear soon that her health continues to gain ground.
I have a letter from Southey, in high spirits on the glorious news.
What a pity this last battle[50] was fought. But I am glad the rascals
were beaten once more.
Ever yours,
WALTER SCOTT.
TO ROBERT SOUTHEY, ESQ., KESWICK.
EDINBURGH, 17th June, 1814.
MY DEAR SOUTHEY,--I suspended writing to thank you for the Carmen
Triumphale--(a happy omen of what you can do to immortalize our public
story)--until the feverish mood of expectation and anxiety should be
over. And then, as you truly say, there followed a stunning sort of
listless astonishment and complication of feeling, which, if it did
not lessen enjoyment, confused and confounded one's sense of it. I
remember the first time I happened to see a launch, I was neither so
much struck with the descent of the vessel, nor with its majestic
sweep to its moorings, as with the blank which was suddenly made from
the withdrawing so large an object, and the prospect which was at once
opened to the opposite side of the dock crowded with spectators.
Buonaparte's fall strikes me something in the same way: the huge bulk
of his power, against which a thousand arms were hammering, was
obviously to sink when its main props were struck away--and yet
now--when it has disappeared--the vacancy which it leaves in our minds
and attention marks its huge and preponderating importance more
strongly than even its presence. Yet I so devoutly expected the
termination, that in discussing the matter with Major Philips, who
seemed to partake of the doubts which prevailed during the feverish
period preceding the capture of Paris, when he was expressing his
apprehensions that the capital of France would be defended to the
last, I hazarded a prophecy that a battle would be fought on the
heights of Montmartre--(no great sagacity, since it was the point
where Marlborough proposed to attack, and for which Saxe projected a
scheme of defence)--and that if the allies were successful, which I
little doubted, the city would surrender, and the Senate proclaim the
dethronement of Buonaparte. But I never thought nor imagined that he
would have _given in_ as he has done. I always considered him as
possessing the genius and talents of an Eastern conqueror; and
although I never supposed that he possessed, allowing for some
difference of education, the liberality of conduct and political views
which were sometimes exhibited by old Hyder Ally, yet I did think he
might have shown the same resolved and dogged spirit of resolution
which induced Tippoo Saib to die manfully upon the breach of his
capital city with his sabre clenched in his hand. But this is a poor
devil, and cannot play the tyrant so rarely as Bottom the Weaver
proposed to do. I think it is Strap in Roderick Random, who, seeing a
highwayman that had lately robbed him, disarmed and bound, fairly
offers to box him for a shilling. One has really the same feeling with
respect to Buonaparte, though if he go out of life after all in the
usual manner, it will be the strongest proof of his own
insignificance, and the liberality of the age we live in. Were I a son
of Palm or Hoffer, I should be tempted to take a long shot at him in
his retreat to Elba. As for coaxing the French by restoring all our
conquests, it would be driving generosity into extravagance: most of
them have been colonized with British subjects, and improved by
British capital; and surely we owe no more to the French nation than
any well-meaning individual might owe to a madman, whom--at the
expense of a hard struggle, black eyes, and bruises--he has at length
overpowered, knocked down, and by the wholesome discipline of a bull's
pizzle and strait-jacket, brought to the handsome enjoyment of his
senses. I think with you, what we return to them should be well paid
for; and they should have no Pondicherry to be a nest of smugglers,
nor Mauritius to nurse a hornet-swarm of privateers. In short, draw
teeth, and pare claws, and leave them to fatten themselves in peace
and quiet, when they are deprived of the means of indulging their
restless spirit of enterprise.
--The above was written at Abbotsford last month, but left in my
portfolio there till my return some days ago; and now, when I look
over what I have written, I am confirmed in my opinion that we have
given the rascals too good an opportunity to boast that they have got
well off. An intimate friend of mine,[51] just returned from a long
captivity in France, witnessed the entry of the King, guarded by the
Imperial Guards, whose countenances betokened the most sullen and
ferocious discontent. The mob, and especially the women, pelted them
for refusing to cry, "Vive le Roi." If Louis is well advised, he will
get rid of these fellows gradually, but as soon as possible. "Joy, joy
in London now!" What a scene has been going on there! I think you may
see the Czar appear on the top of one of your stages one morning. He
is a fine fellow, and has fought the good fight. Yours affectionately,
WALTER SCOTT.
On the 1st of July, 1814, Scott's Life and Edition of Swift, in
nineteen volumes 8vo, at length issued from the press. This
adventure, undertaken by Constable in 1808, had been proceeded in
during all the variety of their personal relations, and now came
forth when author and publisher felt more warmly towards each other
than perhaps they had ever before done. The impression was of 1250
copies; and a reprint of similar extent was called for in 1824. The
Life of Swift has subsequently been included in the author's
Miscellanies, and has obtained a very wide circulation.
By his industrious inquiries, in which, as the preface gratefully
acknowledges, he found many zealous assistants, especially among the
Irish literati,[52] Scott added to this edition many admirable
pieces, both in prose and verse, which had never before been
printed, and still more which had escaped notice amidst old bundles
of pamphlets and broadsides. To the illustration of these and of all
the better known writings of the Dean, he brought the same
qualifications which had, by general consent, distinguished his
Dryden, "uniting," as the Edinburgh Review expresses it, "to the
minute knowledge and patient research of the Malones and Chalmerses,
a vigor of judgment and a vivacity of style to which they had no
pretensions." His biographical narrative, introductory essays, and
notes on Swift, show, indeed, an intimacy of acquaintance with the
obscurest details of the political, social, and literary history of
the period of Queen Anne, which it is impossible to consider without
feeling a lively regret that he never accomplished a long-cherished
purpose of preparing a Life and Edition of Pope on a similar scale.
It has been specially unfortunate for that "true deacon of the
craft," as Scott often called Pope, that first Goldsmith, and then
Scott, should have taken up, only to abandon it, the project of
writing his life and editing his works.
The Edinburgh Reviewer thus characterizes Scott's Memoir of the
Dean of St. Patrick's:--
"It is not everywhere extremely well written, in a literary point of
view, but it is drawn up in substance with great intelligence,
liberality, and good feeling. It is quite fair and moderate in
politics; and perhaps rather too indulgent and tender towards
individuals of all descriptions--more full, at least, of kindness and
veneration for genius and social virtue, than of indignation at
baseness and profligacy. Altogether, it is not much like the
production of a mere man of letters, or a fastidious speculator in
sentiment and morality; but exhibits throughout, and in a very
pleasing form, the good sense and large toleration of a man of the
world, with much of that generous allowance for the
'Fears of the brave and follies of the wise,'
which genius too often requires, and should therefore always be most
forward to show. It is impossible, however, to avoid noticing that Mr.
Scott is by far too favorable to the personal character of his author,
whom we think it would really be injurious to the cause of morality to
allow to pass either as a very dignified or a very amiable person. The
truth is, we think, that he was extremely ambitious, arrogant, and
selfish; of a morose, vindictive, and haughty temper; and though
capable of a sort of patronizing generosity towards his dependents,
and of some attachment towards those who had long known and flattered
him, his general demeanor, both in public and private life, appears to
have been far from exemplary; destitute of temper and magnanimity, and
we will add, of principle, in the former; and in the latter, of
tenderness, fidelity, or compassion."--_Edinburgh Review_, vol. xvii.
p. 9.
I have no desire to break a lance in this place in defence of the
personal character of Swift. It does not appear to me that he stands
at all distinguished among politicians (least of all, among the
politicians of his time) for laxity of principle; nor can I consent
to charge his private demeanor with the absence either of
tenderness, or fidelity, or compassion. But who ever dreamed--most
assuredly not Scott--of holding up the Dean of St. Patrick's as on
the whole an "exemplary character"? The biographer felt, whatever
his critic may have thought on the subject, that a vein of morbid
humor ran through Swift's whole existence, both mental and physical,
from the beginning. "He early adopted," says Scott, "the custom of
observing his birthday, as a term not of joy but of sorrow, and of
reading, when it annually recurred, the striking passage of
Scripture in which Job laments and execrates the day upon which it
was said in his father's house _that a man-child was born_;" and I
should have expected that any man who had considered the black close
of the career thus early clouded, and read the entry of Swift's
diary on the funeral of Stella, his epitaph on himself, and the
testament by which he disposed of his fortune, would have been
willing, like Scott, to dwell on the splendor of his immortal
genius, and the many traits of manly generosity "which he
unquestionably exhibited," rather than on the faults and foibles of
nameless and inscrutable disease, which tormented and embittered the
far greater part of his earthly being. What the critic says of the
practical and businesslike style of Scott's biography, appears very
just--and I think the circumstance eminently characteristic; nor, on
the whole, could his edition, as an edition, have been better dealt
with than in the Essay which I have quoted. It was, by the way,
written by Mr. Jeffrey, at Constable's particular request. "It was,
I think, the first time I ever asked such a thing of him," the
bookseller said to me; "and I assure you the result was no
encouragement to repeat such petitions." Mr. Jeffrey attacked
Swift's whole character at great length, and with consummate
dexterity; and, in Constable's opinion, his article threw such a
cloud on the Dean, as materially checked, for a time, the popularity
of his writings. Admirable as the paper is, in point of ability, I
think Mr. Constable may have considerably exaggerated its effects;
but in those days it must have been difficult for him to form an
impartial opinion upon such a question; for, as Johnson said of
Cave, that "he could not spit over his window without thinking of
The Gentleman's Magazine," I believe Constable allowed nothing to
interrupt his paternal pride in the concerns of his Review, until
the Waverley Novels supplied him with another periodical publication
still more important to his fortunes.
And this consummation was not long delayed: a considerable addition
having by that time been made to the original fragment, there
appeared in The Scots Magazine, for February 1, 1814, an
announcement, that "Waverley; or, 'Tis Sixty Years Since, a novel,
in 3 vols., 12mo," would be published in March. And before Scott
came into Edinburgh, at the close of the Christmas vacation, on the
12th of January, Mr. Erskine had perused the greater part of the
first volume, and expressed his decided opinion that Waverley would
prove the most popular of all his friend's writings.[53] The MS. was
forthwith copied by John Ballantyne, and sent to press. As soon as a
volume was printed, Ballantyne conveyed it to Constable, who did not
for a moment doubt from what pen it proceeded, but took a few days
to consider of the matter, and then offered £700 for the copyright.
When we recollect what the state of novel literature in those days
was, and that the only exceptions to its mediocrity, the Irish Tales
of Miss Edgeworth, however appreciated in refined circles, had a
circulation so limited that she had never realized a tithe of £700
by the best of them--it must be allowed that Constable's offer was a
liberal one. Scott's answer, however, transmitted through the same
channel, was that £700 was too much, in case the novel should not
be successful, and too little in case it should. He added, "If our
fat friend had said £1000, I should have been staggered." John did
not forget to hint this last circumstance to Constable, but the
latter did not choose to act upon it; and he ultimately published
the work, on the footing of an equal division of profits between
himself and the author. There was a considerable pause between the
finishing of the first volume and the beginning of the second.
Constable had, in 1812, acquired the copyright of the Encyclopædia
Britannica, and was now preparing to publish the valuable Supplement
to that work, which has since, with modifications, been incorporated
into its text. He earnestly requested Scott to undertake a few
articles for the Supplement; he agreed--and, anxious to gratify the
generous bookseller, at once laid aside his tale until he had
finished two essays--those on Chivalry and the Drama. They appear to
have been completed in the course of April and May, and he received
for each of them--as he did subsequently for that on Romance--£100.
The two next letters will give us, in more exact detail than the
author's own recollection could supply in 1830, the history of the
completion of Waverley. It was published on the 7th of July; and two
days afterwards he thus writes:--
TO J. B. S. MORRITT, ESQ., M. P., LONDON.
EDINBURGH, 9th July, 1814.
MY DEAR MORRITT,--I owe you many apologies for not sooner answering
your very entertaining letter upon your Parisian journey. I heartily
wish I had been of your party, for you have seen what I trust will not
be seen again in a hurry; since, to enjoy the delight of a
restoration, there is a necessity for a previous _bouleversement_ of
everything that is valuable in morals and policy, which seems to have
been the case in France since 1790.[54] The Duke of Buccleuch told me
yesterday of a very good reply of Louis to some of his attendants, who
proposed shutting the doors of his apartments to keep out the throng
of people. "Open the door," he said, "to John Bull; he has suffered a
great deal in keeping the door open for me."
Now, to go from one important subject to another, I must account for
my own laziness, which I do by referring you to a small anonymous sort
of a novel, in three volumes, Waverley, which you will receive by the
mail of this day. It was a very old attempt of mine to embody some
traits of those characters and manners peculiar to Scotland, the last
remnants of which vanished during my own youth, so that few or no
traces now remain. I had written great part of the first volume, and
sketched other passages, when I mislaid the MS., and only found it by
the merest accident as I was rummaging the drawers of an old
cabinet;[55] and I took the fancy of finishing it, which I did so
fast, that the last two volumes were written in three weeks. I had a
great deal of fun in the accomplishment of this task, though I do not
expect that it will be popular in the south, as much of the humor, if
there be any, is local, and some of it even professional. You,
however, who are an adopted Scotchman, will find some amusement in it.
It has made a very strong impression here, and the good people of
Edinburgh are busied in tracing the author, and in finding out
originals for the portraits it contains. In the first case, they will
probably find it difficult to convict the guilty author, although he
is far from escaping suspicion. Jeffrey has offered to make oath that
it is mine, and another great critic has tendered his affidavit _ex
contrario_; so that these authorities have divided the Gude Town.
However, the thing has succeeded very well, and is thought highly of.
I don't know if it has got to London yet. I intend to maintain my
_incognito_. Let me know your opinion about it. I should be most happy
if I could think it would amuse a painful thought at this anxious
moment. I was in hopes Mrs. Morritt was getting so much better, that
this relapse affects me very much. Ever yours truly,
W. SCOTT.
P. S.--As your conscience has very few things to answer for, you must
still burthen it with the secret of the Bridal. It is spreading very
rapidly, and I have one or two little fairy romances, which will make
a second volume, and which I would wish published, but not with my
name. The truth is, that this sort of muddling work amuses me, and I
am something in the condition of Joseph Surface, who was embarrassed
by getting himself too good a reputation; for many things may please
people well enough anonymously, which, if they have me in the
title-page, would just give me that sort of ill name which precedes
hanging--and that would be in many respects inconvenient if I thought
of again trying a _grande opus_.
This statement of the foregoing letter (repeated still more
precisely in the following one), as to the time occupied in the
composition of the second and third volumes of Waverley, recalls to
my memory a trifling anecdote, which, as connected with a dear
friend of my youth, whom I have not seen for many years, and may
very probably never see again in this world, I shall here set down,
in the hope of affording him a momentary, though not an unmixed
pleasure, when he may chance to read this compilation on a distant
shore--and also in the hope that my humble record may impart to some
active mind in the rising generation a shadow of the influence
which the reality certainly exerted upon his. Happening to pass
through Edinburgh in June, 1814, I dined one day with the gentleman
in question (now the Honorable William Menzies, one of the Supreme
Judges at the Cape of Good Hope), whose residence was then in George
Street, situated very near to, and at right angles with, North
Castle Street. It was a party of very young persons, most of them,
like Menzies and myself, destined for the Bar of Scotland, all gay
and thoughtless, enjoying the first flush of manhood, with little
remembrance of the yesterday, or care of the morrow. When my
companion's worthy father and uncle, after seeing two or three
bottles go round, left the juveniles to themselves, the weather
being hot, we adjourned to a library which had one large window
looking northwards. After carousing here for an hour or more, I
observed that a shade had come over the aspect of my friend, who
happened to be placed immediately opposite to myself, and said
something that intimated a fear of his being unwell. "No," said he,
"I shall be well enough presently, if you will only let me sit where
you are, and take my chair; for there is a confounded hand in sight
of me here, which has often bothered me before, and now it won't let
me fill my glass with a good will." I rose to change places with him
accordingly, and he pointed out to me this hand which, like the
writing on Belshazzar's wall, disturbed his hour of hilarity. "Since
we sat down," he said, "I have been watching it--it fascinates my
eye--it never stops--page after page is finished and thrown on that
heap of MS., and still it goes on unwearied--and so it will be till
candles are brought in, and God knows how long after that. It is the
same every night--I can't stand a sight of it when I am not at my
books."--"Some stupid, dogged, engrossing clerk, probably,"
exclaimed myself, or some other giddy youth in our society. "No,
boys," said our host, "I well know what hand it is--'tis Walter
Scott's." This was the hand that, in the evenings of three summer
weeks, wrote the last two volumes of Waverley. Would that all who
that night watched it had profited by its example of diligence as
largely as William Menzies!
In the next of these letters Scott enclosed to Mr. Morritt the
Prospectus of a new edition of the old poems of the Bruce and the
Wallace, undertaken by the learned lexicographer, Dr. John Jamieson;
and he announces his departure on a sailing excursion round the
north of Scotland. It will be observed that when Scott began his
letter, he had only had Mr. Morritt's opinion of the first volume of
Waverley, and that before he closed it he had received his friend's
honest criticism on the work as a whole, with the expression of an
earnest hope that he would drop his _incognito_ on the title-page of
a second edition.
TO J. B. S. MORRITT, ESQ., M. P., PORTLAND PLACE, LONDON.
ABBOTSFORD, July 24, 1814.
MY DEAR MORRITT,--I am going to say my _vales_ to you for some weeks,
having accepted an invitation from a committee of the Commissioners
for the Northern Lights (I don't mean the Edinburgh Reviewers, but the
_bona-fide_ Commissioners for the Beacons), to accompany them upon a
nautical tour round Scotland, visiting all that is curious on
continent and isle. The party are three gentlemen with whom I am very
well acquainted, William Erskine being one. We have a stout cutter,
well fitted up and manned for the service by Government; and to make
assurance double sure, the admiral has sent a sloop of war to cruise
in the dangerous points of our tour, and sweep the sea of the Yankee
privateers, which sometimes annoy our northern latitudes. I shall
visit the Clephanes in their solitude--and let you know all that I see
that is rare and entertaining, which, as we are masters of our time
and vessel, should add much to my stock of knowledge.
As to Waverley, I will play Sir Fretful for once, and assure you that
I left the story to flag in the first volume on purpose; the second
and third have rather more bustle and interest. I wished (with what
success Heaven knows) to avoid the ordinary error of novel writers,
whose first volume is usually their best. But since it has served to
amuse Mrs. Morritt and you _usque ab initio_, I have no doubt you will
tolerate it even unto the end. It may really boast to be a tolerably
faithful portrait of Scottish manners, and has been recognized as such
in Edinburgh. The first edition of a thousand instantly disappeared,
and the bookseller informs me that the second, of double the quantity,
will not supply the market long.--As I shall be very anxious to know
how Mrs. Morritt is, I hope to have a few lines from you on my return,
which will be about the end of August or beginning of September. I
should have mentioned that we have the celebrated engineer, Stevenson,
along with us. I delight in these professional men of talent; they
always give you some new lights by the peculiarity of their habits and
studies, so different from the people who are rounded, and smoothed,
and ground down for conversation, and who can say all that every other
person says, and--nothing more.
What a miserable thing it is that our royal family cannot be quiet and
decent at least, if not correct and moral in their deportment. Old
farmer George's manly simplicity, modesty of expense, and domestic
virtue, saved this country at its most perilous crisis; for it is
inconceivable the number of persons whom these qualities united in his
behalf, who would have felt but feebly the abstract duty of supporting
a crown less worthily worn.
--I had just proceeded thus far when your kind favor of the 21st
reached Abbotsford. I am heartily glad you continued to like Waverley
to the end. The hero is a sneaking piece of imbecility; and if he had
married Flora, she would have set him up upon the chimney-piece, as
Count Borowlaski's wife used to do with him.[56] I am a bad hand at
depicting a hero, properly so called, and have an unfortunate
propensity for the dubious characters of Borderers, buccaneers,
Highland robbers, and all others of a Robin Hood description. I do not
know why it should be, as I am myself, like Hamlet, indifferent
honest; but I suppose the blood of the old cattle-drivers of
Teviotdale continues to stir in my veins.
I shall _not_ own Waverley; my chief reason is that it would prevent
me of the pleasure of writing again. David Hume, nephew of the
historian, says the author must be of a Jacobite family and
predilections, a yeoman-cavalry man, and a Scottish lawyer, and
desires me to guess in whom these happy attributes are united. I shall
not plead guilty, however; and as such seems to be the fashion of the
day, I hope charitable people will believe my _affidavit_ in
contradiction to all other evidence. The Edinburgh faith now is, that
Waverley is written by Jeffrey, having been composed to lighten the
tedium of his late transatlantic voyage. So you see the unknown infant
is like to come to preferment. In truth, I am not sure it would be
considered quite decorous for me, as a Clerk of Session, to write
novels. Judges being monks, Clerks are a sort of lay brethren, from
whom some solemnity of walk and conduct may be expected. So, whatever
I may do of this kind, "I shall whistle it down the wind, and let it
prey at fortune."[57] I will take care, in the next edition, to make
the corrections you recommend. The second is, I believe, nearly
through the press. It will hardly be printed faster than it was
written; for though the first volume was begun long ago, and actually
lost for a time, yet the other two were begun and finished between the
4th June and the 1st July, during all which I attended my duty in
Court, and proceeded without loss of time or hindrance of business.
I wish, for poor auld Scotland's sake,[58] and for the manes of Bruce
and Wallace, and for the living comfort of a very worthy and ingenious
dissenting clergyman, who has collected a library and medals of some
value, and brought up, I believe, sixteen or seventeen children (his
wife's ambition extended to twenty) upon about £150 a year--I say I
wish, for all these reasons, you could get me among your wealthy
friends a name or two for the enclosed proposals. The price is, I
think, too high; but the booksellers fixed it two guineas above what I
proposed. I trust it will be yet lowered to five guineas, which is a
more come-at-able sum than six. The poems themselves are great
curiosities, both to the philologist and antiquary; and that of Bruce
is invaluable even to the historian. They have been hitherto
wretchedly edited.
I am glad you are not to pay for this scrawl. Ever yours,
WALTER SCOTT.
P. S.--I do not see how my silence can be considered as imposing on
the public. If I give my name to a book without writing it,
unquestionably that would be a trick. But, unless in the case of his
averring facts which he may be called upon to defend or justify, I
think an author may use his own discretion in giving or withholding
his name. Harry Mackenzie never put his name in a title-page till the
last edition of his works; and Swift only owned one out of his
thousand-and-one publications. In point of emolument, everybody knows
that I sacrifice much money by withholding my name; and what should I
gain by it, that any human being has a right to consider as an unfair
advantage? In fact, only the freedom of writing trifles with less
personal responsibility, and perhaps more frequently than I otherwise
might do.
W. S.
I am not able to give the exact date of the following reply to one
of John Ballantyne's expostulations on the subject of _the
secret_:--
"No, John, I will not own the book--
I won't, you Picaroon.
When next I try St. Grubby's brook,
The A. of Wa--shall bait the hook--
And flat-fish bite as soon,
As if before them they had got
The worn-out wriggler
WALTER SCOTT."
Footnotes of the Chapter XXVII.
[46: The late Sir John Marjoribanks of Lees, Bart.]
[47: The inscription for this tankard was penned by the
late celebrated Dr. James Gregory, Professor of the Practice of
Physic in the University of Edinburgh; and I therefore transcribe
it.
GUALTERUM SCOTT
DE ABBOTSFORD
VIRUM SUMMI INGENII
SCRIPTOREM ELEGANTEM
POETARUM SUI SECULI FACILE PRINCIPEM
PATRIÆ DECUS
OB VARIA ERGA IPSAM MERITA
IN CIVIUM SUORUM NUMERUM
GRATA ADSCRIPSIT CIVITAS EDINBURGENSIS
ET HOC CANTHARO DONAVIT
A. D. M.DCCC.XIII.]
[48: _2d King Henry IV._ Act V. Scene 3.]
[49: A good many French officers, prisoners of war, had
been living on parole in Melrose, and the adjoining villages; and
Mr. and Mrs. Scott had been particularly kind and hospitable to
them.]
[50: The battle of Toulouse.]
[51: Sir Adam Ferguson, who had been taken prisoner in the
course of the Duke of Wellington's retreat from Burgos.]
[52: The names which he particularly mentions are those of
the late Matthew Weld Hartstonge, Esq., of Dublin, Theophilus Swift,
Esq., Major Tickell, Thomas Steele, Esq., Leonard Macnally, Esq.,
and the Rev. M. Berwick.]
[53: Entertaining one night a small party of friends,
Erskine read the proof sheets of this volume after supper, and was
confirmed in his opinion by the enthusiastic interest they excited
in his highly intelligent circle. Mr. James Simpson and Mr. Norman
Hill, advocates, were of this party, and from the way in which their
host spoke, they both inferred that they were listening to the first
effort of some unknown aspirant. They all pronounced the work one of
the highest classical merit. The sitting was protracted till
daybreak.--(1839.)]
[54: Mr. Morritt had, in the spring of this year, been
present at the first levee held at the Tuileries by Monsieur
(afterwards Charles X.), as representative of his brother Louis
XVIII. Mr. M. had not been in Paris till that time since 1789.]
[55: [The old writing-desk, in which, while searching for
some fishing-tackle for a guest, Scott found the long-lost
manuscript, was given by him to William Laidlaw, who till his death
cherished with religious care all his memorials of Abbotsford. The
desk is now a treasured possession of his grandson, Mr. W. L.
Carruthers, of Inverness.]]
[56: _Count Borowlaski_ was a Polish dwarf, who, after
realizing some money as an itinerant object of exhibition, settled,
married, and died (September 5, 1837) at Durham. He was a well-bred
creature, and much noticed by the clergy and other gentry of that
city. Indeed, even when travelling the country as a show, he had
always maintained a sort of dignity. I remember him as going from
house to house, when I was a child, in a sedan chair, with a servant
in livery following him, who took the fee--_M. le Comte_ himself
(dressed in a scarlet coat and bag wig) being ushered into the room
like any ordinary visitor.
The Count died in his 99th year--
"A SPIRIT brave, yet gentle, has dwelt, as it appears,
Within three feet of flesh for near one hundred years;
Which causes wonder, like his constitution, strong,
That one _so short alive_ should be _alive so long_!"
_Bentley's Miscellany_ for November, 1837.]
[57: _Othello_, Act III. Scene 3.]
[58: Burns--lines _On my early days_.]