[84] The Duchess of Bedford's eldest son.
[85] _My Aunt Margaret's Mirror_.
[86] Sir Walter need have expressed no surprise at this architect's
desire to pull down the old house of Lauriston! The present generation
can judge of Mr. Burn's appreciation of ancient Architecture by looking
at the outside of St. Giles, Edinburgh.--It was given over to his tender
mercies in 1829, a picturesque old building, and it left his hands in
1834 a bit of solid well-jointed mason-work with all Andrew
Fairservice's "whigmaleeries, curliewurlies, and open steek hems" most
thoroughly removed!--_Rob Roy_, vol. viii. pp. 29-30. Fortunately the
tower and crown were untouched, and the interior, which was injured in a
less degree, has, through the liberality and good taste of the late
William Chambers, been restored to its original stateliness.
[87] See Ethwald, _Plays on the Passions_, vol. ii., Lond. 1802.
[88] Alluding to an entry in the _Journal_, that he had expended 30s. in
the purchase of the _Theatre of God's Judgment_, 1612, a book which is
still in the Abbotsford Library.
[89] See note to May 30, 1827, vol. i. p. 398.
[90] Burns's lines _To a Mouse_.
[91] _Ante_, p. 60. The book had only been published two months. "The
Second Series," when published in the following year, contained _St.
Valentine's Eve, or the Fair Maid of Perth_; the two stories objected
to, viz.: _My Aunt Margaret's Mirror_ and the _Laird's Jock_ appeared in
the _Keepsake_ of 1828, and were afterwards included in vol. xli. of the
_Magnum Opus_.
[92] The Garrick papers were published under the title _Private
Correspondence, of David Garrick, illustrated with notes and Memoir_. 2
vols. 4to, London, 1831-32. [Edited by James Boaden.]
[93] Afterwards Judge in the Court of Session under the title of Lord
Jerviswoode.
[94] A few days later, however, the following reply was sent:--"Dear
Gordon,--As I have no money to spare at present, I find it necessary to
make a sacrifice of my own scruples to relieve you from serious
difficulties. The enclosed will entitle you to deal with any respectable
bookseller. You must tell the history in your own way as shortly as
possible. All that is necessary to say is that the discourses were
written to oblige a young friend. It is understood my name is not to be
put in the title-page, or blazed at full length in the preface. You may
trust that to the newspapers.
"Pray do not think of returning any thanks about this; it is enough that
I know it is likely to serve your purpose. But use the funds arising
from this unexpected source with prudence, for such fountains do not
spring up at every place of the desert. I am, in haste, ever yours most
truly, Walter Scott"--_Life_, vol. ix. p. 205.
[95] Issued in 1829 as No. 33 of the Bannatyne Club Books. _Memorials of
George Bannatyne_, 1545-1608, with Memoir by Sir Walter Scott.
[96] It was thus that the scenery of Loch Katrine came to be so
associated with the recollection of many a dear friend and merry
expedition of former days, that to compose the _Lady of the Lake_ was a
labour of love, and no less so to recall the manners and incidents
introduced.--_Life_, vol. i. p. 296.
[97] See note, Jan. 8, 1828, pp. 107-8.
[98] On his own life.
[99] See _Henry V._, Act IV. Sc. 3.
[100] The Edinburgh play-bills of the day intimate the "Second
appearance of Miss Fanny Ayton, Prima Donna of the King's Theatre."
[101] By Congreve--Act II. Sc. 7.
[102] The dissolution of the Goderich Cabinet confirmed very soon these
shrewd guesses; and Sir Walter anticipated nothing but good from the
Premiership of the Duke of Wellington.--_Life_, vol. ix. p. 188.
[103] The Rev. Thomas Wright was minister of Borthwick from 1817 to
1841, when he was deposed on the ground of alleged heresy. His works,
_The True Plan of a Living Temple_, _Morning and Evening Sacrifice_,
_Farewell to Time_, _My Old House_, etc., were published anonymously.
Mr. Wright lived in Edinburgh for fourteen years after his deposition,
much beloved and respected; he died on 13th March 1855 in his
seventy-first year.
[104] Rev. John Clunie, Mr. Wright's predecessor in the parish, of whom,
many absurd stories were told, appears to have been an enthusiastic
lover of Scottish songs, as Burns in 1794 says it was owing to his
singing _Ca' the yowes to the knowes_ so charmingly that he took it down
from his voice, and sent it to Mr. Thomson.--Currie's _Burns_, vol. iv.
p. 100, and Chambers's _Scottish Songs_, 2 vols. Edin. 1829, p. 269.
[105] See Burns's "Auld Farmer's New-year Salutation."
[106] "Mount Benger," of which Hogg had taken a lease on his marriage,
in 1820, and found that he could not make it pay.
[107] The first series had just been published under the following
title: _Tales of a Grandfather, being stories taken from Scottish
History_. Humbly inscribed to Hugh Littlejohn, Esq., in three volumes.
Printed for Cadell and Co., Edinburgh, Simpkin and Marshall, London, and
John Cumming, Dublin, 1828.
[108] During Sir Walter's illness in 1818-19 Mr. Skene was with him at
Abbotsford, and he records a curious incident regarding Dryburgh which
may be given here:--"For nearly two years he had to struggle for his
life with that severe illness, which the natural strength of his
constitution at length proved sufficient to throw off. With its
disappearance, although restored to health, disappeared also much of his
former vigour of body, activity, and power of undergoing fatigue, while
in personal appearance he had advanced twenty years in the downward
course of life; his hair had become bleached to pure white and scanty
locks; the fire of his eye quenched; and his step, more uncertain, had
lost the vigorous swinging gait with which he was used to proceed; in
fact, old age had by many years anticipated its usual progress and
marked how severely he had suffered. The complaint, that of gall-stones,
was one of extreme bodily suffering. During his severest attack he had
been alone at Abbotsford with his daughter Sophia, before her marriage
to Mr. Lockhart, and had sent to say that he was desirous I should come
to him, which I did, and remained for ten days till the attack had
subsided. During its course the extreme violence of the pain end
spasmodic contraction of the muscles of the stomach were such that I
scarcely expected the powers of endurance could sustain him through the
trial, and so much at times was he exhausted by it as to leave us in
alarm as to what the result had actually been. One night I shall not
soon forget: he had been frequently and severely ill during the day, and
having been summoned to his room in the middle of the night, where his
daughter was already standing, the picture of deep despair, at his
bed-side, the attack seemed intense, and we followed the directions left
by the physician to assuage it. At length it seemed to subside, and he
fell back exhausted on the pillow, his eyes were closed, and his
countenance wan and livid. Apparently with corresponding misgivings, his
daughter at one side of the bed and I at the other gazed for some time
intently and in silence on his countenance, and then glanced with
anxious inquiring looks to each other, till, at length, having placed my
finger on his pulse, to ascertain whether it had actually ceased to
throb, I shall never forget the sudden beam which again brightened his
daughter's countenance, and for a moment dispelled the intense
expression of anxiety which had for some time overspread it, when Sir
Walter, aware of my feeling his pulse, and the probable purpose,
whispered, with a faint voice, but without opening his eyes, 'I am not
_yet_ gone.' After some time he revived, and gave us a proof of the
mastery of his mind over the sufferings of the body. 'Do you recollect,'
he said to me, 'a small round turret near the gate of the Monastery of
Aberbrothwick, and placed so as to overhang the street?' Upon answering
that I did perfectly, and that a picturesque little morsel it was, he
said, 'Well, I was over there when a mob had assembled, excited by some
purpose, which I do not recollect, but failing of their original
intention, they took umbrage at the little venerable emblem of
aristocracy, which still bore its weather-stained head so conspicuously
aloft, and, resolving to humble it with the dust, they got a stout
hawser from a vessel in the adjoining harbour, which a sailor lad,
climbing up, coiled round the body of the little turret, and the rabble
seizing the rope by both ends tugged and pulled, and laboured long to
strangle and overthrow the poor old turret, but in vain, for it
withstood all their endeavours. Now that is exactly the condition of my
poor stomach: there is a rope twisted round it, and the malicious devils
are straining and tugging at it, and, faith, I could almost think that I
sometimes hear them shouting and cheering each other to their task, and
when they are at it I always have the little turret and its tormentors
before my eyes.' He complained that particular ideas fixed themselves
down upon his mind, which he had not the power of shaking off; but this
was, in fact, the obvious consequence of the quantity of laudanum which
it was necessary for him to swallow to allay the spasms.
"After he had got some repose, and had become rather better in the
morning, he said, with a smile on his countenance, 'If you will promise
not to laugh at me I have a favour to ask. Do you know I have taken a
childish desire to see the place where I am to be laid when I go home,
which there is some probability may not now be long delayed. Now, as I
cannot go to Dryburgh Abbey--that is out of the question at present--it
would give me much pleasure if you would take a ride down and bring me a
drawing of that spot, which he minutely described the position of, and
mentioned the exact point where he wished it drawn, that the site of his
future grave might appear. His wish was accordingly complied
with."--_Reminiscences_.
1828.