--visiting France, in 1826, for some information requisite to the
work. In the following summer the _Life_ appeared in nine volumes, an
extent much beyond the original project. As might be expected, from
the aristocratical turn of Sir Walter's political tenets, the opinions
on this work were more various than on any other of his productions:
it is, to say the best, the most faulty and unequal of them all; and,
considering how clearly this has been shown, it is somewhat surprising
to hear so clever a critic as Mr. Cunningham pronounce _The Life of
Napoleon_ as "one of the noblest monuments of Scott's genius." We pass
from these considerations to the excellence of the purpose to which
the proceeds (12,000_l._) of this work were applied--namely, to the
payment of 6_s._ 8_d._ in the pound, as the first dividend of the
debts of the author.
In parting with the _Napoleon_, we might notice the conflicting
opinions of the French critics on its merits; but, as that task would
occupy too much space we content ourselves with the following passage
from a journal published a few days subsequent to the melancholy
intelligence of the death of Sir Walter Scott being received in Paris.
The criticism is in every sense plain-spoken:--
"If Sir Walter Scott's politics did not square with the natural state
of things--if upon this subject he still remained the victim of early
prejudices, and, perhaps, of the predilections of a poetical mind, yet
he was fortunate enough to promote, by his writings, the real
improvement of the people. France has reason to reproach him severely
for the unaccountable statements in his "Paul's Letters to his
Kinsfolk," and in the "History of Bonaparte." But those errors were
imputable to carelessness much more than to malice. A prose writer, a
poet, a novelist--he yielded, during his long and laborious career, to
the impulse of a fancy, rich, copious, and entirely independent of
present circumstances, aloof from the agitations of the day,
delighting in the memory of the past, and drawing from the surviving
relics of ancient times the traditionary tale, to revive and embellish
it. He was one of those geniuses in romance who may be said to have
been impartial and disinterested, for he gave a picture of ordinary
life exactly as it was. He painted man in all the varieties produced
in his nature by passion and the force of circumstances, and avoided
mixing up with these portraits what was merely ideal. Persons gifted
with this power of forgetting themselves, as it were, and of assuming
in succession an infinite series of varied characters, who live,
speak, and act before us in a thousand ways that affect or delight us,
such men are often susceptible of feelings the most ardent on their
own account, although they may not directly express as much. It is
difficult to believe that Shakspeare and Moliere, the noblest types of
this class of exalted minds, did not contemplate life with feelings of
deep and, perhaps, melancholy emotion. It was not so, however, with
Scott, who certainly belonged not to their kindred, possessing neither
the vigour of combination, nor the style which distinguished those
men. Of great natural benevolence, gentle and kind, ardent in the
pursuit of various knowledge, accommodating himself to the manners and
sentiments of his day, good-humoured, and favoured by happy
conjunctures of circumstances, Scott came forth under the most
brilliant auspices, accomplishing his best and most durable works
almost without an effort, and without impressing on these productions
any sort of character which would connect them with the personal
character of the author. If he be represented, indeed, in any part of
his writings, it is in such characters as that of Morton (one of the
Puritans), a sort of ambiguous, undetermined, unoffending, good sort
of person."
"WAVERLEY NOVELS."
Up to this period, the secret of the authorship of the novels was not
generally known, though more extensively so than was at the time
imagined. The public had made up their minds to the fact; but the
identity was _not proven_. The adjustment of Messrs. Constable's
affairs, however, rendered it impossible longer to conceal the
authorship, which was revealed by Sir Walter, at the anniversary
dinner of the Edinburgh Theatrical Fund, in February, 1827. Thus he
acknowledged before three hundred gentlemen "a secret which,
considering that it was communicated to more than twenty people, had
been remarkably well kept." His avowal was as follows:--
"He had now to say, however, that the merits of these works, if they
had any, and their faults, were entirely imputable to himself." [Here
the audience broke into an absolute shout of surprise and delight.]
"He was afraid to think on what he had done. 'Look on't again I dare
not.' He had thus far unbosomed himself, and he knew that it would be
reported to the public. He meant, then, seriously to state, that when
he said he was the author, he was the total and undivided author. With
the exception of quotations, there was not a single word written that
was not derived from himself, or suggested in the course of his
reading. The wand was now broken, and the rod buried. His audience
would allow him further to say, with Prospero, 'Your breath has filled
my sails.'"
The copyright of the novels was soon afterwards sold for 8,400_l._,
and they have since been republished, with illustrations, and notes
and introductions by the author, in forty-one volumes, monthly; the
last volume appearing within a few days of the author's death.