III

Scott's modesty was not in danger, but so far as his prudence was

concerned, his success did really lift him off his feet. In 1812, still

more encouraged thereto by entering upon the emoluments of the office of

Clerk of Sessions, the duties of which he had performed for six years

without pay, he purchased Abbotsford, an estate on the Tweed, adjoining

that of the Duke of Buccleugh, his kinsman, and near the beautiful ruins

of Melrose Abbey. Here he began to carry out the dream of his life, to

found a territorial family which should augment the power and fame of

his clan. Beginning with a modest farm house and a farm of a hundred

acres, he gradually bought, planted, and built, until the farm became a

manorial domain and the farm house a castle. He had not gone far in this

work before he began to realize that the returns from his poetry would

never suffice to meet such demands as would thus be made upon his purse.

Byron's star was in the ascendant, and before its baleful magnificence

Scott's milder and more genial light visibly paled. He was himself the

first to declare, with characteristic generosity, that the younger poet

had "bet"[3] him at his own craft. As Carlyle says, "he had held the

sovereignty for some half-score of years, a comparatively long lease of

it, and now the time seemed come for dethronement, for abdication. An

unpleasant business; which, however, he held himself ready, as a brave

man will, to transact with composure and in silence."

[Footnote 3: Bested, got the better of.]

But, as it proved, there was no need for resignation. The reign of

metrical romance, brilliant but brief, was past, or nearly so. But what

of prose romance, which long ago, in picking out _Don Quixote_ from the

puzzling Spanish, he had promised himself he would one day attempt? With

some such questioning of the Fates, Scott drew from his desk the sheets

of a story begun seven years before, and abandoned because of the

success of _The Lay of the Last Minstrel_. This story he now completed,

and published as _Waverley_ in the spring of 1814--an event "memorable

in the annals of British literature; in the annals of British

bookselling thrice and four times memorable." The popularity of the

metrical romances dwindled to insignificance before the enthusiasm with

which this prose romance was received. A moment before quietly resolved

to give up his place in the world's eye, and to live the life of an

obscure country gentleman, Scott found himself launched once more on the

tide of brave fortunes. The Ballantyne publishing and printing houses

ceased to totter, and settled themselves on what seemed the firmest of

foundations. At Abbotsford, buying, planting, and building began on a

greater scale than had ever been planned in its owner's most sanguine

moments.

The history of the next eleven years in Scott's life is the history, on

the one hand, of the rapidly-appearing novels, of a fame gradually

spreading outward from Great Britain until it covered the civilized

world--a fame increased rather than diminished by the _incognito_ which

the "author of _Waverley_" took great pains to preserve even after the

secret had become an open one; on the other hand, of the large-hearted,

hospitable life at Abbotsford, where, in spite of the importunities of

curious and ill-bred tourists, bent on getting a glimpse of the "Wizard

of the North," and in spite of the enormous mass of work, literary and

official, which Scott took upon himself to perform, the atmosphere of

country leisure and merriment was somehow miraculously preserved. This

life of the hearty prosperous country laird was the one toward the

realization of which all Scott's efforts were directed; it is worth

while, therefore, to see as vividly as may be, what kind of life that

was, that we may the better understand what kind of man he was who cared

for it. The following extract from Lockhart's _Life of Scott_ gives us

at least one very characteristic aspect of the Abbotsford world:

"It was a clear, bright September morning, with a sharpness in the

air that doubled the animating influence of the sunshine; and all

was in readiness for a grand coursing-match on Newark Hill. The

only guest who had chalked out other sport for himself was the

staunchest of anglers, Mr. Rose; but he, too, was there on his

_shelty_, armed with his salmon-rod and landing-net.... This little

group of Waltonians, bound for Lord Somerville's preserve, remained

lounging about, to witness the start of the main cavalcade. Sir

Walter, mounted on Sibyl, was marshalling the order of procession

with a huge hunting-whip; and among a dozen frolicsome youths and

maidens, who seemed disposed to laugh at all discipline, appeared,

each on horseback, each as eager as the youngest sportsman in the

troop, Sir Humphrey Davy, Dr. Wollaston, and the patriarch of

Scottish belles-lettres, Henry Mackenzie.... Laidlow (the steward

of Abbotsford) on a strong-tailed wiry Highlander, yclept Hoddin

Grey, which carried him nimbly and stoutly, although his feet

almost touched the ground, was the adjutant. But the most

picturesque figure was the illustrious inventor of the safety-lamp

(Sir Humphrey Davy) ... a brown hat with flexible brim, surrounded

with line upon line of catgut, and innumerable fly-hooks; jackboots

worthy of a Dutch smuggler, and a fustian surtout dabbled with the

blood of salmon, made a fine contrast with the smart jacket,

white-cord breeches, and well-polished jockey-boots of the less

distinguished cavaliers about him. Dr. Wollaston was in black; and

with his noble serene dignity of countenance might have passed for

a sporting archbishop. Mr. Mackenzie, at this time in the

seventy-sixth year of his age, with a hat turned up with green,

green spectacles, green jacket, and long brown leathern gaiters

buttoned upon his nether anatomy, wore a dog-whistle round his

neck.... Tom Purdie (one of Scott's servants) and his subalterns

had preceded us by a few hours with all the grey-hounds that could

be collected at Abbotsford, Darnick, and Melrose; but the giant

Maida had remained as his master's orderly, and now gamboled about

Sibyl Grey barking for mere joy like a spaniel puppy.

"The order of march had all been settled, when Scott's daughter

Anne broke from the line, screaming with laughter, and exclaimed,

'Papa, papa, I knew you could never think of going without your

pet!' Scott looked round, and I rather think there was a blush as

well as a smile upon his face, when he perceived a little black pig

frisking about his pony, evidently a self-elected addition to the

party of the day. He tried to look stern, and cracked his whip at

the creature, but was in a moment obliged to join in the general

cheers. Poor piggy soon found a strap round its neck, and was

dragged into the background; Scott, watching the retreat, repeated

with mock pathos, the first verse of an old pastoral song--

What will I do gin my hoggie die?

My joy, my pride, my hoggie!

My only beast, I had na mae,

And wow, but I was vogie!

--the cheers were redoubled--and the squadron moved on."

Let us supplement this with one more picture, from the same hand,

showing Scott in a little more intimate light. The passage was written

in 1821, after Lockhart had married Scott's eldest daughter, and gone

to spend the summer at Chiefswood, a cottage on the Abbotsford estate:

"We were near enough Abbotsford to partake as often as we liked of

its brilliant and constantly varying society; yet could do so

without being exposed to the worry and exhaustion of spirit which

the daily reception of new-comers entailed upon all the family,

except Scott himself. But in truth, even he was not always proof

against the annoyances connected with such a style of open

house-keeping.... When sore beset at home in this way, he would

every now and then discover that he had some very particular

business to attend to on an outlying part of his estate, and

craving the indulgence of his guests overnight, appear at the cabin

in the glen before its inhabitants were astir in the morning. The

clatter of Sibyl Grey's hoofs, the yelping of Mustard and Spice,

and his own joyous shout of _réveillée_ under our windows, were the

signal that he had burst his toils, and meant for that day to 'take

his ease in his inn.' On descending, he was found to be seated with

all his dogs and ours about him, under a spreading ash that

overshadowed half the bank between the cottage and the brook,

pointing the edge of his woodman's axe, and listening to Tom

Purdie's lecture touching the plantation that most needed thinning.

After breakfast he would take possession of a dressing-room

upstairs, and write a chapter of _The Pirate_; and then, having

made up and despatched his packet for Mr. Ballantyne, away to join

Purdie wherever the foresters were at work ... until it was time to

rejoin his own party at Abbotsford or the quiet circle of the

cottage. When his guests were few and friendly, he often made them

come over and meet him at Chiefswood in a body towards evening....

He was ready with all sorts of devices to supply the wants of a

narrow establishment; he used to delight particularly in sinking

the wine in a well under the _brae_ ere he went out, and hauling up

the basket just before dinner was announced,--this primitive device

being, he said, what he had always practised when a young

housekeeper, and in his opinion far superior in its results to any

application of ice; and in the same spirit, whenever the weather

was sufficiently genial, he voted for dining out of doors

altogether."

Few events of importance except the successive appearances of "our

buiks" as Tom Purdie called his master's novels, and an occasional visit

to London or the continent, intervened to break the busy monotony of

this Abbotsford life. On one of these visits to London, Scott was

invited to dine with the Prince Regent, and when the prince became King

George IV, in 1820, almost the first act of his reign was to create

Scott a baronet. Scott accepted the honor gratefully, as coming, he

said, "from the original source of all honor." There can well be two

opinions as to whether this least admirable of English kings constituted

a very prime fountain of honor, judged by democratic standards; but to

Scott's mind, such an imputation would have been next to sacrilege. The

feudal bias of his mind, strong to start with, had been strengthened by

his long sojourn among the visions of a feudal past; the ideals of

feudalism were living realities to him; and he accepted knighthood from

his king's hand in exactly the same spirit which determined his attitude

of humility towards his "chief," the Duke of Buccleugh, and which

impelled him to exhaust his genius in the effort to build up a great

family estate.

There were already signs that the enormous burden of work under which he

seemed to move so lightly, was telling on him. _The Bride of

Lammermoor_, _The Legend of Montrose_, and _Ivanhoe_, had all of them

been dictated between screams of pain, wrung from his lips by a chronic

cramp of the stomach. By the time he reached _Redgauntlet_ and _St.

Ronan's Well_, there began to be heard faint murmurings of discontent

from his public, hints that he was writing too fast, and that the noble

wine he had poured them for so long was growing at last a trifle watery.

To add to these causes of uneasiness, the commercial ventures in which

he was interested drifted again into a precarious state. He had himself

fallen into the bad habit of forestalling the gains from his novels by

heavy drafts on his publishers, and the example thus set was followed

faithfully by John Ballantyne. Scott's good humor and his partner's bad

judgment saddled the concern with a lot of unsalable books. In 1818 the

affairs of the book-selling business had to be closed up, Constable

taking over the unsalable stock and assuming the outstanding liabilities

in return for copyright privileges covering some of Scott's novels.

This so burdened the veteran publisher that when, in 1825, a large

London firm failed, it carried him down also--and with him James

Ballantyne, with whom he had entered into close relations. Scott's

secret connection with Ballantyne had continued; accordingly he woke up

one fine day to find himself worse than beggared, being personally

liable for one hundred and thirty thousand pounds.