THE WIZARD'S FAREWELL TO ABBOTSFORD
On March 5, 1817, at Castle Street, in the midst of a merry
dinner-party, Scott was seized with a sudden illness--the first since
his childhood. The illness lasted a week, and was more serious than
had been anticipated. It was, indeed, the first of a series of such
paroxysms, which for years visited him periodically, and from which he
never absolutely recovered.
Lockhart parted on one occasion with 'dark prognostications' that it
was for the last time. Scott, too, despaired of himself. Calling his
children about his bed, he said: 'For myself, my dears, I am
unconscious of ever having done any man an injury, or omitted any fair
opportunity of doing any man a benefit. I well know that no human life
can appear otherwise than weak and filthy in the eyes of God; but I
rely on the merits and intercession of our Redeemer.' 'God bless you!'
he again said to each of them, laying his hand on their heads. 'Live
so that you may all hope to meet each other in a better place
hereafter.' Presently he fell into a profound slumber, and on awaking,
the crisis was seen to be over. A gradual re-establishment of health
followed. Of the 'Bride of Lammermoor,' and 'Ivanhoe,' written under
the most adverse circumstances, whilst he still suffered acutely, one
is surprised to find both romances in the very front rank of his
creations. He was under opiates, more or less, when the 'Bride' was on
the stocks, dictating nearly the whole of it to Laidlaw and John
Ballantyne. It is a most curious fact psychologically, for of its
characters, scenes, humour, and all that connected him with the
authorship of the story, he recollected nothing. A more extraordinary
incident literature has not known.[1] But work which cut him short in
the end was the saving of his life in this instance. The mind was a
constant conquest over the weaker physical framework. 'It is my
conviction,' he declared to Gillies, 'that by a little more hearty
application you might forget, and lose altogether, the irritable
sensations of an invalid, and I don't, in this instance, preach what I
have not endeavoured to practise. Be assured that if pain could have
prevented my application to literary labour, not a page of "Ivanhoe"
would have been written; for, from beginning to end of that production,
which has been a good deal praised, I was never free from suffering.
It might have borne a motto somewhat analogous to the inscription which
Frederick the Great's predecessor used to affix to his attempts at
portrait-painting when he had the gout: "Fredericus I., _in tormentis
pinxit_." Now, if I had given way to mere feelings and ceased to work,
it is a question whether the disorder might not have taken deeper root,
and become incurable. The best way is, if possible, to triumph over
disease by setting it at defiance, somewhat on the same principle as
one avoids being stung by boldly grasping a nettle.'
[1] Dickens had a somewhat similar experience, though not, of course,
to the like extent.
[Illustration: THE ENTRANCE HALL, ABBOTSFORD. A spacious apartment, 40
feet by 20 feet, panelled to the height of 7 feet with dark oak from
Dunfermline Abbey.]
By 1820 he was enjoying tolerably good health, with no cramp
recurrences for a time. But in 1823, when busy with 'Peveril,' an
arresting hand laid itself upon Scott in the shape of a slight stroke
of apoplexy. As a matter of fact, and as Lockhart suspected, this was
only one of several such shocks which he had been carefully concealing.
'"Peveril" will, I fear, smell of the apoplexy,' he afterwards
admitted. Hence, no doubt, 'Peveril's' dulness. He rallied,
notwithstanding, and up to Christmas, 1825, his health was excellent.
But from 1826--the year of his crowning sorrows--the record of Scott's
life reads like a long martyrdom. Rheumatism, hallucinations, strange
memory lapses, began to steal from Scott all the little joy that was
left. On February 5, 1830, the blow fell which, like Damocles' sword,
had been hanging over him for years. It fell with unmistakable
meaning. It was his first real paralytic seizure--long dreaded, long
expected. On his return from the Parliament House, in his usual
health, he found an old friend waiting to consult him about a memoir of
her father which he had promised to revise for the press. Whilst
examining the MS. the stroke came, a slight contortion passing over his
features. In a minute or two he rose, staggered to the drawing-room,
where were Miss Anne Scott and Miss Lockhart, but fell to the floor
speechless and insensible. A surgeon quickly at hand cupped him, after
the old-fashioned treatment for such complaints. By night, speech had
returned, and in a day or two he had resumed his Court duties. But he
was never the same again. People in general did not remark any
difference. Doctors and patient, however, knew well enough that it was
the beginning of the end. Both his parents had succumbed to paralysis,
and 'considering the terrible violence and agitation and exertion,'
says Lockhart, 'to which he had been subjected during the four
preceding years, the only wonder is that this blow was deferred so
long; there can be none that it was soon followed by others.'
Still he plodded on. Even with half a brain he should not 'lag
superfluous on the stage.' And heedless of innumerable warnings, he
was at his desk day after day, writing and dictating by turns. He now
resigned his Clerkship, on an £800 a year allowance, surrendered his
Edinburgh house, and settled permanently at Abbotsford, lonely and
desolate, an old man before his time, but indomitable to the core.
There he commenced 'Count Robert of Paris,' the penultimate of his
published tales. But the mighty machinery of his mind moved not as of
yore. Like Samson, his strength had departed. He was now as other
men. By November he suffered from a second stroke, and wrote in his
Diary for January: 'Very indifferent, with more awkward feelings than I
can well bear up against. My voice sunk, and my head strangely
confused.' But a worse shock was coming. Cadell pronounced the
'Count' a complete failure. Yet he struggled to recast it. To crown
all, he went to the 'hustings'--a hardened anti-Reform Billite. At
Jedburgh, as Lockhart tells, the crowd saluted him with blasphemous
shouts of 'Burke Sir Walter!'[2]--the unkindest cut of all, which
haunted him to the end. By July he had begun 'Castle Dangerous,' and
in the middle of the month, accompanied by Lockhart, he started for
Lanarkshire to refresh his memory for the setting of his new story.
They ascended the Tweed by Yair, Ashestiel, Elibank, Innerleithen,
Peebles, Biggar, places all dear to his heart and celebrated in his
writings. Crowds turned out to welcome him. Everywhere he was
received with acclamation and the deepest respect. At Douglas the
travellers inspected the old Castle, the ruin of St. Bride's, with the
monuments and tombs of the 'most heroic and powerful family in Scottish
annals.' At Milton-Lockhart, the seat of Lockhart's brother, Scott met
his old friend Borthwickbrae. Both were paralytics. Each saw his own
case mirrored in the other. They had a joyous--too joyous a meeting,
with startling results to the older invalid. On returning to Cleghorn,
another shock laid him low, and he was despaired of. When the news
reached Scott, he was bent on getting home at once. 'No, William,' he
said to his host, urging him to remain, 'this is a sad warning; I must
home to work while it is called to-day, for the night cometh when no
man can work. I put that text many years ago on my dial-stone, but it
often preached in vain.'
[2] The Burke and Hare murders were recent.
Returned, he finished 'Count Robert' and 'Castle Dangerous.' Both
novels were really the fruit of a paralytic brain. The 'Magnum
Opus,'[3] too, proposed by Cadell (a huge success), engaged much of his
attention. But Sir Walter's work was done. At length, doctors'
treatment doing him little good, from his constant determination to be
at his desk, it was decided, not without difficulty, that Scott should
spend the winter of 1831 in Italy, where his son Charles was attached
to the British Legation at Naples. On September 22 all was in
readiness. A round of touching adieus, one or two gatherings of old
friends, the final instructions to Laidlaw, and Scott quitted
Abbotsford practically for ever. He returned, to be sure, but more a
dead man than a living one. Of his journey to London (meeting many
friends) there is no need to write, nor of the Italian tour--Malta,
Naples, Rome, Florence, Venice--for which, no matter the brilliance of
their associations, he exhibited but a mere passive interest. His
heart was in the homeland.
[3] A reissue of the Poetry, with biographical prefaces, and a uniform
reprint of the Novels, each introduced by an account of the hints on
which it had been founded, and illustrated throughout by historical and
antiquarian annotations.
By June 13, London was again reached, and in the St. James's Hotel,
Jermyn Street (now demolished), he lay for three weeks in a state of
supreme stupor. Allan Cunningham tells of the extraordinary interest
and sympathy which Scott's illness evoked. Walking home late one
night, he found a number of working men standing at the corner of
Jermyn Street, one of whom asked him, as if there had been only one
deathbed in London: 'Do you know, sir, if this is the street where he
is lying?' 'Abbotsford!' was his cry in the more lucid intervals that
came to him. On July 7 he was carried on board the _James Watt_
steamer, accompanied by Lockhart, Cadell, a medical man--Dr. Thomas
Watson--and his two daughters. The Forth was reached on the 9th, and
the next two days--the last in his 'own romantic town'--were passed, as
all the voyage had been, in a condition of absolute unconsciousness.
On the 11th, at a very early hour of the morning, Scott was lifted into
his carriage for the final journey homewards. During the first part of
the drive he remained torpid, until the veil lifted somewhat at Gala
Water. Strange that, after oblivion so profound and prolonged, he
should open his eyes and regain a measure of consciousness just here,
amid landscapes the most familiar to him in the world. Some good angel
must have touched him then. A mere coincidence! Perhaps! But there
are more things in heaven and earth than are dreamt of in our
philosophy. 'Gala Water, surely--Buckholm--Torwoodlee,' he murmured.
When he saw the Eildons--
'Three crests against the saffron sky,
Beyond the purple plain,
The kind remembered melody
Of Tweed once more again'--
he became greatly excited, and in crossing Melrose Bridge, his 'nearest
Rialto,' as he called it, he could hardly be kept in the carriage.
Abbotsford, a mile ahead, was soon reached. Laidlaw--a big lump in his
throat, we may be sure--was waiting at the door, and assisted to carry
his dying master and friend to the dining-room, where his bed had been
prepared. He sat bewildered for a moment or two, then, resting his
eyes on Laidlaw, as if trying to recollect, said immediately, 'Ha,
Willie Laidlaw! O man, how often have I thought of _you_!' By this
time his dogs were around his chair, fawning on him, and licking his
hands. Then, indeed, he knew where he was. Between sobs and tears he
tried to speak to them, and to stroke them as of yore. But the body,
no less than the brain, was exhausted, and gentle sleep closed his
eyelids, like a tired child, once more in his own Abbotsford. He
lingered for some weeks, alternating between cloud and sunshine--mostly
cloud. One day the longing for his desk seized him, and he was wheeled
studywards, but the palsied fingers refused their office, and he sank
back, assured at last that the sceptre had departed. Lockhart and
Laidlaw were now his constant attendants. Both read to him from the
New Testament. 'There is but one Book,' Scott said, and it 'comforted'
him to listen to its soothing and hope-inspiring utterances. Then the
cloud became denser. At last delirium and delusion prostrated him, and
he grew daily feebler. Now he thought himself administering justice as
the Selkirkshire 'Shirra'; anon he was giving Tom Purdie orders anent
trees. Sometimes, his fancy was in Jedburgh, and the words, 'Burke Sir
Walter,' escaped him in a dolorous tone. Then he would repeat snatches
from Isaiah, or the Book of Job, or some grand rugged verse torn off
from the Scottish Psalms, or a strain sublimer still from the Romish
Litany:
'Dies irae, dies ilia,
Solvet saeclum in favilla.'
'As I was dressing on the morning of September 17,' says Lockhart,
'Nicolson came into my room and told me that his master had awoke in a
state of composure and consciousness, and wished to see me immediately.
I found him entirely himself, though in the last extreme of feebleness.
His eye was clear and calm--every trace of the wild fire of delirium
extinguished. "Lockhart," he said, "I may have but a minute to speak
to you. My dear, be a good man--be virtuous--be religious--be a good
man. Nothing else will give you any comfort when you come to lie
here." He paused, and I said: "Shall I send for Sophia and Anne?"
"No," said he, "don't disturb them. Poor souls! I know they were up
all night. God bless you all." With this he sunk into a very tranquil
sleep, and, indeed, he scarcely afterwards gave any sign of
consciousness, except for an instant on the arrival of his sons. About
half-past one p.m., on September 21, Sir Walter Scott breathed his
last, in the presence of all his children. It was a beautiful day--so
warm that every window was wide open, and so perfectly still that the
sound of all others most delicious to his ear, the gentle ripple of the
Tweed over its pebbles, was distinctly audible as we knelt around the
bed, and his eldest son kissed and closed his eyes.'
[Illustration: DRYBURGH ABBEY. Which, if it cannot boast the
architectural glories of Melrose, far surpasses it for queenly
situation.]
He died a month after completing his sixty-first year. On December 7,
1825, almost seven years earlier, we find him taking a survey of his
own health in relation to the ages reached by his parents and other
members of the family, and then setting down in his Diary the result of
his calculations, 'Square the odds, and good-night, Sir Walter, about
sixty. I care not, if I leave my name unstained and my family property
settled. _Sat est vixisse_.' His prophecy was fulfilled. He lived
just a year--but a year of gradual death--beyond his anticipations.
His wish, too, was fulfilled; for he died practically free of debt.
The sale of his works, the insurance of his life, and a sum advanced by
Cadell, completely cleared his engagements. The copyrights purchased
by Cadell were afterwards sold to Messrs. Adam and Charles Black, who
therefore hold the exact text of the works.
On September 26--a Wednesday--Sir Walter was buried. Services at
Abbotsford, after the simple fashion of the Scottish Kirk, were
conducted by the Revs. Principal Baird, of Edinburgh University, Dr.
Dickson, of St. Cuthbert's, and the minister of Melrose. The courtyard
and all the precincts of Abbotsford were crowded with uncovered
spectators as the procession (over a mile in length) was arranged. And
as it advanced through Darnick and Melrose, and the villages on the
route, the whole population appeared at their doors in like manner,
almost all in black. From Darnick Tower a broad crape banner waved in
the wind, and the Abbey bell at Melrose rang a muffled peel. Thence
there is a somewhat steep ascent to Gladswood and Bemersyde. On the
crest of the road overlooking the 'beautiful bend' the hearse came to a
curious halt, at the very spot where Scott was accustomed to rein up
his horses. It was no 'accident,' as Lockhart imagines. For one of
the horses was Sir Walter's own, and must have borne him many a time
hither. Peter Mathieson, Laidlaw, and others of Scott's servants
carried the plain black coffin to the grave within St. Mary's aisle, at
Dryburgh, where it was lowered by his two sons, his son-in-law, and six
of his cousins. And thus the remains of Sir Walter Scott--our Scottish
Shakespeare--were laid by the side of his wife in the sepulchre of his
fathers.