Memoirs of the Life of Sir Walter Scott Volume V Part 16

"I soon felt myself quite at home, and my heart in a glow, with the cordial welcome I experienced. I had thought to make a mere morning visit, but found I was not to be let off so lightly. 'You must not think our neighborhood is to be read in a morning like a newspaper,' said Scott; 'it takes several days of study for an observant traveller, that has a relish for auld-world trumpery. After breakfast you shall make your visit to Melrose Abbey; I shall not be able to accompany you, as I have some household affairs to attend to; but I will put you in charge of my son Charles, who is very learned in all things touching the old ruin and the neighborhood it stands in; and he and my friend Johnnie Bower will tell you the whole truth about it, with a great deal more that you are not called upon to believe, unless you be a true and nothing-doubting antiquary. When you come back, I'll take you out on a ramble about the neighborhood.

To-morrow we will take a {p.183} look at the Yarrow, and the next day we will drive over to Dryburgh Abbey, which is a fine old ruin, well worth your seeing.'--In a word, before Scott had got through with his plan, I found myself committed for a visit of several days, and it seemed as if a little realm of romance was suddenly open before me."

After breakfast, while Scott, no doubt, wrote a chapter of Rob Roy, Mr. Irving, under young Charles's guidance, saw Melrose Abbey, and Johnnie Bower the elder, whose son long since inherited his office as showman of the ruins, and all his enthusiasm about them and their poet. The senior on this occasion was loud in his praises of the affability of Scott. "He'll come here sometimes," said he, "with great folks in his company, and the first I'll know of it is hearing his voice calling out Johnnie!--Johnnie Bower!--and when I go out I'm sure to be greeted with a joke or a pleasant word. He'll stand and crack, an' laugh wi' me just like an auld wife,--and _to think that of a man that has such an awfu' knowledge o' history!_"[73]

[Footnote 73: [From the journal of three English ladies, travellers in Scotland in the summer of 1817, we get another glimpse of Johnnie Bower, and a pleasant sketch of Sophia Scott:--

"In the chancel Miss Scott, a very charming, lively girl of seventeen, pointed out to us 'The Wizard's Grave,'

and then the black stone in the form of a coffin, to which the allusion is made in the poem, 'A Scottish monarch sleeps below,'--said to be the tomb of Alexander II. 'But I will tell you a secret,' she half whispered; 'only don't you tell Johnnie Bower. There is no Scottish monarch there at all, nor anybody else, for papa had the stone taken up, not long ago, and no coffin nor anything was to be found. And then Johnnie came and begged me not to tell people so. "For what wull I do, Miss Scott, when I show the ruins, if I canna point to this bit, and say, 'A Scottish monarch sleeps below'?"' As, however, he had the pleasure of saying this to us the evening before, Miss Scott thought we might fairly have her secret....

"We now set out for Dryburgh, about five miles. Mr.

Scott placed his daughter in our carriage, that she might point out the different places as we pa.s.sed them.

We could not have had a better director, nor a more lively, entertaining companion. Every spot was known to her, and in this fairyland her quick imagination seemed to delight in all the legendary lore she had heard, and could so promptly apply.... At the view of some distant mountains, Miss Scott suddenly exclaimed, 'Look, there are the Cheviots; are you not glad to see England again?' We a.s.sured her we were, though we should quit Scotland with so much regret. 'Well,' she said, 'I should not have liked you if you were not glad to return home.' Her father had taken her to London the year before, and she was delighted to get back again, and to hail the Cheviots on her return. It was plain to see she was her father's darling, and she talked of him with enthusiasm. She has a very natural, unaffected character, with a strong tincture of romantic feeling, which seemed judiciously kept in check by him, as she said he did not allow her to read much poetry, nor had she even read all his own poems, which were never to be found _in the way_, at their house. She spoke of her sister and her brothers, with a warmth of affection very pleasing. On asking what was become of Camp, she shook her head, and said he was dead. 'You must never come to Abbotsford when any of the dogs die, for there is a sad weeping amongst us all.'"--Lang's _Life of Lockhart_, vol. i. pp. 232-234.]]

{p.184} On his return from the Abbey, Irving found Scott ready for a ramble. I cannot refuse myself the pleasure of extracting some parts of his description of it.

"As we sallied forth, every dog in the establishment turned out to attend us. There was the old staghound, Maida, that I have already mentioned, a n.o.ble animal, and Hamlet, the black greyhound, a wild thoughtless youngster, not yet arrived at the years of discretion; and Finette, a beautiful setter, with soft, silken hair, long pendent ears, and a mild eye, the parlor favorite. When in front of the house, we were joined by a superannuated greyhound, who came from the kitchen wagging his tail; and was cheered by Scott as an old friend and comrade. In our walks, he would frequently pause in conversation, to notice his dogs, and speak to them as if rational companions; and, indeed, there appears to be a vast deal of rationality in these faithful attendants on man, derived from their close intimacy with him. Maida deported himself with a gravity becoming his age and size, and seemed to consider himself called upon to preserve a great degree of dignity and decorum in our society. As he jogged along a little distance ahead of us, the young dogs would gambol about him, leap on his neck, worry at his ears, and endeavor to tease him into a gambol. The old dog would keep on for a long time with imperturbable solemnity, now and then seeming to rebuke the wantonness of his young companions. At length he would make a sudden turn, seize one of them, and tumble him in the dust, then giving a {p.185} glance at us, as much as to say, 'You see, gentlemen, I can't help giving way to this nonsense,' would resume his gravity, and jog on as before. Scott amused himself with these peculiarities. 'I make no doubt,' said he, 'when Maida is alone with these young dogs, he throws gravity aside, and plays the boy as much as any of them; but he is ashamed to do so in our company, and seems to say--Ha' done with your nonsense, youngsters: what will the laird and that other gentleman think of me if I give way to such foolery?'

"Scott amused himself with the peculiarities of another of his dogs, a little shamefaced terrier, with large gla.s.sy eyes, one of the most sensitive little bodies to insult and indignity in the world. 'If ever he whipped him,' he said, 'the little fellow would sneak off and hide himself from the light of day in a lumber garret, from whence there was no drawing him forth but by the sound of the chopping-knife, as if chopping up his victuals, when he would steal forth with humiliated and downcast look, but would skulk away again if any one regarded him.'

"While we were discussing the humors and peculiarities of our canine companions, some object provoked their spleen, and produced a sharp and petulant barking from the smaller fry; but it was some time before Maida was sufficiently roused to ramp forward two or three bounds, and join the chorus with a deep-mouthed _bow wow_. It was but a transient outbreak, and he returned instantly, wagging his tail, and looking up dubiously in his master's face, uncertain whether he would receive censure or applause. 'Ay, ay, old boy!'

cried Scott, 'you have done wonders; you have shaken the Eildon hills with your roaring: you may now lay by your artillery for the rest of the day. Maida,' continued he, 'is like the great gun at Constantinople; it takes so long to get it ready, that the smaller guns can fire off a dozen times first: but when it does go off, it plays the very devil.'

"These simple anecdotes may serve to show the delightful play of Scott's humors and feelings in private life. His domestic animals were his friends. Everything about him seemed to rejoice in the light of his countenance.

"Our ramble took us on the hills commanding an extensive prospect. 'Now,' said Scott, 'I have brought you, like the pilgrim in the Pilgrim's Progress, to the top of the Delectable {p.186} Mountains, that I may show you all the goodly regions hereabouts. Yonder is Lammermuir, and Smailholm; and there you have Galashiels, and Torwoodlee, and Gala Water; and in that direction you see Teviotdale and the Braes of Yarrow, and Ettrick stream winding along like a silver thread, to throw itself into the Tweed.' He went on thus to call over names celebrated in Scottish song, and most of which had recently received a romantic interest from his own pen. In fact, I saw a great part of the Border country spread out before me, and could trace the scenes of those poems and romances which had in a manner bewitched the world.

"I gazed about me for a time with mute surprise, I may almost say with disappointment. I beheld a mere succession of gray waving hills, line beyond line, as far as my eye could reach, monotonous in their aspect, and so dest.i.tute of trees, that one could almost see a stout fly walking along their profile; and the far-famed Tweed appeared a naked stream, flowing between bare hills, without a tree or thicket on its banks; and yet such had been the magic web of poetry and romance thrown over the whole, that it had a greater charm for me than the richest scenery I had beheld in England. I could not help giving utterance to my thoughts. Scott hummed for a moment to himself, and looked grave; he had no idea of having his Muse complimented at the expense of his native hills. 'It may be pertinacity,' said he at length; 'but to my eye, these gray hills, and all this wild Border country, have beauties peculiar to themselves. I like the very nakedness of the land; it has something bold, and stern, and solitary about it. When I have been for some time in the rich scenery about Edinburgh, which is like ornamented garden land, I begin to wish myself back again among my own honest gray hills; and if I did not see the heather, at least once a year, _I think I should die!_' The last words were said with an honest warmth, accompanied by a thump on the ground with his staff, by way of emphasis, that showed his heart was in his speech. He vindicated the Tweed, too, as a beautiful stream in itself; and observed that he did not dislike it for being bare of trees, probably from having been much of an angler in his time; and an angler does not like to have a stream overhung by trees, which embarra.s.s him in the exercise of his rod and line.

{p.187} "I took occasion to plead, in like manner, the a.s.sociations of early life for my disappointment in respect to the surrounding scenery. I had been so accustomed to see hills crowned with forests, and streams breaking their way through a wilderness of trees, that all my ideas of romantic landscape were apt to be well wooded. 'Ay, and that's the great charm of your country,' cried Scott. 'You love the forest as I do the heather; but I would not have you think I do not feel the glory of a great woodland prospect. There is nothing I should like more than to be in the midst of one of your grand wild original forests, with the idea of hundreds of miles of untrodden forest around me. I once saw at Leith an immense stick of timber, just landed from America. It must have been an enormous tree when it stood in its native soil, at its full height, and with all its branches. I gazed at it with admiration; it seemed like one of the gigantic obelisks which are now and then brought from Egypt to shame the pigmy monuments of Europe; and, in fact, these vast aboriginal trees, that have sheltered the Indians before the intrusion of the white men, are the monuments and antiquities of your country.'

"The conversation here turned upon Campbell's poem of Gertrude of Wyoming, as ill.u.s.trative of the poetic materials furnished by American scenery. Scott cited several pa.s.sages of it with great delight. 'What a pity it is,' said he, 'that Campbell does not write more, and oftener, and give full sweep to his genius! He has wings that would bear him to the skies; and he does, now and then, spread them grandly, but folds them up again, and resumes his perch, as if he was afraid to launch away. What a grand idea is that,'

said he, 'about prophetic boding, or, in common parlance, second sight--

"Coming events cast their shadows before!"--

The fact is,' added he, 'Campbell is, in a manner, a bugbear to himself. The brightness of his early success is a detriment to all his further efforts. _He is afraid of the shadow that his own fame casts before him._'

"We had not walked much farther, before we saw the two Miss Scotts advancing along the hillside to meet us. The morning's studies being over, they had set off to take a ramble on the hills, and gather heather blossoms with which to decorate {p.188} their hair for dinner. As they came bounding lightly like young fawns, and their dresses fluttering in the pure summer breeze, I was reminded of Scott's own description of his children, in his introduction to one of the cantos of Marmion:--

'My imps, though hardy, bold, and wild, As best befits the mountain child,' etc.

As they approached, the dogs all sprang forward, and gambolled around them. They joined us with countenances full of health and glee. Sophia, the eldest, was the most lively and joyous, having much of her father's varied spirit in conversation, and seeming to catch excitement from his words and looks; Anne was of a quieter mood, rather silent, owing, in some measure, no doubt, to her being some years younger."[74]

[Footnote 74: ["His daughter Sophia and his son Charles were those of his family who seemed most to feel and understand his humors, and to take delight in his conversation. Mrs. Scott did not always pay the same attention, and would now and then make a casual remark which would operate a little like a damper. Thus, one morning at breakfast, when Dominie Thomson the tutor was present, Scott was going on with great glee to relate an anecdote of the laird of Macnab, 'who, poor fellow!'

premised he, 'is dead and gone.' 'Why, Mr. Scott,'

exclaimed the good lady, 'Macnab's not dead, is he?'

'Faith, my dear,' replied Scott, with humorous gravity, 'if he's not dead, they've done him a great injustice,--for they've buried him.'

"The joke pa.s.sed harmless and unnoticed by Mrs. Scott, but hit the poor Dominie just as he had raised a cup of tea to his lips ... sending half its contents about the table."--Irving's _Abbotsford_.]]

Having often, many years afterwards, heard Irving speak warmly of William Laidlaw, I must not omit the following pa.s.sage:--

"One of my pleasantest rambles with Scott about the neighborhood of Abbotsford was taken in company with Mr.

William Laidlaw, the steward of his estate. This was a gentleman for whom Scott entertained a particular value. He had been born to a competency, had been well educated, his mind was richly stored with varied information, and he was a man of sterling moral worth. Having been reduced by misfortune, Scott had got him to take charge of his estate.

He lived at a small farm, on the hillside above Abbotsford, and was treated {p.189} by Scott as a cherished and confidential friend, rather than a dependant.

"That day at dinner we had Mr. Laidlaw and his wife, and a female friend who accompanied them. The latter was a very intelligent respectable person, about the middle age, and was treated with particular attention and courtesy by Scott.

Our dinner was a most agreeable one, for the guests were evidently cherished visitors to the house, and felt that they were appreciated. When they were gone, Scott spoke of them in the most cordial manner. 'I wished to show you,'

said he, 'some of our really excellent, plain Scotch people: not fine gentlemen and ladies, for such you can meet everywhere, and they are everywhere the same. The character of a nation is not to be learnt from its fine folks.' He then went on with a particular eulogium on the lady who had accompanied the Laidlaws. She was the daughter, he said, of a poor country clergyman, who had died in debt, and left her an orphan and dest.i.tute. Having had a good plain education, she immediately set up a child's school, and had soon a numerous flock under her care, by which she earned a decent maintenance. That, however, was not her main object. Her first care was to pay off her father's debts, that no ill word or ill will might rest upon his memory. This, by dint of Scotch economy, backed by filial reverence and pride, she accomplished, though in the effort she subjected herself to every privation. Not content with this, she in certain instances refused to take pay for the tuition of the children of some of her neighbors, who had befriended her father in his need, and had since fallen into poverty. 'In a word,' added Scott, 'she's a fine old Scotch girl, and I delight in her more than in many a fine lady I have known, and I have known many of the finest.'

"The evening pa.s.sed away delightfully in a quaint-looking apartment, half study, half drawing-room. Scott read several pa.s.sages from the old Romance of Arthur, with a fine deep sonorous voice, and a gravity of tone that seemed to suit the antiquated black-letter volume. It was a rich treat to hear such a work read by such a person, and in such a place; and his appearance, as he sat reading, in a large armchair, with his favorite hound Maida at his feet, and surrounded by books and reliques and Border trophies, would have formed {p.190} an admirable and most characteristic picture. When I retired for the night, I found it almost impossible to sleep: the idea of being under the roof of Scott; of being on the Borders on the Tweed; in the very centre of that region which had, for some time past, been the favorite scene of romantic fiction; and, above all, the recollections of the ramble I had taken, the company in which I had taken it, and the conversation which had pa.s.sed, all fermented in my mind, and nearly drove sleep from my pillow.

"On the following morning the sun darted his beams from over the hills through the low lattice of my window. I rose at an early hour, and looked out between the branches of eglantine which overhung the cas.e.m.e.nt. To my surprise, Scott was already up, and forth, seated on a fragment of stone, and chatting with the workmen employed in the new building. I had supposed, after the time he had wasted upon me yesterday, he would be closely occupied this morning: but he appeared like a man of leisure, who had nothing to do but bask in the sunshine, and amuse himself. I soon dressed myself and joined him. He talked about his proposed plans of Abbotsford: happy would it have been for him could he have contented himself with his delightful little vine-covered cottage, and the simple, yet hearty and hospitable, style in which he lived at the time of my visit."[75]

[Footnote 75: [That this visit remained a vivid and delightful memory to the end of Irving's life is shown in some words spoken not long before his death: "Oh!

Scott was a master spirit--as glorious in his conversation as in his writings. Jeffrey was delightful, and had _eloquent runs_ in conversation; but there was a consciousness of talent with it. Scott had nothing of that. He spoke from the fulness of his mind, pouring out an incessant flow of anecdote, story, with dashes of humor, and then never monopolizing, but always ready to listen to and appreciate what came from others. I never felt such a consciousness of happiness as when under his roof."--_Washington Irving's Life and Letters_, vol. iv.

p. 260.]]

Among other visitors who succeeded the distinguished American that autumn, were Lady Byron, the wife of the poet, and the great artist, Mr., now Sir David Wilkie, who then executed for Captain Ferguson that pleasing little picture, in which Scott and his family are represented as a group of peasants, while the gallant soldier {p.191} himself figures by them in the character of a gamekeeper, or perhaps poacher.

Mr. Irving has given, in the little work from which I have quoted so liberally, an amusing account of the delicate scruples of Wilkie about soliciting Scott to devote a morning to the requisite sitting, until, after lingering for several days, he at length became satisfied that, by whatever magic his host might contrive to keep Ballantyne's presses in full play, he had always abundance of leisure for matters less important than Ferguson's destined heirloom. I shall now, however, return to his correspondence; and begin with a letter to Joanna Baillie on Lady Byron's visit.

TO MISS JOANNA BAILLIE, HAMPSTEAD.

ABBOTSFORD, September 26, 1817.

MY DEAR MISS BAILLIE,--A series of little trinketty sort of business, and occupation, and idleness, have succeeded to each other so closely, that I have been scarce able, for some three weeks past, to call my time my own for half an hour together; but enough of apologies--they are vile things, and I know you will impute my negligence to anything rather than forgetting or undervaluing your friendship. You know, by this time, that we have had a visit from Lady Byron, delightful both on its own account, and because it was accompanied with good news and a letter from you. I regret we could not keep her longer than a day with us, which was spent on the banks of the Yarrow, and I hope and believe she was pleased with us, because I am sure she will be so with everything that is intended to please her: meantime her visit gave me a most lawyer-like fit of the bile. I have lived too long to be surprised at any instance of human caprice, but still it vexes me. Now, one would suppose Lady Byron, young, beautiful, with birth, and rank, and fortune, and taste, and high accomplishments, and admirable good sense, qualified to have made happy one whose talents are so high as Lord Byron's, and whose marked {p.192} propensity it is to like those who are qualified to admire and understand his talents; and yet it has proved otherwise. I can safely say my heart ached for her all the time we were together; there was so much patience and decent resignation to a situation which must have pressed on her thoughts, that she was to me one of the most interesting creatures I had seen for a score of years. I am sure I should not have felt such strong kindness towards her had she been at the height of her fortune, and in the full enjoyment of all the brilliant prospects to which she seemed destined.--You will wish to hear of my complaint. I think, thank G.o.d, that it is leaving me--not suddenly, however, for I have had some repet.i.tions, but they have become fainter and fainter, and I have not been disturbed by one for these three weeks. I trust, by care and attention, my stomach will return to its usual tone, and I am as careful as I can. I have taken hard exercise with good effect, and am often six hours on foot without stopping or sitting down, to which my plantations and enclosures contribute not a little. I have, however, given up the gun this season, finding myself unable to walk up to the dogs; but Walter has taken it in hand, and promises to be a first-rate shot; he brought us in about seven or eight brace of birds the evening Lady Byron came to us, which papa was of course a little proud of. The blackc.o.c.ks are getting very plenty on our moor-ground at Abbotsford, but I a.s.sociate them so much with your beautiful poem,[76] that I have not the pleasure I used to have in knocking them down. I wish I knew how to send you a brace. I get on with my labors here; my house is about to be roofed in, and a comical concern it is.

Yours truly,

W. S.

[Footnote 76: "Good-morrow to thy sable beak, And glossy plumage dark and sleek, Thy crimson moon, and azure eye, c.o.c.k of the heath, so wildly shy!" etc.]

{p.193} The next letter refers to the Duke of Buccleuch's preparations for a cattle-show at Bowhill, which was followed by an entertainment on a large scale to his Grace's Selkirkshire neighbors and tenantry, and next day by a fox-hunt, after Dandie Dinmont's fashion, among the rocks of the Yarrow. The Sheriff attended _with his tail on_; and Wilkie, too, went with him. It was there that Sir David first saw Hogg, and the Shepherd's greeting was graceful. He eyed the great painter for a moment in silence, and then stretching out his hand, said: "Thank G.o.d for it. I did not know that you were so young a man!"

TO THE DUKE OF BUCCLEUCH, ETC., ETC., ETC., DRUMLANRIG CASTLE.

MY DEAR LORD DUKE,--I am just honored with your Grace's of the 27th. The posts, which are as cross as pie-crust, have occasioned some delay. Depend on our attending at Bowhill on the 20th, and staying over the show. I have written to Adam Ferguson, who will come with a whoop and a hollo. So will the Ballantynes--flageolet[77] and all--for the festival, and they shall be housed at Abbotsford. I have an inimitably good songster in the person of Terence Magrath, who teaches my girls. He beats almost all whom I have ever heard attempt Moore's songs, and I can easily cajole him also out to Abbotsford for a day or two. In jest or earnest, I never heard a better singer in a room, though his voice is not quite full enough for a concert; and for an after-supper song, he almost equals Irish Johnstone.[78]

[Footnote 77: The _flageolet_ alludes to Mr. Alexander Ballantyne, the third of the brothers--a fine musician, and a most amiable and modest man, never connected with Scott in any business matters, but always much his favorite in private.]

[Footnote 78: Mr. Magrath has now been long established in his native city of Dublin. His musical excellence was by no means the only merit that attached Scott to his society while he remained in Edinburgh.]

Trade of every kind is recovering, and not a loom idle {p.194} in Glasgow. The most faithful respects of this family attend the Ladies and all at Drumlanrig. I ever am your Grace's truly obliged and grateful

Walter SCOTT.

Given from my Castle of Grawacky, this second day of the month called October, One Thousand Eight Hundred and Seventeen Years.