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Title: Sir Walter Scott as a Critic of Literature

Author: Margaret Ball

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*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK SIR WALTER
SCOTT AS A CRITIC OF LITERATURE ***

SIR WALTER SCOTT

AS A CRITIC OF LITERATURE

BY

MARGARET BALL, PH.D.

New York
THE COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY PRESS
1907

Copyright, 1907
BY THE COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY PRESS
Printed from type November, 1907

PRESS OF
THE NEW ERA PRINTING COMPANY
LANCASTER, PA.

PREFACE
The lack of any adequate discussion of Scott's critical work is a
sufficient reason for the undertaking of this study, the subject of
which was suggested to me more than three years ago by Professor
Trent of Columbia University. We still use critical essays and
monumental editions prepared by the author of the Waverley novels,
but the criticism has been so overshadowed by the romances that its
importance is scarcely recognized. It is valuable in itself, as well as
in the opportunity it offers of considering the relation of the critical
to the creative mood, an especially interesting problem when it is
presented concretely in the work of a great writer.

No complete bibliography of Scott's writings has been published,
and perhaps none is possible in the case of an author who wrote so
much anonymously. The present attempt includes some at least of
the books and articles commonly left unnoticed, which are chiefly
of a critical or scholarly character.

I am glad to record my gratitude to Professor William Allan
Neilson, now of Harvard University, and to Professors A.H.
Thorndike, W.W. Lawrence, G.P. Krapp, and J.E. Spingarn, of
Columbia, for suggestions in connection with various parts of the
work. From the beginning Professor Trent has helped me constantly
by his advice as well as by the inspiration of his scholarship, and my
debt to him is one which can be understood only by the many
students who have known his kindness.

MOUNT HOLYOKE COLLEGE,
June, 1907.

CONTENTS

CHAPTER I.
Introduction: An Outline of Scott's Literary Career 1

CHAPTER II.
Scott's Qualifications as Critic 9

CHAPTER III.
Scott's Work as Student and Editor in the Field of Literary History

1. The Mediaeval Period
(a) Minstrelsy of the Scottish Border 17
(b) Studies in the Romances 32
(c) Other Studies in Mediaeval Literature 40

2. The Drama 46

3. The Seventeenth Century: Dryden 59

4. The Eighteenth Century
(a) Swift 65

(b) The Somers Tracts 70
(c) The Lives of the Novelists, and Comments on other 72
Eighteenth Century Writers

CHAPTER IV.
Scott's Criticism of His Contemporaries 81

CHAPTER V.
Scott as a Critic of His Own Work 108

CHAPTER VI.
Scott's Position as Critic 134

APPENDICES
I. Bibliography of Scott, Annotated 147
II. List of Books Quoted 174
Index 179

A DATED LIST OF SCOTT'S BOOKS, ASIDE FROM
THE POEMS AND NOVELS, AND OF THE
PRINCIPAL WORKS WHICH HE EDITED
(PERIODICAL CRITICISM NOT INCLUDED).

1802-3 Minstrelsy of the Scottish Border (edited).
1804 Sir Tristrem (edited).
1806 Original Memoirs written during the Great Civil War; the
Life of Sir H. Slingsby, and Memoirs of Capt. Hodgson
(edited).
1808 Memoirs of Capt. Carleton (edited).
1808 The Works of John Dryden (edited).
1808 Memoirs of Robert Carey, Earl of Monmouth, and
Fragmenta Regalia (edited).
1808 Queenhoo Hall, a Romance; and Ancient Times, a Drama
(edited).
1809 The State Papers and Letters of Sir Ralph Sadler (edited).
1809-15 The Somers Tracts (edited).
1811 Memoirs of the Court of Charles II, by Count Grammont
(edited).
1811 Secret History of the Court of James the First (edited).
1813 Memoirs of the Reign of King Charles I, by Sir Philip
Warwick (edited).
1814 The Works of Jonathan Swift (edited).
1814-17 The Border Antiquities of England and Scotland.
1816 Paul's Letters.
1818 Essay on Chivalry.
1819 Essay on the Drama.
1819-26 Provincial Antiquities and Picturesque Scenery of
Scotland.

1820 Trivial Poems and Triolets by Patrick Carey (edited).
1821 Northern Memoirs, calculated for the Meridian of
Scotland; and the Contemplative and Practical Angler
(edited).
1821-24 The Novelists' Library (edited).
1822 Chronological Notes of Scottish Affairs from 1680 till
1701 (edited).
1822 Military Memoirs of the Great Civil War (edited).
1824 Essay on Romance.
1826 Letters of Malachi Malagrowther on the Currency.
1827 The Life of Napoleon Buonaparte.
1828 Tales of a Grandfather, first series.
1828 Religious Discourses, by a Layman.
1828 Proceedings in the Court-martial held upon John, Master
of Sinclair, etc. (edited).
1829 Memorials of George Bannatyne (edited).
1829 Tales of a Grandfather, second series.
1829-32 The "Opus Magnum" (Novels, Tales, and Romances, with
Introductions and Notes by the Author).
1830 Tales of a Grandfather, third series.
1830 Letters on Demonology and Witchcraft.
1830 History of Scotland.
1831 Tales of a Grandfather, fourth series.
1831 Trial of Duncan Terig, etc. (edited).

1890 The Journal of Sir Walter Scott.
1894 Familiar Letters of Sir Walter Scott.

CHAPTER I
INTRODUCTION
Importance of a study of Scott's critical and scholarly work—Connection
between his creative work and his criticism—Chronological view of his literary
career.

Scott's critical work has become inconspicuous because of his
predominant fame as an imaginative writer; but what it loses on this
account it perhaps gains in the special interest attaching to criticism
formulated by a great creative artist. One phase of his work is emphasized
and explained by the other, and we cannot afford to ignore his criticism if
we attempt fairly to comprehend his genius as a poet and novelist. The fact
that he is the subject of one of the noblest biographies in our language only
increases our obligation to become acquainted with his own presentation of
his artistic principles.

But though criticism by so great and voluminous a writer is valuable
mainly because of the important relation it bears to his other work, and
because of the authority it derives from this relation, Scott's scholarly and
critical writings are individual enough in quality and large enough in extent
to demand consideration on their own merits. Yet this part of his
achievement has received very little attention from biographers and critics.
Lockhart's book is indeed full of materials, and contains also some
suggestive comment on the facts presented; but as the passing of time has
made an estimation of Scott's power more safe, students have lost interest in
his work as a critic, and recent writers have devoted little attention to this
aspect of the great man of letters.[1]

The present study is an attempt to show the scope and quality of Scott's
critical writings, and of such works, not exclusively or mainly critical, as
exhibit the range of his scholarship. For it is impossible to treat his criticism
without discussing his scholarship; since, lightly as he carried it, this was of
consequence in itself and in its influence on all that he did. The materials
for analysis are abundant; and by rearrangement and special study they may
be made to contribute both to the history of criticism and to our
comprehension of the power of a great writer. In considering him from this
point of view we are bound to remember the connection between the
different parts of his vocation. In him, more than in most men of letters, the
critic resembled the creative writer, and though the critical temperament
seems to show itself but rarely in his romances, we find that the
characteristic absence of precise and conscious art is itself in harmony with
his critical creed.

The relation between the different parts of Scott's literary work is
exemplified by the subjects he treated, for as a critic he touched many
portions of the field, which in his capacity of poet and novelist he occupied
in a different way. He was a historical critic no less than a historical
romancer. A larger proportion of his criticism concerns itself with the
eighteenth century, perhaps, than of his fiction,[2] and he often wrote
reviews of contemporary literature, but on the whole the literature with
which he dealt critically was representative of those periods of time which
he chose to portray in novel and poem. This evidently implies great breadth
of scope. Yet Scott's vivid sense of the past had its bounds, as Professor
Masson pointed out.[3] It was the "Gothic" past that he venerated. The field
of his studies, chronologically considered, included the period between his
own time and the crusades; and geographically, was in general confined to
England and Scotland, with comparatively rare excursions abroad. When, in
his novels, he carried his Scottish or English heroes out of Britain into
foreign countries, he was apt to bestow upon them not only a special
endowment of British feeling, but also a portion of that interest in their
native literature which marked the taste of their creator. We find that the
personages in his books are often distinguished by that love of stirring
poetry, particularly of popular and national poetry, which was a dominant
trait in Scott's whole literary career.

With Scotland and with popular poetry any discussion of Sir Walter
properly begins. The love of Scottish minstrelsy first awakened his literary
sense, and the stimulus supplied by ballads and romances never lost its
force. We may say that the little volumes of ballad chap-books which he
collected and bound up before he was a dozen years old suggested the
future editor, as the long poem on the Conquest of Grenada, which he is
said to have written and burned when he was fifteen, foreshadowed the poet
and romancer.

Yet Scott's career as an author began rather late. He published a few
translations when he was twenty-five years old, but his first notable work,
the Minstrelsy of the Scottish Border, did not appear until 1802-3, when he
was over thirty. This book, the outgrowth of his early interest in ballads and
his own attempts at versifying, exhibited both his editorial and his creative
powers. It led up to the publication of two important volumes which
contained material originally intended to form part of the Minstrelsy, but
which outgrew that work. These were the edition of the old metrical
romance Sir Tristrem, which showed Scott as a scholar, and the Lay of the
Last Minstrel, the first of Scott's own metrical romances. So far his literary
achievement was all of one kind, or of two or three kinds closely related. In
this first period of his literary life, perhaps even more than later, his
editorial impulse, his scholarly activity, was closely connected with the
inspiration for original writing. The Lay of the Last Minstrel was the climax
of this series of enterprises.

With the publication of the Minstrelsy, Scott of course became known as
a literary antiquary. He was naturally called upon for help when the
Edinburgh Review was started a few weeks afterwards, especially as Jeffrey,
who soon became the editor, had long been his friend. The articles that he
wrote during 1803 and 1804 were of a sort that most evidently connected
itself with the work he had been doing: reviews, for example, of Southey's
Amadis de Gaul, and of Ellis's Early English Poetry. During 1805-6 the
range of his reviewing became wider and he included some modern books,
especially two or three which offered opportunity for good fun-making.
About 1806, however, his aversion to the political principles which
dominated the Edinburgh Review became so strong that he refused to

continue as a contributor, and only once, years later, did he again write an
article for that periodical.

In the same year, 1806, Scott supplied with editorial apparatus and issued
anonymously Original Memoirs Written during the Great Civil War, the
first of what proved to be a long list of publications having historical
interest, sometimes reprints, sometimes original editions from old
manuscripts, to which he contributed a greater or less amount of material in
the shape of introductions and notes. These were undertaken in a few cases
for money, in others simply because they struck him as interesting and
useful labors. It is easy to trace the relation of this to his other work,
particularly to the novels. He once wrote to a friend, "The editing a new
edition of Somers's Tracts some years ago made me wonderfully well
acquainted with the little traits which marked parties and characters in the
seventeenth century, and the embodying them is really an amusing task."[4]
Among the works which he edited in this way the number of historical
memoirs is noticeable. After the volume that has been mentioned as the
first, he prepared another book of Memoirs of the Great Civil War; and we
find in the list a Secret History of the Court of James I., Memoirs of the
Reign of King Charles I., Count Grammont's Memoirs of the Court of
Charles II., A History of Queen Elizabeth's Favourites, etc. Such books as
these, besides furnishing material for his novels, led Scott to acquire a mass
of information that enabled him to perform with great facility and with
admirable results whatever editorial work he might choose to undertake.

These labors Scott always considered as trifles to be dispatched in the
odd moments of his time, but the great edition of Dryden's Complete Works,
which he began to prepare soon after the Minstrelsy appeared, was more
important. This, next to the Minstrelsy, was probably the most notable of all
Scott's editorial enterprises. It was published in eighteen volumes in 1808,
the year in which Marmion also appeared. When the poet was reproached
by one of his friends for not working more steadily at his vocation, he
replied, "The public, with many other properties of spoiled children, has all
their eagerness after novelty, and were I to dedicate my time entirely to
poetry they would soon tire of me. I must therefore, I fear, continue to edit a
little."[5] His interest in scholarly pursuits appears even in his first attempt at
writing prose fiction, since Joseph Strutt's unfinished romance, Queenhoo

Hall, for which Scott wrote a conclusion, is of consequence only on account
of the antiquarian learning which it exhibits.

Having become seriously alarmed over the political influence of the
Edinburgh Review, Scott was active in forwarding plans for starting a
strong rival periodical in London, and 1809 saw the establishment of the
Quarterly Review. By that time he had done a considerable amount of work
in practically every kind except the novel, and he was recognized as a most
efficient assistant and adviser in any such enterprise as the promoters of the
Quarterly were undertaking. Moreover, his own writings were prominent
among the books which supplied material for the reviewer. He worked hard
for the first volume. But after that year he wrote little for the Quarterly until
1818, and again little until after Lockhart became editor in 1825. From that
time until 1831 he was an occasional contributor.

1814 was the year of Waverley. Before that the poems had been
appearing in rapid succession, and Scott had been busy with the Works of
Swift, which came out also in 1814. The thirteen volumes of the edition of
Somers' Tracts, already mentioned, and several smaller books, bore further
witness to his editorial energy. The last of the long poems was published in
1815, about the same time with Guy Mannering, the second novel, and after
that the novels continued to appear with that rapidity which constitutes one
of the chief facts of Scott's literary career. For a few years after this period
he did comparatively little in the way of editorial work, but his odd
moments were occupied in writing about history, travels, and antiquities.[6]

In 1820 Scott wrote the Lives of the Novelists, which appeared the next
year in Ballantyne's Novelists' Library. By this time he had begun, with
Ivanhoe, to strike out from the Scottish field in which all his first novels had
been placed. The martial pomp prominent in this novel reflects the eager
interest with which he was at that time following his son's opening career in
the army; just as Marmion, written by the young quartermaster of the
Edinburgh Light Horse, also expresses the military ardor which was so
natural to Scott, and which reminds us of his remark that in those days a
regiment of dragoons was tramping through his head day and night.
Probably we might trace many a reason for his literary preoccupations at
special times besides those that he has himself commented upon. In the case

of the critical work, however, the matter was usually determined for him by
circumstances of a much less intimate sort, such as the appeal of an editor
or the appearance of a book which excited his special interest.

When Scott was obliged to make as much money as possible he wrote
novels and histories rather than criticism. His Life of Napoleon Buonaparte,
which appeared in nine volumes in 1827, enabled him to make the first
large payment on the debts that had fallen upon him in the financial crash of
the preceding year, and the Tales of a Grandfather were among the most
successful of his later books. His critical biographies and many of his other
essays were brought together for the first time in 1827, and issued under the
title of Miscellaneous Prose Works. The world of books was making his life
weary with its importunate demands in those years when he was writing to
pay his debts, and it is pleasant to see that some of his later reviews
discussed matters that were not less dear to his heart because they were not
literary. The articles on fishing, on ornamental gardening, on planting waste
lands, remind us of the observation he once made, that his oaks would
outlast his laurels.

By this time the "Author of Waverley" was no longer the "unknown." His
business complications compelled him to give his name to the novels, and
with the loss of a certain kind of privacy he gained the freedom of which
later he made such fortunate use in annotating his own works. From the
beginning of 1828 until the end of his life in 1832, Scott was engaged, in
the intervals of other occupations, in writing these introductions and notes
for his novels, for an edition which he always called the Opus Magnum.
This was a pleasant task, charmingly done. Indeed we may call it the last of
those great editorial labors by which Scott's fame might live unsupported by
anything else. First came the Minstrelsy of the Scottish Border, then the
editions of Dryden and Swift. Next we may count the Lives of the Novelists,
even in the fragmentary state in which the failure of the Novelists' Library
left them; and finally the Opus Magnum. When, in addition, we remember
the mass of his critical work written for periodicals, and the number of
minor volumes he edited, it becomes evident that a study of Scott which
disregards this part of his work can present only a one-sided view of his
achievement. And the qualities of his abundant criticism, especially its large
fresh sanity, seem to make it worthy of closer analysis than it usually

receives, not only because it helps to reveal Scott's genius, but also on
account of the historical and ethical importance which always attaches to
the ideals, literary and other, of a noble man and a great writer.

CHAPTER II
SCOTT'S QUALIFICATIONS AS CRITIC
Wide reading Scott's first qualification—Scott the antiquary—Character of his
interest in history—His imagination—His knowledge of practical affairs—
Common-sense in criticism—Cheerfulness, good-humor, and optimism—
General aspect of Scott's critical work.

Wide and appreciative reading was Scott's first qualification for critical
work. A memory that retained an incredible amount of what he read was the
second. One of the severest censures he ever expressed was in regard to
Godwin, who, he thought, undertook to do scholarly work without adequate
equipment. "We would advise him," Scott said in his review of Godwin's
Life of Chaucer, "in future to read before he writes, and not merely while he
is writing." Scott himself had accumulated a store of literary materials, and
he used them according to the dictates of a temperament which had vivid
interests on many sides.

We may distinguish three points of view which were habitual to Scott,
and which determined the direction of his creative work, as well as the tone
of his criticism. These were—as all the world knows—the historical, the
romantic, the practical.

He was, as he often chose to call himself, an antiquary; he felt the appeal
of all that was old and curious. But he was much more than that. The typical
antiquary has his mind so thoroughly devoted to the past that the present
seems remote to him. The sheer intellectual capacity of such a man as Scott
might be enough to save him from such a limitation, for he could give to the
past as much attention as an ordinary man could muster, and still have

interest for contemporary affairs; but his capacity was not all that saved
Scott. He viewed the past always as filled with living men, whose chief
occupation was to think and feel rather than to provide towers and armor for
the delectation of future antiquaries.[7] A sympathetic student of his work
has said, "There is ... throughout the poetry of this author, even when he
leads us to the remotest wildernesses and the most desolate monuments of
antiquity, a constant reference to the feelings of man in his social
condition."[8] The past, to the author of Kenilworth, was only the far end of
the present, and he believed that the most useful result of the study of
history is a comprehension of the real quality of one's own period and a
wisdom in the conduct of present day affairs.[9]

The favorite pursuits of Scott's youth indicate that his characteristic taste
showed itself early; indeed it is said that he retained his boyish traits more
completely than most people do. We can trace much of his love of the past
to the family traditions which made the adventurous life of his ancestors
vividly real to him. The annals of the Scotts were his earliest study, and he
developed such an affection for his freebooting grandsires that in his
manhood he confessed to an unconquerable liking for the robbers and
captains of banditti of his romances, characters who could not be prevented
from usurping the place of the heroes. "I was always a willing listener to
tales of broil and battle and hubbub of every kind," he wrote in later life,
"and now I look back upon it, I think what a godsend I must have been
while a boy to the old Trojans of 1745, nay 1715, who used to frequent my
father's house, and who knew as little as I did for what market I was laying
up the raw materials of their oft-told tales."[10] What attracted him in his
boyhood, and what continued to attract him, was the picturesque incident,
the color of the past, the mere look of its varied activity. The philosophy of
history was gradually revealed to him, however, and his generalizing
faculty found congenial employment in tracing out the relation of men to
movements, of national impulses to world history. But however much he
might exercise his analytical powers, history was never abstract to him, nor
did it require an effort for him to conjure up scenes of the past. An
acquaintance with the stores of early literature served to give him the spirit
of remote times as well as to feed his literary tastes. On this side he had an
ample equipment for critical work, conditioned, of course, by the other
qualities of his mind, which determined how the equipment should be used.

That Scott was not a dull digger in heaps of ancient lore was owing to his
imaginative power,—the second of the qualities which we have
distinguished as dominating his literary temperament. "I can see as many
castles in the clouds as any man," he testified.[11] A recent writer has said
that Scott had more than any other man that ever lived a sense of the
romantic, and adds that his was that true romance which "lies not upon the
outside of life, but absolutely in the centre of it."[12] The situations and the
very objects that he described have the power of stirring the romantic spirit
in his readers because he was alive to the glamour surrounding anything
which has for generations been connected with human thoughts and
emotions. The subjectivity which was so prominent an element in the
romanticism of Shelley, Keats, and Byron, does not appear in Scott's work.
Nor was his sense of the mystery of things so subtle as that of Coleridge.
But Scott, rather than Coleridge, was the interpreter to his age of the
romantic spirit, for the ordinary person likes his wonders so tangible that he
may know definitely the point at which they impinge upon his
consciousness. In Scott's work the point of contact is made clear: the author
brings his atmosphere not from another world but from the past, and with
all its strangeness it has no unearthly quality. In general the romance of his
nature is rather taken for granted than insisted on, for there are the poems
and the novels to bear witness to that side of his temperament; and the
surprising thing is that such an author was a business man, a large
landowner, an industrious lawyer.[13]

Scott's imaginative sense, which clothed in fine fancies any incident or
scene presented, however nakedly, to his view, accounts in part for his
notorious tendency to overrate the work of other writers, especially those
who wrote stories in any form. This explanation was hinted at by Sir Walter
himself, and formulated by Lockhart; it seems a fairly reasonable way of
accounting for a trait that at first appears to indicate only a foolish excess of
good-nature. This rich and active imagination, which Scott brought to bear
on everything he read, perhaps explains also his habit of paying little
attention to carefully worked out details, and of laying almost exclusive
emphasis upon main outlines. When he was writing his Life of Napoleon, he
said in his Journal: "Better a superficial book which brings well and
strikingly together the known and acknowledged facts, than a dull boring
narrative, pausing to see further into a mill-stone at every moment than the

nature of the mill-stone admits."[14] Probably his high gift of imagination
made him a little impatient with the remoter reaches of the analytic
faculties. Any sustained exercise of the pure reason was outside his
province, reasonable as he was in everyday affairs. He preferred to consider
facts, and to theorize only so far as was necessary to establish comfortable
relations between the facts,—never to the extent of trying to look into the
center of a mill-stone. It was not unusual for him to make very acute
observations in the spheres of ethics, economics, and psychology, and to
use them in explaining any situation which might seem to require their
assistance; but these remarks were brief and incidental, and bore a very
definite relation to the concrete ideas they were meant to illustrate.

Scott was a business man as well as an antiquary and a poet. Mr.
Palgrave thought Lockhart went too far in creating the impression that Scott
could detach his mind from the world of imagination and apply its full force
to practical affairs.[15] Yet the oversight of lands and accounts and of all
ordinary matters was so congenial to him, and his practical activities were
on the whole conducted with so much spirit and capability, that after
emphasizing his preoccupation with the poetic aspects of the life of his
ancestors, we must turn immediately about and lay stress upon his keen
judgment in everyday affairs. To a school-boy poet he once wrote: "I would
... caution you against an enthusiasm which, while it argues an excellent
disposition and a feeling heart, requires to be watched and restrained,
though not repressed. It is apt, if too much indulged, to engender a
fastidious contempt for the ordinary business of the world, and gradually to
render us unfit for the exercise of the useful and domestic virtues which
depend greatly upon our not exalting our feelings above the temper of well-
ordered and well-educated society."[16] He phrased the same matter
differently when he said: "'I'd rather be a kitten and cry, Mew!' than write
the best poetry in the world on condition of laying aside common-sense in
the ordinary transactions and business of the world."[17] "He thought," said
Lockhart, "that to spend some fair portion of every day in any matter-of-fact
occupation is good for the higher faculties themselves in the upshot."[18]
Whether or not we consider this the ideal theory of life for a poet, we find it
reasonable to suppose that a critic will be the better critic if he preserve
some balance between matter-of-fact occupation and the exercise of his

higher faculties. Sir Walter's maxim applies well to himself at least, and an
analysis of his powers as a critic derives some light from it.

The thing that is waiting to be said is of course that his criticism is
distinguished by common-sense. Whether common-sense should really
predominate in criticism might perhaps be debated; the quality indicates,
indeed, not only the excellence but also the limitations of his method. For
example, Scott was rather too much given to accepting popular favor as the
test of merit in literary work, and though the clamorously eager reception of
his own books was never able to raise his self-esteem to a very high pitch, it
seems to have been the only thing that induced him to respect his powers in
anything like an appreciative way.[19] His instinct and his judgment agreed
in urging him to avoid being a man of "mere theory,"[20] and he sought
always to test opinions by practical standards.

More or less connected with his good sense are other qualities which also
had their effect upon his critical work,—his cheerfulness, his sweet temper
and human sympathy, his modesty, his humor, his independence of spirit,
and his enthusiastic delight in literature. That his cheerfulness was a matter
of temperament we cannot doubt, but it was also founded on principle. He
had remarkable power of self-control.[21] His opinion that it is a man's duty
to live a happy life appears rather quaintly in the sermonizing with which he
felt called upon to temper the admiration expressed in his articles on Childe
Harold, and it is implicit in many of his biographical studies. His own
amiability of course influenced all his work. Satire he considered
objectionable, "a woman's fault,"[22] as he once called it; though he did not
feel himself "altogether disqualified for it by nature."[23] "I have refrained,
as much as human frailty will permit, from all satirical composition,"[24] he
said. For satire he seems to have substituted that kind of "serious banter, a
style hovering between affected gravity and satirical slyness," which has
been pointed out as characteristic of him.[25] Washington Irving noticed a
similar tone in all his familiar conversations about local traditions and
superstitions.[26]

He was really optimistic, except on some political questions. In his Lives
of the Novelists he shows that he thought manners and morals had improved
in the previous hundred years; and none of his reviews exhibits the feeling

so common among men of letters in all ages, that their own times are
intellectually degenerate. It is true that he looked back to the days of Blair,
Hume, Adam Smith, Robertson, and Ferguson, as the "golden days of
Edinburgh,"[27] but those golden days were no farther away than his own
boyhood, and he had felt the exhilaration of the stimulating society which
he praised. One of his contemporaries spoke of Scott's own works as
throwing "a literary splendour over his native city";[28] and George Ticknor
said of him, "He is indeed the lord of the ascendant now in Edinburgh, and
well deserves to be, for I look upon him to be quite as remarkable in
intercourse and conversation, as he is in any of his writings, even in his
novels."[29] But he could hardly be expected to perceive the luster
surrounding his own personality, and this one instance of regret for former
days counts little against the abundant evidence that he thought the world
was improving. Yet of all his contemporaries he was probably the one who
looked back at the past with the greatest interest. The impression made by
the author of Waverley upon the mind of a young enthusiast of his own time
is too delightful to pass over without quotation. "He has no eccentric
sympathies or antipathies"; wrote J.L. Adolphus, "no maudlin philanthropy
or impertinent cynicism; no nondescript hobby-horse; and with all his
matchless energy and originality of mind, he is content to admire popular
books, and enjoy popular pleasures; to cherish those opinions which
experience has sanctioned; to reverence those institutions which antiquity
has hallowed; and to enjoy, admire, cherish, and reverence all these with the
same plainness, simplicity, and sincerity as our ancestors did of old."[30]

By temperament, then, Scott was enthusiastic over the past and cheerful
in regard to his own day; he was imaginative, practical, genial; and these
traits must be taken into account in judging his critical writings. These and
other qualities may be deduced from the most superficial study of his
creative work. The mere bulk of that work bears witness to two things: first
that Scott was primarily a creative writer; again, that he was of those who
write much rather than minutely. It is obvious that to attack details would be
easy. And since he was only secondarily a critic, it is natural that his critical
opinions should not have been erected into any system. But while they are
essentially desultory, they are the ideas of a man whose information and
enthusiasm extended through a wide range of studies; and they are rendered

impressive by the abundance, variety, and energy, which mark them as
characteristic of Scott.

CHAPTER III
SCOTT'S WORK AS STUDENT AND EDITOR
IN THE FIELD OF LITERARY HISTORY

THE MEDIAEVAL PERIOD

Minstrelsy of the Scottish Border
Scott's early interest in ballads—Casual origin of the Minstrelsy—Importance
of the book in Scott's career—Plan of the book—Mediaeval scholarship of
Scott's time—His theory as to the origin of ballads and their deterioration—His
attitude toward the work of previous editors—His method of forming texts—
Kinds of changes he made—His qualifications for emending old poetry—
Modern imitations of the ballad included in the Minstrelsy— Remarks on the
ballad style—Impossibility of a scientific treatment of folk-poetry in Scott's time
—Real importance of the Minstrelsy.

We think of the Border Minstrelsy as the first work which resulted from
the preparation of Scott's whole youth, between the days when he insisted
on shouting the lines of Hardyknute into the ears of the irate clergyman
making a parish call, and the time when he and his equally ardent friends
gathered their ballads from the lips of old women among the hills. But we
have seen that the inspiration for his first attempts at writing poetry came
only indirectly from the ballads of his own country. We learn from the
introduction to the third part of the Minstrelsy that some of the young men
of Scott's circle in Edinburgh were stimulated by what the novelist, Henry
Mackenzie, told them of the beauties of German literature, to form a class
for the study of that language. This was when Scott was twenty-one, but it
was still four years before he found himself writing those translations which
mark the sufficiently modest beginning of his literary career. His

enthusiasm for German literature was not at first tempered by any critical
discrimination, if we may judge from the opinions of one or two of his
friends who labored to point out to him the extravagance and false
sentiment which he was too ready to admire along with the real genius of
some of his models.[31] Apparently their efforts were useful, for in a review
written in 1806 we find Scott, in a remark on Bürger, referring to "the taste
for outrageous sensibility, which disgraces most German poetry."[32] His
special interest in the Germans was an early mood which seems not to have
returned. After the process of translation had discovered to him his verse-
making faculty, he naturally passed on to the writing of original poems, and
circumstances of a half accidental sort determined that the Scottish ballads
which he had always loved should absorb his attention for the next two or
three years.

The publication of a book of ballads was first suggested by Scott as an
opportunity for his friend Ballantyne to exhibit his skill as a printer and so
increase his business. "I have been for years collecting old Border ballads,"
Scott remarked, "and I think I could with little trouble put together such a
selection from them as might make a neat little volume to sell for four or
five shillings."[33] From this casual proposition resulted The Minstrelsy of
the Scottish Border, published in three volumes in 1802-3 and often revised
and reissued during the editor's lifetime.

This book and the prefaces to his own novels are likely to be thought of
first when Scott is spoken of as a critic. The connection between the
Minstrelsy and the novels has often been pointed out, ever since the day of
the contemporary who, on reading the ballads with their introductions,
exclaimed that in that book were the elements of a hundred historical
romances.[34] The interest of the earlier work is undoubtedly multiplied by
the associations in the light of which we read it—associations connected
with the editor's whole experience as an author, from the Lay of the Last
Minstrel to Castle Dangerous.

Important as the Minstrelsy is from the point of view of literary criticism,
the material of its introductions is chiefly historical. The introduction in the
original edition gives an account of life on the Border in the fifteenth and
sixteenth centuries, with the outlines of many of the events that stimulated

ballad-making, and an analysis of the temper of the Marchmen among
whom this kind of poetry flourished; then by special introductions and notes
to the poems an attempt is made to explain both the incidents on which they
seem to have been founded, and parallel cases that appear in tradition or
record. Some enthusiastic comment is included, of the kind that was so
natural to Scott, on the effect of ballad poetry upon a spirited and warlike
people. The writer continues: "But it is not the Editor's present intention to
enter upon a history of Border poetry; a subject of great difficulty, and
which the extent of his information does not as yet permit him to engage
in." It was, in fact, nearly thirty years later[35] that Scott wrote the Remarks
on Popular Poetry which since that date have formed an introduction to the
book, as well as the essay, On Imitations of the Ancient Ballad, which at
present precedes the third part. The more purely literary side of the editor's
duty—leaving out of account the modern poems written by Scott and others
—was exhibited chiefly in the construction of texts, a matter of which I
shall speak later, after considering his views of the origin and character of
folk-poetry in general.

But first we may recall the fact that Scott was following a fairly well
established vogue in giving scholarly attention to ancient popular poetry. A
revival of interest in the study of mediaeval literature had been stimulated
in England by the publication of Percy's Reliques in 1765 and Warton's
History of English Poetry in 1774. In 1800 there were enough well-known
antiquaries to keep Scott from being in any sense lonely. Among them
Joseph Ritson[36] was the most learned, but he was crotchety in the extreme;
and while his notions as to research were in advance of his time, his
controversial style resembled that of the seventeenth century. George Ellis,
[37] on the other hand, was distinguished by an eighteenth-century urbanity,
and his combination of learning and good taste fitted him to influence a
broader public than that of specialists. At the same time he was a delightful
and stimulating friend to other scholars. Southey was becoming known as
an authority on the history and literature of the Spanish peninsula. A review
in the Quarterly a dozen years later mentions these three,—Ellis, Scott, and
Southey,—as "good men and true" to serve as guides in the remote realms
of literature.[38] Ellis's friend, John Hookham Frere, had great abilities but
was an incurable dillettante. Scott particularly admired a Middle-English
version of The Battle of Brunanburgh which Frere wrote in his school-boy

days, and considered him an authoritative critic of mediaeval English
poetry. Robert Surtees[39] and Francis Douce[40] were antiquaries of some
importance, and both, like all the others named, were friends of Scott. Mr.
Herford calls this period a day of "Specimens" and extracts: "Mediaeval
romance was studied in Ellis's Specimens," he says, "the Elizabethan drama
in Lamb's, literary history at large in D'Israeli's gently garrulous
compilations of its 'quarrels,' 'amenities,' 'calamities,' and 'curiosities.'"[41]
But the scholarship of the time on the whole is worthy of respect. In the
case of ballads and romances notable work had been done before Scott
entered the field,[42] and he and his contemporaries were carrying out the
promise of the half century before them—continuing the work that Percy
and Warton had begun.

Among the problems connected with ballad study, that which arises first
is naturally the question of origins. Scott made no attempt to formulate a
theory different in any main element from that which was held by his
predecessors. He agreed with Percy that ballads were composed and sung
by minstrels, and based his discussion on the materials brought forward by
Percy and Ritson for use in their great controversy.[43] Ritson himself never
doubted that ballads were composed and sung by individual authors, though
he might refuse to call them minstrels. The idea of communal authorship,
which Jacob Grimm was to suggest only half a dozen years after the first
edition of the Minstrelsy, would doubtless have been rejected by Scott, even
if he had considered it. But we have no evidence that he did so. Probably he
did not, as he never felt the need of a new theory.[44]

Scott's opinion in regard to the transmission of ballads followed naturally
from his theory of their origin. His aristocratic instincts perhaps helped to
determine his belief that ballads were composed by gifted minstrels, and
that they had deteriorated in the process of being handed down by
recitation. He called tradition "a sort of perverted alchymy which converts
gold into lead." "All that is abstractedly poetical," he said, "all that is above
the comprehension of the merest peasant, is apt to escape in frequent
repetition; and the lacunae thus created are filled up either by lines from
other ditties or from the mother wit of the reciter or singer. The injury, in
either case, is obvious and irreparable."[45] From this point of view Scott
considered that the ballads were only getting their rights when a skilful

hand gave them such a retouching as should enable them to appear in
something of what he called their original vigor.[46]

We may learn what qualities he considered necessary for an editor in this
field, from the latter part of his Remarks on Popular Poetry, in which he
discusses previous attempts to collect English and Scottish ballads. Of
Percy he speaks in the highest terms, here and elsewhere. We have seen that
he felt a strong sympathy with Percy's desire to dress up the ballads and
make them as attractive to the public as their intrinsic charms render them
to their friends. He did not of course realize the extent to which the Bishop
reworked his materials, as the publication of the folio manuscript has since
revealed it, and Ritson's captious remarks on the subject were naturally
discounted on the score of their ill-temper. But it is not to be doubted that
Ritson had an appreciable effect on Scott's attitude, by stirring him up to
some comprehension of the things that might be said in favor even of dull
accuracy. Ritson's collections are cited in their place, with a tribute to the
extreme fidelity of their editor. It is a pity that this accurate scholar could
not have had a sufficient amount of literary taste, to say nothing of good
manners, to inspire others with a fuller trust in his method. Scott expresses
impatience with him for seeming to prefer the less effective text in many
instances, "as if a poem was not more likely to be deteriorated than
improved by passing through the mouths of many reciters."[47] He admitted,
however, that it was not in his own period necessary to rework the ballads
as much as Bishop Percy had done, since the Reliques had already created
an audience for popular poetry. His purpose evidently was to steer a middle
course between such graceful but sophisticated versions as were given in
the Reliques, and the exact transcript of everything to be gathered from
tradition, whether interesting or not, that was attempted by Ritson. In his
later revisions he gave way more than at first to his natural impulse in favor
of the added graces which he could supply.[48]

It is easy to see how his own contributions of word and phrase might slip
in, since his avowed method was to collate the different texts secured from
manuscripts or recitation or both, and so to give what to his mind was the
worthiest version. Believing that the ballads had been composed by men not
unlike himself, he assumed, in the manner well known to classical text-
critics, that his familiarity with the conditions of the ancient social order

gave him some license for changing here and there a word or a line. In
determining which stanzas or lines to choose, when choice was possible, he
was guided by his antiquarian knowledge and by the general principle of
selecting the most poetic rendering among those at his command. This was
his way of showing his respect for the minstrel bards of whom he was fond
of considering himself a successor.

So far it is perfectly easy to take his point of view. But it is more difficult
to reconcile his practice with his professions. We find this declaration in the
forefront of the book: "No liberties have been taken either with the recited
or written copies of these ballads, farther than that, where they disagreed,
which is by no means unusual, the editor, in justice to the author, has
uniformly preserved what seemed to him the best or most poetical rendering
of the passage.... Some arrangement was also occasionally necessary to
recover the rhyme, which was often, by the ignorance of the reciters,
transposed or thrown into the middle of the line. With these freedoms,
which were essentially necessary to remove obvious corruptions and fit the
ballads for the press, the editor presents them to the public, under the
complete assurance that they carry with them the most indisputable marks
of their authenticity."[49] In the face of this fair announcement we are
surprised, to say the least, at the number of lines and stanzas which scholars
have discovered to be of Scott's own composition.[50]

Occasionally his notes give some slight indication of his method of
treatment, as for instance this, on The Dowie Dens of Yarrow: "The editor
found it easy to collect a variety of copies; but very difficult indeed to select
from them such a collated edition as might in any degree suit the taste of
'these more light and giddy-paced times.'" Notes on some others of the
ballads say that "a few conjectural emendations have been found
necessary," but no one of these remarks would seem really ingenuous in a
modern scholar when we consider how far the "conjectural emendations"
extended. Moreover, changes were often made without the slightest clue in
introduction or note.[51]

The case was complicated for Scott by the poetical tastes of his
assistants. Leyden[52] was apparently quite capable of taking down a ballad
from recitation in such a way as to produce a more finished poem than one

would expect a traditional ballad to be. And Hogg,[53] who supplied several
ballads from the recitations of his mother and other old people, was
probably still less strict. "Sure no man," he is quoted as having said, "will
think an old song the worse of being somewhat harmonious."[54] Yet it is
easy to see that Scott's friends might have acted differently if his own
practice had favored absolute fidelity to the texts.

A remark in Scott's review of Evans's Old Ballads seems a pretty definite
arraignment of his own procedure. "It may be asked by the severer
antiquary of the present day, why an editor, thinking it necessary to
introduce such alterations in order to bring forth a new, beautiful, and
interesting sense from a meagre or corrupted original, did not in good faith
to his readers acquaint them with the liberties he had taken and make them
judge whether in so doing he transgressed his limits. We answer that
unquestionably such would be the express duty of a modern editor, but such
were not the rules of the service when Dr. Percy first opened the campaign."
[55]

One wonders whether the "rules of the service" did not in Scott's opinion
occasionally permit a little wilful mystification. The case of Kinmont Willie
tempts one to such an explanation. Besides the capital instance of his
anonymity as regards the novels, Scott several times seemed to amuse
himself in perplexing the public. There was the case of the Bridal of
Triermain, which he tried by means of various careful devices to pass off as
the work of a friend. But perhaps the best example appears in connection
with The Fortunes of Nigel. He first designed the material of that book for a
series of "private letters" purporting to have been written in the reign of
James I., but when he had finally complied with the advice of his friends
and used it for a novel, he said to Lockhart, "You were all quite right: if the
letters had passed for genuine, they would have found favour only with a
few musty antiquaries."[56] This suggests comparison with the conduct of
his friend Robert Surtees, who palmed off upon him three whole ballads of
his own and got them inserted in the Minstrelsy as ancient, with a plausible
tale concerning the circumstances of their recovery. Surtees, one is
interested to observe, never dared tell Scott the truth, and Scott always
accepted the ballads as genuine—a lack of discernment rather

compromising in an editor, though one may perhaps excuse him on the
ground of his confidence in his brother antiquary.[57]

In one direction Scott seems to have been more conscientious than we
might be inclined to suppose after seeing the discrepancy between the
standard of exactness that his own statements lead us to expect and the
results that actually appear. I believe that he intended to preserve the
manuscript texts just as he received them, and that he would have wished to
have them given to the public when the public was prepared to want them.
To support this theory we have first the fact that most of his own
emendations have been traced by means of the manuscripts which he used.
[58] It is significant that in speaking of a poet who had altered a manuscript
to suit a revised reading he grew indignant over that fault far more than
over the mere change in the published version. The Raid of the Reidswire,
he said, "first appeared in Allan Ramsay's Evergreen, but some liberties
have been taken by him in transcribing it; and, what is altogether
unpardonable, the manuscript, which is itself rather inaccurate, has been
interpolated to favour his readings; of which there remain obvious marks."
[59] Scott said also that the time had come for the publication of Percy's
folio manuscript; though we must believe that he would not have wished to
see the manuscript published until the ballads had become familiar to the
world in what he considered a beautified form.

The changes Scott made were usually in style rather than in substance.
Often he merely substituted an archaic word for a modern one; but often
whole lines and longer passages offered temptations which the poet in him
could not resist, and he "improved" lavishly. For example, we have his note
on Earl Richard—"The best verses are here selected from both copies, and
some trivial alterations have been adopted from tradition,"—with the
comment by Mr. Henderson—"The emendations of Scott are so many, and
the majority relate so entirely to style, that no mere tradition could have
supplied them."[60] His versions are in general characterized by a
smoothness and precision of meter which to the student of ballads is very
suspicious. But he seems occasionally to have altered or supplied incidents
as well as phrases. The historical event which furnished the purpose for the
expedition of Sir Patrick Spens seems to have been introduced into the
ballad by Scott, and Mr. Henderson thinks that "when the deeds of his

ancestors were concerned it was impossible for him to resist the temptation
to employ some of his own minstrel art on their behalf."[61]

Certainly Scott's qualifications for evolving true poetry out of the crude
fragments that sometimes served as a basis formed a very unusual
combination when they were united with his knowledge of early history and
literature. He had such confidence in his own powers in this direction that
he at one time intended to write a series of imitations of Scottish poets of
different periods, from Thomas the Rhymer down, and thus to exhibit
changes in language as well as variations in literary style.[62] He evidently
thought that the ballads as they appeared in the Minstrelsy were truer to
their originals than were the copies he was able to procure from recitation.
Lockhart gives him precisely the kind of praise he would have desired, in
saying, "From among a hundred corruptions he seized with instinctive tact
the primitive diction and imagery."[63]

It is evident that Scott's public did not wish him to be more careful than
he was in discriminating between new and old matter. One of his moments
of strict veracity seems even to have occasioned some annoyance to the
writer of the Edinburgh article, who apparently preferred to believe in the
antiquity of The Flowers of the Forest rather than to learn that "the most
positive evidence" proved its modern origin. The editor's introduction to the
poem seems perfectly clear; he names his authority and quotes two verses
which are ancient;[64] but the reviewer says with a perverse irritability: "Mr.
Scott would have done well to tell us how much he deems ancient, and to
give us the 'positive evidence' that convinced him the whole was not so."[65]
This review was, however, for the most part favorable.

The fact that Scott included modern imitations of the ballad in his book is
another indication that his attitude was like that of his predecessors.[66]
Doubtless these helped the Minstrelsy to sell, but a more modern taste
would choose to put them in a place by themselves, not in a collection of
old ballads. An essay on Imitations of the Ancient Ballad was written, as
were the Remarks on Popular Poetry, for the 1833 edition. It is chiefly
interesting for its autobiographical matter, though it also contains criticisms
of Burns and other writers of ballad poetry—"a species of literary labour
which the author has himself pursued with some success."[67] Scott's

statement that the ballad style was very popular at the time he began to
write, and that he followed the prevailing fashion, was one of many
examples of his modesty, taken in connection with the remark in another
part of the essay to the effect that this style "had much to recommend it,
especially as it presented considerable facilities to those who wished at as
little exertion or trouble as possible to attain for themselves a certain degree
of literary reputation." To complete the comparison, however, we need an
observation found in one of Scott's reviews, on the spurious ballad poetry,
full of false sentiment, sometimes written in the eighteenth century. "It is
the very last refuge of those who can do nothing better in the shape of
verse; and a man of genius should disdain to invade the province of these
dawdling rhymers."[68]

Scott's criticism of ballad style probably suffered from his interest in
modern imitations of ballads. Perhaps also the real quality of ancient
popular poetry was a little obscured for him by his belief that it was written
by professional or semi-professional poets. If he wrote Kinmont Willie, he
succeeded in catching the right tone better than anyone since him has been
able to do, but even in this poem there are turns of phrase that remind one
of the Lay of the Last Minstrel rather than of the true folk-song.[69] After his
first attempts at versifying he received from William Taylor, of Norwich,
who had made an earlier translation of Bürger's Lenore, a letter of hearty
praise intermingled with very sensible remarks about the tendency in some
parts of Scott's Chase toward too great elaboration.[70] Scott's answer was
as follows: "I do not ... think quite so severely of the Darwinian style, as to
deem it utterly inconsistent with the ballad, which, at least to judge from the
examples left us by antiquity, admits in some cases of a considerable degree
of decoration. Still, however, I do most sincerely agree with you, that this
may be very easily overdone, and I am far from asserting that this may not
be in some degree my own case; but there is scarcely so nice a line to
distinguish, as that which divides true simplicity from flatness and
Sternholdianism (if I may be allowed to coin the word), and therefore it is
not surprising, that in endeavouring to avoid the latter, so young and
inexperienced a rhymer as myself should sometimes have deviated also
from the former."[71] This was Scott's earliest stage as a man of letters, and
he evidently learned more about ballads later. But there appears in much of
his criticism on the subject a limitation which may be assigned partly to his

time, and partly, no doubt, to the fact that he was a poet and could not forget
all the sophistications of his art.

The true nature of ballad poetry could hardly be understood until scholars
had investigated the structure of primitive society in a way that Scott's
contemporaries were not at all prepared to do. Even Scott, with all his
intelligent interest in bygone institutions and modes of expression, could
hardly have foreseen the anthropological researches which the problem of
literary origins has since demanded. We do not find, then, that Scott's work
on ballads was marked by any special originality in point of view or
method. The Minstrelsy of the Scottish Border was a notable book because
it did better what other men had tried to do, and especially because of the
charm and effectiveness of its historical comment. It was more trustworthy
than Percy's collection and more graceful than Ritson's; it was richer than
other books of the kind in what people cared to have when they wanted
ballads, and yet was not, for its time, over-sophisticated. Scott's conclusions
cannot now be accepted without question, but the illustrations with which
he sets them forth and the wide reading and sincere love of folk-poetry
which evidently lie behind them produce a pleasant effect of ripe and
reasonable judgment. The admirable qualities of the book were at once
recognized by competent critics, and it will always be studied with
enthusiasm by scholars as well as by the uncritical lover of ballads.

Studies in the Romances
Scott's theory as to the connection between ballads and romances—His early
fondness for romances—His acquaintance with Romance languages—His work
on the Sir Tristrem—Value of his edition—Special quality of Scott's interest in
the Middle Ages—General theories expressed in the body of his work on
romances—His type of scholarship.

Ballads and romances are so closely related that Scott's early and lasting
interest in the one form naturally grew out of his interest in the other. He
held the theory that "the romantic ballads of later times are for the most part
abridgments of the ancient metrical romances, narrated in a smoother stanza
and more modern language."[72] It is not surprising, then, that a

considerable body of his critical work has to do with the subject of
mediaeval romance.

Throughout his boyhood Scott read all the fairy tales, eastern stories, and
romances of knight-errantry that fell in his way. When he was about
thirteen, he and a young friend used to spend hours reading together such
authors as Spenser, Ariosto, and Boiardo.[73] He remembered the poems so
well that weeks or months afterwards he could repeat whole pages that had
particularly impressed him. Somewhat later the two boys improvised
similar stories to recite to each other, Scott being the one who proposed the
plan and the more successful in carrying it out. With this same friend he
studied Italian and began to read the Italian poets in the original. In his
autobiography he says:[74] "I had previously renewed and extended my
knowledge of the French language, from the same principle of romantic
research. Tressan's romances, the Bibliothèque Bleue, and Bibliothèque de
Romans, were already familiar to me, and I now acquired similar intimacy
with the works of Dante, Boiardo, Pulci, and other eminent Italian authors."
Writing some years later he remarked: "I was once the most enormous
devourer of the Italian romantic poetry, which indeed is the only poetry of
their country which I ever had much patience for; for after all that has been
said of Petrarch and his school, I am always tempted to exclaim like honest
Christopher Sly, 'Marvellous good matter, would it were done.' But with
Charlemagne and his paladins I could dwell forever."[75] Scott learned
languages easily, and he read Spanish with about as much facility as Italian.
Don Quixote seems often to be the guide with whom he chooses to traverse
the fields of romance.[76] In Scott's boyhood one of his teachers noticed that
he could follow and enjoy the meaning of what he read in Latin better than
many of his school-fellows who knew more about the language, and it was
the same all through his life—he got what he wanted from foreign
literatures with very little trouble.

Scott constantly refers to the work of Percy, Warton, Tressan,[77] Ritson,
and Ellis, in the study of ancient romances, but in editing Sir Tristrem he
made one part of the field his own, and became the authority whom he felt
obliged to quote in the Essay on Romance.

Thomas the Rhymer of Erceldoune was at first an object of interest to
Scott because of the ballad of True Thomas and the traditions concerning
him that floated about the countryside. The "Rhymer's Glen" was
afterwards a cherished possession of Scott's own on the Abbotsford estate.
In the Advocates' Library at Edinburgh, of which Scott was in 1795
appointed a curator, was an important manuscript that contained among
other metrical romances one professing to be a copy of that written by
Thomas of Erceldoune on Sir Tristrem. From a careful piecing together of
evidence furnished by this poem and by Robert of Brunne, with the
assistance of certain legal documents which supplied dates, Scott built up
about the old poet a theory that he elaborated in his edition of Sir Tristrem,
published in 1804, and that continued to interest him vividly as long as he
lived. It reappears in many of his critical writings[78] and also in the novels.
In the Bride of Lammermoor Ravenswood goes to his death in compliance
with the prophecy of Thomas quoted by the superstitious Caleb
Balderstone. And in Castle Dangerous Bertram, who is unconvincing
perhaps because he is endowed with the literary and antiquarian tastes of a
Walter Scott himself, is actuated by an irrepressible desire to discover
works of the Rhymer.

Scott's edition of Sir Tristrem gives—besides the text, introduction, and
notes—a short conclusion written by himself in imitation of the original
poet's style. Much of his theory has fallen. He considered this Sir Tristrem
to be the first of the written versions of that story, a supposition that was not
long tenable. The poem is now known to be based upon a French original,
and many scholars think the name Erceldoune was arbitrarily inserted by
the English translator; though Mr. McNeill, the latest editor, thinks there is
a "reasonable probability" in favor of Scott's opinion that the author was the
historic Thomas, who flourished in the thirteenth century. It is important,
however, that Scott's scholarship in the matter passed muster at that time
with such men as Ellis, who wrote the review in the Edinburgh, in which he
said, "Upon the whole we are much disposed to adopt the general
inferences drawn by Mr. Scott from his authorities, and have great pleasure
in bearing testimony to the very uncommon diligence which he has evinced
in collecting curious materials, and to the taste and sagacity with which he
has employed them.... With regard to the notes, they contain an almost
infinite variety of curious information, which had been hitherto unknown or

unnoticed."[79] John Hookham Frere said, as quoted in a letter by Ellis, "I
consider Sir Tristrem as by far the most interesting work that has as yet
been published on the subject of our earliest poets."[80] Scott's opinions
were in 1824 thought to be of sufficient importance, either from their own
merits or on account of his later fame, to call forth a dissertation appended
to the edition of Warton's History of English Poetry published in that year.

The first edition of the text swarms with errors, according to Kölbing,[81]
a recent editor of the romance, and later editions are still very inaccurate.[82]
It could hardly be expected that a man with Scott's habits of mind would
edit a text accurately. But no one of that period was competent to construct
a text that would seem satisfactory now. The study of English philology was
not sufficiently developed in that direction, nor did scholars appreciate
either the difficulties or the requirements of text-criticism. It is not to be
wondered at that Scott failed, in this instance as well as afterwards in the
case of the text of Dryden, to give a version that would stand the minute
scrutiny of later scholarship.

His sympathies were rather with the scholar who opens the store of old
poetry to the public, than with him who uses his erudition simply for the
benefit of erudite people. The diction of the Middle Ages was interesting to
him only as it reflected the customs and emotions of its period. He used the
romances as authorities on ancient manners. The Chronicles of Froissart,
because they give "a knowledge of mankind,"[83] were almost as much a
hobby with him as Thomas the Rhymer, and in this case also he endows
characters in his novels with his own fondness for the ancient writer.[84] The
fruit of Scott's acquaintance with Froissart appears prominently in his essay
on Chivalry and in various introductions to ballads in the Minstrelsy, as
well as in the novels of chivalry. Scott at one time proposed to publish an
edition of Malory, but abandoned the project on learning that Southey had
the same thing in mind.[85]

The first periodical review Scott ever published was on the subject of the
Amadis de Gaul, as translated by Southey and by Rose. The article is long
and very carefully constructed, and expresses many ideas on the subject of
the mediaeval romance in general that reappear again and again,
particularly in the essay on Romance written in 1823 for the Encyclopædia

Britannica. Among these general ideas that found frequent expression in his
critical writings, one which in the light of his creative work becomes
particularly interesting to us is his judgment on the distinctions between
metrical and prose romances. He always preferred the poems, though he
was so interested in the prose stories that he talked about them with much
enthusiasm, and it sometimes seems as if he liked best the kind he happened
to be analyzing at the moment.

Other matters that necessarily presented themselves when he was treating
the subject of romance were the problem of the sources of narrative
material, especially the perplexed question concerning the development of
the Arthurian cycle, and the problem, already discussed in connection with
ballads, concerning the character of minstrels. The minstrels reappear
throughout Scott's studies in mediaeval literature, and were perhaps more
interesting to him than any other part of the subject. Though, as we have
seen, he formulated a compromise between the opposing opinions of Percy
and Ritson, no one who reads the description of the Last Minstrel can doubt
what was the picture that he preferred to carry in his mind.

His ideas on the subject of the origin and diffusion of narrative material
were those of the sensible man trying to look at the matter in a reasonable
way. Here again he adopted an attitude of compromise, in that he admitted
the partial truth of various theories which he considered erroneous only in
so far as any one of them was stretched beyond its proper compass.
"Romance," he said, "was like a compound metal, derived from various
mines, and in the different specimens of which one metal or other was
alternately predominant."[86]

On the subject of the Arthurian cycle, the origin of which has never
ceased to be matter for debate, he held essentially the opinions that the
highest French authority has adopted that Celtic traditions were the
foundation, and that the metrical romances preceded those in prose.[87] The
important offices of French poets in giving form to the story he
underestimated. When he said, "It is now completely proved, that the
earliest and best French romances were composed for the meridian of the
English court,"[88] he fell into the error that has not always been avoided by

scholars who have since written on the subject, of feeling certitude about a
proposition in which there is no certainty.

Scott's work on romances, though it does not always rise above
commonplaceness, escapes the perfunctory quality of hack writing by virtue
of his keen interest in the subject. He continued to like this prosaic kind of
literary task even while he was writing novels with the most wonderful
facility. We may judge not only by the fact that he continued to write
reviews at intervals throughout his life, but by an explicit reference in his
Journal: "I toiled manfully at the review till two o'clock, commencing at
seven. I fear it will be uninteresting, but I like the muddling work of
antiquities, and besides wish to record my sentiments with regard to the
Gothic question."[89]

It is evident that Scott did not himself find the "muddling work of
antiquities" dull, because he realized, emotionally as well as intellectually,
the life of past times. This led him to form broader views than the ordinary
student constructs out of his knowledge of special facts. An admirable
illustration of this characteristic occurs in the essay on Romance, at the
point where Scott is discussing the social position of the minstrels, in the
light of what Percy and Ritson had said on the subject. He goes on: "In fact,
neither of these excellent antiquaries has cast a general or philosophic
glance on the necessary condition of a set of men, who were by profession
the instruments of the pleasure of others during a period of society such as
was presented in the Middle Ages." There follows a detailed and very
interesting account of what the writer's own "philosophic glance" leads him
to believe. The method is useful but dangerous; in the same essay occurs an
amusing example of what philosophy may do when it is given free rein.
Within two pages appear these conflicting statements: "The Metrical
Romances, though in some instances sent to the press, were not very fit to
be published in this form. The dull amplifications, which passed well
enough in the course of a half-heard recitation, became intolerable when
subjected to the eye." "The Metrical Romances in some instances indeed
ran to great length, but were much exceeded in that particular by the folios
which were written on the same or similar topics by their prose successors.
Probably the latter judiciously reflected that a book which addresses itself
only to the eyes may be laid aside when it becomes tiresome to the reader;

whereas it may not always have been so easy to stop the minstrel in the full
career of his metrical declamation." Flaws like this may be picked in the
details of Scott's method, just as we may sometimes find fault with the
lapses in his mediaeval scholarship. We do him no injustice when we say
that aside from certain aspects of his work on the ballads and Sir Tristrem,
his achievement was that of a popularizer of learning.

But if he lacked some of the authority of erudition, he escaped also the
induration of pedantry. In writing of remote and dimly known periods,
critics are perhaps most apt to show their defects of temper, and Scott often
commented on the acerbity of spirit which such studies seem to induce.
"Antiquaries," he said, "are apt to be both positive and polemical upon the
very points which are least susceptible of proof, and which are least
valuable if the truth could be ascertained; and which therefore we would
gladly have seen handled with more diffidence and better temper in
proportion to their uncertainty."[90] Of Ritson he says many times in one
form or another that his "severe accuracy was connected with an unhappy
eagerness and irritability of temper." Scott rode his own hobbies with an
expansive cheerfulness that did not at all hinder them from being essentially
serious.

Other Studies in Mediaeval Literature
Scott's attitude on the Ossianic controversy—His slight acquaintance with
other northern literatures—Anglo-Saxon scholarship of the time—Character of
his familiarity with Middle-English poetry—His opinions in regard to Chaucer—
General importance of Scott's work on mediaeval literature.

Part of Scott's critical work on mediaeval literature falls outside the limits
of the two divisions we have been considering—those of ballad and
romance. He knew comparatively little about the early poetry of the
northern nations, but at some points his knowledge of Scottish literature
made the transition fairly easy to the literature of other Teutonic peoples.
But he was especially bound to be interested in the Gaelic, for a Scotsman
of his day could hardly avoid forming an opinion in regard to the Ossianic
controversy then raging with what Scott thought must be its final violence.

He did not understand the Gaelic language,[91] but he had a vivid interest in
the Highlanders. The picturesque quality of their customs made it natural
enough for him to use them in his novels, and by the "sheer force of
genius," says Mr. Palgrave, who considers this Scott's greatest achievement,
"he united the sympathies of two hostile races."[92]

As early as 1792 Scott had written for the Speculative Society an essay
on the authenticity of Ossian's poems, and one of his articles for the
Edinburgh Review in 1805 was on the same subject, occasioned by a couple
of important documents which supported opposite sides, and which, he said,
set the question finally at issue. This article represents Scott the critic in a
typical attitude. The material was almost altogether furnished in the works
which he was surveying.[93] His task was to distinguish the essential points
of the problem, to state them plainly, and to weigh the evidence on each
side. In this he shows notable clearness of thought, and also, throughout the
rather long treatment of a complicated subject, great lucidity in arrangement
and statement. He was led by this study to change the opinion which he had
held in common with most of his countrymen, and to adopt the belief that
the poems were essentially creations of Macpherson, with only the names
and some parts of the story adopted from the Gaelic.[94] Other references to
Ossian occur in Scott's writings, and it is evident in this case, as in many
others, that an investigation of the matter in his early career, whether from
original or from secondary sources, gave him material for allusion and
comment throughout his life. For, as we have constant occasion to remark
in studying Scott, with a very definite grasp of concrete fact he combined a
vigorous generalizing power, and all the parts of his knowledge were
actively related. He seems to have made little preparation for some of his
most interesting reviews, but to have utilized in them the store gathered in
his mind for other purposes.

Of the northern Teutonic languages Scott had slight knowledge, though
he was always interested in the northern literatures. In a review of the
Poems of William Herbert, of which the part most interesting to the
reviewer consisted of translations from the Icelandic, Scott says: "We do
not pretend any great knowledge of Norse; but we have so far traced the
'Runic rhyme' as to be sensible how much more easy it is to give a just
translation of that poetry into English than into Latin." In the same review

we find him saying, after a slight discussion of the style of Scaldic poetry,
"The other translations are generally less interesting than those from the
Icelandic. There is, however, one poem from the Danish, which I transcribe
as an instance how very clearly the ancient popular ballad of that country
corresponds with our own." So we see him drawing from all sources fuel
for his favorite fire—the study of ballads. Very characteristically also Scott
suggests that the author should extend his researches to the popular poetry
of Scandinavia, "which we cannot help thinking is the real source of many
of the tales of our minstrels."[95] It seems probable that Scott's acquaintance
with northern literatures came partly through his ill-fated amanuensis,
Henry Weber.[96] His acknowledgement in the introduction to Sir Tristrem
would indicate this, taken together with other references by Scott to Weber's
attainments.

Scott could hardly be called a student of Anglo-Saxon, though he was
perhaps able to read the language. His remarks on the subject may,
however, mean simply that he was familiar with early Middle English.[97] In
his essay on Romance he referred to Sharon Turner's account of the story of
Beowulf, but called the poem Caedmon, and made no correction when he
added the later footnote in regard to Conybeare's fuller and more interesting
analysis published in 1826.[98] The researches of these men indicate the
state of Anglo-Saxon scholarship in England. Sharon Turner's very
inaccurate description of Beowulf was published in 1805. Danish scholars
made the first translations of the poem, but no one could give a really
scholarly text or translation until the year after Scott died, when the first
edition by J.M. Kemble appeared. There were students of the language,
however, who were doing good work in feeling their way toward a
comprehension of its special qualities. One of these was George Ellis. In his
Specimens he published examples of Anglo-Saxon and Middle-English
poetry, and his information was helpful in enlarging Scott's outlook. Scott's
own knowledge of Anglo-Saxon literature did not amount to enough to be
of importance by itself, but it served perhaps to fortify the basis of his
generalizations about all early poetry.

A review of the Life and Works of Chatterton gave Scott an opportunity
to discuss the characteristics of Middle-English poetry, but his general
thesis, that the Rowley poems exhibit graces and refinements which are in

marked contrast to the tenuity of idea and tautology of expression found in
genuine works of the period, is supported by an argument which seems to
be based on a characterization of the romances rather than on a close
acquaintance with other Middle-English poetry. We notice a similar quality
in what Scott says elsewhere concerning Frere's translation into Chaucerian
English of the Battle of Brunanburgh: "This appears to us an exquisite
imitation of the antiquated English poetry, not depending on an
accumulation of hard words like the language of Rowley, which in
everything else is refined and harmonious poetry, nor upon an
agglomeration of consonants in the orthography, the resource of later and
more contemptible forgers, but upon the style itself, upon its alternate
strength and weakness, now nervous and concise, now diffuse and eked out
by the feeble aid of expletives."[99] Of Middle-English poets other than
Chaucer and the author or translator of Sir Tristrem, Laurence Minot was
the one to whom Scott alluded most frequently, doubtless because in
Ritson's edition of Minot that poet had become more accessible than most
of his contemporaries. Whatever detailed work Scott did on the poetry of
this period was chiefly in connection with Sir Tristrem, which has naturally
been considered in relation with his other studies in romances.

Scott's familiarity with Chaucer appears in his numerous quotations from
that poet, but usually the passages are cited to illustrate mediaeval manners
rather than for any specifically literary purpose. Yet there are Chaucer
enthusiasts among the characters of Woodstock and Peveril of the Peak.[100]
Chaucer's fame was well enough established so that Scott seems on the
whole to have taken his merit for granted, and not to have said much about
it except in casual references.[101] Among general readers he must have
been comparatively little known, however, notwithstanding the respect paid
him by scholars. In 1805 we find Scott writing to Ellis that his scheme for
editing a collection of the British Poets had fallen through, for, he said, "My
plan was greatly too liberal to stand the least chance of being adopted by
the trade at large, as I wished them to begin with Chaucer. The fact is, I
never expected they would agree to it."[102]

Scott's review of Godwin's Life of Chaucer, one of the best known of his
periodical essays, is altogether concerned with the manner in which Godwin
did his work, and so exhibits Scott's ideas on the subject of biography and

his methods of reviewing rather than his attitude towards Chaucer's poetry.
His most definite remarks concerning Chaucer are to be found in his
comments upon Dryden's Fables, as for example: "The Knight's Tale,
whether we consider Chaucer's original poem, or the spirited and animated
version of Dryden, is one of the best pieces of composition in our
language";[103] "Of all Chaucer's multifarious powers, none is more
wonderful than the humour with which he touched upon natural frailty, and
the truth with which he describes the inward feelings of the human heart."
[104] Yet he once called Troilus and Criseyde "a somewhat dull poem."[105]
The Cock and the Fox, on the other hand, he speaks of as "a poem which, in
grave ironical narrative, liveliness of illustration, and happiness of
humorous description, yields to none that ever was written."[106]

In estimating the importance of Scott's studies on any one period we have
to think of them as part of a greater whole. The wide range of his
investigations would evidently make it impossible to expect a complete
treatment of all the subjects he might choose to discuss, and we have found,
in fact, that his criticism of mediaeval literature led to systematic results in
no other lines than those of the ballad and the romance. But these were
large and important matters. Moreover, to all that he wrote in connection
with the Middle Ages there attaches a special interest; for with that work he
made his real start in literature; and it reflected the peculiarly delightful
vein in his own nature which was constant from youth to age, and which
gave to his poems and novels some of their most brilliant qualities.[107]

THE DRAMA
Scott's fondness for the drama and his acquaintance with actors—His ideas
about plot structure—His own dramatic experiments—His opinion of the
theaters of his day—His knowledge of English dramatic literature—Familiarity
with Elizabethan plays shown in his novels—His Essay on the Drama—Ancient
drama—French drama—Dramatic unities—German drama—Elizabethan drama
—Shakspere—Ben Jonson—Dryden and other Restoration dramatists—Morality
of theater-going—Character of Scott's interest in the drama.

Like most of his characteristics, Scott's taste for the theater was exhibited
in his childhood. We find him reverting, in a review written in 1826,[108] to

his rapturous emotions on the occasion of seeing his first play; and in the
private theatricals which he and his brothers and sister performed in the
family dining-room he was always the manager. In 1810 he was active in
helping to bring out in Edinburgh the Family Legend of his friend Joanna
Baillie.[109] One of the actors on that occasion was Daniel Terry,[110] who
became an intimate friend of Scott's. For Terry Scott wrote The Doom of
Devorgoil, but the piece was not found suitable for presentation. Several of
the novels were more successfully dramatized by the same friend, so that
we find the "Author" humorously complaining in the "Introductory Epistle"
to The Fortunes of Nigel, "I believe my muse would be Terryfied into
treading the stage even if I should write a sermon." Among Scott's friends
were several other actors, particularly Mrs. Siddons and her brother John
Kemble, and the comedian Charles Mathews. In Scott's review of Kelly's
Reminiscences and the Life of Kemble we find recorded many of the
discriminations he was fond of making in regard to the talents of particular
actors.

In his childhood Scott felt well qualified to take the part of Richard III.,
for he considered that his limp "would do well enough to represent the
hump."[111] After a similar fashion we find him commenting on the
improbabilities of the tragedy of Douglas: "But the spectator should, and
indeed must, make considerable allowances if he expects to receive
pleasure from the drama. He must get his mind, according to Tony
Lumpkin's phrase, into 'a concatenation accordingly,'[112] since he cannot
reasonably expect that scenes of deep and complicated interest shall be
placed before him, in close succession, without some force being put upon
ordinary probability; and the question is not, how far you have sacrificed
your judgment in order to accommodate the fiction, but rather, what is the
degree of delight you have received in return."[113]

Scott disclaimed any special knowledge of stage-craft. "I know as little
about the division of a drama as the spinster about the division of a battle,
to use Iago's simile,"[114] he once wrote to a friend. Yet as a critic he had of
course some general ideas about the making of plays, without having
worked out any subtle theories on the subject. In criticising a play by Allan
Cunningham, who had asked for his judgment on it, he remarked first that
the plot was ill-combined. "If the mind can be kept upon one unbroken

course of interest, the effect even in perusal is more gratifying. I have
always considered this as the great secret in dramatic poetry, and conceive it
one of the most difficult exercises of the invention possible, to conduct a
story through five acts, developing it gradually in every scene, so as to keep
up the attention, yet never till the very conclusion permitting the nature of
the catastrophe to become visible,—and all the while to accompany this by
the necessary delineation of character and beauty of language."[115] And
again he said to the same person, "I hope you will make another dramatic
attempt; and in that case I would strongly recommend that you should
previously make a model or skeleton of your incidents, dividing them
regularly into scenes and acts, so as to insure the dependence of one
circumstance upon another, and the simplicity and union of your whole
story."[116] Here we find Scott giving advice which by his own admission he
was not himself able to follow in the composition of fiction. "I never could
lay down a plan, or having laid it down I never could adhere to it," he wrote
in his journal[117]. And the "Author" in the introductory epistle to Nigel
remarks, "It may pass for one good reason for not writing a play, that I
cannot form a plot."

The few experiments that he made he did not seem to regard seriously at
any time, though he was rather favorably impressed on rereading the Doom
of Devorgoil after it had lain unused for several years.[118] Of Halidon Hill
he said, "It is designed to illustrate military antiquities and the manners of
chivalry. The drama (if it can be called one) is in no particular either
designed or calculated for the stage."[119] He seems to have been "often
urged" to write plays, if one may trust Captain Clutterbuck's authority, and
the effectiveness of the many poetical mottoes improvised by the Author of
Waverley for the chapters of his novels, and subscribed "Old Play,"[120] was
naturally used as an argument.[121] Scott's own judgment in the matter was
expressed thus: "Nothing so easy when you are full of an author, as to write
a few lines in his taste and style; the difficulty is to keep it up. Besides, the
greatest success would be but a spiritless imitation, or, at best, what the
Italians call a centone [sic] from Shakspeare."[122] When Elliston became
manager of Drury Lane in 1819 he applied to Scott for plays, but without
effect.[123] Scott seems never to have felt any concern over the fact that the
dramatized versions of his novels were often very poor, but Hazlitt wished
that he would "not leave it to others to mar what he has sketched so

admirably as a ground-work," for he saw no good reason why the author of
Waverley could not write "a first-rate tragedy as well, as so many first-rate
novels."[124]

Scott felt that to write for the stage in his day was a thankless and almost
degrading occupation. "Avowedly I will never write for the stage; if I do,
'call me horse.'" he said in a letter to Terry.[125] Again in a letter to Southey:
"I do not think the character of the audience in London is such that one
could have the least pleasure in pleasing them.... On the whole, I would far
rather write verses for mine honest friend Punch and his audience";[126] and
to a would-be tragedian he said: "In the present day there is only one reason
which seems to me adequate for the encountering the plague of trying to
please a set of conceited performers and a very motley audience,—I mean
the want of money."[127] This degraded condition of the London stage Scott
thought to be a consequence of limiting the number of theaters. We can
hardly suppose, however, that he was pessimistic in regard to the written
drama of his day, when he could say of Byron, "There is one who, to judge
from the dramatic sketch he has given us in Manfred, must be considered as
a match for Aeschylus, even in his sublimest moods of horror";[128] or when
he could place Joanna Baillie in the same class with Shakspere[129].

Scott probably did much reading in the drama in his early life. We know
that by 1804 he had "long since" annotated his copy of Beaumont and
Fletcher sufficiently so that he wished to offer it to Gifford, who, Scott
erroneously understood, was about to edit their dramas.[130] The edition of
Dryden, published in 1808, shows familiarity with Elizabethan as well as
Restoration dramatists. He seems to have had first-hand knowledge of such
men as Ford, Webster, Marston, Brome, Shirley, Chapman, and Dekker,
whom he mentions as being "little known to the general readers of the
present day, even by name."[131] But 1808 was the very year in which
appeared Lamb's Specimens of English Dramatic Poets and Coleridge's first
course of lectures on Shakspere. The old dramatists were beginning to come
to their own, through the sympathetic appreciation of the Romantic critics.
Scott never refers, however, to the work of Lamb, Coleridge, or Hazlitt[132]
in this field and we conclude that his researches in dramatic literature were
the recreation of a man who realized that his business lay in another
direction. But in preparing the Dryden, he doubtless read more widely in

Restoration drama than he would otherwise have done. Throughout his life
he continued to read plays at intervals, as we know from occasional
references in the Journal; but after the Dryden appeared we can point to no
time in his career when such reading was his especial occupation. His
familiarity with Elizabethan drama he showed even more emphatically than
by serious critical writings on the subject, in his fragments from mythical
"Old Plays,"[133] in his frequent references to single plays, and in the
substance of some of the novels, particularly The Fortunes of Nigel and
Woodstock, which make use of settings, situations, and characterizations
suggested by the drama.[134] Mr. Lang says of The Fortunes of Nigel, "The
scenes in Alsatia are a distinct gain to literature, a pearl rescued from the
unread mass of Shadwell."[135]

His serious critical writings on the subject comprise little else than his
Essay on the Drama, which appeared in the supplement to the
Encyclopædia Britannica, published in 1819, and the discussions given in
connection with Dryden's plays.[136] Although the Essay was written ten
years later than the Dryden, we have no reason to think that Scott changed
his views or added greatly to his knowledge in the interval, and using these
two sources we may discuss his account of the drama in general without
regard to the particular date at which his opinions were expressed.

His exposition in the Essay on the Drama rested on the basis furnished
by a historical study of the stage. He did not, of course, pretend to have
formed his own conclusions on all points, and we find him quoting from
various authorities, sometimes naming them and sometimes only indicating,
perhaps, that he was "abridging from the best antiquaries." This, however,
was chiefly in connection with the ancient drama. As I have already
remarked, we do not find him referring to recent studies on the English
drama. And though Scott had forgotten all his Greek we observe that he is
bold enough to disagree with "the ingenious Schlegel" in regard to the
comparative value of the Greek New Comedy. In his treatment of the
ancient drama the main point for note is the success with which he gives a
broad and connected view of the subject. His account of the drama in
France needs correction in certain respects,[137] but it seems to indicate
some first-hand knowledge and very definite opinions. He quotes Molière
frequently throughout his writings, and always speaks of him with

admiration; but with no other French dramatist does he seem to have been
familiar to such a degree. Judging French tragic poets too much from the
Shaksperian point of view, he was not prepared to do them justice.[138] On
the dramatic unities, of which he remarked, "Aristotle says so little and his
commentators and followers talk so much," Scott wrote, here and
elsewhere, with decision and vivacity. The unities of time and place he calls
"fopperies," though time and place, he admits, are not to be lightly changed.
[139] He connects the whole discussion with the study of theatrical
conditions, and never bows down to authority as such. He says, "Surely it is
of less consequence merely to ascertain what was the practice of the
ancients, than to consider how far such practice is founded upon truth, good
taste, and general effect"; and again, "Aristotle would probably have
formulated different rules if he had written in our time." And though he
adopted and applied to the drama the Horatian dictum that the end of poetry
is to instruct and delight, it was not because Horace and a long line of
critics had said it, but because he thought it was true. Doubtless his phrase
would have been different if he had not taken what was lying nearest, but
his habit was never carefully to avoid the common phrase. His general
opinion of French drama was decidedly unfavorable, and he thought it was
doubtful whether their plays would ever be any nearer to nature. "That
nation," he observes calmly, "is so unfortunate as to have no poetical
language."

His remarks on German drama are general in character, though we know
that in his early days he was much interested in translating contemporary
German plays. His version of Goethe's Goetz von Berlichingen was the
most important of these translations. A letter of Scott's contains the
following reference to this play:[140] "The publication of Goetz was a great
era ... in German literature, and served completely to free them from the
French follies of unities and decencies of the scene, and gave an impulse to
their dramas which was unique of its kind. Since that, they have been often
stark mad but never, I think, stupid. They either divert you by taking the
most brilliant leaps through the hoop, or else by tumbling into the custard,
as the newspapers averred the Champion did at the Lord Mayor's dinner."

When he is on English ground we can best trace Scott's individual
opinions, yet even here he reflects some of the limitations of the less

enlightened scholarship of his time, especially in connection with early
Elizabethan writers. He passes from Ferrex and Porrex[141] and Gammer
Gurton's Needle directly to Shakspere, and quite omits Marlowe and the
other immediate predecessors. He was not ignorant of their existence, for
against a statement of Dryden's that Shakspere was the first to use blank
verse we find in Scott's edition the note,—"This is a mistake. Marlowe and
several other dramatic authors used blank verse before the days of
Shakespeare";[142] and one of his youthful notebooks contains this comment
on Faustus: "A very remarkable thing. Grand subject—end grand."[143] In
1831 Scott intended to write an article for the Quarterly Review on Peele,
Greene, and Webster, and in asking Alexander Dyce to have Webster's
works sent to him he said, "Marlowe and others I have,—and some
acquaintance with the subject, though not much."[144] Webster he
considered "one of the best of our ancient dramatists." The proposed article
was never written, because of Scott's final illness.

In spite of his statement that "the English stage might be considered
equally without rule and without model when Shakspeare arose," Scott did
not seem inclined to leave the great man altogether unaccounted for, as
some critics have preferred to do, for he says, "The effect of the genius of
an individual upon the taste of a nation is mighty; but that genius in its turn
is formed according to the opinions prevalent at the period when it comes
into existence." These opinions, however, Scott assigns very vaguely to the
influence of "a nameless crowd of obscure writers," and thinks it fortunate
that Shakspere was unacquainted with classical rules. The critic had
evidently made no attempt to define the influence of particular writers upon
Shakspere. His criticism is at some points purely conventional, as for
instance when he calls the poet "that powerful magician, whose art could
fascinate us even by means of deformity itself "; but on the whole Scott
seems to write about Shakspere in a very reasonable and discriminating
way.

He has a good deal to say of Ben Jonson, in other places as well as in this
Essay on the Drama.[145] He was evidently well acquainted with that poet,
and admired him without liking him. Somewhere he calls him "the dry and
dogged Jonson,"[146] and again he speaks of his genius in very high terms.
The contrast between Shakspere and Jonson moved him even to epigram:

[147] "In reading Shakespeare we often meet passages so congenial to our
nature and feelings that, beautiful as they are, we can hardly help
wondering they did not occur to ourselves; in studying Jonson, we have
often to marvel how his conceptions could have occurred to any human
being." It was characteristic of Scott to note the fact that Shakspere wrote
rapidly, Jonson slowly, for he was fond of getting support for his theory that
rapid writing is the better.

As early as 1804 Scott referred to The Changeling as "an old play which
contains some passages horribly striking,"[148] and in so doing voiced, as
Mr. Swinburne says, "the first word of modern tribute to the tragic genius of
Thomas Middleton."[149] Scott also praised Massinger highly, especially for
his strength in characterization, and once called him "the most gentleman-
like of all the old English dramatists."[150] He discussed Beaumont and
Fletcher sympathetically, for he knew them well and frequently quoted from
them. He named Shirley, Ford, Webster, and Dekker in a group, and spoke
of the singular profusion of talents devoted in this period to the writing of
plays, an observation which is made more explicitly later in the Journal,
when he has just been reading an old play which, he says, "worthless in the
extreme, is, like many of the plays in the beginning of the seventeenth
century, written to a good tune. The dramatic poets of that time seem to
have possessed as joint-stock a highly poetical and abstract tone of
language, so that the worst of them often remind you of the very best."[151]
This circumstance he accounts for by a reference to the audiences, and this
in turn he seems to ascribe partly to the great number of theaters then open
in London. He dwells so much on the evils of limiting the number of play-
houses to two or three, that we may fairly consider it one of his hobbies,
and it is possible that he had some slight influence toward increasing that
public opposition to the theatrical monopoly which finally, in 1843, resulted
in the nullification of the patents.

Scott's discussion of Restoration drama is admirably vigorous and clear.
He probably simplified the matter too much at some points, indeed, as for
example in over-estimating the influence exerted upon the stage by Charles
II. and his French tastes, and in tracing the origin of the French drama to
romances. But in general his facts are right and his deductions fair. Mr.
Saintsbury has accused him of depreciating Dryden's plays, especially the

comedies, out of disgust at their indecency; yet in judging the period as a
whole he seems to discriminate sufficiently between indelicacy and dulness.
"The talents of Otway," he says, "in his scenes of passionate affection rival,
at least, and sometimes excel those of Shakspeare." Again: "The comedies
of Congreve contain probably more wit than was ever before embodied
upon the stage; each word was a jest, and yet so characteristic that the
repartee of the servant is distinguished from that of the master; the jest of
the cox-comb from that of the humorist or fine gentleman of the piece."
Lesser writers of the time are also sympathetically characterized,—
Shadwell, for instance, whom he thought to be commonly underestimated.
[152] The heroic play Scott discussed vivaciously in more than one
connection, for, as we should expect, his sense of humor found its
absurdities tempting.[153] On the rant in the Conquest of Granada he
remarked, "Dryden's apology for these extravagances seems to be that
Almanzor is in a passion. But although talking nonsense is a common effect
of passion, it seems hardly one of those consequences adapted to show forth
the character of a hero in theatrical representation."[154] Scott's opinion of
the form of these plays appears in the following comment: "We doubt if,
with his utmost efforts, [Molière] could have been absolutely dull, without
the assistance of a pastoral subject and heroic measure."[155] Concerning the
indecency of the literature of the period Scott wrote emphatically. He was
much troubled by the problem of whether to publish Dryden's works
without any cutting, and came near taking Ellis's advice to omit some
portions, but he finally adhered to his original determination: "In making an
edition of a man of genius's works for libraries and collections ... I must
give my author as I find him, and will not tear out the page, even to get rid
of the blot, little as I like it."[156]

The question of the morality of theater-going was one Scott felt obliged
to discuss when he was writing upon the drama. He found its vindication,
characteristically, in a universal human trait,—the impulse toward mimicry
and impersonation,—and in the good results that may be supposed to attend
it. In naming these he lays what seems like undue stress on the teaching of
history by the drama, in language that might quite as well be applied to
historical novels. His argument on the literary side also is stated in a
somewhat too sweeping way:—"Had there been no drama, Shakespeare
would, in all likelihood, have been but the author of Venus and Adonis and

of a few sonnets forgotten among the numerous works of the Elizabethan
age, and Otway had been only the compiler of fantastic odes."[157] A final
plea, in favor of the stage as a democratic agency—though this of course is
not Scott's phrasing—seems slightly unusual for him, although not
essentially out of character. "The entertainment," he says, "which is the
subject of general enjoyment, is of a nature which tends to soften, if not to
level, the distinction of ranks."[158] In another mood he admitted the greater
likelihood that immoral plays would injure the public character than that
moral plays would elevate it.[159]

It is sufficiently apparent to any student of Scott's work that he was
personally very fond of the drama. Many of the literary references and
allusions which appear in great abundance throughout his writings are from
plays, and show, as we have seen, a wide acquaintance with English
dramatic writers, from Shakspere to such comparatively little-known
playwrights as Suckling and Cowley. In the Letters of Malachi
Malagrowther on the Currency, for example, Scott's unusual range of
reading reveals itself even in connection with a subject remote from his
ordinary field, and here as elsewhere he shows himself prone to quote from
the drama.[160] But Scott was interested in plays for what he found in them
of characters and manners, of witty and sententious speech, of situations
and incidents, and only secondarily in the technical aspects of the drama.
Reading his novels we could guess that he would care more for the concrete
elements of a play than for the orderly march of events through the various
stages of a formally proper construction. In this respect he differs from
Coleridge; but indeed the two men may be contrasted at almost every point.
In summing up this part of Scott's criticism we must remember also that it
was chiefly incidental. Perhaps whatever qualities it exhibits are on this
account particularly characteristic: at any rate his opinions on the drama
were the reaction of an unusually capable mind upon a department of
literature in which his reading was all the more fruitful because it followed
the lines of a natural inclination.

THE SEVENTEENTH CENTURY

Dryden
Scott's preparations for his edition of Dryden—Wide Scope of the work—
Scott's estimation of Dryden—Grounds for putting Dryden above Chaucer and
Spenser—Admirable style of the biography—Comments by Scott on other
seventeenth century writers.

The edition of Dryden's Complete Works deserves further notice,
especially since only eight of the eighteen volumes are occupied with the
plays, and these have less commentary than other parts of the works. In
1805 Scott wrote to his friend George Ellis, "My critical notes will not be
very numerous but I hope to illustrate the political poems, as Absalom and
Achitophel, the Hind and Panther, etc., with some curious annotations. I
have already made a complete search among some hundred pamphlets of
that pamphlet-writing age, and with considerable success, as I have found
several which throw light on my author."[161] He added that another edition
of Dryden was proposed, and Ellis wrote in answer, "With regard to your
competitors, I feel perfectly at my ease, because I am convinced that though
you should generously furnish them with all the materials, they would not
know how to use them; non cuivis hominum contingit to write critical notes
that anyone will read."[162]

When Scott's Dryden was reëdited and reissued in 1882-93 by Professor
Saintsbury, the new editor said: "It certainly deserves the credit of being one
of the best-edited books on a great scale in English, save in one particular,
—the revision of the text."[163] The elaborate historical notes are left
untouched, as being "in general thoroughly trustworthy,"[164] though the
editor considers them somewhat excessive, especially as sometimes
containing illustrative material from perfectly worthless contemporaries. On
the other hand, the "explanation of word and phrase is a little defective."
[165]

The most notable quality of the Life of Dryden which composes the first
of the eighteen volumes is its breadth of scope. Scott's aim may best be
given in his own words in the Advertisement: "The general critical view of
Dryden's works being sketched by Johnson with unequalled felicity, and the
incidents of his life accurately discussed and ascertained by Malone,
something seemed to remain for him who should consider these literary

productions in their succession, as actuated by, and operating upon, the taste
of an age where they had so predominant influence; and who might, at the
same time, connect the life of Dryden with the history of his publications,
without losing sight of the fate and character of the individual."[166]

Errors of judgment appear in places; sometimes they are due to the
imperfect scholarship of the time; sometimes they arise from prejudices of
Scott's own. In the very first chapter we find him condemning Lyly and all
writers of "conceited" language—particularly of course the Metaphysicals
—with a thoroughness that a truly catholic critic ought probably to avoid.
Scott had a constitutional dislike for a labored style, and at the same time a
fondness for the direct and straightforward way of looking at things. So,
though he was open to the emotional appeal of a poem like Christabel, he
took no pleasure in the devious processes by which the cold intellect has
sometimes tried to give fresh interest to familiar words and ideas. They
quite prevented him from seeing the passion in the work of Donne, for
example, and he considered all metaphysical poets, in so far as they showed
the traits of their class, to be without poetical feeling.

Scott placed Dryden after Shakspere and Milton as third in the list of
English writers. I think he would even have been willing to say that Dryden
was the third as a poet. For greatly as he admired Chaucer, Scott did not feel
Chaucer's full power, and indeed it was only beginning to be possible to
read Chaucer with any appreciation of his metrical excellence. Spenser, of
whom he once wrote: "No author, perhaps, ever possessed and combined in
so brilliant a degree the requisite qualities of a poet,"[167] was more of a
favorite with Scott than Chaucer. But at another time he spoke of Drayton
as possessing perhaps equal powers of poetry,[168] and he seems to have felt
that Spenser becomes tedious through the continued use of his difficult
stanza and even more because of the "languor of a continued allegory."[169]
In comparing his judgments on Spenser and Dryden we may conclude that
the critic found more in the later poet of that solid intellectual basis which
he emphasizes in characterizing him. "This power of ratiocination," says
Scott, "of investigating, discovering, and appreciating that which is really
excellent, if accompanied with the necessary command of fanciful
illustration and elegant expression, is the most interesting quality which can
be possessed by a poet."[170] Again he lays emphasis on Dryden's versatility,

—greater, he says, than that of Shakspere and Milton. In Old Mortality
Dryden is referred to as "the great High-priest of all the Nine." Scott would
have called this another point of his superiority over Spenser, if he had
made the comparison.

Yet he saw Dryden's deficiencies. "It was a consequence of his mental
acuteness that his dramatic personages often philosophized and reasoned
when they ought only to have felt,"[171] Scott remarks and he frequently
deplores Dryden's failure "in expressing the milder and more tender
passions."[172] Of Dryden's great gift of style, Scott speaks in the highest
terms. "With this power," he says, "Dryden's poetry was gifted in a degree
surpassing in modulated harmony that of all who had preceded him and
inferior to none that has since written English verse [sic]. He first
showed"—and here we see Scott's eighteenth-century affinities—"that the
English language was capable of uniting smoothness and strength."[173]

Such criticism as Scott gives on specific parts of Dryden's work is clear-
cut, fair for the most part, and has the sanity and reasonableness which are
the most noticeable qualities of his criticism in general. It would be easier
to find illustrations of shrewdness than of subtlety among his notes, but his
discriminations are often effective and satisfying. His discussion, for
example, of prologues and epilogues considered in relation to the theatrical
conditions which determined their character is admirable.[174] A note on
"the cant of supposing that the Iliad contained an obvious and intentional
moral"[175] is also full of sense and vigor, but these qualities are so
thoroughly diffused through the work that there is no need of
particularizing. His praise of Alexander's Feast may be referred to,
however, as showing his characteristic delight in objective poetry.[176] As a
lyric poet, he says, Dryden "must be allowed to have no equal."[177]

The peculiarly congenial qualities of the subject may have had something
to do with the fact that the style in which the Life of Dryden is written is
noticeably better than that of Scott's ordinary work. It is marked with a care
and accuracy that were not, unfortunately, habitual to him. Perhaps it was
an advantage that when he wrote the book he had not yet become altogether
familiar with his own facility; certainly the substance and the manner of
treatment unite in making this the most important of his critical biographies.

Various references indicate that Scott was acquainted in at least a general
way with English writers throughout the whole of Dryden's century. He
speaks of the poems of Phineas Fletcher as containing "many passages fully
equal to Spenser"[178]; he says that Cowley "is now ... undeservedly
forgotten"[179]; he calls Hudibras "the most witty poem that ever was
written,"[180] but says, "the perpetual scintillation of Butler's wit is too
dazzling to be delightful"[181]; he talks of Waller and quotes from him[182];
he refers to the charming quality of Isaac Walton's work;[183] and he adopts
Samuel Pepys as a familiar acquaintance.[184] These references occur
mostly in the Dryden or in the novels, and we may conclude that the work
for the Dryden gathered up and strengthened all Scott's acquaintance with
the literature of the seventeenth century, from Shakspere and Milton down
to writers of altogether minor importance; and gave him material for many
of the allusions that appear in his later work. It is probably true that there
are more quotations from Dryden in Scott's books than from any other one
author,[185] though lines from Shakspere occurred more often in his
conversation and familiar letters.

THE EIGHTEENTH CENTURY

Swift
The preparation of Swift's Complete Works—Comparison of the Dryden and
the Swift—The bibliographical problem presented by Swift's works—
Inaccuracies in the biography—Scott's success in portraying a perplexing
temperament—Judicious quality of his literary criticism.

As soon as the Dryden was completed Scott was offered twice as much
money as he had received for that work, for a similar edition of Swift.[186]
He readily undertook the task, and in the midst of many other editorial
engagements set to work upon it. The preparation of the book extended over
the six years during which Scott ran the greater part of his poetical career.
On its appearance one of his friends expressed the feeling which every
student of Scott must have had in regard to the large editorial labors that he
undertook, in saying, "I am delighted and surprised; for how a person of
your turn could wade through, and so accurately analyze what you have

done (namely, all the dull things calculated to illustrate your author), seems
almost impossible, and a prodigy in the history of the human mind."[187]
The work was first published in 1814. Ten years later it was revised and
reissued; and Scott's Swift has, like his Dryden, been the standard edition of
that author ever since.

In each case Scott had to deal with an important and varied body of
literature in the two fields of poetry and prose, though the proportions were
different; and in each case he had occasion for illustrative historical
annotations of the kind that he wrote with unrivalled facility. He was master
of the political intrigues of Queen Anne's reign no less completely than of
the circumstances which gave rise to Absalom and Achitophel, and the fact
that his notes are less voluminous in the Swift is probably to be accounted
for by the comparative absence of quaintness in the literary and social
fashions of the eighteenth century.

The peculiar conditions under which Swift's writings had appeared, and
his remarkable indifference to literary fame, gave the editor opportunity to
look for material which had not before been included in his works. The
diligent search of Scott and his various correspondents enabled him to add
about thirty poems, between sixty and seventy letters from Swift, and about
sixteen other small pieces. The most noteworthy item among these
additions was the correspondence between Swift and Miss Vanhomrigh, of
which only a very small part had previously been made public.[188]

Scott's notes seem to indicate that most of the necessary searching
through newspapers and obscure pamphlets for forgotten work of Swift was
performed by "obliging correspondents," and that the editor himself had
only to pass judgment on what was brought to his attention. This impression
may arise largely from his cordiality in expressing indebtedness to his
helpers, but it is certain that his position as a popular poet gave Scott the
assistance of many people who would not have been enlisted in the work by
an ordinary editor. But Scott had the difficult task of deciding whether the
unauthenticated pieces were to be assigned to Swift. The bibliography of
Swift is still so uncertain that it is impossible to say how many of the small
pamphlets in verse and prose added in this edition are really his work.[189]
Scott had good reason for his additions in most cases, though sometimes, as

he was aware, the Dean had merely revised the work of other people. The
editor was occasionally over-credulous in attributing pieces to Swift, but he
was perhaps oftener too generous in giving room to things which he knew
had very little claim to be considered Swift's work. When he was in doubt
he chose to err on the safe side, according to the principles set forth in the
following note on the Letter from Dr. Tripe to Nestor Ironside: "The piece
contains a satirical description of Steele's person, and should the editor be
mistaken in conjecturing that Swift contributed to compose it, may
nevertheless, at this distance of time, merit preservation as a literary
curiosity."[190] The ample space afforded by the nineteen volumes of the
book gives room to Arbuthnot's History of John Bull—because it was
"usually published in Swift's works,"—to the verses addressed to the Dean
and those written in memory of him, as well as to the prose and verse
miscellanies of Pope and Swift, and the miscellanies and jeux d'esprit of
Swift and Sheridan. Swift's correspondence fills the last four and a half
volumes.

The biography, which occupies the first volume, is admirable in tone, but
the facts Scott gives are less to be relied upon than the inferences and
conclusions he derives from them. He corresponded with persons who were
in a position to know about Swift from his friends and acquaintances, and
probably he trusted too much to these "original sources." We find, as
perhaps the most noteworthy instance, that the marriage to Stella is stated as
an ascertained fact, on authority that is not now considered convincing.
Later biographers of Swift,—Sir Henry Craik, Leslie Stephen, Mr. Churton
Collins,—have borne witness to the human interest of Scott's biography,
and its preeminence, in spite of inaccuracies, among all the Lives of Swift
that have been written. But Mr. Churton Collins thinks Scott did not present
a really clear view of Swift's mysterious character, and Craik says he took
only the conventional attitude towards Swift's politics, misanthropy, and
religion. The charge indicates Scott's weakness, and perhaps also much of
his strength, as a biographer and critic, for he had no prejudice against the
conventional as such, and was never anxious to exhibit special "insight" of
any kind. Yet I think his portrayal of Swift has seemed to most readers a
clear presentation of a real and comprehensible character.[191]

Scott's remark when he undertook the work, that Swift was of his early
favorites,[192] seems surprising when one remembers how his genial nature
recoiled from misanthropy and cynicism; but his treatment of the Dean was
so sympathetic that Jeffrey thought him decidedly too lenient, and was
moved to express righteous indignation in the pages of the Edinburgh
Review.[193] The rebuke was unnecessary, for Scott did not omit to record
Swift's failings and to express wholesomely vigorous opinions concerning
them, though he felt that they ought to be looked upon as evidences of
disease rather than of guilt. He felt also, with perhaps some excess of
charity but surely not such as could be in the least harmful, that "if the
Dean's principles were misanthropical, his practice was benevolent. Few
have written so much with so little view either to fame or to profit, or to
aught but benefit to the public."[194] Jeffrey's condemnation of Scott's point
of view was mingled with just praise. He said of the biography: "It is quite
fair and moderate in politics; and perhaps rather too indulgent and tender
towards individuals of all descriptions,—more full, at least, of kindness and
veneration for genius and social virtue, than of indignation at baseness and
profligacy. Altogether it is not much like the production of a mere man of
letters, or a fastidious speculator in sentiment and morality; but exhibits
throughout, and in a very pleasing form, the good sense and large toleration
of a man of the world."

The very practical motives that inspired most of Swift's pamphlets would
naturally attract Scott. Probably it was the remembrance of the Drapier's
Letters that suggested to him a similar form of protest against proposed
changes in the Scottish currency; certainly the Letters of Malachi
Malagrowther had an effect comparable to that of Swift's more
consummately ingenious appeal. Another quality in Swift's work that would
naturally arouse Scott's admiration was the remarkable directness and
lucidity of the style. Scott appreciated the originality force of Swift, even
when it was used in the service of satire. Sometimes, he says, "the intensity
of his satire gives to his poetry a character of emphatic violence which
borders upon grandeur."[195] The editor's discussion of Gulliver's Travels an
acute and illuminating little essay, contains one comment that gives an
amusing revelation of his point of view. He says in regard to the fourth part
of the story: "It is some consolation to remark that the fiction on which this
libel on human nature rests is in every respect gross and improbable, and,

far from being entitled to the praise due to the management of the first two
parts, is inferior in plan even to the third."[196] This is a sound verdict, even
if it does contain an extra-literary element. Scott surpassed most of his
contemporaries, except the younger Romantic writers, in his ability to
eliminate irrelevant considerations in estimating any literary work; and if
occasionally his strong moral feeling appears in his criticism, it serves to
remind us how much less often this happens than a knowledge of his
temperament would lead us to expect. In spite of the qualities in his subject
that might naturally bias Scott's judgment, his criticism throughout this
edition of Swift seems on the whole very judicious. It defines the literary
importance and brings out plainly the power of a man whose work presents
unusual perplexities to the critic.

The Somers Tracts
Character of the collection and of Scott's work on it—Occasional carelessness
—Purpose of the notes—Scott's attitude towards these studies.

While Scott was working on his Dryden and before he began the Swift he
undertook to edit the great collection which had been published fifty years
before as Somers' Tracts. His task was to arrange, revise, and annotate
pamphlets which represented every reign from Elizabeth to George I. He
grouped them chronologically by reigns, and separated them further into
sections under the headings,—Ecclesiastical, Historical, Civil, Military,
Miscellaneous; he also added eighty-one pamphlets, all written before the
time of James II. The largest number of additions in any one section was
historical and had reference to Stafford. Among the miscellaneous tracts
that he incorporated were Derrick's Image of Ireland from a copy in the
Advocates' Library, and Gosson's School of Abuse. Scott's statement in the
Advertisement as to why he did not omit any of the original collection
shows his unpedantic attitude toward the kind of studies which he was
encouraging by the republication of this series. He says: "When the variety
of literary pursuits, and the fluctuation of fashionable study is considered, it
may seem rash to pass a hasty sentence of exclusion, even upon the dullest
and most despised of the essays which this ample collection offers to the
public. There may be among the learned, even now, individuals to whom

the rabbinical lore of Hugh Broughton presents more charms than the verses
of Homer; and a future day may arise when tracts on chronology will bear
as high a value among antiquaries as 'Greene's Groats' Worth of Wit,' or
'George Peele's Jests,' the present respectable objects of research and
reverence."

In editing this collection Scott made little attempt to decide disputed
problems of authorship when the explanation did not lie upon the surface.
Indeed the following note regarding the tract called A New Test of the
Church of England's Loyalty shows that he sometimes neglected very
obvious sources of information, for the piece is given in one of Defoe's own
collections of his works: "This defence of whiggish loyalty," says Scott,
"seems to have been written by the celebrated Daniel De Foe, a conjecture
which is strengthened by the frequent reference to his poem of the True-
born Englishman."[197] He was not often so careless, but the rapidity and
range of his work during these years undoubtedly gave occasion for more
than one lapse of accuracy, while at the same time it perhaps increased the
effectiveness of his comment.

His notes and introductions vary in length according to the requirements
of the case, for he aimed to provide such material as would prevent the
necessity of reference to other works. Matters that were obscure he
explained, and he wrote little comment on those that were generally
understood. When he left himself so free a hand he could indulge his
personal tastes somewhat also, and we are not surprised to find an especial
abundance of notes on an account of the Gowrie Conspiracy which
presented a perplexing problem in Scottish history.

The connection of Somers' Tracts with other things that Scott did has
already been remarked upon.[198] That he found some sort of stimulation in
all his scholarly employments is sufficiently evident to anyone who studies
his work as a whole, and this fact might well serve as a motive for such
study. Yet it is only fair to remember that Scott was not a novelist during
these years when he was performing his most laborious editorial tasks. We
are accustomed to think of the brilliant use he was afterwards to make of
the knowledge he was gaining, but the motives which influenced him were
those of the man whose interest in literature and history makes scholarly

work seem the most natural way of earning money. "These are studies,
indeed, proverbially dull," he once wrote, speaking of Horace Walpole's
antiquarian researches, "but it is only when they are pursued by those
whose fancies nothing can enliven."[199]

The Lives of the Novelists, and Comments on Other Eighteenth
Century Writers
The Novelists' Library—Writers discussed—Value of the Lives—General tone
of competence in these essays—Scott's catholic taste—Points of special interest
in the discussion—Relations of the novel and the drama—Supernatural
machinery in novels—Mistakes in the criticism of Defoe—Realism—Motive in
the novel—Aim of the prefaces—Scott's familiarity with eighteenth century
literature.

It has already been said that a large part of Scott's critical work concerned
itself with the eighteenth century. Of his greater editorial labors two may be
considered as belonging to that period, for Ballantyne's Novelists' Library,
though an enterprise which was commercially a failure and which
consequently remained incomplete, may from the point of view of Scott's
contributions fitly be compared with the Dryden and the Swift. Such parts as
were published appeared in 1821. The bulk of the volumes and the small
type in which they were printed were considered to be the cause of their
failure, and it was not until the critical biographies were extracted and
published separately, by Galignani the Parisian bookseller, in 1825, that
they seem to have attracted notice.

Scott wrote these Lives of the Novelists at a time when his hands were
full of literary projects, altogether for John Ballantyne's benefit. The author
afterwards spoke of them as "rather flimsily written,"[200] but we may
surmise that to the fact that they were not the result of special study is due
something of their ripeness of reflection and breadth of generalization.
"They contain a large assemblage of manly and sagacious remarks on
human life and manners,"[201] wrote the Quarterly reviewer.

The writers considered were all British, with the exception of LeSage.
The choice, or at least the arrangement, seems more or less haphazard.

Richardson, Fielding, and Smollett naturally began the group, and Sterne
followed after an interval. Johnson and Goldsmith were treated briefly, for
the prefaces were to be proportioned to the amount of work by each author
included in the text. Horace Walpole, Clara Reeve, and Mrs. Radcliffe
represented the Gothic romance. Charles Johnstone, Robert Bage, and
Richard Cumberland were among the inferior writers included. Henry
Mackenzie, who was still living and was a personal friend of Scott,
completes the list so far as it went before the series was terminated by the
publisher's death. When Scott's Miscellaneous Prose Works were collected
he added the lives of Charlotte Smith and Defoe, but in each of these cases
the biographical portion was by another hand, the criticism being his own.
[202]

The study of the novel as a genre was naturally undeveloped at that time.
Dunlop's History of Prose Fiction had appeared in 1814, evidently a much
more ambitious attempt than Scott's; but Scott could treat the British
novelists with comparative freedom from the trammels of any established
precedent. Of course his position as one who had struck out a wonderful
new path in the writing of novels gave to his reflections on other novelists a
very special interest. The Lives of the Novelists are not to be neglected even
now, and this is the more to be insisted on because the criticism of novels
has been practiced with increasing zeal since Scott himself has become a
classic and since his successors have made this field of literature more
varied and popular, if not greater, than the first masters made it. A recent
writer on eighteenth century literature says: "By far the best criticism of the
eighteenth century novelists will be found in the prefatory notices
contributed by Scott to Ballantyne's Novelists' Library."[203] But the same
writer adds: "Sir Walter Scott, indeed, considered Fathom superior to
Jonathan Wild, an opinion which must always remain one of the mysteries
of criticism."[204]

This comment indicates that there was no lack of assuredness in Scott's
treatment, and we do indeed find a very pleasant tone of competence which,
though liable to error as in the exaggerated praise bestowed upon Smollett,
gives much of their effectiveness to the criticisms. The quality appears
elsewhere in Scott's critical work, but it is perhaps especially noticeable
here. For example, we find this dictum: "There is no book in existence, in

which so much of the human character, under all its various shades and
phases, is described in so few words, as in the Diable Boiteux."[205] The
illustration is perhaps a trifle extreme, for Scott is not often really dogmatic.
From this point of view as from others we naturally make the comparison
with Johnson's Lives of the Poets, and we find that without being so
sententious, so admirably compact in style, Scott is also not so dictatorial.

We cannot accuse Scott of liking any one kind of novel to the exclusion
of others. He ranks Clarissa Harlowe very high;[206] he says Tom Jones is
"truth and human nature itself."[207] The Vicar of Wakefield he calls "one of
the most delicious morsels of fictitious composition on which the human
mind was ever employed." "We return to it again and again," he says, "and
bless the memory of an author who contrives so well to reconcile us to
human nature."[208] He praises Tristram Shandy, calling Uncle Toby and his
faithful Squire, "the most delightful characters in the work, or perhaps in
any other."[209] The quiet fictions of Maria Edgeworth and Jane Austen, the
exciting tales of Mrs. Radcliffe, the sentiment of Sterne, even the satires of
Bage,—all pleased him in one way or another. Scott's autobiography
contains the following comment on his boyish tastes in the matter of novels:
"The whole Jemmy and Jenny Jessamy tribe I abhorred, and it required the
art of Burney, or the feeling of Mackenzie, to fix my attention upon a
domestic tale. But all that was adventurous and romantic I devoured
without much discrimination."[210] In later life he learned to exercise his
judgment in regard to stories of adventure not less than those of the
"domestic" sort, and perhaps the liking for quiet tales grew upon him; at any
rate his taste seems remarkably catholic.

The most interesting portions of the Lives of the Novelists are those
which show us, by the frequent recurrence of the same subjects, what parts
of the theory of novel-writing had particularly engaged Scott's attention. For
example we find him discussing, most fully in the Life of Fielding, the
reasons why a successful novelist is likely not to be a successful playwright.
The way in which he looks at the matter suggests that he was thinking quite
as much of the probability of failure in his own case should he begin to
write plays, as of the subject of the memoir; for Fielding wrote his plays
before his novels, but the argument assumes a man who writes good novels
first and bad plays afterwards. One of his statements seems rather curious

and hard to explain,—"Though a good acting play may be made by
selecting a plot and characters from a novel, yet scarce any effort of genius
could render a play into a narrative romance." Perhaps he expected the
"Terryfied" versions of Guy Mannering and Rob Roy to hold the stage
longer than fate has permitted them to do. From another point of view also
he was interested in the connection of the novel and the drama. He felt that
the direction of the drama in the modern period had been largely determined
by the influence of successful novels; and he probably overestimated the
effect of the "romances of Calprenède and Scudéri" on heroic tragedy.[211]

A subject which recurs even oftener than that of the distinction between
drama and novel is the question of supernatural machinery in novels.
Horace Walpole is commended for giving us ghosts without furnishing
explanations. Indeed the Castle of Otranto is highly praised;[212] but so also
is Mrs. Radcliffe's work, except on the one point of the attempt to
rationalize mysteries. The kind of romance which she "introduced"[213] is
compared with the melodrama, and its particular mode of appeal is
analyzed in very interesting fashion. In the Life of Clara Reeve the proper
treatment of ghosts is discussed at length, for that author had contended that
ghosts should be very mild and of "sober demeanour." Scott justifies her
practice, but not her theory, on the following grounds: "What are the limits
to be placed to the reader's credulity, when those of common-sense and
ordinary nature are at once exceeded? The question admits only one answer,
namely, that the author himself, being in fact the magician, shall evoke no
spirits whom he is not capable of endowing with manners and language
corresponding to their supernatural character."

Scott writes with much enthusiasm about Defoe's famous little ghost-
story, The Apparition of Mrs. Veal, praising Defoe's wonderful skill in
making the unreal seem credible. In connection with this tale Scott
developed a very interesting anecdote to explain the fact that Drelincourt's
Defence against the Fear of Death is recommended by the apparition.
"Drelincourt's book," he says, "being neglected, lay a dead stock on the
hands of the publisher. In this emergency he applied to De Foe to assist him
(by dint of such means as were then, as well as now, pretty well understood
in the literary world) in rescuing the unfortunate book from the literary
death to which general neglect seemed about to consign it." Scott goes on to

assert that the story was simply a consummately clever advertising device.
He may have found the germ of his hypothesis in a bookseller's tradition,
but he states it as an assured fact, and doubtless believed it firmly because it
seemed so beautifully reasonable. His explanation became the basis of later
statements on the subject, and now obliges everyone who discusses Defoe
to supply a contradiction; for the truth is that Drelincourt's book was so
highly popular as to have gone through several editions before the ghost of
Mrs. Veal mentioned it. Moreover, if Scott's little tale was fictitious,
Defoe's, on the other hand, was really a reporter's version of an experience
actually related by the person to whom he assigns it, and his skill in
achieving verisimilitude was perhaps in this case less wonderful than his
critics have generally supposed.[214]

On the subject of realism, Scott was not in general very rigid. In his Life
of Richardson he says: "It is unfair to tax an author too severely upon
improbabilities, without conceding which his story could have no existence;
and we have the less title to do so, because, in the history of real life, that
which is actually true bears often very little resemblance to that which is
probable."[215] But this is perhaps only a plea for one kind of realism. He
also refers to the question of historical "keening," and concludes that it is
possible to have so much accuracy that the public will refuse to be
interested, as Lear would hardly be popular on the stage if the hero were
represented in the bearskin and paint which a Briton of his time doubtless
wore.[216]

The motive of the novel is a subject which naturally engages the attention
of the novelist-critic. Romantic fiction, he thinks may have sufficient
justification if it acts as an opiate for tired spirits. A significant antithesis
between his point of view in this matter and the more common attitude
taken by critics in his time is illustrated by two reviews of Mrs. Shelley's
Frankenstein, to which we may refer, though the book was later than those
included in the Novelists' Library. Scott wrote in Blackwood's: "We ...
congratulate our readers upon a novel which excites new reflections and
untried sources of emotion."[217] The Quarterly reviewer took the opposite
and more conservative attitude and expressed himself thus: "Our taste and
our judgment alike revolt at this kind of writing, and the greater the ability
with which it may be executed the worse it is—it inculcates no lesson of

conduct, manners, or morality; it cannot mend, and will not even amuse its
readers, unless their taste has been deplorably vitiated—it fatigues the
feelings without interesting the understanding; it gratuitously harasses the
heart, and wantonly adds to the store, already too great, of painful
sensations."[218] In general Scott minimizes the effect of any moral that may
be expressed in the novel, but occasionally he seems inconsistent, when he
is talking of sentiments that are peculiarly distasteful to him.[219] But his
thesis is that "the direct and obvious moral to be deduced from a fictitious
narrative is of much less consequence to the public than the mode in which
the story is treated in the course of its details."[220] In the Life of Fielding he
says of novels: "The best which can be hoped is that they may sometimes
instruct the youthful mind by real pictures of life, and sometimes awaken
their better feelings and sympathies by strains of generous sentiment, and
tales of fictitious woe. Beyond this point they are a mere elegance, a luxury
contrived for the amusement of polished life."

He conceived that his prefaces might be useful to warn readers against
any ill effects that might otherwise result from the reading of the
accompanying texts; and our comments on the Lives of the Novelists may
fitly close with a quotation which shows the writer's attitude toward the
novels and his own criticisms upon them. The passage is taken from the Life
of Bage. "We did not think it proper to reject the works of so eminent an
author from this collection, merely on account of speculative errors.[221] We
have done our best to place a mark on these; and as we are far from being of
opinion that the youngest and most thoughtless derive their serious opinions
from productions of this nature, we leave them for our reader's amusement,
trusting that he will remember that a good jest is no argument; that the
novelist, like the master of a puppet-show, has his drama under his absolute
authority, and shapes the events to favour his own opinions; and that
whether the Devil flies away with Punch, or Punch strangles the Devil,
forms no real argument as to the comparative power of either one or other,
but only indicates the special pleasure of the master of the motion."

Scott was deeply in sympathy with the literature of the century within
which he was born. To the evidence of his Swift and of the Lives of the
Novelists it may be added that he contemplated making a complete edition
of Pope, and that he professed to like London and The Vanity of Human

Wishes the best of all poems. James Ballantyne said, rather ambiguously, "I
think I never saw his countenance more indicative of high admiration than
while reciting aloud from those productions."[222] In one of his letters Scott
spoke of the "beautiful and feeling verses by Dr. Johnson to the memory of
his humble friend Levett, ... which with me, though a tolerably ardent
Scotchman, atone for a thousand of his prejudices."[223] Not only did he
admire the great biography, but he called Boswell "such a biographer as no
man but [Johnson] ever had, or ever deserved to have."[224] But he once
said that many of the Ramblers were "little better than a sort of pageant,
where trite and obvious maxims are made to swagger in lofty and mystic
language, and get some credit only because they are not understood."[225]

Among other eighteenth century writers, Addison is distinguished by
high praise in a few casual references,[226] but Scott once admitted that he
did not like Addison so much as he felt to be proper.[227] A collection of
Prior's poems Scott calls "an English classic of the first order."[228] He
speaks of Parnell as "an admirable man and elegant poet,"[229] and mentions
"the ponderous, persevering, and laborious dullness of Sir Richard
Blackmore."[230] But these observations are of little importance except as
they indicate that Scott had read the authors of the eighteenth century and
acquiesced in the conventional judgments upon them. It is seldom in his
brief and casual comments that Scott is particularly interesting as a critic,
except when he is speaking of living writers, for he lacked the gift of
conciseness. When he has a large canvas he is at his best, and this he has in
the principal works described in this chapter:—The Minstrelsy of the
Scottish Border, the Works of Dryden, the Works of Swift, and the Lives of
the Novelists.

CHAPTER IV
SCOTT'S CRITICISM OF HIS CONTEMPORARIES
Scott's freedom from literary jealousy—His disapproval of the typical
reviewer's attitude—Jeffrey, Gifford, and Lockhart—His own practice in regard
to reviewing—His informal critical remarks—Opportunity for favorable
judgments afforded by the number of important writers in his period.

Poets—Burns—Coleridge—Relation of Christabel to Scott's work—Scott's
dislike for extreme Romanticism—Wordsworth—Southey—Scott's review of
Kehama—Byron—Scott's opinion of Byron's character—Campbell—Moore—
Allan Cunningham—Hogg—Crabbe—Joanna Baillie—Matthew Lewis—Scott's
judgment on his early taste for poetry—Absence of comment on the work of
Lamb, Landor, Hunt, Hazlitt, and DeQuincey.

Novelists—Jane Austen—Maria Edgeworth—Cooper—Personal relations
between Scott and Cooper—Scott's verdict on Americans in general—
Washington Irving—Goethe—Fouqué—Scott's interest in men of action.

To study Scott's relations with contemporary writers is a very pleasant
task because nothing shows better the greatness of his heart. His admirable
freedom from literary jealousy was an innate virtue which he deliberately
increased by cultivation, taking care, also, never to subject himself to the
conditions which he thought accounted for the faults of Pope, who had
"neither the business nor the idleness of life to divide his mind from his
Parnassian pursuits."[231] "Those who have not his genius may be so far
compensated by avoiding his foibles," Scott said; and some years later he
wrote,—"When I first saw that a literary profession was to be my fate, I
endeavoured by all efforts of stoicism to divest myself of that irritable
degree of sensibility—or, to speak plainly, of vanity—which makes the
poetical race miserable and ridiculous."[232] The record of his life clearly
shows that his kindness towards other men of letters was not limited to

words. One who received his good offices has written,—"The sternest
words I ever heard him utter were concerning a certain poet: 'That man,' he
said, 'has had much in his power, but he never befriended rising genius
yet.'"[233] We may safely say that Scott enjoyed liking the work of other
men. "I am most delighted with praise from those who convince me of their
good taste by admiring the genius of my contemporaries,"[234] he once
wrote to Southey.

It is commonly supposed that Scott's amiability led him into absurd
excesses of praise for the works of his fellow-craftsmen, and indeed he did
say some very surprising things. But when all his references to any one man
are brought together, they will be found, with a few exceptions, pretty fairly
to characterize the writer. His obiter dicta must be read in the light of one
another, and in the light, also, of his known principles. Temperamentally
modest about his own work, he was also habitually optimistic, and the
combination gave him an utterly different quality from that of the typical
Edinburgh or Quarterly critics.

His disapproval of their point of view he expressed more than once.[235]
It seemed to him futile and ungentlemanly for the anonymous reviewer to
seek primarily for faults, or "to wound any person's feelings ... unless where
conceit or false doctrine strongly calls for reprobation."[236] "Where praise
can be conscientiously mingled in a larger proportion than blame," he said,
"there is always some amusement in throwing together our ideas upon the
works of our fellow-labourers." He thought, indeed, that vituperative and
satiric criticism was defeating its own end, in the case of the Edinburgh
Review since it was overworked to the point of monotony. Such criticism he
considered futile as well on this account as because he thought it likely to
have an injurious effect on the work of really gifted writers.

An admirer of both Jeffrey and Scott, who once heard a conversation
between the two men, has recorded a distinction which is exactly what we
should expect.[237] He says: "Jeffrey, for the most part, entertained us, when
books were under discussion, with the detection of faults, blunders,
absurdities, or plagiarisms: Scott took up the matter where he left it,
recalled some compensating beauty or excellence for which no credit had

been allowed, and by the recitation, perhaps, of one fine stanza, set the poor
victim on his legs again."

On Jeffrey Scott's verdict was, "There is something in his mode of
reasoning that leads me greatly to doubt whether, notwithstanding the
vivacity of his imagination, he really has any feeling of poetical genius, or
whether he has worn it all off by perpetually sharpening his wit on the
grindstone of criticism."[238] His comment on Gifford's reviews was to the
effect that people were more moved to dislike the critic for his savagery
than the guilty victim whom he flagellated.[239] In the early days of
Blackwood's Magazine Scott often tried to repress Lockhart's "wicked wit,"
[240] and when Lockhart became editor of the Quarterly his father-in-law
did not always approve of his work. "Don't like his article on Sheridan's
life,"[241] says the Journal. "There is no breadth in it, no general views, the
whole flung away in smart but party criticism. Now, no man can take more
general and liberal views of literature than J.G.L."[242]

With these opinions, Scott was not likely often to undertake the
reviewing of books that did not, in one way or another interest him or move
his admiration; and he would lay as much stress as possible on their good
points. Gifford told him that "fun and feeling" were his forte.[243] In his
early days he was probably somewhat influenced by Jeffrey's method, and
his articles on Todd's Spenser and Godwin's Life of Chaucer indicate that he
could occasionally adopt something of the tone of the Edinburgh Review.
Years afterwards he refused to write an article that Lockhart wanted for the
Quarterly, saying, "I cannot write anything about the author unless I know
it can hurt no one alive"[244] but for the first volume of the Quarterly he
reviewed Sir John Carr's Caledonian Sketches in a way that Sharon Turner
seriously objected to, because it made Sir John seem ridiculous.[245] Some
of Scott's critics would perhaps apply one of the strictures to himself:
"Although Sir John quotes Horace, he has yet to learn that a wise man
should not admire too easily; for he frequently falls into a state of
wonderment at what appears to us neither very new nor very extraordinary."
[246] But if admiration seems to characterize too great a proportion of Scott's
critical work, it is because he usually preferred to ignore such books as
demanded the sarcastic treatment which he reprehended, but which he felt
perfectly capable of applying when he wished. Speaking of a fulsome

biography he once said, "I can no more sympathize with a mere eulogist
than I can with a ranting hero upon the stage; and it unfortunately happens
that some of our disrespect is apt, rather unjustly, to be transferred to the
subject of the panegyric in the one case, and to poor Cato in the other."[247]

Besides Scott's formal reviews, we find cited as evidence of his extreme
amiability his letters, his journal, and the remarks he made to friends in
moments of enthusiasm. These do indeed contain some sweeping
statements, but in almost every case one can see some reason, other than the
desire to be obliging, why he made them. He was not double-faced. One of
the nearest approaches to it seems to have been in the case of Miss Seward's
poetry, for which he wrote such an introduction as hardly prepares the
reader for the remark he made to Miss Baillie, that most of it was
"absolutely execrable." His comment in the edition of the poems—the
publication of which Miss Seward really forced upon him as a dying
request—is sedulously kind, and in Waverley he quotes from her a couple of
lines which he calls "beautiful." But the essay is most carefully guarded,
and throughout it the editor implies that the woman was more admirable
than the poetry. Personally, indeed, he seems to have liked and admired her.
[248]

The catalogue of Scott's contemporaries is so full of important names that
his genius for the enjoyment of other men's work had a wide opportunity to
display itself without becoming absurd. An argument early used to prove
that Scott was the author of Waverley was the frequency of quotation in the
novels from all living poets except Scott himself, and he felt constrained to
throw in a reference or two to his own poetry in order to weaken the force
of the evidence.[249] The reader is irresistibly reminded of the following
description, given by Lockhart in a letter to his wife, of a morning walk
taken by Wordsworth and Scott in company: "The Unknown was
continually quoting Wordsworth's Poetry and Wordsworth ditto, but the
great Laker never uttered one syllable by which it might have been
intimated to a stranger that your Papa had ever written a line either of verse
or prose since he was born."[250]

Scott's opinions in regard to his fellow craftsmen may best be given
largely in his own words—words which cannot fail to be interesting,

however little evidence they show of any attempt to make them quotable.

In considering Scott's estimation of his contemporaries it is
chronologically proper to mention Burns first. As a boy of fifteen Scott met
Burns, an event which filled him with the suitable amount of awe. He was
most favorably impressed with the poet's appearance and with everything in
his manner. The boy thought, however, that "Burns' acquaintance with
English poetry was rather limited, and also, that having twenty times the
abilities of Allan Ramsay and of Ferguson, he talked of them with too much
humility as his models."[251] Scott's admiration of Burns was always
expressed in the highest and, if one may say so, the most affectionate terms.
He refused to let himself be named "in the same day" with Burns.[252]
"Long life to thy fame and peace to thy soul, Rob Burns!" he exclaimed, in
his Journal; "when I want to express a sentiment which I feel strongly, I
find the phrase in Shakespeare—or thee."[253] On another day he compared
Burns with Shakspere as excelling all other poets in "the power of exciting
the most varied and discordant emotions with such rapid transitions."[254]
Again, "The Jolly Beggars, for humorous description and nice
discrimination of character, is inferior to no poem of the same length in the
whole range of English poetry."[255] Scott wished that Burns might have
carried out his plan of dramatic composition, and regretted, from that point
of view, the excessive labor at songs which in the nature of things could not
all be masterpieces.[256]

Of writers who were more precisely contemporaries of Scott, the Lake
Poets and Byron are the most important. The precedence ought to be given
to Coleridge because of the suggestion Scott caught from a chance
recitation of Christabel for the meter he made so popular in the Lay.[257]
Fragments from Christabel are quoted or alluded to so often in the
novels[258] and throughout Scott's work that we should conclude it had
made a greater impression upon him than any other single poem written in
his own time, if Lockhart had not spoken of Wordsworth's sonnet on
Neidpath Castle as one which Scott was perhaps fondest of quoting.[259]
Christabel is not the only one of Coleridge's poems which Scott used for
allusion or reference, but it was the favorite. "He is naturally a grand poet,"
Scott once wrote to a friend. "His verses on Love, I think, are among the
most beautiful in the English language. Let me know if you have seen them,

as I have a copy of them as they stood in their original form, which was
afterwards altered for the worse."[260] The Ancient Mariner also made a
decided impression on him, if we judge from the fact that he quoted from it
several times.[261] Scott evidently felt that Coleridge was a most tantalizing
poet, and once intimated that future generations would in regard to him feel
something like Milton's desire "to call up him who left half told the story of
Cambuscan bold."[262] "No man has all the resources of poetry in such
profusion, but he cannot manage them so as to bring out anything of his
own on a large scale at all worthy of his genius.... His fancy and diction
would have long ago placed him above all his contemporaries, had they
been under the direction of a sound judgment and a steady will."[263] Such,
in effect, was the opinion that Scott always expressed concerning Coleridge,
and it is practically that of posterity. In The Monastery Coleridge is called
"the most imaginative of our modern bards." In another connection, after
speaking of the "exquisite powers of poetry he has suffered to remain
uncultivated," Scott adds, "Let us be thankful for what we have received,
however. The unfashioned ore, drawn from so rich a mine, is worth all to
which art can add its highest decorations, when drawn from less abundant
sources."[264] These remarks are worth quoting, not only because of their
wisdom, but also because Scott had small personal acquaintance with
Coleridge and was rather repelled than attracted by what he knew of the
character of the author of Christabel. His praises cannot in this case be
called the tribute of friendship, and his own remarkable power of self-
control might have made him a stern judge of Coleridge's shortcomings.

One of his most interesting comments on Coleridge is contained in a
discussion of Byron's Darkness, a poem which to his mind recalled "the
wild, unbridled, and fiery imagination of Coleridge."[265] Darkness is
characterized as a mass of images and ideas, unarranged, and the critic goes
on to warn the author against indulging in this sort of poetry. He says: "The
feeling of reverence which we entertain for that which is difficult of
comprehension, gives way to weariness whenever we begin to suspect that
it cannot be distinctly comprehended by anyone.... The strength of poetical
conception and beauty of diction bestowed upon such prolusions [sic], is as
much thrown away as the colors of a painter, could he take a cloud of mist
or a wreath of smoke for his canvas." It is disappointing that we have no
comment from Scott upon Shelley's poetry, but we can imagine what is

would have been.[266] Scott's position as the great popularizer of the
Romantic movement in poetry makes particularly interesting his very
evident though not often expressed repugnance to the more extreme
development of that movement.

Wordsworth's peculiar theory of poetry seemed to Scott superfluous and
unnecessary, though he was never, so far as we can judge, especially
irritated by it.[267] Of Wordsworth and Southey he wrote to Miss Seward:
"Were it not for the unfortunate idea of forming a new school of poetry,
these men are calculated to give it a new impulse; but I think they
sometimes lose their energy in trying to find not a better but a different path
from what has been travelled by their predecessors."[268] Scott paid tribute
in the introduction to The Antiquary to as much of Wordsworth's poetical
creed as he could acquiesce in when he said, "The lower orders are less
restrained by the habit of suppressing their feelings, and ... I agree with my
friend Wordsworth that they seldom fail to express them in the strongest
and most powerful language." In a letter to Southey Scott calls Wordsworth
"a great master of the passions,"[269] and in his Journal he said: His
imagination "is naturally exquisite, and highly cultivated by constant
exercise."[270] At another time he compared Wordsworth and Southey as
scholars and commented on the "freshness, vivacity, and spring" of
Wordsworth's mind.[271]

The personal relations between Scott and Wordsworth were, as
Wordsworth's tribute in Yarrow Revisited would indicate, those of
affectionate intimacy. And if Scott took exception to Wordsworth's choice
of subjects and manner, Wordsworth used the same freedom in disagreeing
with Scott's poetical ideals. "Thank you," he wrote in 1808, "for Marmion,
which I have read with lively pleasure. I think your end has been attained.
That it is not in every respect the end which I should wish you to purpose to
yourself, you will be well aware, from what you know of my notions of
composition, both as to matter and manner."[272] When, in 1821, Chantrey
was about to exhibit together his busts of the two poets, Scott wrote: "I am
happy my effigy is to go with that of Wordsworth, for (differing from him
in very many points of taste) I do not know a man more to be venerated for
uprightness of heart and loftiness of genius. Why he will sometimes choose
to crawl upon all fours, when God has given him so noble a countenance to

lift to heaven, I am as little able to account for as for his quarrelling (as you
tell me) with the wrinkles which time and meditation have stamped his
brow withal."[273]

These remarks upon Wordsworth and Coleridge touch merely the fringe
of the subject, and indeed we do not find that Scott exercised any such
sublimated ingenuity in appreciating these men as has often been
considered essential. We can see that he admired certain parts of their work
intensely, but we look in vain for any real analysis of their quality. But as he
never had occasion to write essays upon their poetry, it is perhaps hardly
fair to expect anything more than the general remarks that we actually do
find, and as far as they go they are satisfactory.

Like most of his distinguished contemporaries, Scott held the work of
Southey in surprisingly high estimation.[274] Southey, more than anyone
else except Wordsworth, and more than Wordsworth in some ways, was the
"real poet" of the period, devoting his whole heart to literature and his
whole time to literary pursuits. Scott commented on the fact, saying,
"Southey's ideas are all poetical," and, "In this respect, as well as in many
others, he is a most striking and interesting character."[275] Nevertheless
Scott found it easy to criticise Southey's poems adversely, as we may see
from his correspondence. Writing to Miss Seward he pointed out flaws in
the story and the characterization of Madoc,[276] yet after repeated readings
he saw enough to convince him that Madoc would in the future "assume his
real place at the feet of Milton."[277] Thalaba was one of the poems he liked
to have read aloud on Sunday evenings.[278] A review of The Curse of
Kehama, in which he seemed to express the opinion that this surpassed the
poet's previous work, illustrates his professed creed as to criticism. He
wrote to Ellis concerning his article: "What I could I did, which was to
throw as much weight as possible upon the beautiful passages, of which
there are many, and to slur over the absurdities, of which there are not a
few.... This said Kehama affords cruel openings for the quizzers, and I
suppose will get it roundly in the Edinburgh Review. I could have made a
very different hand of it, indeed, had the order of the day been pour
déchirer."[279] If Scott had to make an effort in writing the review, he made
it with abundant energy. Some absurdities are indeed mentioned, but
various particular passages are characterized in the most enthusiastic way,

with such phrases as "horribly sublime," "impressive and affecting,"
"reminds us of the Satan of Milton, yet stands the comparison," "all the
gloomy power of Dante." It may be noted that Scott used Milton's name
rather freely in comparisons, and that for Dante his admiration was
altogether unimpassioned,[280] but the review, after all, is on the whole very
laudatory.[281] In it Scott awards to Southey the palm for a surpassing share
of imagination, which he elsewhere gave to Coleridge. Possibly Scott was
the less inclined to be severe over the absurdities of Kehama because
Southey agreed with his own theory as to the evil of fastidious corrections.
[282] At any rate he seems to have been quite sincere in saying to Southey, in
connection with the poet-laureateship which, according to Scott's
suggestion, was offered to him in 1813, "I am not such an ass as not to
know that you are my better in poetry, though I have had, probably but for a
time, the tide of popularity in my favour."[283]

Much as Scott admired Southey, Wordsworth, and Coleridge, he
considered Byron the great poetical genius of the period. He once spoke of
Byron as the only poet of transcendent talents that England had had since
Dryden.[284] At another time his comment was: "He wrote from impulse,
never from effort; and therefore I have always reckoned Burns and Byron
the most genuine poetical geniuses of my time, and half a century before
me. We have ... many men of high poetical talent, but none, I think, of that
ever-gushing and perennial fountain of natural water."[285] The likenesses
between Byron's poetical manner and Scott's own must have made it easy
for the elder poet to recognize the power of the younger, since Scott was
innocent of all repining or envy over the fact which he so freely
acknowledged in later years, that Byron "beat" him out of the field.[286]
From the time of the appearance of the first two cantos of Childe Harold he
acknowledged the author's "extraordinary power,"[287] and even before that
he had tried to soften Jeffrey's harsh treatment of Hours of Idleness.[288] In
1814 he was ready to say, "Byron hits the mark where I don't even pretend
to fledge my arrow."[289]

It was Byron, rather than Scott, who realized the debt of the new popular
favorite to the old; and their personal relations were of the pleasantest,
though they were never intimate as Scott was with Southey and
Wordsworth. As poets, Scott and Byron seem to have understood each other

thoroughly.[290] None of the other great poets of the period did justice to
Scott, nor did he succeed so well in defining the power of any of the others.
His first review of Childe Harold is the most important of all his articles on
the poetry of his time; and his remarks written at the death of Lord Byron,
though brief, are not less full of good judgment. Originality, spontaneity,
and the ability and inclination to write rapidly were traits Scott admired
most in Byron, and in the vigor and beauty of the poems he found the fine
flower of all these qualities. "We cannot but repeat our conviction," he says,
"that poetry, being, in its higher classes, an art which has for its elements
sublimity and unaffected beauty, is more liable than any other to suffer from
the labour of polishing.... It must be remembered that we speak of the
higher tones of composition; there are others of a subordinate character
where extreme art and labour are not bestowed in vain. But we cannot
consider over-anxious correction as likely to be employed with advantage
upon poems like those of Lord Byron, which have for their object to rouse
the imagination and awaken the passions."[291]

Byron's temperament was far from being of a sort that Scott could
admire, though he was very susceptible to his personal charm: "Byron's
countenance is a thing to dream of," he once said;[292] but he felt that
popular estimation did Byron injustice. His articles on this poet contain
some of his most characteristic moral reflections. Something of Byron's
gloominess Scott attributes to the sensitive poetic organization which he felt
that Byron had in an extreme degree; but more to the perverted habit of
looking within rather than around upon the realities of life, in which
Providence intended men to find their happiness. The philosophy is not
novel or brilliant; it is only very sincere and very just; and it supplies to
Scott's criticism of Byron that element of moral reflection which we feel
was necessary to the occasion.[293]

But though Scott never failed to express disapproval of Byron's attitude
toward life, he kept his criticism on this point essentially distinct from his
judgment on the poetry. In a way it was impossible to separate the two
subjects, and the public demanded some discussion of the man when his
poetry was reviewed. But Scott's verdict on the importance of the poems as
such was unaffected by his disapproval of the author's point of view. He
praised Don Juan no less heartily than Childe Harold.

His criticism of Don Juan is, however, to be gathered only from short
and incidental remarks, as he never reviewed the poem. A satire written by
R.P. Gillies is commemorated thus in Scott's Journal: "This poem goes to
the tune of Don Juan, but it is the champagne after it has stood two days
with the cork drawn."[294] He called Byron "as various in composition as
Shakspeare himself"; and added, "this will be admitted by all who are
acquainted with his Don Juan.... Neither Childe Harold, nor any of the most
beautiful of Byron's earlier tales, contain more exquisite morsels of poetry
than are to be found scattered through the cantos of Don Juan."[295] The
defence of Cain which Scott wrote in accepting the dedication of that poem
to himself is well known.[296] He calls it a "very grand and tremendous
drama," and continues, "Byron has certainly matched Milton on his own
ground. Some part of the language is bold, and may shock one class of
readers, whose tone will be adopted by others out of affectation or envy.
But then they must condemn the Paradise Lost, if they have a mind to be
consistent."

Scott's comments on Byron are closely paralleled by those of Goethe,
who considered that Byron had the greatest talent of any man of his century.
[297] The opinions of continental critics in general were similar. Among
English critics Matthew Arnold aroused many protests when he ranked
Byron as one of the two greatest English poets of the nineteenth century,
but his views seem perfectly rational now; and though he remarked upon
the extravagance of Scott's phrases his own verdict was not very unlike that
we have been considering.

Scott's enthusiasm about the literature of his own time seems natural
enough when we consider that the list of his notable contemporaries is far
from exhausted after Burns, the Lake Poets, and Byron have been named.
Campbell was a poet of whose powers he thought very highly, but who, he
believed had given only a sample of the great things he might do if he
would cease to "fear the shadow of his own reputation." Before he wrote
about Byron Scott had given in his review of Gertrude of Wyoming an
exposition of his opinion as to the dangers of extreme care in revision. "The
truth is," he says, "that an author cannot work upon a beautiful poem
beyond a certain point without doing it real and irreparable injury in more
respects than one."[298] He felt that Campbell had worked, in many cases,

beyond the "certain point." For the "impetuous lyric sally," like the
Mariners of England and the Battle of the Baltic, Scott rightly thought that
Campbell excelled all his contemporaries. Moore was another lyrist whose
poetry Scott greatly admired. In Moore's case, as in Southey's, the
contemporary estimate was higher than can now be maintained, but Moore
is to-day underrated. From what Scott says about him we conclude that the
man's personality and his way of singing added much to the exquisiteness
of his songs. "He seems almost to think in music," Scott said, "the notes and
words are so happily suited to each other";[299] and, "it would be a
delightful addition to life if T.M. had a cottage within two miles of one."
[300] Allan Cunningham was a young protege of Scott whose songs, "Its
hame and it's hame," and "A wet sheet and a flowing sea," seemed to him
"among the best going."[301] Another poet who received Scott's good offices
was Hogg, whose relations with the greater man are described so vividly
and at some points so amusingly by Lockhart. Scott called him a
"wonderful creature for his opportunities."[302]

For the poet Crabbe, Scott, like Byron and Wordsworth,[303] had a steady
and high admiration. In the Sunday evening readings that Lockhart
describes as being so pleasant a feature of the life of the family in
Edinburgh, Crabbe was perhaps the chief standing resource after Shakspere.
[304] His work was particularly recommended to the young people of the
family,[305] and when the venerable poet visited the Scotts in 1822, he was
received as a man whom they always looked upon as nobly gifted. Scott
once wrote of him: "I think if he had cultivated the sublime and the pathetic
instead of the satirical cast of poetry, he must have stood very high (as
indeed he does at any rate) on the list of British poets. His Sir Eustace Grey
and The Hall of Justice indicate prodigious talent."[306] Scott did not like
Crabbe's choice of subjects,[307] but he appreciated the "force and vigour"
of a poet whom students of our own day are once more beginning to
admire, after a period during which he was practically ignored.

Scott's very high estimation of Joanna Baillie has already been
mentioned.[308] In this case as in many others he was proud and happy in
the personal friendship of the writer whose works he admired. He once
wrote to Miss Edgeworth: "I have always felt the value of having access to
persons of talent and genius to be the best part of a literary man's
prerogative."[309] Almost the earliest of the writers for whose friendship
Scott felt grateful was Matthew Lewis, famed as the author of The Monk.
Lewis was also something of a poet, and was really helpful to Scott in
giving him advice on literary subjects. Though Scott perceived that Lewis's
talents "would not stand much creaming"[310] he continued to regard him as
one who had had high imagination and a "finer ear for rhythm than
Byron's."

Scott felt that his own taste in respect to poetry became more rigorous as
he grew older. In 1823 in a letter to Miss Baillie he commented on Mrs.
Hemans as "somewhat too poetical for my taste—too many flowers, I
mean, and too little fruit—but that may be the cynical criticism of an
elderly gentleman; for it is certain that when I was young I read verses of
every kind with infinitely more indulgence, because with more pleasure
than I can now do—the more shame for me now to refuse the complaisance
which I have had so often to solicit."[311] Similarly he speaks in the preface
to Kenilworth of having once been delighted with the poems of Mickle and
Langhorne: "There is a period in youth when the mere power of numbers
has a more strong effect on ear and imagination than in after-life." With
these comments we may put Lockhart's sagacious remark: "His propensity
to think too well of other men's works sprung, of course, mainly from his
modesty and good nature; but the brilliancy of his imagination greatly
sustained the delusion. It unconsciously gave precision to the trembling
outline, and life and warmth to the vapid colours before him."[312] This and
his kindness would account for the latter half of the observation made by
his publisher: "I like well Scott's ain bairns—but heaven preserve me from
those of his fathering."[313]

I have found no reference to Landor, a poet whom Southey and
Wordsworth read with eagerness, but Mr. Forster makes this statement in
his Biography of Landor: "Among Landor's papers I found a list, prepared
by himself, of resemblances to passages of his own writing to be found in
Scott's Tales of the Crusaders. There were several from Gebir.... The poem
had made a great impression on Scott, who read it at Southey's suggestion."
[314] Forster also notes the fact that Southey, in a letter to Scott written in
1812, spoke very highly of Landor's Count Julian.[315] I am similarly
unable to cite any comment by Scott on the writings of Lamb. Was it
because Scott's genius clung to Scotland and Lamb's to London, that the
two seemed so little to notice each other? It does seem odd that Scott never
refers to the delightful Specimens of English Dramatic Poets. At one time
Lamb wrote to Sir Walter asking a contribution toward a fund that was
being raised to help William Godwin out of pecuniary troubles, and Scott
replied, through the artist Haydon, with a cheque for ten pounds and a
pleasant message to Mr. Lamb, "whom I should be happy to see in
Scotland, though I have not forgotten his metropolitan preference of houses
to rocks, and citizens to wild rustics and highland men."[316] Hazlitt and
Hunt were two other writers whose literary work Scott ignored.[317] This, as
well as his neglect of Lamb's and DeQuincey's essays, may be due largely
to the fact that he seldom read newspapers and magazines, and these writers
were journalists and contributors to periodicals. Voracious reader as Scott
was, he had to economize time somewhere, and the hours saved from
papers could be given to books. We do find one or two references to these
men as political writers. Scott hoped Lockhart would learn, as editor of the
Quarterly, to despise petty adversaries, for "to take notice of such men as
Hazlitt and Hunt in the Quarterly would be to introduce them into a world
which is scarce conscious of their existence."[318]

Among novelists, those of Scott's contemporaries to whom he gave the
highest praise were women. This is, however to be expected, and it is
natural to find Jane Austen receiving the highest praise of all; since Scott
was emphatically not of the tribe of critics who are able to appreciate only
one kind of novel or poem. Her novels seemed to grow upon him and he
read them often. It was in connection with her "exquisite touch" that he was
moved to reflect, in the words so often quoted from his Journal, "The Big
Bow-wow strain I can do myself like any now going."[319] Among the

expressions of admiration which occur in his review of Emma,[320] Scott
records a characteristic bit of protest in regard to the tendency of Miss
Austen and other novelists to make prudence the guiding motive of all their
favorite young women characters, especially in matters of the heart. He did
not like this pushing out of Cupid to make way for so moderate a virtue as
prudence; he thought that it is often good for young people to fall in love
without regard to worldly considerations. Scott rated Miss Edgeworth
nearly as high as Miss Austen, and hers is the added honor of having
inspired the author of Waverley with a desire to emulate her power.[321]
With these two novelists he associated Miss Ferrier, as well as the
somewhat earlier writer, Fanny Burney.[322]

Aside from these women and Henry Mackenzie, perhaps the highest
praise that Scott bestowed on any contemporary novelist was given to
Cooper. Here, as in the case of Byron, Scott seemed to ignore the other
writer's indebtedness to himself. He speaks, in the general preface to the
Waverley Novels, of "that striking field in which Mr. Cooper has achieved
so many triumphs"; and at another time calls him "the justly celebrated
American novelist." In his Journal he comments on The Red Rover[323] and
The Prairie;[324] The Pilot he recommends warmly in a letter to Miss
Edgeworth.[325]

The personal relations between "the Scotch and American lions," as Scott
called himself and Cooper, when they met in Parisian society in 1826,[326]
had some interesting consequences. Cooper suggested to Scott that he try to
secure for himself part of the profits arising from the publication of his
works in America, by entering them as the property of some citizen.[327]
They finally concluded to substitute for this plan one suggested by Scott,
which involved the writing by the Author of Waverley, of a letter addressed
to Cooper, to be transmitted by him to some American publisher who would
undertake the publication of an authorized edition of which half the profits
should go to the author. Future works were to be sent over to this publisher
in advance of their appearance in England. The letter was really an appeal
to the justice of the American people, and contained an allusion to the
publication of Irving's works in England according to a plan very similar to
that proposed by Scott. But the scheme failed here in America, and
apparently the letter was not made public until Cooper, irritated by the

appearance in Lockhart's Life of Scott of Sir Walter's comments on his
personal manner,[328] explained the affair (except the reason for dropping
the plan), and published the correspondence in the Knickerbocker Magazine
for April, 1838.[329] Later in the same year Cooper wrote a severe review of
the biography of Scott, attacking his character in a way that seems absurdly
exaggerated.[330] Yet Charles Sumner seems to have thought that Cooper
made his points, and Mr. Lounsbury is inclined to agree with him.[331]

One of the milder strictures in Cooper's review was as follows "As he
was ambitious of, so was he careful to preserve, his personal popularity, of
which we have a striking proof in the studied kindnesses that for years were
laid before this country in deeds and words, as compared with his real acts
and sentiments toward America and Americans which are now revealed in
his letters." A passage which doubtless roused Cooper's ire may be quoted.
Of the Americans Scott said, in a letter to Miss Edgeworth, "They are a
people possessed of very considerable energy, quickened and brought into
eager action by an honourable love of their country and pride in their
institutions; but they are as yet rude in their ideas of social intercourse, and
totally ignorant, speaking generally, of all the art of good breeding, which
consists chiefly in a postponement of one's own petty wishes or comforts to
those of others. By rude questions and observations, an absolute disrespect
to other people's feelings, and a ready indulgence of their own, they make
one feverish in their company, though perhaps you may be ashamed to
confess the reason. But this will wear off and is already wearing away. Men,
when they have once got benches, will soon fall into the use of cushions.
They are advancing in the lists of our literature, and they will not be long
deficient in the petite morale, especially as they have, like ourselves, the
rage for travelling."[332]

Scott liked George Ticknor,[333] and he called Washington Irving "one of
the best and pleasantest acquaintances I have made this many a day."[334] In
later life he congratulated himself on having from the first foreseen Irving's
success.[335] When we remember also that Scott quotes from Poor Richard,
[336] refers to Cotton Mather's Magnalia,[337] and speaks of "the American
Brown" as one whose novels might be reprinted in England,[338] we ought
probably to conclude that his acquaintance with our literature was as
comprehensive as could have been expected.

Among continental writers belonging to his period, Goethe was very
properly the one for whom Scott had the strongest admiration. But we find
comparatively few references to his reading the great German after the early
period of translation. Throughout Lockhart's Life of Scott it is evident that
the biographer had a more thorough acquaintance with Goethe than had
Scott, and it seems probable that the younger man influenced the elder in
his judgment on Faust and on Goethe's character. In the Introduction to
Quentin Durward we find an interesting comment on Goethe's success in
creating a really wicked Mephistopheles, who escapes the noble dignity that
Milton and Byron gave to their pictures of Satan. Goethe and Scott
exchanged letters once in 1827,[339] and it was a personal grief to Sir Walter
that the German poet's death prevented a visit Scott proposed to make him
in 1832. In Anne of Geierstein Goethe is called "an author born to arouse
the slumbering fame of his country";[340] and in the Journal Scott
characterizes him as "the Ariosto at once and almost the Voltaire of
Germany."[341] The suggestion for the character of Fenella in Peveril of the
Peak was taken from Goethe, as we learn by Scott's acknowledgment in the
Introduction. Another German from whom Scott borrowed a suggestion—
this time for the unlucky "White Lady of Avenel"—was the Baron de la
Motte Fouqué. Scott was evidently interested in his work, though he
thought Fouqué sometimes used such a profusion of historical and
antiquarian lore that readers would find it difficult to follow the narrative.
[342] Sir Walter asked his son to tell the Baroness de la Motte Fouqué that he
had been much interested in her writings and those of the Baron, and added,
"It will be civil, for folks like to know that they are known and respected
beyond the limits of their own country."[343]

In the literary circles of Paris Scott more than once experienced the
pleasure of finding himself "known and respected" by foreigners,[344] and
he had intimate relations with men of letters in London. On one of his visits
there he saw Byron almost every morning for some time, at the house of
Murray the publisher. In Edinburgh society Scott was naturally a prominent
figure, being noted for his fund of anecdote and his superior gifts in
presiding at dinners. But however much his kindly personal feeling is
reflected in his comments on the literary work of his friends, he was too
well-balanced to assume anything of the patronizing tone that such success
as his might have made natural to another sort of man. His fellow-poets

thought him a delightful person whom they liked so much that they could
almost forgive the preposterous success of his facile and unimportant
poetry.

His full-blooded enjoyment of life and literature tempered without
obscuring his critical instinct, and though he was "willing to be pleased by
those who were desirous to give pleasure",[345] he noted the weak points of
men to whose power he gladly paid tribute. Wordsworth, Coleridge,
Southey, and Byron, whom he classed as the great English poets of his time,
may, with the exception of Southey, be given the places he assigned to
them. In regard to Byron, Scott expressed a critical estimate that the public
is only now getting ready to accept after a long period of depreciating
Byron's genius. The men whose work Scott judged fairly and
sympathetically represent widely different types. With some of them he was
connected by the new impulse that they were imparting to English poetry,
but he was so close to the transition period that he could look backward to
his predecessors with no sense of strangeness. He was never inclined to
quarrel with the "erroneous system" of a poem which he really liked. His
comments on Byron's Darkness suggest that if he had read more than he did
of Shelley and others among his younger contemporaries he might have
found much to reprehend, but he held that "we must not limit poetical merit
to the class of composition which exactly suits one's own particular taste."
[346] Among novelists even less than among poets can we trace a "school" to
which he paid special allegiance. He read and enjoyed all sorts of good
stories, growing in this respect more catholic in his tastes, though perhaps
more severe in his standards, as he grew older.

In speaking of Scott's relations with his contemporaries, we must
especially remember his ardent interest in those realities of life which he
considered greater than the greatest books. In one of his reviews he laid
stress on the merit of writing on contemporary events,[347] and he seemed to
think there was too little of such celebration. There are many evidences of
his great admiration for those of his contemporaries who were men of
action, but it is sufficient to remember that the only man in whose presence
Scott felt abashed was the Duke of Wellington, for he counted that famous
commander the greatest man of his time.

CHAPTER V
SCOTT AS A CRITIC OF HIS OWN WORK
Lack of dogmatism about his own work—Harmony between his talents and
his tastes—His conviction of the value of spontaneity and abundance—Merits of
a rapid meter—Greater care necessary in verse writing a reason why he turned to
prose—His attitude in regard to revision—Modesty about his own work—His
opinion of the popular judgment—Importance of novelty—Rivalry with Byron
—Scott's attempts to keep ahead of his imitators—Devices to secure novelty—
His resolution to write history—Historical motives of his novels—His comments
on the use of historical material—His verdict in regard to his descriptive abilities
and methods—Lack of emphasis on the ethical aspect of his work—His
judgment on the position of the novel in literature.

"Scott is invariably his own best critic," says Mr. Andrew Lang.[348] Of
this Scott was not himself in the least convinced, and when we recall how,
to please his printer, James Ballantyne, he tacked on a last scene to Rokeby,
resuscitated the dead Athelstane in Ivanhoe, and eliminated the main motive
of St. Ronan's Well, we wish he had been more uniformly inclined to trust
his own critical judgment.

He never scheduled the qualities of his own genius. A man who could
sincerely say what he did about literary immortality would not be apt to
develop any dogma in regard to his artistic achievement. "Let me please my
own generation," he said, "and let those that come after us judge of their
taste and my performances as they please; the anticipation of their neglect
or censure will affect me very little."[349] His opinions about his own work
are to be deduced largely from casual remarks scattered through his letters
and journals. His introductions to his novels, in the Opus Magnum, are
valuable sources, however, and the "Epistle" preceding The Fortunes of
Nigel is a mine of material, though, unlike the later introductions, it was

written "according to the trick," when he was still preserving his anonymity.
We have an article which he wrote for the Quarterly on two of his own
books, the review of Tales of My Landlord.[350] His criticism of the work of
other people is also very helpful in this connection, since from it we may
learn what qualities he wished to find in poetry and in the novel, as well as
in history, biography, and criticism, the fields in which he did much, though
less famous work.

The student of his criticism is struck at once by the fact that the qualities
which Scott particularly admired in literature were those for which he was
himself preëminent. Yet he cannot be accused, as Poe may be, of
constructing a theory that those types of art were greatest which he found
himself most skilful in exemplifying. Scott's nature was of that most
efficient kind that enables a man to do such things as he likes to see done.
We cannot argue that he was incapable of attending to minute niceties and
on this account chose to emphasize the large qualities of literature. For
notwithstanding that lack of delicacy which characterized his physical
senses and which we might therefore conclude would affect his literary
discernment, we have among his small poems some that show his power,
occasionally at least, to satisfy the most fastidious critic of detail. Evidently
he could write in more than one style, and though the style he used most is
undoubtedly that which was most natural to him, it was also that which he
thought, on other grounds than the character of his own talents, best worth
while. Yet he had so little vanity in regard to his own work that he could
hardly understand his success, though it depended on those very qualities
which, in other authors, excited his utmost admiration.

One of his fundamental opinions about literary work was that to write
much and with abundant spontaneity is better than to polish minutely. Over
and over again we find this idea expressed, most noticeably in connection
with the poet Campbell, whom Scott could scarcely forgive for making so
little use of his poetical gifts. He applauded the much-criticised fertility of
Byron, whose genius was in that respect akin to his own. "I never knew
name or fame burn brighter by over-chary keeping of it,"[351] Scott said.
The greatest writers he observed, have been the most voluminous. His
position was one that could be fortified by inductive reasoning, contrasting
in this respect with theories which seem plausible only until they are tested

by actual facts, as, for example, Poe's idea that long poems lose
effectiveness by their length. But perhaps Scott did not sufficiently take into
account the circular nature of his argument; for since the world has refused
to consider the men very great who "never spoke out," the truth is not so
much that a great man ought to write copiously as that if a man does not
write copiously he will not be counted great. Scott seemed to think it was
mere wilfulness that prevented a man of such gifts as Campbell's from
writing abundantly.

The corresponding disadvantages of rapid composition were of course
evident to him. From the first appearance of the Lay to the end of his career
he lamented his inability to plan a story in an orderly manner and follow out
the scheme; he admitted also that "the misfortune of writing fast is that one
cannot at the same time write concisely."[352] Of Marmion he told Southey,
"I had not time to write the poem shorter."[353]

His grief on these points seems qualified, however, by a conviction that
he could not write with deliberation and method and still produce the effect
of vivacious spontaneity. He thought Fielding was almost the only novelist
who had thoroughly succeeded in combining these various admirable
qualities,[354] and he said in this connection, "To demand equal correctness
and felicity in those who may follow in the track of that illustrious novelist,
would be to fetter too much the power of giving pleasure, by surrounding it
with penal rules; since of this sort of light literature it may be especially
said—tout genre est permis, hors le genre ennuyeux."[355] "To confess to
you the truth," says the "Author" in the Introductory Epistle to Nigel, "the
works and passages in which I have succeeded, have uniformly been
written with the greatest rapidity; and when I have seen some of these
placed in opposition with others, and commended as more highly finished, I
could appeal to pen and standish, that the parts in which I have come feebly
off were by much the more laboured." He attempted to write Rokeby with
great care, but threw the first version into the fire because he concluded that
he had "corrected the spirit out of it, as a lively pupil is sometimes flogged
into a dunce by a severe schoolmaster."[356] He was better satisfied with the
result when he resumed his pen in his "old Cossack manner."[357] Similarly
he writes of John Home's tragedy, Douglas, that the finest scene was, "we
learn with pleasure but without surprise," unchanged from the first draft;

[358] and elsewhere he speaks of the greater chance for popularity of the
"bold, decisive, but light-touched strain of poetry or narrative in literary
composition," over the "more highly-wrought performance."[359]

A good exposition of Scott's real opinion in regard to his own style is to
be found in his review of Tales of My Landlord. Some parts of the article
were probably inserted by his friend William Erskine, but the section I
quote bears unmistakable evidence that it was written by the author himself,
for it expresses that combined reprobation and approval of his style which
is amusingly characteristic of him. He says: "Our author has told us that it
was his object to present a series of scenes and characters connected with
Scotland in its past and present state, and we must own that his stories are
so slightly constructed as to remind us of the showman's thread with which
he draws up his pictures and presents them successively to the eye of the
spectator.... Against this slovenly indifference we have already
remonstrated, and we again enter our protest.... We are the more earnest in
this matter, because it seems that the author errs chiefly from carelessness.
There may be something of system in it, however, for we have remarked,
that with an attention which amounts even to affectation, he has avoided the
common language of narrative and thrown his story, as much as possible,
into a dramatic shape. In many cases this has added greatly to the effect, by
keeping both the actors and action continually before the reader and placing
him, in some measure, in the situation of an audience at a theater, who are
compelled to gather the meaning of the scene from what the dramatis
personae say to each other, and not from any explanation addressed
immediately to themselves. But though the author gain this advantage, and
thereby compel the reader to think of the personages of the novel and not of
the writer, yet the practice, especially pushed to the extent we have noticed,
is a principal cause of the flimsiness and incoherent texture of which his
greatest admirers are compelled to complain."[360]

Lockhart points out that the fruit of Scott's study of Dryden may have
been to fortify his opinion as to what the greatness of literature really
consists in, and applies to Scott himself some of the phrases used in the
characterization of the earlier poet. "'Rapidity of conception, a readiness of
expressing every idea, without losing anything by the way'; 'perpetual
animation and elasticity of thought'; and language 'never laboured, never

loitering, never (in Dryden's own phrase) cursedly confined,'" are set over
against "pointed and nicely turned lines, sedulous study, and long and
repeated correction and revision," and are pronounced the superior virtues.
[361] The concluding paragraph of Scott's review of a poem on the Battle of
Talavera exemplifies his use of this doctrine. "We have shunned, in the
present instance," he says, "the unpleasant task of pointing out and dwelling
upon individual inaccuracies. There are several hasty expressions, flat lines,
and deficient rhymes, which prove to us little more than that the
composition was a hurried one. These, in a poem of a different description,
we should have thought it our duty to point out to the notice of the author.
But after all it is the spirit of a poet that we consider as demanding our chief
attention; and upon its ardour or rapidity must finally hinge our applause or
condemnation."[362]

Scott's opinions about meters reflect the same taste. He persuaded
himself, when he was writing The Lady of the Lake, that the eight-syllable
line is "more congenial to the English language—more favourable to
narrative poetry at least—than that which has been commonly termed
heroic verse,"[363] and he proceeded to show that the first half-dozen lines
of Pope's Iliad were each "bolstered out" with a superfluous adjective. "The
case is different in descriptive poetry," he added, "because there epithets, if
they are happily selected, are rather to be sought after than avoided.... But if
in narrative you are frequently compelled to tag your substantives with
adjectives, it must frequently happen that you are forced upon those that are
merely commonplaces." He mentions other beauties of his favorite verse,—
the opportunities for variation by double rhyme and by occasionally
dropping a syllable, and the correspondence between the length of line and
our natural intervals between punctuation,—but gives as his final excuse for
using it his "better knack at this 'false gallop' of verse." The argument is
ingenious enough, but his analysis of heroic verse has only a limited
application, and his last reason probably was, as he was candid enough to
admit, the most weighty. George Ellis replied to his defence thus: "I don't
think, after all the eloquence with which you plead for your favourite metre,
that you really like it from any other motive than that sainte paresse—that
delightful indolence—which induces one to delight in those things which
we can do with the least fatigue."[364] This seems hardly a fair return for the
poet's appeal to Ellis in one of the epistles of Marmion:[365]

"Come listen! bold in thy applause,
The bard shall scorn pedantic laws."

Another introduction in the same poem is given up to a justification of
the author's "unconfined" style, on the score of his love for the wild songs
of his own country and the freedom of his early training.[366]

Scott practically never rewrote his prose, and the result gave Hazlitt
opportunity to say:[367] "We should think the writer could not possibly read
the manuscript after he has once written it, or overlook the press."[368] His
habit of carrying two trains of thought on together was also responsible for
slips in diction and syntax. An amanuensis working for him noticed this
peculiarity, and Scott said in his Journal: "There must be two currents of
ideas going on in my mind at the same time.... I always laugh when I hear
people say, Do one thing at once. I have done a dozen things at once all my
life."[369]

But the making of poetry required more attention. "Verse I write twice,
and sometimes three times over,"[370] he said, and one is moved to wonder
whether the distaste for writing poetry, that he professed about 1822, arose
largely from a growing aversion to what he probably considered extreme
care in composition.[371] A series of three comments on his own poetry may
be given to illustrate his widely varying moods in regard to it. They are all
taken from letters written not far from the time when Marmion was
published. "As for poetry, it is very little labour to me; indeed 'twere pity of
my life should I spend much time on the light and loose sort of poetry
which alone I can pretend to write."[372] "I believe no man now alive writes
more rapidly than I do (no great recommendation), but I never think of
making verses till I have a sufficient stock of poetical ideas to supply
them."[373] "If I ever write another poem, I am determined to make every
single couplet of it as perfect as my uttermost care and attention can
possibly effect."[374] In spite of this momentary resolution to take more
pains with his next poem, he was unable to do so when the time came; or if,
as in the case of Rokeby he did make the attempt, the results seemed to him
unsatisfactory. Yet verse required much more careful finishing than prose,

even when it was written by Scott, and this fact has been too little
emphasized in discussions of his transition from verse to prose romances.

Scott's temperamental aversion to revising what he had once written was
evidently sanctioned by his literary creed. Near the end of his life he
recalled how he had submitted one of his earliest poems to the criticism of
several acquaintances, with the consequence that after he had adopted their
suggestions, hardly a line remained unaltered, and yet the changes failed to
satisfy the critics.[375] He said: "This unexpected result, after about a
fortnight's anxiety, led me to adopt a rule from which I have seldom
departed during more than thirty years of literary life. When a friend whose
judgment I respect has decided and upon good advisement told me that a
manuscript was worth nothing, or at least possessed no redeeming qualities
sufficient to atone for its defects, I have generally cast it aside; but I am
little in the custom of paying attention to minute criticisms or of offering
such to any friend who may do me the honour to consult me. I am
convinced that, in general, in removing even errors of a trivial or venial
kind, the character of originality is lost, which, upon the whole, may be that
which is most valuable in the production." This position appears doubly
significant when we remember that it was assumed by a man who had only
the slightest possible amount of paternal jealousy in regard to his writings.
[376]

Scott did not always adhere to this resolution, for he did accept criticism
and make alterations, more in compliance with the wishes of James
Ballantyne, his friend and printer, than to meet the desires of anyone else.
He considered that Ballantyne represented the ordinary popular taste, and
he was ready to make some sacrifice of his own judgment in order to satisfy
his public. He sent the conclusion of Rokeby to Ballantyne with this note:
"Dear James,—I send you this out of deference to opinions so strongly
expressed, but still retaining my own, that it spoils one effect without
producing another."

When one of his books was adversely criticised by the public he received
the judgment with open mind, and often analyzed it with much acuteness.
The introduction to The Monastery is a good example of frank, though not
servile, submission to the decree of public opinion. That he was deeply

impressed with his blunder in managing the White Lady of Avenel may be
surmised from the fact that in several later discussions of the effect of
supernatural apparitions in novels, he emphasized the necessity of keeping
them sufficiently infrequent to preserve an atmosphere of mystery. Of The
Monastery he said: "I agree with the public in thinking the work not very
interesting; but it was written with as much care as the others—that is, with
no care at all."[377] But sometimes he felt inclined to rebel against a popular
verdict, as when Norna, in The Pirate, was said to be a mere copy of Meg
Merrilies.[378]

In his later days he grew more and more unsure of himself, as he felt
compelled to work at his topmost speed. His Journal for 1829 has the
following record in regard to a review he was writing: "I began to warm in
my gear, and am about to awake the whole controversy of Goth and Celt. I
wish I may not make some careless blunders."[379] The criticisms of "J.B."
became more frequent and more irritating to him as he felt a growing
inability to achieve precision in details.[380] When Lockhart pointed out
some lapses in his style, he wrote in his Journal, "Well! I will try to
remember all this, but after all I write grammar as I speak, to make my
meaning known, and a solecism in point of composition, like a Scotch word
in speaking, is indifferent to me."[381] Until he felt his powers failing, he
was for the most part at once good-natured and independent in his manner
of receiving criticism. Whether or not he agreed with the opinion expressed,
he usually thought that what he had once written might best stand, though
he might be influenced in later work by the advice that had been given.[382]

"I am sensible that if there be anything good about my poetry or prose
either," Scott wrote, in a passage that has often been quoted, "it is a hurried
frankness of composition which pleases soldiers, sailors and young people
of bold and active disposition."[383] I have tried to show that this quality
was one which he not only enjoyed, in his own work and in that of other
writers, but that as a critic he very seriously approved of it.

Yet in spite of his belief that the greatest literature is not the result of
slow and painful labor, it was probably the ease with which he wrote which
led him to undervalue his own work. However we may account for it, he
found difficulty in regarding himself as a great author.[384] When this

modesty of his came into conflict with the other opinion that he had always
been inclined to hold—that the popularity of books is a test of their merit—
the result is amusing. He was impelled at times to utter contemptuous words
about the foolishness of the public, and of course he could not help being
moved also in the other direction—to believe there was more in his writings
than he had realized. In one mood he said, "I thank God I can write ill
enough for the present taste";[385] and "I have very little respect for that dear
publicum whom I am doomed to amuse, like Goody Trash in Bartholomew
Fair, with rattles and gingerbread; and I should deal very uncandidly with
those who may read my confessions were I to say I knew a public worth
caring for, or capable of distinguishing the nicer beauties of composition.
They weigh good and evil qualities by the pound. Get a good name and you
may write trash. Get a bad one and you may write like Homer, without
pleasing a single reader."[386] Looking back from the end of his career to the
time when The Lady of the Lake was in the height of its success, he wrote:
"It must not be supposed that I was either so ungrateful or so
superabundantly candid as to despise or scorn the value of those whose
voice had elevated me so much higher than my own opinion told me I
deserved. I felt, on the contrary, the more grateful to the public as receiving
that from partiality which I could not have claimed from merit; and I
endeavoured to deserve the partiality by continuing such exertions as I was
capable of for their amusement."[387] The perfect respectability of these
remarks tempts the reader to set over against them this earlier observation
by the same writer in the guise of Chrystal Croftangry, "One thing I have
learned in life—never to speak sense when nonsense will answer the
purpose as well."[388]

Whatever Scott might think of the worth of public admiration, he frankly
attempted to write what would be popular. He had none of the feeling which
has characterized many very interesting men of letters, that the desire for
self-expression is the one motive of the author; his personal literary
impulse, on the contrary, was always guided by the thought of the audience
whom he was addressing. "No one shall find me rowing against the stream,"
says the "Author" in the Introductory Epistle to Nigel. "I care not who
knows it—I write for general amusement; and though I will never aim at
popularity by what I think unworthy means, I will not, on the other hand, be
pertinacious in the defence of my own errors against the voice of the

public." Of his last "apoplectic books," he wrote, "I am ashamed, for the
first time in my life, of the two novels, but since the pensive public have
taken them, there is no more to be said but to eat my pudding and to hold
my tongue."[389] Early in his career he seems to have felt that he could
make a good deal of money by writing, if he should wish.[390] Towards the
end he said, "I know that no literary speculation ever succeeded with me but
where my own works were concerned; and that, on the other hand, these
have rarely failed."[391]

The popularity of his own books was so great that they required a special
category. He seemed to be incapable of ascribing their success to
extraordinary excellence, and he settled down to the opinion that it was
simply their novelty that the public cared for. The enthusiastic welcome
given him by the Irish when he visited Dublin caused him to say in one of
his letters, "Were it not from the chilling recollection that novelty is easily
substituted for merit, I should think, like the booby in Steele's play,[392] that
I had been kept back, and that there was something more about me than I
had ever been led to suspect."[393]

He assumed that he had studied popular taste enough to have some
knowledge of its shiftings, so that he might "set every sail towards the
breeze."[394] "I may be mistaken," he once wrote, "but I do think the tale of
Elspat M'Tavish in my bettermost manner, but J.B. roars for chivalry. He
does not quite understand that everything may be overdone in this world, or
sufficiently estimate the necessity of novelty. The Highlanders have been
off the field now for some time."[395] His comment on Ivanhoe was still
more emphatic. "Novelty is what this giddy-paced time demands
imperiously, and I certainly studies as much as I could to get out of the old
beaten track, leaving those who like to keep the road, which I have rutted
pretty well."[396]

Believing from the beginning of his career that novelty was the chief
merit of his work, he was prepared to live up to his principles. So it was that
when he was "beaten" by Byron in metrical romances, he dropped with
hardly a regret, so far as we can judge, the kind of writing in which he had
attained such remarkable popularity, and turned to another kind. "Since one
line has failed, we must just stick to something else," he remarked, calmly.

[397] This was when the small sales of The Lord of the Isles as compared
with the earlier poems warned Scott and his publisher in a very tangible
way that the field had been captured by Byron. At this time Waverley was in
the market and Guy Mannering was in process of composition. Though it
was to his poetry that he chose to give his name, Scott had little reason to
feel forlorn, as the sale of the novels from the very beginning was a pretty
effective consolation for any possible hurt to his vanity. He could have
owned them as his at any moment, had he chosen to do so. He did not read
criticisms of his books, but was satisfied, as one of his friends observed, "to
accept the intense avidity with which his novels are read, the enormous and
continued sale of his works, as a sufficient commendation of them."[398] In
the case of Byron, as always when the public approved the works of one of
his brother authors, he considered the popular judgment right.

Scott did not altogether stop writing poetry, however, as is sometimes
supposed. The Field of Waterloo and Harold the Dauntless were both
written after this time; and the mottoes and lyrics in the novels compose a
delightful body of verse. The fact seems to be that he lost zest for writing
long poems, partly because of the favor with which Byron's poems were
received, and his own consequent feeling of inferiority in poetic
composition; partly because of his discovery of the greater ease with which
he could write prose, and the greater scope it gave him. The more ambitious
attempts among the poems which he wrote after 1814 are comparative
failures. But the poetry in his nature prevented him from entirely giving
over the composition of verse, and he found real delight in the occasional
writing of short pieces that required no continued effort. They were usually
made to be used in the novels, for after the publication of Guy Mannering
novel-writing became specifically Scott's occupation.[399]

The price of his success in any direction was that he was unable to keep
his field to himself. Having set a fashion, he was more than once annoyed
by the crowd who wrote in his style and made him feel the necessity of
striking out a new line.[400] It was comparatively easy for the vigorous man
who wrote Waverley, but in the end, when through his losses he was more
than ever obliged to hit the popular taste, to feel that he must find a new
style seemed a hard fate. Yet he meant to be beforehand in the race. This is
the record in his Journal: "Hard pressed as I am by these imitators, who

must put the thing out of fashion at last, I consider, like a fox at his last
shifts, whether there be a way to dodge them—some new device to throw
them off, and have a mile or two of free ground while I have legs and wind
left to use it. There is one way to give novelty: to depend for success on the
interest of a well-contrived story. But woe's me! that requires thought,
consideration—the writing out a regular plan or plot—above all, the
adhering to one—which I never can do, for the ideas rise as I write, and
bear such a disproportioned extent to that which each occupied at the first
concoction, that (cocksnowns!) I shall never be able to take the trouble; and
yet to make the world stare, and gain a new march ahead of them all! Well,
something we still will do."[401]

By an easy extension of his principle, he came to believe that novelty
would always succeed for a time. The opinion is expressed often in his
reviews, and in his journal and letters is applied to his own work. So it was
that when any one of his books seemed partially to fail with the public, his
immediate impulse was to look for something new to be done.[402] One of
his schemes was a work on popular superstitions, projected when Quentin
Durward seemed to be falling flat; but the success of the novel made the
immediate execution of the plan unnecessary.[403]

It was largely his desire to secure variety that encouraged him to
undertake historical writing. He had also a theory about how history should
be written, and so he felt that the novelty would consist in something more
than the fact that the Author of Waverley had taken a new line. He wished,
as Thackeray did later when he proposed to write a history of the Age of
Queen Anne, to use in an avowedly serious book the material with which he
had stored his imagination; and he believed he could present it with a
vivacity that was not characteristic of professional historians. The success
of the first series of Tales of a Grandfather served to confirm the opinion he
had expressed about them,—"I care not who knows it, I think well of them.
Nay, I will hash history with anybody, be he who he will."[404]

Scott had a very just sense of the value of his great stores of information.
He did say that he would give one half his knowledge if so he might put the
other half upon a well-built foundation,[405] but as years went on he learned
to use with ease the accumulations of knowledge which in his youth had

proved often unwieldy; and more than once he congratulated himself that he
beat his imitators by possessing historical and antiquarian lore which they
could only acquire by "reading up."[406] Though he testified that in the
beginning of his first novel he described his own education, he could hardly
apply to himself what is there said of Waverley, that, "While he was thus
permitted to read only for the gratification of his amusement, he foresaw
not that he was losing forever the opportunity of acquiring habits of firm
and assiduous application, of gaining the art of controlling, directing, and
concentrating the powers of his mind for earnest investigation."[407] It was
otherwise with Scott himself. The result of the wide and desultory reading
of his youth, acting upon a remarkably strong memory, was to put him into
the position, as he says, of "an ignorant gamester, who kept a good hand
until he knew how to play it."[408] So it was that he said of those who
followed his lead in writing historical novels, "They may do their fooling
with better grace; but I, like Sir Andrew Aguecheek, do it more natural."
[409] His knowledge of history and antiquities was that part of his
intellectual equipment in which he seemed to take most pride. He had the
highest opinion of the value of historical study for ripening men's judgment
of current affairs,[410] and indeed there were few relations of life in which
an acquaintance with history did not seem to him indispensable.

But he felt that historical writing had not been adapted "to the demands
of the increased circles among which literature does already find its way."
[411] Accordingly he resolved to use in the service of history that "knack ...
for selecting the striking and interesting points out of dull details," which he
felt was his endowment.[412] The original introduction to the Tales of the
Crusaders has the following burlesque announcement of his intention, in
the words of the Eidolon Chairman: "I intend to write the most wonderful
book which the world ever read—a book in which every incident shall be
incredible, yet strictly true—a work recalling recollections with which the
ears of this generation once tingled, and which shall be read by our children
with an admiration approaching to incredulity. Such shall be the Life of
Napoleon, by the Author of Waverley." He wished to controvert "the vulgar
opinion that the flattest and dullest mode of detailing events must uniformly
be that which approaches nearest to the truth."[413] There is no doubt that
his histories are readable, yet we feel that Southey was right in his comment
on the Life of Napoleon,—"It was not possible that Sir Walter could keep up

as a historian the character which he had obtained as a novelist; and in the
first announcement of this 'Life' he had, not very wisely, promised
something as stimulating as his novels. Alas! he forgot that there could be
no stimulus of curiosity in it."[414] A recent critic has said, "Scott lost half
his power of vitalizing the past when he sat down formally to record it—
when he turned from his marvellous recreation of James I. to give a
laboured but very ordinary portrait of Napoleon."[415] His partial failure in
this instance may have been due to an unfortunate choice of subject. Only a
few years before he wrote the book Scott had been thinking of Napoleon as
a "tyrannical monster,"[416] a "singular emanation of the Evil Principle,"[417]
"the arch-enemy of mankind,"[418]—phrases which, in spite of their
vividness, hardly seem to promise a life-like portrayal of the man.[419]

In one notable respect, Scott's conception of how history should be
written was very modern: he would depict the life of the people, not simply
the actions of kings and statesmen. His historical novels, said Carlyle,
"taught all men this truth, which looks like a truism, and yet was as good as
unknown to writers of history and others, till so taught: that the bygone ages
of the world were actually filled by living men, not by protocols, state-
papers, controversies, and abstractions of men."[420] One who has the
academic notion that a novel, to be great, must be written with no ulterior
purpose, is almost startled to observe how definitely Scott considered it the
function of his novels to portray ancient manners. Speaking of old
romances as a source which we may use for studying about our ancestors,
he said: "From the romance, we learn what they were; from the history,
what they did: and were we to be deprived of one of these two kinds of
information, it might well be made a question, which is most useful or
interesting."[421] He wished to make his own romances serve much the same
purpose as those written in the midst of the customs which they
unconsciously reflected. Of Waverley he said, "It may really boast to be a
tolerably faithful portrait of Scottish manners."[422] He interrupts the story
of The Pirate to describe the charm of the leaden heart, and offers this
excuse: "As this simple and original remedy is peculiar to the isles of Thule,
it were unpardonable not to preserve it at length, in a narrative connected
with Scottish antiquities."[423] His comment on Ivanhoe was as follows: "I
am convinced that however I myself may fail in the ensuing attempt, yet,
with more labour in collecting, or more skill in using, the materials within

his reach, illustrated as they have been by the labours of Dr. Henry, of the
late Mr. Strutt, and above all, of Mr. Sharon Turner, an abler hand would
have been successful."[424]

Scott's early reading was only the basis for the research that he undertook
afterwards.[425] Much of this later study was accomplished when he was
engaged upon such books as Somers' Tracts, Dryden's and Swift's Works,
and the other historical publications that make the bibliography of Scott so
surprising to the ordinary reader; but some of his investigations were
undertaken specifically for the novels. The Literary Correspondence of his
publisher, Archibald Constable, contains many evidences of Scott's efforts,
assisted often by Constable, to get antiquarian and topographical details
correct in the novels. In 1821 Constable suggested that Sir Walter write a
story of the time of James I. of England, and was told, "If you can suggest
anything about the period I will be happy to hear from you; you are always
happy in your hints."[426] Some years earlier the author and the publisher
had a correspondence concerning a series of letters on the history of
Scotland which the former was planning to write, and which he wished to
publish anonymously for the following reason: "I have not the least doubt
that I will make a popular book, for I trust it will be both interesting and
useful; but I never intended to engage in any proper historical labour, for
which I have neither time, talent, nor inclination.... In truth it would take ten
years of any man's life to write such a History of Scotland as he should put
his name to."[427] He called his Napoleon "the most severe and laborious
undertaking which choice or accident ever placed on my shoulders."[428]

More than once Scott expresses the opinion that though novels may be
useful to arouse curiosity about history, and to impart some knowledge to
people who will not do any serious thinking, they may, on the other hand,
work harm by satisfying with their superficial information those who would
otherwise read history.[429] It seems as if he designed the Life of Napoleon
and the History of Scotland for a new reading class that the novels had been
creating, and as if he wished to make the step of transition not too long. We
can almost fancy them as a series of graded books arranged to lead the
people of Great Britain up to a sufficient height of historical information.
The Tales of a Grandfather were intended for the beginners who had never
been infected by the common heresy concerning the dulness of history, and

who were blessed with sufficiently active imagination to make the sugar-
coating of fiction superfluous.[430]

But great as was the interest that Scott took in the historical aspect of his
work, his artistic sense guided his use of materials, and he was well aware
of the danger of over-working the mine. The principles on which he chose
periods and events to represent are illustrated in many of the introductions.
Of The Fortunes of Nigel he said: "The reign of James I., in which George
Heriot flourished, gave unbounded scope to invention in the fable, while at
the same time it afforded greater variety and discrimination of character
than could, with historical consistency, have been introduced if the scene
had been laid a century earlier."[431]

His first published attempt at fiction-writing was a conclusion to the
novel, Queenhoo-Hall,[432] of which his opinion was that it would never be
popular because antiquarian knowledge was displayed in it too liberally.
"The author," he says, "forgot ... that extensive neutral ground, the large
proportion, that is, of manners and sentiments which are common to us and
to our ancestors, having been handed down unaltered from them to us, or
which, arising out of the principles of our common nature, must have
existed in either state of society."[433] Scott's practice in regard to the
language of his historical novels was based on much the same theory. He
intended to admit "no word or turn of phraseology betraying an origin
directly modern,"[434] but to avoid obsolete words for the most part; and he
never attempted to follow with fidelity the style of the exact age of which
he was writing. The translation of Froissart by Lord Berners seemed to him
a sufficiently good model to serve for the whole mediaeval period.[435] In
his review of Tales of My Landlord he says of the proem to his book: "It is
written in the quaint style of that prefixed by Gay to his Pastorals, being, as
Johnson terms it, 'such imitation as he could obtain of obsolete language,
and by consequence, in a style that was never written or spoken in any age
or place.'"

His Journal contains observations on several historical novels which
were of little consequence, as, for example, on one by a Mr. Bell,—"He
goes not the way to write it; he is too general, and not sufficiently minute";
[436] and on The Spae-Wife, by Galt,—"He has made his story difficult to

understand, by adopting a region of history little known."[437] On the other
hand he remarked, when someone had suggested a number of historical
subjects to him,—"People will not consider that a thing may already be so
well told in history, that romance ought not in prudence to meddle with it";
[438] and at another time he spoke of "the usual habit of antiquarians," to
"neglect what is useful for things that are merely curious."[439]

Aside from the familiar knowledge of ancient manners which he thought
enabled him to give his tales the necessary touch of novelty, and from the
"hurried frankness," or spontaneity of style which endowed them with
vitality, Scott believed that his talents included a special knack at
description. He felt, however, that a sense of the picturesque in action was a
different thing from a similar perception in regard to scenery, and that
though the first was natural to him, he was obliged to use effort to develop
the second.[440] Some study of drawing in his youth helped him to
comprehend the demands of perspective, and he endeavored to carry out the
principle of describing a scene in the way in which it would naturally strike
the spectator, neither overloading with confused detail nor over-
emphasizing what should be subordinate.[441] That his plan was consciously
adopted may be seen from his discussion of Byron's skill in description and
from his comments on the descriptive passages of the mediaeval romances.
[442]

At the same time he understood the advantages of the realistic method.
On one occasion he stated as his creed, "that in nature herself no two scenes
were exactly alike, and that whoever copied truly what was before his eyes
would possess the same variety in his descriptions, and exhibit apparently
an imagination as boundless as the range of nature in the scenes he
recorded; whereas, whoever trusted to imagination would soon find his own
mind circumscribed and contracted to a few favourite images, and the
repetition of these would sooner or later produce that very monotony and
barrenness which had always haunted descriptive poetry in the hands of any
but the patient worshippers of truth."[443] Wordsworth disapproved of
Scott's method in description. He is quoted as having said: "Nature does not
permit an inventory to be made of her charms! He should have left his
pencil and note-book at home [and] fixed his eye as he walked with a
reverent attention on all that surrounded him."[444] Somewhat like a

rejoinder sounds another remark of Scott's, in phrases that Wordsworth
would have detested. Scott said cheerfully, "As to the actual study of nature,
if you mean the landscape gardening of poetry ... I can get on quite as well
from recollection, while sitting in the Parliament house, as if wandering
through wood and wold."[445] At another time he said, "If a man will paint
from nature, he will be likely to amuse those who are daily looking at it."
[446]

Though Scott prided himself somewhat on his descriptive powers he
realized that he could not do his best work on minute canvases. We have
already seen how he contrasted himself with Jane Austen. "The exquisite
touch," he said, "which renders ordinary commonplace things and
characters interesting from the truth of the description and the sentiment, is
denied to me."[447]

Of Scott's opinion in regard to the ethical effect of novels, I have already
spoken.[448] The fact that he refused to use the conventional plea of a desire
to improve public morals, and that he understood how little a reader is
really influenced by the exalted sentiments of heroes of fiction, gave
Carlyle a fit of righteous indignation;[449] but it is futile to say that Scott
"had no message to deliver to the world." He might have retorted, in the
words which he once used about Homer,—"Doubtless an admirable moral
may be often extracted from his poem; because it contains an accurate
picture of human nature, which can never be truly presented without
conveying a lesson of instruction. But it may shrewdly be suspected that the
moral was as little intended by the author as it would have been the object
of an historian, whose work is equally pregnant with morality, though a
detail of facts be only intended."[450] It was a comfort to Scott at the end of
his life to reflect that the tendency of all he had written was morally good,
[451] and we can well believe that he was pleased by the enthusiastic tribute
of his young critic, J.L. Adolphus, who said of his books: "There is not an
unhandsome action or degrading sentiment recorded of any person who is
recommended to the full esteem of the reader."[452]

That Scott considered poetical power very important for a writer of
novels, he made evident in his Lives of the Novelists. Mr. Herford has said,
but surely without good reason, that Scott wholly lacked the sense of

mystery, and that in this respect Mrs. Radcliffe was more modern than he.
[453] Yet it was Scott who censured Mrs. Radcliffe for explaining her
mysteries. He had a vein of superstition in his nature, too, about which he
might have said, using the words given to a character in one of his stories,
—"It soothes my imagination, without influencing my reason or conduct."
[454] A liking for the wonderful and terrible, which he felt from his earliest
childhood, was one manifestation of a poetical temperament which is so
apparent that there is no need of reciting the evidence. The poetical qualities
in the Waverley novels gave Adolphus one of his favorite arguments in the
attempt to prove that Scott was the author.

Yet Scott seemed to feel that his position as a writer of popular fiction,
however much the novel is capable of being the vehicle of imagination and
poetical power, was not a really high one. James Ballantyne persuaded him
to omit from one of his introductions a passage that seemed to belittle the
occupation of his life,[455] but in the introduction to The Abbot he wrote:
"Though it were worse than affectation to deny that my vanity was satisfied
at my success in the department in which chance had in some measure
enlisted me, I was nevertheless far from thinking that the novelist or
romance-writer stands high in the ranks of literature." The ideal which he
set for himself is indicated in the following passage of his article on Tales of
My Landlord: "If ... the features of an age gone by can be recalled in a spirit
of delineation at once faithful and striking ... the composition is in every
point of view dignified and improved; and the author, leaving the light and
frivolous associates with whom a careless observer would be disposed to
ally him, takes his seat on the bench of the historians of his time and
country." He once expressed the opinion that the historical romance
approaches, in some measure, when it is nobly executed, to the epic in
poetry.[456] When a medal of Scott, engraved from the bust by Chantrey,
was struck off, he suggested the motto which was used:

"Bardorum citharas patrio qui reddidit Istro,"

and said, "because I am far more vain of having been able to fix some share
of public attention upon the ancient poetry and manners of my country, than
of any original efforts which I have been able to make in literature."[457]

The following commendation, which he wrote for a book of portraits
accompanied by essays, might be made to apply to his novels: "It is
impossible for me to conceive a work which ought to be more interesting to
the present age than that which exhibits before our eyes our 'fathers as they
lived'"[458] He felt strongly the value and importance of past manners, faiths
and ideals for the present, and from this point of view took satisfaction in
the social and ethical teaching of his novels.

On the whole, Scott's opinions about his own work fitted well with his
general literary principles, except that his modesty inclined him to discount
his own performance while he overestimated that of others. With this
qualification we may remember that he always spoke sensibly about his
work, without affectation, and with abundant geniality. We are reminded of
the comment on Molière quoted by Scott from a French writer,—"He had
the good fortune to escape the most dangerous fault of an author writing
upon his own compositions, and to exhibit wit, where some people would
only have shown vanity and self-conceit."[459]

CHAPTER VI
SCOTT'S POSITION AS CRITIC
Comparison of Scott with Jeffrey and with the Romantic critics—His criticism
largely appreciative—Romantic in special cases and Augustan in attitude—
Comparison with Coleridge—Scott's respect for the verdict of the public—His
opinion that elucidation is the function of criticism—Use of historical illustration
—Hesitation about analysing poetry—Political criticism—Verdict of his
contemporaries on his criticism—Influence as a critic—Literary prophecies—
Character of his critical work as a whole—His attitude towards it—Lack of
system—Broad fields he covered—His greatness a reason for the importance of
his criticism.

Important as Scott's poetry was in the English Romantic revival, as a
critic he can hardly be counted among the Romanticists. His attitude,
nevertheless, differed radically from that of the school represented by
Jeffrey and Gifford. We have already seen that he disliked their manner of
reviewing, and that he was conscious of complete disagreement with Jeffrey
in regard to poetic ideals. Of Jeffrey Mr. Gates has said: "[He] rarely
appreciates a piece of literature.... He is always for or against his author; he
is always making points."[460] That Scott was influenced in his early critical
work by the tone of the Edinburgh Review is undeniable, but
temperamentally he was inclined to give any writer a fair chance to stir his
emotions; and he did not adopt the magisterial mood that dictated the
famous remark, "This will never do." Scott's style lacked the adroitness and
pungency which helped Jeffrey successfully to take the attitude of the
censor, and which made his satire triumphant among his contemporaries.
Scott declined, moreover, to cultivate skill in a method which he considered
unfair. Compared with Jeffrey's his criticism wanted incisiveness, but it
wears better.

The period was transitional, and Jeffrey did not go so far as Scott in
breaking away from the dictation of his predecessors. But his attitude was
on the whole more modern than the reader would infer from the following
sentence in one of his earliest reviews: "Poetry has this much at least in
common with religion, that its standards were fixed long ago by certain
inspired writers, whose authority it is no longer lawful to call in question."
[461] He considered himself rather an interpreter of public opinion than a
judge defining ancient legislation, but he used the opinion of himself and
like-minded men as an unimpeachable test of what the greater public ought
to believe in regard to literature. We may remember that the enthusiasm
over the Elizabethan dramatists which seems a special property of Lamb
and Hazlitt, and which Scott shared, was characteristic also of Jeffrey
himself. It was Jeffrey's dogmatism and his repugnance to certain
fundamental ideas which were to become dominant in the poetry of the
nineteenth century that lead us to consider him one of the last
representatives of the eighteenth century critical tradition. Scott praised the
Augustan writers as warmly as Jeffrey did, but he was more hospitable to
the newer literary impulse. "Perhaps the most damaging accusation that can
be made against Jeffrey as a critic," says Mr. Gates, "is inability to read and
interpret the age in which he lived."[462]

Scott's criticism was largely appreciative, but appreciative on a somewhat
different plane from that of the contemporary critics whom we are
accustomed to place in a more modern school: Hazlitt, Hunt, Lamb, and
Coleridge. His judgments were less delicate and subtle than the judgments
of these men were apt to be, and more "reasonable" in the eighteenth-
century sense; they were marked, however, by a regard for the imagination
that would have seemed most unreasonable to many men of the eighteenth
century.

Scott had not a fixed theory of literature which could dominate his mind
when he approached any work. He was open-minded, and in spite of his
extreme fondness for the poetry of Dr. Johnson he was apt to be on the
Romantic side in any specific critical utterance. We have seen also that he
resembled the Romanticists in his power to disengage his verdicts on
literature from ethical considerations. On the other hand he seems always to
have deferred to the standard authorities of the classical criticism of his

time when his own knowledge was not sufficient to guide him. In
discussing Roscommon's Essay on Translated Verse he wrote: "It must be
remembered that the rules of criticism, now so well known as to be even
trite and hackneyed, were then almost new to the literary world."[463]

Perhaps the main reason why one would not class Scott's critical work
with that of the Romanticists is that he had no desire to proclaim a new era
in creative literature or in criticism. Like the Romanticists he was ready to
substitute "for the absolute method of judging by reference to an external
standard of 'taste,' a method at once imaginative and historical";[464] yet he
talked less about imagination than about good sense. The comparison with
Boileau suggests itself, for Scott admired that critic in the conventional
fashion, calling him "a supereminent authority,"[465] and Boileau also had
said much about "reason and good sense." But Scott had an appreciation of
the furor poeticus that made "good sense" quite a different thing to him
from what it was to Boileau. He did not say, moreover, that the poet should
be supremely characterized by good sense, but that the critic, recognizing
the facts about human emotion, should make use of that quality.

The subjective process by which experience is transmuted into literature
engaged Scott's attention very little: in this respect also he stands apart from
the newer school of critics. The metaphysical description of imagination or
fancy interested him less than the piece of literature in which these qualities
were exhibited. His own mental activities were more easily set in motion
than analysed, and the introspective or philosophical attitude of mind was
unnatural to him. Because of his adoption of the historical method of
studying literature, and the similarity of many of his judgments to those
which were in general characteristic of the Romantic school, we may say
that Scott's criticism looks forward; but it shows the influence of the earlier
period in its acceptance of traditional judgments based on external
standards which disregarded the nature of the creative process.

From Coleridge Scott is separated in the most definite way. Coleridge
began at the foundation, building up a set of principles such as the new
impulse in literature seemed to demand. Scott preferred the concrete, and
was stimulated by the particular book to express opinions that would never
have come to his mind as the result of pursuing a train of unembodied ideas.

Coleridge's judgments, moreover, would be unaffected by public estimation,
for he sought to found them on the spiritual and philosophic consciousness
that exists apart from the crowd.[466] Scott, on the other hand, was ready to
use popular judgment as an important test of his opinions. Coleridge
himself pointed out another interesting contrast. He wrote: "Dear Sir Walter
Scott and myself were exact, but harmonious opposites in this;—that every
old ruin, hill, river, or tree, called up in his mind a host of historical or
biographical associations, ... whereas, for myself, notwithstanding Dr.
Johnson, I believe I should walk over the plain of Marathon without taking
more interest in it than in any other plain of similar features."[467] We might
perhaps say that Coleridge's affection was given to ideas, Scott's, to objects;
hence Coleridge was a critic of literary principles and theories, Scott a critic
of individual books and writers. It follows that Scott was on the whole an
impressionistic critic. A study of his personality is essential to a
consideration of his critical work, for he was not so much a systematic
student of literature, guided by fixed principles, as a man of a certain
temperament who read particular things and made particular remarks about
them as he felt inclined. The inconsistencies and contradictions which
would naturally result from such a procedure are occasionally noticeable,
but they are fewer than would occur in the work of a less well-balanced
man than himself.

His ideas about criticism were influenced by his feeling that the judgment
of the public would after all take its own course, and that it was in the long
run the best criterion. He used his opinion that an author, even in his own
lifetime, commonly receives fair treatment from the public, as an argument
against establishing in England any literary body having the power of
pensioning literary men.[468] On this subject he said, "There is ... really no
occasion for encouraging by a society the competition of authors. The land
is before them, and if they really have merit they seldom fail to conquer
their share of public applause and private profit.... I cannot, in my
knowledge of letters, recollect more than two men whose merit is
undeniable while, I am afraid, their circumstances are narrow. I mean
Coleridge and Maturin."

Scott's whole attitude toward criticism shows that he felt its supreme
function to be elucidation. It should also, he believed, warn the world

against books that were foolish, or pernicious, intellectually or morally; but
unless there were good reason for issuing such warnings the bad books
should be ignored and the good treated sympathetically, not without such
discrimination as should distinguish between the better and the worse in
them, but with emphasis on the better. His literary creed, though not
formulated into a system, was conscious and fairly definite; but it consisted
of general principles which never resolved themselves into intricate
subtleties requiring great space for their development. Scott could not think
in that way, and he felt convinced that such thinking was useless and worse
than useless. A magazine-writer of his own period who said of him,—"The
author of Waverley, we apprehend, has neither the patience nor the
disposition requisite for writing philosophically upon any subject,"[469] was
mistaken, for much of Scott's criticism, without making any pretensions, is
really philosophical. But any fine-drawn analysis seemed to him to serve
the vanity of the critic rather than the need of the public; and he despised
that arrogance in the critic which leads him to assume to direct literary
taste.

Historical illustration was that kind of editorial work which he found
most congenial, and which harmonized best with his critical principles; for
when he could bring definite facts to the service of elucidation he felt that
he was doing something worth while. Among all the introductions and
annotations that we have from his hand, including those of the Dryden and
the Swift, this kind of explanation greatly predominates over the more
strictly literary comment; in his reviews, also, it is evident that he seized
every opportunity for turning from literary to historical discussion. He was
in the habit of "embroidering the subject, whatever it might be, with lively
anecdotic illustration,"[470] as one of his biographers says. We are not to
conclude that in writing on specifically literary subjects he felt ill at ease.
He felt, on the contrary, that the objection lay in the too great ease with
which the critic might become dictatorial. He was fond enough of details
when they were concrete and vital. The facts of literary history were in this
category to him, as distinguished from the notions of literary theory; and we
find that his critical principles are apt to appear incidentally among remarks
on what seemed to him the more tangible and important facts of literary and
social history. The books he chose to review were chiefly those which gave
him a chance to use his historical information and imagination. His ideas

were concrete, as those of a great novelist must inevitably be. Indeed the
dividing line between creative work and criticism seems often to be
obliterated in Scott's literary discussions, since he was inclined to amplify
and illustrate instead of dissecting the book under consideration. As a critic
he was distinguished by the qualities which appear in his novels, and which
may be described in Hazlitt's words, as "the most amazing retentiveness of
memory, and vividness of conception of what would happen, be seen, and
felt by everybody in given circumstances."[471]

Scott felt that there was especial danger of futile theorizing in the
criticism of poetry. In writing about Alexander's Feast he discussed for a
moment the possibility of detecting points at which the author had paused
in his work, but almost immediately he stopped himself with the
characteristic remark—"There may be something fanciful ... in this
reasoning, which I therefore abandon to the reader's mercy; only begging
him to observe, that we have no mode of estimating the exertions of a
quality so capricious as a poetic imagination."[472] Early in his career he
gave this rather over-amiable explanation of the fact that he had never
undertaken to review poetry: "I am sensible there is a greater difference of
tastes in that department than in any other, and that there is much excellent
poetry which I am not nowadays able to read without falling asleep, and
which would nevertheless have given me great pleasure at an earlier period
of my life. Now I think there is something hard in blaming the poor cook
for the fault of our own palate or deficiency of appetite."[473] We have seen
that he did review poetry afterwards, but that he was inclined to do it with
the least possible emphasis on the specifically aesthetic elements. On the
subject of novel-writing he developed a somewhat fuller critical theory, but
here also his discussions concerned themselves rather with the kind of ideas
set forth than with the manner of presentation.

It does indeed seem as if Scott's feelings were more easily aroused to the
point of formulating "laws" in the field of political criticism than in that
which appears to us his more legitimate sphere. He has his fling, to be sure,
at Madame de Staël, because she "lived and died in the belief that
revolutions were to be effected, and countries governed, by a proper
succession of clever pamphlets."[474] But in proposing the establishment of
the Quarterly Review he made no secret of the fact that his motives were

political. The literary aspect of the periodical was thought of as a
subordinate, though a necessary and not unimportant phase of the
undertaking. The Letters of Malachi Malagrowther contain some very
definite maxims on the subject of political economy, and just as decided are
the remarks made in the last of Paul's Letters, as well as in the Life of
Napoleon and elsewhere, as to how Louis XVIII. ought to set about the task
of calming his distracted kingdom of France. But however emphatic Scott
may be in the comments on government which appear throughout his
writings, he was as strongly averse in this matter as in literary affairs to any
separation of philosophy from fact: his maxims are always derived from
experience. The following statement of opinion is typical: "In legislating for
an ancient people, the question is not, what is the best possible system of
law, but what is the best they can bear. Their habitudes and prejudices must
always be respected; and, whenever it is practicable, those prejudices,
instead of being destroyed, ought to be taken as the basis of the new
regulations."[475]

It was Scott's political creed that roused the ire of such men as Hazlitt
and Hunt, though they may also have been exasperated at the
unprecedented success of poetry which seemed so facile and so superficial
to them as Scott's. Leigh Hunt calls him "a poet of a purely conventional
order," "a bitter and not very large-minded politician," "a critic more
agreeable than subtle."[476] But Scott's politics may be looked at in another
way. "In his patriotism," says Mr. Courthope, "his passionate love of the
past, and his reverence for established authority, literary or political, Scott is
the best representative among English men of letters of Conservatism in its
most generous form."[477]

Though it seems to have been a common opinion among the literary men
of his own time that Scott's criticism was superficial, his knowledge of
mediaeval literature was, as we have seen, recognized and respected.
Favorable comments by his contemporaries on other parts of his critical
work are not difficult to find. For example, Gifford wrote to Murray in
regard to the article on Lady Suffolk's Correspondence: "Scott's paper is a
clever, sensible thing—the work of a man who knows what he is about."
[478] Isaac D'Israeli made the following observation on another of Scott's
papers: "The article on Pepys, after so many have been written, is the only

one which, in the most charming manner possible, shows the real value of
these works, which I can assure you many good scholars have no idea of."
[479] A more recent verdict may be set beside those just quoted, and it is in
perfect agreement with them. "His critical faculty," says Professor
Saintsbury, "if not extraordinarily subtle, was always as sound and shrewd
as it was good-natured."[480]

Scott's influence as a critic was not very great, but his creative work
exerted a strong influence on criticism as well as on the whole intellectual
life of his age. His own novels demanded of the critic that kind of
appreciation of the large qualities and negligence of the small which he had
insisted on considering the function of criticism; and they became a fact in
literature which determined to some degree the attitude taken toward
ephemeral ideas. Newman notes the popularity of Scott's novels as one of
the influences which prepared the ground for the Tractarian movement, for
Scott enriched the visions of men by his pictures of the past, gave them
noble ideas, and created a desire for a greater richness of spiritual life.[481]
Much of his criticism also was inspired by the wish to construct an adequate
picture of the past; so far it worked in the same direction with the novels. Its
most important offices aside from this were perhaps to present large and
kindly views of literature and literary characters, especially through
biographical essays; and to ameliorate somewhat the prevailing asperity of
periodical criticism.

A man of Scott's temperament was little likely to set himself up for a
prophet, and probably no literary prophecies of his were in the least
influential. Though he sometimes boasted that he understood the varying
currents of popular taste, his experience in the publishing business taught
him the fallibility of his impressions when the work of writers other than
himself was concerned. He once wrote,—"The friends who know me best,
and to whose judgment I am myself in the constant habit of trusting, reckon
me a very capricious and uncertain judge of poetry; and I have had repeated
occasion to observe that I have often failed in anticipating the reception of
poetry from the public."[482] But it is beyond the strength of flesh and blood
to resist saying things about the future sometimes, and Scott occasionally
yielded to the temptation, helped, no doubt, by his amiability. Southey's
Madoc, however, has not yet assumed that place at the feet of Milton which,

as we have seen, he ventured to predict for it. Yet, if we may trust the
memory of one of his friends, Scott foresaw the literary success of two of
his greatest contemporaries. R.P. Gillies said in his Recollections: "I
remember well how correct Scott's impressions were of such beginners in
the literary world as had not then acquired any fixed character. Of Lord
Byron he had from the first a favourable impression.... Of Wordsworth he
always spoke favourably, insisting that he was a true poet, but predicting
that it would be long ere his works obtained the praise which they merited
from the public."[483] Scott explicitly prided himself on two of his
prophecies: that Washington Irving would make a name for himself, and
that Sir Arthur Wellesley would become known as an extraordinary man.

Though Scott's critical work is comparatively little known, and though it
presents no solidly organized front by which the public may be impressed,
the opinions of so notable a writer have always had a certain weight. Mr.
Churton Collins thinks Scott's judgment on Dunbar has led modern editors
to indulge in very exaggerated statements concerning the merit of that poet.
[484] A heavier charge has been laid at Scott's door on the score of his
edition of the Memoirs of Captain Carleton. He concluded on very
insufficient evidence, says Colonel Parnell, that these memoirs were
genuinely historical, published them as such, and by the weight of his
opinion falsified "the whole stream of nineteenth-century history bearing on
the reign of Queen Anne."[485] Stanhope, Macaulay, and other historians
were ready to accept Scott's judgment without further investigation, it
seems; and if the accusation be true we may conclude that his influence as a
critic has reached farther than might at first sight appear. Yet we may be
content to follow his lead in general, except in those bits of enthusiasm over
his friends which bear witness to a generously optimistic nature rather than
to a rigid critical attitude such as we should hardly demand in any case from
a man of letters commenting on his contemporaries and friends. George
Ticknor was greatly impressed by the "right-mindedness" of the young
Sophia Scott,[486] and we may fairly adopt the word to describe the father
whom she so much resembled. There was in him, as Carlyle said, "such a
sunny current of true humour and humanity, a free joyful sympathy with so
many things; what of fire he had all lying so beautifully latent, as radical
latent heat, as fruitful internal warmth of life;—a most robust, healthy
man!"[487]

Writers upon Scott have made much, perhaps too much, of his feeling
that his position as a landed gentleman was more enviable than his
prominence as a writer. The point would be of greater consequence if it
performed so important a function in explaining his work as has commonly
been assigned to it. We are told that he wrote much and hastily because he
wanted money to establish and support an estate; but the truth is that if he
wrote at all he had to write in this way. He justly believed that he could do
his best work so. Yet it was a natural result of his facility that he should
look upon the literature he produced as of comparatively little moment.
Some of his remarks about his critical work, however, show that he really
regarded creative writing as the business of his life, and that in contrast with
it he considered his criticism a relief from more arduous labor. After the
publication of Marmion he wrote: "I have done with poetry for some time—
it is a scourging crop, and ought not to be hastily repeated. Editing,
therefore, may be considered as a green crop of turnips or peas, extremely
useful for those whose circumstances do not admit of giving their farm a
summer fallow."[488] After years of novel-writing he said of writing a
review, "No one that has not laboured as I have done on imaginary topics
can judge of the comfort afforded by walking on all-fours, and being grave
and dull."[489]

From what Scott said about Dryden as a critic we may conclude that the
unsystematic character of his own scholarly work may have been a matter
of principle as well as inclination. "Dryden," he wrote, "forebore, from
prudence, indolence, or a regard for the freedom of Parnassus, to erect
himself into a legislator."[490] The words remind us of comments made upon
Scott's own work, as for example by Professor Masson, who spoke of "the
shrewdness and sagacity of some of his critical prefaces to his novels,
where he discusses principles of literature without seeming to call them
such."[491] Scott was quick to notice "cant and slang"[492] in the professional
language of men in all arts; and he valued most highly the remarks of those
whose intelligence had not been overlaid by a conventional pedantry.

Knowing that criticism was not the main business of his life, we are
inclined to be surprised at the broad fields which he seemed to have no
hesitation in entering upon. His remarkable memory doubtless had
something to do with this, but he lived in a period when generalization was

more possible and more permissible than it is in this era of special
monographs. The large tendencies and characteristics that he traced in his
essay on Romance, for instance, are undoubtedly to be qualified at
numberless points, but writing when he did, Scott was comparatively
untroubled by these limitations. Moreover, he had the gift of seeing things
broadly, so that in essentials his survey remains true. But the amount of his
work is almost as astonishing as its scope and variety. He could accomplish
so much only by disregarding details of form; and that he did so we know
from our study of his principles of composition, confirmed by the evidence
of the passages from him that have here been quoted. It is clear, also, that he
was not limited by that "horror of the obvious," which, as Mr. Saintsbury
says, "bad taste at all times has taken for a virtue."[493] Beyond this we have
to fall back for explanation on the unusual qualities of his mind. An
observing friend said of him that, "With a degree of patience and quietude
which are seldom combined with much energy, he could get through an
incredible extent of literary labour."[494]

Every quality which made Scott a great man contributes to the interest
and importance of his criticism. Such a body of criticism, formulated by a
large creative genius, would be of special consequence if it served merely
as the basis for a study of his other work, a commentary on the principles
which underlay his whole literary achievement. But it would be strange if a
man of Scott's intellectual personality could write criticism which was not
important in itself, and we can only account for the general neglect of this
part of his work by considering how large a place his poems and novels
give him in the history of our literature. If he deserves a still larger place,
we may remember with satisfaction that as a man he was great enough to
support honorably any distinction won by his mind.

APPENDIX I.
BIBLIOGRAPHY

The bibliography of Scott's writings is given in three parts, as follows:

1. Books which Scott wrote or edited, or to which he was an important
contributor. The list is chronological.
2. Contributions to periodicals.
3. Books which contain letters written by Scott. These titles are arranged
approximately in the order of their importance from the point of view
of a study of Scott.

1. Books which Scott wrote or edited, or to which he was an important
contributor.

(In the following list the first editions of the poems and novels are noted
without bibliographical details. In the case of other works the main facts in
regard to publication are given; and an attempt is made to indicate the
nature of the books named, unless they have been discussed in the text.)

1796
The Chase and William and Helen. (Translated from Bürger.)

1799
Goetz of Berlichingen. (Translated from Goethe.)

Apology for Tales of Terror.

Twelve copies were privately printed, to exhibit the work of the
Ballantyne press at Kelso. The title was occasioned by the delay
in the publication of Matthew Lewis's Tales of Terror, and the

little book contains poems which Scott had contributed to that
work. (The contents are named in the Catalogue of the Centenary
Exhibition.)

1800
The Eve of St. John, a Border ballad.

1802-3
Minstrelsy of the Scottish Border; consisting of historical and romantic
ballads, collected in the southern counties of Scotland; with a few of
modern date founded upon local tradition.

3 vols. Vols. I and 2, Kelso, 1802; vol. 3, Edinburgh, 1803.
Second edition, 1803. The book was republished frequently
before 1830, when it was included in the collected edition of
Scott's poems. It has also been reprinted independently since then
several times. The latest and most complete edition is that
published in 1902, edited by T.F. Henderson. Other books in
which part of Scott's ballad material was used in such a way as to
give his name a place on the title-page are named below:

Kinmont Willie: a Border ballad, with an historical
introduction, by Sir Walter Scott. (Carlisle Tracts No. 6) Carlisle,
1841.

A Ballad Book by C.K. Sharpe. MDCCCXXIII. Reprinted with
notes and ballads from the unpublished manuscripts of C.K.
Sharpe and Sir Walter Scott ... edited by ... D. Laing. Edinburgh,
1880.

1804
Sir Tristrem: a metrical romance of the thirteenth century, by Thomas
of Ercildoune, called the Rhymer. Edited from the Auchinleck
manuscript by Walter Scott. Edinburgh.

Only 12 copies of Sir Tristrem were printed in the form in
which Scott had intended to publish it, without the expurgation
which his friends insisted upon. (Letters to R. Polwhele, etc., p.

18; Lockhart, I. 361). The following book contains a part of the
same material:

A Penni worth of Witte, Florice and Blancheflour, and other
pieces of ancient English poetry, selected from the Auchinleck
manuscript. (With an account of the Auchinleck manuscript by Sir
Walter Scott) Edinburgh, 1857. Printed for the Abbotsford Club.

1805
The Lay of the Last Minstrel.

1806
Original Memoirs written during the great civil war; being the life of
Sir H. Slingsby, and memoirs of Capt. Hodgson. With notes, etc.
Edinburgh. [Edited by Scott anonymously.]

Ballads and Lyrical Pieces. [Poems which had already appeared in
various collections.]

1808
Marmion.

Memoirs of Captain Carleton, ... including anecdotes of the war in
Spain under the Earl of Peterborough, ... written by himself.
Edinburgh. (8vo, but 25 copies were printed on large paper.) [Edited
by Scott anonymously.]

Scott was probably mistaken in considering this to be a genuine
autobiography. (See Col. Parnell's argument in The English
Historical Review, vi:97.) It has been attributed to Defoe, and
Col. Parnell attributes it to Swift, but the question of its
authorship is still unsolved. The book was first published in 1728,
but Scott used the edition of 1743, which he was so inaccurate as
to take for the original edition; and as at that date Defoe had long
been dead and Swift had lost his mind, the possibility of
attributing it to either of them naturally would not occur to him.
Scott wrote scarcely any notes, but his short introduction contains

some interesting general reflections which are quoted by
Lockhart.

The Works of John Dryden, now first collected; illustrated with notes,
historical, critical and explanatory, and a life of the author, by Walter
Scott, Esq. 18 vols. London.

Second edition, 18 vols., Edinburgh, 1821.

Another edition, revised and corrected by George Saintsbury,
Edinburgh, 1882-1893.

The Life of John Dryden (4to, only 50 copies printed).

Memoirs of John Dryden, Paris, 1826.

Memoirs of Robert Carey, Earl of Monmouth, written by himself, and
Fragmenta Regalia, being a history of Queen Elizabeth's favourites, by
Sir Robert Naunton. With explanatory annotations. Edinburgh. [Edited
by Scott anonymously.]

Scott contributed no introductions, but his notes are copious,
especially with regard to the history of the Border. This is one of
the books of which Scott is reported to have said to his publisher,
Mr. Constable, "Did I not do Hodgson, Carey, Carleton, etc., to
serve you; and did I ever ask or receive any remuneration?"
(Ballantyne's Refutation, etc., p. 76.)

Queenhoo-Hall, a romance; and Ancient Times, a drama. By the late
Joseph Strutt, author of Rural Sports and Pastimes of the People of
England. [Edited by Scott, who wrote a conclusion for Queenhoo-Hall.
This conclusion is given in an appendix to the introduction of
Waverley.] Edinburgh.

1809
The State Papers and Letters of Sir Ralph Sadler ... edited by Arthur
Clifford ... to which is added a memoir of the life of Sir Ralph Sadler,

with historical notes, by Walter Scott, Esq. 2 vols. Edinburgh. (Also
the same work in 3 vols., with same date.)

The biography is included in all the editions of Scott's Prose
Works.

The Life of Edward Lord Herbert of Cherbury, written by himself.
With a prefatory memoir. Edinburgh; printed by James Ballantyne &
Co. for John Ballantyne & Co. and John Murray. (A reprint of
Walpole's edition, with the prefatory memoir added.)

It is a question whether Scott edited this book, but it has been
ascribed to him, and is given under his name without hesitation in
the British Museum catalogue. The prefatory memoir is short and
largely made up of quotations, but it sounds as if Scott might have
written it. The book is one to which he often refers. Mr. Sidney
Lee, in his edition of the Autobiography, says merely, "Walpole's
edition was reprinted in 1770, 1809, and in 1826." Reprinted in
the Universal Library: Biography, vol. I, London, 1853.

1809-15
A Collection of Scarce and Valuable Tracts on the most interesting and
entertaining subjects: but chiefly such as relate to the history and
constitution of these kingdoms. Selected from an infinite number in
print and manuscript, in the Royal, Cotton, Sion, and other public, as
well as private, libraries; particularly that of the late Lord Somers. The
second edition, revised, augmented, and arranged by Walter Scott, Esq.
13 vols. London.

There are some additions. Scott says in the Advertisement:
"The Memoirs of the Wars in the Low Countries by the gallant
Williams, and the very singular account of Ireland by Derrick, are
the most curious of those now published for the first time.... The
introductory remarks and notes have been added by the present
Editor, at the expense of some time and labour. It is needless to
observe, that both have been expended upon a humble and
unambitious, though not, it is hoped, an useless task. The object
of the introductions was to present such a short and summary

view of the circumstances under which the Historical and
Controversial Tracts were respectively written, as to prevent the
necessity of referring to other works. Such therefore, as refer to
events of universal notoriety are but slightly and generally
mentioned; such as concern less remarkable points of history are
more fully explained. The Notes are in general illustrative of
obscure passages, or brief notices of authorities, whether
corroborative or contradictory of the text." The following book
contains a part of the same material:

The Image of Irelande with a Discoverie of Woodkarne. By
John Derricke, 1581. With Notes by Sir Walter Scott. Edited by
John Small. Edinburgh, 1883. (See Somers' Tracts, Vol. I.)

1810
English Minstrelsy. Being a selection of fugitive poetry from the best
English authors, with some original pieces hitherto unpublished. 2
vols. Edinburgh.

The Centenary Catalogue says that Scott and his friend William
Erskine edited this book together. In the Advertisement the
publishers (John Ballantyne & Co.) say: "To one eminent
individual, whose name they do not venture to particularize, they
are indebted for most valuable assistance in selection,
arrangement, and contribution; and to that individual they take
this opportunity to present the humble tribute of their thanks, for a
series of kindnesses, of which that now acknowledged is among
the least." There is no critical apparatus. The book contains
original poems by Scott, Southey, Rogers, Joanna Baillie, and
others not so well known.

The Lady of the Lake.

Memoirs of the Duke of Sully. Translated from the French [by
Charlotte Lennox] ... a new edition ... corrected, with additional notes,
some letters of Henry the Great, and a brief historical introduction
embellished with portraits. 5 vols. London.

Another edition, 4 vols. London 1858, has these words on the
title-page: "A new edition, revised and corrected; with additional
notes, and an historical introduction, attributed to Sir Walter
Scott." I have found no external evidence that Scott was the
editor. The introduction sounds as if Scott wrote it, but that so
much work could have been done by him without occasioning
any record seems unlikely. There is a historical introduction of 35
pp., and copious notes. The book is one with which Scott was
familiar. See Memoirs of Robert Carey, pp. 34 and 41.

The Poetical Works of Anna Seward, with extracts from her literary
correspondence. Edited by Walter Scott, Esq. 3 vols. Edinburgh.

The biographical preface is given in the Miscellaneous Prose
Works. The notes are by Miss Seward.

Ancient British Drama, in three volumes. London. (Printed for William
Miller, by James Ballantyne & Co., Edinburgh.)

I find no evidence that Scott was the editor of this book, but it
is sometimes ascribed to him in library catalogues. It contains
merely a two-page introduction and brief notes, and a collection
of plays. (See above, p. 52, note.)

1811
The Modern British Drama, in five volumes. London. (Printed for
William Miller, by James Ballantyne & Co., Edinburgh.)

Vols. I and II, Tragedies, with introduction in vol. I.

Vols. III and IV, Comedies, with introduction in vol. III.

Vol. V, Operas and Farces, with introduction.

These volumes apparently belong to the same collection as the
Ancient British Drama, noted above, and the external evidence
for Scott's authorship is the same. But the introductions are fuller,
and they sound very much like Scott. (See above, p. 52, note.)

The Vision of Don Roderick.

Memoirs of the Court of Charles II, by Count Grammont. With
numerous additions and illustrations. London. [Edited by Scott.]

Reprinted in 1846, 1853, 1864. This last edition, in the Bohn
Library, has about 100 pp. of historical notes.

Secret History of the Court of James the First. With notes and
introductory remarks. 2 vols. Edinburgh. [Edited by Scott
anonymously.]

The book contains 1. Osborne's Traditional Memoirs; 2. Sir
Anthony Welldon's Court and Character of King James; 3.
Aulicus Coquinariae; 4. Sir Edward Peyton's Divine Catastrophe
of the House of Stuarts.

1813
Rokeby.

Memoirs of the Reign of King Charles I., by Sir Philip Warwick.
Edinburgh. [Edited by Scott anonymously.]

The Bridal of Triermain.

1814
Illustrations of Northern Antiquities from the earlier Teutonic and
Scandinavian romances, by Robert Jamieson ... with an abstract of the
Eyrbyggja-Saga; being the early annals of that district of Iceland lying
around the promontory called Sudefells, by Walter Scott. Edinburgh.

See also Northern Antiquities by P.H. Mallet, London, 1847;
and the edition in Bohn's Library, 1890.

Lockhart says: "Any one who examines the share of the work
which goes under Weber's name will see that Scott had a
considerable hand in that also. The rhymed versions from the

Nibelungen Lied came, I can have no doubt, from his pen."
(Lockhart, II, 320.)

The Works of Jonathan Swift, containing additional letters, tracts, and
poems, not hitherto published; with notes and a life of the author, by
Walter Scott. 19 vols. Edinburgh.

Second edition, revised, Edinburgh, 1824.

Memoirs of Jonathan Swift, Paris, 1826.

The Letting of Humour's Blood in the Head Vaine, etc. By Samuel
Rowlands. Edinburgh. [Edited by Scott. His name is not given, but the
Advertisement is dated at Abbotsford.]

This is an exact reproduction of the 1611 edition, except for the
addition of a few pages containing the Advertisement and the
notes. Another edition was printed in 1815.

Waverley.

1814-17
The Border Antiquities of England and Scotland; comprising
specimens of architecture and sculpture, and other vestiges of former
ages, accompanied by descriptions. Together with illustrations of
remarkable incidents in Border history and tradition, and original
poetry. By Walter Scott, Esq. 2 vols. 4to. London.

Another edition, in 2 vols. folio, London, 1889.

Lockhart says the introduction to this work was written in
1817, but this is a mistake, for it is in the first volume, which was
published in 1814.

1815
The Lord of the Isles.

Guy Mannering.

The Field of Waterloo.

The Secret Commonwealth of Elves, Fauns, and Fairies, by Robert
Kirk.

The attribution of this to Scott rests on a letter by George
Ticknor, in Allibone's Dictionary (vol. II, p. 1967) in which he
says: "Kirk's Secret Commonwealth, a curious tract, of about a
hundred quarto pages, on Fairy Superstitions and second sight,
originally published in 1691, and of which, in 1815, Mr. Scott had
caused a hundred copies to be privately printed by the
Ballantynes, with additions, a circumstance, I think, not noted by
Lockhart." Mr. Lang thinks the book was never printed until
1815. (See his edition, London, 1893). This 1815 edition of 100
copies was made, he says, from a manuscript copy preserved in
the Advocates' Library, for Longman & Co. He quotes one of
Scott's references to the book, but does not intimate that Scott was
the editor.

Memorie of the Somervilles; being a history of the baronial house of
Somerville, by James, eleventh Lord Somerville. 2 vols. Edinburgh.
[Edited by Scott anonymously.]

The additions by the editor consist of a short preface and
abundant notes.

1816
Paul's Letters to his Kinsfolk. Edinburgh.

These letters were anonymous, but Scott was always
recognized as the author of them. They are contained in the
Miscellaneous Prose Works.

The Antiquary.

Tales of my Landlord. First series:
The Black Dwarf.
Old Mortality.

1817
Harold the Dauntless.

Rob Roy.

1818
Tales of my Landlord. Second series:
The Heart of Midlothian.

Burt's Letters from the North of Scotland ... the fifth edition, with a
large appendix, containing various important historical documents,
hitherto unpublished; with an introduction and notes, by the editor, R.
Jamieson ... and the history of Donald the Hammerer, from an
authentic account of the family of Invernahyle (by Scott: see a note
accompanying the text). 2 vols. London.

Scott's contribution is short. See also Appendix IV, which is
taken "from a manuscript in the possession of the Gartmore
Family, communicated by Walter Scott Esq." Scott's name had
become so valuable that the publishers tried to put it on the title-
page of this book, to his great indignation. (See Constable, III, III,
119-20.)

1818-24
The Encyclopædia Britannica: Supplement. [For this work Scott wrote
the following essays:] Chivalry, published in 1818; The Drama,
published in 1819; Romance, published in 1824. (These are given in
the Miscellaneous Prose Works.)

1819
Tales of my Landlord. Third series:
The Bride of Lammermoor.
A Legend of Montrose.

The Visionary, by Somnambulus. (A political satire in three letters,
republished from the Edinburgh Weekly Journal.) Edinburgh.

Description of the Regalia of Scotland. Edinburgh.

This has been reprinted many times. It was included also in
Provincial Antiquities.

Ivanhoe.

1819-26
The Provincial Antiquities and Picturesque Scenery of Scotland, with
descriptive illustrations by Sir Walter Scott, Bart. [First published in
ten parts between 1819 and 1826.] 2 vols. London, 1826. 4to.

1820
The Monastery.

The Abbot.

Memorials of the Haliburtons. Edinburgh. [Edited by Scott
anonymously.]

30 copies were printed in 1820, and 30 more in 1824.

Reprinted, London, 1877, for the Royal Historical Society, in
Genealogical Memoirs of the Family of Sir Walter Scott, Bart., of
Abbotsford, by the Rev. Charles Rogers, LL.D.

Trivial Poems and Triolets. Written in obedience to Mrs. Tomkin's
commands. By Patrick Carey. London. [Edited by Scott. His name is
not given, but the introduction is dated at Abbotsford.]

A thin 4to, with a short introduction and a few notes. A part of
the material had been used in the Edinburgh Annual Register for
1810.

1821
Northern Memoirs, calculated for the meridian of Scotland. To which
is added the contemplative and practical angler. Writ in the year 1658.
By Richard Franck. A new edition, with preface and notes. Edinburgh.
[Edited by Scott.]

Kenilworth.

The Pirate.

1821-4
The Novelists' Library. Edited, with prefatory memoirs, by Sir Walter
Scott. 10 vols. London.

Also Lives of the Novelists, 2 vols., Paris, 1825. A recent
edition is that published, with an introduction by Austin Dobson,
by the Oxford University Press (No. 94 in The World's Classics).
When these Lives were issued among the Miscellaneous Prose
Works some of the biographical prefaces were put with them, and
also biographical notices, reprinted from the Edinburgh Weekly
Journal, of Charles Duke of Buccleuch and Queensberry, John
Lord Somerville, King George III, Lord Byron, and The Duke of
York. I give below the names of certain books in which Scott's
biographies were utilized, but the list is probably far from
complete:

An Account of the death and funeral procession of Frederick
Duke of York, etc. To which is subjoined Sir Walter Scott's
Character of His Royal Highness. By John Sykes. Newcastle,
1827.

The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, gentleman. By
Laurence Sterne, A.M., with a life of the author, by Sir Walter
Scott. Paris, 1832. (Baudry's Foreign Library.)

Beauties of Sterne, with some account of his writings by Sir
Walter Scott. Amsterdam, 1836.

Select Works of Smollett. Memoir by Sir W. Scott.
Philadelphia, 1849.

The Novels and Miscellaneous Works of Daniel De Foe. With a
biographical memoir of the author, literary prefaces to the various
pieces, illustrative notes, etc., including all contained in the
edition attributed to the late Sir Walter Scott, with considerable
additions. 20 vols., London, 1840.

The Novels and Miscellaneous Works of Daniel de Foe. With
prefaces and notes, including those attributed to Sir Walter Scott.
6 vols., London, 1854-6. (Bonn's British Classics.)

The Rambler, by Samuel Johnson LL.D., with a sketch of the
author's life by Sir Walter Scott. 2 vols., London, 187?

1822
Chronological Notes of Scottish Affairs, from 1680 till 1701; being
chiefly taken from the diary of Lord Fountainhall. Edinburgh. [Edited
by Scott.]

See Historical Notices of Scotish Affairs, selected from the
manuscripts of Sir John Lauder of Fountainhall, bart. 2 vols.
Edinburgh, 1848, printed for the Bannatyne club. Here Scott's
edition is referred to, and his introduction is reprinted. The book
was re-edited because Scott did not use the original manuscript,
but an interpolated transcript, and he had no means for accurately
determining the original text.

Halidon Hill, a dramatic sketch.

Macduff's Cross (in Joanna Baillie's Poetical Miscellanies).

Military Memoirs of the Great Civil War. Being the military memoirs
of John Gwynne; and an account of the Earl of Glencairn's expedition,
as general of His Majesty's forces, in the highlands of Scotland, in the
years 1653 and 1654, by a person who was eye and ear witness to
every transaction.... Edinburgh. [Edited by Scott. His name is not
given, but the introduction is dated at Abbotsford.]

There are some notes, and a short historical introduction.

Sketch of the Life and Character of the late Lord Kinneder. [Edited by
Scott. A postscript says: "This notice was chiefly drawn up by the late
Mr. Hay Donaldson."] Edinburgh.

Only a few copies were printed, for private distribution.

The Fortunes of Nigel.

1823
Peveril of the Peak.

Quentin Durward.

St. Ronan's Well.

1824
Lays of the Lindsays, being poems by the ladies of the House of
Balcarras. Edinburgh. [Edited by Scott, and designed as a contribution
to the Bannatyne Club, but suppressed after being printed.]

Redgauntlet.

1825
Auld Robin Gray; a ballad. By the Rt. Honourable Lady Anne
Barnard, born Lady Anne Lindsay, of Balcarras. [Edited by Scott for
the Bannatyne Club.]

Tales of the Crusaders:
The Betrothed.
The Talisman.

1826
Letters of Malachi Malagrowther on the Currency. (To the editor of the
Edinburgh Weekly Journal.) 3 parts. Edinburgh.

Woodstock.

1826?
Shakspeare [edited by Scott and Lockhart?], volumes II, III, and IV,
without title page and date. Printed by James Ballantyne & Co.

Scott and Lockhart began in 1823 or 1824 to prepare an edition
of Shakspere. In Jan., 1825, Constable wrote to a London
bookseller: "It gives me great pleasure to tell you that the first
sheet of Sir Walter Scott's Shakspeare is now in type ... This I

expect will be a first-rate property." (Constable's
Correspondence, II, 344.) At the time of Constable's bankruptcy
in 1826 there was a disagreement in regard to the ownership of
the property. Scott wrote to Lockhart, May 30, 1826, "What do
you about Shakspeare? Constable's creditors seem desirous to
carry it on. Certainly their bankruptcy breaks the contract. For me
c'est égal: I have nothing to do with the emoluments, and I can
with very little difficulty discharge my part of the matter, which is
the Prolegomena, and Life and Times." (Lang's Lockhart, I, 409.)
In 1827 the question of carrying on the work was still undecided,
and it was also mentioned in a letter in 1830. (Lang's Lockhart II,
13 and 59). The project was ultimately abandoned, and the fate of
that part of the work which was actually in print is unknown. In
the Barton Collection in the Boston Public Library is preserved
what is perhaps a unique copy of three volumes of the set of ten
that Scott and Lockhart undertook to prepare. But as the books
are bound up without title-pages, and as the commentary contains
nothing that would determine its authorship, the attribution is
probable rather than certain. These volumes include twelve of the
comedies. On the fly-leaf of one of them is a note written by Mr.
Rodd, a London bookseller. He says: "I purchased these three
volumes from a sale at Edinburgh. They were entered in the
catalogue as 'Shakespeare's Works, edited by Sir Walter Scott and
Lockhart, vols. ii, in, iv, all published, unique'." It was not
positively known that such a work had been planned until the
publication of Constable's Correspondence in 1874. At that time
Justin Winsor wrote a letter to the Boston Advertiser (March 21,
1874) in which he said: "The account of the Barton collection,
which was printed fifteen years ago, contained the earliest public
mention, I believe, of the supposition that Scott ever engaged in
such a work, which this life of Constable now renders certain.
These later corroborative statements give a peculiar interest to the
volumes which are now in this library and which are perhaps the
only ones of the edition now in existence." The introductions to
the plays are each only a page or two long, and are mainly, like
the notes, compilations. The book corresponds fairly well with the
description given in Constable. (See Vol. III, pp. 183, 193, 237-8,

241, 242, 244, 246, 305, 321, 442. See also Lang's Lockhart, I,
308-9, 395-6, and Lang's Introduction to Peveril of the Peak.)

1827
The Life of Napoleon Buonaparte, Emperor of the French. With a
preliminary view of the French Revolution. By the author of Waverley.
9 vols. Edinburgh.

Chronicles of the Canongate. First series:
The Highland Widow.
The Two Drovers.
The Surgeon's Daughter

Memoirs of the Marchioness de la Rochejaquelin. Translated from the
French. Edinburgh. (Constable's Miscellany, Vol. V. Introduction and
notes by Scott.)

The Miscellaneous Prose Works of Sir Walter Scott.

6 vols. Edinburgh, 1827, and Boston, 1829.

9 vols. Paris, 1827-34.

30 vols. London, 1834-46. (Containing many of the reviews
contributed by Scott to periodicals.)

Same, first 28 vols. (Omitting the Letters on Demonology and
Witchcraft.) Edinburgh, 1842-6, 1851, and 1861.

7 vols. Paris, 1837-8.

8 vols. Paris, 1840?

3 vols. Edinburgh, 1841-2, 1846, and 1854.

1827-55
The Bannatyne Miscellany; containing original papers and tracts
relating to the history and literature of Scotland. (Edited by Sir Walter
Scott, D. Laing, and T. Thomson.) 3 vols.

1828
Tales of a Grandfather. First series. 3 vols. Edinburgh. Religious
Discourses. By a layman. London.

Two sermons written by Sir Walter for George Huntly Gordon,
then a Probationer. Afterwards published by Gordon, with the
author's permission, to raise money.

Chronicles of the Canongate. Second series:
The Fair Maid of Perth.

Proceedings in the Court-martial held upon John, Master of Sinclair,
captain-lieutenant in Preston's regiment, for the murder of Ensign
Schaw of the same regiment, and Captain Schaw, of the Royals, 17
October, 1708; with correspondence respecting that transaction.
Edinburgh.

Edited by Sir Walter Scott and presented by him to the
Roxburghe club. Some of the same material seems to have been
used in the book named below:

Memoirs of the Insurrection in 1715, by John, Master of
Sinclair. With notes by Sir Walter Scott. Edinburgh, 1858, printed
for the Abbotsford Club.

1829
Papers relative to the Regalia of Scotland. Edinburgh. Edited by Sir
Walter Scott and presented to the members of the Bannatyne Club by
William Bell, Esq.

Memorials of George Bannatyne, 1545-1608. Edited by Sir Walter
Scott for the Bannatyne Club. Edinburgh.

Scott wrote the memoir of George Bannatyne which occupies
the first 25 pages of the book. This memoir is also to be found in
the publications of the Hunterian Club, part 8, published in 1886.

Anne of Geierstein.

Tales of a Grandfather. Second series.

1829-32
Novels, Tales, and Romances, with introductions and notes by the
author. (The "Opus Magnum.")

The same material is used in the following books:

Introductions and notes and illustrations to the novels, tales,
and romances of the author of Waverley. 3 vols., Edinburgh,
1833.

Autobiography of Sir Walter Scott. Philadelphia, 1831.
Anderson, in his bibliography of Scott, gives this as a
supposititious work, but with the exception of the title it is
genuine, for it is simply the piecing together of Scott's
introductions to his novels.

1830
Tales of a Grandfather. Third series.

The Doom of Devorgoil, and Auchindrane or The Ayrshire Tragedy.

Letters on Demonology and Witchcraft, addressed to J.G. Lockhart,
Esq. London. (The Family Library.)

Other editions: New York, 1845; London, 1868 and 1876,
(illustrated by Cruikshank); London 1884, with an introduction by
Henry Morley. Included in the 30 vol. edition of the
Miscellaneous Prose works, but not in the 28 vol. edition.

Poems, with prefaces by the author. 11 vols. Introductory Remarks on
Popular Poetry (prefixed to Minstrelsy, Vol. I) and Essay on Imitations
of the Ancient Ballad (prefixed to Minstrelsy, Vol. III).

These essays were printed in 1830 and attached to the edition
of the poems then on sale. They were first regularly included in
the edition of 1833.

The History of Scotland. (Lardner's Cabinet Cyclopedia.) 2 vols.
London. [Not in the Miscellaneous Prose Works.]

1831
Tales of a Grandfather. Fourth series. History of France.

The Life of Samuel Johnson, LL.D., including a Journal of his Tour to
the Hebrides, by James Boswell, Esq. New edition with numerous
anecdotes and notes by The Right Hon. John Wilson Croker, M.P.... 10
vols. London. [Scott wrote and signed the notes for the Tour to the
Hebrides.]

Trial of Duncan Terig, alias Clerk, and Alexander Bane Macdonald, for
the murder of Arthur Davis, Sergeant in General Guise's regiment of
foot. June, A.D. 1754. Edinburgh.

"To the members of the Bannatyne Club, this copy of a trial,
involving a curious point of evidence, is presented, by Walter
Scott." There is an introduction of 11 pages, giving the story of
the crime, and bringing together instances from literature and
history of the evidence of ghosts being cited in trials. That is the
"curious point of evidence" referred to. The proceedings of the
court are then reprinted without annotation.

1832
Tales of my Landlord. Fourth series:
Count Robert of Paris.
Castle Dangerous.

1848
Two Bannatyne Garlands from Abbotsford.

This little book was prepared for members of the Bannatyne
club by the secretary, D. Laing. It contains two ballads—of which
one is ancient and one a modern imitation written by Robert
Surtees—annotated by Scott.

1889

Reliquiae Trottosienses, or Catalogue of the Gabions of the late
Jonathan Oldbuck. (Partially published in Harper's Magazine for
April, 1889: Vol. lxxviii, pp. 778-788. This fragment describing the
main apartments at Abbotsford is the only part of the Reliquiae
Trottosienses that has been printed. There is a short introduction by
Mary Monica Maxwell Scott.)

The same material was included in the following book:
Abbotsford, the personal relics and antiquarian treasures of Sir
Walter Scott, described by the Hon. Mary Monica Maxwell Scott.
London, 1893.

1890
The Journal of Sir Walter Scott, from the original manuscript at
Abbotsford. (Edited by David Douglas.) 2 vols. Edinburgh.

Second edition, 1891. Large extracts from this Journal had
previously been published in Lockhart's Life of Scott.

2. Contributions to Periodicals.

(a) Reviews

(Most of these essays are reprinted in the 28 and 30 volume editions of
Scott's Miscellaneous Prose Works. Articles not included in that collection
are marked by a note indicating the evidence on which they are attributed to
Scott.)

1803
Amadis de Gaul, translated by Southey and by Rose. (Edinburgh
Review, October. Vol. III.)

Sibbald's Chronicle of Scottish Poetry. (Edinburgh, October. Vol. III.
Not in M.P.W. See Lockhart, Vol. I, p. 335.)

1804

Godwin's Life of Chaucer. (Edinburgh, January. Vol. III.)

Ellis's Specimens of the Early English Poets. (Edinburgh, April. Vol.
IV.)

The Life and Works of Chatterton. (Edinburgh, April. Vol. IV.)

1805
Johnes's Translation of Froissart. (Edinburgh, January. Vol. V.)

Colonel Thornton's Sporting Tour. (Edinburgh, January. Vol. V.)

Fleetwood, a novel by William Godwin. (Edinburgh, April. Vol. VI.)

The New Practice of Cookery. (Edinburgh, July. Vol. VI.)

The Ossianic Poems. (Edinburgh, July. Vol. VI. Not in M.P.W. See
Lockhart, Vol. I, p. 409.)

Todd's Edition of Spenser. (Edinburgh, October. Vol. VII.)

1806
Ellis's Specimens of English Romance, and Ritson's Ancient English
Metrical Romances. (Edinburgh, January. Vol. VII.)

The Miseries of Human Life. [By Rev. James Beresford.] (Edinburgh,
October. Vol. IX.)

Miscellaneous Poetry by the Hon. William Herbert. (Edinburgh,
October. Vol. IX.)

1809
Reliques of Burns, collected by R.H. Cromek. (Quarterly Review,
February. Vol. I.)

Southey's Translation of The Cid. (Quarterly, February. Vol. I.)

Sir John Carr's Caledonian Sketches. (Quarterly, February. Vol. I.)

Campbell's Gertrude of Wyoming and other poems. (Quarterly, May.
Vol. I.)

John de Lancaster, a novel by Richard Cumberland. (Quarterly, May.
Vol. I.)

The Battles of Talavera, a poem [by John Wilson Croker]. (Quarterly,
November. Vol. II.)

1810
The Fatal Revenge or The Family of Montorio, a romance [by C.R.
Maturin]. (Quarterly, May. Vol. III.)

Collections of Ballads and Songs by R.H. Evans and John Aiken.
(Quarterly, May. Vol. III.)

1811
Southey's Curse of Kehama. (Quarterly, February. Vol. V.)

1815
Emma and other novels by Jane Austen. (Quarterly, October. Vol. XIV.
Not in M.P.W. See Lockhart, Vol. IV, p. 3.)

1816
The Culloden Papers. (Quarterly, January. Vol. XIV.)

Childe Harold, Canto III, and other poems by Lord Byron. (Quarterly,
October. Vol. XVI.)

1817
Tales of My Landlord. [Probably written with the help of William
Erskine. See Lockhart, Vol. III, p. 81. See also the Introduction to
Waverley, written in 1830.] (Quarterly, January. Vol. XVI.)

1818
Douglas on Military Bridges. (Quarterly, May. Vol. XVIII. Not in
M.P.W. See Lockhart, Vol. III, p. 173.)

Kirkton's History of the Church of Scotland, edited by C.K. Sharpe.
(Quarterly, May. Vol. XVIII.)

Letters from Horace Walpole to George Montague. (Quarterly, April.
Vol. XIX. Not in M.P.W. See Memoir of John Murray, Vol. II, p. 12.)

Childe Harold, Canto IV. (Quarterly, April. Vol. XIX.)

Women or Pour et Contre, a tale [by C.R. Maturin]. (Edinburgh, June.
Vol. XXX.)

Frankenstein, a novel [by Mrs. Shelley]. (Blackwood, March. Vol. II.)

Remarks on General Gourgaud's Narrative. (Blackwood, November.
Vol. IV. Not in M.P.W. See Lockhart, Vol. III, p. 238.)

1824
The Correspondence of Lady Suffolk. (Quarterly, January. Vol. XXX.)

1826
Pepys' Diary. (Quarterly, March. Vol. XXXIII.) Boaden's Life of
Kemble, and Kelly's Reminiscences. (Quarterly, June. Vol. XXXIV.)

The Omen [by John Galt]. (Blackwood, July. Vol. XX.)

1827
Mackenzie's Life and Works of John Home. (Quarterly, June. Vol.
XXXVI.)

The Forester's Guide, by Robert Monteath. On Planting Waste Lands.
(Quarterly, October. Vol. XXXVI.)

On the Supernatural in Fictitious Composition, and particularly on the
Works of Hoffman. (Foreign Quarterly Review, July. Vol. I.)

See also Contes Fantastiques de E.T.A. Hoffmann, traduits de
l'Allemand par M. Loève-Veimars, et précédés d'une notice
historique sur Hoffmann par Walter Scott. Paris, 1830. 16 vols.

1828
The Planter's Guide, by Sir Henry Steuart. On Landscape Gardening.
(Quarterly, March. Vol. XXXVII.)

Sir Humphrey Davy's Salmonia or Days of Fly-fishing. (Quarterly,
October. Vol. XXXVIII.)

Molière. (Foreign Quarterly Review, February. Vol. II.)

1829
Hajji Baba in England; and The Kuzzilbash, a tale of Khorasan.
(Quarterly, January. Vol. XXXIX.)

Ritson's Annals of the Caledonians, Picts, and Scots, etc. (Quarterly,
July. Vol. XLI.)

Tytler's History of Scotland. (Quarterly, November. Vol. XLI.)

Revolutions of Naples in 1647 and 1648. (Foreign Quarterly Review,
August. Vol. IV. Not in M.P.W. See Journal, Vol. I, p. 145, and Vol. II,
p. 278.)

1830
Southey's Life of John Bunyan. (Quarterly, October. Vol. XLIII.)

1831
Pitcairn's Ancient Criminal Trials. (Quarterly, February. Vol. XLIV.)

(b) Contributions to the Edinburgh Annual Register

(The dates given are those on the volumes. In most cases the book was
issued about a year and a half after the nominal date. Most of Scott's
contributions are unsigned. Those which were afterwards included in the
collected edition of his poems are in this list marked "Poems"; in other
cases (unless the article is signed) a note is made of the reason for
attributing it to Scott).

1808 Vol. I, part 2.
The Bard's Incantation. Poems.

To a Lady, with Flowers from a Roman Wall. Poems.

The Violet. Poems.

Hunting Song. Poems.

The Resolve. Poems.

View of the changes proposed and adopted in the administration of
justice in Scotland. (See Lockhart, Vol. II, p. 154.)

Living Poets of Great Britain. (From internal evidence I think this
article may have been written by Scott, and am sure that he dictated
many of the opinions it expresses, if he is not responsible for the
whole.)

1809 Vol. II, part 2.
The Vision of Don Roderick. (Reprinted from the first edition.) Poems.

Epitaph designed for a Monument to be erected in Lichfield Cathedral
to the Rev. Thomas Seward. Poems.

Cursory remarks upon the French order of battle, particularly in the
campaigns of Buonaparte. (See Lockhart, Vol. II, p. 161.)

Periodical Criticism. (From internal evidence I am sure that this was
written by Scott. The style is decidedly more interesting than that of
the article on the poets, in the volume for the preceding year.)
The Inferno of Altisidora. (This immediately follows the article on
Periodical Criticism, and is a burlesque sketch on the same subject. It
serves to introduce the following imitations, respectively, of Crabbe,
Moore, and Scott himself.)

The Poacher.

"Oh say not, my love, with that mortified air."

The Vision of Triermain.

1810 Vol. III, part 2.
Account of the poems of Patrick Carey, a poet of the seventeenth
century. (Afterwards prefixed to the volume of Carey's poems
published in 1820. See Lockhart, Vol. II, pp. 245-8.)

1811 Vol. IV, part 2.
Biographical memoir of John Leyden, M.D. (In the Miscellaneous
Prose Works.)

1812 Vol. V, part 2.
Extracts from a journal kept during a coasting voyage through the
Scottish Islands. (Published in complete form in Lockhart, Vol. II.)

1813 Vol. VI.
The Dance of Death. Poems.

Romance of Dunois, from the French. Poems.

Song for the anniversary meeting of the Pitt Club of Scotland. Poems.

Song on the lifting of the banner of the House of Buccleuch, at a great
football match on Carterhaugh. Poems.

1814 Vol. VII.
Historical Review of the Year. (See Lockhart, Vol. III, p. 76.)

1815 Vol. VIII.
Historical Review of the Year. (See Lockhart, Vol. III, p. 124.)

The Search after Happiness, or the Quest of Sultaun Solimaun.
(Reprinted from the Sale-Room. See Lockhart, Vol. III, pp. 89-90.)

1816 Vol. IX.
The Noble Moringer. Translated from the German. Poems. (See also
the introduction to The Betrothed.)

1817 Vol. X.

Farewell Address, spoken by Mr. Kemble to the Edinburgh Theatre, on
the 29th March, 1817. (Reprinted from the Sale-Room. ) Poems.

1824 Vol. XVII.
To Mons. Alexandre.

(c) Contributions to other periodicals

Scott contributed frequently to The Edinburgh Weekly Journal, edited and
published by James Ballantyne. Some of the articles are reprinted in the
Miscellaneous Prose Works. Lockhart reprints in the Life Scott's account of
the coronation of George IV., and his Reply to General Gourgaud.

Scott also contributed to The Sale-Room, a weekly paper edited and
published by John Ballantyne from January 4 to July 12, 1817 (28
numbers). (See Lockhart, Vol. III, p. 89.)

To The Keepsake, an annual, Scott contributed in 1828 The Tapestried
Chamber, My Aunt Margaret's Mirror, and The Laird's Jock, and in 1830
The House of Aspen.

In Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Vol. I, appeared three articles
entitled "Notices concerning the Scottish Gypsies," for which Scott
furnished a large part of the material. (Numbers for April, May, and
September, 1817.) Lockhart says that Scott dictated to Thomas Pringle "a
collection of anecdotes concerning Scottish gypsies, which attracted a good
deal of notice." The first article refers to "Mr. Walter Scott, a gentleman to
whose distinguished assistance and advice we have been on the present
occasion very peculiarly indebted, and who has not only furnished us with
many interesting particulars himself, but has also obligingly directed us to
other sources of curious information." Scott quotes from the first of the
three articles in his review of Tales of My Landlord, and he afterwards used
the same anecdotes in the introduction to Guy Mannering.

3. Books which contain letters written by Scott.

(As there is no complete collection of Scott's letters it has been thought
wise to name the various sources, so far as the letters have appeared at all in
print, from which such a collection might be made. The list includes only
those books or articles in which letters were published for the first time; yet
it is probably far from exhaustive. Notes are given in regard to the number
or kind of the letters from Scott to be found in some of the less-known
books.)

Memoirs of Sir Walter Scott, by J.G. Lockhart.

Edinburgh, 7 vols. 1837-8. 10 vols. 1839. Abridged edition 1848.
The edition referred to throughout this study is that published by
Macmillan and Company in 5 volumes, 1900.

Familiar Letters of Sir Walter Scott [edited by D. Douglas].

2 vols. Edinburgh, 1894.

Letters and Recollections of Sir Walter Scott, by Mrs. Hughes (of
Uffington), edited by Horace G. Hutchinson.

London, 1904. (First published in The Century, xliv: 424 and 566;
July and August, 1903.)

The Life and Letters of John Gibson Lockhart, by Andrew Lang, from
Abbotsford and Milton Lockhart mss. and other original sources.

2 vols. London, 1897.

These volumes contain many letters from Scott to Lockhart.

Memoir and Correspondence of the late John Murray, with an account of
the origin and progress of the House, 1768-1843, by Samuel Smiles.

2 vols. London, 1891.

This book contains many letters from Scott to Murray, who
published some of Scott's works and was the proprietor of the
Quarterly Review.

Archibald Constable and his Literary Correspondents. A Memorial by his
son Thomas Constable.

3 vols. Edinburgh, 1873.

The third volume is wholly taken up with an account of Scott's
relations with Constable, his publisher, and many letters are given. See
also Vol. II, pages 347 and 474.

[The Ballantyne and Lockhart Pamphlets.]

I. Refutation of the Misstatements and Calumnies contained in Mr.
Lockhart's Life of Sir Walter Scott, bart., respecting the Messrs.
Ballantyne, by the trustees and son of the late Mr. James Ballantyne.
(1835.)
II. The Ballantyne Humbug Handled by the author of the Life of Sir
Walter Scott. (1839.)
III. Reply to Mr. Lockhart's Pamphlet, entitled "The Ballantyne-Humbug
Handled," etc. (1839.)

The two last pamphlets contain numerous letters of Scott's. For a
history of Scott's publishing operations these pamphlets should be
studied in connection with the Memoirs of Lockhart, Murray, and
Constable.

Annals of a Publishing House; William Blackwood and his sons, their
magazine and friends. By Mrs. Oliphant.

3rd edition, 2 vols. Edinburgh, 1897.

About half a dozen letters not elsewhere published are given in this
book.

Letters from and to Charles Kirkpatrick Sharpe, Esq., edited by Alexander
Allardyce, with a memoir by Rev. W.K.R. Bedford.

2 vols. Edinburgh, 1888.

Lockhart wrote to Sharpe in 1834: "He had preserved so many
letters of yours.... that I must suppose the correspondence was
considered by himself as one not of the common sort." (Vol. II, p.
479.) Both men were authors and antiquaries, and their letters as given
in this book illustrate their favorite studies.

Lady Louisa Stuart. Selections from her manuscripts, edited by Hon. James
Home.

London, 1899. (One section of the book is entitled "Unpublished
Letters of Sir Walter Scott and Lady Louisa Stuart.")

Abbotsford Notanda, by Robert Carruthers. Subjoined to the Life of Sir
Walter Scott by Robert Chambers, edited by W. Chambers.

London, 1871.

Letters from Scott to Hogg and Laidlaw are included.

Memorials of Coleorton, being letters from Coleridge, Wordsworth and his
Sister, Southey, and Sir Walter Scott, to Sir George and Lady Beaumont of
Coleorton, Leicestershire, 1803 to 1834. Edited, with introduction and
notes, by William Knight.

2 vols. Boston, 1887.

The second volume contains three letters by Scott.

The Letters of Sir Walter Scott and Charles Kirkpatrick Sharpe to Robert
Chambers, 1821-45. With original memoranda of Sir Walter Scott, etc.
[Edited by C.E.S. Chambers.]

Edinburgh, 1904.

Reminiscences of Sir Walter Scott, by John Gibson.

Edinburgh, 1871.

Besides nine letters from Scott this book gives in full a memorial
written by him in regard to the claim of Constable's trustee on
Woodstock and Napoleon.

Traditions and Recollections, Domestic, Clerical, and Literary; in which are
included letters of Charles II, Cromwell, Fairfax, Edgecumbe, Macaulay,
Wolcot, Opie, Whitaker, Gibbon, Buller, Courtenay, Moore, Downman,
Drewe, Seward, Darwin, Cowper, Hayley, Hardinge, Sir Walter Scott, and
other distinguished characters. By the Rev. R. Polwhele.

2 vols. London, 1826.

Vol. II. contains five letters from Scott.

Letters of Sir Walter Scott, addressed to the Rev. R. Polwhele; D. Gilbert,
Esq.; Francis Douce, Esq.; etc.

London, 1832.

Twenty-eight letters from Scott are given, of which at least one had
previously been published.

A Memoir of the Life and Writings of the late William Taylor of Norwich,
... containing his correspondence of many years with the late Robert
Southey, Esq., and original letters from Sir Walter Scott, and other eminent
literary men. Compiled and edited by J.W. Robberds, F.G.S., of Norwich.

2 vols. London, 1843.

Vol. I. contains two letters from Scott, of which the second has
decided critical interest. See pp. 94-100. Vol. II. has one letter from
Scott. See p. 533.

Memoirs of Sir William Knighton, Bart. G.C.H. ... including his
correspondence with many distinguished personages. By Lady Knighton.

Philadelphia, 1838.

Fourteen letters from Scott are given.

Letters between James Ellis, Esq., and Walter Scott, Esq.

Newcastle-upon-Tyne, 1850.

The letters from Scott are two in number.

Haydon's Correspondence and Table-talk, with a Memoir by his son,
Frederick Wordsworth Haydon.

2 vols., London, 1876.

The first volume contains a few letters by Scott.

The Life and Letters of Washington Irving, by his nephew, Pierre M. Irving.

4 vols., New York, 1865.

Vol. I, p. 240, contains a letter to Brevoort; pp. 439-40, 442-4 and
450-1 contain three letters to Irving.

Memorials of James Hogg, by M.G. Garden.

London, 1903.

Four letters by Scott are included.

Memoirs of a Literary Veteran, including sketches and anecdotes of the
most distinguished literary characters from 1794 to 1849, by R.P. Gillies.

3 vols. London, 1851.

Vol. II, pp. 77-83, contains three letters from Scott; Vol. III, pp. 143-
4, contains one.

Sir Walter Scott. The story of his life, by R. Shelton Mackenzie.

Boston, 1871.

See p. 471 for a letter not published elsewhere.

Byron's Letters and Journals. Rowland E. Prothero, ed.

6 vols., London, 1898-1901.

See Vol. VI, p. 55 for a letter of Scott's not published elsewhere.

Catalogue of the Exhibition held at Edinburgh in July and August, 1871, on
occasion of the commemoration of the centenary of the birth of Sir Walter
Scott.

Edinburgh, 1872.

This catalogue contains notices of the autograph letters which were
exhibited, and prints a few of the letters.

A Critical Dictionary of English Literature and British and American
Authors.... By S. Austin Allibone.

3 vols. Philadelphia, 1870.

Two letters from Scott to Ticknor are given in the article on Scott.

Fragments of Voyages and Travel, by Basil Hall. Third series.

Chapter I. contains a letter written by Scott in the original
manuscript of The Antiquary, explaining why the author particularly
liked that novel.

Letters, hitherto unpublished, written by members of Sir Walter Scott's
family to their old governess. Edited, with an introduction and notes, by the
Warden of Wadham College, Oxford.

London, 1905.

See pp. 13-15 for a letter from Scott, and pp. 37-38 for a note of
instructions in regard to his daughter Sophia's history lessons.

Correspondence between J. Fenimore Cooper and Sir Walter Scott.

The Knickerbocker Magazine, xi: 380; April, 1838.

The letter from Scott to Cooper quoted above, p. 102, is here given.

Fiction, Fair and Foul. By John Ruskin.

Nineteenth Century, viii: 195; August, 1880.

A footnote on pp. 196-7 contains fragments of five letters from Scott
to the builder of Abbotsford.

Wordsworth's Poetical Works. Edited by William Knight.

II vols. Edinburgh, 1882.

See the index. Vol. XI, p. 196 has a letter from Scott which I think
had not previously been published. Vol. X, p. 105, gives one which
Lockhart quotes "very imperfectly," according to Prof. Knight.

Portraits of Illustrious Personages of Great Britain ... with biographical and
historical memoirs of their lives and actions, by Edmund Lodge.

London, 1835.

Vol. I contains, in the appendix to the preface, a letter from Scott to
the publisher, dated 25th March 1828. (See Lockhart, V, 350.)

The Life and Letters of Maria Edgeworth, edited by Augustus J.C. Hare.

2 vols. Boston, 1895.

This contains a few letters of Scott's, but only one which is not
published elsewhere.

A Short Account of successful exertions in behalf of the fatherless and
widows after the war in 1814; containing letters from Mr. Wilberforce, Sir
Walter Scott, Marshal Blücher, etc. By Rudolf Ackermann.

Oxford, 1871.

There is only one letter by Scott.

The Courser's Manual, etc., by T. Goodlake. 1828.

This book contains one letter by Scott, dated 16th October, 1828,
about an old Scottish poem entitled "The Last Words of Bonny Heck."
(See Lockhart, V. 219, for what is doubtless the same letter.)

The Chimney-sweeper's Friend and Climbing-boy's Album. Arranged by
James Montgomery.

London, 1824.

The Preface contains part of a letter from Scott, in which he
describes the construction of the chimneys at Abbotsford. (See
Lockhart, IV. 158-9.)

APPENDIX II.

1. Bibliographies of Scott

Allibone, S.A. Dictionary of British and American Authors and
Literature. 3 vols. Phil., 1870.

Anderson, J.P. Bibliography of Scott, in the Life of Scott by C.D. Yonge
(Great Writers Series). London, 1888.

Lockhart's Life of Scott; the Centenary Catalogue (see above, p. 171); the
British Museum Catalogue; the Dictionary of National Biography.

2. A partial list of the books used in the preparation of this Study, aside
from those given in the bibliography of Scott's works. (See particularly the
list of books which contain letters written by Scott: Appendix I. 3.)

Adolphus, J.L.
Letters to Richard Heber, Esq., containing critical remarks on the
series of novels beginning with "Waverley," and an attempt to ascertain
their author. Second edition. London, 1822.

Aitken, G.A., ed.
Romances and Narratives by Daniel Defoe. 16 vols. London, 1895.

Arnold, Matthew.
Byron. In Essays in Criticism. Second series. London, 1889.

Carlyle, Thomas.
Sir Walter Scott. In Critical and Miscellaneous Essays. 4 vols. London,
1857.

Chambers, E.K.
The Mediaeval Stage. 2 vols. Oxford, 1903.

Chesterton, G.K.
Varied Types. New York, 1903.

Child, Francis J.
English and Scottish Popular Ballads. 5 vols. Boston, 1882-96.

English and Scottish Popular Ballads, edited from the collection of
Francis James Child by Helen Child Sargent and George Lyman
Kittredge. Boston, 1904.

Clemens, S.L. (Mark Twain).
Life on the Mississippi. Boston, 1883.

Cockburn, Henry.
Memorials of His Time. Edinburgh, 1874.

Coleridge, S.T.
Specimens of the Table Talk of Samuel Taylor Coleridge. 2 vols.
London, 1835.

Letters of Samuel Taylor Coleridge, edited by E.H. Coleridge. 2 vols.
Boston, 1895.

Collins, J. Churton.
Ephemera Critica. London, 1901.

Courthope, W.J.
A History of English Poetry. 4 vols. New York, 1895-1903.

The Liberal Movement in English Literature. London, 1885.

Cunningham, Allan.
Life of Scott. Boston, 1832.

Dowden, Edward.
Life of Percy Bysshe Shelley. 2 vols. London, 1886.

Fitzgerald, Percy.
New History of the English Stage, from the Restoration to the liberty
of the theatres, in connection with the patent houses. 2 vols. London,
1882.

Forster, John.
Walter Savage Landor, a biography. 2 vols. London, 1869.

Freeman, E.A.
The History of the Norman Conquest of England. 5 vols. New York,
1873.

Gates, L.E.
Three Studies in Literature. New York, 1899.

Gillies, R.P.
Recollections of Sir Walter Scott. (Republished in book form from
Fraser's Magazine, Sept., Nov., Dec. 1835, and Jan., 1836.)

Hazlitt, William.
Collected Works, edited by A.R. Waller and Arnold Glover. 12 vols.
London, 1902-4. (Spirit of the Age, Vol. IV; Plain Speaker, Vol. VII;
Dramatic Essays, Vol. VIII.)

Herford, C.H.
The Age of Wordsworth. (Handbooks of English Literature.) London,
1905.

Hogg, James, ed.
Jacobite Relics of Scotland, being the songs, airs, and legends of the
adherents of the House of Stuart. 2 vols. Edinburgh, 1819-21.

Domestic Manners and Private Life of Sir Walter Scott. Glasgow,
1834.

Hudson, W.H.
Sir Walter Scott, London, 1901.

Hunt, J.H. Leigh.
Autobiography; with reminiscences of friends and contemporaries. 2
vols. New York, 1850.

Feast of the Poets. London, 1814.

Lord Byron and some of his contemporaries. Second edition. 2 vols.
London, 1828.

Hutton, R.H.
Sir Walter Scott. (English Men of Letters.) New York, 1878.

Irving, Washington.
Abbotsford and Newstead Abbey. (First volume of the "Crayon
Miscellany.") London, 1835.

Lang, Andrew.
Sir Walter Scott (Literary Lives). New York, 1906.

Border edition of the Waverley Novels, 48 vols. London, 1892-1894.

Laing, Malcolm, ed.
Poems of Ossian, containing the poetical works of James MacPherson
in prose and verse. 2 vols. Edinburgh, 1805.

Legaré, H.S.
Writings.... Edited by his sister. Charleston, S.C., 1846.

Lounsbury, T.R.
James Fenimore Cooper. (American Men of Letters.) Boston, 1882.

Maigron, Louis.
Le Roman Historique à l'Époque Romantique: essai sur l'influence de
Walter Scott. Paris, 1898.

Masson, David.
British Novelists and Their Styles. Cambridge, Eng., 1859.

Matthews, Brander.

The Historical Novel, etc. New York, 1901.

Meteyard, Eliza.
A Group of Englishmen (1795-1815), being records of the younger
Wedgwoods and their friends. London, 1871.

Millar, J.H.
The Mid-Eighteenth Century. (Periods of European Literature.) New
York, 1902.

Moore, Thomas.
Letters and Journals of Lord Byron, with notices of his life. 2 vols.
London, 1830.

Myers, F.W.H.
Wordsworth. (English Men of Letters.) New York, 1881.

Newman, J.H.
Apologia Pro Vita Sua. London, 1892.

Nichol, John.
Byron. (English Men of Letters.) New York, 1880.

Palgrave, F.T.
Biographical and Critical Memoir of Sir Walter Scott. (In Poetical
Works of Scott. London, 1866, Macmillan and Company.)

Paris, Gaston.
La Littérature Française au Moyen Age. Paris, 1890.

Percy, W.
Reliques of Ancient English Poetry, consisting of old heroic ballads,
songs, and other pieces of our earlier poets (chiefly of the lyric kind)
together with some few of later date. 3 vols. London, 1765.

Pierce, E.L.
Memoirs and Letters of Charles Sumner. 2 vols. Boston, 1877.

Ruskin, John.

Modern Painters. New edition, 5 vols. London, 1897.

Saintsbury, George.
Life of Scott. (Famous Scots Series.) New York. [1897.]

A History of Criticism and Literary Taste in Europe.... 3 vols. New
York, 1900-1904.

Scott, Temple, ed.
The Prose Works of Jonathan Swift, D.D. (Bohn's Standard Library.)
London, 1898-1905.

Southey, Robert.
Selections from the Letters of Robert Southey, edited by John Wood
Warter. 4 vols. London, 1856.

Stephen, Leslie.
English Literature and Society in the Eighteenth Century. (Ford
Lectures, 1903.) London, 1904.

Swift. (English Men of Letters.) New York, 1882.

Taine, H.A.
Histoire de la Littérature Anglaise. 4 vols. Paris, 1863-64.

Ticknor, George.
Life, Letters, and Journals of George Ticknor. Sixth edition. 2 vols.
Boston, 1877.

White, A.D.
Autobiography. 3 vols. New York, 1905.

Wylie, L.J.
Studies in the Evolution of English Criticism. Boston, 1894.

3. Periodicals and articles referred to, aside from the articles written by
Scott.

The Bibliographer:
Notes for a Bibliography of Swift, by Stanley Lane-Poole. Vol. VI, pp.
160-71.

The Edinburgh Review:
Review of The Minstrelsy of the Scottish Border, Vol. I, pp. 395-406;
Review of Sir Tristrem, Vol. IV, pp. 427-43; Review of Scott's edition
of Swift, Vol. XXVII, pp. 1-58; Border Ballads, Vol. CCIII, pp. 306-
26.

The English Historical Review:
Dean Swift and The Memoirs of Captain Carleton, by Col. the Hon.
Arthur Parnell, R.E. Vol. VI, pp. 97-151.

Fraser's Magazine:
Review of Letters on Demonology and Witchcraft, Vol. II, pp. 507-
519.

The Knickerbocker Magazine:
Review by J. Fenimore Cooper of Lockhart's Life of Scott, Vol. XII,
pp. 349 ff.

Macmillan's Magazine:
The Historical Novel: Scott and Dumas, by Prof. Saintsbury, Vol.
LXX, pp. 321-330.

The Nineteenth Century:
Defoe's "Apparition of Mrs. Veal," by G.A. Aitken, Vol. XXXVII, pp.
95 ff.

The Quarterly Review:
Review of Dunlop's History of Fiction, Vol. XIII, pp. 384-408; Review
of Frankenstein, Vol. XVIII, pp. 37-385; Review of The Lives of the
Novelists, Vol. XXXIV, pp. 349-378.

INDEX.

Abbot, The, 88, 132, 155
Abbotsford and Newstead Abbey, 15, 176
Abbotsford, described by the Hon. Mary Monica Maxwell Scott, 161
Abbotsford Notanda, 169
Absalom and Achitophel, 60, 63-4, 66
Account of the Death of Frederick, Duke of York, An, 156
Addison, Joseph, 80
Adolphus, J.L., see Letters to Heber
Aeschylus, 50
Age of Wordsworth, The, 10, 20, 125, 131, 136, 175
Aiken's Collection of Songs, Scott's review of, 26, 163
Aitken, G.A., 77, 174, 178
Alastor, 89
Alexander's Feast, 63, 139
Allibone, S.A., 56, 153, 172, 174
Amadis de Gaul, Scott's review of, 4, 37, 128, 129, 162
Ancient British Drama, 52, 151-2
Ancient Criminal Trials, Scott's review of, 46, 143, 165
Ancient English Metrical Romances, Scott's review of, 125, 162
Ancient Mariner, The, 87-8
Ancient Times, 149

Anderson, J.P., see Bibliography of Scott
Annals of a Publishing House, 169
Annals of the Caledonians, etc., Scott's review of, 164
Anne of Geierstein, 51, 65, 104, 127, 160
Antiquary, The, 3, 50, 51, 89, 154, 172
Apologia, Newman's, 142, 176
Apology for Tales of Terror, 147
Apparition of Mrs. Veal, The, 76-7, 178
Arbuthnot, John, 68
Ariosto, 33, 105
Aristotle, 53, 54
Arnold, Matthew, 95-6, 174
Auchindrane, or The Ayrshire Tragedy, 160
Auchinleck Manuscript, The, 34, 148
Auld Robin Gray, 157
Austen, Jane, 75, 100, 130
Autobiography of Scott, 160

Bage, Robert, 73, 75, 79
Baillie, Joanna, 46, 85, 97, 98, 114, 118, 151, 156
Ballad Book, The, 28, 148
Ballads and Lyrical Pieces, 148
Ballantyne and Lockhart Pamphlets, The, 149, 169
Bannatyne, Memoir of, 44, 160
Bannatyne Miscellany, The, 159
Barnard, Lady Anne, 157

Bartholomew Fair, 118
Battle of Brunanburgh, The, 20, 43
Battles of Talavera, Scott's review of, 106, 112-13, 163
Beaumont and Fletcher, 42, 50, 51, 52, 56
Beggar's Bush, The, 50
Beggar's Opera, The, 50
Beowulf, 42
Berners, John, Lord, 128
Betrothed, The, 157, 167
Bibliographer, The, 67, 177
Bibliography of Scott, Anderson's, 174
Bibliothèque Bleue, 33
Bibliothèque de Romans, 33
Black Dwarf, The, 3, 87, 109, 154
Blackmore, Sir Richard, 80
Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, 78, 83, 100, 164, 167, 169
Blair, Hugh, 15
Boaden's Life of Kemble, Scott's review of, 46, 47, 58, 164
Boiardo, 33
Boileau, 136
Border Antiquities, 153
Boswell, James, 80, 161
Brennoralt, 51
Bridal of Triermain, The, 27, 152
Bride of Lammermoor, The, 3, 34, 155
British Novelists and Their Styles, 3, 145, 176

Brome, Richard, 50
Broughton, Hugh, 71
Brown, Charles Brockden, 104
Buchan, Peter, 27
Bunyan, Scott's review of Southey's Life of, 111, 165
Bürger, Gottfried, 18, 31, 147
Burney, Fanny, 100
Burns, Robert, 22, 30, 86, 93, 96
Burt's Letters from the North of Scotland, 154
Butler, Samuel, 64
Byron, George Gordon, Lord, 11, 50, 86, 88-9, 91, 92-6, 97, 98, 99,
101, 104, 105, 106, 110, 121, 129, 143, 163, 171, 176

Cadyow Castle, 30
Cain, 95
Caledonian Sketches, Scott's review of, 84, 163
Calprenède, 53, 76
Campbell, Thomas, 96, 100, 118, 163
Carey, Patrick, 155
Carey, Robert, Memoirs of, 149, 151
Carleton, Captain, Memoirs of, 68, 144, 148, 178
Carlyle, Thomas, 125, 131, 144, 174
Carr, Sir John, 84, 163
Cartwright, William, 50
Castle Dangerous, 18, 34, 161
Castle of Otranto, The, 76

Catalogue of the Centenary Exhibition, 147, 151, 171, 174
Chambers, E.K., 21, 174
Chambers, Robert, 50, 169, 170
Changeling, The, 56
Chapman, George, 50
Chase, The, 31, 147
Chatterton, Scott's review of the Life and Works of, 43, 162
Chaucer, 43, 44-5, 62, 162
Chesterton, G.K., 11, 174
Childe Harold, 14, 88, 93, 94, 95, 129, 163
Child, Francis J., 24, 28, 31, 174
Chimney-Sweeper's Friend, 173
Chivalry, Essay on, 36, 46, 154
Christabel, 62, 86-7, 88
Christie, W.D., 60
Chronicles of the Canongate, 2, 3, 80, 119, 129, 159
Chronological Notes of Scottish Affairs, 156
Chrononhotonthologos, 50
Cid, The, Scott's review of, 92, 163
Clarissa Harlowe, 74
Clemens, Samuel L., 142, 174
Clifford, Arthur, 149
Cock and the Fox, The, 45
Cockburn, Henry, 15, 175
Coleridge, Samuel Taylor, 11, 22, 51, 86-9, 90-91, 92, 106, 135, 137,
138, 169, 175

Collins, Churton, 68, 143-4, 175
Colvin, Sidney, 100
Congreve, William, 57, 60
Conquest of Granada, The, 57
Constable, Archibald, Literary Correspondence of, 12, 33, 48, 52, 98,
104, 121, 126, 127, 154, 158, 168, 169
Conybeare, John J., 42
Cooper, J. Fenimore, 14, 101-3, 172, 178
Correspondence of Lady Suffolk, Scott's review of, 142, 164
Count Julian, 99
Count Robert of Paris, 161
Courser's Manual, The, 173
Courthope, W.J., 21, 141, 175
Cowley, Abraham, 59, 64
Cowper, William, 64
Crabbe, George, 97, 166
Craik, Sir Henry, 68
Critic, The, 50
Croker, J.W., 161, 163
Cromek's Reliques of Burns, Scott's review of, 22, 86, 163
Culloden Papers, Scott's review of, 45, 163
Cumberland, Richard, 73, 163
Cunningham, Allan, 47-8, 81-2, 96, 175
Curse of Kehama, The, Scott's review of, 91, 92, 163

Dante, 33, 92

Darkness, 88-9
Davy, Sir Humphrey, see Salmonia
Dean Swift and the Memoirs of Captain Carleton, 68, 144, 148, 178
Defoe, Daniel, 71, 73, 76-7, 148-9, 156, 178
Dekker, Thomas, 50, 56
Demonology and Witchcraft, Letters on, 45, 104, 138, 160, 178
DeQuincey, Thomas, 99
Derrick, John, 71, 150
Description of the Regalia of Scotland, 155
Diable Boiteux, Le, 74
Dictionary of British and American Authors, 56, 153, 172, 174
D'Israeli, Isaac, 20, 142
Domestic Manners and Private Life of Sir Walter Scott, 114, 175
Don Juan, 95
Donne, John, 62
Don Quixote, 33
Doom of Devorgoil, The, 46-7, 48, 160
Douce, Francis, 20
Douglas, 47, 51, 111
Douglas, David, 161, 168
Douglas on Military Bridges, Scott's review of, 163
Dowden, Prof. Edward, 91, 175
Drama, Essay on, 50, 52-9, 136, 154
Drapier's Letters, The, 69
Drayton, Michael, 62
Drelincourt's Defence, etc., 76-7

Dryden, John, 44, 59-65, 93, 112, 145
Dryden's Works, edited by Scott, 2, 5, 7, 36, 44-5, 50, 51, 52-8, 59-65,
66, 70, 73, 80, 126, 131, 136, 139, 145, 149
Dunbar, William, 44, 143-4
Dunlop, J.C., 73, 178
Dyce, Alexander, 55

Eberty, Felix, 2
Edgeworth, Maria, 75, 76, 97, 100, 101, 103, 173
Edinburgh Annual Register, The, 6, 26, 85, 91, 118, 141, 155, 165-7
Edinburgh Review, 4, 5, 18, 25, 26, 29, 31, 35, 36, 38, 40, 43, 44, 46,
61, 69, 82, 84, 91, 125, 128, 129, 134, 135, 162, 164, 178
Edinburgh Weekly Journal, The, 155, 156, 157, 167
Elliott, Hon. Fitzwilliam, 25
Ellis, George, 4, 20, 34, 35, 43, 44, 58, 60, 91, 113, 162
Ellis, James, Letters of Scott to, 171
Emma, Scott's review of, 100, 163
Encyclopædia Britannica, 37, 46, 52, 154
English and Scottish Popular Ballads, 24, 28, 31, 174
English Historical Review, The, 68, 144, 148, 178
English Literature and Society in the Eighteenth Century, 97, 177
English Minstrelsy, 151
Ephemera Critica, 143-4, 175
Evans's Old Ballads, Scott's review of, 26, 163
Eve of St. John, The, 30, 147
Evergreen, The, 28
Eyrbyggja Saga, The, 42, 152

Fables, Dryden's, 44-5, 64
Fair Maid of Perth, The, 159
Fair Maid of the Inn, The, 50
Family Legend, The, 46
Familiar Letters of Sir Walter Scott, 5, 13, 14, 33, 37, 40, 47, 50, 62,
80, 84, 85, 87, 89, 96, 97, 103, 104, 108, 110, 114, 115, 116, 118, 120,
138, 143, 168
Fatal Revenge, The, Scott's review of, 163
Faust, 104
Faustus, 55
Ferdinand, Count Fathom, 74
Fergusson, Robert, 86
Ferrex and Porrex, 54
Ferrier, Susan, 100
Fielding, Henry, 73, 74, 75-6, 78-9, 110
Field of Waterloo, The, 121, 153
Fitzgerald, Percy, 49, 175
Fleetwood, Scott's review of, 162
Fletcher, John, 42, 50, 51, 52, 56
Fletcher, Phineas, 64
Ford, John, 50, 56
Foreign Quarterly Review, 57, 58, 105, 132, 133, 164
Forester's Guide, The, Scott's review of, 164
Forster, John, 85, 91, 98-9, 175
Fortunes of Nigel, The, 27, 47, 48, 49, 51, 77, 108, 110, 111, 118, 119,
128, 131, 157
Fouqué, Baron de la Motte, 105

Fragmenta Regalia, 55, 149
Fragments of Voyages and Travel, 172
France, Anatole, 127
Franck, Richard, 155
Frankenstein, 78, 89, 164, 178
Fraser's Magazine, 85, 106, 130, 138, 143, 146, 175, 178
Freeman, Edward, 126, 127, 175
Frere, John Hookham, 20, 35
Froissart, 36, 128, 162

Galt, John, 129, 164
Gammer Gurton's Needle, 54
Gates, Prof. L.E., 134, 135, 175
Gay, John, 128
Gebir, 98
Gertrude of Wyoming, Scott's review of, 82, 96, 163
Gibson, John, 170
Gifford, William, 50, 52, 83, 84, 134, 141
Gilfillan, George, 1
Gillies, R.P., 14, 85, 95, 106, 130, 143, 146, 171, 175
Glenfinlas, 30
Godwin, William, 9, 44, 99
Godwin's Life of Chaucer, Scott's review of, 9, 44, 84, 124, 162
Goethe, 54, 95, 104-5, 125, 147
Goetz von Berlichingen, 54, 147
Goldsmith, Oliver, 73, 75

Gosson, Stephen, 71
Gourgaud's Narrative, Remarks on, 164
Grammont, Count, 5, 152
Gray Brother, The, 30
Greene, Robert, 55, 71
Grimm, Jacob, 21
Groat's-worth of Wit, 71
Group of Englishmen, A, 87, 176
Gulliver's Travels, 70
Guy Mannering, 3, 6, 46, 50, 76, 117, 120, 121, 153, 167
Gwynne, John, Military Memoirs of, 157

Hajji Baba in England, Scott's review of, 164
Halidon Hill, 48, 156
Hall of Justice, The, 97
Harold the Dauntless, 121, 154
Harper's Magazine, 161
Hawkesworth, John, 65
Haydon, B.R., 99, 171
Hazlitt, William, 49, 51, 85, 99, 114, 135, 139, 141, 175
Heart of Midlothian, The, 3, 46, 154
Heber, Richard, Letters to, 10, 15-16, 49, 65, 85, 88, 97, 114, 129, 131,
132, 174
Hemans, Mrs. Felicia, 98
Henderson's edition of The Minstrelsy of the Scottish Border, 22, 23,
24-5, 26, 28, 29, 148
Henry, Robert, 126

Herbert, Lord, of Cherbury, 150
Herbert, William, Scott's review of the Poems of, 18, 31, 41, 162
Herford, C.H., see Age of Wordsworth
Highland Widow, The, 120, 159
Hind and the Panther, The, 60
History of Criticism, Saintsbury's, 146, 177
History of English Poetry, Courthope's, 21, 175
History of English Poetry, Warton's, 19, 21, 34, 35
History of John Bull, 68
History of Prose Fiction, Dunlop's, 73, 178
History of Queen Elizabeth's Favourites, 5, 149
History of Scotland, Scott's, 127, 160
History of Scotland, Tytler's, Scott's review of, 45, 124, 164
History of the Church of Scotland, Defoe's, 77
History of the Church of Scotland, Sharpe's Kirkton's, Scott's review
of, 163
History of the Norman Conquest of England, 126, 127, 175
History of the Years 1814 and 1815, 6, 166
Hodgson, Captain, Memoirs of, 148, 149
Hoffman, Scott's review of the Works of, 89, 105, 132, 164
Hogg, James, 26, 96, 114, 169, 171, 175
Home, Scott's review of the Life of, 15, 80, 82, 106, 164
Homer, 63, 71, 118, 131
Horace, 54, 84
Hours of Idleness, 93
House of Aspen, The, 167

Hudibras, 64
Hudson, W.H., 2, 175
Hughes, Mrs., 54, 168
Hume, David, 15
Hunt, Leigh, 99, 100, 135, 141, 176
Hutton, R.H., 1, 176
Hutchinson, H.G., 54, 168

Iliad, The, 63, 131
Illustrations of Northern Antiquities, 152
Image of Ireland, The, 71, 150
Imitations of the Ancient Ballad, Essay on, 19, 30, 41, 42, 88, 115, 160
Indian Emperor, The, 53
Introductions, etc., to the Novels, Tales, and Romances, of the Author
of Waverley, 160
Irving, Washington, 15, 97, 101, 103-4, 117, 143, 171, 176
Ivanhoe, 6, 87, 108, 120, 126, 127, 128, 142, 155

Jacobite Relics, 26, 175
Jamieson, Robert, 42, 152, 154
Jeffrey, Francis, 4, 69, 83, 84, 93, 134-5
Jests of George Peele, 71
Jonathan Wild, 74
John de Lancaster, Scott's review of, 163
Johnes's Froissart, Scott's review of, 36, 162
Johnson, Samuel, 60, 61, 64, 68, 73, 74, 79-80, 102, 128, 135, 137,
161

Johnstone, Charles, 73
Jolly Beggars, The, 86
Jonson, Ben, 50, 51, 56, 118
Journal of a Tour to the Hebrides, 161
Journal, Scott's, 12, 38, 51, 56, 84, 100, 117, 122, 129, 161, 164 (see
the footnotes for the many references not here indexed)
Judicial Reform, Essay on, 141, 165

Keats, John, 11, 100
Keepsake, The, 167
Kelly's Reminiscences, Scott's review of, 46, 47, 58, 164
Kemble, Scott's review of the Life of, 46, 47, 58, 164
Kemble, J.M., 43
Kenilworth, 10, 51, 98, 155
Kinmont Willie, 24, 26, 31, 148
Kirk, Robert, 45, 153
Kirkton's History, etc., Scott's review of, 163
Knickerbocker's History of New York, 103
Knickerbocker Magazine, The, 102, 172, 178
Knight, Prof. William, see Memorials of Coleorton, and Wordsworth
Knight's Tale, The, 44
Knighton, Sir William, Memoirs of, 12, 171
Kölbing, E., 35, 36
Kuzzilbash, The, Scott's review of, 164

Lady of the Lake, The, 46, 97, 113, 118, 119, 151

Lady Suffolk's Correspondence, Scott's review of, 142, 164
Laird's Jock, The, 167
Laing, Malcolm, 40, 176
Lamb, Charles, 20, 51, 99, 100, 135
Landor, Forster's Life of, 85, 91, 98-9, 175
Landscape Gardening, see Planter's Guide
Lane-Poole, Stanley, 67, 177
Lang, Andrew,
Border Edition of the Waverley Novels, 51, 89, 108, 158, 176
Life of Lockhart, 52, 84, 99, 100, 158, 168
Life of Scott, 87, 100, 126, 127, 176
Secret Commonwealth of Elves, Fauns, and Fairies, 153
Langhorne, John, 98
Lay of the Last Minstrel, The, 4, 18, 31, 87, 110, 148
Lays of the Lindsays, 157
Lee, Sidney, 150
Lee, William, 77
Legaré, H.S., 94, 176
Legend of Montrose, A, 51, 155
Lennox, Charlotte, 151
Lenore, 31, 147
Le Sage, 73, 74
Letter from Dr. Tripe to Nestor Ironside, 67
Letters of Malachi Malagrowther on the Currency, 59, 69, 116, 140,
157
Letters of Sir Walter Scott, 168-173, see also Familiar Letters,
Hutchinson, Polwhele, and Stuart, Lady Louisa

Letters on Demonology and Witchcraft, 45, 104, 160, 178
Letters to Richard Heber, etc., 10, 15-16, 49, 65, 85, 88, 97, 114, 129,
131, 132, 174
Letting of Humour's Blood in the Head Vaine, The, 153
Levett, Robert, Verses on the Death of, 80
Lewis, Matthew, 30, 97-8, 147
Leyden, John, 25, 30, 166
Liberal Movement in English Literature, The, 141, 175
Life of Napoleon Buonaparte, The, 7, 12, 78, 102, 124-5, 127, 140,
158, 170
Life on the Mississippi, 142, 174
Life of Sir Walter Scott, The, see Cunningham, Gilfillan, Hudson,
Hutton, Lang, Lockhart, Mackenzie, and Saintsbury
Littérature Française au Moyen Age, La, 38, 177
Little French Lawyer, The, 50
Lives of the Novelists, 6, 7, 15, 72-9, 128, 131, 156, 178
Lives of the Poets, 74
Living Poets of Great Britain, Article on, 118, 165
Livre de Mon Ami, Le, 127, 175
Lockhart, John Gibson, 6, 22, 25, 27, 29, 52, 83, 84, 85, 98, 99, 112,
117, 158, 160, 168, 169
Lockhart's Life of Scott, 1, 11, 12, 13, 96, 98, 101, 102-3, 112, 148,
149, 152, 153, 161, 162, 163, 164, 165, 166, 167, 168, 169, 172, 173,
174, 178 (see the footnotes for the many references not here indexed)
Lodge, Edmund, 132, 172
London, 79
Lord Byron and Some of his Contemporaries, 99-100, 176
Lord of the Isles, The, 120, 153

Lounsbury, Prof. T.R., 14, 102, 176
Love, 87
Lyly, John, 61

Macaulay, T.B., 144
Macduff's Cross, 156
Mackenzie, Colin, 30
Mackenzie, Henry, 17, 73, 75, 100, see also Home, John
Mackenzie, R. Shelton, 1, 52, 123, 139, 171
Macmillan's Magazine, 51, 142, 178
McNeill, G.P., 35
Macpherson, James, 40, 41, 176
Madoc, 91
Magnalia, 104
Maigron, Louis, 105, 176
Malachi Malagrowther, Letters of, 59, 69, 116, 140, 157
Malone, Edmund, 60, 61
Malory, 37
Manfred, 50, 51
Mark Twain, 142, 174
Marlowe, Christopher, 55
Marmion, 5, 6, 31, 90, 93, 97, 110, 113, 115, 145, 148
Marston, John, 50
Masque of Owls, The, 51
Massinger, Philip, 56
Masson, David, 3, 145, 176

Mather, Cotton, 104
Matthews, Prof. Brander, 76, 176
Maturin, C.R., 138, 163, 164
Mediaeval Stage, The, 21, 174
Memoirs of a Literary Veteran, 14, 171
Memoirs of Captain Carleton, 68, 144, 148-9, 178
Memoirs of Captain Hodgson, 148, 149
Memoirs of Robert Carey, 149, 151
Memoirs of the Court of Charles II., 5, 152
Memoirs of the Insurrection in 1715, 159
Memoirs of the Duke of Sully, 151
Memoirs of the Marchioness de la Rochejaquelin, 159
Memoirs of the Reign of King Charles I., 5, 152
Memorials of Coleorton, 169
Memorials of George Bannatyne, 44, 160
Memorials of His Time, Cockburn's, 15, 175
Memorials of James Hogg, 171
Memorials of the Haliburtons, 155
Memorie of the Somervilles, 154
Merry Devil of Edmonton, The, 50
Meteyard, Eliza, 87, 176
Mezeray's History of France, 80
Mickle, W.J., 98
Middleton, Thomas, 50, 56
Mid-Eighteenth Century, The, 74, 176
Millar, J.H., 74, 176

Military Bridges, Scott's review of, 163
Military Memoirs of the Great Civil War, 5, 157
Milton, 40, 62, 65, 88, 91, 92, 95, 104, 143
Minot, Laurence, 43
Minstrelsy of the Scottish Border, 3, 4, 7, 17-32, 33, 36, 45, 80, 147-8,
160, 178
Mirror for Magistrates, The, 55
Miscellaneous Prose Works, Scott's, 7, 26, 73, 149, 151, 154, 156, 159,
160, 162, 163, 164, 166, 167
Miseries of Human Life, Scott's review of, 162
Modern British Drama, The, 52, 152
Modern Painters, 10, 129, 177
Molière, 53, 57, 58, 133, 164
Monastery, The, 88, 105, 116, 155
Monk, The, 98
Moore, Thomas, 96, 97, 166, 176
Murray, John, Memoir and Correspondence of, 83, 84, 93, 105, 141,
142, 163, 168, 169
My Aunt Margaret's Mirror, 131, 167
Myers, F.W.H., 130, 176
Mysterious Mother, The, 50

Napoleon, Scott's Life of, 7, 12, 78, 102, 124-5, 127, 140, 158, 170
Nash, Thomas, 59
Naunton, Sir Robert, 149
Neidpath Castle, Wordsworth's sonnet on, 87
New History of the English Stage, 49, 175

Newman, J.H., 142, 176
New Practice of Cookery, The, Scott's review of, 162
New Test of the Church of England's Loyalty, A, 71
Nichol, John, 95, 176
Nichols, John, 65
Nineteenth Century, The, 77, 172, 178
Norman Conquest of England, The, 126, 127, 175
Northern Antiquities, 42, 152
Northern Memoirs, 155
Notices concerning the Scottish Gypsies, 167
Novelists' Library, The, 6, 7, 72-79, 156

Ode on Scottish Music, 30
Oedipe, 53
Old Mortality, 36, 62, 77, 89, 109, 128, 154
Oliphant, Mrs., 169
Omen, The, Scott's review of, 164
Opus Magnum, The, 7, 108, 160
Original Memoirs Written during the Great Civil War, 4, 148
Ossian, 40-41, 162, 176
Otway, Thomas, 50, 57, 58

Paradise Lost, 95
Palamon and Arcite, 64
Palgrave, Francis, 13, 40, 177
Papers relative to the Regalia of Scotland, 160

Paris, Gaston, 38, 177
Parnell, Col., the Hon. Arthur, 68, 144, 148, 178
Parnell, Thomas, 80
Paul's Letters to his Kinsfolk, 6, 88, 125, 140, 154
Peele, George, 55
Penni Worth of Wit, A, 148
Pepys, Samuel, 65, 142, 164
Percy, Thomas, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 26, 28, 32, 34, 37, 38, 177
Periodical Criticism, Article on, 165
Petrarch, 33
Peveril of the Peak, 44, 105, 157
Pierce, E.L., 177
Pilot, The, 101
Pioneers, The, 14
Pinner of Wakefield, The, 59
Pirate, The, 3, 117, 125-6, 155
Pitcairn's Ancient Criminal Trials, Scott's review of, 46, 143, 165
Planter's Guide, The, Scott's review of, 164
Planting Waste Lands, Scott's review of, 164
Plays on the Passions, 50
Poe, Edgar Allan, 109, 110
Poems, with Prefaces by the Author, 160
Polwhele, R., Letters of Scott to, 132, 148, 170
Poor Richard's Almanac, 104
Pope, Alexander, 79, 81, 93, 97, 106, 113
Popular Poetry, Remarks on, 19, 22, 30, 34, 160

Portraits of Illustrious Personages, 132, 172
Prairie, The, 101
Prior, Matthew, 80
Proceedings in the Court-martial, etc., 159
Provincial Antiquities, 6, 56, 59, 155
Pulci, 33

Quarterly Review, 2, 5-6, 20, 22, 26, 45, 46, 55, 73, 77, 78, 82, 83, 84,
94, 96, 99, 100, 109, 112, 113, 114, 124, 129, 140, 143, 163, 164, 165,
168, 178
Queenhoo Hall, 5, 128, 149
Quentin Durward, 88, 104, 122, 127, 157

Radcliffe, Mrs. Anne, 73, 75, 76, 131
Rambler, The, 80, 156
Ramsay, Allan, 28, 86
Recollections of Sir Walter Scott, R.P. Gillies', 106, 130, 143, 146, 175
Redgauntlet, 3, 89, 157
Red Rover, The, 101
Reeve, Clara, 73, 76, 78
Religio Laici, 64
Religious Discourses by a Layman, 159
Reliquiae Trottosienses, 161
Reliques of Burns, Scott's review of, 22, 86, 163
Remarks on Gen. Gourgaud's Narrative, 164
Remarks on Popular Poetry, 19, 22, 30, 34, 160
Remarks on the Death of Lord Byron, 93, 95

Reminiscences of Sir Walter Scott, John Gibson's, 170
Revolutions of Naples, Article on, 164
Richardson, Samuel, 73, 74-5, 77, 78
Ritson, Joseph, 19, 20, 21, 23, 32, 34, 37, 38, 39, 45, 162, 164
Robert of Brunne, 34
Robertson, William, 15
Robinson, Crabbe, 87
Rob Roy, 3, 76, 154
Rogers, Samuel, 151
Rokeby, 108, 111, 115, 116, 152
Romance, Essay on, 34, 37, 38-9, 42, 46, 146, 154
Roman Historique à l'Époque Romantique, Le, 105, 176
Roscommon, Earl of, 136
Rose, W.S., 37, 92, 162
Rowlands, Samuel, 153
Rowley, 43, 50
Ruskin, John, 10, 129, 172, 177

Sackville, Thomas, 54-5
Sadler, Sir Ralph, State Papers and Letters of, 149
Saint Ronan's Well, 51, 64, 88, 100, 108, 157
Saintsbury, Prof. George, 2, 51, 53, 57, 60, 61, 63, 142, 146, 177, 178
Sale-Room, The, 166, 167
Salmonia, Scott's review of, 164
Schlegel, 53
School of Abuse, The, 71

Scott, Temple, 67, 177
Scudéri, 53, 76
Secret Commonwealth, The, 45, 153
Secret History of One Year, The, 71
Secret History of the Court of James I., 5, 55, 152
Severn, Joseph, 100
Seward, Anne, 30, 85, 89, 91, 151
Shadwell, Thomas, 51, 57
Shakspere, 49, 50, 51, 52, 55-6, 57, 58, 59, 62, 65, 86, 95, 97, 157-8
Sharpe, C.K., 27, 28, 30, 31, 66, 81, 97, 114, 118, 148, 163, 169
Shelley, Mrs. Mary, 78, 163
Shelley, P.B., 11, 89, 91, 106, 175
Sheridan, Thomas, 65
Shirley, James, 50, 56
Short Account of Successful Exertions, etc., 173
Sibbald's Chronicle, Scott's review of, 46, 162
Sir Eustace Grey, 97
Sir John Oldcastle, 59
Sir Tristrem, 4, 34-6, 39, 42, 43, 56, 148, 178
Sketch Book, The, 104
Sketch of Lord Kinneder, 157
Slingsby, Sir H., Life of, 148
Smith, Adam, 15
Smith, Charlotte, 73
Smollett, Tobias, 73, 74, 156
Somers Tracts, The, 4, 6, 60, 63, 70-72, 126, 150

Somerville, Lord, 154
Southerne, Thomas, 50
Southey, Robert, 4, 20, 37, 46, 49, 82, 87, 89, 90, 91-2, 93, 96, 98, 99,
106, 110, 111, 118, 124, 143, 151, 162, 163, 165, 169, 170, 177
Spae-Wife, The, 129
Specimens of Early English Romances, Scott's review of, 125, 162
Specimens of English Dramatic Poets, 20, 51, 99
Specimens of the Early English Poets, Scott's review of, 43, 44, 162
Spenser, 33, 62, 64
Staël, Mme. de, 140
Stanhope, Philip, Earl, 144
Steele, Sir Richard, 67, 120
Stephen, Sir Leslie, 65, 68, 97, 177
Sterne, Laurence, 73, 75, 103, 156
Story of Rimini, The, 99
Strutt, Joseph, 5, 126, 149
Stuart, Lady Louisa, Letters of, 10, 83, 127, 128, 169
Studies in the Evolution of English Criticism, 137, 177
Suckling, Sir John, 51, 59
Sumner, Charles, Memoirs and Letters of, 102, 177
Supernatural in Fictitious Composition, The, 164
Surgeon's Daughter, The, 159
Surtees, Robert, 20, 27, 30, 161
Swift, Deane, 65
Swift, Jonathan, 65-70, 103, 148-9, 177
Swift's Works, edited by Scott, 6, 7, 65-70, 73, 79, 126, 139, 153, 178

Taine, H.A., 125, 177
Tales of a Grandfather, 7, 123, 127, 141, 159, 160
Tales of My Landlord, 77, 109, 111-12, 128, 132, 154, 155, 161, 163,
167
Tales of the Crusaders, 98, 124, 157
Talisman, The, 157
Tapestried Chamber, The, 85, 167
Taylor, William, 31, 170
Tender Husband, The, 120
Terry, Daniel, 46, 49
Thackeray, W.M., 80, 123
Thalaba, 91, 135
Thomas the Rhymer, 29, 30, 34-6, 148
Thorkelin, 42
Thornton's Sporting Tour, Scott's review of, 162
Three Studies in Literature, 134, 135, 175
Ticknor, George, 15, 56, 103, 144, 153, 177
Tieck, 10
Tierry, 127
Todd's Spenser, Scott's review of, 61, 62, 84
Tom Jones, 75
Traditions and Recollections, etc., 170
Tressan, 33, 34
Trial of Duncan Terig, The, 161,
Tristram Shandy, 75, 156
Trivial Poems and Triolets, 155

Troilus and Criseyde, 45
True-born Englishman, The, 71
Trustworthiness of Border Ballads, The, 25, 178
Turner, Sharon, 42, 126
Two Bannatyne Garlands, 161
Two Drovers, The, 159
Tytler's History of Scotland, Scott's review of, 45, 124, 164

Varied Types, 11, 174
Vanity of Human Wishes, The, 79
Venis and Adonis, 58
Vicar of Wakefield, The, 75
Virgin Queen, The, 51
Visionary, The, 155
Vision of Don Roderick, The, 152, 165
Voltaire, 78, 105

Waldron, Francis, 51
Wallenstein, 51, 88
Waller, Edmund, 64
Walpole, Horace, 71, 72, 73, 76, 150, 163
Walpole, Robert, 71
Walton, Isaac, 64-5
War Song of the Royal Edinburgh Light Dragoons, 30
Warton, Joseph, 60
Warton, Thomas, 19, 21, 34, 35

Warter, J.W., 124, 177
Warwick, Sir Philip, 152
Waverley, 3, 6, 36, 85, 100, 120, 122, 123, 125, 149, 153, 163
Weber, Henry, 42, 52, 152
Webster, John, 50, 55, 56
White, Hon. Andrew, D., 127, 177
William and Helen, 147
Wilson, John, 50, 83
Women, Scott's review of, 164
Women Pleased, 50
Woodstock, 44, 51, 141, 157, 170
Wordsworth, William, 85, 87, 89-91, 92, 93, 97, 98, 106, 130, 143,
169, 172, 176
Wylie, L.J., 137, 177

Yarrow Revisited, 90

FOOTNOTES

[1] Mr. Hutton's Life of Scott, in the English Men of Letters
series, contains no chapter nor any extended passage on Scott's
critical and scholarly work, though there is a chapter on
"Scott's Morality and Religion," and one on "Scott as a
Politician." This, like the other short biographies of Scott, is
professedly a compilation, so far as its facts are concerned,
from Lockhart's book. The Lives of Scott by Gilfillan and by
Mackenzie, published about the time of the Scott centenary in
1871, are longer than Hutton's, but contain no more extended
references to the critical writings. Mackenzie's book out of
nearly five hundred pages gives only one to a discussion of the
edition of Dryden, and half a page to an account of the
establishment of the Quarterly Review. Gilfillan characterizes
the critical work in almost as short a space, but with a good
deal of judgment. The German biography of Scott
contemporary with these, by Dr. Felix Eberty, is concerned
with the man rather than his works. Of later Lives of Scott,
Prof. Saintsbury's gives, in proportion to its length, more space
than any other to Scott's critical work, but the book has only a
hundred and fifty-five pages in all. Another recent biographer,
Mr. W.H. Hudson, says of Scott's editorial and critical work,
"these exertions, though they call for passing record, occupy a
minor place in his story"; and he gives them only "passing
record." Mr. Andrew Lang's still more recent and briefer Sir
Walter Scott devotes only a few lines here and there to
comment on Scott as a critic, and contains hardly even a
reference to the little-known volumes that he edited.

[2] Ten of Scott's twenty-seven novels (counting the first series
of Chronicles of the Canongate as one) have scenes laid in the
eighteenth century. They are as follows, arranged
approximately in the order of their periods: The Bride of
Lammermoor, The Pirate, The Black Dwarf, Rob Roy, The
Heart of Midlothian, Waverley, Guy Mannering, Redgauntlet,
Chronicles of the Canongate (First series), The Antiquary. The
long poems all found their setting in earlier periods.

[3] British Novelists and their Styles, pp. 167-8.

[4] Familiar Letters, Vol. II, p. 9.

[5] Ibid., Vol. I, p. 194.

[6] See particularly Paul's Letters; Provincial Antiquities; and
the Histories of the years 1814 and 1815, each a respectable
volume, written for the Edinburgh Annual Register.

[7] Ruskin's remark that "The excellence of Scott's work is
precisely in proportion to the degree in which it is sketched
from present nature," should not necessarily lead on to the
condemnation which follows: "He does not see how anything is
to be got out of the past but confusion, old iron on drawing-
room chairs, and serious inconvenience to Dr. Heavysterne."
(Modern Painters, Part IV, ch. 16, § 32.)

[8] Letters to Richard Heber, etc. (by J.L. Adolphus), pp. 136-
137.

[9] Mr. Herford distinguishes two lines of romantic sentiment
—"the one pursuing the image of the past as a refuge from

reality, the other as a portion of it: the mediaevalism of Tieck
and the mediaevalism of Scott." The Age of Wordsworth,
Introduction, p. xxiv, note.

[10] Letters of Lady Louisa Stuart, p. 249.

[11] Journal, Vol. I, p. 333; Lockhart, Vol. V, p. 81. The edition
of Lockhart's Life of Scott to which reference is made
throughout this study is that in five volumes, published by
Macmillan & Co. in the "Library of English Classics."

[12] Chesterton, Varied Types, pp. 161-2.

[13] The fact that Scott was a Clerk of the Court of Sessions is
remembered less frequently than the fact that he had business
complications. But this employment of his, which could be
undertaken only by a lawyer, occupied a large proportion of his
time during twenty-four years. He once wrote, "I cannot work
well after I have had four or five hours of the court, for though
the business is trifling, yet it requires constant attention, which
is at length exhausting." (Constable's Correspondence, Vol. III,
p. 195.) Again he wrote, "I saw it reported that Joseph Hume
said I composed novels at the clerk's table; but Joseph Hume
said what neither was nor could be correct, as any one who
either knew what belonged to composing novels, or acting as
clerk to a court of justice, would easily have discovered."
(Memoirs of Sir William Knighton, p. 252.)

[14] Journal, Vol. I, p. 60; Lockhart, Vol. IV, p. 390.

[15] See the Memoir prefixed to the Globe Edition of Scott's
poems.

[16] Familiar Letters, Vol. I, p. 217.

[17] Lockhart, Vol. III, p. 447.

[18] Ibid., Vol. I, p. 122.

[19] Cooper measured his own success by the same test. At the
conclusion of the Letter to the Publisher with which The
Pioneers originally opened he said he should look to his
publisher for "the only true account of the reception of his
book." (Lounsbury's Life of Cooper, pp. 43-4.)

[20] Napoleon, Vol. I, ch. 2.

[21] "He fixed his attention on his employments without the
slightest consideration for his own feelings of whatever kind,
either in regard to state of health or domestic sorrows."
(Memoirs of a Literary Veteran, by R.P. Gillies, Vol. III, p.
141.)

[22] Familiar Letters, Vol. II, p. 365.

[23] Familiar Letters, Vol. I, p. 112.

[24] Journal, Vol. 1, p. 303; Lockhart, Vol. V, p. 68.

[25] Letters to Heber, p. 69.

[26] Irving's Abbotsford.

[27] Life, Letters, and Journals of George Ticknor, Vol. I, p.
282. See also Scott's review of the Life of Home; and Lockhart,
Vol. III, p. 304.

[28] Cockburn's Memorials, p. 181.

[29] Ticknor, Vol. I, p. 280.

[30] Letters to Heber, p. 63; Lockhart, Vol. III, p. 496.

[31] Lockhart, Vol. I, p. 177.

[32] Review of Poems of William Herbert, Edinburgh Review,
October, 1806.

[33] Lockhart, Vol. I, pp. 275-6.

[34] Lockhart, Vol. I, p. 333.

[35] In 1830.

[36] Ritson's principal works were as follows: Select Collection
of English Songs (1783); Pieces of Ancient Popular Poetry
from Authentic Manuscripts and Old Printed Copies (1791);
Ancient Songs from the Time of Henry III. to the Revolution
(1792); Scottish Songs with the Genuine Music (1794); Poems
by Laurence Minot (1795); Robin Hood Poems (1795); Ancient
English Metrical Romances (1802).

[37] Ellis published his Specimens of the Early English Poets
in 1790, and it was reissued with the addition of the
Introduction in 1801 and 1803. He edited also Way's
translations of the Fabliaux (1796), and Specimens of Early
English Romances in Metre (1805).

[38] Review of Dunlop's History of Fiction, July, 1815.

[39] The Magnum Opus of Robert Surtees was his History of
Durham, published 1816-1840.

[40] Douce published Illustrations of Shakespeare in 1807.
Later he edited Arnold's Chronicle; Judicium, a Pageant; and a
metrical Life of St. Robert. The two latter, which appeared in
1822 and 1824, were done for the Roxburghe Club. In 1824 he
also wrote some notes for Warton's History of English Poetry.

[41] Age of Wordsworth, p. 39.

[42] A number of volumes containing old ballads together with
modern imitations had been published both before and after the
appearance of Percy's Reliques, but Ritson's collections were
the first, except Percy's, to treat the material in a scholarly way.

[43] The discussion centered upon the social and literary
position of minstrels. The first edition of the Reliques of
Ancient English Poetry, published in 1765, contained an essay
on the History of Minstrelsy, and one on the Origin of the
Metrical Romances, which, taken together, says Mr. Courthope,
"may be said to furnish the first generalized theory of the
nature of mediaeval poetry." (History of English Poetry, Vol. I,
p. 426.) Percy considered the minstrels as the authors of the
compositions which they sang to the harp, and as holding a

dignified social position similar to that of the Anglo-Saxon
scôp or the old Norse scald. This theory was vigorously
attacked by Joseph Ritson in the preface of his Select
Collection of English Songs in 1783, and again in his Ancient
English Metrical Romances in 1802, and in his essay On the
Ancient English Minstrels in Ancient Songs and Ballads
(1792). Ritson contended that minstrels were musical
performers of a low class, or even acrobats, and that they were
not literary composers. Scott used his knowledge of ballads and
romances and the customs depicted in them to reinforce his
own decision that the truth lay somewhere between the two
extremes. He pointed out that the word may have covered a
wide variety of professional entertainers. A modern comment
(by E.K. Chambers, in The Mediaeval Stage, Vol. I, p. 66)
seems like an echo of Scott: "This general antithesis between
the higher and lower minstrelsy may now, perhaps, be regarded
as established. It was the neglect of it, surely, that led to that
curious and barren logomachy between Percy and Ritson, in
which neither of the disputants can be said to have had hold of
more than a bare half of the truth."

[44] Scott's theory as to the authorship of ballads is even now
held by Mr. Courthope. At the end of his chapter on Minstrelsy,
in The History of English Poetry, he thus sums up the matter:
"All the evidence cited in this chapter shows that, so far from
the ballad being a spontaneous product of popular imagination,
it was a type of poem adapted by the professors of the
declining art of minstrelsy, from the romances once in favour
with the educated classes. Everything in the ballad—matter,
form, composition—is the work of the minstrel; all that the
people do is to remember and repeat what the minstrel has put
together." This statement represents a position which is actively
assailed by the adherents of the communal origin theory.
Another critical idea which originated in Germany, and in
which Scott had no interest, though he knew something about
it, was the Wolffian hypothesis in regard to the Homeric

poems. He once heard Coleridge expound the subject, but
failed to join in the discussion. (Journal, Vol. II, p. 164;
Lockhart, Vol. V, p. 193.) He said the theory could never be
held by any poet. See a note by Lockhart on the essay on
Popular Poetry. Henderson's edition of Minstrelsy, Vol. I, p. 3.

[45] Review of Cromek's Reliques of Burns. Quarterly Review,
February, 1809.

[46] "No one but Burns ever succeeded in patching up old
Scottish songs with any good effect," Scott wrote in his Journal
(Vol. II, p. 25). And in his review of Cromek's Reliques of
Burns he said on the same subject of Scottish songs: "Few,
whether serious or humorous, past through his hands without
receiving some of those magic touches which, without greatly
altering the song, restored its original spirit, or gave it more
than it had ever possessed." (Quarterly, February, 1809.)

[47] Remarks on Popular Poetry, Henderson's edition of
Minstrelsy, Vol. I, p. 46.

[48] Henderson's edition of Minstrelsy, Vol. I, p. xix.

[49] Henderson's edition of Minstrelsy, Vol. I, pp. 167-8.

[50] The matter may be traced in Child's collection of ballads,
or more easily in the latest edition of the Minstrelsy, edited by
T.F. Henderson and published in four volumes in 1902. Mr.
Henderson's views of ballad origins are quite in accord with
Scott's own, but he notes the points at which Scott failed to
follow any originals. There seems to be some reason to believe,
however, though Mr. Henderson does not say so, that Scott
wrote Kinmont Willie without any originals at all, except the

very similar situations in three or four other ballads. See the
introduction by Professor Kittredge to the abridged edition of
Child's ballads, edited by himself and Helen Child Sargent.

It is unnecessary to give here any detailed account of Scott's
procedure, as the matter has been thoroughly worked out by
students of ballads. A few examples may be given as
illustrations, however. In The Dowie Dens of Yarrow
(Henderson's edition, Vol. III, p. 173) 28 lines out of the 68 are
noted by Mr. Henderson as either changed or added by Scott.
Scott writes (beginning of fifth stanza), "As he gaed up the
Tennies bank" for "As he gaed up yon high, high hill," and we
find from a note of Lockhart's that The Tennies is the name of a
farm belonging to the Duke of Buccleuch. In the sixth stanza
Scott changes the lines,

"O ir ye come to drink the wine
As we hae done before, O?" to
"O come ye here to part your land,
The bonnie forest thorough?"

In the seventeenth stanza he changes,

"A better rose will never spring
Than him I've lost on Yarrow?" to
"A fairer rose did never bloom
Than now lies cropp'd on Yarrow."

In Jellon Grame (Vol. III, p. 203), Mr. Henderson notes
changes in 15 different lines, and points out 2 whole stanzas,
out of the 21, that are interpolated. In the Gay Goss-hawk (Vol.
III, p. 187) 6 stanzas out of 39 are noted as probably wholly or
mainly by Scott, and 30 stanzas were changed by him.

Sometimes his alterations occurred in every line of a stanza. It
is probable that Scott changed Jamie Telfer enough to make the
Scotts take the place of prominence that had been held by the
Elliotts in the original form of the story. See The
Trustworthiness of Border Ballads as Exemplified by 'Jamie
Telfer i' the Fair Dodhead' and other Ballads; by Lieut.-Col.
the Hon. Fitzwilliam Elliott. Reviewed in Edinburgh Review,
No. 418, p. 306 (October, 1906).

[51] See the examples given in the preceding note. Most of the
changes there spoken of were made without annotation.

[52] This extraordinary young man was poet and scholar on his
own account by 1800, though he was four years younger than
Scott. His erudition in many fields was remarkable, and he was
as enthusiastic as Scott himself about Scotch poetry, and was
the chief assistant in gathering ballads for the Minstrelsy. He
also collected the material for the essay on Fairies in the second
volume, which was especially praised by the reviewer in the
Edinburgh Review (January, 1803). Leyden's chief fame was
derived from his wonderfully varied activities in India, from
1803 to his early death in 1811. Any reader of Lockhart's Life
of Scott or of Scott's delightful little memoir, published first in
the Edinburgh Annual Register for 1811, and included in the
Miscellaneous Prose Works, must feel that the uncouth young
genius is a familiar acquaintance.

[53] The Ettrick Shepherd, who, after reading the first two
volumes of the Minstrelsy, sought an acquaintance with Scott,
and offered assistance which was gladly made use of in the
preparation of the third volume. Scott in his turn provided
much of the material for Hogg's Jacobite Relics, published in
1819. The following note on one of the songs in that work adds
to the reader's doubts concerning the accuracy of Scott's texts:
"I have not altered a word from the manuscript, which is in the

handwriting of an amanuensis of Mr. Scott's, the most incorrect
transcriber, perhaps, that ever tried the business." (Jacobite
Relics, Vol. I, p. 282. Note on song lxiii.)

[54] Henderson's edition of the Minstrelsy, Vol. I, p. 284.

[55] Quarterly, May, 1810.

[56] Lockhart, Vol. III, p. 514.

[57] Still more striking evidence that Scott lacked an infallible
sense of the difference between genuine and spurious ballad
material is afforded by his comments on Peter Buchan's
collection, which is now considered particularly untrustworthy.
He thought that with two or three exceptions the pieces in the
book were genuine, and said: "I scarce know anything so easily
discovered as the piecing and patching of an old ballad; the
darns in a silk stocking are not more manifest."
(Correspondence of C.K. Sharpe, Vol. II, p. 424.)

[58] Scott's manuscript collections of ballads dropped partially
out of sight after his death, and it was only about 1890 that
their magnitude and importance became known. Professor
Child and later editors have found them of very great service.
(On Child's use of the Abbotsford materials, see the
Advertisement to Part VIII of his collection, contained in
Volume IV.) In 1880 appeared a reprint of the Ballad Book of
C.K. Sharpe, "with notes and ballads from the unpublished
manuscripts of C.K. Sharpe and Sir Walter Scott," but the
contributions from Scott's papers did not amount to much.
Scott's materials were at the service of his friend for use in the
original edition of the Ballad Book, published in 1823. See

Sharpe's Correspondence, Vol. II, pp. 264, 271 and 325, for
letters from Scott on this subject.

[59] Note on The Raid of the Reidswire, in the Minstrelsy.

[60] Henderson's edition of the Minstrelsy, Vol. III, p. 232.

[61] Henderson's edition of the Minstrelsy, Vol. II, p. 57.

[62] Lockhart, Vol. I, p. 360.

[63] Ibid., Vol. I, p. 332.

[64] First edition of the Minstrelsy, Vol. II, pp. 156-7.

[65] Edinburgh Review, January, 1803.

[66] The Minstrelsy is arranged in three parts: I., Historical
Ballads; II., Romantic Ballads; III., Imitations of the Ballad.
The first part is preceded by the Introductory Remarks on
Popular Poetry, and by the historical introduction. The second
part is preceded by the essay on The Fairies of Popular
Superstition; and the third by the essay on Imitations of the
Ancient Ballad. The poems by Scott given in this third part are
as follows: Thomas the Rhymer (parts 2 and 3), Glenfinlas, The
Eve of St. John, Cadyow Castle, The Gray Brother, War Song
of the Royal Edinburgh Light Dragoons. Besides these there
are three poems by John Leyden (and he has also an Ode on
Scottish Music preceding the Romantic ballads), two by C.K.
Sharpe, three by John Marriott, who was tutor to the children of
the Duke of Buccleuch, and one each by Matthew Lewis, Anna

Seward, Dr. Jamieson, Colin Mackenzie, J.B.S. Morritt, and an
unnamed author. In the other parts of the book there are a few
imitations, notably the three by Surtees—Lord Ewine, the
Death of Featherstonhaugh, and Barthram's Dirge, which
Scott supposed were old; and one or two like the Flowers of the
Forest, which he noted as largely modern, or which he had
found, after arranging his material, to be wholly modern.
Nearly forty old ballads were published in the Minstrelsy for
the first time.

[67] Remarks on Popular Poetry, conclusion.

[68] Review of the Poems of William Herbert. Edinburgh
Review, October, 1806.

[69] Stanzas 10-12, and 31, are noted by Child as particularly
suspicious. "Basnet," which occurs in stanza 10, is not a very
common word in ballads. It is used in The Lay, Canto I., stanza
25, and in Marmion, Canto VI, st. 21.

[70] Lockhart, Vol. I, p. 221.

[71] Memoir of William Taylor, Vol. I, pp. 98-99, and see
Sharpe's Correspondence, Vol. I, pp. 146-7, for a letter to
Sharpe on a similar point.

[72] Minstrelsy, Introduction to Lord Thomas and Fair Annie.

[73] Lockhart, Vol. I, p. 101.

[74] Ibid., Vol. I, pp. 35-6.

[75] Familiar Letters, Vol. I, p. 244. See also Lockhart, Vol. V,
p. 408.

[76] Sometime before 1821 (probably a good while before, but
the date cannot be fixed), Scott began a translation of Don
Quixote, and afterwards gave the work over to Lockhart, who
completed it. See Constable's Correspondence, Vol. III, p. 161.

[77] Louis-Elizabeth de la Vergne, Comte de Tressan, was born
in 1705 and died in 1783. In early life he was sent to Rome on
diplomatic business, and it is said that in the Vatican library he
acquired his taste for the literature of chivalry. His chief works
were Amadis de Gaules (1779); Roland furieux (translated
from the Italian, 1780); Corps d'extraits romans de chevalerie
(1782). His translations were partly adaptations, and were far
from being rendered with precision.

[78] See particularly his article on Ellis's and Ritson's Metrical
Romances (Edinburgh Review, January, 1806), the essay on
Romance, and Remarks on Popular Poetry in the Minstrelsy.

[79] Edinburgh Review, July, 1804. Ellis and Scott had had
much correspondence on Sir Tristrem, and it was Ellis's queries
that first led Scott into the detailed investigation which resulted
in the separate publication of the work. He had intended to
print it in the Minstrelsy (Lockhart, Vol. I. p. 289). The letters
are given in Lockhart, Vol. I.

[80] Lockhart, Vol. I, p. 381.

[81] Die nordische und die englische Version der Tristan-sage
—II. Sir Tristrem. Heilbronn, 1882. Mr. George P. McNeill's

edition of Sir Tristrem was printed for the Scottish Text
Society, Edinburgh, 1886.

[82] Kölbing thinks Scott probably hired a transcriber who
knew nothing of Middle English—a usual method of procedure
in the beginning of the nineteenth century. In later editions
more errors were introduced by the carelessness of printers,
until, after 1830, when the book was included in the complete
editions of Scott's poems, the text was collated with the
manuscript. But it was still far from correct. Kölbing
enumerates about a hundred and thirty mistakes (see his
Introduction, p. xvii). Of these I took twenty-one at random,
and found that eight of them did not occur in the 1806 edition
—in other words, the person who collated the text nearly thirty
years after Scott or his hired transcriber had done it was far
from infallible. A few illustrations may be given of mistakes
that occur in both the 1806 and the 1833 editions: l. 117, send
is given for sent; l. 846, telle for tel; l. 863, How for Hou; l.
912, mak for make; l. 1212, leuedi for leuedy; l. 1580, wende
sche weren for whende sche were; l. 1334. have for han; l.
1514, as for als.

[83] Review of Johnes's Translation of Froissart, Edinburgh
Review, January, 1805.

[84] Waverley, and Claverhouse in Old Mortality.

[85] Lockhart, Vol. I, pp. 480 and 482. Familiar Letters, Vol. I,
p. 147.

[86] Essay on Romance.

[87] See Gaston Paris, La Littérature Française au Moyen Age,
1ère partie, ch. IV.

[88] Review of Metrical Romances, Edinburgh Review,
January, 1806.

[89] Journal, Vol. II, pp. 258-259.

[90] Essay on Romance.

[91] Familiar Letters, Vol. I, p. 46.

[92] Memoir in the Globe edition of Scott's poems.

[93] Scott adopted the conclusions of Malcolm Laing, who
edited Macpherson's poems and adduced parallel passages from
"a mass of poetry, enough to serve any six gentle readers for
their lifetime," as the reviewer says. The most of these parallels
were found in "Homer, Virgil, and their two translators; Milton,
Thomson, Young, Gray, Mason, Home, and the English Bible."
Although he was convinced by the argument, Scott saw that the
editor was in some cases misled by his own ingenuity.

[94] Later, however (in the essay on Imitations of the Ancient
Ballad, 1830), he said: "In their spirit and diction they nearly
resemble fragments of poetry extant in Gaelic." By this time he
was probably reverting to the earlier opinion which had made
the more vivid impression.

[95] For the Northern Antiquities, edited by Robert Jamieson
and published in 1814, Scott wrote an abstract of the Eyrbyggja

Saga, using, as one would conclude from his introductory
words, the Latin version made by Thorkelin, who published the
saga in 1787. The purpose of the publication required the
historical and antiquarian rather than the literary point of view,
and accordingly we find Scott's notes occupied with historical
comment.

[96] In 1804 Weber came to Edinburgh in a deplorable
condition of poverty, and was employed and assisted in literary
work by Scott during the following nine years. In 1813 he was
seized with insanity, and challenged Scott, across the study
table, to an immediate duel with pistols. Scott supported Weber
during the remaining five years of his life in an insane hospital.
He was much liked by the Scott family. Scott rated his learning
very highly, and gave him valuable assistance in various
literary projects. Weber's chief publications were: Metrical
Romances of the Thirteenth, Fourteenth, and Sixteenth
Centuries, with Introduction, Notes and Glossary (1810);
Dramatic Works of John Ford, with Introduction and
Explanatory Notes (1811); Works of Beaumont and Fletcher,
with Introduction and Explanatory Notes (1812): to this Scott's
notes were the most valuable contribution; Illustrations of
Northern Antiquities (1814), with Jamieson and Scott.

[97] See his essay on Imitations of the Ancient Ballad.

[98] Illustrations of Anglo-Saxon Poetry, translated by the
Vicar of Batheaston. Conybeare had died two years before the
publication of the book.

[99] Review of Ellis's Specimens, Edinburgh Review, April,
1804.

[100] Bletson and Richard Ganlesse.

[101] But see the dictum quoted by Scott in a somewhat over-
emphatic way from Ellis's Specimens of the Early English
Poets, to the effect that Chaucer's "peculiar ornaments of style,
consisting in an affectation of splendour, and especially of
latinity," were perhaps his special contribution to the
improvement of English poetry. (Edinburgh Review, April,
1804.) Scott said of Dunbar, "This darling of the Scottish
muses has been justly raised to a level with Chaucer by every
judge of poetry to whom his obsolete language has not
rendered him unintelligible." (Memoir of Bannatyne, p. 14.)
After naming the various qualities in which Dunbar was
Chaucer's rival, he pronounces the Scottish poet inferior in the
use of pathos. The relative position here assigned to the two
poets seems to be rather an exaltation of Dunbar than a
degradation of Chaucer.

[102] Lockhart, Vol. I, p. 408.

[103] Dryden, Vol. XI, p. 245.

[104] Dryden, Vol. XI, p. 396.

[105] Ibid., Vol. VI, p. 243.

[106] Ibid., Vol. XI, p. 338.

[107] The discussion of popular superstitions given in the
introduction to the Minstrelsy and in the Essay on Fairies,
which is prefixed to the ballad of Young Tamlane, suggests
comparison with the Letters on Demonology and Witchcraft

which Scott wrote in the year before he died. He collected a
remarkable library in regard to superstition, and thought at
various times of making a book on the subject, but the project
was pushed aside for other matters until 1831. The Letters
which he wrote then are full of pleasant anecdote and judicious
comment, and though they lack the vigor of his earlier work
they have remained fairly popular. An edition of Kirk's Secret
Commonwealth of Elves and Fairies, published in 1815, has
been attributed to Scott. (See below, the Bibliography of books
edited by Scott.) Reviews of his which have not been
mentioned in this chapter, but which naturally connect
themselves with the subjects here discussed, are the following:
The Culloden Papers—an account of the Highland clans,
largely narrative (Quarterly, January, 1816); Ritson's Annals of
the Caledonians, Picts and Scots—an article of more than forty
pages, discussing the early history of Scotland and the
historians who have written upon it (Quarterly, July, 1829);
Tytler's History of Scotland—an article similar to that on
Ritson's book (Quarterly, November, 1829); Pitcairn's Ancient
Criminal Trials—a long article, which begins with an extended
digression on booksellers and collectors and on the Roxburghe
and Bannatyne clubs (Quarterly, February, 1831); Sibbald's
Chronicle of Scottish Poetry—merely a series of notes on
special points (Edinburgh Review, October, 1803); Southey's
Chronicle of the Cid (Quarterly, February, 1809). For the
Encyclopædia Britannica Scott wrote an essay on Chivalry, as
well as the one on Romance to which reference has been made.

[108] Review of Kelly's Reminiscences and the Life of Kemble,
Quarterly Review, June, 1826.

[109] Lockhart, Vol. II, p. 97.

[110] Terry had been educated as an architect, and his
knowledge and taste were of assistance to Scott in connection

with the building and furnishing of Abbotsford. After 1812 he
played chiefly in London. In 1816 his version of Guy
Mannering, the first of his adaptations from Scott, was
presented. Before this he had taken the part of Roderick Dhu in
two dramatic versions of The Lady of the Lake. In 1819 he was
the first David Deans in his adaptation of The Heart of
Midlothian. Six years later he became manager of the Adelphi
theater, in association with F.H. Yates. At this time Scott
became Terry's security for £1280, a sum which he was
afterward obliged to pay with the addition of £500 for which
the credit of James Ballantyne was pledged. When financial
embarrassment caused Terry to retire from the management his
mental and physical powers gave way, and he died of paralysis
in 1829. Terry admired Scott so much that he learned to imitate
his facial expression, his speech and his handwriting.

[111] Lockhart, Vol. I, p. 94.

[112] The phrase, which was a favorite one of Scott's, is spoken
not by Tony Lumpkin, but by one of his tavern companions.
Scott's use of it is an indication of the way in which he was
familiar with the drama. Very likely he never reread the play
after his youth, but his strong memory doubtless retained a
pretty definite impression of it.

[113] Review of the Life and Works of John Home, Quarterly,
June, 1827.

[114] Familiar Letters, Vol. II, p. 143.

[115] Lockhart, Vol. III, p. 427. It may be noted that this
criticism does not show much dramatic insight.

[116] Lockhart, Vol. III, pp. 445-6.

[117] Journal, Vol. I, p. 117; Lockhart, Vol. IV, p. 447.

[118] Journal, Vol. I, p. 94; Lockhart, Vol. IV, p. 419.

[119] Advertisement to Halidon Hill. When the publisher
Cadell closed a bargain with Scott in five minutes for Halidon
Hill, giving him £1000, he wrote as follows to his partner: "My
views were these: here is a commencement of a series of
dramatic writings—let us begin by buying them out."
(Constable's Correspondence, Vol. III, p. 217.)

[120] "That well-written, but very didactic 'Old Play'," as
Adolphus calls it. (Letters to Heber, p. 55.)

[121] Introductory epistle to Nigel.

[122] Lockhart, Vol. V, p. 414.

[123] Fitzgerald's New History of the English Stage, Vol. II, p.
404.

[124] Dramatic Essays, Hazlitt's Works, Vol. VIII, p. 422.

[125] Lockhart, Vol. III. p. 176.

[126] Ibid., Vol. III. p. 265.

[127] Ibid., Vol. III. p. 332.

[128] Essay on the Drama.

[129] In 1808 he wrote to a friend: "We have Miss Baillie here
at present, who is certainly the best dramatic writer whom
Britain has produced since the days of Shakspeare and
Massinger." (Fam. Let., Vol. I. p. 99.) But Wilson also put
Joanna Baillie next to Shakspere, and quite seriously. The
article in the Dictionary of National Biography, on Joanna
Baillie says that when the first volume of Plays on the Passions
was published anonymously in 1798, Walter Scott was at first
suspected of being the author. But as Scott had done nothing to
give him a literary reputation in 1798, the assertion is
incredible. It seems to be based on the following very inexact
statement in Chambers's Biographical Dictionary of Eminent
Scotsmen. (Vol. V, Art. Joanna Baillie.) "Rich though the
period was in poetry, this work made a great impression, and a
new edition of it was soon required. The writer was sought for
among the most gifted personages of the day, and the illustrious
Scott, with others then equally appreciated, was suspected as
the author."

[130] Lockhart, Vol. I, p. 380.

[131] Life of Dryden, ch. I. In Guy Mannering and The
Antiquary, the first two novels in which Scott habitually used
mottoes to head his chapters, most of the selections are from
plays. Eighteen plays of Shakspere are represented by twenty-
nine quotations. Other mottoes are from The Merry Devil of
Edmonton, from Jonson, from Fletcher (The Little French
Lawyer, Women Pleased, The Fair Maid of the Inn, The
Beggar's Bush), from Brome, Dekker, Middleton and Rowley,
Cartwright, Otway, Southerne, The Beggar's Opera, Walpole's

Mysterious Mother, The Critic, Chrononhotonthologos, Joanna
Baillie. For the latter part of The Antiquary many of the
mottoes were composed by Scott himself. Kenilworth presents
a similar list, with some variations: Jonson's Masque of Owls
was used, more than one play by Beaumont and Fletcher,
Waldron's Virgin Queen, Wallenstein, and Douglas. In St.
Ronan's Well there is a larger proportion of non-dramatic
mottoes, as in most of the later novels, but we find represented
nine of Shakspere's plays and one of Beaumont and Fletcher's.
The Legend of Montrose (chapter XIV) has a motto from
Suckling's Brennoralt. In Anne of Geierstein ten of Shakspere's
plays were drawn upon, and Manfred was twice used. Scott
made his chapters much longer in these later novels, and used
fewer mottoes, but the evidence of the selections would seem
to indicate that he had lost something of his early familiarity
with dramatic literature.

[132] Hazlitt's Characters of Shakespeare's Plays appeared in
1817; his Lectures on the Dramatic Literature of the Age of
Queen Elizabeth in 1821.

[133] Scott first began to fabricate occasional mottoes for his
chapters during the composition of The Antiquary in 1816.

[134] Saintsbury in Macmillan's Magazine, lxx: 323. Scott's
style in many sages is strongly colored by the influence of
Shakspere.

[135] Introduction by Lang to The Fortunes of Nigel.

[136] It is possible that among the various jobs of editing
undertaken by Scott with a view to keeping the Ballantyne
types busy, were certain collections of dramas. Ancient British

Drama, in three volumes, and Modern British Drama, in five
volumes, published in 1810 and 1811, are sometimes attributed
to Scott in library catalogues, but on what authority it seems
impossible to discover. There is almost no commentary in the
Ancient British Drama, but the Modern British Drama contains
three brief introductions which I believe were written by Scott.
They show a striking likeness to some parts of the Essay on the
Drama written several years later, and it is not probable that
Scott took his criticism ready-made from another author. In the
preface to the Ancient British Drama we find this statement:
"The present publication is intended to form, with The British
Drama and Shakspeare, a complete and uniform collection in
ten volumes of the best English plays." The Shakspeare here
referred to is doubtless that of which Constable the publisher
afterwards spoke in his correspondence with Scott as
"Ballantyne's Shakespeare," and Scott had no hand in the
editorship. (Constable's Correspondence, Vol. III, p. 244.)

It is true, however, as R.S. Mackenzie says in his Life of Scott,
that Scott "had not only meditated, but partly executed an
edition of Shakespeare." The work was suggested by Constable
in 1822, was begun in 1823 or 1824, and three volumes of the
proposed ten were printed by the time of Constable's financial
crash in the beginning of 1826. The project was sometime
afterwards abandoned, and the printed sheets, which apparently
were not bound up, disappeared from view. The first volume
was to be a life of Shakspere by Scott, and this was probably
not begun at all. Of the commentary in the other volumes, Scott
was to have the oversight but Lockhart was to do most of the
work. It was not designed that the critical apparatus should to
any great degree represent original ideas furnished by Lockhart
or Scott, but the book was to be "a sensible Shakespeare, in
which the useful and readable notes should be condensed and
separated from the trash." (See the discussion of the matter in
letters between Scott and his publisher given in the third
volume of Constables Correspondence. See also Lang's Life of

Lockhart, Vol. I, p. 409, and Vol. II, p. 13, and Mackenzie's Life
of Scott, pp. 475-6.) The Boston Public Library contains three
volumes which are thought to be a unique copy of so much of
the Scott-Lockhart Shakspere as was printed. (See below, the
Bibliography of books edited by Scott.)

Scott's notes on Beaumont and Fletcher, which he had wished
in 1804 to offer to Gifford, were actually used by Weber in his
Beaumont and Fletcher, published about 1810, an edition
which was characterized by Scott as "too carelessly done to be
reputable." (Lockhart, Vol. IV, p. 472.)

[137] He seems to have connected heroic plays too closely with
"the romances of Calprenède and Scudéri." See his introduction
to The Indian Emperor, Dryden, Vol. II, pp. 317-20; also Vol. I,
p. 56, and Vol. VI, p. 125. On his opinion in regard to the
relation between novels and plays see below, pp. 75-6.

[138] See his comment on Corneille's Oedipe, Dryden, Vol. VI,
p. 125 and Mr. Saintsbury's note.

[139] Lockhart, Vol. III, p. 446.

[140] Hutchinson's Letters of Scott, p. 224.

[141] That Scott admired Sackville greatly is evident from
more than one comment. Of Ferrex and Porrex he says, "In
Sackville's part of the play, which comprehends the two last
acts, there is some poetry worthy of the author of the sublime
Induction to the Mirror of Magistrates." (Dryden, Vol. II, p.
135.) Elsewhere Scott calls Sackville "a beautiful poet."
(Fragmenta Regalia, p. 277. Secret History of the Court of
James I., Vol. I, p. 278, note.)

[142] Dryden, Vol. II, p. 136.

[143] Lockhart, Vol. I, p. 229. See also Vol. III, p. 223.

[144] Ibid., Vol. V, p. 322.

[145] See, for example, Hawthornden, in Provincial
Antiquities.

[146] Dryden, Vol. XV, p. 337.

[147] Ibid., Vol. I, p. 10.

[148] Note on Sir Tristrem, Fytte II., stanza 56.

[149] See Middleton's Plays in the Mermaid edition:
Introduction, Vol. I, pp. viii-ix.

[150] Ticknor, in Allibone's Dictionary, Vol. II, p. 1968.

[151] Journal, Vol. I, p. 234; Lockhart, Vol. V, p. 23.

[152] See Scott's article on Molière, Foreign Quarterly Review,
February, 1828.

[153] Essay on Drama; Dryden, Vol. I, p. 101 ff., Vol. II, pp.
317-20, Vol. IV, p. 4.

[154] Dryden, Vol. IV, p. 4.

[155] Article on Molière, Foreign Quarterly Review, February,
1828.

[156] Lockhart, Vol. I, p. 431.

[157] Review of Kelly's Reminiscences and the Life of Kemble,
Quarterly Review, June, 1826.

[158] Ibid.

[159] Dryden, Vol. VI, p. 128.

[160] In Provincial Antiquities (Borthwick Castle). Scott cites
parallels from Sir John Oldcastle, The Pinner of Wakefield, and
one of Nash's pamphlets, for a curious incident in Scottish
history.

[161] Lockhart, Vol. I, p. 431. This search among seventeenth
century pamphlets may have suggested to Scott the need of a
new edition of Somers' Tracts. Apparently he arranged with the
publishers in 1807 to undertake this task, but the first volume
did not appear till 1809. (Lockhart, Vol. II, p. 10, and see
below, pp. 89-90, for an account of Scott's edition of the
Tracts.) Some of his materials for the Dryden were taken from
this collection, but more from the Luttrell collection, to which
he refers in the Advertisement.

[162] Lockhart, Vol. I, p. 433. Scott's Dryden appeared in 1808,
and with some slight changes in 1821; as reëdited by Mr.

Saintsbury it was published in 1882-1893. It was the first
complete and uniform edition of Dryden's works, and it
remains the only one. The dramatic works had appeared in
folio in 1701. They were edited by Congreve in 1717, and Scott
used Congreve's text. The non-dramatic poems were also
published in 1701 in folio. They appeared in more convenient
forms in 1741, 1743, and 1760, but of these editions only the
last was reasonably complete. In 1800 the Critical and
Miscellaneous Prose Works were edited by Malone, who added
a Life of Dryden which has furnished a large part of the
material used by biographers since his time. This biography
was badly written, but with Johnson's brilliant essay it was the
only Life of Dryden before Scott's that was worth considering.
An edition of Dryden's poems, with notes by Joseph Warton
and others, appeared in 1811, but seems to have been prepared
before Scott's edition was published. The text of this is very
incorrect. Since then the non-dramatic poems have been
published several times. Mr. Christie said in his preface to the
Globe edition: "Sir Walter Scott's is the last important edition
of Dryden, as it is indeed still the only general collection of his
works; and it is to be regretted that that distinguished man did
not give as much pains to the purification of Dryden's text as he
did to his excellent biography and to the notes which enrich the
edition."

[163] Editor's Preface.

[164] Dryden, Vol. IX, p. 226.

[165] Ibid., Vol. IX, p. 2.

[166] In this connection Scott's review of Todd's edition of
Spenser is interesting. He takes exception to the lack of an
appearance of continuity in the biography, caused by the long

quotations included in the body of the narrative; and censures
the editor for not having used the history of Italian poetry in
elucidating Spenser's work. (Edinburgh Review, October,
1805.)

[167] Review of Todd's Spenser.

[168] Dryden, Vol. I, p. 6.

[169] Familiar Letters, Vol. I, p. 229; and Dryden, Vol. I, p. 6.

[170] Dryden, Vol. I, pp. 402-3.

[171] Dryden, Vol. I, p. 403.

[172] Ibid., p. 404. Mr. Saintsbury thinks that Scott's prefatory
introductions to the plays are often "both meagre and
depreciatory"; also that Scott's judgment on Dryden's letters is
rather harsh, for him, and that after he had begun to write
novels he would not have been so impatient of remarks on
"turkeys, marrow-puddings, and bacon."

[173] Ibid., Vol. I, p. 405.

[174] Ibid., Vol. X, p. 307 ff.

[175] Ibid., Vol. XIV, pp. 136 and 146.

[176] Ibid., Vol. I, p. 405.

[177] In order to give a more specific view of Scott's methods,
two or three of the introductions to well-known poems may be
briefly analysed. The introduction to Absalom and Achitophel
occupies 111/2 pages, of which about 21/2 are given to
quotation from a tract which Scott thought furnished the
argument to Dryden, and which was unnoticed by any former
commentator. Scott's remarks follow this outline: Position of
the poem in literature, and history of its composition; origin of
the particular allegory as applied to modern politics; a parallel
use of the allegory (with a quotation from Somers' Tracts in
illustrations); aptness of the allegory; merits of the satire—
treatment of Monmouth and other main characters; changes in
the second edition to mitigate the satire; characterization of the
poem as having few flights of imagination but much
correctness of taste as well as fire and spirit; other objections
by Johnson refuted; success of the poem; history of the first
publication and of the replies and congratulatory poems;
editions, and Latin versions. The notes on this poem are
historical and very full, but the introduction contains as much
literary as historical comment. Religio Laici is prefaced by 8
pages of introduction, in which are discussed the motive of the
writing, the argument, the title, the purpose of the poem, and its
reputation. Dryden's style in didactic poetry is compared with
Cowper's, to the disadvantage of the later poet. The
introduction to The Hind and the Panther is 20 pages long, and
discusses the history of the period as well as the argument of
the poem, its style, the subject of fables in general, and the
effects the poem produced. The notes on this poem are copious.
As he discussed the Fables in the Life of Dryden, Scott gave
them no general introduction, and for each poem he wrote only
a slight preface, telling something of the source and pointing
out special beauties. His notes vary greatly in abundance.
Those on Palamon and Arcite, e.g., are brief, explaining terms
of chivalry and heraldry, but not giving literary or linguistic
comment.

[178] Dryden, Vol. XIII, p. 324.

[179] Ibid., Vol. XII, p. 20.

[180] Ibid., Vol. X, p. 213.

[181] Ibid., Vol. I, p. 411.

[182] Ibid., Vol. I, p. 98. See also St. Ronan's Well, Vol. I, p.
105, and various mottoes in the novels. The edition of the
novels used for reference is that published in Edinburgh (1867)
in 48 volumes.

[183] Dryden, Vol. X, p. 26.

[184] For example see Anne of Geierstein, Vol. II, p. 307.

[185] Letters to Heber, p. 292.

[186] The price offered for the Swift was £1500. This must
have been a rather rash speculation on the publisher's part, as
there had been several editions of Swift's works published. The
first appeared in twelve volumes in 1755, edited by
Hawkesworth. Deane Swift, Hawkesworth, and others, added
thirteen more volumes in the course of the next twenty-five
years, and when the whole was completed it was reissued in
three different sizes. In 1785 an edition in seventeen volumes
was published, edited by Thomas Sheridan. In 1801 the edition
by Nichols was published, and it reappeared in 1804 and in
1808. Hawkesworth and Thomas Sheridan supplied
biographies which Leslie Stephen characterized by saying that

Hawkesworth's gave no new material and that Sheridan's was
"pompous and dull." (Preface to Leslie Stephen's Life of Swift.)

[187] Correspondence of C.K. Sharpe, Vol. II, p. 178.

[188] This correspondence consisted of 28 letters from Swift,
and 16 "Vanessa."

[189] A comparison of the index with the bibliography in the
Dictionary of National Biography and with Mr. Stanley Lane-
Poole's Notes for a Bibliography of Swift (Bibliographer, vi:
160-71) shows that Scott was usually right in his judgment on
the main articles. But since Mr. Lane-Poole ends his list thus:
"And numerous short poems, trifles, characters and short
pieces," it is evident that one cannot carry the investigation far
without undertaking to make a complete bibliography of Swift.
Mr. Temple Scott says, in the Advertisement of his edition of
Swift's Prose Works, begun in 1897, that since Sir Walter's
edition of 1824 "there has been no serious attempt to grapple
with the difficulties which then prevented and which still beset
the attainment of a trustworthy and substantially complete
text."

[190] Swift, Vol. IV, p. 280. Two more of Scott's comments
may be given, further to illustrate his method. "This piece
[William Crowe's Address to her Majesty, Swift, Vol. XII, p.
265] and those which follow, were first extracted by the learned
Dr. Barrett, of Trinity College, Dublin, from the Lanesborough
and other manuscripts. I have retained them from internal
evidence, as I have discarded some articles upon the same
score." "The following poems [poems given as "ascribed to
Swift," Vol. X, p. 434] are extracted from the manuscript of
Lord Lanesborough, called the Whimsical Medley. They are
here inserted in deference to the opinion of a most obliging

correspondent, who thinks they are juvenile attempts of Swift. I
own I cannot discover much internal evidence in support of the
supposition."

[191] Colonel Parnell, writing in the English Historical Review
on "Dean Swift and the Memoirs of Captain Carleton," has
spoken of the biography as "this most partial, verbose, and
inaccurate account of the dean's life and writings." He says also
that in editing Carleton's Memoirs Scott adopted, without
investigation and in the face of evidence, Johnson's opinion
that the memoirs were genuine; that Scott was mistaken about
the date of the first edition and misquoted the title page; and
that his "glowing account" of Lord Peterborough, in the
introduction, was amplified (without acknowledgment) from a
panegyric by Dr. Birch in "Houbraken's Heads." (English
Historical Review, January, 1891; vi: 97. For a further
reference to the article see below, p. 144.)

[192] Lockhart, Vol. II, p. 20.

[193] September, 1816.

[194] Swift Vol. XVII, p. 4, note.

[195] Life of Swift, conclusion.

[196] Swift, Vol. XI, p. 12.

[197] Vol. IX, p. 569. The tract had already been correctly
assigned. A similar note on another tract indicates more careful
research on the part of the editor. The paper is A Secret History
of One Year, which had commonly been attributed to Robert

Walpole. Scott says: "This tract in not to found in Mr. Coxe's
list of Sir Robert Walpole's publications, nor in that given by
his son, the Earl of Oxford, in the Royal and Noble Authors....
It does not seem at all probable that Walpole should at this
crisis have thought it proper to advocate these principles." (Vol.
XIII, p. 873.) The piece is now attributed to Defoe.

[198] See above, p. 4.

[199] Horace Walpole, in Lives of the Novelists.

[200] Lockhart, Vol. III, p. 512.

[201] Quarterly, September, 1826.

[202] See his explanation, in the articles themselves.

[203] The Mid-Eighteenth Century, by J.H. Millar, p. 143, note.

[204] Ibid., p. 159. Scott compares Fielding and Smollett at
some length in the Life of Smollett.

[205] Life of Le Sage.

[206] Life of Richardson.

[207] Life of Fielding.

[208] Life of Goldsmith. As we might expect, Scott speaks
rather too favorably of Goldsmith's hack work in history and
science.

[209] Life of Sterne.

[210] Lockhart, Vol. I, p. 35.

[211] See above, p. 53, note.

[212] See also the Introductory epistle to Ivanhoe; and the
Review of Walpole's Letters. "In attaining his contemporary
triumph," says Mr. Brander Matthews, "Scott owed more to
Horace Walpole than to Maria Edgeworth." The Historical
Novel, p. 10.

[213] Scott uses the word.

[214] Mr. G.A. Aitken has given convincing evidence that the
story was not invented by Defoe. Mr. Aitken also shows the
falsity of Scott's statement that Drelincourt's book was in need
of advertising, as William Lee, in his Life of Defoe, had
previously done. (See The Nineteenth Century, xxxvii: 95.
January, 1895; and also Aitken's edition of Defoe's Romances
and Narratives, Vol. XV, Introduction.) A passage from Defoe's
History of the Church of Scotland is quoted in the review of
Tales of My Landlord, by Scott, who says that it probably
suggested one of the scenes in Old Mortality. Scott there
speaks of Defoe's "liveliness of imagination," and says he
"excelled all others in dramatizing a story, and presenting it as
if in actual speech and action before the reader." (Quarterly
Review, January, 1817.)

[215] See also The Fortunes of Nigel, Vol. II, pp. 88-9.

[216] Life of Clara Reeve.

[217] Blackwood, March, 1818.

[218] Quarterly, May, 1818.

[219] See a reference to Voltaire and other French authors;
Napoleon, Vol. I, ch. 2.

[220] Life of Richardson.

[221] We gather from Scott's article that he considered the
following to be the chief "speculative errors" of Bage: he was
an infidel; he misrepresented different classes of society,
thinking the high tyrannical and the low virtuous and generous;
his system of ethics was founded on philosophy instead of
religion; he was inclined to minimize the importance of purity
in women; he considered tax-gatherers extortioners, and
soldiers, licensed murderers.

[222] Lockhart, Vol. II, p. 132.

[223] Familiar Letters, Vol. I, p. 192. In his George the Third,
Thackeray said: "Do you remember the verses—the sacred
verses—which Johnson wrote on the death of his humble friend
Levett?" (Biographical edition of Thackeray, Vol. VII, p. 671.)

[224] Life of Johnson.

[225] Introduction to Chronicles of the Canongate.

[226] Dryden, Vol. XI, p. 81, note; Review of the Life and
Works of John Home, Quarterly, June, 1827.

[227] Familiar Letters, Vol. II, p. 44.

[228] Swift, Vol. XVI, p. 275, note. On one of the last sad days
before Sir Walter left Scotland for his Italian journey he quoted
in full Prior's poem on Mezeray's History of France. (Lockhart,
Vol. V, pp. 339-40.)

[229] Swift, Vol. III, p. 36.

[230] Ibid., Vol. XIII, p. 24.

[231] Correspondence of C.K. Sharpe, Vol. II, p. 194.

[232] Journal, Vol. I, p. 67; Lockhart, Vol. IV, p. 401.

[233] Allan Cunningham's Life of Scott, p. 96.

[234] Lockhart, Vol. I, p. 483.

[235] See the satirical paragraph in his review of Gertrude of
Wyoming, on the habits of reviewers in general. "We are
perfectly aware," he says, "that, according to the modern
canons of criticism, the Reviewer is expected to show his
immense superiority to the author reviewed, and at the same
time to relieve the tediousness of narration, by turning the epic,

dramatic, moral story before him into quaint and lively
burlesque." (Quarterly, May, 1809.) In his review of the Life
and Works of John Home he speaks of "the hackneyed rules of
criticism, which, having crushed a hundred poets, will never, it
may be prophesied, create, or assist in creating, a single one."
(Quarterly, June, 1827.)

[236] Lockhart, Vol. I, p. 363.

[237] Lockhart, Vol. I, p. 501. For a further comparison of
Scott and Jeffrey as critics see below, pp. 134-5.

[238] Lockhart, Vol. II, p. 204.

[239] Ibid., Vol. V, p. 97.

[240] Journal, Vol. II, p. 262

[241] Ibid., Vol. I, p. 173

[242] In general Scott admired Lockhart. "I have known the
most able men of my time," he once wrote, "and I never met
any one who had such ready command of his own mind, and
possessed in a greater degree the power of making his talents
available upon the shortest notice, and upon any subject." (Life
of Murray, Vol. II, p. 222.) But in Lockhart's earlier days Scott
said, "I am sometimes angry with him for an exuberant love of
fun in his light writings, which he has caught, I think, from
Wilson, a man of greater genius than himself perhaps, but who
disputes with low adversaries, which I think a terrible error,
and indulges in a sort of humour which exceeds the bounds of