The Sun.
London, England, 1837-03-20 00:00:00

LITETtATUItE

LOCICIIART'S LIFE OP 'SCOTT. Vol. I.
Well, Edinburgh, 1837.
Mr. Lockhart's Life of his ilittstrions relative will not,
e fat as it has yet proceeded, d:sappoint the cxpecta-
dons that have been farmed of it. With the exception of
about ten or twenty pages, which nre devoted to a minute
account, nearly if not altogether superfluous, of Scott's
remote oncestors, not a page but teems with interest. The
dramatic form in which the work is cast greatly heightens
its effect, for Mr. Lockhart does not put himself prominently
forward, but stands modestly in the back-ground, leaving
Sir Walter, assisted by the recollections of his own perso-
nal friends, to be his own biographer. The volume com-
mences with an " auto-biographical fragment discovered in
an old cabinet at Abbotsford, and composed shortly after
the publication of Marmion," in which the great novelist
details the events of his early youth with that manly and
unaffected modesty which distinguished him through life.
From this delightful sketch, whose ably fault is that it is
too short, we take the following singular anecdote, from
which it will be seen how nearly the world was losing, in
early childhood, the author of 'Waverly :
" My mother had sent a maid to take charge of me, that I
might be no inconvenience in the family. But the damsel sent
on that important mission had left her heart behind her, in the
keeping of some wild fellow, it is likely, who had done and
said more to her than he was likely to make good. She be-
came extremely desirous to return to Edinburgh, and as my
mother made a point of remaining where she was, she con-
tracted a sort of hatred at poor me, as the cause of her being
detained at Sandy Knowe. This rose, I suppose, to a sort of
delirious affection, for she confessed to old Alison Wilson, the
housekeeper, that she had carried me up to the Craigs,
meaning, under a strong temptation of the devil, to cut my
throat with the scissors and bury me in the moss. She was
dismissed of course, and I heard became afterwards a lunatic."
Sir Walter's love of reading, particularly the old tradi_
tionary literature of his country, commenced at an early
period—indeed before many boys have mastered their al-
phabet. The fine ballad of " Hardyknute," which if we
remember rightly, may be found in " Percy's Relics," and
which is now known to be of comparatively modern date,
was an early and especial favourite with 'him. " The Ballad
of Hardyknute," says he,
" I was early master of, to the great annoyance of almost
our only visiter, the worthy clergymen of the parish, Dr.
Duncan, who had not patience to have a sober chat interrup-
ted by my shouting forth this ditty. Methinks I now see his
tall, thin, emaciated figure, his legs cased in clasped gamba-
does, and his face of a length that would hare rivalled the
Knights of La Mancha's; and hear him exclaiming, one
may as well speak in the mouth of a cannon as where that
boy is." '
In his fourth year, Sir Walter Scott, accompanied
his father to Bath, where it was hoped that the waters
might be of advantage to his lameness. Here he saw his
first play—an epoch in every child's life, for what boy has
not felt his heart beat at the third ringing of the promptees
bell ?—of which he gives us this amusing anecdote :
" The play was As You Like It, and the witchery of the
whole scene is alive in my mind at this moment. I made, I
believe, noise more than enough, and remember being so
much scandalized at the quarrel between Orlando and his bro-
ther in the first scene, that I screamed out, " Ar'nt they bro.
thers ?' A few weeks residence at home convinced me who
had till then been an only child in the house of my grandfather,
that a quarrel between brothers was a very natural event."
At the age of twelve or thirteen, Scott became acquainted
with the works of Ossian, Spencer, and Shakspeare. Of
the tawdry colouring of the firth he soon tired, but of the
two last he was never weary. " I found," says he "in my
mother's dressing-room some odd volumes of Shakspeare,
nor can I easily forget the rapture with which I sat up in
my shirt, reading by the light of a fire in her apartment,
until the bustle of the family rising from supper warned
me it was time to creep back to my bed, where I was sup-
posed to have been safely deposited since nine o'clock.", But
the work that had the greatest influence over his feelings
at this period ; which first kindled his enthusiasm ; and
to which we may be said in a great degree to owe the " Lay
of the Last Minstrel," " Marmion," and more especially
the " Border Minstrelsy," was " Percy's Relics of Ancient
English Poetry." Of his first acquaintance with this fasci-
nating work, Sir Walter gives us the following recollec-

tions :
" I remember well the spot where I read these volumes for
the first time. It was beneath a huge platanus tree, in the
ruins of what had been intended for an old-fashioned arbour.
The summer day sped onward so fast, that, notwithstanding the
sharp appetite of thirteen, I forgot the hour of dinner, was
sought for anxiously, and was still found entranced in my in-
tellectual banquet. To read and to remember was in this in-
stance the same thing, and henceforth I overwhelmed my
schoolfellows, and all who would hearken to me, with tragical
recitations from the ballads of Bishop Percy. The first time,
too, I could scrape a few shillings together, which were not
common occurrences with me, I bought unto myself a copy of
these beloved books, nor do I believe I ever read a book half
so frequently or with half the enthusiasm."
When Dr. Johnson turned Percy's Relics into such
merciless ridicule at the Literary Club, he little thought that
at that very time they were assisting to form the minds of
the first poet and the first novelist of the age—Words-
worth and Scott—both of whom met with them about the
year 1780, and had the first impulse given to their young
imagination by them. But one's first book, like
one's first love, is a thing whose influence is never
wholly forgotten. What a world of fancy has been called
into play, and brought vividly before the world, by the
Arabian Nights! To his perusal, when a boy, of Schil-
lers's Robbers, we owe the most enduring portion of Cole-
ridge's poetry ; and an acquaintance with Robinson Crusoe
has set thousands wandering over the earth, who other-
wise might have cultivated through life the sedate organ of
Stay-at-home-ativeness. But it was the antiquarian lore
displayed throughout the Relics that chiefly fascinated
Scott ; for though he relished, of course, the rough, cordial
flavour of the old ballads, yet it was the sensibility of the
antiquary, rather than of the poet, that Percy had
stirred within him. For our own part we are taste-
less enough to laugh at all relics of antiquity, save
and except when they come before us in the
shape of a bottle of port wine. It has been often
asserted that Scott's childhood was unmarked by any pre-
cocious displays of talent. Now, Mr. Lockhart's Memoir
proves the direct reverse. We there find Miss Cranstoun,
afterwards the Countess of Purgstall, saying of him, whi!e
yet a mere boy, " upon my word, Walter Scott is going
to turn out a poet, something of a cross, I think, between
Burns and Gray ;" and Mrs. Cockburn, a lady every way
qualified to form a sound opinion, bearing testimony to
his singular precocity in these striking terms :
" I last night supped at Mr. Walter Scott's. He has the
most extraordinary genius of a boy I ever saw. He was read-
ing a poem to his mother when I went in. I made him read
on ; it was the description of a shipwreck. His passion rose
with the storm. He lifted his eyes and hands. There's the
mast gone,' says he; crash it goes I—they will all perish 1'
After his agitation, he turns to me. That is too melancholy,'
says he ; I had better real you something more amusing.' I
preferred a little chat, and asked his opinion of Milton anti
other books he was reading, which he gave me wonderfully.
One of his observations was, How strange it is that Adam,
just new come into the world, should know everything—that
must be the poet's fancy,' says he. But when he was told he
was created perfect by God he instantly yielded. When taken
to bed last night he told his aunt lie liked that lady. What
lady ?' says she. ' Why, Mrs. Cockburn ; for I think she is
a virtuoso, like myself.' Dear Walter,' says aunt Jenny,
what is a virtuoso?' ' Don't ye know ? Why, it's one who
wishes and will know everything.' Now, Sir, you will think
this a very silly story. Pray whet age do you suppose this
boy to be? Name it now, before I tell you. Why, twelve or
fourteen. No such thing ; he is not quite six years old. He
has a lame leg, for which he was a year at Bath, and has ac-
quired the perfect English accent, which he has not lost since
he came, and he reads like a Garrick. You will allow this
an uncommon exotic."
We might make many more delightful extracts of this sort,
but our limits warn us to a close. Enough, therefore, to
say that the book abounds in characteristic detail ; is penned
in a simple, manly style without the slightest undue attempt
at ornament or panegyric ; and proves in every page that
Walter Scott was just the frank, generous, high-minded,
resolute, and unassuming individual that the world
has given him credit for. Utterly devoid of all
mean literary jealousies, he was ever the first to lend
a helping hand to struggling merit. Though moving in the
highest ranks, and himself connected with the old Scotch
nobility, yet he had nothing exclusive or fastidious in his
tastes or habits ; but was far less of an aristocrat than a
man of the world. In private life, as in literature, he gave
fair play to all parties. His nature was eminently social ;
his conversation pregnant with various matter ; and he was,
perhaps, the best story-teller that ever existed. In early man-
hood, though remarkable for his even temper, he was by no
means averse to a row, for which those Oxonians and Can_
tabs, who may happen to be " non-reading men," will hold
his memory in undying veneration. In the present volume
he comes before us chiefly in the capacity of a letter-writer ;
and it is no more than justice to say that his youthful cor-
respondence, if not so dazzling and pungent as Byron's, is far
superior, as respects ease, sly quiet humour, and unaffect-

iti
ed. es. In a word, Walicr Scott, whether regarded
his priviite or public capacity, was a man not buss to ha
loved, than reverenced. Ages have pissed since we have.
had EUC'I a writer among us, and ages may roll on ere we
have such another. He was the greatest genius England
has known since the days of Shakspearc. Before closing
this hurried and minty notice, we should not omit to state
that we find in the present volume, in an anecdote repeated
by Scott to Lockhart, the germ of the most striking
episode in Matthew Wald. One word more. In his
cursory allusions to poor Jamie Hogg, Mr. Lock-
hart has, we think, exhibited rather too much hauteur
and cavalierness. The Shepherd is introduced in only
two instances, and in both he is made to cut a most
pre-eminently ridiculous figure. As if this were net
enough, the biographer accuses him of being something
lax in his notions of literary honesty, just as if it were
possible for one so utterly unsophisticated as Hogg, to do a
bookseller ! As for " modesty," with which Mr. Lock-
hart insinuates James had a very distant acquaintance,
we can readily believe that he had more brass in his face
than in his pocket. The following is one of the ancedotes
to which we have alluded. It bears hard upon Hogg,
nevertheless it is far too good to be omitted :
~ The next time that Hogg's business carried him to Edin-
burgh, he waited upon Scott, who invited him to dinner in
Castle-street, in company with William Laidlaw, who her
pooed also to be in town, and some other admirers of the rustic
genius. When Hogg entered the drawing-room, Mrs. Scott,
being at the time in a delicate state of health, was reclining
on a sofa. The Shepherd, after being presented, and making
his best bow, forthwith took p6ssession of another sofa placed
opposite to hers, and stretched himself thereupon at all his
length ; for, as he said afterwards, I thought I could never
do wrong to copy the lady of the house.' As his dress at this
period was precisely that in which any ordinary herdsman at-
tends cattle to the market, and as his hands, moreover, bore
most legible marks of a recent sheep-smearing, the lady of the
house did not observe with perfect equanimity the novel usage
to which her chintz was exposed. The Shepherd, however,
remarked nothing of all this—dined heartily and drank freely,
and, by jest, anecdote, and song, afforded plentiful merriment
to the more civilized part of the company. As the liquor ope-
rated, his familiarity increased and strengthened,- from
Scott,' he advanced to Sherra,' and thence to Scott,' Vial'
ter,' and Wattie,'—until, at supper, he fairly convulsed the
whole party by addressing Mrs. Scott as ' Charlotte.' "