Grant County herald. [volume] (Lancaster, Wis.) 1850-1968, 1871-08-22
sS SaE Vol. %, NO. II.
The Scott Centenary.
From the New York Tribune, Aug lo,l


ing for Thursday next, are somewh hat
trivial, we cannot but regard the
change as a happy one. For the last
twenty years the Fifteenth of August
has been devoted to festival in the
most brilliant city of civilization in
honor of the birth of a man who SYM
bolizes only the destructive aud re.
pressive forces of modern society. In
1869, this gala-day attained its high
est splendor and glory to celebrate
the completion OF the century which
had elapsed since the birth Of Napo-
leon. 1t saw the apparent triumph,
and the promise of perpetuity of the
institution of Casarism which his
genius had founded and his name had
sustained. A year later, Paris was
in mourning, and NapoIeonism was
dying on the batte-felds of Lorraine.
This year the spell that seemed i'm
mortal has vanished forever, and the
Fifteenth of August exists no longer
as date or holiday for France.
1t is we'll enough, therefore, that the
proud and loving countrymen of Scott
should, in this mem orable year, con-
secrate to his memory some other day
than that so recently sulied by the
incense of false and hurtful glory.
Carlyle has called him rightly, "the
pride "of all Scotchmen." He gives
TO Scotland its first and strongest
claim to eminence in the world of
letters. She has nursed among her
crags and heaths great number of
men of a genuine and noble gift of
speech and song. There is no finer
product of the purely literary talent
than the Noctes Ambrosiape the
world has given birth to no higher
development Of the logical faculties
than are found in Reid and Hamilton
no poet lies closer to mems hearts
than Robert Burns. But Walter
Scott possessed to a greater extent
than any man of our time that prac-
teal and universal power of express
ion and construction which gains for
a writer the attention and the hon.
age of a world. His easy preemi-
nence over all competition is readily
seen in the results of his labor. His
picture in his lifetime was better
known in Europe and America than
that of any sovereign, and he gained
by the proceeds Of his literary labor
two millions and a half of dollars.
This is bald statement of a well
known fact, but what vast and
widespread popularity does it not
denote He created the modern nov
ell. lie formed the very taste which
made him immortal. He formed a
host of ideal exstences, and prepared
or them their reception in the world
He was man of this world. Pure
and noble and generous as are the
teachings of his genius, he never
leaves the atmosphere Of earth. His
sympathies are wholesome, human
ones. He breathes our air and speaks
our language, and feels our needs and
our passions. He is no high priest of
humanity; he is simply the friend
and benefactor Of man. The reward
of his hearty manliness of life and
character and mind is the largest
love and acceptance which any writ
er has ever received from the "kind-
" "race of men,"
/ is hard to resist the temptation
to overpraise which assails us when
the world is pausing for day to do
homage to this robust and beneficent
genius. We all know and remember
his faults-his hasty and careless
composition, his feverish activity, his
lack of artistic conscience. But when
that is said, censure can go no further.
In his broad and hearty grasp he
united the resources Of the modern
scholar and the free and breezy orig.
inality Of the early world. No wri-
ter is richer in those gems of allusion
and suggestion which show the trac-
es of days and nights of studious toll.
Burton and Rabelais do not know
their classics better, and yet there is
an airy ease and FRESHNESS in his poems
which is more like Homer than any
thing we have in modern literature.
| He knew the heart of man well
enough for every purpose OF poetry
and fiction, but he never INDUCED in
those morbid exercises of vivisection
which have made the recent liter.
allure of Europe so exciting and I'M
wholesome. There is no writer who
is at once so strong and so safe. A
boy may browse among the Waverley
Novels and Minstrelsy through his
whole vacation, and he will gain from
them nothing but lessons of honor
and courage and purity.
His life was in harmony with his
work. He asks from the world no
immunity from its censure on account
of the license of genius. He lived and
died hearty, Christian gentleman.
There is nothing more admirable
than the open-handed use be made of
his vast prosperity-nothing more
heroic than the way in which he faced
the adversely which so terribly as
saulted him in his age. At time
when bis battle should have ended,
when be was Justly entitled to the
repose of those who have fought a
good fight, he resolutely sat down to
pay halt million of dollars of debts
by the labor of his pen. His hand
fell paralyzed in the task. His over
worked brain gave way, and he drop
ped in the harness he had himself put
on at the bidding of honor. If he
could have foreseen this day, bis
eager thirst for honorable repute
would have been satisfied. The halo
of this hour would have frightened
even the dense spiritual darkness in
which be passed away. The world
is kneeling at the sepulcher. The
theaters are filed with his creations.
His statue is crowned with garlands
in hundred capitals. But dearer to
his heart than all these testimonials
of the homage of mankind would
have been the thought of the social
recognition his memory has received.