mated it at its real worth, and, after good-naturedly submitting to it, could laugh at its absurdity. It is less pleasant to record a change in his arrangements for study which took place about this time. Finding the day apt to be broken in upon by little duties and by visitors, he adopted the habit of rising and commencing his literary toils at six in the morning, usually finishing them at twelve, after the interruption of breakfast at ten. His biographer, Mr Lockhart, tells us how careful he was to dress neatly before sitting down, but he says nothing of his preparing for the duty before him by taking food. We have come to understand such things better now, and can easily see what fatal effects might arise in a few years from a habit of performing the principal duties of life with an exhausted system.

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All who had the happiness of knowing Sir Walter personally, acknowledge that a genial magnanimity was a leading feature in his character. There was petty vengefulness in his composition. This is visible in the following anecdote. It may be recollected that his poem of Rokeby-one of the least successful of his efforts was followed by a burlesque called Jokeby, published by Mr Tegg of Cheapside. Mr Tegg-an extraordinary man in his way, who had raised himself from humble circumstances-occasionally visited Scotland, and was desirous of being introduced at Abbotsford. This wish was gratified through the medium of an obliging acquaintance in Galashiels, who introduced him as the author of Jokeby. The more jokes the better,' said Sir Walter, as he bustled about for a chair; and in the whole course of the interview he never made further allusion to the burlesque poem, but after his usual manner, or it may be called policy, conversed generally upon the profession of the individual whom he was addressing.

It is on all hands confessed that nothing ever spoiled this great man. Through all his exaltations, both of fortune and reputation, he never lost the original good, easy, kind, and benignant man-never for a moment ceased to

be what he naturally was. Mr Dugald Stewart, in his
life of Dr Robertson, relates that that eminent writer
'used frequently to say, that in Mr Hume's gaiety there
was something approaching to infantine; and that he
had found the same thing so often exemplified in the
circle of his other friends, that he was almost disposed
to consider it as characteristical of genius.' This remark
derives great additional force from the example of Sir
Walter Scott, who seemed to prefer natural affections
and natural feelings above all things, and could sympa-
thise in all the levities and simple ideas of childhood.
The individual who relates these anecdotes recollects well
with what true grandfatherly feeling he spoke, in the
end of the year 1824, of the precocious talent of his
grandson, John Hugh Lockhart, then a child of hardly
four years of age. John, he said, had composed a verse
in imitation of a certain nursery riddle, to the following
effect:-
:-

'The waters of Tweed have broken the law,
And they've come roaring down the haugh;
Grandpapa and all his men

Cannot turn them back again.'

Whether we are to believe that the child really performed this feat of versification without assistance may be matter of debate; but certainly Sir Walter spoke of the thing quite seriously, and with no little pride, as a composition of his grandson.

As another illustration of the extreme familiarity and simplicity of his manners, the following may be related:-He was sitting one evening after dinner with a friend. They were no longer drinking, neither were they talking; both were in that state of partial somnolence which sometimes occurs after dinner, and while as yet the candles have not been introduced to stir the company afresh with the excitement of light. All at once, amidst the twilight stillness of the hour, a hen got up a most vivacious cackle in the courtyard, so as to rouse them both effectually; and Sir Walter, to the great amusement of his friend, burst out with a musical, or rather most unmu

sical imitation of the cheerful sound, which he perhaps recollected for the first time since his childhood, being a human interpretation of what the hen is supposed to say to the old woman, her mistress, when she cackles

Buy tobacco-buy tobacco-I'll pay a'!'

the 'I'll pay a'!' terminating in a scraugh in alt, exactly after the manner of the hen. Perhaps some of our old readers will remember the time when boys used thus to give verbal expression to the parturient exultations of Dame Partlet.

A friend has furnished us with the following anecdote : -Being in London at the time when Sir Walter made researches among the papers of some of the government offices concerning some points in his Life of Bonaparte, I happened to be at the Colonial Office one day waiting in an anteroom, when Sir Walter came in, and sat down close by the door; another gentleman entered shortly after, and giving a slight glance at the persons already in the apartment, took up his station by the chimneypiece, and occupied himself in examining something that hung upon the wall, as if he did not think his companions worthy of any further attention. I sat in a window looking down Downing Street, immediately opposite Sir Walter, and having been previously slightly known to him, it was not long till he recognised and addressed me. He asked how I liked to live in London, to which I made some reply professing my contentment with it on this Sir Walter said, 'Oh, I daresay you would like to see the hills and waters of the North again, and to get a breath of pure mountain air.' The words were simple in themselves, but they marked his own attachment to home, and they were pronounced in such a tone of kindness as made a deep impression on me, for Sir Walter spoke to every man in the kindliest possible spirit. The other person in the room paid no attention to this chat; but I cannot forget his look of surprise when an attendant opened the door, and pronounced the magic name, 'Sir Walter Scott,' by way of intimation that Mr Hay would

be happy to see the baronet up stairs: upon which, as if he had received a shot, the stranger wheeled suddenly round; but perhaps the only opportunity he ever had of seeing that great man, who had made himself known to so many ears, and friends in so many hearts, was lost. Sir Walter sat very near the door, and was concealed by it without our companion obtaining a view of him. He gazed for a moment, then turning round about, honoured me with a stare more particular than he had deigned to bestow at his entrance, and perceiving that I was nothing but a poor clerk, resumed consideration of the table of official regulations which he had previously made the object of study, deeming me entirely beneath his notice.

So eager at all times was Sir Walter to return to the retirement of his beloved Abbotsford, that on the days when the Court of Session closed, having made all necessary preparations previously, his coach was usually in readiness at the doors of the Parliament House in Edinburgh, and he drove off direct to the country, without waiting to take a new day for the journey.

Near the beginning of the Bride of Lammermoor, the sign of the 'Wallace Head' is described as 'the majestic head of Sir William Wallace, grim as when severed from the trunk by the orders of the felon Edward. A person once took the liberty of inquiring of the author whether he meant here felon in the common acceptation of the English word, or if it was a misspelling of the printer for the old Scotch word felloun, which means 'fierce, ruthless.' Sir Walter replied: "I leave the orthography entirely to you, only begging you will spell the felon as feloniously as possible.' This circumstance, though trivial in itself, marks the strong and decided feeling of indignation with which Sir Walter regarded the conduct of Edward towards the preserver of Scottish independence.

At the sale of an antiquarian gentleman's effects in Roxburghshire, which Sir Walter happened to attend, there was one little article, a Roman patera, which occa

figured a large gray cat, which was regaled with titbits from the table, and was evidently as important a personage in the house as Maida. In the evening, while Sir Walter was reading aloud, from the old romance of Arthur, this sage grimalkin,' says Irving, had taken his seat in a chair beside the fire, and remained with fixed eye and grave demeanour, as if listening to the reader. I observed to Scott that his cat seemed to have a black-letter taste in literature. "Ah!" said he, "these cats are a very mysterious kind of folk. There is always more passing in their minds than we are aware of: it comes no doubt from their being so familiar with witches and warlocks." He went on to tell a little story about a gudeman who was returning to his cottage one night, when, in a lonely, out-of-the-way place, he met with a funeral procession of cats, all in mourning, bearing one of their race to the grave in a coffin covered with a black velvet pall. The worthy man, astonished and halffrightened at so strange a pageant, hastened home, and told what he had seen to his wife and children. Scarce had he finished, when a great black cat that sat beside the fire raised himself up, exclaimed: "Then am I king of the cats!" and vanished up the chimney. The funeral seen by the gudeman was of one of the cat dynasty. "Our grimalkin here," added Scott, "sometimes reminds me of this story, by the airs of sovereignty which he assumes ; and I am apt to treat him with respect from the idea that he may be a great prince incog., and may sometime or other come to the throne." In this way Scott would make the habits and peculiarities of even the dumb animals about him subjects for humorous remark or whimsical story?

The above anecdote by the American writer, can be capped by another, demonstrative of Scott's leaning to superstitious fancies. Sir Walter, when a young man, visited Hallyards, in Peeblesshire, and on this occasion was conducted by his acquaintance Mr (now Sir) Adam Ferguson to the neighbouring cottage of old David Ritchie, who furnished a prototype for the character of