A CHAPTER XXXVI. ABBOTSFORD. The Scottish Mecca-Tourists and Sights-Black-mail Gra- BBOTSFORD is the Mecca of the Scotch tourists, and during the summer months the stream of pilgrims is incessantly flowing towards Scott's shrine. The cost to each one, coming by rail from Edinburgh, and returning thither within the day, can scarcely be less than thirty shillings; and a statistician may therefore calculate the wealth that is made to filter through Melrose through the magic of a name.' Carriages for Abbotsford form a summer institution in Melrose, that must be exceedingly remunerative to the landlord of The George Hotel, especially when taken in connection with luncheons, and, above all, with that terrible item in a hotel bill, apartments,' which appears to be a noun of multitude, signifying many' curious additions to the normal necessities of a traveller. A one-horse carriage to Abbotsford will cost you five shillings, with eighteen BLACK-MAIL GRATUITIES. 359 pence for the driver, and a sixpence for a turnpike. When you are there, Black's valuable Guide,' with some hesitation in pronouncing an opinion on so delicate a point, says that with regard to the gratuity payable to domestics, the amount will necessarily vary between prince and peasant, but 18. for a single individual, and 2s. 6d. for parties not exceeding six, may be regarded as fair medium payments.' Regarded by whom? there's the rub. Try the gentleman's gentleman who trots you through the show suite of rooms with a shilling for a single individual, and half-a-crown for parties not exceeding six, and note the expression of his features (which might be overlooked), and (which is more to the purpose) his consequent conduct. Experto crede. He was barely satisfied with half-a-crown from my wife and myself; but he turned upon a French family (with whom we had formed that confluent concourse of atoms which was necessary to make up the 'party' to view the rooms) and rejected their offerings with contempt. A scene thereupon followed, in which pantomime had to explain dialogue, and which terminated, as a matter of course, in the victory of the gentleman's gentleman, and the tax-paying of his opponents. Their intense delight, while going through the rooms, whenever they lighted upon any of the French presents to the illustrious novelist, must have been in strong contrast to the chagrin with which their tour of inspection was terminated by their enforced and involuntary present to that illustrious novelist's showman. 6 If you wish to go round the gardens, that, of course, is an extra,' and we know that all extras must be paid for. If, however, you fall into the hands of a guide of the Tom Purdie school, you will not regret it, from the study of character which may thereby be obtained for the outlay of your shilling. But, if you desire to gain a good view of the exterior of the house, you will contrive to get yourself punted across to the other side of the Tweed, where you will see Abbotsford backed by a hanging wood, and, with its terraced garden, separated from the river by a wide flat meadow, and altogether unlike anything that Turner ever painted purporting to be a view of the spot. If you do not believe me, and are unable to see for yourself whether Turner's picture of the romance in stone and lime' is, or is not, a painted romance, by the author of 'The Fallacies of Hope,' then buy one of those admirable stereographs of Abbotsford, by Moffat, of Edinburgh, and compare the two. As the advertising grocers say, 'One trial will prove the fact.' I believe I am correct in saying that the waters of the Tweed cannot be seen from any of the windows of Abbotsford, although the banks of the river are discernible from thence. In short, the situation of Abbotsford is almost as bad as that of Melrose, both are down in a hole;' and it required as great an exercise of genius to convert Cartley Hole into Abbotsford, as it did to expand a popular legend into a novel that should delight the world. By ascending the highest ground on the farther side of the Tweed, the best general view of Abbotsford is obtained; and from the position indicated (to the N. W.), Sir Walter's whim assumes its finest proportions, and is invested with its most picturesque surroundings. Indeed, with the exception of the Tweed, whatever there is that is picturesque in the near neighbourhood of Abbotsford, is, like the house, due to the constructive and creative mind of Sir Walter himself. The drive ENVIRONS OF ABBOTSFORD. 361 thither from Melrose, after Darnick Peel has been passed, is so comparatively hideous, that it will be quite as well for the tourist to lounge back in his carriage, and closing his eyes to the scenery around, indulge in day-dreams, or in a retrospective review of the interesting history attaching to the world-famous spot to which he is journeying. Sir Walter Scott's first sight of the spot on which his romance' was afterwards to arise, was when he was a young man, and travelling with his father. As their carriage approached the bleak spot, the father said, 'We must get out here, Walter, and see a thing quite in your line.' The carriage stopped midway up a gently rising ground; beneath them was the Tweed, and over against them was that defensive work of the Caledonians, called 'The Cat-rail.' It was the scene of a fierce clan fight between Scott's ancestors and the Douglasses; it was hard by Melrose, and close to Huntley Bank and the Rhymer's Glen, where Thomas of Ercildoun met the fairy queen. This spot was the Cartley Hole, the old farmstead which should hereafter be developed into the Scottish Mecca. Not yet, however, for it was not till the year 1811, when Sir Walter was forty years of age, that he was enabled to purchase the farm, and the first 100 acres of land. In 1813 and 1817 he completed the purchase, and could then congratulate himself on having attained his heart's desire of being a border laird. As soon as he had made his first purchase, he built himself a picturesque cottage, and as Cartley Hole was neither a pretty nor poetical name, he taxed his inventive genius to devise a new name for his estate and residence. It so happened that the Abbots of Melrose had driven their cattle across a ford in the Tweed, just below Cartley Hole. Sir Walter seized upon this fact, and in a happy moment coined that magical word with which the world is familiar. From thenceforth, the ignoble Cartley Hole was lost in the illustrious Abbotsford. In June, 1812, Scott hurried his family into the yet unfinished cottage, and there, amid all the bustle of workmen, plied his author's craft, keeping his mens sana in sano corpore by exercising his frame in daily work on the improvement of his property. In fact,' says Lockhart, that autumn he had no room at all to himself. The only parlour which had been hammered into anything like habitable condition, served at once for diningroom, drawing-room, and study. A window looking to the river was kept sacred as his desk; an old bed-curtain was nailed up across the room close behind his chair, and there, whenever the spade, the dibble, or the chisel (for he took his full share in all the work on hand) was laid aside, he pursued his poetical task, apparently undisturbed and unannoyed by the surrounding confusion of masons and carpenters, to say nothing of the ladies' small talk, the children's babble among themselves, or their repetition of their lessons.' Fact and fiction were simultaneously pursued, though the fabric of the author's brain grew faster than the building of the mason's craft. In November, 1816, and October, 1817, he made additions to his cottage. At this latter date, too, he purchased that small property at Darnick, which we passed on our way from Melrose to Abbotsford. He was very proud of that massive old peel tower, which dated to the fifteenth century, and was the only specimen of the old Scottish feudal fortalice that remained in the neighbourhood. The Duke of Darnick' was a sobriquet that did not displease Sir Walter's ears. In 1821 he further extended his building plans. The old |