was still great; it was not always safe to have even the game of football between villages ;—the old clannish spirit was too apt to break out. The good Duke of Buccleuch's solitary exemption from these heats of Carterhaugh, might read a significant lesson to minor politicians of all parties on more important scenes. In pursuance of the same peacemaking spirit, he appears to have been desirous of doing something gratifying to the men of the town of Selkirk, who had on this occasion taken the field against his Yarrow tenantry. His Grace consulted Scott about the design of a piece of plate to be presented to their community; and his letter on this weighty subject must not be omitted in the memoirs of a Sheriff of Selkirk :

"To his Grace the Duke of Buccleuch, etc., Bowhill.

66

'Edinburgh, Thursday.

"MY DEAR LORD,-I have proceeded in my commission about the cup. It will be a very handsome one. But I am still puzzled to dispose of the birset in a becoming manner. It is a most unmanageable decoration. I tried it upright on the top of the cup; it looked like a shaving-brush, and the goblet might be intended to make the lather. Then I thought I had a brilliant idea. The arms of Selkirk are a female seated on a sarcophagus, decorated with the arms of Scotland, which will make a beautiful top to the cup. So I thought of putting the birse into the lady's other hand; but alas! it looked so precisely like the rod of chastisement uplifted over the poor child, that I laughed at the drawing for half an hour. Next, I tried to take off the castigatory appearance, by inserting the bristles in a kind of handle; but then it looked as if the poor woman had been engaged in the capacities of housemaid and child-keeper at once, and, fatigued with her double duty, had sat down on the wine-cooler, with the broom in one hand, and the bairn in the other. At length, after some conference with Charles Sharpe, I have hit on a plan, which, I think, will look very well, if tolerably executed,— namely, to have the lady seated in due form on the top of the lid (which will look handsome and will be well taken), and to have a thistle wreathed around the sarcophagus and rising above her head, and from the top of the thistle shall proceed the birse. I will bring a drawing with me, and they shall get the cup ready in the mean time. I hope to be at Abbotsford on Monday night, to stay for a week.` My cat has eat two or three birds, while regaling on the crumbs that were thrown for them. This was a breach of hospitality; but oportet vivere—and micat inter omnes-with which stolen pun, and my respectful compliments to Lord Montagu and the ladies, I am, very truly, your Grace's most faithful and obliged servant, WALTER SCOTT."

"P.S.-Under another cover, which I have just received, I send the two drawings of the front and reverse of the lid of the proposed cup. Your Grace will be so good as to understand that the thistle,—the top of which is garnished with the bristle, is entirely detached, in working, from the figure, and slips into a socket. The following lines are humbly suggested for a motto, being taken from

Irving's Abbotsford and Newstead, 1835.

† A birse, or bunch of hog's bristles, forms the cognizance of the sutors. When a new burgess is admitted into their community, the birse passes round with the cup of welcome, and every elder brother dips it into the wine, and draws it through his mouth, before it reaches the happy neophyte, who of course pays it similar respect.

an ancient Scottish canzonetta,-unless the Yarrow committee can find any better:

'The sutor ga'e the sow a kiss;

Grumph! quo' the sow, it's a' for my birss.""

.

Some weeks before the year 1815 closed, Mr Morritt sustained the heaviest of domestic afflictions; and several letters on that sad subject had passed between Rokeby and Abbotsford, before the date of the following:

« To J. B. S. Morritt, Esq., M.P., Rokeby Park.

"Edinburgh, 22d Dec. 1815.

"MY DEAR MORRITT,-While you know what satisfaction it would have given me to have seen you here, I am very sensible of the more weighty reasons which you urge for preferring to stay at Rokeby for some time. I only hope you will remember that Scotland has claims on you, whenever you shall find your own mind so far at ease as to permit you to look abroad for consolation; and if it should happen that you thought of being here about our time of vacation, I have my time then entirely at my own command, and I need not say, that as much of it as could in any manner of way contribute to your amusement, is most heartily at yours. I have myself at present the melancholy task of watching the declining health of my elder brother, Major Scott, whom, I think, you have seen.

"My literary occupation is getting through the press the Letters of Paul, of whose lucubrations I trust soon to send you a copy As the observations of a bystander, perhaps you will find some amusement in them, especially as I had some channels of information not accessible to every one. The recess of our courts, which takes place to-morrow, for three weeks, will give me ample time to complete this job, and also the second volume of Triermain, which is nearly finished, a strange rude story founded partly on the ancient northern traditions respecting the Berserkers, whose peculiar habits, and fits of martial frenzy, make such a figure in the Sagas. I shall then set myself seriously to the Antiquary, of which I have only a very general sketch at present; but when once I get my pen to the paper it will walk fast enough. I am sometimes tempted to leave it alone, and try whether it will not write as well without the assistance of my head as with it. A hopeful prospect for the reader. In the mean while, the snow, which is now falling so fast as to make it dubious when this letter may reach Rokeby, is likely to forward these important avocations, by keeping me a constant resident in Edinburgh, in lieu of my plan of going to Abbotsford, where I had a number of schemes in hand in the way of planting and improving. I believe I told you I have made a considerable addition to my little farm, and extended my domains towards a wild lake, which I have a good prospect of acquiring also. It has a sort of legendary fame; for the persuasion of the solitary shepherds who approach its banks, is, that it is tenanted by a very large amphibious animal, called by them a water-bull, and which several of them pretend to have seen, As his dimensions greatly exceed those of an otter, I am tempted to think with Trinculo, This is the devil, and no monster.' But, after all, is it not strange, that as to almost all the lakes in Scotland, both Lowland and Highland, such a belief should prevail? and that the description popularly given uniformly corresponds with that of the hippopotamus? Is it possible, that at some remote period, that remarkable animal, like some others which have now disappeared, may have been an inhabitant of our large lakes ? Certainly the vanishing of the mammoth and other animals from the face of creation, renders such a conjecture less wild than I would otherwise esteem it. It is certain we have lost the beaver, whose bones have been more than once found in our Selkirkshire bogs and marl-mosses. The remains of

CHAPTER XIII

Publication of Paul's Letters to his Kinsfolk-Guy Mannering "Terry-Fied"Death of Major John Scott-Letters to Thomas Scott-Publication of the Antiquary-History of 1814 for the Edinburgh Annual Register-Letters on the History of Scotland projected-Publication of the First Tales of My Landlord by Murray and Blackwood-Anecdotes by Mr Train-Quarterly Review on the Tales-Building at Abbotsford begun-Letters to Morritt, Terry, Murray, and the Ballantynes.-1816.

THE year 1815 may be considered as, for Scott's peaceful tenor of life, an eventful one. That which followed has left almost its only traces in the successive appearance of nine volumes, which attest the prodigal genius, and hardly less astonishing industry of the man. Early in January were published Paul's Letters to his Kinsfolk, of which I need not now say more than that they were received with a lively curiosity, and general, though not vociferous applause. The first edition was an octavo, of 6000 copies; and it was followed, in the course of the next two or three years, by a second and a third, amounting together to 3000 more. The popularity of the novelist was at its height; and this admitted, if not avowed, specimen of Scott's prose, must have been perceived, by all who had any share of discrimination, to flow from the same pen.

.66

Mr Terry produced in the spring of 1816 a dramatic piece, entitled, Guy Mannering," which met with great success on the London boards, and still continues to be a favourite with the theatrical public; what share the novelist himself had in this first specimen of what he used to call the art of Terryfying," I cannot exactly say; but his correspondence shows that the pretty song of the Lullaby* was not his only contribution to it; and I infer that he had taken the trouble to modify the plot, and re-arrange, for stage purposes, a considerable part of the original dialogue. The casual risk of discovery, through the introduction of the song which had, in the mean time, been communicated to one of his humble dependents, the late Alexander Campbell, editor of Albyn's Anthology-(commonly known at Abbotsford as, by way of excellence, "the Dunniewassail,")-and Scott's suggestions on that difficulty, will amuse the reader of the following letter:

.

*See Scott's Poetical Works.

"To D. Terry, Esq., Alfred Place, Bloomsbury, London.

"Abbotsford, 18th April, 1816.

"MY DEAR TERRY,-I give you joy of your promotion to the dignity of an householder, and heartily wish you all the success you so well deserve, to answer the approaching enlargement of your domestic establishment. You will find a house a very devouring monster, and that the purveying for it requires a little exertion, and a great deal of self-denial and arrangement. But when there is domestic peace and contentment, all that would otherwise be disagreeable, as restraining our taste and occupying our time, becomes easy. I trust Mrs Terry will get her business easily over, and that you will soon dandle Dickie on your knee.' I have been at the spring circuit, which made me late in receiving your letter, and there I was introduced to a man whom I never saw in my life before, namely, the proprietor of all the Pepper and Mustard family, in other words, the genuine Dandie Dinmont. Dandie is himself modest, and says, 'he b'lives its only the dougs that is in the buik, and no himsel.' As the surveyor of taxes was going his ominous rounds past Hyndlea, which is the abode of Dandie, his whole pack rushed out upon the man of execution, and Dandie followed them (conscious that their number greatly exceeded his return), exclaiming, the tae hauf o'them is but whalps, man.' In truth, I knew nothing of the man, except his odd humour of having only two names for twenty dogs. But there are lines of general resemblance among all these hill-men, which there is no missing; and Jamie Davidson of Hyndlea certainly looks Dandie Dinmont remarkably well. He is much flattered with the compliment, and goes uniformly by the name among his comrades, but has never read the book. Ailie used to read it to him, but it set him to sleep. All this you will think funny enough. I am afraid I am in a scrape about the song, and that of my own making; for as it never occurred to me that there was any thing odd in my writing two or three verses for you, which have no connexion with the novel, I was at no pains to disown them; and Campbell is just that sort of crazy creature, with whom there is no confidence, not from want of honour and disposition to oblige, but from his flighty temper. The music of Cadil gu lo is already printed in his publication, and nothing can be done with him, for fear of setting his tongue a-going. Erskine and you may consider whether you should barely acknowledge an obligation to an unknown friend, or pass the matter altogether in silence. In my opinion, my first idea was preferable to both, because I cannot see what earthly connexion there is between the song and the novel, or how acknowledging the one is fathering the other. On the contrary, it seems to me that acknowledgment tends to exclude the idea of farther obligation than to the extent specified. I forgot also that I had given a copy of the lines to Mrs Macleod of Macleod, from whom I had the air. But I remit the matter entirely to you and Erskine, for there, must be many points in it which I cannot be supposed a good judge of. At any rate, don't let it delay your publication, and believe I shall be quite satisfied with what you think proper.

"I have got from my friend Glengarry the noblest dog ever seen on the Border since Johnnie Armstrong's time. He is between the wolf and deer greyhound, about six feet long from the tip of the nose to the tail, and high and strong in proportion he is quite gentle, and a great favourite: tell Will. Erskine he will eat off his plate without being at the trouble to put a paw on the table or chair. I showed him to Matthews, who dined one day in Castle Street before. I came here, where, except for Mrs S., I am like unto

The spirit who dwelleth by himself,

In the land of mist and snow

for it is snowing and hailing eternally, and will kill all the lambs to a certainty, unless it changes in a few hours. At any rate, it will cure us of the embarrass