meet in him at once; he is in the world and not in it, as it were, at the same time; he is almost too unselfconscious. The favourable side of this strangely balanced nature has been already indicated; it gave us in his Poems and Novels together the most brilliant and the most diversified "spectacle of human life " which we have had since Shakespeare; it gave Scott himself many years of pure and peculiar happiness. On the other hand, we have the failure, after long-continued struggles, of his material prosperity, and (closely connected with this) the narrow and even unjust view which he always took, or rather, took always in public, of literature and his own share in it. He could not fully work out his ideal of life, however we interpret it; his career has many curious inconsistencies. There is nothing which Mr. Lockhart notes more pointedly than Scott's aversion from what is called "literature as a profession." He endorses with approval, as Scott's own view, the words of a friend, who wrote in 1799 to encourage him in perseverance at the bar, "I rather think men of business have produced as good poetry in their by-hours as the professed regulars: an assertion of which (it need hardly be added) the writer does not furnish any proof. To the same effect it is added (1815) "that Scott never considered any amount of literary distinction as entitled to be spoken of in the same breath with mastery in the higher departments of practical life. To have done things worthy to be written, was in his eyes a dignity to which no man made any approach, who had only written things worthy to be read;" and the steam-engine, safety-lamp, and campaigns of the Duke of Wellington are presently named as examples.

There can be no doubt that the biographer has here truly reported, not merely what he admired Scott for thinking, but Scott's own conscious idea regarding his life. And if this had been the whole truth, there can equally be no doubt that we should never have had a "Marmion" or a "Bride of Lammermoor." Indeed, except as the opinion of so distinguished a man as Scott, it would hardly deserve examination. For what human being would seriously pretend to compare with each other things so generically different as a battle, a scientific invention, and a song? In what balances should we weigh "Othello" and Trafalgar, the commercial policy of Sir Robert Peel and "The Advancement of Learning,”— -or decide which has been of most value to England? How is the one less a "deed" than the other? Scott's profound modesty as to his own genius was undoubtedly one motive in his estimate of literature; but even this could not have blinded so sensible a man to its untenability, had he not been swayed by something of that instinct for living an old-world life in the present, which lay at the root of his character. We have here one of his practical anachronisms. He puts himself in the place of the Minstrel of the "Lay" at Newark; he leans to the time when hands were more honoured, at least more powerful, than brains; he wavers in the delicate compromise which was to have united the spirit of Scott of Harden and Scott of Abbotsford. A similar sentiment governs his aversion from "literature as a pro

fession." Much might be said for and against this feeling; yet it is hardly more true of Goldsmith, Southey, or Thackeray, that they made letters their profession, than of Walter Scott. Few men whose work can be properly classed as literature have written so much or so continuously; none, probably, have earned more by their writings. What he actually was as a man of business, meanwhile, is recorded in his life. What he was as a lawyer has been described by himself. "My profession and I" (by 1800) "came to stand nearly upon the footing which honest Slender consoled himself on having established with Mistress Ann Page, There was no great love between us at the beginning, and it pleased Heaven to decrease it on further acquaintance." In fact, at the point where we left the narrative, Scott, already enriched by his marriage, was about to obtain the Sheriff-deputeship of Selkirkshire; and soon after (1806) he left the bar for a Clerkship of Session;offices which together gave him a good income, and had the additional advantage of duties that, except a certain amount of attendance and of rapid and accurate penmanship, were almost nominal. The criticism to which these pleasant places seem to have exposed Scott from those who did not share in his political devotion to the house of Dundas, then paramount in Scotland, was unfair; but one cannot say that he is entitled to more than the praise of prudence for obtaining ease and leisure by this ancient and easy method :

Deus nobis haec otia fecit !

And, in fact, before the salary from the clerkship, held at first in reversion, fell in, the sale of Scott's works was already beginning, both directly in itself and indirectly through his partnership with the Ballantynes, to surpass, as it before long reduced to comparative insignificance, any sources of revenue,—except those which he thus derived from the "profession of literature."

Enough, however, has been said on Scott's practical, though morally blameless, inconsistency in this section of his career. Important as the matter of income was for many years to his healthy enjoyment of existence, and at last in giving a direction to his writing, its real importance lies in that to which we gladly turn, --that he was thus enabled to live the life for which he had been planned by Nature. Is not what is most desirable for man contained in this, when "Nature's holy plan" happens to be such as she marked out for Scott? There are several types of a noble life, some of which may be loftier or more striking than his; yet we do not see how he could have done his peculiar work otherwise. One of the masters in the highest human knowledge, -the science of man's nature,-defined the perfection of life as "the serene exercise of thought" (we must thus paraphrase his own word Theoria), “in a state of independence, and leisure, and security so far as man may attain it, together with a complete measure of his days; for nothing incomplete can enter into blessedness. Such a life," he however adds, "would be in itself above the height of humanity." Perhaps Wordsworth

approached this ideal nearer than any distinguished man of Scott's generation, and it is easy to see the features in which Scott fell short; yet on the whole, if the estimate here taken be just, he also was not far from the lofty standard of Aristotle.

We return to trace Scott's career; fortunate, if we have truly and distinctly traced what manner of man he was; for it is only if we feel this, that Mr. Lockhart's detailed narrative of his life, the interest of which cannot be transferred to an abridgment, gains its fullest charm and significance. Some contemporary poets now became friends of Scott; he had only seen Burns as a boy, and it is curious that, closely as their lines met in some points, Burns has left no sign of influence on Scott's writings. A greater effect was produced by his intercourse with Wordsworth, whose elevation and simplicity of mind impressed Scott with a sense of his predominance, not the less striking because it was not consciously avowed. The same tacit recognition is traceable in Byron; one seems also to find it among all Wordsworth's contemporaries in verse; they know that he is the head of the family. "Differing from him in very many points of taste," writes Scott in 1820, "I do not know a man more to be venerated for uprightness of heart and loftiness of genius." Wordsworth, in turn, has recorded his estimate of Scott's power as a poet in some memorable verses, his feeling for the man in an early letter: "Your sincere friend, for such I will call myself, though slow to use a word of such solemn meaning to any one:" (ii: 167.)-Scott had for some years been Sheriff of Selkirkshire; and that he might live within the district he now (1804) moved to Ashestiel, a single house within the old Ettrick Forest, upon the banks of Tweed, not much above its junction with Yarrow. "The river itself is separated from the high bank on which the house stands only by a narrow meadow of the richest verdure. Opposite, and all around, are the green hills. The valley there is narrow, and the aspect in every direction is that of perfect pastoral repose.” “Not equal in picturesque beauty to the banks of Clyde," says Scott himself, "but so sequestered, so simple, and so solitary, that it seems just to have beauty enough to delight its inhabitants." And again, as a crowning recommendation, he describes Ashestiel to his friend the distinguished antiquary, Mr. G. Ellis: "In the very centre of the ancient Reged," otherwise known as the Scoto-British realm of Strathclyde. These passages are extracted, because the general descriptions apply also to the scenery of Abbotsford, except that the landscape is there wider, and more bare, and because they indicate one dominant motive in Scott's mind. The presence of ancient national associations was precisely the point which determined his choice of property: the genius loci which, with an overpowering influence, bound him all his life to the Border, and led him there from Italy to die.

By this time, through study, the collection of traditions, experience of men high or low in rank, solitary thought and imaginative vision, almost all the materials on which Scott was to work were ready. When the first fruits of this long preparation appeared in the "Lay of the Last Minstrel" (1805), its success was not less surprising

to the author than to the public. Begun as a ballad on a large scale to please Lady Dalkeith, gradually moulded into a metrical romance, or "Waverley Novel" in verse, and interspersed with those allusive transitional pieces which no other English poet has managed so gracefully, binding past and present together in one, Scott had here unconsciously put his ideal of life into form, and fairly "found himself." "Marmion," the most powerful of the poems, followed in 1808; when also Scott published an elaborate edition of Dryden. Some similar work in the way of skilful editing or compiling he almost always had on hand; he did as much thus for students as if he had not, at the same time, been the Scott who, in Wordsworth's phrase, was "the whole world's darling." "Labour," he said himself, "is absolutely the charter by which we hold existence." Great regularity, with perfect order and neatness in the arrangements of his library, assisted him in accomplishing so much. Rising at six, he “broke the neck of the day's work" before breakfast: soon after noon, he was on his horse; outdoor employment and conversation completed the day; but though study was not resumed, the eye and the mind of such a man were never idle. He knew when he had finished his work; put his best into it, and had done: was in good-humour with all his tasks, and thought little of them when finished. So curiously had the "determined indolence" of his nature been conquered by the imperious force of creative imagination! During the next year or two we find him planning the "Quarterly Review;" active in encouraging Mr. H. Siddons and a younger theatrical friend, Mr. D. Terry, on the stage; active also in his interest in the war against Napoleon, and (less felicitously) engaged in local politics; then, publishing the "Lady of the Lake." "Don Roderick," unsuccessful in its attempt to blend the past history of Spain with the interests of the Peninsular War, followed (1811); "Triermain," and " "Rokeby," the scene of which is lain within the lands of the most valued friend of Scott's middle life, Mr. Morritt, in 1813: the "Lord of the Isles" (1815) and "Harold" (1817) complete the list of Poems.

Some general remarks on Scott's style as a writer have been reserved for the notice of his Novels. These have naturally overshadowed his fame as a poet; they are more singularly and strikingly original-more unique in literature; and the form of the prose story, admitting readily of narrative details, and allowing the author to explain remote allusions as he advances, was more capable of giving free play for Scott's tastes and materials, than poetry, however irregular in its structure. Hence he did not make himself quite so much at home in his Poems. Perhaps they depend a little too much on archaeology; the ancient manners, dresses, and customs painted occasionally compete in interest with the delineation of human character; those marvellous scenes from common life which are true in all ages, or those sketches of contemporary manners, which Scott has employed with such skill and power to counterpoise the antiquarian element in the Novels, could hardly find a place in verse. He has indeed given us something of this kind in the beautiful

Introductions to the "Lay" and "Marmion," and, less successfully, though even here with much grace, in "Triermain;" but they are not wrought up into a whole; they do not form an integral portion of the poem. On the other hand, the metrical descriptions of scenery, if not more picturesque and vivid than those of the romances, tell more forcibly; they also relieve the narrative, by allowing the writer's own thoughts and interests to touch our hearts: an expedient used by Scott with singular skill. The "Edinburgh” of “Marmion” is a splendid example; but others are scattered through the less familiarly known poems, which, it is hoped, will in this edition find a fresh circle of readers, who are little likely to regret the study.

Scott's incompleteness of style, which is more injurious to poetry than to prose, his "careless glance and reckless rhyme," have been alleged by a great writer of our time as one reason why he is now less popular as a poet than he was in his own day, when from two to three thousand copies of his metrical romances were yearly sold. Beside these faults, which are visible almost everywhere, the charge that he wants depth and penetrative insight, has been often brought. He does not "wrestle with the mystery of existence," it is said; he does not try to solve the problems of human life. Scott, could he have foreseen this criticism, would probably not have been very careful to answer it. He might have allowed its correctness, and said that one man might have this work to do, but his was another. High and enduring pleasure, however conveyed, is the end of poetry. "Othello" gives this by its profound display of tragic passion. "Paradise Lost" gives it by its religious sublimity: "Childe Harold" by its meditative picturesqueness: the "Lay" by its brilliant delineation of ancient life and manners. These are but scanty samples of the vast range of poetry. In that house are many mansions. All poets may be seers and teachers; but some teach directly, others by a less ostensible and larger process. Scott never lays bare the workings of his mind, like Goethe or Shelley; he does not draw out the moral of the landscape, like Wordsworth; rather, after the fashion of Homer and the writers of the ages before criticism, he presents a scene, and leaves it to work its own effect on the reader. His most perfect and lovely poems, the short songs which occur scattered through the metrical or the prose narratives, are excellent instances. He is the most unselfconscious of our modern poets; perhaps, of all our poets; the difference in this respect between him and his friends Byron and Wordsworth is like a difference of centuries. If they give us the inner spirit of modern life, or of nature, enter into our perplexities, or probe our deeper passions, Scott has a dramatic faculty not less delightful and precious. He hence attained eminent success in one of the rarest and most difficult aims of Poetry,-sustained vigour, clearness, and interest in narration. If we reckon up the poets of the world, we may be surprised to find how very few (dramatists not included) have accomplished this, and may be hence led to estimate Scott's rank in his art more justly. One looks through the English poetry of the first half of the century in vain, unless it be here and