WINTER LIGHTNING. The flash at midnight!-'twas a light Then closed as in the tomb: An angel might have passed my bed, So life appears ;-a sudden birth, So fame the poet's hope deceives, Life is a lightning-flash of breath; FROM THE PELICAN ISLAND." LIFE. Life is the transmigration of a soul Through various bodies, various states of being; The Child!—we know no more of happy childhood, Are incoherent as its own crude visions: We but begin to live from that fine point Which memory dwells on, with the morning star; The earliest note we heard the cuckoo sing, Or the first daisy that we ever plucked; When thoughts themselves were stars, and birds, and flowers, Pure brilliance, simplest music, wild perfume. Then, the grey Elder!—leaning on his staff, And bowed beneath a weight of years, that steal Upon him with the secrecy of sleep (No snow falls lighter than the snow of age. None with such subtlety benumbs the frame), She throws a shroud of turf and flowers around him, SIR WALTER SCOTT. (1771-1832.) THE phrase Gothic Literature is somewhat undefined in its boundaries, like the similar one, Gothic Architecture. We associate with the term, however, the departments of poetry which include ballad and romance fictions, or which invest the personages of classical times with the costume and ideas of the feudalism of the middle ages. This taste in English poetry had disappeared after the establishment, in the seventeenth century, of the French school, whose disciples ultimately assumed the position of imitators of Pope. The terms Gothic and Romantic have been opposed to that of Classical, as applicable to the great body of French poetry and to the poetical literature of England during the eighteenth century. We have already alluded to the writers who, in the conclusion of that period, contributed to draw back the national taste to simplicity and nature. And it was reserved for Scott to animate farther the literature of our country, by resuscitating, in a more interesting shape, the poetized traditional history so popular among our ancestors,-by re-creating the imagery, costume, persons, and incidents of other days, in the style, or rather in a higher sphere of taste, that had delighted the listeners of Thomas of Ercildoune, of the troubadours, and of Chaucer. While the brilliant colouring of this literature has contributed to historical misconception, it has, on the other hand, done vast service to the poetry of the nineteenth century. Germany owns her obligations to England for the creation of her drama, and England has to thank Germany for the sparks that contributed to kindle what has been termed the "Revival" of the present era; while Europe is obliged to the same country for a revolution in many of the higher departments of scholarship and philosophy. Scott's earliest published efforts were exhibited in translations from the German muse; yet his primary inspiration in romance poetry had an earlier origin. Walter Scott, a younger son of a writer to the signet, was born in Edinburgh, August 1771. By both parents the future poet was descended from distinguished ancestors. Of this circumstance he was proud, and it was one of his dearest objects of ambition3 to found a new branch of his "clan" for future distinction as lords of the soil. Some of the poet's earliest years were, on account of the delicacy of his health, arising from a malady that caused his lameness, passed with his paternal grandfather at the farm of Sandy Knowe, near the village of Smailholm in Roxburghshire. Here he acquired that taste for border lore and chivalric tradition which was so strongly developed in after life. He entered the High School of Edinburgh in 1779, and passed to the University in 1783: he did not in either sphere display any shining ability; his Latin was little, and his Greek less. During these years, however, his health was precarious; and, 1 Job, xiv. 10.-We have omitted the intervening Ages; comp. Shakespeare's "Seven Ages," in As You Like It: see supra, p. 90. See Schlegel's Dramatic Literature. 3 Disappointed, as has singularly been the case with some other poets, by the deaths of all his children. Some of his boyish verses have been preserved (see Lockhart's Life, vol. i.). He early displayed a talent for story-telling. besides, his favourite studies lay out of the province of schoolmasters and professors: he was, like Coleridge, a helluo librorum, and, before his sixteenth year, had run through a vast circle of fiction and miscellaneous reading, which contributed to rear the splendid mass of materials from which he struck the rich coinages of his future poetry and novels. For a short period, during which he attended the law lectures in the University, he was initiated in his father's office' into the practice of the legal profession; in 1792 he passed advocate. In his profession he was not calculated to rise ; he says of it himself, in the language of Slender to Anne Page, "There was little love between us at first, and it pleased God to decrease it on better acquaintance." But the affluence of his family secured him in the means of indulging his favourite tastes; his studies were incessant and various; he succeeded in obtaining a general, if not critical, knowledge of the modern languages. His first serious efforts in composition were, as has been said, made in translations from the ballads of Germany: Scott shared largely in the admiration of the literature of that country, which had been introduced to the notice of Scotland by Mr Henry Mackenzie, author of the "Man of Feeling." In 1797 he married Miss Charlotte Carpenter, a young French refugee of great beauty. His life now promised every felicity; a happy marriage, a comfortable competency, a rising reputation as a poet, and active employment among his favourite literary antiquities, constituted its features. His circle of acquaintance was large and congenial, and admirably fitted for the advancement of his literary objects. In 1802-3 appeared his "Minstrelsy of the Scottish Border," with his own imitations of the old ballads, and in 1804 his edition of the romance of "Sir Tristrem," ascribed to Thomas the Rhymer of Ercildoune; these works procured for him high reputation as a literary antiquary. His profession, hardly worth retaining, he now resolved to abandon, and to make literature the basis of his fortunes. His Selkirk sheriffship, an easy office, with an annual revenue of L.300, facilitated his acting on this resolution. Accordingly, he threw his genius more boldly into the sphere of original poetry, in the composition of "The Lay of the Last Minstrel," a tale of Border warfare, illustrating the habits and superstitions of former centuries, and glorifying the ancestry of the Duke of Buccleuch, the chief of the clan Scott. Its publication in 1805 attracted universal and enthusiastic admiration. The theme and the style were so new and so original; the colours of forgotten phases of society were painted with such graphic splendour, that this metrical romance placed the author at once in the front rank of genius. time was favourable for the experiment; the great poets of the nineteenth century had merely begun to sing, and, as Scott himself remarks "The realms of Parnassus seemed to lie open to the first bold invader." In the meantime, the poet's prospective revenues were materially improved by the reversion of a clerkship in the Court of Session.* With fortune thus filling his sails from two quarters, Scott proceeded in his new career. "Marmion" appeared in 1808; in 1810, the Lady of the Lake," illustrating the scenery and chivalry of the Highlands in the reign of James V.; these were followed by the "Vision of Don Roderic," " Rokeby," and, in 1814, "The Lord of the Isles." But Scott had reached his culminating point in his Highland poem. Byron's reputation was now paling every other fire; and the anonymous publication of the " Bridal of Triermain," and " Harold the Dauntless," by wakening no feeling correspondent to his former renown, convinced 1 His office training, and his father's character, are delineated in "Redgauntlet." 2 He obtained the sheriff'ship of Selkirk in 1800. The 3 Crabbe, Rogers, and Campbell had been silent for many years; Wordsworth and Coleridge had published but little. The agreement with his retiring predecessor prevented his enjoying the emoluments till the law, six years afterwards, permitted that gentleman to "retire with an annuity.” Scott that he had sung too long. And now he penetrated that rich mine in prose fiction which seemed but the continuation of his poetical vein, and whose treasures astonished the world. For nearly fifteen years he continued anonymously in rapid succession the series of his novels, and the "Author of Waverley" became a profound speculation, the subject of three-volumed works. The secret, however, was faithfully kept; and, though universally suspected, the poet held his incognito till commercial misfortune forced its withdrawal. Besides his poetry and novels, his other literary labours are miraculous in amount. They consist of reviews, histories, biographies, annotated editions of great writers, &c. (see the catalogue at the conclusion of Lockhart's Life.) Ashiesteel, on the Tweed, had been Scott's country residence since his appointment as sheriff of Selkirkshire. As the wealth flowing from his literary industry increased, while his secret connection with the printing and publishing establishments of his friends, the Ballantynes, and the prospective emoluments of his clerkship, promised an ample revenue, the poet's early wish to connect himself" by proprietorship "to his mother-earth," betrayed him into the purchase, piece by piece, of the bare territory that swelled into the estate of Abbotsford. His contemplated cottage expanded into a "romance in stone and lime," as his celebrated mansion has been termed; and thither, while it was yet unfinished, the family removed in 1812. By plantations and other improvements he gave a completely new aspect to the district; and in this beautiful retreat, till the period of his misfortunes, he continued an unparalleled career of literary labour and magnificent hospitality. In 1820 he was created a baronet by George IV., with whom he was a personal favourite. This was the first honour of the kind which the king had conferred since his accession to the crown. But Scott's wealth was altogether "illusory;" his estate had cost him sums immensely above its worth; his connection with the firm of Ballantyne and Co. had entangled him in the responsibilities of an ill-conducted business; and the disastrous year 1826 involved him in the ruin of his latter publishers, Constable and Co. The poet's liabilities, from his relations with these two houses, amounted to upwards of L.100,000. The estate of Abbotsford had been previously male over to his eldest son in his marriage contract; and Scott, after a life so splendidly laborious, stood in the condition of a man without a foot of property he could call his own. But nothing could be more noble than the attitude in which his adversity exhibited him. He sat down, in old age, and in the midst of ruin and of family misfortune, to redeem his fair fame, and to right all whom his imprudence had unintentionally wronged. He would not listen to the offers of compromise generously made to him; he determined to pay his creditors the last farthing, and with "Time and I against any two" as his motto, in a few years he had nearly redeemed his pledge. Woodstock alone, "the labour of three months," cleared to his creditors L.8000. But before he could reach the goal he sunk in the struggle; a paralytic attack in 1831 prostrated the faculties of the over-wrought brain. In vain a voyage to Italy was tried for the restoration of his shattered constitution; returning with haste, that he might die beneath the shade of his own trees, and within hearing of his own Tweed, he expired in unconsciousness on September 21, 1832. In personal appearance Scott was massive and imposing; his head, his most remarkable feature, was almost cylindrical, the upper portion being immensely developed. His eye was inexpressive, unless lighted up by 1 By Byron, for example; Moore's Life, Letter 475 (1822), p. 569, 4to Ed.; see also the anecdote of the dinner at Carlton House, Lockhart, vol. iii. p. 34. 2 Lady Scott died in 1827. some emotion; the quiescent aspect of his face was rather one of stolidity, but often exhibiting the sly humour of quiet observation. His lameness did not much impede his habits of robust activity; he was a sturdy walker, a fearless rider, and seemed to relish physical fatigue and danger. His intellect was characterised by shrewdness and good sense. He despised the affectations and pedantry of the merely literary man, and disliked anything like flattery of his genius. His prodigious memory enabled him to retain and command his world of acquirements, and his strong will gave energy to untiring industry. His affections were warm, and his universal kindliness of nature' extended to attachments to the inferior animals, from the time when he had played with the lambs at Sandy Knowe. The character of Scott's genius was more constructive than creative. The language of his poetry is sometimes careless and even mean, but the vivid splendour of historical and natural scenery, and the impetuosity of the action of the story, carry the mind above the language whose facile flow through various versifications never fatigues by its sameness, nor impedes by cumbrous elaboration the interest of the tale. Of his novels and his other works it is not our province to speak. His writings have given a narrative bent to all the poetical literature that succeeded "The Lay of the Last Minstrel," CADYOW CASTLE.3 When princely Hamilton's abode Ennobled Cadyow's Gothic towers, Then, thrilling to the harp's gay sound, But Cadyow's towers, in ruins laid, Yet still of Cadyow's faded fame On the wild banks of Evandale. For thou, from scenes of courtly pride,* From pleasure's lighter scenes can turn, 1 Few enjoyed more of the good-will of his literary cotemporaries, of all shades of political opinion, in an age when, although literary jealousy was not conspicuous, political differences had a vast effect on literary criticism. Scott's Tory principles were those of patriotism, not faction, the result of his education in the past, and of, perhaps, family connections 2 We have avoided allusion to the circumstances which elicited the "Ballantyne controversy" after the publication of Lockhart's life. 3The ancient baronial residence of the family of Hamilton," in Lanarkshire, on the river Evan, near its junction with the Clyde. Lady Anne Hamilton, eldest daughter of Archibald, ninth duke of Hamilton. For the occasion that suggested the ballad, see Lockhart, vol. ii. p. 77. |