I was received by old Tom and the dogs, with the unsophisticated feelings of goodwill. I have been trying to read a new novel which I have heard praised. It is called Almacks, and the author has so well succeeded in describing the cold selfish fopperies of the time, that the copy is almost as dull as the original. I think I will take up my bundle of Sheriff-Court processes instead of Almacks, as the more entertaining avocation of the two.
March 13.—Before breakfast, prepared and forwarded the processes to Selkirk. As I had the loan of £250 at March from Cadell I am now verging on to the £500 which he promised to allow me in advance on second series Canongate Chronicles. I do not like this, but unless I review or write to some other purpose, what else can I do? My own expenses are as limited as possible, but my house expenses are considerable, and every now and then starts up something of old scores which I cannot turn over to Mr. Gibson and his co-trustees. Well—time and the hour—money is the smallest consideration.
Had a pleasant walk to the thicket, though my ideas were olla-podrida-ish, curiously checkered between pleasure and melancholy. I have cause enough for both humours, God knows. I expect this will not be a day of work but of idleness, for my books are not come. Would to God I could make it light thoughtless idleness, such as I used to have when the silly smart fancies ran in my brain like the bubbles in a glass of champagne,—as brilliant to my thinking, as intoxicating as evanescent. But the wine is somewhat on the lees. Perhaps it was but indifferent cider after all. Yet I am happy in this place, where everything looks friendly, from old Tom to young Nym.[491] After all, he has little to complain of who has left so many things that like him.
March 14.—All yesterday spent in putting to rights books, and so forth. Not a word written except interlocutors. But this won't do. I have tow on the rock, and it must be spun off. Let us see our present undertakings. 1. Napoleon. 2. Review Home, Cranbourne Chase,[492] and the Mysteries. 3. Something for that poor faineant Gillies. 4. Essay on Ballad and Song. 5. Something on the modern state of France. These two last for the Prose Works. But they may
Come, we must up and be doing. There is a rare scud without, which says, "Go spin, you jade, go spin." I loitered on, and might have answered,
Smoked a brace of cigars after dinner as a sedative. This is the first time I have smoked these two months. I was afraid the custom would master me. Went to work in the afternoon, and reviewed for Lockhart Mackenzie's edition of Home's Works.[493] Proceeded as far as the eighth page.
March 15.—Kept still at the review till two o'clock; not that there is any hurry, but because I should lose my ideas, which are not worth preserving. Went on therefore. I drove over to Huntly Burn with Anne, then walked through the plantations, with Tom's help to pull me through the snow-wreaths. Returned in a glow of heat and spirits. Corrected proof-sheets in the evening.
March 16.—
But I hope no otherwise so ended than to meet the rubrick of the ballad, for it is but three o'clock. In the morning I was l'homme qui cherche—everything fell aside,—the very pens absconded, and crept in among a pack of letters and trumpery, where I had the devil's work finding them. Thus the time before breakfast was idled, or rather fidgeted, away. Afterwards it was rather worse. I had settled to finish the review, when, behold, as I am apt to do at a set task, I jibb'd, and my thoughts would rather have gone with Waterloo. So I dawdled, as the women say, with both, now writing a page or two of the review, now reading a few pages of the Battle of Waterloo by Captain Pringle, a manuscript which is excellently-written.[494] Well, I will find the advantage of it by and by. So now I will try to finish this accursed review, for there is nothing to prevent me, save the untractable character that hates to work on compulsion, whether of individuals or circumstances.
March 17.—I wrought away at the review and nearly finished it. Was interrupted, however, by a note from Ballantyne, demanding copy, which brought me back from Home and Mackenzie to Boney. I had my walk as usual, and worked nevertheless very fairly. Corrected proofs.
March 18.—Took up Boney again. I am now at writing, as I used to be at riding, slow, heavy, and awkward at mounting, but when I did get fixed in my saddle, could screed away with any one. I have got six pages ready for my learned Theban[495] to-morrow morning. William Laidlaw and his brother George dined with me, but I wrote in the evening all the same.
March 19.—Set about my labours, but enter Captain John Ferguson from the Spanish Main, where he has been for three years. The honest tar sat about two hours, and I was heartily glad to see him again. I had a general sketch of his adventures, which we will hear more in detail when we can meet at kail-time. Notwithstanding this interruption I have pushed far into the seventh page. Well done for one day. Twenty days should finish me at this rate, and I read hard too. But allowance must be made for interruptions.
March 20.—To-day worked till twelve o'clock, then went with Anne on a visit of condolence to Mrs. Pringle of Yair and her family. Mr. Pringle was the friend both of my father and grandfather; the acquaintance of our families is at least a century old.
March 21.—Wrote till twelve, then out upon the heights though the day was stormy, and faced the gale bravely. Tom Purdie was not with me. He would have obliged me to keep the sheltered ground. But, I don't know—
There is a touch of the old spirit in me yet that bids me brave the tempest,—the spirit that, in spite of manifold infirmities, made me a roaring boy in my youth, a desperate climber, a bold rider, a deep drinker, and a stout player at single-stick, of all which valuable qualities there are now but slender remains. I worked hard when I came in, and finished five pages.
March 22.—Yesterday I wrote to James Ballantyne, acquiescing in his urgent request to extend the two last volumes to about 600 each. I believe it will be no more than necessary after all, but makes one feel like a dog in a wheel, always moving and never advancing.
March 23.—When I was a child, and indeed for some years after, my amusement was in supposing to myself a set of persons engaged in various scenes which contrasted them with each other, and I remember to this day the accuracy of my childish imagination. This might be the effect of a natural turn to fictitious narrative, or it might be the cause of it, or there might be an action and reaction, or it does not signify a pin's head how it is. But with a flash of this remaining spirit, I imagine my mother Duty to be a sort of old task-mistress, like the hag of the merchant Abudah, in the Tales of the Genii—not a hag though, by any means; on the contrary, my old woman wears a rich old-fashioned gown of black silk, with ruffles of triple blonde-lace, and a coif as rich as that of Pearling Jean;[496] a figure and countenance something like Lady D.S.'s twenty years ago; a clear blue eye, capable of great severity of expression, and conforming in that with a wrinkled brow, of which the ordinary expression is a serious approach to a frown—a cautionary and nervous shake of the head; in her withered hand an ebony staff with a crutch head,—a Tompion gold watch, which annoys all who know her by striking the quarters as regularly as if one wished to hear them. Occasionally she has a small scourge of nettles, which I feel her lay across my fingers at this moment, and so Tace is Latin for a candle.[497] I have 150 pages to write yet.
March 24.—Does Duty not wear a pair of round old-fashioned silver buckles? Buckles she has, but they are square ones. All belonging to Duty is rectangular. Thus can we poor children of imagination play with the ideas we create, like children with soap-bubbles. Pity that we pay for it at other times by starting at our shadows.
The hard work still proceeds, varied only by a short walk.
March 25.—Hard work still, but went to Huntly Burn on foot, and returned in the carriage. Walked well and stoutly—God be praised!—and prepared a whole bundle of proofs and copy for the Blucher to morrow; that damned work will certainly end some time or other. As it drips and dribbles out on the paper, I think of the old drunken Presbyterian under the spout.
March 26.—Despatched packets. Colonel and Captain Ferguson arrived to breakfast. I had previously determined to give myself a day to write letters; and, as I expect John Thomson to dinner, this day will do as well as another. I cannot keep up with the world without shying a letter now and then. It is true the greatest happiness I could think of would be to be rid of the world entirely. Excepting my own family, I have little pleasure in the world, less business in it, and am heartily careless about all its concerns. Mr. Thomson came accordingly—not John Thomson of Duddingston, whom the letter led me to expect, but John Anstruther Thomson of Charlton [Fifeshire], the son-in-law of Lord Ch.-Commissioner.
March 27.—Wrote two leaves this morning, and gave the day after breakfast to my visitor, who is a country gentleman of the best description; knows the world, having been a good deal attached both to the turf and the field; is extremely good-humoured, and a good deal of a local antiquary. I showed him the plantations, going first round the terrace, then to the lake, then came down by the Rhymer's Glen, and took carriage at Huntly Burn, almost the grand tour, only we did not walk from Huntly Burn. The Fergusons dined with us.
March 28.—Mr Thomson left us about twelve for Minto, parting a pleased guest, I hope, from a pleased landlord. When I see a "gemman as is a gemman," as the blackguards say, why, I know how to be civil. After he left I set doggedly to work with Bonaparte, who had fallen a little into arrear. I can clear the ground better now by mashing up my old work in the Edinburgh Register with my new matter, a species of colcannen, where cold potatoes are mixed with hot cabbage. After all, I think Ballantyne is right, and that I have some talents for history-writing after all. That same history in the Register reads prettily enough. Coragio, cry Claymore. I finished five pages, but with additions from Register they will run to more than double I hope; like Puff in the Critic, be luxuriant.[498]
Here is snow back again, a nasty, comfortless, stormy sort of a day, and I will work it off at Boney. What shall I do when Bonaparte is done? He engrosses me morning, noon, and night. Never mind; Komt Zeit komt Rath, as the German says. I did not work longer than twelve, however, but went out in as rough weather as I have seen, and stood out several snow blasts.
March 29, 30.—
March 31.—Day varied by dining with Mr. Scrope, where we found Mr. Williams and Mr. Simson,[499] both excellent artists. We had not too much of the palette, but made a very agreeable day out. I contrived to mislay the proof-sheets sent me this morning, so that I must have a revise. This frequent absence of mind becomes very exceeding troublesome. I have the distinct recollection of laying them carefully aside after I dressed to go to the Pavilion. Well, I have a head—the proverb is musty.
April 1.—The proofs are not to be found. Applications from R.P. G[illies]. I must do something for him; yet have the melancholy conviction that nothing will do him any good. Then he writes letters and expects answers. Then they are bothering me about writing in behalf of the oil-gas light, which is going to the devil very fast. I cannot be going a-begging for them or anybody. Please to look down with an eye of pity—a poor distressed creature! No, not for the last morsel of bread. A dry ditch and a speedy death is worth it all.
April 2.—Another letter from R.P.G. I shall begin to wish, like S., that he had been murthered and robbed in his walks between Wimbledon and London. John [Archibald] Murray and his young wife came to dinner, and in good time. I like her very much, and think he has been very lucky. She is not in the vaward of youth, but John is but two or three years my junior. She is pleasing in her manners, and totally free from affectation; a beautiful musician, and willingly exerts her talents in that way; is said to be very learned, but shows none of it. A large fortune is no bad addition to such a woman's society.
April 3.—I had processes to decide; and though I arose at my usual hour, I could not get through above two of five proofs. After breakfast I walked with John Murray, and at twelve we went for Melrose, where I had to show the lions. We came back by Huntly Burn, where the carriage broke down, and gave us a pretty long walk home. Mr. Scrope dined with his two artists, and John [Thomson?]. The last is not only the best landscape-painter of his age and country, but is, moreover, one of the warmest-hearted men living, with a keen and unaffected feeling of poetry. Poor fellow! he has had many misfortunes in his family. I drank a glass or two of wine more than usual, got into good spirits, and came from Tripoli for the amusement of the good company. I was in good fooling.
April 4.—I think I have a little headache this morning; however, as Othello says, "That's not much." I saw our guests go off by seven in the morning, but was not in time to give them good-bye.
I did not go to the oar though, but walked a good deal.
April 5.—Heard from Lockhart; the Duke of W[ellington] and Croker are pleased with my historical labours; so far well—for the former, as a soldier said of him, "I would rather have his long nose on my side than a whole brigade." Well! something good may come of it, and if it does it will be good luck, for, as you and I know, Mother Duty, it has been a rummily written work. I wrote hard to-day.
April 6.—Do. Do. I only took one turn about the thicket, and have nothing to put down but to record my labours.
April 7.—The same history occurs; my desk and my exercise. I am a perfect automaton. Bonaparte runs in my head from seven in the morning till ten at night without intermission. I wrote six leaves to-day and corrected four proofs.
April 8.—Ginger, being in my room, was safely delivered in her basket of four puppies; the mother and children all doing well. Faith! that is as important an entry as my Journal could desire. The day is so beautiful that I long to go out. I won't, though, till I have done something. A letter from Mr. Gibson about the trust affairs. If the infernal bargain with Constable go on well, there will be a pretty sop in the pan to the creditors; £35,000 at least. If I could work as effectually for three years more, I shall stand on my feet like a man. But who can assure success with the public?
April 9.—I wrote as hard to-day as need be, finished my neat eight pages, and, notwithstanding, drove out and visited at Gattonside. The devil must be in it if the matter drags out longer now.
April 10.—Some incivility from the Leith Bank, which I despise with my heels. I have done for settling my affairs all that any man—much more than most men—could have done, and they refuse a draught of £20, because, in mistake, it was £8 overdrawn. But what can be expected of a sow but a grumph? Wrought hard, hard.
April 11.—The parks were rouped for £100 a year more than they brought last year. Poor Abbotsford will come to good after all. In the meantime it is Sic vos non vobis—but who cares a farthing? If Boney succeeds, we will give these affairs a blue eye, and I will wrestle stoutly with them, although
or rather with wasps. A very tough day's work.
April 12.—Ha-a-lt—as we used to say, my proof-sheets being still behind. Very unhandsome conduct on the part of the Blucher[501] while I was lauding it so profusely. It is necessary to halt and close up our files—of correspondence I mean. So it is a chance if, except for contradiction's sake, or upon getting the proof-sheets, I write a line to-day at Boney. I did, however, correct five revised sheets and one proof, which took me up so much of the day that I had but one turn through the courtyard. Owing to this I had some of my flutterings, my trembling exies, as the old people called the ague. Wrote a great many letters—but no "copy."
April 13.—I have sometimes wondered with what regularity—that is, for a shrew of my impatient temper—I have been able to keep this Journal. The use of the first person being, of course, the very essence of a diary, I conceive it is chiefly vanity, the dear pleasure of writing about the best of good fellows, Myself, which gives me perseverance to continue this idle task. This morning I wrote till breakfast, then went out and marked trees to be cut for paling, and am just returned—and what does any one care? Ay, but, Gad! I care myself, though. We had at dinner to-day Mr. and Mrs. Cranstoun (Burns's Maria of Ballochmyle[502]), Mr. Bainbridge and daughters, and Colonel Russell.
April 14.—Went to Selkirk to try a fellow for an assault on Dr. Clarkson—fined him seven guineas, which, with his necessary expenses, will amount to ten guineas. It is rather too little; but as his income does not amount to £30 a year, it will pinch him severely enough, and is better than sending him to an ill-kept jail, where he would be idle and drunk from morning to night. I had a dreadful headache while sitting in the Court—rheumatism in perfection. It did not last after I got warm by the fireside.
April 15.—Delightful soft morning, with mild rain. Walked out and got wet, as a sovereign cure for the rheumatism. Was quite well, though, and scribbled away.
April 16.—A day of work and exercise. In the evening a letter from L[ockhart], with the wonderful news that the Ministry has broken up, and apparently for no cause that any one can explain. The old grudge, I suppose, betwixt Peel and Canning, which has gone on augmenting like a crack in the side of a house, which enlarges from day to day, till down goes the whole. Mr. Canning has declared himself fully satisfied with J.L., and sent Barrow to tell him so. His suspicions were indeed most erroneous, but they were repelled with no little spirit both by L. and myself, and Canning has not been like another Great Man I know to whom I showed demonstrably that he had suspected an individual unjustly. "It may be so," he said, "but his mode of defending himself was offensive."[503]
April 17.—Went to dinner to-day to Mr. Bainbridge's Gattonside House, and had fireworks in the evening, made by Captain Burchard, a good-humoured kind of Will Wimble.[504] One nice little boy announced to us everything that was going to be done, with the importance of a prologue. Some of the country folks assembled, and our party was enlivened by the squeaks of the wenches and the long-protracted Eh, eh's! by which a Teviotdale tup testifies his wonder.
April 18.—I felt the impatience of news so much that I walked up to Mr. Laidlaw, surely for no other purpose than to talk politics. This interrupted Boney a little. After I returned, about twelve or one, behold Tom Tack; he comes from Buenos Ayres with a parcel of little curiosities he had picked up for me. As Tom Tack spins a tough yarn, I lost the morning almost entirely—what with one thing, what with t'other, as my friend the Laird of Raeburn says. Nor have I much to say for the evening, only I smoked a cigar more than usual to get the box ended, and give up the custom for a little.
April 19.—Another letter from Lockhart.[505] I am sorry when I think of the goodly fellowship of vessels which are now scattered on the ocean. There is the Duke of Wellington, the Lord Chancellor, Lord Melville, Mr. Peel, and I wot not who besides, all turned out of office or resigned! I wonder what they can do in the House of Lords when all the great Tories are on the wrong side of the House. Canning seems quite serious in his views of helping Lockhart. I hope it will come to something.
April 20.—A surly sort of day. I walked for two hours, however, and then returned chiefly to Nap. Egad! I believe it has an end at last, this blasted work. I have the fellow at Plymouth, or near about it. Well, I declare, I thought the end of these beastly big eight volumes was like the end of the world, which is always talked of and never comes.
April. 21.—Here is a vile day—downright rain, which disconcerts an inroad of bairns from Gattonside, and, of course, annihilates a part of the stock of human happiness. But what says the proverb of your true rainy day—
April 22.—Wrote till twelve o'clock, then sallied forth, and walked to Huntly Burn with Tom; and so, look you, sir, I drove home in the carriage. Wrought in the afternoon, and tried to read De Vere, a sensible but heavy book, written by an able hand—but a great bore for all that.[506] Wrote in the evening.
April 23.—Snowy morning. White as my shirt. The little Bainbridges came over; invited to see the armoury, etc., which I stood showman to. It is odd how much less cubbish the English boys are than the Scotch. Well-mannered and sensible are the southern boys. I suppose the sun brings them forward. Here comes six o'clock at night, and it is snowing as if it had not snowed these forty years before. Well, I'll work away a couple of chapters—three at most will finish Napoleon.
April 24.—Still deep snow—a foot thick in the courtyard, I dare say. Severe welcome to the poor lambs now coming into the world. But what signifies whether they die just now, or a little while after to be united with salad at luncheon-time? It signifies a good deal too. There is a period, though a short one, when they dance among the gowans, and seem happy. As for your aged sheep or wether, the sooner they pass to the Norman side of the vocabulary the better. They are like some old dowager ladies and gentlemen of my acquaintance,—no one cares about them till they come to be cut up, and then we see how the tallow lies on the kidneys and the chine.
April 25.—Snow yet, and it prevents my walking, and I grow bilious. I wrote hard though. I have now got Boney pegg'd up in the knotty entrails of Saint Helena, and may make a short pause.
So I finished the review of John Home's works, which, after all, are poorer than I thought them. Good blank verse and stately sentiment, but something lukewarmish, excepting Douglas, which is certainly a masterpiece. Even that does not stand the closet. Its merits are for the stage; but it is certainly one of the best acting plays going. Perhaps a play, to act well, should not be too poetical.
There is a talk in London of bringing in the Marquis of Lansdowne, then Lauderdale will perhaps come in here. It is certain the old Tory party is down the wind, not from political opinions, but from personal aversion to Canning. Perhaps his satirical temper has partly occasioned this; but I rather consider emulation as the source of it, the head and front of the offending. Croker no longer rhymes to joker. He has made a good coup, it is said, by securing Lord Hertford for the new administration. D.W. calls him their viper. After all, I cannot sympathise with that delicacy which throws up office, because the most eloquent man in England, and certainly the only man who can manage the House of Commons, is named Minister.[507]
April 26.—The snow still profusely distributed, and the surface, as our hair used to be in youth, after we had played at some active game, half black, half white, all in large patches. I finished the criticism on Home, adding a string of Jacobite anecdotes, like that which boys put to a kite's tail. Sent off the packet to Lockhart; at the same time sent Croker a volume of French tracts, containing La Portefeuille de Bonaparte, which he wished to see. Received a great cargo of papers from Bernadotte, some curious, and would have been inestimable two months back, but now my siege is almost made. Still my feelings for poor Count Itterburg,[508] the lineal and legitimate, make me averse to have much to do with this child of the revolution.
April 27.—This hand of mine gets to be like a kitten's scratch, and will require much deciphering, or, what may be as well for the writer, cannot be deciphered at all. I am sure I cannot read it myself. Weather better, which is well, as I shall get a walk. I have been a little nervous, having been confined to the house for three days. Well, I may be disabled from duty, but my tamed spirits and sense of dejection have quelled all that freakishness of humour which made me a voluntary idler. I present myself to the morning task, as the hack-horse patiently trudges to the pole of his chaise, and backs, however reluctantly, to have the traces fixed. Such are the uses of adversity.
April 28.—Wrought at continuing the Works, with some criticism on Defoe.[509] I have great aversion, I cannot tell why, to stuffing the "Border Antiquities" into what they call the Prose Works.
There is no encouragement, to be sure, for doing better, for nobody seems to care. I cannot get an answer from J. Ballantyne, whether he thinks the review on the Highlands would be a better substitution.
April 29.—Colonel and Captain Ferguson dined here with Mr. Laidlaw. I wrote all the morning, then cut some wood. I think the weather gets too warm for hard work with the axe, or I get too stiff and easily tired.
April 30.—Went to Jedburgh to circuit, where found my old friend and schoolfellow, D. Monypenny.[510] Nothing to-day but a pack of riff-raff cases of petty larceny and trash. Dined as usual with the Judge, and slept at my old friend Mr. Shortreed's.
May 1.—Brought Andrew Shortreed to copy some things I want. Maxpopple came with us as far as Lessudden, and we stopped and made a pilgrimage to Fair Maiden Lilliard's Stone, which has been restored lately, to the credit of Mr. Walker of Muirhouselaw.[511] Set my young clerk to work when we came home, and did some laborious business. A letter from Sir Thomas Lawrence informed me I am chosen Professor of Antiquities to the Royal Academy—a beautiful professor to be sure!
May 2.—Did nothing but proofs this morning. At ten went to Selkirk to arrange about the new measures, which, like all new things, will throw us into confusion for a little at least. The weather was so exquisitely good that I walked after tea to half-past eight, and enjoyed a sort of half-lazy, half-sulky humour—like Caliban's, "There's wood enough within."[512] Well, I may be the bear, but I must mount the ragged staff all the same. I set my myself to labour for R.P.G.[513] The Germanic Horrors are my theme, and I think something may be yet made of them.
May 3.—An early visit from Mr. Thomas Stewart, nephew of Duchess of Wellington, with a letter from his aunt. He seems a well-behaved and pleasant young man. I walked him through the Glen. Colonel Ferguson came to help us out at dinner, and then we had our wine and wassail.
May 4.—Corrected proofs in the morning. Mr. Stewart still here, which prevented work; however, I am far beforehand with everything. We walked a good deal; asked Mr. Alexander Pringle, Whytbank, to dinner. This is rather losing time, though.
May 5.—Worked away upon those wild affairs of Hoffmann for Gillies. I think I have forgot my German very much, and then the stream of criticism does not come freely at all: I cannot tell why. I gave it up in despair at half-past one, and walked out.
Had a letter from R.P.G. He seems in spirits about his work. I wish it may answer. Under good encouragement it certainly might. But—
Maxpopple came to dinner, and Mr. Laidlaw after dinner, so that broke up a day, which I can ill spare. Mr. Stewart left us this day.
May 6.—Wrought again at Hoffmann—unfructuously I fear—unwillingly I am certain; but how else can I do a little good in my generation? I will try a walk. I would fain catch myself in good-humour with my task, but that will not be easy.
May 7.—Finished Hoffmann, talis qualis. I don't like it; but then I have been often displeased with things that have proved successful. Our own labours become disgusting in our eyes, from the ideas having been turned over and over in our own minds. To others, to whom they are presented for the first time, they have a show of novelty. God grant it may prove so. I would help the poor fellow if I could, for I am poor myself.
May 8.—Corrected Hoffmann with a view to send him off, which, however, I could not accomplish. I finished a criticism on Defoe's Writings.[514] His great forte is his power of vraisemblance. This I have instanced in the story of Mrs. Veal's Ghost. Ettrick Shepherd arrived.
May 9.—This day we went to dinner at Mr. Scrope's, at the Pavilion, where were the Haigs of Bemerside, Isaac Haig, Mr. and Mrs. Bainbridge, etc. Warm dispute whether par are or are not salmon trout. "Fleas are not lobsters, d—n their souls."
Mr. Scrope has made a painting of Tivoli, which, when mellowed a little by time, will be a fine one. Letters from Lockhart, with news concerning the beautiful mess they are making in London. Henry Scott will be threatened in Roxburghshire. This would be bad policy, as it would drive the young Duke to take up his ground, which, unless pressed, he may be in no hurry to do. Personally, I do not like to be driven to a point, as I think Canning may do much for the country, provided he does not stand committed to his new Whig counsellors. But if the push does come, I will not quit my old friends—that I am freely resolved, and dissolutely, as Slender says.[515]
May 10.—We went to breakfast at Huntly Burn, and I wandered all the morning in the woods to avoid an English party who came to see the house. When I came home I found my cousin Col. Russell, and his sister, so I had no work to-day but my labour at proofs in the morning. To-day I dismiss my aide-de-camp, Shortreed—a fine lad. The Boar of the Forest left us after breakfast. Had a present of a medal forming one of a series from Chantrey's busts. But this is not for nothing: the donor wants a motto for the reverse of the King's medal. I am a bad hand to apply to.
May 11.—Hogg called this morning to converse about trying to get him on the pecuniary list of the Royal Literary Society. Certainly he deserves it, if genius and necessity could do so. But I do not belong to the society, nor do I propose to enter it as a coadjutor. I don't like your royal academies of this kind; they almost always fall into jobs, and the members are seldom those who do credit to the literature of a country. It affected, too, to comprehend those men of letters who are specially attached to the Crown, and though I love and honour my King as much as any of them can, yet I hold it best, in this free country, to preserve the exterior of independence, that my loyalty may be the more impressive, and tell more effectually. Yet I wish sincerely to help poor Hogg, and have written to Lockhart about it. It may be my own desolate feelings—it may be the apprehension of evil from this political hocus-pocus, but I have seldom felt more moody and uncomfortable than while writing these lines. I have walked, too, but without effect. W. Laidlaw, whose very ingenious mind is delighted with all novelties, talked nonsense about the new government, in which men are to resign principle, I fear, on both sides.
May 12.—Wrote Lockhart on what I think the upright and honest principle, and am resolved to vex myself no more about it. Walked with my cousin, Colonel Russell, for three hours in the woods, and enjoyed the sublime and delectable pleasure of being well,—and listened to on the subject of my favourite themes of laying out ground and plantation. Russel seems quite to follow such an excellent authority, and my spirits mounted while I found I was haranguing to a willing and patient pupil. To be sure, Ashestiel, planting the high knolls, and drawing woodland through the pasture, could be made one of the most beautiful forest things in the world. I have often dreamed of putting it in high order; and, judging from what I have been able to do here, I think I should have succeeded. At any rate, my blue devils are flown at the sense of retaining some sort of consequence. Lord, what fools we are!
May 13.—A most idle and dissipated day. I did not rise till half-past eight o'clock. Col. and Capt. Ferguson came to breakfast. I walked half-way home with them, then turned back and spent the day, which was delightful, wandering from place to place in the woods, sometimes reading the new and interesting volumes of Cyril Thornton,[516] sometimes chewing the cud of sweet and bitter fancy which strangely alternated in my mind, idly stirred by the succession of a thousand vague thoughts and fears, the gay thoughts strangely mingled with those of dismal melancholy; tears, which seemed ready to flow unbidden; smiles, which approached to those of insanity; all that wild variety of mood which solitude engenders. I scribbled some verses, or rather composed them in my memory. The contrast at leaving Abbotsford to former departures is of an agitating and violent description. Assorting papers and so forth. I never could help admiring the concatenation between Ahitophel's setting his house in order and hanging himself. The one seems to me to follow the other as a matter of course. I don't mind the trouble, though my head swims with it. I do not mind meeting accounts, which unpaid remind you of your distress, or paid serve to show you you have been throwing away money you would be glad to have back again. I do not mind the strange contradictory mode of papers hiding themselves that you wish to see, and others thrusting themselves into your hand to confuse and bewilder you. There is a clergyman's letter about the Scottish pronunciation, to which I had written an answer some weeks since (the person is an ass, by the by). But I had laid aside my answer, being unable to find the letter which bore his address; and, in the course of this day, both his letter with the address, and my answer which wanted the address, fell into my hands half-a-dozen times, but separately always. This was the positive malice of some hobgoblin, and I submit to it as such. But what frightens and disgusts me is those fearful letters from those who have been long dead, to those who linger on their wayfare through this valley of tears. These fine lines of Spencer came into my head—
Ay, and can I forget the author!—the frightful moral of his own vision. What is this world? A dream within a dream—as we grow older each step is an awakening. The youth awakes as he thinks from childhood—the full-grown man despises the pursuits of youth as visionary—the old man looks on manhood as a feverish dream. The Grave the last sleep?—no; it is the last and final awakening.
May 14.—To town per Blucher coach, well stowed and crushed, but saved cash, coming off for less than £2; posting costs nearly five, and you don't get on so fast by one-third. Arrived in my old lodgings here with a stouter heart than I expected. Dined with Mr. and Mrs. Skene, and met Lord Medwyn and lady.
May 15.—Parliament House a queer sight. Looked as if people were singing to each other the noble song of "The sky's falling—chickie diddle." Thinks I to myself, I'll keep a calm sough.
I wish the old Government had kept together, but their personal dislike to Canning seems to have rendered that impossible.
I dined at a great dinner given by Sir George Clerk to his electors, the freeholders of Midlothian; a great attendance of Whig and Tory, huzzaing each other's toasts. If is a good peacemaker, but quarter-day is a better. I have a guess the best gamecocks would call a truce if a handful or two of oats were scattered among them.
May 16.—Mr. John Gibson says the Trustees are to allow my expense in travelling—£300, with £50 taken in in Longman's bill. This will place me rectus in curia, and not much more, faith!
There is a fellow bawling out a ditty in the street, the burthen of which is
He shall not be a penny richer for telling me what I know but too well without him.
May 17.—Learned with great distress the death of poor Richard Lockhart, the youngest brother of my son-in-law. He had an exquisite talent for acquiring languages, and was under the patronage of my kinsman, George Swinton, who had taken him into his own family at Calcutta, and now he is drowned in a foolish bathing party.
May 18.—Heard from Abbotsford; all well. Wrought to-day but awkwardly. Tom Campbell called, warm from his Glasgow Rectorship; he is looking very well. He seemed surprised that I did not know anything about the contentions of Tories, Whigs, and Radicals, in the great commercial city. I have other eggs on the spit. He stayed but a few minutes.[518]
May 19.—Went out to-day to Sir John Dalrymple's,[519] at Oxenford, a pretty place; the lady a daughter of Lord Duncan. Will Clerk and Robert Graeme went with me. A good dinner and pleasant enough party; but ten miles going and ten miles coming make twenty, and that is something of a journey. Got a headache too by jolting about after dinner.
May 20.—Wrote a good deal at Appendix [to Bonaparte], or perhaps I should say tried to write. Got myself into a fever when I had finished four pages, and went out at eight o'clock at night to cool myself if possible. Walked with difficulty as far as Skene's,[520] and there sat and got out of my fidgety feeling. Learned that the Princes Street people intend to present me with the key of their gardens, which will be a great treat, as I am too tender-hoofed for the stones. We must now get to work in earnest.
May 21.—Accordingly this day I wrought tightly, and though not in my very best mood I got on in a very businesslike manner. Was at the Gas Council, where I found things getting poorly on. The Treasury have remitted us to the Exchequer. The Committee want me to make private interest with the L.C. Baron. That I won't do, but I will state their cause publicly any way they like.
May 22.—At Court—home by two, walking through the Princes Street Gardens for the first time. Called on Mrs. Jobson. Worked two hours. Must dress to dine at Mr. John Borthwick's, with the young folk, now Mr. and Mrs. Dempster.[521] Kindly and affectionately received by my good young friends, who seem to have succeeded to their parents' regard for me.
May 23.—Got some books, etc., which I wanted to make up the Saint Helena affair. Set about making up the Appendix, but found I had mislaid a number of the said postliminary affair. Had Hogg's nephew here as a transcriber, a modest and well-behaved young man—clever, too, I think.[522] Being Teind Wednesday I was not obliged to go to the Court, and am now bang up, and shall soon finish Mr. Nappy. And how then? Ay, marry, sir, that's the question.