tive. The second style seeks harmonies of sound, avoids elliptical idioms, is scholastic, and is based upon the idea that there must be more dignity in writing than in the best speaking. Johnson is its best exponent and champion. The former style is English; the latter is Latinic. They are both influencing the writing of our own time; but the simpler method commands the higher approval.

TH

CHAPTER XXIV.

WALTER SCOTT.

"Blessings and prayers in nobler retinue

Than sceptred king or laurelled conqueror knows,

Follow this wondrous potentate."-William Wordsworth.

HE great revolution in literary taste which substituted romantic for classical sentiment and subject, and culminated in the poems and novels of Walter Scott, is traceable to the labors of Bishop Thomas Percy (1728-1811). In 1765 he published a collection of old ballads under the title of Reliques of Ancient English Poetry. Many of these ballads had been preserved only in manuscript, and others had been printed on loose sheets in the rudest manner for circulation among the lower orders of people. Many authors before him, as, for instance, Addison and Sir Philip Sidney, had expressed the admiration which cultivated taste must ever feel for the rude, but inimitable charms of the old ballad-poets; but Percy was the first who undertook a systematic and general examination of the neglected treasures. He found, in collecting these compositions, that the majority of the oldest and most interesting were distinctly traceable, both as regards their subjects and their dialect, to the North Countrée, that is, to the frontier region between England and Scotland which had been the scene of the most striking incidents of predatory warfare, such as those recorded in the noble ballads of Chevy Chase

and the Battle of Otterburn. Besides a very large number of these purely heroic ballads, Percy gave specimens of songs and lyrics extending down to a comparatively late period of English history, even to his own century. But the chief interest of his collection, and the chief service he rendered to literature by his publication, is in the earlier portion. It is impossible to exaggerate the influence exerted by the Reliques. This book has been studied with the most intense interest by generation after generation of English poets, and undoubtedly has contributed to give the first direction to the youthful genius of many of our most illustrious writers. The boyish enthusiasm of Walter Scott was stirred by the vivid recitals of the old Border rhapsodists. Percy's volumes* gave him the sentiment that culminated in the Lady of the Lake, and in Waverley.

Our literary history presents few examples of a career so brilliant as that of Walter Scott (254-263). B. 1771.] A genius at once so vigorous and versatile, a proD. 1832.] ductiveness so magnificent and so sustained, will with difficulty be found, though we ransack the wide realms of ancient and modern letters. He was connected, both by the father's and mother's side, with several of those ancient, historic Border-families whose warlike memories his genius was destined to make immortal. In consequence of delicate health in early life he passed much of his time at the farm of his grandfather near Kelso, where he was surrounded with legends, ruins, and historic localities. He was afterwards sent to the High-School, and then to the University of Edinburgh. He was not distinguished as a student; but among his fellows he was famous for his talent in telling stories. After leaving the University, he

* "The first time I could scrape a few shillings together-which were not common occurrences with me-I bought unto myself a copy of these beloved volumes: nor do I believe I ever read a book half so frequently, or with half the enthusiasm." -Scott, in Lockhart's Life.

entered the profession of the law. It had little charm for him. English, German, and Italian authors easily won him away from his law-books. The direction of his mind was towards the poetical and antiquarian works of the Middle Ages; but just at that time there had been awakened in the intellectual circles of Edinburgh a taste for German literature. Scott's first appearance as an author was in translations from Bürger. Scott was now residing with his young wife at Lasswade. He formed the purpose of rescuing from oblivion the large stores of Border ballads still current among the descendants of the Liddesdale and Annandale moss-troopers, and he travelled into those picturesque regions where he not only gathered a vast treasure of unedited legends, but also made himself familiar with the scenery and manners of that country over which he was to cast the magic of his genius. Three volumes of the Minstrelsy of the Scottish Border were soon published. The learning and taste of this work gave Scott a high reputation. His success was tempting him to abandon the profession of the law altogether, and to devote himself to literature, when an appointment as Sheriff of Selkirkshire brought him to a decision. He changed his residence to a pleasant farm at Ashestiel on the Tweed, and six years after he appeared before the public as an original romantic poet. In 1805 The Lay of the Last Minstrel was published. In rapid succession followed Marmion, The Lady of the Lake, Rokeby, and The Lord of the Isles, not to enumerate many less important works, such as The Vision of Don Roderick, The Bridal of Triermain, Harold the Dauntless, and The Field of Waterloo. We cannot overstate the rapture of enthusiasm with which these poems were received. They were written rapidly and with unstinted freshness. With Rokeby the popularity of Scott's poetry, though still very great, perceptibly declined. This may have been due in part to the fact that he was not fortunate in the choice of the

theme for that poem, and in part to the eclipsing glory of Byron's genius. Aware of the declining public favor, he immediately and quietly abandoned poetry to enter the field of the novelist, where he could stand without a rival.

Nine years earlier, Waverley had been sketched out and thrown aside. In 1814 it was published without the author's name, the first of the inimitable Waverley Novels. The town and the country were wild in its praise, and all were curious to know who the writer might be. The secret was long kept. During the seventeen years between 1814 and 1831 he wrote the long series of novels, and wrote them with such inconceivable facility, that, on an average, two of the works appeared in one year. During this same period he also published many works in the departments of history, criticism, and biography; among them, A Life of Napoleon, the Tales of a Grandfather, the amusing Letters on Demonology and Witchcraft, and extensive editions, with lives, of Dryden and Swift. Such activity is rare indeed in the history of letters; still rarer, when combined with such general excellence in the products. The impulse to this prodigious industry was Scott's passionate and longcherished ambition to found a territorial family, and to be able to live the life of a provincial magnate. In 1811 he had purchased about one hundred acres of land on the banks of the Tweed, and now, encouraged by the immense profits accruing from his works, he purchased one piece of land after another, planted and improved the estate, and transformed his modest cottage at Abbotsford into a mansion crowded with the rarest antiquarian relics. There he exercised a princely hospitality, "doing the honors of Scotland" to those who were attracted in crowds by the splendor of his name. The funds needed for such a mode of life he supplied, partly by his unwearying pen, and partly by engaging secretly in large commercial speculations with the printing and publishing firm of the Ballantynes, his