antiquities fill the whole of the chief wall; English poetry and drama, classics and miscellanies, one end; foreign literature, chiefly French and German, the other. "The cases along the outer side contain the specialties and treasures." "One consists entirely of books and MSS. relating to the insurrections of 1715 and 1745 ; and another (within the recesses of the bow-window) of treatises de re magica, both of these being . . . collections of the rarest curiosity." In a corner is the magnificent set of Montfauçon given by George IV., and previously mentioned. There were few authors, contemporaries of Scott, "of whose works presentation copies are not to be found here." There are "inscriptions of that sort in," perhaps, "every European dialect extant. The books are all in prime condition, and bindings that would satisfy Dr. Dibdin." Scott began to collect books when a mere boy; and in one of "several volumes of ballads and chap-books... he has prefixed this MS. note: This little collection of stall tracts and ballads was formed by me, when a boy, from the baskets of the travelling pedlers. Until put into its present decent binding, it had such charms for the servants, that it was repeatedly, and with difficulty recovered from their clutches. It contains most of the pieces that were popular about thirty years since [i.e., about 1780], and I dare say many that could not now be procured for any price.' This note was written in 1810." The grand collection as he left it, is, says Mr. Edwards, particularly strong in "early poetry and early romantic prose fiction, both British and foreign," and "in Scottish history." "But there is nothing more distinctively characteristic of this famous library than its wonderful assemblage of works on Demonology and Witchcraft, and the curious themes allied therewith. Probably no other such collection was ever formed." Towards the close of his life, Scott began a descriptive catalogue of his literary and antiquarian curiosities, entitled " Reliquiæ Trottcosianæ ; or, the Gabions of the late Jonathan Oldbuck, Esq.” But this work was, unfortunately, never finished. A catalogue of the library, however, was printed for the Maitland Club (Edinburgh, 1838, 4to), and also for the Bannatyne Club, 1839. "Few catalogues have been printed so sumptuously, and none ever deserved fine printing less," says Mr. Edwards. "It professes to illustrate the use Scott made of his library," and might have been made "a valuable contribution to the history of literature;" but it fails in these respects, and is merely a list of books, yet withal a very valuable list. A visitor to Abbotsford, many years ago, remarked, "that so many of the volumes were enriched with comments or anecdotes in Scott's own hand, that to look over his books was in some degree to converse with him." After his pecuniary disasters in 1826, the library and museum were at length, in 1830, restored to him by his creditors, with the words, honorable to them and to him, stating this to be "the best means the creditors have of expressing their very high sense of his most honorable conduct, and in grateful acknowledgment of the unparalleled and most successful exertions he has made, and continues to make for them." As has been truly written, "Visits to Abbotsford are now paid to the abode not alone of a famous author, but of a man who chose the sacrifice of health and life as preferable to failure in an obligation, the fulfilment of which most even among honorable and sanguine men would have deemed an impossibility. The life was sacrificed, but the task was achieved." There are many curiosities, besides literary, in this apartment, as in each other apartment, indeed, but requiring personal examination rather than description. The drawing-room opens from the library, by a door at the centre of the western end. It is perhaps twenty-five feet square, and is lighted by two tall windows towards the Tweed. Opposite these is the chimney-piece, rather plainly made of mottled red marble. The walls, the writer found covered with a Chinese paper, and the ceiling painted in clouds. A dado, and foliated scroll cornice, were painted to imitate oak. The furniture was fine, including a set of ebony chairs, presented by George IV., and some well-carved cabinets. There were, also, several interesting paintings, — Dryden, gray-haired and poetic, by Lely; Raeburn's excellent portrait of Sir Walter sitting (over the fireplace); Miss Anna Scott in Spanish costume; Amias Cawood's head of Mary, Queen of Scots, painted the day after decapitation; and eight or ten water-color drawings, a portion of the designs for the "Provincial Antiquities of Scotland," including "Fast Castle" (the Wolf's Crag of the Bride of Lammermoor), by Thomson; and several of Turner's earlier works. Opposite to the library door is another that opens westward, and admits to a rather long and narrow room, crossing the house from north to south, lighted by a colored window at each end, and called the armory. In its eastern side, also, is a door to the hall; and in its west side, a door to the dining-room and other apartments. The ceiling is a low pointed arch; the walls are cov ered with a very curious collection of arms. The dining-room is handsome, and very snug and sociable, with a grand bow-window overlooking the meadow and the Tweed. The ceiling is flat, of dark oak, panelled square by intersecting beams. On the walls are many pictures. Here, about half-past one, on the afternoon of Sept. 21, 1832, while Nature was calm, and Tweed was heard gently and sweetly rippling onward, Sir Walter Scott, in the presence of all his children, in peace and with holy hope, departed for perpetual rest and joy, — "Dead he is not, but departed, for the artist never dies." Beyond this apartment is a delightful breakfast parlor, commanding views towards Ettrick, as well as upon Tweed. Yet farther west and south-west are rooms for servants and offices, and also some new private apartments built by the proprietor (about 1858), for retirement from the almost uninterrupted succession of visits by tourists who are shown several of the apartments that have been described. Only a large and elaborate catalogue can give an adequate idea of the many remarkable objects in the museum; and the charm of effect dwelling in this most wonderful of poet's houses, can only be obtained by more familiar acquaintance than is necessarily possible to most travellers, since fifteen minutes only are allowed a visitor for the examination. Almost every thing in the house and grounds remains scrupulously kept as left by Sir Walter. The best view of the house is from the river side. The offices are skilfully screened from sight, so that there is no obstruction before the picturesque forms of the edifice. There are pleasant walks about the estate, much of which, as before remarked, is separated from the gardens and house, by the public road above them,—an ugly, inharmonious road. One will find broad, high, swelling hills of fields varied by belts, thickets, and tracts of plantations of pines, beeches, oaks, and other trees, among which are shady paths. At the western border of the estate will be found Caulshiels Loch (to which the writer was told there is no good carriage road), and eastward the Rhymer's Glen, where Thomas of Ercildoune used to meet the Queen of Fairy. This glen is a charmingly pretty little ravine, through which winds a tiny stream over and among stones or lichen-colored rocks. Beside it is a narrow path. The banks, on either side, oftener present reddish-earth tint than rock forms or colors, and bear many ferns and thickly growing forest trees. In this quiet nook, one can imaginatively glide into Elf-land, and fancy how when, "True Thomas lay on Huntlie bank; A ferlie he spied wi' his e'e; And there he saw a ladye bright, Come riding down by the Eildon tree. Her skirt was o' the grass green silk, Higher up in the grounds are wider views. In one direction rises the grand Eildon Hill; in another appears Abbotsford itself, and Gala water sweeping into Tweed from busy, smoking Galashiels; and in another Melrose town and Abbey. As even an admiring rambler remarked of this excursion through the estate, -and as "practical" people very likely will remark, "it is amazing what a large stretch of poor land Sir Walter had got together;" "but," added the admirer already quoted, "Sir Walter saw the scene with the eyes of poetic tradition. He saw things which had been done there, and sung of; and all was beautiful to him." And departing from this home that he loved so well,that is, so thoroughly associated with his manly living, his affections, and his glorious creating, -one may possibly think with Irving, "Happy would it have been for him could he have contented himself with his delightful little vine-covered cottage [his first home here], and the simple, yet hearty and hospitable style, in which he lived" while he occupied it. "The great pile of Abbotsford, with the huge expense it entailed upon him, of servants, retainers, guests, and baronial style, was a drain upon his purse, a tax upon his exertions, and a weight upon his mind, that finally crushed him." Indeed, as one looks about the world, it seems as if architectural pomp arises to mark the decadence of power to ruin, whether it be in superb palaces like those of the fading "Bride of the Sea;" or, possibly, in the splendors of cathedrals, demonstrating both the power and wealth and the crumbling of the might of that Ecclesiastical Rome, whose decline their pomp often so closely antedated; or, again, in this elaborated "romance in lime and stone." But this last abides thus far securely, and such a shrine of the affections as few even of those statelier palatial structures are; for this is not a mere suggestion of regret for what it once was, or for what it cost its builder, profound though the latter regret justly is, but this Abbotsford has become a monument of his honest integrity, of his true nineteenth-century chivalry of character, — a character abounding in all the wealth of picturesqueness and vitality of that of the olden time, yet enabling him to meet the great trial of his life, coming in a form in which it is apt to be shaped at this period, and to fight "a good fight," and to conquer, and here, lying down in the exhaustion of victory, to leave behind him this precious memorial, inscribed by him with the story of his noble spirit, demonstrated in his closing life. "Won is the glory, and the grief is past." There is another excursion in the "Land of Scott," very appropriately connected with this, to the home of his latter life. It is an excursion to his earliest rural home, and to his last earthly restingplace, — a varied and pleasant drive from Melrose. The way is across the Tweed, five miles by a charming rural road up Lauderdale to Earlston or Ercildoun, "the prospect hill." There may be seen a broken tower, the life-long residence of Thomas Learmont, - that Thomas the Rhymer so often mentioned in this region. On a church may be seen a stone inscribed, "Auld Rhymer's race lies in this place." There can also be seen, eastward, along this route, where grew the broom celebrated in the old ballad, — "O the broom, and the bonny, bonny broom, And the broom of the Cowdenknows! Aye sae sweet as the lassie sang, I' the bought, milking the ewes." Thence one can go across the country to SANDY KNOWE, the farm of Scott's paternal grandfather, where Scott himself spent much time during boyhood, beginning his living there when he was only about eighteen months old. The farm-house is comfortable and substantial; but its chief interest now is given by the neighboring Smailholm Tower. In this region Scott received his first ideas of the great storied past that he was to grow up to illustrate. There, during long days and evenings, his youthful fancy was awakened and delighted, by grandmother and aunt and old servants, with legends and Border stories, and old songs and ballads. There early he began "making himself." Thence he had a wide prospect "over all the border country, with its feudal towers, its haunted glens, and wizard streams. . . . Thus before" he "could walk he was made familiar with . . . scenes of his future stories, ... |