Sydney Smith found great changes in Edinburgh—­changes, however, in many respects for the better.  The society of Edinburgh was then in its greatest perfection.  ’Its brilliancy, Lord Cockburn remarks, ’was owing to a variety of peculiar circumstances, which only operated during this period.  The principal of these were the survivance of several of the eminent men of the preceding age, and of curious old habits, which the modern flood had not yet obliterated; the rise of a powerful community of young men of ability; the exclusion of the British from the Continent, which made this place, both for education and for residence, a favourite resort of strangers; the war, which maintained a constant excitement of military preparation and of military idleness:  the blaze of that popular literature which made this the second city in the empire for learning and science; and the extent and the ease with which literature and society embellished each other, without rivalry, and without pedantry.

Among the ‘best young’ as his lordship styles them, were Lord Webb Seymour and Francis Horner; whilst those of the ‘interesting old’ most noted were Elizabeth Hamilton and Mrs. Grant of Laggan, who had ‘unfolded herself,’ to borrow Lord Cockburn’s words, in the ’Letters from the Mountains,’ ’an interesting treasury of good solitary thoughts.’  Of these two ladies, Lord Cockburn says, ’They were excellent women, and not too blue.  Their sense covered the colour.’  It was to Mrs. Hamilton that Jeffrey said, ’That there was no objection to the blue stocking, provided the petticoat came low enough to cover it.’  Neither of these ladies possessed personal attractions.  Mrs. Hamilton had the plain face proper to literary women; Mrs. Grant was a tall dark woman, with much dignity of manner:  in spite of her life of misfortune, she had a great flow of spirits.  Beautifully, indeed, does Lord Cockburn render justice to her character:  ’She was always under the influence of an affectionate and delightful enthusiasm, which, unquenched by time and sorrow, survived the wreck of many domestic attachments, and shed a glow over the close of a very protracted life.’

Both she and Mrs. Hamilton succeeded in drawing to their conversazioni, in small rooms of unpretending style, men of the highest order, as well as attractive women of intelligence.  Society in Edinburgh took the form of Parisian soirees, and although much divided into parties, was sufficiently general to be varied.  It is amusing to find that Mrs. Grant was at one time one of the supposed ’Authors of “Waverley,"’ until the disclosure of the mystery silenced reports.  It was the popularity of ‘Marmion,’ that made Scott, as he himself confesses, nearly lose his footing.  Mrs. Grant’s observation on him, after meeting the Great Unknown at some brilliant party, has been allowed, even by the sarcastic Lockhart, to be ‘witty enough.’  ’Mr. Scott always seems to me to be like a glass, through which the rays of admiration pass without sensibly affecting it; but the bit of paper[13] that lies beside it will presently be in a blaze—­and no wonder.’