Author of ‘Marriage,’ ‘Inheritance,’ and ’Destiny.’

I HAVE never kept either note-book or journal, and as my memory is not a retentive one I have allowed much to escape which I should now vainly attempt to recall.  Some things must, however, have made a vivid and durable impression on my mind, as fragments remain, after the lapse of years, far more distinct than occurrences of much more recent date; such, amongst others, are my recollections of my visits to Ashestiel and Abbotsford.

The first took place in the autumn of 1811, in consequence of repeated and pressing invitations from Mr. Scott to my father, in which I was included.  Nothing could be kinder than our welcome, or more gratifying than the attentions we received during our stay; but the weather was too broken and stormy to admit of our enjoying any of the pleasant excursions our more weather-proof host had intended for us.

My father and I could therefore only take short drives with Mrs. Scott, while the bard (about one o’clock:) mounted his pony, and accompanied by Mr. Terry the comedian, his own son Walter, and our young relative George Kinloch, sallied forth for a long morning’s ride in spite of wind and rain.  In the evening Mr. Terry commonly read some scenes from a play, to which Mr. Scott listened with delight, though every word must have been quite familiar to him, as he occasionally took a part in the dialogue impromptu; at other times he recited old and awesome ballads from memory, the very names of which I have forgot.  The night preceding our departure had blown a perfect hurricane; we were to leave immediately after breakfast, and while the carriage was preparing Mr. Scott stepped to a writing-table and wrote a few hurried lines in the course of a very few minutes; these he put into my hand as he led me to the carriage; they were in allusion to the storm, coupled with a friendly adieu, and are to be found in my autograph album.

    “The mountain winds are up, and proud
    O’er heath and hill careering loud;
    The groaning forest to its power
    Yields all that formed our summer bower. 
    The summons wakes the anxious swain,
    Whose tardy shocks still load the plain,
    And bids the sleepless merchant weep,
    Whose richer hazard loads the deep. 
    For me the blast, or low or high,
    Blows nought of wealth or poverty;
    It can but whirl in whimsies vain
    The windmill of a restless brain,
    And bid me tell in slipshod verse
    What honest prose might best rehearse;
    How much we forest-dwellers grieve
    Our valued friends our cot should leave,
    Unseen each beauty that we boast,
    The little wonders of our coast,
    That still the pile of Melrose gray,
    For you must rise in minstrel’s lay,
    And Yarrow’s birk immortal long
    For yon but bloom in rural song. 
    Yet Hope, who still in present sorrow