“Make haste and print it then, lest one of the Miss Edmonstones should die, as then I should think you would scarce venture for fear of being haunted.

* * * * *

“I shall hasten to burn your last letter, as you mention something of looking out for a father for your bantling, so I don’t think it would be decent to let anybody get a sight of such a letter!”

At last, in 1818, the novel was published by the late Mr. Blackwood, and drew forth loud plaudits from the wondering public, as to who the author of so original a book could be.  “In London it is much admired, and generally attributed to Walter Scott,” so writes a friend to Miss Ferrier; and she replies in her humorous style:  “Whosever it is, I have met with nothing that has interested me since.”  Sir Walter must have been flattered at his being supposed its father, for he says, in the conclusion of the Tales of my Landlord:—­

“There remains behind not only a large harvest, but labourers capable of gathering it in; more than one writer has of late displayed talents of this description, and if the present author, himself a phantom, may be permitted to distinguish a brother, or perhaps a sister, shadow, he would mention in particular the author of the very lively work entitled Marriage.”

Mr. Blackwood, whose opinion is of some value, thought very highly of Marriage, and he writes to Miss Ferrier (1817):—­

“Mr. B. will not allow himself to think for one moment that there can be any uncertainty as to the work being completed.  Not to mention his own deep disappointment, Mr. B. would almost consider it a crime if a work possessing so much interest and useful instruction were not given to the world.  The author is the only critic of whom Mr. B. is afraid, and after what he has said, he anxiously hopes that this censor of the press will very speedily affix the imprimatur."

In allusion to Sir Walter’s eulogium on the novel above quoted, Mr. Blackwood writes to the author:—­

“I have the pleasure of enclosing you this concluding sentence of the new Tales of my Landlord, which are to be published to-morrow.  After this call, surely you will be no longer silent.  If the great magician does not conjure you I shall give up all hopes.”

But Miss Ferrier seems to have been proof against the great magician even. Marriage became deservedly popular, and was translated into French, as appears from the annexed:—­

“We perceive by the French papers that a translation of Miss Ferrier’s clever novel Marriage has been very successful in France."-New Times, 6 Oct. ’25.

For Marriage she received the sum of L150.  Her second venture was more successful in a pecuniary sense.  Space, however, prohibits me from dwelling any longer on Marriage, so we come next to The Inheritance. This novel appeared six years after, in 1824, and is a work of very great merit.  To her sister (Mrs. Kinloch, in London) Miss Ferrier writes:—­