of the family, Miss M——­, was active in their service, and it so happened, in the course of arranging their affairs, the packet of letters from Sir Walter Scott, containing the whole of his correspondence with Lord Kinnedder, came into her hands.  She very soon discovered that the correspondence laid open the secret of the authorship of the Waverley Novels, at that period the subject of general and intense interest, and as yet unacknowledged by Sir Walter.

Considering what under these circumstances it was her duty to do, whether to replace the letters and suffer any accident to bring to light what the author seemed anxious might remain unknown, or to seal them up, and keep them in her own custody undivulged—­or finally to destroy them in order to preserve the secret,—­with, no doubt, the best and most upright motives, so far as her own judgment enabled her to decide in the matter, in which she was unable to take advice, without betraying what it was her object to respect, she came to the resolution, most unfortunately for the world, of destroying the letters.  And, accordingly, the whole of them were committed to the flames; depriving the descendants of Lord Kinnedder of a possession which could not fail to be much valued by them, and which, in connection with Lord Kinnedder’s letters to Sir Walter, which are doubtless preserved, would have been equally valuable to the public, as containing the contemporary opinions, prospects, views, and sentiments under which these works were sent forth into the world.  It would also have been curious to learn the unbiased impression which the different works created on the mind of such a man as Lord Kinnedder, before the collision of public opinion had suffused its influence over the opinions of people in general in this matter.—­Skene’s Reminiscences.

END OF VOLUME I.

THE JOURNAL OF

SIR WALTER SCOTT

FROM THE ORIGINAL MANUSCRIPT

AT ABBOTSFORD

[Illustration]

VOLUME II

BURT FRANKLIN NEW YORK

Published by BURT FRANKLIN
235 East 44th St., New York, N.Y. 10017
Originally Published:  1890
Reprinted:  1970
Printed in the U.S.A.

S.B.N. 32110
Library of Congress Card Catalog No.:  73-123604
Burt Franklin:  Research and Source Works Series 535
Essays in Literature and Criticism 82

[Illustration:  [Greek:  NUX GAR ERCHETAI.]

“I must home to work while it is called day; for the night cometh when no man can work.  I put that text, many a year ago, on my dial-stone; but it often preached in vain.”—­Scott’s Life, x. 88.]

“The evening sky of life does not reflect those brilliant flashes of light that shot across its morning and noon, yet I think God it is neither gloomy nor disconsolately lowering—­a sober twilight—­that is all.”

ILLUSTRATIONS.