February 27.—­At Court till half-past two.  Then to the Waterloo Tavern, where we had a final and totally unfructuous meeting with the Committee of the Coal Gas people.  So now my journey to London is resolved on.  I shall lose at least L500 by the job, and get little thanks from those I make the sacrifice for.  But the sacrifice shall be made.  Anything is better than to break one’s word, or desert a sinking vessel.  Heartily do I wish these “Colliers” had seen the matter in the best light for their own interest.  But there is no help.  One thing is certain, that I shall see my whole family once more around me, and that is worth the L500.  Anne too starts at the idea of the sea.  I am horribly vexed, however.  Gibson always expected they would come in, but there seemed to me little chance of it; perhaps they thought we were not serious in our proposal to push through the Act.  Wrought a little in the evening, not much.

February 28.—­At Court till four.  When I came home I did work a little, but as we expected company it was not to much purpose.  Lord Chief Commissioner dined with us with Miss Adam; Mr. Hutchinson, brother of Lord Donoughmore, and Miss Jones, Will Clerk and John Thomson made up the party, and we had a pleasant evening, as such a handful always secures.  Stayed till wine-and-water time.  Thus flew another day.

February 29.—­I had my proof-sheets as usual in the morning and the Court as usual till two.  Then one or two visits and corrected the discourses for Gordon.  This is really a foolish scrape, but what could I do?  It involved the poor lad’s relief from something very like ruin.  I got a letter from the young man Reynolds accepting on Heath’s part my terms for article to The Keepsake, namely L500,—­I to be at liberty to reprint the article in my works after three years.  Mr. Heath to print it in The Keepsake as long and often as he pleases, but not in any other form.  I shall close with them.  If I make my proposed bargain with Murray, all pecuniary matters will be easy in an unusual degree.  Dined at Robert Hamilton’s with Lord and Lady Belhaven, Walter Campbell, and a number of Westlanders.

FOOTNOTES: 

[124] Mr. Colvin Smith painted in all about twenty portraits of Sir Walter, for seven of which he obtained occasional sittings.  A list of the persons who commissioned them is given at p. 73 of the Centenary Catalogue.

[125] The Right Hon. Charles Hope.

[126] Twelfth Night, Act II.  Sc. 2.

[127] Mount Benger, which he had taken in 1820.—­See ante, page 96.

[128] It now hangs in the Drawing-room at Abbotsford.—­See Sharpe’s Letters, vol. ii. p. 408.

[129] Charles Mayne Young, Tragedian, had been a visitor at Abbotsford in the autumn of 1821.  Of this visit his son Julian gives a pleasant account in a Memoir of his father, pp. 88-96.  London, 1871.  Mr. Young died in June 1856.