27 February–5 March 1826

Malachi is getting on; I must finish him to-night. I dare say some of my London friends will be displeased—Canning perhaps, for he is engoué of Huskisson. Can't help it. The place I looked at won't do; but I really must get some lodging, for, reason or none, Dalgleish will not leave me, and cries and makes a scene. Now if I stayed alone in a little set of chambers, he would serve greatly for my accommodation. There are some nice places of the kind in the. New Buildings, but they are distant from the Court, and I cannot walk well on the pavement. It is odd enough that just when I had made a resolution to use my coach frequently I ceased to keep one—in town at least.

Completed Malachi to-day. It is more serious than the first, and in some places perhaps too peppery. Never mind, if you would have a horse kick, make a crupper out of a whin-cow, and I trust to see Scotland kick and fling to some purpose. Woodstock lies back for this. But quid non pro patria?

Malachi is in the Edinburgh Journal to-day, and reads like the work of an uncompromising right-forward Scot of the old school. Some of the cautious and pluckless instigators will be afraid of their confederate; for if a man of some energy and openness of character happens to be on the same side with these truckling jobbers, they stand as much in awe of his vehemence as doth the inexperienced conjurer who invokes a fiend whom he cannot manage. Came home, in a heavy shower with the Solicitor. I tried him on the question, but found him reserved and cautious. The future Lord Advocate must be cautious; but I can tell my good friend John Hope that, if he acts the part of a firm and resolute Scottish patriot, both his own country and England will respect him the more. Ah! Hal Dundas, there was no such truckling in thy day! Looked out a quantity of things to go to Abbotsford; for we are flitting, if you please. It is with a sense of pain that I leave behind a parcel of trumpery prints and little ornaments, once the pride of Lady S——'s heart, but which she sees consigned with indifference to the chance of an auction. Things that have had their day of importance with me I cannot forget, though the merest trifles. But I am glad that she, with bad health and enough to vex her, has not the same useless mode of associating recollections with this unpleasant business. The best part of it is the necessity of leaving behind, viz., setting rid of, a set of most wretched daubs of landscapes, in great gilded frames, of which I have often been heartily ashamed. The history of them was curious. An amateur artist (a lady) happened to fall into misfortunes, upon which her landscapes, the character of which had been buoyed up far beyond their proper level, sank even beneath it, and it was low enough. One most amiable and accomplished old lady continued to encourage her pencil, and to order picture after picture, which she sent in presents to her friends. I suppose I have eight or ten of them, which I could not avoid accepting. There will be plenty of laughing when they come to be sold. It would be a good joke enough to cause it to be circulated that they were performances of my own in early youth, and they would be looked on and bought up as curiosities. True it is that I took lessons of oil-painting in youth from a little Jew animalcule, a smouch called Burrell, a clever sensible creature though; but I could make no progress either in painting or drawing. Nature denied me correctness of eye and neatness of hand, yet I was very desirous to be a draughtsman at least, and laboured harder to attain that point than at any other in my recollection, to which I did not make some approaches. My oil-paintings were to Miss ——— above commemorated what hers are to Claude Lorraine. Yet Burrell was not useless to me altogether neither; he was a Prussian, and I got from him many a long story of the battles of Frederic, in whose armies his father had been a commissary, or perhaps a spy. I remember his picturesque account of seeing a party of the Black Hussars bringing in some forage carts which they had taken from a body of the Cossacks, whom he described as lying on the top of the carts of hay, mortally wounded, and, like the Dying Gladiator, eyeing their own blood as it ran down through the straw. I afterwards took lessons from Walker, whom we used to call Blue-beard. He was one of the most conceited persons in the world, but a good teacher—one of the ugliest countenances he had too—enough, as we say, to spean weans. The man was always extremely precise in the quality of everything about him, his dress, accommodations, and everything else. He became insolvent, poor man, and for some reason or other I attended the meeting of those concerned in his affairs. Instead of ordinary accommodations for writing, each of the persons present was equipped with a large sheet of drawing paper and a swan's quill. It was mournfully ridiculous enough. Skirving made an admirable likeness of Walker, not a single scar or mark of the smallpox which seamed his countenance, but the too accurate brother of the brush had faithfully laid it down in longitude and latitude. Poor Walker destroyed it (being in crayons) rather than let the caricature of his ugliness appear at the sale of his effects. I did learn myself to take some vile views from Nature. When Will Clerk and I lived very much together, I used sometimes to make them under his instruction. He to whom, as to all his family, art is a familiar attribute, wondered at me as a Newfoundland dog would at a greyhound which showed fear of the water. Going down to Liddesdale once, I drew the castle of Hermitage in my fashion, and sketched it so accurately that with a few verbal instructions Clerk put it into regular form, Williams (the Grecian) copied over Clerk's, and his drawing was engraved as the frontispiece of the first volume of the Kelso edition, Minstrelsy of the Scottish Border. Do you know why you have written all this down, Sir W.? Because it pleases me to record that this thrice-transmitted drawing, though taken originally from a sketch of mine, was extremely like Hermitage, which neither of my colleagues in the task had ever seen? No, that's not the reason. You want to put off writing Woodstock, just as easily done as these memoranda, but which it happens your duty and your prudence recommend, and therefore you are loath to begin. "Heigho, I can't say no; But this piece of task-work off I can stave, O, For Malachi's posting into an octavo; To correct the proof-sheets only this night I have, O, So, Madame Conscience, you've gotten as good as you gave, O But to-morrow's a new day and we'll better behave, O, So I lay down the pen, and your pardon I crave, O." In the evening Mr. Gibson called and transacted business.

I have a letter from Colin Mackenzie, approving Malachi,—"Cold men may say it is too strong; but from the true men of Scotland you are sure of the warmest gratitude." I never have yet found, nor do I expect it on this occasion, that ill-will dies in debt, or what is called gratitude distresses herself by frequent payments. The one is like a ward-holding and pays its reddendo in hard blows. The other a blanch-tenure, and is discharged for payment of a red rose or a peppercorn. He that takes the forlorn hope in an attack, is often deserted by those that should support him, and who generally throw the blame of their own cowardice upon his rashness. We shall see this will end in the same way. But I foresaw it from the beginning. The bankers will be persuaded that it is a squib which may burn their own fingers, and will curse the poor pyrotechnist that compounded it; if they do, they be d—d. Slept indifferently, and dreamed of Napoleon's last moments, of which I was reading a medical account last night, by Dr. Arnott. Horrible death—a cancer on the pylorus. I would have given something to have lain still this morning and made up for lost time. But desidiae valedixi. If you once turn on your side after the hour at which you ought to rise, it is all over. Bolt up at once. Bad night last—the next is sure to be better. "When the drum beats, make ready; When the fife plays, march away— To the roll-call, to the roll-call, to the roll-call, Before the break of day." Dined with Chief-Commissioner, Admiral Adam, W. Clerk, Thomson, and I. The excellent old man was cheerful at intervals—at times sad, as was natural. A good blunder he told us, occurred in the Annandale case, which was a question partly of domicile. It was proved that leaving Lochwood, the Earl had given up his kain and carriages; this an English Counsel contended was the best of all possible proofs that the noble Earl designed an absolute change of residence, since he laid aside his walking-stick and his coach. First epistle of Malachi is getting out of print, or rather is out of print already.

Could not get the last sheets of Malachi, Second Epistle, last night, so they must go out to the world uncorrected—a great loss, for the last touches are always most effectual; and I expect misprints in the additional matter. We were especially obliged to have it out this morning, that it may operate as a gentle preparative for the meeting of inhabitants at two o'clock. Vogue la galère—we shall see if Scotsmen have any pluck left. If not, they may kill the next Percy themselves. It is ridiculous enough for me, in a state of insolvency for the present, to be battling about gold and paper currency. It is something like the humorous touch in Hogarth's Distressed Poet, where the poor starveling of the Muses is engaged, when in the abyss of poverty, in writing an Essay on payment of the National Debt; and his wall is adorned with a plan of the mines of Peru. Nevertheless, even these fugitive attempts, from the success which they have had, and the noise they are making, serve to show the truth of the old proverb— "When house and land are gone and spent, Then learning is most excellent." On the whole, I am glad of this brulzie, as far as I am concerned; people will not dare talk of me as an object of pity—no more "poor-manning." Who asks how many punds Scots the old champion had in his pocket when "He set a bugle to his mouth, And blew so loud and shrill, The trees in greenwood shook thereat, Sae loud rang ilka hill"? This sounds conceited enough, yet is not far from truth. The meeting was very numerous, 500 or 600 at least, and unanimous, save in one Mr. Howden, who having been all his life, as I am told, in bitter opposition to Ministers, proposed on the present occasion that the whole contested measure should be trusted to their wisdom. I suppose he chose the opportunity of placing his own opinion in opposition, single opposition too, to that of a large assembly. The speaking was very moderate. Report had said that Jeffrey, J.A. Murray, and other sages of the economical school, were to unbuckle their mails, and give us their opinions. But no such great guns appeared. If they had, having the multitude on my side, I would have tried to break a lance with them. A few short but well-expressed resolutions were adopted unanimously. These were proposed by Lord Rollo, and seconded by Sir James Fergusson, Bart. I was named one of a committee to encourage all sorts of opposition to the measure. So I have already broken through two good and wise resolutions—one, that I would not write on political controversy; another, that I would not be named on public committees. If my good resolves go this way, like snaw aff a dyke—the Lord help me!

Last night I had a letter from Lockhart, who, speaking of Malachi, says, "The Ministers are sore beyond imagination at present; and some of them, I hear, have felt this new whip on the raw to some purpose." I conclude he means Canning is offended. I can't help it, as I said before—fiat justitia, ruat coelum. No cause in which I had the slightest personal interest should have made me use my pen 'gainst them, blunt or pointed as it may be. But as they are about to throw this country into distress and danger, by a measure of useless and uncalled-for experiment, they must hear the opinion of the Scotsmen, to whom it is of no other consequence than as a general measure affecting the country at large,—and mine they shall hear. I had determined to lay down the pen. But now they shall have another of Malachi, beginning with buffoonery, and ending as seriously as I can write it. It is like a frenzy that they will agitate the upper and middling classes of society, so very friendly to them, with unnecessary and hazardous [projects], "Oh, thus it was they loved them dear, And sought how to requite 'em, And having no friends left but they, They did resolve to fight them." The country is very high just now. England may carry the measure if she will, doubtless. But what will be the consequence of the distress ensuing, God only can foretell. Lockhart, moreover, inquires about my affairs anxiously, and asks what he is to say about them; says, "He has inquiries every day; kind, most kind all, and among the most interested and anxious, Sir William Knighton, who told me the king was quite melancholy all the evening he heard of it." This I can well believe, for the king, educated as a prince, has, nevertheless, as true and kind a heart as any subject in his dominions. He goes on: "I do think they would give you a Baron's gown as soon as possible," etc. I have written to him in answer, showing I have enough to carry me on, and can dedicate my literary efforts to clear my land. The preferment would suit me well, and the late Duke of Buccleuch gave me his interest for it. I dare say the young duke would do the same, for the unvaried love I have borne his house; and by and by he will have a voice potential. But there is Sir William Rae in the meantime, whose prevailing claim I would never place my own in opposition to, even were it possible by a tour de force, such as L. points at, to set it aside. Meantime, I am building a barrier betwixt me and promotion. Any prospect of the kind is very distant and very uncertain. Come time, come, rath, as the German says. In the meanwhile, now I am not pulled about for money, etc., methinks I am happier without my wealth than with it. Everything is paid. I have no one wishing to make up a sum of money, and writing for his account to be paid. Since 17th January I have not laid out a guinea, out of my own hand, save two or three in charity, and six shillings for a pocket-book. But the cash with which I set out having run short for family expenses I drew on Blackwood, through Ballantyne, which was honoured, for £25, to account of Malachi's Letters, of which another edition of 1000 is ordered, and gave it to Lady Scott, because our removal will require that in hand. This is for a fortnight succeeding Wednesday next, being the 8th March current. On the 20th my quarter comes in, and though I have something to pay out of it, I shall be on velvet for expense—and regular I will be. Methinks all trifling objects of expenditure seem to grow light in my eyes. That I may regain independence, I must be saving. But ambition awakes, as love of quiet indulgence dies and is mortified within me. "Dark Cuthullin will be renowned or dead."

Something of toddy and cigar in that last quotation, I think. Yet I only smoked two, and liquified with one glass of spirits and water. I have sworn I will not blot out what I have once written here. Malachi goes on, but I am dubious about the commencement—it must be mended at least—reads prosy. Had letters from Walter and Jane, the dears. All well. Regiment about to move from Dublin.