6–12 March 1826

Finished third Malachi, which I don't much like. It respects the difficulty of finding gold to replace the paper circulation. Now this should have been considered first. The admitting that the measure may be imposed is yielding up the question, and Malachi is like a commandant who should begin to fire from interior defences before his outworks were carried. If Ballantyne be of my own opinion I will suppress it. We are all in a bustle shifting things to Abbotsford. I believe we shall stay here till the beginning of next week. It is odd, but I don't feel the impatience for the country which I have usually experienced.

Detained in the Court till three by a hearing. Then to the Committee appointed at the meeting on Friday, to look after the small-note business. A pack of old fainéants, incapable of managing such a business, and who will lose the day from mere coldness of heart. There are about a thousand names at the petition. They have added no designations—a great blunder; for testimonia sunt ponderanda, non numeranda should never be lost sight of. They are disconcerted and helpless; just as in the business of the King's visit, when everybody threw the weight on me, for which I suffered much in my immediate labour, and after bad health it brought on a violent eruption on my skin, which saved me from a fever at the time, but has been troublesome more or less ever since. I was so disgusted with seeing them sitting in ineffectual helplessness spitting on the hot iron that lay before them, and touching it with a timid finger, as if afraid of being scalded, that at another time I might have dashed in and taken up the hammer, summoned the deacons and other heads of public bodies, and by consulting them have carried them with me. But I cannot waste my time, health, and spirits in fighting thankless battles. I left them in a quarter of an hour, and presage, unless the country make an alarm, the cause is lost. The philosophical reviewers manage their affairs better—hold off—avoid committing themselves, but throw their vis inertiæ into the opposite scale, and neutralise the feelings which they cannot combat. To force them to fight on disadvantageous ground is our policy. But we have more sneakers after Ministerial favour than men who love their country, and who upon a liberal scale would serve their party. For to force the Whigs to avow an unpopular doctrine in popular assemblies, or to wrench the government of such bodies from them, would be a coup de maître. But they are alike destitute of manly resolution and sound policy. D—n the whole nest of them! I have corrected the last of Malachi, and let the thing take its chance. I have made enemies enough, and indisposed enough of friends.

At the Court, though a teind day. A foolish thing happened while the Court were engaged with the teinds. I amused myself with writing on a sheet of paper notes on Frederick Maitland's account of the capture of Bonaparte; and I have lost these notes—shuffled in perhaps among my own papers, or those of the teind clerks. What a curious document to be found in a process of valuation! Being jaded and sleepy, I took up Le Due de Guise on Naples. I think this, with the old Memoires on the same subject which I have at Abbotsford, would enable me to make a pretty essay for the Quarterly. We must take up Woodstock now in good earnest. Mr. Cowan, a good and able man, is chosen trustee in Constable's affairs, with full power. From what I hear, the poor man is not sensible of the nature of his own situation; for myself, I have succeeded in putting the matters perfectly out of my mind since I cannot help them, and have arrived at a flocci-pauci-nihili-pili-fication of money, and I thank Shenstone for inventing that long word. They are removing the wine, etc., to the carts, and you will judge if our flitting is not making a noise in the world—or in the street at least.

I foresaw justly, "When first I set this dangerous stone a-rolling, 'Twould fall upon myself." Sir Robert Dundas to-day put into my hands a letter of between thirty and forty pages, in angry and bitter reprobation of Malachi, full of general averments and very untenable arguments, all written at me by name, but of which I am to have no copy, and which is to be shown to me in extenso, and circulated to other special friends, to whom it may be necessary to "give the sign to hate." I got it at two o'clock, and returned [it] with an answer four hours afterwards, in which I have studied not to be tempted into either sarcastic or harsh expressions. A quarrel it is however, in all the forms, between my old friend and myself, and his lordship's reprimand is to be read out in order to all our friends. They all know what I have said is true, but that will be nothing to the purpose if they are desired to consider it as false. As for Lord Melville, I do not wonder that he is angry, though he has little reason, for he, our watchman stented, has from time to time suffered all manner of tampering to go on under his nose with the institutions and habits of Scotland. As for myself, I was quite prepared for my share of displeasure. It is very curious that I should have foreseen all this so distinctly as far back as 17th February. Nobody at least can plague me for interest with Lord Melville as they used to do. By the way, from the tone of his letter, I think his lordship will give up the measure, and I will be the peace-offering. All will agree to condemn me as too warm—too rash—and get rich on privileges which they would not have been able to save but for a little rousing of spirit, which will not perhaps fall asleep again. A gentleman called on the part of a Captain [Rutherford], to make inquiry about the Border Rutherfords. Not being very cleever, as John Fraser used to say, at these pedigree matters, referred him to Mrs. Dr. Russell and Robt. Rutherford. The noble Captain conceits he has some title to the honours of Lord Rutherford. Very odd—when there is a vacant or dormant title in a Scottish family or name, everybody, and all connected with the clan, conceive they have quodam modo a right to it. Not being engrossed by any individual, it communicates part of its lustre to every individual in the tribe, as if it remained in common stock for that purpose.

I am not made entirely in the same mould of passions like other people. Many men would deeply regret a breach with so old a friend as Lord Melville, and many men would be in despair at losing the good graces of a Minister of State for Scotland, and all pretty visions about what might be done for myself and my sons, especially Charles. But I think my good lord doth ill to be angry, like the patriarch of old, and I have, in my odd sans souciance character, a good handful of meal from the grist of the Jolly Miller, who "Once Dwelled on the river Dee; I care for nobody, no, not I, Since nobody cares for me." Breakfasted with me Mr. Franks, a young Irishman from Dublin, who brought letters from Walter and Captain Longmore of the Royal Staff. He has written a book of poetry, Tales of Chivalry and Romance, far from bad, yet wants spirit. He talks of publishing his recollections in the Peninsula, which must be interesting, for he has, I think, sense and reflection. Sandie Young came in at breakfast-time with a Monsieur Brocque of Montpelier. Saw Sir Robert Dundas at Court, who condemns Lord Melville, and says he will not show his letter to any one; in fact it would be exactly placarding me in a private and confidential manner. He is to send my letter to Lord Melville. Colin Mackenzie concurs in thinking Lord Melville quite wrong. "He must cool in the skin he het in." On coming home from the Court a good deal fatigued, I took a nap in my easy-chair, then packed my books, and committed the refuse to Jock Stevenson— "Left not a limb on which a Dane could triumph." Gave Mr. Gibson my father's cabinet, which suits a man of business well. Gave Jock Stevenson the picture of my old favourite dog Camp, mentioned in one of the introductions to Marmion, and a little crow-quill drawing of Melrose Abbey by Nelson, whom I used to call the Admiral. Poor fellow! he had some ingenuity, and was, in a moderate way, a good penman and draughtsman. He left his situation of amanuensis to go into Lord Home's militia regiment, but his dissipated habits got the better of a strong constitution, and he fell into bad ways and poverty, and died, I believe, in the hospital at Liverpool. Strange enough that Henry Weber, who acted afterwards as my amanuensis for many years, had also a melancholy fate ultimately. He was a man of very superior attainments, an excellent linguist and geographer, and a remarkable antiquary. He published a collection of ancient Romances, superior, I think, to the elaborate Ritson. He also published an edition of Beaumont and Fletcher, but too carelessly done to be reputable. He was a violent Jacobin, which he thought he disguised from me, while I, who cared not a fig about the poor young man's politics, used to amuse myself with teasing him. He was an excellent and affectionate creature, but unhappily was afflicted with partial insanity, especially if he used strong liquors, to which, like others with that unhappy tendency, he was occasionally addicted. In 1814 he became quite insane, and, at the risk of my life, I had to disarm him of a pair of loaded pistols, which I did by exerting the sort of authority which, I believe, gives an effectual control in such cases. His friends, who were respectable, placed him in the York Asylum, where he pined away and died, I think, in 1814 or 1815. My patronage in this way has not been lucky to the parties protected. I hope poor George Huntly Gordon will escape the influence of the evil star. He has no vice, poor fellow, but his total deafness makes him helpless.

This day the Court rose after a long and laborious sederunt. I employed the remainder of the day in completing a set of notes on Captain Maitland's manuscript narrative of the reception of Napoleon Bonaparte on board the Bellerophon. It had been previously in the hands of my friend Basil Hall, who had made many excellent corrections in point of style; but he had been hypercritical in wishing (in so important a matter where everything depends on accuracy) this expression to be altered for delicacy's sake,—that to be omitted for fear of giving offence,—and that other to be abridged for fear of being tedious. The plain sailor's narrative for me, written on the spot, and bearing in its minuteness the evidence of its veracity. Lord Elgin sent me, some time since, a curious account of his imprisonment in France, and the attempts which were made to draw him into some intrigue which might authorise treating him with rigour. He called to-day and communicated some curious circumstances, on the authority of Fouché, Denon, and others, respecting Bonaparte and the empress Maria Louise, whom Lord Elgin had conversed with on the subject in Italy. His conduct towards her was something like that of Ethwald to Elburga, in Joanna Baillie's fine tragedy, making her postpone her high rank by birth to the authority which he had acquired by his talents. Dinner was usually announced for a particular hour, and Napoleon's business often made him late. She was not permitted to sit down to table, an etiquette which was reasonable enough. But from the hour of dinner till the Emperor appeared she was to be in the act of sitting down; that is to say, he was displeased if he found her engaged with a book, with work, or with anything else. She was obliged to be in a state of absolute "being about to sit down." She seemed a good deal gênée by something of that kind, though remembering with pride she had been Empress, it might almost be said of the world. The rest for to-morrow.

Resumed Woodstock, and wrote my task of six pages. I was interrupted by a slumberous feeling which made me obliged to stop once or twice. I shall soon have a remedy in the country, which affords the pleasanter resource of a walk when such feelings come on. I hope I am the reverse of the well-known line, "sleepy myself, to give my readers sleep." I cannot gurnalise at any rate, having wrought my eyes nearly out.