was his best inspiration are written with such love for the characters and the scenes that we feel his living joy and love underneath each of the stories as a completing charm, as a spirit that enchants the whole. And in these tales and in his poems his own deep kindliness, his sympathy with human nature, united after years of enmity, the Highlands to the Lowlands. - STOPFORD A. BROOKE.

SOME OF SCOTT'S CHARACTERS.

The fame of Scotland's scenery, the inspiration of her romantic history, and the union in sentiment of her

peoples lowlanders and highlanders are due very largely to the leadership of Sir Walter Scott. He speaks and acts through characters which were the natural product of the country through centuries of advancing civilization. In bringing back "the moss-trooper and the border knight, the glowing tartans and the tragic passion of the highland chieftains," he introduces Scotland to herself, and suggests a newer and broader outlook and a larger and richer life.

Scott's characters do not flourish outside of the environments of their origin. They cannot easily be transplanted. Among the most famous are the following:

Dominie Sampson. Absent-minded, faithful, and affectionate, with a remarkable awkwardness of manners and simplicity of character. His language was always quaint, and, having been educated for the church, he frequently used the forcible and peculiar phraseology of the Scriptures. Found in "Guy Mannering." Robin Hood. The gallant and generous

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king of outlaws and

prince of good fellows." Found in "Ivanhoe.” Jeanie Deans. David Deans' daughter. A perfect model of sober heroism—of the union of good sense with strong affections. Found in "The Heart of Midlothian.”

Meg Merrilies. Henry Bertram's gypsy nurse and a character of commanding interest. She was venerated by her tribe, over whom she held arbitrary authority. She impressed beholders with feelings of superstitious awe. Devoted to Henry Bertram, weird and oracular, she moves through the novel like a spirit of destiny. Found in "Guy Mannering.”

Madge Wildfire. Meg Murdockson's simple-minded daughter. She was very loquacious, and her talk was lively but disjointed. "Pilgrim's Progress" was the favorite subject of her conversation. She received the name of Madge Wildfire from the frequency of her singing the following song:

"I glance like the wildfire through country and town,
I am seen on the causeway, I'm seen on the down.

The lightning that flashes so bright and so free

Is scarcely so blithe or so bonny as me."

Found in "The Heart of Midlothian.”

Edie Ochiltree. A mendicant who had formerly been a soldier. He played an important part in bringing to a happy issue the love affairs of Lovel and Miss Wardour, and in his old age became a member of their household. Found in "The Antiquary."

Meg Dods. Hostess of Cleikum Inn. Meg's especial antipathy was the fashionable hotel at St. Ronan's well. Desiring no master, Meg refused to share her small fortune with any of the numerous aspirants for her hand. She exerted arbitrary sway over her servants and guests. Found in "St. Ronan's Well."

Other characters equally widely known are Fergus and Flora MacIvor in " Waverley"; Mr. Oldbuck, Bailie Littlejohn, and Monkbarns in "The Antiquary"; Preacher Macbrian in “Old Mortality"; MacGregor, Helen Campbell, and Diana Vernon in "Rob Roy"; Saddletree and Sharpitlaw in "The Heart of Midlothian"; Edgar Ravenswood, Caleb Balderstone, and Lucy Ashton in "The Bride of Lammermoor"; Isaac the Jew, Ivanhoe, and Lady Rowena in Ivanhoe"; Amy Robsart in " Kenilworth "; Halbert Glendinning in "The Monastery"; and Alice Lee in "Woodstock."

SCOTT, A GENUINE MAN.

The surliest critic must allow that Scott was a genuine man, which itself is a great matter. No affectation, fantasticality, or distortion dwelt in him, no shadow of cant. Nay, withal was he not a right brave and strong man according to his kind? A most composed, invincible man; in difficulty and distress knowing no discouragement; Samson-like, carrying off on his strong Samson shoulders the gates that would imprison him. - CAR

LYLE.

SCOTT'S CAPACITY FOR UNIFORM WORK.

There is no evidence that any one of the novels was labored or even so much as carefully composed. Scott's method of composition was always the same; and when writing an imaginative work the rate of progress seems to have been pretty even, depending much more upon the absence of disturbing engagements than on any mental irregularity. The morning was always his brightest time; but morning or evening, in country or in town, well or ill, writing with his own pen or dictating to an amanuensis in the intervals of screaming fits due to the torture of cramp in the stomach, Scott spun away at his imaginative web almost as evenly as a silkworm spins at its golden cocoon. RICHARD H. HUTTON.

SCOTT'S GREAT SECRET OF SUCCESS.

Scott's son-in-law, Mr. Lockhart, in describing a journey through Scotland, says that wherever Scott slept, whether in a noble mansion or in the shabbiest of country inns, he very rarely mounted the carriage in the morning without having ready a package of manuscript, corded and sealed, and addressed to his printer in Edinburgh. And yet all the while he kept himself thoroughly well informed upon contemporary literature of all sorts. Mr. Lockhart gives as the grand secret his perpetual practice of his own grand maxim, "Never to be doing nothing." Every moment was turned to account, and thus he had leisure for everything.

On his return from Naples in June, 1832, Scott was

at once conveyed to Abbotsford, a complete wreck in body and mind. He desired to be wheeled through his rooms, and as members of his family moved him leisurely for an hour or more up and down the hall and the great library, he kept saying: "I have seen much, but nothing like my ain house. Give me one turn more."

SCOTT IN CONVERSATION.

The conversation of Scott was frank, hearty, picturesque, and dramatic. During the time of my visit he inclined to the comic rather than the grave in his anecdotes and stories, and such, I was told, was his general inclination. He relished a joke or a trait of humor in social intercourse, and laughed with right good will. He talked, not for effect or display, but from the flow of his spirits, the stories of his memory, and the vigor of his imagination. He had a natural turn for narration; and his narratives and descriptions were without effort, yet wonderfully graphic. He placed the scene before you like a picture ; he gave the dialogue with the appropriate dialect or peculiarities, and described the appearance and characters of his personages with that spirit and felicity evinced in his writings. He made himself so thoroughly the companion of those with whom he happened to be that they forgot for a time his vast superiority, and only recollected and wondered, when all was over, that it was Scott with whom they had been on such familiar terms, and in whose society they had felt so perfectly at ease. WASHINGTON IRVING.