[58] A. Lang: Life and Letters of John Gibson Lockhart, V. i, p. 93
It was the pen of John Gibson Lockhart, however, almost as wholly as Wilson’s which insured the success of the magazine; and Blackwood was as eager to enlist Lockhart into his services as Wilson. Like Wilson, too, “Maga” was Lockhart’s opportunity! He had given early promise as a future critic. Elton says he wrote “sprightly verse and foaming prose”. From 1817 to 1830 he was not only one of the invaluable supporters of “Maga”, but one of its rare lights! In announcing the marriage of his daughter to Lockhart, Sir Walter Scott said: “To a young man of uncommon talents, indeed of as promising a character as I know”.[59] His gift for caricature colored his writings. His was a mind and eye and genius for the comic. His satire was that keen and bitter piercing satire which all are ready to recognize as talent, but few are ready to forgive if once subjected to it. But there was little malice behind it ever. Much of what he wrote has been condemned for its bitter, and often personal, import. But Lockhart was only twenty-three at the time of his first connection with the magazine—and what is more, “constitutionally a mocker”. All is well with his serious work, but according to Mr. Lang, the “Imp of the Perverse” was his ruling genius! Others say, “as a practitioner in the gentle art of making enemies, Lockhart excelled”,[60] and that he possessed the “native gift of insolence”[61]. They are strong words, not wholly without cause, and illustrate the attitude of many minds towards his work; yet perhaps they only go to prove that he began to write responsible articles too young, and was allowed entirely too free a swing.
[59] Ibid., V. i, p. 230
[60] J. H. Millar: A Literary History of Scotland, p. 517
[61] Same
The story of James Hogg is by far the most fascinating of those connected with Blackwood’s; and in a later series of articles in that magazine on these first three stars, the writer says: “Hogg was undoubtedly the most remarkable. For his was an untaught and self-educated genius, which shone with rare though fitful lustre in spite of all disadvantages, and surmounted obstacles that were seemingly insuperable.”[62] It is difficult to ascertain his exact relations with the magazine. One thing at least is certain,—he contributed much. Wilson and Lockhart found great joy in “drawing” him, and Hogg was kept wavering between vexation and pride “at occupying so much space in the most popular periodical of the day”.[63] As Saintsbury puts it, he was at once the “inspiration, model, and butt of Blackwood’s Magazine”[64]. But indeed the shepherd drawn so cleverly in the Noctes “was not”, his daughter testifies, “the Shepherd of Ettrick, or the man James Hogg”. And in all justice to him, there can be no doubt that he is totally misrepresented therein.
[62] Memorials of James Hogg, p. 11
[63] J. H. Millar: A Literary History of Scotland, p. 530
[64] Saintsbury: Essays in English Literature, 1780-1860, p. 37
His poetry is his only claim upon the world. It was the one thing dearest to his own heart, and the one thing for which he claimed or craved distinction or recognition of any kind. The heart warms to this youth with his dreams and aspirations, brain teeming with poems years before he learned to write. As might be expected from a man whose own grandfather had conversed with fairies, in Hogg’s poetry the supernatural is close to the natural world. He is reported once to have said to his friend Sir Walter Scott: “Dear Sir Walter! Ye can never suppose that I belang to your School o’ Chivalry! Ye are the king o’ that school, but I’m the king o’ the Mountain and Fairy School, which is a far higher ane nor yours.”[65] This “sublime egotism” is not displeasing in one whose heart and soul was wrapt up in an earnest belief in and reverence for his art. It is the egotism of a deep nature which scorns to hide its talents in the earth. James Hogg spoke to the heart of Scotland, and was proud and content in so doing.