[[2]] See Chapter V, Rokeby, page 95.
CHAPTER XXXI
A SUCCESSFUL LIFE
In travelling so many miles to view the scenery of Scott's work, I think the strongest impression I have received is that of the all-pervading personality of Scott himself. It was one of the joys of the experience that so many places, not particularly attractive in themselves, should suddenly become interesting when found to be connected in some way with Scott's life or with something he had written; and that scenes of great natural beauty should become invested with a new fascination whenever they were found to suggest some line of poetry or to recall some well-remembered incident. I am sure I should never have given a second thought to the bit of an old wall which is now the scant remnant of Triermain Castle, had I passed it without knowledge of its identity; but it was worth going far out of the way to see, if only for the sake of realizing how the merest fragment of an old ruin could suggest a poem to Scott and how he could rebuild a castle in all its early magnificence and people it with the children of his fancy.
I know of no more romantic place in all of beautiful Scotland than the vale of the Esk, where the river flows between high cliffs, clothed with thick shrubbery and overhanging vines; and one can stand by the side of the stream, looking over the lacelike foliage of the tree-tops, and catch glimpses now and then of some fascinating old ruin, peeping down like a fairy castle, lodged in the topmost branches. Yet when I recall its charm, I cannot help remembering how it transformed an Edinburgh lawyer of small reputation into a poet of world-wide fame.
Wherever we went, whether driving through the Canongate of Edinburgh, or looking across the Tweed toward the Eildon Hills, or listening to the shrill screams of the sea-fowl as they dashed about the dizzy heights of St. Abb's Head, or wandering quietly through the woods that lend a wild and fairy-like enchantment to the Trossachs, there was always the feeling that Scott had been there before and had so left the impress of his personality that his spirit seemed to remain.
It was a pleasant sensation, for there seemed to be in it an indefinable consciousness of the presence of Scott's own genial nature, that spirit of good-fellowship which so delighted Washington Irving when he enjoyed the rare privilege of wandering over the hills and valleys with Sir Walter, listening to countless anecdotes and ballads, and sharing his boundless hospitality for several days.
