[56] All, alas! were now in a great measure so written. "Ivanhoe," "The Monastery," "The Abbot," and "Kenilworth" were all published between December 1819 and January 1821, Constable & Co. giving five thousand guineas for the remaining copyright of them, Scott clearing ten thousand before the bargain was completed; and before the "Fortunes of Nigel" issued from the press Scott had exchanged instruments and received his bookseller's bills for no less than four "works of fiction," not one of them otherwise described in the deeds of agreement, to be produced in unbroken succession, each of them to fill up at least three volumes, but with proper saving clauses as to increase of copy money in case any of them should run to four; and within two years all this anticipation had been wiped off by "Peveril of the Peak," "Quentin Durward," "St. Ronan's Well," and "Redgauntlet."
[57] "Woodstock" was finished 26th March, 1826. He knew then of his ruin; and wrote in bitterness, but not in weakness. The closing pages are the most beautiful of the book. But a month afterwards Lady Scott died; and he never wrote glad word more.
[58] Compare Mr. Spurgeon's not unfrequent orations on the same subject.
[59] There are three definite and intentional portraits of himself, in the novels, each giving a separate part of himself: Mr. Oldbuck, Frank Osbaldistone, and Alan Fairford.
[60] See note, p. 224.—Ed.
[61] Andrew knows Latin, and might have coined the word in his conceit; but, writing to a kind friend in Glasgow, I find the brook was called "Molyndona" even before the building of the Subdean Mill in 1446. See also account of the locality in Mr. George's admirable volume, "Old Glasgow," pp. 129, 149, etc. The Protestantism of Glasgow, since throwing that powder of saints into her brook Kidron, has presented it with other pious offerings; and my friend goes on to say that the brook, once famed for the purity of its waters (much used for bleaching), "has for nearly a hundred years been a crawling stream of loathsomeness. It is now bricked over, and a carriage-way made on the top of it; underneath the foul mess still passes through the heart of the city, till it falls into the Clyde close to the harbor."
FICTION, FAIR AND FOUL.[62]
II.
35. "He hated greetings in the market-place, and there were generally loiterers in the streets to persecute him either about the events of the day, or about some petty pieces of business."