T'S hard work to tell which is Old Harry when everybody's got boots on.
Mrs. Poyser, in George Eliot's Adam Bede.
WANT you to come and pass sentence
On two or three books with a plot;
Of course you know "Janet's Repentance"?
I'm reading Sir Waverley Scott,
The story of Edgar and Lucy,
How thrilling, romantic, and true!
The Master (his bride was a goosey!)
Reminds me of you.
They tell me Cockayne has been crowning
A poet whose garland endures:
It was you who first spouted me Browning—
That stupid old Browning of yours!
His vogue and his verve are alarming;
I'm anxious to give him his due,
But, Fred, he's not nearly so charming
A poet as you!
Frederick Locker, London Lyrics.
OSEPH Gillon was a Writer to the Signet. Calling on him one day in his writing office, Sir Walter Scott said, "Why, Joseph, this place is as hot as an oven." "Well," quoth Gillon, "and isn't it here that I make my bread?"
Lockhart, Life of Scott.