erits of the book
are not small. Even Arthur and Anne are above, not below, the usual hero
and heroine.

The gap in the _Journal_ for the last half of 1828 is matched by another
and more serious one for nearly a twelvemonth, from July 1829 to May
1830, a period during which Sir Walter's health went from bad to worse,
and in which he lost his Abbotsford factotum, Tom Purdie. But the first
six months of 1829, and perhaps a little more, are among its pleasantest
parts. The shock of the failure and of his wife's death were, as far as
might be, over; he had resumed the habit of seeing a fair amount of
society; his work, though still busily pursued, was less killing than
during the composition of the _Napoleon_; and his affairs were looking
almost rosily. A first distribution, of thirty-two thousand pounds at
once, had been made among the creditors. Cadell's scheme of the
_Magnum_--wisely acquiesced in by the trustees, and facilitated by a
bold purchase at auction of Constable's copyrights for some eight
thousand pounds, and later, of those of the poems from Longmans for
about the same or a little less--was turning out a great success. They
had counted on a sale of eight thousand copies; they had to begin with
twelve thousand, and increase it to twenty, while the number ultimately
averaged thirty-five thousand. The work of annotation and introduction
was not hard, and was decidedly interesting.

Unluckily, irreparable mischief had already been done, and when the
_Diary_ begins again, we soon see signs of it. The actual beginning of
the end had occurred before the resumption, on February 15, 1830, when
Sir Walter had, in the presence of his daughter and of Miss Violet
Lockhart, experienced an attack of an apoplectic-paralytic character,
from which he only recovered by much blood-letting and starvation. There
can be little doubt that this helped to determine him to do what he had
for some time meditated, and resign his place at the Clerk's table: nor
perhaps could he have well done otherwise. But the results were partly
unfortunate. The work had been very trifling, and had saved him from
continual drudgery indoors at home, while it incidentally provided him
with society and change of scene. He was now to live at Abbotsford,--for
neither his means nor his health invited an Edinburgh residence when it
was not necessary,--with surroundings only too likely to encourage
'thick-coming fancies,' out of reach of immediate skilled medi