e year 1749;
and now what have I done but begun a third, which is to be all moorland
together, and is to have for a centre-piece a figure that I think you
will appreciate--that of the immortal Braxfield. Braxfield himself is my
grand premier--or since you are so much involved in the British drama,
let me say my heavy lead."

Writing to me at the same date he makes the same announcement more
briefly, with a list of the characters and an indication of the scene
and date of the story. To Mr. Baxter he writes a month later, "I have a
novel on the stocks to be called 'The Justice-Clerk.' It is pretty
Scotch; the grand premier is taken from Braxfield (O, by the by, send me
Cockburn's 'Memorials'), and some of the story is, well, queer. The
heroine is seduced by one man, and finally disappears with the other man
who shot him.... Mind you, I expect 'The Justice-Clerk' to be my
masterpiece. My Braxfield is already a thing of beauty and a joy for
ever, and so far as he has gone far my best character." From the last
extract it appears that he had already at this date drafted some of the
earlier chapters of the book. He also about the same time composed the
dedication to his wife, who found it pinned to her bed-curtains one
morning on awaking. It was always his habit to keep several books in
progress at the same time, turning from one to another as the fancy took
him, and finding relief in the change of labour; and for many months
after the date of this letter, first illness,--then a voyage to
Auckland,--then work on "The Ebb-Tide," on a new tale called "St. Ives,"
which was begun during an attack of influenza, and on his projected book
of family history,--prevented his making any continuous progress with
"Weir." In August 1893 he says he has been recasting the beginning. A
year later, still only the first four or five chapters had been drafted.
Then, in the last weeks of his life, he attacked the task again, in a
sudden heat of inspiration, and worked at it ardently and without
interruption until the end came. No wonder if during these weeks he was
sometimes aware of a tension of the spirit difficult to sustain. "How
can I keep this pitch?" he is reported to have said after finishing one
of the chapters; and all the world knows how that frail organism,
overtaxed so long, in fact betrayed him in mid effort.

With reference to the speech and manners of the Hanging Judge himself:
that they are not a whit exaggerated, in comparison w