John Bell Scott

“ Fillan's church, to detect theft by means of his bell, of bathing mad patients in his pool, to cure their infirmity of mind; and lo! the persecutors have cast me forth of their communion, as they will speedily cast me out of this life."
"Lo you there now," said the glover, "see what it is for a man that cannot take a warning! Well, Father Clement, men will not cast me forth unless it were as a companion of yours. I pray you, therefore, tell me what you have to say of my daughter, and let us be less neighbours than we have been." ”

“ Calderwood, History of the Kirk of Scotland, vol. i, pp. 101-2. Another and less prejudiced account of this John Scott is given by Peder Swave, who visited Scotland in 1535, as Ambassador from Christian II of Denmark to James V: "On the 11th of May I met with a hermit, named John Scott, a person of noble rank, who had quitted a beautiful wife, and children, and all his household, and determined to live by himself in solitude. He ate nothing but bread, and drank nothing save water or milk. He is believed to have endured a fast of forty days and nights in Scotland, England, and Italy. ”

“ He was a thriving rather than a prosperous lawyer; that is to say, he earned his living.
But Scott was too much absorbed in literary studies and in writing ballads, to give to his numerous friends the hope of a distinguished legal career. No man can serve two masters. "His heart" was "in the Highlands a-chasing the deer," or ransacking distant villages for antiquarian lore, or collecting ancient Scottish minstrelsy, or visiting moss-covered and ivy-clad ruins, famous before John Knox swept monasteries and nunneries away as cages of unclean birds ”

“ It is a melancholy fact, and perhaps, after all, his own favourite saying fits it best—that often the wisest of men keep, as it were, the average stock of folly only in reserve, to be all expended on some one flagrant absurdity. One can at least understand Scott's affection for John Ballantyne, when one thinks of such an incident as this, related by Scott himself: 'A poor divinity student was attending his sale one day, and Johnnie remarked to him that he looked as if he were in bad health. ”

“ SCOTT, afterwards Scott-Waring, JOHN (1747–1819) , agent of Warren Hastings, born at Shrewsbury in 1747, was the grandson of John Scott, whose third wife was Dorothy, daughter of Adam Waring of the Hayes, Shropshire. His father was Jonathan Scott of Shrewsbury (d. August 1778) , who married Mary, second daughter of Humphrey Sandford of the Isle of Rossall, Shropshire. The second son, Richard, rose to the rank of lieutenant-colonel, and served with distinction under Sir Eyre Coote against Hyder Ali Khan and under the Marquis of Cornwallis in the war against Sippoo Saltaun. ”

“ SCOTT, JOHN, first Earl of Eldon (1751–1838) , lord chancellor, third son of William Scott of Newcastle-upon-Tyne, by his second wife, was born in Love Lane, Newcastle-upon-Tyne, on 4 June 1751. Heraldic conjecture has sought to connect his family with the noble house of Scott of Balwearie, Fifeshire [see Scott, Sir William, (d. 1532) ] ; but, beyond the name, there is nothing but vague tradition to indicate a Scottish origin. The pedigree cannot be authentically traced further back than William Scott's father, also William Scott, who is described as yeoman of Sandgate, Newcastle-upon-Tyne. ”

“ After this, John Scott spent all his holidays at Lone, and much of them in the society of the handsome shepherdess. His attentions in that direction were regarded with strong disapproval by his father's tenantry, but it was not their place to censure their supposed "young lord," and so they only expressed their sentiments with grave shaking of their heads. ”

“ Thanks to the feuds of this boisterous time, had I twenty hands, instead of these two poor servants of my art (displaying his skinny palms) , there is enough of employment for them — well requited employment, too, where thanks and crowns contend which shall best pay my services; while you, Sir John, wreak upon your chirurgeon the anger you ought only to bear against the author of your wound."
"Villain, it is beneath me to reply to thee," said the patient; "but every word of thy malignant tongue is a dirk, inflicting wounds which set all the medicines of Arabia at defiance." ”

“ It's word's going up, and word's going down,
Going to the king's bower,
That his dear daughter was with child,
That was his daily flower.
'If she be with child,
As I suppose she be,
I'll put her into prison strong,
And hunger her till she die.'
The king he wrote a letter broad,
And sealed it with his hands,
And sent it down to Johnnie Scott,
In Scotland where he stands. ”

“ Scott was generous towards rising talent, and his townsman, Samuel Lee [q. v.] , the orientalist, owed much to his instruction. He died on 11 Feb. 1829 at his residence in St. John's Row, Shrewsbury, and was buried near his parents in the bishop's chancel of old St. Chad's Church in the same city. He married his cousin Anne, daughter of Daniel Austin, M.A., rector of Berrington, Shropshire, who survived him. ”

“ The lady entered into his agitation with tact, and on her departure, he told his mother that he liked their visitor, because "she was a virtuoso, like himself." To her amused inquiry as to what a virtuoso might be, he replied: "Don't ye know? why, 'tis one who wishes to and will know everything."
As a boy at school in Edinburgh and in Kelso, and afterwards as a student at the University and apprentice in his father's law office, Scott took his own way to become a "virtuoso" ”

“ The day of the ordeal at last came, the old doctor ascended the pulpit, and after the preliminary service put on his spectacles and unfolded the roll of the congregation. To the utter amazement of everybody, he began with the theological shepherd, John Scott. Up started the man, a tall, gaunt, sunburnt figure, with his maud over his shoulder, his broad blue bonnet on the board in front of him, and such a look of grim determination on his face as showed how sure he felt of the issue of the logical encounter to which he believed he had been challenged from the pulpit. ”

“ Station, power, wealth, beauty, and genius, strove with each other in every demonstration of respect and worship, and—a few political fanatics and envious poetasters apart—wherever he appeared in town or country, whoever had Scotch blood in him, "gentle or simple," felt it move more rapidly through his veins when he was in the presence of Scott.' But in the midst of this blaze of glory, and while he was dreaming dreams of fortune and family pride, what was it that struck the most keen-eyed of critics when he first saw his hero? ”

“ Look you, I will play Dame Marjory, disposed on this day bed here with a mourning veil and a wreath of willow, to show my forsaken plight; thou, John, wilt look starch and stiff enough for her Galwegian maid of honour, the Countess Hermigild; and Dwining shall present the old Hecate, her nurse—only she hath more beard on her upper lip than Dwining on his whole face, and skull to boot. He should have the commodity of a beard to set her forth conformably. Get thy kitchen drudges, and what passable pages thou hast with thee, to make my women of the bedroom. Hearest thou? ”

“ Sincerely, I like enthusiasm of every kind so well, especially when united with worth of character, that I shall be delighted with this old gentleman. Ever yours,
W. Scott.
The last paragraph of this letter refers to an uncle of Laidlaw's (the father of Hogg's friend, John Grieve) , who at this time thought of occupying a cottage on Scott's estate. He was a preacher of the Cameronian sect, and had long ministered to a very small remnant of "the hill-folk" scattered among the wilds of Ettrick. He was a very good man, and had a most venerable and apostolical benignity of aspect ”

“ With none of the exhilarations of the conflict with crude conditions, so powerful in their appeal to men, there had still to be suffered the same obstacles plus denial of a thousand tender impulses and a thousand deep ambitions which masculine character may never feel. To the end of his life Mr. Scott remembered—this I have from his son—that when he was fourteen years of age, and just before her death, his mother called him to a private talk and gave him admonitions for the guidance of his life which took form as the very foundation stones of his character. ”

“ Johnson, in introducing the subject, had guarded himself against such reflections. “These diminutive observations,” he said, “seem to take away something{48} from the dignity of writing. But it must be remembered that the true state of every nation is the state of common life.” [271] This indifference to pure air no doubt spread death far and wide. In Sir Walter Scott’s family we see an instance of the unwholesomeness of the Old Town. His six elder brothers and sisters, who were all born in the College Wynd, died young. ”

“ John Ballantyne had ventured a “Novelists’ Library,” heavy books in double columns, and Scott contributed charming introductory essays, but in the summer of 1821 he lost this favourite henchman, and remarked that the sun would never shine so brightly again for himself. John clearly was no man of business, his possessions were a minus quantity, though he believed himself to have some property, and bequeathed a visionary £2,000 to Scott. ”

“ Scott quotes from Congreve’s ‘Old Bachelor,’-’Hannibal was a pretty fellow, sir-a very pretty fellow in his day,’ which is part of a speech by Noll Bluffe, one of the characters.
line 139. With ‘Limbo lost,’ cp. the ‘Limbo large and broad’ of ‘Paradise Lost,’ iii. 495. Limbo is the borders of hell, and also hell itself.
line 143. ‘John Leyden, M. D., who had been of great service to Sir Walter Scott in the preparation of the ‘Border Minstrelsy,’ sailed for India in April, 1803, and died at Java in August, 1811, before completing his 36th year. ”

“ So by the tendencies of his mind, by the gravity of his character, by the guides of wisdom, dignity, courage and taste—Mr. Scott planted on high ground and sustained for nearly half a century standards of journalism which must for all time be a pattern for the worthy and rebuke to the vicious. *** For myself whose fortune it was to live long in association with this rare man, to share in many of the influences and in a sense to inherit the inspirations of his life, there seems now a mighty void in the immediate world in which he lived. ”

“ Scott ought to have been content with Ashestiel; or, since every man wishes to own his home, he should have been satisfied with the comfortable cottage which he built at Abbotsford, and the modest improvements that his love for trees and shrubs enabled him to make. But his aspirations led him into serious difficulties. With all his sagacity and good sense, Scott never seemed to know when he was well off. It was a fatal mistake both for his fame and happiness to attempt to compete with those who are called great in England and Scotland,--that is, peers and vast landed proprietors. ”

“ Between his twelfth and fifteenth year, young Scott had a particularly favourite companion of his own age, John Irvine, the mutual attraction being a love of fictions of a chivalrous description, furnished by an eminent circulating library, which had been founded in Edinburgh by Allan Ramsay, and situated in the High Street, a short way above the Tron Church, and then belonged to Mr James Sibbald, a person of literary tastes, who edited the Edinburgh Magazine, and a26 collection of Scottish poetry. ”

“ It was Thomas Scott whose house was open to me when my need was sorest, and he never knew, this generous, noble heart, how sometimes, when I went in, weary and overdone, from a long day's study in the British Museum, with scarce food to struggle through the day—he never knew how his genial, 'Well, little lady,' in welcoming tone, cheered the then utter loneliness of my life. To no living man—save one—do I owe the debt of gratitude that I owe to Thomas Scott. ”

“ And Johnnie Scott's my name.'
'If you be Johnnie Scott,' says he,
'As I suppose you be,
The fairest flower in all England
Is big with child by thee.'
'If she be big with child,' said he,
'As I hope her to be,
I'll make it heir of all my lands,
And she my gay lady.'
'O no,' then the king he crys,
'There's no such thing will be;
There is an Italian in my court,
And by his hands ye'll die.'
'I'll stand my ground,' says Johnnie Scott,
'I'll stand it till I die ”

“ Most of them attained the high distinction to which their talents well entitled them to aspire, and several of them achieved high literary fame. Jeffrey, Cockburn, and Brougham were at the centre of this group, which also for a time included Leyden, Sydney Smith, Thomas Campbell, Francis Horner, and John Allen. Scott, as we know, was on terms of warm intimacy with some of these, but he was not one of their society, though he used to say he seemed never to enjoy an evening so much as when spent among his Whig friends. ”

“ However, in those days character and honesty were still appreciated by men who did not imitate them. Mr. Scott rose to eminence in his profession, and enjoyed at one time an extensive practice. Somewhat formal in manner and a rigid Calvinist in religion, he had many little peculiarities of the rural rather than the city Scot. Thus, though very abstemious in his habits, he was fond of sociability and grew very merry over his sober glass of wine. Moderate in politics, he had a natural leaning to constitutional principles, and was jealous of modern encroachments on the royal prerogative. ”