in the name of an abstract principle of
population. But look, says Scott, at the old-fashioned beggar as he
really was. He had his place in society; he was the depository of the
legends of the whole country-side: chatting with the lairds, the
confidential friend of fishermen, peasants, and farmers; the oracle in
all sports and ruler of village feasts; repaying in friendly offices far
more than the value of the alms which he took as a right; a respecter of
old privileges, because he had privileges himself; and ready when the
French came to take his part in fighting for the old country. There can
be no fear for a country, says Scott, where even the beggar is as ready
to take up arms as the noble. The bluegown, in short, is no waif and
stray, no product of social corruption, or mere obnoxious parasite, but
a genuine member of the fabric, who could respect himself and scorn
servility as much as the highest members of the social hierarchy. Scott,
as Lockhart tells us, was most grievously wounded by the insults of the
Radical mob in Selkirk, who cried 'Burke Sir Walter!' in the place where
all men had loved and honoured him. It was the meeting of the old and
new, and the revelation to Scott in brutal terms of the new spirit which
was destroying all the old social ties. Scott and Wordsworth and
Coleridge and Southey and their like saw in fact the approach of that
industrial revolution, as we call it now, which for good or evil has
been ever since developing. The Radicals denounced them as mere
sentimentalists; the solid Whigs, who fancied that the revolution was
never to get beyond the Reform Bill of 1832, laughed at them as mere
obstructives; by us, who, whatever our opinions, speak with the
advantage of later experience, it must be admitted that such
Conservatism had its justification, and that good and far-seeing men
might well look with alarm at changes whose far-reaching consequences
cannot yet be estimated. Scott, meanwhile, is the incomparable painter
of the sturdy race which he loved so well--a race high-spirited, loyal
to its principles, surpassingly energetic, full of strong affections and
manly spirits, if crabbed, bigoted, and capable of queer perversity and
narrow self-conceit. Nor, if we differ from his opinions, can anyone who
desires to take a reasonable view of history doubt the interest and
value of the conceptions involved. Scott was really the first
imaginative observer who saw distinctly how the national typ