the firm.

[29] I have consulted high authority on the legal side of this
counter-bill story, and have been informed (with the expected caution
that, the facts being so doubtful, the law is hard to give) that under
Scots law these counter-bills, if they existed, would probably be
allowed to rank, supposing that twenty shillings in the pound had not
been paid on the first set, and to an extent sufficient to make up that
sum. But Lockhart's allegation clearly is that they were so used as to
charge Scott's estate to the extent of _forty_ shillings in the pound.

[30] John Ballantyne had died in 1821, before the mischief was punished,
but after it was done.

[31] _Lockhart_, vii. 370, 371.

[32] I am not certain whether the second advance, which was secured by
mortgage on Abbotsford, included the first or not. Probably it did.

[33] A pet name for his 'curios.'

[34] Our now-accepted texts, of course, read 'food'; but no one who
remembers the pleasant use which Sir Walter himself has made of the
other reading in the Introduction to _Quentin Durward_ will readily give
it up.

[35] As Scott, like Swift and Shakespeare, like Thackeray and Fielding,
never hesitated at a touch of grim humour even though it might border on
grotesque, he himself would probably not have missed the coincidence
of--

'Though _bill_men ply the ghastly blow,'

which suggests itself only too tragi-comically.

[36] _Journal_, Feb. 3, 1826, p. 103, ed. Douglas; _Lockhart_, viii.
216, 217.

CHAPTER VI

LAST WORKS AND DAYS

It has been mentioned that when Scott returned from Ireland, and before
his misfortunes came upon him, he had already engaged in two works of
magnitude, a new novel, _Woodstock_, and a _Life of Napoleon_, planned
upon a very large scale, for which Constable made great preparations,
and from which he expected enormous profits. After the catastrophe it
became a question whether Constable's estate could claim the fulfilment
of these contracts, or whether the profits of them could be devoted
wholly to the liquidation of Scott's, or rather Ballantyne & Co.'s, own
debts. The completion of _Woodstock_ was naturally delayed until this
point was settled. But from the very moment when Sir Walter had resolved
to devote himself to the heroic but apparently hopeless task of paying
off his nominal liabilities in full, he arranged a system of work upon
these two books, and especially upon the _Napoleon_, which exceeded in