was, however, very hard to recover from, and he broke
more rapidly after Lady Scott's death than ever before. He writes:--

"A kind of cloud of stupidity hangs about me, as if all were unreal
that men seem to be doing and talking about."

After the burial he writes:--

"The whole scene floats as a sort of dream before me,--the
beautiful day, the gray ruins covered and hidden among clouds of
foliage, where the grave even in the lap of beauty lay lurking and
gaping for its prey. Then the grave looks, the hasty, important
bustle of the men with spades and mattocks, the train of carriages,
the coffin containing the creature that was so long the dearest on
earth to me, and whom I was to consign to the very spot which in
pleasure parties we so frequently visited. It seems still as if it
could not be really so. But it is so, and duty to God and to my
children must teach me patience."

His pecuniary troubles were greeted with the liveliest sympathy from all
quarters. The Earl of Dudley but voiced the general thought when he
exclaimed, on first hearing of them: "Scott ruined! the author of
'Waverley' ruined! Good God! Let every man to whom he has given months
of delight give him a sixpence, and he will rise to-morrow morning
richer than Rothschild." When, after a time, he rallied and went on a
journey to London, the deep sympathy with which he was received, and the
kindness of all with whom he associated, cheered his heart a great deal,
and he went back to his unparalleled labors quite refreshed. But he had
set himself a task which it was impossible that any man could do, and
although he worked himself mercilessly to the end, he failed of
accomplishing it. His nervous system became completely shattered, and he
had several strokes of paralysis; but it was not until his mind also
began to fail in serious fashion that he would give over his work. He
seemed determined to die a free man, but the task was too prodigious. He
labored like a giant, but he failed.

The record of those closing days is very sad. The pity they excite is
too deep even for tears. One turns from them with a heavy burden at the
heart, which nothing can for a time relieve. The only comfort is that he
was surrounded by the kindest and tenderest friends, and that he bore
everything which came to him with unflinching fortitude and the
kindliest spirit. His last words spoken to Lockhart are characteristi