condition of the book clubs than
Sir Walter Scott. In 1823 the Roxburghe made proffers of membership to
him, partly, it would seem, under the influence of a waggish desire to
disturb his great secret, which had not yet been revealed. Dibdin,
weighting himself with more than his usual burden of ponderous
jocularity, set himself in motion to intimate to Scott the desire of the
club that the Author of Waverley, with whom it was supposed that he had
the means of communicating, would accept of the seat at the club vacated
by the death of Sir Mark Sykes. Scott got through the affair ingeniously
with a little coy fencing that deceived no one, and was finally accepted
as the Author of Waverley's representative. The Roxburghe had, however,
at that time, done nothing in serious book-club business, having let
loose only the small flight of flimsy sheets of letterpress already
referred to. It was Scott's own favourite club, the Bannatyne, that
first projected the plan of printing substantial and valuable volumes.

At the commencement of the same year, 1823, when he took his seat at the
Roxburghe (he did not take his bottle there, which was the more
important object, for some time after), he wrote to the late Robert
Pitcairn, the editor of the Criminal Trials, in these terms: "I have
long thought that a something of a bibliomaniacal society might be
formed here, for the prosecution of the important task of publishing
_dilettante_ editions of our national literary curiosities. Several
persons of rank, I believe, would willingly become members, and there
are enough of good operatives. What would you think of such an
association? David Laing was ever keen for it; but the death of Sir
Alexander Boswell and of Alexander Oswald has damped his zeal. I think,
if a good plan were formed, and a certain number of members chosen, the
thing would still do well."[71]

[Footnote 71: Notices of the Bannatyne Club, privately printed.]

Scott gave the Bannatyners a song for their festivities. It goes to the
tune of "One Bottle More," and is a wonderful illustration of his
versatile powers, in the admirable bibulous sort of joviality which he
distils, as it were, from the very dust of musty volumes, thus:--

"John Pinkerton next, and I'm truly concerned
I can't call that worthy so candid as learned;
He railed at the plaid, and blasphemed the claymore,
And set Scots by the ears in his one volume more.
One volume more, my frie