er to reward a man
of genius, and a person of such distinguished merit." The King had
signed the document, and the office fees alone remained to be paid,
when Mr. Pitt died, and a new and opposite ministry succeeded. Sir
Walter, however, obtained the appointment, though not from the favour
of an administration differing from himself in politics, as has been
supposed; the grant having been obtained before Mr. Fox's direction
that the appointment should be conferred as a favour coming directly
from his administration. The duties were easy, and the profits about
1,200_l._ a year, though Sir Walter, according to arrangement,
performed the former for five or six years without salary, until the
retirement of his colleague.

EDITIONS OF DRYDEN AND SWIFT.

Sir Walter's next literary labour was the editorship of the _Works of
John Dryden_, with Notes. Critical and Explanatory, and a Life of the
Author: the chief aim of which appears to be the arrangement of the
"literary productions in their succession, as actuated by, and
operating upon, the taste of an age, where they had so predominating
an influence," and the connexion of the Life of Dryden with the
history of his publications. This he accomplished within a
twelvemonth. Sir Walter subsequently edited, upon a similar plan, an
edition of the _Works of Swift_.--Neither of these works can be said
to entitle Sir Walter to high rank as a biographer.

THE LADY OF THE LAKE

Was written in 1809, and published in 1810, and was considered by the
author as the best of his poetic compositions. He appears to have
taken more than ordinary pains in its accuracy, especially in
verifying the correctness of the local circumstances of the story. In
his introduction to a late edition of the poem, he says--"I recollect,
in particular, that to ascertain whether I was telling a probable
tale, I went into Perthshire, to see whether King James could actually
have ridden from the banks of Loch Venachar to Stirling Castle within
the time supposed in the poem, and had the pleasure to satisfy myself
that it was quite practicable." The success of the poem "was certainly
so extraordinary, as to induce him for the moment to conclude, that he
had at last fixed a nail in the proverbially inconstant wheel of
Fortune, whose stability in behalf of an individual, who had so boldly
courted her favours for three successive times, had not as yet been
shaken."

ABBOTSFORD.--(_See the Cuts_.)

Sin