lls, which were renewed as the necessities
of the publisher increased, till, on his failure, Sir Walter found
himself responsible for various debts, amounting to 102,000_l_. About
this time Lady Scott died, and her loss was an additional affliction
to him. Various modes of settlement were proposed to Sir Walter for
the liquidation of these heavy debts; but, "like the elder
Osbaldistone of his own immortal pages, considering commercial honour
as dear as any other honour," he would only consent to payment _in
full_; and, in the short space of six years, he paid off 60,000_l._
"by his genius alone; but he crushed his spirit in the gigantic
struggle, or, in plain words, sacrificed himself in the attempt to
repair his broken fortunes." He sold his house and furniture in
Edinburgh, and, says Chambers, "retreated into a humble lodging in a
second-rate street (St. David-street, where David Hume had formerly
lived.)" He reduced his establishment at Abbotsford, and retired, as
far as his official duties would permit, from public life, accompanied
only by his younger daughter. In this domestic retreat, at fifty-five
years of age, he commenced

THE LIFE OF NAPOLEON BUONAPARTE

--visiting France, in 1826, for some information requisite to the
work. In the following summer the _Life_ appeared in nine volumes, an
extent much beyond the original project. As might be expected, from
the aristocratical turn of Sir Walter's political tenets, the opinions
on this work were more various than on any other of his productions:
it is, to say the best, the most faulty and unequal of them all; and,
considering how clearly this has been shown, it is somewhat surprising
to hear so clever a critic as Mr. Cunningham pronounce _The Life of
Napoleon_ as "one of the noblest monuments of Scott's genius." We pass
from these considerations to the excellence of the purpose to which
the proceeds (12,000_l._) of this work were applied--namely, to the
payment of 6_s._ 8_d._ in the pound, as the first dividend of the
debts of the author.

In parting with the _Napoleon_, we might notice the conflicting
opinions of the French critics on its merits; but, as that task would
occupy too much space we content ourselves with the following passage
from a journal published a few days subsequent to the melancholy
intelligence of the death of Sir Walter Scott being received in Paris.
The criticism is in every sense plain-spoken:--

"If Sir Walter Scott's politics d