and
"Kenilworth" in 1820, "The Pirate" in 1821, "The Fortunes of Nigel" in
1822, "Peveril of the Peak," "Quentin Durward" and "St. Ronan's Well" in
1823, and "Redgauntlet" in 1824. His great literary reputation was
acknowledged by a baronetcy conferred in 1820, and by the most
flattering condescensions on the part of King George IV on his visit to
Edinburgh in 1822.

_The End of All_

Scott's Diary from November, 1825, shows dear forebodings of the
collapse of the houses of Constable and Ballantyne. In a time of
universal confidence and prosperity, the banks had supported them to an
extent quite unwarranted by their assets or their trade, and as soon as
the banks began to doubt and to enquire, their fall was a foregone
conclusion. In December, Scott borrowed L10,000 on the lands of
Abbotsford, and advanced that sum to the struggling houses; on January
16, 1826, their ruin, and Scott's with them, were complete. Scott
immediately placed his whole affairs in the hands of three trustees, and
by the 26th all his creditors had agreed to a private trust to which he
mortgaged all his future literary labours.

On March 15, he left for the last time his house in Castle Street; on
April 3; "Woodstock" was sold for the creditors' behoof, realising
L8228; on May 15, Lady Scott died, after a short illness, at Abbotsford.
"I think," writes Scott in his Diary, "my heart will break. Lonely,
aged, deprived of all my family--all but poor Anne; an impoverished,
embarrassed man, deprived of the sharer of my thoughts and counsels, who
could always talk down my sense of the calamitous apprehensions which
break the heart that must bear them alone. Even her foibles were of
service to me, by giving me things to think of beyond my weary
self-reflections."

An expedition to Paris, in October, to gather materials for his "Life of
Napoleon." was a seasonable relief. On his return through London, the
King undertook that his son, Charles Scott, then at Oxford, should be
launched in the diplomatic service. The elder son, heir to the
baronetcy, was now with his regiment in Ireland.

The "Life of Buonaparte" was published in June, 1827, and secured high
praise from many, among whom was Goethe. It realised L18,000 for the
creditors, and had health been spared him, Scott must soon have freed
himself from all encumbrances. Before the close of 1829 he had published
also the "Chronicles of the Canongate," "Tales of a Grandfather," "The
Fair Maid o