to death." He thought that she had only plate secreted. "What hast thou done!" said the lady. "The two Rabauts are hid there!"--The man looked round; there was no time to warn the victims. The officers of police were behind him. The poor workman fell down in a faint and was long before he could be recovered. Rabaut de St. Etienne was taken out, and immediately executed* for having tried to save the Tyrant Louis. His brother was shut up in a high room of a prison, that had a view of only a small portion of the Seine. His poor wife, who now writes to my friends, used to tell them, that during her husband's confinement, expecting every day his execution, she had no communication with him, but by going at a particular hour of the day to the river, and there showing him, at a great distance, herself and their infant child, from a boat which she hired to stop in view of the prison. The day before Rabaut was to have been guillotined, the death of Robespierre and his fellow miscreants opened the prison doors to him.

At the restoration of the Bourbons, Rabaut preached a loyal and eloquent sermon on the occasion. He has since been well affected to them; but this bigot, the Duc d'Angoulême, has inflamed the passions of all Catholic France; and it is literally true that the Protestants are persecuted with impunity. This infamous and impolitic principle-if it deserves the name of principlethis raking up the whole memory of the Revolution-has included the venerable Rabaut, at seventy years of age, among the exiled-for what? For a vote which was expressly punished by the Jacobins as the crime of Religion-a vote which, it is on historical record, the unfortunate Louis considered himself as the best for his cause, which his friends on the Convention could give. I really was displeased at one time with my friends the Whigs for premature suspicion of the Bourbons, and for judging of them severely, without allowance for the trying circumstances in which they were placed. But I lament to find, from such proof as this, and the tremendous facts adduced by Sir Samuel Romilly, that whatever Louis XVIII. may be, the rest are bigots and fools. Rabaut's father and grandfather had been Protestant clergymen; and this old gentleman used to show the Miss Hills a spot near his house, inclosed by precipices, and having only access by a difficult pathway, where his grand

* And what adds to the tragical interest of the story is, that his wife, resolved not to outlive her husband, perished, like another Portia, by her own hand.

73

ET. 38.] FRENCH PROTESTANTS-SCOTCH COVENANters.

father's congregation used to meet, when it was a crime for them to be found assembled in their heretical worship. Sentinels were placed to watch the approach of the gens d'armes; the women had horses saddled to escape at a moment's warning; the pulpit was a high niche among the crags. There they used to assemble in tempestuous nights, when the men of blood were couched within their dens. The Miss Hills told these anecdotes to poor James Grahame, and it was from them that he made up his description on the Sabbath of the Scottish Preachings, in times of persecution. Pray look at the passage-

"Then dauntlessly,

The scattered few would meet in some deep dell,
By rocks o'ercanopied, to hear the voice-
Their faithful pastor's voice: he, by the gleam
Of sheeted lightning, oped the sacred book,
And words of comfort spoke," &c.*

T. C.

Of the cordial friendship which subsisted between Sir Walter Scott and Campbell, several instances have been already noticed, and many more might be added; but nothing could place the fact in a more amiable light than the following letter, in which Scott divulges a plan for improving the means, and recovering the personal society, of his friend.

ABBOTSFORD, NEAR MELROSE, April 12, 1816.

MY DEAR TOм,

You will argue, from seeing my unhallowed hand, that I have something to say in the way of business; for I think both you and I have something else to do than to plague ourselves (I always mean the writer-for the receiver will, I trust, be no ways discontented in either case) with writing letters on mere literature. But I have heard, and with great glee, that it is likely that you may be in Edinburgh next winter, and with a view of lecturing, which cannot fail to answer well. But this has put a further plan in my head, which I mentioned to no one until I should see whether it will meet your own wishes

*Campbell was fond of repeating these lines in after life; and in a work, edited by him in 1837, quotes them at full length, as applying to the Waldensian pastors in times of persecution. These conversations with the pastor, RABAUT, were not reported to the Author of "The Sabbath," it is believed, until after the poem was published; but in the history of Covenanting times, as every reader is aware, such incidents were as frequent in Scotland as among the protestants of Dauphinée.

VOL. II.-4

The

and ideas; and it is a very selfish plan on my part, since it would lead to settling you in Edinburgh for life. My idea is this. There are two classes in our University, either of which, filled by you, would be at least 4007. or 500l., yearly; but which, possessed by the present incumbents, are wretched sinecures, in which there are no lectures-or if any lectures, no students—I mean the classes of Rhetoric and History. The gentleman who teaches the first is a minister of Edinburgh, and might be ashamed to accept of a coadjutor. But I think that the History class, being held by a gentleman who has retired for some years into the north country, and does not even pretend to lecture, (a mere stipend, often of a petty salary of 100l., being annexed to the office,) he would, for shame's sake, be glad to accept a colleague. And, were I certain you would be willing to hold a situation so respectable in itself, and which your talents and deserved reputation would render a source of very great emolument, I think I could put the matter in such a light to the patrons of the University, as would induce them to call on the present incumbent, either to accept you as his colleague, or come to discharge his duty in person, which he would not do for the salary. alternative would be, that he should accept the salary which he draws at present (in which respect he would be neither better nor worse), relinquishing to you all the advantage of the class. besides, which I assure you would be a very handsome thing. I have mentioned this to no one, and I request you will not mention it to any one (I mean in Scotland), until your own mind is made up about it. My reason is, first, that there would be some delicacy in setting the matter in motion; and besides that, the said incumbent is a gentleman whom I wish well to in many respects; and, though I censure, I do not derogate from my regard, in desiring the class he holds in my Alma Mater should be filled by such a colleague as you. Yet the story, in passing through two mouths, might be represented as a plan on my part to oust an old friend, of whom I may certainly say, like the dog in the child's tale, "The kid never did me nae ill." If this should answer your views, write instantly, that is, in the course of a week or two. If not, wipe it out like the work of the learned Lipsius, composed the first hour he was born, and say no more about it. Our magistrates, who are patrons of the University, are at present rather well disposed towards literature; (witness their giving me my freedom, with a huge silver tankard that would have done honor to Justice Shallow,) and the Provost is really a great man, and a man of taste and read

ET. 38.]

75

ing; so I have strong hope our point, so advantageous to the University, may be carried. If not, the failure is mine, not yours. You will understand me to be sufficiently selfish in this matter, since few things could give me more pleasure than to secure your good company through what part of life's journey may remain to me. In saying, speak to nobody, I do not include our valuable friend John Richardson, or any other sober or welljudging friend of yours. Only it would be painful to me if our proposal should get abroad, being an imaginary notion of my own, unless you really thought it would suit you. I beg my best respects to Mrs. Campbell, and am ever, dear Campbell, yours most truly, WALTER SCOTT.

HIS AMERICAN COUSIN-STEWART.

The result of this communication has not been ascertained. Campbell, however, had now turned his thoughts to lecturing in some of the provincial cities; and the offers were too encouraging to be lost sight of. But it will probably occur to those who knew him, that, had he become identified with the University of Edinburgh, as his illustrious friend proposed, the color of his fate would have been altered-new energies would have been called forth; and, in the use and application of his fine classical knowledge, some of those bright ideas might have been embodied in poetry, which were seldom afterwards drawn forth but in conversation. But to return to the narrative :

His American cousin, the new laird of Ascog, had arrived in Sydenham; and, writing to his sister, July 18, Campbell reverts to the progress of her "nephew" under his own special tutorship:-"I believe," he says, "you are right respecting the utility of Thomas's correspondence; at present, as he has begun Greek and French, he is really occupied fully, but I intend soon to drill him a little in correspondence, and by degrees to bring him into epistolary habits. Our relation, Frederick-CampbellStewart, of Ascog, has been for some seven weeks in the village, about three-quarters of a mile from us. I think he is a dying man, although his French physician assured him that, by persevering in the use of Iceland moss, and following the regimen he prescribed to him, he should get better. He left France for Mrs. Stewart's accouchement. She was delivered about ten days ago of a fine boy.

"This young man, before leaving America, made an agreement with an uncle, who thought that the present heir, being an alien, could not succeed, by which he gave up a fourth to the uncle, and another fourth to his own brother. Thus he

succeeds to only 15007. a-year, and that is burthened with so many expenses of succession, and debts on the estate, that he says it will be many years before his income is clear. . . . He is an amiable man, but our idea of his taking an interest in our family proves a chimera! I have equal doubts of his ability and disposition; for, though he is mild in temper, I cannot but perceive that he is not a prodigal. . . ."

"I come now, my dear Mary, to a subject which it is painfully delicate for me to express, but which I feel it a duty to myself not to pass in silence. It is my inability at this moment to fulfil the intention I had of remitting you a token of my remembrance, and which I had laid aside for you, in distributing my expenditure for the year. But it is swept away from me; and I am left with only the painful consciousness of a sincere intention. A sum of money advanced by on my account, ten years ago, to my mother, has been claimed; the interest ran it up to 921., but I have come to a compromise to pay 601. You may guess what a slap this is in my finances. . . . I have written three or four occasional poems since winter, some of which you may have probably seen in the papers. I hope in the course of a year to have as many as to form a volume. T. C."

* *

Among the "occasional poems" to which he alludes, is one to a lady,* never published-" On being presented with a Sprig of Alexandrian Laurel:"

The popularity of Campbell's Lectures had, to a certain amount, anticipated that of his Specimens. The consequence

* Miss Eleanor Wigram, now Mrs. Unwin Heathcote.