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"You will find the song you have lately alluded to set out at length in Lockhart's Life of Sir Walter, Edinburgh, 1839, vol. ii. page 323; and you will there find that Scott had regretted the production, and that it had given much offence; but that he was aware of Fox's illness at the time is questionable: I say questionable, for from Lord Holland's volume we are led to think that it was in June, 1806, the family became alarmed.

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"Lockhart says, This song gave great offence to the many sincere personal friends whom Scott numbered among the upper ranks of the Whigs; and, in particular, it created a marked coldness towards him on the part of the accomplished and amiable Countess of Rosslyn (a very intimate friend of his favourite patroness, Lady Dalkeith), which, as his letters show, wounded his feelings severely; the more so, I have no doubt, because a little reflection must have made him repent not a few of its allusions.'

"Scott was gazetted Clerk of Session on 8th March, 1806; the song was sung by Ballantyne, his publisher, on 27th June, 1806.

"Yours, &c.

"J."

The writer of the following letter, which refers to the same subject, was the late venerable and talented Mrs. Fletcher of Lancrigg in Cumberland, the widow of Angus Fletcher, advocate, of Edinburgh.

Mrs. Fletcher to Miss Napier.

"MY DEAR MISS NAPIER,

"Lancrigg, Jan. 4, 1854.

"Mrs. Davy sent me your letter about Mr. Scott's 'song' last night, and it brought to my mind what Edinburgh was forty-eight years ago, when the bitterness of party spirit blighted the fairest forms of society I can conceive upon earth.

VOL. II.

R

"We all know that Mr. Scott was a Tory, but the political element was not predominant in his nature. He was rather a Royalist among the Roundheads from early training and from poetical association, than a vulgar brawler for Church and King, or a servile tool of the Dundas faction when that faction governed Scotland. It is most certain however that the song in question was written by him, and sung at the dinner given by Mr. Dundas's friends after his (so called) acquittal on the impeachment; and this after Mr. Scott had accepted the office of Clerk of Session from the Whig administration. I well remember the disgust the leaders of that party felt and expressed on that occasion, and can mention in corroboration of Mrs.'s remarks that my friend Allan Cunningham having offered me several years after Sir W. Scott's bust, executed by Chantrey about that time, my husband would not allow me to receive it, saying he 'should be ashamed to have a bust of the author of that song under his roof."

"I well remember the most liberal and high-minded of the Whig party were proud of Mr. Fox's superiority to party prejudice when he signed the patent for Mr. Scott's appointment: they had not at that time any dislike to Scott; and to the best of my recollection, Lord Lauderdale told me that when some of Mr. Fox's Cabinet objected to Mr. Scott's appointment on the ground of his being a Tory, Mr. Fox replied, 'That may be, but he is also the author of the Lay of the Last Minstrel,' and immediately signed the patent.

"Mr. Lockhart accounts for Scott's rampant Toryism from resentment at the illiberal remarks the Whigs made on his appointment, and he testified this resentment by the indecent exultation expressed in that vulgar song at the Melville acquittal dinner. The song was sung in June, 1806. Two years after, in 1808, Scott published

'Marmion,' and at page 10 in the introduction to the first canto he pays a tribute to the genius and the patriotism of Fox not unworthy of him.

"Believe me yours most truly,

"ELIZA FLETCHER."

Meanwhile we had drifted into the Russian war; an army was sent out to Turkey, and the country felt the strain of maintaining it in its full numbers, and replacing the waste of sickness and battle.

In December, in consequence of the difficulty of obtaining recruits, the Government introduced into Parliament the Foreign Enlistment Bill,' against which Sir William raised his protest in the following letter:

"SIR,

To the Editor of the Times.'

"Dec. 1854.

"The War Minister, with a strange confidence, told his brother lords, that except Lord Hardinge no officer of capacity and experience remained in England with whom he could consult to avoid the errors he had committed. All were in the Crimea!! He must now be taught that there are officers still in England with indignation enough to rebuke the grovelling spirit which has dictated the degradation of the country and the army by the introduction of foreign soldiers to fight our battles, at the very moment when the steam of heroic blood spilt at Inkerman makes England snort and start like a war-horse in the midst of

carnage.

"I will not say that the German Legion in the last war were not good and trusty soldiers-their cavalry was excellent; but despite of the Duke of Richmond's generous eulogium, I will with Lord Ellenborough say that neither they nor any foreign troops were able to equal the

fighting of the British soldier. That legion was well composed, was indeed a national force, with high moral motives, and with gentlemen of their own country as officers; they were thus presented in the best possible form that foreigners could assume in another nation's service; and gallant things they could and did do, but emulate the terrible fighting of the British soldier they could not. And shall a mere mercenary band, picked up for gold, without national feeling, poor miserable hirelings, selling their limbs and lives, ay! their very souls, for lucre,-ready without a cause, if paid, to murder, to slay, or to be slain, and of course ready to change sides for higher pay if good occasion offered-shall such varlets stand in line beside our noble soldiers who fight shouting England! England!' and dying murmur, 'We have done our duty!'

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"When did German or Switzer, Prussian or Austrian, stand before the gallant French in equal battle? And those brilliant, fierce, impetuous French-could even they sustain the might and terror of British battle? though, glorious soldiers that they are and ever have been, they returned to the combat as unceasingly as waves beating against rocks. Such as they are indeed fit and worthy to stand abreast with the unconquerable red line that never yields; and together they will trample in the dust any troops in the world that presume to oppose them. But let them not be shamed by finding a hired third-rate, selected from inferior sources, between themselves and their British comrades. Let them not be told to depend on the dressed-up foreigners, poor frauds like the camels of Semiramis accoutred as elephants, and sure to leave dark silent gaps where loudest shouts and fiercest fires should stream forth in the hour of need. Shall the stern infantry of Inkerman striding in blood-shall the proud cavalry of Balaklava-those noble horsemen who accepted not an

order but a doubtful sign only, to go bounding in, as it were, to the open jaws of death-shall they have as comrades the refuse hirelings of Germany and Switzerland ? God forbid!

You, Sir, say that the Ministers will go out if the country refuses to accept their degrading measure. So let it be. Let them slink away, while the universal shout arises of God and our right, and St. George for merry England!'

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"WM. NAPIER, Lieut.-General."

To the Earl of Ellenborough.

"Dec. 1854.

"You have put a grave question to me, and one very hard to solve well. First, what is the cause of the difficulty in recruiting? It is said, the high value of peaceable labour. Is it so? A recruiting officer of a very large district tells me that there is no bar to getting recruits but the absurd official tests imposed: he says that numbers of fine strong young men come to him, but he is obliged to refuse them for a slight squint, a small varicose vein, and such like blemishes, not defects. In actual war, the chances of their being killed before these blemishes become serious defects should certainly operate to have them accepted. The men go away dejected and angry, and of course prevent others from presenting themselves. "Now for the remedies spoken of.

"1st. A high bounty never effects much: the men get drunk, and the bounty wanes away under charges for kits, &c. &c., and, as now discovered, tempts rogues to desert to re-enlist. High pay, as you observe, is obviously beyond our means; no nation can sustain the charge of a large army with very high pay. Moreover, it makes the soldiers. careful, thoughtful, and not so willing to seek death and

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