The Lay of the Last Minstrel appeared in Jan. 1805, and at once became widely popular. Its success finally decided that literature was to be the main business of Scott's life, and he proceeded to arrange his affairs accordingly. Since his marriage in 1797 with Charlotte Charpentier, daughter of a French refugee, his chief residence had been at Lasswade, about six miles from Edinburgh. But on a hint from the lord-lieutenant that the sheriff must live at least four months in the year within his county, and that he was attending more closely to his duties as quartermaster of a mounted company of volunteers than was consistent with the proper discharge of his duties as sheriff, he had moved his house hold in 1804 to Ashestiel. When his uncle's bequest fell in, he de termined to buy a small property on the banks of the Tweed within the limits of his sheriffdom. There, within sight of Newark castle and Bowhill, he proposed to live like his ancient minstrel, as be came the bard of the clan, under the shadow of the great ducal head of the Scotts. But this plan was deranged by an accident. It so happened that an old schoolfellow, James Ballantyne 1833), a printer in Kelso, whom he had already befriended, trans planted to Edinburgh, and furnished with both work and money, applied to him for a further loan. Scott declined to lend, but offered to join him as sleeping-partner. Thus the intended pur chase money of Broadmeadows became the capital of a printing concern, of which by degrees the man of letters became the over wrought slave, milch-cow and victim.
When the Lay was off his hands, Scott's next literary enterprise was a prose romance—a confirmation of the argument that he did not take to prose after Byron had "bet him," as he put it, in verse, but that romance writing was a long-cherished purpose. He began Waverley, but a friend to whom he showed the first chapters decided that the work was deficient in interest and un worthy of the author of the Lay. Scott accordingly laid Waverley aside. We may fairly conjecture that he would not have been so easily diverted had he not been occupied at the time with other heavy publishing enterprises calculated to bring grist to the print ing establishment. In 1806 he collected from different publications his Ballads and Lyrical Pieces. Between 1806 and 1812, mainly to serve the interests of the firm, he produced his elaborate edi tions of Dryden (18 vols., 1808), Swift (19 vols., 1818), the Somers Tracts (13 vols., 1809-15), and the State Papers and Let ters of Sir Ralph Sadler (2 vols., 1809).
Marmion, begun in Nov. 1806 and published in Feb. 1808, was written as a relief to "graver cares," and was even more popular than the Lay. Scott's resuscitation of the four-beat measure of the old "gestours" afforded a signal proof of the justness of their instinct in choosing this vehicle for their recitations. The four beat lines of Marmion took possession of the public like a kind of madness, and the critics, except Jeffrey, who may have been offended by the pronounced politics of the poet, were on the whole better pleased than with the Lay. Scott was now facile
princeps among living poets, and touched the highest point of prosperity and happiness. Presently after, he was irritated and tempted by a combination of little circumstances into the great blunder of his life, the establishment of the publishing house of John Ballantyne and Co. A quarrel occurred between Scott's printing firm and Constable, the publisher, who had been the principal feeder of its press. Then the tempter appeared in the shape of Murray, the London publisher, anxious to secure the services of the most popular litterateur of the day. The result of negotiations was that Scott set up, in opposition to Constable, the publishing house of John Ballantyne and Co., to be managed by John Ballantyne (d. 1821), James's younger brother. Scott in terested himself warmly in starting the Quarterly Review, and in return Murray constituted Ballantyne and Co. his Edinburgh agents. Scott's trust in the Ballantynes, and in his own power to supply all their deficiencies, is as strange a piece of infatuation as any that ever formed a theme for romance or tragedy. Their devoted attachment to the architect of their fortunes and proud confidence in his powers helped forward to the catastrophe, for whatever Scott recommended they agreed to, and he was too immersed in multifarious literary work and professional and social engagements to have time for cool examination of the numerous rash speculative ventures into which he launched the firm.
The Lady of the Lake (May 1810) was the first great publica tion by the new house, and next year the Vision of Don Roderick followed. The Lady of the Lake was received with enthusiasm; it made the Perthshire Highlands fashionable for tourists, and raised the post-horse duty in Scotland ; but it did not make up to Ballantyne and Co. for their heavy investments in unsound ven tures. The Edinburgh Annual Register, meant as a rival to the Edinburgh Review, though Scott engaged Southey to write for it and wrote for it largely himself, proved a failure. In a very short time the warehouses of the firm were filled with unsaleable stock, but, so far from understanding the real state of their affairs, Scott considered himself rich enough to make his first purchase of land at Abbotsford. He had hardly settled there in the spring of and begun his schemes for building and planting and converting a bare moor into a richly wooded pleasaunce, when his business troubles began, and he found himself harassed by fears of bank ruptcy. The proceeds of Rokeby (Jan. 1813) and of other labours of Scott's pen were swallowed up, and bankruptcy was inevitable, when Constable, still eager at any price to secure Scott's services, came to the rescue. With his help three crises were tided over in 1813.