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224 which seemed to me so proper in the 'Annals of the Parish,' namely, to bring impressions on the memory harmoniously together; indeed, I have adhered to the principle in all my subsequent compositions, and sometimes I fancy that the propriety of doing so may be justified by nature. I think no ingenuity can make an entirely new thing. Man can only imagine the old together; join legs, and arms, and wings as he may, only the forms of previously-created things can be imitated. The whole figure may be outré, and unlike anything in the heavens, or the earth, or the waters under the earth; but the imitations of the human hand in the details will ever be evident. . . . In my youth I wrote a poem called the 'Legend of St. Anthony,' which I undertook with the intention of depicting comical phantasms; but I had not proceeded far till I was induced to change my mind, by observing that my most extravagant fancies were only things of curious patchwork, and that the same defect might be discerned in all those things in which the 'creative' power of genius was said to be more indisputable. . . . I therefore give up all pretension to belonging to that class who deal in the wild and wonderful; my wish is, to be estimated by the truth of whatever I try to represent."

The next work of Galt was the "Steam-boat," a novel, published originally in Blackwood, in which he wished to give such an account of the coronation of George IV. as an "abortive bailie" from Scotland might be likely to do. This was followed by "Sir Andrew Wyllie," in which he wished to exhibit the rise and progress of an humble Scotchman in London. In this tale, however, he gave way to his literary besetting sin, a fault of which he was afterwards fully conscious; and he says of it very justly, "The incidents are by far too romantic and uncommon to my own taste, and are only redeemed from their extravagance by the natural portraiture of the characters."

But, indeed, either accurate conception or finished execution could scarcely be expected from Galt in his writings at this period, when we remember that the three last-mentioned works, viz., the "Provost," the "Steam-boat," and "Sir Andrew Wyllie," were all published in 1822. In the following year he produced his "Gathering of the West," which was also published in the first instance in Blackwood's Magazine. The subject was the visit of George IV. to Scotland—an event that appeared in so many ludicrous aspects to the mirthful satirical mind of Galt, that he could not repress his profane chuckling at this great avatar, even when he endeavoured to look the most composed. He therefore says of the "Gathering," and its kindred work, the "Steam-boat"—"Notwithstanding the deference for magnates and magnificence under which these works were written, the original sin may be detected here and there peeping out, insomuch that those who consider Toryism as consisting of the enjoyment of at least pensions, must be dreadfully shocked to think even a moderate politician of any sort could be so far left to himself as to speak so irreverently of things which concerned the affairs of empires and burgh towns."

We have already alluded to Galt's exuberance in the productions of 1822; but that of the following year was still more excessive, so that it might well be said of him, vires acquirit eundo. Thus the "Entail," "Ringan Gilhaize," and the "Spaewife"—each a three-volumed novel—were published during this year of portentous abundance. The first of these novels was founded upon an incident related by the Lord Provost of Glasgow to Galt. It was in this way that he was accustomed to make the most of everything that he had heard or witnessed, by either laying it down as the groundwork of a tale, or