Page:A history of booksellers, the old and the new.djvu/164

130 1 30 CONSTABLE, CAD ELL, AND BLACK*. Ballantyne's death relieved them from one great source of complication and difficulty. . . . He must (in his improvements at Abbotsford) have reckoned on clearing ^30,000, at least, in the course of two years, by the novels written within the period, and the pub- lishers, as we have seen, were willing to give him less serious sort, likely to be despatched at leisure hours, without at all interfering with the "main manu- facture. But, alas ! even this was not all. . . . Before The Fortunes of Nigel issued from the press, Scott had exchanged instruments, and received his bookseller's bills for no less than " four works of fiction," not one of them otherwise described in the deeds of agree- ment. And within two years all this anticipation had been wiped off by Peveril of the Peak, Quentin Durward, St. Ron an' s Well, and Red Gauntlet ; and the new castle was at that time complete, and over- flowing with all its splendour ; but by that time the end was also approaching !" To return for a moment to Constable's life as apart from the author of Waverley ; he had, as we have seen, entertained in early years strong literary aspira- tions, and he repeatedly expressed a touching regret at the nonfulfilment of his hopes. The only literary efforts that have been distinctly traced to his pen consist of an edition of Lamonfs Diary, in 1810; a compilation of the poetry contained in the Waverley Novels, and the composition of a small volume which appeared in 1822, under the title of Memoirs of George Heriot, jeweller to King James, containing an account of the hospital founded by him at Edinburgh. In 1816 he lost his wife, and in 1818 he married Miss Charlotte Neale, who survived him. In the early
 * 6ooo, within the space of two years, for works of a