Page:A history of booksellers, the old and the new.djvu/168

134 134 CONSTABLE, C A DELL, AND BLACK. from the last deed of partnership, dated 1st April, 1822. " The said Sir Walter Scott shall remain liable for such bills and debts as there shall be due and current." When the persons most interested differ vitally, it is hard to decide ; however, the result of it all vas, that when Hurst, Robinson, and Co. stopped payment in London, Constable failed for upwards of a quarter of a million, and the Ballantynes were also bankrupt to the extent of 88,607 1 9 S - 9^- It was in the middle of January, 1826, that the actual crash came. Splendid and magnificent to the very last, Constable rushed off to town as fast as post-horses could carry him. He drove straight to Lockhart's house, " and asked me," says that gentleman, " to accompany him as soon as he could get into his carriage to the Bank of England, and support him (as a confidential friend of the author of the ' Waverley Novels ') in his application for a loan of 100,000 to 200,000 on the security of the copy- rights in his possession " a proposal that would have rather startled the old lady of Threadneedle-street, who was, at that time of unparalleled panic, accord- ing to Mr. Huskisson's subsequent confession in the House, on the very verge of suspending payment her- self. When Lockhart refused and, of course, with- out direct instructions from Sir Walter, he could not hazard such a step Constable became livid with rage, stamped on the ground, and swore that he could and would go alone. How Scott bore the blow, and, what he dreaded in- finitely more than the mere loss of money the expo- sure it entailed of his connection with the printing house, we all know ; how he declined to accept any compromise ; how he sold off his Abbotsford estate,