Page:Biographical and critical studies by James Thomson ("B.V.").djvu/404

 388 CRITICAL STUDIES be owned) of truth and beauty and goodness, is not one to be forgotten. Had he talked the merest twaddle, the effect would have been very nearly the same ; he was a living poem where the austere grandeur of the old drama was united with the humour and tender- ness of modern story-tellers ; and some such feeling it was that attracted and fascinated his hearers." So much for Wilson as the Professor : what he did as Christopher North may be judged by a list, appended to the "Memoir," of his contributions to Blackwood, from 1826, it being impossible now to fix the authorship of various articles before that date. In one month we find five articles, making sixty-eight pages, from his pen ; in another, double number, five articles, sixty-five pages ; in another, six, sixty-nine ; in another, double number, seven, one hundred and sixteen ; in another, double, four, one hundred and forty-seven ; in another, double, seven, one hundred and thirty- one. In one year, 1830, he wrote thirty articles, making twelve hundred columns; in the two years, 1833-34, fifty-four, mak- ing two thousand four hundred columns. All this in addition to his university work. "The amazing rapidity with which he wrote caused him too often to delay his work to the very last moment, so that he almost always wrote under compulsion, and every second of time was of consequence. Under such a mode of labour there was no hour left for relaxation. When regularly in for an article for Blacktvood, his whole strength was put forth, and it may be said that he struck into life what he had to do at a blow. He at these times began to write immediately after breakfast. ... He then shut himself into his study.