Page:Biographical and critical studies by James Thomson ("B.V.").djvu/436

420 Moreover, he had a real love and reverence for at least one man, his father-in-law, Scott, and in his last mention of Hogg in the "Life," he affirms "he did not follow his best benefactor until he had insulted his dust." For myself, I have met with nothing to sustain this charge, which probably refers to Hogg's "Domestic Manners and Private Life of Sir Walter Scott," published in 1834; a subject which, as Mr. Thomson suggests, Lockhart, as Scott's literary executor, seems to have regarded as exclusively his own; however, it is not hard to conceive how Lockhart's natural acerbity must have been increased by the insult, real or imaginary, to the one idol of his mind not given to worship. Perhaps the two brothers Chambers will be accepted as pretty shrewd business- like judges of character; and thus they speak, after the death of Hogg ("Memoir of Robert Chambers, with Autobiographic Reminiscences of William")—William: "I saw him first at my brother's house in 1830 [Hogg then 60; William 30; Robert 28], and was much amused with his blunt simplicity of character and good nature. It did not seem as if he had the slightest veneration for any one more than another whom he addressed, no matter what was their rank and position." Which lack of reverence for rank and