Only an old house-keeper was in charge, who had fallen into that dreadful parrot-like way of telling visitors what things were best worth seeing--which frets one terribly. What should you or I care (fresh from _Guy Mannering_ or _Kenilworth_) whether a bit of carving came from Jedburgh or Kelso? or about the jets in the chandelier, or the way in which a Russian Grand Duke wrote his name in the visitors’ book?
But when we catch sight of the desk at which the master wrote, or of the chair in which he sat, and of his shoes and coat and cane--looking as if they might have been worn yesterday--these seem to bring us nearer to the man who has written so much to cheer and to charm the world. There was, too, a little box in the corridor, simple and iron-bound, with the line written below it, “Post will close at two.” It was as if we had heard the master of the house say it. Perhaps the notice was in his handwriting (he had been active there in 1831-2--just thirteen years before)--perhaps not; but--somehow--more than the library, or the portrait bust, or the chatter of the well-meaning house-keeper, it brought back the halting old gentleman in his shooting-coat, and with ivory-headed cane--hobbling with a vigorous step along the corridor, to post in that iron-bound box a packet--maybe a chapter of _Woodstock_.
I have spoken of the vacant house--family gone: The young Sir Walter Scott, of the British army, and heir to the estate--was at that date (1845) absent in the Indies; and only two years thereafter died at sea on his voyage home. Charles Scott, the only brother of the younger Sir Walter, died in 1841.[22] Miss Anne Scott, the only unmarried daughter of the author of _Waverley_, died--worn-out with tenderest care of mother and father, and broken-hearted--in 1833. Her only sister, Mrs. (Sophia Scott) Lockhart, died in 1837. Her oldest son--John Hugh, familiarly known as “Hugh Little John”--the crippled boy, for whom had been written the _Tales of a Grandfather_, and the darling of the two households upon Tweed-side--died in 1831. I cannot forbear quoting here a charming little memorial of him, which, within the present year, has appeared in Mr. Lang’s _Life of Lockhart_.