sincerity that the ability to compose fiction was not for a moment to be
compared with the ability to act effectively in practical activities; and
he was really displeased at the suggestion that he belonged among the
greatest men of the age. In spite of his Romantic tendencies and his
absolute simplicity of character, he clung strongly to the conservatism of
the feudal aristocracy with which he had labored so hard to connect
himself; he was vigorously hostile to the democratic spirit, and, in his
later years, to the Reform Bill; and he felt and expressed almost childish
delight in the friendship of the contemptible George IV, because George IV
was his king. The conservatism was closely connected, in fact, with his
Romantic interest in the past, and in politics it took the form,
theoretically, of Jacobitism, loyalty to the worthless Stuart race whose
memory his novels have done so much to keep alive. All these traits are
made abundantly clear in the extended life of Scott written by his
son-in-law, J. G. Lockhart, which is one of the two or three greatest
English biographies.

Scott's long poems, the best of them, are the chief examples in English of
dashing verse romances of adventure and love. They are hastily done, as we
have said, and there is no attempt at subtilty of characterization or at
any moral or philosophical meaning; nevertheless the reader's interest in
the vigorous and picturesque action is maintained throughout at the highest
pitch. Furthermore, they contain much finely sympathetic description of
Scottish scenery, impressionistic, but poured out with enthusiasm. Scott's
numerous lyrics are similarly stirring or moving expressions of the primal
emotions, and some of them are charmingly musical.

The qualities of the novels, which represent the culmination of Romantic
historical fiction, are much the same. Through his bold and active
historical imagination Scott vivifies the past magnificently; without