My friendships were formed, my place in
society fixed, my life had attained its middle course. My condition in
society was higher perhaps than I deserved, certainly as high as I
wished, and there was scarce any degree of literary success which could
have greatly altered or improved my personal condition.
I was not, therefore, touched by the spur of ambition, usually
stimulating on such occasions; and yet I ought to stand exculpated from
the charge of ungracious or unbecoming indifference to public applause. I
did not the less feel gratitude for the public favour, although I did not
proclaim it; as the lover who wears his mistress's favour in his bosom is
as proud, though not so vain, of possessing it as another who displays
the token of her grace upon his bonnet. Far from such an ungracious state
of mind, I have seldom felt more satisfaction than when, returning from a
pleasure voyage, I found Waverley in the zenith of popularity, and public
curiosity in full cry after the name of the Author. The knowledge that I
had the public approbation was like having the property of a hidden
treasure, not less gratifying to the owner than if all the world knew
that it was his own.
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