Tom will soon be home from
Canada, as the death of my elder brother has left him a little money. He
may answer for himself, but I hardly suspect him, unless much changed, to
be Possessed of the perseverance necessary to write nine volumes." Scott
elsewhere rather encouraged the notion that his brother Thomas was the
author, and tried to make him exert himself and enter the field as a
rival. Gossip also assigned the "Scotch novels" to Jeffrey, to Mrs.
Thomas Scott, aided by her husband and Sir Walter, to a Dr. Greenfield, a
clergyman, and to many others. Sir Walter humorously suggested George
Cranstoun as the real offender. After the secret was publicly confessed,
Lady Louisa Stuart reminded Scott of all the amusement it had given them.
"Old Mortality" had been pronounced "too good" for Scott, and free from
his "wearisome descriptions of scenery." Clever people had detected
several separate hands in "Old Mortality," as in the Iliad. All this was
diverting. Moreover, Scott was in some degree protected from the bores
who pester a successful author. He could deny the facts very stoutly,
though always, as he insists, With the reservation implied in alleging
that, if he had been the author, he would still have declined to confess.
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