48 Maria Riddei.l, the Friend of Burns. 



I am so solicitous to free her from the Httle weaknesses 

 and delicacies that render women ' interesting ' — and 

 miserable, 9 times out of 10 that I was not sorry to seize 

 an opportunity [here the rest of the page is torn out of 

 the diary]. 



[? May, 1800.] [Wrote to] Ld. K The 



dreadful fits of low spirits that sometimes last me for weeks 

 together, always harass me; if not by their actual influence, 

 at least in anticipation. My head was so thoroughly dis- 

 ordered 18 months ago in the fever, that I think the effects 

 sometimxCS linger abt. me still. ' ' 



" July [1800]. I have been too much occupied with 

 the infantry at home to woo the Muse. Besides this gay, 

 gaudy sunshiney season is totally unfavourable to her 

 inspiration. Autumn, the fall of the leaves, the still, grey, 

 gloomy evenings, are exclusively her's and they are what 

 I enjoy beyond all others in the country. When they 

 return, perhaps she may accompany them ; at least she is 

 sure of finding me iheji in the right train of meditation. "^^ 



[? July, 1800.] " The letters (Burns's) are the finest 

 things of the kind in their own peculiar strong enthusiastic 

 way, that have been given to the public for a long while. ^^ 



Charles Montagu Walker, R.N. (b. February 5tli, 1780), one of 

 Nelson's Lieutenants (H.M.S. "Spencer," 1803-1805). She died 

 February 23rd, 1859; he died July 10th, 1833. Captain Walker's 

 father was Nathaniel Walker, and his brother was Sir George 

 Townshend Walker, the distinguished Peninsular officer who was 

 created a Baronet on March 28th, 1835, and who died November 

 14th, 1842. Anna Maria had, with other issue, two sons and four 

 daughters; her third son being Dr. Arthur de Noe Walker (see note 

 109). Her grandson. Colonel Daniel Corrie Walker, R.E., was in 

 1897 proved heir-in-general to his great-grandfather's brother, 

 R/obert Riddell. (See footnote 28.) For a genealogy of the Walker 

 Family, see Edmund Lodge's Peerage, Baronetage, Knightage, and 

 Companionage (1911), pp. 1879-1881. 



91 That she continued to write poetry is evidenced by her con- 

 tributions to The Metrical Miscellany, which was first published in 

 1802. (See Appendix A.) 



92 These letters first appeared in print in The Works of Bobert 



