Stephenson: The Ettrick Shepherd 



95 



situations of peril from which he is always extricated by 

 others, never by his own efforts. In this respect he falls below 

 DeFoe's hero, tho the story is far above Singleton in interest. 



Hogg's characteristic love of the supernatural crops out in 

 the story in the mild form of mystery thrown over the birth 

 of the hero. It is a mystery of such a nature that if the 

 secret were known Locky's life would not be worth a pin's 

 fee; and again and again he meets with a clue to his origin, 

 only to be headed off to his own and the reader's disappoint- 

 ment. 



Scott once said to Hogg that he never put enough time and 

 trouble upon his stories. Hogg, like the great novelist whom 

 he idolized, often found it difficult to end a tale. Captain 

 Locky is a pitiful example. In the first place, the hero him- 

 self never learns the secret of his birth. In the second place, 

 as if the solution of the mystery were an afterthought, Hogg 

 reproduces a couple of letters received in response to an ad- 

 vertisement inserted in a newspaper by a curious person. 

 Hogg did not stop to think that if the solution became known 

 as he said it did it might just as easily have been made known 

 to the captain at any previous time. To add to the chagrin 

 of this anti-climax, the facts are narrated so briefly that all 

 narrative interest is lost. Had Hogg ended with a little more 

 care, the book would stand as high as any of DeFoe's, save 

 always the immortal Crusoe. 



Two other prose writings of Hogg's, not stories, however, 

 require a word of notice. 



Writes Lockhart of Hogg in the Life of Scott : 



He died on the 21st of November, 1835; but it had been better for 

 his fame had his end been of earlier date, for he did not follow his best 

 benefactor until he had insulted his dust,^ 



Whoever reads Lockhart' s attack on Hogg in The Life 

 should read also The Domestic Life and Manners of Sir Walter 

 Scott. The offensive passages that constitute the insult are 

 as follows : 



[After describing his last meeting with Sir Walter, Hogg says of his 

 friend's subsequent condition.] He was described to me by one who saw 

 him often, as exactly in the same state with a man mortally drunk, who 

 could in no wise own or assist himself, the pressure of the abscess on the 

 brain having apparently the same effect as the fumes of drunkenness. " 



iPage 760. 

 -Page 135. 



