Volume 1 - Electric Scotland

24 WILLIAM BLACKWOOD.
neglect. This was the cheerful background of his life
for many years.
Meantime an increasing number of book-hunters
and others gathered round the young bookseller.
And there began to be visitors whose names are
enough to stir our hearts, Walter Scott chief among
them : and visions of better thinofs to come irradi-
ated the dustiness of the old books, suggesting fresh
new ones, damp and delightful, from the press, and
fortune and reputation within reach (almost) of the
young man's eager hand. We hear of no special
difficulty, however, or struggle in the career of one
who established himself so early in all the responsi-
bilities of life, and who seems to have been so
completely independent without the aid of patron-
age or connection. There was from the beginning
plenty, and a liberal provision for all wants, in the
young household in Salisbury Koad ; but the progress
of business was quiet, and there was no rush for
success nor any sensational strain at a new chance,
until the steady advancement culminated in a crisis of
which William Blackwood was prepared and ready to
take advantage. There were rivals in the same field a
step before him in the race, and straining every nerve
to keep that place, especially in respect to London
agencies and other external signs of prosperity. They
were all somewhat rash in the rush of new energy
which had revolutionised " the Trade," bold in their
ventures, and entertaining a faith in literature which
has been much subdued, we fear, since then, or at
least turned into very different channels. It was the
moment of a wonderful new flood of genius over the