CONSTABLE, C A DELL, AND BLACK. 135 which he had devoted all the efforts of his genius to acquire, and which he loved so well ; how he slaved and toiled until the incredible sum was repaid but, alas ! at the expense of a life more precious than all the lucre of creditors; and how his last words on his death-bed were his best epitaph: " My dear, be a good man, be virtuous, be religious be a good man ! Nothing else will give you any comfort when you come to lie here." Our matter, however, is with Constable. He saw his fortunes the strong up-buildings of a gloriously successful life-time dashed to the ground at one blow. With a young family growing up around him, sick in body and weary in soul, he too had to begin life afresh. All his " sunshine " friends fell off, Scott was alienated, and his stock, which he had been wont to contemplate as a mine of wealth, was sequestered, and sold for a tithe of its value.* Cadell, his late partner, purchased the copyrights of the "Waverley Novels" for 8,500, and, securing Scott's countenance, set up as a fortu- nate rival. Constable, however, went manfully to work at his proposed Miscellany. Captain Basil Hall, in kindly consideration, made him a present of his Voyages, and this was brought out in 1827, for the small sum of one shilling, and proved fairly successful. This same year, by-the-by, was commenced the Library of Useful
- Among the sufferers by this failure was the family of Robert Watt,
M.D., author of "Bibliotheca Britannica," for which ,2000 had been given in bills, all of which were dishonoured. He was a ploughboy until his seventeenth year, wrote many medical treatises, and occupied his concluding years with a work precious and indispensable to every student. The whole plan of the "Bibliotheca" is new, and few com- pilations of similar magnitude and variety ever presented, in a first edi- tion, a more complete design and execution.
