Sailing in October, in the "Barham," Sir Walter Scott visited Malta and Naples, and came to Rome in April, 1832. In May he set out for home by Venice, Munich and the Rhine, but his companions could hardly prevail on him to look at the interesting objects by the way, and another serious attack fell upon him at Nimeguen. He reached London on June 13, and on July 7 was carried on board the steamer for Leith, and was at Abbotsford by the 11th. Here the remains of his strength gradually declined, and his mind was hopelessly obscured. As I was dressing on the morning of September 17, a servant came to tell me that his master had awoke in a state of composure and consciousness, and wished to see me immediately. I found him entirely himself, though in the last extreme of feebleness. "Lockhart," he said "I may have no more than a minute to speak to you. 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." He scarcely afterwards gave any sign of consciousness, and breathed his last on September 21, in the presence of all his children. His funeral was unostentatious but the attendance was very great. He was laid in the Abbey of Dryburgh, by the side of his wife, in the sepulchre of his ancestors. * * * * * The Life of Robert Burns John Gibson Lockhart was born, a son of the manse, at Cambusnethan, Lanarkshire, on July 14, 1794. Receiving his early education in Glasgow, he went, at sixteen, with a scholarship to Balliol College, Oxford. In 1816 he was called to the Scottish Bar; but literature occupied him more than law, and as early as 1819 he wrote the once popular "Peter's Letters to his Kinsfolk." Next year he married Scott's eldest daughter, Sophia. Lockhart was a leading contributor to the early "Blackwood," where his fine translations of Spanish ballads first appeared, and he edited the "Quarterly Review" from 1825 to 1853. He died at Abbotsford on November 25, 1854, and was buried at Scott's feet in Dryburgh Abbey. Lockhart's forte was biography, and his "Life of Scott" ranks beside Boswell's "Johnson." The "Life of Burns" was published first in Constable's "Miscellany" in 1828, when the whole impression was exhausted in six weeks. It passed through five editions before the author's death. Though many lives of Burns have appeared since, with details unknown to Lockhart, his biography is in many respects the best we possess, and is never likely to be superseded. Even Mr. Henley is "glad to agree with Lockhart." It is this book that is the subject of Carlyle's famous essay on Burns. _I.--The Poet in the Making_