Hence, he reflected,
that if he could but use his literary instinct to feed some commercial
undertaking, managed by a man he could trust, he might gain a
considerable percentage on his little capital, without so embarking in
commerce as to oblige him either to give up his status as a sheriff,
or his official duties as a clerk of session, or his literary
undertakings. In his old schoolfellow, James Ballantyne, he believed
he had found just such an agent as he wanted, the requisite link
between literary genius like his own, and the world which reads and
buys books; and he thought that, by feeling his way a little, he might
secure, through this partnership, besides the then very bare rewards
of authorship, at least a share in those more liberal rewards which
commercial men managed to squeeze for themselves out of successful
authors. And, further, he felt--and this was probably the greatest
unconscious attraction for him in this scheme--that with James
Ballantyne for his partner he should be the real leader and chief, and
rather in the position of a patron and benefactor of his colleague,
than of one in any degree dependent on the generosity or approval of
others.
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