I had walked till twelve
with Skene and Russell, and then sat down to my work. To my horror and
surprise I could neither write nor spell, but put down one word for
another, and wrote nonsense. I was much overpowered at the same time
and could not conceive the reason. I fell asleep, however, in my
chair, and slept for two hours. On my waking my head was clearer, and
I began to recollect that last night I had taken the anodyne left for
the purpose by Clarkson, and being disturbed in the course of the
night, I had not slept it off." In fact the hyoscyamus had, combined
with his anxieties, given him a slight attack of what is now called
_aphasia_, that brain disease the most striking symptom of which is
that one word is mistaken for another. And this was Scott's
preparation for his failure, and the bold resolve which followed it,
to work for his creditors as he had worked for himself, and to pay
off, if possible, the whole 117,000_l._ by his own literary exertions.
There is nothing in its way in the whole of English biography more
impressive than the stoical extracts from Scott's diary which note the
descent of this blow.
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