It is rare that a full set of Blackwood can be found containing it.

But the publisher persevered, and by 1820 the magazine had established its reputation for slashing criticism and overwhelming gayety. In that year Wilson began the series of papers known as "Noctes Ambrosianæ," which were kept up for a period of fifteen years to the delight of thousands and thousands of readers. Wilson was the principal author, but Maginn and Lockhart occasionally contributed an article.

The scene of "The Noctes purports to be Ambrose's tavern, a well-known resort in Edinburgh, where a select company meet to talk over the events, politics, and literature of the time.

The chief interlocutor of these imaginary conversations is Christopher North, a gouty gentleman of almost three-score years and ten. How his earlier life had been spent we have no distinct account, although we get glimpses of it here and there, but when we meet him he is in affluent circumstances, and as the editor of Blackwood's Magazine, in possession of an inexhaustible mine of wealth. He complains occasionally of the gout and of other infirmities, but notwithstanding these, and his advanced age, he is always ready for every sort of physical adventure. His crutch

becomes a leaping pole, he hunts, fishes, and even

puts on the gloves" with all the energy of youth, and altogether he is a very remarkable septuagenarian. He and his friends consume an astonishing quantity of solids and fluids, outrivaling even Pantagruel. Sometimes it is in the shape of a regular dinner. One we recall, which was opened by a dozen kinds of soup, followed by a corresponding number of dishes in fish, flesh, and fowl, each a course by itself. by itself. More usually the refection is supper, where oysters are consumed by the hundred, not without more solid dishes, which are sometimes disposed of by each member of the party appropriating one; North the turkey, Hogg the round of beef, and Tickler a mighty pie. Whisky galore is introduced on every imaginable occasion before, at, and after the food, porter and ale are profusely swallowed, and gallons of toddy follow. Sometimes the heroes appear in a very questionable state of sobriety. And thus in jocund mirth with much good talk their nights were passed. Nothing like it has ever been seen except in fairyland.

has

The conception of the idea of these papers been claimed for each of the distinguished men who contributed to them-Lockhart, Maginn, Hogg, and Wilson-but there is now but little

question that the merit of them belongs almost altogether to Wilson. He is the Christopher North, a man far advanced in years, but still possessed of herculean strength, and with an omniscience that leaves no question unsettled. The principal figure and chief speaker is the Ettrick Shepherd, into whose mouth Wilson puts many of his best and most pungent sayings. The third principal figure was "Timothy Tickler," whose original was Wilson's uncle, Robert Sym, a well-known citizen of Edinburgh. He holds a sort of common-sense position between the chief interlocutors, North and the Shepherd, and has a sturdy way of bringing them down from their altitudes which gives a rare interest to the dialogue. Other characters are brought in once in awhile, but these three are the chief, and they indulge in the finest conversation and the most Gargantuan eating and drinking ever known in the world. Indeed," said a humorous and indulgent lady correspondent of Wilson's, " indeed, I really think you eat too many oysters in the 'Noctes.' And there can be very little question but what they did. Yet they were but Barmecide feasts, and Wilson has said that in fact he never was in Ambrose's more than half a dozen times in all his life. "The Noctes" were collected and published

in five volumes, with explanatory notes, and there are few books that contain so much of literary history or are really more valuable to the student of literature. Besides this they are full of comical extravaganzas, vivacious talk, eloquent and poetic dreamings, and all sorts of fancies nowhere else to be found in English literature.

Blackwood's Magazine long since sowed all its wild oats and became a staid, respectable and highly meritorious periodical. But the brilliant days of " Maga" are still worthy of recall.

1

PROFESSOR JOHN WILSON,

ONE OF THE KINGS OF MEN.

(1785-1854.)

THE republication of some of the earlier works of Professor John Wilson, the famous "Christopher North" of Blackwood's Magazine of seventy-five years ago, will give new pleasure to a generation that never knew, or have known but little, of that famous grog-drinking, prize-fighting teacher of moral philosophy, who was a prime - favorite with our grandfathers, and was one of the chief characters of Edinburgh town in the days of George IV.

For years and years the name of "Christopher North" was a household word wherever Blackwood's Magazine was known, a rallying point and tower of strength to the old Tory party. Carlyle in his reminiscences says:

The broad-shouldered, stately bulk of the man struck me; his flashing eye, copious disheveled hair, and rapid, uncon