ABSTRACT
Horace (properly Horatio) Smith (1779–1849), was born in London, and was educated at a school in Chigwell, and then placed for training in a merchant’s counting-house. In 1800 he wrote the first of his several novels, The Runaway ; and in 1802 he began to write for the magazine ‘The Pic Nic’. Smith’s ‘Graybeard’ essay is the fullest available source of information about his acquaintance with John Scott. The essay shows in many small details how much more informed Scott’s readers felt about his life after the publication of Lockhart’s biography. Details such as Scott’s lack of interest in Rome, for example, have entered the common tradition, and are used to support a view of Abbotsford which predates by more than four years Scott’s visit to Italy. That Scott hardly mentions Smith does not make Smith’s account inflated; but biographical tradition bolsters it with information which Smith would not have had in the summer of 1827.
