P.
PICKEN, Andrew.—This amiable and agreeable writer in miscellaneous literature, was born at Paisley in 1788. His father, who was a wealthy and thriving manufacturer of the town of Paisley, intended that his son Andrew should follow the mercantile profession, and to that effect the youth was educated. While still very young, he repaired to the West Indies, but finding, on close trial, that the office he held offered few of those advantages it had promised, he returned home, and obtained a confidential situation in the Bank of Ireland. Here he might have enjoyed years of tranquil comfort, and retired at last with a competence, if he could have contented himself with the monotonous routine of a banking establishment; but, having either too much genius, or too little firmness and self-denial for such a life, he threw up his charge, to the great regret of his friends in Ireland; returned to Scotland, and commenced business in Glasgow on his own account. But, unluckily for his interests, the same rest- less and aspiring spirit continued to haunt him ; and finding the occupations of the counting-house insufficient, he combined them with the more attractive and congenial pursuits of authorship. We can easily guess how such a merchant would be regarded in those days by his brethren of the Tontine, and what faith they would attach to bills subscribed by the same hand that wrote stories and novels. In the meantime, his first work came out, under the title of "Tales and Sketches of the West of Scotland;" and, independently of the novelty of such a rara avis as a Glasgow litterateur, the intrinsic merits of the work itself secured for it a large share of local popularity. Among these tales, that of "Mary Ogilvie" is an admirable specimen of his dramatic power in investing ordinary events with high interest, and giving them unwonted influence over our best feelings. As an offset, however, to this, one of the sketches produced a very opposite effect; it was "On the Changes of the West of Scotland during the last Half Century;" and every one aware of these changes can easily divine how hard his notices must have occasionally borne upon some of the most influential and worshipful of the rising city of Glasgow. These notices Mr. Picken did not withhold; on the contrary, he revelled among them with such satirical glee, that the strongest part of the community was in arms against him. This, and other additional causes, soon made the metropolis of the west too hot for him, and accordingly he removed to Liverpool. The change of place was accompanied by change of occupation, for in the town of his new residence he commenced the trade of bookseller.
From the foregoing statement it will easily be judged, that whether merchant, banker, or bookseller, Mr. Picken was not likely to be prosperous. He had no love of traffic, either for its own sake or for its profits; and, besides this, he was too sanguine and too credulous either to win money or to keep it. This was especially the case in 1826, when mercantile speculation was so rampant. Induced by the persuasions of friends, he embarked his all among the hazardous ventures of the day, and that all was lost. Even then, however, when his books as a bankrupt were inspected, his integrity was so manifest, that his creditors, after sympathizing with him in his losses, were ready to aid him in commencing business anew; but of this he seemed to think he had got enough.
