Old Mortality | Page 2

but he could have known
so much about the subject?) in a letter to her, of November 29, 1816.
"You must know the Marquis well,--or rather you must be the Marquis
himself!" quoth Dalgetty. Here follow portions of the letter:
I do not like the first story, "The Black Dwarf," at all; but the long one
which occupies three volumes is a most remarkable production. . . . I
should like to know if you are of my opinion as to these new volumes
coming from the same hand. . . . I wander about from nine in the
morning till five at night with a plaid about my shoulders and an

immensely large bloodhound at my heels, and stick in sprigs which are
to become trees when I shall have no eyes to look at them. . . .
I am truly glad that the Tales have amused you. In my poor opinion
they are the best of the four sets, though perhaps I only think so on
account of their opening ground less familiar to me than the manners of
the Highlanders. . . . If Tom--[His brother, Mr. Thomas Scott.]--wrote
those volumes, he has not put me in his secret. . . . General rumour here
attributes them to a very ingenious but most unhappy man, a clergyman
of the Church of Scotland, who, many years since, was obliged to retire
from his profession, and from society, who hides himself under a
borrowed name. This hypothesis seems to account satisfactorily for the
rigid secrecy observed; but from what I can recollect of the unfortunate
individual, these are not the kind of productions I should expect from
him. Burley, if I mistake not, was on board the Prince of Orange's own
vessel at the time of his death. There was also in the Life Guards such a
person as Francis Stewart, grandson of the last Earl of Bothwell. I have
in my possession various proceedings at his father's instance for
recovering some part of the Earl's large estates which had been granted
to the Earls of Buccleugh and Roxburgh. It would appear that Charles I.
made some attempts to reinstate him in those lands, but, like most of
that poor monarch's measures, the attempt only served to augment his
own enemies, for Buccleugh was one of the first who declared against
him in Scotland, and raised a regiment of twelve hundred men, of
whom my grandfather's grandfather (Sir William Scott of Harden) was
lieutenant-colonel. This regiment was very active at the destruction of
Montrose's Highland army at Philiphaugh. In Charles the Second's time
the old knight suffered as much through the nonconformity of his wife
as Cuddie through that of his mother. My father's grandmother, who
lived to the uncommon age of ninety-eight years, perfectly remembered
being carried, when a child, to the field-preachings, where the
clergyman thundered from the top of a rock, and the ladies sat upon
their side-saddles, which were placed upon the turf for their
accommodation, while the men stood round, all armed with swords and
pistols. . . . Old Mortality was a living person; I have myself seen him
about twenty years ago repairing the Covenanters' tombs as far north as
Dunnottar.
If Lady Abercorn was in any doubt after this ingenuous communication,

Mr. Murray, the publisher, was in none. (Lockhart, v. 169.) He wrote to
Scott on December 14, 1816, rejoicing in the success of the Tales,
"which must be written either by Walter Scott or the Devil. . . . I never
experienced such unmixed pleasure as the reading of this exquisite
work has afforded me; and if you could see me, as the author's literary
chamberlain, receiving the unanimous and vehement praises of those
who have read it, and the curses of those whose needs my scanty
supply could not satisfy, you might judge of the sincerity with which I
now entreat you to assure the Author of the most complete success."
Lord Holland had said, when Mr. Murray asked his opinion, "Opinion!
We did not one of us go to bed last night,--nothing slept but my gout."
The very Whigs were conquered. But not the Scottish Whigs, the Auld
Leaven of the Covenant,--they were still dour, and offered many
criticisms. Thereon Scott, by way of disproving his authorship, offered
to review the Tales in the "Quarterly." His true reason for this step was
the wish to reply to Dr. Thomas McCrie, author of the "Life of John
Knox," who had been criticising Scott's historical view of the Covenant,
in the "Edinburgh Christian Instructor." Scott had, perhaps, no better
mode of answering his censor. He was indifferent to reviews, but here
his historical knowledge and his candour had been challenged. Scott
always recognised the national spirit of the Covenanters, which he