most wonderful degree, yet no army marches through a country in a hostile manner without committing some depredations; and several, to the extent, and of the nature, jocularly imputed to them by the baron, were really laid to the charge of the Highland insurgents for which many traditions, and particularly one respecting the Knight of the Mirror, may be quoted as good evidence.

NOTE.-A homely metrical narrative of the events of the period, which contain some striking particulars, and is still a great favorite with the lower classes, gives a very correct statement of the behavior of the mountaineers respecting this same military license; and as the verses are little known, and contain some good sense, we venture to insert them.

THE AUTHOR'S ADDRESS TO ALL IN GENERAL.

Now, gentle readers, I have let you ken
My very thoughts from heart and pen,
'Tis needless for to conten'

They burnt his very hat and wig,

And thump'd him sore.

And through the Highlands they were so rude,
As leave them neither clothes nor food,
Then burnt their houses to conclude:
"Twas tit for tat.

How can her nainsell e'er be good,
To think on that?

And after all, O shame and grief!
To use some worse than murd'ring thief,
Their very gentleman and chief,
Unhumanly!

Like Popish tortures, I believe,
Such cruelty.

Ev'n what was act on open stage
At Carlisle, in the hottest rage,
When mercy was clapt in a cage,
And pity dead,

Such cruelty approv'd by every age,
I shook my head.

So many to curse, so few to pray,
And some aloud huzza did cry,

They cursed the rebel Scots that day,
As they'd been nowt

Brought up for slaughter, as that way
Too many rowt.

Therefore, alas! dear countrymen,
O never do the like again,

To thirst for vengeance, never ben'
Your gun nor pa',

But with the English e'en borrow and len',
Let anger fa'.

Their boasts and bullying, not worth a louse
As our King's the best about the house.
'Tis aye good to be sober and douce,

To live in peace;

For many, I see, for being c'er crouse,
Gets broken face.

HAVING undertaken to give an Introductory Account of the compositions which are here offered to the public, with Notes, the author, under whose name they are now for the first time collected, feels that he has the delicate task of speaking more of himself and his personal concerns, than may perhaps be either graceful or prudent. In this particular, he runs the risk of presenting himself to the public in the relation that the dumb wife in the jest book held to her husband, when, having spent half of his fortune to obtain the cure of her imperfection, he was willing to have bestowed the other half to restore her to her former condition. But this is a risk inseparable from the task which the author has undertaken, and he can only promise to be as little of an egotist as the situation will permit. It is perhaps an indifferent sign of a disposition to keep his word, that having introduced himself in the third person singular, he proceeds in the second paragraph to make use of the first. But it appears to him that the seeming modesty connected with the former mode of writing, is overbalanced by the inconvenience of stiffness and affectation which attends it during a rarrative of some length, and which may be observed less or more in every work in which the third person is used, from the Commentaries of Cæsar, to the Autobiography of Alexander the Corrector.

I must refer to a very early period of my life, were I to point out my first achievements as a tale teller —but I believe some of my old schoolfellows can still bear witness that I had a distinguished character for that talent, at a time when the applause of my companions was my recompense for the disgraces and punishments which the future romance writer incurred for being idle himself, and keeping others idle, during hours that should have been employed in our tasks. The chief enjoyment of my holidays was to escape with a chosen friend, who had the same taste with myself, and alternately to recite to each other such wild adventures as we were able to devise. We told, each in turn, interminable tales of knight-errantry and battles and enchantments, which were continued from one day to another as opportunity offered, without our ever thinking of bringing them to a conclusion. As we observed a strict secrecy on the subject of this intercourse, it acquired all the character of a concealed pleasure, and we used to select, for the scenes of our indulgence, long walks through the solitary and romantic environs of Arthur's Seat, Salisbury Crags, Braid Hills, and similar places in the vicinity of Edinburgh, and the recollection of those holidays

still forms an oasis in the pilgrimage which I have to look back upon. I have only to add, that my friend still lives, a prosperous gentleman, but too much occupied with graver business, to thank me for indicating him more plainly as a confidant of my childish mystery.

When boyhood advancing into youth required more serious studies and graver cares, a long illness threw me back on the kingdom of fiction, as if it were by a species of fatality. My indisposition arose, in part at least, from my having broken a blood vessel; and motion and speech were for a long time pronounced positively dangerous. For several weeks I was confined strictly to my bed, during which time I was not allowed to speak, above a whisper, to eat more than a spoonful or two of boiled rice, or to have more covering than one thin counterpane. When the reader is informed that 1 was at this time a growing youth, with the spirits, appetite, and impatience of fifteen, and suffered, of course, greatly under this severe regimen, which the repeated return of my disorder rendered indispensable, he will not be surprised that I was abandoned to my own discretion, so far as reading (my almost sole amusement) was concerned, and still less so, that I abused the indulgence which left my time so much at my own disposal.

There was at this time a circulating library in Edinburgh, founded, I believe, by the celebrated Allan Ramsay, which, besides containing a most respectable collection of books of every description, was, as might have been expected, peculiarly rich in works of tiction. It exhibited specimens of every kind, from the romances of chivalry, and the ponderous folios of Cyrus and Cassandra, down to the most approved works of later times. I was plunged into this great ocean of reading without compass or pilot; and unless when some one had the charity to play at chess with me, I was allowed to do nothing save read, from morning to night. I was, in kindness and pity, which was perhaps erroneous, however natural, permitted to select my subjects of study at my own pleasure, upon the same principle that the humors of children are indulged to keep them out of mischief. As my taste and appetite were gratified in nothing else, I indemnified myself by becoming a glutton of books. Accord ingly, I believe 1 read almost all the romances, old plays, and epic poetry, in that formidable collection, and no doubt was unconsciously amassing materials for the task in which it has been my lot to be so much employed.

At the same time I did not in all respects abuse the license permitted me. Familiar acquaintance with the specious miracles of fiction brought with it some degree of satiety, and I began, by degrees, to seek in histories, memoirs, voyages and travels, and the like, events nearly as wonderful as those which were the work of imagination, with the additional advantage that they were at least in a great measure true. The lapse of nearly two years, during which I was left to the exercise of my own free will, was followed by a temporary residence in the country, where I was again very lonely but for the amusement which I derived from a good though old-fashioned library. The vague and wild use which 1 made of this advantage 1 can not describe better than by referring my reader to the desultory studies of Waverley in a similar situation; the pas

sages concerning whose course of reading were imitated from recollections of my own. It must be understood that the resemblance

extends no further.

Time, as it glided on, brought the blessings of confirmed health and personal strength, to a degree which had never been expected or hoped for. The severe studies necessary to render une fit for my profession occupied the greater part of my time; and the society of my friends and companions who were about to enter life along with me, filled up the interval with the usual amusements of young men. I was in a situation which rendered serious labor indispensable; for, neither possessing, on the one hand, any of those peculiar advantages which are supposed to favor a hasty advance in the profession of the law, nor being, on the other hand, exposed to unusual obstacles to interrupt my progress, 1 might reasonably expect to succeed according to the greater or less degree of trouble which I should take to qualify myself as a pleader.

It makes no part of the present story to detail how the success of a few ballads had the effect of changing all the purpose and tenor of my life, and of converting a pains-taking lawyer of some years' standing into a follower of literature. It is enough to say, that I had assumed the latter character for several years before 1 seriously thought of attempting a work of imagination in prose, although one or two of my poetical attempts did not differ from romances otherwise than by being written in verse. But yet, I may observe, that about this time (now, alas! thirty years since) I had nourished the ambitious desire of composing a tale of chivalry, which was to be in the style of the Castle of Otranto, with plenty of Border characters, and supernatural incident. Having found unexpectedly a chapter of this intended work among some old papers, I have subjoined it to this introductory essay, thinking some readers may account as curious, the first attempts at romantic composition by an author who has since written so much in that department.* And those

who complain, not unreasonably, of the profusion of the Tales that have followed Waverley, may bless their stars at the narrow escape they have made by the commencement of the inundation, which had so nearly taken place in the first year of the century, being postponed for fifteen years later.

This particular subject was never resumed, but I did not abandon the idea of fictitious composition in prose, though I determined to give another turn to the style of the work.

My early recollections of the Highland scenery and customs made so favorable an impression in the poem called the Lady of the Lake, that I was induced to think of attempting something of the same kind in prose. I had been a good deal in the Highlands at a time when they were much less accessible, and much less visited, than they have been of late years, and was acquainted with many of the old warriors of 1745, who were like most veterans, easily induced to fight their battles over again, for the benefit of a willing listener like myself. It naturally occurred to me, that the ancient traditions and high spirit of a people, who, living in a civilized age and country, retained so strong a tincture of manners belonging to an early

* See the fragment alluded to, in the Appendix, No. L.