by Walter Scott
CHAPTER LXXII
A POSTSCRIPT, WHICH SHOULD HAVE BEEN A PREFACE
Our journey is now finished, gentle reader; and if your patience hasaccompanied me through these sheets, the contract is, on your part,strictly fulfilled. Yet, like the driver who has received his full hire,I still linger near you, and make, with becoming diffidence, a triflingadditional claim upon your bounty and good nature. You are as free,however, to shut the volume of the one petitioner, as to close your doorin the face of the other.
This should have been a prefatory chapter, but for two reasons:--First,that most novel readers, as my own conscience reminds me, are apt tobe guilty of the sin of omission respecting that same matter ofprefaces;--secondly, that it is a general custom with that class ofstudents, to begin with the last chapter of a work; so that, afterall, these remarks, being introduced last in order, have still the bestchance to be read in their proper place.
There is no European nation, which, within the course of half a century,or little more, has undergone so complete a change as this kingdom ofScotland. The effects of the insurrection of 1745,--the destructionof the patriarchal power of the Highland chiefs,--the abolition of theheritable jurisdictions of the Lowland nobility and barons,--the totaleradication of the Jacobite party, which, averse to intermingle with theEnglish, or adopt their customs, long continued to pride themselvesupon maintaining ancient Scottish manners and customs,--commenced thisinnovation. The gradual influx of wealth, and extension of commerce,have since united to render the present people of Scotland a class ofbeings as different from their grandfathers as the existing Englishare from those of Queen Elizabeth's time, The political and economicaleffects of these changes have been traced by Lord Selkirk with greatprecision and accuracy. But the change, though steadily and rapidlyprogressive, has, nevertheless, been gradual; and, like those who driftdown the stream of a deep and smooth river, we are not aware of theprogress we have made until we fix our eye on the now distant pointfrom which we have been drifted.--Such of the present generation ascan recollect the last twenty or twenty-five years of theeighteenth century, will be fully sensible of the truth of thisstatement;--especially if their acquaintance and connexions lay amongthose, who, in my younger time, were facetiously called 'folks ofthe old leaven,' who still cherished a lingering, though hopeless,attachment, to the house of Stuart. This race has now almost entirelyvanished from the land, and with it, doubtless, much absurd politicalprejudice--but also, many living examples of singular and disinterestedattachment to the principles of loyalty which they received from theirfathers, and of old Scottish faith, hospitality, worth, and honour.
It was my accidental lot, though not born a Highlander (which may be anapology for much bad Gaelic), to reside, during my childhood and youth,among persons of the above description;--and now, for the purpose ofpreserving some idea of the ancient manners of which I have witnessedthe almost total extinction, I have embodied in imaginary scenes, andascribed to fictitious characters, a part of the incidents which I thenreceived from those who were actors in them. Indeed, the most romanticparts of this narrative are precisely those which have a foundation infact. The exchange of mutual protection between a Highland gentlemanand an officer of rank in the king's service, together with the spiritedmanner in which the latter asserted his right to return the favour hehad received, is literally true. The accident by a musket-shot, andthe heroic reply imputed to Flora, relate to a lady of rank not longdeceased. And scarce a gentleman who was 'in hiding' after the battle ofCulloden but could tell a tale of strange concealments, and of wild andhair's-breadth 'scapes, as extraordinary as any which I have ascribedto my heroes. Of this, the escape of Charles Edward himself, as the mostprominent, is the most striking example. The accounts of the battleof Preston and skirmish at Clifton are taken from the narrative ofintelligent eye-witnesses, and corrected from the History of theRebellion by the late venerable author of DOUGLAS. The Lowland Scottishgentlemen, and the subordinate characters, are not given as individualportraits, but are drawn from the general habits of the period (of whichI have witnessed some remnants in my younger days), and partly gatheredfrom tradition.
It has been my object to describe these persons, not by a caricaturedand exaggerated use of the national dialect, but by their habits,manners, and feelings; so as in some distant degree to emulate theadmirable Irish portraits drawn by Miss Edgeworth, so different fromthe 'Teagues' and 'dear joys,' who so long, with the most perfect familyresemblance to each other, occupied the drama and the novel.
I feel no confidence, however, in the manner in which I have executedmy purpose. Indeed, so little was I satisfied with my production, thatI laid it aside in an unfinished state, and only found it again by mereaccident among other waste papers in an old cabinet, the drawers ofwhich I was rummaging, in order to accommodate a friend with somefishing tackle, after it had been mislaid for several years. Twoworks upon similar subjects, by female authors, whose genius is highlycreditable to their country, have appeared in the interval; I mean Mrs.Hamilton's GLENBURNIE, and the late account of Highland Superstitions.But the first is confined to the rural habits of Scotland, of whichit has given a picture with striking and impressive fidelity; and thetraditional records of the respectable and ingenious Mrs. Grant ofLaggan, are of a nature distinct from the fictitious narrative which Ihave here attempted.
I would willingly persuade myself, that the preceding work will not befound altogether uninteresting. To elder persons it will recall scenesand characters familiar to their youth; and to the rising generation thetale may present some idea of the manners of their forefathers.
Yet I heartily wish that the task of tracing the evanescent manners ofhis own country had employed the pen of the only man in Scotland whocould have done it justice,--of him so eminently distinguishedin elegant literature,--and whose sketches of Colonel Caustic andUmphraville are perfectly blended with the finer traits of nationalcharacter. I should in that case have had more pleasure as a readerthan I shall ever feel in the pride of a successful author, should thesesheets confer upon me that envied distinction. And as I have invertedthe usual arrangement, placing these remarks at the end of the workto which they refer, I will venture on a second violation of form, byclosing the whole with a Dedication:--
THESE VOLUMES BEING RESPECTFULLY INSCRIBED TO OUR SCOTTISH ADDISON,
HENRY MACKENZIE,
BY AN UNKNOWN ADMIRER OF HIS GENIUS.
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