



Produced by An Anonymous Volunteer





CHRONICLES OF THE CANONGATE.

By Sir Walter Scott, Bart.



Transcriber's Note: Footnotes and references to the notes at the end of
the printed book have been inserted in the etext in square brackets
("[]") close to the place where they were indicated by a suffix in the
original text. The notes at the end are now numbered instead of using
pages to identify them as was done in the printed text.

Text in italics has been written in capital letters.

The Pound Sterling symbol has been written as "L".



CONTENTS.

  Introduction to Chronicles of the Canongate.
  Appendix to Introduction--The Theatrical Fund Dinner.
  Introductory--Mr. Chrystal Croftangry.
  The Highland Widow.
  The Two Drovers.
  Notes.




INTRODUCTION TO CHRONICLES OF THE CANONGATE.

The preceding volume of this Collection concluded the last of the pieces
originally published under the NOMINIS UMBRA of The Author of Waverley;
and the circumstances which rendered it impossible for the writer to
continue longer in the possession of his incognito were communicated
in 1827, in the Introduction to the first series of Chronicles of the
Canongate, consisting (besides a biographical sketch of the imaginary
chronicler) of three tales, entitled "The Highland Widow," "The Two
Drovers," and "The Surgeon's Daughter." In the present volume the two
first named of these pieces are included, together with three detached
stories which appeared the year after, in the elegant compilation called
"The Keepsake." "The Surgeon's Daughter" it is thought better to defer
until a succeeding volume, than to

  "Begin, and break off in the middle."

I have, perhaps, said enough on former occasions of the misfortunes
which led to the dropping of that mask under which I had, for a long
series of years, enjoyed so large a portion of public favour. Through
the success of those literary efforts, I had been enabled to indulge
most of the tastes which a retired person of my station might be
supposed to entertain. In the pen of this nameless romancer, I seemed
to possess something like the secret fountain of coined gold and pearls
vouchsafed to the traveller of the Eastern Tale; and no doubt believed
that I might venture, without silly imprudence, to extend my personal
expenditure considerably beyond what I should have thought of, had my
means been limited to the competence which I derived from inheritance,
with the moderate income of a professional situation. I bought, and
built, and planted, and was considered by myself, as by the rest of the
world, in the safe possession of an easy fortune. My riches, however,
like the other riches of this world, were liable to accidents, under
which they were ultimately destined to make unto themselves wings, and
fly away. The year 1825, so disastrous to many branches of industry and
commerce, did not spare the market of literature; and the sudden
ruin that fell on so many of the booksellers could scarcely have been
expected to leave unscathed one whose career had of necessity connected
him deeply and extensively with the pecuniary transactions of that
profession. In a word, almost without one note of premonition, I found
myself involved in the sweeping catastrophe of the unhappy time,
and called on to meet the demands of creditors upon commercial
establishments with which my fortunes had long been bound up, to the
extent of no less a sum than one hundred and twenty thousand pounds.

The author having, however rashly, committed his pledges thus largely
to the hazards of trading companies, it behoved him, of course, to
abide the consequences of his conduct, and, with whatever feelings, he
surrendered on the instant every shred of property which he had been
accustomed to call his own. It became vested in the hands of gentlemen
whose integrity, prudence, and intelligence were combined with all
possible liberality and kindness of disposition, and who readily
afforded every assistance towards the execution of plans, in the
success of which the author contemplated the possibility of his ultimate
extrication, and which were of such a nature that, had assistance of
this sort been withheld, he could have had little prospect of carrying
them into effect. Among other resources which occurred was the project
of that complete and corrected edition of his Novels and Romances (whose
real parentage had of necessity been disclosed at the moment of
the commercial convulsions alluded to), which has now advanced with
unprecedented favour nearly to its close; but as he purposed also to
continue, for the behoof of those to whom he was indebted, the exercise
of his pen in the same path of literature, so long as the taste of his
countrymen should seem to approve of his efforts, it appeared to him
that it would have been an idle piece of affectation to attempt getting
up a new incognito, after his original visor had been thus dashed from
his brow. Hence the personal narrative prefixed to the first work of
fiction which he put forth after the paternity of the "Waverley Novels"
had come to be publicly ascertained; and though many of the particulars
originally avowed in that Notice have been unavoidably adverted to in
the Prefaces and Notes to some of the preceding volumes of the present
collection, it is now reprinted as it stood at the time, because some
interest is generally attached to a coin or medal struck on a special
occasion, as expressing, perhaps, more faithfully than the same artist
could have afterwards conveyed, the feelings of the moment that gave
it birth. The Introduction to the first series of Chronicles of the
Canongate ran, then, in these words:--




INTRODUCTION.

All who are acquainted with the early history of the Italian stage are
aware that Arlecchino is not, in his original conception, a mere worker
of marvels with his wooden sword, a jumper in and out of windows, as
upon our theatre, but, as his party- jacket implies, a buffoon
or clown, whose mouth, far from being eternally closed, as amongst us,
is filled, like that of Touchstone, with quips, and cranks, and witty
devices, very often delivered extempore. It is not easy to trace how he
became possessed of his black vizard, which was anciently made in
the resemblance of the face of a cat; but it seems that the mask was
essential to the performance of the character, as will appear from the
following theatrical anecdote:--

An actor on the Italian stage permitted at the Foire du St. Germain, in
Paris, was renowned for the wild, venturous, and extravagant wit, the
brilliant sallies and fortunate repartees, with which he prodigally
seasoned the character of the party- jester. Some critics,
whose good-will towards a favourite performer was stronger than their
judgment, took occasion to remonstrate with the successful actor on
the subject of the grotesque vizard. They went wilily to their purpose,
observing that his classical and Attic wit, his delicate vein of humour,
his happy turn for dialogue, were rendered burlesque and ludicrous by
this unmeaning and bizarre disguise, and that those attributes would
become far more impressive if aided by the spirit of his eye and the
expression of his natural features. The actor's vanity was easily so
far engaged as to induce him to make the experiment. He played Harlequin
barefaced, but was considered on all hands as having made a total
failure. He had lost the audacity which a sense of incognito bestowed,
and with it all the reckless play of raillery which gave vivacity to
his original acting. He cursed his advisers, and resumed his grotesque
vizard, but, it is said, without ever being able to regain the careless
and successful levity which the consciousness of the disguise had
formerly bestowed.

Perhaps the Author of Waverley is now about to incur a risk of the same
kind, and endanger his popularity by having laid aside his incognito. It
is certainly not a voluntary experiment, like that of Harlequin; for
it was my original intention never to have avowed these works during my
lifetime, and the original manuscripts were carefully preserved (though
by the care of others rather than mine), with the purpose of supplying
the necessary evidence of the truth when the period of announcing
it should arrive. [These manuscripts are at present (August 1831)
advertised for public sale, which is an addition, though a small one,
to other annoyances.] But the affairs of my publishers having,
unfortunately, passed into a management different from their own, I had
no right any longer to rely upon secrecy in that quarter; and thus my
mask, like my Aunt Dinah's in "Tristram Shandy," having begun to wax a
little threadbare about the chin, it became time to lay it aside with
a good grace, unless I desired it should fall in pieces from my face,
which was now become likely.

Yet I had not the slightest intention of selecting the time and place in
which the disclosure was finally made; nor was there any concert betwixt
my learned and respected friend LORD MEADOWBANK and myself upon that
occasion. It was, as the reader is probably aware, upon the 23rd
February last, at a public meeting, called for establishing a
professional Theatrical Fund in Edinburgh, that the communication took
place. Just before we sat down to table, Lord Meadowbank [One of the
Supreme Judges of Scotland, termed Lords of Council and Session.] asked
me privately whether I was still anxious to preserve my incognito on the
subject of what were called the Waverley Novels? I did not immediately
see the purpose of his lordship's question, although I certainly might
have been led to infer it, and replied that the secret had now of
necessity become known to so many people that I was indifferent on the
subject. Lord Meadowbank was thus induced, while doing me the great
honour of proposing my health to the meeting, to say something on the
subject of these Novels so strongly connecting them with me as the
author, that by remaining silent I must have stood convicted, either of
the actual paternity, or of the still greater crime of being supposed
willing to receive indirectly praise to which I had no just title. I
thus found myself suddenly and unexpectedly placed in the confessional,
and had only time to recollect that I had been guided thither by a most
friendly hand, and could not, perhaps, find a better public opportunity
to lay down a disguise which began to resemble that of a detected
masquerader.

I had therefore the task of avowing myself, to the numerous and
respectable company assembled, as the sole and unaided author of these
Novels of Waverley, the paternity of which was likely at one time to
have formed a controversy of some celebrity, for the ingenuity with
which some instructors of the public gave their assurance on the subject
was extremely persevering. I now think it further necessary to say
that, while I take on myself all the merits and demerits attending these
compositions, I am bound to acknowledge with gratitude hints of subjects
and legends which I have received from various quarters, and have
occasionally used as a foundation of my fictitious compositions, or
woven up with them in the shape of episodes. I am bound, in particular,
to acknowledge the unremitting kindness of Mr. Joseph Train, supervisor
of excise at Dumfries, to whose unwearied industry I have been indebted
for many curious traditions and points of antiquarian interest. It was
Mr. Train who brought to my recollection the history of Old Mortality,
although I myself had had a personal interview with that celebrated
wanderer so far back as about 1792, when I found him on his usual