I would willingly persuade myself that the preceding work will not be found altogether uninteresting.To elder persons it will recall scenes and characters familiar to their youth; and to the rising generation the tale may present some idea of the manners of their forefathers.
Yet I heartily wish that the task of tracing the evanescent manners of his own country had employed the pen of the only man in Scotland who could have done it justice---of him so eminently distinguished in elegant literature---and whose sketches of Colonel Caustic and Umphraville are perfectly blended with the finer traits of national character.I should in that case have had more pleasure as a reader than I shall ever feel in the pride of a successful author, should these sheets confer upon me that envied distinction.And as I have inverted the usual arrangement, placing these remarks at the end of the work to which they refer, I will venture on a second violation of form, by closing the whole with a dedication:---THESE VOLUMES
BEING RESPECTFULLY INSCRIBED
TO
OUR SCOTTISH ADDISON
HENRY MACKENZIE, BY
AN UNKNOWN ADMIRER
OF
HIS GENIUS.
NOTES TO WAVERLEY.
Note A, p.<? p51>.---Titus Livius.
The attachment to this classic was, it is said, actually displayed, in the manner mentioned in the text, by an unfortunate Jacobite in that unhappy period.He escaped from the jail in which he was confined for a hasty trial and certain condemnation, and was retaken as he hovered around the place in which he had been imprisoned, for which he could give no better reason than the hope of recovering his favourite _Titus Livius._I am sorry to add, that the simplicity of such a character was found to form no apology for his guilt as a rebel, and that he was condemned and executed.
Note B, p.<? p54>.---Nicholas Amhurst.
Nicholas Amhurst, a noted political writer, who conducted for many years a paper called the Craftsman, under the assumed name of Caleb d'Anvers.He was devoted to the Tory interest, and seconded, with much ability, the attacks of Pulteney on Sir Robert Walpole.He died in 1742, neglected by his great patrons, and in the most miserable circumstances.
``Amhurst survived the downfall of Walpole's power, and had reason to expect a reward for his labours.If we excuse Bolingbroke, who had only saved the shipwreck of his fortunes, we shall be at a loss to justify Pulteney, who could with ease have given this man a considerable income.The utmost of his generosity to Amhurst, that I ever heard of, was a hogshead of claret! He died, it is supposed, of a broken heart; and was buried at the charge of his honest printer, Richard Franklin.''---_Lord Chesterfield's Characters Reviewed,_ p.42.
Note C, p.<? p57>.---Colonel Gardiner.
I have now given in the text, the full name of this gallant and excellent man, and proceed to copy the account of his remarkable conversion, as related by Dr.Doddridge.
``This memorable event,'' says the pious writer, ``happened towards the middle of July 1719.The major had spent the evening (and, if I mistake not, it was the Sabbath) in some gay company, and had an unhappy assignation with a married woman, whom he was to attend exactly at twelve.The company broke up about eleven; and not judging it convenient to anticipate the time appointed, he went into his chamber to kill the tedious hour, perhaps with some amusing book, or some other way.
But it very accidentally happened, that he took up a religious book, which his good mother or aunt had, without his knowledge, slipped into his portmanteau.It was called, if I remember the title exactly, `The Christian Soldier, or Heaven taken by Storm,' and it was written by Mr.Thomas Watson.Guessing by the title of it that he would find some phrases of his own profession spiritualised in a manner which he thought might afford him some diversion, he resolved to dip into it; but he took no serious notice of anything it had in it; and yet while this book was in his hand, an impression was made upon his mind (perhaps God only knows how)which drew after it a train of the most important and happy consequences.
He thought he saw an unusual blaze of light fall upon the book which he was reading, which he at first imagined might happen by some accident in the candle; but lifting up his eyes, he apprehended to his extreme amazement, that there was before him, as it were suspended in the air, a visible representation of the Lord Jesus Christ upon the cross, surrounded on all sides with a glory; and was impressed, as if a voice, or something equivalent to a voice, had come to him, to this effect (for he was not confident as to the words), `Oh, sinner! did I suffer this for thee, and are these thy returns!' Struck with so amazing a phenomenon as this, there remained hardly any life in him, so that he sunk down in the arm-chair in which he sat, and continued, he knew not how long, insensible.''
``With regard to this vision,'' says the ingenious Dr.Hibbert, ``the appearance of our Saviour on the cross, and the awful words repeated, can be considered in no other light than as so many recollected images of the mind, which, probably, had their origin in the language of some urgent appeal to repentance, that the colonel might have casually read, or heard delivered.From what cause, however, such ideas were rendered as vivid as actual impressions, we have no information to be depended upon.
This vision was certainly attended with one of the most important of consequences, connected with the Christian dispensation---the conversion of a sinner.And hence no single narrative has, perhaps, done more to confirm the superstitious opinion that apparitions of this awful kind cannot arise without a divine fiat.'' Dr.Hibbert adds, in a note---``A short time before the vision, Colonel Gardiner had received a severe fall from his horse.Did the brain receive some slight degree of injury from the accident, so as to predispose him to this spiritual illusion?''---(_Hibbert's Philosophy of Apparitions,_ Edinburgh, 1824, p.190).