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THE

POETICAL WORKS

OF

SIR WALTER SCOTT, BART.

The Lay of the Last Minstrel:

A POEM, IN SIX CANTOS.

Dum relego, scripsisse pudet; quia plurima cerno,
Me quoque, qui feci, judice, digna lini.

ADVERTISEMENT TO EDITION 1833.

tory as may be supposed to carry interest along with them. Even if I should be mistaken in think

THE INTRODUCTION TO THE LAY OF THE LAST MIN-ing that the secret history of what was once so STREL, written in April, 1830, was revised by the Author in the autumn of 1831, when he also made some corrections in the text of the Poem, and several additions to the notes. The work is now printed from his interleaved copy.

It is much to be regretted that the original MS. of this Poem has not been preserved. We are thus denied the advantage of comparing throughout the Author's various readings, which, in the case of Marmion, the Lady of the Lake, the Lord of the Isles, &c., are often highly curious and instructive.-ED.

INTRODUCTION TO EDITION 1830. A POEM of nearly thirty years' standing' may be supposed hardly to need an Introduction, since, without one, it has been able to keep itself afloat through the best part of a generation. Nevertheless, as, in the edition of the Waverley Novels now in course of publication [1830], I have imposed on myself the task of saying something concerning the purpose and history of each, in their turn, I am desirous that the Poems for which I first received some marks of the public favor, should also be accompanied with such scraps of their literary his

1 Published in 4to (£1 58.), January, 1805.

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popular, may still attract public attention and curiosity, it seems to me not without its use to record the manner and circumstances under which the present, and other Poems on the same plan, attained for a season an extensive reputation.

I must resume the story of my literary labors at the period at which I broke off in the Essay on the Imitation of Popular Poetry [see post], when I had enjoyed the first gleam of public favor, by the success of the first edition of the Minstrelsy of the Scottish Border. The second edition of that work published in 1803, proved, in the language of the trade, rather a heavy concern. The demand in Scotland had been supplied by the first edition, and the curiosity of the English was not much awakened by poems in the rude garb of antiquity, accompanied with notes referring to the obscure feuds of barbarous clans, of whose very names civilized history was ignorant. It was, on the whole, one of those books which are more praised than they are read."

At this time I stood personally in a different position from that which I occupied when I first dipt my desperate pen in ink for other purposes than those of my profession. In 1796, when I first pub

"The Lay' is the best of all possible comments on the Border Minstrelsy."-British Critic, August, 1805

by the general consent of his brethren, recently elected to be their Dean of Faculty, or President,

fessional talents which they had it in their power to offer. But this is an incident much beyond the ideas of a period of thirty years' distance, when a barrister who really possessed any turn for lighter literature, was at as much pains to conceal it, as if it had in reality been something to be ashamed of; and I could mention more than one instance in which literature and society have suffered much loss, that jurisprudence might be enriched.

lished the translations from Bürger, I was an insulated individual, with only my own wants to provide for, and having, in a great measure, my own-being the highest acknowledgment of his proinclinations alone to consult. In 1803, when the second edition of the Minstrelsy appeared, I had arrived at a period of life when men, however thoughtless, encounter duties and circumstances which press consideration and plans of life upon the most careless minds. I had been for some time married-was the father of a rising family, and, though fully enabled to meet the consequent demands upon me, it was my duty and desire to place myself in a situation which would enable me to make honorable provision against the various contingencies of life.

Such, however, was not my case; for the reader will not wonder that my open interference with matters of light literature diminished my employIt may be readily supposed that the attempts ment in the weightier matters of the law. Nor which I had made in literature had been unfavor- did the solicitors, upon whose choice the counsel able to my success at the bar. The goddess The- takes rank in his profession, do me less than jusmis is, at Edinburgh, and I suppose everywhere tice, by regarding others among my contempora else, of a peculiarly jealous disposition. She will ries as fitter to discharge the duty due to their not readily consent to share her authority, and clients, than a young man who was taken up with sternly demands from her votaries, not only that running after ballads, whether Teutonic or national. real duty be carefully attended to and discharged, My profession and I, therefore, came to stand nearbut that a certain air of business shall be observed ly upon the footing which honest Slender consoled even in the midst of total idleness. It is prudent, himself on having established with Mistress Anne if not absolutely necessary, in a young barrister, Page: "There was no great love between us at to appear completely engrossed by his profession; the beginning, and it pleased Heaven to decrease however destitute of employment he may in real-it on farther acquaintance." I became sensible that ity be, he ought to preserve, if possible, the appearance of full occupation. He should, therefore, seem perpetually engaged among his law-papers, dusting them, as it were; and, as Ovid advises the fair,

"Si nullus erit pulvis, tamen excute nullum."1 Perhaps such extremity of attention is more especially required, considering the great number of counsellors who are called to the bar, and how very small a proportion of them are finally disposed, or find encouragement, to follow the law as a profession. Hence the number of deserters is so great, that the least lingering look behind occasions a young novice to be set down as one of the intending fugitives. Certain it is, that the Scottish Themis was at this time peculiarly jealous of any flirtation with the Muses, on the part of those who had ranged themselves under her banners. This was probably owing to her consciousness of the superior attractions of her rivals. Of late, however, she has relaxed in some instances in this particular, an eminent example of which has been shown in the case of my friend, Mr. Jeffrey, who, after long conducting one of the most influential literary periodicals of the age, with unquestionable ability, has been,

1 If dust be none, yet brush that none away.

Mr. Jeffrey, after conducting the Edinburgh Review for twenty-seven years, withdrew from that office in 1829, on being

the time was come when I must either buckle myself resolutely to the "toil by day, the lamp by night," renouncing all the Delilahs of my imagination, or bid adieu to the profession of the law, and hold another course.

I confess my own inclination revolted from the more severe choice, which might have been deemed by many the wiser alternative. As my transgressions had been numerous, my repentance must have been signalized by unusual sacrifices. I ought to have mentioned, that since my fourteenth or fifteenth year, my health, originally delicate, had become extremely robust. From infancy I had labored under the infirmity of a severe lameness, but, as I believe is usually the case with men of spirit who suffer under personal inconveniences of this nature, I had, since the improvement of my health, in defiance of this incapacitating circumstance, distinguished myself by the endurance of toil on foot or horseback, having often walked thirty miles a day, and rode upwards of a hundred without resting. In this manner i made many pleasant journeys through parts of the country then not very accessible, gaining more amusement and instruction than I have been able to acquire since I have travelled in a more commodious manner. I practised most

elected Dean of the Faculty of Advocates. In 1830, under | Earl Grey's Ministry, he was appointed Lord Advocate of Scotland, and, in 1834, a Senator of the College of Justice by the title of Lord Jeffrey.-ED.

silvan sports also, with some success, and with great delight. But these pleasures must have been all resigned, or used with great moderation, had I determined to regain my station at the bar. It was even doubtful whether I could, with perfect character as a jurisconsult, retain a situation in a volunteer corps of cavalry, which I then held. The threats of invasion were at this time instant and menacing; the call by Britain on her children was universal, and was answered by some, who, like myself, consulted rather their desire than their ability to bear arms. My services, however, were found useful in assisting to maintain the discipline of the corps, being the point on which their constitution rendered them most amenable to military criticism. In other respects, the squadron was a fine one, consisting chiefly of handsome men, well mounted, and armed at their own expense. My attention to the corps took up a good deal of time; and while it occupied many of the happiest hours of my life, it furnished an additional reason for my reluctance again to encounter the severe course of study indispensable to success in the juridical profession.

On the other hand, my father, whose feelings might have been hurt by my quitting the bar, had been for two or three years dead, so that I had no control to thwart my own inclination; and my income being equal to all the comforts, and some of the elegancies, of life, I was not pressed to an irksome labor by necessity, that most powerful of motives; consequently, I was the more easily seduced to choose the employment which was most agreeable to me. This was yet the easier, that in 1800 I had obtained the preferment of Sheriff of Selkirkshire, about £300 a year in value, and which was the more agreeable to me, as in that county I had several friends and relations. But I did not abandon the profession to which I had been educated, without certain prudential resolutions, which, at the risk of some egotism, I will here mention; not without the hope that they may be useful to young persons who may stand in circunstances similar to those in which I then stood.

In the first place, upon considering the lives and fortunes of persons who had given themselves up to literature, or to the task of pleasing the public, it seemed to me that the circumstances which chiefly affected their happiness and character, were those from which Horace has bestowed upon authors the epithet of the Irritable Race. It requires no depth of philosophic reflection to perceive, that the petty warfare of Pope with the Dunces of his period could not have been carried on without his suffering the most acute torture, such as a man must endure from musquitoes, by whose stings he suffers agony, although he can rush them in his grasp by myriads. Nor is it ne

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cessary to call to memory the many humiliating instances in which men of the greatest genius have, to avenge some pitiful quarrel, made themselves ridiculous during their lives, to become the still more degraded objects of pity to future times.

Upon the whole, as I had no pretension to the genius of the distinguished persons who had fallen into such errors, I concluded there could be no occasion for imitating them in their mistakes, or what I considered as such; and in adopting literary pursuits as the principal occupation of my future life, I resolved, if possible, to avoid those weaknesses of temper which seemed to have most easily beset my more celebrated predecessors.

With this view, it was my first resolution to keep as far as was in my power abreast of society, continuing to maintain my place in general company, without yielding to the very natural temptation of narrowing myself to what is called literary society. By doing so, I imagined I should escape the besetting sin of listening to language, which, from one motive or other, is apt to ascribe a very undue degree of consequence to literary pursuits, as if they were, indeed, the business, rather than the amusement, of life. The opposite course can only be compared to the injudicious conduct of one who pampers himself with cordial and luscious draughts, until he is unable to endure wholesome bitters. Like Gil Blas, therefore, I resolved to stick by the society of my commis, instead of seeking that of a more literary cast, and to maintain my general interest in what was going on around me, reserving the man of letters for the desk and the library.

My second resolution was a corollary from the first. I determined that, without shutting ny ears to the voice of true criticism, I would pay no regard to that which assumes the form of satiro. I therefore resolved to arm myself with that triple brass of Horace, of which those of my profession are seldom held deficient, against all the roving warfare of satire, parody, and sarcasm; to laugh if the jest was a good one, or, if otherwise, to let it hum and buzz itself to sleep.

It is to the observance of these rules (according to my best belief), that, after a life of thirty years engaged in literary labors of various kinds, I attribute my never having been entangled in any literary quarrel or controversy; and, which is a still more pleasing result, that I have been distinguished by the personal friendship of my most approved contemporaries of all parties.

I adopted, at the same time, another resolution, on which it may doubtless be remarked, that it was well for me that I had it in my power to do so, and that, therefore, it is a line of conduct which, depending upon accident, can be less generally applicable in other cases. Yet I fail not to record

besides, a long work in quatrains, whether those of the common ballad, or such as are termed ele giac, has an effect upon the mind like that of the bed of Procrustes upon the human body; for, as it must be both awkward and difficult to carry on a long sentence from one stanza to another, it fol lows, that the meaning of each period must be comprehended within four lines, and equally s that it must be extended so as to fill that space The alternate dilation and contraction thus ren dered necessary is singularly unfavorable to nar rative composition; and the "Gondibert" of Si William D'Avenant, though containing many strik ing passages, has never become popular, owing chiefly to its being told in this species of elegia

verse.

this part of my plan, convinced that, though it may not be in every one's power to adopt exactly the same resolution, he may nevertheless, by his own exertions, in some shape or other, attain the object on which it was founded, namely, to secure the means of subsistence, without relying exclusively on literary talents. In this respect, I determined that literature should be my staff, but not my crutch, and that the profits of my literary labor, however convenient otherwise, should not, if I could help it, become necessary to my ordinary expenses. With this purpose I resolved, if the interest of my friends could so far favor me, to retire upon any of the respectable offices of the law, in which persons of that profession are glad to take refuge, when they feel themselves, or are judged by others, incompetent to aspire to its In the dilemma occasioned by this objection, th higher honors. Upon such a post an author might idea occurred to the Author of using the measure hope to retreat, without any perceptible alteration short line, which forms the structure of so muc of circumstances, whenever the time should arrive minstrel poetry, that it may be properly termed that the public grew weary of his endeavors to the Romantic stanza, by way of distinction; an please, or he himself should tire of the pen. At which appears so natural to our language, that th this period of my life, I possessed so many friends | very best of our poets have not been able to pro capable of assisting me in this object of ambition, tract it into the verse properly called Heroic, with that I could hardly overrate my own prospects out the use of epithets which are, to say the leas of obtaining the preferment to which I limited my unnecessary. But, on the other hand, the extrem wishes; and, in fact, I obtained in no long period facility of the short couplet, which seems conge the reversion of a situation which completely met nial to our language, and was, doubtless for tha them. reason, so popular with our old minstrels, is, fo the same reason, apt to prove a snare to the com poser who uses it in more modern days, by er couraging him in a habit of slovenly composition The necessity of occasional pauses often forces th young poet to pay more attention to sense, as th boy's kite rises highest when the train is loaded b a due counterpoise. The Author was therefor intimidated by what Byron calls the "fatal faci ity" of the octosyllabic verse, which was otherwi better adapted to his purpose of imitating the mor ancient poetry.

Thus far all was well, and the Author had been guilty, perhaps, of no great imprudence, when he relinquished his forensic practice with the hope of making some figure in the field of literature. But an established character with the public, in my new capacity, still remained to be acquired. I have noticed, that the translations from Bürger had been unsuccessful, nor had the original poetry which appeared under the auspices of Mr. Lewis, in the "Tales of Wonder," in any great degree raised my reputation. It is true, I had private friends disposed to second me in my efforts to obtain popularity. But I was sportsman enough to know, that if the greyhound does not run well, the halloos of his patrons will not obtain the prize for him. Neither was I ignorant that the practice of ballad-writing was for the present out of fashion, and that any attempt to revive it, or to found a poetical character upon it, would certainly fail of suc

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I was not less at a loss for a subject which migh admit of being treated with the simplicity an wildness of the ancient ballad. But accident di tated both a theme and measure, which decide the subject, as well as the structure of the poen

The lovely young Countess of Dalkeith, afte wards Harriet Duchess of Buccleuch, had come the land of her husband with the desire of makin herself acquainted with its traditions and custom as well as its manners and history. All who r member this lady will agree, that the intellectu character of her extreme beauty, the amenity an

That wrath which sent to Pluto's gloomy reign,
The souls of mighty chiefs in battle slain,
Whose bones, unburied on the desert shore,
Devouring dogs and hungry vultures tore."

rourtesy of her manners, the soundness of her understanding, and her unbounded benevolence, gave more the idea of an angelic visitant, than of a be ing belonging to this nether world; and such a thought was but too consistent with the short space she was permitted to tarry among us.' Of course, where all made it a pride and pleasure to gratify her wishes, she soon heard enough of Border lore; among others, an aged gentleman of property, near Langholm, communicated to her ladyship the story of Gilpin Horner, a tradition in which the narrator, and many more of that country, were firm believers. The young Countess, much delighted with the legend, and the gravity and full confidence with which it was told, enjoined on me as a task to compose a ballad on the subject. Of course, to hear was to obey; and thus the goblin story, objected to by several critics as an excrescence upon the poem, was, in fact, the occasion of its being written.

to repeat to me many long specimens of their poetry, which had not yet appeared in print. Amongst others, was the striking fragment called Christabel, by Mr. Coleridge, which, from the singularly irregular structure of the stanzas, and the liberty which it allowed the author, to adapt the sound to the sense, seemed to be exactly suited to such an extravaganza as I meditated on the subject of Gilpin Horner. As applied to comic and humorous poetry, this mescolanza of measures had been already used by Anthony Hall, Anstey, Dr. Wolcott, and others; but it was in Christabel that I first found it used in serious poetry, and it is to Mr. Coleridge that I am bound to make the acknowledgment due from the pupil to his master. I observe that Lord Byron, in noticing my obligations to Mr. Coleridge, which I have been always most ready to acknowledge, expressed, or was understood to express, a hope, that I did not write an unfriendly review on Mr. Coleridge's productions. On this subject I have only to say, that I do not even know the review which is alluded to; and were I ever to take the unbecoming freedom of censuring a man of Mr. Coleridge's extraordinary talents, it would be on account of the caprice and indolence with which he has thrown from him, as if in mere wantonness, those unfinished scraps of poetry, which, like the Torso of antiquity, defy the skill of his poetical brethren to complete them. The charming fragments which the author abandons to their fate, are surely too valuable to be treated like the proofs of careless engravers, the sweepings of whose studios often make the fortune of some painstaking collector.

A chance similar to that which dictated the subject, gave me also the hint of a new mode of treating it. We had at that time the lease of a pleas- | ant cottage, near Lasswade, on the romantic banks of the Esk, to which we escaped when the vacations of the Court permitted me so much leisure. Here I had the pleasure to receive a visit from Mr. Stoddart (now Sir John Stoddart, Judge-Ad- | vocate at Malta), who was at that time collecting the particulars which he afterwards embodied in his Remarks on Local Scenery in Scotland." I was of some use to him in procuring the information which he desired, and guiding him to the scenes which he wished to see. In return, he made me better acquainted than I had hitherto been with the poetic effusions which have since made thejected labor, though I was now furnished with a Lakes of Westmoreland, and the authors by whom they have been sung, so famous wherever the English tongue is spoken.

I was already acquainted with the "Joan of Arc," the "Thalaba," and the "Metrical Ballads" of Mr. Southey, which had found their way to Scotland, and were generally admired. But Mr. Stoddart, who had the advantage of personal friendship with the authors, and who possessed a strong memory with an excellent taste, was able

The Duchess died in August, 1814. Sir Walter Scott's hors on her death will be found in a subsequent page of this collection.-ED.

This was Mr. Beattie of Mickledale, a man then considerably upwards of eighty, of a shrewd and sarcastic temper, which he did not at all times suppress, as the following anecdote will show :-A worthy clergyman, now deceased, with better good-will than tact, was endeavoring to push the senior forward in his recollection of Border ballads and legends, by expressing reiterated surprise at his wonderful memory. No, sir," said old Miekledale; "my memory is good for little, for it cannot retain what ought to be preserved. I can remember all these stories about the auld riding davs, which are of no

I did not immediately proceed upon my pro

subject, and with a structure of verse which might have the effect of novelty to the public ear, and afford the author an opportunity of varying his measure with the variations of a romantic theme. On the contrary, it was, to the best of my recollection, more than a year after Mr. Stoddart's visit, that, by way of experiment, I composed the first two or three stanzas of "The Lay of the Last Minstrel." I was shortly afterwards visited by two intimate friends, one of whom still survives.

earthly importance; but were you, reverend sir, to repeat your best sermon in this drawing-room, I could not tell you half an hour afterwards what you had been speaking about."

* Two volumes, royal octavo. 1801.

4 Medwin's Conversations of Lord Byron, p. 309.
Sir Walter, elsewhere, in allusion to " Coleridge's beauti-
ful and tantalizing fragment of Christabel," says, "Has not
our own imaginative poet cause to fear that future ages will
desire to summon him from his place of rest, as Milton longed

'To call up him who left half told
The story of Cambuscan bold ?'"'
Notes to the Abbot.-ED.

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