The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction. Volume 20, No. 571 (Supplementary Number)

With Five Engravings:

ABBOTSFORD, (FROM THE GARDEN, see page 247.)
Sir Walter Scott was the third son of Walter Scott, Esq., Writer to the Signet, in Edinburgh, and Anne, daughter of Dr. John Rutherford, Professor of Medicine in the University of the above city. His ancestry numbers several distinguished persons; though the well-earned fame of Sir Walter Scott readers his pedigree comparatively uninteresting; inasmuch as it illustrates the saw of an olden poet, that
Learning is an addition beyond
Nobility of birth: honour of blood,
Without the ornament of knowledge, is
A glorious ignorance.
SHIRLEY.
The house in which Sir Walter Scott was born no longer exists. It was situated at the head of the College Wynd, at its entrance into North College-street. It was thus described by Sir Walter in 1825:— It consisted of two flats above Mr. Keith's, and belonged to my father, Mr. Walter Scott, Writer to the Signet. There I had the chance to be born, 15th of August, 1771. My father, soon after my birth, removed to George's Square, and let the house in the College Wynd, first to Mr. Dundas, of Philipstoun, and afterwards to Mr. William Keith, father of Sir Alexander Keith. It was purchased by the public, together with Mr. Keith's (the inferior floors), and pulled down to make way for the new College.
Mr. Cunningham relates some interesting particulars of this period. Before Sir Walter was two years old, his nurse let him fall out of her arms, so as to injure his right foot, and render him lame for life: This accident did not otherwise affect his health; he was, as I have been informed by a lady who chanced to live near him, a remarkably active and dauntless boy, full of all manner of fun, and ready for all manner of mischief. He calls himself, in one of his introductions to Marmion —