The Country of Sir Walter Scott

by Charles S. Olcott

I found a very pleasant family group in front of the next cottage, and after a few moment's conversation asked permission to take their picture. Not hearing a dissenting voice, I understood my request would be granted and began to set up my camera in the street. Before I had half made ready, the entire group had disappeared. The police department of the town then marched up to me,—one man strong,—and for a moment I felt afraid I had been violating some law. But he was only curious, and told me that the people had a strange aversion to being photographed. I left my camera all focused and ready in the street and sauntered with the constable to the side of the road. In a few minutes a picturesque old fishwife, carrying two large empty pails in each hand, came out of her house, all unconscious of the awful presence of a loaded camera and I quickly stepped out and pressed the bulb. 'That's Coffee Betz you got then,' laughed the constable. 'She would n't let you take her picture, but she's one of the Cargills.' In this way I came as near as possible to getting a photograph of the original Luckie Mucklebackit with whom Monkbarns haggled over the price of a bannock-fluke and a cock-padle. For the fishwives of to-day are the same as those of a century ago,—'they keep the man, and keep the house, and keep the siller, too.' The men consider their own work ended when the boat is pulled up on the beach. It is the wife who must market the fish, which she does by carrying them on her back to the nearest town, where she must 'scauld and ban wi' ilka wife that will scauld and ban wi' her' until the fish are sold. 'Them that sell the goods guide the purse—them that guide the purse rule the house,' and therefore by common consent in these communities, the wife is the head of the family.

Back from Auchmithie is the mansion house of Kinblethmont, surrounded by some fine old woods. It will be remembered that Edie Ochiltree was passing this place on his return from the Earl of Glenallan's castle when he was arrested on a charge of assaulting Dousterswivel. Colonel Lindsay, of Kinblethmont, and the Laird of Hospitalfield were the leaders who took the direction of affairs when a French privateer named the 'Dreadnought' threatened the town of Arbroath in very much the same way as Fairport was menaced in 'The Antiquary.' The same scenes of excitement so vividly described in the novel were there enacted.

Scott, however, had passed through a similar experience himself, which enabled him to write the dramatic event with greater ease. For several years, in the early part of the nineteenth century, the people of England and Scotland were kept in a state of nervous dread by the expectation of an invasion by the French. Beacons were erected all along the coast ready to give instant alarm, and militia organizations were everywhere kept in a state of readiness. A false alarm on February 2, 1804, brought out the volunteers of Berwickshire, Roxburghshire, and Selkirkshire with surprising rapidity. Scott had gone with his wife for a visit to Gilsland, the scene of their courtship. He was then a member of the Edinburgh Volunteers. When the alarm came he promptly mounted his horse and rode with all speed to Dalkeith, a distance of one hundred miles, within twenty-four hours. The alarm had subsided when he reached his destination, and after a few jolly evenings with his fellow volunteers he returned to the south. It was on this hurried trip that he composed a poem, entitled, 'The Bard's Incantation.'

'The Antiquary' thus closes as it began, with a leaf out of the author's personal experience. I have no doubt that he heartily enjoyed its composition. It must have been an exquisite pleasure to one so appreciative of genuine humour to caricature his own antiquarian foibles; to weave into the pages of romance the many tales he had heard in his youth of a character so interesting as the old 'gaberlunzie'; and to make the people of his fancy walk the streets of the ancient seaport town, visit the old abbey, saunter along the cliffs of the seashore, or roam about over the adjacent country, where he had spent many pleasant hours in the company of well-loved friends.

Although Scott's own opinion at first was that 'The Antiquary' lacked the romance of 'Waverley' and the adventure of 'Guy Mannering,' yet in subsequent years he came to regard it as his favourite among all the Waverley Novels.

CHAPTER XI
THE BLACK DWARF

Late in the afternoon of a beautiful May day, while on one of our drives from Melrose, we turned off the main road a few miles west of Peebles, and, crossing the Tweed, entered the vale of Manor Water. This secluded valley, peaceful and charming, would make an ideal retreat for any one who wished to escape the noise and confusion of a busy world. The distinguished philosopher and historian, Dr. Adam Ferguson, found it so, when in old age he took up his residence at Hallyards, where his young friend, Walter Scott, paid him a visit in the memorable summer of 1797.

It was not a desire to retire from worldly activities, however, or to visit the house of Dr. Ferguson, that led us into the quiet valley. Our purpose was to see the former home of one of the strangest human beings who ever lived; one who found the seclusion of the beautiful vale well adapted to shield him from the unwelcome observation of the curious-minded. David Ritchie, or 'Bow'd Davie o' the Wud'use,'[[1]] as he was called, was for many years a familiar figure to the few farmers of the valley. He was born about 1735, and lived to be seventy-six years of age. He had been horribly deformed from birth. His shoulders were broad and muscular, and his arms unusually long and powerful, though he could not lift them higher than his breast. But Nature seemed to have omitted providing him with legs and thighs. The upper part of his body, with proportions seemingly intended for a giant, was set upon short fin-like legs, so small that when he stood erect they were almost invisible. His height was scarcely three feet and a half. His feet were badly adapted for walking and were kept wrapped in masses of rags as though they were the particular feature of which their owner was most ashamed. So completely did he depend upon the strength of his arms and chest that, unable to use his feet in the ordinary way in digging his garden, he contrived a peculiar spade which he could force into the soil with his breast. With his great arms he had been known to tear a tree up by the roots, which had defied the strength of two ordinary men.