No one need regret that the days of chap-books are gone, but the human mind has a tendency to turn with a loving look to the past, as if life in it had been easier than in the present. It is, however, another illustration of the familiar adage that ‘distance lends enchantment to the view.’ These works, impossible now, must be regarded in the light in which Dean Ramsay prepared his Reminiscences. His object was to ‘depict a phase of national manners which was fast passing away, and thus, in however humble a department, contribute something to the materials of history, by exhibiting social customs and habits of thought which at a particular era were characteristic of a race.’[39] Such is the value of the remnants of the once extensive chap literature of Scotland. With a finer public taste, and a purer, though not more vigorous, popular literature, these old books are now discredited except for antiquarian purposes. Perhaps the change cannot be better shown than in the illustration given by Dean Ramsay, who says in his ‘Conclusion’:—‘In 1821, Mrs. Keith of Ravelstone, grand-aunt of Sir Walter Scott, thus writes, in returning to him the work of a female novelist which she had borrowed from him out of curiosity, and to remind her of “auld lang syne:”—“Is it not a very odd thing that I, an old woman of eighty and upwards, sitting alone, feel myself ashamed to read a book which, sixty years ago, I have heard read aloud for the amusement of large circles, consisting of the first and most creditable society in London!”’[40] It is well that such should be the case; but it is in the interests of the purity of public morals, of the progress of national life, that these old land-marks should be preserved; for by them only can we tell of the manners and customs of our forefathers, or estimate what advancement has been made since their time.
[AN IMPARTIAL
HISTORY]
of the
RISE, PROGRESS, and EXTINCTION
of the late
REBELLION
In Britain, in the Years 1745 and 1746.
Giving an ACCOUNT of every Battle, Skirmish, and Siege, from the Time of the PRETENDER’S coming out of France, until he landed in France again; with Plans of the Battles of Preston-pans, Clifton, Falkirk, and Culloden.