READER,
THIS TALE WILL NOT BE TOLD IN VAIN, IF IT SHALL BE FOUND TO
ILLUSTRATE THE GREAT TRUTH, THAT GUILT, THOUGH IT MAY ATTAIN
TEMPORAL SPLENDOUR, CAN NEVER CONFER REAL HAPPINESS; THAT THE
EVIL CONSEQUENCES OF OUR CRIMES LONG SURVIVE THEIR COMMISSION,
AND, LIKE THE GHOSTS OF THE MURDERED, FOR EVER HAUNT THE STEPS
OF THE MALEFACTOR; AND THAT THE PATHS OF VIRTUE, THOUGH SELDOM
THOSE OF WORLDLY GREATNESS, ARE ALWAYS THOSE OF PLEASANTNESS
AND PEACE.
L’ENVOY,
BY JEDEDIAH CLEISHBOTHAM.
Thus concludeth the Tale of “The Heart of Mid-Lothian,” which hath filled more pages than I opined. The Heart of Mid-Lothian is now no more, or rather it is transferred to the extreme side of the city, even as the Sieur Jean Baptiste Poquelin hath it, in his pleasant comedy called Le Me’decin Malgre’ Lui, where the simulated doctor wittily replieth to a charge, that he had placed the heart on the right side, instead of the left, “Cela e’tait autrefois ainsi, mais nous avons change’ tout cela.” Of which witty speech if any reader shall demand the purport, I have only to respond, that I teach the French as well as the Classical tongues, at the easy rate of five shillings per quarter, as my advertisements are periodically making known to the public.
NOTES TO THE HEART OF MID-LOTHIAN.
NOTE A—AUTHOR’S CONNECTION WITH QUAKERISM
It is an old proverb, that “many a true word is spoken in jest.” The existence of Walter Scott, third son of Sir William Scott of Harden, is instructed, as it is called, by a charter under the great seal, Domino Willielmo Scott de Harden Militi, et Waltero Scott suo filio legitimo tertio genito, terrarum de Roberton.*
* See Douglas’s Baronage, page 215.
The munificent old gentleman left all his four sons considerable estates. and settled those of Eilrig and Raeburn, together with valuable possessions around Lessuden, upon Walter, his third son, who is ancestor of the Scotts of Raeburn, and of the Author of Waverley. He appears to have become a convert to the doctrine of the Quakers, or Friends, and a great assertor of their peculiar tenets. This was probably at the time when George Fox, the celebrated apostle of the sect, made an expedition into the south of Scotland about 1657, on which occasion, he boasts, that “as he first set his horse’s feet upon Scottish ground, he felt the seed of grace to sparkle about him like innumerable sparks of fire.” Upon the same occasion, probably, Sir Gideon Scott of Highchester, second son of Sir William, immediate elder brother of Walter, and ancestor of the author’s friend and kinsman, the present representative of the family of Harden, also embraced the tenets of Quakerism. This last convert, Gideon, entered into a controversy with the Rev. James Kirkton, author of the Secret and True History of the Church of Scotland, which is noticed by my ingenious friend Mr. Charles Kirkpatrick Sharpe, in his valuable and curious edition of that work, 4to, 1817. Sir William Scott, eldest of the brothers, remained, amid the defection of his two younger brethren, an orthodox member of the Presbyterian Church, and used such means for reclaiming Walter of Raeburn from his heresy, as savoured far more of persecution than persuasion. In this he was assisted by MacDougal of Makerston, brother to Isabella MacDougal, the wife of the said Walter, and who, like her husband, had conformed to the Quaker tenets.