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DEAR PUBLISHER,—YOU say you want a
"Preface" for Roselty Ends. I am afraid you
cannot get it. It is a difficult thing to write a Preface. An orthodox
Preface usually explains the high moral purpose which the author had in
view, or the circumstances under which the book was written. I do not
claim a high moral purpose for the book, and if readers discover evidences
of such in its pages, it is at their own risk, and I wash my hands of all
responsibility. It would be unwise to assert that the book has been issued
to fill the felt want of a thoroughly reliable technical dissertation on
the important subject of leather, because readers would promptly find out
that the book was not built that way. Rosetty Ends was not written to
dispel the ennui of a sick-bed; it was not written to relieve the tedium
of a number of snow-bound passengers on the Highland Railway;
nor was it compiled to mitigate the monotony of the existence of the
entombed victims of a coal-pit explosion, although it is humbly hoped that
the book might be useful on such occasions. Had Rosetly Ends been written
under so romantic circumstances as these, the public might have been glad
to know it; but having no such sentimental apology for its existence, it
may be better to face the reader without the usual "please-don't-kick"
page.
Yours faithfully,
A. DEWAR WILLOCK.
December 1886.
Contents
Chapter I. —Crowdiehowe
Chapter
II.—The Luminous Coo
Chapter III.—The Mysterious Cat
Chapter IV.—Tam
Pearson's Scare
Chapter V.—Miss M'Snaffle's Blight
Chapter VI.—The Hameless Waif
Chapter VII.—Ghaest-Seein' an' its effects
Chapter
VIII.—A cure for love
Chapter IX.—Sandy Pitlesslie's toothache
Chapter X.—The curlin' match
Chapter XI.—Galvanism is life
Chapter
XII.—The dangers o' philosophical experiments
Chapter XIII.—The loves
o' Geordie Simpson an' Mary Wheatsheaf
Chapter XIV.—The village wastre
Chapter
XV.—Frae ill to waur
Chapter XVI.—Dauvit Wabster's vote
Chapter
XVII.—The midnight alarm
Chapter XVIII.—The burglary
Chapter
XIX.—The Macartney legacy
Chapter XX.—Love laughs at Locksmith
Chapter XXI—Some shows
Chapter XXII.—Ither shows
Chapter XXIII.—A
scrape wi a bear
Chapter XXIV.—A teetotal lecture
Chapter XXV.—The burnin' ship
Chapter XXVI.—Wooed an' married an' a' |
