"Remember this, and
show yourselves to be men! Remember the former things of old; for I am
God! declaring the end from the beginning. My counsel shall stand, and I
will do all my pleasure. Hearken unto me, ye stouthearted, that are far
from righteousness! I bring near my righteousness, and it shall not be far
off; and my salvation shall not tarry. I will place salvation for them who
trust in me!"—ISAIAH.
Note respecting the
personal Conformation of SIR WILLIAM WALLACE and KING
ROBERT BRUCE.
THE extraordinary bodily,
as well as mental superiority which Wallace and Bruce possessed over their
contemporaries, is thus recorded
by Hector Boetius:-
"About the latter end
of the year 1430, King James I. (of Scotland,) on returning to Perth, from
St. Andrews, found his curiosity excited to visit a very old lady of the
house of Erskine, who resided in the castle of Kinnoul. In consequence of
her extreme old age she had lost her sight, but all her other senses were
entire, and her body was yet firm and active. She had seen William Wallace
and Robert Bruce in her earliest youth, and frequently told particulars of
them. The King, who entertained a love and veneration for great men,
resolved to visit the old lady, that he might hear her describe the
manners and strength of the two heroes. He therefore sent a message,
acquainting her that he would
come to her the next day. When she was told that the King was approaching,
she went down into the hall of her castle, attended by a train of matrons;
many of whom were her own descendants. She advanced to meet his Majesty so
easily and gracefully that he doubted her being blind! At his desire, she
embraced and kissed him. He took her by the hand, and made her sit down on
the seat next him, and then, in a long conferrence, he interrogated her on
ancient matters. Among others, he asked her to tell him what sort of a man
William Wallace was; what was his personal figure; what his bearing; and
with what degree of strength he was endowed. He put the same comparing
questions to her concerning Robert Bruce. ‘Robert; said she,’ was
a man beautiful, and of a fine appearance. His strength was so great, that
he could easily have overcome any mortal man of his time, save one! Sir
William Wallace ! But in so far as he excelled other men, he was excelled
by Wallace, both in stature and in bodily strength ! For in wrestling,
Wallace could have overthrown two such men as Robert. And he was comely,
as well as strong; and full of the beauty of wisdom"
I might have thought, had I
known the above record in my young days, when I heard my old friend Luckie
Forbes, describe the Scottish heroes, that she must have been one of those
matrons of honour to Lady Kinnoul, and had "seen baith the stalwarth
chiefs" in her also venerable life. But the description of my humble
historiographer, was the work of her own heart; suggested there by
tradition; and a holy reverence of even the name of William Wallace, to
help it out; and so my pen, moved by the same impulse, has attempted to
copy the picture she presented.— (1809.)
Postscript to the above Appendix,
added May, 1841.
The preceding note having
been appended to the first edition of this work, at the time of its
answering date; an extraordinary circumstance which occurred a few years
afterwards, regarding certain portraitures of Sir William Wallace and
Robert Bruce, the author of these pages is tempted to repeat now, as being
a something strange and romantic story. The original relater of it was Mr.
Blake, a young painter of remarkable talents; but which were, at times,
carried away into wild fancies; a mirage of waking dreams, which he
gravely asserted, on describing them, were real visions from the departed
world. Soon after the publication of the "Scottish Chiefs," his
ardent nature had deeply interested him in their fate; but most
particularly in that of Wallace; of whose unjust doom he was often in the
habit of speaking to a friend of the author of the book, and with a force
of language, and indignation at the fact, as if the noble victim’s death
had been only an event of yesterday.
In one of my friend’s
calls on the young painter, he found him in an almost breathless ecstasy,
which he explained to him, by telling him that he had just achieved two
sketches—one of Sir William Wallace, the other of his enemy, Edward the
First!—Both chiefs having actually appeared to him successively, and had
successively stood, at his earnest request, to allow him to make a hasty
sketch of their forms.
While he related this, he
placed a small canvas, of the common portrait size, on his easel, before
my friend; on which was drawn, in a bold and admirable manners the head of
a young warrior in the prime of his days: as Wallace is described to have
been, even at the time in which he was cut off. There was neither helmet,
nor any covering on his head, excepting the rich golden-tinted light-hair,
that waved high and loosely from off his broad and very elevated forehead.
The face was, nearly a front view, remarkably handsome—open in its
expression, and full of an ardent, generous courage: the blue eye being
bright and expanded, and the lips of a noble contour, seemed cheering his
devoted followers to deeds of glory. All was gallant sunshine over that
fine countenance, which, while you looked on it, might almost induce you
to believe the reality of the vision. Also, the high bearing of its
corresponding neck and chest. The first was entirely bare; and the latter
simply discovered a low breastplate of plain workmanship, half covered by
his plaid, broached on the shoulder. This was all which was even outlined
in this mysterious portrait. For the painter told my friend, that having
turned to dip his pencil for a further touch, when he looked up again, the
vision was gone!—While my friend was contemplating this extraordinary
portrait, its enraptured artist had described its origin, in this wise:—"He
was sitting, meditating, as he had often done, on the heroic actions and
hard fate of the Scottish hero, when, like a flash of lightning, a noble
form stood before him; which he instantly knew, by a something within
himself to be Sir William Wallace. He felt it was a spiritual appearance;
which might vanish away as instantly as it came; and, transported at the
sight, he besought the hero to remain a few moments till he might sketch
him. The warrior Scot, in this vision, seemed as true to his historical
mental picture, as his noble shade was to the manly bearing of his
recorded person; for, with his accustomed courtesy, he smiled on the young
painter;—and the sketch was outlined, with a tint or two besides. But,
while eagerly proceeding, the artist bent his head once too often, to
replenish his pencil; and turning again, to pursue the noble contour, the
spirit of the ‘stalworth knight’ had withdrawn from mortal ken. But
(Blake proceeded to say,) it had not left a vacancy! Edward the First
stood in its place; armed from head to foot, in a close and superb suit of
mail; but with the visor of his helmet open!"
The artist, it appears, had
as little difficulty in recognising the royal hero; as, when his heart, as
well as eyes, bowing before the august figure just departed, told him it
was the Caledonian patriot he beheld. His English loyalty, however, made
him rise before the royal apparition. Nevertheless he saluted the monarch
with the same earnest privilege of enthusiastic genius, which had dictated
his request to the Scottish chief; and he asked the stern-looking, but
majestic warrior-king of England, to allow him to make a corresponding
sketch. This too, was accorded. And he had arrived at about the same
point, as in the former portrait, when the British hero also disappeared;—and
Blake was left—not so disappointed at not having accomplished all be
wished, as enraptured at having been permitted to behold two such
extraordinary characters; and to have thus far, identified their personal
presence to himself; and to the world, to all posterity! For such was his
own conviction. The vast expense of life’s energies, wrought in this
young man, by the overactive exercise of his talents; and the burning
enthusiasm, which almost ever over-stimulated their action; swiftly
consumed his constitution; and not very long after the painting of these
two visionary portraits, he died of a rapid decline—my friend purchased
them both; and subsequently showed them to me; recounting the little
history, I have just repeated. And, I confess, I looked upon them with no
small pleasure; for each bore a strong resemblance to the pictures my mind
had before imbibed of both heroes, from all the historical descriptions I
had ever heard, or read. There is, however, a roughly-visaged old head,
that I have often seen, in rude oil-painting, and in equally rude
engraving, which is pretended to be the portrait of Sir William Wallace.
But it does not in any one respect, answer to the historical, or
traditionary accounts of the knight’s person; excepting that it has part
of a coat of mail on its breast, and the usual tartan plaid, which marks a
Scottish warrior of any age. But it has two contradictions to attested
facts, which completely disprove its authenticity as a likeness of that
hero. It is the head of a weather-beaten, and evidently thickset elderly
man, beyond fifty years of age. Whereas, Wallace was hardly more than
thirty, when he died on the scaffold. His figure too, was eminently tall
and well-proportioned; and his hair was noted for being "yellow like
gold." While, on the reverse, the beard, rough eyebrows, and scant
locks of the pretended old portrait of the hero, are dark—almost
amounting to black. That it may be a picture of some distinguished
personage of the name of Wallace, is very likely; from the great respect
in which it is even now held in his country—(and particularly by seamen;
who have been known to keep the print hung up in the cabin of their little
vessels, by way of a talisman against storms, or enemies !)—therefore I
see not why the real original of the memorial in question, may not have
been some celebrated naval defender of the Scottish sea, or shore, of the
family of William Wallace; but of a later period than himself; as the
costume of the portrait, evidently appears of a more modern date.—(1841.)
Note concerning JOANNA
of MAR and STRATHEARN.
This unhappy, and wicked
woman’s descendance, as daughter of a princess of the Orkneys, and her
husband Mellis Earl of Strathearn, is given in all the old Scottish
genealogical, works; and her marriage with Earl de Warenne, followed up by
her most unnatural treasons against her native country, are not less
faithfully recorded.
But it is something
curious, that while revising this volume a few years ago, I met a
paragraph in the Morning Post newspaper, relative to this very lady—now
dead upwards of five hundred years—and dated, August 26th, 1831; almost
the very anniversary-day of Sir William Wallace’s death! It was an
extract from the Perth Courier, and runs thus:— "In
preparing the foundation of the classical monument which Lady Baird is
about to erect on Tom-a-Chastel, to the memory of Sir David, the workmen
discovered the remains of an extensive edifice, intermixed with a blackish
mould, in which human bones frequently, occur, with stirrups, buckles, and
other decayed fragments of ancient armour. In an excavation, were found a
quantity of black earth, the debris of animal matter; some human
bones; a bracelet; and a considerable portion of charcoal; from which it
may be concluded, that the individuals whose remains were discovered, had
perished during a conflagration of the castle. The tradition of the
country is, that—Three ladies had been there burnt to death. And
as it is known that the Lady of Strathearn, a daughter of the Earl of
Orkney, involved herself in the quarrels between Bruce and Baliol; and
was, after the ascendency of the former, in a parliament held at Scone in
1329, doomed to perpetual imprisonment for the crime of laesae
majestatis, it is no violent stretch of conjecture, to come to the
conclusion that this very lady may have been one of the unhappy victims
whose remains have been thus accidentally brought to light. The
excavation, undoubtedly (being the most probable supposition) was that
usually found in the base of the dungeon-keep of the castle. Tom-a-Chastel,
on the summit of which Sir David Baird’s monument is to be placed,
overlooks the whole strath, and is even visible from Dundee." So far,
the note from the Perth newspaper; (which was first appended to this,
"almost veritable, romance-biography of Sir William Wallace," in
the edition of 1831;) and, on comparing the circumstances and dates of the
period referred to, it does not seem improbable that such might have been
the fearful end of that ambitious, and cruelly impassioned woman. Earl de
Warenne was not a man to burden himself with cares for such a partner,
after her treasons had become abortive, in the secret continuance of
which, most likely she had been discovered in some of her territorial
permitted visits to her inherited lands in Scotland. And the relics of the
other two female forms found in the ashes, may reasonably be supposed to
have been those of her personal attendants, sharing her captivity.
The above coincidence of
recollections between the far past, and the present nearly but passing
events, may be regarded as rather remarkable. For the hill of Tom-a-Chastel,
may now be looked upon as an object recalling to memory two heroes.
One, Scotland’s noblest son, of full five hundred ages gone! The other,
her boast on the plains of India, within our own remembrance. While the
same summit, brings two of her daughters likewise, to eminent
recollection. One that disgraced her sex, in every relation of life; the
other, who honours it, in all. The hand of the first would have destroyed
her country’s greatest hero ;—the hand of the second, raises a tumulus,
to maintain the memory, and the example of such true sons of her
country, in a perpetual existence.—(1841.)
The Scarf of
JAMES THE FIFTH OF SCOTLAND, in the
possession of Dr. Jefferson, of West Lodge, Clapham.
This scarf belonged to, and
was worn by the truly royal, but something romantically adventurous King
of Scotland, James the Fifth. He was fond of roaming about in his
dominions, like the celebrated Haroun Al Raschid, in various disguises, to
see, and to observe; and to make acquaintance with his people of all
degrees, without being known by them. In one of these incognito
wanderings, about the year 1533, he was hospitably entertained for a
night, by an ancestor of Dr. Jefferson’s lady; a man of liberal name in
the country;. and who, unwittingly had given most courteous bed and board
to his sovereign, (then personally unknown to him,) when he thought he was
entertaining a person not much above the rank of the commonest degree. It
being the monarch’s humour, generally to assume the most ordinary garb
outwardly; and it therefore depended on the tact of the entertainer, from
his own inherent nobleness, to discern the real quality of the mind and
manners of his transitory guest. The host in question did not discern that
it was his sovereign, he was then treating like a prince; but he felt it
was a visitant, be he whom he may, that was worthy his utmost respect; and
the monarch, highly pleased with his night’s lodging, and previous
gracious welcome, on his departure next morning, presented to the lady of
the mansion a grateful tribute to her good care, in the form of a small
parcel rolled up, which, when opened, they found to be a splendid scarf
endorsed to herself and lord, in the name of the Gudemon o’
Ballangeich. All knew it was then the "generous and pleasant King
of Scotland;" who had been their guest.
The Scottish Chief, on whom
this beautiful memorial of received
hospitality had been bestowed, was John Burgh, of Burntisland, in
Fifeshire; from whom the writer of this note literally traces the present
inheritance of the scarf. John Burgh had an only daughter, who married
John Balfour, K. N., who also had an only daughter, and she married
Gilbert Blair, brother to Blair of Ard-Blair. Their only son, James Blair,
married Jane Morrison, daughter of— Morrison, Esq. and an heiress of the
brave house of Ramsay; by which marriage the ancient and honourable
families of Burgh, Blair, and Ramsay were woven into one branch; and from
this branch, indeed from the first off-set of its united stem, was born,
of this marriage, Margaret Blair; who, dying in the year 1836, bequeathed
the long-cherished scarf to Dr. Jefferson, the worthy husband of her
beloved kinswoman—direct in the line of John Burgh, to whom it had
originally been given. And by the above little memorandum, we see that Dr.
Jefferson’s lady is only fifth in descent from the hospitable chief of
Burntisland!
Touching on the above three
names, so justly respected in Scottish history from the earliest times;
and being especially connected with the era of my "Scottish
Chiefs," I cannot forbear dwelling a little more particularly on
their genealogy, to the present period. Both the Ramsays and the Blairs
were conspicuous adherents to the fates of Wallace and of Bruce. Anterior
to the twelfth century the Blairs were established in Ayrshire, and thence
spread themselves in brave settlements, as was the uses of those times,
northward and southward, into Perthshire, Fifeshire, and on the banks of
the Eske.
The Ramsays, by a similar
valiant course, found to themselves commanding homesteads in the same
districts; and in process of time, as has been shown, mingled their
"brave and beautiful" sons and daughters, into nuptial bands.
We have heraldic records of
these families, and their successive unions, thus from respected
authority. "The sirname of Blair, (observes Douglas, in his
Baronage,) is of great antiquity in Scotland; and there are two families
of the name, who have long competed for the chieftainship:—viz. Blair of
Balthyock, whose principal residence has always been in Fife or Perthshire;
and Blair of Blair, (or that ilk,) in Ayrshire. The first of the Blairs of
Balthyock, we have found upon record, was Alexander de Blair, who
flourished in the reigns of William the Lion, and his son Alexander II.,
who succeeded his royal father, A.D. 1214. Here we have the lineal
ancestors of the Blairs, who drew their swords, and wove their epic song,
to the fame of their country, and of William Wallace. These Blairs
intermarried with the lines of the Ramsays, north and south. And from the
Blairs of Balthyock, and Ard-Blair, Mrs. Jefferson’s mother, whose
maiden name was Margaret Ramsay, of the family of the present Sir James
Ramsay of Banff, (according to the above-quoted authority of Douglas,) was
descended, by a double descent. "Sir Alexander Blair, having married
Helen, the sister of Sir William Ramsay, in 1266; and Sir Gilbert Ramsay,
married Elizabeth, daughter of Sir Thomas Blair, in 1635. To go back to
the point of union between the Blair and the Morrison; from whom Mrs.
Jefferson, the heiress of the royal scarf, is straightly descended, we
find it thus:—James Blair, the great grandson of the hospitable chief to
whom it was first given, married Jane Morrison, whose own mother was a
Ramsay, and of near kindred to Mrs. Jefferson’s maternal grandfather,
George Ramsay, Esq., they having been brother’s children. This George
Ramsay married a beautiful Englishwoman, Miss Doyley, of an ancient family
in Buckinghamshire. The memorials of this honourable parentage, are not
the ostentatious displays of a vain blazonry, but are like the bright
elements of a pure atmosphere. Turn to respire their breath, and their sun
shall inhale a vivifying principle of active and generous usefulness—start
aside, despising the bland influence, the collected rays of successive
ages, and perversely seeking a course of his own, anywhere, and under any
sky; and he need not be surprised when, at the termination of his
unrefleeting career he shall leave no track behind worthy to be followed,
or to be in any way remembered.
Not so was the memory of
the royal scarf I have to describe; nor of the noble race on whom it was
bestowed. And I am especially moved to note it, having seen it, and been
gratified with a minute inspection of it, by its present respected and
deserving possessors. It is composed of a rich and brilliant tissue of
gold and silver threads, interwoven with silk-embroidered flowers in their
natural colours. They are chiefly pansies, the emblems of remembrance;
thistles, the old ensignia of Scotland; and the field daisy, the favourite
symbol of King James’s mother, the beautiful Queen Margaret. The
flowers, entwined together, run in stripes down the splendid web of the
scarf; which terminates at each end with what has been a magnificent
fringe of similar hues and brightness. The scarf is seven feet in length,
by one foot nine inches in width.
This interesting bequest
was still further enriched to Dr. Jefferson, by the addition of a cap and
gloves, which tradition says, the worthy chief of Burntisland wore on his
nuptial day. There are also a smaller pair of gloves, of a more delicate
size and texture, appropriated by the same testimony to the fair bride.
But these articles are supposed to have been of earlier fabric than that
of the scarf—probably about the year 1500; and they are of less
exquisite manufacture: the former appearing to be from the fine looms of
France, and the latter wrought in the less practised machinery of our then
ruder northern isle. The cap is of a pale red silk, with gold cord and
embroidery down the seams, it being formed to fit the head, and therefore
in compartments broad, where they are inserted into the rich fillet-band
round the head; and narrowing to the closely-fitting top. it looked
something like an Albanian cap. The gloves, which are said to have been
those of the chief, were of a brownish fine leather, with embroidered
gauntlet tops. The lady’s are of a lighter hue, and still softer
leather, with gay fringe of varied-coloured silk and gold, and tassels at
the wrists. Both these pairs of gloves were well shaped, and most neatly
sewed.
On these relics of antiquity, and of
ancestorial memorials, devolving on Dr. Jefferson, he sought for a place
of deposit for them, suitable to their dignity, their character, and their
times. He had in his possession a curious old table, of the era of Henry
the Eighth, which he soon adapted to the purpose. Its large oaken slab was
of sufficient dimensions to admit of the royal gift being spread in
graceful folds over the dark surface of the wood, which the better
displayed the tissue’s interchanging tints; and also gave room for the
disposal of the cap and gloves, which were placed in a kind of armorial
crest between its gauntlets, at the head of the scarf; and at its foot was
added a beautifully written inscription in old emblazoned characters,
historic of the interesting relics above. The whole is secured from dust
or other injury by a covering of plate-glass, extending over the entire
surface of the table; which, having a raised carved oak parapet-border, of
about four inches high along all its sides, forms a sort of castellated
sanctuary, that completely defends from accident the glass, and the
treasure beneath it; which is distinctly seen through the lucid medium.
The shape of the table is like what we call a sofa-table, but very long,
being five feet by two and a half. The depth of its frieze altogether, is
eight inches; for it extends four inches below the four-inch parapet
above; and this lower portion is worked into a foliage, enwreathing the
sides. The whole height of the table, from the feet of its four-clawed
pedestal, is three feet two inches. This pedestal, or rather branching
stem of polished oak,—being of the sturdy contour of its original
growth, with its superb ramifications supporting the precious slab above,—shows
an elaborate design in its carvings, far beyond my power to describe; so
luxuriant, so various, so intricate, one might almost suppose that the
matchless tool of the famous Beneventa Cellini had traced its wild and
graceful grotesque. The four claws, which are like roots from the stem of
the pedestal, partake of the same rich arabesque in their design, and
terminate in the form of lion’s-paws.
But the most striking part
of this noble pedestal, is the presence of four figures, with each its
back to the stem; roughly-garbed men, with bag-pipes in their arms and at
their lips. At the first glance, they appear to be ancient Highlanders, in
kilt and bonnet; but on looking closer, they are discovered to be ancient
people indeed, but of what country it may not be so easy to determine.
For, what seemed the Scottish kilt, is a rough, short vesture, of some
animal’s hairy hide; while, whatever other covering the figures have,
which is scanty enough, bears an equally wild and almost savage aspect.
Ancient Italy, as well as ancient Greece, exhibited the bag-pipe. But the
coincidence of seeing men so habited, and appended, on a table its owner
had only adapted to his interesting piece of Scottish antiquity, could
hardly lead to other conjecture, on a first glance, than that they were
the aborigines, at least, of old Caledonia.
The plaids of Scotland, with their
peculiar distinguishing stripes, have been supposed to be of Phoenician
origin; and the bag-pipe too, has been traced to that same primeval
people. The writer of these notes intended to have added some particulars
concerning these tartans’ history, as connected with the Scottish clans;
but her Appendix having swollen so far beyond the length she originally
meditated, she resigns the pleasing task to, she hopes, some more able pen
hereafter; referring the eye of the inquirer into their various bearings,
to the complete collection, and fully satisfactory explanation of them, to
be found at the liberal house of Messrs. Romanes and Paterson, in the city
of Edinburgh; who, above a year ago, obliged her with a gift of some fine
specimens of them all.
And now, on the 30th of
June, 1841, I finish this Appendix; and close my re-touching hand, over
"The Scottish Chiefs;" perhaps for ever. I now resign them
entirely to the world and to posterity, like an aged parent taking a last
leave of the child of her bosom;—and, of a certainty, while writing it,
it was "most pleasant to me—sweet, though mournful to my soul
!" But it was not my first work; it followed that of "Thaddeus
of Warsaw;" which, of course, being published before its successor,
the "Scottish Chiefs" has, by due course of time, returned to
me, to date as my own property again, a few years anterior to the similar
return of the "Scottish Chiefs." And, as I have now re-launched
that, my second-born, (as I may call it,) into the world’s revolving
ocean of taste and opinions;—yet still ultimately steered through by the
one great star of sound Christian principle!—I feel a corresponding
wish, to give a last refit to my first-born also; and, ere long, I hope to
pass my revising hand over its pages, and then resign it to a similar
re-launching as that of the "Scottish Chiefs." In such a case,
"Thaddeus of Warsaw" may then make its last essay, under
some circumstances particularly interesting to its author, at least as far
as relates to her own feelings with regard to her work’s Connection with
their subject.
On its first publication, it was brought out under the
encouragement of friendship; it was a simple tale of true heroism! and it
appeased under the sanctioning banner of her most revered friend, Sir
Sidney Smith;—then "the observed of all observers! "—the just
returned from his ever-memorable defence of St. Jean D’Acre! when
all England pressed to give him hail, and high and low made acclamation to
his well-earned fame. The smiles of beauty, the plaudits of patriotic
virtue, were then, a galaxy around him. Now, the tears of the one, and the
grave regrets of the other, have succeeded; time has passed on and the Hero
of Acre is no more. And also now, the author of "Thaddeus of
Warsaw," contemplating the republication of that little tale of
"other days;" which, in its first morning, imbibing some of that
bright sun’s influence, thereafter lost not hold of a sort of twilight
abiding ray;—she thinks it not improbable, that something like the
dawn, and the evening of her mind’s destiny, may again meet on the same
point:—with this change, the fate of all living, having passed
between that "dawn and evening"—life and death having
re-united that point into one—she thinks it not improbable, that the
last edition of her earliest work may meet the returning mortal remains of
the hero and friend, under whose protecting auspices it first met the
world. He was then full of life and zeal for human-kind, and the hope of
all noble achievements! And now he is laid in his cold coffin, in a
foreign,
and once long-hostile land! But, (and respected be the honourable pledge
given to his country, at the close of the just expired session of
Parliament!) those sacred relics are to be restored to England, and laid
in a tomb of honour, in one or other of the two great cathedral-cemeteries of
our British metropolis!
Thus, it indeed becomes the Government of every
country, and the people who compose its population, to uphold its
defenders in life, and to honour their remains when dead. Such memorials
speak aloud to future generations—"England, while she expects
every man born in her dominions to DO HIS DUTY!—like
the God who made the worlds, rewardeth that duty, as if it were a
debt!" How noble the stimulus! and true to the nature in which the
best of men are formed! Not any sordid reward is promised; but
that which emanates from the exalted soul that gives, and is ardently
welcomed by that of him by whom it is received:—" Honour to whom honour is due!" Of the like character and
acceptance are the records of history. Even so that of the epic song. The
aim, also, of the biographical style of romance; to which my pen hath
ardently, though humbly been devoted, from its holder’s "youth to
age;" and, that its aim has not been disappointed, in the hearth of
many a young aspirant to patriotic glory, and to private virtue, who has
read her pages—chronicling the noble deeds of old!—is indeed a
"setting sun" of gracious influence, to the declining days of
JANE PORTER.
1841.
Note:
There is another book about Wallace and Bruce available in e-text:
In Freedom's Cause : A Story Of Wallace
And Bruce
by Henty, G. A. (George Alfred), 1832-1902 |