SIR WALTER SCOTT'S

POETICAL WORKS.

EDINBURGH:

PRINTED BY BALLANTYNE AND COMPANY,

PAUL'S WORK.

THE

POETICAL WORKS

OF

SIR WALTER SCOTT.

With Memoir and Critical Dissertation,

BY THE

REV. GEORGE GILFILLAN.

VOL. I.

CONTAINING

THE LAY OF THE LAST MINSTREL,

AND

THE LADY OF THE LAKE;

WITH THE ORIGINAL NOTES OF THE AUTHOR,
UNABRIDGED

EDINBURGH:

JAMES NICHOL, 9 NORTH BANK STREET.
LONDON: JAMES NISBET & CO. DUBLIN: W. ROBERTSON.

M.DCCC.LVII.

MEMOIR OF SIR WALTER SCOTT.

PART I.

WALTER SCOTT, the possessor of a name and fame only inferior to those of Homer and Shakspeare, was born in Edinburgh on the 15th of August 1771-the same day of the month as had been signalised two years previously by the birth of Napoleon Bonaparte. He was the son of Walter Scott, W.S., and Anne Rutherfurd, daughter of Dr John Rutherfurd, Professor of Medicine in the University of Edinburgh. Sir Walter, by his father, was descended from a family on the Border, of old extraction, which had branched off from the main current of the blood of Buccleuch, and produced some remarkable characters, such as Auld Watt of Harden, famous in Border-story, and in the song of his great descendant, and Beardie (so called from an enormous beard, which he never cut, in token of his regret for the banished house of Stuart), who was the great-grandfather of the poet. Through his mother he was connected with two other ancient families-the Bauld Rutherfords, mentioned in the notes to the "Lay of the Last Minstrel," and the Swintons, one of whom (Sir John) is extolled by Froissart, and through them with William Alexander, Earl of Stirling, the poet and dramatist. Sir Walter was proud of his lineage, proud of his connexion with the Border, and almost looked on Harden as his birthplace. He for many years made a regular autumnal excursion to the tower where Auld Watt brought home his