reign of the last of the Stuarts with more truthfulness,--their
severity, their strict and Judaical observance of the Sabbath, their
hostility to popular amusements, their rigid and legal morality, their
love of theological dogmas, their inflexible prejudices, their lofty
aspirations? Where shall we find in literature a sterner fanatical
Puritan than John Balfour of Burley, or a fiercer royalist than Graham
of Claverhouse? As a love-story this novel is not remarkable. It is not
in the description of passionate love that Scott anywhere excels. His
heroines, with two or three exceptions, would be called rather tame by
the modern reader, although they win respect for their domestic virtues
and sterling elements of character. His favorite heroes are either
Englishmen of good family, or Scotchmen educated in England,--gallant,
cultivated, and reproachless, but without any striking originality or
intellectual force.

"Rob Roy" was published in the latter part of 1817, and was received by
the public with the same unabated enthusiasm which marked the appearance
of "Guy Mannering" and the other romances. An edition of ten thousand
was disposed of in two weeks, and the subsequent sale amounted to forty
thousand more. The scene of this story is laid in the Highlands of
Scotland, with an English hero and a Scottish heroine; and in this
fascinating work the political history of the times (forty years earlier
than the period of "Waverley") is portrayed with great impartiality. It
is a description of the first Jacobite rising against George I. in the
year 1715. In this novel one of the greatest of Scott's creations
appears in the heroine, Diana Vernon,--rather wild and masculine, but
interesting from her courage and virtue. The character of Baillie Jarvie
is equally original and more amusing.

The general effect of "Rob Roy," as well as of "Waverley" and "Old