The Surgeon's Daughter

CTION.-

s been separated from the stories of the Highland Widow, &c., which it originally accompanied, and deferred to the close of t

as, in Galloway, whose kind assistance he has so often had occasion to acknowledge in the course of these prefaces; and that the military friend who is alluded to as having furnished him with some information as t

d, Septem

TO INTR

s nearly as possible in the shape in which he had told it; but the following na

s of the magistracy of his native burgh. By industry and economy in early life, he obtained the means of erecting, solely on his own account, one of those ingenious manufactories for which Fifeshire is justly celebrated. From the day on which the industrious art

unt. The council, court, and other business of the burgh, occupied much of his time, which caused him to intrust the management of his manufactory to a near relation, whose name was D---, a young man of dissolute habits; but the Thane, seeing at last, that by continuing that extravagant person in that charge, his affairs would, in all probability, fall into a state of b

n courted by D---. Immediately before his departure to India, as a mark of mutual affection, they exchanged miniatures, tak

cription to the old Thane, who took great pleasure in spreading the news of the reformed habits and singular good fortune of his intended heir. None of all his former acquaintances heard with such joy the favourable report of the successful adventurer in the East, as did the fair and accomplished daughter of the village surgeon; but his previous character caused her to keep her own correspondence with him secret from her parents, to whom even the circumstance of her being acquainted

m, and understanding that D--- had at last become a person of sober and ind

ducation, and fit her out in her journey to India; she was to embark at Sheerness, on board one of the Company's ships, for

intended husband, accompanied by her only brother, who, on their arrival at Sheerness, met

ntleman, from the time of her leaving the shores of Britain, till the intended marriage ceremony was du

any's service with so many attendants; and when D--- declined having the marriage ceremony performed according to the rites of the Church, till he returned to the place of his abode, C---, more and more confirmed in his suspicion that all was not right, resolved not to part with Emma till he had fulfilled, in the most satisfactory manner, the promise he had made before leaving England, of

aid of Fife, with whom he had fallen deeply in love, from seeing her miniature likeness in the possession of D---, to whom he h

dia, begging at the same time, for the honour of Caledonia, and protection of injured innocence, that he would use the means in his power, of resisting any attempt that might be made by the native chief to wrest

he affrighted Emma was for a time secured by her countrymen, who fought in her defence with all their native valour, which at length so overpowered their assa

ured me he saw them many years afterwards, living happily together in

.

UGLAS, Ju

TANGRY'S

my mus

a'd is

ises to

es of cou

IONARY

rient impatience, in short, to know what the world in general, and friends in particular, will say to our labours. Some authors, I am told, profess an oyster-like indifference upon this subje

ly; and I had determined to lay my work before the public, with the same unconcern with which the ostrich lays her eggs in the sand, giving herself no farther trouble concerning the incubation, but leaving to the atmosphere to bring forth the young, or

de, under some pretext or other, a bodily retreat to the kitchen or the cockloft, her own peculiar and inviolate domains. My publisher would have been a natural resource; but he understands his business too well, and follows it too closely, to desire to enter into literary discussions, wisely considering, that he who has to

ticule what looked very like a circulating library volume, as soon as her father entered the room. Still he was not only my assured, but almost my only friend, and I had little doubt that he would take an interest in the volume for the sake of the author, which the work itself might fail to

But the hours and days passed on from Monday till Saturday, and I had no acknowledgment whatever that my packet had reached its destination. "This is very unlike my good friend's punctuality," thought I; and having again and again vexed James, my male attendant, by a close examination concerning the time, place, and delivery, I had only to strain my imagination to conceive reasons for my friend

ucing your book into every writing and reading-chamber in Edinburgh, and yet you take fire at the t

gedly; "but for all that, I will ca

Mr. Walker of Edinburgh, [Footnote: Robert Walker, the colleague and rival of Dr. Hugh Blair, in St. Giles's Church Edinburgh] which was read by Miss Catherine with unusual distinctness, simplicity, and judgment. Welcomed as a friend of the house, I had nothing for it but to take my seat quietly, and making a virtue of necessity, endeavour to derive my share of the benefit arising from an excellent sermon. But I am afraid Mr. Walker's force of logic and precision

appearance, and hasty retreat, had rather surprised my friend, since, inst

This is not a night for secular business, but if

myself out of the scrape,-"only-only I sent you a little parcel, and as you are so regular i

always blows its vanities into haven. But this is the end of the session, when I have little time to read any thing printed except Inner-House pap

tic lawyer began my lucubrations, he would not be able to rise from them till he had finished the perusal,

eed, was five punctually; but what did I know but my friend might want half an hour's conversation with me before that time? I was ushered into an empty drawing-room, and, from a needle-book and work-basket hastily abandoned, I had

overheated. He had been taking a turn at golf, to prepare him for "colloquy sublime." And wherefore not? since the game, with its variety of odds, lengths, bunkers, tee'd balls, and so on, may be no inadequate representation of the hazards attending literary pursuits. In particular, those formidable buffets, which make one ball spin through the air like a rifle-shot, and strike another d

y friend's hospitable board, into the stomachs of those who surrounded it, to be there at leisure converted into chyle, while their thoughts were turned on higher matters. At length all was over. But the young ladies sat still, and talked of the music of the Freischutz, for nothing else was then thought of; so we discussed the wild hunter's song, and the tame hunter's song, &c. &c., in all which my young friends were quite at home. Luckily for me, all this horning and hooping drew on some allusion to the Seventh Hussars, which

ge which the arbiter undergoes in your estimation, when raised, though by your own free choice, from an ordinary acquaintance, whose opinions were of as little consequence to you as yours to him, into a superior personage, on w

belonging to the ancient Senate-House of Scotland. But what of that? I had made him my judge by my own election; and I have often observed, that an idea of declining such a reference, on account of his own consciousness of incompetency, is, as it perhaps ought to be, the last which occurs to the referee himself. He that has a literary work subjected to his judgment by the author, immediately throws his mind into a critical attit

tle of particular claret, decanted it with scrupulous accuracy with his own hand, caused his old domestic to bring a saucer of olives, and chips of

doubtless of hurting my feelings. What had I to do to talk to him ab

e would have been in better days to take a pint, in the old Scottish liberal acceptation of the phrase. Maybe you would have

mes was at the happy time of life, when he had better things to do th

solid in his studies-poetry and plays, Mr. Croftangry, all nonsense-they se

find much more grace in your eyes tha

ch fighting in history, as if men only were brought into this world to send one another out

very ill to trouble you with my idle manuscripts, Mr. Fairscribe; but you must do me the justice to remember, that I ha

lling for thi

collecting-"yes, yes, I have been very rude; but I had forgotten en

your side, have been too busy a m

I have read them bit by bit, just as I could get a moment'

riend?" said I,

own here two or three bits of things, which I presume to be errors of the press, otherwise it might be alleged, perhap

owed, that in one or two grossly obvious passages

e casual errors, how do you like the matter and the

igible, Mr. Croftangry, very intelligible; and that I consider as the first point in every thing that is intended to be understood. There are, indeed, here and there some fligh

like the meaning when you did get at it? or was that like some poni

about shooting and dirking, and downright hanging. I am told it was the Germans who first brought in such a practice of choosing their heroes out of the Porteous Roll; [Footnote: List of criminal indictments, so termed

, "my dear sir, le

found a better one, and that is, in Kate's work-basket. I sat down, and, like an old f

have approached that admirable author; even your friendl

side these sheets of yours when business came in the way. But, faith, this Schiller, sir, does not let you off so easily. I forgot one appointment on particular business, and I wilfully broke through another, that I might stay at home and fin

f real life-no pleasure in contemplating those spirit-rousing impulses,

he old days of Jacobitism. I must speak my plain mind, Mr. Croftangry. I cannot tell what innovations in Kirk and State may now be proposed, but our fathers were friends to both, as they were settled

without recollecting, while we gaze on them, any of the feuds by which the originals were animated while alive. But most happy should I be to light upon any topic to

and when you seek the impulses that make soldiers desert and shoot their sergeants and corporals, and Highland drovers dirk English graziers, to prove themselves men of fiery passions, it is not to a man like me you should come. I could tell you some trick

s that, my

d Highlands. If you want rogues, as they are so much in fashion with you, you have that gallant caste of adventurers, who laid down their consciences at the Cape of Good Hope as they went out to India, and forgot to take them up agai

ividual share of interest. They are distinguished among the natives like the Spaniards among the Mexicans. What do I say? They are like Homer's demigods among the warring mortals. Men, like Clive and Caillaud, influenced great events, like Jove himself. Inferior officers are like Mars or Neptune; and the sergeants and corporals m

ine of the story of poor Menie Gray, whose picture you will see in the drawing-room, a distant relation of my father's, who had, however, a handsome part of cousin Menie's succession. There are none living that can be hurt by the story now, th

dressing gown, the stays, however, being retained, and the bosom displayed in a manner which shows that our mothers, like their daughters, were as liberal of their charms as the nature of the dress might permit. To this, the well-known style of the period, the features and form of the individual added, at first sight, little interest. It represented a handsome woman of about thirty, her hair wound simply about her head, he

the picture-"She left our family not less, I dare say, than five thousand pounds, and I believe s

said I-"to judge from her look, i

, "I must away to my business-we cannot be gowfling all the morning, and telling old stories all the afternoon. Katie knows all the outs and the ins of cousin Men

unaffected a girl as you see tripping the new walks of Prince's Street or Heriot Row. Old bachelorship so decided as mine has its privileges in such a tete-a-tete, providing you are, or can seem for the time, perfectly good-humoured and attentive, a

oncern'd

t beauty

iness no

e them my own. A young lady can afford to talk with an old stager like me without either artifice or affectation; and we may maintain a s

knows to a penny what he is worth, and Miss Katie, with all her airs, may like the old brass that buys the new pan. I thought Mr. Croftangry was loo

pectacles which must supply the dimness of my own. I am a little deaf, too, as you know to your sorrow when we are partners; and if I could get

cumstances, which Miss Katie had suppressed or forgotten. Indeed, I have learned on this occasion, what old Lintot meant when he told Pope, that he used to propitiate the critics of importance, when he had a work in the press, by now and then letting them see a sheet of the blotted proof, or a few leaves of the original manuscript. Our

ce he has contributed a subject to the work, he has become a most zealous coadjutor; and half-ashamed, I believe, yet half-proud of the literary stock-company, in which he has got a sh

reader may be

GEON'S