Page:Marmion - Walter Scott (ed. Bayne, 1889).pdf/279
INTRODUCTION TO CANTO FOURTH.
'James Skene, Esq., of Rubislaw, Aberdeenshire, was Cornet in the Royal Edinburgh Light Horse Volunteers; and Sir Walter Scott was Quartermaster of the same corps.'—Lockhart.
For Skene's account of the origin of this regiment, due in large measure to 'Scott's ardour,' see 'Life of Scott,' i. 258.
l. 2. See Taming of the Shrew, i. 4. 135, and 2 Henry IV, v. 3. 143, where a line of an old song is quoted:—
'Where is the life that late I led?'
l. 3. See As you Like It, ii. 7. 12.
l. 7. Scott made the acquaintance of Skene, recently returned from a lengthened stay in Saxony, about the end of 1796, and profited much by his friend's German knowledge and his German books. In later days he utilized suggestions of Skene's in 'Ivanhoe' and 'Quentin Durward.' See 'Life of Scott,' passim, and specially i. 257, and iv. 342.
l. 37. Blackhouse, a farm 'situated on the Douglas-burn, then tenanted by a remarkable family, to which I have already made allusion—that of William Laidlaw.'—'Life,' i. 328. Ettrick Pen is a hill in the south of Selkirkshire.
l. 46. 'Various illustrations of the Poetry and Novels of Sir Walter Scott, from designs by Mr. Skene, have since been published.'—Lockhart.
l. 48. Probably the first reference in poetry to the Scottish heather is, says Prof. Veitch ('Feeling for Nature,' ii. 52), in Thomson's 'Spring,' where the bees are represented as daring
'The purple heath, or where the wild thyme grows.'
ll. 55-97. With this striking typical winter piece, cp. in Thomson's 'Winter,' the vivid and pathetic picture beginning:—
See also Burns's 'Winter Night,' which by these lines may have suggested Scott's 'beamless sun':—