St. Ronan's Well Read online

  EDITOR'S NOTES.

  [I-A] p. 1. "David M'Pherson's map." In his "Geographical History,"London, 4to, 1796.

  [I-B] p. 11. "Jenny Dods ... at Howgate." Scott admitted to Erskine thatthe name of "Dods" was borrowed from this slatternly heroine.

  [I-C] p. 33. "He was nae Roman, but only a Cuddie, or Culdee." SomeScottish Protestants took pride in believing that their Kirk descendedfrom Culdees, who were not of the Roman Communion. The Culdees havegiven rise to a world of dispute, and he would be a bold man whopretended to understand their exact position. The name seems to be _CeleDe_, "servant [gillie] of God." They were not Columban monks, but fill agap between the expulsion of the Columbans by the Picts, and theAnglicising and Romanising of the Scottish Church by St. Margaret andher sons. Originally solitary ascetics, they clustered into groups, and,if we are to believe their supplanters at St. Andrews, the CanonsRegular, they were married men, and used church property for familyprofit. Their mass they celebrated with a rite of their own, in theirlittle church. They were gradually merged in, and overpowered at St.Andrews, for example, by the Canons Regular, and are last heard of inprosecuting a claim to elect the Bishop, at the time of Edward theFirst's interference with Scottish affairs. The points on which theydiffered from Roman practice would probably have seemed veryinsignificant to such a theologian as Meg Dods.

  [I-D] p. 47. "Fortunio, in the fairy-tale." The gifted companions ofFortunio, Keen-eye, Keen-ear, and so forth, are very old stockcharacters in Maerchen: their first known appearance is in the saga ofJason and the Fleece of Gold.

  [I-E] p. 169. "The sportsman's sense of his own cruelty." In thereminiscences of Captain Basil Hall, published by Lockhart, he mentionsthat Scott himself had a dislike of shooting, from a sentiment as to thecruelty of the sport. "I was never quite at ease when I had knocked downmy blackcock, and going to pick him up he cast back his dying eye with alook of reproach. I don't affect to be more squeamish than myneighbours, but I am not ashamed to say that no practice ever reconciledme fully to the cruelty of the affair. At all events, now that I can doas I like without fear of ridicule, I take more pleasure in seeing thebirds fly past me unharmed." (Lockhart, vii. 331.)

  [I-F] p. 240. "Tintock." A hill on the Upper Tweed, celebrated in localrhyme as--

  On Tintock tap there is a mist, And in the mist there is a kist, And in the kist there is a cap, And in the cap there is a drap. Tak' up the cap, drink out the drap, And set it down on Tintock tap.

  [I-G] p. 245. "Donald Cargill." See Editor's Notes to "Redgauntlet." Howieof Lochgoin says Cargill was executed in Edinburgh, not at Queensferry,as stated here.

  ANDREW LANG_December 1893._