It is easy in the dark to
confuse the fire-fly and the star. Fancy, for example, the Old
Masters seeking their subjects in inn parlours, or St. Sebastians,
while Columbus was discovering America before their very faces.
I have said that I think "Ivanhoe" the best of Scott's novels. I
suppose most people would subscribe to that. But how about the
second best? It speaks well for their general average that there is
hardly one among them which might not find some admirers who would
vote it to a place of honour. To the Scottish-born man those novels
which deal with Scottish life and character have a quality of
raciness which gives them a place apart. There is a rich humour of
the soil in such books as "Old Mortality," "The Antiquary," and "Rob
Roy," which puts them in a different class from the others. His old
Scottish women are, next to his soldiers, the best series of types
that he has drawn. At the same time it must be admitted that merit
which is associated with dialect has such limitations that it can
never take the same place as work which makes an equal appeal to all
the world. On the whole, perhaps, "Quentin Durward," on account of
its wider interests, its strong character-drawing, and the European
importance of the events and people described, would have my vote
for the second place. It is the father of all those sword-and-cape
novels which have formed so numerous an addition to the light
literature of the last century. The pictures of Charles the Bold and
of the unspeakable Louis are extraordinarily vivid.
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