Sir Walter Scott's 'Rob Roy'

Well - another Sir Walter under my reading belt. I had never read Rob Roy and the story wasn't quite what I had expected. I haven't seen the Liam Neeson (1995) film either, so that didn't influence me. Apparently, it was the favourite Scott novel of both Lord Rosebery and Robert Louis Stevenson. It is the story of the tension, the conflict even, between commerce and adventure. Between Glasgow and the Highlands? Although Rob himself does appear in volumes one and two of the three-decker, it is not until volume three that he really bestrides the stage. One of Scott's 'faults' is that he takes a long time to get going and then appears to rush the ending. Rob Roy is no exception  - the disposal of uncle Hildebrand and all his sons in the last few pages, and Diana's availability to marry Francis only three pages from the end, is too far-fetched. However, there are plenty of plus marks: amongst other characters, at last a feisty heroine, a nasty 'baddy' and some fascinating side-kicks - the pathetic Mr. Morris; Justice Inglewood; Jobson the attorney (whom John Buchan maintains is one of Scott's best legal comic figures); Mrs Rob Roy, that terrible spectre by the loch shore; Baillie Jarvie (with his pride in his father, the worthy deacon), a triumphant bourgeois, honest and kind, conscientious and moral; and Andrew Fairservice,  Frank's Sancho Panza, whose 'service' is entirely focused on himself.

First edition -  1818

Once more, it is Scott's marvellous depiction of character with overrides any creakiness, or absence, of plot. Here is Francis Osbaldistone's uncle, Sir Hildebrand: [who] notwithstanding his rusticity... retained much of the exterior of a gentleman, and appeared among his sons as the remains of a Corinthian pillar, defaced and overgrown with moss and lichen, might have looked, if contrasted with the rough, unhewn masses of upright stones in Stonhenge [sic]...the sons were, indeed, heavy unadorned blocks as the eye would desire to look upon. There, does the reader need more?! Yes, there is the arch-villain and youngest son Rashleigh, in whose eyes an expression of art and design, and, on provocation, a ferocity tempered by caution, which nature had made obvious to the most ordinary physiognomist, perhaps with the same intention that she has given the rattle to the poisonous snake.

Scott's introduction to Diana Vernon is worth a second reading. Francis has just appeared in Osbaldistone territory and watches a fox being pursued by huntsmen. A vision that passed me interrupted these reflections. It was a young lady, the loveliness of whose very striking features was enhanced by the animation of the chase and the glow of the exercise, mounted on a beautiful horse...her long black hair streamed on the breeze, having in the hurry of the chase escaped from the ribbon that bound it...I had a full view of her uncommonly fine face and person, to which an inexpressible charm was added by the wild gaiety of the scene, and the romance of her singular dress and unexpected appearance...there was a mixture of boldness, satire, and simplicity in the manner...

Diana Vernon cleared the obstruction at a flying leap...

Certainly, to me, it is Diana who dominates the first volume. The fluctuating emotional relationship between her and Francis is well-drawn - "Silly, romping, incorrigible girl!" said I to myself... Although it is really Scott, rather than a young girl, who can discourse in this way about Diana's feelings towards Rashleigh: We are still allies...bound, like other confederate powers, by circumstances of mutual interest; but I am afraid, as will happen in other cases, the treaty of alliance has survived the amicable dispositions in which it had its origin. Hmnn! Even Rob Roy has a grudging respect for her: "...she was a daft hempie [hedge-sparrow] - But she's a mettle quean." She is certainly a brighter spark than the 'hero' Francis, who does not tumble to the Jacobitism involved in her doings until page 194 of the third volume! She may well have been linked in Scott's memory to his own first love. As John Buchan remarks, We learn from her the kind of woman that Scott most admired, for no other of his own class is so lovingly drawn. He had little liking for foolish sylphs.

Frank and Diana

Osbaldistone Hall, or Cub Castle as Diana calls it, is well described with its various architecture... with their stone-shafted latticed windows, projecting turrets, and massive architraves...it reminded me of Scott's own Abbotsford and elements of Janathan Oldbuck's pile in The Antiquary. I pass over the 'gardener', Andrew Fairservice, as, to tell the truth, he rather wearied me (as he did the Baillie), as some of Scott's salt-of-the-earth characters tend to do. Buchan suggests he is one of Scott's foremost creations. Perhaps his self-centredness and cowardice are so well delineated by Scott that I just found his 'type' repugnant.

The love/despair relationship between the distant relatives Baillie Jarvie and Rob Roy is well documented and sustained in the latter two volumes. As Rob says to Baillie: "The only drap o' gentle bluid in your body was our great-grand uncle's that was justified at Dunbarton..." The scene at the Aberfoyle inn allows Scott some of his best descriptive writing, both of character and surroundings.

As an aside, I had to chuckle at Scott's comments at the start of Chapter III in Volume I. Nearly all, if not all, his chapters commence with an extract from a poem of few lines from another author - in this case Gay's Fables. He writes: I have tagged with rhyme and blank verse the subdivisions of this important narrative, in order to seduce your continued attention by powers of composition of stronger attraction than my own., Well, Sir Walter, it has usually failed with me, as I tend to skip those lines more often than not. I did not skip Sir Walter's own prose, though; finding, once again, a delight in his story-telling and character-drawing. Next, it looks like the 4-volumes of The Fair Maid of Perth. Again, it will be the first time of reading.

I have just had a quick look at Hesketh Pearson's biography of Scott (1954), to read his comments on Rob Roy. He calls it the most readable of all Scott's stories, but also explains that the author was experiencing one of his bouts of ill health, often being in excruciating pain with 'stomach cramps', brought on by gallstones. James Ballantyne, asking for more sheets one day, was told " 'tis easy for you to bid me get on, but how the deuce can I make Rob Roy's wife speak with such a curmurring in my guts?" It explains the somewhat hasty ending.

I have sensibly purchased the Chambers Scots Dictionary - compiled by Alexander Warrack - which has been invaluable to me whenever Baillie Jarvie or Andrew Fairservice gave utterance. Although I guessed at many of the Scotch words (in Guy Mannering and The Antiquary, for instance), some of them are nothing like their English counterparts.