Since one line has failed, we must just stick to something else.' And so he dismissed me, and resumed his novel." In these circumstances, far from inspiring, was "Guy Mannering" written and hurried through the press.

The story has its own history: one can watch the various reminiscences and experiences of life that crystallized together in Scott's mind, and grouped themselves fantastically into his unpremeditated plot.

Sir Walter gives, in the preface of 1829, the legend which he heard from John MacKinlay, his father's Highland servant, and on which he meant to found a tale more in Hawthorn's manner than in his own.
That plan he changed in the course of printing, "leaving only just enough of astrology to annoy pedantic reviewers and foolish Puritans." Whence came the rest of the plot,--the tale of the long-lost heir, and so on?
The true heir, "kept out of his own," and returning in disguise, has been a favourite character ever since Homer sang of Odysseus, and probably long before that.

But it is just possible that Scott had a certain modern instance in his mind.

In turning over the old manuscript diary at Branxholme Park (mentioned in a note to "Waverley"), the Editor lighted on a singular tale, which, in the diarist's opinion, might have suggested "Guy Mannering" to Sir Walter.