CHAPTER I.
ANCESTRY, PARENTAGE, AND CHILDHOOD CHAPTER II.
YOUTH--CHOICE OF A PROFESSION CHAPTER III.
LOVE AND MARRIAGE CHAPTER IV.
EARLIEST POETRY AND BORDER MINSTRELSY CHAPTER V.
SCOTT'S MATURER POEMS CHAPTER VI.
COMPANIONS AND FRIENDS CHAPTER VII.
FIRST COUNTRY HOMES CHAPTER VIII.
REMOVAL TO ABBOTSFORD, AND LIFE THERE CHAPTER IX.
SCOTT'S PARTNERSHIPS WITH THE BALLANTYNES CHAPTER X.
THE WAVERLEY NOVELS CHAPTER XI.
SCOTT'S MORALITY AND RELIGION CHAPTER XII.
DISTRACTIONS AND AMUSEMENTS AT ABBOTSFORD CHAPTER XIII.
SCOTT AND GEORGE IV CHAPTER XIV.
SCOTT AS A POLITICIAN CHAPTER XV.
SCOTT IN ADVERSITY CHAPTER XVI.
THE LAST YEAR CHAPTER XVII.
THE END OF THE STRUGGLE SIR WALTER SCOTT.
CHAPTER I.
ANCESTRY, PARENTAGE, AND CHILDHOOD.
Sir Walter Scott was the first literary man of a great riding, sporting, and fighting clan.

Indeed, his father--a Writer to the Signet, or Edinburgh solicitor--was the first of his race to adopt a town life and a sedentary profession.

Sir Walter was the lineal descendant--six generations removed--of that Walter Scott commemorated in _The Lay of the Last Minstrel_, who is known in Border history and legend as Auld Wat of Harden.

Auld Wat's son William, captured by Sir Gideon Murray, of Elibank, during a raid of the Scotts on Sir Gideon's lands, was, as tradition says, given his choice between being hanged on Sir Gideon's private gallows, and marrying the ugliest of Sir Gideon's three ugly daughters, Meikle-mouthed Meg, reputed as carrying off the prize of ugliness among the women of four counties.

Sir William was a handsome man.