The tale of the Surgeon’s Daughter formed part
of the second series of Chronicles of the Canongate,
published in 1827; but has been separated from the
stories of the Highland Widow, &c., which it originally
accompanied, and deferred to the close of this collection,
for reasons which printers and publishers will understand,
and which would hardly interest the general reader.
The Author has nothing to say now in reference to
this little Novel, but that the principal incident
on which it turns, was narrated to him one morning
at breakfast by his worthy friend, Mr. Train, of Castle
Douglas, in Galloway, whose kind assistance he has
so often had occasion to acknowledge in the course
of these prefaces; and that the military friend who
is alluded to as having furnished him with some information
as to Eastern matters, was Colonel James Ferguson
of Huntly Burn, one of the sons of the venerable historian
and philosopher of that name—which name
he took the liberty of concealing under its Gaelic
form of Mac-Erries.
Abbotsford, September 1831.
* * * *
*
[Mr. Train was requested by Sir Walter Scott to give
him in writing the story as nearly as possible in
the shape in which he had told it; but the following
narrative, which he drew up accordingly, did not reach
Abbotsford until July 1832]
In the old Stock of Fife, there was not perhaps an
individual whose exertions were followed by consequences
of such a remarkable nature as those of Davie Duff,
popularly called “The Thane of Fife,” who,
from a very humble parentage, rose to fill one of
the chairs of the magistracy of his native burgh.
By industry and economy in early life, he obtained
the means of erecting, solely on his own account,
one of those ingenious manufactories for which Fifeshire
is justly celebrated. From the day on which the
industrious artisan first took his seat at the Council
Board, he attended so much to the interests of the
little privileged community, that civic honours were
conferred on him as rapidly as the Set of the Royalty
[Footnote: The Constitution of the Borough.] could
legally admit.
To have the right of walking to church on holy-days,
preceded by a phalanx of halberdiers, in habiliments
fashioned as in former times, seems, in the eyes of
many a guild brother, to be a very enviable pitch
of worldly grandeur. Few persons were ever more
proud of civic honours than the Thane of Fife, but
he knew well how to turn his political influence to
the best account. The council, court, and other
business of the burgh, occupied much of his time,
which caused him to intrust the management of his
manufactory to a near relation, whose name was D------,
a young man of dissolute habits; but the Thane, seeing
at last, that by continuing that extravagant person
