. The Scottish Chiefs
by Jane Porter

. The Scottish Chiefs was written by Jane Porter and profusely illustrated by T H Robinson. There is a preface from the first edition which was printed in 1809 from Thames Ditton.

. This particular edition was first issued in 1900 and this volume appears to be the reprint of 1914 by J M Dent of London and E P Dutton of New York.

. Hard cover book without dust jacket. No writing or stamps. Spine covering is crackled. Pages clean and tight. Non smoking storage. 564 pages. Measure approximately 6 x 8 x 2.

. Porter, Jane (1776-1850)

. British novelist, daughter of an army surgeon, was born at Durham in 1776. Her life and reputation are closely linked with those of her sister, ANNA MARIA PORTER (1780-1832), novelist, and her brother, SIft ROBERT KER PORTER (1775-1842), painter and traveller.

. After their fathers death, in 1779, the mother removed from Durham, their birthplace, to Edinburgh, where the childrens love of romance was stimulated by their association with Flora Macdonald and the young Walter Scott. Mrs Porter moved to London, so that her son might study art, and the sisters subsequently resided at Thames Ditton and at Esher with their mother until her death in 1831.

. In 1810, four years before the appearance of Waverley, she attempted national romance in her Scottish Chiefs. The story of Wallace had been a favorite one in her childhood, and she was probably well acquainted with the poem of Blind Harry (Henry the Minstrel). Although the book lacked historical accuracy, and the figure of Wallace is a sentimental, the picturesque power of narration displayed by Miss Porter has saved the story from the oblivion which has overtaken the works of most of Scotts predecessors in historical fiction.

. Her later works included The Pastors Fireside (1815), Duke Christian of Luneburg (1824), Coming Out (1828) and The Field of Forty Footsteps (1828). In conjunction with her sister she published in 1826 the Tales round a Winter Hearth. She also wrote some plays, and made frequent contributions to then current periodical literature..

. Chapter I.

. Scotland.

 . Bright was the summer of 1296. The war which had desolated Scotland was then at an end. Ambition seemed satiated; and the vanquished, after having passed under the yoke of their enemy, concluded they might wear their chains in peace. Such were the hopes of those Scottish noblemen who, early in the preceding spring, had signed the bond of submission to a ruthless conqueror, purchasing life at the price of all that makes life estimable-liberty and honor.

. Prior to this act of vassalage, Edward I., King of England, had entered Scotland at the head of an immense army. He seized Berwick by stratagem; laid the country in ashes; and, on the field of Dunbar, forced the Scottish king and his nobles to acknowledge him their liege lord.

. But while the courts of Edward, or of his representatives, were crowded by the humbled Scots, the spirit of one brave man remained unsubdued. Disgusted alike at the facility with which the sovereign of a warlike nation could resign his people and his crown into the hands of a treacherous invader, and at the pusillanimity of the nobles who had ratified the sacrifice, William Wallace retired to the glen of Ellerslie. Withdrawn from the world, he hoped to avoid the sight of oppressions he could not redress, and the endurance of injuries beyond his power to avenge.

. Beautiful, antique find from a local Bergen County, New Jersey estate. One of many books that were willed to a local library for resale.

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