WAVERLEY
OR
'TIS SIXTY YEARS SINCE
Volume I.
CHAPTER I
INTRODUCTORY
The title of this work has not been chosen without the grave and solid
deliberation which matters of importance demand from the prudent. Even
its first, or general denomination, was the result of no common research
or selection, although, according to the example of my predecessors, I
had only to seize upon the most sounding and euphonic surname that
English history or topography affords, and elect it at once as the title
of my work and the name of my hero. But, alas! what could my readers have
expected from the chivalrous epithets of Howard, Mordaunt, Mortimer, or
Stanley, or from the softer and more sentimental sounds of Belmour,
Belville, Belfield, and Belgrave, but pages of inanity, similar to those
which have been so christened for half a century past? I must modestly
admit I am too diffident of my own merit to place it in unnecessary
opposition to preconceived associations; I have, therefore, like a maiden
knight with his white shield, assumed for my hero, WAVERLEY, an
uncontaminated name, bearing with its sound little of good or evil,
excepting what the reader shall hereafter be pleased to affix to it.
Pages:
127
128
129
130
131
132
133
134
135
136
137
138
139
140
141
142
143
144
145
146
147
148
149
150
151