Maria Edgeworth

“ Judging by our own feeling as authors, we guess that he would rather know our genuine first thoughts, than wait for cool second thoughts, or have a regular eulogium or criticism put in the most lucid manner, and given in the finest sentences that ever were rounded. ”

“ The novelty of the Highland world which is discovered to our view powerfully excites curiosity and interest: but though it is all new to us it does not embarrass or perplex, or strain the attention. We never are harassed by doubts of the probability of any of these modes of life: though we did not know them, we are quite certain they did exist exactly as they are represented. We are sensible that there is a peculiar merit in the work which is in a measure lost upon us, the dialects of the Highlanders, and the Lowlanders, etc. ”

“ Is it possible that I have got thus far without having named Flora or Vich Ian Vohr—the last Vich Ian Vohr! Yet our minds were full of them the moment before I began this letter: and could you have seen the tears forced from us by their fate, you would have been satisfied that the pathos went to our hearts. Ian Vohr from the first moment he appears, till the last, is an admirably-drawn and finely-sustained character—new, perfectly new to the English reader—often entertaining—always heroic—sometimes sublime. The gray spirit, the Bodach Glas, thrills us with horror. Us! ”

“ But to return to the dear good baron: though I acknowledge that I am not as good a judge as my father and brothers are of his recondite learning and his law Latin, yet I feel the humour, and was touched to the quick by the strokes of generosity, gentleness, and pathos in this old man, who is, by the bye, all in good time worked up into a very dignified father-in-law for the hero. ”

“ The last scene between Flora and Waverley is highly pathetic—my brother wishes that bridal garment were shroud: because when the heart is touched we seldom use metaphor, or quaint alliteration-bride-favour, bridal garment. ”

“ He thinks it required more genius to invent, and more ability uniformly to sustain this character than any other of the masterly characters with which the book abounds. There is indeed uncommon art in the manner in which his dignity is preserved by his courage and magnanimity, in spite of all his pedantry and his ridicules, and his bear and bootjack, and all the raillery of M'Ivor. ”