The Maitlen, for instance,
exclusive of its mode of description, is all composed of words, which
would mostly every one spell and pronounce in the very same dialect
that was spoken some centuries ago.
Pardon, my dear Sir, the freedom I have taken in addressing you--it
is my nature; and I could not resist the impulse of writing to you
any longer. Let me hear from you as soon as this comes to your hand,
and tell me when you will be in Ettrick Forest, and suffer me to
subscribe myself, Sir, your most humble and affectionate servant,
JAMES HOGG.
In Scott's printed text of the ballad, two interpolations, of two
lines each, are acknowledged in notes. They occur in stanzas vii.,
xlvi., and are attributed to Hogg. In fact, Hogg sent one of them
(vii.) to Laidlaw in his manuscript. The other he sent to Scott on
30th June 1802.
Colonel Elliot, in the spirit of the Higher Criticism (chimaera
bombinans in vacuo), writes, {31a} "Few will doubt that the
footnotes" (on these interpolations) "were inserted with the purpose
of leading the public to think that Hogg made no other
interpolations; but I am afraid I must go further than this and say
that, since they were inserted on the editor's responsibility, the
intention must have been to make it appear as if no other
interpolations by any other hand had been inserted.
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