Chapter 2

Will none but Hearne the Hunter serve your turn?
--MERRY WIVES OF WINDSOR.

In one of the most remote districts of the south of Scotland, where an
ideal line, drawn along the tops of lofty and bleak mountains, separates
that land from her sister kingdom, a young man, called Halbert, or
Hobbie Elliot, a substantial farmer, who boasted his descent from old
Martin Elliot of the Preakin-tower, noted in Border story and song, was
on his return from deer-stalking. The deer, once so numerous among these
solitary wastes, were now reduced to a very few herds, which, sheltering
themselves in the most remote and inaccessible recesses, rendered the
task of pursuing them equally toilsome and precarious. There were,
however, found many youth of the country ardently attached to this
sport, with all its dangers and fatigues. The sword had been sheathed
upon the Borders for more than a hundred years, by the peaceful union of
the crowns in the reign of James the First of Great Britain. Still
the country retained traces of what it had been in former days; the
inhabitants, their more peaceful avocations having been repeatedly
interrupted by the civil wars of the preceding century, were scarce yet
broken in to the habits of regular industry, sheep-farming had not been
introduced upon any considerable scale, and the feeding of black cattle
was the chief purpose to which the hills and valleys were applied. Near
to the farmer's house, the tenant usually contrived to raise such a crop
of oats or barley, as afforded meal for his family; and the whole of
this slovenly and imperfect mode of cultivation left much time upon his
own hands, and those of his domestics. This was usually employed by the
young men in hunting and fishing; and the spirit of adventure, which
formerly led to raids and forays in the same districts, was still to be
discovered in the eagerness with which they pursued those rural sports.

The more high-spirited among the youth were, about the time that our
narrative begins, expecting, rather with hope than apprehension, an
opportunity of emulating their fathers in their military achievements,
the recital of which formed the chief part of their amusement within
doors. The passing of the Scottish act of security had given the alarm
of England, as it seemed to point at a separation of the two British
kingdoms, after the decease of Queen Anne, the reigning sovereign.
Godolphin, then at the head of the English administration, foresaw that
there was no other mode of avoiding the probable extremity of a civil
war, but by carrying through an incorporating union. How that treaty
was managed, and how little it seemed for some time to promise the
beneficial results which have since taken place to such extent, may be