age on the banks of the Clyde, with its thin blue smoke
among the trees, "showing that the evening meal was being made ready."

_Old Mortality_ always appeared to me the "Marmion" of Scott's
novels.--Chambers, _English Literature_, ii. 587.

_Old Mortality_, an itinerant antiquary, whose craze is to clean the
moss from gravestones, and keep their letters and effigies in good
condition.--Sir W. Scott, _Old Mortality_ (time, Charles II.).

[Asterism] The prototype of "Old Mortality" was Robert Patterson.

=Old Noll=, Oliver Cromwell (1590-1658).

_Old Noll's Fiddler_, Sir Roger Lestrange, who played the base-viol at
the musical parties held at John Hingston's house, where Oliver Cromwell
was a constant guest.

=Old Rowley=, Charles II., so called from his favorite race-horse (1630,
1660-1685).

=Old Stone.= Henry Stone, statuary and painter (died 1653).

=Oldboy= (_Colonel_), a manly retired officer, fond of his glass, and not
averse to a little spice of the Lothario spirit.

_Lady Mary Oldboy_, daughter of Lord Jessamy, and wife of the colonel. A
sickly nonentity, "ever complaining, ever having something the matter
with her head, back, or legs." Afraid of the slightest breath of wind,
jarred by a loud voice, and incapable of the least exertion.

_Diana Oldboy_, daughter of the colonel. She marries Harman.

_Jessamy_, son of the colonel and Lady Mary. An insufferable
prig.--Bickerstaff, _Lionel and Clarissa_.

=Oldbuck= (_Jonathan_), the antiquary, devoted to the study and
accumulation of old coins and medals, etc. He is sarcastic, irritable,
and a woman-hater; but kind-hearted, faithful to his friends, and a
humorist.--Sir W. Scott, _The Antiquary_ (time, George III.).

An excellent temper, with a slight degree of subacid humor;
learning, wit, and drollery, the more poignant that they were a
little marked by the peculiarities of an old bachelor; a soundness
of thought, rendered more forcible by an occasional quaintness of
expression--these were the qualities in which the creature of my
imagintion[TN-46] resembled my benevolent and excellent friend.--Sir
W. Scott.

The merit of _The Antiquary_ as a novel rests on the inimitable
delineation of Oldbuck, that model of black-letter and Roman-camp
antiquaries, whose oddities and conversation are rich and racy as
any of the old crusted port that John of the Girnel might have held
in