" on horseback,
the ribald crew of feasters in the hall are described so
faithfully and in such vivid phrases that it is no wonder Willie
should remark at one point of the story: "I almost think I was
there mysell, though I couldna be born at the same time." The
power of the tale, which fascinates us from beginning to end and
which can be read again and again with renewed pleasure, depends
partly on Wandering Willie's gifts as a narrator, partly on the
emotions that stir him as he talks. With unconscious art, he
always uses the right word in his descriptions, and chooses those
details that help us to fix the rapidly changing imagery of his
scenes; and he reproduces exactly the natural dialogue of the
speakers. He begins in a tone of calm, unhurried narration, with
only a hint of fear in his voice, but, at the death of Sir
Robert, grows breathless with horror and excitement. The uncanny
incident of the silver whistle that sounds from the dead man's
chamber is skilfully followed by a matter-of-fact account of
Steenie's dealings with the new laird. The emotion culminates in
the terror of the hall of ghastly revellers, whose wild shrieks
"made Willie's gudesire's very nails grow blue and chilled the
marrow in his banes." So lifelike is the scene, so full of colour
and movement, that Steenie's descendants might well believe that
their gudesire, like Dante, had seen Hell.

The notes, introductions and appendices to Scott's works are
stored with material for novels of terror. The notes to
_Marmion_, for instance, contain references to a necromantic
priest whose story "much resembles that of Ambrosio in the
_Monk_," to an "Elfin" warrior and to a chest of treasure
jealously guarded for a century by the Devil in the likeness of a
huntsman. In _The Lady of the Lake_ there is a note on the
ancient legend of the Phantom Sire, in _Rokeby_ there is an
allusion to the Demon Frigate wandering under a curse from
harbour to harbour. To Scott "bogle-wark" was merely a diversion.
He did not choose to make it the mainspring either of his poems
or his romances. In _The Lay of the Last Minstrel_ he had,
indeed, intended to make the Goblin Page play a leading part, but
the imp, as Scott remarked to Miss Seward, "by the natural
baseness of his propensities contrived to slink downstairs into
the kitchen." The White Lady of Avenel, who appears in _The
Monastery_ (1830)--a boisterous creature who rides on horseback,
splashes through streams an