A READER FOR HIGHER GRADES I. TALES OF A GRANDFATHER. BY SIR WALTER SCOTT. SIR WALTER SCOTT (1771-1832) was one of the greatest and most beloved of the poets of Scotland. He was also the author of many novels. Scott wrote his poems first, and they were very much admired. While he was enjoying his fame, a great misfortune befell him. The publishing house with which he was connected failed, leaving immense debts. While Scott was in no sense at fault, yet he was so honorable that he gave everything he had to pay the firm's obligations, and went to work again writing novels. Although he was in ill health and growing old, he kept at his writing until he had paid 3 He had many One of these, all the debts. Scott was a man whom everybody loved. beautiful dogs that he often mentioned in his writings. called Maidie, is perhaps the most famous dog in history. The following selection is taken from Scott's "Tales of a Grandfather," a series of sketches of the lives and heroic exploits of many of the early Scottish chiefs. The entire book should be read. I. HOW SCOTLAND AND ENGLAND CAME TO BE SEPARATE KINGDOMS. NGLAND is the southern and Scotland is the northern ENG part of the celebrated island called Great Britain. England is greatly larger than Scotland, and the land is much richer, and produces better crops. There are also a great many more men in England, and both the gentlemen. and the country people are more wealthy and have better food and clothing there than in Scotland. The towns, also, are much more numerous, and more populous. Scotland, on the contrary, is full of hills and huge moors and wilderness, which bear no corn, and afford but little food for flocks of sheep or herds of cattle. But the level ground that lies along the great rivers is more fertile, and produces good crops. The natives of Scotland are accustomed to live more hardily in general than those of England. The cities and towns are fewer, smaller, and less full of inhabitants than in England. But as Scotland possesses great quarries of stone, the houses are commonly built. of that material, which is more lasting, and has a grander effect to the eye than the bricks used in England. Now, as these two nations live in the different ends of the same island, and are separated by large and stormy seas from all other parts of the world, it seems natural that they should have been friendly to each other, and that they should have lived as one people, under the same govern |