I have not told you any of Scott's stories here, because, unlike
many of the books we have spoken of, they are easily to be had.
And the time will soon come, if it has not come already, when you
can read Sir Walter's books, just as he wrote them. It is best,
I think, that you should read them so, for Sir Walter Scott is
perhaps the first of all our great writers nearly the whole of
whose books a child can read without help. You will find many
long descriptions in them, but do not let them frighten you. You
need not read them all the first time, and very likely you will
want to read them the second time.
But perhaps before you read his novels you will like to read his
Metrical Romances. For when we are children--big children
perhaps, but still children--is the time to read them. Long ago
in the twelfth century, when the people of England were simple
and unlearned, they loved Metrical Romances, and we when we are
simple and unlearned may love them too. Many of these old
romances, however, are hard to get, and they are written in a
language hard for many of us to understand.
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