Walter Scott Country Quotations

My foot is on my native heath, and my name is MacGregor.

Land of my sires! what mortal hand Can e'er untie the filial band That knits me to thy rugged strand!

Independently of the curious circumstance that such tales should be found existing in very different countries and languages, which augurs a greater poverty of human invention than we would have expected, there is also a sort of wild fairy interest in them, which makes me think them fully better adapted to awaken the imagination and soften the heart of childhood than the good-boy stories which have been in later years composed for them.

Stood for his country's glory fast, And nailed her colors to the mast!

It was in the beginning of the month of November, 17--, when a young English gentleman, who had just left the university of Oxford, made use of the liberty afforded him, to visit some parts of the north of England; and curiosity extended his tour into the adjacent frontier of the sister country.

But woe awaits a country when She sees the tears of bearded men.

Breathes there the man with soul so dead, Who never to himself hath said, This is my own, my native land.