And the Miser is as good as a Scotch Trapbois, till he becomes
homicidal, and then one fails to recognise him unless he is a little
mad, like that other frantic uncle in "The Merry Men." The scenes
on the ship, with the boy who is murdered, are better--I think more
real--than the scenes of piratical life in "The Master of
Ballantrae." The fight in the Round House, even if it were
exaggerated, would be redeemed by the "Song of the Sword of Alan."
As to Alan Breck himself, with his valour and vanity, his good
heart, his good conceit of himself, his fantastic loyalty, he is
absolutely worthy of the hand that drew Callum Bey and the Dougal
creature. It is just possible that we see, in "Kidnapped," more
signs of determined labour, more evidence of touches and retouches,
than in "Rob Roy." In nothing else which it attempts is it
inferior; in mastery of landscape, as in the scene of the lonely
rock in a dry and thirsty land, it is unsurpassed. If there are
signs of laboured handling on Alan, there are none in the sketches
of Cluny and of Rob Roy's son, the piper. What a generous artist is
Alan! "Robin Oig," he said, when it was done, "ye are a great
piper. I am not fit to blow in the same kingdom with you. Body of
me! ye have mair music in your sporran than I have in my head."
"Kidnapped," we said, is a fragment. It ends anywhere, or nowhere,
as if the pen had dropped from a weary hand.
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