roundings." Womanliness is the one trait about which they are all cock-sure. It is the question at issue, and cannot be lightly begged. But Sophia's strongest plea is the love Sir Walter gave her.
For Scott, though most of his young heroines are drawn in a perfunctory and indifferent fashion—mere incentives to enterprise or rewards of valour—knew something of the quicksands beyond. He made little boast of this knowledge, frankly preferring the ways of men, about whom there was plenty to be told, and whose motives never needed a too assiduous analysis. Mr. Ruskin, it is true, pronounced all the women of the Waverley Novels to be finer than the men; but he was arguing on purely ethical grounds. He liked the women better because they were better, not because their goodness was truer to life. He was incapable of judging any work, literary or artistic, by purely critical standards. He had praise for Rose Bradwardine, and Catherine Seyton, and Alice Lee, because they are such well-behaved young ladies; he excluded from his list of heroines Lucy Ashton, who stands forever as a
