His
passion for the mediaeval was excited by reading Percy's _Reliques_ when
he was a boy; and in one of his school themes he maintained that Ariosto
was a greater poet than Homer. He began early to collect manuscript
ballads, suits of armor, pieces of old plate, border-horns, and similar
relics. He learned Italian in order to read the romancers--Ariosto,
Tasso, Pulci, and Boiardo--preferring them to Dante. He studied Gothic
architecture, heraldry, and the art of fortification, and made drawings
of famous ruins and battle-fields. In particular he read eagerly every
thing that he could lay hands on relating to the history, legends, and
antiquities of the Scottish border--the vale of Tweed, Teviotdale,
Ettrick Forest, and the Yarrow, of all which land he became the
laureate, as Burns had been of Ayrshire and the "West Country." Scott,
like Wordsworth, was an outdoor poet. He spent much time in the saddle,
and was fond of horses, dogs, hunting, and salmon-fishing. He had a keen
eye for the beauties of natural scenery, though "more especially," he
admits, "when combined with ancient ruins or remains of our forefathers'
piety or splendor." He had the historic imagination, and, in creating
the historical novel, he was the first to throw a poetic glamour over
European annals.
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