INTRODUCTION TO CHRONICLES OF THE CANONGATE.
    The preceding volume of this Collection concluded the last of the pieces originally published under the NOMINIS UMBRA of The Author of Waverley; and the circumstances which rendered it impossible for the writer to continue longer in the possession of his incognito were communicated in 1827, in the Introduction to the first series of Chronicles of the Canongate, consisting (besides a biographical sketch of the imaginary chronicler) of three tales, entitled "The Highland Widow," "The Two Drovers," and "The Surgeon's Daughter." In the present volume the two first named of these pieces are included, together with three detached stories which appeared the year after, in the elegant compilation called "The Keepsake." "The Surgeon's Daughter" it is thought better to defer until a succeeding volume, than to
    "Begin, and break off in the middle."