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PREFACE
The following tiny volume is
placed before the public with no pretensions to further claims on attention
than may be put forward by one who has been anxious, in a very humble
sphere, to discharge the duties of a careful and minute compiler, rather
than to obtain the credit of successful authorship. During an intercourse of
considerable intimacy and duration with the locality described, the author
had often been struck with the inadequacy and inaccuracy of the information
to be obtained, even from those whose circumstances ought to have rendered
them familiar with the neighbourhood, in reference to objects which
generally excited the curiosity of strangers. No one can, in the summer
season in particular, make a steam-boat trip on the Tay without being
perplexed by the multiplicity of questions put to him in reference to
matters requiring no great degree of research for their elucidation,
nine-tenths of which he is in all likelihood desirous, but utterly
inadequate, to explain. To put full and accurate information on such
subjects into the hands of those who might be desirous to receive it, in a
shape more ample and authoritative than that usually offered by ordinary
Tourists’ Guides, had for some time been the wish of the writer of the
Topography of the Tay. In the course of more dry and grave investigations in
the Library of the British Museum, where such abundance of materials were
found to be lying around, that the difficulty lay rather in selection and
abridgement than in collection, it afforded amusement and relaxation to
compile and arrange, for this little work, authorities which might be
referred to and relied on. Hence the origin of the Topography of the Tay,
for which, it is hoped, it will not appear egotistical to offer these
explanations, inasmuch as it may account for a redundancy of reference which
might otherwise be considered ostentatious or superfluous, and a deficiency
of strictly descriptive writing, for the absence of which selections from
authors of weight and name will, it is believed, more than compensate. This,
it is hoped, will also help to excuse deficiencies in the genealogical
division, which a residence on the spot might probably have got supplied. It
was essential under the circumstances to refer to books alone for
information, and in these the genealogies of recent or untitled families are
often difficult to be met with, or little to be relied on. The Baronage of
Douglas never extended beyond one volume, and the contents of that are in
many cases unauthentic. The references to the families of commoners to be
found in the Peerage of the same author has been duly adverted to, but
labour, in one respect at least, under the same charge as the Baronage. The
Baronetage of Playfair is nowhere to be depended on. The labours of the
minute and careful Debrett, which have already done so much to correct
previous genealogists as to the Peerage and Baronetage of Great Britain,
have been duly taken advantage of, but have not as yet extended to the
baronage of the locality described. It is in consequence of deficiencies in
printed authorities, and implies no reflection on their lineage, that
scarcely any notice has been taken of the families of the Patersons of
Carpow and Castle-Huntly, the Allens of Errol and Inch-martin, the Yeamans
of Murie, Drummonds of Megginch, Hunters of Seaside, Craigies of Glen-doig,
Mylnes of Mylnefield, Andersons of Inchyra and of Balgay, Trotters of
Ballindean, Websters of Balruddery, and others, whose residences come in for
brief notices in the text. The natural history in the appendix, with the
exception of the geology, is wholly extracted from books carefully referred
to, and will, it is hoped, be found interesting, as consisting of a series
of papers dispersed through a great number of works not commonly in the
hands of ordinary readers, for the first time collected together, in
reference to the animals, and their habits, which frequent the Tay. The
chapter on reclaiming land from the river has been drawn up from information
obtained from those who have been most successfully engaged in these
operations, to whom special acknowledgments are due. Nothing has on this
point, it is believed, been heretofore published, so that if it can lay
claim to no other merit, it may hope to obtain the praise of novelty. In
conclusion, it must be stated that the Topography of the Tay having been
ready for the press in August 1837, unlooked-for circumstances deferred its
publication till ten months after that date.
In the meantime, it was found expedient to give in various ways fragments of
its contents to the public. It is not at present necessary to advert to
these, the portions so given being without the name of the author; but it is
important to say this much to account for what might either seem a partial
republication, or lead to the suspicion that the guilt of plagiarism had
been incurred, where passages are without acknowledgment apparently
reprinted from works already before the public.
Cupar-Fife, May 20, 1838.
The Steam-Boat
Companion
Betwixt Perth and Dundee by George Buist (1838) (pdf)
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