Philip Rollo: The Scottish Musketeers (Complete‪)‬

At a sale of the effects of an eminent antiquary lately deceased, it was our happiness and good fortune to become the possessor of a certain little MS. volume, closely written, in a neat small hand of the 17th century. It is very thick, contains nearly a thousand pages, is bound in black leather, and is fastened by two brass clasps. On the title-page was written, "The Storie of my Lyffe, concludit to this year 1660."

On examining our literary and antiquarian treasure, which we did with ardour, we found that it was the adventures of a Scottish gentleman, of that stirring period indicated by the date, who had served for a time, as a soldier of fortune, in the armies of Denmark. We found the book interesting, from the glimpses of wild adventure, hair-breadth escapes, high military courage, and raciness it exhibited; thus, the more we read, the more pleased did we become.

Philip Rollo, for such was the name of the writer, seemed to be beside us relating his own startling adventures; and we were upon the point of handing over the MS. to our enterprising friends of the Bannatyne Club, when, lo! we discovered that there were two serious gaps in it. Though having little doubt that the archaeologists would gladly publish these curious memoirs even in their mutilated state, we preferred to restore the thread of the narrative, so far as we could do so, from the quaint pages of the Amsterdam Courant, the Swedish Intelligencer, the warlike story of Colonel Monro and others, and, after modernising the spelling and language of the whole, so as to make it more generally readable, handed over our transcript to our friend Mr. Routledge, of London.

Those portions of the work which have been made up from contemporary authority, we are much too cunning to point out; though we have little doubt that the critical reader will easily recognise them. But we may add that, historically considered, we have found the military details to tally so closely with those given in the Low Dutch "Relation," "Ye Danish Warres," and other works, that our soldier of fortune may defy the closest scrutiny.

When we read the memoirs of any eminent man of whom no portrait is extant, we are naturally curious to know what like he was—the colour of his eyes, of his hair, and so forth; and, most fortunately, before entering upon the adventures of Philip Rollo, we are enabled to afford the reader a pretty good idea of these matters; for at the same extensive sale, where it was our fortune to find the MS., a portrait of the cavalier was "knocked down" to us for a comparative trifle—nothing, absolutely, when we consider that it was a real and well-authenticated Jamesone, an artist, so justly esteemed the Vandyke of Scotland, and who studied with Sir Anthony under Rubens at Antwerp.

This portrait, which appears, by a date inscribed thereon, to have been painted about the year 1630, exhibits an eminently handsome cavalier in the gallant and picturesque costume of that time. The face is oval—the forehead white and high—the mustaches and imperial well pointed—the eyes are dark—the hair long and of the deepest brown. The left hand rests in the bowl hilt of a long Spanish rapier, which hangs in a magnificent baldric, worn sash-wise over the right shoulder; the right hand rests on a helmet, to show that it is the portrait of a gentleman and soldier. We have also an admirable example of the Scottish costume of the period. This cavalier's doublet having loose sleeves, slashed with white, the collar being covered by a falling band of the richest point lace; a short crimson cloak hangs jauntily on the left shoulder; the breeches are of blue velvet, fringed with point lace, and meet the long riding boots, which have tops of ruffled lace. A military order sparkles on his breast, and a dagger dangles at his right side. Under the helmet there peeps out a slip of paper, on which is written, Philip Rollo, hys portraitoure.