Scott's comedy is like that of Cervantes in _Don Quixote_--humorous dialogue independent of any definite comic plot and mixed up with all sorts of other business. Might not Falstaff himself be taken into comparison too? Scott's humorous characters are nowhere and never characters in a comedy--and Falstaff, the greatest comic character in Shakespeare, is not great in comedy.
Some of the rich idiomatic Scottish dialogue in the novels might be possibly disparaged (like Ben Jonson) as 'mere humours and observation.' Novelists of lower rank than Scott--Galt in _The Ayrshire Legatees_ and _Annals of the Parish_ and _The Entail_--have nearly rivalled Scott in reporting conversation. But the Bailie at any rate has his part to play in the story of _Rob Roy_--and so has Andrew Fairservice. Scott never did anything more ingenious than his contrast of those two characters--so much alike in language, and to some extent in cast of mind, with the same conceit and self-confidence, the same garrulous Westland security in their own judgment, both attentive to their own interests, yet clearly and absolutely distinct in spirit, the Bailie a match in courage for Rob Roy himself.
Give me leave, before I end, to read one example of Scott's language: from the scene in _Guy Mannering_ where Dandie Dinmont explains his case to Mr. Pleydell the advocate. It is true to life: memory and imagination here indistinguishable:--
Dinmont, who had pushed after Mannering into the room, began with a scrape of his foot and a scratch of his head in unison. 'I am Dandie Dinmont, sir, of the Charlies-hope--the Liddesdale lad--ye'll mind me? It was for me you won yon grand plea.'
'What plea, you loggerhead?' said the lawyer; 'd'ye think I can remember all the fools that come to plague me?'
'Lord, sir, it was the grand plea about the grazing o' the Langtae-head,' said the farmer.
'Well, curse thee, never mind;--give me the memorial, and come to me on Monday at ten,' replied the learned counsel.
'But, sir, I haena got ony distinct memorial.'
'Na, sir, nae memorial,' answered Dandie; 'for your honour said before, Mr. Pleydell, ye'll mind, that ye liked best to hear us hill-folk tell our ane tale by word o' mouth.'
'Beshrew my tongue that said so!' answered the counsellor; 'it will cost my ears a dinning.--Well, say in two words what you've got to say--you see the gentleman waits.'