Excerpt from Wigtown and Whithorn: Historical and Descriptive Sketches, Stories and Anecdotes, Illustrative of the Racy Wit and Pawky Humor of the District
As for the excerpts from the Kirk Session and Burgh records, these Of themselves throw much light upon the state of local society in the times to which they refer, and therefore we have not thrown in many remarks, or hazarded many speculative theories of our own.
We are fully convinced that the most of local works already published, though excellent in their way, are of too antiquarian a nature to be popular with general readers. An old holed stone, or a hoary ruin, is very good and very interesting in its way; but give general readers some thing relating to the manners and customs Of their fore fathers - something that comes home to their human sympathies - that starts the tear, or provokes the laugh and you give a touch of nature. We have endeavoured to keep this in View in preparing this volume, although it is possible we may not have succeeded as well as we could have wished.
As we make no literary pretensions, we bespeak the clemency of the critics. On account of the multifarious nature and frequent urgency of our ordinary duties, we have had only snatches of time to prepare this work. It must not, therefore, be considered strange if the arrange ment of the matter is not the best, or if at times we are a little incoherent.
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