236.  Dispensation.  As Roderick and Ellen were cousins, they could not marry without a dispensation from the Pope.

251.  Orphan.  Referring to child, not to she, as its position indicates.

254.  Shrouds.  Shields, protects.  Cf.  Spenser, F. Q. i. 1. 6:  “And this faire couple eke to shroud themselves were fain” (that is, from the rain).  So the noun = shelter, protection; as in Shakespeare, A. and C. iii. 13. 71:  “put yourself under his shroud,” etc.  See also on 757 below.

260.  Maronnan’s cell.  “The parish of Kilmaronock, at the eastern extremity of Loch Lomond, derives its name from a cell, or chapel, dedicated to Saint Maronock, or Marnock, or Maronnan, about whose sanctity very little is now remembered” (Scott).  Kill = cell; as in Colmekill (Macb. ii. 4. 33), “the cell of Columba,” now known as Icolmkill, or Iona.

270.  Bracklinn’s thundering wave.  This beautiful cascade is on the Keltie, a mile from Callander.  The height of the fall is about fifty feet.  “A few years ago a marriage party of Lowland peasants met with a tragic end here, two of them having tumbled into the broken, angry waters, where they had no more chance of life than if they had dropped into the crater of Hecla” (Black).

271.  Save.  Unless; here followed by the subjunctive.

274.  Claymore.  The word means “a large sword” (Gaelic claidheamh, sword, and more, great).

294.  Shadowy plaid and sable plume.  Appropriate to Roderick Dhu.  See on 220 above.

303.  Woe the while.  Woe be to the time, alas the time!  Cf.  Shakespeare, J. C. i. 3. 82:  “But, woe the while! our fathers’ minds are dead,” etc.  See also on i. 166 above.

306.  Tine-man.  “Archibald, the third Earl of Douglas, was so unfortunate in all his enterprises, that he acquired the epithet of ‘tine-man,’ because he tined, or lost, his followers in every battle which he fought.  He was vanquished, as every reader must remember, in the bloody battle of Homildon-hill, near Wooler, where he himself lost an eye, and was made prisoner by Hotspur.  He was no less unfortunate when allied with Percy, being wounded and taken at the battle of Shrewsbury.  He was so unsuccessful in an attempt to beseige Roxburgh Castle, that it was called the ‘Foul Raid,’ or disgraceful expedition.  His ill fortune left him indeed at the battle of Beauge, in France; but it was only to return with double emphasis at the subsequent action of Vernoil, the last and most unlucky of his encounters, in which he fell, with the flower of the Scottish chivalry, then serving as auxiliaries in France, and about two thousand common soldiers, A.D. 1424” (Scott).

307.  What time, etc.  That is, at the time when Douglas allied himself with Percy in the rebellion against Henry iv. of England.  See Shakespeare, 1 Hen.  IV.