Rob Roy

Rob Roy is a historical novel by the Scottish writer Walter Scott, first published in 1817 and set principally in the years around the Jacobite rising of 1715. It is narrated by Francis Osbaldistone, a young Englishman sent north by his merchant father to stay with his uncle's family in Northumberland after refusing to enter the family business, where he is drawn into a scheme by his cousin and rival Rashleigh Osbaldistone to divert the family's funds to support the Jacobite cause. Francis's pursuit of the stolen bills of exchange takes him into the Scottish Highlands, where he comes under the protection of the real historical outlaw and clan chief Rob Roy MacGregor, a cattle drover turned cattle thief who has been driven into a life of banditry and blood feud after being declared an outlaw by his creditors and enemies, and whose fierce, canny loyalty to Francis proves decisive in recovering the family's fortune and clearing Francis's name. Blending an invented romantic plot, including Francis's courtship of the spirited Diana Vernon, with a historically grounded portrait of Rob Roy and the fractured Highland society on the eve of the Jacobite rising, the novel helped cement Rob Roy MacGregor's transformation in popular memory from a minor historical outlaw into a folk hero comparable to Robin Hood, and it remains one of the best known of Scott's Waverley novels.