The Pirate

Walter Scott set this historical romance among the wild cliffs and folklore of the Shetland Islands at the close of the seventeenth century. Young Mordaunt Mertoun, close to the two daughters of a local landowner, sees that friendship strained when a mysterious shipwrecked stranger named Cleveland washes ashore and stirs rivalry and suspicion. As Cleveland’s true history surfaces, older loyalties and a buried family secret rise with it, pulling the islanders toward crisis. Scott fills the book with sea lore, superstition, and the sharp, weather-beaten character of the northern isles, drawing on his own tour of the region. It stands as one of his atmospheric later novels. This free PDF and EPUB edition includes the complete text.