ABSTRACT
According to gender-indoctrinated Nelly Christie in The Fortunes of Nigel, a king 'comes more natural' to the English than a queen, but when Scott writes about kings, any sense that their status is 'natural' is highly problematized. Scott did criticize his monarchs for their derogation from the ideal standards to which national leaders should subscribe. Scott was capable of being non-censorious about lesbianism and felt that the fact of its existence should not be denied, but he did not try to write about it even though he knew it was of interest to the court of Charles II. To see how far a novelist could go in projecting the behavioural values conventionally associated with women onto a national leader it is instructive to contrast Scott's practice with that of Jane Porter. For Porter, femininity is predicated on an incapacity to engage in or even contemplate violence, but instead to be its victim.
