ment of the parochial schools produced effects
on the rural muse of Scotland also, which have
not hitherto been suspected, and which, though
less splendid in their nature, are not however
to be regarded as trivial, whether we consider
the happiness or the morals of the people.
There is some reason to believe, that the
original inhabitants of the British isles possessed
a peculiar and an interesting species of music,
which being banished from the plains by the
successive invasions of the Saxons, Danes, and
Normans, was preserved with the native race,
in the wilds of Ireland and in the mountains
of Scotland and Wales. The Irish, the Scottish,
and the Welch music, differ indeed from each
other, but the difference may be considered as
in dialect only, and probably produced by the
VOL. I. T influence
274 THE LIFE OF
influence of time, like the different dialects of
their common language. If this conjecture be
true, the Scottish music must be more immedi-
ately of a Highland origin, and the Lowland
tunes, though now of a character somewhat dis-
tinct, must have descended from the mountains
in remote ages. Whatever credit may be given
to conjectures, evidently involved in great un-
certainty, there can be no doubt that the Scot-
tish peasantry have been long in possession of a
number of songs and ballads composed in their
native dialect, and sung to their native music.
The subjects of these compositions were such as
most interested the simple inhabitants, and in
the succession of time varied probably as the
condition of society varied. During the sepa-
ration and the hostility of the two nations, these
songs and ballads, as far as our imperfect docu-
ments enable us to judge, were chiefly warlike;
such as the Huntis of Cheviot, and the Battle
of Harlaw. After the union of the two crowns,
when a certain degree of peace and of tranquil-
lity took place, the rural muse of Scotland
breathed in softer accents. " In the want of
real evidence respecting the history of our
songs," says Mr. Ramsay of Ochtertyre, cc re-
course may be had to conjecture. One would
be disposed to think, that the most beautiful of
the Scottish tunes were clothed with new words
after the union of the crowns. The inhabitants
f
ROBERT BURNS. 275
of the borders, who had formerly been warriors
from choice, and husbandmen from necessity,
either quitted the country, or were transformed
into real shepherds, easy in their circumstances,
and satisfied with their lot. Some sparks of
that spirit of chivalry for which they are cele-
brated by Froissart, remained, sufficient to in-
spire elevation of sentiment and gallantry to-
wards the fair sex. The familiarity and kind-
ness which had long subsisted between the
gentry and the peasantry, could not all at once
be obliterated, and this connexion tended to
sweeten rural life. In this state of innocence,
ease, and tranquillity of mind, the love of
poetry and music would still maintain its
ground, though it would naturally assume a
form congenial to the more peaceful state of
society. The minstrels, whose metrical tales
used once to rouse the borderers like the trum-
pet's sound, had been, by an order of the legis-
lature (in 1579), classed with rogues and vaga-
bonds, and attempted to be suppressed. Knox
and his disciples influenced the Scottish parlia-
ment, but contended in vain with her rural
muse. Amidst our Arcadian vales, probably on
the banks of the Tweed, or some of its tributary
streams, one or more original geniuses may have
arisen, who were destined to give a new turn
to the taste of their countrymen. They would
see that the events and pursuits which chequer
T 2 private
276 TE LIFE OF
private life were the proper subjects for popular
poetry. Love, which had formerly held a di-
vided sway with glory and ambition, became
now the master-passion of the soul. To por-
tray in lively and delicate colours, though with
a hasty hand, the hopes and fears that agitate
the breast of the love-sick swain, or forlorn
maiden, affords ample scope to the rural poet.
Love-songs, of which Tibullus himself would
not have been ashamed, might be composed by
an uneducated rustic with a slight tincture of
letters ; or if in these songs the character of the
rustic be sometimes assumed, the truth of cha-
racter, and the language of nature, are pre-
served. With unaffected simplicity and ten-
derness, topics are urged, most Jikely to soften
the heart of a cruel and coy mistress, or to re-
gain a fickle lover. Even in such as are of a
melancholy cast, a ray of hope breaks through,
and dispels the deep and settled gloom which
characterizes the sweetest of the Highland lue-
?iigs i or vocal airs. Nor are these songs all
plaintive j many of them are lively and hu-
morous, and some appear to us coarse and inde-
licate. They seem, however, genuine descrip-
tions of the manners of an energetic and seques-
tered people in their hours of mirth and festi-
vity, though in their portraits some objects are
brought into open view, which more fastidious
painters would have thrown into shade.
As
ROBERT BURNS. 277
" As those rural poets sung for amusement,
not for gain, their effusions seldom exceeded a
love-song, or a ballad of satire or humour,
which, like the works of the elder minstrels,
were seldom committed to writing, but trea-
sured up in the memory of their friends and
neighbours. Neither known to the learned nor
patronised by the great, these rustic bards lived
and died in obscurity ; and by a strange fa-
tality, their story, and even their very names
have been forgotten.* When proper models
for pastoral songs were produced, there would
be no want of imitators. To succeed in this
species of composition, soundness of under-
standing and sensibility of heart were more re-
quisite than flights of imagination or pomp of
numbers. Great changes have certainly taken
place in Scottish song-writing, though we can-
not trace the steps of this change ; and few of
the pieces admired in Queen Mary's time are
now to be discovered in modern collections. It
is possible, though not probable, that the music
may have remained nearly the same, though
the
* In the Pepys collection, there are a few Scottish
songs of the last century, but the names of the authors
are not preserved.
27S THE LIFE OF
the words to the tunes were entirely new-mo-
delled."*
These conjectures are highly ingenious. It
cannot, however, be presumed, that the state of
ease and tranquillity described by Mr. Ramsay
took place among the Scottish peasantry imme-
diately on the union of the crowns, or indeed
during the greater part of the seventeenth cen-
tury. The Scottish nation, through all its
ranks, was deeply agitated by the civil wars,
and the religious persecutions which succeeded
each other in that disastrous period ; it was not
till after the revolution in 1688, and the subse-
quent establishment of their beloved form of
Church government, that the peasantry of the
Lowlands enjoyed comparative repose ; and it
is since that period that a great number of the
most-admired Scottish songs have been pro-
duced, though the tunes to which they are
sung, are in general of much greater antiquity.
It
* Extract of a letter from Mr. Ramsay of Ochtertyre
to the Editor, Sept. 1 1, 1799- In the Bee, vol. i\. p. 201,
is a communication of Mr. Ramsay, under the signature
of J. Runcole, which enters into this subject somewhat
more at large. In that paper he gives his reasons for
questioning the antiquity of many of the most celebrated
Scottish songs.
ROBERT BURNS. 279
It is not unreasonable to suppose, that the peace
and security derived from the Revolution, and
the Union, produced a favourable change on
the rustic poetry of Scotland ; and it can
scarcely be doubted, that the institution of
parish-schools in 1696, by which a certain degree
of instruct.. 1 was diffused universally among the
peasantry, contributed to this happy effect.
Soon after this appeared Allan Ramsay, the
Scottish Theocritus. He was born on the high
mountains that divide Clydesdale and Annan-
dale, in a small hamlet by the banks of Glan-
gonar, a stream which descends into the Clyde.
The ruins of this hamlet are still shewn to the
inquiring traveller.* He was the son of a pea-
sant, and probably received such instruction as
his parish-school bestowed, and the poverty of
his parents admitted. -f Ramsay made his ap-
pearance
* See Campbell's History of Poetry in Scotland, p. 185.
f The father of Ramsay was, it is said, a workman
in the lead-mines of the Earl of Hopeton, at Lead-hilis.
The workmen in those mines at present are of a very
superior character to miners in general. They have
only six hours of labour in the day, and have time for
reading. They have a common library, supported by
contribution, containing several thousand volumes. When
this
280 THE LIFE 0$
pearance in Edinburgh in the beginning of the
present century, in the humble character of an
apprentice to a barber, or peruke-maker j he was
then fourteen or fifteen years of age. By de-
grees he acquired notice for his social disposi-
tion, and his talent for the composition of
verses in the Scottish idiom ; and, changing
his profession for that of a bookseller, he be-
came intimate with many of the literary, as
well as of the gay and fashionable characters of
his time.* Having published a volume of
poems of his own in 1721, which was favourably
received, he undertook to make a collection of
ancient Scottish poems, under the title of the
Ever-Green, and was afterwards encouraged to
present to the world a collection of Scottish
songs. " From what sources he procured
them," says Mr. Ramsay of Ochtertyre, "whe-
ther from tradition or manuscript, is uncertain.
As
this was instituted I have not learnt. These miners are
said to be of a very sober and moral character. Allan
Ramsay, when very young, is supposed to have been a
washer of ore in these mines.
* " He was coeval with Joseph Mitchell, and his
club of small wits, who, about 171.9, published a very
poor miscellany, to which Dr. Young, the author of the
Night Thoughts, prefixed a copy of verses." Ext/act of a
letter from Mr. Ramsay of Ochtertyre to the Editor.
ROBERT BURNS. 281
As in the Ever-Green he made some rash at-
tempts to improve on the originals of his an-
cient poems, he probably used still greater free-
dom with the songs and ballads. The truth
cannot, however, be known on this point, till
manuscripts of the songs printed by him, more
ancient than the present century, shall be pro-
duced, or access be obtained to his own papers,
if they are still in existence. To several tunes
which either wanted words, or had words that
were improper or imperfect, he or his friends
adapted verses worthy of the melodies they ac-
companied, worthy indeed of the golden age.
These verses were perfectly intelligible to every
rustic, yet justly admired by persons of taste,
who regarded them as the genuine offspring of
the pastoral muse. In some respects Ramsay
had advantages not possessed by poets writing
in the Scottish dialect in our days. Songs in
the dialect of Cumberland or Lancashire could
never be popular, because these dialects have
never been spoken by persons of fashion. But
till the middle of the present century, every
Scotsman, from the peer to the peasant, spoke
a truly Doric language. It is true the English
moralists and poets were by this time read by
every person of condition, and considered as
the standards for polite composition. But, as
national prejudices were still strong, the busy,
the learned, the gay, and the fair, continued to
speak
282 THE LIFE OF
speak their native dialect, and that with an ele-
gance and poignancy, of which Scotsmen of the
present day can have no just notion. I am old
enough to have conversed with Mr. Spittal, of
Leuchat, a scholar and a man of fashion, who
survived all the members of the Union Parlia-
ment, in which he had a seat. His pronuncia-
tion and phraseology differed as much from the
common dialect, as the language of St. James's
from that of Thames-street. Had we retained a
court and parliament of our own, the tongues of
the two sister kingdoms would indeed have dif-
fered like the Castilian and Portuguese ; but each
would have had its own classics, not in a single
branch, but in the whole circle of literature.
".Ramsay associated with the men of wit
and fashion of his day, and several of them at-
tempted to write poetry in his manner. Persons
too idle or too dissipated to think of composi-
tions that required much exertion, succeeded
very happily in making tender sonnets to fa-
vourite tunes in compliment to their mistresses,
and, transforming themselves into impassioned
shepherds, caught the language of the charac-
ters they assumed. Thus, about the year 1731,
Robert Crawfurd of Auchinames, wrote the mo-
dern song of Tweed Side* which has been so
much
* Beginning, What beauties does Flora disclose !
ROBERT BURNS. 28S
much admired. In 1743, Sir Gilbert Elliot,
the first of our lawyers who both spoke and
wrote English elegantly, composed in the cha-
racter of a love-sick swain, a beautiful song,
beginning, My sheep I neglected, I lost my
sheep-hook, on the marriage of his mistress,
Miss Forbes, with Ronald Crawfurd. And
about twelve years afterwards, the sister of Sir
Gilbert wrote the ancient words to the tune of
the Flowers of the Forest* and supposed to al-
lude to the battle of Flowden. In spite of the
double rhyme, it is a sweet, and though in some
parts allegorical, a natural expression of national
sorrow. The more modern words to the same
tune, beginning, / have seen the smiling of for-
tune beguiling, were written long before by Mrs.
Cockburn, a woman of great wit, who outlived
all the first group of literati of the present cen-
tury, all of whom were very fond of her. I
was delighted with her company, though, when
I saw her, she was very old. Much did she
know that is now lost."
In addition to these instances of Scottish
songs produced in the earlier part of the present
century, may be mentioned the ballad of liar-
diknute, by Lady Wardlaw ; the ballad of Wil-
liam and Margaret , and the song entitled the
Birks
* Beginning, I have heard a lilting at our ewes-milking.
284 THE LIFE OP
Birks of Endermay, by Mallet ; the love-song,
beginning, For ever, Fortune ; wilt thou prove,
produced by the youthful mUse of Thomson ;
and the exquisite pathetic ballad, the Braes of
Yarrow, by Hamilton of Bangour. On the re-
vival of letters in Scotland, subsequent to the
Union, a very general taste seems to have pre-
vailed for the national songs and music. " For
many years," says Mr. Ramsay, " the singing
of songs was the great delight of the higher
and middle order of the people, as well as of
the peasantry ; and though a taste for Italian
music has interfered with this amusement, it is
still \ery prevalent. Between forty and fifty
years ago, the common people were not only
exceedingly fond of songs and ballads, but of
metrical history. Often have I, in my cheer-
ful morn of youth, listened to them with de-
light, when reading or reciting the exploits of
Wallace and Bruce against the Southrons. Lord
Hailes was wont to call Blind Harrv their bible,
he being their great favourite next the Scrip-
tures. When therefore, one in the vale of life,
felt the first emotions of genius, he wanted not
models sui generis. But though the seeds of
poetry were scattered with a plentiful hand
among the Scottish peasantry, the product was
probably like that of pears and apples of a
thousand that spring up, nine hundred and fifty
are so bad as to set the teeth on edge ; forty-five
or
ROBERT BURNS. 285
or more are passable and useful ; and the rest
of an exquisite flavour. Allan Ramsay and
Burns are wildlings of this last description. They
had the example of the elder Scottish poets ;
they were not without the aid of the best English
writers ; and, what was of still more importance,
they were no strangers to the book of nature, and
to the book of God."
From this general view, it is apparent that
Allan Ramsay may be considered as in a great
measure the reviver of the rural poetry of his
country. His collection of ancient Scottish
poems, under the name of The Ever-Green, his
collection of Scottish songs, and his own poems,
the principal of which is the Gentle Shepherd,
have been universally read among the peasantry
of his country, and have in some degree super-
seded the adventures of Bruce and Wallace, as
recorded by Barbour and Blind Harry. Burns
was well acquainted with all these. He had
also before him the poems of Fergusson in the
Scottish dialect, which have been produced in
our own times, and of which it will be necessary
to give a short account.
Fergusson was born of parents who had it in
their power to procure him a liberal education,
a circumstance, however, which in Scotland
implies no very high rank in society. From a
well
286 THE LIFE OF
well written and apparently authentic account
of his life,* we learn that he spent six years at
the schools of Edinburgh and Dundee, and se-
veral years at the universities of Edinburgh and
St. Andrew's. It appears that he was at one
time destined for the Scottish church ; but, as
he advanced towards manhood, he renounced
that intention, and at Edinburgh entered, the
office of a writer to the signet, a title which de-
signates a separate and higher order of Scottish
attorneys. Fergusson had sensibility of mind,
a warm and generous heart, and talents for so-
ciety of the most attractive kind. To such a
man no situation could be more dangerous than
that in which he was placed. The excesses
into which he was led, impaired his feeble con-
stitution, and he sunk under them in the month
of October, 1774, in his 23d or 24th year.
Burns was not acquainted with the poems of
this youthful genius when he himself began to
write poetry; and when he first saw them, he
had renounced the muses. But while he re-
sided in the town of Irvine, meeting with Fer-
gusson's Scottish Poems, he informs us that he
" strung his lyre anew with emulating vigour."f
Touched
* In the Supplement to the Encyclopedia Britajinica.
See also, Campbell's Introduction to the History of Poetry
in Scotland, p. 288.
t See p. 51 of this volume.
ROBERT BURNS. 28?
Touched by the sympathy originating in kin-
dred genius, and in the forebodings of similar
fortune, Burns regarded Fergusson with a par-
tial and an affectionate admiration. Over his
grave he erected a monument, as has already
been mentioned ; and his poems he has, in seve-
ral instances, made the subjects of his imitation.
From this account of the Scottish poems
known to Burns, those who are acquainted with
them will see that they are chiefly humorous or
pathetic ; and under one or other of these de-
scriptions most of his own poems will class.
Let us compare him with his predecessors un-
der each of these points of view, and close our
examination with a few general observations.
It has frequently been observed, that Scot-
land has produced, comparatively speaking, few
writers who have excelled in humour. But this
observation is true only when applied to those
who have continued to reside in their own coun-
try, and have confined themselves to composi-
tion in pure English ; and in these circum-
stances it admits of an easy explanation. The
Scottish poets, who have written in the dialect
of Scotland, have been at all times remarkable
for dwelling on subjects of humour, in which
indeed many of them have excelled. It would
be easy to shew, that the dialect f Scotland
having
288 THE LIFE OF
having become provincial, is now scarcely suited
to the more elevated kinds of poetry. If we
may believe that the poem of Christis Kirk of
the Grene was written by James the First of
Scotland,* this accomplished monarch, who
had received an English education under the
direction of, Henry the Fourth, and who bore
arms under his gallant successor, gave the mo-
del on which the greater part of the humorous
productions of the rustic muse of Scotland has
been formed. Christis Kirk of the Grene was
reprinted by Ramsay somewhat modernized in
the orthography, and two cantos were added
by him, in which he attempts to carry on the
design. Hence the poem of King James is
usually printed in Ramsay's works. The royal
bard describes, in the first canto, a rustic dance,
and afterwards a contention in archery, ending
in an affray. Ramsay relates the restoration of
concord, and the renewal of the rural sports,
with the humours of a country wedding.
Though each of the poets describes the man-
ners
* Notwithstanding the evidence produced on this sub-
ject by Mr. Tytler, the Editor acknowledges his being
somewhat of a sceptic on this point. Sir David Dalrymple
inclines to the opinion that it was written by his successor,
James the Fifth. There are difficulties attending this sup-
position also. But on the subject of Scottish Antiquities
the Editor is an incompetent judge.
ROBERT RURNS. 28$
tiers of his respective age, yet in the whole piece
there is a very sufficient uniformity ; a striking
proof of the identity of character in the Scottish
peasantry at the two periods, distant from each
other three hundred years. It is an honourable
distinction to this body of men, that their cha-
racter and manners, very little embellished, have
been found to be susceptible of an amusing and
interesting species of poetry ; and it must ap-
pear not a little curious, that the single nation
of modern Europe which possesses an original
rural poetry, should have received the model,
followed by their rustic bards, from the monarch
on the throne.
The two additional cantos to Christis Kirk
of the Grene, written by Ramsay, though ob-
jectionable in point of delicacy, are among the
happiest of his productions. His chief excel-
lence indeed, lay in the description of rural
characters, incidents and scenery ; for he did
not possess any very high powers either of ima-
gination or of understanding. He was well
acquainted with the peasantry of Scotland, their
lives and opinions. The subject was in a great
measure new j his talents were equal to the sub-
ject; and he Las shewn that it may be hap-
pily adapted to pastoral poetry. In his Gentle
Shepherd, the characters are delineations from
nature, the descriptive parts are in the genuine
vol. I. u style
290 THE LIFE OF
style of beautiful simplicity, the passions and
affections of rural life are finely portrayed, and
the heart is pleasingly interested in the happi-
ness that is bestowed on innocence and virtue.
Throughout the whole there is an air of reality
which the most careless reader cannot but per-
ceive ; and in fact no poem ever perhaps ac-
quired so high a reputation, in which truth re-
ceived so little embellishment from the imagi-
nation. In his pastoral songs, and in his rural
tales, Ramsay appears to less advantage indeed,
but still with considerable attraction. The
story of the Monk and the Miller's Wife,
though somewhat licentious, may rank with the
happiest productions of Prior or La Fontaine.
But when he attempts subjects from higher life,
and aims at pure English composition, he is fee-
ble and uninteresting, and seldom even reaches
mediocrity.* Neither are his familiar epistles
and elegies in the Scottish dialect entitled to
much approbation. Though Fergusson had
higher powers of imagination than Ramsay, his
genius was not of the highest order; nor did
his learning, which was considerable, improve
his genius. His poems written in pure English
in which he often follows classical models,
though superior to the English poems of Ram-
say, seldom rise above mediocrity ; but in those
composed
* See The Morning Interview, &c
ROBERT BURNS. 291
composed in the Scottish dialect he is often
very successful. He was in general, however,
less happy than Ramsay in the subjects of his
muse. As he spent the greater part of his life
in Edinburgh, and wrote for his amusement in
the intervals of business or dissipation, his Scot-
tish poems are chiefly founded on the incidents
of a town life, which, though they are suscep-
tible of humour, do not admit of those delinea-
tions of scenery and manners, which vivify the
rural poetry of Ramsay, and which so agreeably
amuse the fancy [and interest the heart. The
town-eclogues of Fergusson, if we may so de-
nominate them, are however faithful to nature,
and often distinguished by a very happy vein of