Volume Ii Part 2 (1/2)

WALTER WATSON, 302 My Jockie 's far awa, 304 Maggie an' me, 305 Sit down, my cronie, 306 Braes o' Bedlay, 307 Jessie, 308

WILLIAM LAIDLAW, 310 Lucy's flittin', 314 Her bonnie black e'e, 316 Alake for the la.s.sie, 317

METRICAL TRANSLATIONS FROM THE MODERN GAELIC MINSTRELSY.

ALEXANDER MACDONALD, 321 The lion of Macdonald, 323 The brown dairy-maiden, 327 The praise of Morag, 329 News of Prince Charles, 335

JOHN ROY STUART, 340 Lament for Lady Macintosh, 341 The day of Culloden, 343

JOHN MORRISON, 346 My beauty dark, 347

ROBERT MACKAY, 349 The Highlander's home sickness, 349

GLOSSARY, 350

THE

MODERN SCOTTISH MINSTREL.

JAMES HOGG.

The last echoes of the older Border Minstrelsy were dying from the memory of the aged, and the spirit which had awakened the strains seemed to have sighed an eternal farewell to its loved haunts in the past, when, suddenly arousing from a long slumber, it threw the mantle of inspiration, at the close of last century, over several sons of song, worthy to bear the lyre of their minstrel sires. Of these, unquestionably the most remarkable was James Hogg, commonly designated ”The Ettrick Shepherd.” This distinguished individual was born in the bosom of the romantic vale of Ettrick, in Selkirks.h.i.+re,--one of the most mountainous and picturesque districts of Scotland. The family of Hogg claimed descent from Hougo, a Norwegian baron; and the poet's paternal ancestors at one period possessed the lands of Fauldshope in Ettrick Forest, and were followers, under the feudal system, of the Knights of Harden. For several generations they had adopted the simple occupation of shepherds. On the mother's side, the poet was descended from the respectable family of Laidlaw,--one of the oldest in Tweeddale, and of which all the representatives bore the reputation of excelling either in intellectual vigour or physical energy; they generally devoted themselves to the pastoral life. Robert Hogg, the poet's father, was a person of very ordinary sagacity, presenting in this respect a decided contrast to his wife, Margaret Laidlaw, a woman of superior energy and cultivated mind. Their family consisted of four sons, of whom the second was James, the subject of this Memoir. The precise date of his birth is unknown: he was baptised, according to the Baptismal Register of Ettrick, his native parish, on the 9th of December 1770.[28]

At the period of his marriage, Robert Hogg was in circ.u.mstances of considerable affluence; he had saved money as a shepherd, and, taking on lease the two adjoining pastoral farms of Ettrick-hall and Ettrick-house, he largely stocked them with sheep adapted both for the Scottish and English markets. During several years he continued to prosper; but a sudden depression in the market, and the absconding of a party who was indebted to him, at length exhausted his finances, and involved him in bankruptcy. The future poet was then in his sixth year.

In this dest.i.tute condition, the family experienced the friends.h.i.+p and a.s.sistance of Mr Brydon, tenant of the neighbouring farm of Crosslee, who, leasing Ettrick-house, employed Robert Hogg as his shepherd. But the circ.u.mstances of the family were much straitened by recent reverses; and the second son, young as he was, and though he had only been three months at school, was engaged as a cow-herd, his wages for six months being only a ewe-lamb and a pair of shoes! Three months' further attendance at school, on the expiry of his engagement, completed the future bard's scholastic instructions. It was the poet's lot, with the exception of these six months' schooling, to receive his education among the romantic retreats and solitudes of Nature. First as a cow-herd, and subsequently through the various gradations of shepherd-life, his days, till advanced manhood, were all the year round pa.s.sed upon the hills.

And such hills! The mountains of Ettrick and Yarrow are impressed with every feature of Highland scenery, in its wildest and most striking aspects. There are stern summits, enveloped in cloud, and stretching heavenwards; huge broad crests, heathy and verdant, or torn by fissures and broken by the storms; deep ravines, jagged, precipitate, and darksome; and valleys sweetly reposing amidst the sublimity of the awful solitude. There are dark craggy mountains around the Grey-Mare's-Tail, echoing to the roar of its stupendous cataract; and romantic and beautiful green hills, and inaccessible heights, surrounding and towering over St Mary's Loch, and the Loch of the Lowes. To the sublimity of that vast academy, in which he had learned to invoke the Muse, the poet has referred in the ”Queen's Wake”:--

”The bard on Ettrick's mountain green, In Nature's bosom nursed had been; And oft had mark'd in forest lone The beauties on her mountain throne; Had seen her deck the wildwood tree, And star with snowy gems the lea; In loveliest colours paint the plain, And sow the moor with purple grain; By golden mead and mountain sheer, Had view'd the Ettrick waving clear, When shadowy flocks of purest snow Seem'd grazing in a world below.”

Glorious as was his academy, the genius of the poet was not precocious.

Forgetting everything he had learned at school, he spent his intervals of toil in desultory amus.e.m.e.nts, or in pursuing his own shadow upon the hills. As he grew older, he discovered the possession of a musical ear; and saving five s.h.i.+llings of his earnings, he purchased an old violin, upon which he learned to play his favourite tunes. He had now attained his fourteenth year; and in the constant hope of improving his circ.u.mstances, had served twelve masters.

The life of a cow-herd affords limited opportunities for mental improvement. And the early servitude of the Ettrick Shepherd was spent in excessive toil, which his propensities to fun and frolic served just to render tolerable. When he reached the respectable and comparatively easy position of a shepherd, he began to think of teaching himself to read. From Mrs Laidlaw, the wife of the farmer at Willinslee, on which he served, he was privileged with the loan of two works, of which the reputation had been familiar to him from childhood. These were Henry the Minstrel's ”Life and Adventures of Sir William Wallace,” and the ”Gentle Shepherd” of Allan Ramsay. On these the future poet with much difficulty learned to read, in his eighteenth year. He afterwards read a number of theological works, from his employer's collection of books; and among others of a speculative cast, ”Burnet's Theory of the Conflagration of the Earth,” the perusal of which, he has recorded, ”nearly overturned his brain.”

At Whitsunday 1790, in his twentieth year, Hogg entered the service, as shepherd, of Mr James Laidlaw, tenant of Blackhouse,--a farm situate on the Douglasburn in Yarrow. This proved the most signally fortunate step which he had yet taken. Mr Laidlaw was a man of singular shrewdness and of a highly cultivated mind; he readily perceived his shepherd's apt.i.tude for learning, and gave him the use of his library. But the poet's connexion with Blackhouse was especially valuable in enabling him to form the intimacy of Mr William Laidlaw, his master's son, the future factor and amanuensis of Sir Walter Scott. Though ten years his junior, and consequently a mere youth at the period of his coming to Blackhouse, young Laidlaw began early to sympathise with the Shepherd's predilections, and afterwards devoted a large portion of time to his society. The friends.h.i.+p which ensued proved useful to both. A MS.

narrative of the poet's life by this unfailing friend, which has been made available in the preparation of this Memoir, enables us to supply an authentic account of this portion of his career. ”He was not long,”

writes Mr Laidlaw, ”in going through all the books belonging to my father; and learning from me that Mr Elder, bookseller, Peebles, had a large collection of books which he used as a circulating library, he forthwith became a subscriber, and by that means read Smollett's and Fielding's novels, and those voyages and travels which were published at the time, including those of Cook, Carteret, and others.”

The progress of the Shepherd in learning was singularly tardy. He was, by a persevering course of reading, sufficiently familiar with the more esteemed writers in English literature, ere he attempted penmans.h.i.+p. He acquired the art upon the hill-side by copying the Italian alphabet, using his knees as his desk, and having his ink-bottle suspended from his b.u.t.ton. In his twenty-sixth year he first essayed to write verses,--an effort attended, in the manual department, with amusing difficulty, for he stripped himself of his coat and vest to the undertaking, yet could record only a few lines at a sitting! But he was satisfied with the fame derived from his verses, as adequate compensation for the toil of their production; he wrote for the amus.e.m.e.nt of the shepherd maidens, who sung them to their favourite tunes, and bestowed on him the prized designation of ”Jamie the Poeter.”

At the various gatherings of the lads and la.s.ses in the different homesteads, then frequent in this pastoral district, he never failed to present himself, and had golden opportunities of winning the chaplet of applause, both for the strains of his minstrelsy, and the music of his violin. These _reunions_ were not without their influence in stimulating him to more ambitious efforts in versification.

The Shepherd's popularity, while tending the flocks of Mr Laidlaw at Blackhouse, was not wholly derived from his skill as a versifier, and capabilities as a musician, but, among the fairer portion of the creation, was perhaps scarcely less owing to the amenity of his disposition, combined with the handsomeness of his person. As a candidate for the honour of feminine approbation, he was successful alike in the hall and on the green: the rumour of his approach at any rural a.s.semblage or merry-meeting was the watchword for increased mirth and happiness. If any malignant rival had hinted aught to his prejudice, the maidens of the whole district had a.s.sembled to vindicate his cause.

His personal appearance at this early period is thus described by Mr William Laidlaw:--”About nineteen years of age, Hogg was rather above the middle height, of faultless symmetry of form; he was of almost unequalled agility and swiftness. His face was then round and full, and of a ruddy complexion, with bright blue eyes that beamed with gaiety, glee, and good-humour, the effect of the most exuberant animal spirits.

His head was covered with a singular profusion of light-brown hair, which he was obliged to wear coiled up under his hat. On entering church on a Sunday (where he was all his life a regular attender) he used, on lifting his hat, to raise his right hand to a.s.sist a graceful shake of his head in laying back his long hair, which rolled down his back, and fell below his loins. And every female eye was upon him, as, with light step, he ascended the stair to the gallery where he sat.”