Volume Iii Part 7 (1/2)
Eminently successful in business, Mr Grieve found considerable leisure for the cultivation of strong literary tastes. Though without pretension as a man of letters, he became reputed as a contributor to some of the more respectable periodicals.[16] In his youth he had been a votary of the Muse, and some of his early lyrics he was prevailed on to publish anonymously in Hogg's ”Forest Minstrel.” The songs marked C., in the contents of that work, are from his pen. In the encouragement of men of genius he evinced a deep interest, affording them entertainment at his table, and privately contributing to the support of those whose circ.u.mstances were less fortunate. Towards the Ettrick Shepherd his beneficence was munificent. Along with his partner, Mr Scott, a man of kindred tastes and of ample generosity, he enabled Hogg to surmount the numerous difficulties which impeded his entrance into the world of letters. In different portions of his works, the Shepherd has gracefully recorded his grat.i.tude to his benefactors. In his ”Autobiography,” after expressing the steadfast friends.h.i.+p he had experienced from Mr Grieve, he adds, ”During the first six months that I resided in Edinburgh, I lived with him and his partner Mr Scott, who, on a longer acquaintance, became as firmly attached to me as Mr Grieve; and I believe as much so as to any other man alive.... In short, they would not suffer me to be obliged to any one but themselves for the value of a farthing; and without this sure support, I could never have fought my way in Edinburgh. I was fairly starved into it, and if it had not been for Messrs Grieve and Scott, would, in a very short time, have been starved out of it again.” To Mr Grieve, Hogg afterwards dedicated his poem ”Mador of the Moor;” and in the character of one of the competing bards in the ”Queen's Wake,” he has thus depicted him:--
”The bard that night who foremost came Was not enroll'd, nor known his name; A youth he was of manly mould, Gentle as lamb, as lion bold; But his fair face, and forehead high, Glow'd with intrusive modesty.
'Twas said by bank of southland stream Glided his youth in soothing dream; The harp he loved, and wont to stray Far to the wilds and woods away, And sing to brooks that gurgled by Of maiden's form and maiden's eye; That when this dream of youth was past, Deep in the shade his harp he cast; In busy life his cares beguiled, His heart was true, and fortune smiled.”
Affected with a disorder in the spine, Mr Grieve became incapacitated for business in his thirty-seventh year. In this condition he found an appropriate solace in literature; he made himself familiar with the modern languages, that he might form an acquaintance with the more esteemed continental authors. Retaining his usual cheerfulness, he still experienced satisfaction in intercourse with his friends; and to the close of his life, his pleasant cottage at Newington was the daily resort of the _savans_ of the capital. Mr Grieve died unmarried on the 4th April 1836, in the fifty-fifth year of his age. His remains were interred in the sequestered cemetery of St Mary's, in Yarrow. The few songs which he has written are composed in a vigorous style, and ent.i.tle him to rank among those whom he delighted to honour.[17]
[16] In the ”Key to the Chaldee MS.,” he is described as the author of ”The White Cottage, a Tale;” this was not written by him, but was the production of one More, a native of Berwicks.h.i.+re, whose literary aspirations he had promoted.
[17] For a number of particulars in this memoir, we are indebted to our venerated friend Mr Alexander Bald, of Alloa.
CULLODEN; OR, LOCHIEL'S FAREWELL.
AIR--_”Fingal's Lament.”_
Culloden, on thy swarthy brow Spring no wild flowers nor verdure fair; Thou feel'st not summer's genial glow, More than the freezing wintry air.
For once thou drank'st the hero's blood, And war's unhallow'd footsteps bore; Thy deeds unholy, nature view'd, Then fled, and cursed thee evermore.
From Beauly's wild and woodland glens, How proudly Lovat's banners soar!
How fierce the plaided Highland clans Rush onward with the broad claymore!
Those hearts that high with honour heave, The volleying thunder there laid low; Or scatter'd like the forest leaves, When wintry winds begin to blow!
Where now thy honours, brave Lochiel?
The braided plumes torn from thy brow, What must thy haughty spirit feel, When skulking like the mountain roe!
While wild birds chant from Locky's bowers, On April eve, their loves and joys, The Lord of Locky's loftiest towers To foreign lands an exile flies.
To his blue hills that rose in view, As o'er the deep his galley bore, He often look'd and cried, ”Adieu!
I 'll never see Lochaber more!
Though now thy wounds I cannot feel, My dear, my injured native land, In other climes thy foe shall feel The weight of Cameron's deadly brand.
”Land of proud hearts and mountains gray, Where Fingal fought, and Ossian sung!
Mourn dark Culloden's fateful day, That from thy chiefs the laurel wrung.
Where once they ruled and roam'd at will, Free as their own dark mountain game, Their sons are slaves, yet keenly feel A longing for their father's fame.
”Shades of the mighty and the brave, Who, faithful to your Stuart, fell!
No trophies mark your common grave, Nor dirges to your memory swell.
But generous hearts will weep your fate, When far has roll'd the tide of time; And bards unborn shall renovate Your fading fame in loftiest rhyme.”
LOVELY MARY.[18]