Part 5 (1/2)

'Sic as against the assembly speak, The rudest sauls betray, Where matrons, noble, wise, and meek, Conduct the healthfu' play

Where they appear, nae vice dare keek, But to what's good gives way; Like night, soon as the h! shaw thy gratitude, And of sic friends make sure, Wha strive toa generous part and good, In bounty to the poor; Sic virtues, if right understood, Should ev'ry heart allure'

But we must hasten on In 1724 Ramsay published his poem on _Health_, inscribed to the Earl of Stair, and written at the request of that nobleman In it Ramsay exhibits his full powers as a satirist, and inculcates the pursuit of health by the avoidance of such vices as sloth, effeluttony, ebriety, and debauchery, which he personifies under the fictitious characters of Cosmelius, Montanus, Grumaldo, Phimos, Macro, etc These were said to be drawn froh _roues_ of the time, and certainly the various types are limned and contrasted with a masterly hand To the cultured reader, this is the poem of all Ramsay's minor works best calculated to please and to convey an idea of his style, though at tienius seems to move under constraint

But in 1724 our poet showed hi distinction in a new field In 1718, as was stated previously, he had published a volue number of them adapted from older and imperfect copies So successful had the venture been, that a second edition had been called for in 1719, and a third in 1722 To atteer scale, Raed In January 1724 appeared the first volus_

The second volu assured how acceptable neords to known good tunes would prove, I engaged to make verses for above sixty of theenious young gentleenerously lent entleraph on Rah Sketches and Me David Malloch (afterwards Mallet), William Crawford, William Walkinshaw,' to which ould add James Preston A third volume of the _Miscellany_ appeared in 1727 and a fourth in 1732, though, as regards the last, grave doubts exist whether Ramsay were really its editor or collector Few compilations have ever been e editions were exhausted, and since Raht, soinal All classes in the cos contained in the _Miscellany_ That he intended such to be the case is evident from the first four lines of his dedication, in which he offers the contents--

'To ilka lovely British lass, Frae ladies Charlotte, Anne, and Jean, Down to ilk bonny singing Bess, Wha dances barefoot on the green'

In the collection each stratus ith it had been fae Tunes that were old as the days of Jaht the cadences of the ned the in castle and cot, in hall and hut, throughout 'braid Scotland' The denizens of fashi+onable drawing-rooms found their favourites--'Ye powers! was Damon then so blest?' 'Gilderoy,' 'Tellvoluhts and the corn-rigs rejoiced to note that 'Katy's Answer,' 'Polwart on the Green,' 'My Daddy forbad, my Minny forbad,' and 'The Auld Gude day, at each tea-party in town, or rustic gathering in the country, the _Tea-Table Miscellany_ was in des taken from it, for the entertainht evoked by the _Miscellany_ allured Ramsay to essay next a task for which, it must be confessed, his qualifications were scanty Nine months after the publication of the first volume of the _Miscellany_--to wit, in October 1724--appeared another co ane Collection of Scots Poeenious before 1600_ It was dedicated to the Duke of Hamilton, and in the dedicatory epistle he infor old bards present you with an entertainreeable to any Scotsman They now make a demand for that io They do not address you with an indigent face and a thousand pitiful apologies to bribe the goodwill of the critics No; 'tis long since they were superior to the spleen of these sour gentleranted access to the 'Bannatyne MSS'--the literary ree Bannatyne, poet, antiquarian, and collector of ancient manuscripts of Scottish poetry This valuable repository of much that otherould have perished was lent to Ra, advocate (brother to the Earl of Hyndford), with permission to extract what he required From this priceless treasure-trove he drew specimens of Dunbar, Henryson, Alexander Scott, Lyndsay, Kennedy, Montgolas, and others A si his volu, therefore, it is, to compare the manner in which the two editors respectively fulfilled their tasks

In Ramsay's case the poeh the ale was sacrificed to popularity and intelligibility Lord Hailes, on the other hand, was the le letter; for, as he said, the value of the poeht they afford us into the state of the language at the periods when the various pieces ritten Alter thehtest, and you destroy the intrinsic character of the co his compilation from the Bannatyne MSS,' continued Lord Hailes, 'Ramsay has omitted some stanzas and added others, has modernised the versification and varied the ancient ' To offend thus was to render himself liable to the severest censure from all literary antiquarians

The fault was as inexcusable as would be a trader's in paloods as those of the best materials As an example of the ruthless liberties our poet took with the text, it may be well to follow Chalmers' example, and print side by side a stanza of Ramsay's 'paraphrase' and Lord Hailes' severely accurate rendering of the opening of Dunbar's 'Thistle and the Rose'--

_Ramsay_

'Quhen Merch with variand winds was overpast, And sweet Apryle had with his silver showers Tane leif of Nature with an orient blast, And lusty May, that in the ty the tendir odours reid and quhyt, Quhois harrit delyt'

_Hailes_

'Quhen Merche ith variand windis past, And Appryll had with her silver shouris Tane leif at Nature with ane orient blast, And lusty May, that yn thair houris A the tendir odouris reid and quhyt, Quhois harmony to heir it wis delyt'

In Dunbar's 'Lament for the Deth of the Makkaris' he not only varied but added several lines, and these in the silliest manner possible For exay, Ramsay must needs tack on three stanzas, as a prophecy by Dunbar himself, wherein the vanity-full poet is introduced as 'a lad frae Hether for inappropriate fooling like the following, co in to mar the solemn close of Dunbar's almost inspired lines?--

'Suthe I forsie, if spaecraft had, Frae Hether-muirs sall rise a lad, Aftir two centries pas, sall he Revive our farene_; All thanks to careful Bannatyne, And to the patron kind and frie Wha lends the lad baith them and me

Far sall we fare baith eist and west, Owre ilka clime by Scots possest; Then sen our warks sall never dee, _Tireen_ Ramsay published two of his own poems, _The Vision_ (in which the author bewails the Union and the banishle and the Robin Reid-breist_ (likewise a Jacobite poe archaicisht, so as to pass theenious before 1600' He also inserted _Hardyknute_, a fragment, which subsequent research has proved to have been written by Lady Elizabeth Wardlaw, a contereen_ did much to revive popular interest in early Scottish poetry, and thus prepare the way for Lord Hailes and Bishop Percy, from a critical point of vieorse than worthless, inas in Ramsay's specimens of our early Scots literary remains, have not been corrected even to this day

But though Ramsay, in the estiuilty of an offence so heinous,--an offence vitiating both the _Tea-Table Miscellany_ and the _Evergreen_,--on the other hand, from the point of view of the popular reader, his action in e, at least, was not only ible to the great mass of the people

Remembered, too, it must be, that Ramsay lived before the development of what may be styled the antiquarian 'conscience,' in whose code of literary morality one of the cardinal commandments is, 'Thou shalt in no wise alter an ancient MS, that thy reputation and good faith ned in the land wherein thou livest, and that thoua nest of critical hornets about thine ears'

In his _Reh_, Dr Daniel Wilson thus succinctly states the case: 'Ramsay had much more of the poet than the antiquary in his co verse less on account of its age than itsand spurious antiques, and had little co an old poeh customers' He was no Ritson,--and, after all, even Plautus had, for three hundred years after the revival of learning, to await his Ritschl!

CHAPTER VII

'THE GENTLE SHEPHERD'; SCOTTISH IDYLLIC POETRY; RAMSAY'S PASTORALS--1725-30

In the quarto of 1721, not the least reues, the one between Richy (Sir Richard Steele) and Sandy (Alexander Pope), and based on the death of Addison: the other between Patie and Roger, and concerning itself solely with a representation of rural life Ast the best pieces in the volume both undoubtedly ranked In 1723 appeared anotherobvious kinshi+p with _Patie and Roger_ So delighted were his friends, the Clerks and the Bennets, Professors Drummond and Maclaurin, and many others, with the _vraisemblance_ to Scottish rural life, and with the true rustic flavour present in the two dialogues, that they entreated hi links, and to expand them into a pastoral dra powers so varied, and so supreth, induced by their advice, he threw hi with enthusiasm In a letter to his kinsman William Ramsay of Templehall, dated April 8, 1724, he writes: ”I ah with a Drath of five acts, in verse a' the gate, and, if I succeed according to my plan, I hope to tope [rival] with the authors of _Pastor Fido_ and _Aminta_”

On the scenes ith he had beco his lades, of fair Midlothian, he no, as well as from the quaint and curious types of character--the Syes, and the Mauses--ith he had co such seasons