The Cambridge History of English and American Literature in 18 Volumes (190721). Volume IX. From Steele and Addison to Pope and Swift.
XIV. Scottish Popular Poetry before Burns.
§ 5. Original Scots Songs in The Tea-Table Miscellany: Lady Grizel Baillie, lady Wardlaw and
William Hamilton of Gilbertfield.
A lyric in The Tea-Table Miscellany of outstanding excellence and entirely Scottish in sentiment and style, Were na my Heart licht, was written by Lady Grizel Baillie, who also is known to have written various other songs, though none have been recovered except the mournfully beautiful fragment The Ewe-buchtins bonnie, which may have been suggested by the peril of her fatherPatrick Hume, afterwards earl of Marchmontwhen in hiding, in 1684, in the vault of Polwarth because of implication in the Rye house plot. Lady Wardlaw is now known to be the author of the ballads Hardyknute and Gilderoy. Willie was a Wanton Wagsuggested by the English O Willy was so blythe a Lad in Playfords Choice Ayres (1650), but a sparkling, humorous and original sketch of a Scottish gallantwas sent by William Hamilton of Gilbertfield to Ramsays Tea-Table Miscellany; and the lyrics now mentioned with those of Ramsay himself, and others consisting of newand mostly Englishwords by different hands, whose identity, with few exceptions, cannot now be determined, are the first indication, now visible to us, of the new popular lyrical revival in Scotland; though mention may here be made of the Delectable New Ballad, intituled Leader-Haughs and Yarrow (c. 1690), the work, according to a line of the ballad, of Minstrel Burn, which seems to have set the fashion for later Yarrow ballads and songs, and was republished by Ramsay in his Miscellany. |
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