he became dissolute in his habits. Finally, overtaken with poverty and disgrace, he is said to have died from an overdose of opium in 1798, in the forty-eighth year of his age. Lowe is said to have written one of the airs which is set to his popular ballad in Johnson's Musical Museum, and he is also credited with the authorship of a song entitled "Pompey's Ghost."

Robert Graham, 1750-1797.

The name of Robert Graham of Gartmore is suggestive of days long past and gone. His best known song has so much of the spirit of the old cavalier that in reading it one is forcibly reminded of the spirited effusions of the Marquis of Montrose. As a matter of fact, the "Cavalier Song" was for some time attributed to Montrose by no less an authority than Sir Walter Scott, and when its true authorship was discovered it earned for its author the title of "The last of the Cavalier Poets." The author, Robert Graham, was the son of Nichol Graham of Gartmore, and Lady Margaret, daughter of the twelfth Earl of Glencairn. Early in life he went abroad and became a planter in Jamaica, where he met his first wife, who is reported to have brought him a considerable fortune. In 1785 he was chosen Rector of Glasgow University, in opposition to Burke, and two years before his death he sat as Member of Parliament for Stirlingshire. On the death of the fifteenth, and last, Earl of Glencairn he inherited some of his estates, taking the name of Cunningham as a prefix to his own. Unfortunately, Graham did not long enjoy either his new title or the acquisition to his fortune, for he died in the following year at the comparatively early age of forty-seven. Besides the "Cavalier's Song" our author wrote a number of lyrics by no means void of merit, though none of them show the spirit and ability of the "Cavalier's Song."

Passing to the well-known song, "Auld Robin Gray," which has been designated "The king of Scottish ballads," and yet is the only piece that has come from the pen of its Lady Ann Lindsay, authoress which at all entitles her to fame. For 1750-1825. at least half-a-century its authorship remained a secret, thus making it the subject of frequent dispute, but it is

now definitely assigned to Lady Anne Lindsay, the eldest daughter of the Earl of Balcarres. She was born at Balcarres in 1750, and was married to Sir Andrew Barnard, private secretary to the Governor of Cape Colony, in 1793, and died at her London residence in 1825. In spite of the fact that the authorship of this famous ballad was kept a secret so long, Lady Anne Lindsay afterwards went to much trouble to furnish to the public all the particulars connected with its composition, and this created some scepticism with regard to the genuineness of her claim. "Auld Robin Gray" is usually sung to the air composed for it by the Rev. William Leeves, about 1771, who was then Rector of Wrington, in Somersetshire. For the full exposition of the English air it requires two of the four-line stanzas, while the Scots air only requires one. To provide for the exigencies of the English air the first four lines of the poem beginning "When the sheep are in the fauld" are generally left out. In Scotland few songs have been more popular than "Auld Robin Gray," although its popularity has by no means been confined to Scotland. It has been translated into many languages, and has been the subject of many plays and pictures which could not have entered into the conception of the authoress when she penned it. The revelations of the motive of the poem as given by the authoress, alluded to above, does not enhance its romantic features, and would have been better kept in the background.

In the same category as Lady Lindsay may be placed William Dudgeon, 1753-1813, who was also the author of one well-known piece, entitled "The Maid that Tends the Goats." This one piece has been sufficient to perpetuate his name, while many an author with a larger output has been long since forgotten. Dudgeon was born in 1753, at Tyningham, Haddingtonshire, six years before the Poet Burns, and was the son of a farmer, which occupation he also followed with much success. When Burns was making his Border tour he was introduced to him, and the greater Poet thought him worthy of a note in his journal to the following effect: "Dudgeon, a poet at times; a worthy, remarkable character; natural penetration, a good deal of informa

tion, some genius, and extreme modesty." This may explain why one who could write so creditably (and, as Burns says, with some genius) did not take the public into his confidence more frequently than he did. Among the author's other virtues, if virtues they can be called, we are informed that he was a shy, well-conducted, Puritanic person—a poet, and writer of sermons. Yet the only specimen of his poetic genius which has been handed down to us is the one we have mentioned. This song, it would appear, was sung into public notice through the medium of the stage a path to popularity which could scarcely be appreciated by its Puritanic author if he was in any way a reflex of his time. The melody is taken from the Rev. Patric Macdonald's Highland Airs, showing that the Highland laird who composed the air was technically correct according to the modern theory of music.

1750-1774.

national poets.

Notwithstanding the many poets and authors, great and small, already mentioned in the course of this sketch, Robert Fergusson falls to be placed among the first Robert Fergusson, three of Scotland's more modern and truly More than half-a-century intervened between the birth of Ramsay and Fergusson, yet the latter must rank as Ramsay's immediate successor, for he is the connecting link between Ramsay and Burns. It is not so much the bulk of Fergusson's work that must be taken into consideration-for he passed away from the scene of his labours at an age when few poets have commenced to write at all—as the fact that he struck the vernacular keynote which was to set vibrating the more tuneful lyre of Burns. Indeed, we have it on the authority of Burns himself that when a very young man he had all but abandoned poetry in despair, till on reading Fergusson's Scottish poems he "strung anew his wildly-sounding lyre with emulating vigour." There can be no two opinions of the impression those poems made upon Burns. When he first visited Edinburgh he found only a green mound and scattered gowans above the spot where the remains of this wayward genius lay buried. He was moved to the depths of his soul, and when he recalled the brief

and painful past of his unfortunate brother bard he uncovered his head and wept over his last resting-place with all the fervour of the Poet's soul. Nor was it a spasmodic or transitory emotion. What better proof can be given of the depth and sincerity of that emotion than the fact that Burns at once sought leave to erect the humble monument in the Canongate Churchyard which still marks the spot? Robert Fergusson was born at Edinburgh, September 5, 1750, where his father held the office of accountant to the British Linen Hall, which, though respectable, was poorly paid. Like his son, he had poetic gifts; but with a small salary, and a family of five children to provide for, he had not the leisure or freedom from anxiety necessary to cultivate the gift of poetry. It is evident from some of the letters he wrote to his brother that the family were frequently in straitened circumstances. When Robert was first put to school, his father's income was scarcely more than twenty pounds per annum, and yet out of that small annual aggregate he expended 355 for the schooling of his son, which is but another of many instances that might be given to illustrate the value the people of Scotland have always put upon education. When about six years of age, Robert Fergusson was sent to school, but his mother, who was a woman of most excellent parts, had not left his mind uninstructed. After having attended the High School of Edinburgh the usual term of four years, he was transferred to the Grammar School of Dundee, which was distinguished as an efficient educational institution even in Fergusson's time. In 1762 Fergusson earned a bursary, or exhibition, of the annual value of £10 for four years at the University of St. Andrews, where he soon distinguished himself as a student of more than ordinary gifts. His case is the oftrepeated story in connection with the youth of Scotland in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries-he entered the University with the view of going into the Church, and he matriculated in 1765. This was rather the desire of his parents, however, than freedom of choice on his part; but he appears to have willingly acquiesced, for at the age of fifteen he inscribed his name in his class-book, "Robert Fergusson, Student of Divinity." As it had

been at the High School of Edinburgh, he entered the University with the highest promise of rapid progress; but though this was the case it does not appear that he devoted himself to a deep study of the classics, which were then thought so essential. On the authority of Ruddiman, it is stated that Virgil and Horace were the only Latin authors he took much interest in. In spite of his natural bias for poetry, he does not seem to have shown any marked predilection for Greek literature. We are informed that on the fly-leaf of his copy of Xenophon's Anabasis is written in his own hand, "Ex libris Robert Fergusson," and underneath a rude drawing of a harp. Before Fergusson had been long at the University his fellow-students recognised that he was "a fellow of infinite jest" and excellent fancy, the very qualities which were instrumental in hastening his ultimate ruin. As a matter of fact, his great natural gifts gradually drew him into gay and reckless company, and he became noted among his companions as a wit, a songster, a mimic, a viveur-in short, a man who rejoiced to live his life. But his moral sense had too keen an edge to allow him to long play the buffoon, and he paid for his folly by the bitterest pangs of remorse and religious despondency, which ended in reason being hurled from her throne. Soon there was a vacant chair in the circle of his jovial companions, and they might have soliloquised over the remains of the unfortunate youth whom they had undone by their flattery and empty compliments, as did Hamlet over the skull of poor Yorick when he exclaimed with pathetic irony, "Where be thy jibes now, thy gambols, thy songs of merriment which were wont to set the table in a roar ?"

From all that is known of Fergusson's life and character it must not be assumed that he was more dissipated than the average young man of the day; but owing to his delicate constitution and susceptible mental temperament he was soon vanquished, physically and mentally, while some of his more robust companions were permitted farther to play the rebel against Nature. From time to time there have been two statements preferred against Fergusson, but they are scarcely worth serious attention. The one is that he was disobedient and refractory at college, and was