Scottish Text Society publications > Old series > Poems of Alexander Montgomerie

XX
INTRODUCTION.
his sources is given in a footnote. “ This edition,” he
writes, “ is taken from two curious old ones, the first
printed by Robert Waldegrave in 1597, according to a
copy corrected by the author himself; the other by
Andro Hart, printed in 1615.” This remains the only
proof we have of Hart’s edition, for since Ramsay’s
time all copies of it have disappeared. It is of some
importance to determine how Ramsay discharged his
editorial duties, since the texts of David Laing and Dr
Cranstoun are largely based on the ‘ Evergreen ’ version.
This, however, can only be done approximately, since but
one of his sources, Waldegrave’s print, is now available
for purposes of comparison. Between the date of Hart’s
lost edition, however, and the publication of Ramsay’s
text, ten reprints at least of the poem were issued, and
copies of these exist. The nearest in point of time to
Hart’s edition is Wreittoun’s, published in 1636. There
is no reason to suppose that this is anything but a reprint
of Hart’s earlier edition, with the spelling probably modi¬
fied to some extent in an English direction. The other
issues immediately following show only a few unimportant
variations from Wreittoun’s text, and these are obviously
due to the printer’s oversight. Wreittoun’s version, then,
we may safely take as reproducing, save in the matter
of a certain proportion of the spellings, Hart’s lost edition.
§ 12. The basis of Ramsay’s text is the 1615 edition,
and this he would seem, on the whole, to have followed
closely; but from time to time he introduces a reading
from Waldegrave’s earlier version, and occasionally im¬
ports an emendation of his own. Had these changes
been acknowledged, and the displaced readings given in
footnotes, no objection, of course, could be taken to his