Glen Collection of printed music > Printed text > Allan Ramsay

ALLAN RAMSAY 93
Marot, with his Complaint of Louise of Savoy, belonging
the honour, as Professor Morley says, of producing the
first French pastoral. It invaded all the fine arts, — music,
painting, sculpture, romance, were all in turn conquered
by it. From France it spread to England and to
Scotland, and thereafter a flood of shepherds and
shepherdesses, of Strephons and Chloes, of Damons,
Phyllises, and Delias, spread over literature, of which the
evidences in England are Spenser's Shepherds' Calendar,
Sidney's Arcadia ; and in Scotland, Robert Henryson's
Robene and Makyne. Nor did Milton disdain this form
for his Lycidas ; Pope also affected it, as well as Ambrose
Philips ; while, under the title of The Shepherd^ s Week,
Gay produced one of the most charming of his many
charming works, in which our age, by consigning them
to oblivion, has deliberately deprived itself of genuine
poetic enjoyment. To the extent of the name, and of
that only, was Ramsay influenced by his time. As
regards all else he struck out a new line altogether.
With regard to the locale where Ramsay laid the scene
of the drama, two places have laid claim to it ; the first,
and the least probable, being situate near Glencorse,
about seven miles from Edinburgh ; the second, one and
a half miles from the village of Carlops, about twelve
miles distant from the metropolis, and five farther on
from the first - mentioned spot. The balance of proba-
bility lies strongly in favour of the Carlops 'scene.' In
the first named, only the waterfall and one or two minor
details can be identified as corresponding to the natural
features of the scenery in the poem ; in the second, every
feature named by Ramsay is full in view. Here are
'the harbour - craig,' 'the trottin' burnie,' 'the little