CHAPTER 2 



THE PASTORALS AND THE MOUNTAIN BARD 



The immediate cause of Hogg's leaving Blackhouse was the 

 condition of his family at home. His father had grown too 

 old to manage the farm himself. William, the eldest son, was 

 married and found the house too small for the convenience of 

 his family, so James came over from Yarrow to take tempo- 

 rary charge of affairs. 



He returned to Ettrick at Whitsuntide, and in this year, 



1800, was published what is generally considered as his 

 earliest printed song. The immediate popularity of Donald 

 MacDonald was very great, and Hogg gives several amusing 

 anecdotes of times when it was sung in music halls thruout 

 the land as well as at the tables of the military magnates. 

 It, however, added little to his reputation as a poet, for, as 

 Hogg says, it was generally sung without any attention paid 

 to him who wrote it. 



Hogg was always vain of his powers, and the reception of 

 this song for a time turned his head. In a few months, in 



1801, Hogg went to Edinburgh to sell a flock of sheep. They 

 were not all disposed of at once, a fact that required him to 

 remain over in the capital till the next market day. In order 

 to expend the time profitably he decided to issue a volume of 

 verse. In great haste he set about the task of transcribing 

 some of his earlier poems from memory and transmitted them 

 to a printer in a state the imperfection of which afterward 

 caused him much chagrin. He laments this rash adventure 

 in the Autobiography , but the tiny volume forms an important 

 link in the tangible development of his genius.^ 



The volume consisted of 62 pages ; and a list of errata men- 

 tions 8 mistakes, sufficiently disproving Hogg's later asser- 

 tion that the volume abounded in errors on every page. T. 

 Craig-Brown in his History of Selkirkshire says that 



Hogg had the weakness to pretend that he had hurriedly written 

 out the contents from memory during his two days' stay at Edinburgh; 

 but he elsewhere let it out that the manuscript had the advantage of 

 leisurely revisal by Laidlaw and Clarkson. 



* Scottish Pastorals — Poems, Songs, etc, mosthj written in the dialect of the south, — 

 By James Hogg, — Edinburgh. Printed by John Taylor, Grassmarket. ]R01. Price one 

 shilling. 



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