Allan Ramsay

Allan Ramsay was born in Lanarkshire and educated at the parish school before being apprenticed to an Edinburgh wigmaker (1701). He established his reputation as a poet as the laureate of the Jacobite "Easy Club" (1715). After turning bookseller in 1718, Ramsay published two important anthologies of Scottish verse, The Tea-Table Miscellany and the Evergreen. His pastoral drama The Gentle Shepherd was performed and reprinted throughout the eighteenth century and beyond.

TEXT RECORDS:

1719Richy and Sandy, a Pastoral on the Death of Mr. Joseph Addison.
1720Patie and Roger: a Pastoral.
1721Keitha: a Pastoral, lamenting the Death of the right honourable Mary Countess of Wigtoun.
1721Robert, Richy and Sandy. A Pastoral.
1723Jenny and Meggy. A Pastoral.
1724The Vision.
1725The Gentle Shepherd.
1728Epistle to Mr. John Gay.

PUBLICATIONS:

A poem to the memory of the famous Archibald Pitcairn M.D. 1713.
On this great eclipse: a poem. 1715.
Christ's kirk on the green in two cantos. 1718.
Edinburgh's address to the country. 1718?
Elegies on Maggy Johnston, John Cowper and Lucky Wood. 1718.
Elegy on Lady Wood. 1718?
Lucky Spence's last advice. 1718?
The scriblers lash'd. 1718.
Tartana or the plaid. 1718.
Content: a poem. 1719.
An epistle to W[illiam] H[amilton]. 1720?
Familiar epistles between W[illiam] H[amilton] and A[llan] R[amsay]. 1719.
Richy and Sandy: a pastoral on the death of Mr Joseph Addison. 1719?
Bessy Bell and Mary Gray. 1720?
Edinburgh's saluation to the most Honourable My Lord Marquess of Carnavon. 1720.
Grubstreet nae satyre, in answer to Bagpipes no musick. 1720?
To Mr. Law. 1720.
An ode with a pastoral recitative on the marriage of the Rt. Hon. James Earl of Wemyss. 1720.
Patie and Roger: a pastoral. 1720.
A poem on the South Sea. 1720.
Poems. 1720.
The prospect of plenty: a poem on the North-Sea fishery. 1720.
The young laird and Edinburgh Katie. 1720?
An elegy on Patie Birnie. 1721.
The rise and fall of stocks 1720: an epistle. 1721.
Robert, Richy, and Sandy: a pastoral on the death of Matthew Prior esq. 1721.
Fables and tales. 1722.
Fy gar rub her o're wi strae: an Italian canzone. 1722?
A tale of three bonnets. 1722.
The fair assembly: a poem. 1723.
Jenny and Maggie, a pastoral. 1723.
The nuptials: a masque on the marriage of his Grace James Duke of Hamilton. 1723.
The tea-table miscellany [ed. Ramsay]. 1723-27.
Health: a poem. 1724.
Miscellaneous works. 1724.
The monk and the miller's wife: or all parties pleas'd. 1724.
Mouldy-Mowdiwart: or the last speech of a wretched miser. 1724.
The poetick sermon: to R[obert] Y[arde]. 1724.
On pride: an epistle. 1724.
On the Royal Company of Archers. 1724.
On seeing the archers diverting themselves at the butts and rovers. 1724.
The ever-green [ed. Ramsay]. 1724.
The gentle shepherd. 1726.
Poems. 2 vols, 1728.
A collection of Scots proverbs. 1737.
The vision compylit in Latin be a most lernit clerk. 1748.
The domine depos'd. 1780.
Poems. 2 vols, 1797.
Works, ed. B. Martin and J. W. Oliver. 6 vols, 1951-74.

PROFILE AND
ASSOCIATES:

Scottish
Presbyterian

Crawford School

artisan
editor
book trade
poet
dramatist

James Arbuckle
John Gay
William Hamilton of Bangour
David Mallet
Joseph Mitchell
Alexander Pope
William Somervile

REFERENCE:

DNB; NCBEL; DLB.

[Portrait in Poems (1720); obituary in Scots Magazine 19 (December 1757) 670; David Erskine Baker, Companion to the Play-House (1764); Biographia Dramatica (1782; 1812); John Pinkerton, Ancient Scottish Poems (1786); "Strictures on Scottish Poetry, particularly that of Ramsay" The Bee 5 (21 September 1791) 54-58; William Tytler, "Observations on the Vision" in Transactions of the Society of Antiquaries of Scotland 1 (1792) 395-402; "Memoirs of Allan Ramsay" Universal Magazine 97 (October 1795) 225-26 [portrait]; Philo-Scotus, "Memoirs of the Life of Allan Ramsay" Scots Magazine 59 (February 1797) 75-76; "The Gentle Shepherd" Scots Magazine 59 (February, April, August 1797) 76-79, 248-50, 534-35; Alexander Campbell, Introduction to the History of Poetry in Scotland (1798); Life by George Chalmers in Poems (1800); "Observations on the Gentle Shepherd and Strictures on Pastoral Poetry" Edinburgh Magazine or Literary Miscellany NS 19 (June 1802) 410-22; "Remarks on Ramsay's Gentle Shepherd" Edinburgh Magazine or Literary Miscellany NS 20 (November 1802) 403-06; "Description of the Scenery of the Gentle Shepherd with Critical Observations" Edinburgh Magazine or Literary Miscellany NS 21 (February 1803) 83-88; "Ramsay's Gentle Shepherd" Monthly Mirror 18 (November 1804) 322-25; David Irving, in Scottish Poets (1804); "Allan Ramsay" Literary Magazine and American Register 5 (February 1806) 111; "On the Proposal to erect a Monument to Allan Ramsay" Scots Magazine 72 (July 1810) 509-10; Alexander Chalmers, General Biographical Dictionary (1812-17); Leigh Hunt, "Ramsay's Gentle Shepherd" The Examiner (6 July 1817) 428; Memoir by William Tennant in Gentle Shepherd (1819); "The Scottish Proverbs of Allan Ramsay" Blackwood's Magazine 5 (September 1819) 669-71; Thomas Campbell, in Specimens of the British Poets (1819); Joseph Robertson, Lives of Scottish Poets (1821-22); Robert Watt, Bibliotheca Britannica (1824); George B. Cheever, Studies in Poetry ... Elegant Extracts (1830); Robert Chambers, revised Thomson, Biographical Dictionary of Eminent Scotsmen (1832-35; 1870); The Georgian Era: Memoirs of the most Eminent Persons (1832-34); Robert Chambers, Cyclopaedia of English Literature (1844); Allibone, Critical Dictionary of English Literature (1858-71; 1882); William Black, "A Poetical Barber" Once a Week 11 (1864); Andrew R. Bonar, Poets and Poetry of Scotland (1864); William Anderson, Scottish Nation (1866) [portrait]; Ralston Inglis, Dramatic Writers of Scotland (1868); James Grant Wilson, Poetry of Scotland (1876) [portrait]; The English Poets, ed. Thomas Humphry Ward (1880); W. W. Tulloch, "Allan Ramsay and the Gentle Shepherd" Good Words 27 (1886); Oliphant Smeaton, Allan Ramsay (1896); George Eyre-Todd, in Scottish Poetry of the Eighteenth Century (1896); Moulton, Library of Literary Criticism (1901-05); J. W. Mackail, "Allan Ramsay and the Romantic Revival" Essays and Studies 10 (1924); R. W. Chapman, "Allan Ramsay's Poems, 1720" RES 3 (1927) 343-46; Burns Martin, Allan Ramsay: A Study of his Life and Works (1931); Burns Martin, A Bibliography of Allan Ramsay (1932); Fairchild, in Religious Trends in English Poetry (1939); Dobree, OHEL (1959); Chadwyck-Healey English Poetry Database (1995).

COMMENTARY RECORDS
for Allan Ramsay:

1.	1719  William Hamilton of Gilbertfield, "Epistle I. To Allan Ramsay" 1719; Ramsay, Poems (1720) 173-76.
2.	1720  C. T., "To the Author of Tartana, or The Plaid" Ramsay, Poems (1720) 43-44.
3.	1722  David Mallet to John Ker, 10 September 1722; European Magazine 24 (July 1793) 25.
4.	1725  William Hamilton of Bangour, "The the Countess of Eglintoun, with The Gentle Shepherd" 1725; Poems and Songs, ed. Paterson (1850)12-15.
5.	1728 ca.  William Somervile, "To Allan Ramsay upon his publishing his second Volume of Poems" 1728 ca.; London Magazine 25 (December 1756) 605-06..
6.	1729  Joseph Mitchell, in "To Mr. Allan Ramsay" Poems (1729) 1:269-70.
7.	1734  Anonymous, "To Allan Ramsay, on his Faithful Few, a Poem" The Hyp-Doctor (1 October 1734).
8.	1753  John Werge, in "Epistles on Several Subjects" Collection of Original Poems (1753) 303.
9.	1758  James Grainger to Thomas Percy, 18 October 1758; in Nichols, Illustrations (1817-1758) 7:267.
10.	1758  Anonymous, "Elegy on the Death of Allan Ramsay" London Evening Post (4 February 1758).
11.	1758  Anonymous, "To the Memory of Allan Ramsay" Scots Magazine 20 (January 1758) 20-21.
12.	1761  William Shenstone to Mr. MacGowan, 24 September 1761; in Letters, ed. Mallam (1939) 423-24.
13.	1762  Robert Lloyd, in "The Poetry Professors" St. James's Magazine 1 (November 1762) 219.
14.	1770 ca.  Adam Smith, 1770 ca.; in European Magazine 20 (August 1791) 135.
15.	1772  John Aikin, in "On Ballads and Pastoral Songs" Essays on Song-Writing (1772) 33-34.
16.	1773  Samuel Johnson and James Boswell, 1773; Boswell, Life of Johnson (1791); ed. G. B. Hill (1891) 2:253.
17.	1774  William Richardson, "To a Lady, with the Gentle Shepherd" Poems, chiefly Rural (1774) 93.
18.	1774  Anonymous, "Anecdote of Allen Ramsay" London Magazine 43 (June 1774) 259.
19.	1774  T. V., "To Aurelia, with Allan Ramsay's Songs. An Extempore" St. James's Chronicle (3 September 1774).
20.	1776  James Beattie, in Essays (1776) 434.
21.	1778  J. H., "Verses written in a blank Leaf of Allan Ramsay's Poems" St. James's Chronicle (19 November 1778).
22.	1778  J. O., "Lines occasioned by the late Representation of the Gentle Shepherd" Morning Chronicle and London Advertiser (25 September 1778).
23.	1780 ca.  Alexander Fraser Tytler, Inscription at Woodhouslee, 1780 ca.; George Chalmers, Life of Ramsay, Poems (1800; 1877) 1:xxxvii n.
24.	1783  Hugh Blair, in Lectures on Rhetoric and Belles Lettres (1783) 2:351-53.
25.	1786  John Pinkerton, 1786; in Alexander Campbell, Introduction to the History of Poetry in Scotland (1798) 190-91.
26.	1787  Robert Burns to James Hoy, 6 November 1787; in Works, ed Douglas (1877-79) 4:303.
27.	1790 ca.  Alexander Geddes, in Dissertation on the Scoto-Saxon Dialect, 1790 ca.; Irving, Lives of the Scottish Poets (1804) 2:435-36.
28.	1791  John Learmont, in "An Encomium on Allan Ramsay and Robert Fergusson" Poems (1791) 399.
29.	1791  Timothey Thunderproof, in "Strictures on Scottish Poetry, particularly that of Ramsay" The Bee 5 (21 September 1791) 55-56.
30.	1791  Robert Cumming, in Essay, delivered in the Pantheon, on Thursday, April 14. 1791 (1791) 5-6.
31.	1791  Alexander Wilson, in The Laurel Disputed (1791) 20-23.
32.	1791  Ebenezer Picken, in The Laurel Disputed (1791) 8-9.
33.	1794  Joseph Ritson, in Scotish Songs (1794); Moulton, Library of Literary Criticism (1901-05) 3:409.
34.	1794  Robert Alves, in Sketches of a History of Literature (1794) 174-75.
35.	1796  Gavin Turnbull, "Prologue to the Gentle Shepherd" Columbian Herald or, the New Daily Advertiser [Charleston] (11 March 1796).
36.	1797  George Dyer, in The Poet's Fate, a Poetical Dialogue (1797) 21-22 &n.
37.	1800 ca.  George Chalmers to Archibald Constable, 1800 ca.; in Archibald Constable and his Literary Correspondents (1873) 1:407.
38.	1802  Anna Seward to Walter Scott, 10 July 1802; in Letters, ed. Scott (1811) 6:35-36.
39.	1802  Anonymous, in "Observations on the Gentle Shepherd and Strictures on Pastoral Poetry" Edinburgh Magazine or Literary Miscellany NS 10 (June 1802) 417-18.
40.	1806  Charles Brockden Brown?, "Adversaria: Allan Ramsay" Literary Magazine and American Register [Philadelphia] 5 (February 1806) 111.
41.	1806  Anonymous, "On an eminent Scotch Poet and Barber" Flowers of Literature for 1805 (1806) 395-96.
42.	1809  Anonymous, in British Critic 34 (1809) 687-88.
43.	1809  J. M'D., "Lines written at Habby's How, 22d Sept. 1809" Scots Magazine 72 (January 1810) 48.
44.	1816  George Colman the Younger, in Eccentricities for Edinburgh (1816) 3.
45.	1817  Leigh Hunt, in "Ramsay's Gentle Shepherd" The Examiner (6 July 1817) 428.
46.	1819  Thomas Campbell, in Specimens of the British Poets (1819; 1855) 105.
47.	1824  Bryan Waller Procter, in Effigies Poeticae, or, the Portraits of the British Poets (1824) 83-84.
48.	1825  Allan Cunningham, in Songs of Scotland, Ancient and Modern (1825) 1:179-85.
49.	1830  George Barrell Cheever, in Studies in Poetry ... A copious Collection of Elegant Extracts (1830) 90-91.
50.	1832  John Wilson, in Blackwood's Magazine 31 (June 1832) 985.
51.	1851  David Macbeth Moir, in Sketches of the Poetical Literature of the Past Half-Century (1851; 1852) 41.
52.	1860  George Gilfillan, in Specimens with Memoirs of the less-known British Poets (1860) 3:107-10.
53.	1880  William Minto, in The English Poets: Selections with Critical Introductions, ed. Thomas Humphry Ward (1880) 3:159-62.
54.	1882  Epes Sargent, in Harper's Cyclopaedia of British and American Poetry (1882) 139.
55.	1882  Edmund Gosse, in "Essay on Pastoral Poetry" Complete Works of Spenser, ed. Grosart (1882-84) 3:xlvi-vii.

BIOGRAPHY RECORDS
for Allan Ramsay:

1.	1757  Obituary in Scots Magazine 19 (December 1757) 670.
2.	1764  David Erskine Baker, in Companion to the Play-House (1764) 2:Sig. Cc2.
3.	1795  Anonymous, "Memoirs of Allan Ramsay" Universal Magazine 97 (October 1795) 225-26.
4.	1800  George Chalmers, Life in Poems of Allan Ramsay (1800; 1877) 1:ix-xli.
5.	1812  Alexander Chalmers, in General Biographical Dictionary (1812-17) 26:1-10.
6.	1819  Thomas Campbell, in Specimens of the British Poets (1819; 1845) 437-39.
7.	1832  William Clarke and Robert Shelton Mackenzie, in The Georgian Era: Memoirs of the most eminent Persons who have flourished in Great Britain (1832-34) 3:522.
8.	1842  C. H. Timperley, in Encyclopaedia of Literary and Typographical Anecdote (1842) 2:697-98.
9.	1844  Robert Chambers, in Cyclopaedia of English Literature (1844; 1850) 1:581-84.
10.	1859  William Anderson, in Scottish Nation (1859-66) 3:324-25.
11.	1860 ca.  Charles MacKay, "Life of Allan Ramsay" in Burns, Ramsay, and the earlier Poets of Scotland (nd, 1860 ca.) 1:i-vii.
12.	1896  George Eyre-Todd, in Scottish Poetry in the Eighteenth Century (1896) 1:38-41.

AUTHOR AS CRITIC:
(commentary records)

1.	1719  Joseph Addison:   Allan Ramsay, Richy and Sandy, a Pastoral on the Death of Mr. Joseph Addison (1719) 1-4.
2.	1719  James Arbuckle:   Allan Ramsay, "An Epistle to James Arbuckle of Belfast, A.M." 1719; Ramsay, Poems (1720) 317-24.
3.	1720  Joseph Mitchell:   Allan Ramsay, "To Mr. Joseph Mitchel, on the Successful Representation of a Tragedy wrote by him" Ramsay, Poems (1720) 357-58.
4.	1721  Matthew Prior:   Allan Ramsay, Robert, Richy and Sandy. A Pastoral on the Death of Matthew Prior, Esq. (1721) 7-19.
5.	1728  John Gay:   Allan Ramsay, "Epistle to Mr. John Gay" Poems by Allan Ramsay (1728) 2:163-69.