The Ettrick Shepherd: A Biography

By HENRY THEW STEPHENSON, Professor of English in Indiana University

CHAPTER 1

YOUTH OF THE ETTRICK SHEPHERD

PERHAPS no man's character has ever been so much the offspring of environment and heredity as that of the Ettrick Shepherd. The bald, green hills of Ettrick; Lone St. Mary's Loch with its hillside church so closely linked to the history of Sir William Wallace; the Yarrow-source of poetic inspiration for centuries; the lonely life of a shepherd on the Border hills in the bleak winter when he takes his life in his hands on behalf of his flock, or during the soft summer when he is alone upon the braes with nature for days and weeks at a timeall this tells half the story of the Shepherd's genius. And heredity tells the rest, for of education he had none.

Of his father, Robert Hogg, little need be said. In later life the poet loved to trace his family to some bold North Sea rover by the name of Haug. Suffice it to say here that all such connection is wholly fancy-born. The Hoggs for generations had been shepherds in the Ettrick Valley. Robert Hogg had so far risen above his forbears as to become a tenant farmer on a small scale, a social rank, however, which he was unable to maintain; and while the poet was but a tiny lad the farmer returned once more to his former occupation. Robert Hogg was a plain, honest, sober shepherd, and his tale is told.

It was from the maternal side that James Hogg received whatever of his character is due to heredity. In the secluded churchyard of Ettrick Kirk the grave of his mother's father is marked by the following inscription:

Here lyeth William Laidlaw, the far-famed Will o' Phaup, who for feats of Frolic, Agility and Strength Had no Equal in his day; He was born at Craik A.D. 1691, And died in the 84th year of his age.

1 In shepherd's parlance a hog is a young sheep that has not yet been shorn.

Laidlaw is an old name in that country, and the William of the above inscription a man of such local note that the following quotations might find place here even if they were not inserted because they body forth so truly the boisterous, athletic shepherd who used to distinguish himself at the St. Ronan's games, and the poet who eclipsed even Sir Walter Scott as one who portrayed the supernatural lore pertaining to the country of his birth.

Will o' Phaup, one of the genuine Laidlaws of Craik, was born in that place in 1691. He was shepherd in Phaup for fifty-five years. For feats of frolic, strength, and agility he had no equal in his day. In the hall of the laird, at the farmer's ingle, and in the shepherd's cot, Will was alike a welcome guest; and in whatever company he was, he kept the whole in one roar of merriment. In Will's days, brandy was the common drink in this country; as for whisky, it was, like silver in the days of Solomon, nothing accounted of. Good black French brandy was the constant beverage; and a heavy neighbor Will was on it. Many a hard bouse he had about Moffat, and many a race he ran, generally for wagers of so many pints of brandy; and in all his life he never was beaten.2

Hogg himself wrote so much about the fairies, and wrote so earnestly that, tho he sometimes doubts, he is more often sincere, and we cannot fail to attribute to him far more than the average belief in the folklore of the supernatural. He relates many anecdotes of his grandfather, but considers him most noteworthy because he was the last inhabitant of the Ettrick Valley who held personal intercourse with the fairy folk. He thus describes the incident:

When Will had become a right old man, and was sitting on a little green hillock at the end of his house one evening, resting himself, there came three little boys up to him, all exactly like one another, when the following short dialogue ensued between Will and them:—

"Goode'en t'ye, Will Laidlaw."

"Goode'en t'ye, creatures. Whare ir ye gaun this gate?"

"Can ye gie us up-putting for the night?"

"I think three siccan bits of shreds o' hurchins winna be ill to put up. Where came ye frae?"

"Frae a place that ye dinna ken. But we are come on a commission to you."

"Come away in, then, and tak sic cheer as we hae."

Will rose and led the way into the house, and the little boys followed; and as he went he said carelessly without looking back, "What's your commission to me, bairns?" He thought they might be the sons of some gentleman, who was a guest of his master.

2 The Shepherd's Calendar, Chapter XVIII, Odd Characters.

"We are sent to demand a silver key that is in your possession." Will was astounded; and standing still to consider of some old transaction, he said, without lifting his eyes from the ground-"A silver key? In God's name, where came ye from?"

There was no answer, on which Will wheeled round, and round, and round; but the tiny beings were all gone and he never saw them more. At the name of God, they vanished in the twinkling of an eye. It is curious that I should never have heard the secret of the silver key, or indeed, whether there was such a thing or not."

Except for his lack of literary genius, Will o' Phaup might sit as model for his grandson's portrait. Let us glance at William's daughter, the mother of the poet.

Margaret Laidlaw, like her son, was a self-taught genius. She lost her mother when she herself was but a child, who, because she was the eldest, was retained at home to take her mother's place and to superintend the household affairs for her father. She saw her younger brothers and sisters growing up under her care, able to enjoy the advantages of school for which she had no time. When but twelve or thirteen years of age, she began to feel the humiliation of their superior knowledge. On Sunday, her only time for rest, she would wander upon the hillsides, alone and dejected. Here, with the Bible under her arm, and, "humbled by a sense of her ignorance she used to throw herself down on the heath and water the page with her bitter tears"."

Her afternoons on the hillside, however, were not all spent in tears. From the Bible she taught herself to read, and from it she acquired a love of verse that, as we shall see, led her to encourage her son to memorize the metrical version of the Psalms. She soon became enamored with verse of a very different kind, namely, the ballad-lore of Selkirkshire. From an old wandering minstrel, the last of his race, she learned, it is said, no less than ten thousand lines. She dictated to Scott the ballad of Auld Maitland which thus found its way into print for the first time in the pages of the Minstrelsy.

She knew also the tales in prose, many of which are to be read in the pages written by her son. She hushed her children to sleep with song and fable, and her native humor made the cottage of Robert Hogg the meeting-place of a famous coterie of shepherds who assembled to hear her tales and

* The Shepherd's Calendar, Chapter XVIII, Odd Characters.

4 From an article by Y, "The Life and Writings of James Hogg", in the Old Scots' Magazine, January, 1818, page 37.

songs-a coterie famous because doubtless these early scenes gave rise to that inborn taste which at a later date led the Ettrick Shepherd to reproduce the same scenes at his own. cottage of Altrive Lake on Yarrow banks, where the places of shepherd swains were taken by such men as "Shirra" Scott, "Willie" Laidlaw, Dominie Russell, and "Christopher North". Says Mrs. Garden:

Robert Hogg, the poet's father, was not a man in any way remarkable. A hard-working shepherd, a well-meaning, well-living man, he had saved a little money, and having married, he came to entertain the wish, and to indulge the very natural ambition of becoming a farmer himself. He accordingly took a lease of the farms of Ettrickhouse and Ettrickhall, residing at the time of our poet's birth at the humble homestead of Ettrickhall. Prosperous for a time, success did not seem to follow his footsteps, and Robert Hogg was compelled to relinquish his farms, and to resume the calling of a shepherd. Mr. Bryden of Crosslea took the farm of Ettrickhouse, and until his own death provided Robert Hogg employment as a shepherd, and his family with a home."

The poet, the second of four sons, was born at Ettrickhall, probably in November or December, 1770. From the hour of his birth, Hogg seems inseparately linked with the fairy folk of whom he sang. His personal friend, Allan Cunningham, thus relates the anecdote:

He was born on the 25th of January, 1772, thirteen years after the birth of Burns; nor was his appearance on the birthday of the poet the only circumstance that marked that something remarkable was given to the world. A midwife was wanted and a timid rider was sent for her, who was afraid to cross the flooded Ettrick; his hesitation was perceived by an elfin spirit—the kindly Brownie of Bodsbeck, who unhorsed the tardy rustic, carried home the midwife with the rapidity of a rocket, and gave a wild shout when the new born poet was shown to the anxious parents."

5 Page 10.

6 Biographical and Critical History of the British Literature of the last Fifty Years, by Allan Cunningham, 1834.

It will be noticed that this account was published before the death of Hogg, who contradicted neither the facts nor the circumstance narrated in connection with his birth, nor the date, which is incorrect. Hogg was an enthusiastic admirer of Burns, and it was his lifelong wish to emulate his literary hero. Hogg repeatedly asserts that he was born on the above date, and some writers have suggested that he purposely altered the date of his birth to coincide with the anniversary of the birth of Burns. This explanation would not account for the change in year, and any one who is familiar with the Shepherd's character finds it difficult to entertain such a supposition. It is a fact that Hogg was unusually careless about dates. In two family Bibles he recorded the birth of one of his children as occurring in different months. (Mrs. Garden, page 4.) In different editions of his Autobiography he mentions inconsistent dates. In another place he mentions something as having occurred in 1801, and immediately afterward

For six years the family led a comfortable life at Ettrickhall. His brother William writes the following interesting account of these early days:

He was remarkably fond of hearing stories, and our mother to keep us boys quiet would often tell us tales of kings, giants, knights, fairies, kelpies, brownies, etc., etc. These stories fixed both our eyes and attention, and our mother got forward with her housewifery affairs in a more regular way. She also often repeated to us the metre psalms, and accustomed us to repeat them after her; and I think it was the 122d which Jamie (for I love the words and names used among us at that day) could have said. I think this was before he knew any of the letters. I am certain before he could spell a word. After he could read with fluency, the historical part of the Bible was his chief delight, and no person whom I have been acquainted with knew it so well. If one entered into conversation on that subject, he could with ease have repeated the names of the several Kings of Israel and Judah in succession, with the names of their kingdoms.'

The parish school was close adjoining the cottage at Ettrickhall and little Jamie was soon introduced as a pupil. As was usual, the Shorter Catechism and the Book of Proverbs were used as textbooks, and James made progress for the short space of two or three months. Then came the crash in the family fortunes.

Hogg writes of his father at the time he took a lease of Ettrickhall:

He then commenced dealing in sheep-bought up great numbers and drove them to the English and Scottish markets; but at length, owing to a great fall in the price of sheep, and the absconding of his principal debtor, he was ruined, became bankrupt, everything was sold by auction, and my parents were turned out of doors without a farthing in the world. I was then in the sixth year of my age, and remember well the distressed and destitute condition that we were in. At length the late worthy Mr. Brydon, of Crosslea, took compassion upon us; and, taking a short lease of the farm of Ettrickhouse, placed my father there as his shepherd, and thus afforded him the means of supporting us for a time. says that he had already seen Scott's Minstrelsy (published in 1802-3). Doubtless Hogg recollected the date of his birth wrong, and never felt impelled to discover the truth.

The parish register records his baptism, December 9, 1770. Ettrickhall was hardly a stone's throw from the church, and there is no reason to believe that the ceremony of baptism was deferred beyond the necessary time. Mrs. Garden guesses November 25 as the day of her father's birth.

It may be noted here that there is an obscurity about a few other dates of his early childhood. In his Autobiography he refers to several incidents of which there is no other record as having occurred in such and such a year of his life. Should we reckon from the end of 1770 or from the beginning of 1772? The doubt is nowhere of consequence, and in the following pages no further notice will be taken of the fact.

Quoted by Mrs. Garden, page 13.