CHAPTER XII WOMEN OF LETTERS IN the ... - Electric Scotland

SCOTTISH MEN OF LETTERS
“Steal the cow, sister Annie,” suggested Elizabeth; and forthwith the cow was
stolen, and the song “Auld Robin Gray” completed. She never showed the ballad
except to her mother, who was delighted with it. It was copied out, but none outside
the inner circle knew anything of its authorship, though “Suffy” Johnston guessed
full shrewdly. Lady Anne, in her rich voice, sang the tale of rural woes in Fifeshire
mansions and in Edinburgh flats, and through transcripts the ballad became
universally popular, and passed for an ancient song. Antique ladies, with confident
but erroneous memories, professed to have heard it often when they were young; it
found its way into song-books; it was sung everywhere, and even heard by the
camp-fires in the American campaign; it was made subject for a play, and a
clergyman honoured it by claiming it as his own. Gradually the old melody was
abandoned, and the air with which we are familiar, [The words were given by a friend of Lady
Anne’s to Lieut. W. Leeves, 1st Foot Guards - afterwards Rector of Wrington - that he might compose an air for it.
It is his tune which is now used (Hare’s Story of my Life, iii. 270.] composed by an English friend of
Lady Anne’s, was sung in its stead.
Some years after, a sequel was written at her mother’s request - for she would
say, “Annie, I wish you would tell me how that unlucky business of Jeanie and
Jamie ended.” She remembered how the irascible old laird of Dalyell, on hearing it,
had exclaimed, “O ! the auld rascal, I ken wha stealt the puir lassie’s coo. It was
auld Robin himsel’.” And such a story she makes the sequel tell. Like most sequels
it is a failure, in spite of graphic touches and some happy lines. The original had
told all one wished to hear. Of this song she gave no copy even to her mother who,
however, could remember it all from recital, and till nearly a hundred years of age
the old lady loved to repeat it, proud at feeling that she alone knew the secret of its
authorship.
The old life at Balcarres at last came to an end. The eldest brother - the new
earl - married, and Lady Anne went to reside in London with her sister, Lady
Margaret Fordyce, who was now a widow, famous for her beauty, her grace, and her
wit, living in the most brilliant circles of town. There she stayed till, at the age of
forty-three, she married Mr. Barnard, son of the literary Bishop of Limerick, aged
twenty-eight, and accompanied him to the Cape of Good Hope, where he was
secretary to the Governor, Lord Maccartney - an appointment worth £2000 a year,
which his energetic wife had got from her old friend Henry Dundas. She had to
exchange the society of wits and men of fashion, to give up routs, masquerades, and
plays for the company of half-Dutch colonists, with uncouth manners and dialect.
Good-humour she carried with her, with just a touch of the condescension of the