I had not long ago a couple of poems put into my hands by one who, knowing the author, told me something of his life and circumstances. Being much struck by the poems I set to work to make inquiries in the hope of getting something further. But he seems to have written very little. His nephew copied out and sent The Auld Blasted Tree and added “I made inquiry of my aunt if she had any more; she says those you have seen along with this one I now enclose were all he wrote, at least the best of them.” The relatives allowed me to see the account of his funeral with an appreciation of the man as it appeared in the local newspaper. It ran as follows, and was published in The Peebleshire Advertiser, July 7, 1906.
THE LATE MR. FARQUHARSON, LONELYBIELD.
Our obituary of Saturday last contained the name of one whose memory will be for long in this district. We refer to the late Alexander Forrester Farquharson. His “mid name” takes us back to the first baptismal scene of by-gone long occupants of Linton Manse, viz., the Rev. Alexander Forrester, whose father, too, was minister before. Born in Carlops sixty-nine years ago, there are but few now amongst us who were children then. When six years old, his father, of the same vocation as himself, removed to the picturesque hamlet at the foot of the “Howe,” and here his lifetime was spent. Married to one of a family of long pastoral connection with our district, who still survives to cherish the happy memories of their long sojourn together, in this, their quiet and peaceful home, they reared their family. By his departure, there has gone from amongst us one of the finest types of Scotchmen that our country districts develop, both, it may be said, in lineaments of feature and character. But, added to the possession generally of the best features of our race, there was in him truly a special element, which seemed to be gathered from the classic scenes in which he was reared. It is not too much to say that his manner and language (quaint to a degree) were a living, embodied personification of the genius of the place, as pictured in the pages of the immortal Pastoral of Ramsay. Gifted with musical powers and some inspiration from the Muses—which, however, not often saw the light—these were fostered in his wanderings amid the lovely scenes, o’er moor and fell, whither his daily vocations led. And with such characteristics, added to his stores of local lore and story, and knowledge of bird, beast, and fossil, it may be gathered how entertaining were the “cracks” in the homesteads he visited, and how much these would be looked forward to and welcomed. And not less so were those in the cosy home in the “Bield,”[39] to which many a one of kindred spirit specially pilgrimaged. Evidence of this was ample from the large gathering from all parts to his resting-place with his “forbears” in Linton’s “auld kirkyaird.”
Thus far the newspaper of 1906; and a correspondent who knew the family writes under date March 18, 1912, “Alexander Forrester Farquharson (the subject of the foregoing notice) was born on Sept. 26, 1836, and was named Forrester after the minister of West Linton Parish. He was the son of Andrew Farquharson, mole catcher and small Farmer, and Isabella Cairns, both natives of the Carlops district who lived there at a house called Lonely Bield. Alexander lived in the same house, and followed his father’s occupation. His son died lately and the mother has now left the House.” From this somewhat meagre account we may gather that the whole of his life was spent in Nature’s lonely places
and in this respect he resembles Allan Ramsay who drank in the poetry of Nature when a boy at Leadhills high up on the Crawford moor in Lanarkshire, where hills, glens, and burns, with birds and flowers and ever-changing skies were his to watch and study and take delight in, at the impressionable season of boyhood; whereby Nature herself laid the foundations of his poetic fancies. And this opportunity to walk with Nature came also to Farquharson, in even a greater measure than it did to Ramsay; for he, like Burns, lived and laboured in the country after he had grown to manhood. But Farquharson had not so good an education as the other two, nor did it fall to him, as it did to them, to have at the outset of his career books put into his hands which directed his attention more especially to poetry. Thus, what the selection of English Songs, which he called his Vade mecum, did for Burns, Watson’s collection of Scottish poems did for Ramsay, and among these, notably, one by Robt. Semphill called “The life and death of the Piper of Kilbarchan” and another by Hamilton of Gilbertfield, “The last dying words of Bonnie Heck.” Later, Hamilton, who by this poem first inspired Ramsay with the desire to write in verse, heartily recognised his merit and himself wrote of him
This source of inspiration from books of poetry never, as far as we know, fell to the lot of Farquharson, whose education was altogether on a lower plane. He was born and died just a Scottish peasant; but his communing with Nature gave him the power of observation, whilst the love of reading, which has for generations been the heritage of the Scots even in the humblest walks of life, taught him how to express the thoughts which came to him, and he had undoubtedly a gift for verse. His poems on his old “Hardie” fiddle, and on the Sundew are so good that they might have been written by Burns. But, like Burns and Ramsay too, he is best when he sticks to the vernacular. When he begins to write English he is less convincing. It is well to remember that Ramsay could owe nothing to Burns, as he died in 1758, the year before Burns was born; but Farquharson, whose widow is still alive, died only the other day, and was acquainted with the works certainly of one and probably of both of them. This does not, however, make him less deserving of notice; for little as he wrote, the two poems just mentioned show, I cannot help thinking, a high degree of poetic merit, being not merely surprising as the work of a peasant, but—extremely good per se, and serve to show how the true poetic gift may lurk unsuspected in a country village. In his poems Fair Habbies Howe (or hollow) and Monk’s Burn he refers to the fact that the descriptions of Nature in Allan Ramsay’s pastoral The Gentle Shepherd are taken from the Carlops district, about twelve miles from Edinburgh, in which he himself lived. The second scene of the first act of The Gentle Shepherd begins thus:
The Gentle Shepherd, the poem on which Allan Ramsay’s reputation is mainly founded, is a pastoral of great beauty and charm. The original MS. was presented by the author to the Countess of Eglinton. It is a folio Vol. of 105 pages, clearly written by his own hand, and has a few comic pen-and-ink sketches added at the beginning or end of the acts, and at the close is this note:
“Finished the 29ᵗʰ of April, 1725, just as eleven o’clock strikes, by Allan Ramsay.
All glory be to God. Amen.”
We will now turn to the seven bits of verse we have been able to collect by the Shepherd of Lonely Bield.
FOOTNOTES
[1] Or Medeshamstede = Meadow homestead.
[2] He claimed the Earldom of Oxford and the Great Chamberlainship of England in right of his mother, Lady Mary Vere, sister and heiress of Edward, seventeenth Earl of Oxford, but succeeded in establishing his claim to the Chamberlainship only.
[3] Defeated and slain at Flodden Field, 1513.
[4] The others are Riby, Sutton St. Edmund, and one in Lincoln, now destroyed.
[5] The Hermitage which dated from 1323 was absorbed into the Hospital.
[6] Originally “Glanford briggs.”
[7] At Mellor in Derbyshire is a pulpit of very early date, hollowed out of the trunk of a tree and carved in panels.
[8] Nearly five hundred years later his tombstone was discovered in the pavement of St. Mark’s and brought to England.
[9] The coal output in the United Kingdom in 1913 was 287,411,869 tons, an increase of 27 millions on the previous year.
[10] As at Grantham.
[11] Where there were no osiers they took to the reeds. A Ramsay man, now in his 95th year (1914), remembers the reed-harvest at Whittlesey Mere being frequently injured by the clouds of starlings who roosted in them.
[12] Figured in Lyson’s Cumberland p. ccvii.
[13] She saved Smith’s life, subsequently married an Englishman, John Rolfe, and died at Gravesend, where two windows have just—July, 1914—been put up to her memory. Her most distinguished descendant is Sir R. S. Baden-Powell.
[14] Near Boston Haven.
[15] The ‘shout’ was a sort of flat-bottomed canoe, sometimes covered fore and aft with canvas painted grey in which one man lay with his hands over the sides so that by using short paddles he could approach the ducks unseen. It is not likely that Hall made the gun, but no doubt he fitted it to the shout.
[16] On the outer side of Boston Deeps opposite Friskney Flats.
[17] The gift of a late parish clerk.
[18] Wytteworde may have meant the warning notice of a funeral.
[19] Yereday = the anniversary of a death.
[20] Corporaxys is the plural of corporax = a linen cloth for the consecrated elements. (See Chap. XXIII.)
[21] Spelt indifferently Reseuyd, Receuyd, Reseauyd, reseueade, Resauyd, resevyd, Recevyd.
[22] This is Gunby St. Peter; Gunby St. Nicholas is between N. Witham and the Leicestershire border.
[23] The corporax or corporal was the linen cloth to go under or over the vessel containing the consecrated elements.
[24] Wong = field. In Horncastle there is a street called “The Wong.”
[25] The most notable instance of this is on the Gosforth Cross in Cumberland, where the same figure represents both Odin and Christ. Here too was a permanent Norse settlement.
[26] The astounding list of Manors and advowsons handed over to “the Master or custodian and the Chaplains of the College and almshouse of the Holy Trinity of Tattershall and to their successors” was the following:—“The Manors of Wasshyngburgh, Ledenham, ffulbeck, and Driby, and the advowsons of the Churches of the same Manors, and the Manors of Brinkyll, ffoletby, Boston, Ashby Puerorum, Withcall Souche, Withcall Skypwyth, Bynbroke, called Northall, Woodenderby, Moreby, Wylkesby, Conyngesbye, Holtham, the moiety of the Manors of Swynhope, Willughton, Billingey and Walcote and the advowson of the Church of Swynhope.”
[27] They all came from Lord Middleton’s park in Nottinghamshire.
[28] This is now being done.
[29] A tax of a fifteenth levied on merchants’ goods in King John’s reign.
[30] Prov. 17. 14.
[31] See Frontispiece.
[32] Hydegy Hay-de-guy or guise lit. Hay of Guy or Guise, a particular kind of hay or dance in the 16th and early 17th century. Spenser, Shepherd’s Calendar “Heydeguyes”; Drayton, Polyolbion, “dance hy-day-gies” among the hills. Robin Goodfellow in “Percy Reliques,” &c. English Dictionary, Murray. Hay (of uncertain origin) a country dance with winding movement of the nature of a reel.
[34] This Matthew Flinders, of Donington, was a notable hydrographer. He was sent as lieutenant in command of an old ship the Xenophon, renamed the Investigator, to explore and chart the coast of S. Australia in 1801-3. And he took with him his young cousin John Franklin who had just returned from the battle of Copenhagen where he distinguished himself as a midshipman on the Polyphemus,—Captain John Lawford. Under Flinders he showed great aptitude for Nautical and Astronomical observations and was made assistant at the Sydney observatory, the Governor, Mr. King, usually addressing him as “Mr. Tycho Brahe.” These two natives of Lincolnshire, Flinders and Franklin, are of course responsible for such names on the Australian Coast as Franklin Isles, Spilsby Island in the Sir Joseph Banks group, Port Lincoln, Boston Island, Cape Donington, Spalding Cove, Grantham Island, Flinders Bay, &c.
The Investigator proving unseaworthy, Flinders, with part of his crew, sailed homewards on the Cumberland; and touching at St. Mauritius was detained by the French Governor because his passport was made out for the Investigator. He was set free after seven tedious years on the island, 1803-1810, and died at Donington 1814.
[35] The Times, alluding to the Ulster Plot, spoke of “The Pinchbeck Napoleons of the Cabinet.”
[37] These were cut in Nottinghamshire; but I see that Sussex is to supply the oak for the roof timbers of Westminster Hall.
[38] An expression used in “Long whist.”
[39] Or “Shelter,” which, from its name, “Lonely Bield,” was probably far from any other human habitation.
[40] Waterfall.
[41] “A trotting burnie wimpling thro’ the ground,” Allan Ramsay’s Gentle Shepherd, Act I., Sc. 2.
[42] Daisied slopes.
[43] Vale.
[44] Characters in The Gentle Shepherd.
[45] Characters in The Gentle Shepherd.
[46] Brow.
[47] Flaming at one end.
[48] Ruinous walls.
[49] Grace.
[50] Cunning.
[51] Quick.
[52] Hollow.
[53] Taste.
[54] Plenty.
[55] Catgut, fiddlestrings.
[56] Play.
[57] A tune.
[58] Stradivariuses and Cremonas.
[59] Chafers.
[60] Thick covering (of snow).
[61] Offence.
[62] Brew = whisky.
[63] Knocked about.