Page:A biographical dictionary of eminent Scotsmen, vol 9.djvu/287

Rh After this, "Anster Fair" began to be read in circles where it could be best appreciated, and a criticism in the Edinburgh Review," from the discriminating pen of Jeffrey, in 1814, established the character of the poem as one of the most talented and remarkable productions of its kind that had yet appeared. Its merits are thus summed up by the lynx-eyed, accomplished critic: "The great charm of this singular composition consists, no doubt, in the profusion of images and groups which it thrusts upon the fancy, and the crowd, and hurry, and animation with which they are all jostled and driven along; but this, though a very rare merit in any modern production, is entitled perhaps to less distinction than the perpetual sallies and outbreakings of a rich and poetical imagination, by which the homely themes on which the author is professedly employed, are constantly ennobled or contrasted, and in which the ardour of a mind evidently fitted for higher tasks is somewhat capriciously expended. It is this frequent kindling of the diviner spirit this tendency to rise above the trivial subjects among which he has chosen to disport himself, and this power of connecting grand or beautiful conceptions with the representation of vulgar objects or ludicrous occurrencesthat first recommended this poem to our notice, and still seem to us to entitle it to more general notoriety. The author is occupied, no doubt, in general with low matters, and bent upon homely mirth, but his genius soars up every now and then in spite of him; and ’his delights'—to use a quaint expression of Shakspeare—

Thus far the critic. The groundwork which the poet selected for this diversified and gorgeous superstructure, was as unpromising as it well could be, for it was the dirty and unpicturesque Loan of Anster; the sports were sack-racing, ass-racing, and a yelling competition of bagpipes; and the chief personages of the tale were Maggie Lauder, a nymph of less than doubtful reputation in the songs and legends of Fife, and Rob the Ranter, a swaggering, deboshed bagpiper, of no better character. All this, however, was amplified into a tale of interest, as well as purified and aggrandized by redeeming touches; so that, while Maggie under his hands became a chaste bride, and Rob the pink of rural yeomanry, Puck, almost as kingly as Oberon himself, and his tiny dame, scarcely less fair than Titania, take a part in the revels. And the exuberant wit that sparkles, effervesces, and bubbles o'er the brim the mirth and fun, that grow fast and furious as the dancing nimble-footed stanzas proceed for all this, too, we can find a sufficient cause, not only in the temperament of the poet, but the peculiar circumstances under which the poem was produced. For Tennant himself, although a cripple, so that he could not move except upon crutches, was requited for the loss by a buoyancy of spirit, that bore him more lightly through the ills of life than most men. In addition to this, also, it must be remembered that he had been impoverished, imprisoned, and villified; and that "Anster Fair" was the natural rebound of a happy cheerful spirit, that sought and found within itself a bright and merry world of its own, in which it could revel to the full, undisturbed by debts, duns, writs, empty pockets, and sour malignant gossipred. What were John Doe and Richard Roe compared with Rob the Ranter and his bright-haired Maggie, or with Puck and his little Mab fresh from their imprisonment of