Page:Genius, and other essays.djvu/90

GENIUS AND OTHER ESSAYS

The author died in 1845, at the ripe age of eighty years, and throughout her life wrote poetry, some of it humorous, which was quite the fashion in Scotland. "The Laird o' Cockpen" had a wide reading, and is excellent of its kind. There was Susanna Blamire, the "Muse of Cumberland," who made sweet use of the border dialect in her ballads and songs. "The Siller Crown" is always associated with her name:

There, also, is Sheridan's granddaughter, Lady Dufferin, who has composed very many lyrics, but is known by her most beautiful ballad, "The Irish Emigrant's Lament," sometimes wrongly credited to her sister, Mrs. Norton. The words of "I'm Sitting on the Stile, Mary!" and the genuine melody to which they are sung, have that about them which will last. Did Dennis Florence M'Carthy or John Francis Waller write "Dance light, for my heart lies under your feet, love"? I should like to know, for equal authorities ascribe it to one and the other, and it is too graceful an Irish ballad to go a-begging; 'tis almost as good as the song of Irish songs, Allingham's "Lovely Mary [76]