Page:Scotish Descriptive Poems - Leyden (1803).djvu/151



fate of the poem has been extremely unlucky. The author and the original editor are equally unknown; and of the poem itself, no copy, except that which has been used in this edition, is known to exist. It was printed at London, for T. Cooper, in 1737, fol. with the following advertisement:

"The above poem was wrote by a Scots clergyman, some years ago, who is since dead. The fine spirit of poetry which it breathes, its classic air, but above all the noble enthusiasm he discovers for his country, cannot fail to make it agreeable to such as have a taste for that simplicity of nature, and that beautiful diversification of epithets, which constitute the principal excellencies of antiquity." From the following passage of the poem itself, the author appears to have been twenty-four years of age at the time of its composition: