And your images of gold so fine,
Their curses fall on me and mine.
Likewise themselves at any rate,
For money now is ill to get.
I have run my money to an en’,
And have nouther paper nor pen
To write thir lines, the way you see me,
And there’s none for to supplie me.”
As may be inferred from his having soon after set up in business, his finances did not remain long in the condition implied in the above doggerel; and in 1752, in the preface to a second edition of his History, he styles himself “merchant,” a title which ambitious pedlars assumed on finding themselves progressing in business and wealth, which many of them did, to the extent of making large fortunes, and founding establishments whose present owners are merchant princes of Glasgow.
Whether the phrase “me and mine” in the above quotation means a wife and children, as it is usually understood, or dependent parents, or whether mine is a mere expansion for rhyme’s sake, is uncertain; for there is no authentic account of his having ever married; but an advertisement which appeared in the Glasgow Journal of 14th June, 1764, crying down the credit “of Jean Stark, spouse of Dougal Graham, ale seller above the Cross, Glasgow,” for having parted from her husband, has raised some doubts about his having always retained his single blessedness. There is, however, no other evidence than the coincidence of his name with that of a less fortunate clansman, to identify the real Dougal with the “ale seller above the Cross.” The fact that a namesake was such, would naturally lead to a confounding of his name with the better known of the two; and out of the confusion of names would originate the tradition that Dougal the poet was Dougal the ale seller.