[94] We lately visited the spot. Not a vestige of the cottage remains. A wilder and more desolate locality hardly ever nourished the youthful imagination of a poet.
[95] Leyden was assisted in his outfit for India by Sir Walter Scott and Sydney Smith, the latter contributing forty pounds. (See "Memoir of the Rev. Sydney Smith," by his daughter, Lady Holland, vol. i. p. 21. London: 1855. 2 vols. 8vo.)
[96] Thomas Campbell was one of Leyden's early literary friends; they had quarrelled, but continued to respect each other's talents. The following anecdote is recorded by Sir Walter Scott in his diary:—"When I repeated 'Hohenlinden' to Leyden, he said, 'Dash it, man, tell the fellow that I hate him; but, dash him, he has written the finest verses that have been published these fifty years.' I did mine errand as faithful as one of Homer's messengers, and had for answer:—'Tell Leyden that I detest him, but I know the value of his critical approbation.'"—Lockhart's Life of Scott.
[97] Set to music by R. A. Smith.
[98] Another copy has since been discovered.
[99] The last stanza does not appear in the original version of the song; it is here added from Allan Cunningham's collection. The idea of the song, Cunningham remarks, was probably suggested to the author by an old fragment, which still lives among the peasantry:—
"And a' that e'er my Jenny had,
My Jenny had, my Jenny had,
A' that e'er my Jenny had,
Was ae bawbee.
There 's your plack and my plack,
And your plack and my plack,
And my plack and your plack,
And Jenny's bawbee.
We 'll put it in the pint stoup,
The pint stoup, the pint stoup,
We 'll put it in the pint stoup,
And birl 't a' three."
[100] The origin of the air is somewhat amusing. The Rev. Mr Gardner, minister of Birse, in Aberdeenshire, known for his humour and musical talents, was one evening playing over on his Cremona the notes of an air he had previously jotted down, when a curious scene arrested his attention in the courtyard of the manse. His man "Jock," who had lately been a weaver in the neighbouring village, had rudely declined to wipe the minister's shoes, as requested by Mrs Gardner, when the enraged matron, snatching a culinary utensil, administered a hearty drubbing to the shoulders of the impudent boor, and compelled him to execute her orders. The minister witnessing the proceeding from the window, was highly diverted, and gave the air he had just completed the title of "Jenny Dang the Weaver." This incident is said to have occurred in the year 1746.
[101] These verses, which form a translation of Freùt euch des Libens, were written at Leipsig in 1795, when the author was on his continental tour. He was then in his twentieth year.
[102] Contributed to the fourth volume of Mr George Thomson's Collection.