Allan Ramsay. [A biography.] - National Library of Scotland

ALLAN RAMSAY 113
informed Mr. Robert Chambers that ' he was one of the
most amiable men she had ever known. His constant
cheerfulness and lively conversational powers had made
him a favourite amongst persons of rank, whose guest
he frequently was. Being very fond of children, he
encouraged his daughters in bringing troops of young
ladies about the house, in whose sports he would mix
with a patience and vivacity wonderful in an old man.
He used to give these young friends a kind of ball once
a year. From pure kindness for the young, he would
help to make dolls for them, and cradles wherein to
place these Httle effigies, with his own hands.'
From 1740 to 1743 he enjoyed to the full the idyllic
happiness and peace described in his epistle to James
Clerk of Penicuik
—
' Though born to not ae inch of ground,
I keep my conscience white and sound ;
And though I ne'er was a rich heaper,
To make that up I live the cheaper ;
By this ae knack I've made a shift
To drive ambitious care adrift
And now in years and sense grown auld,
In ease I like my limbs to fauld.
Debts I abhor, and plan to be
Frae shochling trade and danger free,
That I may, loos'd frae care and strife,
With calmness view the edge of life ;
And when a full ripe age shall crave,
Slide easily into my grave.'
In 1742, finding himself in a position to take more
ease than his busy life had hitherto permitted to him, he
bought a piece of ground on the Castlehill, overlooking
the valley of the North Loch, and there erected that
curious house, with its octagonal-shaped frontage, copied
;