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

76
FAMOUS SCOTS
the time, a sentence or two may be quoted from a little
pamphlet in the Advocates' Library entitled, ' A Letter
from a Gentleman in the Comitry to his Friend in the
City, with an Answer thereto concerning the New
Assembly.' The author writes :
' I am informed there
is lately a Society erected in your town which I think is
called an "Assembly." The speculations concerning
this meeting have of late exhausted the most part of the
public conversation in this countryside. Some are
pleased to say 'tis only designed to cultivate polite
conversation and genteel behaviour among the better
sort of folks, and to give young people an opportunity of
accomplishing themselves in both ; while others are of
opinion it will have quite a different effect, and tends to
vitiate and deprave the minds and inclinations of the
younger sort.'
The Assemblies themselves must have been charac-
terised by the most funereal solemnity, particularly during
the regime of the famous ' Mistress of Ceremonies,' or
directress. Miss Nicky Murray. So late as 1753, when
the horror at ' promiscuous dancing ' might be supposed
to have mitigated a little, Goldsmith, who then visited
the Assembly, relates that, on entering the room, he saw
one end of it ' taken up by the ladies, who sat dismally
in a group by themselves. On the other side stand
their pensive partners that are to be, but with no
more intercourse between the sexes than between two
countries at war. The ladies, indeed, may ogle and the
gentlemen sigh, but an embargo is laid on any closer
commerce.'
As might well be supposed, such bigoted austerity had
no friend in Allan Ramsay. All that he could do he