The Poetical Works of Miss Susanna Blamire (1842) - Gredos ...

The Salamanca Corpus: The Poetical Works of Miss Susanna Blamire (1842)
[Page]
APPENDIX.
I HAVE inserted the three following pieces in this appendix, because two of them are
involved in some doubt whether or not they belong to Miss Blamire; the third I record in
this first collected edition of her works, as the production of her friend Miss Gilpin, which
was sent by Miss Stubbs, to whom Dr Lonsdale and myself are indebted for several other
obliging communications. I have not seen this excellent song by Miss Gilpin yet in print,
and that is one reason why it is inserted here; but my chief motive is, to let these two
talented ladies go forth to posterity together; for they were lovely in their lives, and in their
deaths were not long divided. I have made many anxious inquiries concerning Miss Gilpin
and her writings, for the purpose of a memoir, and of collecting her works; but hitherto my
endeavours have been unavailing: yet I am not without hope that some one will afford me
materials for a sketch of her life, and furnish me with a correct and genuine copy of her
writings. It is evident that she must have indulged a good deal in literary composition; for
the few things which are known to be
[256] APPENDIX.
hers exhibit no ordinary skill, and are stamped with the impress of unquestionable talent.
The first of the following pieces, which is here entitled “The Carrier Pigeon,” I found many
long years ago,—as mentioned in the Preface,—in the Mason’s Magazine or Masonic
Magazine, for I do not recollect the precise title, having unfortunately taken no note of it at
the time: in such a work however I found it, with the name of Miss Blamire attached. In the
London Monthly Magazine it was published as the production of Lady Anne Lindsay, in
reply to the question, Who was the author of Auld Robin Gray? from which it was copied
into the Soots Magazine for May 1805, p. 336. Future inquiry may, perhaps, solve the
difficulty. A song on the same subject is to be found in “The Vocal Magazine,” vol. iii.
song 2; Edinburgh, 1799, 3 vols. 8vo. That song, in which the writer supposes the pigeon to
return with Colin’s reply to his mistress, we may regard as a continuation of the present.
Dr Lonsdale received “ The Sailor Lad’s Return” from Carlisle, where it is generally
thought to be Miss Blamire’s; but in “ Dialogues, Poems, Songs, &c. in the Westmoreland
and Cumberland dialects,” London, 1839, 8vo, p. 310, it is printed in the Cumberland
dialect, and there said to be the production of Miss Gilpin. The edition here given is in the
Scottish language, and that is the reason why I have some suspicion it was written by Miss