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

The Salamanca Corpus: The Poetical Works of Miss Susanna Blamire (1842)
It is not less apparent that the “Heart, wi’ a’ its virtues rare,” bears a very marked
resemblance to “ And, O I what a heart was that to lose;”
and various other coincidences may be traced between the two songs, to lead to the
conclusion that they are the composition of the same author. Both these songs first
appeared together in Johnston’s “Scots Musical Museum,” vol. iii. 1790, and, it may be
worthy of remark, within a page or two of each other, indicating perhaps that the Editor had
some suspicion that they were from the same pen. “The Siller Croun” was copied into the
“Museum” from a single sheet copy, which, Mr Stenhouse tells us, was some time
previously published by Napier, a well-known musician in Edinburgh ; “The Waefu’
Heart” was taken from a single sheet copy also, which the same authority informs us was
d
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published in London about the year 1788;—a strong corroboration that both are by the
same author, independently of the internal evidence of their similarity of style. The ladywriters
of that period—as confessed by Lady Anne Lindsay was the case with herself, in a
letter to Sir Walter Scott about “Auld Robin Gray”—had a horror at seeing their names
published as authors; even the Delia Cruscans concealed their blushes under feigned
names; and we cannot be surprised that Miss Blamire acted on the same principle. I know
not one poem or song of hers, which was printed during her life, that has her name attached
to it. I find her fine song “Though Bacchus may boast of his care-killing bowl” printed in
the “Calliope, or the Musical Miscellany,” London, 8vo, 1788, without her name; and in
“The Edinburgh Magazine” for 1790, p. 216, is her beautiful little poem “The Adieu and
Recall to Love”—there entitled “To Love”—also anonymous. Thus, if dates can enable us
to come to any conclusion concerning the authorship of “The Waefu’ Heart,” I have
produced sufficient to show, that it is extremely probable it was written by Miss Blamire;
and along with these dates, the remarkable resemblance in style and sentiment must
inevitably lead us to the conviction, that the author of “The Siller Croun” was also the
author of “The Waefu’ Heart:” I have proved that Miss Blamire was
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the author of the first, and gone far to settle her claim to the latter.
It has been a grateful task for me to adduce the arguments in the above inquiry; but I
have two points to bring forth which will oblige me to assume the appearance of an editor
militant, but which I shall close in a very few words. The first is connected with the poem
of “To-morrow.” I was made aware by Dr Lonsdale that there was some doubt concerning
this poem’s being Miss Blamire’s, and that the matter had been discussed in the
“Gentleman’s Magazine;” but, before I had looked into this controversy, the poem was
printed, when another friend mentioned to me that it was claimed by the venerable author
of “The “World before the Flood,” in his interesting selection “The I Christian Poet,” as the
production of Mary Parken. I was not a little staggered at this; for Mr Montgomery is not
the man to make an assertion without due deliberation, and I assuredly should have written
to that gentleman, and inquired on what grounds he made the claim for his author, had the
poem not been printed. But I refrained, because that I had found it among the transcripts of