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Prophefies of apparent impoffibilities were common in Scotland: fuch as the removal of one place to another. Under this popular prophetic formulary, may be ranked the prediction in Shakespeare's MACBETH, where the APPARITION fays, that Birnam-wood shall go to Dufinane. In the fame ftrain, peculiar to his country, fays our author,

Quhen the Bas and the isle of May

Beis fet upon the mount Sinay,

Quhen the Lowmound befyde Falkland

Beis liftit to Northumberland.

But he happily avails himself of the form, to introduce a ftroke of fatire.

Quhen Kirkman zairnis no dignite,

Nor wyffis no foveranite".

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The minority of James the fifth was diffipated in plea-. fures, and his education moft industriously neglected. He

hawking, and hunting; and not as a species of gaming. See alfo, IBID. p. 146. ft. v.

Cards are mentioned in a ftatute of Henry the feventh, xi. Hen. vii. cap. ii. That is, in 1496. Du Cange cites two Greek writers, who mention card-playing as one of the games of modern Greece, at leaft before the year 1498. GLOSS. GR. tom. ii. V. XAPTIA. p. 1734. It seems highly probable, that the Arabians, fo famous for their ingenuity, more efpecially in whatever related to numbers and calculation, were the inventors of cards, which they communicated to the Conftantinopolitan Greeks. Carpentier fays, that cards, or folia luforia, are prohibited in the STATUTA CRIMIN. Saone. cap. xxx. p. 61. But the age of thefe ftatutes has not occured to me. SUPPLEM. LAT. GLOSS. Du Cange, V. CARTE. tom. i. p. 842.

Benedictus Abbas has preferved a very curious edict, which fhews the itate of

gaming in the chriftian army, commanded
by Richard the first king of England, and
Philip of France, during the crufade in
the year 1190. No perfon in the army is
permitted to play at any fort of game for
money, except Knights and Clergymen ;
who in one whole day and night shall not,
each, lofe more than twenty fhillings: on
pain of forfeiting one hundred fhillings, to
the archbishops of the army. The two
kings may play for what they please: but
their attendants, not for more than twenty
fhillings. Otherwise, they are to be whip
ped naked through the army for three days,
&c. VIT, Ric. i. p. 610. edit. Hearn.
tom. ii. King Richard is described play,
ing at chefs in this expedition. MSS.
Harl. 4690.

And kyng Rychard ftode and playe
Att the cheffe in hys galleye.
Earn. Gain.
#Ibid. SIONAT. H. i.

was

was flattered, not inftructed, by his preceptors. His unguarded youth was artfully expofed to the most alluring temptations. It was in this reign, that the nobility of Scotland began to frequent the court; which foon became the theatre of all thofe idle amufements which were calculated to folicit the attention of a young king. All these abuses are painted in this poem with an honest unreserved indignation. It must not in the mean time be forgotten, that James poffeffed eminent abilities, and a love of literature: nor is it befide our prefent purpose to obferve, that he was the author of the celebrated ballad called CHRIST'S KIRK ON THE GREEN'.

The COMPLAYNt of the Papingo is a piece of the like tendency. In the Prologue, there is a curious and critical catalogue of the Scotch poets who flourished about the fourteenth, fifteenth, and fixteenth centuries. As the names and works of many of them feem to be totally forgotten, and as it may contribute to throw fome new lights on the neglected history of the Scotch poetry, I shall not fcruple to give the paffage at large, with a few illuftrations. Our author declares, that the poets of his own age dare not afpire to the praise of the three English poets, Chaucer, Gower, and Lydgate. He then, under the fame idea, makes a transition to the most distinguished poets, who formerly flourished in Scotland.

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Schir, whan ye pleis to Linlithquow pas,.
Thare fall ye fe ane luftie las.
Now tritill tratill trow low,

Quod the third man, thow dois bot mow;
Quhen his grace cummis to faire Stirling
Thare fal he fe ane dayis darling.

Schir quod the fourth, tak my counfell,
And go all to the hie bordell,
Thare may we loup at liberte
Withoutin any gravite, &c..

Compare Buchanan, HIST. lib. xiv. ad fin.
i Printed at Oxford, by Edm. Gibson,
1691. 4to. with Notes. He died in 1452.
Or

1

Or quho can now the workis contrefait*

Of KENNEDIE', with termis aureait ?
Kennedie',

Or of DUNBAR, quha language had at large,

As may be fene intyll his GOLDIN TARGE"?

QUINTYN", MERSER, ROWL', HENDERSON, HAY', and
HOLLAND',

Thocht thay be deid, thair libellis bene livand',

Quhilk to reheirs makis redaris to rejoife.

Allace for one quhilk lamp was of this land,
Of eloquence the flowand balmy strand",
And in our Inglis rhetorick the rose,
As of rubeis the carbuncle bene chofe,

* Imitate.

The

1 I fuppofe Walter Kennedie, who wrote a poem in Scottish metre, whether printed I know not, on the Paffion of Chrift. MSS. Coll. Gresham, 286. Some of Kennedie's poems are in MSS. Hyndford. Flyting between Dunbar and Kennedy is in the EVERGREEN. See Dunbar, ut fupr. P. 77. And ibid. p. 274. And Kennedy's PRAIS OF AGE, ibid. p. 189. He exceeds his cotemporary Dunbar in smoothnefs of verfification.

The poem examined above, p. 264. n He flourished about the year 1320. He was driven from Scotland under the devastations of Edward the firft, and took refuge at Paris. He wrote a poem, called the Complaint of the Miferies of his Country, printed at Paris, 1511. Dempft. xv. 1034.

• Merfer is celebrated by Dunbar, LA-
MENT FOR THE DETH OF THE MAK-
KARIS, OF POETS. See ANC. SCOTTISH
POEMS, ut fupr. p. 77.

That did in luve fo lyfly wryte,
So fchort, fo quick, of fentens hie.
See, in that Collection, his PERRELL IN
PARAMOURS. p. 156.

▸ Dunbar mentions Rowll of Aberdeen, and Rowll of Corstorphine," twa bettir "fallowis did no man fie." Ibid. p. 77.

In Lord Hyndford's Manufcript [p. 104. 2.] a poem is mentioned, called "RowLL's CURSING. ibid. p. 272. There is an allufion in this piece to pope Alexander the fixth, who prefided from 1492 to 1503.

9 Perhaps Robert Henrifon. See Dunbar, ubi fupr. p. 77. And ibid. p. 98. feq. In MSS. Harl. are, "The morall "fabillis of Efope compylit be Maister "Robert Henryfount fcholmaister of Dum

ferling, 1571." 3865. 1. He was most probably a teacher of the youth in the Benedictine convent at Dunfermline. See many of his poems, which are of a grave moral turn, in the elegant Scottish Midcellany juft cited.

His

I know not if he means Archibald Hay, who wrote a panegyric on Cardinal Beaton, printed at Paris, 1540. 4to. He alfo tranflated the HECUBA of Euripides from Greek into Latin. MSS. HATTON. But I have seen none of his Scotch poetry. • See Dunbar, ut fupr. p. 77. poem, called the HOWLATT, is in the Manufcripts of Lord Hyndford, and Lord Auchinleck. In this are described, the Kyndis of inftrumentis, the fportaris, [juglers] the Irish bard, and the fule." It was written before the year 1455

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And as Phebus dois Cynthie precell;
So GAWIN DOWGLAS, bifchop of Dunkell,

Had, quhen he was into this land on lyve,
Above vulgar poetis prorogatyve,

Both in practick and fpeculatioun.

I fay no more: gude redaris may discryve
His worthy workis, in noumer mo than fyve.
And speciallie the trew tranflatioun

Of Virgill, quhilk bene confolatioun

To cunnyng men to knawe his greit ingyne,
As weill in science naturall as devyne.

And in the court bene present in their dayis,
That ballatis brevis" luftally and layis,
Quhilkis to our princis daylie thay do present.
Qho can fay more than schir JAMES INGLIS fayis
In ballatis, farfis, and in plesand playis *?
Bot CULTROSE has his pen maid impotent,
Kid in cunnyng' and practick richt prudent.
And STEWART quhilk defireth one statlie style
Full ornate workis daylis dois compyle.

STEWART of Lorne will carp richt curiouflie2,
GALBRAITH, KYNLOICH, quhen thay tham lyst applie
Into that art, ar craftie of ingyne.

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Bot now of late is start up haistelie,

One cunnyng clarke, quhilk wrytith craftelie:
One plant of poets callit BALLENDYNE';

Quhofe ornate workis my wit can nocht defyne:
Get he into the court auctorite,

He will precell Quintyn and Kennedie ‘.

The Scotch, from that philosophical and speculative cast which characterises their national genius, were more zealous and early friends to a reformation of religion than their neighbours in England. The pomp and elegance of the catholic worship made no impreffion on a people, whose devotion fought only for folid edification; and who had no notion that the interpofition of the fenfes could with any propriety be admitted to cooperate in an exercise of such a nature, which appealed to reafon alone, and feemed to exclude all aids of the imagination. It was natural that such a people, in their fyftem of spiritual refinement, should warmly prefer the fevere and rigid plan of Calvin: and it is from this principle, that we find most of their writers, at the restoration of learning, taking all occafions of cenfuring

I prefume this is John Balantyn, or Ballenden, archdeacon of Murray, canon of Roffe, and clerk of the register in the minority of James the fifth and his fucceffour. He was a doctor of the Sorbonne at Paris. G. Con, De duplici ftatu religionis apud Scotos, lib. ii. p. 167. At the command of James the fifth, he tranflated the feventeen books of Hector Boethius's HISTORY OF SCOTLAND. Edinb. by T. Davidfon, 1536. fol. The preface is in verfe, "Thow marcyal buke pas to the "nobyll prince." Prefixed is the CosMOGRAPHY of Boethius's Hiftory, which Mackenzie calls, A Defcription of Albany, ii. 596. Before it is a Prologue, a vifion in verfe, in which VIRTUE and PLEASURE addrefs the king, after the manner of a dialogue. He wrote an addition of one hundred years to Boethius's hiftory: but Vol. II.

this does not appear in the Edinburgh e-
dition: alfo Epiftles to James the fifth, and
On the Life of Pythagoras. Many of his
poems are extant. The author of the ar-
ticle BALLENDEN, in the BIOGRAPHIA
BRITANNICA, written more than thirty
ago, fays, that "in the large collection of.
"Scottish poems, made by Mr. Carmi-
"chael, there were fome of our author's
on various fubjects; and Mr. Laurence
"Dundafs had feveral, whether in manu-
fcript or printed, I cannot fay." vol. i.
p. 461. His ftyle has many gallicifms.
He feems to have been a young man, when
this compliment was paid him by Lynde-
fay. He died at Rome, 1550. Dempft.
ii. 197. Bale, xiv. 65. Mackenz. ii.
595. feq.

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