or
Allan!

But his daughters, realising to the full the part that now devolved on
them, stepped into the gap left in his domestic circle. Nobly they
fulfilled their duty, and amongst the most affecting tributes Ramsay
paid, is that to the filial affection of 'his girls,' over whom, after
their mother had gone from them, he watched with a wealth of paternal
love and an anxious solicitude, as unsparing as it was unremitting.

And thus did the life of Allan Ramsay roll quietly onward through placid
reaches of domestic and social happiness, during the closing fourteen
years of existence. Though he did not formally retire from business
until 1755, he left it almost entirely in the hands of capable
subordinates. He had worked hard in his day, and now, as he said--

----'I the best and fairest please,
A little man that lo'es my ease,
And never thole these passions lang
That rudely mint to do me wrang.'

Accordingly, he lived quietly in the 'goose-pie,' 'faulding his limbs in
ease,' and absolutely refusing to concern himself with anything
political, social, or ecclesiastical calculated to bring worry and
trouble upon him.

During the Rebellion of 1745, tradition states that Prince Charles
Edward, after the capture of the city by the Highland army, sent a
message to Ramsay, asking him to repair to Holyrood, that some mark of
his new sovereign's favour might be bestowed on him. Singular, indeed,
it was, that the poet should have selected the day in question to repair
to his friend James Clerk's mansion at Penicuik, and that he should
there have been seized with so severe an indisposition as to prevent him
returning to Edinburgh for nearly five weeks. Though a Tory and a
Jacobite, honest Allan knew upon which side his bread was buttered. Such
honours as would have been conferred would have been inconvenient.
Moreover, the Rebellion had not yet attained dimensions sufficient to
transmute it from a rebellion into a revolution. Pawkiness and caution
were prominent traits in his character, and they were never used to more
salient advantage than in the instance in question.

To the end of life, Ramsay remained the same kindly, genial, honourable
man, whose appearance in any of the social circles he frequented, was
the signal for 'quips and cranks and wreathed smiles' to go round, and
for the feast of reason and the flow of soul to commence. His squat,
podgy figure waddling down the High Street on his way to his