RAMSAY, rim'zi, Allan, Scottish poet: b. Leadhills, Lanarkshire, 15 Oct. 1686; d. Edinburgh, 7 Jan. 1758. The death of his father in early life forced him to seek a means of livelihood in the Scottish capital. There he became bound as an apprentice to a wig-maker, which occupation he continued after his ap prenticeship had ceased. The exact period when he commenced bookselling is unknown, but he is said to have been the first who established a circulating library in Scotland. The library continued to exist till a comparatively recent period. His first shop, as we learn from the imprint of some of his books, was ((at the sign of the Mercury, opposite to Niddry's Wynds; but in 1726 he removed to a house at the east end of the •uckenbooths and adopted for his sign the heads of Ben Jonson and Drummond of Hawthornden. In 121 he published a col lection of his poems which was so liberally sub scribed for that he is said to have cleared by it 400 guineas. These poems had originally ap peared on separate broadsheets and sold for a penny each In 1724 the first volume of 'The Tea-Table Miscellany,' a collection of songs appeared, which was soon followed by two others. Shortly afterward he brought out 'The
Evergreen, being a Collection of Scots Poems wrote by the Ingenious before 1600,) which was equally successful. In 1725 appeared his famous pastoral, 'The Gentle Shepherd.' Its success was instantaneous and edition followed edition with great rapidity. In 1728 a second quarto volume of his poems appeared; and his 'Thirty Fables,' undoubtedly the best of Ram say's lesser productions. He was now at the height of his celebrity and his shop was the common resort of the literary characters and wits of Edinburgh. He spent the last 12 years of his life in a quaint house he had built on the north side of Castle Hill, although he did not give up his shop until within three years of his death. He was buried in Greyfriars' Churchyard, where a monument has. been erected. Another monument, erected in 1865, stands in Princes' Street Gardens. Consult 'Life) by Sineaton (1890) ; Graham, Scottish Men of Letters in the 18th Century) (1901).