The Fairy Minstrel and Other Poems.

Notes

A scarce volume of thoroughly romantic verse with some fantastical elements, especially rare inscribed by the author. William Millar leaves little in the historical record, but the BL copy has a manuscript note on the half-title indicating that he 'came from tending cattle, to the Printing Office of the Dumfries and Galloway Courier... and with little, or no learning except what he taught himself, produced this little volume'. Miller's Poets of Dumfriesshire records that afterward Millar left the employ of the Courier (who printed the volume) and went to work for Oliver & Boyd (who published it)and that he 'died at an early age'. (Miller adds: 'The Fairy Minstrel is very poor, but The Infant's Dream... has an intensity which lifts it above the level of the common-place'.)
Tantalisingly, the title poem, which fills the majority of the volume, features a section in which the Lady Jane's love is betrayed by the false Sir William, and the second poem, 'To Bertha', has had 'To Jane' added above its title in pencil, possibly in the same hand as the inscription. It seems possible therefore that the recipient of this copy inspired some of the volume's contents.