Note: Word by James Hogg, "The Ettrick Shepherd," " … born in the bosom of the romantic vale of Ettrick, Selkirkshire, one of the most picturesque districts of Scotland. . . . Robert Hogg, the poet’s father, was a person of very ordinary sagacity, presenting in this respect a decided contrast to his wife, Margaret Laidlaw, a woman of superior energy and cultivated mind. James was the second son, and he was baptised in his native parish on the 9th of December 1770. James saved up his money while working as a shepherd, he had only received six months of schooling, so when he was eighteen he undertook to teach himself to read. He loved the nature of the hills and their beauty and spent many hours with borrowed books amongst his beloved Ettrick hills........." Hogg's novel, Confessions of a Justified Sinner (1824), is considered one of the major works of Scottish literature.