• Colour drawing of a staged theatrical scene framed by two symmetrical classical structures with niches containing gilded statues, flanked by trees. At the centre, a painted backdrop shows an island within an archipelago, with a visible settlement; in the foreground, a vessel approaches the shore. Four figures stand before the backdrop holding branches and other objects. The composition is enclosed within a thin rectangular gold border.

Why You Should Read Allan Ramsay’s ‘The Gentle Shepherd’

What Scottish play, published in 1725, reached over 100 printings by 1800, was called ‘the noblest pastoral’ by Robert Burns, inspired more than forty paintings, more than ‘from the entire works of Chaucer, Defoe, Swift, Richardson, or Fielding’ (R. Altick, Paintings from Books), and was performed by amateur companies throughout Scotland as late as the end of the 19th century?