diff options
| author | Roger Frank <rfrank@pglaf.org> | 2025-10-15 04:53:29 -0700 |
|---|---|---|
| committer | Roger Frank <rfrank@pglaf.org> | 2025-10-15 04:53:29 -0700 |
| commit | 2406e5fddbc238c781ac14d5a7e7c525ef1d8f83 (patch) | |
| tree | 3cbc8efc9d785a0134f939e14da099bc03ce6b29 /18500-h | |
Diffstat (limited to '18500-h')
| -rw-r--r-- | 18500-h/18500-h.htm | 64679 | ||||
| -rw-r--r-- | 18500-h/images/image_01.jpg | bin | 0 -> 68428 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | 18500-h/images/image_02.jpg | bin | 0 -> 72148 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | 18500-h/images/image_03.jpg | bin | 0 -> 51654 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | 18500-h/images/image_04.jpg | bin | 0 -> 79626 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | 18500-h/images/image_05.jpg | bin | 0 -> 94271 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | 18500-h/images/image_06.jpg | bin | 0 -> 58536 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | 18500-h/images/image_07.jpg | bin | 0 -> 51721 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | 18500-h/images/image_08.jpg | bin | 0 -> 56852 bytes |
9 files changed, 64679 insertions, 0 deletions
diff --git a/18500-h/18500-h.htm b/18500-h/18500-h.htm new file mode 100644 index 0000000..7c20ef7 --- /dev/null +++ b/18500-h/18500-h.htm @@ -0,0 +1,64679 @@ +<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Strict//EN" + "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-strict.dtd"> + +<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"> + <head> + <meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html;charset=iso-8859-1" /> + <title> + The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Complete works of Robert Burns, by Allan Cunningham. + </title> + <style type="text/css"> +/*<![CDATA[ XML blockout */ +<!-- + p { margin-top: .75em; + text-align: justify; + margin-bottom: .75em; + } + h1,h2,h3,h4,h5,h6 { + text-align: center; /* all headings centered */ + clear: both; + } + h1 {font-size: 200%;} +h2 {font-size: 150%;} +h3 {font-size: 125%;} +h4 {font-size: 115%;} +h5 {font-size: 100%;} +.f1 {font-size: smaller; } +.f2 {font-size: 80%; } +img { border-style:solid; border-color:#000000; border-width:0.1em; } + hr { width: 33%; + margin-top: 2em; + margin-bottom: 2em; + margin-left: auto; + margin-right: auto; + clear: both; + } +hr.hr1 { width:25%; margin-top:0.5em; margin-bottom:0.5em; margin-left: auto; + margin-right: auto; clear:both; } + a[name] {position:absolute;} + + a:link {color:#0000ff; text-decoration:none} + link {color:#0000ff; + text-decoration:none} + a:visited {color:#0000ff; + text-decoration:none} + a:hover {color:#ff0000} + + table { width:80%; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; } + .tocch { text-align: right; vertical-align: top;} + .tocpg {text-align: right; vertical-align: bottom;} + .tr { text-align: center; + margin-left: 10%; margin-right: 10%; margin-top: 5%; margin-bottom: 5%; padding: 2em; background-color: #f6f2f2; color: black; border: solid black 1px;} +.sp{ letter-spacing: 1em; } + .sig { text-align:right; margin-right: 2em;} + .sig1 { margin-left:35%; } + .sig2 { margin-left:45%; } + .sig3 { margin-left:55%; } + .sig4 { margin-left:60%; } + .sig5 { margin-left:70%; } + .sig6 { margin-left:90%; } + .sig7 { margin-left:3%; } + .sig8 { margin-left:85%; } + .sig9 { margin-left:80%; } + .sig10 { margin-left:75%; } + .sig11 { margin-left:65%; } + body{margin-left: 10%; + margin-right: 10%; + } +.std1 { text-align:center; font-weight:bold; } +.std2 { margin-left:25%; font-weight:bold; } +.std3 { margin-left:20%; font-weight:bold; } + .pagenum { /* uncomment the next line for invisible page numbers */ + /* visibility: hidden; */ + position: absolute; + left: 92%; + font-size: smaller; + text-align: right; + } /* page numbers */ + + + .blockquot{margin-left: 5%; margin-right: 10%;} + +ul { list-style-type: none; + font-size: 95%; + } +li{margin-top:0.2em; margin-bottom:0.2em; } + .center {text-align: center;} + .smcap {font-variant: small-caps;} + + .caption {font-weight: bold;} + + .footnotes {border: solid 1px;} + .footnote {margin-left: 10%; margin-right: 10%; font-size: 0.9em;} + .footnote .label {position: absolute; right: 84%; text-align: right;} + .fnanchor {vertical-align: middle; font-size: .8em; text-decoration: none;} + + .poem {margin-left:10%; margin-right:10%; text-align: left;} + .poem br {display: none;} + .poem .stanza {margin: 1em 0em 1em 0em;} + .poem span.i0 {display: block; margin-left: 0em; padding-left: 3em; text-indent: -3em;} + .poem span.i1 {display: block; margin-left: 1em; padding-left: 3em; text-indent: -3em;} + .poem span.i2 {display: block; margin-left: 2em; padding-left: 3em; text-indent: -3em;} + .poem span.i4 {display: block; margin-left: 4em; padding-left: 3em; text-indent: -3em;} + .poem span.i3 {display: block; margin-left: 3em; padding-left: 3em; text-indent: -3em;} + .poem span.i6 {display: block; margin-left: 6em; padding-left: 3em; text-indent: -3em;} + .poem span.i8 {display: block; margin-left: 8em; padding-left: 3em; text-indent: -3em;} + .poem span.i9 {display: block; margin-left: 9em; padding-left: 3em; text-indent: -3em;} + .poem span.i10 {display: block; margin-left: 10em; padding-left: 3em; text-indent: -3em;} + .poem span.i12 {display: block; margin-left: 12em; padding-left: 3em; text-indent: -3em;} + // --> + /* XML end ]]>*/ + </style> + </head> +<body> + + +<pre> + +The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Complete Works of Robert Burns: +Containing his Poems, Songs, and Correspondence., by Robert Burns and Allan Cunningham + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: The Complete Works of Robert Burns: Containing his Poems, Songs, and Correspondence. + With a New Life of the Poet, and Notices, Critical and + Biographical by Allan Cunningham + +Author: Robert Burns and Allan Cunningham + +Release Date: June 4, 2006 [EBook #18500] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK WORKS OF ROBERT BURNS *** + + + + +Produced by Marilynda Fraser-Cunliffe, Sankar Viswanathan, +and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at +http://www.pgdp.net (This file was made using scans of +public domain works from the University of Michigan Digital +Libraries.) + + + + + + +</pre> + +<div class="tr"><p class="center"> Transcriber’s Note.</p> +<p>1. The hyphenation and accent of words is not uniform throughout the book. No change has been made in this.</p> +<p>2. The relative indentations of Poems, Epitaphs, and Songs are as printed in the original book.</p> +</div> + + + +<h3>THE</h3> + +<h2>COMPLETE WORKS</h2> + +<h4>OF</h4> + +<h1><span class="sp">ROBERT BURNS:</span></h1> + +<p> </p> +<p> </p> + +<h4>CONTAINING HIS</h4> + +<h2>POEMS, SONGS, AND CORRESPONDENCE.</h2> +<p> </p> +<h4>WITH</h4> + +<h2>A NEW LIFE OF THE POET,</h2> + +<h4>AND</h4> + +<h3>NOTICES, CRITICAL AND BIOGRAPHICAL,</h3> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<h2>BY ALLAN CUNNINGHAM.</h2> +<p> </p> +<h3>ELEGANTLY ILLUSTRATED.</h3> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<h2>BOSTON:</h2> +<h3>PHILLIPS, SAMPSON, AND COMPANY.</h3> +<h3>NEW YORK: J.C. DERBY.</h3> +<h3>1855</h3> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<h3>TO</h3> +<h2>ARCHIBALD HASTIE, ESQ.,</h2> +<h3>MEMBER OF PARLIAMENT FOR PAISLEY</h3> + +<h4>THIS</h4> + +<h2>EDITION</h2> +<h4>OF</h4> + +<h2>THE WORKS AND MEMOIRS OF A GREAT POET,</h2> + +<h3>IN WHOSE SENTIMENTS OF FREEDOM HE SHARES,</h3> +<h3>AND WHOSE PICTURES OF SOCIAL AND DOMESTIC LIFE HE LOVES,</h3> +<h4>IS RESPECTFULLY AND GRATEFULLY INSCRIBED</h4> +<p> </p> +<h4>BY</h4> +<p> </p> +<h3>ALLAN CUNNINGHAM.</h3> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_vii" id="Page_vii">[vii]</a></span></p> + +<h2><a name="DEDICATION" id="DEDICATION"></a>DEDICATION.</h2> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<h4>TO THE</h4> +<h3>NOBLEMEN AND GENTLEMEN</h3> +<h4>OF THE</h4> + +<h3>CALEDONIAN HUNT.</h3> + +<hr style="width: 45%;" /> + +<p>[On the title-page of the second or Edinburgh edition, were these +words: “Poems, chiefly in the Scottish Dialect, by Robert Burns, +printed for the Author, and sold by William Creech, 1787.” The motto +of the Kilmarnock edition was omitted; a very numerous list of +subscribers followed: the volume was printed by the celebrated +Smellie.]</p> + + +<p><span class="smcap">My Lords and Gentlemen</span>:</p> + +<p>A Scottish Bard, proud of the name, and whose highest ambition is to +sing in his country’s service, where shall he so properly look for +patronage as to the illustrious names of his native land: those who +bear the honours and inherit the virtues of their ancestors? The +poetic genius of my country found me, as the prophetic bard Elijah did +Elisha—at the <span class="smcap">plough</span>, and threw her inspiring mantle over +me. She bade me sing the loves, the joys, the rural scenes and rural +pleasures of my native soil, in my native tongue; I tuned my wild, +artless notes as she inspired. She whispered me to come to this +ancient metropolis of Caledonia, and lay my songs under your honoured +protection: I now obey her dictates.</p> + +<p>Though much indebted to your goodness, I do not approach you, my Lords +and Gentlemen, in the usual style of dedication, to thank you for past +favours: that path is so hackneyed by prostituted learning that honest +rusticity is ashamed of it. Nor do I present this address with the +venal soul of a servile author, looking for a continuation of those +favours: I was bred to the plough, and am independent. I come to claim +the common Scottish name with you, my illustrious countrymen; and to +tell the world that I glory in the title. I come to congratulate my +country that the blood of her ancient heroes still runs +uncontaminated, and that from your courage, knowledge, and public<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_viii" id="Page_viii">[viii]</a></span> +spirit, she may expect protection, wealth, and liberty. In the last +place, I come to proffer my warmest wishes to the great fountain of +honour, the Monarch of the universe, for your welfare and happiness.</p> + +<p>When you go forth to waken the echoes, in the ancient and favourite +amusement of your forefathers, may Pleasure ever be of your party: and +may social joy await your return! When harassed in courts or camps +with the jostlings of bad men and bad measures, may the honest +consciousness of injured worth attend your return to your native +seats; and may domestic happiness, with a smiling welcome, meet you at +your gates! May corruption shrink at your kindling indignant glance; +and may tyranny in the ruler, and licentiousness in the people, +equally find you an inexorable foe!</p> + +<p class="sig1">I have the honour to be,</p> + +<p class="sig2">With the sincerest gratitude and highest respect,</p> + +<p class="sig3">My Lords and Gentlemen,</p> + +<p class="sig4">Your most devoted humble servant,</p> + +<p class="sig5">ROBERT BURNS.</p> + +<p><span class="smcap">Edinburgh</span>, <i>April 4, 1787.</i></p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_ix" id="Page_ix">[ix]</a></span></p> +<h2>PREFACE.</h2> + + +<p>I cannot give to my country this edition of one of its favourite +poets, without stating that I have deliberately omitted several pieces +of verse ascribed to Burns by other editors, who too hastily, and I +think on insufficient testimony, admitted them among his works. If I +am unable to share in the hesitation expressed by one of them on the +authorship of the stanzas on “Pastoral Poetry,” I can as little share +in the feelings with which they have intruded into the charmed circle +of his poetry such compositions as “Lines on the Ruins of Lincluden +College,” “Verses on the Destruction of the Woods of Drumlanrig,” +“Verses written on a Marble Slab in the Woods of Aberfeldy,” and those +entitled “The Tree of Liberty.” These productions, with the exception +of the last, were never seen by any one even in the handwriting of +Burns, and are one and all wanting in that original vigour of language +and manliness of sentiment which distinguish his poetry. With respect +to “The Tree of Liberty” in particular, a subject dear to the heart of +the Bard, can any one conversant with his genius imagine that he +welcomed its growth or celebrated its fruit with such “capon craws” as +these?</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Upo’ this tree there grows sic fruit,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Its virtues a’ can tell, man;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">It raises man aboon the brute,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">It mak’s him ken himsel’, man.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Gif ance the peasant taste a bit,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">He’s greater than a lord, man,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ wi’ a beggar shares a mite<br /></span> +<span class="i2">O’ a’ he can afford, man.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>There are eleven stanzas, of which the best, compared with the “A +man’s a man for a’ that” of Burns, sounds like a cracked pipkin +against the “heroic clang” of a Damascus blade. That it is extant in +the handwriting of the poet cannot be taken as a proof that it is his +own composition, against the internal testimony of utter want of all +the marks by which we know him—the Burns-stamp, so to speak, which is +visible on all that ever came from his pen. Misled by his handwriting, +I inserted in my former edition of his works an epitaph, beginning</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Here lies a rose, a budding rose,”<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_x" id="Page_x">[x]</a></span></div></div> + +<p>the composition of Shenstone, and which is to be found in the +church-yard of Hales-Owen: as it is not included in every edition of +that poet’s acknowledged works, Burns, who was an admirer of his +genius, had, it seems, copied it with his own hand, and hence my +error. If I hesitated about the exclusion of “The Tree of Liberty,” +and its three false brethren, I could have no scruples regarding the +fine song of “Evan Banks,” claimed and justly for Miss Williams by Sir +Walter Scott, or the humorous song called “Shelah O’Neal,” composed by +the late Sir Alexander Boswell. When I have stated that I have +arranged the Poems, the Songs, and the Letters of Burns, as nearly as +possible in the order in which they were written; that I have omitted +no piece of either verse or prose which bore the impress of his hand, +nor included any by which his high reputation would likely be +impaired, I have said all that seems necessary to be said, save that +the following letter came too late for insertion in its proper place: +it is characteristic and worth a place anywhere.</p> + +<p class="sig">ALLAN CUNNINGHAM.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<h2>TO DR. ARCHIBALD LAURIE.</h2> +<p class="sig"><i>Mossgiel, 13th Nov. 1786.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">Dear Sir</span>,</p> + +<p>I have along with this sent the two volumes of Ossian, with the +remaining volume of the Songs. Ossian I am not in such a hurry about; +but I wish the Songs, with the volume of the Scotch Poets, returned as +soon as they can conveniently be dispatched. If they are left at Mr. +Wilson, the bookseller’s shop, Kilmarnock, they will easily reach me.</p> + +<p>My most respectful compliments to Mr. and Mrs. Laurie; and a Poet’s +warmest wishes for their happiness to the young ladies; particularly +the fair musician, whom I think much better qualified than ever David +was, or could be, to charm an evil spirit out of a Saul.</p> + +<p>Indeed, it needs not the Feelings of a poet to be interested in the +welfare of one of the sweetest scenes of domestic peace and kindred +love that ever I saw; as I think the peaceful unity of St. Margaret’s +Hill can only be excelled by the harmonious concord of the Apocalyptic +Zion.</p> + +<p class="sig11">I am, dear Sir, yours sincerely,</p> + +<p class="sig"><span class="smcap">Robert Burns</span>.</p> + + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_xi" id="Page_xi">[xi]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="TABLE_OF_CONTENTS" id="TABLE_OF_CONTENTS"></a>TABLE OF CONTENTS.</h2> + + + +<table summary="Contents"> +<tr><td></td><td class="tocpg f1">PAGE</td></tr> +<tr><td><span class="smcap"><a href="#LIFE">The Life of Robert Burns</a></span></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_xxiii">xxiii</a></td> +</tr> +<tr><td><a href="#PREFACE_1">Preface to the Kilmarnock Edition of 1786</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_lix">lix</a></td> +</tr> +<tr><td><a href="#DEDICATION">Dedication to the Edinburgh Edition of 1787</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_vii">vii</a></td></tr> +</table> + + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<h2><a href="#POEMS">POEMS.</a></h2> +<table summary="Poems"> + +<tr><td></td><td class="tocpg f1">PAGE</td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#DIRGE">Winter. A Dirge</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_61">61</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#II">The Death and dying Words of poor Mailie</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_61">61</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#III">Poor Mailie’s Elegy</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_62">62</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#IV">First Epistle to Davie, a brother Poet</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_63">63</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#V">Second</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_65">65</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#VI">Address to the Deil</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_65">65</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#VII">The auld Farmer’s New-year Morning Salutation +to his auld Mare Maggie</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_67">67</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#VIII">To a Haggis</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_68">68</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#IX">A Prayer under the pressure of violent Anguish</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_69">69</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#X">A Prayer in the prospect of Death</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_69">69</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#XI">Stanzas on the same occasion</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_69">69</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#XII">A Winter Night</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_70">70</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#XIII">Remorse. A Fragment</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_71">71</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#XIV">The Jolly Beggars. A Cantata</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_71">71</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#XV">Death and Dr. Hornbook. A True Story</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_76">76</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#XVI">The Twa Herds; or, the Holy Tulzie</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_78">78</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#XVII">Holy Willie’s Prayer</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_79">79</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#XVIII">Epitaph to Holy Willie</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_80">80</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#XIX">The Inventory; in answer to a mandate by the +surveyor of taxes</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_81">81</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#XX">The Holy Fair</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_82">82</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#XXI">The Ordination</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_84">84</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#XXII">The Calf</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_86">86</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#XXIII">To James Smith</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_86">86</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#XXIV">The Vision</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_88">88</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#XXV">Halloween</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_92">92</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#XXVI">Man was made to Mourn. A Dirge</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_95">95</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#XXVII">To Ruin</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_96">96</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#XXVIII">To John Goudie of Kilmarnock, on the publication +of his Essays</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_97">97</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#XXIX">To J. Lapraik, an old Scottish Bard. First +Epistle</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_97">97</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#XXX">To J. Lapraik. Second Epistle</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_99">99</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#XXXI">To J. Lapraik. Third Epistle</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_100">100</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#XXXII">To William Simpson, Ochiltree</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_101">101</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#XXXIII">Address to an illegitimate Child</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_103">103</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#XXXIV">Nature’s Law. A Poem humbly inscribed to +G.H., Esq.</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_103">103</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#XXXV">To the Rev. John M’Math</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_104">104</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#XXXVI">To a Mouse</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_105">105</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#XXXVII">Scotch Drink</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_106">106</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#XXXVIII">The Author’s earnest Cry and Prayer to the Scotch +Representatives of the House of Commons</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_107">107</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#XXXIX">Address to the unco Guid, or the rigidly Righteous</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_110">110</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#XL">Tam Samson’s Elegy</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_111">111</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#XLI">Lament, occasioned by the unfortunate issue of +a Friend’s Amour</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_112">112</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#XLII">Despondency. An Ode</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_113">113</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#XLIII">The Cotter’s Saturday Night</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_114">114</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#XLIV">The first Psalm</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_117">117</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#XLV">The first six Verses of the ninetieth Psalm</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_118">118</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#XLVI">To a Mountain Daisy</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_118">118</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#XLVII">Epistle to a young Friend</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_119">119</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#XLVIII">To a Louse, on seeing one on a Lady’s Bonnet +at Church</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_120">120</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#XLIX">Epistle to J. Rankine, enclosing some Poems</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_121">121</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#L">On a Scotch Bard, gone to the West Indies</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_122">122</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#LI">The Farewell</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_123">123</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#LII">Written on the blank leaf of my Poems, presented +to an old Sweetheart then married</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_123">123</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#LIII">A Dedication to Gavin Hamilton, Esq.</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_123">123</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#LIV">Elegy on the Death of Robert Ruisseaux</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_125">125</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#LV">Letter to James Tennant of Glenconner</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_125">125</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#LVI">On the Birth of a posthumous Child</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_126">126</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#LVII">To Miss Cruikshank</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_126">126</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#LVIII">Willie Chalmers</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_127">127</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#LIX">Verses left in the room where he slept</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_128">128</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#LX">To Gavin Hamilton, Esq., recommending a boy</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_128">128</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#LXI">To Mr. M’Adam, of Craigen-gillan</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_129">129</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#LXII">Answer to a Poetical Epistle sent to the Author +by a Tailor</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_129">129</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#LXIII">To J. Rankine. “I am a keeper of the law.”</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_130">130</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#LXIV">Lines written on a Bank-note</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_130">130</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#LXV">A Dream</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_130">130</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#LXVI">A Bard’s Epitaph</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_132">132</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#LXVII">The Twa Dogs. A Tale</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_132">132</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#LXVIII">Lines on meeting with Lord Daer</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_135">135</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#LXIX">Address to Edinburgh</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_136">136</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#LXX">Epistle to Major Logan</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_137">137</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#LXXI">The Brigs of Ayr</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_138">138</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#LXXII">On the Death of Robert Dundas, Esq., of Arniston, +late Lord President of the Court of +Session</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_141">141</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#LXXIII">On reading in a Newspaper the Death of John +M’Leod, Esq.</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_141">141</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#LXXIV">To Miss Logan, with Beattie’s Poems</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_142">142</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#LXXV">The American War, A fragment</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_142">142</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#LXXVI">The Dean of Faculty. A new Ballad</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_143">143</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#LXXVII">To a Lady, with a Present of a Pair of Drinking-glasses</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_144">144</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#LXXVIII">To Clarinda</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_144">144</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#LXXIX">Verses written under the Portrait of the Poet +Fergusson</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_144">144</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#LXXX">Prologue spoken by Mr. Woods, on his Benefit-night, +Monday, April 16, 1787</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_145">145</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#LXXXI">Sketch. A Character</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_145">145</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#LXXXII">To Mr. Scott, of Wauchope</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_145">145</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#LXXXIII">Epistle to William Creech</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_146">146</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#LXXXIV">The humble Petition of Bruar-Water, to the +noble Duke of Athole</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_147">147</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#LXXXV">On scaring some Water-fowl in Loch Turit</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_148">148</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#LXXXVI">Written with a pencil, over the chimney-piece, +in the parlour of the Inn at Kenmore, Taymouth</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_149">149</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#LXXXVII">Written with a pencil, standing by the Fall of +Fyers, near Loch Ness</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_149">149</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#LXXXVIII">To Mr. William Tytler, with the present of the +Bard’s picture</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_150">150</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#LXXXIX">Written in Friars-Carse Hermitage, on the +banks of Nith, June, 1780. First Copy</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_150">150</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#XC">The same. December, 1788. Second Copy</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_151">151</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#XCI">To Captain Riddel, of Glenriddel. Extempore +lines on returning a Newspaper</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_152">152</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#XCII">A Mother’s Lament for the Death of her Son</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_152">152</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#XCIII">First Epistle to Robert Graham, Esq., of Fintray</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_152">152</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#XCIV">On the Death of Sir James Hunter Blair</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_153">153</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#XCV">Epistle to Hugh Parker</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_154">154</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#XCVI">Lines, intended to be written under a Noble +Earl’s Picture</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_155">155</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#XCVII">Elegy on the year 1788. A Sketch</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_155">155</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#XCVIII">Address to the Toothache</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_155">155</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#XCIX">Ode. Sacred to the memory of Mrs. Oswald, of +Auchencruive</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_156">156</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#C">Fragment inscribed to the Right Hon. C.J. Fox</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_156">156</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CI">On seeing a wounded Hare limp by me, which a +Fellow had just shot</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_157">157</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CII">To Dr. Blacklock. In answer to a Letter</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_158">158</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CIII">Delia. An Ode</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_159">159</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CIV">To John M’Murdo, Esq.</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_159">159</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CV">Prologue, spoken at the Theatre, Dumfries, 1st +January, 1790</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_159">159</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CVI">Scots Prologue, for Mr. Sutherland’s Benefit-night, +Dumfries</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_160">160</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CVII">Sketch. New-year’s Day. To Mrs. Dunlop</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_160">160</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CVIII">To a Gentleman who had sent him a Newspaper, +and offered to continue it free of expense</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_161">161</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CIX">The Kirk’s Alarm. A Satire. First Version</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_162">162</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CX">The Kirk’s Alarm. A Ballad. Second Version</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_163">163</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CXI">Peg Nicholson</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_165">165</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CXII">On Captain Matthew Henderson, a gentleman +who held the patent for his honours immediately +from Almighty God</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_165">165</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CXIII">The Five Carlins. A Scots Ballad</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_167">167</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CXIV">The Laddies by the Banks o’ Nith</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_168">168</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CXV">Epistle to Robert Graham, Esq., of Fintray, on +the close of the disputed Election between +Sir James Johnstone, and Captain Miller, +for the Dumfries district of Boroughs</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_169">169</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CXVI">On Captain Grose’s Peregrination through Scotland, +collecting the Antiquities of that kingdom</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_170">170</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CXVII">Written in a wrapper, enclosing a letter to Captain +Grose</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_171">171</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CXVIII">Tam O’ Shanter. A Tale</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_171">171</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CXIX">Address of Beelzebub to the President of the +Highland Society</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_174">174</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CXX">To John Taylor</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_175">175</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CXXI">Lament of Mary Queen of Scots, on the approach +of Spring</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_175">175</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CXXII">The Whistle</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_176">176</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CXXIII">Elegy on Miss Burnet of Monboddo</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_178">178</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CXXIV">Lament for James, Earl of Glencairn</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_178">178</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CXXV">Lines sent to Sir John Whitefoord, Bart., of +Whitefoord, with the foregoing Poem</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_179">179</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CXXVI">Address to the Shade of Thomson, on crowning +his Bust at Ednam with bays</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_179">179</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CXXVII">To Robert Graham, Esq., of Fintray</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_180">180</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CXXVIII">To Robert Graham, Esq., of Fintray, on receiving +a favour</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_181">181</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CXXIX">A Vision</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_181">181</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CXXX">To John Maxwell, of Terraughty, on his birthday</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_182">182</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CXXXI">The Rights of Women, an occasional Address +spoken by Miss Fontenelle, on her benefit-night, +Nov. 26, 1792</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_182">182</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CXXXII">Monody on a Lady famed for her caprice</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_183">183</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CXXXIII">Epistle from Esopus to Maria</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_184">184</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CXXXIV">Poem on Pastoral Poetry</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_185">185</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CXXXV">Sonnet, written on the 25th January, 1793, the +birthday of the Author, on hearing a thrush +sing in a morning walk</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_185">185</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CXXXVI">Sonnet on the death of Robert Riddel, Esq., of +Glenriddel, April, 1794</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_186">186</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CXXXVII">Impromptu on Mrs. Riddel’s birthday</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_186">186</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CXXXVIII">Liberty. A Fragment</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_186">186</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CXXXIX">Verses to a young Lady</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_186">186</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CXL">The Vowels. A Tale</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_187">187</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CXLI">Verses to John Rankine</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_187">187</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CXLII">On Sensibility. To my dear and much-honoured +friend, Mrs. Dunlop, of Dunlop</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_188">188</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CXLIII">Lines sent to a Gentleman whom he had offended</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_188">188</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CXLIV">Address spoken by Miss Fontenelle on her +Benefit-night</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_188">188</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CXLV">On seeing Miss Fontenelle in a favourite character</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_189">189</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CXLVI">To Chloris</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_189">189</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CXLVII">Poetical Inscription for an Altar to Independence</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_189">189</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CXLVIII">The Heron Ballads. Balled First</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_190">190</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CXLIX">The Heron Ballads. Ballad Second</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_190">190</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CL">The Heron Ballads. Ballad Third</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_192">192</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CLI">Poem addressed to Mr. Mitchell, Collector of +Excise, Dumfries, 1796</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_193">193</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CLII">To Miss Jessy Lewars, Dumfries, with Johnson’s +Musical Museum</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_193">193</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CLIII">Poem on Life, addressed to Colonel de Peyster, +Dumfries, 1796</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_193">193</a></td></tr> +</table> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> +<h2><a href="#EPITAPHS_EPIGRAMS_FRAGMENTS">EPITAPHS, EPIGRAMS, FRAGMENTS, &c.</a></h2> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_xiv" id="Page_xiv">[xiv]</a></span></p> +<table summary="EPITAPHS, EPIGRAMS, FRAGMENTS, &c."> + +<tr><td><a href="#epitahI">On the Author’s Father</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_194">194</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#epitahII">On R.A., Esq.</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_194">194</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#epitahIII">On a Friend</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_194">194</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#epitahIV">For Gavin Hamilton</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_194">194</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#epitahV">On wee Johnny</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_195">195</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#epitahVI">On John Dove, Innkeeper, Mauchline</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_195">195</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#epitahVII">On a Wag in Mauchline</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_195">195</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#epitahVIII">On a celebrated ruling Elder</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_195">195</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#epitahIX">On a noisy Polemic</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_195">195</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#epitahX">On Miss Jean Scott</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_195">195</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#epitahXI">On a henpecked Country Squire</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_195">195</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#epitahXII">On the same</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_196">196</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#epitahXIII">On the same</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_196">196</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#epitahXIV">The Highland Welcome</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_196">196</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#epitahXV">On William Smellie</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_196">196</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#epitahXVI">Written on a window of the Inn at Carron</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_196">196</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#epitahXVII">The Book-worms</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_196">196</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#epitahXVIII">Lines on Stirling</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_197">197</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#epitahXIX">The Reproof</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_197">197</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#epitahXX">The Reply</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_197">197</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#epitahXXI">Lines written under the Picture of the celebrated +Miss Burns</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_197">197</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#epitahXXII">Extempore in the Court of Session</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_197">197</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#epitahXXIII">The henpecked Husband</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_197">197</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#epitahXXIV">Written at Inverary</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_198">198</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#epitahXXV">On Elphinston’s Translation of Martial’s Epigrams</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_198">198</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#epitahXXVI">Inscription on the Head-stone of Fergusson</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_198">198</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#epitahXXVII">On a Schoolmaster</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_198">198</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#epitahXXVIII">A Grace before Dinner</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_198">198</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#epitahXXIX">A Grace before Meat</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_198">198</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#epitahXXX">On Wat</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_198">198</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#epitahXXXI">On Captain Francis Grose</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_199">199</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#epitahXXXII">Impromptu to Miss Ainslie</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_199">199</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#epitahXXXIII">The Kirk of Lamington</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_199">199</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#epitahXXXIV">The League and Covenant</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_199">199</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#epitahXXXV">Written on a pane of glass in the Inn at Moffat</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_199">199</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#epitahXXXVI">Spoken on being appointed to the Excise</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_199">199</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#epitahXXXVII">Lines on Mrs. Kemble</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_199">199</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#epitahXXXVIII">To Mr. Syme</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_200">200</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#epitahXXXIX">To Mr. Syme, with a present of a dozen of +porter</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_200">200</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#epitahXL">A Grace</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_200">200</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#epitahXLI">Inscription on a goblet</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_200">200</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#epitahXLII">The Invitation</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_200">200</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#epitahXLIII">The Creed of Poverty</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_200">200</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#epitahXLIV">Written in a Lady’s pocket-book</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_200">200</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#epitahXLV">The Parson’s Looks</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_200">200</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#epitahXLVI">The Toad-eater</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_201">201</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#epitahXLVII">On Robert Riddel</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_201">201</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#epitahXLVIII">The Toast</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_201">201</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#epitahXLIX">On a Person nicknamed the Marquis</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_201">201</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#epitahL">Lines written on a window</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_201">201</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#epitahLI">Lines written on a window of the Globe Tavern, +Dumfries</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_201">201</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#epitahLII">The Selkirk Grace</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_202">202</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#epitahLIII">To Dr. Maxwell, on Jessie Staig’s recovery</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_202">202</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#epitahLIV">Epitaph</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_202">202</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#epitahLV">Epitaph on William Nicol</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_202">202</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#epitahLVI">On the Death of a Lapdog, named Echo</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_202">202</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#epitahLVII">On a noted Coxcomb</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_202">202</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#epitahLVIII">On seeing the beautiful Seat of Lord Galloway</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_202">202</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#epitahLIX">On the same</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_203">203</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#epitahLX">On the same</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_203">203</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#epitahLXI">To the same, on the Author being threatened +with his resentment</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_203">203</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#epitahLXII">On a Country Laird</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_203">203</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#epitahLXIII">On John Bushby</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_203">203</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#epitahLXIV">The true loyal Natives</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_203">203</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#epitahLXV">On a Suicide</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_203">203</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#epitahLXVI">Extempore, pinned on a Lady’s coach</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_203">203</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#epitahLXVII">Lines to John Rankine</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_204">204</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#epitahLXVIII">Jessy Lewars</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_204">204</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#epitahLXIX">The Toast</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_204">204</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#epitahLXX">On Miss Jessy Lewars</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_204">204</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#epitahLXXI">On the recovery of Jessy Lewars</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_204">204</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#epitahLXXII">Tam the Chapman</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_204">204</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#epitahLXXIII">“Here’s a bottle and an honest friend”</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_205">205</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#epitahLXXIV">“Tho’ fickle fortune has deceived me”</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_205">205</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#epitahLXXV">To John Kennedy</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_205">205</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#epitahLXXVI">To the same</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_205">205</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#epitahLXXVII">“There’s naethin’ like the honest nappy”</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_205">205</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#epitahLXXVIII">On the blank leaf of a work by Hannah More, +presented by Mrs. C</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_206">206</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#epitahLXXIX">To the Men and Brethren of the Masonic Lodge +at Tarbolton</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_206">206</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#epitahLXXX">Impromptu</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_206">206</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#epitahLXXXI">Prayer for Adam Armour</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_206">206</a></td></tr> +</table> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> +<h2><a href="#SONGS_AND_BALLADS">SONGS AND BALLADS.</a></h2> + +<table summary="SONGS AND BALLADS."> + +<tr><td><a href="#songsI">Handsome Nell</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_207">207</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsII">Luckless Fortune</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_208">208</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsIII">“I dream’d I lay where flowers were springing”</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_208">208</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsIV">Tibbie, I hae seen the day</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_208">208</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsV">“My father was a farmer upon the Carrick +border”</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_209">209</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsVI">John Barleycorn. A Ballad</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_210">210</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsVII">The Rigs o’ Barley</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_210">210</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsVIII">Montgomery’s Peggy</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_211">211</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsIX">The Mauchline Lady</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_211">211</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsX">The Highland Lassie</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_211">211</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsXI">Peggy</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_212">212</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsXII">The rantin’ Dog the Daddie o’t</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_213">213</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsXIII">“My heart was ance as blithe and free”</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_213">213</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsXIV">My Nannie O</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_213">213</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsXV">A Fragment. “One night as I did wander”</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_214">214</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsXVI">Bonnie Peggy Alison</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_214">214</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsXVII">Green grow the Rashes, O</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_214">214</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsXVIII">My Jean</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_215">215</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsXIX">Robin</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_215">215</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsXX">“Her flowing locks, the raven’s wing”</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_216">216</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsXXI">“O leave novels, ye Mauchline belles”</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_216">216</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsXXII">Young Peggy</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_216">216</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsXXIII">The Cure for all Care</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_217">217</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsXXIV">Eliza</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_217">217</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsXXV">The Sons of Old Killie</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_217">217</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsXXVI">And maun I still on Menie doat</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_218">218</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsXXVII">The Farewell to the Brethren of St. James’s +Lodge, Tarbolton</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_218">218</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsXXVIII">On Cessnock Banks</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_219">219</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsXXIX">Mary</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_220">220</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsXXX">The Lass of Ballochmyle</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_220">220</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsXXXI">“The gloomy night is gathering fast”</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_221">221</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsXXXII">“O whar did ye get that hauver meal bannock?”</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_221">221</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsXXXIII">The Joyful Widower</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_221">221</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsXXXIV">“O Whistle, and I’ll come to you, my lad”</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_222">222</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsXXXV">“I am my mammy’s ae bairn”</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_222">222</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsXXXVI">The Birks of Aberfeldy</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_222">222</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsXXXVII">Macpherson’s Farewell</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_223">223</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsXXXVIII">Braw, braw Lads of Galla Water</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_223">223</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsXXXIX">“Stay, my charmer, can you leave me?”</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_224">224</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsXL">Strathallan’s Lament</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_224">224</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsXLI">My Hoggie</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_224">224</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsXLII">Her Daddie forbad, her Minnie forbad</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_224">224</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsXLIII">Up in the Morning early</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_225">225</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsXLIV">The young Highland Rover</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_225">225</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsXLV">Hey the dusty Miller</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_225">225</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsXLVI">Duncan Davison</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_226">226</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsXLVII">Theniel Menzies’ bonnie Mary</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_226">226</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsXLVIII">The Banks of the Devon</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_226">226</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsXLIX">Weary fa’ you, Duncan Gray</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_227">227</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsL">The Ploughman</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_227">227</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsLI">Landlady, count the Lawin</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_228">228</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsLII">“Raving winds around her blowing”</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_228">228</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsLIII">“How long and dreary is the night”</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_228">228</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsLIV">Musing on the roaring Ocean</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_229">229</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsLV">Blithe, blithe and merry was she</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_229">229</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsLVI">The blude red rose at Yule may blaw</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_229">229</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsLVII">O’er the Water to Charlie</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_230">230</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsLVIII">A Rose-bud by my early walk</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_230">230</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsLIX">Rattlin’, roarin’ Willie</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_230">230</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsLX">Where braving angry Winter’s Storms</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_231">231</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsLXI">Tibbie Dunbar</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_231">231</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsLXII">Bonnie Castle Gordon</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_231">231</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsLXIII">My Harry was a gallant gay</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_232">232</a></td></tr> +<tr><td>T<a href="#songsLXIV">he Tailor fell through the bed, thimbles an’ a’</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_232">232</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsLXV">Ay Waukin O!</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_232">232</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsLXVI">Beware o’ Bonnie Ann</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_233">233</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsLXVII">The Gardener wi’ his paidle</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_233">233</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsLXVIII">Blooming Nelly</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_233">233</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsLXIX">The day returns, my bosom burns</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_234">234</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsLXX">My Love she’s but a lassie yet</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_234">234</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsLXXI">Jamie, come try me</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_234">234</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsLXXII">Go fetch to me a Pint O’ Wine</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_235">235</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsLXXIII">The Lazy Mist</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_235">235</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsLXXIV">O mount and go</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_235">235</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsLXXV">Of a’ the airts the wind can blaw</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_235">235</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsLXXVI">Whistle o’er the lave o’t</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_236">236</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsLXXVII">O were I on Parnassus’ Hill</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_236">236</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsLXXVIII">“There’s a youth in this city”</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_237">237</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsLXXIX">My heart’s in the Highlands</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_237">237</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsLXXX">John Anderson, my Jo</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_237">237</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsLXXXI">Awa, Whigs, awa</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_238">238</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsLXXXII">Ca’ the Ewes to the Knowes</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_238">238</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsLXXXIII">Merry hae I been teethin’ a heckle</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_239">239</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsLXXXIV">The Braes of Ballochmyle</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_239">239</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsLXXXV">To Mary in Heaven</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_239">239</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsLXXXVI">Eppie Adair</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_240">240</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsLXXXVII">The Battle of Sherriff-muir</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_240">240</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsLXXXVIII">Young Jockey was the blithest lad</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_241">241</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsLXXXIX">O Willie brewed a peck o’ maut</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_241">241</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsXC">The braes o’ Killiecrankie, O</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_241">241</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsXCI">I gaed a waefu’ gate yestreen</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_242">242</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsXCII">The Banks of Nith</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_242">242</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsXCIII">Tam Glen</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_242">242</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsXCIV">Frae the friends and land I love</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_243">243</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsXCV">Craigie-burn Wood</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_243">243</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsXCVI">Cock up your Beaver</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_244">244</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsXCVII">O meikle thinks my luve o’ my beauty</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_244">244</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsXCVIII">Gudewife, count the Lawin</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_244">244</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsXCIX">There’ll never be peace till Jamie comes hame</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_245">245</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsC">The bonnie lad that’s far awa</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_245">245</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsCI">I do confess thou art sae fair</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_245">245</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsCII">Yon wild mossy mountains sae lofty and wide</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_246">246</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsCIII">It is na, Jean, thy bonnie face</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_246">246</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsCIV">When I think on the happy days</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_247">247</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsCV">Whan I sleep I dream</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_247">247</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsCVI">“I murder hate by field or flood”</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_247">247</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsCVII">O gude ale comes and gude ale goes</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_247">247</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsCVIII">Robin shure in hairst</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_248">248</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsCIX">Bonnie Peg</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_248">248</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsCX">Gudeen to you, Kimmer</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_248">248</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsCXI">Ah, Chloris, since it may na be</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_249">249</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsCXII">Eppie M’Nab</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_249">249</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsCXIII">Wha is that at my bower-door</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_249">249</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsCXIV">What can a young lassie do wi’ an auld man</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_250">250</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsCXV">Bonnie wee thing, cannie wee thing</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_250">250</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsCXVI">The tither morn when I forlorn</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_250">250</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsCXVII">Ae fond kiss, and then we sever</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_251">251</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsCXVIII">Lovely Davies</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_251">251</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsCXIX">The weary Pond o’ Tow</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_252">252</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsCXX">Naebody</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_252">252</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsCXXI">An O for ane and twenty, Tam</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_252">252</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsCXXII">O Kenmure’s on and awa, Willie</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_253">253</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsCXXIII">The Collier Laddie</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_253">253</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsCXXIV">Nithsdale’s Welcome Hame</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_254">254</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsCXXV">As I was a-wand’ring ae Midsummer e’enin</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_254">254</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsCXXVI">Bessy and her Spinning-wheel</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_254">254</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsCXXVII">The Posie</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_255">255</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsCXXVIII">The Country Lass</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_255">255</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsCXXIX">Turn again, thou fair Eliza</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_256">256</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsCXXX">Ye Jacobites by name</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_256">256</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsCXXXI">Ye flowery banks o’bonnie Doon</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_257">257</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsCXXXII">Ye banks and braes o’ bonnie Doon</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_257">257</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsCXXXIII">Willie Wastle</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_257">257</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsCXXXIV">O Lady Mary Ann</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_258">258</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsCXXXV">Such a parcel of rogues in a nation</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_258">258</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsCXXXVI">The Carle of Kellyburn braes</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_259">259</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsCXXXVII">Jockey’s ta’en the parting kiss</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_260">260</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsCXXXVIII">Lady Onlie</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_260">260</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsCXXXIX">The Chevalier’s Lament</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_260">260</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsCXL">Song of Death</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_261">261</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsCXLI">Flow gently, sweet Afton</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_261">261</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsCXLII">Bonnie Bell</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_262">262</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsCXLIII">Hey ca’ thro’, ca’ thro’</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_262">262</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsCXLIV">The Gallant weaver</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_262">262</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsCXLV">The deuks dang o’er my Daddie</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_262">262</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsCXLVI">She’s fair and fause</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_263">263</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsCXLVII">The Deil cam’ fiddling thro’ the town</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_263">263</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsCXLVIII">The lovely Lass of Inverness</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_263">263</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsCXLIX">O my luve’s like a red, red rose</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_264">264</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsCL">Louis, what reck I by thee</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_264">264</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsCLI">Had I the wyte she bade me</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_264">264</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsCLII">Coming through the rye</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_265">265</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#songsCLIII">Young Jamie, pride of a’ the plain</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_265">265</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CLIV">Out over the Forth I look to the north</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_265">265</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CLV">The Lass of Ecclefechan</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_265">265</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CLVI">The Cooper o’ Cuddie</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_266">266</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CLVII">For the sake of somebody</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_266">266</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CLVIII">I coft a stane o’ haslock woo</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_266">266</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CLIX">The lass that made the bed for me</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_267">267</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CLX">Sae far awa</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_267">267</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CLXI">I’ll ay ca’ in by yon town</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_268">268</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CLXII">O wat ye wha’s in yon town</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_268">268</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CLXIII">O May, thy morn</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_269">269</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CLXIV">Lovely Polly Stewart</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_269">269</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CLXV">Bonnie laddie, Highland laddie</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_269">269</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CLXVI">Anna, thy charms my bosom fire</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_270">270</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CLXVII">Cassilis’ Banks</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_270">270</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CLXVIII">To thee, lov’d Nith</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_270">270</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CLXIX">Bannocks o’ Barley</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_270">270</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CLXX">Hee Balou! my sweet wee Donald</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_270">270</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CLXXI">Wae is my heart, and the tear’s in my e’e</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_271">271</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CLXXII">Here’s his health in water</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_271">271</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CLXXIII">My Peggy’s face, my Peggy’s form</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_271">271</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CLXXIV">Gloomy December</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_272">272</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CLXXV">My lady’s gown, there’s gairs upon ’t</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_272">272</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CLXXVI">Amang the trees, where humming bees</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_272">272</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CLXXVII">The gowden locks of Anna</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_273">273</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CLXXVIII">My ain kind dearie, O</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_273">273</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CLXXIX">Will ye go to the Indies, my Mary</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_273">273</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CLXXX">She is a winsome wee thing</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_274">274</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CLXXXI">Bonny Leslie</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_274">274</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CLXXXII">Highland Mary</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_275">275</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CLXXXIII">Auld Rob Morris</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_275">275</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CLXXXIV">Duncan Gray</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_276">276</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CLXXXV">O poortith cauld, and restless love</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_276">276</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CLXXXVI">Galla Water</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_277">277</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CLXXXVII">Lord Gregory</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_277">277</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CLXXXVIII">Mary Morison</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_277">277</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CLXXXIX">Wandering Willie. First Version</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_278">278</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CXC">Wandering Willie. Last Version</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_278">278</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CXCI">Oh, open the door to me, oh!</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_279">279</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CXCII">Jessie</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_279">279</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CXCIII">The poor and honest sodger</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_279">279</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CXCIV">Meg o’ the Mill</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_280">280</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CXCV">Blithe hae I been on yon hill</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_281">281</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CXCVI">Logan Water</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_281">281</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CXCVII">“O were my love yon lilac fair”</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_281">281</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CXCVIII">Bonnie Jean</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_282">282</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CXCIX">Phillis the fair</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_283">283</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CC">Had I a cave on some wild distant shore</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_283">283</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CCI">By Allan stream</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_283">283</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CCII">O Whistle, and I’ll come to you, my lad</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_284">284</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CCIII">Adown windng Nith I did wander</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_284">284</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CCIV">Come, let me take thee to my breast</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_285">285</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CCV">Daintie Davie</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_285">285</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CCVI">Scots wha hae wi’ Wallace bled. First Version</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_285">285</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CCVII">Scots wha hae wi’ Wallace bled. Second Version</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_286">286</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CCVIII">Behold the hour, the boat arrives</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_287">287</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CCIX">Thou hast left me ever, Jamie</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_287">287</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CCX">Auld lang syne</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_287">287</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CCXI">“Where are the joys I have met in the morning”</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_288">288</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CCXII">“Deluded swain, the pleasure”</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_288">288</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CCXIII">Nancy</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_288">288</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CCXIV">Husband, husband, cease your strife</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_289">289</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CCXV">Wilt thou be my dearie?</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_289">289</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CCXVI">But lately seen in gladsome green</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_290">290</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CCXVII">“Could aught of song declare my pains”</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_290">290</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CCXVIII">Here’s to thy health, my bonnie lass</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_290">290</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CCXIX">It was a’ for our rightfu’ king</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_291">291</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CCXX">O steer her up and haud her gaun</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_291">291</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CCXXI">O ay my wife she dang me</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_291">291</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CCXXII">O wert thou in the cauld blast</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_292">292</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CCXXIII">The Banks of Cree</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_292">292</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CCXXIV">On the seas and far away</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_292">292</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CCXXV">Ca’ the Yowes to the Knowes</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_293">293</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CCXXVI">Sae flaxen were her ringlets</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_293">293</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CCXXVII">O saw ye my dear, my Phely?</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_294">294</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CCXXVIII">How lang and dreary is the night</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_294">294</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CCXXIX">Let not woman e’er complain</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_294">294</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CCXXX">The Lover’s Morning Salute to his Mistress</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_295">295</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CCXXXI">My Chloris, mark how green the groves</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_295">295</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CCXXXII">Youthful Chloe, charming Chloe</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_296">296</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CCXXXIII">Lassie wi’ the lint-white locks</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_296">296</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CCXXXIV">Farewell, thou stream, that winding flows</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_296">296</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CCXXXV">O Philly, happy be the day</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_297">297</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CCXXXVI">Contented wi’ little and cantie wi’ mair</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_297">297</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CCXXXVII">Canst thou leave me thus, my Katy</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_298">298</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CCXXXVIII">My Nannie’s awa</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_298">298</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CCXXXIX">O wha is she that lo’es me</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_299">299</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CCXL">Caledonia</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_299">299</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CCXLI">O lay thy loof in mine, lass</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_300">300</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CCXLII">The Fête Champêtre</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_300">300</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CCXLIII">Here’s a health to them that’s awa</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_301">301</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CCXLIV">For a’ that, and a’ that</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_301">301</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CCXLV">Craigieburn Wood</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_302">302</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CCXLVI">O lassie, art thou sleeping yet</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_302">302</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CCXLVII">O tell na me o’ wind and rain</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_303">303</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CCXLVIII">The Dumfries Volunteers</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_303">303</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CCXLIX">Address to the Wood-lark</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_304">304</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CCL">On Chloris being ill</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_304">304</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CCLI">Their groves o’ sweet myrtle let foreign lands +reckon</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_304">304</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CCLII">’Twas na her bonnie blue een was my ruin</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_305">305</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CCLIII">How cruel are the parents</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_305">305</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CCLIV">Mark yonder pomp of costly fashion</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_305">305</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CCLV">O this is no my ain lassie</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_306">306</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CCLVI">Now Spring has clad the grove in green</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_306">306</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CCLVII">O bonnie was yon rosy brier</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_307">307</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CCLVIII">Forlorn my love, no comfort near</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_307">307</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CCLIX">Last May a braw wooer cam down the lang glen</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_307">307</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CCLX">Chloris</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_308">308</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CCLXI">The Highland Widow’s Lament</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_308">308</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CCLXII">To General Dumourier</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_309">309</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CCLXIII">Peg-a-Ramsey</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_309">309</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CCLXIV">There was a bonnie lass</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_309">309</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CCLXV">O Mally’s meek, Mally’s sweet</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_309">309</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CCLXVI">Hey for a lass wi’ a tocher</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_310">310</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CCLXVII">Jessy. “Here’s a health to ane I lo’e dear”</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_310">310</a></td></tr> +<tr><td><a href="#CCLXVIII">Fairest Maid on Devon banks</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_311">311</a></td></tr> +</table> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> +<h2><a href="#GENERAL_CORRESPONDENCE">GENERAL CORRESPONDENCE.</a></h2> +<table summary="GENERAL_CORRESPONDENCE"> + +<tr><td colspan="4" class="std1">1781.</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">No.</td> + + <td></td> + <td></td><td></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">I.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterI">To William Burness. His health a +little better, but tired of life. The Revelations</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_311">311</a></td></tr> +<tr><td colspan="4" class="std1">1783.</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">II.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterII">To Mr. John Murdoch. His present studies +and temper of mind</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_312">312</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">III.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterIII">To Mr. James Burness. His father’s illness, +and sad state of the country</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_313">313</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">IV.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterIV">To Miss E. Love</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_314">314</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">V.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterV">To Miss E. Love</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_314">314</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">VI.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterVI">To Miss E. Love</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_315">315</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">VII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterVII">To Miss E. On her refusal of his hand</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_316">316</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">VIII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterVIII">To Robert Riddel, Esq. Observations +on poetry and human life</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_316">316</a></td></tr> +<tr><td colspan="4" class="std1">1784.</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">IX.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterIX">To Mr. James Burness. On the death of his +father</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_322">322</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">X.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterX">To Mr. James Burness. Account of the +Buchanites</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_322">322</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">XI.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterXI">To Miss ——. With a book</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_323">323</a></td></tr> +<tr><td colspan="4" class="std1">1786.</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">XII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterXII">To Mr. John Richmond. His progress +in poetic composition</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_323">323</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">XIII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterXIII">To Mr. John Kennedy. The Cotter’s +Saturday Night</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_324">324</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">XIV.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterXIV">To Mr. Robert Muir. Enclosing his +“Scotch Drink”</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_324">324</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">XV.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterXV">To Mr. Aiken. Enclosing a stanza on the +blank leaf of a book by Hannah More</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_324">324</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">XVI.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterXVI">To Mr. M’Whinnie, Subscriptions</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_324">324</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">XVII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterXVII">To Mr. John Kennedy. Enclosing “The +Gowan”</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_325">325</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">XVIII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterXVIII">To Mon. James Smith. His voyage +to the West Indies</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_325">325</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">XIX.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterXIX">To Mr. John Kennedy. His poems in +the press. Subscriptions</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_325">325</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">XX.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterXX">To Mr. David Brice. Jean Armour’s +return,—printing his poems</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_326">326</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">XXI.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterXXI">To Mr. Robert Aiken. Distress of mind</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_326">326</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">XXII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterXXII">To Mr. John Richmond. Jean Armour</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_327">327</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">XXIII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterXXIII">To John Ballantyne, Esq. Aiken’s coldness. +His marriage-lines destroyed</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_328">328</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">XXIV.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterXXIV">To Mr. David Brice. Jean Armour. +West Indies</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_328">328</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">XXV.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterXXV">To Mr. John Richmond. West Indies The Armours</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_328">328</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">XXVI.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterXXVI">To Mr. Robert Muir. Enclosing “The +Calf”</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_329">329</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">XXVII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterXXVII">To Mrs. Dunlop. Thanks for her notice. +Sir William Wallace</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_329">329</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">XXVIII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterXXVIII">To Mr. John Kennedy. Jamaica</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_330">330</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">XXIX.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterXXIX">To Mr. James Burness. His departure +uncertain</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_330">330</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">XXX.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterXXX">To Miss Alexander. “The Lass of Ballochmyle”</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_330">330</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">XXXI.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterXXXI">To Mrs. Stewart, of Stair and Afton. +Enclosing some songs. Miss Alexander</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_331">331</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">XXXII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterXXXII">Proclamation in the name of the Muses</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_332">332</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">XXXIII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterXXXIII">To Mr. Robert Muir. Enclosing “Tam +Samson.” His Edinburgh expedition</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_332">332</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">XXXIV.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterXXXIV">To Dr. Mackenzie. Enclosing the +verses on dining with Lord Daer</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_332">332</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">XXXV.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterXXXV">To Gavin Hamilton, Esq. Rising fame. +Patronage</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_333">333</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">XXXVI.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterXXXVI">To John Ballantyne, Esq. His patrons +and patronesses. The Lounger</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_333">333</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">XXXVII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterXXXVII">To Mr. Robert Muir. A note of +thanks. Talks of sketching the history of his life</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_334">334</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">XXXVIII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterXXXVIII">To Mr. William Chalmers. A humorous +sally</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_334">334</a></td></tr> +<tr><td colspan="4" class="std1">1787.</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">XXXIX.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterXXXIX">To the Earl of Eglinton. Thanks for +his patronage</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_335">335</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">XL.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterXL">To Gavin Hamilton, Esq. Love</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_335">335</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">XLI.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterXLI">To John Ballantyne, Esq. Mr. Miller’s +offer of a farm</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_335">335</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">XLII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterXLII">To John Ballantyne, Esq. Enclosing +“The Banks o’ Doon.” First Copy</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_336">336</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">XLIII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterXLIII">To Mrs. Dunlop. Dr. Moore and Lord +Eglinton. His situation in Edinburgh</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_336">336</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">XLIV.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterXLIV">To Dr. Moore. Acknowledgments for +his notice</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_337">337</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">XLV.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterXLV">To the Rev. G. Lowrie. Reflections on his +situation in life. Dr. Blacklock, Mackenzie</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_338">338</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">XLVI.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterXLVI">To Dr. Moore. Miss Williams</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_338">338</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">XLVII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterXLVII">To John Ballantyne, Esq. His portrait +engraving</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_339">339</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">XLVIII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterXLVIII">To the Earl of Glencairn. Enclosing +“Lines intended to be written under a noble +Earl’s picture”</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_339">339</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">XLIX.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterXLIX">To the Earl of Buchan. In reply to a +letter of advice</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_339">339</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">L.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterL">To Mr. James Candlish. Still “the old +man with his deeds”</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_340">340</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">LI.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterLI">To ——. On Fergusson’s headstone</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_341">341</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">LII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterLII">To Mrs. Dunlop. His prospects on leaving +Edinburgh</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_341">341</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">LIII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterLIII">To Mrs. Dunlop. A letter of acknowledgment +for the payment of the subscription</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_342">342</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">LIV.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterLIV">To Mr. Sibbald. Thanks for his notice +in the magazine</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_343">343</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">LV.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterLV">To Dr. Moore. Acknowledging the present +of his View of Society</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_343">343</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">LVI.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterLVI">To Mr. Dunlop. Reply to criticisms</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_343">343</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">LVII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterLVII">To the Rev. Dr. Hugh Blair. On leaving Edinburgh. Thanks for his kindness</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_344">344</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">LVIII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterLVIII">To the Earl of Glencairn. On leaving +Edinburgh</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_344">344</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">LIX.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterLIX">To Mr. William Dunbar. Thanking him +for the present of Spenser’s poems</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_344">344</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">LX.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterLX">To Mr. James Johnson. Sending a song +to the Scots Musical Museum</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_345">345</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">LXI.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterLXI">To Mr. William Creech. His tour on the +Border. Epistle in verse to Creech</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_345">345</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">LXII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterLXII">To Mr. Patison. Business</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_345">345</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">LXIII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterLXIII">To Mr. W. Nicol. A ride described +in broad Scotch</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_346">346</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">LXIV.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterLXIV">To Mr. James Smith. Unsettled in life. +Jamaica</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_346">346</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">LXV.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterLXV">To Mr. W. Nicol. Mr. Miller, Mr. +Burnside. Bought a pocket Milton</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_347">347</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">LXVI.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterLXVI">To Mr. James Candlish. Seeking a +copy of Lowe’s poem of “Pompey’s Ghost”</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_347">347</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">LXVII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterLXVII">To Robert Ainslie, Esq. His tour</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_348">348</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">LXVIII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterLXVIII">To Mr. W. Nicol. Auchtertyre</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_348">348</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">LXIX.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterLXIX">To Mr. Wm. Cruikshank. Auchtertyre</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_348">348</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">LXX.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterLXX">To Mr. James Smith. An adventure</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_349">349</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">LXXI.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterLXXI">To Mr. John Richmond. His rambles</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_350">350</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">LXXII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterLXXII">To Mr. Robert Ainslie. Sets high +value on his friendship</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_350">350</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">LXXIII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterLXXIII">To the same. Nithsdale and Edinburgh</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_350">350</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">LXXIV.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterLXXIV">To Dr. Moore. Account of his own life</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_351">351</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">LXXV.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterLXXV">To Mr. Robert Ainslie. A humorous +letter</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_357">357</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">LXXVI.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterLXXVI">To Mr. Robert Muir. Stirling, Bannockburn</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_357">357</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">LXXVII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterLXXVII">To Gavin Hamilton, Esq. Of Mr. +Hamilton’s own family</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_358">358</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">LXXVIII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterLXXVIII">To Mr. Walker. Bruar Water. The +Athole family</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_359">359</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">LXXIX.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterLXXIX">To Mr. Gilbert Burns. Account of his +Highland tour</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_359">359</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">LXXX.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterLXXX">To Miss Margaret Chalmers. Charlotte +Hamilton. Skinner. Nithsdale</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_360">360</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">LXXXI.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterLXXXI">To the same. Charlotte Hamilton, and +“The Banks of the Devon”</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_360">360</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">LXXXII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterLXXXII">To James Hoy, Esq. Mr. Nicol. +Johnson’s Musical Museum</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_361">361</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">LXXXIII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterLXXXIII">To Rev. John Skinner. Thanking +him for his poetic compliment</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_361">361</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">LXXXIV.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterLXXXIV">To James Hoy, Esq. Song by the +Duke of Gordon</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_362">362</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">LXXXV.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterLXXXV">To Mr. Robert Ainslie. His friendship +for him</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_363">363</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">LXXXVI.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterLXXXVI">To the Earl of Glencairn. Requesting +his aid in obtaining an excise appointment</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_363">363</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">LXXXVII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterLXXXVII">To James Dalrymple, Esq. Rhyme. +Lord Glencairn</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_363">363</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">LXXXVIII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterLXXXVIII">To Charles Hay, Esq. Enclosing +his poem on the death of the Lord President +Dundas</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_364">364</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">LXXXIX.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterLXXXIX">To Miss M——n. Compliments</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_364">364</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">XC.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterXC">To Miss Chalmers. Charlotte Hamilton</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_365">365</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">XCI.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterXCI">To the same. His bruised limb. The +Bible. The Ochel Hills</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_365">365</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">XCII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterXCII">To the same. His motto—“I dare.” + His own worst enemy</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_365">365</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">XCIII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterXCIII">To Sir John Whitefoord. Thanks for +his friendship. Of poets</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_366">366</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">XCIV.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterXCIV">To Miss Williams. Comments on her +poem of the Slave Trade</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_366">366</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">XCV.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterXCV">To Mr. Richard Brown. Recollections +of early life. Clarinda</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_368">368</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">XCVI.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterXCVI">To Gavin Hamilton, Esq. Prayer for +his health</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_369">369</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">XCVII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterXCVII">To Miss Chalmers. Complimentary +poems. Creech</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_369">369</a></td></tr> +<tr><td colspan="4" class="std1">1788.</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">XCVIII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterXCVIII">To Mrs. Dunlop. Lowness of spirits. +Leaving Edinburgh</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_370">370</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">XCIX.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterXCIX">To the same. Religion</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_370">370</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">C.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterC">To the Rev. John Skinner. Tullochgorum. +Skinner’s Latin</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_370">370</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CI.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCI">To Mr. Richard Brown. His arrival in +Glasgow</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_371">371</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCII">To Mrs. Rose of Kilravock. Recollections +of Kilravock</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_371">371</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CIII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCIII">To Mr. Richard Brown. Friendship. The +pleasures of the present</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_372">372</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CIV.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCIV">To Mr. William Cruikshank. Ellisland. +Plans in life</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_372">372</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CV.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCV">To Mr. Robert Ainslie. Ellisland. Edinburgh. +Clarinda</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_373">373</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CVI.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCVI">To Mr. Richard Brown. Idleness. Farming</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_374">374</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CVII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCVII">To Mr. Robert Muir. His offer for Ellisland. +The close of life</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_374">374</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CVIII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCVIII">To Miss Chalmers. Taken Ellisland. +Miss Kennedy</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_375">375</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CIX.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCIX">To Mrs. Dunlop. Coila’s robe</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_375">375</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CX.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCX">To Mr. Richard Brown. Apologies. On +his way to Dumfries from Glasgow</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_375">375</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CXI.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCXI">To Mr. Robert Cleghorn. Poet and fame. +The air of Captain O’Kean</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_376">376</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CXII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCXII">To Mr. William Dunbar. Foregoing +poetry and wit for farming and business</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_376">376</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CXIII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCXIII">To Miss Chalmers. Miss Kennedy. +Jean Armour</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_377">377</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CXIV.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCXIV">To the same. Creech’s rumoured bankruptcy</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_377">377</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CXV.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCXV">To the same. His entering the Excise</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_377">377</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CXVI.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCXVI">To Mrs. Dunlop. Fanning and the Excise. +Thanks for the loan of Dryden and Tasso</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_378">378</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CXVII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCXVII">To Mr. James Smith. Jocularity. Jean +Armour</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_378">378</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CXVIII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCXVIII">To Professor Dugald Stewart. Enclosing +some poetic trifles</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_379">379</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CXIX.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCXIX">To Mrs. Dunlop. Dryden’s Virgil. His +preference of Dryden to Pope</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_379">379</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CXX.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCXX">To Mr. Robert Ainslie. His marriage.</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_379">379</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CXXI.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCXXI">To Mrs. Dunlop. On the treatment of +servants</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_380">380</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CXXII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCXXII">To the same. The merits of Mrs. Burns</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_380">380</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CXXIII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCXXIII">To Mr. Robert Ainslie. The warfare +of life. Books. Religion</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_381">381</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CXXIV.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCXXIV">To the same. Miers’ profiles</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_382">382</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CXXV.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCXXV">To the same. Of the folly of talking +of one’s private affairs</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_382">382</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CXXVI.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCXXVI">To Mr. George Lockhart. The Miss +Baillies. Bruar Water</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_383">383</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CXXVII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCXXVII">To Mr. Peter Hill. With the present +of a cheese</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_383">383</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CXXVIII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCXXVIII">To Robert Graham Esq., of Fintray. +The Excise</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_384">384</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CXXIX.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCXXIX">To Mr. William Cruikshank. Creech. +Lines written in Friar’s Carse Hermitage</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_385">385</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CXXX.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCXXX">To Mrs. Dunlop. Lines written at Friar’s +Carse. Graham of Fintray</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_385">385</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CXXXI.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCXXXI">To the same. Mrs. Burns. Of accomplished +young ladies</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_386">386</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CXXXII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCXXXII">To the same. Mrs. Miller, of Dalswinton. +“The Life and Age of Man.”</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_387">387</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CXXXIII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCXXXIII">To Mr. Beugo. Ross and “The +Fortunate Shepherdess.”</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_388">388</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CXXXIV.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCXXXIV">To Miss Chalmers. Recollections. +Mrs. Burns. Poetry</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_388">388</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CXXXV.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCXXXV">To Mr. Morison. Urging expedition +with his clock and other furniture for Ellisland</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_390">390</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CXXXVI.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCXXXVI">To Mrs. Dunlop. Mr. Graham. Her +criticisms</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_390">390</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CXXXVII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCXXXVII">To Mr. Peter Hill. Criticism on an +“Address to Loch Lomond.”</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_391">391</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CXXXVIII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCXXXVIII">To the Editor of the Star. Pleading +for the line of the Stuarts</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_392">392</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CXXXIX.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCXXXIX">To Mrs. Dunlop. The present of a +heifer from the Dunlops</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_393">393</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CXL.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCXL">To Mr. James Johnson. Scots Musical +Museum</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_393">393</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CXLI.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCXLI">To Dr. Blacklock. Poetical progress. +His marriage</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_394">394</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CXLII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCXLII">To Mrs. Dunlop. Enclosing “Auld +Lang Syne”</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_394">394</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CXLIII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCXLIII">To Miss Davies. Enclosing the song +of “Charming, lovely Davies”</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_395">395</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CXLIV.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCXLIV">To Mr. John Tennant. Praise of his +whiskey</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_395">395</a></td></tr> +<tr><td colspan="4" class="std1">1789.</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CXLV.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCXLV">To Mrs. Dunlop. Reflections suggested +by the day</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_396">396</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CXLVI.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCXLVI">To Dr. Moore. His situation and +prospects</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_396">396</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CXLVII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCXLVII">To Mr. Robert Ainslie. His favourite +quotations. Musical Museum</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_398">398</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CXLVIII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCXLVIII">To Professor Dugald Stewart. Enclosing +some poems for his comments upon</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_398">398</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CXLIX.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCXLIX">To Bishop Geddes. His situation and +prospects</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_399">399</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CL.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCL">To Mr. James Burness. His wife and farm. +Profit from his poems. Fanny Burns</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_399">399</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CLI.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCLI">To Mrs. Dunlop. Reflections. His success +in song encouraged a shoal of bardlings</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_400">400</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CLII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCLII">To the Rev. Peter Carfrae. Mr. Mylne’s +poem</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_401">401</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CLIII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCLIII">To Dr. Moore. Introduction. His ode +to Mrs. Oswald</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_401">401</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CLIV.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCLIV">To Mr. William Burns. Remembrance</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_402">402</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CLV.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCLV">To Mr. Peter Hill. Economy and frugality. +Purchase of books</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_402">402</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CLVI.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCLVI">To Mrs. Dunlop. Sketch inscribed to +the Right Hon. C.J. Fox</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_403">403</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CLVII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCLVII">To Mr. William Burns. Asking him to +make his house his home</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_404">404</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CLVIII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCLVIII">To Mrs. M’Murdo. With the song of “Bonnie Jean”</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_404">404</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CLIX.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCLIX">To Mr. Cunningham. With the poem of “The Wounded Hare”</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_404">404</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CLX.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCLX">To Mr. Samuel Brown. His farm. Ailsa fowling</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_405">405</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CLXI.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCLXI">To Mr. Richard Brown. Kind wishes</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_405">405</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CLXII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCLXII">To Mr. James Hamilton. Sympathy</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_406">406</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CLXIII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCLXIII">To William Creech, Esq. Toothache. Good wishes</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_406">406</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CLXIV.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCLXIV">To Mr. M’Auley. His own welfare</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_406">406</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CLXV.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCLXV">To Mr. Robert Ainslie. Overwhelmed with incessant toil</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_407">407</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CLXVI.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCLXVI">To Mr. M’Murdo. Enclosing his newest song</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_407">407</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CLXVII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCLXVII">To Mrs. Dunlop. Reflections on religion</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_408">408</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CLXVIII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCLXVIII">To Mr. ——. Fergusson the poet</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_408">408</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CLXIX.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCLXIX">To Miss Williams. Enclosing criticisms on her poems</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_409">409</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CLXX.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCLXX">To Mr. John Logan. With “The Kirk’s Alarm”</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_410">410</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CLXXI.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCLXXI">To Mrs. Dunlop. Religion. Dr. Moore’s “Zeluco”</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_410">410</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CLXXII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCLXXII">To Captain Riddel. “The Whistle”</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_411">411</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CLXXIII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCLXXIII">To the same. With some of his MS. poems</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_411">411</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CLXXIV.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCLXXIV">To Mr. Robert Ainslie. His Excise employment</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_412">412</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CLXXV.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCLXXV">To Mr. Richard Brown. His Excise duties</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_412">412</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CLXXVI.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCLXXVI">To Robert Graham, Esq., of Fintray. The Excise. Captain Grose. Dr. M’Gill</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_413">413</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CLXXVII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCLXXVII">To Mrs. Dunlop. Reflections on immortality</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_414">414</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CLXXVIII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCLXXVIII">To Lady M.W. Constable. Jacobitism</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_415">415</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CLXXIX.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCLXXIX">To Provost Maxwell. At a loss for a subject</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_415">415</a></td></tr> +<tr><td colspan="4" class="std1">1790.</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CLXXX.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCLXXX">To Sir John Sinclair. Account of a book-society in Nithsdale</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_416">416</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CLXXXI.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCLXXXI">To Charles Sharpe, Esq. A letter with a fictitious signature</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_416">416</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CLXXXII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCLXXXII">To Mr. Gilburt Burns. His farm a ruinous affair. Players</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_417">417</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CLXXXIII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCLXXXIII">To Mr. Sutherland. Enclosing a Prologue</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_418">418</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CLXXXIV.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCLXXXIV">To Mr. William Dunbar. Excise. His children. Another world</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_418">418</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CLXXXV.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCLXXXV">To Mrs. Dunlop. Falconer the poet. Old Scottish songs</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_419">419</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CLXXXVI.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCLXXXVI">To Mr. Peter Hill. Mademoiselle Burns. Hurdis. Smollett and Cowper</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_420">420</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CLXXXVII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCLXXXVII">To Mr. W. Nicol. The death of Nicol’s mare Peg Nicholson</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_420">420</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CLXXXVIII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCLXXXVIII">To Mr. W. Cunningham. What strange beings we are</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_421">421</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CLXXXIX.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCLXXXIX">To Mr. Peter Hill. Orders for books. Mankind</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_423">423</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CXC.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCXC">To Mrs. Dunlop. Mackenzie and the Mirror and Lounger</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_423">423</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CXCI.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCXCI">To Collector Mitchell. A county meeting</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_424">424</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CXCII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCXCII">To Dr. Moore. “Zeluco.” Charlotte Smith</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_425">425</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CXCIII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCXCIII">To Mr. Murdoch. William Burns</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_425">425</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CXCIV.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCXCIV">To Mr. M’Murdo. With the Elegy on Matthew Henderson</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_426">426</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CXCV.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCXCV">To Mrs. Dunlop. His pride wounded</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_426">426</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CXCVI.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCXCVI">To Mr. Cunningham. Independence</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_426">426</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CXCVII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCXCVII">To Dr. Anderson. “The Bee.”</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_427">427</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CXCVIII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCXCVIII">To William Tytler, Esq. With some West-country ballads</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_427">427</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CXCIX.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCXCIX">To Crauford Tait, Esq. Introducing Mr. William Duncan</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_427">427</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CC.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCC">To Crauford Tait, Esq. “The Kirk’s Alarm”</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_428">428</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCI.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCCI">To Mrs. Dunlop. On the birth of her grandchild. Tam O’ Shanter</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_429">429</a></td></tr> +<tr><td colspan="4" class="std1">1791.</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCCII">To Lady M.W. Constable. Thanks for the present of a gold snuff-box</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_429">429</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCIII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCCIII">To Mr. William Dunbar. Not gone to Elysium. Sending a poem</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_429">429</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCIV.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCCIV">To Mr. Peter Mill. Apostrophe to Poverty</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_430">430</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCV.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCCV">To Mr. Cunningham. Tam O’ Shanter. Elegy on Miss Burnet</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_430">430</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCVI.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCCVI">To A.F. Tytler, Esq. Tam O’ Shanter</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_431">431</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCVII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCCVII">To Mrs. Dunlop. Miss Burnet. Elegy writing</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_431">431</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCVIII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCCVIII">To Rev. Arch. Alison. Thanking him for his “Essay on Taste”</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_432">432</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCIX.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCCIX">To Dr. Moore. Tam O’ Shanter. Elegyon Henderson. Zeluco. Lord Glencairn</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_432">432</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCX.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCCX">To Mr. Cunningham. Songs</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_433">433</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCXI.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCCXI">To Mr. Alex. Dalzel. The death of the Earl of Glencairn</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_434">434</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCXII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCCXII">To Mrs. Graham, of Fintray. With “Queen Mary’s Lament”</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_434">434</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCXIII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCCXIII">To the same. With his printed Poems</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_435">435</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCXIV.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCCXIV">To the Rev. G. Baird. Michael Bruce</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_435">435</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCXV.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCCXV">To Mrs. Dunlop. Birth of a son</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_435">435</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCXVI.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCCXVI">To the same. Apology for delay</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_436">436</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCXVII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCCXVII">To the same. Quaint invective on a pedantic critic</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_436">436</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCXVIII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCCXVIII">To Mr. Cunningham. The case of Mr. Clarke of Moffat, Schoolmaster</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_437">437</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCXIX.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCCXIX">To the Earl of Buchan. With the Address to the shade of Thomson</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_437">437</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCXX.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCCXX">To Mr. Thomas Sloan. Apologies. His crop sold well</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_438">438</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCXXI.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCCXXI">To Lady E. Cunningham. With the Lament for the Earl of Glencairn</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_438">438</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCXXII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCCXXII">To Mr. Robert Ainslie. State of mind. His income</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_439">439</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCXXIII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCCXXIII">To Col. Fullarton. With some Poems. His anxiety for Fullarton’s friendship</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_439">439</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCXXIV.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCCXXIV">To Miss Davis. Lethargy, Indolence, and Remorse. Our wishes and our powers</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_440">440</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCXXV.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCCXXV">To Mrs. Dunlop. Mrs. Henri. The Song of Death</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_440">440</a></td></tr> +<tr><td colspan="4" class="std1">1792.</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCXXVI.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCCXXVI">To Mrs. Dunlop. The animadversions of the Board of Excise</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_441">441</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCXXVII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCCXXVII">To Mr. William Smellie. Introducing Mrs. Riddel</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_441">441</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCXXVIII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCCXXVIII">To Mr. W. Nicol. Ironical reply to a letter of counsel and reproof</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_442">442</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCXXIX.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCCXXIX">To Francis Grose, Esq. Dugald Stewart</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_443">443</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCXXX.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCCXXX">To the same. Witch stories</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_443">443</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCXXXI.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCCXXXI">To Mr. S. Clarke. Humorous invitation to teach music to the M’Murdo family</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_444">444</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCXXXII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCCXXXII">To Mrs. Dunlop. Love and Lesley Baillie</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_445">445</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCXXXIII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCCXXXIII">To Mr. Cunningham. Lesley Baillie</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_446">446</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCXXXIV.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCCXXXIV">To Mr. Thomson. Promising his assistance to his collection of songs and airs</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_447">447</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCXXXV.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCCXXXV">To Mrs. Dunlop. Situation of Mrs.Henri</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_448">448</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCXXXVI.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCCXXXVI">To the same. On the death of Mrs. Henri</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_449">449</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCXXXVII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCCXXXVII">To Mr. Thomson. Thomson’s fastidiousness. “My Nannie O,” &c.</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_449">449</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCXXXVIII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCCXXXVIII">To the same. With “My wife’s a winsome wee thing,” and “Lesley Baillie”</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_450">450</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCXXXIX.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCCXXXIX">To the same. With Highland Mary. The air of Katherine Ogie</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_450">450</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCXL.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCCXL">To the same. Thomson’s alterations and observations</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_451">451</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCXLI.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCCXLI">To the same. With “Auld Rob Morris,” and “Duncan Gray”</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_451">451</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCXLII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCCXLII">To Mrs. Dunlop. Birth of a daughter. The poet Thomson’s dramas</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_451">451</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCXLIII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCCXLIII">To Robert Graham, Esq., of Fintray. The Excise inquiry into his political conduct</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_452">452</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCXLIV.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCCXLIV">To Mrs. Dunlop. Hurry of business. Excise inquiry</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_453">453</a></td></tr> +<tr><td colspan="4" class="std1">1793.</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCXLV.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCCXLV">To Mr. Thomson. With “Poortithcauld” and “Galla Water”</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_453">453</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCXLVI.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCCXLVI">To the same. William Tytler, Peter Pindar</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_453">453</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCXLVII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCCXLVII">To Mr. Cunningham. The poet’s seal. David Allan</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_454">454</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCXLVIII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCCXLVIII">To Thomson. With “Mary Morison”</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_455">455</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCCXLIX.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCCXLIX">To the same. With “Wandering Willie”</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_455">455</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCL.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCCL">To Miss Benson. Pleasure he had in meeting her</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_455">455</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCLI.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCCLI">To Patrick Miller, Esq. With the present of his printed poems</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_456">456</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCLII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCCLII">To Mr. Thomson. Review of Scottish song. Crawfurd and Ramsay</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_456">456</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCLIII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCCLIII">To the same. Criticism. Allan Ramsay</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_457">457</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCLIV.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCCLIV">To the same. “The last time I came o’er the moor”</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_458">458</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCLV.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCCLV">To John Francis Erskine, Esq. Self-justification. The Excise inquiry</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_459">459</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCLVI.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCCLVI">To Mr. Robert Ainslie. Answering letters. Scholar-craft</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_460">460</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCLVII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCCLVII">To Miss Kennedy. A letter of compliment</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_461">461</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCLVIII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCCLVIII">To Mr. Thomson. Frazer. “Blithe had I been on yon hill”</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_461">461</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCLIX.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCCLIX">To Mr. Thomson. “Logan Water.” “Ogin my love were yon red rose”</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_462">462</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCLX.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCCLX">To the same. With the song of “Bonnie Jean”</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_463">463</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCLXI.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCCLXI">To the same. Hurt at the idea of pecuniary recompense. Remarks on song</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_463">463</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCLXII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCCLXII">To the same. Note written in the name of Stephen Clarke</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_464">464</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCLXIII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCCLXIII">To the same. With “Phillis the fair”</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_464">464</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCLXIV.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCCLXIV">To the same. With “Had I a cave on some wild distant shore</a>”</td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_464">464</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCLXV.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCCLXV">To the same. With “Allan Water”</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_464">464</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCLXVI.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCCLXVI">To the same. With “O whistle, and I’ll come to you, my lad,” &c.</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_465">465</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCLXVII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCCLXVII">To the same. With “Come, let me take thee to my breast”</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_465">465</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCLXVIII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#letterCCLXVIII">To the same. With “Dainty Davie”</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_466">466</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCLXIX.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#CCLXIX">To Miss Craik. Wretchedness of poets</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_466">466</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCLXX.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#CCLXX">To Lady Glencairn. Gratitude. Excise. Dramatic composition</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_466">466</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCLXXI.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#CCLXXI">To Mr. Thomson. With “Scots wha hae wi’ Wallace bled”</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_467">467</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCLXXII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#CCLXXII">To the same. With “Behold the hour, the boat arrive”</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_468">468</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCLXXIII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#CCLXXIII">To the same. Crawfurd and Scottish song</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_468">468</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCLXXIV.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#CCLXXIV">To the same. Alterations in “Scots wha hae wi’ Wallace bled”</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_470">470</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCLXXV.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#CCLXXV">To the same. Further suggested alterations in “Scots wha hae” rejected.</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_470">470</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCLXXVI.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#CCLXXVI">To the same. With “Deluded swain, the pleasure,” and “Raving winds around her blowing”</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_471">471</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCLXXVII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#CCLXXVII">To the same. Erskine and Gavin Turnbull</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_471">471</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCLXXVIII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#CCLXXVIII">To John M’Murdo, Esq. Payment of a debt. “The Merry Muses”</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_472">472</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCLXXIX.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#CCLXXIX">To the same. With his printed poems</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_473">473</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCLXXX.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#CCLXXX">To Captain ——. Anxiety for his acquaintance. “Scots wha hae wi’ Wallace bled”</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_473">473</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCLXXXI.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#CCLXXXI">To Mrs. Riddel. The Dumfries Theatre</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_474">474</a></td></tr> +<tr><td colspan="4" class="std1">1794.</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCLXXXII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#CCLXXXII">To a Lady. In favour of a player’s benefit</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_474">474</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCLXXXIII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#CCLXXXIII">To the Earl of Buchan. With a copy of “Scots wha hae”</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_474">474</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCLXXXIV.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#CCLXXXIV">To Captain Miller. With a copy of “Scots wha hae”</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_475">475</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCLXXXV.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#CCLXXXV">To Mrs. Riddel. Lobster-coated puppies</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_475">475</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCLXXXVI.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#CCLXXXVI">To the same. The gin-horse class of the human genus</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_475">475</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCLXXXVII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#CCLXXXVII">To the same. With “Werter.” Her reception of him</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_475">475</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCLXXXVIII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#CCLXXXVIII">To Mrs. Riddel. Her caprice</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_476">476</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCLXXXIX.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#CCLXXXIX">To the same. Her neglect and unkindness</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_476">476</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCXC.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#CCXC">To John Syme, Esq. Mrs. Oswald, and “O wat ye wha’s in yon town”</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_476">476</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCXCI.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#CCXCI">To Miss ——. Obscure allusions to a friend’s death. His personal and poetic fame</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_477">477</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCXCII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#CCXCII">To Mr. Cunningham. Hypochondria. Requests consolation</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_477">477</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCXCIII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#CCXCIII">To the Earl of Glencairn. With his printed poems</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_478">478</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCXCIV.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#CCXCIV">To Mr. Thomson. David Allan. “The banks of Cree”</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_479">479</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCXCV.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#CCXCV">To David M’Culloch, Esq. Arrangements for a trip in Galloway</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_479">479</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCXCVI.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#CCXCVI">To Mrs. Dunlop. Threatened with flying gout. Ode on Washington’s birthday</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_479">479</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCXCVII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#CCXCVII">To Mr. James Johnson. Low spirits. The Museum. Balmerino’s dirk</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_480">480</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCXCVIII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#CCXCVIII">To Mr. Thomson. Lines written in “Thomson’s Collection of songs”</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_480">480</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCXCIX.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#CCXCIX">To the same. With “How can my poor heart be glad”</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_480">480</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCC.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#CCC">To the same. With “Ca’ the yowes to the knowes”</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_481">481</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCCI.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#CCCI">To the same. With “Sae flaxen were her ringlets.” Epigram to Dr. Maxwell.</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_481">481</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCCII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#CCCII">To the same. The charms of Miss Lorimer. “O saw ye my dear, my Phely,” &c.</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_482">482</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCCIII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#CCCIII">To the same. Ritson’s Scottish Songs. Love and song</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_483">483</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCCIV.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#CCCIV">To the same. English songs. The air of “Ye banks and braes o’ bonnie Doon”</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_484">484</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCCV.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#CCCV">To the same. With “O Philly, happy be the day,” and “Contented wi’ little”</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_485">485</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCCVI.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#CCCVI">To the same. With “Canst thou leave me thus, my Katy”</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_486">486</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCCVII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#CCCVII">To Peter Miller, jun., Esq. Excise. Perry’s offer to write for the Morning Chronicle</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_487">487</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCCVIII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#CCCVIII">To Mr. Samuel Clarke, jun. A political and personal quarrel. Regret</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_487">487</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCCIX.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#CCCIX">To Mr. Thomson. With “Now in her green mantle blithe nature arrays”</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_487">487</a></td></tr> +<tr><td colspan="4" class="std1">1795.</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCCX.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#CCCX">To Mr. Thomson. With “For a’ that and a’ that”</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_488">488</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCCXI.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#CCCXI">To the same. Abuse of Ecclefechan</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_488">488</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCCXII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#CCCXII">To the same. With “O stay, sweet warbling woodlark, stay,” and “The groves of sweet myrtle”</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_488">488</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCCXIII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#CCCXIII">To the same. With “How cruel are the parents” and “Mark yonder pomp of costly fashion”</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_489">489</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCCXIV.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#CCCXIV">To the same. Praise of David Allan’s “Cotter’s Saturday Night”</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_489">489</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCCXV.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#CCCXV">To the same. With “This is no my ain Lassie.” Mrs. Riddel</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_489">489</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCCXVI.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#CCCXVI">To Mr. Thomson. With “Forlorn, my love, no comfort near”</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_490">490</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCCXVII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#CCCXVII">To the same. With “Last May a braw wooer,” and “Why tell thy lover”</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_490">490</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCCXVIII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#CCCXVIII">To Mrs. Riddel. A letter from the grave</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_490">490</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCCXIX.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#CCCXIX">To the same. A letter of compliment. “Anacharsis’ Travels”</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_491">491</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCCXX.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#CCCXX">To Miss Louisa Fontenelle. With a Prologue for her benefit-night</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_491">491</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCCXXI.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#CCCXXI">To Mrs. Dunlop. His family. Miss Fontenelle. Cowper’s “Task”</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_492">492</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCCXXII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#CCCXXII">To Mr. Alexander Findlater. Excise schemes</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_492">492</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCCXXIII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#CCCXXIII">To the Editor of the Morning Chronicle. Written for a friend. A complaint</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_493">493</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCCXXIV.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#CCCXXIV">To Mr. Heron, of Heron. With two political ballads</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_493">493</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCCXXV.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#CCCXXV">To Mrs. Dunlop. Thomson’s Collection. Acting as Supervisor of Excise</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_494">494</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCCXXVI.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#CCCXXVI">To the Right Hon. William Pitt. Address of the Scottish Distillers</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_495">495</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCCXXVII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#CCCXXVII">To the Provost, Bailies, and Town Council of Dumfries. Request to be made a freeman of the town</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_496">496</a></td></tr> +<tr><td colspan="4" class="std1">1796.</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCCXXVIII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#CCCXXVIII">To Mrs. Riddel. “Anarcharsis’ Travels.” The muses</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_496">496</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCCXXIX.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#CCCXXIX">To Mrs. Dunlop. His ill-health.</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_497">497</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCCXXX.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#CCCXXX">To Mr. Thomson. Acknowledging his present to Mrs. Burns of a worsted shawl</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_497">497</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCCXXXI.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#CCCXXXI">To the same. Ill-health. Mrs. Hyslop. Allan’s etchings. Cleghorn</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_497">497</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCCXXXII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#CCCXXXII">To the same. “Here’s a health to ane I loe dear”</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_498">498</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCCXXXIII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#CCCXXXIII">To the same. His anxiety to review his songs, asking for copies</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_498">498</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCCXXXIV.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#CCCXXXIV">To Mrs. Riddel. His increasing ill-health</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_498">498</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCCXXXV.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#CCCXXXV">To Mr. Clarke, acknowledging money and requesting the loan of a further sum</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_499">499</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCCXXXVI.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#CCCXXXVI">To Mr. James Johnson. The Scots Musical Museum. Request for a copy of the collection</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_499">499</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCCXXXVII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#CCCXXXVII">To Mr. Cunningham. Illness and poverty, anticipation of death</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_499">499</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCCXXXVIII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#CCCXXXVIII">To Mr. Gilbert Burns. His ill-health and debts</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_500">500</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCCXXXIX.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#CCCXXXIX">To Mr. James Armour. Entreating Mrs. Armour to come to her daughter’s confinement</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_500">500</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCCXL.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#CCCXL">To Mrs. Burns. Sea-bathing affords little relief</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_500">500</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCCXLI.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#CCCXLI">To Mrs. Dunlop. Her friendship. A farewell</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_501">501</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCCXLII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#CCCXLII">To Mr. Thomson. Solicits the sum of five pounds. “Fairest Maid on Devon Banks”</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_501">501</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCCXLIII.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#CCCXLIII">To Mr. James Burness. Soliciting the sum of ten pounds</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_501">501</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">CCCXLIV.</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#CCCXLIV">To James Gracie, Esq. His rheumatism, &c. &c.—his loss of appetite</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_502">502</a></td></tr> +</table> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<table summary="Contents"> +<tr><td></td><td><a href="#REMARKS">Remarks on Scottish Songs and Ballads</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_502">502</a></td></tr> +<tr><td></td><td><a href="#THE_BORDER_TOUR">The Border Tour</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_522">522</a></td></tr> +<tr><td></td><td><a href="#THE_HIGHLAND_TOUR">The Highland Tour</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_527">527</a></td></tr> +<tr><td></td><td><a href="#THE_POETS_ASSIGNMENT_OF_HIS_WORKS">Burns’s Assignment of his Works</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_530">530</a></td></tr> +<tr><td></td><td><a href="#GLOSSARY">Glossary</a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_531">531</a></td></tr> +</table> + + + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_xxiii" id="Page_xxiii">[xxiii]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="LIFE" id="LIFE"></a>LIFE<br /> + + +OF<br /> + + +ROBERT BURNS.</h2> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p>Robert Burns, the chief of the peasant poets of Scotland, was born in +a little mud-walled cottage on the banks of Doon, near “Alloway’s auld +haunted kirk,” in the shire of Ayr, on the 25th day of January, 1759. +As a natural mark of the event, a sudden storm at the same moment +swept the land: the gabel-wall of the frail dwelling gave way, and the +babe-bard was hurried through a tempest of wind and sleet to the +shelter of a securer hovel. He was the eldest born of three sons and +three daughters; his father, William, who in his native +Kincardineshire wrote his name Burness, was bred a gardener, and +sought for work in the West; but coming from the lands of the noble +family of the Keiths, a suspicion accompanied him that he had been +out—as rebellion was softly called—in the forty-five: a suspicion +fatal to his hopes of rest and bread, in so loyal a district; and it +was only when the clergyman of his native parish certified his loyalty +that he was permitted to toil. This suspicion of Jacobitism, revived +by Burns himself, when he rose into fame, seems not to have influenced +either the feelings, or the tastes of Agnes Brown, a young woman on +the Doon, whom he wooed and married in December, 1757, when he was +thirty-six years old. To support her, he leased a small piece of +ground, which he converted into a nursery and garden, and to shelter +her, he raised with his own hands that humble abode where she gave +birth to her eldest son.</p> + +<p>The elder Burns was a well-informed, silent, austere man, who endured +no idle gaiety, nor indecorous language: while he relaxed somewhat the +hard, stern creed of the Covenanting times, he enforced all the +work-day, as well as sabbath-day observances, which the Calvinistic +kirk requires, and scrupled at promiscuous dancing, as the staid of +our own day scruple at the waltz. His wife was of a milder mood: she +was blest with a singular fortitude of temper; was as devout of heart, +as she was calm of mind; and loved, while busied in her household +concerns, to sweeten the bitterer moments of life, by chanting the +songs and ballads of her country, of which her store was great. The +garden and nursery prospered so much, that he was induced to widen his +views, and by the help of his kind landlord, the laird of Doonholm, +and the more questionable aid of borrowed money, he entered upon a +neighbouring farm, named Mount Oliphant, extending to an hundred +acres. This was in 1765; but the land was hungry and sterile; the +seasons proved rainy and rough; the toil was certain, the reward +unsure; when to his sorrow, the laird of Doonholm—a generous +Ferguson,—died: the strict terms of the lease, as well as the rent, +were exacted by a harsh factor, and with his wife and children, he was +obliged, after a losing struggle of six years, to relinquish the farm, +and seek shelter on the grounds of Lochlea, some ten miles off, in the +parish of Tarbolton. When, in after-days, men’s characters were in the +hands of his eldest son, the scoundrel factor sat for that lasting +portrait of insolence and wrong, in the “Twa Dogs.”</p> + +<p>In this new farm William Burns seemed to strike root, and thrive. He +was strong of body and ardent of mind: every day brought increase of +vigour to his three sons, who, though very young,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_xxiv" id="Page_xxiv">[xxiv]</a></span> already put their +hands to the plough, the reap-hook, and the flail. But it seemed that +nothing which he undertook was decreed in the end to prosper: after +four seasons of prosperity a change ensued: the farm was far from +cheap; the gains under any lease were then so little, that the loss of +a few pounds was ruinous to a farmer: bad seed and wet seasons had +their usual influence: “The gloom of hermits and the moil of +galley-slaves,” as the poet, alluding to those days, said, were +endured to no purpose; when, to crown all, a difference arose between +the landlord and the tenant, as to the terms of the lease; and the +early days of the poet, and the declining years of his father, were +harassed by disputes, in which sensitive minds are sure to suffer.</p> + +<p>Amid these labours and disputes, the poet’s father remembered the +worth of religious and moral instruction: he took part of this upon +himself. A week-day in Lochlea wore the sober looks of a Sunday: he +read the Bible and explained, as intelligent peasants are accustomed +to do, the sense, when dark or difficult; he loved to discuss the +spiritual meanings, and gaze on the mystical splendours of the +Revelations. He was aided in these labours, first, by the +schoolmaster of Alloway-mill, near the Doon; secondly, by John +Murdoch, student of divinity, who undertook to teach arithmetic, +grammar, French, and Latin, to the boys of Lochlea, and the sons of +five neighboring farmers. Murdoch, who was an enthusiast in learning, +much of a pedant, and such a judge of genius that he thought wit +should always be laughing, and poetry wear an eternal smile, performed +his task well: he found Robert to be quick in apprehension, and not +afraid to study when knowledge was the reward. He taught him to turn +verse into its natural prose order; to supply all the ellipses, and +not to desist till the sense was clear and plain: he also, in their +walks, told him the names of different objects both in Latin and +French; and though his knowledge of these languages never amounted to +much, he approached the grammar of the English tongue, through the +former, which was of material use to him, in his poetic compositions. +Burns was, even in those early days, a sort of enthusiast in all that +concerned the glory of Scotland; he used to fancy himself a soldier of +the days of the Wallace and the Bruce: loved to strut after the +bag-pipe and the drum, and read of the bloody struggles of his country +for freedom and existence, till “a Scottish prejudice,” he says, “was +poured into my veins, which will boil there till the flood-gates of +life are shut in eternal rest.”</p> + +<p>In this mood of mind Burns was unconsciously approaching the land of +poesie. In addition to the histories of the Wallace and the Bruce, he +found, on the shelves of his neighbours, not only whole bodies of +divinity, and sermons without limit, but the works of some of the best +English, as well as Scottish poets, together with songs and ballads +innumerable. On these he loved to pore whenever a moment of leisure +came; nor was verse his sole favourite; he desired to drink knowledge +at any fountain, and Guthrie’s Grammar, Dickson on Agriculture, +Addison’s Spectator, Locke on the Human Understanding, and Taylor’s +Scripture Doctrine of Original Sin, were as welcome to his heart as +Shakspeare, Milton, Pope, Thomson, and Young. There is a mystery in +the workings of genius: with these poets in his head and hand, we see +not that he has advanced one step in the way in which he was soon to +walk, “Highland Mary” and “Tam O’ Shanter” sprang from other +inspirations.</p> + +<p>Burns lifts up the veil himself, from the studies which made him a +poet. “In my boyish days,” he says to Moore, “I owed much to an old +woman (Jenny Wilson) who resided in the family, remarkable for her +credulity and superstition. She had, I suppose, the largest collection +in the country of tales and songs, concerning devils, ghosts, fairies, +brownies, witches, warlocks, spunkies, kelpies, elf-candles, +dead-lights, wraiths, apparitions, cantraips, giants, enchanted +towers, dragons, and other trumpery. This cultivated the latent seeds +of poesie; but had so strong an effect upon my imagination that to +this hour, in my nocturnal rambles, I sometimes keep a look-out on +suspicious places.” Here we have the young poet taking lessons in the +classic lore of his native land: in the school of Janet Wilson he +profited largely; her tales gave a hue, all their own, to many noble +effusions. But her teaching was at the hearth-stone: when he was in +the fields, either driving a cart or walking to labour, he had ever in +his hand a collection of songs, such as any stall in the land could +supply him with; and over these he pored, ballad by ballad, and verse +by verse, noting the true, tender, and the natural sublime from +affectation and fustian. “To this,” he said, “I am convinced that I +owe much of my critic craft, such as it is.”<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_xxv" id="Page_xxv">[xxv]</a></span> His mother, too, +unconsciously led him in the ways of the muse: she loved to recite or +sing to him a strange, but clever ballad, called “the Life and Age of +Man:” this strain of piety and imagination was in his mind when he +wrote “Man was made to Mourn.”</p> + +<p>He found other teachers—of a tenderer nature and softer influence. +“You know,” he says to Moore, “our country custom of coupling a man +and woman together as partners in the labours of harvest. In my +fifteenth autumn my partner was a bewitching creature, a year younger +than myself: she was in truth a bonnie, sweet, sonsie lass, and +unwittingly to herself, initiated me in that delicious passion, which, +in spite of acid disappointment, gin-horse prudence, and bookworm +philosophy, I hold to be the first of human joys. How she caught the +contagion I cannot tell; I never expressly said I loved her: indeed I +did not know myself why I liked so much to loiter behind with her, +when returning in the evenings from our labours; why the tones of her +voice made my heart strings thrill like an Æolian harp, and +particularly why my pulse beat such a furious ratan, when I looked and +fingered over her little hand, to pick out the cruel nettle-stings and +thistles. Among other love-inspiring qualities, she sang sweetly, and +it was her favourite reel to which I attempted to give an embodied +vehicle in rhyme; thus with me began love and verse.” This intercourse +with the fair part of the creation, was to his slumbering emotions, a +voice from heaven to call them into life and poetry.</p> + +<p>From the school of traditionary lore and love, Burns now went to a +rougher academy. Lochlea, though not producing fine crops of corn, was +considered excellent for flax; and while the cultivation of this +commodity was committed to his father and his brother Gilbert, he was +sent to Irvine at Midsummer, 1781, to learn the trade of a +flax-dresser, under one Peacock, kinsman to his mother. Some time +before, he had spent a portion of a summer at a school in Kirkoswald, +learning mensuration and land-surveying, where he had mingled in +scenes of sociality with smugglers, and enjoyed the pleasure of a +silent walk, under the moon, with the young and the beautiful. At +Irvine he laboured by day to acquire a knowledge of his business, and +at night he associated with the gay and the thoughtless, with whom he +learnt to empty his glass, and indulge in free discourse on topics +forbidden at Lochlea. He had one small room for a lodging, for which +he gave a shilling a week: meat he seldom tasted, and his food +consisted chiefly of oatmeal and potatoes sent from his father’s +house. In a letter to his father, written with great purity and +simplicity of style, he thus gives a picture of himself, mental and +bodily: “Honoured Sir, I have purposely delayed writing, in the hope +that I should have the pleasure of seeing you on new years’ day, but +work comes so hard upon us that I do not choose to be absent on that +account. My health is nearly the same as when you were here, only my +sleep is a little sounder, and on the whole, I am rather better than +otherwise, though I mend by very slow degrees: the weakness of my +nerves had so debilitated my mind that I dare neither review past +wants nor look forward into futurity, for the least anxiety or +perturbation in my breast produces most unhappy effects on my whole +frame. Sometimes indeed, when for an hour or two my spirits are a +little lightened, I <i>glimmer</i> a little into futurity; but my principal +and indeed my only pleasurable employment is looking backwards and +forwards in a moral and religious way. I am quite transported at the +thought that ere long, perhaps very soon, I shall bid an eternal adieu +to all the pains and uneasinesses, and disquietudes of this weary +life. As for the world, I despair of ever making a figure in it: I am +not formed for the bustle of the busy, nor the flutter of the gay. I +foresee that poverty and obscurity probably await me, and I am in some +measure prepared and daily preparing to meet them. I have but just +time and paper to return you my grateful thanks for the lessons of +virtue and piety you have given me, which were but too much neglected +at the time of giving them, but which, I hope, have been remembered +ere it is yet too late.” This remarkable letter was written in the +twenty-second year of his age; it alludes to the illness which seems +to have been the companion of his youth, a nervous headache, brought +on by constant toil and anxiety; and it speaks of the melancholy which +is the common attendant of genius, and its sensibilities, aggravated +by despair of distinction. The catastrophe which happened ere this +letter was well in his father’s hand, accords ill with quotations from +the Bible, and hopes fixed in heaven:—“As we gave,” he says, “a +welcome carousal to the new year, the shop took fire, and burnt to +ashes, and I was left, like a true poet, not worth a sixpence.”<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_xxvi" id="Page_xxvi">[xxvi]</a></span></p> + +<p>This disaster was followed by one more grievous: his father was well +in years when he was married, and age and a constitution injured by +toil and disappointment, began to press him down, ere his sons had +grown up to man’s estate. On all sides the clouds began to darken: the +farm was unprosperous: the speculations in flax failed; and the +landlord of Lochlea, raising a question upon the meaning of the lease, +concerning rotation of crop, pushed the matter to a lawsuit, alike +ruinous to a poor man either in its success or its failure. “After +three years tossing and whirling,” says Burns, “in the vortex of +litigation, my father was just saved from the horrors of a jail by a +consumption, which, after two years’ promises, kindly slept in and +carried him away to where the ‘wicked cease from troubling and the +weary are at rest.’ His all went among the hell-hounds that prowl in +the kennel of justice. The finishing evil which brought up the rear of +this infernal file, was my constitutional melancholy being increased +to such a degree, that for three months I was in a state of mind +scarcely to be envied by the hopeless wretches who have got their +mittimus, ‘Depart from me, ye cursed.’”</p> + +<p>Robert Burns was now the head of his father’s house. He gathered +together the little that law and misfortune had spared, and took the +farm of Mossgiel, near Mauchline, containing one hundred and eighteen +acres, at a rent of ninety pounds a year: his mother and sisters took +the domestic superintendence of home, barn, and byre; and he +associated his brother Gilbert in the labours of the land. It was made +a joint affair: the poet was young, willing, and vigorous, and +excelled in ploughing, sowing, reaping, mowing, and thrashing. His +wages were fixed at seven pounds per annum, and such for a time was +his care and frugality, that he never exceeded this small allowance. +He purchased books on farming, held conversations with the old and the +knowing; and said unto himself, “I shall be prudent and wise, and my +shadow shall increase in the land.” But it was not decreed that these +resolutions were to endure, and that he was to become a mighty +agriculturist in the west. Farmer Attention, as the proverb says, is a +good farmer, all the world over, and Burns was such by fits and by +starts. But he who writes an ode on the sheep he is about to shear, a +poem on the flower that he covers with the furrow, who sees visions on +his way to market, who makes rhymes on the horse he is about to yoke, +and a song on the girl who shows the whitest hands among his reapers, +has small chance of leading a market, or of being laird of the fields +he rents. The dreams of Burns were of the muses, and not of rising +markets, of golden locks rather than of yellow corn: he had other +faults. It is not known that William Burns was aware before his death +that his eldest son had sinned in rhyme; but we have Gilbert’s +assurance, that his father went to the grave in ignorance of his son’s +errors of a less venial kind—unwitting that he was soon to give a +two-fold proof of both in “Rob the Rhymer’s Address to his Bastard +Child”—a poem less decorous than witty.</p> + +<p>The dress and condition of Burns when he became a poet were not at all +poetical, in the minstrel meaning of the word. His clothes, coarse and +homely, were made from home-grown wool, shorn off his own sheeps’ +backs, carded and spun at his own fireside, woven by the village +weaver, and, when not of natural hodden-gray, dyed a half-blue in the +village vat. They were shaped and sewed by the district tailor, who +usually wrought at the rate of a groat a day and his food; and as the +wool was coarse, so also was the workmanship. The linen which he wore +was home-grown, home-hackled, home-spun, home-woven, and +home-bleached, and, unless designed for Sunday use, was of coarse, +strong harn, to suit the tear and wear of barn and field. His shoes +came from rustic tanpits, for most farmers then prepared their own +leather; were armed, sole and heel, with heavy, broad-headed nails, to +endure the clod and the road: as hats were then little in use, save +among small lairds or country gentry, westland heads were commonly +covered with a coarse, broad, blue bonnet, with a stopple on its flat +crown, made in thousands at Kilmarnock, and known in all lands by the +name of scone bonnets. His plaid was a handsome red and white +check—for pride in poets, he said, was no sin—prepared of fine wool +with more than common care by the hands of his mother and sisters, and +woven with more skill than the village weaver was usually required to +exert. His dwelling was in keeping with his dress, a low, thatched +house, with a kitchen, a bedroom and closet, with floors of kneaded +clay, and ceilings of moorland turf: a few books on a shelf, thumbed +by many a thumb; a few hams drying above head in the smoke,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_xxvii" id="Page_xxvii">[xxvii]</a></span> which was +in no haste to get out at the roof—a wooden settle, some oak chairs, +chaff beds well covered with blankets, with a fire of peat and wood +burning at a distance from the gable wall, on the middle of the floor. +His food was as homely as his habitation, and consisted chiefly of +oatmeal-porridge, barley-broth, and potatoes, and milk. How the muse +happened to visit him in this clay biggin, take a fancy to a clouterly +peasant, and teach him strains of consummate beauty and elegance, must +ever be a matter of wonder to all those, and they are not few, who +hold that noble sentiments and heroic deeds are the exclusive portion +of the gently nursed and the far descended.</p> + +<p>Of the earlier verses of Burns few are preserved: when composed, he +put them on paper, but the kept them to himself: though a poet at +sixteen, he seems not to have made even his brother his confidante +till he became a man, and his judgment had ripened. He, however, made +a little clasped paper book his treasurer, and under the head of +“Observations, Hints, Songs, and Scraps of Poetry,” we find many a +wayward and impassioned verse, songs rising little above the humblest +country strain, or bursting into an elegance and a beauty worthy of +the highest of minstrels. The first words noted down are the stanzas +which he composed on his fair companion of the harvest-field, out of +whose hands he loved to remove the nettle-stings and the thistles: the +prettier song, beginning “Now westlin win’s and slaughtering guns,” +written on the lass of Kirkoswald, with whom, instead of learning +mensuration, he chose to wander under the light of the moon: a strain +better still, inspired by the charms of a neighbouring maiden, of the +name of Annie Ronald; another, of equal merit, arising out of his +nocturnal adventures among the lasses of the west; and, finally, that +crowning glory of all his lyric compositions, “Green grow the rashes.” +This little clasped book, however, seems not to have been made his +confidante till his twenty-third or twenty-fourth year: he probably +admitted to its pages only the strains which he loved most, or such as +had taken a place in his memory: at whatever age it was commenced, he +had then begun to estimate his own character, and intimate his +fortunes, for he calls himself in its pages “a man who had little art +in making money, and still less in keeping it.”</p> + +<p>We have not been told how welcome the incense of his songs rendered +him to the rustic maidens of Kyle: women are not apt to be won by the +charms of verse; they have little sympathy with dreamers on Parnassus, +and allow themselves to be influenced by something more substantial +than the roses and lilies of the muse. Burns had other claims to their +regard then those arising from poetic skill: he was tall, young, +good-looking, with dark, bright eyes, and words and wit at will: he +had a sarcastic sally for all lads who presumed to cross his path, and +a soft, persuasive word for all lasses on whom he fixed his fancy: nor +was this all—he was adventurous and bold in love trystes and love +excursions: long, rough roads, stormy nights, flooded rivers, and +lonesome places, were no letts to him; and when the dangers or labours +of the way were braved, he was alike skilful in eluding vigilant +aunts, wakerife mothers, and envious or suspicions sisters: for rivals +he had a blow as ready us he had a word, and was familiar with snug +stack-yards, broomy glens, and nooks of hawthorn and honeysuckle, +where maidens love to be wooed. This rendered him dearer to woman’s +heart than all the lyric effusions of his fancy; and when we add to +such allurements, a warm, flowing, and persuasive eloquence, we need +not wonder that woman listened and was won; that one of the most +charming damsels of the West said, an hour with him in the dark was +worth a lifetime of light with any other body; or that the +accomplished and beautiful Duchess of Gordon declared, in a latter +day, that no man ever carried her so completely off her feet as Robert +Burns.</p> + +<p>It is one of the delusions of the poet’s critics and biographers, that +the sources of his inspiration are to be found in the great classic +poets of the land, with some of whom he had from his youth been +familiar: there is little or no trace of them in any of his +compositions. He read and wondered—he warmed his fancy at their +flame, he corrected his own natural taste by theirs, but he neither +copied nor imitated, and there are but two or three allusions to Young +and Shakspeare in all the range of his verse. He could not but feel +that he was the scholar of a different school, and that his thirst was +to be slaked at other fountains. The language in which those great +bards embodied their thoughts was unapproachable to an Ayrshire +peasant; it was to him as an almost foreign tongue: he had to think +and feel in the not ungraceful or inharmonious<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_xxviii" id="Page_xxviii">[xxviii]</a></span> language of his own +vale, and then, in a manner, translate it into that of Pope or of +Thomson, with the additional difficulty of finding English words to +express the exact meaning of those of Scotland, which had chiefly been +retained because equivalents could not be found in the more elegant +and grammatical tongue. Such strains as those of the polished Pope or +the sublimer Milton were beyond his power, less from deficiency of +genius than from lack of language: he could, indeed, write English +with ease and fluency; but when he desired to be tender or +impassioned, to persuade or subdue, he had recourse to the Scottish, +and he found it sufficient.</p> + +<p>The goddesses or the Dalilahs of the young poet’s song were, like the +language in which he celebrated them, the produce of the district; not +dames high and exalted, but lasses of the barn and of the byre, who +had never been in higher company than that of shepherds or ploughmen, +or danced in a politer assembly than that of their fellow-peasants, on +a barn-floor, to the sound of the district fiddle. Nor even of these +did he choose the loveliest to lay out the wealth of his verse upon: +he has been accused, by his brother among others, of lavishing the +colours of his fancy on very ordinary faces. “He had always,” says +Gilbert, “a jealousy of people who were richer than himself; his love, +therefore, seldom settled on persons of this description. When he +selected any one, out of the sovereignty of his good pleasure, to whom +he should pay his particular attention, she was instantly invested +with a sufficient stock of charms out of the plentiful stores of his +own imagination: and there was often a great dissimilitude between his +fair captivator, as she appeared to others and as she seemed when +invested with the attributes he gave her.” “My heart,” he himself, +speaking of those days, observes, “was completely tinder, and was +eternally lighted up by some goddess or other.” Yet, it must be +acknowledged that sufficient room exists for believing that Burns and +his brethren of the West had very different notions of the captivating +and the beautiful; while they were moved by rosy checks and looks of +rustic health, he was moved, like a sculptor, by beauty of form or by +harmony of motion, and by expression, which lightened up ordinary +features and rendered them captivating. Such, I have been told, were +several of the lasses of the West, to whom, if he did not surrender +his heart, he rendered homage: and both elegance of form and beauty of +face were visible to all in those of whom he afterwards sang—the +Hamiltons and the Burnets of Edinburgh, and the Millers and M’Murdos +of the Nith.</p> + +<p>The mind of Burns took now a wider range: he had sung of the maidens +of Kyle in strains not likely soon to die, and though not weary of the +softnesses of love, he desired to try his genius on matters of a +sterner kind—what those subjects were he tells us; they were homely +and at hand, of a native nature and of Scottish growth: places +celebrated in Roman story, vales made famous in Grecian song—hills of +vines and groves of myrtle had few charms for him. “I am hurt,” thus +he writes in August, 1785, “to see other towns, rivers, woods, and +haughs of Scotland immortalized in song, while my dear native county, +the ancient Baillieries of Carrick, Kyle, and Cunningham, famous in +both ancient and modern times for a gallant and warlike race of +inhabitants—a county where civil and religious liberty have ever +found their first support and their asylum—a county, the birth-place +of many famous philosophers, soldiers, and statesmen, and the scene of +many great events recorded in history, particularly the actions of the +glorious Wallace—yet we have never had one Scotch poet of any +eminence to make the fertile banks of Irvine, the romantic woodlands +and sequestered scenes of Ayr. and the mountainous source and winding +sweep of the Doon, emulate Tay, Forth, Ettrick, and Tweed. This is a +complaint I would gladly remedy, but, alas! I am far unequal to the +task, both in genius and education.” To fill up with glowing verse the +outline which this sketch indicates, was to raise the long-laid spirit +of national song—to waken a strain to which the whole land would +yield response—a miracle unattempted—certainly unperformed—since +the days of the Gentle Shepherd. It is true that the tongue of the +muse had at no time been wholly silent; that now and then a burst of +sublime woe, like the song of “Mary, weep no more for me,” and of +lasting merriment and humour, like that of “Tibbie Fowler,” proved +that the fire of natural poesie smouldered, if it did not blaze; while +the social strains of the unfortunate Fergusson revived in the city, +if not in the field, the memory of him who sang the “Monk and the +Miller’s wife.” But notwithstanding these and other productions of +equal merit, Scottish poesie, it must be owned, had lost much of its +original ecstasy<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_xxix" id="Page_xxix">[xxix]</a></span> and fervour, and that the boldest efforts of the +muse no more equalled the songs of Dunbar, of Douglas, of Lyndsay, and +of James the Fifth, than the sound of an artificial cascade resembles +the undying thunders of Corra.</p> + +<p>To accomplish this required an acquaintance with man beyond what the +forge, the change-house, and the market-place of the village supplied; +a look further than the barn-yard and the furrowed field, and a +livelier knowledge and deeper feeling of history than, probably, Burns +ever possessed. To all ready and accessible sources of knowledge he +appears to have had recourse; he sought matter for his muse in the +meetings, religious as well as social, of the district—consorted with +staid matrons, grave plodding farmers—with those who preached as well +as those who listened—with sharp-tongued attorneys, who laid down the +law over a Mauchline gill—with country squires, whose wisdom was +great in the game-laws, and in contested elections—and with roving +smugglers, who at that time hung, as a cloud, on all the western coast +of Scotland. In the company of farmers and fellow-peasants, he +witnessed scenes which he loved to embody in verse, saw pictures of +peace and joy, now woven into the web of his song, and had a poetic +impulse given to him both by cottage devotion and cottage merriment. +If he was familiar with love and all its outgoings and incomings—had +met his lass in the midnight shade, or walked with her under the moon, +or braved a stormy night and a haunted road for her sake—he was as +well acquainted with the joys which belong to social intercourse, when +instruments of music speak to the feet, when the reek of punchbowls +gives a tongue to the staid and demure, and bridal festivity, and +harvest-homes, bid a whole valley lift up its voice and be glad. It is +more difficult to decide what poetic use he could make of his +intercourse with that loose and lawless class of men, who, from love +of gain, broke the laws and braved the police of their country: that +he found among smugglers, as he says, “men of noble virtues, +magnanimity, generosity, disinterested friendship, and modesty,” is +easier to believe than that he escaped the contamination of their +sensual manners and prodigality. The people of Kyle regarded this +conduct with suspicion: they were not to be expected to know that when +Burns ranted and housed with smugglers, conversed with tinkers huddled +in a kiln, or listened to the riotous mirth of a batch of “randie +gangrel bodies” as they “toomed their powks and pawned their duds,” +for liquor in Poosie Nansie’s, he was taking sketches for the future +entertainment and instruction of the world; they could not foresee +that from all this moral strength and poetic beauty would arise.</p> + +<p>While meditating something better than a ballad to his mistress’s +eyebrow, he did not neglect to lay out the little skill he had in +cultivating the grounds of Mossgiel. The prosperity in which he found +himself in the first and second seasons, induced him to hope that good +fortune had not yet forsaken him: a genial summer and a good market +seldom come together to the farmer, but at first they came to Burns; +and to show that he was worthy of them, he bought books on +agriculture, calculated rotation of crops, attended sales, held the +plough with diligence, used the scythe, the reap-hook, and the flail, +with skill, and the malicious even began to say that there was +something more in him than wild sallies of wit and foolish rhymes. But +the farm lay high, the bottom was wet, and in a third season, +indifferent seed and a wet harvest robbed him at once of half his +crop: he seems to have regarded this as an intimation from above, that +nothing which he undertook would prosper: and consoled himself with +joyous friends and with the society of the muse. The judgment cannot +be praised which selected a farm with a wet cold bottom, and sowed it +with unsound seed; but that man who despairs because a wet season robs +him of the fruits of the field, is unfit for the warfare of life, +where fortitude is as much required as by a general on a field of +battle, when the tide of success threatens to flow against him. The +poet seems to have believed, very early in life, that he was none of +the elect of Mammon; that he was too much of a genius ever to acquire +wealth by steady labour, or by, as he loved to call it, gin-horse +prudence, or grubbing industry.</p> + +<p>And yet there were hours and days in which Burns, even when the rain +fell on his unhoused sheaves, did not wholly despair of himself: he +laboured, nay sometimes he slaved on his farm; and at intervals of +toil, sought to embellish his mind with such knowledge as might be +useful, should chance, the goddess who ruled his lot, drop him upon +some of the higher places of the land. He had, while he lived at +Tarbolton, united with some half-dozen young men, all sons of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_xxx" id="Page_xxx">[xxx]</a></span> farmers +in that neighbourhood, in forming a club, of which the object was to +charm away a few evening hours in the week with agreeable chit-chat, +and the discussion of topics of economy or love. Of this little +society the poet was president, and the first question they were +called on to settle was this, “Suppose a young man bred a farmer, but +without any fortune, has it in his power to marry either of two women; +the one a girl of large fortune, but neither handsome in person, nor +agreeable in conversation, but who can manage the household affairs of +a farm well enough; the other of them, a girl every way agreeable in +person, conversation, and behaviour, but without any fortune, which of +them shall he choose?” This question was started by the poet, and once +every week the club were called to the consideration of matters +connected with rural life and industry: their expenses were limited to +threepence a week; and till the departure of Burns to the distant +Mossgiel, the club continued to live and thrive; on his removal it +lost the spirit which gave it birth, and was heard of no more; but its +aims and its usefulness were revived in Mauchline, where the poet was +induced to establish a society which only differed from the other in +spending the moderate fines arising from non-attendance, on books, +instead of liquor. Here, too, Burns was the president, and the members +were chiefly the sons of husbandmen, whom he found, he said, more +natural in their manners, and more agreeable than the self-sufficient +mechanics of villages and towns, who were ready to dispute on all +topics, and inclined to be convinced on none. This club had the +pleasure of subscribing for the first edition of the works of its +great associate. It has been questioned by his first biographer, +whether the refinement of mind, which follows the reading of books of +eloquence and delicacy,—the mental improvement resulting from such +calm discussions as the Tarbolton and Mauchline clubs indulged in, was +not injurious to men engaged in the barn and at the plough. A +well-ordered mind will be strengthened, as well as embellished, by +elegant knowledge, while over those naturally barren and ungenial all +that is refined or noble will pass as a sunny shower scuds over lumps +of granite, bringing neither warmth nor life.</p> + +<p>In the account which the poet gives to Moore of his early poems, he +says little about his exquisite lyrics, and less about “The Death and +dying Words of Poor Mailie,” or her “Elegy,” the first of his poems +where the inspiration of the muse is visible; but he speaks with +exultation of the fame which those indecorous sallies, “Holy Willie’s +Prayer” and “The Holy Tulzie” brought from some of the clergy, and the +people of Ayrshire. The west of Scotland is ever in the van, when +mutters either political or religious are agitated. Calvinism was +shaken, at this time, with a controversy among its professors, of +which it is enough to say, that while one party rigidly adhered to the +word and letter of the Confession of Faith, and preached up the palmy +and wholesome days of the Covenant, the other sought to soften the +harsher rules and observances of the kirk, and to bring moderation and +charity into its discipline as well as its councils. Both believed +themselves right, both were loud and hot, and personal,—bitter with a +bitterness only known in religious controversy. The poet sided with +the professors of the New Light, as the more tolerant were called, and +handled the professors of the Old Light, as the other party were +named, with the most unsparing severity. For this he had sufficient +cause:—he had experienced the mercilessness of kirk-discipline, when +his frailties caused him to visit the stool of repentance; and +moreover his friend Gavin Hamilton, a writer in Mauchline, had been +sharply censured by the same authorities, for daring to gallop on +Sundays. Moodie, of Riccarton, and Russel, of Kilmarnock, were the +first who tasted of the poet’s wrath. They, though professors of the +Old Light, had quarrelled, and, it is added, fought: “The Holy +Tulzie,” which recorded, gave at the same time wings to the scandal; +while for “Holy Willie,” an elder of Mauchline, and an austere and +hollow pretender to righteousness, he reserved the fiercest of all his +lampoons. In “Holy Willie’s Prayer,” he lays a burning hand on the +terrible doctrine of predestination: this is a satire, daring, +personal, and profane. Willie claims praise in the singular, +acknowledges folly in the plural, and makes heaven accountable for his +sins! in a similar strain of undevout satire, he congratulates Goudie, +of Kilmarnock, on his Essays on Revealed Religion. These poems, +particularly the two latter, are the sharpest lampoons in the +language.</p> + +<p>While drudging in the cause of the New Light controversialists, Burns +was not unconsciously strengthening his hands for worthier toils: the +applause which selfish divines bestowed on his<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_xxxi" id="Page_xxxi">[xxxi]</a></span> witty, but graceless +effusions, could not be enough for one who knew how fleeting the fame +was which came from the heat of party disputes; nor was he insensible +that songs of a beauty unknown for a century to national poesy, had +been unregarded in the hue and cry which arose on account of “Holy +Willie’s Prayer” and “The Holy Tulzie.” He hesitated to drink longer +out of the agitated puddle of Calvinistic controversy, he resolved to +slake his thirst at the pure well-springs of patriot feeling and +domestic love; and accordingly, in the last and best of his +controversial compositions, he rose out of the lower regions of +lampoon into the upper air of true poetry. “The Holy Fair,” though +stained in one or two verses with personalities, exhibits a scene +glowing with character and incident and life: the aim of the poem is +not so much to satirize one or two Old Light divines, as to expose and +rebuke those almost indecent festivities, which in too many of the +western parishes accompanied the administration of the sacrament. In +the earlier days of the church, when men were staid and sincere, it +was, no doubt, an impressive sight to see rank succeeding rank, of the +old and the young, all calm and all devout, seated before the tent of +the preacher, in the sunny hours of June, listening to his eloquence, +or partaking of the mystic bread and wine; but in these our latter +days, when discipline is relaxed, along with the sedate and the pious +come swarms of the idle and the profligate, whom no eloquence can +edify and no solemn rite affect. On these, and such as these, the poet +has poured his satire; and since this desirable reprehension the Holy +Fairs, east as well as west, have become more decorous, if not more +devout.</p> + +<p>His controversial sallies were accompanied, or followed, by a series +of poems which showed that national character and manners, as Lockhart +has truly and happily said, were once more in the hands of a national +poet. These compositions are both numerous and various: they record +the poet’s own experience and emotions; they exhibit the highest moral +feeling, the purest patriotic sentiments, and a deep sympathy with the +fortunes, both here and hereafter of his fellow-men; they delineate +domestic manners, man’s stern as well as social hours, and mingle the +serious with the joyous, the sarcastic with the solemn, the mournful +with the pathetic, the amiable with the gay, and all with an ease and +unaffected force and freedom known only to the genius of Shakspeare. +In “The Twa Dogs” he seeks to reconcile the labourer to his lot, and +intimates, by examples drawn from the hall as well as the cottage, +that happiness resides in the humblest abodes, and is even partial to +the clouted shoe. In “Scotch Drink” he excites man to love his +country, by precepts both heroic and social; and proves that while +wine and brandy are the tipple of slaves, whiskey and ale are the +drink of the free: sentiments of a similar kind distinguish his +“Earnest Cry and Prayer to the Scotch Representatives in the House of +Commons,” each of whom he exhorts by name to defend the remaining +liberties and immunities of his country. A higher tone distinguishes +the “Address to the Deil:” he records all the names, and some of them +are strange ones; and all the acts, and some of them are as whimsical +as they are terrible, of this far kenned and noted personage; to these +he adds some of the fiend’s doings as they stand in Scripture, +together with his own experiences; and concludes by a hope, as +unexpected as merciful and relenting, that Satan may not be exposed to +an eternity of torments. “The Dream” is a humorous sally, and may be +almost regarded as prophetic. The poet feigns himself present, in +slumber, at the Royal birth-day; and supposes that he addresses his +majesty, on his household matters as well as the affairs of the +nation. Some of the princes, it has been satirically hinted, behaved +afterwards in such a way as if they wished that the scripture of the +Burns should be fulfilled: in this strain, he has imitated the license +and equalled the wit of some of the elder Scottish Poets.</p> + +<p>“The Vision” is wholly serious; it exhibits the poet in one of those +fits of despondency which the dull, who have no misgivings, never +know: he dwells with sarcastic bitterness on the opportunities which, +for the sake of song, he has neglected of becoming wealthy, and is +drawing a sad parallel between rags and riches, when the muse steps in +and cheer his despondency, by assuring him of undying fame. +“Halloween” is a strain of a more homely kind, recording the +superstitious beliefs, and no less superstitious doings of Old +Scotland, on that night, when witches and elves and evil spirits are +let loose among the children of men: it reaches far back into manners +and customs, and is a picture, curious and valuable. The tastes and +feelings of husbandmen<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_xxxii" id="Page_xxxii">[xxxii]</a></span> inspired “The old Farmer’s Address to his old +mare Maggie,” which exhibits some pleasing recollections of his days +of courtship and hours of sociality. The calm, tranquil picture of +household happiness and devotion in “the Cotter’s Saturday Night,” has +induced Hogg, among others, to believe that it has less than usual of +the spirit of the poet, but it has all the spirit that was required; +the toil of the week has ceased, the labourer has returned to his +well-ordered home—his “cozie ingle and his clean hearth-stane,”—and +with his wife and children beside him, turns his thoughts to the +praise of that God to whom he owes all: this he performs with a +reverence and an awe, at once natural, national, and poetic. “The +Mouse” is a brief and happy and very moving poem: happy, for it +delineates, with wonderful truth and life, the agitation of the mouse +when the coulter broke into its abode; and moving, for the poet takes +the lesson of ruin to himself, and feels the present and dreads the +future. “The Mountain Daisy,” once, more properly, called by Burns +“The Gowan,” resembles “The Mouse” in incident and in moral, and is +equally happy, in language and conception. “The Lament” is a dark, and +all but tragic page, from the poet’s own life. “Man was made to +Mourn’” takes the part of the humble and the homeless, against the +coldness and selfishness of the wealthy and the powerful, a favourite +topic of meditation with Burns. He refrained, for awhile, from making +“Death and Doctor Hernbook” public; a poem which deviates from the +offensiveness of personal satire, into a strain of humour, at once +airy and original.</p> + +<p>His epistles in verse may be reckoned amongst his happiest +productions: they are written in all moods of mind, and are, by turns, +lively and sad; careless and serious;—now giving advice, then taking +it; laughing at learning, and lamenting its want; scoffing at +propriety and wealth, yet admitting, that without the one he cannot be +wise, nor wanting the other, independent. The Epistle to David Sillar +is the first of these compositions: the poet has no news to tell, and +no serious question to ask: he has only to communicate his own +emotions of joy, or of sorrow, and these he relates and discusses with +singular elegance as well as ease, twining, at the same time, into the +fabric of his composition, agreeable allusions to the taste and +affections of his correspondent. He seems to have rated the intellect +of Sillar as the highest among his rustic friends: he pays him more +deference, and addresses him in a higher vein than he observes to +others. The Epistles to Lapraik, to Smith, and to Rankine, are in a +more familiar, or social mood, and lift the veil from the darkness of +the poet’s condition, and exhibit a mind of first-rate power, groping, +and that surely, its way to distinction, in spite of humility of +birth, obscurity of condition, and the coldness of the wealthy or the +titled. The epistles of other poets owe some of their fame to the rank +or the reputation of those to whom they are addressed; those of Burns +are written, one and all, to nameless and undistinguished men. Sillar +was a country schoolmaster, Lapraik a moorland laird, Smith a small +shop-keeper, and Rankine a farmer, who loved a gill and a joke. Yet +these men were the chief friends, the only literary associates of the +poet, during those early years, in which, with some exceptions, his +finest works were written.</p> + +<p>Burns, while he was writing the poems, the chief of which we have +named, was a labouring husbandman on the little farm of Mossgiel, a +pursuit which affords but few leisure hours for either reading or +pondering; but to him the stubble-field was musing-ground, and the +walk behind the plough, a twilight saunter on Parnassus. As, with a +careful hand and a steady eye, he guided his horses, and saw an evenly +furrow turned up by the share, his thoughts were on other themes; he +was straying in haunted glens, when spirits have power—looking in +fancy on the lasses “skelping barefoot,” in silks and in scarlets, to +a field-preaching—walking in imagination with the rosy widow, who on +Halloween ventured to dip her left sleeve in the burn, where three +lairds’ lands met—making the “bottle clunk,” with joyous smugglers, +on a lucky run of gin or brandy—or if his thoughts at all approached +his acts—he was moralizing on the daisy oppressed by the furrow which +his own ploughshare had turned. That his thoughts were thus wandering +we have his own testimony, with that of his brother Gilbert; and were +both wanting, the certainty that he composed the greater part of his +immortal poems in two years, from the summer of 1784 to the summer of +1786, would be evidence sufficient. The muse must have been strong +within him, when, in spite of the rains and sleets of the +“ever-dropping west”—when in defiance of the hot and sweaty brows +occasioned by reaping and thrashing—declining markets, and showery<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_xxxiii" id="Page_xxxiii">[xxxiii]</a></span> +harvests—the clamour of his laird for his rent, and the tradesman for +his account, he persevered in song, and sought solace in verse, when +all other solace was denied him.</p> + +<p>The circumstances under which his principal poems were composed, have +been related: the “Lament of Mailie” found its origin in the +catastrophe of a pet ewe; the “Epistle to Sillar” was confided by the +poet to his brother while they were engaged in weeding the kale-yard; +the “Address to the Deil” was suggested by the many strange portraits +which belief or fear had drawn of Satan, and was repeated by the one +brother to the other, on the way with their carts to the kiln, for +lime; the “Cotter’s Saturday Night” originated in the reverence with +which the worship of God was conducted in the family of the poet’s +father, and in the solemn tone with which he desired his children to +compose themselves for praise and prayer; “the Mouse,” and its moral +companion “the Daisy,” were the offspring of the incidents which they +relate; and “Death and Doctor Hornbook” was conceived at a +freemason-meeting, where the hero of the piece had shown too much of +the pedant, and composed on his way home, after midnight, by the poet, +while his head was somewhat dizzy with drink. One of the most +remarkable of his compositions, the “Jolly Beggars,” a drama, to which +nothing in the language of either the North or South can be compared, +and which was unknown till after the death of the author, was +suggested by a scene which he saw in a low ale-house, into which, on a +Saturday night, most of the sturdy beggars of the district had met to +sell their meal, pledge their superfluous rags, and drink their gains. +It may be added, that he loved to walk in solitary spots; that his +chief musing-ground was the banks of the Ayr; the season most +congenial to his fancy that of winter, when the winds were heard in +the leafless woods, and the voice of the swollen streams came from +vale and hill; and that he seldom composed a whole poem at once, but +satisfied with a few fervent verses, laid the subject aside, till the +muse summoned him to another exertion of fancy. In a little back +closet, still existing in the farm-house of Mossgiel, he committed +most of his poems to paper.</p> + +<p>But while the poet rose, the farmer sank. It was not the cold clayey +bottom of his ground, nor the purchase of unsound seed-corn, not the +fluctuation in the markets alone, which injured him; neither was it +the taste for freemason socialities, nor a desire to join the mirth of +comrades, either of the sea or the shore: neither could it be wholly +imputed to his passionate following of the softer sex—indulgence in +the “illicit rove,” or giving way to his eloquence at the feet of one +whom he loved and honoured; other farmers indulged in the one, or +suffered from the other, yet were prosperous. His want of success +arose from other causes; his heart was not with his task, save by fits +and starts: he felt he was designed for higher purposes than +ploughing, and harrowing, and sowing, and reaping: when the sun called +on him, after a shower, to come to the plough, or when the ripe corn +invited the sickle, or the ready market called for the measured grain, +the poet was under other spells, and was slow to avail himself of +those golden moments which come but once in the season. To this may be +added, a too superficial knowledge of the art of farming, and a want +of intimacy with the nature of the soil he was called to cultivate. He +could speak fluently of leas, and faughs, and fallows, of change of +seed and rotation of crops, but practical knowledge and application +were required, and in these Burns was deficient. The moderate gain +which those dark days of agriculture brought to the economical farmer, +was not obtained: the close, the all but niggardly care by which he +could win and keep his crown-piece,—gold was seldom in the farmer’s +hand,—was either above or below the mind of the poet, and Mossgiel, +which, in the hands of an assiduous farmer, might have made a +reasonable return for labour, was unproductive, under one who had +little skill, less economy, and no taste for the task.</p> + +<p>Other reasons for his failure have been assigned. It is to the credit +of the moral sentiments of the husbandmen of Scotland, that when one +of their class forgets what virtue requires, and dishonours, without +reparation, even the humblest of the maidens, he is not allowed to go +unpunished. No proceedings take place, perhaps one hard word is not +spoken; but he is regarded with loathing by the old and the devout; he +is looked on by all with cold and reproachful eyes—sorrow is foretold +as his lot, sure disaster as his fortune; and is these chance to +arrive, the only sympathy expressed is, “What better could he expect?” +Something of this sort befel Burns: he had already satisfied the kirk +in the matter of “Sonsie, smirking, dear-bought Bess,” his daughter, +by one of his mother’s maids; and now, to use his own words, he was +brought within point-blank<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_xxxiv" id="Page_xxxiv">[xxxiv]</a></span> of the heaviest metal of the kirk by a +similar folly. The fair transgressor, both for her fathers and her own +youth, had a large share of public sympathy. Jean Armour, for it is of +her I speak, was in her eighteenth year; with dark eyes, a handsome +foot, and a melodious tongue, she made her way to the poet’s +heart—and, as their stations in life were equal, it seemed that they +had only to be satisfied themselves to render their union easy. But +her father, in addition to being a very devout man, was a zealot of +the Old Light; and Jean, dreading his resentment, was willing, while +she loved its unforgiven satirist, to love him in secret, in the hope +that the time would come when she might safely avow it: she admitted +the poet, therefore, to her company in lonesome places, and walks +beneath the moon, where they both forgot themselves, and were at last +obliged to own a private marriage as a protection from kirk censure. +The professors of the Old Light rejoiced, since it brought a scoffing +rhymer within reach of their hand; but her father felt a twofold +sorrow, because of the shame of a favourite daughter, and for having +committed the folly with one both loose in conduct and profane of +speech. He had cause to be angry, but his anger, through his zeal, +became tyrannous: in the exercise of what he called a father’s power, +he compelled his child to renounce the poet as her husband and burn +the marriage-lines; for he regarded her marriage, without the kirk’s +permission, with a man so utterly cast away, as a worse crime than her +folly. So blind is anger! She could renounce neither her husband nor +his offspring in a lawful way, and in spite of the destruction of the +marriage lines, and renouncing the name of wife, she was as much Mrs. +Burns as marriage could make her. No one concerned seemed to think so. +Burns, who loved her tenderly, went all but mad when she renounced +him: he gave up his share of Mossgiel to his brother, and roamed, +moody and idle, about the land, with no better aim in life than a +situation in one of our western sugar-isles, and a vague hope of +distinction as a poet.</p> + +<p>How the distinction which he desired as a poet was to be obtained, +was, to a poor bard in a provincial place, a sore puzzle: there were +no enterprising booksellers in the western land, and it was not to be +expected that the printers of either Kilmarnock or Paisley had money +to expend on a speculation in rhyme: it is much to the honour of his +native county that the publication which he wished for was at last +made easy. The best of his poems, in his own handwriting, had found +their way into the hands of the Ballantynes, Hamiltons, Parkers, and +Mackenzies, and were much admired. Mrs. Stewart, of Stair and Afton, a +lady of distinction and taste, had made, accidentally, the +acquaintance both of Burns and some of his songs, and was ready to +befriend him; and so favourable was the impression on all hands, that +a subscription, sufficient to defray the outlay of paper and print, +was soon filled up—one hundred copies being subscribed for by the +Parkers alone. He soon arranged materials for a volume, and put them +into the hands of a printer in Kilmarnock, the Wee Johnnie of one of +his biting epigrams. Johnnie was startled at the unceremonious freedom +of most of the pieces, and asked the poet to compose one of modest +language and moral aim, to stand at the beginning, and excuse some of +those free ones which followed: Burns, whose “Twa Dogs” was then +incomplete, finished the poem at a sitting, and put it in the van, +much to his printer’s satisfaction. If the “Jolly Beggars” was omitted +for any other cause than its freedom of sentiment and language, or +“Death and Doctor Hornbook” from any other feeling than that of being +too personal, the causes of their exclusion have remained a secret. It +is less easy to account for the emission of many songs of high merit +which he had among his papers: perhaps he thought those which he +selected were sufficient to test the taste of the public. Before he +printed the whole, he, with the consent of his brother, altered his +name from Burness to Burns, a change which, I am told, he in after +years regretted.</p> + +<p>In the summer of the year 1786, the little volume, big with the hopes +and fortunes of the bard made its appearance: it was entitled simply, +“Poems, chiefly in the Scottish Dialect; by Robert Burns;” and +accompanied by a modest preface, saying, that he submitted his book to +his country with fear and with trembling, since it contained little of +the art of poesie, and at the best was but a voice given, rude, he +feared, and uncouth, to the loves, the hopes, and the fears of his own +bosom. Had a summer sun risen on a winter morning, it could not have +surprised the Lowlands of Scotland more than this Kilmarnock volume +surprised and delighted the people, one and all. The milkmaid sang his +songs, the ploughman repeated his poems; the old quoted both, and +ever<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_xxxv" id="Page_xxxv">[xxxv]</a></span> the devout rejoiced that idle verse had at last mixed a tone of +morality with its mirth. The volume penetrated even into Nithsdale. +“Keep it out of the way of your children,” said a Cameronian divine, +when he lent it to my father, “lest ye find them, as I found mine, +reading it on the Sabbath.” No wonder that such a volume made its way +to the hearts of a peasantry whose taste in poetry had been the marvel +of many writers: the poems were mostly on topics with which they were +familiar: the language was that of the fireside, raised above the +vulgarities of common life, by a purifying spirit of expression and +the exalting fervour of inspiration: and there was such a brilliant +and graceful mixture of the elegant and the homely, the lofty and the +low, the familiar and the elevated—such a rapid succession of scenes +which moved to tenderness or tears; or to subdued mirth or open +laughter—unlooked for allusions to scripture, or touches of sarcasm +and scandal—of superstitions to scare, and of humour to +delight—while through the whole was diffused, as the scent of flowers +through summer air, a moral meaning—a sentimental beauty, which +sweetened and sanctified all. The poet’s expectations from this little +venture were humble: he hoped as much money from it as would pay for +his passage to the West Indies, where he proposed to enter into the +service of some of the Scottish settlers, and help to manage the +double mystery of sugar-making and slavery.</p> + +<p>The hearty applause which I have recorded came chiefly from the +husbandman, the shepherd, and the mechanic: the approbation of the +magnates of the west, though not less-warm, was longer in coming. Mrs. +Stewart of Stair, indeed, commended the poems and cheered their +author: Dugald Stewart received his visits with pleasure, and wondered +at his vigour of conversation as much as at his muse: the door of the +house of Hamilton was open to him, where the table was ever spread, +and the hand ever ready to help: while the purses of the Ballantynes +and the Parkers were always as open to him as were the doors of their +houses. Those persons must be regarded as the real patrons of the +poet: the high names of the district are not to be found among those +who helped him with purse and patronage in 1786, that year of deep +distress and high distinction. The Montgomerys came with their praise +when his fame was up; the Kennedys and the Boswells were silent: and +though the Cunninghams gave effectual aid, it was when the muse was +crying with a loud voice before him, “Come all and see the man whom I +delight to honour.” It would be unjust as well as ungenerous not to +mention the name of Mrs. Dunlop among the poet’s best and early +patrons: the distance at which she lived from Mossgiel had kept his +name from her till his poems appeared: but his works induced her to +desire his acquaintance, and she became his warmest and surest friend.</p> + +<p>To say the truth, Burns endeavoured in every honourable way to obtain +the notice of those who had influence in the land: he copied out the +best of his unpublished poems in a fair hand, and inserting them in +his printed volume, presented it to those who seemed slow to buy: he +rewarded the notice of this one with a song—the attentions of that +one with a sally of encomiastic verse: he left psalms of his own +composing in the manse when he feasted with a divine: he enclosed +“Holy Willie’s Prayer,” with an injunction to be grave, to one who +loved mirth: he sent the “Holy Fair” to one whom he invited to drink a +gill out of a mutchkin stoup, at Mauchline market; and on accidentally +meeting with Lord Daer, he immediately commemorated the event in a +sally of verse, of a strain more free and yet as flattering as ever +flowed from the lips of a court bard. While musing over the names of +those on whom fortune had smiled, yet who had neglected to smile on +him, he remembered that he had met Miss Alexander, a young beauty of +the west, in the walks of Ballochmyle; and he recorded the impression +which this fair vision made on him in a song of unequalled elegance +and melody. He had met her in the woods in July, on the 18th of +November he sent her the song, and reminded her of the circumstance +from which it arose, in a letter which it is evident he had laboured +to render polished and complimentary. The young lady took no notice of +either the song or the poet, though willing, it is said, to hear of +both now:—this seems to have been the last attempt he made on the +taste or the sympathies of the gentry of his native district: for on +the very day following we find him busy in making arrangements for his +departure to Jamaica.</p> + +<p>For this step Burns had more than sufficient reasons: the profits of +his volume amounted to little more than enough to waft him across the +Atlantic: Wee Johnnie, though the edition was<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_xxxvi" id="Page_xxxvi">[xxxvi]</a></span> all sold, refused to +risk another on speculation: his friends, both Ballantynes and +Parkers, volunteered to relieve the printer’s anxieties, but the poet +declined their bounty, and gloomily indented himself in a ship about +to sail from Greenock, and called on his muse to take farewell of +Caledonia, in the last song he ever expected to measure in his native +land. That fine lyric, beginning “The gloomy night is gathering fast,” +was the offspring of these moments of regret and sorrow. His feelings +were not expressed in song alone: he remembered his mother and his +natural daughter, and made an assignment of all that pertained to him +at Mossgiel—and that was but little—and of all the advantage which a +cruel, unjust, and insulting law allowed in the proceeds of his poems, +for their support and behoof. This document was publicly read in the +presence of the poet, at the market-cross of Ayr, by his friend +William Chalmers, a notary public. Even this step was to Burns one of +danger: some ill-advised person had uncoupled the merciless pack of +the law at his heels, and he was obliged to shelter himself as he best +could, in woods, it is said, by day and in barns by night, till the +final hour of his departure came. That hour arrived, and his chest was +on the way to the ship, when a letter was put into his hand which +seemed to light him to brighter prospects.</p> + +<p>Among the friends whom his merits had procured him was Dr. Laurie, a +district clergyman, who had taste enough to admire the deep +sensibilities as well as the humour of the poet, and the generosity to +make known both his works and his worth to the warm-hearted and +amiable Blacklock, who boldly proclaimed him a poet of the first rank, +and lamented that he was not in Edinburgh to publish another edition +of his poems. Burns was ever a man of impulse: he recalled his chest +from Greenock; he relinquished the situation he had accepted on the +estate of one Douglas; took a secret leave of his mother, and, without +an introduction to any one, and unknown personally to all, save to +Dugald Stewart, away he walked, through Glenap, to Edinburgh, full of +new hope and confiding in his genius. When he arrived, he scarcely +knew what to do: he hesitated to call on the professor; he refrained +from making himself known, as it has been supposed he did, to the +enthusiastic Blacklock; but, sitting down in an obscure lodging, he +sought out an obscure printer, recommended by a humble comrade from +Kyle, and began to negotiate for a new edition of the Poems of the +Ayrshire Ploughman. This was not the way to go about it: his barge had +well nigh been shipwrecked in the launch; and he might have lived to +regret the letter which hindered his voyage to Jamaica, had he not met +by chance in the street a gentleman of the west, of the name of +Dalzell, who introduced him to the Earl of Glencairn, a nobleman whose +classic education did not hurt his taste for Scottish poetry, and who +was not too proud to lend his helping hand to a rustic stranger of +such merit as Burns. Cunningham carried him to Creech, then the Murray +of Edinburgh, a shrewd man of business, who opened the poet’s eyes to +his true interests: the first proposals, then all but issued, were put +in the fire, and new ones printed and diffused over the island. The +subscription was headed by half the noblemen of the north: the +Caledonian Hunt, through the interest of Glencairn, took six hundred +copies: duchesses and countesses swelled the list, and such a crowding +to write down names had not been witnessed since the signing of the +solemn league and covenant.</p> + +<p>While the subscription-papers were filling and the new volume printing +on a paper and in a type worthy of such high patronage, Burns remained +in Edinburgh, where, for the winter season, he was a lion, and one of +an unwonted kind. Philosophers, historians, and scholars had shaken +the elegant coteries of the city with their wit, or enlightened them +with their learning, but they were all men who had been polished by +polite letters or by intercourse with high life, and there was a +sameness in their very dress as well as address, of which peers and +peeresses had become weary. They therefore welcomed this rustic +candidate for the honour of giving wings to their hours of lassitude +and weariness, with a welcome more than common; and when his approach +was announced, the polished circle looked for the advent of a lout +from the plough, in whose uncouth manners and embarrassed address they +might find matter both for mirth and wonder. But they met with a +barbarian who was not at all barbarous: as the poet met in Lord Daer +feelings and sentiments as natural as those of a ploughman, so they +met in a ploughman manners worthy of a lord: his air was easy and +unperplexed: his address was perfectly well-bred, and elegant in its +simplicity: he felt neither eclipsed by the titled nor struck dumb +before the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_xxxvii" id="Page_xxxvii">[xxxvii]</a></span> learned and the eloquent, but took his station with the +ease and grace of one born to it. In the society of men alone he spoke +out: he spared neither his wit, his humour, nor his sarcasm—he seemed +to say to all—“I am a man, and you are no more; and why should I not +act and speak like one?”—it was remarked, however, that he had not +learnt, or did not desire, to conceal his emotions—that he commended +with more rapture than was courteous, and contradicted with more +bluntness than was accounted polite. It was thus with him in the +company of men: when woman approached, his look altered, his eye +beamed milder; all that was stern in his nature underwent a change, +and he received them with deference, but with a consciousness that he +could win their attention as he had won that of others, who differed, +indeed, from them only in the texture of their kirtles. This natural +power of rendering himself acceptable to women had been observed and +envied by Sillar, one of the dearest of his early comrades; and it +stood him in good stead now, when he was the object to whom the +Duchess of Gordon, the loveliest as well as the wittiest of +women—directed her discourse. Burns, she afterwards said, won the +attention of the Edinburgh ladies by a deferential way of address—by +an ease and natural grace of manners, as new as it was +unexpected—that he told them the stories of some of his tenderest +songs or liveliest poems in a style quite magical—enriching his +little narratives, which had one and all the merit of being short, +with personal incidents of humour or of pathos.</p> + +<p>In a party, when Dr. Blair and Professor Walker were present, Burns +related the circumstances under which he had composed his melancholy +song, “The gloomy night is gathering fast,” in a way even more +touching than the verses: and in the company of the ruling beauties of +the time, he hesitated not to lift the veil from some of the tenderer +parts of his own history, and give them glimpses of the romance of +rustic life. A lady of birth—one of his must willing listeners—used, +I am told, to say, that she should never forget the tale which he +related of his affection for Mary Campbell, his Highland Mary, as he +loved to call her. She was fair, he said, and affectionate, and as +guileless as she was beautiful; and beautiful he thought her in a very +high degree. The first time he saw her was during one of his musing +walks in the woods of Montgomery Castle; and the first time he spoke +to her was during the merriment of a harvest-kirn. There were others +there who admired her, but he addressed her, and had the luck to win +her regard from them all. He soon found that she was the lass whom he +had long sought, but never before found—that her good looks were +surpassed by her good sense; and her good sense was equalled by her +discretion and modesty. He met her frequently: she saw by his looks +that he was sincere; she put full trust in his love, and used to +wander with him among the green knowes and stream-banks till the sun +went down and the moon rose, talking, dreaming of love and the golden +days which awaited them. He was poor, and she had only her half-year’s +fee, for she was in the condition of a servant; but thoughts of gear +never darkened their dream: they resolved to wed, and exchanged vows +of constancy and love. They plighted their vows on the Sabbath to +render them more sacred—they made them by a burn, where they had +courted, that open nature might be a witness—they made them over an +open Bible, to show that they thought of God in this mutual act—and +when they had done they both took water in their hands, and scattered +it in the air, to intimate that as the stream was pure so were their +intentions. They parted when they did this, but they parted never to +meet more: she died in a burning fever, during a visit to her +relations to prepare for her marriage; and all that he had of her was +a lock of her long bright hair, and her Bible, which she exchanged for +his.</p> + +<p>Even with the tales which he related of rustic love and adventure his +own story mingled; and ladies of rank heard, for the first time, that +in all that was romantic in the passion of love, and in all that was +chivalrous in sentiment, men of distinction, both by education and +birth, were at least equalled by the peasantry of the land. They +listened with interest, and inclined their feathers beside the bard, +to hear how love went on in the west, and in no case it ran quite +smooth. Sometimes young hearts were kept asunder by the sordid +feelings of parents, who could not be persuaded to bestow their +daughter, perhaps an only one, on a wooer who could not count penny +for penny, and number cow for cow: sometimes a mother desired her +daughter to look higher than to one of her station: for her beauty and +her education entitled her to match among the lairds, rather than the +tenants; and sometimes, the devotional tastes of both father and +mother,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_xxxviii" id="Page_xxxviii">[xxxviii]</a></span> approving of personal looks and connexions, were averse to +see a daughter bestow her hand on one, whose language in religion was +indiscreet, and whose morals were suspected. Yet, neither the +vigilance of fathers, nor the suspicious care of aunts and mothers, +could succeed in keeping those asunder whose hearts were together; but +in these meetings circumspection and invention were necessary: all +fears were to be lulled by the seeming carelessness of the lass,—all +perils were to be met and braved by the spirit of the lad. His home, +perhaps, was at a distance, and he had wild woods to come through, and +deep streams to pass, before he could see the signal-light, now shown +and now withdrawn, at her window; he had to approach with a quick eye +and a wary foot, lest a father or a brother should see, and deter him: +he had sometimes to wish for a cloud upon the moon, whose light, +welcome to him on his way in the distance, was likely to betray him +when near; and he not unfrequently reckoned a wild night of wind and +rain as a blessing, since it helped to conceal his coming, and proved +to his mistress that he was ready to brave all for her sake. Of rivals +met and baffled; of half-willing and half-unconsenting maidens, +persuaded and won; of the light-hearted and the careless becoming +affectionate and tender; and the coy, the proud, and the satiric being +gained by “persuasive words, and more persuasive sighs,” as dames had +been gained of old, he had tales enow. The ladies listened, and smiled +at the tender narratives of the poet.</p> + +<p>Of his appearance among the sons as well as the daughters of men, we +have the account of Dugald Stewart. “Burns,” says the philosopher, +“came to Edinburgh early in the winter: the attentions which he +received from all ranks and descriptions of persons, were such as +would have turned any head but his own. He retained the same +simplicity of manners and appearance which had struck me so forcibly +when I first saw him in the country: his dress was suited to his +station; plain and unpretending, with sufficient attention to +neatness: he always wore boots, and, when on more than usual ceremony, +buckskin breeches. His manners were manly, simple, and independent; +strongly expressive of conscious genius and worth, but without any +indication of forwardness, arrogance, or vanity. He took his share in +conversation, but not more than belonged to him, and listened with +apparent deference on subjects where his want of education deprived +him of the means of information. If there had been a little more of +gentleness and accommodation in his temper, he would have been still +more interesting; but he had been accustomed to give law in the circle +of his ordinary acquaintance, and his dread of anything approaching to +meanness or servility, rendered his manner somewhat decided and hard. +Nothing perhaps was more remarkable among his various attainments, +than the fluency and precision and originality of language, when he +spoke in company; more particularly as he aimed at purity in his turn +of expression, and avoided more successfully than most Scotsmen, the +peculiarities of Scottish phraseology. From his conversation I should +have pronounced him to have been fitted to excel in whatever walk of +ambition he had chosen to exert his abilities. He was passionately +fond of the beauties of nature, and I recollect he once told me, when +I was admiring a distant prospect in one of our morning walks, that +the sight of so many smoking cottages gave a pleasure to his mind, +which none could understand who had not witnessed, like himself, the +happiness and worth which cottages contained.”</p> + +<p>Such was the impression which Burns made at first on the fair, the +titled, and the learned of Edinburgh; an impression which, though +lessened by intimacy and closer examination on the part of the men, +remained unimpaired, on that of the softer sex, till his dying-day. +His company, during the season of balls and festivities, continued to +be courted by all who desired to be reckoned gay or polite. Cards of +invitation fell thick on him; he was not more welcome to the plumed +and jewelled groups, whom her fascinating Grace of Gordon gathered +about her, than he was to the grave divines and polished scholars, who +assembled in the rooms of Stewart, or Blair, or Robertson. The classic +socialities of Tytler, afterwards Lord Woodhouslee, or the elaborate +supper-tables of the whimsical Monboddo, whose guests imagined they +were entertained in the manner of Lucullus or of Cicero, were not +complete without the presence of the ploughman of Kyle; and the +feelings of the rustic poet, facing such companies, though of surprise +and delight at first, gradually subsided, he said, as he discerned, +that man differed from man only in the polish, and not in the grain. +But Edinburgh offered tables and entertainers of a less orderly<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_xxxix" id="Page_xxxix">[xxxix]</a></span> and +staid character than those I have named—where the glass circulated +with greater rapidity; where the wit flowed more freely; and where +there were neither highbred ladies to charm conversation within the +bounds of modesty, nor serious philosophers, nor grave divines, to set +a limit to the license of speech, or the hours of enjoyment. To these +companions—and these were all of the better classes, the levities of +the rustic poet’s wit and humour were as welcome us were the tenderest +of his narratives to the accomplished Duchess of Gordon and the +beautiful Miss Burnet of Monboddo; they raised a social roar not at +all classic, and demanded and provoked his sallies of wild humour, or +indecorous mirth, with as much delight as he had witnessed among the +lads of Kyle, when, at mill or forge, his humorous sallies abounded as +the ale flowed. In these enjoyments the rough, but learned William +Nicol, and the young and amiable Robert Ainslie shared: the name of +the poet was coupled with those of profane wits, free livers, and that +class of half-idle gentlemen who hang about the courts of law, or for +a season or two wear the livery of Mars, and handle cold iron.</p> + +<p>Edinburgh had still another class of genteel convivialists, to whom +the poet was attracted by principles as well as by pleasure; these +were the relics of that once numerous body, the Jacobites, who still +loved to cherish the feelings of birth or education rather than of +judgment, and toasted the name of Stuart, when the last of the race +had renounced his pretensions to a throne, for the sake of peace and +the cross. Young men then, and high names were among them, annually +met on the pretender’s birth-day, and sang songs in which the white +rose of Jacobitism flourished; toasted toasts announcing adherence to +the male line of the Bruce and the Stuart, and listened to the strains +of the laureate of the day, who prophesied, in drink, the dismissal of +the intrusive Hanoverian, by the right and might of the righteous and +disinherited line. Burns, who was descended from a northern race, +whoso father was suspected of having drawn the claymore in 1745, and +who loved the blood of the Keith-Marishalls, under whose banners his +ancestors had marched, readily united himself to a band in whose +sentiments, political and social, he was a sharer. He was received +with acclamation: the dignity of laureate was conferred upon him, and +his inauguration ode, in which he recalled the names and the deeds of +the Grahams, the Erskines, the Boyds, and the Gordons, was applauded +for its fire, as well as for its sentiments. Yet, though he ate and +drank and sang with Jacobites, he was only as far as sympathy and +poesie went, of their number: his reason renounced the principles and +the religion of the Stuart line; and though he shed a tear over their +fallen fortunes—though he sympathized with the brave and honourable +names that perished in their cause—though he cursed “the butcher, +Cumberland,” and the bloody spirit which commanded the heads of the +good and the heroic to be stuck where they would affright the +passer-by, and pollute the air—he had no desire to see the splendid +fabric of constitutional freedom, which the united genius of all +parties had raised, thrown wantonly down. His Jacobitism influenced, +not his head, but his heart, and gave a mournful hue to many of his +lyric compositions.</p> + +<p>Meanwhile his poems were passing through the press. Burns made a few +emendations of those published in the Kilmarnock edition, and he added +others which, as he expressed it, he had carded and spun, since he +passed Glenbuck. Some rather coarse lines were softened or omitted in +the “Twa Dogs;” others, from a change of his personal feelings, were +made in the “Vision:” “Death and Doctor Hornbook,” excluded before, +was admitted now: the “Dream” was retained, in spite of the +remonstrances of Mrs. Stewart, of Stair, and Mrs. Dunlop; and the +“Brigs of Ayr,” in compliment to his patrons in his native district, +and the “Address to Edinburgh,” in honour of his titled and +distinguished friends in that metropolis, were printed for the first +time. He was unwilling to alter what he had once printed: his friends, +classic, titled, and rustic, found him stubborn and unpliable, in +matters of criticism; yet he was generally of a complimental mood: he +loaded the robe of Coila in the “Vision,” with more scenes than it +could well contain, that he might include in the landscape, all the +country-seats of his friends, and he gave more than their share of +commendation to the Wallaces, out of respect to his friend Mrs. +Dunlop. Of the critics of Edinburgh he said, they spun the thread of +their criticisms so fine that it was unfit for either warp or weft; +and of its scholars, he said, they were never satisfied with any +Scottish poet, unless they could trace him in Horace. One morning at +Dr. Blair’s breakfast-table, when the “Holy Fair” was the subject of +conversation, the reverend critic said, “Why should<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_xl" id="Page_xl">[xl]</a></span></p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">‘——Moody speel the holy door<br /></span> +<span class="i4">With tidings of <i>salvation</i>?’<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>if you had said, with tidings of <i>damnation</i>, the satire would have +been the better and the bitterer.” “Excellent!” exclaimed the poet, +“the alteration is capital, and I hope you will honour me by allowing +me to say in a note at whose suggestion it was made.” Professor +Walker, who tells the anecdote, adds that Blair evaded, with equal +good humour and decision, this not very polite request; nor was this +the only slip which the poet made on this occasion: some one asked him +in which of the churches of Edinburgh he had received the highest +gratification: he named the High-church, but gave the preference over +all preachers to Robert Walker, the colleague and rival in eloquence +of Dr. Blair himself, and that in a tone so pointed and decisive as to +make all at the table stare and look embarrassed. The poet confessed +afterwards that he never reflected on his blunder without pain and +mortification. Blair probably had this in his mind, when, on reading +the poem beginning “When Guildford good our pilot stood,” he +exclaimed, “Ah! the politics of Burns always smell of the smithy,” +meaning, that they were vulgar and common.</p> + +<p>In April, the second or Edinburgh, edition was published: it was +widely purchased, and as warmly commended. The country had been +prepared for it by the generous and discriminating criticisms of Henry +Mackenzie, published in that popular periodical, “The Lounger,” where +he says, “Burns possesses the spirit as well as the fancy of a poet; +that honest pride and independence of soul, which are sometimes the +muse’s only dower, break forth on every occasion, in his works.” The +praise of the author of the “Man of Feeling” was not more felt by +Burns, than it was by the whole island: the harp of the north had not +been swept for centuries by a hand so forcible, and at the same time +so varied, that it awakened every tone, whether of joy or woe: the +language was that of rustic life; the scenes of the poems were the +dusty barn, the clay-floored reeky cottage, and the furrowed field; +and the characters were cowherds, ploughmen, and mechanics. The volume +was embellished by a head of the poet from the hand of the now +venerable Alexander Nasmith; and introduced by a dedication to the +noblemen and gentlemen of the Caledonian Hunt, in a style of vehement +independence, unknown hitherto in the history of subscriptions. The +whole work, verse, prose, and portrait, won public attention, and kept +it: and though some critics signified their displeasure at expressions +which bordered on profanity, and at a license of language which they +pronounced impure, by far the greater number united their praise to +the all but general voice; nay, some scrupled not to call him, from +his perfect ease and nature and variety, the Scottish Shakspeare. No +one rejoiced more in his success and his fame, than the matron of +Mossgiel.</p> + +<p>Other matters than his poems and socialities claimed the attention of +Burns in Edinburgh. He had a hearty relish for the joyous genius of +Allan Ramsay; he traced out his residences, and rejoiced to think that +while he stood in the shop of his own bookseller, Creech, the same +floor had been trod by the feet of his great forerunner. He visited, +too, the lowly grave of the unfortunate Robert Fergusson; and it must +be recorded to the shame of the magistrates of Edinburgh, that they +allowed him to erect a headstone to his memory, and to the scandal of +Scotland, that in such a memorial he had not been anticipated. He +seems not to have regarded the graves of scholars or philosophers; and +he trod the pavements where the warlike princes and nobles had walked +without any emotion. He loved, however, to see places celebrated in +Scottish song, and fields where battles for the independence of his +country had been stricken; and, with money in his pocket which his +poems had produced, and with a letter from a witty but weak man, Lord +Buchan, instructing him to pull birks on the Yarrow, broom on the +Cowden-knowes, and not to neglect to admire the ruins of Drybrugh +Abbey, Burns set out on a border tour, accompanied by Robert Ainslie, +of Berrywell. As the poet had talked of returning to the plough, Dr. +Blair imagined that he was on his way back to the furrowed field, and +wrote him a handsome farewell, saying he was leaving Edinburgh with a +character which had survived many temptations; with a name which would +be placed with the Ramsays and the Fergussons, and with the hopes of +all, that, in a second volume, on which his fate as a poet would very +much depend, he might rise yet higher in merit and in fame. Burns, who +received this communication when laying his leg over<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_xli" id="Page_xli">[xli]</a></span> the saddle to be +gone, is said to have muttered, “Ay, but a man’s first book is +sometimes like his first babe, healthier and stronger than those which +follow.”</p> + +<p>On the 6th of May, 1787, Burns reached Berrywell: he recorded of the +laird, that he was clear-headed, and of Miss Ainslie, that she was +amiable and handsome—of Dudgeon, the author of “The Maid that tends +the Goats,” that he had penetration and modesty, and of the preacher, +Bowmaker, that he was a man of strong lungs and vigorous remark. On +crossing the Tweed at Coldstream he took off his hat, and kneeling +down, repeated aloud the two last verses of the “Cotter’s Saturday +Night:” on returning, he drunk tea with Brydone, the traveller, a man, +he said, kind and benevolent: he cursed one Cole as an English +Hottentot, for having rooted out an ancient garden belonging to a +Romish ruin; and he wrote of Macdowal, of Caverton-mill, that by his +skill in rearing sheep, he sold his flocks, ewe and lamb, for a couple +of guineas each: that he washed his sheep before shearing—and by his +turnips improved sheep-husbandry; he added, that lands were generally +let at sixteen shillings the Scottish acre; the farmers rich, and, +compared to Ayrshire, their houses magnificent. On his way to Jedburgh +he visited an old gentleman in whose house was an arm-chair, once the +property of the author of “The Seasons;” he reverently examined the +relic, and could scarcely be persuaded to sit in it: he was a warm +admirer of Thomson.</p> + +<p>In Jedburgh, Burns found much to interest him: the ruins of a splendid +cathedral, and of a strong castle—and, what was still more +attractive, an amiable young lady, very handsome, with “beautiful +hazel eyes, full of spirit, sparkling with delicious moisture,” and +looks which betokened a high order of female mind. He gave her his +portrait, and entered this remembrance of her attractions among his +memoranda:—“My heart is thawed into melting pleasure, after being so +long frozen up in the Greenland bay of indifference, amid the noise +and nonsense of Edinburgh. I am afraid my bosom has nearly as much +tinder as ever. Jed, pure be thy streams, and hallowed thy sylvan +banks: sweet Isabella Lindsay, may peace dwell in thy bosom +uninterrupted, except by the tumultuous throbbings of rapturous love!” +With the freedom of Jedburgh, handsomely bestowed by the magistrates, +in his pocket, Burns made his way to Wauchope, the residence of Mrs. +Scott, who had welcomed him into the world as a poet in verses lively +and graceful: he found her, he said, “a lady of sense and taste, and +of a decision peculiar to female authors.” After dining with Sir +Alexander Don, who, he said, was a clever man, but far from a match +for his divine lady, a sister of his patron Glencairn, he spent an +hour among the beautiful ruins of Dryburgh Abbey; glanced on the +splendid remains of Melrose; passed, unconscious of the future, over +that ground on which have arisen the romantic towers of Abbotsford; +dined with certain of the Souters of Selkirk; and visited the old keep +of Thomas the Rhymer, and a dozen of the hills and streams celebrated +in song. Nor did he fail to pay his respects, after returning through +Dunse, to Sir James Hall, of Dunglass, and his lady, and was much +pleased with the scenery of their romantic place. He was now joined by +a gentleman of the name of Kerr, and crossing the Tweed a second time, +penetrated into England, as far as the ancient town of Newcastle, +where he smiled at a facetious Northumbrian, who at dinner caused the +beef to be eaten before the broth was served, in obedience to an +ancient injunction, lest the hungry Scotch should come and snatch it. +On his way back he saw, what proved to be prophetic of his own +fortune—the roup of an unfortunate farmer’s stock: he took out his +journal, and wrote with a troubled brow, “Rigid economy, and decent +industry, do you preserve me from being the principal <i>dramatis +personæ</i>, in such a scene of horror.” He extended his tour to +Carlisle, and from thence to the banks of the Nith, where he looked at +the farm of Ellisland, with the intention of trying once more his +fortune at the plough, should poetry and patronage fail him.</p> + +<p>On his way through the West, Burns spent a few days with his mother at +Mossgiel: he had left her an unknown and an almost banished man: he +returned in fame and in sunshine, admired by all who aspired to be +thought tasteful or refined. He felt offended alike with the patrician +stateliness of Edinburgh and the plebeian servility of the husbandmen +of Ayrshire; and dreading the influence of the unlucky star which had +hitherto ruled his lot, he bought a pocket Milton, he said, for the +purpose of studying the intrepid independence and daring magnanimity, +and noble defiance of hardships, exhibited by Satan! In this mood he +reached Edinburgh—only to leave it<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_xlii" id="Page_xlii">[xlii]</a></span> again on three hurried excursions +into the Highlands. The route which he took and the sentiments which +the scenes awakened, are but faintly intimated in the memoranda which +he made. His first journey seems to have been performed in ill-humour; +at Stirling, his Jacobitism, provoked at seeing the ruined palace of +the Stuarts, broke out in some unloyal lines which he had the +indiscretion to write with a diamond on the window of a public inn. At +Carron, where he was refused a sight of the magnificent foundry, he +avenged himself in epigram. At Inverary he resented some real or +imaginary neglect on the part of his Grace of Argyll, by a stinging +lampoon; nor can he be said to have fairly regained his serenity of +temper, till he danced his wrath away with some Highland ladies at +Dumbarton.</p> + +<p>His second excursion was made in the company of Dr. Adair, of +Harrowgate: the reluctant doors of Carron foundry were opened to him, +and he expressed his wonder at the blazing furnaces and broiling +labours of the place; he removed the disloyal lines from the window of +the inn at Stirling, and he paid a two days’ visit to Ramsay of +Ochtertyre, a distinguished scholar, and discussed with him future +topics for the muse. “I have been in the company of many men of +genius,” said Ramsay afterwards to Currie, “some of them poets, but +never witnessed such flashes of intellectual brightness as from +him—the impulse of the moment, sparks of celestial fire.” From the +Forth he went to the Devon, in the county of Clackmannan, where, for +the first time, he saw the beautiful Charlotte Hamilton, the sister of +his friend Gavin Hamilton, of Mauchline. “She is not only beautiful,” +he thus writes to her brother, “but lovely: her form is elegant, her +features not regular, but they have the smile of sweetness, and the +settled complacency of good nature in the highest degree. Her eyes are +fascinating; at once expressive of good sense, tenderness and a noble +mind. After the exercise of our riding to the Falls, Charlotte was +exactly Dr. Donne’s mistress:—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i8">“Her pure and eloquent blood<br /> +</span> +<span class="i0">Spoke in her cheeks, and so distinctly wrought,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That one would almost say her body thought.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>Accompanied by this charming dame, he visited an old lady, Mrs. Bruce, +of Clackmannan, who, in the belief that she had the blood of the royal +Bruce in her veins, received the poet with something of princely +state, and, half in jest, conferred the honour of knighthood upon him, +with her ancestor’s sword, saying, in true Jacobitical mood, that she +had a better right to do that than some folk had! In the same pleasing +company he visited the famous cataract on the Devon, called the +Cauldron Lian, and the Rumbling bridge, a single arch thrown, it is +said by the devil, over the Devon, at the height of a hundred feet in +the air. It was the complaint of his companions that Burns exhibited +no raptures, and poured out no unpremeditated verses at such +magnificent scenes. But he did not like to be tutored or prompted: +“Look, look!” exclaimed some one, as Carron foundry belched forth +flames—“look, Burns, look! good heavens, what a grand sight!—look!” +“I would not look—look, sir, at your bidding,” said the bard, turning +away, “were it into the mouth of hell!” When he visited, at a future +time, the romantic Linn of Creehope, in Nithsdale, he looked silently +at its wonders, and showed none of the hoped-for rapture. “You do not +admire it, I fear,” said a gentleman who accompanied him; “I could not +admire it more, sir,” replied Burns, “if He who made it were to desire +me to do it.” There are other reasons for the silence of Burns amid +the scenes of the Devon: he was charmed into love by the sense and the +beauty of Charlotte Hamilton, and rendered her homage in that sweet +song, “The Banks of the Devon,” and in a dozen letters written with +more than his usual care, elegance, and tenderness. But the lady was +neither to be won by verse nor by prose: she afterwards gave her hand +to Adair, the poet’s companion, and, what was less meritorious, threw +his letters into the fire.</p> + +<p>The third and last tour into the North was in company of Nicol of the +High-School of Edinburgh: on the fields of Bannockburn and +Falkirk—places of triumph and of woe to Scotland, he gave way to +patriotic impulses, and in these words he recorded them:—“Stirling, +August 20, 1787: this morning I knelt at the tomb of Sir John the +Graham, the gallant friend of the immortal Wallace; and two hours ago +I said a fervent prayer for old Caledonia, over the hole in a +whin<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_xliii" id="Page_xliii">[xliii]</a></span>stone where Robert the Bruce fixed his royal standard on the +banks of Bannockburn.” He then proceeded northward by Ochtertyre, the +water of Earn, the vale of Glen Almond, and the traditionary grave of +Ossian. He looked in at princely Taymouth; mused an hour or two among +the Birks of Aberfeldy; gazed from Birnam top; paused amid the wild +grandeur of the pass of Killiecrankie, at the stone which marks the +spot where a second patriot Graham fell, and spent a day at Blair, +where he experienced the graceful kindness of the Duke of Athol, and in a strain truly elegant, petitioned him, in the name of Bruar Water, to hide the utter nakedness of its +otherwise picturesque banks, with plantations of birch and oak. +Quitting Blair he followed the course of the Spey, and passing, as he +told his brother, through a wild country, among cliffs gray with +eternal snows, and glens gloomy and savage, reached Findhorn in mist +and darkness; visited Castle Cawdor, where Macbeth murdered Duncan; +hastened through Inverness to Urquhart Castle, and the Falls of Fyers, +and turned southward to Kilravock, over the fatal moor of Culloden. He +admired the ladies of that classic region for their snooded ringlets, +simple elegance of dress, and expressive eyes: in Mrs. Rose, of +Kilravock Castle, he found that matronly grace and dignity which he +owned he loved; and in the Duke and Duchess of Gordon a renewal of +that more than kindness with which they had welcomed him in Edinburgh. +But while he admired the palace of Fochabers, and was charmed by the +condescensions of the noble proprietors, he forgot that he had left a +companion at the inn, too proud and captious to be pleased at favours +showered on others: he hastened back to the inn with an invitation and +an apology: he found the fiery pedant in a foaming rage, striding up +and down the street, cursing in Scotch and Latin the loitering +postilions for not yoking the horses, and hurrying him away. All +apology and explanation was in vain, and Burns, with a vexation which +he sought not to conceal, took his seat silently beside the irascible +pedagogue, and returned to the South by Broughty Castle, the banks of +Endermay and Queensferry. He parted with the Highlands in a kindly +mood, and loved to recal the scenes and the people, both in +conversation and in song.</p> + +<p>On his return to Edinburgh he had to bide the time of his bookseller +and the public: the impression of his poems, extending to two thousand +eight hundred copies, was sold widely: much of the money had to come +from a distance, and Burns lingered about the northern metropolis, +expecting a settlement with Creech, and with the hope that those who +dispensed his country’s patronage might remember one who then, as now, +was reckoned an ornament to the land. But Creech, a parsimonious man, +was slow in his payments; the patronage of the country was swallowed +up in the sink of politics, and though noblemen smiled, and ladies of +rank nodded their jewelled heads in approbation of every new song he +sung and every witty sally he uttered, they reckoned any further +notice or care superfluous: the poet, an observant man, saw all this; +but hope was the cordial of his heart, he said, and he hoped and +lingered on. Too active a genius to remain idle, he addressed himself +to the twofold business of love and verse. Repulsed by the stately +Beauty of the Devon, he sought consolation in the society of one, as +fair, and infinitely more witty; and as an accident had for a time +deprived him of the use of one of his legs, he gave wings to hours of +pain, by writing a series of letters to this Edinburgh enchantress, in +which he signed himself Sylvander, and addressed her under the name of +Clarinda. In these compositions, which no one can regard as serious, +and which James Grahame the poet called “a romance of real Platonic +affection,” amid much affectation both of language and sentiment, and +a desire to say fine and startling things, we can see the proud heart +of the poet throbbing in the dread of being neglected or forgotten by +his country. The love which he offers up at the altar of wit and +beauty, seems assumed and put on, for its rapture is artificial, and +its brilliancy that of an icicle: no woman was ever wooed and won in +that Malvolio way; and there is no doubt that Mrs. M’Lehose felt as +much offence as pleasure at this boisterous display of regard. In +aftertimes he loved to remember her:—when wine circulated, Mrs. Mac +was his favourite toast.</p> + +<p>During this season he began his lyric contributions to the Musical +Museum of Johnson, a work which, amid many imperfections of taste and +arrangement, contains more of the true old music and genuine old songs +of Scotland, than any other collection with which I am acquainted. +Burns gathered oral airs, and fitted them with words of mirth or of +woe, of tenderness or of humour, with unexampled readiness and +felicity; he eked out old fragments and sobered down licentious<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_xliv" id="Page_xliv">[xliv]</a></span> +strains so much in the olden spirit and feeling, that the new cannot +be distinguished from the ancient; nay, he inserted lines and half +lines, with such skill and nicety, that antiquarians are perplexed to +settle which is genuine or which is simulated. Yet with all this he +abated not of the natural mirth or the racy humour of the lyric muse +of Scotland: he did not like her the less because she walked like some +of the maidens of her strains, high-kilted at times, and spoke with +the freedom of innocence. In these communications we observe how +little his border-jaunt among the fountains of ancient song +contributed either of sentiment or allusion, to his lyrics; and how +deeply his strains, whether of pity or of merriment, were coloured by +what he had seen, and heard, and felt in the Highlands. In truth, all +that lay beyond the Forth was an undiscovered land to him; while the +lowland districts were not only familiar to his mind and eye, but all +their more romantic vales and hills and streams were already musical +in songs of such excellence as induced him to dread failure rather +than hope triumph. Moreover, the Highlands teemed with jacobitical +feelings, and scenes hallowed by the blood or the sufferings of men +heroic, and perhaps misguided; and the poet, willingly yielding to an +impulse which was truly romantic, and believed by thousands to be +loyal, penned his songs on Drumossie, and Killiecrankie, as the +spirit of sorrow or of bitterness prevailed. Though accompanied, +during his northern excursions, by friends whose socialities and +conversation forbade deep thought, or even serious remark, it will be +seen by those who read his lyrics with care, that his wreath is +indebted for some of its fairest flowers to the Highlands.</p> + +<p>The second winter of the poet’s abode in Edinburgh had now arrived: it +opened, as might have been expected, with less rapturous welcomes and +with more of frosty civility than the first. It must be confessed, +that indulgence in prolonged socialities, and in company which, though +clever, could not be called select, contributed to this; nor must it +be forgotten that his love for the sweeter part of creation was now +and then carried beyond the limits of poetic respect, and the +delicacies of courtesy; tending to estrange the austere and to lessen +the admiration at first common to all. Other causes may be assigned +for this wane of popularity: he took no care to conceal his contempt +for all who depended on mere scholarship for eminence, and he had a +perilous knack in sketching with a sarcastic hand the characters of +the learned and the grave. Some indeed of the high literati of the +north—Home, the author of Douglas, was one of them—spoke of the poet +as a chance or an accident: and though they admitted that he was a +poet, yet he was not one of settled grandeur of soul, brightened by +study. Burns was probably aware of this; he takes occasion in some of +his letters to suggest, that the hour may be at hand when he shall be +accounted by scholars as a meteor, rather than a fixed light, and to +suspect that the praise bestowed on his genius was partly owing to the +humility of his condition. From his lingering so long about Edinburgh, +the nobility began to dread a second volume by subscription, the +learned to regard him as a fierce Theban, who resolved to carry all +the outworks to the temple of Fame without the labour of making +regular approaches; while a third party, and not the least numerous, +looked on him with distrust, as one who hovered between Jacobite and +Jacobin; who disliked the loyal-minded, and loved to lampoon the +reigning family. Besides, the marvel of the inspired ploughman had +begun to subside; the bright gloss of novelty was worn off, and his +fault lay in his unwillingness to see that he had made all the sport +which the Philistines expected, and was required to make room for some +“salvage” of the season, to paw, and roar, and shake the mane. The +doors of the titled, which at first opened spontaneous, like those in +Milton’s heaven, were now unclosed for him with a tardy courtesy: he +was received with measured stateliness, and seldom requested to repeat +his visit. Of this changed aspect of things he complained to a friend: +but his real sorrows were mixed with those of the fancy:—he told Mrs. +Dunlop with what pangs of heart he was compelled to take shelter in a +corner, lest the rattling equipage of some gaping blockhead should +mangle him in the mire. In this land of titles and wealth such +querulous sensibilities must have been frequently offended.</p> + +<p>Burns, who had talked lightly hitherto of resuming the plough, began +now to think seriously about it, for he saw it must come to that at +last. Miller, of Dalswinton, a gentleman of scientific acquirements, +and who has the merit of applying the impulse of steam to navigation, +had offered the poet the choice of his farms, on a fair estate which +he had purchased on the Nith: aided by<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_xlv" id="Page_xlv">[xlv]</a></span> a westland farmer, he selected +Ellisland, a beautiful spot, fit alike for the steps of ploughman or +poet. On intimating this to the magnates of Edinburgh, no one lamented +that a genius so bright and original should be driven to win his bread +with the sweat of his brow: no one, with an indignant eye, ventured to +tell those to whom the patronage of this magnificent empire was +confided, that they were misusing the sacred trust, and that posterity +would curse them for their coldness or neglect: neither did any of the +rich nobles, whose tables he had adorned by his wit, offer to enable +him to toil free of rent, in a land of which he was to be a permanent +ornament;—all were silent—all were cold—the Earl of Glencairn +alone, aided by Alexander Wood, a gentleman who merits praise oftener +than he is named, did the little that was done or attempted to be done +for him: nor was that little done on the peer’s part without +solicitation:—“I wish to go into the excise;” thus he wrote to +Glencairn; “and I am told your lordship’s interest will easily procure +me the grant from the commissioners: and your lordship’s patronage and +goodness, which have already rescued me from obscurity, wretchedness, +and exile, emboldens me to ask that interest. You have likewise put it +in my power to save the little tie of home that sheltered an aged +mother, two brothers, and three sisters from destruction. I am ill +qualified to dog the heels of greatness with the impertinence of +solicitation, and tremble nearly as much at the thought of the cold +promise as the cold denial.” The farm and the excise exhibit the +poet’s humble scheme of life: the money of the one, he thought, would +support the toil of the other, and in the fortunate management of +both, he looked for the rough abundance, if not the elegancies +suitable to a poet’s condition.</p> + +<p>While Scotland was disgraced by sordidly allowing her brightest genius +to descend to the plough and the excise, the poet hastened his +departure from a city which had witnessed both his triumph and his +shame: he bade farewell in a few well-chosen words to such of the +classic literati—the Blairs, the Stewarts, the Mackenzies, and the +Tytlers—as had welcomed the rustic bard and continued to countenance +him; while in softer accents he bade adieu to the Clarindas and +Chlorises of whose charms he had sung, and, having wrung a settlement +from Creech, he turned his steps towards Mossgiel and Mauchline. He +had several reasons, and all serious ones, for taking Ayrshire in his +way to the Nith: he desired to see his mother, his brothers and +sisters, who had partaken of his success, and were now raised from +pining penury to comparative affluence: he desired to see those who +had aided him in his early struggles into the upper air—perhaps +those, too, who had looked coldly on, and smiled at his outward +aspirations after fame or distinction; but more than all, he desired +to see one whom he once and still dearly loved, who had been a +sufferer for his sake, and whom he proposed to make mistress of his +fireside and the sharer of his fortunes. Even while whispering of love +to Charlotte Hamilton, on the banks of the Devon, or sighing out the +affected sentimentalities of platonic or pastoral love in the ear of +Clarinda, his thoughts wandered to her whom he had left bleaching her +webs among the daisies on Mauchline braes—she had still his heart, +and in spite of her own and her father’s disclamation, she was his +wife. It was one of the delusions of this great poet, as well as of +those good people, the Armours, that the marriage had been dissolved +by the destruction of the marriage-lines, and that Robert Burns and +Jean Armour were as single as though they had neither vowed nor +written themselves man and wife. Be that as it may, the time was come +when all scruples and obstacles were to be removed which stood in the +way of their union: their hands were united by Gavin Hamilton, +according to law, in April, 1788: and even the Reverend Mr. Auld, so +mercilessly lampooned, smiled forgivingly as the poet satisfied a +church wisely scrupulous regarding the sacred ceremony of marriage.</p> + +<p>Though Jean Armour was but a country lass of humble degree, she had +sense and intelligence, and personal charms sufficient not only to win +and fix the attentions of the poet, but to sanction the praise which +he showered on her in song. In a letter to Mrs. Dunlop, he thus +describes her: “The most placid good nature and sweetness of +disposition, a warm heart, gratefully devoted with all its powers to +love me; vigorous health and sprightly cheerfulness, set off to the +best advantage by a more than commonly handsome figure: these I think +in a woman may make a good wife, though she should never have read a +page but the Scriptures, nor have danced in a<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_xlvi" id="Page_xlvi">[xlvi]</a></span> brighter assembly than +a penny-pay wedding.” To the accomplished Margaret Chalmers, of +Edinburgh, he adds, to complete the picture, “I have got the +handsomest figure, the sweetest temper, the soundest constitution, and +kindest heart in the country: a certain late publication of Scots’ +poems she has perused very devoutly, and all the ballads in the land, +as she has the finest wood-note wild you ever heard.” With his young +wife, a punch bowl of Scottish marble, and an eight-day clock, both +presents from Mr. Armour, now reconciled to his eminent son-in-law, +with a new plough, and a beautiful heifer, given by Mrs. Dunlop, with +about four hundred pounds in his pocket, a resolution to toil, and a +hope of success, Burns made his appearance on the banks of the Nith, +and set up his staff at Ellisland. This farm, now a classic spot, is +about six miles up the river from Dumfries; it extends to upwards of a +hundred acres: the soil is kindly; the holmland portion of it loamy +and rich, and it has at command fine walks on the river side, and +views of the Friar’s Carse, Cowehill, and Dalswinton. For a while the +poet had to hide his head in a smoky hovel; till a house to his fancy, +and offices for his cattle and his crops were built, his accommodation +was sufficiently humble; and his mind taking its hue from his +situation, infused a bitterness into the letters in which he first +made known to his western friends that he had fixed his abode in +Nithsdale. “I am here,” said he, “at the very elbow of existence: the +only things to be found in perfection in this country are stupidity +and canting; prose they only know in graces and prayers, and the value +of these they estimate as they do their plaiden-webs, by the ell: as +for the muses, they have as much an idea of a rhinoceros as of a +poet.” “This is an undiscovered clime,” he at another period exclaims, +“it is unknown to poetry, and prose never looked on it save in drink. +I sit by the fire, and listen to the hum of the spinning-wheel: I +hear, but cannot see it, for it is hidden in the smoke which eddies +round and round me before it seeks to escape by window and door. I +have no converse but with the ignorance which encloses me: No kenned +face but that of my old mare, Jenny Geddes—my life is dwindled down +to mere existence.”</p> + +<p>When the poet’s new house was built and plenished, and the atmosphere +of his mind began to clear, he found the land to be fruitful, and its +people intelligent and wise. In Riddel, of Friar’s Carse, he found a +scholar and antiquarian; in Miller, of Dalswinton, a man conversant +with science as well as with the world; in M’Murdo, of Drumlanrig, a +generous and accomplished gentleman; and in John Syme, of Ryedale, a +man much after his own heart, and a lover of the wit and socialities +of polished life. Of these gentlemen Riddel, who was his neighbour, +was the favourite: a door was made in the march-fence which separated +Ellisland from Friar’s Carse, that the poet might indulge in the +retirement of the Carse hermitage, a little lodge in the wood, as +romantic as it was beautiful, while a pathway was cut through the +dwarf oaks and birches which fringed the river bank, to enable the +poet to saunter and muse without lot or interruption. This attention +was rewarded by an inscription for the hermitage, written with +elegance as well as feeling, and which was the first fruits of his +fancy in this unpoetic land. In a happier strain he remembered Matthew +Henderson: this is one of the sweetest as well as happiest of his +poetic compositions. He heard of his friend’s death, and called on +nature animate and inanimate, to lament the loss of one who held the +patent of his honours from God alone, and who loved all that was pure +and lovely and good. “The Whistle” is another of his Ellisland +compositions: the contest which he has recorded with such spirit and +humour took place almost at his door: the heroes were Fergusson, of +Craigdarroch, Sir Robert Laurie, of Maxwelltown, and Riddel, of the +Friar’s Carse: the poet was present, and drank bottle and bottle about +with the best, and when all was done he seemed much disposed, as an +old servant at Friar’s Carse remembered, to take up the victor.</p> + +<p>Burns had become fully reconciled to Nithsdale, and was on the most +intimate terms with the muse when he produced Tam O’ Shanter, the +crowning glory of all his poems. For this marvellous tale we are +indebted to something like accident: Francis Grose, the antiquary, +happened to visit Friar’s Carse, and as he loved wine and wit, the +total want of imagination was no hinderance to his friendly +intercourse with the poet: “Alloway’s auld haunted kirk” was +mentioned, and Grose said he would include it in his illustrations of +the antiquities of Scotland, if the bard of the Doon would write a +poem to accompany it. Burns consented, and before he left the table, +the various traditions which belonged to the ruin were passing through +his mind. One of these was<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_xlvii" id="Page_xlvii">[xlvii]</a></span> of a farmer, who, on a night wild with +wind and rain, on passing the old kirk was startled by a light +glimmering inside the walls; on drawing near he saw a caldron hung +over a fire, in which the heads and limbs of children were simmering: +there was neither witch nor fiend to guard it, so he unhooked the +caldron, turned out the contents, and carried it home as a trophy. A +second tradition was of a man of Kyle, who, having been on a market +night detained late in Ayr, on crossing the old bridge of Doon, on his +way home, saw a light streaming through the gothic window of Alloway +kirk, and on riding near, beheld a batch of the district witches +dancing merrily round their master, the devil, who kept them “louping +and flinging” to the sound of a bagpipe. He knew several of the old +crones, and smiled at their gambols, for they were dancing in their +smocks: but one of them, and she happened to be young and rosy, had on +a smock shorter than those of her companions by two spans at least, +which so moved the farmer that he exclaimed, “Weel luppan, Maggie wi’ +the short sark!” Satan stopped his music, the light was extinguished, +and out rushed the hags after the farmer, who made at the gallop for +the bridge of Doon, knowing that they could not cross a stream: he +escaped; but Maggie, who was foremost, seized his horse’s tail at the +middle of the bridge, and pulled it off in her efforts to stay him.</p> + +<p>This poem was the work of a single day: Burns walked out to his +favourite musing path, which runs towards the old tower of the Isle, +along Nithside, and was observed to walk hastily and mutter as he +went. His wife knew by these signs that he was engaged in composition, +and watched him from the window; at last wearying, and moreover +wondering at the unusual length of his meditations, she took her +children with her and went to meet him; but as he seemed not to see +her, she stept aside among the broom to allow him to pass, which he +did with a flushed brow and dropping eyes, reciting these lines +aloud:—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Now Tam! O, Tum! had thae been queans,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A’ plump and strapping in their teens,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Their sacks, instead o’ creeshie flannen,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Been snaw-white seventeen hunder linen!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thir breeks o’ mine, my only pair,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That ance were plush, o’ gude blue hair,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I wad hae gien them off my hurdies,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For ae blink o’ the bonnie burdies!”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>He embellished this wild tradition from fact as well as from fancy: +along the road which Tam came on that eventful night his memory +supplied circumstances which prepared him for the strange sight at the +kirk of Alloway. A poor chapman had perished, some winters before, in +the snow; a murdered child had been found by some early hunters; a +tippling farmer had fallen from his horse at the expense of his neck, +beside a “meikle stane”; and a melancholy old woman had hanged herself +at the bush aboon the well, as the poem relates: all these matters the +poet pressed into the service of the muse, and used them with a skill +which adorns rather than oppresses the legend. A pert lawyer from +Dumfries objected to the language as obscure: “Obscure, sir!” said +Burns; “you know not the language of that great master of your own +art—the devil. If you had a witch for your client you would not be +able to manage her defence!”</p> + +<p>He wrote few poems after his marriage, but he composed many songs: the +sweet voice of Mrs. Burns and the craving of Johnson’s Museum will in +some measure account for the number, but not for their variety, which +is truly wonderful. In the history of that mournful strain, “Mary in +Heaven,” we read the story of many of his lyrics, for they generally +sprang from his personal feelings: no poet has put more of himself +into his poetry than Burns, “Robert, though ill of a cold,” said his +wife, “had been busy all day—a day of September, 1789, with the +shearers in the field, and as he had got most of the corn into the +stack-yard, was in good spirits; but when twilight came he grew sad +about something, and could not rest: he wandered first up the +waterside, and then went into the stack-yard: I followed, and begged +him to come into the house, as he was ill, and the air was sharp and +cold. He said, ‘Ay, ay,’ but did not come: he threw himself down on +some loose sheaves, and lay looking at the sky, and particularly at a +large, bright star, which shone like another moon. At last, but that +was long after I had left him, he came home—the song was already +composed.” To the memory of Mary Campbell he dedicated<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_xlviii" id="Page_xlviii">[xlviii]</a></span> that touching +ode; and he thus intimates the continuance of his early affection for +“The fair haired lass of the west,” in a letter of that time to Mrs. +Dunlop. “If there is another life, it must be only for the just, the +benevolent, the amiable, and the humane. What a flattering idea, then, +is a world to come! There shall I, with speechless agony of rapture, +again recognise my lost, my ever dear Mary, whose bosom was fraught +with truth, honour, constancy, and love.” These melancholy words gave +way in their turn to others of a nature lively and humorous: “Tam +Glen,” in which the thoughts flow as freely as the waters of the Nith, +on whose banks he wrote it; “Findlay,” with its quiet vein of sly +simplicity; “Willie brewed a peck o’ maut,” the first of social, and +“She’s fair and fause,” the first of sarcastic songs, with “The deil’s +awa wi’ the Exciseman,” are all productions of this period—a period +which had besides its own fears and its own forebodings.</p> + +<p>For a while Burns seemed to prosper in his farm: he held the plough +with his own hand, he guided the harrows, he distributed the seed-corn +equally among the furrows, and he reaped the crop in its season, and +saw it safely covered in from the storms of winter with “thack and +rape;” his wife, too, superintended the dairy with a skill which she +had brought from Kyle, and as the harvest, for a season or two, was +abundant, and the dairy yielded butter and cheese for the market, it +seemed that “the luckless star” which ruled his lot had relented, and +now shone unboding and benignly. But much more is required than toil +of hand to make a successful farmer, nor will the attention bestowed +only by fits and starts, compensate for carelessness or oversight: +frugality, not in one thing but in all, is demanded, in small matters +as well as in great, while a careful mind and a vigilant eye must +superintend the labours of servants, and the whole system of in-door +and out-door economy. Now, during the three years which Burns stayed +in Ellisland, he neither wrought with that constant diligence which +farming demands, nor did he bestow upon it the unremitting attention +of eye and mind which such a farm required: besides his skill in +husbandry was but moderate—the rent, though of his own fixing, was +too high for him and for the times; the ground, though good, was not +so excellent as he might have had on the same estate—he employed more +servants than the number of acres demanded, and spread for them a +richer board than common: when we have said this we need not add the +expensive tastes induced by poetry, to keep readers from starting, +when they are told that Burns, at the close of the third year of +occupation, resigned his lease to the landlord, and bade farewell for +ever to the plough. He was not, however, quite desolate; he had for a +year or more been appointed on the excise, and had superintended a +district extending to ten large parishes, with applause; indeed, it +has been assigned as the chief reason for failure in his farm, that +when the plough or the sickle summoned him to the field, he was to be +found, either pursuing the defaulters of the revenue, among the +valleys of Dumfrieshire, or measuring out pastoral verse to the +beauties of the land. He retired to a house in the Bank-vennel of +Dumfries, and commenced a town-life: he commenced it with an empty +pocket, for Ellisland had swallowed up all the profits of his poems: +he had now neither a barn to produce meal nor barley, a barn-yard to +yield a fat hen, a field to which he could go at Martinmas for a mart, +nor a dairy to supply milk and cheese and butter to the table—he had, +in short, all to buy and little to buy with. He regarded it as a +compensation that he had no farm-rent to provide, no bankruptcies to +dread, no horse to keep, for his excise duties were now confined to +Dumfries, and that the burthen of a barren farm was removed from his +mind, and his muse at liberty to renew her unsolicited strains.</p> + +<p>But from the day of his departure from “the barren” Ellisland, the +downward course of Burns may be dated. The cold neglect of his country +had driven him back indignantly to the plough, and he hoped to gain +from the furrowed field that independence which it was the duty of +Scotland to have provided: but he did not resume the plough with all +the advantages he possessed when he first forsook it: he had revelled +in the luxuries of polished life—his tastes had been rendered +expensive as well as pure: he had witnessed, and he hoped for the +pleasures of literary retirement, while the hands which had led +jewelled dames over scented carpets to supper tables leaded with +silver took hold of the hilts of the plough with more of reluctance +than good-will. Edinburgh, with its lords and its ladies, its delights +and its hopes, spoiled him for farming. Nor were his new labours more +acceptable to his haughty spirit than those of the plough: the excise +for a<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_xlix" id="Page_xlix">[xlix]</a></span> century had been a word of opprobrium or of hatred in the +north: the duties which it imposed were regarded, not by peasants +alone, as a serious encroachment upon the ancient rights of the +nation, and to mislead a gauger, or resist him, even to blood, was +considered by few as a fault. That the brightest genius of the +nation—one whose tastes and sensibilities were so peculiarly its +own—should be, as a reward, set to look after run-rum and smuggled +tobacco, and to gauge ale-wife’s barrels, was a regret and a marvel to +many, and a source of bitter merriment to Burns himself.</p> + +<p>The duties of his situation were however performed punctually, if not +with pleasure: he was a vigilant officer; he was also a merciful and +considerate one: though loving a joke, and not at all averse to a +dram, he walked among suspicious brewers, captious ale-wives, and +frowning shop-keepers as uprightly as courteously: he smoothed the +ruggedest natures into acquiescence by his gayety and humour, and yet +never gave cause for a malicious remark, by allowing his vigilance to +slumber. He was brave, too, and in the capture of an armed smuggler, +in which he led the attack, showed that he neither feared water nor +fire: he loved, also, to counsel the more forward of the smugglers to +abandon their dangerous calling; his sympathy for the helpless poor +induced him to give them now and then notice of his approach; he has +been known to interpret the severe laws of the excise into tenderness +and mercy in behalf of the widow and the fatherless. In all this he +did but his duty to his country and his kind: and his conduct was so +regarded by a very competent and candid judge. “Let me look at the +books of Burns,” said Maxwell, of Terraughty, at the meeting of the +district magistrates, “for they show that an upright officer may be a +merciful one.” With a salary of some seventy pounds a year, the chance +of a few guineas annually from the future editions of his poems, and +the hope of rising at some distant day to the more lucrative situation +of supervisor, Burns continued to live in Dumfries; first in the +Bank-vennel, and next in a small house in a humble street, since +called by his name.</p> + +<p>In his earlier years the poet seems to have scattered songs as thick +as a summer eve scatters its dews; nor did he scatter them less +carelessly: he appears, indeed, to have thought much less of them than +of his poems: the sweet song of Mary Morison, and others not at all +inferior, lay unregarded among his papers till accident called them +out to shine and be admired. Many of these brief but happy +compositions, sometimes with his name, and oftener without, he threw +in dozens at a time into Johnson, where they were noticed only by the +captious Ritson: but now a work of higher pretence claimed a share in +his skill: in September, 1792, he was requested by George Thomson to +render, for his national collection, the poetry worthy of the muses of +the north, and to take compassion on many choice airs, which had +waited for a poet like the author of the Cotter’s Saturday Night, to +wed them to immortal verse. To engage in such an undertaking, Burns +required small persuasion, and while Thomson asked for strains +delicate and polished, the poet characteristically stipulated that his +contributions were to be without remuneration, and the language +seasoned with a sprinkling of the Scottish dialect. As his heart was +much in the matter, he began to pour out verse with a readiness and +talent unknown in the history of song: his engagement with Thomson, +and his esteem for Johnson, gave birth to a series of songs as +brilliant as varied, and as naturally easy as they were gracefully +original. In looking over those very dissimilar collections it is not +difficult to discover that the songs which he wrote for the more +stately work, while they are more polished and elegant than those +which he contributed to the less pretending one, are at the same time +less happy in their humour and less simple in their pathos. “What +pleases <i>me</i> as simple and naive,” says Burns to Thomson, “disgusts +<i>you</i> as ludicrous and low. For this reason ‘Fye, gie me my coggie, +sirs,’ ‘Fye, let us a’ to the bridal,’ with several others of that +cast, are to me highly pleasing, while ‘Saw ye my Father’ delights me +with its descriptive simple pathos:” we read in these words the +reasons of the difference between the lyrics of the two collections.</p> + +<p>The land where the poet lived furnished ready materials for song: +hills with fine woods, vales with clear waters, and dames as lovely as +any recorded in verse, were to be had in his walks and his visits; +while, for the purposes of mirth or of humour, characters, in whose +faces originality was legibly written, were as numerous in Nithsdale +as he had found them in the west. He had been reproached, while in +Kyle, with seeing charms in very ordinary looks, and hanging the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_l" id="Page_l">[l]</a></span> +garlands of the muse on unlovely altars; he was liable to no such +censure in Nithsdale; he poured out the incense of poetry only on the +fair and captivating: his Jeans, his Lucys, his Phillises, and his +Jessies were ladies of such mental or personal charms as the +Reynolds’s and the Lawrences of the time would have rejoiced to lay +out their choicest colours on. But he did not limit himself to the +charms of those whom he could step out to the walks and admire: his +lyrics give evidence of the wandering of his thoughts to the distant +or the dead—he loves to remember Charlotte Hamilton and Mary +Campbell, and think of the sighs and vows on the Devon and the Doon, +while his harpstrings were still quivering to the names of the Millers +and the M’Murdos—to the charms of the lasses with golden or with +flaxen locks, in the valley where he dwelt. Of Jean M’Murdo and her +sister Phillis he loved to sing; and their beauty merited his strains: +to one who died in her bloom, Lucy Johnston, he addressed a song of +great sweetness; to Jessie Lewars, two or three songs of gratitude and +praise: nor did he forget other beauties, for the accomplished Mrs. +Riddel is remembered, and the absence of fair Clarinda is lamented in +strains both impassioned and pathetic.</p> + +<p>But the main inspirer of the latter songs of Burns was a young woman +of humble birth: of a form equal to the most exquisite proportions of +sculpture, with bloom on her cheeks, and merriment in her large bright +eyes, enough to drive an amatory poet crazy. Her name was Jean +Lorimer; she was not more than seventeen when the poet made her +acquaintance, and though she had got a sort of brevet-right from an +officer of the army, to use his southron name of Whelpdale, she loved +best to be addressed by her maiden designation, while the poet chose +to veil her in the numerous lyrics, to which she gave life, under the +names of “Chloris,” “The lass of Craigie-burnwood,” and “The lassie +wi’ the lintwhite locks.” Though of a temper not much inclined to +conceal anything, Burns complied so tastefully with the growing demand +of the age for the exterior decencies of life, that when the scrupling +dames of Caledonia sung a new song in her praise, they were as +unconscious whence its beauties came, as is the lover of art, that the +shape and gracefulness of the marble nymph which he admires, are +derived from a creature who sells the use of her charms indifferently +to sculpture or to love. Fine poetry, like other arts called fine, +springs from “strange places,” as the flower in the fable said, when +it bloomed on the dunghill; nor is Burns more to be blamed than was +Raphael, who painted Madonnas, and Magdalens with dishevelled hair and +lifted eyes, from a loose lady, whom the pope, “Holy at Rome—here +Antichrist,” charitably prescribed to the artist, while he laboured in +the cause of the church. Of the poetic use which he made of Jean +Lorimer’s charms, Burns gives this account to Thomson. “The lady of +whom the song of Craigie-burnwood was made is one of the finest women +in Scotland, and in fact is to me in a manner what Sterne’s Eliza was +to him—a mistress, or friend, or what you will, in the guileless +simplicity of platonic love. I assure you that to my lovely friend you +are indebted for many of my best songs. Do you think that the sober +gin-horse routine of my existence could inspire a man with life and +love and joy—could fire him with enthusiasm, or melt him with pathos, +equal to the genius of your book? No! no! Whenever I want to be more +than ordinary in song—to be in some degree equal to your diviner +airs—do you imagine I fast and pray for the celestial emanation? +Quite the contrary. I have a glorious recipe; the very one that for +his own use was invented by the divinity of healing and poesy, when +erst he piped to the flocks of Admetus. I put myself in a regimen of +admiring a fine woman; and in proportion to the adorability of her +charms, in proportion are you delighted with my verses. The lightning +of her eye is the godhead of Parnassus, and the witchery of her smile, +the divinity of Helicon.”</p> + +<p>Most of the songs which he composed under the influences to which I +have alluded are of the first order: “Bonnie Lesley,” “Highland Mary,” +“Auld Rob Morris,” “Duncan Gray,” “Wandering Willie,” “Meg o’ the +Mill,” “The poor and honest sodger,” “Bonnie Jean,” “Phillis the +fair,” “John Anderson my Jo,” “Had I a cave on some wild distant +shore,” “Whistle and I’ll come to you, my lad,” “Bruce’s Address to +his men at Bannockburn,” “Auld Lang Syne,” “Thine am I, my faithful +fair,” “Wilt thou be my dearie,” “O Chloris, mark how green the +groves,” “Contented wi’ little, and cantie wi’ mair,” “Their groves of +sweet myrtle,” “Last May a braw wooer came down the long glen,” “O +Mally’s meek, Mally’s sweet,” “Hey for a lass wi’ a tocher,”<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_li" id="Page_li">[li]</a></span> “Here’s +a health to ane I loe dear,” and the “Fairest maid on Devon banks.” +Many of the latter lyrics of Burns were more or less altered, to put +them into better harmony with the airs, and I am not the only one who +has wondered that a bard so impetuous and intractable in most matters, +should have become so soft and pliable, as to make changes which too +often sacrificed the poetry for the sake of a fuller and more swelling +sound. It is true that the emphatic notes of the music must find their +echo in the emphatic words of the verse, and that words soft and +liquid are fitter for ladies’ lips, than words hissing and rough; but +it is also true that in changing a harsher word for one more +harmonious the sense often suffers, and that happiness of expression, +and that dance of words which lyric verse requires, lose much of their +life and vigour. The poet’s favourite walk in composing his songs was +on a beautiful green sward on the northern side of the Nith, opposite +Lincluden: and his favourite posture for composition at home was +balancing himself on the hind legs of his arm-chair.</p> + +<p>While indulging in these lyrical nights, politics penetrated into +Nithsdale, and disturbed the tranquillity of that secluded region. +First, there came a contest far the representation of the Dumfries +district of boroughs, between Patrick Miller, younger, of Dalswinton, +and Sir James Johnstone, of Westerhall, and some two years afterwards, +a struggle for the representation of the county of Kirkcudbright, +between the interest of the Stewarts, of Galloway, and Patrick Heron, +of Kerroughtree. In the first of these the poet mingled discretion +with his mirth, and raised a hearty laugh, in which both parties +joined; for this sobriety of temper, good reasons may be assigned: +Miller, the elder, of Dalswinton, had desired to oblige him in the +affair of Ellisland, and his firm and considerate friend, M’Murdo, of +Drumlanrig, was chamberlain to his Grace of Queensbury, on whoso +interest Miller stood. On the other hand, his old Jacobitical +affections made him the secret well-wisher to Westerhall, for up to +this time, at least till acid disappointment and the democratic +doctrine of the natural equality of man influenced him, Burns, or as a +western rhymer of his day and district worded the reproach—Rob was a +Tory. His situation, it will therefore be observed, disposed him to +moderation, and accounts for the milkiness of his Epistle to Fintray, +in which he marshals the chiefs of the contending factions, and +foretells the fierceness of the strife, without pretending to foresee +the event. Neither is he more explicit, though infinitely more +humorous, in his ballad of “The Five Carlins,” in which he +impersonates the five boroughs—Dumfries, Kirkcudbright, Lochmaben, +Sanquhar, and Annan, and draws their characters as shrewd and +calculating dames, met in much wrath and drink to choose a +representative.</p> + +<p>But the two or three years which elapsed between the election for the +boroughs, and that for the county adjoining, wrought a serious change +in the temper as well as the opinions of the poet. His Jacobitism, as +has been said was of a poetic kind, and put on but in obedience to old +feelings, and made no part of the man: he was in his heart as +democratic as the kirk of Scotland, which educated him—he +acknowledged no other superiority but the mental: “he was disposed, +too,” said Professor Walker, “from constitutional temper, from +education and the accidents of life, to a jealousy of power, and a +keen hostility against every system which enabled birth and opulence +to anticipate those rewards which he conceived to belong to genius and +virtue.” When we add to this, a resentment of the injurious treatment +of the dispensers of public patronage, who had neglected his claims, +and showered pensions and places on men unworthy of being named with +him, we have assigned causes for the change of side and the tone of +asperity and bitterness infused into “The Heron Ballads.” Formerly +honey was mixed with his gall: a little praise sweetened his censure: +in these election lampoons he is fierce and even venomous:—no man has +a head but what is empty, nor a heart that is not black: men descended +without reproach from lines of heroes are stigmatized as cowards, and +the honest and conscientious are reproached as miserly, mean, and +dishonourable. Such is the spirit of party. “I have privately,” thus +writes the poet to Heron, “printed a good many copies of the ballads, +and have sent them among friends about the country. You have already, +as your auxiliary, the sober detestation of mankind on the heads of +your opponents; find I swear by the lyre of Thalia, to muster on your +side all the votaries of honest laughter and fair, candid ridicule.” +The ridicule was uncandid, and the laughter dishonest. The poet was +unfortunate in his political attachments: Miller gained the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_lii" id="Page_lii">[lii]</a></span> boroughs +which Burns wished he might lose, and Heron lost the county which he +foretold he would gain. It must also be recorded against the good +taste of the poet, that he loved to recite “The Heron Ballads,” and +reckon them among his happiest compositions.</p> + +<p>From attacking others, the poet was—in the interval between penning +these election lampoons—called on to defend himself: for this he +seems to have been quite unprepared, though in those yeasty times he +might have expected it. “I have been surprised, confounded, and +distracted,” he thus writes to Graham, of Fintray, “by Mr. Mitchell, +the collector, telling me that he has received an order from your +board to inquire into my political conduct, and blaming me as a person +disaffected to government. Sir, you are a husband and a father: you +know what you would feel, to see the much-loved wife of your bosom, +and your helpless prattling little ones, turned adrift into the world, +degraded and disgraced, from a situation in which they had been +respectable and respected. I would not tell a deliberate falsehood, +no, not though even worse horrors, if worse can be than those I have +mentioned, hung over my head, and I say that the allegation, whatever +villain has made it, is a lie! To the British constitution, on +Revolution principles, next after my God, I am devotedly attached. To +your patronage as a man of some genius, you have allowed me a claim; +and your esteem as an honest man I know is my due. To these, sir, +permit me to appeal: by these I adjure you to save me from that misery +which threatens to overwhelm me, and which with my latest breath I +will say I have not deserved.” In this letter, another, intended for +the eye of the Commissioners of the Board of Excise, was enclosed, in +which he disclaimed entertaining the idea of a British republic—a +wild dream of the day—but stood by the principles of the constitution +of 1688, with the wish to see such corruptions as had crept in, +amended. This last remark, it appears, by a letter from the poet to +Captain Erskine, afterwards Earl of Mar, gave great offence, for +Corbet, one of the superiors, was desired to inform him, “that his +business was to act, and not to think; and that whatever might be men +or measures, it was his duty to be silent and obedient.” The +intercession of Fintray, and the explanations of Burns, were so far +effectual, that his political offense was forgiven, “only I +understand,” said he, “that all hopes of my getting officially forward +are blasted.” The records of the Excise Office exhibit no trace of +this memorable matter, and two noblemen, who were then in the +government, have assured me that this harsh proceeding received no +countenance at head-quarters, and must have originated with some +ungenerous or malicious person, on whom the poet had spilt a little of +the nitric acid of his wrath.</p> + +<p>That Burns was numbered among the republicans of Dumfries I well +remember: but then those who held different sentiments from the men in +power, were all, in that loyal town, stigmatized as democrats: that he +either desired to see the constitution changed, or his country invaded +by the liberal French, who proposed to set us free with the bayonet, +and then admit us to the “fraternal embrace,” no one ever believed. It +is true that he spoke of premiers and peers with contempt; that he +hesitated to take off his hat in the theatre, to the air of “God save +the king;” that he refused to drink the health of Pitt, saying he +preferred that of Washington—a far greater man; that he wrote bitter +words against that combination of princes, who desired to put down +freedom in France; that he said the titled spurred and the wealthy +switched England and Scotland like two hack-horses; and that all the +high places of the land, instead of being filled by genius and talent, +were occupied, as were the high-places of Israel, with idols of wood +or of stone. But all this and more had been done and said before by +thousands in this land, whose love of their country was never +questioned. That it was bad taste to refuse to remove his hat when +other heads were bared, and little better to refuse to pledge in +company the name of Pitt, because he preferred Washington, cannot +admit of a doubt; but that he deserved to be written down traitor, for +mere matters of whim or caprice, or to be turned out of the unenvied +situation of “gauging auld wives’ barrels,” because he thought there +were some stains on the white robe of the constitution, seems a sort +of tyranny new in the history of oppression. His love of country is +recorded in too many undying lines to admit of a doubt now: nor is it +that chivalrous love alone which men call romantic; it is a love which +may be laid up in every man’s heart and practised in every man’s life; +the words are homely, but the words of Burns are always expressive:<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_liii" id="Page_liii">[liii]</a></span>—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“The kettle of the kirk and state<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Perhaps a clout may fail in’t,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But deil a foreign tinkler loon<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Shall ever ca’ a nail in’t.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Be Britons still to Britons true,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Amang ourselves united;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For never but by British hands<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Shall British wrongs be righted.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>But while verses, deserving as these do to become the national motto, +and sentiments loyal and generous, were overlooked and forgotten, all +his rash words about freedom, and his sarcastic sallies about thrones +and kings, were treasured up to his injury, by the mean and the +malicious. His steps were watched and his words weighed; when he +talked with a friend in the street, he was supposed to utter sedition; +and when ladies retired from the table, and the wine circulated with +closed doors, he was suspected of treason rather than of toasting, +which he often did with much humour, the charms of woman; even when he +gave as a sentiment, “May our success be equal to the justice of our +cause,” he was liable to be challenged by some gunpowder captain, who +thought that we deserved success in war, whether right or wrong. It is +true that he hated with a most cordial hatred all who presumed on +their own consequence, whether arising from wealth, titles, or +commissions in the army; officers he usually called “the epauletted +puppies,” and lords he generally spoke of as “feather-headed fools,” +who could but strut and stare and be no answer in kind to retort his +satiric flings, his unfriends reported that it was unsafe for young +men to associate with one whose principles were democratic, and +scarcely either modest or safe for young women to listen to a poet +whose notions of female virtue were so loose and his songs so free. +These sentiments prevailed so far that a gentleman on a visit from +London, told me he was dissuaded from inviting Burns to a dinner, +given by way of welcome back to his native place, because he was the +associate of democrats and loose people; and when a modest dame of +Dumfries expressed, through a friend, a wish to have but the honour of +speaking to one of whose genius she was an admirer, the poet declined +the interview, with a half-serious smile, saying, “Alas! she is +handsome, and you know the character publicly assigned to me.” She +escaped the danger of being numbered, it is likely, with the Annas and +the Chlorises of his freer strains.</p> + +<p>The neglect of his country, the tyranny of the Excise, and the +downfall of his hopes and fortunes, were now to bring forth their +fruits—the poet’s health began to decline. His drooping looks, his +neglect of his person, his solitary saunterings, his escape from the +stings of reflection into socialities, and his distempered joy in the +company of beauty, all spoke, as plainly as with a tongue, of a +sinking heart and a declining body. Yet though he was sensible of +sinking health, hope did not at once desert him: he continued to pour +out such tender strains, and to show such flashes of wit and humour at +the call of Thomson, as are recorded of no other lyrist: neither did +he, when in company after his own mind, hang the head, and speak +mournfully, but talked and smiled and still charmed all listeners by +his witty vivacities.</p> + +<p>On the 20th of June, 1795, he writes thus of his fortunes and +condition to his friend Clarke, “Still, still the victim of +affliction; were you to see the emaciated figure who now holds the pen +to you, you would not know your old friend. Whether I shall ever get +about again is only known to HIM, the Great Unknown, whoso creature I +am. Alas, Clarke, I begin to fear the worst! As to my individual self +I am tranquil, and would despise myself if I were not: but Burns’s +poor widow and half-a-dozen of his dear little ones, helpless orphans! +<i>Here</i> I am as weak as a woman’s tear. Enough of this! ’tis half my +disease. I duly received your last, enclosing the note: it came +extremely in time, and I am much obliged to your punctuality. Again I +must request you to do me the same kindness. Be so very good as by +return of post to enclose me <i>another</i> note: I trust you can do so +without inconvenience, and it will seriously oblige me. If I must go, +I leave a few friends behind me, whom I shall regret while +consciousness remains. I know I shall live in their remembrance. O, +dear, dear Clarke! that I shall ever see you again is I am afraid +highly improbable.” This remarkable letter proves both the declining +health, and the poverty of the poet: his digestion was so bad that he +could taste neither flesh nor fish: porridge and milk he<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_liv" id="Page_liv">[liv]</a></span> could alone +swallow, and that but in small quantities. When it is recollected that +he had no more than thirty shillings a week to keep house, and live +like a gentleman, no one need wonder that his wife had to be obliged +to a generous neighbour for some of the chief necessaries for her +coming confinement, and that the poet had to beg, in extreme need, two +guinea notes from a distant friend.</p> + +<p>His sinking state was not unobserved by his friends, and Syme and +M’Murdo united with Dr. Maxwell in persuading him, at the beginning of +the summer, to seek health at the Brow-well, a few miles east of +Dumfries, where there were pleasant walks on the Solway-side, and +salubrious breezes from the sea, which it was expected would bring the +health to the poet they had brought to many. For a while, his looks +brightened up, and health seemed inclined to return: his friend, the +witty and accomplished Mrs. Riddel, who was herself ailing, paid him a +visit. “I was struck,” she said, “with his appearance on entering the +room: the stamp of death was impressed on his features. His first +words were, ‘Well, Madam, have you any commands for the other world?’ +I replied that it seemed a doubtful case which of us should be there +soonest; he looked in my face with an air of great kindness, and +expressed his concern at seeing me so ill, with his usual sensibility. +At table he ate little or nothing: we had a long conversation about +his present state, and the approaching termination of all his earthly +prospects. He showed great concern about his literary fame, and +particularly the publication of his posthumous works; he said he was +well aware that his death would occasion some noise, and that every +scrap of his writing would be revived against him, to the injury of +his future reputation; that letters and verses, written with unguarded +freedom, would be handed about by vanity or malevolence when no dread +of his resentment would restrain them, or prevent malice or envy from +pouring forth their venom on his name. I had seldom seen his mind +greater, or more collected. There was frequently a considerable degree +of vivacity in his sallies; but the concern and dejection I could not +disguise, damped the spirit of pleasantry he seemed willing to +indulge.” This was on the evening of the 5th of July; another lady who +called to see him, found him seated at a window, gazing on the sun, +then setting brightly on the summits of the green hills of Nithsdale. +“Look how lovely the sun is,” said the poet, “but he will soon have +done with shining for me.”</p> + +<p>He now longed for home: his wife, whom he ever tenderly loved, was +about to be confined in child-bed: his papers were in sad confusion, +and required arrangement; and he felt that desire to die, at least, +among familiar things and friendly faces, so common to our nature. He +had not long before, though much reduced in pocket, refused with scorn +an offer of fifty pounds, which a speculating bookseller made, for +leave to publish his looser compositions; he had refused an offer of +the like sum yearly, from Perry of the Morning Chronicle, for poetic +contributions to his paper, lest it might embroil him with the ruling +powers, and he had resented the remittance of five pounds from +Thomson, on account of his lyric contributions, and desired him to do +so no more, unless he wished to quarrel with him; but his necessities +now, and they had at no time been so great, induced him to solicit +five pounds from Thomson, and ten pounds from his cousin, James +Burness, of Montrose, and to beg his friend Alexander Cunningham to +intercede with the Commissioners of Excise, to depart from their usual +practice, and grant him his full salary; “for without that,” he added, +“if I die not of disease, I must perish with hunger.” Thomson sent the +five pounds, James Burness sent the ten, but the Commissioners of +Excise refused to be either merciful or generous. Stobie, a young +expectant in the customs, was both;—he performed the duties of the +dying poet, and refused to touch the salary. The mind of Burns was +haunted with the fears of want and the terrors of a jail; nor were +those fears without foundation; one Williamson, to whom he was +indebted for the cloth to make his volunteer regimentals, threatened +the one; and a feeling that he was without money for either his own +illness or the confinement of his wife, threatened the other.</p> + +<p>Burns returned from the Brow-well, on the 18th of July: as he walked +from the little carriage which brought him up the Mill hole-brae to +his own door, he trembled much, and stooped with weakness and pain, +and kept his feet with difficulty: his looks were woe-worn and +ghastly, and no one who saw him, and there were several, expected to +see him again in life. It was soon circulated through Dumfries, that +Burns had returned worse from the Brow-well; that Maxwell thought ill +of him, and that, in truth, he was dying. The anxiety of all classes +was great; dif<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_lv" id="Page_lv">[lv]</a></span>ferences of opinion were forgotten, in sympathy for his +early fate: wherever two or three were met together their talk was of +Burns, of his rare wit, matchless humour, the vivacity of his +conversation, and the kindness of his heart. To the poet himself, +death, which he now knew was at hand, brought with it no fear; his +good-humour, which small matters alone ruffled, did not forsake him, +and his wit was ever ready. He was poor—he gave his pistols, which he +had used against the smugglers on the Solway, to his physician, adding +with a smile, that he had tried them and found them an honour to their +maker, which was more than he could say of the bulk of mankind! He was +proud—he remembered the indifferent practice of the corps to which he +belonged, and turning to Gibson, one of his fellow-soldiers, who stood +at his bedside with wet eyes, “John,” said he, and a gleam of humour +passed over his face, “pray don’t let the awkward-squad fire over me.” +It was almost the last act of his life to copy into his Common-place +Book, the letters which contained the charge against him of the +Commissioners of Excise, and his own eloquent refutation, leaving +judgment to be pronounced by the candour of posterity.</p> + +<p>It has been injuriously said of Burns, by Coleridge, that the man +sunk, but the poet was bright to the last: he did not sink in the +sense that these words imply: the man was manly to the latest draught +of breath. That he was a poet to the last, can be proved by facts, as +well as by the word of the author of Christabel. As he lay silently +growing weaker and weaker, he observed Jessie Lewars, a modest and +beautiful young creature, and sister to one of his brethren of the +Excise, watching over him with moist eyes, and tending him with the +care of a daughter; he rewarded her with one of those songs which are +an insurance against forgetfulness. The lyrics of the north have +nothing finer than this exquisite stanza:—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Altho’ thou maun never be mine,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Altho’ even hope is denied,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">’Tis sweeter for thee despairing,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Than aught in the world beside.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>His thoughts as he lay wandered to Charlotte Hamilton, and he +dedicated some beautiful stanzas to her beauty and her coldness, +beginning, “Fairest maid on Devon banks.”</p> + +<p>It was a sad sight to see the poet gradually sinking; his wife in +hourly expectation of her sixth confinement, and his four helpless +children—a daughter, a sweet child, had died the year before—with no +one of their lineage to soothe them with kind words or minister to +their wants. Jessie Lewars, with equal prudence and attention, watched +over them all: she could not help seeing that the thoughts of the +desolation which his death would bring, pressed sorely on him, for he +loved his children, and hoped much from his boys. He wrote to his +father-in-law, James Armour, at Mauchline, that he was dying, his wife +nigh her confinement, and begged that his mother-in-law would hasten +to them and speak comfort. He wrote to Mrs. Dunlop, saying, “I have +written to you so often without receiving any answer that I would not +trouble you again, but for the circumstances in which I am. An illness +which has long hung about me in all probability will speedily send me +beyond that bourne whence no traveller returns. Your friendship, with +which for many years you honoured me, was a friendship dearest to my +soul: your conversation and your correspondence were at once highly +entertaining and instructive—with what pleasure did I use to break up +the seal! The remembrance yet adds one pulse more to my poor +palpitating heart. Farewell!” A tremor pervaded his frame; his tongue +grew parched, and he was at times delirious: on the fourth day after +his return, when his attendant, James Maclure, held his medicine to +his lips, he swallowed it eagerly, rose almost wholly up, spread out +his hands, sprang forward nigh the whole length of the bed, fell on +his face, and expired. He died on the 21st of July, when nearly +thirty-seven years and seven months old.</p> + +<p>The burial of Burns, on the 25th of July, was an impressive and +mournful scene: half the people of Nithsdale and the neighbouring +parts of Galloway had crowded into Dumfries, to see their poet +“mingled with the earth,” and not a few had been permitted to look at +his body, laid out for interment. It was a calm and beautiful day, and +as the body was borne along the street towards the old kirk-yard, by +his brethren of the volunteers, not a sound was heard but the measured +step and the solemn music: there was no impatient crushing, no fierce +elbowing—the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_lvi" id="Page_lvi">[lvi]</a></span> crowd which filled the street seemed conscious of what +they were now losing for ever. Even while this pageant was passing, +the widow of the poet was taken in labour; but the infant born in that +unhappy hour soon shared his father’s grave. On reaching the northern +nook of the kirk-yard, where the grave was made, the mourners halted; +the coffin was divested of the mort-cloth, and silently lowered to its +resting-place, and as the first shovel-full of earth fell on the lid, +the volunteers, too agitated to be steady, justified the fears of the +poet, by three ragged volleys. He who now writes this very brief and +imperfect account, was present: he thought then, as he thinks now, +that all the military array of foot and horse did not harmonize with +either the genius or the fortunes of the poet, and that the tears +which he saw on many cheeks around, as the earth was replaced, were +worth all the splendour of a show which mocked with unintended mockery +the burial of the poor and neglected Burns. The body of the poet was, +on the 5th of June, 1815, removed to a more commodious spot in the +same burial-ground—his dark, and waving locks looked then fresh and +glossy—to afford room for a marble monument, which embodies, with +neither skill nor grace, that well-known passage in the dedication to +the gentlemen of the Caledonian Hunt:—“The poetic genius of my +country found me, as the prophetic bard, Elijah, did Elisha, at the +plough, and threw her inspiring mantle over me.” The dust of the bard +was again disturbed, when the body of Mrs. Burns was laid, in April, +1834, beside the remains of her husband: his skull was dug up by the +district craniologists, to satisfy their minds by measurement that he +was equal to the composition of “Tam o’ Shanter,” or “Mary in Heaven.” +This done, they placed the skull in a leaden box, “carefully lined +with the softest materials,” and returned it, we hope for ever, to the +hallowed ground.</p> + +<p>Thus lived and died Robert Burns, the chief of Scottish poets: in his +person he was tall and sinewy, and of such strength and activity, that +Scott alone, of all the poets I have seen, seemed his equal: his +forehead was broad, his hair black, with an inclination to curl, his +visage uncommonly swarthy, his eyes large, dark and lustrous, and his +voice deep and manly. His sensibility was strong, his passions full to +overflowing, and he loved, nay, adored, whatever was gentle and +beautiful. He had, when a lad at the plough, an eloquent word and an +inspired song for every fair face that smiled on him, and a sharp +sarcasm or a fierce lampoon for every rustic who thwarted or +contradicted him. As his first inspiration came from love, he +continued through life to love on, and was as ready with the lasting +incense of the muse for the ladies of Nithsdale as for the lasses of +Kyle: his earliest song was in praise of a young girl who reaped by +his side, when he was seventeen—his latest in honour of a lady by +whose side he had wandered and dreamed on the banks of the Devon. He +was of a nature proud and suspicious, and towards the close of his +life seemed disposed to regard all above him in rank as men who +unworthily possessed the patrimony of genius: he desired to see the +order of nature restored, and worth and talent in precedence of the +base or the dull. He had no medium in his hatred or his love; he never +spared the stupid, as if they were not to be endured because he was +bright; and on the heads of the innocent possessors of titles or +wealth he was ever ready to shower his lampoons. He loved to start +doubts in religion which he knew inspiration only could solve, and he +spoke of Calvinism with a latitude of language that grieved pious +listeners. He was warm-hearted and generous to a degree, above all +men, and scorned all that was selfish and mean with a scorn quite +romantic. He was a steadfast friend and a good neighbour: while he +lived at Ellisland few passed his door without being entertained at +his table; and even when in poverty, on the Millhole-brae, the poor +seldom left his door but with blessings on their lips.</p> + +<p>Of his modes of study he has himself informed us, as well as of the +seasons and the places in which he loved to muse. He composed while he +strolled along the secluded banks of the Doon, the Ayr, or the Nith: +as the images crowded on his fancy his pace became quickened, and in +his highest moods he was excited even to tears. He loved the winter +for its leafless trees, its swelling floods, and its winds which swept +along the gloomy sky, with frost and snow on their wings: but he loved +the autumn more—he has neglected to say why—the muse was then more +liberal of her favours, and he composed with a happy alacrity unfelt +in all other seasons. He filled his mind and heart with the materials +of song—and retired from gazing on woman’s beauty,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_lvii" id="Page_lvii">[lvii]</a></span> and from the +excitement of her charms, to record his impressions in verse, as a +painter delineates oil his canvas the looks of those who sit to his +pencil. His chief place of study at Ellisland is still remembered: it +extends along the river-bank towards the Isle: there the neighbouring +gentry love to walk and peasants to gather, and hold it sacred, as the +place where he composed Tam O’ Shanter. His favourite place of study +when residing in Dumfries, was the ruins of Lincluden College, made +classic by that sublime ode, “The Vision,” and that level and clovery +sward contiguous to the College, on the northern side of the Nith: the +latter place was his favourite resort; it is known now by the name of +Burns’s musing ground, and there he conceived many of his latter +lyrics. In case of interruption he completed the verses at the +fireside, where he swung to and fro in his arm-chair till the task was +done: he then submitted the song to the ordeal of his wife’s voice, +which was both sweet and clear, and while she sung he listened +attentively, and altered or amended till the whole was in harmony, +music and words.</p> + +<p>The genius of Burns is of a high order: in brightness of expression +and unsolicited ease and natural vehemence of language, he stands in +the first rank of poets: in choice of subjects, in happiness of +conception, and loftiness of imagination, he recedes into the second. +He owes little of his fame to his objects, for, saving the beauty of a +few ladies, they were all of an ordinary kind: he sought neither in +romance nor in history for themes to the muse; he took up topics from +life around which were familiar to all, and endowed them with +character, with passion, with tenderness, with humour—elevating all +that he touched into the regions of poetry and morals. He went to no +far lands for the purpose of surprising us with wonders, neither did +he go to crowns or coronets to attract the stare of the peasantry +around him, by things which to them were as a book shut and sealed: +“The Daisy” grew on the lands which he ploughed; “The Mouse” built her +frail nest on his own stubble-field; “The Haggis” reeked on his own +table; “The Scotch Drink” of which he sang was the produce of a +neighbouring still; “The Twa Dogs,” which conversed so wisely and +wittily, were, one of them at least, his own collies; “The Vision” is +but a picture, and a brilliant one, of his own hopes and fears; “Tam +Samson” was a friend whom he loved; “Doctor Hornbook” a neighbouring +pedant; “Matthew Henderson” a social captain on half-pay; “The Scotch +Bard” who had gone to the West Indies was Burns himself; the heroine +of “The Lament,” was Jean Armour; and “Tam O’ Shanter” a facetious +farmer of Kyle, who rode late and loved pleasant company, nay, even +“The Deil” himself, whom he had the hardihood to address, was a being +whose eldrich croon bad alarmed the devout matrons of Kyle, and had +wandered, not unseen by the bard himself, among the lonely glens of +the Doon. Burns was one of the first to teach the world that high +moral poetry resided in the humblest subjects: whatever he touched +became elevated; his spirit possessed and inspired the commonest +topics, and endowed them with life and beauty.</p> + +<p>His songs have all the beauties and but few of them the faults of his +poems: they flow to the music as readily as if both air and words came +into the world together. The sentiments are from nature, they are +rarely strained or forced, and the words dance in their places and +echo the music in its pastoral sweetness, social glee, or in the +tender and the moving. He seems always to write with woman’s eye upon +him: he is gentle, persuasive and impassioned: he appears to watch her +looks, and pours out his praise or his complaint according to the +changeful moods of her mind. He looks on her, too, with a sculptor’s +as well as a poet’s eye: to him who works in marble, the diamonds, +emeralds, pearls, and elaborate ornaments of gold, but load and injure +the harmony of proportion, the grace of form, and divinity of +sentiment of his nymph or his goddess—so with Burns the fashion of a +lady’s boddice, the lustre of her satins, or the sparkle of her +diamonds, or other finery with which wealth or taste has loaded her, +are neglected us idle frippery; while her beauty, her form, or her +mind, matters which are of nature and not of fashion, are remembered +and praised. He is none of the millinery bards, who deal in scented +silks, spider-net laces, rare gems, set in rarer workmanship, and who +shower diamonds and pearls by the bushel on a lady’s locks: he makes +bright eyes, flushing cheeks, the magic of the tongue, and the +“pulses’ maddening play” perform all. His songs are, in general, +pastoral pictures: he seldom finishes a portrait of female beauty +without enclosing it in a natural frame-work of waving woods, running +streams, the melody of birds, and the lights of heaven.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_lviii" id="Page_lviii">[lviii]</a></span> Those who +desire to feel Burns in all his force, must seek some summer glen, +when a country girl searches among his many songs for one which +sympathizes with her own heart, and gives it full utterance, till wood +and vale is filled with the melody. It is remarkable that the most +naturally elegant and truly impassioned songs in our literature were +written by a ploughman in honour of the rustic lasses around him.</p> + +<p>His poetry is all life and energy, and bears the impress of a warm +heart and a clear understanding: it abounds with passions and +opinions—vivid pictures of rural happiness and the raptures of +successful love, all fresh from nature and observation, and not as +they are seen through the spectacles of books. The wit of the clouted +shoe is there without its coarseness: there is a prodigality of humour +without licentiousness, a pathos ever natural and manly, a social joy +akin sometimes to sadness, a melancholy not unallied to mirth, and a +sublime morality which seeks to elevate and soothe. To a love of man +he added an affection for the flowers of the valley, the fowls of the +air, and the beasts of the field: he perceived the tie of social +sympathy which united animated with unanimated nature, and in many of +his finest poems most beautifully he has enforced it. His thoughts are +original and his style new and unborrowed: all that he has written is +distinguished by a happy carelessness, a bounding elasticity of +spirit, and a singular felicity of expression, simple yet inimitable; +he is familiar yet dignified, careless, yet correct, and concise, yet +clear and full. All this and much more is embodied in the language of +humble life—a dialect reckoned barbarous by scholars, but which, +coming from the lips of inspiration, becomes classic and elevated.</p> + +<p>The prose of this great poet has much of the original merit of his +verse, but it is seldom so natural and so sustained: it abounds with +fine outflashings and with a genial warmth and vigour, but it is +defaced by false ornament and by a constant anxiety to say fine and +forcible things. He seems not to know that simplicity was as rare and +as needful a beauty in prose as in verse; he covets the pauses of +Sterne and the point and antithesis of Junius, like one who believes +that to write prose well he must be ever lively, ever pointed, and +ever smart. Yet the account which he wrote of himself to Dr. Moore is +one of the most spirited and natural narratives in the language, and +composed in a style remote from the strained and groped-for witticisms +and put-on sensibilities of many of his letters:—“Simple,” as John +Wilson says, “we may well call it; rich in fancy, overflowing in +feeling, and dashed off in every other paragraph with the easy +boldness of a great master.”</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_lix" id="Page_lix">[lix]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="PREFACE_1" id="PREFACE_1"></a>PREFACE.</h2> + + +<p>[The first edition, printed at Kilmarnock, July, 1786, by John Wilson, +bore on the title-page these simple words:—“Poems, chiefly in the +Scottish Dialect, by Robert Burns;” the following motto, marked +“Anonymous,” but evidently the poet’s own composition, was more +ambitious:—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“The simple Bard, unbroke by rules of art,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He pours the wild effusions of the heart:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And if inspired, ’tis nature’s pow’rs inspire—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Hers all the melting thrill, and hers the kindling fire.”]<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>The following trifles are not the production of the Poet, who, with +all the advantages of learned art, and perhaps amid the elegancies and +idlenesses of upper life, looks down for a rural theme with an eye to +Theocritus or Virgil. To the author of this, these, and other +celebrated names their countrymen, are, at least in their original +language, <i>a fountain shut up, and a book sealed.</i> Unacquainted with +the necessary requisites for commencing poet by rule, he sings the +sentiments and manners he felt and saw in himself and his rustic +compeers around him in his and their native language. Though a rhymer +from his earliest years, at least from the earliest impulse of the +softer passions, it was not till very lately that the applause, +perhaps the partiality, of friendship awakened his vanity so for as to +make him think anything of his worth showing: and none of the +following works were composed with a view to the press. To amuse +himself with the little creations of his own fancy, amid the toil and +fatigue of a laborious life; to transcribe the various feelings—the +loves, the griefs, the hopes, the fears—in his own breast; to find +some kind of counterpoise to the struggles of a world, always an alien +scene, a task uncouth to the poetical mind—these were his motives for +courting the Muses, and in these he found poetry to be its own reward.</p> + +<p>Now that he appears in the public character of an author, he does it +with fear and trembling. So dear is fame to the rhyming tribe, that +even he, an obscure, nameless Bard, shrinks aghast at the thought of +being branded as—an impertinent blockhead,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_lx" id="Page_lx">[lx]</a></span> obtruding his nonsense on +the world; and, because he can make a shift to jingle a few doggerel +Scotch rhymes together, looking upon himself as a poet of no small +consequence, forsooth!</p> + +<p>It is an observation of that celebrated poet, Shenstone, whose divine +elegies do honour to our language, our nation, and our species, that +“<i>Humility</i> has depressed many a genius to a hermit, but never raised +one to fame!” If any critic catches at the word <i>genius</i> the author +tells him, once for all, that he certainly looks upon himself as +possessed of some poetic abilities, otherwise his publishing in the +manner he has done would be a manœuvre below the worst character, +which, he hopes, his worst enemy will ever give him. But to the genius +of a Ramsay, or the glorious dawnings of the poor, unfortunate +Fergusson, he, with equal unaffected sincerity, declares, that even in +his highest pulse of vanity, he has not the most distant pretensions. +These two justly admired Scotch poets he has often had in his eye in +the following pieces, but rather with a view to kindle at their flame, +than for servile imitation.</p> + +<p>To his Subscriber, the Author returns his most sincere thanks. Not the +mercenary bow over a counter, but the heart-throbbing gratitude of the +Bard, conscious how much he owes to benevolence and friendship for +gratifying him, if he deserves it, in that dearest wish of every +poetic bosom—to be distinguished. He begs his readers, particularly +the learned and the polite, who may honour him with a perusal, that +they will make every allowance for education and circumstances of +life; but if, after a fair, candid, and impartial criticism, he shall +stand convicted of dulness and nonsense, let him be done by as he +would in that case do by others—let him be condemned, without mercy, +in contempt and oblivion.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_61" id="Page_61">[61]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="POEMS" id="POEMS"></a>THE</h2> + + +<h2>POETICAL WORKS</h2> + +<h2>OF</h2> + +<h2>ROBERT BURNS.</h2> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="DIRGE" id="DIRGE"></a>I.</h2> +<h3>WINTER.</h3> +<h3>A DIRGE.</h3> +<p>[This is one of the earliest of the poet’s recorded compositions: it +was written before the death of his father, and is called by Gilbert +Burns, ‘a juvenile production.’ To walk by a river while flooded, or +through a wood on a rough winter day, and hear the storm howling among +the leafless trees, exalted the poet’s thoughts. “In such a season,” +he said, “just after a train of misfortunes, I composed <i>Winter, a +Dirge.</i>”]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The wintry west extends his blast,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And hail and rain does blaw;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or the stormy north sends driving forth<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The blinding sleet and snaw;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">While tumbling brown, the burn comes down,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And roars frae bank to brae;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And bird and beast in covert rest,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And pass the heartless day.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“The sweeping blast, the sky o’ercast,”<a name="FNanchor_1_1" id="FNanchor_1_1"></a><a href="#Footnote_1_1" class="fnanchor">[1]</a><br /></span> +<span class="i2">The joyless winter day<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Let others fear, to me more dear<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Than all the pride of May:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The tempest’s howl, it soothes my soul,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My griefs it seems to join;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The leafless trees my fancy please,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Their fate resembles mine!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Thou Power Supreme, whose mighty scheme<br /></span> +<span class="i2">These woes of mine fulfil,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Here, firm, I rest, they must be best,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Because they are Thy will!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Then all I want (O, do thou grant<br /></span> +<span class="i2">This one request of mine!)<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Since to enjoy Thou dost deny,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Assist me to resign!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_1_1" id="Footnote_1_1"></a><a href="#FNanchor_1_1"><span class="label">[1]</span></a> Dr. Young.</p></div> +</div> + + + +<h2><a name="II" id="II"></a>II.</h2> + +<h5>THE</h5> +<h4>DEATH AND DYING WORDS</h4> +<h5>OF</h5> +<h3>POOR MAILIE,</h3> +<h4>THE AUTHOR’S ONLY PET YOWE.</h4> +<h5>AN UNCO MOURNFU’ TALE.</h5> +<p>[This tale is partly true; the poet’s pet ewe got entangled in her +tether, and tumbled into a ditch; the face of ludicrous and awkward +sorrow with which this was related by Hughoc, the herd-boy, amused +Burns so much, who was on his way to the plough, that he immediately +composed the poem, and repeated it to his brother Gilbert when they +met in the evening; the field where the poet held the plough, and the +ditch into which poor Mailie fell, are still pointed out.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">As Mailie, an’ her lambs thegither,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Were ae day nibbling on the tether,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Upon her cloot she coost a hitch,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ owre she warsl’d in the ditch:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">There, groaning, dying, she did lie,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When Hughoc<a name="FNanchor_2_2" id="FNanchor_2_2"></a><a href="#Footnote_2_2" class="fnanchor">[2]</a> he cam doytin by.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wi’ glowing e’en an’ lifted han’s,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Poor Hughoc like a statue stan’s;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He saw her days were near-hand ended,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But, waes my heart! he could na mend it!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He gaped wide but naething spak—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">At length poor Mailie silence brak.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“O thou, whose lamentable face<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Appears to mourn my woefu’ case!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My dying words attentive hear,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ bear them to my master dear.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i2">“Tell him, if e’er again he keep<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As muckle gear as buy a sheep,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O bid him never tie them mair<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wi’ wicked strings o’ hemp or hair!<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_62" id="Page_62">[62]</a></span><span class="i0">But ca’ them out to park or hill,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ let them wander at their will;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">So may his flock increase, and grow<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To scores o’ lambs, an’ packs of woo’!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i2">“Tell him he was a master kin’<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ ay was gude to me an’ mine;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ now my dying charge I gie him,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My helpless lambs, I trust them wi’ him.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i2">“O, bid him save their harmless lives<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Frae dogs, and tods, an’ butchers’ knives!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But gie them guid cow-milk their fill,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Till they be fit to fend themsel;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ tent them duly, e’en an’ morn,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wi’ teats o’ hay, an’ ripps o’ corn.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i2">“An’ may they never learn the gaets<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of ither vile, wanrestfu’ pets!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To sink thro’ slaps, an’ reave an’ steal<br /></span> +<span class="i0">At stacks o’ pease, or stocks o’ kail.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">So may they, like their great forbears,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For monie a year come thro’ the sheers;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">So wives will gie them bits o’ bread,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ bairns greet for them when they’re dead.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i2">“My poor toop-lamb, my son an’ heir,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O, bid him breed him up wi’ care;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ if he live to be a beast,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To pit some havins in his breast!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ warn him what I winna name,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To stay content wi’ yowes at hame<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ no to rin an’ wear his cloots,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Like ither menseless, graceless brutes.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i2">“An’ niest my yowie, silly thing,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Gude keep thee frae a tether string!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O, may thou ne’er forgather up<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wi’ ony blastit, moorland toop,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But ay keep mind to moop an’ mell<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wi’ sheep o’ credit like thysel!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i2">“And now, my bairns, wi’ my last breath<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I lea’e my blessin wi’ you baith:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ when you think upo’ your mither,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Mind to be kind to ane anither.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i2">“Now, honest Hughoc, dinna fail<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To tell my master a’ my tale;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ bid him burn this cursed tether,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’, for thy pains, thou’se get my blather.”<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">This said, poor Mailie turn’d her head,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And clos’d her een amang the dead.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_2_2" id="Footnote_2_2"></a><a href="#FNanchor_2_2"><span class="label">[2]</span></a> A neibor herd-callan.</p></div> +</div> + + + +<h2><a name="III" id="III"></a>III.</h2> + +<h3>POOR MAILIE’S ELEGY.</h3> + +<p>[Burns, when he calls on the bards of Ayr and Doon to join in the +lament for Mailie, intimates that he regards himself as a poet. Hogg +calls it a very elegant morsel: but says that it resembles too closely +“The Ewie and the Crooked Horn,” to be admired as original: the +shepherd might have remembered that they both resemble Sempill’s “Life +and death of the Piper of Kilbarchan.”]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Lament in rhyme, lament in prose,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wi’ saut tears trickling down your nose;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Our bardie’s fate is at a close,<br /></span> +<span class="i9">Past a’ remead;<br /> +</span> +<span class="i0">The last sad cape-stane of his woes;<br /></span> +<span class="i9">Poor Mailie’s dead.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">It’s no the loss o’ warl’s gear,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That could sae bitter draw the tear,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or mak our bardie, dowie, wear<br /></span> +<span class="i9">The mourning weed;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He’s lost a friend and neebor dear,<br /></span> +<span class="i9">In Mailie dead.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Thro’ a’ the toun she trotted by him;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A long half-mile she could descry him;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wi’ kindly bleat, when she did spy him,<br /></span> +<span class="i9">She run wi’ speed:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A friend mair faithfu’ ne’er cam nigh him,<br /></span> +<span class="i9">Than Mailie dead.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I wat she was a sheep o’ sense,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ could behave hersel wi’ mense:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I’ll say’t, she never brak a fence,<br /></span> +<span class="i9">Thro’ thievish greed.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Our bardie, tamely, keeps the spence<br /></span> +<span class="i9">Sin’ Mailie’s dead.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Or, if he wonders up the howe,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Her living image in her yowe<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Comes bleating to him, owre the knowe,<br /></span> +<span class="i9">For bits o’ bread;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ down the briny pearls rowe<br /></span> +<span class="i9">For Mailie dead.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">She was nae get o’ moorland tips,<a name="FNanchor_3_3" id="FNanchor_3_3"></a><a href="#Footnote_3_3" class="fnanchor">[3]</a><br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wi’ tawted ket, an hairy hips;<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_63" id="Page_63">[63]</a></span><span class="i0">For her forbears were brought in ships<br /></span> +<span class="i9">Frae yont the Tweed:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A bonnier fleesh ne’er cross’d the clips<br /></span> +<span class="i9">Than Mailie dead.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Wae worth the man wha first did shape<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That vile, wanchancie thing—a rape!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">It maks guid fellows girn an’ gape,<br /></span> +<span class="i9">Wi’ chokin dread;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ Robin’s bonnet wave wi’ crape,<br /></span> +<span class="i9">For Mailie dead.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O, a’ ye bards on bonnie Doon!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ wha on Ayr your chanters tune!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Come, join the melancholious croon<br /></span> +<span class="i9">O’ Robin’s reed!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">His heart will never get aboon!<br /></span> +<span class="i9">His Mailie’s dead!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_3_3" id="Footnote_3_3"></a><a href="#FNanchor_3_3"><span class="label">[3]</span></a> VARIATION. +</p> +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">‘She was nae get o’ runted rams,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wi’ woo’ like goats an’ legs like trams;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">She was the flower o’ Farlie lambs,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">A famous breed!<br /> +</span> +<span class="i0">Now Robin, greetin, chews the hams<br /></span> +<span class="i6">O’ Mailie dead.’<br /></span> +</div></div> +</div> +</div> + + + +<h2><a name="IV" id="IV"></a>IV.</h2> + +<h3>FIRST EPISTLE TO DAVIE,</h3> + +<h4>A BROTHER POET</h4> +<p>[In the summer of 1781, Burns, while at work in the garden, repeated +this Epistle to his brother Gilbert, who was much pleased with the +performance, which he considered equal if not superior to some of +Allan Ramsay’s Epistles, and said if it were printed he had no doubt +that it would be well received by people of taste.] </p> + +<p class="sig">—<i>January</i>, + [1784.]</p> +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">While winds frae aff Ben-Lomond blaw,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And bar the doors wi’ driving snaw,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And hing us owre the ingle,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I set me down to pass the time,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And spin a verse or twa o’ rhyme,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In hamely westlin jingle.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">While frosty winds blaw in the drift,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Ben to the chimla lug,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I grudge a wee the great folks’ gift,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That live sae bien an’ snug:<br /></span> +<span class="i4">I tent less and want less<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Their roomy fire-side;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">But hanker and canker<br /></span> +<span class="i6">To see their cursed pride.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">It’s hardly in a body’s power<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To keep, at times, frae being sour,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To see how things are shar’d;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">How best o’ chiels are whiles in want.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">While coofs on countless thousands rant,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And ken na how to wair’t;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But Davie, lad, ne’er fash your head,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Tho’ we hae little gear,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">We’re fit to win our daily bread,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">As lang’s we’re hale and fier:<br /></span> +<span class="i4">“Muir spier na, nor fear na,”<a name="FNanchor_4_4" id="FNanchor_4_4"></a><a href="#Footnote_4_4" class="fnanchor">[4]</a><br /></span> +<span class="i6">Auld age ne’er mind a feg,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">The last o’t, the warst o’t,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Is only but to beg.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">To lie in kilns and barns at e’en<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When banes are craz’d, and bluid is thin,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Is, doubtless, great distress!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yet then content could make us blest;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ev’n then, sometimes we’d snatch a taste<br /></span> +<span class="i2">O’ truest happiness.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The honest heart that’s free frae a’<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Intended fraud or guile,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">However Fortune kick the ba’,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Has ay some cause to smile:<br /></span> +<span class="i4">And mind still, you’ll find still,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">A comfort this nae sma’;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Nae mair then, we’ll care then,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Nae farther we can fa’.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">What tho’, like commoners of air,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">We wander out we know not where,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But either house or hall?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yet nature’s charms, the hills and woods,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The sweeping vales, and foaming floods,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Are free alike to all.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In days when daisies deck the ground,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And blackbirds whistle clear,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With honest joy our hearts will bound<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To see the coming year:<br /></span> +<span class="i4">On braes when we please, then,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">We’ll sit and sowth a tune;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Syne rhyme till’t we’ll time till’t,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">And sing’t when we hae done.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">V.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">It’s no in titles nor in rank;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">It’s no in wealth like Lon’on bank,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To purchase peace and rest;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">It’s no in makin muckle mair;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">It’s no in books, it’s no in lear,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To make us truly blest;<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_64" id="Page_64">[64]</a></span><span class="i0">If happiness hae not her seat<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And centre in the breast,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">We may be wise, or rich, or great,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But never can be blest:<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Nae treasures, nor pleasures,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Could make us happy lang;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">The heart ay’s the part ay<br /></span> +<span class="i6">That makes us right or wrang.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">VI.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Think ye, that sic as you and I,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wha drudge and drive thro’ wet an’ dry,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Wi’ never-ceasing toil;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Think ye, are we less blest than they,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wha scarcely tent us in their way,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">As hardly worth their while?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Alas! how aft, in haughty mood<br /></span> +<span class="i2">God’s creatures they oppress!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or else, neglecting a’ that’s guid,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">They riot in excess!<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Baith careless and fearless<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Of either heaven or hell!<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Esteeming and deeming<br /></span> +<span class="i6">It’s a’ an idle tale!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">VII.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Then let us cheerfu’ acquiesce;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Nor make one scanty pleasures less,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">By pining at our state;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And, even should misfortunes come,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I, here wha sit, hae met wi’ some,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’s thankfu’ for them yet.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">They gie the wit of age to youth;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">They let us ken oursel’;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">They make us see the naked truth,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The real guid and ill.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Tho’ losses, and crosses,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Be lessons right severe,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">There’s wit there, ye’ll get there,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Ye’ll find nae other where.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">VIII.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But tent me, Davie, ace o’ hearts!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">(To say aught less wad wrang the cartes,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And flatt’ry I detest,)<br /></span> +<span class="i0">This life has joys for you and I;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And joys that riches ne’er could buy:<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And joys the very best.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">There’s a’ the pleasures o’ the heart,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The lover an’ the frien’;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ye hae your Meg your dearest part,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And I my darling Jean!<br /></span> +<span class="i4">It warms me, it charms me,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">To mention but her name:<br /></span> +<span class="i4">It heats me, it beets me,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">And sets me a’ on flame!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IX.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O, all ye pow’rs who rule above!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O, Thou, whose very self art love!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Thou know’st my words sincere!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The life-blood streaming thro’ my heart,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or my more dear immortal part,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Is not more fondly dear!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When heart-corroding care and grief<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Deprive my soul of rest,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Her dear idea brings relief<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And solace to my breast.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Thou Being, All-seeing,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">O hear my fervent pray’r!<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Still take her, and make her<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Thy most peculiar care!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">X.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">All hail, ye tender feelings dear!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The smile of love, the friendly tear,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The sympathetic glow!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Long since, this world’s thorny ways<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Had number’d out my weary days,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Had it not been for you!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Fate still has blest me with a friend,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In every care and ill;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And oft a more endearing hand,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A tie more tender still.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">It lightens, it brightens<br /></span> +<span class="i6">The tenebrific scene,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">To meet with, and greet with<br /></span> +<span class="i6">My Davie or my Jean!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">XI.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O, how that name inspires my style<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The words come skelpin, rank and file,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Amaist before I ken!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The ready measure rins as fine,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As Phœbus and the famous Nine<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Were glowrin owre my pen.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My spaviet Pegasus will limp,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">’Till ance he’s fairly het;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And then he’ll hilch, and stilt, and jimp,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’ rin an unco fit:<br /></span> +<span class="i4">But least then, the beast then<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Should rue this hasty ride,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">I’ll light now, and dight now<br /></span> +<span class="i6">His sweaty, wizen’d hide.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_4_4" id="Footnote_4_4"></a><a href="#FNanchor_4_4"><span class="label">[4]</span></a> Ramsay.</p></div> + + +</div> + + + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_65" id="Page_65">[65]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="V" id="V"></a>V.</h2> + +<h3>SECOND EPISTLE TO DAVIE,</h3> + +<h4>A BROTHER POET.</h4> +<p>[David Sillar, to whom these epistles are addressed, was at that time +master of a country school, and was welcome to Burns both as a scholar +and a writer of verse. This epistle he prefixed to his poems printed +at Kilmarnock in the year 1789: he loved to speak of his early +comrade, and supplied Walker with some very valuable anecdotes: he +died one of the magistrates of Irvine, on the 2d of May, 1830, at the +age of seventy.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i2 f2">AULD NIBOR,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I’m three times doubly o’er your debtor,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For your auld-farrent, frien’ly letter;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Tho’ I maun say’t, I doubt ye flatter,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Ye speak sae fair.<br /> +</span> +<span class="i0">For my puir, silly, rhymin clatter<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Some less maun sair.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Hale be your heart, hale be your fiddle;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Lang may your elbuck jink and diddle,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To cheer you thro’ the weary widdle<br /></span> +<span class="i8">O’ war’ly cares,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Till bairn’s bairns kindly cuddle<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Your auld, gray hairs.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But Davie, lad, I’m red ye’re glaikit;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I’m tauld the Muse ye hae negleckit;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ gif it’s sae, ye sud be licket<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Until yo fyke;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sic hauns as you sud ne’er be faiket,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Be hain’t who like.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">For me, I’m on Parnassus’ brink,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Rivin’ the words to gar them clink;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Whyles daez’t wi’ love, whyles daez’t wi’ drink,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Wi’ jads or masons;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ whyles, but ay owre late, I think<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Braw sober lessons.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Of a’ the thoughtless sons o’ man,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Commen’ me to the Bardie clan;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Except it be some idle plan<br /></span> +<span class="i8">O’ rhymin’ clink,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The devil-haet, that I sud ban,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">They ever think.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Nae thought, nae view, nae scheme o’ livin’,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Nae cares to gie us joy or grievin’;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But just the pouchie put the nieve in,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">An’ while ought’s there,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Then hiltie skiltie, we gae scrievin’,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">An’ fash nae mair.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Leeze me on rhyme! it’s aye a treasure,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My chief, amaist my only pleasure,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">At hame, a-fiel’, at work, or leisure,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">The Muse, poor hizzie!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Tho’ rough an’ raploch be her measure,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">She’s seldom lazy.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Haud to the Muse, my dainty Davie:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The warl’ may play you monie a shavie;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But for the Muse she’ll never leave ye,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Tho’ e’er so puir,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Na, even tho’ limpin’ wi’ the spavie<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Frae door to door.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="VI" id="VI"></a>VI.</h2> + +<h3>ADDRESS TO THE DEIL</h3> +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“O Prince! O Chief of many throned Pow’rs,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That led th’ embattled Seraphim to war.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="sig2"><span class="smcap">Milton</span></p> + +<p>[The beautiful and relenting spirit in which this fine poem finishes +moved the heart on one of the coldest of our critics. “It was, I +think,” says Gilbert Burns, “in the winter of 1784, as we were going +with carts for coals to the family fire, and I could yet point out the +particular spot, that Robert first repeated to me the ‘Address to the +Deil.’ The idea of the address was suggested to him by running over in +his mind the many ludicrous accounts we have of that august +personage.”]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O thou! whatever title suit thee,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Auld Hornie, Satan, Kick, or Clootie,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wha in yon cavern grim an’ sootie,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Closed under hatches,<br /> +</span> +<span class="i0">Spairges about the brunstane cootie,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">To scaud poor wretches!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Hear me, auld Hangie, for a wee,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ let poor damned bodies be;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I’m sure sma’ pleasure it can gie,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">E’en to a deil,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To skelp an’ scaud poor dogs like me,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">An’ hear us squeel!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Great is thy pow’r, an’ great thy fame;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Far kend an’ noted is thy name;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ tho’ yon lowin heugh’s thy hame,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Thou travels far;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’, faith! thou’s neither lag nor lame,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Nor blate nor scaur.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Whyles, ranging like a roaring lion,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For prey, a’ holes an’ corners tryin;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Whyles, on the strong-winged tempest flyin,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Tirlin the kirks;<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_66" id="Page_66">[66]</a></span><span class="i0">Whiles, in the human bosom pryin,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Unseen thou lurks.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I’ve heard my reverend Graunie say,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In lanely glens ye like to stray;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or where auld-ruin’d castles, gray,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Nod to the moon,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ye fright the nightly wand’rer’s way<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Wi’ eldricht croon.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">When twilight did my Graunie summon,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To say her prayers, douce, honest woman!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Aft yont the dyke she’s heard you bummin,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Wi’ eerie drone;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or, rustlin, thro’ the boortries comin,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Wi’ heavy groan.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Ae dreary, windy, winter night,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The stars shot down wi’ sklentin light,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wi’ you, mysel, I gat a fright<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Ayont the lough;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ye, like a rash-buss, stood in sight,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Wi’ waving sough.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The cudgel in my nieve did shake.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Each bristl’d hair stood like a stake,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When wi’ an eldritch, stoor quaick—quaick—<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Amang the springs,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Awa ye squatter’d, like a drake,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">On whistling wings.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Let warlocks grim, an’ wither’d hags,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Tell how wi’ you, on rag weed nags,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">They skim the muirs an’ dizzy crags<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Wi’ wicked speed;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And in kirk-yards renew their leagues<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Owre howkit dead.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Thence countra wives, wi’ toil an’ pain,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">May plunge an’ plunge the kirn in vain:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For, oh! the yellow treasure’s taen<br /></span> +<span class="i8">By witching skill;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ dawtit, twal-pint hawkie’s gaen<br /></span> +<span class="i8">As yell’s the bill.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Thence mystic knots mak great abuse<br /></span> +<span class="i0">On young guidmen, fond, keen, an’ crouse;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When the best wark-lume i’ the house<br /></span> +<span class="i8">By cantrip wit,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Is instant made no worth a louse,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Just at the bit,<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">When thowes dissolve the snawy hoord,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ float the jinglin icy-boord,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Then water-kelpies haunt the foord,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">By your direction;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ nighted trav’llers are allur’d<br /></span> +<span class="i8">To their destruction.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">An’ aft your moss-traversing spunkies<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Decoy the wight that late an’ drunk is,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The bleezin, curst, mischievous monkeys<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Delude his eyes,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Till in some miry slough he sunk is,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Ne’er mair to rise.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">When masons’ mystic word an’ grip<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In storms an’ tempests raise you up,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Some cock or cat your rage maun stop,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Or, strange to tell!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The youngest brother ye wad whip<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Aff straught to hell!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Lang syne, in Eden’s bonie yard,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When youthfu’ lovers first were pair’d,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ all the soul of love they shar’d,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">The raptur’d hour,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sweet on the fragrant, flow’ry sward,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">In shady bow’r:<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Then you, ye auld, snick-drawing dog!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ye came to Paradise incog.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ play’d on man a cursed brogue,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">(Black be your fa’!)<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ gied the infant world a shog,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">‘Maist ruin’d a’.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">D’ye mind that day, when in a bizz,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wi’ reekit duds, an’ reestit gizz,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ye did present your smoutie phiz<br /></span> +<span class="i8">‘Mang better folk,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ sklented on the man of Uzz<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Your spitefu’ joke?<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">An’ how ye gat him i’ your thrall,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ brak him out o’ house an’ hall,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">While scabs an’ botches did him gall,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Wi’ bitter claw,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ lows’d his ill tongu’d, wicked scawl,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Was warst ava?<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But a’ your doings to rehearse,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Your wily snares an’ fechtin fierce,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sin’ that day Michael did you pierce,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Down to this time,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wad ding a’ Lallan tongue, or Erse,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">In prose or rhyme.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">An’ now, auld Cloots, I ken ye’re thinkin,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A certain Bardie’s rantin, drinkin,<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_67" id="Page_67">[67]</a></span><span class="i0">Some luckless hour will send him linkin<br /></span> +<span class="i8">To your black pit;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But, faith! he’ll turn a corner jinkin,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">An’ cheat you yet.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But fare ye well, auld Nickie-ben!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O wad ye tak a thought an’ men’!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ye aiblins might—I dinna ken—<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Still hae a stake—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I’m wae to think upo’ yon den<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Ev’n for your sake!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<p class="center"><img src="images/image_01.jpg" alt=""AULD MARE MAGGIE."" width="500" height="562" /><br /> +<br /> + +<span class="caption"> “AULD MARE MAGGIE.”</span></p> +<h2><a name="VII" id="VII"></a>VII.</h2> + +<h4>THE AULD FARMER’S</h4> +<h5>NEW-YEAR MORNING SALUTATION TO HIS</h5> +<h3>AULD MARE MAGGIE,</h3> +<h5>ON GIVING HER THE ACCUSTOMED RIPP OF CORN TO HANSEL IN THE NEW YEAR</h5> +<p>[“Whenever Burns has occasion,” says Hogg, “to address or mention any +subordinate being, however mean, even a mouse or a flower, then there +is a gentle pathos in it that awakens the finest feelings of the +heart.” The Auld Farmer of Kyle has the spirit of knight-errant, and +loves his mare according to the rules of chivalry; and well he might: +she carried him safely home from markets, triumphantly from +wedding-brooses; she ploughed the stiffest land; faced the steepest +brae, and, moreover, bore home his bonnie bride with a consciousness +of the loveliness of the load.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">A guid New-year I wish thee, Maggie!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Hae, there’s a rip to thy auld baggie:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Tho’ thou’s howe-backit, now, an’ knaggie,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">I’ve seen the day<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thou could hae gaen like onie staggie<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Out-owre the lay.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Tho’ now thou’s dowie, stiff, an’ crazy,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ thy auld hide as white’s a daisy,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I’ve seen thee dappl’t, sleek, and glaizie,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">A bonny gray:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He should been tight that daur’t to raize thee,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Ance in a day.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Thou ance was i’ the foremost rank,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A filly, buirdly, steeve, an’ swank,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An set weel down a shapely shank,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">As e’er tread yird;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ could hae flown out-owre a stank,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Like ony bird.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">It’s now some nine-an’-twenty year,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sin’ thou was my guid-father’s Meere;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He gied me thee, o’ tocher clear,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">An’ fifty mark;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Tho’ it was sma’, ’twas weel-won gear,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">An’ thou was stark.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">When first I gaed to woo my Jenny,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ye then was trottin wi’ your minnie:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Tho’ ye was trickle, slee, an’ funny,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Ye ne’er was donsie:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But hamely, tawie, quiet an’ cannie,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">An’ unco sonsie.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">That day ye pranc’d wi’ muckle pride,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When ye bure hame my bonnie bride:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ sweet an’ gracefu’ she did ride,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Wi’ maiden air!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Kyle-Stewart I could bragged wide,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">For sic a pair.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Tho’ now ye dow but hoyte and hoble,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ wintle like a saumont-coble,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That day, ye was a jinker noble,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">For heels an’ win’!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ ran them till they a’ did wauble,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Far, far, behin’!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">When thou an’ I were young an’ skeigh,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ stable-meals at fairs were dreigh,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">How thou wad prance, an’ snore, an’ skreigh,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">An’ tak the road!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Town’s bodies ran, an’ stood abeigh,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">An’ ca’t thee mad.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">When thou was corn’t, an’ I was mellow,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">We took the road ay like a swallow:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">At Brooses thou had ne’er a fellow,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">For pith an’ speed;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But every tail thou pay’t them hollow,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Where’er thou gaed.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The sma’, droop-rumpl’t, hunter cattle,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Might aiblins waur’t thee for a brattle;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But sax Scotch miles thou try’t their mettle,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">An’ gar’t them whaizle:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Nae whip nor spur, but just a whattle<br /></span> +<span class="i8">O’ saugh or hazle.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Thou was a noble fittie-lan’,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As e’er in tug or tow was drawn:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Aft thee an’ I, in aught hours gaun,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">In guid March-weather,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Hae turn’d sax rood beside our han’<br /></span> +<span class="i8">For days thegither.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Thou never braindg’t, an’ fetch’t, an’ fliskit,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But thy auld tail thou wad hae whiskit,<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_68" id="Page_68">[68]</a></span><span class="i0">An’ spread abreed thy weel-fill’d brisket,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Wi’ pith an’ pow’r,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">’Till spiritty knowes wad rair’t and risket,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">An’ slypet owre.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">When frosts lay lang, an’ snaws were deep,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ threaten’d labour back to keep,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I gied thy cog a wee-bit heap<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Aboon the timmer;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I ken’d my Maggie wad na sleep<br /></span> +<span class="i8">For that, or simmer.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">In cart or car thou never reestit;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The steyest brae thou wad hae fac’t it;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thou never lap, an’ sten’t, an’ breastit,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Then stood to blaw;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But just thy step a wee thing hastit,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Thou snoov’t awa.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">My pleugh is now thy bairntime a’;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Four gallant brutes as e’er did draw;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Forbye sax mae, I’ve sell’t awa,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">That thou hast nurst:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">They drew me thretteen pund an’ twa,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">The vera worst.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Monie a sair daurk we twa hae wrought,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An, wi’ the weary warl’ fought!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ monie an anxious day, I thought<br /></span> +<span class="i8">We wad be beat!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yet here to crazy age we’re brought,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Wi’ something yet.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">And think na, my auld, trusty servan’,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That now perhaps thou’s less deservin,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ thy auld days may end in starvin,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">For my last fow,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A heapit stimpart, I’ll reserve ane<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Laid by for you.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">We’ve worn to crazy years thegither;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">We’ll toyte about wi’ ane anither;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wi’ tentie care I’ll flit thy tether,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">To some hain’d rig,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Whare ye may nobly rax your leather,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Wi’ sma’ fatigue.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="VIII" id="VIII"></a>VIII.</h2> + +<h3>TO A HAGGIS.</h3> +<p>[The vehement nationality of this poem is but a small part of its +merit. The haggis of the north is the minced pie of the south; both +are characteristic of the people: the ingredients which compose the +former are all of Scottish growth, including the bag which contains +them; the ingredients of the latter are gathered chiefly from the four +quarters of the globe: the haggis is the triumph of poverty, the +minced pie the triumph of wealth.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Fair fa’ your honest, sonsie face,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Great chieftain o’ the pudding-race!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Aboon them a’ ye tak your place,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Painch, tripe, or thairm:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Weel are ye wordy o’ a grace<br /></span> +<span class="i8">As lang’s my arm.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The groaning trencher there ye fill,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Your hurdies like a distant hill,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Your pin wad help to mend a mill<br /></span> +<span class="i8">In time o’ need,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">While thro’ your pores the dews distil<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Like amber bead.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">His knife see rustic-labour dight,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ cut you up wi’ ready slight,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Trenching your gushing entrails bright<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Like onie ditch;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And then, O what a glorious sight,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Warm-reekin, rich!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Then horn for horn they stretch an’ strive,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Deil tak the hindmost, on they drive,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">’Till a’ their weel-swall’d kytes belyve<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Are bent like drums;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Then auld Guidman, maist like to rive,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Bethankit hums.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Is there that o’er his French ragout,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or olio that wad staw a sow,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or fricassee wad mak her spew<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Wi’ perfect sconner,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Looks down wi’ sneering, scornfu’ view<br /></span> +<span class="i8">On sic a dinner?<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Poor devil! see him owre his trash,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As feckless as a wither’d rash,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">His spindle shank a guid whip-lash,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">His nieve a nit;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thro’ bloody flood or field to dash,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">O how unfit!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But mark the rustic, haggis-fed,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The trembling earth resounds his tread,<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_69" id="Page_69">[69]</a></span><span class="i0">Clap in his walie nieve a blade,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">He’ll mak it whissle;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ legs, an’ arms, an’ heads will sned,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Like taps o’ thrissle.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Ye pow’rs wha mak mankind your care,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And dish them out their bill o’ fare,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Auld Scotland wants nae stinking ware<br /></span> +<span class="i8">That jaups in luggies;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But, if ye wish her gratefu’ pray’r,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Gie her a Haggis!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="IX" id="IX"></a>IX.</h2> + +<h3>A PRAYER,</h3> +<h4>UNDER THE PRESSURE OF VIOLENT ANGUISH.</h4> +<p>[“There was a certain period of my life,” says Burns, “that my spirit +was broke by repeated losses and disasters, which threatened and +indeed effected the ruin of my fortune. My body, too, was attacked by +the most dreadful distemper, a hypochondria or confirmed melancholy. +In this wretched state, the recollection of which makes me yet +shudder, I hung my harp on the willow-trees, except in some lucid +intervals, in one of which I composed the following.”]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O Thou Great Being! what Thou art<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Surpasses me to know;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yet sure I am, that known to Thee<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Are all Thy works below.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Thy creature here before Thee stands,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">All wretched and distrest;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yet sure those ills that wring my soul<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Obey Thy high behest.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Sure Thou, Almighty, canst not act<br /></span> +<span class="i2">From cruelty or wrath!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O, free my weary eyes from tears,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Or close them fast in death!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But if I must afflicted be,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To suit some wise design;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Then, man my soul with firm resolves<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To bear and not repine!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="X" id="X"></a>X.</h2> + +<h3>A PRAYER</h3> +<h4>IN THE PROSPECT OF DEATH.</h4> +<p>[I have heard the third verse of this very moving Prayer quoted by +scrupulous men as a proof that the poet imputed his errors to the +Being who had endowed him with wild and unruly passions. The meaning +is very different: Burns felt the torrent-strength of passion +overpowering his resolution, and trusted that God would be merciful to +the errors of one on whom he had bestowed such o’ermastering gifts.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O Thou unknown, Almighty Cause<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Of all my hope and fear?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In whose dread presence, ere an hour<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Perhaps I must appear!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">If I have wander’d in those paths<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Of life I ought to shun;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As something, loudly, in my breast,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Remonstrates I have done;<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Thou know’st that Thou hast formed me,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">With passions wild and strong;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And list’ning to their witching voice<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Has often led me wrong.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Where human weakness has come short,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Or frailty stept aside,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Do Thou, All-Good! for such thou art,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In shades of darkness hide.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Where with intention I have err’d,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">No other plea I have,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But, Thou art good; and goodness still<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Delighteth to forgive.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="XI" id="XI"></a>XI.</h2> + +<h3>STANZAS</h3> +<h4>ON THE SAME OCCASION.</h4> +<p>[These verses the poet, in his common-place book, calls “Misgivings in +the Hour of Despondency and Prospect of Death.” He elsewhere says they +were composed when fainting-fits and other alarming symptoms of a +pleurisy, or some other dangerous disorder, first put nature on the +alarm.]</p> + + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Why am I loth to leave this earthly scene?<br /></span> +<span class="i2">How I so found it full of pleasing charms?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Some drops of joy with draughts of ill between:<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Some gleams of sunshine ‘mid renewing storms:<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_70" id="Page_70">[70]</a></span><span class="i0">Is it departing pangs my soul alarms?<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Or Death’s unlovely, dreary, dark abode?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For guilt, for guilt, my terrors are in arms;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I tremble to approach an angry God,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And justly smart beneath his sin-avenging rod.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Fain would I say, “Forgive my foul offence!”<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Fain promise never more to disobey;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But, should my Author health again dispense,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Again I might desert fair virtue’s way:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Again in folly’s path might go astray;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Again exalt the brute and sink the man;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Then how should I for heavenly mercy pray,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Who act so counter heavenly mercy’s plan?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Who sin so oft have mourn’d, yet to temptation ran?<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O Thou, great Governor of all below!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">If I may dare a lifted eye to Thee,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thy nod can make the tempest cease to blow,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Or still the tumult of the raging sea:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With that controlling pow’r assist ev’n me<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Those headlong furious passions to confine;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For all unfit I feel my pow’rs to be,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To rule their torrent in th’ allowed line;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O, aid me with Thy help, Omnipotence Divine!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="XII" id="XII"></a>XII.</h2> + +<h3>A WINTER NIGHT.</h3> +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Poor naked wretches, wheresoe’er you are<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That bide the pelting of the pitiless storm!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">How shall your houseless heads and unfed sides,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Your looped and widow’d raggedness defend you<br /></span> +<span class="i0">From seasons such as these?”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="sig1 smcap">Shakspeare.</p> + +<p>[“This poem,” says my friend Thomas Carlyle, “is worth several +homilies on mercy, for it is the voice of Mercy herself. Burns, +indeed, lives in sympathy: his soul rushes forth into all the realms +of being: nothing that has existence can be indifferent to him.”]</p> + + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">When biting Boreas, fell and doure,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sharp shivers thro’ the leafless bow’r;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When Phœbus gies a short-liv’d glow’r<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Far south the lift,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Dim-darkening through the flaky show’r,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Or whirling drift:<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Ae night the storm the steeples rocked,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Poor labour sweet in sleep was locked,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">While burns, wi’ snawy wreeths up-choked,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Wild-eddying swirl.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or through the mining outlet bocked,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Down headlong hurl.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Listening, the doors an’ winnocks rattle,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I thought me on the ourie cattle,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or silly sheep, wha bide this brattle<br /></span> +<span class="i8">O’ winter war,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And through the drift, deep-lairing sprattle<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Beneath a scar.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Ilk happing bird, wee, helpless thing,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That, in the merry months o’ spring,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Delighted me to hear thee sing,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">What comes o’ thee?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Whare wilt thou cower thy chittering wing,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">An’ close thy e’e?<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Ev’n you on murd’ring errands toil’d,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Lone from your savage homes exiled,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The blood-stained roost, and sheep-cote spoiled<br /></span> +<span class="i8">My heart forgets,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">While pitiless the tempest wild<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Sore on you beats.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Now Phoebe, in her midnight reign,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Dark muffled, viewed the dreary plain;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Still crowding thoughts, a pensive train,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Rose in my soul,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When on my ear this plaintive strain<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Slow, solemn, stole:—<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i2">“Blow, blow, ye winds, with heavier gust!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And freeze, thou bitter-biting frost:<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Descend, ye chilly, smothering snows!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Not all your rage, as now united, shows<br /></span> +<span class="i4">More hard unkindness, unrelenting,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Vengeful malice unrepenting,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Than heaven-illumined man on brother man bestows;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">See stern oppression’s iron grip,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Or mad ambition’s gory hand,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sending, like blood-hounds from the slip,<br /></span> +<span class="i3">Woe, want, and murder o’er a land!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Even in the peaceful rural vale,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Truth, weeping, tells the mournful tale,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">How pamper’d luxury, flattery by her side,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The parasite empoisoning her ear.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">With all the servile wretches in the rear,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Looks o’er proud property, extended wide;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And eyes the simple rustic hind,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Whose toil upholds the glittering show,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A creature of another kind,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Some coarser substance, unrefin’d,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Placed for her lordly use thus far, thus vile, below.<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_71" id="Page_71">[71]</a></span><span class="i2">Where, where is love’s fond, tender throe,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">With lordly honour’s lofty brow,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">The powers you proudly own?<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Is there, beneath love’s noble name,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Can harbour, dark, the selfish aim,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">To bless himself alone!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Mark maiden innocence a prey<br /></span> +<span class="i4">To love-pretending snares,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">This boasted honour turns away,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Shunning soft pity’s rising sway,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Regardless of the tears and unavailing prayers!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Perhaps this hour, in misery’s squalid nest,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">She strains your infant to her joyless breast,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And with a mother’s fears shrinks at the rocking blast!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Oh ye! who, sunk in beds of down,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Feel not a want but what yourselves create,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Think, for a moment, on his wretched fate,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Whom friends and fortune quite disown!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ill satisfied keen nature’s clamorous call,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Stretched on his straw he lays himself to sleep,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">While through the ragged roof and chinky wall,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Chill o’er his slumbers piles the drifty heap!<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Think on the dungeon’s grim confine,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Where guilt and poor misfortune pine!<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Guilt, erring man, relenting view!<br /></span> +<span class="i4">But shall thy legal rage pursue<br /></span> +<span class="i4">The wretch, already crushed low<br /></span> +<span class="i4">By cruel fortune’s undeserved blow?<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Affliction’s sons are brothers in distress,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A brother to relieve, how exquisite the bliss!”<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i2">I heard nae mair, for Chanticleer<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Shook off the pouthery snaw,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And hailed the morning with a cheer—<br /></span> +<span class="i4">A cottage-rousing craw!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i2">But deep this truth impressed my mind—<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Through all his works abroad,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The heart benevolent and kind<br /></span> +<span class="i4">The most resembles <span class="smcap">God</span>.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="XIII" id="XIII"></a>XIII.</h2> + +<h3>REMORSE.</h3> +<h4>A FRAGMENT.</h4> +<p>[“I entirely agree,” says Burns, “with the author of the <i>Theory of +Moral Sentiments</i>, that Remorse is the most painful sentiment that can +embitter the human bosom; an ordinary pitch of fortitude may bear up +admirably well, under those calamities, in the procurement of which we +ourselves have had no hand; but when our follies or crimes have made +us wretched, to bear all with manly firmness, and at the same time +have a proper penitential sense of our misconduct, is a glorious +effort of self-command.”]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Of all the numerous ills that hurt our peace,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That press the soul, or wring the mind with anguish,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Beyond comparison the worst are those<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That to our folly or our guilt we owe.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In every other circumstance, the mind<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Has this to say, ‘It was no deed of mine;’<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But when to all the evil of misfortune<br /></span> +<span class="i0">This sting is added—‘Blame thy foolish self!’<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or worser far, the pangs of keen remorse;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The torturing, gnawing consciousness of guilt,—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of guilt, perhaps, where we’ve involved others;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The young, the innocent, who fondly lov’d us,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Nay, more, that very love their cause of ruin!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O burning hell! in all thy store of torments,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">There’s not a keener lash!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Lives there a man so firm, who, while his heart<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Feels all the bitter horrors of his crime,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Can reason down its agonizing throbs;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And, after proper purpose of amendment,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Can firmly force his jarring thoughts to peace?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O, happy! happy! enviable man!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O glorious magnanimity of soul!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="XIV" id="XIV"></a>XIV.</h2> + +<h3>THE JOLLY BEGGARS.</h3> +<h4>A CANTATA.</h4> +<p>[This inimitable poem, unknown to Currie and unheardof while the poet +lived, was first given to the world, with other characteristic pieces, +by Mr. Stewart of Glasgow, in the year 1801. Some have surmised that +it is not the work of Burns; but the parentage is certain: the +original manuscript at the time of its composition, in 1785, was put +into the hands of Mr. Richmond of Mauchline, and afterwards given by +Burns himself to Mr. Woodburn, factor of the laird of Craigen-gillan; +the song of “For a’ that, and a’ that” was inserted by the poet, with +his name, in the <i>Musical Museum</i> of February, 1790. Cromek admired, +yet did not, from overruling advice, print it in the <i>Reliques</i>, for +which he was sharply censured by Sir Walter Scott, in the <i>Quarterly +Review.</i> The scene of the poem is in Mauchline, where Poosie Nancy had +her change-house. Only one copy in the handwriting of Burns is +supposed to exist; and of it a very accurate fac-simile has been +given.]</p> + +<p class="std2">RECITATIVO.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">When lyart leaves bestrow the yird,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or wavering like the bauckie-bird,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Bedim cauld Boreas’ blast;<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_72" id="Page_72">[72]</a></span><span class="i0">When hailstanes drive wi’ bitter skyte<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And infant frosts begin to bite,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">In hoary cranreuch drest;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ae night at e’en a merry core<br /></span> +<span class="i4">O’ randie, gangrel bodies,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In Poosie-Nansie’s held the splore,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">To drink their orra duddies:<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Wi’ quaffing and laughing,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">They ranted an’ they sang;<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Wi’ jumping and thumping,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">The vera girdle rang.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">First, neist the fire, in auld red rags,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ane sat, weel brac’d wi’ mealy bags,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">And knapsack a’ in order;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">His doxy lay within his arm,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wi’ usquebae an’ blankets warm—<br /></span> +<span class="i6">She blinket on her sodger:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ ay he gies the tozie drab<br /></span> +<span class="i4">The tither skelpin’ kiss,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">While she held up her greedy gab<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Just like an aumous dish.<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Ilk smack still, did crack still,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Just like a cadger’s whip,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Then staggering and swaggering<br /></span> +<span class="i8">He roar’d this ditty up—<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">AIR.</p> + +<p class="std3">Tune—“<i>Soldiers’ Joy.</i>”</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I am a son of Mars,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Who have been in many wars,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And show my cuts and scars<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Wherever I come;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">This here was for a wench,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And that other in a trench,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When welcoming the French<br /></span> +<span class="i4">At the sound of the drum.<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Lal de daudle, &c.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">My ‘prenticeship I past<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where my leader breath’d his last,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When the bloody die was cast<br /></span> +<span class="i4">On the heights of Abram;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I served out my trade<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When the gallant game was play’d,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And the Moro low was laid<br /></span> +<span class="i4">At the sound of the drum.<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Lal de daudle, &c.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I lastly was with Curtis,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Among the floating batt’ries,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And there I left for witness<br /></span> +<span class="i4">An arm and a limb;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yet let my country need me,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With Elliot to head me,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I’d clatter on my stumps<br /></span> +<span class="i4">At the sound of a drum.<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Lal de dandle, &c.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">And now tho’ I must beg,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With a wooden arm and leg,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And many a tatter’d rag<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Hanging over my bum<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I’m as happy with my wallet,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My bottle and my callet,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As when I used in scarlet<br /></span> +<span class="i4">To follow a drum.<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Lal de daudle, &c.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">What tho’ with hoary locks<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I must stand the winter shocks,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Beneath the woods and rocks<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Oftentimes for a home,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When the tother bag I sell,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And the tother bottle tell,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I could meet a troop of hell,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">At the sound of a drum.<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Lal de daudle, &c.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">RECITATIVO.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">He ended; and kebars sheuk<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Aboon the chorus roar;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">While frighted rattons backward leuk,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And seek the benmost bore;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A fairy fiddler frae the neuk,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">He skirl’d out—encore!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But up arose the martial Chuck,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And laid the loud uproar.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">AIR.</p> + +<p class="std3">Tune—“<i>Soldier laddie.</i>”</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I once was a maid, tho’ I cannot tell when,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And still my delight is in proper young men;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Some one of a troop of dragoons was my daddie,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">No wonder I’m fond of a sodger laddie.<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Sing, Lal de dal, &c.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The first of my loves was a swaggering blade,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To rattle the thundering drum was his trade;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">His leg was so tight, and his cheek was so ruddy,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Transported I was with my sodger laddie.<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Sing, Lal de dal, &c.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But the godly old chaplain left him in the lurch,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The sword I forsook for the sake of the church;<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_73" id="Page_73">[73]</a></span><span class="i0">He ventur’d the soul, and I risk’d the body,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">’Twas then I prov’d false to my sodger laddie.<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Sing, Lal de dal, &c.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Full soon I grew sick of my sanctified sot,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The regiment at large for a husband I got;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">From the gilded spontoon to the fife I was ready,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I asked no more but a sodger laddie.<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Sing, Lal de dal, &c.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But the peace it reduc’d me to beg in despair,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Till I met my old boy in a Cunningham fair;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">His rags regimental they flutter’d so gaudy,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My heart is rejoic’d at my sodger laddie.<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Sing, Lal de dal, &c.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">And now I have liv’d—I know not how long,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And still I can join in a cup or a song;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But whilst with both hands I can hold the glass steady,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Here’s to thee, my hero, my sodger laddie.<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Sing, Lal de dal, &c.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">RECITATIVO.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Poor Merry Andrew in the neuk,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Sat guzzling wi’ a tinkler hizzie;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">They mind’t na wha the chorus teuk,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Between themselves they were sae busy:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">At length wi’ drink and courting dizzy<br /></span> +<span class="i2">He stoitered up an’ made a face;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Then turn’d, an’ laid a smack on Grizzie,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Syne tun’d his pipes wi’ grave grimace.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">AIR.</p> + +<p class="std3">Tune—“<i>Auld Sir Symon.</i>”</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Sir Wisdom’s a fool when he’s fou,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Sir Knave is a fool in a session;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He’s there but a ‘prentice I trow,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But I am a fool by profession.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">My grannie she bought me a beuk,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And I held awa to the school;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I fear I my talent misteuk,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But what will ye hae of a fool?<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">For drink I would venture my neck,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A hizzie’s the half o’ my craft,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But what could ye other expect,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Of ane that’s avowedly daft?<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I ance was ty’d up like a stirk,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For civilly swearing and quaffing;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I ance was abused in the kirk,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Fer touzling a lass i’ my daffin.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Poor Andrew that tumbles for sport,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Let naebody name wi’ a jeer;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">There’s ev’n I’m tauld i’ the court<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A tumbler ca’d the premier.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Observ’d ye, yon reverend lad<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Maks faces to tickle the mob;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He rails at our mountebank squad,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Its rivalship just i’ the job.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">And now my conclusion I’ll tell,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For faith I’m confoundedly dry;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The chiel that’s a fool for himsel’,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Gude L—d! he’s far dafter than I.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">RECITATIVO.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Then neist outspak a raucle carlin,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wha kent fu’ weel to cleek the sterling,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For monie a pursie she had hooked,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And had in mony a well been ducked.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Her dove had been a Highland laddie,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But weary fa’ the waefu’ woodie!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wi’ sighs and sobs she thus began<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To wail her braw John Highlandman.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">AIR.</p> + +<p class="std3">Tune—“<i>O an ye were dead, guidman.</i>”</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">A Highland lad my love was born,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The Lalland laws he held in scorn;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But he still was faithfu’ to his clan,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My gallant braw John Highlandman.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std3">CHORUS.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Sing, hey my braw John Highlandman!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sing, ho my braw John Highlandman!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">There’s not a lad in a’ the lan’<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Was match for my John Highlandman.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">With his philibeg an’ tartan plaid,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ gude claymore down by his side,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The ladies’ hearts he did trepan,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My gallant braw John Highlandman.<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Sing, hey, &c.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">We ranged a’ from Tweed to Spey,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ liv’d like lords and ladies gay;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For a Lalland face he feared none,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My gallant braw John Highlandman.<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Sing, hey, &c.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">They banished him beyond the sea,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But ere the bud was on the tree,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Adown my cheeks the pearls ran,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Embracing my John Highlandman.<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Sing, hey, &c.<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_74" id="Page_74">[74]</a></span></div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But, och! they catch’d him at the last,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And bound him in a dungeon fast;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My curse upon them every one,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">They’ve hang’d my braw John Highlandman.<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Sing, hey, &c.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">And now a widow, I must mourn,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The pleasures that will ne’er return:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">No comfort but a hearty can,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When I think on John Highlandman.<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Sing, hey, &c.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">RECITATIVO.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">A pigmy scraper, wi’ his fiddle,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wha us’d at trysts and fairs to driddle,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Her strappan limb and gausy middle<br /></span> +<span class="i8">He reach’d na higher,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Had hol’d his heartie like a riddle,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">An’ blawn’t on fire.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Wi’ hand on hainch, an’ upward e’e,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He croon’d his gamut, one, two, three,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Then in an Arioso key,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">The wee Apollo<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Set off wi’ Allegretto glee<br /></span> +<span class="i8">His giga solo.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">AIR.</p> + +<p class="std3">Tune—“<i>Whistle o’er the lave o’t.</i>”</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Let me ryke up to dight that tear,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And go wi’ me and be my dear,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And then your every care and fear<br /></span> +<span class="i2">May whistle owre the lave o’t.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std3">CHORUS.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I am a fiddler to my trade,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ a’ the tunes that e’er I play’d,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The sweetest still to wife or maid,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Was whistle owre the lave o’t.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">At kirns and weddings we’se be there,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And O! sae nicely’s we will fare;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">We’ll house about till Daddie Care<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Sings whistle owre the lave o’t<br /></span> +<span class="i6">I am, &c.<br /> +</span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Sae merrily the banes we’ll byke,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And sun oursells about the dyke,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And at our leisure, when ye like,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">We’ll whistle owre the lave o’t.<br /></span> +<span class="i6">I am, &c.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But bless me wi’ your heav’n o’ charms,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And while I kittle hair on thairms,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Hunger, cauld, and a’ sic harms,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">May whistle owre the lave o’t.<br /></span> +<span class="i6">I am, &c.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">RECITATIVO.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Her charms had struck a sturdy caird,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">As weel as poor gut-scraper;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He taks the fiddler by the beard,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And draws a roosty rapier—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He swoor by a’ was swearing worth,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To speet him like a pliver,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Unless he wad from that time forth<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Relinquish her for ever.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Wi’ ghastly e’e, poor tweedle-dee<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Upon his hunkers bended,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And pray’d for grace wi’ ruefu’ face,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And sae the quarrel ended.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But tho’ his little heart did grieve<br /></span> +<span class="i2">When round the tinkler prest her,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He feign’d to snirtle in his sleeve,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">When thus the caird address’d her:<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">AIR.</p> + +<p class="std3">Tune—“<i>Clout the Caudron.</i>”</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">My bonny lass, I work in brass,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A tinkler is my station:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I’ve travell’d round all Christian ground<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In this my occupation:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I’ve taen the gold, an’ been enrolled<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In many a noble sqadron:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But vain they search’d, when off I march’d<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To go and clout the caudron.<br /></span> +<span class="i8">I’ve taen the gold, &c.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Despise that shrimp, that wither’d imp,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Wi’ a’ his noise and caprin,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And tak a share wi’ those that bear<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The budget and the apron.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And by that stoup, my faith and houp,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’ by that dear Kilbaigie,<a name="FNanchor_5_5" id="FNanchor_5_5"></a><a href="#Footnote_5_5" class="fnanchor">[5]</a><br /></span> +<span class="i0">If e’er ye want, or meet wi’ scant,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">May I ne’er weet my craigie.<br /></span> +<span class="i8">An’ by that stoup, &c.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">RECITATIVO.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The caird prevail’d—th’ unblushing fair<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In his embraces sunk,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Partly wi’ love o’ercome sae sair,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’ partly she was drunk.<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_75" id="Page_75">[75]</a></span><span class="i0">Sir Violino, with an air<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That show’d a man of spunk,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wish’d unison between the pair,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’ made the bottle clunk<br /></span> +<span class="i8">To their health that night.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But urchin Cupid shot a shaft,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That play’d a dame a shavie,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A sailor rak’d her fore and aft,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Behint the chicken cavie.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Her lord, a wight o’ Homer’s craft,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Tho’ limping wi’ the spavie,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He hirpl’d up and lap like daft,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And shor’d them Dainty Davie<br /></span> +<span class="i8">O boot that night.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">He was a care-defying blade<br /></span> +<span class="i2">As ever Bacchus listed,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Tho’ Fortune sair upon him laid,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">His heart she ever miss’d it.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He had nae wish but—to be glad,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Nor want but—when he thirsted;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He hated nought but—to be sad,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And thus the Muse suggested<br /></span> +<span class="i8">His sang that night.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">AIR </p> +<p class="std3">Tune—“<i>For a’ that, an’ a’ that.</i>”</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I am a bard of no regard<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Wi’ gentle folks, an’ a’ that:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But Homer-like, the glowran byke,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Frae town to town I draw that.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">CHORUS</p> +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">For a’ that, an’ a’ that,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’ twice as muckle’s a’ that;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I’ve lost but ane, I’ve twa behin’,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I’ve wife enough for a’ that.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I never drank the Muses’ stank,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Castalia’s burn, an’ a’ that;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But there it streams, and richly reams,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My Helicon I ca’ that.<br /></span> +<span class="i8">For a’ that, &c.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Great love I bear to a’ the fair,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Their humble slave, an’ a’ that;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But lordly will, I hold it still<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A mortal sin to thraw that.<br /></span> +<span class="i8">For a’ that, &c.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">In raptures sweet, this hour we meet,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Wi’ mutual love, an a’ that:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But for how lang the flie may stang,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Let inclination law that.<br /></span> +<span class="i8">For a’ that, &c.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Their tricks and craft have put me daft.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">They’ve ta’en me in, and a’ that;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But clear your decks, and here’s the sex!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I like the jads for a’ that<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">CHORUS</p> +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">For a’ that, an’ a’ that,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’ twice as muckle’s a’ that;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My dearest bluid, to do them guid,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">They’re welcome till’t for a’ that<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">RECITATIVO</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">So sung the bard—and Nansie’s wa’s<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Shook with a thunder of applause,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Re-echo’d from each mouth:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">They toom’d their pocks, an’ pawn’d their duds,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">They scarcely left to co’er their fuds,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">To quench their lowan drouth.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Then owre again, the jovial thrang,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">The poet did request,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To loose his pack an’ wale a sang,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">A ballad o’ the best;<br /></span> +<span class="i6">He rising, rejoicing,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Between his twa Deborahs<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Looks round him, an’ found them<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Impatient for the chorus.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">AIR </p> +<p class="std3">Tune—“<i>Jolly Mortals, fill your Glasses.</i>”</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">See! the smoking bowl before us,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Mark our jovial ragged ring!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Round and round take up the chorus,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And in raptures let us sing.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std3">CHORUS.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">A fig for those by law protected!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Liberty’s a glorious feast!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Courts for cowards were erected,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Churches built to please the priest.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">What is title? what is treasure?<br /></span> +<span class="i2">What is reputation’s care?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">If we lead a life of pleasure,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">’Tis no matter how or where!<br /></span> +<span class="i8">A fig, &c.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">With the ready trick and fable,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Round we wander all the day;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And at night, in barn or stable,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Hug our doxies on the hay.<br /></span> +<span class="i8">A fig, &c.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_76" id="Page_76">[76]</a></span> +<span class="i0">Does the train-attended carriage<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Through the country lighter rove?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Does the sober bed of marriage<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Witness brighter scenes of love?<br /></span> +<span class="i8">A fig, &c.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Life is all a variorum,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">We regard not how it goes;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Let them cant about decorum<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Who have characters to lose.<br /></span> +<span class="i8">A fig, &c.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Here’s to budgets, bags, and wallets!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Here’s to all the wandering train!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Here’s our ragged brats and wallets!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">One and all cry out—Amen!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i2">A fig for those by law protected!<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Liberty’s a glorious feast!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Courts for cowards were erected,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Churches built to please the priest.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_5_5" id="Footnote_5_5"></a><a href="#FNanchor_5_5"><span class="label">[5]</span></a> A peculiar sort of whiskey.</p></div> +</div> + + + +<h2><a name="XV" id="XV"></a>XV.</h2> + +<h3>DEATH AND DR. HORNBOOK.</h3> +<h4>A TRUE STORY.</h4> +<p>[John Wilson, raised to the unwelcome elevation of hero to this poem, +was, at the time of its composition, schoolmaster in Tarbolton: he as, +it is said, a fair scholar, and a very worthy man, but vain of his +knowledge in medicine—so vain, that he advertised his merits, and +offered advice gratis. It was his misfortune to encounter Burns at a +mason meeting, who, provoked by a long and pedantic speech, from the +Dominie, exclaimed, the future lampoon dawning upon him, “Sit down, +Dr. Hornbook.” On his way home, the poet seated himself on the ledge +of a bridge, composed the poem, and, overcome with poesie and drink, +fell asleep, and did not awaken till the sun was shining over Galston +Moors. Wilson went afterwards to Glasgow, embarked in mercantile and +matrimonial speculations, and prospered, and is still prospering.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Some books are lies frae end to end,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And some great lies were never penn’d:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ev’n ministers, they ha’e been kenn’d,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">In holy rapture,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A rousing whid, at times, to vend,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">And nail’t wi’ Scripture.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But this that I am gaun to tell,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Which lately on a night befel,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Is just as true’s the Deil’s in h—ll<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Or Dublin-city;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That e’er he nearer comes oursel<br /></span> +<span class="i8">‘S a muckle pity.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The Clachan yill had made me canty,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I was na fou, but just had plenty;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I stacher’d whyles, but yet took tent ay<br /></span> +<span class="i8">To free the ditches;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ hillocks, stanes, and bushes, kenn’d ay<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Frae ghaists an’ witches.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The rising moon began to glow’r<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The distant Cumnock hills out-owre:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To count her horns with a’ my pow’r,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">I set mysel;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But whether she had three or four,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">I could na tell.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I was come round about the hill,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And todlin down on Willie’s mill,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Setting my staff with a’ my skill,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">To keep me sicker;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Tho’ leeward whyles, against my will,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">I took a bicker.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I there wi’ something did forgather,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That put me in an eerie swither;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An awfu’ scythe, out-owre ae shouther,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Clear-dangling, hang;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A three-taed leister on the ither<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Lay, large an’ lang.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Its stature seem’d lang Scotch ells twa,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The queerest shape that e’er I saw,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For fient a wame it had ava:<br /></span> +<span class="i8">And then, its shanks,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">They were as thin, as sharp an’ sma’<br /></span> +<span class="i8">As cheeks o’ branks.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Guid-een,” quo’ I; “Friend, hae ye been mawin,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When ither folk are busy sawin?”<br /></span> +<span class="i0">It seem’d to mak a kind o’ stan’,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">But naething spak;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">At length, says I, “Friend, where ye gaun,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Will ye go back?”<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">It spak right howe,—“My name is Death,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But be na fley’d.”—Quoth I, “Guid faith,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ye’re may be come to stap my breath;<br /></span> +<span class="i8">But tent me, billie;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I red ye weel, take care o’ skaith,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">See, there’s a gully!”<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Guidman,” quo’ he, “put up your whittle,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I’m no design’d to try its mettle;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But if I did, I wad be kittle<br /></span> +<span class="i8">To be mislear’d,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I wad nae mind it, no that spittle<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Out-owre my beard.”<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_77" id="Page_77">[77]</a></span></div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Weel, weel!” says I, “a bargain be’t;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Come, gies your hand, an’ sae we’re gree’t;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">We’ll ease our shanks an’ tak a seat,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Come, gies your news!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">This while ye hae been mony a gate<br /></span> +<span class="i8">At mony a house.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Ay, ay!” quo’ he, an’ shook his head,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">“It’s e’en a lang, lang time indeed<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sin’ I began to nick the thread,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">An’ choke the breath:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Folk maun do something for their bread,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">An’ sae maun Death.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Sax thousand years are near hand fled<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sin’ I was to the butching bred,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ mony a scheme in vain’s been laid,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">To stap or scar me;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Till ane Hornbook’s ta’en up the trade,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">An’ faith, he’ll waur me.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Ye ken Jock Hornbook i’ the Clachan,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Deil mak his kings-hood in a spleuchan!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He’s grown sae weel acquaint wi’ Buchan<a name="FNanchor_6_6" id="FNanchor_6_6"></a><a href="#Footnote_6_6" class="fnanchor">[6]</a><br /></span> +<span class="i8">An’ ither chaps,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The weans haud out their fingers laughin<br /></span> +<span class="i8">And pouk my hips.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“See, here’s a scythe, and there’s a dart,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">They hae pierc’d mony a gallant heart;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But Doctor Hornbook, wi’ his art<br /></span> +<span class="i8">And cursed skill,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Has made them baith no worth a f——t,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Damn’d haet they’ll kill.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“’Twas but yestreen, nae farther gaen,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I threw a noble throw at ane;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wi’ less, I’m sure, I’ve hundreds slain;<br /></span> +<span class="i8">But-deil-ma-care,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">It just play’d dirl on the bane,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">But did nae mair.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Hornbook was by, wi’ ready art,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And had sae fortified the part,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That when I looked to my dart,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">It was sae blunt,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Fient haet o’t wad hae pierc’d the heart<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Of a kail-runt.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“I drew my scythe in sic a fury,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I near-hand cowpit wi’ my hurry,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But yet the bauld Apothecary,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Withstood the shock;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I might as weel hae tried a quarry<br /></span> +<span class="i8">O’ hard whin rock.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Ev’n them he canna get attended,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Although their face he ne’er had kend it,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Just sh—— in a kail-blade, and send it,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">As soon’s he smells’t,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Baith their disease, and what will mend it,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">At once he tells’t.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“And then a’ doctor’s saws and whittles,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of a’ dimensions, shapes, an’ mettles,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A’ kinds o’ boxes, mugs, an’ bottles,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">He’s sure to hae;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Their Latin names as fast he rattles<br /></span> +<span class="i8">As A B C.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Calces o’ fossils, earths, and trees;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">True sal-marinum o’ the seas;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The farina of beans and pease,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">He has’t in plenty;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Aqua-fortis, what you please,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">He can content ye.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Forbye some new, uncommon weapons,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Urinus spiritus of capons;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or mite-horn shavings, filings, scrapings,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Distill’d <i>per se</i>;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sal-alkali o’ midge-tail clippings,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">And mony mae.”<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Waes me for Johnny Ged’s-Hole<a name="FNanchor_7_7" id="FNanchor_7_7"></a><a href="#Footnote_7_7" class="fnanchor">[7]</a> now,”<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Quo’ I, “If that thae news be true!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">His braw calf-ward whare gowans grew,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Sae white and bonie,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Nae doubt they’ll rive it wi’ the plew;<br /></span> +<span class="i8">They’ll ruin Johnie!”<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The creature grain’d an eldritch laugh,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And says, “Ye need na yoke the plough,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Kirkyards will soon be till’d eneugh,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Tak ye nae fear;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">They’ll a’ be trench’d wi’ mony a sheugh<br /></span> +<span class="i8">In twa-three year.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Whare I kill’d ane a fair strae death,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">By loss o’ blood or want of breath,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">This night I’m free to tak my aith,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">That Hornbook’s skill<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Has clad a score i’ their last claith,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">By drap an’ pill.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“An honest wabster to his trade,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Whase wife’s twa nieves were scarce weel bred,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Gat tippence-worth to mend her head,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">When it was sair;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The wife slade cannie to her bed,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">But ne’er spak mair<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_78" id="Page_78">[78]</a></span></p><div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“A countra laird had ta’en the batts,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or some curmurring in his guts,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">His only son for Hornbook sets,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">An’ pays him well.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The lad, for twa guid gimmer-pets,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Was laird himsel.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“A bonnie lass, ye kend her name,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Some ill-brewn drink had hov’d her wame;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">She trusts hersel, to hide the shame,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">In Hornbook’s care;<br /></span> +<span class="i0"><i>Horn</i> sent her aff to her lang hame,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">To hide it there.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“That’s just a swatch o’ Hornbook’s way;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thus goes he on from day to day,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thus does he poison, kill, an’ slay,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">An’s weel paid for’t;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yet stops me o’ my lawfu’ prey,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Wi’ his d—mn’d dirt:<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“But, hark! I’ll tell you of a plot,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Though dinna ye be speaking o’t;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I’ll nail the self-conceited sot,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">As dead’s a herrin’:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Niest time we meet, I’ll wad a groat,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">He gets his fairin’!”<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But just as he began to tell,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The auld kirk-hammer strak’ the bell<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Some wee short hour ayont the twal,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Which rais’d us baith:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I took the way that pleas’d mysel’,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">And sae did Death.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_6_6" id="Footnote_6_6"></a><a href="#FNanchor_6_6"><span class="label">[6]</span></a> Buchan’s Domestic Medicine.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_7_7" id="Footnote_7_7"></a><a href="#FNanchor_7_7"><span class="label">[7]</span></a> The grave-digger.</p></div> +</div> + + + +<h2><a name="XVI" id="XVI"></a>XVI.</h2> + +<h4>THE TWA HERDS:</h4> +<h5>OR,</h5> +<h3>THE HOLY TULZIE.</h3> +<p>[The actors in this indecent drama were Moodie, minister of Ricartoun, +and Russell, helper to the minister of Kilmarnock: though apostles of +the “Old Light,” they forgot their brotherhood in the vehemence of +controversy, and went, it is said, to blows. “This poem,” says Burns, +“with a certain description of the clergy as well as laity, met with a +roar of applause.”]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O a’ ye pious godly flocks,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Weel fed on pastures orthodox,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wha now will keep you frae the fox,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Or worrying tykes,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or wha will tent the waifs and crocks,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">About the dykes?<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The twa best herds in a’ the wast,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That e’er ga’e gospel horn a blast,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">These five and twenty simmers past,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">O! dool to tell,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ha’e had a bitter black out-cast<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Atween themsel.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O, Moodie, man, and wordy Russell,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">How could you raise so vile a bustle,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ye’ll see how New-Light herds will whistle<br /></span> +<span class="i8">And think it fine:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The Lord’s cause ne’er got sic a twistle<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Sin’ I ha’e min’.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O, sirs! whae’er wad ha’e expeckit<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Your duty ye wad sae negleckit,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ye wha were ne’er by lairds respeckit,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">To wear the plaid,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But by the brutes themselves eleckit,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">To be their guide.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">What flock wi’ Moodie’s flock could rank,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sae hale and hearty every shank,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Nae poison’d sour Arminian stank,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">He let them taste,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Frae Calvin’s well, ay clear they drank,—<br /></span> +<span class="i8">O sic a feast!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The thummart, wil’-cat, brock, and tod,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Weel kend his voice thro’ a’ the wood,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He smelt their ilka hole and road,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Baith out and in,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And weel he lik’d to shed their bluid,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">And sell their skin.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">What herd like Russell tell’d his tale,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">His voice was heard thro’ muir and dale,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He kend the Lord’s sheep, ilka tail,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">O’er a’ the height,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And saw gin they were sick or hale,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">At the first sight.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">He fine a mangy sheep could scrub,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or nobly fling the gospel club,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And New-Light herds could nicely drub,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Or pay their skin;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Could shake them o’er the burning dub,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Or heave them in.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Sic twa—O! do I live to see’t,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sic famous twa should disagreet,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ names, like villain, hypocrite,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Ilk ither gi’en,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">While New-Light herds, wi’ laughin’ spite,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Say neither’s liein’!<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_79" id="Page_79">[79]</a></span></div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">An’ ye wha tent the gospel fauld,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">There’s Duncan, deep, and Peebles, shaul,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But chiefly thou, apostle Auld,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">We trust in thee,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That thou wilt work them, hot and cauld,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Till they agree.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Consider, Sirs, how we’re beset;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">There’s scarce a new herd that we get<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But comes frae mang that cursed set<br /></span> +<span class="i8">I winna name;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I hope frae heav’n to see them yet<br /></span> +<span class="i8">In fiery flame.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Dalrymple has been lang our fae,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">M’Gill has wrought us meikle wae,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And that curs’d rascal call’d M’Quhae,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">And baith the Shaws,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That aft ha’e made us black and blae,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Wi’ vengefu’ paws.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Auld Wodrow lang has hatch’d mischief,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">We thought ay death wad bring relief,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But he has gotten, to our grief,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Ane to succeed him,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A chield wha’ll soundly buff our beef;<br /></span> +<span class="i8">I meikle dread him.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">And mony a ane that I could tell,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wha fain would openly rebel,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Forbye turn-coats amang oursel,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">There’s Smith for ane,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I doubt he’s but a grey-nick quill,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">An’ that ye’ll fin’.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O! a’ ye flocks o’er a’ the hills,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">By mosses, meadows, moors, and fells,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Come, join your counsel and your skills<br /></span> +<span class="i8">To cow the lairds,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And get the brutes the powers themsels<br /></span> +<span class="i8">To choose their herds;<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Then Orthodoxy yet may prance,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And Learning in a woody dance,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And that fell cur ca’d Common Sense,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">That bites sae sair,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Be banish’d o’er the sea to France:<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Let him bark there.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Then Shaw’s and Dalrymple’s eloquence,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">M’Gill’s close nervous excellence,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">M’Quhae’s pathetic manly sense,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">And guid M’Math,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wi’ Smith, wha thro’ the heart can glance,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">May a’ pack aff.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="XVII" id="XVII"></a>XVII.</h2> + +<h3>HOLY WILLIE’S PRAYER.</h3> +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“And send the godly in a pet to pray.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="sig1 smcap">Pope.</p> + +<p>[Of this sarcastic and too daring poem many copies in manuscript were +circulated while the poet lived, but though not unknown or unfelt by +Currie, it continued unpublished till printed by Stewart with the +Jolly Beggars, in 1801. Holy Willie was a small farmer, leading elder +to Auld, a name well known to all lovers of Burns; austere in speech, +scrupulous in all outward observances, and, what is known by the name +of a “professing Christian.” He experienced, however, a “sore fall;” +he permitted himself to be “filled fou,” and in a moment when “self +got in” made free, it is said, with the money of the poor of the +parish. His name was William Fisher.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O thou, wha in the heavens dost dwell,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wha, as it pleases best thysel’,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sends ane to heaven, and ten to hell,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">A’ for thy glory,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And no for ony gude or ill<br /></span> +<span class="i8">They’ve done afore thee!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I bless and praise thy matchless might,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Whan thousands thou hast left in night,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That I am here afore thy sight,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">For gifts and grace,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A burnin’ and a shinin’ light<br /></span> +<span class="i8">To a’ this place.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">What was I, or my generation,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That I should get sic exaltation,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I wha deserve sic just damnation,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">For broken laws,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Five thousand years ‘fore my creation,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Thro’ Adam’s cause.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">When frae my mither’s womb I fell,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thou might hae plunged me in hell,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To gnash my gums, to weep and wail,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">In burnin’ lake,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Whar damned devils roar and yell,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Chain’d to a stake.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Yet I am here a chosen sample;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To show thy grace is great and ample;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I’m here a pillar in thy temple,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Strong as a rock,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A guide, a buckler, an example,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">To a’ thy flock.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But yet, O Lord! confess I must,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">At times I’m fash’d wi’ fleshly lust;<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_80" id="Page_80">[80]</a></span><span class="i0">And sometimes, too, wi’ warldly trust,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Vile self gets in;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But thou remembers we are dust,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Defil’d in sin.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O Lord! yestreen thou kens, wi’ Meg—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thy pardon I sincerely beg,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O! may’t ne’er be a livin’ plague<br /></span> +<span class="i8">To my dishonour,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ I’ll ne’er lift a lawless leg<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Again upon her.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Besides, I farther maun allow,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wi’ Lizzie’s lass, three times I trow—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But Lord, that Friday I was fou,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">When I came near her,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or else, thou kens, thy servant true<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Wad ne’er hae steer’d her.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Maybe thou lets this fleshly thorn,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Beset thy servant e’en and morn,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Lest he owre high and proud should turn,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">‘Cause he’s sae gifted;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">If sae, thy han’ maun e’en be borne<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Until thou lift it.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Lord, bless thy chosen in this place,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For here thou hast a chosen race:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But God confound their stubborn face,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">And blast their name,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wha bring thy elders to disgrace<br /></span> +<span class="i8">And public shame.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Lord, mind Gawn Hamilton’s deserts,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He drinks, and swears, and plays at carts,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yet has sae mony takin’ arts,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Wi’ grit and sma’,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Frae God’s ain priests the people’s hearts<br /></span> +<span class="i8">He steals awa.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">An’ whan we chasten’d him therefore,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thou kens how he bred sic a splore,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As set the warld in a roar<br /></span> +<span class="i8">O’ laughin’ at us;—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Curse thou his basket and his store,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Kail and potatoes.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Lord, hear my earnest cry and pray’r,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Against the presbyt’ry of Ayr;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thy strong right hand, Lord, mak it bare<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Upo’ their heads,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Lord weigh it down, and dinna spare,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">For their misdeeds.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O Lord my God, that glib-tongu’d Aiken,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My very heart and saul are quakin’,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To think how we stood groanin’, shakin’,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">And swat wi’ dread,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">While Auld wi’ hingin lips gaed sneakin’<br /></span> +<span class="i8">And hung his head.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Lord, in the day of vengeance try him,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Lord, visit them wha did employ him,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And pass not in thy mercy by ‘em,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Nor hear their pray’r;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But for thy people’s sake destroy ‘em,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">And dinna spare.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But, Lord, remember me an mine,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wi’ mercies temp’ral and divine,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That I for gear and grace may shine,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Excell’d by nane,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And a’ the glory shall be thine,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Amen, Amen!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="XVIII" id="XVIII"></a>XVIII.</h2> + +<h3>EPITAPH ON HOLY WILLIE.</h3> +<p>[We are informed by Richmond of Mauchline, that when he was clerk in +Gavin Hamilton’s office, Burns came in one morning and said, “I have +just composed a poem, John, and if you will write it, I will repeat +it.” He repeated Holy Willie’s Prayer and Epitaph; Hamilton came in at +the moment, and having read them with delight, ran laughing with them +in his hand to Robert Aiken. The end of Holy Willie was other than +godly; in one of his visits to Mauchline, he drank more than was +needful, fell into a ditch on his way home, and was found dead in the +morning.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Here Holy Willie’s sair worn clay<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Takes up its last abode;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">His saul has ta’en some other way,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I fear the left-hand road.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Stop! there he is, as sure’s a gun,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Poor, silly body, see him;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Nae wonder he’s as black’s the grun,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Observe wha’s standing wi’ him.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Your brunstane devilship I see,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Has got him there before ye;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But hand your nine-tail cat a wee,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Till ance you’ve heard my story.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Your pity I will not implore,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For pity ye hae nane;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Justice, alas! has gi’en him o’er,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And mercy’s day is gaen.<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_81" id="Page_81">[81]</a></span></div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But hear me, sir, deil as ye are,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Look something to your credit;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A coof like him wad stain your name,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">If it were kent ye did it.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="XIX" id="XIX"></a>XIX.</h2> + +<h3>THE INVENTORY;</h3> +<h4>IN ANSWER TO A MANDATE BY THE SURVEYOR +OF THE TAXES.</h4> +<p>[We have heard of a poor play-actor who, by a humorous inventory of +his effects, so moved the commissioners of the income tax, that they +remitted all claim on him then and forever; we know not that this very +humorous inventory of Burns had any such effect on Mr. Aiken, the +surveyor of the taxes. It is dated “Mossgiel, February 22d, 1786,” and +is remarkable for wit and sprightliness, and for the information which +it gives us of the poet’s habits, household, and agricultural +implements.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Sir, as your mandate did request,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I send you here a faithfu’ list,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O’ gudes, an’ gear, an’ a’ my graith,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To which I’m clear to gi’e my aith.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i2"><i>Imprimis</i>, then, for carriage cattle,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I have four brutes o’ gallant mettle,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As ever drew afore a pettle.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My lan’ afore’s<a name="FNanchor_8_8" id="FNanchor_8_8"></a><a href="#Footnote_8_8" class="fnanchor">[8]</a> a gude auld has been,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ wight, an’ wilfu’ a’ his days been.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My lan ahin’s<a name="FNanchor_9_9" id="FNanchor_9_9"></a><a href="#Footnote_9_9" class="fnanchor">[9]</a> a weel gaun fillie,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That aft has borne me hame frae Killie,<a name="FNanchor_10_10" id="FNanchor_10_10"></a><a href="#Footnote_10_10" class="fnanchor">[10]</a><br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ your auld burro’ mony a time,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In days when riding was nae crime—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But ance, whan in my wooing pride,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I like a blockhead boost to ride,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The wilfu’ creature sae I pat to,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">(L—d pardon a’ my sins an’ that too!)<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I play’d my fillie sic a shavie,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">She’s a’ bedevil’d with the spavie.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My fur ahin’s<a name="FNanchor_11_11" id="FNanchor_11_11"></a><a href="#Footnote_11_11" class="fnanchor">[11]</a> a wordy beast,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As e’er in tug or tow was trac’d.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The fourth’s a Highland Donald hastie,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A d—n’d red wud Kilburnie blastie!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Forbye a cowt o’ cowt’s the wale,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As ever ran afore a tail.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">If he be spar’d to be a beast,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He’ll draw me fifteen pun’ at least.—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wheel carriages I ha’e but few,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Three carts, an’ twa are feckly new;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ae auld wheelbarrow, mair for token,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ae leg an’ baith the trams are broken;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I made a poker o’ the spin’le,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ my auld mither brunt the trin’le.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i2">For men I’ve three mischievous boys,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Run de’ils for rantin’ an’ for noise;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A gaudsman ane, a thrasher t’other.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wee Davock hauds the nowt in fother.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I rule them as I ought, discreetly,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ aften labour them completely;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ ay on Sundays, duly, nightly,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I on the Questions targe them tightly;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Till, faith, wee Davock’s turn’d sae gleg,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Tho’ scarcely langer than your leg,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He’ll screed you aff Effectual calling,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As fast as ony in the dwalling.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I’ve nane in female servan’ station,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">(Lord keep me ay frae a’ temptation!)<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I ha’e nae wife—and that my bliss is,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ ye have laid nae tax on misses;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ then, if kirk folks dinna clutch me,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I ken the devils darena touch me.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wi’ weans I’m mair than weel contented,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Heav’n sent me ane mae than I wanted.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My sonsie smirking dear-bought Bess,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">She stares the daddy in her face,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Enough of ought ye like but grace;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But her, my bonnie sweet wee lady,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I’ve paid enough for her already,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ gin ye tax her or her mither,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">B’ the L—d! ye’se get them a’thegither.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i2">And now, remember, Mr. Aiken,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Nae kind of license out I’m takin’;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Frae this time forth, I do declare<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I’se ne’er ride horse nor hizzie mair;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thro’ dirt and dub for life I’ll paidle,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ere I sae dear pay for a saddle;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My travel a’ on foot I’ll shank it,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I’ve sturdy bearers, Gude be thankit.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The kirk and you may tak’ you that,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">It puts but little in your pat;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sae dinna put me in your buke.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Nor for my ten white shillings luke.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i2">This list wi’ my ain hand I wrote it,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">the day and date as under noted;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Then know all ye whom it concerns,<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><i>Subscripsi huic</i> </p> +<p class="sig"><span class="smcap">Robert Burns</span>.</p> + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_8_8" id="Footnote_8_8"></a><a href="#FNanchor_8_8"><span class="label">[8]</span></a> The fore-horse on the left-hand in the plough.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_9_9" id="Footnote_9_9"></a><a href="#FNanchor_9_9"><span class="label">[9]</span></a> The hindmost on the left-hand in the plough.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_10_10" id="Footnote_10_10"></a><a href="#FNanchor_10_10"><span class="label">[10]</span></a> Kilmarnock.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_11_11" id="Footnote_11_11"></a><a href="#FNanchor_11_11"><span class="label">[11]</span></a> The hindmost horse on the right-hand in the plough.</p></div> +</div> + + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_82" id="Page_82">[82]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="XX" id="XX"></a>XX.</h2> + +<h3>THE HOLY FAIR.</h3> +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">A robe of seeming truth and trust<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Did crafty observation;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And secret hung, with poison’d crust,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The dirk of Defamation:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A mask that like the gorget show’d,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Dye-varying on the pigeon;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And for a mantle large and broad,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">He wrapt him in Religion.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="sig1"><span class="smcap">Hypocrisy a-la-mode</span>.</p> + +<p>[The scene of this fine poem is the church-yard of Mauchline, and the +subject handled so cleverly and sharply is the laxity of manners +visible in matters so solemn and terrible as the administration of the +sacrament. “This was indeed,” says Lockhart, “an extraordinary +performance: no partisan of any sect could whisper that malice had +formed its principal inspiration, or that its chief attraction lay in +the boldness with which individuals, entitled and accustomed to +respect, were held up to ridicule: it was acknowledged, amidst the +sternest mutterings of wrath, that national manners were once more in +the hands of a national poet.” “It is no doubt,” says Hogg, “a +reckless piece of satire, but it is a clever one, and must have cut to +the bone. But much as I admire the poem I must regret that it is +partly borrowed from Ferguson.”]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Upon a simmer Sunday morn,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">When Nature’s face is fair,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I walked forth to view the corn,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’ snuff the caller air.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The rising sun owre Galston muirs,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Wi’ glorious light was glintin’;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The hares were hirplin down the furs,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The lav’rocks they were chantin’<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Fu’ sweet that day.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">As lightsomely I glowr’d abroad,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To see a scene sae gay,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Three hizzies, early at the road,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Cam skelpin up the way;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Twa had manteeles o’ dolefu’ black,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But ane wi’ lyart lining;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The third, that gaed a-wee a-back,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Was in the fashion shining<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Fu’ gay that day.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The twa appear’d like sisters twin,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In feature, form, an’ claes;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Their visage, wither’d, lang, an’ thin,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’ sour as ony slaes:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The third cam up, hap-step-an’-lowp,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">As light as ony lambie,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ wi’ a curchie low did stoop,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">As soon as e’er she saw me,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Fu’ kind that day.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Wi’ bonnet aff, quoth I, “Sweet lass,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I think ye seem to ken me;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I’m sure I’ve seen that bonnie face,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But yet I canna name ye.”<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Quo’ she, an’ laughin’ as she spak,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’ taks me by the hands,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">“Ye, for my sake, hae gi’en the feck,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Of a’ the ten commands<br /></span> +<span class="i8">A screed some day.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“My name is Fun—your cronie dear,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The nearest friend ye hae;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ this is Superstition here,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’ that’s Hypocrisy.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I’m gaun to Mauchline holy fair,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To spend an hour in daffin:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Gin ye’ll go there, yon runkl’d pair,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">We will get famous laughin’<br /></span> +<span class="i8">At them this day.”<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Quoth I, “With a’ my heart I’ll do’t;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I’ll get my Sunday’s sark on,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ meet you on the holy spot;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Faith, we’se hae fine remarkin’!”<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Then I gaed hame at crowdie-time<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’ soon I made me ready;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For roads were clad, frae side to side,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Wi’ monie a wearie body,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">In droves that day.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Here farmers gash, in ridin’ graith<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Gaed hoddin by their cottars;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">There, swankies young, in braw braid-claith,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Are springin’ o’er the gutters.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The lasses, skelpin barefit, thrang,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In silks an’ scarlets glitter;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wi’ sweet-milk cheese, in monie a whang,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’ farls bak’d wi’ butter,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Fu’ crump that day.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">When by the plate we set our nose,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Weel heaped up wi’ ha’pence,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A greedy glowr Black Bonnet throws,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’ we maun draw our tippence.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Then in we go to see the show,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">On ev’ry side they’re gath’rin’,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Some carrying dails, some chairs an’ stools,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’ some are busy blethrin’<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Right loud that day.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Here stands a shed to fend the show’rs,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’ screen our countra gentry,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">There, racer Jess, and twa-three wh-res,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Are blinkin’ at the entry.<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_83" id="Page_83">[83]</a></span><span class="i0">Here sits a raw of titlin’ jades,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Wi’ heaving breast and bare neck,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ there’s a batch o’ wabster lads,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Blackguarding frae Kilmarnock<br /></span> +<span class="i8">For fun this day.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Here some are thinkin’ on their sins,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’ some upo’ their claes;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ane curses feet that fyl’d his shins,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Anither sighs an’ prays:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">On this hand sits a chosen swatch,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Wi’ screw’d up grace-proud faces;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">On that a set o’ chaps at watch,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Thrang winkin’ on the lasses<br /></span> +<span class="i8">To chairs that day.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O happy is that man an’ blest!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Nae wonder that it pride him!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wha’s ain dear lass that he likes best,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Comes clinkin’ down beside him;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wi’ arm repos’d on the chair back,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">He sweetly does compose him;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Which, by degrees, slips round her neck,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’s loof upon her bosom,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Unkenn’d that day.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Now a’ the congregation o’er<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Is silent expectation;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For Moodie speeds the holy door,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Wi’ tidings o’ damnation.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Should Hornie, as in ancient days,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">‘Mang sons o’ God present him,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The vera sight o’ Moodie’s face,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To’s ain het hame had sent him<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Wi’ fright that day.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Hear how he clears the points o’ faith<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Wi’ ratlin’ an’ wi’ thumpin’!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Now meekly calm, now wild in wrath,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">He’s stampin an’ he’s jumpin’!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">His lengthen’d chin, his turn’d-up snout,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">His eldritch squeel and gestures,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Oh, how they fire the heart devout,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Like cantharidian plasters,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">On sic a day.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But hark! the tent has chang’d its voice:<br /></span> +<span class="i2">There’s peace an’ rest nae langer:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For a’ the real judges rise,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">They canna sit for anger.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Smith opens out his cauld harangues,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">On practice and on morals;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ aff the godly pour in thrangs,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To gie the jars an’ barrels<br /></span> +<span class="i8">A lift that day.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">What signifies his barren shine,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Of moral pow’rs and reason?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">His English style, an’ gestures fine,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Are a’ clean out o’ season.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Like Socrates or Antonine,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Or some auld pagan heathen,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The moral man he does define,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But ne’er a word o’ faith in<br /></span> +<span class="i8">That’s right that day.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">In guid time comes an antidote<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Against sic poison’d nostrum;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For Peebles, frae the water-fit,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Ascends the holy rostrum:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">See, up he’s got the word o’ God,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’ meek an’ mim has view’d it,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">While Common-Sense has ta’en the road,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’ aff, an’ up the Cowgate,<a name="FNanchor_12_12" id="FNanchor_12_12"></a><a href="#Footnote_12_12" class="fnanchor">[12]</a><br /></span> +<span class="i8">Fast, fast, that day.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Wee Miller, neist the guard relieves,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’ orthodoxy raibles,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Tho’ in his heart he weel believes,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’ thinks it auld wives’ fables:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But faith! the birkie wants a manse,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">So, cannily he hums them;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Altho’ his carnal wit an’ sense<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Like hafflins-ways o’ercomes him<br /></span> +<span class="i8">At times that day.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Now but an’ ben, the Change-house fills,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Wi’ yill-caup commentators:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Here’s crying out for bakes and gills,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’ there the pint-stowp clatters;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">While thick an’ thrang, an’ loud an’ lang,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Wi’ logic, an’ wi’ scripture,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">They raise a din, that, in the end,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Is like to breed a rupture<br /></span> +<span class="i8">O’ wrath that day.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Leeze me on drink! it gies us mair<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Than either school or college:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">It kindles wit, it waukens lair,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">It pangs us fou’ o’ knowledge,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Be’t whisky gill, or penny wheep,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Or any stronger potion,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">It never fails, on drinking deep,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To kittle up our notion<br /></span> +<span class="i8">By night or day.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The lads an’ lasses, blythely bent<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To mind baith saul an’ body,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sit round the table, weel content,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’ steer about the toddy.<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_84" id="Page_84">[84]</a></span><span class="i0">On this ane’s dress, an’ that ane’s leuk,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">They’re making observations;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">While some are cozie i’ the neuk,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’ formin’ assignations<br /></span> +<span class="i8">To meet some day.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But now the Lord’s ain trumpet touts,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Till a’ the hills are rairin’,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ echoes back return the shouts:<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Black Russell is na’ sparin’:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">His piercing words, like Highlan’ swords,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Divide the joints and marrow;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">His talk o’ Hell, where devils dwell,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Our vera sauls does harrow<a name="FNanchor_13_13" id="FNanchor_13_13"></a><a href="#Footnote_13_13" class="fnanchor">[13]</a><br /></span> +<span class="i8">Wi’ fright that day.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">A vast, unbottom’d boundless pit,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Fill’d fou o’ lowin’ brunstane,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wha’s ragin’ flame, an’ scorchin’ heat,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Wad melt the hardest whunstane!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The half asleep start up wi’ fear,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’ think they hear it roarin’,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When presently it does appear,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">’Twas but some neibor snorin’<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Asleep that day.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">’Twad be owre lang a tale to tell<br /></span> +<span class="i2">How monie stories past,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ how they crowded to the yill,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">When they were a’ dismist:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">How drink gaed round, in cogs an’ caups,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Amang the furms an’ benches:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ cheese an’ bread, frae women’s laps,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Was dealt about in lunches,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">An’ dawds that day.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">In comes a gaucie, gash guidwife,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’ sits down by the fire,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Syne draws her kebbuck an’ her knife;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The lasses they are shyer.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The auld guidmen, about the grace,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Frae side to side they bother,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Till some ane by his bonnet lays,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’ gi’es them’t like a tether,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Fu’ lang that day.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Waesucks! for him that gets nae lass,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Or lasses that hae naething;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sma’ need has he to say a grace,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Or melvie his braw claithing!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O wives, be mindfu’ ance yoursel<br /></span> +<span class="i2">How bonnie lads ye wanted,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ dinna, for a kebbuck-heel,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Let lasses be affronted<br /></span> +<span class="i8">On sic a day!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Now Clinkumbell, wi’ ratlin tow,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Begins to jow an’ croon;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Some swagger hame, the best they dow,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Some wait the afternoon.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">At slaps the billies halt a blink,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Till lasses strip their shoon:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wi’ faith an’ hope, an’ love an’ drink,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">They’re a’ in famous tune<br /></span> +<span class="i8">For crack that day.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">How monie hearts this day converts<br /></span> +<span class="i2">O’ sinners and o’ lasses!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Their hearts o’ stane, gin night, are gane,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">As saft as ony flesh is.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">There’s some are fou o’ love divine;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">There’s some are fou o’ brandy;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ monie jobs that day begin<br /></span> +<span class="i2">May end in houghmagandie<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Some ither day.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_12_12" id="Footnote_12_12"></a><a href="#FNanchor_12_12"><span class="label">[12]</span></a> A street so called, which faces the tent in Mauchline.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_13_13" id="Footnote_13_13"></a><a href="#FNanchor_13_13"><span class="label">[13]</span></a> Shakespeare’s Hamlet.</p></div></div> + + +<h2><a name="XXI" id="XXI"></a>XXI.</h2> + +<h3>THE ORDINATION.</h3> +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“For sense they little owe to frugal heav’n—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To please the mob they hide the little giv’n.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>[This sarcastic sally was written on the admission of Mr. Mackinlay, +as one of the ministers to the Laigh, or parochial Kirk of Kilmarnock, +on the 6th of April, 1786. That reverend person was +an Auld Light professor, and his ordination incensed all the New +Lights, hence the bitter levity of the poem. These dissensions have +long since past away: Mackinlay, a pious and kind-hearted sincere man, +lived down all the personalities of the satire, and though unwelcome +at first, he soon learned to regard them only as a proof of the powers +of the poet.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Kilmarnock wabsters fidge an’ claw,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’ pour your creeshie nations;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ ye wha leather rax an’ draw,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Of a’ denominations,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Swith to the Laigh Kirk, ane an’ a’,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’ there tak up your stations;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Then aff to Begbie’s in a raw,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’ pour divine libations<br /></span> +<span class="i8">For joy this day.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Curst Common-Sense, that imp o’ hell,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Cam in wi’ Maggie Lauder;<a name="FNanchor_14_14" id="FNanchor_14_14"></a><a href="#Footnote_14_14" class="fnanchor">[14]</a><br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_85" id="Page_85">[85]</a></span><span class="i0">But Oliphant aft made her yell,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’ Russell sair misca’d her;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">This day Mackinlay taks the flail,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And he’s the boy will blaud her!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He’ll clap a shangan on her tail,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’ set the bairns to daud her<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Wi’ dirt this day.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Mak haste an’ turn King David owre,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’ lilt wi’ holy clangor;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O’ double verse come gie us four,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’ skirl up the Bangor:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">This day the Kirk kicks up a stoure,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Nae mair the knaves shall wrang her,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For Heresy is in her pow’r,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And gloriously she’ll whang her<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Wi’ pith this day.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Come, let a proper text be read,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’ touch it aff wi’ vigour,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">How graceless Ham<a name="FNanchor_15_15" id="FNanchor_15_15"></a><a href="#Footnote_15_15" class="fnanchor">[15]</a> leugh at his dad,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Which made Canaan a niger;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or Phineas<a name="FNanchor_16_16" id="FNanchor_16_16"></a><a href="#Footnote_16_16" class="fnanchor">[16]</a> drove the murdering blade,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Wi’ wh-re-abhorring rigour;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or Zipporah,<a name="FNanchor_17_17" id="FNanchor_17_17"></a><a href="#Footnote_17_17" class="fnanchor">[17]</a> the scauldin’ jad,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Was like a bluidy tiger<br /></span> +<span class="i8">I’ th’ inn that day.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">There, try his mettle on the creed,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And bind him down wi’ caution,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That stipend is a carnal weed<br /></span> +<span class="i2">He taks but for the fashion;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And gie him o’er the flock, to feed,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And punish each transgression;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Especial, rams that cross the breed,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Gie them sufficient threshin’,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Spare them nae day.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Now, auld Kilmarnock, cock thy tail,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And toss thy horns fu’ canty;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Nae mair thou’lt rowte out-owre the dale,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Because thy pasture’s scanty;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For lapfu’s large o’ gospel kail<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Shall fill thy crib in plenty,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ runts o’ grace the pick and wale,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">No gi’en by way o’ dainty,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">But ilka day.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Nae mair by Babel’s streams we’ll weep,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To think upon our Zion;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And hing our fiddles up to sleep,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Like baby-clouts a-dryin’:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Come, screw the pegs, wi’ tunefu’ cheep,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And o’er the thairms be tryin’;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Oh, rare! to see our elbucks wheep,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’ a’ like lamb-tails flyin’<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Fu’ fast this day!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Lang Patronage, wi’ rod o’ airn,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Has shor’d the Kirk’s undoin’,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As lately Fenwick, sair forfairn,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Has proven to its ruin:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Our patron, honest man! Glencairn,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">He saw mischief was brewin’;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And like a godly elect bairn<br /></span> +<span class="i2">He’s wal’d us out a true ane,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">And sound this day.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Now, Robinson, harangue nae mair,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But steek your gab for ever.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or try the wicked town of Ayr,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For there they’ll think you clever;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or, nae reflection on your lear,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Ye may commence a shaver;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or to the Netherton repair,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And turn a carpet-weaver<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Aff-hand this day.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Mutrie and you were just a match<br /></span> +<span class="i2">We never had sic twa drones:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Auld Hornie did the Laigh Kirk watch,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Just like a winkin’ baudrons:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And ay’ he catch’d the tither wretch,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To fry them in his caudrons;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But now his honour maun detach,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Wi’ a’ his brimstane squadrons,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Fast, fast this day.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">See, see auld Orthodoxy’s faes<br /></span> +<span class="i2">She’s swingein’ through the city;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Hark, how the nine-tail’d cat she plays!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I vow it’s unco pretty:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">There, Learning, with his Greekish face,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Grunts out some Latin ditty;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And Common Sense is gaun, she says,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To mak to Jamie Beattie<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Her plaint this day.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But there’s Morality himsel’,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Embracing all opinions;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Hear, how he gies the tither yell,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Between his twa companions;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">See, how she peels the skin an’ fell.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">As ane were peelin’ onions!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Now there—they’re packed aff to hell,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And banished our dominions,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Henceforth this day.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_86" id="Page_86">[86]</a></span></p><div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O, happy day! rejoice, rejoice!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Come bouse about the porter!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Morality’s demure decoys<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Shall here nae mair find quarter:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Mackinlay, Russell, are the boys,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That Heresy can torture:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">They’ll gie her on a rape a hoyse,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And cowe her measure shorter<br /></span> +<span class="i8">By th’ head some day.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Come, bring the tither mutchkin in,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And here’s for a conclusion,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To every New Light<a name="FNanchor_18_18" id="FNanchor_18_18"></a><a href="#Footnote_18_18" class="fnanchor">[18]</a> mother’s son,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">From this time forth Confusion:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">If mair they deave us wi’ their din,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Or Patronage intrusion,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">We’ll light a spunk, and ev’ry skin,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">We’ll rin them aff in fusion<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Like oil, some day.<br /></span> +</div></div> +<div class="footnotes"> +<h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_14_14" id="Footnote_14_14"></a><a href="#FNanchor_14_14"><span class="label">[14]</span></a> Alluding to a scoffing ballad which was made on the +admission of the late reverend and worthy Mr. Lindsay to the Laigh +Kirk.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_15_15" id="Footnote_15_15"></a><a href="#FNanchor_15_15"><span class="label">[15]</span></a> Genesis, ix. 22.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_16_16" id="Footnote_16_16"></a><a href="#FNanchor_16_16"><span class="label">[16]</span></a> Numbers, xxv. 8.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_17_17" id="Footnote_17_17"></a><a href="#FNanchor_17_17"><span class="label">[17]</span></a> Exodus, iv. 25.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_18_18" id="Footnote_18_18"></a><a href="#FNanchor_18_18"><span class="label">[18]</span></a> “New Light” is a cant phrase in the West of Scotland, for +those religions opinions which Dr. Taylor of Norwich has defended.</p></div></div> + + + + +<h2><a name="XXII" id="XXII"></a>XXII.</h2> + +<h3>THE CALF.</h3> +<h4>TO THE REV. MR. JAMES STEVEN.</h4> +<p>On his text, <span class="smcap">Malachi</span>, iv. 2—“And ye shall go forth, and grow +up as <span class="smcap">Calves</span> of the stall.”</p> + +<p>[The laugh which this little poem raised against Steven was a loud +one. Burns composed it during the sermon to which it relates and +repeated it to Gavin Hamilton, with whom he happened on that day to +dine. The Calf—for the name it seems stuck—came to London, where the +younger brother of Burns heard him preach in Covent Garden Chapel, in +1796.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Right, Sir! your text I’ll prove it true,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Though Heretics may laugh;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For instance; there’s yoursel’ just now,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">God knows, an unco Calf!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">And should some patron be so kind,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">As bless you wi’ a kirk,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I doubt na, Sir, but then we’ll find,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Ye’re still as great a Stirk.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But, if the lover’s raptur’d hour<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Shall ever be your lot,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Forbid it, ev’ry heavenly power,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">You e’er should be a stot!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Tho’, when some kind, connubial dear,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Your but-and-ben adorns,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The like has been that you may wear<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A noble head of horns.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">And in your lug, most reverend James,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To hear you roar and rowte,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Few men o’ sense will doubt your claims<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To rank among the nowte.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">And when ye’re number’d wi’ the dead,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Below a grassy hillock,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wi’ justice they may mark your head—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">“Here lies a famous Bullock!”<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="XXIII" id="XXIII"></a>XXIII.</h2> + +<h3>TO JAMES SMITH.</h3> +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Friendship! mysterious cement of the soul!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sweet’ner of life and solder of society!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I owe thee much!—“<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="sig1"><span class="smcap">Blair.</span></p> + +<p>[The James Smith, to whom this epistle is addressed, was at that time +a small shop-keeper in Mauchline, and the comrade or rather follower of +the poet in all his merry expeditions with “Yill-caup commentators.” +He was present in Poosie Nansie’s when the Jolly Beggars first dawned +on the fancy of Burns: the comrades of the poet’s heart were not +generally very successful in life: Smith left Mauchline, and +established a calico-printing manufactory at Avon near Linlithgow, +where his friend found him in all appearance prosperous in 1788; but +this was not to last; he failed in his speculations and went to the +West Indies, and died early. His wit was ready, and his manners lively +and unaffected.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Dear Smith, the sleest, paukie thief,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That e’er attempted stealth or rief,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ye surely hae some warlock-breef<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Owre human hearts;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For ne’er a bosom yet was prief<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Against your arts.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">For me, I swear by sun an’ moon,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And ev’ry star that blinks aboon,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ye’ve cost me twenty pair o’ shoon<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Just gaun to see you;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And ev’ry ither pair that’s done,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Mair ta’en I’m wi’ you.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">That auld capricious carlin, Nature,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To mak amends for scrimpit stature,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">She’s turn’d you aff, a human creature<br /></span> +<span class="i8">On her first plan;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And in her freaks, on every feature<br /></span> +<span class="i8">She’s wrote, the Man.<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_87" id="Page_87">[87]</a></span></div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Just now I’ve ta’en the fit o’ rhyme,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My barmie noddle’s working prime,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My fancy yerkit it up sublime<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Wi’ hasty summon:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Hae ye a leisure-moment’s time<br /></span> +<span class="i8">To hear what’s comin’?<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Some rhyme a neighbour’s name to lash;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Some rhyme (vain thought!) for needfu’ cash:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Some rhyme to court the countra clash,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">An’ raise a din;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For me, an aim I never fash;<br /></span> +<span class="i8">I rhyme for fun.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The star that rules my luckless lot,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Has fated me the russet coat,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ damn’d my fortune to the groat;<br /></span> +<span class="i8">But in requit,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Has blest me with a random shot<br /></span> +<span class="i8">O’ countra wit.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">This while my notion’s ta’en a sklent,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To try my fate in guid black prent;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But still the mair I’m that way bent,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Something cries “Hoolie!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I red you, honest man, tak tent!<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Ye’ll shaw your folly.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“There’s ither poets much your betters,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Far seen in Greek, deep men o’ letters,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Hae thought they had ensur’d their debtors,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">A’ future ages:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Now moths deform in shapeless tatters,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Their unknown pages.”<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Then farewell hopes o’ laurel-boughs,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To garland my poetic brows!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Henceforth I’ll rove where busy ploughs<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Are whistling thrang,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ teach the lanely heights an’ howes<br /></span> +<span class="i8">My rustic sang.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I’ll wander on, with tentless heed<br /></span> +<span class="i0">How never-halting moments speed,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Till fate shall snap the brittle thread;<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Then, all unknown,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I’ll lay me with th’ inglorious dead,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Forgot and gone!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But why o’ death begin a tale?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Just now we’re living sound and hale,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Then top and maintop crowd the sail,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Heave care o’er side!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And large, before enjoyment’s gale,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Let’s tak the tide.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">This life, sae far’s I understand,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Is a’ enchanted fairy land,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where pleasure is the magic wand,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">That, wielded right,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Maks hours like minutes, hand in hand,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Dance by fu’ light.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The magic wand then let us wield;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For, ance that five-an’-forty’s speel’d,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">See crazy, weary, joyless eild,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Wi’ wrinkl’d face,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Comes hostin’, hirplin’, owre the field,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Wi’ creepin’ pace.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">When ance life’s day draws near the gloamin’,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Then fareweel vacant careless roamin’;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ fareweel cheerfu’ tankards foamin’,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">An’ social noise;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ fareweel dear, deluding woman!<br /></span> +<span class="i8">The joy of joys!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O Life! how pleasant in thy morning,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Young Fancy’s rays the hills adorning!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Cold-pausing Caution’s lesson scorning,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">We frisk away,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Like school-boys, at th’ expected warning,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">To joy and play.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">We wander there, we wander here,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">We eye the rose upon the brier,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Unmindful that the thorn is near,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Among the leaves;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And tho’ the puny wound appear,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Short while it grieves.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Some, lucky, find a flow’ry spot,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For which they never toil’d nor swat;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">They drink the sweet and eat the fat,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">But care or pain;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And, haply, eye the barren hut<br /></span> +<span class="i8">With high disdain.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">With steady aim some Fortune chase;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Keen hope does ev’ry sinew brace;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thro’ fair, thro’ foul, they urge the race,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">And seize the prey;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Then cannie, in some cozie place,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">They close the day.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">And others, like your humble servan’,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Poor wights! nae rules nor roads observin’;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To right or left, eternal swervin’,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">They zig-zag on;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">’Till curst with age, obscure an’ starvin’,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">They aften groan.<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_88" id="Page_88">[88]</a></span></div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Alas! what bitter toil an’ straining—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But truce with peevish, poor complaining!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Is fortune’s fickle Luna waning?<br /></span> +<span class="i8">E’en let her gang!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Beneath what light she has remaining,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Let’s sing our sang.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">My pen I here fling to the door,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And kneel, “Ye Pow’rs,” and warm implore,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">“Tho’ I should wander terra e’er,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">In all her climes,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Grant me but this, I ask no more,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Ay rowth o’ rhymes.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Gie dreeping roasts to countra lairds,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Till icicles hing frae their beards;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Gie fine braw claes to fine life-guards,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">And maids of honour!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And yill an’ whisky gie to cairds,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Until they sconner.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“A title, Dempster merits it;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A garter gie to Willie Pitt;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Gie wealth to some be-ledger’d cit,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">In cent. per cent.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But give me real, sterling wit,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">And I’m content.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“While ye are pleas’d to keep me hale,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I’ll sit down o’er my scanty meal,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Be’t water-brose, or muslin-kail,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Wi’ cheerfu’ face,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As lang’s the muses dinna fail<br /></span> +<span class="i8">To say the grace.”<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">An anxious e’e I never throws<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Behint my lug, or by my nose;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I jouk beneath misfortune’s blows<br /></span> +<span class="i8">As weel’s I may;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sworn foe to sorrow, care, and prose,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">I rhyme away.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O ye douce folk, that live by rule,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Grave, tideless-blooded, calm and cool,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Compar’d wi’ you—O fool! fool! fool!<br /></span> +<span class="i8">How much unlike!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Your hearts are just a standing pool,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Your lives a dyke!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Nae hair-brain’d, sentimental traces,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In your unletter’d nameless faces!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In arioso trills and graces<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Ye never stray,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But gravissimo, solemn basses<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Ye hum away.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Ye are sae grave, nae doubt ye’re wise;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Nae ferly tho’ ye do despise<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The hairum-scarum, ram-stam boys,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">The rattling squad:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I see you upward cast your eyes—<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Ye ken the road—<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Whilst I—but I shall haud me there—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wi’ you I’ll scarce gang ony where—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Then, Jamie, I shall say nae mair,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">But quat my sang,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Content wi’ you to mak a pair,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Whare’er I gang.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="XXIV" id="XXIV"></a>XXIV.</h2> + +<h3>THE VISION.</h3> +<h4>DUAN FIRST.<a name="FNanchor_19_19" id="FNanchor_19_19"></a><a href="#Footnote_19_19" class="fnanchor">[19]</a></h4> +<p>[The Vision and the Briggs of Ayr, are said by Jeffrey to be “the only +pieces by Burns which can be classed under the head of pure fiction:” +but Tam O’ Shanter and twenty other of his compositions have an equal +right to be classed with works of fiction. The edition of this poem +published at Kilmarnock, differs in some particulars from the edition +which followed in Edinburgh. The maiden whose foot was so handsome as +to match that of Coila, was a Bess at first, but old affection +triumphed, and Jean, for whom the honour was from the first designed, +regained her place. The robe of Coila, too, was expanded, so far +indeed that she got more cloth than she could well carry.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The sun had clos’d the winter day,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The curlers quat their roaring play,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ hunger’d maukin ta’en her way<br /></span> +<span class="i8">To kail-yards green,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">While faithless snaws ilk step betray<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Whare she has been.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The thresher’s weary flingin’-tree<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The lee-lang day had tired me;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And when the day had closed his e’e<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Far i’ the west,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ben i’ the spence, right pensivelie,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">I gaed to rest.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">There, lanely, by the ingle-cheek,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I sat and ey’d the spewing reek,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That fill’d, wi’ hoast-provoking smeek,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">The auld clay biggin’;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ heard the restless rattons squeak<br /></span> +<span class="i8">About the riggin’.<br /></span> +</div></div> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_89" id="Page_89">[89]</a></span></p> +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">All in this mottie, misty clime,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I backward mused on wastet time,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">How I had spent my youthfu’ prime,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">An’ done nae thing,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But stringin’ blethers up in rhyme,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">For fools to sing.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Had I to guid advice but harkit,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I might, by this hae led a market,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or strutted in a bank an’ clarkit<br /></span> +<span class="i8">My cash-account:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">While here, half-mad, half-fed, half-sarkit,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Is a’ th’ amount.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I started, mutt’ring, blockhead! coof!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And heav’d on high my waukit loof,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To swear by a’ yon starry roof,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Or some rash aith,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That I, henceforth, would be rhyme-proof<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Till my last breath—<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">When, click! the string the snick did draw:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And, jee! the door gaed to the wa’;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ by my ingle-lowe I saw,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Now bleezin’ bright,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A tight outlandish hizzie, braw<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Come full in sight.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Ye need na doubt, I held my wisht;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The infant aith, half-form’d, was crusht;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I glowr’d as eerie’s I’d been dusht<br /></span> +<span class="i8">In some wild glen;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When sweet, like modest worth, she blusht,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">And stepped ben.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Green, slender, leaf-clad holly-boughs<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Were twisted, gracefu’, round her brows,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I took her for some Scottish Muse,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">By that same token;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ come to stop those reckless vows,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Wou’d soon be broken.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">A “hair-brain’d, sentimental trace”<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Was strongly marked in her face;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A wildly-witty, rustic grace<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Shone full upon her:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Her eye, ev’n turn’d on empty space,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Beam’d keen with honour.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Down flow’d her robe, a tartan sheen,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">’Till half a leg was scrimply seen:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And such a leg! my bonnie Jean<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Could only peer it;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sae straught, sae taper, tight, and clean,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Nane else came near it.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Her mantle large, of greenish hue,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My gazing wonder chiefly drew;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Deep lights and shades, bold-mingling, threw<br /></span> +<span class="i8">A lustre grand;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And seem’d to my astonish’d view,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">A well-known land.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Here, rivers in the sea were lost;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">There, mountains to the skies were tost:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Here, tumbling billows mark’d the coast,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">With surging foam;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">There, distant shone Art’s lofty boast,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">The lordly dome.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Here, Doon pour’d down his far-fetch’d floods;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">There, well-fed Irwine stately thuds:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Auld hermit Ayr staw thro’ his woods,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">On to the shore;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And many a lesser torrent scuds,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">With seeming roar.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Low, in a sandy valley spread,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An ancient borough rear’d her head;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Still, as in Scottish story read,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">She boasts a race,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To ev’ry nobler virtue bred,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">And polish’d grace.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">By stately tow’r, or palace fair,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or ruins pendent in the air,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Bold stems of heroes, here and there,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">I could discern;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Some seem’d to muse, some seem’d to dare,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">With feature stern.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">My heart did glowing transport feel,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To see a race<a name="FNanchor_20_20" id="FNanchor_20_20"></a><a href="#Footnote_20_20" class="fnanchor">[20]</a> heroic wheel,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And brandish round the deep-dy’d steel<br /></span> +<span class="i8">In sturdy blows;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">While back-recoiling seem’d to reel<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Their southron foes.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">His Country’s Saviour,<a name="FNanchor_21_21" id="FNanchor_21_21"></a><a href="#Footnote_21_21" class="fnanchor">[21]</a> mark him well!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Bold Richardton’s<a name="FNanchor_22_22" id="FNanchor_22_22"></a><a href="#Footnote_22_22" class="fnanchor">[22]</a> heroic swell;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The chief on Sark<a name="FNanchor_23_23" id="FNanchor_23_23"></a><a href="#Footnote_23_23" class="fnanchor">[23]</a> who glorious fell,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">In high command;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And He whom ruthless fates expel<br /></span> +<span class="i8">His native land.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_90" id="Page_90">[90]</a></span></p><div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">There, where a sceptr’d Pictish shade<a name="FNanchor_24_24" id="FNanchor_24_24"></a><a href="#Footnote_24_24" class="fnanchor">[24]</a><br /></span> +<span class="i0">Stalk’d round his ashes lowly laid,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I mark’d a martial race portray’d<br /></span> +<span class="i8">In colours strong;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Bold, soldier-featur’d, undismay’d<br /></span> +<span class="i8">They strode along.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Thro’ many a wild romantic grove,<a name="FNanchor_25_25" id="FNanchor_25_25"></a><a href="#Footnote_25_25" class="fnanchor">[25]</a><br /></span> +<span class="i0">Near many a hermit-fancy’d cove,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">(Fit haunts for friendship or for love,)<br /></span> +<span class="i8">In musing mood,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An aged judge, I saw him rove,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Dispensing good.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">With deep-struck, reverential awe,<a name="FNanchor_26_26" id="FNanchor_26_26"></a><a href="#Footnote_26_26" class="fnanchor">[26]</a><br /></span> +<span class="i0">The learned sire and son I saw,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To Nature’s God and Nature’s law,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">They gave their lore,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">This, all its source and end to draw;<br /></span> +<span class="i8">That, to adore.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Brydone’s brave ward<a name="FNanchor_27_27" id="FNanchor_27_27"></a><a href="#Footnote_27_27" class="fnanchor">[27]</a> I well could spy,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Beneath old Scotia’s smiling eye;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Who call’d on Fame, low standing by,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">To hand him on,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where many a Patriot-name on high<br /></span> +<span class="i8">And hero shone.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<h4>DUAN SECOND</h4> +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">With musing-deep, astonish’d stare,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I view’d the heavenly-seeming fair;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A whisp’ring throb did witness bear<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Of kindred sweet,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When with an elder sister’s air<br /></span> +<span class="i8">She did me greet.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“All hail! My own inspired bard!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In me thy native Muse regard!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Nor longer mourn thy fate is hard,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Thus poorly low!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I come to give thee such reward<br /></span> +<span class="i8">As we bestow.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Know, the great genius of this land,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Has many a light aërial band,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Who, all beneath his high command,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Harmoniously,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As arts or arms they understand,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Their labours ply.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“They Scotia’s race among them share;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Some fire the soldier on to dare;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Some rouse the patriot up to bare<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Corruption’s heart.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Some teach the bard, a darling care,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">The tuneful art.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“‘Mong swelling floods of reeking gore,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">They, ardent, kindling spirits, pour;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or ‘mid the venal senate’s roar,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">They, sightless, stand,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To mend the honest patriot-lore,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">And grace the hand.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“And when the bard, or hoary sage,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Charm or instruct the future age,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">They bind the wild, poetic rage<br /></span> +<span class="i8">In energy,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or point the inconclusive page<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Full on the eye.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Hence Fullarton, the brave and young;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Hence Dempster’s zeal-inspired tongue;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Hence sweet harmonious Beattie sung<br /></span> +<span class="i8">His ‘Minstrel’ lays;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or tore, with noble ardour stung,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">The sceptic’s bays.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“To lower orders are assign’d<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The humbler ranks of human-kind,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The rustic bard, the lab’ring hind,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">The artisan;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">All choose, as various they’re inclin’d<br /></span> +<span class="i8">The various man.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“When yellow waves the heavy grain,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The threat’ning storm some, strongly, rein;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Some teach to meliorate the plain,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">With tillage-skill;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And some instruct the shepherd-train,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Blythe o’er the hill.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Some hint the lover’s harmless wile;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Some grace the maiden’s artless smile;<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_91" id="Page_91">[91]</a></span><span class="i0">Some soothe the lab’rer’s weary toil,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">For humble gains,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And make his cottage-scenes beguile<br /></span> +<span class="i8">His cares and pains.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Some, bounded to a district-space,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Explore at large man’s infant race,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To mark the embryotic trace<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Of rustic bard:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And careful note each op’ning grace,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">A guide and guard.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Of these am I—Coila my name;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And this district as mine I claim,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where once the Campbells, chiefs of fame,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Held ruling pow’r:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I mark’d thy embryo-tuneful flame,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Thy natal hour.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“With future hope, I oft would gaze,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Fond, on thy little early ways,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thy rudely carroll’d, chiming phrase,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">In uncouth rhymes,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Fir’d at the simple, artless lays<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Of other times.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“I saw thee seek the sounding shore,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Delighted with the dashing roar;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or when the north his fleecy store<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Drove through the sky,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I saw grim Nature’s visage hoar<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Struck thy young eye.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Or when the deep green-mantled earth<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Warm cherish’d ev’ry flow’ret’s birth,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And joy and music pouring forth<br /></span> +<span class="i8">In ev’ry grove,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I saw thee eye the general mirth<br /></span> +<span class="i8">With boundless love.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“When ripen’d fields, and azure skies,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Called forth the reaper’s rustling noise,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I saw thee leave their evening joys,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">And lonely stalk,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To vent thy bosom’s swelling rise<br /></span> +<span class="i8">In pensive walk.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“When youthful love, warm-blushing, strong,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Keen-shivering shot thy nerves along,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Those accents, grateful to thy tongue,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Th’ adored Name<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I taught thee how to pour in song,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">To soothe thy flame.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“I saw thy pulse’s maddening play,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wild send thee pleasure’s devious way,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Misled by Fancy’s meteor-ray,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">By passion driven;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But yet the light that led astray<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Was light from Heaven.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“I taught thy manners-painting strains,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The loves, the ways of simple swains,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Till now, o’er all my wide domains<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Thy fame extends;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And some, the pride of Coila’s plains,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Become thy friends.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Thou canst not learn, nor can I show,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To paint with Thomson’s landscape glow;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or wake the bosom-melting throe,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">With Shenstone’s art;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or pour, with Gray, the moving flow,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Warm on the heart.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Yet, all beneath the unrivall’d rose,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The lowly daisy sweetly blows;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Tho’ large the forest’s monarch throws<br /></span> +<span class="i8">His army shade,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yet green the juicy hawthorn grows,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Adown the glade.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Then never murmur nor repine;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Strive in thy humble sphere to shine;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And, trust me, not Potosi’s mine,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Nor king’s regard,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Can give a bliss o’ermatching thine,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">A rustic bard.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“To give my counsels all in one,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thy tuneful flame still careful fan;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Preserve the dignity of man,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">With soul erect;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And trust, the universal plan<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Will all protect.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“And wear thou this,”—she solemn said,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And bound the holly round my head:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The polish’d leaves and berries red<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Did rustling play;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And like a passing thought, she fled<br /></span> +<span class="i8">In light away.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_19_19" id="Footnote_19_19"></a><a href="#FNanchor_19_19"><span class="label">[19]</span></a> Duan, a term of Ossian’s for the different divisions of a +digressive poem. See his “Cath-Loda,” vol. ii. of Macpherson’s +translation.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_20_20" id="Footnote_20_20"></a><a href="#FNanchor_20_20"><span class="label">[20]</span></a> The Wallaces.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_21_21" id="Footnote_21_21"></a><a href="#FNanchor_21_21"><span class="label">[21]</span></a> Sir William Wallace.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_22_22" id="Footnote_22_22"></a><a href="#FNanchor_22_22"><span class="label">[22]</span></a> Adam Wallace, of Richardton, cousin to the immortal +preserver of Scottish independence.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_23_23" id="Footnote_23_23"></a><a href="#FNanchor_23_23"><span class="label">[23]</span></a> Wallace, Laird of Craigie, who was second in command +under Douglas, Earl of Ormond, at the famous battle on the banks of +Sark, fought anno 1448. That glorious victory was principally owing to +the judicious conduct and intrepid valour of the gallant laird of +Craigie, who died of his wounds after the action.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_24_24" id="Footnote_24_24"></a><a href="#FNanchor_24_24"><span class="label">[24]</span></a> Coilus, king of the Picts, from whom the district of Kyle +is said to take its name, lies buried, as tradition says, near the +family seat of the Montgomeries of Coilsfield, where his burial-place +is still shown.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_25_25" id="Footnote_25_25"></a><a href="#FNanchor_25_25"><span class="label">[25]</span></a> Barskimming, the seat of the late Lord Justice-Clerk (Sir +Thomas Miller of Glenlee, afterwards President of the Court of +Session.)</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_26_26" id="Footnote_26_26"></a><a href="#FNanchor_26_26"><span class="label">[26]</span></a> Catrine, the seat of Professor Dugald Steward.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_27_27" id="Footnote_27_27"></a><a href="#FNanchor_27_27"><span class="label">[27]</span></a> Colonel Fullarton.</p></div> +</div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_92" id="Page_92">[92]</a></span></p> + + +<h2><a name="XXV" id="XXV"></a>XXV.</h2> + +<h3>HALLOWEEN.<a name="FNanchor_28_28" id="FNanchor_28_28"></a><a href="#Footnote_28_28" class="fnanchor">[28]</a></h3> +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Yes! let the rich deride, the proud disdain,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The simple pleasures of the lowly train;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To me more dear, congenial to my heart,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">One native charm, than all the gloss of art.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="sig1"><span class="smcap">Goldsmith</span>.</p> + + +<p>[This Poem contains a lively and striking picture of some of the +superstitious observances of old Scotland: on Halloween the desire to +look into futurity was once all but universal in the north; and the +charms and spells which Burns describes, form but a portion of those +employed to enable the peasantry to have a peep up the dark vista of +the future. The scene is laid on the romantic shores of Ayr, at a +farmer’s fireside, and the actors in the rustic drama are the whole +household, including supernumerary reapers and bandsmen about to be +discharged from the engagements of harvest. “I never can help +regarding this,” says James Hogg, “as rather a trivial poem!”]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Upon that night, when fairies light<br /></span> +<span class="i2">On Cassilis Downans<a name="FNanchor_29_29" id="FNanchor_29_29"></a><a href="#Footnote_29_29" class="fnanchor">[29]</a> dance,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or owre the lays, in splendid blaze,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">On sprightly coursers prance;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or for Colean the rout is ta’en,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Beneath the moon’s pale beams;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">There, up the Cove,<a name="FNanchor_30_30" id="FNanchor_30_30"></a><a href="#Footnote_30_30" class="fnanchor">[30]</a> to stray an’ rove<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Amang the rocks an’ streams<br /></span> +<span class="i8">To sport that night.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Amang the bonnie winding banks<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Where Doon rins, wimplin’, clear,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where Bruce<a name="FNanchor_31_31" id="FNanchor_31_31"></a><a href="#Footnote_31_31" class="fnanchor">[31]</a> ance rul’d the martial ranks,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’ shook his Carrick spear,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Some merry, friendly, countra folks,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Together did convene,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To burn their nits, an’ pou their stocks,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’ haud their Halloween<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Fu’ blythe that night.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The lasses feat, an’ cleanly neat,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Mair braw than when they’re fine;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Their faces blythe, fu’ sweetly kythe,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Hearts leal, an’ warm, an’ kin’;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The lads sae trig, wi’ wooer babs,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Weel knotted on their garten,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Some unco blate, an’ some wi’ gabs,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Gar lasses’ hearts gang startin’<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Whiles fast at night.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Then, first and foremost, thro’ the kail,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Their stocks<a name="FNanchor_32_32" id="FNanchor_32_32"></a><a href="#Footnote_32_32" class="fnanchor">[32]</a> maun a’ be sought ance;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">They steek their een, an’ graip an’ wale,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For muckle anes an’ straught anes.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Poor hav’rel Will fell aff the drift,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’ wander’d through the bow-kail,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ pou’t, for want o’ better shift,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A runt was like a sow-tail,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Sae bow’t that night.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Then, straught or crooked, yird or nane,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">They roar an’ cry a’ throu’ther;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The vera wee-things, todlin’, rin<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Wi’ stocks out-owre their shouther;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ gif the custoc’s sweet or sour,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Wi’ joctelegs they taste them;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Syne coziely, aboon the door,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Wi’ cannie care, they’ve placed them<br /></span> +<span class="i8">To lie that night.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The lasses staw frae mang them a’<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To pou their stalks o’ corn;<a name="FNanchor_33_33" id="FNanchor_33_33"></a><a href="#Footnote_33_33" class="fnanchor">[33]</a><br /></span> +<span class="i0">But Rab slips out, an’ jinks about,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Behint the muckle thorn:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He grippet Nelly hard an’ fast;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Loud skirl’d a’ the lasses;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But her tap-pickle maist was lost,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">When kiuttlin’ in the fause-house<a name="FNanchor_34_34" id="FNanchor_34_34"></a><a href="#Footnote_34_34" class="fnanchor">[34]</a><br /></span> +<span class="i8">Wi’ him that night.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_93" id="Page_93">[93]</a></span></p><div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The auld guidwife’s weel hoordet nits<a name="FNanchor_35_35" id="FNanchor_35_35"></a><a href="#Footnote_35_35" class="fnanchor">[35]</a><br /></span> +<span class="i0">Are round an’ round divided;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ monie lads’ an’ lasses’ fates<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Are there that night decided:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Some kindle, couthie, side by side,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ burn thegither trimly;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Some start awa’ wi’ saucy pride,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And jump out-owre the chimlie<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Fu’ high that night.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Jean slips in twa wi’ tentie e’e;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wha ’twas, she wadna tell;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But this is Jock, an’ this is me,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">She says in to hersel’:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He bleez’d owre her, an’ she owre him,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As they wad never mair part;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">’Till, fuff! he started up the lum,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ Jean had e’en a sair heart<br /></span> +<span class="i8">To see’t that night.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Poor Willie, wi’ his bow-kail runt,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Was brunt wi’ primsie Mallie;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ Mallie, nae doubt, took the drunt,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To be compar’d to Willie;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Mall’s nit lap out wi’ pridefu’ fling,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ her ain fit it brunt it;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">While Willie lap, and swoor, by jing,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">’Twas just the way he wanted<br /></span> +<span class="i8">To be that night.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Nell had the fause-house in her min’,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">She pits hersel an’ Rob in;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In loving bleeze they sweetly join,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">’Till white in ase they’re sobbin’;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Nell’s heart, was dancin’ at the view,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">She whisper’d Rob to leuk for’t:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Rob, stowlins, prie’d her bonie mou’,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Fu’ cozie in the neuk for’t,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Unseen that night.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But Merran sat behint their backs,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Her thoughts on Andrew Bell;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">She lea’es them gashin’ at their cracks,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And slips out by hersel’:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">She through the yard the nearest taks,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ to the kiln she goes then,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ darklins graipit for the bauks,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And in the blue-clue<a name="FNanchor_36_36" id="FNanchor_36_36"></a><a href="#Footnote_36_36" class="fnanchor">[36]</a> throws then,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Right fear’t that night.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">An’ ay she win’t, an’ ay she swat,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I wat she made nae jaukin’;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">’Till something held within the pat,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Guid L—d! but she was quaukin’!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But whether ’twas the Deil himsel’,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or whether ’twas a bauk-en’,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or whether it was Andrew Bell,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">She did na wait on talkin’<br /></span> +<span class="i8">To spier that night.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Wee Jenny to her graunie says,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">“Will ye go wi’ me, graunie?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I’ll eat the apple<a name="FNanchor_37_37" id="FNanchor_37_37"></a><a href="#Footnote_37_37" class="fnanchor">[37]</a> at the glass,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I gat frae uncle Johnnie:”<br /></span> +<span class="i0">She fuff’t her pipe wi’ sic a lunt,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In wrath she was sae vap’rin’,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">She notic’t na, an aizle brunt<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Her braw new worset apron<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Out thro’ that night.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Ye little skelpie-limmer’s face!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I daur you try sic sportin’,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As seek the foul Thief onie place,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For him to spae your fortune:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Nae doubt but ye may get a sight!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Great cause ye hae to fear it;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For monie a ane has gotten a fright,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ liv’d an’ died deleeret<br /></span> +<span class="i8">On sic a night.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Ae hairst afore the Sherra-moor,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I mind’t as weel’s yestreen,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I was a gilpey then, I’m sure<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I was na past fifteen:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The simmer had been cauld an’ wat,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ stuff was unco green;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ ay a rantin’ kirn we gat,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ just on Halloween<br /></span> +<span class="i8">It fell that night.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_94" id="Page_94">[94]</a></span></p><div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Our stibble-rig was Rab M’Graen,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A clever, sturdy fellow:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He’s sin gat Eppie Sim wi’ wean,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That liv’d in Achmacalla:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He gat hemp-seed,<a name="FNanchor_38_38" id="FNanchor_38_38"></a><a href="#Footnote_38_38" class="fnanchor">[38]</a> I mind it weel,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And he made unco light o’t;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But monie a day was by himsel’,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">He was sae sairly frighted<br /></span> +<span class="i8">That vera night.”<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Then up gat fechtin’ Jamie Fleck,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’ he swoor by his conscience,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That he could saw hemp-seed a peck;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For it was a’ but nonsense;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The auld guidman raught down the pock,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’ out a’ handfu’ gied him;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Syne bad him slip frae ‘mang the folk,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Sometime when nae ane see’d him,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">An’ try’t that night.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">He marches thro’ amang the stacks,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Tho’ he was something sturtin;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The graip he for a harrow taks,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’ haurls at his curpin;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ ev’ry now an’ then he says,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">“Hemp-seed, I saw thee,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ her that is to be my lass,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Come after me, an’ draw thee<br /></span> +<span class="i8">As fast that night.”<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">He whistl’d up Lord Lennox’ march,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To keep his courage cheery;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Altho’ his hair began to arch,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">He was sae fley’d an’ eerie;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">’Till presently he hears a squeak,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’ then a grane an’ gruntle;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He by his shouther gae a keek,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’ tumbl’d wi’ a wintle<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Out-owre that night.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">He roar’d a horrid murder-shout,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In dreadfu’ desperation!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ young an’ auld cam rinnin’ out,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’ hear the sad narration;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He swoor ’twas hilchin Jean M’Craw,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Or crouchie Merran Humphie,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">’Till, stop! she trotted thro’ them a’;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’ wha was it but Grumphie<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Asteer that night!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Meg fain wad to the barn hae gaen,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To win three wechts o’ naething;<a name="FNanchor_39_39" id="FNanchor_39_39"></a><a href="#Footnote_39_39" class="fnanchor">[39]</a><br /></span> +<span class="i0">But for to meet the deil her lane,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">She pat but little faith in:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">She gies the herd a pickle nits,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’ twa red cheekit apples,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To watch, while for the barn she sets,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In hopes to see Tam Kipples<br /></span> +<span class="i8">That vera night.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">She turns the key wi’ cannie thraw,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’ owre the threshold ventures;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But first on Sawnie gies a ca’,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Syne bauldly in she enters:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A ratton rattled up the wa’,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’ she cried, L—d preserve her!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ ran thro’ midden-hole an’ a’,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’ pray’d wi’ zeal and fervour,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Fu’ fast that night.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">They hoy’t out Will, wi sair advice;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">They hecht him some fine braw ane;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">It chanc’d the stack he faddom’t thrice,<a name="FNanchor_40_40" id="FNanchor_40_40"></a><a href="#Footnote_40_40" class="fnanchor">[40]</a><br /></span> +<span class="i2">Was timmer-propt for thrawin’;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He taks a swirlie auld moss-oak,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For some black, grousome carlin;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ loot a winze, an’ drew a stroke,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">’Till skin in blypes cam haurlin’<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Aff’s nieves that night.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">A wanton widow Leezie was,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">As canty as a kittlin;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But, och! that night, amang the shaws,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">She got a fearfu’ settlin’!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">She thro’ the whins, an’ by the cairn,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’ owre the hill gaed scrievin,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Whare three lairds’ lands met at a burn,<a name="FNanchor_41_41" id="FNanchor_41_41"></a><a href="#Footnote_41_41" class="fnanchor">[41]</a><br /></span> +<span class="i2">To dip her left sark-sleeve in,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Was bent that night.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_95" id="Page_95">[95]</a></span></p><div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Whyles owre a linn the burnie plays,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">As through the glen it wimpl’t;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Whyles round a rocky scaur it strays,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Whyles in a wiel it dimpl’t;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Whyles glitter’d to the nightly rays,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Wi’ bickering, dancing dazzle;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Whyles cookit underneath the braes,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Below the spreading hazel,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Unseen that night.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Amang the brackens on the brae,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Between her an’ the moon,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The deil, or else an outler quey,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Gat up an’ gae a croon:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Poor Leezie’s heart maist lap the hool!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Near lav’rock-height she jumpit,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But mist a fit, an’ in the pool<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Out-owre the lugs she plumpit,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Wi’ a plunge that night.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">In order, on the clean hearth-stane,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The luggies three<a name="FNanchor_42_42" id="FNanchor_42_42"></a><a href="#Footnote_42_42" class="fnanchor">[42]</a> are ranged,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And ev’ry time great care is ta’en,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To see them duly changed:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Auld uncle John, wha wedlock’s joys<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Sin Mar’s-year did desire,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Because he gat the toom-dish thrice,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">He heav’d them on the fire<br /></span> +<span class="i8">In wrath that night.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Wi’ merry sangs, and friendly cracks,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I wat they did na weary;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ unco tales, an’ funnie jokes,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Their sports were cheap an’ cheery;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Till butter’d so’ns<a name="FNanchor_43_43" id="FNanchor_43_43"></a><a href="#Footnote_43_43" class="fnanchor">[43]</a> wi’ fragrant lunt,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Set a’ their gabs a-steerin’;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Syne, wi’ a social glass o’ strunt,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">They parted aff careerin’<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Fu’ blythe that night.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_28_28" id="Footnote_28_28"></a><a href="#FNanchor_28_28"><span class="label">[28]</span></a> Is thought to be a night when witches, devils, and other +mischief-making beings are all abroad on their baneful midnight +errands: particularly those aërial people, the Fairies, are said on +that night to hold a grand anniversary.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_29_29" id="Footnote_29_29"></a><a href="#FNanchor_29_29"><span class="label">[29]</span></a> Certain little, romantic, rocky green hills, in the +neighbourhood of the ancient seat of the Earls of Cassilis.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_30_30" id="Footnote_30_30"></a><a href="#FNanchor_30_30"><span class="label">[30]</span></a> A noted cavern near Colean-house, called the Cove of +Colean which, as well as Cassilis Downans, is famed in country story +for being a favourite haunt of fairies.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_31_31" id="Footnote_31_31"></a><a href="#FNanchor_31_31"><span class="label">[31]</span></a> The famous family of that name, the ancestors of Robert, +the great deliverer of his country, were Earls of Carrick.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_32_32" id="Footnote_32_32"></a><a href="#FNanchor_32_32"><span class="label">[32]</span></a> The first ceremony of Halloween is pulling each a stock, +or plant of kail. They must go out, hand-in-hand, with eyes shut, and +pull the first they meet with: its being big or little, straight or +crooked, is prophetic of the size and shape of the grand object of all +their spells—the husband or wife. If any yird, or earth, stick to the +root, that is tocher, or fortune; and the taste of the custoc, that +is, the heart of the stem, is indicative of the natural temper and +disposition. Lastly, the stems, or, to give them their ordinary +appellation, the runts, are placed somewhere above the head of the +door; and the Christian names of the people whom chance brings into +the house are, according to the priority of placing the runts, the +names in question.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_33_33" id="Footnote_33_33"></a><a href="#FNanchor_33_33"><span class="label">[33]</span></a> They go to the barn-yard, and pull each at three several +times, a stalk of oats. If the third stalk wants the top-pickle, that +is, the grain at the top of the stalk, the party in question will come +to the marriage-bed anything but a maid.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_34_34" id="Footnote_34_34"></a><a href="#FNanchor_34_34"><span class="label">[34]</span></a> When the corn is in a doubtful state, by being too green +or wet, the stack-builder, by means of old timber, &c., makes a large +apartment in his stack, with an opening in the side which is fairest +exposed to the wind: this he calls a fause-house.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_35_35" id="Footnote_35_35"></a><a href="#FNanchor_35_35"><span class="label">[35]</span></a> Burning the nuts is a famous charm. They name the lad and +lass to each particular nut, as they lay them in the fire, and +according as they burn quietly together, or start from beside one +another, the course and issue of the courtship will be.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_36_36" id="Footnote_36_36"></a><a href="#FNanchor_36_36"><span class="label">[36]</span></a> Whoever would, with success, try this spell, must +strictly observe these directions: Steal out, all alone, to the kiln, +and, darkling, throw into the pot a clue of blue yarn; wind it in a +clue off the old one; and towards the latter end, something will hold +the thread; demand “wha hauds?” i.e. who holds? an answer will be +returned from the kiln-pot, naming the Christian and surname of your +future spouse.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_37_37" id="Footnote_37_37"></a><a href="#FNanchor_37_37"><span class="label">[37]</span></a> Take a candle, and go alone to a looking-glass; eat an +apple before it, and some traditions say, you should comb your hair +all the time; the face of your conjugal companion, to be, will be seen +in the glass, as if peeping over your shoulder.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_38_38" id="Footnote_38_38"></a><a href="#FNanchor_38_38"><span class="label">[38]</span></a> Steal out unperceived, and sow a handful of hemp-seed, +harrowing it with anything you can conveniently draw after you. +Repeat, now and then, “Hemp-seed, I saw thee; hemp-seed, I saw thee; +and him (or her) that is to be my true love, come after me and pou +thee.” Look over your left shoulder, and you will see the appearance +of the person invoked, in the attitude of pulling hemp. Some +traditions say, “Come after me, and shaw thee,” that is, show thyself; +in which case it simply appears. Others omit the harrowing, and say, +“Come after me, and harrow thee.”</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_39_39" id="Footnote_39_39"></a><a href="#FNanchor_39_39"><span class="label">[39]</span></a> This charm must likewise be performed, unperceived, and +alone. You go to the barn, and open both doors, taking them off the +hinges, if possible; for there is danger that the being about to +appear may shut the doors and do you some mischief. Then take that +instrument used in winnowing the corn, which, in our country dialect, +we call a wecht; and go through all the attitudes of letting down corn +against the wind. Repeat it three times; and the third time, an +apparition will pass through the barn, in at the windy door, and out +at the other, having both the figure in question, and the appearance +or retinue marking the employment or station in life.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_40_40" id="Footnote_40_40"></a><a href="#FNanchor_40_40"><span class="label">[40]</span></a> Take an opportunity of going unnoticed, to a bean stack, +and fathom it three times round. The last fathom of the last time, you +will catch in your arms the appearance of your future conjugal +yoke-fellow.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_41_41" id="Footnote_41_41"></a><a href="#FNanchor_41_41"><span class="label">[41]</span></a> You go out, one or more, for this is a social spell, to a +south running spring or rivulet, where “three lairds’ lands meet,” and +dip your left shirt-sleeve. Go to bed in sight of a fire, and hang +your wet sleeve before it to dry. Lie awake: and, some time near +midnight, an apparition having the exact figure of the grand object in +question, will come and turn the sleeve, as if to dry the other side +of it.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_42_42" id="Footnote_42_42"></a><a href="#FNanchor_42_42"><span class="label">[42]</span></a> Take three dishes: put clean water in one, foul water in +another, and leave the third empty; blindfold a person and lead him to +the hearth where the dishes are ranged; he (or she) dips the left +hand: if by chance in the clean water, the future husband or wife will +come to the bar of matrimony a maid; if in the foul, a widow; if in +the empty dish, it foretells, with equal certainty, no marriage at +all. It is repeated three times, and every time the arrangement of the +dishes is altered.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_43_43" id="Footnote_43_43"></a><a href="#FNanchor_43_43"><span class="label">[43]</span></a> Sowens, with butter instead of milk to them, is always +the Halloween supper.</p></div> +</div> + + + +<h2><a name="XXVI" id="XXVI"></a>XXVI.</h2> + +<h3>MAN WAS MADE TO MOURN.</h3> +<h4>A DIRGE.</h4> +<p>[The origin of this fine poem is alluded to by Burns in one of his +letters to Mrs. Dunlop: “I had an old grand-uncle with whom my mother +lived in her girlish years: the good old man was long blind ere he +died, during which time his highest enjoyment was to sit and cry, +while my mother would sing the simple old song of ‘The Life and Age of +Man.’” From that truly venerable woman, long after the death of her +distinguished son, Cromek, in collecting the Reliques, obtained a copy +by recitation of the older strain. Though the tone and sentiment +coincide closely with “Man was made to Mourn,” I agree with Lockhart, +that Burns wrote it in obedience to his own habitual feelings.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">When chill November’s surly blast<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Made fields and forests bare,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">One ev’ning as I wandered forth<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Along the banks of Ayr,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I spy’d a man whose aged step<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Seem’d weary, worn with care;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">His face was furrow’d o’er with years,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And hoary was his hair.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Young stranger, whither wand’rest thou?”<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Began the rev’rend sage;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">“Does thirst of wealth thy step constrain,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Or youthful pleasure’s rage?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or haply, prest with cares and woes,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Too soon thou hast began<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To wander forth, with me to mourn<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The miseries of man.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“The sun that overhangs yon moors,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Out-spreading far and wide,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where hundreds labour to support<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A haughty lordling’s pride:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I’ve seen yon weary winter-sun<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Twice forty times return,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And ev’ry time had added proofs<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That man was made to mourn.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“O man! while in thy early years,<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_96" id="Page_96">[96]</a></span><span class="i2">How prodigal of time!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Misspending all thy precious hours,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Thy glorious youthful prime!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Alternate follies take the sway;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Licentious passions burn;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Which tenfold force gives nature’s law,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That man was made to mourn.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Look not alone on youthful prime,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Or manhood’s active might;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Man then is useful to his kind,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Supported in his right:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But see him on the edge of life,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">With cares and sorrows worn;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Then age and want—oh! ill-match’d pair!—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Show man was made to mourn.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“A few seem favorites of fate,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In pleasure’s lap carest:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yet, think not all the rich and great<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Are likewise truly blest.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But, oh! what crowds in every land,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">All wretched and forlorn!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thro’ weary life this lesson learn—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That man was made to mourn.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Many and sharp the num’rous ills<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Inwoven with our frame!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">More pointed still we make ourselves,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Regret, remorse, and shame!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And man, whose heaven-erected face<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The smiles of love adorn,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Man’s inhumanity to man<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Makes countless thousands mourn!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“See yonder poor, o’erlabour’d wight,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">So abject, mean, and vile,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Who begs a brother of the earth<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To give him leave to toil;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And see his lordly fellow-worm<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The poor petition spurn,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Unmindful, though a weeping wife<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And helpless offspring mourn.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“If I’m design’d yon lordling’s slave—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">By Nature’s law design’d—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Why was an independent wish<br /></span> +<span class="i2">E’er planted in my mind?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">If not, why am I subject to<br /></span> +<span class="i2">His cruelty or scorn?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or why has man the will and power<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To make his fellow mourn?<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Yet, let not this too much, my son,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Disturb thy youthful breast;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">This partial view of human-kind<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Is surely not the best!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The poor, oppressed, honest man<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Had never, sure, been born,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Had there not been some recompense<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To comfort those that mourn!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“O Death! the poor man’s dearest friend—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The kindest and the best!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Welcome the hour, my aged limbs<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Are laid with thee at rest!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The great, the wealthy, fear thy blow,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">From pomp and pleasure torn!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But, oh! a blest relief to those<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That weary-laden mourn.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="XXVII" id="XXVII"></a>XXVII.</h2> + +<h3>TO RUIN.</h3> +<p>[“I have been,” says Burns, in his common-place book, “taking a peep +through, as Young finely says, ‘The dark postern of time long +elapsed.’ ’Twas a rueful prospect! What a tissue of thoughtlessness, +weakness, and folly! my life reminded me of a ruined temple. What +strength, what proportion in some parts, what unsightly gaps, what +prostrate ruins in others!” The fragment, To Ruin, seems to have had +its origin in moments such as these.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">All hail! inexorable lord!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">At whose destruction-breathing word,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The mightiest empires fall!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thy cruel, woe-delighted train,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The ministers of grief and pain,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A sullen welcome, all!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With stern-resolv’d, despairing eye,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I see each aimed dart;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For one has cut my dearest tie,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And quivers in my heart.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Then low’ring and pouring,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">The storm no more I dread;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Though thick’ning and black’ning,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Round my devoted head.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">And thou grim pow’r, by life abhorr’d,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">While life a pleasure can afford,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Oh! hear a wretch’s prayer!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">No more I shrink appall’d, afraid;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I court, I beg thy friendly aid,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To close this scene of care!<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_97" id="Page_97">[97]</a></span><span class="i0">When shall my soul, in silent peace,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Resign life’s joyless day;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My weary heart its throbbings cease,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Cold mould’ring in the clay?<br /></span> +<span class="i4">No fear more, no tear more,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">To stain my lifeless face;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Enclasped, and grasped<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Within thy cold embrace!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="XXVIII" id="XXVIII"></a>XXVIII.</h2> + +<h5>TO</h5> +<h3>JOHN GOUDIE OF KILMARNOCK.</h3> +<h4>ON THE PUBLICATION OF HIS ESSAYS</h4> +<p>[This burning commentary, by Burns, on the Essays of Goudie in the +Macgill controversy, was first published by Stewart, with the Jolly +Beggars, in 1801; it is akin in life and spirit to Holy Willie’s +Prayer; and may be cited as a sample of the wit and the force which +the poet brought to the great, but now forgotten, controversy of the +West.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O Goudie! terror of the Whigs,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Dread of black coats and rev’rend wigs,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sour Bigotry, on her last legs,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Girnin’, looks back,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wishin’ the ten Egyptian plagues<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Wad seize you quick.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Poor gapin’, glowrin’ Superstition,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Waes me! she’s in a sad condition:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Fie! bring Black Jock, her state physician,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">To see her water:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Alas! there’s ground o’ great suspicion<br /></span> +<span class="i8">She’ll ne’er get better.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Auld Orthodoxy lang did grapple,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But now she’s got an unco ripple;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Haste, gie her name up i’ the chapel,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Nigh unto death;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">See, how she fetches at the thrapple,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">An’ gasps for breath.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Enthusiasm’s past redemption,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Gaen in a gallopin’ consumption,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Not a’ the quacks, wi’ a’ their gumption,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Will ever mend her.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Her feeble pulse gies strong presumption<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Death soon will end her.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">’Tis you and Taylor<a name="FNanchor_44_44" id="FNanchor_44_44"></a><a href="#Footnote_44_44" class="fnanchor">[44]</a> are the chief,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wha are to blame for this mischief,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But gin the Lord’s ain focks gat leave,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">A toom tar-barrel,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ twa red peats wad send relief,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">An’ end the quarrel.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_44_44" id="Footnote_44_44"></a><a href="#FNanchor_44_44"><span class="label">[44]</span></a> Dr. Taylor, of Norwich.</p></div> +</div> + + +<h2><a name="XXIX" id="XXIX"></a>XXIX.</h2> + +<h5>TO</h5> +<h3>J. LAPRAIK.</h3> +<h4>AN OLD SCOTTISH BARD.</h4> +<p class="std1"><i>April 1st, 1785.</i></p> + +<p class="std1">(FIRST EPISTLE.)</p> + +<p>[“The epistle to John Lapraik,” says Gilbert Burns, “was produced +exactly on the occasion described by the author. Rocking is a term +derived from primitive times, when our country-women employed their +spare hours in spinning on the roke or distaff. This simple instrument +is a very portable one; and well fitted to the social inclination of +meeting in a neighbour’s house; hence the phrase of going a rocking, +or with the roke. As the connexion the phrase had with the implement +was forgotten when the roke gave place to the spinning-wheel, the +phrase came to be used by both sexes on social occasions, and men talk +of going with their rokes as well as women.”]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">While briers an’ woodbines budding green,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ paitricks scraichin’ loud at e’en,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ morning poussie whidden seen,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Inspire my muse,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">This freedom in an unknown frien’<br /></span> +<span class="i8">I pray excuse.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">On Fasten-een we had a rockin’,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To ca’ the crack and weave our stockin’,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And there was muckle fun an’ jokin’,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Ye need na doubt;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">At length we had a hearty yokin’<br /></span> +<span class="i8">At sang about.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">There was ae sang, amang the rest,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Aboon them a’ it pleas’d me best,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That some kind husband had addrest<br /></span> +<span class="i8">To some sweet wife;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">It thirl’d the heart-strings thro’ the breast,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">A’ to the life.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I’ve scarce heard aught describ’d sae weel,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">What gen’rous manly bosoms feel,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thought I, “Can this be Pope or Steele,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Or Beattie’s wark?”<br /></span> +<span class="i0">They told me ’twas an odd kind chiel<br /></span> +<span class="i8">About Muirkirk.<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_98" id="Page_98">[98]</a></span></div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">It pat me fidgin-fain to hear’t,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And sae about him there I spier’t,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Then a’ that ken’t him round declar’d<br /></span> +<span class="i8">He had injine,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That, nane excell’d it, few cam near’t,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">It was sae fine.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">That, set him to a pint of ale,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ either douce or merry tale,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or rhymes an’ sangs he’d made himsel’,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Or witty catches,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">’Tween Inverness and Tiviotdale,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">He had few matches.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Then up I gat, an’ swoor an aith,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Tho’ I should pawn my pleugh and graith,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or die a cadger pownie’s death<br /></span> +<span class="i8">At some dyke-back,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A pint an’ gill I’d gie them baith<br /></span> +<span class="i8">To hear your crack.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But, first an’ foremost, I should tell,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Amaist as soon as I could spell,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I to the crambo-jingle fell,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Tho’ rude an’ rough,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yet crooning to a body’s sel’,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Does weel eneugh.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I am nae poet in a sense,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But just a rhymer, like, by chance,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ hae to learning nae pretence,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Yet what the matter?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Whene’er my Muse does on me glance,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">I jingle at her.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Your critic-folk may cock their nose,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And say, “How can you e’er propose,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">You, wha ken hardly verse frae prose,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">To mak a sang?”<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But, by your leaves, my learned foes,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Ye’re may-be wrang.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">What’s a’ your jargon o’ your schools,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Your Latin names for horns an’ stools;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">If honest nature made you fools,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">What sairs your grammars?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ye’d better taen up spades and shools,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Or knappin-hammers.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">A set o’ dull, conceited hashes,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Confuse their brains in college classes!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">They gang in stirks and come out asses,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Plain truth to speak;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ syne they think to climb Parnassus<br /></span> +<span class="i8">By dint o’ Greek!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Gie me ae spark o’ Nature’s fire!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That’s a’ the learning I desire;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Then though I drudge thro’ dub an’ mire<br /></span> +<span class="i8">At pleugh or cart,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My muse, though hamely in attire,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">May touch the heart.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O for a spunk o’ Allan’s glee,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or Fergusson’s, the bauld and slee,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or bright Lapraik’s, my friend to be,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">If I can hit it!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That would be lear eneugh for me,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">If I could get it.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Now, sir, if ye hae friends enow,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Tho’ real friends, I b’lieve, are few,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yet, if your catalogue be fou,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">I’se no insist,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But gif ye want ae friend that’s true—<br /></span> +<span class="i8">I’m on your list.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I winna blaw about mysel;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As ill I like my fauts to tell;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But friends an’ folk that wish me well,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">They sometimes roose me;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Tho’ I maun own, as monie still<br /></span> +<span class="i8">As far abuse me.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">There’s ae wee faut they whiles lay to me,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I like the lasses—Gude forgie me!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For monie a plack they wheedle frae me,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">At dance or fair;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">May be some ither thing they gie me<br /></span> +<span class="i8">They weel can spare.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But Mauchline race, or Mauchline fair;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I should be proud to meet you there!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">We’se gie ae night’s discharge to care,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">If we forgather,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ hae a swap o’ rhymin’-ware<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Wi’ ane anither.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The four-gill chap, we’se gar him clatter,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ kirsen him wi’ reekin’ water;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Syne we’ll sit down an’ tak our whitter,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">To cheer our heart;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ faith, we’se be acquainted better,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Before we part.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Awa, ye selfish, warly race,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wha think that havins, sense, an’ grace,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ev’n love an’ friendship, should give place<br /></span> +<span class="i8">To catch-the-plack!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I dinna like to see your face,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Nor hear your crack.<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_99" id="Page_99">[99]</a></span></div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But ye whom social pleasure charms,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Whose hearts the tide of kindness warms,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Who hold your being on the terms,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">“Each aid the others,”<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Come to my bowl, come to my arms,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">My friends, my brothers!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But, to conclude my lang epistle,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As my auld pen’s worn to the grissle;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Twa lines frae you wad gar me fissle,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Who am, most fervent,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">While I can either sing or whissle,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Your friend and servant.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="XXX" id="XXX"></a>XXX.</h2> + +<h5>To</h5> +<h3>J. LAPRAIK.</h3> +<p class="std1">(SECOND EPISTLE.)</p> + +<p>[The John Lapraik to whom these epistles are addressed lived at +Dalfram in the neighbourhood of Muirkirk, and was a rustic worshipper +of the Muse: he unluckily, however, involved himself in that Western +bubble, the Ayr Bank, and consoled himself by composing in his +distress that song which moved the heart of Burns, beginning</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“When I upon thy bosom lean.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>He afterwards published a volume of verse, of a quality which proved +that the inspiration in his song of domestic sorrow was no settled +power of soul.]</p> + +<p class="sig1"><i>April 21st</i>, 1785.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">While new-ca’d ky, rowte at the stake,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ pownies reek in pleugh or braik,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">This hour on e’enin’s edge I take<br /></span> +<span class="i8">To own I’m debtor,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To honest-hearted, auld Lapraik,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">For his kind letter.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Forjesket sair, wi’ weary legs,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Rattlin’ the corn out-owre the rigs,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or dealing thro’ amang the naigs<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Their ten hours’ bite,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My awkart muse sair pleads and begs,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">I would na write.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The tapetless ramfeezl’d hizzie,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">She’s saft at best, and something lazy,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Quo’ she, “Ye ken, we’ve been sae busy,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">This month’ an’ mair,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That trouth, my head is grown right dizzie,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">An’ something sair.”<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Her dowff excuses pat me mad:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">“Conscience,” says I, “ye thowless jad!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I’ll write, an’ that a hearty blaud,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">This vera night;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">So dinna ye affront your trade,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">But rhyme it right.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Shall bauld Lapraik, the king o’ hearts,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Tho’ mankind were a pack o’ cartes,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Roose you sae weel for your deserts,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">In terms sae friendly,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yet ye’ll neglect to show your parts,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">An’ thank him kindly?”<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Sae I gat paper in a blink<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ down gaed stumpie in the ink:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Quoth I, “Before I sleep a wink,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">I vow I’ll close it;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ if ye winna mak it clink,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">By Jove I’ll prose it!”<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Sae I’ve begun to scrawl, but whether<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In rhyme or prose, or baith thegither,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or some hotch-potch that’s rightly neither,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Let time mak proof;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But I shall scribble down some blether<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Just clean aff-loof.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">My worthy friend, ne’er grudge an’ carp,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Tho’ fortune use you hard an’ sharp;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Come, kittle up your moorland-harp<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Wi’ gleesome touch!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ne’er mind how fortune waft an’ warp;<br /></span> +<span class="i8">She’s but a b—tch.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">She’s gien me monie a jirt an’ fleg,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sin’ I could striddle owre a rig;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But, by the L—d, tho’ I should beg<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Wi’ lyart pow,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I’ll laugh, an’ sing, an’ shake my leg,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">As lang’s I dow!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Now comes the sax an’ twentieth simmer,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I’ve seen the bud upo’ the timmer,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Still persecuted by the limmer<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Frae year to year;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But yet despite the kittle kimmer,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">I, Rob, am here.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Do ye envy the city gent,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Behint a kist to lie and sklent,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or purse-proud, big wi’ cent. per cent.<br /></span> +<span class="i8">And muckle wame,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In some bit brugh to represent<br /></span> +<span class="i8">A bailie’s name?<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_100" id="Page_100">[100]</a></span></div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Or is’t the paughty, feudal Thane,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wi’ ruffl’d sark an’ glancing cane,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wha thinks himsel nae sheep-shank bane,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">But lordly stalks,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">While caps and bonnets aff are taen,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">As by he walks!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“O Thou wha gies us each guid gift!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Gie me o’ wit an’ sense a lift,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Then turn me, if Thou please, adrift,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Thro’ Scotland wide;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wi’ cits nor lairds I wadna shift,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">In a’ their pride!”<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Were this the charter of our state,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">“On pain’ o’ hell be rich an’ great,”<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Damnation then would be our fate,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Beyond remead;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But, thanks to Heav’n, that’s no the gate<br /></span> +<span class="i8">We learn our creed.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">For thus the royal mandate ran,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When first the human race began,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">“The social, friendly, honest man,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Whate’er he be,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">’Tis he fulfils great Nature’s plan,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">An’ none but he!”<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O mandate, glorious and divine!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The followers o’ the ragged Nine,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Poor thoughtless devils! yet may shine<br /></span> +<span class="i8">In glorious light,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">While sordid sons o’ Mammon’s line<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Are dark as night.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Tho’ here they scrape, an’ squeeze, an’ growl,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Their worthless nievfu’ of a soul<br /></span> +<span class="i0">May in some future carcase howl<br /></span> +<span class="i8">The forest’s fright;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or in some day-detesting owl<br /></span> +<span class="i8">May shun the light.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Then may Lapraik and Burns arise,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To reach their native kindred skies,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And sing their pleasures, hopes, an’ joys,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">In some mild sphere,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Still closer knit in friendship’s ties<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Each passing year!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="XXXI" id="XXXI"></a>XXXI.</h2> + +<h5>TO</h5> +<h3>J. LAPRAIK.</h3> +<p class="std1">(THIRD EPISTLE.)</p> + +<p>[I have heard one of our most distinguished English poets recite with +a sort of ecstasy some of the verses of these epistles, and praise the +ease of the language and the happiness of the thoughts. He averred, +however, that the poet, when pinched for a word, hesitated not to coin +one, and instanced, “tapetless,” “ramfeezled,” and “forjesket,” as +intrusions in our dialect. These words seem indeed, to some Scotchmen, +strange and uncouth, but they are true words of the west.]</p> + +<p class="sig1"><i>Sept.</i> 13th, 1785.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Guid speed an’ furder to you, Johnny,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Guid health, hale han’s, an’ weather bonny;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Now when ye’re nickan down fu’ canny<br /></span> +<span class="i8">The staff o’ bread,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">May ye ne’er want a stoup o’ bran’y<br /></span> +<span class="i8">To clear your head.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">May Boreas never thresh your rigs,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Nor kick your rickles aff their legs,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sendin’ the stuff o’er muirs an’ haggs<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Like drivin’ wrack;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But may the tapmast grain that wags<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Come to the sack.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I’m bizzie too, an’ skelpin’ at it,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But bitter, daudin’ showers hae wat it,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sae my auld stumpie pen I gat it<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Wi’ muckle wark,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ took my jocteleg an’ whatt it,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Like ony clark.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">It’s now twa month that I’m your debtor<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For your braw, nameless, dateless letter,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Abusin’ me for harsh ill nature<br /></span> +<span class="i8">On holy men,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">While deil a hair yoursel’ ye’re better,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">But mair profane.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But let the kirk-folk ring their bells,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Let’s sing about our noble sel’s;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">We’ll cry nae jads frae heathen hills<br /></span> +<span class="i8">To help, or roose us,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But browster wives an’ whiskey stills,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">They are the muses.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Your friendship, Sir, I winna quat it<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ if ye mak’ objections at it,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Then han’ in nieve some day we’ll knot it,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">An’ witness take,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ when wi’ Usquabae we’ve wat it<br /></span> +<span class="i8">It winna break.<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_101" id="Page_101">[101]</a></span></div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But if the beast and branks be spar’d<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Till kye be gaun without the herd,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ a’ the vittel in the yard,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">An’ theekit right,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I mean your ingle-side to guard<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Ae winter night.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Then muse-inspirin’ aqua-vitæ<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Shall make us baith sae blythe an’ witty,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Till ye forget ye’re auld an’ gatty,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">An’ be as canty,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As ye were nine year less than thretty,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Sweet ane an’ twenty!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But stooks are cowpet wi’ the blast,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ now the sin keeks in the west,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Then I maun rin amang the rest<br /></span> +<span class="i8">An’ quat my chanter;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sae I subscribe myself in haste,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Yours, Rab the Ranter.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="XXXII" id="XXXII"></a>XXXII.</h2> + +<h5>TO</h5> +<h3>WILLIAM SIMPSON,</h3> +<h4>OCHILTREE.</h4> +<p>[The person to whom this epistle is addressed, was schoolmaster of +Ochiltree, and afterwards of New Lanark: he was a writer of verses +too, like many more of the poet’s comrades;—of verses which rose not +above the barren level of mediocrity: “one of his poems,” says +Chambers, “was a laughable elegy on the death of the Emperor Paul.” In +his verses to Burns, under the name of a Tailor, there is nothing to +laugh at, though they are intended to be laughable as well as +monitory.]</p> + +<p class="sig1"><i>May, 1785.</i></p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I gat your letter, winsome Willie;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wi’ gratefu’ heart I thank you brawlie;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Tho’ I maun say’t, I wad be silly,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">An’ unco vain,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Should I believe, my coaxin’ billie,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Your flatterin’ strain.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But I’se believe ye kindly meant it,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I sud be laith to think ye hinted<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ironic satire, sidelins sklented<br /></span> +<span class="i8">On my poor Musie;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Tho’ in sic phraisin’ terms ye’ve penn’d it,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">I scarce excuse ye.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">My senses wad be in a creel,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Should I but dare a hope to speel,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wi’ Allan, or wi’ Gilbertfield,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">The braes o’ fame;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or Fergusson, the writer chiel,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">A deathless name.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">(O Fergusson! thy glorious parts<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ill suited law’s dry, musty arts!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My curse upon your whunstane hearts,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Ye Enbrugh gentry!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The tythe o’ what ye waste at cartes<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Wad stow’d his pantry!)<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Yet when a tale comes i’ my head,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or lasses gie my heart a screed,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As whiles they’re like to be my dead<br /></span> +<span class="i8">(O sad disease!)<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I kittle up my rustic reed,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">It gies me ease.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Auld Coila, now, may fidge fu’ fain,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">She’s gotten poets o’ her ain,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Chiels wha their chanters winna hain,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">But tune their lays,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Till echoes a’ resound again<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Her weel-sung praise.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Nae poet thought her worth his while,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To set her name in measur’d stile;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">She lay like some unkenn’d-of isle<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Beside New-Holland,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or whare wild-meeting oceans boil<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Besouth Magellan.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Ramsay an’ famous Fergusson<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Gied Forth and Tay a lift aboon;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yarrow an’ Tweed, to monie a tune,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Owre Scotland rings,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">While Irwin, Lugar, Ayr, an’ Doon,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Nae body sings.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Th’ Ilissus, Tiber, Thames, an’ Seine,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Glide sweet in monie a tunefu’ line!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But, Willie, set your fit to mine,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">An’ cock your crest,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">We’ll gar our streams an’ burnies shine<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Up wi’ the best.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">We’ll sing auld Coila’s plains an’ fells,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Her moor’s red-brown wi’ heather bells,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Her banks an’ braes, her dens an’ dells,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Where glorious Wallace<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Aft bure the gree, as story tells,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Frae southron billies.<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_102" id="Page_102">[102]</a></span></div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">At Wallace’ name, what Scottish blood<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But boils up in a spring-tide flood!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Oft have our fearless fathers strode<br /></span> +<span class="i8">By Wallace’ side,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Still pressing onward, red-wat shod,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Or glorious dy’d.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O sweet are Coila’s haughs an’ woods,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When lintwhites chant amang the buds,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And jinkin’ hares, in amorous whids<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Their loves enjoy,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">While thro’ the braes the cushat croods<br /></span> +<span class="i8">With wailfu’ cry!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Ev’n winter bleak has charms to me<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When winds rave thro’ the naked tree;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or frosts on hills of Ochiltree<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Are hoary gray:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or blinding drifts wild-furious flee,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Dark’ning the day.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O Nature! a’ thy shews an’ forms<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To feeling, pensive hearts hae charms!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Whether the summer kindly warms,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Wi’ life an’ light,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or winter howls, in gusty storms,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">The lang, dark night!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The muse, nae Poet ever fand her,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">’Till by himsel’ he learn’d to wander,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Adown some trotting burn’s meander,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">An’ no think lang;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O sweet, to stray an’ pensive ponder<br /></span> +<span class="i8">A heart-felt sang!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The warly race may drudge an’ drive,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Hog-shouther, jundie, stretch an’ strive,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Let me fair Nature’s face descrive,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">And I, wi’ pleasure,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Shall let the busy, grumbling hive<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Bum owre their treasure.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Fareweel, my “rhyme-composing brither!”<br /></span> +<span class="i0">We’ve been owre lang unkenn’d to ither:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Now let us lay our heads thegither,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">In love fraternal;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">May envy wallop in a tether,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Black fiend, infernal!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">While Highlandmen hate tolls an’ taxes;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">While moorlan’ herds like guid fat braxies;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">While terra firma, on her axes<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Diurnal turns,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Count on a friend, in faith an’ practice,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">In Robert Burns.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">POSTSCRIPT</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">My memory’s no worth a preen:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I had amaist forgotten clean,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ye bade me write you what they mean,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">By this New Light,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">‘Bout which our herds sae aft hae been,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Maist like to fight.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">In days when mankind were but callans,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">At grammar, logic, an’ sic talents,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">They took nae pains their speech to balance,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Or rules to gie,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But spak their thoughts in plain, braid Lallans,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Like you or me.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">In thae auld times, they thought the moon,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Just like a sark, or pair o’ shoon,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wore by degrees, ’till her last roon,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Gaed past their viewing,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ shortly after she was done,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">They gat a new one.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">This past for certain—undisputed;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">It ne’er cam i’ their heads to doubt it,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">’Till chiels gat up an’ wad confute it,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">An’ ca’d it wrang;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ muckle din there was about it,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Baith loud an’ lang.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Some herds, weel learn’d upo’ the beuk,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wad threap auld folk the thing misteuk;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For ’twas the auld moon turned a neuk,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">An’ out o’ sight,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ backlins-comin’, to the leuk,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">She grew mair bright.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">This was deny’d, it was affirm’d;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The herds an’ hissels were alarm’d:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The rev’rend gray-beards rav’d and storm’d<br /></span> +<span class="i8">That beardless laddies<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Should think they better were inform’d<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Than their auld daddies.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Frae less to mair it gaed to sticks;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Frae words an’ aiths to clours an’ nicks,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ monie a fallow gat his licks,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Wi’ hearty crunt;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ some, to learn them for their tricks,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Were hang’d an’ brunt.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">This game was play’d in monie lands,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ Auld Light caddies bure sic hands,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That, faith, the youngsters took the sands<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Wi’ nimble shanks,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">’Till lairds forbade, by strict commands,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Sic bluidy pranks.<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_103" id="Page_103">[103]</a></span></div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But New Light herds gat sic a cowe,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Folk thought them ruin’d stick-an’-stowe,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Till now amaist on every knowe,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Ye’ll find ane plac’d;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ some their New Light fair avow,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Just quite barefac’d.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Nae doubt the Auld Light flocks are bleatin’;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Their zealous herds are vex’d an’ sweatin’:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Mysel’, I’ve even seen them greetin’<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Wi’ girnin’ spite,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To hear the moon sae sadly lie’d on<br /></span> +<span class="i8">By word an’ write.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But shortly they will cowe the loons;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Some Auld Light herds in neibor towns<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Are mind’t in things they ca’ balloons,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">To tak a flight,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ stay ae month amang the moons<br /></span> +<span class="i8">And see them right.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Guid observation they will gie them:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ when the auld moon’s gaun to lea’e them,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The hindmost shaird, they’ll fetch it wi’ them,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Just i’ their pouch,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ when the New Light billies see them,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">I think they’ll crouch!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Sae, ye observe that a’ this clatter<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Is naething but a “moonshine matter;”<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But tho’ dull prose-folk Latin splatter<br /></span> +<span class="i8">In logic tulzie,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I hope we bardies ken some better<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Than mind sic brulzie.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="XXXIII" id="XXXIII"></a>XXXIII.</h2> + +<h4>ADDRESS</h4> +<h5>TO AN</h5> +<h3>ILLEGITIMATE CHILD.</h3> +<p>[This hasty and not very decorous effusion, was originally entitled +“The Poet’s Welcome; or, Rab the Rhymer’s Address to his Bastard +Child.” A copy, with the more softened, but less expressive title, was +published by Stewart, in 1801, and is alluded to by Burns himself, in +his biographical letter to Moore. “Bonnie Betty,” the mother of the +“sonsie-smirking, dear-bought Bess,” of the Inventory, lived in +Largieside: to support this daughter the poet made over the copyright +of his works when he proposed to go to the West Indies. She lived to +be a woman, and to marry one John Bishop, overseer at Polkemmet, where +she died in 1817. It is said she resembled Burns quite as much as any +of the rest of his children.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Thou’s welcome, wean, mischanter fa’ me,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">If ought of thee, or of thy mammy,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Shall ever daunton me, or awe me,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">My sweet wee lady,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or if I blush when thou shalt ca’ me<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Tit-ta or daddy.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Wee image of my bonny Betty,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I, fatherly, will kiss and daut thee,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As dear and near my heart I set thee<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Wi’ as gude will<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As a’ the priests had seen me get thee<br /></span> +<span class="i8">That’s out o’ hell.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">What tho’ they ca’ me fornicator,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ tease my name in kintry clatter:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The mair they talk I’m kent the better,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">E’en let them clash;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An auld wife’s tongue’s a feckless matter<br /></span> +<span class="i8">To gie ane fash.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Sweet fruit o’ mony a merry dint,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My funny toil is now a’ tint,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sin’ thou came to the warl asklent,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Which fools may scoff at;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In my last plack thy part’s be in’t<br /></span> +<span class="i8">The better ha’f o’t.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">An’ if thou be what I wad hae thee,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ tak the counsel I sall gie thee,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A lovin’ father I’ll be to thee,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">If thou be spar’d;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thro’ a’ thy childish years I’ll e’e thee,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">An’ think’t weel war’d.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Gude grant that thou may ay inherit<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thy mither’s person, grace, an’ merit,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ thy poor worthless daddy’s spirit,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Without his failins;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">’Twill please me mair to hear an’ see it<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Than stocket mailens.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="XXXIV" id="XXXIV"></a>XXXIV.</h2> + +<h3>NATURE’S LAW.</h3> +<h4>A POEM HUMBLY INSCRIBED TO G. H. ESQ.</h4> +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Great nature spoke, observant man obey’d.”<br /></span> +</div></div> +<p class="sig2 smcap">Pope.</p> + +<p>[This Poem was written by Burns at Mossgiel, and “humbly inscribed to +Gavin Hamilton, Esq.” It is supposed to allude to his intercourse with +Jean Armour, with the circumstances of which he seems to have made +many of his comrades acquainted. These verses were well known to many +of the admirers of the poet, but they remained in manuscript till +given to the world by Sir Harris Nicolas, in Pickering’s Aldine +Edition of the British Poets.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Let other heroes boast their scars,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The marks of sturt and strife;<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_104" id="Page_104">[104]</a></span><span class="i0">And other poets sing of wars,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The plagues of human life;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Shame fa’ the fun; wi’ sword and gun<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To slap mankind like lumber!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I sing his name, and nobler fame,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Wha multiplies our number.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Great Nature spoke with air benign,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">“Go on, ye human race!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">This lower world I you resign;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Be fruitful and increase.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The liquid fire of strong desire<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I’ve pour’d it in each bosom;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Here, in this hand, does mankind stand,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And there, is beauty’s blossom.”<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The hero of these artless strains,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A lowly bard was he,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Who sung his rhymes in Coila’s plains<br /></span> +<span class="i2">With meikle mirth an’ glee;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Kind Nature’s care had given his share,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Large, of the flaming current;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And all devout, he never sought<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To stem the sacred torrent.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">He felt the powerful, high behest,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Thrill vital through and through;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And sought a correspondent breast,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To give obedience due:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Propitious Powers screen’d the young flowers,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">From mildews of abortion;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And lo! the bard, a great reward,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Has got a double portion!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Auld cantie Coil may count the day,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">As annual it returns,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The third of Libra’s equal sway,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That gave another B[urns],<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With future rhymes, an’ other times,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To emulate his sire;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To sing auld Coil in nobler style,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">With more poetic fire.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Ye Powers of peace, and peaceful song,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Look down with gracious eyes;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And bless auld Coila, large and long,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">With multiplying joys:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Lang may she stand to prop the land,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The flow’r of ancient nations;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And B[urns’s] spring, her fame to sing,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Thro’ endless generations!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="XXXV" id="XXXV"></a>XXXV.</h2> + +<h3>TO THE REV. JOHN M’MATH.</h3> +<p>[Poor M’Math was at the period of this epistle assistant to Wodrow, +minister of Tarbolton: he was a good preacher, a moderate man in +matters of discipline, and an intimate of the Coilsfield Montgomerys. +His dependent condition depressed his spirits: he grew dissipated; and +finally, it is said, enlisted as a common soldier, and died in a +foreign land.]</p> + +<p class="sig1"><i>Sept. 17th, 1785.</i></p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">While at the stook the shearers cow’r<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To shun the bitter blaudin’ show’r,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or in gulravage rinnin’ scow’r<br /></span> +<span class="i8">To pass the time,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To you I dedicate the hour<br /></span> +<span class="i8">In idle rhyme.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">My musie, tir’d wi’ mony a sonnet<br /></span> +<span class="i0">On gown, an’ ban’, and douse black bonnet,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Is grown right eerie now she’s done it,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Lest they should blame her,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ rouse their holy thunder on it<br /></span> +<span class="i8">And anathem her.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I own ’twas rash, an’ rather hardy,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That I, a simple countra bardie,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Shou’d meddle wi’ a pack sae sturdy,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Wha, if they ken me,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Can easy, wi’ a single wordie,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Lowse hell upon me.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But I gae mad at their grimaces,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Their sighin’ cantin’ grace-proud faces,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Their three-mile prayers, and hauf-mile graces,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Their raxin’ conscience,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Whase greed, revenge, an’ pride disgraces,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Waur nor their nonsense.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">There’s Gaun,<a name="FNanchor_45_45" id="FNanchor_45_45"></a><a href="#Footnote_45_45" class="fnanchor">[45]</a> miska’t waur than a beast,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wha has mair honour in his breast<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Than mony scores as guid’s the priest<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Wha sae abus’t him.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ may a bard no crack his jest<br /></span> +<span class="i8">What way they’ve use’t him.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">See him, the poor man’s friend in need,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The gentleman in word an’ deed,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ shall his fame an’ honour bleed<br /></span> +<span class="i8">By worthless skellums,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ not a muse erect her head<br /></span> +<span class="i8">To cowe the blellums?<br /></span> +</div></div> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_105" id="Page_105">[105]</a></span></p> +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O Pope, had I thy satire’s darts<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To gie the rascals their deserts,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I’d rip their rotten, hollow hearts,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">An’ tell aloud<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Their jugglin’ hocus-pocus arts<br /></span> +<span class="i8">To cheat the crowd.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">God knows, I’m no the thing I shou’d be,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Nor am I even the thing I cou’d be,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But twenty times, I rather wou’d be<br /></span> +<span class="i8">An atheist clean,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Than under gospel colours hid be<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Just for a screen.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">An honest man may like a glass,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An honest man may like a lass,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But mean revenge, an’ malice fause<br /></span> +<span class="i8">He’ll still disdain,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ then cry zeal for gospel laws,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Like some we ken.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">They take religion in their mouth;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">They talk o’ mercy, grace, an’ truth,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For what?—to gie their malice skouth<br /></span> +<span class="i8">On some puir wight,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ hunt him down, o’er right, an’ ruth,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">To ruin straight.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">All hail, Religion! maid divine!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Pardon a muse sae mean as mine,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Who in her rough imperfect line,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Thus daurs to name thee;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To stigmatize false friends of thine<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Can ne’er defame thee.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Tho’ blotch’d an’ foul wi’ mony a stain,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ far unworthy of thy train,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With trembling voice I tune my strain<br /></span> +<span class="i8">To join with those,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Who boldly daur thy cause maintain<br /></span> +<span class="i8">In spite o’ foes:<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">In spite o’ crowds, in spite o’ mobs,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In spite of undermining jobs,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In spite o’ dark banditti stabs<br /></span> +<span class="i8">At worth an’ merit,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">By scoundrels, even wi’ holy robes,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">But hellish spirit.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O Ayr! my dear, my native ground,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Within thy presbyterial bound<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A candid lib’ral band is found<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Of public teachers,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As men, as Christians too, renown’d,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">An’ manly preachers.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Sir, in that circle you are nam’d;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sir, in that circle you are fam’d;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ some, by whom your doctrine’s blam’d,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">(Which gies you honour,)<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Even Sir, by them your heart’s esteem’d,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">An’ winning manner.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Pardon this freedom I have ta’en,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ if impertinent I’ve been,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Impute it not, good Sir, in ane<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Whase heart ne’er wrang’d ye,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But to his utmost would befriend<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Ought that belang’d ye.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_45_45" id="Footnote_45_45"></a><a href="#FNanchor_45_45"><span class="label">[45]</span></a> Gavin Hamilton, Esq.</p></div> +</div> + + + +<h2><a name="XXXVI" id="XXXVI"></a>XXXVI.</h2> + +<h3>TO A MOUSE,</h3> +<h4>ON TURNING HER UP IN HER NEST WITH THE PLOUGH,</h4> +<h4>NOVEMBER, 1785.</h4> +<p>[This beautiful poem was imagined while the poet was holding the +plough, on the farm of Mossgiel: the field is still pointed out: and a +man called Blane is still living, who says he was gaudsman to the bard +at the time, and chased the mouse with the plough-pettle, for which he +was rebuked by his young master, who inquired what harm the poor mouse +had done him. In the night that followed, Burns awoke his gaudsman, +who was in the same bed with him, recited the poem as it now stands, +and said, “What think you of our mouse now?”]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Wee, sleekit, cow’rin’, tim’rous beastie,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O, what a panic’s in thy breastie!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thou need na start awa sae hasty,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Wi’ bickering brattle!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I wad be laith to rin an’ chase thee,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Wi’ murd’ring pattle!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I’m truly sorry man’s dominion<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Has broken nature’s social union,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ justifies that ill opinion,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Which makes thee startle<br /></span> +<span class="i0">At me, thy poor earth-born companion,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">An’ fellow-mortal!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I doubt na, whyles, but thou may thieve;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">What then? poor beastie, thou maun live!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A daimen icker in a thrave<br /></span> +<span class="i8">‘S a sma’ request:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I’ll get a blessin’ wi’ the lave,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">And never miss’t!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Thy wee bit housie, too, in ruin;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Its silly wa’s the win’s are strewin’!<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_106" id="Page_106">[106]</a></span><span class="i0">An’ naething, now, to big a new ane,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">O’ foggage green!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ bleak December’s winds ensuin’,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Baith snell and keen!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Thou saw the fields laid bare an’ waste,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ weary winter comin’ fast,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ cozie here, beneath the blast,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Thou thought to dwell,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">’Till, crash! the cruel coulter past<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Out thro’ thy cell.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">That wee bit heap o’ leaves an’ stibble,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Has cost thee mony a weary nibble!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Now thou’s turn’d out, for a’ thy trouble,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">But house or hald,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To thole the winter’s sleety dribble,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">An’ cranreuch cauld!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But, Mousie, thou art no thy lane,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In proving foresight may be vain:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The best laid schemes o’ mice an’ men,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Gang aft a-gley,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ lea’e us nought but grief and pain,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">For promis’d joy.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Still thou art blest, compar’d wi’ me!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The present only toucheth thee:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But, Och! I backward cast my e’e,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">On prospects drear!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ forward, tho’ I canna see,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">I guess an’ fear.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="XXXVII" id="XXXVII"></a>XXXVII.</h2> + +<h3>SCOTCH DRINK.</h3> +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Gie him strong drink, until he wink,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That’s sinking in despair;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ liquor guid to fire his bluid,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That’s prest wi’ grief an’ care;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">There let him bouse, an’ deep carouse,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Wi’ bumpers flowing o’er,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Till he forgets his loves or debts,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’ minds his griefs no more.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="sig1"><span class="smcap">Solomon’s Proverb</span>, xxxi. 6, 7.</p> + +<p>[“I here enclose you,” said Burns, 20 March, 1786, to his friend +Kennedy, “my Scotch Drink; I hope some time before we hear the gowk, +to have the pleasure of seeing you at Kilmarnock: when I intend we +shall have a gill between us, in a mutchkin stoup.”]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Let other poets raise a fracas<br /></span> +<span class="i0">‘Bout vines, an’ wines, an’ dru’ken Bacchus,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ crabbit names and stories wrack us,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">An’ grate our lug,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I sing the juice Scotch bear can mak us,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">In glass or jug.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O, thou, my Muse! guid auld Scotch drink;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Whether thro’ wimplin’ worms thou jink,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or, richly brown, ream o’er the brink,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">In glorious faem,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Inspire me, till I lisp an’ wink,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">To sing thy name!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Let husky wheat the haughs adorn,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ aits set up their awnie horn,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ pease an’ beans, at e’en or morn,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Perfume the plain,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Leeze me on thee, John Barleycorn,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Thou king o’ grain!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">On thee aft Scotland chows her cood,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In souple scones, the wale o’ food!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or tumblin’ in the boilin’ flood<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Wi’ kail an’ beef;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But when thou pours thy strong heart’s blood,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">There thou shines chief.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Food fills the wame an’ keeps us livin’;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Tho’ life’s a gift no worth receivin’<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When heavy dragg’d wi’ pine an’ grievin’;<br /></span> +<span class="i8">But, oil’d by thee,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The wheels o’ life gae down-hill, scrievin,’<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Wi’ rattlin’ glee.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Thou clears the head o’ doited Lear;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thou cheers the heart o’ drooping Care;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thou strings the nerves o’ Labour sair,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">At’s weary toil;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thou even brightens dark Despair<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Wi’ gloomy smile.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Aft, clad in massy, siller weed,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wi’ gentles thou erects thy head;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yet humbly kind in time o’ need,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">The poor man’s wine,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">His wee drap parritch, or his bread,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Thou kitchens fine.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Thou art the life o’ public haunts;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But thee, what were our fairs an’ rants?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ev’n godly meetings o’ the saunts,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">By thee inspir’d,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When gaping they besiege the tents,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Are doubly fir’d.<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_107" id="Page_107">[107]</a></span></div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">That merry night we get the corn in,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O sweetly then thou reams the horn in!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or reekin’ on a new-year morning<br /></span> +<span class="i8">In cog or dicker,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ just a wee drap sp’ritual burn in,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">An’ gusty sucker!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">When Vulcan gies his bellows breath,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ ploughmen gather wi’ their graith,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O rare! to see thee fizz an’ freath<br /></span> +<span class="i8">I’ th’ lugget caup!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Then Burnewin comes on like Death<br /></span> +<span class="i8">At ev’ry chap.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Nae mercy, then, for airn or steel;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The brawnie, bainie, ploughman chiel,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Brings hard owrehip, wi’ sturdy wheel,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">The strong forehammer,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Till block an’ studdie ring an’ reel<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Wi’ dinsome clamour.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">When skirlin’ weanies see the light,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thou maks the gossips clatter bright,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">How fumblin’ cuifs their dearies slight;<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Wae worth the name!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Nae howdie gets a social night,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Or plack frae them.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">When neibors anger at a plea,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ just as wud as wud can be,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">How easy can the barley-bree<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Cement the quarrel!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">It’s aye the cheapest lawyer’s fee,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">To taste the barrel.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Alake! that e’er my muse has reason<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To wyte her countrymen wi’ treason!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But monie daily weet their weason<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Wi’ liquors nice,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ hardly, in a winter’s season,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">E’er spier her price.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Wae worth that brandy, burning trash!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Fell source o’ monie a pain an’ brash!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Twins monie a poor, doylt, druken hash,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">O’ half his days;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ sends, beside, auld Scotland’s cash<br /></span> +<span class="i8">To her warst faes.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Ye Scots, wha wish auld Scotland well,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ye chief, to you my tale I tell,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Poor plackless devils like mysel’,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">It sets you ill,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wi’ bitter, dearthfu’ wines to mell,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Or foreign gill.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">May gravels round his blather wrench,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ gouts torment him inch by inch,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wha twists his gruntle wi’ a glunch<br /></span> +<span class="i8">O’ sour disdain,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Out owre a glass o’ whiskey punch<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Wi’ honest men;<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O whiskey! soul o’ plays an’ pranks!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Accept a Bardie’s gratefu’ thanks!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When wanting thee, what tuneless cranks<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Are my poor verses!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thou comes—they rattle i’ their ranks<br /></span> +<span class="i8">At ither’s a——s!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Thee, Ferintosh! O sadly lost!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Scotland lament frae coast to coast!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Now colic grips, an’ barkin’ hoast,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">May kill us a’;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For loyal Forbes’ charter’d boast,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Is ta’en awa.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Thae curst horse-leeches o’ th’ Excise,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wha mak the whiskey stells their prize!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Haud up thy han’, Deil! ance, twice, thrice!<br /></span> +<span class="i8">There, seize the blinkers!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ bake them up in brunstane pies<br /></span> +<span class="i8">For poor d—n’d drinkers.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Fortune! if thou’ll but gie me still<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Hale breeks, a scone, an’ whiskey gill,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ rowth o’ rhyme to rave at will,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Tak’ a’ the rest,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ deal’t about as thy blind skill<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Directs thee best.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="XXXVIII" id="XXXVIII"></a>XXXVIII.</h2> + + +<h4>THE AUTHOR’S</h4> +<h3>EARNEST CRY AND PRAYER</h3> +<h5>TO THE</h5> +<h4>SCOTCH REPRESENTATIVES</h4> +<h5>IN THE</h5> +<h4>HOUSE OF COMMONS.</h4> +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">‘Dearest of distillation! last and best!——<br /></span> +<span class="i0">———How art thou lost!————’<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="sig1"><span class="smcap">Parody on Milton</span></p> + +<p>[“This Poem was written,” says Burns, “before the act anent the +Scottish distilleries, of session 1786, for which Scotland and the +author return their most grateful thanks.” Before the passing of this +lenient act, so sharp was the law in the North, that some distillers<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_108" id="Page_108">[108]</a></span> +relinquished their trade; the price of barley was affected, and +Scotland, already exasperated at the refusal of a militia, for which +she was a petitioner, began to handle her claymore, and was perhaps +only hindered from drawing it by the act mentioned by the poet. In an +early copy of the poem, he thus alludes to Colonel Hugh Montgomery, +afterwards Earl of Eglinton:—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Thee, sodger Hugh, my watchman stented,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">If bardies e’er are represented,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I ken if that yere sword were wanted<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Ye’d lend yere hand;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But when there’s aught to say anent it<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Yere at a stand.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>The poet was not sure that Montgomery would think the compliment to +his ready hand an excuse in full for the allusion to his unready +tongue, and omitted the stanza.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Ye Irish lords, ye knights an’ squires,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wha represent our brughs an’ shires,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ doucely manage our affairs<br /></span> +<span class="i8">In Parliament,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To you a simple Bardie’s prayers<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Are humbly sent.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Alas! my roupet Muse is hearse!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Your honours’ hearts wi’ grief ’twad pierce,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To see her sittin’ on her a—e<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Low i’ the dust,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ scriechin’ out prosaic verse,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">An’ like to brust!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Tell them wha hae the chief direction,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Scotland an’ me’s in great affliction,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">E’er sin’ they laid that curst restriction<br /></span> +<span class="i8">On aqua-vitæ;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ rouse them up to strong conviction,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">An’ move their pity.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Stand forth, an’ tell yon Premier youth,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The honest, open, naked truth:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Tell him o’ mine an’ Scotland’s drouth,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">His servants humble:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The muckie devil blaw ye south,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">If ye dissemble!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Does ony great man glunch an’ gloom?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Speak out, an’ never fash your thumb!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Let posts an’ pensions sink or soom<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Wi’ them wha grant ‘em:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">If honestly they canna come,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Far better want ‘em.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">In gath’rin votes you were na slack;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Now stand as tightly by your tack;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ne’er claw your lug, an’ fidge your back,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">An’ hum an’ haw;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But raise your arm, an’ tell your crack<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Before them a’.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Paint Scotland greetin’ owre her thrizzle,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Her mutchkin stoup as toom’s a whissle:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ damn’d excisemen in a bussle,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Seizin’ a stell,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Triumphant crushin’t like a mussel<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Or lampit shell.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Then on the tither hand present her,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A blackguard smuggler, right behint her,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ cheek-for-chow, a chuffie vintner,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Colleaguing join,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Picking her pouch as bare as winter<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Of a’ kind coin.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Is there, that bears the name o’ Scot,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But feels his heart’s bluid rising hot,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To see his poor auld mither’s pot<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Thus dung in staves,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ plunder’d o’ her hindmost groat<br /></span> +<span class="i8">By gallows knaves?<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Alas! I’m but a nameless wight,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Trode i’ the mire out o’ sight!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But could I like Montgomeries fight,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Or gab like Boswell,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">There’s some sark-necks I wad draw tight,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">An’ tie some hose well.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">God bless your honours, can ye see’t,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The kind, auld, canty carlin greet,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ no get warmly on your feet,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">An’ gar them hear it!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ tell them with a patriot heat,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Ye winna bear it?<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Some o’ you nicely ken the laws,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To round the period an’ pause,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ wi’ rhetorie clause on clause<br /></span> +<span class="i8">To mak harangues:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Then echo thro’ Saint Stephen’s wa’s<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Auld Scotland’s wrangs.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Dempster, a true blue Scot I’se warran’;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thee, aith-detesting, chaste Kilkerran;<a name="FNanchor_46_46" id="FNanchor_46_46"></a><a href="#Footnote_46_46" class="fnanchor">[46]</a><br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ that glib-gabbet Highland baron,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">The Laird o’ Graham;<a name="FNanchor_47_47" id="FNanchor_47_47"></a><a href="#Footnote_47_47" class="fnanchor">[47]</a><br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ ane, a chap that’s damn’d auldfarren,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Dundas his name.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_109" id="Page_109">[109]</a></span></p><div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Erskine, a spunkie Norland billie;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">True Campbells, Frederick an’ Hay;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ Livingstone, the bauld Sir Willie:<br /></span> +<span class="i8">An’ monie ithers,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Whom auld Demosthenes or Tully<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Might own for brithers.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Arouse, my boys! exert your mettle,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To get auld Scotland back her kettle:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or faith! I’ll wad my new pleugh-pettle,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Ye’ll see’t or lang,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">She’ll teach you, wi’ a reekin’ whittle,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Anither sang.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">This while she’s been in crankous mood,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Her lost militia fir’d her bluid;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">(Deil na they never mair do guid,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Play’d her that pliskie!)<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ now she’s like to rin red-wud<br /></span> +<span class="i8">About her whiskey.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">An’ L—d, if once they pit her till’t,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Her tartan petticoat she’ll kilt,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ durk an’ pistol at her belt,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">She’ll tak the streets,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ rin her whittle to the hilt,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">I’ th’ first she meets!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">For God sake, sirs, then speak her fair,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ straik her cannie wi’ the hair,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ to the muckle house repair,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Wi’ instant speed,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ strive, wi’ a’ your wit and lear,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">To get remead.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Yon ill-tongu’d tinkler, Charlie Fox,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">May taunt you wi’ his jeers an’ mocks;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But gie him’t het, my hearty cocks!<br /></span> +<span class="i8">E’en cowe the cadie!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ send him to his dicing box,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">An’ sportin’ lady.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Tell yon guid bluid o’ auld Boconnock’s<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I’ll be his debt twa mashlum bonnocks,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ drink his health in auld Nanse Tinnock’s<a name="FNanchor_48_48" id="FNanchor_48_48"></a><a href="#Footnote_48_48" class="fnanchor">[48]</a><br /></span> +<span class="i8">Nine times a-week,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">If he some scheme, like tea an’ winnocks,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Wad kindly seek.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Could he some commutation broach,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I’ll pledge my aith in guid braid Scotch,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He need na fear their foul reproach<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Nor erudition,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yon mixtie-maxtie queer hotch-potch,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">The Coalition.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Auld Scotland has a raucle tongue;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">She’s just a devil wi’ a rung;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ if she promise auld or young<br /></span> +<span class="i8">To tak their part,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Tho’ by the neck she should be strung,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">She’ll no desert.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">An’ now, ye chosen Five-and-Forty,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">May still your mither’s heart support ye,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Then, though a minister grow dorty,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">An’ kick your place,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ye’ll snap your fingers, poor an’ hearty,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Before his face.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">God bless your honours a’ your days,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wi’ sowps o’ kail and brats o’ claise,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In spite o’ a’ the thievish kaes,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">That haunt St. Jamie’s:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Your humble Poet signs an’ prays<br /></span> +<span class="i8">While Rab his name is.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + +<p class="std2">POSTSCRIPT.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Let half-starv’d slaves in warmer skies<br /></span> +<span class="i0">See future wines, rich clust’ring, rise;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Their lot auld Scotland ne’er envies,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">But blythe and frisky,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">She eyes her freeborn, martial boys,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Tak aff their whiskey.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">What tho’ their Phœbus kinder warms,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">While fragrance blooms and beauty charms!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When wretches range, in famish’d swarms,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">The scented groves,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or hounded forth, dishonour arms<br /></span> +<span class="i8">In hungry droves.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Their gun’s a burden on their shouther;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">They downa bide the stink o’ powther;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Their bauldest thought’s a’ hank’ring swither<br /></span> +<span class="i8">To stan’ or rin,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Till skelp—a shot—they’re aff, a’ throther<br /></span> +<span class="i8">To save their skin.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But bring a Scotsman frae his hill,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Clap in his check a Highland gill,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Say, such is royal George’s will,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">An’ there’s the foe,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He has nae thought but how to kill<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Twa at a blow.<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_110" id="Page_110">[110]</a></span></div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Nae could faint-hearted doubtings tease him;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Death comes, wi’ fearless eye he sees him;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wi’ bluidy han’ a welcome gies him;<br /></span> +<span class="i8">An’ when he fa’s,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">His latest draught o’ breathin’ lea’es him<br /></span> +<span class="i8">In faint huzzas!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Sages their solemn een may steek,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ raise a philosophic reek,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ physically causes seek,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">In clime an’ season;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But tell me whiskey’s name in Greek,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">I’ll tell the reason.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Scotland, my auld, respected mither!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Tho’ whiles ye moistify your leather,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Till whare ye sit, on craps o’ heather<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Ye tine your dam;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Freedom and whiskey gang thegither!—<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Tak aff your dram!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_46_46" id="Footnote_46_46"></a><a href="#FNanchor_46_46"><span class="label">[46]</span></a> Sir Adam Ferguson.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_47_47" id="Footnote_47_47"></a><a href="#FNanchor_47_47"><span class="label">[47]</span></a> The Duke of Montrose.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_48_48" id="Footnote_48_48"></a><a href="#FNanchor_48_48"><span class="label">[48]</span></a> A worthy old hostess of the author’s in Mauchline, where +he sometimes studies politics over a glass of guid auld Scotch drink.</p></div> +</div> + + + +<h2><a name="XXXIX" id="XXXIX"></a>XXXIX.</h2> + +<h3>ADDRESS TO THE UNCO GUID,</h3> +<h5>OR THE</h5> +<h4>RIGIDLY RIGHTEOUS.</h4> +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“My son, these maxims make a rule,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And lump them ay thegither;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The Rigid Righteous is a fool,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The Rigid Wise anither:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The cleanest corn that e’er was dight<br /></span> +<span class="i2">May hae some pyles o’ caff in;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">So ne’er a fellow-creature slight<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For random fits o’ daffin.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="sig1"><span class="smcap">Solomon</span>.—Eccles. ch. vii. ver. 16.</p> + +<p>[“Burns,” says Hogg, in a note on this Poem, “has written more from +his own heart and his own feelings than any other poet. External +nature had few charms for him; the sublime shades and hues of heaven +and earth never excited his enthusiasm: but with the secret fountains +of passion in the human soul he was well acquainted.” Burns, indeed, +was not what is called a descriptive poet: yet with what exquisite +snatches of description are some of his poems adorned, and in what +fragrant and romantic scenes he enshrines the heroes and heroines of +many of his finest songs! Who the high, exalted, virtuous dames were, +to whom the Poem refers, we are not told. How much men stand indebted +to want of opportunity to sin, and how much of their good name they +owe to the ignorance of the world, were inquiries in which the poet +found pleasure.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> + +<span class="i0">O ye wha are sae guid yoursel’, </span> +<span class="i2">Sae pious and sae holy,</span> +<span class="i0">Ye’ve nought to do but mark and tell</span> + <span class="i2">Your neibor’s fauts and folly! </span> +<span class="i0">Whase life is like a weel-gaun mill, </span> +<span class="i2">Supply’d wi’ store o’ water, </span> +<span class="i0">The heaped happer’s ebbing still,</span> +<span class="i2"> And still the clap plays clatter. </span></div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Hear me, ye venerable core,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">As counsel for poor mortals,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That frequent pass douce Wisdom’s door<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For glaikit Folly’s portals;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I, for their thoughtless, careless sakes,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Would here propone defences,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Their donsie tricks, their black mistakes,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Their failings and mischances.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Ye see your state wi’ theirs compar’d,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And shudder at the niffer,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But cast a moment’s fair regard,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">What maks the mighty differ?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Discount what scant occasion gave,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That purity ye pride in,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And (what’s aft mair than a’ the lave)<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Your better art o’ hiding.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Think, when your castigated pulse<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Gies now and then a wallop,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">What ragings must his veins convulse,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That still eternal gallop:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wi’ wind and tide fair i’ your tail,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Right on ye scud your sea-way;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But in the teeth o’ baith to sail,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">It makes an unco lee-way.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">V.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">See social life and glee sit down,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">All joyous and unthinking,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">’Till, quite transmugrify’d, they’re grown<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Debauchery and drinking;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O would they stay to calculate<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Th’ eternal consequences;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or your more dreaded hell to state,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">D—mnation of expenses!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">VI.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Ye high, exalted, virtuous dames,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Ty’d up in godly laces,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Before ye gie poor frailty names,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Suppose a change o’ cases;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A dear lov’d lad, convenience snug,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A treacherous inclination—<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_111" id="Page_111">[111]</a></span><span class="i0">But, let me whisper, i’ your lug,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Ye’re aiblins nae temptation.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">VII.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Then gently scan your brother man,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Still gentler sister woman;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Though they may gang a kennin’ wrang,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To step aside is human:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">One point must still be greatly dark,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The moving why they do it:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And just as lamely can ye mark,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">How far perhaps they rue it.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">VIII.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Who made the heart, ’tis He alone<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Decidedly can try us,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He knows each chord—its various tone,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Each spring—its various bias:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Then at the balance let’s be mute,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">We never can adjust it;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">What’s done we partly may compute,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But know not what’s resisted.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="XL" id="XL"></a>XL.</h2> + +<h3>TAM SAMSON’S ELEGY.<a name="FNanchor_49_49" id="FNanchor_49_49"></a><a href="#Footnote_49_49" class="fnanchor">[49]</a></h3> +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“An honest man’s the noblest work of God.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="sig2"><span class="smcap">Pope</span>.</p> + +<p>[Tam Samson was a west country seedsman and sportsman, who loved a +good song, a social glass, and relished a shot so well that he +expressed a wish to die and be buried in the moors. On this hint Burns +wrote the Elegy: when Tam heard o’ this he waited on the poet, caused +him to recite it, and expressed displeasure at being numbered with the +dead: the author, whose wit was as ready as his rhymes, added the Per +Contra in a moment, much to the delight of his friend. At his death +the four lines of Epitaph were cut on his gravestone. “This poem has +always,” says Hogg, “been a great country favourite: it abounds with +happy expressions.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">‘In vain the burns cam’ down like waters,<br /></span> +<span class="i10">An acre braid.’<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>What a picture of a flooded burn! any other poet would have given us a +long description: Burns dashes it down at once in a style so graphic +no one can mistake it.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">‘Perhaps upon his mouldering breast<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Some spitefu’ moorfowl bigs her nest.’<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>Match that sentence who can.”]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Has auld Kilmarnock seen the deil?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or great M’Kinlay<a name="FNanchor_50_50" id="FNanchor_50_50"></a><a href="#Footnote_50_50" class="fnanchor">[50]</a> thrawn his heel?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or Robinson<a name="FNanchor_51_51" id="FNanchor_51_51"></a><a href="#Footnote_51_51" class="fnanchor">[51]</a> again grown weel,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">To preach an’ read?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">“Na, waur than a’!” cries ilka chiel,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Tam Samson’s dead!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Kilmarnock lang may grunt an’ grane,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ sigh, an’ sob, an’ greet her lane,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ cleed her bairns, man, wife, an wean,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">In mourning weed;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To death, she’s dearly paid the kane,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Tam Samson’s dead!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The brethren o’ the mystic level<br /></span> +<span class="i0">May hing their head in woefu’ bevel,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">While by their nose the tears will revel,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Like ony bead;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Death’s gien the lodge an unco devel,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Tam Samson’s dead!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">When Winter muffles up his cloak,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And binds the mire like a rock;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When to the lochs the curlers flock,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Wi’ gleesome speed,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wha will they station at the cock?<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Tam Samson’s dead!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">He was the king o’ a’ the core,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To guard or draw, or wick a bore,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or up the rink like Jehu roar<br /></span> +<span class="i8">In time o’ need;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But now he lags on death’s hog-score,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Tam Samson’s dead!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Now safe the stately sawmont sail,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And trouts be-dropp’d wi’ crimson hail,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And eels weel ken’d for souple tail,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">And geds for greed,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Since dark in death’s fish-creel we wail<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Tam Samson dead.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Rejoice, ye birring patricks a’;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ye cootie moor-cocks, crousely craw;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ye maukins, cock your fud fu’ braw,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Withouten dread;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Your mortal fae is now awa’—<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Tam Samson’s dead!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_112" id="Page_112">[112]</a></span></p><div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">That woefu’ morn be ever mourn’d<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Saw him in shootin’ graith adorn’d,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">While pointers round impatient burn’d,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Frae couples freed;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But, Och! he gaed and ne’er return’d!<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Tam Samson’s dead!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">In vain auld age his body batters;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In vain the gout his ancles fetters;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In vain the burns cam’ down like waters,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">An acre braid!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Now ev’ry auld wife, greetin’, clatters,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Tam Samson’s dead!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Owre many a weary hag he limpit,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ ay the tither shot he thumpit,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Till coward death behind him jumpit,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Wi’ deadly feide;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Now he proclaims, wi’ tout o’ trumpet,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Tam Samson’s dead!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">When at his heart he felt the dagger,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He reel’d his wonted bottle swagger,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But yet he drew the mortal trigger<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Wi’ weel-aim’d heed;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">“L—d, five!” he cry’d, an’ owre did stagger;<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Tam Samson’s dead!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Ilk hoary hunter mourn’d a brither;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ilk sportsman youth bemoan’d a father;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yon auld grey stane, amang the heather,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Marks out his head,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Whare Burns has wrote in rhyming blether<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Tam Samson’s dead!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">There low he lies, in lasting rest;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Perhaps upon his mould’ring breast<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Some spitefu’ muirfowl bigs her nest,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">To hatch an’ breed;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Alas! nae mair he’ll them molest!<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Tam Samson’s dead!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">When August winds the heather wave,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And sportsmen wander by yon grave,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Three volleys let his mem’ry crave<br /></span> +<span class="i8">O’ pouther an’ lead,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">’Till echo answer frae her cave<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Tam Samson’s dead!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Heav’n rest his soul, whare’er he be!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Is th’ wish o’ mony mae than me;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He had twa fauts, or may be three,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Yet what remead?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ae social, honest man want we:<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Tam Samson’s dead!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p class="std2">EPITAPH.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Tam Samson’s weel-worn clay here lies,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Ye canting zealots spare him!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">If honest worth in heaven rise,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Ye’ll mend or ye win near him.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p class="std2">PER CONTRA.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Go, Fame, an’ canter like a filly<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thro’ a’ the streets an’ neuks o’ Killie,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Tell ev’ry social honest billie<br /></span> +<span class="i8">To cease his grievin’,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For yet, unskaith’d by death’s gleg gullie,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Tam Samson’s livin’.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_49_49" id="Footnote_49_49"></a><a href="#FNanchor_49_49"><span class="label">[49]</span></a> When this worthy old sportsman went out last muirfowl +season, he supposed it was to be, in Ossian’s phrase, “the last of his +fields.”</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_50_50" id="Footnote_50_50"></a><a href="#FNanchor_50_50"><span class="label">[50]</span></a> A preacher, a great favourite with the million. <i>Vide</i> +the Ordination, stanza II</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_51_51" id="Footnote_51_51"></a><a href="#FNanchor_51_51"><span class="label">[51]</span></a> Another preacher, an equal favourite with the few, who +was at that time ailing. For him see also the Ordination, stanza IX.</p></div> +</div> + + + +<h2><a name="XLI" id="XLI"></a>XLI.</h2> + + +<h4>LAMENT,</h4> +<h5>OCCASIONED BY THE UNFORTUNATE ISSUE</h5> +<h5>OF A</h5> +<h3>FRIEND’S AMOUR.</h3> +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Alas! how oft does goodness wound itself!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And sweet affection prove the spring of woe.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="sig2"><span class="smcap">Home</span>.</p> + +<p>[The hero and heroine of this little mournful poem, were Robert Burns +and Jean Armour. “This was a most melancholy affair,” says the poet in +his letter to Moore, “which I cannot yet bear to reflect on, and had +very nearly given me one or two of the principal qualifications for a +place among those who have lost the chart and mistaken the reckoning +of rationality.” Hogg and Motherwell, with an ignorance which is +easier to laugh at than account for, say this Poem was “written on the +occasion of Alexander Cunningham’s darling sweetheart alighting him +and marrying another:—she acted a wise part.” With what care they had +read the great poet whom they jointly edited in is needless to say: +and how they could read the last two lines of the third verse and +commend the lady’s wisdom for slighting her lover, seems a problem +which defies definition. This mistake was pointed out by a friend, and +corrected in a second issue of the volume.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I. </p> +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> + <span class="i0">O thou pale orb, that silent shines, </span> + <span class="i2">While care-untroubled mortals sleep! </span> + <span class="i0">Thou seest a wretch who inly pines, </span> + <span class="i2">And wanders here to wail and weep! </span> + <span class="i0">With woe I nightly vigils keep, </span> + <span class="i2">Beneath thy wan, unwarming beam, </span> + <span class="i0">And mourn, in lamentation deep, </span> + <span class="i2">How life and love are all a dream. </span> + </div></div> + <p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_113" id="Page_113">[113]</a></span></p> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">A joyless view thy rays adorn<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The faintly marked distant hill:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I joyless view thy trembling horn,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Reflected in the gurgling rill:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My fondly-fluttering heart, be still:<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Thou busy pow’r, Remembrance, cease!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ah! must the agonizing thrill<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For ever bar returning peace!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">No idly-feign’d poetic pains,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My sad, love-lorn lamentings claim;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">No shepherd’s pipe—Arcadian strains;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">No fabled tortures, quaint and tame:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The plighted faith; the mutual flame;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The oft-attested Pow’rs above;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The promis’d father’s tender name;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">These were the pledges of my love!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Encircled in her clasping arms,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">How have the raptur’d moments flown!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">How have I wish’d for fortune’s charms,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For her dear sake, and hers alone!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And must I think it!—is she gone,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My secret heart’s exulting boast?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And does she heedless hear my groan?<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And is she ever, ever lost?<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">V.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Oh! can she bear so base a heart,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">So lost to honour, lost to truth,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As from the fondest lover part,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The plighted husband of her youth!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Alas! life’s path may be unsmooth!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Her way may lie thro’ rough distress!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Then, who her pangs and pains will soothe,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Her sorrows share, and make them less?<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">VI.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Ye winged hours that o’er us past,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Enraptur’d more, the more enjoy’d,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Your dear remembrance in my breast,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My fondly-treasur’d thoughts employ’d,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That breast, how dreary now, and void,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For her too scanty once of room!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ev’n ev’ry ray of hope destroy’d,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And not a wish to gild the gloom!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">VII.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The morn that warns th’ approaching day,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Awakes me up to toil and woe:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I see the hours in long array,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That I must suffer, lingering slow.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Full many a pang, and many a throe,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Keen recollection’s direful train,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Must wring my soul, ere Phœbus, low,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Shall kiss the distant, western main.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">VIII.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">And when my nightly couch I try,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Sore-harass’d out with care and grief,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My toil-beat nerves, and tear-worn eye,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Keep watchings with the nightly thief:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or if I slumber, fancy, chief,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Reigns haggard-wild, in sore affright:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ev’n day, all-bitter, brings relief,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">From such a horror-breathing night.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IX.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O! thou bright queen, who o’er th’ expanse<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Now highest reign’st, with boundless sway!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Oft has thy silent-marking glance<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Observ’d us, fondly-wand’ring, stray!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The time, unheeded, sped away,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">While love’s luxurious pulse beat high,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Beneath thy silver-gleaming ray,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To mark the mutual kindling eye.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">X.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Oh! scenes in strong remembrance set!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Scenes never, never to return!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Scenes, if in stupor I forget,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Again I feel, again I burn!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">From ev’ry joy and pleasure torn,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Life’s weary vale I’ll wander thro’;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And hopeless, comfortless, I’ll mourn<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A faithless woman’s broken vow.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="XLII" id="XLII"></a>XLII.</h2> + +<h3>DESPONDENCY.</h3> +<h4>AN ODE.</h4> +<p>[“I think,” said Burns, “it is one of the greatest pleasures attending +a poetic genius, that we can give our woes, cares, joys, and loves an +embodied form in verse, which to me is ever immediate ease.” He +elsewhere says, “My passions raged like so many devils till they got +vent in rhyme.” That eminent painter, Fuseli, on seeing his wife in a +passion, said composedly, “Swear my love, swear heartily: you know not +how much it will ease you!” This poem was printed in the Kilmarnock +edition, and gives a true picture of those bitter moments experienced +by the bard, when love and fortune alike deceived him.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Oppress’d with grief, oppress’d with care,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A burden more than I can bear,<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_114" id="Page_114">[114]</a></span><span class="i2">I set me down and sigh:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O life! thou art a galling load,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Along a rough, a weary road,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To wretches such as I!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Dim-backward as I cast my view,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">What sick’ning scenes appear!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">What sorrows yet may pierce me thro’<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Too justly I may fear!<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Still caring, despairing,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Must be my bitter doom;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">My woes here shall close ne’er<br /></span> +<span class="i6">But with the closing tomb!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Happy, ye sons of busy life,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Who, equal to the bustling strife,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">No other view regard!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ev’n when the wished end’s deny’d,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yet while the busy means are ply’d,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">They bring their own reward:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Whilst I, a hope-abandon’d wight,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Unfitted with an aim,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Meet ev’ry sad returning night<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And joyless morn the same;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">You, bustling, and justling,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Forget each grief and pain;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">I, listless, yet restless,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Find every prospect vain.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">How blest the solitary’s lot,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Who, all-forgetting, all forgot,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Within his humble cell,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The cavern wild with tangling roots,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sits o’er his newly-gather’d fruits,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Beside his crystal well!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or, haply, to his ev’ning thought,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">By unfrequented stream,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The ways of men are distant brought,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A faint collected dream;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">While praising, and raising<br /></span> +<span class="i6">His thoughts to heav’n on high,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">As wand’ring, meand’ring,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">He views the solemn sky.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Than I, no lonely hermit plac’d<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where never human footstep trac’d,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Less fit to play the part;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The lucky moment to improve,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And just to stop, and just to move,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">With self-respecting art:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But, ah! those pleasures, loves, and joys,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Which I too keenly taste,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The solitary can despise,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Can want, and yet be blest!<br /></span> +<span class="i4">He needs not, he heeds not,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Or human love or hate,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Whilst I here, must cry here<br /></span> +<span class="i6">At perfidy ingrate!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">V.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Oh! enviable, early days,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When dancing thoughtless pleasure’s maze,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To care, to guilt unknown!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">How ill exchang’d for riper times,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To feel the follies, or the crimes,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Of others, or my own!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ye tiny elves that guiltless sport,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Like linnets in the bush,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ye little know the ills ye court,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">When manhood is your wish!<br /></span> +<span class="i4">The losses, the crosses,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">That active man engage!<br /></span> +<span class="i4">The fears all, the tears all,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Of dim declining age!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + + + +<p class="center"><img src="images/image_02.jpg" alt=""THE COTTER’S SATURDAY NIGHT."" width="500" height="655" /><br /><br /> +<span class="caption">“THE COTTER’S SATURDAY NIGHT.”</span></p> +<h2><a name="XLIII" id="XLIII"></a>XLIII.</h2> + +<h4>THE</h4> +<h3>COTTER’S SATURDAY NIGHT.</h3> +<h4>INSCRIBED TO ROBERT AIKEN, ESQ.</h4> +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Let not ambition mock their useful toil,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Their homely joys, and destiny obscure:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Nor grandeur hear, with a disdainful smile,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The short and simple annals of the poor.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="sig2"><span class="smcap">Gray</span></p> + + +<p>[The house of William Burns was the scene of this fine, devout, and +tranquil drama, and William himself was the saint, the father, and the +husband, who gives life and sentiment to the whole. “Robert had +frequently remarked to me,” says Gilbert Burns, “that he thought there +was something peculiarly venerable in the phrase, ‘Let us worship +God!’ used by a decent sober head of a family, introducing family +worship.” To this sentiment of the author the world is indebted for +the “Cotter’s Saturday Night.” He owed some little, however, of the +inspiration to Fergusson’s “Farmer’s Ingle,” a poem of great merit. +The calm tone and holy composure of the Cotter’s Saturday Night have +been mistaken by Hogg for want of nerve and life. “It is a dull, +heavy, lifeless poem,” he says, “and the only beauty it possesses, in +my estimation, is, that it is a sort of family picture of the poet’s +family. The worst thing of all, it is not original, but is a decided +imitation of Fergusson’s beautiful pastoral, ‘The Farmer’s Ingle:’ I +have a perfect contempt for all plagiarisms and imitations.” +Motherwell tries to qualify the censure of his brother editor, by +quoting Lockhart’s opinion—at once lofty and just, of this fine +picture of domestic happiness and devotion.]</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_115" id="Page_115">[115]</a></span></p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i2">My lov’d, my honour’d, much respected friend!<br /></span> +<span class="i4">No mercenary bard his homage pays;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">With honest pride, I scorn each selfish end:<br /></span> +<span class="i4">My dearest meed, a friend’s esteem and praise:<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To you I sing, in simple Scottish lays,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">The lowly train in life’s sequester’d scene;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The native feelings strong, the guileless ways;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">What Aiken in a cottage would have been;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ah! tho’ his work unknown, far happier there, I ween!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i2">November chill blaws loud wi’ angry sugh;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">The short’ning winter-day is near a close;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The miry beasts retreating frae the pleugh:<br /></span> +<span class="i4">The black’ning trains o’ craws to their repose:<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The toil-worn Cotter frae his labour goes,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">This night his weekly moil is at an end,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Collects his spades, his mattocks, and his hoes,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Hoping the morn in ease and rest to spend,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And weary, o’er the moor, his course does homeward bend.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i2">At length his lonely cot appears in view,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Beneath the shelter of an aged tree;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Th’ expectant wee-things, toddlin’, stacher thro’<br /></span> +<span class="i4">To meet their Dad, wi’ flichterin’ noise an’ glee.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">His wee bit ingle, blinkin’ bonnily.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">His clean hearth-stane, his thriftie Wifie’s smile,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The lisping infant prattling on his knee,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Does a’ his weary kiaugh and care beguile,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ makes him quite forget his labour and his toil.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i2">Belyve, the elder bairns come drapping in,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">At service out amang the farmers roun’:<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Some ca’ the pleugh, some herd, some tentie rin<br /></span> +<span class="i4">A cannie errand to a neebor town:<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Their eldest hope, their Jenny, woman grown,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">In youthfu’ bloom, love sparkling in her e’e,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Comes hame, perhaps to shew a braw new gown,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Or deposite her sair won penny-fee,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To help her parents dear, if they in hardship be.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">V.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i2">With joy unfeign’d, brothers and sisters meet,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">An’ each for other’s welfare kindly spiers:<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The social hours, swift-wing’d, unnotic’d, fleet;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Each tells the unco’s that he sees or hears;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The parents, partial, eye their hopeful years;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Anticipation forward points the view.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The Mother, wi’ her needle an’ her shears,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Gars auld claes look amaist as weel’s the new;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The Father mixes a’ wi’ admonition due.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">VI.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i2">Their master’s an’ their mistress’s command,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">The younkers a’ are warned to obey;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And mind their labours wi’ an eydent hand,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">An’ ne’er, tho’ out of sight, to jauk or play:<br /></span> +<span class="i2">“And O! be sure to fear the Lord alway!<br /></span> +<span class="i4">And mind your duty, duly, morn and night!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Lest in temptation’s path ye gang astray,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Implore His counsel and assisting might:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">They never sought in vain, that sought the Lord aright!”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">VII.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i2">But, hark! a rap comes gently to the door;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Jenny, wha kens the meaning o’ the same,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Tells how a neebor lad cam o’er the moor,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">To do some errands, and convoy her hame.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The wily Mother sees the conscious flame<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Sparkle in Jenny’s e’e, and flush her cheek,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">With heart-struck anxious care, inquires his name,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">While Jenny hafflins is afraid to speak;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Weel pleas’d the Mother hears it’s nae wild, worthless rake.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">VIII.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i2">Wi’ kindly welcome, Jenny brings him ben;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">A strappan youth; he taks the Mother’s eye;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Blythe Jenny sees the visit’s no ill ta’en;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">The Father cracks of horses, pleughs, and kye.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The youngster’s artless heart o’erflows wi’ joy,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">But blate, an laithfu’, scarce can weel behave;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The Mother, wi’ a woman’s wiles, can spy<br /></span> +<span class="i4">What makes the youth sae bashfu’ and sae grave;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Weel pleas’d to think her bairn’s respected like the lave.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_116" id="Page_116">[116]</a></span></p> + +<p class="std2">IX.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i2">O happy love! Where love like this is found!<br /></span> +<span class="i4">O heart-felt raptures!—bliss beyond compare!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I’ve paced much this weary, mortal round,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">And sage experience bids me this declare—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">“If heaven a draught of heavenly pleasure spare,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">One cordial in this melancholy vale,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">’Tis when a youthful, loving, modest pair,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">In other’s arms, breathe out the tender tale,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Beneath the milk-white thorn that scents the ev’ning gale.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">X.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i2">Is there, in human form, that bears a heart—<br /></span> +<span class="i4">A wretch! a villain! lost to love and truth!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That can, with studied, sly, ensnaring art,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Betray sweet Jenny’s unsuspecting youth?<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Curse on his perjur’d arts! dissembling smooth!<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Are honour, virtue, conscience, all exil’d?<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Is there no pity, no relenting ruth,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Points to the parents fondling o’er their child?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Then paints the ruin’d maid, and their distraction wild?<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">XI.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i2">But now the supper crowns their simple board,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">The halesome parritch, chief of Scotia’s food:<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The soupe their only hawkie does afford,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">That ‘yont the hallan snugly chows her cood:<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The dame brings forth in complimental mood,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">To grace the lad, her weel-hain’d kebbuck, fell,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’ aft he’s prest, an’ aft he ca’s it guid;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">The frugal wifie, garrulous, will tell,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">How ’twas a towmond auld, sin’ lint was i’ the bell.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">XII.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i2">The cheerfu’ supper done, wi’ serious face,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">They, round the ingle, form a circle wide;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The Sire turns o’er, with patriarchal grace,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">The big ha’-Bible, ance his father’s pride;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">His bonnet rev’rently is laid aside,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">His lyart haffets wearing thin an’ bare;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Those strains that once did sweet in Zion glide,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">He wales a portion with judicious care;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And ‘Let us worship <span class="smcap">God</span>!’ he says, with solemn air.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">XIII.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i2">They chant their artless notes in simple guise;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">They tune their hearts, by far the noblest aim:<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Perhaps Dundee’s wild-warbling measures rise,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Or plaintive Martyrs, worthy of the name;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Or noble Elgin beets the heaven-ward flame,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">The sweetest far of Scotia’s holy lays:<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Compar’d with these, Italian trills are tame;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">The tickl’d ear no heart-felt raptures raise;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Nae unison hae they with our Creator’s praise.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">XIV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i2">The priest-like Father reads the sacred page,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">How Abram was the friend of God on high;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Or, Moses bade eternal warfare wage<br /></span> +<span class="i4">With Amalek’s ungracious progeny;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Or how the royal bard did groaning lie<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Beneath the stroke of Heaven’s avenging ire;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Or Job’s pathetic plaint, and wailing cry;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Or rapt Isaiah’s wild, seraphic fire;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or other holy seers that tune the sacred lyre.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">XV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i2">Perhaps the Christian volume is the theme,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">How guiltless blood for guilty man was shed;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">How <span class="smcap">He</span>, who bore in Heaven the second name,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Had not on earth whereon to lay his head:<br /></span> +<span class="i2">How His first followers and servants sped,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">The precepts sage they wrote to many a land:<br /></span> +<span class="i2">How he who lone in Patmos banished,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Saw in the sun a mighty angel stand;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And heard great Bab’lon’s doom pronounc’d by Heaven’s command.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">XVI.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i2">Then kneeling down, to <span class="smcap">Heaven’s eternal King</span>,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">The Saint, the Father, and the Husband prays:<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Hope ‘springs exulting on triumphant wing,’<a name="FNanchor_52_52" id="FNanchor_52_52"></a><a href="#Footnote_52_52" class="fnanchor">[52]</a><br /></span> +<span class="i4">That thus they all shall meet in future days:<br /></span> +<span class="i2">There ever bask in uncreated rays,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">No more to sigh, or shed the bitter tear,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Together hymning their Creator’s praise,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">In such society, yet still more dear:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">While circling Time moves round in an eternal sphere.<br /></span> +</div></div> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_117" id="Page_117">[117]</a></span></p> +<p class="std2">XVII.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i2">Compar’d with this, how poor Religion’s pride,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">In all the pomp of method and of art,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">When men display to congregations wide,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Devotion’s ev’ry grace, except the heart!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The Pow’r, incens’d, the pageant will desert,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">The pompous strain, the sacerdotal stole;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But haply, in some cottage far apart,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">May hear, well pleas’d, the language of the soul;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And in His book of life the inmates poor enrol.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">XVIII.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i2">Then homeward all take off their sev’ral way;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">The youngling cottagers retire to rest:<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Their Parent-pair their secret homage pay,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">And proffer up to Heaven the warm request,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That <span class="smcap">He</span>, who stills the raven’s clam’rous nest,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">And decks the lily fair in flow’ry pride,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Would, in the way His wisdom sees the best,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">For them and for their little ones provide;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But, chiefly, in their hearts with grace divine preside.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">XIX.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i2">From scenes like these, old Scotia’s grandeur springs,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">That makes her lov’d at home, rever’d abroad:<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Princes and lords are but the breath of kings,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">“An honest man’s the noblest work of <span class="smcap">God</span>;”<a name="FNanchor_53_53" id="FNanchor_53_53"></a><a href="#Footnote_53_53" class="fnanchor">[53]</a><br /></span> +<span class="i2">And certes, in fair virtue’s heav’nly road,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">The cottage leaves the palace far behind;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">What is a lordship’s pomp? a cumbrous load,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Disguising oft the wretch of human kind,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Studied in arts of Hell, in wickedness refin’d!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">XX.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i2">O Scotia! my dear, my native soil!<br /></span> +<span class="i4">For whom my warmest wish to Heaven is sent!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Long may thy hardy sons of rustic toil<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Be blest with health, and peace, and sweet content!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And, O! may heaven their simple lives prevent<br /></span> +<span class="i4">From luxury’s contagion, weak and vile!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Then, howe’er crowns and coronets be rent,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">A virtuous populace may rise the while,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And stand a wall of fire around their much-lov’d Isle.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">XXI.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i2">O Thou! who pour’d the patriotic tide<br /></span> +<span class="i4">That stream’d through Wallace’s undaunted heart:<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Who dar’d to nobly stem tyrannic pride,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Or nobly die, the second glorious part,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">(The patriot’s God, peculiarly Thou art,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">His friend, inspirer, guardian, and reward!)<br /></span> +<span class="i2">O never, never, Scotia’s realm desert;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">But still the patriot, and the patriot bard,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In bright succession raise, her ornament and guard!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_52_52" id="Footnote_52_52"></a><a href="#FNanchor_52_52"><span class="label">[52]</span></a> Pope.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_53_53" id="Footnote_53_53"></a><a href="#FNanchor_53_53"><span class="label">[53]</span></a> Pope.</p></div> +</div> + + + +<h2><a name="XLIV" id="XLIV"></a>XLIV.</h2> + +<h3>THE FIRST PSALM.</h3> +<p>[This version was first printed in the second edition of the poet’s +work. It cannot be regarded as one of his happiest compositions: it is +inferior, not indeed in ease, but in simplicity and antique rigour of +language, to the common version used in the Kirk of Scotland. Burns +had admitted “Death and Dr. Hornbook” into Creech’s edition, and +probably desired to balance it with something at which the devout +could not cavil.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The man, in life wherever plac’d,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Hath happiness in store,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Who walks not in the wicked’s way,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Nor learns their guilty lore!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Nor from the seat of scornful pride<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Casts forth his eyes abroad,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But with humility and awe<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Still walks before his <span class="smcap">God</span>.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">That man shall flourish like the trees<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Which by the streamlets grow;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The fruitful top is spread on high,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And firm the root below.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But he whose blossom buds in guilt<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Shall to the ground be cast,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And, like the rootless stubble, tost<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Before the sweeping blast.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">For why? that <span class="smcap">God</span> the good adore<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Hath giv’n them peace and rest,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But hath decreed that wicked men<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Shall ne’er be truly blest.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_118" id="Page_118">[118]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="XLV" id="XLV"></a>XLV.</h2> + +<h3>THE FIRST SIX VERSES</h3> +<h5>OF THE</h5> +<h4>NINETIETH PSALM.</h4> +<p>[The ninetieth Psalm is said to have been a favourite in the household +of William Burns: the version used by the Kirk, though unequal, +contains beautiful verses, and possesses the same strain of sentiment +and moral reasoning as the poem of “Man was made to Mourn.” These +verses first appeared in the Edinburgh edition; and they might have +been spared; for in the hands of a poet ignorant of the original +language of the Psalmist, how could they be so correct in sense and +expression as in a sacred strain is not only desirable but necessary?]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O Thou, the first, the greatest friend<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Of all the human race!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Whose strong right hand has ever been<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Their stay and dwelling place!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Before the mountains heav’d their heads<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Beneath Thy forming hand,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Before this ponderous globe itself<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Arose at Thy command;<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">That Pow’r which rais’d and still upholds<br /></span> +<span class="i2">This universal frame,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">From countless, unbeginning time<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Was ever still the same.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Those mighty periods of years<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Which seem to us so vast,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Appear no more before Thy sight<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Than yesterday that’s past.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Thou giv’st the word: Thy creature, man,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Is to existence brought;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Again thou say’st, “Ye sons of men,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Return ye into nought!”<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Thou layest them, with all their cares,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In everlasting sleep;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As with a flood Thou tak’st them off<br /></span> +<span class="i2">With overwhelming sweep.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">They flourish like the morning flow’r,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In beauty’s pride array’d;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But long ere night, cut down, it lies<br /></span> +<span class="i2">All wither’d and decay’d.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="XLVI" id="XLVI"></a>XLVI.</h2> + +<h3>TO A MOUNTAIN DAISY,</h3> +<h4>ON TURNING ONE DOWN WITH THE PLOUGH IN</h4> +<h4>APRIL, 1786.</h4> +<p>[This was not the original title of this sweet poem: I have a copy in +the handwriting of Burns entitled “The Gowan.” This more natural name +he changed as he did his own, without reasonable cause; and he changed +it about the same time, for he ceased to call himself Burness and his +poem “The Gowan,” in the first edition of his works. The field at +Mossgiel where he turned down the Daisy is said to be the same field +where some five months before he turned up the Mouse; but this seems +likely only to those who are little acquainted with tillage—who think +that in time and place reside the chief charms of verse; and who feel +not the beauty of “The Daisy,” till they seek and find the spot on +which it grew. Sublime morality and the deepest emotions of the soul +pass for little with those who remember only what the genius loves to +forget.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Wee, modest, crimson-tipped flow’r,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thou’s met me in an evil hour;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For I maun crush amang the stoure<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Thy slender stem:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To spare thee now is past my pow’r,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Thou bonnie gem.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Alas! it’s no thy neebor sweet,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The bonnie lark, companion meet!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Bending thee ‘mang the dewy weet,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Wi’ spreckl’d breast,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When upward-springing, blythe, to greet<br /></span> +<span class="i8">The purpling east.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Cauld blew the bitter-biting north<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Upon thy early, humble birth;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yet cheerfully thou glinted forth<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Amid the storm,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Scarce rear’d above the parent earth<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Thy tender form.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The flaunting flowers our gardens yield,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">High shelt’ring woods and wa’s maun shield<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But thou, beneath the random bield<br /></span> +<span class="i8">O’ clod or stane,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Adorns the histie stibble-field,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Unseen, alane.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">There, in thy scanty mantle clad,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thy snawie bosom sunward spread,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thou lifts thy unassuming head<br /></span> +<span class="i8">In humble guise;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But now the share uptears thy bed,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">And low thou lies!<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_119" id="Page_119">[119]</a></span></div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Such is the fate of artless maid,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sweet flow’ret of the rural shade!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">By love’s simplicity betray’d,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">And guileless trust,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">’Till she, like thee, all soil’d, is laid<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Low i’ the dust.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Such is the fate of simple bard,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">On life’s rough ocean luckless starr’d!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Unskilful he to note the card<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Of prudent lore,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">’Till billows rage, and gales blow hard,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">And whelm him o’er!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Such fate to suffering worth is giv’n,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Who long with wants and woes has striv’n,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">By human pride or cunning driv’n<br /></span> +<span class="i8">To mis’ry’s brink,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">’Till wrenched of every stay but Heav’n,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">He, ruin’d, sink!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Ev’n thou who mourn’st the Daisy’s fate,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That fate is thine—no distant date;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Stern Ruin’s ploughshare drives, elate,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Full on thy bloom,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">’Till crush’d beneath the furrow’s weight,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Shall be thy doom!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="XLVII" id="XLVII"></a>XLVII.</h2> + +<h3>EPISTLE TO A YOUNG FRIEND.</h3> +<h4>MAY, 1786.</h4> +<p>[Andrew Aikin, to whom this poem of good counsel is addressed, was one +of the sons of Robert Aiken, writer in Ayr, to whom the Cotter’s +Saturday Night is inscribed. He became a merchant in Liverpool, with +what success we are not informed, and died at St. Petersburgh. The +poet has been charged with a desire to teach hypocrisy rather than +truth to his “Andrew dear;” but surely to conceal one’s own thoughts +and discover those of others, can scarcely be called hypocritical: it +is, in fact, a version of the celebrated precept of prudence, +“Thoughts close and looks loose.” Whether he profited by all the +counsel showered upon him by the muse we know not: he was much +respected—his name embalmed, like that of his father, in the poetry +of his friend, is not likely soon to perish.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I lang hae thought, my youthfu’ friend,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A something to have sent you,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Though it should serve nae ither end<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Than just a kind memento;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But how the subject-theme may gang,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Let time and chance determine;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Perhaps it may turn out a sang,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Perhaps, turn out a sermon.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Ye’ll try the world soon, my lad,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And, Andrew dear, believe me,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ye’ll find mankind an unco squad,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And muckle they may grieve ye:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For care and trouble set your thought,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Ev’n when your end’s attain’d;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And a’ your views may come to nought,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Where ev’ry nerve is strained.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I’ll no say men are villains a’;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The real, harden’d wicked,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wha hae nae check but human law,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Are to a few restricked;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But, och! mankind are unco weak,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’ little to be trusted;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">If self the wavering balance shake,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">It’s rarely right adjusted!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Yet they wha fa’ in Fortune’s strife,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Their fate we should na censure,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For still th’ important end of life<br /></span> +<span class="i2">They equally may answer;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A man may hae an honest heart,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Tho’ poortith hourly stare him;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A man may tak a neebor’s part,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Yet hae nae cash to spare him.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">V.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Ay free, aff han’ your story tell,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">When wi’ a bosom crony;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But still keep something to yoursel’<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Ye scarcely tell to ony.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Conceal yoursel’ as weel’s ye can<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Frae critical dissection;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But keek thro’ ev’ry other man,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Wi’ sharpen’d, sly inspection.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">VI.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The sacred lowe o’ weel-plac’d love,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Luxuriantly indulge it;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But never tempt th’ illicit rove,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Tho’ naething should divulge it:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I waive the quantum o’ the sin,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The hazard of concealing;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But, och! it hardens a’ within,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And petrifies the feeling!<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_120" id="Page_120">[120]</a></span></div></div> + +<p class="std2">VII.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">To catch dame Fortune’s golden smile,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Assiduous wait upon her;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And gather gear by ev’ry wile<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That’s justified by honour;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Not for to hide it in a hedge,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Nor for a train-attendant;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But for the glorious privilege<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Of being independent.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">VIII.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The fear o’ Hell’s a hangman’s whip,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To haud the wretch in order;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But where ye feel your honour grip,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Let that ay be your border:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Its slightest touches, instant pause—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Debar a’ side pretences;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And resolutely keep its laws,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Uncaring consequences.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IX.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The great Creator to revere<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Must sure become the creature;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But still the preaching cant forbear,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And ev’n the rigid feature:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yet ne’er with wits profane to range,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Be complaisance extended;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An Atheist laugh’s a poor exchange<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For Deity offended!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">X.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">When ranting round in pleasure’s ring,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Religion may be blinded;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or if she gie a random sting,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">It may be little minded;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But when on life we’re tempest-driv’n,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A conscience but a canker—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A correspondence fix’d wi’ Heav’n<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Is sure a noble anchor!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">XI.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Adieu, dear, amiable youth!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Your heart can ne’er be wanting!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">May prudence, fortitude, and truth<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Erect your brow undaunting!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In ploughman phrase, ‘God send you speed,’<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Still daily to grow wiser:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And may you better reck the rede<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Than ever did th’ adviser!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="XLVIII" id="XLVIII"></a>XLVIII.</h2> + +<h3>TO A LOUSE,</h3> +<h5>ON SEEING ONE IN A LADY’S BONNET, AT CHURCH</h5> +<p>[A Mauchline incident of a Mauchline lady is related in this poem, +which to many of the softer friends of the bard was anything but +welcome: it appeared in the Kilmarnock copy of his Poems, and +remonstrance and persuasion were alike tried in vain to keep it out of +the Edinburgh edition. Instead of regarding it as a seasonable rebuke +to pride and vanity, some of his learned commentators called it course +and vulgar—those classic persons might have remembered that Julian, +no vulgar person, but an emperor and a scholar, wore a populous beard, +and was proud of it.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Ha! whare ye gaun, ye crowlin ferlie!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Your impudence protects you sairly:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I canna say by ye strunt rarely,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Owre gauze and lace;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Tho’ faith, I fear, ye dine but sparely<br /></span> +<span class="i8">On sic a place.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Ye ugly, creepin’, blastit wonner,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Detested, shunn’d, by saunt an’ sinner,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">How dare you set your fit upon her,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Sae fine a lady!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Gae somewhere else, and seek your dinner<br /></span> +<span class="i8">On some poor body.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Swith, in some beggar’s haffet squattle;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">There ye may creep, and sprawl, and sprattle<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wi’ ither kindred, jumping cattle,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">In shoals and nations;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Whare horn nor bane ne’er daur unsettle<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Your thick plantations.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Now haud you there, ye’re out o’ sight,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Below the fatt’rells, snug an’ tight;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Na, faith ye yet! ye’ll no be right<br /></span> +<span class="i8">’Till ye’ve got on it,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The vera topmost, tow’ring height<br /></span> +<span class="i8">O’ Miss’s bonnet.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">My sooth! right bauld ye set your nose out,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As plump an’ gray as onie grozet;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O for some rank, mercurial rozet,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Or fell, red smeddum,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I’d gie you sic a hearty doze o’t,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Wad dross your droddum!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I wad na been surpris’d to spy<br /></span> +<span class="i0">You on an auld wife’s flainen toy;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or aiblins some bit duddie boy,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">On’s wyliecoat;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But Miss’s fine Lunardi! fie!<br /></span> +<span class="i8">How daur ye do’t?<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_121" id="Page_121">[121]</a></span></div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O, Jenny, dinna toss your head,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ set your beauties a’ abread!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ye little ken what cursed speed<br /></span> +<span class="i8">The blastie’s makin’!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thae winks and finger-ends, I dread,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Are notice takin’!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O wad some Power the giftie gie us<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To see oursels as others see us!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">It wad frae monie a blunder free us<br /></span> +<span class="i8">An’ foolish notion;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">What airs in dress an’ gait wad lea’e us,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">And ev’n devotion!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="XLIX" id="XLIX"></a>XLIX.</h2> + +<h3>EPISTLE TO J. RANKINE,</h3> +<h5>ENCLOSING SOME POEMS.</h5> +<p>[The person to whom these verses are addressed lived at Adamhill in +Ayrshire, and merited the praise of rough and ready-witted, which the +poem bestows. The humorous dream alluded to, was related by way of +rebuke to a west country earl, who was in the habit of calling all +people of low degree “Brutes!—damned brutes.” “I dreamed that I was +dead,” said the rustic satirist to his superior, “and condemned for +the company I kept. When I came to hell-door, where mony of your +lordship’s friends gang, I chappit, and ‘Wha are ye, and where d’ye +come frae?’ Satan exclaimed. I just said, that my name was Rankine, +and I came frae yere lordship’s land. ‘Awa wi’ you,’ cried Satan, ye +canna come here: hell’s fou o’ his lordship’s damned brutes +already.’”]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O rough, rude, ready-witted Rankine,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The wale o’ cocks for fun an’ drinkin’!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">There’s monie godly folks are thinkin’,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Your dreams<a name="FNanchor_54_54" id="FNanchor_54_54"></a><a href="#Footnote_54_54" class="fnanchor">[54]</a> an’ tricks<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Will send you, Korah-like, a-sinkin’<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Straught to auld Nick’s.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Ye hae sae monie cracks an’ cants,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And in your wicked, dru’ken rants,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ye mak a devil o’ the saunts,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">An’ fill them fou;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And then their failings, flaws, an’ wants,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Are a’ seen through.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Hypocrisy, in mercy spare it!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That holy robe, O dinna tear it!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Spare’t for their sakes wha aften wear it,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">The lads in black!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But your curst wit, when it comes near it,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Rives’t aff their back.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Think, wicked sinner, wha ye’re skaithing,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">It’s just the blue-gown badge and claithing<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O’ saunts; tak that, ye lea’e them naething<br /></span> +<span class="i8">To ken them by,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Frae ony unregenerate heathen,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Like you or I.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I’ve sent you here some rhyming ware,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A’ that I bargain’d for, an’ mair;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sae, when you hae an hour to spare,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">I will expect<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yon sang,<a name="FNanchor_55_55" id="FNanchor_55_55"></a><a href="#Footnote_55_55" class="fnanchor">[55]</a> ye’ll sen’t wi cannie care,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">And no neglect.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Tho’ faith, sma’ heart hae I to sing!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My muse dow scarcely spread her wing!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I’ve play’d mysel’ a bonnie spring,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">An’ danc’d my fill!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I’d better gaen an’ sair’t the king,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">At Bunker’s Hill.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">’Twas ae night lately, in my fun,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I gaed a roving wi’ the gun,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ brought a paitrick to the grun’,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">A bonnie hen,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And, as the twilight was begun,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Thought nane wad ken.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The poor wee thing was little hurt;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I straikit it a wee for sport,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ne’er thinkin’ they wad fash me for’t;<br /></span> +<span class="i8">But, deil-ma-care!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Somebody tells the poacher-court<br /></span> +<span class="i8">The hale affair.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Some auld us’d hands had taen a note,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That sic a hen had got a shot;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I was suspected for the plot;<br /></span> +<span class="i8">I scorn’d to lie;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">So gat the whissle o’ my groat,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">An’ pay’t the fee.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But, by my gun, o’ guns the wale,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ by my pouther an’ my hail,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ by my hen, an’ by her tail,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">I vow an’ swear!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The game shall pay o’er moor an’ dale,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">For this niest year.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_122" id="Page_122">[122]</a></span></p><div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">As soon’s the clockin-time is by,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ the wee pouts begun to cry,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">L—d, I’se hae sportin’ by an’ by,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">For my gowd guinea;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Tho’ I should herd the buckskin kye<br /></span> +<span class="i8">For’t, in Virginia.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Trowth, they had muckle for to blame!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">’Twas neither broken wing nor limb,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But twa-three draps about the wame<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Scarce thro’ the feathers;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ baith a yellow George to claim,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">An’ thole their blethers!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">It pits me ay as mad’s a hare;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">So I can rhyme nor write nae mair;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But pennyworths again is fair,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">When time’s expedient:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Meanwhile I am, respected Sir,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Your most obedient.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_54_54" id="Footnote_54_54"></a><a href="#FNanchor_54_54"><span class="label">[54]</span></a> A certain humorous dream of his was then making a noise +in the country-side.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_55_55" id="Footnote_55_55"></a><a href="#FNanchor_55_55"><span class="label">[55]</span></a> A song he had promised the author.</p></div> +</div> + + + +<h2><a name="L" id="L"></a>L.</h2> + +<h3>ON A SCOTCH BARD,</h3> +<h5>GONE TO THE WEST INDIES.</h5> +<p>[Burns in this Poem, as well as in others, speaks openly of his tastes +and passions: his own fortunes are dwelt on with painful minuteness, +and his errors are recorded with the accuracy, but not the seriousness +of the confessional. He seems to have been fond of taking himself to +task. It was written when “Hungry ruin had him in the wind,” and +emigration to the West Indies was the only refuge which he could think +of, or his friends suggest, from the persecutions of fortune.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">A’ ye wha live by sowps o’ drink,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A’ ye wha live by crambo-clink,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A’ ye wha live and never think,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Come, mourn wi’ me!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Our billie’s gien us a’ a jink,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">An’ owre the sea.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Lament him a’ ye rantin’ core,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wha dearly like a random-splore,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Nae mair he’ll join the merry roar<br /></span> +<span class="i8">In social key;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For now he’s taen anither shore,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">An’ owre the sea!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The bonnie lasses weel may wiss him,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And in their dear petitions place him;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The widows, wives, an’ a’ may bless him,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Wi’ tearfu’ e’e;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For weel I wat they’ll sairly miss him<br /></span> +<span class="i8">That’s owre the sea!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O Fortune, they hae room to grumble!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Hadst thou taen’ aff some drowsy bummle<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wha can do nought but fyke and fumble,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">’Twad been nae plea,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But he was gleg as onie wumble,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">That’s owre the sea!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Auld, cantie Kyle may weepers wear,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ stain them wi’ the saut, saut tear;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">’Twill mak her poor auld heart, I fear,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">In flinders flee;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He was her laureate monie a year,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">That’s owre the sea!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">He saw Misfortune’s cauld nor-west<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Lang mustering up a bitter blast;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A jillet brak his heart at last,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Ill may she be!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">So, took a birth afore the mast,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">An’ owre the sea.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">To tremble under fortune’s cummock,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">On scarce a bellyfu’ o’ drummock,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wi’ his proud, independent stomach,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Could ill agree;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">So, row’t his hurdies in a hammock,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">An’ owre the sea.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">He ne’er was gien to great misguiding,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yet coin his pouches wad na bide in;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wi’ him it ne’er was under hiding:<br /></span> +<span class="i8">He dealt it free;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The muse was a’ that he took pride in,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">That’s owre the sea.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Jamaica bodies, use him weel,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ hap him in a cozie biel;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ye’ll find him ay a dainty chiel,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">And fou o’ glee;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He wad na wrang’d the vera deil,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">That’s owre the sea.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Fareweel, my rhyme-composing billie!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Your native soil was right ill-willie;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But may ye flourish like a lily,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Now bonnilie!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I’ll toast ye in my hindmost gillie,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Tho’ owre the sea!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_123" id="Page_123">[123]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="LI" id="LI"></a>LI.</h2> + +<h3>THE FAREWELL.</h3> +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“The valiant, in himself, what can he suffer?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or what does he regard his single woes?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But when, alas! he multiplies himself,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To dearer selves, to the lov’d tender fair,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The those whose bliss, whose beings hang upon him,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To helpless children! then, O then! he feels<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The point of misery fest’ring in his heart,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And weakly weeps his fortune like a coward.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Such, such am I! undone.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="sig1"><span class="smcap">Thomson</span>.</p> + +<p>[In these serious stanzas, where the comic, as in the lines to the +Scottish bard, are not permitted to mingle, Burns bids farewell to all +on whom his heart had any claim. He seems to have looked on the sea as +only a place of peril, and on the West Indies as a charnel-house.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Farewell, old Scotia’s bleak domains,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Far dearer than the torrid plains<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Where rich ananas blow!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Farewell, a mother’s blessing dear!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A brother’s sigh! a sister’s tear!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My Jean’s heart-rending throe!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Farewell, my Bess! tho’ thou’rt bereft<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Of my parental care,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A faithful brother I have left,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My part in him thou’lt share!<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Adieu too, to you too,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">My Smith, my bosom frien’;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">When kindly you mind me,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">O then befriend my Jean!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">What bursting anguish tears my heart!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">From thee, my Jeany, must I part!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Thou weeping answ’rest—“No!”<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Alas! misfortune stares my face,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And points to ruin and disgrace,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I for thy sake must go!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thee, Hamilton, and Aiken dear,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A grateful, warm adieu;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I, with a much-indebted tear,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Shall still remember you!<br /></span> +<span class="i4">All-hail then, the gale then,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Wafts me from thee, dear shore!<br /></span> +<span class="i4">It rustles, and whistles<br /></span> +<span class="i6">I’ll never see thee more!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="LII" id="LII"></a>LII.</h2> + +<h3>WRITTEN</h3> +<h5>ON THE BLANK LEAF OF A COPY OF MY POEMS, PRESENTED TO AN OLD + SWEETHEART, THEN MARRIED.</h5> +<p>[This is another of the poet’s lamentations, at the prospect of +“torrid climes” and the roars of the Atlantic. To Burns, Scotland was +the land of promise, the west of Scotland his paradise; and the land +of dread, Jamaica! I found these lines copied by the poet into a +volume which he presented to Dr. Geddes: they were addressed, it is +thought, to the “Dear E.” of his earliest correspondence.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Once fondly lov’d and still remember’d dear;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Sweet early object of my youthful vows!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Accept this mark of friendship, warm, sincere,—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Friendship! ’tis all cold duty now allows.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">And when you read the simple artless rhymes,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">One friendly sigh for him—he asks no more,—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Who distant burns in flaming torrid climes,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Or haply lies beneath th’ Atlantic roar.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="LIII" id="LIII"></a>LIII.</h2> + +<h4>A DEDICATION</h4> +<h5>TO</h5> +<h3>GAVIN HAMILTON, ESQ.</h3> +<p>[The gentleman to whom these manly lines are addressed, was of good +birth, and of an open and generous nature: he was one of the first of +the gentry of the west to encourage the muse of Coila to stretch her +wings at full length. His free life, and free speech, exposed him to +the censures of that stern divine, Daddie Auld, who charged him with +the sin of absenting himself from church for three successive days; +for having, without the fear of God’s servant before him, profanely +said damn it, in his presence, and far having gallopped on Sunday. +These charges were contemptuously dismissed by the presbyterial court. +Hamilton was the brother of the Charlotte to whose charms, on the +banks of Devon, Burns, it is said, paid the homage of a lover, as well +as of a poet. The poem had a place in the Kilmarnock edition, but not +as an express dedication.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Expect na, Sir, in this narration,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A fleechin’, fleth’rin dedication,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To roose you up, an’ ca’ you guid,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ sprung o’ great an’ noble bluid,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Because ye’re surnam’d like his Grace;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Perhaps related to the race;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Then when I’m tir’d—and sae are ye,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wi’ monie a fulsome, sinfu’ lie,<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_124" id="Page_124">[124]</a></span><span class="i0">Set up a face, how I stop short,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For fear your modesty be hurt.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">This may do—maun do, Sir, wi’ them wha<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Maun please the great folk for a wamefou;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For me! sae laigh I needna bow,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For, Lord be thankit, I can plough;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And when I downa yoke a naig,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Then, Lord be thankit, I can beg;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sae I shall say, an’ that’s nae flatt’rin’,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">It’s just sic poet, an’ sic patron.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The Poet, some guid angel help him,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or else, I fear some ill ane skelp him,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He may do weel for a’ he’s done yet,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But only—he’s no just begun yet.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The Patron, (Sir, ye maun forgie me,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I winna lie, come what will o’ me,)<br /></span> +<span class="i0">On ev’ry hand it will allow’d be,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He’s just—nae better than he should be.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I readily and freely grant,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He downa see a poor man want;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">What’s no his ain, he winna tak it;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">What ance he says, he winna break it;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ought he can lend he’ll no refus’t,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">’Till aft his guidness is abus’d;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And rascals whyles that do him wrang,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">E’en that, he does na mind it lang:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As master, landlord, husband, father,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He does na fail his part in either.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But then, nae thanks to him for a’ that;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Nae godly symptom ye can ca’ that;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">It’s naething but a milder feature,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of our poor sinfu’, corrupt nature:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ye’ll get the best o’ moral works,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">‘Mang black Gentoos and pagan Turks,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or hunters wild on Ponotaxi,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wha never heard of orthodoxy.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">That he’s the poor man’s friend in need,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The gentleman in word and deed,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">It’s no thro’ terror of damnation;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">It’s just a carnal inclination.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Morality, thou deadly bane,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thy tens o’ thousands thou hast slain!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Vain is his hope, whose stay and trust is<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In moral mercy, truth and justice!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">No—stretch a point to catch a plack;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Abuse a brother to his back;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Steal thro’ a winnock frae a whore,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But point the rake that taks the door;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Be to the poor like onie whunstane,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And haud their noses to the grunstane,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ply ev’ry art o’ legal thieving;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">No matter—stick to sound believing.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Learn three-mile pray’rs an’ half-mile graces,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wi’ weel-spread looves, and lang wry faces;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Grunt up a solemn, lengthen’d groan,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And damn a’ parties but your own;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I’ll warrant then, ye’re nae deceiver,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A steady, sturdy, staunch believer.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O ye wha leave the springs o’ Calvin,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For gumlie dubs of your ain delvin’!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ye sons of heresy and error,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ye’ll some day squeal in quaking terror!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When Vengeance draws the sword in wrath,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And in the fire throws the sheath;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When Ruin, with his sweeping besom,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Just frets ’till Heav’n commission gies him:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">While o’er the harp pale Mis’ry moans,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And strikes the ever-deep’ning tones,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Still louder shrieks, and heavier groans!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Your pardon, Sir, for this digression.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I maist forgat my dedication;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But when divinity comes cross me<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My readers still are sure to lose me.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">So, Sir, ye see ’twas nae daft vapour,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But I maturely thought it proper,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When a’ my works I did review,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To dedicate them, Sir, to you:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Because (ye need na tak it ill)<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I thought them something like yoursel’.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Then patronize them wi’ your favour,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And your petitioner shall ever—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I had amaist said, ever pray,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But that’s a word I need na say:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For prayin’ I hae little skill o’t;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I’m baith dead sweer, an’ wretched ill o’t;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But I’se repeat each poor man’s pray’r,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That kens or hears about you, Sir—<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“May ne’er misfortune’s gowling bark,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Howl thro’ the dwelling o’ the Clerk!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">May ne’er his gen’rous, honest heart,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For that same gen’rous spirit smart!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">May Kennedy’s far-honour’d name<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Lang beet his hymeneal flame,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Till Hamiltons, at least a dizen,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Are frae their nuptial labours risen:<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_125" id="Page_125">[125]</a></span> +<span class="i0">Five bonnie lasses round their table,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And seven braw fellows, stout an’ able<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To serve their king and country weel,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">By word, or pen, or pointed steel!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">May health and peace, with mutual rays,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Shine on the ev’ning o’ his days;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">’Till his wee curlie John’s-ier-oe,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When ebbing life nae mair shall flow,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The last, sad, mournful rites bestow.”<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I will not wind a lang conclusion,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With complimentary effusion:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But whilst your wishes and endeavours<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Are blest with Fortune’s smiles and favours,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I am, dear Sir, with zeal most fervent,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Your much indebted, humble servant.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But if (which pow’rs above prevent)<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That iron-hearted carl, Want,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Attended in his grim advances<br /></span> +<span class="i0">By sad mistakes and black mischances,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">While hopes, and joys, and pleasures fly him,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Make you as poor a dog as I am,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Your humble servant then no more;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For who would humbly serve the poor!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But by a poor man’s hope in Heav’n!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">While recollection’s pow’r is given,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">If, in the vale of humble life,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The victim sad of fortune’s strife,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I, thro’ the tender gushing tear,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Should recognise my Master dear,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">If friendless, low, we meet together,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Then Sir, your hand—my friend and brother.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="LIV" id="LIV"></a>LIV.</h2> + +<h3>ELEGY</h3> +<h5>ON</h5> +<h4>THE DEATH OF ROBERT RUISSEAUX.</h4> +<p>[Cromek found these verses among the loose papers of Burns, and +printed them in the Reliques. They contain a portion of the character +of the poet, record his habitual carelessness in worldly affairs, and +his desire to be distinguished.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Now Robin lies in his last lair,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He’ll gabble rhyme, nor sing nae mair,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Cauld poverty, wi’ hungry stare,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Nae mair shall fear him;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Nor anxious fear, nor cankert care,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">E’er mair come near him.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">To tell the truth, they seldom fash’t him,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Except the moment that they crush’t him;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For sune as chance or fate had hush’t ‘em,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Tho’ e’er sae short,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Then wi’ a rhyme or song he lash’t ‘em,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">And thought it sport.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Tho’ he was bred to kintra wark,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And counted was baith wight and stark.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yet that was never Robin’s mark<br /></span> +<span class="i8">To mak a man;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But tell him he was learned and clark,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Ye roos’d him than!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="LV" id="LV"></a>LV.</h2> + +<h3>LETTER TO JAMES TENNANT,</h3> +<h4>OF GLENCONNER.</h4> +<p>[The west country farmer to whom this letter was sent was a social +man. The poet depended on his judgment in the choice of a farm, when +he resolved to quit the harp for the plough: but as Ellisland was his +choice, his skill may be questioned.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Auld comrade dear, and brither sinner,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">How’s a’ the folk about Glenconner?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">How do you this blae eastlin wind,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That’s like to blaw a body blind?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For me, my faculties are frozen,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My dearest member nearly dozen’d,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I’ve sent you here, by Johnie Simson,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Twa sage philosophers to glimpse on;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Smith, wi’ his sympathetic feeling,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ Reid, to common sense appealing.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Philosophers have fought and wrangled,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ meikle Greek and Latin mangled,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Till wi’ their logic-jargon tir’d,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ in the depth of science mir’d,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To common sense they now appeal,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">What wives and wabsters see and feel.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But, hark ye, friend! I charge you strictly<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Peruse them, an’ return them quickly,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For now I’m grown sae cursed douce<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I pray and ponder butt the house,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My shins, my lane, I there sit roastin’,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Perusing Bunyan, Brown, an’ Boston;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Till by an’ by, if I haud on,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I’ll grunt a real gospel groan:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Already I begin to try it,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To cast my e’en up like a pyet,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When by the gun she tumbles o’er,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Flutt’ring an’ gasping in her gore:<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_126" id="Page_126">[126]</a></span><span class="i0">Sae shortly you shall see me bright,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A burning and a shining light.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">My heart-warm love to guid auld Glen,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The ace an’ wale of honest men:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When bending down wi’ auld gray hairs,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Beneath the load of years and cares,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">May He who made him still support him,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ views beyond the grave comfort him,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">His worthy fam’ly far and near,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">God bless them a’ wi’ grace and gear!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">My auld schoolfellow, preacher Willie,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The manly tar, my mason Billie,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ Auchenbay, I wish him joy;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">If he’s a parent, lass or boy,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">May he be dad, and Meg the mither,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Just five-and-forty years thegither!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ no forgetting wabster Charlie,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I’m tauld he offers very fairly.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ Lord, remember singing Sannock,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wi’ hale breeks, saxpence, an’ a bannock,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ next my auld acquaintance, Nancy,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Since she is fitted to her fancy;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ her kind stars hae airted till her<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A good chiel wi’ a pickle siller.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My kindest, best respects I sen’ it,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To cousin Kate, an’ sister Janet;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Tell them, frae me, wi’ chiels be cautious,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For, faith, they’ll aiblins fin’ them fashious;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To grant a heart is fairly civil,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But to grant the maidenhead’s the devil<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ lastly, Jamie, for yoursel’,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">May guardian angels tak a spell,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ steer you seven miles south o’ hell:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But first, before you see heaven’s glory,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">May ye get monie a merry story,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Monie a laugh, and monie a drink,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And aye eneugh, o’ needfu’ clink.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Now fare ye weel, an’ joy be wi’ you,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For my sake this I beg it o’ you.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Assist poor Simson a’ ye can,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ye’ll fin’ him just an honest man;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sae I conclude, and quat my chanter,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Your’s, saint or sinner,<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="sig1"><span class="smcap">Rob the Ranter</span>.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="LVI" id="LVI"></a>LVI.</h2> + +<h4>ON THE</h4> +<h3>BIRTH OF A POSTHUMOUS CHILD.</h3> +<p>[From letters addressed by Burns to Mrs. Dunlop, it would appear that +this “Sweet Flow’ret, pledge o’ meikle love,” was the only son of her +daughter, Mrs. Henri, who had married a French gentleman. The mother +soon followed the father to the grave: she died in the south of +France, whither she had gone in search of health.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Sweet flow’ret, pledge o’ meikle love,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And ward o’ mony a pray’r,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">What heart o’ stane wad thou na move,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Sae helpless, sweet, and fair!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">November hirples o’er the lea,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Chill on thy lovely form;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And gane, alas! the shelt’ring tree,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Should shield thee frae the storm.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">May He who gives the rain to pour,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And wings the blast to blaw,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Protect thee frae the driving show’r,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The bitter frost and snaw!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">May He, the friend of woe and want,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Who heals life’s various stounds,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Protect and guard the mother-plant,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And heal her cruel wounds!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But late she flourish’d, rooted fast,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Fair on the summer-morn:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Now feebly bends she in the blast,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Unshelter’d and forlorn.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Blest be thy bloom, thou lovely gem,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Unscath’d by ruffian hand!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And from thee many a parent stem<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Arise to deck our land!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="LVII" id="LVII"></a>LVII.</h2> + +<h3>TO MISS CRUIKSHANK,</h3> +<h4>A VERY YOUNG LADY.</h4> +<h5>WRITTEN ON THE BLANK LEAF OF A BOOK, PRESENTED<br /> + TO HER BY THE AUTHOR.</h5> +<p>[The beauteous rose-bud of this poem was one of the daughters of Mr. +Cruikshank, a master in the High School of Edinburgh, at whose table +Burns was a frequent guest during the year of hope which he spent in +the northern metropolis.]<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_127" id="Page_127">[127]</a></span></p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Beauteous rose-bud, young and gay,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Blooming in thy early May,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Never may’st thou, lovely flow’r,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Chilly shrink in sleety show’r!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Never Boreas’ hoary path,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Never Eurus’ poisonous breath,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Never baleful stellar lights,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Taint thee with untimely blights!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Never, never reptile thief<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Riot on thy virgin leaf!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Nor even Sol too fiercely view<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thy bosom blushing still with dew!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">May’st thou long, sweet crimson gem,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Richly deck thy native stem:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">’Till some evening, sober, calm,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Dropping dews and breathing balm,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">While all around the woodland rings,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And ev’ry bird thy requiem sings;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thou, amid the dirgeful sound,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Shed thy dying honours round,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And resign to parent earth<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The loveliest form she e’er gave birth.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="LVIII" id="LVIII"></a>LVIII.</h2> + +<h3>WILLIE CHALMERS.</h3> +<p>[Lockhart first gave this poetic curiosity to the world: he copied it +from a small manuscript volume of Poems given by Burns to Lady Harriet +Don, with an explanation in these words: “W. Chalmers, a gentleman in +Ayrshire, a particular friend of mine, asked me to write a poetic +epistle to a young lady, his Dulcinea. I had seen her, but was +scarcely acquainted with her, and wrote as follows.” Chalmers was a +writer in Ayr. I have not heard that the lady was influenced by this +volunteer effusion: ladies are seldom rhymed into the matrimonial +snare.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Wi’ braw new branks in mickle pride,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And eke a braw new brechan,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My Pegasus I’m got astride,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And up Parnassus pechin;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Whiles owre a bush wi’ downward crush<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The doitie beastie stammers;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Then up he gets and off he sets<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For sake o’ Willie Chalmers.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I doubt na, lass, that weel kenn’d name<br /></span> +<span class="i2">May cost a pair o’ blushes;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I am nae stranger to your fame,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Nor his warm urged wishes.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Your bonnie face sae mild and sweet<br /></span> +<span class="i2">His honest heart enamours,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And faith ye’ll no be lost a whit,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Tho’ waired on Willie Chalmers.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Auld Truth hersel’ might swear ye’re fair,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And Honour safely back her,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And Modesty assume your air,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And ne’er a ane mistak’ her:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And sic twa love-inspiring een<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Might fire even holy Palmers;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Nae wonder then they’ve fatal been<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To honest Willie Chalmers.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I doubt na fortune may you shore<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Some mim-mou’d pouthered priestie,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Fu’ lifted up wi’ Hebrew lore,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And band upon his breastie:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But Oh! what signifies to you<br /></span> +<span class="i2">His lexicons and grammars;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The feeling heart’s the royal blue,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And that’s wi’ Willie Chalmers.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">V.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Some gapin’ glowrin’ countra laird,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">May warstle for your favour;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">May claw his lug, and straik his beard,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And hoast up some palaver.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My bonnie maid, before ye wed<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Sic clumsy-witted hammers,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Seek Heaven for help, and barefit skelp<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Awa’ wi’ Willie Chalmers.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">VI.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Forgive the Bard! my fond regard<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For ane that shares my bosom,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Inspires my muse to gie ‘m his dues,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For de’il a hair I roose him.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">May powers aboon unite you soon,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And fructify your amours,—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And every year come in mair dear<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To you and Willie Chalmers.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_128" id="Page_128">[128]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="LIX" id="LIX"></a>LIX.</h2> + +<h5>LYING AT A REVEREND FRIEND’S HOUSE ON NIGHT,<br /> + + +THE AUTHOR LEFT THE FOLLOWING</h5> +<h3>VERSES</h3> +<h5>IN THE ROOM WHERE HE SLEPT.</h5> +<p>[Of the origin of those verses Gilbert Burns gives the following +account. “The first time Robert heard the spinet played was at the +house of Dr. Lawrie, then minister of Loudon, now in +Glasgow. Dr. Lawrie has several daughters; one of them played; the +father and the mother led down the dance; the rest of the sisters, the +brother, the poet and the other guests mixed in it. It was a +delightful family scene for our poet, then lately introduced to the +world; his mind was roused to a poetic enthusiasm, and the stanzas +were left in the room where he slept.”]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O thou dread Power, who reign’st above!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I know thou wilt me hear,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When for this scene of peace and love<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I make my prayer sincere.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The hoary sire—the mortal stroke,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Long, long, be pleased to spare;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To bless his filial little flock<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And show what good men are.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">She who her lovely offspring eyes<br /></span> +<span class="i2">With tender hopes and fears,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O, bless her with a mother’s joys,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But spare a mother’s tears!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Their hope—their stay—their darling youth,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In manhood’s dawning blush—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Bless him, thou <span class="smcap">God</span> of love and truth,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Up to a parent’s wish!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">V.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The beauteous, seraph sister-band,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">With earnest tears I pray,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thous know’st the snares on ev’ry hand—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Guide Thou their steps alway.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">VI.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">When soon or late they reach that coast,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">O’er life’s rough ocean driven,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">May they rejoice, no wanderer lost,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A family in Heaven!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="LX" id="LX"></a>LX.</h2> + +<h3>TO GAVIN HAMILTON, ESQ.,</h3> +<h4>MAUCHLINE.</h4> +<h5>(RECOMMENDING A BOY.)</h5> +<p>[Verse seems to have been the natural language of Burns. The Master +Tootie whose skill he records, lived in Mauchline, and dealt in cows: +he was an artful and contriving person, great in bargaining and +intimate with all the professional tricks by which old cows are made +to look young, and six-pint hawkies pass for those of twelve.]</p> + +<p class="sig1"><i>Mossgiel, May 3, 1786.</i></p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I hold it, Sir, my bounden duty,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To warn you how that Master Tootie,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Alias, Laird M’Gaun,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Was here to hire yon lad away<br /></span> +<span class="i0">‘Bout whom ye spak the tither day,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’ wad ha’e done’t aff han’:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But lest he learn the callan tricks,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">As, faith, I muckle doubt him,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Like scrapin’ out auld Crummie’s nicks,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’ tellin’ lies about them;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">As lieve then, I’d have then,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Your clerkship he should sair,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">If sae be, ye may be<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Not fitted otherwhere.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Altho’ I say’t, he’s gleg enough,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ bout a house that’s rude an’ rough<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The boy might learn to swear;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But then, wi’ you, he’ll be sae taught,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ get sic fair example straught,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I havena ony fear.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ye’ll catechize him every quirk,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’ shore him weel wi’ Hell;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ gar him follow to the kirk—<br /></span> +<span class="i1">—Ay when ye gang yoursel’.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">If ye then, maun be then<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Frae hame this comin’ Friday;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Then please Sir, to lea’e Sir,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">The orders wi’ your lady.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">My word of honour I hae gien,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In Paisley John’s, that night at e’n,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To meet the Warld’s worm;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To try to get the twa to gree,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ name the airles<a name="FNanchor_56_56" id="FNanchor_56_56"></a><a href="#Footnote_56_56" class="fnanchor">[56]</a> an’ the fee,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In legal mode an’ form:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I ken he weel a snick can draw,<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_129" id="Page_129">[129]</a></span><span class="i2">When simple bodies let him;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ if a Devil be at a’,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In faith he’s sure to get him.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">To phrase you, an’ praise you,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Ye ken your Laureat scorns:<br /></span> +<span class="i4">The pray’r still, you share still,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Of grateful <span class="smcap">Minstrel Burns</span>.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_56_56" id="Footnote_56_56"></a><a href="#FNanchor_56_56"><span class="label">[56]</span></a> The airles—earnest money.</p></div> +</div> + + + +<h2><a name="LXI" id="LXI"></a>LXI.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. M’ADAM,</h3> +<h5>OF CRAIGEN-GILLAN.</h5> +<p>[It seems that Burns, delighted with the praise which the Laird of +Craigen-Gillan bestowed on his verses,—probably the Jolly Beggars, +then in the hands of Woodburn, his steward,—poured out this little +unpremeditated natural acknowledgment.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Sir, o’er a gill I gat your card,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I trow it made me proud;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">See wha tak’s notice o’ the bard<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I lap and cry’d fu’ loud.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Now deil-ma-care about their jaw,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The senseless, gawky million:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I’ll cock my nose aboon them a’—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I’m roos’d by Craigen-Gillan!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">’Twas noble, Sir; ’twas like yoursel’,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To grant your high protection:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A great man’s smile, ye ken fu’ well,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Is ay a blest infection.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Tho’ by his<a name="FNanchor_57_57" id="FNanchor_57_57"></a><a href="#Footnote_57_57" class="fnanchor">[57]</a> banes who in a tub<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Match’d Macedonian Sandy!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">On my ain legs thro’ dirt and dub,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I independent stand ay.—<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">And when those legs to gude, warm kail,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Wi’ welcome canna bear me;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A lee dyke-side, a sybow-tail,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And barley-scone shall cheer me.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Heaven spare you lang to kiss the breath<br /></span> +<span class="i2">O’ many flow’ry simmers!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And bless your bonnie lasses baith,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I’m tauld they’re loosome kimmers!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">And <span class="smcap">God</span> bless young Dunaskin’s laird,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The blossom of our gentry!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And may he wear an auld man’s beard,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A credit to his country.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_57_57" id="Footnote_57_57"></a><a href="#FNanchor_57_57"><span class="label">[57]</span></a> Diogenes.</p></div> +</div> + + + +<h2><a name="LXII" id="LXII"></a>LXII.</h2> + +<h3>ANSWER TO A POETICAL EPISTLE</h3> +<h5>SENT TO THE AUTHOR BY A TAILOR.</h5> +<p>[The person who in the name of a Tailor took the liberty of +admonishing Burns about his errors, is generally believed to have been +William Simpson, the schoolmaster of Ochiltree: the verses seem about +the measure of his capacity, and were attributed at the time to his +hand. The natural poet took advantage of the mask in which the made +poet concealed himself, and rained such a merciless storm upon him, as +would have extinguished half the Tailors in Ayrshire, and made the +amazed dominie</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Strangely fidge and fyke.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>It was first printed in 1801, by Stewart.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">What ails ye now, ye lousie b——h,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To thresh my back at sic a pitch?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Losh, man! hae mercy wi’ your natch,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Your bodkin’s bauld,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I didna suffer ha’f sae much<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Frae Daddie Auld.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">What tho’ at times when I grow crouse,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I gie their wames a random pouse,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Is that enough for you to souse<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Your servant sae?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Gae mind your seam, ye prick-the-louse,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">An’ jag-the-flae.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">King David o’ poetic brief,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wrought ‘mang the lasses sic mischief,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As fill’d his after life wi’ grief,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">An’ bluidy rants,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ yet he’s rank’d amang the chief<br /></span> +<span class="i8">O’ lang-syne saunts.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">And maybe, Tam, for a’ my cants,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My wicked rhymes, an’ druken rants,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I’ll gie auld cloven Clootie’s haunts<br /></span> +<span class="i8">An unco’ slip yet,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ snugly sit among the saunts<br /></span> +<span class="i8">At Davie’s hip get.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But fegs, the Session says I maun<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Gae fa’ upo’ anither plan,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Than garrin lasses cowp the cran<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Clean heels owre body,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And sairly thole their mither’s ban<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Afore the howdy.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">This leads me on, to tell for sport,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">How I did wi’ the Session sort,<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_130" id="Page_130">[130]</a></span><span class="i0">Auld Clinkum at the inner port<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Cried three times—“Robin!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Come hither, lad, an’ answer for’t,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Ye’re blamed for jobbin’.”<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Wi’ pinch I pat a Sunday’s face on,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ snoov’d away before the Session;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I made an open fair confession—<br /></span> +<span class="i8">I scorn’d to lee;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ syne Mess John, beyond expression,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Fell foul o’ me.<br /></span> +<hr class="hr1" /> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="LXIII" id="LXIII"></a>LXIII.</h2> + +<h3>TO J. RANKINE.</h3> +<p>[With the Laird of Adamhill’s personal character the reader is already +acquainted: the lady about whose frailties the rumour alluded to was +about to rise, has not been named, and it would neither be delicate +nor polite to guess.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I am a keeper of the law<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In some sma’ points, altho’ not a’;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Some people tell me gin I fa’<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Ae way or ither.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The breaking of ae point, though sma’,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Breaks a’ thegither<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I hae been in for’t once or twice,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And winna say o’er far for thrice,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yet never met with that surprise<br /></span> +<span class="i8">That broke my rest,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But now a rumour’s like to rise,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">A whaup’s i’ the nest.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="LXIV" id="LXIV"></a>LXIV.</h2> + +<h3>LINES</h3> +<h5>WRITTEN ON A BANK-NOTE.</h5> +<p>[The bank-note on which these characteristic lines were endorsed, came +into the hands of the late James Gracie, banker in Dumfries: he knew +the handwriting of Burns, and kept it as a curiosity. The concluding +lines point to the year 1786, as the date of the composition.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i2">Wae worth thy power, thou cursed leaf,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Fell source o’ a’ my woe an’ grief;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For lack o’ thee I’ve lost my lass,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For lack o’ thee I scrimp my glass.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I see the children of affliction<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Unaided, through thy cursed restriction<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I’ve seen the oppressor’s cruel smile<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Amid his hapless victim’s spoil:<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And for thy potence vainly wished,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To crush the villain in the dust.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For lack o’ thee, I leave this much-lov’d shore,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Never, perhaps, to greet old Scotland more.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="sig2">R. B.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="LXV" id="LXV"></a>LXV.</h2> + +<h3>A DREAM.</h3> +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Thoughts, words, and deeds, the statute blames with reason;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But surely dreams were ne’er indicted treason.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>On reading, in the public papers, the “Laureate’s Ode,” with the other +parade of June 4th, 1786, the author was no sooner dropt asleep, than +he imagined himself transported to the birth-day levee; and, in his +dreaming fancy, made the following “Address.”</p> + +<p>[The prudent friends of the poet remonstrated with him about this +Poem, which they appeared to think would injure his fortunes and stop +the royal bounty to which he was thought entitled. Mrs. Dunlop, and +Mrs. Stewart, of Stair, solicited him in vain to omit it in the +Edinburgh edition of his poems. I know of no poem for which a claim of +being prophetic would be so successfully set up: it is full of point +as well as of the future. The allusions require no comment.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Guid-mornin’ to your Majesty!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">May Heaven augment your blisses,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">On ev’ry new birth-day ye see,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A humble poet wishes!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My bardship here, at your levee,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">On sic a day as this is,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Is sure an uncouth sight to see,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Amang thae birth-day dresses<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Sae fine this day.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I see ye’re complimented thrang,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">By many a lord an’ lady;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">“God save the King!” ‘s a cuckoo sang<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That’s unco easy said ay;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The poets, too, a venal gang,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Wi’ rhymes weel-turn’d and ready,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wad gar you trow ye ne’er do wrang,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But ay unerring steady,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">On sic a day.<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_131" id="Page_131">[131]</a></span></div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">For me, before a monarch’s face,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Ev’n there I winna flatter;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For neither pension, post, nor place,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Am I your humble debtor:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">So, nae reflection on your grace,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Your kingship to bespatter;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">There’s monie waur been o’ the race,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And aiblins ane been better<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Than you this day.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">’Tis very true, my sov’reign king,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My skill may weel be doubted:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But facts are chiels that winna ding,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’ downa be disputed:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Your royal nest beneath your wing,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Is e’en right reft an’ clouted,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And now the third part of the string,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’ less, will gang about it<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Than did ae day.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Far be’t frae me that I aspire<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To blame your legislation,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or say, ye wisdom want, or fire,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To rule this mighty nation.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But faith! I muckle doubt, my sire,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Ye’ve trusted ministration<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To chaps, wha, in a barn or byre,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Wad better fill’d their station<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Than courts yon day.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">And now ye’ve gien auld Britain peace,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Her broken shins to plaister;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Your sair taxation does her fleece,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Till she has scarce a tester;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For me, thank God, my life’s a lease,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Nae bargain wearing faster,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or, faith! I fear, that, wi’ the geese,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I shortly boost to pasture<br /></span> +<span class="i8">I’ the craft some day.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I’m no mistrusting Willie Pitt,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">When taxes he enlarges,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">(An’ Will’s a true guid fallow’s get,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A name not envy spairges,)<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That he intends to pay your debt,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’ lessen a’ your charges;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But, G-d-sake! let nae saving-fit<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Abridge your bonnie barges<br /></span> +<span class="i8">An’ boats this day.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Adieu, my Liege! may freedom geck<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Beneath your high protection;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ may ye rax corruption’s neck,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And gie her for dissection!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But since I’m here, I’ll no neglect,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In loyal, true affection,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To pay your Queen, with due respect,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My fealty an’ subjection<br /></span> +<span class="i8">This great birth-day<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Hail, Majesty Most Excellent!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">While nobles strive to please ye,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Will ye accept a compliment<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A simple poet gi’es ye?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thae bonnie bairntime, Heav’n has lent,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Still higher may they heeze ye<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In bliss, till fate some day is sent,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For ever to release ye<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Frae care that day.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">For you, young potentate o’ Wales,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I tell your Highness fairly,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Down pleasure’s stream, wi’ swelling sails,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I’m tauld ye’re driving rarely;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But some day ye may gnaw your nails,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’ curse your folly sairly,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That e’er ye brak Diana’s pales,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Or rattl’d dice wi’ Charlie,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">By night or day.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Yet aft a ragged cowte’s been known<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To mak a noble aiver;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">So, ye may doucely fill a throne,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For a’ their clish-ma-claver:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">There, him at Agincourt wha shone,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Few better were or braver;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And yet, wi’ funny, queer Sir John,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">He was an unco shaver<br /></span> +<span class="i8">For monie a day.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">For you, right rev’rend Osnaburg,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Nane sets the lawn-sleeve sweeter,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Altho’ a ribbon at your lug,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Wad been a dress completer:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As ye disown yon paughty dog<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That bears the keys of Peter,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Then, swith! an’ get a wife to hug,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Or, trouth! ye’ll stain the mitre<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Some luckless day.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Young, royal Tarry Breeks, I learn,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Ye’ve lately come athwart her;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A glorious galley,<a name="FNanchor_58_58" id="FNanchor_58_58"></a><a href="#Footnote_58_58" class="fnanchor">[58]</a> stem an’ stern,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Weel rigg’d for Venus’ barter;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But first hang out, that she’ll discern<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Your hymeneal charter,<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_132" id="Page_132">[132]</a></span><span class="i0">Then heave aboard your grapple airn,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’, large upon her quarter,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Come full that day.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Ye, lastly, bonnie blossoms a’,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Ye royal lasses dainty,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Heav’n mak you guid as weel as braw,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’ gie you lads a-plenty:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But sneer na British Boys awa’,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For kings are unco scant ay;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ German gentles are but sma’,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">They’re better just than want ay<br /></span> +<span class="i8">On onie day.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">God bless you a’! consider now,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Ye’re unco muckle dautet;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But ere the course o’ life be thro’,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">It may be bitter sautet:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ I hae seen their coggie fou,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That yet hae tarrow’t at it;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But or the day was done, I trow,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The laggen they hae clautet<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Fu’ clean that day.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_58_58" id="Footnote_58_58"></a><a href="#FNanchor_58_58"><span class="label">[58]</span></a> Alluding to the newspaper account of a certain royal +sailor’s amour</p></div> +</div> + + + +<h2><a name="LXVI" id="LXVI"></a>LXVI.</h2> + +<h3>A BARD’S EPITAPH.</h3> +<p>[This beautiful and affecting poem was printed in the Kilmarnock +edition: Wordsworth writes with his usual taste and feeling about it: +“Whom did the poet intend should be thought of, as occupying that +grave, over which, after modestly setting forth the moral discernment +and warm affections of the ‘poor inhabitant’ it is supposed to be +inscribed that</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">‘Thoughtless follies laid him low,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">And stained his name!’<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>Who but himself—himself anticipating the but too probable termination +of his own course? Here is a sincere and solemn avowal—a confession +at once devout, poetical, and human—a history in the shape of a +prophecy! What more was required of the biographer, than to have put +his seal to the writing, testifying that the foreboding had been +realized and that the record was authentic?”]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Is there a whim-inspired fool,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Owre fast for thought, owre hot for rule,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Owre blate to seek, owre proud to snool,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Let him draw near;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And owre this grassy heap sing dool,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">And drap a tear.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Is there a bard of rustic song,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Who, noteless, steals the crowds among,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That weekly this area throng,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">O, pass not by!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But with a frater-feeling strong,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Here heave a sigh.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Is there a man, whose judgment clear,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Can others teach the course to steer,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yet runs, himself, life’s mad career,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Wild as the wave;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Here pause—and, through the starting tear,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Survey this grave.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The poor inhabitant below<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Was quick to learn and wise to know,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And keenly felt the friendly glow,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">And softer flame,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But thoughtless follies laid him low,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">And stain’d his name!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Reader, attend—whether thy soul<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Soars fancy’s flights beyond the pole,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or darkling grubs this earthly hole,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">In low pursuit;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Know, prudent, cautious self-control,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Is wisdom’s root.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="LXVII" id="LXVII"></a>LXVII.</h2> + +<h3>THE TWA DOGS.</h3> +<h5>A TALE.</h5> +<p>[Cromek, an anxious and curious inquirer, informed me, that the Twa +Dogs was in a half-finished state, when the poet consulted John +Wilson, the printer, about the Kilmarnock edition. On looking over the +manuscripts, the printer, with a sagacity common to his profession, +said, “The Address to the Deil” and “The Holy Fair” were grand things, +but it would be as well to have a calmer and sedater strain, to put at +the front of the volume. Burns was struck with the remark, and on his +way home to Mossgiel, completed the Poem, and took it next day to +Kilmarnock, much to the satisfaction of “Wee Johnnie.” On the 17th +February Burns says to John Richmond, of Mauchline, “I have completed +my Poem of the Twa Dogs, but have not shown it to the world.” It is +difficult to fix the dates with anything like accuracy, to +compositions which are not struck off at one heat of the fancy. “Luath +was one of the poet’s dogs, which some person had wantonly killed,” +says Gilbert Burns; “but Cæsar was merely the creature of the +imagination.” The Ettrick Shepherd, a judge of collies, says that +Luath is true to the life, and that many a hundred times he has seen +the dogs bark for very joy, when the cottage children were merry.]</p> + + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Twas in that place o’ Scotland’s isle<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That bears the name o’ Auld King Coil,<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_133" id="Page_133">[133]</a></span><span class="i0">Upon a bonnie day in June,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When wearing through the afternoon,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Twa dogs that were na thrang at hame,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Forgather’d ance upon a time.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The first I’ll name, they ca’d him Cæsar,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Was keepit for his honour’s pleasure;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">His hair, his size, his mouth, his lugs,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Show’d he was nane o’ Scotland’s dogs;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But whalpit some place far abroad,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where sailors gang to fish for cod.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">His locked, letter’d, braw brass collar<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Show’d him the gentleman and scholar;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But though he was o’ high degree,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The fient a pride—nae pride had he;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But wad hae spent an hour caressin’,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ev’n wi’ a tinkler-gypsey’s messin’.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">At kirk or market, mill or smiddie,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Nae tawted tyke, though e’er sae duddie,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But he wad stan’t, as glad to see him,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And stroan’t on stanes and hillocks wi’ him.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The tither was a ploughman’s collie,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A rhyming, ranting, raving billie,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wha for his friend an’ comrade had him,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And in his freaks had Luath ca’d him,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">After some dog in Highland sang,<a name="FNanchor_59_59" id="FNanchor_59_59"></a><a href="#Footnote_59_59" class="fnanchor">[59]</a><br /></span> +<span class="i0">Was made lang syne—Lord know how lang.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">He was a gash an’ faithful tyke,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As ever lap a sheugh or dyke.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">His honest, sonsie, baws’nt face,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ay gat him friends in ilka place.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">His breast was white, his touzie back<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Weel clad wi’ coat o’ glossy black;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">His gaucie tail, wi’ upward curl,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Hung o’er his hurdies wi’ a swirl.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Nae doubt but they were fain o’ ither,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ unco pack an’ thick thegither;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wi’ social nose whyles snuff’d and snowkit,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Whyles mice and moudiewarts they howkit;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Whyles scour’d awa in lang excursion,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ worry’d ither in diversion;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Until wi’ daffin weary grown,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Upon a knowe they sat them down,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And there began a lang digression<br /></span> +<span class="i0">About the lords o’ the creation.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">CÆSAR.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I’ve aften wonder’d, honest Luath,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">What sort o’ life poor dogs like you have;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ when the gentry’s life I saw,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">What way poor bodies liv’d ava.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Our laird gets in his racked rents,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">His coals, his kain, and a’ his stents;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He rises when he likes himsel’;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">His flunkies answer at the bell;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He ca’s his coach, he ca’s his horse;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He draws a bonnie silken purse<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As lang’s my tail, whare, through the steeks,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The yellow letter’d Geordie keeks.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Frae morn to e’en its nought but toiling,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">At baking, roasting, frying, boiling;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ though the gentry first are stechin,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yet even the ha’ folk fill their pechan<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wi’ sauce, ragouts, and sic like trashtrie,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That’s little short o’ downright wastrie.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Our whipper-in, wee, blastit wonner,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Poor worthless elf, eats a dinner,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Better than ony tenant man<br /></span> +<span class="i0">His honour has in a’ the lan’;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ what poor cot-folk pit their painch in,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I own it’s past my comprehension.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">LUATH.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Trowth, Cæsar, whyles they’re fash’t eneugh<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A cotter howkin in a sheugh,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wi’ dirty stanes biggin’ a dyke,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Baring a quarry, and sic like;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Himself, a wife, he thus sustains,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A smytrie o’ wee duddie weans,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ nought but his han’ darg, to keep<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Them right and tight in thack an’ rape.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">An’ when they meet wi’ sair disasters,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Like loss o’ health, or want o’ masters,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ye maist wad think a wee touch langer<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ they maun starve o’ cauld and hunger;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But, how it comes, I never kenn’d yet,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">They’re maistly wonderfu’ contented:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ buirdly chiels, an’ clever hizzies,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Are bred in sic a way as this is.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">CÆSAR.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But then to see how ye’re negleckit,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">How huff’d, and cuff’d, and disrespeckit!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">L—d, man, our gentry care as little<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For delvers, ditchers, an’ sic cattle;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">They gang as saucy by poor folk,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As I wad by a stinking brock.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I’ve notic’d, on our Laird’s court-day,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ mony a time my heart’s been wae,<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_134" id="Page_134">[134]</a></span><span class="i0">Poor tenant bodies, scant o’ cash,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">How they maun thole a factor’s snash:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He’ll stamp an’ threaten, curse an’ swear,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He’ll apprehend them, poind their gear;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">While they maun stan’, wi’ aspect humble,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ hear it a’, an’ fear an’ tremble!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> + +<span class="i0">I see how folk live that hae riches;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But surely poor folk maun be wretches!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">LUATH.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">They’re no sae wretched’s ane wad think;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Tho’ constantly on poortith’s brink:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">They’re sae accustom’d wi’ the sight,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The view o’t gies them little fright.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Then chance an’ fortune are sae guided,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">They’re ay in less or mair provided;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ tho’ fatigu’d wi’ close employment,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A blink o’ rest’s a sweet enjoyment.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The dearest comfort o’ their lives,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Their grushie weans, an’ faithfu’ wives;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The prattling things are just their pride,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That sweetens a’ their fire-side;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ whyles twalpennie worth o’ nappy<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Can mak’ the bodies unco happy;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">They lay aside their private cares,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To mind the Kirk and State affairs:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">They’ll talk o’ patronage and priests;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wi’ kindling fury in their breasts;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or tell what new taxation’s comin’,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And ferlie at the folk in Lon’on.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">As bleak-fac’d Hallowmass returns,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">They get the jovial, ranting kirns,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When rural life, o’ ev’ry station,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Unite in common recreation;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Love blinks, Wit slaps, an’ social Mirth<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Forgets there’s Care upo’ the earth.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">That merry day the year begins,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">They bar the door on frosty win’s;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The nappy reeks wi’ mantling ream,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ sheds a heart-inspiring steam;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The luntin pipe, an sneeshin mill,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Are handed round wi’ right guid will;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The cantie auld folks crackin’ crouse,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The young anes rantin’ thro’ the house,—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My heart has been sae fain to see them,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That I for joy hae barkit wi’ them.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Still it’s owre true that ye hae said,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sic game is now owre aften play’d.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">There’s monie a creditable stock<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O’ decent, honest, fawsont folk,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Are riven out baith root and branch,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Some rascal’s pridefu’ greed to quench,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wha thinks to knit himsel’ the faster<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In favour wi’ some gentle master,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wha aiblins, thrang a parliamentin’,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For Britain’s guid his saul indentin’—<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">CÆSAR.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Haith, lad, ye little ken about it!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For Britain’s guid! guid faith, I doubt it!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Say rather, gaun as Premiers lead him,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ saying, aye or no’s they bid him,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">At operas an’ plays parading,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Mortgaging, gambling, masquerading;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or may be, in a frolic daft,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To Hague or Calais takes a waft,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To mak a tour, an’ tak’ a whirl,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To learn <i>bon ton</i>, an’ see the worl’.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">There, at Vienna or Versailles,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He rives his father’s auld entails;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or by Madrid he takes the rout,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To thrum guitars, an’ fecht wi’ nowt;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or down Italian vista startles,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wh—re-hunting amang groves o’ myrtles<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Then bouses drumly German water,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To mak’ himsel’ look fair and fatter,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ clear the consequential sorrows,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Love-gifts of carnival signoras.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For Britain’s guid!—for her destruction<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wi’ dissipation, feud, an’ faction.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">LUATH.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Hech, man! dear sirs! is that the gate<br /></span> +<span class="i0">They waste sae mony a braw estate!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Are we sae foughten an’ harass’d<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For gear to gang that gate at last!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O, would they stay aback frae courts,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ please themsels wi’ countra sports,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">It wad for ev’ry ane be better,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The Laird, the Tenant, an’ the Cotter!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For thae frank, rantin’, ramblin’ billies,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Fient haet o’ them’s ill-hearted fellows;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Except for breakin’ o’ their timmer,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or speakin’ lightly o’ their limmer,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or shootin’ o’ a hare or moor-cock,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The ne’er a bit they’re ill to poor folk.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But will ye tell me, Master Cæsar,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sure great folk’s life’s a life o’ pleasure?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Nae cauld or hunger e’er can steer them,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The vera thought o’t need na fear them.<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_135" id="Page_135">[135]</a></span></div></div> + +<p class="std2">CÆSAR.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">L—d, man, were ye but whyles whare I am,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The gentles ye wad ne’er envy ‘em.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">It’s true, they needna starve or sweat,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thro’ winters cauld, or simmer’s heat;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">They’ve nae sair wark to craze their banes,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ fill auld age wi’ grips an’ granes:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But human bodies are sic fools,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For a’ their colleges and schools,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That when nae real ills perplex them,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">They mak enow themsels to vex them;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ ay the less they hae to sturt them,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In like proportion, less will hurt them.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">A country fellow at the pleugh,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">His acres till’d, he’s right eneugh;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A country girl at her wheel,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Her dizzen’s done, she’s unco weel:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But Gentlemen, an’ Ladies warst,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wi’ ev’n down want o’ wark are curst.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">They loiter, lounging, lank, an’ lazy;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Tho’ deil haet ails them, yet uneasy;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Their days insipid, dull, an’ tasteless;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Their nights unquiet, lang an’ restless;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ even their sports, their balls an’ races,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Their galloping thro’ public places,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">There’s sic parade, sic pomp, an’ art,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The joy can scarcely reach the heart.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The men cast out in party matches,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Then sowther a’ in deep debauches;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ae night they’re mad wi’ drink and wh-ring,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Niest day their life is past enduring.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The Ladies arm-in-arm in clusters,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As great and gracious a’ as sisters;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But hear their absent thoughts o’ ither,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">They’re a’ run deils an’ jads thegither.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Whyles, o’er the wee bit cup an’ platie,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">They sip the scandal potion pretty;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or lee-lang nights, wi’ crabbit leuks<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Pore owre the devil’s pictur’d beuks;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Stake on a chance a farmer’s stack-yard,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ cheat like onie unhang’d blackguard.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">There’s some exception, man an’ woman;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But this is Gentry’s life in common.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">By this, the sun was out o’ sight,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ darker gloaming brought the night:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The bum-clock humm’d wi’ lazy drone;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The kye stood rowtin i’ the loan;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When up they gat, and shook their lugs,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Rejoic’d they were na men, but dogs;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ each took aff his several way,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Resolv’d to meet some ither day.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_59_59" id="Footnote_59_59"></a><a href="#FNanchor_59_59"><span class="label">[59]</span></a> Cuchullin’s dog in Ossian’s Fingal.</p></div> +</div> + + + +<h2><a name="LXVIII" id="LXVIII"></a>LXVIII.</h2> + +<h3>LINES</h3> +<h5>ON</h5> +<h4>MEETING WITH LORD DAER.</h4> +<p>[“The first time I saw Robert Burns,” says Dugald Stewart, “was on the +23rd of October, 1786, when he dined at my house in Ayrshire, together +with our common friend, John Mackenzie, surgeon in Mauchline, to whom +I am indebted for the pleasure of his acquaintance. My excellent and +much-lamented friend, the late Basil, Lord Daer, happened to arrive at +Catrine the same day, and, by the kindness and frankness of his +manners, left an impression on the mind of the poet which was never +effaced. The verses which the poet wrote on the occasion are among the +most imperfect of his pieces, but a few stanzas may perhaps be a +matter of curiosity, both on account of the character to which they +relate and the light which they throw on the situation and the +feelings of the writer before his work was known to the public.” +Basil, Lord Daer, the uncle of the present Earl of Selkirk, was born +in the year 1769, at the family seat of St. +Mary’s Isle: he distinguished himself early at school, and at college +excelled in literature and science; he had a greater regard for +democracy than was then reckoned consistent with his birth and rank. +He was, when Burns met him, in his twenty-third year; was very tall, +something careless in his dress, and had the taste and talent common +to his distinguished family. He died in his thirty-third year.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">This wot ye all whom it concerns,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I, Rhymer Robin, alias Burns,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">October twenty-third,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A ne’er-to-be-forgotten day,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sae far I sprachled up the brae,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">I dinner’d wi’ a Lord.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I’ve been at druken writers’ feasts,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Nay, been bitch-fou’ ‘mang godly priests,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Wi’ rev’rence be it spoken:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I’ve even join’d the honour’d jorum,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When mighty squireships of the quorum<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Their hydra drouth did sloken.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But wi’ a Lord—stand out, my shin!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A Lord—a Peer—an Earl’s son!—<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Up higher yet, my bonnet!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And sic a Lord!—lang Scotch ells twa,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Our Peerage he o’erlooks them a’,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">As I look o’er my sonnet.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But, oh! for Hogarth’s magic pow’r!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To show Sir Bardie’s willyart glow’r,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">And how he star’d and stammer’d,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When goavan, as if led wi’ branks,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ stumpan on his ploughman shanks,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">He in the parlour hammer’d.<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_136" id="Page_136">[136]</a></span></div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I sidling shelter’d in a nook,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ at his lordship steal’t a look,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Like some portentous omen;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Except good sense and social glee,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ (what surpris’d me) modesty,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">I marked nought uncommon.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I watch’d the symptoms o’ the great,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The gentle pride, the lordly state,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">The arrogant assuming;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The fient a pride, nae pride had he,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Nor sauce, nor state, that I could see,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Mair than an honest ploughman.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Then from his lordship I shall learn,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Henceforth to meet with unconcern<br /></span> +<span class="i6">One rank as weel’s another;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Nae honest worthy man need care<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To meet with noble youthful Daer,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">For he but meets a brother.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="LXIX" id="LXIX"></a>LXIX.</h2> + +<h3>ADDRESS TO EDINBURGH.</h3> +<p>[“I enclose you two poems,” said Burns to his friend Chalmers, “which +I have carded and spun since I passed Glenbuck. One blank in the +Address to Edinburgh, ‘Fair B——,’ is the heavenly Miss Burnet, +daughter to Lord Monboddo, at whose house I have had the honour to be +more than once. There has not been anything nearly like her, in all +the combinations of beauty, grace, and goodness the great Creator has +formed, since Milton’s Eve, on the first day of her existence.” Lord +Monboddo made himself ridiculous by his speculations on human nature, +and acceptable by his kindly manners and suppers in the manner of the +ancients, where his viands were spread under ambrosial lights, and his +Falernian was wreathed with flowers. At these suppers Burns sometimes +made his appearance. The “Address” was first printed in the Edinburgh +edition: the poet’s hopes were then high, and his compliments, both to +town and people, were elegant and happy.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Edina! Scotia’s darling seat!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">All hail thy palaces and tow’rs,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where once beneath a monarch’s feet<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Sat Legislation’s sov’reign pow’rs!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">From marking wildly-scatter’d flow’rs,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">As on the banks of Ayr I stray’d,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And singing, lone, the ling’ring hours,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I shelter in thy honour’d shade.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Here wealth still swells the golden tide,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">As busy Trade his labour plies;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">There Architecture’s noble pride<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Bids elegance and splendour rise;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Here Justice, from her native skies,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">High wields her balance and her rod;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">There Learning, with his eagle eyes,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Seeks Science in her coy abode.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Thy sons, Edina! social, kind,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">With open arms the stranger hail;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Their views enlarg’d, their liberal mind,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Above the narrow, rural vale;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Attentive still to sorrow’s wail,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Or modest merit’s silent claim;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And never may their sources fail!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And never envy blot their name!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Thy daughters bright thy walks adorn,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Gay as the gilded summer sky,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sweet as the dewy milk-white thorn,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Dear as the raptur’d thrill of joy!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Fair Burnet strikes th’ adoring eye,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Heav’n’s beauties on my fancy shine;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I see the Sire of Love on high,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And own his work indeed divine!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">V.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">There, watching high the least alarms,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Thy rough, rude fortress gleams afar,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Like some bold vet’ran, gray in arms,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And mark’d with many a seamy scar:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The pond’rous wall and massy bar,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Grim-rising o’er the rugged rock,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Have oft withstood assailing war,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And oft repell’d th’ invader’s shock.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">VI.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">With awe-struck thought, and pitying tears,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I view that noble, stately dome,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where Scotia’s kings of other years,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Fam’d heroes! had their royal home:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Alas, how chang’d the times to come!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Their royal name low in the dust!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Their hapless race wild-wand’ring roam,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Tho’ rigid law cries out, ’twas just!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">VII.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Wild beats my heart to trace your steps,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Whose ancestors, in days of yore,<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_137" id="Page_137">[137]</a></span><span class="i0">Thro’ hostile ranks and ruin’d gaps<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Old Scotia’s bloody lion bore:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ev’n I who sing in rustic lore,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Haply, my sires have left their shed,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And fac’d grim danger’s loudest roar,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Bold-following where your fathers led!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">VIII.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Edina! Scotia’s darling seat!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">All hail thy palaces and tow’rs,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where once beneath a monarch’s feet<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Sat Legislation’s sov’reign pow’rs!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">From marking wildly-scatter’d flow’rs,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">As on the hanks of Ayr I stray’d,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And singing, lone, the ling’ring hours,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I shelter in thy honour’d shade.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="LXX" id="LXX"></a>LXX.</h2> + +<h3>EPISTLE TO MAJOR LOGAN.</h3> +<p>[Major Logan, of Camlarg, lived, when this hasty Poem was written, +with his mother and sister at Parkhouse, near Ayr. He was a good +musician, a joyous companion, and something of a wit. The Epistle was +printed, for the first time, in my edition of Burns, in 1834, and +since then no other edition has wanted it.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Hail, thairm-inspirin’, rattlin’ Willie!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Though fortune’s road be rough an’ hilly<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To every fiddling, rhyming billie,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">We never heed,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But tak’ it like the unback’d filly,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Proud o’ her speed.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">When idly goavan whyles we saunter<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yirr, fancy barks, awa’ we canter<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Uphill, down brae, till some mishanter,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Some black bog-hole,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Arrests us, then the scathe an’ banter<br /></span> +<span class="i8">We’re forced to thole.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Hale be your heart! Hale be your fiddle!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Lang may your elbuck jink and diddle,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To cheer you through the weary widdle<br /></span> +<span class="i8">O’ this wild warl’,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Until you on a crummock driddle<br /></span> +<span class="i8">A gray-hair’d carl.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Come wealth, come poortith, late or soon,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Heaven send your heart-strings ay in tune,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And screw your temper pins aboon<br /></span> +<span class="i8">A fifth or mair,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The melancholious, lazy croon<br /></span> +<span class="i8">O’ cankrie care.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">May still your life from day to day<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Nae “lente largo” in the play,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But “allegretto forte” gay<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Harmonious flow:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A sweeping, kindling, bauld strathspey—<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Encore! Bravo!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">A blessing on the cheery gang<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wha dearly like a jig or sang,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ never think o’ right an’ wrang<br /></span> +<span class="i8">By square an’ rule,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But as the clegs o’ feeling stang<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Are wise or fool.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">My hand-waled curse keep hard in chase<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The harpy, hoodock, purse-proud race,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wha count on poortith as disgrace—<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Their tuneless hearts!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">May fireside discords jar a base<br /></span> +<span class="i8">To a’ their parts!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But come, your hand, my careless brither,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I’ th’ ither warl’, if there’s anither,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ that there is I’ve little swither<br /></span> +<span class="i8">About the matter;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">We check for chow shall jog thegither,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">I’se ne’er bid better.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">We’ve faults and failings—granted clearly,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">We’re frail backsliding mortals merely,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Eve’s bonny squad, priests wyte them sheerly<br /></span> +<span class="i8">For our grand fa’;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But stilt, but still, I like them dearly—<br /></span> +<span class="i8">God bless them a’!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Ochon! for poor Castalian drinkers,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When they fa’ foul o’ earthly jinkers,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The witching curs’d delicious blinkers<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Hae put me hyte,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And gart me weet my waukrife winkers,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Wi’ girnan spite.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But by yon moon!—and that’s high swearin’—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ every star within my hearin’!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ by her een wha was a dear ane!<br /></span> +<span class="i8">I’ll ne’er forget;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I hope to gie the jads a clearin’<br /></span> +<span class="i8">In fair play yet.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">My loss I mourn, but not repent it,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I’ll seek my pursie whare I tint it,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ance to the Indies I were wonted,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Some cantraip hour,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">By some sweet elf I’ll yet be dinted,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Then, <i>vive l’amour</i>!<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_138" id="Page_138">[138]</a></span></div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0"><i>Faites mes baisemains respectueuse</i>,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To sentimental sister Susie,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ honest Lucky; no to roose you,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Ye may be proud,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That sic a couple fate allows ye<br /></span> +<span class="i8">To grace your blood.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Nae mair at present can I measure,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ trowth my rhymin’ ware’s nae treasure;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But when in Ayr, some half-hour’s leisure,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Be’t light, be’t dark,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sir Bard will do himself the pleasure<br /></span> +<span class="i8">To call at Park.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="sig1"><span class="smcap">Robert Burns</span>.</p> + +<p class="blockquot"><i>Mossgiel, 30th October</i>, 1786.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="LXXI" id="LXXI"></a>LXXI.</h2> + +<h3>THE BRIGS OF AYR,</h3> +<h4>A POEM,</h4> +<h5>INSCRIBED TO J. BALLANTYNE, ESQ., AYR.</h5> +<p>[Burns took the hint of this Poem from the Planestanes and Causeway of +Fergusson, but all that lends it life and feeling belongs to his own +heart and his native Ayr: he wrote it for the second edition of his +poems, and in compliment to the patrons of his genius in the west. +Ballantyne, to whom the Poem is inscribed, was generous when the +distresses of his farming speculations pressed upon him: others of his +friends figure in the scene: Montgomery’s courage, the learning of +Dugald Stewart, and condescension and kindness of Mrs. General +Stewart, of Stair, are gratefully recorded.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The simple Bard, rough at the rustic plough,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Learning his tuneful trade from ev’ry bough;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The chanting linnet, or the mellow thrush,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Hailing the setting sun, sweet, in the green thorn bush:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The soaring lark, the perching red-breast shrill,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or deep-ton’d plovers, gray, wild-whistling o’er the hill;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Shall he, nurst in the peasant’s lowly shed,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To hardy independence bravely bred,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">By early poverty to hardship steel’d,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And train’d to arms in stern misfortune’s field—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Shall he be guilty of their hireling crimes,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The servile, mercenary Swiss of rhymes?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or labour hard the panegyric close,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With all the venal soul of dedicating prose?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">No! though his artless strains he rudely sings,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And throws his hand uncouthly o’er the strings,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He glows with all the spirit of the Bard,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Fame, honest fame, his great, his dear reward!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Still, if some patron’s gen’rous care he trace,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Skill’d in the secret to bestow with grace;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When Ballantyne befriends his humble name,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And hands the rustic stranger up to fame,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With heart-felt throes his grateful bosom swells,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The godlike bliss, to give, alone excels.<br /></span> +</div></div> +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">’Twas when the stacks get on their winter hap,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And thack and rape secure the toil-won crap;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Potato-bings are snugged up frae skaith<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of coming Winter’s biting, frosty breath;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The bees, rejoicing o’er their summer toils,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Unnumber’d buds, an’ flow’rs delicious spoils,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Seal’d up with frugal care in massive waxen piles,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Are doom’d by man, that tyrant o’er the weak,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The death o’ devils smoor’d wi’ brimstone reek<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The thundering guns are heard on ev’ry side,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The wounded coveys, reeling, scatter wide;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The feather’d field-mates, bound by Nature’s tie,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sires, mothers, children, in one carnage lie:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">(What warm, poetic heart, but inly bleeds,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And execrates man’s savage, ruthless deeds!)<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Nae mair the flow’r in field or meadow springs;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Nae mair the grove with airy concert rings,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Except, perhaps, the robin’s whistling glee,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Proud o’ the height o’ some bit half-lang tree:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The hoary morns precede the sunny days,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Mild, calm, serene, wide spreads the noontide blaze,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">While thick the gossamer waves wanton in the rays.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">’Twas in that season, when a simple bard,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Unknown and poor, simplicity’s reward,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ae night, within the ancient brugh of Ayr,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">By whim inspired, or haply prest wi’ care,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He left his bed, and took his wayward rout,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And down by Simpson’s<a name="FNanchor_60_60" id="FNanchor_60_60"></a><a href="#Footnote_60_60" class="fnanchor">[60]</a> wheel’d the left about:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">(Whether impell’d by all-directing Fate,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To witness what I after shall narrate;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or whether, rapt in meditation high,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He wander’d out he knew not where nor why)<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The drowsy Dungeon-clock,<a name="FNanchor_61a_61a" id="FNanchor_61a_61a"></a><a href="#Footnote_61_61" class="fnanchor">[61]</a> had number’d two,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And Wallace Tow’r<a name="FNanchor_61_61" id="FNanchor_61_61"></a><a href="#Footnote_61_61" class="fnanchor">[61]</a> had sworn the fact was true:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The tide-swol’n Firth, with sullen sounding roar,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Through the still night dash’d hoarse along the shore.<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_139" id="Page_139">[139]</a></span><span class="i0">All else was hush’d as Nature’s closed e’e:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The silent moon shone high o’er tow’r and tree:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The chilly frost, beneath the silver beam,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Crept, gently-crusting, o’er the glittering stream.—<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> + + +<span class="i0">When, lo! on either hand the list’ning Bard,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The clanging sugh of whistling wings is heard;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Two dusky forms dart thro’ the midnight air,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Swift as the gos<a name="FNanchor_62_62" id="FNanchor_62_62"></a><a href="#Footnote_62_62" class="fnanchor">[62]</a> drives on the wheeling hare;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ane on th’ Auld Brig his airy shape uprears,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The ither flutters o’er the rising piers:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Our warlock Rhymer instantly descry’d<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The Sprites that owre the brigs of Ayr preside.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">(That Bards are second-sighted is nae joke,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And ken the lingo of the sp’ritual folk;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Fays, Spunkies, Kelpies, a’, they can explain them,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And ev’n the vera deils they brawly ken them.)<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Auld Brig appear’d of ancient Pictish race,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The very wrinkles gothic in his face:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He seem’d as he wi’ Time had warstl’d lang,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yet, teughly doure, he bade an unco bang.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">New Brig was buskit in a braw new coat,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That he at Lon’on, frae ane Adams got;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In’s hand five taper staves as smooth’s a bead,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wi’ virls and whirlygigums at the head.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The Goth was stalking round with anxious search,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Spying the time-worn flaws in ev’ry arch;—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">It chanc’d his new-come neebor took his e’e,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And e’en a vex’d and angry heart had he!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wi’ thieveless sneer to see his modish mien,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He, down the water, gies him this guid-e’en:—<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">AULD BRIG.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i2">I doubt na’, frien’, ye’ll think ye’re nae sheep-shank,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ance ye were streekit o’er frae bank to bank!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But gin ye be a brig as auld as me,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Tho’ faith, that day I doubt ye’ll never see;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">There’ll be, if that date come, I’ll wad a boddle,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Some fewer whigmeleeries in your noddle.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">NEW BRIG.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i2">Auld Vandal, ye but show your little mense,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Just much about it wi’ your scanty sense;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Will your poor, narrow foot-path of a street,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where twa wheel-barrows tremble when they meet—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Your ruin’d formless bulk o’ stane en’ lime,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Compare wi’ bonnie Brigs o’ modern time?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">There’s men o’ taste wou’d tak the Ducat-stream,<a name="FNanchor_63_63" id="FNanchor_63_63"></a><a href="#Footnote_63_63" class="fnanchor">[63]</a><br /></span> +<span class="i0">Tho’ they should cast the vera sark and swim,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ere they would grate their feelings wi’ the view<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of sic an ugly, Gothic hulk as you.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">AULD BRIG.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i2">Conceited gowk! puff’d up wi’ windy pride!—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">This mony a year I’ve stood the flood an’ tide;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And tho’ wi’ crazy eild I’m sair forfairn,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I’ll be a Brig, when ye’re a shapeless cairn!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As yet ye little ken about the matter,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But twa-three winters will inform ye better.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When heavy, dark, continued a’-day rains,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wi’ deepening deluges o’erflow the plains;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When from the hills where springs the brawling Coil,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or stately Lugar’s mossy fountains boil,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or where the Greenock winds his moorland course,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or haunted Garpal<a name="FNanchor_64_64" id="FNanchor_64_64"></a><a href="#Footnote_64_64" class="fnanchor">[64]</a> draws his feeble source,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Arous’d by blust’ring winds an’ spotting thowes,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In mony a torrent down the snaw-broo rowes;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">While crashing ice born on the roaring speat,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sweeps dams, an’ mills, an’ brigs, a’ to the gate;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And from Glenbuck,<a name="FNanchor_65_65" id="FNanchor_65_65"></a><a href="#Footnote_65_65" class="fnanchor">[65]</a> down to the Ratton-key,<a name="FNanchor_66_66" id="FNanchor_66_66"></a><a href="#Footnote_66_66" class="fnanchor">[66]</a><br /></span> +<span class="i0">Auld Ayr is just one lengthen’d tumbling sea—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Then down ye’ll hurl, deil nor ye never rise!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And dash the gumlie jaups up to the pouring skies.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A lesson sadly teaching, to your cost,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That Architecture’s noble art is lost!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">NEW BRIG.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i2">Fine Architecture, trowth, I needs must say’t o’t!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The L—d be thankit that we’ve tint the gate o’t!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Gaunt, ghastly, ghaist-alluring edifices,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Hanging with threat’ning jut like precipices;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O’er-arching, mouldy, gloom-inspiring coves,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Supporting roofs fantastic, stony groves;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Windows and doors, in nameless sculpture drest,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With order, symmetry, or taste unblest;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Forms like some bedlam Statuary’s dream,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The craz’d creations of misguided whim;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Forms might be worshipp’d on the bended knee,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And still the second dread command be free,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Their likeness is not found on earth, in air, or sea.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Mansions that would disgrace the building taste<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of any mason reptile, bird or beast;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Fit only for a doited monkish race,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or frosty maids forsworn the dear embrace;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or cuifs of later times wha held the notion<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That sullen gloom was sterling true devotion;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Fancies that our guid Brugh denies protection!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And soon may they expire, unblest with resurrection!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_140" id="Page_140">[140]</a></span></p><p class="std2">AULD BRIG.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i2">O ye, my dear-remember’d ancient yealings,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Were ye but here to share my wounded feelings!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ye worthy Proveses, an’ mony a Bailie,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wha in the paths o’ righteousness did toil ay;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ye dainty Deacons and ye douce Conveeners,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To whom our moderns are but causey-cleaners:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ye godly Councils wha hae blest this town;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ye godly Brethren o’ the sacred gown,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wha meekly gie your hurdies to the smiters;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And (what would now be strange) ye godly writers;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A’ ye douce folk I’ve borne aboon the broo,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Were ye but here, what would ye say or do!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">How would your spirits groan in deep vexation,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To see each melancholy alteration;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And, agonizing, curse the time and place<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When ye begat the base, degen’rate race!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Nae langer rev’rend men, their country’s glory,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In plain braid Scots hold forth a plain braid story!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Nae langer thrifty citizens an’ douce,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Meet owre a pint, or in the council-house;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But staumrel, corky-headed, graceless gentry,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The herryment and ruin of the country;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Men, three parts made by tailors and by barbers,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wha waste your weel-hain’d gear on d—d new Brigs and Harbours!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">NEW BRIG.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i2">Now haud you there! for faith ye’ve said enough,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And muckle mair than ye can mak to through;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As for your Priesthood, I shall say but little,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Corbies and Clergy, are a shot right kittle:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But under favour o’ your langer beard,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Abuse o’ Magistrates might weel be spar’d:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To liken them to your auld-warld squad,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I must needs say, comparisons are odd.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In Ayr, wag-wits nae mair can have a handle<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To mouth ‘a citizen,’ a term o’ scandal;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Nae mair the Council waddles down the street,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In all the pomp of ignorant conceit;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Men wha grew wise priggin’ owre hops an’ raisins,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or gather’d lib’ral views in bonds and seisins,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">If haply Knowledge, on a random tramp,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Had shor’d them with a glimmer of his lamp,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And would to Common-sense for once betray’d them,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Plain, dull Stupidity stept kindly in to aid them<br /></span> +</div></div> +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i2">What farther clishmaclaver might been said,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">What bloody wars, if Spirites had blood to shed,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">No man can tell; but all before their sight,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A fairy train appear’d in order bright:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Adown the glitt’ring stream they featly danc’d;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Bright to the moon their various dresses glanc’d:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">They footed owre the wat’ry glass so neat,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The infant ice scarce bent beneath their feet:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">While arts of minstrelsy among them rung,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And soul-ennobling bards heroic ditties sung.—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O had M’Lauchlan,<a name="FNanchor_67_67" id="FNanchor_67_67"></a><a href="#Footnote_67_67" class="fnanchor">[67]</a> thairm-inspiring Sage,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Been there to hear this heavenly band engage,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When thro’ his dear strathspeys they bore with highland rage;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or when they struck old Scotia’s melting airs,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The lover’s raptur’d joys or bleeding cares;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">How would his highland lug been nobler fir’d,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And ev’n his matchless hand with finer touch inspir’d!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">No guess could tell what instrument appear’d,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But all the soul of Music’s self was heard,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Harmonious concert rung in every part,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">While simple melody pour’d moving on the heart.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i2">The Genius of the stream in front appears,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A venerable Chief advanc’d in years;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">His hoary head with water-lilies crown’d,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">His manly leg with garter tangle bound.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Next came the loveliest pair in all the ring,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sweet Female Beauty hand in hand with Spring;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Then, crown’d with flow’ry hay, came Rural Joy,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And Summer, with his fervid-beaming eye:<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_141" id="Page_141">[141]</a></span><span class="i0">All-cheering Plenty, with her flowing horn,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Led yellow Autumn, wreath’d with nodding corn;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Then Winter’s time-bleach’d looks did hoary show,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">By Hospitality with cloudless brow.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Next follow’d Courage, with his martial stride,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">From where the Feal wild woody coverts hide;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Benevolence, with mild, benignant air,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A female form, came from the tow’rs of Stair:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Learning and Worth in equal measures trode<br /></span> +<span class="i0">From simple Catrine, their long-lov’d abode:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Last, white-rob’d Peace, crown’d with a hazel wreath,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To rustic Agriculture did bequeath<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The broken iron instruments of death;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">At sight of whom our Sprites forgat their kindling wrath.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_60_60" id="Footnote_60_60"></a><a href="#FNanchor_60_60"><span class="label">[60]</span></a> A noted tavern at the auld Brig end.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_61_61" id="Footnote_61_61"></a><a href="#FNanchor_61_61"><span class="label">[61]</span></a> The two steeples.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_62_62" id="Footnote_62_62"></a><a href="#FNanchor_62_62"><span class="label">[62]</span></a> The gos-hawk or falcon.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_63_63" id="Footnote_63_63"></a><a href="#FNanchor_63_63"><span class="label">[63]</span></a> A noted ford, just above the Auld Brig.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_64_64" id="Footnote_64_64"></a><a href="#FNanchor_64_64"><span class="label">[64]</span></a> The banks of Garpal Water is one of the few places in the +West of Scotland, where those fancy-scaring beings, known by the name +of Ghaists, still continue pertinaciously to inhabit.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_65_65" id="Footnote_65_65"></a><a href="#FNanchor_65_65"><span class="label">[65]</span></a> The source of the river Ayr.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_66_66" id="Footnote_66_66"></a><a href="#FNanchor_66_66"><span class="label">[66]</span></a> A small landing-place above the large key.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_67_67" id="Footnote_67_67"></a><a href="#FNanchor_67_67"><span class="label">[67]</span></a> A well known performer of Scottish music on the violin.</p></div> +</div> + + + +<h2><a name="LXXII" id="LXXII"></a>LXXII.</h2> + +<h4>ON</h4> +<h3>THE DEATH OF ROBERT DUNDAS, ESQ.,</h3> +<h4>OF ARNISTON,</h4> +<h5>LATE LORD PRESIDENT OF THE COURT OF SESSION.</h5> +<p>[At the request of Advocate Hay, Burns composed this Poem, in the hope +that it might interest the powerful family of Dundas in his fortunes. +I found it inserted in the handwriting of the poet, in an interleaved +copy of his Poems, which he presented to Dr. Geddes, accompanied by +the following surly note:—“The foregoing Poem has some tolerable +lines in it, but the incurable wound of my pride will not suffer me to +correct, or even peruse it. I sent a copy of it with my best prose +letter to the son of the great man, the theme of the piece, by the +hands of one of the noblest men in God’s world, Alexander Wood, +surgeon: when, behold! his solicitorship took no more notice of my +Poem, or of me, than I had been a strolling fiddler who had made free +with his lady’s name, for a silly new reel. Did the fellow imagine +that I looked for any dirty gratuity?” This Robert Dundas was the +elder brother of that Lord Melville to whose hands, soon after these +lines were written, all the government patronage in Scotland was +confided, and who, when the name of Burns was mentioned, pushed the +wine to Pitt, and said nothing. The poem was first printed by me, in +1834.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Lone on the bleaky hills the straying flocks<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Shun the fierce storms among the sheltering rocks;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Down from the rivulets, red with dashing rains,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The gathering floods burst o’er the distant plains;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Beneath the blasts the leafless forests groan;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The hollow caves return a sullen moan.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Ye hills, ye plains, ye forests and ye caves,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ye howling winds, and wintry swelling waves!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Unheard, unseen, by human ear or eye,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sad to your sympathetic scenes I fly;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where to the whistling blast and waters’ roar<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Pale Scotia’s recent wound I may deplore.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O heavy loss, thy country ill could bear!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A loss these evil days can ne’er repair!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Justice, the high vicegerent of her God,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Her doubtful balance ey’d, and sway’d her rod;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Hearing the tidings of the fatal blow<br /></span> +<span class="i0">She sunk, abandon’d to the wildest woe.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Wrongs, injuries, from many a darksome den,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Now gay in hope explore the paths of men:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">See from this cavern grim Oppression rise,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And throw on poverty his cruel eyes;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Keen on the helpless victim see him fly,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And stifle, dark, the feebly-bursting cry:<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Mark ruffian Violence, distain’d with crimes,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Rousing elate in these degenerate times;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">View unsuspecting Innocence a prey,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As guileful Fraud points out the erring way:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">While subtile Litigation’s pliant tongue<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The life-blood equal sucks of Right and Wrong:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Hark, injur’d Want recounts th’ unlisten’d tale,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And much-wrong’d Mis’ry pours th’ unpitied wail!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Ye dark waste hills, and brown unsightly plains,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To you I sing my grief-inspired strains:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ye tempests, rage! ye turbid torrents, roll!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ye suit the joyless tenor of my soul.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Life’s social haunts and pleasures I resign,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Be nameless wilds and lonely wanderings mine,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To mourn the woes my country must endure,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That wound degenerate ages cannot cure.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="LXXIII" id="LXXIII"></a>LXXIII.</h2> + +<h4>ON READING IN A NEWSPAPER</h4> +<h3>THE DEATH OF JOHN M’LEOD, ESQ.</h3> +<h5>BROTHER TO A YOUNG LADY, A PARTICULAR FRIEND + + OF THE AUTHOR’S.</h5> +<p>[John M’Leod was of the ancient family of Raza, and brother to that +Isabella M’Leod, for whom Burns, in his correspondence, expressed +great regard. The little <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_142" id="Page_142">[142]</a></span>Poem, when first printed, consisted of six +verses: I found a seventh in M’Murdo Manuscripts, the fifth in this +edition, along with an intimation in prose, that the M’Leod family had +endured many unmerited misfortunes. I observe that Sir Harris Nicolas +has rejected this new verse, because, he says, it repeats the same +sentiment as the one which precedes it. I think differently, and have +retained it.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Sad thy tale, thou idle page,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And rueful thy alarms:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Death tears the brother of her love<br /></span> +<span class="i2">From Isabella’s arms.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Sweetly deck’d with pearly dew<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The morning rose may blow;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But cold successive noontide blasts<br /></span> +<span class="i2">May lay its beauties low.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Fair on Isabella’s morn<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The sun propitious smil’d;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But, long ere noon, succeeding clouds<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Succeeding hopes beguil’d.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Fate oft tears the bosom chords<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That nature finest strung:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">So Isabella’s heart was form’d,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And so that heart was wrung.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Were it in the poet’s power,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Strong as he shares the grief<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That pierces Isabella’s heart,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To give that heart relief!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Dread Omnipotence, alone,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Can heal the wound He gave;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Can point the brimful grief-worn eyes<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To scenes beyond the grave.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Virtue’s blossoms there shall blow,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And fear no withering blast;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">There Isabella’s spotless worth<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Shall happy be at last.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="LXXIV" id="LXXIV"></a>LXXIV.</h2> + +<h3>TO MISS LOGAN,</h3> +<h4>WITH BEATTIE’S POEMS FOR A NEW YEAR’S GIFT.</h4> +<h5>JAN. 1, 1787.</h5> +<p>[Burns was fond of writing compliments in books, and giving them in +presents among his fair friends. Miss Logan, of Park house, was sister +to Major Logan, of Camlarg, and the “sentimental sister Susie,” of the +Epistle to her brother. Both these names were early dropped out of the +poet’s correspondence.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Again the silent wheels of time<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Their annual round have driv’n,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And you, tho’ scarce in maiden prime,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Are so much nearer Heav’n.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">No gifts have I from Indian coasts<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The infant year to hail:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I send you more than India boasts<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In Edwin’s simple tale.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Our sex with guile and faithless love<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Is charg’d, perhaps, too true;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But may, dear maid, each lover prove<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An Edwin still to you!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="LXXV" id="LXXV"></a>LXXV.</h2> + +<h3>THE AMERICAN WAR.</h3> +<h5>A FRAGMENT.</h5> +<p>[Dr. Blair said that the politics of Burns smelt of the smithy, which, +interpreted, means, that they were unstatesman-like, and worthy of a +country ale-house, and an audience of peasants. The Poem gives us a +striking picture of the humorous and familiar way in which the hinds +and husbandmen of Scotland handle national topics: the smithy is a +favourite resort, during the winter evenings, of rustic politicians; +and national affairs and parish scandal are alike discussed. Burns was +in those days, and some time after, a vehement Tory: his admiration of +“Chatham’s Boy,” called down on him the dusty indignation of the +republican Ritson.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">When Guildford good our pilot stood,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And did our hellim thraw, man,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ae night, at tea, began a plea,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Within America, man:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Then up they gat the maskin-pat,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And in the sea did jaw, man;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ did nae less in full Congress,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Than quite refuse our law, man.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Then thro’ the lakes Montgomery takes,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I wat he was na slaw, man;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Down Lowrie’s burn he took a turn,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And Carleton did ca’, man;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But yet, what-reck, he, at Quebec,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Montgomery-like did fa’, man,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wi’ sword in hand, before his band,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Amang his en’mies a’, man.<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_143" id="Page_143">[143]</a></span></div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Poor Tammy Gage, within a cage,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Was kept at Boston ha’, man;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Till Willie Howe took o’er the knowe<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For Philadelphia, man;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wi’ sword an’ gun he thought a sin<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Guid Christian blood to draw, man:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But at New York, wi’ knife an’ fork,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Sir-loin he hacked sma’, man.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Burgoyne gaed up, like spur an’ whip,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Till Fraser brave did fa’, man,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Then lost his way, ae misty day,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In Saratoga shaw, man.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Cornwallis fought as lang’s he dought,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’ did the buckskins claw, man;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But Clinton’s glaive frae rust to save,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He hung it to the wa’, man.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">V.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Then Montague, an’ Guilford, too,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Began to fear a fa’, man;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And Sackville dour, wha stood the stoure,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The German Chief to thraw, man;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For Paddy Burke, like ony Turk,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Nae mercy had at a’, man;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ Charlie Fox threw by the box,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’ lows’d his tinkler jaw, man.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">VI.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Then Rockingham took up the game,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Till death did on him ca’, man;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When Shelburne meek held up his cheek,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Conform to gospel law, man;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Saint Stephen’s boys, wi’ jarring noise,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">They did his measures thraw, man,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For North an’ Fox united stocks,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’ bore him to the wa’, man.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">VII.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Then clubs an’ hearts were Charlie’s cartes,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">He swept the stakes awa’, man,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Till the diamond’s ace, of Indian race,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Led him a sair <i>faux pas</i>, man;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The Saxon lads, wi’ loud placads,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">On Chatham’s boy did ca’, man;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ Scotland drew her pipe, an’ blew,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">“Up, Willie, waur them a’, man!”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">VIII.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Behind the throne then Grenville’s gone,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A secret word or twa, man;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">While slee Dundas arous’d the class,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Be-north the Roman wa’, man:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ Chatham’s wraith, in heavenly graith,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">(Inspired Bardies saw, man)<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wi’ kindling eyes cry’d “Willie, rise!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Would I hae fear’d them a’, man?”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IX.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But, word an’ blow, North, Fox, and Co.,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Gowff’d Willie like a ba’, man,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Till Suthron raise, and coost their claise<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Behind him in a raw, man;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ Caledon threw by the drone,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’ did her whittle draw, man;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ swoor fu’ rude, thro’ dirt an’ blood<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To make it guid in law, man.<br /></span> + +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="LXXVI" id="LXXVI"></a>LXXVI.</h2> + +<h3>THE DEAN OF FACULTY.</h3> +<h4>A NEW BALLAD.</h4> +<p>[The Hal and Bob of these satiric lines were Henry Erskine, and Robert +Dundas: and their contention was, as the verses intimate, for the +place of Dean of the Faculty of Advocates: Erskine was successful. It +is supposed that in characterizing Dundas, the poet remembered “the +incurable wound which his pride had got” in the affair of the elegiac +verses on the death of the elder Dundas. The poem first appeared in +the Reliques of Burns.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Dire was the hate at old Harlaw,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That Scot to Scot did carry;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And dire the discord Langside saw,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For beauteous, hapless Mary:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But Scot with Scot ne’er met so hot,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Or were more in fury seen, Sir,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Than ’twixt Hal and Bob for the famous job—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Who should be Faculty’s Dean, Sir.—<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">This Hal for genius, wit, and lore,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Among the first was number’d;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But pious Bob, ‘mid learning’s store,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Commandment tenth remember’d.—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yet simple Bob the victory got,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And won his heart’s desire;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Which shows that heaven can boil the pot,<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_144" id="Page_144">[144]</a></span><span class="i2">Though the devil p—s in the fire.—<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Squire Hal besides had in this case<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Pretensions rather brassy,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For talents to deserve a place<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Are qualifications saucy;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">So, their worships of the Faculty,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Quite sick of merit’s rudeness,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Chose one who should owe it all, d’ye see,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To their gratis grace and goodness.—<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">As once on Pisgah purg’d was the sight<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Of a son of Circumcision,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">So may be, on this Pisgah height,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Bob’s purblind, mental vision:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Nay, Bobby’s mouth may be open’d yet<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Till for eloquence you hail him,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And swear he has the angel met<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That met the Ass of Balaam.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="LXXVII" id="LXXVII"></a>LXXVII.</h2> + +<h3>TO A LADY,</h3> +<h5>WITH A PRESENT OF A PAIR OF DRINKING-GLASSES.</h5> +<p>[To Mrs. M’Lehose, of Edinburgh, the poet presented the +drinking-glasses alluded to in the verses: they are, it seems, still +preserved, and the lady on occasions of high festival, indulges, it is +said, favourite visiters with a draught from them of “The blood of +Shiraz’ scorched vine.”]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Fair Empress of the Poet’s soul,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And Queen of Poetesses;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Clarinda, take this little boon,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">This humble pair of glasses.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">And fill them high with generous juice,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">As generous as your mind;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And pledge me in the generous toast—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">“The whole of human kind!”<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“To those who love us!”—second fill;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But not to those whom we love;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Lest we love those who love not us!—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A third—“to thee and me, love!”<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="LXXVIII" id="LXXVIII"></a>LXXVIII.</h2> + +<h3>TO CLARINDA.</h3> +<p>[This is the lady of the drinking-glasses; the Mrs. Mac of many a +toast among the poet’s acquaintances. She was, in those days, young +and beautiful, and we fear a little giddy, since she indulged in that +sentimental and platonic flirtation with the poet, contained in the +well-known letters to Clarinda. The letters, after the poet’s death, +appeared in print without her permission: she obtained an injunction +against the publication, which still remains in force, but her anger +seems to have been less a matter of taste than of whim, for the +injunction has been allowed to slumber in the case of some editors, +though it has been enforced against others.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Clarinda, mistress of my soul,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The measur’d time is run!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The wretch beneath the dreary pole<br /></span> +<span class="i2">So marks his latest sun.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">To what dark cave of frozen night<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Shall poor Sylvander hie;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Depriv’d of thee, his life and light,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The sun of all his joy.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">We part—but, by these precious drops<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That fill thy lovely eyes!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">No other light shall guide my steps<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Till thy bright beams arise.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">She, the fair sun of all her sex,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Has blest my glorious day;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And shall a glimmering planet fix<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My worship to its ray?<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="LXXIX" id="LXXIX"></a>LXXIX.</h2> + +<h3>VERSES</h3> +<h5>WRITTEN UNDER THE PORTRAIT OF FERGUSSON, THE POET, IN A COPY OF THAT + AUTHOR’S WORKS PRESENTED TO A YOUNG LADY.</h5> +<p>[Who the young lady was to whom the poet presented the portrait and +Poems of the ill-fated Fergusson, we have not been told. The verses +are dated Edinburgh, March 19th, 1787.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Curse on ungrateful man, that can be pleas’d,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And yet can starve the author of the pleasure!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O thou my elder brother in misfortune,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">By far my elder brother in the muses,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With tears I pity thy unhappy fate!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Why is the bard unpitied by the world,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yet has so keen a relish of its pleasures?<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_145" id="Page_145">[145]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="LXXX" id="LXXX"></a>LXXX.</h2> + +<h3>PROLOGUE</h3> +<h4>SPOKEN BY MR. WOODS ON HIS BENEFIT NIGHT,</h4> +<h5>MONDAY, 16 April, 1787.</h5> +<p>[The Woods for whom this Prologue was written, was in those days a +popular actor in Edinburgh. He had other claims on Burns: he had been +the friend as well as comrade of poor Fergusson, and possessed some +poetical talent. He died in Edinburgh, December 14th, 1802.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">When by a generous Public’s kind acclaim,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That dearest meed is granted—honest fame;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When <i>here</i> your favour is the actor’s lot,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Nor even the <i>man</i> in <i>private life</i> forgot;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">What breast so dead to heavenly virtue’s glow,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But heaves impassion’d with the grateful throe?<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Poor is the task to please a barbarous throng,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">It needs no Siddons’ powers in Southerne’s song;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But here an ancient nation fam’d afar,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For genius, learning high, as great in war—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Hail, <span class="smcap">Caledonia</span>, name for ever dear!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Before whose sons I’m honoured to appear!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where every science—every nobler art—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That can inform the mind, or mend the heart,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Is known; as grateful nations oft have found<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Far as the rude barbarian marks the bound.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Philosophy, no idle pedant dream,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Here holds her search by heaven-taught Reason’s beam;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Here History paints, with elegance and force,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The tide of Empires’ fluctuating course;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Here Douglas forms wild Shakspeare into plan,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And Harley<a name="FNanchor_68_68" id="FNanchor_68_68"></a><a href="#Footnote_68_68" class="fnanchor">[68]</a> rouses all the god in man.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When well-form’d taste and sparkling wit unite,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With manly lore, or female beauty bright,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">(Beauty, where faultless symmetry and grace,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Can only charm as in the second place,)<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Witness my heart, how oft with panting fear,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As on this night, I’ve met these judges here!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But still the hope Experience taught to live,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Equal to judge—you’re candid to forgive.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Nor hundred-headed Riot here we meet,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With decency and law beneath his feet:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Nor Insolence assumes fair Freedom’s name;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Like <span class="smcap">Caledonians</span>, you applaud or blame.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O Thou dread Power! whose Empire-giving hand<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Has oft been stretch’d to shield the honour’d land!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Strong may she glow with all her ancient fire:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">May every son be worthy of his sire;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Firm may she rise with generous disdain<br /></span> +<span class="i0">At Tyranny’s, or direr Pleasure’s chain;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Still self-dependent in her native shore,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Bold may she brave grim Danger’s loudest roar,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Till Fate the curtain drop on worlds to be no more.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_68_68" id="Footnote_68_68"></a><a href="#FNanchor_68_68"><span class="label">[68]</span></a> The Man of Feeling, by Mackenzie.</p></div> +</div> + + + +<h2><a name="LXXXI" id="LXXXI"></a>LXXXI.</h2> + +<h3>SKETCH.</h3> +<p>[This Sketch is a portion of a long Poem which Burns proposed to call +“The Poet’s Progress.” He communicated the little he had done, for he +was a courter of opinions, to Dugald Stewart. “The Fragment forms,” +said he, “the postulata, the axioms, the definition of a character, +which, if it appear at all, shall be placed in a variety of lights. +This particular part I send you, merely as a sample of my hand at +portrait-sketching.” It is probable that the professor’s response was +not favourable for we hear no more of the Poem.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">A little, upright, pert, tart, tripping wight,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And still his precious self his dear delight;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Who loves his own smart shadow in the streets<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Better than e’er the fairest she he meets:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A man of fashion, too, he made his tour,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Learn’d vive la bagatelle, et vive l’amour:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">So travell’d monkeys their grimace improve,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Polish their grin, nay, sigh for ladies’ love.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Much specious lore, but little understood;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Veneering oft outshines the solid wood:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">His solid sense—by inches you must tell.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But mete his cunning by the old Scots ell;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">His meddling vanity, a busy fiend,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Still making work his selfish craft must mend.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="LXXXII" id="LXXXII"></a>LXXXII.</h2> + +<h3>TO MRS. SCOTT,</h3> +<h4>OF WAUCHOPE.</h4> +<p>[The lady to whom this epistle is addressed was a painter and a +poetess: her pencil sketches are said to have been beautiful; and she +had a ready skill in rhyme, as the verses addressed to Burns fully +testify. Taste and poetry belonged to her family; she was the niece of +Mrs. Cockburn, authoress of a beautiful variation of The Flowers of +the Forest.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I mind it weel in early date,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When I was beardless, young and blate,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’ first could thresh the barn;<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_146" id="Page_146">[146]</a></span><span class="i0">Or hand a yokin at the pleugh;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ tho’ forfoughten sair enough,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Yet unco proud to learn:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When first amang the yellow corn<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A man I reckon’d was,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ wi’ the lave ilk merry morn<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Could rank my rig and lass,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Still shearing, and clearing,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">The tither stooked raw,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Wi’ claivers, an’ haivers,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Wearing the day awa.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">E’en then, a wish, I mind its pow’r,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A wish that to my latest hour<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Shall strongly heave my breast,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That I for poor auld Scotland’s sake<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Some usefu’ plan or beuk could make,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Or sing a sang at least.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The rough burr-thistle, spreading wide<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Amang the bearded bear,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I turn’d the weeder-clips aside,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’ spar’d the symbol dear:<br /></span> +<span class="i4">No nation, no station,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">My envy e’er could raise,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">A Scot still, but blot still,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">I knew nae higher praise.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But still the elements o’ sang<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In formless jumble, right an’ wrang,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Wild floated in my brain;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">’Till on that har’st I said before,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My partner in the merry core,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">She rous’d the forming strain:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I see her yet, the sonsie quean,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That lighted up her jingle,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Her witching smile, her pauky een<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That gart my heart-strings tingle:<br /></span> +<span class="i4">I fired, inspired,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">At every kindling keek,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">But bashing and dashing<br /></span> +<span class="i6">I feared aye to speak.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Health to the sex, ilk guid chiel says,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wi’ merry dance in winter days,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’ we to share in common:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The gust o’ joy, the balm of woe,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The saul o’ life, the heaven below,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Is rapture-giving woman.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ye surly sumphs, who hate the name,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Be mindfu’ o’ your mither:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">She, honest woman, may think shame<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That ye’re connected with her.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Ye’re wae men, ye’re nae men<br /></span> +<span class="i6">That slight the lovely dears;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">To shame ye, disclaim ye,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Ilk honest birkie swears.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">For you, no bred to barn and byre,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wha sweetly tune the Scottish lyre,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Thanks to you for your line:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The marled plaid ye kindly spare,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">By me should gratefully be ware;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">’Twad please me to the nine.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I’d be mair vauntie o’ my hap,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Douce hingin’ owre my curple<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Than ony ermine ever lap,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Or proud imperial purple.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Fareweel then, lang heel then,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">An’ plenty be your fa’;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">May losses and crosses<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Ne’er at your hallan ca’.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="LXXXIII" id="LXXXIII"></a>LXXXIII.</h2> + +<h3>EPISTLE TO WILLIAM CREECH.</h3> +<p>[A storm of rain detained Burns one day, during his border tour, at +Selkirk, and he employed his time in writing this characteristic +epistle to Creech, his bookseller. Creech was a person of education +and taste; he was not only the most popular publisher in the north, +but he was intimate with almost all the distinguished men who, in +those days, adorned Scottish literature. But though a joyous man, a +lover of sociality, and the keeper of a good table, he was close and +parsimonious, and loved to hold money to the last moment that the law +allowed.]</p> + +<p class="sig1"><i>Selkirk</i>, 13 <i>May</i>, 1787.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Auld chukie Reekie’s<a name="FNanchor_69_69" id="FNanchor_69_69"></a><a href="#Footnote_69_69" class="fnanchor">[69]</a> sair distrest,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Down droops her ance weel-burnisht crest,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Nae joy her bonnie buskit nest<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Can yield ava,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Her darling bird that she lo’es best,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Willie’s awa!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O Willie was a witty wight,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And had o’ things an unco slight;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Auld Reekie ay he keepit tight,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">An’ trig an’ braw:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But now they’ll busk her like a fright,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Willie’s awa!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The stiffest o’ them a’ he bow’d;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The bauldest o’ them a’ he cow’d;<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_147" id="Page_147">[147]</a></span><span class="i0">They durst nae mair than he allow’d,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">That was a law;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">We’ve lost a birkie weel worth gowd,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Willie’s awa!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> + +<span class="i0">Now gawkies, tawpies, gowks, and fools,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Frae colleges and boarding-schools,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">May sprout like simmer puddock stools<br /></span> +<span class="i8">In glen or shaw;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He wha could brush them down to mools,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Willie’s awa!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The brethren o’ the Commerce-Chaumer<a name="FNanchor_70_70" id="FNanchor_70_70"></a><a href="#Footnote_70_70" class="fnanchor">[70]</a><br /></span> +<span class="i0">May mourn their loss wi’ doofu’ clamour;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He was a dictionar and grammar<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Amang them a’;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I fear they’ll now mak mony a stammer,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Willie’s awa!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Nae mair we see his levee door<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Philosophers and poets pour,<a name="FNanchor_71_71" id="FNanchor_71_71"></a><a href="#Footnote_71_71" class="fnanchor">[71]</a><br /></span> +<span class="i0">And toothy critics by the score<br /></span> +<span class="i8">In bloody raw!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The adjutant o’ a’ the core,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Willie’s awa!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Now worthy Gregory’s Latin face,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Tytler’s and Greenfield’s modest grace;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Mackenzie, Stewart, sic a brace<br /></span> +<span class="i8">As Rome n’er saw;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">They a’ maun meet some ither place,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Willie’s awa!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Poor Burns—e’en Scotch drink canna quicken,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He cheeps like some bewilder’d chicken,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Scar’d frae its minnie and the cleckin<br /></span> +<span class="i8">By hoodie-craw;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Grief’s gien his heart an unco kickin’,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Willie’s awa!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Now ev’ry sour-mou’d girnin’ blellum,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And Calvin’s fock are fit to fell him;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And self-conceited critic skellum<br /></span> +<span class="i8">His quill may draw;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He wha could brawlie ward their bellum,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Willie’s awa!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Up wimpling stately Tweed I’ve sped,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And Eden scenes on crystal Jed,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And Ettrick banks now roaring red,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">While tempests blaw;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But every joy and pleasure’s fled,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Willie’s awa!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">May I be slander’s common speech;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A text for infamy to preach;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And lastly, streekit out to bleach<br /></span> +<span class="i8">In winter snaw;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When I forget thee! Willie Creech,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Tho’ far awa!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">May never wicked fortune touzle him!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">May never wicked man bamboozle him!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Until a pow as auld’s Methusalem<br /></span> +<span class="i8">He canty claw!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Then to the blessed New Jerusalem,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Fleet wing awa!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_69_69" id="Footnote_69_69"></a><a href="#FNanchor_69_69"><span class="label">[69]</span></a> Edinburgh.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_70_70" id="Footnote_70_70"></a><a href="#FNanchor_70_70"><span class="label">[70]</span></a> The Chamber of Commerce in Edinburgh, of which Creech was +Secretary.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_71_71" id="Footnote_71_71"></a><a href="#FNanchor_71_71"><span class="label">[71]</span></a> Many literary gentlemen were accustomed to meet at Mr. +Creech’s house at breakfast.</p></div> +</div> + + + +<h2><a name="LXXXIV" id="LXXXIV"></a>LXXXIV.</h2> + +<h5>THE</h5> +<h3>HUMBLE PETITION OF BRUAR WATER</h3> +<h5>TO THE</h5> +<h4>NOBLE DUKE OF ATHOLE.</h4> +<p>[The Falls of Bruar in Athole are exceedingly beautiful and +picturesque; and their effect, when Burns visited them, was much +impaired by want of shrubs and trees. This was in 1787: the poet, +accompanied by his future biographer, Professor Walker, went, when +close on twilight, to this romantic scene: “he threw himself,” said +the Professor, “on a heathy seat, and gave himself up to a tender, +abstracted, and voluptuous enthusiasm of imagination. In a few days I +received a letter from Inverness, for the poet had gone on his way, +with the Petition enclosed.” His Grace of Athole obeyed the +injunction: the picturesque points are now crowned with thriving +woods, and the beauty of the Falls is much increased.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">My Lord, I know your noble ear<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Woe ne’er assails in vain;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Embolden’d thus, I beg you’ll hear<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Your humble slave complain,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">How saucy Phœbus’ scorching beams<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In flaming summer-pride,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Dry-withering, waste my foamy streams,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And drink my crystal tide.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The lightly-jumpin’ glowrin’ trouts,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That thro’ my waters play,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">If, in their random, wanton spouts,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">They near the margin stray;<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_148" id="Page_148">[148]</a></span><span class="i0">If, hapless chance! they linger lang,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I’m scorching up so shallow,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">They’re left the whitening stanes amang,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In gasping death to wallow.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Last day I grat wi’ spite and teen,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">As Poet Burns came by,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That to a bard I should be seen<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Wi’ half my channel dry:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A panegyric rhyme, I ween,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Even as I was he shor’d me;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But had I in my glory been,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">He, kneeling, wad ador’d me.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Here, foaming down the shelvy rocks,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In twisting strength I rin;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">There, high my boiling torrent smokes,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Wild-roaring o’er a linn:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Enjoying large each spring and well,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">As Nature gave them me,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I am, altho’ I say’t mysel’,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Worth gaun a mile to see.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">V.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Would then my noble master please<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To grant my highest wishes,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He’ll shade my banks wi’ tow’ring trees,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And bonnie spreading bushes.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Delighted doubly then, my Lord,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">You’ll wander on my banks,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And listen mony a grateful bird<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Return you tuneful thanks.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">VI.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The sober laverock, warbling wild,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Shall to the skies aspire;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The gowdspink, music’s gayest child,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Shall sweetly join the choir:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The blackbird strong, the lintwhite clear,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The mavis mild and mellow;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The robin pensive autumn cheer,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In all her locks of yellow.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">VII.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">This, too, a covert shall insure<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To shield them from the storm;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And coward maukin sleep secure,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Low in her grassy form:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Here shall the shepherd make his seat,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To weave his crown of flow’rs;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or find a shelt’ring safe retreat<br /></span> +<span class="i2">From prone-descending show’rs.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">VIII.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">And here, by sweet, endearing stealth,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Shall meet the loving pair,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Despising worlds with all their wealth<br /></span> +<span class="i2">As empty idle care.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The flow’rs shall vie in all their charms<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The hour of heav’n to grace,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And birks extend their fragrant arms<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To screen the dear embrace.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IX.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Here haply too, at vernal dawn,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Some musing bard may stray,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And eye the smoking, dewy lawn,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And misty mountain gray;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or, by the reaper’s nightly beam,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Mild-chequering thro’ the trees,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Rave to my darkly-dashing stream,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Hoarse-swelling on the breeze.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">X.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Let lofty firs, and ashes cool,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My lowly banks o’erspread,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And view, deep-bending in the pool,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Their shadows’ wat’ry bed!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Let fragrant birks in woodbines drest<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My craggy cliffs adorn;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And, for the little songster’s nest,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The close embow’ring thorn.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">XI.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">So may old Scotia’s darling hope,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Your little angel band,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Spring, like their fathers, up to prop<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Their honour’d native land!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">So may thro’ Albion’s farthest ken,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To social-flowing glasses,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The grace be—“Athole’s honest men,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And Athole’s bonnie lasses?”<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="LXXXV" id="LXXXV"></a>LXXXV.</h2> + +<h3>ON SCARING SOME WATER-FOWL</h3> +<h5>IN LOCH-TURIT.</h5> +<p>[When Burns wrote these touching lines, he was staying with Sir +William Murray, of Ochtertyre, during one of his Highland tours. +Loch-Turit is a wild lake among the recesses of the hills, and was +welcome from its loneliness to the heart of the poet.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Why, ye tenants of the lake,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For me your wat’ry haunt forsake?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Tell me, fellow-creatures, why<br /></span> +<span class="i0">At my presence thus you fly?<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_149" id="Page_149">[149]</a></span></div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Why disturb your social joys,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Parent, filial, kindred ties?—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Common friend to you and me,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Nature’s gifts to all are free:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Peaceful keep your dimpling wave,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Busy feed, or wanton lave:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or, beneath the sheltering rock,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Bide the surging billow’s shock.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Conscious, blushing for our race,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Soon, too soon, your fears I trace.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Man, your proud usurping foe,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Would be lord of all below:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Plumes himself in Freedom’s pride,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Tyrant stern to all beside.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The eagle, from the cliffy brow,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Marking you his prey below,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In his breast no pity dwells,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Strong necessity compels:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But man, to whom alone is giv’n<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A ray direct from pitying heav’n,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Glories in his heart humane—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And creatures for his pleasure slain.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">In these savage, liquid plains,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Only known to wand’ring swains,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where the mossy riv’let strays,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Far from human haunts and ways;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">All on Nature you depend,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And life’s poor season peaceful spend.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Or, if man’s superior might<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Dare invade your native right,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">On the lofty ether borne,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Man with all his pow’rs you scorn;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Swiftly seek, on clanging wings,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Other lakes and other springs;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And the foe you cannot brave,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Scorn at least to be his slave.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="LXXXVI" id="LXXXVI"></a>LXXXVI.</h2> + +<h3>WRITTEN WITH A PENCIL,</h3> +<h5>OVER THE CHIMNEY-PIECE, IN THE PARLOUR OF THE + + + INN AT KENMORE, TAYMOUTH.</h5> +<p>[The castle of Taymouth is the residence of the Earl of Breadalbane: +it is a magnificent structure, contains many fine paintings: has some +splendid old trees and romantic scenery.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Admiring Nature in her wildest grace,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">These northern scenes with weary feet I trace;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O’er many a winding dale and painful steep,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Th’ abodes of covey’d grouse and timid sheep,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My savage journey, curious I pursue,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">’Till fam’d Breadalbane opens to my view.—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The meeting cliffs each deep-sunk glen divides,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The woods, wild scatter’d, clothe their ample sides;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Th’ outstretching lake, embosom’d ‘mong the hills,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The eye with wonder and amazement fills;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The Tay, meand’ring sweet in infant pride,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The palace, rising on its verdant side;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The lawns, wood-fring’d in Nature’s native taste;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The hillocks, dropt in Nature’s careless haste;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The arches, striding o’er the new-born stream;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The village, glittering in the noontide beam—<br /></span> +</div></div> +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Poetic ardours in my bosom swell,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Lone wand’ring by the hermit’s mossy cell:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The sweeping theatre of hanging woods;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Th’ incessant roar of headlong tumbling floods—<br /></span> +</div></div> +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Here Poesy might wake her heav’n-taught lyre,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And look through Nature with creative fire;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Here, to the wrongs of fate half reconcil’d,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Misfortune’s lighten’d steps might wander wild;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And Disappointment, in these lonely bounds,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Find balm to soothe her bitter—rankling wounds:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Here heart-struck Grief might heav’nward stretch her scan,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And injur’d Worth forget and pardon man.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="LXXXVII" id="LXXXVII"></a>LXXXVII.</h2> + +<h4>WRITTEN WITH A PENCIL,</h4> +<h3>STANDING BY THE FALL OF FYERS,</h3> +<h5>NEAR LOCH-NESS</h5> +<p>[This is one of the many fine scenes, in the Celtic Parnassus of +Ossian: but when Burns saw it, the Highland passion of the stream was +abated, for there had been no rain for some time to swell and send it +pouring down its precipices in a way worthy of the scene. The descent +of the water is about two hundred feet. There is another fall further +up the stream, very wild and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_150" id="Page_150">[150]</a></span> savage, on which the Fyers makes three +prodigious leaps into a deep gulf where nothing can be seen for the +whirling foam and agitated mist.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Among the heathy hills and ragged woods<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The roaring Fyers pours his mossy floods;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Till full he dashes on the rocky mounds,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where, thro’ a shapeless breach, his stream resounds,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As high in air the bursting torrents flow,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As deep-recoiling surges foam below,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Prone down the rock the whitening sheet descends,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And viewless Echo’s ear, astonish’d, rends.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Dim seen, through rising mists and ceaseless show’rs,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The hoary cavern, wide surrounding, low’rs.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Still thro’ the gap the struggling river toils,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And still below, the horrid cauldron boils—<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="LXXXVIII" id="LXXXVIII"></a>LXXXVIII.</h2> + +<h4>POETICAL ADDRESS</h4> +<h3>TO MR. W. TYTLER,</h3> +<h5>WITH THE PRESENT OF THE BARD’S PICTURE.</h5> +<p>[When these verses were written there was much stately Jacobitism +about Edinburgh, and it is likely that Tytler, who laboured to dispel +the cloud of calumny which hung over the memory of Queen Mary, had a +bearing that way. Taste and talent have now descended in the Tytlers +through three generations: an uncommon event in families. The present +edition of the Poem has been completed from the original in the poet’s +handwriting.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Revered defender of beauteous Stuart,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Of Stuart, a name once respected,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A name, which to love, was once mark of a true heart,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But now ’tis despis’d and neglected.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Tho’ something like moisture conglobes in my eye,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Let no one misdeem me disloyal;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A poor friendless wand’rer may well claim a sigh,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Still more, if that wand’rer were royal.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">My fathers that name have rever’d on a throne,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My fathers have fallen to right it;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Those fathers would spurn their degenerate son,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That name should he scoffingly slight it.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Still in prayers for King George I most heartily join,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The Queen and the rest of the gentry,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Be they wise, be they foolish, is nothing of mine;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Their title’s avow’d by my country.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But why of that epocha make such a fuss,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That gave us th’ Electoral stem?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">If bringing them over was lucky for us,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I’m sure ’twas as lucky for them.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But loyalty truce! we’re on dangerous ground,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Who knows how the fashions may alter?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The doctrine, to-day, that is loyalty sound,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To-morrow may bring us a halter.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I send you a trifle, the head of a bard,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A trifle scarce worthy your care;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But accept it, good Sir, as a mark of regard,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Sincere as a saint’s dying prayer.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Now life’s chilly evening dim shades on your eye,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And ushers the long dreary night;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But you, like the star that athwart gilds the sky,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Your course to the latest is bright.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="LXXXIX" id="LXXXIX"></a>LXXXIX.</h2> + +<h4>WRITTEN IN</h4> +<h3>FRIARS-CARSE HERMITAGE,</h3> +<h4>ON THE BANKS OF NITH.</h4> +<h5>JUNE. 1788.</h5> +<p class="std1">[FIRST COPY.]</p> + +<p>[The interleaved volume presented by Burns to Dr. Geddes, has enabled +me to present the reader with the rough draught of this truly +beautiful Poem, the first-fruits perhaps of his intercourse with the +muses of Nithside.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Thou whom chance may hither lead,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Be thou clad in russet weed,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Be thou deck’d in silken stole,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Grave these maxims on thy soul.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Life is but a day at most,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sprung from night, in darkness lost;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Day, how rapid in its flight—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Day, how few must see the night;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Hope not sunshine every hour,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Fear not clouds will always lower.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Happiness is but a name,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Make content and ease thy aim.<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_151" id="Page_151">[151]</a></span></div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Ambition is a meteor gleam;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Fame, a restless idle dream:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Pleasures, insects on the wing<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Round Peace, the tenderest flower of Spring;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Those that sip the dew alone,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Make the butterflies thy own;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Those that would the bloom devour,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Crush the locusts—save the flower.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For the future be prepar’d,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Guard wherever thou canst guard;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But, thy utmost duly done,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Welcome what thou canst not shun.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Follies past, give thou to air,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Make their consequence thy care:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Keep the name of man in mind,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And dishonour not thy kind.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Reverence with lowly heart<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Him whose wondrous work thou art;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Keep His goodness still in view,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thy trust—and thy example, too.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Stranger, go! Heaven be thy guide!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Quod the Beadsman on Nithside.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="XC" id="XC"></a>XC.</h2> + +<h4>WRITTEN IN</h4> +<h3>FRIARS-CARSE HERMITAGE,</h3> +<h4>ON NITHSIDE.</h4> +<h5>DECEMBER, 1788.</h5> +<p>[Of this Poem Burns thought so well that he gave away many copies in +his own handwriting: I have seen three. When corrected to his mind, +and the manuscripts showed many changes and corrections, he published +it in the new edition of his Poems as it stands in this second copy. +The little Hermitage where these lines were written, stood in a lonely +plantation belonging to the estate of Friars-Carse, and close to the +march-dyke of Ellisland; a small door in the fence, of which the poet +had the key, admitted him at pleasure, and there he found seclusion +such as he liked, with flowers and shrubs all around him. The first +twelve lines of the Poem were engraved neatly on one of the +window-panes, by the diamond pencil of the Bard. On Riddel’s death, +the Hermitage was allowed to go quietly to decay: I remember in 1803 +turning two outlyer stots out of the interior.]</p> + + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Thou whom chance may hither lead,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Be thou clad in russet weed,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Be thou deck’d in silken stole,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Grave these counsels on thy soul.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Life is but a day at most,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sprung from night, in darkness lost;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Hope not sunshine ev’ry hour.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Fear not clouds will always lour.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As Youth and Love with sprightly dance<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Beneath thy morning star advance,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Pleasure with her siren air<br /></span> +<span class="i0">May delude the thoughtless pair:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Let Prudence bless enjoyment’s cup,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Then raptur’d sip, and sip it up.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">As thy day grows warm and high,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Life’s meridian flaming nigh,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Dost thou spurn the humble vale?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Life’s proud summits would’st thou scale?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Check thy climbing step, elate,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Evils lurk in felon wait:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Dangers, eagle-pinion’d, bold,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Soar around each cliffy hold,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">While cheerful peace, with linnet song,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Chants the lowly dells among.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">As the shades of ev’ning close,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Beck’ning thee to long repose;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As life itself becomes disease,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Seek the chimney-nook of ease.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">There ruminate, with sober thought,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">On all thou’st seen, and heard, and wrought;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And teach the sportive younkers round,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Saws of experience, sage and sound.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Say, man’s true genuine estimate,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The grand criterion of his fate,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Is not—Art thou high or low?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Did thy fortune ebb or flow?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wast thou cottager or king?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Peer or peasant?—no such thing!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Did many talents gild thy span?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or frugal nature grudge thee one?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Tell them, and press it on their mind,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As thou thyself must shortly find,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The smile or frown of awful Heav’n,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To virtue or to vice is giv’n.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Say, to be just, and kind, and wise,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">There solid self-enjoyment lies;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That foolish, selfish, faithless ways<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Lead to the wretched, vile, and base.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Thus, resign’d and quiet, creep<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To the bed of lasting sleep;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sleep, whence thou shalt ne’er awake,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Night, where dawn shall never break,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Till future life, future no more,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To light and joy the good restore,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To light and joy unknown before.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Stranger, go! Hea’vn be thy guide!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Quod the beadsman of Nithside.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_152" id="Page_152">[152]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="XCI" id="XCI"></a>XCI.</h2> + +<h3>TO CAPTAIN RIDDEL,</h3> +<h4>OF GLENRIDDEL.</h4> +<h5>EXTEMPORE LINES ON RETURNING A NEWSPAPER.</h5> +<p>[Captain Riddel, the Laird of Friars-Carse, was Burns’s neighbour, at +Ellisland: he was a kind, hospitable man, and a good antiquary. The +“News and Review” which he sent to the poet contained, I have heard, +some sharp strictures on his works: Burns, with his usual strong +sense, set the proper value upon all contemporary criticism; genius, +he knew, had nothing to fear from the folly or the malice of all such +nameless “chippers and hewers.” He demanded trial by his peers, and +where were such to be found?]</p> + +<p class="sig1"><i>Ellisland, Monday Evening.</i></p> + + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Your news and review, Sir, I’ve read through and through, Sir,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">With little admiring or blaming;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The papers are barren of home-news or foreign,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">No murders or rapes worth the naming.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Our friends, the reviewers, those chippers and hewers,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Are judges of mortar and stone, Sir,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But of <i>meet</i> or <i>unmeet</i> in a <i>fabric complete</i>,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I’ll boldly pronounce they are none, Sir.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">My goose-quill too rude is to tell all your goodness<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Bestow’d on your servant, the Poet;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Would to God I had one like a beam of the sun,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And then all the world, Sir, should know it!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="XCII" id="XCII"></a>XCII.</h2> + +<h3>A MOTHER’S LAMENT</h3> +<h5>FOR THE DEATH OF HER SON.</h5> +<p>[“The Mother’s Lament,” says the poet, in a copy of the verses now +before me, “was composed partly with a view to Mrs. Fergusson of +Craigdarroch, and partly to the worthy patroness of my early unknown +muse, Mrs. Stewart, of Afton.”]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Fate gave the word, the arrow sped,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And pierc’d my darling’s heart;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And with him all the joys are fled<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Life can to me impart.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">By cruel hands the sapling drops,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In dust dishonour’d laid:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">So fell the pride of all my hopes,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My age’s future shade.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The mother-linnet in the brake<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Bewails her ravish’d young;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">So I, for my lost darling’s sake,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Lament the live day long.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Death, oft I’ve fear’d thy fatal blow,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Now, fond I bare my breast,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O, do thou kindly lay me low<br /></span> +<span class="i2">With him I love, at rest!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="XCIII" id="XCIII"></a>XCIII.</h2> + +<h4>FIRST EPISTLE</h4> +<h3>TO ROBERT GRAHAM, ESQ.</h3> +<h5>OF FINTRAY.</h5> +<p>[In his manuscript copy of this Epistle the poet says “accompanying a +request.” What the request was the letter which enclosed it relates. +Graham was one of the leading men of the Excise in Scotland, and had +promised Burns a situation as exciseman: for this the poet had +qualified himself; and as he began to dread that farming would be +unprofitable, he wrote to remind his patron of his promise, and +requested to be appointed to a division in his own neighbourhood. He +was appointed in due time: his division was extensive, and included +ten parishes.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">When Nature her great master-piece designed,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And fram’d her last, best work, the human mind,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Her eye intent on all the mazy plan,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">She form’d of various parts the various man.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Then first she calls the useful many forth;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Plain plodding industry, and sober worth:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thence peasants, farmers, native sons of earth,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And merchandise’ whole genus take their birth:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Each prudent cit a warm existence finds,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And all mechanics’ many-apron’d kinds.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Some other rarer sorts are wanted yet,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The lead and buoy are needful to the net;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The <i>caput mortuum</i> of gross desires<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Makes a material for mere knights and squires;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The martial phosphorus is taught to flow,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">She kneads the lumpish philosophic dough,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Then marks th’ unyielding mass with grave designs,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Law, physic, politics, and deep divines:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Last, she sublimes th’ Aurora of the poles,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The flashing elements of female souls.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The order’d system fair before her stood,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Nature, well pleas’d, pronounc’d it very good;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But ere she gave creating labour o’er,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Half-jest, she tried one curious labour more.<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_153" id="Page_153">[153]</a></span><span class="i0">Some spumy, fiery, <i>ignis fatuus</i> matter,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Such as the slightest breath of air might scatter;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With arch alacrity and conscious glee<br /></span> +<span class="i0">(Nature may have her whim as well as we,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Her Hogarth-art perhaps she meant to show it)<br /></span> +<span class="i0">She forms the thing, and christens it—a Poet.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Creature, tho’ oft the prey of care and sorrow,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When blest to-day, unmindful of to-morrow.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A being form’d t’amuse his graver friends,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Admir’d and prais’d—and there the homage ends:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A mortal quite unfit for fortune’s strife,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yet oft the sport of all the ills of life;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Prone to enjoy each pleasure riches give,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yet haply wanting wherewithal to live;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Longing to wipe each tear, to heal each groan,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yet frequent all unheeded in his own.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But honest Nature is not quite a Turk,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">She laugh’d at first, then felt for her poor work.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Pitying the propless climber of mankind,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">She cast about a standard tree to find;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And, to support his helpless woodbine state,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Attach’d him to the generous truly great,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A title, and the only one I claim,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To lay strong hold for help on bounteous Graham.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Pity the tuneful muses’ hapless train,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Weak, timid landsmen on life’s stormy main!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Their hearts no selfish stern absorbent stuff,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That never gives—tho’ humbly takes enough;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The little fate allows, they share as soon,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Unlike sage proverb’d wisdom’s hard-wrung boon.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The world were blest did bliss on them depend,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ah, that “the friendly e’er should want a friend!”<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Let prudence number o’er each sturdy son<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Who life and wisdom at one race begun,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Who feel by reason and who give by rule,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">(Instinct’s a brute, and sentiment a fool!)<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Who make poor <i>will do</i> wait upon <i>I should</i>—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">We own they’re prudent, but who feels they’re good?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ye wise ones, hence! ye hurt the social eye!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">God’s image rudely etch’d on base alloy!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But come ye who the godlike pleasure know,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Heaven’s attribute distinguished—to bestow!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Whose arms of love would grasp the human race:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Come thou who giv’st with all a courtier’s grace;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Friend of my life, true patron of my rhymes!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Prop of my dearest hopes for future times.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Why shrinks my soul half blushing, half afraid,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Backward, abash’d to ask thy friendly aid?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I know my need, I know thy giving hand,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I crave thy friendship at thy kind command;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But there are such who court the tuneful nine—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Heavens! should the branded character be mine!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Whose verse in manhood’s pride sublimely flows,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yet vilest reptiles in their begging prose.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Mark, how their lofty independent spirit<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Soars on the spurning wing of injur’d merit!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Seek not the proofs in private life to find;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Pity the best of words should be but wind!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">So to heaven’s gates the lark’s shrill song ascends,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But grovelling on the earth the carol ends.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In all the clam’rous cry of starving want,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">They dun benevolence with shameless front;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Oblige them, patronize their tinsel lays,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">They persecute you all your future days!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ere my poor soul such deep damnation stain,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My horny fist assume the plough again;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The pie-bald jacket let me patch once more;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">On eighteen-pence a week I’ve liv’d before.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Tho’, thanks to Heaven, I dare even that last shift!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I trust, meantime, my boon is in thy gift:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That, plac’d by thee upon the wish’d-for height,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where, man and nature fairer in her sight,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My muse may imp her wing for some sublimer flight.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="XCIV" id="XCIV"></a>XCIV.</h2> + +<h4>ON THE DEATH OF</h4> +<h3>SIR JAMES HUNTER BLAIR.</h3> +<p>[I found these lines written with a pencil in one of Burns’s +memorandum-books: he said he had just composed them, and pencilled +them down lest they should escape from his memory. They differed in +nothing from the printed copy of the first Liverpool edition. That +they are by Burns there cannot be a doubt, though they were, I know +not for what reason, excluded from several editions of the Posthumous +Works of the poet.]</p> + + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The lamp of day, with ill-presaging glare,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Dim, cloudy, sunk beneath the western wave;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Th’ inconstant blast howl’d thro’ the darkening air,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And hollow whistled in the rocky cave.<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_154" id="Page_154">[154]</a></span></div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Lone as I wander’d by each cliff and dell,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Once the lov’d haunts of Scotia’s royal train;<a name="FNanchor_72_72" id="FNanchor_72_72"></a><a href="#Footnote_72_72" class="fnanchor">[72]</a><br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or mus’d where limpid streams once hallow’d well,<a name="FNanchor_73_73" id="FNanchor_73_73"></a><a href="#Footnote_73_73" class="fnanchor">[73]</a><br /></span> +<span class="i2">Or mould’ring ruins mark the sacred fane.<a name="FNanchor_74_74" id="FNanchor_74_74"></a><a href="#Footnote_74_74" class="fnanchor">[74]</a><br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Th’ increasing blast roared round the beetling rocks,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The clouds, swift-wing’d, flew o’er the starry sky,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The groaning trees untimely shed their locks,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And shooting meteors caught the startled eye.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The paly moon rose in the livid east,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And ‘mong the cliffs disclos’d a stately form,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In weeds of woe that frantic beat her breast,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And mix’d her wailings with the raving storm.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Wild to my heart the filial pulses glow,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">’Twas Caledonia’s trophied shield I view’d:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Her form majestic droop’d in pensive woe,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The lightning of her eye in tears imbued.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Revers’d that spear, redoubtable in war,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Reclined that banner, erst in fields unfurl’d,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That like a deathful meteor gleam’d afar,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And brav’d the mighty monarchs of the world.—<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“My patriot son fills an untimely grave!”<br /></span> +<span class="i2">With accents wild and lifted arms—she cried;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">“Low lies the hand that oft was stretch’d to save,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Low lies the heart that swell’d with honest pride.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“A weeping country joins a widow’s tear,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The helpless poor mix with the orphan’s cry;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The drooping arts surround their patron’s bier,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And grateful science heaves the heart-felt sigh!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“I saw my sons resume their ancient fire;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I saw fair freedom’s blossoms richly blow:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But ah! how hope is born but to expire!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Relentless fate has laid their guardian low.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“My patriot falls, but shall he lie unsung,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">While empty greatness saves a worthless name!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">No; every muse shall join her tuneful tongue,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And future ages hear his growing fame.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“And I will join a mother’s tender cares,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Thro’ future times to make his virtues last;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That distant years may boast of other Blairs!”—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">She said, and vanish’d with the sweeping blast.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_72_72" id="Footnote_72_72"></a><a href="#FNanchor_72_72"><span class="label">[72]</span></a> The King’s Park, at Holyrood-house.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_73_73" id="Footnote_73_73"></a><a href="#FNanchor_73_73"><span class="label">[73]</span></a> St. Anthony’s Well.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_74_74" id="Footnote_74_74"></a><a href="#FNanchor_74_74"><span class="label">[74]</span></a> St. Anthony’s Chapel.</p></div> +</div> + + + +<h2><a name="XCV" id="XCV"></a>XCV.</h2> + +<h3>EPISTLE TO HUGH PARKER.</h3> +<p>[This little lively, biting epistle was addressed to one of the poet’s +Kilmarnock companions. Hugh Parker was the brother of William Parker, +one of the subscribers to the Edinburgh edition of Burns’s Poems: he +has been dead many years: the Epistle was recovered, luckily, from his +papers, and printed for the first time in 1834.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">In this strange land, this uncouth clime,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A land unknown to prose or rhyme;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where words ne’er crost the muse’s heckles,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Nor limpet in poetic shackles:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A land that prose did never view it,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Except when drunk he stacher’t thro’ it,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Here, ambush’d by the chimla cheek,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Hid in an atmosphere of reek,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I hear a wheel thrum i’ the neuk,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I hear it—for in vain I leuk.—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The red peat gleams, a fiery kernel,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Enhusked by a fog infernal:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Here, for my wonted rhyming raptures,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I sit and count my sins by chapters;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For life and spunk like ither Christians,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I’m dwindled down to mere existence,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wi’ nae converse but Gallowa’ bodies,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wi’ nae kend face but Jenny Geddes.<a name="FNanchor_75_75" id="FNanchor_75_75"></a><a href="#Footnote_75_75" class="fnanchor">[75]</a><br /></span> +<span class="i0">Jenny, my Pegasean pride!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Dowie she saunters down Nithside,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And ay a westlin leuk she throws,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">While tears hap o’er her auld brown nose!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Was it for this, wi’ canny care,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thou bure the bard through many a shire?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">At howes or hillocks never stumbled,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And late or early never grumbled?—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O had I power like inclination,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I’d heeze thee up a constellation,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To canter with the Sagitarre,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or loup the ecliptic like a bar;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or turn the pole like any arrow;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or, when auld Phœbus bids good-morrow,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Down the zodiac urge the race,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And cast dirt on his godship’s face;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For I could lay my bread and kail<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He’d ne’er cast saut upo’ thy tail.—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wi’ a’ this care and a’ this grief,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And sma,’ sma’ prospect of relief,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And nought but peat reek i’ my head,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">How can I write what ye can read?—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Tarbolton, twenty-fourth o’ June,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ye’ll find me in a better tune;<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_155" id="Page_155">[155]</a></span><span class="i0">But till we meet and weet our whistle,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Tak this excuse for nae epistle.<br /></span> +</div></div> +<p class="sig1">Robert Burns.</p> +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_75_75" id="Footnote_75_75"></a><a href="#FNanchor_75_75"><span class="label">[75]</span></a> His mare.</p></div> +</div> + + + +<h2><a name="XCVI" id="XCVI"></a>XCVI.</h2> + +<h3>LINES</h3> +<h5>INTENDED TO BE WRITTEN UNDER</h5> +<h3>A NOBLE EARL’S PICTURE.</h3> +<p>[Burns placed the portraits of Dr. Blacklock and the Earl of +Glencairn, over his parlour chimney-piece at Ellisland: beneath the +head of the latter he wrote some verses, which he sent to the Earl, +and requested leave to make public. This seems to have been refused; +and, as the verses were lost for years, it was believed they were +destroyed: a rough copy, however, is preserved, and is now in the safe +keeping of the Earl’s name-son, Major James Glencairn Burns. James +Cunningham, Earl of Glencairn, died 20th January, 1791, aged 42 years; +he was succeeded by his only and childless brother, with whom this +ancient race was closed.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Whose is that noble dauntless brow?<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And whose that eye of fire?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And whose that generous princely mien,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">E’en rooted foes admire?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Stranger! to justly show that brow,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And mark that eye of fire,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Would take <i>His</i> hand, whose vernal tints<br /></span> +<span class="i2">His other works inspire.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Bright as a cloudless summer sun,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">With stately port he moves;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">His guardian seraph eyes with awe<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The noble ward he loves—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Among th’ illustrious Scottish sons<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That chief thou may’st discern;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Mark Scotia’s fond returning eye—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">It dwells upon Glencairn.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="XCVII" id="XCVII"></a>XCVII.</h2> + +<h3>ELEGY</h3> +<h4>ON THE YEAR 1788</h4> +<h5>A SKETCH.</h5> +<p>[This Poem was first printed by Stewart, in 1801. The poet loved to +indulge in such sarcastic sallies: it is full of character, and +reflects a distinct image of those yeasty times.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">For Lords or Kings I dinna mourn,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">E’en let them die—for that they’re born,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But oh! prodigious to reflec’!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A Towmont, Sirs, is gane to wreck!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O Eighty-eight, in thy sma’ space<br /></span> +<span class="i0">What dire events ha’e taken place!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of what enjoyments thou hast reft us!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In what a pickle thou hast left us!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The Spanish empire’s tint a-head,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ my auld toothless Bawtie’s dead;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The tulzie’s sair ’tween Pitt and Fox,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And our guid wife’s wee birdie cocks;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The tane is game, a bluidie devil,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But to the hen-birds unco civil:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The tither’s something dour o’ treadin’,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But better stuff ne’er claw’d a midden—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ye ministers, come mount the pu’pit,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ cry till ye be hearse an’ roupet,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For Eighty-eight he wish’d you weel,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ gied you a’ baith gear an’ meal;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">E’en mony a plack, and mony a peck,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ye ken yoursels, for little feck!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Ye bonnie lasses, dight your e’en,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For some o’ you ha’e tint a frien’;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In Eighty-eight, ye ken, was ta’en,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">What ye’ll ne’er ha’e to gie again.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Observe the very nowt an’ sheep,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">How dowf and dowie now they creep;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Nay, even the yirth itsel’ does cry,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For Embro’ wells are grutten dry.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O Eighty-nine, thou’s but a bairn,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ no owre auld, I hope, to learn!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thou beardless boy, I pray tak’ care,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thou now has got thy daddy’s chair,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Nae hand-cuff’d, mizl’d, hap-shackl’d Regent,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But, like himsel’ a full free agent.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Be sure ye follow out the plan<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Nae waur than he did, honest man!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As muckle better as ye can.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="sig1"><i>January 1</i>, 1789.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<p class="center"><img src="images/image_03.jpg" alt=""THE TOOTHACHE."" width="500" height="561" /><br /> +<br /> +<span class="caption">“THE TOOTHACHE.”</span></p> + +<h2><a name="XCVIII" id="XCVIII"></a>XCVIII.</h2> + +<h3>ADDRESS TO THE TOOTHACHE.</h3> +<p>[“I had intended,” says Burns to Creech, 30th May, 1789, “to have +troubled you with a long letter, but at present the delightful +sensation of an omnipotent toothache so engrosses all my inner man, as +to put it out of my power even to write nonsense.” The poetic Address +to the Toothache seems to belong to this period.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">My curse upon thy venom’d stang,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That shoots my tortur’d gums alang;<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_156" id="Page_156">[156]</a></span><span class="i0">And thro’ my lugs gies mony a twang,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Wi’ gnawing vengeance;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Tearing my nerves wi’ bitter pang,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Like racking engines!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">When fevers burn, or ague freezes,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Rheumatics gnaw, or cholic squeezes;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Our neighbours’ sympathy may ease us,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Wi’ pitying moan;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But thee—thou hell o’ a’ diseases,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Ay mocks our groan!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Adown my beard the slavers trickle!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I kick the wee stools o’er the mickle,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As round the fire the giglets keckle,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">To see me loup;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">While, raving mad, I wish a heckle<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Were in their doup.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O’ a’ the num’rous human dools,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ill har’sts, daft bargains, cutty-stools,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or worthy friends rak’d i’ the mools,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Sad sight to see!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The tricks o’ knaves, or fash o’ fools,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Thou bears’t the gree.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Where’er that place be priests ca’ hell,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Whence a’ the tones o’ mis’ry yell,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And ranked plagues their numbers tell,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">In dreadfu’ raw,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thou, Toothache, surely bear’st the bell<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Amang them a’!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O thou grim mischief-making chiel,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That gars the notes of discord squeel,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">’Till daft mankind aft dance a reel<br /></span> +<span class="i8">In gore a shoe-thick!—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Gie’ a’ the faes o’ Scotland’s weal<br /></span> +<span class="i8">A towmond’s Toothache.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="XCIX" id="XCIX"></a>XCIX.</h2> + +<h3>ODE</h3> +<h4>SACRED TO THE MEMORY OF</h4> +<h3>MRS. OSWALD,</h3> +<h5>OF AUCHENCRUIVE.</h5> +<p>[The origin of this harsh effusion shows under what feelings Burns +sometimes wrote. He was, he says, on his way to Ayrshire, one stormy +day in January, and had made himself comfortable, in spite of the +snow-drift, over a smoking bowl, at an inn at the Sanquhar, when in +wheeled the whole funeral pageantry of Mrs. Oswald. He was obliged to +mount his horse and ride for quarters to New Cumnock, where, over a +good fire, he penned, in his very ungallant indignation, the Ode to +the lady’s memory. He lived to think better of the name.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Dweller in yon dungeon dark,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Hangman of creation, mark!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Who in widow-weeds appears,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Laden with unhonoured years,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Noosing with care a bursting purse,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Baited with many a deadly curse?<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">STROPHE.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">View the wither’d beldam’s face—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Can thy keen inspection trace<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Aught of Humanity’s sweet melting grace?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Note that eye, ’tis rheum o’erflows,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Pity’s flood there never rose.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">See these hands, ne’er stretch’d to save,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Hands that took—but never gave.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Keeper of Mammon’s iron chest,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Lo, there she goes, unpitied and unblest<br /></span> +<span class="i0">She goes, but not to realms of everlasting rest!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">ANTISTROPHE.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Plunderer of armies, lift thine eyes,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">(Awhile forbear, ye tort’ring fiends;)<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Seest thou whose step, unwilling hither bends?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">No fallen angel, hurl’d from upper skies;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">’Tis thy trusty quondam mate,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Doom’d to share thy fiery fate,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">She, tardy, hell-ward plies.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">EPODE.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">And are they of no more avail,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ten thousand glitt’ring pounds a-year?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In other worlds can Mammon fail,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Omnipotent as he is here?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O, bitter mock’ry of the pompous bier,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">While down the wretched vital part is driv’n!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The cave-lodg’d beggar, with a conscience clear,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Expires in rags, unknown, and goes to Heav’n.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="C" id="C"></a>C.</h2> + +<h4>FRAGMENT INSCRIBED</h4> +<h3>TO THE RIGHT HON. C.J. FOX.</h3> +<p>[It was late in life before Burns began to think very highly of Fox: +he had hitherto spoken of him rather as a rattler of dice, and a +frequenter of soft company, than as a statesman. As his hopes from the +Tories vanished,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_157" id="Page_157">[157]</a></span> he began to think of the Whigs: the first did +nothing, and the latter held out hopes; and as hope, he said was the +cordial of the human heart, he continued to hope on.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">How wisdom and folly meet, mix, and unite;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">How virtue and vice blend their black and their white;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">How genius, th’ illustrious father of fiction,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Confounds rule and law, reconciles contradiction—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I sing: if these mortals, the critics, should bustle,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I care not, not I—let the critics go whistle!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But now for a patron, whose name and whose glory<br /></span> +<span class="i0">At once may illustrate and honour my story.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Thou first of our orators, first of our wits;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yet whose parts and acquirements seem mere lucky hits;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With knowledge so vast, and with judgment so strong,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">No man with the half of ‘em e’er went far wrong;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With passions so potent, and fancies so bright,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">No man with the half of ‘em e’er went quite right;—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A sorry, poor misbegot son of the muses,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For using thy name offers fifty excuses.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i2">Good L—d, what is man? for as simple he looks,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Do but try to develope his hooks and his crooks;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With his depths and his shallows, his good and his evil,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">All in all he’s a problem must puzzle the devil.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">On his one ruling passion Sir Pope hugely labours,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That, like th’ old Hebrew walking-switch, eats up its neighbours;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Mankind are his show-box—a friend, would you know him?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Pull the string, ruling passion the picture will show him.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">What pity, in rearing so beauteous a system,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">One trifling particular, truth, should have miss’d him;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For spite of his fine theoretic positions,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Mankind is a science defies definitions.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Some sort all our qualities each to its tribe,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And think human nature they truly describe;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Have you found this, or t’other? there’s more in the wind,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As by one drunken fellow his comrades you’ll find.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But such is the flaw, or the depth of the plan,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In the make of that wonderful creature, call’d man,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">No two virtues, whatever relation they claim,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Nor even two different shades of the same,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Though like as was ever twin brother to brother,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Possessing the one shall imply you’ve the other.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But truce with abstraction, and truce with a muse,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Whose rhymes you’ll perhaps, Sir, ne’er deign to peruse:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Will you leave your justings, your jars, and your quarrels,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Contending with Billy for proud-nodding laurels.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My much-honour’d Patron, believe your poor poet,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Your courage much more than your prudence you show it;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In vain with Squire Billy, for laurels you struggle,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He’ll have them by fair trade, if not, he will smuggle;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Not cabinets even of kings would conceal ‘em,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He’d up the back-stairs, and by G—he would steal ‘em.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Then feats like Squire Billy’s you ne’er can achieve ‘em;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">It is not, outdo him, the task is, out-thieve him.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CI" id="CI"></a>CI.</h2> + +<h4>ON SEEING</h4> +<h3>A WOUNDED HARE</h3> +<h4>LIMP BY ME,</h4> +<h5>WHICH A FELLOW HAD JUST SHOT.</h5> +<p>[This Poem is founded on fact. A young man of the name of Thomson told +me—quite unconscious of the existence of the Poem—that while Burns +lived at Ellisland—he shot at and hurt a hare, which in the twilight +was feeding on his father’s wheat-bread. The poet, on observing the +hare come bleeding past him, “was in great wrath,” said Thomson, “and +cursed me, and said little hindered him from throwing me into the +Nith; and he was able enough to do it, though I was both young and +strong.” The boor of Nithside did not use the hare worse than the +critical Dr. Gregory, of Edinburgh, used the Poem: when Burns read his +remarks he said, “Gregory is a good man, but he crucifies me!”]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Inhuman man! curse on thy barb’rous art,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And blasted be thy murder-aiming eye;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">May never pity soothe thee with a sigh,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Nor ever pleasure glad thy cruel heart.<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_158" id="Page_158">[158]</a></span></div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Go live, poor wanderer of the wood and field!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The bitter little that of life remains:<br /></span> +<span class="i2">No more the thickening brakes and verdant plains<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To thee shall home, or food, or pastime yield.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Seek, mangled wretch, some place of wonted rest,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">No more of rest, but now thy dying bed!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The sheltering rushes whistling o’er thy head,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The cold earth with thy bloody bosom prest.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Oft as by winding Nith, I, musing, wait<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The sober eve, or hail the cheerful dawn;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I’ll miss thee sporting o’er the dewy lawn,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And curse the ruffian’s aim, and mourn thy hapless fate.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CII" id="CII"></a>CII.</h2> + +<h3>TO DR. BLACKLOCK,</h3> +<h5>IN ANSWER TO A LETTER.</h5> +<p>[This blind scholar, though an indifferent Poet, was an excellent and +generous man: he was foremost of the Edinburgh literati to admire the +Poems of Burns, promote their fame, and advise that the author, +instead of shipping himself for Jamaica, should come to Edinburgh and +publish a new edition. The poet reverenced the name of Thomas +Blacklock to the last hour of his life.—Henry Mackenzie, the Earl of +Glencairn, and the Blind Bard, were his three favourites.]</p> + + +<p class="sig1"><i>Ellisland, 21st Oct.</i> 1789.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Wow, but your letter made me vauntie!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And are ye hale, and weel, and cantie?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I kenn’d it still your wee bit jauntie<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Wad bring ye to:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Lord send you ay as weel’s I want ye,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">And then ye’ll do.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The ill-thief blaw the heron south!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And never drink be near his drouth!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He tauld mysel’ by word o’ mouth,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">He’d tak my letter:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I lippen’d to the chief in trouth,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">And bade nae better.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But aiblins honest Master Heron,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Had at the time some dainty fair one,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To ware his theologic care on,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">And holy study;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And tir’d o’ sauls to waste his lear on<br /></span> +<span class="i8">E’en tried the body.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But what dy’e think, my trusty fier,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I’m turn’d a gauger—Peace be here!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Parnassian queans, I fear, I fear,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Ye’ll now disdain me!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And then my fifty pounds a year<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Will little gain me.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Ye glaiket, gleesome, dainty damies,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wha, by Castalia’s wimplin’ streamies,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Lowp, sing, and lave your pretty limbies,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Ye ken, ye ken,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That strang necessity supreme is<br /></span> +<span class="i8">‘Mang sons o’ men.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I hae a wife and twa wee laddies,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">They maun hae brose and brats o’ duddies;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ye ken yoursels my heart right proud is—<br /></span> +<span class="i8">I need na vaunt,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But I’ll sned besoms—thraw saugh woodies,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Before they want.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Lord help me thro’ this warld o’ care!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I’m weary sick o’t late and air!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Not but I hae a richer share<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Than mony ithers:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But why should ae man better fare,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">And a’ men brithers?<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Come, firm Resolve, take then the van,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thou stalk o’ carl-hemp in man!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And let us mind, faint-heart ne’er wan<br /></span> +<span class="i8">A lady fair:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wha does the utmost that he can,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Will whyles do mair.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But to conclude my silly rhyme,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">(I’m scant o’ verse, and scant o’ time,)<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To make a happy fire-side clime<br /></span> +<span class="i8">To weans and wife,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That’s the true pathos and sublime<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Of human life.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">My compliments to sister Beckie;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And eke the same to honest Lucky,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I wat she is a dainty chuckie,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">As e’er tread clay!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And gratefully, my guid auld cockie,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">I’m yours for ay,<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="sig1"><span class="smcap">Robert Burns.</span></p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_159" id="Page_159">[159]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="CIII" id="CIII"></a>CIII.</h2> + +<h3>DELIA.</h3> +<h4>AN ODE.</h4> +<p>[These verses were first printed in the Star newspaper, in May, 1789. +It is said that one day a friend read to the poet some verses from the +Star, composed on the pattern of Pope’s song, by a Person of Quality. +“These lines are beyond you,” he added: “the muse of Kyle cannot match +the muse of London.” Burns mused a moment, then recited “Delia, an +Ode.”]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Fair the face of orient day,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Fair the tints of op’ning rose,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But fairer still my Delia dawns,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">More lovely far her beauty blows.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Sweet the lark’s wild-warbled lay,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sweet the tinkling rill to hear;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But, Delia, more delightful still<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Steal thine accents on mine ear.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The flow’r-enamoured busy bee<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The rosy banquet loves to sip;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sweet the streamlet’s limpid lapse<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To the sun-brown’d Arab’s lip;—<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But, Delia, on thy balmy lips<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Let me, no vagrant insect, rove!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O, let me steal one liquid kiss!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For, oh! my soul is parch’d with love.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CIV" id="CIV"></a>CIV.</h2> + +<h3>TO JOHN M’MURDO, ESQ.</h3> +<p>[John M’Murdo, Esq., one of the chamberlains of the Duke of +Queensberry, lived at Drumlanrig: he was a high-minded, warm-hearted +man, and much the friend of the poet. These lines accompanied a +present of books: others were added soon afterwards on a pane of glass +in Drumlanrig castle.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Blest be M’Murdo to his latest day!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">No envious cloud o’ercast his evening ray;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">No wrinkle furrowed by the hand of care,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Nor ever sorrow add one silver hair!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O may no son the father’s honour stain,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Nor ever daughter give the mother pain.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>How fully the poet’s wishes were fulfilled need not be told to any one +acquainted with the family.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O, could I give thee India’s wealth,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">As I this trifle send!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Because thy joy in both would be<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To share them with a friend.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But golden sands did never grace<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The Heliconian stream;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Then take what gold could never buy—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An honest Bard’s esteem.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CV" id="CV"></a>CV.</h2> + +<h3>PROLOGUE,</h3> +<h4>SPOKEN AT THE THEATRE, DUMFRIES,</h4> +<h5>1 JAN. 1790.</h5> +<p>[This prologue was written in December, 1789, for Mr. Sutherland, who +recited it with applause in the little theatre of Dumfries, on +new-year’s night. Sir Harris Nicolas, however, has given to Ellisland +the benefit of a theatre! and to Burns the whole barony of Dalswinton +for a farm!]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">No song nor dance I bring from yon great city<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That queens it o’er our taste—the more’s the pity:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Tho’, by-the-by, abroad why will you roam?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Good sense and taste are natives here at home:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But not for panegyric I appear,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I come to wish you all a good new year!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Old Father Time deputes me here before ye,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Not for to preach, but tell his simple story:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The sage grave ancient cough’d, and bade me say,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">“You’re one year older this important day.”<br /></span> +<span class="i0">If wiser too—he hinted some suggestion,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But ’twould be rude, you know, to ask the question;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And with a would-be roguish leer and wink,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He bade me on you press this one word—“think!”<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i2">Ye sprightly youths, quite flushed with hope and spirit,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Who think to storm the world by dint of merit,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To you the dotard has a deal to say,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In his sly, dry, sententious, proverb way;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He bids you mind, amid your thoughtless rattle,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That the first blow is ever half the battle:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That tho’ some by the skirt may try to snatch him,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yet by the forelock is the hold to catch him;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That whether doing, suffering, or forbearing,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">You may do miracles by persevering.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i2">Last, tho’ not least in love, ye youthful fair,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Angelic forms, high Heaven’s peculiar care!<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_160" id="Page_160">[160]</a></span><span class="i0">To yon old Bald-pate smooths his wrinkled brow,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And humbly begs you’ll mind the important <span class="smcap">now</span>!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To crown your happiness he asks your leave,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And offers bliss to give and to receive.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i2">For our sincere, tho’ haply weak endeavours,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With grateful pride we own your many favours,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And howsoe’er our tongues may ill reveal it,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Believe our glowing bosoms truly feel it.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CVI" id="CVI"></a>CVI.</h2> + +<h3>SCOTS PROLOGUE,</h3> +<h4>FOR MR. SUTHERLAND’S BENEFIT NIGHT,</h4> +<h4>DUMFRIES.</h4> +<p>[Burns did not shine in prologues: he produced some vigorous lines, +but they did not come in harmony from his tongue, like the songs in +which he recorded the loveliness of the dames of Caledonia. Sutherland +was manager of the theatre, and a writer of rhymes.—Burns said his +players were a very decent set: he had seen them an evening or two.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i2">What needs this din about the town o’ Lon’on,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">How this new play an’ that new sang is comin’?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Why is outlandish stuff sae meikle courted?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Does nonsense mend like whiskey, when imported?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Is there nae poet, burning keen for fame,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Will try to gie us songs and plays at hame?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For comedy abroad he need nae toil,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A fool and knave are plants of every soil;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Nor need he hunt as far as Rome and Greece<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To gather matter for a serious piece;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">There’s themes enough in Caledonian story,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Would show the tragic muse in a’ her glory.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Is there no daring bard will rise, and tell<br /></span> +<span class="i0">How glorious Wallace stood, how hapless fell?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where are the muses fled that could produce<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A drama worthy o’ the name o’ Bruce;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">How here, even here, he first unsheath’d the sword,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">‘Gainst mighty England and her guilty lord,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And after mony a bloody, deathless doing,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wrench’d his dear country from the jaws of ruin?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O for a Shakspeare or an Otway scene,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To draw the lovely, hapless Scottish Queen!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Vain all th’ omnipotence of female charms<br /></span> +<span class="i0">‘Gainst headlong, ruthless, mad Rebellion’s arms.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">She fell, but fell with spirit truly Roman,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To glut the vengeance of a rival woman;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A woman—tho’ the phrase may seem uncivil—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As able and as cruel as the Devil!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">One Douglas lives in Home’s immortal page,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But Douglases were heroes every age:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And tho’ your fathers, prodigal of life,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A Douglas follow’d to the martial strife,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Perhaps if bowls row right, and right succeeds,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ye yet may follow where a Douglas leads!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">As ye hae generous done, if a’ the land<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Would take the muses’ servants by the hand;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Not only hear, but patronize, befriend them,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And where ye justly can commend, commend them;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And aiblins when they winna stand the test,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wink hard, and say the folks hae done their best!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Would a’ the land do this, then I’ll be caution<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ye’ll soon hae poets o’ the Scottish nation,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Will gar fame blaw until her trumpet crack,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And warsle time, on’ lay him on his back!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For us and for our stage should ony spier,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">“Whose aught thae chiels maks a’ this bustle here!”<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My best leg foremost, I’ll set up my brow,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">We have the honour to belong to you!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">We’re your ain bairns, e’en guide us as ye like,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But like good withers, shore before ye strike.—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And gratefu’ still I hope ye’ll ever find us,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For a’ the patronage and meikle kindness<br /></span> +<span class="i0">We’ve got frae a’ professions, sets, and ranks:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">God help us! we’re but poor—ye’se get but thanks.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CVII" id="CVII"></a>CVII.</h2> + +<h4>SKETCH.</h4> +<h3>NEW YEAR’S DAY.</h3> +<h4>TO MRS. DUNLOP.</h4> +<p>[This is a picture of the Dunlop family: it was printed from a hasty +sketch, which the poet called extempore. The major whom it mentions, +was General Andrew Dunlop, who died in 1804: Rachel Dunlop was +afterwards married to Robert Glasgow, Esq. Another of the Dunlops +served with distinction in India, where he rose to the rank of +General. They were a gallant race, and all distinguished.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">This day, Time winds th’ exhausted chain,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To run the twelvemonth’s length again:<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_161" id="Page_161">[161]</a></span><span class="i0">I see the old, bald-pated follow,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With ardent eyes, complexion sallow,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Adjust the unimpair’d machine,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To wheel the equal, dull routine.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The absent lover, minor heir,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In vain assail him with their prayer;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Deaf as my friend, he sees them press,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Nor makes the hour one moment less.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Will you (the Major’s with the hounds,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The happy tenants share his rounds;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Coila’s fair Rachel’s care to-day,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And blooming Keith’s engaged with Gray)<br /></span> +<span class="i0">From housewife cares a minute borrow—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That grandchild’s cap will do to-morrow—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And join with me a moralizing,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">This day’s propitious to be wise in.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">First, what did yesternight deliver?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">“Another year is gone for ever.”<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And what is this day’s strong suggestion?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">“The passing moment’s all we rest on!”<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Rest on—for what? what do we here?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or why regard the passing year?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Will time, amus’d with proverb’d lore,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Add to our date one minute more?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A few days more—a few years must—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Repose us in the silent dust.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Then is it wise to damp our bliss?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yes—all such reasonings are amiss!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The voice of nature loudly cries,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And many a message from the skies,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That something in us never dies:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That on this frail, uncertain state,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Hang matters of eternal weight:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That future life in worlds unknown<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Must take its hue from this alone;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Whether as heavenly glory bright,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or dark as misery’s woeful night.—<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Since then, my honour’d, first of friends,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">On this poor being all depends,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Let us th’ important <i>now</i> employ,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And live as those who never die.—<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Tho’ you, with days and honours crown’d,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Witness that filial circle round,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">(A sight, life’s sorrows to repulse,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A sight, pale envy to convulse,)<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Others now claim your chief regard;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yourself, you wait your bright reward.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CVIII" id="CVIII"></a>CVIII.</h2> + +<h3>TO A GENTLEMAN</h3> +<h5>WHO HAD SENT HIM A NEWSPAPER, AND OFFERED TO</h5> +<h5>CONTINUE IT FREE OF EXPENSE.</h5> +<p>[These sarcastic lines contain a too true picture of the times in +which they were written. Though great changes have taken place in +court and camp, yet Austria, Russia, and Prussia keep the tack of +Poland: nobody says a word of Denmark: emasculated Italy is still +singing; opera girls are still dancing; but Chatham Will, glaikit +Charlie, Daddie Burke, Royal George, and Geordie Wales, have all +passed to their account.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Kind Sir, I’ve read your paper through,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And, faith, to me ’twas really new!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">How guess’d ye, Sir, what maist I wanted?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">This mony a day I’ve grain’d and gaunted,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To ken what French mischief was brewin’;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or what the drumlie Dutch were doin’;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That vile doup-skelper, Emperor Joseph,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">If Venus yet had got his nose off;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or how the collieshangie works<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Atween the Russians and the Turks:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or if the Swede, before he halt,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Would play anither Charles the Twalt:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">If Denmark, any body spak o’t;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or Poland, wha had now the tack o’t;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">How cut-throat Prussian blades were hingin’;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">How libbet Italy was singin’;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">If Spaniard, Portuguese, or Swiss<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Were sayin’ or takin’ aught amiss:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or how our merry lads at hame,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In Britain’s court kept up the game:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">How royal George, the Lord leuk o’er him!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Was managing St. Stephen’s quorum;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">If sleekit Chatham Will was livin’;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or glaikit Charlie got his nieve in:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">How daddie Burke the plea was cookin’,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">If Warren Hastings’ neck was yeukin;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">How cesses, stents, and fees were rax’d,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or if bare a—s yet were tax’d;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The news o’ princes, dukes, and earls,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Pimps, sharpers, bawds, and opera girls;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">If that daft buckie, Geordie Wales,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Was threshin’ still at hizzies’ tails;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or if he was grown oughtlins douser,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And no a perfect kintra cooser.—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A’ this and mair I never heard of;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And but for you I might despair’d of.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">So, gratefu’, back your news I send you,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And pray, a’ guid things may attend you!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="sig1"><i>Ellisland, Monday morning</i>, 1790.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_162" id="Page_162">[162]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="CIX" id="CIX"></a>CIX.</h2> + +<h3>THE KIRK’S ALARM;<a name="FNanchor_76_76" id="FNanchor_76_76"></a><a href="#Footnote_76_76" class="fnanchor">[76]</a></h3> +<h5>A SATIRE.</h5> +<p class="std1">[FIRST VERSION.]</p> + +<p>[The history of this Poem is curious. M’Gill, one of the ministers of +Ayr, long suspected of entertaining heterodox opinions concerning +original sin and the Trinity, published “A Practical Essay on the +Death of Jesus Christ,” which, in the opinion of the more rigid +portion of his brethren, inclined both to Arianism and Socinianism. +This essay was denounced as heretical, by a minister of the name +Peebles, in a sermon preached November 5th, 1788, and all the west +country was in a flame. The subject was brought before the Synod, and +was warmly debated till M’Gill expressed his regret for the disquiet +he had occasioned, explained away or apologized for the challenged +passages in his Essay, and declared his adherence to the Standard +doctrines of his mother church. Burns was prevailed upon to bring his +satire to the aid of M’Gill, but he appears to have done so with +reluctance.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i4">Orthodox, orthodox,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Wha believe in John Knox,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Let me sound an alarm to your conscience:<br /></span> +<span class="i4">There’s a heretic blast<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Has been blawn in the wast,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That what is no sense must be nonsense.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i4">Dr. Mac,<a name="FNanchor_77_77" id="FNanchor_77_77"></a><a href="#Footnote_77_77" class="fnanchor">[77]</a> Dr. Mac,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">You should stretch on a rack,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To strike evil doers wi’ terror;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">To join faith and sense<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Upon ony pretence,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Is heretic, damnable error.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i4">Town of Ayr, town of Ayr,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">It was mad, I declare,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To meddle wi’ mischief a-brewing;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Provost John<a name="FNanchor_78_78" id="FNanchor_78_78"></a><a href="#Footnote_78_78" class="fnanchor">[78]</a> is still deaf<br /></span> +<span class="i4">To the church’s relief,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And orator Bob<a name="FNanchor_79_79" id="FNanchor_79_79"></a><a href="#Footnote_79_79" class="fnanchor">[79]</a> is its ruin.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i4">D’rymple mild,<a name="FNanchor_80_80" id="FNanchor_80_80"></a><a href="#Footnote_80_80" class="fnanchor">[80]</a> D’rymple mild,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Thro’ your heart’s like a child,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And your life like the new driven snaw,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Yet that winna save ye,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Auld Satan must hav ye,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For preaching that three’s ane an’ twa.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i4">Rumble John,<a name="FNanchor_81_81" id="FNanchor_81_81"></a><a href="#Footnote_81_81" class="fnanchor">[81]</a> Rumble John,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Mount the steps wi’ a groan,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Cry the book is wi’ heresy cramm’d;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Then lug out your ladle,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Deal brimstone like adle,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And roar every note of the danm’d.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i4">Simper James,<a name="FNanchor_82_82" id="FNanchor_82_82"></a><a href="#Footnote_82_82" class="fnanchor">[82]</a> Simper James,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Leave the fair Killie dames,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">There’s a holier chase in your view;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">I’ll lay on your head<br /></span> +<span class="i4">That the pack ye’ll soon lead.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For puppies like you there’s but few.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i4">Singet Sawney,<a name="FNanchor_83_83" id="FNanchor_83_83"></a><a href="#Footnote_83_83" class="fnanchor">[83]</a> Singet Sawney,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Are ye herding the penny,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Unconscious what evil await?<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Wi’ a jump, yell, and howl,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Alarm every soul,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For the foul thief is just at your gate.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i4">Daddy Auld,<a name="FNanchor_84_84" id="FNanchor_84_84"></a><a href="#Footnote_84_84" class="fnanchor">[84]</a> Daddy Auld,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">There’s a tod in the fauld,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A tod meikle waur than the clerk;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Though yo can do little skaith,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Ye’ll be in at the death,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And gif ye canna bite, ye may bark.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i4">Davie Bluster,<a name="FNanchor_85_85" id="FNanchor_85_85"></a><a href="#Footnote_85_85" class="fnanchor">[85]</a> Davie Bluster,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">If for a saint ye do muster,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The corps is no nice of recruits;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Yet to worth let’s be just,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Royal blood ye might boast,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">If the ass was the king of the brutes.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i4">Jamy Goose,<a name="FNanchor_86_86" id="FNanchor_86_86"></a><a href="#Footnote_86_86" class="fnanchor">[86]</a> Jamy Goose,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Ye ha’e made but toom roose,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In hunting the wicked lieutenant;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">But the Doctor’s your mark,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">For the L—d’s haly ark;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He has cooper’d and cawd a wrang pin in’t.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i4">Poet Willie,<a name="FNanchor_87_87" id="FNanchor_87_87"></a><a href="#Footnote_87_87" class="fnanchor">[87]</a> Poet Willie,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Fie the Doctor a volley,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wi’ your liberty’s chain and your wit;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">O’er Pegasus’ side<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Ye ne’er laid astride,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ye but smelt, man, the place where he ——.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_163" id="Page_163">[163]</a></span></p><div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i4">Andro Gouk,<a name="FNanchor_88_88" id="FNanchor_88_88"></a><a href="#Footnote_88_88" class="fnanchor">[88]</a>, Andro Gouk,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Ye may slander the book,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And the book not the waur, let me tell ye;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Ye are rich and look big,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">But lay by hat and wig,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And ye’ll ha’e a calf’s head o’ sma’ value.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i4">Barr Steenie,<a name="FNanchor_89_89" id="FNanchor_89_89"></a><a href="#Footnote_89_89" class="fnanchor">[89]</a> Barr Steenie,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">What mean ye, what mean ye?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">If ye’ll meddle nae mair wi’ the matter,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Ye may ha’e some pretence<br /></span> +<span class="i4">To havins and sense,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wi’ people wha ken ye nae better.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i4">Irvine side,<a name="FNanchor_90_90" id="FNanchor_90_90"></a><a href="#Footnote_90_90" class="fnanchor">[90]</a> Irvine side,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Wi’ your turkey-cock pride,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of manhood but sum’ is your share,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Ye’ve the figure ’tis true,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Even your faes will allow,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And your friends they dae grunt you nae mair.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i4">Muirland Jock,<a name="FNanchor_91_91" id="FNanchor_91_91"></a><a href="#Footnote_91_91" class="fnanchor">[91]</a> Muirland Jock,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">When the L—d makes a rock<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To crush Common sense for her sins,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">If ill manners were wit,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">There’s no mortal so fit<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To confound the poor Doctor at ance.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i4">Holy Will,<a name="FNanchor_92_92" id="FNanchor_92_92"></a><a href="#Footnote_92_92" class="fnanchor">[92]</a> Holy Will,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">There was wit i’ your skull,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When ye pilfer’d the alms o’ the poor;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">The timmer is scant,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">When ye’re ta’en for a saunt,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wha should swing in a rape for an hour.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i4">Calvin’s sons, Calvin’s sons,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Seize your spir’tual guns,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ammunition you never can need;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Your hearts are the stuff,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Will be powther enough,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And your skulls are storehouses o’ lead.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i4">Poet Burns, Poet Burns,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Wi’ your priest-skelping turns,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Why desert ye your auld native shire?<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Your muse is a gipsie,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">E’en tho’ she were tipsie,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">She could ca’ us nae waur than we are.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_76_76" id="Footnote_76_76"></a><a href="#FNanchor_76_76"><span class="label">[76]</span></a> This Poem was written a short time after the publication +of M’Gill’s Essay.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_77_77" id="Footnote_77_77"></a><a href="#FNanchor_77_77"><span class="label">[77]</span></a> Dr. M’Gill.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_78_78" id="Footnote_78_78"></a><a href="#FNanchor_78_78"><span class="label">[78]</span></a> John Ballantyne.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_79_79" id="Footnote_79_79"></a><a href="#FNanchor_79_79"><span class="label">[79]</span></a> Robert Aiken.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_80_80" id="Footnote_80_80"></a><a href="#FNanchor_80_80"><span class="label">[80]</span></a> Dr. Dalrymple.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_81_81" id="Footnote_81_81"></a><a href="#FNanchor_81_81"><span class="label">[81]</span></a> Mr. Russell.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_82_82" id="Footnote_82_82"></a><a href="#FNanchor_82_82"><span class="label">[82]</span></a> Mr. M’Kinlay.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_83_83" id="Footnote_83_83"></a><a href="#FNanchor_83_83"><span class="label">[83]</span></a> Mr. Moody, of Riccarton.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_84_84" id="Footnote_84_84"></a><a href="#FNanchor_84_84"><span class="label">[84]</span></a> Mr. Auld of Mauchline.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_85_85" id="Footnote_85_85"></a><a href="#FNanchor_85_85"><span class="label">[85]</span></a> Mr. Grant, of Ochiltree.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_86_86" id="Footnote_86_86"></a><a href="#FNanchor_86_86"><span class="label">[86]</span></a> Mr. Young, of Cumnock.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_87_87" id="Footnote_87_87"></a><a href="#FNanchor_87_87"><span class="label">[87]</span></a> Mr. Peebles, Ayr.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_88_88" id="Footnote_88_88"></a><a href="#FNanchor_88_88"><span class="label">[88]</span></a> Dr. Andrew Mitchell, of Monkton.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_89_89" id="Footnote_89_89"></a><a href="#FNanchor_89_89"><span class="label">[89]</span></a> Mr. Stephen Young, of Barr.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_90_90" id="Footnote_90_90"></a><a href="#FNanchor_90_90"><span class="label">[90]</span></a> Mr. George Smith, of Galston.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_91_91" id="Footnote_91_91"></a><a href="#FNanchor_91_91"><span class="label">[91]</span></a> Mr. John Shepherd, Muirkirk.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_92_92" id="Footnote_92_92"></a><a href="#FNanchor_92_92"><span class="label">[92]</span></a> Holy Willie, alias William Fisher, Elder in Mauchline.</p></div> +</div> + + + +<h2><a name="CX" id="CX"></a>CX.</h2> + +<h3>THE KIRK’S ALARM.</h3> +<h5>A BALLAD.</h5> +<p class="std1">[SECOND VERSION.]</p> + +<p>[This version is from the papers of Miss Logan, of Afton. The origin +of the Poem is thus related to Graham of Fintry by the poet himself: +“Though I dare say you have none of the solemn League and Covenant +fire Which shone so conspicuous in Lord George Gordon, and the +Kilmarnock weavers, yet I think you must have heard of Dr. M’Gill, one +of the clergymen of Ayr, and his heretical book, God help him, poor +man! Though one of the worthiest, as well as one of the ablest of the +whole priesthood of the Kirk of Scotland, in every sense of that +ambiguous term, yet the poor doctor and his numerous family are in +imminent danger of being thrown out (9th December, 1790) to the mercy +of the winter winds. The enclosed ballad on that business, is, I +confess too local: but I laughed myself at some conceits in it, though +I am convinced in my conscience there are a good many heavy stanzas in +it too.” The Kirk’s Alarm was first printed by Stewart, in 1801. +Cromek calls it, “A silly satire, on some worthy ministers of the +gospel, in Ayrshire.”]</p> + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i4">Orthodox, orthodox,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Who believe in John Knox,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Let me sound an alarm to your conscience—<br /></span> +<span class="i4">There’s a heretic blast,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Has been blawn i’ the wast,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That what is not sense must be nonsense,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Orthodox,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That what is not sense must be nonsense.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i4">Doctor Mac, Doctor Mac,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Ye should stretch on a rack,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And strike evil doers wi’ terror;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">To join faith and sense,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Upon any pretence,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Was heretic damnable error,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Doctor Mac,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Was heretic damnable error.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i4">Town of Ayr, town of Ayr,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">It was rash I declare,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To meddle wi’ mischief a-brewing;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Provost John is still deaf,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">To the church’s relief,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And orator Bob is its ruin,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Town Of Ayr,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And orator Bob is its ruin.<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_164" id="Page_164">[164]</a></span></div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i4">D’rymple mild, D’rymple mild,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Tho’ your heart’s like a child,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And your life like the new-driven snaw,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Yet that winna save ye,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Old Satan must have ye<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For preaching that three’s are an’ twa,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">D’rymple mild,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For preaching that three’s are an’ twa.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">V.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i4">Calvin’s sons, Calvin’s sons,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Seize your spiritual guns,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ammunition ye never can need;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Your hearts are the stuff,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Will be powder enough,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And your skulls are a storehouse of lead,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Calvin’s sons,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And your skulls are a storehouse of lead.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">VI.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i4">Rumble John, Rumble John,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Mount the steps with a groan,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Cry the book is with heresy cramm’d;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Then lug out your ladle,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Deal brimstone like aidle,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And roar every note o’ the damn’d,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Rumble John,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And roar every note o’ the damn’d.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">VII.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i4">Simper James, Simper James,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Leave the fair Killie dames,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">There’s a holier chase in your view;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">I’ll lay on your head,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">That the pack ye’ll soon lead,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For puppies like you there’s but few,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Simper James,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For puppies like you there’s but few.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">VIII.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i4">Singet Sawnie, Singet Sawnie,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Are ye herding the penny,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Unconscious what danger awaits?<br /></span> +<span class="i4">With a jump, yell, and howl,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Alarm every soul,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For Hannibal’s just at your gates,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Singet Sawnie,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For Hannibal’s just at your gates.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IX.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i4">Andrew Gowk, Andrew Gowk,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Ye may slander the book,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And the book nought the waur—let me tell you;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Tho’ ye’re rich and look big,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Yet lay by hat and wig,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And ye’ll hae a calf’s-head o’ sma’ value,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Andrew Gowk,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And ye’ll hae a calf’s-head o’ sma’ value.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">X.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i4">Poet Willie, Poet Willie,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Gie the doctor a volley,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wi’ your “liberty’s chain” and your wit;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">O’er Pegasus’ side,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Ye ne’er laid a stride<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ye only stood by when he ——,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Poet Willie,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ye only stood by when he ——.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">XI.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i4">Barr Steenie, Barr Steenie,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">What mean ye? what mean ye?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">If ye’ll meddle nae mair wi’ the matter,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Ye may hae some pretence, man,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">To havins and sense, man,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wi’ people that ken ye nae better,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Barr Steenie,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wi’ people that ken ye nae better.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">XII.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i4">Jamie Goose, Jamie Goose,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Ye hae made but toom roose,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O’ hunting the wicked lieutenant;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">But the doctor’s your mark,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">For the L—d’s holy ark,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He has cooper’d and ca’d a wrong pin in’t,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Jamie Goose,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He has cooper’d and ca’d a wrong pin in’t.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">XIII.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i4">Davie Bluster, Davie Bluster,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">For a saunt if ye muster,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">It’s a sign they’re no nice o’ recruits,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Yet to worth let’s be just,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Royal blood ye might boast,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">If the ass were the king o’ the brutes,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Davie Bluster,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">If the ass were the king o’ the brutes.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">XIV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i4">Muirland George, Muirland George,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Whom the Lord made a scourge,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To claw common sense for her sins;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">If ill manners were wit,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">There’s no mortal so fit,<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_165" id="Page_165">[165]</a></span><span class="i0">To confound the poor doctor at ance,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Muirland George,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To confound the poor doctor at ance.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">XV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i4">Cessnockside, Cessnockside,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Wi’ your turkey-cock pride,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O’ manhood but sma’ is your share;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Ye’ve the figure, it’s true,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Even our faes maun allow,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And your friends daurna say ye hae mair,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Cessnockside,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And your friends daurna say ye hae mair.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">XVI.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i4">Daddie Auld, Daddie Auld,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">There’s a tod i’ the fauld<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A tod meikle waur than the clerk;<a name="FNanchor_93_93" id="FNanchor_93_93"></a><a href="#Footnote_93_93" class="fnanchor">[93]</a><br /></span> +<span class="i4">Tho’ ye downa do skaith,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Ye’ll be in at the death,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And if ye canna bite ye can bark,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Daddie Auld,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And if ye canna bite ye can bark.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">XVII.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i4">Poet Burns, Poet Burns,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Wi’ your priest-skelping turns,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Why desert ye your auld native shire?<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Tho’ your Muse is a gipsy,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Yet were she even tipsy,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">She could ca’ us nae waur than we are,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Poet Burns,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">She could ca’ us nae waur than we are.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p class="std2">POSTSCRIPT.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i4">Afton’s Laird, Afton’s Laird,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">When your pen can be spar’d,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A copy o’ this I bequeath,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">On the same sicker score<br /></span> +<span class="i4">I mentioned before,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To that trusty auld worthy Clackleith,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Afton’s Laird,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To that trusty auld worthy Clackleith.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_93_93" id="Footnote_93_93"></a><a href="#FNanchor_93_93"><span class="label">[93]</span></a> Gavin Hamilton.</p></div> +</div> + + + +<h2><a name="CXI" id="CXI"></a>CXI.</h2> + +<h3>PEG NICHOLSON.</h3> +<p>[These hasty verses are to be found in a letter addressed to Nicol, of +the High School of Edinburgh, by the poet, giving him on account of +the unlooked-for death of his mare, Peg Nicholson, the successor of +Jenny Geddes. She had suffered both in the employ of the joyous priest +and the thoughtless poet. She acquired her name from that frantic +virago who attempted to murder George the Third.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Peg Nicholson was a good bay mare,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">As ever trode on airn;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But now she’s floating down the Nith,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And past the mouth o’ Cairn.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Peg Nicholson was a good bay mare,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And rode thro’ thick an’ thin;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But now she’s floating down the Nith,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And wanting even the skin.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Peg Nicholson was a good bay mare,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And ance she bore a priest;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But now she’s flouting down the Nith,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For Solway fish a feast.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Peg Nicholson was a good bay mare,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And the priest he rode her sair;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And much oppress’d and bruis’d she was;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">As priest-rid cattle are, &c. &c.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CXII" id="CXII"></a>CXII.</h2> + +<h4>ON</h4> +<h3>CAPTAIN MATTHEW HENDERSON,</h3> +<h5>A GENTLEMAN WHO HELD THE PATENT FOR HIS HONOURS + + + IMMEDIATELY FROM ALMIGHTY GOD.</h5> +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Should the poor be flattered?”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="sig1"><span class="smcap">Shakspeare.</span></p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But now his radiant course is run,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For Matthew’s course was bright;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">His soul was like the glorious sun,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A matchless heav’nly light!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>[Captain Matthew Henderson, a gentleman of very agreeable manners and +great propriety of character, usually lived in Edinburgh, dined +constantly at Fortune’s Tavern, and was a member of the Capillaire +Club, which was composed of all who desired to be thought witty or +joyous: he died in 1789: Burns, in a note to the Poem, says, “I loved +the man much, and have not flattered his memory.” Henderson seems +indeed to have been universally liked. “In our travelling party,” says +Sir James Campbell, of Ardkinglass, “was Matthew Henderson, then +(1759) and afterwards well known and much esteemed in the town of +Edinburgh; at that time an officer in the twenty-fifth regiment of +foot, and like myself on his way to join the army; and I may say with +truth, that in the course of a long life I have never known a more +estimable character, than Matthew Henderson.” <i>Memoirs of Campbell, of +Ardkinglass</i>, p. 17.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O death! thou tyrant fell and bloody!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The meikle devil wi’ a woodie<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_166" id="Page_166">[166]</a></span><span class="i0">Haurl thee hame to his black smiddie,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">O’er hurcheon hides,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And like stock-fish come o’er his studdie<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Wi’ thy auld sides!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">He’s gane! he’s gane! he’s frae us torn,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The ae best fellow e’er was born!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thee, Matthew, Nature’s sel’ shall mourn<br /></span> +<span class="i8">By wood and wild,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where, haply, pity strays forlorn,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Frae man exil’d!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Ye hills! near neebors o’ the starns,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That proudly cock your cresting cairns!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ye cliffs, the haunts of sailing yearns,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Where echo slumbers!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Come join, ye Nature’s sturdiest bairns,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">My wailing numbers!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Mourn, ilka grove the cushat kens!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ye haz’lly shaws and briery dens!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ye burnies, wimplin’ down your glens,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Wi’ toddlin’ din,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or foaming strang, wi’ hasty stens,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Frae lin to lin!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Mourn, little harebells o’er the lea;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ye stately foxgloves fair to see;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ye woodbines, hanging bonnilie,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">In scented bow’rs;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ye roses on your thorny tree,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">The first o’ flow’rs.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">At dawn, when ev’ry grassy blade<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Droops with a diamond at its head,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">At ev’n, when beans their fragrance shed<br /></span> +<span class="i8">I’ th’ rustling gale,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ye maukins whiddin thro’ the glade,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Come join my wail.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Mourn, ye wee songsters o’ the wood;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ye grouse that crap the heather bud;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ye curlews calling thro’ a clud;<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Ye whistling plover;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ mourn, ye whirring paitrick brood!—<br /></span> +<span class="i8">He’s gane for ever!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Mourn, sooty coots, and speckled teals;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ye fisher herons, watching eels:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ye duck and drake, wi’ airy wheels<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Circling the lake;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ye bitterns, till the quagmire reels,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Rair for his sake.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Mourn, clam’ring craiks, at close o’ day,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">‘Mang fields o’ flowering clover gay;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And when ye wing your annual way<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Frae our cauld shore,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Tell thae far warlds, wha lies in clay,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Wham we deplore.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Ye houlets, frae your ivy bow’r,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In some auld tree, or eldritch tow’r,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">What time the moon, wi’ silent glow’r,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Sets up her horn,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wail thro’ the dreary midnight hour<br /></span> +<span class="i8">’Till waukrife morn!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O rivers, forests, hills, and plains!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Oft have ye heard my canty strains:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But now, what else for me remains<br /></span> +<span class="i8">But tales of woe?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And frae my een the drapping rains<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Maun ever flow.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Mourn, spring, thou darling of the year!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ilk cowslip cup shall kep a tear:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thou, simmer, while each corny spear<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Shoots up its head,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The gay, green, flow’ry tresses shear<br /></span> +<span class="i8">For him that’s dead!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Thou, autumn, wi’ thy yellow hair,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In grief thy sallow mantle tear:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thou, winter, hurling thro’ the air<br /></span> +<span class="i8">The roaring blast,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wide, o’er the naked world declare<br /></span> +<span class="i8">The worth we’ve lost!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Mourn him, thou sun, great source of light!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Mourn, empress of the silent night!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And you, ye twinkling starnies bright,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">My Matthew mourn!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For through your orbs he’s ta’en his flight,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Ne’er to return.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O, Henderson! the man—the brother!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And art thou gone, and gone for ever?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And hast thou crost that unknown river<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Life’s dreary bound?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Like thee, where shall I find another,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">The world around?<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Go to your sculptur’d tombs, ye great,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In a’ the tinsel trash o’ state!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But by thy honest turf I’ll wait,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Thou man of worth!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And weep the ae best fellow’s fate<br /></span> +<span class="i8">E’er lay in earth.<br /></span> +</div></div> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_167" id="Page_167">[167]</a></span></p> + +<p class="std2">THE EPITAPH.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Stop, passenger!—my story’s brief,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And truth I shall relate, man;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I tell nae common tale o’ grief—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For Matthew was a great man.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">If thou uncommon merit hast,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Yet spurn’d at fortune’s door, man,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A look of pity hither cast—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For Matthew was a poor man.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">If thou a noble sodger art,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That passest by this grave, man,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">There moulders here a gallant heart—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For Matthew was a brave man.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">If thou on men, their works and ways,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Canst throw uncommon light, man,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Here lies wha weel had won thy praise—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For Matthew was a bright man.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">If thou at friendship’s sacred ca’<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Wad life itself resign, man,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thy sympathetic tear maun fa’—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For Matthew was a kind man!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">If thou art staunch without a stain,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Like the unchanging blue, man,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">This was a kinsman o’ thy ain—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For Matthew was a true man.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">If thou hast wit, and fun, and fire,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And ne’er guid wine did fear, man,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">This was thy billie, dam and sire—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For Matthew was a queer man.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">If ony whiggish whingin sot,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To blame poor Matthew dare, man,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">May dool and sorrow be his lot!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For Matthew was a rare man.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CXIII" id="CXIII"></a>CXIII.</h2> + +<h3>THE FIVE CARLINS.</h3> +<h4>A SCOTS BALLAD.</h4> +<h5>Tune—<i>Chevy Chase.</i></h5> +<p>[This is a local and political Poem composed on the contest between +Miller, the younger, of Dalswinton, and Johnstone, of Westerhall, for +the representation of the Dumfries and Galloway district of Boroughs. +Each town or borough speaks and acts in character: Maggy personates +Dumfries; Marjory, Lochmaben; Bess of Solway-side, Annan; Whiskey Jean, +Kirkcudbright; and Black Joan, Sanquhar. On the part of Miller, all +the Whig interest of the Duke of Queensberry was exerted, and all the +Tory interest on the side of the Johnstone: the poet’s heart was with +the latter. Annan and Lochmaben stood staunch by old names and old +affections: after a contest, bitterer than anything of the kind +remembered, the Whig interest prevailed.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">There were five carlins in the south,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">They fell upon a scheme,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To send a lad to London town,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To bring them tidings hame.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Not only bring them tidings hame,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But do their errands there;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And aiblins gowd and honour baith<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Might be that laddie’s share.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">There was Maggy by the banks o’ Nith,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A dame wi’ pride eneugh;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And Marjory o’ the mony lochs,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A carlin auld and teugh.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">And blinkin’ Bess of Annandale,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That dwelt near Solway-side;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And whiskey Jean, that took her gill<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In Galloway sae wide.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">And black Joan, frae Crighton-peel,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">O’ gipsey kith an’ kin;—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Five wighter carlins were na found<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The south countrie within.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">To send a lad to London town,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">They met upon a day;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And mony a knight, and mony a laird,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">This errand fain wad gae.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O mony a knight, and mony a laird,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">This errand fain wad gae;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But nae ane could their fancy please,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">O ne’er a ane but twae.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The first ane was a belted knight,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Bred of a border band;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And he wad gae to London town,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Might nae man him withstand.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">And he wad do their errands weel,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And meikle he wad say;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And ilka ane about the court<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Wad bid to him gude-day.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The neist cam in a sodger youth,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And spak wi’ modest grace,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And he wad gae to London town,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">If sae their pleasure was.<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_168" id="Page_168">[168]</a></span></div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">He wad na hecht them courtly gifts,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Nor meikle speech pretend;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But he wad hecht an honest heart,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Wad ne’er desert his friend.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Then wham to chuse, and wham refuse,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">At strife thir carlins fell;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For some had gentlefolks to please,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And some wad please themsel’.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Then out spak mim-mou’d Meg o’ Nith,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And she spak up wi’ pride,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And she wad send the sodger youth,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Whatever might betide.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">For the auld gudeman o’ London court<br /></span> +<span class="i2">She didna care a pin;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But she wad send the sodger youth<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To greet his eldest son.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Then slow raise Marjory o’ the Lochs<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And wrinkled was her brow;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Her ancient weed was russet gray,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Her auld Scotch heart was true.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“The London court set light by me—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I set as light by them;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And I wilt send the sodger lad<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To shaw that court the same.”<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Then up sprang Bess of Annandale,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And swore a deadly aith,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Says, “I will send the border-knight<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Spite o’ you carlins baith.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“For far-off fowls hae feathers fair,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And fools o’ change are fain;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But I hae try’d this border-knight,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I’ll try him yet again.”<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Then whiskey Jean spak o’er her drink,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">“Ye weel ken, kimmersa’,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The auld gudeman o’ London court,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">His back’s been at the wa’.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“And mony a friend that kiss’d his caup,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Is now a fremit wight;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But it’s ne’er be sae wi’ whiskey Jean,—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">We’ll send the border-knight.”<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Says black Joan o’ Crighton-peel,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A carlin stoor and grim,—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">“The auld gudeman, or the young gudeman,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For me may sink or swim.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“For fools will prate o’ right and wrang,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">While knaves laugh in their sleeve;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But wha blaws best the horn shall win,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I’ll spier nae courtier’s leave.”<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">So how this mighty plea may end<br /></span> +<span class="i2">There’s naebody can tell:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">God grant the king, and ilka man,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">May look weel to himsel’!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CXIV" id="CXIV"></a>CXIV.</h2> + +<h3>THE LADDIES BY THE BANKS O’ NITH.</h3> +<p>[This short Poem was first published by Robert Chambers. It intimates +pretty strongly, how much the poet disapproved of the change which +came over the Duke of Queensberry’s opinions, when he supported the +right of the Prince of Wales to assume the government, without consent +of Parliament, during the king’s alarming illness, in 1788.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The laddies by the banks o’ Nith,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Wad trust his Grace wi’ a’, Jamie,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But he’ll sair them, as he sair’d the King,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Turn tail and rin awa’, Jamie.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Up and waur them a’, Jamie,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Up and waur them a’;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The Johnstones hae the guidin’ o’t,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Ye turncoat Whigs awa’.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The day he stude his country’s friend,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Or gied her faes a claw, Jamie:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or frae puir man a blessin’ wan,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That day the Duke ne’er saw, Jamie.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But wha is he, his country’s boast?<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Like him there is na twa, Jamie,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">There’s no a callant tents the kye,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But kens o’ Westerha’, Jamie.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">To end the wark here’s Whistlebirk,<a name="FNanchor_94_94" id="FNanchor_94_94"></a><a href="#Footnote_94_94" class="fnanchor">[94]</a><br /></span> +<span class="i2">Lang may his whistle blaw, Jamie;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And Maxwell true o’ sterling blue:<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And we’ll be Johnstones a’, Jamie.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + + + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_94_94" id="Footnote_94_94"></a><a href="#FNanchor_94_94"><span class="label">[94]</span></a> Birkwhistle: a Galloway laird, and elector.</p></div> +</div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_169" id="Page_169">[169]</a></span></p> + +<h2><a name="CXV" id="CXV"></a>CXV.</h2> + +<h3>EPISTLE TO ROBERT GRAHAM, ESQ.</h3> +<h4>OF FINTRAY:</h4> +<h5>ON THE CLOSE OF THE DISPUTED ELECTION BETWEEN</h5> +<h5>SIR JAMES JOHNSTONE AND CAPTAIN MILLER, FOR</h5> +<h5>THE DUMFRIES DISTRICT OF BOROUGHS.</h5> +<p>[“I am too little a man,” said Burns, in the note to Fintray, which +accompanied this poem, “to have any political attachment: I am deeply +indebted to, and have the warmest veneration for individuals of both +parties: but a man who has it in his power to be the father of a +country, and who acts like his Grace of Queensberry, is a character +that one cannot speak of with patience.” This Epistle was first +printed in my edition of Burns in 1834: I had the use of the Macmurdo +and the Afton manuscripts for that purpose: to both families the poet +was much indebted for many acts of courtesy and kindness.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Fintray, my stay in worldly strife,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Friend o’ my muse, friend o’ my life,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Are ye as idle’s I am?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Come then, wi’ uncouth, kintra fleg,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O’er Pegasus I’ll fling my leg,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">And ye shall see me try him.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I’ll sing the zeal Drumlanrig bears,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Who left the all-important cares<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Of princes and their darlings;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And, bent on winning borough towns,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Came shaking hands wi’ wabster lowns,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">And kissing barefit carlins.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Combustion thro’ our boroughs rode,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Whistling his roaring pack abroad<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Of mad unmuzzled lions;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As Queensberry buff and blue unfurl’d,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And Westerha’ and Hopeton hurl’d<br /></span> +<span class="i6">To every Whig defiance.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But cautious Queensberry left the war,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Th’ unmanner’d dust might soil his star;<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Besides, he hated bleeding:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But left behind him heroes bright,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Heroes in Cæsarean fight,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Or Ciceronian pleading.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O! for a throat like huge Mons-meg,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To muster o’er each ardent Whig<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Beneath Drumlanrig’s banner;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Heroes and heroines commix,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">All in the field of politics,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">To win immortal honour.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">M’Murdo<a name="FNanchor_95_95" id="FNanchor_95_95"></a><a href="#Footnote_95_95" class="fnanchor">[95]</a> and his lovely spouse,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">(Th’ enamour’d laurels kiss her brows!)<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Led on the loves and graces:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">She won each gaping burgess’ heart,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">While he, all-conquering, play’d his part<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Among their wives and lasses.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Craigdarroch<a name="FNanchor_96_96" id="FNanchor_96_96"></a><a href="#Footnote_96_96" class="fnanchor">[96]</a> led a light-arm’d corps,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Tropes, metaphors and figures pour,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Like Hecla streaming thunder:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Glenriddel,<a name="FNanchor_97_97" id="FNanchor_97_97"></a><a href="#Footnote_97_97" class="fnanchor">[97]</a> skill’d in rusty coins,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Blew up each Tory’s dark designs,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">And bar’d the treason under.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">In either wing two champions fought,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Redoubted Staig<a name="FNanchor_98_98" id="FNanchor_98_98"></a><a href="#Footnote_98_98" class="fnanchor">[98]</a> who set at nought<br /></span> +<span class="i6">The wildest savage Tory:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And Welsh,<a name="FNanchor_99_99" id="FNanchor_99_99"></a><a href="#Footnote_99_99" class="fnanchor">[99]</a> who ne’er yet flinch’d his ground,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">High-wav’d his magnum-bonum round<br /></span> +<span class="i6">With Cyclopeian fury.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Miller brought up th’ artillery ranks,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The many-pounders of the Banks,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Resistless desolation!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">While Maxwelton, that baron bold,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">‘Mid Lawson’s<a name="FNanchor_100_100" id="FNanchor_100_100"></a><a href="#Footnote_100_100" class="fnanchor">[100]</a> port intrench’d his hold,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">And threaten’d worse damnation.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">To these what Tory hosts oppos’d,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With these what Tory warriors clos’d.<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Surpasses my descriving:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Squadrons extended long and large,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With furious speed rush to the charge,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Like raging devils driving.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">What verse can sing, what prose narrate,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The butcher deeds of bloody fate<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Amid this mighty tulzie!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Grim Horror grinn’d—pale Terror roar’d,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As Murther at his thrapple shor’d,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">And hell mix’d in the brulzie.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">As highland craigs by thunder cleft,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When lightnings fire the stormy lift,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Hurl down with crashing rattle:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As flames among a hundred woods;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As headlong foam a hundred floods;<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Such is the rage of battle!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The stubborn Tories dare to die;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As soon the rooted oaks would fly<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Before the approaching fellers:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The Whigs come on like Ocean’s roar,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When all his wintry billows pour<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Against the Buchan Bullers.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_170" id="Page_170">[170]</a></span></p><div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Lo, from the shades of Death’s deep night,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Departed Whigs enjoy the fight,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">And think on former daring:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The muffled murtherer<a name="FNanchor_101_101" id="FNanchor_101_101"></a><a href="#Footnote_101_101" class="fnanchor">[101]</a> of Charles<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The Magna Charter flag unfurls,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">All deadly gules it’s bearing.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Nor wanting ghosts of Tory fame.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Bold Scrimgeour<a name="FNanchor_102_102" id="FNanchor_102_102"></a><a href="#Footnote_102_102" class="fnanchor">[102]</a> follows gallant Graham,<a name="FNanchor_103_103" id="FNanchor_103_103"></a><a href="#Footnote_103_103" class="fnanchor">[103]</a><br /></span> +<span class="i6">Auld Covenanters shiver.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">(Forgive, forgive, much-wrong’d Montrose!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Now death and hell engulph thy foes,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Thou liv’st on high for ever!)<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Still o’er the field the combat burns,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The Tories, Whigs, give way by turns;<br /></span> +<span class="i6">But fate the word has spoken:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For woman’s wit and strength o’ man,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Alas! can do but what they can!<br /></span> +<span class="i6">The Tory ranks are broken.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O that my een were flowing burns,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My voice a lioness that mourns<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Her darling cubs’ undoing!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That I might greet, that I might cry,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">While Tories fall, while Tories fly,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">And furious Whigs pursuing!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">What Whig but melts for good Sir James!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Dear to his country by the names<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Friend, patron, benefactor!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Not Pulteney’s wealth can Pulteney save!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And Hopeton falls, the generous brave!<br /></span> +<span class="i6">And Stewart,<a name="FNanchor_104_104" id="FNanchor_104_104"></a><a href="#Footnote_104_104" class="fnanchor">[104]</a> bold as Hector.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Thou, Pitt, shalt rue this overthrow;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And Thurlow growl a curse of woe;<br /></span> +<span class="i6">And Melville melt in wailing!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">How Fox and Sheridan rejoice!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And Burke shall sing, O Prince, arise,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Thy power is all prevailing!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">For your poor friend, the Bard, afar<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He only hears and sees the war,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">A cool spectator purely;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">So, when the storm the forests rends,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The robin in the hedge descends,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">And sober chirps securely.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_95_95" id="Footnote_95_95"></a><a href="#FNanchor_95_95"><span class="label">[95]</span></a> John M’Murdo, Esq., of Drumlanrig.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_96_96" id="Footnote_96_96"></a><a href="#FNanchor_96_96"><span class="label">[96]</span></a> Fergusson of Craigdarroch.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_97_97" id="Footnote_97_97"></a><a href="#FNanchor_97_97"><span class="label">[97]</span></a> Riddel of Friars-Carse.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_98_98" id="Footnote_98_98"></a><a href="#FNanchor_98_98"><span class="label">[98]</span></a> Provost Staig of Dumfries.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_99_99" id="Footnote_99_99"></a><a href="#FNanchor_99_99"><span class="label">[99]</span></a> Sheriff Welsh.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_100_100" id="Footnote_100_100"></a><a href="#FNanchor_100_100"><span class="label">[100]</span></a> A wine merchant in Dumfries.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_101_101" id="Footnote_101_101"></a><a href="#FNanchor_101_101"><span class="label">[101]</span></a> The executioner of Charles I. was masked.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_102_102" id="Footnote_102_102"></a><a href="#FNanchor_102_102"><span class="label">[102]</span></a> Scrimgeour, Lord Dundee.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_103_103" id="Footnote_103_103"></a><a href="#FNanchor_103_103"><span class="label">[103]</span></a> Graham, Marquis of Montrose.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_104_104" id="Footnote_104_104"></a><a href="#FNanchor_104_104"><span class="label">[104]</span></a> Stewart of Hillside.</p></div> +</div> + + + +<h2><a name="CXVI" id="CXVI"></a>CXVI.</h2> + +<h5>ON</h5> +<h3>CAPTAIN GROSE’S</h3> +<h4>PEREGRINATIONS THROUGH SCOTLAND,</h4> +<h5>COLLECTING THE</h5> +<h4>ANTIQUITIES OF THAT KINGDOM.</h4> +<p>[This “fine, fat, fodgel wight” was a clever man, a skilful antiquary, +and fond of wit and wine. He was well acquainted with heraldry, and +was conversant with the weapons and the armor of his own and other +countries. He found his way to Friars-Carse, in the Vale of Nith, and +there, at the social “board of Glenriddel,” for the first time saw +Burns. The Englishman heard, it is said, with wonder, the sarcastic +sallies and eloquent bursts of the inspired Scot, who, in his turn, +surveyed with wonder the remarkable corpulence, and listened with +pleasure to the independent sentiments and humourous turns of +conversation in the joyous Englishman. This Poem was the fruit of the +interview, and it is said that Grose regarded some passages as rather +personal.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Hear, Land o’ Cakes and brither Scots,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Frae Maidenkirk to Johnny Groat’s;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">If there’s a hole in a’ your coats,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">I rede you tent it:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A chiel’s amang you taking notes,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">And, faith, he’ll prent it!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">If in your bounds ye chance to light<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Upon a fine, fat, fodgel wight,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O’ stature short, but genius bright,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">That’s he, mark weel—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And wow! he has an unco slight<br /></span> +<span class="i8">O’ cauk and keel.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">By some auld, houlet-haunted biggin,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or kirk deserted by its riggin,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">It’s ten to one ye’ll find him snug in<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Some eldritch part,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wi’ deils, they say, L—d save’s! colleaguin’<br /></span> +<span class="i8">At some black art.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Ilk ghaist that haunts auld ha’ or chaumer,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ye gipsey-gang that deal in glamour,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And you deep read in hell’s black grammar,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Warlocks and witches;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ye’ll quake at his conjuring hammer,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Ye midnight b——s!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">It’s tauld he was a sodger bred,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And ane wad rather fa’n than fled;<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_171" id="Page_171">[171]</a></span><span class="i0">But now he’s quat the spurtle-blade,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">And dog-skin wallet,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And ta’en the—Antiquarian trade,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">I think they call it.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">He has a fouth o’ auld nick-nackets:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Rusty airn caps and jinglin’ jackets,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wad haud the Lothians three in tackets,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">A towmont guid;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And parritch-pats, and auld saut-backets,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Afore the flood.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Of Eve’s first fire he has a cinder;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Auld Tubal-Cain’s fire-shool and fender;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That which distinguished the gender<br /></span> +<span class="i8">O’ Balaam’s ass;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A broom-stick o’ the witch o’ Endor,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Weel shod wi’ brass.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Forbye, he’ll shape you aff, fu’ gleg,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The cut of Adam’s philibeg:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The knife that nicket Abel’s craig<br /></span> +<span class="i8">He’ll prove you fully,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">It was a faulding jocteleg,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Or lang-kail gully.—<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But wad ye see him in his glee,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For meikle glee and fun has he,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Then set him down, and twa or three<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Guid fellows wi’ him;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And port, O port! shine thou a wee,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">And then ye’ll see him!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Now, by the pow’rs o’ verse and prose!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thou art a dainty chiel, O Grose!—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Whae’er o’ thee shall ill suppose,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">They sair misca’ thee;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I’d take the rascal by the nose,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Wad say, Shame fa’ thee!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CXVII" id="CXVII"></a>CXVII.</h2> + +<h4>WRITTEN IN A WRAPPER,</h4> +<h5>ENCLOSING</h5> +<h3>A LETTER TO CAPTAIN GROSE.</h3> +<p>[Burns wrote out some antiquarian and legendary memoranda, respecting +certain ruins in Kyle, and enclosed them in a sheet of a paper to +Cardonnel, a northern antiquary. As his mind teemed with poetry he +could not, as he afterwards said, let the opportunity, pass of sending +a rhyming inquiry after his fat friend, and Cardonnel spread the +condoling inquiry over the North—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Is he slain by Highlan’ bodies?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And eaten like a wether-haggis?”]<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Ken ye ought o’ Captain Grose?<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Igo and ago,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">If he’s amang his friends or foes?<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Iram, coram, dago.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Is he south or is he north?<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Igo and ago,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or drowned in the river Forth?<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Iram, coram, dago.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Is he slain by Highlan’ bodies?<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Igo and ago,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And eaten like a wether-haggis?<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Iram, coram, dago.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Is he to Abram’s bosom gane?<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Igo and ago,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or haudin’ Sarah by the wame?<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Iram, coram, dago.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Where’er he be, the L—d be near him!<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Igo and ago,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As for the deil, he daur na steer him!<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Iram, coram, dago.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But please transmit the enclosed letter,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Igo and ago,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Which will oblige your humble debtor,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Iram, coram, dago.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">So may he hae auld stanes in store,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Igo and ago,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The very stanes that Adam bore,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Iram, coram, dago.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">So may ye get in glad possession,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Igo and ago,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The coins o’ Satan’s coronation!<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Iram, coram, dago.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + + + + +<h2><a name="CXVIII" id="CXVIII"></a>CXVIII.</h2> + +<h3>TAM O’ SHANTER.</h3> +<h4>A TALE.</h4> +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Of brownys and of bogilis full is this buke.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="sig1"><span class="smcap">Gawin Douglas</span></p> + +<p>[This is a West-country legend, embellished by genius. No other Poem +in our language displays such variety of power, in the same number of +lines. It was<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_172" id="Page_172">[172]</a></span> written as an inducement to Grose to admit Alloway-Kirk +into his work on the Antiquities of Scotland; and written with such +ecstasy, that the poet shed tears in the moments of composition. The +walk in which it was conceived, on the braes of Ellisland, is held in +remembrance in the vale, and pointed out to poetic inquirers: while +the scene where the poem is laid—the crumbling ruins—the place where +the chapman perished in the snow—the tree on which the poor mother of +Mungo ended her sorrows—the cairn where the murdered child was found +by the hunters—and the old bridge over which Maggie bore her +astonished master when all hell was in pursuit, are first-rate objects +of inspection and inquiry in the “Land of Burns.” “In the inimitable +tale of Tam o’ Shanter,” says Scott “Burns has left us sufficient +evidence of his ability to combine the ludicrous with the awful, and +even the horrible. No poet, with the exception of Shakspeare, ever +possessed the power of exciting the most varied and discordant +emotions with such rapid transitions.”]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">When chapman billies leave the street,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And drouthy neebors neebors meet,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As market-days are wearing late,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ folk begin to tak’ the gate;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">While we sit bousing at the nappy,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ gettin’ fou and unco happy,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">We think na on the lang Scots miles,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The mosses, waters, slaps, and stiles,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That lie between us and our hame,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where sits our sulky sullen dame,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Gathering her brows like gathering storm,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Nursing her wrath to keep it warm.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">This truth fand honest Tam O’ Shanter,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As he frae Ayr ae night did canter,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">(Auld Ayr, wham ne’er a town surpasses,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For honest men and bonny lasses.)<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O Tam! hadst thou but been sae wise,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As ta’en thy ain wife Kate’s advice!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">She tauld thee weel thou was a skellum,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A blethering, blustering, drunken blellum;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That frae November till October,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ae market-day thou wasna sober;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That ilka melder, wi’ the miller,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thou sat as lang as thou had siller;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That ev’ry naig was ca’d a shoe on,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The smith and thee gat roaring fou on;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That at the Lord’s house, ev’n on Sunday,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thou drank wi’ Kirton Jean till Monday.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">She prophesy’d, that late or soon,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thou would be found deep drown’d in Doon;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or catch’d wi’ warlocks in the mirk,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">By Alloway’s auld haunted kirk.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Ah, gentle dames! it gars me greet,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To think how mony counsels sweet,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">How mony lengthen’d sage advices,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The husband frae the wife despises!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But to our tale:—Ae market night,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Tam had got planted unco right;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Fast by an ingle bleezing finely,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wi’ reaming swats, that drank divinely;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And at his elbow, Souter Johnny,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">His ancient, trusty, drouthy crony;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Tam lo’ed him like a vera brither;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">They had been fou’ for weeks thegither!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The night drave on wi’ sangs an’ clatter;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And ay the ale was growing better:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The landlady and Tam grew gracious;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wi’ favors secret, sweet, and precious;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The Souter tauld his queerest stories;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The landlord’s laugh was ready chorus:<a name="FNanchor_105_105" id="FNanchor_105_105"></a><a href="#Footnote_105_105" class="fnanchor">[105]</a><br /></span> +<span class="i0">The storm without might rair and rustle—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Tam did na mind the storm a whistle.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Care, mad to see a man sae happy,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">E’en drown’d himself amang the nappy!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As bees flee hame wi’ lades o’ treasure,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The minutes wing’d their way wi’ pleasure:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Kings may be blest, but Tam was glorious,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O’er a’ the ills o’ life victorious.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But pleasures are like poppies spread,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">You seize the flow’r, its bloom is shed;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or like the snow falls in the river,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A moment white—then melts for ever;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or like the borealis race,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That flit ere you can point their place;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or like the rainbow’s lovely form<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Evanishing amid the storm.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Nae man can tether time or tide;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The hour approaches Tam maun ride;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That hour, o’ night’s black arch the key-stane,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That dreary hour he mounts his beast in;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And sic a night he taks the road in<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As ne’er poor sinner was abroad in.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The wind blew as ’twad blawn its last;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The rattling show’rs rose on the blast;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The speedy gleams the darkness swallow’d;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Loud, deep, and lang the thunder bellow’d:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That night, a child might understand,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The de’il had business on his hand.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Weel mounted on his gray mare, Meg,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A better never lifted leg,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Tam skelpit on thro’ dub and mire,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Despising wind, and rain, and fire;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Whiles holding fast his guid blue bonnet;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Whiles crooning o’er some auld Scots sonnet;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Whiles glow’ring round wi’ prudent cares,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Lest bogles catch him unawares;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Kirk-Alloway was drawing nigh,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Whare ghaists and houlets nightly cry.—<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + + + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_173" id="Page_173">[173]</a></span></p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">By this time he was cross the foord,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Whare in the snaw the chapman smoor’d;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And past the birks and meikle stane,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where drunken Charlie brak’s neck-bane;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And thro’ the whins, and by the cairn,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where hunters fand the murder’d bairn;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And near the thorn, aboon the well,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where Mungo’s mither hang’d hersel’.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Before him Doon pours all his floods;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The doubling storm roars thro’ the woods;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The lightnings flash from pole to pole;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Near and more the thunders roll;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When, glimmering thro’ the groaning trees,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Kirk-Alloway seem’d in a bleeze;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thro’ ilka bore the beams were glancing;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And loud resounded mirth and dancing.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Inspiring, bold John Barleycorn!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">What dangers thou canst make us scorn!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wi’ tippenny, we fear nae evil;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wi’ usquabae we’ll face the devil!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The swats sae ream’d in Tammie’s noddle,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Fair play, he car’d nae deils a boddle.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But Maggie stood right sair astonish’d,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">’Till, by the heel and hand admonish’d,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">She ventur’d forward on the light;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And wow! Tam saw an unco sight!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Warlocks and witches in a dance;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Nae cotillion brent new frae France,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But hornpipes, jigs, strathspeys, and reels,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Put life and mettle in their heels:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A winnock-bunker in the east,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">There sat auld Nick, in shape o’ beast;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A towzie tyke, black, grim, and large,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To gie them music was his charge;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He screw’d the pipes and gart them skirl,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Till roof and rafters a’ did dirl.—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Coffins stood round, like open presses;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That shaw’d the dead in their last dresses;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And by some devilish cantrip slight<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Each in its cauld hand held a light—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">By which heroic Tam was able<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To note upon the haly table,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A murderer’s banes in gibbet airns;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Twa span-lang, wee, unchristen’d bairns;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A thief, new-cutted frae a rape,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wi’ his last gasp his gab did gape;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Five tomahawks, wi’ bluid red-rusted;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Five scimitars, wi’ murder crusted;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A garter, which a babe had strangled;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A knife, a father’s throat had mangled,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Whom his ain son o’ life bereft,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The gray hairs yet stack to the heft:<a name="FNanchor_106_106" id="FNanchor_106_106"></a><a href="#Footnote_106_106" class="fnanchor">[106]</a><br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wi’ mair o’ horrible and awfu’,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Which ev’n to name would be unlawfu’.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">As Tammie glowr’d, amaz’d, and curious,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The mirth and fun grew fast and furious:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The piper loud and louder blew;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The dancers quick and quicker flew;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">They reel’d, they set, they cross’d, they cleekit,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">’Till ilka carlin swat and reekit,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And coost her duddies to the wark,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And linket at it in her sark!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Now Tam, O Tam! had thae been queans<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A’ plump and strapping, in their teens;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Their sarks, instead o’ creeshie flannen,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Been snaw-white seventeen hunder linen,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thir breeks o’ mine, my only pair,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That ance were plush, o’ guid blue hair,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I wad hae gi’en them off my hurdies,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For ae blink o’ the bonnie burdies!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But wither’d beldams, auld and droll,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Rigwoodie hags, wad spean a foal,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Lowping an’ flinging on a cummock,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I wonder didna turn thy stomach.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But Tam kenn’d what was what fu’ brawlie,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">There was a winsome wench and walie,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That night enlisted in the core,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">(Lang after kenn’d on Carrick shore;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For mony a beast to dead she shot,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And perish’d mony a bonnie boat,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And shook baith meikle corn and bear,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And kept the country-side in fear.)<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Her cutty sark, o’ Paisley harn,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That, while a lassie, she had worn,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In longitude tho’ sorely scanty,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">It was her best, and she was vauntie—<br /></span> +</div></div> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_174" id="Page_174">[174]</a></span></p> +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Ah! little kenn’d the reverend grannie,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That sark she coft for her wee Nannie,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wi’ twa pund Scots (’twas a’ her riches),<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wad ever grac’d a dance of witches!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But here my muse her wing maun cour;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sic flights are far beyond her pow’r;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To sing how Nannie lap and flang,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">(A souple jade she was and strung,)<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And how Tam stood, like ane bewitch’d;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And thought his very een enrich’d;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Even Satan glowr’d, and fidg’d fu’ fain,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And hotch’d and blew wi’ might and main:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">’Till first ae caper, syne anither,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Tam tint his reason a’ thegither,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And roars out, “Weel done, Cutty-sark!”<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And in an instant all was dark:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And scarcely had he Maggie rallied,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When out the hellish legion sallied.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">As bees bizz out wi’ angry fyke,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When plundering herds assail their byke;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As open pussie’s mortal foes,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When, pop! she starts before their nose;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As eager runs the market-crowd,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When “Catch the thief!” resounds aloud;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">So Maggie runs, the witches follow,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wi’ mony an eldritch screech and hollow.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Ah, Tam! Ah, Tam! thou’ll get thy fairin’!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In hell they’ll roast thee like a herrin’!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In vain thy Kate awaits thy comin’!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Kate soon will be a woefu’ woman!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Now do thy speedy utmost, Meg,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And win the key-stane<a name="FNanchor_107_107" id="FNanchor_107_107"></a><a href="#Footnote_107_107" class="fnanchor">[107]</a> of the brig;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">There at them thou thy tail may toss,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A running stream they darena cross!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But ere the key-stane she could make,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The fient a tail she had to shake!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For Nannie, far before the rest,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Hard upon noble Maggie prest,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And flew at Tam wi’ furious ettle;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But little wist she Maggie’s mettle—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ae spring brought off her master hale,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But left behind her ain gray tail:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The carlin claught her by the rump,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And left poor Maggie scarce a stump.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Now, wha this tale o’ truth shall read,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ilk man and mother’s son, take heed:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Whene’er to drink you are inclin’d,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or cutty-sarks run in your mind,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Think! ye may buy the joys o’er dear—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Remember Tam O’ Shanter’s mare.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_105_105" id="Footnote_105_105"></a><a href="#FNanchor_105_105"><span class="label">[105]</span></a> VARIATION. +</p> +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The cricket raised its cheering cry,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The kitten chas’d its tail in joy.</span></div> +</div></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_106_106" id="Footnote_106_106"></a><a href="#FNanchor_106_106"><span class="label">[106]</span></a> VARIATION. +</p> +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Three lawyers’ tongues turn’d inside out,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wi’ lies seem’d like a beggar’s clout;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And priests’ hearts rotten black as muck,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Lay stinking vile, in every neuk.<br /></span> +</div></div> +</div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_107_107" id="Footnote_107_107"></a><a href="#FNanchor_107_107"><span class="label">[107]</span></a> It is a well-known fact that witches, or any evil +spirits, have no power to follow a poor wight any further than the +middle of the next running stream. It may be proper likewise to +mention to the benighted traveller, that when he falls in with +<i>bogles</i>, whatever danger there may be in his going forward, there is +much more hazard in turning back.</p></div> +</div> + + + +<h2><a name="CXIX" id="CXIX"></a>CXIX.</h2> + +<h3>ADDRESS OF BEELZEBUB</h3> +<h5>TO THE</h5> +<h4>PRESIDENT OF THE HIGHLAND SOCIETY.</h4> +<p>[This Poem made its first appearance, as I was assured by my friend +the late Thomas Pringle, in the Scots Magazine, for February, 1818, +and was printed from the original in the handwriting of Burns. It was +headed thus, “To the Right honorable the Earl of Brendalbyne, +President of the Right Honourable and Honourable the Highland Society, +which met on the 23d of May last, at the Shakspeare, Covent Garden, to +concert ways and means to frustrate the designs of four hundred +Highlanders, who, as the Society were informed by Mr. M. ——, of A——s, were so audacious as to attempt an escape from their lawful lairds +and masters, whose property they were, by emigrating from the lands of +Mr. Macdonald, of Glengarry, to the wilds of Canada, in search of that +fantastic thing—<span class="smcap">Liberty</span>.” The Poem was communicated by Burns +to his friend Rankine of Adam Hill, in Ayrshire.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Long life, my Lord, an’ health be yours,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Unskaith’d by hunger’d Highland boors;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Lord grant mae duddie desperate beggar,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wi’ dirk, claymore, or rusty trigger,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">May twin auld Scotland o’ a life<br /></span> +<span class="i0">She likes—as lambkins like a knife.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Faith, you and A——s were right<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To keep the Highland hounds in sight;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I doubt na! they wad bid nae better<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Than let them ance out owre the water;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Then up among the lakes and seas<br /></span> +<span class="i0">They’ll mak’ what rules and laws they please;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Some daring Hancock, or a Franklin’;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">May set their Highland bluid a ranklin’;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Some Washington again may head them,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or some Montgomery fearless lead them,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Till God knows what may be effected<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When by such heads and hearts directed—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Poor dunghill sons of dirt and mire<br /></span> +<span class="i0">May to Patrician rights aspire!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Nae sage North, now, nor sager Sackville,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To watch and premier o’er the pack vile,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ whare will ye get Howes and Clintons<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To bring them to a right repentance,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To cowe the rebel generation,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ save the honour o’ the nation?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">They an’ be d——d! what right hae they<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To meat or sleep, or light o’ day?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Far less to riches, pow’r, or freedom,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But what your lordship likes to gie them?<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_175" id="Page_175">[175]</a></span></div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But hear, my lord! Glengarry, hear!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Your hand’s owre light on them, I fear;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Your factors, grieves, trustees, and bailies,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I canna’ say but they do gaylies;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">They lay aside a’ tender mercies,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ tirl the hallions to the birses;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yet while they’re only poind’t and herriet,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">They’ll keep their stubborn Highland spirit;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But smash them! crash them a’ to spails!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ rot the dyvors i’ the jails!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The young dogs, swinge them to the labour;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Let wark an’ hunger mak’ them sober!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The hizzies, if they’re aughtlins fawsont,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Let them in Drury-lane be lesson’d!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ if the wives an’ dirty brats<br /></span> +<span class="i0">E’en thigger at your doors an’ yetts,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Flaffan wi’ duds an’ grey wi’ beas’,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Frightin’ awa your deuks an’ geese,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Get out a horsewhip or a jowler,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The langest thong, the fiercest growler,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ gar the tattered gypsies pack<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wi’ a’ their bastards on their back!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Go on, my Lord! I lang to meet you,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ in my house at hame to greet you;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wi’ common lords ye shanna mingle,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The benmost neuk beside the ingle,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">At my right han’ assigned your seat<br /></span> +<span class="i0">’Tween Herod’s hip an Polycrate,—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or if you on your station tarrow,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Between Almagro and Pizarro,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A seat I’m sure ye’re weel deservin’t;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ till ye come—Your humble rervant,<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="sig1"><span class="smcap">Beelzebub</span>.</p> + +<p class="blockquot"><i>June 1st, Anno Mundi 5790.</i></p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CXX" id="CXX"></a>CXX.</h2> + +<h4>TO</h4> +<h3>JOHN TAYLOR.</h3> +<p>[Burns, it appears, was, in one of his excursions in revenue matters, +likely to be detained at Wanlockhead: the roads were slippery with +ice, his mare kept her feet with difficulty, and all the blacksmiths +of the village were pre-engaged. To Mr. Taylor, a person of influence +in the place, the poet, in despair, addressed this little Poem, +begging his interference: Taylor spoke to a smith; the smith flew to +his tools, sharpened or frosted the shoes, and it is said lived for +thirty years to boast that he had “never been well paid but ance, and +that was by a poet, who paid him in money, paid him in drink, and paid +him in verse.”]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">With Pegasus upon a day,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Apollo weary flying,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Through frosty hills the journey lay,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">On foot the way was plying,<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Poor slip-shod giddy Pegasus<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Was but a sorry walker;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To Vulcan then Apollo goes,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To get a frosty calker.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Obliging Vulcan fell to work,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Threw by his coat and bonnet,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And did Sol’s business in a crack;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Sol paid him with a sonnet.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Ye Vulcan’s sons of Wanlockhead,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Pity my sad disaster;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My Pegasus is poorly shod—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I’ll pay you like my master.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="sig1"><span class="smcap">Robert Burns</span>.</p> + +<p class="blockquot"><i>Ramages</i>, <i>3 o’clock</i>, (<i>no date.</i>)</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CXXI" id="CXXI"></a>CXXI.</h2> + +<h4>LAMENT</h4> +<h5>OF</h5> +<h3>MARY, QUEEN OF SCOTS,</h3> +<h5>ON THE APPROACH OF SPRING.</h5> +<p>[The poet communicated this “Lament” to his friend, Dr. Moore, in +February, 1791, but it was composed about the close of the preceding +year, at the request of Lady Winifred Maxwell Constable, of +Terreagles, the last in direct descent of the noble and ancient house +of Maxwell, of Nithsdale. Burns expressed himself more than commonly +pleased with this composition; nor was he unrewarded, for Lady +Winifred gave him a valuable snuff-box, with the portrait of the +unfortunate Mary on the lid. The bed still keeps its place in +Terreagles, on which the queen slept as she was on her way to take +refuge with her cruel and treacherous cousin, Elizabeth; and a letter +from her no less unfortunate grandson, Charles the First, calling the +Maxwells to arm in his cause, is preserved in the family archives.]</p> + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Now Nature hangs her mantle green<br /></span> +<span class="i2">On every blooming tree,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And spreads her sheets o’ daisies white<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Out o’er the grassy lea:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Now Phœbus cheers the crystal streams,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And glads the azure skies;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But nought can glad the weary wight<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That fast in durance lies.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Now lav’rocks wake the merry morn,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Aloft on dewy wing;<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_176" id="Page_176">[176]</a></span><span class="i0">The merle, in his noontide bow’r,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Makes woodland echoes ring;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The mavis wild wi’ mony a note,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Sings drowsy day to rest:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In love and freedom they rejoice,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Wi’ care nor thrall opprest.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Now blooms the lily by the bank,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The primrose down the brae;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The hawthorn’s budding in the glen,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And milk-white is the slae;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The meanest hind in fair Scotland<br /></span> +<span class="i2">May rove their sweets amang;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But I, the Queen of a’ Scotland,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Maun lie in prison strang!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I was the Queen o’ bonnie France,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Where happy I hae been;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Fu’ lightly rase I in the morn,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">As blythe lay down at e’en:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And I’m the sov’reign o’ Scotland,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And mony a traitor there;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yet here I lie in foreign bands<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And never-ending care.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">V.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But as for thee, thou false woman!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My sister and my fae,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Grim vengeance yet shall whet a sword<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That thro’ thy soul shall gae!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The weeping blood in woman’s breast<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Was never known to thee;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Nor th’ balm that draps on wounds of woe<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Frae woman’s pitying e’e.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">VI.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">My son! my son! may kinder stars<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Upon thy fortune shine;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And may those pleasures gild thy reign,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That ne’er wad blink on mine!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">God keep thee frae thy mother’s faes,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Or turn their hearts to thee:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And where thou meet’st thy mother’s friend<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Remember him for me!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">VII.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O! soon, to me, may summer suns<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Nae mair light up the morn!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Nae mair, to me, the autumn winds<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Wave o’er the yellow corn!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And in the narrow house o’ death<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Let winter round me rave;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And the next flow’rs that deck the spring<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Bloom on my peaceful grave!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CXXII" id="CXXII"></a>CXXII.</h2> + +<h3>THE WHISTLE.</h3> +<p>[“As the authentic prose history,” says Burns, “of the ‘Whistle’ is +curious, I shall here give it. In the train of Anne of Denmark, when +she came to Scotland with our James the Sixth, there came over also a +Danish gentleman of gigantic stature and great prowess, and a +matchless champion of Bacchus. He had a little ebony whistle, which at +the commencement of the orgies, he laid on the table, and whoever was +the last able to blow it, everybody else being disabled by the potency +of the bottle, was to carry off the whistle as a trophy of victory. +The Dane produced credentials of his victories, without a single +defeat, at the courts of Copenhagen, Stockholm, Moscow, Warsaw, and +several of the petty courts in Germany; and challenged the Scotch +Bacchanalians to the alternative of trying his prowess, or else of +acknowledging their inferiority. After man overthrows on the part of +the Scots, the Dane was encountered by Sir Robert Lawrie, of +Maxwelton, ancestor of the present worthy baronet of that name; who, +after three days and three nights’ hard contest, left the Scandinavian +under the table,</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">‘And blew on the whistle his requiem shrill.’<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>“Sir Walter, son to Sir Robert before mentioned, afterwards lost the +whistle to Walter Riddel, of Glenriddel, who had married a sister of +Sir Walter’s.—On Friday, the 16th of October, 1790, at Friars-Carse, +the whistle was once more contended for, as related in the ballad, by +the present Sir Robert of Maxwelton; Robert Riddel, Esq., of +Glenriddel, lineal descendant and representative of Walter Riddel, who +won the whistle, and in whose family it had continued; and Alexander +Fergusson, Esq., of Craigdarroch, likewise descended of the great Sir +Robert; which last gentleman carried off the hard-won honours of the +field.”</p> + +<p>The jovial contest took place in the dining-room of Friars-Carse, in +the presence of the Bard, who drank bottle and bottle about with them, +and seemed quite disposed to take up the conqueror when the day +dawned.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I sing of a whistle, a whistle of worth,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I sing of a whistle, the pride of the North,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Was brought to the court of our good Scottish king,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And long with this whistle all Scotland shall ring.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Old Loda,<a name="FNanchor_108_108" id="FNanchor_108_108"></a><a href="#Footnote_108_108" class="fnanchor">[108]</a> still rueing the arm of Fingal,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The god of the bottle sends down from his hall—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">“This whistle’s your challenge—to Scotland get o’er,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And drink them to hell, Sir! or ne’er see me more!”<br /></span> +</div></div> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_177" id="Page_177">[177]</a></span></p> +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Old poets have sung, and old chronicles tell,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">What champions ventur’d, what champions fell;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The son of great Loda was conqueror still,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And blew on his whistle his requiem shrill.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Till Robert, the Lord of the Cairn and the Scaur,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Unmatch’d at the bottle, unconquer’d in war,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He drank his poor godship as deep as the sea,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">No tide of the Baltic e’er drunker than he.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Thus Robert, victorious, the trophy has gain’d;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Which now in his house has for ages remain’d;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Till three noble chieftains, and all of his blood,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The jovial contest again have renew’d.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Three joyous good fellows, with hearts clear of flaw;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Craigdarroch, so famous for wit, worth, and law;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And trusty Glenriddel, so skill’d in old coins;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And gallant Sir Robert, deep-read in old wines.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Craigdarroch began, with a tongue smooth as oil,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Desiring Glenriddel to yield up the spoil;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or else he would muster the heads of the clan,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And once more, in claret, try which was the man.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“By the gods of the ancients!” Glenriddel replies,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">“Before I surrender so glorious a prize,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I’ll conjure the ghost of the great Rorie More,<a name="FNanchor_109_109" id="FNanchor_109_109"></a><a href="#Footnote_109_109" class="fnanchor">[109]</a><br /></span> +<span class="i0">And bumper his horn with him twenty times o’er.”<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Sir Robert, a soldier, no speech would pretend,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But he ne’er turn’d his back on his foe—or his friend,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Said, toss down the whistle, the prize of the field,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And, knee-deep in claret, he’d die or he’d yield.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">To the board of Glenriddel our heroes repair,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">So noted for drowning of sorrow and care;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Bur for wine and for welcome not more known to fame<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Than the sense, wit, and taste of a sweet lovely dame.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">A bard was selected to witness the fray,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And tell future ages the feats of the day;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A bard who detested all sadness and spleen,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And wish’d that Parnassus a vineyard had been.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The dinner being over, the claret they ply,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And ev’ry new cork is a new spring of joy;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In the bands of old friendship and kindred so set,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And the bands grew the tighter the more they were wet.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Gay Pleasure ran riot as bumpers ran o’er;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Bright Phœbus ne’er witness’d so joyous a core,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And vow’d that to leave them he was quite forlorn,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Till Cynthia hinted he’d find them next morn.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Six bottles a-piece had well wore out the night,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When gallant Sir Robert, to finish the fight,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Turn’d o’er in one bumper a bottle of red,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And swore ’twas the way that their ancestor did.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Then worthy Glenriddel, so cautions and sage,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">No longer the warfare, ungodly, would wage;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A high-ruling Elder to wallow in wine!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He left the foul business to folks less divine.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The gallant Sir Robert fought hard to the end;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But who can with fate and quart-bumpers contend?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Though fate said—a hero shall perish in light;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">So up rose bright Phœbus—and down fell the knight.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Next up rose our bard, like a prophet in drink;—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">“Craigdarroch, thou’lt soar when creation shall sink;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But if thou would flourish immortal in rhyme,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Come—one bottle more—and have at the sublime!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Thy line, that have struggled for freedom with Bruce,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Shall heroes and patriots ever produce:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">So thine be the laurel, and mine be the bay;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The field thou hast won, by yon bright god of day!”<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + + + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_108_108" id="Footnote_108_108"></a><a href="#FNanchor_108_108"><span class="label">[108]</span></a> See Ossian’s Carie-thura.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_109_109" id="Footnote_109_109"></a><a href="#FNanchor_109_109"><span class="label">[109]</span></a> See Johnson’s Tour to the Hebrides</p></div> +</div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_178" id="Page_178">[178]</a></span></p> + +<h2><a name="CXXIII" id="CXXIII"></a>CXXIII.</h2> + +<h4>ELEGY</h4> +<h5>ON</h5> +<h3>MISS BURNET,</h3> +<h5>OF MONBODDO.</h5> +<p>[This beautiful and accomplished lady, the heavenly Burnet, as Burns +loved to call her, was daughter to the odd and the elegant, the clever +and the whimsical Lord Monboddo. “In domestic circumstances,” says +Robert Chambers, “Monboddo was particularly unfortunate. His wife, a +very beautiful woman, died in child-bed. His son, a promising boy, in +whose education he took great delight, was likewise snatched from his +affections by a premature death; and his second daughter, in personal +loveliness one of the first women of the age, was cut off by +consumption, when only twenty-five years old.” Her name was +Elizabeth.]</p> + + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Life ne’er exulted in so rich a prize<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As Burnet, lovely from her native skies;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Nor envious death so triumph’d in a blow,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As that which laid th’ accomplish’d Burnet low.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Thy form and mind, sweet maid, can I forget?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In richest ore the brightest jewel set!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In thee, high Heaven above was truest shown,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As by his noblest work, the Godhead best is known.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">In vain ye flaunt in summer’s pride, ye groves;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Thou crystal streamlet with thy flowery shore,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ye woodland choir that chant your idle loves,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Ye cease to charm—Eliza is no more!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Ye heathy wastes, immix’d with reedy fens;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Ye mossy streams, with sedge and rushes stor’d;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ye rugged cliffs, o’erhanging dreary glens,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To you I fly, ye with my soul accord.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Princes, whose cumb’rous pride was all their worth,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Shall venal lays their pompous exit hail?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And thou, sweet excellence! forsake our earth,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And not a muse in honest grief bewail?<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">We saw thee shine in youth and beauty’s pride,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And virtue’s light, that beams beyond the spheres;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But like the sun eclips’d at morning tide,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Thou left’st us darkling in a world of tears.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The parent’s heart that nestled fond in thee,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That heart how sunk, a prey to grief and care;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">So leck’d the woodbine sweet yon aged tree;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">So from it ravish’d, leaves it bleak and bare.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CXXIV" id="CXXIV"></a>CXXIV.</h2> + +<h4>LAMENT</h4> +<h5>FOR</h5> +<h3>JAMES, EARL OF GLENCAIRN.</h3> +<p>[Burns lamented the death of this kind and accomplished nobleman with +melancholy sincerity: he moreover named one of his sons for him: he +went into mourning when he heard of his death, and he sung of his +merits in a strain not destined soon to lose the place it has taken +among the verses which record the names of the noble and the generous. +He died January 30, 1791, in the forty-second year of his age. James +Cunningham was succeeded in his title by his brother, and with him +expired, in 1796, the last of a race, whose name is intimately +connected with the History of Scotland, from the days of Malcolm +Canmore.]</p> + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The wind blew hollow frae the hills,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">By fits the sun’s departing beam<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Look’d on the fading yellow woods<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That wav’d o’er Lugar’s winding stream:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Beneath a craggy steep, a bard,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Laden with years and meikle pain,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In loud lament bewail’d his lord,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Whom death had all untimely ta’en.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">He lean’d him to an ancient aik,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Whose trunk was mould’ring down with years;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">His locks were bleached white with time,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">His hoary cheek was wet wi’ tears;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And as he touch’d his trembling harp,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And as he tun’d his doleful sang,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The winds, lamenting thro’ their caves,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To echo bore the notes alang.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Ye scattered birds that faintly sing,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The reliques of the vernal quire!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ye woods that shed on a’ the winds<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The honours of the aged year!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A few short months, and glad and gay,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Again ye’ll charm the ear and e’e;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But nocht in all revolving time<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Can gladness bring again to me.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“I am a bending aged tree,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That long has stood the wind and rain;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But now has come a cruel blast,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And my last hold of earth is gane:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Nae leaf o’ mine shall greet the spring,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Nae simmer sun exalt my bloom;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But I maun lie before the storm,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And ithers plant them in my room.<br /></span> +</div></div> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_179" id="Page_179">[179]</a></span></p> + +<p class="std2">V.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“I’ve seen sae mony changefu’ years,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">On earth I am a stranger grown;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I wander in the ways of men,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Alike unknowing and unknown:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Unheard, unpitied, unrelieved,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I bear alane my lade o’ care,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For silent, low, on beds of dust,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Lie a’ that would my sorrows share.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">VI.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“And last (the sum of a’ my griefs!)<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My noble master lies in clay;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The flow’r amang our barons bold,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">His country’s pride! his country’s stay—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In weary being now I pine,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For a’ the life of life is dead,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And hope has left my aged ken,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">On forward wing for ever fled.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">VII.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Awake thy last sad voice, my harp!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The voice of woe and wild despair;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Awake! resound thy latest lay—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Then sleep in silence evermair!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And thou, my last, best, only friend,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That fillest an untimely tomb,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Accept this tribute from the bard<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Though brought from fortune’s mirkest gloom.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">VIII.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“In poverty’s low barren vale<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Thick mists, obscure, involve me round;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Though oft I turn’d the wistful eye,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Nae ray of fame was to be found:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thou found’st me, like the morning sun,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That melts the fogs in limpid air,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The friendless bard and rustic song<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Became alike thy fostering care.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IX.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“O! why has worth so short a date?<br /></span> +<span class="i2">While villains ripen fray with time;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Must thou, the noble, gen’rous, great,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Fall in bold manhood’s hardy prime!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Why did I live to see that day?<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A day to me so full of woe!—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O had I met the mortal shaft<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Which laid my benefactor low.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">X.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“The bridegroom may forget the bride<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Was made his wedded wife yestreen;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The monarch may forget the crown<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That on his head an hour has been;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The mother may forget the child<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That smiles sae sweetly on her knee;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But I’ll remember thee, Glencairn,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And a’ that thou hast done for me!”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CXXV" id="CXXV"></a>CXXV.</h2> + +<h4>LINES</h4> +<h5>SENT TO</h5> +<h3>SIR JOHN WHITEFOORD, BART.,</h3> +<h4>OF WHITEFOORD.</h4> +<h5>WITH THE FOREGOING POEM.</h5> +<p>[Sir John Whitefoord, a name of old standing in Ayrshire, inherited +the love of his family for literature, and interested himself early in +the fame and fortunes of Burns.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Thou, who thy honour as thy God rever’st,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Who, save thy mind’s reproach, nought earthly fear’st,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To thee this votive offering I impart,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The tearful tribute of a broken heart.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The friend thou valuedst, I, the patron, lov’d;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">His worth, his honour, all the world approv’d,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">We’ll mourn till we too go as he has gone,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And tread the dreary path to that dark world unknown.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CXXVI" id="CXXVI"></a>CXXVI.</h2> + +<h4>ADDRESS</h4> +<h5>TO</h5> +<h3>THE SHADE OF THOMSON,</h3> +<h5>ON CROWNING HIS BUST AT EDNAM WITH BAYS.</h5> +<p>[“Lord Buchan has the pleasure to invite Mr. Burns to make one at the +coronation of the bust of Thomson, on Ednam Hill, on the 22d of +September: for which day perhaps his muse may inspire an ode suited to +the occasion. Suppose Mr. Burns should, leaving the Nith, go across +the country, and meet the Tweed at the nearest point from his farm, +and, wandering along the pastoral banks of Thomson’s pure parent +stream, catch inspiration in the devious walk, till he finds Lord +Buchan sitting on the ruins of Dryburgh. There the Commendator will +give him a hearty welcome, and try to light his lamp at the pure flame +of native genius, upon the altar of Caledonian virtue.” Such was the +invitation of the Earl of Buchan to Burns. To request the poet to lay +down his sickle when his harvest was half reaped, and traverse<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_180" id="Page_180">[180]</a></span> one of +the wildest and most untrodden ways in Scotland, for the purpose of +looking at the fantastic coronation of the bad bust of on excellent +poet, was worthy of Lord Buchan. The poor bard made answer, that a +week’s absence in the middle of his harvest was a step he durst not +venture upon—but he sent this Poem.</p> + +<p>The poet’s manuscript affords the following interesting variations:—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“While cold-eyed Spring, a virgin coy,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Unfolds her verdant mantle sweet,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or pranks the sod in frolic joy,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A carpet for her youthful feet:<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“While Summer, with a matron’s grace,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Walks stately in the cooling shade,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And oft delighted loves to trace<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The progress of the spiky blade:<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“While Autumn, benefactor kind,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">With age’s hoary honours clad,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Surveys, with self-approving mind,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Each creature on his bounty fed.”]<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">While virgin Spring, by Eden’s flood,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Unfolds her tender mantle green,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or pranks the sod in frolic mood,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Or tunes Æolian strains between:<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">While Summer, with a matron grace,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Retreats to Dryburgh’s cooling shade,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yet oft, delighted, stops to trace<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The progress of the spiky blade:<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">While Autumn, benefactor kind,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">By Tweed erects his aged head,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And sees, with self-approving mind,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Each creature on his bounty fed:<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">While maniac Winter rages o’er<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The hills whence classic Yarrow flows,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Rousing the turbid torrent’s roar,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Or sweeping, wild, a waste of snows:<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">So long, sweet Poet of the year!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Shall bloom that wreath thou well hast won;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">While Scotia, with exulting tear,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Proclaims that Thomson was her son.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CXXVII" id="CXXVII"></a>CXXVII.</h2> + +<h4>TO</h4> +<h3>ROBERT GRAHAM, ESQ.,</h3> +<h4>OF FINTRAY.</h4> +<p>[By this Poem Burns prepared the way for his humble request to be +removed to a district more moderate in its bounds than one which +extended over ten country parishes, and exposed him both to fatigue +and expense. This wish was expressed in prose, and was in due time +attended to, for Fintray was a gentleman at once kind and +considerate.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Late crippl’d of an arm, and now a leg,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">About to beg a pass for leave to beg:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Dull, listless, teas’d, dejected, and deprest,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">(Nature is adverse to a cripple’s rest;)<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Will generous Graham list to his Poet’s wail?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">(It soothes poor misery, hearkening to her tale,)<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And hear him curse the light he first survey’d,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And doubly curse the luckless rhyming trade?<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Thou, Nature, partial Nature! I arraign;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of thy caprice maternal I complain:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The lion and the bull thy care have found,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">One shakes the forests, and one spurns the ground:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thou giv’st the ass his hide, the snail his shell,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Th’ envenom’d wasp, victorious, guards his cell;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thy minions, kings, defend, control, devour,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In all th’ omnipotence of rule and power;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Foxes and statesmen, subtile wiles insure;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The cit and polecat stink, and are secure;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Toads with their poison, doctors with their drug,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The priest and hedgehog in their robes are snug;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ev’n silly woman has her warlike arts,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Her tongue and eyes, her dreaded spear and darts;—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But, oh! thou bitter stepmother and hard,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To thy poor fenceless, naked child—the Bard!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A thing unteachable in world’s skill,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And half an idiot too, more helpless still;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">No heels to bear him from the op’ning dun;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">No claws to dig, his hated sight to shun;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">No horns, but those by luckless Hymen worn,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And those, alas! not Amalthea’s horn:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">No nerves olfact’ry, Mammon’s trusty cur,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Clad in rich dullness’ comfortable fur;—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In naked feeling, and in aching pride,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He bears the unbroken blast from every side.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Vampyre booksellers drain him to the heart,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And scorpion critics cureless venom dart.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Critics!—appall’d I venture on the name,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Those cut-throat bandits in the paths of fame.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Bloody dissectors, worse than ten Monroes!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He hacks to teach, they mangle to expose.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">His heart by causeless wanton malice wrung,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">By blockheads’ daring into madness stung;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">His well-won bays, than life itself more dear,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">By miscreants torn, who ne’er one sprig must wear:<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_181" id="Page_181">[181]</a></span><span class="i0">Foil’d, bleeding, tortur’d, in the unequal strife,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The hapless poet flounders on through life;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Till, fled each hope that once his bosom fir’d,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And fled each muse that glorious once inspir’d,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Low sunk in squalid, unprotected age,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Dead, even resentment, for his injur’d page,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He heeds or feels no more the ruthless critic’s rage!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">So, by some hedge, the gen’rous steed deceas’d,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For half-starv’d snarling curs a dainty feast:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">By toil and famine wore to skin and bone,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Lies senseless of each tugging bitch’s son.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O dullness! portion of the truly blest!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Calm sheltered haven of eternal rest!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thy sons ne’er madden in the fierce extremes<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of fortune’s polar frost, or torrid beams.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">If mantling high she fills the golden cup,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With sober selfish ease they sip it up;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Conscious the bounteous meed they well deserve,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">They only wonder “some folks” do not starve.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The grave sage hern thus easy picks his frog,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And thinks the mallard a sad worthless dog.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When disappointment snaps the clue of hope,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And thro’ disastrous night they darkling grope,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With deaf endurance sluggishly they bear,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And just conclude that “fools are fortune’s care.”<br /></span> +<span class="i0">So, heavy, passive to the tempest’s shocks,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Strong on the sign-post stands the stupid ox.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Not so the idle muses’ mad-cap train,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Not such the workings of their moon-struck brain;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In equanimity they never dwell,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">By turns in soaring heav’n or vaulted hell<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I dread thee, fate, relentless and severe,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With all a poet’s, husband’s, father’s fear!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Already one strong hold of hope is lost,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Glencairn, the truly noble, lies in dust;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">(Fled, like the sun eclips’d as noon appears,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And left us darkling in a world of tears:)<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O! hear my ardent, grateful, selfish pray’r!—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Fintray, my other stay, long bless and spare!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thro’ a long life his hopes and wishes crown;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And bright in cloudless skies his sun go down!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">May bliss domestic smooth his private path;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Give energy to life; and soothe his latest breath,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With many a filial tear circling the bed of death!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CXXVIII" id="CXXVIII"></a>CXXVIII.</h2> + +<h4>TO</h4> +<h3>ROBERT GRAHAM, ESQ.,</h3> +<h4>OF FINTRAY.</h4> +<h5>ON RECEIVING A FAVOUR.</h5> +<p>[Graham of Fintray not only obtained for the poet the appointment in +Excise, which, while he lived in Edinburgh, he desired, but he also +removed him, as he wished, to a better district; and when imputations +were thrown out against his loyalty, he defended him with obstinate +and successful eloquence. Fintray did all that was done to raise Burns +out of the toiling humility of his condition, and enable him to serve +the muse without fear of want.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I call no goddess to inspire my strains,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A fabled muse may suit a bard that feigns;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Friend of my life! my ardent spirit burns,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And all the tribute of my heart returns,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For boons accorded, goodness ever new,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The gift still dearer, as the giver, you.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Thou orb of day! thou other paler light!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And all ye many sparkling stars of night;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">If aught that giver from my mind efface;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">If I that giver’s bounty e’er disgrace;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Then roll to me, along your wandering spheres,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Only to number out a villain’s years!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CXXIX" id="CXXIX"></a>CXXIX.</h2> + +<h3>A VISION.</h3> +<p>[This Vision of Liberty descended on Burns among the magnificent ruins +of the College of Lincluden, which stand on the junction of the Cluden +and the Nith, a short mile above Dumfries. He gave us the Vision; +perhaps, he dared not in those yeasty times venture on the song, which +his secret visitant poured from her lips. The scene is chiefly copied +from nature: the swellings of the Nith, the howling of the fox on the +hill, and the cry of the owl, unite at times with the natural beauty +of the spot, and give it life and voice. These ruins were a favourite +haunt of the poet.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">As I stood by yon roofless tower,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Where the wa’-flower scents the dewy air,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where th’ howlet mourns in her ivy bower<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And tells the midnight moon her care;<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The winds were laid, the air was still,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The Stars they shot along the sky;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The fox was howling on the hill,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And the distant echoing glens reply.<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_182" id="Page_182">[182]</a></span></div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The stream, adown its hazelly path,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Was rushing by the ruin’d wa’s,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Hasting to join the sweeping Nith,<a name="FNanchor_109A_109A" id="FNanchor_109A_109A"></a><a href="#Footnote_109A_109A" class="fnanchor">[109A]</a><br /></span> +<span class="i2">Whose distant roaring swells and fa’s.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The cauld blue north was streaming forth<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Her lights, wi’ hissing eerie din;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Athort the lift they start and shift,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Like fortune’s favours, tint as win.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">By heedless chance I turn’d mine eyes,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And, by the moon-beam, shook to see<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A stern and stalwart ghaist arise,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Attir’d as minstrels wont to be.<a name="FNanchor_109B_109B" id="FNanchor_109B_109B"></a><a href="#Footnote_109B_109B" class="fnanchor">[109B]</a><br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Had I a statue been o’ stane,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">His darin’ look had daunted me;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And on his bonnet grav’d was plain,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The sacred posy—‘Libertie!’<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">And frae his harp sic strains did flow,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Might rous’d the slumb’ring dead to hear;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But, oh! it was a tale of woe,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">As ever met a Briton’s ear.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">He sang wi’ joy the former day,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">He weeping wail’d his latter times;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But what he said it was nae play,—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I winna ventur’t in my rhymes.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_109A_109A" id="Footnote_109A_109A"></a><a href="#FNanchor_109A_109A"><span class="label">[109A]</span></a>VARIATIONS</p> +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">To join yon river on the Strath.</span></div></div></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_109B_109B" id="Footnote_109B_109B"></a><a href="#FNanchor_109B_109B"><span class="label">[109B]</span></a>VARIATIONS</p> + + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Now looking over firth and fauld,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Her horn the pale-fac’d Cynthia rear’d;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When, lo, in form of minstrel auld,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A storm and stalwart ghaist appear’d.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + +</div> +</div> + + + + + + +<h2><a name="CXXX" id="CXXX"></a>CXXX.</h2> + +<h4>TO</h4> +<h3>JOHN MAXWELL OF TERRAUGHTY,</h3> +<h5>ON HIS BIRTHDAY.</h5> +<p>[John Maxwell of Terraughty and Munshes, to whom these verses are +addressed, though descended from the Earls of Nithsdale, cared little +about lineage, and claimed merit only from a judgment sound and +clear—a knowledge of business which penetrated into all the concerns +of life, and a skill in handling the most difficult subjects, which +was considered unrivalled. Under an austere manner, he hid much +kindness of heart, and was in a fair way of doing an act of gentleness +when giving a refusal. He loved to meet Burns: not that he either +cared for or comprehended poetry; but he was pleased with his +knowledge of human nature, and with the keen and piercing remarks in +which he indulged. He was seventy-one years old when these verses were +written, and survived the poet twenty years.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Health to the Maxwell’s vet’ran chief!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Health, ay unsour’d by care or grief:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Inspir’d, I turn’d Fate’s sybil leaf<br /></span> +<span class="i8">This natal morn;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I see thy life is stuff o’ prief,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Scarce quite half worn.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">This day thou metes three score eleven,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And I can tell that bounteous Heaven<br /></span> +<span class="i0">(The second sight, ye ken, is given<br /></span> +<span class="i8">To ilka Poet)<br /></span> +<span class="i0">On thee a tack o’ seven times seven<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Will yet bestow it.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">If envious buckies view wi’ sorrow<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thy lengthen’d days on this blest morrow,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">May desolation’s lang teeth’d harrow,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Nine miles an hour,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Rake them like Sodom and Gomorrah,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">In brunstane stoure—<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But for thy friends, and they are mony,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Baith honest men and lasses bonnie,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">May couthie fortune, kind and cannie,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">In social glee,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wi’ mornings blythe and e’enings funny<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Bless them and thee!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Fareweel, auld birkie! Lord be near ye,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And then the Deil he daur na steer ye;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Your friends ay love, your faes ay fear ye;<br /></span> +<span class="i8">For me, shame fa’ me,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">If neist my heart I dinna wear ye<br /></span> +<span class="i8">While <span class="smcap">Burns</span> they ca’ me!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="blockquot"><i>Dumfries, 18 Feb. 1792.</i></p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CXXXI" id="CXXXI"></a>CXXXI.</h2> + +<h3>THE RIGHTS OF WOMAN.</h3> +<h5>AN OCCASIONAL ADDRESS SPOKEN BY MISS FONTENELLE</h5> +<h5>ON HER BENEFIT NIGHT,</h5> +<h5>Nov. 26, 1792.</h5> +<p>[Miss Fontenelle was one of the actresses whom Williamson, the +manager, brought for several seasons to Dumfries: she was young and +pretty, indulged in little levities of speech, and rumour added, +perhaps maliciously, levities of action. The Rights of Man had been +advocated by Paine, the Rights of Woman by Mary Wol<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_183" id="Page_183">[183]</a></span>stonecroft, and +nought was talked of, but the moral and political regeneration of the +world. The line</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“But truce with kings and truce with constitutions,”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>got an uncivil twist in recitation, from some of the audience. The +words were eagerly caught up, and had some hisses bestowed on them.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">While Europe’s eye is fix’d on mighty things,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The fate of empires and the fall of kings;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">While quacks of state must each produce his plan,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And even children lisp the Rights of Man;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Amid this mighty fuss just let me mention,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The Rights of Woman merit some attention.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">First on the sexes’ intermix’d connexion,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">One sacred Right of Woman is protection.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The tender flower that lifts its head, elate,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Helpless, must fall before the blasts of fate,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sunk on the earth, defac’d its lovely form,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Unless your shelter ward th’ impending storm.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Our second Right—but needless here is caution,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To keep that right inviolate’s the fashion,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Each man of sense has it so full before him,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He’d die before he’d wrong it—’tis decorum.—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">There was, indeed, in far less polish’d days,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A time, when rough, rude man had haughty ways;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Would swagger, swear, get drunk, kick up a riot,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Nay, even thus invade a lady’s quiet.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Now, thank our stars! these Gothic times are fled;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Now, well-bred men—and you are all well-bred—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Most justly think (and we are much the gainers)<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Such conduct neither spirit, wit, nor manners.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">For Right the third, our last, our best, our dearest,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That right to fluttering female hearts the nearest,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Which even the Rights of Kings in low prostration<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Most humbly own—’tis dear, dear admiration!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In that blest sphere alone we live and move;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">There taste that life of life—immortal love.—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Smiles, glances, sighs, tears, fits, flirtations, airs,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">‘Gainst such an host what flinty savage dares—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When awful Beauty joins with all her charms,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Who is so rash as rise in rebel arms?<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But truce with kings and truce with constitutions,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With bloody armaments and revolutions,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Let majesty your first attention summon,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ah! ça ira! the majesty of woman!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CXXXII" id="CXXXII"></a>CXXXII.</h2> + +<h3>MONODY,</h3> +<h5>ON A LADY FAMED FOR HER CAPRICE.</h5> +<p>[The heroine Of this rough lampoon was Mrs. Riddel of Woodleigh Park: +a lady young and gay, much of a wit, and something of a poetess, and +till the hour of his death the friend of Burns himself. She pulled his +displeasure on her, it is said, by smiling more sweetly than he liked +on some “epauletted coxcombs,” for so he sometimes designated +commissioned officers: the lady soon laughed him out of his mood. We +owe to her pen an account of her last interview with the poet, written +with great beauty and feeling.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">How cold is that bosom which folly once fired,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">How pale is that cheek where the rouge lately glisten’d!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">How silent that tongue which the echoes oft tired,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">How dull is that ear which to flattery so listen’d!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">If sorrow and anguish their exit await,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">From friendship and dearest affection remov’d;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">How doubly severer, Maria, thy fate,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Thou diest unwept as thou livedst unlov’d.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Loves, Graces, and Virtues, I call not on you;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">So shy, grave, and distant, ye shed not a tear:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But come, all ye offspring of Folly so true,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And flowers let us cull for Maria’s cold bier.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">We’ll search through the garden for each silly flower,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">We’ll roam through the forest for each idle weed;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But chiefly the nettle, so typical, shower,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For none e’er approach’d her but rued the rash deed.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">We’ll sculpture the marble, we’ll measure the lay;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Here Vanity strums on her idiot lyre;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">There keen indignation shall dart on her prey,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Which spurning Contempt shall redeem from his ire.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p class="std2">THE EPITAPH.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Here lies, now a prey to insulting neglect,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">What once was a butterfly, gay in life’s beam:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Want only of wisdom denied her respect,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Want only of goodness denied her esteem<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_184" id="Page_184">[184]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="CXXXIII" id="CXXXIII"></a>CXXXIII.</h2> + +<h4>EPISTLE</h4> +<h5>FROM</h5> +<h3>ESOPUS TO MARIA.</h3> +<p>[Williamson, the actor, Colonel Macdouall, Captain Gillespie, and Mrs. +Riddel, are the characters which pass over the stage in this strange +composition: it is printed from the Poet’s own manuscript, and seems a +sort of outpouring of wrath and contempt, on persons who, in his eyes, +gave themselves airs beyond their condition, or their merits. The +verse of the lady is held up to contempt and laughter: the satirist +celebrates her</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Motley foundling fancies, stolen or strayed;”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>and has a passing hit at her</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Still matchless tongue that conquers all reply.”]<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">From those drear solitudes and frowsy cells,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where infamy with sad repentance dwells;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where turnkeys make the jealous portal fast,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And deal from iron hands the spare repast;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where truant ‘prentices, yet young in sin,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Blush at the curious stranger peeping in;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where strumpets, relics of the drunken roar,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Resolve to drink, nay, half to whore, no more;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where tiny thieves not destin’d yet to swing,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Beat hemp for others, riper for the string:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">From these dire scenes my wretched lines I date,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To tell Maria her Esopus’ fate.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Alas! I feel I am no actor here!”<br /></span> +<span class="i0">’Tis real hangmen, real scourges bear!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Prepare, Maria, for a horrid tale<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Will turn thy very rouge to deadly pale;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Will make they hair, tho’ erst from gipsy polled,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">By barber woven, and by barber sold,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Though twisted smooth with Harry’s nicest care,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Like hoary bristles to erect and stare.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The hero of the mimic scene, no more<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I start in Hamlet, in Othello roar;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or haughty Chieftain, ‘mid the din of arms,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In Highland bonnet woo Malvina’s charms;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">While sans culottes stoop up the mountain high,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And steal from me Maria’s prying eye.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Blest Highland bonnet! Once my proudest dress,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Now prouder still, Maria’s temples press.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I see her wave thy towering plumes afar,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And call each coxcomb to the wordy war.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I see her face the first of Ireland’s sons,<a name="FNanchor_110_110" id="FNanchor_110_110"></a><a href="#Footnote_110_110" class="fnanchor">[110]</a><br /></span> +<span class="i0">And even out-Irish his Hibernian bronze;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The crafty colonel<a name="FNanchor_111_111" id="FNanchor_111_111"></a><a href="#Footnote_111_111" class="fnanchor">[111]</a> leaves the tartan’d lines,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For other wars, where he a hero shines;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The hopeful youth, in Scottish senate bred,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Who owns a Bushby’s heart without the head;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Comes, ‘mid a string of coxcombs to display<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That veni, vidi, vici, is his way;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The shrinking bard adown the alley skulks,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And dreads a meeting worse than Woolwich hulks;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Though there, his heresies in church and state<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Might well award him Muir and Palmer’s fate:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Still she undaunted reels and rattles on,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And dares the public like a noontide sun.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">(What scandal call’d Maria’s janty stagger<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The ricket reeling of a crooked swagger,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Whose spleen e’en worse than Burns’ venom when<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He dips in gall unmix’d his eager pen,—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And pours his vengeance in the burning line,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Who christen’d thus Maria’s lyre divine;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The idiot strum of vanity bemused,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And even th’ abuse of poesy abused!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Who call’d her verse, a parish workhouse made<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For motley foundling fancies, stolen or stray’d?)<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">A workhouse! ah, that sound awakes my woes,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And pillows on the thorn my rack’d repose!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In durance vile here must I wake and weep,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And all my frowsy couch in sorrow steep;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That straw where many a rogue has lain of yore,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And vermin’d gipsies litter’d heretofore.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Why, Lonsdale, thus thy wrath on vagrants pour?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Must earth no rascal save thyself endure?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Must thou alone in guilt immortal swell,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And make a vast monopoly of hell?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thou know’st, the virtues cannot hate thee worse,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The vices also, must they club their curse?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or must no tiny sin to others fall,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Because thy guilt’s supreme enough for all?<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Maria, send me too thy griefs and cares;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In all of thee sure thy Esopus shares.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As thou at all mankind the flag unfurls,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Who on my fair one satire’s vengeance hurls?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Who calls thee, pert, affected, vain coquette,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A wit in folly, and a fool in wit?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Who says, that fool alone is not thy due,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And quotes thy treacheries to prove it true?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Our force united on thy foes we’ll turn,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And dare the war with all of woman born:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For who can write and speak as thou and I?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My periods that deciphering defy,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And thy still matchless tongue that conquers all reply.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + + + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_110_110" id="Footnote_110_110"></a><a href="#FNanchor_110_110"><span class="label">[110]</span></a> Captain Gillespie.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_111_111" id="Footnote_111_111"></a><a href="#FNanchor_111_111"><span class="label">[111]</span></a> Col. Macdouall.</p></div> +</div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_185" id="Page_185">[185]</a></span></p> + +<h2><a name="CXXXIV" id="CXXXIV"></a>CXXXIV.</h2> + +<h4>POEM</h4> +<h3>ON PASTORAL POETRY.</h3> +<p>[Though Gilbert Burns says there is some doubt of this Poem being by +his brother, and though Robert Chambers declares that he “has scarcely +a doubt that it is not by the Ayrshire Bard,” I must print it as his, +for I have no doubt on the subject. It was found among the papers of +the poet, in his own handwriting: the second, the fourth, and the +concluding verses bear the Burns’ stamp, which no one has been +successful in counterfeiting: they resemble the verses of Beattie, to +which Chambers has compared them, as little as the cry of the eagle +resembles the chirp of the wren.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Hail Poesie! thou Nymph reserv’d!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In chase o’ thee, what crowds hae swerv’d<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Frae common sense, or sunk enerv’d<br /></span> +<span class="i8">‘Mang heaps o’ clavers;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And och! o’er aft thy joes hae starv’d<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Mid a’ thy favours!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Say, Lassie, why thy train amang,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">While loud the trump’s heroic clang,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And sock or buskin skelp alang,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">To death or marriage;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Scarce ane has tried the shepherd-sang<br /></span> +<span class="i8">But wi’ miscarriage?<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">In Homer’s craft Jock Milton thrives;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Eschylus’ pen Will Shakspeare drives;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wee Pope, the knurlin, ’till him rives<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Horatian fame;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In thy sweet sang, Barbauld, survives<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Even Sappho’s flame.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But thee, Theocritus, wha matches?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">They’re no herd’s ballats, Maro’s catches;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Squire Pope but busks his skinklin patches<br /></span> +<span class="i8">O’ heathen tatters;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I pass by hunders, nameless wretches,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">That ape their betters.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">In this braw age o’ wit and lear,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Will nane the Shepherd’s whistle mair<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Blaw sweetly in its native air<br /></span> +<span class="i8">And rural grace;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And wi’ the far-fam’d Grecian share<br /></span> +<span class="i8">A rival place?<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Yes! there is ane; a Scottish callan—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">There’s ane; come forrit, honest Allan!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thou need na jouk behint the hallan,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">A chiel sae clever;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The teeth o’ time may gnaw Tantallan,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">But thou’s for ever!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Thou paints auld nature to the nines,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In thy sweet Caledonian lines;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Nae gowden stream thro’ myrtles twines,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Where Philomel,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">While nightly breezes sweep the vines,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Her griefs will tell!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">In gowany glens thy burnie strays,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where bonnie lasses bleach their claes;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or trots by hazelly shaws and braes,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Wi’ hawthorns gray,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where blackbirds join the shepherd’s lays<br /></span> +<span class="i8">At close o’ day.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Thy rural loves are nature’s sel’;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Nae bombast spates o’ nonsense swell;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Nae snap conceits, but that sweet spell<br /></span> +<span class="i8">O’ witchin’ love;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That charm that can the strongest quell,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">The sternest move.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CXXXV" id="CXXXV"></a>CXXXV.</h2> + +<h3>SONNET,</h3> +<h5>WRITTEN ON THE TWENTY-FIFTH OF JANUARY, 1793,</h5> +<h5>THE BIRTHDAY OF THE AUTHOR, ON HEARING A</h5> +<h5>THRUSH SING IN A MORNING WALK.</h5> +<p>[Burns was fond of a saunter in a leafless wood, when the winter storm +howled among the branches. These characteristic lines were composed on +the morning of his birthday, with the Nith at his feet, and the ruins +of Lincluden at his side: he is willing to accept the unlooked-for +song of the thrush as a fortunate omen.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Sing on, sweet thrush, upon the leafless bough,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Sing on, sweet bird, I listen to thy strain:<br /></span> +<span class="i2">See, aged Winter, ‘mid his surly reign,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">At thy blythe carol clears his furrow’d brow.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">So, in lone Poverty’s dominion drear,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Sits meek Content with light unanxious heart,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Welcomes the rapid moments, bids them part,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Nor asks if they bring aught to hope or fear.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I thank Thee, Author of this opening day!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Thou whose bright sun now gilds yon orient skies!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Riches denied, Thy boon was purer joys,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">What wealth could never give nor take away.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Yet come, thou child of poverty and care,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The mite high Heaven bestow’d, that mite with thee I’ll share.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_186" id="Page_186">[186]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="CXXXVI" id="CXXXVI"></a>CXXXVI.</h2> + +<h4>SONNET,</h4> +<h5>ON THE</h5> +<h3>DEATH OF ROBERT RIDDEL, ESQ.</h3> +<h5>OF GLENRIDDEL,</h5> +<h5><span class="smcap">April, 1794.</span></h5> +<p>[The death of Glencairn, who was his patron, and the death of +Glenriddel, who was his friend, and had, while he lived at Ellisland, +been his neighbor, weighed hard on the mind of Burns, who, about this +time, began to regard his own future fortune with more of dismay than +of hope. Riddel united antiquarian pursuits with those of literature, +and experienced all the vulgar prejudices entertained by the peasantry +against those who indulge in such researches. His collection of what +the rustics of the vale called “queer quairns and swine-troughs,” is +now scattered or neglected: I have heard a competent judge say, that +they threw light on both the public and domestic history of Scotland.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">No more, ye warblers of the wood—no more!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Nor pour your descant, grating, on my soul;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Thou young-eyed Spring, gay in thy verdant stole,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">More welcome were to me grim Winter’s wildest roar.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">How can ye charm, ye flow’rs, with all your dyes?<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Ye blow upon the sod that wraps my friend:<br /></span> +<span class="i2">How can I to the tuneful strain attend?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That strain flows round th’ untimely tomb where Riddel lies.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Yes, pour, ye warblers, pour the notes of woe!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And soothe the Virtues weeping on this bier:<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The Man of Worth, who has not left his peer,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Is in his “narrow house” for ever darkly low.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Thee, Spring, again with joy shall others greet,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Me, mem’ry of my loss will only meet.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CXXXVII" id="CXXXVII"></a>CXXXVII.</h2> + +<h4>IMPROMPTU,</h4> +<h3>ON MRS. R——’S BIRTHDAY.</h3> +<p>[By compliments such as these lines contain, Burns soothed the smart +which his verses “On a lady famed for her caprice” inflicted on the +accomplished Mrs. Riddel.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Old Winter, with his frosty beard,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thus once to Jove his prayer preferr’d,—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">What have I done of all the year,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To bear this hated doom severe?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My cheerless suns no pleasure know;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Night’s horrid car drags, dreary, slow:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My dismal months no joys are crowning,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But spleeny English, hanging, drowning.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Now, Jove, for once be mighty civil,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To counterbalance all this evil;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Give me, and I’ve no more to say,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Give me Maria’s natal day!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That brilliant gift shall so enrich me,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Spring, Summer, Autumn, cannot match me;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">’Tis done! says Jove; so ends my story,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And Winter once rejoiced in glory.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CXXXVIII" id="CXXXVIII"></a>CXXXVIII.</h2> + +<h3>LIBERTY.</h3> +<h4>A FRAGMENT.</h4> +<p>[Fragment of verse were numerous, Dr. Currie said, among the loose +papers of the poet. These lines formed the commencement of an ode +commemorating the achievement of liberty for America under the +directing genius of Washington and Franklin.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Thee, Caledonia, thy wild heaths among,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thee, fam’d for martial deed and sacred song,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To thee I turn with swimming eyes;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where is that soul of freedom fled?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Immingled with the mighty dead!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Beneath the hallow’d turf where Wallace lies!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Hear it not, Wallace, in thy bed of death!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Ye babbling winds, in silence sweep;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Disturb not ye the hero’s sleep,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Nor give the coward secret breath.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Is this the power in freedom’s war,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That wont to bid the battle rage?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Behold that eye which shot immortal hate,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Crushing the despot’s proudest bearing!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CXXXIX" id="CXXXIX"></a>CXXXIX.</h2> + +<h4>VERSES</h4> +<h3>TO A YOUNG LADY.</h3> +<p>[This young lady was the daughter of the poet’s friend, Graham of +Fintray; and the gift alluded to was a<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_187" id="Page_187">[187]</a></span> copy of George Thomson’s +Select Scottish Songs: a work which owes many attractions to the lyric +genius of Burns.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Here, where the Scottish muse immortal lives,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In sacred strains and tuneful numbers join’d,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Accept the gift;—tho’ humble he who gives,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Rich is the tribute of the grateful mind.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">So may no ruffian feeling in thy breast,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Discordant jar thy bosom-chords among;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But peace attune thy gentle soul to rest,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Or love ecstatic wake his seraph song.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Or pity’s notes in luxury of tears,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">As modest want the tale of woe reveals;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">While conscious virtue all the strain endears,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And heaven-born piety her sanction seals.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CXL" id="CXL"></a>CXL.</h2> + +<h3>THE VOWELS.</h3> +<h5>A TALE.</h5> +<p>[Burns admired genius adorned by learning; but mere learning without +genius he always regarded as pedantry. Those critics who scrupled too +much about words he called eunuchs of literature, and to one, who +taxed him with writing obscure language in questionable grammar, he +said, “Thou art but a Gretna-green match-maker between vowels and +consonants!”]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">’Twas where the birch and sounding thong are ply’d,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The noisy domicile of pedant pride;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where ignorance her darkening vapour throws,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And cruelty directs the thickening blows;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">upon a time, Sir Abece the great,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In all his pedagogic powers elate,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">His awful chair of state resolves to mount,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And call the trembling vowels to account.—<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">First enter’d A, a grave, broad, solemn wight,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But, ah! deform’d, dishonest to the sight!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">His twisted head look’d backward on the way,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And flagrant from the scourge he grunted, <i>ai!</i><br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Reluctant, E stalk’d in; with piteous race<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The justling tears ran down his honest face!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That name! that well-worn name, and all his own,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Pale he surrenders at the tyrant’s throne!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The pedant stifles keen the Roman sound<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Not all his mongrel diphthongs can compound;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And next the title following close behind,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He to the nameless, ghastly wretch assign’d.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The cobweb’d gothic dome resounded Y!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In sullen vengeance, I, disdain’d reply:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The pedant swung his felon cudgel round,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And knock’d the groaning vowel to the ground!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">In rueful apprehension enter’d O,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The wailing minstrel of despairing woe;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Th’ Inquisitor of Spain the most expert<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Might there have learnt new mysteries of his art;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">So grim, deform’d, with horrors entering U,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">His dearest friend and brother scarcely knew!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">As trembling U stood staring all aghast,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The pedant in his left hand clutched him fast,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In helpless infants’ tears he dipp’d his right,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Baptiz’d him <i>eu</i>, and kick’d him from his sight.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CXLI" id="CXLI"></a>CXLI.</h2> + +<h4>VERSES</h4> +<h3>TO JOHN RANKINE.</h3> +<p>[With the “rough, rude, ready-witted Rankine,” of Adamhill, in +Ayrshire, Burns kept up a will o’-wispish sort of a correspondence in +rhyme, till the day of his death: these communications, of which this +is one, were sometimes graceless, but always witty. It is supposed, +that those lines were suggested by Falstaff’s account of his ragged +recruits:—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“I’ll not march through Coventry with them, that’s flat!”]<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Ae day, as Death, that grusome carl,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Was driving to the tither warl’<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A mixtie-maxtie motley squad,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And mony a guilt-bespotted lad;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Black gowns of each denomination,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And thieves of every rank and station,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">From him that wears the star and garter,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To him that wintles in a halter:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Asham’d himsel’ to see the wretches,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He mutters, glowrin’ at the bitches,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">“By G—d, I’ll not be seen behint them,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Nor ‘mang the sp’ritual core present them,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Without, at least, ae honest man,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To grace this d—d infernal clan.”<br /></span> +<span class="i0">By Adamhill a glance he threw,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">“L—d G—d!” quoth he, “I have it now,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">There’s just the man I want, i’ faith!”<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And quickly stoppit Rankine’s breath.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_188" id="Page_188">[188]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="CXLII" id="CXLII"></a>CXLII.</h2> + +<h3>ON SENSIBILITY.</h3> +<h5>TO</h5> +<h5>MY DEAR AND MUCH HONOURED FRIEND, MRS. DUNLOP,</h5> +<h5>OF DUNLOP.</h5> +<p>[These verses were occasioned, it is said, by some sentiments +contained in a communication from Mrs. Dunlop. That excellent lady was +sorely tried with domestic afflictions for a time, and to these he +appears to allude; but he deadened the effect of his sympathy, when he +printed the stanzas in the Museum, changing the fourth line to,</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Dearest Nancy, thou canst tell!”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>and so transferring the whole to another heroine.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Sensibility how charming,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Thou, my friend, canst truly tell:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But distress with horrors arming,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Thou host also known too well.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Fairest flower, behold the lily,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Blooming in the sunny ray:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Let the blast sweep o’er the valley,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">See it prostrate on the clay.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Hear the woodlark charm the forest,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Telling o’er his little joys:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Hapless bird! a prey the surest,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To each pirate of the skies.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Dearly bought, the hidden treasure,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Finer feeling can bestow;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Chords that vibrate sweetest pleasure,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Thrill the deepest notes of woe.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CXLIII" id="CXLIII"></a>CXLIII.</h2> + +<h3>LINES,</h3> +<h5>SENT TO A GENTLEMAN WHOM HE HAD</h5> +<h5>OFFENDED.</h5> +<p>[The too hospitable board of Mrs. Riddel occasioned these repentant +strains: they were accepted as they were meant by the party. The poet +had, it seems, not only spoken of mere titles and rank with +disrespect, but had allowed his tongue unbridled license of speech, on +the claim of political importance, and domestic equality, which Mary +Wolstonecroft and her followers patronized, at which Mrs. Riddel +affected to be grievously offended.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The friend whom wild from wisdom’s way,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The fumes of wine infuriate send;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">(Not moony madness more astray;)<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Who but deplores that hapless friend?<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Mine was th’ insensate frenzied part,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Ah, why should I such scenes outlive<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Scenes so abhorrent to my heart!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">’Tis thine to pity and forgive.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CXLIV" id="CXLIV"></a>CXLIV.</h2> + +<h3>ADDRESS,</h3> +<h5>SPOKEN BY MISS FONTENELLE ON HER BENEFIT<br /> + + + NIGHT.</h5> +<p>[This address was spoken by Miss Fontenelle, at the Dumfries theatre, +on the 4th of December, 1795.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Still anxious to secure your partial favour,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And not less anxious, sure, this night than ever,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A Prologue, Epilogue, or some such matter,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">’Twould vamp my bill, said I, if nothing better;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">So sought a Poet, roosted near the skies,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Told him I came to feast my curious eyes;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Said nothing like his works was ever printed;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And last, my Prologue-business slyly hinted!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">“Ma’am, let me tell you,” quoth my man of rhymes,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">“I know your bent—these are no laughing times:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Can you—but, Miss, I own I have my fears,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Dissolve in pause—and sentimental tears;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With laden sighs, and solemn-rounded sentence,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Rouse from his sluggish slumbers, fell Repentance;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Paint Vengeance as he takes his horrid stand,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Waving on high the desolating brand,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Calling the storms to bear him o’er a guilty land?”<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I could no more—askance the creature eyeing,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">D’ye think, said I, this face was made for crying?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I’ll laugh, that’s poz—nay more, the world shall know it;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And so your servant: gloomy Master Poet!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Firm as my creed, Sirs, ’tis my fix’d belief,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That Misery’s another word for Grief;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I also think—so may I be a bride!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That so much laughter, so much life enjoy’d.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Thou man of crazy care and ceaseless sigh,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Still under bleak Misfortune’s blasting eye;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Doom’d to that sorest task of man alive—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To make three guineas do the work of five:<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_189" id="Page_189">[189]</a></span><span class="i0">Laugh in Misfortune’s face—the beldam witch!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Say, you’ll be merry, tho’ you can’t be rich.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Thou other man of care, the wretch in love,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Who long with jiltish arts and airs hast strove;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Who, us the boughs all temptingly project,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Measur’st in desperate thought—a rope—thy neck—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or, where the beetling cliff o’erhangs the deep,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Peerest to meditate the healing leap:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Would’st thou be cur’d, thou silly, moping elf?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Laugh at their follies—laugh e’en at thyself:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Learn to despise those frowns now so terrific,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And love a kinder—that’s your grand specific.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">To sum up all, be merry, I advise;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And as we’re merry, may we still be wise.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CXLV" id="CXLV"></a>CXLV.</h2> + +<h4>ON</h4> +<h3>SEEING MISS FONTENELLE</h3> +<h5>IN A FAVOURITE CHARACTER.</h5> +<p>[The good looks and the natural acting of Miss Fontenelle pleased +others as well as Burns. I know not to what character in the range of +her personations he alludes: she was a favourite on the Dumfries +boards.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Sweet naiveté of feature,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Simple, wild, enchanting elf,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Not to thee, but thanks to nature,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Thou art acting but thyself.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Wert thou awkward, stiff, affected,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Spurning nature, torturing art;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Loves and graces all rejected,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Then indeed thou’dst act a part.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="sig1">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CXLVI" id="CXLVI"></a>CXLVI.</h2> + +<h3>TO CHLORIS.</h3> +<p>[Chloris was a Nithsdale beauty. Love and sorrow were strongly mingled +in her early history: that she did not look so lovely in other eyes as +she did in those of Burns is well known: but he had much of the taste +of an artist, and admired the elegance of her form, and the harmony of +her motion, as much as he did her blooming face and sweet voice.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">’Tis Friendship’s pledge, my young, fair friend,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Nor thou the gift refuse,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Nor with unwilling ear attend<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The moralizing muse.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Since thou in all thy youth and charms,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Must bid the world adieu,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">(A world ‘gainst peace in constant arms)<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To join the friendly few.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Since, thy gay morn of life o’ercast,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Chill came the tempest’s lower;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">(And ne’er misfortune’s eastern blast<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Did nip a fairer flower.)<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Since life’s gay scenes must charm no more,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Still much is left behind;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Still nobler wealth hast thou in store—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The comforts of the mind!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Thine is the self-approving glow,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">On conscious honour’s part;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And, dearest gift of heaven below,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Thine friendship’s truest heart.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The joys refin’d of sense and taste,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">With every muse to rove:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And doubly were the poet blest,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">These joys could he improve.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CXLVII" id="CXLVII"></a>CXLVII.</h2> + +<h3>POETICAL INSCRIPTION</h3> +<h4>FOR AN ALTAR TO INDEPENDENCE.</h4> +<p>[It was the fashion of the feverish times of the French Revolution to +plant trees of Liberty, and raise altars to Independence. Heron of +Kerroughtree, a gentleman widely esteemed in Galloway, was about to +engage in an election contest, and these noble lines served the +purpose of announcing the candidate’s sentiments on freedom.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Thou of an independent mind,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With soul resolv’d, with soul resign’d;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Prepar’d Power’s proudest frown to brave,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Who wilt not be, nor have a slave;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Virtue alone who dost revere,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thy own reproach alone dost fear,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Approach this shrine, and worship here.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_190" id="Page_190">[190]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="CXLVIII" id="CXLVIII"></a>CXLVIII.</h2> + +<h3>THE HERON BALLADS.</h3> +<p class="std1">[BALLAD FIRST.]</p> + +<p>[This is the first of several party ballads which Burns wrote to serve +Patrick Heron, of Kerroughtree, in two elections for the Stewartry of +Kirkcudbright, in which he was opposed, first, by Gordon of Balmaghie, +and secondly, by the Hon. Montgomery Stewart. There is a personal +bitterness in these lampoons, which did not mingle with the strains in +which the poet recorded the contest between Miller and Johnstone. They +are printed here as matters of poetry, and I feel sure that none will +be displeased, and some will smile.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Whom will you send to London town,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To Parliament and a’ that?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or wha in a’ the country round<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The best deserves to fa’ that?<br /></span> +<span class="i6">For a’ that, and a’ that;<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Thro Galloway and a’ that;<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Where is the laird or belted knight<br /></span> +<span class="i6">That best deserves to fa’ that?<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Wha sees Kerroughtree’s open yett,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And wha is’t never saw that?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wha ever wi’ Kerroughtree meets<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And has a doubt of a’ that?<br /></span> +<span class="i6">For a’ that, and a’ that,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Here’s Heron yet for a’ that,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">The independent patriot,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">The honest man, an’ a’ that.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Tho’ wit and worth in either sex,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">St. Mary’s Isle can shaw that;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wi’ dukes and lords let Selkirk mix,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And weel does Selkirk fa’ that.<br /></span> +<span class="i6">For a’ that, and a’ that,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Here’s Heron yet for a’ that!<br /></span> +<span class="i6">The independent commoner<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Shall be the man for a’ that.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But why should we to nobles jouk,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And it’s against the law that;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For why, a lord may be a gouk,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Wi’ ribbon, star, an’ a’ that.<br /></span> +<span class="i6">For a’ that, an’ a’ that,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Here’s Heron yet for a’ that!<br /></span> +<span class="i6">A lord may be a lousy loun,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Wi’ ribbon, star, an’ a’ that.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">V.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">A beardless boy comes o’er the hills,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Wi’ uncle’s purse an’ a’ that;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But we’ll hae ane frae ‘mang oursels,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A man we ken, an’ a’ that.<br /></span> +<span class="i6">For a’ that, an’ a’ that,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Here’s Heron yet for a’ that!<br /></span> +<span class="i6">For we’re not to be bought an’ sold<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Like naigs, an’ nowt, an’ a’ that.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">VI.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Then let us drink the Stewartry,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Kerroughtree’s laird, an’ a’ that,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Our representative to be,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For weel he’s worthy a’ that.<br /></span> +<span class="i6">For a’ that, an’ a’ that,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Here’s Heron yet for a’ that,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">A House of Commons such as he,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">They would be blest that saw that.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CXLIX" id="CXLIX"></a>CXLIX.</h2> + +<h3>THE HERON BALLADS.</h3> +<p class="std1">[BALLAD SECOND.]</p> + +<p>[In this ballad the poet gathers together, after the manner of “Fy! +let us a’ to the bridal,” all the leading electors of the Stewartry, +who befriended Heron, or opposed him; and draws their portraits in the +colours of light or darkness, according to the complexion of their +politics. He is too severe in most instances, and in some he is +venomous. On the Earl of Galloway’s family, and on the Murrays of +Broughton and Caillie, as well as on Bushby of Tinwaldowns, he pours +his hottest satire. But words which are unjust, or undeserved, fall +off their victims like rain-drops from a wild-duck’s wing. The Murrays +of Broughton and Caillie have long borne, from the vulgar, the stigma +of treachery to the cause of Prince Charles Stewart: from such infamy +the family is wholly free: the traitor, Murray, was of a race now +extinct; and while he was betraying the cause in which so much noble +and gallant blood was shed, Murray of Broughton and Caillie was +performing the duties of an honourable and loyal man: he was, like his +great-grandson now, representing his native district in parliament.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">THE ELECTION.</p> + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Fy, let us a’ to Kirkcudbright,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For there will be bickerin’ there;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For Murray’s<a name="FNanchor_112_112" id="FNanchor_112_112"></a><a href="#Footnote_112_112" class="fnanchor">[112]</a> light horse are to muster,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And O, how the heroes will swear!<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_191" id="Page_191">[191]</a></span><span class="i0">An’ there will be Murray commander,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And Gordon<a name="FNanchor_113_113" id="FNanchor_113_113"></a><a href="#Footnote_113_113" class="fnanchor">[113]</a> the battle to win;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Like brothers they’ll stand by each other,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Sae knit in alliance an’ kin.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">An’ there will be black-lippit Johnnie,<a name="FNanchor_114_114" id="FNanchor_114_114"></a><a href="#Footnote_114_114" class="fnanchor">[114]</a><br /></span> +<span class="i2">The tongue o’ the trump to them a’;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And he get na hell for his haddin’<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The deil gets na justice ava’;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And there will Kempleton’s birkie,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A boy no sae black at the bane,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But, as for his fine nabob fortune,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">We’ll e’en let the subject alane.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">An’ there will be Wigton’s new sheriff,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Dame Justice fu’ brawlie has sped,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">She’s gotten the heart of a Bushby,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But, Lord, what’s become o’ the head?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ there will be Cardoness,<a name="FNanchor_115_115" id="FNanchor_115_115"></a><a href="#Footnote_115_115" class="fnanchor">[115]</a> Esquire,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Sae mighty in Cardoness’ eyes;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A wight that will weather damnation,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For the devil the prey will despise.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">An’ there will be Douglasses<a name="FNanchor_116_116" id="FNanchor_116_116"></a><a href="#Footnote_116_116" class="fnanchor">[116]</a> doughty,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">New christ’ning towns far and near;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Abjuring their democrat doings,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">By kissing the —— o’ a peer;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ there will be Kenmure<a name="FNanchor_117_117" id="FNanchor_117_117"></a><a href="#Footnote_117_117" class="fnanchor">[117]</a> sae gen’rous,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Whose honour is proof to the storm,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To save them from stark reprobation,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">He lent them his name to the firm.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">V.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But we winna mention Redcastle,<a name="FNanchor_118_118" id="FNanchor_118_118"></a><a href="#Footnote_118_118" class="fnanchor">[118]</a><br /></span> +<span class="i2">The body, e’en let him escape!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He’d venture the gallows for siller,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’ ’twere na the cost o’ the rape.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ where is our king’s lord lieutenant,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Sae fam’d for his gratefu’ return?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The billie is gettin’ his questions,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To say in St. Stephen’s the morn.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">VI.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">An’ there will be lads o’ the gospel,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Muirhead,<a name="FNanchor_119_119" id="FNanchor_119_119"></a><a href="#Footnote_119_119" class="fnanchor">[119]</a> wha’s as gude as he’s true;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ there will be Buittle’s<a name="FNanchor_120_120" id="FNanchor_120_120"></a><a href="#Footnote_120_120" class="fnanchor">[120]</a> apostle,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Wha’s more o’ the black than the blue;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ there will be folk from St. Mary’s,<a name="FNanchor_121_121" id="FNanchor_121_121"></a><a href="#Footnote_121_121" class="fnanchor">[121]</a><br /></span> +<span class="i2">A house o’ great merit and note,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The deil ane but honours them highly,—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The deil ane will gie them his vote!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">VII.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">An’ there will be wealthy young Richard,<a name="FNanchor_122_122" id="FNanchor_122_122"></a><a href="#Footnote_122_122" class="fnanchor">[122]</a><br /></span> +<span class="i2">Dame Fortune should hing by the neck;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For prodigal, thriftless, bestowing,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">His merit had won him respect:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ there will be rich brother nabobs,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Tho’ nabobs, yet men of the first,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ there will be Collieston’s<a name="FNanchor_123_123" id="FNanchor_123_123"></a><a href="#Footnote_123_123" class="fnanchor">[123]</a> whiskers,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’ Quintin, o’ lads not the worst.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">VIII.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">An’ there will be stamp-office Johnnie,<a name="FNanchor_124_124" id="FNanchor_124_124"></a><a href="#Footnote_124_124" class="fnanchor">[124]</a><br /></span> +<span class="i2">Tak’ tent how ye purchase a dram;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ there will be gay Cassencarrie,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’ there will be gleg Colonel Tam;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ there will be trusty Kerroughtree,<a name="FNanchor_125_125" id="FNanchor_125_125"></a><a href="#Footnote_125_125" class="fnanchor">[125]</a><br /></span> +<span class="i2">Whose honour was ever his law,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">If the virtues were pack’d in a parcel,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">His worth might be sample for a’.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IX.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">An’ can we forget the auld major,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Wha’ll ne’er be forgot in the Greys,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Our flatt’ry we’ll keep for some other,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Him only ’tis justice to praise.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ there will be maiden Kilkerran,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And also Barskimming’s gude knight,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ there will be roarin’ Birtwhistle,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Wha luckily roars in the right.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">X.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">An’ there, frae the Niddisdale borders,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Will mingle the Maxwells in droves;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Teugh Johnnie, staunch Geordie, an’ Walie,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That griens for the fishes an’ loaves;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ there will be Logan Mac Douall,<a name="FNanchor_126_126" id="FNanchor_126_126"></a><a href="#Footnote_126_126" class="fnanchor">[126]</a><br /></span> +<span class="i2">Sculdudd’ry an’ he will be there,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ also the wild Scot of Galloway,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Sodgerin’, gunpowder Blair.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_192" id="Page_192">[192]</a></span></p><p class="std2">XI.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Then hey the chaste interest o’ Broughton,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’ hey for the blessings ’twill bring?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">It may send Balmaghie to the Commons,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In Sodom ’twould make him a king;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ hey for the sanctified M——y,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Our land who wi’ chapels has stor’d;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He founder’d his horse among harlots,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But gied the auld naig to the Lord.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_112_112" id="Footnote_112_112"></a><a href="#FNanchor_112_112"><span class="label">[112]</span></a> Murray, of Broughton and Caillie.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_113_113" id="Footnote_113_113"></a><a href="#FNanchor_113_113"><span class="label">[113]</span></a> Gordon of Balmaghie.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_114_114" id="Footnote_114_114"></a><a href="#FNanchor_114_114"><span class="label">[114]</span></a> Bushby, of Tinwald-Downs.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_115_115" id="Footnote_115_115"></a><a href="#FNanchor_115_115"><span class="label">[115]</span></a> Maxwell, of Cardoness.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_116_116" id="Footnote_116_116"></a><a href="#FNanchor_116_116"><span class="label">[116]</span></a> The Douglasses, of Orchardtown and Castle-Douglas.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_117_117" id="Footnote_117_117"></a><a href="#FNanchor_117_117"><span class="label">[117]</span></a> Gordon, afterwards Viscount Kenmore.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_118_118" id="Footnote_118_118"></a><a href="#FNanchor_118_118"><span class="label">[118]</span></a> Laurie, of Redcastle.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_119_119" id="Footnote_119_119"></a><a href="#FNanchor_119_119"><span class="label">[119]</span></a> Morehead, Minister of Urr.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_120_120" id="Footnote_120_120"></a><a href="#FNanchor_120_120"><span class="label">[120]</span></a> The Minister of Buittle.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_121_121" id="Footnote_121_121"></a><a href="#FNanchor_121_121"><span class="label">[121]</span></a> Earl of Selkirk’s family.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_122_122" id="Footnote_122_122"></a><a href="#FNanchor_122_122"><span class="label">[122]</span></a> Oswald, of Auchuncruive.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_123_123" id="Footnote_123_123"></a><a href="#FNanchor_123_123"><span class="label">[123]</span></a> Copland, of Collieston and Blackwood.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_124_124" id="Footnote_124_124"></a><a href="#FNanchor_124_124"><span class="label">[124]</span></a> John Syme, of the Stamp-office.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_125_125" id="Footnote_125_125"></a><a href="#FNanchor_125_125"><span class="label">[125]</span></a> Heron, of Kerroughtree.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_126_126" id="Footnote_126_126"></a><a href="#FNanchor_126_126"><span class="label">[126]</span></a> Colonel Macdouall, of Logan.</p></div> +</div> + + + +<h2><a name="CL" id="CL"></a>CL.</h2> + +<h3>THE HERON BALLADS.</h3> +<p class="std1">[BALLAD THIRD.]</p> + +<p>[This third and last ballad was written on the contest between Heron +and Stewart, which followed close on that with Gordon. Heron carried +the election, but was unseated by the decision of a Committee of the +House of Commons: a decision which it is said he took so much to heart +that it affected his health, and shortened his life.]</p> + +<h4>AN EXCELLENT NEW SONG.</h4> +<p class="std1">Tune.—“<i>Buy broom besoms.</i>”</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Wha will buy my troggin,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Fine election ware;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Broken trade o’ Broughton,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A’ in high repair.<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Buy braw troggin,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Frae the banks o’ Dee;<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Wha wants troggin<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Let him come to me.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">There’s a noble Earl’s<a name="FNanchor_127_127" id="FNanchor_127_127"></a><a href="#Footnote_127_127" class="fnanchor">[127]</a><br /></span> +<span class="i2">Fame and high renown<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For an auld sang—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">It’s thought the gudes were stown.<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Buy braw troggin, &c.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Here’s the worth o’ Broughton<a name="FNanchor_128_128" id="FNanchor_128_128"></a><a href="#Footnote_128_128" class="fnanchor">[128]</a><br /></span> +<span class="i2">In a needle’s ee;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Here’s a reputation<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Tint by Balmaghie.<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Buy braw troggin, &c.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Here’s an honest conscience<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Might a prince adorn;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Frae the downs o’ Tinwald—<a name="FNanchor_129_129" id="FNanchor_129_129"></a><a href="#Footnote_129_129" class="fnanchor">[129]</a><br /></span> +<span class="i2">So was never worn.<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Buy braw troggin, &c.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Here’s its stuff and lining,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Cardoness’<a name="FNanchor_130_130" id="FNanchor_130_130"></a><a href="#Footnote_130_130" class="fnanchor">[130]</a> head;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Fine for a sodger<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A’ the wale o’ lead.<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Buy braw troggin, &c.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Here’s a little wadset<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Buittle’s<a name="FNanchor_131_131" id="FNanchor_131_131"></a><a href="#Footnote_131_131" class="fnanchor">[131]</a> scrap o’ truth,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Pawn’d in a gin-shop<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Quenching holy drouth.<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Buy braw troggin, &c.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Here’s armorial bearings<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Frae the manse o’ Urr;<a name="FNanchor_132_132" id="FNanchor_132_132"></a><a href="#Footnote_132_132" class="fnanchor">[132]</a><br /></span> +<span class="i0">The crest, an auld crab-apple<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Rotten at the core.<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Buy braw troggin, &c.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Here is Satan’s picture,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Like a bizzard gled,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Pouncing poor Redcastle,<a name="FNanchor_133_133" id="FNanchor_133_133"></a><a href="#Footnote_133_133" class="fnanchor">[133]</a><br /></span> +<span class="i2">Sprawlin’ as a taed.<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Buy braw troggin, &c.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Here’s the worth and wisdom<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Collieston<a name="FNanchor_134_134" id="FNanchor_134_134"></a><a href="#Footnote_134_134" class="fnanchor">[134]</a> can boast;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">By a thievish midge<br /></span> +<span class="i2">They had been nearly lost.<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Buy braw troggin, &c.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Here is Murray’s fragments<br /></span> +<span class="i2">O’ the ten commands;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Gifted by black Jock<a name="FNanchor_135_135" id="FNanchor_135_135"></a><a href="#Footnote_135_135" class="fnanchor">[135]</a><br /></span> +<span class="i2">To get them aff his hands.<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Buy braw troggin, &c.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Saw ye e’er sic troggin?<br /></span> +<span class="i2">If to buy ye’re slack,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Hornie’s turnin’ chapman,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">He’ll buy a’ the pack.<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Buy braw troggin,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Frae the banks o’ Dee;<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Wha wants troggin<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Let him come to me.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_127_127" id="Footnote_127_127"></a><a href="#FNanchor_127_127"><span class="label">[127]</span></a> The Earl of Galloway.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_128_128" id="Footnote_128_128"></a><a href="#FNanchor_128_128"><span class="label">[128]</span></a> Murray, of Broughton and Caillie.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_129_129" id="Footnote_129_129"></a><a href="#FNanchor_129_129"><span class="label">[129]</span></a> Bushby, of Tinwald-downs.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_130_130" id="Footnote_130_130"></a><a href="#FNanchor_130_130"><span class="label">[130]</span></a> Maxwell, of Cardoness.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_131_131" id="Footnote_131_131"></a><a href="#FNanchor_131_131"><span class="label">[131]</span></a> The Minister of Buittle.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_132_132" id="Footnote_132_132"></a><a href="#FNanchor_132_132"><span class="label">[132]</span></a> Morehead, of Urr.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_133_133" id="Footnote_133_133"></a><a href="#FNanchor_133_133"><span class="label">[133]</span></a> Laurie, of Redcastle.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_134_134" id="Footnote_134_134"></a><a href="#FNanchor_134_134"><span class="label">[134]</span></a> Copland, of Collieston and Blackwood.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_135_135" id="Footnote_135_135"></a><a href="#FNanchor_135_135"><span class="label">[135]</span></a> John Bushby, of Tinwald-downs.</p></div> +</div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_193" id="Page_193">[193]</a></span></p> + +<h2><a name="CLI" id="CLI"></a>CLI.</h2> + +<h3>POEM,</h3> +<h5>ADDRESSED TO</h5> +<h4>MR. MITCHELL, COLLECTOR OF EXCISE.</h4> +<h4>DUMFRIES, 1796.</h4> +<p>[The gentlemen to whom this very modest, and, under the circumstances, +most affecting application for his salary was made, filled the office +of Collector of Excise for the district, and was of a kind and +generous nature: but few were aware that the poet was suffering both +from ill-health and poverty.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Friend of the Poet, tried and leal,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wha, wanting thee, might beg or steal;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Alake, alake, the meikle deil<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Wi’ a’ his witches<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Are at it, skelpin’ jig and reel,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">In my poor pouches!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I modestly fu’ fain wad hint it,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That one pound one, I sairly want it,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">If wi’ the hizzie down ye sent it,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">It would be kind;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And while my heart wi’ life-blood dunted<br /></span> +<span class="i8">I’d bear’t in mind.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">So may the auld year gang out moaning<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To see the new come laden, groaning,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wi’ double plenty o’er the loanin<br /></span> +<span class="i8">To thee and thine;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Domestic peace and comforts crowning<br /></span> +<span class="i8">The hale design.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p class="std2">POSTSCRIPT.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Ye’ve heard this while how I’ve been licket,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And by felt death was nearly nicket;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Grim loon! he got me by the fecket,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">And sair me sheuk;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But by guid luck I lap a wicket,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">And turn’d a neuk.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But by that health, I’ve got a share o’t,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And by that life, I’m promised mair o’t,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My hale and weel I’ll tak a care o’t,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">A tentier way:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Then farewell folly, hide and hair o’t,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">For ance and aye!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CLII" id="CLII"></a>CLII.</h2> + +<h4>TO</h4> +<h3>MISS JESSY LEWARS,</h3> +<h4>DUMFRIES.</h4> +<h5>WITH JOHNSON’S ‘MUSICAL MUSEUM.’</h5> +<p>[Miss Jessy Lewars watched over the declining days of the poet, with +the affectionate reverence of a daughter: for this she has the silent +gratitude of all who admire the genius of Burns; she has received +more, the thanks of the poet himself, expressed in verses not destined +soon to die.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Thine be the volumes, Jessy fair,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And with them take the Poet’s prayer;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That fate may in her fairest page,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With every kindliest, best presage<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of future bliss, enrol thy name:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With native worth and spotless fame,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And wakeful caution still aware<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of ill—but chief, man’s felon snare;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">All blameless joys on earth we find,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And all the treasures of the mind—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">These be thy guardian and reward;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">So prays thy faithful friend, The Bard.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="blockquot"><i>June</i> 26, 1796.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CLIII" id="CLIII"></a>CLIII.</h2> + +<h4>POEM ON LIFE,</h4> +<h5>ADDRESSED TO</h5> +<h3>COLONEL DE PEYSTER.</h3> +<h4>DUMFRIES, 1796.</h4> +<p>[This is supposed to be the last Poem written by the hand, or +conceived by the muse of Burns. The person to whom it is addressed was +Colonel of the gentlemen Volunteers of Dumfries, in whose ranks Burns +was a private: he was a Canadian by birth, and prided himself on +having defended Detroit, against the united efforts of the French and +Americans. He was rough and austere, and thought the science of war +the noblest of all sciences: he affected a taste for literature, and +wrote verses.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">My honoured colonel, deep I feel<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Your interest in the Poet’s weal;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ah! now sma’ heart hae I to speel<br /></span> +<span class="i8">The steep Parnassus,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Surrounded thus by bolus, pill,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">And potion glasses.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O what a canty warld were it,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Would pain and care and sickness spare it;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And fortune favour worth and merit,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">As they deserve!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">(And aye a rowth, roast beef and claret;<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Syne, wha wad starve?)<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_194" id="Page_194">[194]</a></span></div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Dame Life, tho’ fiction out may trick her,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And in paste gems and frippery deck her;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Oh! flickering, feeble, and unsicker<br /></span> +<span class="i8">I’ve found her still,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ay wavering like the willow-wicker,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">’Tween good and ill.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Then that curst carmagnole, auld Satan,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Watches, like baudrons by a rattan,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Our sinfu’ saul to get a claut on<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Wi’ felon ire;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Syne, whip! his tail ye’ll ne’er cast saut on—<br /></span> +<span class="i8">He’s aff like fire.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Ah Nick! ah Nick! it is na fair,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">First shewing us the tempting ware,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Bright wines and bonnie lasses rare,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">To put us daft;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Syne, weave, unseen, thy spider snare<br /></span> +<span class="i8">O’ hell’s damn’d waft.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Poor man, the flie, aft bizzes bye,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And aft as chance he comes thee nigh,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thy auld danm’d elbow yeuks wi’ joy,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">And hellish pleasure;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Already in thy fancy’s eye,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Thy sicker treasure!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Soon heels-o’er gowdie! in he gangs,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And like a sheep head on a tangs,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thy girning laugh enjoys his pangs<br /></span> +<span class="i8">And murd’ring wrestle,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As, dangling in the wind, he hangs<br /></span> +<span class="i8">A gibbet’s tassel.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But lest you think I am uncivil,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To plague you with this draunting drivel,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Abjuring a’ intentions evil,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">I quat my pen:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The Lord preserve us frae the devil,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Amen! amen!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="EPITAPHS_EPIGRAMS_FRAGMENTS" id="EPITAPHS_EPIGRAMS_FRAGMENTS"></a>EPITAPHS, EPIGRAMS, FRAGMENTS,</h2> + +<h4>ETC., ETC.</h4> +<h2><a name="epitahI" id="epitahI"></a>I.</h2> + +<h3>ON THE AUTHOR’S FATHER.</h3> +<p>[William Burness merited his son’s eulogiums: he was an example of +piety, patience, and fortitude.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O ye whose cheek the tear of pity stains,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Draw near with pious rev’rence and attend!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Here lie the loving husband’s dear remains,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The tender father and the gen’rous friend.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The pitying heart that felt for human woe;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The dauntless heart that feared no human pride;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The friend of man, to vice alone a foe;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">“For ev’n his failings lean’d to virtue’s side.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="epitahII" id="epitahII"></a>II.</h2> + +<h3>ON R.A., ESQ.</h3> +<p>[Robert Aiken, Esq., to whom “The Cotter’s Saturday Night” is +addressed: a kind and generous man.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Know thou, O stranger to the fame<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of this much lov’d, much honour’d name!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">(For none that knew him need be told)<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A warmer heart death ne’er made cold.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="epitahIII" id="epitahIII"></a>III.</h2> + +<h3>ON A FRIEND.</h3> +<p>[The name of this friend is neither mentioned nor alluded to in any of +the poet’s productions.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">An honest man here lies at rest<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As e’er God with his image blest!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The friend of man, the friend of truth;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The friend of age, and guide of youth;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Few hearts like his, with virtue warm’d,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Few heads with knowledge so inform’d:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">If there’s another world, he lives in bliss;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">If there is none, he made the best of this.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="epitahIV" id="epitahIV"></a>IV.</h2> + +<h3>FOR GAVIN HAMILTON.</h3> +<p>[These lines allude to the persecution which Hamilton endured for +presuming to ride on Sunday, and say, “damn it,” in the presence of +the minister of Mauchline.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The poor man weeps—here Gavin sleeps,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Whom canting wretches blam’d:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But with such as he, where’er he be,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">May I be sav’d or damn’d!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_195" id="Page_195">[195]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="epitahV" id="epitahV"></a>V.</h2> + +<h3>ON WEE JOHNNY.</h3> +<h4>HIC JACET WEE JOHNNY.</h4> +<p>[Wee Johnny was John Wilson, printer of the Kilmarnock edition of +Burns’s Poems: he doubted the success of the speculation, and the poet +punished him in these lines, which he printed unaware of their +meaning.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Whoe’er thou art, O reader, know,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That death has murder’d Johnny!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ here his body lies fu’ low—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For saul he ne’er had ony.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="epitahVI" id="epitahVI"></a>VI.</h2> + +<h3>ON JOHN DOVE,</h3> +<h4>INNKEEPER, MAUCHLINE.</h4> +<p>[John Dove kept the Whitefoord Arms in Mauchline: his religion is made +to consist of a comparative appreciation of the liquors he kept.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Here lies Johnny Pidgeon;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">What was his religion?<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Wha e’er desires to ken,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To some other warl’<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Maun follow the carl,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For here Johnny Pidgeon had nane!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Strong ale was ablution—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Small beer, persecution,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A dram was <i>memento mori</i>;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But a full flowing bowl<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Was the saving his soul,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And port was celestial glory.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="epitahVII" id="epitahVII"></a>VII.</h2> + +<h3>ON A WAG IN MAUCHLINE.</h3> +<p>[This laborious and useful wag was the “Dear Smith, thou sleest pawkie +thief,” of one of the poet’s finest epistles: he died in the West +Indies.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Lament him, Mauchline husbands a’,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">He aften did assist ye;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For had ye staid whole weeks awa,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Your wives they ne’er had missed ye.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ye Mauchline bairns, as on ye press<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To school in bands thegither,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O tread ye lightly on his grass,—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Perhaps he was your father.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="epitahVIII" id="epitahVIII"></a>VIII.</h2> + +<h3>ON A CELEBRATED RULING ELDER.</h3> +<p>[Souter Hood obtained the distinction of this Epigram by his +impertinent inquiries into what he called the moral delinquencies of +Burns.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Here souter Hood in death does sleep;—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To h—ll, if he’s gane thither,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Satan, gie him thy gear to keep,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">He’ll haud it weel thegither.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="epitahIX" id="epitahIX"></a>IX.</h2> + +<h3>ON A NOISY POLEMIC.</h3> +<p>[This noisy polemic was a mason of the name of James Humphrey: he +astonished Cromek by an eloquent dissertation on free grace, +effectual-calling, and predestination.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Below thir stanes lie Jamie’s banes:<br /></span> +<span class="i2">O Death, it’s my opinion,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thou ne’er took such a blethrin’ b—ch<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Into thy dark dominion!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="epitahX" id="epitahX"></a>X.</h2> + +<h3>ON MISS JEAN SCOTT.</h3> +<p>[The heroine of these complimentary lines lived in Ayr, and cheered +the poet with her sweet voice, as well as her sweet looks.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Oh! had each Scot of ancient times,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Been Jeany Scott, as thou art,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The bravest heart on English ground<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Had yielded like a coward!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="epitahXI" id="epitahXI"></a>XI.</h2> + +<h3>ON A HENPECKED COUNTRY SQUIRE.</h3> +<p>[Though satisfied with the severe satire of these lines, the poet made +a second attempt.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">As father Adam first was fool’d,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A case that’s still too common,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Here lies a man a woman rul’d,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The devil rul’d the woman.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_196" id="Page_196">[196]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="epitahXII" id="epitahXII"></a>XII.</h2> + +<h3>ON THE SAME.</h3> +<p>[The second attempt did not in Burns’s fancy exhaust this fruitful +subject: he tried his hand again.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O Death, hadst thou but spared his life,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Whom we this day lament,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">We freely wad exchang’d the wife,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And a’ been weel content!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Ev’n as he is, cauld in his graff,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The swap we yet will do’t;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Take thou the carlin’s carcase aff,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Thou’se get the soul to boot.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="epitahXIII" id="epitahXIII"></a>XIII.</h2> + +<h3>ON THE SAME.</h3> +<p>[In these lines he bade farewell to the sordid dame, who lived, it is +said, in Netherplace, near Mauchline.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">One Queen Artemisia, as old stories tell,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When depriv’d of her husband she loved so well,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In respect for the love and affection he’d show’d her,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">She reduc’d him to dust and she drank up the powder.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But Queen Netherplace, of a diff’rent complexion,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When call’d on to order the fun’ral direction,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Would have eat her dear lord, on a slender pretence,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Not to show her respect, but to save the expense.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="epitahXIV" id="epitahXIV"></a>XIV.</h2> + +<h3>THE HIGHLAND WELCOME.</h3> +<p>[Burns took farewell of the hospitalities of the Scottish Highlands in +these happy lines.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">When Death’s dark stream I ferry o’er,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A time that surely shall come;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In Heaven itself I’ll ask no more<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Than just a Highland welcome.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="epitahXV" id="epitahXV"></a>XV.</h2> + +<h3>ON WILLIAM SMELLIE.</h3> +<p>[Smellie, author of the Philosophy of History; a singular person, of +ready wit, and negligent in nothing save his dress.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Shrewd Willie Smellie to Crochallan came,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The old cock’d hat, the gray surtout, the same;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">His bristling beard just rising in its might,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">’Twas four long nights and days to shaving night:<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">His uncomb’d grizzly locks wild staring, thatch’d<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A head for thought profound and clear, unmatch’d:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yet tho’ his caustic wit was biting, rude,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">His heart was warm, benevolent, and good.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="epitahXVI" id="epitahXVI"></a>XVI.</h2> + +<h3>VERSES</h3> +<h4>WRITTEN ON A WINDOW OF THE INN AT CARRON.</h4> +<p>[These lines were written on receiving what the poet considered an +uncivil refusal to look at the works of the celebrated Carron +foundry.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">We came na here to view your warks<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In hopes to be mair wise,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But only, lest we gang to hell,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">It may be nae surprise:<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">For whan we tirl’d at your door,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Your porter dought na hear us;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sae may, shou’d we to hell’s yetts come<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Your billy Satan sair us!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="epitahXVII" id="epitahXVII"></a>XVII.</h2> + +<h3>THE BOOK-WORMS.</h3> +<p>[Burns wrote this reproof in a Shakspeare, which he found splendidly +bound and gilt, but unread and worm-eaten, in a noble person’s +library.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Through and through the inspir’d leaves,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Ye maggots, make your windings;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But oh! respect his lordship’s taste,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And spare his golden bindings.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_197" id="Page_197">[197]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="epitahXVIII" id="epitahXVIII"></a>XVIII.</h2> + +<h3>LINES ON STIRLING.</h3> +<p>[On visiting Stirling, Burns was stung at beholding nothing but +desolation in the palaces of our princes and our halls of legislation, +and vented his indignation in those unloyal lines: some one has said +that they were written by his companion, Nicol, but this wants +confirmation.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Here Stuarts once in glory reign’d,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And laws for Scotland’s weal ordain’d;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But now unroof’d their palace stands,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Their sceptre’s sway’d by other hands;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The injured Stuart line is gone,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A race outlandish fills their throne;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An idiot race, to honour lost;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Who know them best despise them most.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="epitahXIX" id="epitahXIX"></a>XIX.</h2> + +<h3>THE REPROOF.</h3> +<p>[The imprudence of making the lines written at Stirling public was +hinted to Burns by a friend; he said, “Oh, but I mean to reprove +myself for it,” which he did in these words.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Rash mortal, and slanderous Poet, thy name<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Shall no longer appear in the records of fame;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Dost not know that old Mansfield, who writes like the Bible,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Says the more ’tis a truth, Sir, the more ’tis a libel?<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="epitahXX" id="epitahXX"></a>XX.</h2> + +<h3>THE REPLY.</h3> +<p>[The minister of Gladsmuir wrote a censure on the Stirling lines, +intimating, as a priest, that Burns’s race was nigh run, and as a +prophet, that oblivion awaited his muse. The poet replied to the +expostulation.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Like Esop’s lion, Burns says, sore I feel<br /></span> +<span class="i0">All others’ scorn—but damn that ass’s heel.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="epitahXXI" id="epitahXXI"></a>XXI.</h2> + +<h3>LINES</h3> +<h5>WRITTEN UNDER THE PICTURE OF THE CELEBRATED <br /> + MISS BURNS.</h5> +<p>[The Miss Burns of these lines was well known in those days to the +bucks of the Scottish metropolis: there is still a letter by the poet, +claiming from the magistrates of Edinburgh a liberal interpretation of +the laws of social morality, in belief of his fair namesake.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Cease, ye prudes, your envious railings,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Lovely Burns has charms—confess:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">True it is, she had one failing—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Had a woman ever less?<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="epitahXXII" id="epitahXXII"></a>XXII.</h2> + +<h3>EXTEMPORE IN THE COURT OF SESSION.</h3> +<p>[These portraits are strongly coloured with the partialities of the +poet: Dundas had offended his pride, Erskine had pleased his vanity; +and as he felt he spoke.]</p> + +<p class="std2">LORD ADVOCATE.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">He clench’d his pamphlets in his fist,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">He quoted and he hinted,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">’Till in a declamation-mist<br /></span> +<span class="i2">His argument he tint it:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He gaped for’t, he grap’d for’t,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">He fand it was awa, man;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But what his common sense came short<br /></span> +<span class="i2">He eked out wi’ law, man.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">MR. ERSKINE.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Collected Harry stood awee,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Then open’d out his arm, man:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">His lordship sat wi’ rueful e’e,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And ey’d the gathering storm, man;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Like wind-driv’n hail it did assail,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Or torrents owre a linn, man;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The Bench sae wise lift up their eyes,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Half-wauken’d wi’ the din, man.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="epitahXXIII" id="epitahXXIII"></a>XXIII.</h2> + +<h3>THE HENPECKED HUSBAND.</h3> +<p>[A lady who expressed herself with incivility about her husband’s +potations with Burns, was rewarded by these sharp lines.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Curs’d be the man, the poorest wretch in life,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The crouching vassal to the tyrant wife!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Who has no will but by her high permission;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Who has not sixpence but in her possession;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Who must to her his dear friend’s secret tell;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Who dreads a curtain lecture worse than hell!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Were such the wife had fallen to my part,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I’d break her spirit, or I’d break her heart;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I’d charm her with the magic of a switch,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I’d kiss her maids, and kick the perverse b——h.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_198" id="Page_198">[198]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="epitahXXIV" id="epitahXXIV"></a>XXIV.</h2> + +<h3>WRITTEN AT INVERARY.</h3> +<p>[Neglected at the inn of Inverary, on account of the presence of some +northern chiefs, and overlooked by his Grace of Argyll, the poet let +loose his wrath and his rhyme: tradition speaks of a pursuit which +took place on the part of the Campbell, when he was told of his +mistake, and of a resolution not to be soothed on the part of the +bard.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Whoe’er he be that sojourns here,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I pity much his case,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Unless he’s come to wait upon<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The Lord their God, his Grace.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">There’s naething here but Highland pride<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And Highland cauld and hunger;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">If Providence has sent me here,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">T’was surely in his anger.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="epitahXXV" id="epitahXXV"></a>XXV.</h2> + +<h3>ON ELPHINSTON’S TRANSLATIONS.</h3> +<h5>OF</h5> +<h4>MARTIAL’S EPIGRAMS.</h4> +<p>[Burns thus relates the origin of this sally:—“Stopping at a +merchant’s shop in Edinburgh, a friend of mine one day put +Elphinston’s Translation of Martial into my hand, and desired my +opinion of it. I asked permission to write my opinion on a blank leaf +of the book; which being granted, I wrote this epigram.”]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O thou, whom poesy abhors,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Whom prose has turned out of doors,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Heard’st thou that groan? proceed no further;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">’Twas laurell’d Martial roaring murther!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="epitahXXVI" id="epitahXXVI"></a>XXVI.</h2> + +<h3>INSCRIPTION.</h3> +<h4>ON THE HEADSTONE OF FERGUSSON.</h4> +<p>[Some social friends, whose good feelings were better than their +taste, have ornamented with supplemental iron work the headstone which +Burns erected, with this inscription to the memory of his brother +bard, Fergusson.]</p> + +<p class="center"> +<b>Here lies<br /> +<span class="smcap">Robert Fergusson,</span> Poet.<br /> +Born, September 5, 1751;<br /> +Died, Oct. 15, 1774.<br /></b> +</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">No sculptured marble here, nor pompous lay,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">“No storied urn nor animated bust;”<br /></span> +<span class="i0">This simple stone directs pale Scotia’s way<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To pour her sorrows o’er her poet’s dust.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="epitahXXVII" id="epitahXXVII"></a>XXVII.</h2> + +<h3>ON A SCHOOLMASTER.</h3> +<p>[The Willie Michie of this epigram was, it is said, schoolmaster of +the parish of Cleish, in Fifeshire: he met Burns during his first +visit to Edinburgh.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Here lie Willie Michie’s banes;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">O, Satan! when ye tak’ him,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Gi’ him the schoolin’ o’ your weans,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For clever de’ils he’ll mak’ them.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="epitahXXVIII" id="epitahXXVIII"></a>XXVIII.</h2> + +<h3>A GRACE BEFORE DINNER.</h3> +<p>[This was an extempore grace, pronounced by the poet at a +dinner-table, in Dumfries: he was ever ready to contribute the small +change of rhyme, for either the use or amusement of a company.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O thou, who kindly dost provide<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For every creature’s want!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">We bless thee, God of Nature wide,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For all thy goodness lent:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And if it please thee, Heavenly Guide,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">May never worse be sent;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But, whether granted or denied,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Lord bless us with content!<br /></span> +<span class="i12">Amen.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="epitahXXIX" id="epitahXXIX"></a>XXIX.</h2> + +<h3>A GRACE BEFORE MEAT.</h3> +<p>[Pronounced, tradition says, at the table of Mrs. Riddel, of +Woodleigh-Park.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O thou in whom we live and move,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Who mad’st the sea and shore,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thy goodness constantly we prove,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And grateful would adore.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And if it please thee, Power above,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Still grant us with such store,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The friend we trust, the fair we love,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And we desire no more.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="epitahXXX" id="epitahXXX"></a>XXX.</h2> + +<h3>ON WAT.</h3> +<p>[The name of the object of this fierce epigram might be found, but in +gratifying curiosity, some pain would be inflicted.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Sic a reptile was Wat,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Sic a miscreant slave,<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_199" id="Page_199">[199]</a></span><span class="i0">That the very worms damn’d him<br /></span> +<span class="i2">When laid in his grave.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">“In his flesh there’s a famine,”<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A starv’d reptile cries;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">“An’ his heart is rank poison,”<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Another replies.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="epitahXXXI" id="epitahXXXI"></a>XXXI.</h2> + +<h3>ON CAPTAIN FRANCIS GROSE.</h3> +<p>[This was a festive sally: it is said that Grose, who was very fat, +though he joined in the laugh, did not relish it.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The devil got notice that Grose was a-dying,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">So whip! at the summons, old Satan came flying;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But when he approach’d where poor Francis lay moaning,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And saw each bed-post with its burden a-groaning,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Astonish’d! confounded! cry’d Satan, “By ——,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I’ll want him, ere I take such a damnable load!”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="epitahXXXII" id="epitahXXXII"></a>XXXII.</h2> + +<h4>IMPROMPTU,</h4> +<h3>TO MISS AINSLIE.</h3> +<p>[These lines were occasioned by a sermon on sin, to which the poet and +Miss Ainslie of Berrywell had listened, during his visit to the +border.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Fair maid, you need not take the hint,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Nor idle texts pursue:—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">’Twas guilty sinners that he meant,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Not angels such as you!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="epitahXXXIII" id="epitahXXXIII"></a>XXXIII.</h2> + +<h3>THE KIRK OF LAMINGTON.</h3> +<p>[One rough, cold day, Burns listened to a sermon, so little to his +liking, in the kirk of Lamington, in Clydesdale, that he left this +protest on the seat where he sat.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">As cauld a wind as ever blew,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As caulder kirk, and in’t but few;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As cauld a minister’s e’er spak,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ye’se a’ be het ere I come back.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="epitahXXXIV" id="epitahXXXIV"></a>XXXIV.</h2> + +<h3>THE LEAGUE AND COVENANT.</h3> +<p>[In answer to a gentleman, who called the solemn League and Covenant +ridiculous and fanatical.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The solemn League and Covenant<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Cost Scotland blood—cost Scotland tears;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But it sealed freedom’s sacred cause—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">If thou’rt a slave, indulge thy sneers.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="epitahXXXV" id="epitahXXXV"></a>XXXV.</h2> + +<h3>WRITTEN ON A PANE OF GLASS,</h3> +<h5>IN THE INN AT MOFFAT.</h5> +<p>[A friend asked the poet why God made Miss Davies so little, and a +lady who was with her, so large: before the ladies, who had just +passed the window, were out of sight, the following answer was +recorded on a pane of glass.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Ask why God made the gem so small,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And why so huge the granite?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Because God meant mankind should set<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The higher value on it.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="epitahXXXVI" id="epitahXXXVI"></a>XXXVI.</h2> + +<h3>SPOKEN,</h3> +<h5>ON BEING APPOINTED TO THE EXCISE.</h5> +<p>[Burns took no pleasure in the name of gauger: the situation was +unworthy of him, and he seldom hesitated to say so.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Searching auld wives’ barrels,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Och—hon! the day!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That clarty barm should stain my laurels;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But—what’ll ye say!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">These movin’ things ca’d wives and weans<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wad move the very hearts o’ stanes!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="epitahXXXVII" id="epitahXXXVII"></a>XXXVII.</h2> + +<h3>LINES ON MRS. KEMBLE.</h3> +<p>[The poet wrote these lines in Mrs. Riddel’s box in the Dumfries +Theatre, in the winter of 1794: he was much moved by Mrs. Kemble’s +noble and pathetic acting.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Kemble, thou cur’st my unbelief<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Of Moses and his rod;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">At Yarico’s sweet notes of grief<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The rock with tears had flow’d.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_200" id="Page_200">[200]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="epitahXXXVIII" id="epitahXXXVIII"></a>XXXVIII.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. SYME.</h3> +<p>[John Syme, of Ryedale, a rhymer, a wit, and a gentleman of education +and intelligence, was, while Burns resided in Dumfries, his chief +companion: he was bred to the law.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">No more of your guests, be they titled or not,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And cook’ry the first in the nation;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Who is proof to thy personal converse and wit,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Is proof to all other temptation.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="epitahXXXIX" id="epitahXXXIX"></a>XXXIX.</h2> + +<h4>TO MR. SYME.</h4> +<h5>WITH A PRESENT OF A DOZEN OF PORTER.</h5> +<p>[The tavern where these lines were written was kept by a wandering +mortal of the name of Smith; who, having visited in some capacity or +other the Holy Land, put on his sign, “John Smith, from Jerusalem.” He +was commonly known by the name of Jerusalem John.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O, had the malt thy strength of mind,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Or hops the flavour of thy wit,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">’Twere drink for first of human kind,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A gift that e’en for Syme were fit.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="blockquot"><i>Jerusalem Tavern, Dumfries.</i></p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="epitahXL" id="epitahXL"></a>XL.</h2> + +<h3>A GRACE.</h3> +<p>[This Grace was spoken at the table of Ryedale, where to the best +cookery was added the richest wine, as well as the rarest wit: Hyslop +was a distiller.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Lord, we thank and thee adore,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For temp’ral gifts we little merit;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">At present we will ask no more,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Let William Hyslop give the spirit.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="epitahXLI" id="epitahXLI"></a>XLI.</h2> + +<h3>INSCRIPTION ON A GOBLET.</h3> +<p>[Written on a dinner-goblet by the hand of Burns. Syme, exasperated at +having his set of crystal defaced, threw the goblet under the grate: +it was taken up by his clerk, and it is still preserved as a +curiosity.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">There’s death in the cup—sae beware!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Nay, more—there is danger in touching;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But wha can avoid the fell snare?<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The man and his wine’s sae bewitching!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="epitahXLII" id="epitahXLII"></a>XLII.</h2> + +<h3>THE INVITATION.</h3> +<p>[Burns had a happy knack in acknowledging civilities. These lines were +written with a pencil on the paper in which Mrs. Hyslop, of +Lochrutton, enclosed an invitation to dinner.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The King’s most humble servant I,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Can scarcely spare a minute;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But I am yours at dinner-time,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Or else the devil’s in it.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="epitahXLIII" id="epitahXLIII"></a>XLIII.</h2> + +<h3>THE CREED OF POVERTY.</h3> +<p>[When the commissioners of Excise told Burns that he was to act, and +not to think; he took out his pencil and wrote “The Creed of +Poverty.”]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">In politics if thou would’st mix,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And mean thy fortunes be;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Bear this in mind—be deaf and blind;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Let great folks hear and see.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="epitahXLIV" id="epitahXLIV"></a>XLIV.</h2> + +<h3>WRITTEN IN A LADY’S POCKET-BOOK.</h3> +<p>[That Burns loved liberty and sympathized with those who were warring +in its cause, these lines, and hundreds more, sufficiently testify.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Grant me, indulgent Heav’n, that I may live<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To see the miscreants feel the pains they give,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Deal Freedom’s sacred treasures free as air,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Till slave and despot be but things which were.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="epitahXLV" id="epitahXLV"></a>XLV.</h2> + +<h3>THE PARSON’S LOOKS.</h3> +<p>[Some sarcastic person said, in Burns’s hearing, that there was +falsehood in the Reverend Dr. Burnside’s looks: the poet mused for a +moment, and replied in lines which have less of truth than point.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">That there is falsehood in his looks<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I must and will deny;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">They say their master is a knave—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And sure they do not lie.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_201" id="Page_201">[201]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="epitahXLVI" id="epitahXLVI"></a>XLVI.</h2> + +<h3>THE TOAD-EATER.</h3> +<p>[This reproof was administered extempore to one of the guests at the +table of Maxwell, of Terraughty, whose whole talk was of Dukes with +whom he had dined, and of earls with whom he had supped.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">What of earls with whom you have supt,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And of dukes that you dined with yestreen?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Lord! a louse, Sir, is still but a louse,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Though it crawl on the curl of a queen.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="epitahXLVII" id="epitahXLVII"></a>XLVII.</h2> + +<h3>ON ROBERT RIDDEL.</h3> +<p>[I copied these lines from a pane of glass in the Friars-Carse +Hermitage, on which they had been traced with the diamond of Burns.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">To Riddel, much-lamented man,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">This ivied cot was dear;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Reader, dost value matchless worth?<br /></span> +<span class="i2">This ivied cot revere.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="epitahXLVIII" id="epitahXLVIII"></a>XLVIII.</h2> + +<h3>THE TOAST.</h3> +<p>[Burns being called on for a song, by his brother volunteers, on a +festive occasion, gave the following Toast.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Instead of a song, boys, I’ll give you a toast—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Here’s the memory of those on the twelfth that we lost!—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That we lost, did I say? nay, by Heav’n, that we found;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For their fame it shall last while the world goes round.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The next in succession, I’ll give you—the King!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Whoe’er would betray him, on high may he swing;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And here’s the grand fabric, our free Constitution,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As built on the base of the great Revolution;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And longer with politics not to be cramm’d,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Be Anarchy curs’d, and be Tyranny damn’d;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And who would to Liberty e’er prove disloyal,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">May his son be a hangman, and he his first trial.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="epitahXLIX" id="epitahXLIX"></a>XLIX.</h2> + +<h5>ON A PERSON NICKNAMED</h5> +<h3>THE MARQUIS.</h3> +<p>[In a moment when vanity prevailed against prudence, this person, who +kept a respectable public-house in Dumfries, desired Burns, to write +his epitaph.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Here lies a mock Marquis, whose titles were shamm’d;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">If ever he rise, it will be to be damn’d.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="epitahL" id="epitahL"></a>L.</h2> + +<h3>LINES</h3> +<h5>WRITTEN ON A WINDOW.</h5> +<p>[Burns traced these words with a diamond, on the window of the King’s +Arms Tavern, Dumfries, as a reply, or reproof, to one who had been +witty on excisemen.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Ye men of wit and wealth, why all this sneering<br /></span> +<span class="i0">‘Gainst poor Excisemen? give the cause a hearing;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">What are you, landlords’ rent-rolls? teasing ledgers:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">What premiers—what? even monarchs’ mighty gaugers:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Nay, what are priests, those seeming godly wise men?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">What are they, pray, but spiritual Excisemen?<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="epitahLI" id="epitahLI"></a>LI.</h2> + +<h3>LINES</h3> +<h5>WRITTEN ON A WINDOW OF THE GLOBE TAVERN, <br /> + DUMFRIES.</h5> +<p>[The Globe Tavern was Burne’s favourite “Howff,” as he called it. It +had other attractions than good liquor; there lived “Anna, with the +golden locks.”]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The greybeard, old Wisdom, may boast of his treasures,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Give me with gay Folly to live;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I grant him his calm-blooded, time-settled pleasures,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But Folly has raptures to give.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_202" id="Page_202">[202]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="epitahLII" id="epitahLII"></a>LII.</h2> + +<h3>THE SELKIRK GRACE.</h3> +<p>[On a visit to St. Mary’s Isle, Burns was requested by the noble owner +to say grace to dinner; he obeyed in these lines, now known in +Galloway by the name of “The Selkirk Grace.”]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Some hae meat and canna eat,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And some wad eat that want it;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But we hae meat and we can eat,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And sae the Lord be thanket.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="epitahLIII" id="epitahLIII"></a>LIII.</h2> + +<h3>TO DR. MAXWELL,</h3> +<h4>ON JESSIE STAIG’S RECOVERY.</h4> +<p>[Maxwell was a skilful physician; and Jessie Staig, the Provost’s +oldest daughter, was a young lady of great beauty: she died early.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Maxwell, if merit here you crave<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That merit I deny,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">You save fair Jessie from the grave—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An angel could not die.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="epitahLIV" id="epitahLIV"></a>LIV.</h2> + +<h3>EPITAPH.</h3> +<p>[These lines were traced by the hand of Burns on a goblet belonging to +Gabriel Richardson, brewer, in Dumfries: it is carefully preserved in +the family.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Here brewer Gabriel’s fire’s extinct,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And empty all his barrels:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He’s blest—if, as he brew’d, he drink—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In upright virtuous morals.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="epitahLV" id="epitahLV"></a>LV.</h2> + +<h4>EPITAPH</h4> +<h3>ON WILLIAM NICOL.</h3> +<p>[Nicol was a scholar, of ready and rough wit, who loved a joke and a +gill.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Ye maggots, feast on Nicol’s brain,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For few sic feasts ye’ve gotten;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And fix your claws in Nicol’s heart,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For deil a bit o’t’s rotten.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="epitahLVI" id="epitahLVI"></a>LVI.</h2> + +<h3>ON THE DEATH OF A LAP-DOG,</h3> +<h4>NAMED ECHO.</h4> +<p>[When visiting with Syme at Kenmore Castle, Burns wrote this Epitaph, +rather reluctantly, it is said, at the request of the lady of the +house, in honour of her lap dog.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">In wood and wild, ye warbling throng,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Your heavy loss deplore;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Now half extinct your powers of song,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Sweet Echo is no more.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Ye jarring, screeching things around,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Scream your discordant joys;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Now half your din of tuneless sound<br /></span> +<span class="i2">With Echo silent lies.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="epitahLVII" id="epitahLVII"></a>LVII.</h2> + +<h3>ON A NOTED COXCOMB.</h3> +<p>[Neither Ayr, Edinburgh, nor Dumfries have contested the honour of +producing the person on whom these lines were written:—coxcombs are +the growth of all districts.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Light lay the earth on Willy’s breast,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">His chicken-heart so tender;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But build a castle on his head,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">His skull will prop it under.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="epitahLVIII" id="epitahLVIII"></a>LVIII.</h2> + +<h5>ON SEEING THE BEAUTIFUL SEAT OF</h5> +<h3>LORD GALLOWAY.</h3> +<p>[This, and the three succeeding Epigrams, are hasty squibs thrown amid +the tumult of a contested election, and must not be taken as the fixed +and deliberate sentiments of the poet, regarding an ancient and noble +house.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">What dost thou in that mansion fair?—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Flit, Galloway, and find<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Some narrow, dirty, dungeon cave,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The picture of thy mind!<br /></span> +</div></div> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_203" id="Page_203">[203]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="epitahLIX" id="epitahLIX"></a>LIX.</h2> + +<h3>ON THE SAME.</h3> +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">No Stewart art thou, Galloway,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The Stewarts all were brave;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Besides, the Stewarts were but fools,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Not one of them a knave.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="epitahLX" id="epitahLX"></a>LX.</h2> + +<h3>ON THE SAME.</h3> +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Bright ran thy line, O Galloway,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Thro’ many a far-fam’d sire!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">So ran the far-fam’d Roman way,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">So ended in a mire.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="epitahLXI" id="epitahLXI"></a>LXI.</h2> + +<h3>TO THE SAME,</h3> +<h5>ON THE AUTHOR BEING THREATENED WITH HIS<br /> + + + RESENTMENT.</h5> +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Spare me thy vengeance, Galloway,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In quiet let me live:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I ask no kindness at thy hand,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For thou hast none to give.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="epitahLXII" id="epitahLXII"></a>LXII.</h2> + +<h3>ON A COUNTRY LAIRD.</h3> +<p>[Mr. Maxwell, of Cardoness, afterwards Sir David, exposed himself to +the rhyming wrath of Burns, by his activity in the contested elections +of Heron.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Bless Jesus Christ, O Cardoness,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">With grateful lifted eyes,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Who said that not the soul alone<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But body too, must rise:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For had he said, “the soul alone<br /></span> +<span class="i2">From death I will deliver;”<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Alas! alas! O Cardoness,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Then thou hadst slept for ever.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="epitahLXIII" id="epitahLXIII"></a>LXIII.</h2> + +<h3>ON JOHN BUSHBY.</h3> +<p>[Burns, in his harshest lampoons, always admitted the talents of +Bushby: the peasantry, who hate all clever attorneys, loved to handle +his character with unsparing severity.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Here lies John Bushby, honest man!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Cheat him, Devil, gin ye can.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="epitahLXIV" id="epitahLXIV"></a>LXIV.</h2> + +<h3>THE TRUE LOYAL NATIVES.</h3> +<p>[At a dinner-party, where politics ran high, lines signed by men who +called themselves the true loyal natives of Dumfries, were handed to +Burns: he took a pencil, and at once wrote this reply.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Ye true “Loyal Natives,” attend to my song,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In uproar and riot rejoice the night long;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">From envy or hatred your corps is exempt,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But where is your shield from the darts of contempt?<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="epitahLXV" id="epitahLXV"></a>LXV.</h2> + +<h3>ON A SUICIDE.</h3> +<p>[Burns was observed by my friend, Dr. Copland Hutchinson, to fix, one +morning, a bit of paper on the grave of a person who had committed +suicide: on the paper these lines were pencilled.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Earth’d up here lies an imp o’ hell,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Planted by Satan’s dibble—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Poor silly wretch, he’s damn’d himsel’<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To save the Lord the trouble.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="epitahLXVI" id="epitahLXVI"></a>LXVI.</h2> + +<h3>EXTEMPORE</h3> +<h4>PINNED ON A LADY’S COUCH.</h4> +<p>[“Printed,” says Sir Harris Nicolas, “from a copy in Burns’s +handwriting,” a slight alteration in the last line is made from an +oral version.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">If you rattle along like your mistress’s tongue,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Your speed will outrival the dart:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But, a fly for your load, you’ll break down on the road<br /></span> +<span class="i2">If your stuff has the rot, like her heart.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_204" id="Page_204">[204]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="epitahLXVII" id="epitahLXVII"></a>LXVII.</h2> + +<h4>LINES</h4> +<h3>TO JOHN RANKINE.</h3> +<p>[These lines were said to have been written by the poet to Rankine, of +Adamhill, with orders to forward them when he died.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">He who of Rankine sang lies stiff and dead,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And a green grassy hillock hides his head;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Alas! alas! a devilish change indeed.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="epitahLXVIII" id="epitahLXVIII"></a>LXVIII.</h2> + +<h3>JESSY LEWARS.</h3> +<p>[Written on the blank side of a list of wild beasts, exhibiting in +Dumfries. “Now,” said the poet, who was then very ill, “it is fit to +be presented to a lady.”]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Talk not to me of savages<br /></span> +<span class="i2">From Afric’s burning sun,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">No savage e’er could rend my heart<br /></span> +<span class="i2">As, Jessy, thou hast done.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But Jessy’s lovely hand in mine,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A mutual faith to plight,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Not even to view the heavenly choir<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Would be so blest a sight.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="epitahLXIX" id="epitahLXIX"></a>LXIX.</h2> + +<h3>THE TOAST.</h3> +<p>[One day, when Burns was ill and seemed in slumber, he observed Jessy +Lewars moving about the house with a light step lest she should +disturb him. He took a crystal goblet containing wine-and-water for +moistening his lips, wrote these words upon it with a diamond, and +presented it to her.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Fill me with the rosy-wine,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Call a toast—a toast divine;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Give the Poet’s darling flame,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Lovely Jessy be the name;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Then thou mayest freely boast,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thou hast given a peerless toast.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="epitahLXX" id="epitahLXX"></a>LXX.</h2> + +<h3>ON MISS JESSY LEWARS.</h3> +<p>[The constancy of her attendance on the poet’s sick-bed and anxiety of +mind brought a slight illness upon Jessy Lewars. “You must not die +yet,” said the poet: “give me that goblet, and I shall prepare you for +the worst.” He traced these lines with his diamond, and said, “That +will be a companion to ‘The Toast.’”]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Say, sages, what’s the charm on earth<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Can turn Death’s dart aside?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">It is not purity and worth,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Else Jessy had not died.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="sig1">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="epitahLXXI" id="epitahLXXI"></a>LXXI.</h2> + +<h5>ON THE</h5> +<h3>RECOVERY OF JESSY LEWARS.</h3> +<p>[A little repose brought health to the young lady. “I knew you would +not die,” observed the poet, with a smile: “there is a poetic reason +for your recovery;” he wrote, and with a feeble hand, the following +lines.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But rarely seen since Nature’s birth,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The natives of the sky;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yet still one seraph’s left on earth,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For Jessy did not die.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="sig1">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="epitahLXXII" id="epitahLXXII"></a>LXXII.</h2> + +<h3>TAM, THE CHAPMAN.</h3> +<p>[Tam, the chapman, is said by the late William Cobbett, who knew him, +to have been a Thomas Kennedy, a native of Ayrshire, agent to a +mercantile house in the west of Scotland. Sir Harris Nicolas confounds +him with the Kennedy to whom Burns addressed several letters and +verses, which I printed in my edition of the poet in 1834: it is +perhaps enough to say that the name of the one was Thomas and the name +of the other John.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">As Tam the Chapman on a day,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wi’ Death forgather’d by the way,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Weel pleas’d he greets a wight so famous,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And Death was nae less pleas’d wi’ Thomas,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wha cheerfully lays down the pack,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And there blaws up a hearty crack;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">His social, friendly, honest heart,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sae tickled Death they could na part:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sac after viewing knives and garters,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Death takes him hame to gie him quarters.<br /></span> +</div></div> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_205" id="Page_205">[205]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="epitahLXXIII" id="epitahLXXIII"></a>LXXIII.</h2> + +<p>[These lines seem to owe their origin to the precept of Mickle.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“The present moment is our ain,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The next we never saw.”]<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Here’s a bottle and an honest friend!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">What wad you wish for mair, man?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wha kens before his life may end,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">What his share may be o’ care, man?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Then catch the moments as they fly,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And use them as ye ought, man?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Believe me, happiness is shy,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And comes not ay when sought, man.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="epitahLXXIV" id="epitahLXXIV"></a>LXXIV.</h2> + +<p>[The sentiment which these lines express, was one familiar to Burns, +in the early, as well as concluding days of his life.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Though fickle Fortune has deceived me,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">She promis’d fair and perform’d but ill;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of mistress, friends, and wealth bereav’d me,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Yet I bear a heart shall support me still.—<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I’ll act with prudence as far’s I’m able,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But if success I must never find,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Then come misfortune, I bid thee welcome,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I’ll meet thee with an undaunted mind.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="epitahLXXV" id="epitahLXXV"></a>LXXV.</h2> + +<h3>TO JOHN KENNEDY.</h3> +<p>[The John Kennedy to whom these verses and the succeeding lines were +addressed, lived, in 1796, at Dumfries-house, and his taste was so +much esteemed by the poet, that he submitted his “Cotter’s Saturday +Night” and the “Mountain Daisy” to his judgment: he seems to have been +of a social disposition.]</p> + + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Now, Kennedy, if foot or horse<br /></span> +<span class="i0">E’er bring you in by Mauchline Cross,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">L—d, man, there’s lasses there wad force<br /></span> +<span class="i8">A hermit’s fancy.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And down the gate in faith they’re worse<br /></span> +<span class="i8">And mair unchancy.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But as I’m sayin’, please step to Dow’s,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And taste sic gear as Johnnie brews,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Till some bit callan bring me news<br /></span> +<span class="i8">That ye are there,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And if we dinna hae a bouze<br /></span> +<span class="i8">I’se ne’er drink mair.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">It’s no I like to sit an’ swallow,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Then like a swine to puke and wallow,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But gie me just a true good fellow,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Wi’ right ingine,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And spunkie ance to make us mellow,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">And then we’ll shine.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Now if ye’re ane o’ warl’s folk,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wha rate the wearer by the cloak,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ sklent on poverty their joke<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Wi’ bitter sneer,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wi’ you nae friendship I will troke,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Nor cheap nor dear.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But if, as I’m informed weel,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ye hate as ill’s the very deil<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The flinty heart that canna feel—<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Come, Sir, here’s tae you!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Hae, there’s my haun, I wiss you weel,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">And gude be wi’ you.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="sig1"><span class="smcap">Robert Burness.</span></p> + +<p class="blockquot"><i>Mossgiel, 3 March, 1786.</i></p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="epitahLXXVI" id="epitahLXXVI"></a>LXXVI.</h2> + +<h3>TO JOHN KENNEDY.</h3> +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Farewell, dear friend! may guid luck hit you,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And ‘mang her favourites admit you!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">If e’er Detraction shore to smit you,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">May nane believe him!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And ony deil that thinks to get you,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Good Lord deceive him!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="sig2">R. B.</p> + +<p class="blockquot"><i>Kilmarnock, August, 1786</i></p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="epitahLXXVII" id="epitahLXXVII"></a>LXXVII.</h2> + +<p>[Cromek found these characteristic lines among the poet’s papers.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">There’s naethin like the honest nappy!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Whaur’ll ye e’er see men sae happy,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or women, sonsie, saft an’ sappy,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">’Tween morn an’ morn<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As them wha like to taste the drappie<br /></span> +<span class="i8">In glass or horn?<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I’ve seen me daezt upon a time;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I scarce could wink or see a styme;<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_206" id="Page_206">[206]</a></span><span class="i0">Just ae hauf muchkin does me prime,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Ought less is little,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Then back I rattle on the rhyme,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">As gleg’s a whittle.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="epitahLXXVIII" id="epitahLXXVIII"></a>LXXVIII.</h2> + +<h4>ON THE BLANK LEAF</h4> +<h5>OF A</h5> +<h3>WORK BY HANNAH MORE.</h3> +<h4>PRESENTED BY MRS C——.</h4> +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Thou flattering work of friendship kind,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Still may thy pages call to mind<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The dear, the beauteous donor;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Though sweetly female every part,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yet such a head, and more the heart,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Does both the sexes honour.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">She showed her taste refined and just,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">When she selected thee,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yet deviating, own I must,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For so approving me!<br /></span> +<span class="i4">But kind still, I’ll mind still<br /></span> +<span class="i6">The giver in the gift;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">I’ll bless her, and wiss her<br /></span> +<span class="i6">A Friend above the Lift.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="blockquot"><i>Mossgiel, April</i>, 1786.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="epitahLXXIX" id="epitahLXXIX"></a>LXXIX.</h2> + +<h4>TO THE MEN AND BRETHREN</h4> +<h5>OF THE</h5> +<h3>MASONIC LODGE AT TARBOLTON.</h3> +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Within your dear mansion may wayward contention<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Or withering envy ne’er enter:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">May secrecy round be the mystical bound,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And brotherly love be the centre.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="blockquot"><i>Edinburgh</i>, 23 <i>August</i>, 1787.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="epitahLXXX" id="epitahLXXX"></a>LXXX.</h2> + +<h3>IMPROMPTU.</h3> +<p>[The tumbler on which these verses are inscribed by the diamond of +Burns, found its way to the hands of Sir Walter Scott, and is now +among the treasures of Abbotsford.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">You’re welcome, Willie Stewart,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">You’re welcome, Willie Stewart;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">There’s ne’er a flower that blooms in May,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That’s half sae welcome’s thou art.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Come bumpers high, express your joy,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The bowl we maun renew it;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The tappit-hen, gae bring her ben,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To welcome Willie Stewart.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">My foes be strang, and friends be slack,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Ilk action may he rue it,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">May woman on him turn her back,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That wrongs thee, Willie Stewart.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="epitahLXXXI" id="epitahLXXXI"></a>LXXXI.</h2> + +<h3>PRAYER FOR ADAM ARMOUR.</h3> +<p>[The origin of this prayer is curious. In 1785, the maid-servant of an +innkeeper at Mauchline, having been caught in what old ballad-makers +delicately call “the deed of shame,” Adam Armour, the brother of the +poet’s bonnie Jean, with one or two more of his comrades, executed a +rustic act of justice upon her, by parading her perforce through the +village, placed on a rough, unpruned piece of wood: an unpleasant +ceremony, vulgarly called “Riding the Stang.” This was resented by +Geordie and Nanse, the girl’s master and mistress; law was restored +to, and as Adam had to hide till the matter was settled, he durst not +venture home till late on the Saturday nights. In one of these +home-comings he met Burns who laughed when he heard the story, and +said, “You have need of some one to pray for you.” “No one can do that +better than yourself,” was the reply, and this humorous intercession +was made on the instant, and, as it is said, “clean off loof.” From +Adam Armour I obtained the verses, and when he wrote them out, he told +the story in which the prayer originated.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Lord, pity me, for I am little,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An elf of mischief and of mettle,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That can like ony wabster’s shuttle,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Jink there or here,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Though scarce as lang’s a gude kale-whittle,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">I’m unco queer.<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_207" id="Page_207">[207]</a></span></div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Lord pity now our waefu’ case,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For Geordie’s Jurr we’re in disgrace,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Because we stang’d her through the place,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">‘Mang hundreds laughin’,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For which we daurna show our face<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Within the clachan.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">And now we’re dern’d in glens and hallows,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And hunted as was William Wallace,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">By constables, those blackguard fellows,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">And bailies baith,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O Lord, preserve us frae the gallows!<br /></span> +<span class="i8">That cursed death.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Auld, grim, black-bearded Geordie’s sel’,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O shake him ewre the mouth o’ hell,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And let him hing and roar and yell,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Wi’ hideous din,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And if he offers to rebel<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Just heave him in.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">When Death comes in wi’ glimmering blink,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And tips auld drunken Nanse the wink’<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Gaur Satan gie her a—e a clink<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Behint his yett,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And fill her up wi’ brimstone drink,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Red reeking het!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">There’s Jockie and the hav’rel Jenny,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Some devil seize them in a hurry,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And waft them in th’ infernal wherry,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Straught through the lake,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And gie their hides a noble curry,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Wi’ oil of aik.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">As for the lass, lascivious body,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">She’s had mischief enough already,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Weel stang’d by market, mill, and smiddie,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">She’s suffer’d sair;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But may she wintle in a widdie,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">If she wh—re mair.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="SONGS_AND_BALLADS" id="SONGS_AND_BALLADS"></a>SONGS AND BALLADS.</h2> + +<p class="center"><img src="images/image_04.jpg" alt=""HANDSOME NELL."" width="500" height="634" /><br /> +<br /> +<span class="caption"> +“HANDSOME NELL.”</span></p> + +<h2><a name="songsI" id="songsI"></a>I.</h2> + +<h3>HANDSOME NELL.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune.—“<i>I am a man unmarried.”</i></p> + +<p>[“This composition,” says Burns in his “Common-place Book,” “was the +first of my performances, and done at an early period in life, when my +heart glowed with honest, warm simplicity; unacquainted and +uncorrupted with the ways of a wicked world. The subject of it was a +young girl who really deserved all the praises I have bestowed on +her.”]</p> + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O once I lov’d a bonnie lass,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Ay, and I love her still;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And whilst that honour warms my breast,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I’ll love my handsome Nell.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">As bonnie lasses I hae seen,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And mony full as braw;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But for a modest gracefu’ mien<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The like I never saw.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">A bonnie lass, I will confess, </span> +<span class="i2">Is pleasant to the e’e, </span> +<span class="i0">But without some better qualities</span> +<span class="i2">She’s no a lass for me. </span></div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But Nelly’s looks are blithe and sweet,</span> +<span class="i2">And what is best of a’,</span> +<span class="i0">Her reputation is complete, </span> +<span class="i2">And fair without a flaw.</span></div></div> + +<p class="std2">V.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">She dresses ay sae clean and neat,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Both decent and genteel:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And then there’s something in her gait<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Gars ony dress look weel.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">VI.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">A gaudy dress and gentle air<br /></span> +<span class="i2">May slightly touch the heart;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But it’s innocence and modesty<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That polishes the dart.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">VII.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">’Tis this in Nelly pleases me,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">’Tis this enchants my soul;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For absolutely in my breast<br /></span> +<span class="i2">She reigns without control<br /></span> +</div></div> + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_208" id="Page_208">[208]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="songsII" id="songsII"></a>II.</h2> + +<h3>LUCKLESS FORTUNE.</h3> +<p>[Those lines, as Burns informs us, were written to a tune of his own +composing, consisting of three parts, and the words were the echo of +the air.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O raging fortune’s withering blast<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Has laid my leaf full low, O!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O raging fortune’s withering blast<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Has laid my leaf full low, O!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My stem was fair, my bud was green,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My blossom sweet did blow, O;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The dew fell fresh, the sun rose mild,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And made my branches grow, O.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But luckless fortune’s northern storms<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Laid a’ my blossoms low, O;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But luckless fortune’s northern storms<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Laid a’ my blossoms low, O.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsIII" id="songsIII"></a>III.</h2> + +<h3>I DREAM’D I LAY.</h3> +<p>[These melancholy verses were written when the poet was some seventeen +years old: his early days were typical of his latter.]</p> + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I dream’d I lay where flowers were springing<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Gaily in the sunny beam;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">List’ning to the wild birds singing,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">By a falling crystal stream:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Straight the sky grew black and daring;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Thro’ the woods the whirlwinds rave;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Trees with aged arms were warring.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">O’er the swelling drumlie wave.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Such was my life’s deceitful morning,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Such the pleasure I enjoy’d:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But lang or noon, loud tempests storming,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A’ my flowery bliss destroy’d.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Tho’ fickle fortune has deceiv’d me,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">She promis’d fair, and perform’d but ill;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of mony a joy and hope bereav’d me,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I bear a heart shall support me still.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsIV" id="songsIV"></a>IV.</h2> + +<h3>TIBBIE, I HAE SEEN THE DAY.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Invercald’s Reel.</i>”</p> + +<p>[The Tibbie who “spak na, but gaed by like stoure,” was, it is said, +the daughter of a man who was laird of three acres of peatmoss, and +thought it became her to put on airs in consequence.]</p> + + +<p class="std3">CHORUS.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O Tibbie, I hae seen the day,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Ye wad na been sae shy;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For lack o’ gear ye lightly me,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But, trowth, I care na by.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Yestreen I met you on the moor,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ye spak na, but gaed by like stoure;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ye geck at me because I’m poor,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But fient a hair care I.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I doubt na, lass, but ye may think,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Because ye hae the name o’ clink,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That ye can please me at a wink,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Whene’er ye like to try.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But sorrow tak him that’s sae mean,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Altho’ his pouch o’ coin were clean,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wha follows ony saucy quean,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That looks sae proud and high.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Altho’ a lad were e’er sae smart,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">If that he want the yellow dirt,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ye’ll cast your head anither airt,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And answer him fu’ dry.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">V.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But if he hae the name o’ gear,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ye’ll fasten to him like a brier,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Tho’ hardly he, for sense or lear,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Be better than the kye.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">VI.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But, Tibbie, lass, tak my advice,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Your daddie’s gear maks you sae nice;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The deil a ane wad spier your price,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Were ye as poor as I.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">VII.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">There lives a lass in yonder park,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I would nae gie her in her sark,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For thee, wi’ a’ thy thousan’ mark;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Ye need na look sae high.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_209" id="Page_209">[209]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="songsV" id="songsV"></a>V.</h2> + +<h3>MY FATHER WAS A FARMER.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>The Weaver and his Shuttle, O.</i>”</p> + +<p>[“The following song,” says the poet, “is a wild rhapsody, miserably +deficient in versification, but as the sentiments are the genuine +feelings of my heart, for that reason I have a particular pleasure in +conning it over.”]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">My father was a farmer<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Upon the Carrick border, O,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And carefully he bred me,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In decency and order, O;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He bade me act a manly part,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Though I had ne’er a farthing, O;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For without an honest manly heart,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">No man was worth regarding, O.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Then out into the world<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My course I did determine, O;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Tho’ to be rich was not my wish,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">yet to be great was charming, O:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My talents they were not the worst,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Nor yet my education, O;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Resolv’d was I, at least to try,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To mend my situation, O.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">In many a way, and vain essay,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I courted fortune’s favour, O;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Some cause unseen still stept between,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To frustrate each endeavour, O:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sometimes by foes I was o’erpower’d,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Sometimes by friends forsaken, O,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And when my hope was at the top,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I still was worst mistaken, O.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Then sore harass’d, and tir’d at last,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">With fortune’s vain delusion, O,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I dropt my schemes, like idle dreams,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And came to this conclusion, O:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The past was bad, and the future hid;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Its good or ill untried, O;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But the present hour, was in my pow’r<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And so I would enjoy it, O.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">V.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">No help, nor hope, nor view had I,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Nor person to befriend me, O;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">So I must toil, and sweat and broil,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And labour to sustain me, O:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To plough and sow, to reap and mow,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My father bred me early, O;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For one, he said, to labour bred,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Was a match for fortune fairly, O.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">VI.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Thus all obscure, unknown, and poor,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Thro’ life I’m doom’d to wander, O,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Till down my weary bones I lay,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In everlasting slumber, O.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">No view nor care, but shun whate’er<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Might breed me pain or sorrow, O:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I live to-day as well’s I may,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Regardless of to-morrow, O.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">VII.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But cheerful still, I am as well,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">As a monarch in a palace, O,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Tho’ Fortune’s frown still hunts me down,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">With all her wonted malice, O:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I make indeed my daily bread,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But ne’er can make it farther, O;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But, as daily bread is all I need,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I do not much regard her, O.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">VIII.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">When sometimes by my labour<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I earn a little money, O,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Some unforeseen misfortune<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Comes gen’rally upon me, O:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Mischance, mistake, or by neglect,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Or my goodnatur’d folly, O;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But come what will, I’ve sworn it still,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I’ll ne’er be melancholy, O.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IX.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">All you who follow wealth and power,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">With unremitting ardour, O,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The more in this you look for bliss,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">You leave your view the farther, O:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Had you the wealth Potosi boasts,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Or nations to adorn you, O,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A cheerful honest-hearted clown<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I will prefer before you, O.<br /></span> +</div></div> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_210" id="Page_210">[210]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="songsVI" id="songsVI"></a>VI.</h2> + +<h3>JOHN BARLEYCORN:</h3> +<h4>A BALLAD.</h4> +<p>[Composed on the plan of an old song, of which David Laing has given +an authentic version in his very curious volume of Metrical Tales.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">There were three kings into the east,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Three kings both great and high;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And they hae sworn a solemn oath<br /></span> +<span class="i2">John Barleycorn should die.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">They took a plough and plough’d him down,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Put clods upon his head;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And they ha’e sworn a solemn oath<br /></span> +<span class="i2">John Barleycorn was dead.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But the cheerful spring came kindly on,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And show’rs began to fall;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">John Barleycorn got up again,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And sore surpris’d them all.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The sultry suns of summer came,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And he grew thick and strong;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">His head weel arm’d wi’ pointed spears<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That no one should him wrong.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">V.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The sober autumn enter’d mild,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">When he grew wan and pale;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">His beading joints and drooping head<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Show’d he began to fail.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">VI.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">His colour sicken’d more and more,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">He faded into age;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And then his enemies began<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To show their deadly rage.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">VII.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">They’ve ta’en a weapon, long and sharp,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And cut him by the knee;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Then ty’d him fast upon a cart,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Like a rogue for forgerie.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">VIII.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">They laid him down upon his back,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And cudgell’d him full sore;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">They hung him up before the storm.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And turn’d him o’er and o’er.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IX.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">They filled up a darksome pit<br /></span> +<span class="i2">With water to the brim;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">They heaved in John Barleycorn,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">There let him sink or swim.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">X.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">They laid him out upon the floor,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To work him farther woe;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And still, as signs of life appear’d,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">They toss’d him to and fro.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">XI.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">They wasted o’er a scorching flame<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The marrow of his bones;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But a miller us’d him worst of all—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">He crush’d him ’tween the stones.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">XII.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">And they ha’e ta’en his very heart’s blood,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And drank it round and round;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And still the more and more they drank,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Their joy did more abound.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">XIII.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">John Barleycorn was a hero bold,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Of noble enterprise;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For if you do but taste his blood,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">’Twill make your courage rise.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">XIV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">’Twill make a man forget his woe;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">’Twill heighten all his joy:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">’Twill make the widow’s heart to sing,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Tho’ the tear were in her eye.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">XV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Then let us toast John Barleycorn,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Each man a glass in hand;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And may his great posterity<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Ne’er fail in old Scotland!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsVII" id="songsVII"></a>VII.</h2> + +<h3>THE RIGS O’ BARLEY.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Corn rigs are bonnie.”</i></p> + +<p>[Two young women of the west, Anne Ronald and Anne Blair, have each, +by the district traditions, been claimed as the heroine of this early +song.]</p> +<p class="std2">I.</p> +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">It was upon a Lammas night,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">When corn rigs are bonnie,<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_211" id="Page_211">[211]</a></span><span class="i0">Beneath the moon’s unclouded light,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I held awa to Annie:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The time flew by wi’ tentless heed,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">’Till ’tween the late and early,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wi’ sma’ persuasion she agreed,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To see me through the barley.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The sky was blue, the wind was still,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The moon was shining clearly;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I set her down wi’ right good will,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Amang the rigs o’ barley:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I ken’t her heart was a’ my ain;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I lov’d her most sincerely;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I kiss’d her owre and owre again,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Amang the rigs o’ barley.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I lock’d her in my fond embrace!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Her heart was beating rarely:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My blessings on that happy place.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Amang the rigs o’ barley!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But by the moon and stars so bright.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That shone that hour so clearly?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">She ay shall bless that happy night,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Amang the rigs o’ barley!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I hae been blithe wi’ comrades dear;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I hae been merry drinkin’;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I hae been joyfu’ gath’rin’ gear;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I hae been happy thinkin’:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But a’ the pleasures e’er I saw,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Tho’ three times doubled fairly,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That happy night was worth them a’,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Amang the rigs o’ barley.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std3">CHORUS.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Corn rigs, an’ barley rigs,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’ corn rigs are bonnie:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I’ll ne’er forget that happy night,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Amang the rigs wi’ Annie.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsVIII" id="songsVIII"></a>VIII.</h2> + +<h3>MONTGOMERY’S PEGGY.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Galla-Water.”</i></p> + +<p>[“My Montgomery’s Peggy,” says Burns, “was my deity for six or eight +months: she had been bred in a style of life rather elegant: it cost +me some heart-aches to get rid of the affair.” The young lady listened +to the eloquence of the poet, poured out in many an interview, and +then quietly told him that she stood unalterably engaged to another.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Altho’ my bed were in yon muir,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Amang the heather, in my plaidie,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yet happy, happy would I be,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Had I my dear Montgomery’s Peggy.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">When o’er the hill beat surly storms,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And winter nights were dark and rainy;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I’d seek some dell, and in my arms<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I’d shelter dear Montgomery’s Peggy.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Were I a baron proud and high,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And horse and servants waiting ready,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Then a’ ’twad gie o’ joy to me,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The sharin’t with Montgomery’s Peggy.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsIX" id="songsIX"></a>IX.</h2> + +<h3>THE MAUCHLINE LADY.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>I had a horse, I had nae mair.</i>”</p> + +<p>[The Mauchline lady who won the poet’s heart was Jean Armour: she +loved to relate how the bard made her acquaintance: his dog run across +some linen webs which she was bleaching among Mauchline gowans, and he +apologized so handsomely that she took another look at him. To this +interview the world owes some of our most impassioned strains.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">When first I came to Stewart Kyle,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My mind it was nae steady;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where’er I gaed, where’er I rade,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A mistress still I had ay:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But when I came roun’ by Mauchline town,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Not dreadin’ any body,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My heart was caught before I thought,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And by a Mauchline lady.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsX" id="songsX"></a>X.</h2> + +<h3>THE HIGHLAND LASSIE.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>The deuks dang o’er my daddy</i>!”</p> + +<p>[“The Highland Lassie” was Mary Campbell, whose too early death the +poet sung in strains that will endure<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_212" id="Page_212">[212]</a></span> while the language lasts. “She +was,” says Burns, “a warm-hearted, charming young creature as ever +blessed a man with generous love.”]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Nae gentle dames, tho’ e’er sae fair,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Shall ever be my muse’s care:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Their titles a’ are empty show;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Gie me my Highland lassie, O.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Within the glen sae bushy, O,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Aboon the plains sae rushy, O,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I set me down wi’ right good-will,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To sing my Highland lassie, O.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Oh, were yon hills and valleys mine,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yon palace and yon gardens fine,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The world then the love should know<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I bear my Highland lassie, O.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But fickle fortune frowns on me,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And I maun cross the raging sea;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But while my crimson currents flow,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I’ll love my Highland lassie, O.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Altho’ thro’ foreign climes I range,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I know her heart will never change,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For her bosom burns with honour’s glow,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My faithful Highland lassie, O.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">V.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">For her I’ll dare the billows’ roar,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For her I’ll trace a distant shore,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That Indian wealth may lustre throw<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Around my Highland lassie, O.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">VI.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">She has my heart, she has my hand,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">by sacred truth and honour’s band!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">’Till the mortal stroke shall lay me low,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I’m thine, my Highland lassie, O.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Farewell the glen sae bushy, O!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Farewell the plain sae rushy, O!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To other lands I now must go,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To sing my Highland lassie, O.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsXI" id="songsXI"></a>XI.</h2> + +<h3>PEGGY.</h3> +<p>[The heroine of this song is said to have been “Montgomery’s Peggy.”]</p> + +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>I had a horse, I had nae mair.</i>”</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Now westlin winds and slaughtering guns<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Bring autumn’s pleasant weather;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The moor-cock springs, on whirring wings,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Amang the blooming heather:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Now waving grain, wide o’er the plain,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Delights the weary farmer;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And the moon shines bright, when I rove at night<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To muse upon my charmer.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The partridge loves the fruitful fells;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The plover loves the mountains;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The woodcock haunts the lonely dells;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The soaring hern the fountains;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thro’ lofty groves the cushat roves<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The path of man to shun it;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The hazel bush o’erhangs the thrush,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The spreading thorn the linnet.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Thus ev’ry kind their pleasure find,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The savage and the tender;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Some social join, and leagues combine;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Some solitary wander:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Avaunt, away! the cruel sway,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Tyrannic man’s dominion;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The sportsman’s joy, the murd’ring cry,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The flutt’ring, gory pinion.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But Peggy, dear, the ev’ning’s clear,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Thick flies the skimming swallow;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The sky is blue, the fields in view,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">All fading-green and yellow:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Come, let us stray our gladsome way,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And view the charms of nature;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The rustling corn, the fruited thorn,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And every happy creature.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">V.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">We’ll gently walk, and sweetly talk,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Till the silent moon shine clearly;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I’ll grasp thy waist, and, fondly prest,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Swear how I love thee dearly:<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_213" id="Page_213">[213]</a></span><span class="i0">Not vernal show’rs to budding flow’rs,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Not autumn to the farmer,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">So dear can be as thou to me,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My fair, my lovely charmer!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + + + + + + +<h2><a name="songsXII" id="songsXII"></a>XII.</h2> + +<h3>THE RANTIN’ DOG, THE DADDIE O’T.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>East nook o’ Fife.</i>”</p> + +<p>[The heroine of this humorous ditty was the mother of “Sonsie, +smirking, dear-bought Bess,” a person whom the poet regarded, as he +says, both for her form and her grace.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O wha my babie-clouts will buy?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O wha will tent me when I cry?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wha will kiss me where I lie?—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The rantin’ dog, the daddie o’t.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O wha will own he did the fau’t?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O wha will buy the groanin’ maut?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O wha will tell me how to ca’t?<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The rantin’ dog, the daddie o’t.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">When I mount the creepie chair,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wha will sit beside me there?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Gie me Rob, I’ll seek nae mair,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The rantin’ dog, the daddie o’t.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Wha will crack to me my lane?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wha will make me fidgin’ fain?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wha will kiss me o’er again?—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The rantin’ dog, the daddie o’t.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsXIII" id="songsXIII"></a>XIII.</h2> + +<h3>MY HEART WAS ANCE.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>To the weavers gin ye go.</i>”</p> + +<p>[“The chorus of this song,” says Burns, in his note to the Museum, “is +old, the rest is mine.” The “bonnie, westlin weaver lad” is said to +have been one of the rivals of the poet in the affection of a west +landlady.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">My heart was ance as blythe and free<br /></span> +<span class="i2">As simmer days were lang,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But a bonnie, westlin weaver lad<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Has gart me change my sang.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">To the weavers gin ye go, fair maids,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">To the weavers gin ye go;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">I rede you right gang ne’er at night,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">To the weavers gin ye go.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">My mither sent me to the town,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To warp a plaiden wab;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But the weary, weary warpin o’t<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Has gart me sigh and sab.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">A bonnie westlin weaver lad,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Sat working at his loom;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He took my heart as wi’ a net,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In every knot and thrum.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I sat beside my warpin-wheel,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And ay I ca’d it roun’;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But every shot and every knock,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My heart it gae a stoun.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">V.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The moon was sinking in the west<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Wi’ visage pale and wan,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As my bonnie westlin weaver lad<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Convoy’d me thro’ the glen.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">VI.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But what was said, or what was done,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Shame fa’ me gin I tell;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But, oh! I fear the kintra soon<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Will ken as weel’s mysel.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">To the weavers gin ye go, fair maids,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">To the weavers gin ye go;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">I rede you right gang ne’er at night,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">To the weavers gin ye go.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsXIV" id="songsXIV"></a>XIV.</h2> + +<h3>NANNIE.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>My Nannie, O.</i>”</p> + +<p>[Agnes Fleming, servant at Calcothill, inspired this fine song: she +died at an advanced age, and was more remarkable for the beauty of her +form than face. When questioned about the love of Burns, she smiled +and said, “Aye, atweel he made a great wark about me.”]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Behind yon hills, where Lugar flows,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">‘Mang moors an’ mosses many, O,<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_214" id="Page_214">[214]</a></span><span class="i0">The wintry sun the day has closed,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And I’ll awa to Nannie, O.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The westlin wind blaws loud an’ shrill;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The night’s baith mirk and rainy, O;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But I’ll get my plaid, an’ out I’ll steal,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’ owre the hills to Nannie, O.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">My Nannie’s charming, sweet, an’ young;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Nae artfu’ wiles to win ye, O:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">May ill befa’ the flattering tongue<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That wad beguile my Nannie, O.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Her face is fair, her heart is true,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">As spotless as she’s bonnie, O:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The op’ning gowan, wat wi’ dew,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Nae purer is than Nannie, O.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">V.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">A country lad is my degree,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’ few there be that ken me, O;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But what care I how few they be?<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I’m welcome ay to Nannie, O.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">VI.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">My riches a’s my penny-fee,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’ I maun guide it cannie, O;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But warl’s gear ne’er troubles me,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My thoughts are a’ my Nannie, O.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">VII.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Our auld guidman delights to view<br /></span> +<span class="i2">His sheep an’ kye thrive bonnie, O;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But I’m as blythe that hauds his pleugh,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’ has nae care but Nannie, O.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">VIII.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Come weel, come woe, I care na by,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I’ll tak what Heav’n will sen’ me, O:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Nae ither care in life have I,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But live, an’ love my Nannie, O.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsXV" id="songsXV"></a>XV.</h2> + +<h3>A FRAGMENT.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>John Anderson my jo.</i>”</p> + +<p>[This verse, written early, and probably intended for the starting +verse of a song, was found among the papers of the poet.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">One night as I did wander,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">When corn begins to shoot,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I sat me down to ponder,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Upon an auld tree root:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Auld Ayr ran by before me,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And bicker’d to the seas;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A cushat crooded o’er me,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That echoed thro’ the braes.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsXVI" id="songsXVI"></a>XVI.</h2> + +<h3>BONNIE PEGGY ALISON.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Braes o’ Balquihidder.</i>”</p> + +<p>[On those whom Burns loved, he poured out songs without limit. Peggy +Alison is said, by a western tradition, to be Montgomery’s Peggy, but +this seems doubtful.]</p> + + +<p class="std3">CHORUS.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I’ll kiss thee yet, yet,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’ I’ll kiss thee o’er again;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ I’ll kiss thee yet, yet,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My bonnie Peggy Alison!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Ilk care and fear, when thou art near,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I ever mair defy them, O;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Young kings upon their hansel throne<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Are no sae blest as I am, O!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">When in my arms, wi’ a’ thy charms,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I clasp my countless treasure, O,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I seek nae mair o’ Heaven to share<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Than sic a moment’s pleasure, O!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">And by thy een, sae bonnie blue,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I swear, I’m thine for ever, O!—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And on thy lips I seal my vow,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">And break it shall I never, O!<br /></span> +<span class="i6">I’ll kiss thee yet, yet,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">An’ I’ll kiss thee o’er again;<br /></span> +<span class="i6">An’ I’ll kiss thee yet, yet,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">My bonnie Peggy Alison!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsXVII" id="songsXVII"></a>XVII.</h2> + +<h3>THERE’S NOUGHT BUT CARE.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Green grow the rashes.</i>”</p> + +<p>[“Man was made when nature was but an apprentice; but woman is the +last and most perfect work of nature,” says an old writer, in a rare +old book: a passage <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_215" id="Page_215">[215]</a></span>which expresses the sentiment of Burns; yet it is +all but certain, that the Ploughman Bard was unacquainted with +“Cupid’s Whirlygig,” where these words are to be found.]</p> + + +<p class="std3">CHORUS.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Green grow the rashes, O!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Green grow the rashes, O!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The sweetest hours that e’er I spend<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Are spent amang the lasses, O.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">There’s nought but care on ev’ry han’,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In every hour that passes, O:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">What signifies the life o’ man,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’ ’twere na for the lasses, O.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The warly race may riches chase,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’ riches still may fly them, O;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ tho’ at last they catch them fast,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Their hearts can ne’er enjoy them, O.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But gie me a canny hour at e’en,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My arms about my dearie, O;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ warly cares, an’ warly men,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">May a’ gae tapsalteerie, O.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">For you sae douce, ye sneer at this,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Ye’re nought but senseless asses, O:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The wisest man the warl’ e’er saw,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">He dearly lov’d the lasses, O.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">V.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Auld Nature swears the lovely dears<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Her noblest work she classes, O:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Her ‘prentice han’ she try’d on man,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’ then she made the lasses, O.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Green grow the rashes, O!<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Green grow the rashes, O!<br /></span> +<span class="i4">The sweetest hours that e’er I spend<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Are spent amang the lasses, O.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsXVIII" id="songsXVIII"></a>XVIII.</h2> + +<h3>MY JEAN!</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>The Northern Lass.</i>”</p> + +<p>[The lady on whom this passionate verse was written was Jean Armour.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Though cruel fate should bid us part,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Far as the pole and line,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Her dear idea round my heart,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Should tenderly entwine.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Though mountains rise, and deserts howl,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And oceans roar between;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yet, dearer than my deathless soul,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I still would love my Jean<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsXIX" id="songsXIX"></a>XIX.</h2> + +<h3>ROBIN.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Daintie Davie.</i>”</p> + +<p>[Stothard painted a clever little picture from this characteristic +ditty: the cannie wife, it was evident, saw in Robin’s palm something +which tickled her, and a curious intelligence sparkled in the eyes of +her gossips.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">There was a lad was born in Kyle,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But whatna day o’ whatna style<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I doubt it’s hardly worth the while<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To be sae nice wi’ Robin.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Robin was a rovin’ boy,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Rantin’ rovin’, rantin’ rovin’;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Robin was a rovin’ boy,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Rantin’ rovin’ Robin!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Our monarch’s hindmost year but ane<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Was five-and-twenty days begun,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Twas then a blast o’ Janwar win’<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Blew hansel in on Robin.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The gossip keekit in his loof,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Quo’ she, wha lives will see the proof.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">This waly boy will be nae coof,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I think we’ll ca’ him Robin<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">He’ll hae misfortunes great and sma’,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But ay a heart aboon them a’;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He’ll be a credit to us a’,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">We’ll a’ be proud o’ Robin.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">V.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But sure as three times three mak nine,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I see by ilka score and line,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">This chap will dearly like our kin’,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">So leeze me on thee, Robin.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">VI.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Guid faith, quo’ she, I doubt you gar,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The bonnie lasses lie aspar,<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_216" id="Page_216">[216]</a></span><span class="i0">But twenty fauts ye may hae waur,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">So blessin’s on thee, Robin!<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Robin was a rovin’ boy,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Rantin’ rovin’, rantin’ rovin’;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Robin was a rovin’ boy,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Rantin’ rovin’ Robin!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsXX" id="songsXX"></a>XX.</h2> + +<h3>HER FLOWING LOCKS.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—(unknown.)</p> + +<p>[One day—it is tradition that speaks—Burns had his foot in the +stirrup to return from Ayr to Mauchline, when a young lady of great +beauty rode up to the inn, and ordered refreshments for her servants; +he made these lines at the moment, to keep, he said, so much beauty in +his memory.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Her flowing locks, the raven’s wing,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Adown her neck and bosom hing;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">How sweet unto that breast to cling,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And round that neck entwine her!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Her lips are roses wat wi’ dew,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O, what a feast her bonnie mou’!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Her cheeks a mair celestial hue,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A crimson still diviner.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsXXI" id="songsXXI"></a>XXI.</h2> + +<h3>O LEAVE NOVELS.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i> Mauchline belles.</i>”</p> + +<p>[Who these Mauchline belles were the bard in other verse informs us:—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Miss Miller is fine, Miss Markland’s divine,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Miss Smith, she has wit, and Miss Betty is braw;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">There’s beauty and fortune to get with Miss Morton,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But Armour’s the jewel for me o’ them a’.”]<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O leave novels, ye Mauchline belles,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Ye’re safer at your spinning-wheel;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Such witching books are baited hooks<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For rakish rooks, like Rob Mossgiel.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Your fine Tom Jones and Grandisons,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">They make your youthful fancies reel;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">They heat your brains, and fire your veins,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And then you’re prey for Rob Mossgiel.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Beware a tongue that’s smoothly hung,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A heart that warmly seems to feel;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That feeling heart but acts a part—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">’Tis rakish art in Rob Mossgiel.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The frank address, the soft caress,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Are worse than poison’d darts of steel;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The frank address and politesse<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Are all finesse in Rob Mossgiel.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsXXII" id="songsXXII"></a>XXII.</h2> + +<h3>YOUNG PEGGY.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Last time I cam o’er the muir.</i>”</p> + +<p>[In these verses Burns, it is said, bade farewell to one on whom he +had, according to his own account, wasted eights months of courtship. +We hear no more of Montgomery’s Peggy.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Young Peggy blooms our bonniest lass,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Her blush is like the morning,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The rosy dawn, the springing grass,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">With early gems adorning:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Her eyes outshone the radiant beams<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That gild the passing shower,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And glitter o’er the crystal streams,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And cheer each fresh’ning flower.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Her lips, more than the cherries bright,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A richer dye has graced them;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">They charm th’ admiring gazer’s sight,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And sweetly tempt to taste them:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Her smile is, as the evening mild,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">When feather’d tribes are courting,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And little lambkins wanton wild,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In playful bands disporting.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Were fortune lovely Peggy’s foe,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Such sweetness would relent her,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As blooming spring unbends the brow<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Of surly, savage winter.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Detraction’s eye no aim can gain,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Her winning powers to lessen;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And fretful envy grins in vain<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The poison’d tooth to fasten.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Ye powers of honour, love, and truth,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">From every ill defend her;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Inspire the highly-favour’d youth,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The destinies intend her:<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_217" id="Page_217">[217]</a></span><span class="i0">Still fan the sweet connubial flame<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Responsive in each bosom,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And bless the dear parental name<br /></span> +<span class="i2">With many a filial blossom.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsXXIII" id="songsXXIII"></a>XXIII.</h2> + +<h3>THE CURE FOR ALL CARE.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Prepare, my dear brethren, to the tavern</i> <i>let’s fly.</i>”</p> + +<p>[Tarbolton Lodge, of which the poet was a member, was noted for its +socialities. Masonic lyrics are all of a dark and mystic order; and +those of Burns are scarcely an exception.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">No churchman am I for to rail and to write,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">No statesman nor soldier to plot or to fight,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">No sly man of business, contriving to snare—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For a big-bellied bottle’s the whole of my care.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The peer I don’t envy, I give him his bow;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I scorn not the peasant, tho’ ever so low;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But a club of good fellows, like those that are here,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And a bottle like this, are my glory and care.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Here passes the squire on his brother—his horse;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">There centum per centum, the cit with his purse;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But see you The Crown, how it waves in the air!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">There a big-bellied bottle still eases my care.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The wife of my bosom, alas! she did die;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For sweet consolation to church I did fly;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I found that old Solomon proved it fair,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That a big-bellied bottle’s a cure for all care.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">V.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I once was persuaded a venture to make;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A letter inform’d me that all was to wreck;—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But the pursy old landlord just waddled up stairs,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With a glorious bottle that ended my cares.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">VI.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Life’s cares they are comforts,”<a name="FNanchor_136_136" id="FNanchor_136_136"></a><a href="#Footnote_136_136" class="fnanchor">[136]</a>—a maxim laid down<br /></span> +<span class="i0">By the bard, what d’ye call him, that wore the black gown;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And faith I agree with th’ old prig to a hair;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For a big-bellied bottle’s a heav’n of care.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">VII.</p> + +<p class="std3">ADDED IN A MASON LODGE.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Then fill up a bumper and make it o’erflow.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The honours masonic prepare for to throw;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">May every true brother of the compass and square<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Have a big-bellied bottle when harass’d with care!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_136_136" id="Footnote_136_136"></a><a href="#FNanchor_136_136"><span class="label">[136]</span></a> Young’s Night Thoughts.</p></div> +</div> + + + +<h2><a name="songsXXIV" id="songsXXIV"></a>XXIV.</h2> + +<h3>ELIZA.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Gilderoy.</i>”</p> + +<p>[My late excellent friend, John Galt, informed me that the Eliza of +this song was his relative, and that her name was Elizabeth Barbour.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">From thee, Eliza, I must go,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And from my native shore;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The cruel Fates between us throw<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A boundless ocean’s roar:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But boundless oceans roaring wide<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Between my love and me,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">They never, never can divide<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My heart and soul from thee!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Farewell, farewell, Eliza dear,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The maid that I adore!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A boding voice is in mine ear,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">We part to meet no more!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The latest throb that leaves my heart,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">While death stands victor by,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That throb, Eliza, is thy part,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And thine that latest sigh!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsXXV" id="songsXXV"></a>XXV.</h2> + +<h3>THE SONS OF OLD KILLIE.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Shawnboy.”</i></p> + +<p>[“This song, wrote by Mr. Burns, was sung by him in the +Kilmarnock-Kilwinning Lodge, in 1786, and given by him to Mr. Parker, +who was Master of the Lodge.” <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_218" id="Page_218">[218]</a></span>These interesting words are on the +original, in the poet’s handwriting, in the possession of Mr. Gabriel +Neil, of Glasgow.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Ye sons of old Killie, assembled by Willie,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To follow the noble vocation;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Your thrifty old mother has scarce such another<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To sit in that honoured station.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I’ve little to say, but only to pray,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">As praying’s the ton of your fashion;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A prayer from the muse you well may excuse,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">’Tis seldom her favourite passion.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Ye powers who preside o’er the wind and the tide,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Who marked each element’s border;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Who formed this frame with beneficent aim,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Whose sovereign statute is order;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Within this dear mansion, may wayward contention<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Or withered envy ne’er enter;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">May secrecy round be the mystical bound,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And brotherly love be the centre.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsXXVI" id="songsXXVI"></a>XXVI.</h2> + +<h3>MENIE.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune.—“<i>Johnny’s grey breeks.</i>”</p> + +<p>[Of the lady who inspired this song no one has given any account: It +first appeared in the second edition of the poet’s works, and as the +chorus was written by an Edinburgh gentleman, it has been surmised +that the song was a matter of friendship rather than of the heart.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Again rejoicing nature sees<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Her robe assume its vernal hues,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Her leafy locks wave in the breeze,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">All freshly steep’d in morning dews.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">And maun I still on Menie doat,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">And bear the scorn that’s in her e’e?<br /></span> +<span class="i4">For it’s jet, jet black, an’ it’s like a hawk,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">An’ it winna let a body be.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">In vain to me the cowslips blaw,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In vain to me the vi’lets spring;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In vain to me, in glen or shaw,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The mavis and the lintwhite sing.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The merry plough-boy cheers his team,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Wi’ joy the tentie seedsman stalks;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But life to me’s a weary dream,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A dream of ane that never wauks.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The wanton coot the water skims,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Amang the reeds the ducklings cry,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The stately swan majestic swims,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And every thing is blest but I.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">V.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The sheep-herd steeks his faulding slap,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And owre the moorland whistles shrill;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wi’ wild, unequal, wand’ring step,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I meet him on the dewy hill.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">VI.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">And when the lark, ’tween light and dark,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Blythe waukens by the daisy’s side,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And mounts and sings on flittering wings,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A woe-worn ghaist I hameward glide.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">VII.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Come, Winter, with thine angry howl,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And raging bend the naked tree:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thy gloom will sooth my cheerless soul,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">When nature all is sad like me!<br /></span> +<span class="i4">And maun I still on Menie doat,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">And bear the scorn that’s in her e’e?<br /></span> +<span class="i4">For it’s jet, jet black, an’ it’s like a hawk,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">An’ it winna let a body be.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsXXVII" id="songsXXVII"></a>XXVII.</h2> + +<h3>THE FAREWELL</h3> +<h5>TO THE</h5> +<h4>BRETHREN OF ST. JAMES’S LODGE,</h4> +<h4>TARBOLTON.</h4> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Good-night, and joy be wi’ you a’.</i>”</p> + +<p>[Burns, it is said, sung this song in the St. James’s Lodge of +Tarbolton, when his chest was on the way to Greenock: men are yet +living who had the honour of hearing him—the concluding verse +affected the whole lodge.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Adieu! a heart-warm, fond adieu!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Dear brothers of the mystic tie!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ye favour’d, ye enlighten’d few,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Companions of my social joy!<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_219" id="Page_219">[219]</a></span><span class="i0">Tho’ I to foreign lands must hie,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Pursuing Fortune’s slidd’ry ba’,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With melting heart, and brimful eye,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I’ll mind you still, tho’ far awa’.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Oft have I met your social band,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And spent the cheerful, festive night;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Oft honour’d with supreme command,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Presided o’er the sons of light:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And by that hieroglyphic bright,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Which none but craftsmen ever saw!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Strong mem’ry on my heart shall write<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Those happy scenes when far awa’.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">May freedom, harmony, and love<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Unite you in the grand design,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Beneath th’ Omniscient Eye above,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The glorious architect divine!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That you may keep th’ unerring line,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Still rising by the plummet’s law,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Till order bright completely shine,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Shall be my pray’r when far awa’.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">And you farewell! whose merits claim,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Justly, that highest badge to wear!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Heav’n bless your honour’d, noble name,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To masonry and Scotia dear!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A last request permit me here,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">When yearly ye assemble a’,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">One round—I ask it with a tear,—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To him, the Bard that’s far awa’.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsXXVIII" id="songsXXVIII"></a>XXVIII.</h2> + +<h3>ON CESSNOCK BANKS.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>If he be a butcher neat and trim.</i>”</p> + +<p>[There are many variations of this song, which was first printed by +Cromek from the oral communication of a Glasgow Lady, on whose charms, +the poet, in early life, composed it.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">On Cessnock banks a lassie dwells;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Could I describe her shape and mien;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Our lasses a’ she far excels,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An she has twa sparkling roguish een.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">She’s sweeter than the morning dawn<br /></span> +<span class="i2">When rising Phœbus first is seen,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And dew-drops twinkle o’er the lawn;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’ she has twa sparkling roguish een<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">She’s stately like yon youthful ash,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That grows the cowslip braes between,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And drinks the stream with vigour fresh;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’ she has twa sparkling roguish een.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">She’s spotless like the flow’ring thorn,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">With flow’rs so white and leaves so green,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When purest in the dewy morn;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’ she has twa sparkling roguish een.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">V.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Her looks are like the vernal May,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">When evening Phœbus shines serene,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">While birds rejoice on every spray—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’ she has twa sparkling roguish een.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">VI.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Her hair is like the curling mist<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That climbs the mountain-sides at e’en,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When flow’r-reviving rains are past;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’ she has twa sparkling roguish een.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">VII.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Her forehead’s like the show’ry bow,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">When gleaming sunbeams intervene,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And gild the distant mountain’s brow;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’ she has twa sparkling roguish een.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">VIII.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Her cheeks are like yon crimson gem,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The pride of all the flow’ry scene,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Just opening on its thorny stem;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’ she has twa sparkling roguish een.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IX.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Her teeth are like the nightly snow<br /></span> +<span class="i2">When pale the morning rises keen,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">While hid the murmuring streamlets flow;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’ she has twa sparkling roguish een<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">X.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Her lips are like yon cherries ripe,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That sunny walls from Boreas screen—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">They tempt the taste and charm the sight;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’ she has twa, sparkling roguish een.<br /></span> +</div></div> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_220" id="Page_220">[220]</a></span></p> + +<p class="std2">XI.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Her teeth are like a flock of sheep,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">With fleeces newly washen clean,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That slowly mount the rising steep;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’ she has twa glancin’ roguish een.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">XII.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Her breath is like the fragrant breeze<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That gently stirs the blossom’d bean,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When Phœbus sinks behind the seas;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’ she has twa sparkling roguish een.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">XIII.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Her voice is like the ev’ning thrush<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That sings on Cessnock banks unseen,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">While his mate sits nestling in the bush;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’ she has twa sparkling roguish een.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">XIV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But it’s not her air, her form, her face,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Tho’ matching beauty’s fabled queen,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">’Tis the mind that shines in ev’ry grace,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’ chiefly in her roguish een.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsXXIX" id="songsXXIX"></a>XXIX.</h2> + +<h3>MARY!</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Blue Bonnets.</i>”</p> + +<p>[In the original manuscript Burns calls this song “A Prayer for Mary;” +his Highland Mary is supposed to be the inspirer.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Powers celestial! whose protection<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Ever guards the virtuous fair,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">While in distant climes I wander,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Let my Mary be your care:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Let her form sae fair and faultless,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Fair and faultless as your own,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Let my Mary’s kindred spirit<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Draw your choicest influence down.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Make the gales you waft around her<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Soft and peaceful as her breast;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Breathing in the breeze that fans her,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Soothe her bosom into rest:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Guardian angels! O protect her,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">When in distant lands I roam;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To realms unknown while fate exiles me,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Make her bosom still my home.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsXXX" id="songsXXX"></a>XXX.</h2> + +<h3>THE LASS OF BALLOCHMYLE.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Miss Forbes’s Farewell to Banff.</i>”</p> + +<p>[Miss Alexander, of Ballochmyle, as the poet tells her in a letter, +dated November, 1786, inspired this popular song. He chanced to meet +her in one of his favourite walks on the banks of the Ayr, and the +fine scene and the lovely lady set the muse to work. Miss Alexander, +perhaps unaccustomed to this forward wooing of the muse, allowed the +offering to remain unnoticed for a time: it is now in a costly frame, +and hung in her chamber—as it deserves to be.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">’Twas even—the dewy fields were green,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">On every blade the pearls hang,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The zephyr wanton’d round the bean,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And bore its fragrant sweets alang:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In ev’ry glen the mavis sang,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">All nature listening seem’d the while,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Except where greenwood echoes rang<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Amang the braes o’ Ballochmyle!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">With careless step I onward stray’d,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My heart rejoic’d in nature’s joy,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When musing in a lonely glade,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A maiden fair I chanc’d to spy;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Her look was like the morning’s eye,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Her air like nature’s vernal smile,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Perfection whisper’d passing by,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Behold the lass o’ Ballochmyle!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Fair is the morn in flow’ry May,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And sweet is night in autumn mild<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When roving thro’ the garden gay,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Or wand’ring in the lonely wild;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But woman, nature’s darling child!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">There all her charms she does compile;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Even there her other works are foil’d<br /></span> +<span class="i2">By the bonnie lass o’ Ballochmyle.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O, had she been a country maid,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And I the happy country swain,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Tho’ shelter’d in the lowest shed<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That ever rose on Scotland’s plain,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thro’ weary winter’s wind and rain,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">With joy, with rapture, I would toil;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And nightly to my bosom strain<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The bonnie lass of Ballochmyle.<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_221" id="Page_221">[221]</a></span></div></div> + +<p class="std2">V.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Then pride might climb the slippery steep,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Where fame and honours lofty shine:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And thirst of gold might tempt the deep<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Or downward seek the Indian mine;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Give me the cot below the pine,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To tend the flocks, or till the soil,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And ev’ry day have joys divine<br /></span> +<span class="i2">With the bonnie lass o’ Ballochmyle.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsXXXI" id="songsXXXI"></a>XXXI.</h2> + +<h3>THE GLOOMY NIGHT.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Roslin Castle.</i>”</p> + +<p>[“I had taken,” says Burns, “the last farewell of my friends, my chest +was on the road to Greenock, and I had composed the last song I should +ever measure in Caledonia—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">’The gloomy night is gathering fast.’”]<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The gloomy night is gath’ring fast,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Loud roars the wild inconstant blast;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yon murky cloud is foul with rain,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I see it driving o’er the plain;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The hunter now has left the moor,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The scatter’d coveys meet secure;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">While here I wander, prest with care,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Along the lonely banks of Ayr.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The Autumn mourns her rip’ning corn,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">By early Winter’s ravage torn;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Across her placid, azure sky,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">She sees the scowling tempest fly:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Chill runs my blood to hear it rave—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I think upon the stormy wave,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where many a danger I must dare,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Far from the bonnie banks of Ayr.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">’Tis not the surging billow’s roar,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">’Tis not that fatal deadly shore;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Tho’ death in ev’ry shape appear,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The wretched have no more to fear!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But round my heart the ties are bound,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That heart transpierc’d with many a wound;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">These bleed afresh, those ties I tear,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To leave the bonnie banks of Ayr.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Farewell old Coila’s hills and dales,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Her heathy moors and winding vales;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The scenes where wretched fancy roves,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Pursuing past, unhappy loves!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Farewell, my friends! farewell, my foes!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My peace with these, my love with those—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The bursting tears my heart declare;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Farewell, the bonnie banks of Ayr!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsXXXII" id="songsXXXII"></a>XXXII.</h2> + +<h3>O WHAR DID YE GET</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Bonnie Dundee.</i>”</p> + +<p>[This is one of the first songs which Burns communicated to Johnson’s +Musical Museum: the starting verse is partly old and partly new: the +second is wholly by his hand.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O, whar did ye get that hauver meal bannock?<br /></span> +<span class="i2">O silly blind body, O dinna ye see?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I gat it frae a young brisk sodger laddie,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Between Saint Johnston and bonnie Dundee.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O gin I saw the laddie that gae me’t!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Aft has he doudl’d me up on his knee;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">May Heaven protect my bonnie Scots laddie,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And send him safe hame to his babie and me!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">My blessin’s upon thy sweet wee lippie,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My blessin’s upon thy bonnie e’e brie!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thy smiles are sae like my blythe sodger laddie,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Thou’s ay the dearer and dearer to me!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But I’ll big a bower on yon bonnie banks,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Where Tay rins wimplin’ by sae clear;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And I’ll cleed thee in the tartan sae fine,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And mak thee a man like thy daddie dear.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsXXXIII" id="songsXXXIII"></a>XXXIII.</h2> + +<h3>THE JOYFUL WIDOWER.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Maggy Lauder.</i>”</p> + +<p>[Most of this song is by Burns: his fancy was fierce with images of +matrimonial joy or infelicity, and he had them ever ready at the call +of the muse. It was first printed in the Musical Museum.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I married with a scolding wife<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The fourteenth of November;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">She made me weary of my life,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">By one unruly member.<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_222" id="Page_222">[222]</a></span><span class="i0">Long did I bear the heavy yoke,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And many griefs attended;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But to my comfort be it spoke,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Now, now her life is ended.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">We liv’d full one-and-twenty years<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A man and wife together;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">At length from me her course she steer’d,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And gone I know not whither:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Would I could guess, I do profess,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I speak, and do not flatter,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of all the woman in the world,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I never could come at her.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Her body is bestowed well,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A handsome grave does hide her;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But sure her soul is not in hell,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The deil would ne’er abide her.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I rather think she is aloft,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And imitating thunder;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For why,—methinks I hear her voice<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Tearing the clouds asunder.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsXXXIV" id="songsXXXIV"></a>XXXIV.</h2> + +<h3>COME DOWN THE BACK STAIRS.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Whistle, and I’ll come to you, my lad.</i>”</p> + +<p>[The air of this song was composed by John Bruce, a Dumfries fiddler. +Burns gave another and happier version to the work of Thomson: this +was written for the Museum of Johnson, where it was first published.]</p> + + +<p class="std3">CHORUS.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i2">O whistle, and I’ll come<br /></span> +<span class="i4">To you, my lad;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">O whistle, and I’ll come<br /></span> +<span class="i4">To you, my lad:<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Tho’ father and mither<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Should baith gae mad,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">O whistle, and I’ll come<br /></span> +<span class="i4">To you, my lad.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Come down the back stairs<br /></span> +<span class="i2">When ye come to court me;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Come down the back stairs<br /></span> +<span class="i2">When ye come to court me;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Come down the back stairs,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And let naebody see,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And come as ye were na<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Coming to me.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsXXXV" id="songsXXXV"></a>XXXV.</h2> + +<h3>I AM MY MAMMY’S AE BAIRN.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>I’m o’er young to marry yet.</i>”</p> + +<p>[The title, and part of the chorus only of this song, are old; the +rest is by Burns, and was written for Johnson.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I am my mammy’s ae bairn,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Wi’ unco folk I weary, Sir;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And lying in a man’s bed,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I’m fley’d it make me eerie, Sir.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">I’m o’er young to marry yet;<br /></span> +<span class="i6">I’m o’er young to marry yet;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">I’m o’er young—’twad be a sin<br /></span> +<span class="i6">To tak’ me frae my mammy yet.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Hallowmas is come and gane,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The nights are lang in winter, Sir;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And you an’ I in ae bed,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In trouth, I dare na venture, Sir.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Fu’ loud and shrill the frosty wind,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Blaws through the leafless timmer, Sir;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But, if ye come this gate again,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I’ll aulder be gin simmer, Sir.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">I’m o’er young to marry yet;<br /></span> +<span class="i6">I’m o’er young to marry yet;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">I’m o’er young, ’twad be a sin<br /></span> +<span class="i6">To tak me frae my mammy yet.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsXXXVI" id="songsXXXVI"></a>XXXVI.</h2> + +<h3>BONNIE LASSIE, WILL YE GO.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>The birks of Aberfeldy.</i>”</p> + +<p>[An old strain, called “The Birks of Abergeldie,” was the forerunner +of this sweet song: it was written, the poet says, standing under the +Falls of Aberfeldy, near Moness, in Perthshire, during one of the +tours which he made to the north, in the year 1787.]</p> + + +<p class="std3">CHORUS.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Bonnie lassie, will ye go,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Will ye go, will ye go;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Bonnie lassie, will ye go<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To the birks of Aberfeldy?<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Now simmer blinks on flowery braes,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And o’er the crystal streamlet plays;<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_223" id="Page_223">[223]</a></span><span class="i0">Come let us spend the lightsome days<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In the birks of Aberfeldy.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The little birdies blithely sing,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">While o’er their heads the hazels hing,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or lightly flit on wanton wing<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In the birks of Aberfeldy.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The braes ascend, like lofty wa’s,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The foamy stream deep-roaring fa’s,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O’erhung wi’ fragrant spreading shaws,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The birks of Aberfeldy.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The hoary cliffs are crown’d wi’ flowers,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">White o’er the linns the burnie pours,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And rising, weets wi’ misty showers<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The birks of Aberfeldy.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">V.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Let Fortune’s gifts at random flee,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">They ne’er shall draw a wish frae me,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Supremely blest wi’ love and thee,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In the birks of Aberfeldy.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Bonnie lassie, will ye go,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Will ye go, will ye go;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Bonnie lassie, will ye go<br /></span> +<span class="i6">To the birks of Aberfeldy?<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsXXXVII" id="songsXXXVII"></a>XXXVII.</h2> + +<h3>MACPHERSON’S FAREWELL.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>M’Pherson’s Rant.</i>”</p> + +<p>[This vehement and daring song had its origin in an older and inferior +strain, recording the feelings of a noted freebooter when brought to +“Justify his deeds on the gallows-tree” at Inverness.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Farewell, ye dungeons dark and strong,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The wretch’s destinie!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Macpherson’s time will not be long<br /></span> +<span class="i2">On yonder gallows-tree.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Sae rantingly, sae wantonly,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Sae dauntingly gaed he;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">He play’d a spring, and danc’d it round,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Below the gallows-tree.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Oh, what is death but parting breath?<br /></span> +<span class="i2">On many a bloody plain<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I’ve dar’d his face, and in this place<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I scorn him yet again!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Untie these bands from off my hands,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And bring to me my sword;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And there’s no a man in all Scotland,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But I’ll brave him at a word.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I’ve liv’d a life of sturt and strife;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I die by treacherie:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">It burns my heart I must depart,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And not avenged be.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">V.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Now farewell light—thou sunshine bright,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And all beneath the sky!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">May coward shame distain his name,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The wretch that dares not die!<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Sae rantingly, sae wantonly,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Sae dauntingly gaed he;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">He play’d a spring, and danc’d it round,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Below the gallows-tree.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsXXXVIII" id="songsXXXVIII"></a>XXXVIII.</h2> + +<h3>BRAW LADS OF GALLA WATER.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Galla Water.</i>”</p> + +<p>[Burns found this song in the collection of Herd; added the first +verse, made other but not material emendations, and published it in +Johnson: in 1793 he wrote another version for Thomson.]</p> + + + +<p class="std3">CHORUS.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Braw, braw lads of Galla Water;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">O braw lads of Galla Water:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I’ll kilt my coats aboon my knee,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And follow my love thro’ the water.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Sae fair her hair, sae brent her brow,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Sae bonny blue her een, my dearie;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sae white her teeth, sae sweet her mou’,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The mair I kiss she’s ay my dearie.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O’er yon bank and o’er yon brae,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">O’er yon moss amang the heather;<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_224" id="Page_224">[224]</a></span><span class="i0">I’ll kilt my coats aboon my knee,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And follow my love thro’ the water.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Down amang the broom, the broom,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Down amang the broom, my dearie,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The lassie lost a silken snood,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That cost her mony a blirt and bleary.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Braw, braw lads of Galla Water;<br /></span> +<span class="i6">O braw lads of Galla-Water:<br /></span> +<span class="i4">I’ll kilt my coats aboon my knee,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">And follow my love thro’ the water.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsXXXIX" id="songsXXXIX"></a>XXXIX.</h2> + +<h3>STAY, MY CHARMER.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune-“<i>An Gille dubh ciar dhubh.</i>”</p> + +<p>[The air of this song was picked up by the poet in one of his northern +tours: his Highland excursions coloured many of his lyric +compositions.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Stay, my charmer, can you leave me?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Cruel, cruel, to deceive me!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Well you know how much you grieve me;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Cruel charmer, can you go?<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Cruel charmer, can you go?<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">By my love so ill requited;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">By the faith you fondly plighted;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">By the pangs of lovers slighted;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Do not, do not leave me so!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Do not, do not leave me so!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsXL" id="songsXL"></a>XL.</h2> + +<h3>THICKEST NIGHT, O’ERHANG MY DWELLING.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Strathallan’s Lament.</i>”</p> + +<p>[The Viscount Strathallan, whom this song commemorates, was William +Drummond: he was slain at the carnage of Culloden. It was long +believed that he escaped to France and died in exile.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Thickest night, surround my dwelling!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Howling tempests, o’er me rave!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Turbid torrents, wintry swelling,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Roaring by my lonely cave!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Crystal streamlets gently flowing,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Busy haunts of base mankind,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Western breezes softly blowing,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Suit not my distracted mind.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">In the cause of Right engaged,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Wrongs injurious to redress,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Honour’s war we strongly waged,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But the heavens denied success.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Ruin’s wheel has driven o’er us,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Not a hope that dare attend,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The wild world is all before us—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But a world without a friend.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsXLI" id="songsXLI"></a>XLI.</h2> + +<h3>MY HOGGIE.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>What will I do gin my Hoggie die?</i>”</p> + +<p>[Burns was struck with the pastoral wildness of this Liddesdale air, +and wrote these words to it for the Museum: the first line only is +old.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">What will I do gin my Hoggie die?<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My joy, my pride, my Hoggie!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My only beast, I had nae mae,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And vow but I was vogie!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The lee-lang night we watch’d the fauld,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Me and my faithfu’ doggie;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">We heard nought but the roaring linn,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Amang the braes sae scroggie;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But the houlet cry’d frae the castle wa’,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The blitter frae the boggie,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The tod reply’d upon the hill,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I trembled for my Hoggie.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When day did daw, and cocks did craw,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The morning it was foggie;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ unco tyke lap o’er the dyke,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And maist has kill’d my Hoggie.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsXLII" id="songsXLII"></a>XLII.</h2> + +<h3>HER DADDIE FORBAD.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Jumpin’ John.</i>”</p> + +<p>[This is one of the old songs which Ritson accuses Burns of amending +for the Museum: little of it, how<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_225" id="Page_225">[225]</a></span>ever, is his, save a touch here and +there—but they are Burns’s touches.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Her daddie forbad, her minnie forbad;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Forbidden she wadna be:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">She wadna trow’t, the browst she brew’d<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Wad taste sae bitterlie.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">The lang lad they ca’ jumpin’ John<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Beguiled the bonnie lassie,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">The lang lad they ca’ Jumpin’ John<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Beguiled the bonnie lassie.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">A cow and a cauf, a yowe and a hauf,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And thretty gude shillin’s and three;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A vera gude tocher, a cotter-man’s dochter,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The lass wi’ the bonnie black e’e.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">The lang lad they ca’ Jumpin’ John<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Beguiled the bonnie lassie,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">The lang lad they ca’ Jumpin’ John<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Beguiled the bonnie lassie.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsXLIII" id="songsXLIII"></a>XLIII</h2> + +<h3>UP IN THE MORNING EARLY</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Cold blows the wind.</i>”</p> + +<p>[“The chorus of this song,” says the poet, in his notes on the +Scottish Lyrics, “is old, the two stanzas are mine.” The air is +ancient, and was a favourite of Mary Stuart, the queen of William the +Third.]</p> + + +<p class="std3">CHORUS.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Up in the morning’s no for me,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Up in the morning early;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When a’ the hills are cover’d wi’ snaw,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I’m sure it’s winter fairly.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Cauld blaws the wind frae east to west,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The drift is driving sairly;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sae loud and shill I hear the blast,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I’m sure it’s winter fairly.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The birds sit chittering in the thorn,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A’ day they fare but sparely;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And lang’s the night frae e’en to morn—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I’m sure it’s winter fairly.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Up in the morning’s no for me,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Up in the morning early;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">When a’ the hills are cover’d wi’ snaw,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">I’m sure it’s winter fairly.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsXLIV" id="songsXLIV"></a>XLIV.</h2> + +<h5>THE</h5> +<h3>YOUNG HIGHLAND ROVER.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Morag.</i>”</p> + +<p>[The Young Highland Rover of this strain is supposed by some to be the +Chevalier, and with more probability by others, to be a Gordon, as the +song was composed in consequence of the poet’s visit to “bonnie +Castle-Gordon,” in September, 1787.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Loud blaw the frosty breezes,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The snaws the mountains cover;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Like winter on me seizes,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Since my young Highland rover<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Far wanders nations over.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where’er he go, where’er he stray.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">May Heaven be his warden:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Return him safe to fair Strathspey,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And bonnie Castle-Gordon!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The trees now naked groaning,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Shall Soon wi’ leaves be hinging.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The birdies dowie moaning,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Shall a’ be blithely singing,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And every flower be springing.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sae I’ll rejoice the lee-lang day<br /></span> +<span class="i2">When by his mighty Warden<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My youth’s returned to fair Strathspey,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And bonnie Castle-Gordon.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsXLV" id="songsXLV"></a>XLV.</h2> + +<h3>HEY, THE DUSTY MILLER</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>The Dusty Miller.</i>”</p> + +<p>[The Dusty Miller is an old strain, modified for the Museum by Burns: +it is a happy specimen of his taste and skill in making the new look +like the old.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Hey, the dusty miller,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And his dusty coat;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He will win a shilling,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Or he spend a groat.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Dusty was the coat,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Dusty was the colour,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Dusty was the kiss<br /></span> +<span class="i6">That I got frae the miller.<br /></span> +</div></div> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_226" id="Page_226">[226]</a></span></p> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Hey, the dusty miller,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And his dusty sack;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Leeze me on the calling<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Fills the dusty peck.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Fills the dusty peck,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Brings the dusty siller;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">I wad gie my coatie<br /></span> +<span class="i6">For the dusty miller.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsXLVI" id="songsXLVI"></a>XLVI.</h2> + +<h3>THERE WAS A LASS.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Duncan Davison.</i>”</p> + +<p>[There are several other versions of Duncan Davison, which it is more +delicate to allude to than to quote: this one is in the Museum.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">There was a lass, they ca’d her Meg,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And she held o’er the moors to spin;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">There was a lad that follow’d her,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">They ca’d him Duncan Davison.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The moor was driegh, and Meg was skiegh,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Her favour Duncan could na win;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For wi’ the roke she wad him knock.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And ay she shook the temper-pin.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">As o’er the moor they lightly foor,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A burn was clear, a glen was green,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Upon the banks they eas’d-their shanks,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And ay she set the wheel between:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But Duncan swore a haly aith,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That Meg should be a bride the morn,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Then Meg took up her spinnin’ graith,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And flang them a’ out o’er the burn.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">We’ll big a house,—a wee, wee house,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And we will live like king and queen,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sae blythe and merry we will be<br /></span> +<span class="i2">When ye set by the wheel at e’en.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A man may drink and no be drunk;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A man may fight and no be slain;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A man may kiss a bonnie lass,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And ay be welcome back again.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsXLVII" id="songsXLVII"></a>XLVII.</h2> + +<h3>THENIEL MENZIES’ BONNIE MARY.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune.—“<i>The Ruffian’s Rant.</i>”</p> + +<p>[Burns, it is believed, wrote this song during his first Highland +tour, when he danced among the northern dames, to the tune of “Bab at +the Bowster,” till the morning sun rose and reproved them from the top +of Ben Lomond.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">In coming by the brig o’ Dye,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">At Darlet we a blink did tarry;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As day was dawin in the sky,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">We drank a health to bonnie Mary.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Theniel Menzies’ bonnie Mary;<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Theniel Menzies’ bonnie Mary;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Charlie Gregor tint his plaidie,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Kissin’ Theniel’s bonnie Mary.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Her een sae bright, her brow sae white,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Her haffet locks as brown’s a berry;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And ay, they dimpl’t wi’ a smile,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The rosy checks o’ bonnie Mary.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">We lap and danced the lee lang day,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Till piper lads were wae and weary;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But Charlie gat the spring to pay,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For kissin’ Theniel’s bonnie Mary.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Theniel Menzies’ bonnie Mary;<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Theniel Menzies’ bonnie Mary;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Charlie Gregor tint his plaidie,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Kissin’ Theniel’s bonnie Mary.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsXLVIII" id="songsXLVIII"></a>XLVIII.</h2> + +<h3>THE BANKS OF THE DEVON.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune.—“<i>Bhannerach dhon na chri.</i>”</p> + +<p>[These verses were composed on a charming young lady, Charlotte +Hamilton, sister to the poet’s friend, Gavin Hamilton of Mauchline, +residing, when the song was written, at Harvieston, on the banks of +the Devon, in the county of Clackmannan.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">How pleasant the banks of the clear winding Devon,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">With green spreading bushes, and flowers blooming fair!<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_227" id="Page_227">[227]</a></span><span class="i0">But the bonniest flower on the banks of the Devon<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Was once a sweet bud on the braes of the Ayr.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Mild be the sun on this sweet blushing flower,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In the gay rosy morn, as it bathes in the dew;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And gentle the fall of the soft vernal shower,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That steals on the evening each leaf to renew.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O spare the dear blossom, ye orient breezes,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">With chill hoary wing, as ye usher the dawn;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And far be thou distant, thou reptile that seizes<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The verdure and pride of the garden and lawn!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Let Bourbon exult in his gay gilded Lilies,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And England, triumphant, display her proud Rose:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A fairer than either adorns the green valleys,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Where Devon, sweet Devon, meandering flows.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsXLIX" id="songsXLIX"></a>XLIX.</h2> + +<h3>WEARY FA’ YOU, DUNCAN GRAY.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Duncan Gray.</i>”</p> + +<p>[The original Duncan Gray, out of which the present strain was +extracted for Johnson, had no right to be called a lad of grace: +another version, and in a happier mood, was written for Thomson.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Weary fa’ you, Duncan Gray—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Ha, ha, the girdin o’t!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wae gae by you, Duncan Gray—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Ha, ha, the girdin o’t!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When a’ the lave gae to their play,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Then I maun sit the lee lang day,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And jog the cradle wi’ my tae,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And a’ for the girdin o’t!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Bonnie was the Lammas moon—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Ha, ha, the girdin o’t!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Glowrin’ a’ the hills aboon—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Ha, ha, the girdin o’t!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The girdin brak, the beast cam down,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I tint my curch, and baith my shoon;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ah! Duncan, ye’re an unco loon—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Wae on the bad girdin o’t!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But, Duncan, gin ye’ll keep your aith—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Ha, ha, the girdin o’t!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I’se bless you wi’ my hindmost breath—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Ha, ha, the girdin o’t!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Duncan, gin ye’ll keep your aith,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The beast again can bear us baith,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And auld Mess John will mend the skaith,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And clout the bad girdin o’t.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsL" id="songsL"></a>L.</h2> + +<h3>THE PLOUGHMAN.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Up wi’ the ploughman.</i>”</p> + +<p>[The old words, of which these in the Museum are an altered and +amended version, are in the collection of Herd.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The ploughman he’s a bonnie lad,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">His mind is ever true, jo,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">His garters knit below his knee,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">His bonnet it is blue, jo.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Then up wi’ him my ploughman lad,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">And hey my merry ploughman!<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Of a’ the trades that I do ken,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Commend me to the ploughman.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">My ploughman he comes hame at e’en,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">He’s aften wat and weary;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Cast off the wat, put on the dry,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And gae to bed, my dearie!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I will wash my ploughman’s hose,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And I will dress his o’erlay;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I will mak my ploughman’s bed,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And cheer him late and early.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I hae been east, I hae been west,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I hae been at Saint Johnston;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The bonniest sight that e’er I saw<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Was the ploughman laddie dancin’.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">V.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Snaw-white stockins on his legs,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And siller buckles glancin’;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A gude blue bonnet on his head—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And O, but he was handsome!<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_228" id="Page_228">[228]</a></span></div></div> + +<p class="std2">VI.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Commend me to the barn-yard,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And the corn-mou, man;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I never gat my coggie fou,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Till I met wi’ the ploughman.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Up wi’ him my ploughman lad,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">And hey my merry ploughman!<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Of a’ the trades that I do ken,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Commend me to the ploughman.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsLI" id="songsLI"></a>LI.</h2> + +<h3>LANDLADY, COUNT THE LAWIN.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Hey tutti, taiti.</i>”</p> + +<p>[Of this song, the first and second verses are by Burns: the closing +verse belongs to a strain threatening Britain with an invasion from +the iron-handed Charles XII. of Sweden, to avenge his own wrongs and +restore the line of the Stuarts.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Landlady, count the lawin,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The day is near the dawin;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ye’re a’ blind drunk, boys,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And I’m but jolly fou,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Hey tutti, taiti,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">How tutti, taiti—<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Wha’s fou now?<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Cog an’ ye were ay fou,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Cog an’ ye were ay fou,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I wad sit and sing to you<br /></span> +<span class="i2">If ye were ay fou.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Weel may ye a’ be!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ill may we never see!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">God bless the king,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And the companie!<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Hey tutti, taiti,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">How tutti, taiti—<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Wha’s fou now?<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsLII" id="songsLII"></a>LII.</h2> + +<h3>RAVING WINDS AROUND HER BLOWING.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Macgregor of Rura’s Lament.</i>”</p> + +<p>[“I composed these verses,” says Burns, “on Miss Isabella M’Leod, of +Raza, alluding to her feelings on the death of her sister, and the +still more melancholy death of her sister’s husband, the late Earl of +Loudon, in 1796.”]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Raving winds around her blowing,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yellow leaves the woodlands strowing,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">By a river hoarsely roaring,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Isabella stray’d deploring—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">“Farewell hours that late did measure<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sunshine days of joy and pleasure;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Hail, thou gloomy night of sorrow,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Cheerless night that knows no morrow!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“O’er the past too fondly wandering,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">On the hopeless future pondering;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Chilly grief my life-blood freezes,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Fell despair my fancy seizes.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Life, thou soul of every blessing,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Load to misery most distressing,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Gladly how would I resign thee,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And to dark oblivion join thee!”<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsLIII" id="songsLIII"></a>LIII.</h2> + +<h3>HOW LONG AND DREARY IS THE NIGHT.</h3> +<p class="std1"><i>To a Gaelic air.</i></p> + +<p>[Composed for the Museum: the air of this affecting strain is true +Highland: Burns, though not a musician, had a fine natural taste in +the matter of national melodies.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">How long and dreary is the night<br /></span> +<span class="i2">When I am frae my dearie!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I sleepless lie frae e’en to morn,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Tho’ I were ne’er sae weary.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I sleepless lie frae e’en to morn,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Tho’ I were ne’er sae weary.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">When I think on the happy days<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I spent wi’ you, my dearie,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And now what lands between us lie,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">How can I but be eerie!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And now what lands between us lie,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">How can I be but eerie!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">How slow ye move, ye heavy hours,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">As ye were wae and weary!<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_229" id="Page_229">[229]</a></span><span class="i0">It was na sae ye glinted by,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">When I was wi’ my dearie.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">It was na sae ye glinted by,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">When I was wi’ my dearie.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsLIV" id="songsLIV"></a>LIV.</h2> + +<h3>MUSING ON THE ROARING OCEAN.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Druimion dubh.</i>”</p> + +<p>[The air of this song is from the Highlands: the verses were written +in compliment to the feelings of Mrs. M’Lauchlan, whose husband was an +officer serving in the East Indies.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Musing on the roaring ocean,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Which divides my love and me;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wearying heaven in warm devotion,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For his weal where’er he be.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Hope and fear’s alternate billow<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Yielding late to nature’s law,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Whisp’ring spirits round my pillow<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Talk of him that’s far awa.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Ye whom sorrow never wounded,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Ye who never shed a tear,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Care-untroubled, joy-surrounded,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Gaudy day to you is dear.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Gentle night, do thou befriend me;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Downy sleep, the curtain draw;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Spirits kind, again attend me,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Talk of him that’s far awa!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsLV" id="songsLV"></a>LV.</h2> + +<h3>BLITHE WAS SHE.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Andro and his cutty gun.</i>”</p> + +<p>[The heroine of this song, Euphemia Murray, of Lintrose was justly +called the “Flower of Strathmore:” she is now widow of Lord Methven, +one of the Scottish judges, and mother of a fine family. The song was +written at Ochtertyre, in June 1787.]</p> + + +<p class="std3">CHORUS.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Blithe, blithe and merry was she,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Blithe was she but and ben:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Blithe by the banks of Ern,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And blithe in Glenturit glen.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">By Auchtertyre grows the aik,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">On Yarrow banks the birken shaw;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But Phemie was a bonnier lass<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Than braes of Yarrow ever saw.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Her looks were like a flow’r in May,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Her smile was like a simmer morn;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">She tripped by the banks of Ern,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">As light’s a bird upon a thorn.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Her bonnie face it was as meek<br /></span> +<span class="i2">As any lamb upon a lea;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The evening sun was ne’er sae sweet,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">As was the blink o’ Phemie’s ee.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The Highland hills I’ve wander’d wide,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And o’er the Lowlands I hae been;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But Phemie was the blithest lass<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That ever trod the dewy green.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Blithe, blithe and merry was she,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Blithe was she but and ben:<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Blithe by the banks of Ern.<br /></span> +<span class="i6">And blithe in Glenturit glen.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsLVI" id="songsLVI"></a>LVI.</h2> + +<h3>THE BLUDE RED ROSE AT YULE MAY BLAW.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>To daunton me.</i>”</p> + +<p>[The Jacobite strain of “To daunton me,” must have been in the mind of +the poet when he wrote this pithy lyric for the Museum.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The blude red rose at Yule may blaw,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The simmer lilies bloom in snaw,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The frost may freeze the deepest sea;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But an auld man shall never daunton me.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To daunton me, and me so young,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Wi’ his fause heart and flatt’ring tongue.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That is the thing you ne’er shall see;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For an auld man shall never daunton me.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">For a’ his meal and a’ his maut,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For a’ his fresh beef and his saut,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For a’ his gold and white monie,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An auld man shall never daunton me.<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_230" id="Page_230">[230]</a></span></div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">His gear may buy him kye and yowes,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">His gear may buy him glens and knowes;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But me he shall not buy nor fee,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For an auld man shall never daunton me.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">He hirples twa fauld as he dow,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wi’ his teethless gab and Ma auld beld pow,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And the rain rains down frae his red bleer’d ee—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That auld man shall never daunton me.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To daunton me, and me sae young,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Wi’ his fause heart and flatt’ring tongue,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That is the thing you ne’er shall see;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For an auld man shall never daunton me.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsLVII" id="songsLVII"></a>LVII.</h2> + +<h3>COME BOAT ME O’ER TO CHARLIE.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>O’er the water to Charlie.</i>”</p> + +<p>[The second stanza of this song, and nearly all the third, are by +Burns. Many songs, some of merit, on the same subject, and to the same +air, were in other days current in Scotland.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Come boat me o’er, come row me o’er,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Come boat me o’er to Charlie;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I’ll gie John Ross another bawbee,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To boat me o’er to Charlie.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">We’ll o’er the water and o’er the sea,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">We’ll o’er the water to Charlie;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Come weal, come woe, we’ll gather and go,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">And live or die wi’ Charlie.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I lo’e weel my Charlie’s name,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Tho’ some there be abhor him:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But O, to see auld Nick gaun hame,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And Charlie’s faes before him!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I swear and vow by moon and stars,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And sun that shines so early,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">If I had twenty thousand lives,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I’d die as aft for Charlie.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">We’ll o’er the water and o’er the sea,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">We’ll o’er the water to Charlie;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Come weal, come woe, we’ll gather and go,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">And live or die wi’ Charlie!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsLVIII" id="songsLVIII"></a>LVIII.</h2> + +<h3>A ROSE-BUD BY MY EARLY WALK.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>The Rose-bud.</i>”</p> + +<p>[The “Rose-bud” of these sweet verses was Miss Jean Cruikshank, +afterwards Mrs. Henderson, daughter of William Cruikshank, of St. +James’s Square, one of the masters of the High School of Edinburgh: +she is also the subject of a poem equally sweet.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">A rose-bud by my early walk,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Adown a corn-enclosed bawk,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sae gently bent its thorny stalk,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">All on a dewy morning.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ere twice the shades o’ dawn are fled,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In a’ its crimson glory spread,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And drooping rich the dewy head,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">It scents the early morning.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Within the bush, her covert nest<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A little linnet fondly prest,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The dew sat chilly on her breast<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Sae early in the morning.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">She soon shall see her tender brood,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The pride, the pleasure o’ the wood,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Amang the fresh green leaves bedew’d,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Awake the early morning.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">So thou, dear bird, young Jeany fair,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">On trembling string or vocal air,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Shall sweetly pay the tender care<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That tends thy early morning.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">So thou, sweet rose-bud, young and gay,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Shalt beauteous blaze upon the day,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And bless the parent’s evening ray<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That watch’d thy early morning.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsLIX" id="songsLIX"></a>LIX.</h2> + +<h3>RATTLIN’, ROARIN’ WILLIE.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Rattlin’, roarin’ Willie.</i>”</p> + +<p>[“The hero of this chant,” says Burns “was one of the worthiest +fellows in the world—William Dunbar, Esq., Write to the Signet, +Edinburgh, and Colonel of the Crochallan corps—a club of wits, who +took that title at the time of raising the fencible regiments.”]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O rattlin’, roarin’ Willie,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">O, he held to the fair,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ for to sell his fiddle,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’ buy some other ware;<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_231" id="Page_231">[231]</a></span><span class="i0">But parting wi’ his fiddle,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The saut tear blint his ee;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And rattlin’, roarin’ Willie,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Ye’re welcome hame to me!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O Willie, come sell your fiddle,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">O sell your fiddle sae fine;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O Willie, come sell your fiddle,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And buy a pint o’ wine!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">If I should sell my fiddle,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The warl’ would think I was mad;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For mony a rantin’ day<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My fiddle and I hae had.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">As I cam by Crochallan,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I cannily keekit ben—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Rattlin’, roarin’ Willie<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Was sittin’ at yon board en’;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sitting at yon board en’,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And amang good companie;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Rattlin’, roarin’ Willie,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Ye’re welcome hame to me I<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsLX" id="songsLX"></a>LX.</h2> + +<h3>BRAVING ANGRY WINTER’S STORMS.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Neil Gow’s Lamentations for Abercairny.</i>”</p> + +<p>[“This song,” says the poet, “I composed on one of the most +accomplished of women, Miss Peggy Chalmers that was, now Mrs. Lewis +Hay, of Forbes and Co.’s bank, Edinburgh.” She now lives at Pau, in +the south of France.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Where, braving angry winter’s storms,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The lofty Ochels rise,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Far in their shade my Peggy’s charms<br /></span> +<span class="i2">First blest my wondering eyes;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As one who by some savage stream,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A lonely gem surveys,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Astonish’d, doubly marks its beam,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">With art’s most polish’d blaze.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Blest be the wild, sequester’d shade,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And blest the day and hour,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where Peggy’s charms I first survey’d,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">When first I felt their power!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The tyrant Death, with grim control,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">May seize my fleeting breath;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But tearing Peggy from my soul<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Must be a stronger death.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsLXI" id="songsLXI"></a>LXI.</h2> + +<h3>TIBBIE DUNBAR.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Johnny M’Gill.</i>”</p> + +<p>[We owe the air of this song to one Johnny M’Gill, a fiddler of +Girvan, who bestowed his own name on it: and the song itself partly to +Burns and partly to some unknown minstrel. They are both in the +Museum.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O, Wilt thou go wi’ me,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Sweet Tibbie Dunbar?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O, wilt thou go wi’ me,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Sweet Tibbie Dunbar?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wilt thou ride on a horse,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Or be drawn in a car,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or walk by my side,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">O, sweet Tibbie Dunbar?<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I care na thy daddie,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">His lands and his money,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I care na thy kindred,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Sae high and sae lordly:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But say thou wilt hae me<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For better for waur—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And come in thy coatie,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Sweet Tibbie Dunbar!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsLXII" id="songsLXII"></a>LXII.</h2> + +<h3>STREAMS THAT GLIDE IN ORIENT PLAINS.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Morag.</i>”</p> + +<p>[We owe these verses to the too brief visit which the poet, in 1787, +made to Gordon Castle: he was hurried away, much against his will, by +his moody and obstinate friend William Nicol.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Streams that glide in orient plains,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Never bound by winter’s chains;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Glowing here on golden sands,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">There commix’d with foulest stains<br /></span> +<span class="i2">From tyranny’s empurpled bands;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">These, their richly gleaming waves,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I leave to tyrants and their slaves;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Give me the stream that sweetly laves<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The banks by Castle-Gordon.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Spicy forests, ever gay,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Shading from the burning ray,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Hapless wretches sold to toil,<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_232" id="Page_232">[232]</a></span><span class="i2">Or the ruthless native’s way,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Bent on slaughter, blood, and spoil:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Woods that ever verdant wave,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I leave the tyrant and the slave,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Give me the groves that lofty brave<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The storms by Castle-Gordon.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Wildly here without control,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Nature reigns and rules the whole;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In that sober pensive mood,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Dearest to the feeling soul,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">She plants the forest, pours the flood;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Life’s poor day I’ll musing rave,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And find at night a sheltering cave,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where waters flow and wild woods wave,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">By bonnie Castle-Gordon.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsLXIII" id="songsLXIII"></a>LXIII.</h2> + +<h3>MY HARRY WAS A GALLANT GAY.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Highland’s Lament.</i>”</p> + +<p>[“The chorus,” says Burns, “I picked up from an old woman in Dumblane: +the rest of the song is mine.” He composed it for Johnson: the tone is +Jacobitical.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">My Harry was a gallant gay,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Fu’ stately strode he on the plain:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But now he’s banish’d far away,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I’ll never see him back again,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">O for him back again!<br /></span> +<span class="i6">O for him back again!<br /></span> +<span class="i4">I wad gie a’ Knockhaspie’s land<br /></span> +<span class="i6">For Highland Harry back again.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">When a’ the lave gae to their bed,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I wander dowie up the glen;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I set me down and greet my fill,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And ay I wish him back again.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O were some villains hangit high.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And ilka body had their ain!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Then I might see the joyfu’ sight,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My Highland Harry back again.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">O for him back again!<br /></span> +<span class="i6">O for him back again!<br /></span> +<span class="i4">I wad gie a’ Knockhaspie’s land<br /></span> +<span class="i6">For Highland Harry back again.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsLXIV" id="songsLXIV"></a>LXIV.</h2> + +<h3>THE TAILOR.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>The Tailor fell thro’ the bed, thimbles an’ a’.</i>”</p> +<p>[The second and fourth verses are by Burns, the rest is very old, the +air is also very old, and is played at trade festivals and processions +by the Corporation of Tailors.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The Tailor fell thro’ the bed, thimbles an’ a’,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The Tailor fell thro’ the bed, thimbles an’ a’;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The blankets were thin, and the sheets they were sma’,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The Tailor fell thro’ the bed, thimbles an’ a’.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The sleepy bit lassie, she dreaded nae ill,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The sleepy bit lassie, she dreaded nae ill;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The weather was cauld, and the lassie lay still,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">She thought that a tailor could do her nae ill.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Gie me the groat again, canny young man;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Gie me the groat again, canny young man;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The day it is short, and the night it is lang,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The dearest siller that ever I wan!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">There’s somebody weary wi’ lying her lane;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">There’s somebody weary wi’ lying her lane;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">There’s some that are dowie, I trow would be fain<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To see the bit tailor come skippin’ again.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsLXV" id="songsLXV"></a>LXV.</h2> + +<h3>SIMMER’S A PLEASANT TIME.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Ay waukin o’.</i>”</p> + +<p>[Tytler and Ritson unite in considering the air of these words as one +of our most ancient melodies. The first verse of the song is from the +hand of Burns; the rest had the benefit of his emendations: it is to +be found in the Museum.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Simmer’s a pleasant time,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Flow’rs of ev’ry colour;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The water rins o’er the heugh,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And I long for my true lover.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Ay waukin O,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Waukin still and wearie:<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Sleep I can get nane<br /></span> +<span class="i6">For thinking on my dearie.<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_233" id="Page_233">[233]</a></span></div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">When I sleep I dream,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">When I wauk I’m eerie;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sleep I can get nane<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For thinking on my dearie.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Lanely night comes on,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A’ the lave are sleeping;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I think on my bonnie lad<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And I bleer my een with greetin’.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Ay waukin O,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Waukin still and wearie:<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Sleep I can get nane<br /></span> +<span class="i6">For thinking on my dearie.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsLXVI" id="songsLXVI"></a>LXVI.</h2> + +<h3>BEWARE O’ BONNIE ANN.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Ye gallants bright.</i>”</p> + +<p>[Burns wrote this song in honour of Ann Masterton, daughter of Allan +Masterton, author of the air of Strathallan’s Lament: she is now Mrs. +Derbishire, and resides in London.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Ye gallants bright, I red ye right,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Beware o’ bonnie Ann;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Her comely face sae fu’ o’ grace,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Your heart she will trepan.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Her een sae bright, like stars by night,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Her skin is like the swan;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sae jimply lac’d her genty waist,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That sweetly ye might span.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Youth, grace, and love attendant move,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And pleasure leads the van:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In a’ their charms, and conquering arms,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">They wait on bonnie Ann.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The captive bands may chain the hands,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But love enclaves the man;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ye Gallants braw, I red you a’,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Beware of bonnie Ann!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsLXVII" id="songsLXVII"></a>LXVII.</h2> + +<h3>WHEN ROSY MAY.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>The gardener wi’ his paidle.</i>”</p> + +<p>[The air of this song is played annually at the precession of the +Gardeners: the title only is old; the rest is the work of Burns. Every +trade had, in other days, an air of its own, and songs to correspond; +but toil and sweat came in harder measures, and drove melodies out of +working-men’s heads.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">When rosy May comes in wi’ flowers,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To deck her gay green-spreading bowers,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Then busy, busy are his hours—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The gard’ner wi’ his paidle<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The crystal waters gently fa’;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The merry birds are lovers a’;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The scented breezes round him blaw—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The gard’ner wi’ his paidle.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">When purple morning starts the hare<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To steal upon her early fare,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Then thro’ the dews he maun repair—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The gard’ner wi’ his paidle.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When day, expiring in the west,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The curtain draws of nature’s rest,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He flies to her arms he lo’es best—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The gard’ner wi’ his paidle.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsLXVIII" id="songsLXVIII"></a>LXVIII.</h2> + +<h3>BLOOMING NELLY.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>On a bank of flowers.</i>”</p> + +<p>[One of the lyrics of Allan Ramsay’s collection seems to have been in +the mind of Burns when he wrote this: the words and air are in the +Museum.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">On a bank of flowers, in a summer day,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For summer lightly drest,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The youthful blooming Nelly lay,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">With love and sleep opprest;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When Willie wand’ring thro’ the wood,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Who for her favour oft had sued,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He gaz’d, he wish’d, he fear’d, he blush’d,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And trembled where he stood.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Her closed eyes like weapons sheath’d,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Were seal’d in soft repose;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Her lips still as she fragrant breath’d,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">It richer dy’d the rose.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The springing lilies sweetly prest,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Wild—wanton, kiss’d her rival breast;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He gaz’d, he wish’d, he fear’d, he blush’d—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">His bosom ill at rest.<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_234" id="Page_234">[234]</a></span></div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Her robes light waving in the breeze<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Her tender limbs embrace;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Her lovely form, her native ease,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">All harmony and grace:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Tumultuous tides his pulses roll,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A faltering, ardent kiss he stole;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He gaz’d, he wish’d, he fear’d, he blush’d,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And sigh’d his very soul.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">As flies the partridge from the brake,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">On fear-inspired wings,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">So Nelly, starting, half awake,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Away affrighted springs:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But Willie follow’d, as he should,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">He overtook her in a wood;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He vow’d, he pray’d, he found the maid<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Forgiving all and good.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsLXIX" id="songsLXIX"></a>LXIX.</h2> + +<h3>THE DAY RETURNS.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Seventh of November.</i>”</p> + +<p>[The seventh of November was the anniversary of the marriage of Mr. +and Mrs. Riddel, of Friars-Carse, and these verses were composed in +compliment to the day.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The day returns, my bosom burns,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The blissful day we twa did meet,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Tho’ winter wild in tempest toil’d,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Ne’er summer-sun was half sae sweet.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Than a’ the pride that loads the tide,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And crosses o’er the sultry line;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Than kingly robes, than crowns and globes,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Heaven gave me more—it made thee mine!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">While day and night can bring delight,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Or nature aught of pleasure give,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">While joys above my mind can move,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For thee, and thee alone I live.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When that grim foe of life below,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Comes in between to make us part,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The iron hand that breaks our band,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">It breaks my bliss—it breaks my heart.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsLXX" id="songsLXX"></a>LXX.</h2> + +<h3>MY LOVE SHE’S BUT A LASSIE YET.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Lady Bandinscoth’s Reel.</i>”</p> + +<p>[These verses had their origin in an olden strain, equally lively and +less delicate: some of the old lines keep their place: the title is +old. Both words and all are in the Musical Museum.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">My love she’s but a lassie yet,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My love she’s but a lassie yet,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">We’ll let her stand a year or twa,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Shell no be half so saucy yet.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I rue the day I sought her, O;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I rue the day I sought her, O;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wha gets her needs na say he’s woo’d,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But he may say he’s bought her, O!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Come, draw a drap o’ the best o’t yet;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Come, draw a drap o’ the best o’t yet;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Gae seek for pleasure where ye will,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But here I never miss’d it yet.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">We’re a’ dry wi’ drinking o’t;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">We’re a’ dry wi’ drinking o’t;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The minister kiss’d the fiddler’s wife,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’ could na preach for thinkin’ o’t.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsLXXI" id="songsLXXI"></a>LXXI.</h2> + +<h3>JAMIE, COME TRY ME.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Jamy, come try me.</i>”</p> + +<p>[Burns in these verses caught up the starting note of an old song, of +which little more than the starting words deserve to be remembered: +the word and air are in the Musical Museum.]</p> + + +<p class="std3">CHORUS.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i4">Jamie, come try me,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Jamie, come try me;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">If thou would win my love,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Jamie, come try me.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">If thou should ask my love,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Could I deny thee?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">If thou would win my love,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Jamie, come try me.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">If thou should kiss me, love,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Wha could espy thee?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">If thou wad be my love,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Jamie, come try me.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Jamie, come try me,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Jamie, come try me;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">If thou would win my love,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Jamie, come try me.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_235" id="Page_235">[235]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="songsLXXII" id="songsLXXII"></a>LXXII.</h2> + +<h3>MY BONNIE MARY.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Go fetch to me a pint o’ wine.</i>”</p> + +<p>[Concerning this fine song, Burns in his notes says, “This air is +Oswald’s: the first half-stanza of the song is old, the rest is mine.” +It is believed, however, that the whole of the song is from his hand: +in Hogg and Motherwell’s edition of Burns, the starting lines are +supplied from an olden strain: but some of the old strains in that +work are to be regarded with suspicion.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Go fetch to me a pint o’ wine,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’ fill it in a silver tassie;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That I may drink, before I go,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A service to my bonnie lassie;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The boat rocks at the pier o’ Leith;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Fu’ loud the wind blaws frae the ferry;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The ship rides by the Berwick-law,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And I maun leave my bonnie Mary.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The trumpets sound, the banners fly,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The glittering spears are ranked ready;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The shouts o’ war are heard afar,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The battle closes thick and bloody;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">It’s not the roar o’ sea or shore<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Wad make me langer wish to tarry;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Nor shouts o’ war that’s heard afar—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">It’s leaving thee, my bonnie Mary.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsLXXIII" id="songsLXXIII"></a>LXXIII.</h2> + +<h3>THE LAZY MIST.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>The lazy mist.</i>”</p> + +<p>[All that Burns says about the authorship of The Lazy Mist, is, “This +song is mine.” The air, which is by Oswald, together with the words, +is in the Musical Museum.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The lazy mist hangs from the brow of the hill,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Concealing the course of the dark winding rill;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">How languid the scenes, late so sprightly, appear!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As Autumn to Winter resigns the pale year.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The forests are leafless, the meadows are brown,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And all the gay foppery of summer is flown:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Apart let me wander, apart let me muse,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">How quick Time is flying, how keen Fate pursues!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">How long have I liv’d, but how much liv’d in vain!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">How little of life’s scanty span may remain!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">What aspects, old Time, in his progress, has worn!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">What ties cruel Fate in my bosom has torn!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">How foolish, or worse, till our summit is gain’d!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And downward, how weaken’d, how darken’d, how pain’d!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Life is not worth having with all it can give—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For something beyond it poor man sure must live.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsLXXIV" id="songsLXXIV"></a>LXXIV.</h2> + +<h3>THE CAPTAIN’S LADY.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>O mount and go.</i>”</p> + +<p>[Part of this song belongs to an old maritime strain, with the same +title: it was communicated, along with many other songs, made or +amended by Burns, to the Musical Museum.]</p> + + +<p class="std3">CHORUS.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i4">O mount and go,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Mount and make you ready;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">O mount and go,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">And be the Captain’s Lady.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">When the drums do beat,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And the cannons rattle,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thou shall sit in state,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And see thy love in battle.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">When the vanquish’d foe<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Sues for peace and quiet,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To the shades we’ll go,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And in love enjoy it.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">O mount and go,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Mount and make you ready;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">O mount and go,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">And be the Captain’s Lady.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsLXXV" id="songsLXXV"></a>LXXV.</h2> + +<h3>OF A’ THE AIRTS THE WIND CAN BLAW</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Miss Admiral Gordon’s Strathspey.</i>”</p> + +<p>[Bums wrote this charming song in honour of Joan Armour: he archly +says in his notes, “P.S. it was during<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_236" id="Page_236">[236]</a></span> the honeymoon.” Other +versions are abroad; this one is from the manuscripts of the poet.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Of a’ the airts the wind can blaw,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I dearly like the west,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For there the bonnie lassie lives,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The lassie I lo’e best:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">There wild-woods grow, and rivers row,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And mony a hill between;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But day and night my fancy’s flight<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Is ever wi’ my Jean.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I see her in the dewy flowers,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I see her sweet and fair:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I hear her in the tunefu’ birds,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I hear her charm the air:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">There’s not a bonnie flower that springs<br /></span> +<span class="i2">By fountain, shaw, or green,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">There’s not a bonnie bird that sings,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But minds me o’ my Jean.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O blaw, ye westlin winds, blaw saft<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Among the leafy trees,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wi’ balmy gale, frae hill and dale<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Bring hame the laden bees;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And bring the lassie back to me<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That’s aye sae neat and clean;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ae smile o’ her wad banish care,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Sae charming is my Jean.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">What sighs and vows amang the knowes<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Hae passed atween us twa!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">How fond to meet, how wae to part,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That night she gaed awa!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The powers aboon can only ken,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To whom the heart is seen,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That nane can be sae dear to me<br /></span> +<span class="i2">As my sweet lovely Jean!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsLXXVI" id="songsLXXVI"></a>LXXVI.</h2> + +<h3>FIRST WHEN MAGGY WAS MY CARE.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Whistle o’er the lave o’t.”</i></p> + +<p>[The air of this song was composed by John Bruce, of Dumfries, +musician: the words, though originating in an olden strain, are wholly +by Burns, and right bitter ones they are. The words and air are in the +Museum.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">First when Maggy was my care,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Heaven, I thought, was in her air;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Now we’re married—spier nae mair—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Whistle o’er the lave o’t.—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Meg was meek, and Meg was mild,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Bonnie Meg was nature’s child;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wiser men than me’s beguil’d—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Whistle o’er the lave o’t.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">How we live, my Meg and me,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">How we love, and how we ‘gree,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I care na by how few may see;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Whistle o’er the lave o’t.—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wha I wish were maggot’s meat,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Dish’d up in her winding sheet,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I could write—but Meg maun see’t—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Whistle o’er the lave o’t.<br /></span> +</div></div> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + + + + +<h2><a name="songsLXXVII" id="songsLXXVII"></a>LXXVII.</h2> + +<h3>O WERE I ON PARNASSUS HILL.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>My love is lost to me.</i>”</p> + +<p>[The poet welcomed with this exquisite song his wife to Nithsdale: the +air is one of Oswald’s.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O, were I on Parnassus’ hill!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or had of Helicon my fill;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That I might catch poetic skill,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To sing how dear I love thee.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But Nith maun be my Muse’s well;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My Muse maun be thy bonnie sel’:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">On Corsincon I’ll glow’r and spell,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And write how dear I love thee.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Then come, sweet Muse, inspire my lay!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For a’ the lee-lang simmer’s day<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I coudna sing, I coudna say,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">How much, how dear, I love thee.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I see thee dancing o’er the green,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thy waist sae jimp, thy limbs sae clean,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thy tempting lips, thy roguish een—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">By heaven and earth I love thee!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">By night, by day, a-field, at hame,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The thoughts o’ thee my breast inflame;<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_237" id="Page_237">[237]</a></span><span class="i0">And aye I muse and sing thy name—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I only live to love thee.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Tho’ I were doom’d to wander on<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Beyond the sea, beyond the sun,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Till my last weary sand was run;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Till then—and then I love thee.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsLXXVIII" id="songsLXXVIII"></a>LXXVIII.</h2> + +<h3>THERE’S A YOUTH IN THIS CITY.</h3> +<p class="std1"><i>To a Gaelic Air.</i></p> + +<p>[“This air,” says Burns, “is claimed by Neil Gow, who calls it a +Lament for his Brother. The first half-stanza of the song is old: the +rest is mine.” They are both in the Museum.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i4">There’s a youth in this city,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">It were a great pity<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That he frae our lasses shou’d wander awa:<br /></span> +<span class="i4">For he’s bonnie an’ braw,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Weel-favour’d an’ a’,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And his hair has a natural buckle an’ a’.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">His coat is the hue<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Of his bonnet sae blue;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">His feck it is white as the new-driven snaw;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">His hose they are blae,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">And his shoon like the slae.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And his clear siller buckles they dazzle us a’.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i4">For beauty and fortune<br /></span> +<span class="i4">The laddie’s been courtin’;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Weel-featured, weel-tocher’d, weel-mounted and braw;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">But chiefly the siller,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">That gars him gang till her,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The pennie’s the jewel that beautifies a’.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">There’s Meg wi’ the mailen<br /></span> +<span class="i4">That fain wad a haen him;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And Susie, whose daddy was laird o’ the ha’;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">There’s lang-tocher’d Nancy<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Maist fetters his fancy—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But the laddie’s dear sel’ he lo’es dearest of a’.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsLXXIX" id="songsLXXIX"></a>LXXIX.</h2> + +<h3>MY HEART’S IN THE HIGHLANDS.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Failte na Miosg.</i>”</p> + +<p>[The words and the air are in the Museum, to which they were +contributed by Burns. He says, in his notes on that collection, “The +first half-stanza of this song is old; the rest mine.” Of the old +strain no one has recorded any remembrance.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">My heart’s in the Highlands, my heart is not here;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My heart’s in the Highlands a-chasing the deer;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A-chasing the wild deer, and following the roe—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My heart’s in the Highlands wherever I go.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Farewell to the Highlands, farewell to the North,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The birth-place of valour, the country of worth;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wherever I wander, wherever I rove,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The hills of the Highlands for ever I love.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Farewell to the mountains high cover’d with snow;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Farewell to the straths and green valleys below:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Farewell to the forests and wild-hanging woods;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Farewell to the torrents and loud-pouring floods.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My heart’s in the Highlands, my heart is not here,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My heart’s in the Highlands a-chasing the deer;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Chasing the wild deer, and following the roe—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My heart’s in the Highlands wherever I go.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<p class="center"><img src="images/image_05.jpg" alt="Illustration" width="500" height="794" /></p> +<h2><a name="songsLXXX" id="songsLXXX"></a>LXXX.</h2> + +<h3>JOHN ANDERSON.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>John Anderson, my jo.</i>”</p> + +<p>[Soon after the death of Burns, the very handsome Miscellanies of +Brash and Reid, of Glasgow, contained what was called an improved John +Anderson, from the pen of the Ayrshire bard; but, save the second +stanza, none of the new matter looked like his hand.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“John Anderson, my jo, John,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">When nature first began<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To try her cannie hand, John,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Her master-piece was man;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And you amang them a’, John,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Sae trig frae tap to toe,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">She proved to be nae journey-work,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">John Anderson, my jo.”]<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“John Anderson, my jo, John,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">When we were first acquent,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Your locks were like the raven,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Your bonnie brow was brent;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But now your brow is beld, John,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Your locks are like the snaw;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But blessings on your frosty pow,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">John Anderson, my jo.<br /></span> +</div></div> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_238" id="Page_238">[238]</a></span></p> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">John Anderson, my jo, John,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">We clamb the hill thegither;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And mony a canty day, John,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">We’ve had wi’ ane anither:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Now we maun totter down, John,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But hand in hand we’ll go;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And sleep thegither at the foot,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">John Anderson, my jo.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsLXXXI" id="songsLXXXI"></a>LXXXI.</h2> + +<h3>OUR THRISSLES FLOURISHED FRESH AND FAIR.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Awa Whigs, awa.</i>”</p> + +<p>[Burns trimmed up this old Jacobite ditty for the Museum, and added +some of the bitterest bits: the second and fourth verses are wholly +his.]</p> + + +<p class="std3">CHORUS.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Awa Whigs, awa!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Awa Whigs, awa!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ye’re but a pack o’ traitor louns,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Ye’ll do nae good at a’.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">I</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Our thrissles flourish’d fresh and fair,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And bonnie bloom’d our roses;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But Whigs came like a frost in June,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And wither’d a’ our posies.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Our ancient crown’s fa’n in the dust—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Deil blin’ them wi’ the stoure o’t;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And write their names in his black beuk,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Wha gae the Whigs the power o’t.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Our sad decay in Church and State<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Surpasses my descriving:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The Whigs came o’er us for a curse,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And we hae done wi’ thriving.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Grim vengeance lang ha’s taen a nap,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But we may see him wauken;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Gude help the day when royal heads<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Are hunted like a maukin.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Awa Whigs, awa!<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Awa Whigs, awa!<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Ye’re but a pack o’ traitor louns,<br /></span> + <span class="i6">Ye’ll do nae gude at a’. </span></div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsLXXXII" id="songsLXXXII"></a>LXXXII.</h2> + +<h3>CA’ THE EWES.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Ca’ the ewes to the knowes.</i>”</p> + +<p>[Most of this sweet pastoral is of other days: Burns made several +emendations, and added the concluding verse. He afterwards, it will be +observed, wrote for Thomson a second version of the subject and the +air.]</p> + + +<p class="std3">CHORUS</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Ca’ the ewes to the knowes,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ca’ them whare the heather grows,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ca’ them whare the burnie rowes,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My bonnie dearie!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">As I gaed down the water-side,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">There I met my shepherd lad,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He row’d me sweetly in his plaid,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’ he ca’d me his dearie.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Will ye gang down the water-side,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And see the waves sae sweetly glide,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Beneath the hazels spreading wide?<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The moon it shines fu’ clearly.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I was bred up at nae sic school,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My shepherd lad, to play the fool,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And a’ the day to sit in dool,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And naebody to see me.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Ye sall get gowns and ribbons meet,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Cauf-leather shoon upon your feet,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And in my arms ye’se lie and sleep,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And ye shall be my dearie.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">V.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">If ye’ll but stand to what ye’ve said,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I’se gang wi’ you, my shepherd lad,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And ye may rowe me in your plaid,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And I shall be your dearie.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">VI.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">While waters wimple to the sea;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">While day blinks in the lift sae hie;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">’Till clay-cauld death sall blin’ my e’e,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Ye sall be my dearie.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Ca’ the ewes to the knowes,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Ca’ them whare the heather grows,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Ca’ them whare the burnie rowes,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">My bonnie dearie.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_239" id="Page_239">[239]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="songsLXXXIII" id="songsLXXXIII"></a>LXXXIII.</h2> + +<h3>MERRY HAE I BEEN TEETHIN’ A HECKLE.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Lord Breadalbone’s March.</i>”</p> + +<p>[Part of this song is old: Sir Harris Nicolas says it does not appear +to be in the Museum: let him look again.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O merry hae I been teethin’ a heckle,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And merry hae I been shapin’ a spoon;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O merry hae I been cloutin a kettle,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And kissin’ my Katie when a’ was done.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O a’ the lang day I ca’ at my hammer,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’ a’ the lang day I whistle and sing,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A’ the lang night I cuddle my kimmer,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’ a’ the lang night as happy’s a king.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Bitter in dool I lickit my winnins,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">O’ marrying Bess to gie her a slave:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Blest be the hour she cool’d in her linens,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And blythe be the bird that sings on her grave.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Come to my arms, my Katie, my Katie,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’ come to my arms and kiss me again!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Drunken or sober, here’s to thee, Katie!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And blest be the day I did it again.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsLXXXIV" id="songsLXXXIV"></a>LXXXIV.</h2> + +<h3>THE BRAES O’ BALLOCHMYLE.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>The Braes o’ Ballochmyle.</i>”</p> + +<p>[Mary Whitefoord, eldest daughter of Sir John Whitefoord, was the +heroine of this song: it was written when that ancient family left +their ancient inheritance. It is in the Museum, with an air by Allan +Masterton.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The Catrine woods were yellow seen,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The flowers decay’d on Catrine lea,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Nae lav’rock sang on hillock green,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But nature sicken’d on the e’e.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thro’ faded groves Maria sang,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Hersel’ in beauty’s bloom the while,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And ay the wild-wood echoes rang,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Fareweel the Braes o’ Ballochmyle!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Low in your wintry beds, ye flowers,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Again ye’ll nourish fresh and fair;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ye birdies dumb, in withering bowers,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Again ye’ll charm the vocal air.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But here, alas! for me nae mair<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Shall birdie charm, or floweret smile;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Fareweel the bonnie banks of Ayr,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Fareweel, fareweel! sweet Ballochmyle!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsLXXXV" id="songsLXXXV"></a>LXXXV.</h2> + +<h3>TO MARY IN HEAVEN.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Death of Captain Cook.</i>”</p> + +<p>[This sublime and affecting Ode was composed by Burns in one of his +fits of melancholy, on the anniversary of Highland Mary’s death. All +the day he had been thoughtful, and at evening he went out, threw +himself down by the side of one of his corn-ricks, and with his eyes +fixed on “a bright, particular star,” was found by his wife, who with +difficulty brought him in from the chill midnight air. The song was +already composed, and he had only to commit it to paper. It first +appeared in the Museum.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Thou lingering star, with less’ning ray,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That lov’st to greet the early morn,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Again thou usherest in the day<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My Mary from my soul was torn.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O Mary! dear departed shade!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Where is thy place of blissful rest?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Seest thou thy lover lowly laid?<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Hear’st thou the groans that rend his breast?<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">That sacred hour can I forget,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Can I forget the hallow’d grove,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where by the winding Ayr we met,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To live one day of parting love!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Eternity cannot efface<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Those records dear of transports past;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thy image at our last embrace;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Ah! little thought we ’twas our last!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Ayr, gurgling, kiss’d his pebbled shore,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">O’erhung with wild woods, thick’ning green;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The fragrant birch, and hawthorn, hoar,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Twin’d am’rous round the raptured scene;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The flow’rs sprang wanton to be prest,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The birds sang love on every spray—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Till too, too soon, the glowing west<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Proclaim’d the speed of winged day.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Still o’er these scenes my mem’ry wakes,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And fondly broods with miser care!<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_240" id="Page_240">[240]</a></span><span class="i0">Time but th’ impression stronger makes,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">As streams their channels deeper wear.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My Mary, dear departed shade!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Where is thy place of blissful rest?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Seest thou thy lover lowly laid?<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Hear’st thou the groans that rend his breast?<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsLXXXVI" id="songsLXXXVI"></a>LXXXVI.</h2> + +<h3>EPPIE ADAIR.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>My Eppie.</i>”</p> + +<p>[“This song,” says Sir Harris Nicolas, “which has been ascribed to +Burns by some of his editors, is in the Musical Museum without any +name.” It is partly an old strain, corrected by Burns: he communicated +it to the Museum.]</p> + + +<p class="std3">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">An’ O! my Eppie,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My jewel, my Eppie!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wha wadna be happy<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Wi’ Eppie Adair?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">By love, and by beauty,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">By law, and by duty,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I swear to be true to<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My Eppie Adair!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std3">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">An’ O! my Eppie,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My jewel, my Eppie!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wha wadna be happy<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Wi’ Eppie Adair?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A’ pleasure exile me,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Dishonour defile me,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">If e’er I beguile thee,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My Eppie Adair!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsLXXXVII" id="songsLXXXVII"></a>LXXXVII.</h2> + +<h3>THE BATTLE OF SHERIFF-MUIR.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Cameronian Rant.</i>”</p> + +<p>[One Barclay, a dissenting clergyman in Edinburgh, wrote a rhyming +dialogue between two rustics, on the battle of Sheriff-muir: Burns was +in nowise pleased with the way in which the reverend rhymer handled +the Highland clans, and wrote this modified and improved version.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“O cam ye here the fight to shun,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Or herd the sheep wi’ me, man?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or were ye at the Sherra-muir,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And did the battle see, man?”<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I saw the battle, sair and tough,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And reekin’ red ran mony a sheugh.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My heart, for fear, gaed sough for sough,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To hear the thuds, and see the cluds,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O’ clans frae woods, in tartan duds,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Wha glaum’d at kingdoms three, man.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The red-coat lads, wi’ black cockades,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To meet them were na slaw, man;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">They rush’d and push’d, and blude outgush’d,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And mony a bouk did fa’, man:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The great Argyll led on his files,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I wat they glanc’d for twenty miles:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">They hough’d the clans like nine-pin kyles,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">They hack’d and hash’d, while broad-swords clash’d,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And thro’ they dash’d, and hew’d, and smash’d,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">’Till fey men died awa, man.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But had you seen the philibegs,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And skyrin tartan trews, man;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When in the teeth they dar’d our Whigs<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And covenant true blues, man;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In lines extended lang and large,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When bayonets opposed the targe,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And thousands hasten’d to the charge,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wi’ Highland wrath they frae the sheath,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Drew blades o’ death, ’till, out o’ breath,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">They fled like frighted doos, man.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“O how deil, Tam, can that be true?<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The chase gaed frae the north, man;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I saw myself, they did pursue<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The horsemen back to Forth, man;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And at Dumblane, in my ain sight,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">They took the brig wi’ a’ their might,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And straught to Stirling winged their flight;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But, cursed lot! the gates were shut;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And mony a huntit, poor red-coat,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For fear amaist did swarf, man!”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">V.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">My sister Kate cam up the gate<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Wi’ crowdie unto me, man;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">She swore she saw some rebels run<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Frae Perth unto Dundee, man:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Their left-hand general had nae skill,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The Angus lads had nae good-will<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That day their neebors’ blood to spill;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For fear, by foes, that they should lose<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Their cogs o’ brose—they scar’d at blows.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And so it goes, you see, man.<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_241" id="Page_241">[241]</a></span></div></div> + +<p class="std2">VI.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">They’ve lost some gallant gentlemen,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Amang the Highland clans, man!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I fear my Lord Panmure is slain,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Or fallen in Whiggish hands, man:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Now wad ye sing this double fight,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Some fell for wrang, and some for right;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And mony bade the world guid-night;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Then ye may tell, how pell and mell,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">By red claymores, and muskets’ knell,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wi’ dying yell, the Tories fell,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And Whigs to hell did flee, man.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsLXXXVIII" id="songsLXXXVIII"></a>LXXXVIII.</h2> + +<h3>YOUNG JOCKEY.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Young Jockey.</i>”</p> + +<p>[With the exception of three or four lines, this song, though marked +in the Museum as an old song with additions, is the work of Burns. He +often seems to have sat down to amend or modify old verses, and found +it easier to make verses wholly new.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Young Jockey was the blythest lad<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In a’ our town or here awa:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Fu’ blythe he whistled at the gaud,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Fu’ lightly danced he in the ha’.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He roosed my een, sae bonnie blue,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">He roos’d my waist sae genty sma’,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And ay my heart came to my mou’<br /></span> +<span class="i2">When ne’er a body heard or saw.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">My Jockey toils upon the plain,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Thro’ wind and weet, thro’ frost and snaw;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And o’er the lea I leuk fu’ fain,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">When Jockey’s owsen hameward ca’.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ ay the night comes round again,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">When in his arms he takes me a’,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ ay he vows he’ll be my ain,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">As lang’s he has a breath to draw.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsLXXXIX" id="songsLXXXIX"></a>LXXXIX.</h2> + +<h3>O WILLIE BREW’D.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Willie brew’d a peck o’ maut.</i>”</p> + +<p>[The scene of this song is Laggan, in Nithsdale, a small estate which +Nicol bought by the advice of the poet. It was composed in memory of +the house-heating. “We had such a joyous meeting,” says Burns, “that +Masterton and I agreed, each in our own way, to celebrate the +business.” The Willie who made the browst was, therefore, William +Nicol; the Allan who composed the air, Allan Masterton; and he who +wrote this choicest of convivial songs, Robert Burns.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O, Willie brew’d a peck o’ maut,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And Rob and Allan came to see:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Three blither hearts, that lee-lang night<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Ye wad na find in Christendie.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">We are na fou, we’re no that fou,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">But just a drappie in our e’e;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">The cock may craw, the day may daw,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">And aye we’ll taste the barley bree.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Here are we met, three merry boys,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Three merry boys, I trow, are we;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And mony a night we’ve merry been,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And mony mae we hope to be!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">It is the moon—I ken her horn,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That’s blinkin in the lift sae hie;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">She shines sae bright to wyle us hame,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But, by my sooth, she’ll wait a wee!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Wha first shall rise to gang awa’,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A cuckold, coward loon is he!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wha last beside his chair shall fa’,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">He is the king amang us three!<br /></span> +<span class="i4">We are na fou, we’re no that fou,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">But just a drappie in our e’e;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">The cock may craw, the day may daw,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">And aye we’ll taste the barley bree.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsXC" id="songsXC"></a>XC.</h2> + +<h3>WHARE HAE YE BEEN.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—<i>“Killiecrankie.</i>”</p> + +<p>[“This song,” says Sir Harris Nicolas, “is in the Museum without +Burns’s name.” It was composed by Burns on the battle of +Killiecrankie, and sent in his own handwriting to Johnson; he puts it +in the mouth of a Whig.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Whare hae ye been sae braw, lad?<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Whare hae ye been sae brankie, O?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O, whare hae ye been sae braw, lad?<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Cam ye by Killiecrankie, O?<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_242" id="Page_242">[242]</a></span><span class="i0">An’ ye had been whare I hae been,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Ye wad na been so cantie, O;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ ye had seen what I hae seen,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">On the braes o’ Killiecrankie, O.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I fought at land, I fought at sea;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">At hame I fought my auntie, O;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But I met the Devil an’ Dundee,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">On the braes o’ Killiecrankie, O.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The bauld Pitcur fell in a furr,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’ Claver'se got a clankie, O;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or I had fed on Athole gled,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">On the braes o’ Killiecrankie, O.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsXCI" id="songsXCI"></a>XCI.</h2> + +<h3>I GAED A WAEFU’ GATE YESTREEN.</h3> +<p class="std1">Air—“<i>The blue-eyed lass.”</i></p> + +<p>[This blue-eyed lass was Jean Jeffry, daughter to the minister of +Lochmaben: she was then a rosy girl of seventeen, with winning manners +and laughing blue eyes. She is now Mrs. Renwick, and lives in New +York.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I gaed a waefu’ gate yestreen,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A gate, I fear, I’ll dearlie rue;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I gat my death frae twa sweet een,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Twa lovely een o’ bonnie blue.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">’Twas not her golden ringlets bright;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Her lips, like roses, wat wi’ dew,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Her heaving bosom, lily-white—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">It was her een sae bonnie blue.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">She talk’d, she smil’d, my heart she wyl’d;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">She charm’d my soul—I wist na how:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And ay the stound, the deadly wound,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Cam frae her een sae bonnie blue.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But spare to speak, and spare to speed;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">She’ll aiblins listen to my vow:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Should she refuse, I’ll lay my dead<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To her twa een sae bonnie blue.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsXCII" id="songsXCII"></a>XCII.</h2> + +<h3>THE BANKS OF NITH.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Robie donna Gorach.</i>”</p> + +<p>[The command which the Comyns held on the Nith was lost to the +Douglasses: the Nithsdale power, on the downfall of that proud name, +was divided; part went to the Charteris’s and the better portion to +the Maxwells: the Johnstones afterwards came in for a share, and now +the Scots prevail.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The Thames flows proudly to the sea,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Where royal cities stately stand;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But sweeter flows the Nith, to me,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Where Comyns ance had high command:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When shall I see that honour’d land,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That winding stream I love so dear!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Must wayward Fortune’s adverse hand<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For ever, ever keep me here?<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">How lovely, Nith, thy fruitful vales,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Where spreading hawthorns gaily bloom!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">How sweetly wind thy sloping dales,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Where lambkins wanton thro’ the broom!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Tho’ wandering now, must be my doom,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Far from thy bonnie banks and braes,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">May there my latest hours consume,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Amang the friends of early days!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsXCIII" id="songsXCIII"></a>XCIII.</h2> + +<h3>MY HEART IS A-BREAKING, DEAR TITTIE.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Tam Glen.</i>”</p> + +<p>[Tam Glen is the title of an old Scottish song, and older air: of the +former all that remains is a portion of the chorus. Burns when he +wrote it sent it to the Museum.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">My heart is a-breaking, dear Tittie!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Some counsel unto me come len’,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To anger them a’ is a pity,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But what will I do wi’ Tam Glen?<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I’m thinking wi’ sic a braw fellow,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In poortith I might make a fen’;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">What care I in riches to wallow,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">If I maunna marry Tam Glen?<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">There’s Lowrie the laird o’ Dumeller,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">“Gude day to you, brute!” he comes ben:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He brags and he blaws o’ his siller,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But when will he dance like Tam Glen?<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">My minnie does constantly deave me,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And bids me beware o’ young men;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">They flatter, she says, to deceive me,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But wha can think so o’ Tam Glen?<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_243" id="Page_243">[243]</a></span></div></div> + +<p class="std2">V.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">My daddie says, gin I’ll forsake him,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">He’ll gie me guid hunder marks ten:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But, if it’s ordain’d I maun take him,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">O wha will I get but Tam Glen?<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">VI.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Yestreen at the Valentine’s dealing,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My heart to my mou’ gied a sten;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For thrice I drew ane without failing,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And thrice it was written—Tam Glen.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">VII.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The last Halloween I was waukin<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My droukit sark-sleeve, as ye ken;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">His likeness cam up the house staukin,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And the very grey breeks o’ Tam Glen!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">VIII.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Come counsel, dear Tittie! don’t tarry—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I’ll gie you my bonnie black hen,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Gif ye will advise me to marry<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The lad that I lo’e dearly, Tam Glen.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsXCIV" id="songsXCIV"></a>XCIV.</h2> + +<h3>FRAE THE FRIENDS AND LAND I LOVE.</h3> +<p class="std1">Air—“<i>Carron Side.</i>”</p> + +<p>[Burns says, “I added the four last lines, by way of giving a turn to +the theme of the poem, such as it is.” The rest of the song is +supposed to be from the same hand: the lines are not to be found in +earlier collections.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Frae the friends and land I love,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Driv’n by fortune’s felly spite,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Frae my best belov’d I rove,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Never mair to taste delight;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Never mair maun hope to find,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Ease frae toil, relief frae care:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When remembrance wracks the mind,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Pleasures but unveil despair.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Brightest climes shall mirk appear,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Desert ilka blooming shore,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Till the Fates, nae mair severe,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Friendship, love, and peace restore;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Till Revenge, wi’ laurell’d head,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Bring our banish’d hame again;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And ilka loyal bonnie lad<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Cross the seas and win his ain.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsXCV" id="songsXCV"></a>XCV.</h2> + +<h3>SWEET CLOSES THE EVENING.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Craigie-burn-wood.</i>”</p> + +<p>[This is one of several fine songs in honour of Jean Lorimer, of +Kemmis-hall, Kirkmahoe, who for some time lived on the banks of the +Craigie-burn, near Moffat. It was composed in aid of the eloquence of +a Mr. Gillespie, who was in love with her: but it did not prevail, for +she married an officer of the name of Whelpdale, lived with him for a +month or so: reasons arose on both sides which rendered separation +necessary; she then took up her residence in Dumfries, where she had +many opportunities of seeing the poet. She lived till lately.]</p> + + +<p class="std3">CHORUS.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Beyond thee, dearie, beyond thee, dearie,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And O, to be lying beyond thee;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O sweetly, soundly, weel may he sleep<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That’s laid in the bed beyond thee!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Sweet closes the evening on Craigie-burn-wood,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And blithely awaukens the morrow;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But the pride of the spring in the Craigie-burn-wood<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Can yield to me nothing but sorrow.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I see the spreading leaves and flowers,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I hear the wild birds singing;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But pleasure they hae nane for me,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">While care my heart is wringing.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I canna tell, I maunna tell,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I darena for your anger;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But secret love will break my heart,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">If I conceal it langer.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I see thee gracefu’, straight, and tall,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I see thee sweet and bonnie;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But oh! what will my torments be,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">If thou refuse thy Johnnie!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">V.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">To see thee in anither’s arms,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In love to lie and languish,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">’Twad be my dead, that will be seen,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My heart wad burst wi’ anguish.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">VI.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But, Jeanie, say thou wilt be mine,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Say, thou lo’es nane before me;<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_244" id="Page_244">[244]</a></span><span class="i0">And a’ my days o’ life to come<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I’ll gratefully adore thee.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Beyond thee, dearie, beyond thee, dearie,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">And O, to be lying beyond thee;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">O sweetly, soundly, weel may he sleep<br /></span> +<span class="i6">That’s laid in the bed beyond thee!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsXCVI" id="songsXCVI"></a>XCVI.</h2> + +<h3>COCK UP YOUR BEAVER.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Cock up your beaver.</i>”</p> + +<p>[“Printed,” says Sir Harris Nicolas, “in the Musical Museum, but not +with Burns’s name.” It is an old song, eked out and amended by the +poet: all the last verse, save the last line, is his; several of the +lines too of the first verse, have felt his amending hand: he +communicated it to the Museum.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">When first my brave Johnnie lad<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Came to this town,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He had a blue bonnet<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That wanted the crown;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But now he has gotten<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A hat and a feather,—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Hey, brave Johnnie lad,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Cock up your beaver!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Cock up your beaver,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And cock it fu’ sprush,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">We’ll over the border<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And gie them a brush;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">There’s somebody there<br /></span> +<span class="i2">We’ll teach better behaviour—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Hey, brave Johnnie lad,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Cock up your beaver!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsXCVII" id="songsXCVII"></a>XCVII.</h2> + +<h3>MEIKLE THINKS MY LUVE.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>My tocher’s the jewel.</i>”</p> + +<p>[These verses were written by Burns for the Museum, to an air by +Oswald: but he wished them to be sung to a tune called “Lord Elcho’s +favourite,” of which he was an admirer.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O Meikle thinks my luve o’ my beauty,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And meikle thinks my luve o’ my kin;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But little thinks my luve I ken brawlie<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My tocher’s the jewel has charms for him.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">It’s a’ for the apple he’ll nourish the tree;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">It’s a’ for the hiney he’ll cherish the bee;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My laddie’s sae meikle in luve wi’ the siller,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">He canna hae lure to spare for me.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Your proffer o’ luve’s an airl-penny,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My tocher’s the bargain ye wad buy;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But an ye be crafty, I am cunnin’,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Sae ye wi’ anither your fortune maun try.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ye’re like to the timmer o’ yon rotten tree,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Ye’ll slip frae me like a knotless thread,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And ye’ll crack your credit wi’ mae nor me.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsXCVIII" id="songsXCVIII"></a>XCVIII.</h2> + +<h3>GANE IS THE DAY.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Gudewife count the lawin.</i>”</p> + +<p>[The air as well as words of this song were furnished to the Museum by +Burns. “The chorus,” he says, “is part of an old song.”]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Gane is the day, and mirk’s the night,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But we’ll ne’er stray for fau’t o’ light,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For ale and brandy’s stars and moon,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And blude-red wine’s the rising sun.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Then gudewife count the lawin,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">The lawin, the lawin;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Then gudewife count the lawin,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">And bring a coggie mair!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">There’s wealth and ease for gentlemen,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And simple folk maun fight and fen;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But here we’re a’ in ae accord,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For ilka man that’s drunk’s a lord.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">My coggie is a haly pool,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That heals the wounds o’ care and dool;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And pleasure is a wanton trout,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ ye drink but deep ye’ll find him out.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Then gudewife count the lawin;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">The lawin, the lawin,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Then gudewife count the lawin,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">And bring a coggie mair!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_245" id="Page_245">[245]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="songsXCIX" id="songsXCIX"></a>XCIX.</h2> + +<h3>THERE’LL NEVER BE PEACE.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>There art few gude fellows when Willie’s awa.</i>”</p> + +<p>[The bard was in one of his Jacobitical moods when he wrote this song. +The air is a well known one, called “There’s few gude fellows when +Willie’s awa.” But of the words none, it is supposed, are +preserved.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">By yon castle wa’, at the close of the day,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I heard a man sing, though his head it was gray;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And as he was singing the tears down came,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">There’ll never be peace till Jamie comes hame.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The church is in ruins, the state is in jars;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Delusions, oppressions, and murderous wars:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">We darena weel say’t, though we ken wha’s to blame,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">There’ll never be peace till Jamie comes hame!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">My seven braw sons for Jamie drew sword,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And now I greet round their green beds in the yerd.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">It brak the sweet heart of my faithfu’ auld dame—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">There’ll never be peace till Jamie comes hame.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Now life is a burthen that bows me down,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Since I tint my bairns, and he tint his crown;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But till my last moments my words are the same—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">There’ll never be peace till Jamie comes hame!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsC" id="songsC"></a>C.</h2> + +<h3>HOW CAN I BE BLYTHE AND GLAD?</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>The bonnie lad that’s far awa.</i>”</p> + +<p>[This lamentation was written, it is said, in allusion to the +sufferings of Jean Armour, when her correspondence with Burns was +discovered by her family.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O how can I be blythe and glad,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Or how can I gang brisk and braw,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When the bonnie lad that I lo’e best<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Is o’er the hills and far awa?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When the bonnie lad that I lo’e best<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Is o’er the hills and far awa.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">It’s no the frosty winter wind,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">It’s no the driving drift and snaw;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But ay the tear comes in my e’e,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To think on him that’s far awa.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But ay the tear comes in my e’e,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To think on him that’s far awa.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">My father pat me frae his door,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My friends they line disown’d me a’,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But I hae ane will tak’ my part,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The bonnie lad that’s far awa.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But I hae ane will tak’ my part,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The bonnie lad that’s far awa.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">A pair o’ gloves he gae to me,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And silken snoods he gae me twa;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And I will wear them for his sake,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The bonnie lad that’s far awa.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And I will wear them for his sake,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The bonnie lad that’s far awa.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">V.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O weary Winter soon will pass,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And spring will cleed the birken shaw;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And my young babie will be born,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And he’ll be hame that’s far awa.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And my young babie will be born,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And he’ll be hame that’s far awa.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsCI" id="songsCI"></a>CI.</h2> + +<h3>I DO CONFESS THOU ART SAE FAIR.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>I do confess thou art sae fair.</i>”</p> + +<p>[“I do think,” says Burns, in allusion to this song, “that I have +improved the simplicity of the sentiments by giving them a Scottish +dress.” The original song is of great elegance and beauty: it was +written by Sir Robert Aytoun, secretary to Anne of Denmark, Queen of +James I.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I do confess thou art sae fair,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I wad been o’er the lugs in love,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Had I na found the slightest prayer<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That lips could speak thy heart could muve.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I do confess thee sweet, but find<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Thou art sae thriftless o’ thy sweets,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thy favours are the silly wind,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That kisses ilka thing it meets.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">See yonder rose-bud, rich in dew,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Amang its native briers sae coy;<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_246" id="Page_246">[246]</a></span><span class="i0">How sune it tines its scent and hue<br /></span> +<span class="i2">When pou’d and worn a common toy!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sic fate, ere lang, shall thee betide,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Tho’ thou may gaily bloom awhile;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yet sune thou shalt be thrown aside<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Like ony common weed and vile.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsCII" id="songsCII"></a>CII.</h2> + +<h3>YON WILD MOSSY MOUNTAINS.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Yon wild mossy mountains.</i>”</p> + +<p>[“This song alludes to a part of my private history, which is of no +consequence to the world to know.” These are the words of Burns: he +sent the song to the Musical Museum; the heroine is supposed to be the +“Nannie,” who dwelt near the Lugar.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Yon wild mossy mountains sae lofty and wide,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That nurse in their bosom the youth o’ the Clyde,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where the grouse lead their coveys thro’ the heather to feed,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And the shepherd tents his flock as he pipes on his reed.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Where the grouse lead their coveys thro’ the heather to feed,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And the shepherd tents his flock as he pipes on his reed.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Not Gowrie’s rich valleys, nor Forth’s sunny shores,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To me hae the charms o’ yon wild, mossy moors;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For there, by a lanely and sequester’d stream,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Resides a sweet lassie, my thought and my dream.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For there, by a lanely and sequester’d stream,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Resides a sweet lassie, my thought and my dream.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Amang thae wild mountains shall still be my path,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ilk stream foaming down its ain green, narrow strath;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For there, wi’ my lassie, the day lang I rove,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">While o’er us unheeded flee the swift hours o’ love.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For there wi’ my lassie, the day lang I rove,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">While o’er us unheeded flee the swift hours o’ love.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">She is not the fairest, altho’ she is fair;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O’ nice education but sma’ is her share;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Her parentage humble as humble can be;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But I lo’e the dear lassie because she lo’es me.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Her parentage humble as humble can be;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But I lo’e the dear lassie because she lo’es me.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">V.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">To beauty what man but maun yield him a prize,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In her armour of glances, and blushes, and sighs?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And when wit and refinement hae polish’d her darts,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">They dazzle our een as they flee to our hearts.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And when wit and refinement hae polish’d her darts,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">They dazzle our een, as they flee to our hearts.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">VI.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But kindness, sweet kindness, in the fond sparkling e’e,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Has lustre outshining the diamond to me:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And the heart beating love as I’m clasp’d in her arms,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O, these are my lassie’s all-conquering charms!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And the heart beating love as I’m clasp’d in her arms,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">O, these are my lassie’s all-conquering charms!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsCIII" id="songsCIII"></a>CIII.</h2> + +<h3>IT IS NA, JEAN, THY BONNIE FACE.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>The Maid’s Complaint.</i>”</p> + +<p>[Burns found this song in English attire, bestowed a Scottish dress +upon it, and published it in the Museum, together with the air by +Oswald, which is one of his best.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">It is na, Jean, thy bonnie face,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Nor shape that I admire,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Altho’ thy beauty and thy grace<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Might weel awake desire.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Something in ilka part o’ thee,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To praise, to love, I find;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But dear as is thy form to me,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Still dearer is thy mind.<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_247" id="Page_247">[247]</a></span></div></div> + + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Nae mair ungen’rous wish I hae,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Nor stronger in my breast,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Than, if I canna mak thee sae,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">at least to see thee blest.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Content am I, if heaven shall give<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But happiness to thee:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And as wi’ thee I’d wish to live,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For thee I’d bear to die.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsCIV" id="songsCIV"></a>CIV.</h2> + +<h3>WHEN I THINK ON THE HAPPY DAYS.</h3> +<p>[These verses were in latter years expanded by Burns into a song, for +the collection of Thomson: the song will be found in its place: the +variations are worthy of preservation.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">When I think on the happy days<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I spent wi’ you, my dearie;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And now what lands between us lie,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">How can I be but eerie!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">How slow ye move, ye heavy hours,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">As ye were wae and weary!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">It was na sae ye glinted by,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">When I was wi’ my dearie.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsCV" id="songsCV"></a>CV.</h2> + +<h3>WHAN I SLEEP I DREAM.</h3> +<p>[This presents another version of song LXV. Variations are to a poet +what changes are in the thoughts of a painter, and speak of fertility +of sentiment in both.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Whan I sleep I dream,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Whan I wauk I’m eerie,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sleep I canna get,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For thinkin’ o’ my dearie.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Lanely night comes on,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A’ the house are sleeping,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I think on the bonnie lad<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That has my heart a keeping.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Ay waukin O, waukin ay and wearie,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Sleep I canna get, for thinkin’ o’ my dearie.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Lanely nights come on,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A’ the house are sleeping,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I think on my bonnie lad,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’ I blear my een wi’ greetin’!<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Ay waukin, &c.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsCVI" id="songsCVI"></a>CVI.</h2> + +<h3>I MURDER HATE.</h3> +<p>[These verses are to be found in a volume which may be alluded to +without being named, in which many of Burns’s strains, some looser +than these, are to be found.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I murder hate by field or flood,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Tho’ glory’s name may screen us:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In wars at hame I’ll spend my blood,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Life-giving wars of Venus.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The deities that I adore<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Are social Peace and Plenty,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I’m better pleas’d to make one more,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Than be the death of twenty.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsCVII" id="songsCVII"></a>CVII.</h2> + +<h3>O GUDE ALE COMES.</h3> +<p>[These verses are in the museum; the first two are old, the concluding +one is by Burns.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O gude ale comes, and gude ale goes,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Gude ale gars me sell my hose,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sell my hose, and pawn my shoon,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Gude ale keeps my heart aboon.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I had sax owsen in a pleugh,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">They drew a’ weel eneugh,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I sell’d them a’ just ane by ane;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Gude ale keeps my heart aboon.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Gude ale hands me bare and busy,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Gars me moop wi’ the servant hizzie,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Stand i’ the stool when I hae done,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Gude ale keeps my heart aboon.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">O gude ale comes, &c.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_248" id="Page_248">[248]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="songsCVIII" id="songsCVIII"></a>CVIII.</h2> + +<h3>ROBIN SHURE IN HAIRST.</h3> +<p>[This is an old chaunt, out of which Burns brushed some loose +expressions, added the third and fourth verses, and sent it to the +Museum.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Robin shure in hairst,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I shure wi’ him,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Fient a heuk had I,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Yet I stack by him.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I gaed up to Dunse,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To warp a wab o’ plaiden,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">At his daddie’s yett,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Wha met me but Robin.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Was na Robin bauld,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Tho’ I was a cotter,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Play’d me sic a trick,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And me the eller’s dochter?<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Robin share in hairst, &c.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Robin promis’d me<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A’ my winter vittle;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Fient haet he had but three<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Goose feathers and a whittle.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Robin share in hairst, &c.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsCIX" id="songsCIX"></a>CIX.</h2> + +<h3>BONNIE PEG.</h3> +<p>[A fourth verse makes the moon a witness to the endearments of these +lovers; but that planet sees more indiscreet matters than it is right +to describe.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">As I came in by our gate end,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">As day was waxin’ weary,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O wha came tripping down the street,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But Bonnie Peg my dearie!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Her air sae sweet, and shape complete,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Wi’ nae proportion wanting;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The Queen of Love did never move<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Wi’ motion mair enchanting.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Wi’ linked hands, we took the sands<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A-down yon winding river;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And, oh! that hour and broomy bower,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Can I forget it ever?<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsCX" id="songsCX"></a>CX.</h2> + +<h3>GUDEEN TO YOU, KIMMER.</h3> +<p>[This song in other days was a controversial one, and continued some +sarcastic allusions to Mother Rome and her brood of seven sacraments, +five of whom were illegitimate. Burns changed the meaning, and +published his altered version in the Museum.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Gudeen to you, Kimmer,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And how do ye do?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Hiccup, quo’ Kimmer,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The better that I’m fou.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">We’re a’ noddin, nid nid noddin,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">We’re a’ noddin, at our house at hame.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Kate sits i’ the neuk,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Suppin hen broo;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Deil tak Kate<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’ she be na noddin too!<br /></span> +<span class="i4">We’re a’ noddin, &c.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">How’s a’ wi’ you, Kimmer,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And how do ye fare?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A pint o’ the best o’t,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And twa pints mair.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">We’re a’ noddin, &c.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">How’s a’ wi’ you, Kimmer,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And how do ye thrive;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">How many bairns hae ye?<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Quo’ Kimmer, I hae five.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">We’re a’ noddin, &c.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">V.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Are they a’ Johnie’s?<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Eh! atweel no:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Twa o’ them were gotten<br /></span> +<span class="i2">When Johnie was awa.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">We’re a noddin, &c.<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_249" id="Page_249">[249]</a></span></div></div> + +<p class="std2">VI.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Cats like milk,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And dogs like broo;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Lads like lasses weel,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And lasses lads too.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">We’re a’ noddin, &c.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsCXI" id="songsCXI"></a>CXI.</h2> + +<h3>AH, CHLORIS, SINCE IT MAY NA BE.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Major Graham.</i>”</p> + +<p>[Sir Harris Nicolas found these lines on Chloris among the papers of +Burns, and printed them in his late edition of the poet’s works.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Ah, Chloris, since it may na be,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That thou of love wilt hear;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">If from the lover thou maun flee,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Yet let the friend be dear.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Altho’ I love my Chloris mair<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Than ever tongue could tell;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My passion I will ne’er declare,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I’ll say, I wish thee well.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Tho’ a’ my daily care thou art,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And a’ my nightly dream,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I’ll hide the struggle in my heart,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And say it is esteem.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsCXII" id="songsCXII"></a>CXII.</h2> + +<h3>O SAW YE MY DEARIE.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Eppie Macnab.</i>”</p> + +<p>[“Published in the Museum,” says Sir Harris Nicolas, “without any +name.” Burns corrected some lines in the old song, which had more wit, +he said, than decency, and added others, and sent his amended version +to Johnson.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O saw ye my dearie, my Eppie M’Nab?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O saw ye my dearie, my Eppie M’Nab?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">She’s down in the yard, she’s kissin’ the laird,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">She winna come hame to her ain Jock Rab.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O come thy ways to me, my Eppie M’Nab!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O come thy ways to me, my Eppie M’Nab!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Whate’er thou hast done, be it late, be it soon,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thou’s welcome again to thy ain Jock Rab.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">What says she, my dearie, my Eppie M’Nab?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">What says she, my dearie, my Eppie M’Nab?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">She lets thee to wit, that she has thee forgot,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And for ever disowns thee, her ain Jock Rab.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O had I ne’er seen thee, my Eppie M’Nab!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O had I ne’er seen thee, my Eppie M’Nab!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As light as the air, and fause as thou’s fair,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thou’s broken the heart o’ thy ain Jock Rab.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsCXIII" id="songsCXIII"></a>CXIII.</h2> + +<h3>WHA IS THAT AT MY BOWER-DOOR.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Lass an I come near thee.</i>”</p> + +<p>[The “Auld man and the Widow,” in Ramsay’s collection is said, by +Gilbert Burns, to have suggested this song to his brother: it first +appeared in the Museum.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Wha is that at my bower door?<br /></span> +<span class="i2">O, wha is it but Findlay?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Then gae your gate, ye’se nae be here!—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Indeed, maun I, quo’ Findlay.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">What mak ye sae like a thief?<br /></span> +<span class="i2">O come and see, quo’ Findlay;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Before the morn ye’ll work mischief;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Indeed will I, quo’ Findlay.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Gif I rise and let you in?<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Let me in, quo’ Findlay;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ye’ll keep me waukin wi’ your din;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Indeed will I, quo’ Findlay.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In my bower if you should stay?<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Let me stay, quo’ Findlay;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I fear ye’ll bide till break o’ day;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Indeed will I, quo’ Findlay.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Here this night if ye remain;—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I’ll remain, quo’ Findlay;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I dread ye’ll learn the gate again;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Indeed will I, quo’ Findlay.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">What may pass within this bower,—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Let it pass, quo’ Findlay;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ye maun conceal till your last hour;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Indeed will I, quo’ Findlay!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_250" id="Page_250">[250]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="songsCXIV" id="songsCXIV"></a>CXIV.</h2> + +<h3>WHAT CAN A YOUNG LASSIE.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>What can a young lassie do wi’ an auld man.</i>”</p> + +<p>[In the old strain, which partly suggested this song, the heroine +threatens only to adorn her husband’s brows: Burns proposes a system +of domestic annoyance to break his heart.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">What can a young lassie, what shall a young lassie,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">What can a young lassie do wi’ an auld man?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Bad luck on the pennie that tempted my minnie<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To sell her poor Jenny for siller an’ lan’!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Bad luck on the pennie that tempted my minnie<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To sell her poor Jenny for siller an’ lan’!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">He’s always compleenin’ frae mornin’ to e’enin’,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">He hosts and he hirples the weary day lang;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He’s doyl’t and he’s dozin’, his bluid it is frozen,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">O, dreary’s the night wi’ a crazy auld man!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He’s doyl’t and he’s dozin’, his bluid it is frozen,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">O, dreary’s the night wi’ a crazy auld man!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">He hums and he hankers, he frets and he cankers,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I never can please him, do a’ that I can;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He’s peevish and jealous of a’ the young fellows:<br /></span> +<span class="i2">O, dool on the day I met wi’ an auld man!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He’s peevish and jealous of a’ the young fellows:<br /></span> +<span class="i2">O, dool on the day I met wi’ an auld man!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">My auld auntie Katie upon me takes pity,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I’ll do my endeavour to follow her plan;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I’ll cross him, and wrack him, until I heart-break him,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And then his auld brass will buy me a new pan.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I’ll cross him, and wrack him, until I heart-break him,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And then his auld brass will buy me a new pan.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsCXV" id="songsCXV"></a>CXV.</h2> + +<h3>THE BONNIE WEE THING.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Bonnie wee thing.</i>”</p> + +<p>[“Composed,” says the poet, “on my little idol, the charming, lovely +Davies.”]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Bonnie wee thing, cannie wee thing,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Lovely wee thing, wert thou mine,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I wad wear thee in my bosom,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Lest my jewel I should tine.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wishfully I look and languish<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In that bonnie face o’ thine;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And my heart it stounds wi’ anguish,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Lest my wee thing be na mine.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Wit, and grace, and love, and beauty<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In ae constellation shine;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To adore thee is my duty,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Goddess o’ this soul o’ mine!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Bonnie wee thing, cannie wee thing.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Lovely wee thing, wert thou mine,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I wad wear thee in my bosom,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Lest my jewel I should tine!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsCXVI" id="songsCXVI"></a>CXVI.</h2> + +<h3>THE TITHER MOON.</h3> +<p class="std1"><i>To a Highland Air.</i></p> + +<p>[“The tune of this song,” says Burns, “is originally from the +Highlands. I have heard a Gaelic song to it, which was not by any +means a lady’s song.” “It occurs,” says Sir Harris Nicolas, “in the +Museum, without the name of Burns.” It was sent in the poet’s own +handwriting to Johnson, and is believed to be his composition.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i4">The tither morn,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">When I forlorn,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Aneath an oak sat moaning,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">I did na trow<br /></span> +<span class="i4">I’d see my Jo,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Beside me, gain the gloaming.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">But he sae trig,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Lap o’er the rig.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And dawtingly did cheer me,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">When I, what reck,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Did least expec’,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To see my lad so near me.<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_251" id="Page_251">[251]</a></span></div></div> + + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i4">His bonnet he,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">A thought ajee,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Cock’d sprush when first he clasp’d me;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">And I, I wat,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Wi’ fainness grat,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">While in his grips be press’d me.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Deil tak’ the war!<br /></span> +<span class="i4">I late and air<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Hae wish’d since Jock departed;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">But now as glad<br /></span> +<span class="i4">I’m wi’ my lad,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As short syne broken-hearted.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i4">Fu’ aft at e’en<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Wi’ dancing keen,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When a’ were blythe and merry,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">I car’d na by,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Sae sad was I<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In absence o’ my dearie.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">But praise be blest,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">My mind’s at rest,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I’m happy wi’ my Johnny:<br /></span> +<span class="i4">At kirk and fair,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">I’se ay be there,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And be as canty’s ony.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsCXVII" id="songsCXVII"></a>CXVII.</h2> + +<h3>AE FOND KISS.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Rory Dall’s Port.</i>”</p> + +<p>[Believed to relate to the poet’s parting with Clarinda. “These +exquisitely affecting stanzas,” says Scott, “contain the essence of a +thousand love-tales.” They are in the Museum.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Ae fond kiss, and then we sever;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ae fareweel, and then for ever!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Deep in heart-wrung tears I’ll pledge thee,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Warring sighs and groans I’ll wage thee.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Who shall say that fortune grieves him<br /></span> +<span class="i0">While the star of hope she leaves him?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Me, nae cheerfu’ twinkle lights me;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Dark despair around benights me.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I’ll ne’er blame my partial fancy,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Naething could resist my Nancy;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But to see her, was to love her;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Love but her, and love for ever.—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Had we never lov’d sae kindly,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Had we never lov’d sae blindly,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Never met—or never parted,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">We had ne’er been broken hearted.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Fare thee weel, thou first and fairest!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Fare thee weel, thou best and dearest!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thine be ilka joy and treasure,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Peace, enjoyment, love, and pleasure!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ae fond kiss, and then we sever;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ae farewell, alas! for ever!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Deep in heart-wrung tears I’ll pledge thee,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Warring sighs and groans I’ll wage thee!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsCXVIII" id="songsCXVIII"></a>CXVIII.</h2> + +<h3>LOVELY DAVIES.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Miss Muir.</i>”</p> + +<p>[Written for the Museum, in honour of the witty, the handsome, the +lovely, and unfortunate Miss Davies.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O how shall I, unskilfu’, try<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The poet’s occupation,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The tunefu’ powers, in happy hours,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That whispers inspiration?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Even they maun dare an effort mair,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Than aught they ever gave us,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or they rehearse, in equal verse,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The charms o’ lovely Davies.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Each eye it cheers, when she appears,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Like Phœbus in the morning.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When past the shower, and ev’ry flower<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The garden is adorning.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As the wretch looks o’er Siberia’s shore,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">When winter-bound the wave is;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sae droops our heart when we maun part<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Frae charming lovely Davies.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Her smile’s a gift, frae ‘boon the lift,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That maks us mair than princes;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A scepter’d hand, a king’s command,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Is in her darting glances:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The man in arms, ‘gainst female charms,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Even he her willing slave is;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He hugs his chain, and owns the reign<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Of conquering, lovely Davies.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My muse to dream of such a theme,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Her feeble pow’rs surrender:<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_252" id="Page_252">[252]</a></span><span class="i0">The eagle’s gaze alone surveys<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The sun’s meridian splendour:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I wad in vain essay the strain,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The deed too daring brave is!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I’ll drap the lyre, and mute admire<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The charms o’ lovely Davies.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsCXIX" id="songsCXIX"></a>CXIX.</h2> + +<h3>THE WEARY PUND O’ TOW.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>The weary Pund o’ Tow.</i>”</p> + +<p>[“This song,” says Sir Harris Nicolas, “is in the Musical Museum; but +it is not attributed to Burns. Mr. Allan Cunningham does not state +upon what authority he has assigned it to Burns.” The critical knight +might have, if he had pleased, stated similar objections to many songs +which he took without scruple from my edition, where they were claimed +for Burns, for the first time, and on good authority. I, however, as +it happens, did not claim the song wholly for the poet: I said “the +idea of the song is old, and perhaps some of the words.” It was sent +by Burns to the Museum, and in his own handwriting.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The weary pund, the weary pund,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The weary pund o’ tow:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I think my wife will end her life<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Before she spin her tow.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I bought my wife a stane o’ lint<br /></span> +<span class="i2">As gude as e’er did grow;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And a’ that she has made o’ that,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Is ae poor pund o’ tow.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">There sat a bottle in a bole,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Beyont the ingle low,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And ay she took the tither souk,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To drouk the stowrie tow.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Quoth I, for shame, ye dirty dame,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Gae spin your tap o’ tow!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">She took the rock, and wi’ a knock<br /></span> +<span class="i2">She brak it o’er my pow.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">At last her feet—I sang to see’t—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Gaed foremost o’er the knowe;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And or I wad anither jad,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I’ll wallop in a tow.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">The weary pund, the weary pund,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">The weary pund o’ tow!<br /></span> +<span class="i4">I think my wife will end her life<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Before she spin her tow.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsCXX" id="songsCXX"></a>CXX.</h2> + +<h3>NAEBODY.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Naebody.</i>”</p> + +<p>[Burns had built his house at Ellisland, sowed his first crop, the +woman he loved was at his side, and hope was high; no wonder that he +indulged in this independent strain.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I hae a wife o’ my ain—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I’ll partake wi’ naebody;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I’ll tak cuckold frae nane,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I’ll gie cuckold to naebody.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I hae a penny to spend,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">There—thanks to naebody;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I hae naething to lend,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I’ll borrow frae naebody.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I am naebody’s lord—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I’ll be slave to naebody;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I hae a guid braid sword,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I’ll tak dunts frae naebody.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I’ll be merry and free,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I’ll be sad for naebody;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Naebody cares for me,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I’ll care for naebody.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsCXXI" id="songsCXXI"></a>CXXI.</h2> + +<h3>O, FOR ANE-AND-TWENTY, TAM!</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>The Moudiewort.</i>”</p> + +<p>[In his memoranda on this song in the Museum, Burns says simply, “This +song is mine.” The air for a century before had to bear the burthen of +very ordinary words.]</p> + + +<p class="std3">CHORUS.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">An O, for ane-and-twenty, Tam,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’ hey, sweet ane-and-twenty, Tam,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I’ll learn my kin a rattlin’ sang,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An I saw ane-and-twenty, Tam.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">They snool me sair, and haud me down,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And gar me look like bluntie, Tam!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But three short years will soon wheel roun’—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And then comes ane-and-twenty, Tam.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">A gleib o’ lan’, a claut o’ gear,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Was left me by my auntie, Tam,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">At kith or kin I need na spier,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An I saw ane-and-twenty, Tam.<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_253" id="Page_253">[253]</a></span></div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">They’ll hae me wed a wealthy coof,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Tho’ I mysel’ hae plenty, Tam;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But hear’st thou, laddie—there’s my loof—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I’m thine at ane-and-twenty, Tam.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">An O, for ane-and-twenty, Tam!<br /></span> +<span class="i6">An hey, sweet ane-and-twenty, Tam!<br /></span> +<span class="i4">I’ll learn my kin a rattlin’ song,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">An I saw ane-and-twenty, Tam.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsCXXII" id="songsCXXII"></a>CXXII.</h2> + +<h3>O KENMURE’S ON AND AWA.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>O Kenmure’s on and awa, Willie.</i>”</p> + +<p>[The second and third, and concluding verses of this Jacobite strain, +were written by Burns: the whole was sent in his own handwriting to +the Museum.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O Kenmure’s on and awa, Willie!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">O Kenmure’s on and awa!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And Kenmure’s lord’s the bravest lord,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That ever Galloway saw.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Success to Kenmure’s band, Willie!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Success to Kenmure’s band;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">There’s no a heart that fears a Whig,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That rides by Kenmure’s hand.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Here’s Kenmure’s health in wine, Willie!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Here’s Kenmure’s health in wine;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">There ne’er was a coward o’ Kenmure’s blude,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Nor yet o’ Gordon’s line.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O Kenmure’s lads are men, Willie!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">O Kenmure’s lads are men;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Their hearts and swords are metal true—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And that their faes shall ken.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">V.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">They’ll live or die wi’ fame, Willie!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">They’ll live or die wi’ fame;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But soon wi’ sounding victorie,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">May Kenmure’s lord come hame.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">VI.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Here’s him that’s far awa, Willie,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Here’s him that’s far awa;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And here’s the flower that I love best—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The rose that’s like the snaw!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsCXXIII" id="songsCXXIII"></a>CXXIII.</h2> + +<h3>MY COLLIER LADDIE.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>The Collier Laddie.</i>”</p> + +<p>[The Collier Laddie was communicated by Burns, and in his handwriting, +to the Museum: it is chiefly his own composition, though coloured by +an older strain.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Where live ye, my bonnie lass?<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’ tell me what they ca’ ye;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My name, she says, is Mistress Jean,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And I follow the Collier Laddie.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My name she says, is Mistress Jean,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And I follow the Collier Laddie.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">See you not yon hills and dales,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The sun shines on sae brawlie!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">They a’ are mine, and they shall be thine,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Gin ye’ll leave your Collier Laddie.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">They a’ are mine, and they shall be thine,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Gin ye’ll leave your Collier Laddie.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Ye shall gang in gay attire,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Weel buskit up sae gaudy;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And ane to wait on every hand,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Gin ye’ll leave your Collier Laddie.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And ane to wait on every hand,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Gin ye’ll leave your Collier Laddie.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Tho’ ye had a’ the sun shines on,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And the earth conceals sae lowly;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I wad turn my back on you and it a’,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And embrace my Collier Laddie.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I wad turn my back on you and it a’,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And embrace my Collier Laddie.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">V.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I can win my five pennies a day,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And spen’t at night fu’ brawlie;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And make my bed in the Collier’s neuk,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And lie down wi’ my Collier Laddie.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And make my bed in the Collier’s neuk,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And lie down wi’ my Collier Laddie.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">VI.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Luve for luve is the bargain for me,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Tho’ the wee cot-house should haud me;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And the world before me to win my bread,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And fair fa’ my Collier Laddie.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And the world before me to win my bread,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And fair fa’ my Collier Laddie.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_254" id="Page_254">[254]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="songsCXXIV" id="songsCXXIV"></a>CXXIV.</h2> + +<h3>NITHSDALE’S WELCOME HAME.</h3> +<p>[These verses were written by Burns for the Museum: the Maxwells of +Terreagles are the lineal descendants of the Earls of Nithsdale.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The noble Maxwells and their powers<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Are coming o’er the border,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And they’ll gae bigg Terreagle’s towers,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’ set them a’ in order.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And they declare Terreagles fair,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For their abode they chuse it;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">There’s no a heart in a’ the land,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But’s lighter at the news o’t.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Tho’ stars in skies may disappear,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And angry tempests gather;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The happy hour may soon be near<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That brings us pleasant weather:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The weary night o’ care and grief<br /></span> +<span class="i2">May hae a joyful morrow;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">So dawning day has brought relief—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Fareweel our night o’ sorrow!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsCXXV" id="songsCXXV"></a>CXXV.</h2> + +<h3>AS I WAS A-WAND’RING.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Rinn Meudial mo Mhealladh.</i>”</p> + +<p>[The original song in the Gaelic language was translated for Burns by +an Inverness-shire lady; he turned it into verse, and sent it to the +Museum.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">As I was a-wand’ring ae midsummer e’enin’,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The pipers and youngsters were making their game;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Amang them I spied my faithless fause lover,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Which bled a’ the wound o’ my dolour again.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Weel, since he has left me, may pleasure gae wi’ him;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I may be distress’d, but I winna complain;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I flatter my fancy I may get anither,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My heart it shall never be broken for ane.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I could na get sleeping till dawin for greetin’,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The tears trickled down like the hail and the rain:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Had I na got greetin’, my heart wad a broken,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For, oh! luve forsaken’s a tormenting pain.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Although he has left me for greed o’ the siller,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I dinna envy him the gains he can win;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I rather wad bear a’ the lade o’ my sorrow<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Than ever hae acted sae faithless to him.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Weel, since he has left me, may pleasure gae wi’ him,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I may be distress’d, but I winna complain;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I flatter my fancy I may get anither,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My heart it shall never be broken for ane.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsCXXVI" id="songsCXXVI"></a>CXXVI.</h2> + +<h3>BESS AND HER SPINNING-WHEEL.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>The sweet lass that lo’es me.</i>”</p> + +<p>[There are several variations of this song, but they neither affect +the sentiment, nor afford matter for quotation.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O leeze me on my spinning-wheel,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O leeze me on the rock and reel;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Frae tap to tae that cleeds me bien,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And haps me fiel and warm at e’en!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I’ll set me down and sing and spin,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">While laigh descends the simmer sun,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Blest wi’ content, and milk and meal—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O leeze me on my spinning-wheel!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">On ilka hand the burnies trot,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And meet below my theekit cot;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The scented birk and hawthorn white,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Across the pool their arms unite,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Alike to screen the birdie’s nest,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And little fishes’ caller rest:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The sun blinks kindly in the biel’,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where blithe I turn my spinning-wheel.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">On lofty aiks the cushats wail,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And Echo cons the doolfu’ tale;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The lintwhites in the hazel braes,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Delighted, rival ither’s lays:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The craik amang the clover hay,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The paitrick whirrin o’er the ley,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The swallow jinkin round my shiel,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Amuse me at my spinning-wheel.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Wi’ sma’ to sell, and less to buy,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Aboon distress, below envy,<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_255" id="Page_255">[255]</a></span><span class="i0">O wha wad leave this humble state,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For a’ the pride of a’ the great?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Amid their flaring, idle toys,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Amid their cumbrous, dinsome joys,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Can they the peace and pleasure feel<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of Bessy at her spinning-wheel?<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsCXXVII" id="songsCXXVII"></a>CXXVII.</h2> + +<h3>O LUVE WILL VENTURE IN.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>The Posie.</i>”</p> + +<p>[“The Posie is my composition,” says Burns, in a letter to Thomson. +“The air was taken down from Mrs. Burns’s voice.” It was first printed +in the Museum.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O luve will venture in<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Where it daurna weel be seen;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O luve will venture in<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Where wisdom ance has been.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But I will down yon river rove,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Among the wood sae green—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And a’ to pu’ a posie<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To my ain dear May.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The primrose I will pu’,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The firstling o’ the year,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And I will pu’ the pink,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The emblem o’ my dear,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For she’s the pink o’ womankind,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And blooms without a peer—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And a’ to be a posie<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To my ain dear May.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I’ll pu’ the budding rose,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">When Phœbus peeps in view,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For it’s like a baumy kiss<br /></span> +<span class="i2">O’ her sweet bonnie mou’;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The hyacinth’s for constancy,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Wi’ its unchanging blue—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And a’ to be a posie<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To my ain dear May.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The lily it is pure,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And the lily it is fair,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And in her lovely bosom<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I’ll place the lily there;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The daisy’s for simplicity,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And unaffected air—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And a’ to be a posie<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To my ain dear May.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">V.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The hawthorn I will pu’<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Wi’ its locks o’ siller gray,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where, like an aged man,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">It stands at break of day.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But the songster’s nest within the bush<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I winna tak away—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And a’ to be a posie<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To my ain dear May.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">VI.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The woodbine I will pu’<br /></span> +<span class="i2">When the e’ening star is near,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And the diamond drops o’ dew<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Shall be her e’en sae clear;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The violet’s for modesty,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Which weel she fa’s to wear,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And a’ to be a posie<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To my ain dear May.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">VII.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I’ll tie the posie round,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Wi’ the silken band o’ luve,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And I’ll place it in her breast,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And I’ll swear by a’ above,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That to my latest draught of life<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The band shall ne’er remove,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And this will be a posie<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To my ain dear May.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsCXXVIII" id="songsCXXVIII"></a>CXXVIII.</h2> + +<h3>COUNTRY LASSIE.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>The Country Lass.</i>”</p> + +<p>[A manuscript copy before me, in the poet’s handwriting, presents two +or three immaterial variations of this dramatic song.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">In simmer, when the hay was mawn,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And corn wav’d green in ilka field,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">While claver blooms white o’er the lea,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And roses blaw in ilka bield;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Blithe Bessie in the milking shiel,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Says—I’ll be wed, come o’t what will;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Out spak a dame in wrinkled eild—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">O’ guid advisement comes nae ill.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">It’s ye hae wooers mony ane,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And, lassie, ye’re but young ye ken;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Then wait a wee, and cannie wale,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A routhie butt, a routhie ben:<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_256" id="Page_256">[256]</a></span><span class="i0">There’s Johnie o’ the Buskie-glen,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Fu’ is his burn, fu’ is his byre;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Tak this frae me, my bonnie hen,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">It’s plenty beets the luver’s fire.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">For Johnie o’ the Buskie-glen,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I dinna care a single flie;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He lo’es sae weel his craps and kye,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">He has nae luve to spare for me:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But blithe’s the blink o’ Robie’s e’e,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And weel I wat he lo’es me dear:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ae blink o’ him I wad nae gie<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For Buskie-glen and a’ his gear.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O thoughtless lassie, life’s a faught;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The canniest gate, the strife is sair;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But ay fu’ han’t is fechtin best,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An hungry care’s an unco care:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But some will spend, and some will spare,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’ wilfu’ folk maun hae their will;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Syne as ye brew, my maiden fair,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Keep mind that ye maun drink the yill.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">V.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O, gear will buy me rigs o’ land,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And gear will buy me sheep and kye;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But the tender heart o’ leesome luve,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The gowd and siller canna buy;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">We may be poor—Robie and I,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Light is the burden luve lays on;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Content and luve brings peace and joy—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">What mair hae queens upon a throne?<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsCXXIX" id="songsCXXIX"></a>CXXIX.</h2> + +<h3>FAIR ELIZA.</h3> +<p class="std1"><i>A Gaelic Air.</i></p> + +<p>[The name of the heroine of this song was at first Rabina: but +Johnson, the publisher, alarmed at admitting something new into verse, +caused Eliza to be substituted; which was a positive fraud; for Rabina +was a real lady, and a lovely one, and Eliza one of air.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Turn again, thou fair Eliza,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Ae kind blink before we part,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Rue on thy despairing lover!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Canst thou break his faithfu’ heart?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Turn again, thou fair Eliza;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">If to love thy heart denies,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For pity hide the cruel sentence<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Under friendship’s kind disguise!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Thee, dear maid, hae I offended?<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The offence is loving thee:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Canst thou wreck his peace for ever,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Wha for time wad gladly die?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">While the life beats in my bosom,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Thou shalt mix in ilka throe;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Turn again, thou lovely maiden.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Ae sweet smile on me bestow.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Not the bee upon the blossom,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In the pride o’ sunny noon;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Not the little sporting fairy,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">All beneath the simmer moon;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Not the poet, in the moment<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Fancy lightens in his e’e,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Kens the pleasure, feels the rapture,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That thy presence gies to me.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsCXXX" id="songsCXXX"></a>CXXX.</h2> + +<h3>YE JACOBITES BY NAME.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Ye Jacobites by name.</i>”</p> + +<p>[“Ye Jacobites by name,” appeared for the first time in the Museum: it +was sent in the handwriting of Burns.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Ye Jacobites by name, give and ear, give an ear;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Ye Jacobites by name, give an ear;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Ye Jacobites by name,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Your fautes I will proclaim,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Your doctrines I maun blame—<br /></span> +<span class="i10">You shall hear.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">What is right, and what is wrang, by the law, by the law?<br /></span> +<span class="i2">What is right and what is wrang, by the law?<br /></span> +<span class="i4">What is right and what is wrang?<br /></span> +<span class="i6">A short sword, and a lang,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">A weak arm, and a strang<br /></span> +<span class="i10">For to draw.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">What makes heroic strife, fam’d afar, fam’d afar?<br /></span> +<span class="i2">What makes heroic strife, fam’d afar?<br /></span> +<span class="i4">What makes heroic strife?<br /></span> +<span class="i6">To whet th’ assassin’s knife,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Or hunt a parent’s life<br /></span> +<span class="i10">Wi’ bluidie war.<br /></span> +</div></div> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_257" id="Page_257">[257]</a></span></p> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Then let your schemes alone, in the state, in the state;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Then let your schemes alone in the state;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Then let your schemes alone,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Adore the rising sun,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">And leave a man undone<br /></span> +<span class="i10">To his fate.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsCXXXI" id="songsCXXXI"></a>CXXXI.</h2> + +<h3>THE BANKS OF DOON.</h3> +<p class="std1">[FIRST VERSION.]</p> + +<p>[An Ayrshire legend says the heroine of this affecting song was Miss +Kennedy, of Dalgarrock, a young creature, beautiful and accomplished, +who fell a victim to her love for her kinsman, McDoual, of Logan.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Ye flowery banks o’ bonnie Doon,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">How can ye bloom sae fair;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">How can ye chant, ye little birds,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And I sae fu’ o’ care!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Thou’ll break my heart, thou bonnie bird,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That sings upon the bough;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thou minds me o’ the happy days<br /></span> +<span class="i2">When my fause love was true.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Thou’ll break my heart, thou bonnie bird,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That sings beside thy mate;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For sae I sat, and sae I sang,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And wist na o’ my fate.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Aft hae I rov’d by bonnie Doon,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To see the woodbine twine,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And ilka bird sang o’ its love;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And sae did I o’ mine.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">V.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Wi’ lightsome heart I pu’d a rose,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Frae aff its thorny tree:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And my fause luver staw the rose,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But left the thorn wi’ me.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsCXXXII" id="songsCXXXII"></a>CXXXII.</h2> + +<h3>THE BANKS O’ DOON.</h3> +<p class="std1">[SECOND VERSION.]</p> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Caledonian Hunt’s Delight.</i>”</p> + +<p>[Burns injured somewhat the simplicity of the song by adapting it to a +new air, accidentally composed by an amateur who was directed, if he +desired to create a Scottish air, to keep his fingers to the black +keys of the harpsichord and preserve rhythm.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Ye banks and braes o’ bonnie Doon,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">How can ye bloom sae fresh and fair;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">How can ye chant, ye little birds,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And I sae weary, fu’ o’ care!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thou’lt break my heart, thou warbling bird,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That wantons thro’ the flowering thorn:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thou minds me o’ departed joys,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Departed—never to return!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Aft hae I rov’d by bonnie Doon,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To see the rose and woodbine twine;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And ilka bird sang o’ its luve,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And fondly sae did I o’ mine.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wi’ lightsome heart I pu’d a rose,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Fu’ sweet upon its thorny tree;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And my fause luver stole my rose,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But, ah! he left the thorn wi’ me.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsCXXXIII" id="songsCXXXIII"></a>CXXXIII.</h2> + +<h3>WILLIE WASTLE.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>The eight men of Moidart.</i>”</p> + +<p>[The person who is raised to the disagreeable elevation of heroine of +this song, was, it is said, a farmer’s wife of the old school of +domestic care and uncleanness, who lived nigh the poet, at Ellisland.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Willie Wastle dwalt on Tweed,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The spot they call’d it Linkum-doddie.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Willie was a wabster guid,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Cou’d stown a clue wi’ onie bodie;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He had a wife was dour and din,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">O Tinkler Madgie was her mither;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sic a wife as Willie had,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I wad nae gie a button for her.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">She has an e’e—she has but ane,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The cat has twa the very colour;<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_258" id="Page_258">[258]</a></span><span class="i0">Five rusty teeth, forbye a stump,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A clapper-tongue wad deave a miller:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A whiskin’ beard about her mou’,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Her nose and chin they threaten ither—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sic a wife as Willie had,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I wad nae gie a button for her.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">She’s bow hough’d, she’s hem shinn’d,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A limpin’ leg, a hand-breed shorter;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">She’s twisted right, she’s twisted left,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To balance fair in ilka quarter:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">She has a hump upon her breast,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The twin o’ that upon her shouther—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sic a wife as Willie had,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I wad nae gie a button for her.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Auld baudrans by the ingle sits,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’ wi’ her loof her face a-washin’;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But Willie’s wife is nae sae trig,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">She dights her grunzie wi’ a hushion.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Her walie nieves like midden-creels,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Her face wad fyle the Logan-Water—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sic a wife as Willie had,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I wad nae gie a button for her.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsCXXXIV" id="songsCXXXIV"></a>CXXXIV.</h2> + +<h3>LADY MARY ANN.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Craigtown’s growing.</i>”</p> + +<p>[The poet sent this song to the Museum, in his own handwriting: yet +part of it is believed to be old; how much cannot be well known, with +such skill has he made his interpolations and changes.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O, Lady Mary Ann<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Looks o’er the castle wa’,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">She saw three bonnie boys<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Playing at the ba’;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The youngest he was<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The flower amang them a’—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My bonnie laddie’s young,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But he’s growin’ yet.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O father! O father!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’ ye think it fit,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">We’ll send him a year<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To the college yet:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">We’ll sew a green ribbon<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Round about his hat,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And that will let them ken<br /></span> +<span class="i2">He’s to marry yet.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Lady Mary Ann<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Was a flower i’ the dew,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sweet was its smell,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And bonnie was its hue;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And the langer it blossom’d<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The sweeter it grew;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For the lily in the bud<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Will be bonnier yet.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Young Charlie Cochran<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Was the sprout of an aik;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Bonnie and bloomin’<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And straught was its make:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The sun took delight<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To shine for its sake,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And it will be the brag<br /></span> +<span class="i2">O’ the forest yet.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">V.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The simmer is gane,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">When the leaves they were green,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And the days are awa,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That we hae seen;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But far better days<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I trust will come again,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For my bonnie laddie’s young,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But he’s growin’ yet.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsCXXXV" id="songsCXXXV"></a>CXXXV.</h2> + +<h3>SUCH A PARCEL OF ROGUES IN A NATION.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune.—“<i>A parcel of rogues in a nation.</i>”</p> + +<p>[This song was written by Burns in a moment of honest indignation at +the northern scoundrels who sold to those of the south the +independence of Scotland, at the time of the Union.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Fareweel to a’ our Scottish fame,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Fareweel our ancient glory,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Fareweel even to the Scottish name,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Sae fam’d in martial story.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Now Sark rins o’er the Solway sands,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And Tweed rins to the ocean,<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_259" id="Page_259">[259]</a></span><span class="i0">To mark where England’s province stands—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Such a parcel of rogues in a nation.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">What force or guile could not subdue,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Thro’ many warlike ages,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Is wrought now by a coward few<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For hireling traitor’s wages.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The English steel we could disdain;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Secure in valour’s station;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But English gold has been our bane—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Such a parcel of rogues in a nation.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O would, or I had seen the day<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That treason thus could sell us,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My auld gray head had lien in clay,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Wi’ Bruce and loyal Wallace!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But pith and power, till my last hour,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I’ll mak’ this declaration;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">We’ve bought and sold for English gold—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Such a parcel of rogues in a nation.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsCXXXVI" id="songsCXXXVI"></a>CXXXVI.</h2> + +<h3>THE CARLE OF KELLYBURN BRAES.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Kellyburn Braes.</i>”</p> + +<p>[Of this song Mrs. Burns said to Cromek, when running her finger over +the long list of lyrics which her husband had written or amended for +the Museum, “Robert gae this one a terrible brushing.” A considerable +portion of the old still remains.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">There lived a carle on Kellyburn braes,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">(Hey, and the rue grows bonnie wi’ thyme),<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And he had a wife was the plague o’ his days;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And the thyme it is wither’d, and rue is in prime.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Ae day as the carle gaed up the lang glen,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">(Hey, and the rue grows bonnie wi’ thyme),<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He met wi’ the devil; says, “How do yow fen?”<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And the thyme it is wither’d, and rue is in prime.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“I’ve got a bad wife, sir; that’s a’ my complaint;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">(Hey, and the rue grows bonnie wi’ thyme),<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For, saving your presence, to her ye’re a saint;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And the thyme it is wither’d, and rue is in prime.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“It’s neither your stot nor your staig I shall crave,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">(Hey, and the rue grows bonnie wi’ thyme),<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But gie me your wife, man, for her I must have,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And the thyme it is wither’d, and rue is in prime.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">V.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“O welcome, most kindly,” the blythe carle said,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">(Hey, and the rue grows bonnie wi’ thyme),<br /></span> +<span class="i0">“But if ye can match her, ye’re waur nor ye’re ca’d,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And the thyme it is wither’d, and rue is in prime.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">VI.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The devil has got the auld wife on his back;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">(Hey, and the rue grows bonnie wi’ thyme),<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And, like a poor pedlar, he’s carried his pack;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And the thyme it is wither’d, and rue is in prime.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">VII.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">He’s carried her hame to his ain hallan-door;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">(Hey, and the rue grows bonnie wi’ thyme).<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Syne bade her gae in, for a b—h and a w—e,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And the thyme it is wither’d, and rue is in prime.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">VIII.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Then straight he makes fifty, the pick o’ his band,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">(Hey, and the rue grows bonnie wi’ thyme),<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Turn out on her guard in the clap of a hand;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And the thyme it is wither’d, and rue is in prime.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IX.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The carlin gaed thro’ them like ony wud bear,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">(Hey, and the rue grows bonnie wi’ thyme),<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Whate’er she gat hands on cam near her nae mair;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And the thyme it is wither’d, and rue is in prime.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">X.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">A reekit wee devil looks over the wa’;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">(Hey, and the rue grows bonnie wi’ thyme),<br /></span> +<span class="i0">“O, help, master, help, or she’ll ruin us a’,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And the thyme it is wither’d, and rue is in prime.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">XI.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The devil he swore by the edge o’ his knife,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">(Hey, and the rue grows bonnie wi’ thyme),<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_260" id="Page_260">[260]</a></span><span class="i0">He pitied the man that was tied to a wife;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And the thyme it is wither’d, and rue is in prime.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">XII.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The devil he swore by the kirk and the bell,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">(Hey, and the rue grows bonnie wi’ thyme),<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He was not in wedlock, thank heav’n, but in hell;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And the thyme it is wither’d, and rue is in prime.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">XIII.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Then Satan has travelled again wi’ his pack;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">(Hey, and the rue grows bonnie wi’ thyme),<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And to her auld husband he’s carried her back:<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And the thyme it is wither’d, and rue is in prime.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">XIV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“I hae been a devil the feck o’ my life;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">(Hey, and the rue grows bonnie wi’ thyme),<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But ne’er was in hell, till I met wi’ a wife;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And the thyme it is wither’d, and rue is in prime.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsCXXXVII" id="songsCXXXVII"></a>CXXXVII.</h2> + +<h3>JOCKEY’S TA’EN THE PARTING KISS.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Jockey’s ta’en the parting kiss.</i>”</p> + +<p>[Burns, when he sent this song to the Museum, said nothing of its +origin: and he is silent about it in his memoranda.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Jockey’s ta’en the parting kiss,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">O’er the mountains he is gane;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And with him is a’ my bliss,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Nought but griefs with me remain.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Spare my luve, ye winds that blaw,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Plashy sleets and beating rain!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Spare my luve, thou feathery snaw,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Drifting o’er the frozen plain.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">When the shades of evening creep<br /></span> +<span class="i2">O’er the day’s fair, gladsome e’e,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sound and safely may he sleep,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Sweetly blithe his waukening be!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He will think on her he loves,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Fondly he’ll repeat her name;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For where’er he distant roves,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Jockey’s heart is still at hame.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsCXXXVIII" id="songsCXXXVIII"></a>CXXXVIII.</h2> + +<h3>LADY ONLIE.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>The Ruffian’s Rant.</i>”</p> + +<p>[Communicated to the Museum in the handwriting of Burns: part, but not +much, is believed to be old.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">A’ the lads o’ Thornie-bank,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">When they gae to the shore o’ Bucky,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">They’ll step in an’ tak’ a pint<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Wi’ Lady Onlie, honest Lucky!<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Lady Onlie, honest Lucky!<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Brews good ale at shore o’ Bucky;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">I wish her sale for her gude ale,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">The best on a’ the shore o’ Bucky.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Her house sae bien, her curch sae clean,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I wat she is a dainty chucky;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And cheerlie blinks the ingle-gleed<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Of Lady Onlie, honest Lucky!<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Lady Onlie, honest Lucky,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Brews good ale at shore o’ Bucky<br /></span> +<span class="i4">I wish her sale for her gude ale,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">The best on a’ the shore o’ Bucky.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsCXXXIX" id="songsCXXXIX"></a>CXXXIX.</h2> + +<h3>THE CHEVALIER’S LAMENT.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Captain O’Kean.</i>”</p> + +<p>[“Composed,” says Burns to M’Murdo, “at the desire of a friend who had +an equal enthusiasm for the air and subject.” The friend alluded to is +supposed to be Robert Cleghorn: he loved the air much, and he was much +of a Jacobite.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The small birds rejoice in the green leaves returning,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The murmuring streamlet winds clear thro’ the vale;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The hawthorn trees blow in the dew of the morning,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And wild scatter’d cowslips bedeck the green dale:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But what can give pleasure, or what can seem fair,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">While the lingering moments are number’d by care?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">No flow’rs gaily springing, nor birds sweetly singing,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Can soothe the sad bosom of joyless despair.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_261" id="Page_261">[261]</a></span></p> +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The deed that I dared, could it merit their malice,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A king and a father to place on his throne?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">His right are these hills, and his right are these valleys,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Where the wild beasts find shelter, but I can find none;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But ’tis not my sufferings thus wretched, forlorn:<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My brave gallant friends! ’tis your ruin I mourn;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Your deeds proved so loyal in hot-bloody trial—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Alas! I can make you no sweeter return!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsCXL" id="songsCXL"></a>CXL.</h2> + +<h3>SONG OF DEATH.</h3> +<p class="std1">Air—“<i>Oran an Aoig.</i>”</p> + +<p>[“I have just finished the following song,” says Burns to Mrs. Dunlop, +“which to a lady, the descendant of Wallace, and herself the mother of +several soldiers, needs neither preface nor apology.”]</p> + +<p class="blockquot"><i>Scene</i>—A field of battle. Time of the day, evening. The wounded and +dying of the victorious army are supposed to join in the following +song:</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Farewell, thou fair day, thou green earth, and ye skies,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Now gay with the bright setting sun;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Farewell loves and friendships, ye dear tender ties—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Our race of existence is run!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Thou grim king of terrors, thou life’s gloomy foe!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Go frighten the coward and slave;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Go, teach them to tremble, fell tyrant! but know,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">No terrors hast thou to the brave!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Thou strik’st the dull peasant—he sinks in the dark,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Nor saves e’en the wreck of a name;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thou strik’st the young hero—a glorious mark!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">He falls in the blaze of his fame!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">In the field of proud honour—our swords in our hands,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Our king and our country to save—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">While victory shines on life’s last ebbing sands,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Oh! who would not die with the brave!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsCXLI" id="songsCXLI"></a>CXLI.</h2> + +<h3>FLOW GENTLY, SWEET AFTON.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Afton Water.</i>”</p> + +<p>[The scenes on Afton Water are beautiful, and the poet felt them, as +well as the generous kindness of his earliest patroness, Mrs. General +Stewart, of Afton-lodge, when he wrote this sweet pastoral.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Flow gently, sweet Afton! among thy green braes,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Flow gently, I’ll sing thee a song in thy praise;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My Mary’s asleep by thy murmuring stream—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Flow gently, sweet Afton, disturb not her dream.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Thou stock-dove, whose echo resounds thro’ the glen;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ye wild whistling blackbirds in yon thorny den;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thou green-crested lapwing, thy screaming forbear—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I charge you disturb not my slumbering fair.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">How lofty, sweet Afton! thy neighbouring hills,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Far mark’d with the courses of clear, winding rills;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">There daily I wander as noon rises high,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My flocks and my Mary’s sweet cot in my eye.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">How pleasant thy banks and green valleys below,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where wild in the woodlands the primroses blow!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">There, oft as mild evening weeps over the lea,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The sweet-scented birk shades my Mary and me.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">V.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Thy crystal stream, Afton, how lovely it glides,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And winds by the cot where my Mary resides;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">How wanton thy waters her snowy feet lave,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As gathering sweet flow’rets she stems thy clear wave.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">VI.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Flow gently, sweet Afton! among thy green braes,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Flow gently, sweet river, the theme of my lays!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My Mary’s asleep by thy murmuring stream—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Flow gently, sweet Afton! disturb not her dream.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_262" id="Page_262">[262]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="songsCXLII" id="songsCXLII"></a>CXLII.</h2> + +<h3>THE SMILING SPRING.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>The Bonnie Bell.</i>”</p> + +<p>[“Bonnie Bell,” was first printed in the Museum: who the heroine was +the poet has neglected to tell us, and it is a pity.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The smiling Spring comes in rejoicing,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And surly Winter grimly flies;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Now crystal clear are the falling waters,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And bonnie blue are the sunny skies;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Fresh o’er the mountains breaks forth the morning,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The ev’ning gilds the ocean’s swell;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">All creatures joy in the sun’s returning,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And I rejoice in my bonnie Bell.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The flowery Spring leads sunny Summer,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And yellow Autumn presses near,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Then in his turn comes gloomy Winter,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Till smiling Spring again appear.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thus Seasons dancing, life advancing,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Old Time and Nature their changes tell,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But never ranging, still unchanging,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I adore my bonnie Bell.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsCXLIII" id="songsCXLIII"></a>CXLIII.</h2> + +<h3>THE CARLES OF DYSART.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Hey ca’ thro’.</i>”</p> + +<p>[Communicated to the Museum by Burns in his own handwriting: part of +it is his composition, and some believe the whole.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Up wi’ the carles o’ Dysart,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And the lads o’ Buckhaven,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And the kimmers o’ Largo,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And the lasses o’ Leven.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Hey, ca’ thro’, ca’ thro’,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">For we hae mickle ado;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Hey, ca’ thro’, ca’ thro’,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">For we hae mickle ado.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">We hae tales to tell,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And we hae sangs to sing;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">We hae pennies to spend,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And we hae pints to bring.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">We’ll live a’ our days,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And them that come behin’,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Let them do the like,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And spend the gear they win.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Hey, ca’ thro’, ca’ thro’,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">For we hae mickle ado,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Hey, ca’ thro’, ca’ thro’,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">For we hae mickle ado.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsCXLIV" id="songsCXLIV"></a>CXLIV.</h2> + +<h3>THE GALLANT WEAVER.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>The Weavers’ March.</i>”</p> + +<p>[Sent by the poet to the Museum. Neither tradition nor criticism has +noticed it, but the song is popular among the looms, in the west of +Scotland.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Where Cart rins rowin to the sea,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">By mony a flow’r and spreading tree,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">There lives a lad, the lad for me,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">He is a gallant weaver.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Oh, I had wooers aught or nine,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">They gied me rings and ribbons fine;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And I was fear’d my heart would tine,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">And I gied it to the weaver.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">My daddie sign’d my tocher-band,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To gie the lad that has the land;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But to my heart I’ll add my hand,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">And gie it to the weaver.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">While birds rejoice in leafy bowers;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">While bees delight in op’ning flowers;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">While corn grows green in simmer showers,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">I’ll love my gallant weaver.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsCXLV" id="songsCXLV"></a>CXLV.</h2> + +<h3>THE BAIRNS GAT OUT.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>The deuks dang o’er my daddie.</i>”</p> + +<p>[Burns found some of the sentiments and a few of the words of this +song in a strain, rather rough and home-spun, of Scotland’s elder day. +He communicated it to the Museum.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The bairns gat out wi’ an unco shout,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The deuks dang o’er my daddie, O!<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_263" id="Page_263">[263]</a></span><span class="i0">The fien’-ma-care, quo’ the feirrie auld wife,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">He was but a paidlin body, O!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He paidles out, an’ he paidles in,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’ he paidles late an’ early, O!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">This seven lang years I hae lien by his side,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’ he is but a fusionless carlie, O!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O, hand your tongue, my feirrie auld wife,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">O, haud your tongue, now Nansie, O!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I’ve seen the day, and sae hae ye,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Ye wadna been sae donsie, O!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I’ve seen the day ye butter’d my brose,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And cuddled me late and early, O!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But downa do’s come o’er me now,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And, oh! I feel it sairly, O!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsCXLVI" id="songsCXLVI"></a>CXLVI.</h2> + +<h3>SHE’S FAIR AND FAUSE.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>She’s fair and fause.</i>”</p> + +<p>[One of the happiest as well as the most sarcastic of the songs of the +North: the air is almost as happy as the words.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">She’s fair and fause that causes my smart,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I lo’ed her meikle and lang;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">She’s broken her vow, she’s broken my heart,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And I may e’en gae hang.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A coof cam in wi’ routh o’ gear,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And I hae tint my dearest dear;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But woman is but warld’s gear,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Sae let the bonnie lass gang.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Whae’er ye be that woman love,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To this be never blind,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Nae ferlie ’tis tho’ fickle she prove,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A woman has’t by kind.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O woman, lovely woman fair!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An angel form’s fa’n to thy share,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">’Twad been o’er meikle to gien thee mair—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I mean an angel mind.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsCXLVII" id="songsCXLVII"></a>CXLVII.</h2> + +<h3>THE EXCISEMAN.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>The Deil cam’ fiddling through the town.</i>”</p> + +<p>[Composed and sung by the poet at a festive meeting of the excisemen +of the Dumfries district.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The deil cam’ fiddling through the town,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And danced awa wi’ the Exciseman,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And ilka wife cries—“Auld Mahoun,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I wish you luck o’ the prize, man!”<br /></span> +<span class="i4">The deil’s awa, the deil’s awa,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">The deil’s awa wi’ the Exciseman;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">He’s danc’d awa, he’s danc’d awa,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">He’s danc’d awa wi’ the Exciseman!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">We’ll mak our maut, we’ll brew our drink,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">We’ll dance, and sing, and rejoice, man;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And mony braw thanks to the meikle black deil<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That danc’d awa wi’ the Exciseman.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">There’s threesome reels, there’s foursome reels,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">There’s hornpipes and strathspeys, man;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But the ae best dance e’er cam to the land<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Was—the deil’s awa wi’ the Exciseman.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">The deil’s awa, the deil’s awa,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">The deil’s awa wi’ the Exciseman:<br /></span> +<span class="i4">He’s danc’d awa, he’s danc’d awa,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">He’s danc’d awa wi’ the Exciseman.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsCXLVIII" id="songsCXLVIII"></a>CXLVIII.</h2> + +<h3>THE LOVELY LASS OF INVERNESS.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Lass of Inverness.</i>”</p> + +<p>[As Burns passed slowly over the moor of Culloden, in one of his +Highland tours, the lament of the Lass of Inverness, it is said, rose +on his fancy: the first four lines are partly old.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The lovely lass o’ Inverness,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Nae joy nor pleasure can she see;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For e’en and morn, she cries, alas!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And ay the saut tear blin’s her e’e:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Drumossie moor—Drumossie day—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A waefu’ day it was to me!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For there I lost my father dear,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My father dear, and brethren three.<br /></span> +</div></div> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_264" id="Page_264">[264]</a></span></p> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Their winding sheet the bluidy clay,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Their graves are growing green to see:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And by them lies the dearest lad<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That ever blest a woman’s e’e!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Now wae to thee, thou cruel lord,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A bluidy man I trow thou be;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For mony a heart thou host made sair,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That ne’er did wrong to thine or thee.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsCXLIX" id="songsCXLIX"></a>CXLIX.</h2> + +<h3>A RED, RED ROSE.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Graham’s Strathspey.</i>”</p> + +<p>[Some editors have pleased themselves with tracing the sentiments of +this song in certain street ballads: it resembles them as much as a +sour sloe resembles a drop-ripe damson.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O, my luve’s like a red, red rose,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That’s newly sprung in June:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O, my luve’s like the melodie,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That’s sweetly play’d in tune.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">As fair art thou, my bonnie lass,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">So deep in luve am I:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And I will luve thee still, my dear,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">’Till a’ the seas gang dry.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">’Till a’ the seas gang dry, my dear,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And the rocks melt wi’ the sun:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I will luve thee still, my dear,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">While the sands o’ life shall run.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">And fare thee weel, my only luve!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And fare thee weel a-while!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And I will come again, my luve,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Tho’ it were ten thousand mile.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsCL" id="songsCL"></a>CL.</h2> + +<h3>LOUIS, WHAT RECK I BY THEE. </h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Louis, what reck I by thee.</i>”</p> + +<p>[The Jeannie of this very short, but very clever song, is Mrs. Burns. +Her name has no chance of passing from the earth if impassioned verse +can preserve it.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Louis, what reck I by thee,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Or Geordie on his ocean?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Dyvor, beggar loons to me—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I reign in Jeannie’s bosom.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Let her crown my love her law,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And in her breast enthrone me.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Kings and nations—swith, awa!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Reif randies, I disown ye!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsCLI" id="songsCLI"></a>CLI.</h2> + +<h3>HAD I THE WYTE.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Had I the wyte she bade me.</i>”</p> + +<p>[Burns in evoking this song out of the old verses did not cast wholly +out the spirit of ancient license in which our minstrels indulged. He +sent it to the Museum.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Had I the wyte, had I the wyte,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Had I the wyte she bade me;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">She watch’d me by the hie-gate side.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And up the loan she shaw’d me;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And when I wadna venture in,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A coward loon she ca’d me;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Had kirk and state been in the gate,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I lighted when she bade me.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Sae craftilie she took me ben,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And bade me make nae clatter;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">“For our ramgunshoch glum gudeman<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Is out and owre the water:”<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Whae’er shall say I wanted grace<br /></span> +<span class="i2">When I did kiss and dawte her,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Let him be planted in my place,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Syne say I was the fautor.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Could I for shame, could I for shame,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Could I for shame refused her?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And wadna manhood been to blame,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Had I unkindly used her?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He claw’d her wi’ the ripplin-kame,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And blue and bluidy bruised her;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When sic a husband was frae hame,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">What wife but had excused her?<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I dighted ay her een sae blue,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And bann’d the cruel randy;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And weel I wat her willing mou’,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Was e’en like sugar-candy.<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_265" id="Page_265">[265]</a></span><span class="i0">A gloamin-shot it was I wot,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I lighted on the Monday;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But I cam through the Tysday’s dew,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To wanton Willie’s brandy.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsCLII" id="songsCLII"></a>CLII.</h2> + +<h3>COMING THROUGH THE RYE.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Coming through the rye.</i>”</p> + +<p>[The poet in this song removed some of the coarse chaff, from the old +chant, and fitted it for the Museum, when it was first printed.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Coming through the rye, poor body,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Coming through the rye,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">She draiglet a’ her petticoatie,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Coming through the rye.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Jenny’s a’ wat, poor body,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Jenny’s seldom dry;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">She draiglet a’ her petticoatie,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Coming through the rye.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Gin a body meet a body—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Coming through the rye,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Gin a body kiss a body—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Need a body cry?<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Gin a body meet a body<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Coming through the glen,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Gin a body kiss a body—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Need the world ken?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Jenny’s a’ wat, poor body;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Jenny’s seldom dry;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">She draiglet a’ her petticoatie,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Coming through the rye.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="songsCLIII" id="songsCLIII"></a>CLIII.</h2> + +<h3>YOUNG JAMIE, PRIDE OF A’ THE PLAIN.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>The carlin o’ the glen.</i>”</p> + +<p>[Sent to the Museum by Burns in his own handwriting: part only is +thought to be his]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Young Jamie, pride of a’ the plain,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sae gallant and sae gay a swain;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thro’ a’ our lasses he did rove,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And reign’d resistless king of love:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But now wi’ sighs and starting tears,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He strays amang the woods and briers;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or in the glens and rocky caves<br /></span> +<span class="i0">His sad complaining dowie raves.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I wha sae late did range and rove,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And chang’d with every moon my love,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I little thought the time was near,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Repentance I should buy sae dear:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The slighted maids my torment see,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And laugh at a’ the pangs I dree;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">While she, my cruel, scornfu’ fair,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Forbids me e’er to see her mair!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CLIV" id="CLIV"></a>CLIV.</h2> + +<h3>OUT OVER THE FORTH.</h3> + +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Charlie Gordon’s welcome hame.</i>”</p> + +<p>[In one of his letters to Cunningham, dated 11th March 1791, Burns +quoted the four last lines of this tender and gentle lyric, and +inquires how he likes them.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Out over the Forth I look to the north,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But what is the north and its Highlands to me?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The south nor the east gie ease to my breast,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The far foreign land, or the wild rolling sea.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But I look to the west, when I gae to rest,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That happy my dreams and my slumbers may be;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For far in the west lives he I Io’e best,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The lad that is dear to my babie and me.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CLV" id="CLV"></a>CLV.</h2> + +<h3>THE LASS OF ECCLEFECHAN.</h3> + +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Jacky Latin.</i>”</p> + +<p>[Burns in one of his professional visits to Ecclefechan was amused +with a rough old district song, which some one sung: he rendered, at a +leisure moment, the language more delicate and the sentiments less +warm, and sent it to the Museum.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Gat ye me, O gat ye me,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">O gat ye me wi’ naething?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Rock and reel, and spinnin’ wheel,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A mickle quarter basin.<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_266" id="Page_266">[266]</a></span><span class="i0">Bye attour, my gutcher has<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A hich house and a laigh ane,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A’ for bye, my bonnie sel’,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The toss of Ecclefechan.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O haud your tongue now, Luckie Laing,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">O hand your tongue and jauner;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I held the gate till you I met,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Syne I began to wander:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I tint my whistle and my sang,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I tint my peace and pleasure:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But your green graff, now, Luckie Laing,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Wad airt me to my treasure.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CLVI" id="CLVI"></a>CLVI.</h2> + +<h3>THE COOPER O’ CUDDIE.</h3> + +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Bab at the bowster.</i>”</p> + +<p>[The wit of this song is better than its delicacy: it is printed in +the Museum, with the name of Burns attached.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The cooper o’ Cuddie cam’ here awa,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And ca’d the girrs out owre us a’—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And our gudewife has gotten a ca’<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That anger’d the silly gude-man, O.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">We’ll hide the cooper behind the door;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Behind the door, behind the door;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">We’ll hide the cooper behind the door,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And cover him under a mawn, O.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">He sought them out, he sought them in,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wi’, deil hae her! and, deil hae him!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But the body was sae doited and blin’,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">He wist na where he was gaun, O.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">They cooper’d at e’en, they cooper’d at morn,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">’Till our gude-man has gotten the scorn;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">On ilka brow she’s planted a horn,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And swears that they shall stan’, O.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">We’ll hide the cooper behind the door,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Behind the door, behind the door;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">We’ll hide the cooper behind the door,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And cover him under a mawn, O.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CLVII" id="CLVII"></a>CLVII.</h2> + +<h3>SOMEBODY.</h3> + +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>For the sake of somebody.</i>”</p> + +<p>[Burns seems to have borrowed two or three lines of this lyric from +Ramsay: he sent it to the Museum.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">My heart is sair—I dare na tell—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My heart is sair for somebody;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I could wake a winter night<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For the sake o’ somebody.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Oh-hon! for somebody!<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Oh-hey! for somebody!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I could range the world around,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For the sake o’ somebody!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Ye powers that smile on virtuous love,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">O, sweetly smile on somebody!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Frae ilka danger keep him free,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And send me safe my somebody.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Oh-hon! for somebody!<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Oh-hey! for somebody!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I wad do—what wad I not?<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For the sake o’ somebody!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CLVIII" id="CLVIII"></a>CLVIII.</h2> + +<h3>THE CARDIN’ O’T.</h3> + +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Salt-fish and dumplings.</i>”</p> + +<p>[“This song,” says Sir Harris Nicolas, “is in the Musical Museum, but +not with Burns’s name to it.” It was given by Burns to Johnson in his +own handwriting.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I coft a stane o’ haslock woo’,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To make a wat to Johnny o’t;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For Johnny is my only jo,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I lo’e him best of ony yet.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">The cardin’ o’t, the spinnin’ o’t,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">The warpin’ o’t, the winnin’ o’t;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">When ilka ell cost me a groat,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">The tailor staw the lynin o’t.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">For though his locks be lyart gray,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And tho’ his brow be beld aboon;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yet I hae seen him on a day,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The pride of a’ the parishen.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">The cardin’ o’t, the spinnin’ o’t,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">The warpin’ o’t, the winnin’ o’t;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">When ilka ell cost me a groat,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">The tailor staw the lynin o’t.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_267" id="Page_267">[267]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="CLIX" id="CLIX"></a>CLIX.</h2> + +<h3>WHEN JANUAR’ WIND.</h3> + +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>The lass that made the bed for me.</i>”</p> + +<p>[Burns found an old, clever, but not very decorous strain, recording +an adventure which Charles the Second, while under Presbyterian rule +in Scotland, had with a young lady of the house of Port Letham, and +exercising his taste and skill upon it, produced the present—still +too free song, for the Museum.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">When Januar’ wind was blawing cauld,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">As to the north I took my way,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The mirksome night did me enfauld,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I knew na where to lodge till day.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">By my good luck a maid I met,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Just in the middle o’ my care;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And kindly she did me invite<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To walk into a chamber fair.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I bow’d fu’ low unto this maid,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And thank’d her for her courtesie;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I bow’d fu’ low unto this maid,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And bade her mak a bed to me.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">She made the bed baith large and wide,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Wi’ twa white hands she spread it down;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">She put the cup to her rosy lips,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And drank, “Young man, now sleep ye soun’.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">V.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">She snatch’d the candle in her hand,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And frae my chamber went wi’ speed;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But I call’d her quickly back again<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To lay some mair below my head.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">VI.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">A cod she laid below my head,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And served me wi’ due respect;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And to salute her wi’ a kiss,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I put my arms about her neck.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">VII.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Haud aff your hands, young man,” she says,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">“And dinna sae uncivil be:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">If ye hae onto love for me,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">O wrang na my virginitie!”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">VIII.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Her hair was like the links o’ gowd,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Her teeth were like the ivorie;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Her cheeks like lilies dipt in wine,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The lass that made the bed to me.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IX.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Her bosom was the driven snaw,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Twa drifted heaps sae fair to see;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Her limbs the polish’d marble stane,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The lass that made the bed to me.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">X.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I kiss’d her owre and owre again,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And ay she wist na what to say;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I laid her between me and the wa’—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The lassie thought na lang till day.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">XI.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Upon the morrow when we rose,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I thank’d her for her courtesie;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But aye she blush’d, and aye she sigh’d,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And said, “Alas! ye’ve ruin’d me.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">XII.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I clasp’d her waist, and kiss’d her syne,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">While the tear stood twinklin’ in her e’e;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I said, “My lassie, dinna cry,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For ye ay shall mak the bed to me.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">XIII.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">She took her mither’s Holland sheets,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And made them a’ in sarks to me:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Blythe and merry may she be,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The lass that made the bed to me.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">XIV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The bonnie lass made the bed to me,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The braw lass made the bed to me:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I’ll ne’er forget till the day I die,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The lass that made the bed to me!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CLX" id="CLX"></a>CLX.</h2> + +<h3>SAE FAR AWA.</h3> + +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Dalkeith Maiden Bridge.</i>”</p> + +<p>[This song was sent to the Museum by Burns, in his own handwriting.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O, sad and heavy should I part,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But for her sake sae far awa;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Unknowing what my way may thwart,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My native land sae far awa.<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_268" id="Page_268">[268]</a></span><span class="i0">Thou that of a’ things Maker art,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That form’d this fair sae far awa,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Gie body strength, then I’ll ne’er start<br /></span> +<span class="i2">At this my way sae far awa.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">How true is love to pure desert,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">So love to her, sae far awa:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And nocht can heal my bosom’s smart,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">While, oh! she is sae far awa.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Nane other love, nane other dart,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I feel but hers, sae far awa;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But fairer never touch’d a heart<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Than hers, the fair sae far awa.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CLXI" id="CLXI"></a>CLXI.</h2> + +<h3>I’LL AY CA’ IN BY YON TOWN.</h3> + +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>I’ll gae nae mair to yon town.</i>”</p> + +<p>[Jean Armour inspired this very sweet song. Sir Harris Nicolas says it +is printed in Cromek’s Reliques: it was first printed in the Museum.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I’ll ay ca’ in by yon town,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And by yon garden green, again;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I’ll ay ca’ in by yon town,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And see my bonnie Jean again.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">There’s nane sall ken, there’s nane sall guess,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">What brings me back the gate again;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But she my fairest faithfu’ lass,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And stownlins we sall meet again.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">She’ll wander by the aiken tree,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">When trystin-time draws near again;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And when her lovely form I see,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">O haith, she’s doubly dear again!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I’ll ay ca’ in by yon town,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And by yon garden green, again;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I’ll ay ca’ in by yon town,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And see my bonnie Jean again.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CLXII" id="CLXII"></a>CLXII.</h2> + +<h3>O, WAT YE WHA’S IN YON TOWN.</h3> + +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>I’ll ay ca’ in by yon town.</i>”</p> + +<p>[The beautiful Lucy Johnstone, married to Oswald, of Auchencruive, was +the heroine of this song: it was not, however, composed expressly in +honour of her charms. “As I was a good deal pleased,” he says in a +letter to Syme, “with my performance, I, in my first fervour, thought +of sending it to Mrs. Oswald.” He sent it to the Museum, perhaps also +to the lady.]</p> + + +<p class="std3">CHORUS.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i2">O, wat ye wha’s in yon town,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Ye see the e’enin sun upon?<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The fairest dame’s in yon town,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">That e’enin sun is shining on.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Now haply down yon gay green shaw,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">She wanders by yon spreading tree;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">How blest ye flow’rs that round her blaw,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Ye catch the glances o’ her e’e!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">How blest ye birds that round her sing,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And welcome in the blooming year!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And doubly welcome be the spring,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The season to my Lucy dear.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The sun blinks blithe on yon town,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And on yon bonnie braes of Ayr;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But my delight in yon town,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And dearest bliss, is Lucy fair.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Without my love, not a’ the charms<br /></span> +<span class="i2">O’ Paradise could yield me joy;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But gie me Lucy in my arms,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And welcome Lapland’s dreary sky!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">V.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">My cave wad be a lover’s bower,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Tho’ raging winter rent the air;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And she a lovely little flower,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That I wad tent and shelter there.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">VI.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O sweet is she in yon town,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Yon sinkin sun’s gane down upon;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A fairer than’s in you town<br /></span> +<span class="i2">His setting beam ne’er shone upon.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">VII.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">If angry fate is sworn my foe,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And suffering I am doom’d to bear;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I careless quit aught else below,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But spare me—spare me, Lucy dear!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">VIII.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">For while life’s dearest blood is warm,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Ae thought frae her shall ne’er depart,<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_269" id="Page_269">[269]</a></span><span class="i0">And she—as fairest is her form!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">She has the truest, kindest heart!<br /></span> +<span class="i4">O, wat ye wha’s in yon town,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Ye see the e’enin sun upon?<br /></span> +<span class="i4">The fairest dame’s in yon town<br /></span> +<span class="i6">That e’enin sun is shining on.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CLXIII" id="CLXIII"></a>CLXIII.</h2> + +<h3>O MAY, THY MORN.</h3> + +<p class="std1">Tune—<i>“May, thy morn.”</i></p> + +<p>[Our lyrical legends assign the inspiration of this strain to the +accomplished Clarinda. It has been omitted by Chambers in his +“People’s Edition” of Burns.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O May, thy morn was ne’er sae sweet<br /></span> +<span class="i2">As the mirk night o’ December;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For sparkling was the rosy wine,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And private was the chamber:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And dear was she I dare na name,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But I will ay remember.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And dear was she I dare na name,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But I will ay remember.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">And here’s to them, that, like oursel,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Can push about the jorum;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And here’s to them that wish us weel,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">May a’ that’s guid watch o’er them,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And here’s to them we dare na tell,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The dearest o’ the quorum.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ami here’s to them we dare na tell,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The dearest o’ the quorum!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CLXIV" id="CLXIV"></a>CLXIV.</h2> + +<h3>LOVELY POLLY STEWART.</h3> + +<p class="std1">Tune—<i>“Ye’re welcome, Charlie Stewart.”</i></p> + +<p>[The poet’s eye was on Polly Stewart, but his mind seems to have been +with Charlie Stewart, and the Jacobite ballads, when he penned these +words;—they are in the Museum.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O lovely Polly Stewart!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">O charming Polly Stewart!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">There’s not a flower that blooms in May<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That’s half so fair as thou art.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The flower it blaws, it fades and fa’s,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And art can ne’er renew it;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But worth and truth eternal youth<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Will give to Polly Stewart.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">May he whose arms shall fauld thy charms<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Possess a leal and true heart;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To him be given to ken the heaven<br /></span> +<span class="i2">He grasps in Polly Stewart.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O lovely Polly Stewart!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">O charming Polly Stewart!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">There’s ne’er a flower that blooms in May<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That’s half so sweet as thou art.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CLXV" id="CLXV"></a>CLXV.</h2> + +<h3>THE HIGHLAND LADDIE.</h3> + +<p class="std1">Tune—<i>“If thou’lt play me fair play.”</i></p> + +<p>[A long and wearisome ditty, called “The Highland Lad and Lowland +Lassie,” which Burns compressed into these stanzas, for Johnson’s +Museum.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The bonniest lad that e’er I saw,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Bonnie laddie, Highland laddie,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wore a plaid, and was fu’ braw,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Bonnie Highland laddie.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">On his head a bonnet blue,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Bonnie laddie, Highland laddie;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">His royal heart was firm and true,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Bonnie Highland laddie.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Trumpets sound, and cannons roar,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Bonnie lassie; Lowland lassie;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And a’ the hills wi’ echoes roar,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Bonnie Lowland lassie.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Glory, honour, now invite,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Bonnie lassie, Lowland lassie,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For freedom and my king to fight,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Bonnie Lowland lassie.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The sun a backward course shall take,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Bonnie laddie, Highland laddie,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ere aught thy manly courage shake,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Bonnie Highland laddie.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Go, for yourself procure renown,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Bonnie laddie, Highland laddie;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And for your lawful king, his crown,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Bonnie Highland laddie.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_270" id="Page_270">[270]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="CLXVI" id="CLXVI"></a>CLXVI.</h2> + +<h3>ANNA, THY CHARMS.</h3> + +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Bonnie Mary.</i>”</p> + +<p>[The heroine of this short, sweet song is unknown: it was inserted in +the third edition of his Poems.]</p> + + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Anna, thy charms my bosom fire,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And waste my soul with care;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But ah! how bootless to admire,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">When fated to despair!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yet in thy presence, lovely fair,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To hope may be forgiv’n;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For sure ’twere impious to despair,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">So much in sight of Heav’n.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CLXVII" id="CLXVII"></a>CLXVII.</h2> + +<h3>CASSILLIS’ BANKS.</h3> + +<p class="std1">Tune—[unknown.]</p> + +<p>[It is supposed that “Highland Mary,” who lived sometime on +Cassillis’s banks, is the heroine of these verses.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Now bank an’ brae are claith’d in green,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’ scattered cowslips sweetly spring;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">By Girvan’s fairy-haunted stream,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The birdies flit on wanton wing.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To Cassillis’ banks when e’ening fa’s,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">There wi’ my Mary let me flee,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">There catch her ilka glance of love,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The bonnie blink o’ Mary’s e’e!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The chield wha boasts o’ warld’s walth<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Is aften laird o’ meikle care;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But Mary she is a’ my ain—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Ah! fortune canna gie me mair.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Then let me range by Cassillis’ banks,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Wi’ her, the lassie dear to me,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And catch her ilka glance o’ love,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The bonnie blink o’ Mary’s e’e!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CLXVIII" id="CLXVIII"></a>CLXVIII.</h2> + +<h3>TO THEE, LOVED NITH.</h3> + +<p class="std1">Tune—[unknown.]</p> + +<p>[There are several variations extant of these verses, and among others +one which transfers the praise from the Nith to the Dee: but to the +Dee, if the poet spoke in his own person, no such influences could +belong.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">To thee, lov’d Nith, thy gladsome plains,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Where late wi’ careless thought I rang’d,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Though prest wi’ care and sunk in woe,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To thee I bring a heart unchang’d.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I love thee, Nith, thy banks and braes,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Tho’ mem’ry there my bosom tear;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For there he rov’d that brake my heart,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Yet to that heart, ah! still how dear!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CLXIX" id="CLXIX"></a>CLXIX.</h2> + +<h3>BANNOCKS O’ BARLEY.</h3> + +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>The Killogie.</i>”</p> + +<p>[“This song is in the Museum,” says Sir Harris Nicolas, “but without +Burns’s name.” Burns took up an old song, and letting some of the old +words stand, infused a Jacobite spirit into it, wrote it out, and sent +it to the Museum.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Bannocks o’ bear meal,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Bannocks o’ barley;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Here’s to the Highlandman’s<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Bannocks o’ barley.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wha in a brulzie<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Will first cry a parley?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Never the lads wi’<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The bannocks o’ barley.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Bannocks o’ bear meal,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Bannocks o’ barley;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Here’s to the lads wi’<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The bannocks o’ barley.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wha in his wae-days<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Were loyal to Charlie?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wha but the lads wi’<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The bannocks o’ barley?<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CLXX" id="CLXX"></a>CLXX.</h2> + +<h3>HEE BALOU.</h3> + +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>The Highland Balou.</i>”</p> + +<p>[“Published in the Musical Museum,” says Sir Harris Nicolas, “but +without the name of the author.” It is an<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_271" id="Page_271">[271]</a></span> old strain, eked out and +amended by Burns, and sent to the Museum in his own handwriting.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Hee balou! my sweet wee Donald,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Picture o’ the great Clanronald;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Brawlie kens our wanton chief<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wha got my young Highland thief.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Leeze me on thy bonnie craigie,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ thou live, thou’ll steal a naigie:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Travel the country thro’ and thro’,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And bring hame a Carlisle cow.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Thro’ the Lawlands, o’er the border,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Weel, my babie, may thou furder:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Herry the louns o’ the laigh countree,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Syne to the Highlands hame to me.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CLXXI" id="CLXXI"></a>CLXXI.</h2> + +<h3>WAE IS MY HEART.</h3> + +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Wae is my heart.</i>”</p> + +<p>[Composed, it is said, at the request of Clarke, the musician, who +felt, or imagined he felt, some pangs of heart for one of the +loveliest young ladies in Nithsdale, Phillis M’Murdo.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Wae is my heart, and the tear’s in my e’e;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Lang, lang, joy’s been a stranger to me;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Forsaken and friendless, my burden I bear,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And the sweet voice of pity ne’er sounds in my ear.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Love, thou hast pleasures, and deep hae I loved;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Love, thou hast sorrows, and sair hae I proved;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But this bruised heart that now bleeds in my breast,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I can feel by its throbbings will soon be at rest.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O, if I were happy, where happy I hae been,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Down by yon stream, and yon bonnie castle green;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For there he is wand’ring, and musing on me,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wha wad soon dry the tear frae his Phillis’s e’e.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CLXXII" id="CLXXII"></a>CLXXII.</h2> + +<h3>HERE’S HIS HEALTH IN WATER.</h3> + +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>The job of journey-work.</i>”</p> + +<p>[Burns took the hint of this song from an older and less decorous +strain, and wrote these words, it has been said, in humorous allusion +to the condition in which Jean Armour found herself before marriage; +as if Burns could be capable of anything so insulting. The words are +in the Museum.]</p> + + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Altho’ my back be at the wa’,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’ tho’ he be the fautor;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Altho’ my back be at the wa’,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Yet here’s his health in water!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O! wae gae by his wanton sides,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Sae brawlie he could flatter;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Till for his sake I’m slighted sair,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And dree the kintra clatter.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But tho’ my back be at the wa’,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And tho’ he be the fautor;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But tho’ my back be at the wa’,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Yet here’s his health in water!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CLXXIII" id="CLXXIII"></a>CLXXIII.</h2> + +<h3>MY PEGGY’S FACE.</h3> + +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>My Peggy’s Face.</i>”</p> + +<p>[Composed in honour of Miss Margaret Chalmers, afterwards Mrs. Lewis +Hay, one of the wisest, and, it is said, the wittiest of all the +poet’s lady correspondents. Burns, in the note in which he +communicated it to Johnson, said he had a strong private reason for +wishing it to appear in the second volume of the Museum.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">My Peggy’s face, my Peggy’s form,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The frost of hermit age might warm;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My Peggy’s worth, my Peggy’s mind,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Might charm the first of human kind.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I love my Peggy’s angel air,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Her face so truly, heav’nly fair,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Her native grace so void of art,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But I adore my Peggy’s heart.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The lily’s hue, the rose’s dye,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The kindling lustre of an eye;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Who but owns their magic sway?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Who but knows they all decay!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The tender thrill, the pitying tear,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The gen’rous purpose, nobly dear,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The gentle look, that rage disarms—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">These are all immortal charms.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_272" id="Page_272">[272]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="CLXXIV" id="CLXXIV"></a>CLXXIV.</h2> + +<h3>GLOOMY DECEMBER.</h3> + +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Wandering Willie.</i>”</p> + +<p>[These verses were, it is said, inspired by Clarinda, and must be +taken as a record of his feelings at parting with one dear to him in +the last moment of existence—the Mrs. Mac of many a toast, both in +serious and festive hours.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Ance mair I hail thee, thou gloomy December!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Ance mair I hail thee wi’ sorrow and care:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sad was the parting thou makes me remember,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Parting wi’ Nancy, oh! ne’er to meet mair.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Fond lovers’ parting is sweet painful pleasure,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Hope beaming mild on the soft parting hour;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But the dire feeling, O farewell for ever!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Is anguish unmingled, and agony pure.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Wild as the winter now tearing the forest,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">’Till the last leaf o’ the summer is flown,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Such is the tempest has shaken my bosom,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Since my last hope and last comfort is gone!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Still as I hail thee, thou gloomy December,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Still shall I hail thee wi’ sorrow and care;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For sad was the parting thou makes me remember,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Parting wi’ Nancy, oh! ne’er to meet mair.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CLXXV" id="CLXXV"></a>CLXXV.</h2> + +<h3>MY LADY’S GOWN, THERE’S GAIRS UPON’T.</h3> + +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Gregg’s Pipes.</i>”</p> + +<p>[Most of this song is from the pen of Burns: he corrected the +improprieties, and infused some of his own lyric genius into the old +strain, and printed the result in the Museum.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">My lady’s gown, there’s gairs upon’t,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And gowden flowers sae rare upon’t;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But Jenny’s jimps and jirkinet,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My lord thinks meikle mair upon’t.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My lord a-hunting he is gane,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But hounds or hawks wi’ him are nane;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">By Colin’s cottage lies his game,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">If Colin’s Jenny be at hame.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">My lady’s white, my lady’s red,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And kith and kin o’ Cassillis’ blude;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But her ten-pund lands o’ tocher guid<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Were a’ the charms his lordship lo’ed.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Out o’er yon muir, out o’er yon moss,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Whare gor-cocks thro’ the heather pass,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">There wons auld Colin’s bonnie lass,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A lily in a wilderness.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Sae sweetly move her genty limbs,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Like music notes o’ lovers’ hymns:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The diamond dew is her een sae blue,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where laughing love sae wanton swims.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">V.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">My lady’s dink, my lady’s drest,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The flower and fancy o’ the west;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But the lassie that a man lo’es best,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O that’s the lass to make him blest.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My lady’s gown, there’s gairs upon’t,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And gowden flowers sae rare upon’t;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But Jenny’s jimps and jirkinet,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My lord thinks meikle mair upon’t.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CLXXVI" id="CLXXVI"></a>CLXXVI.</h2> + +<h3>AMANG THE TREES.</h3> + +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>The King of France, he rade a race.</i>”</p> + +<p>[Burns wrote these verses in scorn of those, and they are many, who +prefer</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“The capon craws and queer ha ha’s!”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>of emasculated Italy to the original and delicious airs, Highland and +Lowland, of old Caledonia: the song is a fragment—the more’s the +pity.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Amang the trees, where humming bees<br /></span> +<span class="i2">At buds and flowers were hinging, O,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Auld Caledon drew out her drone,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And to her pipe was singing, O;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">’Twas pibroch, sang, strathspey, or reels,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">She dirl’d them aff fu’ clearly, O,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When there cam a yell o’ foreign squeels,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That dang her tapsalteerie, O.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Their capon craws and queer ha ha’s,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">They made our lugs grow eerie, O;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The hungry bike did scrape and pike,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">’Till we were wae and weary, O;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But a royal ghaist wha ance was cas’d<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A prisoner aughteen year awa,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He fir’d a fiddler in the north<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That dang them tapsalteerie, O.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_273" id="Page_273">[273]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="CLXXVII" id="CLXXVII"></a>CLXXVII.</h2> + +<h3>THE GOWDEN LOCKS OF ANNA.</h3> + +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Banks of Banna.</i>”</p> + +<p>[“Anne with the golden locks,” one of the attendant maidens in Burns’s +Howff, in Dumfries, was very fair and very tractable, and, as may be +surmised from the song, had other pretty ways to render herself +agreeable to the customers than the serving of wine. Burns recommended +this song to Thomson; and one of his editors makes him say, “I think +this is one of the best love-songs I ever composed,” but these are not +the words of Burns; this contradiction is made openly, lest it should +be thought that the bard had the bad taste to prefer this strain to +dozens of others more simple, more impassioned, and more natural.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Yestreen I had a pint o’ wine,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A place where body saw na’;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yestreen lay on this breast o’ mine<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The gowden locks of Anna.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The hungry Jew in wilderness<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Rejoicing o’er his manna,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Was naething to my hinny bliss<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Upon the lips of Anna.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Ye monarchs tak the east and west,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Frae Indus to Savannah!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Gie me within my straining grasp<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The melting form of Anna.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">There I’ll despise imperial charms,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An empress or sultana,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">While dying raptures in her arms<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I give and take with Anna!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Awa, thou flaunting god o’ day!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Awa, thou pale Diana!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ilk star gae hide thy twinkling ray,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">When I’m to meet my Anna.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Come, in thy raven plumage, night!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Sun, moon, and stars withdrawn a’;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And bring an angel pen to write<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My transports wi’ my Anna!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The kirk an’ state may join and tell—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To do sic things I maunna:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The kirk and state may gang to hell,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And I’ll gae to my Anna.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">She is the sunshine of my e’e,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To live but her I canna:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Had I on earth but wishes three,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The first should be my Anna.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CLXXVIII" id="CLXXVIII"></a>CLXXVIII.</h2> + +<h3>MY AIN KIND DEARIE O.</h3> + +<p>[This is the first song composed by Burns for the national collection +of Thomson: it was written in October, 1792. “On reading over the +Lea-rig,” he says, “I immediately set about trying my hand on it, and, +after all, I could make nothing more of it than the following.” The +first and second verses were only sent: Burns added the third and last +verse in December.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">When o’er the hill the eastern star<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Tells bughtin-time is near, my jo;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And owsen frae the furrow’d field<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Return sae dowf and weary, O!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Down by the burn, where scented birks<a name="FNanchor_137_137" id="FNanchor_137_137"></a><a href="#Footnote_137_137" class="fnanchor">[137]</a><br /></span> +<span class="i2">Wi’ dew are hanging clear, my jo;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I’ll meet thee on the lea-rig,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My ain kind dearie O!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">In mirkest glen, at midnight hour,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I’d rove, and ne’er be eerie, O;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">If thro’ that glen I gaed to thee,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My ain kind dearie O!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Altho’ the night were ne’er sae wild,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And I were ne’er sae wearie, O,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I’d meet thee on the lea-rig,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My ain kind dearie O!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The hunter lo’es the morning sun,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To rouse the mountain deer, my jo;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">At noon the fisher seeks the glen,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Alang the burn to steer, my jo;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Gie me the hour o’ gloamin gray,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">It maks my heart sae cheery, O,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To meet thee on the lea-ring,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My ain kind dearie O!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_137_137" id="Footnote_137_137"></a><a href="#FNanchor_137_137"><span class="label">[137]</span></a> For “scented birks,” in some copies, “birken buds.”</p></div> +</div> + + + +<h2><a name="CLXXIX" id="CLXXIX"></a>CLXXIX.</h2> + +<h3>TO MARY CAMPBELL.</h3> + +<p>[“In my very early years,” says Burns to Thomson “when I was thinking +of going to the West Indies, I took the following farewell of a dear +girl. You must know that all my earlier love-songs were the breathings +of ardent passion, and though it might have been easy in after times +to have given them a polish, yet that polish, to me, would have +defaced the legend of my heart, so<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_274" id="Page_274">[274]</a></span> faithfully inscribed on them. +Their uncouth simplicity was, as they say of wines, their race.” The +heroine of this early composition was Highland Mary.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Will ye go to the Indies, my Mary,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And leave old Scotia’s shore?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Will ye go to the Indies, my Mary,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Across th’ Atlantic’s roar?<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O sweet grows the lime and the orange,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And the apple on the pine;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But a’ the charms o’ the Indies<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Can never equal thine.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I hae sworn by the Heavens to my Mary,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I hae sworn by the Heavens to be true;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And sae may the Heavens forget me<br /></span> +<span class="i2">When I forget my vow!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O plight me your faith, my Mary,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And plight me your lily white hand;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O plight me your faith, my Mary,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Before I leave Scotia’s strand.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">V.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">We hae plighted our troth, my Mary,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In mutual affection to join;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And curst be the cause that shall part us!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The hour and the moment o’ time!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CLXXX" id="CLXXX"></a>CLXXX.</h2> + +<h3>THE WINSOME WEE THING.</h3> + +<p>[These words were written for Thomson: or rather made extempore. “I +might give you something more profound,” says the poet, “yet it might +not suit the light-horse gallop of the air, so well as this random +clink.”]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">She is a winsome wee thing,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">She is a handsome wee thing,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">She is a bonnie wee thing,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">This sweet wee wife o’ mine.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I never saw a fairer,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I never lo’ed a dearer;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And niest my heart I’ll wear her,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For fear my jewel tine.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">She is a winsome wee thing,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">She is a handsome wee thing,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">She is a bonnie wee thing,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">This sweet wee wife o’ mine.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The warld’s wrack we share o’t,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The warstle and the care o’t;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wi’ her I’ll blythely bear it,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And think my lot divine.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CLXXXI" id="CLXXXI"></a>CLXXXI.</h2> + +<h3>BONNIE LESLEY.</h3> + +<p>[“I have just,” says Burns to Thomson, “been looking over the +‘Collier’s bonnie Daughter,’ and if the following rhapsody, which I +composed the other day, on a charming Ayrshire girl, Miss Leslie +Baillie, as she passed through this place to England, will suit your +taste better than the Collier Lassie, fall on and welcome.” This lady +was soon afterwards married to Mr. Cuming, of Logie.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O saw ye bonnie Lesley<br /></span> +<span class="i2">As she ga’ed o’er the border?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">She’s gane, like Alexander,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To spread her conquests farther.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">To see her is to love her,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And love but her for ever;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For Nature made her what she is,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And never made anither!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Thou art a queen, fair Lesley,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Thy subjects we, before thee:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thou art divine, fair Lesley,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The hearts o’ men adore thee.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The deil he could na scaith thee,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Or aught that wad belang thee;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He’d look into thy bonnie face,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And say, “I canna wrang thee.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">V.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The powers aboon will tent thee;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Misfortune sha’ na steer thee:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thou’rt like themselves so lovely,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That ill they’ll ne’er let near thee.<br /></span> +</div></div> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_275" id="Page_275">[275]</a></span></p> + +<p class="std2">VI.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Return again, fair Lesley,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Return to Caledonie;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That we may brag, we hae a lass<br /></span> +<span class="i2">There’s nane again sae bonnie.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CLXXXII" id="CLXXXII"></a>CLXXXII.</h2> + +<h3>HIGHLAND MARY.</h3> + +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Katherine Ogie.</i>”</p> + +<p>[Mary Campbell, of whose worth and beauty Burns has sung with such +deep feeling, was the daughter of a mariner, who lived in Greenock. +She became acquainted with the poet while on service at the castle of +Montgomery, and their strolls in the woods and their roaming trysts +only served to deepen and settle their affections. Their love had much +of the solemn as well as of the romantic: on the day of their +separation they plighted their mutual faith by the exchange of Bibles: +they stood with a running-stream between them, and lifting up water in +their hands vowed love while woods grew and waters ran. The Bible +which the poet gave was elegantly bound: ‘Ye shall not swear by my +name falsely,’ was written in the bold Mauchline hand of Burns, and +underneath was his name, and his mark as a freemason. They parted to +meet no more: Mary Campbell was carried off suddenly by a burning +fever, and the first intimation which the poet had of her fate, was +when, it is said, he visited her friends to meet her on her return +from Cowal, whither she had gone to make arrangements for her +marriage. The Bible is in the keeping of her relations: we have seen a +lock of her hair; it was very long and very bright, and of a hue +deeper than the flaxen. The song was written for Thomson’s work.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Ye banks, and braes, and streams around<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The castle o’ Montgomery,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Green be your woods, and fair your flowers,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Your waters never drumlie!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">There Simmer first unfauld her robes,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And there the langest tarry;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For there I took the last farewell<br /></span> +<span class="i2">O’ my sweet Highland Mary.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">How sweetly bloom’d the gay green birk,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">How rich the hawthorn’s blossom,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As underneath their fragrant shade<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I clasp’d her to my bosom!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The golden hours, on angel wings,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Flew o’er me and my dearie;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For dear to me, as light and life,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Was my sweet Highland Mary!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Wi’ mony a vow, and lock’d embrace,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Our parting was fu’ tender;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And, pledging aft to meet again,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">We tore oursels asunder;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But oh! fell death’s untimely frost,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That nipt my flower sae early!—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Now green’s the sod, and cauld’s the clay,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That wraps my Highland Mary!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O pale, pale now, those rosy lips<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I aft hae kissed sae fondly!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And clos’d for ay the sparkling glance<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That dwelt on me sae kindly!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And mouldering now in silent dust,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That heart that lo’ed me dearly—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But still within my bosom’s core<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Shall live my Highland Mary!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CLXXXIII" id="CLXXXIII"></a>CLXXXIII.</h2> + +<h3>AULD ROB MORRIS.</h3> + +<p>[The starting lines of this song are from one of no little merit in +Ramsey’s collection: the old strain is sarcastic; the new strain is +tender: it was written for Thomson.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">There’s auld Rob Morris that wons in yon glen,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He’s the king o’ guid fellows and wale of auld men;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He has gowd in his coffers, he has owsen and kine,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And ae bonnie lassie, his darling and mine.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">She’s fresh as the morning, the fairest in May;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">She’s sweet as the ev’ning amang the new hay;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As blythe and as artless as the lamb on the lea,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And dear to my heart as the light to my e’e.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But oh! she’s an heiress,—auld Robin’s a laird,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And my daddie has nought but a cot-house and yard;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A wooer like me mamma hope to come speed;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The wounds I must hide that will soon be my dead.<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_276" id="Page_276">[276]</a></span></div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The day comes to me, but delight brings me nane;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The night comes to me, but my rest it is gane:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I wander my lane like a night-troubled ghaist,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And I sigh as my heart it wad burst in my breast.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">V.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O had she but been of a lower degree,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I then might hae hop’d she wad smil’d upon me!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O, how past descriving had then been my bliss,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As now my distraction no words can express!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CLXXXIV" id="CLXXXIV"></a>CLXXXIV.</h2> + +<h3>DUNCAN GRAY.</h3> + +<p>[This Duncan Gray of Burns, has nothing in common with the wild old +song of that name, save the first line, and a part of the third, +neither has it any share in the sentiments of an earlier strain, with +the same title, by the same hand. It was written for the work of +Thomson.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Duncan Gray cam here to woo,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Ha, ha, the wooing o’t;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">On blythe yule night when we were fou,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Ha, ha, the wooing o’t.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Maggie coost her head fu’ high,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Look’d asklent and unco skeigh,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Gart poor Duncan stand abeigh;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Ha, ha, the wooing o’t.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Duncan fleech’d, and Duncan pray’d,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Ha, ha, the wooing o’t;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Meg was deaf as Ailsa Craig,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Ha, ha, the wooing o’t.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Duncan sigh’d baith out and in,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Grat his een baith bleer’t and blin’,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Spak o’ lowpin o’er a linn;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Ha, ha, the wooing o’t.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Time and chance are but a tide,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Ha, ha, the wooing o’t;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Slighted love is sair to bide,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Ha, ha, the wooing o’t.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Shall I, like a fool, quoth he,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For a haughty hizzie die?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">She may gae to—France for me!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Ha, ha, the wooing o’t.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">How it comes let doctors tell,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Ha, ha, the wooing o’t;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Meg grew sick—as he grew heal,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Ha, ha, the wooing o’t.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Something in her bosom wrings,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For relief a sigh she brings:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And O, her een, they spak sic things!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Ha, ha, the wooing o’t.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">V.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Duncan was a lad o’ grace.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Ha, ha, the wooing o’t;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Maggie’s was a piteous case,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Ha, ha, the wooing o’t.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Duncan could na be her death,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Swelling pity smoor’d his wrath;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Now they’re crouse and canty baith,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Ha, ha, the wooing o’t.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CLXXXV" id="CLXXXV"></a>CLXXXV.</h2> + +<h3>O POORTITH CAULD.</h3> + +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>I had a horse.</i>”</p> + +<p>[Jean Lorimer, the Chloris and the “Lassie with the lint-white locks” +of Burns, was the heroine of this exquisite lyric: she was at that +time very young; her shape was fine, and her “dimpled cheek and cherry +mou” will be long remembered in Nithsdale.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O poortith cauld, and restless love,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Ye wreck my peace between ye;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yet poortith a’ I could forgive,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">An’ twere na’ for my Jeanie.<br /></span> +<span class="i6">O why should fate sic pleasure have,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Life’s dearest bands untwining?<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Or why sae sweet a flower as love<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Depend on fortune’s shining?<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">This warld’s wealth when I think on,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">It’s pride, and a’ the lave o’t—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Fie, fie on silly coward man,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That he should be the slave o’t!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Her een sae bonnie blue betray<br /></span> +<span class="i2">How she repays my passion;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But prudence is her o’erword ay,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">She talks of rank and fashion.<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_277" id="Page_277">[277]</a></span></div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O wha can prudence think upon,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And sic a lassie by him?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O wha can prudence think upon,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And sae in love as I am?<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">V.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">How blest the humble cotter’s fate!<a name="FNanchor_138_138" id="FNanchor_138_138"></a><a href="#Footnote_138_138" class="fnanchor">[138]</a><br /></span> +<span class="i2">He wooes his simple dearie;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The silly bogles, wealth and state,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Can never make them eerie.<br /></span> +<span class="i6">O why should Fate sic pleasure have,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Life’s dearest bands untwining?<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Or why sae sweet a flower as love<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Depend on Fortune’s shining?<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_138_138" id="Footnote_138_138"></a><a href="#FNanchor_138_138"><span class="label">[138]</span></a> “The wild-wood Indian’s Fate,” in the original MS.</p></div> +</div> + + + +<h2><a name="CLXXXVI" id="CLXXXVI"></a>CLXXXVI.</h2> + +<h3>GALLA WATER.</h3> + +<p>[“Galla Water” is an improved version of an earlier song by Burns: but +both songs owe some of their attractions to an older strain, which the +exquisite air has made popular over the world. It was written for +Thomson.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">There’s braw, braw lads on Yarrow braes,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That wander thro’ the blooming heather;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But Yarrow braes nor Ettrick shaws<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Can match the lads o’ Galla Water.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But there is ane, a secret ane,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Aboon them a’ I lo’e him better;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And I’ll be his, and he’ll be mine,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The bonnie lad o’ Galla Water.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Altho’ his daddie was nae laird,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And tho’ I hae nae meikle tocher;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yet rich in kindest, truest love,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">We’ll tent our flocks by Galla Water.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">It ne’er was wealth, it ne’er was wealth,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That coft contentment, peace, or pleasure;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The bands and bliss o’ mutual love,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">O that’s the chiefest warld’s treasure!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CLXXXVII" id="CLXXXVII"></a>CLXXXVII.</h2> + +<h3>LORD GREGORY.</h3> + +<p>[Dr. Wolcot wrote a Lord Gregory for Thomson’s collection, in +imitation of which Burns wrote his, and the Englishman complained, +with an oath, that the Scotchman sought to rob him of the merit of his +composition. Wolcot’s song was, indeed, written first, but they are +both but imitations of that most exquisite old ballad, “Fair Annie of +Lochryan,” which neither Wolcot nor Burns valued as it deserved: it +far surpasses both their songs.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O mirk, mirk is this midnight hour,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And loud the tempest’s roar;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A waefu’ wanderer seeks thy tow’r,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Lord Gregory, ope thy door!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">An exile frae her father’s ha’,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And a’ for loving thee;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">At least some pity on me shaw,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">If love it may na be.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Lord Gregory, mind’st thou not the grove<br /></span> +<span class="i2">By bonnie Irwin-side,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where first I own’d that virgin-love<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I lang, lang had denied?<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">How often didst thou pledge and vow<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Thou wad for ay be mine;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And my fond heart, itsel’ sae true,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">It ne’er mistrusted thine.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">V.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Hard is thy heart, Lord Gregory,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And flinty is thy breast—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thou dart of heaven that flashest by,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">O wilt thou give me rest!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">VI.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Ye mustering thunders from above,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Your willing victim see!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But spare and pardon my fause love,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">His wrangs to heaven and me!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CLXXXVIII" id="CLXXXVIII"></a>CLXXXVIII.</h2> + +<h3>MARY MORISON.</h3> + +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Bide ye yet.</i>”</p> + +<p>[“The song prefixed,” observes Burns to Thomson, “is one of my +juvenile works. I leave it in your hands.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_278" id="Page_278">[278]</a></span> I do not think it very +remarkable either for its merits or its demerits.” “Of all the +productions of Burns,” says Hazlitt, “the pathetic and serious +love-songs which he has left behind him, in the manner of the old +ballads, are, perhaps, those which take the deepest and most lasting +hold of the mind. Such are the lines to Mary Morison.” The song is +supposed to have been written on one of a family of Morisons at +Mauchline.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O Mary, at thy window be,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">It is the wish’d, the trysted hour!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Those smiles and glances let me see<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That make the miser’s treasure poor:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">How blithely wad I bide the stoure,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A weary slave frae sun to sun;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Could I the rich reward secure,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The lovely Mary Morison!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Yestreen, when to the trembling string<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The dance gaed thro’ the lighted ha’,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To thee my fancy took its wing,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I sat, but neither heard or saw:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Tho’ this was fair, and that was braw,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And yon the toast of a’ the town,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I sigh’d, and said amang them a’,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">“Ye are na Mary Morison.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O Mary, canst thou wreck his peace,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Wha for thy sake wad gladly die?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or canst thou break that heart of his,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Whase only faut is loving thee?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">If love for love thou wilt na gie,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">At least be pity to me shown;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A thought ungentle canna be<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The thought o’ Mary Morison.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CLXXXIX" id="CLXXXIX"></a>CLXXXIX.</h2> + +<h3>WANDERING WILLIE.</h3> + +<p class="std1">[FIRST VERSION.]</p> + +<p>[The idea of this song is taken from verses of the same name published +by Herd: the heroine is supposed to have been the accomplished Mrs. +Riddel. Erskine and Thomson sat in judgment upon it, and, like true +critics, squeezed much of the natural and original spirit out of it. +Burns approved of their alterations; but he approved, no doubt, in +bitterness of spirit.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Here awa, there awa, wandering Willie,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Now tired with wandering, haud awa hame;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Come to my bosom, my ae only dearie,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And tell me thou bring’st me my Willie the same.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Loud blew the cauld winter winds at our parting;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">It was na the blast brought the tear in my e’e;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Now welcome the simmer, and welcome my Willie,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The simmer to nature, my Willie to me.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Ye hurricanes, rest in the cave o’ your slumbers!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">O how your wild horrors a lover alarms!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Awaken, ye breezes, row gently, ye billows,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And waft my dear laddie ance mair to my arms.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But if he’s forgotten his faithfulest Nannie,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">O still flow between us, thou wide roaring main;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">May I never see it, may I never trow it,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But, dying, believe that my Willie’s my ain.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CXC" id="CXC"></a>CXC.</h2> + +<h3>WANDERING WILLIE.</h3> + +<p class="std1">[LAST VERSION.]</p> + +<p>[This is the “Wandering Willie” as altered by Erskine and Thomson, and +approved by Burns, after rejecting several of their emendations. The +changes were made chiefly with the view of harmonizing the words with +the music—an Italian mode of mending the harmony of the human voice.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Here awa, there awa, wandering Willie,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Here awa, there awa, haud awa hame;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Come to my bosom, my ain only dearie,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Tell me thou bring’st me my Willie the same.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Winter winds blew loud and cauld at our parting,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Fears for my Willie brought tears in my e’e;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Welcome now simmer, and welcome my Willie,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The simmer to nature, my Willie to me.<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_279" id="Page_279">[279]</a></span></div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Rest, ye wild storms, in the cave of your slumbers,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">How your dread howling a lover alarms!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wauken, ye breezes, row gently, ye billows,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And waft my dear laddie ance mair to my arms.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But oh, if he’s faithless, and minds na his Nannie,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Flow still between us, thou wide roaring main;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">May I never see it, may I never trow it,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But, dying, believe that my Willie’s my ain.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CXCI" id="CXCI"></a>CXCI.</h2> + +<h3>OPEN THE DOOR TO ME, OH!</h3> + +<p>[Written for Thomson’s collection: the first version which he wrote +was not happy in its harmony: Burns altered and corrected it as it now +stands, and then said, “I do not know if this song be really mended.”]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Oh, open the door, some pity to show,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Oh, open the door to me, Oh!<a name="FNanchor_139_139" id="FNanchor_139_139"></a><a href="#Footnote_139_139" class="fnanchor">[139]</a><br /></span> +<span class="i0">Tho’ thou has been false, I’ll ever prove true,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Oh, open the door to me, Oh!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Cauld is the blast upon my pale cheek,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But caulder thy love for me, Oh!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The frost that freezes the life at my heart,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Is nought to my pains frae thee, Oh!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The wan moon is setting behind the white wave,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And time is setting with me, Oh!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">False friends, false love, farewell! for mair<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I’ll ne’er trouble them, nor thee, Oh!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">She has open’d the door, she has open’d it wide;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">She sees his pale corse on the plain, Oh!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My true love! she cried, and sank down by his side,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Never to rise again, Oh!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_139_139" id="Footnote_139_139"></a><a href="#FNanchor_139_139"><span class="label">[139]</span></a> This second line was originally—“If love it may na be, +Oh!”</p></div> +</div> + + + +<h2><a name="CXCII" id="CXCII"></a>CXCII.</h2> + +<h3>JESSIE.</h3> + +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Bonnie Dundee.</i>”</p> + +<p>[Jessie Staig, the eldest daughter of the provost of Dumfries, was +the heroine of this song. She became a wife and a mother, but died +early in life: she is still affectionately remembered in her native +place.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">True hearted was he, the sad swain o’ the Yarrow,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And fair are the maids on the banks o’ the Ayr,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But by the sweet side o’ the Nith’s winding river,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Are lovers as faithful, and maidens as fair:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To equal young Jessie seek Scotland all over;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To equal young Jessie you seek it in vain;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Grace, beauty, and elegance fetter her lover,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And maidenly modesty fixes the chain.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O, fresh is the rose in the gay, dewy morning,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And sweet is the lily at evening close;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But in the fair presence o’ lovely young Jessie<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Unseen is the lily, unheeded the rose.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Love sits in her smile, a wizard ensnaring;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Enthron’d in her een he delivers his law:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And still to her charms she alone is a stranger—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Her modest demeanour’s the jewel of a’!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CXCIII" id="CXCIII"></a>CXCIII.</h2> + +<h3>THE POOR AND HONEST SODGER.</h3> + +<p class="std1">Air—“<i>The Mill, Mill, O.</i>”</p> + +<p>[Burns, it is said, composed this song, once very popular, on hearing +a maimed soldier relate his adventures, at Brownhill, in Nithsdale: it +was published by Thomson, after suggesting some alterations, which +were properly rejected.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">When wild war’s deadly blast was blawn<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And gentle peace returning,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wi’ mony a sweet babe fatherless,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And mony a widow mourning;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I left the lines and tented field,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Where lang I’d been a lodger,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My humble knapsack a’ my wealth,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A poor and honest sodger.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">A leal, light heart was in my breast,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My hand unstain’d wi’ plunder;<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_280" id="Page_280">[280]</a></span> +<span class="i0">And for fair Scotia, hame again,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I cheery on did wander.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I thought upon the banks o’ Coil,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I thought upon my Nancy,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I thought upon the witching smile<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That caught my youthful fancy.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">At length I reach’d the bonny glen,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Where early life I sported;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I pass’d the mill, and trysting thorn,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Where Nancy aft I courted:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wha spied I but my ain dear maid,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Down by her mother’s dwelling!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And turn’d me round to hide the flood<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That in my een was swelling.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Wi’ alter’d voice, quoth I, sweet lass,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Sweet as yon hawthorn’s blossom,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O! happy, happy, may he be<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That’s dearest to thy bosom!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My purse is light, I’ve far to gang,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And fain wud be thy lodger;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I’ve serv’d my king and country lang—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Take pity on a sodger.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">V.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Sae wistfully she gaz’d on me,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And lovelier was then ever;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Quo’ she, a sodger ance I lo’d,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Forget him shall I never:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Our humble cot, and hamely fare,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Ye freely shall partake it,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That gallant badge—the dear cockade—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Ye’re welcome for the sake o’t.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">VI.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">She gaz’d—she redden’d like a rose—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Syne pale like onie lily;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">She sank within my arms, and cried,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Art thou my ain dear Willie?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">By him who made yon sun and sky—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">By whom true love’s regarded,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I am the man: and thus may still<br /></span> +<span class="i2">True lovers be rewarded!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">VII.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The wars are o’er, and I’m come hame,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And find thee still true-hearted;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Tho’ poor in gear, we’re rich in love,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And mair we’se ne’er be parted.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Quo’ she, my grandsire left me gowd,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A mailen plenish’d fairly;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And come, my faithful sodger lad,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Thou’rt welcome to it dearly!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">VIII.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">For gold the merchant ploughs the main,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The farmer ploughs the manor;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But glory is the sodger’s prize,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The sodger’s wealth is honour;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The brave poor sodger ne’er despise,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Nor count him as a stranger;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Remember he’s his country’s stay,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In day and hour of danger.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CXCIV" id="CXCIV"></a>CXCIV.</h2> + +<h3>MEG O’ THE MILL.</h3> + +<p class="std1">Air—“<i>Hey! bonnie lass, will you lie in a barrack?</i>”</p> + +<p>[“Do you know a fine air,” Burns asks Thomson, April, 1973, “called +‘Jackie Hume’s Lament?’ I have a song of considerable merit to that +air: I’ll enclose you both song and tune, as I have them ready to send +to the Museum.” It is probable that Thomson liked these verses too +well to let them go willingly from his hands: Burns touched up the old +song with the same starting line, but a less delicate conclusion, and +published it in the Museum.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O ken ye what Meg o’ the Mill has gotten?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ ken ye what Meg o’ the Mill has gotten?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">She has gotten a coof wi’ a claute o’ siller,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And broken the heart o’ the barley Miller.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The Miller was strappin, the Miller was ruddy;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A heart like a lord and a hue like a lady:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The Laird was a widdiefu’, bleerit knurl;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">She’s left the guid-fellow and ta’en the churl.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The Miller he hecht her a heart leal and loving;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The Laird did address her wi’ matter mair moving,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A fine pacing horse wi’ a clear chained bridle,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A whip by her side and a bonnie side-saddle.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O wae on the siller, it is sae prevailing;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And wae on the love that is fixed on a mailen’<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A tocher’s nae word in a true lover’s parle,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But gie me my love, and a fig for the warl!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_281" id="Page_281">[281]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="CXCV" id="CXCV"></a>CXCV.</h2> + +<h3>BLYTHE HAE I BEEN.</h3> + +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Liggeram Cosh.</i>”</p> + +<p>[Burns, who seldom praised his own compositions, told Thomson, for +whose work he wrote it, that “Blythe hae I been on yon hill,” was one +of the finest songs he had ever made in his life, and composed on one +of the most lovely women in the world. The heroine was Miss Lesley +Baillie.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Blythe hae I been on yon hill<br /></span> +<span class="i2">As the lambs before me;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Careless ilka thought and free<br /></span> +<span class="i2">As the breeze flew o’er me.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Now nae langer sport and play,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Mirth or sang can please me;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Lesley is sae fair and coy,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Care and anguish seize me.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Heavy, heavy is the task,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Hopeless love declaring:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Trembling, I dow nocht but glow’r,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Sighing, dumb, despairing!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">If she winna ease the thraws<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In my bosom swelling,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Underneath the grass-green sod<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Soon maun be my dwelling.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<p class="center"><img src="images/image_06.jpg" alt=""LOGAN BRAES."" width="500" height="666" /><br /> +<br /> +<span class="caption">“LOGAN BRAES.”</span></p> + +<h2><a name="CXCVI" id="CXCVI"></a>CXCVI.</h2> + +<h3>LOGAN WATER.</h3> + +<p>[“Have you ever, my dear sir,” says Burns to Thomson, 25th June, 1793, +“felt your bosom ready to burst with indignation on reading of those +mighty villains who divide kingdom against kingdom, desolate +provinces, and lay nations waste, out of wantoness of ambition, or +often from still more ignoble passions? In a mood of this kind to-day +I recollected the air of Logan Water. If I have done anything at all +like justice to my feelings, the following song, composed in +three-quarters of an hour’s meditation in my elbow-chair, ought to +have some merit.” The poet had in mind, too, during this poetic fit, +the beautiful song of Logan-braes, by my friend John Mayne, a +Nithsdale poet.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O Logan, sweetly didst thou glide,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That day I was my Willie’s bride!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And years synsyne hae o’er us run<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Like Logan to the simmer sun.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But now thy flow’ry banks appear<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Like drumlie winter, dark and drear,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">While my dear lad maun face his faes,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Far, far frae me and Logan braes!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Again the merry month o’ May<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Has made our hills and valleys gay;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The birds rejoice in leafy bowers,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The bees hum round the breathing flowers;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Blythe Morning lifts his rosy eye,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And Evening’s tears are tears of joy:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My soul, delightless, a’ surveys,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">While Willie’s far frae Logan braes.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Within yon milk-white hawthorn bush,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Amang her nestlings sits the thrush;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Her faithfu’ mate will share her toil,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or wi’ his song her cares beguile:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But I, wi’ my sweet nurslings here,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Nae mate to help, nae mate to cheer,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Pass widow’d nights and joyless days,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">While Willie’s far frae Logan braes.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O wae upon you, men o’ state,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That brethren rouse to deadly hate!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As ye make mony a fond heart mourn,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sae may it on your heads return!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">How can your flinty hearts enjoy<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The widow’s tears, the orphan’s cry?<a name="FNanchor_140_140" id="FNanchor_140_140"></a><a href="#Footnote_140_140" class="fnanchor">[140]</a><br /></span> +<span class="i0">But soon may peace bring happy days<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And Willie hame to Logan braes!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_140_140" id="Footnote_140_140"></a><a href="#FNanchor_140_140"><span class="label">[140]</span></a> Originally— +</p> +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Ye mind na, ‘mid your cruel joys,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The widow’s tears, the orphan’s cries.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +</div> +</div> + + + +<h2><a name="CXCVII" id="CXCVII"></a>CXCVII.</h2> + +<h3>THE RED, RED ROSE.</h3> + +<p class="std1">Air—“<i>Hughie Graham.</i>”</p> + +<p>[There are snatches of old song so exquisitely fine that, like +fractured crystal, they cannot be mended or eked out, without showing +where the hand of the restorer has been. This seems the case with the +first verse of this song, which the poet found in Witherspoon, and +completed by the addition of the second verse, which he felt to be +inferior, by desiring Thomson to make his own the first verse, and let +the other follow, which would conclude the strain with a thought as +beautiful as it was original.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O were my love yon lilac fair,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Wi’ purple blossoms to the spring;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And I, a bird to shelter there,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">When wearied on my little wing!<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_282" id="Page_282">[282]</a></span><span class="i0">How I wad mourn, when it was torn<br /></span> +<span class="i2">By autumn wild, and winter rude!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But I wad sing on wanton wing,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">When youthfu’ May its bloom renewed.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O gin my love were yon red rose,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That grows upon the castle wa’;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And I mysel’ a drap o’ dew,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Into her bonnie breast to fa’!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Oh, there beyond expression blest,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I’d feast on beauty a’ the night;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Seal’d on her silk-saft faulds to rest,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Till fley’d awa by Phœbus’ light.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CXCVIII" id="CXCVIII"></a>CXCVIII.</h2> + +<h3>BONNIE JEAN.</h3> + +<p>[Jean M’Murdo, the heroine of this song, the eldest daughter of John +M’Murdo of Drumlanrig, was, both in merit and look, very worthy of so +sweet a strain, and justified the poet from the charge made against +him in the West, that his beauties were not other men’s beauties. In +the M’Murdo manuscript, in Burns’s handwriting, there is a +well-merited compliment which has slipt out of the printed copy in +Thomson:—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Thy <i>handsome</i> foot thou shalt na set<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In barn or byre to trouble thee.”]<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">There was a lass, and she was fair,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">At kirk and market to be seen,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When a’ the fairest maids were met,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The fairest maid was bonnie Jean.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">And aye she wrought her mammie’s wark,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And ay she sang so merrilie:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The blithest bird upon the bush<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Had ne’er a lighter heart than she.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But hawks will rob the tender joys<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That bless the little lintwhite’s nest;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And frost will blight the fairest flowers,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And love will break the soundest rest.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Young Robie was the brawest lad,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The flower and pride of a’ the glen;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And he had owsen, sheep, and kye,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And wanton naigies nine or ten.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">V.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">He gaed wi’ Jeanie to the tryste,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">He danc’d wi’ Jeanie on the down;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And, lang ere witless Jeanie wist,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Her heart was tint, her peace was stown.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">VI.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">As in the bosom o’ the stream,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The moon-beam dwells at dewy e’en;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">So trembling, pure, was tender love<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Within the breast o’ bonnie Jean.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">VII.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">And now she works her mammie’s wark,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And ay she sighs wi’ care and pain;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yet wist na what her ail might be,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Or what wad mak her weel again.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">VIII.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But did na Jeanie’s heart loup light,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And did na joy blink in her e’e,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As Robie tauld a tale of love,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Ae e’enin’ on the lily lea?<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IX.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The sun was sinking in the west,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The birds sung sweet in ilka grove;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">His cheek to hers he fondly prest,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And whisper’d thus his tale o’ love:<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">X.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O Jeanie fair, I lo’e thee dear;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">O canst thou think to fancy me!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or wilt thou leave thy mammie’s cot,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And learn to tent the farms wi’ me?<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">XI.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">At barn or byre thou shalt na drudge,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Or naething else to trouble thee;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But stray amang the heather-bells,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And tent the waving corn wi’ me.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">XII.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Now what could artless Jeanie do?<br /></span> +<span class="i2">She had nae will to say him na:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">At length she blush’d a sweet consent,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And love was ay between them twa.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_283" id="Page_283">[283]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="CXCIX" id="CXCIX"></a>CXCIX.</h2> + +<h3>PHILLIS THE FAIR.</h3> + +<p class="std1">Tune—“Robin Adair.”</p> + +<p>[The ladies of the M’Murdo family were graceful and beautiful, and +lucky in finding a poet capable of recording their charms in lasting +strains. The heroine of this song was Phyllis M’Murdo; a favourite of +the poet. The verses were composed at the request of Clarke, the +musician, who believed himself in love with his “charming pupil.” She +laughed at the presumptuous fiddler.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">While larks with little wing<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Fann’d the pure air,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Tasting the breathing spring,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Forth I did fare:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Gay the sun’s golden eye<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Peep’d o’er the mountains high;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Such thy morn! did I cry,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Phillis the fair.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">In each bird’s careless song,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Glad I did share;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">While yon wild flowers among,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Chance led me there:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sweet to the opening day,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Rosebuds bent the dewy spray;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Such thy bloom! did I say,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Phillis the fair.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Down in a shady walk<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Doves cooing were,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I mark’d the cruel hawk,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Caught in a snare:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">So kind may fortune be,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Such make his destiny!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He who would injure thee,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Phillis the fair.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CC" id="CC"></a>CC.</h2> + +<h3>HAD I A CAVE.</h3> + +<p class="std1">Tune—“Robin Adair.”</p> + +<p>[Alexander Cunningham, on whose unfortunate love-adventure Burns +composed this song for Thomson, was a jeweller in Edinburgh, well +connected, and of agreeable and polished manners. The story of his +faithless mistress was the talk of Edinburgh, in 1793, when these +words were written: the hero of the lay has been long dead; the +heroine resides, a widow, in Edinburgh.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Had I a cave on some wild, distant shore,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Where the winds howl to the waves’ dashing roar;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">There would I weep my woes,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">There seek my lost repose,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Till grief my eyes should close,<br /></span> +<span class="i10">Ne’er to wake more.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Falsest of womankind, canst thou declare,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">All thy fond plighted vows—fleeting as air!<br /></span> +<span class="i4">To thy new lover hie,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Laugh o’er thy perjury,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Then in thy bosom try<br /></span> +<span class="i10">What peace is there!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CCI" id="CCI"></a>CCI.</h2> + +<h3>BY ALLAN STREAM.</h3> + +<p>[“Bravo! say I,” exclaimed Burns, when he wrote these verses for +Thomson. “It is a good song. Should you think so too, not else, you +can set the music to it, and let the other follow as English verses. +Autumn is my propitious season; I make more verses in it than all the +year else.” The old song of “O my love Annie’s very bonnie,” helped +the muse of Burns with this lyric.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">By Allan stream I chanced to rove<br /></span> +<span class="i2">While Phœbus sank beyond Benledi;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The winds were whispering through the grove,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The yellow corn was waving ready;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I listened to a lover’s sang,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And thought on youthfu’ pleasures mony:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And aye the wild wood echoes rang—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">O dearly do I lo’e thee, Annie!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O happy be the woodbine bower,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Nae nightly bogle make it eerie;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Nor ever sorrow stain the hour,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The place and time I met my dearie!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Her head upon my throbbing breast,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">She, sinking, said, “I’m thine for ever?”<br /></span> +<span class="i0">While mony a kiss the seal imprest,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The sacred vow,—we ne’er should sever.<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_284" id="Page_284">[284]</a></span></div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The haunt o’ Spring’s the primrose brae,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The Simmer joys the flocks to follow;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">How cheery, thro’ her shortening day,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Is Autumn, in her weeds o’ yellow!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But can they melt the glowing heart,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Or chain the soul in speechless pleasure,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or thro’ each nerve the rapture dart,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Like meeting her, our bosom’s treasure?<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + + +<p class="center"><img src="images/image_07.jpg" alt=""O WHISTLE, AND I'LL COME TO YOU, MY LAD."" width="500" height="568" /><br /> +<br /> +<span class="caption">“O WHISTLE, AND I’LL COME TO YOU, MY LAD.”</span></p> + +<h2><a name="CCII" id="CCII"></a>CCII.</h2> + +<h3>O WHISTLE, AND I’LL COME TO YOU.</h3> + +<p>[In one of the variations of this song the name of the heroine is +Jeanie: the song itself owes some of the sentiments as well as words +to an old favourite Nithsdale chant of the same name. “Is Whistle, and +I’ll come to you, my lad,” Burns inquires of Thomson, “one of your +airs? I admire it much, and yesterday I set the following verses to +it.” The poet, two years afterwards, altered the fourth line thus:—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Thy Jeany will venture wi’ ye, my lad,”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>and assigned this reason: “In fact, a fair dame at whose shrine I, the +priest of the Nine, offer up the incense of Parnassus; a dame whom the +Graces have attired in witchcraft, and whom the Loves have armed with +lightning; a fair one, herself the heroine of the song, insists on the +amendment, and dispute her commands if you dare.”]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O whistle, and I’ll come to you, my lad,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O whistle, and I’ll come to you, my lad:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Tho’ father and mither and a’ should gae mad,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O whistle, and I’ll come to you, my lad.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But warily tent, when you come to court me,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And come na unless the back-yett be a-jee;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Syne up the back-stile and let naebody see,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And come as ye were na comin’ to me.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And come as ye were na comin’ to me.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">At kirk, or at market, whene’er ye meet me,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Gang by me as tho’ that ye car’d na a flie;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But steal me a blink o’ your bonnie black e’e,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yet look as ye were na lookin’ at me.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yet look as ye were na lookin’ at me.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Ay vow and protest that ye care na for me,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And whiles ye may lightly my beauty a wee;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But court na anither, tho’ jokin’ ye be,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For fear that she wyle your fancy frae me.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For fear that she wyle your fancy frae me.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O whistle, and I’ll come to you, my lad,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O whistle, and I’ll come to you, my lad:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Tho’ father and mither and a’ should gae mad,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O whistle, and I’ll come to you, my lad.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CCIII" id="CCIII"></a>CCIII.</h2> + +<h3>ADOWN WINDING NITH.</h3> + +<p>[“Mr. Clarke,” says Burns to Thompson, “begs you to give Miss Phillis +a corner in your book, as she is a particular flame of his. She is a +Miss Phillis M’Murdo, sister to ‘Bonnie Jean;’ they are both pupils of +his.” This lady afterwards became Mrs. Norman Lockhart, of Carnwath.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Adown winding Nith I did wander,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To mark the sweet flowers as they spring;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Adown winding Nith I did wander,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Of Phillis to muse and to sing.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Awa wi’ your belles and your beauties,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">They never wi’ her can compare:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Whaever has met wi’ my Phillis,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Has met wi’ the queen o’ the fair.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The daisy amus’d my fond fancy,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">So artless, so simple, so wild;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thou emblem, said I, o’ my Phillis,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For she is simplicity’s child.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The rose-bud’s the blush o’ my charmer,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Her sweet balmy lip when ’tis prest:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">How fair and how pure is the lily,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But fairer and purer her breast.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Yon knot of gay flowers in the arbour,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">They ne’er wi’ my Phillis can vie:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Her breath is the breath o’ the woodbine,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Its dew-drop o’ diamond, her eye.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">V.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Her voice is the song of the morning,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That wakes thro’ the green-spreading grove,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When Phœbus peeps over the mountains,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">On music, and pleasure, and love.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">VI.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But beauty how frail and how fleeting,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The bloom of a fine summer’s day!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">While worth in the mind o’ my Phillis<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Will flourish without a decay.<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_285" id="Page_285">[285]</a></span><span class="i0">Awa wi’ your belles and your beauties,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">They never wi’ her can compare:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Whaever has met wi’ my Phillis<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Has met wi’ the queen o’ the fair.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CCIV" id="CCIV"></a>CCIV.</h2> + +<h3>COME, LET ME TAKE THEE.</h3> + +<p class="std1">Air—“<i>Cauld Kail.</i>”</p> + +<p>[Burns composed this lyric in August, 1793, and tradition says it was +produced by the charms of Jean Lorimer. “That tune, Cauld Kail,” he +says to Thomson, “is such a favorite of yours, that I once roved out +yesterday for a gloaming-shot at the Muses; when the Muse that +presides over the shores of Nith, or rather my old inspiring, dearest +nymph, Coila, whispered me the following.”]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Come, let me take thee to my breast,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And pledge we ne’er shall sunder;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And I shall spurn as vilest dust<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The warld’s wealth and grandeur:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And do I hear my Jeanie own<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That equal transports move her?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I ask for dearest life alone,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That I may live to love her.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Thus in my arms, wi’ a’ thy charms,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I clasp my countless treasure;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I’ll seek nae mair o’ heaven to share,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Than sic a moment’s pleasure:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And by thy een, sae bonnie blue,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I swear I’m thine for ever!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And on thy lips I seal my vow,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And break it shall I never.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CCV" id="CCV"></a>CCV.</h2> + +<h3>DAINTY DAVIE.</h3> + +<p>[From the old song of “Daintie Davie” Burns has borrowed only the +title and the measure. The ancient strain records how the Rev. David +Williamson, to escape the pursuit of the dragoons, in the time of the +persecution, was hid, by the devout Lady of Cherrytrees, in the same +bed with her ailing daughter. The divine lived to have six wives +beside the daughter of the Lady of Cherrytrees, and other children +besides the one which his hiding from the dragoons produced. When + and its upshot, he is +said to have exclaimed, “God’s fish! that beats me and the oak: the +man ought to be made a bishop.”]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Now rosy May comes in wi’ flowers,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To deck her gay, green-spreading bowers;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And now comes in my happy hours,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To wander wi’ my Davie.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Meet me on the warlock knowe,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Dainty Davie, dainty Davie,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">There I’ll spend the day wi’ you,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">My ain dear dainty Davie.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The crystal waters round us fa’,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The merry birds are lovers a’,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The scented breezes round us blaw,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A wandering wi’ my Davie.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">When purple morning starts the hare,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To steal upon her early fare,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Then thro’ the dews I will repair,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To meet my faithfu’ Davie<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">When day, expiring in the west,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The curtain draws o’ nature’s rest,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I flee to his arms I lo’e best,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And that’s my ain dear Davie.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Meet me on the warlock knowe,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Bonnie Davie, dainty Davie,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">There I’ll spend the day wi’ you,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">My ain dear dainty Davie.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CCVI" id="CCVI"></a>CCVI.</h2> + +<h3>BRUCE TO HIS MEN AT BANNOCKBURN.</h3> + +<p class="std1">[FIRST VERSION.]</p> + +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Hey, tuttie taitie.</i>”</p> + +<p>[Syme of Ryedale states that this fine ode was composed during a storm +of rain and fire, among the wilds of Glenken in Galloway: the poet +himself gives an account much less romantic. In speaking of the air to +Thomson, he says, “There is a tradition which I have met with in many +places in Scotland, that it was Robert Bruce’s march at the battle of +Bannockburn. This thought, in my solitary wanderings, warmed me to a +pitch of enthusiasm on the theme of liberty and independence, which I +threw into a kind of Scottish ode, fitted to the air, that<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_286" id="Page_286">[286]</a></span> one might +suppose to be the royal Scot’s address to his heroic followers on that +eventful morning.” It was written in September, 1793.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Scots, wha hae wi’ Wallace bled,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Scots, wham Bruce has aften led;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Welcome to your gory bed,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Or to victorie!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Now’s the day, and now’s the hour;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">See the front o’ battle lour:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">See approach proud Edward’s pow’r—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Chains and slaverie!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Wha will be a traitor-knave?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wha can fill a coward’s grave?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wha sae base as be a slave!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Let him turn and flee!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Wha for Scotland’s king and law<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Freedom’s sword will strongly draw,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Freeman stand, or freeman fa’,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Let him follow me!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">V.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">By oppression’s woes and pains!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">By our sons in servile chains!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">We will drain our dearest veins,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But they shall be free!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">VI.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Lay the proud usurpers low!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Tyrants fall in every foe!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Liberty’s in every blow!—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Let us do or die!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<h2><a name="CCVII" id="CCVII"></a>CCVII.</h2> + +<h3>BANNOCKBURN.</h3> +<h4>ROBERT BRUCE’S ADDRESS TO HIS ARMY.</h4> +<p class="std1">[SECOND VERSION.]</p> + +<p>[Thomson acknowledged the charm which this martial and national ode +had for him, but he disliked the air, and proposed to substitute that +of Lewis Gordon in its place. But Lewis Gordon required a couple of +syllables more in every fourth line, which loaded the verse with +expletives, and weakened the simple energy of the original: Burns +consented to the proper alterations, after a slight resistance; but +when Thomson, having succeeded in this, proposed a change in the +expression, no warrior of Bruce’s day ever resisted more sternly the +march of a Southron over the border. “The only line,” says the +musician, “which I dislike in the whole song is,</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">‘Welcome to your gory bed:’<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>gory presents a disagreeable image to the mind, and a prudent general +would avoid saying anything to his soldiers which might tend to make +death more frightful than it is.” “My ode,” replied Burns, “pleases me +so much that I cannot alter it: your proposed alterations would, in my +opinion, make it tame.” Thomson cries out, like the timid wife of +Coriolanus, “Oh, God, no blood!” while Burns exclaims, like that +Roman’s heroic mother, “Yes, blood! it becomes a soldier more than +gilt his trophy.” The ode as originally written was restored +afterwards in Thomson’s collection.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Scots, wha hae wi’ Wallace bled,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Scots, wham Bruce has aften led;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Welcome to your gory bed,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Or to glorious victorie!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Now’s the day, and now’s the hour—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">See the front o’ battle lour;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">See approach proud Edward’s power—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Edward! chains and slaverie!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Wha will be a traitor-knave?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wha can fill a coward’s grave?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wha sae base as be a slave?<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Traitor! coward! turn and flee!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Wha for Scotland’s king and law<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Freedom’s sword will strongly draw,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Freeman stand, or freeman fa’,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Caledonian! on wi’ me!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">V.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">By oppression’s woes and pains!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">By our sons in servile chains!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">We will drain our dearest veins,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But they shall be—shall be free!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">VI.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Lay the proud usurpers low!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Tyrants fall in every foe!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Liberty’s in every blow!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Forward! let us do, or die!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + + + + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_287" id="Page_287">[287]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="CCVIII" id="CCVIII"></a>CCVIII.</h2> + +<h3>BEHOLD THE HOUR.</h3> + +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Oran-gaoil.</i>”</p> + +<p>[“The following song I have composed for the Highland air that you +tell me in your last you have resolved to give a place to in your +book. I have this moment finished the song, so you have it glowing +from the mint.” These are the words of Burns to Thomson: he might have +added that the song was written on the meditated voyage of Clarinda to +the West Indies, to join her husband.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Behold the hour, the boat arrive;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Thou goest, thou darling of my heart!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sever’d from thee can I survive?<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But fate has will’d, and we must part.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I’ll often greet this surging swell,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Yon distant isle will often hail:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">“E’en here I took the last farewell;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">There, latest mark’d her vanish’d sail.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Along the solitary shore<br /></span> +<span class="i2">While flitting sea-fowl round me cry,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Across the rolling, dashing roar,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I’ll westward turn my wistful eye:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Happy, thou Indian grove, I’ll say,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Where now my Nancy’s path may be!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">While thro’ thy sweets she loves to stray,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">O tell me, does she muse on me?<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CCIX" id="CCIX"></a>CCIX.</h2> + +<h3>THOU HAST LEFT ME EVER.</h3> + +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Fee him, father.</i>”</p> + +<p>[“I do not give these verses,” says Burns to Thomson, “for any merit +they have. I composed them at the time in which ‘Patie Allan’s mither +died, about the back o’ midnight,’ and by the lee side of a bowl of +punch, which had overset every mortal in company, except the hautbois +and the muse.” To the poet’s intercourse with musicians we owe some +fine songs.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Thou hast left me ever, Jamie!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Thou hast left me ever;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thou hast left me ever, Jamie!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Thou hast left me ever.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Aften hast thou vow’d that death<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Only should us sever;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Now thou’s left thy lass for ay—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I maun see thee never, Jamie,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">I’ll see thee never!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Thou hast me forsaken, Jamie!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Thou hast me forsaken;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thou hast me forsaken, Jamie!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Thou hast me forsaken.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thou canst love anither jo,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">While my heart is breaking:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Soon my weary een I’ll close,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Never mair to waken, Jamie,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Ne’er mair to waken!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CCX" id="CCX"></a>CCX.</h2> + +<h3>AULD LANG SYNE.</h3> + +<p>[“Is not the Scotch phrase,” Burns writes to Mrs. Dunlop, “Auld lang +syne, exceedingly expressive? There is an old song and tune which has +often thrilled through my soul: I shall give you the verses on the +other sheet. Light be the turf on the breast of the heaven-inspired +poet who composed this glorious fragment.” “The following song,” says +the poet, when he communicated it to George Thomson, “an old song of +the olden times, and which has never been in print, nor even in +manuscript, until I took it down from an old man’s singing, is enough +to recommend any air.” These are strong words, but there can be no +doubt that, save for a line or two, we owe the song to no other +minstrel than “minstrel Burns.”]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Should auld acquaintance be forgot,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And never brought to min’?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Should auld acquaintance be forgot,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And days o’ lang syne?<br /></span> +<span class="i4">For auld lang syne, my dear,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">For auld lang syne,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">We’ll tak a cup o’ kindness yet,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">For auld lang syne!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">We twa hae run about the braes,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And pu’t the gowans fine;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But we’ve wander’d mony a weary foot,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Sin’ auld lang syne.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">We twa hae paidl’t i’ the burn,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Frae mornin’ sun till dine:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But seas between us braid hae roar’d,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Sin’ auld lang syne.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">And here’s a hand, my trusty fiere,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And gie’s a hand o’ thine;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And we’ll take a right guid willie-waught,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For auld lang syne.<br /></span> +</div></div> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_288" id="Page_288">[288]</a></span></p> + +<p class="std2">V.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">And surely ye’ll be your pint-stowp,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And surely I’ll be mine;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And we’ll tak a cup o’ kindness yet,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For auld lang syne.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">For auld lang syne, my dear,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">For auld lang syne,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">We’ll tak a cup o’ kindness yet,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">For auld lang syne!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CCXI" id="CCXI"></a>CCXI.</h2> + +<h3>FAIR JEANY.</h3> + +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Saw ye my father?</i>”</p> + +<p>[In September, 1793, this song, as well as several others, was +communicated to Thomson by Burns. “Of the poetry,” he says, “I speak +with confidence: but the music is a business where I hint my ideas +with the utmost diffidence.”]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Where are the joys I have met in the morning,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That danc’d to the lark’s early song?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where is the peace that awaited my wand’ring,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">At evening the wild woods among?<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">No more a-winding the course of yon river,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And marking sweet flow’rets so fair:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">No more I trace the light footsteps of pleasure,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But sorrow and sad sighing care.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Is it that summer’s forsaken our valleys,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And grim, surly winter is near?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">No, no, the bees’ humming round the gay roses,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Proclaim it the pride of the year.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Fain would I hide, what I fear to discover,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Yet long, long too well have I known,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">All that has caused this wreck in my bosom,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Is Jeany, fair Jeany alone.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">V.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Time cannot aid me, my griefs are immortal,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Nor hope dare a comfort bestow:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Come then, enamour’d and fond of my anguish,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Enjoyment I’ll seek in my woe.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CCXII" id="CCXII"></a>CCXII.</h2> + +<h3>DELUDED SWAIN, THE PLEASURE.</h3> + +<p>[To the air of the “Collier’s dochter,” Burns bids Thomson add the +following old Bacchanal: it is slightly altered from a rather stiff +original.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Deluded swain, the pleasure<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The fickle fair can give thee,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Is but a fairy treasure—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Thy hopes will soon deceive thee.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The billows on the ocean,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The breezes idly roaming,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The clouds uncertain motion—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">They are but types of woman.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O! art thou not ashamed<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To doat upon a feature?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">If man thou wouldst be named,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Despise the silly creature.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Go find an honest fellow;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Good claret set before thee:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Hold on till thou art mellow,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And then to bed in glory.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CCXIII" id="CCXIII"></a>CCXIII.</h2> + +<h3>NANCY.</h3> + +<p>[This song was inspired by the charms of Clarinda. In one of the +poet’s manuscripts the song commences thus:</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Thine am I, my lovely Kate,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Well thou mayest discover<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Every pulse along my veins<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Tell the ardent lover.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>This change was tried out of compliment, it is believed, to Mrs. +Thomson; but Nancy ran more smoothly on the even road of lyrical verse +than Kate.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Thine am I, my faithful fair,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Thine, my lovely Nancy;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ev’ry pulse along my veins,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Ev’ry roving fancy.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">To thy bosom lay my heart,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">There to throb and languish:<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_289" id="Page_289">[289]</a></span><span class="i0">Tho’ despair had wrung its core,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That would heal its anguish.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Take away those rosy lips,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Rich with balmy treasure:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Turn away thine eyes of love,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Lest I die with pleasure.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">What is life when wanting love?<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Night without a morning:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Love’s the cloudless summer sun,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Nature gay adorning.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CCXIV" id="CCXIV"></a>CCXIV.</h2> + +<h3>HUSBAND, HUSBAND.</h3> + +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Jo Janet.</i>”</p> + +<p>[“My Jo Janet,” in the collection of Allan Ramsay, was in the poet’s +eye when he composed this song, as surely as the matrimonial +bickerings recorded by the old minstrels were in his mind. He desires +Thomson briefly to tell him how he likes these verses: the response of +the musician was, “Inimitable.”]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Husband, husband, cease your strife,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Nor longer idly rave, sir;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Tho’ I am your wedded wife,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Yet I am not your slave, sir.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">“One of two must still obey,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Nancy, Nancy;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Is it man or woman, say,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My spouse, Nancy?”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">If ’tis still the lordly word,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Service and obedience;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I’ll desert my sov’reign lord,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And so, good bye, allegiance!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">“Sad will I be, so bereft,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Nancy, Nancy;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yet I’ll try to make a shift,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My spouse, Nancy.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">My poor heart then break it must,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My last hour I’m near it:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When you lay me in the dust,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Think, think, how you will bear it.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">“I will hope and trust in heaven,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Nancy, Nancy;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Strength to bear it will be given,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My spouse, Nancy.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Well, sir, from the silent dead,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Still I’ll try to daunt you;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ever round your midnight bed<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Horrid sprites shall haunt you.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">“I’ll wed another, like my dear<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Nancy, Nancy;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Then all hell will fly for fear,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My spouse, Nancy.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CCXV" id="CCXV"></a>CCXV.</h2> + +<h3>WILT THOU BE MY DEARIE.</h3> + +<p class="std1">Air—“<i>The Sutor’s Dochter.</i>”</p> + +<p>[Composed, it is said, in honour of Janet Miller, of Dalswinton, +mother to the present Earl of Marr, and then, and long after, one of +the loveliest women in the south of Scotland.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Wilt thou be my dearie?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When sorrow wrings thy gentle heart,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wilt thou let me cheer thee?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">By the treasure of my soul,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That’s the love I bear thee!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I swear and vow that only thou<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Shall ever be my dearie.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Only thou, I swear and vow,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Shall ever be my dearie.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Lassie, say thou lo’es me;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or if thou wilt no be my ain,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Say na thou’lt refuse me:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">If it winna, canna be,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thou, for thine may choose me,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Let me, lassie, quickly die,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Trusting that thou lo’es me.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Lassie, let me quickly die,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Trusting that thou lo’es me.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_290" id="Page_290">[290]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="CCXVI" id="CCXVI"></a>CCXVI.</h2> + +<h3>BUT LATELY SEEN.</h3> + +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>The winter of life.</i>”</p> + +<p>[This song was written for Johnson’s Museum, in 1794: the air is East +Indian: it was brought from Hindostan by a particular friend of the +poet. Thomson set the words to the air of Gil Morrice: they are +elsewhere set to the tune of the Death of the Linnet.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But lately seen in gladsome green,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The woods rejoiced the day;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thro’ gentle showers and laughing flowers,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In double pride were gay:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But now our joys are fled<br /></span> +<span class="i2">On winter blasts awa!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yet maiden May, in rich array,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Again shall bring them a’.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But my white pow, nae kindly thowe<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Shall melt the snaws of age;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My trunk of eild, but buss or bield,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Sinks in Time’s wintry rage.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Oh! age has weary days,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And nights o’ sleepless pain!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thou golden time o’ youthfu’ prime,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Why comes thou not again?<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CCXVII" id="CCXVII"></a>CCXVII.</h2> + +<h3>TO MARY.</h3> + +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Could aught of song.</i>”</p> + +<p>[These verses, inspired partly by Hamilton’s very tender and elegant +song,</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Ah! the poor shepherd’s mournful fate,”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>and some unrecorded “Mary” of the poet’s heart, is in the latter +volumes of Johnson. “It is inserted in Johnson’s Museum,” says Sir +Harris Nicolas, “with the name of Burns attached.” He might have added +that it was sent by Burns, written with his own hand.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Could aught of song declare my pains,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Could artful numbers move thee,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The muse should tell, in labour’d strains,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">O Mary, how I love thee!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">They who but feign a wounded heart<br /></span> +<span class="i2">May teach the lyre to languish;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But what avails the pride of art,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">When wastes the soul with anguish?<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Then let the sudden bursting sigh<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The heart-felt pang discover;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And in the keen, yet tender eye,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">O read th’ imploring lover.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For well I know thy gentle mind<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Disdains art’s gay disguising;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Beyond what Fancy e’er refin’d,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The voice of nature prizing.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CCXVIII" id="CCXVIII"></a>CCXVIII.</h2> + +<h3>HERE’S TO THY HEALTH, MY BONNIE LASS.</h3> + +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Laggan Burn.</i>”</p> + +<p>[“This song is in the Musical Museum, with Burns’s name to it,” says +Sir Harris Nicolas. It is a song of the poet’s early days, which he +trimmed up, and sent to Johnson.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Here’s to thy health, my bonnie lass,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Gude night, and joy be wi’ thee;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I’ll come na mair to thy bower-door,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To tell thee that I lo’e thee.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O dinna think, my pretty pink,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But I can live without thee:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I vow and swear I dinna care<br /></span> +<span class="i2">How lang ye look about ye.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Thou’rt ay sae free informing me<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Thou hast na mind to marry;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I’ll be as free informing thee<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Nae time hae I to tarry.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I ken thy friends try ilka means,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Frae wedlock to delay thee;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Depending on some higher chance—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But fortune may betray thee.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I ken they scorn my low estate,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But that does never grieve me;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But I’m as free as any he,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Sma’ siller will relieve me.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I count my health my greatest wealth,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Sae long as I’ll enjoy it:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I’ll fear na scant, I’ll bode nae want,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">As lang’s I get employment.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But far off fowls hae feathers fair,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And ay until ye try them:<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_291" id="Page_291">[291]</a></span><span class="i0">Tho’ they seem fair, still have a care,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">They may prove waur than I am.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But at twal at night, when the moon shines bright,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My dear, I’ll come and see thee;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For the man that lo’es his mistress weel,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Nae travel makes him weary.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CCXIX" id="CCXIX"></a>CCXIX.</h2> + +<h3>THE FAREWELL.</h3> + +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>It was a’ for our rightfu’ king.</i>”</p> + +<p>[“It seems very doubtful,” says Sir Harris Nicolas, “how much, even if +any part of this song was written by Burns: it occurs in the Musical +Museum, but not with his name.” Burns, it is believed, rather pruned +and beautified an old Scottish lyric, than composed this strain +entirely. Johnson received it from him in his own handwriting.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">It was a’ for our rightfu’ king,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">We left fair Scotland’s strand;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">It was a’ for our rightfu’ king<br /></span> +<span class="i2">We e’er saw Irish land,<br /></span> +<span class="i10">My dear;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">We e’er saw Irish land.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Now a’ is done that men can do,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And a’ is done in vain;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My love and native land farewell,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For I maun cross the main,<br /></span> +<span class="i10">My dear;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For I maun cross the main.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">He turn’d him right, and round about<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Upon the Irish shore;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And gae his bridle-reins a shake,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">With adieu for evermore,<br /></span> +<span class="i10">My dear;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">With adieu for evermore.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The sodger from the wars returns,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The sailor frae the main;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But I hae parted frae my love,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Never to meet again,<br /></span> +<span class="i10">My dear;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Never to meet again<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">V.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">When day is gane, and night is come,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And a’ folk bound to sleep;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I think on him that’s far awa’,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The lee-lang night, and weep,<br /></span> +<span class="i10">My dear;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The lee-lang night, and weep.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CCXX" id="CCXX"></a>CCXX.</h2> + +<h3>O STEER HER UP.</h3> + +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>O steer her up, and haud her gaun.</i>”</p> + +<p>[Burns, in composing these verses, took the introductory lines of an +older lyric, eked them out in his own way, and sent them to the +Museum.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O steer her up and haud her gaun—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Her mother’s at the mill, jo;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And gin she winna take a man,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">E’en let her take her will, jo:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">First shore her wi’ a kindly kiss,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And ca’ another gill, jo,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And gin she take the thing amiss,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">E’en let her flyte her fill, jo.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O steer her up, and be na blate,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’ gin she take it ill, jo,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Then lea’e the lassie till her fate,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And time nae longer spill, jo:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ne’er break your heart for ae rebute,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But think upon it still, jo,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That gin the lassie winna do’t,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Ye’ll fin’ anither will, jo.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CCXXI" id="CCXXI"></a>CCXXI.</h2> + +<h3>O AY MY WIFE SHE DANG ME.</h3> + +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>My wife she dang me.</i>”</p> + +<p>[Other verses to the same air, belonging to the olden times, are still +remembered in Scotland: but they are only sung when the wine is in, +and the sense of delicacy out. This song is in the Museum.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O ay my wife she dang me,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And aft my wife did bang me,<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_292" id="Page_292">[292]</a></span><span class="i0">If ye gie a woman a’ her will,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Gude faith, she’ll soon o’er-gang ye.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">On peace and rest my mind was bent,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And fool I was I married;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But never honest man’s intent,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">As cursedly miscarried.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Some sairie comfort still at last,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">When a’ their days are done, man;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My pains o’ hell on earth are past,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I’m sure o’ bliss aboon, man.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O ay my wife she dang me,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And aft my wife did bang me,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">If ye gie a woman a’ her will,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Gude faith, she’ll soon o’er-gang ye.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CCXXII" id="CCXXII"></a>CCXXII.</h2> + +<h3>OH, WERT THOU IN THE CAULD BLAST.</h3> + +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Lass o’ Livistone.</i>”</p> + +<p>[Tradition says this song was composed in honour of Jessie Lewars, the +Jessie of the poet’s death-bed strains. It is inserted in Thomson’s +collection: variations occur in several manuscripts, but they are +neither important nor curious.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Oh, wert thou in the cauld blast,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">On yonder lea, on yonder lea,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My plaidie to the angry airt,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I’d shelter thee, I’d shelter thee:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or did misfortune’s bitter storms<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Around thee blaw, around thee blaw,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thy bield should be my bosom,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To share it a’, to share it a’.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Or were I in the wildest waste,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Sae black and bare, sae black and bare,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The desert were a paradise,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">If thou wert there, if thou wert there:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or were I monarch o’ the globe,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Wi’ thee to reign, wi’ thee to reign,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The brightest jewel in my crown<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Wad be my queen, wad be my queen.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CCXXIII" id="CCXXIII"></a>CCXXIII.</h2> + +<h3>HERE IS THE GLEN.</h3> + +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Banks of Cree.</i>”</p> + +<p>[Of the origin of this song the poet gives the following account. “I +got an air, pretty enough, composed by Lady Elizabeth Heron, of Heron, +which she calls ‘The Banks of Cree.’ Cree is a beautiful romantic +stream: and as her ladyship is a particular friend of mine, I have +written the following song to it.”]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Here is the glen, and here the bower,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">All underneath the birchen shade;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The village-bell has told the hour—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">O what can stay my lovely maid?<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">’Tis not Maria’s whispering call;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">’Tis but the balmy-breathing gale,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Mix’d with some warbler’s dying fall,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The dewy star of eve to hail.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">It is Maria’s voice I hear!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">So calls the woodlark in the grove,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">His little, faithful mate to cheer,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">At once ’tis music—and ’tis love.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">And art thou come? and art thou true?<br /></span> +<span class="i2">O welcome, dear to love and me!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And let us all our vows renew<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Along the flow’ry banks of Cree.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CCXXIV" id="CCXXIV"></a>CCXXIV.</h2> + +<h3>ON THE SEAS AND FAR AWAY.</h3> + +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>O’er the hills,” &c.</i></p> + +<p>[“The last evening,” 29th of August, 1794, “as I was straying out,” +says Burns, “and thinking of ‘O’er the hills and far away,’ I spun the +following stanzas for it. I was pleased with several lines at first, +but I own now that it appears rather a flimsy business. I give you +leave to abuse this song, but do it in the spirit of Christian +meekness.”]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">How can my poor heart be glad,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When absent from my sailor lad?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">How can I the thought forego,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He’s on the seas to meet the foe?<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_293" id="Page_293">[293]</a></span><span class="i0">Let me wander, let me rove,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Still my heart is with my love:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Nightly dreams, and thoughts by day,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Are with him that’s far away.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">On the seas and far away,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">On stormy seas and far away;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Nightly dreams, and thoughts by day,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Are ay with him that’s far away.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">When in summer’s noon I faint,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As weary flocks around me pant,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Haply in this scorching sun<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My sailor’s thund’ring at his gun:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Bullets, spare my only joy!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Bullets, spare my darling boy!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Fate, do with me what you may—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Spare but him that’s far away!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">At the starless midnight hour,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When winter rules with boundless power:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As the storms the forests tear,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And thunders rend the howling air,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Listening to the doubling roar,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Surging on the rocky shore,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">All I can—I weep and pray,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For his weal that’s far away.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Peace, thy olive wand extend,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And bid wild war his ravage end,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Man with brother man to meet,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And as a brother kindly greet:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Then may heaven with prosp’rous gales,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Fill my sailor’s welcome sails,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To my arms their charge convey—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My dear lad that’s far away.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">On the seas and far away<br /></span> +<span class="i2">On stormy seas and far away;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Nightly dreams, and thoughts by day,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Are ay with him that’s far away.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CCXXV" id="CCXXV"></a>CCXXV.</h2> + +<h3>CA’ THE YOWES.</h3> + +<p>[Burns formed this song upon an old lyric, an amended version of which +he had previously communicated to the Museum: he was fond of musing in +the shadow of Lincluden towers, and on the banks of Cluden Water.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Ca’ the yowes to the knowes,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ca’ them whare the heather growes,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ca’ them whare the burnie rowes—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My bonnie dearie!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Hark the mavis’ evening sang<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sounding Cluden’s woods amang!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Then a faulding let us gang,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My bonnie dearie.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">We’ll gae down by Cluden side,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thro’ the hazels spreading wide,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O’er the waves that sweetly glide<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To the moon sae clearly.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Yonder Cluden’s silent towers,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where at moonshine midnight hours,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O’er the dewy bending flowers,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Fairies dance so cheery.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Ghaist nor bogle shalt thou fear;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thou’rt to love and heaven sae dear,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Nocht of ill may come thee near,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My bonnie dearie.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">V.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Fair and lovely as thou art,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thou hast stown my very heart;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I can die—but canna part—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My bonnie dearie!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ca’ the yowes to the knowes,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ca’ them whare the heather growes;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ca’ them where the burnie rowes—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My bonnie dearie!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CCXXVI" id="CCXXVI"></a>CCXXVI.</h2> + +<h3>SHE SAYS SHE LOVES ME BEST OF A’.</h3> + +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Onagh’s Waterfall.</i>”</p> + +<p>[The lady of the flaxen ringlets has already been noticed: she is +described in this song with the accuracy of a painter, and more than +the usual elegance of one: it is needless to add her name, or to say +how fine her form and how resistless her smiles.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Sae flaxen were her ringlets,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Her eyebrows of a darker hue,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Bewitchingly o’er-arching<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Twa laughin’ een o’ bonnie blue.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Her smiling sae wyling,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Wad make a wretch forget his woe;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">What pleasure, what treasure,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Unto these rosy lips to grow:<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_294" id="Page_294">[294]</a></span><span class="i0">Such was my Chloris’ bonnie face,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">When first her bonnie face I saw;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And ay my Chloris’ dearest charm,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">She says she lo’es me best of a’.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Like harmony her motion;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Her pretty ankle is a spy,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Betraying fair proportion,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Wad mak a saint forget the sky.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sae warming, sae charming,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Her faultless form and gracefu’ air;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ilk feature—auld Nature<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Declar’d that she could do nae mair:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Hers are the willing chains o’ love,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">By conquering beauty’s sovereign law;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And ay my Chloris’ dearest charm,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">She says she lo’es me best of a’.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Let others love the city,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And gaudy show at sunny noon;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Gie me the lonely valley,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The dewy eve, and rising moon;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Fair beaming, and streaming,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Her silver light the boughs amang;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">While falling, recalling,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The amorous thrush concludes his sang;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">There, dearest Chloris, wilt thou rove<br /></span> +<span class="i2">By wimpling burn and leafy shaw,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And hear my vows o’ truth and love,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And say thou lo’es me best of a’?<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CCXXVII" id="CCXXVII"></a>CCXXVII.</h2> + +<h3>SAW YE MY PHELY.</h3> +<h4>[QUASI DICAT PHILLIS.]</h4> +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>When she came ben she bobbit.</i>”</p> + +<p>[The despairing swain in this song was Stephen Clarke, musician, and +the young lady whom he persuaded Burns to accuse of inconstancy and +coldness was Phillis M’Murdo.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O saw ye my dear, my Phely?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O saw ye my dear, my Phely?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">She’s down i’ the grove, she’s wi’ a new love!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">She winna come hame to her Willy.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">What says she, my dearest, my Phely?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">What says she, my dearest, my Phely?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">She lets thee to wit that she has thee forgot,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And for ever disowns thee, her Willy.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O had I ne’er seen thee, my Phely!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O had I ne’er seen thee, my Phely!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As light as the air, and fause as thou’s fair,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Thou’s broken the heart o’ thy Willy.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CCXXVIII" id="CCXXVIII"></a>CCXXVIII.</h2> + +<h3>HOW LANG AND DREARY IS THE NIGHT.</h3> + +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Cauld Kail in Aberdeen.</i>”</p> + +<p>[On comparing this lyric, corrected for Thomson, with that in the +Museum, it will be seen that the former has more of elegance and +order: the latter quite as much nature and truth: but there is less of +the new than of the old in both.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">How lang and dreary is the night,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">When I am frae my dearie;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I restless lie frae e’en to morn,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Though I were ne’er sae weary.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">For oh! her lanely nights are lang;<br /></span> +<span class="i6">And oh! her dreams are eerie;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">And oh, her widow’d heart is sair,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">That’s absent frae her dearie.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">When I think on the lightsome days<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I spent wi’ thee my dearie;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And now what seas between us roar—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">How can I be but eerie?<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">How slow ye move, ye heavy hours;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The joyless day how dreary!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">It was na sae ye glinted by,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">When I was wi’ my dearie.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">For oh! her lanely nights are lang;<br /></span> +<span class="i6">And oh, her dreams are eerie;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">And oh, her widow’d heart is sair,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">That’s absent frae her dearie.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CCXXIX" id="CCXXIX"></a>CCXXIX.</h2> + +<h3>LET NOT WOMAN E’ER COMPLAIN.</h3> + +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Duncan Gray.</i>”</p> + +<p>[“These English songs,” thus complains the poet, in the letter which +conveyed this lyric to Thomson, “gravel me to death: I have not that +command of the lan<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_295" id="Page_295">[295]</a></span>guage that I have of my native tongue. I have been +at ‘Duncan Gray,’ to dress it in English, but all I can do is +deplorably stupid. For instance:”]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Let not woman e’er complain<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Of inconstancy in love;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Let not woman e’er complain<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Fickle man is apt to rove:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Look abroad through nature’s range,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Nature’s mighty law is change;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ladies, would it not be strange,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Man should then a monster prove?<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Mark the winds, and mark the skies;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Ocean’s ebb, and ocean’s flow:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sun find moon but set to rise,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Round and round the seasons go:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Why then ask of silly man<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To oppose great nature’s plan?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">We’ll be constant while we can—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">You can be no more, you know.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CCXXX" id="CCXXX"></a>CCXXX.</h2> + +<h3>THE LOVER’S MORNING SALUTE TO HIS MISTRESS.</h3> + +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Deil tak the Wars.</i>”</p> + +<p>[Burns has, in one of his letters, partly intimated that this morning +salutation to Chloris was occasioned by sitting till the dawn at the +punch-bowl, and walking past her window on his way home.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Sleep’st thou, or wak’st thou, fairest creature?<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Rosy Morn now lifts his eye,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Numbering ilka bud which nature<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Waters wi’ the tears o’ joy:<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Now through the leafy woods,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And by the reeking floods,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wild nature’s tenants freely, gladly stray;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The lintwhite in his bower<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Chants o’er the breathing flower;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The lav’rock to the sky<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Ascends wi’ sangs o’ joy,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">While the sun and thou arise to bless the day.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Phœbus gilding the brow o’ morning,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Banishes ilk darksome shade,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Nature gladdening and adorning;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Such to me my lovely maid.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">When absent frae my fair,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The murky shades o’ care<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With starless gloom o’ercast my sullen sky;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But when, in beauty’s light,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">She meets my ravish’d sight,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">When thro’ my very heart<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Her beaming glories dart—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">’Tis then I wake to life, to light, and joy.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CCXXXI" id="CCXXXI"></a>CCXXXI.</h2> + +<h3>CHLORIS.</h3> + +<p class="std1">Air—“<i>My lodging is on the cold ground.</i>”</p> + +<p>[The origin of this song is thus told by Burns to Thomson. “On my +visit the other day to my fair Chloris, that is the poetic name of the +lovely goddess of my inspiration, she suggested an idea which I, on my +return from the visit, wrought into the following song.” The poetic +elevation of Chloris is great: she lived, when her charms faded, in +want, and died all but destitute.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">My Chloris, mark how green the groves,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The primrose banks how fair:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The balmy gales awake the flowers,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And wave thy flaxen hair.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The lav’rock shuns the palace gay,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And o’er the cottage sings;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For nature smiles as sweet, I ween,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To shepherds as to kings<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Let minstrels sweep the skilfu’ string<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In lordly lighted ha’:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The shepherd stops his simple reed,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Blythe, in the birken shaw.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The princely revel may survey<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Our rustic dance wi’ scorn;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But are their hearts as light as ours,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Beneath the milk-white thorn?<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">V.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The shepherd, in the flow’ry glen,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In shepherd’s phrase will woo:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The courtier tells a finer tale—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But is his heart as true?<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_296" id="Page_296">[296]</a></span></div></div> + +<p class="std2">VI.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">These wild-wood flowers I’ve pu’d, to deck<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That spotless breast o’ thine:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The courtier’s gems may witness love—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But ’tis na love like mine.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CCXXXII" id="CCXXXII"></a>CCXXXII.</h2> + +<h3>CHLOE.</h3> + +<p class="std1">Air—“<i>Daintie Davie.</i>”</p> + +<p>[Burns, despairing to fit some of the airs with such verses of +original manufacture as Thomson required, for the English part of his +collection, took the liberty of bestowing a Southron dress on some +genuine Caledonian lyrics. The origin of this song may be found in +Ramsay’s miscellany: the bombast is abated, and the whole much +improved.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">It was the charming month of May,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When all the flow’rs were fresh and gay,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">One morning, by the break of day,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The youthful charming Chloe<br /></span> +<span class="i0">From peaceful slumber she arose,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Girt on her mantle and her hose,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And o’er the flowery mead she goes,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The youthful charming Chloe.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Lovely was she by the dawn,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Youthful Chloe, charming Chloe,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Tripping o’er the pearly lawn,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">The youthful charming Chloe.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The feather’d people you might see,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Perch’d all around, on every tree,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In notes of sweetest melody<br /></span> +<span class="i2">They hail the charming Chloe;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Till painting gay the eastern skies,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The glorious sun began to rise,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Out-rivall’d by the radiant eyes<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Of youthful, charming Chloe.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Lovely was she by the dawn,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Youthful Chloe, charming Chloe,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Tripping o’er the pearly lawn,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">The youthful, charming Chloe.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CCXXXIII" id="CCXXXIII"></a>CCXXXIII.</h2> + +<h3>LASSIE WI’ THE LINT-WHITE LOCKS.</h3> + +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Rothemurche’s Rant.</i>”</p> + +<p>[“Conjugal love,” says the poet, “is a passion which I deeply feel and +highly venerate: but somehow it does not make such a figure in poesie +as that other species of the passion, where love is liberty and nature +law. Musically speaking, the first is an instrument of which the gamut +is scanty and confined, but the tones inexpressibly sweet, while the +last has powers equal to all the intellectual modulations of the human +soul.” It must be owned that the bard could render very pretty reasons +for his rapture about Jean Lorimer.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i2">Lassie wi’ the lint-white locks,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Bonnie lassie, artless lassie,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Wilt thou wi’ me tent the flocks?<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Wilt thou be my dearie, O?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Now nature cleeds the flowery lea,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And a’ is young and sweet like thee;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O wilt thou share its joy wi’ me,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And say thoul’t be my dearie, O?<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">And when the welcome simmer shower<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Has cheer’d ilk drooping little flower,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">We’ll to the breathing woodbine bower<br /></span> +<span class="i2">At sultry noon, my dearie, O.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">When Cynthia lights wi’ silver ray,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The weary shearer’s hameward way;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thro’ yellow waving fields we’ll stray,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And talk o’ love my dearie, O.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">And when the howling wintry blast<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Disturbs my lassie’s midnight rest;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Enclasped to my faithfu’ breast,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I’ll comfort thee, my dearie, O.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Lassie wi’ the lint-white locks,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Bonnie lassie, artless lassie,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Wilt thou wi’ me tent the flocks?<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Wilt thou be my dearie, O?<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CCXXXIV" id="CCXXXIV"></a>CCXXXIV.</h2> + +<h3>FAREWELL, THOU STREAM.</h3> + +<p class="std1">Air—“<i>Nancy’s to the greenwood gane.</i>”</p> + +<p>[This song was written in November, 1794: Thomson pronounced it +excellent.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Farewell, thou stream that winding flows<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Around Eliza’s dwelling!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O mem’ry! spare the cruel throes<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Within my bosom swelling:<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_297" id="Page_297">[297]</a></span><span class="i0">Condemn’d to drag a hopeless chain,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And yet in secret languish,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To feel a fire in ev’ry vein,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Nor dare disclose my anguish.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Love’s veriest wretch, unseen, unknown,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I fain my griefs would cover;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The bursting sigh, th’ unweeting groan,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Betray the hapless lover.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I know thou doom’st me to despair,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Nor wilt, nor canst relieve me;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But oh, Eliza, hear one prayer—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For pity’s sake forgive me!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The music of thy voice I heard,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Nor wist while it enslav’d me;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I saw thine eyes, yet nothing fear’d,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">’Till fears no more had sav’d me:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The unwary sailor thus aghast,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The wheeling torrent viewing;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">‘Mid circling horrors sinks at last<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In overwhelming ruin.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CCXXXV" id="CCXXXV"></a>CCXXXV.</h2> + +<h3>O PHILLY, HAPPY BE THAT DAY.</h3> + +<p class="std1">Tune-“<i>The Sow’s Tail.</i>”</p> + +<p>[“This morning” (19th November, 1794), “though a keen blowing frost,” +Burns writes to Thomson, “in my walk before breakfast I finished my +duet: whether I have uniformly succeeded, I will not say: but here it +is for you, though it is not an hour old.”]</p> + + +<p class="std2">HE.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O Philly, happy be that day,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When roving through the gather’d hay,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My youthfu’ heart was stown away,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And by thy charms, my Philly.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">SHE.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O Willy, ay I bless the grove<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where first I own’d my maiden love,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Whilst thou didst pledge the powers above,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To be my ain dear Willy.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">HE.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">As songsters of the early year<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Are ilka day mair sweet to hear,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">So ilka day to me mair dear<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And charming is my Philly.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">SHE.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">As on the brier the budding rose<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Still richer breathes and fairer blows,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">So in my tender bosom grows<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The love I bear my Willy.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">HE.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The milder sun and bluer sky<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That crown my harvest cares wi’ joy,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Were ne’er sae welcome to my eye<br /></span> +<span class="i2">As is a sight o’ Philly.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">SHE.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The little swallow’s wanton wing,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Tho’ wafting o’er the flowery spring,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Did ne’er to me sic tidings bring,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">As meeting o’ my Willy.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">HE.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The bee that thro’ the sunny hour<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sips nectar in the opening flower,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Compar’d wi’ my delight is poor,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Upon the lips o’ Philly.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">SHE.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The woodbine in the dewy weet<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When evening shades in silence meet,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Is nocht sae fragrant or sae sweet<br /></span> +<span class="i2">As is a kiss o’ Willy.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">HE.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Let Fortune’s wheel at random rin,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And fools may tyne, and knaves may win<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My thoughts are a’ bound up in ane,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And that’s my ain dear Philly.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">SHE.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">What’s a’ joys that gowd can gie?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I care nae wealth a single flie;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The lad I love’s the lad for me,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And that’s my ain dear Willy.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CCXXXVI" id="CCXXXVI"></a>CCXXXVI.</h2> + +<h3>CONTENTED WI’ LITTLE.</h3> + +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Lumps o’ Pudding.</i>”</p> + +<p>[Burns was an admirer of many songs which the more critical and +fastidious regarded as rude and homely. “Todlin Hame” he called an +unequalled composition for wit and humour, and “Andro wi’ his cutty +Gun,” the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_298" id="Page_298">[298]</a></span> work of a master. In the same letter, where he records +these sentiments, he writes his own inimitable song, “Contented wi’ +Little.”]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Contented wi’ little, and cantie wi’ mair,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Whene’er I forgather wi’ sorrow end care,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I gie them a skelp, as they’re creepin alang,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wi’ a cog o’ guid swats, and an auld Scottish sang.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I whyles claw the elbow o’ troublesome thought;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But man is a sodger, and life is a faught:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My mirth and guid humour are coin in my pouch,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And my freedom’s my lairdship nae monarch dare touch.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">A towmond o’ trouble, should that be my fa’,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A night o’ guid fellowship sowthers it a’:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When at the blithe end o’ our journey at last,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wha the deil ever thinks o’ the road he has past?<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Blind chance, let her snapper and stoyte on her way;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Be’t to me, be’t frae me, e’en let the jade gae:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Come ease, or come travail; come pleasure or pain;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My warst word is—“Welcome, and welcome again!”<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CCXXXVII" id="CCXXXVII"></a>CCXXXVII.</h2> + +<h3>CANST THOU LEAVE ME THUS.</h3> + +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Roy’s Wife.</i>”</p> + +<p>[When Burns transcribed the following song for Thomson, on the 20th of +November, 1794, he added, “Well! I think this, to be done in two or +three turns across my room, and with two or three pinches of Irish +blackguard, is not so far amiss. You see I am resolved to have my +quantum of applause from somebody.” The poet in this song complains of +the coldness of Mrs. Riddel: the lady replied in a strain equally +tender and forgiving.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i4">Canst thou leave me thus, my Katy?<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Canst thou leave me thus, my Katy?<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Well thou know’st my aching heart—<br /></span> +<span class="i4">And canst thou leave me thus for pity?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In this thy plighted, fond regard,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Thus cruelly to part, my Katy?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Is this thy faithful swain’s reward—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An aching, broken heart, my Katy!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Farewell! and ne’er such sorrows tear<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That fickle heart of thine, my Katy!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thou may’st find those will love thee dear—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But not a love like mine, my Katy!<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Canst thou leave me thus, my Katy?<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Canst thou leave me thus, my Katy?<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Well thou know’st my aching heart—<br /></span> +<span class="i4">And canst thou leave me thus for pity?<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CCXXXVIII" id="CCXXXVIII"></a>CCXXXVIII.</h2> + +<h3>MY NANNIE’S AWA.</h3> + +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>There’ll never be peace.</i>”</p> + +<p>[Clarinda, tradition avers, was the inspirer of this song, which the +poet composed in December, 1794, for the work of Thomson. His thoughts +were often in Edinburgh: on festive occasions, when, as Campbell +beautifully says, “The wine-cup shines in light,” he seldom forgot to +toast Mrs. Mac.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Now in her green mantle blythe nature arrays,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And listens the lambkins that bleat o’er the braes,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">While birds warble welcome in ilka green shaw;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But to me it’s delightless—my Nannie’s awa!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The snaw-drap and primrose our woodlands adorn,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And violets bathe in the weet o’ the morn;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">They pain my sad bosom, sae sweetly they blaw,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">They mind me o’ Nannie—and Nanny’s awa!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Thou lav’rock that springs frae the dews of the lawn,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The shepherd to warn o’ the gray-breaking dawn,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And thou mellow mavis that hails the night fa’,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Give over for pity—my Nannie’s awa!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Come autumn sae pensive, in yellow and gray,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And soothe me with tidings o’ nature’s decay:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The dark dreary winter, and wild driving snaw,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Alane can delight me—now Nannie’s awa!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_299" id="Page_299">[299]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="CCXXXIX" id="CCXXXIX"></a>CCXXXIX.</h2> + +<h3>O WHA IS SHE THAT LOVES ME.</h3> + +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Morag.</i>”</p> + +<p>[“This song,” says Sir Harris Nicolas, “is said, in Thomson’s +collection, to have been written for that work by Burns: but it is not +included in Mr. Cunningham’s edition.” If sir Harris would be so good +as to look at page 245; vol. V., of Cunningham’s edition of Burns, he +will find the song; and if he will look at page 28, and page 193 of +vol. III., of his own edition, he will find that he has not committed +the error of which he accuses his fellow-editor, for he has inserted +the same song twice. The same may be said of the song to Chloris, +which Sir Harris has printed at page 312, vol. II,. and at page 189, +vol. III., and of “Ae day a braw wooer came down the lang glen,” which +appears both at page 224 of vol. II., and at page 183 of vol, III.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O wha is she that lo’es me,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And has my heart a-keeping?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O sweet is she that lo’es me,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">As dews of simmer weeping,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In tears the rosebuds steeping!<br /></span> +<span class="i4">O that’s the lassie of my heart,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">My lassie ever dearer;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">O that’s the queen of womankind,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">And ne’er a ane to peer her.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">If thou shalt meet a lassie<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In grace and beauty charming,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That e’en thy chosen lassie,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Erewhile thy breast sae warming<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Had ne’er sic powers alarming.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">If thou hadst heard her talking,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And thy attentions plighted,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That ilka body talking,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But her by thee is slighted,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And thou art all delighted.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">If thou hast met this fair one;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">When frae her thou hast parted,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">If every other fair one,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But her, thou hast deserted,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And thou art broken-hearted;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">O that’s the lassie o’ my heart,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">My lassie ever dearer;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">O that’s the queen o’ womankind,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">And ne’er a ane to peer her.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CCXL" id="CCXL"></a>CCXL.</h2> + +<h3>CALEDONIA.</h3> + +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Caledonian Hunt’s Delight.</i>”</p> + +<p>[There is both knowledge of history and elegance of allegory in this +singular lyric: it was first printed by Currie.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">There was once a day—but old Time then was young—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That brave Caledonia, the chief of her line,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">From some of your northern deities sprung,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">(Who knows not that brave Caledonia’s divine?)<br /></span> +<span class="i0">From Tweed to the Orcades was her domain,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To hunt, or to pasture, or do what she would:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Her heav’nly relations there fixed her reign,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And pledg’d her their godheads to warrant it good.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">A lambkin in peace, but a lion in war,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The pride of her kindred the heroine grew;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Her grandsire, old Odin, triumphantly swore<br /></span> +<span class="i2">“Whoe’er shall provoke thee, th’ encounter shall rue!”<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With tillage or pasture at times she would sport,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To feed her fair flocks by her green rustling corn;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But chiefly the woods were her fav’rite resort,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Her darling amusement, the hounds and the horn.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Long quiet she reign’d; till thitherward steers<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A flight of bold eagles from Adria’s strand:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Repeated, successive, for many long years,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">They darken’d the air, and they plunder’d the land:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Their pounces were murder, and terror their cry,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">They’d conquer’d and ruin’d a world beside;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">She took to her hills, and her arrows let fly—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The daring invaders they fled or they died.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The fell harpy-raven took wing from the north,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The scourge of the seas, and the dread of the shore;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The wild Scandinavian boar issu’d forth<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To wanton in carnage, and wallow in gore;<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_300" id="Page_300">[300]</a></span><span class="i0">O’er countries and kingdoms their fury prevail’d,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">No arts could appease them, no arms could repel;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But brave Caledonia in vain they assail’d,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">As Largs well can witness, and Loncartie tell.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">V.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The Cameleon-savage disturbed her repose,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">With tumult, disquiet, rebellion, and strife;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Provok’d beyond bearing, at last she arose,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And robb’d him at once of his hope and his life:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The Anglian lion, the terror of France,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Oft prowling, ensanguin’d the Tweed’s silver flood:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But, taught by the bright Caledonian lance,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">He learned to fear in his own native wood.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">VI.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Thus bold, independent, unconquer’d, and free,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Her bright course of glory for ever shall run:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For brave Caledonia immortal must be;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I’ll prove it from Euclid as clear as the sun:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Rectangle-triangle, the figure we’ll choose,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The upright is Chance, and old Time is the base;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But brave Caledonia’s the hypothenuse;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Then ergo, she’ll match them, and match them always.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CCXLI" id="CCXLI"></a>CCXLI.</h2> + +<h3>O LAY THY LOOF IN MINE, LASS.</h3> + +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Cordwainer’s March.</i>”</p> + +<p>[The air to which these verses were written, is commonly played at the +Saturnalia of the shoemakers on King Crispin’s day. Burns sent it to +the Museum.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O lay thy loof in mine, lass,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In mine, lass, in mine, lass;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And swear on thy white hand, lass,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That thou wilt be my ain.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A slave to love’s unbounded sway,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He aft has wrought me meikle wae;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But now he is my deadly fae,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Unless thou be my ain.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">There’s monie a lass has broke my rest,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That for a blink I hae lo’ed best;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But thou art queen within my breast,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For ever to remain.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O lay thy loof in mine, lass,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In mine, lass, in mine, lass;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And swear on thy white hand, lass,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That thou wilt be my ain.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CCXLII" id="CCXLII"></a>CCXLII.</h2> + +<h3>THE FETE CHAMPETRE.</h3> + +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Killiecrankie.</i>”</p> + +<p>[Written to introduce the name of Cunninghame, of Enterkin, to the +public. Tents were erected on the banks of Ayr, decorated with shrubs, +and strewn with flowers, most of the names of note in the district +were invited, and a splendid entertainment took place; but no +dissolution of parliament followed as was expected, and the Lord of +Enterkin, who was desirous of a seat among the “Commons,” poured out +his wine in vain.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O wha will to Saint Stephen’s house,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To do our errands there, man?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O wha will to Saint Stephen’s house,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">O’ th’ merry lads of Ayr, man?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or will we send a man-o’-law?<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Or will we send a sodger?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or him wha led o’er Scotland a’<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The meikle Ursa-Major?<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Come, will ye court a noble lord,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Or buy a score o’ lairds, man?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For worth and honour pawn their word,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Their vote shall be Glencaird’s, man?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ane gies them coin, ane gies them wine,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Anither gies them clatter;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Anbank, wha guess’d the ladies’ taste,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">He gies a Fête Champêtre.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">When Love and Beauty heard the news,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The gay green-woods amang, man;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where gathering flowers and busking bowers,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">They heard the blackbird’s sang, man;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A vow, they seal’d it with a kiss,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Sir Politicks to fetter,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As theirs alone, the patent-bliss<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To hold a Fête Champêtre.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Then mounted Mirth, on gleesome wing,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">O’er hill and dale she flew, man;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ilk wimpling burn, ilk crystal spring,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Ilk glen and shaw she knew, man:<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_301" id="Page_301">[301]</a></span><span class="i0">She summon’d every social sprite<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That sports by wood or water,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">On th’ bonny banks of Ayr to meet,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And keep this Fête Champêtre.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">V.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Cauld Boreas, wi’ his boisterous crew,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Were bound to stakes like kye, man;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And Cynthia’s car, o’ silver fu’,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Clamb up the starry sky, man:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Reflected beams dwell in the streams,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Or down the current shatter;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The western breeze steals thro’ the trees,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To view this Fête Champêtre.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">VI.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">How many a robe sae gaily floats!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">What sparkling jewels glance, man!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To Harmony’s enchanting notes,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">As moves the mazy dance, man.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The echoing wood, the winding flood,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Like Paradise did glitter,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When angels met, at Adam’s yett,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To hold their Fête Champêtre.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">VII.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">When Politics came there, to mix<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And make his ether-stane, man!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He circled round the magic ground,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But entrance found he nane, man:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He blush’d for shame, he quat his name,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Forswore it, every letter,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wi’ humble prayer to join and share<br /></span> +<span class="i2">This festive Fête Champêtre.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CCXLIII" id="CCXLIII"></a>CCXLIII.</h2> + +<h3>HERE’S A HEALTH.</h3> + +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Here’s a health to them that’s awa.</i>”</p> + +<p>[The Charlie of this song was Charles Fox; Tammie was Lord Erskine; +and M’Leod, the maiden name of the Countess of Loudon, was then, as +now, a name of influence both in the Highlands and Lowlands. The buff +and blue of the Whigs had triumphed over the white rose of Jacobitism +in the heart of Burns, when he wrote these verses.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Here’s a health to them that’s awa,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Here’s a health to them that’s awa;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And wha winna wish guid luck to our cause,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">May never guid luck be their fa’!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">It’s guid to be merry and wise,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">It’s guid to be honest and true,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">It’s good to support Caldonia’s cause,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And bide by the buff and the blue.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Here’s a health to them that’s awa,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Here’s a health to them that’s awa,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Here’s a health to Charlie the chief of the clan,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Altho’ that his band be sma’.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">May liberty meet wi’ success!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">May prudence protect her frae evil!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">May tyrants and tyranny tine in the mist,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And wander their way to the devil!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Here’s a health to them that’s awa,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Here’s a health to them that’s awa;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Here’s a health to Tammie, the Norland laddie,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That lives at the lug o’ the law!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Here’s freedom to him that wad read,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Here’s freedom to him that wad write!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">There’s nane ever fear’d that the truth should be heard,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But they wham the truth wad indite.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Here’s a health to them that’s awa,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Here’s a health to them that’s awa,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Here’s Chieftain M’Leod, a chieftain worth gowd,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Tho’ bred amang mountains o’ snaw!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Here’s a health to them that’s awa,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Here’s a health to them that’s awa;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And wha winna wish guid luck to our cause,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">May never guid luck be their fa’!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CCXLIV" id="CCXLIV"></a>CCXLIV.</h2> + +<h3>IS THERE, FOR HONEST POVERTY.</h3> + +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>For a’ that, and a’ that.</i>”</p> + +<p>[In this noble lyric Burns has vindicated the natural right of his +species. He modestly says to Thomson, “I do not give you this song for +your book, but merely by way of <i>vive la bagatelle</i>; for the piece is +really not poetry, but will be allowed to be two or three pretty good +prose thoughts inverted into rhyme.” Thomson took the song, but +hazarded no praise.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Is there, for honest poverty,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That hangs his head, and a’ that?<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_302" id="Page_302">[302]</a></span><span class="i0">The coward-slave, we pass him by,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">We dare be poor for a’ that!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For a’ that, and a’ that,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Our toils obscure, and a’ that;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The rank is but the guinea’s stamp,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The man’s the gowd for a’ that!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">What tho’ on hamely fare we dine,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Wear hoddin gray, and a’ that;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Gie fools their silks, and knaves their wine,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A man’s a man, for a’ that!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For a’ that, and a’ that,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Their tinsel show, and a’ that;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The honest man, though e’er sae poor,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Is king o’ men for a’ that!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Ye see yon birkie, ca’d—a lord,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Wha struts, and stares, and a’ that;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Though hundreds worship at his word,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">He’s but a coof for a’ that:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For a’ that, and a’ that,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">His riband, star, and a’ that,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The man of independent mind,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">He looks and laughs at a’ that.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">A king can make a belted knight,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A marquis, duke, and a’ that,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But an honest man’s aboon his might,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Guid faith, he maunna fa’ that!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For a’ that, and a’ that,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Their dignities, and a’ that,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The pith o’ sense, and pride o’ worth,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Are higher ranks than a’ that.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">V.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Then let us pray that come it may—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">As come it will for a’ that—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That sense and worth, o’er a’ the earth,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">May bear the gree, and a’ that;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For a’ that, and a’ that,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">It’s comin’ yet for a’ that,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That man to man, the warld o’er,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Shall brothers be for a’ that!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CCXLV" id="CCXLV"></a>CCXLV.</h2> + +<h3>CRAIGIE-BURN WOOD.</h3> + +<p>[Craigie-burn Wood was written for George Thomson: the heroine was +Jean Lorimer. How often the blooming looks and elegant forms of very +indifferent characters lend a lasting lustre to painting and poetry.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Sweet fa’s the eve on Craigie-burn,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And blithe awakes the morrow;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But a’ the pride o’ spring’s return<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Can yield me nocht but sorrow.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I see the flowers and spreading trees<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I hear the wild birds singing;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But what a weary wight can please,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And care his bosom wringing?<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Fain, fain would I my griefs impart,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Yet dare na for your anger;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But secret love will break my heart,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">If I conceal it langer.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">If thou refuse to pity me,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">If thou shall love anither,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When yon green leaves fade frae the tree,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Around my grave they’ll wither.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CCXLVI" id="CCXLVI"></a>CCXLVI.</h2> + +<h3>O LASSIE, ART THOU SLEEPING YET.</h3> + +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Let me in this ae night.</i>”</p> + +<p>[The thoughts of Burns, it is said, wandered to the fair Mrs. Riddel, +of Woodleigh Park, while he composed this song for Thomson. The idea +is taken from an old lyric, of more spirit than decorum.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O Lassie, art thou sleeping yet,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or art thou waking, I would wit?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For love has bound me hand and foot,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And I would fain be in, jo.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">O let me in this ae night,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">This ae, ae, ae night;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">For pity’s sake this ae night,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">O rise and let me in, jo!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Thou hear’st the winter wind and weet!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Nae star blinks thro’ the driving sleet:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Tak pity on my weary feet,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And shield me frae the rain, jo.<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_303" id="Page_303">[303]</a></span></div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The bitter blast that round me blaws,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Unheeded howls, unheeded fa’s;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The cauldness o’ thy heart’s the cause<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Of a’ my grief and pain, jo.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">O let me in this ae night,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">This ae, ae, ae night;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">For pity’s sake this ae night,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">O rise and let me in, jo!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CCXLVII" id="CCXLVII"></a>CCXLVII.</h2> + +<h3>O TELL NA ME O’ WIND AND RAIN.</h3> + +<p>[The poet’s thoughts, as rendered in the lady’s answer, are, at all +events, not borrowed from the sentiments expressed by Mrs. Riddel, +alluded to in song CCXXXVII.; there she is tender and forgiving: here +she in stern and cold.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O tell na me o’ wind and rain,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Upbraid na me wi’ cauld disdain!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Gae back the gate ye cam again,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I winna let you in, jo.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">I tell you now this ae night,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">This ae, ae, ae night,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">And ance for a’ this ae night,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">I winna let you in, jo!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The snellest blast, at mirkest hours,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That round the pathless wand’rer pours,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Is nocht to what poor she endures,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That’s trusted faithless man, jo.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The sweetest flower that deck’d the mead,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Now trodden like the vilest weed:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Let simple maid the lesson read,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The weird may be her ain, jo.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The bird that charm’d his summer-day,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Is now the cruel fowler’s prey;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Let witless, trusting woman say<br /></span> +<span class="i2">How aft her fate’s the same, jo.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">I tell you now this ae night,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">This ae, ae, ae night;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">And ance for a’ this ae night,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">I winna let you in jo!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CCXLVIII" id="CCXLVIII"></a>CCXLVIII.</h2> + +<h3>THE DUMFRIES VOLUNTEERS.</h3> + +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Push about the jorum.</i>”</p> + +<p>[This national song was composed in April, 1795. The poet had been at +a public meeting, where he was less joyous than usual: as something +had been expected from him, he made these verses, when he went home, +and sent them, with his compliments, to Mr. Jackson, editor of the +Dumfries Journal. The original, through the kindness of my friend, +James Milligan, Esq., is now before me.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Does haughty Gaul invasion threat,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Then let the loons beware, Sir,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">There’s wooden walls upon our seas,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And volunteers on shore, Sir.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The Nith shall run to Corsincon,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And Criffel sink in Solway,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ere we permit a foreign foe<br /></span> +<span class="i2">On British ground to rally!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O let us not, like snarling tykes,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In wrangling be divided;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Till slap come in an unco loon<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And wi’ a rung decide it.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Be Britain still to Britain true,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Amang oursels united;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For never but by British hands<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Maun British wrangs be righted!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The kettle o’ the kirk and state,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Perhaps a clout may fail in’t;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But deil a foreign tinkler loon<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Shall ever ca’ a nail in’t.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Our fathers’ bluid the kettle bought,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And wha wad dare to spoil it;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">By heaven! the sacrilegious dog<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Shall fuel be to boil it.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The wretch that wad a tyrant own,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And the wretch his true-born brother,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Who would set the mob aboon the throne,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">May they be damned together!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Who will not sing, “God save the King,”<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Shall hang as high’s the steeple;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But while we sing, “God save the King,”<br /></span> +<span class="i2">We’ll ne’er forget the people.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_304" id="Page_304">[304]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="CCXLIX" id="CCXLIX"></a>CCXLIX.</h2> + +<h3>ADDRESS TO THE WOOD-LARK.</h3> + + +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Where’ll bonnie Ann lie.</i>”</p> + +<p>[The old song to the same air is yet remembered: but the humour is +richer than the delicacy; the same may be said of many of the fine +hearty lyrics of the elder days of Caledonia. These verses were +composed in May, 1795, for Thomson.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O stay, sweet warbling woodlark, stay!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Nor quit for me the trembling spray;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A hapless lover courts thy lay,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Thy soothing fond complaining.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Again, again that tender part,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That I may catch thy melting art;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For surely that would touch her heart,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Wha kills me wi’ disdaining.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Say, was thy little mate unkind,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And heard thee as the careless wind?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Oh, nocht but love and sorrow join’d,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Sic notes o’ woe could wauken.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Thou tells o’ never-ending care;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O’ speechless grief and dark despair:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For pity’s sake, sweet bird, nae mair!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Or my poor heart is broken!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CCL" id="CCL"></a>CCL.</h2> + +<h3>ON CHLORIS BEING ILL.</h3> + + +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Ay wakin’, O.</i>”</p> + +<p>[An old and once popular lyric suggested this brief and happy song for +Thomson: some of the verses deserve to be held in remembrance.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Ay waking, oh,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Waking ay and weary;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sleep I canna get<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For thinking o’ my dearie.]<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Long, long the night,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Heavy comes the morrow,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">While my soul’s delight<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Is on her bed of sorrow.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Can I cease to care?<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Can I cease to languish?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">While my darling fair<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Is on the couch of anguish?<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Every hope is fled,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Every fear is terror;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Slumber even I dread,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Every dream is horror.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Hear me, Pow’rs divine!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Oh, in pity hear me!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Take aught else of mine,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But my Chloris spare me!<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Long, long the night,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Heavy comes the morrow,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">While my soul’s delight<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Is on her bed of sorrow.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CCLI" id="CCLI"></a>CCLI.</h2> + +<h3>CALEDONIA.</h3> + +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Humours of Glen.</i>”</p> + +<p>[Love of country often mingles in the lyric strains of Burns with his +personal attachments, and in few more beautifully than in the +following, written for Thomson the heroine was Mrs. Burns.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Their groves o’ sweet myrtle let foreign lands reckon,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Where bright-beaming summers exalt the perfume;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Far dearer to me yon lone glen o’ green brockan,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Wi’ the burn stealing under the lang yellow broom:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Far dearer to me are yon humble broom bowers,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Where the blue-bell and gowan lurk lowly unseen;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For there, lightly tripping amang the wild flowers,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A listening the linnet, aft wanders my Jean.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Tho’ rich is the breeze in their gay sunny valleys,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And cauld <span class="smcap">Caledonia’s</span> blast on the wave;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Their sweet-scented woodlands that skirt the proud palace,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">What are they?—The haunt of the tyrant and slave!<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_305" id="Page_305">[305]</a></span><span class="i0">The slave’s spicy forests, and gold-bubbling fountains,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The brave Caledonian views wi’ disdain;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He wanders as free as the winds of his mountains,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Save love’s willing fetters, the chains o’ his Jean.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CCLII" id="CCLII"></a>CCLII.</h2> + +<h3>’TWAS NA HER BONNIE BLUE EEN.</h3> + +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Laddie, lie near me.</i>”</p> + +<p>[Though the lady who inspired these verses is called Mary by the poet, +such, says tradition, was not her name: yet tradition, even in this, +wavers, when it avers one while that Mrs. Riddel, and at another time +that Jean Lorimer was the heroine.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">’Twas na her bonnie blue een was my ruin;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Fair tho’ she be, that was ne’er my undoing:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">’Twas the dear smile when naebody did mind us,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">’Twas the bewitching, sweet stown glance o’ kindness.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Sair do I fear that to hope is denied me,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sair do I fear that despair maun abide me!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But tho’ fell fortune should fate us to sever,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Queen shall she be in my bosom for ever.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Mary, I’m thine wi’ a passion sincerest,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And thou hast plighted me love o’ the dearest!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And thou’rt the angel that never can alter—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sooner the sun in his motion would falter.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CCLIII" id="CCLIII"></a>CCLIII.</h2> + +<h3>HOW CRUEL ARE THE PARENTS.</h3> + +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>John Anderson, my jo.</i>”</p> + +<p>[“I am at this moment,” says Burns to Thomson, when he sent him this +song, “holding high converse with the Muses, and have not a word to +throw away on a prosaic dog, such as you are.” Yet there is less than +the poet’s usual inspiration in this lyric, for it is altered from an +English one.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">How cruel are the parents<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Who riches only prize,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And, to the wealthy booby,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Poor woman sacrifice!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Meanwhile the hapless daughter<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Has but a choice of strife;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To shun a tyrant father’s hate,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Become a wretched wife.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The ravening hawk pursuing,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The trembling dove thus flies,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To shun impelling ruin<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Awhile her pinions tries:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Till of escape despairing,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">No shelter or retreat,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">She trusts the ruthless falconer,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And drops beneath his feet!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CCLIV" id="CCLIV"></a>CCLIV.</h2> + +<h3>MARK YONDER POMP.</h3> + +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Deil tak the wars.</i>”</p> + +<p>[Burns tells Thomson, in the letter enclosing this song, that he is in +a high fit of poetizing, provided he is not cured by the +strait-waistcoat of criticism. “You see,” said he, “how I answer your +orders; your tailor could not be more punctual.” This strain in honour +of Chloris is original in conception, but wants the fine lyrical flow +of some of his other compositions.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Mark yonder pomp of costly fashion<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Round the wealthy, titled bride:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But when compar’d with real passion,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Poor is all that princely pride.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">What are the showy treasures?<br /></span> +<span class="i4">What are the noisy pleasures?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The gay gaudy glare of vanity and art:<br /></span> +<span class="i4">The polish’d jewel’s blaze<br /></span> +<span class="i4">May draw the wond’ring gaze,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">And courtly grandeur bright<br /></span> +<span class="i4">The fancy may delight,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But never, never can come near the heart.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But did you see my dearest Chloris<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In simplicity’s array;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Lovely as yonder sweet opening flower is,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Shrinking from the gaze of day;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">O then the heart alarming,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">And all resistless charming,<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_306" id="Page_306">[306]</a></span><span class="i0">In Love’s delightful fetters she chains the willing soul!<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Ambition would disown<br /></span> +<span class="i4">The world’s imperial crown,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Even Avarice would deny<br /></span> +<span class="i4">His worship’d deity,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And feel thro’ every vein Love’s raptures roll.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CCLV" id="CCLV"></a>CCLV.</h2> + +<h3>THIS IS NO MY AIN LASSIE.</h3> + +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>This is no my ain house.</i>”</p> + +<p>[Though composed to the order of Thomson, and therefore less likely to +be the offspring of unsolicited inspiration, this is one of the +happiest modern songs. When the poet wrote it, he seems to have been +beside the “fair dame at whose shrine,” he said, “I, the priest of the +Nine, offer up the incense of Parnassus.”]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i2">O this is no my ain lassie,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Fair tho’ the lassie be;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">O weel ken I my ain lassie,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Kind love is in her e’e.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I see a form, I see a face,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ye weel may wi’ the fairest place:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">It wants, to me, the witching grace,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The kind love that’s in her e’e.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">She’s bonnie, blooming, straight, and tall,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And lang has had my heart in thrall;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And ay it charms my very saul,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The kind love that’s in her e’e.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">A thief sae pawkie is my Jean,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To steal a blink, by a’ unseen;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But gleg as light are lovers’ een,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">When kind love is in the e’e.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">It may escape the courtly sparks,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">It may escape the learned clerks;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But weel the watching lover marks<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The kind love that’s in her e’e.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">O this is no my ain lassie,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Fair tho’ the lassie be;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">O weel ken I my ain lassie,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Kind love is in her e’e.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CCLVI" id="CCLVI"></a>CCLVI.</h2> + +<h3>NOW SPRING HAS CLAD THE</h3> +<h3>GROVE IN GREEN.</h3> +<h5>TO MR. CUNNINGHAM.</h5> +<p>[Composed in reference to a love disappointment of the poet’s friend, +Alexander Cunningham, which also occasioned the song beginning,</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Had I a cave on some wild distant shore.”]<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Now spring has clad the grove in green,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And strew’d the lea wi’ flowers:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The furrow’d waving corn is seen<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Rejoice in fostering showers;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">While ilka thing in nature join<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Their sorrows to forego,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O why thus all alone are mine<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The weary steps of woe?<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The trout within yon wimpling burn<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Glides swift, a silver dart,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And safe beneath the shady thorn<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Defies the angler’s art:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My life was ance that careless stream,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That wanton trout was I;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But love, wi’ unrelenting beam,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Has scorch’d my fountains dry.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The little flow’ret’s peaceful lot,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In yonder cliff that grows,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Which, save the linnet’s flight, I wot,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Nae ruder visit knows,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Was mine; till love has o’er me past,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And blighted a’ my bloom,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And now beneath the with’ring blast<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My youth and joy consume.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The waken’d lav’rock warbling springs<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And climbs the early sky,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Winnowing blythe her dewy wings<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In morning’s rosy eye;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As little reckt I sorrow’s power,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Until the flow’ry snare<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O’ witching love, in luckless hour,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Made me the thrall o’ care.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">V.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O had my fate been Greenland snows,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Or Afric’s burning zone,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wi’ man and nature leagu’d my foes,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">So Peggy ne’er I’d known!<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_307" id="Page_307">[307]</a></span><span class="i0">The wretch whase doom is, “hope nae mair.”<br /></span> +<span class="i2">What tongue his woes can tell!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Within whase bosom, save despair,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Nae kinder spirits dwell.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CCLVII" id="CCLVII"></a>CCLVII.</h2> + +<h3>O BONNIE WAS YON ROSY BRIER.</h3> + +<p>[To Jean Lorimer, the heroine of this song, Burns presented a copy of +the last edition of his poems, that of 1793, with a dedicatory +inscription, in which he moralizes upon her youth, her beauty, and +steadfast friendship, and signs himself Coila.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O Bonnie was yon rosy brier,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That blooms sae far frae haunt o’ man,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And bonnie she, and ah, how dear!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">It shaded frae the e’enin sun.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Yon rosebuds in the morning dew<br /></span> +<span class="i2">How pure, amang the leaves sae green:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But purer was the lover’s vow<br /></span> +<span class="i2">They witness’d in their shade yestreen.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">All in its rude and prickly bower,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That crimson rose, how sweet and fair!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But love is far a sweeter flower<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Amid life’s thorny path o’ care.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The pathless wild, and wimpling burn,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Wi’ Chloris in my arms, be mine;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And I the world, nor wish, nor scorn,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Its joys and griefs alike resign.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CCLVIII" id="CCLVIII"></a>CCLVIII.</h2> + +<h3>FORLORN, MY LOVE, NO COMFORT + +NEAR.</h3> + +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Let me in this ae night.</i>”</p> + +<p>[“How do you like the foregoing?” Burns asks Thomson, after having +copies this song for his collection. “I have written it within this +hour: so much for the speed of my Pegasus: but what say you to his +bottom?”]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Forlorn, my love, no comfort near,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Far, far from thee, I wander here;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Far, far from thee, the fate severe<br /></span> +<span class="i2">At which I most repine, love.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">O wert thou, love, but near me;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">But near, near, near me;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">How kindly thou wouldst cheer me,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">And mingle sighs with mine, love<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Around me scowls a wintry sky,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That blasts each bud of hope and joy;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And shelter, shade, nor home have I,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Save in those arms of thine, love.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Cold, alter’d friendship’s cruel part,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To poison Fortune’s ruthless dart,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Let me not break thy faithful heart,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And say that fate is mine, love.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But dreary tho’ the moments fleet,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O let me think we yet shall meet!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That only ray of solace sweet<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Can on thy Chloris shine, love.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">O wert thou, love, but near me;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">But near, near, near me;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">How kindly thou wouldst cheer me,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">And mingle sighs with mine, love.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CCLIX" id="CCLIX"></a>CCLIX.</h2> + +<h3>LAST MAY A BRAW WOOER.</h3> + +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>The Lothian Lassie.</i>”</p> + +<p>[“Gateslack,” says Burns to Thomson, “is the name of a particular +place, a kind of passage among the Lowther Hills, on the confines of +Dumfrieshire: Dalgarnock, is also the name of a romantic spot near the +Nith, where are still a ruined church and burial-ground.” To this, it +may be added that Dalgarnock kirk-yard is the scene where the author +of Waverley finds Old Mortality repairing the Cameronian +grave-stones.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Last May a braw wooer cam down the lang glen,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And sair wi’ his love he did deave me;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I said there was naething I hated like men,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The deuce gae wi’m, to believe, believe me,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The deuce gae wi’m, to believe me!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">He spak o’ the darts in my bonnie black een,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And vow’d for my love, he was dying;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I said he might die when he liked for Jean,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The Lord forgie me for lying, for lying,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The Lord forgie me for lying!<br /></span> +</div></div> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_308" id="Page_308">[308]</a></span></p> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">A weel-stocked mailen—himsel’ for the laird—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And marriage aff-hand, were his proffers:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I never loot on that I kenn’d it, or car’d,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But thought I may hae waur offers, waur offers,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But thought I might hae waur offers.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But what wad ye think? In a fortnight or less—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The deil tak his taste to gae near her!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He up the Gateslack to my black cousin Bess,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Guess ye how, the jad! I could bear her, could bear her,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Guess ye how, the jad! I could bear her.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">V.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But a’ the niest week as I fretted wi’ care,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I gaed to the tryste o’ Dalgarnock,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And wha but my fine fickle lover was there!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I glowr’d as I’d seen a warlock, a warlock,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I glowr’d as I’d seen a warlock.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">VI.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But owre my left shouther I gae him a blink,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Lest neebors might say I was saucy;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My wooer he caper’d as he’d been in drink,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And vow’d I was his dear lassie, dear lassie,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And vow’d I was his dear lassie.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">VII.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I spier’d for my cousin fu’ couthy and sweet,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Gin she had recovered her hearin’,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And how my auld shoon suited her shauchled feet,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But, heavens! how he fell a swearin’, a swearin’,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But, heavens! how he fell a swearin’.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">VIII.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">He begged, for Gudesake, I wad be his wife,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Or else I wad kill him wi’ sorrow;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">So, e’en to preserve the poor body in life,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I think I maun wed him to-morrow, to-morrow,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I think I maun wed him to morrow.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CCLX" id="CCLX"></a>CCLX.</h2> + +<h3>CHLORIS.</h3> + +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Caledonian Hunt’s Delight.</i>”</p> + +<p>[“I am at present,” says Burns to Thomson, when he communicated these +verses, “quite occupied with the charming sensations of the toothache, +so have not a word to spare—such is the peculiarity of the rhythm of +this air, that I find it impossible to make another stanza to suit +it.” This is the last of his strains in honour of Chloris.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Why, why tell thy lover,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Bliss he never must enjoy:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Why, why undeceive him,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And give all his hopes the lie?<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O why, while fancy raptured, slumbers,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Chloris, Chloris all the theme,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Why, why wouldst thou, cruel,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Wake thy lover from his dream?<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CCLXI" id="CCLXI"></a>CCLXI.</h2> + +<h3>THE HIGHLAND WIDOW’S LAMENT.</h3> + +<p>[This song is said to be Burns’s version of a Gaelic lament for the +ruin which followed the rebellion of the year 1745: he sent it to the +Museum.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Oh! I am come to the low countrie,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Och-on, och-on, och-rie!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Without a penny in my purse,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To buy a meal to me.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">It was na sae in the Highland hills,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Och-on, och-on, och-rie!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Nae woman in the country wide<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Sae happy was as me.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">For then I had a score o’ kye,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Och-on, och-on, och-rie!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Feeding on yon hills so high,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And giving milk to me.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">And there I had three score o’ yowes,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Och-on, och-on, och-rie!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Skipping on yon bonnie knowes,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And casting woo’ to me.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">V.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I was the happiest of a’ the clan,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Sair, sair, may I repine;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For Donald was the brawest lad,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And Donald he was mine.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">VI.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Till Charlie Stewart cam’ at last,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Sae far to set us free;<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_309" id="Page_309">[309]</a></span><span class="i0">My Donald’s arm was wanted then,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For Scotland and for me.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">VII.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Their waefu’ fate what need I tell,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Right to the wrang did yield:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My Donald and his country fell<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Upon Culloden’s field.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">VIII.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Oh! I am come to the low countrie,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Och-on, och-on, och-rie!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Nae woman in the world wide<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Sae wretched now as me.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CCLXII" id="CCLXII"></a>CCLXII.</h2> + +<h3>TO GENERAL DUMOURIER.</h3> +<h4>PARODY ON ROBIN ADAIR.</h4> +<p>[Burns wrote this “Welcome” on the unexpected defection of General +Dumourier.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">You’re welcome to despots, Dumourier;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">You’re welcome to despots, Dumourier;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">How does Dampiere do?<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Aye, and Bournonville, too?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Why did they not come along with you, Dumourier?<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I will fight France with you, Dumourier;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I will fight France with you, Dumourier;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I will fight France with you,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I will take my chance with you;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">By my soul I’ll dance a dance with you, Dumourier.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Then let us fight about, Dumourier;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Then let us fight about, Dumourier;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Then let us fight about,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Till freedom’s spark is out,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Then we’ll be damn’d, no doubt, Dumourier.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CCLXIII" id="CCLXIII"></a>CCLXIII.</h2> + +<h3>PEG-A-RAMSEY.</h3> + +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Cauld is the e’enin blast.</i>”</p> + +<p>[Most of this song is old: Burns gave it a brushing for the Museum.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Cauld is the e’enin’ blast<br /></span> +<span class="i2">O’ Boreas o’er the pool,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And dawin’ it is dreary<br /></span> +<span class="i2">When birks are bare at Yule.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O bitter blaws the e’enin’ blast<br /></span> +<span class="i2">When bitter bites the frost,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And in the mirk and dreary drift<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The hills and glens are lost.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Ne’er sae murky blew the night<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That drifted o’er the hill,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But a bonnie Peg-a-Ramsey<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Gat grist to her mill.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CCLXIV" id="CCLXIV"></a>CCLXIV.</h2> + +<h3>THERE WAS A BONNIE LASS.</h3> + +<p>[A snatch of an old strain, trimmed up a little for the Museum.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i2">There was a bonnie lass,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And a bonnie, bonnie lass,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And she lo’ed her bonnie laddie dear;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Till war’s loud alarms<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Tore her laddie frae her arms,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wi’ mony a sigh and tear.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i2">Over sea, over shore,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Where the cannons loudly roar,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He still was a stranger to fear;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And nocht could him quell,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Or his bosom assail,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But the bonnie lass he lo’ed sae dear.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CCLXV" id="CCLXV"></a>CCLXV.</h2> + +<h3>O MALLY’S MEEK, MALLY’S SWEET.</h3> + +<p>[Burns, it is said, composed these verses, on meeting a country girl, +with her shoes and stockings in her lap, walking homewards from a +Dumfries fair. He was struck with her beauty, and as beautifully has +he recorded it. This was his last communication to the Museum.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O Mally’s meek, Mally’s sweet,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Mally’s modest and discreet,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Mally’s rare, Mally’s fair,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Mally’s every way complete.<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_310" id="Page_310">[310]</a></span><span class="i0">As I was walking up the street,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A barefit maid I chanc’d to meet;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But O the road was very hard<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For that fair maiden’s tender feet.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">It were mair meet that those fine feet<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Were weel lac’d up in silken shoon,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And ’twere more fit that she should sit,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Within yon chariot gilt aboon.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Her yellow hair, beyond compare,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Comes trinkling down her swan-white neck;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And her two eyes, like stars in skies,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Would keep a sinking ship frae wreck.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O Mally’s meek, Mally’s sweet,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Mally’s modest and discreet,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Mally’s rare, Mally’s fair,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Mally’s every way complete.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CCLXVI" id="CCLXVI"></a>CCLXVI.</h2> + +<h3>HEY FOR A LASS WI’ A TOCHER.</h3> + +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Balinamona Ora.</i>”</p> + +<p>[Communicated to Thomson, 17th of February, 1796, to be printed as +part of the poet’s contribution to the Irish melodies: he calls it “a +kind of rhapsody.”]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Awa wi’ your witchcraft o’ beauty’s alarms,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The slender bit beauty you grasp in your arms:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O, gie me the lass that has acres o’ charms,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O, gie me the lass wi’ the weel-stockit farms.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Then hey for a lass wi’ a tocher,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Then hey for a lass wi’ a tocher;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Then hey for a lass wi’ a tocher,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">The nice yellow guineas for me.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Your beauty’s a flower, in the morning that blows,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And withers the faster, the faster it grows;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But the rapturous charm o’ the bonnie green knowes,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ilk spring they’re new deckit wi’ bonnie white yowes.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">And e’en when this beauty your bosom has blest,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The brightest o’ beauty may cloy when possest;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But the sweet yellow darlings wi’ Geordie imprest,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The langer ye hae them—the mair they’re carest.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Then hey for a lass wi’ a tocher,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Then hey for a lass wi’ a tocher;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Then hey for a lass wi’ a tocher,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">The nice yellow guineas for me.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CCLXVII" id="CCLXVII"></a>CCLXVII.</h2> + +<h3>JESSY.</h3> + +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Here’s a health to them that’s awa.</i>”</p> + +<p>[Written in honour of Miss Jessie Lewars, now Mrs. Thomson. Her tender +and daughter-like attentions soothed the last hours of the dying poet, +and if immortality can be considered a recompense, she has been +rewarded.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Here’s a health to ane I lo’e dear;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Here’s a health to ane I lo’e dear;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thou art sweet as the smile when fond lovers meet,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And soft as their parting tear—Jessy!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Altho’ thou maun never be mine,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Altho’ even hope is denied;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">’Tis sweeter for thee despairing,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Then aught in the world beside—Jessy!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">III.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I mourn through the gay, gaudy day,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">As, hopeless, I muse on thy charms:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But welcome the dream o’ sweet slumber,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For then I am lockt in thy arms—Jessy!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">IV.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I guess by the dear angel smile,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I guess by the love rolling e’e;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But why urge the tender confession<br /></span> +<span class="i2">‘Gainst fortune’s fell cruel decree?—Jessy!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Here’s a health to ane I lo’e dear;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Here’s a health to ane I lo’e dear;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thou art sweet as the smile when fond lovers meet,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And soft as their parting tear—Jessy!<br /></span> +</div></div> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_311" id="Page_311">[311]</a></span></p> + +<h2><a name="CCLXVIII" id="CCLXVIII"></a>CCLXVIII.</h2> + +<h3>FAIREST MAID ON DEVON BANKS.</h3> + +<p class="std1">Tune—“<i>Rothemurche.</i>”</p> + +<p>[On the 12th of July, 1796, as Burns lay dying at Brow, on the Solway, +his thoughts wandered to early days, and this song, the last he was to +measure in this world, was dedicated to Charlotte Hamilton, the maid +of the Devon.]</p> + + +<p class="std2">I.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Fairest maid on Devon banks,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Crystal Devon, winding Devon,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wilt thou lay that frown aside,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And smile as thou were wont to do?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Full well thou know’st I love thee, dear!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Could’st thou to malice lend an ear!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O! did not love exclaim “Forbear,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Nor use a faithful lover so.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2">II.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Then come, thou fairest of the fair,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Those wonted smiles, O let me share;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And by thy beauteous self I swear,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">No love but thine my heart shall know.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Fairest maid on Devon banks,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Crystal Devon, winding Devon,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Wilt thou lay that frown aside,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">And smile as thou were wont to do?<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="GENERAL_CORRESPONDENCE" id="GENERAL_CORRESPONDENCE"></a>GENERAL CORRESPONDENCE.</h2> + +<h2><a name="letterI" id="letterI"></a>I.</h2> + +<h3>TO WILLIAM BURNESS.</h3> + +<p>[This was written by Burns in his twenty-third year, when learning +flax-dressing in Irvine, and is the earliest of his letters which has +reached us. It has much of the scriptural deference to paternal +authority, and more of the Complete Letter Writer than we look for in +an original mind.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Irvine, Dec. 27, 1781.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">Honoured Sir</span>,</p> + +<p>I have purposely delayed writing in the hope that I should have the +pleasure of seeing you on New-Year’s day; but work comes so hard upon +us, that I do not choose to be absent on that account, as well as for +some other little reasons which I shall tell you at meeting. My health +is nearly the same as when you were here, only my sleep is a little +sounder, and on the whole I am rather better than otherwise, though I +mend by very slow degrees. The weakness of my nerves has so +debilitated my mind, that I dare neither review past wants, nor look +forward into futurity; for the least anxiety or perturbation in my +breast produces most unhappy effects on my whole frame. Sometimes, +indeed, when for an hour or two my spirits are alightened, I glimmer a +little into futurity; but my principal, and indeed my only pleasurable +employment is looking backwards and forwards in a moral and religious +way; I am quite transported at the thought, that ere long, perhaps +very soon, I shall bid an eternal adieu to all the pains, and +uneasiness, and disquietudes of this weary life: for I assure you I am +heartily tired of it; and if I do not very much deceive myself, I +could contentedly and gladly resign it.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“The soul, uneasy, and confined at home,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Rests and expatiates in a life to come.”<a name="FNanchor_141_141" id="FNanchor_141_141"></a><a href="#Footnote_141_141" class="fnanchor">[141]</a><br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>It is for this reason I am more pleased with the 15th, 16th, and 17th +verses of the 7th chapter of Revelations, than with any ten times as +many verses in the whole Bible, and would not exchange the noble +enthusiasm with which they inspire me for all that this world has to +offer. As for this world, I despair of ever making a figure in it. I +am not formed for the bustle of the busy, nor the flutter of the gay. +I shall never again be capable of entering into such scenes. Indeed I +am altogether unconcerned at the thoughts of this life. I foresee that +poverty and obscurity probably await me, and I am in some measure +prepared, and daily preparing to meet them. I have but just time and +paper to return you my grateful thanks for the lessons of virtue and +piety you have given me, which were too much neglected at the time of +giving them, but which I hope have been remembered ere it is yet too +late. Present my dutiful respects to my mother, and my compliments <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_312" id="Page_312">[312]</a></span>to Mr. and Mrs. Muir; and with wishing you a merry New-Year’s day, I shall conclude. I am, honoured sir, your dutiful son,</p> + +<p class="sig"><span class="smcap">Robert Burness.</span></p> + +<p>P.S. My meal is nearly out, but I am going to borrow till I get more.</p> + + + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_141_141" id="Footnote_141_141"></a><a href="#FNanchor_141_141"><span class="label">[141]</span></a> Pope. <i>Essay on Man</i></p></div> +</div> + + + +<h2><a name="letterII" id="letterII"></a>II.</h2> + + +<h3>TO MR. JOHN MURDOCH,</h3> + +<h5>SCHOOLMASTER,</h5> +<h4>STABLES-INN BUILDINGS, LONDON.</h4> +<p>[John Murdoch, one of the poet’s early teachers, removed from the west +of Scotland to London, where he lived to a good old age, and loved to +talk of the pious William Burness and his eminent son.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Lochlea, 15th January, 1783.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">Dear Sir</span>,</p> + +<p>As I have an opportunity of sending you a letter without putting you +to that expense which any production of mine would but ill repay, I +embrace it with pleasure, to tell you that I have not forgotten, nor +ever will forget, the many obligations I lie under to your kindness +and friendship.</p> + +<p>I do not doubt, Sir, but you will wish to know what has been the +result of all the pains of an indulgent father, and a masterly +teacher; and I wish I could gratify your curiosity with such a recital +as you would be pleased with; but that is what I am afraid will not be +the case. I have, indeed, kept pretty clear of vicious habits; and, in +this respect, I hope, my conduct will not disgrace the education I +have gotten; but, as a man of the world, I am most miserably +deficient. One would have thought that, bred as I have been, under a +father, who has figured pretty well as <i>un homme des affaires</i>, I +might have been, what the world calls, a pushing, active fellow; but +to tell you the truth, Sir, there is hardly anything more my reverse. +I seem to be one sent into the world to see and observe; and I very +easily compound with the knave who tricks me of my money, if there be +anything original about him, which shows me human nature in a +different light from anything I have seen before. In short, the joy of +my heart is to “study men, their manners, and their ways;” and for +this darling subject, I cheerfully sacrifice every other +consideration. I am quite indolent about those great concerns that set +the bustling, busy sons of care agog; and if I have to answer for the +present hour, I am very easy with regard to anything further. Even the +last, worst shift of the unfortunate and the wretched, does not much +terrify me: I know that even then, my talent for what country folks +call a “sensible crack,” when once it is sanctified by a hoary head, +would procure me so much esteem, that even then—I would learn to be +happy.<a name="FNanchor_142_142" id="FNanchor_142_142"></a><a href="#Footnote_142_142" class="fnanchor">[142]</a> However, I am under no apprehensions about that; for though +indolent, yet so far as an extremely delicate constitution permits, I +am not lazy; and in many things, expecially in tavern matters, I am a +strict economist; not, indeed, for the sake of the money; but one of +the principal parts in my composition is a kind of pride of stomach; +and I scorn to fear the face of any man living: above everything, I +abhor as hell, the idea of sneaking in a corner to avoid a +dun—possibly some pitiful, sordid wretch, who in my heart I despise +and detest. ’Tis this, and this alone, that endears economy to me. In +the matter of books, indeed, I am very profuse. My favourite authors +are of the sentimental kind, such as Shenstone, particularly his +“Elegies;” Thomson; “Man of Feeling”—a book I prize next to the +Bible; “Man of the World;” Sterne, especially his “Sentimental +Journey;” Macpherson’s “Ossian,” &c.; these are the glorious models +after which I endeavour to form my conduct, and ’tis incongruous, ’tis +absurd to suppose that the man whose mind glows with sentiments +lighted up at their sacred flame—the man whose heart distends with +benevolence to all the human race—he “who can soar above this little +scene of things”—can he descend to mind the paltry concerns about +which the terræfilial race fret, and fume, and vex themselves! O how +the glorious triumph swells my heart! I forget that I am a poor, +insignificant devil, unnoticed and unknown, stalking up and down fairs +and markets, when I happen to be in them, reading a page or two of +mankind, and “catching the manners living as they rise,” whilst the +men of business jostle me on every side, as an idle encumbrance in +their way.—But I dare say I have by this time tired your patience; so +I shall conclude with begging you to give Mrs. Murdoch—not my +compliments, for that is a mere common-place story; but my warmest, +kindest <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_313" id="Page_313">[313]</a></span> +wishes for her welfare; and accept of the same for yourself, from,</p> + +<p class="sig">Dear Sir, yours.—R. B</p> + + + + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_142_142" id="Footnote_142_142"></a><a href="#FNanchor_142_142"><span class="label">[142]</span></a> The last shift alluded to here must be the condition of +an itinerant beggar.—<span class="smcap">Currie</span></p></div> +</div> + + + +<h2><a name="letterIII" id="letterIII"></a>III.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. JAMES BURNESS,</h3> + +<h4>WRITER, MONTROSE.<a name="FNanchor_143_143" id="FNanchor_143_143"></a><a href="#Footnote_143_143" class="fnanchor">[143]</a></h4> +<p>[James Burness, son of the poet’s uncle, lives at Montrose, and, as +may be surmised, is now very old: fame has come to his house through +his eminent cousin Robert, and dearer still through his own grandson, +Sir Alexander Burnes, with whose talents and intrepidity the world is +well acquainted.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Lochlea</i>, 21<i>st June</i>, 1783.</p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">Dear Sir</span>,</p> + +<p>My father received your favour of the 10th current, and as he has been +for some months very poorly in health, and is in his own opinion (and +indeed, in almost everybody’s else) in a dying condition, he has only, +with great difficulty, written a few farewell lines to each of his +brothers-in-law. For this melancholy reason, I now hold the pen for +him to thank you for your kind letter, and to assure you, Sir, that it +shall not be my fault if my father’s correspondence in the north die +with him. My brother writes to John Caird, and to him I must refer you +for the news of our family.</p> + +<p>I shall only trouble you with a few particulars relative to the +wretched state of this country. Our markets are exceedingly high; +oatmeal 17d. and 18d. per peck, and not to be gotten even at that +price. We have indeed been pretty well supplied with quantities of +white peas from England and elsewhere, but that resource is likely to +fail us, and what will become of us then, particularly the very +poorest sort, Heaven only knows. This country, till of late, was +flourishing incredibly in the manufacture of silk, lawn, and +carpet-weaving; and we are still carrying on a good deal in that way, +but much reduced from what it was. We had also a fine trade in the +shoe way, but now entirely ruined, and hundreds driven to a starving +condition on account of it. Farming is also at a very low ebb with us. +Our lands, generally speaking, are mountainous and barren; and our +landholders, full of ideas of farming gathered from the English and +the Lothians, and other rich soils in Scotland, make no allowance for +the odds of the quality of land, and consequently stretch us much +beyond what in the event we will be found able to pay. We are also +much at a loss for want of proper methods in our improvements of +farming. Necessity compels us to leave our old schemes, and few of us +have opportunities of being well informed in new ones. In short, my +dear Sir, since the unfortunate beginning of this American war, and +its as unfortunate conclusion, this country has been, and still is, +decaying very fast. Even in higher life, a couple of our Ayrshire +noblemen, and the major part of our knights and squires, are all +insolvent. A miserable job of a Douglas, Heron, and Co.’s bank, which +no doubt you heard of, has undone numbers of them; and imitating +English and French, and other foreign luxuries and fopperies, has +ruined as many more. There is a great trade of smuggling carried on +along our coasts, which, however destructive to the interests of the +kingdom at large, certainly enriches this corner of it, but too often +at the expense of our morals. However, it enables individuals to make, +at least for a time, a splendid appearance; but Fortune, as is usual +with her when she is uncommonly lavish of her favours, is generally +even with them at the last; and happy were it for numbers of them if +she would leave them no worse than when she found them.</p> + +<p>My mother sends you a small present of a cheese, ’tis but a very +little one, as our last year’s stock is sold off; but if you could fix +on any correspondent in Edinburgh or Glasgow, we would send you a +proper one in the season. Mrs. Black promises to take the cheese under +her care so far, and then to send it to you by the Stirling carrier.</p> + +<p>I shall conclude this long letter with assuring you that I shall be +very happy to hear from you, or any of our friends in your country, +when opportunity serves.</p> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_314" id="Page_314">[314]</a></span></p> +<p>My father sends you, probably for the last time in this world, his +warmest wishes for your welfare and happiness; and my mother and the +rest of the family desire to enclose their kind compliments to you, +Mrs. Burness, and the rest of your family, along with those of,</p> + +<p class="sig4">Dear Sir,</p> + +<p class="sig5">Your affectionate Cousin,</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + + + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_143_143" id="Footnote_143_143"></a><a href="#FNanchor_143_143"><span class="label">[143]</span></a> This gentleman (the son of an elder brother of my +father’s), when he was very young, lost his father, and having +discovered in his father’s repositories some of my father’s letters, +he requested that the correspondence might be renewed. My father +continued till the last year of his life to correspond with his +nephew, and it was afterwards kept up by my brother. Extracts from +some of my brother’s letters to his cousin are introduced, for the +purpose of exhibiting the poet before he had attracted the notice of +the public, and in his domestic family relations +afterwards.—<span class="smcap">Gilbert Burns.</span></p></div> +</div> + + + +<h2><a name="letterIV" id="letterIV"></a>IV.</h2> + +<h3>TO MISS E.</h3> + +<p>[The name of the lady to whom this and the three succeeding letters +were addressed, seems to have been known to Dr. Currie, who introduced +them in his first edition, but excluded them from his second. They +were restored by Gilbert Burns, without naming the lady.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Lochlea</i>, 1783.</p> + +<p>I verily believe, my dear E., that the pure, genuine feelings of love +are as rare in the world as the pure genuine principles of virtue and +piety. This I hope will account for the uncommon style of all my +letters to you. By uncommon, I mean their being written in such a +serious manner, which, to tell you the truth, has made me often afraid +lest you should take me for some zealous bigot, who conversed with his +mistress as he would converse with his minister. I don’t know how it +is, my dear, for though, except your company, there is nothing on +earth gives me much pleasure as writing to you, yet it never gives me +those giddy raptures so much talked of among lovers. I have often +thought that if a well-grounded affection be not really a part of +virtue, ’tis something extremely akin to it. Whenever the thought of +my E. warms my heart, every feeling of humanity, every principle of +generosity kindles in my breast. It extinguishes every dirty spark of +malice and envy which are but too apt to infest me. I grasp every +creature in the arms of universal benevolence, and equally participate +in the pleasures of the happy, and sympathize with the miseries of the +unfortunate. I assure you, my dear, I often look up to the Divine +Disposer of events with an eye of gratitude for the blessing which I +hope he intends to bestow on me in bestowing you. I sincerely wish +that he may bless my endeavors to make your life as comfortable and +happy as possible, both in sweetening the rougher parts of my natural +temper, and bettering the unkindly circumstances of my fortune. This, +my dear, is a passion, at least in my view, worthy of a man, and I +will add worthy of a Christian. The sordid earth-worm may profess love +to a woman’s person, whilst in reality his affection is centred in her +pocket; and the slavish drudge may go a-wooing as he goes to the +horse-market to choose one who is stout and firm, and as we may say of +an old horse, one who will be a good drudge and draw kindly. I disdain +their dirty, puny ideas. I would be heartily out of humour with myself +if I thought I were capable of having so poor a notion of the sex, +which were designed to crown the pleasures of society. Poor devils! I +don’t envy them their happiness who have such notions. For my part, I +propose quite other pleasures with my dear partner.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterV" id="letterV"></a>V.</h2> + +<h3>TO MISS E.</h3> + +<p class="sig"><i>Lochlea</i>, 1783.</p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">My dear E.</span>:</p> + +<p>I do not remember, in the course of your acquaintance and mine, ever +to have heard your opinion on the ordinary way of falling in love, +amongst people of our station of life: I do not mean the persons who +proceed in the way of bargain, but those whose affection is really +placed on the person.</p> + +<p>Though I be, as you know very well, but a very awkward lover myself, +yet as I have some opportunities of observing the conduct of others +who are much better skilled in the affair of courtship than I am, I +often think it is owing to lucky chance more than to good management, +that there are not more unhappy marriages than usually are.</p> + +<p>It is natural for a young fellow to like the acquaintance of the +females, and customary for him to keep them company when occasion +serves: some one of them is more agreeable to him than the rest; there +is something, he knows not what, pleases him, he knows not how, in her +company. This I take to be what is called love with the greater part +of us; and I must own, dear E., it is a hard game, such a one as you +have to play when you meet with such a lover. You cannot refuse but he +is sincere, and yet though you use him ever so favourably, per<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_315" id="Page_315">[315]</a></span>haps in +a few months, or at farthest in a year or two, the same unaccountable +fancy may make him as distractedly fond of another, whilst you are +quite forgot. I am aware that perhaps the next time I have the +pleasure of seeing you, you may bid me take my own lesson home, and +tell me that the passion I have professed for you is perhaps one of +those transient flashes I have been describing; but I hope, my dear +E., you will do me the justice to believe me, when I assure you that +the love I have for you is founded on the sacred principles of virtue +and honour, and by consequence so long as you continue possessed of +those amiable qualities which first inspired my passion for you, so +long must I continue to love you. Believe me, my dear, it is love like +this alone which can render the marriage state happy. People may talk +of flames and raptures as long as they please, and a warm fancy, with +a flow of youthful spirits, may make them feel something like what +they describe; but sure I am the nobler faculties of the mind, with +kindred feelings of the heart, can only be the foundation of +friendship, and it has always been my opinion that the married life +was only friendship in a more exalted degree. If you will be so good +as to grant my wishes, and it should please Providence to spare us to +the latest periods of life, I can look forward and see that even then, +though bent down with wrinkled age; even then, when all other worldly +circumstances will be indifferent to me, I will regard my E. with the +tenderest affection, and for this plain reason, because she is still +possessed of those noble qualities, improved to a much higher degree, +which first inspired my affection for her.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“O! happy state when souls each other draw,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When love is liberty and nature law.”<a name="FNanchor_144_144" id="FNanchor_144_144"></a><a href="#Footnote_144_144" class="fnanchor">[144]</a><br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>I know were I to speak in such a style to many a girl, who thinks +herself possessed of no small share of sense, she would think it +ridiculous; but the language of the heart is, my dear E., the only +courtship I shall ever use to you.</p> + +<p>When I look over what I have written, I am sensible it is vastly +different from the ordinary style of courtship, but I shall make no +apology—I know your good nature will excuse what your goody sense may +see amiss.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + + + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_144_144" id="Footnote_144_144"></a><a href="#FNanchor_144_144"><span class="label">[144]</span></a> Pope. <i>Eloisa to Abelard.</i></p></div> +</div> + + + +<h2><a name="letterVI" id="letterVI"></a>VI.</h2> + +<h3>TO MISS E.</h3> + +<p class="sig"><i>Lochlea</i>, 1783.</p> + +<p>I have often thought it a peculiarly unlucky circumstance in love, +that though in every other situation in life, telling the truth is not +only the safest, but actually by far the easiest way of proceeding, a +lover is never under greater difficulty in acting, or more puzzled for +expression, than when his passion is sincere, and his intentions are +honourable. I do not think that it is very difficult for a person of +ordinary capacity to talk of love and fondness, which are not felt, +and to make vows of constancy and fidelity, which are never intended +to be performed, if he be villain enough to practise such detestable +conduct: but to a man whose heart glows with the principles of +integrity and truth, and who sincerely loves a woman of amiable +person, uncommon refinement of sentiment and purity of manners—to +such an one, in such circumstances, I can assure you, my dear, from my +own feelings at this present moment, courtship is a task indeed. There +is such a number of foreboding fears and distrustful anxieties crowd +into my mind when I am in your company, or when I sit down to write to +you, that what to speak, or what to write, I am altogether at a loss.</p> + +<p>There is one rule which I have hitherto practised, and which I shall +invariably keep with you, and that is honestly to tell you the plain +truth. There is something so mean and unmanly in the arts of +dissimulation and falsehood, that I am surprised they can be acted by +any one in so noble, so generous a passion, as virtuous love. No, my +dear E., I shall never endeavour to gain your favour by such +detestable practices. If you will be so good and so generous as to +admit me for your partner, your companion, your bosom friend through +life, there is nothing on this side of eternity shall give me greater +transport; but I shall never think of purchasing your hand by any arts +unworthy of a man, and I will add of a Christian. There is one thing, +my dear, which I earnestly request of you, and it is this; that you +would soon either put an end to my hopes by a peremptory refusal, or +cure me of my fears by a generous consent.</p> + +<p>It would oblige me much if you would send me a line or two when +convenient. I shall only add further that, if a behaviour regulated +(though perhaps but very imperfectly) by the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_316" id="Page_316">[316]</a></span> rules of honour and +virtue, if a heart devoted to love and esteem you, and an earnest +endeavour to promote your happiness; if these are qualities you would +wish in a friend, in a husband, I hope you shall ever find them in +your real friend, and sincere lover.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterVII" id="letterVII"></a>VII.</h2> + +<h3>TO MISS E.</h3> + +<p class="sig"><i>Lochlea</i>, 1783.</p> + +<p>I ought, in good manners, to have acknowledged the receipt of your +letter before this time, but my heart was so shocked, with the +contents of it, that I can scarcely yet collect my thoughts so as to +write you on the subject. I will not attempt to describe what I felt +on receiving your letter. I read it over and over, again and again, +and though it was in the politest language of refusal, still it was +peremptory; “you were sorry you could not make me a return, but you +wish me,” what without you I never can obtain, “you wish me all kind +of happiness.” It would be weak and unmanly to say that, without you I +never can be happy; but sure I am, that sharing life with you would +have given it a relish, that, wanting you, I can never taste.</p> + +<p>Your uncommon personal advantages, and your superior good sense, do +not so much strike me; these, possibly, in a few instances may be met +with in others; but that amiable goodness, that tender feminine +softness, that endearing sweetness of disposition, with all the +charming offspring of a warm feeling heart—these I never again expect +to meet with, in such a degree, in this world. All these charming +qualities, heightened by an education much beyond anything I have ever +met in any woman I ever dared to approach, have made an impression on +my heart that I do not think the world can ever efface. My imagination +had fondly flattered myself with a wish, I dare not say it ever +reached a hope, that possibly I might one day call you mine. I had +formed the most delightful images, and my fancy fondly brooded over +them; but now I am wretched for the loss of what I really had no right +to expect. I must now think no more of you as a mistress; still I +presume to ask to be admitted as a friend. As such I wish to be +allowed to wait on you, and as I expect to remove in a few days a +little further off, and you, I suppose, will perhaps soon leave this +place, I wish to see or hear from you soon; and if an expression +should perhaps escape me, rather too warm for friendship, I hope you +will pardon it in, my dear Miss—(pardon me the dear expression for +once) * * * *</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterVIII" id="letterVIII"></a>VIII.</h2> + +<h3>TO ROBERT RIDDEL, ESQ.</h3> + +<h4>OF GLENRIDDEL</h4> + +<p>[These memoranda throw much light on the early days of Burns, and on +the history of his mind and compositions. Robert Riddel, of the +Friars-Carse, to whom these fragments were sent, was a good man as +well as a distinguished antiquary.]</p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">My Dear Sir</span>,</p> + +<p>On rummaging over some old papers I lighted on a MS. of my early +years, in which I had determined to write myself out; as I was placed +by fortune among a class of men to whom my ideas would have been +nonsense. I had meant that the book should have lain by me, in the +fond hope that some time or other, even after I was no more, my +thoughts would fall into the hands of somebody capable of appreciating +their value. It sets off thus:—</p> + +<p>“<span class="smcap">Observations, Hints, Songs, Scraps of Poetry</span>, &c., by +<span class="smcap">Robert Burness</span>: a man who had little art in making money, and +still less in keeping it; but was, however, a man of some sense, a +great deal of honesty, and unbounded good-will to every creature, +rational and irrational.—As he was but little indebted to scholastic +education, and bred at a plough-tail, his performances must be +strongly tinctured with his unpolished, rustic way of life; but as I +believe they are really his own, it may be some entertainment to a +curious observer of human nature to see how a ploughman thinks, and +feels, under the pressure of love, ambition, anxiety, grief, with the +like cares and passions, which, however diversified by the modes and +manners of life, operate pretty much alike, I believe, on all the +species.”</p> + +<div class="blockquot"><p>“There are numbers in the world who do not want sense to +make a figure, so much as an opinion of their own abilities +to put them upon recording their observations, and allowing +them the same importance which they do to those which appear +in print.”—<span class="smcap">Shenstone.</span></p></div> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_317" id="Page_317">[317]</a></span></p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Pleasing, when youth is long expired, to trace<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The forms our pencil, or our pen designed!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Such was our youthful air, and shape, and face,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Such the soft image of our youthful mind.”—<i>Ibid.</i><br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p class="sig"><i>April</i>, 1783.</p> + +<p>Notwithstanding all that has been said against love, respecting the +folly and weakness it lends a young inexperienced mind into; still I +think it in a great measure deserves the highest encomiums that have +been passed upon it. If anything on earth deserves the name of rapture +or transport, it is the feelings of green eighteen in the company of +the mistress of his heart, when she repays him with an equal return of +affection.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p class="sig"><i>August.</i></p> + +<p>There is certainly some connexion between love and music, and poetry; +and therefore, I have always thought it a fine touch of nature, that +passage in a modern love-composition:</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“As towards her cot she jogged along,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Her name was frequent in his song.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>For my own part I never had the least thought or inclination of +turning poet till I got once heartily in love, and then rhyme and song +were in a manner the spontaneous language of my heart. The following +composition was the first of my performances, and done at an early +period of life, when my heart glowed with honest warm simplicity; +unacquainted and uncorrupted with the ways of a wicked world. The +performance is indeed, very puerile and silly; but I am always pleased +with it, as it recalls to my mind those happy days when my heart was +yet honest, and my tongue was sincere. The subject of it was a young +girl who really deserved all the praises I have bestowed on her. I not +only had this opinion of her then—but I actually think so still, now +that the spell is long since broken, and the enchantment at an end.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O once I lov’d a bonnie lass.<a name="FNanchor_145_145" id="FNanchor_145_145"></a><a href="#Footnote_145_145" class="fnanchor">[145]</a><br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>Lest my works should be thought below criticism: or meet with a +critic, who, perhaps, will not look on them with so candid and +favourable an eye, I am determined to criticise them myself.</p> + +<p>The first distich of the first stanza is quite too much in the flimsy +strain of our ordinary street ballads: and, on the other hand, the +second distich is too much in the other extreme. The expression is a +little awkward, and the sentiment too serious. Stanza the second I am +well pleased with; and I think it conveys a fine idea of that amiable +part of the sex—the agreeables; or what in our Scotch dialect we call +a sweet sonsie lass. The third stanza has a little of the flimsy turn +in it; and the third line has rather too serious a cast. The fourth +stanza is a very indifferent one; the first line, is, indeed, all in +the strain of the second stanza, but the rest is most expletive. The +thoughts in the fifth stanza come finely up to my favourite idea—a +sweet sonsie lass: the last line, however, halts a little. The same +sentiments are kept up with equal spirit and tenderness in the sixth +stanza, but the second and fourth lines ending with short syllables +hurt the whole. The seventh stanza has several minute faults; but I +remember I composed it in a wild enthusiasm of passion, and to this +hour I never recollect it but my heart melts, my blood sallies, at the +remembrance.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p class="sig"><i>September.</i></p> + +<p>I entirely agree with that judicious philosopher, Mr. Smith, in his +excellent Theory of Moral Sentiments, that remorse is the most painful +sentiment that can embitter the human bosom. Any ordinary pitch of +fortitude may bear up tolerably well under those calamities, in the +procurement of which we ourselves have had no hand; but when our own +follies, or crimes, have made us miserable and wretched, to bear up +with manly firmness, and at the same time have a proper penitent sense +of our misconduct, is a glorious effort of self-command.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Of all the numerous ills that hurt our peace,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That press the soul, or wring the mind with anguish,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Beyond comparison the worst are those<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That to our folly or our guilt we owe.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In every other circumstance, the mind<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Has this to say, ‘It was no deed of mine;’<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But when to all the evil of misfortune<br /></span> +<span class="i0">This sting is added—‘Blame thy foolish self!’<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or worser far, the pangs of keen remorse;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The torturing, gnawing consciousness of guilt—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of guilt, perhaps, where we’ve involved others;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The young, the innocent, who fondly lov’d us,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Nay, more, that very love their cause of ruin!<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_318" id="Page_318">[318]</a></span><span class="i0">O burning hell; in all thy store of torments,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">There’s not a keener lash!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Lives there a man so firm, who, while his heart<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Feels all the bitter horrors of his crime,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Can reason down its agonizing throbs;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And, after proper purpose of amendment,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Can firmly force his jarring thoughts to peace?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O, happy! happy! enviable man!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O glorious magnanimity of soul!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p class="sig"><i>March</i>, 1784.</p> + +<p>I have often observed, in the course of my experience of human life, +that every man, even the worst, has something good about him; though +very often nothing else than a happy temperament of constitution +inclining him to this or that virtue. For this reason no man can say +in what degree any other person, besides himself, can be, with strict +justice, called wicked. Let any, of the strictest character for +regularity of conduct among us, examine impartially how many vices he +has never been guilty of, not from any care or vigilance, but for want +of opportunity, or some accidental circumstance intervening; how many +of the weaknesses of mankind he has escaped, because he was out of the +line of such temptation; and, what often, if not always, weighs more +than all the rest, how much he is indebted to the world’s good +opinion, because the world does not know all: I say, any man who can +thus think, will scan the failings, nay, the faults and crimes, of +mankind around him, with a brother’s eye.</p> + +<p>I have often courted the acquaintance of that part of mankind, +commonly known by the ordinary phrase of blackguards, sometimes +farther than was consistent with the safety of my character; those who +by thoughtless prodigality or headstrong passions, have been driven to +ruin. Though disgraced by follies, nay sometimes, stained with guilt, +I have yet found among them, in not a few instances, some of the +noblest virtues, magnanimity, generosity, disinterested friendship, +and even modesty.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p class="sig"><i>April.</i></p> + +<p>As I am what the men of the world, if they knew such a man, would call +a whimsical mortal, I have various sources of pleasure and enjoyment, +which are, in a manner, peculiar to myself, or some here and there +such other out-of-the-way person. Such is the peculiar pleasure I take +in the season of winter, more than the rest of the year. This, I +believe, may be partly owing to my misfortunes giving my mind a +melancholy cast: but there is something even in the—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Mighty tempest, and the hoary waste<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Abrupt and deep, stretch’d o’er the buried earth,”—<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>which raises the mind to a serious sublimity, favourable to everything +great and noble. There is scarcely any earthly object gives me more—I +do not know if I should call it pleasure—but something which exalts +me, something which enraptures me—than to walk in the sheltered side +of a wood, or high plantation, in a cloudy winter-day, and hear the +stormy wind howling among the trees, and raving over the plain. It is +my best season for devotion: my mind is wrapt up in a kind of +enthusiasm to Him, who, in the pompous language of the Hebrew bard, +“walks on the wings of the wind.” In one of these seasons, just after +a train of misfortunes, I composed the following:—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The wintry west extends his blast.<a name="FNanchor_146_146" id="FNanchor_146_146"></a><a href="#Footnote_146_146" class="fnanchor">[146]</a><br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>Shenstone finely observes, that love-verses, writ without any real +passion, are the most nauseous of all conceits; and I have often +thought that no man can be a proper critic of love-composition, except +he himself, in one or more instances, have been a warm votary of this +passion. As I have been all along a miserable dupe to love, and have +been led into a thousand weaknesses and follies by it, for that reason +I put the more confidence in my critical skill, in distinguishing +foppery and conceit from real passion and nature. Whether the +following song will stand the test, I will not pretend to say, because +it is my own; only I can say it was, at the time, genuine from the +heart:—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Behind yon hills, where Lugar flows.<a name="FNanchor_147_147" id="FNanchor_147_147"></a><a href="#Footnote_147_147" class="fnanchor">[147]</a><br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p class="sig"><i>March</i>, 1784.</p> + +<p>There was a certain period of my life that my spirit was broke by +repeated losses and disasters which threatened, and indeed effected, +the utter ruin of my fortune. My body, too, was attacked by that most +dreadful distemper, a hypochondria, or confirmed melancholy. In this +wretched <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_319" id="Page_319">[319]</a></span>state, the recollection of which makes me shudder, I hung my +harp on the willow trees, except in some lucid intervals, in one of +which I composed the following:—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O thou Great Being! what Thou art.<a name="FNanchor_148_148" id="FNanchor_148_148"></a><a href="#Footnote_148_148" class="fnanchor">[148]</a><br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p class="sig"><i>April.</i></p> + +<p>The following song is a wild rhapsody, miserably deficient in +versification; but as the sentiments are the genuine feelings of my +heart, for that reason I have a particular pleasure in conning it +over.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">My father was a farmer<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Upon the Carrick border, O.<a name="FNanchor_149_149" id="FNanchor_149_149"></a><a href="#Footnote_149_149" class="fnanchor">[149]</a><br /></span> +</div></div> +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> +<p class="sig"><i>April.</i></p> + +<p>I think the whole species of young men may be naturally enough divided +into two grand classes, which I shall call the <i>grave</i> and the +<i>merry</i>; though, by the by, these terms do not with propriety enough +express my ideas. The grave I shall cast into the usual division of +those who are goaded on by the love of money, and those whose darling +wish is to make a figure in the world. The merry are the men of +pleasure of all denominations; the jovial lads, who have too much fire +and spirit to have any settled rule of action; but, without much +deliberation, follow the strong impulses of nature: the thoughtless, +the careless, the indolent—in particular <i>he</i> who, with a happy +sweetness of natural temper, and a cheerful vacancy of thought, steals +through life—generally, indeed, in poverty and obscurity; but poverty +and obscurity are only evils to him who can sit gravely down and make +a repining comparison between his own situation and that of others; +and lastly, to grace the quorum, such are, generally, those whose +heads are capable of all the towerings of genius, and whose hearts are +warmed with all the delicacy of feeling.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p class="sig"><i>August.</i></p> + +<p>The foregoing was to have been an elaborate dissertation on the +various species of men; but as I cannot please myself in the +arrangement of my ideas, I must wait till farther experience and nicer +observation throw more light on the subject.—In the mean time I shall +set down the following fragment, which, as it is the genuine language +of my heart, will enable anybody to determine which of the classes I +belong to:</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">There’s nought but care on ev’ry han’,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In ev’ry hour that passes, O.<a name="FNanchor_150_150" id="FNanchor_150_150"></a><a href="#Footnote_150_150" class="fnanchor">[150]</a><br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>As the grand end of human life is to cultivate an intercourse with +that <span class="smcap">Being</span> to whom we owe life, with every enjoyment that +renders life delightful; and to maintain an integritive conduct +towards our fellow-creatures; that so, by forming piety and virtue +into habit, we may be fit members for that society of the pious and +the good, which reason and revelation teach us to expect beyond the +grave, I do not see that the turn of mind, and pursuits of such a one +as the above verses describe—one who spends the hours and thoughts +which the vocations of the day can spare with Ossian, Shakspeare, +Thomson, Shenstone, Sterne, &c.; or, as the maggot takes him, a gun, a +fiddle, or a song to make or mend; and at all times some heart’s-dear +bonnie lass in view—I say I do not see that the turn of mind and +pursuits of such an one are in the least more inimical to the sacred +interests of piety and virtue, than the even lawful, bustling and +straining after the world’s riches and honours: and I do not see but +he may gain heaven as well—which, by the by, is no mean +consideration—who steals through the vale of life, amusing himself +with every little flower that fortune throws in his way, as he, who +straining straight forward, and perhaps spattering all about him, +gains some of life’s little eminencies, where, after all, he can only +see and be seen a little more conspicuously than what, in the pride of +his heart, he is apt to term the poor, indolent devil he has left +behind him.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p class="sig"><i>August.</i></p> + +<p>A Prayer, when fainting fits, and other alarming symptoms of a +pleurisy or some other dangerous disorder, which indeed still +threatens me, first put nature on the alarm:—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O thou unknown, Almighty Cause<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Of all my hope and fear!<a name="FNanchor_151_151" id="FNanchor_151_151"></a><a href="#Footnote_151_151" class="fnanchor">[151]</a><br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p class="sig"><i>August.</i></p> + +<p>Misgivings in the hour of <i>despondency</i> and prospect of death:—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Why am I loth to leave this earthly scene.<a name="FNanchor_152_152" id="FNanchor_152_152"></a><a href="#Footnote_152_152" class="fnanchor">[152]</a><br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_320" id="Page_320">[320]</a></span></p> + +<p class="std1">EGOTISMS FROM MY OWN SENSATIONS.</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>May.</i></p> + +<p>I don’t well know what is the reason of it, but somehow or other, +though I am when I have a mind pretty generally beloved, yet I never +could get the art of commanding respect.—I imagine it is owing to my +being deficient in what Sterne calls “that understrapping virtue of +discretion.”—I am so apt to a <i>lapsus linguæ</i>, that I sometimes think +the character of a certain great man I have read of somewhere is very +much <i>apropos</i> to myself—that he was a compound of great talents and +great folly.—N.B. To try if I can discover the causes of this +wretched infirmity, and, if possible, to mend it.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p class="sig"><i>August.</i></p> + +<p>However I am pleased with the works of our Scotch poets, particularly +the excellent Ramsay, and the still more excellent Fergusson, yet I am +hurt to see other places of Scotland, their towns, rivers, woods, +haughs, &c., immortalized in such celebrated performances, while my +dear native country, the ancient bailieries of Carrick, Kyle, and +Cunningham, famous both in ancient and modern times for a gallant and +warlike race of inhabitants; a country where civil, and particularly +religious liberty have ever found their first support, and their last +asylum; a country, the birth-place of many famous philosophers, +soldiers, statesman, and the scene of many important events recorded +in Scottish history, particularly a great many of the actions of the +glorious <span class="smcap">Wallace</span>, the <span class="smcap">Saviour</span> of his country; yet, +we have never had one Scotch poet of any eminence, to make the fertile +banks of Irvine, the romantic woodlands and sequestered scenes on Ayr, +and the healthy mountainous source and winding sweep of <span class="smcap">Doon</span>, +emulate Tay, Forth, Ettrick, Tweed, &c. This is a complaint I would +gladly remedy, but, alas! I am far unequal to the task, both in native +genius and education. Obscure I am, and obscure I must be, though no +young poet, nor young soldier’s heart, ever beat more fondly for fame +than mine—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“And if there is no other scene of being<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where my insatiate wish may have its fill,—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">This something at my heart that heaves for room,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My best, my dearest part, was made in vain.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p class="sig"><i>September.</i></p> + +<p>There is a great irregularity in the old Scotch songs, a redundancy of +syllables with respect to that exactness of accent and measure that +the English poetry requires, but which glides in, most melodiously, +with the respective tunes to which they are set. For instance, the +fine old song of “The Mill, Mill, O,”<a name="FNanchor_153_153" id="FNanchor_153_153"></a><a href="#Footnote_153_153" class="fnanchor">[153]</a> to give it a plain prosaic +reading, it halts prodigiously out of measure; on the other hand, the +song set to the same tune in Bremner’s collection of Scotch songs, +which begins “To Fanny fair could I impart,” &c., it is most exact +measure, and yet, let them both be sung before a real critic, one +above the biases of prejudice, but a thorough judge of nature,—how +flat and spiritless will the last appear, how trite, and lamely +methodical, compared with the wild warbling cadence, the heart-moving +melody of the first!—This is particularly the case with all those +airs which end with a hypermetrical syllable. There is a degree of +wild irregularity in many of the compositions and fragments which are +daily sung to them by my compeers, the common people—a certain happy +arrangement of old Scotch syllables, and yet, very frequently, +nothing, not even like rhyme or sameness of jingle, at the ends of the +lines. This has made me sometimes imagine that perhaps it might be +possible for a Scotch poet, with a nice judicious ear, to set +compositions to many of our most favourite airs, particularly that +class of them mentioned above, independent of rhyme altogether.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p>There is a noble sublimity, a heart-melting tenderness, in some of our +ancient ballads, which show them to be the work of a masterly hand: +and it has often given me many a heart-ache to reflect that such +glorious old bards—bards who very probably owed all their talents to +native genius, yet have described the exploits of heroes, the pangs of +disappointment, and the meltings of love, with such fine strokes of +nature—that their very names (O how mortifying to a bard’s vanity!) +are now “buried among the wreck of things which were.”</p> + +<p>O ye illustrious names unknown! who could feel so strongly and +describe so well: the last, the meanest of the muses’ train—one who, +though far inferior to your flights, yet eyes <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_321" id="Page_321">[321]</a></span>your path, and with +trembling wing would sometimes soar after you—a poor rustic bard +unknown, pays this sympathetic pang to your memory! Some of you tell +us, with all the charms of verse, that you have been unfortunate in +the world—unfortunate in love: he, too, has felt the loss of his +little fortune, the loss of friends, and, worse than all, the loss of +the woman he adored. Like you, all his consolation was his muse: she +taught him in rustic measures to complain. Happy could he have done it +with your strength of imagination and flow of verse! May the turf lie +lightly on your bones! and may you now enjoy that solace and rest +which this world rarely gives to the heart tuned to all the feelings +of poesy and love!</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p class="sig"><i>September.</i></p> + +<p>The following fragment is done something in imitation of the manner of +a noble old Scottish piece, called M’Millan’s Peggy, and sings to the +tune of Galla Water.—My Montgomery’s Peggy was my deity for six or +eight months. She had been bred (though, as the world says, without +any just pretence for it) in a style of life rather elegant; but, as +Vanbrugh says in one of his comedies, my “d——d star found me out” +there too: for though I began the affair merely in a <i>gaitié de +cœur</i>, or, to tell the truth, which will scarcely be believed, a +vanity of showing my parts in courtship, particularly my abilities at +a <i>billet-doux</i>, which I always piqued myself upon, made me lay siege +to her; and when, as I always do in my foolish gallantries, I had +fettered myself into a very warm affection for her, she told me one +day, in a flag of truce, that her fortress had been for some time +before the rightful property of another; but, with the greatest +friendship and politeness, she offered me every allegiance except +actual possession. I found out afterwards that what she told me of a +pre-engagement was really true; but it cost me some heart-aches to get +rid of the affair.</p> + +<p>I have even tried to imitate in this extempore thing that irregularity +in the rhymes, which, when judiciously done, has such a fine effect on +the ear.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Altho’ my bed were in yon muir.”<a name="FNanchor_154_154" id="FNanchor_154_154"></a><a href="#Footnote_154_154" class="fnanchor">[154]</a><br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p class="sig"><i>September.</i></p> + +<p>There is another fragment in imitation of an old Scotch song, well +known among the country ingle-sides.—I cannot tell the name, neither +of the song nor the tune, but they are in fine unison with one +another.—By the way, these old Scottish airs are so nobly +sentimental, that when one would compose to them, to “south the tune,” +as our Scotch phrase is, over and over, is the readiest way to catch +the inspiration, and raise the bard into that glorious enthusiasm so +strongly characteristic of our old Scotch poetry. I shall here set +down one verse of the piece mentioned above, both to mark the song and +tune I mean, and likewise as a debt I owe to the author, as the +repeating of that verse has lighted up my flame a thousand times:—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">When clouds in skies do come together<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To hide the brightness of the sun,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">There will surely be some pleasant weather<br /></span> +<span class="i2">When a’ their storms are past and gone.<a name="FNanchor_155_155" id="FNanchor_155_155"></a><a href="#Footnote_155_155" class="fnanchor">[155]</a><br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Though fickle fortune has deceived me,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">She promis’d fair and perform’d but ill;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of mistress, friends, and wealth bereav’d me,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Yet I bear a heart shall support me still.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I’ll act with prudence as far as I’m able,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But if success I must never find,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Then come misfortune, I bid thee welcome,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I’ll meet thee with an undaunted mind.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>The above was an extempore, under the pressure of a heavy train of +misfortunes, which, indeed, threatened to undo me altogether. It was +just at the close of that dreadful period mentioned already, and +though the weather has brightened up a little with me, yet there has +always been since a tempest brewing round me in the grim sky of +futurity, which I pretty plainly see will some time or other, perhaps +ere long, overwhelm me, and drive me into some doleful dell, to pine +in solitary, squalid wretchedness.—However, as I hope my poor country +muse, who, all rustic, awkward, and unpolished as she is, has more +charms for me than any other of the pleasures of life beside—as I +hope she will not then desert me, I may even then learn to be, if not +happy, at least easy, and south a sang to soothe my misery.</p> + +<p>’Twas at the same time I set about composing an air in the old Scotch +style.—I am not musical <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_322" id="Page_322">[322]</a></span>scholar enough to prick down my tune properly, so it can never see the +light, and perhaps ’tis no great matter; but the following were the +verses I composed to suit it:—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O raging fortune’s withering blast<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Has laid my leaf full low, O!<a name="FNanchor_156_156" id="FNanchor_156_156"></a><a href="#Footnote_156_156" class="fnanchor">[156]</a><br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>The tune consisted of three parts, so that the above verses just went +through the whole air.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p class="sig"><i>October</i>, 1785.</p> + +<p>If ever any young man, in the vestibule of the world, chance to throw +his eye over these pages, let him pay a warm attention to the +following observations, as I assure him they are the fruit of a poor +devil’s dear-bought experience.—I have literally, like that great +poet and great gallant, and by consequence, that great fool, Solomon, +“turned my eyes to behold madness and folly.” Nay, I have, with all +the ardour of a lively, fanciful, and whimsical imagination, +accompanied with a warm, feeling, poetic heart, shaken hands with +their intoxicating friendship.</p> + +<p>In the first place, let my pupil, as he tenders his own peace, keep up +a regular, warm intercourse with the Deity. * * * *</p> + +<p>This is all worth quoting in my MSS., and more than all.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + + + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_145_145" id="Footnote_145_145"></a><a href="#FNanchor_145_145"><span class="label">[145]</span></a> See Songs and Ballads, <a href="#songsI">No. I.</a></p> +</div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_146_146" id="Footnote_146_146"></a><a href="#FNanchor_146_146"><span class="label">[146]</span></a> See Winter. A Dirge. <a href="#POEMS">Poem I.</a></p> +</div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_147_147" id="Footnote_147_147"></a><a href="#FNanchor_147_147"><span class="label">[147]</span></a> <a href="#songsXIV">Song XIV.</a></p> +</div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_148_148" id="Footnote_148_148"></a><a href="#FNanchor_148_148"><span class="label">[148]</span></a> <a href="#IX">Poem IX.</a></p> +</div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_149_149" id="Footnote_149_149"></a><a href="#FNanchor_149_149"><span class="label">[149]</span></a> <a href="#songsV">Song V</a></p> +</div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_150_150" id="Footnote_150_150"></a><a href="#FNanchor_150_150"><span class="label">[150]</span></a> <a href="#songsXVII">Song XVII.</a></p> +</div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_151_151" id="Footnote_151_151"></a><a href="#FNanchor_151_151"><span class="label">[151]</span></a> <a href="#X">Poem X.</a></p> +</div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_152_152" id="Footnote_152_152"></a><a href="#FNanchor_152_152"><span class="label">[152]</span></a> <a href="#XI">Poem XI.</a></p> +</div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_153_153" id="Footnote_153_153"></a><a href="#FNanchor_153_153"><span class="label">[153]</span></a> “The Mill, Mill, O,” is by Allan Ramsay.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_154_154" id="Footnote_154_154"></a><a href="#FNanchor_154_154"><span class="label">[154]</span></a> <a href="#songsVIII">Song VIII.</a></p> +</div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_155_155" id="Footnote_155_155"></a><a href="#FNanchor_155_155"><span class="label">[155]</span></a> Alluding to the misfortunes he feelingly laments before +this verse. (This is the author’s note.)</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_156_156" id="Footnote_156_156"></a><a href="#FNanchor_156_156"><span class="label">[156]</span></a> <a href="#songsII">Song II.</a></p> +</div></div> + + +<h2><a name="letterIX" id="letterIX"></a>IX.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. JAMES BURNESS,</h3> + +<h4>MONTROSE.</h4> + +<p>[The elder Burns, whose death this letter intimates, lies buried in +the kirk-yard of Alloway, with a tombstone recording his worth.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Lochlea</i>, 17<i>th Feb.</i> 1784.</p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">Dear Cousin</span>,</p> + +<p>I would have returned you my thanks for your kind favour of the 13th +of December sooner, had it not been that I waited to give you an +account of that melancholy event, which, for some time past, we have +from day to day expected.</p> + +<p>On the 13th current I lost the best of fathers. Though, to be sure, we +have had long warning of the impending stroke; still the feelings of +nature claim their part, and I cannot recollect the tender endearments +and parental lessons of the best of friends and ablest of instructors, +without feeling what perhaps the calmer dictates of reason would +partly condemn.</p> + +<p>I hope my father’s friends in your country will not let their +connexion in this place die with him. For my part I shall ever with +pleasure—with pride, acknowledge my connexion with those who were +allied by the ties of blood and friendship to a man whose memory I +shall ever honour and revere.</p> + +<p>I expect, therefore, my dear Sir, you will not neglect any opportunity +of letting me hear from you, which will very much oblige,</p> + +<p class="sig4">My dear Cousin, yours sincerely,</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + + + +<h2><a name="letterX" id="letterX"></a>X.</h2> + +<h3>TO JAMES BURNESS,</h3> + +<h4>MONTROSE.</h4> + +<p>[Mrs. Buchan, the forerunner in extravagance and absurdity of Joanna +Southcote, after attempting to fix her tent among the hills of the +west and the vales of the Nith, finally set up her staff at +Auchengibbert-Hill, in Galloway, where she lectured her followers, and +held out hopes of their reaching the stars, even in this life. She +died early: one or two of her people, as she called them, survived +till within these half-dozen years.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Mossgiel, August</i>, 1784.</p> + +<p>We have been surprised with one of the most extraordinary phenomena in +the moral world which, I dare say, had happened in the course of this +half century. We have had a party of Presbytery relief, as they call +themselves, for some time in this country. A pretty thriving society +of them has been in the burgh of Irvine for some years past, till +about two years ago, a Mrs. Buchan from Glasgow came among them, and +began to spread some fanatical notions of religion among them, and, in +a short time, made many converts; and, among others, their preacher, +Mr. Whyte, who, upon that account, has been suspended and formally +deposed by his brethren. He continued, however, to preach in private +to his party, and was supported, both he and their spiritual mother, +as they affect to call old Buchan, by the contributions of the rest, +several of whom were in good circumstances; till, in spring last, the +populace rose and mobbed Mrs. Buchan, and put her out of the town; on +which all her followers voluntarily quitted the place likewise, and +with such precipitation, that many of them never shut their +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_323" id="Page_323">[323]</a></span> +doors behind them; one left a washing on the green, another a cow +bellowing at the crib without food, or anybody to mind her, and after +several stages, they are fixed at present in the neighbourhood of +Dumfries. Their tenets are a strange jumble of enthusiastic jargon; +among others, she pretends to give them the Holy Ghost by breathing on +them, which she does with postures and practices that are scandalously +indecent; they have likewise disposed of all their effects, and hold a +community of goods, and live nearly an idle life, carrying on a great +farce of pretended devotion in barns and woods, where they lodge and +lie all together, and hold likewise a community of women, as it is +another of their tenets that they can commit no mortal sin. I am +personally acquainted with most of them, and I can assure you the +above mentioned are facts.</p> + +<p>This, my dear Sir, is one of the many instances of the folly of +leaving the guidance of sound reason and common sense in matters of +religion.</p> + +<p>Whenever we neglect or despise these sacred monitors, the whimsical +notions of a perturbated brain are taken for the immediate influences +of the Deity, and the wildest fanaticism, and the most inconstant +absurdities, will meet with abettors and converts. Nay, I have often +thought, that the more out-of-the-way and ridiculous the fancies are, +if once they are sanctified under the sacred name of religion, the +unhappy mistaken votaries are the more firmly glued to them.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterXI" id="letterXI"></a>XI.</h2> + +<h3>TO MISS——.</h3> + +<p>[This has generally been printed among the early letters of Burns. +Cromek thinks that the person addressed was the “Peggy” of the +Common-place Book. This is questioned by Robert Chambers, who, +however, leaves both name and date unsettled.]</p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">My dear Countrywoman</span>,</p> + +<p>I am so impatient to show you that I am once more at peace with you, +that I send you the book I mentioned directly, rather than wait the +uncertain time of my seeing you. I am afraid I have mislaid or lost +Collins’ Poems, which I promised to Miss Irvin. If I can find them, I +will forward them by you; if not, you must apologize for me.</p> + +<p>I know you will laugh at it when I tell you that your piano and you +together have played the deuce somehow about my heart. My breast has +been widowed these many months, and I thought myself proof against the +fascinating witchcraft; but I am afraid you will “feelingly convince +me what I am.” I say, I am afraid, because I am not sure what is the +matter with me. I have one miserable bad symptom; when you whisper, or +look kindly to another, it gives me a draught of damnation. I have a +kind of wayward wish to be with you ten minutes by yourself, though +what I would say, Heaven above knows, for I am sure I know not. I have +no formed design in all this; but just, in the nakedness of my heart, +write you down a mere matter-of-fact story. You may perhaps give +yourself airs of distance on this, and that will completely cure me; +but I wish you would not: just let us meet, if you please, in the old +beaten way of friendship.</p> + +<p>I will not subscribe myself your humble servant, for that is a phrase, +I think at least fifty miles off from the heart; but I will conclude +with sincerely wishing that the Great Protector of innocence may +shield you from the barbed dart of calumny, and hand you by the covert +snare of deceit.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterXII" id="letterXII"></a>XII.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. JOHN RICHMOND,</h3> + +<h4>OF EDINBURGH.</h4> + +<p>[John Richmond, writer, one of the poet’s Mauchline friends, to whom +we are indebted for much valuable information concerning Burns and his +productions—Connel was the Mauchline carrier.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Mossgiel, Feb.</i> 17, 1786.</p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">My dear Sir</span>,</p> + +<p>I have not time at present to upbraid you for your silence and +neglect; I shall only say I received yours with great pleasure. I have +enclosed you a piece of rhyming ware for your perusal. I have been +very busy with the muses since I saw you, and have composed, among +several others, “The Ordination,” a poem on Mr. M’Kinlay’s being +called to Kilmarnock; “Scotch Drink,” a poem; “The Cotter’s Saturday +Night;” “An Address to the Devil,” &c. I have likewise completed my +poem on the “Dogs,” but have not shown it to the world. My chief +patron now is Mr. Aiken, in Ayr, who is pleased to express great +approbation of my works. Be so good as send me Fergusson, by<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_324" id="Page_324">[324]</a></span> Connel, +and I will remit you the money. I have no news to acquaint you with +about Mauchline, they are just going on in the old way. I have some +very important news with respect to myself, not the most +agreeable—news that I am sure you cannot guess, but I shall give you +the particulars another time. I am extremely happy with Smith; he is +the only friend I have now in Mauchline. I can scarcely forgive your +long neglect of me, and I beg you will let me hear from you regularly +by Connel. If you would act your part as a friend, I am sure neither +good nor bad fortune should strange of alter me. Excuse haste, as I +got yours but yesterday.</p> + +<p class="sig5">I am, my dear Sir,</p> + +<p class="sig8">Yours,</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterXIII" id="letterXIII"></a>XIII.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. JOHN KENNEDY,</h3> + +<h4>DUMFRIES HOUSE.</h4> +<p>[Who the John Kennedy was to whom Burns addressed this note, enclosing +“The Cotter’s Saturday night,” it is now, perhaps, vain to inquire: +the Kennedy to whom Mr. Cobbett introduces us was a Thomas—perhaps a +relation.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Mossgiel, 3d March</i>, 1786.</p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">Sir,</span></p> + +<p>I have done myself the pleasure of complying with your request in +sending you my Cottager.—If you have a leisure minute, I should be +glad you would copy it, and return me either the original or the +transcript, as I have not a copy of it by me, and I have a friend who +wishes to see it.</p> + +<p class="blockquot">“Now, Kennedy, if foot or horse.”<a name="FNanchor_157_157" id="FNanchor_157_157"></a><a href="#Footnote_157_157" class="fnanchor">[157]</a></p> + +<p class="smcap sig">Robt. Burness.</p> + + + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_157_157" id="Footnote_157_157"></a><a href="#FNanchor_157_157"><span class="label">[157]</span></a> <a href="#LXXV">Poem LXXV.</a></p> +</div> +</div> + + + +<h2><a name="letterXIV" id="letterXIV"></a>XIV.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. ROBERT MUIR,</h3> + +<h4>KILMARNOCK.</h4> + +<p>[The Muirs—there were two brothers—were kind and generous patrons of +the poet. They subscribed for half-a-hundred copies of the Kilmarnock +edition of his works, and befriended him when friends were few.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Mossgiel</i>, 20<i>th March</i>, 1786.</p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">Dear Sir,</span></p> + +<p>I am heartily sorry I had not the pleasure of seeing you as you +returned through Mauchline; but as I was engaged, I could not be in +town before the evening.</p> + +<p>I here enclose you my “Scotch Drink,” and “may the —— follow with a +blessing for your edification.” I hope, some time before we hear the +gowk, to have the pleasure of seeing you at Kilmarnock, when I intend +we shall have a gill between us, in a mutchkin-stoup; which will be a +great comfort and consolation to,</p> + +<p class="sig4">Dear Sir,</p> + +<p class="sig5">Your humble servant,</p> + +<p class="sig">Robt. Burness.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterXV" id="letterXV"></a>XV.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. AIKEN.</h3> + +<p>[Robert Aiken, the gentleman to whom the “Cotter’s Saturday Night” is +inscribed, is also introduced in the “Brigs of Ayr.” This is the last +letter to which Burns seems to have subscribed his name in the +spelling of his ancestors.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Mossgiel, 3d April</i>, 1786.</p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">Dear Sir,</span></p> + +<p>I received your kind letter with double pleasure, on account of the +second flattering instance of Mrs. C.’s notice and approbation, I +assure you I</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Turn out the burnt o’ my shin,”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>as the famous Ramsay, of jingling memory, says, at such a patroness. +Present her my most grateful acknowledgment in your very best manner +of telling truth. I have inscribed the following stanza on the blank +leaf of Miss More’s Work:—<a name="FNanchor_158_158" id="FNanchor_158_158"></a><a href="#Footnote_158_158" class="fnanchor">[158]</a></p> + +<p>My proposals for publishing I am just going to send to press. I expect +to hear from you by the first opportunity.</p> + +<p class="sig5">I am ever, dear Sir,</p> + +<p class="sig8">Yours,</p> + +<p class="smcap sig">Robt. Burness.</p> + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_158_158" id="Footnote_158_158"></a><a href="#FNanchor_158_158"><span class="label">[158]</span></a> See <a href="#LXXVIII">Poem LXXVIII.</a></p> +</div></div> + + +<h2><a name="letterXVI" id="letterXVI"></a>XVI.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. M’WHINNIE,</h3> + +<h4>WRITER, AYR.</h4> + +<p>[Mr. M’Whinnie obtained for Burns several subscriptions for the first +edition of his Poems, of which this note enclosed the proposals.]<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_325" id="Page_325">[325]</a></span></p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Mossgiel, 17th April, 1786.</i></p> + +<p>It is injuring some hearts, those hearts that elegantly bear the +impression of the good Creator, to say to them you give them the +trouble of obliging a friend; for this reason, I only tell you that I +gratify my own feelings in requesting your friendly offices with +respect to the enclosed, because I know it will gratify yours to +assist me in it to the utmost of your power.</p> + +<p>I have sent you four copies, as I have no less than eight dozen, which +is a great deal more than I shall ever need.</p> + +<p>Be sure to remember a poor poet militant in your prayers. He looks +forward with fear and trembling to that, to him, important moment +which stamps the die with—with—with, perhaps, the eternal disgrace +of,</p> + +<p class="sig3">My dear Sir,</p> + +<p class="sig4">Your humble,</p> + +<p class="sig5">afflicted, tormented,</p> + +<p class="smcap sig">Robert Burns.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterXVII" id="letterXVII"></a>XVII.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. JOHN KENNEDY.</h3> + +<p>[“The small piece,” the very last of his productions, which the poet +enclosed in this letter, was “The Mountain Daisy,” called in the +manuscript more properly “The Gowan.”]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Mossgiel, 20th April, 1786.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">Sir</span>,</p> + +<p>By some neglect in Mr. Hamilton, I did not hear of your kind request +for a subscription paper ’till this day. I will not attempt any +acknowledgment for this, nor the manner in which I see your name in +Mr. Hamilton’s subscription list. Allow me only to say, Sir, I feel +the weight of the debt.</p> + +<p>I have here likewise enclosed a small piece, the very latest of my +productions. I am a good deal pleased with some sentiments myself, as +they are just the native querulous feelings of a heart, which, as the +elegantly melting Gray says, “melancholy has marked for her own.”</p> + +<p>Our race comes on a-pace; that much-expected scene of revelry and +mirth; but to me it brings no joy equal to that meeting with which +your last flattered the expectation of,</p> + +<p class="sig3">Sir,</p> + +<p class="sig4">Your indebted humble servant,</p> + +<p class="sig">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterXVIII" id="letterXVIII"></a>XVIII.</h2> + +<h3>TO MON. JAMES SMITH,</h3> + +<h4>MAUCHLINE.</h4> + +<p>[James Smith, of whom Burns said he was small of stature, but large of +soul, kept at that time a draper’s shop in Mauchline, and was comrade +to the poet in many a wild adventure.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Monday Morning, Mossgiel, 1786.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">My Dear Sir</span>,</p> + +<p>I went to Dr. Douglas yesterday, fully resolved to take the +opportunity of Captain Smith: but I found the Doctor with a Mr. and +Mrs. White, both Jamaicans, and they have deranged my plans +altogether. They assure him that to send me from Savannah la Mar to +Port Antonio will cost my master, Charles Douglas, upwards of fifty +pounds; besides running the risk of throwing myself into a pleuritic +fever, in consequence of hard travelling in the sun. On these +accounts, he refuses sending me with Smith, but a vessel sails from +Greenock the first of September, right for the place of my +destination. The Captain of her is an intimate friend of Mr. Gavin +Hamilton’s, and as good a fellow as heart could wish: with him I am +destined to go. Where I shall shelter, I know not, but I hope to +weather the storm. Perish the drop of blood of mine that fears them! I +know their worst, and am prepared to meet it;—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“I’ll laugh an’ sing, an’ shake my leg,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">As lang’s I dow.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>On Thursday morning, if you can muster as much self-denial as to be +out of bed about seven o’clock, I shall see you, as I ride through to +Cumnock. After all, Heaven bless the sex! I feel there is still +happiness for me among them:</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“O woman, lovely woman! Heaven design’d you<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To temper man!—we had been brutes without you.”<a name="FNanchor_159_159" id="FNanchor_159_159"></a><a href="#Footnote_159_159" class="fnanchor">[159]</a><br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_159_159" id="Footnote_159_159"></a><a href="#FNanchor_159_159"><span class="label">[159]</span></a> Otway. Venice Preserved.</p></div></div> + + +<h2><a name="letterXIX" id="letterXIX"></a>XIX.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. JOHN KENNEDY.</h3> + +<p>[Burns was busy in a two-fold sense at present: he was seeking patrons +in every quarter for his contemplated volume, and was composing for it +some of his most exquisite poetry.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Mossgiel, 16 May, 1796.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">Dear Sir</span>,</p> + +<p>I have sent you the above hasty copy as I promised. In about three or +four weeks I shall <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_326" id="Page_326">[326]</a></span>probably set the press a-going. I am much hurried +at present, otherwise your diligence, so very friendly in my +subscription, should have a more lengthened acknowledgment from,</p> + +<p class="sig4">Dear Sir,</p> + +<p class="sig5">Your obliged servant,</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterXX" id="letterXX"></a>XX.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. DAVID BRICE.</h3> + +<p>[David Brice was a shoemaker, and shared with Smith the confidence of +the poet in his love affairs. He was working in Glasgow when this +letter was written.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Mossgiel, June</i> 12, 1786.</p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">Dear Brice</span>,</p> + +<p>I received your message by G. Patterson, and as I am not very throng +at present, I just write to let you know that there is such a +worthless, rhyming reprobate, as your humble servant, still in the +land of the living, though I can scarcely say, in the place of hope. I +have no news to tell you that will give me any pleasure to mention, or +you to hear.</p> + +<p>Poor ill-advised ungrateful Armour came home on Friday last. You have +heard all the particulars of that affair, and a black affair it is. +What she thinks of her conduct now, I don’t know; one thing I do +know—she has made me completely miserable. Never man loved, or rather +adored a woman more than I did her; and, to confess a truth between +you and me, I do still love her to distraction after all, though I +won’t tell her so if I were to see her, which I don’t want to do. My +poor dear unfortunate Jean! how happy have I been in thy arms! It is +not the losing her that makes me so unhappy, but for her sake I feel +most severely: I foresee she is in the road to, I am afraid, eternal +ruin. * * * *</p> + +<p>May Almighty God forgive her ingratitude and perjury to me, as I from +my very soul forgive her: and may his grace be with her and bless her +in all her future life! I can have no nearer idea of the place of +eternal punishment than what I have felt in my own breast on her +account. I have tried often to forget her; I have run into all kinds +of dissipation and riots, mason-meetings, drinking matches, and other +mischief, to drive her out of my head, but all in vain. And now for a +grand cure; the ship is on her way home that is to take me out to +Jamaica; and then, farewell dear old Scotland! and farewell dear +ungrateful Jean! for never never will I see you more.</p> + +<p>You will have heard that I am going to commence poet in print; and to +morrow my works go to the press. I expect it will be a volume of about +two hundred pages—it is just the last foolish action I intend to do; +and then turn a wise man as fast as possible.</p> + +<p class="sig3">Believe me to be, dear Brice,</p> + +<p class="sig5">Your friend and well-wisher,</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterXXI" id="letterXXI"></a>XXI.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. ROBERT AIKEN.</h3> + +<p>[This letter was written under great distress of mind. That separation +which Burns records in “The Lament,” had, unhappily, taken place +between him and Jean Armour, and it would appear, that for a time at +least a coldness ensued between the poet and the patron, occasioned, +it is conjectured, by that fruitful subject of sorrow and disquiet. +The letter, I regret to say, is not wholly here.]</p> + +<p class="sig">[<i>Ayrshire</i>, 1786.]</p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">Sir</span>,</p> + +<p>I was with Wilson, my printer, t’other day, and settled all our +by-gone matters between us. After I had paid him all demands, I made +him the offer of the second edition, on the hazard of being paid out +of the first and readiest, which he declines. By his account, the +paper of a thousand copies would cost me about twenty-seven pounds, +and the printing about fifteen or sixteen: he offers to agree to this +for the printing, if I will advance for the paper, but this, you know, +is out of my power; so farewell hopes of a second edition till I grow +rich! an epoch which I think will arrive at the payment of the +British national debt.</p> + +<p>There is scarcely anything hurts me so much in being disappointed of +my second edition, as not having it in my power to show my gratitude +to Mr. Ballantyne, by publishing my poem of “The Brigs of Ayr.” I +would detest myself as a wretch, if I thought I were capable in a very +long life of forgetting the honest, warm, and tender delicacy with +which he enters into my interests. I am sometimes pleased with myself +in my greateful sensations; but I believe, on the whole, I have very +little merit in it, as my gratitude is not a virtue, the consequence +of reflection; but sheerly the instinctive emotion of my heart, too +inattentive to allow worldly maxims and views to settle into selfish +habits.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_327" id="Page_327">[327]</a></span> I have been feeling all the various rotations and movements +within, respecting the excise. There are many things plead strongly +against it; the uncertainty of getting soon into business; the +consequences of my follies, which may perhaps make it impracticable +for me to stay at home; and besides I have for some time been pining +under secret wretchedness, from causes which you pretty well know—the +pang of disappointment, the sting of pride, with some wandering stabs +of remorse, which never fail to settle on my vitals like vultures, +when attention is not called away by the calls of society, or the +vagaries of the muse. Even in the hour of social mirth, my gayety is +the madness of an intoxicated criminal under the hands of the +executioner. All these reasons urge me to go abroad, and to all these +reasons I have only one answer—the feelings of a father. This, in the +present mood I am in, overbalances everything that can be laid in the +scale against it. * * * *</p> + +<p>You may perhaps think it an extravagant fancy, but it is a sentiment +which strikes home to my very soul: though sceptical in some points of +our current belief, yet, I think, I have every evidence for the +reality of a life beyond the stinted bourne of our present existence; +if so, then, how should I, in the presence of that tremendous Being, +the Author of existence, how should I meet the reproaches of those who +stand to me in the dear relation of children, whom I deserted in the +smiling innocency of helpless infancy? O, thou great unknown +Power!—thou almighty God! who has lighted up reason in my breast, and +blessed me with immortality!—I have frequently wandered from that +order and regularity necessary for the perfection of thy works, yet +thou hast never left me nor forsaken me! * * * *</p> + +<p>Since I wrote the foregoing sheet, I have seen something of the storm +of mischief thickening over my folly-devoted head. Should you, my +friends, my benefactors, be successful in your applications for me, +perhaps it may not be in my power, in that way, to reap the fruit of +your friendly efforts. What I have written in the preceding pages, is +the settled tenor of my present resolution; but should inimical +circumstances forbid me closing with your kind offer, or enjoying it +only threaten to entail farther misery— * * * *</p> + +<p>To tell the truth, I have little reason for complaint; as the world, +in general, has been kind to me fully up to my deserts. I was, for +some time past, fast getting into the pining, distrustful snarl of the +misanthrope. I saw myself alone, unlit for the struggle of life, +shrinking at every rising cloud in the chance-directed atmosphere of +fortune, while all defenceless I looked about in vain for a cover. It +never occurred to me, at least never with the force it deserved, that +this world is a busy scene, and man, a creature destined for a +progressive struggle; and that, however I might possess a warm heart +and inoffensive manners (which last, by the by, was rather more than I +could well boast); still, more than these passive qualities, there was +something to be done. When all my school-fellows and youthful compeers +(those misguided few excepted who joined, to use a Gentoo phrase, the +“hallachores” of the human race) were striking off with eager hope and +earnest intent, in some one or other of the many paths of busy life, I +was “standing idle in the market-place,” or only left the chase of the +butterfly from flower to flower, to hunt fancy from whim to whim. * * +* *</p> + +<p>You see, Sir, that if to know one’s errors were a probability of +mending them, I stand a fair chance; but according to the reverend +Westminster divines, though conviction must precede conversion, it is +very far from always implying it. * * * *</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterXXII" id="letterXXII"></a>XXII.</h2> + +<h3>TO JOHN RICHMOND,</h3> + +<h4>EDINBURGH.</h4> + +<p>[The minister who took upon him to pronounce Burns a single man, as he +intimates in this letter, was the Rev. Mr. Auld, of Mauchline: that +the law of the land and the law of the church were at variance on the +subject no one can deny.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Mossgiel</i>, 9<i>th July</i>, 1786.</p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">My Dear Friend</span>,</p> + +<p>With the sincerest grief I read your letter. You are truly a son of +misfortune. I shall be extremely anxious to hear from you how your +health goes on; if it is in any way re-establishing, or if Leith +promises well; in short, how you feel in the inner man.</p> + +<p>No news worth anything: only godly Bryan was in the inquisition +yesterday, and half the country-side as witness against him. He still +stands out steady and denying: but proof was led yesternight of +circumstances highly suspi<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_328" id="Page_328">[328]</a></span>cious: almost <i>de facto</i> one of the servant +girls made faith that she upon a time rashly entered the house—to +speak in your cant, “in the hour of cause.”</p> + +<p>I have waited on Armour since her return home; not from any the least +view of reconciliation, but merely to ask for her health and—to you I +will confess it—from a foolish hankering fondness—very ill placed +indeed. The mother forbade me the house, nor did Jean show the +penitence that might have been expected. However, the priest, I am +informed, will give me a certificate as a single man, if I comply with +the rules of the church, which for that very reason I intend to do.</p> + +<p>I am going to put on sack-cloth and ashes this day. I am indulged so +far as to appear in my own seat. <i>Peccavi, pater, miserere mei.</i> My +book will be ready in a fortnight. If you have any subscribers, return +them by Connel. The Lord stand with the righteous: amen, amen.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterXXIII" id="letterXXIII"></a>XXIII.</h2> + +<h3>TO JOHN BALLANTYNE,</h3> + +<h4>OF AYR.</h4> + +<p>[There is a plain account in this letter of the destruction of the +lines of marriage which united, as far as a civil contract in a manner +civil can, the poet and Jean Armour. Aiken was consulted, and in +consequence of his advice, the certificate of marriage was destroyed.]</p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">Honoured Sir</span>,</p> + +<p>My proposals came to hand last night, and knowing that you would wish +to have it in your power to do me a service as early as anybody, I +enclose you half a sheet of them. I must consult you, first +opportunity, on the propriety of sending my quondam friend, Mr. Aiken, +a copy. If he is now reconciled to my character as an honest man, I +would do it with all my soul; but I would not be beholden to the +noblest being ever God created, if he imagined me to be a rascal. +Apropos, old Mr. Armour prevailed with him to mutilate that unlucky +paper yesterday. Would you believe it? though I had not a hope, nor +even a wish, to make her mine after her conduct; yet, when he told me +the names were all out of the paper, my heart died within me, and he +cut my veins with the news. Perdition seize her falsehood!</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterXXIV" id="letterXXIV"></a>XXIV.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. DAVID BRICE.</h3> + +<h4>SHOEMAKER, GLASGOW.</h4> + +<p>[The letters of Burns at the sad period of his life are full of his +private sorrows. Had Jean Armour been left to the guidance of her own +heart, the story of her early years would have been brighter.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Mossgiel, 17th July, 1786.</i></p> + +<p>I have been so throng printing my Poems, that I could scarcely find as +much time as to write to you. Poor Armour is come back again to +Mauchline, and I went to call for her, and her mother forbade me the +house, nor did she herself express much sorrow for what she has done. +I have already appeared publicly in church, and was indulged in the +liberty of standing in my own seat. I do this to get a certificate as +a bachelor, which Mr. Auld has promised me. I am now fixed to go for +the West Indies in October. Jean and her friends insisted much that +she should stand along with me in the kirk, but the minister would not +allow it, which bred a great trouble I assure you, and I am blamed as +the cause of it, though I am sure I am innocent; but I am very much +pleased, for all that, not to have had her company. I have no news to +tell you that I remember. I am really happy to hear of your welfare, +and that you are so well in Glasgow. I must certainly see you before I +leave the country. I shall expect to hear from you soon, and am,</p> + +<p class="sig9">Dear Brice,</p> + +<p class="sig">Yours,—R. B</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterXXV" id="letterXXV"></a>XXV.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. JOHN RICHMOND.</h3> + +<p>[When this letter was written the poet was skulking from place to +place: the merciless pack of the law had been uncoupled at his heels. +Mr. Armour did not wish to imprison, but to drive him from the +country.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Old Rome Forest, 30th July, 1786.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">My dear Richmond</span>,</p> + +<p>My hour is now come—you and I will never meet in Britain more. I have +orders within three weeks at farthest, to repair aboard the Nancy, +Captain Smith, from Clyde to Jamaica, and call at Antigua. This, +except to our friend Smith, whom God long preserve, is a secret about +Mauchline. Would you believe it? Armour<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_329" id="Page_329">[329]</a></span> has got a warrant to throw me +in jail till I find security for an enormous sum. This they keep an +entire secret, but I got it by a channel they little dream of; and I +am wandering from one friend’s house to another, and, like a true son +of the gospel, “have nowhere to lay my head.” I know you will pour an +execration on her head, but spare the poor, ill-advised girl, for my +sake; though may all the furies that rend the injured, enraged lover’s +bosom, await her mother until her latest hour! I write in a moment of +rage, reflecting on my miserable situation—exiled, abandoned, +forlorn. I can write no more—let me hear from you by the return of +coach. I will write you ere I go.</p> + +<p class="sig4">I am dear Sir,</p> + +<p class="sig5">Yours, here and hereafter,</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterXXVI" id="letterXXVI"></a>XXVI.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. ROBERT MUIR,</h3> + +<h4>KILMARNOCK.</h4> + +<p>[Burns never tried to conceal either his joys or his sorrows: he sent +copies of his favorite pieces, and intimations of much that befel him +to his chief friends and comrades—this brief note was made to carry +double.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Mossgiel, Friday noon.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">My Friend, my Brother</span>,</p> + +<p>Warm recollection of an absent friend presses so hard upon my heart, +that I send him the prefixed bagatelle (the Calf), pleased with the +thought that it will greet the man of my bosom, and be a kind of +distant language of friendship.</p> + +<p>You will have heard that poor Armour has repaid me double. A very fine +boy and a girl have awakened a thought and feelings that thrill, some +with tender pressure and some with foreboding anguish, through my +soul.</p> + +<p>The poem was nearly an extemporaneous production, on a wager with Mr. +Hamilton, that I would not produce a poem on the subject in a given +time.</p> + +<p>If you think it worth while, read it to Charles and Mr. W. Parker, and +if they choose a copy of it, it is at their service, as they are men +whose friendship I shall be proud to claim, both in this world and +that which is to come.</p> + +<p>I believe all hopes of staying at home will be abortive, but more of +this when, in the latter part of next week, you shall be troubled with +a visit from,</p> + +<p class="sig4">My dear Sir,</p> + +<p class="sig5">Your most devoted,</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterXXVII" id="letterXXVII"></a>XXVII.</h2> + +<h3>TO MRS. DUNLOP,</h3> + +<h4>OF DUNLOP.</h4> + +<p>[Mrs. Dunlop was a poetess, and had the blood of the Wallaces in her +veins: though she disliked the irregularities of the poet, she scorned +to got into a fine moral passion about follies which could not be +helped, and continued her friendship to the last of his life.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Ayrshire</i>, 1786.</p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">Madam</span>,</p> + +<p>I am truly sorry I was not at home yesterday, when I was so much +honoured with your order for my copies, and incomparably more by the +handsome compliments you are pleased to pay my poetic abilities. I am +fully persuaded that there is not any class of mankind so feelingly +alive to the titillations of applause as the sons of Parnassus: nor is +it easy to conceive how the heart of the poor bard dances with +rapture, when those, whose character in life gives them a right to be +polite judges, honour him with their approbation. Had you been +thoroughly acquainted with me, Madam, you could not have touched my +darling heart-chord more sweetly than by noticing my attempts to +celebrate your illustrious ancestor, the Saviour of his Country.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Great patriot hero! ill-requited chief!”<a name="FNanchor_160_160" id="FNanchor_160_160"></a><a href="#Footnote_160_160" class="fnanchor">[160]</a><br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>The first book I met with in my early years, which I perused with +pleasure, was, “The Life Of Hannibal;” the next was, “The History of +Sir William Wallace:” for several of my earlier years I had few other +authors; and many a solitary hour have I stole out, after the +laborious vocations of the day, to shed a tear over their glorious, +but unfortunate stories. In those boyish days I remember, in +particular, being struck with that part of Wallace’s story where these +lines occur—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Syne to the Leglen wood, when it was late,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To make a silent and safe retreat.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>I chose a fine summer Sunday, the only day my line of life allowed, +and walked half a dozen <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_330" id="Page_330">[330]</a></span> +of miles to pay my respects to the Leglen wood, with as much devout +enthusiasm as ever pilgrim did to Loretto; and, as I explored every +den and dell where I could suppose my heroic countryman to have +lodged, I recollect (for even then I was a rhymer) that my heart +glowed with a wish to be able to make a song on him in some measure +equal to his merits.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_160_160" id="Footnote_160_160"></a><a href="#FNanchor_160_160"><span class="label">[160]</span></a> Thomson.</p></div></div> + + +<h2><a name="letterXXVIII" id="letterXXVIII"></a>XXVIII.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. JOHN KENNEDY.</h3> + +<p>[It is a curious chapter in the life of Burns to count the number of +letters which he wrote, the number of fine poems he composed, and the +number of places which he visited in the unhappy summer and autumn of +1786.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Kilmarnock, August</i>, 1786.</p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">My dear Sir</span>,</p> + +<p>Your truly facetious epistle of the 3d inst. gave me much +entertainment. I was sorry I had not the pleasure of seeing you as I +passed your way, but we shall bring up all our lee way on Wednesday, +the 16th current, when I hope to have it in my power to call on you +and take a kind, very probably a last adieu, before I go for Jamaica; +and I expect orders to repair to Greenock every day.—I have at last +made my public appearance, and am solemnly inaugurated into the +numerous class.—Could I have got a carrier, you should have had a +score of vouchers for my authorship; but now you have them, let them +speak for themselves.—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Farewell, my dear friend! may guid luck hit you,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And ‘mang her favourites admit you!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">If e’er Detraction shore to smit you,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">May nane believe him!<br /> +</span> +<span class="i0">And ony de’il that thinks to get you,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Good Lord deceive him.<br /> +</span> +</div></div> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterXXIX" id="letterXXIX"></a>XXIX.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. JAMES BURNESS,</h3> + +<h4>MONTROSE.</h4> + +<p>[The good and generous James Burness, of Montrose, was ever ready to +rejoice with his cousin’s success or sympathize with his sorrows, but +he did not like the change which came over the old northern surname of +Burness, when the bard modified it into Burns: the name now a rising +one in India, is spelt Burnes.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Mossgiel, Tuesday noon, Sept. 26, 1786.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">My dear Sir</span>,</p> + +<p>I this moment receive yours—receive it with the honest hospitable +warmth of a friend’s welcome. Whatever comes from you wakens always up +the better blood about my heart, which your kind little recollections +of my parental friends carries as far as it will go. ’Tis there that +man is blest! ’Tis there, my friend, man feels a consciousness of +something within him above the trodden clod! The grateful reverence to +the hoary (earthly) author of his being—the burning glow when he +clasps the woman of his soul to his bosom—the tender yearnings of +heart for the little angels to whom he has given existence—these +nature has poured in milky streams about the human heart; and the man +who never rouses them to action, by the inspiring influences of their +proper objects, loses by far the most pleasurable part of his +existence.</p> + +<p>My departure is uncertain, but I do not think it will be till after +harvest. I will be on very short allowance of time indeed, if I do not +comply with your friendly invitation. When it will be I don’t know, +but if I can make my wish good, I will endeavour to drop you a line +some time before. My best compliments to Mrs. ——; I should [be] +equally mortified should I drop in when she is abroad, but of that I +suppose there is little chance.</p> + +<p>What I have wrote heaven knows; I have not time to review it; so +accept of it in the beaten way of friendship. With the ordinary +phrase—perhaps rather more than the ordinary sincerity,</p> + +<p class="sig5">I am, dear Sir,</p> + +<p class="sig9">Ever yours,</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterXXX" id="letterXXX"></a>XXX.</h2> + +<h3>TO MISS ALEXANDER.</h3> + +<p>[This letter, Robert Chambers says, concluded with requesting Miss +Alexander to allow the poet to print the song which it enclosed, in a +second edition of his Poems. Her neglect in not replying to this +request is a very good poetic reason for his wrath. Many of Burns’s +letters have been printed, it is right to say, from the rough drafts +found among the poet’s papers at his death. This is one.]<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_331" id="Page_331">[331]</a></span></p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Mossgiel, 18th Nov. 1786.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">Madam</span>,</p> + +<p>Poets are such outré beings, so much the children of wayward fancy and +capricious whim, that I believe the world generally allows them a +larger latitude in the laws of propriety, than the sober sons of +judgment and prudence. I mention this as an apology for the liberties +that a nameless stranger has taken with you in the enclosed poem, +which he begs leave to present you with. Whether it has poetical merit +any way worthy of the theme, I am not the proper judge; but it is the +best my abilities can produce; and what to a good heart will, perhaps, +be a superior grace, it is equally sincere as fervent.</p> + +<p>The scenery was nearly taken from real life, though I dare say, Madam, +you do not recollect it, as I believe you scarcely noticed the poetic +reveur as he wandered by you. I had roved out as chance directed, in +the favourite haunts of my muse on the banks of the Ayr, to view +nature in all the gayety of the vernal year. The evening sun was +flaming over the distant western hills; not a breath stirred the +crimson opening blossom, or the verdant spreading leaf. It was a +golden moment for a poetic heart. I listened to the feathered +warblers, pouring their harmony on every hand, with a congenial +kindred regard, and frequently turned out of my path, lest I should +disturb their little songs, or frighten them to another station. +Surely, said I to myself, he must be a wretch indeed, who, regardless +of your harmonious endeavour to please him, can eye your elusive +flights to discover your secret recesses, and to rob you of all the +property nature gives you—your dearest comforts, your helpless +nestlings. Even the hoary hawthorn twig that shot across the way, what +heart at such a time but must have been interested in its welfare, and +wished it preserved from the rudely-browsing cattle, or the withering +eastern blast? Such was the scene,—and such the hour, when, in a +corner of my prospect, I spied one of the fairest pieces of nature’s +workmanship that ever crowned a poetic landscape or met a poet’s eye, +those visionary bards excepted, who hold commerce with aërial beings! +Had Calumny and Villany taken my walk, they had at that moment sworn +eternal peace with such an object.</p> + +<p>What an hour of inspiration for a poet! It would have raised plain +dull historic prose into metaphor measure.</p> + +<p>The enclosed song was the work of my return home: and perhaps it but +poorly answers what might have been expected from such a scene.</p> + +<p class="sig3">I have the honour to be,</p> + +<p class="sig4">Madam,</p> + +<p class="sig5">Your most obedient and very</p> + +<p class="sig9">humble Servant,</p> + +<p class="sig">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterXXXI" id="letterXXXI"></a>XXXI.</h2> + +<h3>TO MRS. STEWART,</h3> + +<h4>OF STAIR AND AFTON.</h4> + +<p>[Mrs. Stewart, of Stair and Afton, was the first person of note in the +West who had the taste to see and feel the genius of Burns. He used to +relate how his heart fluttered when he first walked into the parlour +of the towers of Stair, to hear the lady’s opinion of some of his +songs.]</p> + +<p class="sig">[1786]</p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">Madam</span>,</p> + +<p>The hurry of my preparations for going abroad has hindered me from +performing my promise so soon as I intended. I have here sent you a +parcel of songs, &c., which never made their appearance, except to a +friend or two at most. Perhaps some of them may be no great +entertainment to you, but of that I am far from being an adequate +judge. The song to the tune of “Ettrick Banks” [The bonnie lass of +Ballochmyle] you will easily see the impropriety of exposing much, +even in manuscript. I think, myself, it has some merit: both as a +tolerable description of one of nature’s sweetest scenes, a July +evening, and one of the finest pieces of nature’s workmanship, the +finest indeed we know anything of, an amiable, beautiful young +woman;<a name="FNanchor_161_161" id="FNanchor_161_161"></a><a href="#Footnote_161_161" class="fnanchor">[161]</a> but I have no common friend to procure me that permission, +without which I would not dare to spread the copy.</p> + +<p>I am quite aware, Madam, what task the world would assign me in this +letter. The obscure bard, when any of the great condescend to take +notice of him, should heap the altar with the incense of flattery. +Their high ancestry, their own great and godlike qualities and +actions, should be recounted with the most exaggerated description. +This, Madam, is a task for which I am altogether unfit. Besides a +certain disqualifying pride of heart, I know nothing of your +connexions in life, and have no access to where <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_332" id="Page_332">[332]</a></span> your real character is to be found—the company of your compeers: and more, I am afraid that even the most refined adulation is by no means +the road to your good opinion.</p> + +<p>One feature of your character I shall ever with grateful pleasure +remember;—the reception I got when I had the honour of waiting on you +at Stair. I am little acquainted with politeness, but I know a good +deal of benevolence of temper and goodness of heart. Surely did those +in exalted stations know how happy they could make some classes of +their inferiors by condescension and affability, they would never +stand so high, measuring out with every look the height of their +elevation, but condescend as sweetly as did Mrs. Stewart of Stair.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + + + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_161_161" id="Footnote_161_161"></a><a href="#FNanchor_161_161"><span class="label">[161]</span></a> Miss Alexander.</p></div> +</div> + + + +<h2><a name="letterXXXII" id="letterXXXII"></a>XXXII.</h2> + +<h3>IN THE NAME OF THE NINE. AMEN.</h3> +<p>[The song or ballad which one of the “Deil’s yeld Nowte” was commanded +to burn, was “Holy Willie’s Prayer,” it is believed. Currie interprets +the “Deil’s yeld Nowte,” to mean old bachelors, which, if right, +points to some other of his compositions, for purgation by fire. +Gilbert Burns says it is a scoffing appellation sometimes given to +sheriff’s officers and other executors of the law.]</p> + +<p>We, Robert Burns, by virtue of a warrant from Nature, bearing date the +twenty-fifth day of January, Anno Domini one thousand seven hundred +and fifty-nine,<a name="FNanchor_162_162" id="FNanchor_162_162"></a><a href="#Footnote_162_162" class="fnanchor">[162]</a> Poet Laureat, and Bard in Chief, in and over the +districts and countries of Kyle, Cunningham, and Carrick, of old +extent, To our trusty and well-beloved William Chalmers and John +M’Adam, students and practitioners in the ancient and mysterious +science of confounding right and wrong.</p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">Right Trusty</span>:</p> + +<p>Be it known unto you that whereas in the course of our care and +watchings over the order and police of all and sundry the +manufacturers, retainers, and venders of poesy; bards, poets, +poetasters, rhymers, jinglers, songsters, ballad-singers, &c. &c. &c. +&c., male and female—We have discovered a certain nefarious, +abominable, and wicked song or ballad, a copy whereof We have here +enclosed; Our Will therefore is, that Ye pitch upon and appoint the +most execrable individual of that most execrable species, known by the +appellation, phrase, and nick-name of The Deil’s Yeld Nowte: and after +having caused him to kindle a fire at the Cross of Ayr, ye shall, at +noontide of the day, put into the said wretch’s merciless hands the +said copy of the said nefarious and wicked song, to be consumed by +fire in the presence of all beholders, in abhorrence of, and terrorem +to, all such compositions and composers. And this in nowise leave ye +undone, but have it executed in every point as this our mandate bears, +before the twenty-fourth current, when in person We hope to applaud +your faithfulness and zeal.</p> + +<p>Given at Mauchline this twentieth day of November, Anno Domini one +thousand seven hundred and eighty-six.</p> + +<p class="sig7">God save the Bard!</p> + + + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_162_162" id="Footnote_162_162"></a><a href="#FNanchor_162_162"><span class="label">[162]</span></a> His birth-day.</p></div> +</div> + + + +<h2><a name="letterXXXIII" id="letterXXXIII"></a>XXXIII.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. ROBERT MUIR.</h3> + +<p>[The expedition to Edinburgh, to which this short letter alludes, was +undertaken, it is needless to say, in consequence of a warm and +generous commendation of the genius of Burns written by Dr. Blacklock, +to the Rev. Mr. Lawrie, and communicated by Gavin Hamilton to the +poet, when he was on the wing for the West Indies.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Mossgiel, 18th Nov., 1786.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">My dear Sir</span>,</p> + +<p>Enclosed you have “Tam Samson,” as I intend to print him. I am +thinking for my Edinburgh expedition on Monday or Tuesday, come +se’ennight, for pos. I will see you on Tuesday first.</p> + +<p class="sig4">I am ever,</p> + +<p class="sig5">Your much indebted,</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterXXXIV" id="letterXXXIV"></a>XXXIV.</h2> + +<h3>TO DR. MACKENZIE,</h3> + +<h4>MAUCHLINE;</h4> + +<p class="std1">ENCLOSING THE VERSES ON DINING WITH LORD DAER.</p> + +<p>[To the kind and venerable Dr. Mackenzie, the poet was indebted for +some valuable friendships, and his biographers for some valuable +information respecting the early days of Burns.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Wednesday Morning.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">Dear Sir</span>,</p> + +<p>I never spent an afternoon among great folks with half that pleasure +as when, in company with you, I had the honour of paying my devoirs to +the plain, honest, worthy man, the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_333" id="Page_333">[333]</a></span> professor. [Dugald Stewart.] I +would be delighted to see him perform acts of kindness and friendship, +though I were not the object; he does it with such a grace. I think +his character, divided into ten parts, stands thus—four parts +Socrates—four parts Nathaniel—and two parts Shakspeare’s Brutus.</p> + +<p>The foregoing verses were really extempore, but a little corrected +since. They may entertain you a little with the help of that +partiality with which you are so good as to favour the performances +of,</p> + +<p class="sig4">Dear Sir,</p> + +<p class="sig5">Your very humble servant,</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterXXXV" id="letterXXXV"></a>XXXV.</h2> + +<h3>TO GAVIN HAMILTON, ESQ.,</h3> + +<h4>MAUCHLINE.</h4> + +<p>[From Gavin Hamilton Burns and his brother took the farm of Mossgiel: +the landlord was not slow in perceiving the genius of Robert: he had +him frequently at his table, and the poet repaid this notice by verse +not likely soon to die.]</p> + +<p class="sig">Edinburgh, Dec. 7th, 1786.</p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">Honoured Sir,</span></p> + +<p>I have paid every attention to your commands, but can only say what +perhaps you will have heard before this reach you, that Muirkirklands +were bought by a John Gordon, W.S., but for whom I know not; +Mauchlands, Haugh, Miln, &c., by a Frederick Fotheringham, supposed to +be for Ballochmyle Laird, and Adamhill and Shawood were bought for +Oswald’s folks.—This is so imperfect an account, and will be so late +ere it reach you, that were it not to discharge my conscience I would +not trouble you with it; but after all my diligence I could make it no +sooner nor better.</p> + +<p>For my own affairs, I am in a fair way of becoming as eminent as +Thomas à Kempis or John Bunyan; and you may expect henceforth to see +my birth-day inserted among the wonderful events, in the Poor Robin’s +and Aberdeen Almanacks, along with the Black Monday, and the battle of +Bothwell bridge.—My Lord Glencairn and the Dean of Faculty, Mr. H. +Erskine, have taken me under their wing; and by all probability I +shall soon be the tenth worthy, and the eighth wise man in the world. +Through my lord’s influence it is inserted in the records of the +Caledonian Hunt, that they universally, one and all, subscribe for the +second edition.—My subscription bills come out to-morrow, and you +shall have some of them next post.—I have met, in Mr. Dalrymple, of +Orangefield, what Solomon emphatically calls “a friend that sticketh +closer than a brother.”—The warmth with which he interests himself in +my affairs is of the same enthusiastic kind which you, Mr. Aiken, and +the few patrons that took notice of my earlier poetic days, showed for +the poor unlucky devil of a poet.</p> + +<p>I always remember Mrs. Hamilton and Miss Kennedy in my poetic prayers, +but you both in prose and verse.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">May cauld ne’er catch you but a hap,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Nor hunger but in plenty’s lap!<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Amen!<br /> +</span> +</div></div> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterXXXVI" id="letterXXXVI"></a>XXXVI.</h2> + +<h3>TO JOHN BALLANTYNE, ESQ.,</h3> + +<h4>BANKER, AYR.</h4> + +<p>[This is the second letter which Burns wrote, after his arrival in +Edinburgh, and it is remarkable because it distinctly imputes his +introduction to the Earl of Glencairn, to Dalrymple, of Orangefield; +though he elsewhere says this was done by Mr. Dalzell;—perhaps both +those gentlemen had a hand in this good deed.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Edinburgh, 13th Dec. 1786.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">My Honoured Friend</span>,</p> + +<p>I would not write you till I could have it in my power to give you +some account of myself and my matters, which, by the by, is often no +easy task.—I arrived here on Tuesday was se’ennight, and have +suffered ever since I came to town with a miserable headache and +stomach complaint, but am now a good deal better.—I have found a +worthy warm friend in Mr. Dalrymple, of Orangefield, who introduced me +to Lord Glencairn, a man whose worth and brotherly kindness to me, I +shall remember when time shall be no more.—By his interest it is +passed in the “Caledonian Hunt,” and entered in their books, that they +are to take each a copy of the second edition, for which they are to +pay one guinea.—I have been introduced to a good many of the +noblesse, but my avowed patrons and patronesses are the Duchess of +Gordon—the Countess of Glencairn, with my Lord, and Lady +Betty<a name="FNanchor_163_163" id="FNanchor_163_163"></a><a href="#Footnote_163_163" class="fnanchor">[163]</a>—the Dean of Faculty—Sir John Whitefoord—I <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_334" id="Page_334">[334]</a></span> have likewise warm friends among the literati; Professors Stewart, Blair, and Mr. Mackenzie—the Man of Feeling.—An unknown hand left +ten guineas for the Ayrshire bard with Mr. Sibbald, which I got.—I +since have discovered my generous unknown friend to be Patrick Miller, +Esq., brother to the Justice Clerk; and drank a glass of claret with +him, by invitation, at his own house, yesternight. I am nearly agreed +with Creech to print my book, and I suppose I will begin on Monday. I +will send a subscription bill or two, next post; when I intend writing +my first kind patron, Mr. Aiken. I saw his son to-day, and he is very +well.</p> + +<p>Dugald Stewart, and some of my learned friends, put me in the +periodical paper, called The Lounger,<a name="FNanchor_164_164" id="FNanchor_164_164"></a><a href="#Footnote_164_164" class="fnanchor">[164]</a> a copy of which I here +enclose you.—I was, Sir, when I was first honoured with your notice, +too obscure; now I tremble lest I should be ruined by being dragged +too suddenly into the glare of polite and learned observation.</p> + +<p>I shall certainly, my ever honoured patron, write you an account of my +every step; and better health and more spirits may enable me to make +it something better than this stupid matter-of-fact epistle.</p> + +<p class="sig3">I have the honour to be,</p> + +<p class="sig5">Good Sir,</p> + +<p class="sig4">Your ever grateful humble servant,</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<p>If any of my friends write me, my direction is, care of Mr. Creech, +bookseller.</p> + + + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_163_163" id="Footnote_163_163"></a><a href="#FNanchor_163_163"><span class="label">[163]</span></a> Lady Betty Cunningham.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_164_164" id="Footnote_164_164"></a><a href="#FNanchor_164_164"><span class="label">[164]</span></a> The paper here alluded to, was written by Mr. Mackenzie, +the celebrated author of “The Man of Feeling.”</p></div> +</div> + + + +<h2><a name="letterXXXVII" id="letterXXXVII"></a>XXXVII.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. ROBERT MUIR.</h3> + +<p>[“Muir, thy weaknesses,” says Burns, writing of this gentleman to Mrs. +Dunlop, “thy weaknesses were the aberrations of human nature; but thy +heart glowed with everything generous, manly, and noble: and if ever +emanation from the All-good Being animated a human form, it was +thine.”]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Edinburgh, Dec. 20th, 1786.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">My dear Friend</span>,</p> + +<p>I have just time for the carrier, to tell you that I received your +letter; of which I shall say no more but what a lass of my +acquaintance said of her bastard wean; she said she “did na ken wha +was the father exactly, but she suspected it was some o’ the bonny +blackguard smugglers, for it was like them.” So I only say your +obliging epistle was like you. I enclose you a parcel of subscription +bills. Your affair of sixty copies is also like you; but it would not +be like me to comply.</p> + +<p>Your friend’s notion of my life has put a crotchet in my head of +sketching it in some future epistle to you. My compliments to Charles +and Mr. Parker.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterXXXVIII" id="letterXXXVIII"></a>XXXVIII.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. WILLIAM CHALMERS,</h3> + +<h4>WRITER, AYR.</h4> + +<p>[William Chalmers drew out the assignment of the copyright of Burns’s +Poems, in favour of his brother Gilbert, and for the maintenance of +his natural child, when engaged to go to the West Indies, in the +autumn of 1786.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Edinburgh, Dec. 27, 1786.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">My dear Friend</span>,</p> + +<p>I confess I have sinned the sin for which there is hardly any +forgiveness—ingratitude to friendship—in not writing you sooner; but +of all men living, I had intended to have sent you an entertaining +letter; and by all the plodding, stupid powers, that in nodding, +conceited majesty, preside over the dull routine of business—a +heavily solemn oath this!—I am, and have been, ever since I came to +Edinburgh, as unfit to write a letter of humour, as to write a +commentary on the Revelation of St. John the Divine, who was banished +to the Isle of Patmos, by the cruel and bloody Domitian, son to +Vespasian and brother to Titus, both emperors of Rome, and who was +himself an emperor, and raised the second or third persecution, I +forget which, against the Christians, and after throwing the said +Apostle John, brother to the Apostle James, commonly called James the +Greater, to distinguish him from another James, who was, on some +account or other, known by the name of James the Less—after throwing +him into a cauldron of boiling oil, from which he was miraculously +preserved, he banished the poor son of Zebedee to a desert island in +the Archipelago, where he was gifted with the second sight, and saw as +many wild beasts as I have seen since I came to Edinburgh; which, a +circumstance not<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_335" id="Page_335">[335]</a></span> very uncommon in story-telling, brings me back to +where I set out.</p> + +<p>To make you some amends for what, before you reach this paragraph, you +will have suffered, I enclose you two poems I have carded and spun +since I past Glenbuck.</p> + +<p>One blank in the address to Edinburgh—“Fair B——,” is heavenly Miss +Burnet, daughter to Lord Monboddo, at whose house I have had the +honour to be more than once. There has not been anything nearly like +her in all the combinations of beauty, grace, and goodness the great +Creator has formed since Milton’s Eve on the first day of her +existence.</p> + +<p>My direction is—care of Andrew Bruce, merchant, Bridge-street.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterXXXIX" id="letterXXXIX"></a>XXXIX.</h2> + +<h3>TO THE EARL OF EGLINTOUN.</h3> + +<p>[Archibald Montgomery, eleventh Earl of Eglinton, and Colonel Hugh +Montgomery, of Coilsfield, who succeeded his brother in his titles and +estates, were patrons, and kind ones, of Burns.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Edinburgh, January</i> 1787.</p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">My Lord,</span></p> + +<p>As I have but slender pretensions to philosophy, I cannot rise to the +exalted ideas of a citizen of the world, but have all those national +prejudices, which I believe glow peculiarly strong in the breast of a +Scotchman. There is scarcely anything to which I am so feelingly alive +as the honour and welfare of my country: and, as a poet, I have no +higher enjoyment than singing her sons and daughters. Fate had cast my +station in the veriest shades of life; but never did a heart pant more +ardently than mine to be distinguished; though, till very lately, I +looked in vain on every side for a ray of light. It is easy then to +guess how much I was gratified with the countenance and approbation of +one of my country’s most illustrious sons, when Mr. Wauchope called on +me yesterday on the part of your lordship. Your munificence, my lord, +certainly deserves my very grateful acknowledgments; but your +patronage is a bounty peculiarly suited to my feelings. I am not +master enough of the etiquette of life to know, whether there be not +some impropriety in troubling your lordship with my thanks, but my +heart whispered me to do it. From the emotions of my inmost soul I do +it. Selfish ingratitude I hope I am incapable of; and mercenary +servility, I trust, I shall ever have so much honest pride as to +detest.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterXL" id="letterXL"></a>XL.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. GAVIN HAMILTON.</h3> + +<p>[This letter was first published by Hubert Chambers, who considered it +as closing the enquiry, “was Burns a married man?” No doubt Burns +thought himself unmarried, and the Rev. Mr. Auld was of the same +opinion, since he offered him a certificate that he was single: but no +opinion of priest or lawyer, including the disclamation of Jean +Armour, and the belief of Burns, could have, in my opinion, barred the +claim of the children to full legitimacy, according to the law of +Scotland.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Edinburgh, Jan.</i> 7, 1787.</p> + +<p>To tell the truth among friends, I feel a miserable blank in my heart, +with the want of her, and I don’t think I shall ever meet with so +delicious an armful again. She has her faults; and so have you and I; +and so has everybody:</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Their tricks and craft hae put me daft;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">They’ve ta’en me in and a’ that;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But clear your decks, and here’s the sex,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I like the jads for a’ that.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">For a’ that and a’ that,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">And twice as muckle’s a’ that.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p>I have met with a very pretty girl, a Lothian farmer’s daughter, whom +I have almost persuaded to accompany me to the west country, should I +ever return to settle there. By the bye, a Lothian farmer is about an +Ayrshire squire of the lower kind; and I had a most delicious ride +from Leith to her house yesternight, in a hackney-coach with her +brother and two sisters, and brother’s wife. We had dined altogether +at a common friend’s house in Leith, and danced, drank, and sang till +late enough. The night was dark, the claret had been good, and I +thirsty. * * * * *</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterXLI" id="letterXLI"></a>XLI.</h2> + +<h3>TO JOHN BALLANTYNE, ESQ.</h3> + +<p>[This letter contains the first intimation that the poet desired to +resume the labours of the farmer. The old<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_336" id="Page_336">[336]</a></span> saw of “Willie Gaw’s +Skate,” he picked up from his mother, who had a vast collection of +such sayings.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Edinburgh, Jan. 14, 1787.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">My Honoured Friend</span>,</p> + +<p>It gives me a secret comfort to observe in myself that I am not yet so +far gone as Willie Gaw’s Skate, “past redemption;” for I have still +this favourable symptom of grace, that when my conscience, as in the +case of this letter, tells me I am leaving something undone that I +ought to do, it teases me eternally till I do it.</p> + +<p>I am still “dark as was Chaos”<a name="FNanchor_165_165" id="FNanchor_165_165"></a><a href="#Footnote_165_165" class="fnanchor">[165]</a> in respect to futurity. My generous +friend, Mr. Patrick Miller, has been talking with me about a lease of +some farm or other in an estate called Dalswinton, which he has lately +bought, near Dumfries. Some life-rented embittering recollections +whisper me that I will be happier anywhere than in my old +neighbourhood, but Mr. Miller is no judge of land; and though I dare +say he means to favour me, yet he may give me, in his opinion, an +advantageous bargain that may ruin me. I am to take a tour by Dumfries +as I return, and have promised to meet Mr. Miller on his lands some +time in May.</p> + +<p>I went to a mason-lodge yesternight, where the most Worshipful Grand +Master Charters, and all the Grand Lodge of Scotland visited. The +meeting was numerous and elegant; all the different lodges about town +were present, in all their pomp. The Grand Master, who presided with +great solemnity and honour to himself as a gentleman and mason, among +other general toasts, gave “Caledonia, and Caledonia’s Bard, Brother +Burns,” which rung through the whole assembly with multiplied honours +and repeated acclamations. As I had no idea such a thing would happen, +I was downright thunderstruck, and, trembling in every nerve, made the +best return in my power. Just as I had finished, some of the grand +officers said, so loud that I could hear, with a most comforting +accent, “Very well indeed!” which set me something to rights again.</p> + +<p>I have to-day corrected my 152d page. My best good wishes to Mr. +Aiken.</p> + +<p class="sig4">I am ever,</p> + +<p class="sig5">Dear Sir,</p> + +<p class="sig4">Your much indebted humble servant,</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + + + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_165_165" id="Footnote_165_165"></a><a href="#FNanchor_165_165"><span class="label">[165]</span></a> See Blair’s Grave. This was a favourite quotation with +Burns.</p></div> +</div> + + + +<h2><a name="letterXLII" id="letterXLII"></a>XLII.</h2> + +<h3>TO JOHN BALLANTYNE.</h3> + +<p>[I have not hesitated to insert all letters which show what Burns was +musing on as a poet, or planning as a man.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>January </i>——, 1787.</p> + +<p>While here I sit, sad and solitary by the side of a fire in a little +country inn, and drying my wet clothes, in pops a poor fellow of +sodger, and tells me he is going to Ayr. By heavens! say I to myself, +with a tide of good spirits which the magic of that sound, Auld Toon +o’ Ayr, conjured up, I will sent my last song to Mr. Ballantyne. Here +it is—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Ye flowery banks o’ bonnie Doon,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">How can ye blume sae fair;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">How can ye chant, ye little birds,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And I sae fu’ o’ care!<a name="FNanchor_166_166" id="FNanchor_166_166"></a><a href="#Footnote_166_166" class="fnanchor">[166]</a><br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_166_166" id="Footnote_166_166"></a><a href="#FNanchor_166_166"><span class="label">[166]</span></a> <a href="#songsCXXXI">Song CXXXI.</a></p> +</div> +</div> + + + +<h2><a name="letterXLIII" id="letterXLIII"></a>XLIII.</h2> + +<h3>TO MRS. DUNLOP.</h3> + +<p>[The friendship of Mrs. Dunlop purified, while it strengthened the +national prejudices of Burns.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Edinburgh, 15th January</i>, 1787.</p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">Madam</span>,</p> + +<p>Yours of the 9th current, which I am this moment honoured with, is a +deep reproach to me for ungrateful neglect. I will tell you the real +truth, for I am miserably awkward at a fib—I wished to have written +to Dr. Moore before I wrote to you; but though every day since I +received yours of December 30th, the idea, the wish to write to him +has constantly pressed on my thoughts, yet I could not for my soul set +about it. I know his fame and character, and I am one of “the sons of +little men.” To write him a mere matter-of-fact affair, like a +merchant’s order, would be disgracing the little character I have; and +to write the author of “The View of Society and Manners” a letter of +sentiment—I declare every artery runs cold at the thought. I shall +try, however, to write to him to-morrow or next day. His kind +interposition in my behalf I have already experienced, as a gentleman +waited on me the other day, on the part of Lord Eglintoun, with ten +guineas, by<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_337" id="Page_337">[337]</a></span> way of subscription for two copies of my next edition.</p> + +<p>The word you object to in the mention I have made of my glorious +countryman and your immortal ancestor, is indeed borrowed from +Thomson; but it does not strike me us an improper epithet. I +distrusted my own judgment on your finding fault with it, and applied +for the opinion of some of the literati here, who honour me with their +critical strictures, and they all allow it to be proper. The song you +ask I cannot recollect, and I have not a copy of it. I have not +composed anything on the great Wallace, except what you have, seen in +print; and the enclosed, which I will print in this edition. You will +see I have mentioned some others of the name. When I composed my +“Vision” long ago, I had attempted a description of Koyle, of which +the additional stanzas are a part, as it originally stood. My heart +glows with a wish to be able to do justice to the merits of the +“Saviour of his Country,” which sooner or later I shall at least +attempt.</p> + +<p>You are afraid I shall grow intoxicated with my prosperity as a poet; +alas! Madam, I know myself and the world too well. I do not mean any +airs of affected modesty; I am willing to believe that my abilities +deserve some notice; but in a most enlightened, informed age and +nation, when poetry is and has been the study of man of the first +natural genius, aided with all the powers of polite learning, polite +books, and polite company—to be dragged forth to the full glare of +learned and polite observation, with all my imperfections of awkward +rusticity and crude unpolished ideas on my head—I assure you, Madam, +I do not dissemble when I tell you I tremble for the consequences. The +novelty of a poet in my obscure situation, without any of those +advantages which are reckoned necessary for that character, at least +at this time of day, has raised a partial tide of public notice which +has borne me to a height, where I am absolutely, feelingly certain, my +abilities are inadequate to support me; and too surely do I see that +time when the same tide will leave me, and recede, perhaps, as far +below the mark of truth. I do not say this in the ridiculous +affectation of self-abasement and modesty. I have studied myself, and +know what ground I occupy; and, however a friend or the world may +differ from me in that particular, I stand for my own opinion, in +silent resolve, with all the tenaciousness of property. I mention this +to you once for all to disburthen my mind, and I do not wish to hear +or say more about it—But,</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“When proud fortune’s ebbing tide recedes,”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>you will bear me witness, that when my bubble of fame was at the +highest, I stood unintoxicated with the inebriating cup in my hand, +looking forward with rueful resolve to the hastening time, when the +blow of Calumny should dash it to the ground with all the eagerness of +vengeful triumph.</p> + +<p>Your patronizing me and interesting yourself in my fame and character +as a poet, I rejoice in; it exalts me in my own idea; and whether you +can or cannot aid me in my subscription is a trifle. Has a paltry +subscription-bill any charms to the heart of a bard, compared with the +patronage of the descendant of the immortal Wallace?</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterXLIV" id="letterXLIV"></a>XLIV.</h2> + +<h3>TO DR. MOORE.</h3> + +<p>[Dr. Moore, the accomplished author of Zeluco and father of Sir John +Moore, interested himself in the fame and fortune of Burns, as soon as +the publication of his Poems made his name known to the world.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Edinburgh, Jan. 1787.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">Sir</span>,</p> + +<p>Mrs. Dunlop has been so kind as to send me extracts of letters she has +had from you, where you do the rustic bard the honour of noticing him +and his works. Those who have felt the anxieties and solicitudes of +authorship, can only know what pleasure it gives to be noticed in such +a manner, by judges of the first character. Your criticism, Sir, I +receive with reverence; only I am sorry they mostly came too late: a +peccant passage or two that I would certainly have altered, were gone +to the press.</p> + +<p>The hope to be admired for ages, is, in by far the greater part of +those even who are authors of repute, an unsubstantial dream. For my +part, my first ambition was, and still my strongest wish is, to please +my compeers, the rustic inmates of the hamlet, while ever-changing +language and manners shall allow me to be relished and understood. I +am very willing to admit that I have some poetical abilities; and as +few, if any, writers, either moral or poetical, are intimately +acquainted with the classes of mankind<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_338" id="Page_338">[338]</a></span> among whom I have chiefly +mingled, I may have seen men and manners in a different phasis from +what is common, which may assist originality of thought. Still I know +very well the novelty of my character has by far the greatest share in +the learned and polite notice I have lately had; and in a language +where Pope and Churchill have raised the laugh, and Shenstone and Gray +drawn the tear; where Thomson and Beattie have painted the landscape, +and Lyttelton and Collins described the heart, I am not vain enough to +hope for distinguished poetic fame.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterXLV" id="letterXLV"></a>XLV.</h2> + +<h3>TO THE REV. G. LAURIE,</h3> + +<h4>NEWMILLS, NEAR KILMARNOCK.</h4> + +<p>[It has been said in the Life of Burns, that for some time after he +went to Edinburgh, he did not visit Dr. Blacklock, whose high opinion +of his genius induced him to try his fortune in that city: it will be +seen by this letter that he had neglected also, for a time, at least, +to write to Dr. Laurie, who introduced him to the Doctor.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Edinburgh, Feb. 5th, 1787.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">Reverend and Dear Sir</span>,</p> + +<p>When I look at the date of your kind letter, my heart reproaches me +severely with ingratitude in neglecting so long to answer it. I will +not trouble you with any account, by way of apology, of my hurried +life and distracted attention: do me the justice to believe that my +delay by no means proceeded from want of respect. I feel, and ever +shall feel for you the mingled sentiments of esteem for a friend and +reverence for a father.</p> + +<p>I thank you, Sir, with all my soul for your friendly hints, though I +do not need them so much as my friends are apt to imagine. You are +dazzled with newspaper accounts and distant reports; but, in reality, +I have no great temptation to be intoxicated with the cup of +prosperity. Novelty may attract the attention of mankind awhile; to it +I owe my present éclat; but I see the time not far distant when the +popular tide which has borne me to a height of which I am, perhaps, +unworthy, shall recede with silent celerity, and leave me a barren +waste of sand, to descend at my leisure to my former station. I do not +say this in the affectation of modesty; I see the consequence is +unavoidable, and am prepared for it. I had been at a good deal of +pains to form a just, impartial estimate of my intellectual powers +before I came here; I have not added, since I came to Edinburgh, +anything to the account; and I trust I shall take every atom of it +back to my shades, the coverts of my unnoticed, early years.</p> + +<p>In Dr. Blacklock, whom I see very often, I have found what I would +have expected in our friend, a clear head and an excellent heart.</p> + +<p>By far the most agreeable hours I spend in Edinburgh must be placed to +the account of Miss Laurie and her piano-forte. I cannot help +repeating to you and Mrs. Laurie a compliment that Mr. Mackenzie, the +celebrated “Man of Feeling,” paid to Miss Laurie, the other night, at +the concert. I had come in at the interlude, and sat down by him till +I saw Miss Laurie in a seat not very distant, and went up to pay my +respects to her. On my return to Mr. Mackenzie he asked me who she +was; I told him ’twas the daughter of a reverend friend of mine in the +west country. He returned, there was something very striking, to his +idea, in her appearance. On my desiring to know what it was, he was +pleased to say, “She has a great deal of the elegance of a well-bred +lady about her, with all the sweet simplicity of a country girl.”</p> + +<p>My compliments to all the happy inmates of St. Margaret’s.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterXLVI" id="letterXLVI"></a>XLVI.</h2> + +<h3>TO DR. MOORE.</h3> + +<p>[In the answer to this letter, Dr. Moore says that the poet was a +great favourite in his family, and that his youngest son, at +Winchester school, had translated part of “Halloween” into Latin +verse, for the benefit of his comrades.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Edinburgh, 15th February, 1787.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">Sir</span>,</p> + +<p>Pardon my seeming neglect in delaying so long to acknowledge the +honour you have done me, in your kind notice of me, January 23d. Not +many months ago I knew no other employment than following the plough, +nor could boast anything higher than a distant acquaintance with a +country clergyman. Mere greatness never embarrasses me; I have nothing +to ask from the great, and I do not fear their judgment: but genius, +polished by learning, and at its proper point of elevation in the eye +of the world, this of late I frequently meet with, and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_339" id="Page_339">[339]</a></span> tremble at its +approach. I scorn the affectation of seeming modesty to cover +self-conceit. That I have some merit I do not deny; but I see with +frequent wringings of heart, that the novelty of my character, and the +honest national prejudice of my countrymen, have borne me to a height +altogether untenable to my abilities.</p> + +<p>For the honour Miss Williams has done me, please, Sir, return her in +my name my most grateful thanks. I have more than once thought of +paying her in kind, but have hitherto quitted the idea in hopeless +despondency. I had never before heard of her; but the other day I got +her poems, which for several reasons, some belonging to the head, and +others the offspring of the heart, give me a great deal of pleasure. I +have little pretensions to critic lore; there are, I think, two +characteristic features in her poetry—the unfettered wild flight of +native genius, and the querulous sombre tenderness of “time-settled +sorrow.”</p> + +<p>I only know what pleases me, often without being able to tell why.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterXLVII" id="letterXLVII"></a>XLVII.</h2> + +<h3>TO JOHN BALLANTYNE, ESQ.</h3> + +<p>[The picture from which Beugo engraved the portrait alluded to in this +letter, was painted by the now venerable Alexander Nasmyth—the eldest +of living British artists:—it is, with the exception of a profile by +Miers, the only portrait for which we are quite sure that the poet +sat.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Edinburgh, Feb. 24th, 1787.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">My honoured Friend</span>,</p> + +<p>I will soon be with you now, in guid black prent;—in a week or ten +days at farthest. I am obliged, against my own wish, to print +subscribers’ names; so if any of my Ayr friends have subscription +bills, they must be sent in to Creech directly. I am getting my phiz +done by an eminent engraver, and if it can be ready in time, I will +appear in my book, looking like all other <i>fools</i> to my title-page.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterXLVIII" id="letterXLVIII"></a>XLVIII.</h2> + +<h3>TO THE EARL OF GLENCAIRN.</h3> + +<p>[The Earl of Glencairn seems to have refused, from motives of +delicacy, the request of the poet: the verses, long lost, were at last +found, and are now, through the kindness of my friend, Major James +Glencairn Burns, printed with the rest of his eminent father’s works.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Edinburgh, 1787</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">My Lord</span>,</p> + +<p>I wanted to purchase a profile of your lordship, which I was told was +to be got in town; but I am truly sorry to see that a blundering +painter has spoiled a “human face divine.” The enclosed stanzas I +intended to have written below a picture or profile of your lordship, +could I have been so happy as to procure one with anything of a +likeness.</p> + +<p>As I will soon return to my shades, I wanted to have something like a +material object for my gratitude; I wanted to have it in my power to +say to a friend, there is my noble patron, my generous benefactor. +Allow me, my lord, to publish these verses. I conjure your lordship, +by the honest throe of gratitude, by the generous wish of benevolence, +by all the powers and feelings which compose the magnanimous mind, do +not deny me this petition. I owe much to your lordship: and, what has +not in some other instances always been the case with me, the weight +of the obligation is a pleasing load. I trust I have a heart as +independent as your lordship’s, than which I can say nothing more; and +I would not be beholden to favours that would crucify my feelings. +Your dignified character in life, and manner of supporting that +character, are flattering to my pride; and I would be jealous of the +purity of my grateful attachment, where I was under the patronage of +one of the much favoured sons of fortune.</p> + +<p>Almost every poet has celebrated his patrons, particularly when they +were names dear to fame, and illustrious in their country; allow me, +then, my lord, if you think the verses have intrinsic merit, to tell +the world how much I have the honour to be,</p> + +<p class="sig3">Your lordship’s highly indebted, </p> +<p class="sig4">And ever grateful humble servant,</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterXLIX" id="letterXLIX"></a>XLIX.</h2> + +<h3>TO THE EARL OF BUCHAN.</h3> + +<p>[The Earl of Buchan, a man of talent, but more than tolerably vain, +advised Burns to visit the battle-fields and scenes celebrated in song +on the Scottish border, with the hope, perhaps, that he would drop a +few of his<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_340" id="Page_340">[340]</a></span> happy verses in Dryburgh Abbey, the residence of his +lordship.]</p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">My Lord</span>,</p> + +<p>The honour your lordship has done me, by your notice and advice in +yours of the 1st instant, I shall ever gratefully remember:—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Praise from thy lips, ’tis mine with joy to boast,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">They best can give it who deserve it most.”<a name="FNanchor_167_167" id="FNanchor_167_167"></a><a href="#Footnote_167_167" class="fnanchor">[167]</a><br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>Your lordship touches the darling chord of my heart when you advise me +to fire my muse at Scottish story and Scotch scenes. I wish for +nothing more than to make a leisurely pilgrimage through my native +country; to sit and muse on those once hard-contended fields, where +Caledonia, rejoicing, saw her bloody lion borne through broken ranks +to victory and fame; and, catching the inspiration, to pour the +deathless names in song. But, my lord, in the midst of these +enthusiastic reveries, a long-visaged, dry, moral-looking phantom +strides across my imagination, and pronounces these emphatic words:—</p> + +<p>“I, Wisdom, dwell with Prudence. Friend, I do not come to open the +ill-closed wounds of your follies and misfortunes, merely to give you +pain: I wish through these wounds to imprint a lasting lesson on your +heart. I will not mention how many of my salutary advices you have +despised: I have given you line upon line and precept upon precept; +and while I was chalking out to you the straight way to wealth and +character, with audacious effrontery you have zigzagged across the +path, contemning me to my face: you know the consequences. It is not +yet three months since home was so hot for you that you were on the +wing for the western shore of the Atlantic, not to make a fortune, but +to hide your misfortune.</p> + +<p>“Now that your dear-loved Scotia puts it in your power to return to +the situation of your forefathers, will you follow these will-o’-wisp +meteors of fancy and whim, till they bring you once more to the brink +of ruin? I grant that the utmost ground you can occupy is but half a +step from the veriest poverty; but still it is half a step from it. If +all that I can urge be ineffectual, let her who seldom calls to you in +vain, let the call of pride prevail with you. You know how you feel at +the iron gripe of ruthless oppression: you know how you bear the +galling sneer of contumelious greatness. I hold you out the +conveniences, the comforts of life, independence, and character, on +the one hand; I tender you civility, dependence, and wretchedness, on +the other. I will not insult your understanding by bidding you make a +choice.”</p> + +<p>This, my lord, is unanswerable. I must return to my humble station, +and woo my rustic muse in my wonted way at the plough-tail. Still, my +lord, while the drops of life warm my heart, gratitude to that +dear-loved country in which I boast my birth, and gratitude to those +her distinguished sons who have honoured me so much with their +patronage and approbation, shall, while stealing through my humble +shades; ever distend my bosom, and at times, as now, draw forth the +swelling tear.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + + + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_167_167" id="Footnote_167_167"></a><a href="#FNanchor_167_167"><span class="label">[167]</span></a> Imitated from Pope’s Eloisa to Abelard.</p></div> +</div> + + + +<h2><a name="letterL" id="letterL"></a>L.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. JAMES CANDLISH.</h3> + +<p>[James Candlish, a student of medicine, was well acquainted with the +poetry of Lowe, author of that sublime lyric, “Mary’s Dream,” and at +the request of Burns sent Lowe’s classic song of “Pompey’s Ghost,” to +the Musical Museum.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Edinburgh, March 21, 1787.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">My ever dear old Acquaintance</span>,</p> + +<p>I was equally surprised and pleased at your letter, though I dare say +you will think by my delaying so long to write to you that I am so +drowned in the intoxication of good fortune as to be indifferent to +old, and once dear connexions. The truth is, I was determined to write +a good letter, full of argument, amplification, erudition, and, as +Bayes says, <i>all that.</i> I thought of it, and thought of it, and, by my +soul, I could not; and, lest you should mistake the cause of my +silence, I just sit down to tell you so. Don’t give yourself credit, +though, that the strength of your logic scares me: the truth is, I +never mean to meet you on that ground at all. You have shown me one +thing which was to be demonstrated: that strong pride of reasoning, +with a little affectation of singularity, may mislead the best of +hearts. I likewise, since you and I were first acquainted, in the +pride of despising old woman’s stories, ventured in “the daring path +Spinosa trod;” but experience of the weakness, not the strength of +human powers, made me glad to grasp at revealed religion.</p> + +<p>I am still, in the Apostle Paul’s phrase, “The old man with his +deeds,” as when we<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_341" id="Page_341">[341]</a></span> were sporting about the “Lady Thorn.” I shall be +four weeks here yet at least; and so I shall expect to hear from you; +welcome sense, welcome nonsense.</p> + +<p class="sig4">I am, with the warmest sincerity,</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterLI" id="letterLI"></a>LI.</h2> + +<h3>TO ——.</h3> + +<p>[The name of the friend to whom this letter was addressed is still +unknown, though known to Dr. Currie. The Esculapian Club of Edinburgh +have, since the death of Burns, added some iron-work, with an +inscription in honour of the Ayrshire poet to the original headstone. +The cost to the poet was £5 10s.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Edinburgh, March, 1787.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">My dear Sir,</span></p> + +<p>You may think, and too justly, that I am a selfish, ungrateful fellow, +having received so many repeated instances of kindness from you, and +yet never putting pen to paper to say thank you; but if you knew what +a devil of a life my conscience has led me on that account, your good +heart would think yourself too much avenged. By the bye, there is +nothing in the whole frame of man which seems to be so unaccountable +as that thing called conscience. Had the troublesome yelping cur +powers efficient to prevent a mischief, he might be of use; but at the +beginning of the business, his feeble efforts are to the workings of +passion as the infant frosts of an autumnal morning to the unclouded +fervour of the rising sun: and no sooner are the tumultuous doings of +the wicked deed over, than, amidst the bitter native consequences of +folly, in the very vortex of our horrors, up starts conscience, and +harrows us with the feelings of the damned.</p> + +<p>I have enclosed you, by way of expiation, some verse and prose, that, +if they merit a place in your truly entertaining miscellany, you are +welcome to. The prose extract is literally as Mr. Sprott sent it me.</p> + +<p>The inscription on the stone is as follows:—</p> + +<div class="blockquot"><p>“HERE LIES ROBERT FERGUSSON, POET.</p> + +<p>Born, September 5th, 1751—Died, 16th October 1774.</p></div> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“No scuptur’d marble here, nor pompous lay,<br /></span> +<span class="i3">‘No storied urn or animated bust;’<br /></span> +<span class="i1">This simple stone directs pale Scotia’s way<br /></span> +<span class="i3">To pour her sorrows o’er her poet’s dust.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>On the other side of the stone is as follows:</p> + +<p class="blockquot">“By special grant of the managers to Robert Burns, who erected this +stone, this burial place is to remain for ever sacred to the memory of +Robert Fergusson.”</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p class="center"><i>Session-house, within the Kirk of Canongate, the twenty-second day of +February, one thousand seven hundred eighty-seven years.</i></p> + +<p class="center">Sederunt of the Managers of the Kirk and Kirk-Yard funds of Canongate.</p> + +<p>Which day, the treasurer to the said funds produced a letter from Mr. +Robert Burns, of date the 6th current, which was read and appointed to +be engrossed in their sederunt book, and of which letter the tenor +follows:—</p> + +<p>“To the honourable baillies of Canongate, Edinburgh.—Gentlemen, I am +sorry to be told that the remains of Robert Fergusson, the so justly +celebrated poet, a man whose talents for ages to come will do honour +to our Caledonian name, lie in your church-yard among the ignoble +dead, unnoticed and unknown.</p> + +<p>“Some memorial to direct the steps of the lovers of Scottish song, +when they wish to shed a tear over the ‘narrow house’ of the bard who +is no more, is surely a tribute due to Fergusson’s memory: a tribute I +wish to have the honour of paying.</p> + +<p>“I petition you then, gentlemen, to permit me to lay a simple stone +over his revered ashes, to remain an unalienable property to his +deathless fame. I have the honour to be, gentlemen, your very humble +servant (<i>sic subscribitur</i>),</p> + +<p class="sig9"><span class="smcap">Robert Burns.</span>”</p> + +<p>Thereafter the said managers, in consideration of the laudable and +disinterested motion of Mr. Burns, and the propriety of his request, +did, and hereby do, unanimously, grant power and liberty to the said +Robert Burns to erect a headstone at the grave of the said Robert +Fergusson, and to keep up and preserve the same to his memory in all +time coming. Extracted forth of the records of the managers, by</p> + +<p class="sig5"><span class="smcap">William Sprott,</span> Clerk.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterLII" id="letterLII"></a>LII.</h2> + +<h3>TO MRS. DUNLOP.</h3> + +<p>[The poet alludes in this letter to the profits of the Edinburgh +edition of his Poems: the exact sum is no<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_342" id="Page_342">[342]</a></span> where stated, but it could +not have been less than seven hundred pounds.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Edinburgh, March 22d, 1787.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">Madam</span>,</p> + +<p>I read your letter with watery eyes. A little, very little while ago, +I had scarce a friend but the stubborn pride of my own bosom: now I am +distinguished, patronized, befriended by you. Your friendly advices, I +will not give them the cold name of criticisms, I receive with +reverence. I have made some small alterations in what I before had +printed. I have the advice of some very judicious friends among the +literati here, but with them I sometimes find it necessary to claim +the privilege of thinking for myself. The noble Karl of Glencairn, to +whom I owe more than to any man, does me the honor of giving me his +strictures: his hints, with respect to impropriety or indelicacy, I +follow implicitly.</p> + +<p>You kindly interest yourself in my future views and prospects; there I +can give you no light. It is all</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Dark as was Chaos ere the infant sun<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Was roll’d together, or had tried his beams<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Athwart the gloom profound.”<a name="FNanchor_168_168" id="FNanchor_168_168"></a><a href="#Footnote_168_168" class="fnanchor">[168]</a><br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>The appellation of a Scottish bard, is by far my highest pride; to +continue to deserve it is my most exalted ambition. Scottish scenes +and Scottish story are the themes I could wish to sing. I have no +dearer aim than to have it in my power, unplagued with the routine of +business, for which heaven knows I am unfit enough, to make leisurely +pilgrimages through Caledonia; to sit on the fields of her battles; to +wander on the romantic banks of her rivers; and to muse by the stately +towers or venerable ruins, once the honoured abodes of her heroes.</p> + +<p>But these are all Utopian thoughts: I have dallied long enough with +life; ’tis time to be in earnest. I have a fond, an aged mother to +care for: and some other bosom ties perhaps equally tender. Where the +individual only suffers by the consequences of his own +thoughtlessness, indolence, or folly, he may be excusable; nay, +shining abilities, and some of the nobler virtues, may half sanctify a +heedless character; but where God and nature have intrusted the +welfare of others to his care; where the trust is sacred, and the ties +are dear, that man must be far gone in selfishness, or strangely lost +to reflection, whom these connexions will not rouse to exertion.</p> + +<p>I guess that I shall clear between two and three hundred pounds by my +authorship; with that sum I intend, so far as I may be said to have +any intention, to return to my old acquaintance, the plough, and if I +can meet with a lease by which I can live, to commence farmer. I do +not intend to give up poetry; being bred to labour, secures me +independence, and the muses are my chief, sometimes have been my only +enjoyment. If my practice second my resolution, I shall have +principally at heart the serious business of life; but while following +my plough, or building up my shocks, I shall cast a leisure glance to +that dear, that only feature of my character, which gave me the notice +of my country, and the patronage of a Wallace.</p> + +<p>Thus, honoured Madam, I have given you the bard, his situation, and +his views, native as they are in his own bosom.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + + + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_168_168" id="Footnote_168_168"></a><a href="#FNanchor_168_168"><span class="label">[168]</span></a> Blair’s Grave.</p></div> +</div> + + + +<h2><a name="letterLIII" id="letterLIII"></a>LIII.</h2> + +<h3>TO MRS. DUNLOP.</h3> + +<p>[This seems to be a letter acknowledging the payment of Mrs. Dunlop’s +subscription for his poems.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Edinburgh</i>, 15 <i>April, 1787.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">Madam</span>,</p> + +<p>There is an affectation of gratitude which I dislike. The periods of +Johnson and the pause of Sterne, may hide a selfish heart. For my +part, Madam, I trust I have too much pride for servility, and too +little prudence for selfishness. I have this moment broken open your +letter, but</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i4">“Rude am I in speech,<br /> +</span> +<span class="i0">And therefore little can I grace my cause<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In speaking for myself—“<a name="FNanchor_169_169" id="FNanchor_169_169"></a><a href="#Footnote_169_169" class="fnanchor">[169]</a><br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>so I shall not trouble you with any fine speeches and hunted figures. +I shall just lay my hand on my heart and say, I hope I shall ever have +the truest, the warmest sense of your goodness.</p> + +<p>I come abroad in print, for certain on Wednesday. Your orders I shall +punctually attend to; only, by the way, I must tell you that I was +paid before for Dr. Moore’s and Miss Williams’s copies, through the +medium of Commissioner Cochrane in this place, but that we can settle +when I have the honour of waiting on you.</p> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_343" id="Page_343">[343]</a></span></p> +<p>Dr. Smith<a name="FNanchor_170_170" id="FNanchor_170_170"></a><a href="#Footnote_170_170" class="fnanchor">[170]</a> was just gone to London the morning before I received +your letter to him.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + + + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_169_169" id="Footnote_169_169"></a><a href="#FNanchor_169_169"><span class="label">[169]</span></a> From Othello.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_170_170" id="Footnote_170_170"></a><a href="#FNanchor_170_170"><span class="label">[170]</span></a> Adam Smith.</p></div> +</div> + + + +<h2><a name="letterLIV" id="letterLIV"></a>LIV.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. SIBBALD,</h3> + +<h4>BOOKSELLER IN EDINBURGH.</h4> +<p>[This letter first appeared in that very valuable work, Nicholl’s +Illustrations of Literature.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Lawn Market.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">Sir</span>,</p> + +<p>So little am I acquainted with the words and manners of the more +public and polished walks of life, that I often feel myself much +embarrassed how to express the feelings of my heart, particularly +gratitude:—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i4">“Rude am I in my speech,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And little therefore shall I grace my cause<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In speaking for myself—“<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>The warmth with which you have befriended an obscure man and a young +author in the last three magazines—I can only say, Sir, I feel the +weight of the obligation, I wish I could express my sense of it. In +the mean time accept of the conscious acknowledgment from,</p> + +<p class="sig9">Sir,</p> + +<p class="sig5">Your obliged servant,</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterLV" id="letterLV"></a>LV.</h2> + +<h3>TO DR. MOORE.</h3> + +<p>[The book to which the poet alludes, was the well-known View of +Society by Dr. Moore, a work of spirit and observation.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Edinburgh, 23d April, 1787.</i></p> + +<p>I received the books, and sent the one you mentioned to Mrs. Dunlop. I +am ill skilled in beating the coverts of imagination for metaphors of +gratitude. I thank you, Sir, for the honour you have done me; and to +my latest hour will warmly remember it. To be highly pleased with your +book is what I have in common with the world; but to regard these +volumes as a mark of the author’s friendly esteem, is a still more +supreme gratification.</p> + +<p>I leave Edinburgh in the course of ten days or a fortnight, and after +a few pilgrimages over some of the classic ground of Caledonia, Cowden +Knowes, Banks of Yarrow, Tweed, &c., I shall return to my rural +shades, in all likelihood never more to quit them. I have formed many +intimacies and friendships here, but I am afraid they are all of too +tender a construction to bear carriage a hundred and fifty miles. To +the rich, the great, the fashionable, the polite, I have no equivalent +to offer; and I am afraid my meteor appearance will by no means +entitle me to a settled correspondence with any of you, who are the +permanent lights of genius and literature.</p> + +<p>My most respectful compliments to Miss Williams. If once this tangent +flight of mine were over, and I were returned to my wonted leisurely +motion in my old circle, I may probably endeavour to return her poetic +compliment in kind.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterLVI" id="letterLVI"></a>LVI.</h2> + +<h3>TO MRS. DUNLOP.</h3> + +<p>[This letter was in answer to one of criticism and remonstrance, from +Mrs. Dunlop, respecting “The Dream,” which she had begged the poet to +omit, lest it should harm his fortunes with the world.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Edinburgh, 30th April, 1787.</i></p> + +<p>---- Your criticisms, Madam, I understand very well, and could have +wished to have pleased you better. You are right in your guess that I +am not very amenable to counsel. Poets, much my superiors, have so +flattered those who possessed the adventitious qualities of wealth and +power, that I am determined to flatter no created being, either in +prose or verse.</p> + +<p>I set as little by princes, lords, clergy, critics, &c., as all these +respective gentry do by my bardship. I know what I may expect from the +word, by and by—illiberal abuse, and perhaps contemptuous neglect.</p> + +<p>I am happy, Madam, that some of my own favourite pieces are +distinguished by your particular approbation. For my “Dream,” which +has unfortunately incurred your loyal displeasure, I hope in four +weeks, or less, to have the honour of appearing, at Dunlop, in its +defence in person.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_344" id="Page_344">[344]</a></span></p> + + +<h2><a name="letterLVII" id="letterLVII"></a>LVII.</h2> + +<h3>TO THE REV. DR. HUGH BLAIR.</h3> + +<p>[The answer of Dr. Blair to this letter contains the following +passage: “Your situation, as you say, was indeed very singular: and in +being brought out all at once from the shades of deepest privacy to so +great a share of public notice and observation, you had to stand a +severe trial. I am happy you have stood it so well, and, as far as I +have known or heard, though in the midst of many temptations, without +reproach to your character or behaviour.”]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Lawn-market, Edinburgh, 3d May, 1787.</i></p> + +<p><span class="smcap">Reverend and much-respected Sir,</span></p> + +<p>I leave Edinburgh to-morrow morning, but could not go without +troubling you with half a line, sincerely to thank you for the +kindness, patronage, and friendship you have shown me. I often felt +the embarrassment of my singular situation; drawn forth from the +veriest shades of life to the glare of remark; and honoured by the +notice of those illustrious names of my country whose works, while +they are applauded to the end of time, will ever instruct and mend the +heart. However the meteor-like novelty of my appearance in the world +might attract notice, and honour me with the acquaintance of the +permanent lights of genius and literature, those who are truly +benefactors of the immortal nature of man, I knew very well that my +utmost merit was far unequal to the task of preserving that character +when once the novelty was over; I have made up my mind that abuse, or +almost even neglect, will not surprise me in my quarters.</p> + +<p>I have sent you a proof impression of Beugo’s work<a name="FNanchor_171_171" id="FNanchor_171_171"></a><a href="#Footnote_171_171" class="fnanchor">[171]</a> for me, done on +Indian paper, as a trifling but sincere testimony with what heart-warm +gratitude I am, &c.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + + + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_171_171" id="Footnote_171_171"></a><a href="#FNanchor_171_171"><span class="label">[171]</span></a> The portrait of the poet after Nasmyth.</p></div> +</div> + + + +<h2><a name="letterLVIII" id="letterLVIII"></a>LVIII.</h2> + +<h3>TO THE EARL OF GLENCAIRN.</h3> + +<p>[The poet addressed the following letter to the Earl of Glencairn, +when he commenced his journey to the Border. It was first printed in +the third edition of Lockhart’s Life of Burns; an eloquent and manly +work.]</p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">My Lord,</span></p> + +<p>I go away to-morrow morning early, and allow me to vent the fulness of +my heart, in thanking your lordship for all that patronage, that +benevolence and that friendship with which you have honoured me. With +brimful eyes, I pray that you may find in that great Being, whose +image you so nobly bear, that friend which I have found in you. My +gratitude is not selfish design—that I disdain—it is not dodging +after the heels of greatness—that is an offering you disdain. It is a +feeling of the same kind with my devotion.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterLIX" id="letterLIX"></a>LIX.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. WILLIAM DUNBAR.</h3> + +<p>[William Dunbar, Colonel of the Crochallan Fencibles. The name has a +martial sound, but the corps which he commanded was club of wits, +whose courage was exercised on “paitricks, teals, moorpowts, and +plovers.”]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Lawn-market, Monday morning.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">Dear Sir,</span></p> + +<p>In justice to Spenser, I must acknowledge that there is scarcely a +poet in the language could have been a more agreeable present to me; +and in justice to you, allow me to say, Sir, that I have not met with +a man in Edinburgh to whom I would so willingly have been indebted for +the gift. The tattered rhymes I herewith present you, and the handsome +volumes of Spenser for which I am so much indebted to your goodness, +may perhaps be not in proportion to one another; but be that as it +may, my gift, though far less valuable, is as sincere a mark of esteem +as yours.</p> + +<p>The time is approaching when I shall return to my shades; and I am +afraid my numerous Edinburgh friendships are of so tender a +construction, that they will not bear carriage with me. Yours is one +of the few that I could wish of a more robust constitution. It is +indeed very probable that when I leave this city, we part never more +to meet in this sublunary sphere; but I have a strong fancy that in +some future eccentric planet, the comet of happier systems than any +with which astronomy is yet acquainted, you and I, among the harum +scarum sons of imagination and whim, with a hearty shake of a hand, a +metaphor and a laugh, shall recognise old acquaintance:</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Where wit may sparkle all its rays,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Uncurs’d with caution’s fears;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That pleasure, basking in the blaze,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Rejoice for endless years.”<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_345" id="Page_345">[345]</a></span></div></div> +<p>I have the honour to be, with the warmest sincerity, dear Sir, &c.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterLX" id="letterLX"></a>LX.</h2> + +<h3>TO JAMES JOHNSON.</h3> + +<p>[James Johnson was an engraver in Edinburgh, and proprietor of the +Musical Museum; a truly national work, for which Burns wrote or +amended many songs.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Lawn-market, Friday noon, 3 May, 1787.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">Dear Sir,</span></p> + +<p>I have sent you a song never before known, for your collection; the +air by M’Gibbon, but I know not the author of the words, as I got it +from Dr. Blacklock.</p> + +<p>Farewell, my dear Sir! I wished to have seen you, but I have been +dreadfully throng, as I march to-morrow. Had my acquaintance with you +been a little older, I would have asked the favour of your +correspondence, as I have met with few people whose company and +conversation gives me so much pleasure, because I have met with few +whose sentiments are so congenial to my own.</p> + +<p>When Dunbar and you meet, tell him that I left Edinburgh with the idea +of him hanging somewhere about my heart.</p> + +<p>Keep the original of the song till we meet again, whenever that may +be.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterLXI" id="letterLXI"></a>LXI.</h2> + +<h3>TO WILLIAM CREECH, ESQ.</h3> + +<h4 >Edinburgh.</h4> +<p>[This characteristic letter was written during the poet’s border tour: +he narrowly escaped a soaking with whiskey, as well as with water; for +according to the Ettrick Shepherd, “a couple of Yarrow lads, lovers of +poesy and punch, awaited his coming to Selkirk, but would not believe +that the parson-looking, black-avised man, who rode up to the inn, +more like a drouket craw than a poet, could be Burns, and so went +disappointed away.”]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Selkirk, 13th May, 1787.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">My honoured friend,</span></p> + +<p>The enclosed I have just wrote, nearly extempore, in a solitary inn in +Selkirk, after a miserable wet day’s riding. I have been over most of +East Lothian, Berwick, Roxburgh, and Selkirk-shires; and next week I +begin a tour through the north of England. Yesterday I dined with Lady +Harriet, sister to my noble patron,<a name="FNanchor_172_172" id="FNanchor_172_172"></a><a href="#Footnote_172_172" class="fnanchor">[172]</a> <i>Quem Deus conservet</i>! I would +write till I would tire you as much with dull prose, as I dare say by +this time you are with wretched verse, but I am jaded to death; so, +with a grateful farewell,</p> + +<p class="sig4">I have the honour to be,</p> + +<p class="sig5">Good Sir, yours sincerely,</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Auld chuckie Reekie’s sair distrest,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Down drops her ance weel burnish’d crest,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Nae joy her bonnie buskit nest<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Can yield ava;<br /> +</span> +<span class="i0">Her darling bird that she loves best,<br /></span> +<span class="i8">Willie’s awa.<a name="FNanchor_173_173" id="FNanchor_173_173"></a><a href="#Footnote_173_173" class="fnanchor">[173]</a><br /> +</span> +</div></div> + + + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_172_172" id="Footnote_172_172"></a><a href="#FNanchor_172_172"><span class="label">[172]</span></a> James, Earl of Glencairn.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_173_173" id="Footnote_173_173"></a><a href="#FNanchor_173_173"><span class="label">[173]</span></a> See <a href="#LXXXIII">Poem LXXXIII</a>.</p> +</div> +</div> + + + +<h2><a name="letterLXII" id="letterLXII"></a>LXII.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. PATISON,</h3> + +<h4><span class="smcap">Bookseller, Paisley.</span></h4> + +<p>[This letter has a business air about it: the name of Patison is +nowhere else to be found in the poet’s correspondence.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Berrywell, near Dunse, May 17th, 1787.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">Dear Sir,</span></p> + +<p>I am sorry I was out of Edinburgh, making a slight pilgrimage to the +classic scenes of this country, when I was favoured with yours of the +11th instant, enclosing an order of the Paisley banking company on the +royal bank, for twenty-two pounds seven shillings sterling, payment in +full, after carriage deducted, for ninety copies of my book I sent +you. According to your motions, I see you will have left Scotland +before this reaches you, otherwise I would send you “Holy Willie” with +all my heart. I was so hurried that I absolutely forgot several things +I ought to have minded, among the rest sending books to Mr. Cowan; but +any order of yours will be answered at Creech’s shop. You will please +remember that non-subscribers pay six shillings, this is Creech’s +profit; but those who have subscribed, though their names have been +neglected in the printed list, which is very incorrect, are supplied +at subscription price. I was not at Glasgow, nor do I intend for +London; and I think Mrs. Fame is very idle to tell<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_346" id="Page_346">[346]</a></span> so many lies on a +poor poet. When you or Mr. Cowan write for copies, if you should want +any direct to Mr. Hill, at Mr. Creech’s shop, and I write to Mr. Hill +by this post, to answer either of your orders. Hill is Mr. Creech’s +first clerk, and Creech himself is presently in London. I suppose I +shall have the pleasure, against your return to Paisley, of assuring +you how much I am, dear Sir, your obliged humble servant,</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterLXIII" id="letterLXIII"></a>LXIII.</h2> + +<h3>TO W. NICOL, ESQ.,</h3> + +<h4><span class="smcap">Master of the High School, Edinburgh.</span></h4> + +<p>[Jenny Geddes was a zealous old woman, who threw the stool on which +she sat, at the Dean of Edinburgh’s head, when, in 1637, he attempted +to introduce a Scottish Liturgy, and cried as she threw, “Villain, +wilt thou say the mass at my lug!” The poet named his mare after this +virago.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Carlisle, June 1., 1787.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">Kind, honest-hearted Willie,</span></p> + +<p>I’m sitten down here after seven and forty miles ridin’, e’en as +forjesket and forniaw’d as a forfoughten cock, to gie you some notion +o’ my land lowper-like stravaguin sin the sorrowfu’ hour that I sheuk +hands and parted wi’ auld Reekie.</p> + +<p>My auld, ga’d gleyde o’ a meere has huch-yall’d up hill and down brae, +in Scotland and England, as teugh and birnie as a vera devil wi’ me. +It’s true, she’s as poor’s a sang-maker and as hard’s a kirk, and +tipper-taipers when she taks the gate, first like a lady’s gentlewoman +in a minuwae, or a hen on a het girdle; but she’s a yauld, poutherie +Girran for a’ that, and has a stomack like Willie Stalker’s meere that +wad hae disgeested tumbler-wheels, for she’ll whip me aff her five +stimparts o’ the best aits at a down-sittin and ne’er fash her thumb. +When ance her ringbanes and spavies, her crucks and cramps, and fairly +soupl’d, she beets to, beets to, and ay the hindmost hour the +tightest. I could wager her price to a thretty pennies, that for twa +or three wooks ridin at fifty miles a day, the deil-stricket a five +gallopers acqueesh Clyde and Whithorn could cast saut on her tail.</p> + +<p>I hae dander’d owre a’ the kintra frae Dumbar to Selcraig, and hae +forgather’d wi’ monie a guid fallow, and monie a weelfar’d huzzie. I +met wi’ twa dink quines in particular, ane o’ them a sonsie, fine, +fodgel lass, baith braw and bonnie; the tither was clean-shankit, +straught, tight, weelfar’d winch, as blythe’s a lintwhite on a +flowerie thorn, and as sweet and modest’s a new-blawn plumrose in a +hazle shaw. They were baith bred to mainers by the beuk, and onie ane +o’ them had as muckle smeddum and rumblegumtion as the half o’ some +presbytries that you and I baith ken. They play’d me sik a deevil o’ a +shavie that I daur say if my harigals were turn’d out, ye wad see twa +nicks i’ the heart o’ me like the mark o’ a kail-whittle in a castock.</p> + +<p>I was gaun to write you a lang pystle, but, Gude forgie me, I gat +mysel sae noutouriously bitchify’d the day after kail-time, that I can +hardly stoiter but and ben.</p> + +<p>My best respecks to the guidwife and a’ our common friens, especiall +Mr. and Mrs. Cruikshank, and the honest guidman o’ Jock’s Lodge.</p> + +<p>I’ll be in Dumfries the morn gif the beast be to the fore, and the +branks bide hale.</p> + +<p class="sig4">Gude be wi’ you, Willie! Amen!</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterLXIV" id="letterLXIV"></a>LXIV.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. JAMES SMITH,</h3> + +<h4><span class="smcap">at Miller and Smith’s Office, Linlithgow.</span></h4> + +<p>[Burns, it seems by this letter, had still a belief that he would be +obliged to try his fortune in the West Indies: he soon saw how hollow +all the hopes were, which had been formed by his friends of “pension, +post or place,” in his native land.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Mauchline, 11th June, 1787.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">My ever dear Sir,</span></p> + +<p>I date this from Mauchline, where I arrived on Friday even last. I +slept at John Dow’s, and called for my daughter. Mr. Hamilton and your +family; your mother, sister, and brother; my quondam Eliza, &c., all +well. If anything had been wanting to disgust me completely at +Armour’s family, their mean, servile compliance would have done it.</p> + +<p>Give me a spirit like my favourite hero, Milton’s Satan:</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i6">Hail, horrors! hail,<br /> +</span> +<span class="i0">Infernal world! and thou proufoundest hell,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Receive thy new possessor! he who brings<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A mind not be chang’d by <i>place</i> or <i>time</i>!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>I cannot settle to my mind.—Farming, the only thing of which I know +anything, and heaven above knows but little do I understand of that, I +cannot, dare not risk on farms as they are. If I do not fix I will go +for Jamaica.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_347" id="Page_347">[347]</a></span> Should I stay in an unsettled state at home, I would +only dissipate my little fortune, and ruin what I intend shall +compensate my little ones, for the stigma I have brought on their +names.</p> + +<p>I shall write you more at large soon; as this letter costs you no +postage, if it be worth reading you cannot complain of your +pennyworth.</p> + +<p class="sig5">I am ever, my dear Sir,</p> + +<p class="sig8">Yours,</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<p>P.S. The cloot has unfortunately broke, but I have provided a fine +buffalo-horn, on which I am going to affix the same cipher which you +will remember was on the lid of the cloot.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterLXV" id="letterLXV"></a>LXV.</h2> + +<h3>TO WILLIAM NICOL, ESQ.</h3> + +<p>[The charm which Dumfries threw over the poet, seems to have dissolved +like a spell, when he sat down in Ellisland: he spoke, for a time, +with little respect of either place or people.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Mauchline, June 18, 1787.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">My dear Friend,</span></p> + +<p>I am now arrived safe in my native country, after a very agreeable +jaunt, and have the pleasure to find all my friends well. I +breakfasted with your gray-headed, reverend friend, Mr. Smith; and was +highly pleased both with the cordial welcome he gave me, and his most +excellent appearance and sterling good sense.</p> + +<p>I have been with Mr. Miller at Dalswinton, and am to meet him again in +August. From my view of the lands, and his reception of my bardship, +my hopes in that business are rather mended; but still they are but +slender.</p> + +<p>I am quite charmed with Dumfries folks—Mr. Burnside, the clergyman, +in particular, is a man whom I shall ever gratefully remember; and his +wife, Gude forgie me! I had almost broke the tenth commandment on her +account. Simplicity, elegance, good sense, sweetness of disposition, +good humour, kind hospitality are the constituents of her manner and +heart; in short—but if I say one word more about her, I shall be +directly in love with her.</p> + +<p>I never, my friend, thought mankind very capable of anything generous; +but the stateliness of the patricians in Edinburgh, and the servility +of my plebeian brethren (who perhaps formerly eyed me askance) since I +returned home, have nearly put me out of conceit altogether with my +species. I have bought a pocket Milton, which I carry perpetually +about with me, in order to study the sentiments—the dauntless +magnanimity, the intrepid, unyielding independence, the desperate +daring, and noble defiance of hardship, in that great personage, +<span class="smcap">Satan</span>. ’Tis true, I have just now a little cash; but I am +afraid the star that hitherto has shed its malignant, purpose-blasting +rays full in my zenith; that noxious planet so baneful in its +influences to the rhyming tribe, I much dread it is not yet beneath my +horizon.—Misfortune dodges the path of human life; the poetic mind +finds itself miserably deranged in, and unfit for the walks of +business; add to all, that thoughtless follies and hare-brained whims, +like so many <i>ignes fatui</i>, eternally diverging from the right line of +sober discretion, sparkle with step-bewitching blaze in the +idly-gazing eyes of the poor heedless bard, till, pop, “he falls like +Lucifer, never to hope again.” God grant this may be an unreal picture +with respect to me! but should it not, I have very little dependence +on mankind. I will close my letter with this tribute my heart bids me +pay you—the many ties of acquaintance and friendship which I have, or +think I have in life, I have felt along the lines, and, damn them, +they are almost all of them of such frail contexture, that I am sure +they would not stand the breath of the least adverse breeze of +fortune; but from you, my ever dear Sir, I look with confidence for +the apostolic love that shall wait on me “through good report and bad +report”—the love which Solomon emphatically says “is strong as +death.” My compliments to Mrs. Nicol, and all the circle of our common +friends.</p> + +<p>P.S. I shall be in Edinburgh about the latter end of July.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterLXVI" id="letterLXVI"></a>LXVI.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. JAMES CANDLISH.</h3> + +<p>[Candlish was a classic scholar, but had a love for the songs of +Scotland, as well as for the poetry of Greece and Rome.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Edinburgh, 1787.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">My dear Friend,</span></p> + +<p>If once I were gone from this scene of hurry and dissipation, I +promise myself the pleasure of that correspondence being renewed +which<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_348" id="Page_348">[348]</a></span> has been so long broken. At present I have time for nothing. +Dissipation and business engross every moment. I am engaged in +assisting an honest Scotch enthusiast,<a name="FNanchor_174_174" id="FNanchor_174_174"></a><a href="#Footnote_174_174" class="fnanchor">[174]</a> a friend of mine, who is an +engraver, and has taken it into his head to publish a collection of +all our songs set to music, of which the words and music are done by +Scotsmen. This, you will easily guess, is an undertaking exactly to my +taste. I have collected, begged, borrowed, and stolen, all the songs I +could meet with. Pompey’s Ghost, words and music, I beg from you +immediately, to go into his second number: the first is already +published. I shall show you the first number when I see you in +Glasgow, which will be in a fortnight or less. Do be so kind as to +send me the song in a day or two; you cannot imagine how much it will +oblige me.</p> + +<p>Direct to me at Mr. W. Cruikshank’s, St. James’s Square, New Town, +Edinburgh.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + + + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_174_174" id="Footnote_174_174"></a><a href="#FNanchor_174_174"><span class="label">[174]</span></a> Johnson, the publisher and proprietor of the Musical +Museum.</p></div> +</div> + + + +<h2><a name="letterLXVII" id="letterLXVII"></a>LXVII.</h2> + +<h3>TO ROBERT AINSLIE, ESQ.</h3> + +<p>[“Burns had a memory stored with the finest poetical passages, which +he was in the habit of quoting most aptly in his correspondence with +his friends: and he delighted also in repeating them in the company of +those friends who enjoyed them.” These are the words of Ainslie, of +Berrywell, to whom this letter in addressed.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Arracher</i>, 28<i>th June</i>, 1787.</p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">My dear Sir,</span></p> + +<p>I write on my tour through a country where savage streams tumble over +savage mountains, thinly overspread with savage flocks, which +sparingly support as savage inhabitants. My last stage was +Inverary—to-morrow night’s stage Dumbarton. I ought sooner to have +answered your kind letter, but you know I am a man of many sins.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterLXVIII" id="letterLXVIII"></a>LXVIII.</h2> + +<h3>TO WILLIAM NICOL, ESQ.</h3> + +<p>[This visit to Auchtertyre produced that sweet lyric, beginning +“Blythe, blythe and merry was she;” and the lady who inspired it was +at his side, when he wrote this letter.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Auchtertyre, Monday, June, 1787.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">My dear Sir,</span></p> + +<p>I find myself very comfortable here, neither oppressed by ceremony nor +mortified by neglect. Lady Augusta is a most engaging woman, and very +happy in her family, which makes one’s outgoings and incomings very +agreeable. I called at Mr. Ramsay’s of Auchtertyre as I came up the +country, and am so delighted with him that I shall certainly accept of +his invitation to spend a day or two with him as I return. I leave +this place on Wednesday or Thursday.</p> + +<p>Make my kind compliments to Mr. and Mrs. Cruikshank and Mrs. Nicol, if +she is returned.</p> + +<p class="sig4">I am ever, dear Sir,</p> + +<p class="sig5">Your deeply indebted,</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterLXIX" id="letterLXIX"></a>LXIX.</h2> + +<h3>TO WILLIAM CRUIKSHANK, ESQ.</h3> + +<h4>ST. JAMES’S SQUARE, EDINBURGH.</h4> +<p>[At the house of William Cruikshank, one of the masters of the High +School, in Edinburgh, Burns passed many agreeable hours.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Auchtertyre, Monday morning.</i></p> + +<p>I have nothing, my dear Sir, to write to you but that I feel myself +exceedingly comfortably situated in this good family: just notice +enough to make me easy but not to embarrass me. I was storm-staid two +days at the foot of the Ochillhills, with Mr. Trait of Herveyston and +Mr. Johnston of Alva, but was so well pleased that I shall certainly +spend a day on the banks of the Devon as I return. I leave this place +I suppose on Wednesday, and shall devote a day to Mr. Ramsay at +Auchtertyre, near Stirling: a man to whose worth I cannot do justice. +My respectful kind compliments to Mrs. Cruikshank, and my dear little +Jeanie, and if you see Mr. Masterton, please remember me to him.</p> + +<p class="sig5">I am ever,</p> + +<p class="sig10">My dear Sir, &c.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_349" id="Page_349">[349]</a></span></p> + + +<h2><a name="letterLXX" id="letterLXX"></a>LXX.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. JAMES SMITH.</h3> + +<h4><span class="smcap">Linlithgow</span>.</h4> + +<p>[The young lady to whom the poet alludes in this letter, was very +beautiful, and very proud: it is said she gave him a specimen of both +her temper and her pride, when he touched on the subject of love.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>June 30, 1787.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">My dear Friend,</span></p> + +<p>On our return, at a Highland gentleman’s hospitable mansion, we fell +in with a merry party, and danced till the ladies left us, at three in +the morning. Our dancing was none of the French or English insipid +formal movements; the ladies sung Scotch songs like angels, at +intervals; then we flew at Bab at the Bowster, Tullochgorum, Loch +Erroch Side, &c., like midges sporting in the mottie sun, or craws +prognosticating a storm in a hairst day.—When the dear lasses left +us, we ranged round the bowl till the good-fellow hour of six; except +a few minutes that we went out to pay our devotions to the glorious +lamp of day peering over the towering top of Benlomond. We all +kneeled; our worthy landlord’s son held the bowl; each man a full +glass in his hand; and I, as priest, repeated some rhyming nonsense, +like Thomas-a-Rhymer’s prophecies I suppose.—After a small +refreshment of the gifts of Somnus, we proceeded to spend the day on +Lochlomond, and reach Dumbarton in the evening. We dined at another +good fellow’s house, and consequently, pushed the bottle; when we went +out to mount our horses, we found ourselves “No vera fou but gaylie +yet.” My two friends and I rode soberly down the Loch side, till by +came a Highlandman at the gallop, on a tolerably good horse, but which +had never known the ornaments of iron or leather. We scorned to be +out-galloped by a Highlandman, so off we started, whip and spur. My +companions, though seemingly gaily mounted, fell sadly astern; but my +old mare, Jenny Geddes, one of the Rosinante family, she strained past +the Highlandman in spite of all his efforts with the hair halter; just +as I was passing him, Donald wheeled his horse, as if to cross before +me to mar my progress, when down came his horse, and threw his rider’s +breekless a——e in a clipt hedge; and down came Jenny Geddes over +all, and my bardship between her and the Highlandman’s horse. Jenny +Geddes trode over me with such cautious reverence, that matters were +not so bad as might well have been expected; so I came off with a few +cuts and bruises, and a thorough resolution to be a pattern of +sobriety for the future.</p> + +<p>I have yet fixed on nothing with respect to the serious business of +life. I am, just as usual, a rhyming, mason-making, raking, aimless, +idle fellow. However, I shall somewhere have a farm soon. I was going +to say, a wife too; but that must never be my blessed lot. I am but a +younger son of the house of Parnassus, and like other younger sons of +great families, I may intrigue, if I choose to run all risks, but must +not marry.</p> + +<p>I am afraid I have almost ruined one source, the principal one, +indeed, of my former happiness; that eternal propensity I always had +to fall in love. My heart no more glows with feverish rapture. I have +no paradisaical evening interviews, stolen from the restless cares and +prying inhabitants of this weary world. I have only * * * *. This last +is one of your distant acquaintances, has a fine figure, and elegant +manners; and in the train of some great folks whom you know, has seen, +the politest quarters in Europe. I do like her a good deal; but what +piques me is her conduct at the commencement of our acquaintance. I +frequently visited her when I was in ——, and after passing regularly +the intermediate degrees between the distant formal bow and the +familiar grasp round the waist, I ventured, in my careless way, to +talk of friendship in rather ambiguous terms; and after her return +to ——, I wrote to her in the same style. Miss, construing my words +farther I suppose than even I intended, flew off in a tangent of +female dignity and reserve, like a mounting lark in an April morning; +and wrote me an answer which measured me out very completely what an +immense way I had to travel before I could reach the climate of her +favour. But I am an old hawk at the sport, and wrote her such a cool, +deliberate, prudent reply, as brought my bird from her aerial +towerings, pop, down at my foot, like Corporal Trim’s hat.</p> + +<p>As for the rest of my acts, and my wars, and all my wise sayings, and +why my mare was called Jenny Geddes, they shall be recorded in a few +weeks hence at Linlithgow, in the chronicles of your memory, by</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_350" id="Page_350">[350]</a></span></p> + + +<h2><a name="letterLXXI" id="letterLXXI"></a>LXXI.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. JOHN RICHMOND.</h3> + +<p>[Mr. John Richmond, writer, was one of the poet’s earliest and firmest +friends; he shared his room with him when they met in Edinburgh, and +did him many little offices of kindness and regard.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Mossgiel, 7th July, 1787.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">My dear Richmond,</span></p> + +<p>I am all impatience to hear of your fate since the old confounder of +right and wrong has turned you out of place, by his journey to answer +his indictment at the bar of the other world. He will find the +practice of the court so different from the practice in which he has +for so many years been thoroughly hackneyed, that his friends, if he +had any connexions truly of that kind, which I rather doubt, may well +tremble for his sake. His chicane, his left-handed wisdom, which stood +so firmly by him, to such good purpose, here, like other accomplices +in robbery and plunder, will, now the piratical business is blown, in +all probability turn the king’s evidences, and then the devil’s +bagpiper will touch him off “Bundle and go!”</p> + +<p>If he has left you any legacy, I beg your pardon for all this; if not, +I know you will swear to every word I said about him.</p> + +<p>I have lately been rambling over by Dumbarton and Inverary, and +running a drunken race on the side of Loch Lomond with a wild +Highlandman; his horse, which had never known the ornaments of iron or +leather, zigzagged across before my old spavin’d hunter, whose name is +Jenny Geddes, and down came the Highlandman, horse and all, and down +came Jenny and my bardship; so I have got such a skinful of bruises +and wounds, that I shall be at least four weeks before I dare venture +on my journey to Edinburgh.</p> + +<p>Not one new thing under the sun has happened in Mauchline since you +left it. I hope this will find you as comfortably situated as +formerly, or, if heaven pleases, more so; but, at all events, I trust +you will let me know of course how matters stand with you, well or +ill. ’Tis but poor consolation to tell the world when matters go +wrong; but you know very well your connexion and mine stands on a +different footing.</p> + +<p class="sig4">I am ever, my dear friend, yours,</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterLXXII" id="letterLXXII"></a>LXXII.</h2> + +<h3>TO ROBERT AINSLIE, ESQ.</h3> + +<p>[This letter, were proof wanting, shows the friendly and familiar +footing on which Burns stood with the Ainslies, and more particularly +with the author of that popular work, the “Reasons for the Hope that +is in us.”]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Mauchline, 23d July, 1787.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">My dear Ainslie,</span></p> + +<p>There is one thing for which I set great store by you as a friend, and +it is this, that I have not a friend upon earth, besides yourself, to +whom I can talk nonsense without forfeiting some degree of his esteem. +Now, to one like me, who never cares for speaking anything else but +nonsense, such a friend as you is an invaluable treasure. I was never +a rogue, but have been a fool all my life; and, in spite of all my +endeavours, I see now plainly that I shall never be wise. Now it +rejoices my heart to have met with such a fellow as you, who, though +you are not just such a hopeless fool as I, yet I trust you will never +listen so much to the temptations of the devil as to grow so very wise +that you will in the least disrespect an honest follow because he is a +fool. In short, I have set you down as the staff of my old age, when +the whole list of my friends will, after a decent share of pity, have +forgot me.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Though in the morn comes sturt and strife,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Yet joy may come at noon;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And I hope to live a merry, merry life<br /></span> +<span class="i2">When a’ thir days are done.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>Write me soon, were it but a few lines just to tell me how that good +sagacious man your father is—that kind dainty body your mother—that +strapping chiel your brother Douglas—and my friend Rachel, who is as +far before Rachel of old, as she was before her blear-eyed sister +Leah.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterLXXIII" id="letterLXXIII"></a>LXXIII.</h2> + +<h3>TO ROBERT AINSLIE, ESQ.</h3> + +<p>[The “savage hospitality,” of which Burns complains in this letter, +was at that time an evil fashion in Scotland: the bottle was made to +circulate rapidly, and every glass was drunk “clean caup out.”]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Mauchline, July, 1787.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">My dear Sir,</span></p> + +<p>My life, since I saw you last, has been one continued hurry; that +savage hospitality which<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_351" id="Page_351">[351]</a></span> knocks a man down with strong liquors, is +the devil. I have a sore warfare in this world; the devil, the world, +and the flesh are three formidable foes. The first I generally try to +fly from; the second, alas! generally flies from me; but the third is +my plague, worse than the ten plagues of Egypt.</p> + +<p>I have been looking over several farms in this country; one in +particular, in Nithsdale, pleased me so well, that if my offer to the +proprietor is accepted, I shall commence farmer at Whit-Sunday. If +farming do not appear eligible, I shall have recourse to my other +shift: but this to a friend.</p> + +<p>I set out for Edinburgh on Monday morning; how long I stay there is +uncertain, but you will know so soon as I can inform you myself. +However I determine, poesy must be laid aside for some time; my mind +has been vitiated with idleness, and it will take a good deal of +effort to habituate it to the routine of business.</p> + +<p class="sig5">I am, my dear Sir,</p> + +<p class="sig10">Yours sincerely,</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterLXXIV" id="letterLXXIV"></a>LXXIV.</h2> + +<h3>TO DR. MOORE.</h3> + +<p>[Dr. Moore was one of the first to point out the beauty of the lyric +compositions of Burns. “‘Green grow the Rashes,’ and of the two +songs,” says he, “which follow, beginning ‘Again rejoicing nature +sees,’ and ‘The gloomy night is gathering fast;’ the latter is +exquisite. By the way, I imagine you have a peculiar talent for such +compositions which you ought to indulge: no kind of poetry demands +more delicacy or higher polishing.” On this letter to Moore all the +biographies of Burns are founded.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Mauchline, 2d August, 1787.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">Sir</span>,</p> + +<p>For some months past I have been rambling over the country, but I am +now confined with some lingering complaints, originating, as I take +it, in the stomach. To divert my spirits a little in this miserable +fog of ennui, I have taken a whim to give you a history of myself. My +name has made some little noise in this country; you have done me the +honour to interest yourself very warmly in my behalf; and I think a +faithful account of what character of a man I am, and how I came by +that character, may perhaps amuse you in an idle moment. I will give +you an honest narrative, though I know it will be often at my own +expense; for I assure you, Sir, I have, like Solomon, whose character, +excepting in the trifling affair of wisdom, I sometimes think I +resemble,—I have, I say, like him turned my eyes to behold madness +and folly, and like him, too, frequently shaken hands with their +intoxicating friendship.—After you have perused these pages, should +you think them trifling and impertinent, I only beg leave to tell you, +that the poor author wrote them under some twitching qualms of +conscience, arising from a suspicion that he was doing what he ought +not to do; a predicament he has more than once been in before.</p> + +<p>I have not the most distant pretensions to assume that character which +the pye-coated guardians of escutcheons call a gentleman. When at +Edinburgh last winter, I got acquainted in the herald’s office; and, +looking through that granary of honours, I there found almost every +name in the kingdom; but for me,</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i4">“My ancient but ignoble blood<br /> +</span> +<span class="i0">Has crept thro’ scoundrels ever since the flood.”<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +</div></div> + +<p class="sig2"><span class="smcap">Pope</span>.</p> + +<p>Gules, purpure, argent, &c., quite disowned me.</p> + +<p>My father was of the north of Scotland, the son of a farmer, and was +thrown by early misfortunes on the world at large; where, after many +years’ wanderings and sojournings, he picked up a pretty large +quantity of observation and experience, to which I am indebted for +most of my little pretensions to wisdom—I have met with few who +understood men, their manners, and their ways, equal to him; but +stubborn, ungainly integrity, and headlong, ungovernable irascibility, +are disqualifying circumstances; consequently, I was born a very poor +man’s son. For the first six or seven years of my life, my father was +gardener to a worthy gentleman of small estate in the neighbourhood of +Ayr. Had he continued in that station I must have marched off to be +one of the little underlings about a farm-house; but it was his +dearest wish and prayer to have it in his power to keep his children +under his own eye, till they could discern between good and evil; so, +with the assistance of his generous master, my father ventured on a +small farm on his estate. At those years, I was by no means a +favourite with anybody. I was a good deal noted for a retentive +memory, a stubborn sturdy something in my disposition, and an +enthusiastic idiot<a name="FNanchor_175_175" id="FNanchor_175_175"></a><a href="#Footnote_175_175" class="fnanchor">[175]</a> piety. I say idiot piety, because I was then +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_352" id="Page_352">[352]</a></span>but a child. Though it cost the schoolmaster some thrashings, I made +an excellent English, scholar; and by the time I was ten or eleven +years of age, I was a critic in substantives, verbs, and particles. In +my infant and boyish days, too, I owed much to an old woman who +resided in the family, remarkable for her ignorance, credulity, and +superstition. She had, I suppose, the largest collection in the +country of tales and songs concerning devils, ghosts, fairies, +brownies, witches, warlocks, spunkies, kelpies, elf-candles, +dead-lights, wraiths, apparitions, cantraips, giants, enchanted towers, +dragons, and other trumpery. This cultivated the latent seeds of +poetry; but had so strong an effect on my imagination, that to this +hour, in my nocturnal rambles, I sometimes keep a sharp look out in +suspicions places; and though nobody can be more sceptical than I am +in such matters, yet it often takes an effort of philosophy to shake +off these idle terrors. The earliest composition that I recollect +taking pleasure in, was The Vision of Mirza, and a hymn of Addison’s +beginning, “How are thy servants blest, O Lord!” I particularly +remember one half-stanza which was music to my boyish ear—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“For though in dreadful whirls we hung<br /></span> +<span class="i2">High on the broken wave—“<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>I met with these pieces in Mason’s English Collection, one of my +school-books. The first two books I ever read in private, and which +gave me more pleasure than any two books I ever read since, were The +Life of Hannibal, and The History of Sir William Wallace. Hannibal +gave my young ideas such a turn, that I used to strut in raptures up +and down after the recruiting drum and bag-pipe, and wish myself tall +enough to be a soldier; while the story of Wallace poured a Scottish +prejudice into my veins, which will boil along there till the +flood-gates of life shut in eternal rest.</p> + +<p>Polemical divinity about this time was putting the country half mad, +and I, ambitious of shining in conversation parties on Sundays, +between sermons, at funerals, &c., used a few years afterwards to +puzzle Calvinism with so much heat and indiscretion, that I raised a +hue and cry of heresy against me, which has not ceased to this hour.</p> + +<p>My vicinity to Ayr was of some advantage to me. My social disposition, +when not checked by some modifications of spirited pride, was like our +catechism definition of infinitude, without bounds or limits. I formed +several connexions with other younkers, who possessed superior +advantages; the youngling actors who were busy in the rehearsal of +parts, in which they were shortly to appear on the stage of life, +where, alas! I was destined to drudge behind the scenes. It is not +commonly at this green age, that our young gentry have a just sense of +the immense distance between them and their ragged playfellows. It +takes a few dashes into the world, to give the young great man that +proper, decent, unnoticing disregard for the poor, insignificant +stupid devils, the mechanics and peasantry around him, who were, +perhaps, born in the same village. My young superiors never insulted +the clouterly appearance of my plough-boy carcase, the two extremes +of which were often exposed to all the inclemencies of all the +seasons. They would give me stray volumes of books; among them, even +then, I could pick up some observations, and one, whose heart, I am +sure, not even the “Munny Begum” scenes have tainted, helped me to a +little French. Parting with these my young friends and benefactors, as +they occasionally went off for the East or West Indies, was often to +me a sore affliction; but I was soon called to more serious evils. My +father’s generous master died! the farm proved a ruinous bargain; and +to clench the misfortune, we fell into the hands of a factor, who sat +for the picture I have drawn of one in my tale of “The Twa Dogs.” My +father was advanced in life when he married; I was the eldest of seven +children, and he, worn out by early hardships, was unfit for labour. +My father’s spirit was soon irritated, but not easily broken. There +was a freedom in his lease in two years more, and to weather these two +years, we retrenched our expenses. We lived very poorly: I was a +dexterous ploughman for my age; and the next eldest to me was a +brother (Gilbert), who could drive the plough very well, and help me +to thrash the corn. A novel-writer might, perhaps, have viewed these +scenes with some satisfaction, but so did not I; my indignation yet +boils at the recollection of the scoundrel factor’s insolent +threatening letters, which used to set us all in tears.</p> + +<p>This kind of life—the cheerless gloom of a hermit, with the unceasing +moil of a galley-slave, brought me to my sixteenth year; a little +before which period I first committed the sin of rhyme. You know our +country custom of cou<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_353" id="Page_353">[353]</a></span>pling a man and woman together as partners in +the labours of harvest. In my fifteenth autumn, my partner was a +bewitching creature, a year younger than myself. My scarcity of +English denies me the power of doing her justice in that language, but +you know the Scottish idiom: she was a “bonnie, sweet, sonsie lass.” +In short, she, altogether unwittingly to herself, initiated me in that +delicious passion, which, in spite of acid disappointment, gin-horse +prudence, and bookworm philosophy, I hold to be the first of human +joys, our dearest blessing here below! How she caught the contagion I +cannot tell; you medical people talk much of infection from breathing +the same air, the touch, &c.; but I never expressly said I loved +her.—Indeed, I did not know myself why I liked so much to loiter +behind with her, when returning in the evening from our labours; why +the tones of her voice made my heart-strings thrill like an Æolian +harp; and particularly why my pulse beat such a furious ratan, when I +looked and fingered over her little hand to pick out the cruel +nettle-stings and thistles. Among her other love-inspiring qualities, +she sung sweetly; and it was her favourite reel to which I attempted +giving an embodied vehicle in ryhme. I was not so presumptuous as to +imagine that I could make verses like printed ones, composed by men +who had Greek and Latin; but my girl sung a song which was said to be +composed by a small country laird’s son, on one of his father’s maids, +with whom he was in love; and I saw no reason why I might not rhyme as +well as he; for excepting that he could smear sheep, and cast peats, +his father living in the moorlands, he had no more scholar-craft than +myself.</p> + +<p>Thus with me began love and poetry; which at times have been my only, +and till within the last twelve months, have been my highest +enjoyment. My father struggled on till he reached the freedom in his +lease, when he entered on a larger farm, about ten miles farther in +the country. The nature of the bargain he made was such as to throw a +little ready money into his hands at the commencement of his lease, +otherwise the affair would have been impracticable. For four years we +lived comfortably here, but a difference commencing between him and +his landlord as to terms, after three years tossing and whirling in +the vortex of litigation, my father was just saved from the horrors of +a jail, by a consumption, which, after two years’ promises, kindly +stepped in, and carried him away, to where the wicked cease from +troubling, and where the weary are at rest!</p> + +<p>It is during the time that we lived on this farm that my little story +is most eventful. I was, at the beginning of this period, perhaps, the +most ungainly awkward boy in the parish—no <i>solitaire</i> was less +acquainted with the ways of the world. What I knew of ancient story +was gathered from Salmon’s and Guthrie’s Geographical Grammars; and +the ideas I had formed of modern manners, of literature, and +criticism, I got from the Spectator. These, with Pope’s Works, some +Plays of Shakspeare, Tull and Dickson on Agriculture, the Pantheon, +Locke’s Essay on the Human Understanding, Stackhouse’s History of the +Bible, Justice’s British Gardener’s Directory, Boyle’s Lectures, Allan +Ramsay’s Works, Taylor’s Scripture Doctrine of Original Sin, A Select +Collection of English Songs, and Hervey’s Meditations, had formed the +whole of my reading. The collection of Songs was my <i>vade mecum.</i> I +pored over them, driving my cart, or walking to labour, song by song, +verse by verse; carefully noting the true tender, or sublime, from +affectation and fustian. I am convinced I owe to this practice much of +my critic craft, such as it is.</p> + +<p>In my seventeenth year, to give my manners a brush, I went to a +country dancing-school. My father had an unaccountable antipathy +against these meetings, and my going was, what to this moment I +repent, in opposition to his wishes. My father, as I said before, was +subject to strong passions; from that instance of disobedience in me, +he took a sort of dislike to me, which, I believe, was one cause of +the dissipation which marked my succeeding years. I say dissipation, +comparatively with the strictness, and sobriety, and regularity of +Presbyterian country life; for though the will-o’-wisp meteors of +thoughtless whim were almost the sole lights of my path, yet early +ingrained piety and virtue kept me for several years afterwards within +the line of innocence. The great misfortune of my life was to want an +aim. I had felt early some stirrings of ambition, but they were the +blind gropings of Homer’s Cyclops round the walls of his cave. I saw +my father’s situation entailed on me perpetual labour. The only two +openings by which I could enter the temple of fortune were the gate of +niggardly economy, or the path of little chican<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_354" id="Page_354">[354]</a></span>ing bargain-making. +The first is so contracted an aperture I never could squeeze myself +into it—the last I always hated—there was contamination in the very +entrance! Thus abandoned of aim or view in life, with a strong +appetite for sociability, as well from native hilarity as from a pride +of observation and remark; a constitutional melancholy or +hypochondriasm that made me fly solitude; add to these incentives to +social life, my reputation for bookish knowledge, a certain wild +logical talent, and a strength of thought, something like the +rudiments of good sense; and it will not seem surprising that I was +generally a welcome guest where I visited, or any great wonder that +always, where two or three met together, there was I among them. But +far beyond all other impulses of my heart, was <i>un penchant à l’ +adorable moitié du genre humain.</i> My heart was completely tinder, and +was eternally lighted up by some goddess or other; and, as in every +other warfare in this world, my fortune was various; sometimes I was +received with favour, and sometimes I was mortified with a repulse. At +the plough, scythe, or reap-hook, I feared no competitor, and thus I +set absolute want at defiance; and as I never cared farther for my +labours than while I was in actual exercise, I spent the evenings in +the way after my own heart. A country lad seldom carries on a love +adventure without an assisting confidant. I possessed a curiosity, +zeal, and intrepid dexterity that recommended me as a proper second on +these occasions; and I dare say, I felt as much pleasure in being in +the secret of half the loves of the parish of Tarbolton, as ever did +statesman in knowing the intrigues of half the courts of Europe. The +very goose feather in my hand seems to know instinctively the +well-worn path of my imagination, the favourite theme of my song; and +is with difficulty restrained from giving you a couple of paragraphs +on the love-adventures of my compeers, the humble inmates of the +farm-house and cottage; but the grave sons of science, ambition, or +avarice baptize these things by the name of follies. To the sons and +daughters of labour and poverty they are matters of the most serious +nature: to them the ardent hope, the stolen interview, the tender +farewell, are the greatest and most delicious parts of their +enjoyments.</p> + +<p>Another circumstance in my life which made some alteration in my mind +and manners, was, that I spent my nineteenth summer on a smuggling +coast, a good distance from home, at a noted school to learn +mensuration, surveying, dialling, &c., in which I made a pretty good +progress. But I made a greater progress in the knowledge of mankind. +The contraband trade was at that time very successful, and it +sometimes happened to me to fall in with those who carried it on. +Scenes of swaggering riot and roaring dissipation were, till this +time, new to me; but I was no enemy to social life. Here, though I +learnt to fill my glass, and to mix without fear in a drunken +squabble, yet I went on with a high hand with my geometry, till the +sun entered Virgo, a month which is always a carnival in my bosom, +when a charming fillette, who lived next door to the school, overset +my trigonometry, and set me off at a tangent from the spheres of my +studies. I, however, struggled on with my sines and co-sines for a few +days more; but stepping into the garden one charming noon to take the +sun’s altitude, there I met my angel,</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i2">“Like Proserpine gathering flowers,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Herself a fairer flower—“<a name="FNanchor_176_176" id="FNanchor_176_176"></a><a href="#Footnote_176_176" class="fnanchor">[176]</a><br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>It was in vain to think of doing any more good at school. The +remaining week I stayed I did nothing but craze the faculties of my +soul about her, or steal out to meet her; and the two last nights of +my stay in the country, had sleep been a mortal sin, the image of this +modest and innocent girl had kept me guiltless.</p> + +<p>I returned home very considerably improved. My reading was enlarged +with the very important addition of Thomson’s and Shenstone’s works; I +had seen human nature in a new phasis; and I engaged several of my +school-fellows to keep up a literary correspondence with me. This +improved me in composition. I had met with a collection of letters by +the wits of Queen Anne’s reign, and I pored over them most devoutly. I +kept copies of any of my own letters that pleased me, and a comparison +between them and the composition of most of my correspondents +flattered my vanity. I carried this whim so far, that though I hid not +three-farthings’ worth of business in the world, yet almost every post +brought me as many letters as if I had been a broad plodding son of +the day-book and ledger.</p> + +<p>My life flowed on much in the same course <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_355" id="Page_355">[355]</a></span> till my twenty-third year. <i>Vive l’amour, et vive la bagatelle</i>, were +my sole principles of action. The addition of two more authors to my +library gave me great pleasure; Sterne and Mackenzie—Tristram Shandy +and the Man of Feeling were my bosom favourites. Poesy was still a +darling walk for my mind, but it was only indulged in according to the +humour of the hour. I had usually half a dozen or more pieces on hand; +I took up one or other, as it suited the momentary tone of the mind, +and dismissed the work as it bordered on fatigue. My passions, when +once lighted up, raged like so many devils, till they got vent in +rhyme; and then the conning over my verses, like a spell, soothed all +into quiet! None of the rhymes of those days are in print, except +“Winter, a dirge,” the eldest of my printed pieces; “The Death of poor +Maillie,” “John Barleycorn,” and songs first, second, and third. Song +second was the ebullition of that passion which ended the +forementioned school-business.</p> + +<p>My twenty-third year was to me an important æra. Partly through whim, +and partly that I wished to set about doing something in life, I +joined a flax-dresser in a neighboring town (Irvine) to learn his +trade. This was an unlucky affair. My * * * and to finish the whole, +as we were giving a welcome carousal to the new year, the shop took +fire and burnt to ashes, and I was left, like a true poet, not worth a +sixpence.</p> + +<p>I was obliged to give up this scheme; the clouds of misfortune were +gathering thick round my father’s head; and, what was worst of all, he +was visibly far gone in a consumption; and to crown my distresses, a +<i>belle fille</i>, whom I adored, and who had pledged her soul to meet me +in the field of matrimony, jilted me, with peculiar circumstances of +mortification. The finishing evil that brought up the rear of this +infernal file, was my constitutional melancholy being increased to +such a degree, that for three months I was in a state of mind scarcely +to be envied by the hopeless wretches who have got their +mittimus—depart from me, ye cursed!</p> + +<p>From this adventure I learned something of a town life; but the +principal thing which gave my mind a turn, was a friendship I formed +with a young fellow, a very noble character, but a hapless son of +misfortune. He was the son of a simple mechanic; but a great man in +the neighbourhood taking him under his patronage, gave him a genteel +education, with a view of bettering his situation in life. The patron +dying just as he was ready to launch out into the world, the poor +fellow in despair went to sea; where, after a variety of good and +ill-fortune, a little before I was acquainted with him he had been set +on shore by an American privateer, on the wild coast of Connaught, +stripped of everything. I cannot quit this poor fellow’s story without +adding, that he is at this time master of a large West-Indiaman +belonging to the Thames.</p> + +<p>His mind was fraught with independence, magnanimity, and every manly +virtue. I loved and admired him to a degree of enthusiasm, and of +course strove to imitate him. In some measure I succeeded; I had pride +before, but he taught it to flow in proper channels. His knowledge of +the world was vastly superior to mine, and I was all attention to +learn. He was the only man I ever saw who was a greater fool than +myself where woman was the presiding star; but he spoke of illicit +love with the levity of a sailor, which hitherto I had regarded with +horror. Here his friendship did me a mischief, and the consequence +was, that soon after I resumed the plough, I wrote the “Poet’s +Welcome.”<a name="FNanchor_177_177" id="FNanchor_177_177"></a><a href="#Footnote_177_177" class="fnanchor">[177]</a> My reading only increased while in this town by two stray +volumes of Pamela, and one of Ferdinand Count Fathom, which gave me +some idea of novels. Rhyme, except some religious pieces that are in +print, I had given up; but meeting with Fergusson’s Scottish Poems, I +strung anew my wildly-sounding lyre with emulating vigour. When my +father died, his all went among the hell-hounds that growl in the +kennel of justice; but we made a shift to collect a little money in +the family amongst us, with which, to keep us together, my brother and +I took a neighbouring farm. My brother wanted my hair-brained +imagination, as well as my social and amorous madness; but in good +sense, and every sober qualification, he was far my superior.</p> + +<p>I entered on this farm with a full resolution, “come, go to, I will be +wise!” I read farming books, I calculated crops; I attended markets; +and in short, in spite of the devil, and the world, and the flesh, I +believe I should have been a wise man; but the first year, from +unfortunately buying bad seed, the second from a late harvest, <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_356" id="Page_356">[356]</a></span> we lost half our crops. This overset all my wisdom, and I returned, +“like the dog to his vomit, and the sow that was washed, to her +wallowing in the mire.”</p> + +<p>I now began to be known in the neighbourhood as a maker of rhymes. The +first of my poetic offspring that saw the light, was a burlesque +lamentation on a quarrel between two reverend Calvinists, both of them +<i>dramatis personæ</i> in “Holy Fair.” I had a notion myself that the +piece had some merit; but, to prevent the worst, I gave a copy of it +to a friend, who was very fond of such things, and told him that I +could not guess who was the author of it, but that I thought it pretty +clever. With a certain description of the clergy, as well as laity, it +met with a roar of applause. “Holy Willie’s Prayer” next made its +appearance, and alarmed the kirk-session so much, that they held +several meetings to look over their spiritual artillery, if haply any +of it might be pointed against profane rhymers. Unluckily for me, my +wanderings led me on another side, within point-blank shot of their +heaviest metal. This is the unfortunate story that gave rise to my +printed poem, “The Lament.” This was a most melancholy affair, which I +cannot yet bear to reflect on, and had very nearly given me one or two +of the principal qualifications for a place among those who have lost +the chart, and mistaken the reckoning of rationality. I gave up my +part of the farm to my brother; in truth it was only nominally mine; +and made what little preparation was in my power for Jamaica. But, +before leaving my native country for ever, I resolved to publish my +poems. I weighed my productions as impartially as was in my power; I +thought they had merit; and it was a delicious idea that I should be +called a clever fellow, even though it should never reach my ears—a +poor negro-driver—or perhaps a victim to that inhospitable clime, and +gone to the world of spirits! I can truly say, that <i>pauvre inconnu</i> +as I then was, I had pretty nearly as high an idea of myself and of my +works as I have at this moment, when the public has decided in their +favour. It ever was my opinion that the mistakes and blunders, both in +a rational and religious point of view, of which we see thousands +daily guilty, are owing to their ignorance of themselves.—To know +myself had been all along my constant study. I weighed myself alone; I +balanced myself with others; I watched every means of information, to +see how much ground I occupied as a man and as a poet; I studied +assiduously Nature’s design in my formation—where the lights and +shades in my character were intended. I was pretty confident my poems +would meet with some applause; but, at the worst, the roar of the +Atlantic would deafen the voice of censure, and the novelty of West +Indian scenes make me forget neglect. I threw off six hundred copies, +of which I had got subscriptions for about three hundred and +fifty.—My vanity was highly gratified by the reception I met with +from the public; and besides I pocketed, all expenses deducted, nearly +twenty pounds. This sum came very seasonably, as I was thinking of +indenting myself, for want of money to procure my passage. As soon as +I was master of nine guineas, the price of wafting me to the torrid +zone, I took a steerage passage in the first ship that was to sail +from the Clyde, for</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Hungry ruin had me in the wind.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>I had been for some days skulking from covert to covert, under all the +terrors of a jail; as some ill-advised people had uncoupled the +merciless pack of the law at my heels. I had taken the last farewell +of my few friends; my chest was on the road to Greenock; I had +composed the last song I should ever measure in Caledonia—“The gloomy +night is gathering fast,” when a letter from Dr. Blacklock to a friend +of mine, overthrew all my schemes, by opening new prospects to my +poetic ambition. The doctor belonged to a set of critics for whose +applause I had not dared to hope. His opinion, that I would meet with +encouragement in Edinburgh for a second edition, fired me so much, +that away I posted for that city, without a single acquaintance, or a +single letter of introduction. The baneful star that had so long shed +its blasting influence in my zenith, for once made a revolution to the +nadir; and a kind Providence placed me under the patronage of one of +the noblest of men, the Earl of Glencairn. <i>Oublie-moi, grand Dieu, si +jamais je l’oublie!</i></p> + +<p>I need relate no farther. At Edinburgh I was in a new world; I mingled +among many classes of men, but all of them new to me, and I was all +attention to “catch” the characters and “the manners living as they +rise.” Whether I have profited, time will show.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_357" id="Page_357">[357]</a></span></p><hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p>My most respectful compliments to Miss Williams. Her very elegant and +friendly letter I cannot answer at present, as my presence is +requisite in Edinburgh, and I set out to-morrow.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + + + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_175_175" id="Footnote_175_175"></a><a href="#FNanchor_175_175"><span class="label">[175]</span></a> Idiot for idiotic.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_176_176" id="Footnote_176_176"></a><a href="#FNanchor_176_176"><span class="label">[176]</span></a> Paradise Lost, b. iv</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_177_177" id="Footnote_177_177"></a><a href="#FNanchor_177_177"><span class="label">[177]</span></a> “Rob the Rhymer’s Welcome to his Bastard Child.”—See + <a href="#XXXIII">Poem XXXIII.</a></p> +</div> +</div> + + + +<h2><a name="letterLXXV" id="letterLXXV"></a>LXXV.</h2> + +<h3>TO ROBERT AINSLIE, ESQ.,</h3> + +<h4>BERRYWELL DUNSE.</h4> + +<p>[This characteristic letter was first published by Sir Harris Nichols; +others, still more characteristic, addressed to the same gentleman, +are abroad: how they escaped from private keeping is a sort of a +riddle.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Edinburgh, 23d August</i>, 1787.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“As I gaed up to Dunse<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To warp a pickle yarn,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Robin, silly body,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">He gat me wi’ bairn.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>From henceforth, my dear Sir, I am determined to set off with my +letters like the periodical writers, viz. prefix a kind of text, +quoted from some classic of undoubted authority, such as the author of +the immortal piece, of which my text is part. What I have to say on my +text is exhausted in a letter which I wrote you the other day, before +I had the pleasure of receiving yours from Inverkeithing; and sure +never was anything more lucky, as I have but the time to write this, +that Mr. Nicol, on the opposite side of the table, takes to correct a +proof-sheet of a thesis. They are gabbling Latin so loud that I cannot +hear what my own soul is saying in my own skull, so I must just give +you a matter-of-fact sentence or two, and end, if time permit, with a +verse de rei generatione. To-morrow I leave Edinburgh in a chaise; +Nicol thinks it more comfortable than horseback, to which I say, Amen; +so Jenny Geddes goes home to Ayrshire, to use a phrase of my mother’s, +wi’ her finger in her mouth.</p> + +<p>Now for a modest verse of classical authority:</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The cats like kitchen;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The dogs like broo;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The lasses like the lads weel,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And th’ auld wives too.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std3">CHORUS.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">And we’re a’ noddin,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Nid, nid, noddin,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">We’re a’ noddin fou at e’en.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>If this does not please you, let me hear from you; if you write any +time before the 1st of September, direct to Inverness, to be left at +the post-office till called for; the next week at Aberdeen, the next +at Edinburgh.</p> + +<p>The sheet is done, and I shall just conclude with assuring you that</p> + +<p class="sig4">I am, and ever with pride shall be,</p> + +<p class="sig10">My dear Sir, &c.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<p>Call your boy what you think proper, only interject Burns. What do you +say to a Scripture name? Zimri Burns Ainslie, or Architophel, &c., +look your Bible for these two heroes, if you do this, I will repay the +compliment.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterLXXVI" id="letterLXXVI"></a>LXXVI.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. ROBERT MUIR.</h3> + +<p>[No Scotsman will ever read, without emotion, the poet’s words in this +letter, and in “Scots wha hae wi Wallace bled,” about Bannnockburn and +its glories.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Stirling, 26th August, 1787.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">My Dear Sir</span>,</p> + +<p>I intended to have written you from Edinburgh, and now write you from +Stirling to make an excuse. Here am I, on my way to Inverness, with a +truly original, but very worthy man, a Mr. Nicol, one of the masters +of the High-school, in Edinburgh. I left Auld Reekie yesterday +morning, and have passed, besides by-excursions, Linlithgow, +Borrowstouness, Falkirk, and here am I undoubtedly. This morning I +knelt at the tomb of Sir John the Graham, the gallant friend of the +immortal Wallace; and two hours ago I said a fervent prayer, for Old +Caledonia, over the hole in a blue whinstone, where Robert de Bruce +fixed his royal standard on the banks of Bannockburn; and just now, +from Stirling Castle, I have seen by the setting sun the glorious +prospect of the windings of Forth through the rich carse of Stirling, +and skirting the equally rich carse of Falkirk. The crops are very +strong, but so very late, that there is no harvest, except a ridge or +two perhaps in ten miles, all the way I have travelled from Edinburgh.</p> + +<p>I left Andrew Bruce and family all well. I will be at least three +weeks in making my tour, as I shall return by the coast, and have many +people to call for.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_358" id="Page_358">[358]</a></span></p> + +<p>My best compliments to Charles, our dear kinsman and fellow-saint; and +Messrs. W. and H. Parkers. I hope Hughoc is going on and prospering +with God and Miss M’Causlin.</p> + +<p>If I could think on anything sprightly, I should let you hear every +other post; but a dull, matter-of-fact business, like this scrawl, the +less and seldomer one writes, the better.</p> + +<p>Among other matters-of-fact I shall add this, that I am and ever shall +be,</p> + +<p class="sig10">My dear Sir,</p> + +<p class="sig9">Your obliged,</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterLXXVII" id="letterLXXVII"></a>LXXVII.</h2> + +<h3>TO GAVIN HAMILTON, ESQ.</h3> + +<p>[It is supposed that the warmth of the lover came in this letter to +the aid of the imagination of the poet, in his account of Charlotte +Hamilton.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Stirling, 28th August</i>, 1787.</p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">My dear Sir</span>,</p> + +<p>Here am I on my way to Inverness. I have rambled over the rich, +fertile carses of Falkirk and Sterling, and am delighted with their +appearance: richly waving crops of wheat, barley, &c., but no harvest +at all yet, except, in one or two places, an old wife’s ridge. +Yesterday morning I rode from this town up the meandering Devon’s +banks, to pay my respects to some Ayrshire folks at Harvieston. After +breakfast, we made a party to go and see the famous Caudron-linn, a +remarkable cascade in the Devon, about five miles above Harvieston; +and after spending one of the most pleasant days I ever had in my +life, I returned to Stirling in the evening. They are a family, Sir, +though I had not any prior tie; though they had not been the brother +and sisters of a certain generous friend of mine, I would never forget +them. I am told you have not seen them these several years, so you can +have very little idea of what these young folks are now. Your brother +is as tall as you are, but slender rather than otherwise; and I have +the satisfaction to inform you that he is getting the better of those +consumptive symptoms which I suppose you know were threatening him. +His make, and particularly his manner, resemble you, but he will still +have a finer face. (I put in the word <i>still</i> to please Mrs. +Hamilton.) Good sense, modesty, and at the same time a just idea of +that respect that man owes to man, and has a right in his turn to +exact, are striking features in his character; and, what with me is +the Alpha and the Omega, he has a heart that might adorn the breast of +a poet! Grace has a good figure, and the look of health and +cheerfulness, but nothing else remarkable in her person. I scarcely +ever saw so striking a likeness as is between her and your little +Beenie; the mouth and chin particularly. She is reserved at first; but +as we grew better acquainted, I was delighted with the native +frankness of her manner, and the sterling sense of her observation. Of +Charlotte I cannot speak in common terms of admiration: she is not +only beautiful but lovely. Her form is elegant; her features not +regular, but they have the smile of sweetness and the settled +complacency of good nature in the highest degree: and her complexion, +now that she has happily recovered her wonted health, is equal to Miss +Burnet’s. After the exercise of our riding to the Falls, Charlotte was +exactly Dr. Donne’s mistress:—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">—————“Her pure and eloquent blood<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Spoke in her cheeks, and so distinctly wrought,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That one would almost say her body thought.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>Her eyes are fascinating; at once expressive of good sense, +tenderness, and a noble mind.</p> + +<p>I do not give you all this account, my good Sir, to flatter you. I +mean it to reproach you. Such relations the first peer in the realm +might own with pride; then why do you not keep up more correspondence +with these so amiable young folks? I had a thousand questions to +answer about you. I had to describe the little ones with the +minuteness of anatomy. They were highly delighted when I told them +that John was so good a boy, and so fine a scholar, and that Willie +was going on still very pretty; but I have it in commission to tell +her from them that beauty is a poor silly bauble without she be good. +Miss Chalmers I had left in Edinburgh, but I had the pleasure of +meeting Mrs. Chalmers, only Lady Mackenzie being rather a little +alarmingly ill of a sore throat somewhat marred our enjoyment.</p> + +<p>I shall not be in Ayrshire for four weeks. My most respectful +compliments to Mrs. Hamilton, Miss Kennedy, and Doctor Mackenzie. I +shall probably write him from some stage or other.</p> + +<p class="sig4">I am ever, Sir,</p> + +<p class="sig5">Yours most gratefully,</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_359" id="Page_359">[359]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="letterLXXVIII" id="letterLXXVIII"></a>LXXVIII.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. WALKER,</h3> + +<h4>BLAIR OF ATHOLE.</h4> + +<p>[Professor Walker was a native of Ayrshire, and an accomplished +scholar; he saw Burns often in Edinburgh; he saw him at the Earl of +Athol’s on the Bruar; he visited him too at Dumfries; and after the +copyright of Currie’s edition of the poet’s works expired, he wrote, +with much taste and feeling his life anew, and edited his works—what +passed under his own observation he related with truth and ease.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Inverness, 5th September</i>, 1787.</p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">My dear Sir</span>,</p> + +<p>I have just time to write the foregoing,<a name="FNanchor_178_178" id="FNanchor_178_178"></a><a href="#Footnote_178_178" class="fnanchor">[178]</a> and to tell you that it +was (at least most part of it) the effusion of an half-hour I spent at +Bruar. I do not mean it was extempore, for I have endeavoured to brush +it up as well as Mr. Nicol’s chat and the jogging of the chaise would +allow. It eases my heart a good deal, as rhyme is the coin with which +a poet pays his debts of honour or gratitude. What I owe to the noble +family of Athol, of the first kind, I shall ever proudly boast; what I +owe of the last, so help me God in my hour of need! I shall never +forget.</p> + +<p>The “little angel-band!” I declare I prayed for them very sincerely +to-day at the Fall of Fyers. I shall never forget the fine +family-piece I saw at Blair; the amiable, the truly noble duchess, +with her smiling little seraph in her lap, at the head of the table; +the lovely “olive plants,” as the Hebrew bard finely says, round the +happy mother: the beautiful Mrs. G——; the lovely sweet Miss C., &c. +I wish I had the powers of Guido to do them justice! My Lord Duke’s +kind hospitality—markedly kind indeed. Mr. Graham of Fintray’s charms +of conversation—Sir W. Murray’s friendship. In short, the +recollection of all that polite, agreeable company raises an honest +glow in my bosom.</p> + + + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_178_178" id="Footnote_178_178"></a><a href="#FNanchor_178_178"><span class="label">[178]</span></a> <a href="#LXXXIV">The Humble Petition of Bruar-water</a></p> +</div> +</div> + + + +<h2><a name="letterLXXIX" id="letterLXXIX"></a>LXXIX.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. GILBERT BURNS.</h3> + +<p>[The letters of Robert to Gilbert are neither many nor important: the +latter was a calm, considerate, sensible man, with nothing poetic in +his composition: he died lately, much and widely respected.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Edinburgh, 17th September, 1787.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">My dear Brother</span>,</p> + +<p>I arrived here safe yesterday evening, after a tour of twenty-two +days, and travelling near six hundred miles, windings included. My +farthest stretch was about ten miles beyond Inverness. I went through +the heart of the Highlands by Crieff, Taymouth, the famous seat of +Lord Breadalbane, down the Tay, among cascades and druidical circles +of stones, to Dunkeld, a seat of the Duke of Athol; thence across the +Tay, and up one of his tributary streams to Blair of Athole, another +of the duke’s seats, where I had the honour of spending nearly two +days with his grace and family; thence many miles through a wild +country, among cliffs gray with eternal snows and gloomy savage glens, +till I crossed Spey and went down the stream through Strathspey, so +famous in Scottish music; Badenoch, &c., till I reached Grant Castle, +where I spent half a day with Sir James Grant and family; and then +crossed the country for Fort George, but called by the way at Cawdor, +the ancient seat of Macbeth; there I saw the identical bed, in which +tradition says king Duncan was murdered: lastly, from Fort George to +Inverness.</p> + +<p>I returned by the coast, through Nairn, Forres, and so on, to +Aberdeen, thence to Stonehive, where James Burness, from Montrose, met +me by appointment. I spent two days among our relations, and found our +aunts, Jean and Isabel, still alive, and hale old women. John Cairn, +though born the same year with our father, walks as vigorously as I +can: they have had several letters from his son in New York. William +Brand is likewise a stout old fellow; but further particulars I delay +till I see you, which will be in two or three weeks. The rest of my +stages are not worth rehearsing: warm as I was from +Ossian’s country, where I had seen his very grave, what cared I for +fishing-towns or fertile carses? I slept at the famous Brodie of +Brodie’s one night, and dined at Gordon Castle next day, with the +duke, duchess and family. I am thinking to cause my old mare to meet +me, by means of John Ronald, at Glasgow; but you shall hear farther +from me before I leave Edinburgh. My duty and many compliments from +the north to my mother; and my brotherly compliments to the rest. I +have been trying for a berth for William, but am not likely to be +successful. Farewell.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_360" id="Page_360">[360]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="letterLXXX" id="letterLXXX"></a>LXXX.</h2> + +<h3>TO MISS MARGARET CHALMERS.</h3> + +<h4>(NOW MRS. HAY.)</h4> + +<p>[To Margaret Chalmers, the youngest daughter of James Chalmers, Esq., +of Fingland, it is said that Burns confided his affection to Charlotte +Hamilton: his letters to Miss Chalmers, like those to Mrs. Dunlop, are +distinguished for their good sense and delicacy as well as freedom.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Sept. 26, 1787.</i></p> + +<p>I send Charlotte the first number of the songs; I would not wait for +the second number; I hate delays in little marks of friendship, as I +hate dissimulation in the language of the heart. I am determined to +pay Charlotte a poetic compliment, if I could hit on some glorious old +Scotch air, in number second.<a name="FNanchor_179_179" id="FNanchor_179_179"></a><a href="#Footnote_179_179" class="fnanchor">[179]</a> You will see a small attempt on a +shred of paper in the book: but though Dr. Blacklock commended it very +highly, I am not just satisfied with it myself. I intend to make it a +description of some kind: the whining cant of love, except in real +passion, and by a masterly hand, is to me as insufferable as the +preaching cant of old Father Smeaton, whig-minister at Kilmaurs. +Darts, flames, cupids, loves, graces, and all that farrago, are just a +Mauchline * * * * a senseless rabble.</p> + +<p>I got an excellent poetic epistle yesternight from the old, venerable +author of “Tullochgorum,” “John of Badenyon,” &c. I suppose you know +he is a clergyman. It is by far the finest poetic compliment I ever +got. I will send you a copy of it.</p> + +<p>I go on Thursday or Friday to Dumfries, to wait on Mr. Miller about +his farms.—Do tell that to Lady Mackenzie, that she may give me +credit for a little wisdom. “I Wisdom dwell with Prudence.” What a +blessed fire-side! How happy should I be to pass a winter evening +under their venerable roof! and smoke a pipe of tobacco, or drink +water-gruel with them! What solemn, lengthened, laughter-quashing +gravity of phiz! What sage remarks on the good-for-nothing sons and +daughters of indiscretion and folly! And what frugal lessons, as we +straitened the fire-side circle, on the uses of the poker and tongs!</p> + +<p>Miss N. is very well, and begs to be remembered in the old way to you. +I used all my eloquence, all the persuasive flourishes of the hand, +and heart-melting modulation of periods in my power, to urge her out +to Harvieston, but all in vain. My rhetoric seems quite to have lost +its effect on the lovely half of mankind. I have seen the day—but +that is a “tale of other years.”—In my conscience I believe that my +heart has been so oft on fire that it is absolutely vitrified. I look +on the sex with something like the admiration with which I regard the +starry sky in a frosty December night. I admire the beauty of the +Creator’s workmanship; I am charmed with the wild but graceful +eccentricity of their motions, and—wish them good night. I mean this +with respect to a certain passion <i>dont j’ai eu l’honneur d’être un +miserable esclave</i>: as for friendship, you and Charlotte have given me +pleasure, permanent pleasure, “which the world cannot give, nor take +away,” I hope; and which will outlast the heavens and the earth.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + + + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_179_179" id="Footnote_179_179"></a><a href="#FNanchor_179_179"><span class="label">[179]</span></a> Of the Scots Musical Museum</p></div> +</div> + + + +<h2><a name="letterLXXXI" id="letterLXXXI"></a>LXXXI.</h2> + +<h3>TO MISS MARGARET CHALMERS.</h3> + +<p>[That fine song, “The Banks of the Devon,” dedicated to the charms of +Charlotte Hamilton, was enclosed in the following letter.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Without date.</i></p> + +<p>I have been at Dumfries, and at one visit more shall be decided about +a farm in that country. I am rather hopeless in it; but as my brother +is an excellent farmer, and is, besides, an exceedingly prudent, sober +man (qualities which are only a younger brother’s fortune in our +family), I am determined, if my Dumfries business fail me, to return +into partnership with him, and at our leisure take another farm in the +neighbourhood.</p> + +<p>I assure you I look for high compliments from you and Charlotte on +this very sage instance of my unfathomable, incomprehensible wisdom. +Talking of Charlotte, I must tell her that I have, to the best of my +power, paid her a poetic compliment, now completed. The air is +admirable: true old Highland. It was the tune of a Gaelic song, which +an Inverness lady sung me when I was there; and I was so charmed with +it that I begged her to write me a set of it from her singing; for it +had never been set before. I am fixed that it shall go in Johnson’s +next number; so Charlotte and you need not spend your precious time in +contradicting me. I won’t say the poetry is first-rate; though I am +convinced it is<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_361" id="Page_361">[361]</a></span> very well; and, what is not always the case with +compliments to ladies, it is not only sincere, but just.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterLXXXII" id="letterLXXXII"></a>LXXXII.</h2> + +<h3>TO JAMES HOY, ESQ.</h3> + +<h4>GORDON CASTLE</h4> + +<p>[James Hoy, librarian of Gordon Castle, was, it is said, the gentleman +whom his grace of Gordon sent with a message inviting in vain that +“obstinate son of Latin prose,” Nicol, to stop and enjoy himself.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Edinburgh, 20th October</i>, 1787.</p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">Sir,</span></p> + +<p>I will defend my conduct in giving you this trouble, on the best of +Christian principles—“Whatsoever ye would that men should do unto +you, do ye even so unto them.”—I shall certainly, among my legacies, +leave my latest curse to that unlucky predicament which hurried—tore +me away from Castle Gordon. May that obstinate son of Latin prose +[Nicol] be curst to Scotch mile periods, and damned to seven league +paragraphs; while Declension and Conjugation, Gender, Number, and +Time, under the ragged banners of Dissonance and Disarrangement, +eternally rank against him in hostile array.</p> + +<p>Allow me, Sir, to strengthen the small claim I have to your +acquaintance, by the following request. An engraver, James Johnson, in +Edinburgh, has, not from mercenary views, but from an honest, Scotch +enthusiasm, set about collecting all our native songs and setting them +to music; particularly those that have never been set before. Clarke, +the well known musician, presides over the musical arrangement, and +Drs. Beattie and Blacklock, Mr. Tytler, of Woodhouselee, and your +humble servant to the utmost of his small power, assist in collecting +the old poetry, or sometimes for a fine air make a stanza, when it has +no words. The brats, too tedious to mention, claim a parental pang +from my bardship. I suppose it will appear in Johnson’s second +number—the first was published before my acquaintance with him. My +request is—“Cauld Kail in Aberdeen,” is one intended for this number, +and I beg a copy of his Grace of Gordon’s words to it, which you were +so kind as to repeat to me. You may be sure we won’t prefix the +author’s name, except you like, though I look on it as no small merit +to this work that the names of many of the authors of our old Scotch +songs, names almost forgotten, will be inserted.</p> + +<p>I do not well know where to write to you—I rather write at you; but +if you will be so obliging, immediately on receipt of this, as to +write me a few lines, I shall perhaps pay you in kind, though not in +quality. Johnson’s terms are:—each number a handsome pocket volume, +to consist at least of a hundred Scotch songs, with basses for the +harpsichord, &c. The price to subscribers 5s.; to non-subscribers 6s. +He will have three numbers I conjecture.</p> + +<p>My direction for two or three weeks will be at Mr. William +Cruikshank’s, St. James’s-square, New-town, Edinburgh.</p> + +<p class="sig10">I am,</p> + +<p class="sig9">Sir,</p> + +<p class="sig10">Your’s to command,</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterLXXXIII" id="letterLXXXIII"></a>LXXXIII.</h2> + +<h3>TO REV. JOHN SKINNER.</h3> + +<p>[The songs of “Tullochgorum,” and “John of Badenyon,” have made the +name of Skinner dear to all lovers of Scottish verse: he was a man +cheerful and pious, nor did the family talent expire with him: his son +became Bishop of Aberdeen.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Edinburgh, October 25,</i> 1787.</p> + +<p><span class="smcap">Reverend and Venerable Sir,</span></p> + +<p>Accept, in plain dull prose, my most sincere thanks for the best +poetical compliment I ever received. I assure you, Sir, as a poet, you +have conjured up an airy demon of vanity in my fancy, which the best +abilities in your other capacity would be ill able to lay. I regret, +and while I live I shall regret, that when I was in the north, I had +not the pleasure of paying a younger brother’s dutiful respect to the +author of the best Scotch song ever Scotland saw—“Tullochgorum’s my +delight!” The world may think slightingly of the craft of song-making, +if they please, but, as Job says—“Oh! that mine adversary had written +a book!”—let them try. There is a certain something in the old Scotch +songs, a wild happiness of thought and expression, which peculiarly +marks them, not only from English songs, but also from the modern +efforts of song-wrights in our native manner and language. The only +remains of this enchantment, these spells of the imagination, rests +with you. Our true brother, Ross of Lochlee, was likewise “owre +cannie”—a “wild warlock”—but now he sings among the “sons of the +morning.”</p> + +<p>I have often wished, and will certainly endea<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_362" id="Page_362">[362]</a></span>vour to form a kind of +common acquaintance among all the genuine sons of Caledonian song. The +world, busy in low prosaic pursuits, may overlook most of us; but +“reverence thyself.” The world is not our <i>peers</i>, so we challenge the +jury. We can lash that world, and find ourselves a very great source +of amusement and happiness independent of that world.</p> + +<p>There is a work going on in Edinburgh, just now, which claims your +best assistance. An engraver in this town has set about collecting and +publishing all the Scotch songs, with the music, that can be found. +Songs in the English language, if by Scotchmen, are admitted, but the +music must all be Scotch. Drs. Beattie and Blacklock are lending a +hand, and the first musician in town presides over that department. I +have been absolutely crazed about it, collecting old stanzas, and +every information respecting their origin, authors, &c. &c. This last +is but a very fragment business; but at the end of his second +number—the first is already published—a small account will be given +of the authors, particularly to preserve those of latter times. Your +three songs, “Tullochgorum,” “John of Badenyon,” and “Ewie wi’ the +crookit horn,” go in this second number. I was determined, before I +got your letter, to write you, begging that you would let me know +where the editions of these pieces may be found, as you would wish +them to continue in future times: and if you would be so kind to this +undertaking as send any songs, of your own or others, that you would +think proper to publish, your name will be inserted among the other +authors,—“Nill ye, will ye.” One half of Scotland already give your +songs to other authors. Paper is done. I beg to hear from you; the +sooner the better, as I leave Edinburgh in a fortnight or three +weeks.—</p> + +<p class="sig3">I am,</p> + +<p class="sig2">With the warmest sincerity, Sir,</p> + +<p class="sig4">Your obliged humble servant,—R. B</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterLXXXIV" id="letterLXXXIV"></a>LXXXIV.</h2> + +<h3>TO JAMES HOY, ESQ.</h3> + +<h4>AT GORDON CASTLE, FOCHABERS.</h4> + +<p>[In singleness of heart and simplicity of manners James Hoy is said, +by one who knew him well, to have rivalled Dominie Sampson: his love +of learning and his scorn of wealth are still remembered to his +honour.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Edinburgh, 6th November</i>, 1787.</p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">Dear Sir,</span></p> + +<p>I would have wrote you immediately on receipt of your kind letter, but +a mixed impulse of gratitude and esteem whispered me that I ought to +send you something by way of return. When a poet owes anything, +particularly when he is indebted for good offices, the payment that +usually recurs to him—the only coin indeed in which he probably is +conversant—is rhyme. Johnson sends the books by the fly, as directed, +and begs me to enclose his most grateful thanks: my return I intended +should have been one or two poetic bagatelles which the world have not +seen, or, perhaps, for obvious reasons, cannot see. These I shall send +you before I leave Edinburgh. They may make you laugh a little, which, +on the whole, is no bad way of spending one’s precious hours and still +more precious breath: at any rate, they will be, though a small, yet a +very sincere mark of my respectful esteem for a gentleman whose +further acquaintance I should look upon as a peculiar obligation.</p> + +<p>The duke’s song, independent totally of his dukeship, charms me. There +is I know not what of wild happiness of thought and expression +peculiarly beautiful in the old Scottish song style, of which his +Grace, old venerable Skinner, the author of “Tullochgorum,” &c., and +the late Ross, at Lochlee, of true Scottish poetic memory, are the +only modern instances that I recollect, since Ramsay with his +contemporaries, and poor Bob Fergusson, went to the world of deathless +existence and truly immortal song. The mob of mankind, that +many-headed beast, would laugh at so serious a speech about an old +song; but as Job says, “O that mine adversary had written a book!” +Those who think that composing a Scotch song is a trifling +business—let them try.</p> + +<p>I wish my Lord Duke would pay a proper attention to the Christian +admonition—“Hide not your candle under a bushel,” but “let your light +shine before men.” I could name half a dozen dukes that I guess are a +devilish deal worse employed: nay, I question if there are half a +dozen better: perhaps there are not half that scanty number whom +Heaven has favoured with the tuneful, happy, and, I will say, glorious +gift.</p> + +<p class="sig3">I am, dear Sir,</p> + +<p class="sig4">Your obliged humble servant,</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_363" id="Page_363">[363]</a></span></p> + + +<h2><a name="letterLXXXV" id="letterLXXXV"></a>LXXXV.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. ROBERT AINSLIE,</h3> + +<h4>EDINBURGH.</h4> + +<p>[“I set you down,” says Burns, elsewhere, to Ainslie, “as the staff of +my old age, when all my other friends, after a decent show of pity, +will have forgot me.”]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Edinburgh, Sunday Morning</i>,</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Nov.</i> 23, 1787.</p> + +<p>I Beg, my dear Sir, you would not make any appointment to take us to +Mr. Ainslie’s to-night. On looking over my engagements, constitution, +present state of my health, some little vexatious soul concerns, &c., +I find I can’t sup abroad to-night. I shall be in to-day till one +o’clock if you have a leisure hour.</p> + +<p>You will think it romantic when I tell you, that I find the idea of +your friendship almost necessary to my existence.—You assume a proper +length of face in my bitter hours of blue-devilism, and you laugh +fully up to my highest wishes at my good things.—I don’t know upon +the whole, if you are one of the first fellows in God’s world, but you +are so to me. I tell you this just now in the conviction that some +inequalities in my temper and manner may perhaps sometimes make you +suspect that I am not so warmly as I ought to be your friend.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterLXXXVI" id="letterLXXXVI"></a>LXXXVI.</h2> + +<h3>TO THE EARL OF GLENCAIRN.</h3> + +<p>[The views of Burns were always humble: he regarded a place in the +excise as a thing worthy of paying court for, both in verse and +prose.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Edinburgh</i>, 1787.</p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">My Lord,</span></p> + +<p>I know your lordship will disapprove of my ideas in a request I am +going to make to you; but I have weighed, long and seriously weighed, +my situation, my hopes and turn of mind, and am fully fixed to my +scheme if I can possibly effectuate it. I wish to get into the Excise; +I am told that your lordship’s interest will easily procure me the +grant from the commissioners; and your lordship’s patronage and +goodness, which have already rescued me from obscurity, wretchedness, +and exile, embolden me to ask that interest. You have likewise put it +in my power to save the little tie of home that sheltered an aged +mother, two brothers, and three sisters from destruction. There, my +lord, you have bound me over to the highest gratitude.</p> + +<p>My brother’s farm is but a wretched lease, but I think he will +probably weather out the remaining seven years of it; and after the +assistance which I have given and will give him, to keep the family +together, I think, by my guess, I shall have rather better than two +hundred pounds, and instead of seeking, what is almost impossible at +present to find, a farm that I can certainly live by, with so small a +stock, I shall lodge this sum in a banking-house, a sacred deposit, +expecting only the calls of uncommon distress or necessitous old age.</p> + +<p>These, my lord, are my views: I have resolved from the maturest +deliberation; and now I am fixed, I shall leave no stone unturned to +carry my resolve into execution. Your lordship’s patronage is the +strength of my hopes; nor have I yet applied to anybody else. Indeed +my heart sinks within me at the idea of applying to any other of the +great who have honoured me with their countenance. I am ill qualified +to dog the heels of greatness with the impertinence of solicitation, +and tremble nearly as much at the thought of the cold promise as the +cold denial; but to your lordship I have not only the honour, the +comfort, but the pleasure of being</p> + +<p class="sig3">Your lordship’s much obliged</p> + +<p class="sig4">And deeply indebted humble servant,</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterLXXXVII" id="letterLXXXVII"></a>LXXXVII.</h2> + +<h3>TO JAMES DALRYMPLE, ESQ.</h3> + +<h4>ORANGEFIELD.</h4> + +<p>[James Dalrymple, Esq., of Orangefield, was a gentleman of birth and +poetic tastes—he interested himself in the fortunes of Burns.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Edinburgh</i>, 1787.</p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">Dear Sir,</span></p> + +<p>I suppose the devil is so elated with his success with you that he is +determined by a <i>coup de main</i> to complete his purposes on you all at +once, in making you a poet. I broke open the letter you sent me; +hummed over the rhymes; and, as I saw they were extempore, said to +myself, they were very well; but when I saw at the bottom a name that +I shall ever value with grateful respect, “I gapit wide, but naething +spak.” I was nearly as much struck as the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_364" id="Page_364">[364]</a></span> friends of Job, of +affliction-bearing memory, when they sat down with him seven days and +seven nights, and spake not a word.</p> + +<p>I am naturally of a superstitious cast, and as soon as my +wonder-scared imagination regained its consciousness, and resumed its +functions, I cast about what this mania of yours might portend. My +foreboding ideas had the wide stretch of possibility; and several +events, great in their magnitude, and important in their consequences, +occurred to my fancy. The downfall of the conclave, or the crushing of +the Cork rumps; a ducal coronet to Lord George Gordon and the +Protestant interest; or St. Peter’s keys to * * * * * *.</p> + +<p>You want to know how I come on. I am just in <i>statu quo</i>, or, not to +insult a gentleman with my Latin, in “auld use and wont.” The noble +Earl of Glencairn took me by the hand to-day, and interested himself +in my concerns, with a goodness like that benevolent Being, whose +image he so richly bears. He is a stronger proof of the immortality of +the soul, than any that philosophy ever produced. A mind like his can +never die. Let the worshipful squire H. L., or the reverend Mass J. M. +go into their primitive nothing. At best, they are but ill-digested +lumps of chaos, only one of them strongly tinged with bituminous +particles and sulphureous effluvia. But my noble patron, eternal as +the heroic swell of magnanimity, and the generous throb of +benevolence, shall look on with princely eye at “the war of elements, +the wreck of matter, and the crush of worlds.”</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterLXXXVIII" id="letterLXXXVIII"></a>LXXXVIII.</h2> + +<h3>TO CHARLES HAY. ESQ.,</h3> + +<h4>ADVOCATE.</h4> + +<p>[The verses enclosed were written on the death of the Lord President +Dundas, at the suggestion of Charles Hay, Esq., advocate, afterwards a +judge, under the title of Lord Newton.]</p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">Sir,</span></p> + +<p>The enclosed poem was written in consequence of your suggestion, last +time I had the pleasure of seeing you. It cost me an hour or two of +next morning’s sleep, but did not please me; so it lay by, an +ill-digested effort, till the other day that I gave it a critic brush. +These kind of subjects are much hackneyed; and, besides, the wailings +of the rhyming tribe over the ashes of the great are cursedly +suspicious, and out of all character for sincerity. These ideas damped +my muse’s fire; however, I have done the best I could, and, at all +events, it gives me an opportunity of declaring that I have the honour +to be, Sir, your obliged humble servant,</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterLXXXIX" id="letterLXXXIX"></a>LXXXIX.</h2> + +<h3>TO MISS M——N.</h3> + +<p>[This letter appeared for the first time in the “Letters to Clarinda,” +a little work which was speedily suppressed—it is, on the whole, a +sort of Corydon and Phillis affair, with here and there expressions +too graphic, and passages over-warm. Who the lady was is not known—or +known only to one.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Saturday Noon, No. 2, St. James’s Square</i>,</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>New Town, Edinburgh</i></p> + +<p>Here have I sat, my ‘dear Madam, in the stony altitude of perplexed +study for fifteen vexatious minutes, my head askew, bending over the +intended card; my fixed eye insensible to the very light of day poured +around; my pendulous goose-feather, loaded with ink, hanging over the +future letter, all for the important purpose of writing a +complimentary card to accompany your trinket.</p> + +<p>Compliment is such a miserable Greenland expression, lies at such a +chilly polar distance from the torrid zone of my constitution, that I +cannot, for the very soul of me, use it to any person for whom I have +the twentieth part of the esteem every one must have for you who knows +you.</p> + +<p>As I leave town in three or four days, I can give myself the pleasure +of calling on you only for a minute. Tuesday evening, some time about +seven or after, I shall wait on you for your farewell commands.</p> + +<p>The hinge of your box I put into the hands of the proper connoisseur. +The broken glass, likewise, went under review; but deliberative wisdom +thought it would too much endanger the whole fabric.</p> + +<p class="sig3">I am, dear Madam,</p> + +<p class="sig4">With all sincerity of enthusiasm,</p> + +<p class="sig5">Your very obedient servant,</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_365" id="Page_365">[365]</a></span></p> + + +<h2><a name="letterXC" id="letterXC"></a>XC.</h2> + +<h3>TO MISS CHALMERS.</h3> + +<p>[Some dozen or so, it is said, of the most beautiful letters that +Burns ever wrote, and dedicated to the beauty of Charlotte Hamilton, +were destroyed by that lady, in a moment when anger was too strong for +reflection.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Edinburgh, Nov.</i> 21, 1787.</p> + +<p>I have one vexatious fault to the kindly-welcome, well-filled sheet +which I owe to your and Charlotte’s goodness,—it contains too much +sense, sentiment, and good-spelling. It is impossible that even you +two, whom I declare to my God I will give credit for any degree of +excellence the sex are capable of attaining, it is impossible you can +go on to correspond at that rate; so like those who, Shenstone says, +retire because they make a good speech, I shall, after a few letters, +hear no more of you. I insist that you shall write whatever comes +first: what you see, what you read, what you hear, what you admire, +what you dislike, trifles, bagatelles, nonsense; or to fill up a +corner, e’en put down a laugh at full length. Now none of your polite +hints about flattery; I leave that to your lovers, if you have or +shall have any; though, thank heaven, I have found at last two girls +who can be luxuriantly happy in their own minds and with one another, +without that commonly necessary appendage to female bliss—<span class="f2">A LOVER.</span></p> + +<p>Charlotte and you are just two favourite resting-places for my soul in +her wanderings through the weary, thorny wilderness of this world. God +knows I am ill-fitted for the struggle: I glory in being a Poet, and I +want to be thought a wise man—I would fondly be generous, and I wish +to be rich. After all, I am afraid I am a lost subject. “Some folk hae +a hantle o’ fauts, an’ I’m but a ne’er-do-weel.”</p> + +<p><i>Afternoon</i>—To close the melancholy reflections at the end of last +sheet, I shall just add a piece of devotion commonly known in Carrick +by the title of the “Wabster’s grace:”—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Some say we’re thieves, and e’en sae are we,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Some say we lie, and e’en sae do we!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Gude forgie us, and I hope sae will he!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">——Up and to your looms, lads.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterXCI" id="letterXCI"></a>XCI.</h2> + +<h3>TO MISS CHALMERS.</h3> + +<p>[The “Ochel-Hills,” which the poet promises in this letter, is a song, +beginning,</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Where braving angry winter’s storms<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The lofty Ochels rise,”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>written in honour of Margaret Chalmers, and published along with the +“Banks of the Devon,” in Johnson’s Musical Museum.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Edinburgh, Dec.</i> 12, 1787.</p> + +<p>I am here under the care of a surgeon, with a bruised limb extended on +a cushion; and the tints of my mind vying with the livid horror +preceding a midnight thunder-storm. A drunken coachman was the cause +of the first, and incomparably the lightest evil; misfortune, bodily +constitution, hell, and myself have formed a “quadruple alliance” to +guaranty the other. I got my fall on Saturday, and am getting slowly +better.</p> + +<p>I have taken tooth and nail to the Bible, and am got through the five +books of Moses, and half way in Joshua. It is really a glorious book. +I sent for my bookbinder to-day, and ordered him to get me an octavo +Bible in sheets, the best paper and print in town; and bind it with +all the elegance of his craft.</p> + +<p>I would give my best song to my worst enemy, I mean the merit of +making it, to have you and Charlotte by me. You are angelic creatures, +and would pour oil and wine into my wounded spirit.</p> + +<p>I enclose you a proof copy of the “Banks of the Devon,” which present +with my best wishes to Charlotte. The “Ochel-hills” you shall probably +have next week for yourself. None of your fine speeches!</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterXCII" id="letterXCII"></a>XCII.</h2> + +<h3>TO MISS CHALMERS.</h3> + +<p>[The eloquent hypochondriasm of the concluding paragraph of this +letter, called forth the commendation of Lord Jeffrey, when he +criticised Cromek’s Reliques of Burns, in the Edinburgh Review.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Edinburgh, Dec.</i> 19, 1787.</p> + +<p>I begin this letter in answer to yours of the 17th current, which is +not yet cold since I read it. The atmosphere of my soul is vastly +clearer than when I wrote you last. For the first time, yesterday I +crossed the room on crutches. It would do your heart good to see my +hardship, not on my poetic, but on my oaken stilts; throwing my best +leg with an air! and with as much hilarity in my gait and countenance, +as a May frog leaping across the newly harrowed<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_366" id="Page_366">[366]</a></span> ridge, enjoying the +fragrance of the refreshed earth, after the long-expected shower!</p> + +<p>I can’t say I am altogether at my ease when I see anywhere in my path +that meagre, squalid, famine-faced spectre, Poverty; attended as he +always is, by iron-fisted oppression, and leering contempt; but I have +sturdily withstood his buffetings many a hard-laboured day already, +and still my motto is—I <span class="smcap">Dare</span>! My worst enemy is <i>moi-même.</i> +I lie so miserably open to the inroads and incursions of a +mischievous, light-armed, well-mounted banditti, under the banners of +imagination, whim, caprice, and passion: and the heavy-armed veteran +regulars of wisdom, prudence, and forethought move so very, very slow, +that I am almost in a state of perpetual warfare, and, alas! frequent +defeat. There are just two creatures I would envy, a horse in his wild +state traversing the forests of Asia, or an oyster on some of the +desert shores of Europe. The one has not a wish without enjoyment, the +other has neither wish nor fear.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterXCIII" id="letterXCIII"></a>XCIII.</h2> + +<h3>TO SIR JOHN WHITEFOORD.</h3> + +<p>[The Whitefoords of Whitefoord, interested themselves in all matters +connected with literature: the power of the family, unluckily for +Burns, was not equal to their taste.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Edinburgh, December</i>, 1787.</p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">Sir,</span></p> + +<p>Mr. Mackenzie, in Mauchline, my very warm and worthy friend, has +informed me how much you are pleased to interest yourself in my fate +as a man, and (what to me is incomparably dearer) my fame as a poet. +I have, Sir, in one or two instances, been patronized by those of your +character in life, when I was introduced to their notice by * * * * * +friends to them and honoured acquaintances to me! but you are the +first gentleman in the country whose benevolence and goodness of heart +has interested himself for me, unsolicited and unknown. I am not +master enough of the etiquette of these matters to know, nor did I +stay to inquire, whether formal duty bade, or cold propriety +disallowed, my thanking you in this manner, as I am convinced, from +the light in which you kindly view me, that you will do me the justice +to believe this letter is not the manœuvre of the needy, sharping +author, fastening on those in upper life, who honour him with a little +notice of him or his works. Indeed, the situation of poets is +generally such, to a proverb, as may, in some measure, palliate that +prostitution of heart and talents, they have at times been guilty of. +I do not think prodigality is, by any means, a necessary concomitant +of a poetic turn, but I believe a careless indolent attention to +economy, is almost inseparable from it; then there must be in the +heart of every bard of Nature’s making, a certain modest sensibility, +mixed with a kind of pride, that will ever keep him out of the way of +those windfalls of fortune which frequently light on hardy impudence +and foot-licking servility. It is not easy to imagine a more helpless +state than his whose poetic fancy unfits him for the world, and whose +character as a scholar gives him some pretensions to the <i>politesse</i> +of life—yet is as poor as I am.</p> + +<p>For my part, I thank Heaven my star has been kinder; learning never +elevated my ideas above the peasant’s shed, and I have an independent +fortune at the plough-tail.</p> + +<p>I was surprised to hear that any one who pretended in the least to the +manners of the gentleman, should be so foolish, or worse, as to stoop +to traduce the morals of such a one as I am, and so inhumanly cruel, +too, as to meddle with that late most unfortunate, unhappy part of my +story. With a tear of gratitude, I thank you, Sir, for the warmth with +which you interposed in behalf of my conduct. I am, I acknowledge, too +frequently the sport of whim, caprice, and passion, but reverence to +God, and integrity to my fellow-creatures, I hope I shall ever +preserve. I have no return, Sir, to make you for your goodness but +one—a return which, I am persuaded, will not be unacceptable—the +honest, warm wishes of a grateful heart for your happiness, and every +one of that lovely flock, who stand to you in a filial relation. If +ever calumny aim the poisoned shaft at them, may friendship be by to +ward the blow!</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterXCIV" id="letterXCIV"></a>XCIV.</h2> + +<h3>TO MISS WILLIAMS,</h3> + +<h4>ON READING HER POEM OF THE SLAVE-TRADE.</h4> +<p>[The name and merits of Miss Williams are widely known; nor is it a +small honour to her muse that her tender song of “Evan Banks” was +imputed to Burns by<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_367" id="Page_367">[367]</a></span> Cromek: other editors since have continued to +include it in his works, though Sir Walter Scott named the true +author.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Edinburgh, Dec.</i> 1787.</p> + +<p>I know very little of scientific criticism, so all I can pretend to in +that intricate art is merely to note, as I read along, what passages +strike me as being uncommonly beautiful, and where the expression +seems to be perplexed or faulty.</p> + +<p>The poem opens finely. There are none of these idle prefatory lines +which one may skip over before one comes to the subject. Verses 9th +and 10th in particular,</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i4">“Where ocean’s unseen bound<br /> +</span> +<span class="i0">Leaves a drear world of waters round,”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>are truly beautiful. The simile of the hurricane is likewise fine; +and, indeed, beautiful as the poem is, almost all the similes rise +decidedly above it. From verse 31st to verse 50th is a pretty eulogy +on Britain. Verse 36th, “That foul drama deep with wrong,” is nobly +expressive. Verse 46th, I am afraid, is rather unworthy of the rest; +“to dare to feel” is an idea that I do not altogether like. The +contrast of valour and mercy, from the 36th verse to the 50th, is +admirable.</p> + +<p>Either my apprehension is dull, or there is something a little +confused in the apostrophe to Mr. Pitt. Verse 55th is the antecedent +to verses 57th and 58th, but in verse 58th the connexion seems +ungrammatical:—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Powers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . <br /></span> +<span class="i0">. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . <br /></span> +<span class="i0">With no gradation mark’d their flight,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But rose at once to glory’s height.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>Ris’n should be the word instead of rose. Try it in prose. +Powers,—their flight marked by no gradations, but [the same powers] +risen at once to the height of glory. Likewise, verse 53d, “For this,” +is evidently meant to lead on the sense of the verses 59th, 60th, +61st, and 62d: but let us try how the thread of connexion runs,—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“For this . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .<br /></span> +<span class="i0">. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The deeds of mercy, that embrace<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A distant sphere, an alien race,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Shall virtue’s lips record and claim<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The fairest honours of thy name.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>I beg pardon if I misapprehended the matter, but this appears to me +the only imperfect passage in the poem. The comparison of the sunbeam +is fine.</p> + +<p>The compliment to the Duke of Richmond is, I hope, as just as it is +certainly elegant The thought,</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Virtue . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .<br /></span> +<span class="i0">. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sends from her unsullied source,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The gems of thought their purest force,”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>is exceeding beautiful. The idea, from verse 81st to the 85th, that +the “blest decree” is like the beams of morning ushering in the +glorious day of liberty, ought not to pass unnoticed or unapplauded. +From verse 85th to verse 108th, is an animated contrast between the +unfeeling selfishness of the oppressor on the one hand, and the misery +of the captive on the other. Verse 88th might perhaps be amended thus: +“Nor ever <i>quit</i> her narrow maze.” We are said to <i>pass</i> a bound, but +we <i>quit</i>, a maze. Verse 100th is exquisitely beautiful:—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“They, whom wasted blessings tire.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>Verse 110th is I doubt a clashing of metaphors: “to load a span” is, I +am afraid, an unwarrantable expression. In verse 114th, “Cast the +universe in shade,” is a fine idea. From the 115th verse to the 142d +is a striking description of the wrongs of the poor African. Verse +120th, “The load of unremitted pain,” is a remarkable, strong +expression. The address to the advocates for abolishing the +slave-trade, from verse 143d to verse 208th, is animated with the true +life of genius. The picture of oppression:—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“While she links her impious chain,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And calculates the price of pain;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Weighs agony in sordid scales,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And marks if death or life prevails,”—<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>is nobly executed.</p> + +<p>What a tender idea is in verse 108th! Indeed, that whole description +of home may vie with Thomson’s description of home, somewhere in the +beginning of his Autumn. I do not remember to have seen a stronger +expression of misery than is contained in these verses:—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Condemned, severe extreme, to live<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When all is fled that life can give”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>The comparison of our distant joys to distant objects is equally +original and striking.</p> + +<p>The character and manners of the dealer in the infernal traffic is a +well done though a horrid picture. I am not sure how far introducing +the sailor was right; for though the sailor’s common characteristic is +generosity, yet, in this case, he is certainly not only an unconcerned +witness, but, in some degree, an efficient<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_368" id="Page_368">[368]</a></span> agent in the business. +Verse 224th is a nervous .... expressive—“The heart convulsive anguish +breaks.” The description of the captive wretch when he arrives in the +West Indies, is carried on with equal spirit. The thought that the +oppressor’s sorrow on seeing the slave pine, is like the butcher’s +regret when his destined lamb dies a natural death, is exceedingly +fine.</p> + +<p>I am got so much into the cant of criticism, that I begin to be afraid +lest I have nothing except the cant of it; and instead of elucidating +my author, am only benighting myself. For this reason, I will not +pretend to go through the whole poem. Some few remaining beautiful +lines, however, I cannot pass over. Verse 280th is the strongest +description of selfishness I ever saw. The comparison of verses 285th +and 286th is new and fine; and the line, “Your arms to penury you +lend,” is excellent. In verse 317th, “like” should certainly be “as” +or “so;” for instance—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“His sway the hardened bosom leads<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To cruelty’s remorseless deeds:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As (or, so) the blue lightning when it springs<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With fury on its livid wings,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Darts on the goal with rapid force,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Nor heeds that ruin marks its course.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>If you insert the word “like” where I have placed “as,” you must alter +“darts” to “darting,” and “heeds” to “heeding” in order to make it +grammar. A tempest is a favourite subject with the poets, but I do not +remember anything even in Thomson’s Winter superior to your verses +from the 347th to the 351st. Indeed, the last simile, beginning with +“Fancy may dress,” &c., and ending with the 350th verse, is, in my +opinion, the most beautiful passage in the poem; it would do honour to +the greatest names that ever graced our profession.</p> + +<p>I will not beg your pardon, Madam, for these strictures, as my +conscience tells me, that for once in my life I have acted up to the +duties of a Christian, in doing as I would be done by.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + + + +<h2><a name="letterXCV" id="letterXCV"></a>XCV.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. RICHARD BROWN,</h3> + +<h4>IRVINE.</h4> + +<p>[Richard Brown was the “hapless son of misfortune,” alluded to by +Burns in his biographical letter to Dr. Moore: by fortitude and +prudence he retrieved his fortunes, and lived much respected in +Greenock, to a good old age. He said Burns had little to learn in +matters of levity, when he became acquainted with him.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Edinburgh, 30th Dec.</i> 1787.</p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">My dear Sir,</span></p> + +<p>I have met with few things in life which have given me more pleasure +than Fortune’s kindness to you since those days in which we met in the +vale of misery; as I can honestly say, that I never knew a man who +more truly deserved it, or to whom my heart more truly wished it. I +have been much indebted since that time to your story and sentiments +for steeling my mind against evils, of which I have had a pretty +decent share. My will-o’wisp fate you know: do you recollect a Sunday +we spent together in Eglinton woods! You told me, on my repeating some +verses to you, that you wondered I could resist the temptation of +sending verses of such merit to a magazine. It was from this remark I +derived that idea of my own pieces, which encouraged me to endeavour +at the character of a poet. I am happy to hear that you will be two or +three months at home. As soon as a bruised limb will permit me, I +shall return to Ayrshire, and we shall meet; “and faith, I hope we’ll +not sit dumb, nor yet cast out!”</p> + +<p>I have much to tell you “of men, their manners, and their ways,” +perhaps a little of the other sex. Apropos, I beg to be remembered to +Mrs. Brown. There I doubt not, my dear friend, but you have found +substantial happiness. I expect to find you something of an altered +but not a different man; the wild, bold, generous young fellow +composed into the steady affectionate husband, and the fond careful +parent. For me, I am just the same will-o’-wisp being I used to be. +About the first and fourth quarters of the moon, I generally set in +for the trade wind of wisdom: but about the full and change, I am the +luckless victim of mad tornadoes, which blow me into chaos. Almighty +love still reigns and revels in my bosom; and I am at this moment +ready to hang myself for a young Edinburgh widow, who has wit and +wisdom more murderously fatal than the assassinating stiletto of the +Sicilian banditti, or the poisoned arrow of the savage African. My +highland dirk, that used to hang beside my crutches, I have gravely +removed into a neighbouring closet, the key of which I cannot command +in case of spring-tide paroxysms. You may guess of her wit by +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_369" id="Page_369">[369]</a></span> +the following verses, which she sent me the other day:—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Talk not of love, it gives me pain,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For love has been my foe;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He bound me with an iron chain,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And plunged me deep in woe!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But friendship’s pure and lasting joys.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My heart was formed to prove,—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">There, welcome, win, and wear the prize,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But never talk of love!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Your friendship much can make me blest—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">O why that bliss destroy?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Why urge the odious one request,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">You know I must deny?<a name="FNanchor_180_180" id="FNanchor_180_180"></a><a href="#Footnote_180_180" class="fnanchor">[180]</a><br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>My best compliments to our friend Allan.</p> + +<p class="sig9">Adieu!</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_180_180" id="Footnote_180_180"></a><a href="#FNanchor_180_180"><span class="label">[180]</span></a> See song 186, in Johnson’s Musical Museum. Burns altered +the two last lines, and added a stanza: +</p> +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Why urge the only one request<br /></span> +<span class="i2">You know I will deny!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Your thought if love must harbour there,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Conceal it in that thought;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Nor cause me from my bosom tear<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The very friend I sought.<br /></span> +</div></div> +</div> +</div> + + + +<h2><a name="letterXCVI" id="letterXCVI"></a>XCVI.</h2> + +<h3>TO GAVIN HAMILTON.</h3> + +<p>[The Hamiltons of the West continue to love the memory of Burns: the +old arm-chair in which the bard sat, when he visited Nanse Tinnocks, +was lately presented to the mason Lodge of Mauchline, by Dr. Hamilton, +the “wee curly Johnie” of the Dedication.]</p> + +<p class="sig">[<i>Edinburgh, Dec.</i> 1787.]</p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">My dear Sir,</span></p> + +<p>It is indeed with the highest pleasure that I congratulate you on the +return of days of ease and nights of pleasure, after the horrid hours +of misery in which I saw you suffering existence when last in +Ayrshire; I seldom pray for any body, “I’m baith dead-sweer and +wretched ill o’t;” but most fervently do I beseech the Power that +directs the world, that you may live long and be happy, but live no +longer than you are happy. It is needless for me to advise you to have +a reverend care of your health. I know you will make it a point never +at one time to drink more than a pint of wine (I mean an English +pint), and that you will never be witness to more than one bowl of +punch at a time, and that cold drams you will never more taste; and, +above all things, I am convinced, that after drinking perhaps boiling +punch, you will never mount your horse and gallop home in a chill late +hour. Above all things, as I understand you are in habits of intimacy +with that Boanerges of gospel powers, Father Auld, be earnest with him +that he will wrestle in prayer for you, that you may see the vanity of +vanities in trusting to, or even practising the casual moral works of +charity, humanity, generosity, and forgiveness of things, which you +practised so flagrantly that it was evident you delighted in them, +neglecting, or perhaps profanely despising, the wholesome doctrine of +faith without works, the only anchor of salvation. A hymn of +thanksgiving would, in my opinion, be highly becoming from you at +present, and in my zeal for your well-being, I earnestly press on you +to be diligent in chanting over the two enclosed pieces of sacred +poesy. My best compliments to Mrs. Hamilton and Miss Kennedy.</p> + +<p class="sig10">Yours in the L—d,</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + + + +<h2><a name="letterXCVII" id="letterXCVII"></a>XCVII.</h2> + +<h3>TO MISS CHALMERS.</h3> + +<p>[The blank which takes the place of the name of the “Gentleman in mind +and manners,” of this letter, cannot now be filled up, nor is it much +matter: the acquaintance of such a man as the poet describes few or +none would desire.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Edinburgh, Dec.</i> 1787.</p> + +<p><span class="smcap">My dear Madam,</span></p> + +<p>I just now have read yours. The poetic compliments I pay cannot be +misunderstood. They are neither of them so particular as to point you +out to the world at large; and the circle of your acquaintances will +allow all I have said. Besides, I have complimented you chiefly, +almost solely, on your mental charms. Shall I be plain with you? I +will; so look to it. Personal attractions, Madam, you have much above +par; wit, understanding, and worth, you possess in the first class. +This is a cursed flat way of telling you these truths, but let me hear +no more of your sheepish timidity. I know the world a little. I know +what they will say of my poems; by second sight I suppose; for I am +seldom out in my conjectures; and you may believe me, my dear Madam, I +would not run any risk of hurting you by any ill-judged compliment. I +wish to show to the world, the odds between a poet’s friends and those +of simple prosemen. More for your information, both the pieces go in. +One of them, “Where braving <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_370" id="Page_370">[370]</a></span> angry winter’s storms,” is already set—the tune is Neil Gow’s +Lamentation for <i>Abercarny</i>; the other is to be set to an old Highland +air in Daniel Dow’s collection of ancient Scots music; the name is +“<i>Ha a Chaillich air mo Dheith.</i>” My treacherous memory has forgot +every circumstance about <i>Les Incas</i>, only I think you mentioned them +as being in Creech’s possession. I shall ask him about it. I am afraid +the song of “Somebody” will come too late—as I shall, for certain, +leave town in a week for Ayrshire, and from that to Dumfries, but +there my hopes are slender. I leave my direction in town, so anything, +wherever I am, will reach me.</p> + +<p>I saw yours to ——; it is not too severe, nor did he take it amiss. On +the contrary, like a whipt spaniel, he talks of being with you in the +Christmas days. Mr. —— has given him the invitation, and he is +determined to accept of it. O selfishness! he owns, in his sober +moments, that from his own volatility of inclination, the +circumstances in which he is situated, and his knowledge of his +father’s disposition;—the whole affair is chimerical—yet he <i>will</i> +gratify an idle <i>penchant</i> at the enormous, cruel expense, of perhaps +ruining the peace of the very woman for whom he professes the generous +passion of love! He is a gentleman in his mind and manners—<i>tant +pis</i>! He is a volatile school-boy—the heir of a man’s fortune who +well knows the value of two times two!</p> + +<p>Perdition seize them and their fortunes, before they should make the +amiable, the lovely ——, the derided object of their purse-proud +contempt!</p> + +<p>I am doubly happy to hear of Mrs. ——’srecovery, because I really +thought all was over with her. There are days of pleasure yet awaiting +her:</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“As I came in by Glenap,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I met with an aged woman:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">She bad me cheer up my heart,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For the best o’ my days was comin’.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>This day will decide my affairs with Creech. Things are, like myself, +not what they ought to be; yet better than what they appear to be.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Heaven’s sovereign saves all beings but himself—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That hideous sight—a naked human heart.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>Farewell! remember me to Charlotte.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterXCVIII" id="letterXCVIII"></a>XCVIII.</h2> + +<h3>TO MRS. DUNLOP.</h3> + +<p>[The poet alludes in this letter, as in some before, to a hurt which +he got in one of his excursions in the neighbourhood of Edinburgh.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Edinburgh, January 21, 1788.</i></p> + +<p>After six weeks’ confinement, I am beginning to walk across the room. +They have been six horrible weeks; anguish and low spirits made me +unfit to read, write, or think.</p> + +<p>I have a hundred times wished that one could resign life as an officer +resigns a commission: for I would not take in any poor, ignorant +wretch, by selling out. Lately I was a sixpenny private; and, God +knows, a miserable soldier enough; now I march to the campaign, a +starving cadet: a little more conspicuously wretched.</p> + +<p>I am ashamed of all this; for though I do want bravery for the warfare +of life, I could wish, like some other soldiers, to have as much +fortitude or cunning as to dissemble or conceal my cowardice.</p> + +<p>As soon as I can bear the journey, which will be, I suppose, about the +middle of next week, I leave Edinburgh: and soon after I shall pay my +grateful duty at Dunlop-House.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterXCIX" id="letterXCIX"></a>XCIX.</h2> + +<h3>TO MRS. DUNLOP.</h3> + +<p>[The levity with which Burns sometimes spoke of things sacred, had +been obliquely touched upon by his good and anxious friend Mrs. +Dunlop: he pleads guilty of folly, but not of irreligion.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Edinburgh, February 12, 1788.</i></p> + +<p>Some things in your late letters hurt me: not that <i>you say them</i>, but +that <i>you mistake me.</i> Religion, my honoured Madam, has not only been +all my life my chief dependence, but my dearest enjoyment. I have, +indeed, been the luckless victim of wayward follies; but, alas! I have +ever been “more fool than knave.” A mathematician without religion is +a probable character; an irreligious poet is a monster.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterC" id="letterC"></a>C.</h2> + +<h3>TO THE REV. JOHN SKINNER.</h3> + +<p>[When Burns undertook to supply Johnson with songs for the Musical +Museum, he laid all the bards of Scotland<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_371" id="Page_371">[371]</a></span> under contribution, and +Skinner among the number, of whose talents, as well as those of Ross, +author of Helenore, he was a great admirer.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Edinburgh, 14th February, 1788.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">Reverend and dear Sir</span>,</p> + +<p>I have been a cripple now near three months, though I am getting +vastly better, and have been very much hurried beside, or else I would +have wrote you sooner. I must beg your pardon for the epistle you sent +me appearing in the Magazine. I had given a copy or two to some of my +intimate friends, but did not know of the printing of it till the +publication of the Magazine. However, as it does great honour to us +both, you will forgive it.</p> + +<p>The second volume of the songs I mentioned to you in my last is +published to-day. I send you a copy which I beg you will accept as a +mark of the veneration I have long had, and shall ever have, for your +character, and of the claim I make to your continued acquaintance. +Your songs appear in the third volume, with your name in the index; +as, I assure you, Sir, I have heard your “Tullochgorum,” particularly +among our west-country folks, given to many different names, and most +commonly to the immortal author of “The Minstrel,” who, indeed, never +wrote anything superior to “Gie’s a sang, Montgomery cried.” Your +brother has promised me your verses to the Marquis of Huntley’s reel, +which certainly deserve a place in the collection. My kind host, Mr. +Cruikshank, of the High-school here, and said to be one of the best +Latins in this age, begs me to make you his grateful acknowledgments +for the entertainment he has got in a Latin publication of yours, that +I borrowed for him from your acquaintance and much respected friend in +this place, the Reverend Dr. Webster. Mr. Cruikshank maintains that +you write the best Latin since Buchanan. I leave Edinburgh to-morrow, +but shall return in three weeks. Your song you mentioned in your last, +to the tune of “Dumbarton Drums,” and the other, which you say was +done by a brother by trade of mine, a ploughman, I shall thank you +much for a copy of each. I am ever, Reverend Sir, with the most +respectful esteem and sincere veneration, yours,</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCI" id="letterCI"></a>CI.</h2> + +<h3>TO RICHARD BROWN.</h3> + +<p>[The letters of Burns to Brown, and Smith, and Richmond, and others of +his west-country friends, written when he was in the first flush of +fame, show that he did not forget humble men, who anticipated the +public in perceiving his merit.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Edinburgh, February 15th</i>, 1788.</p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">My dear Friend</span>,</p> + +<p>I received yours with the greatest pleasure. I shall arrive at Glasgow +on Monday evening; and beg, if possible, you will meet me on Tuesday. +I shall wait you Tuesday all day. I shall be found at Davies’, Black +Bull inn. I am hurried, as if hunted by fifty devils, else I should go +to Greenock: but if you cannot possibly come, write me, if possible, +to Glasgow, on Monday; or direct to me at Mossgiel by Mauchline; and +name a day and place in Ayrshire, within a fortnight from this date, +where I may meet you. I only stay a fortnight in Ayrshire, and return +to Edinburgh. I am ever, my dearest friend, yours,</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCII" id="letterCII"></a>CII.</h2> + +<h3>TO MRS. ROSE, OF KILRAVOCK.</h3> + +<p>[Mrs. Rose of Kilravock, a lady distinguished by the elegance of her +manners, as well as by her talents, was long remembered by Burns: she +procured for him snatches of old songs, and copies of northern +melodies; to her we owe the preservation of some fine airs as well as +the inspiration of some fine lyrics.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Edinburgh, February 17th, 1788.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">Madam</span>,</p> + +<p>You are much indebted to some indispensable business I have had on my +hands, otherwise my gratitude threatened such a return for your +obliging favour as would have tired your patience. It but poorly +expresses my feelings to say, that I am sensible of your kindness: it +may be said of hearts such as yours is, and such, I hope, mine is, +much more justly than Addison applies it,—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Some souls by instinct to each other turn.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>There was something in my reception at Kilravock so different from the +cold, obsequious, dancing-school bow of politeness, that it almost got +into my head that friendship had occupied<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_372" id="Page_372">[372]</a></span> her ground without the +intermediate march of acquaintance. I wish I could transcribe, or +rather transfuse into language, the glow of my heart when I read your +letter. My ready fancy, with colours more mellow than life itself, +painted the beautifully wild scenery of Kilravock—the venerable +grandeur of the castle—the spreading woods—the winding river, gladly +leaving his unsightly, heathy source, and lingering with apparent +delight as he passes the fairy walk at the bottom of the garden;—your +late distressful anxieties—your present enjoyments—your dear little +angel, the pride of your hopes;—my aged friend, venerable in worth +and years, whose loyalty and other virtues will strongly entitle her +to the support of the Almighty Spirit here, and his peculiar favour in +a happier state of existence. You cannot imagine, Madam, how much such +feelings delight me; they are my dearest proofs of my own immortality. +Should I never revisit the north, as probably I never will, nor again +see your hospitable mansion, were I, some twenty years hence, to see +your little fellow’s name making a proper figure in a newspaper +paragraph, my heart would bound with pleasure.</p> + +<p>I am assisting a friend in a collection of Scottish songs, set to +their proper tunes; every air worth preserving is to be included: +among others I have given “Morag,” and some few Highland airs which +pleased me most, a dress which will be more generally known, though +far, far inferior in real merit. As a small mark of my grateful +esteem, I beg leave to present you with a copy of the work, as far as +it is printed; the Man of Feeling, that first of men, has promised to +transmit it by the first opportunity.</p> + +<p>I beg to be remembered most respectfully to my venerable friend, and +to your little Highland chieftain. When you see the “two fair spirits +of the hill,” at Kildrummie,<a name="FNanchor_181_181" id="FNanchor_181_181"></a><a href="#Footnote_181_181" class="fnanchor">[181]</a> tell them that I have done myself the +honour of setting myself down as one of their admirers for at least +twenty years to come, consequently they must look upon me as an +acquaintance for the same period; but, as the apostle Paul says, “this +I ask of grace, not of debt.”</p> + +<p class="sig3">I have the honour to be, Madam, &c.,</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_181_181" id="Footnote_181_181"></a><a href="#FNanchor_181_181"><span class="label">[181]</span></a> Miss Sophia Brodie, of L——, and Miss Rose of Kilravock.</p></div> +</div> + + + +<h2><a name="letterCIII" id="letterCIII"></a>CIII.</h2> + +<h3>TO RICHARD BROWN.</h3> + +<p>[While Burns was confined to his lodgings by his maimed limb, he +beguiled the time and eased the pain by composing the Clarinda +epistles, writing songs for Johnson, and letters to his companions.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Mossgiel, 24th February, 1788.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">My dear Sir</span>,</p> + +<p>I cannot get the proper direction for my friend in Jamaica, but the +following will do:—To Mr. Jo. Hutchinson, at Jo. Brownrigg’s, Esq., +care of Mr. Benjamin Henriquez, merchant, Orange-street, Kingston. I +arrived here, at my brother’s, only yesterday, after fighting my way +through Paisley and Kilmarnock, against those old powerful foes of +mine, the devil, the world, and the flesh—so terrible in the fields +of dissipation. I have met with few incidents in my life which gave me +so much pleasure as meeting you in Glasgow. There is a time of life +beyond which we cannot form a tie worth the name of friendship. “O +youth! enchanting stage, profusely blest.” Life is a fairy scene: +almost all that deserves the name of enjoyment or pleasure is only a +charming delusion; and in comes repining age in all the gravity of +hoary wisdom, and wretchedly chases away the bewitching phantom. When +I think of life, I resolve to keep a strict look-out in the course of +economy, for the sake of worldly convenience and independence of mind; +to cultivate intimacy with a few of the companions of youth, that they +may be the friends of age; never to refuse my liquorish humour a +handful of the sweetmeats of life, when they come not too dear; and, +for futurity,—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“The present moment is our ain,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The neist we never saw!”<a name="FNanchor_182_182" id="FNanchor_182_182"></a><a href="#Footnote_182_182" class="fnanchor">[182]</a><br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>How like you my philosophy? Give my best compliments to Mrs. B., and +believe me to be,</p> + +<p class="sig5">My dear Sir,</p> + +<p class="sig10">Yours most truly,</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + + + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_182_182" id="Footnote_182_182"></a><a href="#FNanchor_182_182"><span class="label">[182]</span></a> Mickle.</p></div> +</div> + + + +<h2><a name="letterCIV" id="letterCIV"></a>CIV.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. WILLIAM CRUIKSHANK.</h3> + +<p>[The excise and farming alternately occupied the poet’s thoughts in +Edinburgh: he studied books of husbandry <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_373" id="Page_373">[373]</a></span>and took lessons in gauging, +and in the latter he became expert.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Mauchline, March 3d, 1788.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">My dear Sir</span>,</p> + +<p>Apologies for not writing are frequently like apologies for not +singing—the apology better than the song. I have fought my way +severely through the savage hospitality of this country, to send every +guest drunk to bed if they can.</p> + +<p>I executed your commission in Glasgow, and I hope the cocoa came safe. +’Twas the same price and the very same kind as your former parcel, for +the gentleman recollected your buying there perfectly well.</p> + +<p>I should return my thanks for your hospitality (I +leave a blank for the epithet, as I know none can do it justice) to a +poor, wayfaring bard, who was spent and utmost overpowered fighting +with prosaic wickednesses in high places; but I am afraid lest you +should burn the letter whenever you come to the passage, so I pass +over it in silence. I am just returned from visiting Mr. Miller’s +farm. The friend whom I told you I would take with me was highly +pleased with the farm; and as he is, without exception, the most +intelligent farmer in the country, he has staggered me a good deal. I +have the two plans of life before me; I shall balance them to the best +of my judgment, and fix on the most eligible. I have written Mr. +Miller, and shall wait on him when I come to town, which shall be the +beginning or middle of next week; I would be in sooner, but my unlucky +knee is rather worse, and I fear for some time will scarcely stand the +fatigue of my Excise instructions. I only mention these ideas to you; +and, indeed, except Mr. Ainslie, whom I intend writing to to-morrow, I +will not write at all to Edinburgh till I return to it. I would send +my compliments to Mr. Nicol, but he would be hurt if he knew I wrote +to anybody and not to him: so I shall only beg my best, kindest, +kindest compliments to my worthy hostess and the sweet little +rose-bud.</p> + +<p>So soon as I am settled in the routine of life, either as an +Excise-officer, or as a farmer, I propose myself great pleasure from a +regular correspondence with the only man almost I ever saw who joined +the most attentive prudence with the warmest generosity.</p> + +<p>I am much interested for that best of men, Mr. Wood; I hope he is in +better health and spirits than when I saw him last.</p> + +<p class="sig4">I am ever,</p> + +<p class="sig4">My dearest friend,</p> + +<p class="sig5">Your obliged, humble servant,</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCV" id="letterCV"></a>CV.</h2> + +<h3>TO ROBERT AINSLIE, ESQ.</h3> + +<p>[The sensible and intelligent farmer on whose judgment Burns depended +in the choice of his farm, was Mr. Tait, of +Glenconner.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Mauchline, 3d March, 1788.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">My dear Friend</span>,</p> + +<p>I am just returned from Mr. Miller’s farm. My old friend whom I took +with me was highly pleased with the bargain, and advised me to accept +of it. He is the most intelligent sensible farmer in the county, and +his advice has staggered me a good deal. I have the two plans before +me: I shall endeavour to balance them to the best of my judgement, and +fix on the most eligible. On the whole, if I find Mr. Miller in the +same favourable disposition as when I saw him last, I shall in all +probability turn farmer.</p> + +<p>I have been through sore tribulation and under much buffeting of the +wicked one since I came to this country. Jean I found banished, +forlorn, destitute and friendless: I have reconciled her to her fate, +and I have reconciled her to her mother.</p> + +<p>I shall be in Edinburgh middle of next week. My farming ideas I shall +keep private till I see. I got a letter from Clarinda yesterday, and +she tells me she has got no letter of mine but one. Tell her that I +wrote to her from Glasgow, from Kilmarnock, from Mauchline, and +yesterday from Cumnock as I returned from Dumfries. Indeed she is the +only person in Edinburgh I have written to till this day. How are your +soul and body putting up?—a little like man and wife, I suppose.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_374" id="Page_374">[374]</a></span></p> + + +<h2><a name="letterCVI" id="letterCVI"></a>CVI.</h2> + +<h3>TO RICHARD BROWN.</h3> + +<p>[Richard Brown, it is said, fell off in his liking for Burns when he +found that he had made free with his name in his epistle to Moore.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Mauchline, 7th March</i>, 1788.</p> + +<p>I have been out of the country, my dear friend, and have not had an +opportunity of writing till now, when I am afraid you will be gone out +of the country too. I have been looking at farms, and, after all, +perhaps I may settle in the character of a farmer. I have got so +vicious a bent to idleness, and have ever been so little a man of +business, that it will take no ordinary effort to bring my mind +properly into the routine: but you will save a “great effort is worthy +of you.” I say so myself; and butter up my vanity with all the +stimulating compliments I can think of. Men of grave, geometrical +minds, the sons of “which was to be demonstrated,” may cry up reason +as much as they please; but I have always found an honest passion, or +native instinct, the truest auxiliary in the warfare of this world. +Reason almost always comes to me like an unlucky wife to a poor devil +of a husband, just in sufficient time to add her reproaches to his +other grievances.</p> + +<p>I am gratified with your kind inquiries after Jean; as, after all, I +may say with Othello:—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">————————“Excellent wretch!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Perdition catch my soul, but I do love thee!”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>I go for Edinburgh on Monday.</p> + +<p class="sig8">Yours,—R. B</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCVII" id="letterCVII"></a>CVII.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. MUIR.</h3> + +<p>[The change which Burns says in this letter took place in his ideas, +refers, it is said, to his West India voyage, on which, it appears by +one of his letters to Smith, he meditated for some time after his +debut in Edinburgh.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Mossgiel, 7th March</i>, 1788.</p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">Dear Sir,</span></p> + +<p>I have partly changed my ideas, my dear friend, since I saw you. I +took old Glenconner with mo to Mr. Miller’s farm, and he was so +pleased with it, that I have wrote an offer to Mr. Miller, which, if +he accepts, I shall sit down a plain farmer, the happiest of lives +when a man can live by it. In this case I shall not stay in Edinburgh +above a week. I set out on Monday, and would have come by Kilmarnock, +but there are several small sums owing me for my first edition about +Galston and Newmills, and I shall set off so early as to dispatch my +business, and reach Glasgow by night. When I return, I shall devote a +forenoon or two to make some kind of acknowledgment for all the +kindness I owe your friendship. Now that I hope to settle with some +credit and comfort at home, there was not any friendship or friendly +correspondence that promised me more pleasure than yours; I hope I +will not be disappointed. I trust the spring will renew your shattered +frame, and make your friends happy. You and I have often agreed that +life is no great blessing on the whole. The close of life, indeed, to +a reasoning eye, is,</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Dark as was chaos, ere the infant sun<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Was roll’d together, or had try’d his beams<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Athwart their gloom profound.”<a name="FNanchor_183_183" id="FNanchor_183_183"></a><a href="#Footnote_183_183" class="fnanchor">[183]</a><br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>But an honest man has nothing to fear. If we lie down in the grave, +the whole man a piece of broken machinery, to moulder with the clods +of the valley, be it so: at least there is an end of pain, care, woes, +and wants: if that part of us called mind does survive the apparent +destruction of the man—away with old-wife prejudices and tales! Every +age and every nation has had a different set of stories; and as the +many are always weak, of consequence, they have often, perhaps always, +been deceived; a man conscious of having acted an honest part among +his fellow-creatures—even granting that he may have been the sport at +times of passions and instincts—he goes to a great unknown Being, who +could have no other end in giving him existence but to make him happy, +who gave him those passions and instincts, and well knows their force.</p> + +<p>These, my worthy friend, are my ideas; and I know they are not far +different from yours. It becomes a man of sense to think for himself, +particularly in a case where all men are equally interested, and +where, indeed, all men are equally in the dark.</p> + +<p>Adieu, my dear Sir; God send us a cheerful meeting!</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + + + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_183_183" id="Footnote_183_183"></a><a href="#FNanchor_183_183"><span class="label">[183]</span></a> Blair’s Grave.</p></div> +</div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_375" id="Page_375">[375]</a></span></p> + +<h2><a name="letterCVIII" id="letterCVIII"></a>CVIII.</h2> + +<h3>TO MRS. DUNLOP.</h3> + +<p>[One of the daughters of Mrs. Dunlop painted a sketch of Coila from +Burns’s poem of the Vision: it is still in existence, and is said to +have merit.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Mossgiel, 17th March, 1788.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">Madam</span>,</p> + +<p>The last paragraph in yours of the 30th February affected me most, so +I shall begin my answer where you ended your letter. That I am often a +sinner with any little wit I have, I do confess: but I have taxed my +recollection to no purpose, to find out when it was employed against +you. I hate an ungenerous sarcasm a great deal worse than I do the +devil; at least as Milton described him; and though I may be rascally +enough to be sometimes guilty of it myself, I cannot endure it in +others. You, my honoured friend, who cannot appear in any light but +you are sure of being respectable—you can afford to pass by an +occasion to display your wit, because you may depend for fame on your +sense; or, if you choose to be silent, you know you can rely on the +gratitude of many, and the esteem of all; but, God help us, who are +wits or witlings by profession, if we stand for fame there, we sink +unsupported!</p> + +<p>I am highly flattered by the news you tell me of Coila. I may say to +the fair painter who does me so much honour, as Dr. Beattie says to +Ross the poet of his muse Scota, from which, by the bye, I took the +idea of Coila (’tis a poem of Beattie’s in the Scottish dialect, which +perhaps you have never seen:)—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Ye shak your heads, but o’ my fegs,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ye’ve sat auld Scota on her legs:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Lang had she lien wi’ beffs and flegs,<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Bumbaz’d and dizzie,<br /> +</span> +<span class="i0">Her fiddle wanted strings and pegs.<br /></span> +<span class="i6">Wae’s me, poor hizzie.”<br /> +</span> +</div></div> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCIX" id="letterCIX"></a>CIX.</h2> + +<h3>TO MISS CHALMERS.</h3> + +<p>[The uncouth cares of which the poet complains in this letter were the +construction of a common farmhouse, with barn, byre, and stable to +suit.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Edinburgh, March 14, 1788.</i></p> + +<p>I know, my ever dear friend, that you will be pleased with the news +when I tell you, I have at last taken a lease of a farm. Yesternight I +completed a bargain with Mr. Miller, of Dalswinton for the farm of +Ellisland, on the banks of the Nith, between five and six miles above +Dumfries. I begin at Whit-Sunday to build a house, drive lime, &c.; +and heaven be my help! for it will take a strong effort to bring my +mind into the routine of business. I have discharged all the army of +my former pursuits, fancies, and pleasures; a motley host! and have +literally and strictly retained only the ideas of a few friends, which +I have incorporated into a lifeguard. I trust in Dr. Johnson’s +observation, “Where much is attempted, something is done.” Firmness, +both in sufferance and exertion, is a character I would wish to be +thought to possess: and have always despised the whining yelp of +complaint, and the cowardly, feeble resolve.</p> + +<p>Poor Miss K. is ailing a good deal this winter, and begged me to +remember her to you the first time I wrote to you. Surely woman, +amiable woman, is often made in vain. Too delicately formed for the +rougher pursuits of ambition; too noble for the dirt of avarice, and +even too gentle for the rage of pleasure; formed indeed for, and +highly susceptible of enjoyment and rapture; but that enjoyment, alas! +almost wholly at the mercy of the caprice, malevolence, stupidity, or +wickedness of an animal at all times comparatively unfeeling, and +often brutal.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCX" id="letterCX"></a>CX.</h2> + +<h3>TO RICHARD BROWN.</h3> + +<p>[The excitement referred to in this letter arose from the dilatory and +reluctant movements of Creech, who was so slow in settling his +accounts that the poet suspected his solvency.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Glasgow, 26th March, 1788.</i></p> + +<p>I am monstrously to blame, my dear Sir, in not writing to you, and +sending you the Directory. I have been getting my tack extended, as I +have taken a farm; and I have been racking shop accounts with Mr. +Creech, both of which, together with watching, fatigue, and a load of +care almost too heavy for my shoulders, have in some degree actually +fevered me. I really forgot the Directory yesterday, which vexed me; +but I was convulsed with rage a great part of the day. I have to thank +you for the ingenious, friendly, and elegant epistle from<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_376" id="Page_376">[376]</a></span> your friend +Mr. Crawford. I shall certainly write to him, but not now. This is +merely a card to you, as I am posting to Dumfries-shire, where many +perplexing arrangements await me. I am vexed about the Directory; but, +my dear Sir, forgive me: these eight days I have been positively +crazed. My compliments to Mrs. B. I shall write to you at Grenada.—I +am ever, my dearest friend,</p> + +<p class="sig8">Yours,—R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCXI" id="letterCXI"></a>CXI.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. ROBERT CLEGHORN.</h3> + +<p>[Cleghorn was a farmer, a social man, and much of a musician. The poet +wrote the Chevalier’s Lament to please the jacobitical taste of his +friend; and the musician gave him advice in farming which he neglected +to follow:—“Farmer Attention,” says Cleghorn, “is a good farmer +everywhere.”]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Mauchline, 31st March, 1788.</i></p> + +<p>Yesterday, my dear Sir, as I was riding through a track of melancholy, +joyless muirs, between Galloway and Ayrshire, it being Sunday, I +turned my thoughts to psalms, and hymns, and spiritual songs; and your +favourite air, “Captain O’Kean,” coming at length into my head, I +tried these words to it. You will see that the first part of the tune +must be repeated.</p> + +<p>I am tolerably pleased with these verses, but as I have only a sketch +of the tune, I leave it with you to try if they suit the measure of +the music.</p> + +<p>I am so harassed with care and anxiety, about this farming project of +mine, that my muse has degenerated into the veriest prose-wench that +ever picked cinders, or followed a tinker. When I am fairly got into +the routine of business, I shall trouble you with a longer epistle; +perhaps with some queries respecting farming; at present, the world +sits such a load on my mind, that it has effaced almost every trace of +the poet in me.</p> + +<p>My very best compliments and good wishes to Mrs. Cleghorn.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCXII" id="letterCXII"></a>CXII.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. WILLIAM DUNBAR,</h3> + +<h4>EDINBURGH.</h4> +<p>[This letter was printed for the first time by Robert Chambers, in his +“People’s Edition” of Burns.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Mauchline, 7th April, 1788.</i></p> + +<p>I have not delayed so long to write you, my much respected friend, +because I thought no farther of my promise. I have long since give up +that kind of formal correspondence, where one sits down irksomely to +write a letter, because we think we are in duty bound so to do.</p> + +<p>I have been roving over the country, as the farm I have taken is forty +miles from this place, hiring servants and preparing matters; but most +of all I am earnestly busy to bring about a revolution in my own mind. +As, till within these eighteen months, I never was the wealthy master +of 10 guineas, my knowledge of business is to learn; add to this my +late scenes of idleness and dissipation have enervated my mind to an +alarming degree. Skill in the sober science of life is my most serious +and hourly study. I have dropt all conversation and all reading (prose +reading) but what tends in some way or other to my serious aim. Except +one worthy young fellow, I have not one single correspondent in +Edinburgh. You have indeed kindly made me an offer of that kind. The +world of wits, and <i>gens comme il faut</i> which I lately left, and with +whom I never again will intimately mix—from that port, Sir, I expect +your Gazette: what <i>Les beaux esprit</i> are saying, what they are doing, +and what they are singing. Any sober intelligence from my sequestered +walks of life; any droll original; any passing reward, important +forsooth, because it is mine; any little poetic effort, however +embryoth; these, my dear Sir, are all you have to expect from me. When +I talk of poetic efforts, I must have it always understood, that I +appeal from your wit and taste to your friendship and good nature. The +first would be my favourite tribunal, where I defied censure; but the +last, where I declined justice.</p> + +<p>I have scarcely made a single distich since I saw you. When I meet +with an old Scots air that has any facetious idea in its name, I have +a peculiar pleasure in following out that idea for a verse or two.</p> + +<p>I trust that this will find you in better health<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_377" id="Page_377">[377]</a></span> than I did last time +I called for you. A few lines from you, directed to me at Mauchline, +were it but to let me know how you are, will set my mind a good deal +[at rest.] Now, never shun the idea of writing me because perhaps you +may be out of humour or spirits. I could give you a hundred good +consequences attending a dull letter; one, for example, and the +remaining ninety-nine some other time—it will always serve to keep in +countenance, my much respected Sir, your obliged friend and humble +servant,</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCXIII" id="letterCXIII"></a>CXIII.</h2> + +<h3>TO MISS CHALMERS.</h3> + +<p>[The sacrifice referred to by the poet, was his resolution to unite +his fortune with Jean Armour.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Mauchline, 7th April, 1788.</i></p> + +<p>I am indebted to you and Miss Nimmo for letting me know Miss Kennedy. +Strange! how apt we are to indulge prejudices in our judgments of one +another! Even I, who pique myself on my skill in marking +characters—because I am too proud of my character as a man, to be +dazzled in my judgment for glaring wealth; and too proud of my +situation as a poor man to be biased against squalid poverty—I was +unacquainted with Miss K.’s very uncommon worth.</p> + +<p>I am going on a good deal progressive in <i>mon grand bût</i>, the sober +science of life. I have lately made some sacrifices, for which, were I +<i>vivâ voce</i> with you to paint the situation and recount the +circumstances, you should applaud me.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCXIV" id="letterCXIV"></a>CXIV.</h2> + +<h3>TO MISS CHALMERS.</h3> + +<p>[The hint alluded to, was a whisper of the insolvency of Creech; but +the bailie was firm as the Bass.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>No date.</i></p> + +<p>Now for that wayward, unfortunate thing, myself. I have broke measures +with Creech, and last week I wrote him a frosty, keen letter. He +replied in terms of chastisement, and promised me upon his honour that +I should have the account on Monday; but this is Tuesday, and yet I +have not heard a word from him. God have mercy on me! a poor d—mned, +incautious, duped, unfortunate fool! The sport, the miserable victim +of rebellious pride, hypochondriac imagination, agonizing sensibility, +and bedlam passions?</p> + +<p>“I wish that I were dead, but I’m no like to die!” I had lately “a +hair-breadth ‘scape in th’ imminent deadly breach” of love too. Thank +my stars, I got off heart-whole, “waur fleyd than +hurt.”—Interruption.</p> + +<p>I have this moment got a hint: I fear I am something like—undone—but +I hope for the best. Come, stubborn pride and unshrinking resolution; +accompany me through this, to me, miserable world! You must not desert +me! Your friendship I think I can count on, though I should date my +letters from a marching regiment. Early in life, and all my life I +reckoned on a recruiting drum as my forlorn hope. Seriously though, +life at present presents me with but a melancholy path: but—my limb +will soon be sound, and I shall struggle on.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCXV" id="letterCXV"></a>CXV.</h2> + +<h3>TO MISS CHALMERS.</h3> + +<p>[Although Burns gladly grasped at a situation in the Excise, he wrote +many apologies to his friends, for the acceptance of a place, which, +though humble enough, was the only one that offered.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Edinburgh, Sunday.</i></p> + +<p>To-morrow, my dear madam, I leave Edinburgh. I have altered all my +plans of future life. A farm that I could live in, I could not find; +and, indeed, after the necessary support my brother and the rest of +the family required, I could not venture on farming in that style +suitable to my feelings. You will condemn me for the next step I have +taken. I have entered into the Excise. I stay in the west about three +weeks, and then return to Edinburgh, for six weeks’ instructions: +afterwards, for I get employ instantly, I go <i>où il plait à +Dieu</i>,—<i>et mon Roi.</i> I have chosen this, my dear friend, after mature +deliberation. The question is not at what door of fortune’s palace +shall we enter in; but what doors does she open to us? I was not +likely to get anything to do. I wanted <i>un bût</i>, which is a dangerous, +an unhappy situation. I got this without any hanging on, or mortifying +solicitation; it is immediate bread, and though poor in comparison of +the last eighteen months of my existence, ’tis luxury in com<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_378" id="Page_378">[378]</a></span>parison +of all my preceding life: besides, the commissioners are some of them +my acquaintances, and all of them my firm friends.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCXVI" id="letterCXVI"></a>CXVI.</h2> + +<h3>TO MRS. DUNLOP.</h3> + +<p>[The Tasso, with the perusal of which Mrs. Dunlop indulged the poet, +was not the line version of Fairfax, but the translation of Hoole—a +far inferior performance.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Mauchline, 28th April, 1788.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">Madam</span>,</p> + +<p>Your powers of reprehension must be great indeed, as I assure you they +made my heart ache with penitential pangs, even though I was really +not guilty. As I commence farmer at Whit-Sunday, you will easily guess +I must be pretty busy; but that is not all. As I got the offer of the +Excise business without solicitation, and as it costs me only six +months’ attendance for instructions, to entitle me to a +commission—which commission lies by me, and at any future period, on +my simple petition, ca be resumed—I thought five-and-thirty pounds +a-year was no bad <i>dernier ressort</i> for a poor poet, if fortune in her +jade tricks should kick him down from the little eminence to which she +has lately helped him up.</p> + +<p>For this reason, I am at present attending these instructions, to have +them completed before Whit-sunday. Still, Madam, I prepared with the +sincerest pleasure to meet you at the Mount, and came to my brother’s +on Saturday night, to set out on Sunday; but for some nights preceding +I had slept in an apartment, where the force of the winds and rains +was only mitigated by being sifted through numberless apertures in the +windows, walls, &c. In consequence I was on Sunday, Monday, and part +of Tuesday, unable to stir out of bed, with all the miserable effects +of a violent cold.</p> + +<p>You see, Madam, the truth of the French maxim, <i>le vrai n’est pas +toujours le vraisemblable</i>; your last was so full of expostulation, +and was something so like the language of an offended friend, that I +began to tremble for a correspondence, which I had with grateful +pleasure set down as one of the greatest enjoyments of my future life.</p> + +<p>Your books have delighted me: Virgil, Dryden, and Tasso were all +equally strangers to me; but of this more at large in my next.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCXVII" id="letterCXVII"></a>CXVII.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. JAMES SMITH,</h3> + +<h4><span class="smcap">Avon Printfield, Linlithgow.</span></h4> + +<p>[James Smith, as this letter intimates, had moved from Mauchline to +try to mend his fortunes at Avon Printfield, near Linlithgow.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Mauchline, April 28, 1788.</i></p> + +<p>Beware of your Strasburgh, my good Sir! Look on this as the opening of +a correspondence, like the opening of a twenty-four gun battery!</p> + +<p>There is no understanding a man properly, without knowing something of +his previous ideas (that is to say, if the man has any ideas; for I +know many who, in the animal-muster, pass for men, that are the scanty +masters of only one idea on any given subject, and by far the greatest +part of your acquaintances and mine can barely boast of ideas, +1.25—1.5—1.75 or some such fractional matter;) so to let you a +little into the secrets of my pericranium, there is, you must know, a +certain clean-limbed, handsome, bewitching young hussy of your +acquaintance, to whom I have lately and privately given a matrimonial +title to my corpus.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Bode a robe and wear it,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Bode a pock and bear it,”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>says the wise old Scots adage! I hate to presage ill-luck; and as my +girl has been doubly kinder to me than even the best of women usually +are to their partners of our sex, in similar circumstances, I reckon +on twelve times a brace of children against I celebrate my twelfth +wedding-day: these twenty-four will give me twenty-four gossipings, +twenty-four christenings (I mean one equal to two), and I hope, by the +blessing of the God of my fathers, to make them twenty-four dutiful +children to their parents, twenty-four useful members of society, and +twenty-four approved services of their God! * * *</p> + +<p>“Light’s heartsome,” quo’ the wife when she was stealing sheep. You +see what a lamp I have hung up to lighten your paths, when you are +idle enough to explore the combinations and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_379" id="Page_379">[379]</a></span> relations of my ideas. +’Tis now as plain as a pike-staff, why a twenty-four gun battery was a +metaphor I could readily employ.</p> + +<p>Now for business.—I intend to present Mrs. Burns with a printed +shawl, an article of which I dare say you have variety: ’tis my first +present to her since I have irrevocably called her mine, and I have a +kind of whimsical wish to get her the first said present from an old +and much-valued friend of hers and mine, a trusty Trojan, on whose +friendship I count myself possessed of as a life-rent lease.</p> + +<p>Look on this letter as a “beginning of sorrows;” I will write you till +your eyes ache reading nonsense.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Burns (’tis only her private designation) begs her best +compliments to you.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCXVIII" id="letterCXVIII"></a>CXVIII.</h2> + +<h3>TO PROFESSOR DUGALD STEWART.</h3> + +<p>[Dugald Stewart loved the poet, admired his works, and enriched the +biography of Currie with some genuine reminiscences of his earlier +days.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Mauchline, 3d May, 1788.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">Sir</span>,</p> + +<p>I enclose you one or two more of my bagatelles. If the fervent wishes +of honest gratitude have any influence with that great unknown being +who frames the chain of causes and events, prosperity and happiness +will attend your visits to the continent, and return you safe to your +native shore.</p> + +<p>Wherever I am, allow me, Sir, to claim it as my privilege to acquaint +you with my progress in my trade of rhymes; as I am sure I could say +it with truth, that next to my little fame, and the having it in my +power to make life more comfortable to those whom nature has made dear +to me, I shall ever regard your countenance, your patronage, your +friendly good offices, as the most valued consequence of my late +success in life.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCXIX" id="letterCXIX"></a>CXIX.</h2> + +<h3>TO MRS. DUNLOP.</h3> + +<p>[A poem, something after the fashion of the Georgics, was long present +to the mind of Burns: had fortune been more friendly he might have, in +due time, produced it.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Mauchline, 4th May, 1788.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">Madam</span>,</p> + +<p>Dryden’s Virgil has delighted me. I do not know whether the critics +will agree with me, but the Georgics are to me by far the best of +Virgil. It is indeed a species of writing entirely new to me; and has +filled my head with a thousand fancies of emulation: but, alas! when I +read the Georgics, and then survey my own powers, ’tis like the idea +of a Shetland pony, drawn up by the side of a thorough-bred hunter to +start for the plate. I own I am disappointed in the Æneid. Faultless +correctness may please, and does highly please, the lettered critic: +but to that awful character I have not the most distant pretensions. I +do not know whether I do not hazard my pretensions to be a critic of +any kind, when I say that I think Virgil, in many instances, a servile +copier of Homer. If I had the Odyssey by me, I could parallel many +passages where Virgil has evidently copied, but by no means improved, +Homer. Nor can I think there is anything of this owing to the +translators; for, from everything I have seen of Dryden, I think him +in genius and fluency of language, Pope’s master. I have not perused +Tasso enough to form an opinion: in some future letter, you shall have +my ideas of him; though I am conscious my criticisms must be very +inaccurate and imperfect, as there I have ever felt and lamented my +want of learning most.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCXX" id="letterCXX"></a>CXX.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. ROBERT AINSLIE.</h3> + +<p>[I have heard the gentleman say, to whom this brief letter is +addressed, how much he was pleased with the intimation, that the poet +had reunited himself with Jean Armour, for he know his heart was with +her.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Mauchline, May 26, 1788.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">My dear Friend</span>,</p> + +<p>I am two kind letters in your debt, but I have been from home, and +horribly busy, buying and preparing for my farming business, over and +above the plague of my Excise instructions, which this week will +finish.</p> + +<p>As I flatter my wishes that I foresee many future years’ +correspondence between us, ’tis<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_380" id="Page_380">[380]</a></span> foolish to talk of excusing dull +epistles; a dull letter may be a very kind one. I have the pleasure to +tell you that I have been extremely fortunate in all my buyings, and +bargainings hitherto; Mrs. Burns not excepted; which title I now avow +to the world. I am truly pleased with this last affair: it has indeed +added to my anxieties for futurity, but it has given a stability to my +mind, and resolutions unknown before; and the poor girl has the most +sacred enthusiasm of attachment to me, and has not a wish but to +gratify my every idea of her deportment. I am interrupted.—Farewell! +my dear Sir.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCXXI" id="letterCXXI"></a>CXXI.</h2> + +<h3>TO MRS. DUNLOP.</h3> + +<p>[This letter, on the hiring season, is well worth the consideration of +all masters, and all servants. In England, servants are engaged by the +month; in Scotland by the half-year, and therefore less at the mercy +of the changeable and capricious.]</p> + +<p class="sig">27<i>th May, 1788.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">Madam</span>,</p> + +<p>I have been torturing my philosophy to no purpose, to account for that +kind partiality of yours, which has followed me, in my return to the +shade of life, with assiduous benevolence. Often did I regret, in the +fleeting hours of my late will-o’-wisp appearance, that “here I had no +continuing city;” and but for the consolation of a few solid guineas, +could almost lament the time that a momentary acquaintance with wealth +and splendour put me so much out of conceit with the sworn companions +of my road through life—insignificance and poverty.</p> + +<p>There are few circumstances relating to the unequal distribution of +the good things of this life that give me more vexation (I mean in +what I see around me) than the importance the opulent bestow on their +trifling family affairs, compared with the very same things on the +contracted scale of a cottage. Last afternoon I had the honour to +spend an hour or two at a good woman’s fireside, where the planks that +composed the floor were decorated with a splendid carpet, and the gay +table sparkled with silver and china. ’Tis now about term-day, and +there has been a revolution among those creatures, who though in +appearance partakers, and equally noble partakers, of the same nature +with Madame, are from time to time—their nerves, their sinews, their +health, strength, wisdom, experience, genius, time, nay a good part of +their very thoughts—sold for months and years, not only to the +necessities, the conveniences, but, the caprices of the important few. +We talked of the insignificant creatures, nay notwithstanding their +general stupidity and rascality, did some of the poor devils the +honour to commend them. But light be the turf upon his breast who +taught “Reverence thyself!” We looked down on the unpolished wretches, +their impertinent wives and clouterly brats, as the lordly bull does +on the little dirty ant-hill, whose puny inhabitants he crushes in the +carelessness of his ramble, or tosses in the air in the wantonness of +his pride.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCXXII" id="letterCXXII"></a>CXXII.</h2> + +<h3>TO MRS. DUNLOP,</h3> + +<h4><span class="smcap">At Mr. Dunlop’s, Haddington.</span></h4> + +<p>[In this, the poet’s first letter from Ellisland, he lays down his +whole system of in-door and out-door economy: while his wife took care +of the household, he was to manage the farm, and “pen a stanza” during +his hours of leisure.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Ellisland, 13th June, 1788.</i></p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Where’er I roam, whatever realms I see,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My heart, untravell’d, fondly turns to thee;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Still to my <i>friend</i> it turns with ceaseless pain,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">and drags at each remove a lengthening chain.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="sig2"><span class="smcap">Goldsmith</span>.</p> + +<p>This is the second day, my honoured friend, that I have been on my +farm. A solitary inmate of an old smoky spense; far from every object +I love, or by whom I am beloved; nor any acquaintance older than +yesterday, except Jenny Geddes, the old mare I ride on; while uncouth +cares and novel plans hourly insult my awkward ignorance and bashful +inexperience. There is a foggy atmosphere native to my soul in the +hour of care; consequently the dreary objects seem larger than life. +Extreme sensibility, irritated and prejudiced on the gloomy side by a +series of misfortunes and disappointments, at that period of my +existence when the soul is laying in her cargo of ideas for the voyage +of life, is, I believe, the principal cause of this unhappy frame of +mind.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_381" id="Page_381">[381]</a></span></p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“The valiant, in himself, what can he suffer?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or what need he regard his <i>single</i> woes?” &c.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>Your surmise, Madam, is just; I am indeed a husband.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p>To jealousy or infidelity I am an equal stranger. My preservative from +the first is the most thorough consciousness of her sentiments of +honour, and her attachment to me: my antidote against the last is my +long and deep-rooted affection for her.</p> + +<p>In housewife matters, of aptness to learn and activity to execute, she +is eminently mistress; and during my absence in Nithsdale, she is +regularly and constantly apprentice to my mother and sisters in their +dairy and other rural business.</p> + +<p>The muses must not be offended when I tell them, the concerns of my +wife and family will, in my mind, always take the <i>pas</i>; but I assure +them their ladyships will ever come next in place.</p> + +<p>You are right that a bachelor state would have insured me more +friends; but from a cause you will easily guess, conscious peace in +the enjoyment of my own mind, and unmistrusting confidence in +approaching my God, would seldom have been of the number.</p> + +<p>I found a once much-loved and still much-loved female, literally and +truly cast out to the mercy of the naked elements; but I enabled her +to <i>purchase</i> a shelter;—there is no sporting with a +fellow-creature’s happiness or misery.</p> + +<p>The most placid good-nature and sweetness of disposition; a warm +heart, gratefully devoted with all its powers to love me; vigorous +health and sprightly cheerfulness, set off to the best advantage by a +more than commonly handsome figure; these, I think, in a woman, may +make a good wife, though she should never have read a page but the +Scriptures of the Old and New Testament, nor have danced in a brighter +assembly than a penny pay-wedding.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCXXIII" id="letterCXXIII"></a>CXXIII.</h2> + +<h3>TO ROBERT AINSLIE, ESQ.</h3> + +<p>[Had Burns written his fine song, beginning “Contented wi’ little and +cantie wi’ mair,” when he penned this letter, the prose might have +followed as a note to the verse; he calls the Excise a luxury.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Ellisland, June 14th, 1788.</i></p> + +<p>This is now the third day, my dearest Sir, that I have sojourned in +these regions; and during these three days you have occupied more of +my thoughts than in three weeks preceding: in Ayrshire I have several +variations of friendship’s compass, here it points invariably to the +pole. My farm gives me a good many uncouth cares and anxieties, but I +hate the language of complaint. Job, or some one of his friends, says +well—“why should a living man complain?”</p> + +<p>I have lately been much mortified with contemplating an unlucky +imperfection in the very framing and construction of my soul; namely, +a blundering inaccuracy of her olfactory organs in hitting the scent +of craft or design in my fellow-creatures. I do not mean any +compliment to my ingenuousness, or to hint that the defect is in +consequence of the unsuspicious simplicity of conscious truth or +honour: I take it to be, in some, why or other, an imperfection in the +mental sight; or, metaphor apart, some modification of dulness. In two +or three small instances lately, I have been most shamefully out.</p> + +<p>I have all along hitherto, in the warfare of life, been bred to arms +among the light-horse—the piquet-guards of fancy: a kind of hussars +and Highlanders of the brain; but I am firmly resolved to sell out of +these giddy battalions, who have no ideas of a battle but fighting the +foe, or of a siege but storming the town. Cost what it will, I am +determined to buy in among the grave squadrons of heavy-armed thought, +or the artillery corps of plodding contrivance.</p> + +<p>What books are you reading, or what is the subject of your thoughts, +besides the great studies of your profession? You said something about +religion in your last. I don’t exactly remember what it was, as the +letter is in Ayrshire; but I thought it not only prettily said, but +nobly thought. You will make a noble fellow if once you were married. +I make no reservation of your being well-married: you have so much +sense, and knowledge of human nature, that though you may not realize +perhaps the ideas of romance, yet you will never be ill-married.</p> + +<p>Were it not for the terrors of my ticklish situation respecting +provision for a family of children, I am decidedly of opinion that the +step I have taken is vastly for my happiness. As it is<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_382" id="Page_382">[382]</a></span> I look to the +Excise scheme as a certainty of maintenance!—luxury to what either +Mrs. Burns or I were born to.</p> + +<p class="sig8">Adieu.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCXXIV" id="letterCXXIV"></a>CXXIV.</h2> + +<h3>TO ROBERT AINSLIE, ESQ.</h3> + +<p>[The kindness of Field, the profilist, has not only indulged me with a +look at the original, from which the profile alluded to in the letter +was taken, but has put me in possession of a capital copy.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Mauchline, 23d June, 1788.</i></p> + +<p>This letter, my dear Sir, is only a business scrap. Mr. Miers, profile +painter in your town, has executed a profile of Dr. Blacklock for me: +do me the favour to call for it, and sit to him yourself for me, which +put in the same size as the doctor’s. The account of both profiles +will be fifteen shillings, which I have given to James Connell, our +Mauchline carrier, to pay you when you give him the parcel. You must +not, my friend, refuse to sit. The time is short: when I sat to Mr. +Miers, I am sure he did not exceed two minutes. I propose hanging Lord +Glencairn, the Doctor, and you in trio over my new chimney-piece that +is to be.</p> + +<p class="sig8">Adieu.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCXXV" id="letterCXXV"></a>CXXV.</h2> + +<h3>TO ROBERT AINSLIE, ESQ.</h3> + +<p>[“There is a degree of folly,” says Burns in this letter, “in talking +unnecessarily of one’s private affairs.” The folly is scarcely less to +write about them, and much did the poet and his friend write about +their own private affairs as well as those of others.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Ellisland, June 30th, 1788.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">My dear Sir</span>,</p> + +<p>I just now received your brief epistle; and, to take vengeance on your +laziness, I have, you see, taken a long sheet of writing-paper, and +have begun at the top of the page, intending to scribble on to the +very last corner.</p> + +<p>I am vexed at that affair of the * * *, but dare not enlarge on the +subject until you send me your direction, as I suppose that will be +altered on your late master and friend’s death. I am concerned for the +old fellow’s exit, only as I fear it may be to your disadvantage in +any respect—for an old man’s dying, except he has been a very +benevolent character, or in some particular situation of life that the +welfare of the poor or the helpless depended on him, I think it an +event of the most trifling moment in the world. Man is naturally a +kind, benevolent animal, but he is dropped into such a needy situation +here in this vexatious world, and has such a whoreson hungry, +growling, multiplying pack of necessities, appetites, passions, and +desires about him, ready to devour him for want of other food; that in +fact he must lay aside his cares for others that he may look properly +to himself. You have been imposed upon in paying Mr. Miers for the +profile of a Mr. H. I did not mention it in my letter to you, nor did +I ever give Mr. Miers any such order. I have no objection to lose the +money, but I will not have any such profile in my possession.</p> + +<p>I desired the carrier to pay you, but as I mentioned only fifteen +shillings to him, I would rather enclose you a guinea note. I have it +not, indeed, to spare here, as I am only a sojourner in a strange land +in this place; but in a day or two I return to Mauchline, and there I +have the bank-notes through the house like salt permits.</p> + +<p>There is a great degree of folly in talking unnecessarily of one’s +private affairs. I have just now been interrupted by one of my new +neighbours, who has made himself absolutely contemptible in my eyes, +by his silly garrulous pruriency. I know it has been a fault of my +own, too; but from this moment I abjure it, as I would the service of +hell! Your poets, spend-thrifts, and other fools of that kidney, +pretend forsooth to crack their jokes on prudence; but ’tis a squalid +vagabond glorying in his rags. Still, imprudence respecting money +matters is much more pardonable than imprudence respecting character. +I have no objection to prefer prodigality to avarice, in some few +instances; but I appeal to your observation, if you have not met, and +often met, with the same disingenuousness, the same hollow-hearted +insincerity, and disintegritive depravity of principle, in the +hackneyed victims of profusion, as in the unfeeling children of +parsimony. I have every possible reverence for the much-talked-of +world beyond the grave, and I wish that which piety believes, and +virtue deserves, may be all matter of fact. But in things belonging +to, and ter<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_383" id="Page_383">[383]</a></span>minating in this present scene of existence, man has +serious and interesting business on hand. Whether a man shall shake +hands with welcome in the distinguished elevation of respect, or +shrink from contempt in the abject corner of insignificance; whether +he shall wanton under the tropic of plenty, at least enjoy himself in +the comfortable latitudes of easy convenience, or starve in the arctic +circle of dreary poverty; whether he shall rise in the manly +consciousness of a self-approving mind, or sink beneath a galling load +of regret and remorse—these are alternatives of the last moment.</p> + +<p>You see how I preach. You used occasionally to sermonize too; I wish +you would, in charity, favour me with a sheet full in your own way. I +admire the close of a letter Lord Bolingbroke writes to Dean +Swift:—“Adieu dear Swift! with all thy faults I love thee entirely: +make an effort to love me with all mine!” Humble servant, and all that +trumpery, is now such a prostituted business, that honest friendship, +in her sincere way, must have recourse to her primitive, +simple,—farewell!</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCXXVI" id="letterCXXVI"></a>CXXVI.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. GEORGE LOCKHART,</h3> + +<h4><span class="smcap">Merchant, Glasgow.</span></h4> + +<p>[Burns, more than any poet of the age, loved to write out copies of +his favourite poems, and present them to his friends: he sent “The +Falls of Bruar” to Mr. Lockhart.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Mauchline, 18th July, 1788.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">My dear Sir</span>,</p> + +<p>I am just going for Nithsdale, else I would certainly have transcribed +some of my rhyming things for you. The Miss Baillies I have seen in +Edinburgh. “Fair and lovely are thy works, Lord God Almighty! Who +would not praise thee for these thy gifts in thy goodness to the sons +of men!” It needed not your fine taste to admire them. I declare, one +day I had the honour of dining at Mr. Baillie’s, I was almost in the +predicament of the children of Israel, when they could not look on +Moses’ face for the glory that shone in it when he descended from +Mount Sinai.</p> + +<p>I did once write a poetic address from the Falls of Bruar to his Grace +of Athole, when I was in the Highlands. When you return to Scotland, +let me know, and I will send such of my pieces as please myself best. +I return to Mauchline in about ten days.</p> + +<p>My compliments to Mr. Purdon. I am in truth, but at present in haste,</p> + +<p class="sig9">Yours,—R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCXXVII" id="letterCXXVII"></a>CXXVII.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. PETER HILL.</h3> + +<p>[Peter Hill was a bookseller in Edinburgh: David Ramsay, printer of +the Evening Courant: William Dunbar, an advocate, and president of a +club of Edinburgh wits; and Alexander Cunningham, a jeweller, who +loved mirth and wine.]</p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">My dear Hill,</span></p> + +<p>I shall say nothing to your mad present—you have so long and often +been of important service to me, and I suppose you mean to go on +conferring obligations until I shall not be able to lift up my face +before you. In the mean time, as Sir Roger de Coverley, because it +happened to be a cold day in which he made his will, ordered his +servants great coats for mourning, so, because I have been this week +plagued with an indigestion, I have sent you by the carrier a fine old +ewe-milk cheese.</p> + +<p>Indigestion is the devil: nay, ’tis the devil and all. It besets a man +in every one of his senses. I lose my appetite at the sight of +successful knavery, and sicken to loathing at the noise and nonsense +of self-important folly. When the hollow-hearted wretch takes me by +the hand, the feeling spoils my dinner: the proud man’s wine so +offends my palate that it chokes me in the gullet; and the +<i>pulvilised</i>, feathered, pert coxcomb is so disgustful in my nostril +that my stomach turns.</p> + +<p>If ever you have any of these disagreeable sensations, let me +prescribe for you patience; and a bit of my cheese. I know that you +are no niggard of your good things among your friends, and some of +them are in much need of a slice. There, in my eye is our friend +Smellie; a man positively of the first abilities and greatest strength +of mind, as well as one of the best hearts and keenest wits that I +have ever met with; when you see him, as, alas! he too is smarting at +the pinch of distressful circumstances, aggravated by the sneer of +contumelious greatness—a bit of my cheese alone will<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_384" id="Page_384">[384]</a></span> not cure him, +but if you add a tankard of brown stout, and superadd a magnum of +right Oporto, you will see his sorrows vanish like the morning mist +before the summer sun.</p> + +<p>Candlish, the earliest friend, except my only brother, that I have on +earth, and one of the worthiest fellows that ever any man called by +the name of friend, if a luncheon of my cheese would help to rid him +of some of his super-abundant modesty, you would do well to give it +him.</p> + +<p>David,<a name="FNanchor_184_184" id="FNanchor_184_184"></a><a href="#Footnote_184_184" class="fnanchor">[184]</a> with his <i>Courant</i>, comes, too, across my recollection, and +I beg you will help him largely from the said ewe-milk cheese, to +enable him to digest those bedaubing paragraphs with which he is +eternally larding the lean characters of certain great men in a +certain great town. I grant you the periods are very well turned; so, +a fresh egg is a very good thing, but when thrown at a man in a +pillory, it does not at all improve his figure, not to mention the +irreparable loss of the egg.</p> + +<p>My facetious friend Dunbar I would wish also to be a partaker: not to +digest his spleen, for that he laughs off, but to digest his last +night’s wine at the last field-day of the Crochallan corps.<a name="FNanchor_185_185" id="FNanchor_185_185"></a><a href="#Footnote_185_185" class="fnanchor">[185]</a></p> + +<p>Among our common friends I must not forget one of the dearest of +them—Cunningham. The brutality, insolence, and selfishness of a world +unworthy of having such a fellow as he is in it, I know sticks in his +stomach, and if you can help him to anything that will make him a +little easier on that score, it will be very obliging.</p> + +<p>As to honest J—— S——e, he is such a contented, happy man, that I +know not what can annoy him, except, perhaps, he may not have got the +better of a parcel of modest anecdotes which a certain poet gave him +one night at supper, the last time the said poet was in town.</p> + +<p>Though I have mentioned so many men of law, I shall have nothing to do +with them professedly—the faculty are beyond my prescription. As to +their clients, that is another thing; God knows they have much to +digest!</p> + +<p>The clergy I pass by; their profundity of erudition, and their +liberality of sentiment; their total want of pride, and their +detestation of hypocrisy, are so proverbially notorious as to place +them far, far above either my praise or censure.</p> + +<p>I was going to mention a man of worth whom I have the honour to call +friend, the Laird of Craigdarroch; but I have spoken to the landlord +of the King’s-Arms inn here, to have at the next county meeting a +large ewe-milk cheese on the table, for the benefit of the +Dumfries-shire Whigs, to enable them to digest the Duke of +Queensberry’s late political conduct.</p> + +<p>I have just this moment an opportunity of a private hand to Edinburgh, +as perhaps you would not digest double postage.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + + + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_184_184" id="Footnote_184_184"></a><a href="#FNanchor_184_184"><span class="label">[184]</span></a> Printer of the <i>Edinburgh Evening Courant.</i></p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_185_185" id="Footnote_185_185"></a><a href="#FNanchor_185_185"><span class="label">[185]</span></a> A club of choice spirits.</p></div> +</div> + + + +<h2><a name="letterCXXVIII" id="letterCXXVIII"></a>CXXVIII.</h2> + +<h3>TO ROBERT GRAHAM, ESQ.,</h3> + +<h4><span class="smcap">of Fintray</span>.</h4> + +<p>[The filial and fraternal claims alluded to in this letter were +satisfied with about three hundred pounds, two hundred of which went +to his brother Gilbert—a sum which made a sad inroad on the money +arising from the second edition of his Poems.]</p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">Sir</span>,</p> + +<p>When I had the honour of being introduced to you at Athole-house, I +did not think so soon of asking a favour of you. When Lear, in +Shakspeare, asked Old Kent why he wished to be in his service, he +answers, “Because you have that in your face which I would fain call +master.” For some such reason, Sir, do I now solicit your patronage. +You know, I dare say, of an application I lately made to your Board to +be admitted an officer of Excise. I have, according to form, been +examined by a supervisor, and to-day I gave in his certificate, with a +request for an order for instructions. In this affair, if I succeed, I +am afraid I shall but too much need a patronizing friend. Propriety of +conduct as a man, and fidelity and attention as an officer, I dare +engage for; but with anything like business, except manual labour, I +am totally unacquainted.</p> + +<p>I had intended to have closed my late appearance on the stage of life, +in the character of a country farmer; but after discharging some +filial and fraternal claims, I find I could only fight for existence +in that miserable manner, which I have lived to see throw a venerable +parent into the jaws of a jail; whence death, the poor man’s last and +often best friend, rescued him.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_385" id="Page_385">[385]</a></span></p> + +<p>I know, Sir, that to need your goodness, is to have a claim on it; may +I, therefore, beg your patronage to forward me in this affair, till I +be appointed to a division; where, by the help of rigid economy, I +will try to support that independence so dear to my soul, but which +has been too often so distant from my situation.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCXXIX" id="letterCXXIX"></a>CXXIX.</h2> + +<h3>TO WILLIAM CRUIKSHANK.</h3> + +<p>[The verses which this letter conveyed to Cruikshank were the lines +written in Friars-Carse Hermitage: “the first-fruits,” says the poet, +elsewhere, “of my intercourse with the Nithsdale muse.”]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Ellisland, August, 1788.</i></p> + +<p>I have not room, my dear friend, to answer all the particulars of your +last kind letter. I shall be in Edinburgh on some business very soon; +and as I shall be two days, or perhaps three, in town, we shall +discuss matters <i>vivâ voce.</i> My knee, I believe, will never be +entirely well; and an unlucky fall this winter has made it still +worse. I well remember the circumstance you allude to, respecting +Creech’s opinion of Mr. Nicol; but, as the first gentleman owes me +still about fifty pounds, I dare not meddle in the affair.</p> + +<p>It gave me a very heavy heart to read such accounts of the consequence +of your quarrel with that puritanic, rotten-hearted, hell-commissioned +scoundrel A——. If, notwithstanding your unprecedented industry in +public, and your irreproachable conduct in private life, he still has +you so much in his power, what ruin may he not bring on some others I +could name?</p> + +<p>Many and happy returns of seasons to you, with your dearest and +worthiest friend, and the lovely little pledge of your happy union. +May the great Author of life, and of every enjoyment that can render +life delightful, make her that comfortable blessing to you both, which +you so ardently wish for, and which, allow me to say, you so well +deserve! Glance over the foregoing verses, and let me have your blots.</p> + +<p class="sig8">Adieu.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCXXX" id="letterCXXX"></a>CXXX.</h2> + +<h3>TO MRS. DUNLOP.</h3> + +<p>[The lines on the Hermitage were presented by the poet to several of +his friends, and Mrs. Dunlop was among the number.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Mauchline, August 2, 1788.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">Honoured Madam</span>,</p> + +<p>Your kind letter welcomed me, yesternight, to Ayrshire. I am, indeed, +seriously angry with you at the quantum of your luckpenny; but, vexed +and hurt as I was, I could not help laughing very heartily at the +noble lord’s apology for the missed napkin.</p> + +<p>I would write you from Nithsdale, and give you my direction there, but +I have scarce an opportunity of calling at a post-office once in a +fortnight. I am six miles from Dumfries, am scarcely ever in it +myself, and, as yet, have little acquaintance in the neighbourhood. +Besides, I am now very busy on my farm, building a dwelling-house; as +at present I am almost an evangelical man in Nithsdale, for I have +scarce “where to lay my head.”</p> + +<p>There are some passages in your last that brought tears in my eyes. +“The heart knoweth its own sorrows, and a stranger intermeddleth not +therewith.” The repository of these “sorrows of the heart” is a kind +of <i>sanctum sanctorum:</i> and ’tis only a chosen friend, and that, too, +at particular sacred times, who dares enter into them:—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Heaven oft tears the bosom-chords<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That nature finest strung.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>You will excuse this quotation for the sake of the author. Instead of +entering on this subject farther, I shall transcribe you a few lines I +wrote in a hermitage, belonging to a gentleman in my Nithsdale +neighbourhood. They are almost the only favours the muses have +conferred on me in that country:—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Thou whom chance may hither lead.<a name="FNanchor_186_186" id="FNanchor_186_186"></a><a href="#Footnote_186_186" class="fnanchor">[186]</a><br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>Since I am in the way of transcribing, the following were the +production of yesterday as I jogged through the wild hills of New +Cumnock. I intend inserting them, or something like them, in an +epistle I am going to write to the gentleman on whose friendship my +Excise hopes depend, Mr. Graham, of Fintray, one of <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_386" id="Page_386">[386]</a></span> the worthiest and most accomplished gentlemen not only of this +country, but, I will dare to say it, of this age. The following are +just the first crude thoughts “unhousel’d, unanointed, unanneal’d:”—</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Pity the tuneful muses’ helpless train;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Weak, timid landsmen on life’s stormy main:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The world were blest, did bliss on them depend;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ah, that “the friendly e’er should want a friend!”<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The little fate bestows they share as soon;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Unlike sage, proverb’d, wisdom’s hard-wrung boon.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Let Prudence number o’er each sturdy son,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Who life and wisdom at one race begun;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Who feel by reason and who give by rule;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Instinct’s a brute and sentiment a fool!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Who make poor <i>will do</i> wait upon <i>I should</i>;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">We own they’re prudent, but who owns they’re good?<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Ye wise ones, hence! ye hurt the social eye;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">God’s image rudely etch’d on base alloy!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But come * * * * * *<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>Here the muse left me. I am astonished at what yon tell me of +Anthony’s writing me. I never received it. Poor fellow! you vex me +much by telling me that he is unfortunate. I shall be in Ayrshire ten +days from this date. I have just room for an old Roman farewell.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + + + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_186_186" id="Footnote_186_186"></a><a href="#FNanchor_186_186"><span class="label">[186]</span></a> See Poems <a href="#LXXXIX">LXXXIX</a> and <a href="#XC">XC</a></p> +</div> +</div> + + + +<h2><a name="letterCXXXI" id="letterCXXXI"></a>CXXXI.</h2> + +<h3>TO MRS. DUNLOP.</h3> + +<p>[This letter has been often cited, and very properly, as a proof of +the strong attachment of Burns to one who was, in many respects, +worthy.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Mauchline, August 10, 1788.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">My much honoured Friend,</span></p> + +<p>Yours of the 24th June is before me. I found it, as well as another +valued friend—my wife, waiting to welcome me to Ayrshire: I met both +with the sincerest pleasure.</p> + +<p>When I write you, Madam, I do not sit down to answer every paragraph +of yours, by echoing every sentiment, like the faithful Commons of +Great Britain in Parliament assembled, answering a speech from the +best of kings! I express myself in the fulness of my heart, and may, +perhaps, be guilty of neglecting some of your kind inquiries; but not +from your very old reason, that I do not read your letters. All your +epistles for several months have cost me nothing, except a swelling +throb of gratitude, or a deep-felt sentiment of veneration.</p> + +<p>When Mrs. Burns, Madam, first found herself “as women wish to be who +love their lords,” as I loved her nearly to distraction, we took steps +for a private marriage. Her parents got the hint; and not only forbade +me her company and their house, but, on my rumoured West Indian +voyage, got a warrant to put me in jail, till I should find security +in my about-to-be paternal relation. You know my lucky reverse of +fortune. On my <i>éclatant</i> return to Mauchline, I was made very welcome +to visit my girl. The usual consequences began to betray her; and, as +I was at that time laid up a cripple in Edinburgh, she was turned, +literally turned out of doors, and I wrote to a friend to shelter her +till my return, when our marriage was declared. Her happiness or +misery were in my hands, and who could trifle with such a deposit?</p> + +<p>I can easily fancy a more agreeable companion for my journey of life; +but, upon my honour, I have never seen the individual instance.</p> + +<p>Circumstanced as I am, I could never have got a female partner for +life, who could have entered into my favourite studies, relished my +favourite authors, &c., without probably entailing on me at the same +time expensive living, fantastic caprice, perhaps apish affectation, +with all the other blessed boarding-school acquirements, which +(<i>pardonnez moi, Madame</i>,) are sometimes to be found among females of +the upper ranks, but almost universally pervade the misses of the +would-be gentry.</p> + +<p>I like your way in your church-yard lucubrations. Thoughts that are +the spontaneous result of accidental situations, either respecting +health, place, or company, have often a strength, and always an +originality, that would in vain be looked for in fancied circumstances +and studied paragraphs. For me, I have often thought of keeping a +letter, in progression by me, to send you when the sheet was written +out. Now I talk of sheets, I must tell you, my reason for writing to +you on paper of this kind is my pruriency of writing to you at large. +A page of post is on such a dissocial, narrow-minded scale,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_387" id="Page_387">[387]</a></span> that I +cannot abide it; and double letters, at least in my miscellaneous +revery manner, are a monstrous tax in a close correspondence.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCXXXII" id="letterCXXXII"></a>CXXXII.</h2> + +<h3>TO MRS. DUNLOP.</h3> + +<p>[Mrs. Miller, of Dalswinton, was a lady of beauty and talent: she +wrote verses with skill and taste. Her maiden name was Jean Lindsay.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Ellisland, 16th August, 1788.</i></p> + +<p>I am in a fine disposition, my honoured friend, to send you an elegiac +epistle; and want only genius to make it quite Shenstonian:—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Why droops my heart with fancied woes forlorn?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Why sinks my soul, beneath each wintry sky?”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>My increasing cares in this, as yet strange country—gloomy +conjectures in the dark vista of futurity—consciousness of my own +inability for the struggle of the world—my broadened mark to +misfortune in a wife and children;—I could indulge these reflections +till my humour should ferment into the most acid chagrin, that would +corrode the very thread of life.</p> + +<p>To counterwork these baneful feelings, I have sat down to write to +you; as I declare upon my soul I always find that the most sovereign +balm for my wounded spirit.</p> + +<p>I was yesterday at Mr. Miller’s to dinner for the first time. My +reception was quite to my mind: from the lady of the house quite +flattering. She sometimes hits on a couplet or two, <i>impromptu.</i> She +repeated one or two to the admiration of all present. My suffrage as a +professional man, was expected: I for once went agonizing over the +belly of my conscience. Pardon me, ye my adored household gods, +independence of spirit, and integrity of soul! In the course of +conversation, “Johnson’s Musical Museum,” a collection of Scottish +songs with the music, was talked of. We got a song on the harpsichord, +beginning,</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Raving winds around her blowing.”<a name="FNanchor_187_187" id="FNanchor_187_187"></a><a href="#Footnote_187_187" class="fnanchor">[187]</a><br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>The air was much admired: the lady of the house asked me whose were +the words. “Mine, Madam—they are indeed my very best verses;” she +took not the smallest notice of them! The old Scottish proverb says +well, “king’s caff is better than ither folks’ corn.” I was going to +make a New Testament quotation about “casting pearls” but that would +be too virulent, for the lady is actually a woman of sense and taste.</p> + +<p>After all that has been said on the other side of the question, man is +by no means a happy creature. I do not speak of the selected few, +favoured by partial heaven, whose souls are tuned to gladness amid +riches and honours, and prudence and wisdom. I speak of the neglected +many, whose nerves, whose sinews, whose days are sold to the minions +of fortune.</p> + +<p>If I thought you had never seen it, I would transcribe for you a +stanza of an old Scottish ballad, called, “The Life and Age of Man;” +beginning thus:</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“’Twas in the sixteenth hunder year<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Of God and fifty-three,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Frae Christ was born, that bought us dear,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">As writings testifie.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>I had an old grand-uncle, with whom my mother lived awhile in her +girlish years; the good old man, for such he was, was long blind ere +he died, during which time his highest enjoyment was to sit down and +cry, while my mother would sing the simple old song of “the Life and +Age of Man.”</p> + +<p>It is this way of thinking; it is these melancholy truths, that make +religion so precious to the poor, miserable children of men.—If it is +a mere phantom, existing only in the heated imagination of enthusiasm,</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“What truth on earth so precious as a lie.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>My idle reasonings sometimes make me a little sceptical, but the +necessities of my heart always give the cold philosophisings the lie. +Who looks for the heart weaned from earth; the soul affianced to her +God; the correspondent devout thanksgiving, constant as the +vicissitudes of even and morn; who thinks to meet with these in the +court, the palace, in the glare of public life? No: to find them in +their precious importance and divine efficacy, we must search among +the obscure recesses of disappointment, affliction, poverty, and +distress.</p> + +<p>I am sure, dear Madam, you are now more than pleased with the length +of my letters. I return to Ayrshire middle of next week: and it +quickens my pace to think that there will be a letter from you waiting +me there. I must be here again very soon for my harvest.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + + + + + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_187_187" id="Footnote_187_187"></a><a href="#FNanchor_187_187"><span class="label">[187]</span></a> See <a href="#songsLII">Song LII.</a></p> +</div> +</div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_388" id="Page_388">[388]</a></span></p> + +<h2><a name="letterCXXXIII" id="letterCXXXIII"></a>CXXXIII.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. BEUGO,</h3> + +<h4><span class="smcap">Engraver, Edinburgh.</span></h4> + +<p>[Mr. Beugo was at well-known engraver in Edinburgh: he engraved +Nasmyth’s portrait of Burns, for Creech’s first edition of his Poems; +and as he could draw a little, he improved, as he called it, the +engraving from sittings of the poet, and made it a little more like, +and a little less poetic.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Ellisland, 9th Sept. 1788.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">My dear Sir</span>,</p> + +<p>There is not in Edinburgh above the number of the graces whose letters +would have given me so much pleasure as yours of the 3d instant, which +only reached me yesternight.</p> + +<p>I am here on the farm, busy with my harvest; but for all that most +pleasurable part of life called <span class="smcap">social communication</span>, I am +here at the very elbow of existence. The only things that are to be +found in this country, in any degree of perfection, are stupidity and +canting. Prose they only know in graces, prayers, &c., and the value +of these they estimate as they do their plaiding webs—by the ell! As +for the muses, they have as much an idea of a rhinoceros as of a poet. +For my old capricious but good-natured huzzy of a muse—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“By banks of Nith I sat and wept<br /></span> +<span class="i2">When Coila I thought on,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In midst thereof I hung my harp<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The willow-trees upon.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>I am generally about half my time in Ayrshire with my “darling Jean,” +and then I, at lucid intervals, throw my horny fist across my +becob-webbed lyre, much in the same manner as an old wife throws her +hand across the spokes of her spinning-wheel.</p> + +<p>I will send you the “Fortunate Shepherdess” as soon as I return to +Ayrshire, for there I keep it with other precious treasure. I shall +send it by a careful hand, as I would not for anything it should be +mislaid or lost. I do not wish to serve you from any benevolence, or +other grave Christian virtue; ’tis purely a selfish gratification of +my own feelings whenever I think of you.</p> + +<p>If your better functions would give you leisure to write me, I should +be extremely happy; that is to say if you neither keep nor look for a +regular correspondence. I hate the idea of being obliged to write a +letter. I sometimes write a friend twice a week, at other times once a +quarter.</p> + +<p>I am exceedingly pleased with your fancy in making the author you +mention place a map of Iceland instead of his portrait before his +works: ’twas a glorious idea.</p> + +<p>Could you conveniently do me one thing?—whenever you finish any head +I should like to have a proof copy of it. I might tell you a long +story about your fine genius; but as what everybody knows cannot have +escaped you, I shall not say one syllable about it.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCXXXIV" id="letterCXXXIV"></a>CXXXIV.</h2> + +<h3>TO MISS CHALMERS,</h3> + +<h4><span class="smcap">Edinburgh</span>.</h4> + +<p>[To this fine letter all the biographer of Burns are largely +indebted.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Ellisland, near Dumfries, Sept. 16th, 1788.</i></p> + +<p>Where are you? and how are you? and is Lady Mackenzie recovering her +health? for I have had but one solitary letter from you. I will not +think you have forgot me, Madam; and for my part—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“When thee, Jerusalem, I forget,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Skill part from my right hand!”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>“My heart is not of that rock, nor my soul careless as that sea.” I do +not make my progress among mankind as a bowl does among its +fellows—rolling through the crowd without bearing away any mark of +impression, except where they hit in hostile collision.</p> + +<p>I am here, driven in with my harvest-folks by bad weather; and as you +and your sister once did me the honour of interesting yourselves much +<i>à l’égard de moi</i>, I sit down to beg the continuation of your +goodness. I can truly say that, all the exterior of life apart, I +never saw two, whose esteem flattered the nobler feelings of my +soul—I will not say more, but so much as Lady Mackenzie and Miss +Chalmers. When I think of you—hearts the best, minds the noblest of +human kind—unfortunate even in the shades of life—when I think I +have met with you, and have lived more of real life with you in eight +days than I can do with almost any body I meet with in eight +years—when I think on the improbability of meeting you in this world +again—I could sit down and cry like a child! If ever you honoured me +with a place in your esteem, I trust I can now plead more<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_389" id="Page_389">[389]</a></span> desert. I +am secure against that crushing grip of iron poverty, which, alas! is +less or more fatal to the native worth and purity of, I fear, the +noblest souls; and a late important step in my life has kindly taken +me out of the way of those ungrateful iniquities, which, however +overlooked in fashionable license, or varnished in fashionable phrase, +are indeed but lighter and deeper shades of <span class="smcap">villany</span>.</p> + +<p>Shortly after my last return to Ayrshire, I married “my Jean.” This +was not in consequence of the attachment of romance, perhaps; but I +had a long and much-loved fellow-creature’s happiness or misery in my +determination, and I durst not trifle with so important a deposit. Nor +have I any cause to repent it. If I have not got polite tattle, modish +manners, and fashionable dress, I am not sickened and disgusted with +the multiform curse of boarding-school affectation: and I have got the +handsomest figure, the sweetest temper, the soundest constitution, and +the kindest heart in the county. Mrs. Burns believes, as firmly as her +creed, that I am <i>le plus bel esprit, et le plus honnête homme</i> in the +universe; although she scarcely ever in her life, except the +Scriptures of the Old and New Testament, and the Psalms of David in +metre, spent five minutes together either on prose or verse. I must +except also from this last a certain late publication of Scots poems, +which she has perused very devoutly; and all the ballads in the +country, as she has (O the partial lover! you will cry) the finest +“wood-note wild” I ever heard. I am the more particular in this lady’s +character, as I know she will henceforth have the honour of a share in +your best wishes. She is still at Mauchline, as I am building my +house; for this hovel that I shelter in, while occasionally here, is +pervious to every blast that blows, and every shower that falls; and I +am only preserved from being chilled to death by being suffocated with +smoke. I do not find my farm that pennyworth I was taught to expect, +but I believe, in time, it may be a saving bargain. You will be +pleased to hear that I have laid aside idle <i>éclat</i>, and bind every +day after my reapers.</p> + +<p>To save me from that horrid situation of at any time going down in a +losing bargain of a farm, to misery, I have taken my Excise +instructions, and have my commission in my pocket for any emergency of +fortune. If I could set all before your view, whatever disrespect you, +in common with the world, have for this business, I know you would +approve of my idea.</p> + +<p>I will make no apology, dear Madam, for this egotistic detail; I know +you and your sister will be interested in every circumstance of it. +What signify the silly, idle gewgaws of wealth, or the ideal trumpery +of greatness! When fellow-partakers of the same nature fear the same +God, have the same benevolence of heart, the same nobleness of soul, +the same detestation at everything dishonest, and the same scorn at +everything unworthy—if they are not in the dependence of absolute +beggary, in the name of common sense are they not <span class="smcap">equals</span>? And +if the bias, the instinctive bias, of their souls run the same way, +why may they not be <span class="smcap">friends</span>?</p> + +<p>When I may have an opportunity of sending you this, Heaven only knows. +Shenstone says, “When one is confined idle within doors by bad +weather, the best antidote against <i>ennui</i> is to read the letters of +or write to, one’s friends;” in that case then, if the weather +continues thus, I may scrawl you half a quire.</p> + +<p>I very lately—to wit, since harvest began—wrote a poem, not in +imitation, but in the manner, of Pope’s Moral Epistles. It is only a +short essay, just to try the strength of my muse’s pinion in that way. +I will send you a copy of it, when once I have heard from you. I have +likewise been laying the foundation of some pretty large poetic works: +how the superstructure will come on, I leave to that great maker and +marrer of projects—<span class="smcap">time</span>. Johnson’s collection of Scots songs +is going on in the third volume; and, of consequence, finds me a +consumpt for a great deal of idle metre. One of the most tolerable +things I have done in that way is two stanzas I made to an air, a +musical gentleman of my acquaintance composed for the anniversary of +his wedding-day, which happens on the seventh of November. Take it as +follows:—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“The day returns—my bosom burns,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The blissful day we twa did meet,” &c.<a name="FNanchor_188_188" id="FNanchor_188_188"></a><a href="#Footnote_188_188" class="fnanchor">[188]</a><br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>I shall give over this letter for shame. If I should be seized with a +scribbling fit, before this goes away, I shall make it another letter; +and then you may allow your patience a week’s respite between the two. +I have not room for more than the old, kind, hearty farewell.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_390" id="Page_390">[390]</a></span></p><hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p>To make some amends, <i>mes chères Mesdames</i>, for dragging you on to +this second sheet, and to relieve a little the tiresomeness of my +unstudied and uncorrectible prose, I shall transcribe you some of my +late poetic bagatelles; though I have, these eight or ten months, done +very little that way. One day in a hermitage on the banks of Nith, +belonging to a gentleman in my neighbourhood, who is so good as give +me a key at pleasure, I wrote as follows; supposing myself the +sequestered, venerable inhabitant of the lonely mansion.</p> + +<p class="std1">LINES WRITTEN IN FRIARS-CARSE</p> + +<p class="std1">HERMITAGE.</p> +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Thou whom chance may hither lead,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Be thou clad in russet weed.”<a name="FNanchor_189_189" id="FNanchor_189_189"></a><a href="#Footnote_189_189" class="fnanchor">[189]</a><br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + + + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_188_188" id="Footnote_188_188"></a><a href="#FNanchor_188_188"><span class="label">[188]</span></a> <a href="#songsLXIX">Song LXIX.</a></p> +</div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_189_189" id="Footnote_189_189"></a><a href="#FNanchor_189_189"><span class="label">[189]</span></a> Poems <a href="#LXXXIX">LXXXIX.</a> and <a href="#XC">XC.</a></p> +</div> +</div> + + + +<h2><a name="letterCXXXV" id="letterCXXXV"></a>CXXXV.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. MORISON,</h3> + +<h4><span class="smcap">Mauchline</span>.</h4> + +<p>[Morison, of Mauchline, made most of the poet’s furniture, for +Ellisland: from Mauchline, too, came that eight-day clock, which was +sold, at the death of the poet’s widow, for thirty-eight pounds, to +one who would have paid one hundred, sooner than wanted it.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Ellisland, September 22, 1788.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">My dear Sir,</span></p> + +<p>Necessity obliges me to go into my new house even before it be +plastered. I will inhabit the one end until the other is finished. +About three weeks more, I think, will at farthest be my time, beyond +which I cannot stay in this present house. If ever you wished to +deserve the blessing of him that was ready to perish; if ever you were +in a situation that a little kindness would have rescued you from many +evils; if ever you hope to find rest in future states of untried +being—get these matters of mine ready. My servant will be out in the +beginning of next week for the clock. My compliments to Mrs. Morison.</p> + +<p class="sig10">I am,</p> + +<p class="sig5">After all my tribulation,</p> + +<p class="sig10">Dear Sir, yours,</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCXXXVI" id="letterCXXXVI"></a>CXXXVI.</h2> + +<h3>TO MRS. DUNLOP,</h3> + +<h4><span class="smcap">of Dunlop</span>.</h4> + +<p>[Burns had no great respect for critics who found blemishes without +perceiving beauties: he expresses his contempt for such in this +letter.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Mauchline, 27th Sept. 1788.</i></p> + +<p>I have received twins, dear Madam, more than once; but scarcely ever +with more pleasure than when I received yours of the 12th instant. To +make myself understood; I had wrote to Mr. Graham, enclosing my poem +addressed to him, and the same post which favoured me with yours +brought me an answer from him. It was dated the very day he had +received mine; and I am quite at a loss to say whether it was most +polite or kind.</p> + +<p>Your criticisms, my honoured benefactress, are truly the work of a +friend. They are not the blasting depredations of a canker-toothed, +caterpillar critic; nor are they the fair statement of cold +impartiality, balancing with unfeeling exactitude the <i>pro</i> and <i>con</i> +of an author’s merits; they are the judicious observations of animated +friendship, selecting the beauties of the piece. I have just arrived +from Nithsdale, and will be here a fortnight. I was on horseback this +morning by three o’clock; for between my wife and my farm is just +forty-six miles. As I jogged on in the dark, I was taken with a poetic +fit as follows:</p> + +<p>“Mrs. Ferguson of Craigdarroch’s lamentation for the death of her son; +an uncommonly promising youth of eighteen or nineteen years of age.”</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Fate gave the word—the arrow sped,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And pierced my darling’s heart.”<a name="FNanchor_190_190" id="FNanchor_190_190"></a><a href="#Footnote_190_190" class="fnanchor">[190]</a><br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>You will not send me your poetic rambles, but, you see I am no niggard +of mine. I am sure your impromptus give me double pleasure; what falls +from your pen can neither be unentertaining in itself, nor indifferent +to me.</p> + +<p>The one fault you found, is just; but I cannot please myself in an +emendation.</p> + +<p>What a life of solicitude is the life of a parent! You interested me +much in your young couple.</p> + +<p>I would not take my folio paper for this epistle, and now I repent it. +I am so jaded with my dirty long journey that I was afraid to drawl +into the essence of dulness with anything <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_391" id="Page_391">[391]</a></span>larger than a quarto, and +so I must leave out another rhyme of this morning’s manufacture.</p> + +<p>I will pay the sapientipotent George, most cheerfully, to hear from +you ere I leave Ayrshire.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + + + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_190_190" id="Footnote_190_190"></a><a href="#FNanchor_190_190"><span class="label">[190]</span></a> <a href="#XCII">Poem XCII.</a></p> +</div> +</div> + + + +<h2><a name="letterCXXXVII" id="letterCXXXVII"></a>CXXXVII.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. PETER HILL.</h3> + +<p>[“The ‘Address to Lochlomond,’ which this letter criticises,” says +Currie in 1800, “was written by a gentleman, now one of the masters of +the High-school of Edinburgh, and the same who translated the +beautiful story of ‘The Paria,’ published in the Bee of Dr. +Anderson.”]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Mauchline, 1st October, 1788.</i></p> + +<p>I have been here in this country about three days, and all that time +my chief reading has been the “Address to Lochlomond” you were so +obliging as to send to me. Were I impannelled one of the author’s +jury, to determine his criminality respecting the sin of poesy, my +verdict should be “guilty! a poet of nature’s making!”. It is an +excellent method for improvement, and what I believe every poet does, +to place some favourite classic author in his own walks of study and +composition, before him as a model. Though your author had not +mentioned the name, I could have, at half a glance, guessed his model +to be Thomson. Will my brother-poet forgive me, if I venture to hint +that his imitation of that immortal bard is in two or three places +rather more servile than such a genius as his required:—<i>e.g.</i></p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“To soothe the maddening passions all to peace.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="sig2"><span class="smcap">Address.</span></p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“To soothe the throbbing passions into peace.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="sig2"><span class="smcap">Thomson.</span></p> + +<p>I think the “Address” is in simplicity, harmony, and elegance of +versification, fully equal to the “Seasons.” Like Thomson, too, he has +looked into nature for himself: you meet with no copied description. +One particular criticism I made at first reading; in no one instance +has he said too much. He never flags in his progress, but, like a true +poet of nature’s making kindles in his course. His beginning is simple +and modest, as if distrustful of the strength of his pinion; only, I +do not altogether like—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">—————————————“Truth<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The soul of every song that’s nobly great.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>Fiction is the soul of many a song that is nobly great. Perhaps I am +wrong: this may be but a prose criticism. Is not the phrase in line 7, +page 6, “Great lake,” too much vulgarized by every-day language for so +sublime a poem?</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Great mass of waters, theme for nobler song,”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>is perhaps no emendation. His enumeration of a comparison with other +lakes is at once harmonious and poetic. Every reader’s ideas must +sweep the</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Winding margin of an hundred miles.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>The perspective that follows mountains blue—the imprisoned billows +beating in vain—the wooded isles—the digression on the +yew-tree—“Ben-lomond’s lofty, cloud-envelop’d head,” &c. are +beautiful. A thunder-storm is a subject which has been often tried, +yet our poet in his grand picture has interjected a circumstance, so +far as I know, entirely original:—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">————————————“the gloom<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Deep seam’d with frequent streaks of moving fire.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>In his preface to the Storm, “the glens how dark between,” is noble +highland landscape! The “rain ploughing the red mould,” too, is +beautifully fancied. “Ben-lomond’s lofty, pathless top,” is a good +expression; and the surrounding view from it is truly great: the</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">——————“silver mist,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Beneath the beaming sun,”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>is well described; and here he has contrived to enliven his poem with +a little of that passion which bids fair, I think, to usurp the modern +muses altogether. I know not how far this episode is a beauty upon the +whole, but the swain’s wish to carry “some faint idea of the vision +bright,” to entertain her “partial listening ear,” is a pretty +thought. But in my opinion the most beautiful passages in the whole +poem are the fowls crowding, in wintry frosts, to Lochlomond’s +“hospitable flood;” their wheeling round, their lighting, mixing, +diving, &c.; and the glorious description of the sportsman. This last +is equal to anything in the “Seasons.” The idea of “the floating tribe +distant seen, far glistering to the moon,” provoking his eye as he is +obliged to leave them, is a noble ray of poetic genius. “The howling +winds,” the “hideous roar” of the white cascades, are all in the same +style.</p> + +<p>I forget that while I am thus holding forth with the heedless warmth +of an enthusiast, I am perhaps tiring you with nonsense. I must, +however, mention that the last verse of the sixteenth page is one of +the most elegant compli<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_392" id="Page_392">[392]</a></span>ments I have ever seen. I must likewise notice +that beautiful paragraph beginning, “The gleaming lake,” &c. I dare +not go into the particular beauties of the last two paragraphs, but +they are admirably fine, and truly Ossianic.</p> + +<p>I must beg your pardon for this lengthened scrawl. I had no idea of it +when I began—I should like to know who the author is; but, whoever he +be, please present him with my grateful thanks for the entertainment +he has afforded me.</p> + +<p>A friend of mine desired me to commission for him two books, “Letters +on the Religion essential to Man,” a book you sent me before; and “The +World unmasked, or the Philosopher the greatest Cheat.” Send me them +by the first opportunity. The Bible you sent me is truly elegant; I +only wish it had been in two volumes.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCXXXVIII" id="letterCXXXVIII"></a>CXXXVIII.</h2> + +<h3>TO THE EDITOR OF “THE STAR.”</h3> + +<p>[The clergyman who preached the sermon which this letter condemns, was +a man equally worthy and stern—a divine of Scotland’s elder day: he +received “a harmonious call” to a smaller stipend than that of +Dunscore—and accepted it.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>November 8th, 1788.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">Sir</span>,</p> + +<p>Notwithstanding the opprobrious epithets with which some of our +philosophers and gloomy sectarians have branded our nature—the +principle of universal selfishness, the proneness to all evil, they +have given us; still the detestation in which inhumanity to the +distressed, or insolence to the fallen, are held by all mankind, shows +that they are not natives of the human heart. Even the unhappy partner +of our kind, who is undone, the bitter consequence of his follies or +his crimes, who but sympathizes with the miseries of this ruined +profligate brother? We forget the injuries and feel for the man.</p> + +<p>I went, last Wednesday, to my parish church, most cordially to join in +grateful acknowledgment to the <span class="smcap">Author of all Good</span>, for the +consequent blessings of the glorious revolution. To that auspicious +event we owe no less than our liberties, civil and religious; to it we +are likewise indebted for the present Royal Family, the ruling +features of whose administration have ever been mildness to the +subject, and tenderness of his rights.</p> + +<p>Bred and educated in revolution principles, the principles of reason +and common sense, it could not be any silly political prejudice which +made my heart revolt at the harsh abusive manner in which the reverend +gentleman mentioned the House of Stewart, and which, I am afraid, was +too much the language of the day. We may rejoice sufficiently in our +deliverance from past evils, without cruelly raking up the ashes of +those whose misfortune it was, perhaps as much as their crime, to be +the authors of those evils; and we may bless God for all his goodness +to us as a nation, without at the same time cursing a few ruined, +powerless exiles, who only harboured ideas, and made attempts, that +most of us would have done, had we been in their situation.</p> + +<p>“The bloody and tyrannical House of Stewart” may be said with +propriety and justice, when compared with the present royal family, +and the sentiments of our days; but is there no allowance to be made +for the manners of the times? Were the royal contemporaries of the +Stewarts more attentive to their subjects’ rights? Might not the +epithets of “bloody and tyrannical” be, with at least equal justice, +applied to the House of Tudor, of York, or any other of their +predecessors?</p> + +<p>The simple state of the case, Sir, seems to be this:—At that period, +the science of government, the knowledge of the true relation between +king and subject, was, like other sciences and other knowledge, just +in its infancy, emerging from dark ages of ignorance and barbarity.</p> + +<p>The Stewarts only contended for prerogatives which they knew their +predecessors enjoyed, and which they saw their contemporaries +enjoying; but these prerogatives were inimical to the happiness of a +nation and the rights of subjects.</p> + +<p>In the contest between prince and people, the consequence of that +light of science which had lately dawned over Europe, the monarch of +France, for example, was victorious over the struggling liberties of +his people: with us, luckily the monarch failed, and his unwarrantable +pretensions fell a sacrifice to our rights and happiness. Whether it +was owing to the wisdom of leading individuals, or to the justling +of parties, I cannot pretend to determine; but likewise happily for +us, the kingly power was shifted into another branch of the family, +who, as they owed the throne solely to the call<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_393" id="Page_393">[393]</a></span> of a free people, +could claim nothing inconsistent with the covenanted terms which +placed them there.</p> + +<p>The Stewarts have been condemned and laughed at for the folly and +impracticability of their attempts in 1715 and 1745. That they failed, +I bless <span class="smcap">God</span>; but cannot join in the ridicule against them. +Who does not know that the abilities or defects of leaders and +commanders are often hidden until put to the touchstone of exigency; +and that there is a caprice of fortune, an omnipotence in particular +accidents and conjunctures of circumstances, which exalt us as heroes, +or brand us as madmen, just as they are for or against us?</p> + +<p>Man, Mr. Publisher, is a strange, weak, inconsistent being; who would +believe, Sir, that in this our Augustan age of liberality and +refinement, while we seem so justly sensible and jealous of our rights +and liberties, and animated with such indignation against the very +memory of those who would have subverted them—that a certain people +under our national protection should complain, not against our monarch +and a few favorite advisers, but against our <span class="smcap">whole legislative +body</span>, for similar oppression, and almost in the very same terms, +as our forefathers did of the house of Stewart! I will not, I cannot +enter into the merits of the cause; but I dare say the American +Congress, in 1776, will be allowed to be as able and as enlightened as +the English Convention was in 1688; and that their posterity will +celebrate the centenary of their deliverance from us, as duly and +sincerely as we do ours from the oppressive measures of the +wrong-headed House of Stewart.</p> + +<p>To conclude, Sir; let every man who has a tear for the many miseries +incident to humanity feel for a family illustrious as any in Europe, +and unfortunate beyond historic precedent; and let every Briton (and +particularly every Scotsman) who ever looked with reverential pity on +the dotage of a parent, cast a veil over the fatal mistakes of the +kings of his forefathers.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCXXXIX" id="letterCXXXIX"></a>CXXXIX.</h2> + +<h3>TO MRS. DUNLOP,</h3> + +<h4><span class="smcap">At Moreham Mains</span>.</h4> + +<p>[The heifer presented to the poet by the Dunlops was bought, at the +sale of Ellisland stock, by Miller of Dalswinton, and long grazed the +pastures in his “policies” by the name of “Burns.”]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Mauchline</i>, 13<i>th November</i>, 1788.</p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">Madam</span>,</p> + +<p>I had the very great pleasure of dining at Dunlop yesterday. Men are +said to flatter women because they are weak; if it is so, poets must +be weaker still; for Misses R. and K. and Miss G. M’K., with their +flattering attentions, and artful compliments, absolutely turned my +head. I own they did not lard me over as many a poet does his patron, +but they so intoxicated me with their sly insinuations and delicate +inuendos of compliment, that if it had not been for a lucky +recollection, how much additional weight and lustre your good opinion +and friendship must give me in that circle, I had certainly looked +upon myself as a person of no small consequence. I dare not say one +word how much I was charmed with the Major’s friendly welcome, elegant +manner, and acute remark, lest I should be thought to overbalance my +orientalisms of applause over-against the finest quey<a name="FNanchor_191_191" id="FNanchor_191_191"></a><a href="#Footnote_191_191" class="fnanchor">[191]</a> in Ayrshire, +which he made me a present of to help and adorn my farm-stock. As it +was on hallow-day, I am determined annually, as that day returns, to +decorate her horns with an ode of gratitude to the family of Dunlop.</p> + +<p>So soon as I know of your arrival at Dunlop, I will take the first +conveniency to dedicate a day, or perhaps two, to you and friendship, +under the guarantee of the Major’s hospitality. There will soon be +threescore and ten miles of permanent distance between us; and now +that your friendship and friendly correspondence is entwisted with the +heart-strings of my enjoyment of life, I must indulge myself in a +happy day of “The feast of reason and the flow of soul.”</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + + + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_191_191" id="Footnote_191_191"></a><a href="#FNanchor_191_191"><span class="label">[191]</span></a> Heifer.</p></div> +</div> + + + +<h2><a name="letterCXL" id="letterCXL"></a>CXL.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. JAMES JOHNSON,</h3> + +<h4><span class="smcap">Engraver</span>.</h4> + +<p>[James Johnson, though not an ungenerous man, meanly refused to give a +copy of the Musical Museum to Burns, who desired to bestow it on one +to whom his family was deeply indebted. This was in the last year of +the poet’s life, and after the Museum had been brightened by so much +of his lyric verse.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Mauchline, November 15th, 1788.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">My dear Sir,</span></p> + +<p>I have sent you two more songs. If you have<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_394" id="Page_394">[394]</a></span> got any tunes, or +anything to correct, please send them by return of the carrier.</p> + +<p>I can easily see, my dear friend, that you will very probably have +four volumes. Perhaps you may not find your account lucratively in +this business; but you are a patriot for the music of your country; +and I am certain posterity will look on themselves as highly indebted +to your public spirit. Be not in a hurry; let us go on correctly, and +your name shall be immortal.</p> + +<p>I am preparing a flaming preface for your third volume. I see every +day new musical publications advertised; but what are they? Gaudy, +hunted butterflies of a day, and then vanish for ever: but your work +will outlive the momentary neglects of idle fashion, and defy the +teeth of time.</p> + +<p>Have you never a fair goddess that leads you a wild-goose chase of +amorous devotion? Let me know a few of her qualities, such as whether +she be rather black, or fair; plump, or thin; short, or tall, &c.; and +choose your air, and I shall task my muse to celebrate her.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCXLI" id="letterCXLI"></a>CXLI.</h2> + +<h3>TO DR. BLACKLOCK.</h3> + +<p>[Blacklock, though blind, was a cheerful and good man. “There was, +perhaps, never one among all mankind,” says Heron, “whom you might +more truly have called an angel upon earth.”]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Mauchline, November 15th, 1788.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">Reverend and dear Sir</span>,</p> + +<p>As I hear nothing of your motions, but that you are, or were, out of +town, I do not know where this may find you, or whether it will find +you at all. I wrote you a long letter, dated from the land of +matrimony, in June; but either it had not found you, or, what I dread +more, it found you or Mrs. Blacklock in too precarious a state of +health and spirits to take notice of an idle packet.</p> + +<p>I have done many little things for Johnson, since I had the pleasure +of seeing you; and I have finished one piece, in the way of Pope’s +“Moral Epistles;” but, from your silence, I have everything to fear, +so I have only sent you two melancholy things, which I tremble lest +they should too well suit the tone of your present feelings.</p> + +<p>In a fortnight I move, bag and baggage, to Nithsdale; till then, my +direction is at this place; after that period, it will be at +Ellisland, near Dumfries. It would extremely oblige me, were it but +half a line, to let me know how you are, and where you are. Can I be +indifferent to the fate of a man to whom I owe so much? A man whom I +not only esteem, but venerate.</p> + +<p>My warmest good wishes and most respectful compliments to Mrs. +Blacklock, and Miss Johnston, if she is with you.</p> + +<p>I cannot conclude without telling you that I am more and more pleased +with the step I took respecting “my Jean.” Two things, from my happy +experience, I set down as apothegms in life. A wife’s head is +immaterial, compared with her heart; and—“Virtue’s (for wisdom what +poet pretends to it?) ways are ways of pleasantness, and all her paths +are peace.”</p> + +<p class="sig9">Adieu!</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<p>[Here follow “The Mother’s Lament for the Loss of her Son,” and the +song beginning “The lazy mist hangs from the brow of the hill.”]</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCXLII" id="letterCXLII"></a>CXLII.</h2> + +<h3>TO MRS. DUNLOP.</h3> + +<p>[The “Auld lang syne,” which Burns here introduces to Mrs. Dunlop as a +strain of the olden time, is as surely his own as Tam-o-Shanter.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Ellisland, 17th December, 1788.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">My dear honoured Friend</span>,</p> + +<p>Yours, dated Edinburgh, which I have just read, makes me very unhappy. +“Almost blind and wholly deaf,” are melancholy news of human nature; +but when told of a much-loved and honoured friend, they carry misery +in the sound. Goodness on your part, and gratitude on mine, began a +tie which has gradually entwisted itself among the dearest chords of +my bosom, and I tremble at the omens of your late and present ailing +habit and shattered health. You miscalculate matters widely, when you +forbid my waiting on you, lest it should hurt my worldly concerns. My +small scale of farming is exceedingly more simple and easy than what +you have lately seen at Moreham Mains. But, be that as it may, the +heart of the man and the fancy of the poet are the two grand +considerations for which I live: if miry ridges and dirty dunghills +are to engross the best part of the functions of my soul immortal, I +had better been a rook or a magpie at once, and then I should<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_395" id="Page_395">[395]</a></span> not +have been plagued with any ideas superior to breaking of clods and +picking up grubs; not to mention barn-door cocks or mallards, +creatures with which I could almost exchange lives at any time. If you +continue so deaf, I am afraid a visit will be no great pleasure to +either of us; but if I hear you are got so well again as to be able to +relish conversation, look you to it, Madam, for I will make my +threatenings good. I am to be at the New-year-day fair of Ayr; and, by +all that is sacred in the world, friend, I will come and see you.</p> + +<p>Your meeting, which you so well describe, with your old schoolfellow +and friend, was truly interesting. Out upon the ways of the +world!—They spoil “these social offsprings of the heart.” Two +veterans of the “men of the world” would have met with little more +heart-workings than two old hacks worn out on the road. Apropos, is +not the Scotch phrase, “Auld lang syne,” exceedingly expressive? There +is an old song and tune which has often thrilled through my soul. You +know I am an enthusiast in old Scotch songs. I shall give you the +verses on the other sheet, as I suppose Mr. Ker will save you the +postage.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Should auld acquaintance be forgot!”<a name="FNanchor_192_192" id="FNanchor_192_192"></a><a href="#Footnote_192_192" class="fnanchor">[192]</a><br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>Light be the turf on the breast of the heaven-inspired poet who +composed this glorious fragment. There is more of the fire of native +genius in it than in half-a-dozen of modern English Bacchanalians! Now +I am on my hobby-horse, I cannot help inserting two other old stanzas, +which please me mightily:—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Go fetch to me a pint of wine.”<a name="FNanchor_193_193" id="FNanchor_193_193"></a><a href="#Footnote_193_193" class="fnanchor">[193]</a><br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + + + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_192_192" id="Footnote_192_192"></a><a href="#FNanchor_192_192"><span class="label">[192]</span></a> <a href="#CCX">See Song CCX.</a></p> +</div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_193_193" id="Footnote_193_193"></a><a href="#FNanchor_193_193"><span class="label">[193]</span></a> <a href="#songsLXII">See Song LXXII.</a></p> +</div> +</div> + + + +<h2><a name="letterCXLIII" id="letterCXLIII"></a>CXLIII.</h2> + +<h3>TO MISS DAVIES.</h3> + +<p>[The Laird of Glenriddel informed “the charming, lovely Davies” that +Burns was composing a song in her praise. The poet acted on this, and +sent the song, enclosed in this characteristic letter.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>December, 1788.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">Madam</span>,</p> + +<p>I understand my very worthy neighbour, Mr. Riddel, has informed you +that I have made you the subject of some verses. There is something +so provoking in the idea of being the burthen of a ballad, that I do +not think Job or Moses, though such patterns of patience and meekness, +could have resisted the curiosity to know what that ballad was: so my +worthy friend has done me a mischief, which I dare say he never +intended; and reduced me to the unfortunate alternative of leaving +your curiosity ungratified, or else disgusting you with foolish +verses, the unfinished production of a random moment, and never meant +to have met your ear. I have heard or read somewhere of a gentleman +who had some genius, much eccentricity, and very considerable +dexterity with his pencil. In the accidental group of life into which +one is thrown, wherever this gentleman met with a character in a more +than ordinary degree congenial to his heart, he used to steal a sketch +of the face, merely, he said, as a <i>nota bene</i>, to point out the +agreeable recollection to his memory. What this gentleman’s pencil was +to him, my muse is to me; and the verses I do myself the honour to +send you are a <i>memento</i> exactly of the same kind that he indulged in.</p> + +<p>It may be more owing to the fastidiousness of my caprice than the +delicacy of my taste; but I am so often tired, disgusted and hurt with +insipidity, affectation, and pride of mankind, that when I meet with a +person “after my own heart,” I positively feel what an orthodox +Protestant would call a species of idolatry, which acts on my fancy +like inspiration; and I can no more desist rhyming on the impulse, +than an Æolian harp can refuse its tones to the streaming air. A +distich or two would be the consequence, though the object which hit +my fancy were gray-bearded-age; but where my theme is youth and +beauty, a young lady whose personal charms, wit, and sentiment are +equally striking and unaffected—by heavens! though I had lived three +score years a married man, and three score years before I was a +married man, my imagination would hallow the very idea: and I am truly +sorry that the inclosed stanzas have done such poor justice to such a +subject.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCXLIV" id="letterCXLIV"></a>CXLIV.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. JOHN TENNANT.</h3> + +<p>[The mill of John Currie stood on a small stream which fed the loch of +Friar’s Carse—near the house of the dame of whom he sang, “Sic a wife +as Willie had.”]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>December 22, 1788.</i></p> + +<p>I yesterday tried my cask of whiskey for the first time, and I assure +you it does you great<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_396" id="Page_396">[396]</a></span> credit. It will bear five waters strong; or six +ordinary toddy. The whiskey of this country is a most rascally liquor; +and, by consequence, only drank by the most rascally part of the +inhabitants. I am persuaded, if you once get a footing here, you might +do a great deal of business, in the way of consumpt; and should you +commence distiller again, this is the native barley country. I am +ignorant if, in your present way of dealing, you would think it worth +your while to extend your business so far as this country side. I +write you this on the account of an accident, which I must take the +merit of having partly designed to. A neighbour of mine, a John +Currie, miller in Carsemill—a man who is, in a word, a “very” good +man, even for a £500 bargain—he and his wife were in my house the +time I broke open the cask. They keep a country public-house and sell +a great deal of foreign spirits, but all along thought that whiskey +would have degraded this house. They were perfectly astonished at my +whiskey, both for its taste and strength; and, by their desire, I +write you to know if you could supply them with liquor of an equal +quality, and what price. Please write me by first post, and direct to +me at Ellisland, near Dumfries. If you could take a jaunt this way +yourself, I have a spare spoon, knife and fork very much at your +service. My compliments to Mrs. Tennant, and all the good folks in +Glenconnel and Barquharrie.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCXLV" id="letterCXLV"></a>CXLV.</h2> + +<h3>TO MRS. DUNLOP.</h3> + +<p>[The feeling mood of moral reflection exhibited in the following +letter, was common to the house of William Burns: in a letter +addressed by Gilbert to Robert of this date, the poet is reminded of +the early vicissitudes of their name, and desired to look up, and be +thankful.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Ellisland, New-year-day Morning, 1789.</i></p> + +<p>This, dear Madam, is a morning of wishes, and would to God that I came +under the apostle James’s description!—<i>the prayer of a righteous man +availeth much.</i> In that case, Madam, you should welcome in a year full +of blessings: everything that obstructs or disturbs tranquillity and +self-enjoyment, should be removed, and every pleasure that frail +humanity can taste, should be yours. I own myself so little a +Presbyterian, that I approve of set times and seasons of more than +ordinary acts of devotion, for breaking in on that habitual routine of +life and thought, which is so apt to reduce our existence to a kind of +instinct, or even sometimes, and with some minds, to a state very +little superior to mere machinery.</p> + +<p>This day, the first Sunday of May, a breezy, blue-skyed noon some time +about the beginning, and a hoary morning and calm sunny day about the +end, of autumn; these, time out of mind, have been with me a kind of +holiday.</p> + +<p>I believe I owe this to that glorious paper in the Spectator, “The +Vision of Mirza,” a piece that struck my young fancy before I was +capable of fixing an idea to a word of three syllables: “On the 6th +day of the moon, which, according to the custom of my forefathers, I +always <i>keep holy</i>, after washing myself, and offering up my morning +devotions, I ascended the high hill of Bagdat, in order to pass the +rest of the day in meditation and prayer.”</p> + +<p>We know nothing, or next to nothing, of the substance or structure of +our souls, so cannot account for those seeming caprices in them, that +one should be particularly pleased with this thing, or struck with +that, which, on minds of a different cast, makes no extraordinary +impression. I have some favourite flowers in spring, among which are +the mountain-daisy, the hare-bell, the fox-glove, the wild +brier-rose, the budding birch, and the hoary hawthorn, that I view and +hang over with particular delight. I never hear the loud solitary +whistle of the curlew in a summer noon, or the wild mixing cadence of +a troop of grey plovers, in an autumnal morning, without feeling an +elevation of soul like the enthusiasm of devotion or poetry. Tell me, +my dear friend, to what can this be owing? Are we a piece of +machinery, which, like the Æolian harp, passive, takes the impression +of the passing accident? Or do these workings argue something within +us above the trodden clod? I own myself partial to such proofs of +those awful and important realities—a God that made all things—man’s +immaterial and immortal nature—and a world of weal or woe beyond +death and the grave.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCXLVI" id="letterCXLVI"></a>CXLVI.</h2> + +<h3>TO DR. MOORE.</h3> + +<p>[The poet seems, in this letter, to perceive that Ellisland was not +the bargain he had reckoned it: he intimated,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_397" id="Page_397">[397]</a></span> as the reader will +remember, something of the same kind to Margaret Chalmers.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Ellisland, 4th Jan. 1789.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">Sir</span>,</p> + +<p>As often as I think of writing to you, which has been three or four +times every week these six months, it gives me something so like the +idea of an ordinary-sized statue offering at a conversation with the +Rhodian colossus, that my mind misgives me, and the affair always +miscarries somewhere between purpose and resolve. I have at last got +some business with you, and business letters are written by the +stylebook. I say my business is with you, Sir, for you never had any +with me, except the business that benevolence has in the mansion of +poverty.</p> + +<p>The character and employment of a poet were formerly my pleasure, but +are now my pride. I know that a very great deal of my late eclat was +owing to the singularity of my situation, and the honest prejudice of +Scotsmen; but still, as I said in the preface to my first edition, I +do look upon myself as having some pretensions from Nature to the +poetic character. I have not a doubt but the knack, the aptitude, to +learn the muses’ trade, is a gift bestowed by him “who forms the +secret bias of the soul;”—but I as firmly believe, that <i>excellence</i> +in the profession is the fruit of industry, labour, attention, and +pains. At least I am resolved to try my doctrine by the test of +experience. Another appearance from the press I put off to a very +distant day, a day that may never arrive—but poesy I am determined to +prosecute with all my vigour. Nature has given very few, if any, of +the profession, the talents of shining in every species of +composition. I shall try (for until trial it is impossible to know) +whether she has qualified me to shine in any one. The worst of it is, +by the time one has finished a piece, it has been so often viewed and +reviewed before the mental eye, that one loses, in a good measure, the +powers of critical discrimination. Here the best criterion I know is a +friend—not only of abilities to judge, but with good-nature enough, +like a prudent teacher with a young learner, to praise perhaps a +little more than is exactly just, lest the thin-skinned animal fall +into that most deplorable of all poetic diseases—heart-breaking +despondency of himself. Dare I, Sir, already immensely indebted to +your goodness, ask the additional obligation of your being that friend +to me? I enclose you an essay of mine in a walk of poesy to me +entirely new; I mean the epistle addressed to R. G. Esq. or Robert +Graham of Fintray, Esq., a gentleman of uncommon worth, to whom I lie +under very great obligations. The story of the poem, like most of my +poems, is connected with my own story, and to give you the one, I must +give you something of the other. I cannot boast of Mr. Creech’s +ingenuous fair dealing to me. He kept me hanging about Edinburgh from +the 7th August, 1787, until the 13th April, 1788, before he would +condescend to give me a statement of affairs; nor had I got it even +then, but for an angry letter I wrote him, which irritated his pride. +“I could” not a “tale” but a detail “unfold,” but what am I that +should speak against the Lord’s anointed Bailie of Edinburgh?</p> + +<p>I believe I shall in the whole, 100<i>l.</i> copyright included, clear +about 400<i>l.</i> some little odds; and even part of this depends upon +what the gentleman has yet to settle with me. I give you this +information, because you did me the honour to interest yourself much +in my welfare. I give you this information, but I give it to yourself +only, for I am still much in the gentleman’s mercy. Perhaps I injure +the man in the idea I am sometimes tempted to have of him—God forbid +I should! A little time will try, for in a month I shall go to town to +wind up the business if possible.</p> + +<p>To give the rest of my story in brief, I have married “my Jean,” and +taken a farm: with the first step I have every day more and more +reason to be satisfied: with the last, it is rather the reverse. I +have a younger brother, who supports my aged mother; another still +younger brother, and three sisters, in a farm. On my last return from +Edinburgh, it cost me about 180l. to save them from ruin. Not that I +have lost so much.—I only interposed between my brother and his +impending fate by the loan of so much. I give myself no airs on this, +for it was mere selfishness on my part: I was conscious that the wrong +scale of the balance was pretty heavily charged, and I thought that +throwing a little filial piety and fraternal affection into the scale +in my favour, might help to smooth matters at the <i>grand reckoning.</i> +There is still one thing would make my circumstances quite easy: I +have an excise officer’s commission, and I live in the midst of a +country division. My request to Mr. Graham, who is one of the +commissioners of excise, was, if in his power, to procure me that +division. If I were<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_398" id="Page_398">[398]</a></span> very sanguine, I might hope that some of my great +patrons might procure me a Treasury warrant for supervisor, +surveyor-general, &c.</p> + +<p>Thus, secure of a livelihood, “to thee, sweet poetry, delightful +maid,” I would consecrate my future days.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCXLVII" id="letterCXLVII"></a>CXLVII.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. ROBERT AINSLIE.</h3> + +<p>[The song which the poet says he brushed up a little is nowhere +mentioned: he wrote one hundred, and brushed up more, for the Museum +of Johnson.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Ellisland, Jan. 6, 1789.</i></p> + +<p>Many happy returns of the season to you, my dear Sir! May you be +comparatively happy up to your comparative worth among the sons of +men; which wish would, I am sure, make you one of the most blest of +the human race.</p> + +<p>I do not know if passing a “Writer to the signet,” be a trial of +scientific merit, or a mere business of friends and interest. However +it be, let me quote you my two favourite passages, which, though I +have repeated them ten thousand times, still they rouse my manhood and +steel my resolution like inspiration.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">———————“On reason build resolve,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That column of true majesty in man.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="sig1"><span class="smcap">Young. Night Thoughts.</span></p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Hear, Alfred, hero of the state,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thy genius heaven’s high will declare;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The triumph of the truly great,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Is never, never to despair!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Is never to despair!”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="sig1"><span class="smcap">Thomson. Masque of Alfred.</span></p> +<p>I grant you enter the lists of life, to struggle for bread, business, +notice, and distinction, in common with hundreds.—But who are they? +Men, like yourself, and of that aggregate body your compeers, +seven-tenths of them come short of your advantages natural and +accidental; while two of those that remain, either neglect their +parts, as flowers blooming in a desert, or mis-spend their strength, +like a bull goring a bramble-bush.</p> + +<p>But to change the theme: I am still catering for Johnson’s +publication; and among others, I have brushed up the following old +favourite song a little, with a view to your worship. I have only +altered a word here and there; but if you like the humour of it, we +shall think of a stanza or two to add to it.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCXLVIII" id="letterCXLVIII"></a>CXLVIII.</h2> + +<h3>TO PROFESSOR DUGALD STEWART.</h3> + +<p>[The iron justice to which the poet alludes, in this letter, was +exercised by Dr. Gregory, on the poem of the “Wounded Hare.”]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Ellisland, 20th Jan, 1789.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">Sir</span>,</p> + +<p>The enclosed sealed packet I sent to Edinburgh, a few days after I had +the happiness of meeting you in Ayrshire, but you were gone for the +Continent. I have now added a few more of my productions, those for +which I am indebted to the Nithsdale muses. The piece inscribed to R. +G. Esq., is a copy of verses I sent Mr. Graham, of Fintray, +accompanying a request for his assistance in a matter to me of very +great moment. To that gentleman I am already doubly indebted, for +deeds of kindness of serious import to my dearest interests, done in a +manner grateful to the delicate feelings of sensibility. This poem is +a species of composition new to me, but I do not intend it shall be my +last essay of the kind, as you will see by the “Poet’s Progress.” +These fragments, if my design succeed, are but a small part of the +intended whole. I propose it shall be the work of my utmost exertions, +ripened by years; of course I do not wish it much known. The fragment +beginning “A little, upright, pert, tart, &c.,” I have not shown to +man living, till I now send it you. It forms the postulata, the +axioms, the definition of a character, which, if it appear at all, +shall be placed in a variety of lights. This particular part I send +you merely as a sample of my hand at portrait-sketching, but, lest +idle conjecture should pretend to point out the original, please to +let it be for your single, sole inspection.</p> + +<p>Need I make any apology for this trouble, to a gentleman who has +treated me with such marked benevolence and peculiar kindness—who has +entered into my interests with so much zeal, and on whose critical +decisions I can so fully depend? A poet as I am by trade, these +decisions are to me of the last consequence. My late transient +acquaintance among some of the mere rank and file of greatness, I +resign with ease; but to the distinguished champions of genius and +learning, I shall be ever ambitious of being known. The native genius +and accurate discernment in Mr. Stewart’s critical strictures; the +justness (iron justice, for he has no bowels of compassion for a poor +poetic sin<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_399" id="Page_399">[399]</a></span>ner) of Dr. Gregory’s remarks, and the delicacy of +Professor Dalzel’s taste, I shall ever revere.</p> + +<p>I shall be in Edinburgh some time next month.</p> + +<p class="sig3">I have the honour to be, Sir,</p> + +<p class="sig4">Your highly obliged, and very</p> + +<p class="sig10">Humble servant,</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCXLIX" id="letterCXLIX"></a>CXLIX.</h2> + +<h3>TO BISHOP GEDDES.</h3> + +<p>[Alexander Geddes was a controversialist and poet, and a bishop of the +broken remnant of the Catholic Church of Scotland: he is known as the +author of a very humorous ballad called “The Wee bit Wifickie,” and as +the translator of one of the books of the Iliad, in opposition to +Cowper.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Ellisland, 3d Feb. 1789.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">Venerable Father</span>,</p> + +<p>As I am conscious that wherever I am, you do me the honour to interest +yourself in my welfare, it gives me pleasure to inform you that I am +here at last, stationary in the serious business of life, and have now +not only the retired leisure, but the hearty inclination, to attend to +those great and important questions—what I am? where I am? and for +what I am destined?</p> + +<p>In that first concern, the conduct of the man, there was ever but one +side on which I was habitually blameable, and there I have secured +myself in the way pointed out by Nature and Nature’s God. I was +sensible that to so helpless a creature as a poor poet, a wife and +family were encumbrances, which a species of prudence would bid him +shun; but when the alternative was, being at eternal warfare with +myself, on account of habitual follies, to give them no worse name, +which no general example, no licentious wit, no sophistical +infidelity, would, to me, ever justify, I must have been a fool to +have hesitated, and a madman to have made another choice. Besides, I +had in “my Jean” a long and much-loved fellow-creature’s happiness or +misery among my hands, and who could trifle with such a deposit?</p> + +<p>In the affair of a livelihood, I think myself tolerably secure: I have +good hopes of my farm, but should they fail, I have an excise +commission, which on my simple petition, will, at any time, procure me +bread. There is a certain stigma affixed to the character of an Excise +officer, but I do not pretend to borrow honour from my profession; and +though the salary be comparatively small, it is luxury to anything +that the first twenty-five years of my life taught me to expect.</p> + +<p>Thus, with a rational aim and method in life, you may easily guess, my +reverend and much-honoured friend, that my characteristical trade is +not forgotten. I am, if possible, more than over an enthusiast to the +muses. I am determined to study man and nature, and in that view +incessantly; and to try if the ripening and corrections of years can +enable me to produce something worth preserving.</p> + +<p>You will see in your book, which I beg your pardon for detaining so +long, that I have been tuning my lyre on the banks of Nith. Some large +poetic plans that are floating in my imagination, or partly put in +execution, I shall impart to you when I have the pleasure of meeting +with you; which, if you are then in Edinburgh, I shall have about the +beginning of March.</p> + +<p>That acquaintance, worthy Sir, with which you were pleased to honour +me, you must still allow me to challenge; for with whatever unconcern +I give up my transient connexion with the merely great, those +self-important beings whose intrinsic * * * * [con]cealed under the +accidental advantages of their * * * * I cannot lose the patronizing +notice of the learned and good, without the bitterest regret.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCL" id="letterCL"></a>CL.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. JAMES BURNESS.</h3> + +<p>[Fanny Burns married Adam Armour, brother to bonnie Jean, went with +him to Mauchline, and bore him sons and daughters.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Ellisland, 9th Feb. 1789.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">My dear Sir</span>,</p> + +<p>Why I did not write to you long ago, is what, even on the rack, I +could not answer. If you can in your mind form an idea of indolence, +dissipation, hurry, cares, change of country, entering on untried +scenes of life, all combined, you will save me the trouble of a +blushing apology. It could not be want of regard for a man for whom I +had a high esteem before I knew him—an esteem which has much +increased since I did know him; and this caveat entered, I shall plead +guilty to any other indictment with which you shall please to charge +me.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_400" id="Page_400">[400]</a></span></p> + +<p>After I had parted from you for many months my life was one continued +scene of dissipation. Here at last I am become stationary, and have +taken a farm and—a wife.</p> + +<p>The farm is beautifully situated on the Nith, a large river that runs +by Dumfries, and falls into the Solway frith. I have gotten a lease of +my farm as long as I pleased: but how it may turn out is just a guess, +it is yet to improve and enclose, &c.; however, I have good hopes of +my bargain on the whole.</p> + +<p>My wife is my Jean, with whose story you are partly acquainted. I +found I had a much-loved fellow creature’s happiness or misery among +my hands, and I durst not trifle with so sacred a deposit. Indeed I +have not any reason to repent the step I have taken, as I have +attached myself to a very good wife, and have shaken myself loose of +every bad failing.</p> + +<p>I have found my book a very profitable business, and with the profits +of it I have begun life pretty decently. Should fortune not favour me +in farming, as I have no great faith in her fickle ladyship, I have +provided myself in another resource, which however some folks may +affect to despise it, is still a comfortable shift in the day of +misfortune. In the heyday of my fame, a gentleman whose name at least +I dare say you know, as his estate lies somewhere near Dundee, Mr. +Graham, of Fintray, one of the commissioners of Excise, offered me the +commission of an Excise officer. I thought it prudent to accept the +offer; and accordingly I took my instructions, and have my commission +by me. Whether I may ever do duty, or be a penny the better for it, is +what I do not know; but I have the comfortable assurance, that come +whatever ill fate will, I can, on my simple petition to the +Excise-board, get into employ.</p> + +<p>We have lost poor uncle Robert this winter. He has long been very +weak, and with very little alteration on him, he expired 3d Jan.</p> + +<p>His son William has been with me this winter, and goes in May to be an +apprentice to a mason. His other son, the eldest, John, comes to me I +expect in summer. They are both remarkably stout young fellows, and +promise to do well. His only daughter, Fanny, has been with me ever +since her father’s death, and I purpose keeping her in my family till +she be quite woman grown, and fit for service. She is one of the +cleverest girls, and has one of the most amiable dispositions I have +ever seen.</p> + +<p>All friends in this country and Ayrshire are well. Remember me to all +friends in the north. My wife joins me in compliments to Mrs. B. and +family.</p> + +<p class="sig4">I am ever, my dear Cousin,</p> + +<p class="sig10">Yours, sincerely,</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCLI" id="letterCLI"></a>CLI.</h2> + +<h3>TO MRS. DUNLOP.</h3> + +<p>[The beautiful lines with which this letter concludes, I have reason +to believe were the production of the lady to whom the epistle is +addressed.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Ellisland, 4th March, 1789.</i></p> + +<p>Here am I, my honoured friend, returned safe from the capital. To a +man, who has a home, however humble or remote—if that home is like +mine, the scene of domestic comfort—the bustle of Edinburgh will soon +be a business of sickening disgust.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Vain pomp and glory of this world, I hate you!”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>When I must skulk into a corner, lest the rattling equipage of some +gaping blockhead should mangle me in the mire, I am tempted to +exclaim—“What merits has he had, or what demerit have I had, in some +state of pre-existence, that he is ushered into this state of being +with the sceptre of rule, and the key of riches in his puny fist, and +I am kicked into the world, the sport of folly, or the victim of +pride?” I have read somewhere of a monarch (in Spain I think it was), +who was so out of humour with the Ptolemean system of astronomy, that +he said had he been of the <span class="smcap">Creator’s</span> council, he could have +saved him a great deal of labour and absurdity. I will not defend this +blasphemous speech; but often, as I have glided with humble stealth +through the pomp of Princes’ street, it has suggested itself to me, as +an improvement on the present human figure, that a man in proportion +to his own conceit of his consequence in the world, could have pushed +out the longitude of his common size, as a snail pushes out his horns, +or, as we draw out a perspective. This trifling alteration, not to +mention the prodigious saving it would be in the tear and wear of the +neck and limb-sinews of many of his majesty’s liege subjects, in the +way of tossing the head and tiptoe strutting, would evidently turn out +a vast advantage, in enabling us at once to adjust the ceremonials in +making a bow, or making way to a great man, and that too within a +second of the precise spherical angle of reverence, or<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_401" id="Page_401">[401]</a></span> an inch of the +particular point of respectful distance, which the important creature +itself requires; as a measuring-glance at its towering altitude, would +determine the affair like instinct.</p> + +<p>You are right, Madam, in your idea of poor Mylne’s poem, which he has +addressed to me. The piece has a good deal of merit, but it has one +great fault—it is, by far, too long. Besides, my success has +encouraged such a shoal of ill-spawned monsters to crawl into public +notice, under the title of Scottish Poets, that the very term Scottish +Poetry borders on the burlesque. When I write to Mr. Carfrae, I shall +advise him rather to try one of his deceased friend’s English pieces. +I am prodigiously hurried with my own matters, else I would have +requested a perusal of all Mylne’s poetic performances; and would have +offered his friends my assistance in either selecting or correcting +what would be proper for the press. What it is that occupies me so +much, and perhaps a little oppresses my present spirits, shall fill up +a paragraph in some future letter. In the mean time, allow me to close +this epistle with a few lines done by a friend of mine * * * * *. I give +you them, that as you have seen the original, you may guess whether +one or two alterations I have ventured to make in them, be any real +improvement.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Like the fair plant that from our touch withdraws,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Shrink, mildly fearful, even from applause,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Be all a mother’s fondest hope can dream,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And all you are, my charming ..., seem.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Straight as the fox-glove, ere her bells disclose,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Mild as the maiden-blushing hawthorn blows,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Fair as the fairest of each lovely kind,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Your form shall be the image of your mind;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Your manners shall so true your soul express,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That all shall long to know the worth they guess:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Congenial hearts shall greet with kindred love,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And even sick’ning envy must approve.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCLII" id="letterCLII"></a>CLII.</h2> + +<h3>TO THE REV. PETER CARFRAE.</h3> + +<p>[Mylne was a worthy and a modest man: he died of an inflammatory fever +in the prime of life.]</p> + +<p class="sig">1789.</p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">Rev. Sir</span>,</p> + +<p>I do not recollect that I have ever felt a severer pang of shame, than +on looking at the date of your obliging letter which accompanied Mr. +Mylne’s poem.</p> + +<p>I am much to blame: the honour Mr. Mylne has done me, greatly enhanced +in its value by the endearing, though melancholy circumstance, of its +being the last production of his muse, deserved a better return.</p> + +<p>I have, as you hint, thought of sending a copy of the poem to some +periodical publication; but, on second thoughts, I am afraid, that in +the present case, it would be an improper step. My success, perhaps as +much accidental as merited, has brought an inundation of nonsense +under the name of Scottish poetry. Subscription-bills for Scottish +poems have so dunned, and daily do dun the public, that the very name +is in danger of contempt. For these reasons, if publishing any of Mr. +Mylne’s poems in a magazine, &c., be at all prudent, in my opinion it +certainly should not be a Scottish poem. The profits of the labours of +a man of genius are, I hope, as honourable as any profits whatever; +and Mr. Mylne’s relations are most justly entitled to that honest +harvest, which fate has denied himself to reap. But let the friends of +Mr. Mylne’s fame (among whom I crave the honour of ranking myself) +always keep in eye his respectability as a man and as a poet, and take +no measure that, before the world knows anything about him, would risk +his name and character being classed with the fools of the times.</p> + +<p>I have, Sir, some experience of publishing; and the way in which I +would proceed with Mr. Mylne’s poem is this:—I would publish, in two +or three English and Scottish public papers, any one of his English +poems which should, by private judges, be thought the most excellent, +and mention it, at the same time, as one of the productions of a +Lothian farmer, of respectable character, lately deceased, whose poems +his friends had it in idea to publish, soon, by subscription, for the +sake of his numerous family:—not in pity to that family, but in +justice to what his friends think the poetic merits of the deceased; +and to secure, in the most effectual manner, to those tender +connexions, whose right it is, the pecuniary reward of those merits.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCLIII" id="letterCLIII"></a>CLIII.</h2> + +<h3>TO DR. MOORE.</h3> + +<p>[Edward Nielson, whom Burns here introduces to Dr. Moore, was minister +of Kirkbean, on the Solway-side.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_402" id="Page_402">[402]</a></span> He was a jovial man, and loved good +cheer, and merry company.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Ellisland, 23d March, 1789.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">Sir</span>,</p> + +<p>The gentleman who will deliver you this is a Mr. Nielson, a worthy +clergyman in my neighbourhood, and a very particular acquaintance of +mine. As I have troubled him with this packet, I must turn him over to +your goodness, to recompense him for it in a way in which he much +needs your assistance, and where you can effectually serve him:—Mr. +Nielson is on his way for France, to wait on his Grace of Queensberry, +on some little business of a good deal of importance to him, and he +wishes for your instructions respecting the most eligible mode of +travelling, &c., for him, when he has crossed the channel. I should +not have dared to take this liberty with you, but that I am told, by +those who have the honour of your personal acquaintance, that to be a +poor honest Scotchman is a letter of recommendation to you, and that +to have it in your power to serve such a character, gives you much +pleasure.</p> + +<p>The enclosed ode is a compliment to the memory of the late Mrs. +Oswald, of Auchencruive. You, probably, knew her personally, an honour +of which I cannot boast; but I spent my early years in her +neighbourhood, and among her servants and tenants. I know that she was +detested with the most heart-felt cordiality. However, in the +particular part of her conduct which roused my poetic wrath, she was +much less blameable. In January last, on my road to Ayrshire, I had +put up at Bailie Wigham’s in Sanquhar, the only tolerable inn in the +place. The frost was keen, and the grim evening and howling wind were +ushering in a night of snow and drift. My horse and I were both much +fatigued with the labours of the day, and just as my friend the Bailie +and I were bidding defiance to the storm, over a smoking bowl, in +wheels the funeral pageantry of the late great Mrs. Oswald, and poor I +am forced to brave all the horrors of the tempestuous night, and jade +my horse, my young favourite horse, whom I had just christened +Pegasus, twelve miles farther on, through the wildest moors and hills +of Ayrshire, to New Cumnock, the next inn. The powers of poesy and +prose sink under me, when I would describe what I felt. Suffice it to +say, that when a good fire at New Cumnock had so far recovered my +frozen sinews, I sat down and wrote the enclosed ode.</p> + +<p>I was at Edinburgh lately, and settled finally with Mr. Creech; and I +must own, that, at last, he has been amicable and fair with me.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCLIV" id="letterCLIV"></a>CLIV.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. WILLIAM BURNS.</h3> + +<p>[William Burns was the youngest brother of the poet: he was bred a +sadler; went to Longtown, and finally to London, where he died early.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Isle, March 25th, 1789.</i></p> + +<p>I have stolen from my corn-sowing this minute to write a line to +accompany your shirt and hat, for I can no more. Your sister Maria +arrived yesternight, and begs to be remembered to you. Write me every +opportunity, never mind postage. My head, too, is as addle as an egg, +this morning, with dining abroad yesterday. I received yours by the +mason. Forgive me this foolish-looking scrawl of an epistle.</p> + +<p class="sig5">I am ever,</p> + +<p class="sig10">My dear William,</p> + +<p class="sig8">Yours,</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<p>P.S. If you are not then gone from Longtown, I’ll write you a long +letter, by this day se’ennight. If you should not succeed in your +tramps, don’t be dejected, or take any rash step—return to us in that +case, and we will court fortune’s better humour. Remember this, I +charge you.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCLV" id="letterCLV"></a>CLV.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. HILL.</h3> + +<p>[The Monkland Book Club existed only while Robert Riddel, of the +Friars-Carse, lived, or Burns had leisure to attend: such +institutions, when well conducted, are very beneficial, when not +oppressed by divinity and verse, as they sometimes are.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Ellisland, 2d April, 1789.</i></p> + +<p>I will make no excuse, my dear Bibliopolus (God forgive me for +murdering language!) that I have sat down to write you on this vile +paper.</p> + +<p>It is economy, Sir; it is that cardinal virtue, prudence: so I beg you +will sit down, and either compose or borrow a panegyric. If you are +going to borrow, apply to * * * * to compose, or rather to compound, +something very clever on my remarkable frugality; that I write to one +of my most esteemed friends on this wretched paper, which was +originally intended for the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_403" id="Page_403">[403]</a></span> venal fist of some drunken exciseman, to +take dirty notes in a miserable vault of an ale-cellar.</p> + +<p>O Frugality! thou mother of ten thousand blessings—thou cook of fat +beef and dainty greens!—thou manufacturer of warm Shetland hose, and +comfortable surtouts!—thou old housewife darning thy decayed +stockings with thy ancient spectacles on thy aged nose!—lead me, hand +me in thy clutching palsied fist, up those heights, and through those +thickets, hitherto inaccessible, and impervious to my anxious, weary +feet:—not those Parnassian crags, bleak and barren, where the hungry +worshippers of fame are breathless, clambering, hanging between heaven +and hell; but those glittering cliffs of Potosi, where the +all-sufficient, all powerful deity, Wealth, holds his immediate court +of joys and pleasures; where the sunny exposure of plenty, and the hot +walls of profusion, produce those blissful fruits of luxury, exotics +in this world, and natives of paradise!—Thou withered sibyl, my sage +conductress, usher me into thy refulgent, adored presence!—The power, +splendid and potent as he now is, was once the puling nursling of thy +faithful care, and tender arms! Call me thy son, thy cousin, thy +kinsman, or favourite, and adjure the god by the scenes of his infant +years, no longer to repulse me as a stranger, or an alien, but to +favour me with his peculiar countenance and protection?—He daily +bestows his greatest kindness on the undeserving and the +worthless—assure him, that I bring ample documents of meritorious +demerits! Pledge yourself for me, that, for the glorious cause of +Lucre, I will do anything, be anything—but the horse-leech of private +oppression, or the vulture of public robbery!</p> + +<p>But to descend from heroics.</p> + +<p>I want a Shakspeare; I want likewise an English dictionary—Johnson’s, +I suppose, is best. In these and all my prose commissions, the +cheapest is always best for me. There is a small debt of honour that I +owe Mr. Robert Cleghorn, in Saughton Mills, my worthy friend, and your +well-wisher. Please give him, and urge him to take it, the first time +you see him, ten shillings worth of anything you have to sell, and +place it to my account.</p> + +<p>The library scheme that I mentioned to you, is already begun, under +the direction of Captain Riddel. There is another in emulation of it +going on at Closeburn, under the auspices of Mr. Monteith, of +Closeburn, which will be on a greater scale than ours. Capt. Riddel +gave his infant society a great many of his old books, else I had +written you on that subject; but one of these days, I shall trouble +you with a commission for “The Monkland Friendly Society”—a copy of +<i>The Spectator</i>, <i>Mirror</i>, and <i>Lounger</i>, <i>Man of Feeling, Man of the +World</i>, <i>Guthrie’s Geographical Grammar</i>, with some religious pieces, +will likely be our first order.</p> + +<p>When I grow richer, I will write to you on gilt post, to make amends +for this sheet. At present, every guinea has a five guinea errand +with,</p> + +<p class="sig2">My dear Sir,</p> + +<p class="sig3">Your faithful, poor, but honest, friend,</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCLVI" id="letterCLVI"></a>CLVI.</h2> + +<h3>TO MRS. DUNLOP</h3> + +<p>[Some lines which extend, but fail to finish the sketch contained in +this letter, will be found elsewhere in this publication.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Ellisland, 4th April, 1789.</i></p> + +<p>I no sooner hit on any poetic plan or fancy, but I wish to send it to +you: and if knowing and reading these give half the pleasure to you, +that communicating them to you gives to me, I am satisfied.</p> + +<p>I have a poetic whim in my head, which I at present dedicate, or +rather inscribe to the Right Hon. Charles James Fox; but how long that +fancy may hold, I cannot say. A few of the first lines, I have just +rough-sketched as follows:</p> + +<p class="std1"><span class="smcap">SKETCH</span>.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">How wisdom and folly meet, mix, and unite;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">How virtue and vice blend their black and their white;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">How genius, the illustrious father of fiction,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Confounds rule and law, reconciles contradiction—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I sing: If these mortals, the critics, should bustle,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I care not, not I, let the critics go whistle.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i2">But now for a patron, whose name and whose glory,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">At once may illustrate and honour my story.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i2">Thou first of our orators, first of our wits;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yet whose parts and acquirements seem mere lucky hits;<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_404" id="Page_404">[404]</a></span><span class="i0">With knowledge so vast, and with judgment so strong,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">No man with the half of ‘em e’er went far wrong;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With passion so potent, and fancies so bright,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">No man with the half of ‘em ere went quite right;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A sorry, poor misbegot son of the muses,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For using thy name offers many excuses.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>On the 20th current I hope to have the honour of assuring you in +person, how sincerely I am—</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCLVII" id="letterCLVII"></a>CLVII.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. WILLIAM BURNS,</h3> + +<h4>SADLER,</h4> +<h5>CARE OF MR. WRIGHT, CARRIER, LONGTOWN.</h5> +<p>[“Never to despair” was a favourite saying with Burns: and “firm +resolve,” he held, with Young, to be “the column of true majesty in +man.”]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Isle, 15th April, 1789.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">My dear William</span>,</p> + +<p>I am extremely sorry at the misfortune of your legs; I beg you will +never let any worldly concern interfere with the more serious matter, +the safety of your life and limbs. I have not time in these hurried +days to write you anything other than a mere how d’ye letter. I will +only repeat my favourite quotation:—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“What proves the hero truly great<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Is never, never to despair.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>My house shall be your welcome home; and as I know your prudence +(would to God you had <i>resolution</i> equal to your <i>prudence</i>!) if +anywhere at a distance from friends, you should need money, you know +my direction by post.</p> + +<p>The enclosed is from Gilbert, brought by your sister Nanny. It was +unluckily forgot. Yours to Gilbert goes by post.—I heard from them +yesterday, they are all well.</p> + +<p class="sig8">Adieu.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCLVIII" id="letterCLVIII"></a>CLVIII.</h2> + +<h3>TO MRS. M’MURDO,</h3> + +<h4>DRUMLANRIG.</h4> + +<p>[Of this accomplished lady, Mrs. M’Murdo, of Drumlanrig, and her +daughters, something has been said in the notes on the songs: the poem +alluded to was the song of “Bonnie Jean.”]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Ellisland, 2d May, 1789.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">Madam</span>,</p> + +<p>I have finished the piece which had the happy fortune to be honoured +with your approbation; and never did little miss with more sparkling +pleasure show her applauded sampler to partial mamma, than I now send +my poem to you and Mr. M’Murdo if he is returned to Drumlanrig. You +cannot easily imagine what thin-skinned animals—what sensitive plants +poor poets are. How do we shrink into the embittered corner of +self-abasement, when neglected or condemned by those to whom we look +up! and how do we, in erect importance, add another cubit to our +stature on being noticed and applauded by those whom we honour and +respect! My late visit to Drumlanrig has, I can tell you, Madam, given +me a balloon waft up Parnassus, where on my fancied elevation I regard +my poetic self with no small degree of complacency. Surely with all +their sins, the rhyming tribe are not ungrateful creatures.—I +recollect your goodness to your humble guest—I see Mr. M’Murdo adding +to the politeness of the gentleman, the kindness of a friend, and my +heart swells as it would burst, with warm emotions and ardent wishes! +It may be it is not gratitude—it may be a mixed sensation. That +strange, shifting, doubling animal man is so generally, at best, but a +negative, often a worthless creature, that we cannot see real goodness +and native worth without feeling the bosom glow with sympathetic +approbation.</p> + +<p class="sig3">With every sentiment of grateful respect,</p> + +<p class="sig5">I have the honour to be,</p> + +<p class="sig10">Madam,</p> + +<p class="sig3">Your obliged and grateful humble servant,</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCLIX" id="letterCLIX"></a>CLIX.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. CUNNINGHAM.</h3> + +<p>[Honest Jamie Thomson, who shot the hare because she browsed with her +companions on his father’s “wheat-braird,” had no idea he was pulling +down such a burst of indignation on his head as this letter with the +poem which it enclosed expresses.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Ellisland, 4th May, 1789.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">My dear Sir</span>,</p> + +<p>Your <i>duty-free</i> favour of the 26th April I received two days ago; I +will not say I perused it with pleasure; that is the cold compliment +of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_405" id="Page_405">[405]</a></span> ceremony; I perused it, Sir, with delicious satisfaction;—in +short, it is such a letter, that not you, nor your friend, but the +legislature, by express proviso in their postage laws, should frank.</p> + +<p>A letter informed with the soul of friendship is such an honour to +human nature, that they should order it free ingress and egress to and +from their bags and mails, as an encouragement and mark of distinction +to supereminent virtue.</p> + +<p>I have just put the last hand to a little poem which I think will be +something to your taste. One morning lately, as I was out pretty early +in the fields, sowing some grass seeds, I heard the burst of a shot +from a neighbouring plantation, and presently a poor little wounded +hare came crippling by me. You will guess my indignation at the +inhuman fellow who could shoot a hare at this season, when all of them +have young ones. Indeed there is something in that business of +destroying for our sport individuals in the animal creation that do +not injure us materially, which I could never reconcile to my ideas of +virtue.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Inhuman man! curse on thy barb’rous art,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And blasted be thy murder-aiming eye!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">May never pity soothe thee with a sigh,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Nor ever pleasure glad thy cruel heart!<br /></span> +<span class="i4">&c. &c.<br /> +</span> +</div></div> + +<p>Let me know how you like my poem. I am doubtful whether it would not +be an improvement to keep out the last stanza but one altogether.</p> + +<p>Cruikshank is a glorious production of the author of man. You, he, and +the noble Colonel of the Crochallan Fencibles are to me</p> + +<div class="blockquot"><p>“Dear as the ruddy drops which warm my heart”</p></div> + +<p>I have a good mind to make verses on you all, to the tune of “<i>Three +guid fellows ayont the glen.</i>”</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCLX" id="letterCLX"></a>CLX.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. SAMUEL BROWN.</h3> + +<p>[Samuel Brown was brother to the poet’s mother: he seems to have been +a joyous sort of person, who loved a joke, and understood double +meanings.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Mossgiel, 4th May, 1789.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">Dear Uncle,</span></p> + +<p>This, I hope, will find you and your conjugal yoke-fellow in your good +old way; I am impatient to know if the Ailsa fowling be commenced for +this season yet, as I want three or four stones of feathers, and I +hope you will bespeak them for me. It would be a vain attempt for me +to enumerate the various transactions I have been engaged in since I +saw you last, but this know,—I am engaged in a <i>smuggling trade</i>, and +God knows if ever any poor man experienced better returns, two for +one, but as freight and delivery have turned out so dear, I am +thinking of taking out a license and beginning in fair trade. I have +taken a farm on the borders of the Nith, and in imitation of the old +Patriarchs, get men-servants and maid-servants, and flocks and herds, +and beget sons and daughters.</p> + +<p class="sig5">Your obedient nephew,</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCLXI" id="letterCLXI"></a>CLXI.</h2> + +<h3>TO RICHARD BROWN.</h3> + +<p>[Burns was much attached to Brown; and one regrets that an +inconsiderate word should have estranged the haughty sailor.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Mauchline, 21st May, 1789.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">My dear Friend,</span></p> + +<p>I was in the country by accident, and hearing of your safe arrival, I +could not resist the temptation of wishing you joy on your return, +wishing you would write to me before you sail again, wishing you would +always set me down as your bosom friend, wishing you long life and +prosperity, and that every good thing may attend you, wishing Mrs. +Brown and your little ones as free of the evils of this world, as is +consistent with humanity, wishing you and she were to make two at the +ensuing lying-in, with which Mrs. B. threatens very soon to favour me, +wishing I had longer time to write to you at present; and, finally, +wishing that if there is to be another state of existence, Mr. B., +Mrs. B., our little ones, and both families, and you and I, in some +snug retreat, may make a jovial party to all eternity!</p> + +<p>My direction is at Ellisland, near Dumfries</p> + +<p class="sig8">Yours,</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_406" id="Page_406">[406]</a></span></p> + + +<h2><a name="letterCLXII" id="letterCLXII"></a>CLXII.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. JAMES HAMILTON.</h3> + +<p>[James Hamilton, grocer, in Glasgow, interested himself early in the +fortunes of the poet.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Ellisland, 26th May, 1789.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">Dear Sir</span>,</p> + +<p>I send you by John Glover, carrier, the account for Mr. Turnbull, as I +suppose you know his address.</p> + +<p>I would fain offer, my dear Sir, a word of sympathy with your +misfortunes; but it is a tender string, and I know not how to touch +it. It is easy to flourish a set of high-flown sentiments on the +subjects that would give great satisfaction to—a breast quite at +ease; but as <span class="smcap">one</span> observes, who was very seldom mistaken in +the theory of life, “The heart knoweth its own sorrows, and a stranger +intermeddleth not therewith.”</p> + +<p>Among some distressful emergencies that I have experienced in life, I +ever laid this down as my foundation of comfort—<i>That he who has +lived the life of an honest man, has by no means lived in vain!</i></p> + +<p>With every wish for your welfare and future success,</p> + +<p class="sig5">I am, my dear Sir,</p> + +<p class="sig10">Sincerely yours,</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCLXIII" id="letterCLXIII"></a>CLXIII.</h2> + +<h3>TO WILLIAM CREECH, ESQ.</h3> + +<p>[The poetic address to the “venomed stang” of the toothache seems to +have come into existence about this time.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Ellisland, 30th May, 1789.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">Sir</span>,</p> + +<p>I had intended to have troubled you with a long letter, but at present +the delightful sensations of an omnipotent toothache so engross all my +inner man, as to put it out of my power even to write nonsense. +However, as in duty bound, I approach my bookseller with an offering +in my hand—a few poetic clinches, and a song:—To expect any other +kind of offering from the Rhyming Tribe would be to know them much +less than you do. I do not pretend that there is much merit in these +<i>morceaux</i>, but I have two reasons for sending them; <i>primo</i>, they are +mostly ill-natured, so are in unison with my present feelings, while +fifty troops of infernal spirits are driving post from ear to ear +along my jaw-bones; and <i>secondly</i>, they are so short, that you cannot +leave off in the middle, and so hurt my pride in the idea that you +found any work of mine too heavy to get through.</p> + +<p>I have a request to beg of you, and I not only beg of you, but conjure +you, by all your wishes and by all your hopes, that the muse will +spare the satiric wink in the moment of your foibles; that she will +warble the song of rapture round your hymeneal couch; and that she +will shed on your turf the honest tear of elegiac gratitude! Grant my +request as speedily as possible—send me by the very first fly or +coach for this place three copies of the last edition of my poems, +which place to my account.</p> + +<p>Now may the good things of prose, and the good things of verse, come +among thy hands, until they be filled with the <i>good things of this +life</i>, prayeth</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCLXIV" id="letterCLXIV"></a>CLXIV.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. M’AULEY.</h3> + +<p>[The poet made the acquaintance of Mr. M’Auley, of Dumbarton, in one +of his northern tours,—he was introduced by his friend Kennedy.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Ellisland, 4th June, 1789.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">Dear Sir</span>,</p> + +<p>Though I am not without my fears respecting my fate, at that grand, +universal inquest of right and wrong, commonly called <i>The Last Day</i>, +yet I trust there is one sin, which that arch-vagabond, Satan, who I +understand is to be king’s evidence, cannot throw in my teeth, I mean +ingratitude. There is a certain pretty large quantum of kindness for +which I remain, and from inability, I fear, must still remain, your +debtor; but though unable to repay the debt, I assure you, Sir, I +shall ever warmly remember the obligation. It gives me the sincerest +pleasure to hear by my old acquaintance, Mr. Kennedy, that you are, in +immortal Allan’s language, “Hale, and weel, and living;” and that your +charming family are well, and promising to be an amiable and +respectable addition to the company of performers, whom the Great +Manager of the Drama of Man is bringing into action for the succeeding +age.</p> + +<p>With respect to my welfare, a subject in which you once warmly and +effectively interested yourself, I am here in my old way, holding my +plough, marking the growth of my corn, or the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_407" id="Page_407">[407]</a></span> health of my dairy; and +at times sauntering by the delightful windings of the Nith, on the +margin of which I have built my humble domicile, praying for +seasonable weather, or holding an intrigue with the muses; the only +gipsies with whom I have now any intercourse. As I am entered into the +holy state of matrimony, I trust my face is turned completely +Zion-ward; and as it is a rule with all honest fellows to repeat no +grievances, I hope that the little poetic licenses of former days will +of course fall under the oblivious influence of some good-natured +statute of celestial prescription. In my family devotion, which, like +a good Presbyterian, I occasionally give to my household folks, I am +extremely fond of that psalm, “Let not the errors of my youth,” &c., +and that other, “Lo, children are God’s heritage,” &c., in which last +Mrs. Burns, who by the bye has a glorious “wood-note wild” at either +old song or psalmody, joins me with the pathos of Handel’s Messiah.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCLXV" id="letterCLXV"></a>CLXV.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. ROBERT AINSLIE.</h3> + +<p>[The following high-minded letter may be regarded as a sermon on +domestic morality preached by one of the experienced.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Ellisland, 8th June, 1789.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">My dear Friend,</span></p> + +<p>I am perfectly ashamed of myself when I look at the date of your last. +It is not that I forget the friend of my heart and the companion of my +peregrinations; but I have been condemned to drudgery beyond +sufferance, though not, thank God, beyond redemption. I have had a +collection of poems by a lady, put into my hands to prepare them for +the press; which horrid task, with sowing corn with my own hand, a +parcel of masons, wrights, plasterers, &c., to attend to, roaming on +business through Ayrshire—all this was against me, and the very first +dreadful article was of itself too much for me.</p> + +<p>13th. I have not had a moment to spare from incessant toil since the +8th. Life, my dear Sir, is a serious matter. You know by experience +that a man’s individual self is a good deal, but believe me, a wife +and family of children, whenever you have the honour to be a husband +and a father, will show you that your present and most anxious hours +of solitude are spent on trifles. The welfare of those who are very +dear to us, whose only support, hope and stay we are—this, to a +generous mind, is another sort of more important object of care than +any concerns whatever which centre merely in the individual. On the +other hand, let no young, unmarried, rakehelly dog among you, make a +song of his pretended liberty and freedom from care. If the relations +we stand in to king, country, kindred, and friends, be anything but +the visionary fancies of dreaming metaphysicians; if religion, virtue, +magnanimity, generosity, humanity and justice, be aught but empty +sounds; then the man who may be said to live only for others, for the +beloved, honourable female, whose tender faithful embrace endears +life, and for the helpless little innocents who are to be the men and +women, the worshippers of his God, the subjects of his king, and the +support, nay the vital existence of his <span class="smcap">country</span> in the +ensuing age;—compare such a man with any fellow whatever, who, +whether he bustle and push in business among labourers, clerks, +statesmen; or whether he roar and rant, and drink and sing in +taverns—a fellow over whose grave no one will breathe a single +heigh-ho, except from the cobweb-tie of what is called +good-fellowship—who has no view nor aim but what terminates in +himself—if there be any grovelling earth-born wretch of our species, a +renegado to common sense, who would fain believe that the noble +creature man, is no better than a sort of fungus, generated out of +nothing, nobody knows how, and soon dissipated in nothing, nobody +knows where; such a stupid beast, such a crawling reptile, might +balance the foregoing unexaggerated comparison, but no one else would +have the patience.</p> + +<p>Forgive me, my dear Sir, for this long silence. <i>To make you amends</i>, +I shall send you soon, and more encouraging still, without any +postage, one or two rhymes of my later manufacture.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCLXVI" id="letterCLXVI"></a>CLXVI.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. M’MURDO.</h3> + +<p>[John M’Murdo has been already mentioned as one of Burns’s firmest +friends: his table at Drumlanrig was always spread at the poet’s +coming: nor was it uncheered by the presence of the lady of the house +and her daughters.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Ellisland, 19th June, 1789.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">Sir</span>,</p> + +<p>A poet and a beggar are, in so many points of view, alike, that one +might take them for the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_408" id="Page_408">[408]</a></span> same individual character under different +designations; were it not that though, with a trifling poetic license, +most poets may be styled beggars, yet the converse of the proposition +does not hold, that every beggar is a poet. In one particular, +however, they remarkably agree; if you help either the one or the +other to a mug of ale, or the picking of a bone, they will very +willingly repay you with a song. This occurs to me at present, as I +have just despatched a well-lined rib of John Kirkpatrick’s +Highlander; a bargain for which I am indebted to you, in the style of +our ballad printers, “Five excellent new songs.” The enclosed is +nearly my newest song, and one that has cost me some pains, though +that is but an equivocal mark of its excellence. Two or three others, +which I have by me, shall do themselves the honour to wait on your +after leisure: petitioners for admittance into favour must not harass +the condescension of their benefactor.</p> + +<p>You see, Sir, what it is to patronize a poet. ’Tis like being a +magistrate in a petty borough; you do them the favour to preside in +their council for one year, and your name bears the prefatory stigma +of Bailie for life.</p> + +<p>With, not the compliments, but the best wishes, the sincerest prayers +of the season for you, that you may see many and happy years with Mrs. +M’Murdo, and your family; two blessings by the bye, to which your rank +does not, by any means, entitle you; a loving wife and fine family +being almost the only good things of this life to which the farm-house +and cottage have an exclusive right,</p> + +<p class="sig5">I have the honour to be,</p> + +<p class="sig10">Sir,</p> + +<p class="sig3">Your much indebted and very humble servant,</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCLXVII" id="letterCLXVII"></a>CLXVII.</h2> + +<h3>TO MRS. DUNLOP.</h3> + +<p>[The devil, the pope, and the Pretender darkened the sermons, for more +than a century, of many sound divines in the north. As a Jacobite, +Burns disliked to hear Prince Charles called the Pretender, and as a +man of a tolerant nature, he disliked to hear the Pope treated unlike +a gentleman: his notions regarding Satan are recorded in his +inimitable address.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Ellisland, 21st June, 1789.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">Dear Madam,</span></p> + +<p>Will you take the effusions, the miserable effusions of low spirits, +just as they flow from their bitter spring? I know not of any +particular cause for this worst of all my foes besetting me; but for +some time my soul has been beclouded with a thickening atmosphere of +evil imaginations and gloomy presages.</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Monday Evening.</i></p> + +<p>I have just heard Mr. Kirkpatrick preach a sermon. He is a man famous +for his benevolence, and I revere him; but from such ideas of my +Creator, good Lord deliver me! Religion, my honoured friend, is surely +a simple business, as it equally concerns the ignorant and the +learned, the poor and the rich. That there is an incomprehensible +Great Being, to whom I owe my existence, and that he must be +intimately acquainted with the operations and progress of the internal +machinery, and consequent outward deportment of this creature which he +has made; these are, I think, self-evident propositions. That there is +a real and eternal distinction between virtue and vice, and +consequently, that I am an accountable creature; that from the seeming +nature of the human mind, as well as from the evident imperfection, +nay, positive injustice, in the administration of affairs, both in the +natural and moral worlds, there must be a retributive scene of +existence beyond the grave; must, I think, be allowed by every one who +will give himself a moment’s reflection. I will go farther, and affirm +that from the sublimity, excellence, and purity of his doctrine and +precepts, unparalleled by all the aggregated wisdom and learning of +many preceding ages, though, <i>to appearance</i>, he himself was the +obscurest and most illiterate of our species; therefore Jesus Christ +was from God.</p> + +<p>Whatever mitigates the woes, or increases the happiness of others, +this is my criterion of goodness; and whatever injures society at +large, or any individual in it, this is my measure of iniquity.</p> + +<p>What think you, madam, of my creed? I trust that I have said nothing +that will lessen me in the eye of one, whose good opinion I value +almost next to the approbation of my own mind.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCLXVIII" id="letterCLXVIII"></a>CLXVIII.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. ——.</h3> + +<p>[The name of the person to whom the following letter is addressed is +unknown: he seems, from his letter to Burns to have been intimate with +the unfortunate poet,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_409" id="Page_409">[409]</a></span> Robert Fergusson, who, in richness of +conversation and plenitude of fancy, reminded him, he said, of Robert +Burns.]</p> + +<p class="sig">1789.</p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">My dear Sir,</span></p> + +<p>The hurry of a farmer in this particular season, and the indolence of +a poet at all times and seasons, will, I hope, plead my excuse for +neglecting so long to answer your obliging letter of the 5th of +August.</p> + +<p>That you have done well in quitting your laborious concern in * * * *, I +do not doubt; the weighty reasons you mention, were, I hope, very, and +deservedly indeed, weighty ones, and your health is a matter of the +last importance; but whether the remaining proprietors of the paper +have also done well, is what I much doubt. The * * * *, so far as I was a +reader, exhibited such a brilliancy of point, such an elegance of +paragraph, and such a variety of intelligence, that I can hardly +conceive it possible to continue a daily paper in the same degree of +excellence: but if there was a man who had abilities equal to the +task, that man’s assistance the proprietors have lost.</p> + +<p>When I received your letter I was transcribing for * * * *, my letter to +the magistrates of the Canongate, Edinburgh, begging their permission +to place a tombstone over poor Fergusson, and their edict in +consequence of my petition, but now I shall send them to * * * * * *. Poor +Fergusson! If there be a life beyond the grave, which I trust there +is; and if there be a good God presiding over all nature, which I am +sure there is; thou art now enjoying existence in a glorious world, +where worth of the heart alone is distinction in the man; where +riches, deprived of all their pleasure-purchasing powers, return to +their native sordid matter; where titles and honours are the +disregarded reveries of an idle dream; and where that heavy virtue, +which is the negative consequence of steady dulness, and those +thoughtless, though often destructive follies which are unavoidable +aberrations of frail human nature, will be thrown into equal oblivion +as if they had never been!</p> + +<p>Adieu my dear sir! So soon as your present views and schemes are +concentered in an aim, I shall be glad to hear from you; as your +welfare and happiness is by no means a subject indifferent to</p> + +<p class="sig8">Yours,</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCLXIX" id="letterCLXIX"></a>CLXIX.</h2> + +<h3>TO MISS WILLIAMS.</h3> + +<p>[Helen Maria Williams acknowledged this letter, with the critical +pencilling, on her poem on the Slave Trade, which it enclosed: she +agreed, she said, with all his objections, save one, but considered +his praise too high.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Ellisland, 1789.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">Madam</span>,</p> + +<p>Of the many problems in the nature of that wonderful creature, man, +this is one of the most extraordinary, that he shall go on from day to +day, from week to week, from month to month, or perhaps from year to +year, suffering a hundred times more in an hour from the impotent +consciousness of neglecting what he ought to do, than the very doing +of it would cost him. I am deeply indebted to you, first for a most +elegant poetic compliment; then for a polite, obliging letter; and, +lastly, for your excellent poem on the Slave Trade; and yet, wretch +that I am! though the debts were debts of honour, and the creditor a +lady, I have put off and put off even the very acknowledgment of the +obligation, until you must indeed be the very angel I take you for, if +you can forgive me.</p> + +<p>Your poem I have read with the highest pleasure. I have a way whenever +I read a book, I mean a book in our own trade, Madam, a poetic one, +and when it is my own property, that I take a pencil and mark at the +ends of verses, or note on margins and odd paper, little criticisms of +approbation or disapprobation as I peruse along. I will make no +apology for presenting you with a few unconnected thoughts that +occurred to me in my repeated perusals of your poem. I want to show +you that I have honesty enough to tell you what I take to be truths, +even when they are not quite on the side of approbation; and I do it +in the firm faith that you have equal greatness of mind to hear them +with pleasure.</p> + +<p>I had lately the honour of a letter from Dr. Moore, where he tells me +that he has sent me some books: they are not yet come to hand, but I +hear they are on the way.</p> + +<p>Wishing you all success in your progress in the path of fame; and that +you may equally escape the danger of stumbling through incautious +speed, or losing ground through loitering neglect.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_410" id="Page_410">[410]</a></span></p> + + +<h2><a name="letterCLXX" id="letterCLXX"></a>CLXX.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. JOHN LOGAN.</h3> + +<p>[The Kirk’s Alarm, to which this letter alludes, has little of the +spirit of malice and drollery, so rife in his earlier controversial +compositions.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Ellisland, near Dumfries, 7th Aug. 1789.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">Dear Sir</span>,</p> + +<p>I intended to have written you long ere now, and as I told you, I had +gotten three stanzas and a half on my way in a poetic epistle to you; +but that old enemy of all <i>good works</i>, the devil, threw me into a +prosaic mire, and for the soul of me I cannot get out of it. I dare +not write you a long letter, as I am going to intrude on your time +with a long ballad. I have, as you will shortly see, finished “The +Kirk’s Alarm;” but now that it is done, and that I have laughed once +or twice at the conceits in some of the stanzas, I am determined not +to let it get into the public; so I send you this copy, the first that +I have sent to Ayrshire, except some few of the stanzas, which I wrote +off in embryo for Gavin Hamilton, under the express provision and +request that you will only read it to a few of us, and do not on any +account give, or permit to be taken, any copy of the ballad. If I +could be of any service to Dr. M’Gill, I would do it, though it should +be at a much greater expense than irritating a few bigoted priests, +but I am afraid serving him in his present <i>embarras</i> is a task too +hard for me. I have enemies enow, God knows, though I do not wantonly +add to the number. Still as I think there is some merit in two or +three of the thoughts, I send it to you as a small, but sincere +testimony how much, and with what respectful esteem,</p> + +<p class="sig10">I am, dear Sir,</p> + +<p class="sig5">Your obliged humble servant,</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCLXXI" id="letterCLXXI"></a>CLXXI.</h2> + +<h3>TO MRS. DUNLOP.</h3> + +<p>[The poetic epistle of worthy Janet Little was of small account: nor +was the advice of Dr. Moore, to abandon the Scottish stanza and +dialect, and adopt the measure and language of modern English poetry, +better inspired than the strains of the milkmaid, for such was Jenny +Little.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Ellisland, 6th Sept., 1789.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">Dear Madam</span>,</p> + +<p>I have mentioned in my last my appointment to the Excise, and the +birth of little Frank; who, by the bye, I trust will be no discredit +to the honourable name of Wallace, as he has a fine manly countenance, +and a figure that might do credit to a little fellow two months older; +and likewise an excellent good temper, though when he pleases he has a +pipe, only not quite so loud as the horn that his immortal namesake +blew as a signal to take out the pin of Stirling bridge.</p> + +<p>I had some time ago an epistle, part poetic, and part prosaic, from +your poetess, Mrs. J. Little, a very ingenious, but modest +composition. I should have written her as she requested, but for the +hurry of this new business. I have heard of her and her compositions +in this country; and I am happy to add, always to the honour of her +character. The fact is, I know not well how to write to her: I should +sit down to a sheet of paper that I knew not how to stain. I am no dab +at fine-drawn letter-writing; and, except when prompted by friendship +or gratitude, or, which happens extremely rarely, inspired by the muse +(I know not her name) that presides over epistolary writing, I sit +down, when necessitated to write, as I would sit down, to beat hemp.</p> + +<p>Some parts of your letter of the 20th August, struck me with the most +melancholy concern for the state of your mind at present.</p> + +<p>Would I could write you a letter of comfort, I would sit down to it +with as much pleasure, as I would to write an epic poem of my own +composition that should equal the <i>Iliad.</i> Religion, my dear friend, +is the true comfort! A strong persuasion in a future state of +existence; a proposition so obviously probable, that, setting +revelation aside, every nation and people, so far as investigation has +reached, for at least near four thousand years, have, in some mode or +other, firmly believed it. In vain would we reason and pretend to +doubt. I have myself done so to a very daring pitch; but, when I +reflected, that I was opposing the most ardent wishes, and the most +darling hopes of good men, and flying in the face of all human belief, +in all ages, I was shocked at my own conduct.</p> + +<p>I know not whether I have ever sent you the following lines, or if you +have ever seen them; but it is one of my favourite quotations, which I +keep constantly by me in my progress through life, in the language of +the book of Job,</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Against the day of battle and of war”—<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>spoken of religion:</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“’Tis <i>this</i>, my friend, that streaks our morning bright,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">’Tis <i>this</i>, that gilds the horror of our night.<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_411" id="Page_411">[411]</a></span><span class="i0">When wealth forsakes us, and when friends are few,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When friends are faithless, or when foes pursue;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Tis this that wards the blow, or stills the smart,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Disarms affliction, or repels his dart;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Within the breast bids purest raptures rise,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Bids smiling conscience spread her cloudless skies.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>I have been busy with <i>Zeluco.</i> The Doctor is so obliging as to +request my opinion of it; and I have been revolving in my mind some +kind of criticisms on novel-writing, but it is a depth beyond my +research. I shall however digest my thoughts on the subject as well as +I can. <i>Zeluco</i> is a most sterling performance.</p> + +<p>Farewell! <i>A Dieu, le bon Dieu, je vous commende.</i></p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCLXXII" id="letterCLXXII"></a>CLXXII.</h2> + +<h3>TO CAPTAIN RIDDEL,</h3> + +<h4><span class="smcap">Carse</span>.</h4> + +<p>[The Whistle alluded to in this letter was contended for on the 16th +of October, 1790—the successful competitor, Fergusson, of +Craigdarroch, was killed by a fall from his horse, some time after the +“Jovial contest.”]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Ellisland, 16th Oct., 1789.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">Sir</span>,</p> + +<p>Big with the idea of this important day at Friars-Carse, I have +watched the elements and skies in the full persuasion that they would +announce it to the astonished world by some phenomena of terrific +portent.—Yesternight until a very late hour did I wait with anxious +horror, for the appearance of some comet firing half the sky; or +aerial armies of sanguinary Scandinavians, darting athwart the +startled heavens, rapid as the ragged lightning, and horrid as those +convulsions of nature that bury nations.</p> + +<p>The elements, however, seem to take the matter very quietly: they did +not even usher in this morning with triple suns and a shower of blood, +symbolical of the three potent heroes, and the mighty claret-shed of +the day.—For me, as Thomson in his Winter says of the storm—I shall +“Hear astonished, and astonished sing”</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i2">The whistle and the man; I sing<br /></span> +<span class="i4">The man that won the whistle, &c.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Here are we met, three merry boys,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Three merry boys I trow are we;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And mony a night we’ve merry been,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And mony mae we hope to be.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Wha first shall rise to gang awa,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A cuckold coward loun is he:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wha <i>last</i> beside his chair shall fa’,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">He is the king amang us three.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>To leave the heights of Parnassus and come to the humble vale of +prose.—I have some misgivings that I take too much upon me, when I +request you to get your guest, Sir Robert Lowrie, to frank the two +enclosed covers for me, the one of them to Sir William Cunningham, of +Robertland, Bart. at Kilmarnock,—the other to Mr. Allan Masterton, +Writing-Master, Edinburgh. The first has a kindred claim on Sir +Robert, as being a brother Baronet, and likewise a keen Foxite; the +other is one of the worthiest men in the world, and a man of real +genius; so, allow me to say, he has a fraternal claim on you. I want +them franked for to-morrow, as I cannot get them to the post +to-night.—I shall send a servant again for them in the evening. +Wishing that your head may be crowned with laurels to-night, and free +from aches to-morrow,</p> + +<p class="sig4">I have the honour to be, Sir,</p> + +<p class="sig3">Your deeply indebted humble Servant,</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCLXXIII" id="letterCLXXIII"></a>CLXXIII.</h2> + +<h3>TO CAPTAIN RIDDEL.</h3> + +<p>[Robert Riddel kept one of those present pests of society—an +album—into which Burns copied the Lines on the Hermitage, and the +Wounded Hare.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Ellisland, 1789.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">Sir</span>,</p> + +<p>I wish from my inmost soul it were in my power to give you a more +substantial gratification and return for all the goodness to the poet, +than transcribing a few of his idle rhymes.—However, “an old song,” +though to a proverb an instance of insignificance, is generally the +only coin a poet has to pay with.</p> + +<p>If my poems which I have transcribed, and mean still to transcribe +into your book, were equal to the grateful respect and high esteem I +bear for the gentleman to whom I present them, they would be the +finest poems in the language.—As they are, they will at least be a +testimony with what sincerity I have the honour to be,</p> + +<p class="sig10">Sir,</p> + +<p class="sig4">Your devoted humble Servant,</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_412" id="Page_412">[412]</a></span></p> + + +<h2><a name="letterCLXXIV" id="letterCLXXIV"></a>CLXXIV.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. ROBERT AINSLIE.</h3> + +<p>[The ignominy of a poet becoming a gauger seems ever to have been +present to the mind of Burns—but those moving things ca’d wives and +weans have a strong influence on the actions of man.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Ellisland, 1st Nov. 1789.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">My dear Friend,</span></p> + +<p>I had written you long ere now, could I have guessed where to find +you, for I am sure you have more good sense than to waste the precious +days of vacation time in the dirt of business and Edinburgh.—Wherever +you are, God bless you, and lead you not into temptation, but deliver +you from evil!</p> + +<p>I do not know if I have informed you that I am now appointed to an +excise division, in the middle of which my house and farm lie. In this +I was extremely lucky. Without ever having been an expectant, as they +call their journeymen excisemen, I was directly planted down to all +intents and purposes an officer of excise; there to flourish and bring +forth fruits—worthy of repentance.</p> + +<p>I know not how the word exciseman, or still more opprobrious, gauger, +will sound in your ears. I too have seen the day when my auditory +nerves would have felt very delicately on this subject; but a wife and +children are things which have a wonderful power in blunting these +kind of sensations. Fifty pounds a year for life, and a provision for +widows and orphans, you will allow is no bad settlement for a <i>poet.</i> +For the ignominy of the profession, I have the encouragement which I +once heard a recruiting sergeant give to a numerous, if not a +respectable audience, in the streets of Kilmarnock.—“Gentlemen, for +your further and better encouragement, I can assure you that our +regiment is the most blackguard corps under the crown, and +consequently with us an honest fellow has the surest chance for +preferment.”</p> + +<p>You need not doubt that I find several very unpleasant and +disagreeable circumstances in my business; but I am tired with and +disgusted at the language of complaint against the evils of life. +Human existence in the most favourable situations does not abound with +pleasures, and has its inconveniences and ills; capricious foolish man +mistakes these inconveniences and ills as if they were the peculiar +property of his particular situation; and hence that eternal +fickleness, that love of change, which has ruined, and daily does ruin +many a fine fellow, as well as many a blockhead, and is almost, +without exception, a constant source of disappointment and misery.</p> + +<p>I long to hear from you how you go on—not so much in business as in +life. Are you pretty well satisfied with your own exertions, and +tolerably at ease in your internal reflections? ’Tis much to be a +great character as a lawyer, but beyond comparison more to be a great +character as a man. That you may be both the one and the other is the +earnest wish, and that you <i>will</i> be both is the firm persuasion of,</p> + +<p class="sig10">My dear Sir, &c.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCLXXV" id="letterCLXXV"></a>CLXXV.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. RICHARD BROWN.</h3> + +<p>[With this letter closes the correspondence of Robert Burns and +Richard Brown.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Ellisland, 4th November, 1789.</i></p> + +<p>I have been so hurried, my ever dear friend, that though I got both +your letters, I have not been able to command an hour to answer them +as I wished; and even now, you are to look on this as merely +confessing debt, and craving days. Few things could have given me so +much pleasure as the news that you were once more safe and sound on +terra firma, and happy in that place where happiness is alone to be +found, in the fireside circle. May the benevolent Director of all +things peculiarly bless you in all those endearing connexions +consequent on the tender and venerable names of husband and father! I +have indeed been extremely lucky in getting an additional income of +£50 a year, while, at the same time, the appointment will not cost me +above £10 or £12 per annum of expenses more than I must have +inevitably incurred. The worst circumstance is, that the excise +division which I have got is so extensive, no less than ten parishes +to ride over; and it abounds besides with so much business, that I can +scarcely steal a spare moment. However, labour endears rest, and both +together are absolutely necessary for the proper enjoyment of human +existence. I cannot meet you anywhere. No less than an order from the +Board of Excise, at Edinburgh, is necessary before I can have so much +time as to meet you in Ayrshire. But do you come, and see me. We must +have a social<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_413" id="Page_413">[413]</a></span> day, and perhaps lengthen it out with half the half the +night before you go again to sea. You are the earliest friend I now +have on earth, my brothers excepted; and is not that an endearing +circumstance? When you and I first met, we were at the green period of +human life. The twig would easily take a bent, but would as easily +return to its former state. You and I not only took a mutual bent, but +by the melancholy, though strong influence of being both of the family +of the unfortunate, we were entwined with one another in our growth +towards advanced age; and blasted be the sacrilegious hand that shall +attempt to undo the union! You and I must have one bumper to my +favourite toast, “May the companions of our youth be the friends of +our old age!” Come and see me one year; I shall see you at Port +Glasgow the next, and if we can contrive to have a gossiping between +our two bedfellows, it will be so much additional pleasure. Mrs. +Burns joins me in kind compliments to you and Mrs. Brown. Adieu!</p> + +<p class="sig4">I am ever, my dear Sir, yours,</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCLXXVI" id="letterCLXXVI"></a>CLXXVI.</h2> + +<h3>TO R. GRAHAM, ESQ.</h3> + +<p>[The poet enclosed in this letter to his patron in the Excise the +clever verses on Captain Grose, the Kirk’s Alarm, and the first ballad +on Captain Miller’s election.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>9th December, 1789.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">Sir</span>,</p> + +<p>I have a good while had a wish to trouble you with a letter, and had +certainly done it long ere now—but for a humiliating something that +throws cold water on the resolution, as if one should say, “You have +found Mr. Graham a very powerful and kind friend indeed, and that +interest he is so kindly taking in your concerns, you ought by +everything in your power to keep alive and cherish.” Now though since +God has thought proper to make one powerful and another helpless, the +connexion of obliger and obliged is all fair; and though my being +under your patronage is to me highly honourable, yet, Sir, allow me to +flatter myself, that, as a poet and an honest man you first interested +yourself in my welfare, and principally as such, still you permit me +to approach you.</p> + +<p>I have found the excise business go on a great deal smoother with me +than I expected; owing a good deal to the generous friendship of Mr. +Mitchel, my collector, and the kind assistance of Mr. Findlater, my +supervisor. I dare to be honest, and I fear no labour. Nor do I find +my hurried life greatly inimical to my correspondence with the muses. +Their visits to me, indeed, and I believe to most of their +acquaintance, like the visits of good angels, are short and far +between: but I meet them now and then as I jog through the hills of +Nithsdale, just as I used to do on the banks of Ayr. I take the +liberty to enclose you a few bagatelles, all of them the productions +of my leisure thoughts in my excise rides.</p> + +<p>If you know or have ever seen Captain Grose, the antiquarian, you will +enter into any humour that is in the verses on him. Perhaps you have +seen them before, as I sent them to a London newspaper. Though I dare +say you have none of the solemn-league-and-covenant fire, which shone +so conspicuous in Lord George Gordon, and the Kilmarnock weavers, yet +I think you must have heard of Dr. M’Gill, one of the clergymen of +Ayr, and his heretical book. God help him, poor man! Though he is one +of the worthiest, as well as one of the ablest of the whole priesthood +of the Kirk of Scotland, in every sense of that ambiguous term, yet +the poor Doctor and his numerous family are in imminent danger of +being thrown out to the mercy of the winter-winds. The enclosed ballad +on that business is, I confess, too local, but I laughed myself at +some conceits in it, though I am convinced in my conscience that there +are a good many heavy stanzas in it too.</p> + +<p>The election ballad, as you will see, alludes to the present canvass +in our string of boroughs. I do not believe there will be such a +hard-run match in the whole general election.</p> + +<p>I am too little a man to have any political attachments; I am deeply +indebted to, and have the warmest veneration for, individuals of both +parties; but a man who has it in his power to be the father of his +country, and who * * * * *, is a character that one cannot speak of +with patience.</p> + +<p>Sir J. J. does “what man can do,” but yet I doubt his fate.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_414" id="Page_414">[414]</a></span></p> + + +<h2><a name="letterCLXXVII" id="letterCLXXVII"></a>CLXXVII.</h2> + +<h3>TO MRS. DUNLOP.</h3> + +<p>[Burns was often a prey to lowness of spirits: at this some dull men +have marvelled; but the dull have no misgivings: they go blindly and +stupidly on, like a horse in a mill, and have none of the sorrows or +joys which genius is heir to.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Ellisland, 13th December, 1789.</i></p> + +<p>Many thanks, dear Madam, for your sheet-full of rhymes. Though at +present I am below the veriest prose, yet from you everything pleases. +I am groaning under the miseries of a diseased nervous system; a +system, the state of which is most conducive to our happiness—or the +most productive of our misery. For now near three weeks I have been so +ill with a nervous head-ache, that I have been obliged for a time to +give up my excise-books, being scarce able to lift my head, much less +to ride once a week over ten muir parishes. What is man?—To-day in +the luxuriance of health, exulting in the enjoyment of existence; in a +few days, perhaps in a few hours, loaded with conscious painful being, +counting the tardy pace of the lingering moments by the repercussions +of anguish, and refusing or denied a comforter. Day follows night, and +night comes after day, only to curse him with life which gives him no +pleasure; and yet the awful, dark termination of that life is +something at which he recoils.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Tell us, ye dead; will none of you in pity<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Disclose the secret————————<br /></span> +<span class="i0"><i>What ’tis you are, and we must shortly be?</i><br /></span> +<span class="i0">——————————’tis no matter:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A little time will make us learn’d as you are.”<a name="FNanchor_194_194" id="FNanchor_194_194"></a><a href="#Footnote_194_194" class="fnanchor">[194]</a><br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>Can it be possible, that when I resign this frail, feverish being, I +shall still find myself in conscious existence? When the last gasp of +agony has announced that I am no more to those that knew me, and the +few who loved me; when the cold, stiffened, unconscious, ghastly corse +is resigned into the earth, to be the prey of unsightly reptiles, and +to become in time a trodden clod, shall I be yet warm in life, seeing +and seen, enjoying and enjoyed? Ye venerable sages and holy flamens, +is there probability in your conjectures, truth in your stories, of +another world beyond death; or are they all alike, baseless visions, +and fabricated fables? If there is another life, it must be only for +the just, the benevolent, the amiable, and the humane; what a +flattering idea, then, is a world to come! Would to God I as firmly +believed it, as I ardently wish it! There I should meet an aged +parent, now at rest from the many buffetings of an evil world, against +which he so long and so bravely struggled. There should I meet the +friend, the disinterested friend of my early life; the man who +rejoiced to see me, because he loved me and could serve me.—Muir, thy +weaknesses were the aberrations of human nature, but thy heart glowed +with everything generous, manly and noble; and if ever emanation from +the All-good Being animated a human form, it was thine! There should +I, with speechless agony of rapture, again recognise my lost, my ever +dear Mary! whose bosom was fraught with truth, honour, constancy, and +love.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“My Mary, dear departed shade!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Where is thy place of heavenly rest?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Seest thou thy lover lowly laid?<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Hear’st thou the groans that rend his breast?”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>Jesus Christ, thou amiablest of characters! I trust thou art no +impostor, and that thy revelation of blissful scenes of existence +beyond death and the grave, is not one of the many impositions which +time after time have been palmed on credulous mankind. I trust that in +thee “shall all the families of the earth be blessed,” by being yet +connected together in a better world, where every tie that bound heart +to heart, in this state of existence, shall be, far beyond our present +conceptions, more endearing.</p> + +<p>I am a good deal inclined to think with those who maintain, that what +are called nervous affections are in fact diseases of the mind. I +cannot reason, I cannot think; and but to you I would not venture to +write anything above an order to a cobbler. You have felt too much of +the ills of life not to sympathise with a diseased wretch, who has +impaired more than half of any faculties he possessed. Your goodness +will excuse this distracted scrawl, which the writer dare scarcely +read, and which he would throw into the fire, were he able to write +anything better, or indeed anything at all.</p> + +<p>Rumour told me something of a son of yours, who was returned from the +East or West Indies. If you have gotten news from James or Anthony, it +was cruel in you not to let me know; as I promise you on the sincerity +of a man, who is weary of one world, and anxious about another, that +scarce anything could give me so much pleasure as to hear of any good +thing befalling my honoured friend.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_415" id="Page_415">[415]</a></span></p> + +<p>If you have a minute’s leisure, take up your pen in pity to <i>le pauvre +miserable.</i></p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + + + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_194_194" id="Footnote_194_194"></a><a href="#FNanchor_194_194"><span class="label">[194]</span></a> Blair’s Grave.</p></div> +</div> + + + +<h2><a name="letterCLXXVIII" id="letterCLXXVIII"></a>CLXXVIII.</h2> + +<h3>TO LADY W[INIFRED] M[AXWELL] CONSTABLE.</h3> + +<p>[The Lady Winifred Maxwell, the last of the old line of Nithsdale, was +granddaughter of that Earl who, in 1715, made an almost miraculous +escape from death, through the spirit and fortitude of his countess, a +lady of the noble family of Powis.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Ellisland, 16th December, 1789.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">My Lady</span>,</p> + +<p>In vain have I from day to day expected to hear from Mrs. Young, as +she promised me at Dalswinton that she would do me the honour to +introduce me at Tinwald; and it was impossible, not from your +ladyship’s accessibility, but from my own feelings, that I could go +alone. Lately indeed, Mr. Maxwell of Carruchen, in his usual goodness, +offered to accompany me, when an unlucky indisposition on my part +hindered my embracing the opportunity. To court the notice or the +tables of the great, except where I sometimes have had a little matter +to ask of them, or more often the pleasanter task of witnessing my +gratitude to them, is what I never have done, and I trust never shall +do. But with your ladyship I have the honour to be connected by one of +the strongest and most endearing ties in the whole moral world. Common +sufferers, in a cause where even to be unfortunate is glorious, the +cause of heroic loyalty! Though my fathers had not illustrious honours +and vast properties to hazard in the contest, though they left their +humble cottages only to add so many units more to the unnoted crowd +that followed their leaders, yet what they could they did, and what +they had they lost; with unshaken firmness and unconcealed political +attachments, they shook hands with ruin for what they esteemed the +cause of their king and their country. The language and the enclosed +verses are for your ladyship’s eye alone. Poets are not very famous +for their prudence; but as I can do nothing for a cause which is now +nearly no more, I do not wish to hurt myself.</p> + +<p class="sig5">I have the honour to be,</p> + +<p class="sig10">My lady,</p> + +<p class="sig4">Your ladyship’s obliged and obedient</p> + +<p class="sig9">Humble servant,</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCLXXIX" id="letterCLXXIX"></a>CLXXIX.</h2> + +<h3>TO PROVOST MAXWELL,</h3> + +<h4>OF LOCHMABEN.</h4> +<p>[Of Lochmaben, the “Marjory of the mony Lochs” of the election +ballads, Maxwell was at this time provost, a post more of honour than +of labour.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Ellisland, 20th December, 1789.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">Dear Provost</span>,</p> + +<p>As my friend Mr. Graham goes for your good town to-morrow, I cannot +resist the temptation to send you a few lines, and as I have nothing +to say I have chosen this sheet of foolscap, and begun as you see at +the top of the first page, because I have ever observed, that when +once people have fairly set out they know not where to stop. Now that +my first sentence is concluded, I have nothing to do but to pray +heaven to help me on to another. Shall I write you on Politics or +Religion, two master subjects for your sayers of nothing. Of the first +I dare say by this time you are nearly surfeited: and for the last, +whatever they may talk of it, who make it a kind of company concern, I +never could endure it beyond a soliloquy. I might write you on +farming, on building, or marketing, but my poor distracted mind is so +torn, so jaded, so racked and bediveled with the task of the +superlative damned to make <i>one guinea do the business of three</i>, that +I detest, abhor, and swoon at the very word business, though no less +than four letters of my very short sirname are in it.</p> + +<p>Well, to make the matter short, I shall betake myself to a subject +ever fruitful of themes; a subject the turtle-feast of the sons of +Satan, and the delicious secret sugar-plum of the babes of grace—a +subject sparkling with all the jewels that wit can find in the mines +of genius: and pregnant with all the stores of learning from Moses and +Confucius to Franklin and Priestley—in short, may it please your +Lordship, I intend to write * * *</p> + +<p>[<i>Here the Poet inserted a song which can only be sung at times when +the punch-bowl has done its duty and wild wit is set free.</i>]</p> + +<p>If at any time you expect a field-day in your town, a day when Dukes, +Earls, and Knights pay their court to weavers, tailors, and cobblers, +I should like to know of it two or three days beforehand. It is not +that I care three skips of a cur dog for the politics, but I should +like to see<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_416" id="Page_416">[416]</a></span> such an exhibition of human nature. If you meet with that +worthy old veteran in religion and good-fellowship, Mr. Jeffrey, or +any of his amiable family, I beg you will give them my best +compliments.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCLXXX" id="letterCLXXX"></a>CLXXX.</h2> + +<h3>TO SIR JOHN SINCLAIR.</h3> + +<p>[Of the Monkland Book-Club alluded to in this letter, the clergyman +had omitted all mention in his account of the Parish of Dunscore, +published in Sir John Sinclair’s work: some of the books which the +poet introduced were stigmatized as vain and frivolous.]</p> + +<p class="sig">1790.</p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">Sir</span>,</p> + +<p>The following circumstance has, I believe, been committed in the +statistical account, transmitted to you of the parish of Dunscore, in +Nithsdale. I beg leave to send it to you because it is new, and may be +useful. How far it is deserving of a place in your patriotic +publication, you are the best judge.</p> + +<p>To store the minds of the lower classes with useful knowledge, is +certainly of very great importance, both to them as individuals and to +society at large. Giving them a turn for reading and reflection, is +giving them a source of innocent and laudable amusement: and besides, +raises them to a more dignified degree in the scale of rationality. +Impressed with this idea, a gentleman in this parish, Robert Riddel, +Esq., of Glenriddel, set on foot a species of circulating library, on +a plan so simple as to be practicable in any corner of the country; +and so useful, as to deserve the notice of every country gentleman, +who thinks the improvement of that part of his own species, whom +chance has thrown into the humble walks of the peasant and the +artisan, a matter worthy of his attention.</p> + +<p>Mr. Riddel got a number of his own tenants, and farming neighbors, to +form themselves into a society for the purpose of having a library +among themselves. They entered into a legal engagement to abide by it +for three years; with a saving clause or two in case of a removal to a +distance, or death. Each member, at his entry, paid five shillings; +and at each of their meetings, which were held every fourth Saturday, +sixpence more. With their entry-money, and the credit which they took +on the faith of their future funds, they laid in a tolerable stock of +books at the commencement. What authors they were to purchase, was +always decided by the majority. At every meeting, all the books, under +certain fines and forfeitures, by way of penalty, were to be produced; +and the members had their choice of the volumes in rotation. He whose +name stood for that night first on the list, had his choice of what +volume he pleased in the whole collection; the second had his choice +after the first; the third after the second, and so on to the last. At +next meeting, he who had been first on the list at the preceding +meeting, was last at this; he who had been second was first; and so on +through the whole three years. At the expiration of the engagement the +books were sold by auction, but only among the members themselves; +each man had his share of the common stock, in money or in books, as +he chose to be a purchaser or not.</p> + +<p>At the breaking up of this little society, which was formed under Mr. +Riddel’s patronage, what with benefactions of books from him, and what +with their own purchases, they had collected together upwards of one +hundred and fifty volumes. It will easily be guessed, that a good deal +of trash would be bought. Among the books, however, of this little +library, were, <i>Blair’s Sermons</i>, <i>Robertson’s History of Scotland</i>, +<i>Hume’s History of the Stewarts</i>, <i>The Spectator</i>, <i>Idler</i>, +<i>Adventurer</i>, <i>Mirror</i>, <i>Lounger</i>, <i>Observer</i>, <i>Man of Feeling</i>, <i>Man +of the World</i>, <i>Chrysal</i>, <i>Don Quixote</i>, <i>Joseph Andrews</i>, &c. A +peasant who can read, and enjoy such books, is certainly a much +superior being to his neighbour, who perhaps stalks besides his team, +very little removed, except in shape, from the brutes he drives.</p> + +<p>Wishing your patriotic exertions their so much merited success,</p> + +<p class="sig4">I am, Sir,</p> + +<p class="sig5">Your humble servant,</p> + +<p class="sig9"><span class="smcap">A Peasant</span>.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCLXXXI" id="letterCLXXXI"></a>CLXXXI.</h2> + +<h3>TO CHARLES SHARPE, ESQ.,</h3> + +<h4>OF HODDAM.</h4> + +<p>[The family of Hoddam is of old standing in Nithsdale. It has mingled +blood with some of the noblest Scottish names; nor is it unknown +either in history or literature—the fierce knight of Closeburn, who +in the scuffle between Bruce and Comyne drew his sword and made<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_417" id="Page_417">[417]</a></span> +“sicker,” and my friend Charles Kirkpatrick Sharpe, are not the least +distinguished of its members.]</p> + +<p class="sig">[1790.]</p> + +<p>It is true, Sir, you are a gentleman of rank and fortune, and I am a +poor devil: you are a feather in the cap of society, and I am a very +hobnail in its shoes; yet I have the honour to belong to the same +family with you, and on that score I now address you. You will perhaps +suspect that I am going to claim affinity with the ancient and +honourable house of Kirkpatrick. No, no, Sir: I cannot indeed be +properly said to belong to any house, or even any province or kingdom; +as my mother, who, for many years was spouse to a marching regiment, +gave me into this bad world, aboard the packet-boat, somewhere between +Donaghadee and Portpatrick. By our common family, I mean, Sir, the +family of the muses. I am a fiddler and a poet; and you, I am told, +play an exquisite violin, and have a standard taste in the Belles +Lettres. The other day, a brother catgut gave me a charming Scots air +of your composition. If I was pleased with the tune, I was in raptures +with the title you have given it; and taking up the idea I have spun +it into the three stanzas enclosed. Will you allow me, Sir, to present +you them, as the dearest offering that a misbegotten son of poverty +and rhyme has to give? I have a longing to take you by the hand and +unburthen my heart by saying, “Sir, I honour you as a man who supports +the dignity of human nature, amid an age when frivolity and avarice +have, between them, debased us below the brutes that perish!” But, +alas, Sir! to me you are unapproachable. It is true, the muses +baptized me in Castalian streams, but the thoughtless gipsies forgot +to give me a name. As the sex have served many a good fellow, the Nine +have given me a great deal of pleasure, but, bewitching jades! they +have beggared me. Would they but spare me a little of their +cast-linen! Were it only in my power to say that I have a shirt on my +back! but the idle wenches, like Solomon’s lilies, “they toil not, +neither do they spin;” so I must e’en continue to tie my remnant of a +cravat, like the hangman’s rope, round my naked throat, and coax my +galligaskins to keep together their many-coloured fragments. As to the +affair of shoes, I have given that up. My pilgrimages in my +ballad-trade, from town to town, and on your stony-hearted turnpikes +too, are what not even the hide of Job’s Behemoth could bear. The coat +on my back is no more: I shall not speak evil of the dead. It would be +equally unhandsome and ungrateful to find fault with my old surtout, +which so kindly supplies and conceals the want of that coat. My hat +indeed is a great favourite; and though I got it literally for an old +song, I would not exchange it for the best beaver in Britain. I was, +during several years, a kind of factotum servant to a country +clergyman, where I pickt up a good many scraps of learning, +particularly in some branches of the mathematics. Whenever I feel +inclined to rest myself on my way, I take my seat under a hedge, +laying my poetic wallet on the one side, and my fiddle-case on the +other, and placing my hat between my legs, I can, by means of its +brim, or rather brims, go through the whole doctrine of the conic +sections.</p> + +<p>However, Sir, don’t let me mislead you, as if I would interest your +pity. Fortune has so much forsaken me, that she has taught me to live +without her; and amid all my rags and poverty, I am as independent, +and much more happy, than a monarch of the world. According to the +hackneyed metaphor, I value the several actors in the great drama of +life, simply as they act their parts. I can look on a worthless fellow +of a duke with unqualified contempt, and can regard an honest +scavenger with sincere respect. As you, Sir, go through your role with +such distinguished merit, permit me to make one in the chorus of +universal applause, and assure you that with the highest respect,</p> + +<p class="sig4">I have the honour to be, &c.,</p> + +<p class="sig9"><span class="smcap">Johnny Faa</span>.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCLXXXII" id="letterCLXXXII"></a>CLXXXII.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. GILBERT BURNS.</h3> + +<p>[In the few fierce words of this letter the poet bids adieu to all +hopes of wealth from Ellisland.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Ellisland, 11th January, 1790.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">Dear Brother</span>,</p> + +<p>I mean to take advantage of the frank, though I have not, in my +present frame of mind, much appetite for exertion in writing. My +nerves are in a cursed state. I feel that horrid hypochondria +pervading every atom of both body and soul. This farm has undone my +enjoyment of myself. It is a ruinous affair on all hands<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_418" id="Page_418">[418]</a></span> But let it +go to bell! I’ll fight it out and be off with it.</p> + +<p>We have gotten a set of very decent players here just now. I have seen +them an evening or two. David Campbell, in Ayr, wrote to me by the +manager of the company, a Mr. Sutherland, who is a man of apparent +worth. On New-year-day evening I gave him the following prologue, +which he spouted to his audience with applause.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">No song nor dance I bring from yon great city,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That queens it o’er our taste—the more’s the pity:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Tho’, by the bye, abroad why will you roam?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Good sense and taste are natives here at home.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>I can no more.—If once I was clear of this cursed farm, I should +respire more at ease.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCLXXXIII" id="letterCLXXXIII"></a>CLXXXIII.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. SUTHERLAND,</h3> + +<h4>PLAYER.</h4> + +<h5>ENCLOSING A PROLOGUE.</h5> +<p>[When the farm failed, the poet sought pleasure in the playhouse: he +tried to retire from his own harassing reflections, into a world +created by other minds.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Monday Morning.</i></p> + +<p>I was much disappointed, my dear Sir, in wanting your most agreeable +company yesterday. However, I heartily pray for good weather next +Sunday; and whatever aërial Being has the guidance of the elements, +may take any other half-dozen of Sundays he pleases, and clothe them +with</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Vapours and clouds, and storms,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Until he terrify himself<br /></span> +<span class="i0">At combustion of his own raising.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>I shall see you on Wednesday forenoon. In the greatest hurry,</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCLXXXIV" id="letterCLXXXIV"></a>CLXXXIV.</h2> + +<h3>TO WILLIAM DUNBAR, W.S.</h3> + +<p>[This letter was first published by the Ettrick Shepherd, in his +edition of Burns: it is remarkable for this sentence, “I am resolved +never to breed up a son of mine to any of the learned professions: I +know the value of independence, and since I cannot give my sons an +independent fortune, I shall give them an independent line of life.” +We may look round us and inquire which line of life the poet could +possibly mean.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Ellisland, 14th January, 1790.</i></p> + +<p>Since we are here creatures of a day, since “a few summer days, and a +few winter nights, and the life of man is at an end,” why, my dear +much-esteem Sir, should you and I let negligent indolence, for I know +it is nothing worse, step in between us and bar the enjoyment of a +mutual correspondence? We are not shapen out of the common, heavy, +methodical clod, the elemental stuff of the plodding selfish race, the +sons of Arithmetic and Prudence; our feelings and hearts are not +benumbed and poisoned by the cursed influence of riches, which, +whatever blessing they may be in other respects, are no friends to the +nobler qualities of the heart: in the name of random sensibility, +then, let never the moon change on our silence any more. I have had a +tract of had health most part of this winter, else you had heard from +me long ere now. Thank Heaven, I am now got so much better as to be +able to partake a little in the enjoyments of life.</p> + +<p>Our friend Cunningham will, perhaps, have told you of my going into +the Excise. The truth is, I found it a very convenient business to +have £50 per annum, nor have I yet felt any of those mortifying +circumstances in it that I was led to fear.</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Feb. 2.</i></p> + +<p>I have not, for sheer hurry of business, been able to spare five +minutes to finish my letter. Besides my farm business, I ride on my +Excise matters at least two hundred miles every week. I have not by +any means given up the muses. You will see in the 3d vol. of Johnson’s +Scots songs that I have contributed my mite there.</p> + +<p>But, my dear Sir, little ones that look up to you for paternal +protection are an important charge. I have already two fine, healthy, +stout little fellows, and I wish to throw some light upon them. I have +a thousand reveries and schemes about them, and their future destiny. +Not that I am a Utopian projector in these things. I am resolved never +to breed up a son of mine to any of the learned professions. I know +the value of independence; and since I cannot give my sons an +independent fortune, I shall give them an independent line of life. +What a chaos of hurry, chance, and changes is this world, when one +sits soberly down to reflect on it! To a father, who himself knows the +world, the thought that he shall have sons to<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_419" id="Page_419">[419]</a></span> usher into it must fill +him with dread; but if he have daughters, the prospect in a thoughtful +moment is apt to shock him.</p> + +<p>I hope Mrs. Fordyce and the two young ladies are well. Do let me +forget that they are nieces of yours, and let me say that I never saw +a more interesting, sweeter pair of sisters in my life. I am the fool +of my feelings and attachments. I often take up a volume of my Spenser +to realize you to my imagination, and think over the social scenes we +have had together. God grant that there may be another world more +congenial to honest fellows beyond this. A world where these rubs and +plagues of absence, distance, misfortunes, ill-health, &c., shall no +more damp hilarity and divide friendship. This I know is your throng +season, but half a page will much oblige,</p> + +<p class="sig5">My dear Sir,</p> + +<p class="sig9">Yours sincerely,</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCLXXXV" id="letterCLXXXV"></a>CLXXXV.</h2> + +<h3>TO MRS. DUNLOP.</h3> + +<p>[Falconer, the poet, whom Burns mentions here, perished in the Aurora, +in which he acted as purser: he was a satirist of no mean power, and +wrote that useful work, the Marine Dictionary: but his fame depends +upon “The Shipwreck,” one of the most original and mournful poems in +the language.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Ellisland, 25th January, 1790.</i></p> + +<p>It has been owing to unremitting hurry of business that I have not +written to you, Madam, long ere now. My health is greatly better, and +I now begin once more to share in satisfaction and enjoyment with the +rest of my fellow-creatures.</p> + +<p>Many thanks, my much-esteemed friend, for your kind letters; but why +will you make me run the risk of being contemptible and mercenary in +my own eyes? When I pique myself on my independent spirit, I hope it +is neither poetic license, nor poetic rant; and I am so flattered with +the honour you have done me, in making me your compeer in friendship +and friendly correspondence, that I cannot without pain, and a degree +of mortification, be reminded of the real inequality between our +situations.</p> + +<p>Most sincerely do I rejoice with you, dear Madam, in the good news of +Anthony. Not only your anxiety about his fate, but my own esteem for +such a noble, warm-hearted, manly young fellow, in the little I had of +his acquaintance, has interested me deeply in his fortunes.</p> + +<p>Falconer, the unfortunate author of the “Shipwreck,” which you so much +admire, is no more. After witnessing the dreadful catastrophe he so +feelingly describes in his poem, and after weathering many hard gales +of fortune, he went to the bottom with the Aurora frigate!</p> + +<p>I forget what part of Scotland had the honour of giving him birth; but +he was the son of obscurity and misfortune. He was one of those daring +adventurous spirits, which Scotland, beyond any other country, is +remarkable for producing. Little does the fond mother think, as she +hangs delighted over the sweet little leech at her bosom, where the +poor fellow may hereafter wander, and what may be his fate. I remember +a stanza in an old Scottish ballad, which, notwithstanding its rude +simplicity, speaks feelingly to the heart:</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Little did my mother think,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That day she cradled me,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">What land I was to travel in,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Or what death I should die!”<a name="FNanchor_195_195" id="FNanchor_195_195"></a><a href="#Footnote_195_195" class="fnanchor">[195]</a><br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>Old Scottish song are, you know, a favourite study and pursuit of +mine, and now I am on that subject, allow me to give you two stanzas +of another old simple ballad, which I am sure will please you. The +catastrophe of the piece is a poor ruined female, lamenting her fate. +She concludes with this pathetic wish:—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“O that my father had ne’er on me smil’d;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">O that my mother had ne’er to me sung!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O that my cradle had never been rock’d;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But that I had died when I was young!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“O that the grave it were my bed;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My blankets were my winding sheet;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The clocks and the worms my bedfellows a’;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And O sae sound as I should sleep!”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>I do not remember in all my reading, to have met with anything more +truly the language of misery, than the exclamation in the last line. +Misery is like love; to speak its language truly, the author must have +felt it.</p> + +<p>I am every day expecting the doctor to give your little godson<a name="FNanchor_196_196" id="FNanchor_196_196"></a><a href="#Footnote_196_196" class="fnanchor">[196]</a> the +small-pox. They are <i>rife</i> in the country, and I tremble for his fate. +By the way, I cannot help congratulating you on his looks and spirit. +Every person who sees <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_420" id="Page_420">[420]</a></span> +him, acknowledges him to be the finest, handsomest child he has ever +seen. I am myself delighted with the manly swell of his little chest, +and a certain miniature dignity in the carriage of his head, and the +glance of his fine black eye, which promise the undaunted gallantry of +an independent mind.</p> + +<p>I thought to have sent you some rhymes, but time forbids. I promise +you poetry until you are tired of it, next time I have the honour of +assuring you how truly I am, &c.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + + + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_195_195" id="Footnote_195_195"></a><a href="#FNanchor_195_195"><span class="label">[195]</span></a> The ballad is in the Minstrelsy of the Scottish Border, +ed. 1833, vol. iii. p. 304.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_196_196" id="Footnote_196_196"></a><a href="#FNanchor_196_196"><span class="label">[196]</span></a> The bard’s second son, Francis.</p></div> +</div> + + + +<h2><a name="letterCLXXXVI" id="letterCLXXXVI"></a>CLXXXVI.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. PETER HILL,</h3> + +<h4>BOOKSELLER, EDINBURGH.</h4> + +<p>[The Mademoiselle Burns whom the poet inquires about, was one of the +“ladies of the Canongate,” who desired to introduce free trade in her +profession into a close borough: this was refused by the magistrates +of Edinburgh, though advocated with much eloquence and humour in a +letter by her namesake—it is coloured too strongly with her calling +to be published.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Ellisland, 2d Feb., 1790.</i></p> + +<p>No! I will not say one word about apologies or excuses for not +writing.—I am a poor, rascally gauger, condemned to gallop at least +200 miles every week to inspect dirty ponds and yeasty barrels, and +where can I find time to write to, or importance to interest anybody? +The upbraidings of my conscience, nay the upbraidings of my wife, have +persecuted me on your account these two or three months past.—I wish +to God I was a great man, that my correspondence might throw light +upon you, to let the world see what you really are: and then I would +make your fortune without putting my hand in my pocket for you, which, +like all other great men, I suppose I would avoid as much as possible. +What are you doing, and how are you doing? Have you lately seen any of +my few friends? What is become of the <span class="smcap">borough reform</span>, or how +is the fate of my poor namesake, Mademoiselle Burns, decided? O man! +but for thee and thy selfish appetites, and dishonest artifices, that +beauteous form, and that once innocent and still ingenuous mind, might +have shone conspicuous and lovely in the faithful wife, and the +affectionate mother; and shall the unfortunate sacrifice to thy +pleasures have no claim on thy humanity!</p> + +<p>I saw lately in a Review, some extracts from a new poem, called the +Village Curate; send it me. I want likewise a cheap copy of The World. +Mr. Armstrong, the young poet, who does me the honour to mention me so +kindly in his works, please give him my best thanks for the copy of +his book—I shall write him, my first leisure hour. I like his poetry +much, but I think his style in prose quite astonishing.</p> + +<p>Your book came safe, and I am going to trouble you with further +commissions. I call it troubling you,—because I want only, +<span class="smcap">books</span>; the cheapest way, the best; so you may have to hunt +for them in the evening auctions. I want Smollette’s works, for the +sake of his incomparable humour. I have already Roderick Random, and +Humphrey Clinker.—Peregrine Pickle, Launcelot Greaves, and Ferdinand +Count Fathom, I still want; but as I said, the veriest ordinary copies +will serve me. I am nice only in the appearance of my poets. I forget +the price of Cowper’s Poems, but, I believe, I must have them. I saw +the other day, proposals for a publication, entitled “Banks’s new and +complete Christian’s Family Bible,” printed for C. Cooke, +Paternoster-row, London.—He promises at least, to give in the work, I +think it is three hundred and odd engravings, to which he has put the +names of the first artists in London.—You will know the character of +the performance, as some numbers of it are published; and if it is +really what it pretends to be, set me down as a subscriber, and send +me the published numbers.</p> + +<p>Let me hear from you, your first leisure minute, and trust me you +shall in future have no reason to complain of my silence. The dazzling +perplexity of novelty will dissipate and leave me to pursue my course +in the quiet path of methodical routine.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCLXXXVII" id="letterCLXXXVII"></a>CLXXXVII.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. W. NICOL.</h3> + +<p>[The poet has recorded this unlooked-for death of the Dominie’s mare +in some hasty verses, which are not much superior to the subject.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Ellisland, Feb. 9th, 1790.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">My dear Sir</span>,</p> + +<p>That d—mned mare of yours is dead. I would<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_421" id="Page_421">[421]</a></span> freely have given her +price to have saved her; she has vexed me beyond description. Indebted +as I was to your goodness beyond what I can ever repay, I eagerly +grasped at your offer to have the mare with me. That I might at least +show my readiness in wishing to be grateful, I took every care of her +in my power. She was never crossed for riding above half a score of +times by me or in my keeping. I drew her in the plough, one of three, +for one poor week. I refused fifty-five shillings for her, which was +the highest bode I could squeeze for her. I fed her up and had her in +fine order for Dumfries fair; when four or five days before the fair, +she was seized with an unaccountable disorder in the sinews, or +somewhere in the bones of the neck; with a weakness or total want of +power in her fillets, and in short the whole vertebrae of her spine +seemed to be diseased and unhinged, and in eight-and-forty hours, in +spite of the two best farriers in the country, she died and be d—mned +to her! The farriers said that she had been quite strained in the +fillets beyond cure before you had bought her; and that the poor +devil, though she might keep a little flesh, had been jaded and quite +worn out with fatigue and oppression. While she was with me, she was +under my own eye, and I assure you, my much valued friend, everything +was done for her that could be done; and the accident has vexed me to +the heart. In fact I could not pluck up spirits to write to you, on +account of the unfortunate business.</p> + +<p>There is little new in this country. Our theatrical company, of which +you must have heard, leave us this week.—Their merit and character +are indeed very great, both on the stage and in private life; not a +worthless creature among them; and their encouragement has been +accordingly. Their usual run is from eighteen to twenty-five pounds a +night: seldom less than the one, and the house will hold no more than +the other. There have been repeated instances of sending away six, and +eight, and ten pounds a night for want of room. A new theatre is to be +built by subscription; the first stone is to be laid on Friday first +to come. Three hundred guineas have been raised by thirty subscribers, +and thirty more might have been got if wanted. The manager, Mr. +Sutherland, was introduced to me by a friend from Ayr; and a worthier +or cleverer fellow I have rarely met with. Some of our clergy have +slipt in by stealth now and then; but they have got up a farce of +their own. You must have heard how the Rev. Mr. Lawson of Kirkmahoe, +seconded by the Rev. Mr. Kirkpatrick of Dunscore, and the rest of that +faction, have accused in formal process, the unfortunate and Rev. Mr. +Heron, of Kirkgunzeon, that in ordaining Mr. Nielson to the cure of +souls in Kirkbean, he, the said Heron, feloniously and treasonably +bound the said Nielson to the confession of faith, <i>so far as it was +agreeable to reason and the word of God</i>!</p> + +<p>Mrs. B. begs to be remembered most gratefully to you. Little Bobby and +Frank are charmingly well and healthy. I am jaded to death with +fatigue. For these two or three months, on an average, I have not +ridden less than two hundred miles per week. I have done little in the +poetic way. I have given Mr. Sutherland two Prologues; one of which +was delivered last week. I have likewise strung four or five barbarous +stanzas, to the tune of Chevy Chase, by way of Elegy on your poor +unfortunate mare, beginning (the name she got here was Peg Nicholson)</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Peg Nicholson was a good bay mare,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">As ever trod on airn;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But now she’s floating down the Nith,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And past the mouth o’ Cairn.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>My best compliments to Mrs. Nicol, and little Neddy, and all the +family; I hope Ned is a good scholar, and will come out to gather nuts +and apples with me next harvest.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCLXXXVIII" id="letterCLXXXVIII"></a>CLXXXVIII.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. CUNNINGHAM.</h3> + +<p>[Burns looks back with something of regret to the days of rich dinners +and flowing wine-cups which he experienced in Edinburgh. Alexander +Cunningham and his unhappy loves are recorded in that fine song, “Had +I a cave on some wild distant shore.”]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Ellisland, 13th February, 1790.</i></p> + +<p>I beg your pardon, my dear and much valued friend, for writing to you +on this very unfashionable, unsightly sheet—</p> + +<div class="blockquot"><p>“My poverty but not my will consents.”</p></div> + +<p>But to make amends, since of modish post I have none, except one poor +widowed half-sheet of gilt, which lies in my drawer among my plebeian +fool’s-cap pages, like the widow of a man<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_422" id="Page_422">[422]</a></span> of fashion, whom that +unpolite scoundrel, Necessity, has driven from Burgundy and Pineapple, +to a dish of Bohea, with the scandal-bearing help-mate of a +village-priest; or a glass of whisky-toddy, with a ruby-nosed +yoke-fellow of a foot-padding exciseman—I make a vow to enclose this +sheet-full of epistolary fragments in that my only scrap of gilt +paper.</p> + +<p>I am indeed your unworthy debtor for three friendly letters. I ought +to have written to you long ere now, but it is a literal fact, I have +scarcely a spare moment. It is not that I <i>will not</i> write to you; +Miss Burnet is not more dear to her guardian angel, nor his grace the +Duke of Queensbury to the powers of darkness, than my friend +Cunningham to me. It is not that I <i>cannot</i> write to you; should you +doubt it, take the following fragment, which was intended for you some +time ago, and be convinced that I can <i>antithesize</i> sentiment, and +<i>circumvolute</i> periods, as well as any coiner of phrase in the regions +of philology.</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>December, 1789.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">My dear Cunningham</span>,</p> + +<p>Where are you? And what are you doing? Can you be that son of levity, +who takes up a friendship as he takes up a fashion; or are you, like +some other of the worthiest fellows in the world, the victim of +indolence, laden with fetters of ever-increasing weight?</p> + +<p>What strange beings we are! Since we have a portion of conscious +existence, equally capable of enjoying pleasure, happiness, and +rapture, or of suffering pain, wretchedness, and misery, it is surely +worthy of an inquiry, whether there be not such a thing as a science +of life; whether method, economy, and fertility of expedients be not +applicable to enjoyment, and whether there be not a want of dexterity +in pleasure, which renders our little scantling of happiness still +less; and a profuseness, an intoxication in bliss, which leads to +satiety, disgust, and self-abhorrence. There is not a doubt but that +health, talents, character, decent competency, respectable friends, +are real substantial blessings; and yet do we not daily see those who +enjoy many or all of these good things contrive notwithstanding to be +as unhappy as others to whose lot few of them have fallen? I believe +one great source of this mistake or misconduct is owing to a certain +stimulus, with us called ambition, which goads us up the hill of life, +not as we ascend other eminences, for the laudable curiosity of +viewing an extended landscape, but rather for the dishonest pride of +looking down on others of our fellow-creatures, seemingly diminutive +in humbler stations, &c. &c.</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Sunday, 14th February, 1790.</i></p> + +<p>God help me! I am now obliged to</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Join night to day, and Sunday to the week.”<a name="FNanchor_197_197" id="FNanchor_197_197"></a><a href="#Footnote_197_197" class="fnanchor">[197]</a><br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>If there be any truth in the orthodox faith of these churches, I am +d—mned past redemption, and what is worse, d—mned to all eternity. I +am deeply read in Boston’s Four-fold State, Marshal on Sanctification, +Guthrie’s Trial of a Saving Interest, &c.; but “there is no balm in +Gilead, there is no physician there,” for me; so I shall e’en turn +Arminian, and trust to “sincere though imperfect obedience.”</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Tuesday, 16th.</i></p> + +<p>Luckily for me, I was prevented from the discussion of the knotty +point at which I had just made a full stop. All my fears and care are +of this world: if there is another, an honest man has nothing to fear +from it. I hate a man that wishes to be a Deist: but I fear, every +fair, unprejudiced inquirer must in some degree be a sceptic. It is +not that there are any very staggering arguments against the +immortality of man; but like electricity, phlogiston, &c., the subject +is so involved in darkness, that we want data to go upon. One thing +frightens me much: that we are to live for ever, seems <i>too good news +to be true.</i> That we are to enter into a new scene of existence, +where, exempt from want and pain, we shall enjoy ourselves and our +friends without satiety or separation—how much should I be indebted +to any one who could fully assure me that this was certain!</p> + +<p>My time is once more expired. I will write to Mr. Cleghorn soon. God +bless him and all his concerns! And may all the powers that preside +over conviviality and friendship, be present with all their kindest +influence, when the bearer of this, Mr. Syme, and you meet! I wish I +could also make one.</p> + +<p>Finally, brethren, farewell! Whatsoever things are lovely, whatsoever +things are gentle, whatsoever things are charitable, whatsoever things +are kind, think on these things, and think on</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + + + + + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_197_197" id="Footnote_197_197"></a><a href="#FNanchor_197_197"><span class="label">[197]</span></a> Young. <i>Satire on Women.</i></p></div> +</div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_423" id="Page_423">[423]</a></span></p> + +<h2><a name="letterCLXXXIX" id="letterCLXXXIX"></a>CLXXXIX.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. PETER HILL.</h3> + +<p>[That Burns turned at this time his thoughts on the drama, this order +to his bookseller for dramatic works, as well as his attendances at +the Dumfries theatre, afford proof.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Ellisland, 2d March, 1790.</i></p> + +<p>At a late meeting of the Monkland Friendly Society, it was resolved to +augment their library by the following books, which you are to send us +as soon as possible:—The Mirror, The Lounger, Man of Feeling, Man of +the World, (these, for my own sake, I wish to have by the first +carrier), Knox’s History of the Reformation; Rae’s History of the +Rebellion in 1715; any good history of the rebellion in 1745; A +Display of the Secession Act and Testimony, by Mr. Gibb; Hervey’s +Meditations; Beveridge’s Thoughts; and another copy of Watson’s Body +of Divinity.</p> + +<p>I wrote to Mr. A. Masterton three or four months ago, to pay some +money he owed me into your hands, and lately I wrote to you to the +same purpose, but I have heard from neither one or other of you.</p> + +<p>In addition to the books I commissioned in my last, I want very much +An Index to the Excise Laws, or an Abridgment of all the Statutes now +in force relative to the Excise, by Jellinger Symons; I want three +copies of this book: if it is now to be had, cheap or dear, get it for +me. An honest country neighbour of mine wants too a Family Bible, the +larger the better; but second-handed, for he does not choose to give +above ten shillings for the book. I want likewise for myself, as you +can pick them up, second-handed or cheap, copies of Otway’s Dramatic +Works, Ben Jonson’s, Dryden’s, Congreve’s, Wycherley’s, Vanbrugh’s, +Cibber’s, or any dramatic works of the more modern, Macklin, Garrick, +Foote, Colman, or Sheridan. A good copy too of Moliere, in French, I +much want. Any other good dramatic authors in that language I want +also; but comic authors, chiefly, though I should wish to have Racine, +Corneille, and Voltaire too. I am in no hurry for all, or any of +these, but if you accidentally meet with them very cheap, get them for +me.</p> + +<p>And now to quit the dry walk of business, how do you do, my dear +friend? and how is Mrs. Hill? I trust, if now and then not so +<i>elegantly</i> handsome, at least as amiable, and sings as divinely as +ever. My good wife too has a charming “wood-note wild;” now could we +four ——.</p> + +<p>I am out of all patience with this vile world, for one thing. Mankind +are by nature benevolent creatures, except in a few scoundrelly +instances. I do not think that avarice of the good things we chance to +have, is born with us; but we are placed here amid so much nakedness, +and hunger, and poverty, and want, that we are under a cursed +necessity of studying selfishness, in order that we may +<span class="smcap">exist</span>! Still there are, in every age, a few souls, that all +the wants and woes of life cannot debase to selfishness, or even to +the necessary alloy of caution and prudence. If ever I am in danger of +vanity, it is when I contemplate myself on this side of my disposition +and character. God knows I am no saint; I have a whole host of follies +and sin, to answer for; but if I could, and I believe I do it as far +as I can, I would wipe away all tears from all eyes.</p> + +<p class="sig8">Adieu!</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + + + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCXC" id="letterCXC"></a>CXC.</h2> + +<h3>TO MRS. DUNLOP.</h3> + +<p>[It is not a little singular that Burns says, in this letter, he had +just met with the Mirror and Lounger for the first time: it will be +remembered that a few years before a generous article was dedicated by +Mackenzie, the editor, to the Poems of Burns, and to this the poet +often alludes in his correspondence.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Ellisland, 10th April, 1790.</i></p> + +<p>I have just now, my ever honoured friend, enjoyed a very high luxury, +in reading a paper of the Lounger. You know my national prejudices. I +had often read and admired the Spectator, Adventurer, Rambler, and +World; but still with a certain regret, that they were so thoroughly +and entirely English. Alas! have I often said to myself, what are all +the boasted advantages which my country reaps from the union, that can +counterbalance the annihilation of her independence, and even her very +name! I often repeat that couplet of my favourite poet, Goldsmith—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“——— States of native liberty possest,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Tho’ very poor, may yet be very blest.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>Nothing can reconcile me to the common terms, “English ambassador, +English court,” &c. And I am out of all patience to see that<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_424" id="Page_424">[424]</a></span> +equivocal character, Hastings, impeached by “the Commons of England.” +Tell me, my friend, is this weak prejudice? I believe in my conscience +such ideas as “my country; her independence; her honour; the +illustrious names that mark the history of my native land;” &c.—I +believe these, among your <i>men of the world</i>, men who in fact guide +for the most part and govern our world, are looked on as so many +modifications of wrongheadedness. They know the use of bawling out +such terms, to rouse or lead <span class="smcap">the rabble</span>; but for their own +private use, with almost all the <i>able statesmen</i> that ever existed, +or now exist, when they talk of right and wrong, they only mean proper +and improper; and their measure of conduct is, not what they +<span class="smcap">ought</span>, but what they <span class="smcap">dare</span>. For the truth of this I +shall not ransack the history of nations, but appeal to one of the +ablest judges of men that ever lived—the celebrated Earl of +Chesterfield. In fact, a man who could thoroughly control his vices +whenever they interfered with his interests, and who could completely +put on the appearance of every virtue as often as it suited his +purposes, is, on the Stanhopean plan, the <i>perfect man</i>; a man to lead +nations. But are great abilities, complete without a flaw, and +polished without a blemish, the standard of human excellence? This is +certainly the staunch opinion of <i>men of the world</i>; but I call on +honour, virtue, and worth, to give the stygian doctrine a loud +negative! However, this must be allowed, that, if you abstract from +man the idea of an existence beyond the grave, <i>then</i> the true measure +of human conduct is, <i>proper</i> and <i>improper</i>: virtue and vice, as +dispositions of the heart, are, in that case, of scarcely the same +import and value to the world at large, as harmony and discord in the +modifications of sound; and a delicate sense of honour, like a nice +ear for music, though it may sometimes give the possessor an ecstasy +unknown to the coarser organs of the herd, yet, considering the harsh +gratings, and inharmonic jars, in this ill-tuned state of being, it is +odds but the individual would be as happy, and certainly would be as +much respected by the true judges of society as it would then stand, +without either a good ear or a good heart.</p> + +<p>You must know I have just met with the Mirror and Lounger for the +first time, and I am quite in raptures with them; I should be glad to +have your opinion of some of the papers. The one I have just read, +Lounger, No. 61, has cost me more honest tears than anything I have +read of a long time. Mackenzie has been called the Addison of the +Scots, and in my opinion, Addison would not be hurt at the comparison. +If he has not Addison’s exquisite humour, he as certainly outdoes him +in the tender and the pathetic. His Man of Feeling (but I am not +counsel learned in the laws of criticism) I estimate as the first +performance in its kind I ever saw. From what book, moral or even +pious, will the susceptible young mind receive impressions more +congenial to humanity and kindness, generosity and benevolence; in +short, more of all that ennobles the soul to herself, or endears her +to others—than from the simple affecting tale of poor Harley?</p> + +<p>Still, with all my admiration of Mackenzie’s writings, I do not know +if they are the fittest reading for a young man who is about to set +out, as the phrase is, to make his way into life. Do not you think, +Madam, that among the few favoured of heaven in the structure of their +minds (for such there certainly are) there may be a purity, a +tenderness, a dignity, an elegance of soul, which are of no use, nay, +in some degree, absolutely disqualifying for the truly important +business of making a man’s way into life? If I am not much mistaken, +my gallant young friend, A * * * * * *, is very much under these +disqualifications; and for the young females of a family I could +mention, well may they excite parental solicitude, for I, a common +acquaintance, or as my vanity will have it, an humble friend, have +often trembled for a turn of mind which may render them eminently +happy—or peculiarly miserable!</p> + +<p>I have been manufacturing some verses lately; but when I have got the +most hurried season of excise business over, I hope to have more +leisure to transcribe anything that may show how much I have the +honour to be, Madam,</p> + +<p class="sig9">Yours, &c.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + + + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCXCI" id="letterCXCI"></a>CXCI.</h2> + +<h3>TO COLLECTOR MITCHELL.</h3> + +<p>[Collector Mitchell was a kind and considerate gentle man: to his +grandson, Mr. John Campbell, surgeon, in Aberdeen, I owe this +characteristic letter.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Ellisland, 1790.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">Sir</span>,</p> + +<p>I shall not fail to wait on Captain Riddel<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_425" id="Page_425">[425]</a></span> to-night—I wish and pray +that the goddess of justice herself would appear to-morrow among our +hon. gentlemen, merely to give them a word in their ear that mercy to +the thief is injustice to the honest man. For my part I have galloped +over my ten parishes these four days, until this moment that I am just +alighted, or rather, that my poor jackass-skeleton of a horse has let +me down; for the miserable devil has been on his knees half a score of +times within the last twenty miles, telling me in his own way, +‘Behold, am not I thy faithful jade of a horse, on which thou hast +ridden these many years!’</p> + +<p>In short, Sir, I have broke my horse’s wind, and almost broke my own +neck, besides some injuries in a part that shall be nameless, owing to +a hard-hearted stone for a saddle. I find that every offender has so +many great men to espouse his cause, that I shall not be surprised if +I am committed to the strong hold of the law to-morrow for insolence +to the dear friends of the gentlemen of the country.</p> + +<p class="sig3">I have the honour to be, Sir,</p> + +<p class="sig4">Your obliged and obedient humble</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + + + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCXCII" id="letterCXCII"></a>CXCII.</h2> + +<h3>TO DR. MOORE.</h3> + +<p>[The sonnets alluded to by Burns were those of Charlotte Smith: the +poet’s copy is now before me, with a few marks of his pen on the +margins.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Dumfries, Excise-Office, 14th July, 1790.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">Sir</span>,</p> + +<p>Coming into town this morning, to attend my duty in this office, it +being collection-day, I met with a gentleman who tells me he is on his +way to London; so I take the opportunity of writing to you, as +franking is at present under a temporary death. I shall have some +snatches of leisure through the day, amid our horrid business and +bustle, and I shall improve them as well as I can; but let my letter +be as stupid as * * * * * * * * *, as miscellaneous as a newspaper, as short as a +hungry grace-before-meat, or as long as a law-paper in the Douglas +cause; as ill-spelt as country John’s billet-doux, or as unsightly a +scrawl as Betty Byre-Mucker’s answer to it; I hope, considering +circumstances, you will forgive it; and as it will put you to no +expense of postage, I shall have the less reflection about it.</p> + +<p>I am sadly ungrateful in not returning you my thanks for your most +valuable present, <i>Zeluco.</i> In fact, you are in some degree blameable +for my neglect. You were pleased to express a wish for my opinion of +the work, which so flattered me, that nothing less would serve my +overweening fancy, than a formal criticism on the book. In fact, I +have gravely planned a comparative view of you, Fielding, Richardson, +and Smollett, in your different qualities and merits as novel-writers. +This, I own, betrays my ridiculous vanity, and I may probably never +bring the business to bear; and I am fond of the spirit young Elihu +shows in the book of Job—“And I said, I will also declare my +opinion,” I have quite disfigured my copy of the book with my +annotations. I never take it up without at the same time taking my +pencil, and marking with asterisms, parentheses, &c., wherever I meet +with an original thought, a nervous remark on life and manners, a +remarkable well-turned period, or a character sketched with uncommon +precision.</p> + +<p>Though I should hardly think of fairly writing out my “Comparative +View,” I shall certainly trouble you with my remarks, such as they +are.</p> + +<p>I have just received from my gentleman that horrid summons in the book +of Revelations—“That time shall be no more!”</p> + +<p>The little collection of sonnets have some charming poetry in them. If +<i>indeed</i> I am indebted to the fair author for the book, and not, as I +rather suspect, to a celebrated author of the other sex, I should +certainly have written to the lady, with my grateful acknowledgments, +and my own ideas of the comparative excellence of her pieces. I would +do this last, not from any vanity of thinking that my remarks could be +of much consequence to Mrs. Smith, but merely from my own feelings as +an author, doing as I would be done by.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + + + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCXCIII" id="letterCXCIII"></a>CXCIII.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. MURDOCH,</h3> + +<h4>TEACHER OF FRENCH, LONDON.</h4> + +<p>[The account of himself, promised to Murdoch by Burns, was never +written.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Ellisland, July 16, 1790.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">My dear Sir</span>,</p> + +<p>I received a letter from you a long time ago,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_426" id="Page_426">[426]</a></span> but unfortunately, as +it was in the time of my peregrinations and journeyings through +Scotland, I mislaid or lost it, and by consequence your direction +along with it. Luckily my good star brought me acquainted with Mr. +Kennedy, who, I understand, is an acquaintance of yours: and by his +means and mediation I hope to replace that link which my unfortunate +negligence had so unluckily broke in the chain of our correspondence. +I was the more vexed at the vile accident, as my brother William, a +journeyman saddler, has been for some time in London; and wished above +all things for your direction, that he might have paid his respects to +his father’s friend.</p> + +<p>His last address he sent me was, “Wm. Burns, at Mr. Barber’s, saddler, +No. 181, Strand.” I writ him by Mr. Kennedy, but neglected to ask him +for your address; so, if you find a spare half-minute, please let my +brother know by a card where and when he will find you, and the poor +fellow will joyfully wait on you, as one of the few surviving friends +of the man whose name, and Christian name too, he has the honour to +bear.</p> + +<p>The next letter I write you shall be a long one. I have much to tell +you of “hair-breadth ‘scapes in th’ imminent deadly breach,” with all +the eventful history of a life, the early years of which owed so much +to your kind tutorage; but this at an hour of leisure. My kindest +compliments to Mrs. Murdoch and family.</p> + +<p class="sig4">I am ever, my dear Sir,</p> + +<p class="sig10">Your obliged friend,</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + + + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCXCIV" id="letterCXCIV"></a>CXCIV.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. M’MURDO.</h3> + +<p>[This hasty note was accompanied by the splendid elegy on Matthew +Henderson, and no one could better feel than M’Murdo, to whom it is +addressed, the difference between the music of verse and the clangour +of politics.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Ellisland, 2d August, 1790.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">Sir</span>,</p> + +<p>Now that you are over with the sirens of Flattery, the harpies of +Corruption, and the furies of Ambition, these infernal deities, that +on all sides, and in all parties, preside over the villanous business +of politics, permit a rustic muse of your acquaintance to do her best +to soothe you with a song.—</p> + +<p>You knew Henderson—I have not flattered his memory.</p> + +<p class="sig4">I have the honour to be, Sir,</p> + +<p class="sig5">Your obliged humble servant,</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + + + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCXCV" id="letterCXCV"></a>CXCV.</h2> + +<h3>TO MRS. DUNLOP.</h3> + +<p>[Inquiries have been made in vain after the name of Burns’s ci-devant +friend, who had so deeply wounded his feelings.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>8th August, 1790.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">Dear Madam</span>,</p> + +<p>After a long day’s toil, plague, and care, I sit down to write to you. +Ask me not why I have delayed it so long! It was owing to hurry, +indolence, and fifty other things; in short to anything—but +forgetfulness of <i>la plus aimable de son sexe.</i> By the bye, you are +indebted your best courtesy to me for this last compliment; as I pay +it from my sincere conviction of its truth—a quality rather rare in +compliments of these grinning, bowing, scraping times.</p> + +<p>Well, I hope writing to <i>you</i> will ease a little my troubled soul. +Sorely has it been bruised to-day! A ci-devant friend of mine, and an +intimate acquaintance of yours, has given my feelings a wound that I +perceive will gangrene dangerously ere it cure. He has wounded my +pride!</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + + + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCXCVI" id="letterCXCVI"></a>CXCVI.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. CUNNINGHAM.</h3> + +<p>[“The strain of invective,” says the judicious Currie, of this letter, +“goes on some time longer in the style in which our bard was too apt +to indulge, and of which the reader has already seen so much.”]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Ellisland, 8th August, 1790.</i></p> + +<p>Forgive me, my once dear, and ever dear friend, my seeming negligence. +You cannot sit down and fancy the busy life I lead.</p> + +<p>I laid down my goose-feather to beat my brains for an apt simile, and +had some thoughts of a country grannum at a family christening; a +bride on the market-day before her marriage; or a tavern-keeper at an +election-dinner; but the resemblance that hits my fancy best is, that<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_427" id="Page_427">[427]</a></span> +blackguard miscreant, Satan, who roams about like a roaring lion, +seeking, <i>searching</i> whom he may devour. However, tossed about as I +am, if I choose (and who would not choose) to bind down with the +crampets of attention the brazen foundation of integrity, I may rear +up the superstructure of Independence, and from its daring turrets bid +defiance to the storms of fate. And is not this a “consummation +devoutly to be wished?”</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Thy spirit, Independence, let me share;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Lord of the lion-heart, and eagle-eye!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thy steps I follow with my bosom bare,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Nor heed the storm that howls along the sky!”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>Are not these noble verses? They are the introduction of Smollett’s +Ode to Independence: if you have not seen the poem, I will send it to +you.—How wretched is the man that hangs on by the favours of the +great! To shrink from every dignity of man, at the approach of a +lordly piece of self-consequence, who, amid all his tinsel glitter, +and stately hauteur, is but a creature formed as thou art—and perhaps +not so well formed as thou art—came into the world a puling infant as +thou didst, and must go out of it, as all men must, a naked corse.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + + + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCXCVII" id="letterCXCVII"></a>CXCVII.</h2> + +<h3>TO DR. ANDERSON.</h3> + +<p>[The gentleman to whom this imperfect note is addressed was Dr. James +Anderson, a well-known agricultural and miscellaneous writer, and the +editor of a weekly miscellany called the Bee.]</p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">Sir</span>,</p> + +<p>I am much indebted to my worthy friend, Dr. Blacklock, for introducing +me to a gentleman of Dr. Anderson’s celebrity; but when you do me the +honour to ask my assistance in your proposed publication, alas, Sir! +you might as well think to cheapen a little honesty at the sign of an +advocate’s wig, or humility under the Geneva band. I am a miserable +hurried devil, worn to the marrow in the friction of holding the noses +of the poor publicans to the grindstone of the excise! and, like +Milton’s Satan, for private reasons, am forced</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“To do what yet though damn’d I would abhor.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>—and, except a couplet or two of honest execration * * * *</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + + + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCXCVIII" id="letterCXCVIII"></a>CXCVIII.</h2> + +<h3>TO WILLIAM TYTLER, ESQ.,</h3> + +<h4>OF WOODHOUSELEE.</h4> + +<p>[William Tytler was the “revered defender of the beauteous Stuart”—a +man of genius and a gentleman.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Lawn Market, August, 1790.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">Sir</span>,</p> + +<p>Enclosed I have sent you a sample of the old pieces that are still to +be found among our peasantry in the west. I had once a great many of +these fragments, and some of these here, entire; but as I had no idea +then that anybody cared for them, I have forgotten them. I invariably +hold it sacrilege to add anything of my own to help out with the +shattered wrecks of these venerable old compositions; but they have +many various readings. If you have not seen these before, I know they +will flatter your true old-style Caledonian feelings; at any rate I am +truly happy to have an opportunity of assuring you how sincerely I am, +revered Sir,</p> + +<p class="sig3">Your gratefully indebted humble servant,</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + + + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCXCIX" id="letterCXCIX"></a>CXCIX.</h2> + +<h3>TO CRAUFORD TAIT, ESQ.,</h3> + +<h4>EDINBURGH.</h4> + +<p>[Margaret Chalmers had now, it appears by this letter, become Mrs. +Lewis Hay: her friend, Charlotte Hamilton, had been for some time Mrs. +Adair, of Scarborough: Miss Nimmo was the lady who introduced Burns to +the far-famed Clarinda.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Ellisland</i>, 15th <i>October, 1790.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">Dear Sir</span>,</p> + +<p>Allow me to introduce to your acquaintance the bearer, Mr. Wm. Duncan, +a friend of mine, whom I have long known and long loved. His father, +whose only son he is, has a decent little property in Ayrshire, and +has bred the young man to the law, in which department he comes up an +adventurer to your good town. I shall give you my friend’s character +in two words: as to his head, he has talents enough, and more than +enough for common life; as to his heart, when nature had kneaded the +kindly clay that composes it, she said, “I can no more.”</p> + +<p>You, my good Sir, were born under kinder stars; but your fraternal +sympathy, I well know<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_428" id="Page_428">[428]</a></span> can enter into the feelings of the young man, +who goes into life with the laudable ambition to <i>do</i> something, and +to <i>be</i> something among his fellow-creatures; but whom the +consciousness of friendless obscurity presses to the earth, and wounds +to the soul!</p> + +<p>Even the fairest of his virtues are against him. That independent +spirit, and that ingenuous modesty, qualities inseparable from a noble +mind, are, with the million, circumstances not a little disqualifying. +What pleasure is in the power of the fortunate and the happy, by their +notice and patronage, to brighten the countenance and glad the heart +of such depressed youth! I am not so angry with mankind for their deaf +economy of the purse:—the goods of this world cannot be divided +without being lessened—but why be a niggard of that which bestows +bliss on a fellow-creature, yet takes nothing from our own means of +enjoyment? We wrap ourselves up in the cloak of our own better +fortune, and turn away our eyes, lest the wants and woes of our +brother-mortals should disturb the selfish apathy of our souls!</p> + +<p>I am the worst hand in the world at asking a favour. That indirect +address, that insinuating implication, which, without any positive +request, plainly expresses your wish, is a talent not to be acquired +at a plough-tail. Tell me then, for you can, in what periphrasis of +language, in what circumvolution of phrase, I shall envelope, yet not +conceal this plain story.—“My dear Mr. Tait, my friend Mr. Duncan, +whom I have the pleasure of introducing to you, is a young lad of your +own profession, and a gentleman of much modesty, and great worth. +Perhaps it may be in your power to assist him in the, to him, +important consideration of getting a place; but at all events, your +notice and acquaintance will be a very great acquisition to him; and I +dare pledge myself that he will never disgrace your favour.”</p> + +<p>You may possibly be surprised, Sir, at such a letter from me; ’tis, I +own, in the usual way of calculating these matters, more than our +acquaintance entitles me to; but my answer is short:—Of all the men +at your time of life, whom I knew in Edinburgh, you are the most +accessible on the side on which I have assailed you. You are very much +altered indeed from what you were when I knew you, if generosity point +the path you will not tread, or humanity call to you in vain.</p> + +<p>As to myself, a being to whose interest I believe you are still a +well-wisher; I am here, breathing at all times, thinking sometimes, +and rhyming now and then. Every situation has its share of the cares +and pains of life, and my situation I am persuaded has a full ordinary +allowance of its pleasures and enjoyments.</p> + +<p>My best compliments to your father and Miss Tait. If you have an +opportunity, please remember me in the solemn league and covenant of +friendship to Mrs. Lewis Hay. I am a wretch for not writing her; but I +am so hackneyed with self-accusation in that way, that my conscience +lies in my bosom with scarce the sensibility of an oyster in its +shell. Where is Lady M’Kenzie? wherever she is, God bless her! I +likewise beg leave to trouble you with compliments to Mr. Wm. +Hamilton; Mrs. Hamilton and family; and Mrs. Chalmers, when you are in +that country. Should you meet with Miss Nimmo, please remember me +kindly to her.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + + + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCC" id="letterCC"></a>CC.</h2> + +<h3>TO ——.</h3> + +<p>[This letter contained the Kirk’s Alarm, a satire written to help the +cause of Dr. M’Gill, who recanted his heresy rather than be removed +from his kirk.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Ellisland, 1790.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">Dear Sir</span>,</p> + +<p>Whether in the way of my trade I can be of any service to the Rev. +Doctor, is I fear very doubtful. Ajax’s shield consisted, I think, of +seven bull-hides and a plate of brass, which altogether set Hector’s +utmost force at defiance. Alas! I am not a Hector, and the worthy +Doctor’s foes are as securely armed as Ajax was. Ignorance, +superstition, bigotry, stupidity, malevolence, self-conceit, envy—all +strongly bound in a massy frame of brazen impudence. Good God, Sir! to +such a shield, humour is the peck of a sparrow, and satire the pop-gun +of a school-boy. Creation-disgracing scelerats such as they, God only +can mend, and the devil only can punish. In the comprehending way of +Caligula, I wish they all had but one neck. I feel impotent as a child +to the ardour of my wishes! O for a withering curse to blast the +germins of their wicked machinations! O for a poisonous tornado, +winged from the torrid zone of Tar<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_429" id="Page_429">[429]</a></span>tarus, to sweep the spreading crop +of their villainous contrivances to the lowest hell!</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + + + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCCI" id="letterCCI"></a>CCI.</h2> + +<h3>TO MRS. DUNLOP.</h3> + +<p>[The poet wrote out several copies of Tam o’ Shanter and sent them to +his friends, requesting their criticisms: he wrote few poems so +universally applauded.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Ellisland, November, 1790.</i></p> + +<p>“As cold waters to a thirsty soul, so is good news from a far +country.”</p> + +<p>Fate has long owed me a letter of good news from you, in return for +the many tidings of sorrow which I have received. In this instance I +most cordially obey the apostle—“Rejoice with them that do +rejoice”—for me, <i>to sing</i> for joy, is no new thing; but <i>to preach</i> +for joy, as I have done in the commencement of this epistle, is a +pitch of extravagant rapture to which I never rose before.</p> + +<p>I read your letter—I literally jumped for joy—How could such a +mercurial creature as a poet lumpishly keep his seat on the receipt of +the best news from his best friend. I seized my gilt-headed Wangee +rod, an instrument indispensably necessary in my left hand, in the +moment of inspiration and rapture; and stride, stride—quick and +quicker—out skipt I among the broomy banks of Nith to muse over my +joy by retail. To keep within the bounds of prose was impossible. Mrs. +Little’s is a more elegant, but not a more sincere compliment to the +sweet little fellow, than I, extempore almost, poured out to him in +the following verses:—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Sweet flow’ret, pledge o’ meikle love<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And ward o’ mony a prayer,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">What heart o’ stane wad thou na move,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Sae helpless, sweet, an’ fair.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">November hirples o’er the lea<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Chill on thy lovely form;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But gane, alas! the shelt’ring tree<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Should shield thee frae the storm.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>I am much flattered by your approbation of my <i>Tam o’ Shanter</i>, which +you express in your former letter; though, by the bye, you load me in +that said letter with accusations heavy and many; to all which I +plead, <i>not guilty</i>! Your book is, I hear, on the road to reach me. As +to printing of poetry, when you prepare it for the press, you have +only to spell it right, and place the capital letters properly: as to +the punctuation, the printers do that themselves.</p> + +<p>I have a copy of <i>Tam o’ Shanter</i> ready to send you by the first +opportunity: it is too heavy to send by post.</p> + +<p>I heard of Mr. Corbet lately. He, in consequence of your +recommendation, is most zealous to serve me. Please favour me soon +with an account of your good folks; if Mrs. H. is recovering, and the +young gentleman doing well.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + + + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCCII" id="letterCCII"></a>CCII.</h2> + +<h3>TO LADY W. M. CONSTABLE.</h3> + +<p>[The present alluded to was a gold snuff-box, with a portrait of Queen +Mary on the lid.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Ellisland, 11th January, 1791.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">My Lady</span>,</p> + +<p>Nothing less than the unlucky accident of having lately broken my +right arm, could have prevented me, the moment I received your +ladyship’s elegant present by Mrs. Miller, from returning you my +warmest and most grateful acknowledgments. I assure your ladyship, I +shall set it apart—the symbols of religion shall only be more sacred. +In the moment of poetic composition, the box shall be my inspiring +genius. When I would breathe the comprehensive wish of benevolence for +the happiness of others, I shall recollect your ladyship; when I would +interest my fancy in the distresses incident to humanity, I shall +remember the unfortunate Mary.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + + + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCCIII" id="letterCCIII"></a>CCIII.</h2> + +<h3>TO WILLIAM DUNBAR, W.S.</h3> + +<p>[This letter was in answer to one from Dunbar, in which the witty +colonel of the Crochallan Fencibles supposed the poet had been +translated to Elysium to sing to the immortals, as his voice had not +been beard of late on earth.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Ellisland, 17th January, 1791.</i></p> + +<p>I am not gone to Elysium, most noble colonel, but am still here in +this sublunary world, serving my God, by propagating his image, and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_430" id="Page_430">[430]</a></span> +honouring my king by begetting him loyal subjects.</p> + +<p>Many happy returns of the season await my friend. May the thorns of +care never beset his path! May peace be an inmate of his bosom, and +rapture a frequent visitor of his soul! May the blood-hounds of +misfortune never track his steps, nor the screech-owl of sorrow alarm +his dwelling! May enjoyment tell thy hours, and pleasure number thy +days, thou friend of the bard! “Blessed be he that blesseth thee, and +cursed be he that curseth thee!!!”</p> + +<p>As a further proof that I am still in the land of existence, I send +you a poem, the latest I have composed. I have a particular reason for +wishing you only to show it to select friends, should you think it +worthy a friend’s perusal; but if, at your first leisure hour, you +will favour me with your opinion of, and strictures on the +performance, it will be an additional obligation on, dear Sir, your +deeply indebted humble servant,</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + + + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCCIV" id="letterCCIV"></a>CCIV.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. PETER HILL.</h3> + +<p>[The poet’s eloquent apostrophe to poverty has no little feeling in +it: he beheld the money which his poems brought melt silently away, +and he looked to the future with more fear than hope.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Ellisland, 17th January, 1791.</i></p> + +<p>Take these two guineas, and place them over against that d—mned +account of yours! which has gagged my mouth these five or six months! +I can as little write good things as apologies to the man I owe money +to. O the supreme curse of making three guineas do the business of +five! Not all the labours of Hercules; not all the Hebrews’ three +centuries of Egyptian bondage, were such an insuperable business, such +an infernal task!! Poverty! thou half-sister of death, thou +cousin-german of hell: where shall I find force of execration equal to +the amplitude of thy demerits? Oppressed by thee, the venerable +ancient, grown hoary in the practice of every virtue, laden with years +and wretchedness, implores a little—little aid to support his +existence, from a stony-hearted son of Mammon, whose sun of prosperity +never knew a cloud; and is by him denied and insulted. Oppressed by +thee, the man of sentiment, whose heart glows with independence, and +melts with sensibility, inly pines under the neglect, or writhes in +bitterness of soul, under the contumely of arrogant, unfeeling wealth. +Oppressed by thee, the son of genius, whose ill-starred ambition +plants him at the tables of the fashionable and polite, must see in +suffering silence, his remark neglected, and his person despised, +while shallow greatness in his idiot attempts at wit, shall meet with +countenance and applause. Nor is it only the family of worth that have +reason to complain of thee: the children of folly and vice, though in +common with thee the offspring of evil, smart equally under thy rod. +Owing to thee, the man of unfortunate disposition and neglected +education, is condemned as a fool for his dissipation, despised and +shunned as a needy wretch, when his follies as usual bring him to +want; and when his unprincipled necessities drive him to dishonest +practices, he is abhorred as a miscreant, and perishes by the justice +of his country. But far otherwise is the lot of the man of family and +fortune. <i>His</i> early follies and extravagance, are spirit and fire; +<i>his</i> consequent wants are the embarrassments of an honest fellow; and +when, to remedy the matter, he has gained a legal commission to +plunder distant provinces, or massacre peaceful nations, he returns, +perhaps, laden with the spoils of rapine and murder; lives wicked and +respected, and dies a scoundrel and a lord.—Nay, worst of all, alas +for helpless woman! the needy prostitute, who has shivered at the +corner of the street, waiting to earn the wages of casual +prostitution, is left neglected and insulted, ridden down by the +chariot wheels of the coroneted <span class="smcap">Rip</span>, hurrying on to the +guilty assignation; she who without the same necessities to plead, +riots nightly in the same guilty trade.</p> + +<p>Well! divines may say of it what they please; but execration is to the +mind what phlebotomy is to the body: the vital sluices of both are +wonderfully relieved by their respective evacuations.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + + + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCCV" id="letterCCV"></a>CCV.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. CUNNINGHAM.</h3> + +<p>[To Alexander Cunningham the poet generally communicated his favourite +compositions.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Ellisland, 23d January, 1791.</i></p> + +<p>Many happy returns of the season to you, my dear friend! As many of +the good things<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_431" id="Page_431">[431]</a></span> of this life, as is consistent with the usual mixture +of good and evil in the cup of being!</p> + +<p>I have just finished a poem (Tam o’ Shanter) which you will receive +enclosed. It is my first essay in the way of tales.</p> + +<p>I have these several months been hammering at an elegy on the amiable +and accomplished Miss Burnet. I have got, and can get, no farther than +the following fragment, on which please give me your strictures. In +all kinds of poetic composition, I set great store by your opinion; +but in sentimental verses, in the poetry of the heart, no Roman +Catholic ever set more value on the infallibility of the Holy Father +than I do on yours.</p> + +<p>I mean the introductory couplets as text verses.</p> + +<h4>ELEGY</h4> +<h5>ON THE LATE MISS BURNET, OF MONBODDO.</h5> +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Life ne’er exulted in so rich a prize<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As Burnet lovely from her native skies;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Nor envious death so triumph’d in a blow,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As that which laid th’ accomplish’d Burnet low.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>Let me hear from you soon.</p> + +<p class="sig8">Adieu!</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + + + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCCVI" id="letterCCVI"></a>CCVI.</h2> + +<h3>TO A.F. TYTLER, ESQ.</h3> + +<p>[“I have seldom in my life,” says Lord Woodhouselee, “tasted a higher +enjoyment from any work of genius than I received from Tam o’ +Shanter.”]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Ellisland, February, 1791.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">Sir</span>,</p> + +<p>Nothing less than the unfortunate accident I have met with, could have +prevented my grateful acknowledgments for your letter. His own +favourite poem, and that an essay in the walk of the muses entirely +new to him, where consequently his hopes and fears were on the most +anxious alarm for his success in the attempt; to have that poem so +much applauded by one of the first judges, was the most delicious +vibration that ever thrilled along the heart-strings of a poor poet. +However, Providence, to keep up the proper proportion of evil with the +good, which it seems is necessary in this sublunary state, thought +proper to check my exultation by a very serious misfortune. A day or +two after I received your letter, my horse came down with me and broke +my right arm. As this is the first service my arm has done me since +its disaster, I find myself unable to do more than just in general +terms thank you for this additional instance of your patronage and +friendship. As to the faults you detected in the piece, they are truly +there: one of them, the hit at the lawyer and priest, I shall cut out; +as to the falling off in the catastrophe, for the reason you justly +adduce, it cannot easily be remedied. Your approbation, Sir, has given +me such additional spirits to persevere in this species of poetic +composition, that I am already revolving two or three stories in my +fancy. If I can bring these floating ideas to bear any kind of +embodied form, it will give me additional opportunity of assuring you +how much I have the honour to be, &c.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + + + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCCVII" id="letterCCVII"></a>CCVII.</h2> + +<h3>TO MRS. DUNLOP.</h3> + +<p>[The elegy on the beautiful Miss Burnet, of Monboddo, was laboured +zealously by Burns, but it never reached the excellence of some of his +other compositions.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Ellisland, 7th Feb. 1791.</i></p> + +<p>When I tell you, Madam, that by a fall, not from my horse, but with my +horse, I have been a cripple some time, and that this is the first day +my arm and hand have been able to serve me in writing; you will allow +that it is too good an apology for my seemingly ungrateful silence. I +am now getting better, and am able to rhyme a little, which implies +some tolerable ease, as I cannot think that the most poetic genius is +able to compose on the rack.</p> + +<p>I do not remember if ever I mentioned to you my having an idea of +composing an elegy on the late Miss Burnet, of Monboddo. I had the +honour of being pretty well acquainted with her, and have seldom felt +so much at the loss of an acquaintance, as when I heard that so +amiable and accomplished a piece of God’s work was no more. I have, as +yet, gone no farther than the following fragment, of which please let +me have your opinion. You know that elegy is a subject so much +exhausted, that any new idea on the business is not to be expected: +’tis well if we can place an old idea in a new light. How far I have +succeeded as to this last, you<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_432" id="Page_432">[432]</a></span> will judge from what follows. I have +proceeded no further.</p> + +<p>Your kind letter, with your kind <i>remembrance</i> of your godson, came +safe. This last, Madam, is scarcely what my pride can bear. As to the +little fellow, he is, partiality apart, the finest boy I have for a +long time seen. He is now seventeen months old, has the small-pox and +measles over, has cut several teeth, and never had a grain of doctor’s +drugs in his bowels.</p> + +<p>I am truly happy to hear that the “little floweret” is blooming so +fresh and fair, and that the “mother plant” is rather recovering her +drooping head. Soon and well may her “cruel wounds” be healed. I have +written thus far with a good deal of difficulty. When I get a little +abler you shall hear farther from,</p> + +<p class="sig9">Madam, yours,</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + + + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCCVIII" id="letterCCVIII"></a>CCVIII.</h2> + +<h3>TO THE REV. ARCH. ALISON.</h3> + +<p>[Alison was much gratified it is said, with this recognition of the +principles laid down in his ingenious and popular work.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Ellisland, near Dumfries, 14th Feb. 1791.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">Sir</span>,</p> + +<p>You must by this time have set me down as one of the most ungrateful +of men. You did me the honour to present me with a book, which does +honour to science and the intellectual powers of man, and I have not +even so much as acknowledged the receipt of it. The fact is, you +yourself are to blame for it. Flattered as I was by your telling me +that you wished to have my opinion of the work, the old spiritual +enemy of mankind, who knows well that vanity is one of the sins that +most easily beset me, put it into my head to ponder over the +performance with the look-out of a critic, and to draw up forsooth a +deep learned digest of strictures on a composition, of which, in fact, +until I read the book, I did not even know the first principles. I +own, Sir, that at first glance, several of your propositions startled +me as paradoxical. That the martial clangour of a trumpet had +something in it vastly more grand, heroic, and sublime, than the +twingle twangle of a jew’s-harp: that the delicate flexure of a +rose-twig, when the half-blown flower is heavy with the tears of the +dawn, was infinitely more beautiful and elegant than the upright stub +of a burdock; and that from something innate and independent of all +associations of ideas;—these I had set down as irrefragable, orthodox +truths, until perusing your book shook my faith.—In short, Sir, +except Euclid’s Elements of Geometry, which I made a shift to unravel +by my father’s fire-side, in the winter evening of the first season I +held the plough, I never read a book which gave me such a quantum of +information, and added so much to my stock of ideas, as your “Essays +on the Principles of Taste.” One thing, Sir, you must forgive my +mentioning as an uncommon merit in the work, I mean the language. To +clothe abstract philosophy in elegance of style, sounds something like +a contradiction in terms; but you have convinced me that they are +quite compatible.</p> + +<p>I enclose you some poetic bagatelles of my late composition. The one +in print<a name="FNanchor_198_198" id="FNanchor_198_198"></a><a href="#Footnote_198_198" class="fnanchor">[198]</a> is my first essay in the way of telling a tale.</p> + +<p class="sig9">I am, Sir, &c.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + + + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_198_198" id="Footnote_198_198"></a><a href="#FNanchor_198_198"><span class="label">[198]</span></a> Tam o’ Shanter</p></div> +</div> + +<p class="center"><img src="images/image_08.jpg" alt=""A NAVAL BATTLE."" width="500" height="694" /><br /> +<br /> +<span class="caption">“A NAVAL BATTLE.”</span></p> + +<h2><a name="letterCCIX" id="letterCCIX"></a>CCIX.</h2> + +<h3>TO DR. MOORE.</h3> + +<p>[Moore admired but moderately the beautiful ballad on Queen Mary, and +the Elegy on Captain Matthew Henderson: Tam o’ Shanter he thought full +of poetical beauties.—He again regrets that he writes in the language +of Scotland.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Ellisland, 20th February, 1791.</i></p> + +<p>I do not know, Sir, whether you are a subscriber to <i>Grose’s +Antiquities of Scotland.</i> If you are, the enclosed poem will not be +altogether new to you. Captain Grose did me the favour to send me a +dozen copies of the proof sheet, of which this is one. Should you have +read the piece before, still this will answer the principal end I have +in view: it will give me another opportunity of thanking you for all +your goodness to the rustic bard; and also of showing you, that the +abilities you have been pleased to commend and patronize are still +employed in the way you wish.</p> + +<p>The <i>Elegy on Captain Henderson</i>, is a tribute to the memory of a man +I loved much. Poets +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_433" id="Page_433">[433]</a></span> +have in this the same advantage as Roman Catholics; they can be of +service to their friends after they have passed that bourne where all +other kindness ceases to be of avail. Whether, after all, either the +one or the other be of any real service to the dead, is, I fear, very +problematical; but I am sure they are highly gratifying to the living: +and as a very orthodox text, I forget where in scripture, says, +“whatsoever is not of faith is sin;” so say I, whatsoever is not +detrimental to society, and is of positive enjoyment, is of God, the +giver of all good things, and ought to be received and enjoyed by his +creatures with thankful delight. As almost all my religious tenets +originate from my heart, I am wonderfully pleased with the idea, that +I can still keep up a tender intercourse with the dearly beloved +friend, or still more dearly beloved mistress, who is gone to the +world of spirits.</p> + +<p>The ballad on Queen Mary was begun while I was busy with <i>Percy’s +Reliques of English Poetry.</i> By the way, how much is every honest +heart, which has a tincture of Caledonian prejudice, obliged to you +for your glorious story of Buchanan and Targe! ’Twas an unequivocal +proof of your loyal gallantry of soul, giving Targe the victory. I +should have been mortified to the ground if you had not.</p> + +<p>I have just read over, once more of many times, your <i>Zeluco.</i> I +marked with my pencil, as I went along, every passage that pleased me +particularly above the rest; and one or two, I think, which with +humble deference, I am disposed to think unequal to the merits of the +book. I have sometimes thought to transcribe these marked passages, or +at least so much of them as to point where they are, and send them to +you. Original strokes that strongly depict the human heart, is your +and Fielding’s province beyond any other novelist I have ever perused. +Richardson indeed might perhaps be excepted; but unhappily, <i>dramatis +personæ</i> are beings of another world; and however they may captivate +the unexperienced, romantic fancy of a boy or a girl, they will ever, +in proportion as we have made human nature our study, dissatisfy our +riper years.</p> + +<p>As to my private concerns, I am going on, a mighty tax-gatherer before +the Lord, and have lately had the interest to get myself ranked on the +list of excise as a supervisor. I am not yet employed as such, but in +a few years I shall fall into the file of supervisorship by seniority. +I have had an immense loss in the death of the Earl of Glencairn; the +patron from whom all my fame and fortune took its rise. Independent of +my grateful attachment to him, which was indeed so strong that it +pervaded my very soul, and was entwined with the thread of my +existence: so soon as the prince’s friends had got in (and every dog +you know has his day), my getting forward in the excise would have +been an easier business than otherwise it will be. Though this was a +consummation devoutly to be wished, yet, thank Heaven, I can live and +rhyme as I am: and as to my boys, poor little fellows! if I cannot +place them on as high an elevation in life, as I could wish, I shall, +if I am favoured so much of the Disposer of events as to see that +period, fix them on as broad and independent a basis as possible. +Among the many wise adages which have been treasured up by our +Scottish ancestors, this is one of the best, <i>Better be the head o’ +the commonalty, than the tail o’ the gentry.</i></p> + +<p>But I am got on a subject, which however interesting to me, is of no +manner of consequence to you; so I shall give you a short poem on the +other page, and close this with assuring you how sincerely I have the +honour to be,</p> + +<p class="sig9">Yours, &c.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<p>Written on the blank leaf of a book, which I presented to a very young +lady, whom I had formerly characterized under the denomination of <i>The +Rose Bud.</i> * * *</p> + + + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCCX" id="letterCCX"></a>CCX.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. CUNNINGHAM.</h3> + +<p>[Cunningham could tell a merry story, and sing a humorous song; nor +was he without a feeling for the deep sensibilities of his friend’s +verse.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Ellisland, 12th March, 1791.</i></p> + +<p>If the foregoing piece be worth your strictures, let me have them. For +my own part, a thing that I have just composed always appears through +a double portion of that partial medium in which an author will ever +view his own works. I believe in general, novelty has something in it +that inebriates the fancy, and not unfrequently dissipates and fumes +away like other intoxication, and leaves the poor patient, as usual, +with<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_434" id="Page_434">[434]</a></span> an aching heart. A striking instance of this might be adduced, +in the revolution of many a hymeneal honeymoon. But lest I sink into +stupid prose, and so sacrilegiously intrude on the office of my +parish-priest, I shall fill up the page in my own way, and give you +another song of my late composition, which will appear perhaps in +Johnson’s work, as well as the former.</p> + +<p>You must know a beautiful Jacobite air, <i>There’ll never be peace ’till +Jamie comes hame.</i> When political combustion ceases to be the object +of princes and patriots, it then you know becomes the lawful prey of +historians and poets.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">By yon castle wa’ at the close of the day,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I heard a man sing, tho’ his head it was grey;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And as he was singing, the tears fast down came—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">There’ll never be peace till Jamie comes hame.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>If you like the air, and if the stanzas hit your fancy, you cannot +imagine, my dear friend, how much you would oblige me, if by the +charms of your delightful voice, you would give my honest effusion to +“the memory of joys that are past,” to the few friends whom you +indulge in that pleasure. But I have scribbled on ’till I hear the +clock has intimated the near approach of</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">That hour, o’ night’s black arch the key-stane.—<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>So good night to you! Sound be your sleep, and delectable your dreams! +Apropos, how do you like this thought in a ballad, I have just now on +the tapis?</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I look to the west when I gae to rest,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That happy my dreams and my slumbers may be;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Far, far in the west is he I lo’e best,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The lad that is dear to my babie and me!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>Good night, once more, and God bless you!</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + + + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCCXI" id="letterCCXI"></a>CCXI.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. ALEXANDER DALZEL,</h3> + +<h4>FACTOR, FINDLAYSTON.</h4> + +<p>[Cromek says that Alexander Dalzel introduced the poetry of Burns to +the notice of the Earl of Glencairn, who carried the Kilmarnock +edition with him to Edinburgh, and begged that the poet would let him +know what his views in the world were, that he might further them.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Ellisland, 19th March, 1791.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">My dear Sir,</span></p> + +<p>I have taken the liberty to frank this letter to you, as it encloses +an idle poem of mine, which I send you; and God knows you may perhaps +pay dear enough for it if you read it through. Not that this is my own +opinion; but the author, by the time he has composed and corrected his +work, has quite pored away all his powers of critical discrimination.</p> + +<p>I can easily guess from my own heart, what you have felt on a late +most melancholy event. God knows what I have suffered, at the loss of +my best friend, my first and dearest patron and benefactor; the man to +whom I owe all that I am and have! I am gone into mourning for him, +and with more sincerity of grief than I fear some will, who by +nature’s ties ought to feel on the occasion.</p> + +<p>I will be exceedingly obliged to you, indeed, to let me know the news +of the noble family, how the poor mother and the two sisters support +their loss. I had a packet of poetic bagatelles ready to send to Lady +Betty, when I saw the fatal tidings in the newspaper. I see by the +same channel that the honoured REMAINS of my noble patron, are +designed to be brought to the family burial-place. Dare I trouble you +to let me know privately before the day of interment, that I may cross +the country, and steal among the crowd, to pay a tear to the last +sight of my ever revered benefactor? It will oblige me beyond +expression.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + + + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCCXII" id="letterCCXII"></a>CCXII.</h2> + +<h3>TO MRS. GRAHAM,</h3> + +<h4>OF FINTRAY.</h4> + +<p>[Mrs. Graham, of Fintray, felt both as a lady and a Scottish one, the +tender Lament of the fair and unfortunate princess, which this letter +contained.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Ellisland, 1791.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">Madam</span>,</p> + +<p>Whether it is that the story of our Mary Queen of Scots has a peculiar +effect on the feelings of a poet, or whether I have, in the enclosed +ballad, succeeded beyond my usual poetic success, I know not; but it +has pleased me beyond any effort of my muse for a good while<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_435" id="Page_435">[435]</a></span> past; on +that account I enclose it particularly to you. It is true, the purity +of my motives may be suspected. I am already deeply indebted to Mr. +Graham’s goodness; and what, <i>in the usual ways of men</i>, is of +infinitely greater importance, Mr. G. can do me service of the utmost +importance in time to come. I was born a poor dog; and however I may +occasionally pick a better bone than I used to do, I know I must live +and die poor: but I will indulge the flattering faith that my poetry +will considerably outlive my poverty; and without any fustian +affectation of spirit, I can promise and affirm, that it must be no +ordinary craving of the latter shall ever make me do anything +injurious to the honest fame of the former. Whatever may be my +failings, for failings are a part of human nature, may they ever be +those of a generous heart, and an independent mind! It is no fault of +mine that I was born to dependence; nor is it Mr. Graham’s chiefest +praise that he can command influence; but it is his merit to bestow, +not only with the kindness of a brother, but with the politeness of a +gentleman; and I trust it shall be mine, to receive with thankfulness, +and remember with undiminished gratitude.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + + + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCCXIII" id="letterCCXIII"></a>CCXIII.</h2> + +<h3>TO MRS. GRAHAM,</h3> + +<h4>OF FINTRAY.</h4> + +<p>[The following letter was written on the blank leaf of a new edition +of his poems, presented by the poet, to one whom he regarded, and +justly, as a patroness.]</p> + +<p>It is probable, Madam, that this page may be read, when the hand that +now writes it shall be mouldering in the dust: may it then bear +witness, that I present you these volumes as a tribute of gratitude, +on my part ardent and sincere, as your and Mr. Graham’s goodness to me +has been generous and noble! May every child of yours, in the hour of +need, find such a friend as I shall teach every child of mine, that +their father found in you.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + + + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCCXIV" id="letterCCXIV"></a>CCXIV.</h2> + +<h3>TO THE REV. G. BAIRD.</h3> + +<p>[It was proposed to publish a new edition of the poems of Michael +Bruce, by subscription, and give the profits to his mother, a woman +eighty years old, and poor and helpless, and Burns was asked for a +poem to give a new impulse to the publication.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Ellisland, 1791.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">Reverend Sir</span>,</p> + +<p>Why did you, my dear Sir, write to me in such a hesitating style on +the business of poor Bruce? Don’t I know, and have I not felt, the +many ills, the peculiar ills that poetic flesh is heir to? You shall +have your choice of all the unpublished poems I have; and had your +letter had my direction, so as to have reached me sooner (it only came +to my hand this moment), I should have directly put you out of +suspense on the subject. I only ask, that some prefatory advertisement +in the book, as well as the subscription bills, may bear, that the +publication is solely for the benefit of Bruce’s mother. I would not +put it in the power of ignorance to surmise, or malice to insinuate, +that I clubbed a share in the work from mercenary motives. Nor need +you give me credit for any remarkable generosity in my part of the +business. I have such a host of peccadilloes, failings, follies, and +backslidings (anybody but myself might perhaps give some of them a +worse appellation), that by way of some balance, however trifling, in +the account, I am fain to do any good that occurs in my very limited +power to a fellow-creature, just for the selfish purpose of clearing a +little the vista of retrospection.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + + + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCCXV" id="letterCCXV"></a>CCXV.</h2> + +<h3>TO MRS. DUNLOP.</h3> + +<p>[Francis Wallace Burns, the godson of Mrs. Dunlop, to whom this letter +refers, died at the age of fourteen—he was a fine and a promising +youth.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Ellisland, 11th April, 1791.</i></p> + +<p>I am once more able, my honoured friend, to return you, with my own +hand, thanks for the many instances of your friendship, and +particularly for your kind anxiety in this last disaster, that my evil +genius had in store for me. However, life is chequered—joy and +sorrow—for on Saturday morning last, Mrs. Burns made me a present of +a fine boy; rather stouter, but not so handsome as your godson was at +his time of life. Indeed I look on your little namesake to be my <i>chef +d’œuvre</i> in that species of manufacture, as I look on Tam o’ +Shanter to be my standard performance in the poetical line. ’Tis<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_436" id="Page_436">[436]</a></span> +true, both the one and the other discover a spice of roguish waggery, +that might perhaps be as well spared; but then they also show, in my +opinion, a force of genius and a finishing polish that I despair of +ever excelling. Mrs. Burns is getting stout again, and laid as lustily +about her to-day at breakfast, as a reaper from the corn-ridge. That +is the peculiar privilege and blessing of our hale, sprightly damsels, +that are bred among the <i>hay and heather.</i> We cannot hope for that +highly polished mind, that charming delicacy of soul, which is found +among the female world in the more elevated stations of life, and +which is certainly by far the most bewitching charm in the famous +cestus of Venus. It is indeed such an inestimable treasure, that where +it can be had in its native heavenly purity, unstained by some one or +other of the many shades of affectation, and unalloyed by some one or +other of the many species of caprice, I declare to Heaven, I should +think it cheaply purchased at the expense of every other earthly good! +But as this angelic creature is, I am afraid, extremely rare in any +station and rank of life, and totally denied to such a humble one as +mine, we meaner mortals must put up with the next rank of female +excellence—as fine a figure and face we can produce as any rank of +life whatever; rustic, native grace; unaffected modesty, and unsullied +purity; nature’s mother-wit, and the rudiments of taste; a simplicity +of soul, unsuspicious of, because unacquainted with, the crooked ways +of a selfish, interested, disingenuous world; and the dearest charm of +all the rest, a yielding sweetness of disposition, and a generous +warmth of heart, grateful for love on our part, and ardently glowing +with a more than equal return; these, with a healthy frame, a sound, +vigorous constitution, which your higher ranks can scarcely ever hope +to enjoy, are the charms of lovely woman in my humble walk of life.</p> + +<p>This is the greatest effort my broken arm has yet made. Do let me +hear, by first post, how <i>cher petit Monsieur</i> comes on with his +small-pox. May almighty goodness preserve and restore him!</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCCXVI" id="letterCCXVI"></a>CCXVI.</h2> + +<h3>TO ——.</h3> + +<p>[That his works found their way to the newspapers, need have +occasioned no surprise: the poet gave copies of his favorite pieces +freely to his friends, as soon as they were written: who, in their +turn, spread their fame among their acquaintances.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Ellisland, 1791.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">Dear Sir</span>,</p> + +<p>I am exceedingly to blame in not writing you long ago; but the truth +is, that I am the most indolent of all human beings; and when I +matriculate in the herald’s office, I intend that my supporters shall +be two sloths, my crest a slow-worm, and the motto, “Deil tak the +foremost.” So much by way of apology for not thanking you sooner for +your kind execution of my commission.</p> + +<p>I would have sent you the poem; but somehow or other it found its way +into the public papers, where you must have seen it.</p> + +<p class="sig10">I am ever, dear Sir,</p> + +<p class="sig9">Yours sincerely,</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + + + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCCXVII" id="letterCCXVII"></a>CCXVII.</h2> + +<h3>TO ——.</h3> + +<p>[This singular letter was sent by Burns, it is believed, to a critic, +who had taken him to task about obscure language, and imperfect +grammar.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Ellisland, 1791.</i></p> + +<p>Thou eunuch of language: thou Englishman, who never was south the +Tweed: thou servile echo of fashionable barbarisms: thou quack, +vending the nostrums of empirical elocution: thou marriage-maker +between vowels and consonants, on the Gretna-green of caprice: thou +cobler, botching the flimsy socks of bombast oratory: thou blacksmith, +hammering the rivets of absurdity: thou butcher, imbruing thy hands in +the bowels of orthography: thou arch-heretic in pronunciation: thou +pitch-pipe of affected emphasis: thou carpenter, mortising the awkward +joints of jarring sentences: thou squeaking dissonance of cadence: +thou pimp of gender: thou Lion Herald to silly etymology: thou +antipode of grammar: thou executioner of construction: thou brood of +the speech-distracting builders of the Tower of Babel; thou lingual +confusion worse confounded: thou scape-gallows from the land of +syntax: thou scavenger of mood and tense: thou murderous accoucheur of +infant learning; thou <i>ignis fatuus</i>, misleading the steps of +benighted ignorance: thou pickle-herring in the puppet-show of +nonsense: thou faithful recorder of barbarous idiom: thou<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_437" id="Page_437">[437]</a></span> persecutor +of syllabication: thou baleful meteor, foretelling and facilitating +the rapid approach of Nox and Erebus.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + + + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCCXVIII" id="letterCCXVIII"></a>CCXVIII.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. CUNNINGHAM.</h3> + +<p>[To Clarke, the Schoolmaster, Burns, it is said, addressed several +letters, which on his death were put into the fire by his widow, +because of their license of language.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>11th June, 1791.</i></p> + +<p>Let me interest you, my dear Cunningham, in behalf of the gentleman +who waits on you with this. He is a Mr. Clarke, of Moffat, principal +schoolmaster there, and is at present suffering severely under the +persecution of one or two powerful individuals of his employers. He is +accused of harshness to boys that were placed under his care. God help +the teacher, if a man of sensibility and genius, and such is my friend +Clarke, when a booby father presents him with his booby son, and +insists on lighting up the rays of science, in a fellow’s head whose +skull is impervious and inaccessible by any other way than a positive +fracture with a cudgel: a fellow whom in fact it savours of impiety to +attempt making a scholar of, as he has been marked a blockhead in the +book of fate, at the almighty fiat of his Creator.</p> + +<p>The patrons of Moffat-school are, the ministers, magistrates, and +town-council of Edinburgh, and as the business comes now before them, +let me beg my dearest friend to do everything in his power to serve +the interests of a man of genius and worth, and a man whom I +particularly respect and esteem. You know some good fellows among the +magistracy and council, but particularly you have much to say with a +reverend gentleman to whom you have the honour of being very nearly +related, and whom this country and age have had the honour to produce. +I need not name the historian of Charles V. I tell him through the +medium of his nephew’s influence, that Mr. Clarke is a gentleman who +will not disgrace even his patronage. I know the merits of the cause +thoroughly, and say it, that my friend is falling a sacrifice to +prejudiced ignorance.</p> + +<p>God help the children of dependence! Hated and persecuted by their +enemies, and too often, alas! almost unexceptionably, received by +their friends with disrespect and reproach, under the thin disguise of +cold civility and humiliating advice. O! to be a sturdy savage, +stalking in the pride of his independence, amid the solitary wilds of +his deserts; rather than in civilized life, helplessly to tremble for +a subsistence, precarious as the caprice of a fellow-creature! Every +man has his virtues, and no man is without his failings; and curse on +that privileged plain-dealing of friendship, which, in the hour of my +calamity, cannot reach forth the helping hand without at the same time +pointing out those failings, and apportioning them their share in +procuring my present distress. My friends, for such the world calls +ye, and such ye think yourselves to be, pass by my virtues if you +please, but do, also, spare my follies: the first will witness in my +breast for themselves, and the last will give pain enough to the +ingenuous mind without you. And since deviating more or less from the +paths of propriety and rectitude, must be incident to human nature, do +thou, Fortune, put it in my power, always from myself, and of myself, +to bear the consequence of those errors! I do not want to be +independent that I may sin, but I want to be independent in my +sinning.</p> + +<p>To return in this rambling letter to the subject I set out with, let +me recommend my friend, Mr. Clarke, to your acquaintance and good +offices; his worth entitles him to the one, and his gratitude will +merit the other. I long much to hear from you.</p> + +<p class="sig8">Adieu!</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + + + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCCXIX" id="letterCCXIX"></a>CCXIX.</h2> + +<h3>TO THE EARL OF BUCHAN.</h3> + +<p>[Lord Buchan printed this letter in his Essay on the Life of Thomson, +in 1792. His lordship invited Burns to leave his corn unreaped, walk +from Ellisland to Dryburgh, and help him to crown Thomson’s bust with +bays, on Ednam Hill, on the 22d of September.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Ellisland, August 29th, 1791.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">My Lord</span>,</p> + +<p>Language sinks under the ardour of my feelings when I would thank your +lordship for the honour you have done me in inviting me to make one at +the coronation of the bust of Thomson. In my first enthusiasm in +reading the card you did me the honour to write me, I overlooked<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_438" id="Page_438">[438]</a></span> +every obstacle, and determined to go; but I fear it will not be in my +power. A week or two’s absence, in the very middle of my harvest, is +what I much doubt I dare not venture on. I once already made a +pilgrimage <i>up</i> the whole course of the Tweed, and fondly would I take +the same delightful journey <i>down</i> the windings of that delightful +stream.</p> + +<p>Your lordship hints at an ode for the occasion: but who would write +after Collins? I read over his verses to the memory of Thomson, and +despaired.—I got indeed to the length of three or four stanzas, in +the way of address to the shade of the bard, on crowning his bust. I +shall trouble your lordship with the subjoined copy of them, which, I +am afraid, will be but too convincing a proof how unequal I am to the +task. However, it affords me an opportunity of approaching your +lordship, and declaring how sincerely and gratefully I have the honour +to be, &c.,</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + + + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCCXX" id="letterCCXX"></a>CCXX.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. THOMAS SLOAN.</h3> + +<p>[Thomas Sloan was a west of Scotland man, and seems, though not much +in correspondence, to have been on intimate terms with Burns.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Ellisland, Sept. 1, 1791.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">My dear Sloan</span>,</p> + +<p>Suspense is worse than disappointment, for that reason I hurry to tell +you that I just now learn that Mr. Ballantyne does not choose to +interfere more in the business. I am truly sorry for it, but cannot +help it.</p> + +<p>You blame me for not writing you sooner, but you will please to +recollect that you omitted one little necessary piece of +information;—your address.</p> + +<p>However, you know equally well, my hurried life, indolent temper, and +strength of attachment. It must be a longer period than the longest +life “in the world’s hale and undegenerate days,” that will make me +forget so dear a friend as Mr. Sloan. I am prodigal enough at times, +but I will not part with such a treasure as that.</p> + +<p>I can easily enter into the <i>embarras</i> of your present situation. You +know my favourite quotation from Young—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">———————“On reason build <span class="smcap">Resolve</span>!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That column of true majesty in man;”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>and that other favourite one from Thomson’s Alfred—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“What proves the hero truly <span class="smcap">great</span>,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Is never, never to despair.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>Or shall I quote you an author of your acquaintance?</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“——Whether <span class="smcap">doing, suffering, or forbearing,</span><br /></span> +<span class="i0">You may do miracles by—<span class="smcap">persevering</span>.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>I have nothing new to tell you. The few friends we have are going on +in the old way. I sold my crop on this day se’ennight, and sold it +very well. A guinea an acre, on an average, above value. But such a +scene of drunkenness was hardly ever seen in this country. After the +roup was over, about thirty people engaged in a battle, every man for +his own hand, and fought it out for three hours. Nor was the scene +much better in the house. No fighting, indeed, but folks lying drunk +on the floor, and decanting, until both my dogs got so drunk by +attending them, that they could not stand. You will easily guess how I +enjoyed the scene; as I was no farther over than you used to see me.</p> + +<p>Mrs. B. and family have been in Ayrshire these many weeks.</p> + +<p class="sig7">Farewell; and God bless you, my dear friend!</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + + + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCCXXI" id="letterCCXXI"></a>CCXXI.</h2> + +<h3>TO LADY E. CUNNINGHAM.</h3> + +<p>[The poem enclosed was the Lament for James, Earl of Glencairn: it is +probable that the Earl’s sister liked the verses, for they were +printed soon afterwards.]</p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">My Lady</span>,</p> + +<p>I would, as usual, have availed myself of the privilege your goodness +has allowed me, of sending you anything I compose in my poetical way; +but as I had resolved, so soon as the shock of my irreparable loss +would allow me, to pay a tribute to my late benefactor, I determined +to make that the first piece I should do myself the honour of sending +you. Had the wing of my fancy been equal to the ardour of my heart, +the enclosed had been much more worthy your perusal: as it is, I beg +leave to lay it at your ladyship’s feet. As all the world knows my +obligations to the late Earl of Glencairn, I would wish to show as +openly that my heart glows, and will ever glow, with the most grateful +sense and remembrance of his lordship’s goodness. The<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_439" id="Page_439">[439]</a></span> sables I did +myself the honour to wear to his lordship’s memory, were not the +“mockery of woe.” Nor shall my gratitude perish with me!—if among my +children I shall have a son that has a heart, he shall hand it down to +his child as a family honour, and a family debt, that my dearest +existence I owe to the noble house of Glencairn!</p> + +<p>I was about to say, my lady, that if you think the poem may venture to +see the light, I would, in some way or other, give it to the world.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + + + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCCXXII" id="letterCCXXII"></a>CCXXII.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. AINSLIE.</h3> + +<p>[It has been said that the poet loved to aggravate his follies to his +friends: but that this tone of aggravation was often ironical, this +letter, as well as others, might be cited.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Ellisland, 1791.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">My dear Ainslie</span>,</p> + +<p>Can you minister to a mind diseased? can you, amid the horrors of +penitence, remorse, head-ache, nausea, and all the rest of the d——d +hounds of hell, that beset a poor wretch, who has been guilty of the +sin of drunkenness—can you speak peace to a troubled soul?</p> + +<p><i>Miserable perdu</i> that I am, I have tried everything that used to +amuse me, but in vain: here must I sit, a monument of the vengeance +laid up in store for the wicked, slowly counting every chick of the +clock as it slowly, slowly, numbers over these lazy scoundrels of +hours, who, d——n them, are ranked up before me, every one at his +neighbour’s backside, and every one with a burthen of anguish on his +back, to pour on my devoted head—and there is none to pity me. My +wife scolds me! my business torments me, and my sins come staring me +in the face, every one telling a more bitter tale than his +fellow.—When I tell you even * * * has lost its power to please, you +will guess something of my hell within, and all around me—I begun +<i>Elibanks and Elibraes</i>, but the stanzas fell unenjoyed, and +unfinished from my listless tongue: at last I luckily thought of +reading over an old letter of yours, that lay by me in my book-case, +and I felt something for the first time since I opened my eyes, of +pleasurable existence. —— Well—I begin to breathe a little, since I +began to write to you. How are you, and what are you doing? How goes +Law? Apropos, for connexion’s sake, do not address to me supervisor, +for that is an honour I cannot pretend to—I am on the list, as we +call it, for a supervisor, and will be called out by and bye to act as +one; but at present, I am a simple gauger, tho’ t’other day I got an +appointment to an excise division of 25<i>l. per annum</i> better than the +rest. My present income, down money, is 70<i>l. per annum.</i></p> + +<p>I have one or two good fellows here whom you would be glad to know.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + + + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCCXXIII" id="letterCCXXIII"></a>CCXXIII.</h2> + +<h3>TO COL. FULLARTON.</h3> + +<h4>OF FULLARTON.</h4> + +<p>[This letter was first published in the Edinburgh Chronicle.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Ellisland, 1791.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">Sir</span>,</p> + +<p>I have just this minute got the frank, and next minute must send it to +post, else I purposed to have sent you two or three other bagatelles, +that might have amused a vacant hour about as well as “Six excellent +new songs,” or, the Aberdeen ‘Prognostication for the year to come.’ I +shall probably trouble you soon with another packet. About the gloomy +month of November, when ‘the people of England hang and drown +themselves,’ anything generally is better than one’s own thought.</p> + +<p>Fond as I may be of my own productions, it is not for their sake that +I am so anxious to send you them. I am ambitious, covetously ambitious +of being known to a gentleman whom I am proud to call my countryman; a +gentleman who was a foreign ambassador as soon as he was a man, and a +leader of armies as soon as he was a soldier, and that with an eclat +unknown to the usual minions of a court, men who, with all the +adventitious advantages of princely connexions and princely fortune, +must yet, like the caterpillar, labour a whole lifetime before they +reach the wished height, there to roost a stupid chrysalis, and doze +out the remaining glimmering existence of old age.</p> + +<p>If the gentleman who accompanied you when you did me the honour of +calling on me, is with you, I beg to be respectfully remembered to +him.</p> + +<p class="sig5">I have the honour to be,</p> + +<p class="sig8">Sir,</p> + +<p class="sig4">Your highly obliged, and most devoted</p> + +<p class="sig9">Humble servant,</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_440" id="Page_440">[440]</a></span></p> + + +<h2><a name="letterCCXXIV" id="letterCCXXIV"></a>CCXXIV.</h2> + +<h3>TO MISS DAVIES.</h3> + +<p>[This accomplished lady was the youngest daughter of Dr. Davies, of +Tenby, in Pembrokeshire: she was related to the Riddels of Friar’s +Carse, and one of her sisters married Captain Adam Gordon, of the +noble family of Kenmure. She had both taste and skill in verse.]</p> + +<p>It is impossible, Madam, that the generous warmth and angelic purity +of your youthful mind, can have any idea of that moral disease under +which I unhappily must rank us the chief of sinners; I mean a +torpitude of the moral powers, that may be called, a lethargy of +conscience. In vain Remorse rears her horrent crest, and rouses all +her snakes; beneath the deadly fixed eye and leaden hand of Indolence, +their wildest ire is charmed into the torpor of the bat, slumbering +out the rigours of winter, in the chink of a ruined wall. Nothing +less, Madam, could have made me so long neglect your obliging +commands. Indeed I had one apology—the bagatelle was not worth +presenting. Besides, so strongly am I interested in Miss Davies’s fate +and welfare in the serious business of life, amid its chances and +changes, that to make her the subject of a silly ballad is downright +mockery of these ardent feelings; ’tis like an impertinent jest to a +dying friend.</p> + +<p>Gracious Heaven! why this disparity between our wishes and our powers? +Why is the most generous wish to make others blest, impotent and +ineffectual—as the idle breeze that crosses the pathless desert! In +my walks of life I have met with a few people to whom how gladly would +I have said—“Go, be happy! I know that your hearts have been wounded +by the scorn of the proud, whom accident has placed above you—or +worse still, in whose hands are, perhaps, placed many of the comforts +of your life. But there! ascend that rock, Independence, and look +justly down on their littleness of soul. Make the worthless tremble +under your indignation, and the foolish sink before your contempt; and +largely impart that happiness to others, which, I am certain, will +give yourselves so much pleasure to bestow.”</p> + +<p>Why, dear Madam, must I wake from this delightful revery, and find it +all a dream? Why, amid my generous enthusiasm, must I, find myself +poor and powerless, incapable of wiping one tear from the eye of pity, +or of adding one comfort to the friend I love!—Out upon the world, +say I, that its affairs are administered so ill! They talk of +reform;—good Heaven! what a reform would I make among the sons and +even the daughters of men!—Down, immediately, should go fools from +the high places, where misbegotten chance has perked them up, and +through life should they skulk, ever haunted by their native +insignificance, as the body marches accompanied by its shadow.—As for +a much more formidable class, the knaves, I am at a loss what to do +with them: had I a world, there should not be a knave in it.</p> + +<p>But the hand that could give, I would liberally fill: and I would pour +delight on the heart that could kindly forgive, and generously love.</p> + +<p>Still the inequalities of life are, among men, comparatively +tolerable—but there is a delicacy, a tenderness, accompanying every +view in which we can place lovely Woman, that are grated and shocked +at the rude, capricious distinctions of fortune. Woman is the +blood-royal of life: let there be slight degrees of precedency among +them—but let them be ALL sacred.—Whether this last sentiment be +right or wrong, I am not accountable; it is an original component +feature of my mind.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + + + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCCXXV" id="letterCCXXV"></a>CCXXV.</h2> + +<h3>TO MRS. DUNLOP.</h3> + +<p>[Burns, says Cromek, acknowledged that a refined and accomplished +woman was a being all but new to him till he went to Edinburgh, and +received letters from Mrs. Dunlop.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Ellisland, 17th December, 1791.</i></p> + +<p>Many thanks to you, Madam, for your good news respecting the little +floweret and the mother-plant. I hope my poetic prayers have been +heard, and will be answered up to the warmest sincerity of their +fullest extent; and then Mrs. Henri will find her little darling the +representative of his late parent, in everything but his abridged +existence.</p> + +<p>I have just finished the following song, which to a lady the +descendant of Wallace—and many heroes of his true illustrious +line—and herself the mother of several soldiers, needs neither +preface nor apology.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_441" id="Page_441">[441]</a></span></p> + +<div class="blockquot"><p><i>Scene</i>—<i>a field of battle</i>—<i>time of the day, evening; +the wounded and dying of the victorious army are supposed to +join in the following</i></p></div> + +<p class="std2">SONG OF DEATH.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Farewell, thou fair day, thou green earth, and ye skies<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Now gay with the bright setting sun;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Farewell, loves and friendships, ye dear tender ties—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Our race of existence is run!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>The circumstance that gave rise to the foregoing verses was, looking +over with a musical friend M’Donald’s collection of Highland airs, I +was struck with one, an Isle of Skye tune, entitled “Oran and Aoig, +or, The Song of Death,” to the measure of which I have adapted my +stanzas. I have of late composed two or three other little pieces, +which, ere yon full-orbed moon, whose broad impudent face now stares +at old mother earth all night, shall have shrunk into a modest +crescent, just peeping forth at dewy dawn, I shall find an hour to +transcribe for you. <i>A Dieu je vous commende.</i></p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + + + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCCXXVI" id="letterCCXXVI"></a>CCXXVI.</h2> + +<h3>TO MRS. DUNLOP.</h3> + +<p>[That the poet spoke mildly concerning the rebuke which he received +from the Excise, on what he calls his political delinquencies, his +letter to Erskine of Mar sufficiently proves.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>5th January, 1792.</i></p> + +<p>You see my hurried life, Madam: I can only command starts of time; +however, I am glad of one thing; since I finished the other sheet, the +political blast that threatened my welfare is overblown. I have +corresponded with Commissioner Graham, for the board had made me the +subject of their animadversions; and now I have the pleasure of +informing you, that all is set to rights in that quarter. Now as to +these informers, may the devil be let loose to —— but, hold! I was +praying most fervently in my last sheet, and I must not so soon fall a +swearing in this.</p> + +<p>Alas! how little do the wantonly or idly officious think what mischief +they do by their malicious insinuations, indirect impertinence, or +thoughtless blabbings. What a difference there is in intrinsic worth, +candour, benevolence, generosity, kindness,—in all the charities and +all the virtues, between one class of human beings and another! For +instance, the amiable circle I so lately mixed with in the hospitable +hall of Dunlop, their generous hearts—their uncontaminated dignified +minds—their informed and polished understandings—what a contrast, +when compared—if such comparing were not downright sacrilege—with +the soul of the miscreant who can deliberately plot the destruction of +an honest man that never offended him, and with a grin of satisfaction +see the unfortunate being, his faithful wife, and prattling innocents, +turned over to beggary and ruin!</p> + +<p>Your cup, my dear Madam, arrived safe. I had two worthy fellows dining +with me the other day, when I, with great formality, produced my +whigmeeleerie cup, and told them that it had been a family-piece among +the descendants of William Wallace. This roused such an enthusiasm, +that they insisted on bumpering the punch round in it; and by and by, +never did your great ancestor lay a <i>Suthron</i> more completely to rest, +than for a time did your cup my two friends. Apropos, this is the +season of wishing. My God bless you, my dear friend, and bless me, the +humblest and sincerest of your friends, by granting you yet many +returns of the season! May all good things attend you and yours +wherever they are scattered over the earth!</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + + + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCCXXVII" id="letterCCXXVII"></a>CCXXVII.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. WILLIAM SMELLIE,</h3> + +<h4>PRINTER.</h4> + +<p>[When Burns sends his warmest wishes to Smellie, and prays that +fortune may never place his subsistence at the mercy of a knave, or +set his character on the judgment of a fool, he had his political +enemies probably in his mind.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Dumfries, 22d January, 1792.</i></p> + +<p>I sit down, my dear Sir, to introduce a young lady to you, and a lady +in the first ranks of fashion too. What a task! to you—who care no +more for the herd of animals called young ladies, than you do for the +herd of animals called young gentlemen. To you—who despise and detest +the groupings and combinations of fashion,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_442" id="Page_442">[442]</a></span> as an idiot painter that +seems industrious to place staring fools and unprincipled knaves in +the foreground of his picture, while men of sense and honesty are too +often thrown in the dimmest shades. Mrs. Riddel, who will take this +letter to town with her, and send it to you, is a character that, even +in your own way, as a naturalist and a philosopher, would be an +acquisition to your acquaintance. The lady, too, is a votary to the +muses; and as I think myself somewhat of a judge in my own trade, I +assure you that her verses, always correct, and often elegant, are +much beyond the common run of the <i>lady-poetesses</i> of the day. She is +a great admirer of your book; and, hearing me say that I was +acquainted with you, she begged to be known to you, as she is just +going to pay her first visit to our Caledonian capital. I told her +that her best way was, to desire her near relation, and your intimate +friend, Craigdarroch, to have you at his house while she was there; +and lest you might think of a lively West Indian girl, of eighteen, as +girls of eighteen too often deserve to be thought of, I should take +care to remove that prejudice. To be impartial, however, in +appreciating the lady’s merits, she has one unlucky failing: a failing +which you will easily discover, as she seems rather pleased with +indulging in it; and a failing that you will easily pardon, as it is a +sin which very much besets yourself;—where she dislikes, or despises, +she is apt to make no more a secret of it, than where she esteems and +respects.</p> + +<p>I will not present you with the unmeaning <i>compliments of the season</i>, +but I will send you my warmest wishes and most ardent prayers, that +Fortune may never throw your subsistence to the mercy of a Knave, or +set your character on the judgment of a Fool; but that, upright and +erect, you may walk to an honest grave, where men of letters shall +say, here lies a man who did honour to science, and men of worth shall +say, here lies a man who did honour to human nature.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + + + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCCXXVIII" id="letterCCXXVIII"></a>CCXXVIII.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. W. NICOL.</h3> + +<p>[This ironical letter was in answer to one from Nicol, containing +counsel and reproof.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>20th February, 1792.</i></p> + +<p>O thou, wisest among the wise, meridian blaze of prudence, full-moon +of discretion, and chief of many counsellors! How infinitely is thy +puddle-headed, rattle-headed, wrong-headed, round-headed slave +indebted to thy supereminent goodness, that from the luminous path of +thy own right-lined rectitude, thou lookest benignly down on an erring +wretch, of whom the zig-zag wanderings defy all the powers of +calculation, from the simple copulation of units, up to the hidden +mysteries of fluxions! May one feeble ray of that light of wisdom +which darts from thy sensorium, straight as the arrow of heaven, and +bright as the meteor of inspiration, may it be my portion, so that I +may be less unworthy of the face and favour of that father of proverbs +and master of maxims, that antipode of folly, and magnet among the +sages, the wise and witty Willie Nicol! Amen! Amen! Yea, so be it!</p> + +<p>For me! I am a beast, a reptile, and know nothing! From the cave of my +ignorance, amid the fogs of my dulness, and pestilential fumes of my +political heresies, I look up to thee, as doth a toad through the +iron-barred lucerne of a pestiferous dungeon, to the cloudless glory +of a summer sun! Sorely sighing in bitterness of soul, I say, when +shall my name be the quotation of the wise, and my countenance be the +delight of the godly, like the illustrious lord of Laggan’s many +hills? As for him, his works are perfect: never did the pen of calumny +blur the fair page of his reputation, nor the bolt of hatred fly at +his dwelling.</p> + +<p>Thou mirror of purity, when shall the elfine lamp of my glimmerous +understanding, purged from sensual appetites and gross desires, shine +like the constellation of thy intellectual powers!—As for thee, thy +thoughts are pure, and thy lips are holy. Never did the unhallowed +breath of the powers of darkness, and the pleasures of darkness, +pollute the sacred flame of thy sky-descended and heaven-bound +desires: never did the vapours of impurity stain the unclouded serene +of thy cerulean imagination. O that like thine were the tenor of my +life, like thine the tenor of my conversation! then should no friend +fear for my strength, no enemy rejoice in my weakness! Then should I +lie down and rise up, and none to make me afraid.—May thy pity and +thy prayer be exercised for, O thou lamp of wisdom and mirror of +morality! thy devoted slave.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_443" id="Page_443">[443]</a></span></p> + + +<h2><a name="letterCCXXIX" id="letterCCXXIX"></a>CCXXIX.</h2> + +<h3>TO FRANCIS GROSE, ESQ., F.S.A.</h3> + +<p>[Captain Grose was introduced to Burns, by his brother Antiquary, of +Friar’s Carse: he was collecting materials for his work on the +Antiquities of Scotland.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Dumfries, 1792.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">Sir</span>,</p> + +<p>I believe among all our Scots Literati you have not met with Professor +Dugald Stewart, who fills the moral philosophy chair in the University +of Edinburgh. To say that he is a man of the first parts, and what is +more, a man of the first worth, to a gentleman of your general +acquaintance, and who so much enjoys the luxury of unencumbered +freedom and undisturbed privacy, is not perhaps recommendation +enough:—but when I inform you that Mr. Stewart’s principal +characteristic is your favourite feature; <i>that</i> sterling independence +of mind, which, though every man’s right, so few men have the courage +to claim, and fewer still, the magnanimity to support:—when I tell +you that, unseduced by splendour, and undisgusted by wretchedness, he +appreciates the merits of the various actors in the great drama of +life, merely as they perform their parts—in short, he is a man after +your own heart, and I comply with his earnest request in letting you +know that he wishes above all things to meet with you. His house, +Catrine, is within less than a mile of Sorn Castle, which you proposed +visiting; or if you could transmit him the enclosed, he would with the +greatest pleasure meet you anywhere in the neighbourhood. I write to +Ayrshire to inform Mr. Stewart that I have acquitted myself of my +promise. Should your time and spirits permit your meeting with Mr. +Stewart, ’tis well; if not, I hope you will forgive this liberty, and +I have at least an opportunity of assuring you with what truth and +respect,</p> + +<p class="sig3">I am, Sir,</p> + +<p class="sig4">Your great admirer,</p> + +<p class="sig5">And very humble servant,</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + + + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCCXXX" id="letterCCXXX"></a>CCXXX.</h2> + +<h3>TO FRANCIS GROSE, ESQ., F.S.A.</h3> + +<p>[This letter, interesting to all who desire to see how a poet works +beauty and regularity out of a vulgar tradition, was first printed by +Sir Egerton Brydges, in the “Censura Literaria.”]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Dumfries, 1792.</i></p> + +<p>Among the many witch stories I have heard, relating to Alloway kirk, I +distinctly remember only two or three.</p> + +<p>Upon a stormy night, amid whistling squalls of wind, and bitter blasts +of hail; in short, on such a night as the devil would choose to take +the air in; a farmer or farmer’s servant was plodding and plashing +homeward with his plough-irons on his shoulder, having been getting +some repairs on them at a neighbouring smithy. His way lay by the kirk +of Alloway, and being rather on the anxious look-out in approaching a +place so well known to be a favourite haunt of the devil and the +devil’s friends and emissaries, he was struck aghast by discovering +through the horrors of the storm and stormy night, a light, which on +his nearer approach plainly showed itself to proceed from the haunted +edifice. Whether he had been fortified from above, on his devout +supplication, as is customary with people when they suspect the +immediate presence of Satan; or whether, according to another custom, +he had got courageously drunk at the smithy, I will not pretend to +determine; but so it was that he ventured to go up to, nay, into, the +very kirk. As luck would have it, his temerity came off unpunished.</p> + +<p>The members of the infernal junto were all out on some midnight +business or other, and he saw nothing but a kind of kettle or caldron, +depending from the roof, over the fire, simmering some heads of +unchristened children, limbs of executed malefactors, &c., for the +business of the night.—It was in for a penny in for a pound, with the +honest ploughman: so without ceremony he unhooked the caldron from off +the fire, and pouring out the damnable ingredients, inverted it on his +head, and carried it fairly home, where it remained long in the +family, a living evidence of the truth of the story.</p> + +<p>Another story, which I can prove to be equally authentic, was as +follows:</p> + +<p>On a market day in the town of Ayr, a farmer from Carrick, and +consequently whose way lay by the very gate of Alloway kirk-yard, in +order to cross the river Doon at the old bridge, which is about two or +three hundred yards farther on than the said gate, had been detained +by his business, till by the time he reached Alloway it was the wizard +hour, between night and morning.</p> + +<p>Though he was terrified with a blaze stream<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_444" id="Page_444">[444]</a></span>ing from the kirk, yet it +is a well-known fact that to turn back on these occasions is running +by far the greatest risk of mischief, he prudently advanced on his +road. When he had reached the gate of the kirk-yard, he was surprised +and entertained, through the ribs and arches of an old gothic window, +which still faces the highway, to see a dance of witches merrily +footing it round their old sooty blackguard master, who was keeping +them all alive with the power of his bag-pipe. The farmer stopping his +horse to observe them a little, could plainly descry the faces of many +old women of his acquaintance and neighbourhood. How the gentleman was +dressed tradition does not say; but that the ladies were all in their +smocks: and one of them happening unluckily to have a smock which was +considerably too short to answer all the purpose of that piece of +dress, our farmer was so tickled, that he involuntarily burst out, +with a loud laugh, “Weel luppen, Maggy wi’ the short sark!” and +recollecting himself, instantly spurred his horse to the top of his +speed. I need not mention the universally known fact, that no +diabolical power can pursue you beyond the middle of a running stream. +Lucky it was for the poor farmer that the river Doon was so near, for +notwithstanding the speed of his horse, which was a good one, against +he reached the middle of the arch of the bridge, and consequently the +middle of the stream, the pursuing, vengeful hags, were so close at +big heels, that one of them actually sprung to seize him; but it was +too late, nothing was on her side of the stream, but the horse’s tail, +which immediately gave way at her infernal grip, as if blasted by a +stroke of lightning; but the farmer was beyond her reach. However, the +unsightly, tailless condition of the vigorous steed was, to the last +hour of the noble creature’s life, an awful warning to the Carrick +farmers, not to stay too late in Ayr markets.</p> + +<p>The last relation I shall give, though equally true, is not so well +identified as the two former, with regard to the scene; but as the +best authorities give it for Alloway, I shall relate it.</p> + +<p>On a summer’s evening, about the time that nature puts on her sables +to mourn the expiry of the cheerful day, a shepherd boy, belonging to +a farmer in the immediate neighbourhood of Alloway kirk, had just +folded his charge, and was returning home. As he passed the kirk, in +the adjoining field, he fell in with a crew of men and women, who were +busy pulling stems of the plant Ragwort. He observed that as each +person pulled a Ragwort, he or she got astride of it, and called out, +“Up horsie!” on which the Ragwort flew off, like Pegasus, through the +air with its rider. The foolish boy likewise pulled his Ragwort, and +cried with the rest, “Up horsie!” and, strange to tell, away he flew +with the company. The first stage at which the cavalcade stopt, was a +merchant’s wine-cellar in Bordeaux, where, without saying by your +leave, they quaffed away at the best the cellar could afford, until +the morning, foe to the imps and works of darkness, threatened to +throw light on the matter, and frightened them from their carousals.</p> + +<p>The poor shepherd lad, being equally a stranger to the scene and the +liquor, heedlessly got himself drunk; and when the rest took horse, he +fell asleep, and was found so next day by some of the people belonging +to the merchant. Somebody that understood Scotch, asking him what he +was, he said such-a-one’s herd in Alloway, and by some means or other +getting home again, he lived long to tell the world the wondrous tale.</p> + +<p class="sig8">I am, &c.,</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + + + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCCXXXI" id="letterCCXXXI"></a>CCXXXI.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. S. CLARKE,</h3> + +<h4>EDINBURGH.</h4> + +<p>[This introduction of Clarke, the musician, to the M’Murdo’s of +Drumlanrig, brought to two of the ladies the choicest honours of the +muse.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>July 1, 1792.</i></p> + +<p>Mr. Burns begs leave to present his most respectful compliments to Mr. +Clarke.—Mr. B. some time ago did himself the honour of writing to Mr. +C. respecting coming out to the country, to give a little musical +instruction in a highly respectable family, where Mr. C. may have his +own terms, and may be as happy as indolence, the devil, and the gout +will permit him. Mr. B. knows well how Mr. C. is engaged with another +family; but cannot Mr. C. find two or three weeks to spare to each of +them? Mr. B. is deeply impressed with, and awfully conscious of, the +high importance of Mr. C.’s time, whether in the winged moments of +symphonious exhibition, at the keys of harmony, while listening +seraphs cease their own less de<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_445" id="Page_445">[445]</a></span>lightful strains; or in the drowsy +arms of slumb’rous repose, in the arms of his dearly beloved +elbowchair, where the frowsy, but potent power of indolence, +circumfuses her vapours round, and sheds her dews on the head of her +darling son. But half a line conveying half a meaning from Mr. C. +would make Mr. B. the happiest of mortals.</p> + + + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCCXXXII" id="letterCCXXXII"></a>CCXXXII.</h2> + +<h3>TO MRS. DUNLOP.</h3> + +<p>[To enthusiastic fits of admiration for the young and the beautiful, +such as Burns has expressed in this letter, he loved to give way:—we +owe some of his best songs to these sallies.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Annan Water Foot, 22d August, 1792.</i></p> + +<p>Do not blame me for it, Madam;—my own conscience, hackneyed and +weather-beaten as it is in watching and reproving my vagaries, +follies, indolence, &c., has continued to punish me sufficiently.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p>Do you think it possible, my dear and honoured friend, that I could be +so lost to gratitude for many favours; to esteem for much worth, and +to the honest, kind, pleasurably tie of, now old acquaintance, and I +hope and am sure of progressive, increasing friendship—as for a +single day, not to think of you—to ask the Fates what they are doing +and about to do with my much-loved friend and her wide-scattered +connexions, and to beg of them to be as kind to you and yours as they +possibly can?</p> + +<p>Apropos! (though how it is apropos, I have not leisure to explain,) do +you not know that I am almost in love with an acquaintance of +yours?—Almost! said I—I am in love, souse! over head and ears, deep +as the most unfathomable abyss of the boundless ocean; but the word +Love, owing to the <i>intermingledoms</i> of the good and the bad, the pure +and the impure, in this world, being rather an equivocal term for +expressing one’s sentiments and sensations, I must do justice to the +sacred purity of my attachment. Know, then, that the heart-struck awe; +the distant humble approach; the delight we should have in gazing upon +and listening to a messenger of heaven, appearing in all the unspotted +purity of his celestial home, among the coarse, polluted, far inferior +sons of men, to deliver to them tidings that make their hearts swim in +joy, and their imaginations soar in transport—such, so delighting and +so pure, were the emotions of my soul on meeting the other day with +Miss Lesley Baillie, your neighbour, at M——. Mr. B. with his two +daughters, accompanied by Mr. H. of G. passing through Dumfries a few +days ago, on their way to England, did me the honour of calling on me; +on which I took my horse (though God knows I could ill spare the +time), and accompanied them fourteen or fifteen miles, and dined and +spent the day with them. ’Twas about nine, I think, when I left them, +and riding home, I composed the following ballad, of which you will +probably think you have a dear bargain, as it will cost you another +groat of postage. You must know that there is an old ballad beginning +with—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“My bonnie Lizzie Baillie<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I’ll rowe thee in my plaidie, &c.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>So I parodied it as follows, which is literally the first copy, +“unanointed, unanneal’d;” as Hamlet says.—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O saw ye bonny Lesley<br /></span> +<span class="i2">As she gaed o’er the border?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">She’s gane like Alexander,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To spread her conquests farther.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>So much for ballads. I regret that you are gone to the east country, +as I am to be in Ayrshire in about a fortnight. This world of ours, +notwithstanding it has many good things in it, yet it has ever had +this curse, that two or three people, who would be the happier the +oftener they met together, are, almost without exception, always so +placed as never to meet but once or twice a-year, which, considering +the few years of a man’s life, is a very great “evil under the sun,” +which I do not recollect that Solomon has mentioned in his catalogue +of the miseries of man. I hope and believe that there is a state of +existence beyond the grave, where the worthy of this life will renew +their former intimacies, with this endearing addition, that, “we meet +to part no more!”</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i4">. . . . . . . . . . . .<br /></span> +<span class="i8">“Tell us, ye dead,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Will none of you in pity disclose the secret,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">What ’tis you are, and we must shortly be?”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="sig2"><span class="smcap">Blair</span></p> + +<p>A thousand times have I made this apostrophe to the departed sons of +men, but not one of them has ever thought fit to answer the question. +“O that some courteous ghost would blab it out!” but it cannot be; you +and I, my friend,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_446" id="Page_446">[446]</a></span> must make the experiment by ourselves and for +ourselves. However, I am so convinced that an unshaken faith in the +doctrines of religion is not only necessary, by making us better men, +but also by making us happier men, that I should take every care that +your little godson, and every little creature that shall call me +father, shall be taught them.</p> + +<p>So ends this heterogeneous letter, written at this wild place of the +world, in the intervals of my labour of discharging a vessel of rum +from Antigua.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + + + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCCXXXIII" id="letterCCXXXIII"></a>CCXXXIII.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. CUNNINGHAM.</h3> + +<p>[There is both bitterness and humour in this letter: the poet +discourses on many matters, and woman is among them—but he places the +bottle at his elbow as an antidote against the discourtesy of +scandal.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Dumfries, 10th September, 1792.</i></p> + +<p>No! I will not attempt an apology.—Amid all my hurry of business, +grinding the faces of the publican and the sinner on the merciless +wheels of the Excise; making ballads, and then drinking, and singing +them! and, over and above all, the correcting the press-work of two +different publications; still, still I might have stolen five minutes +to dedicate to one of the first of my friends and fellow-creatures. I +might have done as I do at present, snatched an hour near “witching +time of night,” and scrawled a page or two. I might have congratulated +my friend on his marriage; or I might have thanked the Caledonian +archers for the honour they have done me (though, to do myself +justice, I intended to have done both in rhyme, else I had done both +long ere now). Well, then, here’s to your good health! for you must +know, I have set a nipperkin of toddy by me, just by way of spell, to +keep away the meikle horned deil, or any of his subaltern imps who may +be on their nightly rounds.</p> + +<p>But what shall I write to you?—“The voice said cry,” and I said, +“what shall I cry?”—O, thou spirit! whatever thou art, or wherever +thou makest thyself visible! be thou a bogle by the eerie side of an +auld thorn, in the dreary glen through which the herd-callan maun +bicker in his gloamin route frae the faulde!—Be thou a brownie, set, +at dead of night, to thy task by the blazing ingle, or in the solitary +barn, where the repercussions of thy iron flail half affright thyself +as thou performest the work of twenty of the sons of men, ere the +cock-crowing summon thee to thy ample cog of substantial brose—Be +thou a kelpie, haunting the ford or ferry, in the starless night, +mixing thy laughing yell with the howling of the storm and the roaring +of the flood, as thou viewest the perils and miseries of man on the +foundering horse, or in the tumbling boat!—or, lastly, be thou a +ghost, paying thy nocturnal visits to the hoary ruins of decayed +grandeur; or performing thy mystic rites in the shadow of the +time-worn church, while the moon looks, without a cloud, on the silent +ghastly dwellings of the dead around thee! or taking thy stand by the +bedside of the villain, or the murderer, pourtraying on his dreaming +fancy, pictures, dreadful as the horrors of unveiled hell, and +terrible as the wrath of incensed Deity!—Come, thou spirit, but not +in these horrid forms; come with the milder, gentle, easy +inspirations, which thou breathest round the wig of a prating +advocate, or the tête of a tea-sipping gossip, while their tongues run +at the light-horse gallop of clishmaclaver for ever and ever—come +and assist a poor devil who is quite jaded in the attempt to share +half an idea among half a hundred words; to fill up four quarto pages, +while he has not got one single sentence of recollection, information, +or remark worth putting pen to paper for.</p> + +<p>I feel, I feel the presence of supernatural assistance! circled in the +embrace of my elbowchair, my breast labours, like the bloated Sybil on +her three-footed stool, and like her, too, labours with +Nonsense.—Nonsense, suspicious name! Tutor, friend, and finger-post +in the mystic mazes of law; the cadaverous paths of physic; and +particularly in the sightless soarings of <span class="smcap">school divinity</span>, +who, leaving Common Sense confounded at his strength of pinion, +Reason, delirious with eyeing his giddy flight; and Truth creeping +back into the bottom of her well, cursing the hour that ever she +offered her scorned alliance to the wizard power of Theologic +Vision—raves abroad on all the winds. “On earth Discord! a gloomy +Heaven above, opening her jealous gates to the nineteenth thousandth +part of the tithe of mankind; and below, an inescapable and inexorable +hell, expanding its leviathan jaws for the vast residue of +mortals!!!”—O doctrine! comfortable and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_447" id="Page_447">[447]</a></span> healing to the weary, +wounded soul of man! Ye sons and daughters of affliction, ye <i>pauvres +miserables</i>, to whom day brings no pleasure, and night yields no rest, +be comforted! “’Tis but <i>one</i> to nineteen hundred thousand that your +situation will mend in this world;” so, alas, the experience of the +poor and the needy too often affirms; and ’tis nineteen hundred +thousand sand to <i>one</i>, by the dogmas of * * * * * * * * that you will be damned +eternally in the world to come!</p> + +<p>But of all nonsense, religious nonsense is the most nonsensical; so +enough, and more than enough of it. Only, by the by, will you or can +you tell me, my dear Cunningham, why a sectarian turn of mind has +always a tendency to narrow and illiberalize the heart? They are +orderly; they may be just; nay, I have known them merciful: but still +your children of sanctity move among their fellow-creatures with a +nostril-snuffing putrescence, and a foot-spurning filth, in short, +with a conceited dignity that your titled * * * * * * * * or any other of your +Scottish lordlings of seven centuries standing, display when they +accidentally mix among the many-aproned sons of mechanical life. I +remember, in my plough-boy days, I could not conceive it possible that +a noble lord could be a fool, or a godly man could be a knave—How +ignorant are plough-boys!—Nay, I have since discovered that a <i>godly +woman</i> may be a *****!—But hold—Here’s t’ye again—this rum is +generous Antigua, so a very unfit menstruum for scandal.</p> + +<p>Apropos, how do you like, I mean <i>really</i> like, the married life? Ah, +my friend! matrimony is quite a different thing from what your +love-sick youths and sighing girls take it to be! But marriage, we are +told, is appointed by God, and I shall never quarrel with any of his +institutions. I am a husband of older standing than you, and shall +give you <i>my</i> ideas of the conjugal state, (<i>en passant</i>; you know I +am no Latinist, is not <i>conjugal</i> derived from <i>jugum</i>, a yoke?) Well, +then, the scale of good wifeship I divide into ten +parts:—good-nature, four; good sense, two; wit, one; personal charms, +viz. a sweet face, eloquent eyes, fine limbs, graceful carriage (I +would add a fine waist too, but that is so soon spoilt you know), all +these, one; as for the other qualities belonging to, or attending on, +a wife, such as fortune, connexions, education (I mean education +extraordinary) family, blood, &c., divide the two remaining degrees +among them as you please; only, remember that all these minor +properties must be expressed by <i>fractions</i>, for there is not any one +of them, in the aforesaid scale, entitled to the dignity of an +<i>integer.</i></p> + +<p>As for the rest of my fancies and reveries—how I lately met with Miss +Lesley Baillie, the most beautiful, elegant woman in the world—how I +accompanied her and her father’s family fifteen miles on their +journey, out of pure devotion, to admire the loveliness of the works +of God, in such an unequalled display of them—how, in galloping home +at night, I made a ballad on her, of which these two stanzas make a +part—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Thou, bonny Lesley, art a queen,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Thy subjects we before thee;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thou, bonny Lesley, art divine,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The hearts o’ men adore thee.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The very deil he could na scathe<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Whatever wad belang thee!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He’d look into thy bonnie face<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And say, “I canna wrang thee.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>—behold all these things are written in the chronicles of my +imaginations, and shall be read by thee, my dear friend, and by thy +beloved spouse, my other dear friend, at a more convenient season.</p> + +<p>Now, to thee, and to thy before-designed <i>bosom</i>-companion, be given +the precious things brought forth by the sun, and the precious things +brought forth by the moon, and the benignest influences of the stars, +and the living streams which flow from the fountains of life, and by +the tree of life, for ever and ever! Amen!</p> + + + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCCXXXIV" id="letterCCXXXIV"></a>CCXXXIV.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. THOMSON.</h3> + +<p>[George Thomson, of Edinburgh, principal clerk to the trustees for the +encouraging the manufactures of Scotland, projected a work, entitled, +“A select Collection of Original Scottish Airs, for the Voice, to +which are added introductory and concluding Symphonies and +Accompaniments for the Pianoforte and Violin, by Pleyel and Kozeluch, +with select and characteristic Verses, by the most admired Scottish +Poets.” To Burns he applied for help in the verse: he could not find a +truer poet, nor one to whom such a work was more congenial.]<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_448" id="Page_448">[448]</a></span></p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Dumfries, 16th Sept. 1792.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">Sir</span>,</p> + +<p>I have just this moment got your letter. As the request you make to me +will positively add to my enjoyments in complying with it, I shall +enter into your undertaking with all the small portion of abilities I +have, strained to their utmost exertion by the impulse of enthusiasm. +Only, don’t hurry me—“Deil tak the hindmost” is by no means the <i>cri +de guerre</i> of my muse. Will you, as I am inferior to none of you in +enthusiastic attachment to the poetry and music of old Caledonia, and, +since you request it, have cheerfully promised my mite of +assistance—will you let me have a list of your airs with the first +line of the printed verses you intend for them, that I may have an +opportunity of suggesting any alteration that may occur to me? You +know ’tis in the way of my trade; still leaving you, gentlemen, the +undoubted right of publishers to approve or reject, at your pleasure, +for your own publication. Apropos, if you are for English verses, +there is, on my part, an end of the matter. Whether in the simplicity +of the Ballad, or the pathos of the song, I can only hope to please +myself in being allowed at least a sprinkling of our native tongue. +English verses, particularly the works of Scotsmen, that have merit, +are certainly very eligible. “Tweedside’” “Ah! the poor shepherd’s +mournful fate!” “Ah! Chloris, could I now but sit,” &c., you cannot +mend;<a name="FNanchor_199_199" id="FNanchor_199_199"></a><a href="#Footnote_199_199" class="fnanchor">[199]</a> but such insipid stuff as “To Fanny fair could I impart,” +&c., usually set to “The Mill, Mill, O!” is a disgrace to the +collections in which it has already appeared, and would doubly +disgrace a collection that will have the very superior merit of yours. +But more of this in the further prosecution of the business, if I am +called on for my strictures and amendments—I say amendments, for I +will not alter except where I myself, at least, think that I amend.</p> + +<p>As to any remuneration, you may think my songs either above or below +price; for they should absolutely be the one or the other. In the +honest enthusiasm with which I embark in your undertaking, to talk of +money, wages, fee, hire, &c., would be downright prostitution of soul! +a proof of each of the song that I compose or amend, I shall receive +as a favour. In the rustic phrase of the season, “Gude speed the +wark!”</p> + +<p class="sig5">I am, Sir,</p> + +<p class="sig5">Your very humble servant,</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + + + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_199_199" id="Footnote_199_199"></a><a href="#FNanchor_199_199"><span class="label">[199]</span></a> “Tweedside” is by Crawfurd; “Ah, the poor shepherd,” &c., +by Hamilton, of Bangour; “Ah! Chloris,” &c., by Sir Charles +Sedley—Burns has attributed it to Sir Peter Halket, of Pitferran.</p></div> +</div> + + + +<h2><a name="letterCCXXXV" id="letterCCXXXV"></a>CCXXXV.</h2> + +<h3>TO MRS. DUNLOP.</h3> + +<p>[One of the daughters of Mrs. Dunlop was married to M. Henri, a French +gentleman, who died in 1790, at Loudon Castle, in Ayrshire. The widow +went with her orphan son to France, and lived for awhile amid the +dangers of the revolution.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Dumfries, 24th September, 1792.</i></p> + +<p>I have this moment, my dear Madam, yours of the twenty-third. All your +other kind reproaches, your news, &c., are out of my head when I read +and think on Mrs. H——’ssituation. Good God! a heart-wounded +helpless young woman—in a strange, foreign land, and that land +convulsed with every horror that can harrow the human +feelings—sick—looking, longing for a comforter, but finding none—a +mother’s feelings, too:—but it is too much: he who wounded (he only +can) may He heal!</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p>I wish the farmer great joy of his new acquisition to his family. * * * * * +I cannot say that I give him joy of his life as a farmer. ’Tis, as a +farmer paying a dear, unconscionable rent, a <i>cursed life</i>! As to a +laird farming his own property; sowing his own corn in hope; and +reaping it, in spite of brittle weather, in gladness; knowing that +none can say unto him, ‘what dost thou?’—fattening his herds; +shearing his flocks; rejoicing at Christmas; and begetting sons and +daughters, until he be the venerated, gray-haired leader of a little +tribe—’tis a heavenly life! but devil take the life of reaping the +fruits that another must eat.</p> + +<p>Well, your kind wishes will be gratified, as to seeing me when I make +my Ayrshire visit. I cannot leave Mrs. B——, until her nine months’ +race is run, which may perhaps be in three or four weeks. She, too, +seems determined to make me the patriarchal leader of a band. However, +if Heaven will be so obliging as to let me have them in the proportion +of three boys to one girl, I shall be so much the more pleased. I +hope, if I am spared with them, to show a<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_449" id="Page_449">[449]</a></span> set of boys that will do +honour to my cares and name; but I am not equal to the task of rearing +girls. Besides, I am too poor; a girl should always have a fortune. +Apropos, your little godson is thriving charmingly, but is a very +devil. He, though two years younger, has completely mastered his +brother. Robert is indeed the mildest, gentlest creature I ever saw. +He has a most surprising memory, and is quite the pride of his +schoolmaster.</p> + +<p>You know how readily we get into prattle upon a subject dear to our +heart: you can excuse it. God bless you and yours!</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + + + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCCXXXVI" id="letterCCXXXVI"></a>CCXXXVI.</h2> + +<h3>TO MRS. DUNLOP.</h3> + +<p>[This letter has no date: it is supposed to have been written on the +death of her daughter, Mrs. Henri, whose orphan son, deprived of the +protection of all his relations, was preserved by the affectionate +kindness of Mademoiselle Susette, one of the family domestics, and +after the Revolution obtained the estate of his blood and name.]</p> + +<p>I had been from home, and did not receive your letter until my return +the other day. What shall I say to comfort you, my much-valued, +much-afflicted friend! I can but grieve with you; consolation I have +none to offer, except that which religion holds out to the children of +affliction—<i>children of affliction!</i>—how just the expression! and +like every other family they have matters among them which they hear, +see, and feel in a serious, all-important manner, of which the world +has not, nor cares to have, any idea. The world looks indifferently +on, makes the passing remark, and proceeds to the next novel +occurrence.</p> + +<p>Alas, Madam! who would wish for many years? What is it but to drag +existence until our joys gradually expire, and leave us in a night of +misery: like the gloom which blots out the stars one by one, from the +face of night, and leaves us, without a ray of comfort, in the howling +waste!</p> + +<p>I am interrupted, and must leave off. You shall soon hear from me +again.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + + + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCCXXXVII" id="letterCCXXXVII"></a>CCXXXVII.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. THOMSON.</h3> + +<p>[Thomson had delivered judgment on some old Scottish songs, but the +poet murmured against George’s decree.]</p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">My Dear Sir</span>,</p> + +<p>Let me tell you, that you are too fastidious in your ideas of songs +and ballads. I own that your criticisms are just; the songs you +specify in your list have, all but one, the faults you remark in them; +but who shall mend the matter? Who shall rise up and say, “Go to! I +will make a better?” For instance, on reading over “The Lea-rig,” I +immediately set about trying my hand on it, and, after all, I could +make nothing more of it than the following, which, Heaven knows, is +poor enough.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">When o’er the hill the eastern star, &c.<a name="FNanchor_200_200" id="FNanchor_200_200"></a><a href="#Footnote_200_200" class="fnanchor">[200]</a><br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>Your observation as to the aptitude of Dr. Percy’s ballad to the air, +“Nannie, O!” is just. It is, besides, perhaps, the most beautiful +ballad in the English language. But let me remark to you, that in the +sentiment and style of our Scottish airs, there is a pastoral +simplicity, a something that one may call the Doric style and dialect +of vocal music, to which a dash of our native tongue and manners is +particularly, nay peculiarly, apposite. For this reason, and upon my +honour, for this reason alone, I am of opinion (but, as I told you +before, my opinion is yours, freely yours, to approve or reject, as +you please) that my ballad of “Nannie, O!” might perhaps do for one +set of verses to the tune. Now don’t let it enter into your head, that +you are under any necessity of taking my verses. I have long ago made +up my mind as to my own reputation in the business of authorship, and +have nothing to be pleased or offended at, in your adoption or +rejection of my verses. Though you should reject one half of what I +give you, I shall be pleased with your adopting the other half, and +shall continue to serve you with the same assiduity.</p> + +<p>In the printed copy of my “Nannie, O!” the name of the river is +horribly prosaic.<a name="FNanchor_201_201" id="FNanchor_201_201"></a><a href="#Footnote_201_201" class="fnanchor">[201]</a> I will alter it:</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Behind yon hills where Lugar flows.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>Girvan is the name of the river that suits the idea of the stanza +best, but Lugar is the most agreeable modulation of syllables.</p> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_450" id="Page_450">[450]</a></span></p> +<p>I will soon give you a great many more remarks on this business; but I +have just now an opportunity of conveying you this scrawl, free of +postage, an expense that it is ill able to pay: so, with my best +compliments to honest Allan, Gude be wi’ ye, &c.</p> + +<p class="sig7"><i>Friday Night.</i></p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Saturday Morning.</i></p> + +<p>As I find I have still an hour to spare this morning before my +conveyance goes away, I will give you “Nannie, O!” at length.</p> + +<p>Your remarks on “Ewe-bughts, Marion,” are just; still it has obtained +a place among our more classical Scottish songs; and what with many +beauties in its composition, and more prejudices in its favour, you +will not find it easy to supplant it.</p> + +<p>In my very early years, when I was thinking of going to the West +Indies, I took the following farewell of a dear girl. It is quite +trifling, and has nothing of the merits of “Ewe-bughts;” but it will +fill up this page. You must know that all my earlier love-songs were +the breathings of ardent passion, and though it might have been easy +in aftertimes to have given them a polish, yet that polish, to me, +whose they were, and who perhaps alone cared for them, would have +defaced the legend of my heart, which was so faithfully inscribed on +them. Their uncouth simplicity was, as they say of wines, their race.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Will ye go to the Indies, my Mary? &c.<a name="FNanchor_202_202" id="FNanchor_202_202"></a><a href="#Footnote_202_202" class="fnanchor">[202]</a><br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>“Gala Water” and “Auld Rob Morris” I think, will most probably be the +next subject of my musings. However, even on my verses, speak out your +criticisms with equal frankness. My wish is not to stand aloof, the +uncomplying bigot of <i>opiniâtreté</i>, but cordially to join issue with +you in the furtherance of the work.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + + + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_200_200" id="Footnote_200_200"></a><a href="#FNanchor_200_200"><span class="label">[200]</span></a> <a href="#CLXXVII">Song CLXXVII</a></p> +</div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_201_201" id="Footnote_201_201"></a><a href="#FNanchor_201_201"><span class="label">[201]</span></a> It is something worse in the Edinburgh edition—“Behind yon hills where Stinchar flows.”—Poems, p +322.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_202_202" id="Footnote_202_202"></a><a href="#FNanchor_202_202"><span class="label">[202]</span></a> <a href="#CLXXIX">Song CLXXIX.</a></p> +</div> +</div> + + + +<h2><a name="letterCCXXXVIII" id="letterCCXXXVIII"></a>CCXXXVIII.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. THOMSON.</h3> + +<p>[The poet loved to describe the influence which the charms of Miss +Lesley Baillie exercised over his imagination.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>November 8th, 1792.</i></p> + +<p>If you mean, my dear Sir, that all the songs in your collection shall +be poetry of the first merit, I am afraid you will find more +difficulty in the undertaking than you are aware of. There is a +peculiar rhythmus in many of our airs, and a necessity of adapting +syllables to the emphasis, or what I would call the feature-notes of +the tune, that cramp the poet, and lay him under almost insuperable +difficulties. For instance, in the air, “My wife’s a wanton wee +thing,” if a few lines smooth and pretty can be adapted to it, it is +all you can expect. The following were made extempore to it; and +though on further study I might give you something more profound, yet +it might not suit the light-horse gallop of the air so well as this +random clink:—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">My wife’s a winsome wee thing, &c.<a name="FNanchor_203_203" id="FNanchor_203_203"></a><a href="#Footnote_203_203" class="fnanchor">[203]</a><br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>I have just been looking over the “Collier’s bonny dochter;” and if +the following rhapsody, which I composed the other day, on a charming +Ayrshire girl, Miss Lesley Baillie, as she passed through this place +to England, will suit your taste better than the “Collier Lassie,” +fall on and welcome:—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O, saw ye bonny Lesley? &c.<a name="FNanchor_204_204" id="FNanchor_204_204"></a><a href="#Footnote_204_204" class="fnanchor">[204]</a><br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>I have hitherto deferred the sublimer, more pathetic airs, until more +leisure, as they will take, and deserve, a greater effort. However, +they are all put into your hands, as clay into the hands of the +potter, to make one vessel to honour, and another to dishonour. +Farewell, &c.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + + + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_203_203" id="Footnote_203_203"></a><a href="#FNanchor_203_203"><span class="label">[203]</span></a> <a href="#CLXXX">Song CLXXX.</a></p> +</div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_204_204" id="Footnote_204_204"></a><a href="#FNanchor_204_204"><span class="label">[204]</span></a> <a href="#CLXXXI">Song CLXXXI.</a></p> +</div> +</div> + + + +<h2><a name="letterCCXXXIX" id="letterCCXXXIX"></a>CCXXXIX.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. THOMSON.</h3> + +<p>[The story of Mary Campbell’s love is related in the notes on the +songs which the poet wrote in her honour. Thomson says, in his answer, +“I have heard the sad story of your Mary; you always seem inspired +when you write of her.”]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>14th November, 1792.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">My Dear Sir</span>,</p> + +<p>I agree with you that the song, “Katherine Ogie,” is very poor stuff, +and unworthy, altogether unworthy of so beautiful an air. I tried to +mend it; but the awkward sound, Ogie, recurring so often in the rhyme, +spoils every attempt at introducing sentiment into the piece. The +foregoing song<a name="FNanchor_205_205" id="FNanchor_205_205"></a><a href="#Footnote_205_205" class="fnanchor">[205]</a> pleases myself; I think it <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_451" id="Page_451">[451]</a></span> as in my happiest manner: you will see at first glance that it suits +the air. The subject of the song is one of the most interesting +passages of my youthful days, and I own that I should be much +flattered to see the verses set to an air which would ensure +celebrity. Perhaps, after all, ’tis the still glowing prejudice of my +heart that throws a borrowed lustre over the merits of the +composition.</p> + +<p>I have partly taken your idea of “Auld Rob Morris.” I have adopted the +two first verses, and am going on with the song on a new plan, which +promises pretty well. I take up one or another, just as the bee of the +moment buzzes in my bonnet-lug; and do you, <i>sans ceremonie</i>, make +what use you choose of the productions.</p> + +<p class="sig8">Adieu, &c.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + + + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_205_205" id="Footnote_205_205"></a><a href="#FNanchor_205_205"><span class="label">[205]</span></a> +</p> +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Ye banks and braes and streams around<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The castle o’ Montgomery.<br /></span> +</div></div> +<p class="sig1"> + <a href="#CLXXXII">Song CLXXXII</a></p> +</div> +</div> + + + +<h2><a name="letterCCXL" id="letterCCXL"></a>CCXL.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. THOMSON.</h3> + +<p>[The poet approved of several emendations proposed by Thomson, whose +wish was to make the words flow more readily with the music: he +refused, however, to adopt others, where he thought too much of the +sense was sacrificed.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Dumfries, 1st December, 1792.</i></p> + +<p>Your alterations of my “Nannie, O!” are perfectly right. So are those +of “My wife’s a winsome wee thing.” Your alteration of the second +stanza is a positive improvement. Now, my dear Sir, with the freedom +which characterizes our correspondence, I must not, cannot alter +“Bonnie Lesley.” You are right; the word “Alexander” makes the line a +little uncouth, but I think the thought is pretty. Of Alexander, +beyond all other heroes, it may be said, in the sublime language of +Scripture, that “he went forth conquering and to conquer.”</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">For nature made her what she is,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And never made anither. (Such a person as she is.)<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>This is, in my opinion, more poetical than “Ne’er made sic anither.” +However, it is immaterial: make it either way. “Caledonie,” I agree +with you, is not so good a word as could be wished, though it is +sanctioned in three or four instances by Allan Ramsay; but I cannot +help it. In short, that species of stanza is the most difficult that I +have ever tried.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + + + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCCXLI" id="letterCCXLI"></a>CCXLI.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. THOMSON.</h3> + +<p>[Duncan Gray, which this letter contained, became a favourite as soon +as it was published, and the same may be said of Auld Rob Morris.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>4th December, 1792.</i></p> + +<p>The foregoing [“Auld Rob Morris,” and “Duncan Gray,”<a name="FNanchor_206_206" id="FNanchor_206_206"></a><a href="#Footnote_206_206" class="fnanchor">[206]</a>] I submit, my +dear Sir, to your better judgment. Acquit them or condemn them, as +seemeth good in your sight. “Duncan Gray” is that kind of light-horse +gallop of an air, which precludes sentiment. The ludicrous is its +ruling feature.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + + + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_206_206" id="Footnote_206_206"></a><a href="#FNanchor_206_206"><span class="label">[206]</span></a> Songs <a href="#CLXXXIII">CLXXXIII</a>. and <a href="#CLXXXIV">CLXXXIV</a>.</p> +</div> +</div> + + + +<h2><a name="letterCCXLII" id="letterCCXLII"></a>CCXLII.</h2> + +<h3>TO MRS. DUNLOP.</h3> + +<p>[Burns often discourses with Mrs. Dunlop on poetry and poets: the +dramas of Thomson, to which he alludes, are stiff, cold compositions.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Dumfries, 6th December, 1792.</i></p> + +<p>I shall be in Ayrshire, I think, next week; and, if at all possible, I +shall certainly, my much-esteemed friend, have the pleasure of +visiting at Dunlop-house.</p> + +<p>Alas, Madam! how seldom do we meet in this world, that we have reason +to congratulate ourselves on accessions of happiness! I have not +passed half the ordinary term of an old man’s life, and yet I scarcely +look over the obituary of a newspaper, that I do not see some names +that I have known, and which I, and other acquaintances, little +thought to meet with there so soon. Every other instance of the +mortality of our kind, makes us cast an anxious look into the dreadful +abyss of uncertainty, and shudder with apprehension for our own fate. +But of how different an importance are the lives of different +individuals? Nay, of what importance is one period of the same life, +more than another? A few years ago, I could have laid down in the +dust, “careless of the voice of the morning;” and now not a few, and +these most helpless individuals, would, on losing me and my exertions, +lose both their “staff and shield.” By the way, these helpless ones +have lately got an addition; Mrs. B—— having given me a fine girl +since I wrote you. There is a charm<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_452" id="Page_452">[452]</a></span>ing passage in Thomson’s “Edward +and Eleonora:”</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“The valiant <i>in himself</i>, what can he suffer?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or what need he regard his <i>single</i> woes?” &c.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>As I am got in the way of quotations, I shall give you another from +the same piece, peculiarly, alas! too peculiarly apposite, my dear +Madam, to your present frame of mind:</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Who so unworthy but may proudly deck him<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With his fair-weather virtue, that exults<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Glad o’er the summer main! the tempest comes,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The rough winds rage aloud; when from the helm,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">This virtue shrinks, and in a corner lies<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Lamenting—Heavens! if privileged from trial,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">How cheap a thing were virtue?”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>I do not remember to have heard you mention Thomson’s dramas. I pick +up favourite quotations, and store them in my mind as ready armour, +offensive or defensive, amid the struggle of this turbulent existence. +Of these is one, a very favourite one, from his “Alfred:”</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Attach thee firmly to the virtuous deeds<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And offices of life; to life itself,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With all its vain and transient joys, sit loose.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>Probably I have quoted some of these to you formerly, as indeed when I +write from the heart, I am apt to be guilty of such repetitions. The +compass of the heart, in the musical style of expression, is much more +bounded than that of the imagination; so the notes of the former are +extremely apt to run into one another; but in return for the paucity +of its compass, its few notes are much more sweet. I must still give +you another quotation, which I am almost sure I have given you before, +but I cannot resist the temptation. The subject is religion—speaking +of its importance to mankind, the author says,</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“’Tis this, my friend, that streaks our morning bright.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>I see you are in for double postage, so I shall e’en scribble out +t’other sheet. We, in this country here, have many alarms of the +reforming, or rather the republican spirit, of your part of the +kingdom. Indeed we are a good deal in commotion ourselves. For me, I +am a placeman, you know; a very humble one indeed, Heaven knows, but +still so much as to gag me. What my private sentiments are, you will +find out without an interpreter.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p>I have taken up the subject, and the other day, for a pretty actress’s +benefit night, I wrote an address, which I will give on the other +page, called “The rights of woman:”</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“While Europe’s eye is fixed on mighty things.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>I shall have the honour of receiving your criticisms in person at +Dunlop.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + + + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCCXLIII" id="letterCCXLIII"></a>CCXLIII.</h2> + +<h3>TO R. GRAHAM, ESQ.,</h3> + +<h4>FINTRAY.</h4> + +<p>[Graham stood by the bard in the hour of peril recorded in this +letter: and the Board of Excise had the generosity to permit him to +eat its “bitter bread” for the remainder of his life.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>December, 1792.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">Sir</span>,</p> + +<p>I have been surprised, confounded, and distracted by Mr. Mitchell, the +collector, telling me that he has received an order from your Board to +inquire into my political conduct, and blaming me as a person +disaffected to government.</p> + +<p>Sir, you are a husband—and a father.—You know what you would feel, +to see the much-loved wife of your bosom, and your helpless, prattling +little ones, turned adrift into the world, degraded and disgraced from +a situation in which they had been respectable and respected, and left +almost without the necessary support of a miserable existence. Alas, +Sir! must I think that such, soon, will be my lot! and from the +d—mned, dark insinuations of hellish, groundless envy too! I believe, +Sir, I may aver it, and in the sight of Omniscience, that I would not +tell a deliberate falsehood, no, not though even worse horrors, if +worse can be, than those I have mentioned, hung over my head; and I +say, that the allegation, whatever villain has made it, is a lie! To +the British constitution on Revolution principles, next after my God, +I am most devoutly attached; you, Sir, have been much and generously +my friend.—Heaven knows how warmly I have felt the obligation, and +how gratefully I have thanked you.—Fortune, Sir, has made you +powerful, and me impotent; has given you patronage, and me +dependence.—I would not for my single self, call on your humanity; +were such my insular, unconnected situation, I would despise the tear +that now swells in my eye—I could brave misfortune, I could face +ruin; for at the worst, “Death’s thousand doors stand open;” but, good +God! the tender concerns that I have mentioned, the claims and ties +that I see at this moment, and feel around me, how they unnerve +courage, and wither resolution<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_453" id="Page_453">[453]</a></span>! To your patronage, as a man of some +genius, you have allowed me a claim; and your esteem, as an honest +man, I know is my due: to these, Sir, permit me to appeal; by these +may I adjure you to save me from that misery which threatens to +overwhelm me, and which, with my latest breath I will say it, I have +not deserved.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + + + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCCXLIV" id="letterCCXLIV"></a>CCXLIV.</h2> + +<h3>TO MRS. DUNLOP.</h3> + +<p>[Burns was ordered, he says, to mind his duties in the Excise, and to +hold his tongue about politics—the latter part of the injunction was +hard to obey, for at that time politics were in every mouth.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Dumfries, 31st December, 1792.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">Dear Madam</span>,</p> + +<p>A hurry of business, thrown in heaps by my absence, has until now +prevented my returning my grateful acknowledgments to the good family +of Dunlop, and you in particular, for that hospitable kindness which +rendered the four days I spent under that genial roof, four of the +pleasantest I ever enjoyed.—Alas, my dearest friend! how few and +fleeting are those things we call pleasures! on my road to Ayrshire, I +spent a night with a friend whom I much valued; a man whose days +promised to be many; and on Saturday last we laid him in the dust!</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Jan. 2, 1793.</i></p> + +<p>I have just received yours of the 30th, and feel much for your +situation. However, I heartily rejoice in your prospect of recovery +from that vile jaundice. As to myself, I am better, though not quite +free of my complaint.—You must not think, as you seem to insinuate, +that in my way of life I want exercise. Of that I have enough; but +occasional hard drinking is the devil to me. Against this I have again +and again bent my resolution, and have greatly succeeded. Taverns I +have totally abandoned: it is the private parties in the family way, +among the hard-drinking gentlemen of this country, that do me the +mischief—but even this I have more than half given over.</p> + +<p>Mr. Corbet can be of little service to me at present; at least I +should be shy of applying. I cannot possibly be settled as a +supervisor, for several years. I must wait the rotation of the list, +and there are twenty names before mine. I might indeed get a job of +officiating, where a settled supervisor was ill, or aged; but that +hauls me from my family, as I could not remove them on such an +uncertainty. Besides, some envious, malicious devil, has raised a +little demur on my political principles, and I wish to let that matter +settle before I offer myself too much in the eye of my supervisors. I +have set, henceforth, a seal on my lips, as to these unlucky politics; +but to you I must breathe my sentiments. In this, as in everything +else, I shall show the undisguised emotions of my soul. War I +deprecate: misery and ruin to thousands are in the blast that +announces the destructive demon.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + + + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCCXLV" id="letterCCXLV"></a>CCXLV.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. THOMSON.</h3> + +<p>[The songs to which the poet alludes were “<a href="#CLXXXV">Poortith Cauld</a>,” and “<a href="#CLXXXVI">Galla +Water</a>.”]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Jan. 1793.</i></p> + +<p>Many returns of the season to you, my dear Sir. How comes on your +publication?—will these two foregoing [Songs <a href="#CLXXXV"><span class="smcap">clxxxv.</span></a> and <a href="#CLXXXVI"><span class="smcap">clxxxvi.</span></a> be of any service to you? I should like to know +what songs you print to each tune, besides the verses to which it is +set. In short, I would wish to give you my opinion on all the poetry +you publish. You know it is my trade, and a man in the way of his +trade may suggest useful hints that escape men of much superior parts +and endowments in other things.</p> + +<p>If you meet with my dear and much-valued Cunningham, greet him, in my +name, with the compliments of the season.</p> + +<p class="sig8">Yours, &c.,</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + + + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCCXLVI" id="letterCCXLVI"></a>CCXLVI.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. THOMSON.</h3> + +<p>[Thomson explained more fully than at first the plan of his +publication, and stated that Dr. Beattie had promised an essay on +Scottish music, by way of an introduction to the work.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>26th January, 1793.</i></p> + +<p>I approve greatly, my dear Sir, of your plans. Dr. Beattie’s essay +will, of itself, be a treasure. On my part I mean to draw up an +appendix to the Doctor’s essay, containing my stock of anecdotes, &c., +of our Scots songs. All the late Mr.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_454" id="Page_454">[454]</a></span> Tytler’s anecdotes I have by me, +taken down in the course of my acquaintance with him, from his own +mouth. I am such an enthusiast, that in the course of my several +peregrinations through Scotland, I made a pilgrimage to the individual +spot from which every song took its rise, “Lochaber” and the “Braes of +Ballenden” excepted. So far as the locality, either from the title of +the air, or the tenor of the song, could be ascertained, I have paid +my devotions at the particular shrine of every Scots muse.</p> + +<p>I do not doubt but you might make a very valuable collection of +Jacobite songs; but would it give no offence? In the meantime, do not +you think that some of them, particularly “The sow’s tail to Geordie,” +as an air, with other words, might be well worth a place in your +collection of lively songs?</p> + +<p>If it were possible to procure songs of merit, it would be proper to +have one set of Scots words to every air, and that the set of words to +which the notes ought to be set. There is a <i>navïeté</i>, a pastoral +simplicity, in a slight intermixture of Scots words and phraseology, +which is more in unison (at least to my taste, and, I will add, to +every genuine Caledonian taste) with the simple pathos, or rustic +sprightliness of our native music, than any English verses whatever.</p> + +<p>The very name of Peter Pindar is an acquisition to your work. His +“Gregory” is beautiful. I have tried to give you a set of stanzas in +Scots, on the same subject, which are at your service. Not that I +intend to enter the lists with Peter—that would be presumption +indeed. My song, though much inferior in poetic merit, has, I think, +more of the ballad simplicity in it.</p> + +<p>[Here follows “Lord Gregory.” Song <a href="#CCXXXVII"><span class="smcap">clxxxvii</span></a>.]</p> + +<p>My most respectful compliments to the honourable gentleman who +favoured me with a postscript in your last. He shall hear from me and +receive his MSS. soon.</p> + +<p class="sig8">Yours,</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCCXLVII" id="letterCCXLVII"></a>CCXLVII.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. CUNNINGHAM.</h3> + +<p>[The seal, with the coat-of-arms which the poet invented, is still in +the family, and regarded as a relique.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>3d March, 1793.</i></p> + +<p>Since I wrote to you the last lugubrious sheet, I have not had time to +write you further. When I say that I had not time, that as usual +means, that the three demons, indolence, business, and ennui, have so +completely shared my hours among them, as not to leave me a five +minutes’ fragment to take up a pen in.</p> + +<p>Thank heaven, I feel my spirits buoying upwards with the renovating +year. Now I shall in good earnest take up Thomson’s songs. I dare say +he thinks I have used him unkindly, and I must own with too much +appearance of truth. Apropos, do you know the much admired old +Highland air called “The Sutor’s Dochter?” It is a first-rate +favourite of mine, and I have written what I reckon one of my best +songs to it. I will send it to you as it was sung with great applause +in some fashionable circles by Major Roberston, of Lude, who was here +with his corps.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p>There is one commission that I must trouble you with. I lately lost a +valuable seal, a present from a departed friend which vexes me much.</p> + +<p>I have gotten one of your Highland pebbles, which I fancy would make a +very decent one; and I want to cut my armorial bearing on it; will you +be so obliging as inquire what will be the expense of such a business? +I do not know that my name is matriculated, as the heralds call it, at +all; but I have invented arms for myself, so you know I shall be chief +of the name; and, by courtesy of Scotland, will likewise be entitled +to supporters. These, however, I do not intend having on my seal. I am +a bit of a herald, and shall give you, <i>secundum artem</i>, my arms. On a +field, azure, a holly-bush, seeded, proper, in base; a shepherd’s pipe +and crook, saltier-wise, also proper in chief. On a wreath of the +colours, a wood lark perching on a sprig of bay-tree, proper, for +crest. Two mottos; round the top of the crest, <i>Wood-notes wild</i>: at +the bottom of the shield, in the usual place, <i>Better a wee bush than +nae bield.</i> By the shepherd’s pipe and crook I do not mean the +nonsense of painters of Arcadia, but a <i>stock and horn</i>, and a <i>club</i>, +such as you see at the head of Allan Ramsay, in Allan’s quarto edition +of the <i>Gentle Shepherd.</i> By the bye, do you know Allan? He must be a +man of very great genius—Why is he not more known?—Has he no +patrons? or do “Poverty’s cold wind and crushing rain beat keen and +heavy” on him! I once, and but once, got a glance of that noble +edition of the noblest pastoral in the world; and dear as it was, I +mean<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_455" id="Page_455">[455]</a></span> dear as to my pocket, I would have bought it; but I was told +that it was printed and engraved for subscribers only. He is the +<i>only</i> artist who has hit <i>genuine</i> pastoral <i>costume.</i> What, my dear +Cunningham, is there in riches, that they narrow and harden the heart +so? I think, that were I as rich as the sun, I should be as generous +as the day; but as I have no reason to imagine my soul a nobler one +than any other man’s, I must conclude that wealth imparts a bird-lime +quality to the possessor, at which the man, in his native poverty, +would have revolted. What has led me to this, is the idea, of such +merit as Mr. Allan possesses, and such riches us a nabob or government +contractor possesses, and why they do not form a mutual league. Let +wealth shelter and cherish unprotected merit, and the gratitude and +celebrity of that merit will richly repay it.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCCXLVIII" id="letterCCXLVIII"></a>CCXLVIII.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. THOMSON.</h3> + +<p>[Burns in these careless words makes us acquainted with one of his +sweetest songs.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>20th March, 1793.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">My dear Sir</span>,</p> + +<p>The song prefixed [“Mary Morison”<a name="FNanchor_207_207" id="FNanchor_207_207"></a><a href="#Footnote_207_207" class="fnanchor">[207]</a>] is one of my juvenile works. I +leave it in your hands. I do not think it very remarkable, either for +its merits or demerits. It is impossible (at least I feel it so in my +stinted powers) to be always original, entertaining, and witty.</p> + +<p>What is become of the list, &c., of your songs? I shall be out of all +temper with you, by and bye. I have always looked on myself as the +prince of indolent correspondence, and valued myself accordingly; and +I will not, cannot, bear rivalship from you, nor anybody else.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + + + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_207_207" id="Footnote_207_207"></a><a href="#FNanchor_207_207"><span class="label">[207]</span></a> <a href="#CLXXXVIII">Song CLXXXVIII.</a></p> +</div> +</div> + + + +<h2><a name="letterCCXLIX" id="letterCCXLIX"></a>CCXLIX.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. THOMSON.</h3> + +<p>[For the “Wandering Willie” of this communication Thomson offered +several corrections.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>March, 1793.</i></p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Here awa, there awa, wandering Willie,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Now tired with wandering, haud awa hame;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Come to my bosom, my ae only dearie,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And tell me thou bring’st me my Willie the same.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Loud blew the cauld winter winds at our parting;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">It was na the blast brought the tear in my e’e;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Now welcome the simmer, and welcome my Willie,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The simmer to nature, my Willie to me.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Ye hurricanes, rest in the cave o’ your slumbers!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Oh how your wild horrors a lover alarms!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Awaken, ye breezes! blow gently, ye billows!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And waft my dear laddie ance mair to my arms.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But if he’s forgotten his faithfulest Nannie,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">O still flow between us, thou wide, roaring main;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">May I never see it, may I never trow it,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But, dying, believe that my Willie’s my ain!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>I leave it to you, my dear Sir, to determine whether the above, or the +old “Thro’ the lang muir I have followed my Willie,” be the best.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCCL" id="letterCCL"></a>CCL.</h2> + +<h3>TO MISS BENSON.</h3> + +<p>[Miss Benson, when this letter was written, was on a visit to +Arbigland, the beautiful seat of Captain Craik; she is now Mrs. Basil +Montagu.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Dumfries, 21st March, 1793.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">Madam</span>,</p> + +<p>Among many things for which I envy those hale, long-lived old fellows +before the flood, is this in particular, that when they met with +anybody after their own heart, they had a charming long prospect of +many, many happy meetings with them in after-life.</p> + +<p>Now in this short, stormy, winter day of our fleeting existence, when +you now and then, in the Chapter of Accidents, meet an individual +whose acquaintance is a real acquisition, there are all the +probabilities against you, that you shall never meet with that valued +character more. On the other hand, brief as this miserable being is, +it is none of the least of the miseries belonging to it, that if there +is any miscreant whom you hate, or creature whom you despise, the +ill-run of the chances shall be so against you, that in the +overtakings, turnings, and jostlings of life, pop, at some unlucky +corner, eternally comes the wretch upon you, and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_456" id="Page_456">[456]</a></span> will not allow your +indignation or contempt a moment’s repose. As I am a sturdy believer +in the powers of darkness, I take these to be the doings of that old +author of mischief, the devil. It is well-known that he has some kind +of short-hand way of taking down our thoughts, and I make no doubt he +is perfectly acquainted with my sentiments respecting Miss Benson: how +much I admired her abilities and valued her worth, and how very +fortunate I thought myself in her acquaintance. For this last reason, +my dear Madam, I must entertain no hopes of the very great pleasure of +meeting with you again.</p> + +<p>Miss Hamilton tells me that she is sending a packet to you, and I beg +leave to send you the enclosed sonnet, though, to tell you the real +truth, the sonnet is a mere pretence, that I may have the opportunity +of declaring with how much respectful esteem I have the honour to be, +&c.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCCLI" id="letterCCLI"></a>CCLI.</h2> + +<h3>TO PATRICK MILLER, ESQ.,</h3> + +<h4>OF DALSWINTON.</h4> + +<p>[The time to which Burns alludes was the period of his occupation of +Ellisland.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Dumfries, April, 1793.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">Sir</span>,</p> + +<p>My poems having just come out in another edition, will you do me the +honour to accept of a copy? A mark of my gratitude to you, as a +gentleman to whose goodness I have been much indebted; of my respect +for you, as a patriot who, in a venal, sliding age, stands forth the +champion of the liberties of my country; and of my veneration for you, +as a man, whose benevolence of heart does honour to human nature.</p> + +<p>There <i>was</i> a time, Sir, when I was your dependent: this language +<i>then</i> would have been like the vile incense of flattery—I could not +have used it. Now that connexion is at an end, do me the honour to +accept this <i>honest</i> tribute of respect from, Sir,</p> + +<p class="sig3">Your much indebted humble servant,</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCCLII" id="letterCCLII"></a>CCLII.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. THOMSON.</h3> + +<p>[This review of our Scottish lyrics is well worth the attention of all +who write songs, read songs, or sing songs.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>7th April, 1793.</i></p> + +<p>Thank you, my dear Sir, for your packet. You cannot imagine how much +this business of composing for your publication has added to my +enjoyments. What with my early attachment to ballads, your book, &c., +ballad-making is now as completely my hobby-horse as ever +fortification was Uncle Toby’s; so I’ll e’en canter it away till I +come to the limit of my race—God grant that I may take the right side +of the winning post!—and then cheerfully looking back on the honest +folks with whom I have been happy, I shall say or sing, “Sae merry as +we a’ hae been!” and, raising my last looks to the whole human race, +the last words of the voice of “Coila”<a name="FNanchor_208_208" id="FNanchor_208_208"></a><a href="#Footnote_208_208" class="fnanchor">[208]</a> shall be, “Good night, and +joy be wi’ you a’!” So much for my last words: now for a few present +remarks, as they have occurred at random, on looking over your list.</p> + +<p>The first lines of “The last time I came o’er the moor,” and several +other lines in it, are beautiful; but, in my opinion—pardon me, +revered shade of Ramsay!—the song is unworthy of the divine air. I +shall try to make or mend.</p> + +<p>“For ever, Fortune, wilt thou prove,”<a name="FNanchor_209_209" id="FNanchor_209_209"></a><a href="#Footnote_209_209" class="fnanchor">[209]</a> is a charming song; but “Logan +burn and Logan braes” is sweetly susceptible of rural imagery; I’ll +try that likewise, and, if I succeed, the other song may class among +the English ones. I remember the two last lines of a verse in some of +the old songs of “Logan Water” (for I know a good many different ones) +which I think pretty:—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Now my dear lad maun faces his faes,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Far, far frae me and Logan braes.”<a name="FNanchor_210_210" id="FNanchor_210_210"></a><a href="#Footnote_210_210" class="fnanchor">[210]</a><br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>“My Patie is a lover gay,” is unequal. “His mind is never muddy,” is a +muddy expression indeed.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Then I’ll resign and marry Pate,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And syne my cockernony—“<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>This is surely far unworthy of Ramsay or your book. My song, “Rigs of +barley,” to the same tune, does not altogether please me; but if I can +mend it, and thrash a few loose sentiments</p> + +<p>.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_457" id="Page_457">[457]</a></span> +out of it, I will submit it to your consideration. “The lass o’ +Patie’s mill” is one of Ramsay’s best songs; but there is one loose +sentiment in it, which my much-valued friend Mr. Erskine will take +into his critical consideration. In Sir John Sinclair’s statistical +volumes, are two claims—one, I think from Aberdeenshire, and the +other from Ayrshire—for the honour of this song. The following +anecdote, which I had from the present Sir William Cunningham of +Robertland, who had it of the late John, Earl of Loudon, I can, on +such authorities, believe:</p> + +<p>Allan Ramsay was residing at Loudon-castle with the then Earl, father +to Earl John; and one forenoon, riding or walking, out together, his +lordship and Allan passed a sweet romantic spot on Irvine water, still +called “Patie’s mill,” where a bonnie lass was “tedding hay, +bare-headed on the green.” My lord observed to Allan, that it would be +a fine theme for a song. Ramsay took the hint, and, lingering behind, +he composed the first sketch of it, which he produced at dinner.</p> + +<p>“One day I heard Mary say,”<a name="FNanchor_211_211" id="FNanchor_211_211"></a><a href="#Footnote_211_211" class="fnanchor">[211]</a> is a fine song; but, for consistency’s +sake, alter the name “Adonis.” Were there ever such banns published, +as a purpose of marriage between Adonis and Mary! I agree with you +that my song, “There’s nought but care on every hand,” is much +superior to “Poortith cauld.” The original song, “The mill, mill, +O!”<a name="FNanchor_212_212" id="FNanchor_212_212"></a><a href="#Footnote_212_212" class="fnanchor">[212]</a> though excellent, is, on account of delicacy, inadmissible; +still I like the title, and think a Scottish song would suit the notes +best; and let your chosen song, which is very pretty, follow as an +English set. “The Banks of the Dee” is, you know, literally +“Langolee,” to slow time. The song is well enough, but has some false +imagery in it: for instance,</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“And sweetly the nightingale sang from the tree.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>In the first place, the nightingale sings in a low bush, but never +from a tree; and in the second place, there never was a nightingale +seen or heard on the banks of the Dee, or on the banks of any other +river in Scotland. Exotic rural imagery is always comparatively +flat.<a name="FNanchor_213_213" id="FNanchor_213_213"></a><a href="#Footnote_213_213" class="fnanchor">[213]</a> If I could hit on another stanza, equal to “The small birds +rejoice,” &c., I do myself honestly avow, that I think it a superior +song.<a name="FNanchor_214_214" id="FNanchor_214_214"></a><a href="#Footnote_214_214" class="fnanchor">[214]</a> “John Anderson, my jo”—the song to this tune in Johnson’s +Museum, is my composition, and I think it not my worst:<a name="FNanchor_215_215" id="FNanchor_215_215"></a><a href="#Footnote_215_215" class="fnanchor">[215]</a> if it suit +you, take it, and welcome. Your collection of sentimental and pathetic +songs, is, in my opinion, very complete; but not so your comic ones. +Where are “Tullochgorum,” “Lumps o’ puddin,” “Tibbie Fowler,” and +several others, which, in my humble judgment, are well worthy of +preservation? There is also one sentimental song of mine in the +Museum, which never was known out of the immediate neighbourhood, +until I got it taken down from a country girl’s singing. It is called +“Craigieburn wood,” and, in the opinion of Mr. Clarke, is one of the +sweetest Scottish songs. He is quite an enthusiast about it; and I +would take his taste in Scottish music against the taste of most +connoisseurs.</p> + +<p>You are quite right in inserting the last five in your list, though +they are certainly Irish. “Shepherds, I have lost my love!” is to me a +heavenly air—what would you think of a set of Scottish verses to it? +I have made one to it a good while ago, which I think * * *, but in +its original state it is not quite a lady’s song. I enclose an +altered, not amended copy for you,<a name="FNanchor_216_216" id="FNanchor_216_216"></a><a href="#Footnote_216_216" class="fnanchor">[216]</a> if you choose to set the tune to +it, and let the Irish verses follow.</p> + +<p>Mr. Erskine’s songs are all pretty, but his “Lone-vale”<a name="FNanchor_217_217" id="FNanchor_217_217"></a><a href="#Footnote_217_217" class="fnanchor">[217]</a> is divine.</p> + +<p class="sig9">Yours, &c.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<p>Let me know just how you like these random hints.</p> + + + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_208_208" id="Footnote_208_208"></a><a href="#FNanchor_208_208"><span class="label">[208]</span></a> Burns here calls himself the “Voice of Coila,” in +imitation of Ossian, who denominates himself the “Voice of +Cona.”—<span class="smcap">Currie</span>.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_209_209" id="Footnote_209_209"></a><a href="#FNanchor_209_209"><span class="label">[209]</span></a> By Thomson, not the musician, but the poet.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_210_210" id="Footnote_210_210"></a><a href="#FNanchor_210_210"><span class="label">[210]</span></a> This song is not old; its author, the late John Mayne, +long outlived Burns</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_211_211" id="Footnote_211_211"></a><a href="#FNanchor_211_211"><span class="label">[211]</span></a> By Crawfurd.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_212_212" id="Footnote_212_212"></a><a href="#FNanchor_212_212"><span class="label">[212]</span></a> By Ramsay.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_213_213" id="Footnote_213_213"></a><a href="#FNanchor_213_213"><span class="label">[213]</span></a> The author, John Tait, a writer to the Signet and some +time Judge of the police-court in Edinburgh, assented to this, and +altered the line to, +</p> +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“And sweetly the wood-pigeon cooed from the tree.”<br /></span> +</div></div> +</div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_214_214" id="Footnote_214_214"></a><a href="#FNanchor_214_214"><span class="label">[214]</span></a> <a href="#songsCXXXIX">Song CXXXIX.</a></p> +</div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_215_215" id="Footnote_215_215"></a><a href="#FNanchor_215_215"><span class="label">[215]</span></a> <a href="#songsLXXX">Song LXXX.</a></p> +</div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_216_216" id="Footnote_216_216"></a><a href="#FNanchor_216_216"><span class="label">[216]</span></a> <a href="#CLXXVII">Song CLXXVII.</a></p> +</div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_217_217" id="Footnote_217_217"></a><a href="#FNanchor_217_217"><span class="label">[217]</span></a> +</p> +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“How sweet this lone vale, and how soothing to feeling,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yon nightingale’s notes which in melody meet.”<br /></span> +</div></div> +<p> +The song has found its way into several collections.</p></div> +</div> + + + +<h2><a name="letterCCLIII" id="letterCCLIII"></a>CCLIII.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. THOMSON.</h3> + +<p>[The letter to which this is in part an answer, Currie says, contains +many observations on Scottish songs, and on the manner of adapting the +words to the music, which at Mr. Thomson’s desire are suppressed.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>April, 1793.</i></p> + +<p>I have yours, my dear Sir, this moment. I shall answer it and your +former letter, in my desultory way of saying whatever comes +uppermost.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_458" id="Page_458">[458]</a></span></p> + +<p>The business of many of our tunes wanting, at the beginning, what +fiddlers call a starting-note, is often a rub to us poor rhymers.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“There’s braw, braw lads on Yarrow braes,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That wander through the blooming heather,”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>you may alter to</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Braw, braw lads on Yarrow braes,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ye wander,” &c.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>My song, “Here awa, there awa,” as amended by Mr. Erskine, I entirely +approve of, and return you.</p> + +<p>Give me leave to criticise your taste in the only thing in which it +is, in my opinion, reprehensible. You know I ought to know something +of my own trade. Of pathos, sentiment, and point, you are a complete +judge; but there is a quality more necessary than either in a song, +and which is the very essence of a ballad—I mean simplicity: now, if +I mistake not, this last feature you are a little apt to sacrifice to +the foregoing.</p> + +<p>Ramsay, as every other poet, has not been always equally happy in his +pieces; still I cannot approve of taking such liberties with an author +as Mr. Walker proposes doing with “The last time I came o’er the +moor.” Let a poet, if he choose, take up the idea of another, and work +it into a piece of his own; but to mangle the works of the poor bard, +whose tuneful tongue is now mute for ever, in the dark and narrow +house—by Heaven, ’twould be sacrilege! I grant that Mr. W.’s version +is an improvement; but I know Mr. W. well, and esteem him much; let +him mend the song, as the Highlander mended his gun—he gave it a new +stock, a new lock, and a new barrel.</p> + +<p>I do not, by this, object to leaving out improper stanzas, where that +can be done without spoiling the whole. One stanza in “The lass o’ +Patie’s mill” must be left out: the song will be nothing worse for it. +I am not sure if we can take the same liberty with “Corn rigs are +bonnie.” Perhaps it might want the last stanza, and be the better for +it. “Cauld kail in Aberdeen,” you must leave with me yet awhile. I +have vowed to have a song to that air, on the lady whom I attempted to +celebrate in the verses, “Poortith cauld and restless love.” At any +rate, my other song, “Green grow the rashes,” will never suit. That +song is current in Scotland under the old title, and to the merry old +tune of that name, which, of course, would mar the progress of your +song to celebrity. Your book will be the standard of Scots songs for +the future: let this idea ever keep your judgment on the alarm.</p> + +<p>I send a song on a celebrated toast in this country, to suit “Bonnie +Dundee.” I send you also a ballad to the “Mill, mill, O!”<a name="FNanchor_218_218" id="FNanchor_218_218"></a><a href="#Footnote_218_218" class="fnanchor">[218]</a></p> + +<p>“The last time I came o’er the moor,” I would fain attempt to make a +Scots song for, and let Ramsay’s be the English set. You shall hear +from me soon. When you go to London on this business, can you come by +Dumfries? I have still several MS. Scots airs by me, which I have +picked up, mostly from the singing of country lasses. They please me +vastly; but your learned <i>lugs</i> would perhaps be displeased with the +very feature for which I like them. I call them simple; you would +pronounce them silly. Do you know a fine air called “Jackie Hume’s +Lament?” I have a song of considerable merit to that air. I’ll enclose +you both the song and tune, as I had them ready to send to Johnson’s +Museum.<a name="FNanchor_219_219" id="FNanchor_219_219"></a><a href="#Footnote_219_219" class="fnanchor">[219]</a> I send you likewise, to me, a beautiful little air, which I +had taken down from <i>viva voce.</i><a name="FNanchor_220_220" id="FNanchor_220_220"></a><a href="#Footnote_220_220" class="fnanchor">[220]</a></p> + +<p class="sig8">Adieu.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + + + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_218_218" id="Footnote_218_218"></a><a href="#FNanchor_218_218"><span class="label">[218]</span></a> Songs <a href="#CXCII">CXCII</a>. and <a href="#CXCIII">CXCIII.</a></p> +</div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_219_219" id="Footnote_219_219"></a><a href="#FNanchor_219_219"><span class="label">[219]</span></a> <a href="#CXCIV">Song CXCIV.</a></p> +</div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_220_220" id="Footnote_220_220"></a><a href="#FNanchor_220_220"><span class="label">[220]</span></a> <a href="#CXCVIII">Song CXCVIII.</a></p> +</div> +</div> + + + +<h2><a name="letterCCLIV" id="letterCCLIV"></a>CCLIV.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. THOMSON.</h3> + +<p>[Thomson, it would appear by his answer to this letter, was at issue +with Burns on the subject-matter of simplicity: the former seems to +have desired a sort of diplomatic and varnished style: the latter felt +that elegance and simplicity were “sisters twin.”]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>April, 1793.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">My dear Sir</span>,</p> + +<p>I had scarcely put my last letter into the post-office, when I took +up the subject of “The last time I came o’er the moor,” and ere I +slept drew the outlines of the foregoing.<a name="FNanchor_221_221" id="FNanchor_221_221"></a><a href="#Footnote_221_221" class="fnanchor">[221]</a> How I have succeeded, I +leave on this, as on every other occasion, to you to decide. I own my +vanity is flattered, when you give my songs a place in your elegant +and superb work; but to be of service to the work is my first wish. As +I have <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_459" id="Page_459">[459]</a></span> +often told you, I do not in a single instance wish you, out of +compliment to me, to insert anything of mine. One hint let me give +you—whatever Mr. Pleyel does, let him not alter one iota of the +original Scottish airs, I mean in the song department, but let our +national music preserve its native features. They are, I own, +frequently wild and irreducible to the more modern rules; but on that +very eccentricity, perhaps, depends a great part of their effect.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + + + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_221_221" id="Footnote_221_221"></a><a href="#FNanchor_221_221"><span class="label">[221]</span></a> <a href="#CCXXXIV">Song CCXXXIV.</a></p> +</div> +</div> + + + +<h2><a name="letterCCLV" id="letterCCLV"></a>CCLV.</h2> + +<h3>TO JOHN FRANCIS ERSKINE, ESQ.,</h3> + +<h4>OF M A R.</h4> + +<p>[This remarkable letter has been of late the subject of some +controversy: Mr. Findlater, who happened then to be in the Excise, is +vehement in defence of the “honourable board,” and is certain that +Burns has misrepresented the conduct of his very generous masters. In +answer to this it has been urged that the word of the poet has in no +other thing been questioned: that in the last moments of his life, he +solemnly wrote this letter into his memorandum-book, and that the +reproof of Mr. Corbet, is given by him either as a quotation from a +paper or an exact recollection of the words used: the expressions, +“<i>not to think</i>” and be “<i>silent</i> and <i>obedient</i>” are underlined.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Dumfries, 13th April, 1793.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">Sir</span>,</p> + +<p>Degenerate as human nature is said to be, and in many instances, +worthless and unprincipled it is, still there are bright examples to +the contrary; examples that even in the eyes of superior beings, must +shed a lustre on the name of man.</p> + +<p>Such an example have I now before me, when you, Sir, came forward to +patronize and befriend a distant, obscure stranger, merely because +poverty had made him helpless, and his British hardihood of mind had +provoked the arbitrary wantonness of power. My much esteemed friend, +Mr. Riddel of Glenriddel, has just read me a paragraph of a letter he +had from you. Accept, Sir, of the silent throb of gratitude; for words +would but mock the emotions of my soul.</p> + +<p>You have been misinformed as to my final dismission from the Excise; I +am still in the service.—Indeed, but for the exertions of a gentleman +who must be known to you, Mr. Graham of Fintray, a gentleman who has +ever been my warm and generous friend, I had, without so much us a +hearing, or the slightest previous intimation, been turned adrift, +with my helpless family, to all the horrors of want. Had I had any +other resource, probably I might have saved them the trouble of a +dismission; but the little money I gained by my publication, is almost +every guinea embarked, to save from ruin an only brother, who, though +one of the worthiest, is by no means one of the most fortunate of men.</p> + +<p>In my defence to their accusations, I said, that whatever might be my +sentiments of republics, ancient or modern, as to Britain, I abjured +the idea!—That a <span class="smcap">constitution</span>, which, in its original +principles, experience had proved to be every way fitted for our +happiness in society, it would be insanity to sacrifice to an untried +visionary theory:—that, in consideration of my being situated in a +department, however humble, immediately in the hands of people in +power, I had forborne taking any active part, either personally, or as +an author, in the present business of Reform. But, that, where I must +declare my sentiments, I would say there existed a system of +corruption between the executive power and the representative part of +the legislature, which boded no good to our glorious +<span class="smcap">constitution</span>; and which every patriotic Briton must wish to +see amended.—Some such sentiments as these, I stated in a letter to +my generous patron, Mr. Graham, which he laid before the Board at +large; where, it seems, my last remark gave great offence; and one of +our supervisors-general, a Mr. Corbet, was instructed to inquire on +the spot, and to document me—“that my business was to act, <i>not to +think;</i> and that whatever might be men or measures, it was for me to +be <i>silent</i> and <i>obedient.</i>”</p> + +<p>Mr. Corbet was likewise my steady friend; so between Mr. Graham and +him, I have been partly forgiven; only I understand that all hopes of +my getting officially forward, are blasted.</p> + +<p>Now, Sir, to the business in which I would more immediately interest +you. The partiality of my <span class="smcap">countrymen</span> has brought me forward +as a man of genius, and has given me a character to support. In the +Poet I have avowed manly and independent sentiments, which I trust +will be found in the man. Reasons of no less weight than the support +of a wife and family, have pointed out as the eligible, and, situated +as I was, the only eligible line of life for me, my present +occupation. Still my honest fame is my<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_460" id="Page_460">[460]</a></span> dearest concern; and a +thousand times have I trembled at the idea of those <i>degrading</i> +epithets that malice or misrepresentation may affix to my name. I have +often, in blasting anticipation, listened to some future hackney +scribbler, with the heavy malice of savage stupidity, exulting in his +hireling paragraphs—“Burns, notwithstanding the <i>fanfaronade</i> of +independence to be found in his works, and after having been held +forth to public view and to public estimation as a man of some genius, +yet quite destitute of resources within himself to support his +borrowed dignity, he dwindled into a paltry exciseman, and slunk out +the rest of his insignificant existence in the meanest of pursuits, +and among the vilest of mankind.”</p> + +<p>In your illustrious hands, Sir, permit me to lodge my disavowal and +defiance of these slanderous falsehoods. <span class="smcap">Burns</span> was a poor man +from birth, and an exciseman by necessity: but I <i>will</i> say it! the +sterling of his honest worth, no poverty could debase, and his +independent British mind, oppression might bend, but could not subdue. +Have not I, to me, a more precious stake in my country’s welfare than +the richest dukedom in it?—I have a large family of children, and the +prospect of many more. I have three sons, who, I see already, have +brought into the world souls ill qualified to inhabit the bodies of +<span class="smcap">slaves</span>.—Can I look tamely on, and see any machination to +wrest from them the birthright of my boys,—the little independent +<span class="smcap">Britons</span>, in whose veins runs my own blood?—No! I will not! +should my heart’s blood stream around my attempt to defend it!</p> + +<p>Does any man tell me, that my full efforts can be of no service; and +that it does not belong to my humble station to meddle with the +concern of a nation?</p> + +<p>I can tell him, that it is on such individuals as I, that a nation has +to rest, both for the hand of support, and the eye of intelligence. +The uninformed mob may swell a nation’s bulk; and the titled, tinsel, +courtly throng, may be its feathered ornament; but the number of those +who are elevated enough in life to reason and to reflect; yet low +enough to keep clear of the venal contagion of a court!—these are a +nation’s strength.</p> + +<p>I know not how to apologize for the impertinent length of this +epistle; but one small request I must ask of you further—when you +have honoured this letter with a perusal, please to commit it to the +flames. <span class="smcap">Burns</span>, in whose behalf you have so generously +interested yourself, I have here in his native colours drawn <i>as he +is</i>, but should any of the people in whose hands is the very bread he +eats, get the least knowledge of the picture, <i>it would ruin the poor</i> +<span class="smcap">bard</span> <i>for ever</i>!</p> + +<p>My poems having just come out in another edition, I beg leave to +present you with a copy, as a small mark of that high esteem and +ardent gratitude, with which I have the honour to be,</p> + +<p class="sig10">Sir,</p> + +<p class="sig5">Your deeply indebted,</p> + +<p class="sig4">And ever devoted humble servant,</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCCLVI" id="letterCCLVI"></a>CCLVI.</h2> + +<h3>TO ROBERT AINSLIE, ESQ.</h3> + +<p>[“Up tails a’, by the light o’ the moon,” was the name of a Scottish +air, to which the devil danced with the witches of Fife, on Magus +Moor, as reported by a warlock, in that credible work, “Satan’s +Invisible World discovered.”]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>April 26, 1793.</i></p> + +<p>I am d—mnably out of humour, my dear Ainslie, and that is the reason, +why I take up the pen to <i>you</i>: ’tis the nearest way (<i>probatum est</i>) +to recover my spirits again.</p> + +<p>I received your last, and was much entertained with it; but I will not +at this time, nor at any other time, answer it.—Answer a letter? I +never could answer a letter in my life!—I have written many a letter +in return for letters I have received; but then—they were original +matter—spurt-away! zig here, zag there; as if the devil that, my +Grannie (an old woman indeed) often told me, rode on will-o’-wisp, or, +in her more classic phrase, <span class="smcap">Spunkie</span>, were looking over my +elbow.—Happy thought that idea has engendered in my head! +<span class="smcap">Spunkie</span>—thou shalt henceforth be my symbol signature, and +tutelary genius! Like thee, hap-step-and-lowp, here-awa-there-awa, +higglety-pigglety, pell-mell, hither-and-yon, ram-stam, +happy-go-lucky, up-tails-a’-by-the-light-o’-the-moon,—has been, is, +and shall be, my progress through the mosses and moors of this vile, +bleak, barren wilderness of a life of ours.</p> + +<p>Come then, my guardian spirit, like thee may I skip away, amusing +myself by and at my own light: and if any opaque-souled lubber of +mankind complain that my elfine, lambent, glim<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_461" id="Page_461">[461]</a></span> merous wanderings have +misled his stupid steps over precipices, or into bogs, let the +thickheaded blunderbuss recollect, that he is not Spunkie:—that</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“<span class="smcap">Spunkie’s</span> wanderings could not copied be:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Amid these perils none durst walk but he.”—<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p>I have no doubt but scholar-craft may be caught, as a Scotchman catches +the itch,—by friction. How else can you account for it, that born +blockheads, by mere dint of <i>handling</i> books, grow so wise that even +they themselves are equally convinced of and surprised at their own +parts? I once carried this philosophy to that degree that in a knot of +country folks who had a library amongst them, and who, to the honour +of their good sense, made me factotum in the business; one of our +members, a little, wise-looking, squat, upright, jabbering body of a +tailor, I advised him, instead of turning over the leaves, <i>to bind +the book on his back.</i>—Johnnie took the hint; and as our meetings +were every fourth Saturday, and Pricklouse having a good Scots mile to +walk in coming, and, of course, another in returning, Bodkin was sure +to lay his hand on some heavy quarto, or ponderous folio, with, and +under which, wrapt up in his gray plaid, he grew wise, as he grew +weary, all the way home. He carried this so far, that an old musty +Hebrew concordance, which we had in a present from a neighbouring +priest, by mere dint of applying it, as doctors do a blistering +plaster, between his shoulders, Stitch, in a dozen pilgrimages, +acquired as much rational theology as the said priest had done by +forty years perusal of the pages.</p> + +<p>Tell me, and tell me truly, what you think of this theory.</p> + +<p class="sig9">Yours,</p> + +<p class="sig8"><span class="smcap">Spunkie</span>.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCCLVII" id="letterCCLVII"></a>CCLVII.</h2> + +<h3>TO MISS KENNEDY.</h3> + +<p>[Miss Kennedy was one of that numerous band of ladies who patronized +the poet in Edinburgh; she was related to the Hamiltons of Mossgiel.]</p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">Madam</span>,</p> + +<p>Permit me to present you with the enclosed song as a small though +grateful tribute for the honour of your acquaintance. I have, in these +verses, attempted some faint sketches of your portrait in the +unembellished simple manner of descriptive <span class="smcap">truth</span>.—Flattery, +I leave to your <span class="smcap">lovers</span>, whose exaggerating fancies may make +them imagine you still nearer perfection than you really are.</p> + +<p>Poets, Madam, of all mankind, feel most forcibly the powers of +<span class="smcap">beauty</span>; as, if they are really poets of nature’s making, +their feelings must be finer, and their taste more delicate than most +of the world. In the cheerful bloom of <span class="smcap">spring</span>, or the pensive +mildness of <span class="smcap">autumn</span>; the grandeur of <span class="smcap">summer</span>, or the +hoary majesty of <span class="smcap">winter</span>, the poet feels a charm unknown to +the rest of his species. Even the sight of a fine flower, or the +company of a fine woman (by far the finest part of God’s works below), +have sensations for the poetic heart that the <span class="smcap">herd</span> of man are +strangers to.—On this last account, Madam, I am, as in many other +things, indebted to Mr. Hamilton’s kindness in introducing me to you. +Your lovers may view you with a wish, I look on you with pleasure; +their hearts, in your presence, may glow with desire, mine rises with +admiration.</p> + +<p>That the arrows of misfortune, however they should, as incident to +humanity, glance a slight wound, may never reach your <i>heart</i>—that +the snares of villany may never beset you in the road of life—that +<span class="smcap">innocence</span> may hand you by the path of honour to the dwelling +of <span class="smcap">peace</span>, is the sincere wish of him who has the honour to +be, &c.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCCLVIII" id="letterCCLVIII"></a>CCLVIII.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. THOMSON.</h3> + +<p>[The name of the friend who fell a sacrifice to those changeable +times, has not been mentioned: it is believed he was of the west +country.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>June, 1793.</i></p> + +<p>When I tell you, my dear Sir, that a friend of mine in whom I am much +interested, has fallen a sacrifice to these accursed times, you will +easily allow that it might unhinge me for doing any good among +ballads. My own loss as to pecuniary matters is trifling; but the +total ruin of a much-loved friend is a loss indeed. Pardon my seeming +inattention to your last commands.</p> + +<p>I cannot alter the disputed lines in the “Mill<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_462" id="Page_462">[462]</a></span> Mill, O!”<a name="FNanchor_222_222" id="FNanchor_222_222"></a><a href="#Footnote_222_222" class="fnanchor">[222]</a> What you +think a defect, I esteem as a positive beauty; so you see how doctors +differ. I shall now, with as much alacrity as I can muster, go on with +your commands.</p> + +<p>You know Frazer, the hautboy-player in Edinburgh—he is here, +instructing a band of music for a fencible corps quartered in this +county. Among many of his airs that please me, there is one, well +known as a reel, by the name of “The Quaker’s Wife;” and which, I +remember, a grand-aunt of mine used to sing, by the name of “Liggeram +Cosh, my bonnie wee lass.” Mr. Frazer plays it slow, and with an +expression that quite charms me. I became such an enthusiast about it, +that I made a song for it, which I here subjoin, and enclose Frazer’s +set of the tune. If they hit your fancy, they are at your service; if +not, return me the tune, and I will put it in Johnson’s Museum. I +think the song is not in my worst manner.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Blythe hae I been on yon hill.<a name="FNanchor_223_223" id="FNanchor_223_223"></a><a href="#Footnote_223_223" class="fnanchor">[223]</a><br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="sig7">I should wish to hear how this pleases you.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + + + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_222_222" id="Footnote_222_222"></a><a href="#FNanchor_222_222"><span class="label">[222]</span></a> “The lines were the third and fourth: +</p> +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">‘Wi’ mony a sweet babe fatherless,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And mony a widow mourning.’<br /></span> +</div></div> +<p> +As our poet had maintained a long silence, and the first number of Mr. +Thomson’s musical work was in the press, this gentleman ventured, by +Mr. Erskine’s advice, to substitute for them, in that publication. +</p> +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">‘And eyes again with pleasure beam’d<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That had been blear’d with mourning.’<br /></span> +</div></div> +<p> +Though better suited to the music, these lines are inferior to the +original.”—<span class="smcap">Currie</span>.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_223_223" id="Footnote_223_223"></a><a href="#FNanchor_223_223"><span class="label">[223]</span></a> <a href="#songsCXV">Song CXV.</a></p> +</div> +</div> + + + +<h2><a name="letterCCLIX" id="letterCCLIX"></a>CCLIX.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. THOMSON.</h3> + +<p>[Against the mighty oppressors of the earth the poet was ever ready to +set the sharpest shafts of his wrath: the times in which he wrote were +sadly out of sorts.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>June 25th, 1793.</i></p> + +<p>Have you ever, my dear Sir, felt your bosom ready to burst with +indignation, on reading of those mighty villains who divide kingdoms, +desolate provinces, and lay nations waste, out of the wantonness of +ambition, or often from still more ignoble passions? In a mood of this +kind to-day I recollected the air of “Logan Water,” and it occurred to +me that its querulous melody probably had its origin from the +plaintive indignation of some swelling, suffering heart, fired at the +tyrannic strides of some public destroyer, and overwhelmed with +private distress, the consequence of a country’s ruin. If I have done +anything at all like justice to my feelings, the following song, +composed in three-quarters of an hour’s meditation in my elbow-chair, +ought to have some merit:—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O Logan, sweetly didst thou glide.<a name="FNanchor_224_224" id="FNanchor_224_224"></a><a href="#Footnote_224_224" class="fnanchor">[224]</a><br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>Do you know the following beautiful little fragment, in Wotherspoon’s +collection of Scots songs?<a name="FNanchor_225_225" id="FNanchor_225_225"></a><a href="#Footnote_225_225" class="fnanchor">[225]</a></p> + +<p class="std2">Air—“<i>Hughie Graham.</i>”</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Oh gin my love were yon red rose,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That grows upon the castle wa’;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And I mysel’ a drap o’ dew,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Into her bonnie breast to fa’!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Oh there, beyond expression blest,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I’d feast on beauty a’ the night,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Seal’d on her silk-saft faulds to rest,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Till fley’d awa by Phœbus light!”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>This thought is inexpressibly beautiful; and quite, so far as I know, +original. It is too short for a song, else I would forswear you +altogether unless you gave it a place. I have often tried to eke a +stanza to it, but in vain. After balancing myself for a musing five +minutes, on the hind legs of my elbow-chair, I produced the following.</p> + +<p>The verses are far inferior to the foregoing, I frankly confess: but +if worthy of insertion at all, they might be first in place; as every +poet who knows anything of his trade, will husband his best thoughts +for a concluding stroke.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Oh were my love yon lilac fair,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Wi’ purple blossoms to the spring;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And I a bird to shelter there,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">When wearied on my little wing!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">How I wad mourn, when it was torn<br /></span> +<span class="i2">By autumn wild and winter rude!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But I wad sing on wanton wing,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">When youthfu’ May its bloom renewed.<a name="FNanchor_226_226" id="FNanchor_226_226"></a><a href="#Footnote_226_226" class="fnanchor">[226]</a><br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + + + + + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_224_224" id="Footnote_224_224"></a><a href="#FNanchor_224_224"><span class="label">[224]</span></a> <a href="#CXCVI">Song CXCVI.</a></p> +</div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_225_225" id="Footnote_225_225"></a><a href="#FNanchor_225_225"><span class="label">[225]</span></a> Better known as Herd’s. Wotherspoon was one of the +publishers.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_226_226" id="Footnote_226_226"></a><a href="#FNanchor_226_226"><span class="label">[226]</span></a> See <a href="#CXCVII">Song CXCVII.</a></p> +</div> +</div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_463" id="Page_463">[463]</a></span></p> + +<h2><a name="letterCCLX" id="letterCCLX"></a>CCLX.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. THOMSON.</h3> + +<p>[Thomson, in his reply to the preceding letter, laments that anything +should untune the feelings of the poet, and begs his acceptance of +five pounds, as a small mark of his gratitude for his beautiful +songs.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>July 2d, 1793.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">My dear Sir</span>,</p> + +<p>I have just finished the following ballad, and, as I do think it in my +best style, I send it you. Mr. Clarke, who wrote down the air from +Mrs. Burns’s wood-note wild, is very fond of it, and has given it a +celebrity by teaching it to some young ladies of the first fashion +here. If you do not like the air enough to give it a place in your +collection, please return it. The song you may keep, as I remember it.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">There was a lass, and she was fair.<a name="FNanchor_227_227" id="FNanchor_227_227"></a><a href="#Footnote_227_227" class="fnanchor">[227]</a><br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>I have some thoughts of inserting in your index, or in my notes, the +names of the fair ones, the themes of my songs. I do not mean the name +at full; but dashes or asterisms, so as ingenuity may find them out.</p> + +<p>The heroine of the foregoing is Miss M’Murdo, daughter to Mr. M’Murdo, +of Drumlanrig, one of your subscribers. I have not painted her in the +rank which she holds in life, but in the dress and character of a +cottager.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + + + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_227_227" id="Footnote_227_227"></a><a href="#FNanchor_227_227"><span class="label">[227]</span></a> <a href="#CXCVIII">Song CXCVIII.</a></p> +</div> +</div> + + + +<h2><a name="letterCCLXI" id="letterCCLXI"></a>CCLXI.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. THOMSON.</h3> + +<p>[Burns in this letter speaks of the pecuniary present which Thomson +sent him, in a lofty and angry mood: he who published poems by +subscription might surely have accepted, without any impropriety, +payment for his songs.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>July, 1793.</i></p> + +<p>I assure you, my dear Sir, that you truly hurt me with your pecuniary +parcel. It degrades me in my own eyes. However, to return it would +savour of affectation; but, as to any more traffic of that debtor and +creditor kind, I swear by that <span class="smcap">honour</span> which crowns the +upright statue of <span class="smcap">Robert Burns’s Integrity</span>—on the least +motion of it, I will indignantly spurn the by-past transaction, and +from that moment commence entire stranger to you! <span class="smcap">Burns’s</span> +character for generosity of sentiment and independence of mind, will, +I trust, long outlive any of his wants which the cold unfeeling ore +can supply; at least, I will take care that such a character he shall +deserve.</p> + +<p>Thank you for my copy of your publication. Never did my eyes behold in +any musical work such elegance and correctness. Your preface, too, is +admirably written, only your partiality to me has made you say too +much: however, it will bind me down to double every effort in the +future progress of the work. The following are a few remarks on the +songs in the list you sent me. I never copy what I write to you, so I +may be often tautological, or perhaps contradictory.</p> + +<p>“The Flowers o’ the Forest,” is charming as a poem, and should be, and +must be, set to the notes; but, though out of your rule, the three +stanzas beginning,</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“I’ve seen the smiling of fortune beguiling,”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>are worthy of a place, were it but to immortalize the author of them, +who is an old lady of my acquaintance, and at this moment living in +Edinburgh. She is a Mrs. Cockburn, I forget of what place, but from +Roxburghshire.<a name="FNanchor_228_228" id="FNanchor_228_228"></a><a href="#Footnote_228_228" class="fnanchor">[228]</a> What a charming apostrophe is</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“O fickle fortune, why this cruel sporting,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Why thus perplex us, poor sons of a day?”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>The old ballad, “I wish I were where Helen lies,” is silly to +contemptibility. My alteration of it, in Johnson’s, is not much +better. Mr. Pinkerton, in his, what he calls, ancient ballads (many of +them notorious, though beautiful enough, forgeries), has the best set. +It is full of his own interpolations—but no matter.</p> + +<p>In my next I will suggest to your consideration a few songs which may +have escaped your hurried notice. In the meantime allow me to +congratulate you now, as a brother of the quill. You have committed +your character and fame, which will now be tried, for ages to come, by +the illustrious jury of the <span class="smcap">Sons and Daughters of Taste</span>—all +whom poesy can please or music charm.</p> + +<p>Being a bard of nature, I have some pretensions to second sight; and I +am warranted by the spirit to foretell and affirm, that your +great-grand-child will hold up your volumes, and say, with honest +pride, “This so much admired selection was the work of my ancestor!”</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + + + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_228_228" id="Footnote_228_228"></a><a href="#FNanchor_228_228"><span class="label">[228]</span></a> Miss Rutherford, of Fernilee in Selkirkshire, by marriage +Mrs. Patrick Cockburn, of Ormiston. She died in 1794, at an advanced +age.</p></div> +</div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_464" id="Page_464">[464]</a></span></p> + +<h2><a name="letterCCLXII" id="letterCCLXII"></a>CCLXII.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. THOMSON.</h3> + +<p>[Stephen Clarke, whose name is at this strange note, was a musician +and composer; he was a clever man, and had a high opinion of his own +powers.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>August</i>, 1793.</p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">My dear Thomson</span>,</p> + +<p>I hold the pen for our friend Clarke, who at present is studying the +music of the spheres at my elbow. The Georgium Sidus he thinks is +rather out of tune; so, until he rectify that matter, he cannot stoop +to terrestrial affairs.</p> + +<p>He sends you six of the <i>rondeau</i> subjects, and if more are wanted, he +says you shall have them.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p>Confound your long stairs!</p> + +<p class="sig"><span class="smcap">S. Clarke.</span></p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="letterCCLXIII" id="letterCCLXIII"></a>CCLXIII.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. THOMSON.</h3> + +<p>[“Phillis the Fair” endured much at the hands of both Burns and +Clarke. The young lady had reason to complain, when the poet +volunteered to sing the imaginary love of that fantastic fiddler.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>August</i>, 1793.</p> + +<p>Your objection, my dear Sir, to the passages in my song of “Logan +Water,” is right in one instance; but it is difficult to mend it: if I +can, I will. The other passage you object to does not appear in the +same light to me.</p> + +<p>I have tried my hand on “Robin Adair,” and, you will probably think, +with little success; but it is such a cursed, cramp, out-of-the-way +measure, that I despair of doing anything better to it.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">While larks with little wing.<a name="FNanchor_229_229" id="FNanchor_229_229"></a><a href="#Footnote_229_229" class="fnanchor">[229]</a><br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>So much for namby-pamby. I may, after all, try my hand on it in Scots +verse. There I always find myself most at home.</p> + +<p>I have just put the last hand to the song I meant for “Cauld kail in +Aberdeen.” If it suits you to insert it, I shall be pleased, as the +heroine is a favourite of mine; if not, I shall also be pleased; +because I wish, and will be glad, to see you act decidedly on the +business. ’Tis a tribute as a man of taste, and as an editor, which +you owe yourself.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_229_229" id="Footnote_229_229"></a><a href="#FNanchor_229_229"><span class="label">[229]</span></a> <a href="#CXCIX">Song CXCIX.</a></p> +</div> + +</div> + + +<h2><a name="letterCCLXIV" id="letterCCLXIV"></a>CCLXIV.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. THOMSON.</h3> + +<p>[The infusion of Highland airs and north country subjects into the +music and songs of Scotland, has invigorated both: Burns, who had a +fine ear as well as a fine taste, was familiar with all, either +Highland or Lowland.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>August</i>, 1793.</p> + +<p>That crinkum-crankum tune, “Robin Adair,” has run so in my head, and I +succeeded so ill in my last attempt, that I have ventured, in this +morning’s walk, one essay more. You, my dear Sir, will remember an +unfortunate part of our worthy friend Cunningham’s story, which +happened about three years ago. That struck my fancy, and I +endeavoured to do the idea justice as follows:</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Had I a cave on some wild distant shore.<a name="FNanchor_230_230" id="FNanchor_230_230"></a><a href="#Footnote_230_230" class="fnanchor">[230]</a><br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>By the way, I have met with a musical Highlander in Breadalbane’s +Fencibles, which are quartered here, who assures me that he well +remembers his mother singing Gaelic songs to both “Robin Adair,” and +“Grammachree.” They certainly have more of the Scotch than Irish taste +in them.</p> + +<p>This man comes from the vicinity of Inverness: so it could not be any +intercourse with Ireland that could bring them; except, what I +shrewdly suspect to be the case, the wandering minstrels, harpers, and +pipers, used to go frequently errant through the wilds both of +Scotland and Ireland, and so some favourite airs might be common to +both. A case in point—they have lately, in Ireland, published an +Irish air, as they say, called “Caun du delish.” The fact is, in a +publication of Corri’s, a great while ago, you will find the same air, +called a Highland one, with a Gaelic song set to it. Its name there, I +think, is “Oran Gaoil,” and a fine air it is. Do ask honest Allan or +the Rev. Gaelic parson, about these matters.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + + + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + + + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_230_230" id="Footnote_230_230"></a><a href="#FNanchor_230_230"><span class="label">[230]</span></a> <a href="#CC">Song CC.</a></p> +</div> +</div> + + + +<h2><a name="letterCCLXV" id="letterCCLXV"></a>CCLXV.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. THOMSON.</h3> + +<p>[While Burns composed songs, Thomson got some of the happiest embodied +by David Allan, the painter, whose illustrations of the Gentle +Shepherd had been favourably received. But save when an old man was +admitted to the scene, his designs may be regarded as failures: his +maidens were coarse and his old wives rigwiddie carlins.]</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_465" id="Page_465">[465]</a></span></p><p class="sig"><i>August</i>, 1793.</p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">My dear Sir</span>,</p> + +<p>“Let me in this ae night” I will reconsider. I am glad that you are +pleased with my song, “Had I a cave,” &c., as I liked it myself.</p> + +<p>I walked out yesterday evening with a volume of the Museum in my hand, +when turning up “Allan Water,” “What numbers shall the muse repeat,” +&c., as the words appeared to me rather unworthy of so fine an air, +and recollecting that it is on your list, I sat and raved under the +shade of an old thorn, till I wrote one to suit the measure. I may be +wrong; but I think it not in my worst style. You must know, that in +Ramsay’s Tea-table, where the modern song first appeared, the ancient +name of the tune, Allan says, is “Allan Water,” or “My love Annie’s +very bonnie.” This last has certainly been a line of the original +song; so I took up the idea, and, as you will see, have introduced the +line in its place, which I presume it formerly occupied; though I +likewise give you a choosing line, if it should not hit the cut of +your fancy:</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">By Allan stream I chanced to rove.<a name="FNanchor_231_231" id="FNanchor_231_231"></a><a href="#Footnote_231_231" class="fnanchor">[231]</a><br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>Bravo! say I; it is a good song. Should you think so too (not else) +you can set the music to it, and let the other follow as English +verses.</p> + +<p>Autumn is my propitious season. I make more verses in it than all the +year else. God bless you!</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_231_231" id="Footnote_231_231"></a><a href="#FNanchor_231_231"><span class="label">[231]</span></a> <a href="#CCI">Song CCI.</a></p> +</div> + + + + +</div> +<h2><a name="letterCCLXVI" id="letterCCLXVI"></a>CCLXVI.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. THOMSON.</h3> + +<p>[Phillis, or Philadelphia M’Murdo, in whose honour Burns composed the +song beginning “Adown winding Nith I did wander,” and several others, +died September 5th, 1825.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>August</i>, 1793.</p> + +<p>Is “Whistle, and I’ll come to you, my lad,” one of your airs? I admire +it much; and yesterday I set the following verses to it. Urbani, whom +I have met with here, begged them of me, as he admires the air much; +but as I understand that he looks with rather an evil eye on your +work, I did not choose to comply. However, if the song does not suit +your taste I may possibly send it him. The set of the air which I had +in my eye, is in Johnson’s Museum.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O whistle, and I’ll come to you, my lad.<a name="FNanchor_232_232" id="FNanchor_232_232"></a><a href="#Footnote_232_232" class="fnanchor">[232]</a><br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>Another favourite air of mine is, “The muckin’ o’ Geordie’s byre.” +When sung slow, with expression, I have wished that it had had better +poetry; that I have endeavoured to supply as follows:</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Adown winding Nith I did wander.<a name="FNanchor_233_233" id="FNanchor_233_233"></a><a href="#Footnote_233_233" class="fnanchor">[233]</a><br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>Mr. Clarke begs you to give Miss Phillis a corner in your book, as she +is a particular flame of his, and out of compliment to him I have made +the song. She is a Miss Phillis M’Murdo, sister to “Bonnie Jean.” They +are both pupils of his. You shall hear from me, the very first grist I +get from my rhyming-mill.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + + + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_232_232" id="Footnote_232_232"></a><a href="#FNanchor_232_232"><span class="label">[232]</span></a> <a href="#CCII">Song CCII.</a></p> +</div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_233_233" id="Footnote_233_233"></a><a href="#FNanchor_233_233"><span class="label">[233]</span></a> <a href="#CCIII">Song CCIII.</a></p> +</div> +</div> + + + +<h2><a name="letterCCLXVII" id="letterCCLXVII"></a>CCLXVII.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. THOMSON.</h3> + +<p>[Burns was fond of expressive words: “Gloaming, the twilight,” says +Currie, “is a beautiful poetic word, which ought to be adopted in +England.” Burns and Scott have made the Scottish language popular over +the world.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>August</i>, 1793.</p> + +<p>That tune, “Cauld kail,” is such a favourite of yours, that I once +more roved out yesterday for a gloamin-shot at the muses; when the +muse that presides o’er the shores of Nith, or rather my old inspiring +dearest nymph, Coila, whispered me the following. I have two reasons +for thinking that it was my early, sweet simple inspirer that was by +my elbow, “smooth gliding without step,” and pouring the song on my +glowing fancy. In the first place, since I left Coila’s native haunts, +not a fragment of a poet has arisen to cheer her solitary musings, by +catching inspiration from her, so I more than suspect that she has +followed me hither, or, at least, makes me occasional visits; +secondly, the last stanza of this song I send you, is the very words +that Coila taught me many years ago, and which I set to an old Scots +reel in Johnson’s Museum.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Come, let me take thee to my breast.<a name="FNanchor_234_234" id="FNanchor_234_234"></a><a href="#Footnote_234_234" class="fnanchor">[234]</a><br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>If you think the above will suit your idea of <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_466" id="Page_466">[466]</a></span>your favourite air, I shall be highly pleased. “The last time I came +o’er the moor” I cannot meddle with, as to mending it; and the musical +world have been so long accustomed to Ramsay’s words, that a different +song, though positively superior, would not be so well received. I am +not fond of choruses to songs, so I have not made one for the +foregoing.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + + + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_234_234" id="Footnote_234_234"></a><a href="#FNanchor_234_234"><span class="label">[234]</span></a> <a href="#CCIV">Song CCIV.</a></p> +</div> +</div> + + + +<h2><a name="letterCCLXVIII" id="letterCCLXVIII"></a>CCLXVIII.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. THOMSON.</h3> + +<p>[“Cauld kail in Aberdeen, and castocks in Strabogie,” are words which +have no connexion with the sentiment of the song which Burns wrote for +the air.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>August</i>, 1793.</p> + +<p class="std2"><span class="smcap">Song.</span></p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Now rosy May comes in wi’ flowers.<a name="FNanchor_235_235" id="FNanchor_235_235"></a><a href="#Footnote_235_235" class="fnanchor">[235]</a><br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>So much for Davie. The chorus, you know, is to the low part of the +tune. See Clarke’s set of it in the Museum.</p> + +<p>N.B. In the Museum they have drawled out the tune to twelve lines of +poetry, which is —— nonsense. Four lines of song, and four of chorus, +is the way.<a name="FNanchor_236_236" id="FNanchor_236_236"></a><a href="#Footnote_236_236" class="fnanchor">[236]</a></p> + + + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_235_235" id="Footnote_235_235"></a><a href="#FNanchor_235_235"><span class="label">[235]</span></a> <a href="#CCV">Song CCV.</a></p> +</div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_236_236" id="Footnote_236_236"></a><a href="#FNanchor_236_236"><span class="label">[236]</span></a> <a href="#songsLXVII">See Song LXVII.</a></p> +</div> +</div> + + + +<h2><a name="CCLXIX" id="CCLXIX"></a>CCLXIX.</h2> + +<h3>TO MISS CRAIK.</h3> + +<p>[Miss Helen Craik of Arbigland, had merit both as a poetess and +novelist: her ballads may be compared with those of Hector M’Neil: her +novels had a seasoning of satire in them.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Dumfries, August</i>, 1793.</p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">Madam</span>,</p> + +<p>Some rather unlooked-for accidents have prevented my doing myself the +honour of a second visit to Arbigland, as I was so hospitably invited, +and so positively meant to have done.—However, I still hope to have +that pleasure before the busy months of harvest begin.</p> + +<p>I enclose you two of my late pieces, as some kind of return for the +pleasure I have received in perusing a certain MS. volume of poems in +the possession of Captain Riddel. To repay one with an <i>old song</i>, is +a proverb, whose force, you, Madam, I know, will not allow. What is +said of illustrious descent is, I believe, equally true of a talent +for poetry, none ever despised it who had pretensions to it. The fates +and characters of the rhyming tribe often employ my thoughts when I am +disposed to be melancholy. There is not, among all the martyrologies +that ever were penned, so rueful a narrative as the lives of the +poets.—In the comparative view of wretches, the criterion is not what +they are doomed to suffer, but how they are formed to bear. Take a +being of our kind, give him a stronger imagination and a more delicate +sensibility, which between them will ever engender a more ungovernable +set of passions than are the usual lot of man; implant in him an +irresistible impulse to some idle vagary, such as arranging wild +flowers in fantastical nosegays, tracing the grasshopper to his haunt +by his chirping song, watching the frisks of the little minnows in the +sunny pool, or hunting after the intrigues of butterflies—in short, +send him adrift after some pursuit which shall eternally mislead him +from the paths of lucre, and yet curse him with a keener relish than +any man living for the pleasures that lucre can purchase; lastly, fill +up the measure of his woes by bestowing on him a spurning sense of his +own dignity, and you have created a wight nearly as miserable as a +poet. To you, Madam, I need not recount the fairy pleasures the muse +bestows to counterbalance this catalogue of evils. Bewitching poetry +is like bewitching woman; she has in all ages been accused of +misleading mankind from the councils of wisdom and the paths of +prudence, involving them in difficulties, baiting them with poverty, +branding them with infamy, and plunging them in the whirling vortex of +ruin; yet, where is the man but must own that all our happiness on +earth is not worthy the name—that even the holy hermit’s solitary +prospect of paradisiacal bliss is but the glitter of a northern sun +rising over a frozen region, compared with the many pleasures, the +nameless raptures that we owe to the lovely queen of the heart of man!</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CCLXX" id="CCLXX"></a>CCLXX.</h2> + +<h3>TO LADY GLENCAIRN.</h3> + +<p>[Burns, as the concluding paragraph of this letter proves, continued +to the last years of his life to think of the composition of a +Scottish drama, which Sir Walter<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_467" id="Page_467">[467]</a></span> Scott laments he did not write, +instead of pouring out multitudes of lyrics for Johnson and Thomson.]</p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">My Lady</span>,</p> + +<p>The honour you have done your poor poet, in writing him so very +obliging a letter, and the pleasure the enclosed beautiful verses have +given him, came very seasonably to his aid, amid the cheerless gloom +and sinking despondency of diseased nerves and December weather. As to +forgetting the family of Glencairn, Heaven is my witness with what +sincerity I could use those old verses which please me more in their +rude simplicity than the most elegant lines I ever saw.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“If thee, Jerusalem, I forget,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Skill part from my right hand.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">My tongue to my mouth’s roof let cleave,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">If I do thee forget,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Jerusalem, and thee above<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My chief joy do not set.”—<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>When I am tempted to do anything improper, I dare not, because I look +on myself as accountable to your ladyship and family. Now and then, +when I have the honour to be called to the tables of the great, if I +happen to meet with any mortification from the stately stupidity of +self-sufficient squires, or the luxurious insolence of upstart nabobs, +I get above the creatures by calling to remembrance that I am +patronized by the noble house of Glencairn; and at gala-times, such as +new-year’s day, a christening, or the kirn-night, when my punch-bowl +is brought from its dusty corner and filled up in honour of the +occasion, I begin with,—<i>The Countess of Glencairn!</i> My good woman +with the enthusiasm of a grateful heart, next cries, <i>My Lord!</i> and so +the toast goes on until I end with <i>Lady Harriet’s little angel!</i> +whose epithalamium I have pledged myself to write.</p> + +<p>When I received your ladyship’s letter, I was just in the act of +transcribing for you some verses I have lately composed; and meant to +have sent them my first leisure hour, and acquainted you with my late +change of life. I mentioned to my lord my fears concerning my farm. +Those fears were indeed too true; it is a bargain would have ruined +me, but for the lucky circumstance of my having an excise commission.</p> + +<p>People may talk as they please, of the ignominy of the excise; 50<i>l.</i> +a year will support my wife and children, and keep me independent of +the world; and I would much rather have it said that my profession +borrowed credit from me, than that I borrowed credit from my +profession. Another advantage I have in this business, is the +knowledge it gives me of the various shades of human character, +consequently assisting me vastly in my poetic pursuits. I had the most +ardent enthusiasm for the muses when nobody knew me, but myself, and +that ardour is by no means cooled now that my lord Glencairn’s +goodness has introduced me to all the world. Not that I am in haste +for the press. I have no idea of publishing, else I certainly had +consulted my noble generous patron; but after acting the part of an +honest man, and supporting my family, my whole wishes and views are +directed to poetic pursuits. I am aware that though I were to give +performances to the world superior to my former works, still if they +were of the same kind with those, the comparative reception they would +meet with would mortify me. I have turned my thoughts on the drama. I +do not mean the stately buskin of the tragic muse.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p>Does not your ladyship think that an Edinburgh theatre would be more +amused with affectation, folly, and whim of true Scottish growth, than +manners which by far the greatest part of the audience can only know +at second hand?</p> + +<p class="sig2">I have the honour to be,</p> + +<p class="sig3">Your ladyship’s ever devoted</p> + +<p class="sig4">And grateful humble servant,</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CCLXXI" id="CCLXXI"></a>CCLXXI.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. THOMSON.</h3> + +<p>[Peter Pindar, the name under which it was the pleasure of that bitter +but vulgar satirist, Dr. Wolcot, to write, was a man of little lyrical +talent. He purchased a good annuity for the remainder of his life, by +the copyright of his works, and survived his popularity many year.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Sept.</i> 1793.</p> + +<p>You may readily trust, my dear Sir, that any exertion in my power is +heartily at your service. But one thing I must hint to you; the very +name of Peter Pindar is of great service to your publication, so get a +verse from him now and then; though I have no objection, as well as I +can, to bear the burden of the business.</p> + +<p>You know that my pretensions to musical taste are merely a few of +nature’s instincts, untaught and untutored by art. For this reason, +many musical compositions, particularly<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_468" id="Page_468">[468]</a></span> where much of the merit lies +in counterpoint, however they may transport and ravish the ears of +your connoisseurs, affect my simple lug no otherwise than merely as +melodious din. On the other hand, by way of amends, I am delighted +with many little melodies, which the learned musician despises as +silly and insipid. I do not know whether the old air “Hey tuttie +taitie,” may rank among this number; but well I know that, with +Frazer’s haut-boy, it has often filled my eyes with tears. There is a +tradition, which I have met with in many places in Scotland, that it +was Robert Bruce’s march at the battle of Bannockburn. This thought, +in yesternight’s evening walk, warmed me to a pitch of enthusiasm on +the theme of liberty and independence, which I threw into a kind of +Scottish ode, fitted to the air, that one might suppose to be the +gallant Royal Scot’s address to his heroic followers on the eventful +morning.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Scots, wha hae wi’ Wallace bled.<a name="FNanchor_237_237" id="FNanchor_237_237"></a><a href="#Footnote_237_237" class="fnanchor">[237]</a><br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>So may God ever defend the cause of truth and liberty, as he did that +day! Amen.</p> + +<p>P.S. I showed the air to Urbani, who was highly pleased with it, and +begged me to make soft verses for it; but I had no idea of giving +myself any trouble on the subject, till the accidental recollection of +that glorious struggle for freedom, associated with the glowing ideas +of some other struggles of the same nature, not quite so ancient, +roused my rhyming mania. Clarke’s set of the tune, with his bass, you +will find in the Museum, though I am afraid that the air is not what +will entitle it to a place in your elegant selection.<a name="FNanchor_238_238" id="FNanchor_238_238"></a><a href="#Footnote_238_238" class="fnanchor">[238]</a></p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_237_237" id="Footnote_237_237"></a><a href="#FNanchor_237_237"><span class="label">[237]</span></a> <a href="#CCVII">Song CCVII</a>.</p> +</div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_238_238" id="Footnote_238_238"></a><a href="#FNanchor_238_238"><span class="label">[238]</span></a> <a href="#CCVIII">Song CCVIII.</a></p> +</div> +</div> + + +<h2><a name="CCLXXII" id="CCLXXII"></a>CCLXXII.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. THOMSON.</h3> + +<p>[This letter contains further proof of the love of Burns for the airs +of the Highlands.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Sept.</i> 1793.</p> + +<p>I dare say, my dear Sir, that you will begin to think my +correspondence is persecution. No matter, I can’t help it; a ballad is +my hobby-horse, which, though otherwise a simple sort of harmless +idiotical beast enough, has yet this blessed headstrong property, that +when once it has fairly made off with a hapless wight, it gets so +enamoured with the tinkle-gingle, tinkle-gingle of its own bells, that +it is sure to run poor pilgarlick, the bedlam jockey, quite beyond any +useful point or post in the common race of men.</p> + +<p>The following song I have composed for “Oran-gaoil,” the Highland air +that, you tell me in your last, you have resolved to give a place to +in your book. I have this moment finished the song, so you have it +glowing from the mint. If it suit you, well!—If not, ’tis also well!</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Behold the hour, the boat arrive!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + + + + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CCLXXIII" id="CCLXXIII"></a>CCLXXIII.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. THOMSON.</h3> + +<p>[This is another of the sagacious letters on Scottish song, which +poets and musicians would do well to read and consider.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Sept.</i> 1793.</p> + +<p>I have received your list, my dear Sir, and here go my observations on +it.<a name="FNanchor_239_239" id="FNanchor_239_239"></a><a href="#Footnote_239_239" class="fnanchor">[239]</a></p> + +<p>“Down the burn, Davie.” I have this moment tried an alteration, +leaving out the last half of the third stanza, and the first half of +the last stanza, thus:</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">As down the burn they took their way,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And thro’ the flowery dale;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">His cheek to hers he aft did lay,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And love was aye the tale.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With “Mary, when shall we return,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Sic pleasure to renew?”<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Quoth Mary, “Love, I like the burn,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And aye shall follow you.”<a name="FNanchor_240_240" id="FNanchor_240_240"></a><a href="#Footnote_240_240" class="fnanchor">[240]</a><br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>“Thro’ the wood, laddie”—I am decidedly of opinion that both in this, +and “There’ll never be peace till Jamie comes hame,” the second or +high part of the tune being a repetition of the first part an octave +higher, is only for instrumental music, and would be much better +omitted in singing.</p> + +<p>“Cowden-knowes.” Remember in your index that the song in pure English +to this tune, beginning,</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“When summer comes, the swains on Tweed,”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_469" id="Page_469">[469]</a></span></p><p>is the production of Crawfurd. Robert was his Christian name.<a name="FNanchor_241_241" id="FNanchor_241_241"></a><a href="#Footnote_241_241" class="fnanchor">[241]</a></p> + +<p>“Laddie, lie near me,” must lie by me for some time. I do not know the +air; and until I am complete master of a tune, in my own singing (such +as it is), I can never compose for it. My way is: I consider the +poetic sentiment correspondent to my idea of the musical expression; +then choose my theme; begin one stanza: when that is composed, which +is generally the most difficult part of the business, I walk out, sit +down now and then, look out for objects of nature around me that are +in unison and harmony with the cogitations of my fancy, and workings +of my bosom; humming every now and then the air with the verses I have +framed. When I feel my muse beginning to jade, I retire to the +solitary fire-side of my study, and there commit my effusions to +paper; swinging at intervals on the hind-legs of my elbow-chair, by +way of calling forth my own critical strictures as my pen goes on. +Seriously, this, at home, is almost invariably my way.</p> + +<p>What cursed egotism!</p> + +<p>“Gil Morice” I am for leaving out. It is a plaguy length; the air +itself is never sung; and its place can well be supplied by one or two +songs for fine airs that are not in your list—for instance +“Craigieburn-wood” and “Roy’s wife.” The first, beside its intrinsic +merit, has novelty, and the last has high merit as well as great +celebrity. I have the original words of a song for the last air, in +the handwriting of the lady who composed it; and they are superior to +any edition of the song which the public has yet seen.</p> + +<p>“Highland laddie.” The old set will please a mere Scotch ear best; and +the new an Italianised one. There is a third, and what Oswald calls +the old “Highland laddie,” which pleases me more than either of them. +It is sometimes called “Ginglin Johnnie;” it being the air of an old +humorous tawdry song of that name. You will find it in the Museum, “I +hae been at Crookieden,” &c. I would advise you, in the musical +quandary, to offer up your prayers to the muses for inspiring +direction; and in the meantime, waiting for this direction, bestow a +libation to Bacchus; and there is not a doubt but you will hit on a +judicious choice. <i>Probatum est.</i></p> + +<p>“Auld Sir Simon” I must beg you to leave out, and put in its place +“The Quaker’s wife.”</p> + +<p>“Blythe hae I been on yon hill,”<a name="FNanchor_242_242" id="FNanchor_242_242"></a><a href="#Footnote_242_242" class="fnanchor">[242]</a> is one of the finest songs ever I +made in my life, and, besides, is composed on a young lady, positively +the most beautiful, lovely woman in the world. As I purpose giving you +the names and designations of all my heroines, to appear in some +future edition of your work, perhaps half a century hence, you must +certainly include “The bonniest lass in a’ the warld,” in your +collection.</p> + +<p>“Dainty Davie” I have heard sung nineteen thousand nine hundred and +ninety-nine times, and always with the chorus to the low part of the +tune; and nothing has surprised me so much as your opinion on this +subject. If it will not suit as I proposed, we will lay two of the +stanzas together, and then make the chorus follow, exactly as Lucky +Nancy in the Museum.</p> + +<p>“Fee him, father:” I enclose you Frazer’s set of this tune when he +plays it slow: in fact he makes it the language of despair. I shall +here give you two stanzas, in that style, merely to try if it will be +any improvement. Were it possible, in singing, to give it half the +pathos which Frazer gives it in playing, it would make an admirably +pathetic song. I do not give these verses for any merit they have. I +composed them at the time in which “Patie Allan’s mither died—that +was about the back o’ midnight;” and by the lee-side of a bowl of +punch, which had overset every mortal in company except the hautbois +and the muse.</p> + +<p>Thou hast left me ever, Jamie.<a name="FNanchor_243_243" id="FNanchor_243_243"></a><a href="#Footnote_243_243" class="fnanchor">[243]</a></p> + +<p>“Jockie and Jenny” I would discard, and in its place would put +“There’s nae luck about the house,”<a name="FNanchor_244_244" id="FNanchor_244_244"></a><a href="#Footnote_244_244" class="fnanchor">[244]</a> which has a very pleasant air, +and which is positively the finest love-ballad in that style in the +Scottish, or perhaps in any other language. “When she came ben she +bobbit,” as an air is more beautiful than either, and in the <i>andante</i> +way would unite with a charming sentimental ballad.</p> + +<p>“Saw ye my father?” is one of my greatest favourites. The evening +before last, I wandered out, and began a tender song, in what I think +is its native style. I must premise that the old way, and the way to +give most effect, is to have no starting note, as the fiddlers call +it, but to <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_470" id="Page_470">[470]</a></span> +burst at once into the pathos. Every country girl sings “Saw ye my +father?” &c.</p> + +<p>My song is but just begun; and I should like, before I proceed, to +know your opinion of it. I have sprinkled it with the Scottish +dialect, but it may be easily turned into correct English.<a name="FNanchor_245_245" id="FNanchor_245_245"></a><a href="#Footnote_245_245" class="fnanchor">[245]</a></p> + +<p>“Todlin hame.” Urbani mentioned an idea of his, which has long been +mine, that this air is highly susceptible of pathos: accordingly, you +will soon hear him at your concert try it to a song of mine in the +Museum, “Ye banks and braes o’ bonnie Doon.” One song more and I have +done; “Auld lang syne.” The air is but mediocre; but the following +song, the old song of the olden times, and which has never been in +print, nor even in manuscript, until I took it down from an old man’s +singing, is enough to recommend any air.<a name="FNanchor_246_246" id="FNanchor_246_246"></a><a href="#Footnote_246_246" class="fnanchor">[246]</a></p> + +<p>Now, I suppose, I have tried your patience fairly. You must, after all +is over, have a number of ballads, properly so called. “Gil Morice,” +“Tranent Muir,” “Macpherson’s farewell,” “Battle of Sherriff-muir,” +or, “We ran, and they ran,” (I know the author of this charming +ballad, and his history,) “Hardiknute,” “Barbara Allan” (I can furnish +a finer set of this tune than any that has yet appeared;) and besides +do you know that I really have the old tune to which “The cherry and +the slae” was sung, and which is mentioned as a well-known air in +“Scotland’s Complaint,” a book published before poor Mary’s days?<a name="FNanchor_247_247" id="FNanchor_247_247"></a><a href="#Footnote_247_247" class="fnanchor">[247]</a> +It was then called “The banks of Helicon;” an old poem which Pinkerton +has brought to light. You will see all this in Tytler’s history of +Scottish music. The tune, to a learned ear, may have no great merit; +but it is a great curiosity. I have a good many original things of +this kind.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + + + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_239_239" id="Footnote_239_239"></a><a href="#FNanchor_239_239"><span class="label">[239]</span></a> Mr. Thomson’s list of songs for his publication.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_240_240" id="Footnote_240_240"></a><a href="#FNanchor_240_240"><span class="label">[240]</span></a> This is an alteration of one of Crawford’s songs.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_241_241" id="Footnote_241_241"></a><a href="#FNanchor_241_241"><span class="label">[241]</span></a> His Christian name was William.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_242_242" id="Footnote_242_242"></a><a href="#FNanchor_242_242"><span class="label">[242]</span></a> <a href="#CXCV">Song CXCV</a>.</p> +</div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_243_243" id="Footnote_243_243"></a><a href="#FNanchor_243_243"><span class="label">[243]</span></a> <a href="#CCIX">Song CCIX.</a></p> +</div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_244_244" id="Footnote_244_244"></a><a href="#FNanchor_244_244"><span class="label">[244]</span></a> By William Julius Mickle.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_245_245" id="Footnote_245_245"></a><a href="#FNanchor_245_245"><span class="label">[245]</span></a> The song here alluded to is one which the poet afterwards +sent in an entire form:— +</p> +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Where are the joys I hae met in the morning.”<br /></span> +</div></div> +</div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_246_246" id="Footnote_246_246"></a><a href="#FNanchor_246_246"><span class="label">[246]</span></a> <a href="#CCX">Song CCX.</a></p> +</div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_247_247" id="Footnote_247_247"></a><a href="#FNanchor_247_247"><span class="label">[247]</span></a> A curious and rare book, which Leyden afterwards edited.</p></div> +</div> + + + +<h2><a name="CCLXXIV" id="CCLXXIV"></a>CCLXXIV.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. THOMSON.</h3> + +<p>[Burns listened too readily to the suggestion of Thomson, to alter +“Bruce’s Address to his troops at Bannockburn:” whatever may be the +merits of the air of “Louis Gordon,” the sublime simplicity of the +words was injured by the alteration: it is now sung as originally +written, by all singers of taste.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>September, 1793.</i></p> + +<p>I am happy, my dear Sir, that my ode pleases you so much. Your idea, +“honour’s bed,” is, though a beautiful, a hackneyed idea; so, if you +please, we will let the line stand as it is. I have altered the song +as follows:—<a name="FNanchor_248_248" id="FNanchor_248_248"></a><a href="#Footnote_248_248" class="fnanchor">[248]</a></p> + +<p>N. B. I have borrowed the last stanza from the common stall edition of +Wallace—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“A false usurper sinks in every foe,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And liberty returns with every blow.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>A couplet worthy of Homer. Yesterday you had enough of my +correspondence. The post goes, and my head aches miserably. One +comfort! I suffer so much, just now, in this world, for last night’s +joviality, that I shall escape scot-free for it in the world to come. +Amen.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + + + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_248_248" id="Footnote_248_248"></a><a href="#FNanchor_248_248"><span class="label">[248]</span></a> <a href="#CCVII">Song CCVII.</a></p> +</div> +</div> + + + +<h2><a name="CCLXXV" id="CCLXXV"></a>CCLXXV.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. THOMSON.</h3> + +<p>[The poet’s good sense rose at last in arms against the criticisms of +the musician, and he refused to lessen the dignity of his war-ode by +any more alterations.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>September, 1793.</i></p> + +<p>“Who shall decide when doctors disagree?” My ode pleases me so much +that I cannot alter it. Your proposed alterations would, in my +opinion, make it tame. I am exceedingly obliged to you for putting me +on reconsidering it, as I think I have much improved it. Instead of +“sodger! hero!” I will have it “Caledonian, on wi’ me!”</p> + +<p>I have scrutinized it over and over; and to the world, some way or +other, it shall go as it is. At the same time it will not in the least +hurt me, should you leave it out altogether, and adhere to your first +intention of adopting Logan’s verses.</p> + +<p>I have finished my song to “Saw ye my father?” and in English, as you +will see. That there is a syllable too much for the expression of the +air, is true; but, allow me to say, that the mere dividing of a dotted +crotchet into a crotchet and a quaver, is not a great matter: however, +in that I have no pretensions to cope in judgment with you. Of the +poetry I speak <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_471" id="Page_471">[471]</a></span> +with confidence; but the music is a business where I hint my ideas +with the utmost diffidence.</p> + +<p>The old verses have merit, though unequal, and are popular: my advice +is to set the air to the old words, and let mine follow as English +verses. Here they are:—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Where are the joys I have met in the morning?<a name="FNanchor_249_249" id="FNanchor_249_249"></a><a href="#Footnote_249_249" class="fnanchor">[249]</a><br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>Adieu, my dear Sir! the post goes, so I shall defer some other remarks +until more leisure.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + + + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_249_249" id="Footnote_249_249"></a><a href="#FNanchor_249_249"><span class="label">[249]</span></a> <a href="#CCXI">Song CCXI.</a></p> +</div> +</div> + + + +<h2><a name="CCLXXVI" id="CCLXXVI"></a>CCLXXVI.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. THOMSON.</h3> + +<p>[For “Fy! let us a’ to the bridal,” and “Fy! gie me my coggie, Sirs,” +and “There’s nae luck about the house,” Burns puts in a word of +praise, from a feeling that Thomson’s taste would induce him to +exclude the first—one of our most original songs—from his +collection.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>September, 1793.</i></p> + +<p>I have been turning over some volumes of songs, to find verses whose +measures would suit the airs for which you have allotted me to find +English songs.</p> + +<p>For “Muirland Willie,” you have, in Ramsay’s Tea-Table, an excellent +song beginning, “Ah, why those tears in Nelly’s eyes?” As for “The +Collier’s Dochter,” take the following old bacchanal:—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Deluded swain, the pleasure, &c.”<a name="FNanchor_250_250" id="FNanchor_250_250"></a><a href="#Footnote_250_250" class="fnanchor">[250]</a><br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>The faulty line in Logan-Water, I mend thus:</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">How can your flinty hearts enjoy<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The widow’s tears, the orphan’s cry?<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>The song otherwise will pass. As to “M’Gregoira Rua-Ruth,” you will +see a song of mine to it, with a set of the air superior to yours, in +the Museum, vol. ii. p. 181. The song begins,</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Raving winds around her blowing.<a name="FNanchor_251_251" id="FNanchor_251_251"></a><a href="#Footnote_251_251" class="fnanchor">[251]</a><br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>Your Irish airs are pretty, but they are rank Irish. If they were like +the “Banks of Banna,” for instance, though really Irish, yet in the +Scottish taste, you might adopt them. Since you are so fond of Irish +music, what say you to twenty-five of them in an additional number? We +could easily find this quantity of charming airs; I will take care +that you shall not want songs; and I assure you that you would find it +the most saleable of the whole. If you do not approve of “Roy’s wife,” +for the music’s sake, we shall not insert it. “Deil tak the wars” is a +charming song; so is, “Saw ye my Peggy?” “There’s nae luck about the +house” well deserves a place. I cannot say that “O’er the hills and +far awa” strikes me as equal to your selection. “This is no my ain +house,” is a great favourite air of mine; and if you will send me your +set of it, I will task my muse to her highest effort. What is your +opinion of “I hae laid a herrin’ in saut?” I like it much. Your +jacobite airs are pretty, and there are many others of the same kind +pretty; but you have not room for them. You cannot, I think, insert +“Fy! let’s a’ to the bridal,” to any other words than its own.</p> + +<p>What pleases me, as simple and <i>naive</i>, disgusts you as ludicrous and +low. For this reason, “Fy! gie me my coggie, Sirs,” “Fy let’s a’ to +the bridal,” with several others of that cast, are to me highly +pleasing; while “Saw ye my father, or saw ye my mother?” delights me +with its descriptive simple pathos. Thus my song, “Ken ye what Meg o’ +the mill has gotten?” pleases myself so much, that I cannot try my +hand at another song to the air, so I shall not attempt it. I know you +will laugh at all this: but “ilka man wears his belt his ain gait.”</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + + + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_250_250" id="Footnote_250_250"></a><a href="#FNanchor_250_250"><span class="label">[250]</span></a> <a href="#CCXII">Song CCXII.</a></p> +</div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_251_251" id="Footnote_251_251"></a><a href="#FNanchor_251_251"><span class="label">[251]</span></a> <a href="#songsLII">Song LII.</a></p> +</div> +</div> + + + +<h2><a name="CCLXXVII" id="CCLXXVII"></a>CCLXXVII.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. THOMSON.</h3> + +<p>[Of the Hon. Andrew Erskine an account was communicated in a letter to +Burns by Thomson, which the writer has withheld. He was a gentleman of +talent, and joint projector of Thomson’s now celebrated work.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>October, 1793.</i></p> + +<p>Your last letter, my dear Thomson, was indeed laden with heavy news. +Alas, poor Erskine!<a name="FNanchor_252_252" id="FNanchor_252_252"></a><a href="#Footnote_252_252" class="fnanchor">[252]</a> The recollection that he was a co-adjutator in +your publication, has till now scared me from writing to you, or +turning my thoughts on composing for you.</p> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_472" id="Page_472">[472]</a></span></p> +<p>I am pleased that you are reconciled to the air of the “Quaker’s +wife;” though, by the bye, an old Highland gentleman, and a deep +antiquarian, tells me it is a Gaelic air, and known by the name of +“Leiger m’ choss.” The following verses, I hope, will please you, as +an English song to the air.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Thine am I, my faithful fair:<a name="FNanchor_253_253" id="FNanchor_253_253"></a><a href="#Footnote_253_253" class="fnanchor">[253]</a><br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>Your objection to the English song I proposed for “John Anderson my +jo,” is certainly just. The following is by an old acquaintance of +mine, and I think has merit. The song was never in print, which I +think is so much in your favour. The more original good poetry your +collection contains, it certainly has so much the more merit.</p> + +<p class="std2">SONG.—BY GAVIN TURNBULL.<a name="FNanchor_254_254" id="FNanchor_254_254"></a><a href="#Footnote_254_254" class="fnanchor">[254]</a></p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Oh, condescend, dear charming maid,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My wretched state to view;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A tender swain, to love betray’d,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And sad despair, by you.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">While here, all melancholy,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My passion I deplore,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yet, urg’d by stern, resistless fate,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I love thee more and more.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I heard of love, and with disdain<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The urchin’s power denied.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I laugh’d at every lover’s pain,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And mock’d them when they sigh’d.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But how my state is alter’d!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Those happy days are o’er;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For all thy unrelenting hate,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I love thee more and more.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Oh, yield, illustrious beauty, yield!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">No longer let me mourn;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And though victorious in the field,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Thy captive do not scorn.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Let generous pity warm thee,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My wonted peace restore;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And grateful I shall bless thee still,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And love thee more and more.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>The following address of Turnbull’s to the Nightingale will suit as an +English song to the air “There was a lass, and she was fair.” By the +bye, Turnbull has a great many songs in MS., which I can command, if +you like his manner. Possibly, as he is an old friend of mine, I may +be prejudiced in his favour; but I like some of his pieces very much.</p> + +<p class="std2">THE NIGHTINGALE.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Thou sweetest minstrel of the grove,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That ever tried the plaintive strain,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Awake thy tender tale of love,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And soothe a poor forsaken swain.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">For though the muses deign to aid<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And teach him smoothly to complain,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yet Delia, charming, cruel maid,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Is deaf to her forsaken swain.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">All day, with fashion’s gaudy sons,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In sport she wanders o’er the plain:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Their tales approves, and still she shuns<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The notes of her forsaken swain.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">When evening shades obscure the sky,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And bring the solemn hours again,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Begin, sweet bird, thy melody,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And soothe a poor forsaken swain.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>I shall just transcribe another of Turnbull’s, which would go +charmingly to “Lewie Gordon.”</p> + +<p class="std2">LAURA.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Let me wander where I will,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">By shady wood, or winding rill;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where the sweetest May-born flowers<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Paint the meadows, deck the bowers;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where the linnet’s early song<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Echoes sweet the woods among:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Let me wander where I will,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Laura haunts my fancy still.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">If at rosy dawn I choose<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To indulge the smiling muse;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">If I court some cool retreat,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To avoid the noontide heat;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">If beneath the moon’s pale ray,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thro’ unfrequented wilds I stray;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Let me wander where I will,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Laura haunts my fancy still.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">When at night the drowsy god<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Waves his sleep-compelling rod,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And to fancy’s wakeful eyes<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Bids celestial visions rise,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">While with boundless joy I rove<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thro’ the fairy land of love;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Let me wander where I will,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Laura haunts my fancy still.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>The rest of your letter I shall answer at some other opportunity.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + + + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_252_252" id="Footnote_252_252"></a><a href="#FNanchor_252_252"><span class="label">[252]</span></a> “The honorable Andrew Erskine, whose melancholy death Mr. +Thomson had communicated in an excellent letter, which he has +suppressed.”—<span class="smcap">Currie</span>.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_253_253" id="Footnote_253_253"></a><a href="#FNanchor_253_253"><span class="label">[253]</span></a> <a href="#CCXIII">Song CCXIII.</a></p> +</div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_254_254" id="Footnote_254_254"></a><a href="#FNanchor_254_254"><span class="label">[254]</span></a> Gavin Turnbull was author of a now forgotten volume, +published at Glasgow, in 1788, under the title of “Poetical Essays.”</p></div> +</div> + + + +<h2><a name="CCLXXVIII" id="CCLXXVIII"></a>CCLXXVIII.</h2> + +<h3>TO JOHN M’MURDO, ESQ.,</h3> + +<h4>WITH A PARCEL.</h4> + +<p>[The collection of songs alluded to in this letter, are only known to +the curious in loose lore: they were<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_473" id="Page_473">[473]</a></span> printed by an obscure +bookseller, but not before death had secured him from the indignation +of Burns.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Dumfries, [December, 1793.]</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">Sir</span>,</p> + +<p>’Tis said that we take the greatest liberties with our greatest +friends, and I pay myself a very high compliment in the manner in +which I am going to apply the remark. I have owed you money longer +than ever I owed it to any man. Here is Kerr’s account, and here are +the six guineas; and now I don’t owe a shilling to man—or woman +either. But for these d——d dirty, dog’s-ear’d little pages,<a name="FNanchor_255_255" id="FNanchor_255_255"></a><a href="#Footnote_255_255" class="fnanchor">[255]</a> I +had done myself the honour to have waited on you long ago. Independent +of the obligations your hospitality has laid me under, the +consciousness of your superiority in the rank of man and gentleman, of +itself was fully as much as I could ever make head against; but to owe +you money too, was more than I could face.</p> + +<p>I think I once mentioned something to you of a collection of Scots +songs I have for some years been making: I send you a perusal of what +I have got together. I could not conveniently spare them above five or +six days, and five or six glances of them will probably more than +suffice you. When you are tired of them, please leave them with Mr. +Clint, of the King’s Arms. There is not another copy of the collection +in the world; and I should be sorry that any unfortunate negligence +should deprive me of what has cost me a good deal of pains.</p> + +<p class="sig5">I have the honour to be, &c.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_255_255" id="Footnote_255_255"></a><a href="#FNanchor_255_255"><span class="label">[255]</span></a> Scottish Bank notes.</p></div></div> + + +<h2><a name="CCLXXIX" id="CCLXXIX"></a>CCLXXIX.</h2> + +<h3>TO JOHN M’MURDO, ESQ.,</h3> + +<h4>DRUMLANRIG.</h4> + +<p>[These words, thrown into the form of a note, are copied from a blank +leaf of the poet’s works, published in two volumes, small octavo, in +1793.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Dumfries, 1793.</i></p> + +<p>Will Mr. M’Murdo do me the favour to accept of these volumes; a +trifling but sincere mark of the very high respect I bear for his +worth as a man, his manners as a gentleman, and his kindness as a +friend. However inferior now, or afterwards, I may rank as a poet; one +honest virtue to which few poets can pretend, I trust I shall ever +claim as mine:—to no man, whatever his station in life, or his power +to serve me, have I ever paid a compliment at the expense of +<span class="smcap">truth</span>.</p> + +<p class="sig"><span class="smcap">The Author.</span></p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CCLXXX" id="CCLXXX"></a>CCLXXX.</h2> + +<h3>TO CAPTAIN ——.</h3> + +<p>[This excellent letter, obtained from Stewart of Dalguise, is copied +from my kind friend Chambers’s collection of Scottish songs.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Dumfries, 5th December, 1793.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">Sir</span>,</p> + +<p>Heated as I was with wine yesternight, I was perhaps rather seemingly +impertinent in my anxious wish to be honoured with your acquaintance. +You will forgive it: it was the impulse of heart-felt respect. “He is +the father of the Scottish county reform, and is a man who does honour +to the business, at the same time that the business does honour to +him,” said my worthy friend Glenriddel to somebody by me who was +talking of your coming to this county with your corps. “Then,” I said, +“I have a woman’s longing to take him by the hand, and say to him, +‘Sir, I honour you as a man to whom the interests of humanity are +dear, and as a patriot to whom the rights of your country are +sacred.’”</p> + +<p>In times like these, Sir, when our commoners are barely able by the +glimmer of their own twilight understandings to scrawl a frank, and +when lords are what gentlemen would be ashamed to be, to whom shall a +sinking country call for help? To the independent country gentleman. +To him who has too deep a stake in his country not to be in earnest +for her welfare; and who in the honest pride of a man can view with +equal contempt the insolence of office and the allurements of +corruption.</p> + +<p>I mentioned to you a Scots ode or song I had lately composed, and +which I think has some merit. Allow me to enclose it. When I fall in +with you at the theatre, I shall be glad to have your opinion of it. +Accept it, Sir, as a very humble but most sincere tribute of respect +from a man, who, dear as he prizes poetic fame, yet holds dearer an +independent mind.</p> + +<p class="sig5">I have the honour to be,</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_474" id="Page_474">[474]</a></span></p> + + +<h2><a name="CCLXXXI" id="CCLXXXI"></a>CCLXXXI.</h2> + +<h3>TO MRS. RIDDEL,</h3> + +<p class="center"><b><i>Who was about to bespeak a Play one evening at the Dumfries Theatre.</i></b></p> + +<p>[This clever lady, whom Burns so happily applies the words of Thomson, +died in the year 1820, at Hampton Court.]</p> + +<p>I am thinking to send my “Address” to some periodical publication, but +it has not yet got your sanction, so pray look at it.</p> + +<p>As to the Tuesday’s play, let me beg of you, my dear madam, to give +us, “The Wonder, a Woman keeps a Secret!” to which please add, “The +Spoilt Child”—you will highly oblige me by so doing.</p> + +<p>Ah, what an enviable creature you are! There now, this cursed, gloomy, +blue-devil day, you are going to a party of choice spirits—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i6">“To play the shapes<br /> +</span> +<span class="i0">Of frolic fancy, and incessant form<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Those rapid pictures, assembled train<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of fleet ideas, never join’d before,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where lively <i>wit</i> excites to gay surprise;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or folly-painting <i>humour</i>, grave himself,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Calls laughter forth, deep-shaking every nerve.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="sig1"><span class="smcap">Thomson</span>.</p> + +<p>But as you rejoice with them that do rejoice, do also remember to weep +with them that weep, and pity your melancholy friend.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CCLXXXII" id="CCLXXXII"></a>CCLXXXII.</h2> + +<h3>TO A LADY.</h3> + +<h4>IN FAVOUR OF A PLAYER’S BENEFIT.</h4> + +<p>[The name of the lady to whom this letter is addressed, has not +transpired.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Dumfries, 1794.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">Madam</span>,</p> + +<p>You were so very good as to promise me to honour my friend with your +presence on his benefit night. That night is fixed for Friday first: +the play a most interesting one! “The Way to Keep Him.” I have the +pleasure to know Mr. G. well. His merit as an actor is generally +acknowledged. He has genius and worth which would do honour to +patronage: he is a poor and modest man; claims which from their very +<i>silence</i> have the more forcible power on the generous heart. Alas, +for pity! that from the indolence of those who have the good things of +this life in their gift, too often does brazen-fronted importunity +snatch that boon, the rightful due of retiring, humble want! Of all +the qualities we assign to the author and director of nature, by far +the most enviable is—to be able “to wipe away all tears from all +eyes.” O what insignificant, sordid wretches are they, however chance +may have loaded them with wealth, who go to their graves, to their +magnificent <i>mausoleums</i>, with hardly the consciousness of having made +one poor honest heart happy!</p> + +<p>But I crave your pardon, Madam; I came to beg, not to preach.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CCLXXXIII" id="CCLXXXIII"></a>CCLXXXIII.</h2> + +<h3>TO THE EARL OF BUCHAN,</h3> + +<h4><i>With a Copy of Bruce’s Address to his Troops at Bannockburn.</i></h4> + +<p>[This fantastic Earl of Buchan died a few years ago: when he was put +into the family burial-ground, at Dryburgh, his head was laid the +wrong way, which Sir Walter Scott said was little matter, as it had +never been quite right in his lifetime.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Dumfries, 12th January, 1794.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7 smcap">My Lord,</p> + +<p>Will your lordship allow me to present you with the enclosed little +composition of mine, as a small tribute of gratitude for the +acquaintance with which you have been pleased to honour me? +Independent of my enthusiasm as a Scotsman, I have rarely met with +anything in history which interests my feelings as a man, equal with +the story of Bannockburn. On the one hand, a cruel, but able usurper, +leading on the finest army in Europe to extinguish the last spark of +freedom among a greatly-daring and greatly-injured people; on the +other hand, the desperate relics of a gallant nation, devoting +themselves to rescue their bleeding country, or perish with her.</p> + +<p>Liberty! thou art a prize truly and indeed invaluable! for never canst +thou be too dearly bought!</p> + +<p>If my little ode has the honour of your lordship’s approbation, it +will gratify my highest ambition.</p> + +<p class="sig5">I have the honour to be, &c.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_475" id="Page_475">[475]</a></span></p> + + +<h2><a name="CCLXXXIV" id="CCLXXXIV"></a>CCLXXXIV.</h2> + +<h3>TO CAPTAIN MILLER,</h3> + +<h4>DALSWINTON.</h4> + +<p>[Captain Miller, of Dalswinton, sat in the House of Commons for the +Dumfries district of boroughs. Dalswinton has passed from the family +to my friend James M’Alpine Leny, Esq.]</p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">Dear Sir,</span></p> + +<p>The following ode is on a subject which I know you by no means regard +with indifference. Oh, Liberty,</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Thou mak’st the gloomy face of nature gay,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Giv’st beauty to the sun, and pleasure to the day.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="sig2"><span class="smcap">Addison.</span></p> + +<p>It does me so much good to meet with a man whose honest bosom glows +with the generous enthusiasm, the heroic daring of liberty, that I +could not forbear sending you a composition of my own on the subject, +which I really think is in my best manner.</p> + +<p class="sig5">I have the honour to be,</p> + +<p class="sig9">Dear Sir, &c.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CCLXXXV" id="CCLXXXV"></a>CCLXXXV.</h2> + +<h3>TO MRS. RIDDEL.</h3> + +<p>[The dragon guarding the Hesperian fruit, was simply a military +officer, who, with the courtesy of those whose trade is arms, paid +attention to the lady.]</p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">Dear Madam</span>,</p> + +<p>I meant to have called on you yesternight, but as I edged up to your +box-door, the first object which greeted my view, was one of those +lobster-coated puppies, sitting like another dragon, guarding the +Hesperian fruit. On the conditions and capitulations you so obligingly +offer, I shall certainly make my weather-beaten rustic phiz a part of +your box-furniture on Tuesday; when we may arrange the business of the +visit.</p> + +<p>Among the profusion of idle compliments, which insidious craft, or +unmeaning folly, incessantly offer at your shrine—a shrine, how far +exalted above such adoration—permit me, were it but for rarity’s +sake, to pay you the honest tribute of a warm heart and an independent +mind; and to assure you, that I am, thou most amiable and most +accomplished of thy sex, with the most respectful esteem, and fervent +regard, thine, &c.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CCLXXXVI" id="CCLXXXVI"></a>CCLXXXVI.</h2> + +<h3>TO MRS. RIDDEL.</h3> + +<p>[The patient sons of order and prudence seem often to have stirred the +poet to such invectives as this letter exhibits.]</p> + +<p>I will wait on you, my ever-valued friend, but whether in the morning +I am not sure. Sunday closes a period of our curst revenue business, +and may probably keep me employed with my pen until noon. Fine +employment for a poet’s pen! There is a species of the human genus +that I call <i>the gin-horse class:</i> what enviable dogs they are! Round, +and round, and round they go,—Mundell’s ox that drives his +cotton-mill is their exact prototype—without an idea or wish beyond +their circle; fat, sleek, stupid, patient, quiet, and contented; while +here I sit, altogether Novemberish, a d—mn’d melange of fretfulness +and melancholy; not enough of the one to rouse me to passion, nor of +the other to repose me in torpor, my soul flouncing and fluttering +round her tenement, like a wild finch, caught amid the horrors of +winter, and newly thrust into a cage. Well, I am persuaded that it was +of me the Hebrew sage prophesied, when he foretold—“And behold, on +whatsoever this man doth set his heart, it shall not prosper!” If my +resentment is awaked, it is sure to be where it dare not squeak: and +if— * * * * *</p> + +<p>Pray that wisdom and bliss be more frequent visiters of</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CCLXXXVII" id="CCLXXXVII"></a>CCLXXXVII.</h2> + +<h3>TO MRS. RIDDEL.</h3> + +<p>[The bard often offended and often appeased this whimsical but very +clever lady.]</p> + +<p>I have this moment got the song from Syme, and I am sorry to see that +he has spoilt it a good deal. It shall be a lesson to me how I lend +him anything again.</p> + +<p>I have sent you “Werter,” truly happy to have any the smallest +opportunity of obliging you.</p> + +<p>’Tis true, Madam, I saw you once since I was at Woodlea; and that once +froze the very life-blood of my heart. Your reception of me was such, +that a wretch meeting the eye of his judge, about to pronounce +sentence of death on him<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_476" id="Page_476">[476]</a></span> could only have envied my feelings and +situation. But I hate the theme, and never more shall write or speak +on it.</p> + +<p>One thing I shall proudly say, that I can pay Mrs. R. a higher tribute +of esteem, and appreciate her amiable worth more truly, than any man +whom I have seen approach her.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CCLXXXVIII" id="CCLXXXVIII"></a>CCLXXXVIII.</h2> + +<h3>TO MRS. RIDDEL.</h3> + +<p>[Burns often complained in company, and sometimes in his letters, of +the caprice of Mrs. Riddel.]</p> + +<p>I have often told you, my dear friend, that you had a spice of caprice +in your composition, and you have as often disavowed it; even perhaps +while your opinions were, at the moment, irrefragably proving it. +Could <i>anything</i> estrange me from a friend such as you?—No! To-morrow +I shall have the honour of waiting on you.</p> + +<p>Farewell, thou first of friends, and most accomplished of women; even +with all thy little caprices!</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CCLXXXIX" id="CCLXXXIX"></a>CCLXXXIX.</h2> + +<h3>TO MRS. RIDDEL.</h3> + +<p>[The offended lady was soothed by this submissive letter, and the bard +was re-established in her good graces.]</p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">Madam</span>,</p> + +<p>I return your common-place book. I have perused it with much pleasure, +and would have continued my criticisms, but as it seems the critic has +forfeited your esteem, his strictures must lose their value.</p> + +<p>If it is true that “offences come only from the heart,” before you I +am guiltless. To admire, esteem, and prize you as the most +accomplished of women, and the first of friends—if these are crimes, +I am the most offending thing alive.</p> + +<p>In a face where I used to meet the kind complacency of friendly +confidence, <i>now</i> to find cold neglect, and contemptuous scorn—is a +wrench that my heart can ill bear. It is, however, some kind of +miserable good luck, and while <i>de haut-en-bas</i> rigour may depress an +unoffending wretch to the ground, it has a tendency to rouse a +stubborn something in his bosom, which, though it cannot heal the +wounds of his soul, is at least an opiate to blunt their poignancy.</p> + +<p>With the profoundest respect for your abilities; the most sincere +esteem and ardent regard for your gentle heart and amiable manners; +and the most fervent wish and prayer for your welfare, peace, and +bliss, I have the honour to be,</p> + +<p class="sig5">Madam,</p> + +<p class="sig4">Your most devoted humble servant,</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CCXC" id="CCXC"></a>CCXC.</h2> + +<h3>TO JOHN SYME, ESQ.</h3> + +<p>[John Syme, of the stamp-office, was the companion as well as comrade +in arms, of Burns: he was a well-informed gentleman, loved witty +company, and sinned in rhyme now and then: his epigrams were often +happy.]</p> + +<p>You know that among other high dignities, you have the honour to be my +supreme court of critical judicature, from which there is no appeal. I +enclose you a song which I composed since I saw you, and I am going to +give you the history of it. Do you know that among much that I admire +in the characters and manners of those great folks whom I have now the +honour to call my acquaintances, the Oswald family, there is nothing +charms me more than Mr. Oswald’s unconcealable attachment to that +incomparable woman. Did you ever, my dear Syme, meet with a man who +owed more to the Divine Giver of all good things than Mr. O.? A fine +fortune; a pleasing exterior; self-evident amiable dispositions, and +an ingenuous upright mind, and that informed, too, much beyond the +usual run of young fellows of his rank and fortune: and to all this, +such a woman!—but of her I shall say nothing at all, in despair of +saying anything adequate: in my song I have endeavoured to do justice +to what would be his feelings, on seeing, in the scene I have drawn, +the habitation of his Lucy. As I am a good deal pleased with my +performance, I, in my first fervour, thought of sending it to Mrs. +Oswald, but on second thoughts, perhaps what I offer as the honest +incense of genuine respect, might, from the well-known character of +poverty and poetry, be construed into some modification or other of +that servility which my soul abhors.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_477" id="Page_477">[477]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="CCXCI" id="CCXCI"></a>CCXCI.</h2> + +<h3>TO MISS ——.</h3> + +<p>[Burns, on other occasions than this, recalled both his letters and +verses: it is to be regretted that he did not recall more of both.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Dumfries, 1794.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">Madam</span>,</p> + +<p>Nothing short of a kind of absolute necessity could have made me +trouble you with this letter. Except my ardent and just esteem for +your sense, taste, and worth, every sentiment arising in my breast, as +I put pen to paper to you, is painful. The scenes I have passed with +the friend of my soul and his amiable connexions! the wrench at my +heart to think that he is gone, for ever gone from me, never more to +meet in the wanderings of a weary world! and the cutting reflection of +all, that I had most unfortunately, though most undeservedly, lost the +confidence of that soul of worth, ere it took its flight!</p> + +<p>These, Madam, are sensations of no ordinary anguish.—However, you +also may be offended with some <i>imputed</i> improprieties of mine; +sensibility you know I possess, and sincerity none will deny me.</p> + +<p>To oppose those prejudices which have been raised against me, is not +the business of this letter. Indeed it is a warfare I know not how to +wage. The powers of positive vice I can in some degree calculate, and +against direct malevolence I can be on my guard; but who can estimate +the fatuity of giddy caprice, or ward off the unthinking mischief of +precipitate folly?</p> + +<p>I have a favour to request of you, Madam, and of your sister Mrs. ——, +through your means. You know that, at the wish of my late friend, I +made a collection of all my trifles in verse which I had ever written. +They are many of them local, some of them puerile and silly, and all +of them unfit for the public eye. As I have some little fame at stake, +a fame that I trust may live when the hate of those who “watch for my +halting,” and the contumelious sneer of those whom accident has made +my superiors, will, with themselves, be gone to the regions of +oblivion; I am uneasy now for the fate of those manuscripts—Will +Mrs. —— have the goodness to destroy them, or return them to me? As a +pledge of friendship they were bestowed; and that circumstance indeed +was all their merit. Most unhappily for me, that merit they no longer +possess; and I hope that Mrs. —— ‘s goodness, which I well know, and +ever will revere, will not refuse this favour to a man whom she once +held in some degree of estimation.</p> + +<p class="sig4">With the sincerest esteem,</p> + +<p class="sig5">I have the honour to be,</p> + +<p class="sig8">Madam, &c.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CCXCII" id="CCXCII"></a>CCXCII.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. CUNNINGHAM.</h3> + +<p>[The religious feeling of Burns was sometimes blunted, but at times it +burst out, as in this letter, with eloquence and fervour, mingled with +fear.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>25th February, 1794.</i></p> + +<p>Canst thou minister to a mind diseased? Canst thou speak peace and +rest to a soul tost on a sea of troubles, without one friendly star to +guide her course, and dreading that the next surge may overwhelm her? +Canst thou give to a frame tremblingly alive as the tortures of +suspense, the stability and hardihood of the rock that braves the +blast? If thou canst not do the least of these, why wouldst thou +disturb me in my miseries, with thy inquiries after me?</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p>For these two months I have not been able to lift a pen. My +constitution and frame were, <i>ab origine</i>, blasted with a deep +incurable taint of hypochondria, which poisons my existence. Of late a +number of domestic vexations, and some pecuniary share in the ruin of +these cursed times; losses which, though trifling, were yet what I +could ill bear, have so irritated me, that my feelings at times could +only be envied by a reprobate spirit listening to the sentence that +dooms it to perdition.</p> + +<p>Are you deep in the language of consolation? I have exhausted in +reflection every topic of comfort. <i>A heart at ease</i> would have been +charmed with my sentiments and reasonings; but as to myself I was like +Judas Iscariot preaching the gospel; he might melt and mould the +hearts of those around him, but his own kept its native +incorrigibility.</p> + +<p>Still there are two great pillars that bear us up, amid the wreck of +misfortune and misery. The one is composed of the different +modifications of a certain noble stubborn something in man, known by +the names of courage, fortitude,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_478" id="Page_478">[478]</a></span> magnanimity. The other is made up of +those feelings and sentiments, which, however the sceptic may deny +them, or the enthusiast disfigure them, are yet, I am convinced, +original and component parts of the human soul; those <i>senses of the +mind</i>, if I may be allowed the expression, which connect us with, and +link us to, those awful, obscure realities—an all-powerful, and +equally beneficent God; and a world to come, beyond death and the +grave. The first gives the nerve of combat, while a ray of hope beams +on the field: the last pours the balm of comfort into the wounds which +time can never cure.</p> + +<p>I do not remember, my dear Cunningham, that you and I ever talked on +the subject of religion at all. I know some who laugh at it, as the +trick of the crafty few, to lead the undiscerning <span class="smcap">many</span>; or at +most as an uncertain obscurity, which mankind can never know anything +of, and with which they are fools if they give themselves much to do. +Nor would I quarrel with a man for his irreligion, any more than I +would for his want of a musical ear. I would regret that he was shut +out from what, to me and to others, were such superlative sources of +enjoyment. It is in this point of view, and for this reason, that I +will deeply imbue the mind of every child of mine with religion. If my +son should happen to be a man of feeling, sentiment, and taste, I +shall thus add largely to his enjoyments. Let me flatter myself that +this sweet little fellow, who is just now running about my desk, will +be a man of a melting, ardent, glowing heart; and an imagination, +delighted with the painter, and rapt with the poet. Let me figure him +wandering out in a sweet evening, to inhale the balmy gales, and enjoy +the growing luxuriance of spring; himself the while in the blooming +youth of life. He looks abroad on all nature, and through nature up to +nature’s God. His soul, by swift delighting degrees, is rapt above +this sublunary sphere, until he can be silent no longer, and bursts +out into the glorious enthusiasm of Thomson,</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“These, as they change, Almighty Father, these<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Are but the varied God.—The rolling year<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Is full of thee.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>And so on, in all the spirit and ardour of that charming hymn. These +are no ideal pleasures, they are real delights; and I ask what of the +delights among the sons of men are superior, not to say equal to them? +And they have this precious, vast addition, that conscious virtue +stamps them for her own; and lays hold on them to bring herself into +the presence of a witnessing, judging, and approving God.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CCXCIII" id="CCXCIII"></a>CCXCIII.</h2> + +<h3>TO THE EARL OF GLENCAIRN.</h3> + +<p>[The original letter is in the possession of the Hon. Mrs. Halland, of +Poynings: it is undated, but from a memorandum on the back it appears +to have been written in May, 1794.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>May, 1794.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">My Lord</span>,</p> + +<p>When you cast your eye on the name at the bottom of this letter, and +on the title-page of the book I do myself the honour to send your +lordship, a more pleasurable feeling than my vanity tells me that it +must be a name not entirely unknown to you. The generous patronage of +your late illustrious brother found me in the lowest obscurity: he +introduced my rustic muse to the partiality of my country; and to him +I owe all. My sense of his goodness, and the anguish of my soul at +losing my truly noble protector and friend, I have endeavoured to +express in a poem to his memory, which I have now published. This +edition is just from the press; and in my gratitude to the dead, and +my respect for the living (fame belies you, my lord, if you possess +not the same dignity of man, which was your noble brother’s +characteristic feature), I had destined a copy for the Earl of +Glencairn. I learnt just now that you are in town:—allow me to +present it you.</p> + +<p>I know, my lord, such is the vile, venal contagion which pervades the +world of letters, that professions of respect from an author, +particularly from a poet, to a lord, are more than suspicious. I claim +my by-past conduct, and my feelings at this moment, as exceptions to +the too just conclusion. Exalted as are the honours of your lordship’s +name, and unnoted as is the obscurity of mine; with the uprightness of +an honest man, I come before your lordship with an offering, however +humble, ’tis all I have to give, of my grateful respect; and to beg of +you, my lord,—’tis all I have to ask of you,—that you will do me the +honour to accept of it.</p> + +<p class="sig5">I have the honour to be,</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_479" id="Page_479">[479]</a></span></p> + + +<h2><a name="CCXCIV" id="CCXCIV"></a>CCXCIV.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. THOMSON.</h3> + +<p>[The correspondence between the poet and the musician was interrupted +in spring, but in summer and autumn the song-strains were renewed.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>May, 1794.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">My dear Sir</span>,</p> + +<p>I return you the plates, with which I am highly pleased; I would +humbly propose, instead of the younker knitting stockings, to put a +stock and horn into his hands. A friend of mine, who is positively the +ablest judge on the subject I have ever met with, and, though an +unknown, is yet a superior artist with the burin, is quite charmed +with Allan’s manner. I got him a peep of the “Gentle Shepherd;” and he +pronounces Allan a most original artist of great excellence.</p> + +<p>For my part, I look on Mr. Allan’s choosing my favourite poem for his +subject, to be one of the highest compliments I have ever received.</p> + +<p>I am quite vexed at Pleyel’s being cooped up in France, as it will put +an entire stop to our work. Now, and for six or seven months, I shall +be quite in song, as you shall see by and bye. I got an air, pretty +enough, composed by Lady Elizabeth Heron, of Heron, which she calls +“The Banks of Cree.” Cree is a beautiful romantic stream; and, as her +ladyship is a particular friend of mine, I have written the following +song to it.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Here is the glen and here the bower.<a name="FNanchor_256_256" id="FNanchor_256_256"></a><a href="#Footnote_256_256" class="fnanchor">[256]</a><br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_256_256" id="Footnote_256_256"></a><a href="#FNanchor_256_256"><span class="label">[256]</span></a> <a href="#CCXXIII">Song CCXXIII.</a></p> +</div></div> + + +<h2><a name="CCXCV" id="CCXCV"></a>CCXCV.</h2> + +<h3>TO DAVID M’CULLOCH, ESQ.</h3> + +<p>[The endorsement on the back of the original letter shows in what far +lands it has travelled:—“Given by David M’Culloch, Penang, 1810. A. +Fraser.” “Received 15th December, 1823, in Calcutta, from Captain +Frazer’s widow, by me, Thomas Rankine.” “Transmitted to Archibald +Hastie, Esq., London, March 27th, 1824, from Bombay.”]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Dumfries, 21st June, 1794.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">My dear Sir</span>,</p> + +<p>My long-projected journey through your country is at last fixed: and +on Wednesday next, if you have nothing of more importance to do, take +a saunter down to Gatehouse about two or three o’clock, I shall be +happy to take a draught of M’Kune’s best with you. Collector Syme will +be at Glens about that time, and will meet us about dish-of-tea hour. +Syme goes also to Kerroughtree, and let me remind you of your kind +promise to accompany me there; I will need all the friends I can +muster, for I am indeed ill at ease whenever I approach your +honourables and right honourables.</p> + +<p class="sig10">Yours sincerely,</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CCXCVI" id="CCXCVI"></a>CCXCVI.</h2> + +<h3>TO MRS. DUNLOP.</h3> + +<p>[Castle Douglas is a thriving Galloway village: it was in other days +called “The Carlinwark,” but accepted its present proud name from an +opulent family of mercantile Douglasses, well known in Scotland, +England, and America.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Castle Douglas, 25th June, 1794.</i></p> + +<p>Here, in a solitary inn, in a solitary village, am I set by myself, to +amuse my brooding fancy as I may.—Solitary confinement, you know, is +Howard’s favourite idea of reclaiming sinners; so let me consider by +what fatality it happens that I have so long been so exceeding sinful +as to neglect the correspondence of the most valued friend I have on +earth. To tell you that I have been in poor health will not be excuse +enough, though it is true. I am afraid that I am about to suffer for +the follies of my youth. My medical friends threaten me with a flying +gout; but I trust they are mistaken.</p> + +<p>I am just going to trouble your critical patience with the first +sketch of a stanza I have been framing as I passed along the road. The +subject is Liberty: you know, my honoured friend, how dear the theme +is to me. I design it as an irregular ode for General Washington’s +birth-day. After having mentioned the degeneracy of other kingdoms, I +come to Scotland thus:—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Thee, Caledonia, thy wild heaths among,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thee, famed for martial deed, and sacred song,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To thee I turn with swimming eyes;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where is that soul of freedom fled?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Immingled with the mighty dead!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Beneath the hallowed turf where Wallace lies!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Hear it not, Wallace, in thy bed of death!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Ye babbling winds in silence sweep,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Disturb not ye the hero’s sleep.<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_480" id="Page_480">[480]</a></span></div></div> + +<p>with additions of</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">That arm which nerved with thundering fate,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Braved usurpation’s boldest daring!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">One quenched in darkness like the sinking star,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And one the palsied arm of tottering, powerless age.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>You will probably have another scrawl from me in a stage or two.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CCXCVII" id="CCXCVII"></a>CCXCVII.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. JAMES JOHNSON.</h3> + +<p>[The anxiety of Burns about the accuracy of his poetry, while in the +press, was great: he found full employment for months in correcting a +new edition of his poems.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Dumfries, 1794.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">My dear Friend</span>,</p> + +<p>You should have heard from me long ago; but over and above some +vexatious share in the pecuniary losses of these accursed times, I +have all this winter been plagued with low spirits and blue devils, so +that <i>I have almost hung my harp on the willow-trees.</i></p> + +<p>I am just now busy correcting a new edition of my poems, and this, +with my ordinary business, finds me in full employment.</p> + +<p>I send you by my friend Mr. Wallace forty-one songs for your fifth +volume; if we cannot finish it in any other way, what would you think +of Scots words to some beautiful Irish airs? In the mean time, at your +leisure, give a copy of the Museum to my worthy friend, Sir. Peter +Hill, bookseller, to bind for me, interleaved with blank leaves, +exactly as he did the Laird of Glenriddel’s, that I may insert every +anecdote I can learn, together with my own criticisms and remarks on +the songs. A copy of this kind I shall leave with you, the editor, to +publish at some after period, by way of making the Museum a book +famous to the end of time, and you renowned for ever.</p> + +<p>I have got an Highland dirk, for which I have great veneration; as it +once was the dirk of <i>Lord Balmerino.</i> It fell into bad hands, who +stripped it of the silver mounting, as well as the knife and fork. I +have some thoughts of sending it to your care, to get it mounted anew.</p> + +<p>Thank you for the copies of my Volunteer Ballad.—Our friend Clarke +has done <i>indeed</i> well! ’tis chaste and beautiful. I have not met with +anything that has pleased me so much. You know I am no connoisseur: +but that I am an amateur—will be allowed me.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CCXCVIII" id="CCXCVIII"></a>CCXCVIII.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. THOMSON.</h3> + +<p>[The blank in this letter could be filled up without writing treason: +but nothing has been omitted of an original nature.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>July, 1794.</i></p> + +<p>Is there no news yet of Pleyel? Or is your work to be at a dead stop, +until the allies set our modern Orpheus at liberty from the savage +thraldom of democrat discords? Alas the day! And woe is me! That +auspicious period, pregnant with the happiness of millions. * * * *</p> + +<p>I have presented a copy of your songs to the daughter of a much-valued +and much-honoured friend of mine, Mr. Graham of Fintray. I wrote on +the blank side of the title-page the following address to the young +lady:</p> + + +<p class="sig7">Here, where the Scottish muse immortal lives, +&c.<a name="FNanchor_257_257" id="FNanchor_257_257"></a><a href="#Footnote_257_257" class="fnanchor">[257]</a></p> + + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + + + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_257_257" id="Footnote_257_257"></a><a href="#FNanchor_257_257"><span class="label">[257]</span></a> <a href="#CCXXIX">Song CCXXIX.</a></p> +</div> +</div> + + + +<h2><a name="CCXCIX" id="CCXCIX"></a>CCXCIX.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. THOMSON.</h3> + +<p>[Thomson says to Burns, “You have anticipated my opinion of ‘O’er the +seas and far away.’” Yet some of the verses are original and +touching.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>30th August, 1794.</i></p> + +<p>The last evening, as I was straying out, and thinking of “O’er the +hills and far away,” I spun the following stanza for it; but whether +my spinning will deserve to be laid up in store, like the precious +thread of the silk-worm, or brushed to the devil, like the vile +manufacture of the spider, I leave, my dear Sir, to your usual candid +criticism. I was pleased with several lines in it at first, but I own +that now it appears rather a flimsy business.</p> + +<p>This is just a hasty sketch, until I see whether it be worth a +critique. We have many sailor songs, but as far as I at present +recollect, they are mostly the effusions of the jovial sailor, not the +wailings of his love-lorn mistress. I must here make one sweet +exception—“Sweet Annie frae the sea-beach came.” Now for the song:—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">How can my poor heart be glad.<a name="FNanchor_258_258" id="FNanchor_258_258"></a><a href="#Footnote_258_258" class="fnanchor">[258]</a><br /></span> +</div></div> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_481" id="Page_481">[481]</a></span></p> +<p>I give you leave to abuse this song, but do it in the spirit of +Christian meekness.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + + + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_258_258" id="Footnote_258_258"></a><a href="#FNanchor_258_258"><span class="label">[258]</span></a> <a href="#CCXXIV">Song CCXXIV.</a></p> +</div> +</div> + + + +<h2><a name="CCC" id="CCC"></a>CCC.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. THOMSON.</h3> + +<p>[The stream on the banks of which this song is supposed to be sung, is +known by three names, Cairn, Dalgonar, and Cluden. It rises under the +name of Cairn, runs through a wild country, under the name of +Dalgonar, affording fine trout-fishing as well as fine scenes, and +under that of Cluden it all but washes the walls of Lincluden College, +and then unites with the Nith.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Sept. 1794.</i></p> + +<p>I shall withdraw my “On the seas and far away” altogether: it is +unequal, and unworthy the work. Making a poem is like begetting a son: +you cannot know whether you have a wise man or a fool, until you +produce him to the world to try him.</p> + +<p>For that reason I send you the offspring of my brain, abortions and +all; and, as such, pray look over them, and forgive them, and burn +them. I am flattered at your adopting “Ca’ the yowes to the knowes,” +as it was owing to me that ever it saw the light. About seven years +ago I was well acquainted with a worthy little fellow of a clergyman, +a Mr. Clunie, who sang it charmingly; and, at my request, Mr. Clarke +took it down from his singing. When I gave it to Johnson, I added some +stanzas to the song, and mended others, but still it will not do for +you. In a solitary stroll which I took to-day, I tried my hand on a +few pastoral lines, following up the idea of the chorus, which I would +preserve. Here it is, with all its crudities and imperfections on its +head.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Ca’ the yowes to the knowes, &c.<a name="FNanchor_259_259" id="FNanchor_259_259"></a><a href="#Footnote_259_259" class="fnanchor">[259]</a><br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>I shall give you my opinion of your other newly adopted songs my first +scribbling fit.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + + + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_259_259" id="Footnote_259_259"></a><a href="#FNanchor_259_259"><span class="label">[259]</span></a> <a href="#CCXXV">Song CCXXV</a>.</p> +</div> +</div> + + + +<h2><a name="CCCI" id="CCCI"></a>CCCI.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. THOMSON.</h3> + +<p>[Dr. Maxwell, whose skill called forth the praises of the poet, had +the honour of being named by Burke in the House of Commons: he shared +in the French revolution, and narrowly escaped the guillotine, like +many other true friends of liberty.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Sept. 1794.</i></p> + +<p>Do you know a blackguard Irish song called “Onagh’s Waterfall?” The +air is charming, and I have often regretted the want of decent verses +to it. It is too much, at least for my humble rustic muse, to expect +that every effort of hers shall have merit; still I think that it is +better to have mediocre verses to a favourite air, than none at all. +On this principle I have all along proceeded in the Scots Musical +Museum; and as that publication is at its last volume, I intend the +following song, to the air above mentioned, for that work.</p> + +<p>If it does not suit you as an editor, you may be pleased to have +verses to it that you can sing in the company of ladies.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Sae flaxen were her ringlets.<a name="FNanchor_260_260" id="FNanchor_260_260"></a><a href="#Footnote_260_260" class="fnanchor">[260]</a><br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>Not to compare small things with great, my taste in music is like the +mighty Frederick of Prussia’s taste in painting: we are told that he +frequently admired what the connoisseurs decried, and always without +any hypocrisy confessed his admiration. I am sensible that my taste in +music must be inelegant and vulgar, because people of undisputed and +cultivated taste can find no merit in my favourite tunes. Still, +because I am cheaply pleased, is that any reason why I should deny +myself that pleasure? Many of our strathspeys, ancient and modern, +give me most exquisite enjoyment, where you and other judges would +probably be showing disgust. For instance, I am just now making verses +for “Rothemurche’s rant,” an air which puts me in raptures; and, in +fact, unless I be pleased with the tune, I never can make verses to +it. Here I have Clarke on my side, who is a judge that I will pit +against any of you. “Rothemurche,” he says, “is an air both original +and beautiful;” and, on his recommendation, I have taken the first +part of the tune for a chorus, and the fourth or last part for the +song. I am but two stanzas deep in the work, and possibly you may +think, and justly, that the poetry is as little worth your attention +as the music.</p> + +<p>[Here follow two stanzas of the song, beginning “Lassie wi’ the +lint-white locks.” Song <a href="#CCXXXIII">CCXXXIII.</a>]</p> + +<p>I have begun anew, “Let me in this ae night.” Do you think that we +ought to retain the old chorus? I think we must retain both the old +chorus and the first stanza of the old song. I<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_482" id="Page_482">[482]</a></span> do not altogether like +the third line of the first stanza, but cannot alter it to please +myself. I am just three stanzas deep in it. Would you have the +<i>denouement</i> to be successful or otherwise?—should she “let him in” +or not?</p> + +<p>Did you not once propose “The sow’s tail to Geordie” as an air for +your work? I am quite delighted with it; but I acknowledge that is no +mark of its real excellence. I once set about verses for it, which I +meant to be in the alternate way of a lover and his mistress chanting +together. I have not the pleasure of knowing Mrs. Thomson’s Christian +name, and yours, I am afraid, is rather burlesque for sentiment, else +I had meant to have made you the hero and heroine of the little piece.</p> + +<p>How do you like the following epigram which I wrote the other day on a +lovely young girl’s recovery from a fever? Doctor Maxwell was the +physician who seemingly saved her from the grave; and to him I address +the following:</p> + +<h4>TO DR. MAXWELL,</h4> + +<h5>ON MISS JESSIE STAIG’S RECOVERY.</h5> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Maxwell, if merit here you crave,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That merit I deny:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">You save fair Jessy from the grave?—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An angel could not die!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>God grant you patience with this stupid epistle!</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + + + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_260_260" id="Footnote_260_260"></a><a href="#FNanchor_260_260"><span class="label">[260]</span></a> <a href="#CCXXVI">Song CCXXVI.</a></p> +</div> +</div> + + + +<h2><a name="CCCII" id="CCCII"></a>CCCII.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. THOMSON.</h3> + +<p>[The poet relates the history of several of his best songs in this +letter: the true old strain of “Andro and his cutty gun” is the first +of its kind.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>19th October, 1794.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">My dear Friend</span>,</p> + +<p>By this morning’s post I have your list, and, in general, I highly +approve of it. I shall, at more leisure, give you a critique on the +whole. Clarke goes to your town by to-day’s fly, and I wish you would +call on him and take his opinion in general: you know his taste is a +standard. He will return here again in a week or two, so please do not +miss asking for him. One thing I hope he will do—persuade you to +adopt my favourite “Craigieburn-wood,” in your selection: it is as +great a favourite of his as of mine. The lady on whom it was made is +one of the finest women in Scotland; and in fact (<i>entre nous</i>) is in +a manner to me what Sterne’s Eliza was to him—a mistress, or friend, +or what you will, in the guileless simplicity of Platonic love. (Now, +don’t put any of your squinting constructions on this, or have any +clishmaclaver about it among our acquaintances.) I assure you that to +my lovely friend you are indebted for many of your best songs of mine. +Do you think that the sober, gin-horse routine of existence could +inspire a man with life, and love, and joy—could fire him with +enthusiasm, or melt him with pathos, equal to the genius of your book? +No! no! Whenever I want to be more than ordinary in song—to be in +some degree equal to your diviner airs—do you imagine I fast and pray +for the celestial emanation? <i>Tout au contraire!</i> I have a glorious +recipe; the very one that for his own use was invented by the divinity +of healing and poetry, when erst he piped to the flocks of Admetus. I +put myself in a regimen of admiring a fine woman; and in proportion to +the adorability of her charms, in proportion you are delighted with my +verses. The lightning of her eye is the godhead of Parnassus, and the +witchery of her smile the divinity of Helicon!</p> + +<p>To descend to business: if you like my idea of “When she cam ben she +bobbit,” the following stanzas of mine, altered a little from what +they were formerly, when set to another air, may perhaps do instead of +worse stanzas:—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O saw ye my dear, my Phely.<a name="FNanchor_261_261" id="FNanchor_261_261"></a><a href="#Footnote_261_261" class="fnanchor">[261]</a><br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>Now for a few miscellaneous remarks. “The Posie” (in the Museum) is my +composition; the air was taken down from Mrs. Burns’s voice. It is +well known in the west country, but the old words are trash. By the +bye, take a look at the tune again, and tell me if you do not think it +is the original from which “Roslin Castle” is composed. The second +part in particular, for the first two or three bars, is exactly the +old air. “Strathallan’s Lament” is mine; the music is by our right +trusty and deservedly well-beloved Allan Masterton. “Donocht-Head” is +not mine; I would give ten pounds it were. It appeared first in the +Edinburgh Herald, and came to the editor of that paper with the +Newcastle post-mark on it “Whistle o’er the lave o’t” is mine: the +music said to be by a John<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_483" id="Page_483">[483]</a></span> Bruce, a celebrated violin-player in +Dumfries, about the beginning of this century. This I know, Bruce, who +was an honest man, though a red-wud Highlandman, constantly claimed +it; and by all the old musical people here is believed to be the +author of it.</p> + +<p>“Andrew and his cutty gun.” The song to which this is set in the +Museum is mine, and was composed on Miss Euphemia Murray, of Lintrose, +commonly and deservedly called the Flower of Strathmore.</p> + +<p>“How long and dreary is the night!” I met with some such words in a +collection of songs somewhere, which I altered and enlarged; and to +please you, and to suit your favourite air, I have taken a stride or +two across my room, and have arranged it anew, as you will find on the +other page.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">How long and dreary is the night, &c.<a name="FNanchor_262_262" id="FNanchor_262_262"></a><a href="#Footnote_262_262" class="fnanchor">[262]</a><br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>Tell me how you like this. I differ from your idea of the expression +of the tune. There is, to me, a great deal of tenderness in it. You +cannot, in my opinion, dispense with a bass to your addenda airs. A +lady of my acquaintance, a noted performer, plays and sings at the +same time so charmingly, that I shall never bear to see any of her +songs sent into the world, as naked as Mr. What-d’ye-call-um has done +in his London collection.<a name="FNanchor_263_263" id="FNanchor_263_263"></a><a href="#Footnote_263_263" class="fnanchor">[263]</a></p> + +<p>These English songs gravel me to death. I have not that command of the +language that I have of my native tongue. I have been at “Duncan +Gray,” to dress it in English, but all I can do is deplorably stupid. +For instance:—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Let not woman e’er complain, &c.<a name="FNanchor_264_264" id="FNanchor_264_264"></a><a href="#Footnote_264_264" class="fnanchor">[264]</a><br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>Since the above, I have been out in the country, taking a dinner with +a friend, where I met with a lady whom I mentioned in the second page +in this odds-and-ends of a letter. As usual, I got into song; and +returning home I composed the following:</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Sleep’st thou, or wak’st thou, fairest creature +&c.<a name="FNanchor_265_265" id="FNanchor_265_265"></a><a href="#Footnote_265_265" class="fnanchor">[265]</a></span> +</div></div> + +<p>If you honour my verses by setting the air to them, I will vamp up the +old song, and make it English enough to be understood.</p> + +<p>I enclose you a musical curiosity, an East Indian air, which you would +swear was a Scottish one. I know the authenticity of it, as the +gentleman who brought it over is a particular acquaintance of mine. Do +preserve me the copy I send you, as it is the only one I have. Clarke +has set a bass to it, and I intend putting it into the Musical Museum. +Here follow the verses I intend for it.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But lately seen in gladsome green, &c.<a name="FNanchor_266_266" id="FNanchor_266_266"></a><a href="#Footnote_266_266" class="fnanchor">[266]</a><br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>I would be obliged to you if you would procure me a sight of Ritson’s +collection of English songs, which you mention in your letter. I will +thank you for another information, and that as speedily as you please: +whether this miserable drawling hotch-potch epistle has not completely +tired you of my correspondence?</p> + +<p class="std2"><span class="smcap">Variation.</span></p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i4">Now to the streaming fountain,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Or up the heathy mountain,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The hart, hind, and roe, freely, wildly-wanton stray;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">In twining hazel bowers,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">His lay the linnet pours;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">The lav’rock to the sky<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Ascends wi’ sangs o’ joy,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">While the sun and thou arise to bless the day.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i4">When frae my Chloris parted,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Sad, cheerless, broken-hearted,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The night’s gloomy shades, cloudy, dark, o’ercast my sky.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">But when she charms my sight,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">In pride of beauty’s light;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">When through my very heart<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Her beaming glories dart;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">’Tis then, ’tis then I wake to life and joy!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + + + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_261_261" id="Footnote_261_261"></a><a href="#FNanchor_261_261"><span class="label">[261]</span></a> <a href="#CCXXVII">Song CCXXVII.</a></p> +</div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_262_262" id="Footnote_262_262"></a><a href="#FNanchor_262_262"><span class="label">[262]</span></a> <a href="#CCXXVIII">Song CCXXVIII.</a></p> +</div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_263_263" id="Footnote_263_263"></a><a href="#FNanchor_263_263"><span class="label">[263]</span></a> Mr. Ritson, whose collection of Scottish songs was +published this year.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_264_264" id="Footnote_264_264"></a><a href="#FNanchor_264_264"><span class="label">[264]</span></a> <a href="#CCXXIX">Song CCXXIX.</a></p> +</div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_265_265" id="Footnote_265_265"></a><a href="#FNanchor_265_265"><span class="label">[265]</span></a> <a href="#CCXXX">Song CCXXX.</a></p> +</div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_266_266" id="Footnote_266_266"></a><a href="#FNanchor_266_266"><span class="label">[266]</span></a> <a href="#CCXVI">Song CCXVI.</a></p> +</div> +</div> + + + +<h2><a name="CCCIII" id="CCCIII"></a>CCCIII.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. THOMSON.</h3> + +<p>[The presents made to the poet were far from numerous: the book for +which he expresses his thanks, was the work of the waspish Ritson.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>November, 1794.</i></p> + +<p>Many thanks to you, my dear Sir, for your present; it is a book of the +utmost importance to me. I have yesterday begun my anecdotes, &c., for +your work. I intend drawing them up in the form of a letter to you, +which will save<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_484" id="Page_484">[484]</a></span> me from the tedious dull business of systematic +arrangement. Indeed, as all I have to say consists of unconnected +remarks, anecdotes, scraps of old songs, &c., it would be impossible +to give the work a beginning, a middle, and an end, which the critics +insist to be absolutely necessary in a work. In my last, I told you my +objections to the song you had selected for “My lodging is on the cold +ground.” On my visit the other day to my friend Chloris (that is the +poetic name of the lovely goddess of my inspiration), she suggested an +idea, which I, on my return from the visit, wrought into the following +song.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">My Chloris, mark how green the groves.<a name="FNanchor_267_267" id="FNanchor_267_267"></a><a href="#Footnote_267_267" class="fnanchor">[267]</a><br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>How do you like the simplicity and tenderness of this pastoral? I +think it pretty well.</p> + +<p>I like you for entering so candidly and so kindly into the story of +“<i>ma chere amie.</i>” I assure you I was never more in earnest in my +life, than in the account of that affair which I sent you in my last. +Conjugal love is a passion which I deeply feel, and highly venerate; +but, somehow, it does not make such a figure in poesy as that other +species of the passion,</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Where love is liberty, and nature law.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>Musically speaking, the first is an instrument of which the gamut is +scanty and confined, but the tones inexpressibly sweet, while the last +has powers equal to all the intellectual modulations of the human +soul. Still, I am a very poet in my enthusiasm of the passion. The +welfare and happiness of the beloved object is the first and inviolate +sentiment that pervades my soul; and whatever pleasures I might wish +for, or whatever might be the raptures they would give me, yet, if +they interfere with that first principle, it is having these pleasures +at a dishonest price; and justice forbids and generosity disdains the +purchase.</p> + +<p>Despairing of my own powers to give you variety enough in English +songs, I have been turning over old collections, to pick out songs, of +which the measure is something similar to what I want; and, with a +little alteration, so as to suit the rhythm of the air exactly, to +give you them for your work. Where the songs have hitherto been but +little noticed, nor have ever been set to music, I think the shift a +fair one. A song, which, under the same first verse, you will find in +Ramsay’s Tea-table Miscellany, I have cut down for an English dress to +your “Dainty Davie,” as follows:—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">It was the charming month of May.<a name="FNanchor_268_268" id="FNanchor_268_268"></a><a href="#Footnote_268_268" class="fnanchor">[268]</a><br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>You may think meanly of this, but take a look at the bombast original, +and you will be surprised that I have made so much of it. I have +finished my song to “Rothemurche’s rant,” and you have Clarke to +consult as to the set of the air for singing.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Lassie wi’ the lint-white locks, &c.<a name="FNanchor_269_269" id="FNanchor_269_269"></a><a href="#Footnote_269_269" class="fnanchor">[269]</a><br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>This piece has at least the merit of being a regular pastoral: the +vernal morn, the summer noon, the autumnal evening, and the winter +night, are regularly rounded. If you like it, well; if not, I will +insert it in the Museum.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + + + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_267_267" id="Footnote_267_267"></a><a href="#FNanchor_267_267"><span class="label">[267]</span></a> <a href="#CCXXXI">Song CCXXXI.</a></p> +</div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_268_268" id="Footnote_268_268"></a><a href="#FNanchor_268_268"><span class="label">[268]</span></a> <a href="#CCXXXII">Song CCXXXII.</a></p> +</div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_269_269" id="Footnote_269_269"></a><a href="#FNanchor_269_269"><span class="label">[269]</span></a> <a href="#CCXXXIII">Song CCXXXIII.</a></p> +</div> +</div> + + + +<h2><a name="CCCIV" id="CCCIV"></a>CCCIV.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. THOMSON.</h3> + +<p>[Sir Walter Scott remarked, on the lyrics of Burns, “that at last the +writing a series of songs for large musical collections degenerated +into a slavish labour which no talents could support.”]</p> + +<p>I am out of temper that you should set so sweet, so tender an air, as +“Deil tak the wars,” to the foolish old verses. You talk of the +silliness of “Saw ye my father?”—By heavens! the odds is gold to +brass! Besides, the old song, though now pretty well modernized into +the Scottish language, is originally, and in the early editions, a +bungling low imitation of the Scottish manner, by that genius Tom +D’Urfey, so has no pretensions to be a Scottish production. There is a +pretty English song by Sheridan, in the “Duenna,” to this air, which +is out of sight superior to D’Urfey’s. It begins,</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“When sable night each drooping plant restoring.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>The air, if I understand the expression of it properly, is the very +native language of simplicity, tenderness, and love. I have again gone +over my song to the tune.</p> + +<p>Now for my English song to “Nancy’s to the greenwood,” &c.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Farewell thou stream that winding flows.<a name="FNanchor_270_270" id="FNanchor_270_270"></a><a href="#Footnote_270_270" class="fnanchor">[270]</a><br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>There is an air, “The Caledonian Hunt’s Delight,” to which I wrote a +song that, you will find in Johnson, “Ye banks and braes o’ bonnie<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_485" id="Page_485">[485]</a></span> +Doon:” this air I think might find a place among your hundred, as Lear +says of his knights. Do you know the history of the air? It is curious +enough. A good many years ago, Mr. James Miller, writer in your good +town, a gentleman whom possibly you know, was in company with our +friend Clarke; and talking of Scottish music, Miller expressed an +ardent ambition to be able to compose a Scots air. Mr. Clarke, partly +by way of joke, told him to keep to the black keys of the harpsichord, +and preserve some kind of rhythm, and he would infallibly compose a +Scots air. Certain it is that, in a few days, Mr. Miller produced the +rudiments of an air, which Mr. Clarke, with some touches and +corrections, fashioned into the tune in question. Ritson, you know, +has the same story of the black keys; but this account which I have +just given you, Mr. Clarke informed me of several years ago. Now, to +show you how difficult it is to trace the origin of our airs, I have +heard it repeatedly asserted that this was an Irish air; nay, I met +with an Irish gentleman who affirmed he had heard it in Ireland among +the old women; while, on the other hand, a countess informed me, that +the first person who introduced the air into this country, was a +baronet’s lady of her acquaintance, who took down the notes from an +itinerant piper in the Isle of Man. How difficult, then, to ascertain +the truth respecting our poesy and music! I, myself, have lately seen +a couple of ballads sung through the streets of Dumfries, with my name +at the head of them as the author, though it was the first time I had +ever seen them.</p> + +<p>I thank you for admitting “Craigieburn-wood;” and I shall take care to +furnish you with a new chorus. In fact, the chorus was not my work, +but a part of some old verses to the air. If I can catch myself in a +more than ordinarily propitious moment, I shall write a new +“Craigieburn-wood” altogether. My heart is much in the theme.</p> + +<p>I am ashamed, my dear fellow, to make the request; ’tis dunning your +generosity; but in a moment when I had forgotten whether I was rich or +poor, I promised Chloris a copy of your songs. It wrings my honest +pride to write you this; but an ungracious request is doubly so by a +tedious apology. To make you some amends, as soon as I have extracted +the necessary information out of them, I will return you Ritson’s +volumes.</p> + +<p>The lady is not a little proud that she is to make so distinguished a +figure in your collection, and I am not a little proud that I have it +in my power to please her so much. Lucky it is for your patience that +my paper is done, for when I am in a scribbling humour, I know not +when to give over.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + + + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_270_270" id="Footnote_270_270"></a><a href="#FNanchor_270_270"><span class="label">[270]</span></a> <a href="#CCXXXIV">Song CCXXXIV.</a></p> +</div> +</div> + + + +<h2><a name="CCCV" id="CCCV"></a>CCCV.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. THOMSON.</h3> + +<p>[Willy and Phely, in one of the lyrics which this letter contained, +carry on the pleasant bandying of praise till compliments grow scarce, +and the lovers are reduced to silence.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>19th November, 1794.</i></p> + +<p>You see, my dear Sir, what a punctual correspondent I am; though, +indeed, you may thank yourself for the <i>tedium</i> of my letters, as you +have so flattered me on my horsemanship with my favourite hobby, and +have praised the grace of his ambling so much, that I am scarcely ever +off his back. For instance, this morning, though a keen blowing frost, +in my walk before breakfast, I finished my duet, which you were +pleased to praise so much. Whether I have uniformly succeeded, I will +not say; but here it is for you, though it is not an hour old.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O Philly, happy be the day.<a name="FNanchor_271_271" id="FNanchor_271_271"></a><a href="#Footnote_271_271" class="fnanchor">[271]</a><br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>Tell me honestly how you like it, and point out whatever you think +faulty.</p> + +<p>I am much pleased with your idea of singing our songs in alternate +stanzas, and regret that you did not hint it to me sooner. In those +that remain, I shall have it in my eye. I remember your objections to +the name Philly, but it is the common abbreviation of Phillis. Sally, +the only other name that suits, has to my ear a vulgarity about it, +which unfits it, for anything except burlesque. The legion of Scottish +poetasters of the day, whom your brother editor, Mr. Ritson, ranks +with me as my coevals, have always mistaken vulgarity for simplicity; +whereas, simplicity is as much <i>eloignée</i> from vulgarity on the one +hand, as from affected point and puerile conceit on the other.</p> + +<p>I agree with you as to the air, “Craigieburn-wood,” that a chorus +would, in some degree, spoil the effect, and shall certainly have +none<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_486" id="Page_486">[486]</a></span> in my projected song to it. It is not, however, a case in point +with “Rothemurche;” there, as in “Roy’s Wife of Aldivalloch,” a chorus +goes, to my taste, well enough. As to the chorus going first, that is +the case with “Roy’s Wife,” as well as “Rothemurche.” In fact, in the +first part of both tunes, the rhythm is so peculiar and irregular, and +on that irregularity depends so much of their beauty, that we must +e’en take them with all their wildness, and humour the verse +accordingly. Leaving out the starting note in both tunes, has, I +think, an effect that no regularity could counterbalance the want of.</p> + +<p class="sig7"> +Try, {Oh Roy’s wife of Aldivalloch.<br /> + {O lassie wi’ the lint-white locks.</p> +<p> +and</p> +<p class="sig7">compare with + {Roy’s wife of Aldivalloch.<br /> + {Lassie wi the lint-white locks. +</p> + +<p>Does not the lameness of the prefixed syllable strike you? In the last +case, with the true furor of genius, you strike at once into the wild +originality of the air; whereas, in the first insipid method, it is +like the grating screw of the pins before the fiddle is brought into +tune. This is my taste; if I am wrong, I beg pardon of the +<i>cognoscenti.</i></p> + +<p>“The Caledonian Hunt” is so charming, that it would make any subject +in a song go down; but pathos is certainly its native tongue. Scottish +bacchanalians we certainly want, though the few we have are excellent. +For instance, “Todlin hame,” is, for wit and humour, an unparalleled +composition; And “Andrew and his cutty gun” is the work of a master. +By the way, are you not quite vexed to think that those men of genius, +for such they certainly were, who composed our fine Scottish lyrics, +should be unknown? It has given me many a heart-ache. Apropos to +bacchanalian songs in Scottish, I composed one yesterday, for an air I +like much—“Lumps o’ pudding.”</p> + +<p>Contented wi’ little and cantie wi’ mair.<a name="FNanchor_272_272" id="FNanchor_272_272"></a><a href="#Footnote_272_272" class="fnanchor">[272]</a></p> + +<p>If you do not relish this air, I will send it to Johnson.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + + + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_271_271" id="Footnote_271_271"></a><a href="#FNanchor_271_271"><span class="label">[271]</span></a> <a href="#CCXXXV">Song CCXXXV.</a></p> +</div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_272_272" id="Footnote_272_272"></a><a href="#FNanchor_272_272"><span class="label">[272]</span></a> <a href="#CCXXXVI">Song CCXXXVI.</a></p> +</div> +</div> + + + +<h2><a name="CCCVI" id="CCCVI"></a>CCCVI.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. THOMSON.</h3> + +<p>[The instrument which the poet got from the braes of Athol, seems of +an order as rude and incapable of fine sounds as the whistles which +school-boys make in spring from the smaller boughs of the plane-tree.]</p> + +<p>Since yesterday’s penmanship, I have framed a couple of English +stanzas, by way of an English song to “Roy’s Wife.” You will allow me, +that in this instance my English corresponds in sentiment with the +Scottish.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Canst thou leave me thus, my Katy?<a name="FNanchor_273_273" id="FNanchor_273_273"></a><a href="#Footnote_273_273" class="fnanchor">[273]</a><br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>Well! I think this, to be done in two or three turns across my room, +and with two or three pinches of Irish blackguard, is not so far +amiss. You see I am determined to have my quantum of applause from +somebody.</p> + +<p>Tell my friend Allan (for I am sure that we only want the trifling +circumstance of being known to one another, to be the best friends on +earth) that I much suspect he has, in his plates, mistaken the figure +of the stock and horn. I have, at last, gotten one, but it is a very +rude instrument. It is comprised of three parts; the stock, which is +the hinder thigh bone of a sheep, such as you see in a mutton ham; the +horn, which is a common Highland cow’s horn, cut off at the smaller +end, until the aperture be large enough to admit the stock to be +pushed up through the horn until it be held by the thicker end of the +thigh-bone; and lastly, an oaten reed exactly cut and notched like +that which you see every shepherd boy have, when the corn-stems are +green and full grown. The reed is not made fast in the bone, but is +held by the lips, and plays loose in the smaller end of the stock; +while the stock, with the horn hanging on its larger end, is held by +the hands in playing. The stock has six or seven ventages on the upper +side, and one back-ventage, like the common flute. This of mine was +made by a man from the braes of Athole, and is exactly what the +shepherds wont to use in that country.</p> + +<p>However, either it is not quite properly bored in the holes, or else +we have not the art of blowing it rightly; for we can make little of +it. If Mr. Allan chooses, I will send him a sight of mine, as I look +on myself to be a kind of brother-brush with him. “Pride in poets is +nae sin;” and I will say it, that I look on Mr. Allan and Mr. Burns to +be the only genuine and real painters of Scottish costume in the +world.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + + + + +<div class="footnotes"> + <h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + <div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_273_273" id="Footnote_273_273"></a><a href="#FNanchor_273_273"><span class="label">[273]</span></a> <a href="#CCXXXVII">Song CCXXXVII.</a></p> + </div></div> + + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_487" id="Page_487">[487]</a></span></p> + +<h2><a name="CCCVII" id="CCCVII"></a>CCCVII.</h2> + +<h3>TO PETER MILLER, JUN., ESQ.,</h3> + +<h4>OF DALSWINTON.</h4> + +<p>[In a conversation with James Perry, editor of the Morning Chronicle, +Mr. Miller, who was then member for the Dumfries boroughs, kindly +represented the poverty of the poet and the increasing number of his +family: Perry at once offered fifty pounds a year for any +contributions he might choose to make to his newspaper: the reasons +for his refusal are stated in this letter.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Dumfries, Nov. 1794.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">Dear Sir</span>,</p> + +<p>Your offer is indeed truly generous, and most sincerely do I thank you +for it; but in my present situation, I find that I dare not accept it. +You well know my political sentiments; and were I an insular +individual, unconnected with a wife and a family of children, with the +most fervid enthusiasm I would have volunteered my services: I then +could and would have despised all consequences that might have ensued.</p> + +<p>My prospect in the Excise is something; at least it is, encumbered as +I am with the welfare, the very existence, of near half-a-score of +helpless individuals, what I dare not sport with.</p> + +<p>In the mean time, they are most welcome to my Ode; only, let them +insert it as a thing they have met with by accident and unknown to +me.—Nay, if Mr. Perry, whose honour, after your character of him, I +cannot doubt; if he will give me an address and channel by which +anything will come safe from those spies with which he may be certain +that his correspondence is beset, I will now and then send him any +bagatelle that I may write. In the present hurry of Europe, nothing +but news and politics will be regarded; but against the days of peace, +which Heaven send soon, my little assistance may perhaps fill up an +idle column of a newspaper. I have long had it in my head to try my +hand in the way of little prose essays, which I propose sending into +the world though the medium of some newspaper; and should these be +worth his while, to these Mr. Perry shall be welcome; and all my +reward shall be, his treating me with his paper, which, by the bye, to +anybody who has the least relish for wit, is a high treat indeed.</p> + +<p class="sig3">With the most grateful esteem I am ever,</p> + +<p class="sig8">Dear Sir,</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CCCVIII" id="CCCVIII"></a>CCCVIII.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. SAMUEL CLARKE, JUN.,</h3> + +<h4>DUMFRIES.</h4> + +<p>[Political animosities troubled society during the days of Burns, as +much at least as they disturb it now—this letter is an instance of +it.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Sunday Morning.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">Dear Sir</span>,</p> + +<p>I was, I know, drunk last night, but I am sober this morning. From the +expressions Capt. —— made use of to me, had I had no-body’s welfare +to care for but my own, we should certainly have come, according to +the manners of the world, to the necessity of murdering one another +about the business. The words were such as, generally, I believe, end +in a brace of pistols; but I am still pleased to think that I did not +ruin the peace and welfare of a wife and a family of children in a +drunken squabble. Farther, you know that the report of certain +political opinions being mine, has already once before brought me to +the brink of destruction. I dread lest last night’s business may be +misrepresented in the same way.—You, I beg, will take care to prevent +it. I tax your wish for Mr. Burns’ welfare with the task of waiting as +soon as possible, on every gentleman who was present, and state this +to him, and, as you please, show him this letter. What, after all, was +the obnoxious toast? “May our success in the present war be equal to +the justice of our cause.”—A toast that the most outrageous frenzy of +loyalty cannot object to. I request and beg that this morning you will +wait on the parties present at the foolish dispute. I shall only add, +that I am truly sorry that a man who stood so high in my estimation as +Mr. ——, should use me in the manner in which I conceive he has done.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CCCIX" id="CCCIX"></a>CCCIX.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. THOMSON.</h3> + +<p>[Burns allowed for the songs which Wolcot wrote for Thomson a degree +of lyric merit which the world has refused to sanction.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>December, 1794.</i></p> + +<p>It is, I assure you, the pride of my heart to do anything to forward +or add to the value of your book; and as I agree with you that the +jacobite song in the Museum to “There’ll never<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_488" id="Page_488">[488]</a></span> be peace till Jamie +comes hame,” would not so well consort with Peter Pindar’s excellent +love-song to that air, I have just framed for you the following:—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Now in her green mantle, &c.<a name="FNanchor_274_274" id="FNanchor_274_274"></a><a href="#Footnote_274_274" class="fnanchor">[274]</a><br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>How does this please you? As to the point of time for the expression, +in your proposed print from my “Sodger’s Return,” it must certainly be +at—“She gaz’d.” The interesting dubiety and suspense taking +possession of her countenance, and the gushing fondness, with a +mixture of roguish playfulness, in his, strike me as things of which a +master will make a great deal. In great haste, but in great truth, +yours,</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + + + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_274_274" id="Footnote_274_274"></a><a href="#FNanchor_274_274"><span class="label">[274]</span></a> <a href="#CCXXXVIII">Song CCXXXVIII.</a></p> +</div> +</div> + + + +<h2><a name="CCCX" id="CCCX"></a>CCCX.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. THOMSON.</h3> + +<p>[In this brief and off-hand way Burns bestows on Thompson one of the +finest songs ever dedicated to the cause of human freedom.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>January</i>, 1795.</p> + +<p>I fear for my songs; however, a few may please, yet originality is a +coy feature in composition, and in a multiplicity of efforts in the +same style, disappears altogether. For these three thousand years, we +poetic folks have been describing the spring, for instance; and as the +spring continues the same, there must soon be a sameness in the +imagery, &c., of these said rhyming folks.</p> + +<p>A great critic (Aikin) on songs, says that love and wine are the +exclusive themes for song-writing. The following is on neither +subject, and consequently is no song; but will be allowed, I think, to +be two or three pretty good prose thoughts inverted into rhyme.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Is there for honest poverty.<a name="FNanchor_275_275" id="FNanchor_275_275"></a><a href="#Footnote_275_275" class="fnanchor">[275]</a><br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>I do not give you the foregoing song for your book, but merely by way +of <i>vive la bagatelle</i>; for the piece is not really poetry. How will +the following do for “Craigieburn-wood?”—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Sweet fa’s the eve on Craigieburn.<a name="FNanchor_276_276" id="FNanchor_276_276"></a><a href="#Footnote_276_276" class="fnanchor">[276]</a><br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="sig5">Farewell! God bless you!</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + + + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_275_275" id="Footnote_275_275"></a><a href="#FNanchor_275_275"><span class="label">[275]</span></a> <a href="#CCLXIV">Song CCLXIV.</a></p> +</div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_276_276" id="Footnote_276_276"></a><a href="#FNanchor_276_276"><span class="label">[276]</span></a> <a href="#CCXLV">Song CCXLV.</a></p> +</div> +</div> + + + +<h2><a name="CCCXI" id="CCCXI"></a>CCCXI.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. THOMSON.</h3> + +<p>[Of this letter, Dr. Currie writes “the poet must have been tipsy +indeed to abuse sweet Ecclefechan at this rate;” it is one of the +prettiest of our Annandale villages, and the birth-place of that +distinguished biographer.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Ecclefechan</i>, 7<i>th February</i>, 1795.</p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">My dear Thomson</span>,</p> + +<p>You cannot have any idea of the predicament in which I write to you. +In the course of my duty as supervisor (in which capacity I have acted +of late), I came yesternight to this unfortunate, wicked little +village. I have gone forward, but snows of ten feet deep have impeded +my progress: I have tried to “gae back the gate I cam again,” but the +same obstacle has shut me up within insuperable bars. To add to my +misfortune, since dinner, a scraper has been torturing catgut, in +sounds that would have insulted the dying agonies of a sow under the +hands of a butcher, and thinks himself, on that very account, +exceeding good company. In fact, I have been in a dilemma, either to +get drunk, to forget these miseries; or to hang myself, to get rid of +them: like a prudent man (a character congenial to my every thought, +word, and deed), I of two evils have chosen the least, and am very +drunk, at your service!</p> + +<p>I wrote you yesterday from Dumfries. I had not time then to tell you +all I wanted to say; and, Heaven knows, at present have not capacity.</p> + +<p>Do you know an air—I am sure you must know it—“We’ll gang nae mair +to yon town?” I think, in slowish time, it would make an excellent +song. I am highly delighted with it; and if you should think it worthy +of your attention, I have a fair dame in my eye to whom I would +consecrate it.</p> + +<p>As I am just going to bed, I wish you a good night.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CCCXII" id="CCCXII"></a>CCCXII.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. THOMSON.</h3> + +<p>[The song of Caledonia, in honour of Mrs. Burns, was accompanied by +two others in honour of the poet’s<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_489" id="Page_489">[489]</a></span> mistress: the muse was high in +song, and used few words in the letter which enclosed them.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>May, 1795.</i></p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O stay, sweet warbling woodlark, stay!<a name="FNanchor_277_277" id="FNanchor_277_277"></a><a href="#Footnote_277_277" class="fnanchor">[277]</a><br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>Let me know, your very first leisure, how you like this song.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Long, long the night.<a name="FNanchor_278_278" id="FNanchor_278_278"></a><a href="#Footnote_278_278" class="fnanchor">[278]</a><br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>How do you like the foregoing? The Irish air, “Humours of Glen,” is a +great favourite of mine, and as, except the silly stuff in the “Poor +Soldier,” there are not any decent verses for it, I have written for +it as follows:—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Their groves o’ sweet myrtle let foreign lands reckon.<a name="FNanchor_279_279" id="FNanchor_279_279"></a><a href="#Footnote_279_279" class="fnanchor">[279]</a><br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>Let me hear from you.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + + + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_277_277" id="Footnote_277_277"></a><a href="#FNanchor_277_277"><span class="label">[277]</span></a> <a href="#CCXLIX">Song CCXLIX.</a></p> +</div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_278_278" id="Footnote_278_278"></a><a href="#FNanchor_278_278"><span class="label">[278]</span></a> <a href="#CCL">Song CCL.</a></p> +</div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_279_279" id="Footnote_279_279"></a><a href="#FNanchor_279_279"><span class="label">[279]</span></a> <a href="#CCLI">Song CCLI.</a></p> +</div> +</div> + + + +<h2><a name="CCCXIII" id="CCCXIII"></a>CCCXIII.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. THOMSON.</h3> + +<p>[The poet calls for praise in this letter, a species of coin which is +always ready.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i2">How cruel are the parents.<a name="FNanchor_280_280" id="FNanchor_280_280"></a><a href="#Footnote_280_280" class="fnanchor">[280]</a><br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Mark yonder pomp of costly fashion.<a name="FNanchor_281_281" id="FNanchor_281_281"></a><a href="#Footnote_281_281" class="fnanchor">[281]</a><br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>Well, this is not amiss. You see how I answer your orders—your tailor +could not be more punctual. I am just now in a high fit for poetizing, +provided that the strait-jacket of criticism don’t cure me. If you +can, in a post or two, administer a little of the intoxicating potion +of your applause, it will raise your humble servant’s phrensy to any +height you want. I am at this moment “holding high converse” with the +muses, and have not a word to throw away on such a prosaic dog as you +are.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + + + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_280_280" id="Footnote_280_280"></a><a href="#FNanchor_280_280"><span class="label">[280]</span></a> <a href="#CCLIII">Song CCLIII.</a></p> +</div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_281_281" id="Footnote_281_281"></a><a href="#FNanchor_281_281"><span class="label">[281]</span></a> <a href="#CCLIV">Song CCLIV.</a></p> +</div> +</div> + + + +<h2><a name="CCCXIV" id="CCCXIV"></a>CCCXIV.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. THOMSON.</h3> + +<p>[Thomson at this time sent the drawing to Burns in which David Allan +sought to embody the “Cotter’s Saturday Night:” it displays at once +the talent and want of taste of the ingenious artist.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>May, 1795.</i></p> + +<p>Ten thousand thanks for your elegant present—though I am ashamed of +the value of it, being bestowed on a man who has not, by any means, +merited such an instance of kindness. I have shown it to two or three +judges of the first abilities here, and they all agree with me in +classing it as a first-rate production. My phiz is sae kenspeckle, +that the very joiner’s apprentice, whom Mrs. Burns employed to break +up the parcel (I was out of town that day) knew it at once. My most +grateful compliments to Allan, who has honoured my rustic music so +much with his masterly pencil. One strange coincidence is, that the +little one who is making the felonious attempt on the cat’s tail, is +the most striking likeness of an ill-deedie, d—n’d, wee, +rumblegairie urchin of mine, whom from that propensity to witty +wickedness, and man-fu’ mischief, which, even at twa days auld, I +foresaw would form the striking features of his disposition, I named +Willie Nicol, after a certain friend of mine, who is one of the +masters of a grammar-school in a city which shall be nameless.</p> + +<p>Give the enclosed epigram to my much-valued friend Cunningham, and +tell him, that on Wednesday I go to visit a friend of his, to whom his +friendly partiality in speaking of me in a manner introduced me—I +mean a well-known military and literary character, Colonel Dirom.</p> + +<p>You do not tell me how you liked my two last songs. Are they +condemned?</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CCCXV" id="CCCXV"></a>CCCXV.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. THOMSON.</h3> + +<p>[In allusion to the preceding letter, Thomson says to Burns, “You +really make me blush when you tell me you have not merited the drawing +from me.” The “For a’ that and a’ that,” which went with this letter, +was, it is believed, the composition of Mrs. Riddel.]</p> + +<p>In “Whistle, and I’ll come to ye, my lad,” the iteration of that line +is tiresome to my ear. Here goes what I think is an improvement:—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Oh whistle, and I’ll come to ye, my lad;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Oh whistle, and I’ll come to ye, my lad;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Tho’ father and mother and a’ should gae mad,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thy Jeanie will venture wi’ ye, my lad.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>In fact, a fair dame, at whose shrine I, the priest of the Nine, offer +up the incense of Parnassus—a dame whom the Graces have attired<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_490" id="Page_490">[490]</a></span> in +witchcraft, and whom the Loves have armed with lightning—a fair one, +herself the heroine of the song, insists on the amendment, and dispute +her commands if you dare?</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">This is no my ain lassie,<a name="FNanchor_282_282" id="FNanchor_282_282"></a><a href="#Footnote_282_282" class="fnanchor">[282]</a> &c.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>Do you know that you have roused the torpidity of Clarke at last? He +has requested me to write three or four songs for him, which he is to +set to music himself. The enclosed sheet contains two songs for him, +which please to present to my valued friend Cunningham.</p> + +<p>I enclose the sheet open, both for your inspection, and that you may +copy the song “Oh bonnie was yon rosy brier.” I do not know whether I +am right, but that song pleases me; and as it is extremely probable +that Clarke’s newly-roused celestial spark will be soon smothered in +the fogs of indolence, if you like the song, it may go as Scottish +verses to the air of “I wish my love was in a mire;” and poor +Erskine’s English lines may follow.</p> + +<p>I enclose you a “For a’ that and a’ that,” which was never in print: +it is a much superior song to mine. I have been told that it was +composed by a lady, and some lines written on the blank leaf of a copy +of the last edition of my poems, presented to the lady whom, in so +many fictitious reveries of passion, but with the most ardent +sentiments of real friendship, I have so often sung under the name of +Chloris:—</p> + +<p class="center">To Chloris.<a name="FNanchor_283_283" id="FNanchor_283_283"></a><a href="#Footnote_283_283" class="fnanchor">[283]</a></p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0"><i>Une bagatelle de l’amitié.</i><br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="sig1"><span class="smcap">Coila</span>.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + + + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_282_282" id="Footnote_282_282"></a><a href="#FNanchor_282_282"><span class="label">[282]</span></a> <a href="#CCLV">Song CCLV.</a></p> +</div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_283_283" id="Footnote_283_283"></a><a href="#FNanchor_283_283"><span class="label">[283]</span></a> Poems, <a href="#CXLVI">No. CXLVI.</a></p> +</div> +</div> + + + +<h2><a name="CCCXVI" id="CCCXVI"></a>CCCXVI.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. THOMSON.</h3> + +<p>[In the double service of poesy and music the poet had to sing of +pangs which he never endured, from beauties to whom he had never +spoken.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0"><span class="smcap">Forlorn</span> my love, no comfort near, &c.<a name="FNanchor_284_284" id="FNanchor_284_284"></a><a href="#Footnote_284_284" class="fnanchor">[284]</a><br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>How do you like the foregoing? I have written it within this hour: so +much for the speed of my Pegasus; but what say you to his bottom?</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + + + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_284_284" id="Footnote_284_284"></a><a href="#FNanchor_284_284"><span class="label">[284]</span></a> <a href="#CCLVIII">Song CCLVIII.</a></p> +</div> +</div> + + + +<h2><a name="CCCXVII" id="CCCXVII"></a>CCCXVII.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. THOMSON.</h3> + +<p>[The unexampled brevity of Burns’s letters, and the extraordinary flow +and grace of his songs, towards the close of his life, have not now +for the first time been remarked.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0"><span class="smcap">Last</span> May a braw wooer.<a name="FNanchor_285_285" id="FNanchor_285_285"></a><a href="#Footnote_285_285" class="fnanchor">[285]</a><br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Why, why tell thy lover.<a name="FNanchor_286_286" id="FNanchor_286_286"></a><a href="#Footnote_286_286" class="fnanchor">[286]</a><br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>Such is the peculiarity of the rhythm of this air, that I find it +impossible to make another stanza to suit it.</p> + +<p>I am at present quite occupied with the charming sensations of the +toothache, so have not a word to spare.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_285_285" id="Footnote_285_285"></a><a href="#FNanchor_285_285"><span class="label">[285]</span></a> <a href="#CCLIX">Song CCLIX.</a></p> +</div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_286_286" id="Footnote_286_286"></a><a href="#FNanchor_286_286"><span class="label">[286]</span></a> <a href="#CCLX">Song CCLX.</a></p> +</div></div> + + +<h2><a name="CCCXVIII" id="CCCXVIII"></a>CCCXVIII.</h2> + +<h3>TO MRS. RIDDEL.</h3> + +<p><i>Supposes himself to be writing from the dead to the living.</i></p> + +<p>[Ill health, poverty, a sense of dependence, with the much he had +deserved of his country, and the little he had obtained, were all at +this time pressing on the mind of Burns, and inducing him to forget +what was due to himself as well as to the courtesies of life.]</p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">Madam</span>,</p> + +<p>I dare say that this is the first epistle you ever received from this +nether world. I write you from the regions of Hell, amid the horrors +of the damned. The time and the manner of my leaving your earth I do +not exactly know, as I took my departure in the heat of a fever of +intoxication contracted at your too hospitable mansion; but, on my +arrival here, I was fairly tried, and sentenced to endure the +purgatorial tortures of this infernal confine for the space of +ninety-nine years, eleven months, and twenty-nine days, and all on +account of the impropriety of my conduct yesternight under your roof. +Here am I, laid on a bed of pitiless furze, with my aching head +reclined on a pillow of ever-piercing thorn, while an infernal +tormentor, wrinkled, and old, and cruel, his name I think is +<i>Recollection</i>, with a whip of scorpions, forbids peace or rest to +approach me, and keeps anguish eternally awake. Still, Madam, if I +could in any measure be reinstated in the good opinion of the fair +circle whom my conduct last night<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_491" id="Page_491">[491]</a></span> so much injured, I think it would +be an alleviation to my torments. For this reason I trouble you with +this letter. To the men of the company I will make no apology.—Your +husband, who insisted on my drinking more than I chose, has no right +to blame me; and the other gentlemen were partakers of my guilt. But +to you, Madam, I have much to apologize. Your good opinion I valued as +one of the greatest acquisitions I had made on earth, and I was truly +a beast to forfeit it. There was a Miss I——, too, a woman of fine +sense, gentle and unassuming manners—do make on my part, a miserable +d—mned wretch’s best apology to her. A Mrs. G——, a charming woman, +did me the honour to be prejudiced in my favour; this makes me hope +that I have not outraged her beyond all forgiveness.—To all the other +ladies please present my humblest contrition for my conduct, and my +petition for their gracious pardon. O all ye powers of decency and +decorum! whisper to them that my errors, though great, were +involuntary—that an intoxicated man is the vilest of beasts—that it +was not in my nature to be brutal to any one—that to be rude to a +woman, when in my senses, was impossible with me—but—</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p>Regret! Remorse! Shame! ye three hell-hounds that ever dog my steps +and bay at my heels, spare me! spare me!</p> + +<p>Forgive the offences, and pity the perdition of, Madam, your humble +slave.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CCCXIX" id="CCCXIX"></a>CCCXIX.</h2> + +<h3>TO MRS. RIDDEL.</h3> + +<p>[Mrs. Riddel, it is said, possessed many more of the poet’s letters +than are printed—she sometimes read them to friends who could feel +their wit, and, like herself, make allowance for their freedom.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Dumfries, 1795.</i></p> + +<p>Mr. Burns’s compliments to Mrs. Riddel—is much obliged to her for her +polite attention in sending him the book. Owing to Mr. B.’s being at +present acting as supervisor of excise, a department that occupies his +every hour of the day, he has not that time to spare which is +necessary for any belle-lettre pursuit; but, as he will, in a week or +two, again return to his wonted leisure, he will then pay that +attention to Mrs. R.’s beautiful song, “To thee, loved Nith”—which it +so well deserves. When “Anacharsis’ Travels” come to hand, which Mrs. +Riddel mentioned as her gift to the public library, Mr. B. will thank +her for a reading of it previous to her sending it to the library, as +it is a book Mr. B. has never seen: he wishes to have a longer perusal +of them than the regulations of the library allow.</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Friday Eve.</i></p> + +<p>P.S. Mr. Burns will be much obliged to Mrs. Riddel if she will favour +him with a perusal of any of her poetical pieces which he may not have +seen.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CCCXX" id="CCCXX"></a>CCCXX.</h2> + +<h3>TO MISS LOUISA FONTENELLE.</h3> + +<p>[That Miss Fontenelle, as an actress, did not deserve the high praise +which Burns bestows may be guessed: the lines to which he alludes were +recited by the lady on her benefit-night, and are printed among his +Poems.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Dumfries, December, 1795.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">Madam</span>,</p> + +<p>In such a bad world as ours, those who add to the scanty sum of our +pleasures, are positively our benefactors. To you, Madam, on our +humble Dumfries boards, I have been more indebted for entertainment +than ever I was in prouder theatres. Your charms as a woman would +insure applause to the most indifferent actress, and your theatrical +talents would insure admiration to the plainest figure. This, Madam, +is not the unmeaning or insidious compliment of the frivolous or +interested; I pay it from the same honest impulse that the sublime of +nature excites my admiration, or her beauties give me delight.</p> + +<p>Will the foregoing lines be of any service to you in your approaching +benefit-night? If they will I shall be prouder of my muse than ever. +They are nearly extempore: I know they have no great merit; but though +they should add but little to the entertainment of the evening, they +give me the happiness of an opportunity to declare how much I have the +honour to be, &c.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_492" id="Page_492">[492]</a></span></p> + + +<h2><a name="CCCXXI" id="CCCXXI"></a>CCCXXI.</h2> + +<h3>TO MRS. DUNLOP.</h3> + +<p>[Of the sweet girl to whom Burns alludes in this letter he was +deprived during this year: her death pressed sorely on him.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>15th December, 1795.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">My dear Friend</span>,</p> + +<p>As I am in a complete Decemberish humour, gloomy, sullen, stupid as +even the Deity of Dulness herself could wish, I shall not drawl out a +heavy letter with a number of heavier apologies for my late silence. +Only one I shall mention, because I know you will sympathize in it: +these four months, a sweet little girl, my youngest child, has been so +ill, that every day, a week or less, threatened to terminate her +existence. There had much need be many pleasures annexed to the states +of husband and father, for, God knows, they have many peculiar cares. +I cannot describe to you the anxious, sleepless hours these ties +frequently give me. I see a train of helpless little folks; me and my +exertions all their stay: and on what a brittle thread does the life +of man hang! If I am nipt off at the command of fate! even in all the +vigour of manhood as I am—such things happen every day—gracious God! +what would become of my little flock! ’Tis here that I envy your +people of fortune.—A father on his death-bed, taking an everlasting +leave of his children, has indeed woe enough; but the man of competent +fortune leaves his sons and daughters independency and friends; while +I—but I shall run distracted if I think any longer on the subject!</p> + +<p>To leave talking of the matter so gravely, I shall sing with the old +Scots ballad—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“O that I had ne’er been married,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I would never had nae care;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Now I’ve gotten wife and bairns,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">They cry crowdie! evermair.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Crowdie! ance; crowdie! twice;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Crowdie! three times in a day;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An ye crowdie! ony mair,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Ye’ll crowdie! a’ my meal away.”—<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p class="sig"><i>December 24th.</i></p> + +<p>We have had a brilliant theatre here this season; only, as all other +business does, it experiences a stagnation of trade from the +epidemical complaint of the country, <i>want of cash.</i> I mentioned our +theatre merely to lug in an occasional Address which I wrote for the +benefit-night of one of the actresses, and which is as follows:—</p> + +<h4>ADDRESS,</h4> +<h5>SPOKEN BY MISS FONTENELLE ON HER BENEFIT-NIGHT, <br /> +DEC. 4, 1795, AT + THE THEATRE, DUMFRIES.</h5> +<p>Still anxious to secure your partial favour, &c.</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>25th, Christmas-Morning.</i></p> + +<p>This, my much-loved friend, is a morning of wishes—accept mine—so +heaven hear me as they are sincere! that blessings may attend your +steps, and affliction know you not! In the charming words of my +favourite author, “The Man of Feeling,” “May the Great Spirit bear up +the weight of thy gray hairs, and blunt the arrow that brings them +rest!”</p> + +<p>Now that I talk of authors, how do you like Cowper? Is not the “Task” +a glorious poem? The religion of the “Task,” bating a few scraps of +Calvinistic divinity, is the religion of God and nature; the religion +that exalts, that ennobles man. Were not you to send me your “Zeluco,” +in return for mine? Tell me how you like my marks and notes through +the book. I would not give a farthing for a book, unless I were at +liberty to blot it with my criticisms.</p> + +<p>I have lately collected, for a friend’s perusal, all my letters; I +mean those which I first sketched, in a rough draught, and afterwards +wrote out fair. On looking over some old musty papers, which, from +time to time, I had parcelled by, as trash that were scarce worth +preserving, and which yet at the same time I did not care to destroy; +I discovered many of these rude sketches, and have written, and am +writing them out, in a bound MS. for my friend’s library. As I wrote +always to you the rhapsody of the moment, I cannot find a single +scroll to you, except one about the commencement of our acquaintance. +If there were any possible conveyance, I would send you a perusal of +my book.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CCCXXII" id="CCCXXII"></a>CCCXXII.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. ALEXANDER FINDLATER,</h3> + +<h4>SUPERVISOR OF EXCISE, DUMFRIES.</h4> + +<p>[The person to whom this letter is addressed, is the same who lately +denied that Burns was harshly used by the Board of Excise: but those, +and they are many, who believe what the poet wrote to Erskine, of Mar, +cannot agree with Mr. Findlater.]</p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">Sir</span>,</p> + +<p>Enclosed are the two schemes. I would not have troubled you with the +collector’s one, but<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_493" id="Page_493">[493]</a></span> for suspicion lest it be not right. Mr. Erskine +promised me to make it right, if you will have the goodness to show +him how. As I have no copy of the scheme for myself, and the +alterations being very considerable from what it was formerly, I hope +that I shall have access to this scheme I send you, when I come to +face up my new books. <i>So much for schemes.</i>—And that no scheme to +betray a <span class="smcap">friend</span>, or mislead a <span class="smcap">stranger</span>; to seduce a +<span class="smcap">young girl</span>, or rob a <span class="smcap">hen-roost</span>; to subvert +<span class="smcap">liberty</span>, or bribe an <span class="smcap">exciseman</span>; to disturb the +<span class="smcap">general assembly</span>, or annoy a <span class="smcap">gossipping</span>; to +overthrow the credit of <span class="smcap">orthodoxy</span>, or the authority of +<span class="smcap">old songs</span>; to oppose <i>your wishes</i>, or frustrate <i>my +hopes</i>—<span class="smcap">may prosper</span>—is the sincere wish and prayer of</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CCCXXIII" id="CCCXXIII"></a>CCCXXIII.</h2> + +<h3>TO THE EDITOR OF THE MORNING CHRONICLE.</h3> + +<p>[Cromek says, when a neighbour complained that his copy of the Morning +Chronicle was not regularly delivered to him from the post-office, the +poet wrote the following indignant letter to Perry on a leaf of his +excise-book, but before it went to the post he reflected and recalled +it.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Dumfries, 1795.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">Sir</span>,</p> + +<p>You will see by your subscribers’ list, that I have been about nine +months of that number.</p> + +<p>I am sorry to inform you, that in that time, seven or eight of your +papers either have never been sent to me, or else have never reached +me. To be deprived of any one number of the first newspaper in Great +Britain for information, ability, and independence, is what I can ill +brook and bear; but to be deprived of that most admirable oration of +the Marquis of Lansdowne, when he made the great though ineffectual +attempt (in the language of the poet, I fear too true), “to save a +<span class="smcap">sinking state</span>”—this was a loss that I neither can nor will +forgive you.—That paper, Sir, never reached me; but I demand it of +you. I am a <span class="smcap">Briton</span>; and must be interested in the cause of +<span class="smcap">liberty</span>:—I am a <span class="smcap">man</span>; and the <span class="smcap">rights</span> of +<span class="smcap">human nature</span> cannot be indifferent to me. However, do not let +me mislead you: I am not a man in that situation of life, which, as +your subscriber, can be of any consequence to you, in the eyes of +those to whom <span class="smcap">situation of life alone</span> is the criterion of +<span class="smcap">man</span>.—I am but a plain tradesman, in this distant, obscure +country town: but that humble domicile in which I shelter my wife and +children is the <span class="smcap">Castellum</span> of a <span class="smcap">Briton</span>; and that +scanty, hard-earned income which supports them is as truly my +property, as the most magnificent fortune, of the most <span class="smcap">puissant +member</span> of your <span class="smcap">house</span> of <span class="smcap">nobles</span>.</p> + +<p>These, Sir, are my sentiments; and to them I subscribe my name: and +were I a man of ability and consequence enough to address the PUBLIC, +with that name should they appear.</p> + +<p class="sig8">I am, &c.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CCCXXIV" id="CCCXXIV"></a>CCCXXIV.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. HERON,</h3> + +<h4>OF HERON.</h4> + +<p>[Of Patrick Heron, of Kerroughtree, something has been said in the +notes on the Ballads which bear his name.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Dumfries, 1794,</i> or <i>1795.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">Sir</span>,</p> + +<p>I enclose you some copies of a couple of political ballads; one of +which, I believe, you have never seen. Would to Heaven I could make +you master of as many votes in the Stewartry—but—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i4">“Who does the utmost that he can,<br /> +</span> +<span class="i0">Does well, acts nobly, angels could no more.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>In order to bring my humble efforts to bear with more effect on the +foe, I have privately printed a good many copies of both ballads, and +have sent them among friends all about the country.</p> + +<p>To pillory on Parnassus the rank reprobation of character, the utter +dereliction of all principle, in a profligate junto which has not only +outraged virtue, but violated common decency; which, spurning even +hypocrisy as paltry iniquity below their daring;—to unmask their +flagitiousness to the broadest day—to deliver such over to their +merited fate, is surely not merely innocent, but laudable; is not only +propriety, but virtue. You have already, as your auxiliary, the sober +detestation of mankind on the heads or your opponents; and I swear by +the lyre of Thalia to muster on your side all the votaries of honest +laughter, and fair, candid ridicule!</p> + +<p>I am extremely obliged to you for your kind mention of my interests in +a letter which Mr. Syme showed me. At present my situation in life +must be in a great measure stationary, at<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_494" id="Page_494">[494]</a></span> least for two or three +years. The statement is this—I am on the supervisors’ list, and as we +come on there by precedency, in two or three years I shall be at the +head of that list, and be appointed <i>of course.</i> <i>Then</i>, a +<span class="smcap">friend</span> might be of service to me in getting me into a place +of the kingdom which I would like. A supervisor’s income varies from +about a hundred and twenty to two hundred a year; but the business is +an incessant drudgery, and would be nearly a complete bar to every +species of literary pursuit. The moment I am appointed supervisor, in +the common routine, I may be nominated on the collector’s list; and +this is always a business purely of political patronage. A +collector-ship varies much, from better than two hundred a year to +near a thousand. They also come forward by precedency on the list; and +have, besides a handsome income, a life of complete leisure. A life of +literary leisure with a decent competency, is the summit of my wishes. +It would be the prudish affectation of silly pride in me to say that I +do not need, or would not be indebted to a political friend; at the +same time, Sir, I by no means lay my affairs before you thus, to hook +my dependent situation on your benevolence. If, in my progress of +life, an opening should occur where the good offices of a gentleman of +your public character and political consequence might bring me +forward, I shall petition your goodness with the same frankness as I +now do myself the honour to subscribe myself</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CCCXXV" id="CCCXXV"></a>CCCXXV.</h2> + +<h3>TO MRS. DUNLOP,</h3> + +<h4>IN LONDON.</h4> + +<p>[In the correspondence of the poet with Mrs. Dunlop he rarely mentions +Thomson’s Collection of Songs, though his heart was set much upon it: +in the Dunlop library there are many letters from the poet, it is +said, which have not been published.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Dumfries, 20th December, 1795.</i></p> + +<p>I have been prodigiously disappointed in this London journey of yours. +In the first place, when your last to me reached Dumfries, I was in +the country, and did not return until too late to answer your letter; +in the next place, I thought you would certainly take this route; and +now I know not what is become of you, or whether this may reach you at +all. God grant that it may find you and yours in prospering health and +good spirits! Do let me hear from you the soonest possible.</p> + +<p>As I hope to get a frank from my friend Captain Miller, I shall every +leisure hour, take up the pen, and gossip away whatever comes first, +prose or poetry, sermon or song. In this last article I have abounded +of late. I have often mentioned to you a superb publication of +Scottish songs which is making its appearance in your great +metropolis, and where I have the honour to preside over the Scottish +verse, as no less a personage than Peter Pindar does over the English.</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>December 29th.</i></p> + +<p>Since I began this letter, I have been appointed to act in the +capacity of supervisor here, and I assure you, what with the load of +business, and what with that business being new to me, I could +scarcely have commanded ten minutes to have spoken to you, had you +been in town, much less to have written you an epistle. This +appointment is only temporary, and during the illness of the present +incumbent; but I look forward to an early period when I shall be +appointed in full form: a consummation devoutly to be wished! My +political sins seem to be forgiven me.</p> + +<p>This is the season (New-year’s-day is now my date) of wishing; and +mine are most fervently offered up for you! May life to you be a +positive blessing while it lasts, for your own sake; and that it may +yet be greatly prolonged, is my wish for my own sake, and for the sake +of the rest of your friends! What a transient business is life! Very +lately I was a boy; but t’other day I was a young man; and I already +begin to feel the rigid fibre and stiffening joints of old age coming +fast o’er my frame. With all my follies of youth, and I fear, a few +vices of manhood, still I congratulate myself on having had in early +days religion strongly impressed on my mind. I have nothing to say to +any one as to which sect he belongs to, or what creed he believes: but +I look on the man, who is firmly persuaded of infinite wisdom and +goodness, superintending and directing every circumstance that can +happen in his lot—I felicitate such a man as having a solid +foundation for his mental enjoyment; a firm prop and sure stay, in the +hour of difficulty, trouble, and distress; and a never-failing anchor +of hope, when he looks beyond the grave.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_495" id="Page_495">[495]</a></span></p> + +<p class="sig"><i>January 12th.</i></p> + +<p>You will have seen our worthy and ingenious friend, the Doctor, long +ere this. I hope he is well, and beg to be remembered to him. I have +just been reading over again, I dare say for the hundred and fiftieth +time, his <i>View of Society and Manners</i>; and still I read it with +delight. His humour is perfectly original—it is neither the humour of +Addison, nor Swift, nor Sterne, nor of anybody but Dr. Moore. By the +bye, you have deprived me of <i>Zeluco</i>, remember that, when you are +disposed to rake up the sins of my neglect from among the ashes of my +laziness.</p> + +<p>He has paid me a pretty compliment, by quoting me in his last +publication.<a name="FNanchor_287_287" id="FNanchor_287_287"></a><a href="#Footnote_287_287" class="fnanchor">[287]</a></p> + +<hr class="hr1" /> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + + + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_287_287" id="Footnote_287_287"></a><a href="#FNanchor_287_287"><span class="label">[287]</span></a> Edward.</p></div> +</div> + + + +<h2><a name="CCCXXVI" id="CCCXXVI"></a>CCCXXVI.</h2> + +<h4>ADDRESS OF THE SCOTCH DISTILLERS</h4> +<h3>TO THE RIGHT HON. WILLIAM PITT.</h3> + +<p>[This ironical letter to the prime minister was found among the papers +of Burns.]</p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">Sir</span>,</p> + +<p>While pursy burgesses crowd your gate, sweating under the weight of +heavy addresses, permit us, the quondam distillers in that part of +Great Britain called Scotland, to approach you, not with venal +approbation, but with fraternal condolence; not as what you are just +now, or for some time have been; but as what, in all probability, you +will shortly be.—We shall have the merit of not deserting our friends +in the day of their calamity, and you will have the satisfaction of +perusing at least one honest address. You are well acquainted with the +dissection of human nature; nor do you need the assistance of a +fellow-creature’s bosom to inform you, that man is always a selfish, +often a perfidious being.—This assertion, however the hasty +conclusions of superficial observation may doubt of it, or the raw +inexperience of youth may deny it, those who make the fatal experiment +we have done, will feel.—You are a statesman, and consequently are +not ignorant of the traffic of these corporation compliments—The +little great man who drives the borough to market, and the very great +man who buys the borough in that market, they two do the whole +business; and you well know they, likewise, have their price. With +that sullen disdain which you can so well assume, rise, illustrious +Sir, and spurn these hireling efforts of venal stupidity. At best they +are the compliments of a man’s friends on the morning of his +execution: they take a decent farewell, resign you to your fate, and +hurry away from your approaching hour.</p> + +<p>If fame say true, and omens be not very much mistaken, you are about +to make your exit from that world where the sun of gladness gilds the +paths of prosperous man: permit us, great Sir, with the sympathy of +fellow-feeling to hail your passage to the realms of ruin.</p> + +<p>Whether the sentiment proceed from the selfishness or cowardice of +mankind is immaterial; but to point out to a child of misfortune those +who are still more unhappy, is to give him some degree of positive +enjoyment. In this light, Sir, our downfall may be again useful to +you:—though not exactly in the same way, it is not perhaps the first +time it has gratified your feelings. It is true, the triumph of your +evil star is exceedingly despiteful.—At an age when others are the +votaries of pleasure, or underlings in business, you had attained the +highest wish of a British statesman; and with the ordinary date of +human life, what a prospect was before you! Deeply rooted in <i>Royal +favour</i>, you overshadowed the land. The birds of passage, which follow +ministerial sunshine through every clime of political faith and +manners, flocked to your branches; and the beasts of the field (the +lordly possessors of hills and valleys) crowded under your shade. “But +behold a watcher, a holy one, came down from heaven, and cried aloud, +and said thus: Hew down the tree, and cut off his branches; shake off +his leaves, and scatter his fruit; let the beasts get away from under +it, and the fowls from his branches!” A blow from an unthought-of +quarter, one of those terrible accidents which peculiarly mark the +hand of Omnipotence, overset your career, and laid all your fancied +honours in the dust. But turn your eyes, Sir, to the tragic scenes of +our fate:—an ancient nation, that for many ages had gallantly +maintained the unequal struggle for independence with her much more +powerful neighbour, at last agrees to a union which should ever after +make them one people. In consideration of certain circumstances, it +was covenanted that the former should enjoy a stipulated alleviation +in her share of the public<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_496" id="Page_496">[496]</a></span> burdens, particularly in that branch of +the revenue called the Excise. This just privilege has of late given +great umbrage to some interested, powerful individuals of the more +potent part of the empire, and they have spared no wicked pains, under +insidious pretexts, to subvert what they dared not openly to attack, +from the dread which they yet entertained of the spirit of their +ancient enemies.</p> + +<p>In this conspiracy we fell; nor did we alone suffer, our country was +deeply wounded. A number of (we will say) respectable individuals, +largely engaged in trade, where we were not only useful, but +absolutely necessary to our country in her dearest interests; we, with +all that was near and dear to us, were sacrificed without remorse, to +the infernal deity of political expediency! We fell to gratify the +wishes of dark envy, and the views of unprincipled ambition! Your +foes, Sir, were avowed; were too brave to take an ungenerous +advantage; <i>you</i> fell in the face of day.—On the contrary, our +enemies, to complete our overthrow, contrived to make their guilt +appear the villany of a nation.—Your downfall only drags with you +your private friends and partisans: in our misery are more or less +involved the most numerous and most valuable part of the +community—all those who immediately depend on the cultivation of the +soil, from the landlord of a province, down to his lowest hind.</p> + +<p>Allow us, Sir, yet further, just to hint at another rich vein of +comfort in the dreary regions of adversity;—the gratulations of an +approving conscience. In a certain great assembly, of which you are a +distinguished member, panegyrics on your private virtues have so often +wounded your delicacy, that we shall not distress you with anything on +the subject. There is, however, one part of your public conduct which +our feelings will not permit us to pass in silence: our gratitude must +trespass on your modesty; we mean, worthy Sir, your whole behaviour to +the Scots Distillers.—In evil hours, when obtrusive recollection +presses bitterly on the sense, let that, Sir, come like an healing +angel, and speak the peace to your soul which the world can neither +give nor take away.</p> + +<p class="sig3">We have the honour to be,</p> + +<p class="sig5">Sir,</p> + +<p class="sig4">Your sympathizing fellow-sufferers,</p> + +<p class="sig5">And grateful humble servants,</p> + +<p class="sig5"><span class="smcap">John Barleycorn</span>—Præses.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CCCXXVII" id="CCCXXVII"></a>CCCXXVII.</h2> + +<h3>TO THE HON. PROVOST, BAILIES, AND</h3> + +<h3>TOWN COUNCIL OF DUMFRIES.</h3> + +<p>[The Provost and Bailies complied at once with the modest request of +the poet: both Jackson and Staig, who were heads of the town by turns, +were men of taste and feeling.]</p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">Gentlemen</span>,</p> + +<p>The literary taste and liberal spirit of your good town has so ably +filled the various departments of your schools, as to make it a very +great object for a parent to have his children educated in them. +Still, to me, a stranger, with my large family, and very stinted +income, to give my young ones that education I wish, at the high fees +which a stranger pays, will bear hard upon me.</p> + +<p>Some years ago your good town did me the honour of making me an +honorary burgess.—Will you allow me to request that this mark of +distinction may extend so far, as to put me on a footing of a real +freeman of the town, in the schools?</p> + +<p>If you are so very kind as to grant my request, it will certainly be a +constant incentive to me to strain every nerve where I can officially +serve you; and will, if possible, increase that grateful respect with +which I have the honour to be,</p> + +<p class="sig10">Gentlemen,</p> + +<p class="sig5">Your devoted humble servant,</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CCCXXVIII" id="CCCXXVIII"></a>CCCXXVIII.</h2> + +<h3>TO MRS. RIDDEL.</h3> + +<p>[Mrs. Riddel was, like Burns, a well-wisher to the great cause of +human liberty, and lamented with him the excesses of the French +Revolution.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Dumfries, 20th January, 1796.</i></p> + +<p>I cannot express my gratitude to you, for allowing me a longer perusal +of “Anacharsis.” In fact, I never met with a book that bewitched me so +much; and I, as a member of the library, must warmly feel the +obligation you have laid us under. Indeed to me the obligation is +stronger than to any other individual of our society; as “Anacharsis” +is an indispensable desideratum to a son of the muses.</p> + +<p>The health you wished me in your morning’s card, is, I think, flown +from me for ever. I<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_497" id="Page_497">[497]</a></span> have not been able to leave my bed to-day till +about an hour ago. These wickedly unlucky advertisements I lent (I did +wrong) to a friend, and I am ill able to go in quest of him.</p> + +<p>The muses have not quite forsaken me. The following detached stanza I +intend to interweave in some disastrous tale of a shepherd.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CCCXXIX" id="CCCXXIX"></a>CCCXXIX.</h2> + +<h3>TO MRS. DUNLOP.</h3> + +<p>[It seems that Mrs. Dunlop regarded the conduct of Burns, for some +months, with displeasure, and withheld or delayed her usual kind and +charming communications.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Dumfries, 31st January, 1796.</i></p> + +<p>These many months you have been two packets in my debt—what sin of +ignorance I have committed against so highly-valued a friend I am +utterly at a loss to guess. Alas! Madam, ill can I afford, at this +time, to be deprived of any of the small remnant of my pleasures. I +have lately drunk deep in the cup of affliction. The autumn robbed me +of my only daughter and darling child, and that at a distance too, and +so rapidly, as to put it out of my power to pay the last duties to +her. I had scarcely begun to recover from that shock, when I became +myself the victim of a most severe rheumatic fever, and long the die +spun doubtful; until, after many weeks of a sick bed, it seems to have +turned up life, and I am beginning to crawl across my room, and once +indeed have been before my own door in the street.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“When pleasure fascinates the mental sight,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Affliction purifies the visual ray,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Religion hails the drear, the untried night,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And shuts, for ever shuts! life’s doubtful day.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CCCXXX" id="CCCXXX"></a>CCCXXX.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. THOMSON.</h3> + +<p>[Cromek informed me, on the authority of Mrs. Burns, that the +“handsome, elegant present” mentioned in this letter, was a common +worsted shawl.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>February, 1796.</i></p> + +<p>Many thanks, my dear Sir, for your handsome, elegant present to Mrs. +Burns, and for my remaining volume of P. Pindar. Peter is a delightful +fellow, and a first favourite of mine. I am much pleased with your +idea of publishing a collection of our songs in octavo, with etchings. +I am extremely willing to lend every assistance in my power. The Irish +airs I shall cheerfully undertake the task of finding verses for.</p> + +<p>I have already, you know, equipt three with words, and the other day I +strung up a kind of rhapsody to another Hibernian melody, which I +admire much.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Awa’ wi’ your witchcraft o’ beauty’s alarms.<a name="FNanchor_288_288" id="FNanchor_288_288"></a><a href="#Footnote_288_288" class="fnanchor">[288]</a><br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>If this will do, you have now four of my Irish engagement. In my +by-past songs I dislike one thing, the name Chloris—I meant it as the +fictitious name of a certain lady: but, on second thoughts, it is a +high incongruity to have a Greek appellation to a Scottish pastoral +ballad. Of this, and some things else, in my next: I have more +amendments to propose. What you once mentioned of “flaxen locks” is +just: they cannot enter into an elegant description of beauty. Of this +also again—God bless you!<a name="FNanchor_289_289" id="FNanchor_289_289"></a><a href="#Footnote_289_289" class="fnanchor">[289]</a></p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_288_288" id="Footnote_288_288"></a><a href="#FNanchor_288_288"><span class="label">[288]</span></a> <a href="#CCLXVI">Song CCLXVI.</a></p> + +</div><div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_289_289" id="Footnote_289_289"></a><a href="#FNanchor_289_289"><span class="label">[289]</span></a> Our poet never explained what name he would have +substituted for Chloris.—Mr. Thomson.</p></div></div> + + +<h2><a name="CCCXXXI" id="CCCXXXI"></a>CCCXXXI.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. THOMSON.</h3> + +<p>[It is seldom that painting speaks in the spirit of poetry Burns +perceived some of the blemishes of Allan’s illustrations: but at that +time little nature and less elegance entered into the embellishments +of books.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>April, 1796.</i></p> + +<p>Alas! my dear Thomson, I fear it will be some time ere I tune my lyre +again! “By Babel streams I have sat and wept” almost ever since I +wrote you last; I have only known existence by the pressure of the +heavy hand of sickness, and have counted time by the repercussions of +pain! Rheumatism, cold, and fever have formed to me a terrible +combination. I close my eyes in misery, and open them without hope. I +look on the vernal day, and say with poor Fergusson,</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Say, wherefore has an all-indulgent heaven<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Light to the comfortless and wretched given?”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>This will be delivered to you by Mrs. Hyslop, landlady of the Globe +Tavern here, which for these many years has been my howff, and where<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_498" id="Page_498">[498]</a></span> +our friend Clarke and I have had many a merry squeeze. I am highly +delighted with Mr. Allan’s etchings. “Woo’d an’ married an’ a’,” is +admirable! The grouping is beyond all praise. The expression of the +figures, conformable to the story in the ballad, is absolutely +faultless perfection. I next admire “Turnim-spike.” What I like least +is “Jenny said to Jockey.” Besides the female being in her appearance +* * * *, if you take her stooping into the account, she is at least two +inches taller than her lover. Poor Cleghorn! I sincerely sympathize +with him. Happy I am to think that he yet has a well-grounded hope of +health and enjoyment in this world. As for me—but that is a sad +subject.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CCCXXXII" id="CCCXXXII"></a>CCCXXXII.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. THOMSON.</h3> + +<p>[The genius of the poet triumphed over pain and want,—his last songs +are as tender and as true as any of his early compositions.]</p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">My dear Sir</span>,</p> + +<p>I once mentioned to you an air which I have long admired—“Here’s a +health to them that’s awa, hiney,” but I forget if you took any notice +of it. I have just been trying to suit it with verses, and I beg leave +to recommend the air to your attention once more. I have only begun +it.</p> + +<p>[Here follow the first three stanzas of the song, beginning,</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Here’s a health to ane I loe dear;<a name="FNanchor_290_290" id="FNanchor_290_290"></a><a href="#Footnote_290_290" class="fnanchor">[290]</a><br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>the fourth was found among the poet’s MSS. after his death.]</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + + + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_290_290" id="Footnote_290_290"></a><a href="#FNanchor_290_290"><span class="label">[290]</span></a> <a href="#CCLXVII">Song CCLXVII.</a></p> +</div> +</div> + + + +<h2><a name="CCCXXXIII" id="CCCXXXIII"></a>CCCXXXIII.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. THOMSON.</h3> + +<p>[John Lewars, whom the poet introduces to Thomson, was a brother +gauger, and a kind, warm-hearted gentleman; Jessie Lewars was his +sister, and at this time but in her teens.]</p> + +<p>This will be delivered by Mr. Lewars, a young fellow of uncommon +merit. As he will be a day or two in town, you will have leisure, if +you choose, to write me by him: and if you have a spare half-hour to +spend with him, I shall place your kindness to my account. I have no +copies of the songs I have sent you, and I have taken a fancy to +review them all, and possibly may mend some of them; so when you have +complete leisure, I will thank you for either the originals or +copies.<a name="FNanchor_291_291" id="FNanchor_291_291"></a><a href="#Footnote_291_291" class="fnanchor">[291]</a> I had rather be the author of five well-written songs than +of ten otherwise. I have great hopes that the genial influence of the +approaching summer will set me to rights, but as yet I cannot boast of +returning health. I have now reason to believe that my complaint is a +flying gout—a sad business!</p> + +<p>Do let me know how Cleghorn is, and remember me to him.</p> + +<p>This should have been delivered to you a month ago. I am still very +poorly, but should like much to hear from you.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_291_291" id="Footnote_291_291"></a><a href="#FNanchor_291_291"><span class="label">[291]</span></a> “It is needless to say that this revisal Burns did not +live to perform.”—Currie.</p></div></div> + + +<h2><a name="CCCXXXIV" id="CCCXXXIV"></a>CCCXXXIV.</h2> + +<h3>TO MRS. RIDDEL,</h3> + +<p class="center"><i><b>Who had desired him to go to the Birth-Day Assembly on that day to +show his loyalty.</b></i></p> + +<p>[This is the last letter which the poet wrote to this accomplished +lady.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Dumfries, 4th June, 1796.</i></p> + +<p>I am in such miserable health as to be utterly incapable of showing my +loyalty in any way. Rackt as I am with rheumatisms, I meet every face +with a greeting like that of Balak to Balaam—“Come, curse me Jacob; +and come, defy me Israel!” So say I—Come, curse me that east wind; +and come, defy me the north! Would you have me in such circumstances +copy you out a love-song?</p> + +<p>I may perhaps see you on Saturday, but I will not be at the ball.—Why +should I? “man delights not me, nor woman either!” Can you supply me +with the song, “Let us all be unhappy together?”—do if you can, and +oblige, <i>le pauvre miserable</i></p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_499" id="Page_499">[499]</a></span></p> + + +<h2><a name="CCCXXXV" id="CCCXXXV"></a>CCCXXXV.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. CLARKE,</h3> + +<h4>SCHOOLMASTER, FORFAR.</h4> + +<p>[Who will say, after reading the following distressing letter, lately +come to light, that Burns did not die in great poverty.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Dumfries, 26th June, 1796.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">My dear Clarke</span>,</p> + +<p>Still, still the victim of affliction! Were you to see the emaciated +figure who now holds the pen to you, you would not know your old +friend. Whether I shall ever get about again, is only known to Him, +the Great Unknown, whose creature I am. Alas, Clarke! I begin to fear +the worst.</p> + +<p>As to my individual self, I am tranquil, and would despise myself, if +I were not; but Burns’s poor widow, and half-a-dozen of his dear +little ones—helpless orphans!—<i>there</i> I am weak as a woman’s tear. +Enough of this! ’Tis half of my disease.</p> + +<p>I duly received your last, enclosing the note. It came extremely in +time, and I am much obliged by your punctuality. Again I must request +you to do me the same kindness. Be so very good, as, by return of +post, to enclose me <i>another</i> note. I trust you can do it without +inconvenience, and it will seriously oblige me. If I must go, I shall +leave a few friends behind me, whom I shall regret while consciousness +remains. I know I shall live in their remembrance. Adieu, dear Clarke. +That I shall ever see you again, is, I am afraid, highly improbable.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CCCXXXVI" id="CCCXXXVI"></a>CCCXXXVI.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. JAMES JOHNSON,</h3> + +<h4>EDINBURGH.</h4> + +<p>[“In this humble and delicate manner did poor Burns ask for a copy of +a work of which he was principally the founder, and to which he had +contributed <i>gratuitously</i> not less than one hundred and eighty-four +<i>original, altered, and collected</i> songs! The editor has seen one +hundred and eighty transcribed by his own hand, for the +‘Museum.’”—<span class="smcap">Cromek</span>. Will it be believed that this “humble +request” of Burns was not complied with! The work was intended as a +present to Jessie Lewars.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Dumfries, 4th July, 1796.</i></p> + +<p>How are you, my dear friend, and how comes on your fifth volume? You +may probably think that for some time past I have neglected you and +your work; but, alas! the hand of pain, and sorrow, and care, has +these many months lain heavy on me! Personal and domestic affliction +have almost entirely banished that alacrity and life with which I used +to woo the rural muse of Scotia. In the meantime let us finish what we +have so well begun.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p>You are a good, worthy, honest fellow, and have a good right to live +in this world—because you deserve it. Many a merry meeting this +publication has given us, and possibly it may give us more, though, +alas! I fear it. This protracting, slow, consuming illness which hangs +over me, will, I doubt much, my ever dear friend, arrest my sun before +he has well reached his middle career, and will turn over the poet to +other and far more important concerns than studying the brilliancy of +wit, or the pathos of sentiment! However, <i>hope</i> is the cordial of the +human heart, and I endeavour to cherish it as well as I can.</p> + +<p>Let me hear from you as soon as convenient.—Your work is a great one; +and now that it is finished, I see, if we were to begin again, two or +three things that might be mended; yet I will venture to prophesy, +that to future ages your publication will be the text-book and +standard of Scottish song and music.</p> + +<p>I am ashamed to ask another favour of you, because you have been so +very good already; but my wife has a very particular friend of hers, a +young lady who sings well, to whom she wishes to present the “Scots +Musical Museum.” If you have a spare copy, will you be so obliging as +to send it by the very first <i>fly</i>, as I am anxious to have it soon.</p> + +<p>The gentleman, Mr. Lewars, a particular friend of mine, will bring out +any proofs (if they are ready) or any message you may have. I am +extremely anxious for your work, as indeed I am for everything +concerning you, and your welfare.</p> + +<p class="sig9">Farewell,</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<p>P. S. You should have had this when Mr. Lewars called on you, but his +saddle-bags miscarried.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CCCXXXVII" id="CCCXXXVII"></a>CCCXXXVII.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. CUNNINGHAM.</h3> + +<p>[Few of the last requests of the poet were effectual: Clarke, it is +believed, did not send the second <i>note</i> he wrote for: Johnson did not +send the copy of the Museum<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_500" id="Page_500">[500]</a></span> which he requested, and the Commissioners +of Excise refused the continuance of his full salary.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Brow, Sea-bathing quarters, 7th July, 1796.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">My dear Cunningham</span>,</p> + +<p>I received yours here this moment, and am indeed highly flattered with +the approbation of the literary circle you mention; a literary circle +inferior to none in the two kingdoms. Alas! my friend, I fear the +voice of the bard will soon be heard among you no more! For these +eight or ten months I have been ailing, sometimes bedfast and +sometimes not; but these last three months I have been tortured with +an excruciating rheumatism, which has reduced me to nearly the last +stage. You actually would not know me if you saw me—Pale, emaciated, +and so feeble, as occasionally to need help from my chair—my spirits +fled! fled! but I can no more on the subject—only the medical folks +tell me that my last only chance is bathing and country-quarters, and +riding.—The deuce of the matter is this; when an exciseman is off +duty, his salary is reduced to 35<i>l.</i> instead of 50<i>l.</i>—What way, in +the name of thrift, shall I maintain myself, and keep a horse in +country quarters—with a wife and five children at home, on 35<i>l.</i>? I +mention this, because I had intended to beg your utmost interest, and +that of all the friends you can muster, to move our commissioners of +excise to grant me the full salary; I dare say you know them all +personally. If they do not grant it me, I must lay my account with an +exit truly <i>en poëte</i>—if I die not of disease, I must perish with +hunger.</p> + +<p>I have sent you one of the songs; the other my memory does not serve +me with, and I have no copy here; but I shall be at home soon, when I +will send it you.—Apropos to being at home, Mrs. Burns threatens, in +a week or two, to add one more to my paternal charge, which, if of the +right gender, I intend shall be introduced to the world by the +respectable designation of <i>Alexander Cunningham Burns.</i> My last was +<i>James Glencairn</i>, so you can have no objection to the company of +nobility. Farewell.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CCCXXXVIII" id="CCCXXXVIII"></a>CCCXXXVIII.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. GILBERT BURNS.</h3> + +<p>[This letter contained heavy news for Gilbert Burns: the loss of a +brother whom he dearly loved and admired, was not all, though the +worst.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>10th July, 1796.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">Dear Brother</span>,</p> + +<p>It will be no very pleasing news to you to be told that I am +dangerously ill, and not likely to get better. An inveterate +rheumatism has reduced me to such a state of debility, and my appetite +is so totally gone, that I can scarcely stand on my legs. I have been +a week at sea-bathing, and I will continue there, or in a friend’s +house in the country, all the summer. God keep my wife and children: +if I am taken from their head, they will be poor indeed. I have +contracted one or two serious debts, partly from my illness these many +months, partly from too much thoughtlessness as to expense, when I +came to town, that will cut in too much on the little I leave them in +your hands. Remember me to my mother.</p> + +<p class="sig8">Yours,</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CCCXXXIX" id="CCCXXXIX"></a>CCCXXXIX.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. JAMES ARMOUR,</h3> + +<h4>MASON, MAUCHLINE.</h4> + +<p>[The original letter is now in a safe sanctuary, the hands of the +poet’s son, Major James Glencairn Burns.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>July 10th</i> [1796.]</p> + +<p>For Heaven’s sake, and as you value the we[l]fare of your daughter and +my wife, do, my dearest Sir, write to Fife, to Mrs. Armour to come if +possible. My wife thinks she can yet reckon upon a fortnight. The +medical people order me, <i>as I value my existence</i>, to fly to +sea-bathing and country-quarters, so it is ten thousand chances to one +that I shall not be within a dozen miles of her when her hour comes. +What a situation for her, poor girl, without a single friend by her on +such a serious moment.</p> + +<p>I have now been a week at salt-water, and though I think I have got +some good by it, yet I have some secret fears that this business will +be dangerous if not fatal.</p> + +<p class="sig5">Your most affectionate son,</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CCCXL" id="CCCXL"></a>CCCXL.</h2> + +<h3>TO MRS. BURNS.</h3> + +<p>[Sea-bathing, I have heard skilful men say, was injudicious: but it +was felt that Burns was on his way to the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_501" id="Page_501">[501]</a></span> grave, and as he desired to +try the influence of sea-water, as well as sea-air, his wishes were +not opposed.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Brow, Thursday.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">My dearest Love</span>,</p> + +<p>I delayed writing until I could tell you what effect sea-bathing was +likely to produce. It would be injustice to deny that it has eased my +pains, and I think has strengthened me; but my appetite is still +extremely bad. No flesh nor fish can I swallow: porridge and milk are +the only things I can taste. I am very happy to hear, by Miss Jess +Lewars, that you are all well. My very best and kindest compliments to +her, and to all the children. I will see you on Sunday.</p> + +<p class="sig5">Your affectionate husband,</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CCCXLI" id="CCCXLI"></a>CCCXLI.</h2> + +<h3>TO MRS. DUNLOP.</h3> + +<p>[“The poet had the pleasure of receiving a satisfactory explanation of +this lady’s silence,” says Currie, “and an assurance of the +continuance of her friendship to his widow and children.”]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Brow, Saturday, 12th July, 1796.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">Madam</span>,</p> + +<p>I have written you so often, without receiving any answer, that I +would not trouble you again, but for the circumstances in which I am. +An illness which has long hung about me, in all probability will +speedily send me beyond that <i>bourn whence no traveller returns.</i> Your +friendship, with which for many years you honoured me, was a +friendship dearest to my soul. Your conversation, and especially your +correspondence, were at once highly entertaining and instructive. With +what pleasure did I use to break up the seal! The remembrance yet adds +one pulse more to my poor palpitating heart.</p> + +<p class="sig9">Farewell!!!</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CCCXLII" id="CCCXLII"></a>CCCXLII.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. THOMSON.</h3> + +<p>[Thomson instantly complied with the dying poet’s request, and +transmitted the exact sum which he requested, viz. five pounds, by +return of post: he was afraid of offending the pride of Burns, +otherwise he would, he says, have sent a larger sum. He has not, +however, told us how much he sent to the all but desolate widow and +children, when death had released him from all dread of the poet’s +indignation.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Brow, on the Solway-firth, 12th July, 1796.</i></p> + +<p>After all my boasted independence, curst necessity compels me to +implore you for five pounds. A cruel wretch of a haberdasher, to whom +I owe an account, taking it into his head that I am dying, has +commenced a process, and will infallibly put me into jail. Do, for +God’s sake, send me that sum, and that by return of post. Forgive me +this earnestness, but the horrors of a jail have made me half +distracted. I do not ask all this gratuitously; for, upon returning +health, I hereby promise and engage to furnish you with five pounds’ +worth of the neatest song-genius you have seen. I tried my hand on +“Rothemurche” this morning. The measure is so difficult that it is +impossible to infuse much genius into the lines; they are on the other +side. Forgive, forgive me!</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Fairest maid on Devon’s banks.<a name="FNanchor_292_292" id="FNanchor_292_292"></a><a href="#Footnote_292_292" class="fnanchor">[292]</a><br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_292_292" id="Footnote_292_292"></a><a href="#FNanchor_292_292"><span class="label">[292]</span></a> <a href="#CCLXVIII">Song CCLXVIII.</a></p> +</div></div> + + +<h2><a name="CCCXLIII" id="CCCXLIII"></a>CCCXLIII.</h2> + +<h3>TO MR. JAMES BURNESS,</h3> + +<h4>WRITER, MONTROSE.</h4> + +<p>[The good, the warm-hearted James Burness sent his cousin ten pounds +on the 29th of July—he sent five pounds afterwards to the family, and +offered to take one of the boys, and educate him in his own profession +of a writer. All this was unknown to the world till lately.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Brow, 12th July.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">My dear Cousin</span>,</p> + +<p>When you offered me money assistance, little did I think I should want +it so soon. A rascal of a haberdasher, to whom I owe a considerable +bill, taking it into his head that I am dying, has commenced process +against me, and will infallibly put my emaciated body into jail. Will +you be so good as to accommodate me, and that by return of post, with +ten pounds? O James! did you know the pride of my heart, you would +feel doubly for me! Alas! I am not used to beg! The worst of it is, my +health was coming about finely; you know, and my physician assured me, +that melancholy and low spirits are half my disease; guess then my +horrors since this business began. If I had it settled, I would be, I +think, quite well in a manner. How shall I use the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_502" id="Page_502">[502]</a></span> language to you, O +do not disappoint me! but strong necessity’s curst command.</p> + +<p>I have been thinking over and over my brother’s affairs, and I fear I +must cut him up; but on this I will correspond at another time, +particularly as I shall [require] your advice.</p> + +<p>Forgive me for once more mentioning by return of post;—save me from +the horrors of a jail!</p> + +<p>My compliments to my friend James, and to all the rest. I do not know +what I have written. The subject is so horrible I dare not look it +over again.</p> + +<p class="sig8">Farewell.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CCCXLIV" id="CCCXLIV"></a>CCCXLIV.</h2> + +<h3>TO JAMES GRACIE, ESQ.</h3> + +<p>[James Gracie was, for some time, a banker in Dumfries: his eldest son, a fine, high-spirited youth, fell by a +rifle-ball in America, when leading the troops to the attack on +Washington.]</p> + +<p class="sig"><i>Brow, Wednesday Morning, 16th July, 1796.</i></p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">My dear Sir</span>,</p> + +<p>It would [be] doing high injustice to this place not to acknowledge +that my rheumatisms have derived great benefits from it already; but +alas! my loss of appetite still continues. I shall not need your kind +offer <i>this week</i>, and I return to town the beginning of next week, it +not being a tide-week. I am detaining a man in a burning hurry.</p> + +<p class="sig10">So God bless you.</p> + +<p class="sig6">R. B.</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h3><a name="REMARKS" id="REMARKS"></a>REMARKS</h3> +<h5>ON</h5> +<h2>SCOTTISH SONGS AND BALLADS.</h2> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<p>[The following Strictures on Scottish Song exist in the handwriting of +Burns, in the interleaved copy of Johnson’s Musical Museum, which the +poet presented to Captain Riddel, of Friars Carse; on the death of +Mrs. Riddel, these precious volumes passed into the hands of her +niece, Eliza Bayley, of Manchester, who kindly permitted Mr. Cromek to +transcribe and publish them in the Reliques.]</p> +<hr style="width: 45%;" /> + +<h3>THE HIGHLAND QUEEN.</h3> + +<p>This Highland Queen, music and poetry, was composed by Mr. M’Vicar, +purser of the Solebay man-of-war.—This I had from Dr. Blacklock.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>BESS THE GAWKIE.</h3> + +<p>This song shows that the Scottish muses did not all leave us when we +lost Ramsay and Oswald, as I have good reason to believe that the +verses and music are both posterior to the days of these two +gentlemen. It is a beautiful song, and in the genuine Scots taste. We +have few pastoral compositions, I mean the pastoral of nature, that +are equal to this.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>OH, OPEN THE DOOR, LORD GREGORY.</h3> + +<p>It is somewhat singular, that in Lanark, Renfrew, Ayr, Wigton, +Kirkudbright, and Dumfries-shires, there is scarcely an old song or +tune which, from the title, &c., can be guessed to belong to, or be +the production of these countries. This, I conjecture, is one of these +very few; as the ballad, which is a long one, is called, both by +tradition and in printed collections, “The Lass of Lochroyan,” which I +take to be Lochroyan, in Galloway.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>THE BANKS OF THE TWEED.</h3> + +<p>This song is one of the many attempts that English composers have made +to imitate the Scottish manner, and which I shall, in these +strictures, beg leave to distinguish by the ap<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_503" id="Page_503">[503]</a></span>pellation of +Anglo-Scottish productions. The music is pretty good, but the verses +are just above contempt.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>THE BEDS OF SWEET ROSES.</h3> + +<p>This song, as far as I know, for the first time appears here in +print.—When I was a boy, it was a very popular song in Ayrshire. I +remember to have heard those fanatics, the Buchanites, sing some of +their nonsensical rhymes, which they dignify with the name of hymns, +to this air.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>ROSLIN CASTLE.</h3> + +<p>These beautiful verses were the production of a Richard Hewit, a young +man that Dr. Blacklock, to whom I am indebted for the anecdote, kept +for some years as amanuensis. I do not know who is the author of +the second song to the tune. Tytler, in his amusing history of Scots +music, gives the air to Oswald; but in Oswald’s own collection of +Scots tunes, where he affixes an asterisk to those he himself +composed, he does not make the least claim to the tune.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>SAW YE JOHNNIE CUMMIN? QUO’ SHE.</h3> + +<p>This song, for genuine humour in the verses, and lively originality in +the air, is unparalleled. I take it to be very old.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>CLOUT THE CALDRON.</h3> + +<p>A tradition is mentioned in the “Bee,” that the second Bishop +Chisholm, of Dunblane, used to say, that if he were going to be +hanged, nothing would soothe his mind so much by the way as to hear +“Clout the Caldron” played.</p> + +<p>I have met with another tradition, that the old song to this tune,</p> +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Hae ye onie pots or pans,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or onie broken chanlers,”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>was composed on one of the Kenmure family, in the cavalier times; and +alluded to an amour he had, while under hiding, in the disguise of an +itinerant tinker. The air is also known by the name of</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“The blacksmith and his apron,”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>which from the rhythm, seems to have been a line of some old song to +the tune.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>SAW YE MY PEGGY.</h3> + +<p>This charming song is much older, and indeed superior to Ramsay’s +verses, “The Toast,” as he calls them. There is another set of the +words, much older still, and which I take to be the original one, but +though it has a very great deal of merit, it is not quite ladies’ +reading.</p> + +<p>The original words, for they can scarcely be called verses, seem to be +as follows; a song familiar from the cradle to every Scottish ear.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Saw ye my Maggie,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Saw ye my Maggie,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Saw ye my Maggie<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Linkin o’er the lea?<br /> +</span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">High kilted was she,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">High kilted was she,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">High kilted was she,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Her coat aboon her knee.<br /> +</span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">What mark has your Maggie,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">What mark has your Maggie,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">What mark has your Maggie,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">That ane may ken her be?”<br /> +</span> +</div></div> + +<p>Though it by no means follows that the silliest verses to an air must, +for that reason, be the original song; yet I take this ballad, of +which I have quoted part, to be old verses. The two songs in Ramsay, +one of them evidently his own, are never to be met with in the +fire-side circle of our peasantry; while that which I take to be the +old song, is in every shepherd’s mouth. Ramsay, I suppose, had thought +the old verses unworthy of a place in his collection.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>THE FLOWERS OF EDINBURGH.</h3> + +<p>This song is one of the many effusions of Scots Jacobitism.—The title +“Flowers of Edinburgh,” has no manner of connexion with the present +verses, so I suspect there has been an older set of words, of which +the title is all that remains.</p> + +<p>By the bye, it is singular enough that the Scottish muses were all +Jacobites.—I have paid more attention to every description of Scots +songs than perhaps anybody living has done, and I do not recollect one +single stanza, or even the title of the most trifling Scots air, which +has the least panegyrical reference to the families of Nassau or +Brunswick; while there are hundreds satirizing them.—This may be +thought no panegyric on the Scots Poets, but I mean it as such. For +myself, I would always take it as a compliment to have it said, that +my heart ran before my head,—and surely the gallant though<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_504" id="Page_504">[504]</a></span> +unfortunate house of Stewart, the kings of our fathers for so many +heroic ages, is a theme * * * * * *</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>JAMIE GAY.</h3> + +<p>Jamie Gay is another and a tolerable Anglo-Scottish piece.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>MY DEAR JOCKIE.</h3> + +<p>Another Anglo-Scottish production.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>FYE, GAE RUB HER O’ER WI’ STRAE.</h3> + +<p>It is self-evident that the first four lines of this song are part of +a song more ancient than Ramsay’s beautiful verses which are annexed +to them. As music is the language of nature; and poetry, particularly +songs, are always less or more localized (if I may be allowed the +verb) by some of the modifications of time and place, this is the +reason why so many of our Scots airs have outlived their original, and +perhaps many subsequent sets of verses; except a single name or +phrase, or sometimes one or two lines, simply to distinguish the tunes +by.</p> + +<p>To this day among people who know nothing of Ramsay’s verses, the +following is the song, and all the song that ever I heard:</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Gin ye meet a bonnie lassie,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Gie her a kiss and let her gae;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But gin ye meet a dirty hizzie,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Fye, gae rub her o’er wi’ strae.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Fye, gae rub her, rub her, rub her,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Fye, gae rub her o’er wi’ strae:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ gin ye meet dirty hizzie,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Fye, gae rub her o’er wi’ strae.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>THE LASS O’ LIVISTON.</h3> + +<p>The old song, in three eight-line stanzas, is well known, and has +merit as to wit and humour; but it is rather unfit for insertion.—It +begins,</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“The Bonnie lass o’ Liviston,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Her name ye ken, her name ye ken,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And she has written in her contract<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To lie her lane, to lie her lane.”<br /></span> +<span class="i6">&c. &c.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>THE LAST TIME I CAME O’ER THE MOOR.</h3> + +<p>Ramsay found the first line of this song, which had been preserved as +the title of the charming air, and then composed the rest of the +verses to suit that line. This has always a finer effect than +composing English words, or words with an idea foreign to the spirit +of the old title. Where old titles of songs convey any idea at all, it +will generally be found to be quite in the spirit of the air.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>JOCKIE’S GRAY BREEKS.</h3> + +<p>Though this has certainly every evidence of being a Scottish air, yet +there is a well-known tune and song in the north of Ireland, called +“The Weaver and his Shuttle O,” which, though sung much quicker, is +every note the very tune.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>THE HAPPY MARRIAGE.</h3> + +<p>Another, but very pretty Anglo-Scottish piece.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>THE LASS OF PATIE’S MILL.</h3> + +<p>In Sinclair’s Statistical Account of Scotland, this song is localized +(a verb I must use for want of another to express my idea) somewhere +in the north of Scotland, and likewise is claimed by Ayrshire.—The +following anecdote I had from the present Sir William Cunningham, of +Robertland, who had it from the last John, Earl of Loudon. The then +Earl of Loudon, and father to Earl John before mentioned, had Ramsay +at Loudon, and one day walking together by the banks of Irvine water, +near New-Mills, at a place called Patie’s Mill, they were struck with +the appearance of a beautiful country girl. His lordship observed that +she would be a fine theme for a song.—Allan lagged behind in +returning to Loudon Castle, and at dinner produced this identical +song.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>THE TURNIMSPIKE.</h3> + +<p>There is a stanza of this excellent song for local humour, omitted in +this set.—Where I have placed the asterisms.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“They tak the horse then by te head,<br /></span> +<span class="i3">And tere tey mak her stan’, man;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Me tell tem, me hae seen te day,<br /></span> +<span class="i3">Tey no had sic comman’, man.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>HIGHLAND LADDIE.</h3> + +<p>As this was a favourite theme with our later Scottish muses, there are +several airs and songs<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_505" id="Page_505">[505]</a></span> of that name. That which I take to be the +oldest, is to be found in the “Musical Museum,” beginning, “I hae been +at Crookieden.” One reason for my thinking so is, that Oswald has it +in his collection, by the name of “The Auld Highland Laddie.” It is +also known by the name of “Jinglan Johnie,” which is a well-known song +of four or five stanzas, and seems to be an earlier song than Jacobite +times. As a proof of this, it is little known to the peasantry by the +name of “Highland Laddie;” while everybody knows “Jinglan Johnie.” The +song begins</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Jinglan John, the meickle man,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">He met wi’ a lass was blythe and bonie.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>Another “Highland Laddie” is also in the “Museum,” vol. v., which I +take to be Ramsay’s original, as he has borrowed the chorus—“O my +bonie Highland lad,” &c. It consists of three stanzas, besides the +chorus; and has humour in its composition—it is an excellent, but +somewhat licentious song.—It begins</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“As I cam o’er Cairney mount,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And down among the blooming heather.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>This air, and the common “Highland Laddie,” seem only to be different +sets.</p> + +<p>Another “Highland Laddie,” also in the “Museum,” vol. v., is the tune +of several Jacobite fragments. One of these old songs to it, only +exists, as far as I know, in these four lines—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Where hae ye been a’ day,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Bonie laddie, Highland laddie?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Down the back o’ Bell’s brae,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Courtin Maggie, courtin Maggie.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>Another of this name is Dr. Arne’s beautiful air, called the new +“Highland Laddie.”</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>THE GENTLE SWAIN.</h3> + +<p>To sing such a beautiful air to such execrable verses, is downright +prostitution of common sense! The Scots verses indeed are tolerable.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>HE STOLE MY TENDER HEART AWAY.</h3> + +<p>This is an Anglo-Scottish production, but by no means a bad one.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>FAIREST OF THE FAIR.</h3> + +<p>It is too barefaced to take Dr. Percy’s charming song, and by means of +transposing a few English words into Scots, to offer to pass it for a +Scots song.—I was not acquainted with the editor until the first +volume was nearly finished, else, had I known in time, I would have +prevented such an impudent absurdity.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>THE BLAITHRIE O’T.</h3> + +<p>The following is a set of this song, which was the earliest song I +remember to have got by heart. When a child, an old woman sung it to +me, and I picked it up, every word, at first hearing.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“O Willy, weel I mind, I lent you my hand<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To sing you a song which you did me command;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But my memory’s so bad I had almost forgot<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That you called it the gear and the blaithrie o’t.—<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I’ll not sing about confusion, delusion or pride,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I’ll sing about a laddie was for a virtuous bride;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For virtue is an ornament that time will never rot,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And preferable to gear and the blaithrie o’t.—<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Tho’ my lassie hae nae scarlets or silks to put on,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">We envy not the greatest that sits upon the throne;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I wad rather hae my lassie, tho’ she cam in her smock,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Than a princess wi’ the gear and the blaithrie o’t.—<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Tho’ we hae nae horses or menzies at command,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">We will toil on our foot, and we’ll work wi’ our hand;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And when wearied without rest, we’ll find it sweet in any spot,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And we’ll value not the gear and the blaithrie o’t.—<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">If we hae ony babies, we’ll count them as lent;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Hae we less, hae we mair, we will ay be content;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For they say they hae mair pleasure that wins bu groat,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Than the miser wi’ his gear and the blaithrie o’t—<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I’ll not meddle wi’ th’ affairs of the kirk or the queen;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">They’re nae matters for a sang, let them sink, let them swim;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">On your kirk I’ll ne’er encroach, but I’ll hold it stil remote,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sae tak this for the gear and the blaithrie o’t.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>MAY EVE, OR KATE OF ABERDEEN.</h3> + +<p>“Kate of Aberdeen” is, I believe, the work of poor Cunningham the +player; of whom the following anecdote, though told before, deserves a +recital. A fat dignitary of the church coming past Cunningham one +<i>Sunday</i>, as the poor poet was busy plying a fishing-rod in some +stream near Durham, his native country, his reverence reprimanded +Cunningham very se<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_506" id="Page_506">[506]</a></span>verely for such an occupation on such a day. The +poor poet, with that inoffensive gentleness of manners which was his +peculiar characteristic, replied, that he hoped God and his reverence +would forgive his seeming profanity of that sacred day, “<i>as he had no +dinner to eat, but what lay at the bottom of that pool</i>!” This, Mr. +Woods, the player, who knew Cunningham well, and esteemed him much, +assured me was true.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>TWEED SIDE.</h3> + +<p>In Ramsay’s Tea-table Miscellany, he tells us that about thirty of the +songs in that publication were the works of some young gentlemen of +his acquaintance; which songs are marked with the letters D. C. +&c.—Old Mr. Tytler of Woodhouselee, the worthy and able defender of +the beauteous Queen of Scots, told me that the songs marked C, in the +<i>Tea-table</i>, were the composition of a Mr. Crawfurd, of the house of +Achnames, who was afterwards unfortunately drowned coming from +France.—As Tytler was most intimately acquainted with Allan Ramsay, I +think the anecdote may be depended on. Of consequence, the beautiful +song of Tweed Side is Mr. Crawfurd’s, and indeed does great honour to +his poetical talents. He was a Robert Crawfurd; the Mary he celebrates +was a Mary Stewart, of the Castle-Milk family, afterwards married to a +Mr. John Ritchie.</p> + +<p>I have seen a song, calling itself the original Tweed Side, and said +to have been composed by a Lord Yester. It consisted of two stanzas, +of which I still recollect the first—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“When Maggy and I was acquaint,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I carried my noddle fu’ hie;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Nae lintwhite on a’ the green plain,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Nor gowdspink sae happy as me:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But I saw her sae fair and I lo’ed:<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I woo’d, but I came nae great speed;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">So now I maun wander abroad,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And lay my banes far frae the Tweed.”—<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>THE POSY.</h3> + +<p>It appears evident to me that Oswald composed his <i>Roslin Castle</i> on +the modulation of this air.—In the second part of Oswald’s, in the +three first bars, he has either hit on a wonderful similarity to, or +else he has entirely borrowed the three first bars of the old air; and +the close of both tunes is almost exactly the same. The old verses to +which it was sung, when I took down the notes from a country girl’s +voice, had no great merit.—The following is a specimen:</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“There was a pretty May, and a milkin she went;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Wi’ her red rosy cheeks, and her coal black hair;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And she has met a young man a comin o’er the bent,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">With a double and adieu to thee, fair May.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O where are ye goin, my ain pretty May,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Wi’ thy red rosy cheeks, and thy coal black hair?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Unto the yowes a milkin, kind sir, she says,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">With a double and adieu to thee, fair May.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">What if I gang alang with thee, my ain pretty May,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Wi’ thy red rosy cheeks, any thy coal-black hair;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wad I be aught the warse o’ that, kind sir, she says,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">With a double and adieu to thee, fair May.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>MARY’S DREAM.</h3> + +<p>The Mary here alluded to is generally supposed to be Miss Mary +Macghie, daughter to the Laird of Airds, in Galloway. The poet was a +Mr. John Lowe, who likewise wrote another beautiful song, called +Pompey’s Ghost.—I have seen a poetic epistle from him in North +America, where he now is, or lately was, to a lady in Scotland.—By +the strain of the verses, it appeared that they allude to some love +affair.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>THE MAID THAT TENDS THE GOATS.</h3> + +<h4>BY MR. DUDGEON.</h4> +<p>This Dudgeon is a respectable farmer’s son in Berwickshire.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>I WISH MY LOVE WERE IN A MIRE.</h3> + +<p>I never heard more of the words of this old song than the title.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>ALLAN WATER.</h3> + +<p>This Allan Water, which the composer of the music has honoured with +the name of the air, I have been told is Allan Water, in Strathallan.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>THERE’S NAE LUCK ABOUT THE HOUSE.</h3> + +<p>This is one of the most beautiful songs in the Scots, or any other +language.—The two lines,</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“And will I see his face again!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And will I hear him speak!”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>as well as the two preceding ones, are unequalled almost by anything I +ever heard or read: and the lines,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_507" id="Page_507">[507]</a></span></p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“The present moment is our ain,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The neist we never saw,”—<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>are worthy of the first poet. It is long posterior to Ramsay’s days. +About the year 1771, or 72, it came first on the streets as a ballad; +and I suppose the composition of the song was not much anterior to +that period.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>TARRY WOO.</h3> + +<p>This is a very pretty song; but I fancy that the first half stanza, as +well as the tune itself, are much older than the rest of the words.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>GRAMACHREE.</h3> + +<p>The song of Gramachree was composed by a Mr. Poe, a counsellor at law +in Dublin. This anecdote I had from a gentleman who knew the lady, the +“Molly,” who is the subject of the song, and to whom Mr. Poe sent the +first manuscript of his most beautiful verses. I do not remember any +single line that has more true pathos than</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“How can she break that honest heart that wears her in its core!”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>But as the song is Irish, it had nothing to do in this collection.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>THE COLLIER’S BONNIE LASSIE.</h3> + +<p>The first half stanza is much older than the days of Ramsay.—The old +words began thus:</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“The collier has a dochter, and, O, she’s wonder bonnie!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A laird he was that sought her, rich baith in lands and money.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">She wad na hae a laird, nor wad she be a lady,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But she wad hae a collier, the colour o’ her daddie.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>MY AIN KIND DEARIE-O.</h3> + +<p>The old words of this song are omitted here, though much more +beautiful than these inserted; which were mostly composed by poor +Fergusson, in one of his merry humours. The old words began thus:</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“I’ll rowe thee o’er the lea-rig,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My ain kind dearie, O,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I’ll rowe thee o’er the lea-rig,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My ain kind dearie, O,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Altho’ the night were ne’er sae wat,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And I were ne’er sae weary, O;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I’ll rowe thee o’er the lea-rig,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My ain kind dearie, O.”—<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>MARY SCOTT, THE FLOWER OF YARROW.</h3> + +<p>Mr. Robertson, in his statistical account of the parish of Selkirk, +says, that Mary Scott, the Flower of Yarrow, was descended from the +Dryhope, and married into the Harden family. Her daughter was married +to a predecessor of the present Sir Francis Elliot, of Stobbs, and of +the late Lord Heathfield.</p> + +<p>There is a circumstance in their contract of marriage that merits +attention, and it strongly marks the predatory spirit of the times. +The father-in-law agrees to keep his daughter for some time after the +marriage; for which the son-in-law binds himself to give him the +profits of the first Michaelmas moon!</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>DOWN THE BURN, DAVIE.</h3> + +<p>I have been informed, that the tune of “Down the burn, Davie,” was the +composition of David Maigh, keeper of the blood slough hounds, +belonging to the Laird of Riddel, in Tweeddale.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>BLINK O’ER THE BURN, SWEET BETTIE.</h3> + +<p>The old words, all that I remember, are,—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Blink over the burn, sweet Betty,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">It is a cauld winter night:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">It rains, it hails, it thunders,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The moon, she gies nae light:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">It’s a’ for the sake o’ sweet Betty,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That ever I tint my way;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sweet, let me lie beyond thee<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Until it be break o’ day.—<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O, Betty will bake my bread,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And Betty will brew my ale,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And Betty will be my love,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">When I come over the dale:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Blink over the burn, sweet Betty,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Blink over the burn to me,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And while I hae life, dear lassie,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My ain sweet Betty thou’s be.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>THE BLITHSOME BRIDAL.</h3> + +<p>I find the “Blithsome Bridal” in James Watson’s collection of Scots +poems, printed at Edinburgh, in 1706. This collection, the publisher +says, is the first of its nature which has been published in our own +native Scots dialect—it is now extremely scarce.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_508" id="Page_508">[508]</a></span></p> + + + + + +<h3>JOHN HAY’S BONNIE LASSIE.</h3> + +<p>John Hay’s “Bonnie Lassie” was daughter of John Hay, Earl or Marquis +of Tweeddale, and late Countess Dowager of Roxburgh.—She died at +Broomlands, near Kelso, some time between the years 1720 and 1740.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>THE BONIE BRUCKET LASSIE.</h3> + +<p>The two first lines of this song are all of it that is old. The rest +of the song, as well as those songs in the Museum marked T., are the +works of an obscure, tippling, but extraordinary body of the name of +Tytler, commonly known by the name of Balloon Tytler, from his having +projected a balloon; a mortal, who, though he drudges about Edinburgh +as a common printer, with leaky shoes, a sky-lighted hat, and +knee-buckles as unlike as George-by-the-grace-of-God, and +Solomon-the-son-of-David; yet that same unknown drunken mortal is +author and compiler of three-fourths of Elliot’s pompous Encyclopedia +Britannica, which he composed at half a guinea a week!</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>SAE MERRY AS WE TWA HA’E BEEN.</h3> + +<p>This song is beautiful.—The chorus in particular is truly pathetic. I +never could learn anything of its author.</p> + +<p class="std3"><span class="smcap">Chorus</span>.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Sae merry as we twa ha’e been,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Sae merry as we twa ha’e been;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My heart is like for to break,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">When I think on the days we ha’e seen.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>THE BANKS OF FORTH.</h3> + +<p>This air is Oswald’s.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>THE BUSH ABOON TRAQUAIR.</h3> + +<p>This is another beautiful song of Mr. Crawfurd’s composition. In the +neighbourhood of Traquair, tradition still shows the old “Bush;” +which, when I saw it, in the year 1787, was composed of eight or nine +ragged birches. The Earl of Traquair has planted a clump of trees near +by, which he calls “The New Bush.”</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>CROMLET’S LILT.</h3> + +<p>The following interesting account of this plaintive dirge was +communicated to Mr. Riddel by Alexander Fraser Tytler, Esq., of +Woodhouselee.</p> + +<p>“In the latter end of the sixteenth century, the Chisolms were +proprietors of the estate of Cromlecks (now possessed by the +Drummonds). The eldest son of that family was very much attached to a +daughter of Sterling of Ardoch, commonly known by the name of Fair +Helen of Ardoch.</p> + +<p>“At that time the opportunities of meeting betwixt the sexes were more +rare, consequently more sought after than now; and the Scottish +ladies, far from priding themselves on extensive literature, were +thought sufficiently book-learned if they could make out the +Scriptures in their mother-tongue. Writing was entirely out of the +line of female education. At that period the most of our young men of +family sought a fortune, or found a grave, in France. Cromlus, when he +went abroad to the war, was obliged to leave the management of his +correspondence with his mistress to a lay-brother of the monastery of +Dumblain, in the immediate neighbourhood of Cromleck, and near Ardoch. +This man, unfortunately, was deeply sensible of Helen’s charms. He +artfully prepossessed her with stories to the disadvantage of Cromlus; +and, by misinterpreting or keeping up the letters and messages +intrusted to his care, he entirely irritated both. All connexion was +broken off betwixt them; Helen was inconsolable, and Cromlus has left +behind him, in the ballad called ‘Cromlet’s Lilt,’ a proof of the +elegance of his genius, as well as the steadiness of his love.</p> + +<p>“When the artful monk thought time had sufficiently softened Helen’s +sorrow, he proposed himself as a lover: Helen was obdurate: but at +last, overcome by the persuasions of her brother, with whom she lived, +and who, having a family of thirty-one children, was probably very +well pleased to get her off his hands—she submitted, rather than +consented to the ceremony; but there her compliance ended; and, when +forcibly put into bed, she started quite frantic from it, screaming +out, that after three gentle taps on the wainscot, at the bed-head, +she heard Cromlus’s voice, crying, ‘Helen, Helen, mind me!’ Cromlus +soon after coming home, the treachery of the confidant was +dis<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_509" id="Page_509">[509]</a></span>covered,—her marriage disannulled,—and Helen became Lady +Cromlecks.”</p> + +<p>N. B. Marg. Murray, mother to these thirty-one children, was daughter +to Murray of Strewn, one of the seventeen sons of Tullybardine, and +whose youngest son, commonly called the Tutor of Ardoch, died in the +year 1715, aged 111 years.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>MY DEARIE, IF THOU DIE.</h3> + +<p>Another beautiful song of Crawfurd’s.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>SHE ROSE AND LOOT ME IN.</h3> + +<p>The old set of this song, which is still to be found in printed +collections, is much prettier than this; but somebody, I believe it +was Ramsay, took it into his head to clear it of some seeming +indelicacies, and made it at once more chaste and more dull.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>GO TO THE EWE-BUGHTS, MARION.</h3> + +<p>I am not sure if this old and charming air be of the South, as is +commonly said, or of the North of Scotland. There is a song, +apparently as ancient us “Ewe-bughts, Marion,” which sings to the same +tune, and is evidently of the North.—It begins thus:</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“The Lord o’ Gordon had three dochters,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Mary, Marget, and Jean,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">They wad na stay at bonie Castle Gordon,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But awa to Aberdeen.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>LEWIS GORDON.</h3> + +<p>This air is a proof how one of our Scots tunes comes to be composed +out of another. I have one of the earliest copies of the song, and it +has prefixed,</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Tune of Tarry Woo.”—<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>Of which tune a different set has insensibly varied into a different +air.—To a Scots critic, the pathos of the line,</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“‘Tho’ his back be at the wa’,”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>—must be very striking. It needs not a Jacobite prejudice to be +affected with this song.</p> + +<p>The supposed author of “Lewis Gordon” was a Mr. Geddes, priest, at +Shenval, in the Ainzie.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>O HONE A RIE.</h3> + +<p>Dr. Blacklock informed me that this song was composed on the infamous +massacre of Glencoe.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>I’LL NEVER LEAVE THEE.</h3> + +<p>This is another of Crawfurd’s songs, but I do not think in his +happiest manner.—What an absurdity, to join such names as <i>Adonis</i> +and <i>Mary</i> together!</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>CORN RIGS ARE BONIE.</h3> + +<p>All the old words that ever I could meet to this air were the +following, which seem to have been an old chorus:</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“O corn rigs and rye rigs,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">O corn rigs are bonie;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And where’er you meet a bonie lass,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Preen up her cockernony.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>THE MUCKING OF GEORDIE’S BYRE.</h3> + +<p>The chorus of this song is old; the rest is the work of Balloon +Tytler.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>BIDE YE YET.</h3> + +<p>There is a beautiful song to this tune, beginning,</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Alas, my son, you little know,”—<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>which is the composition of Miss Jenny Graham, of Dumfries.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>WAUKIN O’ THE FAULD.</h3> + +<p>There are two stanzas still sung to this tune, which I take to be the +original song whence Ramsay composed his beautiful song of that name +in the Gentle Shepherd.—It begins</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“O will ye speak at our town,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As ye come frae the fauld.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>I regret that, as in many of our old songs, the delicacy of this old +fragment is not equal to its wit and humour.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>TRANENT-MUIR.</h3> + +<p>“Tranent-Muir,” was composed by a Mr. Skirving, a very worthy +respectable farmer near Haddington. I have heard the anecdote often, +that Lieut. Smith, whom he mentions in the ninth stanza, came to +Haddington after the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_510" id="Page_510">[510]</a></span> publication of the song, and sent a challenge to +Skirving to meet him at Haddington, and answer for the unworthy manner +in which he had noticed him in his song. “Gang away back,” said the +honest farmer, “and tell Mr. Smith that I hae nae leisure to come to +Haddington; but tell him to come here, and I’ll tak a look o’ him, and +if I think I’m fit to fecht him, I’ll fecht him; and if no, I’ll do as +he did—<i>I’ll rin awa.”</i>—</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>TO THE WEAVERS GIN YE GO.</h3> + +<p>The chorus of this song is old, the rest of it is mine. Here, once for +all, let me apologize for many silly compositions of mine in this +work. Many beautiful airs wanted words; in the hurry of other +avocations, if I could string a parcel of rhymes together anything +near tolerable, I was fain to let them pass. He must be an excellent +poet indeed whose every performance is excellent.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>POLWARTH ON THE GREEN.</h3> + +<p>The author of “Polwarth on the Green” is Capt. John Drummond M’Gregor, +of the family of Bochaldie.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>STREPHON AND LYDIA.</h3> + +<p>The following account of this song I had from Dr. Blacklock.</p> + +<p>The Strephon and Lydia mentioned in the song were perhaps the +loveliest couple of their time. The gentleman was commonly known by +the name of Beau Gibson. The lady was the “Gentle Jean,” celebrated +somewhere in Hamilton of Bangour’s poems.—Having frequently met at +public places, they had formed a reciprocal attachment, which their +friends thought dangerous, as their resources were by no means +adequate to their tastes and habits of life. To elude the bad +consequences of such a connexion, Strephon was sent abroad with a +commission, and perished in Admiral Vernon’s expedition to Carthagena.</p> + +<p>The author of this song was William Wallace, Esq. of Cairnhill, in +Ayrshire.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>I’M O’ER YOUNG TO MARRY YET.</h3> + +<p>The chorus of this song is old. The rest of it, such as it is, is +mine.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>M’PHERSON’S FAREWELL.</h3> + +<p>M’Pherson, a daring robber, in the beginning of this century, was +condemned to be hanged at the assizes of Inverness. He is said, when +under sentence of death, to have composed this tune, which he called +his own lament or farewell.</p> + +<p>Gow has published a variation of this fine tune as his own +composition, which he calls “The Princess Augusta.”</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>MY JO, JANET.</h3> + +<p>Johnson, the publisher, with a foolish delicacy, refused to insert the +last stanza of this humorous ballad.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>THE SHEPHERD’S COMPLAINT.</h3> + +<p>The words by a Mr. R. Scott, from the town or neighbourhood of Biggar.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>THE BIRKS OF ABERFELDY.</h3> + +<p>I composed these stanzas standing under the falls of Aberfeldy, at or +near Moness.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>THE HIGHLAND LASSIE O.</h3> + +<p>This was a composition of mine in very early life, before I was known +at all in the world. My Highland lassie was a warm-hearted, charming +young creature as ever blessed a man with generous love. After a +pretty long tract of the most ardent reciprocal attachment, we met by +appointment on the second Sunday of May, in a sequestered spot by the +banks of Ayr, where we spent the day in taking a farewell before she +should embark for the West Highlands, to arrange matters among her +friends for our projected change of life. At the close of autumn +following she crossed the sea to meet me at Greenock, where she had +scarce landed when she was seized with a malignant fever, which +hurried my dear girl to the grave in a few days, before I could even +hear of her last illness.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>FIFE, AND A’ THE LANDS ABOUT IT.</h3> + +<p>This song is Dr. Blacklock’s. He, as well as I, often gave Johnson +verses, trifling enough<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_511" id="Page_511">[511]</a></span> perhaps, but they served as a vehicle to the +music.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>WERE NA MY HEART LIGHT I WAD DIE.</h3> + +<p>Lord Hailes, in the notes to his collection of ancient Scots poems, +says that this song was the composition of a Lady Grissel Baillie, +daughter of the first Earl of Marchmont, and wife of George Baillie, +of Jerviswood.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>THE YOUNG MAN’S DREAM.</h3> + +<p>This song is the composition of Balloon Tytler.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>STRATHALLAN’S LAMENT.</h3> + +<p>This air in the composition of one of the worthiest and best-hearted +men living—Allan Masterton, schoolmaster in Edinburgh. As he and I +were both sprouts of Jacobitism we agreed to dedicate the words and +air to that cause.</p> + +<p>To tell the matter-of-fact, except when my passions were heated by +some accidental cause, my Jacobitism was merely by way of <i>vive la +bagatelle.</i></p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>UP IN THE MORNING EARLY.</h3> + +<p>The chorus of this is old; the two stanzas are mine.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>THE TEARS OF SCOTLAND.</h3> + +<p>Dr. Blacklock told me that Smollet, who was at the bottom a great +Jacobite, composed these beautiful and pathetic verses on the infamous +depredations of the Duke of Cumberland after the battle of Culloden.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>WHAT WILL I DO GIN MY HOGGIE DIE.</h3> + +<p>Dr. Walker, who was minister at Moffat in 1772, and is now (1791) +Professor of Natural History in the University of Edinburgh, told the +following anecdote concerning this air.—He said, that some gentlemen, +riding a few years ago through Liddesdale, stopped at a hamlet +consisting of a few houses, called Moss Platt, when they were struck +with this tune, which an old woman, spinning on a rock at her door, +was singing. All she could tell concerning it was, that she was taught +it when a child, and it was called “What will I do gin my Hoggie die?” +No person, except a few females at Moss Platt, knew this fine old +tune, which in all probability would have been lost had not one of the +gentlemen, who happened to have a flute with him, taken it down.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>I DREAM’D I LAY WHERE FLOWERS WERE SPRINGING.</h3> + +<p>These two stanzas I composed when I was seventeen, and are among the +oldest of my printed pieces.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>AH! THE POOR SHEPHERD’S MOURNFUL FATE.</h3> + +<p class="std1">Tune—“Gallashiels.”</p> + +<p>The old title, “Sour Plums o’ Gallashiels,” probably was the beginning +of a song to this air, which is now lost.</p> + +<p>The tune of Gallashiels was composed about the beginning of the +present century by the Laird of Gallashiel’s piper.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>THE BANKS OF THE DEVON.</h3> + +<p>These verses were composed on a charming girl, a Miss Charlotte +Hamilton, who is now married to James M’Kitrick Adair, Esq., +physician. She is sister to my worthy friend Gavin Hamilton, of +Mauchline, and was born on the banks of the Ayr, but was, at the time +I wrote these lines, residing at Herveyston, in Clackmannanshire, on +the romantic banks of the little river Devon. I first heard the air +from a lady in Inverness, and got the notes taken down for this work.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>MILL, MILL O.</h3> + +<p>The original, or at least a song evidently prior to Ramsay’s is still +extant.—It runs thus,</p> + +<p class="std2"><span class="smcap">Chorus</span>.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“The mill, mill O, and the kill, kill O,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And the coggin o’ Peggy’s wheel, O,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The sack and the sieve, and a’ she did leave,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And danc’d the miller’s reel O.—<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">As I came down yon waterside,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And by yon shellin-hill O,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">There I spied a bonie bonie lass,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And a lass that I lov’d right well O.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_512" id="Page_512">[512]</a></span></p> + + + + +<h3>WE RAN AND THEY RAN.</h3> + +<p>The author of “We ran and they ran”—was a Rev. Mr. Murdoch M’Lennan, +minister at Crathie, Dee-side.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>WALY, WALY.</h3> + +<p>In the west country I have heard a different edition of the second +stanza.—Instead of the four lines, beginning with, “When +cockle-shells, &c.,” the other way ran thus:—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“O wherefore need I busk my head,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Or wherefore need I kame my hair,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sin my fause luve has me forsook,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And sys, he’ll never luve me mair.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>DUNCAN GRAY.</h3> + +<p>Dr. Blacklock informed me that he had often heard the tradition, that +this air was composed by a carman in Glasgow.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>DUMBARTON DRUMS.</h3> + +<p>This is the last of the West-Highland airs; and from it over the whole +tract of country to the confines of Tweedside, there is hardly a tune +or song that one can say has taken its origin from any place or +transaction in that part of Scotland.—The oldest Ayrshire reel, is +Stewarton Lasses, which was made by the father of the present Sir +Walter Montgomery Cunningham, alias Lord Lysle; since which period +there has indeed been local music in that country in great +plenty.—Johnie Faa is the only old song which I could ever trace as +belonging to the extensive county of Ayr.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>CAULD KAIL IN ABERDEEN.</h3> + +<p>This song is by the Duke of Gordon.—The old verses are,</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“There’s cauld kail in Aberdeen,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And castocks in Strathbogie;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When ilka lad maun hae his lass,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Then fye, gie me my coggie.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="std2"><span class="smcap">Chorus</span>.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">My coggie, Sirs, my coggie, Sirs,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I cannot want my coggie;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I wadna gie my three-girr’d cap<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For e’er a quene on Bogie.—<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">There’s Johnie Smith has got a wife,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That scrimps him o’ his coggie,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">If she were mine, upon my life<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I wad douk her in a bogie.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>FOR LAKE OF GOLD.</h3> + +<p>The country girls in Ayrshire, instead of the line—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“She me forsook for a great duke,”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>say</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“For Athole’s duke she me forsook;”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>which I take to be the original reading.</p> + +<p>These were composed by the late Dr. Austin, physician at +Edinburgh.—He had courted a lady, to whom he was shortly to have been +married; but the Duke of Athole having seen her, became so much in +love with her, that he made proposals of marriage, which were accepted +of, and she jilted the doctor.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>HERE’S A HEALTH TO MY TRUE LOVE, &c.</h3> + +<p>This song is Dr. Blacklock’s. He told me that tradition gives the air +to our James IV. of Scotland.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>HEY TUTTI TAITI.</h3> + +<p>I Have met the tradition universally over Scotland, and particularly +about Stirling, in the neighbourhood of the scene, that this air was +Robert Bruce’s march at the battle of Bannockburn.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>RAVING WINDS AROUND HER BLOWING.</h3> + +<p>I Composed these verses on Miss Isabella M’Leod, of Raza, alluding to +her feelings on the death of her sister, and the still more melancholy +death of her sister’s husband, the late Earl of Loudon; who shot +himself out of sheer heart-break at some mortifications he suffered, +owing to the deranged state of his finances.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>TAK YOUR AULD CLOAK ABOUT YE.</h3> + +<p>A part of this old song, according to the English set of it, is quoted +in Shakspeare.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>YE GODS, WAS STREPHON’S PICTURE BLEST?</h3> + +<p class="std1">Tune—“Fourteenth of October.”</p> + +<p>The title of this air shows that it alludes to the famous king +Crispian, the patron of the honourable corporation of shoemakers.—St. +Crispian’s day falls on the fourteenth of October old style, as the +old proverb tells:</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“On the fourteenth of October<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Was ne’er a sutor sober.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_513" id="Page_513">[513]</a></span></p> + + + + +<h3>SINCE ROBB’D OF ALL THAT CHARM’D MY VIEWS.</h3> + +<p>The old name of this air is, “the Blossom o’ the Raspberry.” The song +is Dr. Blacklock’s.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>YOUNG DAMON.</h3> + +<p>This air is by Oswald.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>KIRK WAD LET ME BE.</h3> + +<p>Tradition in the western parts of Scotland tells that this old song, +of which there are still three stanzas extant, once saved a +covenanting clergyman out of a scrape. It was a little prior to the +revolution, a period when being a Scots covenanter was being a felon, +that one of their clergy, who was at that very time hunted by the +merciless soldiery, fell in, by accident, with a party of the +military. The soldiers were not exactly acquainted with the person of +the reverend gentleman of whom they were in search; but from +suspicious circumstances, they fancied that they had got one of that +cloth and opprobrious persuasion among them in the person of this +stranger. “Mass John” to extricate himself, assumed a freedom of +manners, very unlike the gloomy strictness of his sect; and among +other convivial exhibitions, sung (and some traditions say, composed +on the spur of the occasion) “Kirk wad let me be,” with such effect, +that the soldiers swore he was a d——d honest fellow, and that it +was impossible <i>he</i> could belong to those hellish conventicles; and so +gave him his liberty.</p> + +<p>The first stanza of this song, a little altered, is a favourite kind +of dramatic interlude acted at country weddings, in the south-west +parts of the kingdom. A young fellow is dressed up like an old beggar; +a peruke, commonly made of carded tow, represents hoary locks; an old +bonnet; a ragged plaid, or surtout, bound with a straw rope for a +girdle; a pair of old shoes, with straw ropes twisted round his +ankles, as is done by shepherds in snowy weather: his face they +disguise as like wretched old age as they can: in this plight he is +brought into the wedding-house, frequently to the astonishment of +strangers, who are not in the secret, and begins to sing—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“O, I am a silly auld man,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My name it is auld Glenae,” &c.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>He is asked to drink, and by and bye to dance, which after some +uncouth excuses he is prevailed on to do, the fiddler playing the +tune, which here is commonly called “Auld Glenae;” in short he is all +the time so plied with liquor that he is understood to get +intoxicated, and with all the ridiculous gesticulations of an old +drunken beggar, he dances and staggers until he falls on the floor; +yet still in all his riot, nay, in his rolling and tumbling on the +floor, with some or other drunken motion of his body, he beats time to +the music, till at last he is supposed to be carried out dead drunk.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>MUSING ON THE ROARING OCEAN.</h3> + +<p>I composed these verses out of compliment to a Mrs. M’Lachlan, whose +husband is an officer in the East Indies.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>BLYTHE WAS SHE.</h3> + +<p>I composed these verses while I stayed at Ochtertyre with Sir William +Murray.—The lady, who was also at Ochtertyre at the same time, was +the well-known toast, Miss Euphemia Murray, of Lentrose; she was +called, and very justly, “The Flower of Strathmore.”</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>JOHNNIE FAA, OR THE GYPSIE LADDIE.</h3> + +<p>The people in Ayrshire begin this song—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“The gypsies cam to my Lord Cassilis’ yett.”—<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>They have a great many more stanzas in this song than I ever yet saw +in any printed copy.—The castle is still remaining at Maybole, where +his lordship shut up his wayward spouse, and kept her for life.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>TO DAUNTON ME.</h3> + +<p>The two following old stanzas to this tune have some merit:</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“To daunton me, to daunton me,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O ken ye what it is that’ll daunton me?—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">There’s eighty-eight and eighty-nine,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And a’ that I hae borne sinsyne,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">There’s cess and press and Presbytrie,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I think it will do meikle for to daunton me.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But to wanton me, to wanton me,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O ken ye what it is that wad wanton me—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To see gude corn upon the rigs,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And banishment amang the Whigs,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And right restor’d where right sud be,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I think it would do meikle for to wanton me.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_514" id="Page_514">[514]</a></span></p> + + + + +<h3>THE BONNIE LASS MADE THE BED TO ME.</h3> + +<p>“The Bonnie Lass made the Bed to me,” was composed on an amour of +Charles II. when skulking in the North, about Aberdeen, in the time of +the usurpation. He formed <i>une petite affaire</i> with a daughter of the +house of Portletham, who was the “lass that made the bed to him:”—two +verses of it are,</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“I kiss’d her lips sae rosy red,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">While the tear stood blinkin in her e’e;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I said, My lassie, dinna cry,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For ye ay shall make the bed to me.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">She took her mither’s holland sheets,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And made them a’ in sarks to me;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Blythe and merry may she be,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The lass that made the bed to me.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>ABSENCE.</h3> + +<p>A song in the manner of Shenstone.</p> + +<p>This song and air are both by Dr. Blacklock.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>I HAD A HORSE AND I HAD NAE MAIR.</h3> + +<p>This story is founded on fact. A John Hunter, ancestor to a very +respectable farming family, who live in a place in the parish, I +think, of Galston, called Bar-mill, was the luckless hero that “had a +horse and had nae mair.”—For some little youthful follies he found it +necessary to make a retreat to the West-Highlands, where “he feed +himself to a <i>Highland</i> Laird,” for that is the expression of all the +oral editions of the song I ever heard.—The present Mr. Hunter, who +told me the anecdote, is the great-grandchild of our hero.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>UP AND WARN A’ WILLIE.</h3> + +<p>This edition of the song I got from Tom Niel, of facetious fame, in +Edinburgh. The expression “Up and warn a’ Willie,” alludes to the +Crantara, or warning of a Highland clan to arms. Not understanding +this, the Lowlanders in the west and south say, “Up and <i>waur</i> them +a’,” &c.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>A ROSE-BUD BY MY EARLY WALK.</h3> + +<p>This song I composed on Miss Jenny Cruikshank, only child of my worthy +friend Mr. William Cruikshank, of the High-School, Edinburgh. This air +is by a David Sillar, quondam merchant, and now schoolmaster in +Irvine. He is the <i>Davie</i> to whom I address my printed poetical +epistle in the measure of the Cherry and the Slae.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>AULD ROB MORRIS.</h3> + +<p>It is remark-worthy that the song of “Holy and Fairly,” in all the old +editions of it, is called “The Drunken Wife o’ Galloway,” which +localizes it to that country.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>RATTLIN, ROARIN WILLIE.</h3> + +<p>The last stanza of this song is mine; it was composed out of +compliment to one of the worthiest fellows in the world, William +Dunbar, Esq., writer to the signet, Edinburgh, and Colonel of the +Crochallan Corps, a club of wits who took that title at the time of +raising the fencible regiments.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>WHERE BRAVING ANGRY WINTER STORMS.</h3> + +<p>This song I composed on one of the most accomplished of women, Miss +Peggy Chalmers, that was, now Mrs. Lewis Hay, of Forbes and Co.’s +bank, Edinburgh.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>TIBBIE, I HAE SEEN THE DAY.</h3> + +<p>This song I composed about the age of seventeen.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>NANCY’S GHOST.</h3> + +<p>This song is by Dr. Blacklock.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>TUNE YOUR FIDDLES, ETC.</h3> + +<p>This song was composed by the Rev. John Skinner, nonjuror clergyman at +Linshart, near Peterhead. He is likewise author of “Tullochgorum,” +“Ewie wi’ the crooked Horn,” “John o’ Badenyond,” &c., and what is of +still more consequence, he is one of the worthiest of mankind. He is +the author of an ecclesiastical history of Scotland. The air is by Mr. +Marshall, butler to the Duke of Gordon; the first composer of +strathspeys of the age. I have been told by somebody, who had it of +Marshall himself, that he took the idea of his three most celebrated +pieces, “The Marquis of Huntley’s<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_515" id="Page_515">[515]</a></span> Reel,” his “Farewell,” and “Miss +Admiral Gordon’s Reel,” from the old air, “The German Lairdie.”</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>GILL MORICE.</h3> + +<p>This plaintive ballad ought to have been called Child Maurice, and not +Gil Maurice. In its present dress, it has gained immortal honour from +Mr. Home’s taking from it the ground-work of his fine tragedy of +Douglas. But I am of opinion that the present ballad is a modern +composition; perhaps not much above the age of the middle of the last +century; at least I should be glad to see or hear of a copy of the +present words prior to 1650. That it was taken from an old ballad, +called “Child Maurice,” now lost, I am inclined to believe; but the +present one may be classed with “Hardyknute,” “Kenneth,” “Duncan, the +Laird of Woodhouselie,” “Lord Livingston,” “Binnorie,” “The Death of +Monteith,” and many other modern productions, which have been +swallowed by many readers as ancient fragments of old poems. This +beautiful plaintive tune was composed by Mr. M’Gibbon, the selector of +a collection of Scots tunes. R. B.</p> + +<p>In addition to the observations on Gil Morice, I add, that of the +songs which Captain Riddel mentions, “Kenneth” and “Duncan” are +juvenile compositions of Mr. M’Kenzie, “The Man of +Feeling.”—M’Kenzie’s father showed them in MS. to Dr. Blacklock, as +the productions of his son, from which the Doctor rightly +prognosticated that the young poet would make, in his more advanced +years, a respectable figure in the world of letters.</p> + +<p>This I had from Blacklock.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>TIBBIE DUNBAR.</h3> + +<p>This tune is said to be the composition of John M’Gill, fiddler, in +Girvan. He called it after his own name.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>WHEN I UPON THY BOSOM LEAN.</h3> + +<p>This song was the work of a very worthy facetious old fellow, John +Lapraik, late of Dalfram, near Muirkirk; which little property he was +obliged to sell in consequence of some connexion as security for some +persons concerned in that villanous bubble <span class="smcap">the ayr bank</span>. He +has often told me that he composed this song one day when his wife had +been fretting o’er their misfortunes.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>MY HARRY WAS A GALLANT GAY.</h3> + +<p class="std1">Tune—“Highlander’s Lament.”</p> + +<p>The oldest title I ever heard to this air, was, “The Highland Watch’s +Farewell to Ireland.” The chorus I picked up from an old woman in +Dumblane; the rest of the song is mine.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>THE HIGHLAND CHARACTER.</h3> + +<p>This tune was the composition of Gen. Reid, and called by him “The +Highland, or 42d Regiment’s March.” The words are by Sir Harry +Erskine.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>LEADER-HAUGHS AND YARROW.</h3> + +<p>There is in several collections, the old song of “Leader-Haughs and +Yarrow.” It seems to have been the work of one of our itinerant +minstrels, as he calls himself, at the conclusion of his song, +“Minstrel Burn.”</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>THE TAILOR FELL THRO’ THE BED, THIMBLE AN’ A’.</h3> + +<p>This air is the march of the corporation of tailors. The second and +fourth stanzas are mine.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>BEWARE O’ BONNIE ANN.</h3> + +<p>I composed this song out of compliment to Miss Ann Masterton, the +daughter of my friend Allan Masterton, the author of the air of +Strathallan’s Lament, and two or three others in this work.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>THIS IS NO MINE AIN HOUSE.</h3> + +<p>The first half stanza is old, the rest is Ramsay’s. The old words +are—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“This is no mine ain house,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My ain house, my ain house;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">This is no mine ain house,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I ken by the biggin o’t.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Bread and cheese are my door-cheeks,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My door-cheeks, my door-cheeks;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Bread and cheese are my door-cheeks,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And pancakes the riggin o’t.<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_516" id="Page_516">[516]</a></span></div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">This is no my ain wean;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My ain wean, my ain wean;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">This is no my ain wean,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I ken by the greetie o’t.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I’ll tak the curchie aff my head,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Aff my head, aff my head;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I’ll tak the curchie aff my head,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And row’t about the feetie o’t.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>The tune is an old Highland air, called “Shuan truish willighan.”</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>LADDIE, LIE NEAR ME.</h3> + +<p>This song is by Blacklock.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>THE GARDENER AND HIS PAIDLE.</h3> + +<p>This air is the “Gardener’s March.” The title of the song only is old; +the rest is mine.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>THE DAY RETURNS, MY BOSOM BURNS.</h3> +<p class="std1">Tune.—“Seventh of November.”</p> + +<p>I composed this song out of compliment to one of the happiest and +worthiest married couples in the world, Robert Riddel, Esq., of +Glenriddel, and his lady. At their fire-side I have enjoyed more +pleasant evenings than at all the houses of fashionable people in this +country put together; and to their kindness and hospitality I am +indebted for many of the happiest hours of my life.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>THE GABERLUNZIE MAN.</h3> + +<p>The “Gaberlunzie Man” is supposed to commemorate an intrigue of James +the Fifth. Mr. Callander, of Craigforth, published some years ago an +edition of “Christ’s Kirk on the Green,” and the “Gaberlunzie Man,” +with notes critical and historical. James the Fifth is said to have +been fond of Gosford, in Aberlady parish, and that it was suspected by +his contemporaries, that in his frequent excursions to that part of +the country, he had other purposes in view besides golfing and +archery. Three favourite ladies, Sandilands, Weir, and Oliphant (one +of them resided at Gosford, and the others in the neighbourhood), were +occasionally visited by their royal and gallant admirer, which gave +rise to the following advice to his majesty, from Sir David Lindsay, +of the Mount, Lord Lyon.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Sow not your seed on Sandylands,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">spend not your strength in Weir,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And ride not on an Elephant,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For gawing o’ your gear.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>MY BONNIE MARY.</h3> + +<p>This air is Oswald’s; the first half stanza of the song is old, the +rest mine.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>THE BLACK EAGLE.</h3> + +<p>This song is by Dr. Fordyce, whose merits as a prose writer are well +known.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>JAMIE, COME TRY ME.</h3> + +<p>This air is Oswald’s; the song mine.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>THE LAZY MIST.</h3> + + +<p>This song is mine.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>JOHNIE COPE.</h3> + +<p>This satirical song was composed to commemorate General Cope’s defeat +at Preston Pans, in 1745, when he marched against the Clans.</p> + +<p>The air was the tune of an old song, of which I have heard some +verses, but now only remember the title, which was,</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Will ye go the coals in the morning.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>I LOVE MY JEAN.</h3> + +<p>This air is by Marshall; the song I composed out of compliment to Mrs. +Burns.</p> + +<p>N.B. It was during the honeymoon.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>CEASE, CEASE, MY DEAR FRIEND, TO EXPLORE.</h3> + +<p>The song is by Dr. Blacklock; I believe, but am not quite certain, +that the air is his too.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>AULD ROBIN GRAY.</h3> + +<p>This air was formerly called, “The bridegroom greets when the sun +gangs down.” The words are by Lady Ann Lindsay, of the Balcarras +family.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_517" id="Page_517">[517]</a></span></p> + + + + +<h3>DONALD AND FLORA.</h3> + +<p>This is one of those fine Gaelic tunes, preserved from time immemorial +in the Hebrides; they seem to be the ground-work of many of our finest +Scots pastoral tunes. The words of this song were written to +commemorate the unfortunate expedition of General Burgoyne in America, +in 1777.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>O WERE I ON PARNASSUS’ HILL.</h3> + +<p>This air is Oswald’s; the song I made out of compliment to Mrs. Burns.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>THE CAPTIVE ROBIN.</h3> + +<p>This air is called “Robie donna Gorach.”</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>THERE’S A YOUTH IN THIS CITY.</h3> + +<p>This air is claimed by Neil Gow, who calls it his lament for his +brother. The first half-stanza of the song is old; the rest mine.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>MY HEART’S IN THE HIGHLANDS.</h3> + +<p>The first half-stanza of this song is old; the rest is mine.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>CA’ THE EWES AND THE KNOWES.</h3> + +<p>This beautiful song is in true old Scotch taste, yet I do not know +that either air or words were in print before.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>THE BRIDAL O’T.</h3> + +<p>This song is the work of a Mr. Alexander Ross, late schoolmaster at +Lochlee; and author of a beautiful Scots poem, called “The Fortunate +Shepherdess.”</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“They say that Jockey ‘ll speed weel o’t,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">They say that Jockey ‘ll speed weel o’t,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For he grows brawer ilka day,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I hope we’ll hae a bridal o’t:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For yesternight nae farder gane,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The backhouse at the side wa’ o’t,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He there wi’ Meg was mirden seen,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I hope we’ll hae a bridal o’t.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">An’ we had but a bridal o’t,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’ we had but a bridal o’t,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">We’d leave the rest unto gude luck,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Altho’ there should betide ill o’t:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For bridal days are merry times,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And young folks like the coming o’t,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And scribblers they bang up their rhymes,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And pipers they the bumming o’t.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The lasses like a bridal o’t,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The lasses like a bridal o’t,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Their braws maun be in rank and file,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Altho’ that they should guide ill o’t:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The boddom o’ the kist is then<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Turn’d up into the inmost o’t,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The end that held the kecks sae clean,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Is now become the teemest o’t.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The bangster at the threshing o’t.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The bangster at the threshing o’t,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Afore it comes is fidgin-fain,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And ilka day’s a clashing o’t:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He’ll sell his jerkin for a groat,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">His linder for anither o’t,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And e’er he want to clear his shot,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">His sark’ll pay the tither o’t<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The pipers and the fiddlers o’t,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The pipers and the fiddlers o’t,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Can smell a bridal unco’ far,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And like to be the middlers o’t;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Fan<a name="FNanchor_293_293" id="FNanchor_293_293"></a><a href="#Footnote_293_293" class="fnanchor">[293]</a> thick and threefold they convene,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Ilk ane envies the tither o’t,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And wishes nane but him alane<br /></span> +<span class="i2">May ever see anither o’t.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Fan they hae done wi’ eating o’t,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Fan they hae done wi’ eating o’t,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For dancing they gae to the green,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And aiblins to the beating o’t:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He dances best that dances fast,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And loups at ilka reesing o’t,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And claps his hands frae hough to hough,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And furls about the feezings o’t.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>TODLEN HAME.</h3> + +<p>This is perhaps the first bottle song that ever was composed.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>THE BRAES O’ BALLOCHMYLE.</h3> + +<p>This air is the composition of my friend Allan Masterton, in +Edinburgh. I composed the verses on the amiable and excellent family +of Whitefoords leaving Ballochmyle, when Sir John’s misfortunes had +obliged him to sell the estate.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>THE RANTIN’ DOG, THE DADDIE O’T.</h3> + +<p>I composed this song pretty early in life, and sent it to a young +girl, a very particular acquaintance of mine, who was at that time +under a cloud.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_518" id="Page_518">[518]</a></span></p> +<h3>THE SHEPHERD’S PREFERENCE.</h3> + +<p>This song is Dr. Blacklock’s.—I don’t know how it came by the name, +but the oldest appellation of the air was, “Whistle and I’ll come to +you, my lad.”</p> + +<p>It has little affinity to the tune commonly known by that name.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>THE BONIE BANKS OF AYR.</h3> + +<p>I composed this song as I conveyed my chest so far on the road to +Greenock, where I was to embark in a few days for Jamaica.</p> + +<p>I meant it as my farewell dirge to my native land.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>JOHN O’ BADENYON.</h3> + +<p>This excellent song is the composition of my worthy friend, old +Skinner, at Linshart.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“When first I cam to be a man<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Of twenty years or so,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I thought myself a handsome youth,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And fain the world would know;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In best attire I stept abroad,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">With spirits brisk and gay,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And here and there and everywhere,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Was like a morn in May;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">No care had I nor fear of want,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But rambled up and down,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And for a beau I might have pass’d<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In country or in town;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I still was pleas’d where’er I went,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And when I was alone,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I tun’d my pipe and pleas’d myself<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Wi’ John o’ Badenyon.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Now in the days of youthful prime<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A mistress I must find,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For <i>love</i>, I heard, gave one an air<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And ev’n improved the mind:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">On Phillis fair above the rest<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Kind fortune fixt my eyes,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Her piercing beauty struck my heart,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And she became my choice;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To Cupid now with hearty prayer<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I offer’d many a vow;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And danc’d, and sung, and sigh’d, and swore,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">As other lovers do;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But, when at last I breath’d my flame,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I found her cold as stone;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I left the jilt, and tun’d my pipe<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To John o’ Badenyon.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">When <i>love</i> had thus my heart beguil’d<br /></span> +<span class="i2">With foolish hopes and vain,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To <i>friendship’s</i> port I steer’d my course,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And laugh’d at lover’s pain<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A friend I got by lucky chance<br /></span> +<span class="i2">’Twas something like divine,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An honest friend’s a precious gift,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And such a gift was mine:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And now, whatever might betide,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A happy man was I,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In any strait I knew to whom<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I freely might apply;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A strait soon came: my friend I try’d;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">He heard, and spurn’d my moan;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I hy’d me home, and tun’d my pipe<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To John o’ Badenyon.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Methought I should be wiser next,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And would a <i>patriot</i> turn,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Began to doat on Johnny Wilks,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And cry up Parson Horne.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Their manly spirit I admir’d,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And prais’d their noble zeal,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Who had with flaming tongue and pen<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Maintain’d the public weal;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But e’er a month or two had past,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I found myself betray’d,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">’Twas <i>self</i> and <i>party</i> after all,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For a’ the stir they made;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">At last I saw the factious knaves<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Insult the very throne,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I curs’d them a’, and tun’d my pipe<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To John o’ Badenyon.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>A WAUKRIFE MINNIE.</h3> + +<p>I picked up this old song and tune from a country girl in +Nithsdale.—I never met with it elsewhere in Scotland.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Whare are you gaun, my bonie lass,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Whare are you gaun, my hinnie,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">She answer’d me right saucilie,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An errand for my minnie.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O whare live ye, my bonnie lass,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">O whare live ye, my hinnie,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">By yon burn-side, gin ye maun ken,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In a wee house wi’ my minnie.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But I foor up the glen at e’en,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To see my bonie lassie;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And lang before the gray morn cam,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">She was na hauf sa sacie.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O weary fa’ the waukrife cock,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And the foumart lay his crawin!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He wauken’d the auld wife frae her sleep,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A wee blink or the dawin.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">An angry wife I wat she raise,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And o’er the bed she brought her;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And wi’ a mickle hazle rung<br /></span> +<span class="i2">She made her a weel pay’d dochter.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O fare thee weel, my bonie lass!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">O fare thee weel, my hinnie!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thou art a gay and a bonie lass,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But thou hast a waukrife minnie.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>TULLOCHGORUM.</h3> + +<p>This first of songs, is the master-piece of my old friend Skinner. He +was passing the day,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_519" id="Page_519">[519]</a></span> at the town of Cullen, I think it was, in a +friend’s house whose name was Montgomery. Mrs. Montgomery observing, +<i>en passant</i>, that the beautiful reel of Tullochgorum wanted words, +she begged them of Mr. Skinner, who gratified her wishes, and the +wishes of every Scottish song, in this most excellent ballad.</p> + +<p>These particulars I had from the author’s son, Bishop Skinner, at +Aberdeen.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>FOR A’ THAT AND A’ THAT.</h3> + +<p>This song is mine, all except the chorus.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>AULD LANG SYNE.</h3> + +<p>Ramsay here, as usual with him, has taken the idea of the song, and +the first line, from the old fragment which may be seen in the +“Museum,” vol. v.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>WILLIE BREW’D A PECK O’ MAUT.</h3> + +<p>This air is Masterton’s; the song mine.—The occasion of it was +this:—Mr. W. Nicol, of the High-School, Edinburgh, during the autumn +vacation being at Moffat, honest Allan, who was at that time on a +visit to Dalswinton, and I, went to pay Nicol a visit.—We had such a +joyous meeting that Mr. Masterton and I agreed, each in our own way, +that we should celebrate the business.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>KILLIECRANKIE.</h3> + +<p>The battle of Killiecrankie was the last stand made by the clans for +James, after his abdication. Here the gallant Lord Dundee fell in the +moment of victory, and with him fell the hopes of the party. General +Mackay, when he found the Highlanders did not pursue his flying army, +said, “Dundee must be killed, or he never would have overlooked this +advantage.” A great stone marks the spot where Dundee fell.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>THE EWIE WI’ THE CROOKED HORN.</h3> + +<p>Another excellent song of old Skinner’s.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>CRAIGIE-BURN WOOD.</h3> + +<p>It is remarkable of this air that it is the confine of that country +where the greatest part of our Lowland music (so far as from the +title, words, &c., we can localize it) has been composed. From +Craigie-burn, near Moffat, until one reaches the West Highlands, we +have scarcely one slow air of any antiquity.</p> + +<p>The song was composed on a passion which a Mr. Gillespie, a particular +friend of mine, had for a Miss Lorimer, afterwards a Mrs. Whelpdale. +This young lady was born at Craigie-burn Wood.—The chorus is part of +an old foolish ballad.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>FRAE THE FRIENDS AND LAND I LOVE.</h3> + +<p>I added the four last lines, by way of giving a turn to the theme of +the poem, such as it is.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>HUGHIE GRAHAM</h3> + +<p>There are several editions of this ballad.—This, here inserted, is +from oral tradition in Ayrshire, where, when I was a boy, it was a +popular song.—It originally had a simple old tune, which I have +forgotten.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Our lords are to the mountains gane,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A hunting o’ the fallow deer,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And they have gripet Hughie Graham,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For stealing o’ the bishop’s mare.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">And they have tied him hand and foot,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And led him up, thro’ Stirling town;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The lads and lasses met him there,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Cried, Hughie Graham, thou art a loun.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O lowse my right hand free, he says,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And put my braid sword in the same;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He’s no in Stirling town this day,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Dare tell the tale to Hughie Graham.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Up then bespake the brave Whitefoord,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">As he sat by the bishop’s knee,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Five hundred white stots I’ll gie you,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">If ye’ll let Hughie Graham gae free.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O haud your tongue, the bishop says,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And wi’ your pleading let me be;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For tho’ ten Grahams were in his coat,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Hughie Graham this day shall die.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Up then bespake the fair Whitefoord,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">As she sat by the bishop’s knee;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Five hundred white pence I’ll gie you,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">If ye’ll gie Hughie Graham to me.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O haud your tongue now, lady fair,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And wi’ your pleading let it be;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Altho’ ten Grahams were in his coat,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">It’s for my honour he maun die.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">They’ve ta’en him to the gallows knowe,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">He looked to the gallows tree,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yet never colour left his cheek,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Nor ever did he blink his e’e<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_520" id="Page_520">[520]</a></span></div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">At length he looked around about,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To see whatever he could spy:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And there he saw his auld father,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And he was weeping bitterly.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O haud your tongue, my father dear,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And wi’ your weeping let it be;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thy weeping’s sairer on my heart,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Than a’ that they can do to me.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">And ye may gie my brother John<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My sword that’s bent in the middle clear;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And let him come at twelve o’clock,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And see me pay the bishop’s mare.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">And ye may gie my brother James<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My sword that’s bent in the middle brown;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And bid him come at four o’clock,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And see his brother Hugh cut down.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Remember me to Maggy my wife,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The neist time ye gang o’er the moor,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Tell her she staw the bishop’s mare,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Tell her she was the bishop’s whore.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">And ye may tell my kith and kin,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I never did disgrace their blood;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And when they meet the bishop’s cloak,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To mak it shorter by the hood.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>A SOUTHLAND JENNY.</h3> + +<p>This is a popular Ayrshire song, though the notes were never taken +down before. It, as well as many of the ballad tunes in this +collection, was written from Mrs. Burns’s voice.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>MY TOCHER’S THE JEWEL.</h3> + +<p>This tune is claimed by Nathaniel Gow.—It is notoriously taken from +“The muckin o’ Gordie’s byre.”—It is also to be found long prior to +Nathaniel Gow’s era, in Aird’s Selection of Airs and Marches, the +first edition under the name of “The Highway to Edinburgh.”</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>THEN, GUID WIFE, COUNT THE LAWIN’.</h3> + +<p>The chorus of this is part of an old song, no stanza of which I +recollect.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>THERE’LL NEVER BE PEACE TILL JAMIE COMES HAME.</h3> + +<p>This tune is sometimes called “There’s few gude fellows when Willie’s +awa.”—But I never have been able to meet with anything else of the +song than the title.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>I DO CONFESS THOU ART SAE FAIR.</h3> + +<p>This song is altered from a poem by Sir Robert Ayton, private +secretary to Mary and Ann, Queens of Scotland.—The poem is to be +found in James Watson’s Collection of Scots Poems, the earliest +collection printed in Scotland. I think that I have improved the +simplicity of the sentiments, by giving them a Scots dress.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>THE SODGER LADDIE.</h3> + +<p>The first verse of this is old; the rest is by Ramsay. The tune seems +to be the same with a slow air, called “Jackey Hume’s Lament”—or, +“The Hollin Buss”—or “Ken ye what Meg o’ the Mill has gotten?”</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>WHERE WAD BONNIE ANNIE LIE.</h3> + +<p>The old name of this tune is,—</p> + +<p class="blockquot">“Whare’ll our gudeman lie.”</p> + +<p>A silly old stanza of it runs thus—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“O whare’ll our gudeman lie,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Gudeman lie, gudeman lie,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O whare’ll our gudeman lie,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Till he shute o’er the simmer?<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Up amang the hen-bawks,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The hen-bawks, the hen-bawks,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Up amang the hen-bawks,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Amang the rotten timmer.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>GALLOWAY TAM.</h3> + +<p>I have seen an interlude (acted at a wedding) to this tune, called +“The Wooing of the Maiden.” These entertainments are now much worn out +in this part of Scotland. Two are still retained in Nithsdale, viz. +“Silly Pure Auld Glenae,” and this one, “The Wooing of the Maiden.”</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>AS I CAM DOWN BY YON CASTLE WA.</h3> + +<p>This is a very popular Ayrshire song.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>LORD RONALD MY SON.</h3> + +<p>This air, a very favourite one in Ayrshire, is evidently the original +of Lochaber. In this manner most of our finest more modern airs have +had their origin. Some early minstrel, or musical shepherd, composed +the simple, artless original air; which being picked up by the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_521" id="Page_521">[521]</a></span> more +learned musician, took the improved form it bears.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>O’ER THE MOOR AMANG THE HEATHER.</h3> + +<p>This song is the composition of a Jean Glover, a girl who was not only +a whore, but also a thief; and in one or other character has visited +most of the Correction Houses in the West. She was born I believe in +Kilmarnock,—I took the song down from her singing, as she was +strolling through the country, with a sleight-of-hand blackguard.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>TO THE ROSE-BUD.</h3> + +<p>This song is the composition of a —— Johnson, a joiner in the +neighbourhood of Belfast. The tune is by Oswald, altered, evidently, +from “Jockie’s Gray Breeks.”</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>YON WILD MOSSY MOUNTAINS.</h3> + +<p>This tune is by Oswald. The song alludes to a part of my private +history, which it is of no consequence to the world to know.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>IT IS NA, JEAN, THY BONNIE FACE.</h3> + +<p>These were originally English verses:—I gave them the Scots dress.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>EPPIE M’NAB.</h3> + +<p>The old song with this title has more wit than decency.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>WHA IS THAT AT MY BOWER DOOR.</h3> + +<p>This tune is also known by the name of “Lass an I come near thee.” The +words are mine.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>THOU ART GANE AWA.</h3> + +<p>This time is the same with “Haud awa frae me, Donald.”</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>THE TEARS I SHED MUST EVER FALL.</h3> + +<p>This song of genius was composed by a Miss Cranston. It wanted four +lines, to make all the stanzas suit the music, which I added, and are +the four first of the last stanza.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“No cold approach, no alter’d mien,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Just what would make suspicion start;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">No pause the dire extremes between,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">He made me blest—and broke my heart!”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>THE BONIE WEE THING.</h3> + +<p>Composed on my little idol “the charming, lovely Davies.”</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>THE TITHER MORN.</h3> + +<p>This tune is originally from the Highlands. I have heard a Gaelic song +to it, which I was told was very clever, but not by any means a lady’s +song.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>A MOTHER’S LAMENT FOR THE DEATH OF HER SON.</h3> + +<p>This most beautiful tune is, I think, the happiest composition of that +bard-born genius, John Riddel, of the family of Glencarnock, at Ayr. +The words were composed to commemorate the much-lamented and premature +death of James Ferguson, Esq., jun. of Craigdarroch.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>DAINTIE DAVIE.</h3> + +<p>This song, tradition says, and the composition itself confirms it, was +composed on the Rev. David Williamson’s begetting the daughter of Lady +Cherrytrees with child, while a party of dragoons were searching her +house to apprehend him for being an adherent to the solemn league and +covenant. The pious woman had put a lady’s night-cap on him, and had +laid him a-bed with her own daughter, and passed him to the soldiery +as a lady, her daughter’s bed-fellow. A mutilated stanza or two are to +be found in Herd’s collection, but the original song consists of five +or six stanzas, and were their <i>delicacy</i> equal to their <i>wit</i> and +<i>humour</i>, they would merit a place in any collection. The first stanza +is</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Being pursued by the dragoons,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Within my bed he was laid down;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And weel I wat he was worth his room,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For he was my Daintie Davie.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>Ramsay’s song, “Luckie Nansy,” though he calls it an old song with +additions, seems to be all his own except the chorus:</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“I was a telling you,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Luckie Nansy, Luckie Nansy<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_522" id="Page_522">[522]</a></span><span class="i0">Auld springs wad ding the new,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But ye wad never trow me.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>Which I should conjecture to be part of a song prior to the affair of +Williamson.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + + +<h3>BOB O’ DUMBLANE.</h3> + +<p><span class="smcap">Ramsay</span>, as usual, has modernized this song. The original, +which I learned on the spot, from my old hostess in the principal inn +there, is—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Lassie, lend me your braw hemp heckle,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And I’ll lend you my thripplin-kame;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My heckle is broken, it canna be gotten,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And we’ll gae dance the bob o’ Dumblane.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Twa gaed to the wood, to the wood, to the wood.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Twa gaed to the wood—three came hame;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An’ it be na weel bobbit, weel bobbit, weel bobbit<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An’ it be na weel bobbit, we’ll bob it again.”<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>I insert this song to introduce the following anecdote, which I have +heard well authenticated. In the evening of the day of the battle of +Dumblane, (Sheriff Muir,) when the action was over, a Scots officer in +Argyll’s army, observed to His Grace, that he was afraid the rebels +would give out to the world that <i>they</i> had gotten the +victory.—“Weel, weel,” returned his Grace, alluding to the foregoing +ballad, “if they think it be nae weel bobbit, we’ll bob it again.”</p> + + + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_293_293" id="Footnote_293_293"></a><a href="#FNanchor_293_293"><span class="label">[293]</span></a> <i>Fan</i>, when—the dialect of Angus.</p></div> +</div> + + + +<h2><a name="THE_BORDER_TOUR" id="THE_BORDER_TOUR"></a>THE BORDER TOUR.</h2> + + +<p>Left Edinburgh (May 6, 1787)—Lammermuir-hills miserably dreary, but +at times very picturesque. Lanton-edge, a glorious view of the +Merse—Reach Berrywell—old Mr. Ainslie an uncommon character;—his +hobbies, agriculture, natural philosophy, and politics.—In the first +he is unexceptionably the clearest-headed, best-informed man I ever +met with; in the other two, very intelligent:—As a man of business he +has uncommon merit, and by fairly deserving it has made a very decent +independence. Mrs. Ainslie, an excellent, sensible, cheerful, amiable +old woman—Miss Ainslie—her person a little <i>embonpoint</i>, but +handsome; her face, particularly her eyes, full of sweetness and good +humour—she unites three qualities rarely to be found together; keen, +solid penetration; sly, witty observation and remark; and the +gentlest, most unaffected female modesty—Douglas, a clever, fine, +promising young fellow.—The family-meeting with their brother; my +<i>compagnon de voyage</i>, very charming; particularly the sister. The +whole family remarkably attached to their menials—Mrs. A. full of +stories of the sagacity and sense of the little girl in the +kitchen.—Mr. A. high in the praises of an African, his +house-servant—all his people old in his service—Douglas’s old nurse +came to Berrywell yesterday to remind them of its being his birthday.</p> + +<p>A Mr. Dudgeon, a poet at times,<a name="FNanchor_294_294" id="FNanchor_294_294"></a><a href="#Footnote_294_294" class="fnanchor">[294]</a> a worthy remarkable +character—natural penetration, a great deal of information, some +genius, and extreme modesty.</p> + +<p><i>Sunday.</i>—Went to church at Dunse<a name="FNanchor_295_295" id="FNanchor_295_295"></a><a href="#Footnote_295_295" class="fnanchor">[295]</a>—Dr. Howmaker a man of strong +lungs and pretty judicious remark; but ill skilled in propriety, and +altogether unconscious of his want of it.</p> + +<p><i>Monday.</i>—Coldstream—went over to England—Cornhill—glorious river +Tweed—clear and majestic—fine bridge. Dine at Coldstream with <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_523" id="Page_523">[523]</a></span>Mr. Ainslie and Mr. Foreman—beat Mr. F—— in a dispute about +Voltaire. Tea at Lenel House with Mr. Brydone—Mr. Brydone a most +excellent heart, kind, joyous, and benevolent; but a good deal of the +French indiscriminate complaisance—from his situation past and +present, an admirer of everything that bears a splendid title, or that +possesses a large estate—Mrs. Brydone a most elegant woman in her +person and manners; the tones of her voice remarkably sweet—my +reception extremely flattering—sleep at Coldstream.</p> + +<p><i>Tuesday.</i>—Breakfast at Kelso—charming situation of Kelso—fine +bridge over the Tweed—enchanting views and prospects on both sides of +the river, particularly the Scotch side; introduced to Mr. Scott of +the Royal Bank—an excellent, modest fellow—fine situation of +it—ruins of Roxburgh Castle—a holly-bush, growing where James II. of +Scotland was accidentally killed by the bursting of a cannon. A small +old religious ruin, and a fine old garden planted by the religious, +rooted out and destroyed by an English hottentot, a <i>maitre d’hotel</i> +of the duke’s, a Mr. Cole—climate and soil of Berwickshire, and even +Roxburghshire, superior to Ayrshire—bad roads. Turnip and sheep +husbandry, their great improvements—Mr. M’Dowal, at Caverton Mill, a +friend of Mr. Ainslie’s, with whom I dined to-day, sold his sheep, ewe +and lamb together, at two guineas a piece—wash their sheep before +shearing—seven or eight pounds of washen wool in a fleece—low +markets, consequently low rents—fine lands not above sixteen +shillings a Scotch acre—magnificence of farmers and farm-houses—come +up Teviot and up Jed to Jedburgh to lie, and so wish myself a good +night.</p> + +<p><i>Wednesday.</i>—Breakfast with Mr. —— in Jedburgh—a squabble between +Mrs. ——, a crazed, talkative slattern, and a sister of hers, an old +maid, respecting a relief minister—Miss gives Madam the lie; and +Madam, by way of revenge, upbraids her that she laid snares to +entangle the said minister, then a widower, in the net of +matrimony—go about two miles out of Jedburgh to a roup of parks—meet +a polite, soldier-like gentleman, a Captain Rutherford, who had been +many years through the wilds of America, a prisoner among the +Indians—charming, romantic situation of Jedburgh, with gardens, +orchards, &c., intermingled among the houses—fine old ruins—a once +magnificent cathedral, and strong castle. All the towns here have the +appearance of old, rude grandeur, but the people extremely idle—Jed a +fine romantic little river.</p> + +<p>Dine with Capt. Rutherford—the Captain a polite fellow, fond of money +in his farming way; showed a particular respect to my bardship—his +lady exactly a proper matrimonial second part for him. Miss Rutherford +a beautiful girl, but too far gone woman to expose so much of a fine +swelling bosom—her face very fine.</p> + +<p>Return to Jedburgh—walk up Jed with some ladies to be shown Love-lane +and Blackburn, two fairy scenes. Introduced to Mr. Potts, writer, a +very clever fellow; and Mr. Somerville, the clergyman of the place, a +man and a gentleman, but sadly addicted to punning.—The walking party +of ladies, Mrs. —— and Miss —— her sister, before mentioned.—N.B. +These two appear still more comfortably ugly and stupid, and bore me +most shockingly. Two Miss ——, tolerably agreeable. Miss Hope, a +tolerably pretty girl, fond of laughing and fun. Miss Lindsay, a +good-humoured, amiable girl; rather short <i>et embonpoint</i>, but +handsome, and extremely graceful—beautiful hazel eyes, full of +spirit, and sparkling with delicious moisture—an engaging face—<i>un +tout ensemble</i> that speaks her of the first order of female minds—her +sister, a bonnie, strappan, rosy, sonsie lass. Shake myself loose, +after several unsuccessful efforts, of Mrs. —— and Miss ——, and +somehow or other, get hold of Miss Lindsay’s arm. My heart is thawed +into melting pleasure after being so long frozen up in the Greenland +bay of indifference, amid the noise and nonsense of Edinburgh. Miss +seems very well pleased with my bardship’s distinguishing her, and +after some slight qualms, which I could easily mark, she sets the +titter round at defiance, and kindly allows me to keep my hold; and +when parted by the ceremony of my introduction to Mr. Somerville, she +met me half, to resume my situation.—Nota Bene—The poet within a +point and a half of being d—mnably in love—I am afraid my bosom is +still nearly as much tinder as ever.</p> + +<p>The old cross-grained, whiggish, ugly, slanderous Miss ——, with all +the poisonous spleen of a disappointed, ancient maid, stops me very +unseasonably to ease her bursting breast, by<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_524" id="Page_524">[524]</a></span> falling abusively foul +on the Miss Lindsays, particularly on my Dulcinea;—I hardly refrain +from cursing her to her face for daring to mouth her calumnious +slander on one of the finest pieces of the workmanship of Almighty +Excellence! Sup at Mr. ——’s; vexed that the Miss Lindsays are not of +the supper-party, as they only are wanting. Mrs. —— and Miss ——still +improve infernally on my hands.</p> + +<p>Set out next morning for Wauchope, the seat of my correspondent, Mrs. +Scott—breakfast by the way with Dr. Elliot, an agreeable, +good-hearted, climate-beaten old veteran, in the medical line; now +retired to a romantic, but rather moorish place, on the banks of the +Roole—he accompanies us almost to Wauchope—we traverse the country +to the top of Bochester, the scene of an old encampment, and Woolee +Hill.</p> + +<p>Wauchope—Mr. Scott exactly the figure and face commonly given to +Sancho Panca—very shrewd in his farming matters, and not unfrequently +stumbles on what may be called a strong thing rather than a good +thing. Mrs. Scott all the sense, taste, intrepidity of face, and bold, +critical decision, which usually distinguish female authors.—Sup with +Mr. Potts—agreeable party.—Breakfast next morning with Mr. +Somerville—the <i>bruit</i> of Miss Lindsay and my bardship, by means of +the invention and malice of Miss ——. Mr. Somerville sends to Dr. +Lindsay, begging him and family to breakfast if convenient, but at all +events to send Miss Lindsay; accordingly Miss Lindsay only comes.—I +find Miss Lindsay would soon play the devil with me—I met with some +little flattering attentions from her. Mrs. Somerville an excellent, +motherly, agreeable woman, and a fine family.—Mr. Ainslie, and Mrs. +S——, junrs., with Mr. ——, Miss Lindsay, and myself, go to see +<i>Esther</i>, a very remarkable woman for reciting poetry of all kinds, +and sometimes making Scotch doggerel herself—she can repeat by heart +almost everything she has ever read, particularly Pope’s Homer from +end to end—has studied Euclid by herself, and in short, is a woman of +very extraordinary abilities.—On conversing with her I find her fully +equal to the character given of her.<a name="FNanchor_296_296" id="FNanchor_296_296"></a><a href="#Footnote_296_296" class="fnanchor">[296]</a>—She is very much flattered +that I send for her, and that she sees a poet who has <i>put out a +book</i>, as she says.—She is, among other things, a great florist—and +is rather past the meridian of once celebrated beauty.</p> + +<p>I walk in <i>Esther’s</i> garden with Miss Lindsay, and after some little +chit-chat of the tender kind, I presented her with a proof print of my +Nob, which she accepted with something more tinder than gratitude. She +told me many little stories which Miss —— had retailed concerning her +and me, with prolonging pleasure—God bless her! Was waited on by the +magistrates, and presented with the freedom of the burgh.</p> + +<p>Took farewell of Jedburgh, with some melancholy, disagreeable +sensations.—Jed, pure be thy crystal streams, and hallowed thy sylvan +banks! Sweet Isabella Lindsay, may peace dwell in thy bosom, +uninterrupted, except by the tumultuous throbbings of rapturous love! +That love-kindling eye must beam on another, not on me; that graceful +form must bless another’s arms; not mine!</p> + +<p>Kelso. Dine with the farmers’ club—all gentlemen, talking of high +matters—each of them keeps a hunter from thirty to fifty pounds +value, and attends the fox-huntings in the country—go out with Mr. +Ker, one of the club, and a friend of Mr. Ainslie’s, to lie—Mr. Ker a +most gentlemanly, clever, handsome fellow, a widower with some fine +children—his mind and manner astonishingly like my dear old friend +Robert Muir, in Kilmarnock—everything in Mr. Ker’s most elegant—he +offers to accompany me in my English tour. Dine with Sir Alexander +Don—a pretty clever fellow, but far from being a match for his divine +lady.—A very wet day * * *—Sleep at Stodrig again; and set out for +Melrose—visit Dryburgh, a fine old ruined abbey—still bad +weather—cross Leader, and come up Tweed to Melrose—dine there, and +visit that far-famed, glorious ruin—come to Selkirk, up Ettrick; the +whole country hereabout, both on Tweed and Ettrick, remarkably stony.</p> + +<p><i>Monday.</i>—Come to Inverleithing, a famous shaw, and in the vicinity +of the palace of Traquair, where having dined, and drank some +Galloway-whey, I hero remain till to-morrow<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_525" id="Page_525">[525]</a></span>—saw Elibanks and +Elibraes, on the other side of the Tweed.</p> + +<p><i>Tuesday.</i>—Drank tea yesternight at Pirn, with Mr. +Horseburgh.—Breakfasted to-day with Mr. Ballantyne of +Hollowlee—Proposal for a four-horse team to consist of Mr. Scott of +Wauchope, Fittieland: Logan of Logan, Fittiefurr: Ballantyne of +Hollowlee, Forewynd: Horsburgh of Horsburgh.—Dine at a country inn, +kept by a miller, in Earlston, the birth-place and residence of the +celebrated Thomas a Rhymer—saw the ruins of his castle—come to +Berrywell.</p> + +<p><i>Wednesday.</i>—Dine at Dunse with the farmers’ club-company—impossible +to do them justice—Rev. Mr. Smith a famous punster, and Mr. Meikle a +celebrated mechanic, and inventor of the threshing-mills.</p> + +<p><i>Thursday</i>, breakfast at Berrywell, and walk into Dunse to see a +famous knife made by a cutler there, and to be presented to an Italian +prince.—A pleasant ride with my friend Mr. Robert Ainslie, and his +sister, to Mr. Thomson’s, a man who has newly commenced farmer, and +has married a Miss Patty Grieve, formerly a flame of Mr. Robert +Ainslie’s.—Company—Miss Jacky Grieve, an amiable sister of Mrs. +Thomson’s, and Mr. Hood, an honest, worthy, facetious farmer, in the +neighbourhood.</p> + +<p><i>Friday.</i>—Ride to Berwick—An idle town, rudely picturesque.—Meet +Lord Errol in walking round the walls.—His lordship’s flattering +notice of me.—Dine with Mr. Clunzie, merchant—nothing particular in +company or conversation—Come up a bold shore, and over a wild country +to Eyemouth—sup and sleep at Mr. Grieve’s.</p> + +<p><i>Saturday.</i>—Spend the day at Mr. Grieve’s—made a royal arch mason of +St. Abb’s Lodge,<a name="FNanchor_297_297" id="FNanchor_297_297"></a><a href="#Footnote_297_297" class="fnanchor">[297]</a>—Mr. William Grieve, the oldest brother, a joyous, +warm-hearted, jolly, clever fellow—takes a hearty glass, and sings a +good song.—Mr. Robert, his brother, and partner in trade, a good +fellow, but says little. Take a sail after dinner. Fishing of all +kinds pays tithes at Eyemouth.</p> + +<p><i>Sunday.</i>—A Mr. Robinson, brewer at Ednam, sets out with us to +Dunbar.</p> + +<p>The Miss Grieves very good girls.—My bardship’s heart got a brush +from Miss Betsey.</p> + +<p>Mr. William Grieve’s attachment to the family-circle, so fond, that +when he is out, which by the bye is often the case, he cannot go to +bed till he see if all his sisters are sleeping well —— Pass the +famous Abbey of Coldingham, and Pease-bridge.—Call at Mr. Sheriff’s +where Mr. A. and I dine.—Mr. S. talkative and conceited. I talk of +love to Nancy the whole evening, while her brother escorts home some +companions like himself.—Sir James Hall of Dunglass, having heard of +my being in the neighbourhood, comes to Mr. Sheriff’s to +breakfast—takes me to see his fine scenery on the stream of +Dunglass—Dunglass the most romantic, sweet place I over saw—Sir +James and his lady a pleasant happy couple.—He points out a walk for +which he has an uncommon respect, as it was made by an aunt of his, to +whom he owes much.</p> + +<p>Miss —— will accompany me to Dunbar, by way of making a parade of me +as a sweetheart of hers, among her relations. She mounts an old +cart-horse, as huge and as lean as a house; a rusty old side-saddle +without girth, or stirrup, but fastened on with an old +pillion-girth—herself as fine as hands could make her, in +cream-coloured riding clothes, hat and feather, &c.—I, ashamed of my +situation, ride like the devil, and almost shake her to pieces on old +Jolly—get rid of her by refusing to call at her uncle’s with her.</p> + +<p>Past through the most glorious corn-country I ever saw, till I reach +Dunbar, a neat little town.—Dine with Provost Fall, an eminent +merchant, and most respectable character, but undescribable, as he +exhibits no marked traits. Mrs. Fall, a genius in painting; fully more +clever in the fine arts and sciences than my friend Lady Wauchope, +without her consummate +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_526" id="Page_526">[526]</a></span> +assurance of her own abilities.—Call with Mr. Robinson (who, by the +bye, I find to be a worthy, much respected man, very modest; warm, +social heart, which with less good sense than his would be perhaps +with the children of prim precision and pride, rather inimical to that +respect which is man’s due from man) with him I call on Miss Clarke, a +maiden in the Scotch phrase, “<i>Guid enough, but no brent new</i>:” a +clever woman, with tolerable pretensions to remark and wit; while time +had blown the blushing bud of bashful modesty into the flower of easy +confidence. She wanted to see what sort of <i>raree show</i> an author was; +and to let him know, that though Dunbar was but a little town, yet it +was not destitute of people of parts.</p> + +<p>Breakfast next morning at Skateraw, at Mr. Lee’s, a farmer of great +note.—Mr. Lee, an excellent, hospitable, social fellow, rather +oldish; warm-hearted and chatty—a most judicious, sensible farmer. +Mr. Lee detains me till next morning.—Company at dinner.—My Rev. +acquaintance Dr. Bowmaker, a reverend, rattling old fellow.—Two sea +lieutenants; a cousin of the landlord’s, a fellow whose looks are of +that kind which deceived me in a gentleman at Kelso, and has often +deceived me: a goodly handsome figure and face, which incline one to +give them credit for parts which they have not. Mr. Clarke, a much +cleverer fellow, but whose looks a little cloudy, and his appearance +rather ungainly, with an every-day observer may prejudice the opinion +against him.—Dr. Brown, a medical young gentleman from Dunbar, a +fellow whose face and manners are open and engaging.—Leave Skateraw +for Dunse next day, along with collector ——, a lad of slender +abilities and bashfully diffident to an extreme.</p> + +<p>Found Miss Ainslie, the amiable, the sensible, the good-humoured, the +sweet Miss Ainslie, all alone at Berrywell.—Heavenly powers, who know +the weakness of human hearts, support mine! What happiness must I see +only to remind me that I cannot enjoy it!</p> + +<p>Lammer-muir Hills, from East Lothian to Dunse, very wild.—Dine with +the farmer’s club at Kelso. Sir John Hume and Mr. Lumsden there, but +nothing worth remembrance when the following circumstance is +considered—I walk into Dunse before dinner, and out to Berrywell in +the evening with Miss Ainslie—how well-bred, how frank, how good she +is! Charming Rachael! may thy bosom never be wrung by the evils of +this life of sorrows, or by the villany of this world’s sons!</p> + +<p><i>Thursday.</i>—Mr. Ker and I set out to dine at Mr. Hood’s on our way to +England.</p> + +<p>I am taken extremely ill with strong feverish symptoms, and take a +servant of Mr. Hood’s to watch me all night—embittering remorse +scares my fancy at the gloomy forebodings of death.—I am determined +to live for the future in such a manner as not to be scared at the +approach of death—I am sure I could meet him with indifference, but +for “The something beyond the grave.”—Mr. Hood agrees to accompany us +to England if we will wait till Sunday.</p> + +<p><i>Friday.</i>—I go with Mr. Hood to see a roup of an unfortunate farmer’s +stock—rigid economy, and decent industry, do you preserve me from +being the principal <i>dramatis persona</i> in such a scene of horror.</p> + +<p>Meet my good old friend Mr. Ainslie, who calls on Mr. Hood in the +evening to take farewell of my bardship. This day I feel myself warm +with sentiments of gratitude to the Great Preserver of men, who has +kindly restored me to health and strength once more.</p> + +<p>A pleasant walk with my young friend Douglas Ainslie, a sweet, modest, +clever young fellow.</p> + +<p><i>Sunday</i>, 27<i>th May.</i>—Cross Tweed, and traverse the moors through a +wild country till I reach Alnwick—Alnwick Castle a seat of the Duke +of Northumberland, furnished in a most princely manner.—A Mr. Wilkin, +agent of His Grace’s, shows us the house and policies. Mr. Wilkin, a +discreet, sensible, ingenious man.</p> + +<p><i>Monday.</i>—Come, still through by-ways, to Warkworth, where we +dine.—Hermitage and old castle. Warkworth situated very picturesque, +with Coquet Island, a small rocky spot, the seat of an old monastery, +facing it a little in the sea; and the small but romantic river +Coquet, running through it.—Sleep at Morpeth, a pleasant enough +little town, and on next day to Newcastle.—Meet with a very +agreeable, sensible fellow, a Mr. Chattox, who shows us a great many +civilities, and who dines and sups with us.</p> + +<p><i>Wednesday.</i>—Left Newcastle early in the morning, and rode over a +fine country to Hexham to breakfast—from Hexham to Wardrue, the +celebrated Spa, where we slept.</p> + +<p><i>Thursday</i>—Reach<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_527" id="Page_527">[527]</a></span> Longtown to dine, and part there with my good +friends Messrs. Hood and Ker—A hiring day in Longtown—I am +uncommonly happy to see so many young folks enjoying life.—I come to +Carlisle.—(Meet a strange enough romantic adventure by the way, in +falling in with a girl and her married sister—the girl, after some +overtures of gallantry on my side, sees me a little cut with the +bottle, and offers to take me in for a Gretna-Green affair.—I, not +being such a gull, as she imagines, make an appointment with her, by +way of <i>vive la bagatelle</i>, to hold a conference on it when we reach +town.—I meet her in town and give her a brush of caressing, and a +bottle of cider; but finding herself <i>un peu trompé</i> in her man she +sheers off.) Next day I meet my good friend, Mr. Mitchell, and walk +with him round the town and its environs, and through his +printing-works, &c.—four or five hundred people employed, many of +them women and children.—Dine with Mr. Mitchell, and leave +Carlisle.—Come by the coast to Annan.—Overtaken on the way by a +curious old fish of a shoemaker, and miner, from Cumberland mines.</p> + +<p>[<i>Here the manuscript abruptly terminates.</i>]</p> + + + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_294_294" id="Footnote_294_294"></a><a href="#FNanchor_294_294"><span class="label">[294]</span></a> The author of that fine song, “The Maid that tends the +Goats.”</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_295_295" id="Footnote_295_295"></a><a href="#FNanchor_295_295"><span class="label">[295]</span></a> “During the discourse Burns produced a neat impromptu, +conveying an elegant compliment to Miss Ainslie. Dr. B. had selected a +text of Scripture that contained a heavy denunciation against +obstinate sinners. In the course of the sermon Burns observed the +young lady turning over the leaves of her Bible, with much +earnestness, in search of the text. He took out a slip of paper, and +with a pencil wrote the following lines on it, which he immediately +presented to her. +</p> +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“Fair maid, you need not take the hint,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Nor idle texts pursue:—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">’Twas <i>guilty sinners</i> that he meant,—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Not <i>angels</i> such as you.”<br /></span> +</div></div> +<p class="sig1"> +<span class="smcap">Cromek.</span></p> +</div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_296_296" id="Footnote_296_296"></a><a href="#FNanchor_296_296"><span class="label">[296]</span></a> “This extraordinary woman then moved in a very humble +walk of life:—the wife of a common working gardener. She is still +living, and, if I am rightly informed, her time is principally +occupied in her attentions to a little day-school, which not being +sufficient for her subsistence, she is obliged to solicit the charily +of her benevolent neighbours. ‘Ah, who would love the +lyre!’“—<span class="smcap">Cromek</span>.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_297_297" id="Footnote_297_297"></a><a href="#FNanchor_297_297"><span class="label">[297]</span></a> The entry made on this occasion in the Lodge-books of St +Abb’s is honorable to +</p><p class="blockquot"> +“The brethren of the mystic level.” +</p><p class="sig1"> +“<i>Eyemouth</i>, 19<i>th May</i>, 1787. +</p><p> +“At a general encampment held this day, the following brethren were +made royal arch masons, viz. Robert Burns, from the Lodge of St. +James’s, Tarbolton, Ayrshire, and Robert Ainslie, from the Lodge of +St. Luke’s, Edinburgh by James Carmichael, Wm. Grieve, Daniel Dow, +John Clay, Robert Grieve, &c. &c. Robert Ainslie paid one guinea +admission dues; but on account of R. Burns’s remarkable poetical +genius, the encampment unanimously agreed to admit him gratis, and +considered themselves honoured by having a man of such shining +abilities for one of their companions.” +</p><p> +Extracted from the Minute Book of the Lodge by <span class="smcap">Thomas +Bowbill</span></p></div> +</div> + + + +<h2><a name="THE_HIGHLAND_TOUR" id="THE_HIGHLAND_TOUR"></a>THE HIGHLAND TOUR.</h2> + + +<p class="sig">25<i>th August</i>, 1787.</p> + +<p>I leave Edinburgh for a northern tour, in company with my good friend +Mr. Nicol, whose originality of humour promises me much +entertainment.—Linlithgow—a fertile improved country—West Lothian. +The more elegance and luxury among the farmers, I always observe in +equal proportion, the rudeness and stupidity of the peasantry. This +remark I have made all over the Lothians, Merse, Roxburgh, &c. For +this, among other reasons, I think that a man of romantic taste, a +“Man of Feeling,” will be better pleased with the poverty, but +intelligent minds of the peasantry in Ayrshire (peasantry they are all +below the justice of peace) than the opulence of a club of Merse +farmers, when at the same time, he considers the vandalism of their +plough-folks, &c. I carry this idea so far, that an unenclosed, half +improven country is to me actually more agreeable, and gives me more +pleasure as a prospect, than a country cultivated like a garden.—Soil +about Linlithgow light and thin.—The town carries the appearance of +rude, decayed grandeur—charmingly rural, retired situation. The old +royal palace a tolerably fine, but melancholy ruin—sweetly situated +on a small elevation, by the brink of a loch. Shown the room where the +beautiful, injured Mary Queen of Scots was born—a pretty good old +Gothic church. The infamous stool of repentance standing, in the old +Romish way, on a lofty situation.</p> + +<p>What a poor pimping business is a Presbyterian place of worship; +dirty, narrow, and squalid; stuck in a corner of old popish grandeur +such as Linlithgow, and much more, Melrose! Ceremony and show, if +judiciously thrown in, absolutely necessary for the bulk of mankind, +both in religious and civil matters.—Dine.—Go to my friend +Smith’s at Avon printfield—find nobody but Mrs. Miller, an agreeable, +sensible, modest, good body; as useful, but not so ornamental as +Fielding’s Miss Western—not rigidly polite <i>à la Français</i>, but easy, +hospitable, and housewifely.</p> + +<p>An old lady from Paisley, a Mrs. Lawson, whom I promised to call for +in Paisley—like old lady W——, and still more like Mrs. C——, her +conversation is pregnant with strong sense and just remark, but like +them, a certain air of self-importance and a <i>duresse</i> in the eye, +seem to indicate, as the Ayrshire wife observed of her cow, that “she +had a mind o’ her ain.”</p> + +<p>Pleasant view of Dunfermline and the rest of the fertile coast of +Fife, as we go down to that dirty, ugly place, Borrowstones—see a +horse-race and call on a friend of Mr. Nicol’s, a Bailie Cowan, of +whom I know too little to attempt his portrait—Come through the rich +carse of Falkirk to pass the night. Falkirk nothing<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_528" id="Page_528">[528]</a></span> remarkable except +the tomb of Sir John the Graham, over which, in the succession of +time, four stones have been placed.—Camelon, the ancient metropolis +of the Picts, now a small village in the neighbourhood of +Falkirk.—Cross the grand canal to Carron.—Come past Larbert and +admire a fine monument of cast-iron erected by Mr. Bruce, the African +traveller, to his wife.</p> + +<p>Pass Dunipace, a place laid out with fine taste—a charming +amphitheatre bounded by Denny village, and pleasant seats down the way +to Dunnipace.—The Carron running down the bosom of the whole makes it +one of the most charming little prospects I have seen.</p> + +<p>Dine at Auchinbowie—Mr. Monro an excellent, worthy old man—Miss +Monro an amiable, sensible, sweet young woman, much resembling Mrs. +Grierson. Come to Bannockburn—Shown the old house where James III. +finished so tragically his unfortunate life. The field of +Bannockburn—the hole where glorious Bruce set his standard. Here no +Scot can pass uninterested.—I fancy to myself that I see my gallant, +heroic countrymen coming o’er the hill and down upon the plunderers of +their country, the murderers of their fathers; noble revenge, and just +hate, glowing in every vein, striding more and more eagerly as they +approach the oppressive, insulting, blood-thirsty foe! I see them meet +in gloriously triumphant congratulation on the victorious field, +exulting in their heroic royal leader, and rescued liberty and +independence! Come to Stirling.—<i>Monday</i> go to Harvieston. Go to see +Caudron linn, and Rumbling brig, and Diel’s mill. Return in the +evening. Supper—Messrs. Doig, the schoolmaster; Bell; and Captain +Forrester of the castle—Doig a queerish figure, and something of a +pedant—Bell a joyous fellow, who sings a good song.—Forrester a +merry, swearing kind of man, with a dash of the sodger.</p> + +<p><i>Tuesday Morning.</i>—Breakfast with Captain Forrester—Ochel +Hills—Devon River—Forth and Tieth—Allan River—Strathallan, a fine +country, but little improved—Cross Earn to Crieff—Dine and go to +Arbruchil—cold reception at Arbruchil—a most romantically pleasant +ride up Earn, by Auchtertyre and Comrie to Arbruchil—Sup at Crieff.</p> + +<p><i>Wednesday Morning.</i>—Leave Crieff—Glen Amond—Amond river—Ossian’s +grave—Loch Fruoch—Glenquaich—Landlord and landlady remarkable +characters—Taymouth described in rhyme—Meet the Hon. Charles +Townshend.</p> + +<p><i>Thursday.</i>—Come down Tay to Dunkeld—Glenlyon House—Lyon +River—Druid’s Temple—three circles of stones—the outer-most +sunk—the second has thirteen stones remaining—the innermost has +eight—two large detached ones like a gate, to the south-east—Say +prayers in it—Pass Taybridge—Aberfeldy—described in rhyme—Castle +Menzies—Inver—Dr. Stewart—sup.</p> + +<p><i>Friday.</i>—Walk with Mrs. Stewart and Beard to Birnam top—fine +prospect down Tay—Craigieburn hills—Hermitage on the Branwater, with +a picture of Ossian—Breakfast with Dr. Stewart—Neil Gow<a name="FNanchor_298_298" id="FNanchor_298_298"></a><a href="#Footnote_298_298" class="fnanchor">[298]</a> plays—a +short, stout-built, honest Highland figure, with his grayish hair shed +on his honest social brow—an interesting face, marking strong sense, +kind openheartedness, mixed with unmistrusting simplicity—visit his +house—Marget Gow.</p> + +<p>Ride up Tummel River to Blair—Fascally a beautiful romantic +nest—wild grandeur of the pass of Gilliecrankie—visit the gallant +Lord Dundee’s stone.</p> + +<p>Blair—Sup with the Duchess—easy and happy from the manners of the +family—confirmed in my good opinion of my friend Walker.</p> + +<p><i>Saturday.</i>—Visit the scenes round Blair—fine, but spoiled with bad +taste—Tilt and Gairie rivers—Falls on the Tilt—Heather seat—Ride +in company with Sir William Murray and Mr. Walker, to Loch +Tummel—meanderings of the +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_529" id="Page_529">[529]</a></span> +Rannach, which runs through quondam Struan Robertson’s estate from +Loch Rannach to Loch Tummel—Dine at Blair—Company—General +Murray—Captain Murray, an honest tar—Sir William Murray, an honest, +worthy man, but tormented with the hypochondria—Mrs. Graham, <i>belle +et aimable</i>—Miss Catchcart—Mrs. Murray, a painter—Mrs. +King—Duchess and fine family, the Marquis, Lords James, Edward, and +Robert—Ladies Charlotte, Emilia, and children dance—Sup—Mr. Graham +of Fintray.</p> + +<p>Come up the Garrie—Falls of +Bruar—Daldecairoch—Dalwhinnie—Dine—Snow on the hills 17 feet +deep—No corn from Loch-Gairie to Dalwhinnie—Cross the Spey, and come +down the stream to Pitnin—Straths rich—<i>les environs</i> +picturesque—Craigow hill—Ruthven of Badenoch—Barracks—wild and +magnificent—Rothemurche on the other side, and Glenmore—Grant of +Rothemurche’s poetry—told me by the Duke of Gordon—Strathspey, rich +and romantic—Breakfast at Aviemore, a wild spot—dine at Sir James +Grant’s—Lady Grant, a sweet, pleasant body—come through mist and +darkness to Dulsie, to lie.</p> + +<p><i>Tuesday.</i>—Findhorn river—rocky banks—come on to Castle Cawdor, +where Macbeth murdered King Duncan—saw the bed in which King Duncan +was stabbed—dine at Kilravock—Mrs. Rose, sen., a true chieftain’s +wife—Fort George—Inverness.</p> + +<p><i>Wednesday.</i>—Loch Ness—Braes of Ness—General’s hut—Falls of +Fyers—Urquhart Castle and Strath.</p> + +<p><i>Thursday.</i>—Come over Culloden Muir—reflections on the field of +battle—breakfast at Kilravock—old Mrs. Rose, sterling sense, warm +heart, strong passions, and honest pride, all in an uncommon +degree—Mrs. Rose, jun., a little milder than the mother—this perhaps +owing to her being younger—Mr. Grant, minister at Calder, resembles +Mr. Scott at Inverleithing—Mrs. Rose and Mrs. Grant accompany us to +Kildrummie—two young ladies—Miss Rose, who sung two Gaelic songs, +beautiful and lovely—Miss Sophia Brodie, most agreeable and +amiable—both of them gentle, mild; the sweetest creatures on earth, +and happiness be with them!—Dine at Nairn—fall in with a pleasant +enough gentleman, Dr. Stewart, who had been long abroad with his +father in the forty-five; and Mr. Falconer, a spare, irascible, +warm-hearted Norland, and a nonjuror—Brodie-house to lie.</p> + +<p><i>Friday</i>—Forres—famous stone at Forres—Mr. Brodie tells me that the +muir where Shakspeare lays Macbeth’s witch-meeting is still +haunted—that the country folks won’t pass it by night.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p>Venerable ruins of Elgin Abbey—A grander effect at first glance than +Melrose, but not near so beautiful—Cross Spey to Fochabers—fine +palace, worthy of the generous proprietor—Dine—company, Duke and +Duchess, Ladies Charlotte and Magdeline, Col. Abercrombie, and Lady, +Mr. Gordon and Mr.——, a clergyman, a venerable, aged figure—the +Duke makes me happier than ever great man did—noble, princely; yet +mild, condescending, and affable; gay and kind—the Duchess witty and +sensible—God bless them!</p> + +<p>Come to Cullen to lie—hitherto the country is sadly poor and +unimproven.</p> + +<p>Come to Aberdeen—meet with Mr. Chalmers, printer, a facetious +fellow—Mr. Ross a fine fellow, like Professor Tytler,—Mr. Marshal +one of the <i>poetæ minores</i>—Mr. Sheriffs, author of “Jamie and Bess,” +a little decrepid body with some abilities—Bishop Skinner, a +nonjuror, son of the author of “Tullochgorum,” a man whose mild, +venerable manner is the most marked of any in so young a +man—Professor Gordon, a good-natured, jolly-looking +professor—Aberdeen, a lazy town—near Stonhive, the coast a good deal +romantic—meet my relations—Robert Burns, writer, in Stonhive, one of +those who love fun, a gill, and a punning joke, and have not a bad +heart—his wife a sweet hospitable body, without any affectation of +what is called town-breeding.</p> + +<p><i>Tuesday.</i>—Breakfast with Mr. Burns—lie at Lawrence Kirk—Album +library—Mrs. —— a jolly, frank, sensible, love-inspiring widow—Howe +of the Mearns, a rich, cultivated, but still unenclosed country.</p> + +<p><i>Wednesday.</i>—Cross North Esk river and a rich country to Craigow.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p>Go to Montrose, that finely-situated handsome town—breakfast at +Muthie, and sail along that wild rocky coast, and see the famous +caverns, particularly the Gariepot—land and dine at Arbroath—stately +ruins of Arbroath Abbey—come to Dundee through a fertile +country—Dundee a low-lying, but pleasant town—old +Steeple—Tayfrith—Broughty Castle, a finely situated ruin, jutting +into the Tay.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_530" id="Page_530">[530]</a></span></p> + +<p><i>Friday.</i>—Breakfast with the Miss Scotts—Miss Bess Scott like Mrs. +Greenfield—my bardship almost in love with her—come through the rich +harvests and fine hedge-rows of the Carse of Gowrie, along the +romantic margin of the Grampian hills, to Perth—fine, fruitful, +hilly, woody country round Perth.</p> + +<p><i>Saturday Morning.</i>—Leave Perth—come up Strathearn to +Endermay—fine, fruitful, cultivated Strath—the scene of “Bessy Bell, +and Mary Gray,” near Perth—fine scenery on the banks of the May—Mrs. +Belcher, gawcie, frank, affable, fond of rural sports, hunting, +&c.—Lie at Kinross—reflections in a fit of the colic.</p> + +<p><i>Sunday.</i>—Pass through a cold, barren country to +Queensferry—dine—cross the ferry and on to Edinburgh.</p> + + + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_298_298" id="Footnote_298_298"></a><a href="#FNanchor_298_298"><span class="label">[298]</span></a> Another northern bard has sketched this eminent +musician— +</p> +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">“The blythe Strathspey springs up, reminding some<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of nights when Gow’s old arm, (nor old the tale,)<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Unceasing, save when reeking cans went round,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Made heart and heel leap light as bounding roe.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Alas! no more shall we behold that look<br /></span> +<span class="i0">So venerable, yet so blent with mirth,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And festive joy sedate; that ancient garb<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Unvaried,—tartan hose, and bonnet blue!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">No more shall Beauty’s partial eye draw forth<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The full intoxication of his strain.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Mellifluous, strong, exuberantly rich!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">No more, amid the pauses of the dance,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Shall he repeat those measures, that in days<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of other years, could soothe a falling prince,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And light his visage with a transient smile<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of melancholy joy,—like autumn sun<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Gilding a sear tree with a passing beam!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or play to sportive children on the green<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Dancing at gloamin hour; or willing cheer<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With strains unbought, the shepherd’s bridal day.”<br /></span> +</div></div> +<p class="sig2"> +<i>British Georgics, p.</i> 81</p> +</div> +</div> + + + +<h2><a name="THE_POETS_ASSIGNMENT_OF_HIS_WORKS" id="THE_POETS_ASSIGNMENT_OF_HIS_WORKS"></a>THE POET’S ASSIGNMENT OF HIS WORKS.</h2> + + +<p>Know all men by these presents that I Robert Burns of Mossgiel: +whereas I intend to leave Scotland and go abroad, and having +acknowledged myself the father of a child named Elizabeth, begot upon +Elizabeth Paton in Largieside: and whereas Gilbert Burns in Mossgiel, +my brother, has become bound, and hereby binds and obliges himself to +aliment, clothe, and educate my said natural child in a suitable +manner as if she was his own, in case her mother chuse to part with +her, and that until she arrive at the age of fifteen years. Therefore, +and to enable the said Gilbert Burns to make good his said engagement, +wit ye me to have assigned, disponed, conveyed and made over to, and +in favours of, the said Gilbert Burns, his heirs, executors, and +assignees, who are always to be bound in like manner, with, himself, +all and sundry goods, gear, corns, cattle, horses, nolt, sheep, +household furniture, and all other moveable effects of whatever kind +that I shall leave behind me on my departure from this Kingdom, after +allowing for my part of the conjunct debts due by the said Gilbert +Burns and me as joint tacksmen of the farm of Mossgiel. And +particularly without prejudice of the foresaid generality, the profits +that may arise from the publication of my poems presently in the +press. And also, I hereby dispone and convey to him in trust for +behoof of my said natural daughter, the copyright of said poems in so +far as I can dispose of the same by law, after she arrives at the +above age of fifteen years complete. Surrogating and substituting the +said Gilbert Burns my brother and his foresaids in my full right, +title, room and place of the whole premises, with power to him to +intromit with, and dispose upon the same at pleasure, and in general +to do every other thing in the premises that I could have done myself +before granting hereof, but always with and under the conditions +before expressed. And I oblige myself to warrant this disposition and +assignation from my own proper fact and deed allenarly. Consenting to +the registration hereof in the books of Council and Session, or any +other Judges books competent, therein to remain for preservation and +constitute.</p> + +<p>Proculars, &c. In witness whereof I have wrote and signed these +presents, consisting of this and the preceding page, on stamped paper, +with my own hand, at the Mossgiel, the twenty-second day of July, one +thousand seven hundred and eighty-six years.</p> + +<p>(Signed) </p> +<p class="sig9">ROBERT BURNS.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p>Upon the twenty-fourth day of July, one thousand seven hundred and +eighty-six years, I, William Chalmer, Notary Publick, past to the +Mercat Cross of Ayr head Burgh of the Sheriffdome thereof, and thereat +I made due and lawful intimation of the foregoing disposition and +assignation to his Majesties lieges, that they might not pretend +ignorance thereof by reading the same over in presence of a number of +people assembled. Whereupon William Crooks, writer, in Ayr, as +attorney for the before designed Gilbert Burns, protested that the +same was lawfully intimated, and asked and took instruments in my +hands. These things were done betwixt the hours of ten and eleven +forenoon, before and in presence of William M’Cubbin, and William +Eaton, apprentices to the Sheriff Clerk of Ayr, witnesses to the +premises.</p> + + +<p>(Signed)</p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">William Chalmer</span>, N.P.</p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">William M’Cubbin</span>, Witness.</p> + +<p class="sig7"><span class="smcap">William Eaton</span>, Witness.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_531" id="Page_531">[531]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="GLOSSARY" id="GLOSSARY"></a>GLOSSARY.</h2> + + +<p>“The <i>ch</i> and <i>gh</i> have always the guttural sound. The sound of the +English diphthong <i>oo</i> is commonly spelled <i>ou.</i> The French <i>u</i>, a +sound which often occurs in the Scottish language, is marked <i>oo</i> or +<i>ui.</i> The <i>a</i>, in genuine Scottish words, except when forming a +diphthong, or followed by an <i>e</i> mute after a single consonant, sounds +generally like the broad English <i>a</i> in <i>wall.</i> The Scottish diphthong +<i>ae</i> always, and <i>ea</i> very often, sound like the French <i>e</i> masculine. +The Scottish diphthong <i>ey</i> sounds like the Latin <i>ei.</i>”</p> + + + + +<p class="std2">A.</p> +<ul> +<li><i>A’</i>, all.</li> + +<li><i>Aback</i>, away, aloof, backwards.</li> + +<li><i>Abeigh</i>, at a shy distance.</li> + +<li><i>Aboon</i>, above, up.</li> + +<li><i>Abread</i>, abroad, in sight, to publish.</li> + +<li><i>Abreed</i>, in breadth.</li> + +<li><i>Ae</i>, one.</li> + +<li><i>Aff</i>, off.</li> + +<li><i>Aff-loof</i>, off-hand, extempore, without premeditation.</li> + +<li><i>Afore</i>, before.</li> + +<li><i>Aft</i>, oft.</li> + +<li><i>Aften</i>, often.</li> + +<li><i>Agley</i>, off the right line, wrong, awry.</li> + +<li><i>Aiblins</i>, perhaps.</li> + +<li><i>Ain</i>, own.</li> + +<li><i>Airn</i>, iron, a tool of that metal, a mason’s chisel.</li> + +<li><i>Airles</i>, earnest money.</li> + +<li><i>Airl-penny</i>, a silver penny given as erles or hiring money.</li> + +<li><i>Airt</i>, quarter of the heaven, point of the compass.</li> + +<li><i>Agee</i>, on one side.</li> + +<li><i>Attour</i>, moreover, beyond, besides.</li> + +<li><i>Aith</i>, an oath.</li> + +<li><i>Aits</i>, oats.</li> + +<li><i>Aiver</i>, an old horse.</li> + +<li><i>Aizle</i>, a hot cinder, an ember of wood.</li> + +<li><i>Alake</i>, alas.</li> + +<li><i>Alane</i>, alone.</li> + +<li><i>Akwart</i>, awkward, athwart.</li> + +<li><i>Amaist</i>, almost.</li> + +<li><i>Amang</i>, among.</li> + +<li><i>An’</i>, and, if.</li> + +<li><i>Ance</i>, once</li> + +<li><i>Ane</i>, one.</li> + +<li><i>Anent</i>, over-against, concerning, about.</li> + +<li><i>Anither</i>, another.</li> + +<li><i>Ase</i>, ashes of wood, remains of a hearth fire.</li> + +<li><i>Asteer</i>, abroad, stirring in a lively manner.</li> + +<li><i>Aqueesh</i>, between.</li> + +<li><i>Aught</i>, possession, as “in a’ my aught,” in all my possession.</li> + +<li><i>Auld</i>, old.</li> + +<li><i>Auld-farran’</i>, auld farrant, sagacious, prudent, cunning.</li> + +<li><i>Ava</i>, at all.</li> + +<li><i>Awa</i>, away, begone.</li> + +<li><i>Awfu’</i>, awful.</li> + +<li><i>Auld-shoon</i>, old shoes literally, a discarded lover metaphorically.</li> + +<li><i>Aumos</i>, gift to a beggar.</li> + +<li><i>Aumos-dish</i>, a beggar’s dish in which the aumos is received.</li> + +<li><i>Awn</i>, the beard of barley, oats, &c.</li> + +<li><i>Awnie</i>, bearded.</li> + +<li><i>Ayont</i>, beyond.</li> +</ul> + +<p class="std2">B.</p> +<ul> +<li><i>Ba’</i>, ball.</li> + +<li><i>Babie-clouts</i>, child’s first clothes.</li> + +<li><i>Backets</i>, ash-boards, as pieces of backet for removing ashes.</li> + +<li><i>Backlins</i>, comin’, coming back, returning.</li> + +<li><i>Back-yett</i>, private gate.</li> + +<li><i>Baide</i>, endured, did stay.</li> + +<li><i>Baggie</i>, the belly.</li> + +<li><i>Bairn</i>, a child.</li> + +<li><i>Bairn-time</i>, a family of children, a brood.</li> + +<li><i>Baith</i>, both.</li> + +<li><i>Ballets</i>, <i>Ballants</i>, ballads.</li> + +<li><i>Ban</i>, to swear.</li> + +<li><i>Bane</i>, bone.</li> + +<li><i>Bang</i>, to beat, to strive, to excel.</li> + +<li><i>Bannock</i>, flat, round, soft cake.</li> + +<li><i>Bardie</i>, diminutive of bard.</li> + +<li><i>Barefit</i>, barefooted.</li> + +<li><i>Barley-bree</i>, barley-broo, blood of barley, malt liquor.</li> + +<li><i>Barmie</i>, of, or like barm, yeasty.</li> + +<li><i>Batch</i>, a crew, a gang.</li> + +<li><i>Batts</i>, botts.</li> + +<li><i>Bauckie-bird</i>, the bat.</li> + +<li><i>Baudrons</i>, a cat.</li> + +<li><i>Bauld</i>, bold.</li> + +<li><i>Baws’nt</i>, having a white stripe down the face.</li> + +<li><i>Be</i>, to let be, to give over, to cease.</li> + +<li><i>Beets</i>, boots.</li> + +<li><i>Bear</i>, barley.</li> + +<li><i>Bearded-bear</i>, barley with its bristly head.</li> + +<li><i>Beastie</i>, diminutive of beast.</li> + +<li><i>Beet</i>, <i>beek</i>, to add fuel to a fire, to bask.</li> + +<li><i>Beld</i>, bald.</li> + +<li><i>Belyve</i>, by and by, presently, quickly.</li> + +<li><i>Ben</i>, into the spence or parlour.</li> + +<li><i>Benmost-bore</i>, the remotest hole, the innermost recess.</li> + +<li><i>Bethankit</i>, grace after meat.</li> + +<li><i>Beuk</i>, a book.</li> + +<li><i>Bicker</i>, a kind of wooden dish, a short rapid race.</li> + +<li><i>Bickering</i>, careering, hurrying with quarrelsome intent.</li> + +<li><i>Birnie</i>, birnie ground is where thick heath has been burnt, leaving the birns, or unconsumed stalks, standing up sharp and stubley.</li> + +<li><i>Bie</i>, or <i>bield</i>, shelter, a sheltered place, the sunny nook of a wood.</li> + +<li><i>Bien</i>, wealthy, plentiful.</li> + +<li><i>Big</i>, to build.</li> + +<li><i>Biggin</i>, building, a house.</li> + +<li><i>Biggit</i>, built.</li> + +<li><i>Bill</i>, a bull.</li> + +<li><i>Billie</i>, a brother, a young fellow, a companion.</li> + +<li><i>Bing</i>, a heap of grain, potatoes, &c.</li> + +<li><i>Birdie-cocks</i>, young cocks, still belonging to the brood.</li> + +<li><i>Birk</i>, birch.</li> + +<li><i>Birkie</i>, a clever, a forward conceited fellow.</li> + +<li><i>Birring</i>, the noise of partridges when they rise.</li> + +<li><i>Birses</i>, bristles.</li> + +<li><i>Bit</i>, crisis, nick of time, place.</li> + +<li><i>Bizz</i>, a bustle, to buzz.</li> + +<li><i>Black’s the grun’</i>, as black as the ground.</li> + +<li><i>Blastie</i>, a shrivelled dwarf, a term of contempt, full of mischief.</li> + +<li><i>Blastit</i>, blasted.</li> + +<li><i>Blate</i>, bashful, sheepish.</li> + +<li><i>Blather</i>, bladder.</li> + +<li><i>Blaud</i>, a flat piece of anything, to slap.</li> + +<li><i>Blaudin-shower</i>, a heavy driving rain; a blauding signifies a beating.</li> + +<li><i>Blaw</i>, to blow, to boast; “blaw i’ my lug,” to flatter.</li> + +<li><i>Bleerit</i>, bedimmed, eyes hurt with weeping.</li> + +<li><i>Bleer my een</i>, dim my eyes.</li> + +<li><i>Bleezing</i>, <i>bleeze</i>, blazing, flame.</li> + +<li><i>Blellum</i>, idle talking fellow.</li> + +<li><i>Blether</i>, to talk idly.</li> + +<li><i>Bleth’rin</i>, talking idly.</li> + +<li><i>Blink</i>, a little while, a smiling look, to look kindly, to shine by fits.</li> + +<li><i>Blinker</i>, a term of contempt: it means, too, a lively engaging girl.</li> + +<li><i>Blinkin’</i>, smirking, smiling with the eyes, looking lovingly.</li> + +<li><i>Blirt and blearie</i>, out-burst of grief, with wet eyes.</li> + +<li><i>Blue-gown</i>, one of those beggars who get annually, on the king’s birth-day, a blue cloak or gown with a badge.</li> + +<li><i>Bluid</i>, blood.</li> + +<li><i>Blype</i>, a shred, a large piece.</li> + +<li><i>Bobbit</i>, the obeisance made by a lady.</li> + +<li><i>Bock</i>, to vomit, to gush intermittently.</li> + +<li><i>Bocked</i>, gushed, vomited.</li> + +<li><i>Bodle</i>, a copper coin of the value of two pennies Scots.</li> + +<li><i>Bogie</i>, a small morass.</li> + +<li><i>Bonnie</i>, or <i>bonny</i>, handsome, beautiful.</li> + +<li><i>Bonnock</i>, a kind of thick cake of bread, a small jannock or loaf made of oatmeal. See <i>Bannock.</i></li> + +<li><i>Boord</i>, a board.</li> + +<li><i>Bore</i>, a hole in the wall, a cranny.</li> + +<li><i>Boortree</i>, the shrub elder, planted much of old in hedges of barn-yards and gardens.</li> + +<li><i>Boost</i>, behoved, must needs, wilfulness.</li> + +<li><i>Botch</i>, <i>blotch</i>, an angry tumour.</li> + +<li><i>Bousing</i>, drinking, making merry with liquor.</li> + +<li><i>Bowk</i>, body.</li> + +<li><i>Bow-kail</i>, cabbage.</li> + +<li><i>Bow-hought</i>, out-kneed, crooked at the knee joint.</li> + +<li><i>Bowt</i>, <i>bowlt</i>, bended, crooked.</li> + +<li><i>Brackens</i>, fern.</li> + +<li><i>Brae</i>, a declivity, a precipice, the slope of a hill.</li> + +<li><i>Braid</i>, broad.</li> + +<li><i>Braik</i>, an instrument for rough-dressing flax.</li> + +<li><i>Brainge</i>, to run rashly forward, to churn violently.</li> + +<li><i>Braing’t</i>, “the horse braing’t,” plunged end fretted in the harness.</li> + +<li><i>Brak</i>, broke, became insolvent.</li> + +<li><i>Branks</i>, a kind of wooden curb for horses.</li> + +<li><i>Brankie</i>, gaudy.</li> + +<li><i>Brash</i>, a sudden illness.</li> + +<li><i>Brats</i>, coarse clothes, rags, &c.</li> + +<li><i>Brattle</i>, a short race, hurry, fury.</li> + +<li><i>Braw</i>, fine, handsome.</li> + +<li><i>Brawlys</i>, or <i>brawlie</i>, very well, finely, heartily, bravely.</li> + +<li><i>Braxies</i>, diseased sheep.</li> + +<li><i>Breastie</i>, diminutive of breast.</li> + +<li><i>Breastit</i>, did spring up or forward; the act of mounting a horse.</li> + +<li><i>Brechame</i>, a horse-collar.</li> + +<li><i>Breckens</i>, fern.</li> + +<li><i>Breef</i>, an invulnerable or irresistible spell.</li> + +<li><i>Breeks</i>, breeches.</li> + +<li><i>Brent</i>, bright, clear; “a brent brow,” a brow high and smooth.</li> + +<li><i>Brewin’</i>, brewing, gathering.</li> + +<li><i>Bree</i>, juice, liquid.</li> + +<li><i>Brig</i>, a bridge.</li> + +<li><i>Brunstane</i>, brimstone.</li> + +<li><i>Brisket</i>, the breast, the bosom.</li> + +<li><i>Brither</i>, a brother.</li> + +<li><i>Brock</i>, a badger.</li> + +<li><i>Brogue</i>, a hum, a trick.</li> + +<li><i>Broo</i>, broth, liquid, water.</li> + +<li><i>Broose</i>, broth, a race at country weddings; he who first reaches the bridegroom’s house on returning from church wins the broose.</li> + +<li><i>Browst</i>, ale, as much malt liquor as is brewed at a time.</li> + +<li><i>Brugh</i>, a burgh.</li> + +<li><i>Bruilsie</i>, a broil, combustion.</li> + +<li><i>Brunt</i>, did burn, burnt.</li> + +<li><i>Brust</i>, to burst, burst.</li> + +<li><i>Buchan-bullers</i>, the boiling of the sea among the rocks on the coast of Buchan.</li> + +<li><i>Buckskin</i>, an inhabitant of Virginia.</li> + +<li><i>Buff our beef</i>, thrash us soundly, give us a beating behind and before.</li> + +<li><i>Buff and blue</i>, the colours of the Whigs.</li> + +<li><i>Buirdly</i>, stout made, broad built.</li> + +<li><i>Bum-clock</i>, the humming beetle that flies in the summer evenings.</li> + +<li><i>Bummin</i>, humming as bees, buzzing.</li> + +<li><i>Bummle</i>, to blunder, a drone, an idle fellow.</li> + +<li><i>Bummler</i>, a blunderer, one whose noise is greater than his work.</li> + +<li><i>Bunker</i>, a window-seat.</li> + +<li><i>Bure</i>, did bear.</li> + +<li><i>Burn</i>, <i>burnie</i>, water, a rivulet, a small stream which is heard as it runs.</li> + +<li><i>Burniewin’</i>, burn this wind, the blacksmith.</li> + +<li><i>Burr-thistle</i>, the thistle of Scotland.</li> + +<li><i>Buskit</i>, dressed.</li> + +<li><i>Buskit-nest</i>, an ornamented residence.</li> + +<li><i>Busle</i>, a bustle.</li> + +<li><i>But</i>, <i>bot</i>, without.</li> + +<li><i>But and ben</i>, the country kitchen and parlour.</li> + +<li><i>By himself</i>, lunatic, distracted, beside himself.</li> + +<li><i>Byke</i>, a bee-hive, a wild bee-nest.</li> + +<li><i>Byre</i>, a cow-house, a sheep-pen.</li> +</ul> + +<p class="std2">C.</p> +<ul> + +<li><i>Ca’</i>, to call, to name, to drive.</li> + +<li><i>Ca’t</i>, called, driven, calved.</li> + +<li><i>Cadger</i>, a carrier.</li> + +<li><i>Cadie</i> or <i>caddie</i>, a person, a young fellow, a public messenger.</li> + +<li><i>Caff</i>, chaff.</li> + +<li><i>Caird</i>, a tinker, a maker of horn spoons and teller of fortunes.</li> + +<li><i>Cairn</i>, a loose heap of stones, a rustic monument.</li> + +<li><i>Calf-ward</i>, a small enclosure for calves.</li> + +<li><i>Calimanco</i>, a certain kind of cotton cloth worn by ladies.</li> + +<li><i>Callan</i>, a boy.</li> + +<li><i>Caller</i>, fresh.</li> + +<li><i>Callet</i>, a loose woman, a follower of a camp.</li> + +<li><i>Cannie</i>, gentle, mild, dexterous.</li> + +<li><i>Cannilie</i>, dexterously, gently.</li> + +<li><i>Cantie</i>, or <i>canty</i>, cheerful, merry.</li> + +<li><i>Cantraip</i>, a charm, a spell.</li> + +<li><i>Cap-stane</i>, cape-stone, topmost stone of the building.</li> + +<li><i>Car</i>, a rustic cart with or without wheels.</li> + +<li><i>Careerin’</i>, moving cheerfully.</li> + +<li><i>Castock</i>, the stalk of a cabbage.</li> + +<li><i>Carl</i>, an old man.</li> + +<li><i>Carl-hemp</i>, the male stalk of hemp, easily known by its superior strength and stature, and being without seed.</li> + +<li><i>Carlin</i>, a stout old woman.</li> + +<li><i>Cartes</i>, cards.</li> + +<li><i>Caudron</i>, a cauldron.</li> + +<li><i>Cauk and keel</i>, chalk and red clay.</li> + +<li><i>Cauld</i>, cold.</li> + +<li><i>Caup</i>, a wooden drinking vessel, a cup.</li> + +<li><i>Cavie</i>, a hen-coop.</li> + +<li><i>Chanter</i>, drone of a bagpipe.</li> + +<li><i>Chap</i>, a person, a fellow.</li> + +<li><i>Chaup</i>, a stroke, a blow.</li> + +<li><i>Cheek for chow</i>, close and united, brotherly, side by side.</li> + +<li><i>Cheekit</i>, cheeked.</li> + +<li><i>Cheep</i>, a chirp, to chirp.</li> + +<li><i>Chiel</i>, or <i>cheal</i>, a young fellow.</li> + +<li><i>Chimla</i>, or <i>chimlie</i>, a fire-grate, fire-place.</li> + +<li><i>Chimla-lug</i>, the fire-side.</li> + +<li><i>Chirps</i>, cries of a young bird.</li> + +<li><i>Chittering</i>, shivering, trembling.</li> + +<li><i>Chockin</i>, choking.</li> + +<li><i>Chow</i>, to chew; a quid of tobacco.</li> + +<li><i>Chuckie</i>, a brood-hen.</li> + +<li><i>Chuffie</i>, fat-faced.</li> + +<li><i>Clachan</i>, a small village about a church, a hamlet.</li> + +<li><i>Claise</i>, or <i>claes</i>, clothes.</li> + +<li><i>Claith</i>, cloth.</li> + +<li><i>Claithing</i>, clothing.</li> + +<li><i>Clavers and havers</i>, agreeable nonsense, to talk foolishly.</li> + +<li><i>Clapper-claps</i>, the clapper of a mill; it is now silenced.</li> + +<li><i>Clap-clack</i>, clapper of a mill.</li> + +<li><i>Clartie</i>, dirty, filthy.</li> + +<li><i>Clarkit</i>, wrote.</li> + +<li><i>Clash</i>, an idle tale.</li> + +<li><i>Clatter</i>, to tell little idle stories, an idle story.</li> + +<li><i>Claught</i>, snatched at, laid hold of.</li> + +<li><i>Claut</i>, to clean, to scrape.</li> + +<li><i>Clauted</i>, scraped.</li> + +<li><i>Claw</i>, to scratch.</li> + +<li><i>Cleed</i>, to clothe.</li> + +<li><i>Cleek</i>, hook, snatch.</li> + +<li><i>Cleekin</i>, a brood of chickens, or ducks.</li> + +<li><i>Clegs</i>, the gad flies.</li> + +<li><i>Clinkin</i>, “clinking down,” sitting down hastily.</li> + +<li><i>Clinkumbell</i>, the church bell; he who rings it; a sort of beadle.</li> + +<li><i>Clips</i>, wool-shears.</li> + +<li><i>Clishmaclaver</i>, idle conversation.</li> + +<li><i>Clock</i>, to hatch, a beetle.</li> + +<li><i>Clockin</i>, hatching.</li> + +<li><i>Cloot</i>, the hoof of a cow, sheep, &c.</li> + +<li><i>Clootie</i>, a familiar name for the devil.</li> + +<li><i>Clour</i>, a bump, or swelling, after a blow.</li> + +<li><i>Cloutin</i>, repairing with cloth.</li> + +<li><i>Cluds</i>, clouds.</li> + +<li><i>Clunk</i>, the sound in setting down an empty bottle.</li> + +<li><i>Coaxin</i>, wheedling.</li> + +<li><i>Coble</i>, a fishing-boat.</li> + +<li><i>Cod</i>, a pillow.</li> + +<li><i>Coft</i>, bought.</li> + +<li><i>Cog</i>, and <i>coggie</i>, a wooden dish.</li> + +<li><i>Coila</i>, from Kyle, a district in Ayrshire, so called, saith tradition, from Coil, or Coilus, a Pictish monarch.</li> + +<li><i>Collie</i>, a general, and sometimes a particular name for country curs.</li> + +<li><i>Collie-shangie</i>, a quarrel among dogs, an Irish row.</li> + +<li><i>Commaun</i>, command.</li> + +<li><i>Convoyed</i>, accompanied lovingly.</li> + +<li><i>Cool’d in her linens</i>, cool’d in her death-shift.</li> + +<li><i>Cood</i>, the cud.</li> + +<li><i>Coof</i>, a blockhead, a ninny.</li> + +<li><i>Cookit</i>, appeared and disappeared by fits.</li> + +<li><i>Cooser</i>, a stallion.</li> + +<li><i>Coost</i>, did cast.</li> + +<li><i>Coot</i>, the ankle, a species of water-fowl.</li> + +<li><i>Corbies</i>, blood crows.</li> + +<li><i>Cootie</i>, a wooden dish, rough-legged.</li> + +<li><i>Core</i>, corps, party, clan.</li> + +<li><i>Corn’t</i>, fed with oats.</li> + +<li><i>Cotter</i>, the inhabitant of a cot-house, or cottage.</li> + +<li><i>Couthie</i>, kind, loving.</li> + +<li><i>Cove</i>, a cave.</li> + +<li><i>Cowe</i>, to terrify, to keep under, to lop.</li> + +<li><i>Cowp</i>, to barter, to tumble over.</li> + +<li><i>Cowp the cran</i>, to tumble a full bucket or basket.</li> + +<li><i>Cowpit</i>, tumbled.</li> + +<li><i>Cowrin</i>, cowering.</li> + +<li><i>Cowte</i>, a colt.</li> + +<li><i>Cosie</i>, snug.</li> + +<li><i>Crabbit</i>, crabbed, fretful.</li> + +<li><i>Creuks</i>, a disease of horses.</li> + +<li><i>Crack</i>, conversation, to converse, to boast.</li> + +<li><i>Crackin’</i>, cracked, conversing, conversed.</li> + +<li><i>Craft</i>, or <i>croft</i>, a field near a house, in old husbandry.</li> + +<li><i>Craig</i>, <i>craigie</i>, neck.</li> + +<li><i>Craiks</i>, cries or calls incessantly, a bird, the corn-rail.</li> + +<li><i>Crambo-clink</i>, or <i>crambo-jingle</i>, rhymes, doggerel verses.</li> + +<li><i>Crank</i>, the noise of an ungreased wheel—metaphorically inharmonious verse.</li> + +<li><i>Crankous</i>, fretful, captious.</li> + +<li><i>Cranreuch</i>, the hoar-frost, called in Nithsdale “frost-rhyme.”</li> + +<li><i>Crap</i>, a crop, to crop.</li> + +<li><i>Craw</i>, a crow of a cock, a rook.</li> + +<li><i>Creel</i>, a basket, to have one’s wits in a creel, to be crazed, to be fascinated.</li> + +<li><i>Creshie</i>, greasy.</li> + +<li><i>Crood</i>, or <i>Croud</i>, to coo as a dove.</li> + +<li><i>Croon</i>, a hollow and continued moan; to make a noise like the low roar of a bull; to hum a tune.</li> + +<li><i>Crooning</i>, humming.</li> + +<li><i>Crouchie</i>, crook-backed.</li> + +<li><i>Crouse</i>, cheerful, courageous.</li> + +<li><i>Crously</i>, cheerfully, courageously.</li> + +<li><i>Crowdie</i>, a composition of oatmeal, boiled water and butter; sometimes made from the broth of beef, mutton, &c. &c.</li> + +<li><i>Crowdie time</i>, breakfast time.</li> + +<li><i>Crowlin</i>, crawling, a deformed creeping thing.</li> + +<li><i>Crummie’s nicks</i>, marks on the horns of a cow.</li> + +<li><i>Crummock</i>, <i>Crummet</i>, a cow with crooked horns.</li> + +<li><i>Crummock driddle</i>, walk slowly, leaning on a staff with a crooked head.</li> + +<li><i>Crump-crumpin</i>, hard and brittle, spoken of bread; frozen snow yielding to the foot.</li> + +<li><i>Crunt</i>, a blow on the head with a cudgel.</li> + +<li><i>Cuddle</i>, to clasp and caress.</li> + +<li><i>Cummock</i>, a short staff, with a crooked head.</li> + +<li><i>Curch</i>, a covering for the head, a kerchief.</li> + +<li><i>Curchie</i>, a curtesy, female obeisance.</li> + +<li><i>Curler</i>, a player at a game on the ice, practised in Scotland, called curling.</li> + +<li><i>Curlie</i>, curled, whose hair falls naturally in ringlets.</li> + +<li><i>Curling</i>, a well-known game on the ice.</li> + +<li><i>Curmurring</i>, murmuring, a slight rumbling noise.</li> + +<li><i>Curpin</i>, the crupper, the rump.</li> + +<li><i>Curple</i>, the rear.</li> + +<li><i>Cushat</i>, the dove, or wood-pigeon.</li> + +<li><i>Cutty</i>, short, a spoon broken in the middle.</li> + +<li><i>Cutty Stool</i>, or, <i>Creepie Chair</i>, the seat of shame, stool of repentance.</li> + +</ul> +<p class="std2">D.</p> +<ul> +<li><i>Daddie</i>, a father.</li> + +<li><i>Daffin</i>, merriment, foolishness.</li> + +<li><i>Daft</i>, merry, giddy, foolish; <i>Daft-buckie</i>, mad fish.</li> + +<li><i>Daimen</i>, rare, now and then; <i>Daimen icker</i>, an ear of corn occasionally.</li> + +<li><i>Dainty</i>, pleasant, good-humored, agreeable, rare.</li> + +<li><i>Dandered</i>, wandered.</li> + +<li><i>Darklins</i>, darkling, without light.</li> + +<li><i>Daud</i>, to thrash, to abuse; <i>Daudin-showers</i>, rain urged by wind.</li> + +<li><i>Daur</i>, to dare; <i>Daurt</i>, dared.</li> + +<li><i>Daurg</i>, or <i>Daurk</i>, a day’s labour.</li> + +<li><i>Daur</i>, <i>daurna</i>, dare, dare not.</li> + +<li><i>Davoc</i>, diminutive of Davie, as Davie is of David.</li> + +<li><i>Dawd</i>, a large piece.</li> + +<li><i>Dawin</i>, dawning of the day.</li> + +<li><i>Dawtit</i>, <i>dawtet</i>, fondled, caressed.</li> + +<li><i>Dearies</i>, diminutive of dears, sweethearts.</li> + +<li><i>Dearthfu’</i>, dear, expensive.</li> + +<li><i>Deave</i>, to deafen.</li> + +<li><i>Deil-ma-care</i>, no matter for all that.</li> + +<li><i>Deleerit</i>, delirious.</li> + +<li><i>Descrive</i>, to describe, to perceive.</li> + +<li><i>Deuks</i>, ducks.</li> + +<li><i>Dight</i>, to wipe, to clean corn from chaff.</li> + +<li><i>Ding</i>, to worst, to push, to surpass, to excel.</li> + +<li><i>Dink</i>, neat, lady-like.</li> + +<li><i>Dinna</i>, do not.</li> + +<li><i>Dirl</i>, a slight tremulous stroke or pain, a tremulous motion.</li> + +<li><i>Distain</i>, stain.</li> + +<li><i>Dizzen</i>, a dozen.</li> + +<li><i>Dochter</i>, daughter.</li> + +<li><i>Doited</i>, stupefied, silly from age.</li> + +<li><i>Dolt</i>, stupefied, crazed; also a fool.</li> + +<li><i>Donsie</i>, unlucky, affectedly neat and trim, pettish.</li> + +<li><i>Doodle</i>, to dandle.</li> + +<li><i>Dool</i>, sorrow, to lament, to mourn.</li> + +<li><i>Doos</i>, doves, pigeons.</li> + +<li><i>Dorty</i>, saucy, nice.</li> + +<li><i>Douse</i>, or <i>douce</i>, sober, wise, prudent.</li> + +<li><i>Doucely</i>, soberly, prudently.</li> + +<li><i>Dought</i>, was or were able.</li> + +<li><i>Doup</i>, backside.</li> + +<li><i>Doup-skelper</i>, one that strikes the tail.</li> + +<li><i>Dour and din</i>, sullen and sallow</li> + +<li><i>Douser</i>, more prudent.</li> + +<li><i>Dow</i>, am or are able, can.</li> + +<li><i>Dowff</i>, pithless, wanting force.</li> + +<li><i>Dowie</i>, worn with grief, fatigue, &c., half asleep.</li> + +<li><i>Downa</i>, am or are not able, cannot.</li> + +<li><i>Doylt</i>, wearied, exhausted.</li> + +<li><i>Dozen</i>, stupified, the effects of age, to dozen, to benumb.</li> + +<li><i>Drab</i>, a young female beggar; to spot, to stain.</li> + +<li><i>Drap</i>, a drop, to drop.</li> + +<li><i>Drapping</i>, dropping.</li> + +<li><i>Draunting</i>, drawling, speaking with a sectarian tone.</li> + +<li><i>Dreep</i>, to ooze, to drop.</li> + +<li><i>Dreigh</i>, tedious, long about it, lingering.</li> + +<li><i>Dribble</i>, drizzling, trickling.</li> + +<li><i>Driddle</i>, the motion of one who tries to dance but moves the middle only.</li> + +<li><i>Drift</i>, a drove, a flight of fowls, snow moved by the wind.</li> + +<li><i>Droddum</i>, the breech.</li> + +<li><i>Drone</i>, part of a bagpipe, the chanter.</li> + +<li><i>Droop rumpl’t</i>, that droops at the crupper.</li> + +<li><i>Droukit</i>, wet.</li> + +<li><i>Drouth</i>, thirst, drought.</li> + +<li><i>Drucken</i>, drunken.</li> + +<li><i>Drumly</i>, muddy.</li> + +<li><i>Drummock</i> or <i>Drammock</i>, meal and water mixed, raw.</li> + +<li><i>Drunt</i>, pet, sour humour.</li> + +<li><i>Dub</i>, a small pond, a hollow filled with rain water.</li> + +<li><i>Duds</i>, rags, clothes.</li> + +<li><i>Duddie</i>, ragged.</li> + +<li><i>Dung-dang</i>, worsted, pushed, stricken.</li> + +<li><i>Dunted</i>, throbbed, beaten.</li> + +<li><i>Dush-dunsh</i>, to push, or butt as a ram.</li> + +<li><i>Dusht</i>, overcome with superstitious fear, to drop down suddenly.</li> + +<li><i>Dyvor</i>, bankrupt, or about to become one.</li> +</ul> + +<p class="std2">E.</p> +<ul> +<li><i>E’e</i>, the eye.</li> + +<li><i>Een</i>, the eyes, the evening.</li> + +<li><i>Eebree</i>, the eyebrow.</li> + +<li><i>Eenin’</i>, the evening.</li> + +<li><i>Eerie</i>, frighted, haunted, dreading spirits.</li> + +<li><i>Eild</i>, old age.</li> + +<li><i>Elbuck</i>, the elbow.</li> + +<li><i>Eldritch</i>, ghastly, frightful, elvish.</li> + +<li><i>En’</i>, end.</li> + +<li><i>Enbrugh</i>, Edinburgh.</li> + +<li><i>Eneugh</i>, and <i>aneuch</i>, enough.</li> + +<li><i>Especial</i>, especially.</li> + +<li><i>Ether-stone</i>, stone formed by adders, an adder bead.</li> + +<li><i>Ettle</i>, to try, attempt, aim.</li> + +<li><i>Eydent</i>, diligent.</li> +</ul> + +<p class="std2">F.</p> +<ul> +<li><i>Fa’</i>, fall, lot, to fall, fate.</li> + +<li><i>Fa’ that</i>, to enjoy, to try, to inherit.</li> + +<li><i>Faddom’t</i>, fathomed, measured with the extended arms.</li> + +<li><i>Faes</i>, foes.</li> + +<li><i>Faem</i>, foam of the sea.</li> + +<li><i>Faiket</i>, forgiven or excused, abated, a demand.</li> + +<li><i>Fainness</i>, gladness, overcome with joy.</li> + +<li><i>Fairin’</i>, fairing, a present brought from a fair.</li> + +<li><i>Fallow</i>, fellow.</li> + +<li><i>Fand</i>, did find.</li> + +<li><i>Farl</i>, a cake of bread; third part of a cake.</li> + +<li><i>Fash</i>, trouble, care, to trouble, to care for.</li> + +<li><i>Fasheous</i>, troublesome.</li> + +<li><i>Fasht</i>, troubled.</li> + +<li><i>Fasten e’en</i>, Fasten’s even.</li> + +<li><i>Faught</i>, fight.</li> + +<li><i>Faugh</i>, a single furrow, out of lea, fallow.</li> + +<li><i>Fauld</i>, and <i>Fald</i>, a fold for sheep, to fold.</li> + +<li><i>Faut</i>, fault.</li> + +<li><i>Fawsont</i>, decent, seemly.</li> + +<li><i>Feal</i>, loyal, steadfast.</li> + +<li><i>Fearfu’</i>, fearful, frightful.</li> + +<li><i>Fear’t</i>, affrighted.</li> + +<li><i>Feat</i>, neat, spruce, clever.</li> + +<li><i>Fecht</i>, to fight.</li> + +<li><i>Fechtin’</i>, fighting.</li> + +<li><i>Feck</i> and <i>fek</i>, number, quantity.</li> + +<li><i>Fecket</i>, an under-waistcoat.</li> + +<li><i>Feckfu’</i>, large, brawny, stout.</li> + +<li><i>Feckless</i>, puny, weak, silly.</li> + +<li><i>Feckly</i>, mostly.</li> + +<li><i>Feg</i>, a fig.</li> + +<li><i>Fegs</i>, faith, an exclamation.</li> + +<li><i>Feide</i>, feud, enmity.</li> + +<li><i>Fell</i>, keen, biting; the flesh immediately under the skin; level moor.</li> + +<li><i>Felly</i>, relentless.</li> + +<li><i>Fend</i>, <i>Fen</i>, to make a shift, contrive to live.</li> + +<li><i>Ferlie</i> or <i>ferley</i>, to wonder, a wonder, a term of contempt.</li> + +<li><i>Fetch</i>, to pull by fits.</li> + +<li><i>Fetch’t</i>, pull’d intermittently.</li> + +<li><i>Fey</i>, strange; one marked for death, predestined.</li> + +<li><i>Fidge</i>, to fidget, fidgeting.</li> + +<li><i>Fidgin-fain</i>, tickled with pleasure.</li> + +<li><i>Fient</i>, fiend, a petty oath.</li> + +<li><i>Fien ma care</i>, the devil may care.</li> + +<li><i>Fier</i>, sound, healthy; a brother, a friend.</li> + +<li><i>Fierrie</i>, bustle, activity.</li> + +<li><i>Fissle</i>, to make a rustling noise, to fidget, bustle, fuss.</li> + +<li><i>Fit</i>, foot.</li> + +<li><i>Fittie-lan</i>, the nearer horse of the hindmost pair in the plough.</li> + +<li><i>Fizz</i>, to make a hissing noise, fuss, disturbance.</li> + +<li><i>Flaffen</i>, the motion of rags in the wind; of wings.</li> + +<li><i>Flainen</i>, flannel.</li> + +<li><i>Flandrekins</i>, foreign generals, soldiers of Flanders.</li> + +<li><i>Flang</i>, threw with violence.</li> + +<li><i>Fleech</i>, to supplicate in a flattering manner.</li> + +<li><i>Fleechin</i>, supplicating.</li> + +<li><i>Fleesh</i>, a fleece.</li> + +<li><i>Fleg</i>, a kick, a random blow, a fight.</li> + +<li><i>Flether</i>, to decoy by fair words.</li> + +<li><i>Flethrin</i>, <i>flethers</i>, flattering—smooth wheedling words.</li> + +<li><i>Fley</i>, to scare, to frighten.</li> + +<li><i>Flichter</i>, <i>flichtering</i>, to flutter as young nestlings do when their dam approaches.</li> + +<li><i>Flinders</i>, shreds, broken pieces.</li> + +<li><i>Flingin-tree</i>, a piece of timber hung by way of partition between +two horses in a stable; a flail.</li> + +<li><i>Flisk</i>, <i>flisky</i>, to fret at the yoke.</li> + +<li><i>Flisket</i>, fretted.</li> + +<li><i>Flitter</i>, to vibrate like the wings of small birds.</li> + +<li><i>Flittering</i>, fluttering, vibrating, moving tremulously from place to place.</li> + +<li><i>Flunkie</i>, a servant in livery.</li> + +<li><i>Flyte</i>, <i>flyting</i>, scold: flyting, scolding.</li> + +<li><i>Foor</i>, hastened.</li> + +<li><i>Foord</i>, a ford.</li> + +<li><i>Forbears</i>, forefathers.</li> + +<li><i>Forbye</i>, besides.</li> + +<li><i>Forfairn</i>, distressed, worn out, jaded, forlorn, destitute.</li> + +<li><i>Forgather</i>, to meet, to encounter with.</li> + +<li><i>Forgie</i>, to forgive.</li> + +<li><i>Forinawed</i>, worn out.</li> + +<li><i>Forjesket</i>, jaded with fatigue.</li> + +<li><i>Fou’</i>, full, drunk.</li> + +<li><i>Foughten</i>, <i>forfoughten</i>, troubled, fatigued.</li> + +<li><i>Foul-thief</i>, the devil, the arch-fiend.</li> + +<li><i>Fouth</i>, plenty, enough, or more than enough.</li> + +<li><i>Fow</i>, a measure, a bushel: also a pitchfork.</li> + +<li><i>Frae</i>, from.</li> + +<li><i>Freath</i>, froth, the frothing of ale in the tankard.</li> + +<li><i>Frien’</i>, friend.</li> + +<li><i>Frosty-calker</i>, the heels and front of a horse-shoe, turned sharply up for riding on an icy road.</li> + +<li><i>Fu’</i>, full.</li> + +<li><i>Fud</i>, the scut or tail of the hare, coney, &c.</li> + +<li><i>Fuff</i>, to blow intermittently.</li> + +<li><i>Fu-hant</i>, full-handed; said of one well to live in the world.</li> + +<li><i>Funnie</i>, full of merriment.</li> + +<li><i>Fur-ahin</i>, the hindmost horse on the right hand when ploughing.</li> + +<li><i>Furder</i>, further, succeed.</li> + +<li><i>Furm</i>, a form, a bench.</li> + +<li><i>Fusionless</i>, spiritless, without sap or soul.</li> + +<li><i>Fyke</i>, trifling cares, to be in a fuss about trifles.</li> + +<li><i>Fyte</i>, to soil, to dirty.</li> + +<li><i>Fylt</i>, soiled, dirtied.</li> +</ul> + +<p class="std2">G.</p> +<ul> +<li><i>Gab</i>, the mouth, to speak boldly or pertly.</li> + +<li><i>Gaberlunzie</i>, wallet-man, or tinker.</li> + +<li><i>Gae</i>, to go; <i>gaed</i>, went; <i>gane</i> or <i>gaen</i>, gone; <i>gaun</i>, going.</li> + +<li><i>Gaet</i> or <i>gate</i>, way, manner, road.</li> + +<li><i>Gairs</i>, parts of a lady’s gown.</li> + +<li><i>Gang</i>, to go, to walk.</li> + +<li><i>Gangrel</i>, a wandering person.</li> + +<li><i>Gar</i>, to make, to force to; <i>gar’t</i>, forced to.</li> + +<li><i>Garten</i>, a garter.</li> + +<li><i>Gash</i>, wise, sagacious, talkative, to converse.</li> + +<li><i>Gatty</i>, failing in body.</li> + +<li><i>Gaucy</i>, jolly, large, plump.</li> + +<li><i>Gaud</i> and <i>gad</i>, a rod or goad.</li> + +<li><i>Gaudsman</i>, one who drives the horses at the plough.</li> + +<li><i>Gaun</i>, going.</li> + +<li><i>Gaunted</i>, yawned, longed.</li> + +<li><i>Gawkie</i>, a thoughtless person, and something weak.</li> + +<li><i>Gaylies</i>, <i>gylie</i>, pretty well.</li> + +<li><i>Gear</i>, riches, goods of any kind.</li> + +<li><i>Geck</i>, to toss the head in wantonness or scorn.</li> + +<li><i>Ged</i>, a pike.</li> + +<li><i>Gentles</i>, great folks.</li> + +<li><i>Genty</i>, elegant.</li> + +<li><i>Geordie</i>, George, a guinea, called Geordie from the head of King George.</li> + +<li><i>Get</i> and <i>geat</i>, a child, a young one.</li> + +<li><i>Ghaist</i>, <i>ghaistis</i>, a ghost.</li> + +<li><i>Gie</i>, to give; <i>gied</i>, gave; <i>gien</i>, given.</li> + +<li><i>Giftie</i>, diminutive of gift.</li> + +<li><i>Giglets</i>, laughing maidens.</li> + +<li><i>Gillie</i>, <i>gillock</i>, diminutive of gill.</li> + +<li><i>Gilpey</i>, a half-grown, half-informed boy or girl, a romping lad, a hoyden.</li> + +<li><i>Gimmer</i>, an ewe two years old, a contemptuous term for a woman.</li> + +<li><i>Gin</i>, if, against.</li> + +<li><i>Gipsey</i>, a young girl.</li> + +<li><i>Girdle</i>, a round iron plate on which oat-cake is fired.</li> + +<li><i>Girn</i>, to grin, to twist the features in rage, agony, &c.; grinning.</li> + +<li><i>Gizz</i>, a periwig, the face.</li> + +<li><i>Glaikit</i>, inattentive, foolish.</li> + +<li><i>Glaive</i>, a sword.</li> + +<li><i>Glaizie</i>, glittering, smooth, like glass.</li> + +<li><i>Glaumed</i>, grasped, snatched at eagerly.</li> + +<li><i>Girran</i>, a poutherie girran, a little vigorous animal; a horse rather old, but yet active when heated.</li> + +<li><i>Gled</i>, a hawk.</li> + +<li><i>Gleg</i>, sharp, ready.</li> + +<li><i>Gley</i>, a squint, to squint; <i>a-gley</i>, off at the side, wrong.</li> + +<li><i>Gleyde</i>, an old horse.</li> + +<li><i>Glib-gabbit</i>, that speaks smoothly and readily.</li> + +<li><i>Glieb o’ lan’</i>, a portion of ground. The ground belonging to a manse is called “the glieb,” or portion.</li> + +<li><i>Glint</i>, <i>glintin’</i>, to peep.</li> + +<li><i>Glinted by</i>, went brightly past.</li> + +<li><i>Gloamin</i>, the twilight.</li> + +<li><i>Gloamin-shot</i>, twilight musing; a shot in the twilight.</li> + +<li><i>Glowr</i>, to stare, to look; a stare, a look.</li> + +<li><i>Glowran</i>, amazed, looking suspiciously, gazing.</li> + +<li><i>Glum</i>, displeased.</li> + +<li><i>Gor-cocks</i>, the red-game, red-cock, or moor-cock.</li> + +<li><i>Gowan</i>, the flower of the daisy, dandelion, hawkweed, &c.</li> + +<li><i>Gowany</i>, covered with daisies.</li> + +<li><i>Goavan</i>, walking as if blind, or without an aim.</li> + +<li><i>Gowd</i>, gold.</li> + +<li><i>Gowl</i>, to howl.</li> + +<li><i>Gowff</i>, a fool; the game of golf, to strike, as the bat does the ball at golf.</li> + +<li><i>Gowk</i>, term of contempt, the cuckoo.</li> + +<li><i>Grane</i> or <i>grain</i>, a groan, to groan; <i>graining</i>, groaning.</li> + +<li><i>Graip</i>, a pronged instrument for cleaning cowhouses.</li> + +<li><i>Graith</i>, accoutrements, furniture, dress.</li> + +<li><i>Grannie</i>, grandmother.</li> + +<li><i>Grape</i>, to grope; <i>grapet</i>, groped.</li> + +<li><i>Great</i>, <i>grit</i>, intimate, familiar.</li> + +<li><i>Gree</i>, to agree; <i>to bear the gree</i>, to be decidedly victor; <i>gree’t</i>, agreed.</li> + +<li><i>Green-graff</i>, green grave,</li> + +<li><i>Gruesome</i>, loathsomely, grim.</li> + +<li><i>Greet</i>, to shed tears, to weep; <i>greetin’</i>, weeping.</li> + +<li><i>Grey-neck-quill</i>, a quill unfit for a pen.</li> + +<li><i>Griens</i>, longs, desires.</li> + +<li><i>Grieves</i>, stewards.</li> + +<li><i>Grippit</i>, seized.</li> + +<li><i>Groanin-Maut</i>, drink for the cummers at a lying-in.</li> + +<li><i>Groat</i>, to get the whistle of one’s groat; to play a losing game, to feel the consequences of one’s folly.</li> + +<li><i>Groset</i>, a gooseberry.</li> + +<li><i>Grumph</i>, a grunt, to grunt.</li> + +<li><i>Grumphie</i>, <i>Grumphin</i>, a sow; the snorting of an angry pig.</li> + +<li><i>Grun’</i>, ground.</li> + +<li><i>Grunstone</i>, a grindstone.</li> + +<li><i>Gruntle</i>, the phiz, the snout, a grunting noise.</li> + +<li><i>Grunzie</i>, a mouth which pokes out like that of a pig.</li> + +<li><i>Grushie</i>, thick, of thriving growth.</li> + +<li><i>Gude</i>, <i>guid</i>, <i>guids</i>, the Supreme Being, good, goods.</li> + +<li><i>Gude auld-has-been</i>, was once excellent.</li> + +<li><i>Guid-mornin’</i>, good-morrow.</li> + +<li><i>Guid-e’en</i>, good evening.</li> + +<li><i>Guidfather</i> and <i>guidmother</i>, father-in-law, and mother-in-law.</li> + +<li><i>Guidman</i> and <i>guidwife</i>, the master and mistress of the house; <i>young guidman</i>, a man newly married.</li> + +<li><i>Gully</i> or <i>Gullie</i>, a large knife.</li> + +<li><i>Gulravage</i>, joyous mischief.</li> + +<li><i>Gumlie</i>, muddy.</li> + +<li><i>Gumption</i>, discernment, knowledge, talent.</li> + +<li><i>Gusty</i>, <i>gustfu’</i>, tasteful.</li> + +<li><i>Gut-scraper</i>, a fiddler.</li> + +<li><i>Gutcher</i>, grandsire.</li> +</ul> + +<p class="std2">H.</p> +<ul> +<li><i>Ha’</i>, hall.</li> + +<li><i>Ha’ Bible</i>, the great Bible that lies in the hall.</li> + +<li><i>Haddin’</i>, house, home, dwelling-place, a possession.</li> + +<li><i>Hae</i>, to have, to accept.</li> + +<li><i>Haen</i>, had, (the participle of hae); haven.</li> + +<li><i>Haet</i>, <i>fient haet</i>, a petty oath of negation; nothing.</li> + +<li><i>Haffet</i>, the temple, the side of the head.</li> + +<li><i>Hafflins</i>, nearly half, partly, not fully grown.</li> + +<li><i>Hag</i>, a gulf in mosses and moors, moss-ground.</li> + +<li><i>Haggis</i>, a kind of pudding, boiled in the stomach of a cow, or sheep.</li> + +<li><i>Hain</i>, to spare, to save, to lay out at interest.</li> + +<li><i>Hain’d</i>, spared; <i>hain’d gear</i>, hoarded money.</li> + +<li><i>Hairst</i>, harvest</li> + +<li><i>Haith</i>, petty oath.</li> + +<li><i>Haivers</i>, nonsense, speaking without thought.</li> + +<li><i>Hal’</i>, or <i>hald</i>, an abiding place.</li> + +<li><i>Hale</i>, or <i>haill</i>, whole, tight, healthy.</li> + +<li><i>Hallan</i>, a particular partition-wall in a cottage, or more properly a seat of turf at the outside.</li> + +<li><i>Hallowmass</i>, Hallow-eve, 31st October.</li> + +<li><i>Haly</i>, holy; “haly-pool,” holy well with healing properties.</li> + +<li><i>Hame</i>, home.</li> + +<li><i>Hammered</i>, the noise of feet like the din of hammers.</li> + +<li><i>Han’s breed</i>, hand’s breadth.</li> + +<li><i>Hanks</i>, thread as it comes from the measuring reel, quantities, &c.</li> + +<li><i>Hansel-throne</i>, throne when first occupied by a king.</li> + +<li><i>Hap</i>, an outer garment, mantle, plaid, &c.; to wrap, to cover, to hap.</li> + +<li><i>Harigals</i>, heart, liver, and lights of an animal.</li> + +<li><i>Hap-shackled</i>, when a fore and hind foot of a ram are fastened together to prevent leaping he is said to be hap-shackled. A wife is called “the kirk’s hap-shackle.”</li> + +<li><i>Happer</i>, a hopper, the hopper of a mill.</li> + +<li><i>Happing</i>, hopping.</li> + +<li><i>Hap-step-an’-loup</i>, hop, step, and leap.</li> + +<li><i>Harkit</i>, hearkened.</li> + +<li><i>Harn</i>, very coarse linen.</li> + +<li><i>Hash</i>, a fellow who knows not how to act with propriety.</li> + +<li><i>Hastit</i>, hastened.</li> + +<li><i>Haud</i>, to hold.</li> + +<li><i>Haughs</i>, low-lying, rich land, valleys.</li> + +<li><i>Haurl</i>, to drag, to pull violently.</li> + +<li><i>Haurlin</i>, tearing off, pulling roughly.</li> + +<li><i>Haver-meal</i>, oatmeal.</li> + +<li><i>Haveril</i>, a half-witted person, half-witted, one who habitually talks in a foolish or incoherent manner.</li> + +<li><i>Havins</i>, good manners, decorum, good sense.</li> + +<li><i>Hawkie</i>, a cow, properly one with a white face.</li> + +<li><i>Heapit</i>, heaped.</li> + +<li><i>Healsome</i> healthful, wholesome.</li> + +<li><i>Hearse</i>, hoarse.</li> + +<li><i>Heather</i>, heath.</li> + +<li><i>Hech</i>, oh strange! an exclamation during heavy work.</li> + +<li><i>Hecht</i>, promised, to foretell something that is to be got or given, foretold, the thing foretold, offered.</li> + +<li><i>Heckle</i>, a board in which are fixed a number of sharp steel prongs upright for dressing hemp, flax, &c.</li> + +<li><i>Hee balou</i>, words used to soothe a child.</li> + +<li><i>Heels-owre-gowdie</i>, topsy-turvy, turned the bottom upwards.</li> + +<li><i>Heeze</i>, to elevate, to rise, to lift.</li> + +<li><i>Hellim</i>, the rudder or helm.</li> + +<li><i>Herd</i>, to tend flocks, one who tends flocks.</li> + +<li><i>Herrin’</i>, a herring.</li> + +<li><i>Herry</i>, to plunder; most properly to plunder birds’ nests.</li> + +<li><i>Herryment</i>, plundering, devastation.</li> + +<li><i>Hersel-hirsel</i>, a flock of sheep, also a herd of cattle of any sort.</li> + +<li><i>Het</i>, hot, heated.</li> + +<li><i>Heugh</i>, a crag, a ravine; <i>coal-heugh</i>, a coal-pit, <i>lowin heugh</i>, a blazing pit.</li> + +<li><i>Hilch</i>, <i>hilchin’</i>, to halt, halting.</li> + +<li><i>Hiney</i>, honey.</li> + +<li><i>Hing</i>, to hang.</li> + +<li><i>Hirple</i>, to walk crazily, to walk lamely, to creep.</li> + +<li><i>Histie</i>, dry, chapt, barren.</li> + +<li><i>Hitcht</i>, a loop, made a knot.</li> + +<li><i>Hizzie</i>, huzzy, a young girl.</li> + +<li><i>Hoddin</i>, the motion of a husbandman riding on a cart-horse, humble.</li> + +<li><i>Hoddin-gray</i>, woollen cloth of a coarse quality, made by mingling one black fleece with a dozen white ones.</li> + +<li><i>Hoggie</i>, a two-year-old sheep.</li> + +<li><i>Hog-score</i>, a distance line in curling drawn across the rink. When a stone fails to cross it, a cry is raised of “A hog, a hog!” and it is removed.</li> + +<li><i>Hog-shouther</i>, a kind of horse-play by justling with the shoulder; to justle.</li> + +<li><i>Hoodie-craw</i>, a blood crow, corbie.</li> + +<li><i>Hool</i>, outer skin or case, a nutshell, a pea-husk.</li> + +<li><i>Hoolie</i>, slowly, leisurely.</li> + +<li><i>Hoord</i>, a hoard, to hoard.</li> + +<li><i>Hoordit</i>, hoarded.</li> + +<li><i>Horn</i>, a spoon made of horn.</li> + +<li><i>Hornie</i>, one of the many names of the devil.</li> + +<li><i>Host</i>, or <i>hoast</i>, to cough.</li> + +<li><i>Hostin</i>, coughing.</li> + +<li><i>Hotch’d</i>, turned topsy-turvy, blended, ruined, moved.</li> + +<li><i>Houghmagandie</i>, loose behaviour.</li> + +<li><i>Howlet</i>, an owl.</li> + +<li><i>Housie</i>, diminutive of house.</li> + +<li><i>Hove, hoved</i>, to heave, to swell.</li> + +<li><i>Howdie</i>, a midwife.</li> + +<li><i>Howe</i>, hollow, a hollow or dell.</li> + +<li><i>Howebackit</i>, sunk in the back, spoken of a horse.</li> + +<li><i>Howff</i>, a house of resort.</li> + +<li><i>Howk</i>, to dig.</li> + +<li><i>Howkit</i>, digged.</li> + +<li><i>Howkin’</i>, digging deep.</li> + +<li><i>Hoy, hoy’t</i>, to urge, urged.</li> + +<li><i>Hoyse</i>, a pull upwards. “Hoyse a creel,” to raise a basket; hence “hoisting creels.”</li> + +<li><i>Hoyte</i>, to amble crazily.</li> + +<li><i>Hughoc</i>, diminutive of Hughie, as Hughie is of Hugh.</li> + +<li><i>Hums and hankers</i>, mumbles and seeks to do what he cannot perform.</li> + +<li><i>Hunkers</i>, kneeling and falling back on the hams.</li> + +<li><i>Hurcheon</i>, a hedgehog.</li> + +<li><i>Hurdies</i>, the loins, the crupper.</li> + +<li><i>Hushion</i>, a cushion, also a stocking wanting the foot.</li> + +<li><i>Huchyalled</i>, to move with a hilch.</li> + +</ul> +<p class="std2">I.</p> +<ul> +<li><i>Icker</i>, an ear of corn.</li> + +<li><i>Ieroe</i>, a great grandchild.</li> + +<li><i>Ilk</i>, or <i>ilka</i>, each, every.</li> + +<li><i>Ill-deedie</i>, mischievous.</li> + +<li><i>Ill-willie</i>, ill-natured, malicious, niggardly.</li> + +<li><i>Ingine</i>, genius, ingenuity.</li> + +<li><i>Ingle</i>, fire, fire-place.</li> + +<li><i>Ingle-low</i>, light from the fire, flame from the hearth.</li> + +<li><i>I rede ye</i>, I advise ye, I warn ye.</li> + +<li><i>I’se</i>, I shall or will.</li> + +<li><i>Ither</i>, other, one another.</li> +</ul> + +<p class="std2">J.</p> +<ul> +<li><i>Jad</i>, jade; also a familiar term among country folks for a giddy young girl.</li> + +<li><i>Jauk</i>, to dally, to trifle.</li> + +<li><i>Jaukin’</i>, trifling, dallying.</li> + +<li><i>Jauner</i>, talking, and not always to the purpose.</li> + +<li><i>Jaup</i>, a jerk of water; to jerk, as agitated water.</li> + +<li><i>Jaw</i>, coarse raillery, to pour out, to shut, to jerk as water.</li> + +<li><i>Jillet</i>, a jilt, a giddy girl.</li> + +<li><i>Jimp</i>, to jump, slender in the waist, handsome.</li> + +<li><i>Jink</i>, to dodge, to turn a corner; a sudden turning, a corner.</li> + +<li><i>Jink an’ diddle</i>, moving to music, motion of a fiddler’s elbow. Starting here and there with a tremulous movement.</li> + +<li><i>Jinker</i>, that turns quickly, a gay sprightly girl.</li> + +<li><i>Jinkin’</i>, dodging, the quick motion of the bow on the fiddle.</li> + +<li><i>Jirt</i>, a jerk, the emission of water, to squirt.</li> + +<li><i>Jocteleg</i>, a kind of knife.</li> + +<li><i>Jouk</i>, to stoop, to bow the head, to conceal.</li> + +<li><i>Jow</i>, to <i>jow</i>, a verb, which includes both the swinging motion and pealing sound of a large bell; also the undulation of water.</li> + +<li><i>Jundie</i>, to justle, a push with the elbow.</li> + +</ul> +<p class="std2">K.</p> +<ul> +<li><i>Kae</i>, a daw.</li> + +<li><i>Kail</i>, colewort, a kind of broth.</li> + +<li><i>Kailrunt</i>, the stem of colewort.</li> + +<li><i>Kain</i>, fowls, &c., paid as rent by a farmer.</li> + +<li><i>Kebars</i>, rafters.</li> + +<li><i>Kebbuck</i>, a cheese.</li> + +<li><i>Keckle</i>, joyous cry; to cackle as a hen.</li> + +<li><i>Keek</i>, a keek, to peep.</li> + +<li><i>Kelpies</i>, a sort of mischievous water-spirit, said to haunt fords and ferries at night, especially in storms.</li> + +<li><i>Ken</i>, to know; <i>ken’d</i> or <i>ken’t</i>, knew.</li> + +<li><i>Kennin</i>, a small matter.</li> + +<li><i>Ket-Ketty</i>, matted, a fleece of wool.</li> + +<li><i>Kiaught</i>, carking, anxiety, to be in a flutter.</li> + +<li><i>Kilt</i>, to truss up the clothes.</li> + +<li><i>Kimmer</i>, a young girl, a gossip.</li> + +<li><i>Kin’</i>, kindred.</li> + +<li><i>Kin’</i>, kind.</li> + +<li><i>King’s-hood</i>, a certain part of the entrails of an ox.</li> + +<li><i>Kintra</i>, <i>kintrie</i>, country.</li> + +<li><i>Kirn</i>, the harvest supper, a churn.</li> + +<li><i>Kirsen</i>, to christen, to baptize.</li> + +<li><i>Kist</i>, a shop-counter.</li> + +<li><i>Kitchen</i>, anything that eats with bread, to serve for soup, gravy.</li> + +<li><i>Kittle</i>, to tickle, ticklish.</li> + +<li><i>Kittling</i>, a young cat. The ace of diamonds is called among rustics the kittlin’s e’e.</li> + +<li><i>Knaggie</i>, like knags, or points of rocks.</li> + +<li><i>Knappin-hammer</i>, a hammer for breaking stones; <i>knap</i>, to strike or break.</li> + +<li><i>Knurlin</i>, crooked but strong, knotty.</li> + +<li><i>Knowe</i>, a small, round hillock, a knoll.</li> + +<li><i>Kuittle</i>, to cuddle; <i>kuitlin</i>, cuddling, fondling.</li> + +<li><i>Kye</i>, cows.</li> + +<li><i>Kyle</i>, a district in Ayrshire.</li> + +<li><i>Kyte</i>, the belly.</li> + +<li><i>Kythe</i>, to discover, to show one’s self.</li> + +</ul> + + <p class="std2">L.</p> + +<ul> +<li><i>Labour</i>, thrash.</li> + +<li><i>Laddie</i>, diminutive of lad.</li> + +<li><i>Laggen</i>, the angle between the side and the bottom of a wooden dish.</li> + +<li><i>Laigh</i>, low.</li> + +<li><i>Lairing, lairie</i>, wading, and sinking in snow, mud &c., miry.</li> + +<li><i>Laith</i>, loath, impure.</li> + +<li><i>Laithfu</i>‘, bashful, sheepish, abstemious.</li> + +<li><i>Lallans</i>, Scottish dialect, Lowlands.</li> + +<li><i>Lambie</i>, diminutive of lamb.</li> + +<li><i>Lammas moon</i>, harvest-moon.</li> + +<li><i>Lampit</i>, kind of shell-fish, a limpet.</li> + +<li><i>Lan</i>‘, land, estate.</li> + +<li><i>Lan’-afore</i>, foremost horse in the plough.</li> + +<li><i>Lan’-ahin</i>, hindmost horse in the plough.</li> + +<li><i>Lane</i>, lone; <i>my lane, thy tune, &c.</i>, myself alone.</li> + +<li><i>Lanely</i>, lonely.</li> + +<li><i>Lang</i>, long; to <i>think lang</i>, to long, to weary.</li> + +<li><i>Lap</i>, did leap.</li> + +<li><i>Late and air</i>, late and early.</li> + +<li><i>Lave</i>, the rest, the remainder, the others.</li> + +<li><i>Laverock</i>, the lark.</li> + +<li><i>Lawlan’</i>, lowland.</li> + +<li><i>Lay my dead</i>, attribute my death.</li> + +<li><i>Leal</i>, loyal, true, faithful.</li> + +<li><i>Lear</i>, learning, lore.</li> + +<li><i>Lee-lang</i>, live-long.</li> + +<li><i>Leesome luve</i>, happy, gladsome love.</li> + +<li><i>Leeze me</i>, a phrase of congratulatory endearment; I am happy in thee or proud of thee.</li> + +<li><i>Leister</i>, a three-pronged and barbed dart for striking fish.</li> + +<li><i>Leugh</i>, did laugh.</li> + +<li><i>Leuk</i>, a look, to look.</li> + +<li><i>Libbet</i>, castrated.</li> + +<li><i>Lick, licket</i>, beat, thrashen.</li> + +<li><i>Lift</i>, sky, firmament.</li> + +<li><i>Lightly</i>, sneeringly, to sneer at, to undervalue.</li> + +<li><i>Lilt</i>, a ballad, a tune, to sing.</li> + +<li><i>Limmer</i>, a kept mistress, a strumpet.</li> + +<li><i>Limp’t</i>, limped, hobbled.</li> + +<li><i>Link</i>, to trip along; <i>linkin</i>, tripping along.</li> + +<li><i>Linn</i>, a waterfall, a cascade.</li> + +<li><i>Lint</i>, flax; <i>lint i’ the bell</i>, flax in flower.</li> + +<li><i>Lint-white</i>, a linnet, flaxen.</li> + +<li><i>Loan</i>, the place of milking.</li> + +<li><i>Loaning</i>, lane.</li> + +<li><i>Loof</i>, the palm of the hand.</li> + +<li><i>Loot</i>, did let.</li> + +<li><i>Looves</i>, the plural of loof.</li> + +<li><i>Losh man</i>! rustic exclamation modified from Lord man.</li> + +<li><i>Loun</i>, a follow, a ragamuffin, a woman of easy virtue.</li> + +<li><i>Loup</i>, leap, startled with pain.</li> + +<li><i>Louper-like</i>, lan-louper, a stranger of a suspected character.</li> + +<li><i>Lowe</i>, a flame.</li> + +<li><i>Lowin</i>‘, flaming; <i>lowin-drouth</i>, burning desire for drink.</li> + +<li><i>Lowrie</i>, abbreviation of Lawrence.</li> + +<li><i>Lowse</i>, to loose.</li> + +<li><i>Lowsed</i>, unbound, loosed.</li> + +<li><i>Lug</i>, the ear.</li> + +<li><i>Lug of the law</i>, at the judgment-seat.</li> + +<li><i>Lugget</i>, having a handle.</li> + +<li><i>Luggie</i>, a small wooden dish with a handle.</li> + +<li><i>Lum</i>, the chimney; <i>lum-head</i>, chimney-top.</li> + +<li><i>Lunch</i>, a large piece of cheese, flesh, &c.</li> + +<li><i>Lunt</i>, a column of smoke, to smoke, to walk quickly.</li> + +<li><i>Lyart</i>, of a mixed colour, gray.</li> +</ul> + +<p class="std2">M.</p> +<ul> +<li><i>Mae</i>, and <i>mair</i>, more.</li> + +<li><i>Maggot’s-meat</i>, food for the worms.</li> + +<li><i>Mahoun</i>, Satan.</li> + +<li><i>Mailen</i>, a farm.</li> + +<li><i>Maist</i>, most, almost.</li> + +<li><i>Maistly</i>, mostly, for the greater part.</li> + +<li><i>Mak</i>‘, to make; <i>makin</i>‘, making.</li> + +<li><i>Mally</i>, Molly, Mary.</li> + +<li><i>Mang</i>, among.</li> + +<li><i>Manse</i>, the house of the parish minister is called “the Manse.”</li> + +<li><i>Manteele</i>, a mantle.</li> + +<li><i>Mark</i>, marks. This and several other nouns which in English require an <i>s</i> to form the plural, are in Scotch, like the words sheep, deer, the same in both numbers.</li> + +<li><i>Mark, merk</i>, a Scottish coin, value thirteen shillings and four-pence.</li> + +<li><i>Marled</i>, party-coloured.</li> + +<li><i>Mar’s year</i>, the year 1715. Called Mar’s year from the rebellion of Erskine, Earl of Mar.</li> + +<li><i>Martial chuck,</i> the soldier’s camp-comrade, female companion.</li> + +<li><i>Mashlum</i>, mixed corn.</li> + +<li><i>Mask</i>, to mash, as malt, &c., to infuse.</li> + +<li><i>Maskin-pot</i>, teapot.</li> + +<li><i>Maukin</i>, a hare.</li> + +<li><i>Maun, mauna</i>, must, must not.</li> + +<li><i>Maut</i>, malt.</li> + +<li><i>Mavis</i>, the thrush.</li> + +<li><i>Maw</i>, to mow.</li> + +<li><i>Mawin</i>, mowing; <i>maun</i>, mowed; <i>maw’d</i>, mowed.</li> + +<li><i>Mawn</i>, a small basket, without a handle.</li> + +<li><i>Meere</i>, a mare.</li> + +<li><i>Melancholious</i>, mournful.</li> + +<li><i>Melder</i>, a load of corn, &c., sent to the mill to be ground.</li> + +<li><i>Mell</i>, to be intimate, to meddle, also a mallet for pounding barley in a stone trough.</li> + +<li><i>Melvie</i>, to soil with meal.</li> + +<li><i>Men</i>‘, to mend.</li> + +<li><i>Mense</i>, good manners, decorum.</li> + +<li><i>Menseless</i>, ill-bred, impudent.</li> + +<li><i>Merle</i>, the blackbird.</li> + +<li><i>Messin</i>, a small dog.</li> + +<li><i>Middin</i>, a dunghill.</li> + +<li><i>Middin-creels</i>, dung-baskets, panniers in which horses carry manure.</li> + +<li><i>Midden-hole</i>, a gutter at the bottom of a dunghill.</li> + +<li><i>Milkin-shiel</i> a place where cows or ewes are brought to be milked.</li> + +<li><i>Mim</i>, prim, affectedly meek.</li> + +<li><i>Mim-mou’d</i>, gentle-mouthed.</li> + +<li><i>Min</i>‘, to remember.</li> + +<li><i>Minawae</i>, minuet.</li> + +<li><i>Mind’t</i>, mind it, resolved, intending, remembered.</li> + +<li><i>Minnie</i>, mother, dam.</li> + +<li><i>Mirk</i>, dark.</li> + +<li><i>Misca</i>‘, to abuse, to call names; <i>misca’d</i>, abused.</li> + +<li><i>Mischanter</i>, accident.</li> + +<li><i>Misleard</i>, mischievous, unmannerly.</li> + +<li><i>Misteuk</i>, mistook.</li> + +<li><i>Mither,</i> mother.</li> + +<li><i>Mixtie-maxtie</i>, confusedly mixed, mish-mash.</li> + +<li><i>Moistify</i>, <i>moistified</i>, to moisten, to soak; moistened, soaked.</li> + +<li><i>Mons-Meg,</i> a large piece of ordnance, to be seen at the Castle of Edinburgh, composed of iron bars welded together and then hooped.</li> + +<li><i>Mools</i>, earth.</li> + +<li><i>Mony</i>, or <i>monie</i>, many.</li> + +<li><i>Moop,</i> to nibble as a sheep.</li> + +<li><i>Moorlan</i>, of or belonging to moors.</li> + +<li><i>Morn</i>, the next day, to-morrow.</li> + +<li><i>Mou</i>, the mouth.</li> + +<li><i>Moudiwort</i>, a mole.</li> + +<li><i>Mousie</i>, diminutive of mouse.</li> + +<li><i>Muckle</i>, or <i>mickle</i>, great, big, much.</li> + +<li><i>Muses-stank</i>, muses-rill, a stank, slow-flowing water.</li> + +<li><i>Musie</i>, diminutive of muse.</li> + +<li><i>Muslin-kail</i>, broth, composed simply of water, shelled barley, and greens; thin poor broth.</li> + +<li><i>Mutchkin</i>, an English pint.</li> + +<li><i>Mysel</i>, myself.</li> + +</ul> +<p class="std2">N.</p> +<ul> +<li><i>Na</i>‘, no, not, nor.</li> + +<li><i>Nae</i>, or <i>na</i>, no, not any.</li> + +<li><i>Naething</i>, or <i>naithing</i>, nothing.</li> + +<li><i>Naig</i>, a horse, a nag.</li> + +<li><i>Nane</i>, none.</li> + +<li><i>Nappy</i>, ale, to be tipsy.</li> + +<li><i>Negleckit</i>, neglected.</li> + +<li><i>Neebor</i>, a neighbour.</li> + +<li><i>Neuk</i>, nook.</li> + +<li><i>Neist</i>, next.</li> + +<li><i>Nieve, neif</i>, the fist</li> + +<li><i>Nievefu’</i>, handful.</li> + +<li><i>Niffer</i>, an exchange, to barter.</li> + +<li><i>Niger</i>, a negro.</li> + +<li><i>Nine-tailed cat</i>, a hangman’s whip.</li> + +<li><i>Nit</i>, a nut.</li> + +<li><i>Norland</i>, of or belonging to the north.</li> + +<li><i>Notic’t</i>, noticed.</li> + +<li><i>Nowte</i>, black cattle.</li> + +</ul> + +<p class="std2">O.</p> +<ul> +<li><i>O’</i>, of.</li> + +<li><i>O’ergang</i>, overbearingness, to treat with indignity, literally to tread.</li> + +<li><i>O’erlay</i>, an upper cravat.</li> + +<li><i>Ony</i>, or <i>onie</i>, any.</li> + +<li><i>Or</i>, is often used for ere, before.</li> + +<li><i>Orra-duddies</i>, superfluous rags, old clothes.</li> + +<li><i>O’t</i>, of it.</li> + +<li><i>Ourie</i>, drooping, shivering.</li> + +<li><i>Oursel, oursels</i>, ourselves.</li> + +<li><i>Outlers</i>, outliers; cattle unhoused.</li> + +<li><i>Ower, owre</i>, over.</li> + +<li><i>Owre-hip</i>, striking with a forehammer by bringing it with a swing over the hip.</li> + +<li><i>Owsen</i>, oxen.</li> + +<li><i>Oxtered</i>, carried or supported under the arm.</li> + +</ul> +<p class="std2">P.</p> +<ul> +<li><i>Pack</i>, intimate, familiar: twelve stone of wool.</li> + +<li><i>Paidle, paidlen</i>, to walk with difficulty, as if in water.</li> + +<li><i>Painch</i>, paunch.</li> + +<li><i>Paitrick</i>, partridge.</li> + +<li><i>Pang</i>, to cram.</li> + +<li><i>Parle</i>, courtship.</li> + +<li><i>Parishen</i>, parish.</li> + +<li><i>Parritch</i>, oatmeal pudding, a well-known Scotch drink.</li> + +<li><i>Pat</i>, did put, a pot.</li> + +<li><i>Pattle</i>, or <i>pettle</i>, a small spades to clean the plough.</li> + +<li><i>Paughty</i>, proud, haughty.</li> + +<li><i>Pauky</i>, cunning, sly.</li> + +<li><i>Pay’t</i>, paid, beat.</li> + +<li><i>Peat-reek</i>, the smoke of burning turf, a bitter exhalation, whisky.</li> + +<li><i>Pech</i>, to fetch the breath shortly, as in an asthma.</li> + +<li><i>Pechan</i>, the crop, the stomach.</li> + +<li><i>Pechin</i>, respiring with difficulty.</li> + +<li><i>Pennie</i>, riches.</li> + +<li><i>Pet</i>, a domesticated sheep, &c., a favourite.</li> + +<li><i>Pettle</i>, to cherish.</li> + +<li><i>Philabeg</i>, the kilt.</li> + +<li><i>Phraise</i>, fair speeches, flattery, to flatter.</li> + +<li><i>Phraisin</i>, flattering.</li> + +<li><i>Pibroch</i>, a martial air.</li> + +<li><i>Pickle</i>, a small quantity, one grain of corn.</li> + +<li><i>Pigmy-scraper</i>, little fiddler; a term of contempt for a bad player.</li> + +<li><i>Pint-stomp</i>, a two-quart measure.</li> + +<li><i>Pine</i>, pain, uneasiness.</li> + +<li><i>Pingle</i>, a small pan for warming children’s sops.</li> + +<li><i>Plack</i>, an old Scotch coin, the third part of an English penny.</li> + +<li><i>Plackless</i>, pennyless, without money.</li> + +<li><i>Plaidie</i>, diminutive of plaid.</li> + +<li><i>Platie</i>, diminutive of plate.</li> + +<li><i>Plew</i>, or <i>pleugh</i>, a plough.</li> + +<li><i>Pliskie</i>, a trick.</li> + +<li><i>Plumrose</i>, primrose.</li> + +<li><i>Pock</i>, a meal-bag.</li> + +<li><i>Poind</i>, to seize on cattle, or take the goods as the laws of Scotland allow, for rent, &c.</li> + +<li><i>Poorteth</i>, poverty.</li> + +<li><i>Posie</i>, a nosegay, a garland.</li> + +<li><i>Pou, pou’d</i>, to pull, pulled.</li> + +<li><i>Pouk</i>, to pluck.</li> + +<li><i>Poussie</i>, a hare or cat.</li> + +<li><i>Pouse</i>, to pluck with the hand.</li> + +<li><i>Pout</i>, a polt, a chick.</li> + +<li><i>Pou’t</i>, did pull.</li> + +<li><i>Poutherey</i>, fiery, active.</li> + +<li><i>Pouthery</i>, like powder.</li> + +<li><i>Pow</i>, the head, the skull.</li> + +<li><i>Pownie</i>, a little horse, a pony.</li> + +<li><i>Powther</i>, or <i>pouther</i>, gunpowder.</li> + +<li><i>Preclair</i>, supereminent.</li> + +<li><i>Preen</i>, a pin.</li> + +<li><i>Prent</i>, printing, print.</li> + +<li><i>Prie</i>, to taste; <i>prie’d</i>, tasted.</li> + +<li><i>Prief</i>, proof.</li> + +<li><i>Prig</i>, to cheapen, to dispute; <i>priggin</i>, cheapening.</li> + +<li><i>Primsie</i>, demure, precise.</li> + +<li><i>Propone</i>, to lay down, to propose.</li> + +<li><i>Pund, pund o’ tow</i>, pound, pound weight of the refuse of flax.</li> + +<li><i>Pyet</i>, a magpie.</li> + +<li><i>Pyle, a pyle, o’ caff</i>, a single grain of chaff.</li> + +<li><i>Pystle</i>, epistle.</li> +</ul> + +<p class="std2">Q.</p> +<ul> +<li><i>Quat</i>, quit</li> + +<li><i>Quak</i>, the cry of a duck.</li> + +<li><i>Quech</i>, a drinking-cup made of wood with two handles.</li> + +<li><i>Quey</i>, a cow from one to two years old, a heifer.</li> + +<li><i>Quines</i>, queans.</li> + +<li><i>Quakin</i>, quaking.</li> +</ul> + +<p class="std2">R.</p> +<ul> +<li><i>Ragweed</i>, herb-ragwort.</li> + +<li><i>Raible</i>, to rattle, nonsense.</li> + +<li><i>Rair</i>, to roar.</li> + +<li><i>Raize</i>, to madden, to inflame.</li> + +<li><i>Ramfeezled</i>, fatigued, overpowered.</li> + +<li><i>Rampin’</i>, raging.</li> + +<li><i>Ramstam</i>, thoughtless, forward.</li> + +<li><i>Randie</i>, a scolding sturdy beggar, a shrew.</li> + +<li><i>Rantin</i>‘, joyous.</li> + +<li><i>Raploch</i>, properly a coarse cloth, but used for coarse.</li> + +<li><i>Rarely</i>, excellently, very well.</li> + +<li><i>Rash</i>, a rush; <i>rash-buss</i>, a bush of rushes.</li> + +<li><i>Ratton</i>, a rat.</li> + +<li><i>Raucle</i>, rash, stout, fearless, reckless.</li> + +<li><i>Raught</i>, reached.</li> + +<li><i>Raw</i>, a row.</li> + +<li><i>Rax</i>, to stretch.</li> + +<li><i>Ream</i>, cream, to cream.</li> + +<li><i>Reamin’</i>, brimful, frothing.</li> + +<li><i>Reave</i>, take by force.</li> + +<li><i>Rebute</i>, to repulse, rebuke.</li> + +<li><i>Reck</i>, to heed.</li> + +<li><i>Rede</i>, counsel, to counsel, to discourse.</li> + +<li><i>Red-peats</i>, burning turfs.</li> + +<li><i>Red-wat-shod</i>, walking in blood over the shoe-tops.</li> + +<li><i>Red-wud</i>, stark mad.</li> + +<li><i>Ree</i>, half drunk, fuddled; <i>a ree yaud</i>, a wild horse.</li> + +<li><i>Reek</i>, smoke.</li> + +<li><i>Reekin’</i>, smoking.</li> + +<li><i>Reekit</i>, smoked, smoky.</li> + +<li><i>Reestit</i>, stood restive; stunted, withered.</li> + +<li><i>Remead</i>, remedy.</li> + +<li><i>Requite</i>, requited.</li> + +<li><i>Restricked</i>, restricted.</li> + +<li><i>Rew</i>, to smile, look affectionately, tenderly.</li> + +<li><i>Rickles</i>, shocks of corn, stooks.</li> + +<li><i>Riddle</i>, instrument for purifying corn.</li> + +<li><i>Rief-randies</i>, men who take the property of others, accompanied by violence and rude words.</li> + +<li><i>Rig</i>, a ridge.</li> + +<li><i>Rin</i>, to run, to melt; <i>rinnin’</i>, running.</li> + +<li><i>Rink</i>, the course of the stones, a term in curling on ice.</li> + +<li><i>Rip</i>, a handful of unthreshed corn.</li> + +<li><i>Ripples</i>, pains in the back and loins, sounds which usher in death.</li> + +<li><i>Ripplin-kame</i>, instrument for dressing flax.</li> + +<li><i>Riskit</i>, a noise like the tearing of roots.</li> + +<li><i>Rockin’</i>, a denomination for a friendly visit. In former times young women met with their distaffs during the winter evenings, to sing, and spin, and be merry; these were called “rockings.”</li> + +<li><i>Roke</i>, distaff.</li> + +<li><i>Rood</i>, stands likewise for the plural, roods.</li> + +<li><i>Roon</i>, a shred, the selvage of woollen cloth.</li> + +<li><i>Roose</i>, to praise, to commend.</li> + +<li><i>Roun’</i>, round, in the circle of neighbourhood.</li> + +<li><i>Roupet</i>, hoarse, as with a cold.</li> + +<li><i>Row</i>, to roll, to rap, to roll as water.</li> + +<li><i>Row’t</i>, rolled, wrapped.</li> + +<li><i>Rowte</i>, to low, to bellow.</li> + +<li><i>Rowth</i>, plenty.</li> + +<li><i>Rowtin’</i>, lowing.</li> + +<li><i>Rozet</i>, rosin.</li> + +<li><i>Rumble-gumption</i>, rough commonsense.</li> + +<li><i>Run-deils</i>, downright devils.</li> + +<li><i>Rung</i>, a cudgel.</li> + +<li><i>Runt</i>, the stem of colewort or cabbage.</li> + +<li><i>Runkled</i>, wrinkled.</li> + +<li><i>Ruth</i>, a woman’s name, the book so called, sorrow.</li> + +<li><i>Ryke</i>, reach.</li> + +</ul> + +<p class="std2">S.</p> +<ul> + +<li><i>Sae</i>, so.</li> + +<li><i>Saft</i>, soft.</li> + +<li><i>Sair</i>, to serve, a sore; <i>sairie</i>, sorrowful.</li> + +<li><i>Sairly</i>, sorely.</li> + +<li><i>Sair’t</i>, served.</li> + +<li><i>Sark</i>, a shirt.</li> + +<li><i>Sarkit</i>, provided in shirts.</li> + +<li><i>Saugh</i>, willow.</li> + +<li><i>Saugh-woodies</i>, withies, made of willows, now supplanted by ropes and chains.</li> + +<li><i>Saul</i>, soul.</li> + +<li><i>Saumont</i>, salmon.</li> + +<li><i>Saunt, sauntet</i>, saint; to varnish.</li> + +<li><i>Saut</i>, salt.</li> + +<li><i>Saw</i>, to sow.</li> + +<li><i>Sawin’</i>, sowing.</li> + +<li><i>Sax</i>, six.</li> + +<li><i>Scaud</i>, to scald.</li> + +<li><i>Scauld</i>, to scold.</li> + +<li><i>Scaur</i>, apt to be scared; a precipitous bank of earth which the stream has washed red.</li> + +<li><i>Scawl</i>, scold.</li> + +<li><i>Scone</i>, a kind of bread.</li> + +<li><i>Sconner</i>, a loathing, to loath.</li> + +<li><i>Scraich</i> and <i>Scriegh</i>, to scream, as a hen or partridge.</li> + +<li><i>Screed</i>, to tear, a rent; <i>screeding</i>, tearing.</li> + +<li><i>Scrieve, scrieven,</i> to glide softly, gleesomely along.</li> + +<li><i>Scrimp</i>, to scant.</li> + +<li><i>Scrimpet</i>, scant, scanty.</li> + +<li><i>Scroggie</i>, covered with underwood, bushy.</li> + +<li><i>Sculdudrey</i>, fornication.</li> + +<li><i>Seizin’</i>, seizing.</li> + +<li><i>Sel</i>, self; <i>a body’s sel’</i>, one’s self alone.</li> + +<li><i>Sell’t</i>, did sell.</li> + +<li><i>Sen’</i>, to send.</li> + +<li><i>Servan’</i>, servant.</li> + +<li><i>Settlin’</i>, settling; <i>to get a settlin’</i>, to be frightened into quietness.</li> + +<li><i>Sets, sets off</i>, goes away.</li> + +<li><i>Shachlet-feet</i>, ill-shaped.</li> + +<li><i>Shair’d</i>, a shred, a shard.</li> + +<li><i>Shangan</i>, a stick cleft at one end for pulling the tail of a dog, &c., by way of mischief, or to frighten him away.</li> + +<li><i>Shank-it</i>, walk it; <i>shanks</i>, legs.</li> + +<li><i>Shaul</i>, shallow.</li> + +<li><i>Shaver</i>, a humorous wag, a barber.</li> + +<li><i>Shavie</i>, to do an ill turn.</li> + +<li><i>Shaw</i>, to show; a small wood in a hollow place.</li> + +<li><i>Sheep-shank, to think one’s self nae sheep-shank</i>, to be conceited.</li> + +<li><i>Sherra-muir</i>, Sheriff-Muir, the famous battle of, 1715.</li> + +<li><i>Sheugh</i>, a ditch, a trench, a sluice.</li> + +<li><i>Shiel, shealing</i>, a shepherd’s cottage.</li> + +<li><i>Shill</i>, shrill.</li> + +<li><i>Shog</i>, a shock, a push off at one side.</li> + +<li><i>Shoo</i>, ill to please, ill to fit.</li> + +<li><i>Shool</i>, a shovel.</li> + +<li><i>Shoon</i>, shoes.</li> + +<li><i>Shore</i>, to offer, to threaten.</li> + +<li><i>Shor’d</i>, half offered and threatened.</li> + +<li><i>Shouther</i>, the shoulder.</li> + +<li><i>Shot</i>, one traverse of the shuttle from side to side of the web.</li> + +<li><i>Sic</i>, such.</li> + +<li><i>Sicker</i>, sure, steady.</li> + +<li><i>Sidelins</i>, sideling, slanting.</li> + +<li><i>Silken-snood</i>, a fillet of silk, a token of virginity.</li> + +<li><i>Siller</i>, silver, money, white.</li> + +<li><i>Sin</i>, a son.</li> + +<li><i>Sinsyne</i>, since then.</li> + +<li><i>Skaith</i>, to damage, to injure, injury.</li> + +<li><i>Skeigh</i>, proud, nice, saucy, mettled.</li> + +<li><i>Skeigh</i>, shy, maiden coyness.</li> + +<li><i>Skellum</i>, to strike, to slap; to walk with a smart tripping step, a smart stroke.</li> + +<li><i>Skelpi-limmer</i>, a technical term in female scolding.</li> + +<li><i>Skelpin, skelpit</i>, striking, walking rapidly, literally striking the ground.</li> + +<li><i>Skinklin</i>, thin, gauzy, scaltery.</li> + +<li><i>Skirling</i>, shrieking, crying.</li> + +<li><i>Skirl</i>, to cry, to shriek shrilly.</li> + +<li><i>Skirl’t</i>, shrieked.</li> + +<li><i>Sklent</i>, slant, to run aslant, to deviate from truth.</li> + +<li><i>Sklented</i>, ran, or hit, in an oblique direction.</li> + +<li><i>Skouth</i>, vent, free action.</li> + +<li><i>Skreigh</i>, a scream, to scream, the first cry uttered by a child.</li> + +<li><i>Skyte</i>, a worthless fellow, to slide rapidly off.</li> + +<li><i>Skyrin</i>, party-coloured, the checks of the tartan.</li> + +<li><i>Slae</i>, sloe.</li> + +<li><i>Slade</i>, did slide.</li> + +<li><i>Slap</i>, a gate, a breach in a fence.</li> + +<li><i>Slaw</i>, slow.</li> + +<li><i>Slee, sleest</i>, sly, slyest.</li> + +<li><i>Sleekit</i>, sleek, sly.</li> + +<li><i>Sliddery</i>, slippery.</li> + +<li><i>Slip-shod</i>, smooth shod.</li> + +<li><i>Sloken</i>, quench, slake.</li> + +<li><i>Slype</i>, to fall over, as a wet furrow from the plough.</li> + +<li><i>Slypet-o’er</i>, fell over with a slow reluctant motion.</li> + +<li><i>Sma’</i>, small.</li> + +<li><i>Smeddum</i>, dust, powder, mettle, sense, sagacity.</li> + +<li><i>Smiddy</i>, smithy.</li> + +<li><i>Smirking</i>, good-natured, winking.</li> + +<li><i>Smoor, smoored</i>, to smother, smothered.</li> + +<li><i>Smoutie</i>, smutty, obscene; <i>smoutie phiz</i>, sooty aspect.</li> + +<li><i>Smytrie</i>, a numerous collection of small individuals.</li> + +<li><i>Snapper</i>, mistake.</li> + +<li><i>Snash</i>, abuse, Billingsgate, impertinence.</li> + +<li><i>Snaw</i>, snow, to snow.</li> + +<li><i>Snaw-broo</i>, melted snow.</li> + +<li><i>Snawie</i>, snowy.</li> + +<li><i>Snap</i>, to lop, to cut off.</li> + +<li><i>Sned-besoms</i>, to cut brooms.</li> + +<li><i>Sneeshin</i>, snuff.</li> + +<li><i>Sneeshin-mill</i>, a snuff-box.</li> + +<li><i>Snell</i> and <i>snelly</i>, bitter, biting; <i>snellest</i>, bitterest.</li> + +<li><i>Snick-drawing</i>, trick, contriving.</li> + +<li><i>Snick</i>, the latchet of a door.</li> + +<li><i>Snirt, snirtle</i>, concealed laughter, to breathe the nostrils in a displeased manner.</li> + +<li><i>Snool</i>, one whose spirit is broken with oppressive slavery; to submit tamely, to sneak.</li> + +<li><i>Snoove</i>, to go smoothly and constantly, to sneak.</li> + +<li><i>Snowk, snowkit</i>, to scent or snuff as a dog, scented, snuffed.</li> + +<li><i>Sodger</i>, a soldier.</li> + +<li><i>Sonsie</i>, having sweet engaging looks, lucky, jolly.</li> + +<li><i>Soom</i>, to swim.</li> + +<li><i>Souk</i>, to suck, to drink long and enduringly.</li> + +<li><i>Souple</i>, flexible, swift.</li> + +<li><i>Soupled</i>, suppled.</li> + +<li><i>Souther</i>, to solder.</li> + +<li><i>Souter</i>, a shoemaker.</li> + +<li><i>Sowens</i>, the fine flour remaining among the seeds, of oatmeal made into an agreeable pudding.</li> + +<li><i>Sowp</i>, a spoonful, a small quantity of anything liquid.</li> + +<li><i>Sowth</i>, to try over a tune with a low whistle.</li> + +<li><i>Spae</i>, to prophesy, to divine.</li> + +<li><i>Spails</i>, chips, splinters.</li> + +<li><i>Spaul</i>, a limb.</li> + +<li><i>Spairge</i>, to clash, to soil, as with mire.</li> + +<li><i>Spates</i>, sudden floods.</li> + +<li><i>Spaviet</i>, having the spavin.</li> + +<li><i>Speat</i>, a sweeping torrent after rain or thaw.</li> + +<li><i>Speel</i>, to climb.</li> + +<li><i>Spence</i>, the parlour of a farmhouse or cottage.</li> + +<li><i>Spier</i>, to ask, to inquire; <i>spiert</i>, inquired.</li> + +<li><i>Spinnin-graith</i>, wheel and roke and lint.</li> + +<li><i>Splatter</i>, to splutter, a splutter.</li> + +<li><i>Spleughan</i>, a tobacco-pouch.</li> + +<li><i>Splore</i>, a frolic, noise, riot.</li> + +<li><i>Sprachled</i>, scrambled.</li> + +<li><i>Sprattle</i>, to scramble.</li> + +<li><i>Spreckled</i>, spotted, speckled.</li> + +<li><i>Spring</i>, a quick air in music, a Scottish reel.</li> + +<li><i>Sprit, spret</i>, a tough-rooted plant something like rushes, jointed-leaved rush.</li> + +<li><i>Sprittie</i>, full of spirits.</li> + +<li><i>Spunk</i>, fire, mettle, wit, spark.</li> + +<li><i>Spunkie</i>, mettlesome, fiery; will o’ the wisp, or ignis fatuus; the devil.</li> + +<li><i>Spurtle</i>, a stick used in making oatmeal pudding or porridge, a notable Scottish dish.</li> + +<li><i>Squad</i>, a crew or party, a squadron.</li> + +<li><i>Squatter</i>, to flutter in water, as a wild-duck, &c.</li> + +<li><i>Squattle</i>, to sprawl in the act of hiding.</li> + +<li><i>Squeel</i>, a scream, a screech, to scream.</li> + +<li><i>Stacher</i>, to stagger.</li> + +<li><i>Stack</i>, a rick of corn, hay, peats.</li> + +<li><i>Staggie</i>, a stag.</li> + +<li><i>Staig</i>, a two year-old horse.</li> + +<li><i>Stalwart</i>, stately, strong.</li> + +<li><i>Stang</i>, sting, stung.</li> + +<li><i>Stan’t</i>, to stand; <i>stan’t</i>, did stand.</li> + +<li><i>Stane</i>, stone.</li> + +<li><i>Stank</i>, did stink, a pool of standing water, slow-moving water.</li> + +<li><i>Stap</i>, stop, stave.</li> + +<li><i>Stark</i>, stout, potent.</li> + +<li><i>Startle</i>, to run as cattle stung by the gadfly.</li> + +<li><i>Staukin</i>, stalking, walking disdainfully, walking without an aim.</li> + +<li><i>Staumrel</i>, a blockhead, half-witted.</li> + +<li><i>Staw</i>, did steal, to surfeit.</li> + +<li><i>Stech</i>, to cram the belly.</li> + +<li><i>Stechin</i>, cramming.</li> + +<li><i>Steek</i>, to shut, a stitch.</li> + +<li><i>Steer</i>, to molest, to stir.</li> + +<li><i>Steeve</i>, firm, compacted.</li> + +<li><i>Stell</i>, a still.</li> + +<li><i>Sten</i>, to rear as a horse, to leap suddenly.</li> + +<li><i>Stravagin</i>, wandering without an aim.</li> + +<li><i>Stents</i>, tribute, dues of any kind.</li> + +<li><i>Stey</i>, steep; <i>styest</i>, steepest.</li> + +<li><i>Stibble</i>, stubble; <i>stubble-rig</i>, the reaper in harvest who takes the lead.</li> + +<li><i>Stick-an’-stow</i>, totally, altogether.</li> + +<li><i>Stilt-stilts</i>, a crutch; to limp, to halt; poles for crossing a river.</li> + +<li><i>Stimpart</i>, the eighth part of a Winchester bushel.</li> + +<li><i>Stirk</i>, a cow or bullock a year old.</li> + +<li><i>Stock</i>, a plant of colewort, cabbages.</li> + +<li><i>Stockin’</i>, stocking; <i>throwing the stockin’</i>, when the bride and bridegroom are put into bed, the former throws a stocking at random among the company, +and the person whom it falls on is the next that will be married.</li> + +<li><i>Stook, stooked</i>, a shock of corn, made into shocks.</li> + +<li><i>Stot</i>, a young bull or ox.</li> + +<li><i>Stound</i>, sudden pang of the heart.</li> + +<li><i>Stoup</i>, or <i>stowp</i>, a kind of high narrow jug or dish with a handle for holding liquids.</li> + +<li><i>Stowre</i>, dust, more particularly dust in motion; <i>stowrie</i>, dusty.</li> + +<li><i>Stownlins</i>, by stealth.</li> + +<li><i>Stown</i>, stolen.</li> + +<li><i>Stoyte</i>, the walking of a drunken man.</li> + +<li><i>Straek</i>, did strike.</li> + +<li><i>Strae</i>, straw; <i>to die a fair strae death</i>, to die in bed.</li> + +<li><i>Straik</i>, to stroke; <i>straiket</i>, stroked.</li> + +<li><i>Strappen</i>, tall, handsome, vigorous.</li> + +<li><i>Strath</i>, low alluvial land, a holm.</li> + +<li><i>Straught</i>, straight.</li> + +<li><i>Streek</i>, stretched, to stretch.</li> + +<li><i>Striddle</i>, to straddle.</li> + +<li><i>Stroan</i>, to spout, to piss.</li> + +<li><i>Stroup</i>, the spout.</li> + +<li><i>Studdie</i>, the anvil.</li> + +<li><i>Stumpie</i>, diminutive of stump; a grub pen.</li> + +<li><i>Strunt</i>, spirituous liquor of any kind; to walk sturdily, to be affronted.</li> + +<li><i>Stuff</i>, corn or pulse of any kind.</li> + +<li><i>Sturt</i>, trouble; to molest.</li> + +<li><i>Startin</i>, frighted.</li> + +<li><i>Styme</i>, a glimmer.</li> + +<li><i>Sucker</i>, sugar.</li> + +<li><i>Sud</i>, should.</li> + +<li><i>Sugh</i>, the continued rushing noise of wind or water.</li> + +<li><i>Sumph</i>, a pluckless fellow, with little heart or soul.</li> + +<li><i>Suthron</i>, Southern, an old name of the English.</li> + +<li><i>Swaird</i>, sword.</li> + +<li><i>Swall’d</i>, swelled.</li> + +<li><i>Swank</i>, stately, jolly.</li> + +<li><i>Swankie</i>, or <i>swanker</i>, a tight strapping young fellow or girl.</li> + +<li><i>Swap</i>, an exchange, to barter.</li> + +<li><i>Swarfed</i>, swooned.</li> + +<li><i>Swat</i>, did sweat.</li> + +<li><i>Swatch</i>, a sample.</li> + +<li><i>Swats</i>, drink, good ale, new ale or wort.</li> + +<li><i>Sweer</i>, lazy, averse; <i>dead-sweer</i>, extremely averse.</li> + +<li><i>Swoor</i>, swore, did swear.</li> + +<li><i>Swinge</i>, beat, to whip.</li> + +<li><i>Swinke</i>, to labour hard.</li> + +<li><i>Swirlie</i>, knaggy, full of knots.</li> + +<li><i>Swirl</i>, a curve, an eddying blast or pool, a knot in the wood.</li> + +<li><i>Swith</i>, get away.</li> + +<li><i>Swither</i>, to hesitate in choice, an irresolute wavering in choice.</li> + +<li><i>Syebow</i>, a thick-necked onion.</li> + +<li><i>Syne</i>, since, ago, then.</li> +</ul> + +<p class="std2">T.</p> +<ul> + +<li><i>Tackets</i>, broad-headed nails for the heels of shoes.</li> + +<li><i>Tae</i>, a toe, <i>three-taed</i>, having three prongs.</li> + +<li><i>Tak</i>, to take; <i>takin</i>, taking.</li> + +<li><i>Tangle</i>, a sea-weed used as salad.</li> + +<li><i>Tap</i>, the top.</li> + +<li><i>Tapetless</i>, heedless, foolish.</li> + +<li><i>Targe, targe them tightly</i>, cross-question them severely.</li> + +<li><i>Tarrow</i>, to murmur at one’s allowance.</li> + +<li><i>Tarry-breeks</i>, a sailor.</li> + +<li><i>Tassie</i>, a small measure for liquor.</li> + +<li><i>Tauld</i>, or <i>tald</i>, told.</li> + +<li><i>Taupie</i>, a foolish, thoughtless young person.</li> + +<li><i>Tauted</i>, or <i>tautie</i>, matted together (spoken of hair and wool).</li> + +<li><i>Tawie</i>, that allows itself peaceably to be handled (spoken of a cow, horse, &c.)</li> + +<li><i>Teat</i>, a small quantity.</li> + +<li><i>Teethless bawtie</i>, toothless cur.</li> + +<li><i>Teethless gab</i>, a mouth wanting the teeth, an expression of scorn.</li> + +<li><i>Ten-hours-bite</i>, a slight feed to the horse while in the yoke in the forenoon.</li> + +<li><i>Tent</i>, a field pulpit, heed, caution; to take heed.</li> + +<li><i>Tentie</i>, heedful, cautious.</li> + +<li><i>Tentless</i>, heedless, careless.</li> + +<li><i>Teugh</i>, tough.</li> + +<li><i>Thack</i>, thatch; <i>thack an’ rape</i>, clothing and necessaries.</li> + +<li><i>Thae</i>, these.</li> + +<li><i>Thairms</i>, small guts, fiddle-strings.</li> + +<li><i>Thankit</i>, thanked.</li> + +<li><i>Theekit</i>, thatched.</li> + +<li><i>Thegither</i>, together.</li> + +<li><i>Themsel’</i>, themselves.</li> + +<li><i>Thick</i>, intimate, familiar.</li> + +<li><i>Thigger</i>, crowding, make a noise; a seeker of alms.</li> + +<li><i>Thir</i>, these.</li> + +<li><i>Thirl</i>, to thrill.</li> + +<li><i>Thirled</i>, thrilled, vibrated.</li> + +<li><i>Thole</i>, to suffer, to endure.</li> + +<li><i>Thowe</i>, a thaw, to thaw.</li> + +<li><i>Thowless</i>, slack, lazy.</li> + +<li><i>Thrang</i>, throng, busy, a crowd.</li> + +<li><i>Thrapple</i>, throat, windpipe.</li> + +<li><i>Thraw</i>, to sprain, to twist, to contradict.</li> + +<li><i>Thrawin’</i>, twisting, &c.</li> + +<li><i>Thrawn</i>, sprained, twisted, contradicted, contradiction.</li> + +<li><i>Threap</i>, to maintain by dint of assertion.</li> + +<li><i>Threshin’</i>, threshing; <i>threshin’-tree</i>, a flail.</li> + +<li><i>Threteen</i>, thirteen.</li> + +<li><i>Thristle</i>, thistle.</li> + +<li><i>Through</i>, to go on with, to make out.</li> + +<li><i>Throuther</i>, pell-mell, confusedly (through-ither).</li> + +<li><i>Thrum</i>, sound of a spinning-wheel in motion, the thread remaining at the end of a web.</li> + +<li><i>Thud</i>, to make a loud intermittent noise.</li> + +<li><i>Thummart</i>, foumart, polecat</li> + +<li><i>Thumpit</i>, thumped.</li> + +<li><i>Thysel’</i>, thyself.</li> + +<li><i>Till’t</i>, to it.</li> + +<li><i>Timmer</i>, timber.</li> + +<li><i>Tine</i>, to lose; <i>tint</i>, lost.</li> + +<li><i>Tinkler</i>, a tinker.</li> + +<li><i>Tip</i>, a ram.</li> + +<li><i>Tippence</i>, twopence, money.</li> + +<li><i>Tirl</i>, to make a slight noise, to uncover.</li> + +<li><i>Tirlin’</i>, <i>tirlet</i>, uncovering.</li> + +<li><i>Tither</i>, the other.</li> + +<li><i>Tittle</i>, to whisper, to prate idly.</li> + +<li><i>Tittlin</i>, whispering.</li> + +<li><i>Tocher</i>, marriage portion; <i>tocher bands</i>, marriage bonds.</li> + +<li><i>Tod</i>, a fox. <i>“Tod i’ the fauld,”</i> fox in the fold.</li> + +<li><i>Toddle</i>, to totter, like the walk of a child; <i>todlen-dow</i>, toddling dove.</li> + +<li><i>Too-fa’</i>, “Too fa’ o’ the nicht,” when twilight darkens into night; a building added, a lean-to.</li> + +<li><i>Toom</i>, empty.</li> + +<li><i>Toomed</i>, emptied.</li> + +<li><i>Toop</i>, a ram.</li> + +<li><i>Toss</i>, a toast.</li> + +<li><i>Tosie</i>, warm and ruddy with warmth, good-looking, intoxicating.</li> + +<li><i>Toun</i>, a hamlet, a farmhouse.</li> + +<li><i>Tout</i>, the blast of a horn or trumpet, to blow a horn or trumpet.</li> + +<li><i>Touzles</i>, <i>touzling</i>, romping, ruffling the clothes.</li> + +<li><i>Tow</i>, a rope.</li> + +<li><i>Towmond</i>, a twelvemonth.</li> + +<li><i>Towzie</i>, rough, shaggy.</li> + +<li><i>Toy</i>, a very old fashion of female head-dress.</li> + +<li><i>Toyte</i>, to totter like old age.</li> + +<li><i>Trams</i>, <i>barrow-trams</i>, the handles of a barrow.</li> + +<li><i>Transmugrified</i>, transmigrated, metamorphosed.</li> + +<li><i>Trashtrie</i>, trash, rubbish.</li> + +<li><i>Trickie</i>, full of tricks.</li> + +<li><i>Trig</i>, spruce, neat.</li> + +<li><i>Trimly</i>, cleverly, excellently, in a seemly manner.</li> + +<li><i>Trinle</i>, <i>trintle</i>, the wheel of a barrow, to roll.</li> + +<li><i>Trinklin</i>, trickling.</li> + +<li><i>Troggers</i>, <i>troggin’</i>, wandering merchants, goods to truck or dispose of.</li> + +<li><i>Trow</i>, to believe, to trust to.</li> + +<li><i>Trowth</i>, truth, a petty oath.</li> + +<li><i>Trysts</i>, appointments, love meetings, cattle shows.</li> + +<li><i>Tumbler-wheels</i>, wheels of a kind of low cart.</li> + +<li><i>Tug</i>, raw hide, of which in old time plough-traces were frequently made.</li> + +<li><i>Tug</i> or <i>tow</i>, either in leather or rope.</li> + +<li><i>Tulzie</i>, a quarrel, to quarrel, to fight.</li> + +<li><i>Twa</i>, two; <i>twa-fald</i>, twofold.</li> + +<li><i>Twa-three</i>, a few.</li> + +<li><i>Twad</i>, it would.</li> + +<li><i>Twal</i>, twelve; <i>twalpennie worth</i>, a small quantity, a pennyworth.—N.B. One penny English is 12d. Scotch.</li> + +<li><i>Twa faul</i>, twofold.</li> + +<li><i>Twin</i>, to part.</li> + +<li><i>Twistle</i>, twisting, the art of making a rope.</li> + +<li><i>Tyke</i>, a dog.</li> + +<li><i>Tysday</i>, Tuesday.</li> +</ul> + +<p class="std2">U.</p> +<ul> +<li><i>Unback’d filly</i>, a young mare hitherto unsaddled.</li> + +<li><i>Unco</i>, strange, uncouth, very, very great, prodigious.</li> + +<li><i>Uncos</i>, news.</li> + +<li><i>Unfauld</i>, unfold.</li> + +<li><i>Unkenn’d</i>, unknown.</li> + +<li><i>Unsicker</i>, uncertain, wavering, insecure.</li> + +<li><i>Unskaithed</i>, undamaged, unhurt.</li> + +<li><i>Upo’</i>, upon.</li> + +</ul> +<p class="std2">V.</p> +<ul> + +<li><i>Vap’rin</i>, vapouring.</li> + +<li><i>Vauntie</i>, joyous, delight which cannot contain itself.</li> + +<li><i>Vera</i>, very.</li> + +<li><i>Virl</i>, a ring round a column, &c.</li> + +<li><i>Vogie</i>, vain.</li> +</ul> + +<p class="std2">W.</p> +<ul> + +<li><i>Wa’</i>, wall; <i>wa’s</i>, walls.</li> + +<li><i>Wabster</i>, a weaver.</li> + +<li><i>Wad</i>, would, to bet, a bet, a pledge.</li> + +<li><i>Wadna</i>, would not.</li> + +<li><i>Wadset</i>, land on which money is lent, a mortgage.</li> + +<li><i>Wae</i>, woe; <i>waefu’</i>, sorrowful, wailing.</li> + +<li><i>Waefu’-woodie</i>, hangman’s rope.</li> + +<li><i>Waesucks! Wae’s me!</i>, Alas! O the pity!</li> + +<li><i>Wa’ flower</i>, wall-flower.</li> + +<li><i>Waft</i>, woof; the cross thread that goes from the shuttle through the web.</li> + +<li><i>Waifs an’ crocks</i>, stray sheep and old ewes past breeding.</li> + +<li><i>Wair</i>, to lay out, to expend.</li> + +<li><i>Wale</i>, choice, to choose.</li> + +<li><i>Wal’d</i>, chose, chosen.</li> + +<li><i>Walie</i>, ample, large, jolly, also an exclamation of distress.</li> + +<li><i>Wame</i>, the belly.</li> + +<li><i>Wamefu’</i>, a bellyful.</li> + +<li><i>Wanchansie</i>, unlucky.</li> + +<li><i>Wanrest</i>, <i>wanrestfu’</i>, restless, unrestful.</li> + +<li><i>Wark</i>, work.</li> + +<li><i>Wark-lume</i>, a tool to work with.</li> + +<li><i>Warld’s-worm</i>, a miser.</li> + +<li><i>Warle</i>, or <i>warld</i>, world.</li> + +<li><i>Warlock</i>, a wizard; <i>warlock-knowe</i>, a knoll where warlocks once held tryste.</li> + +<li><i>Warly</i>, worldly, eager in amassing wealth.</li> + +<li><i>Warran’</i>, a warrant, to warrant.</li> + +<li><i>Warsle</i>, wrestle.</li> + +<li><i>Warsl’d</i>, or <i>warst’led</i>, wrestled.</li> + +<li><i>Wastrie</i>, prodigality.</li> + +<li><i>Wat</i>, wet; <i>I wat</i>—<i>I wot</i>—I know.</li> + +<li><i>Wat</i>, a man’s upper dress; a sort of mantle.</li> + +<li><i>Water-brose</i>, brose made of meal and water simply, without the addition of milk, butter, &c.</li> + +<li><i>Wattle</i>, a twig, a wand.</li> + +<li><i>Wauble</i>, to swing, to reel.</li> + +<li><i>Waukin</i>, waking, watching.</li> + +<li><i>Waukit</i>, thickened as fullers do cloth.</li> + +<li><i>Waukrife</i>, not apt to sleep.</li> + +<li><i>Waur</i>, worse, to worst.</li> + +<li><i>Waur’t</i>, worsted.</li> + +<li><i>Wean</i>, a child.</li> + +<li><i>Weary-widdle</i>, toilsome contest of life.</li> + +<li><i>Weason</i>, weasand, windpipe.</li> + +<li><i>Weaven’ the stocking</i>, to knit stockings.</li> + +<li><i>Weeder-clips</i>, instrument for removing weeds.</li> + +<li><i>Wee</i>, little; <i>wee things</i>, little ones, <i>wee bits</i>, a small matter.</li> + +<li><i>Weel</i>, well; <i>weelfare</i>, welfare.</li> + +<li><i>Weet</i>, rain, wetness; to wet.</li> + +<li><i>We’se</i>, we shall.</li> + +<li><i>Wha</i>, who.</li> + +<li><i>Whaizle</i>, to wheeze.</li> + +<li><i>Whalpit</i>, whelped.</li> + +<li><i>Whang</i>, a leathorn thing, a piece of cheese, bread, &c.</li> + +<li><i>Whare</i>, where; <i>whare’er</i>, wherever.</li> + +<li><i>Wheep</i>, to fly nimbly, to jerk, penny-wheep, small-beer.</li> + +<li><i>Whase</i>, <i>wha’s</i>, whose—who is.</li> + +<li><i>What reck</i>, nevertheless.</li> + +<li><i>Whid</i>, the motion of a hare running but not frightened.—a lie.</li> + +<li><i>Whidden</i>, running as a hare or coney.</li> + +<li><i>Whigmeleeries</i>, whims, fancies, crotchets.</li> + +<li><i>Whilk</i>, which.</li> + +<li><i>Whingin’</i>, crying, complaining, fretting.</li> + +<li><i>Whirligigums</i>, useless ornaments, trifling appendages.</li> + +<li><i>Whissle</i>, a whistle, to whistle.</li> + +<li><i>Whisht</i>, silence; <i>to hold one’s whisht</i>, to be silent.</li> + +<li><i>Whisk</i>, <i>whisket</i>, to sweep, to lash.</li> + +<li><i>Whiskin’ beard</i>, a beard like the whiskers of a cat.</li> + +<li><i>Whiskit</i>, lashed, the motion of a horse’s tail removing flies.</li> + +<li><i>Whitter</i>, a hearty draught of liquor.</li> + +<li><i>Whittle</i>, a knife.</li> + +<li><i>Whunstane</i>, a whinstone.</li> + +<li><i>Wi’</i>, with.</li> + +<li><i>Wick</i>, to strike a stone in an oblique direction, a term in curling.</li> + +<li><i>Widdifu</i>, twisted like a withy, one who merits hanging.</li> + +<li><i>Wiel</i>, a small whirlpool.</li> + +<li><i>Wifie-wifikie</i>, a diminutive or endearing name for wife.</li> + +<li><i>Wight</i>, stout, enduring.</li> + +<li><i>Willyart-glower</i>, a bewildered dismayed stare.</li> + +<li><i>Wimple-womplet</i>, to meander, meandered, to enfold.</li> + +<li><i>Wimplin</i>, waving, meandering.</li> + +<li><i>Win</i>‘, to wind, to winnow.</li> + +<li><i>Winnin’-thread</i>, putting thread into hanks.</li> + +<li><i>Win’t</i>, winded as a bottom of yarn.</li> + +<li><i>Win</i>‘, wind.</li> + +<li><i>Win</i>, live.</li> + +<li><i>Winna</i>, will not.</li> + +<li><i>Winnock</i>, a window.</li> + +<li><i>Winsome</i>, hearty, vaunted, gay.</li> + +<li><i>Wintle</i>, a staggering motion, to stagger, to reel.</li> + +<li><i>Wiss</i>, to wish.</li> + +<li><i>Withouten</i>, without.</li> + +<li><i>Wizened</i>, hide-bound, dried, shrunk.</li> + +<li><i>Winze</i>, a curse or imprecation.</li> + +<li><i>Wonner</i>, a wonder, a contemptuous appellation.</li> + +<li><i>Woo</i>‘, wool.</li> + +<li><i>Woo</i>, to court, to make love to.</li> + +<li><i>Widdie</i>, a rope, more properly one of withs or willows.</li> + +<li><i>Woer-bobs</i>, the garter knitted below the knee with a couple of loops.</li> + +<li><i>Wordy</i>, worthy.</li> + +<li><i>Worset</i>, worsted.</li> + +<li><i>Wrack</i>, to tease, to vex.</li> + +<li><i>Wud</i>, wild, mad; <i>wud-mad</i>, distracted.</li> + +<li><i>Wumble</i>, a wimble.</li> + +<li><i>Wraith</i>, a spirit, a ghost, an apparition exactly like a living person, whose appearance is said to forbode the person’s approaching death; also wrath.</li> + +<li><i>Wrang</i>, wrong, to wrong.</li> + +<li><i>Wreeth</i>, a drifted heap of snow.</li> + +<li><i>Wyliecoat</i>, a flannel vest.</li> + +<li><i>Wyte</i>, blame, to blame.</li> +</ul> + +<p class="std2">Y.</p> +<ul> + +<li><i>Ye</i>, this pronoun is frequently used for thou.</li> + +<li><i>Yearns</i>, longs much.</li> + +<li><i>Yealings</i>, born in the same year, coevals.</li> + +<li><i>Year</i>, is used both for singular and plural, years.</li> + +<li><i>Yell</i>, barren, that gives no milk.</li> + +<li><i>Yerk</i>, to lash, to jerk.</li> + +<li><i>Yerket</i>, jerked, lashed.</li> + +<li><i>Yestreen</i>, yesternight.</li> + +<li><i>Yett</i>, a gate.</li> + +<li><i>Yeuk’s</i>, itches.</li> + +<li><i>Yill</i>, ale.</li> + +<li><i>Yird, yirded</i>, earth, earthed, buried.</li> + +<li><i>Yokin</i>‘, yoking.</li> + +<li><i>Yont</i>, ayont, beyond.</li> + +<li><i>Yirr</i>, lively.</li> + +<li><i>Yowe</i>, an ewe.</li> + +<li><i>Yowie</i>, diminutive of <i>yowe.</i></li> + +<li><i>Yule</i>, Christmas.</li></ul> + + + +<h3>THE END.</h3> +<hr style="width:65%" /> + + + + + + + +<pre> + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Complete Works of Robert Burns: +Containing his Poems, Songs, and Correspondence., by Robert Burns and Allan Cunningham + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK WORKS OF ROBERT BURNS *** + +***** This file should be named 18500-h.htm or 18500-h.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/1/8/5/0/18500/ + +Produced by Marilynda Fraser-Cunliffe, Sankar Viswanathan, +and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at +http://www.pgdp.net (This file was made using scans of +public domain works from the University of Michigan Digital +Libraries.) + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. Special rules, +set forth in the General Terms of Use part of this license, apply to +copying and distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works to +protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm concept and trademark. Project +Gutenberg is a registered trademark, and may not be used if you +charge for the eBooks, unless you receive specific permission. If you +do not charge anything for copies of this eBook, complying with the +rules is very easy. You may use this eBook for nearly any purpose +such as creation of derivative works, reports, performances and +research. They may be modified and printed and given away--you may do +practically ANYTHING with public domain eBooks. Redistribution is +subject to the trademark license, especially commercial +redistribution. + + + +*** START: FULL LICENSE *** + +THE FULL PROJECT GUTENBERG LICENSE +PLEASE READ THIS BEFORE YOU DISTRIBUTE OR USE THIS WORK + +To protect the Project Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting the free +distribution of electronic works, by using or distributing this work +(or any other work associated in any way with the phrase "Project +Gutenberg"), you agree to comply with all the terms of the Full Project +Gutenberg-tm License (available with this file or online at +http://gutenberg.org/license). + + +Section 1. General Terms of Use and Redistributing Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic works + +1.A. By reading or using any part of this Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic work, you indicate that you have read, understand, agree to +and accept all the terms of this license and intellectual property +(trademark/copyright) agreement. If you do not agree to abide by all +the terms of this agreement, you must cease using and return or destroy +all copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in your possession. +If you paid a fee for obtaining a copy of or access to a Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic work and you do not agree to be bound by the +terms of this agreement, you may obtain a refund from the person or +entity to whom you paid the fee as set forth in paragraph 1.E.8. + +1.B. "Project Gutenberg" is a registered trademark. It may only be +used on or associated in any way with an electronic work by people who +agree to be bound by the terms of this agreement. There are a few +things that you can do with most Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works +even without complying with the full terms of this agreement. See +paragraph 1.C below. There are a lot of things you can do with Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic works if you follow the terms of this agreement +and help preserve free future access to Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works. See paragraph 1.E below. + +1.C. The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation ("the Foundation" +or PGLAF), owns a compilation copyright in the collection of Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic works. Nearly all the individual works in the +collection are in the public domain in the United States. If an +individual work is in the public domain in the United States and you are +located in the United States, we do not claim a right to prevent you from +copying, distributing, performing, displaying or creating derivative +works based on the work as long as all references to Project Gutenberg +are removed. Of course, we hope that you will support the Project +Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting free access to electronic works by +freely sharing Project Gutenberg-tm works in compliance with the terms of +this agreement for keeping the Project Gutenberg-tm name associated with +the work. You can easily comply with the terms of this agreement by +keeping this work in the same format with its attached full Project +Gutenberg-tm License when you share it without charge with others. + +1.D. The copyright laws of the place where you are located also govern +what you can do with this work. Copyright laws in most countries are in +a constant state of change. If you are outside the United States, check +the laws of your country in addition to the terms of this agreement +before downloading, copying, displaying, performing, distributing or +creating derivative works based on this work or any other Project +Gutenberg-tm work. The Foundation makes no representations concerning +the copyright status of any work in any country outside the United +States. + +1.E. Unless you have removed all references to Project Gutenberg: + +1.E.1. The following sentence, with active links to, or other immediate +access to, the full Project Gutenberg-tm License must appear prominently +whenever any copy of a Project Gutenberg-tm work (any work on which the +phrase "Project Gutenberg" appears, or with which the phrase "Project +Gutenberg" is associated) is accessed, displayed, performed, viewed, +copied or distributed: + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + +1.E.2. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is derived +from the public domain (does not contain a notice indicating that it is +posted with permission of the copyright holder), the work can be copied +and distributed to anyone in the United States without paying any fees +or charges. If you are redistributing or providing access to a work +with the phrase "Project Gutenberg" associated with or appearing on the +work, you must comply either with the requirements of paragraphs 1.E.1 +through 1.E.7 or obtain permission for the use of the work and the +Project Gutenberg-tm trademark as set forth in paragraphs 1.E.8 or +1.E.9. + +1.E.3. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is posted +with the permission of the copyright holder, your use and distribution +must comply with both paragraphs 1.E.1 through 1.E.7 and any additional +terms imposed by the copyright holder. Additional terms will be linked +to the Project Gutenberg-tm License for all works posted with the +permission of the copyright holder found at the beginning of this work. + +1.E.4. Do not unlink or detach or remove the full Project Gutenberg-tm +License terms from this work, or any files containing a part of this +work or any other work associated with Project Gutenberg-tm. + +1.E.5. Do not copy, display, perform, distribute or redistribute this +electronic work, or any part of this electronic work, without +prominently displaying the sentence set forth in paragraph 1.E.1 with +active links or immediate access to the full terms of the Project +Gutenberg-tm License. + +1.E.6. You may convert to and distribute this work in any binary, +compressed, marked up, nonproprietary or proprietary form, including any +word processing or hypertext form. However, if you provide access to or +distribute copies of a Project Gutenberg-tm work in a format other than +"Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other format used in the official version +posted on the official Project Gutenberg-tm web site (www.gutenberg.org), +you must, at no additional cost, fee or expense to the user, provide a +copy, a means of exporting a copy, or a means of obtaining a copy upon +request, of the work in its original "Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other +form. Any alternate format must include the full Project Gutenberg-tm +License as specified in paragraph 1.E.1. + +1.E.7. Do not charge a fee for access to, viewing, displaying, +performing, copying or distributing any Project Gutenberg-tm works +unless you comply with paragraph 1.E.8 or 1.E.9. + +1.E.8. You may charge a reasonable fee for copies of or providing +access to or distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works provided +that + +- You pay a royalty fee of 20% of the gross profits you derive from + the use of Project Gutenberg-tm works calculated using the method + you already use to calculate your applicable taxes. The fee is + owed to the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark, but he + has agreed to donate royalties under this paragraph to the + Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation. Royalty payments + must be paid within 60 days following each date on which you + prepare (or are legally required to prepare) your periodic tax + returns. Royalty payments should be clearly marked as such and + sent to the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation at the + address specified in Section 4, "Information about donations to + the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation." + +- You provide a full refund of any money paid by a user who notifies + you in writing (or by e-mail) within 30 days of receipt that s/he + does not agree to the terms of the full Project Gutenberg-tm + License. You must require such a user to return or + destroy all copies of the works possessed in a physical medium + and discontinue all use of and all access to other copies of + Project Gutenberg-tm works. + +- You provide, in accordance with paragraph 1.F.3, a full refund of any + money paid for a work or a replacement copy, if a defect in the + electronic work is discovered and reported to you within 90 days + of receipt of the work. + +- You comply with all other terms of this agreement for free + distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm works. + +1.E.9. If you wish to charge a fee or distribute a Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic work or group of works on different terms than are set +forth in this agreement, you must obtain permission in writing from +both the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation and Michael +Hart, the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark. Contact the +Foundation as set forth in Section 3 below. + +1.F. + +1.F.1. Project Gutenberg volunteers and employees expend considerable +effort to identify, do copyright research on, transcribe and proofread +public domain works in creating the Project Gutenberg-tm +collection. Despite these efforts, Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works, and the medium on which they may be stored, may contain +"Defects," such as, but not limited to, incomplete, inaccurate or +corrupt data, transcription errors, a copyright or other intellectual +property infringement, a defective or damaged disk or other medium, a +computer virus, or computer codes that damage or cannot be read by +your equipment. + +1.F.2. LIMITED WARRANTY, DISCLAIMER OF DAMAGES - Except for the "Right +of Replacement or Refund" described in paragraph 1.F.3, the Project +Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation, the owner of the Project +Gutenberg-tm trademark, and any other party distributing a Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic work under this agreement, disclaim all +liability to you for damages, costs and expenses, including legal +fees. YOU AGREE THAT YOU HAVE NO REMEDIES FOR NEGLIGENCE, STRICT +LIABILITY, BREACH OF WARRANTY OR BREACH OF CONTRACT EXCEPT THOSE +PROVIDED IN PARAGRAPH F3. YOU AGREE THAT THE FOUNDATION, THE +TRADEMARK OWNER, AND ANY DISTRIBUTOR UNDER THIS AGREEMENT WILL NOT BE +LIABLE TO YOU FOR ACTUAL, DIRECT, INDIRECT, CONSEQUENTIAL, PUNITIVE OR +INCIDENTAL DAMAGES EVEN IF YOU GIVE NOTICE OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH +DAMAGE. + +1.F.3. LIMITED RIGHT OF REPLACEMENT OR REFUND - If you discover a +defect in this electronic work within 90 days of receiving it, you can +receive a refund of the money (if any) you paid for it by sending a +written explanation to the person you received the work from. If you +received the work on a physical medium, you must return the medium with +your written explanation. The person or entity that provided you with +the defective work may elect to provide a replacement copy in lieu of a +refund. If you received the work electronically, the person or entity +providing it to you may choose to give you a second opportunity to +receive the work electronically in lieu of a refund. If the second copy +is also defective, you may demand a refund in writing without further +opportunities to fix the problem. + +1.F.4. Except for the limited right of replacement or refund set forth +in paragraph 1.F.3, this work is provided to you 'AS-IS' WITH NO OTHER +WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO +WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTIBILITY OR FITNESS FOR ANY PURPOSE. + +1.F.5. Some states do not allow disclaimers of certain implied +warranties or the exclusion or limitation of certain types of damages. +If any disclaimer or limitation set forth in this agreement violates the +law of the state applicable to this agreement, the agreement shall be +interpreted to make the maximum disclaimer or limitation permitted by +the applicable state law. The invalidity or unenforceability of any +provision of this agreement shall not void the remaining provisions. + +1.F.6. INDEMNITY - You agree to indemnify and hold the Foundation, the +trademark owner, any agent or employee of the Foundation, anyone +providing copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in accordance +with this agreement, and any volunteers associated with the production, +promotion and distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works, +harmless from all liability, costs and expenses, including legal fees, +that arise directly or indirectly from any of the following which you do +or cause to occur: (a) distribution of this or any Project Gutenberg-tm +work, (b) alteration, modification, or additions or deletions to any +Project Gutenberg-tm work, and (c) any Defect you cause. + + +Section 2. Information about the Mission of Project Gutenberg-tm + +Project Gutenberg-tm is synonymous with the free distribution of +electronic works in formats readable by the widest variety of computers +including obsolete, old, middle-aged and new computers. It exists +because of the efforts of hundreds of volunteers and donations from +people in all walks of life. + +Volunteers and financial support to provide volunteers with the +assistance they need, is critical to reaching Project Gutenberg-tm's +goals and ensuring that the Project Gutenberg-tm collection will +remain freely available for generations to come. In 2001, the Project +Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation was created to provide a secure +and permanent future for Project Gutenberg-tm and future generations. +To learn more about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation +and how your efforts and donations can help, see Sections 3 and 4 +and the Foundation web page at http://www.pglaf.org. + + +Section 3. Information about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive +Foundation + +The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation is a non profit +501(c)(3) educational corporation organized under the laws of the +state of Mississippi and granted tax exempt status by the Internal +Revenue Service. The Foundation's EIN or federal tax identification +number is 64-6221541. Its 501(c)(3) letter is posted at +http://pglaf.org/fundraising. Contributions to the Project Gutenberg +Literary Archive Foundation are tax deductible to the full extent +permitted by U.S. federal laws and your state's laws. + +The Foundation's principal office is located at 4557 Melan Dr. S. +Fairbanks, AK, 99712., but its volunteers and employees are scattered +throughout numerous locations. Its business office is located at +809 North 1500 West, Salt Lake City, UT 84116, (801) 596-1887, email +business@pglaf.org. Email contact links and up to date contact +information can be found at the Foundation's web site and official +page at http://pglaf.org + +For additional contact information: + Dr. Gregory B. Newby + Chief Executive and Director + gbnewby@pglaf.org + + +Section 4. Information about Donations to the Project Gutenberg +Literary Archive Foundation + +Project Gutenberg-tm depends upon and cannot survive without wide +spread public support and donations to carry out its mission of +increasing the number of public domain and licensed works that can be +freely distributed in machine readable form accessible by the widest +array of equipment including outdated equipment. Many small donations +($1 to $5,000) are particularly important to maintaining tax exempt +status with the IRS. + +The Foundation is committed to complying with the laws regulating +charities and charitable donations in all 50 states of the United +States. Compliance requirements are not uniform and it takes a +considerable effort, much paperwork and many fees to meet and keep up +with these requirements. We do not solicit donations in locations +where we have not received written confirmation of compliance. To +SEND DONATIONS or determine the status of compliance for any +particular state visit http://pglaf.org + +While we cannot and do not solicit contributions from states where we +have not met the solicitation requirements, we know of no prohibition +against accepting unsolicited donations from donors in such states who +approach us with offers to donate. + +International donations are gratefully accepted, but we cannot make +any statements concerning tax treatment of donations received from +outside the United States. U.S. laws alone swamp our small staff. + +Please check the Project Gutenberg Web pages for current donation +methods and addresses. Donations are accepted in a number of other +ways including checks, online payments and credit card donations. +To donate, please visit: http://pglaf.org/donate + + +Section 5. General Information About Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works. + +Professor Michael S. Hart is the originator of the Project Gutenberg-tm +concept of a library of electronic works that could be freely shared +with anyone. For thirty years, he produced and distributed Project +Gutenberg-tm eBooks with only a loose network of volunteer support. + + +Project Gutenberg-tm eBooks are often created from several printed +editions, all of which are confirmed as Public Domain in the U.S. +unless a copyright notice is included. Thus, we do not necessarily +keep eBooks in compliance with any particular paper edition. + + +Most people start at our Web site which has the main PG search facility: + + http://www.gutenberg.org + +This Web site includes information about Project Gutenberg-tm, +including how to make donations to the Project Gutenberg Literary +Archive Foundation, how to help produce our new eBooks, and how to +subscribe to our email newsletter to hear about new eBooks. + + +</pre> + +</body> +</html> diff --git a/18500-h/images/image_01.jpg b/18500-h/images/image_01.jpg Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..20d5242 --- /dev/null +++ b/18500-h/images/image_01.jpg diff --git a/18500-h/images/image_02.jpg b/18500-h/images/image_02.jpg Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..b617408 --- /dev/null +++ b/18500-h/images/image_02.jpg diff --git a/18500-h/images/image_03.jpg b/18500-h/images/image_03.jpg Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..5fa8599 --- /dev/null +++ b/18500-h/images/image_03.jpg diff --git a/18500-h/images/image_04.jpg b/18500-h/images/image_04.jpg Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..c0282e0 --- /dev/null +++ b/18500-h/images/image_04.jpg diff --git a/18500-h/images/image_05.jpg b/18500-h/images/image_05.jpg Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..e53d5c1 --- /dev/null +++ b/18500-h/images/image_05.jpg diff --git a/18500-h/images/image_06.jpg b/18500-h/images/image_06.jpg Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..2a8f6d3 --- /dev/null +++ b/18500-h/images/image_06.jpg diff --git a/18500-h/images/image_07.jpg b/18500-h/images/image_07.jpg Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..0d4af6c --- /dev/null +++ b/18500-h/images/image_07.jpg diff --git a/18500-h/images/image_08.jpg b/18500-h/images/image_08.jpg Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..a0fe1a1 --- /dev/null +++ b/18500-h/images/image_08.jpg |
