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 iHTRJlMSS-CiUSSlK HliiRMiraaWlB, 
 
 
OP 
 
 ROBERT BURNS: 
 
 WITH 
 
 AN ACCOUNT OF HIS LIFE, 
 
 AND 
 
 OHXTzozsia ozr his 'wmzrzxi'as. 
 
 TO WHICH ARE PKEFIZSI) 
 
 SOME OBSERVATIONS ON THE CHARACTER AND CONDITION 
 OF THE SCOTTISH PEASANTRY. 
 
 BY JAMES CURRIE, M. !> 
 
 A J^EW EDITlOJf, 
 
 FOUR VOLUMES COMPLETE IN ONE 
 WITH MANY ADDITIONAL POEMS AND SONGS, 
 
 AND 
 
 AN ENLARGED AND CORRECTED GLOSSARY. 
 
 From the last London Edition of 189Si, 
 
 J. CRISSY, 14 SOUTH SEVENTH STREET. 
 1827. 
 
nd-^Oil^iii 
 
Vi- 
 
 W®(^mAPMI©A^ ^^®^©M 
 
 THE AUTHOR. 
 
 Robert Burns was bom on the 29th day of 
 January, 1759, in a small house about two 
 miles from the town of Ayr in Scotland. The 
 family name, which the poet modernized into 
 Burns, was originally Bur ties or Burness. His 
 fatlier, William, appears to have been early 
 mured to poverty and hardships, which he 
 bore with pious resignation, and endeavoured 
 to alleviate by industry and economy. After 
 various attempts to gain a liveliiiood, he took 
 a lease of seven acres of land, with a view of 
 commencing nurseryman and public gardener ; 
 and having built a house upon it with his own 
 hands (an instance of patient ingenuity by no 
 means uncommon among his countrymen in 
 humble life,) he married, December 1757, 
 Agnes Brown.* The first fruit of his marriage 
 was Robert, the subject of the present sketch. 
 
 In his sixth year, Robert was sent to a 
 school, where he made considerable proficiency 
 in reading and writing, and where he dis- 
 covered an inchnation for books not very com- 
 mon at so early an age. About the age of 
 thirteen or fourteen, he was sent to the parish 
 school of Dalrymple, where he increased liis 
 acquaintance with English Grammar, and 
 gained some knowledge of the French. Latin 
 was also recommended to him ; but he did not 
 make any great progress in it. 
 
 The far greater part of his time, liowever, 
 was employed on his father's farm, which, in 
 spite of much industry, became so unproduc- 
 tive as to involve the family in great, distress. 
 His father having taljcn another farm, the 
 speculation was yet more fatal, and involved 
 his affairs in complete ruin. He died, Feb. 13, 
 1784, leaving behmd him the character' of a 
 good and wise man, and an aflectionate father, 
 who, under all his misfortunes, struggled to 
 procure his children an excellent education; 
 and endeavoured, both by precept and example 
 to form their minds to religion and virtue. 
 
 ♦This excellent woman is still living in the family 
 of her son Gilbert. (May, 1813.) 
 
 It was betwujn the fifteenth and sixteenth 
 year of his age, that Robert first " committed 
 the sin of rhyme." Having formed a boyish 
 affection for a female who was his companion 
 in the toils of the field, he composed a song, 
 which, however extraordinary from one at his 
 age, and in his circumstances, is far inferior 
 to any of his subsequent performances. He 
 was at this time " an ungainly, awkward 
 boy," unacquainted with the world, but who 
 occasionally had picked up some notions of 
 liistory, literature, and criticism, from the few 
 books within his reach. These he informs us, 
 were Salmon's and Guthrie's Geographical 
 Grammars, the Spectator, Pope's Works, some 
 plays of Shakspeare, Tull and Dickson on 
 Agriculture, the Pantheon, Locke's Essay on 
 the Human Understanding, Stackhouse's His- 
 tory of the Bible, Justice's British Gardener's 
 Directory, Boyle's Lectures, Allan Ramsay's 
 Works, Taylor's Scripture Doctrine of Ori- 
 ginal Sin, a select Collection of English 
 Songs, and Hervey's Meditations. Of this 
 motley assemblage, it may readily be sup- 
 posed, that some would be studied, and some 
 read superficially. There is reason to think, 
 however, that he perused the works of the 
 poets with such attention as, assisted by his na- 
 turally vigorous capacity, soon directed his 
 taste, and enabled him to discriminate ten- 
 derness and sublimity from affectation and 
 bombast. 
 
 It appears that from the seventeenth to the 
 twenty-fourth year of Robert's age, he made 
 no considerable literary improvement. His ac- 
 cessions of knowledge, or opportunities of 
 reading, could not be frequent, but no exter- 
 nal circumstances could prevent the innate 
 peculiarites of his character from displaying 
 themselves. He was distinguished by a vigor- 
 ous understanding, and an untameable spirit. 
 His resentments were quick, and, although 
 not durable, expressed witii a volubility of 
 indignation which could not but silence and 
 overwhelm his humble and illiterate asso- 
 ciates ; while the occasional effusions of his 
 muse on temporary subjects, which were hand* 
 
BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH 
 
 ed about in manuscript, raised him to a local 
 superiority that seemed the earnest of a more 
 extended fame. His first motive to compose 
 verse;?, as has been already noticed, was his 
 early and warm attachment to the fair sex. 
 His favourites were in the humblest walks of 
 hfe ; but during his passion, he elevated them 
 to Lauras and Saocharissas. His attach- 
 ments, however, were of the purer kind, and 
 his constant theme the happiness of the mar- 
 ried state ; to obtain a suitable provision for 
 which, lie engaged in partnership with a fiax- 
 dresser, hoping, probably, to attain b}' degrees 
 the rank of a manufacturer. But this specu- 
 lation was attended with very little success, 
 and was finally ended by an accidental fire. 
 
 On his father's death he took a farm in con- 
 junction with his brother, with the honourable 
 view of providing for their large and orphan 
 family. But here, too, he was doomed to be 
 unfortunate, although, m his brother Gilbert, 
 he had a coadjutor of excellent sense, a man 
 of uncommon powers both of thought and ex- 
 pression. 
 
 During his residence on this farm he formed 
 a connexion with a young woman, the con- 
 sequences of which could not be long con- 
 cealed. Li this dilemma, the imprudent couple 
 agreed to make a legal acknowledgment 
 of a private marriage, and projected that she 
 should remain with her father, while he was 
 to go to Jamaica " to push his fortune." This 
 proceeding, however romantic it may appear, 
 would have rescued the lady's character, ac- 
 cording to the laws of Scotland, but it did not 
 satisfy her father, who insisted on having all 
 the written documents respecting the marriage 
 cancelled, and by this unfeeling measure, he 
 intended that it should be rendered void. Di- 
 vorced now from all he hold dear in the world, 
 he had no resource but in his projected voyag 
 to .Jamaica, which was prevented by one of 
 those circumstances that in conmion cases 
 might pass without observation, but whi_ 
 eventually laid the foundation of his fixture 
 fame. For once, his pover'nj stood his friend. 
 Had he been provided with money to pay for 
 his passage to .himaiea. he might have set sail, 
 and been forgotten. But he was destitute of 
 every necessary for the voyage, and was there- 
 fore advised to raise a sum of money by pub- 
 lisliing his poems in the way of subscription. 
 They were accordingly printed at Kilmarnock, 
 in tile year 1761!, hi a small volume, which 
 was encouraged b}' subscriptions for about 350 
 copies. 
 
 It is hardly possible to express M'ith what 
 eager admiration these poems were every 
 where received. Old and young, high and 
 low, learned and ignorant, all were alike de- 
 lighted. Such transports would naturally find 
 their way into the bosom of the author, 
 especially when he found that, instead of the 
 necessity of flying from his native land, he 
 
 was now encouraged to go to Edinburgh 
 and superintend the publication of a second 
 edition. 
 
 In the metropolis, he was soon introduced 
 into the company and received the homage of 
 men of literature, rank, and taste ; and his ap- 
 pearance and behaviour at this time, as they 
 exceeded all expectation, heightened and kept 
 up the curiosity which his works had excited. 
 He became the object of universal admiration 
 and was feasted, and flattered, as if it had been 
 impossible to reward his merit too highly. 
 But what contributed principally to extend 
 his fame into the sister kingdom, was his 
 fortunate introduction to Mr. Mackenzie, who, 
 m the 97tli paper of the Lounger, recomrriend- 
 ed his poems by judicious specimens, and 
 generous and elegant criticism. From this 
 time, whether present or absent. Bums and 
 liis genius were the objects which engrossed 
 all attention and all conversation. 
 
 It cannot be surprising if this new scene of 
 life, produced effects on Bums which were 
 the source of much of the unhappiness of his 
 future life : for while he was admitted into 
 the company of men of taste, and virtue, he 
 was also seduced, by pressing invitations into 
 the society of those whose habits are too social 
 and inconsiderate. It is to be regretted that he 
 had little resolution to withstand those atten- 
 tions which flattered his merit, and appeared 
 to be the just respect due to a degree of supe- 
 riority, of which he could not avoid being con 
 scions. Among his superiors in rank and 
 merit, his behaviour was in general decorous 
 and unassuming ; but among his more equal 
 or inferior associates, he was himself the source 
 of the mirth of the evening, and repaid the at- 
 tention and submission of his hearers by sal- 
 lies of wit, which, from one of his birth and 
 edu(^(on, had all the fascination of wonder, 
 troduction, about the same time, mto 
 ain convivial clubs of higher rank, was an 
 injudicious mark of respect to one who was 
 destined to return to the plough, and to the 
 simple and frugal enjoyments of a peasant's 
 
 During his residence at Edinburgh, his 
 finances were considerably improved by the 
 new edition of his poems ; and this enabled 
 him to visit several other parts of his native 
 country. He left Edinburgh, May G, 1787, 
 and in the course of his journey was hospitably 
 received at the houses of many gentlemen of 
 worth and learnuig. He afterwards travelled 
 into England as far as Carlisle. In the be- 
 ginning of June he arrived in Ayrshire, after 
 an absence of six months, during which he had 
 experienced a change of fortune, to which the 
 hopes of few men in his situation could have 
 aspired. His companion in some of these 
 tours was a Mr. Nicol, a man who was en- 
 deared to Burns not only by the warmth of 
 his friendship, but by a certain congeniality of 
 
OF THE AUTHOR. 
 
 sentiment and agreement in habits. This sym- 
 pathy, in some other instances, made our po- 
 et capriciously fond of companions, who, in 
 the eyes of men of more regular conduct, were 
 insuflerable. 
 
 During the greater part of the winter 1 787-8, 
 Burns again resided in Edinburgh, and enter- 
 ed with pecuUar relish into its gayetics. But 
 as the singularities of his manner displayed 
 themselves more openly, and as the novelty of 
 his appearance wore off, he became less an ob- 
 ject of general attention. He lingered long 
 in this place, in hopes that some situation 
 would have been offered which might place 
 him in independence : but as it did not seem 
 probable that any thing of that kind would 
 occur soon, he began seriously to rctlect that 
 tours of pleasure and praise would not pro- 
 vide for the wants of a family. Influenced by 
 these considerations he quittid Edinburgh in 
 the month of February, 1788. Finding him- 
 self master of nearly 500/. from the sale of his 
 poems, he took the farm of Ellisland, near 
 Dumfries, and stocked it with part of this mo- 
 ney, besides generously advancing 200/. to 
 his brother Gilbert, who was struggling with 
 Difficulties. He was now also legally united 
 to Mrs. Burns, who joined him with their chil- 
 dren about the end of tliis year. 
 
 Quitting now speculations for more active 
 pursuits, he rebuilt the dwelling-house on his 
 farm ; and during his engagement in tliis ob- 
 ject, and while the regulations of the farm had 
 the charm of novelty, he passed his time in 
 more tranquillity than he had lately experi- 
 enced. But unfortunately, his old habits were 
 rather interrupted than broken. He was again 
 invited into social parties, with the additional 
 recommendation of a man who had seen the 
 world, and lived with the great ; and again 
 partook of those irregularities for which men of 
 warm imaginations, and conversation-talents, 
 find too many apologies. But a circumstance 
 now occurred which threw many obstacles in 
 his way as a farmer. 
 
 Bums very fondly cherished those notions 
 of independence, which are dear to the young 
 and ingenuous. But he had not matured these 
 by reflection ; and he was now to learn, that 
 a little knowledge of the world will overturn 
 many such airy fabrics. If we may form any 
 judgment, however, from his correspondence, 
 his expectations were not very extravagant, 
 since he expected only that some of his illus- 
 trious patrons would have placed him, on 
 whom they bestowed the honours of genius, in 
 a situation where his exertions minfht have 
 been uninterrupted by the fatigues of labour, 
 and the calls of want. Disappointed in this, 
 he now formed a design of applying for the 
 office of exciseman, as a kind of re^■ource in 
 case his expectations from the farm should be 
 baffled. By the interest of one of his friends 
 this object was accomplished ; and after the 
 
 usual forms were gone through, he was ap- 
 pointed exciseman, or, as it is vulgarly called, 
 ganger of the district in which he lived. 
 
 " His farm was now abandoned to his ser- 
 vants, wloile he betook liimself to the duties 
 of his new appointment. He might still, in- 
 deed, be seen in the spring, directing his 
 plough, a labour in which he excelled, or stri- 
 ding with measured steps, along his turned-up 
 furrows, and scattering the grain in the earth. 
 But his farm no longer occupied the principal 
 part of his care or his thoughts. Mounted on 
 horseback, he was found pursuing the defaul- 
 ters of the revenue, among the hills and vales 
 of Nithsdale." 
 
 About this time (1792,) he was solicited, to 
 give his aid to Mr. Thomson's Collection of 
 Scottish Songs. He wrote, with attention and 
 without delay, for this work, all the songs 
 which appear in this volume ; to which we 
 have added those he contributed to Johnson's 
 Musical Musemn. 
 
 Burns also found leisure to form a society 
 for purchasing and circulating books among 
 the farmers of the neighbourhood ; but these, 
 however praiseworthy employments, still in- 
 terrupted the attention he ought to have be- 
 stowed on his farm, which became so unpro- 
 ductive that he found it convenient to resign 
 it, and, disposing of his stock and crop, re- 
 moved to a small house which he had taken 
 in Dumfries, a short time previous to his lyric 
 engagement with Mr. Thomson. He had now 
 received from the Board of Excise, an appoint- 
 ment to a new district, the emoluments of 
 which amounted to about seventy pounds ster- 
 ling j)er annum. 
 
 While at Dumfries, his temptations to ir- 
 regularrty, recuiTcd so frequently as nearly to 
 overpower his resolutions, and which ]ie ap- 
 pears to have formed with a perfect knowledge 
 of what is right and prudent. During liis 
 quiet moments, however, he was enlarging his 
 fame by those admirable compositions he sent 
 to Mr. Tliomson : and his temporary salhes 
 and flashes of imagination, in the merriment of 
 the social table, still bespoke a genius of won- 
 derful strength and captivations. It has been 
 saiti, indeed, that, extraordinary as his puems 
 are, they afford but inadequate proof of the 
 powers of their author, or of that acuteness 
 of observation, and expression, he displayed 
 on common topics in conversation. In the so- 
 ciety of persons of taste, he could refrain from 
 those indulgences, which, among his more con- 
 stant companions, probably formed his chief 
 recommendation. 
 
 The emoluments of his office, which now 
 composed his whole fortune, soon appeared 
 insufficient for the maintenance of his family. 
 He did not, indeed, from the first, expect that 
 they could ; but he had hopes of promotion 
 
vi 
 
 BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH 
 
 and would probably have attained it, if he 
 had not forfeited the favour of the Board of 
 Excise, by some conversations on the state of 
 public affairs, which were deemed higlily im- 
 proper, and were probably reported to the 
 Board in a way not calculated to lessen their 
 effect. That he should have been deceived by 
 the affairs in France daring the early periods 
 of the revolution, is not surprising ; he only 
 caught a portion of an enthusiasm which was 
 then very general ; but that he should have 
 raised his imagination to a warmth beyond 
 his fellows, will appear very singular, when 
 we consider that he had hitherto distinguish- 
 ed himself as a Jacobite, an adherent to the 
 house of Stewart. Yet he had uttered opi- 
 nions which were thought dangerous ; and in- 
 formation being given to the Board, an in- 
 quiry was instituted into his conduct, the re- 
 sult of wliich, although rather favourable, was 
 not so much as to re-instate him in the good 
 opinion of the commissioners. Interest was 
 necessary to enable him to retain his office ; 
 and he was informed that his promotion was 
 deferred, and must depend on lais future be- 
 haviour. 
 
 He is said to have defended himself, on this 
 occasion, in a letter addressed to one of the 
 Board, with much spirit and skill. He wrote 
 another letter to a gentleman, who, hearing 
 that he had been dismissed from his situation, 
 proposed a subscription for him. In tiiis last, 
 he gives an account of the whole transaction, 
 and endeavours to vmdicate his loyalty ; he 
 also contends for an independence of spirit, 
 which he certainly possessed, but which yet 
 appears to have partaken of that extravagance 
 of sentiment wliich are fitter to point a stanza 
 than to conduct a life. 
 
 A passage in this letter is too characteristic 
 to be omitted. — "Often," says our poet, "in 
 blasting anticipation have I listened to some 
 future hackney scribbler, with heavy malice 
 of savage stupidity, exultingly asserting that 
 Bums, notwithstanding the fanfaronade of in- 
 dependence to be found in his works, and 
 after having been held up 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, dwindled in- 
 to a paltry exciseman ; and slunli out the rest 
 of his insignificant existence, in the meanest 
 of pursuits, and among tlie lowest of man- 
 kind." 
 
 This passage has no doubt often been read 
 with sympathy. Tliat Burns should have em- 
 braced the only opportunity in his power to 
 provide for his family, can be no topic of 
 censure or ridicule, and however incompatible 
 with the cultivation of genius the business of 
 an exciseman may be, there is nothing of mo- 
 ral turpitude or disgrace attached to it. It 
 was not his choice, it was the only help within 
 
 his reach : and he laid hold of it. But that he 
 should not have found a patron generous or 
 wise enough to place him in a situation at 
 least free from allurements to " the sin that 
 so easily beset him ;" is a curcvimstance on 
 which the admirers of Burns have found it 
 painful to dwell. 
 
 Mr. Mackenzie, in the 97th number of the 
 Lounger, after mentioning the poet's design 
 of going to the West Indies, concludes that 
 paper in words to which sufficient attention 
 appears not to have been paid : " I trust 
 means may be found to prevent this resolu- 
 tion from taking place ; and that I do my 
 country no more than justice, when I suppose 
 her ready to stretch out the hand to cherish 
 and retain this native poet, whose " wood 
 notes wild" possess so much excellence. To 
 repair the wrongs of suffering or neglected 
 merit ; to call forth genius from the obscurity 
 in which it had pined indignant, and place it 
 irhere it may projlt or delight t/ie icoHd : — these 
 are exertions which give to wealth an enviable 
 superiority, to greatness and to patronage a 
 laudable pride." 
 
 Although Bums deprecated the reflections 
 which might be made on his occupation of 
 exciseman, it may be necessary to add, that 
 from this humble step, he foresaw all the con- 
 tingencies and gradations of promotion up to 
 a rank on which it is not usual to look with 
 contempt. In a letter dated 1794, he states 
 that he is on the list of supervisors ; that in 
 two or three years he should be at the head 
 of that list, and be appointed, as a matter of 
 course ; but that then a friend might be of 
 service in getting him into a part of the king- 
 dom which he would like. A supervisor's in- 
 come varies from about 120^. to 200/. a year : 
 but the business is " an incessant drudgery, 
 and would be nearly a complete bar to every 
 species of literary pursuit." He proceeds, 
 however, to observe, that the moment he is 
 appointed supervisor he might be nominated 
 on the Collector's list, " and tliis is always a 
 business purely of political patronage. A col- 
 Icctorship varies from much better than two 
 hundred a year to near a thousand. Collec- 
 tors also come forward by precedency on the 
 Hst, and have besides a handsome income, a 
 life of complete leisure. A life of hterary lei- 
 sure with a decent competence, is the summit 
 of my wishes." 
 
 He was doomed, however, to continue in 
 his present employment for the remainder of 
 his days, which were not many. His consti- 
 tution was now rapidly decaying; yet, his 
 resolutions of amendment were but feeble. 
 His temper became irritable and gloomy, and 
 he was even insensible to the kind forgiveness 
 and soothing attentions of his affectionate wife. 
 In the month of June, 1796, he removed to 
 Brow, about ten miles from Dumfries, to try 
 
OP THE AUTHOR. 
 
 vU 
 
 tho effect of sea-bathing; a remedy that at 
 first, he imagined, relieved the rheumatic pains 
 in his Umbs, with which he had been afflicted 
 for some months : but this was immediately 
 followed by a new attack of fever. When 
 brought back to his house at Dumfries, on the 
 18th of July, he was no longer able to stand 
 upright. The fever increased, attended with 
 delirium and debihty, and on the 21st he 
 expired, in the thirty-eighth year of his age. 
 
 He left a widow and four sons, for whom 
 the inhabitants of Dumfries opened a sub- 
 scription, which being extended to England, 
 produced a considerable sum for their imme- 
 diate necessities.* This has since been aug- 
 mented by the profits of the edition of ms 
 works, printed in four volumes, 8vo. ; to 
 
 * Mrs. Burns continues to live in the Iinuse in wbicti 
 the Pofitdied : the eldest eon, Robert, is at present in the 
 Stamp Office : the other two are officers in the East In- 
 dia Company's army, William is in Bengal, and James 
 in Madras, (May, 1813.) Wallace, the second soQi a lad 
 of great promise died of a consumption. 
 
 which Dr. Currie, of Liverpool, prefixed a life, 
 written with much elegance and taste. 
 
 As to the person of our poet, he is described 
 as being nearly five feet ten inches in height, 
 and of a form that indicated agility as well as 
 strength. His well-raised forehead, shaded 
 with black curling hair, expressed uncommon 
 capacity. His eyes were large, dark, full of 
 ardour and animation. His face was well 
 formed, and his countenance imcommonly in- 
 teresting. His conversation is tmiversally 
 aUowed to have been uncommonly fascinating, 
 and rich in wit, humour, whim, and occa- 
 sionally in serious and apposite reflection. 
 This excellence, however, proved a lasting 
 misfortune to him : for while it procured him 
 the friendship of men of character and taste, in 
 whose company his humour was guarded and 
 chaste, it had also allurements for the lowest 
 of mankind, who know no difference between 
 freedom and licentiousness, and are never so 
 completely gratified as when genius conde- 
 scends to give a kind of sanction to their 
 grossnesB. He died poor, but not in debt, and 
 lefl behind him a name, the fame of which 
 will not soon be eclipsed. 
 
ON 
 
 THE DEATH OF BURNS. 
 
 BY MR. ROSCOE. 
 
 Rear high thy bleak, majestic hills, 
 
 Thy shelter'd valleys proudly spread, 
 And, Scotia, pour thy thousand rills. 
 
 And wave thy heaths with blossoms red ; 
 But, ah ! what poet now shall tread 
 
 Thy airy heights, thy woodland reign, 
 Since he the sweetest bard is dead 
 
 That ever breath'd the soothing strain ' 
 
 As green thy towering pmes may grow, 
 
 As clear thy streams may speed along ; 
 As bright thy summer suns may glow. 
 
 And wake again thy feathery throng ; 
 But now, unheeded is the song, 
 
 And dull and hfeless all around. 
 For his Vild harp Ues all unstrung. 
 
 And cold the hand that wak'd its sound. 
 
 What tho' thy vigorous oiFspring rise 
 
 In arts and arms thy sons excel ; 
 Tho' beauty in thy daughters' eyes, 
 
 And health in every feature dwell ; 
 Yet who shall now their praises tell, 
 
 In strains impassion'd, fond, and free. 
 Since he no more the song shall swell 
 
 To love, and liberty, and thee ! 
 
 With step-dame eye and frown severe 
 
 His hapless youth why didst thou view i 
 For all thy joys to him were dear. 
 
 And all his vows to thee were due : 
 Nor greater bliss his bosom knew. 
 
 In opening youtli's delightful prime. 
 Than when thy favouring ear he drew 
 
 To Usten to his chanted rhyme. 
 
 Thy lonely wastes and irowning skies 
 
 To him were all with rapture fraught ; 
 He heard with joy the tempests rise 
 
 That wak'd him to sublimer thought; 
 And oft thy winding dells he sought, 
 
 Where wild flowecs pour'd their rath perfume 
 And with sincere devotion brought 
 
 To thee the summer's earliest bloom. 
 » 
 
 But, ah ! no fond maternal smile 
 
 His unprotected youth enjoy'd; 
 His limbs inur'd to early toil. 
 
 His days with early hardships tried: 
 And more to mark the gloomy void. 
 
 And bid him feel his misery. 
 Before his infant eyes would gUde 
 
 Day-dreams of immortahty. 
 
 Yet, not by cold neglect depress'd, 
 
 With sinewy arm he turn'd the soil. 
 Sunk with the evening sun to rest, 
 
 And met at mom liis earliest smile, 
 Wak'd by his rustic pipe, meanwhile 
 
 The powers of fancy came along. 
 And soothed his lengthen'd hour of toil 
 
 With native wit and sprightly song. 
 
 — Ah 1 days of bliss, too swiftly fled, 
 
 When vigorous health fronflabour springs, 
 And bland contentment smooths the bed, 
 
 And sleep his ready opiate brings ; 
 And hovering round on airy wings 
 
 Float the light forms of young desire, 
 That of unutterable things 
 
 The soft and shadowy hope inspire. 
 
 Now spells of mightier power prepare, 
 
 Bid brigliter phantoms round him dance : 
 Let flattery spread lier viewless snare. 
 
 And fame attract his vagrant glance : 
 Let sprightly pleasure too advance, 
 
 Unveil'd her eyes, unclasp 'd her zone. 
 Till lost in love's delirious trance 
 
 He scorns the joys his youth has known. 
 
 Let friendship pour her brightest blaze. 
 
 Expanding all the bloom of soul; 
 And mirth concentre all lier rays, 
 
 And point them from the sparkling bov/l ; 
 And let the careless moments roll 
 
 In social pleasures unconfin'd. 
 And confidence that spurns control, 
 
 Unlock the inmost springs of mind. 
 A. 2 
 
ON THE DEATH OP BURNS. 
 
 And load his steps those bowers among, 
 
 Where elegance with splendour vies, 
 Or science bids her favoured throng 
 
 To more refiii'd sensations rise ; 
 Beyond the peasant's humbler joys, 
 
 And freed from each laborious strife, 
 There let him learn the bhss to prize 
 
 That waits the sons of polish'd life. 
 
 Then whilst his throbbing veins beat high 
 
 With every impulse of deUght, 
 Dash from liis lips the cup of joy. 
 
 And shroud the scene in shades of night ; 
 And let despair, with wizard light. 
 
 Disclose the yawning gulf below, 
 And pour incessant on his sight, 
 
 Her spectred ills and shapes of wo : 
 
 And show beneath a cheerless shed, 
 With sorrowing heart and streaming eyes, 
 
 In silent grief where droops her head, 
 Tlie partner of his early joys ; 
 
 And let his infant's tender cries 
 His fond pajental succour claim, 
 
 And bid him hear in agonies 
 A husband and a father's name. 
 
 'Tis done — the powerful charm succeeds ; 
 
 His high reluctant spirit bends ; 
 In bitterness of soul he bleeds, 
 
 Nor longer with his fate contends. 
 An idiot laugh the welkin rends 
 
 As genius thus degraded hes ; 
 Till pitying Heaven the veil extends 
 
 That shrouds the Poet's ju-dent eyes. 
 
 — Rear high thy bleak, majestic hills, 
 
 Thy shelter'd valleys proudly spread, 
 And, Scotia, pour thy thousand nils. 
 
 And wave thy heaths with blossoms red ; 
 But never more shall poet tread 
 
 Thy airy heights, thy woodland reign, 
 Since he the sweetest bard is dead 
 
 That ever breath'd the soothing strftin. 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 Page 
 
 Biographical Sketch of the Author, . 
 
 On the Death of Burns, by Mr. Roscoe, 
 
 Preface to the First Edition of Burns' 
 Poems, pubhshed at Kilmarnock, 
 
 Dedication of the Second Edition of 
 the Poems formerly printed. To the 
 Noblemen and Gentlemen of the 
 Caledonian Hunt, . . . . 
 
 POEMS, CHIEFLY SCOTTISH. 
 
 The Twa Dogs, a Tale, . 
 
 Scotch Drink, 
 
 The Author's earnest Cry and Prayer to 
 
 the Scotch Representatives in the 
 
 House of Commons, 
 
 Postscript, 
 
 The Holy Fair, 
 
 Death and Dr. Hornbook, . 
 
 The Brigs of Ayr, a Poem inscribed to 
 
 J. B**>******, Esq. Ayr, 
 
 The Ordination, 
 
 The Calf. To the Rev. Mr. 
 
 Address to the Deil, . 
 
 The Death and Dymg Words of Poor 
 
 Mailie, 
 
 Poor Mailie's Elesry, .... 
 
 To J. s****, r . . . . 
 
 A Dream, 
 
 The Vision, 
 
 Address to c^" TTnc.o Guid, or the Rigid- 
 ly Righteous, . ... 
 
 Tam Samson's Elegy, .... 
 
 The Epitaph, . . . . 
 
 Halloween, . . . . 
 
 The Auld Farmer's New-Year Morning 
 Salutation to his Auld Mars Maggie, 
 
 To a Mouse, on turning her up in her 
 nest with the Plough, Noven.'^"' 
 1785 
 
 A Winter Night, .... 
 
 E|)istle to Davie, a Brother Poet, 
 
 The Lament, occasioned by the unfor- 
 tunate issue of a Friend's Amour, 
 
 Despondency, an Ode, 
 
 Winter, a Dirge, .... 
 
 The Cotter's Saturday Night, 
 
 Man was made to Mourn, a Dirge, 
 
 A Prayer in the prospect of Deatli, 
 
 Stanzas on the same occasion. 
 
 Verses left by the Author, in the room 
 where he slept, having lain at the 
 House of a Reverend \ riend, . 
 
 The First Psahn, .... 
 
 Pige 
 
 A Prayer, under the pressure of violent 
 Anguish, 
 
 The first six verses of the Ninetieth 
 Psalm, 
 
 To a Mountain Daisy, on turning one 
 dov/n with the Plough, in April, 1786, 
 
 To Ruin, 
 
 To Miss L , with Beattie's Poems as 
 
 a New Year's Gift, Jan. 1, 1787, 
 
 Epistle to a Young Friend, . 
 
 On a Scotch Bard, gone to the West 
 Indies, ..... 
 
 To a Haggis, .... 
 
 A Dedication to Gavm Hamilton, Esq 
 
 To a Louse, on seeing one on a Lady's 
 Bonnet at Church, 
 
 Address to Edinburgh, 
 
 Epistle to J. Lapr^, an old Scottish 
 Bard 
 
 To the Same, .... 
 
 To W. S*****n, Ochiltree, May, 1785, 
 
 Postscript, 
 
 Epistle to J. R******, enclosing some 
 Poems, 
 
 John Barleycorn, a Ballad, . 
 
 Written in Friars-Carse Hermitage, on 
 Nith-Side 
 
 Ode, sacred to the memory of Mrs. 
 
 of 
 
 Elegy on Capt. Matthew Henderson, 
 
 The Epitaph, . . . . 
 
 To Robert Graham, Esq. of Fintra, 
 
 Lament for James, Earl of Glencaim, 
 
 Lines sent to Sir John Whitefoord of 
 Whitefoord, Bart, with the foregoing 
 Poem, 
 
 Tam O' Shanter, a Tale, . 
 
 On seeing a wounded Hare limp by me, 
 which a fellow had just shot at. 
 
 Address to the Shade of Thomson, on 
 Crov\Tiing his bust at Ednam, Rox- 
 burghshire, with Bays, 
 
 Epitaph on a celebrated Ruling Elder, 
 
 On a Noisy Polemic, . 
 
 On Wee Johnie, .... 
 
 For the Author's Father, . . 
 
 Fov R. A. Esq 
 
 ForG. H. Esq 
 
 A Burd's Epitaph, ... 
 
 On the late Captain Grose's Peregrina- 
 tions th'ough Scotland, collecting the 
 Antiquitjes of that Kingdom, . 
 
 To Miss Cruikshanks, a very young 
 Lady. Written on the blank leaf of a 
 Book, presented to her by the Author 
 
On reading in a Newspaper the Death 
 of John M'Leod, Esq. Brother to a 
 young Lady, a particular Friend of 
 
 the Author's, 72 
 
 The Humble petition of Bruar Water to 
 
 the Noble Duke of Athole, . . ib. 
 On scaring some Water-Fowl in Loch- 
 
 Turit 73 
 
 Written with a Pencil over theChimney- 
 piece, in the Parlour of the Inn at 
 Kenmore, Taymouth, . . . ' ib; 
 Written with a Pencil, standing by the 
 
 Fall of Fyers, near Loch-Ness, . 74 
 
 On the Birth of a Posthumous Child, 
 Born in peculiar Circumstances of 
 Family Distress, . . . . ib 
 
 The Whistle, a Ballad, . , . ib! 
 
 Second Epistle to Davie, ... 76 
 
 Lines on an Interview with Lord 
 
 Daer, 77 
 
 On the Death of a Lap-Dog, named 
 
 Echo 79 
 
 Inscription to the Memory of Fergusson, ib. 
 
 Epistle to R. Graham, Esq. . . ib. 
 
 Fragment, inscribed to the Right Hon. 
 
 C.J. Fox 81 
 
 To Dr. Blacklock, . . . . ib. 
 
 Prologue, spoken at the Theatre Ellis- 
 land, on New-Year's-Day Evening, 82 
 
 Elegy on the late Miss Burnet, of Mon- 
 
 boddo, jb. 
 
 The Rights of Woman, ... 83 
 
 Address, spoken by Miss Fontenelle, 
 on her Benefit Night, Dec. 4, 1795, at 
 the Theatre, Dumfries. ... 84 
 
 Verses to a young Lady, with a present 
 
 of Songs, 95 
 
 Lmes written on a blank leaf of a copy 
 of his poems presented to a young 
 Lady, 104 
 
 Copy of a Poetical Address to Mr. 
 
 William Tytler, .... 117 
 
 Caledonia, 118 
 
 Poem written to a Gentleman who had 
 sent him a Newspaper, and offered to 
 continue it free of expense, . , 119 
 
 Poem on Pastoral Poetry, . . . ib. 
 
 Sketch— New Year's Day, . . .120 
 
 Extempore, on the late Mr. William 
 Smellie, 121 
 
 Poetical Inscription for an Altar to In- 
 dependence, ..... ib. 
 
 Sonnet, on the Death of Robert Riddel, 
 
 Esq ib. 
 
 Monody on a Lady famed for her ca- 
 price. ib. 
 
 The Epitaph, 122 
 
 Answer to a mandate sent by the Sur- 
 veyor of the Windows, Carriages, &c. ib. 
 
 Impromptu, on Mrs. 's Birth-day, 123 
 
 To a young Lady, Miss Jessy , 
 
 Dumfries ; with Books which tlie Bard 
 presented her, ib. 
 
 *onnet, written on the 25th of .January, 
 1793, the Birth-day of the Author, on. 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 Page 
 
 Page 
 
 hearing a Thrush sing in a morning 
 
 walk, 
 
 Extempore,^ to Mr. S**e, on refusing 
 
 dine with him, 
 To Mr. S**e, with a present of a dozen 
 
 of porter, .... 
 Poem, addressed to Mr. Mitchell, col 
 
 lector of Excise, Dumfries, 1796, 
 Sent to a Gentleman^whom he had of- 
 fended, . 
 Poem on Life, addressed to Col. De 
 
 Peyster, Dumfries, 
 Address to the Tooth-ach, 
 To Robert Graham, Esq. of Fin try, on 
 
 receiving a favour. 
 Epitaph on a Friend, 
 A Grace before Dinner, 
 On Sensibility. Addressed to Mrs, 
 
 Dunlop, of Dunlop, 
 A Verse. When Death's dark stream ] 
 
 ferry o'er 
 
 Verses written at Selkirk, . 
 
 Liberty, a Fragment, 
 
 Elegy on the death of RxjbertRuisseaux, 
 
 The loyal Natives' "f' 
 
 Burns — Extempore. 
 
 To J. Lapraik, . 
 
 To the Rev. John M'Math, enclosing 
 
 a copy of Holy Willie's Prayer, 
 
 which.he had requested, . 
 To Gavin Hamilton, Esq. Mauchline 
 
 recommending a Boy, 
 To Mr. M'Adam, of Craigen-Gillan, 
 To Capt. Riddel, Glenriddel, . 
 To Terrauglity, on his Birth-day, 
 To a Lady, with a present of a pair of 
 
 drinking-glasses. 
 The Vowels, a Tale, . 
 
 Sketch, 
 
 Scots Prologue, for Mr. Sutherland'! 
 
 Benefit, .... 
 
 Extemporaneous Effusion on being ap 
 
 pointed to the Excise, 
 On seeing the beautiful seat of Lord G 
 On the same, 
 On the same, • 
 To the same on the Author being 
 
 threatened with his resentment, 
 The Dean of Faculty, 
 Extempore in the Court of Session 
 Verses to J. Ranken, . 
 On hearing that there was falsehood in 
 
 the Rev. Dr. B 's very looks, . 
 
 On a Schoohnaster in Cleish Parish, 
 
 Fifeshire, .... 
 Elegy on the Year 1788, a Sketch, 
 Verses written under the Portrait of 
 
 Fergusson, the Poet 
 The Guidwife of Wauchope-house to 
 
 Robert Burns, 
 The Answer, 
 
 The Kirk's Alarm, A Satire. 
 The twa Herds, 
 Epistle from a Taylor to Robert Bums, 
 The Answer, 
 
Letter to John Goudie, Kilmarnock, on 
 the publication of his Essays, 
 
 Letter to J — s T 1 Gl nc r. 
 
 On the Death of Sir James Hmiter 
 
 CONTENTS 
 
 Page 
 
 The Jolly Beggars, a Cantata. 
 
 SONGS. 
 
 Adieu ! a heart- warm, fond adieu ! 
 Adown winding Nith I did wander. 
 Ae fond kiss and then we sever. 
 Again rejoicing nature sees, 
 A Highland lad my love was born, 
 Altho' my bed were in yon muir, 
 Amang the trees where humming bees. 
 An O, for ane and twenty, Tam ! 
 Ance mair I hail thee, thou gloomy De^ 
 
 cember ! .... 
 
 Anna, thy charms my bosom fire, 
 A rose-bud by my early walk. 
 As 1 cam in by our gate-end. 
 As I stood by yon roofless tower. 
 As I was a-wandermg ae morning in 
 
 sprmg, 
 
 Awa wi' your witchcraft o' beauty's 
 alarms, 
 
 B. 
 
 Belimd yon hills where Liigar flows, 
 Behold the hour, the boat arrive ; 
 Beyond thee, dearie, beyond thee, 
 
 dearie, 
 
 Blithe, blithe and merry was she, 
 Blithe hae I been on yon liill, 
 I'onnie lassie will ye go, 
 Bonnie wee thing, cannie wee thing, 
 But lately seen in gladsome green. 
 By Allan stream I chanced to rove, 
 By yon castle wa', at the close of the 
 
 day, 
 
 C. 
 
 Ca' the yowes to the knowes, 
 Canst thou leave me thus, my Katy ? 
 Clarinda, mistress of my soul. 
 Come, let mo take thee to my breast, 
 Comin thro' the rye, poor body, 
 Contented wi' little, and cantie wi' mair, 
 Could aught of song declare my pains. 
 
 Deluded swam, the pleasure, 
 
 Does haughty Gaul invasion threat i 
 
 105 
 
 Duncan Gray came here to woo, 
 
 F. 
 
 Fair the face of orient day. 
 Fairest maid on Devon banks. 
 Farewell, thou fair day, thou green 
 
 earth, and ye skies. 
 Farewell thou stream that winding 
 
 flows, 
 
 Farewell, ye dungeons dark and strong, 
 Fate gave the word, the arrow sped, . 
 First when Maggie was my care, 
 "Flow gently, sweet Afton, among thy 
 
 green braes, 
 
 Forlorn, my love, no comfort near, 
 From thee, Eliza, I must go. 
 
 Gane is the day, and mirk's the night, 
 Go fetch to me a pint o' wine, 
 Green grows the rashes, O I 
 
 xiu 
 Page 
 
 151 
 
 106 
 
 99 
 142 
 116 
 142 
 
 115 
 104 
 61 
 
 H. 
 
 Had I a cave on some wild, distant shore, 
 Here awa, there awa, wandering WiUie, 
 Here's a bottle and an honest friend, . 
 Here's a health to ane I lo'e dear. 
 Here's a health to them that's awa, 
 Here is the glen, and here the bower, 
 Her flowing locks, the raven's wing, . 
 How can my poor heart be glad, 
 How cruel are the parents, . , 
 
 How long and dreary is the night, . 
 How pleasant the banks of me clear- 
 winding Devon, .... 
 Husband, husband, cease "your strife, , 
 
 I am a bard of no regard, 
 
 I am a fiddler to my trade, 
 
 I am a son of Mars, 
 
 I do confess thou art so fair, 
 
 I dream'd I lay where flowers were 
 
 springing, .... 
 
 I gaed a waefu' gate yestreen, 
 I hae a wife o' my ain, 
 I'll ay ca' in by yon town, 
 rU kiss thee yet, yet, . 
 In sunmer when the hay was mawn, 
 I once was a maid tho' I cannot tell 
 
 when. 
 Is there for honest poverty, 
 
 It was upon a Lammas night. 
 
 It was the charming montn of May, 
 
 J. 
 
 Jockey's ta'en the parting kiss, 
 John Anderson my jo, John, 
 
 111 
 137 
 59 
 
 91 
 
 88 
 143 
 105 
 146 
 
 95 
 147 
 
 96 
 102 
 
 97 
 
 78 
 95 
 
 162 
 161 
 
 137 
 110 
 78 
 142 
 143 
 112 
 
 159 
 100 
 
 126 
 110 
 
K. 
 
 Ken ye ought o' Captain Grose ? . 
 
 L. 
 
 Lassie wi' the lint-wliite locks, . 
 Last May a braw wooer cam down the 
 
 lang glen, 
 Let me ryke up to dight that tear, 
 Let not woman e'er complain 
 Long, long the night, . 
 Loud blaw tile frosty breezes, 
 Louis, what reck I by thee, . 
 
 M. 
 
 Mark yonder pomp of costly fasliion, 
 Musing on the roaring ocean. 
 My bonny lass, I work in brass, . 
 My Chloris, mark how green the groves, 
 My father was a farmer upon the Car- 
 rick border, O, ... 
 My lieart is a-breaking, dear Tittie, 
 My heart 's in the Highlands, my heart 
 
 is not here ; . . . . 
 My heart is sair, I dare na teU, . 
 My lady's gown there's gairs upon't, 
 My Peggy's face, my Peggy's form, 
 
 N. 
 
 Nae "Gentle dames, tho' e'er sae fair, . 
 No churchman am I for to rail and to 
 
 write, 
 
 Now bank and brae are claith'd in green 
 Now in her green mantle blithe nature 
 
 arrays, 
 
 Now nature hangs her mantle green . 
 Now rosy May comes in wi' flowers 
 Now spring has cloth'd the groves in 
 
 green, . . . . . . 
 
 Now weslin winds and slaughtermg 
 
 guns, 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 Page 
 
 . 126 
 
 O. 
 
 O ay my wife she dang me, 
 O bonnie was yon rosy brier, . 
 O cam ye here the fight to shun, . 
 Of a' the airts the wiiid can blaw, 
 O gin my love were yon red rose, 
 O guid aJe comes, and guid ale goes, 
 O how can I be blithe and glad, . 
 Oh, open the door, some pity to show 
 Oh, wert thou in the cauld blast, . 
 O ken ye wha Meg o' the Mill has got- 
 ten 
 
 O lassie, art thou sleepin yet ? 
 O leave novels, ye MauchlLne belles, 
 O leeze me on my spinning wheel, 
 G Logan, sweetly didst thou glide, 
 O lovely Polly Stewart, 
 O luve will venture in, where it daur na 
 weel bo seen, . . • 
 
 O Mary, at thy window be, 
 O May, thy mom was ne'er sae sweet, 
 O meikle thinks my luve o' my beauty. 
 O mirk, mirk is the midnight hour, 
 O my luve's like a red, red rose, . 
 On a bank of flowers, one summer's 
 
 day, 
 
 On Cessnock banks there hves a lass, 
 
 One night as I did wander, . 
 
 O, once I lov'd a bonnie lass, 
 
 O Philly, happy be the day, 
 
 O poortith cauld, and restless love, 
 
 O raging fortune's withering blast, 
 
 O saw ye bonnie Lesley, 
 
 O saw ye my dear, my Phely ? 
 
 O stay, sweet warbling wood-lark, stay 
 
 O tell na me o' wind and rain, 
 
 O, this is no my ain lassie, . 
 
 O Tibbie, I hae seen the day. 
 
 Out over the Forth I look to the north 
 
 O, wat ye wha's in yon town, 
 
 O, were I on Parnassus' hill ! 
 
 O wha is she that lo'es me, . 
 
 O wha my babic-clouts will buy ? 
 
 O whistle, and Fll come to you, my lad 
 
 O, Willie brew'd a peck o' maut, . 
 
 O wilt thou go wi' me, sweet Tibbie 
 
 Dunbar, 
 
 O why the deuce should I repine, 
 
 P. 
 
 Powers celestial, whose protection 
 
 Raving winds around her blowing, 
 Robin shure in hairst, . 
 
 Sae flaxen were her ringlets, 
 Scenes of wo and scenes of pleasure, . 
 Scots wha hae wi' Wallace bled. 
 See the smoking bowl before us, . 
 She's fair and fause that causes my 
 
 smart, . . . • 
 She is a winsome wee thing, 
 Shovild auld acquaintance be forgot, . 
 Sir Wisdom's a fool when he's fou, 
 Sleep'st thou, or wak'st thou, faurest 
 
 creature, 
 
 Slow spreads the gloom my soul 
 
 desires, 
 
 Stay my charmer, can you leave me? . 
 Streams that glide in orient plains, 
 Sweet fa's the eve on Craigie-bum, . 
 
 Tho bairns gat out wi' an unco shout, . 
 The Co trine woods were yellow seen, . 
 The day returns, my bosom burns, 
 
 Page 
 
 87 
 116 
 111 
 
 87 
 117 
 
 151 
 
 143 
 
 145 
 
 79 
 
 99 
 
 86 
 
 146 
 
 85 
 
 97 
 
 101 
 
 ib. 
 
 103 
 
 108 
 
 142 
 
 116 
 
 109 
 
 125 
 
 138 
 
 92 
 
 110 
 
 163 
 
 144 
 
 107 
 149 
 
 127 
 
 94 
 
 162 
 
 115 
 
 85 
 93 
 160 
 
 97 
 
 152 
 
 106 
 
 78 
 
 101 
 
 150 
 109 
 ib. 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 Page 
 
 The deil cam fiddling tho' the town, . 144 
 
 The gloomy night is gath'ring fast, . 60 
 The heather was blooming,the meadows 
 
 were mawn, 144 
 
 The lazv mist hangs from the brow of 
 
 the hill, 109 
 
 The lovely lass o' Inverness, . . 116 
 The small birds rejoice in the green 
 
 leaves returning, . . . . 79 
 
 The smihng spring comes in rejoicing, . 115 
 
 The Thames flows proudly to the sea, . 110 
 The winter it is past, and the simmer 
 
 comes at last, . . . . .147 
 Their groves o' sweet myrtle let foreign 
 
 lands reckon, 102 
 
 There's auld Rob Morris that wons in 
 
 yon glen, 86 
 
 There's a youth in this city, it were a 
 
 great pity, 138 
 
 There's braw, braw lads on Yarrow 
 
 braes, 87 
 
 There was a bonnie lass, and a bonnie, 
 
 bonnie lass, 149 
 
 There was a lad was born at Kyle, . 146 
 
 There was a lass and she was fair, . . 90 
 
 There were five carhns in the South, . 152 
 
 Thickest night o'erhang my dwelling ! . 106 
 
 Thine am I, my faitliful fair, . . 94 
 
 Tho' cruel fate should bid us part, . 141 
 
 Thou hast left me ever, Jamie, . . 93 
 
 Thou lingering star, with less'ning ray, 77 
 To thee, lov'd Nith, thy gladsome 
 
 plams, 147 
 
 True heatred was he, the sad swam of 
 
 Yarrow, ...... 89 
 
 Turn again, thou fair Eliza, . . 113 
 Twas even, the dewy fields were 
 
 green, 76 
 
 Twas na bcr bonnie blue e'e was my 
 
 ruin; . _ 102 
 
 Up in the morning's no for me, . 
 W, 
 
 Wae is my heart and the tear's in my e'e, 
 Wee Willie Gray, and his leather wallet ; 
 Wha is this at my bower door ? . 
 What can a young lassie, what shall a 
 
 young lassie, 
 
 When first I came to Stewart Kyle, 
 When Guilford good our pilot stood, . 
 When o'er the h3l the eastern star. 
 When January winds were blawing 
 
 cauld, 
 
 When wild war's deadly blast was 
 
 blawn, 
 
 Where are the joys I hae met in the 
 
 morning, 
 
 Where bravmg angry wmter's storms. 
 
 Where Cart rins rowm to the sea. 
 
 While larks, with little wing. 
 
 Why, why tell thy lover, 
 
 Will ye go to the Indies, my Mary, 
 
 WilUe Wastle dwalt on Tweed, . 
 
 Wilt thou be my dearie? 
 
 Page 
 
 137 
 
 144 
 15U 
 14U 
 
 111 
 
 146 
 57 
 
 84 
 
 153 
 
 94 
 108 
 115 
 
 91 
 105 
 
 85 
 114 
 
 Ye banks and braes, and streams, 
 
 around, 85 
 
 Ye banks and braes o' bonnie Doon, . 113 
 
 Ye flowery banks o' bonnie Doon, . 114 
 
 Ye gallants bright I red you right, . 137 
 
 Yestreen I had a pint o' wine, . . 144 
 
 Yon wand'ring rill, that marks the hill, 149 
 
 Yon wild mossy mountains, . . 139 
 
 Young Jockey was the blithest lad, . 142 
 
 Young Peggy blooms our bonniest lasd, 145 
 
 You're wekome to Despots, Dumourier, 136 
 
PREFACE 
 
 FIRST EDXTIOir 
 
 iwmns^ ^(©sm^a 
 
 PUBLISHED AT KILMARNOCK IN 1786. 
 
 The following trifles arc not the production 
 of tlio 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 Vir- 
 gil. To the author of this, these and other 
 celebrated names, their countrymen, are, at 
 hiast in their original language, a fountain shut 
 up, and a book sealed, ijnacquainted with the 
 necessary requisites for commencing poet by 
 rule, he sings the sentiments and manners he 
 felt and saw in himself and his rustic com- 
 peers around him, in his and their native lan- 
 guage. Though a rhymer from his earliest 
 years, at least from the earliest impulses of 
 the softer passions, it was not till very Lately 
 that tlie applause, perhaps the partiality, of 
 friendship, wakened his vanity so far as to 
 make him think any thing of his worth show- 
 ing ; 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 fatigues of a laborious 
 life ; to transcribe tlie various feelings, the 
 loves, the griefs, the hopes, the fears, in liis 
 own breast : to find some kind of counterpoise 
 to the struggles of a world, always an alien 
 ecene, 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 re- 
 ward. 
 
 Now that he appears in the puljlic charar-ter 
 of an author, he does it with fear and trem- 
 bling. So dear is fame to the rhyming tril)e, 
 that even he, an obscure, nameless Bard, shrinks 
 aghast at the thouglit of being branded as — An 
 impertinent blockhead, obtruding his nonsense 
 on the world ; and, because he can malce a shift 
 to jingle a few doggerel Scotch rjiynios to- 
 
 B 
 
 gether, looking upon himself as a poet of no 
 small consequence, foFBOoth ! 
 
 It is an observation of that celebrated poet, 
 Shenstone, whose divine elegies do honour to 
 our language, our nation, and our species, that 
 " Humility has depressed many a genius to a 
 hermit, but never raised one to fame !" If any 
 critic catches at the word senilis, the author 
 tells him once for all, that he certainly looks 
 upon himself as possessed of some poetic abili- 
 ties, otherwise his publishmg in the marnier ho 
 has done, would be a manoeuvre 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 
 ]>oor unfortunate Fergusson, he, with equal un- 
 aifected 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. 
 
 To his Subscribers, the author returns his 
 most sincere thanks. Not the mercenary bow 
 over a counter, but the heart-throbbing grati- 
 tude of the bard, conscious how much he owes 
 to benevolence and friendship, for gratifying 
 him, if he deserves it, in that dearest wish <M 
 every poetic bosom — to be distingished. He 
 begs his readers, particularly the Teamed and 
 the polite, who may honour him with a perusal, 
 that they will make every allowance for edu- 
 cation and circumstances of life ; but if, after 
 a fair, candid, and impartial criticism, he shall 
 stand convicted of dulness and noniiense, let 
 him be done by as he would in that case do 
 by others — let him be condemned, without 
 mercy, to contempt and oblivion. 
 
B®B1€A1^I(^M 
 
 SECOND EDITION OF THE 
 
 POEMS FORMERLY PRINTED. 
 
 vtOBiMHHLTmr axtd oziM'TZ.ziMzrir 
 
 OF THE 
 
 CALEDOJSriAJV HUJ^T. 
 
 My Lords and Grvtt.f.men, 
 A Scottish Bard, proud of the name, and 
 whose liighest ambition is to sing in his Coun- 
 try'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 
 plough ; and threw her mspiring 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 tliis ancient Metropolis of Cale- 
 donia, and lay my Songs under your honoured 
 protection ; I now obey her dictates. 
 
 Though much indebted to your goodness, I 
 do not approach you, my Lords and Gentle- 
 men, 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, look- 
 ing for a continuation of those favours ; I was 
 brod 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 
 spirit, she may expect protection, wealth, and 
 liberty. In the last place, I come to proffer my 
 warmest wishes to the Great Fountain of Ho- 
 nour, the Monarch of tlie Universe, for your 
 welfare and happiness. 
 
 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 re- 
 turn 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 hcentiousness in the People, 
 equally find you an inexorable foe 1 
 I have the honour to be. 
 With the sincerest gratitude, 
 and highest respect. 
 My Lords and Gentlemen, 
 Your most devoted humble servant. 
 
 ROBERT BURNS. 
 
 Edinburgh, 
 April 4, 1787 
 
^(©MO^ 
 
 CHIEF!. -a- SCOTTISB^ 
 
 THE TWA DOGS, 
 
 'TwAS in that place o' Scotland's isln, 
 That hears the name o' Auld King Coil, 
 Upon a honnie day in June, 
 When wearing thro' the afternoon, 
 Twa dogs that were na thrang at hame, 
 Forgather'd auce upon a time. 
 
 The first I'll name, they ca'd him Ccesar, 
 Was keepit for his Honour's pleasure.: 
 His hair, his size, his mouth, his lugs, 
 Show'd he was nane o' Scotland's dogs; 
 But whalpit some place far abroad, 
 Where sailors gang to fish for Cod. 
 
 His locked, letter'd, braw brass collar, 
 Show'd him the gentleman and scholar ; 
 But though he was o' high degree, 
 The fient a pride, na pride had he ; 
 But wad hae spent an hour caressin, 
 Ev'n wi' a tinkler-gypsey's mcssin. 
 At kirk or market, mill or smiddie, 
 Nae tawted tyke, tho' e'er sae duddie, 
 But he wad stawn't, as glad to see him. 
 And stroan't on stanes an' liillocks wi' him. 
 
 The tither was a ploughman's collie, 
 A- rhyming, ranting, raving billie, 
 Wha for his friend an' comrade had him, 
 And in his freaks had Luath ca'd him. 
 After some dog in Highland sang,* 
 Was made lang syne — Lord knows how lane 
 
 He was a gash an' faithfu' tyke, 
 As ever lap a sheugli or dyke. 
 His honest, sonsie, baws'nt face, 
 Ay gat him friends in ilka place. 
 His breast was white, his towzie back 
 Weel clad wi' coat o' glossy black ; 
 His gawcie tail, wi' upward curl. 
 Hung o'er his hurdles wi' a swurl. 
 
 Nae doubt but they were fain o' ither, 
 An' unco pack an' thick thegither ; 
 
 • Ciiclmllin's dog in Ossi.in's Fiiijjal. 
 
 Wi' social nose whyles snufTd and snowkit, 
 Whyles mice an' moudieworts they howkit ; 
 Whyles scour'd awa' in lang excursion, 
 An' worry'd ither in diversion ; 
 Until wi' daffin weary grown, 
 Upon a knowe they sat them down, 
 And there began a lang digression 
 About the lords o' the creation. 
 
 C^SAR. 
 
 I've aflen wonder'd, honest Luath, 
 What sort o' life poor dogs like you have ; 
 An' when the gentry's life I saw 
 What way poor bodies liv'd ava. 
 
 Our Laird gets in his racked rents, 
 His coals, his kain, and a' his stents* 
 He rises when he likes himsel ; 
 His flunkies answer at the bell ; 
 He ca's his coach, he ca's his horse; 
 He draws a honnie silken purse 
 As lang's my tail, whare, thro' the steeks. 
 The yellow letter'd Geordie keeks. 
 
 Frae mom to e'en it's nought but toiling. 
 At baking, roasting, frying, boiling ; 
 An' tho' the gentry first are stechin. 
 Yet ev'n the ha' folk fill their pechan 
 Wi' sauce, ragouts, and siclike trashtrie, 
 That's little short o' downright wastrie. 
 Our Whipper-in, wee blastit wonner, 
 Poor worthless elf, it eats a dinner, 
 Better than ony tenant man 
 I lis Honour has in a' the Ian' : 
 An' what poor cot-folk pit then- painch in, 
 I own it's past my comprehension. 
 
 LUATH. 
 
 Trowth,Caesar, whyles they're fash't eneugh; 
 A cottar howkin in a sheugh, 
 Wi' dirty stanes biggin a dyke. 
 Baring a quarry, and sic hke. 
 Himself a wife, he thus sustains, 
 A smytrie o' wee duddie weans, 
 An' nought but his han' darg, to keep 
 Them right and tight in thack an' rape. 
 
BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 An' when they meet wi' salr disasters, 
 Like loss o' health, or want o' masters. 
 Ye maist wad think, a wee touch langer, 
 An' they maun starve o' cauld an' hunge 
 But, how it comes, I never kenn'd yet, 
 They're maistly wonderfu' contented ; 
 An' buirdly chiels, an' clever hizzies, 
 Are bred in sic a way as this is. 
 
 C^SAR. 
 
 But then to see how ye're negleckit. 
 How hutf 'd, and cuff 'd, and disrespeckit ! 
 L — d, man, our gentry care as little 
 For delvers, ditchers, an' sic cattle ; 
 They gang as saucy by poor fo'k, 
 As I wad by a stinking brock. 
 
 I've notic'd on our Laird's court-day, 
 An' mony a time my heart's been wae, 
 Poor tenant bodies scant o' cash, 
 How they maun thole a factor's snash : 
 He'll stamp an' threaten, curse an' swear, 
 He'll apprehend them, poind their gear ; 
 "Wliile they maun staun', wi' aspect humble, 
 An' hear it a', an' fear an' tremble. 
 
 I see how folk live that hae riches ; 
 But surely poor folk maun be wretches? 
 
 LUATH. 
 
 They're nae sae wretched's ane wad think ; 
 Tho' constantly on poortith's brink : 
 They're sae accustom'd wi' the sight, 
 The view o't gies them little fright. 
 
 Then chance an' fortune are sae guided, 
 They're ay in less or mair provided ; 
 An' tho' fatigu'd wi' close employment, 
 A blink o' rest's a sweet enjoyment. 
 
 The dearest comfort o' their lives, 
 Their grushie weans an' faithfu' wives ; 
 The prattling things are just their pride, 
 That sweetens a' their fire-side. 
 
 An' whyles twalpennie worth o' nappy 
 Can mak the bodies unco happy ; 
 They lay aside their private cares, 
 To mend the Kirk and State affairs : 
 They'll talk o' patronage and priests, 
 Wi' kindling fury in their breasts, 
 Or tell what new taxation's comin, 
 An' ferlie at the folk m Lon'on. 
 
 As bleak-fac'd Hallowmass returns. 
 They get the jovial, ranting kirns, 
 "When rural life, o' ev'ry station. 
 Unite in common recreation ; 
 
 Love blinks, Wit slaps, an' social Mirth, 
 Forgets there's Care upo' the earth. 
 
 That merry day the year begins, 
 They bar the door on frosty winds ; 
 The nappy reeks wi' mantling ream, 
 An' sheds a heart-inspiring steam ; 
 The luntin pipe, an' sneeshin mill, 
 Are handed round wi' richt guid will; 
 The cantie auld folks crackin crouse, 
 The yoimg anes rantin thro' the house,— 
 My heart has been sae fain to see them, 
 That I for joy hae barkit wi' them. 
 
 Still it's owre true that ye hae said, 
 Sic game is now owre aften play'd. 
 There's monie a creditable stock, 
 O' decent, honest, fawsont fo'k, 
 Are riven out baith root and branch, 
 Some rascal's pridefu' greed to quench, 
 Wha tliinks to knit liimsel the faster 
 In favour wi' some gentle master, 
 Wha, aiblins, thrang a-parliamentin. 
 For Britain's guid Ins saul indentin— 
 
 C^SAR. 
 
 Haith, lad, ye little ken about it ; 
 For Britain's guid .' guid faith ! I douht it 
 Say rather, gaun as Premiers lead him. 
 An' saying aye or no's they bid him. 
 At operas an' plays parading, 
 Mortgaging, gambling, masqueradmg ; 
 Or may be, in a froUc daft, 
 To Hague or Calais takes a waft. 
 To make a tour, an' tak a wh'rl. 
 To learn bon ton, an' see the warl'. 
 
 There, at Vienna or Versailles 
 He rives his father's auld entails ; 
 Or by Madrid he takes the rout. 
 To thrum guitars, and fecht wi' nowt ; 
 Or down ItaUan vista startles, 
 Wh-re-hunting among groves o' myrtles ; 
 Then bouses drumly German water, 
 To mak himsel look fair and fatter. 
 An' clear the consequential sorrows. 
 Love-gifts of Carnival signoras. 
 For Britain's guid I for her destruction ! 
 Wi' dissipation, feud, an' faction. 
 
 LUATH. 
 
 Hech man ! dear Sirs ! is that the gate 
 They waste sae mony a braw estate ! 
 Are we sae foughten an' harass'd 
 For gear to gang that gate at last I 
 
 O would they stay aback frae courts, 
 An' please themsels wi' kintra sports, 
 
BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 It wad for ev'ry ane be better, 
 The Laird, the Tenant, and the Cotter ! 
 For thae frank, rantin, ramblin biUies, 
 Fient haet o' them's ill-hearted fellows ; 
 Except for breakin o' their timmer, 
 Or speakin lightly o' their limmer, 
 Or shootin o' a hare or moor-cock, 
 The ne'er a bit they're ill to poor folk. 
 
 But will ye tell me. Master CcRsar, 
 Sure great folk's life's a life o' pleasure ? 
 Nae cauld nor hunger e'er can steer them. 
 The vera thought o't need na fear them. 
 
 CiESAR. 
 
 L — d, man, were ye but whyles whare I am, 
 The gentles ye wad ne'er envy 'em. 
 
 It's true they need na starve or sweat. 
 Thro' winter's cauld, or simmer's heat ; 
 They've nae sair wark to craze their banes, 
 An' fill auld age wi' gripes an' granes : 
 But human bodies are sic fools. 
 For a' their colleges and schools, 
 That when nae real ills perplex them, 
 They make enow themselves to vex them ; 
 An'^ ay Uie less they hae to sturt them. 
 In like proportion less will hurt them. 
 A country fellow at the pleugh, 
 His acres till'd, he's right eneugh ; 
 A kintra lassie at her wheel. 
 Her dizzens done, she's unco weel : 
 But Gentlemen, an' Ladies warst, 
 Wi' ev'ndown want o' wark are curst. 
 They loiter, lounging, lank, an' lazy ; 
 Tho' deil haet ails them, yet uneasy ; 
 Their days, insipid, dull, an' tasteless ; 
 Their nights unquiet, lang an' restless ; 
 An' e'en their sports, their balls an' races, 
 Their galloping thro' public places. 
 There's sic parade, sic pomp, an' art, 
 The joy can scarcely reach the heart. 
 The men cast out in party matches, 
 Then sowther a' in deep debauches ; 
 Ae night they're mad wi' drink an' wh-ring, 
 Niest day their life is past enduring. 
 The Ladies arm-in-arm in clusters. 
 As great and gracious a' as sisters ; 
 But hear theii- absent thoughts o' ither, 
 They're a' run deils an' jads thegither. 
 Whyles o'er the wee bit cup an' platie, 
 They sip the scandal potion pretty ; 
 Or lee-lang nights, wi' crabbit leuks 
 Pore owre the devil's pictur'd beuks ; 
 Stake on a chance a farmer's stackyard. 
 An' cheat like onie unhang'd blackguard. 
 
 There's some exception, man an' woman ; 
 But this is Gentry's life in common. 
 
 By this, the sim was out o' sight, 
 An' darker gloaming brought the night ! 
 The bum-clock humm'd wi' lazy drono ; 
 Tho kyo stood rowtiii i' the loan ; 
 
 When up they gat, and shook their lugs, 
 Rejoiced they were na men but dogs ; 
 An' each took aiF his several way, 
 Resolv'd to meet some ither day. 
 
 SCOTCH DRINK 
 
 Gie him strong drink, unlll he wink, 
 
 That's sinking in despair ; 
 An' liquor guid to fire hisbluid, 
 
 That's press'd wi' grief an' care ; 
 Thcrclethim bouse, an' deep carouse, 
 
 Wi' bumpers flowing o'er. 
 Till he forgets his loves or debts, 
 
 An' minds his griefs no more. 
 
 Solomon's Proverbs xxxi. 6, 7. 
 
 Let other poets raise a fracas 
 
 'Bout vines, an' wines, an' drunken Bacchus, 
 
 An' crabbit names an' stories wrack us. 
 
 An' grate our lug, 
 I sing the juice Scots bear can mak us, 
 
 In glass or jug. 
 
 O thou, my Muse ! guid auld Scotch Drink : 
 Whether thro' winipling worms thou jink, 
 Or, ricldy brown, ream o'er the brink. 
 
 In glorious faem, 
 Inspire me, till I lisp and wink, 
 
 To sing thy name ! 
 
 Let husky Wheat the laughs adorn, 
 An' Aits set up their awnie horn, 
 An' Pease and Beans at e'en or morn, 
 
 Perfiune the plain, 
 Leeze me on thee, John Barleycorn, 
 
 Thou king o' grain ! 
 
 On thee aft Scotland chows her cood, 
 In souple scones, the wale o' food ! 
 Or ttunbUn in the boilmg flood 
 
 Wi' kail an' beef; 
 But when thou pours thy strong heart's blood. 
 
 There tliou shines chief. 
 
 Food fills the wame, an' keeps us Hvin ; 
 Tho' life's a gift no worth receivin, 
 When heavy dragg'd wi' pine an' gricvin. 
 
 But, oil'd by thee, 
 The wheels o' life gae down-liill, scrievin, 
 
 Wi' rattlin glee. 
 
 Thou clears the head o' doited Lear ; 
 Thou cheers the heart o' droopm Care ; 
 
BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 Thou strings the nerves o' Labour sair, 
 At's weary toil, 
 
 Thou even brightens dark Despair 
 
 Wi' gloomy smile. 
 
 Aft, clad in massy siller weed, 
 Wi' Gentles thou erects thy head ; 
 Yet humbly kind in time o' need, 
 
 The poor man's wine ; 
 His wee drap parritch, or his bread, 
 
 Thou kitchens fine. 
 
 Thou art the life o' public haunts ; 
 But thee, what were our fairs and rants .' 
 Ev'n godly meetings o' the saunts. 
 
 By thee inspir'd, 
 When gaping they besiege the tents, 
 
 Are doubly fir'd. 
 
 That merry night we get the corn in, 
 O sweetly then thou reams the horn in 
 Or reekin on a New-year morning 
 
 In cog or bicker, 
 An' just a wee drap sp'ritual bum in. 
 
 An' gusty sucker ! 
 
 When Vulcan gies his bellows breath. 
 An' ploughmen gather wi' their graitli, 
 O rare ! to see thee fizz an freath 
 
 r th' luggit caup ! 
 Then Bumewin* comes on like death 
 At every chaup. 
 
 Alake ! that e'er my Muse has reason 
 To wyte her countrymen wi' treason ! 
 But monie daily weet their weason 
 
 Wi' liquors nice. 
 An' hardly, in a winter's season. 
 E'er spier her price. 
 
 Wae worth that brandy, burning trash \ 
 Fell source o' monie a pain an' brash 
 Twins monie a poor, doylt, drunken hash, 
 
 O' half liis days 
 An' sends, beside, auld Scotland's cash 
 
 To her warst faes. 
 
 Ye Scots, wha wish auld Scotland well ! 
 Ye chief, to you my tale I tell. 
 Poor plackless deevils like mysel ! 
 
 It sets you ill, 
 Wi' bitter, dearthfu' wines to mell, 
 
 Or foreign gill. 
 
 May gravels round his blather wrench, 
 An' gouts torment him inch by inch, 
 Wha twists his grimtle wi' a glunch 
 O' sour disdain, 
 Out owre a glass o' whisky punch 
 
 Wi' honest men. 
 
 ! O Whisky ! saul o' plays an' pranks ! 
 
 I Accept a Bardie's humble tlianks ! 
 
 { When wanting thee, what tuneless cranks 
 
 Are my poor verses ! 
 Thou comes — they rattle i' their ranks 
 
 At ither's a — s ! 
 
 Nae mercy, then, for aim or steel ; 
 The brawnie, bainie, ploughman cliiel, 
 Brmgs hard owrehip, wi' sturdy wheel. 
 
 The strong forehammer, 
 Till block an' studdie ring an' reel 
 
 Wi' dinsome clamour. 
 
 When skirlin weanies see the light, 
 Thou maks the gossips clatter bright. 
 How fumblin cuifs their dearies shght ; 
 
 Wae worth the name ! 
 Nae howdie gets a social night. 
 
 Or plack frae them. 
 
 When neebors anger at a plea. 
 An' just as wud as wud can be. 
 How easy can the barley bree 
 
 Cement the quarrel ! 
 It's aye the cheapest lawyer's fee 
 
 To taste the barrel. 
 
 * Bumewin— hv.m-the-tDind— the Blackumitli- 
 appropriate title. E. 
 
 Thee, Ferintosh I O sadly lost ! 
 Scotland, lament frae coast to coast ! 
 Now colic grips, an' barkin hoast 
 
 May kill vs a' ; 
 For royal Forbes' charter'd beast 
 Is ta'en awa ! 
 
 Thae curst horse-leeches o' tbe Excise, 
 Wha mak the Whisky Stells their prize I 
 Hand up thy han', Deil ! ance, twice, thrice ! 
 
 There, seize the blinkers ! 
 And bake them up in brunstane pies 
 
 For poor d — n'd drinkers. 
 
 Fortime ! if thou'll but gie me still 
 Hale breeks, a scone, and Whisky gill, 
 An' rowth o' rhyme to rave at will, 
 
 Tak a' the rest, 
 An' deal't about a^ thy blind skill 
 
 Directs thee beet. 
 
BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 THE AUTHOR'S 
 
 EARNEST CRY AND PRAYER* 
 
 TO THE 
 
 SCOTCH REPRESENTATIVES, 
 
 IN THE 
 HOUSE OF COMMONS. 
 
 Dearest of Distillation ! last and best- 
 
 How art thou lost ! 
 
 Parody o 
 
 Ye Irish Lords, ye Knights an' Squires, 
 Wha represent our brughs an' shires, 
 An' doucely manage our affairs 
 
 In parliament, 
 To you a simple Poet's prayers 
 
 Are humbly sent. 
 
 Alas ! my roupet Muse is hearse I 
 Your honors' hearts wi' grief 'twad pierce, 
 To see her sittin on her a — 
 
 Low i' the dust. 
 An' scriechin out prosaic verse, 
 
 An' like to brust ! 
 
 Tell them wha hae the chief direction, 
 Scotland an' jne'5 in great affliction. 
 E'er sin' they laid that curst restriction. 
 
 On Aquavitm ; 
 An' rouse them up to strong conviction. 
 An' move their pity. 
 
 Stand forth, an' tell yon Premier Youth, 
 The honest, open, naked truth : 
 Tell him o' mine an' Scotland's drouth, 
 
 His servants humble ! 
 The muckle deevil blaw ye south. 
 
 If ye dissemble I 
 
 Does ony great man glunch an' gloom ? 
 Speak out, an' never fash your thumb ! 
 Let posts an' pensions sink or soom 
 
 Wi' them wha grant 'em : 
 If honestly they canna come. 
 
 Far bettor want e'm. 
 
 In gath'ring votes you were na slack ; 
 Now stand as tightly by your tack ; 
 Ne'er claw your lug, an' fidge your back. 
 
 An' hum an' haw ; 
 But raise your arm, an' tell your crack 
 
 Before them a'. 
 
 * This was written before the act anent the Scotch 
 Distilleries, of session 1786 ; for which Scotland and 
 tlic Author return their most grateful thanks. 
 
 Paint Scotland greeting owre her Uirisslc ; 
 Her mutclikin stoup as toom's a whissle : 
 An' d — mn'd Excisemen in a bussle, 
 
 Seizin a Stell, 
 Triumphant crushin't like a mussel ^ 
 
 Or laR\pit shell. 
 
 Then on the tither hand present her, 
 A blackguard Smuggler right behint her. 
 An' cheek-for-chow, a chulfie Vintner, 
 
 Colleaguing join. 
 Picking her pouch as bare as winter 
 
 Of a' kind coin. 
 
 Is there, that bears the name o' Scol, 
 But feels his heart's bluid rising hot. 
 To see his poor auld Mither's pot 
 
 Thus dung in staves. 
 An' plunder'd o' her hindmost groat 
 
 By gallows knaves ? 
 
 Alas ! I'm but a nameless wight, 
 Trode i' the mire clean out o' sight ; 
 But could I hke Montgorn'rien fight. 
 
 Or gab like Boswell 
 There's some sark-necks I wad draw tight. 
 
 An' tie some hose well. 
 
 God bless your Honors, can ye see't, 
 The kind, auld, cantie Carlin greet, 
 An' no get warmly to your feet. 
 
 An' gar them hear it. 
 An' tell them wi' a patriot heat, 
 
 Ye winna bear it ! 
 
 Some o' you nicely ken the laws, 
 To round the period, an' pause, 
 An' wi' rhetoric clause on clause 
 
 To mak harangues ; 
 Then echo thro' Saint Stephen's wa's 
 
 Atild Scotland's wranj, . 
 
 Dempster, a true blue Scot, I'se warran ; 
 Thee, aith- detesting, chaste Kilkerran;* 
 An' that glib-gabbet Highland Baron, 
 
 The Laird o' Graham^f 
 An' ane, a chap that's d — mn'd auldfarran, 
 
 Dundas his name. 
 
 Erskine, a spunkie Norland billie ; 
 True Campbells, Frederick an' nay ; 
 An' Livingstone, the bauld Sir Willie ; 
 
 An' monie ithera 
 Whom auld Demosthenes or Tully 
 
 Might own for brithers. 
 
 Arouse, my boys ! exert your mettle, 
 To get auld Scotland back her kettle ; 
 
 ' Sir Adam Ferguson. E. 
 The present Duke of Montrose. (1800.) E. 
 
BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 Or faith ! I'll wad my new pleugh-pettle, 
 Ye'll see't, or lang, 
 
 She'll teach you, wi' a reekin whittle, 
 Anither sang. 
 
 This wMle she's been in crankous mood, 
 Her lost Militia fii'd her bluid ; 
 (Deil na they never mair do guid. 
 
 Play'd her that phskie !) 
 An' now she's like to rin red-wud 
 
 About her Whisky. 
 
 An' L — d, if ance they pit her till't, 
 Her tartan petticoat she'll kilt, 
 An' dark an' pistol at her belt, 
 
 She'll tak the streets, 
 An' rin her whittle to the hilt, 
 
 r th' first she meets I 
 
 For G— d sake, Shs ! then speak her fair, 
 An' straik her cannie wi' the hair, 
 An' to the muckle house repair, 
 
 Wi' uistant speed,' 
 An' strive wi' a' your Wit and Lear, 
 
 To get remead. 
 
 Yon ill-tongu'd tinkler, Charlie Fox, 
 May taunt you wi' his jeers an' mocks ; \ 
 
 But gie him't het, my hearty cocks ! 
 
 E'en cowe the caddie ; 
 An' send him to his dicing box 
 
 An' sportin lady. 
 
 Tell yon guid bluid o' auld BoconnocWs 
 I'll be his debt twa mashlum bonnocks. 
 An' drink his health in auld J^anse Tinnoclc's* 
 
 Nine times a-week. 
 If he some scheme, like tea an' winnock's. 
 
 Wad kindly seek. 
 
 Could he some commutation broach, 
 I'll pledge my aith in guid braid Scotch, 
 He need na fear their foul reproach 
 
 Nor erudition, 
 Yon mixtie-maxtie queer hotch-potch, 
 
 The CoalUion. 
 
 Auld Scotland has a raucle tongue ; 
 She's just a devil wi' a rimg ; 
 An' if she promise auld or young 
 
 To tak their part, 
 Tho' by the neck she should be strung, 
 
 She'll no desert. 
 
 An' now, ye chosen Five-aiid-Forl^y, 
 May still your Mither's heart support ye ; 
 
 * A worthy old Hostess of the Author's in Mauchline, 
 where he sometimes studied Politics over a glass of 
 guid auld Scotcli Drink 
 
 Then, though a Minister erow dorty, 
 
 An' Kick your place, 
 
 Ye'll snap your fingers, poor an' hearty, 
 Before his face. 
 
 God bless your Honours a' your days, 
 Wi' sowps o' kail and brats o' claise, 
 In spite o' a' the thievish kaes. 
 
 That haunt St. Jamie's i 
 Your humble Poet sings an' prays 
 
 While Rob his name is. 
 
 POSTSCRIPT. 
 
 Let half-starv'd slaves, in warmer skiea 
 See future wines, rich clust'ring, rise ; 
 Their lot auld Scotland ne'er envies. 
 
 But blythe and frisky. 
 She eyes her frceborn, martial boys, 
 
 TiUi aff their Whisky. 
 
 What tho' their Phoebus kinder warms, 
 While fragrance blooms and beauty charms ; 
 When wretches range, in famisird swarms. 
 
 The scented ^ 
 Or hounded forth, dishonour arms 
 
 In hungry droves. 
 
 Their gun's a burden on their shouther 
 They downa bide the stink o' powther; 
 Their bauldest thought's a hanli'ring swither 
 
 To Stan' or rin. 
 Till skelp — a shot — they're aff, a' throwtber, 
 
 To save their skio. 
 
 But bring a Scotsman frae his kill. 
 Clap in his cheek a Highland gill. 
 Say, such is royal George's will. 
 
 An' there's the foe. 
 He has nae thought but how to kill 
 
 Twa at a blow. 
 
 Nae cauld, faint-hearted doubtmgs tease 
 him; 
 Death comes, wi' fearless eye he sees him ; 
 Wi' bluidy hand a welcome gies liim : 
 
 An' when he fa's. 
 His latest draught o' breathiji lea'es liim 
 In faint huzzas. 
 
 Sages their solemn een may steek, 
 An' raise a philosopliic reek, 
 And physically causes seek. 
 
 In chmo and season ; 
 But toll me Wliislu/s name in Greek, 
 
 I'll tell the reason. 
 
BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 Scotland, my auld, respected Mither ! 
 Tho' whiles ye moistify your leather, 
 Till whare ye sit, on craps o' heather, 
 
 Ye tine your dam ; 
 Frtedom and Whisky gang thegither ! 
 
 Tak aff your dram. 
 
 THE HOLY FAIR. 
 
 A robe of seeming truth and trust 
 
 Hid crafty Observation ; 
 And secret liung, with poison'd crust. 
 
 The dirk of Defamation : 
 A maslc that like the gorget show'd, 
 
 Dye-varying on tlie pigeon ; 
 And for a mantle large and broad, 
 
 Hs wrapt him in Religion. 
 
 Hypocrisy a-la-modc. 
 
 I. 
 
 Upon a simmer Sunday mom, 
 
 When Nature's face is fair, 
 I walked forth to view the corn. 
 
 An' snuff the caller air, 
 The rising sun owre Galston muirs, 
 
 Wi' glorious light was glintin ; 
 The hares were hirplin down the furs. 
 
 The lav'rocks they were chantin 
 
 Fu' sweet that day. 
 
 n. 
 
 As lightsomely I glowr'd abroad, 
 
 To see a scene sae gay, 
 Tlirce Hizzies, early at the road. 
 
 Cam skelpin up the way ; 
 Twa had manteeles o' dolefu' black, 
 
 But ane wi' lyart lining ; 
 The third, that gaed a wee a-back, 
 
 ' as in the fasliion sliiuing 
 
 Fu' gay that day. 
 
 III. 
 
 The twa appear'd like sisters twin, 
 Li feature, form, an' claes ! 
 
 Their visage, wither'd, lang, an' tliin, 
 An' sour as ony slaes : 
 
 * Holy Fair Is a common phrase in »lie 
 Scotland for a Sacramental occasion. 
 B 2 
 
 Tho third cam up, hap-step-an'-lowp, 
 
 As light as ony lambie. 
 An' viri' a curchie low did stoop. 
 
 As soon as e'er she saw me, 
 
 Fu' kind that day. 
 
 IV. 
 
 Wi' bannet aff, quoth I," Sweet lass, 
 
 I think ye seem to ken me ; 
 I'm sure Fve seen that bonnie face, 
 
 But yet I caima name ye." 
 Quo' she, an' laugliin as she spak, 
 
 An' taks me by the hands, 
 " Ye, for my sake, hae gi'en the feck 
 
 Of a' the ten commands 
 
 A screed some day. 
 
 V. 
 
 " My name is Fun— your cronie dear, 
 
 The nearest friend ye hae ; 
 An' this is Superstition here, 
 
 An' that's Hypocrisy. 
 I'm gaun to ********* fjoly Fair, 
 
 To spend an hour in daflfin . 
 Gin ye'U go there, yon runkl'd pair, 
 
 We will get famous laughin 
 
 At them this day." 
 
 VI. 
 
 Quoth I, " With a' my heart, I'll do't : 
 
 I'll get my Sunday's sark on 
 An' meet you on the holy spot ; 
 
 Faith, we'se hae fine remarkin !" 
 Then I gaed hame at crowdie-time 
 
 An' soon I made me ready ; 
 For roads were clad, frae side to side, 
 
 Wi' monie a wearie body, 
 
 In droves that day 
 
 VII. 
 
 Here farmers gash, in ridin graith, 
 
 Gaed hoddin by their cotters ; 
 There, swankies young, in braw braid- 
 claith. 
 
 Are springin o'er the gutters. 
 The lasses, skelpin barefit, tln-ang, 
 
 In silks an' scarlets glitter ; 
 Wi' siveet-milk cheese, in monie a whang. 
 
 An' furls bak'd wi' butter 
 
 Fu' crump that day. 
 
 VIII. 
 
 When by the ptale we set our nose, 
 
 Weel heaped up wi' ha'pence, 
 A greedy glowr Black Bonnet throws, 
 
 An' we maun draw our tippence. 
 Then in we go to see the show. 
 
 On ev'ry side'they'rc gathrin. 
 Some carrying dales, some chairs an' stoola. 
 
 An' some are busy blcthrin 
 
 Right loud that dav. 
 
10 
 
 BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 IX. 
 
 Here stands a shed to fend the show'rs, 
 
 An' screen our kintra Gentry, 
 There, racer Jess, an' twa-three wh-res, 
 
 Are blinkin at the entry. 
 Here sits a raw of titthn jades, 
 
 Wi' heaving breast and bare neck 
 An' there a batch of wabster lads, 
 
 Blackguarding frae K ck 
 
 For fun tliis day. 
 
 Here some are thinkin on their sins, 
 
 An' some upo' their claes ; 
 Ane curses feet that fyl'd his shins, 
 
 Anither sighs an' prays : 
 On this hand sits a chosen swatch, 
 
 Wi' screw'd up grace-proud faces ; 
 On that a set o' chaps at watch, 
 
 Thrang winkin on the lasses 
 
 To chairs that day. 
 
 XI. 
 
 O happy is that man an' blest ! 
 
 Nae wonder that it pride him ! 
 Whase ain dear lass, that he likes best, 
 
 Comes clinkin down beside him ! 
 Wi' arm rcpos'd on the chair back. 
 
 He sweetly does compose him ! 
 Wliich, by degrees, slips round her neck, 
 
 An's loof upon her bosom 
 
 Unken'd that day. 
 
 XII. 
 
 Now a' the congregation o'er, 
 
 Is silent expectation ; 
 YoT ****** speels the holy door, 
 
 Wi' tidings o' d-mn-t — n. 
 Should Hornie, as m ancient days, 
 
 'Mang sons o' G — present him. 
 The vera siglit o' * * * * *'s face, 
 
 To's ain het liamc had sent him 
 
 Wi' fright that day. 
 
 XIII. 
 
 Hear how he clears the pomts o' faith, 
 
 Wi' ratlin an' wi' thumpin ! 
 Now meekly calm, now wild in wrath. 
 
 He's stampin an' he's jumpin ! 
 His lengthen'd chin, his "turn'd up snout, 
 
 His eldritch squeel and gestures. 
 Oh how they fire the heart devout, 
 
 Like cantharidian plasters. 
 
 On sic a day I 
 
 XIV. 
 
 But, hark ! the tent has chang'd its voice | 
 
 There's peace an' rest nae langer : 
 For a' the real judges rise. 
 
 They canna sit for anger. 
 ***** opens out his cauld harangues, 
 
 On practice and on morals ; 
 An' aff the godly pour in thrangs. 
 
 To gie the jars an' barrels 
 
 A lift that day. 
 
 XV. 
 
 What signifies his barren shine 
 
 Of moral pow'rs and reason .'' 
 His English style, an' gesture fine, 
 
 Are a' clean out o' season. 
 Like Socrates or Antonine, 
 
 Or some auld pagan Heathen, 
 The moral man he does define, 
 
 But ne'er a word o' faith in 
 
 That's right that day. 
 
 XVI. 
 
 In guid tune comes an antidote 
 
 Against sic poison'd nostrum ; 
 For ****** *, frae the water-fit, 
 
 Ascends the holy rostrum : 
 See, up he's got the word o' G — , 
 
 An' meek an' mim has view'd it, 
 While Common-Sense has ta'en the road, 
 
 An' aff", an' up the Cowgate,* 
 
 Fast, fast, that day. 
 
 xvn. 
 
 Wee ***** *^ niest, the Guard relieves, 
 
 An' Orthodoxy raibles, 
 Tho' in his heart he weel beUeves, 
 
 An' thinks it auld wives' fables : 
 But, faith ! the birkie wants a Manse, 
 
 So, camuly he hums them ; 
 Altho' liis carnal wit an' sense 
 
 Like hafiiins-ways o'ercomes him 
 At tunes that day. 
 
 xvm. 
 
 Now butt an' ben, the Change-house fills, 
 I Wi' yill-caup Commentators ; 
 
 Here's crying out for bakes and gills, 
 An' there the pint stowp clatters ; 
 While thick an' thrang, an' loud an' lang, 
 
 Wi' Logic an' wi' Scripture, 
 They raise a din, that in the end, 
 Is like to breed a rupture 
 
 O' wrath that day. 
 
 •■ A street so called, wliich faces tlic tent in • 
 
BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 11 
 
 XIX. 
 
 Leeze me on Drink ! it gies us mair 
 
 Than either School or College : 
 It kindles wit, it wankens lair, 
 
 It pangs us fou o' knowledge. 
 Be't whisky gill, or penny wheep, 
 
 Or ony stronger potion, 
 It never fails on drinking deep, 
 
 To kittle up our notion 
 
 By night or day. 
 
 XX. 
 
 The lads an' lasses blythely bent 
 
 To mind baith saul an' body. 
 Sit round the table weel content. 
 
 An' steer about the toddy. 
 On this ane's dress, an' that ane's leuk, 
 
 They're making observations ; 
 While some are cozie i' the neuk, 
 
 An' formin assignations. 
 
 To meet some day. 
 
 XXI. 
 
 But now the L — d's ain trumpet louts, 
 
 Till a' the hills are rairin, 
 An' echoes back return the shouts : 
 
 Black ****** is na spairin : 
 His piercing words, like Highland swords, 
 
 Divide the joints an' marrow ; 
 His talk o' H-11, where devils dwell, 
 
 Our vera sauls does harrow* 
 
 Wi' fright that day. 
 
 XXII. 
 
 A vast, unbottom'd, boundless pit, 
 
 Fill'd fou o' lowin brunstane, 
 Whase ragin flame, an' scorchin heat. 
 
 Wad melt the hardest whun-stane ! 
 The half asleep start up wi' fear, 
 
 An' think they hear it roarin. 
 When presently it does appear, 
 
 'Twas but some neebor snorin 
 
 Asleep that day. 
 
 XXIII. 
 
 'Twad be owre lang a tale, to tell 
 
 How monie stories past. 
 An' how they crowded to tlie yill 
 
 When they were a' dismist ; 
 How drink gaed round, in cogs an' caups, 
 
 Amang the furms an' benches ; 
 An' cheese an' bread frae women's laps. 
 
 Was dealt about in lunches. 
 
 An' dawds that day. 
 
 XXIV. 
 
 Shakspeare's Hamlet. 
 
 In comes a gaucie gash Guidwife, 
 
 An' sits down by the fire. 
 Syne draws her kebbuck an' her knife, 
 
 The lasses they are shyer. 
 The auld Guidmen about the grace, 
 
 Frae side to side they bother. 
 Till some ane by his bonnet lays, 
 
 An' gi'es them't like a tether, 
 
 Fu' lang that day. 
 
 XXV. 
 
 Waesucks ! for him that gets naes lass, 
 
 Or lasses that hae naethmg ! 
 Sma' need has he to say a grace, 
 
 Or melvie liis braw claithing I 
 O wives, be mindfu', ance yoursel, 
 
 How bonnie lads ye wanted. 
 An' diima, for a kebbuck-heel, 
 
 Let lasses be affronted 
 
 On sic a day ! 
 
 XXVI. 
 
 Now Clinlcumbell, wi' rattlin tow, 
 
 Begins to jow an' croon ; 
 Some swagger hame, the best they dow, 
 
 Some wait the afternoon. 
 At slaps the billies halt a blink, 
 
 Till lasses strip their slioon : 
 Wi' faith an' hope an' love an' drink. 
 
 They're a' m famous tune. 
 
 For crack that day. 
 
 XXVII. 
 
 How monie hearts this day converts 
 
 O' sinners and o' lasses ! 
 Their hearts o' stane, gin night are gane, 
 
 As saft as ony flesh is. 
 There's some are fou o' love divine ; 
 
 There's some are fou o' brandy ; 
 An' monie jobs that day begin, 
 
 May end in Houghmagandie 
 
 Some ither day. 
 
 DEATH AND DR. HORNBOOK. 
 
 A TRUE STORY. 
 
 Some books are lies frae end to end. 
 And some great lies were never penn'd, 
 Ev'n Ministers, they hae beenkenn'd 
 
 In holy rapture, 
 A rousing wind, at times to vend. 
 
 And nail't wi' Scripture. 
 
12 
 
 BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 But this that I am gaun to tell, 
 Which lately on a night befel, 
 Is just as true's the Deil's m h-11 
 
 Or Dublin city : 
 That e'er he nearer comes oursel 
 
 'S a muckle pity 
 
 The Clachan yill had made me canty, 
 
 I was na fou, but just had plenty ; 
 
 I stacher'd whyles, but yet took tent ay 
 
 To free the ditches ; 
 An' hillocks, stanes, an' bushes, kenn'd ay 
 
 Frae ghaists an' witches. 
 
 The rising moon began to glow'r 
 The distant Cumnock hills out-owre : 
 To count her horns, wi' a' my pow'r, 
 
 I set mysel ; 
 But whether she had three or foiir, 
 
 I cou'd na tell. 
 
 I was come round about the hill. 
 And toddlin down on Willie's mill. 
 Setting my staff wi' a' my skill. 
 
 To keep me sicker : 
 The' leeward whyles, against my will, 
 
 I took a bicker. 
 
 I there wi' Something did forgather, 
 That put me in an eerie swither ; 
 An awfu' sithe, out-owre ae showther, 
 
 Clear-dangling, hang ; 
 A three-tae'd leister on the ither 
 
 Lay, large an' lang. 
 
 Its stature seem'd lang Scotch ells twa, 
 The queerest shape that e'er I saw. 
 For fient a wame it had ava ! 
 
 And then, its shanks, 
 They were as thin, as sharp an' sma' 
 
 As cheeks o' branks. 
 
 " Guid-een," quo' I ; " Friend 1 hae ye been 
 
 mawin. 
 When ither folk are busy sawin ?"* 
 It seem'd to mak a kind o' stan,' 
 
 But naetliing spak ; 
 At length, says I, " Friend, whare ye gaun. 
 
 Will ye go back?" 
 
 It spak right hows, — " My name is Death, 
 But be na fley'd."— Quoth I, " Guid faith, 
 Ye're may be come to stap my breath ; 
 
 But tent me, billie : 
 I red ye weel, tak care o' skaith, 
 
 See, there's a gully I" 
 
 •This rencounter happened in seea-time, 1785. 
 
 " Guidman," quo' he, " put up your whittle, 
 I'm no design'd to try its mettle ; 
 But if I did, I wad be kittle 
 
 To be mislear'd, 
 I wad na mind it, no, that spittle 
 
 Out-owre my beard 
 
 " Weel, weel !" says I, " a bargain be't ; 
 Come, gies your hand, an' sae we're gree't i 
 We'll ease our shanks an' tak a seat, 
 
 Come, gies your news ; 
 This while* ye hae been monie a gate 
 
 At monie a house." 
 
 " Ay, ay !" quo' he, an' shook his head, 
 " It's e'en a lang, lang time indeed 
 Sin' I began to nick the thread. 
 
 An' choke the breath ! 
 Folk maun do something for their bread. 
 
 An' sae maun Death. 
 
 " Sax thousand years are near hand fled 
 
 Sin' I was to the hutching bred. 
 
 An' monie a scheme in vain's been laid, 
 
 To stap or .scar me ; 
 Till ane flbmfioofe'it ta'en up the trade. 
 
 An' faith, hell waur : 
 
 " Ye ken Jock Hornbook i' the Clachan, 
 Deil mak his king's-hood in a spleuchan ! 
 He's grown sae well acquaint wi' Buchxtn^ 
 
 An' ither chaps. 
 That weans haud out their fingers laughin 
 
 And po\^ my hips. 
 
 " See, here's a sithe, and there's a dart, 
 They hae pierc'd monyfa gallant heart; 
 But Doctor Hornbook, wi' his art. 
 
 And cursed skill. 
 Has made them baith not worth a f — t, 
 
 Damn'd haet they'll kilL 
 
 " 'Twas but yestreen, nae farther gaen, 
 
 I threw a noble throw at ane ; 
 
 Wi' less, I'm sure, I've himdreds slain ; 
 
 But deil-ma-care. 
 It just play'd dirl on the bane. 
 
 But did nae'mair. 
 
 " Hornbook was by, wi' ready art, 
 And had sae fortify'd the part, 
 
 * An epidemical fever was then^raglng In tbat 
 country. 
 
 t Tliis gentleman, Dr. Hornbook, Is professionally, 
 a brother of the Sovereign Order of the Ferula; but, 
 by intuition and inspiration, ia at once on Aootbecary, 
 Surgeon, and Physician. 
 
 { Buchau's Domestic Medicine- 
 
BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 13 
 
 That when I looked to my dart, 
 
 It was sae Wunt, 
 
 Fient haet o't wad hae pierc'd tlie heart 
 Of a kail-runt. 
 
 " I drew my sithe in sic a fury, 
 I nearhand cowpit wi' my hurry 
 But yet the bauld Apothecary 
 
 Witlistood the shock 
 I might as weel hae try'd a quarry 
 
 O' hard whin rock. 
 
 " Ev'n them he canna get attended, 
 Alto' their face he ne'er liad kend it, 
 Just in a kail-blade, and send it. 
 
 As soon he smells't, 
 Baith their disease, and what will mend it 
 
 At once he tells't. 
 
 " And then a' doctors' saws and whittles, 
 Of a' dimensions, shapes, an' mettles, 
 A' kinds o' boxes, mugs, an' bottles, 
 
 He's sure to hae ; 
 Their Latm names as fast he rattles 
 
 As A B C. 
 
 " Calces o' fossils, earth, and trees ; 
 True Sal-raarinmn o' the seas ; 
 The Farina of beans and pease. 
 
 Ho has't in plenty ; 
 Aqua-fontis, what you please. 
 
 He can content ye. 
 
 " Forbye some new, uncommon weapons, 
 
 Urinus Spiritus of capons ; 
 
 Or Mite-horn shavings, filings, scrapings, 
 
 Distill'd per se ; 
 Sal-alkali o' Midge- tail- clippings. 
 
 And monie mae." 
 
 " Waes me for Johnny Ged's Hole^ now," 
 
 Quo' I, " if that the news be true ! 
 
 His braw calf-ward whare gowans grew, 
 
 Sae white and bonnie, 
 Nae doubt they'll rive it wi' the plew ; 
 
 They'll ruin Johnie .'" 
 
 The creature grain'd an eldritch laugh. 
 And says, " Ye need na yoke the pleugh, 
 Kirkyards will soon be till'd eneugh, 
 
 Tak ye nae fear : 
 They'll a' be trench'd wi' monie a sheugh 
 
 In twa-three year 
 
 • Whare I kill'd ana a fair strae-death, 
 By loss o' blood or want o' breath, 
 
 The grave-digger 
 
 This night I'm free to tak my aith. 
 
 That Hornbook''s skill 
 
 Has clad a score i' their last claith, 
 
 By drap an' pill. 
 
 " An honest Wabster to his trade, 
 
 \\Tiase wife's twa nieves were scarce w 
 
 bred. 
 Gat tippence-worth to mend her head. 
 
 When it was sair ; 
 The wife slade cannie to her bed. 
 
 But ne'er spak mair. 
 
 " A kintra Laird had ta'en the batts, 
 Or some curmurring in his guts, 
 His only son for Hornbook sets, 
 
 An' pays hun well. 
 The lad, for twa guid gimmer pets. 
 
 Was laird himsel. 
 
 " A bonnie lass, ye kend her name, 
 
 Some ill-brewn drink had hov'd her wame : 
 
 She trusts hersel, to hide the shame, 
 
 In Hornbook''s care ; 
 Horn sent her aff to her lang hame, 
 
 To hide it there. 
 
 " That's just a swatch o' Hornbook'' s way ; 
 Thus goes he on from day to day. 
 Thus does he poison, kill, an' slay, 
 
 An's weel paid for't ; 
 Yet stops me o' my lawfu' prey, 
 
 Wi' his d-mn'd dirt : 
 
 " But, hark ! I'll tell you of a plot, 
 Tho' dmna ye be speaking o't ; 
 I'll nail the self-conceited Scot, 
 
 As dead's a herrin : 
 Niest time we meet, I'll wad a groat. 
 
 He gets his fairin 1" 
 
 But just as he began to tell. 
 
 The auld kirk-hammer strak the bell 
 
 Some wee short hour ayont the twal. 
 
 Which rais'd us baith < 
 I took the way that pleas'd mysel 
 
 And sae did Death. 
 
 THE BRIGS OF AYR, 
 
 A POEM. 
 
 INSCRIBED TO J. B*********, Esq. AYR. 
 
 The simple Bard, rough at the rustic plough, 
 Learning his tuneful trade from every bough ; 
 The chanting linnet, or the mellow thrush. 
 Hailing the setting sun, sweet, in the green 
 thorn bush ; 
 
u 
 
 BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 The Boaring lark, the pcrclilng red-breast 
 
 shrill, 
 Or deep-ton'd, plovers, gray, wild-whistling 
 
 o'er the hill ; 
 Shall he, nurst in the peasant's lowly shed, 
 To hardy Independence bravely bred, 
 By early Poverty to hardship steel'd. 
 And train'd to arms in stern Misfortune's field, 
 Shall he be guilty of their hireling crimes, 
 The servile mercenary Swiss of rhymes? 
 Or labour hard the panegyric close. 
 With all the venal soul of dedicatmg Prose ? 
 No ! though his artless strains he rudely sings. 
 And throws his hand uncoutlily o'er the 
 
 strmgs. 
 He glows with all the spirit of the Bard, 
 Fame, honest fame, his great, his dear reward. 
 Still, if some Patron's gen'rous care he trace, 
 Skill'd m the secret, to bestow with grace ; 
 When B********* befriends his humble 
 
 name. 
 And hands the rustic stranger up to fame. 
 With heart-felt throes his grateful bosom 
 
 swells. 
 The godlike bliss, to give, alone excels. 
 
 'Twas when the stacks get on their winter- 
 hap. 
 And thack and rape secure the toil won-crap ; 
 Potatoe-bings are snugged up frae skaith 
 Of coming Winter's biting, frosty breath ; 
 The bees, rejoicing o'er their summer toils, 
 Unnumber'd buds an' flowers' delicious spoils, 
 Seal'd up with frugal care in massive waxen 
 
 piles, 
 Are doom'd by man, that tyrant o'er the weak, 
 The death o' devils smoor'd wi' brimstone 
 
 reek: 
 The thundering guns are heard on every side, 
 The wounded coveys, reeling, scatter wide ; 
 The feather'd field-mates, bound by Nature's 
 
 tie, 
 Sires, mothers, children, in one carnage he : 
 (What warm, poetic heart, but inly bleeds, 
 And execrates man's savage, ruthless deeds !) 
 Nae mair the flower in field or meadow 
 
 springs ; 
 Nae mair the grove with airy concert rings. 
 Except perhaps the Robin's whistling glee. 
 Proud o' the height o' some bit half-lang tree : 
 The hoary morns precede the suimy days. 
 Mild, calm, serene, wide spreads the noon-tide 
 
 blaze, 
 Wliile thick the gossamour waves wanton in 
 
 the rays. 
 'Twas in that season, when a simple bard, 
 Unknown and poor, simplicity's reward ; 
 Ae night, within the ancient brugh o^ Ayr 
 By whim inspir'd, or haply prest wi' care ; 
 He left his bed, and took his wayward route. 
 And down by Simpson's* wheel'd the left 
 
 about : 
 
 * A noted tavern at the Auld Brig end. 
 
 (Whether impell'd by all-directing Fate, 
 
 To witness what I after shall narrate ; 
 
 Or whether, rapt in meditation high, 
 
 He wander'd out he knew not where nor 
 
 why:) 
 The drowsy Dungeon-docl^ had number'd two. 
 And Wallace Tower* had sworn the fact was 
 
 true. 
 The tide-swohi Firth with sullen Bounding 
 
 roar. 
 Through the still night dash'd hoarse along the 
 
 shore : 
 All else was hush'd as Natm-e's closed e'e ; 
 The silent moon shone liigh o'er tower and 
 
 tree : 
 The chilly frost, beneath the silver beam, 
 Crept, gently crusting, o'er the glittering 
 
 stream. — 
 When, lo ! on either hand the list'ning Bard, 
 The clanging sugh of whistling wings is 
 
 heard ; 
 Two dusky forms dart thro' the midnight air. 
 Swift as the Gos\ drives on the wheeling 
 
 hare ; 
 Ane on th' A'nM Brig his airy shape uprears, 
 The ither flutters o'er the rising -piers : 
 Our warlock Rhymer instantly descry'd 
 The Sprites that owre the Brigs of Ayr pre- 
 side. 
 (Tliat Bards are second-sighted is nae joke, 
 And ken the lingo of the sp'ritual fo'k ; 
 Fays, Spunkies, Kelpies, a', they can explain 
 
 them,) 
 And ev'n the very deils they brawly kea 
 
 them.) 
 Auld Brig appear'd of ancient Pictish racCj 
 Tlie vera wrinkles Gothic Ln his face : 
 He seem'd as he wi' Time had warstl'd lang. 
 Yet teughly doure, he bade an unco bang. 
 J^ew Brig was buskit in a braw new coat. 
 That he, at London, frae ane Adams, got ;■ 
 In's hand five taper staves as smooth's a 
 
 bead, 
 Wi' virls and wliirlygigums at the head. 
 The Goth was stalking round with anxious 
 
 search. 
 Spying the time-worn flaws in ev'ry arch ; 
 It chanc'd his new-come neebor took his e'e, 
 And e'en a vex'd and angry heart had he ! 
 Wi' thieveless sneer to see his modish mien, 
 He, down the water, gies liim this guideen : — 
 
 AULD BRIG. 
 
 I doubt na, frien', yell think ye're nae sheep 
 
 shank, 
 Ance ye were streekit o'er frae bank to bank, 
 But gin ye be a brig as auld as me, 
 The' faith that day, I doubt, ye'U never see 
 
 * The two steeples. 
 tThe goshawk, or falcon. 
 
BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 Thereni be, if that date come, I'll wad a bod- 
 Some fewer whigmeleeries in your noddle. 
 NEW BRIG. 
 
 Auld Vandal, ye but show your little mense, 
 Just much about it wi' your scanty sense ; 
 Will your poor, narrow foot-path of a street, 
 Wliere twa wheel-barrows tremble when they 
 
 meet. 
 Your ruin'd, formless bulk o' stane an' lime, 
 Compare wi' boimie Brigs o' modern time ? 
 Tiiere's men o' taste would tak the Ducat- 
 
 slream,* 
 Tho' they should cast the very sark an swim. 
 Ere they would grate their feelings wi' the 
 
 view 
 Of sic an ugly Gothic hulk as you. 
 
 AULD BRIG. 
 
 Conceited gowk! pufF'd up wi' windy 
 
 piide ! 
 This monle a year I've stood the flood an' tide ; 
 And tho' wi' crazy eild I'm sair forfaim, 
 I'll be a Brig, when ye're a shapeless cairn ! 
 As yet ye little ken about the matter. 
 But twa-three winters will inform you better, 
 When heavy, dark, continued, a'-day rams, 
 Wi' deepening deluges o'erflow the plains ; 
 When from the hills where springs the brawl- 
 ing Coil, 
 Or stately Luga/s mossy fountains boil, 
 Or where the Greenock winds his moorland 
 
 course. 
 Or haunted Garpalf draws his feeble source, 
 Arous'd by blust'ring winds an' spotting 
 
 thowes, 
 In mony a torrent down his sna-broo rowes ; 
 While crashing ice, borne on the roaring speat, 
 Sweeps dams, an' mills, an' brigs, a' to the 
 
 gate ; 
 And from Glenhuck,X down to the Rotlon- 
 
 key,h 
 Auld At/r is just one lengthen'd, tumbling sea ; 
 Then down ye "11 hurl, deil nor ye never rise ! 
 And dash the gumlie jaups up to the pouring 
 
 skies : 
 A lesson sadly teaching, to your cost, 
 That Arcliitccture's noble art is lost I 
 
 NEW BRIG. 
 
 Fine Architecture^ trowth, I needs must say't 
 o't ! 
 The L — d be thankit that we've tint the gate 
 o't! 
 
 • A noted fori, just above the Auld Brig. 
 
 t The banks of Garpal Water is one of the few 
 places in the West of Scotland, where those fancy- 
 gearing beings, known by the name of Ghaists, still 
 continue pertinaciously to inhabit. 
 
 } The source of the river Ayr. 
 
 f A small landing place above the large key. 
 
 Gaunt, ghastly, ghaist-alluring edifices, 
 Hanging with threat'ning jut, like precipices ; 
 O'er arching, mouldy, gloom-inspiring coves 
 Supporting roofs fantastic, stony groves : 
 Windows and doors, in nameless sculpture 
 
 drest. 
 With order, symmetry, or taste imblest ; 
 Forms like some bedlam statuary's dream, 
 The craz'd creations of misguided whim; 
 Forms might be worshipp'd on the bended 
 
 knee, 
 And still the second dread command be free, 
 Their likeness is not found on earth, m air, or 
 
 sea. 
 Mansions that would disgrace the building 
 
 taste 
 Of any mason, reptile, bird, or beast ; 
 Fit only for a doited Monkish race. 
 Or frosty maids forsworn the dear embrace. 
 Or cuifs of later times, wha held the notion 
 That sullen gloom was sterling true devotion ; 
 Fancies that our guid Brugh denies protection. 
 And soon may they expire, imblest with re- 
 surrection ! 
 
 AULD BRIG. 
 
 O ye, my dear-remember'd, ancient yealmgs, 
 Were ye but here to share my wounded feel- 
 ings! 
 Ye worthy Provescs, an' mony a Bailie,, 
 Wha in the paths o' righteousness did toil ay ; 
 Ye dainty Deacons, and ye douce Conveeners, 
 To whom our modems are but causey-clean- 
 ers; 
 Ye godly Councils wha hae blest this town ; 
 Ye godly Brethren of the sacred gown, 
 Wha meekly gie your hurdies to the smiters ; 
 And (what woula now be strange) ye godly 
 
 Writers : 
 A' ye douce folk I've borne aboon the broo. 
 Were ye but here, what would ye say or do .-' 
 How would your spirits groan in deep vex- 
 ation, 
 To see each melancholy alteration ; 
 And, agonizing, curse the time and place 
 When ye begat the base, degen'rate race ! 
 Nae langer Rev'rend Men, their country's 
 
 glory. 
 In plain braid Scots hold fbrth a plain braid 
 
 story ! 
 Nae langer thrifty Citizens, an' douce. 
 Meet owre a pint, or in the Council-house ; 
 But staumrel, corky-headed, graceless Gentry, 
 The herryment and ruin of the country ; 
 Men, three-parts made by Tailors and by Bar- 
 bers, 
 Wha waste your well-hain'd gear'on d — d new 
 Brigs and Harbours 1 
 
 NEW BRIG. 
 
 Now baud you there I for faith ye've said 
 enough. 
 And muckle mair than ye can mak to through. 
 
16 
 
 BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 As for your priesthood, I shall say but little, 
 Corbies and Clergy are a shot right kittle : 
 But under favour o' your langer beard. 
 Abuse o' Magistrates might .weal be spar'd : 
 To liken them to your auld-warld squad, 
 I must needs say, comparisons are odd. 
 In Ayr, Wag-wits nae mair can hae a handle 
 To mouth " a Citizen," a term o' scandal : 
 Nae mair the Coimcil waddles down the 
 
 street, 
 In all the pomp of ignorant conceit; 
 Men wha grew wise priggin owre hops an' 
 
 raisins, 
 Or gathered libVal views in Bonds and Seisins. 
 If haply Knov/ledge, on a random tramp, 
 Had shor'd them with a glimmer of his lamp, 
 And would to Common-sense, for once be- 
 
 tray'd them, ^ 
 
 Plain, dull Stupidity stept kindly in to aid 
 them. 
 
 clishmaclaver might been 
 had blood to 
 
 What farther 
 
 said. 
 What bloody wars, if Sprit 
 
 shed. 
 
 No man can tell ; but all before their sight, 
 A fairy train appeared in order bright : 
 Adown the glittering stream they featly 
 
 danc'd ; 
 Bright to the moon their various dresses 
 
 glanc'd : 
 They footed o'er the watry glass so neat. 
 The infant ice scarce bent beneath their feet : 
 Wliile arts of Minstrelsy among them rung. 
 And soul-ennobling Bards heroic ditties sung. 
 O had M''Lauchlan,* thairm-inspiring Sage, 
 Been there to hear this heavenly band engage. 
 When thro' his dear Strathspeys they bore with 
 
 Highland rage, 
 Or when they struck old Scotia's melting airs, 
 The lover's raptur'd joys or bleeding cares ; 
 How would his Highland lug been nobler fir'd. 
 And ev'n his matdiless hand with finer touch 
 
 inspir'd ! 
 No guess could tell what instrument appear'd, 
 But all the soul of Music's self was heard ; 
 Harmonious concert rung in every part. 
 While simple melody pour'd moving on the 
 
 heart. 
 
 The Genius of the Stream in front appears, 
 A venerable Cliief advanced in years ; 
 His hoary head with water-hlies crown'd. 
 His manly leg with garter tangle bound. 
 Next came the loveliest pair in all the ring. 
 Sweet Female Beauty hand in hand with 
 
 Spring ; 
 Then, crown'd with flow'ry hay, came rural 
 
 Joy, 
 And Summer, with his fervid-beammg eye : 
 
 * A well known performer of Scottish music on the 
 violin. 
 
 All-cheering Plenty, with her flowing horn, 
 Led yellow Autumn wrcath'd with nodding 
 
 corn; 
 Then Winter's time-bleach'd locks did hoary 
 
 show, 
 By Hospitality with cloudless brow. 
 Ne.xt follow'd Courage with his martial strid», 
 From where the jPeaZ wild- woody coverts hide; 
 Benevolence, with mild, benignant air, 
 A female form, came from the tow'rs of Stair : 
 Learning and Worth in equal measures trode 
 From simple Catrine, their long-lov'd abode : 
 Last, white-rob'd Peace, crown'd with a hazol 
 
 wreath. 
 To rustic Agriculture did bequeath - 
 The broken iron instruments of death; 
 At sight of whom our Sprites forgat theif 
 
 kindling wrath. 
 
 THE ORDINATION. 
 
 For sonse they little owe to Frugal Heaven. — 
 To please Uie Mob they hide the Utile given. 
 
 Kilmarnock Wabsters fidge an' claw 
 
 An' pour your creeshie nations ; 
 An' ye wha leather rax an' draw. 
 
 Of a' denominations, 
 Swith to the Laigh Kirk., ane an' a' 
 
 An' there tak up your stations ; 
 Then aff to B-gb — '.9 in a raw, 
 
 An' pour divine libations 
 
 For joy this day 
 
 II. 
 
 Curst Common Sense that imp o' h-11, 
 
 Cam in wi' Maggie Lauder ;* 
 But 0*******aft made her yell, 
 
 An' R ***** sair misca'd her ; 
 This day M' ****** * takes the flail. 
 
 And he's the boy will blaud her ! 
 He'll clap a shangan on her tail, 
 
 An' set the bairns to daub her 
 Wi' dirt this day. 
 
 Mak haste an' turn king David owre, 
 .J An' lilt wi' holy clangor ; 
 
 * Alluding to a scoffinc ballad which was made on the 
 admissioH of the late Reverend and worthy Mr. L. to 
 
 the Laigh Kirk 
 
BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 IT 
 
 O' double verse come gie us four, 
 
 An' skirl up the Bangor : 
 This day the kirk kicks up a stoure, 
 
 Nae mair the knaves shall wrang her, 
 For Heresy is in her pow'r, 
 
 An' gloriously shall whang her 
 
 Wi' pith this day. 
 
 IV. 
 
 Come, let a proper text be read, 
 
 An' touch it afF wi' vigour, 
 How graceless Ham* leugh at his Dad, 
 
 Which made Canaan a niger ; 
 Or Phineasf drove the murdering blade, 
 
 Wi' wh-re-abhorring rigour ; 
 Or Zipporah, % the scauldin jade. 
 
 Was like a bluidy tiger 
 
 r th' inn that day. 
 
 There, try his mettle on the creed. 
 
 And bind liim down wi' caution, 
 That Stipend is a carnal weed 
 
 He taks but for the fashion ; 
 An' gie him o'er thejlock, to feed. 
 
 And punish each transgression ; 
 Especial, rams that cross the breed, 
 
 Gie them sufficient threshin, 
 
 Spare them nae day. 
 
 VI. 
 
 Now auld Kilmarnock cock thy tail. 
 
 And toss thy horns fu' canty ; 
 Nae mair thou'lt rowte out-owre the dale. 
 
 Because thy pasture's scanty ; 
 For lapfu's large o' gospel kail 
 
 Shall fill thy crib in plenty. 
 An' runts o' grace the pick an' wale, 
 
 No gi'en by way o' dainty. 
 
 But ilka day. 
 
 vn. 
 
 Nae mair by BabeVs streams we'll weep. 
 
 To think upon our Zion ; 
 And hing our fiddles up to sleep. 
 
 Like baby-clouts a-dryin : 
 Come, screw the pegs wi' tunefu' cheep. 
 
 And o'er the thairms be tryin ; 
 Oh, rare ! to see our elbucks wlieep. 
 
 An' a' like lamb-tails flpn 
 
 Fu' fast tliis day ! 
 
 • Genesis, chap ix. 22. t Numbers, cli. xxv. vor 
 t Exodus, ch, iv. ver. 25. 
 
 c 
 
 VIII. 
 
 Lang Patronage, wi' rod o' airn, 
 
 Has shor'd the Kirk's undoin, 
 As lately F-nw-ck sair forfaim, 
 
 Has proven to its ruin : 
 Our Patron, honest man ! Glencaim, 
 
 He saw mischief was brewin ; 
 And like a godly elect bairn. 
 
 He's wal'd us out a true ane, 
 
 And sound this day. 
 
 IX. 
 
 Now R******* harangue nae mair, 
 
 But steek your gab for ever : 
 Or try the wicked town of A**, 
 
 For there they'll think you clever ; 
 Or, nae reflection on your lear, 
 
 Ye may commence a Shaver • 
 Or to the J^-th-rt-n repair. 
 
 And turn a Carpet-weaver 
 
 Aff-hand this day. 
 
 X. 
 
 M ***** and you were just a match, 
 
 We never had sic twa drones : 
 Auld Hornie did the Laigh Kirk watch. 
 
 Just like a winkin baudrons ; 
 And ay' he catch'd the tither vsretch, 
 
 To fry them in his caudrons ; 
 But now his honour maun detach, 
 
 Wi' a' his brimstone squadrons. 
 Fast, fast this day. 
 
 XI. 
 
 See, see auld Orthodoxy's faes, 
 
 She's swingein thro' the city : 
 Hark, how the nine-tail 'd cat she plays! 
 
 I vow it's imco pretty : 
 There, Learning, with his Greekish face, 
 
 Grunts out some Latm ditty ; 
 And Common Sense is gaun, she says, 
 
 To mak to Jamie Beattie 
 
 Her 'plaint tliis day. 
 
 XII. 
 
 But there's Mortality himsel, 
 
 Embracing all opinions ; 
 Hear, how he gies the tither yell, 
 
 Between his twa companions ; 
 See, how she peels the skin an' fell. 
 
 As ane were peelin onions ! 
 Now there — they're packed aff to hell. 
 
 And banish'd our dominions. 
 
 Henceforth this day 
 
BURNS' rOEMS. 
 
 XIII. 
 
 O happy day ! rejoice, rejoice I 
 
 Come bouse about the porter I 
 MoraUty's demure decors 
 
 Shall here nae mair find quarter : 
 M^*******^ R***** are the boys, 
 
 That Heresy can torture ; 
 They'll gie her on a rape and hoyse 
 
 And cow her measure shorter 
 
 By th' head some day. 
 
 XIV. 
 
 Come, bring the tither mutchkin in, 
 
 And liere's, for a conclusion, 
 To every J^ew Light* mother's son, 
 
 From this time forth, Confusion : 
 If mair they deave us with their din. 
 
 Or Patronage intrusion, 
 We'll light a spunk, and, ev'ryskin, 
 
 We'U rin them afF in fusion 
 
 Like oil, some day. 
 
 THE CALF. 
 
 TO THE REV. MR. - 
 
 On hi« Text, Malachi, ch. Iv. ver. 2. " And they 
 ■hall go forth, and grow up, like calves of the stall " 
 
 Right, Sir ! your text I'll prove it true, 
 
 Though Heretics may laugh ; 
 For instance ; there's yoursel just now, 
 
 God knows, an unco Calf! 
 
 And should some Patron be so kind, 
 
 As bless you wi' a kirk, 
 I doubt na. Sir, but then we'll find. 
 
 Ye 're still as great a Stirk. 
 
 But, if the Lover's raptur'd hour 
 
 Shall ever be your lot, 
 Forbid it, ev'ry heavenly Power, 
 
 You e'er should be a Slot ! 
 
 Tho', when some kind connubial Dear, 
 
 Your but-and-ben adorns. 
 The like has been that you may wear 
 
 A noble head of horns. 
 
 And in your lug most reverend Jama., 
 
 To hear you roar and rowte, 
 Few men o' sense will doubt your claims 
 
 To rank amang the nowte. 
 
 *^felB Light is a cant phrase in the West of Scotland, 
 tot those religious opinions which Dr. Tavlor of Nor- 
 wich has defended so strenuously. 
 
 And when ye're niunber'd wi' the dead, 
 
 Below a grassy hillock, 
 Wi' justice they may mark your head — 
 
 " Here lies a famous Bullock /" 
 
 ADDRESS TO THE DEIL. 
 
 O Prince ! O Chief of many throned Powers, 
 That led th' embattled Seraphim to war. 
 
 Milton. 
 
 O THOU '. whatever title suit thee, 
 Auld Homie, Satan, Nick, or Clootie, 
 Wha in yon cavern grim an' sootie. 
 
 Closed under hatches, 
 Spairges about the brunstane cootie, 
 
 To scaud poor wretches. 
 
 Hear me, auld Hangie, for a wee. 
 An' let poor damned bodies be ; 
 IVn sure sma' pleasure it «an gie, 
 
 E'en to a deil. 
 To skelp an' scaud poor dogs like me, 
 
 An' hear us squeel ! 
 
 Great is thy pow'r, an' great thy fame ; 
 Far kend and noted is thy name ; 
 An' tho' yon lowin heugh's thy hame. 
 
 Thou travels far ; 
 An' iaith ! thou's neither lag nor lame. 
 
 Nor blate nor scaur. 
 
 Whyles, rangmg like a roarin lion. 
 For prey, a' holes an' corners tryin ; 
 Whyles on the strong-wing'd tempest flyin, 
 
 Tirling the kirks ; 
 Whyles, in the human bosom pryin. 
 
 Unseen thou lurks. 
 
 I've heard my reverend Grannie say, 
 In lanely glens ye lilie to stray ; 
 Or where auld-ruin'd castles, gray. 
 
 Nod to the moon, 
 Ye fright the nightly wand'rer's way, 
 
 Wi' eldritch croon. 
 
 When twilight did my Grannie summon 
 To say her prayers, douce, honest woman ! 
 Aft yont the dyke she's heard you bummin, 
 
 Wi' eerie drone ; 
 Or, rustlin, thro' the boortrees comin, 
 
 Wi' heavy groan. 
 
 Ae dreary, windy, winter night, 
 The stars shot down wi' sklentin light. 
 
BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 Wi' you, mysel, I gat a fright, 
 
 Ayont the lough ; 
 
 Ye, like a rash-bush, stood in siglit, 
 
 Wi' waviiii"- KUiiii. 
 
 The cudgel in my nieve did shake, 
 Each bristl'd hair stood like a stake, 
 When wi' an eldritch, stour, quaick — quaick- 
 
 Amang the springs, 
 Awa ye squatter'd, like a drake. 
 
 On whistling wings. 
 
 Let warlocks grim, an' wither 'd hxigs. 
 Tell how wi' you on ragweed nags 
 They skim the muirs, an' dizzy crags, 
 
 Wi' wicked speed ; 
 And in kirk yards renew their leagues, 
 
 Owre howkit dead. 
 
 Thence kintra wives, wi' toil an' pain. 
 May plunge an' plunge the kirn in vain ; 
 For, oh ! the yellow treasure's ta'en 
 
 By witching skill ; 
 An' davvtit, twal-pint Hawkie^s gaen 
 
 As yell's the Bill. 
 
 Thence mystic knots mak great abuse, 
 On young Guidman, fond, keen, an' crouse ; 
 When the best wark-lume i' the house, 
 
 By cantrip wit, 
 Is instant made no worse a louse. 
 
 Just at the bit. 
 
 When thowes dissolve the snawy hoord, 
 An' float the jinglin icy-boord, 
 Then Water-kelpies haunt the foord. 
 
 By your direction. 
 An' nighted Trav'Uers are allur'd 
 
 To their destruction. 
 
 An' aft your moss-traversing Spunkies 
 Decoy the wight that late an' drunk is : 
 The bleezm, curst, mischievous monkeys 
 
 Delude his eyes. 
 Till in some miry slough he sunk is. 
 
 Ne'er mair to rise. 
 
 When Masons'' mystic word an' grip 
 In storms an' tempests raise you up, 
 Some cock or cat your rage maun stop. 
 Or, strange to tell I 
 The youngest Brother ye wad whip 
 
 Affstraught tohell! 
 
 Lang syne, in Eden's bonnie yard. 
 When youthfii' lovers first were pair'd, 
 An' all the soul of love they shar'd, 
 
 The r;kptur'd hour, 
 Sweet on the fragrant, flow'ry swaird 
 
 In shady bovv'r : 
 
 Then you, ye auld, snic-drawing dog! 
 Ye came to Paradise incog, 
 An' play'd on man a cursed brogue, 
 
 (Black be your fa' ! 
 An' gicd the infant warld a shog, 
 
 'Maist ruin'd a' 
 
 D'ye mind that day, when in a bizz, 
 Wi' reekit duds, an' reestit gizz, 
 Ye did present your smoutie phiz, 
 
 'Mang better fo'k, 
 An' sklented on the man of Usz 
 
 Your spitefu' joke ? 
 
 An' how ye gat him i' your thrall, 
 An' brak him out o' house an' hall. 
 While scabs an' blotches did him gall, 
 Wi' bitter claw, 
 An' lows'd his ill-tongu'd, wicked Scawl, 
 Was warst ava? 
 
 But a' your doings to rehearse. 
 Your wily snares an' fechtin fierce. 
 Sin' that day Michael* did you pierce, 
 
 Down to this time. 
 Wad ding a' Lallan tongue, or Erse, 
 
 In prose or rhyme. 
 
 An' now, auld Cloots, I ken ye're thinkin 
 A certain Bardie's rantin, drinkin. 
 Some luckless hour will send him linking 
 
 To your black pit; 
 But, faith ! he'll turn a comer jinkin, 
 
 An' cheat you yet. 
 
 But, fare you weel, auld J^ickie-benl 
 O wad ye tak a thought an' men' ! 
 Ye aiblins might — I dinna ken — 
 
 Still hae a slake— 
 I'm wae to think upo' yon den, 
 
 Ev'n for your sake ! 
 
 DEATH AND DYING WORDS 
 
 OF 
 
 POOR MAILIE, 
 
 THE AUTHOR'S ONLY PET YOWE. 
 
 AN UNCO MOURN FU' TALE 
 
 As Mailie, an' her Iambs thegither 
 Were ae day nibbling on the tether. 
 Upon her cloot she coost a hitch. 
 An' owre she warsl'd in the ditch . 
 
 * Vide Milton, Book VI. 
 
20 
 
 There, groaning, dying, slie did lie, 
 Wlien Uughoc* he cam doytin by. 
 
 BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 Wi' glowrin een, an' lifted han's, 
 Poor Hughoc like a statue stan's ; 
 He saw her days were near-hand ended, 
 But, waes my heart ! lie could na mend it ! 
 He gaped wide, but naething spak I 
 At length Poor Mailie silence brak. 
 
 " O thou, whase lamentable face 
 Appears to mourn my woefu' case ! 
 My dying words attentive hear, 
 An' bear them to my master dear. 
 
 " Tell him, if e'er again he keep, 
 As muckle gear as buy a sheep, 
 O, bid him never tie them mair 
 Wi' wicked strings o' hemp or hair '. 
 But ca' them out to park or hill. 
 An' let them wander at their will ; 
 So may his flock increase, an' grow 
 To scores o' lambs, jui' packs <r woo' ! 
 
 " Tell him, he was a master kin', 
 An' ay was guid to me and mine ; 
 An' now my dying charge I gie him. 
 My helpless lambs I trust them wi' him 
 
 " O, bid him," save their harmless lives, 
 Frae dogs, an' tods, an' butchers' knives ! 
 But gie them guid cow-milk their fill. 
 Till they be fit to fend themsel : 
 An' tent them duly, e'en an' morn, 
 W teats o' hay an' rips o' corn. 
 
 " An' may they never learn the gaets 
 Of ither vile wanrestfu' petx .' 
 To slink thro' slaps, an' reave an' steal, 
 At stacks o' pease, or stocks o' kail. 
 So may they, like their great Forbears, 
 For monie a year come thro' the sheers : 
 So wives will gie them bits o' bread. 
 An' bairns greet for them when they're dead. 
 
 " My poor tonp-lamb, my son an' heir, 
 O, bid him breed him up wi' care 1 
 An', if-he live to be a beast. 
 To pit some havins in his breast ! 
 An' warn him, wliat I winna name, 
 To stay content wi' yowes at hame ; 
 An' no to rin an' wear his cloots. 
 Like ither menseless, graceless brutes. 
 
 " An, niest my yotvie, silly thing, 
 Gude keep thee frae a tether string'. 
 O, may thou ne'er forgather up 
 Wi' ony blastit, moorland toop ; 
 
 A neebor herd-callan 
 
 But ay keep mind to moop an' mell, 
 Wi' sheep o' credit like thysel ! 
 
 " And now, my bairns, wi' my last breath, 
 I lea'e my blessin wi' you baith : 
 An' when you think upo' your Mither, 
 Mind to be kin' to ane anither. 
 
 " Now, honest Hughoc, dinna fail, 
 To tell my master a' my tale ; 
 An' bid him burn this cursed tether, 
 An', for thy pains, thou'se get my blather." 
 
 This said, poor Mailie tum'd her head. 
 An' clos'd her e'en amang the dead. 
 
 POOR MAILIE'S ELEGY. 
 
 Lament in rhyme, lament in prose, 
 Wi' saut tears trickling down your nose ; 
 Our bardie's fate is at a close. 
 
 Past a' remead ; 
 The last sad cape-stane of his woes ; 
 
 Poor Mailie's dead ! 
 
 It's no the loss o' warl's gear, 
 That could sae bitter draw the tear 
 Or raak our bardie, dowie, wear 
 
 The mourning weed ; 
 He's lost a friend and neebor dear, 
 
 In Mailie dead. 
 
 Thro a' the town she trotted by him ; 
 A lang half-mile she could descry him ; 
 Wi' kmdly bleat, when she did spy him. 
 
 She ran wi' speed : 
 A friend mair faitlifu' ne'er cam nigh him, 
 
 Than Mailie dead. 
 
 I wat she was a sheep o' sense, 
 An' could behave hersel wi' mense : 
 I'll say't, she never brak a fence. 
 
 Thro' thievish greed. 
 Our bardie, lanely, keeps the spence 
 
 Sm' MaUie's dead. 
 
 Or, if he wanders up the howe. 
 Her living image in her yowe. 
 Comes bleating to him, owre the knowe, 
 
 For bits o' bread ; 
 An' down the briny pearls rowe ' 
 
 For Mailie dead. 
 
 She was nae get o' moorland tips, 
 Wi' tawted ket, an hairy hips ; 
 For her forbears were brought in ships 
 
 Frae yont the Tweed: 
 A bonnier^ecsA ne'er cross'd the clips 
 
 Than Mailie dead. 
 
BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 21 
 
 Wae worth the man wha first did shape 
 That vile, wanchancie tliinff— a rape ! 
 I maks guid fellows girn an* gape, 
 
 Wi' chokin dread ; 
 An' Robin's bonnet wave wi' crape, 
 
 For Mailie dead. 
 
 O, a' ye bards on bonnie Boon ! 
 An' wha on Ayr your chanters tune ! 
 Come, join the melancholious croon 
 
 O' Robin's reed 1 
 His heart will never get aboon 
 
 get a 
 Ilis 
 
 Mailie dead. 
 
 TO J. S****. 
 
 Friendship ! mysterious cement of the soul ! 
 Sweet'ner of life, and solder of society ! 
 
 I owe tliee much. 
 
 Blair. 
 
 Dear S****, the sleest, paukie thief, 
 That e'er attempted stealth or rief, 
 Ye surely hae some warlock-breef 
 
 Owre human hearts ; 
 For ne'er a bosom yet was prief 
 
 Against your arts. 
 
 For me, I swear by sun an' moon, 
 And ev'ry star that blinks aboon, 
 Ye've cost me twenty pair o' shoon 
 
 Just gaun to see you ; 
 And ev'ry ither pair that's done, 
 
 Mair ta'en I'm wi' you. 
 
 That auld, capricious carlin. Nature, 
 To mak amends for scrimpit stature. 
 She's turn'd you aff, a human creature 
 On her Jirst plan. 
 And in her freaks, on ev'ry feature, 
 
 She's wroto, the Man. 
 
 Just now Iv'e ta'en the fit o' rhyme, 
 My barmie noddle's working prime 
 My fancy yerkit up sublime 
 
 Wi' hasty summon : 
 Hae ye a leisure-moment's time 
 
 To hear what's comin ? 
 
 Some rhyme, a ncebor's name to lash ; 
 Some rhyme (vain thought !) for needfu' cash | 
 Some rhyme to court the kintra clash. 
 
 An' raise a din ; 
 For me, an aim I never fash ; 
 
 I rhyme for flan. 
 
 The star that rules my luckless lot. 
 Has fated me the russet coat, 
 An' damn'd my fortune to the groat ; 
 
 But in rcquit. 
 Has bless'd me wi' a random shot 
 
 O' kintra wit. 
 
 This while my notion's ta'en a sklent, 
 To try my fate in gviid black prent ; 
 But still the mair I'm tliat way bent. 
 
 Something cries, " HooUe ! 
 I red you, honest man, tak tent ! 
 
 Ye '11 shaw your folly. 
 
 " There's ither poets, much your betters, 
 Far seen in Greek, deep men o' letters, 
 Hae thought they had ensur'd their debtors, 
 
 A' future ages ; 
 Now moths deform in shapeless tetters, 
 
 Their imknown pages.' 
 
 Then fareweel hopes o' laurel-boughs, 
 To garland my poetic brows ! 
 Henceforth I'll rove where busy ploughs 
 
 Are whistling thrang. 
 An' teach the lanely heights an' howes 
 My rustic sang. 
 
 I'll wander on, with tentless heed 
 How never-halting moments speed. 
 Till fate shall snap the brittle thread 
 
 Then, all unknown, 
 I'll lay me witli the inglorious dead. 
 
 Forgot and gone 1 
 
 But why o' death begin a tale ? 
 Just now we're living sound and hale, 
 Then top and maintop crowd the sail, 
 
 Heave care o'er si 
 And large, before enjoyment's gale, 
 
 Let's tak the tide. 
 
 This life, sae far's I understand, 
 Is a' enchanted, fairy land, 
 Where pleasure is the magic wand. 
 
 That wielded right, 
 Maks hours, like minutes, hand in hand. 
 
 Dance by fii' light. 
 
 The magic-wand then let us wield ; 
 For ance that five-an'-forty's speel'd. 
 See crazy, weary, joyless eild, 
 
 Wi' wrmkl'd face. 
 Comes hostin, hirplin owre the field, 
 
 Wi' creepin pace. 
 
 When ance life't day draws near the gloamin, 
 Then fareweel vacant carclesB roamin ; 
 
22 
 
 BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 An' fareweel cheerfu' tankards foamin, 
 An' social noise ; 
 
 An' fareweel, dear, deluding woman. 
 The joy of joys 1 
 
 O Life ! how pleasant in thy morning, 
 Young Fancy's rays the hills adorning ! 
 Cold-pausing Caution's lesson scorning, 
 
 We frisk away, 
 Like school-boys, at th' expected warning. 
 
 To joy and play. 
 
 We wander there, we wander here. 
 We eye the rose upon the brier. 
 Unmindful that the thorn is near, 
 
 Among the leaves ; 
 And though the puny wound appear, 
 
 Short wliUe it grieves. 
 
 Some, lucky, find a flow'ry spot. 
 For which they never toil'd nor swat ; 
 They drink the sweet, and eat the fat. 
 
 But care or pain ; 
 And, haply, eye the barren hut 
 
 Witli high disdain. 
 
 With steady aim, some fortune chase ; 
 Keen Hope does every sinew brace ; 
 Thro' fair, thro' foul, they urge the race. 
 And seize the prey 
 Then cannie, in some cozie place. 
 
 They close the day. 
 
 And others, hke your humble servan', 
 Poor wights ! nae rules nor roads observm ; 
 To right or left, eternal swervin, 
 
 They zig-zag on ; 
 Till curst with age, obscure an' starvin, 
 They aften groan.- 
 
 Alaf ! what bitter toil an' straining — • 
 But truce with peevish, poor complaining 
 Is fortune's fickle Lima waning ? 
 
 E'en let her gang ! 
 Beneath what hght she has remaining, 
 Let's sing our sang. 
 
 My pen I here fling to the door. 
 And kneel, " Ye Powers I" and warm implore, 
 " Tho' I should wander terra o'er. 
 
 In all her climes. 
 Grant me but this, I ask no more. 
 
 Ay rowth o' rhymes. 
 
 " Gie dreeping roasts to kintra lairds, 
 Till icicles hing frae their beards • 
 
 Gie fine braw claes to fine life-g[uards, 
 
 And maids of honour; 
 
 And yill an' whisky gie to cairds. 
 
 Until they sconner. 
 
 " A title, Dempster merits it ; 
 A garter gie to IVillie Pitt ; 
 Gie wealth to some be-ledger'd cit, 
 
 In cent, per cent,, 
 But gie me real, sterling wit, 
 
 y^id I'm content. 
 
 " While ye are pleas'd to keep me hale, 
 I'll sit down o'er my scanty meal, 
 Be't wattr-brose, or muslin-kail, 
 
 Wi' cheerfu' face, 
 As lang's the muses dinna fail 
 
 To say the grace." 
 
 An anxious e'e I never throws 
 Beliint my lug, or by my nose ; 
 I jouk beneath misfortune's blows 
 
 As weel's 1 may ; 
 Sworn foe to sorrow, care, and prose, 
 
 1 rhyme away. 
 
 O ye douce folk, tliat live by rule, 
 Grave, tideless-blooded, calm and cool, 
 Compar'd wi' you — O fool 1 fool ! fool 
 
 How much unlike ! 
 Your hearts are just a standing pool, 
 
 Your lives, a dyke ! 
 
 Hae hair-brain'd, sentimental traces 
 In your unletter'd, nameless faces ! 
 In arioso trills and graces 
 
 Ye never stray. 
 But, gravissimo, solemn basses 
 
 Ye hum away 
 
 Ye are sae c;rave, nae doubt ye're wise ; 
 Nae ferly tho'^ ye do despise 
 The hairum-scairum, ram-stam boys, 
 
 The rattliii squad : 
 I see you upward cast yoiu eyes — 
 
 — Ye ken the road.- 
 
 Wliilst I — ^but I shall hand me there— 
 Wi' you I'll scarce gang ony where — 
 Then, Jamie, I shall say nae mair, 
 
 But quat my sang. 
 Content wi' you to mak a pair, 
 
 Whare'er I gang. 
 
BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 23 
 
 A DREAM. 
 
 Thoughts, words, and deeds, the statute blames with 
 
 reason ; 
 But surely dreams were ne'er indicted treason. 
 
 [On reading, In the public papers, the Laurcat's Ode, 
 with the other parade of June 4, J786, the author 
 was no sooner dropped asleep, than he imagined him- 
 self to the birth-day levee ; and in hia dreaming fancy 
 made the following Mdress.] 
 
 GuiD-MORNiNG to yoiiT Majesty ! 
 
 May heav'n augment your blisses, 
 On every new birth-day ye see, 
 
 A humble poet wishes ! 
 My bardsliip here, at your levee, 
 
 On sic a day as this is, 
 Is sure an uncouth sight to see, 
 
 Amang the birth-day dresses 
 
 Sae fine this day. 
 
 n. 
 
 I see ye're complimented thrang, 
 
 By monie a lord and lady ; 
 " God save the king !" 's a cuckoo sang 
 
 That's unco easy said ay ; 
 The foels, too, a venal gang, 
 
 Wi' rhymes weel-turn'd and ready, 
 Wad gar you trow ye ne'er do wrang, 
 
 But ay unerring steady. 
 
 On sic a day. 
 
 m. 
 
 For me ! before a monarch's face, 
 
 Ev'n there I winna flatter ; 
 For neither pension, post, nor place, 
 
 Am I your humble debtor : 
 So, nae reflection on your grace. 
 
 Your kingship to bespatter ; 
 There's monie waur been o' the race. 
 
 And aiblins ane been better 
 
 , '"han you this day. 
 
 IV. 
 
 'Tis very true my sov'reign king, 
 
 My skill may weel be doubted : 
 But facts are chiels that winna ding, 
 
 An' downa be disputed : 
 Your royal nest, beneath your wing. 
 
 Is e'en right reft an' clouted, 
 And now the tliird part of the string. 
 
 An' less, will gang about it 
 
 Than did ao day 
 
 Far be't frae me that I aspire 
 
 To blame your legislation. 
 Or say, ye wisdom want, or fire. 
 
 To rule this mighty nation ! 
 But, faith 1 1 muckle doubt, my Sire^ 
 
 Ye've trusted ministration 
 To chaps, wha, in a bam or byre. 
 
 Wad better fiU'd their station 
 
 Than courts yon day 
 
 VI. 
 
 And now ye've gien auld Britain peace. 
 
 Her broken shins to plaster 
 Your sair taxation does her fleece. 
 
 Till she has scarce a tester ; 
 For me, thank God, my life's a lease, 
 
 Nae bargain wearing faster. 
 Or, faith ! I fear, that wi' the geese, 
 
 I shortly boost to pasture 
 
 I' the craft some day. 
 
 VII. 
 
 I'm no mistrusting Willie Pitt, 
 
 When taxes he enlarges, 
 (An' WiWs a true guid fallow's get, 
 
 A name not envy spairges,) 
 That he intends to pay your debt. 
 
 An' lessen a' your charges ; 
 But, G-d-sake ! let nae samng-Jil 
 
 Abridge your bonnie barges 
 
 An' boats this day. 
 
 vni. 
 
 Adieu, my Liege! may freedom geek 
 
 Beneath your high protection ; 
 An' may ye rax corruption's neck, 
 
 And gie her for dissection ! 
 But since I'm here, I'll no neglect, 
 
 In loyal, true affection. 
 To pay your Qwecn, with due respect, 
 
 My fealty an' subjection 
 
 This great birth-day. 
 
 IX. 
 
 Hail, Majesty Most Excellent ! 
 
 While nobles strive to please ye. 
 Will ye accept a compliment 
 
 A simple poet gies ye? 
 Thae bonnie bairntime, Heav'n has lent, 
 
 Still higher may they heeze ye 
 In bliss, till fate some day is sent, 
 
 For ever to release ye 
 
 Frae care that day. 
 
24 
 
 BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 For you, yotuig potentate o' W , 
 
 I tell your Highness fairly, 
 Down pleasure's stream, wi' swelling sails, 
 
 I'm tauld ye're driving rarely ; 
 But some day ye may gnaw your nails. 
 
 An' curse your folly sairly. 
 That e'er ye brak Diana's pales, 
 
 Or, rattl'd dice wi' Charlie, 
 
 By night or day. 
 
 XI. 
 
 Yet aft a ragged cowte''s been known 
 
 To make a noble aiver ; 
 So, ye may doucely fill a tlirone. 
 
 For a' their clish-ma-claver : 
 There, him* at Agincourt wha shone, 
 
 Few better were or braver ; 
 And yet, wi' funny, queer Sir John,f 
 
 He was an unco shaver 
 
 For monie a day. 
 
 XII. 
 
 For you, right rev'rend O , 
 
 Nane sets the lawn-sleeve sweeter, 
 Although a ribban at your lug 
 
 Wad been a dress completpr : 
 As ye disown yon paughty dog 
 
 That bears the keys of Peter, 
 Then, swith ! an' get a wife to hug, 
 
 Or, trouth I ye'll stain the mitre 
 
 Some luckless day. 
 
 xni 
 
 Young, royal Tarry Breeks, I learn, 
 
 Ye've lately come athwart her ; 
 A glorious galki),\ stem an' stem. 
 
 Well rigg'd for Venus'' barter ; 
 But first hang out, that she'll discern 
 
 Your hymenial charter. 
 Then heave aboard your grapple aim, 
 
 An', large upo' her quarter. 
 
 Come full that day. 
 
 XIV. 
 
 Ye, lastly, boimie blossoms a', 
 
 Ye royal lasses dainty 
 Heav'n mak you guid as weel as braw. 
 
 An' gie you lads a-plenty : 
 But sneer nae British boys awa,' 
 
 For kings are unco scant ay ; 
 An' German gentles are but sma". 
 
 They're better just than want ay 
 On onie day. 
 
 • King Henry V. 
 t Sir John Falstaff : vide Shakspeare. 
 X Alluding to the newspaper account of a certain 
 royal sailor's amour. 
 
 XV. 
 
 God bless you a' ! consider now, 
 
 Ye're imco muckle dautet ; 
 But, ere the course o' life be thro', 
 
 It may be bitter sautet :' 
 An' I hae seen their coggie fou, 
 
 That yet hae tarrow't at it ; > 
 But or the day was done, I trow, 
 
 The laggen they hae clautet 
 
 Fu' clean that day. 
 
 THE VISION 
 
 DUAN FIRST.* 
 
 The sun had clos'd the winter day. 
 The curlers quat their roaring play, 
 An' hunger'd maukiii ta'en her way 
 
 To kail-yards green. 
 While faithless snaws ilk step betray 
 
 Whare she has been. 
 
 Tlie thresher's weary Jlingin-iree 
 The lee-lang day had tired me ; 
 And when the day had clos'd his e'e, 
 
 Far i' the west, 
 Ben i' the spence, right pensivelie, 
 
 I gaed to rest. 
 
 There, lanely, by the ingle-cheek, 
 I sat and ey'd tiie spewing reek. 
 That tilld'd, wi' hoast-provoking smeek. 
 
 The auld clay biggin ; 
 An' heard the restless rattons squeak 
 
 About the riggm. 
 
 All in this mottie, misty clime, 
 I backward mus'd on wasted time. 
 How I had spent my youthfu' prune, 
 
 An' done nae-tliing. 
 But stringin blethers up in rhyme. 
 
 For fools to suig. 
 
 Had I to guid advice but harkit, 
 I might, by this, hae led a market. 
 Or strutted m a bank an' clarkit 
 
 My cash account . 
 While here, half-mad, half-fed, half-sarkit, 
 
 Is a' th' amoimt. 
 
 I started, mutt'ring, blockhead ! coof I 
 And heav'd on high my waukit loof. 
 To swear by a' yon starry roof. 
 
 Or some rash aith. 
 That I, henceforth, would be rhyme-proof 
 
 Till my last breath — 
 
 *Duan, a term of Ossian's for the different divisions 
 of a digreraive poem. See his Calk- Lodii, vol. ii. of 
 MTherson's translation. 
 
BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 25 
 
 When click ! the string the snick did draw ; 
 And jee ! the door gaed to the wa' ; 
 An' by ray ingle-lowe I saw, 
 
 Now bleezin bright, 
 A tight, outlandish Hissie, braw, 
 
 Come full in sight. 
 
 Ye need na doubt, I held my whisht ; 
 The infant aith, half-form'd, was crusht ; 
 I glowr'd as eerie's I'd been dusht 
 
 In some wild glen ; 
 , When sweet, like modest worth, slie blusht, 
 And stepped ben. 
 
 Green, slender, leaf-clad holly-boughs 
 Were twisted, gracefu', round her brows ; 
 I took her for some Scottish Muse, 
 
 By that same token ; 
 An' come to stop those reckless vows, 
 
 Wou'd soon been broken. 
 
 A " hair-brain'd, sentimental trace," 
 Was strongly marked in her face ; 
 A wildly-witty, rustic grace 
 
 Shone full upon her ; 
 Her eye, ev'n turn'd on empty space, 
 
 Beam'd keen with honour. 
 
 Down flow'd her robe, a tartan sheen ; 
 Till half a leg was scrimply seen ; 
 And such a leg ! my bonnie Jean 
 
 Could only peer it ; 
 Sae straught, sae taper, tight, and clean, 
 
 Nane else came near it. 
 
 Her mantle large, of greenish hue. 
 My gazing wonder chiefly drew ; 
 Deep lights and shades, bold-mingUng threw, 
 
 A lustre grand ; 
 And seem'd, to my astonished view, 
 
 A well known land. 
 
 Here, rivers in the sea were lost ; 
 There, mountains to the skies were tost : 
 Here, tumbling billows mark'd the coast. 
 With surging foam ; 
 •There, distant shone Art's lofty boast. 
 The lordly dome. 
 
 Here, Doon pour'd down his far-fetch'd 
 floods ; 
 There, well-fed Irwine stately thuds : 
 Auld hermit Ayr staw thro' his woods. 
 On to the shore ; 
 And many a lesser torrent scuds. 
 
 With seeming roar. 
 
 Low, in a sandy valley spread. 
 An ancient borough rcar'd her head 
 C2 
 
 Still, as m Scottish story read. 
 
 She boasts a race, 
 
 To ev'ry nobler virtue bred. 
 
 And polish'd grace. 
 
 By stately tow'r or palace fair 
 Or ruins pendent in the air. 
 Bold stems of heroes, here and there, 
 I could discern ; 
 Some seem'd to muse, some seem'd to dare, 
 With feature stem. 
 
 My heart did glowing transport feel, 
 To see a race* heroic wheel. 
 And brandish round the deep-dy'd 'steel 
 
 In sturdy blows ; 
 Wliile back-recoiling seem'd to reel 
 
 Their stubborn foes. 
 
 His country's saviour ,t mark him well ! 
 Bold Richardton''st heroic swell ; 
 The chief on Sark\ who glorious fell. 
 
 In high command ; 
 And he whom ruthless fates expel 
 
 His native land. 
 
 There, where a scepter'd Pictish shade,|| 
 Stalk'd roimd his ashes lowly laid, 
 
 I mark'd a martial race, portray'd 
 
 In colours strong ; 
 Bold, soldier-featur'd, undismay'd 
 
 They strode along. 
 
 Thro' many a vrild, romantic grove,ir 
 Near many a hermit-fancy 'd cove, 
 (Fit haunts for friendship or for love) 
 
 In musing mood, 
 An agedjicdge, I saw him rove. 
 
 Dispensing good. 
 
 With deep-struck reverential awe** 
 The learned sire and son I saw, 
 To Nature's God and Nature's law 
 
 Tliey gave their lore, 
 This, all its source and end to draw. 
 That, to adore. 
 
 * The Wallaces. f William Wallace 
 
 t Adam Wallace, of Rlchardton, cousin to ;he im- 
 mortal preserver of Scottish independence. 
 
 ^ Wallace, Laird of Craigie, who was second in com- 
 mand, 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 iiis wounds after the action. 
 
 II Coiliis, king of the I'icts, 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 Coil's- 
 field, where his burial-place is still shown. 
 
 IT Barskimming the seat of the Lord Justice -Clerk. 
 ** Catrine, the seat of the late doctor and present 
 professor Stewart. 
 
BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 Brydone's brave ward* I well could spy, 
 Beneath old Scotia''s smiling eye ; 
 Who call'd on fame, low standing by. 
 
 To hand him on, 
 Where many a patriot name on high. 
 
 And hero shone. 
 
 DUAN SECOND. 
 
 With musing-deep, astonish'd stare, 
 I view'd the heavenly-seeming /air ; 
 A whispering throb did witness bear, 
 
 Of kindred sweet, 
 When with an elder sister's air 
 
 She did me greet. 
 
 " All hail ! my own inspired bard ! 
 In me thy native muse regard ! 
 Nor longer mourn thy fate is hard, 
 
 Thus poorly low I 
 I come to give thee such reward 
 
 As we bestow. 
 
 " Know, the great genhis of this land 
 Has many a light aerial band. 
 Who, all beneath his high command, 
 
 Harmoniously, 
 As arts or arms they understand, 
 
 Their labours ply. 
 
 " They Scotia's race among them share ; 
 Some fire the soldier on to dare ; 
 Some rouse the patriot up to bare 
 
 Corruption's heart : 
 Some teach the bard, a darling care, 
 The tuneful art. 
 
 " 'Mong swelling floods of reeking gore, 
 They, ardent, kindling spirits pour ; 
 Or, mid the venal senate's roar. 
 
 They, sightless, stand, 
 To mend the honest patriot-lore. 
 
 And grace the hand. 
 
 " And when the bard, or hoary sage. 
 Charm or instruct tlie future age. 
 They bind the wild poetic rage 
 In energy. 
 Or pomt the uiconclusive page 
 
 Full on the eye. 
 
 " Hence FuUarton, the brave and young ; 
 Hence Dempste/s zeal-inspired tongue ; 
 Hence sweet harmonious Beattie sung 
 
 His ' Minstrel lays ;' 
 Or tore, with noble ardour stung, 
 
 The sceptic's bays. 
 
 " To lower orders are assign'd 
 The humbler ranks of human-kind. 
 
 ' Colonel Fullartoii. 
 
 The rustic Bard, the lab'ring Hind 
 The Artisan ; 
 
 All chuse, as various they're inclin'd. 
 The various man. 
 
 " When yellow waves the heavy grain, 
 The threat'ning storm some strongly rein, 
 Some teach to meliorate the plain 
 
 With tillage-skill ; 
 And some instruct the shepherd-train, 
 
 Blythe o'er the hill. 
 
 " Some jiint the lover's harmless wile ; 
 Some grace the maiden's artless smile ; 
 Some soothe the lab'rer's weary toil. 
 
 For humble gains, 
 And make his cottage-scenes beguile 
 
 His cares and pains. 
 
 " Some, bounded to a district-space. 
 Explore at large man's infant race, 
 To mark the embryotic trace 
 
 Of rustic Bard ; 
 And careful note each op'ning grace, 
 
 A guide and guard. 
 
 " Of these am I — Coila my name ; 
 And this district as mine I claim. 
 Where once the Campbells, chiefs of fame. 
 
 Held ruling pow'r : 
 I mark'd thy embryo tuneful flame. 
 
 Thy natal hour. 
 
 " With future hope, I oft would gaze 
 Fond, on thy httle early ways, 
 Tliy rudely caroU'd chiming phrase, 
 
 In imcouth rh3anes, 
 Fir'd at the simple, artless lays 
 
 Of other times. 
 
 " I saw thee seek the sounding shore, 
 Delighted with the dashing roar ; 
 Or when the north his fleecy store 
 
 Drove thro' the sky, 
 I saw grim nature's visage hoar 
 
 Struck thy yoimg eye. 
 
 " Or, when the deep green-mantl'd earth 
 Warm cKerish'd ev'ry flow'ret's birth, 
 And joy and music pouring forth 
 
 In ev'ry grove, 
 I saw thee eye the gen'ral mirth 
 
 With boundless love. 
 
 " When ripen'd fields, and azure skies, 
 Call'd forth the reaper's rustling noise, 
 I saw thee leave their evening joys, 
 
 And lonely stalk. 
 To vent thy bosom's swelling rise 
 
 In pensive walk. 
 
«* When youthful love, warm-blushing, 
 strong, 
 
 Keen-shivering shot thy nerves along. 
 Those accents, grateful to thy tongue, 
 
 Th' adored J^ame, 
 I taught thee how to pour in song, 
 
 "" soothe thy flame. 
 
 BURNS' POEMS 27 
 
 ADDRESS TO THE UNCO GUID, 
 
 ipou 
 To 
 
 " I saw thy pulse's maddening play, 
 Wild send thee pleasure's devious way, 
 Misled by fancy's meteor ray. 
 
 By passion driven ; 
 But yet the light that led astray ^ 
 
 Was light from heaven. 
 
 " I taught thy manners-painting strains, 
 The loves, the ways of simple swains. 
 Till now, o'er all my wide domains 
 
 Tliy fame extends: 
 And some, the pride of Coila's plains. 
 
 Become my friends. 
 
 " Thou canst not learn, nor can I show. 
 To paint with Thomsmi's landscape-glow ; 
 Or wake the bosom-melting throe. 
 
 With Shenstone^s art • 
 Or pour, with Gray, tlie moving flow 
 
 Warm on the heart. 
 
 " Yet all beneath th' unrivall'd rose. 
 The lowly daisy sweetly blows ; 
 Tho' large the forest's monarch throws 
 
 His army shade. 
 Yet green the juicy hawthorn grows, 
 Adown the glade. 
 
 " Then never murmur nor repine ; 
 Strive in thy humble sphere to sliine : 
 And trust me, not Potosis mine, 
 
 Nor kuigs' regard. 
 Can give a bliss o'emiatcliing thine, 
 
 A rustic Bard. 
 
 " To give my counsels all in one 
 'I'hy tuneful flame still careful fan ; 
 Preserve the Dignify of Man, 
 
 With soul erect ; 
 And trust, the Universal Plan 
 
 Will all protect. 
 
 " And wear thou this''' — she solemn said, 
 And bound the Holly round my liead : 
 The polish'd leaves, and berries red. 
 
 Did rustling play ; 
 And, like a passing tliought, she fled 
 
 In light away. 
 
 RIGIDLY RIGHTEOUS. 
 
 My son, these maxims make a rule, 
 
 And lump them ay thegither ; 
 The Rigid Righteous U a fool, 
 
 The Rigid Wise anither : 
 Tiie cleanest corn that e'er was dight 
 
 May hae some pyles o' caff in ; 
 So ne'er a fellow-creature slight 
 
 For random fits o' daffin. 
 
 Solomon. — Ecclea. cli. vii. ver. 16. 
 
 O YK wha are sae guid yoursel, 
 
 Sae pious and sae holy, 
 Ye've nought to do but mark and tell 
 
 Your neebor's faults and folly ! 
 Whase life is like a weel-gaun mill, 
 
 Supply'd wi' store o' water. 
 The heapet happer's ebbing still, 
 
 And still the clap plays clatter 
 
 II. 
 
 Hear me, ye venerable core, 
 
 As counsel for poor mortals. 
 That frequent pass douce Wisdom's door 
 
 For glaikit Folly's portals ; 
 I, for their thoughtless, careless sakes, 
 
 Would here propone defences. 
 Their donsie tricks, tlieir black mistakes. 
 
 Their failings and mischances. 
 
 III. 
 
 Ye see your state wi' theirs compar'd, 
 
 And sliudder at the nifler, 
 But cast a moment's fair regard, 
 
 What maks the mighty diflfer ; 
 Discount what scant occasion gave. 
 
 That purity ye pride in. 
 And (what's aft mair than a' tlie lave) 
 
 Your better art o' liiding. 
 
 IV. 
 
 Think, when your castigated pulse 
 
 Gies now and then a wallop, 
 WJiat ragings must his veins convulse, 
 
 That still eternal gallop : 
 Wi' wind and tide fair i' ynur tail. 
 
 Right on ye scud your sea-way ; 
 But in the leeth o' baitli to sail, 
 
 It maks an unco leeway. 
 
28 
 
 BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 V. 
 
 See social life and glee sit down, 
 
 All joyous and unthinking, 
 Till, quite transmugrify'd, tliey're grown 
 
 Debaucliery and drinking : 
 O, would tliey stay to calculate 
 
 Th' eternal consequences ; 
 Or your more dreaded hell to taste, 
 
 D-mnation of expense^l 
 
 VI. 
 
 Ye high, exalted, virtuous dames, 
 
 Ty'd up in godly laces, 
 Before ye gie poor frailty names, 
 
 Suppose a change o' cases ; 
 A dear lov'd lad, convenience snug, 
 
 A treacherous inchnation — 
 But, let me whisper i' your lug, 
 
 Ye're aiblins nae temptation. 
 
 vn. 
 
 Then gently scan your brother man, 
 
 Still gentler sister woman ; 
 Tho' they may gang a kermin wrang; 
 
 To step aside is human : 
 One point must still be greatly dark, 
 
 The moving why they do it : 
 And just as lamely can ye marlc, 
 
 How far perhaps they rue it. 
 
 vm. 
 
 Who made the heart, 'tis He alone 
 
 Decidedly can try us. 
 He knows each chord— its various tone. 
 
 Each spring, its various bias : 
 Then at the balance let's be mute. 
 
 We never can adjust it ; 
 What's done we partly may compute. 
 
 But know not what's resisted. 
 
 TAM SAMSON'S* ELEGY. 
 
 An honest man's the noblest work of God. 
 Pope. 
 
 Has auld K********* seen the Deil ? 
 Or great M'*******t thrawn his heel ! 
 
 •When this worthy old sportsman went out last muir- 
 fowl season, he supposed it was to be, in Ossian's phrase, 
 " the last of his fields ;" and expressed an ardent wish 
 to die and be buried in the muirs. On this hint the 
 author composed his elegy and epitaph. 
 
 t A certain preacher, a great favourite with the mil- 
 lion, Vide tho Ordination, stanza II 
 
 Or R* * * * * * ♦ again grown wee!,* 
 
 To preach an' read. 
 
 " Na, waur than a !" cries ilka chiel, 
 
 Tarn Samson's dead ! 
 
 K* ******** lang may grvmt an' grane 
 An' sigh, an' sab, an' greet her lane. 
 An' deed her bairns, man, wife, an' wean, 
 
 In mourning weed ; 
 To death, she's dearly paid the kane, 
 
 Tam Samson's dead ! 
 
 The bretiy;en of the mystic level 
 May hing their head in woefu' bevel, 
 WMle by their nose the tears will revel. 
 
 Like ony bead ; 
 Death's gien the lodge an unco devel •• 
 
 Tam Samson's dead '. 
 
 When winter muffles up his cloak. 
 And binds the mire like a rock ; 
 When to the loughs the curlers flock, 
 
 Wi' gleesome speed, 
 Wha will they station at the cock ? 
 
 Tam Samson's dead I 
 
 He was the king o' a' the core, 
 To guard, or draw, or wick a bore. 
 Or up the rink like Jehu roar 
 
 In time of need ; 
 But now he lags on death's hog-score, 
 
 Tam Samson's dead 1 
 
 Now safe the stately sawraont sail. 
 And trouts bedropp'd wi' crimson hail, 
 And eels weel kenn'd for souple tail, 
 
 And geds for greed, 
 Since dark in death's Jish-creel we wail 
 
 Tam"Samson dead I 
 
 Rejoice, ye birring paitricks a' ; 
 Ye cootie moorcoclS, crousely craw ; . 
 Ye maukins, cock your fud fu' braw^* 
 
 Withouten dread; 
 Your mortal fae is now awa', 
 
 Tam Samson's dead! 
 
 That woefu' mom be ever moum'd, 
 Saw him m shootrn graith adom'd. 
 While pomters i^ound impatient bum'd, 
 
 Frae couples freed; 
 But, och ! he gaed and ne'er retum'dl 
 
 Tam Samson's dead! 
 
 In vain avdd age his body batters ; 
 In vain the gout his ancles fetters ; 
 
 * Another preacher, an equal favourite with the fev. 
 who was at that time ailing. For him, seealso theOr- 
 dination, stanza IX. 
 
BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 29 
 
 In vain the burns came down like waters, 
 An acre braid ! 
 
 Now ev'ry auld wife, greetin, clatters, 
 
 Tam Samson's dead ! 
 
 Owre many a weary hag he limpit, 
 An' ay the tither shot he thumpit, 
 Till coward death behind him jumpit, 
 
 Wi' deadly feide ; 
 Now lie proclaims, wi' tout o' trumpet, 
 
 Tam Samson's dead ! 
 
 When at his heart he felt the dagger. 
 He reel'd his wonted bottle-swagger, 
 Hut yet he drew the mortal trigger 
 
 Wi' weel aim'd heed; 
 '' L — d, five !" he cry'd an' owre did stagger; 
 
 Tam Samson's dead I 
 
 Ilk hoary hunter mourn'd a brither ; 
 Ilk sportsman youth bemoan'd a father; 
 \ on auld gray stane, amang the heather, 
 
 Marks out his head, 
 Whare Bums has wrote, in rhyming blether, 
 
 Tam Samson'' s dead ! 
 
 There low he lies, in lasting rest ; 
 Perhaps upon his mould'ring breast 
 Some spitefu' muirfowl bigs her nest, 
 
 To hatch an' breed ; 
 Alas I nae mair he'll them molest ! 
 
 Tam Samson's dead ! 
 
 When August winds the heather wave. 
 And sportsmen wander by yon grave, 
 I'hree volleys let his mem'ry crave 
 
 O' pouther an' lead, 
 Till Echo answer frae her cave, 
 
 Tam Samson's dead I 
 
 Heav'n rest Iiis saul, whare'er he be I 
 Is th' wish o' monie mae than me ; 
 lie had twa faults, or may be three. 
 
 Yet what remead ? 
 A" «'^'':°1, honest man want we : 
 
 Tam Samson's dead ! 
 
 THE EPITAPH. 
 
 Tam Samson's weel-wom clay here lies, 
 Ye canting zealots, spare him 1 
 
 If honest worth in heaven rise, 
 Ye '11 mend or ye win near him. 
 
 PER CONTRA. 
 
 Go, fame, an' canter like a filly 
 Thro' a' the streets an' neuks o' Killie^ 
 Tell ev'ry social, honest billie 
 
 To cease his grievin. 
 For yet, unskaith'd by death's gleg gullie, 
 Tam Sajmon''s livin. 
 
 HALLO WEEN.f 
 
 The following Poem will, by many readeri., be well 
 enough understood ; but for the sake of those who 
 are unacquainted with the mannere and traditions 
 of the country where the scene is cast, notes are ad- 
 ded, to give some account of the principal charms and 
 spells of that night, so big with prophecy to the pea- 
 santry in the west of ScoUand. The passion of pry- 
 ing into futurity makes a striking part of the history 
 of human nature in its rude state, in all ages and 
 nations; and it maybe some entertainment to a phi- 
 losophic mind, if any such should h6nour the author 
 with a perusal, to see the remains of it, among the 
 more unenlightened in our own. 
 
 Yes ! let the rich deride, the proud disdain, 
 The simple pleasures of the lowly train ; 
 To me more dear, congenial to my heart, 
 One native charm, than all the gloss of art. 
 
 Goldsmith. 
 I. 
 Upon that night, when fairies light, 
 
 On Cassilis DoivrumsX dance, 
 Or owre the lays, in splendid blaze, 
 
 On sprightly coursers prance ; 
 Or for Colean the route is ta'en, 
 
 Beneath the moon's pale beams ; 
 There, up the cove,i to stray an' rove 
 Amang the rocks and streams 
 
 To sport that night. 
 
 II. 
 
 Amang the bonnie winding banks. 
 Where Doon rins, wimpling clear. 
 
 Where Erace|| ance rul'd the martial ranks. 
 An' shook his Carrick spear, 
 
 * Killie is a phrase the country-folks sometimes tise 
 foir Kilmarnock. 
 
 t Is thought to be night when witches, devils, and 
 other mischiefmaking beings, are all abroad on their 
 baneful, midnight errands; particularly those aerial 
 people the Fairies, are said on that night, to hold a 
 grand anniversary. 
 
 t Certain little, romantic, rocky, green hills, in the 
 neighbourhood of the ancient seat of the Earls of 
 Cai-silis. 
 
 $ A noted cavern near Colean-house, called The 
 Cove of Colean ; which, as Cassilis Downans, is famed 
 in country story for being a favourite haunt of fairies. 
 
 II The famous family of that name, the ancestors of 
 Robert, the great deliverer of his country, were Earls 
 of Carr..jk. 
 
30 
 
 BURNS' POEMS 
 
 Some morry, friomlly, countra follcs, 
 
 Together did convene, 
 To burn their nits, an'/ww their stocks, 
 
 An' liaud their Ilalluivecn 
 
 Fu' blythe that night. 
 
 ni. 
 
 The lasses feat, an' cleanly neat, 
 
 Mair braw than when they're fine ; 
 Tlieir faces blythe, fu' sweetly kytlie, 
 
 Hearts leal, an' warm an' kin': 
 The la^s sae trig, wi' wooer-babs, 
 
 Wee! knotted on their garten, 
 Some unco blate, an' some wi' gabs, 
 
 Gar lasses' hearts gang startin 
 
 Whiles fast at night. 
 
 IV. 
 
 Then first and foremost, thro' the kail, 
 
 Their slacks* maun a' be sougtit ance ; 
 Tliey steek their een' an' graip an' wale, 
 
 For muclde anes an' straught anes. 
 Poor hav'rel Will Mj aff the drift, 
 
 An' wander'd thro' the bow-kail, 
 Aji' pow't for want o' better shift, 
 
 A i-U7it was like a sow-tail, 
 
 Sae bow't that night. 
 
 Then, straught or crooked, yird or nane, 
 
 They roar and cry a' throu'ther ; 
 The vera wee things, todlin, rin 
 
 Wi' stocks out-owre their shouther ; 
 An' gif the caslocs sweet or sour, 
 
 Wr joctelegs they taste them ; 
 Syne coziely, aboon the door, 
 
 Wi' caimie care they place them 
 
 To lie that nigiit. 
 
 VI. 
 
 The lasses staw frac 'mang them a' 
 To pou their stalks o' com ;t 
 
 * 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 tucker, or fortune ; and the taste of 
 the custoc, that is, the lieart 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. 
 
 t They go to the barn-yard and pull each, at three 
 several times, a stalk of oats. If the third stalk wants 
 tt\e top-pickle, that is, the grain at the top of the stalk, 
 the party in question will come to the marriage-bed 
 :uiy thing but a maid. 
 
 But Rab slips out, an' jinks about, 
 
 Behint the muckle thorn : 
 He grippet Nelly hard an' fast ; 
 
 Loud skirl'd a' the lasses ; 
 But her tap-pickle maist was lost, 
 
 When kiuttlin in the fause-house* 
 
 Wi' him that night. 
 
 vn. 
 
 The auld guidwife's weel hoordet riUsi 
 
 Are romid an' roimd divided, 
 
 An' nio*ip lads' and lasses' fates, 
 
 Are there that night decided : 
 
 Some kindle, couthie, side by side 
 
 An' burn thegither trimly ; 
 Some start awa wi' saucie pride, 
 And jump out-owre the chimlie 
 
 Fu' high that night. 
 
 vni 
 
 Jean slips in twa, wi' tentie e'e ; 
 
 Wha 'twas she wadna tell ; 
 But this is Jock, an' this is nie. 
 
 She says in to hersel : 
 He bleez'd owre her, an' she owre him, 
 
 As they wad never mair part ; 
 TiU fuff ! he started up the lum. 
 
 And Jean liad e'en a sair heart 
 
 To see't that night. 
 
 IX. 
 
 Poor Willie, wi' his boic-kail runt, 
 
 Was brunt wi' primsie Mallie ; 
 An' Mallie, nae doubt, took the drunt. 
 
 To be compar'd to Willie : 
 Mall's nit lap out wi' pridefu' fling, 
 
 An' her ain fit it burnt it ; 
 While WiUie lap, and swoor by jing, 
 
 'Twas just tlie way he wanted . 
 To be that night. 
 
 X. 
 
 Nell had the fause-house in her min,' 
 
 She pits hersel an' Rob in ; 
 In loving bleeze they sweetly join. 
 
 Till white in ase they're sobbin : 
 
 * When the corn is in a doubtful state, by being too 
 green, or wet, the stack-builder, by means of old limber, 
 &c., makes a large apartment in bis stack, with an 
 opening in the side which is fairest exposed to the 
 wind : this he calls a fause-house. 
 
 t Burning the nuts is a famous charm. They name 
 the lad and lass to each particular nut, as they lay them 
 in the fiie, and accordingly as they burn quietly to- 
 gether, or start from beside one another, the course and 
 issue of the courtship will be. 
 
BURNS POEMS. 
 
 31 
 
 Ncirs heart was dancin at the view, 
 She wliisper'd Rob to leuk for"t : 
 
 Rob, stowlins, prie'd lier bourne mou, 
 Fu' cozie in the neuk for't, 
 
 Unseen that night. 
 
 XI. 
 
 But Merran sat behint their backs, 
 
 Hor thoughts on Andrew Bell ; 
 She lea'es them gashin at tiieir cracks, 
 
 And slips out by hersel : 
 She thro' the yard tlie nearest taks, 
 
 An' to the kiln she goes then. 
 An' darklins grapit for the banks. 
 
 And in the blue-clue* throws then. 
 
 Right fear't that night. 
 
 XII. 
 
 An' ay she win't, an' a)^ she swat, 
 
 I wat she made nae jaukin ; 
 Till something held within the pat, 
 
 Cruid L — 'd ! but she was quaJtin ! 
 Bat whether 'twas the Deil liimsel. 
 
 Or whether 'twas a bauken, 
 Or whether it was Andrew Bell, 
 
 She did na wait on telkin 
 
 To spier that night. 
 
 XIII. 
 
 Wee Jenny to her Grannie says, 
 
 " Will ye go wi' me, grannie ? 
 ril eal the applet at the^lass, 
 
 \ li'at frae uncle Johnie :" 
 She fuff 't her pipe wi' sic a lunt. 
 
 In wrath she was sae vap'rin, 
 She notic't na, an azle brunt 
 
 Her braw new worset apron 
 
 Out thro' that night. 
 
 XIV. 
 
 " Ye little skelpie-liramer's face ! 
 
 How daur you try sic sportin. 
 As seek the foul Thief ony place. 
 
 For him to spae your fortune : 
 
 * Whoever would, with success, try this spell, must 
 strictly observe these directions ; Steal out, all alone, to 
 the Jciln, and, darkling, throw into the pot a clue of 
 blue yarn ; wind it in a new clue off the old one ; and, 
 towards the latter end, something will hold the thread ; 
 demand whahamts? i- e. who holds ■! an answer will 
 be returned from the kiln-pot, by naming the Chris- 
 tian and surname of your future spouse. 
 
 t 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. 
 
 Nae doubt but ye may get a sight ! 
 
 Great cause ye hae to fear it ; 
 For monie a anc has gotten a fright, 
 
 An' liv'd an' di'd deleeret 
 
 On sic a night. 
 
 XV. 
 
 " Ae hairst afore the Sherra-moor, 
 
 I mind't as weel' yestreen, 
 I was a gilpey then, I'm sure 
 
 I was na past fyfteen : 
 The simmer had been cauld an' wat. 
 
 An' stutf was unco green ; 
 An' ay a rantin kirn we gat. 
 
 An' just on Halloween 
 
 It fell that night. 
 
 XVI. 
 
 " Our stibble-rig was Rab M'Graen, 
 
 A clever, sturdy fallow ; 
 He's sin gat Eppie Sim wi' wean. 
 
 That liv'd in Achmacalla : 
 He gat hemp-seed^* I mind it weel. 
 
 An' he made imco light o't ; 
 But monie a day was by himself 
 
 He was sae sairly frighted 
 
 That vera night." 
 
 XVII. 
 
 Then up gat fechtin Jamie Fleck, 
 
 An' he swoor by his conscience. 
 That he could saio hemp-seed a peck ; 
 
 For it was a' but nonsense ; 
 The auld guidman raught down the pock, 
 
 An' out a handful' gied him ; 
 Syne bad him slip fra 'mang the folk 
 
 Sometimes when nae ane see'd him : 
 An' try't that night. 
 
 XVIII. 
 
 He marches thro' amang the stacks, 
 Tho' he was something sturtin ; 
 
 The graip he for a harrow taks. 
 An' haurls at his curpin : 
 
 * Steal out unperceived, and sow a handful of hemp 
 seed ; harrowing it with any thing you can conveni- 
 ently 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 ynur 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 suy, 
 "come after me, and harrow thee." 
 
BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 An' ev'ry now an' then, he says, 
 
 " Hemp-seed I saw thee, 
 An' her that is to be my lass, 
 
 Come after me, and draw thee, 
 
 As fast this night," 
 
 XIX. 
 
 He whistl'd up Lord Lenox' march, 
 
 To keep his courage cheerie ; 
 Altho' his hair began to arch. 
 
 He was see fley'd an' eerie : 
 Till presently he hears a squeak. 
 
 An' then a grane an' gruntle ; 
 He by his shouther gae a keek. 
 
 An' tumbl'd wi' a wintle 
 
 Out-owre that night. 
 
 XX. 
 
 He roar'd a horrid murder-shout, 
 
 In dreadfu' desperation I 
 An' young an' auld came rinnin out. 
 
 To hear the sad narration : 
 He swoor 'twas hilchin Jean M'Crav 
 
 Or croucliie Merran Humphie, 
 Till stop ! she trotted thro' them a' ; 
 
 An' wha was it but Grumphie 
 
 Asteer that night I 
 
 XXL 
 
 Meg fain wad to the barn gaen 
 
 To win three wechts o' naething ;* 
 But for to meet the deil her lane, 
 
 She pat but little faith in : 
 She gies the herd a pickle nits, 
 
 An' twa red clieekit apples. 
 To watch, while for tiie barn she sets, 
 
 In hopes to see Tam Kipples 
 
 That vera niglit. 
 
 xxn. 
 
 She turns the key wi' cannie thraw. 
 An' owre the threshold ventures ; 
 
 But first on Sawnie gies a ca' 
 Syne bauldly in she enters ; 
 
 * This charm must likewise be performed unpercei ved, 
 and alone. You go to the barn, and open both doors, 
 taking them off the hinges, if possible ; for there is 
 danger ihat the being; about to appear, may shut the 
 doors, and do you some mischief. Then take that in- 
 strument 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. Re- 
 peat 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 
 
 A ration rattled up the wa', 
 
 An' she cry'd L — d preserve her 
 
 An' ran thro' midden-hole an' a', 
 An' pray'd wi' zeal an' fervour, 
 
 Fu' fast that night 
 
 xxni. 
 
 They hoy't out Will, wi' sair advice : 
 
 They hecht him some fine braw ane ; 
 It chanc'd the stack hefaddoni'd thrice,* 
 
 Was timmer propt for thrawin : 
 He taks a swirlie, auld moss-oak, 
 
 For some black, grousome carlin ; 
 An' loot a winze, an, drew a stroke, 
 
 Till skin in blypes came haurlin 
 
 Aff's nieves that night. 
 
 XXIV. 
 
 A wanton widow Leezie was, 
 
 As canty as a kittlen ; 
 But Och ! that night, amang the shaws, 
 
 She got a fcarfu' settlm ! 
 She thro' the whins, an' by the cairn. 
 
 An' owre the hiU gaed scrievin, 
 Whare three lairds^ lands met at a bumf 
 
 To dip her left sark-sleeve in. 
 
 Was bent that night 
 
 XXV. • 
 
 Whyles owre a linn the bumie playS, 
 
 As tlu-o' the glen it wimpl't ; 
 Whyles round a rocky scar it strays; 
 
 Wliyles in a wiel it dimpl't ; 
 Whyles glitter 'd to the nightly, rays, 
 
 Wi' bickering, dancing dazzle ; 
 Whyles cookit underneath the braes, 
 
 Below the spreading hazel. 
 
 Unseen that night 
 
 XXVL 
 
 Amang the brachens, on the brae. 
 Between her an' the moon. 
 
 The deil, or else an outler quey. 
 Gat up an' gae a croon : 
 
 * Take an opportunity of going, unnoticed, to a Bear 
 stack, and fathom it three times round. The last fa- 
 thom of the last time, you will catch in your arms the 
 appearance of your future conjugal yoke-fellow. 
 
 t You go out, one or more, for this is a social spell, to 
 a south running spring or rivulet, where " three lairda' 
 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 sometime near midnight, an ap- 
 parition, 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 
 
BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 33 
 
 Poor Leezie's heart maist lap the hool ; 
 
 Neer lav'rock height she jumpit, 
 But mist a fit, an' in the pool 
 
 Out-owre the lugs she plumpit, 
 
 Wi' a plunge that night. 
 
 xxvn. 
 
 In order, on the clean hearth-stane, 
 
 The luggies three* are ranged, 
 .4nd ev'ry time great care is ta'en, 
 
 To see them duly changed : 
 Auid uncle John, wha wedloclf s joys 
 
 Sin J)far'5 3/m/- did desire, 
 Because he gat the toom-dish tlirice, 
 
 He heav'd tliem on the fire 
 
 In wrath that night. 
 
 xxvin. 
 
 Wi' merry sangs, an' friendly cracks, 
 
 I wat they diuna weary ; 
 An' luico tales, an' funnie jokes, 
 
 Their sports were cheap an' cheery, 
 Till butler d sohis^\ wi' fragrant lunt, 
 
 Set a' their gabs a-steerin ; 
 Syne, wi' a social glass o'strunt, 
 
 They parted afFcareerin 
 
 Fu' blythe that night. 
 
 THE AULD FARMER'S 
 
 NEW-YEAR MORNING SALUTATION 
 
 TO 
 
 HIS AULD MARE MAGGIE, 
 
 On giving her the accustomed Ripp of Corn to haasel 
 in tlie New- Year. 
 
 A GuiD Kew-ycar I wish thee, Maggie ! 
 Hae, there's a ripp to thy auld baggie : 
 Tho' thou's howe-backit, now, an' knaggie, 
 
 I've seen the day. 
 Thou could hae gaen like ony staggie 
 
 Out-owre the lay. 
 
 *Take three dishes ; put clean water In one, foul 
 water in another, leave the third empty : blindfold a 
 person, and lead him to tiie 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, vvithjequal cer- 
 tainty, no marriage at all. It is repeated three times, 
 and every time the arrangement of the dishes is altered. 
 
 tSowens, vriih butter instead of milk to them'jite al- 
 W^ the Halloween Supper. 
 
 D 
 
 Tho' now thou's dowie, stiff, an' crazy, 
 An' thy auld liide's as white's a daisy, 
 I've seen thee dappl't, sleek, and glaizie, 
 
 A bonnie gray : 
 He should been tight that daiu^'t to raise thee, 
 
 Ance in a day. 
 
 Thou ance was i' the foremost rank, 
 A Jilly buirdly, steeve, an' swank, 
 An' set weel down a shapely shank, 
 
 As e'er tread yird ; 
 An' could hae flown out-owre a stank. 
 
 Like ony bird. 
 
 It's now some nine an' twenty year. 
 Sin' thou was my good father's meere ; 
 He gied me thee, o' tocher clear. 
 
 An' fifty mark ; 
 Tho' it was sma', 'twas weel-won gear. 
 
 An' thou was stark. 
 
 When first I gaed to woo my Jenny^ 
 Ye then was trottin wi' your minnie : 
 Tho' ye was trickle, slee, an' funnie. 
 
 Ye ne'er was donsie ; 
 But hamely, tawie, quiet, an' cannie. 
 
 An' unco sonsie. 
 
 That day, ye pranc'd wi' muckle pride, 
 When ye bure hame my bonnie bride ; 
 An' sweet, an' grace! ii' she did ride, 
 
 Wi' maiden air ! 
 Kyle Stewart I could bragged wide, 
 
 For sic a pair. 
 
 Tho' now ye dow but hoyte an' hobble 
 An' wintle like a saumont-coble, 
 That day ye was a jinkcr noble, 
 
 For heels an' win' ! 
 An' ran them till they a' did wauble. 
 
 Far, far behin'. 
 
 When thou an' I were young an' skeigh, 
 An' stable-meals at fairs were dreigh, 
 How thou wad prance, an' snore, an' skreigh. 
 
 An' tak the road ! 
 Town's bodies ran, and stood abeigh. 
 
 An' ca't thee mad. 
 
 When thou was com't, an' I was mellow, 
 We took the road ay like a swallow : 
 At Brooses thou had ne'er a fellow. 
 
 For pith an' speed ; 
 But ev'ry tail thou pay't them hollow, 
 
 Where'er tliou gafid. 
 
 The sma', droop-rumpl't, hunter cattle, 
 Might aiblins waiu't thee for a brattle ; 
 
84 
 
 BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 Bui sax Scotch miles thou try't their mettle, 
 An' garH them whaizlc : 
 
 Nae whip nor spur, but just a wattle 
 
 O' saugh or hazel 
 
 Thou was a noble^/<ie-/an'. 
 As e'er in tug or tow was drawn ! 
 Aft thue an' I, in aught hours gaun. 
 
 On guid Marcli weather 
 Hae turn'd sax rood beside our han'. 
 
 For days thegither. 
 
 Thou never bramdg't, an' fetch't, an' fliskit. 
 But thy auld tail thou wad hae whiskit. 
 An' spread abreed thy weel-fill'd brisket, 
 
 Wi' pith, an' pow'r, 
 Till spritty knowes wad rair't and risket. 
 
 An' slypet owre. 
 
 When frosts lay lang, an' snaws were deep, 
 An' threaten'd labour back to keep, 
 I gied thy cog a wee-bit heap 
 
 Aboon the timmer ; 
 I kenn'd my Maggie wad na sleep 
 
 For that, or simmer. 
 
 In cart or car thou never reestit ; 
 The steyest brae thou wad hae fac't it : 
 Thou never lap, and sten't, and breastit, 
 
 Then stood to blaw ; 
 But just thy step a wee thing hastit. 
 
 Thou snoov't awa. 
 
 My pleugk is now thy bairn-time a' : 
 Four gallant brutes as e'er did draw : 
 Forbye sax raae, I've sell't awa. 
 
 That thou hast nurst ; 
 They drew me thretteen pund an' twa. 
 
 The vera warst. 
 
 Monie a sair daurk we twa hae wrought, 
 An' wi' the weary warl' fought ! 
 An' monie an anxious day, I thought 
 
 We wad be beat ! 
 Yet here to crazy age we're brought, 
 
 Wi' something yet. 
 
 And think na, my auld trusty servan', 
 That now perhaps thou's less deservin. 
 An' thy auld days may end in starvin. 
 
 For my last/ow, 
 A heapit sHmpart, I'll reserve ane 
 
 Laid by for you. 
 
 We've worn to crazy years thegither -, 
 We'll toyte about wi' ane anither ; 
 Wi' tentie care, I'll flit thy tether, 
 
 To some hain'd rig. 
 Where ye may nobly rax your leather, 
 
 Wi' sma' fatigue. 
 
 TO A MOUSE, 
 
 ON TURNING HER UP IN HER NEST WITH 
 THE PLOUGH, NOVEMBER 1785. 
 
 Wee, sleekit, cow'rin, tim'rous beastie, 
 O, what a panic's in thy breastie ! 
 Thou need na start awa sae hasty, 
 
 Wi' bickering brattle ! 
 I wad be laith to rin an' chase thee, 
 
 Wi' murdering pattle I 
 
 I'm truly sorry man's dominion 
 Has broken Nature's social union. 
 An' justifies that ill opinion, 
 
 Which maks thee startle 
 At me, thy poor earth-born companion. 
 
 An'' fellow mortal! 
 
 I doubt na, whyles, but thou may thieve ; 
 What then ? poor beastie, thou maun live ! 
 A daimen-icker in a thrave 
 
 'S a sma' request : 
 I'll get a blessin wi' the lave, 
 
 And never miss't ! 
 
 Thy wee bit housie, too, in ruin ! 
 Its silly wa's the win's are strewin ! 
 An' naething-, now, to big a new ane, 
 
 O' foggage green ! 
 An' bleak December's winds ensuin, 
 
 Baith snell and keen ! 
 
 Thou saw the fields laid bare an' waste, 
 An' weary winter comin fast, 
 An' cozie here, beneath the blast. 
 
 Thou thought to dweF 
 Till crash ! the cruel coulter past 
 
 Out thro' thy cell. 
 
 That wee bit heap o' leaves an' stibble. 
 Has cost thee monie a weary nibble ! 
 Now thou's turn'd out, for a' thy trouble, 
 
 But house or hald,^ — ' 
 To thole the winter's sleety dribble. 
 
 An' cranreuch cauld ! 
 
 But, Mousie,.thou art no thy lane, 
 In provmg foresight may be vain : 
 The best laid schemes o' mice an' men, 
 
 Gang aft a-gley, 
 An' lea'e us nought but grief an pain. 
 
 For promis'd joy. 
 
 Still thou art blest, compar'd wi' me ! 
 The present only toucheth thee : 
 But, Och ! I backward cast my e'e. 
 
 On prospects drear 
 An' forward, tho' I canna see, 
 
 I guess nxCfear. 
 
BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 35 
 
 A WINTER NIGHT. 
 
 Poor naked wretches, wheresoe'er you are, 
 That bide the pelting of this pityless storm ! 
 How shall your houseless heads, and unfed sides, 
 Yourloop'd and window'd raggedness, defend you 
 
 From seasons such as these 1 
 
 Shakspeare. 
 
 When biting Boreas, fell and dourc, 
 
 Sharp shivers thro' the leafless bowV; 
 
 When Phmbus gies a short-livM glow'r 
 
 Far south tlie lift, 
 
 Diin-dark'ning thro' the flaky showV, 
 
 Or wliirlino' drift : 
 
 Ae niglit the storm the steeples rock'd, 
 Poor labour sweet in sleep was lock'd, 
 While burns, wi' snawy wreeths up-chock'd, 
 
 Wild-eddying swirl, 
 Or thro' the mining outlet bock'd, 
 
 Down headlong hurl. 
 
 List'ning, the doors an' winnocks rattle, 
 I thought me on the ourie cattle, 
 Or silly sheep, wha bide this brattle, 
 
 O' winter war, 
 And tlu'o' the drift, deep-lairing sprattle. 
 
 Beneath a scar. 
 
 Ilk happing bird, wee, helpless thing, 
 That, in the merry months o' spring. 
 Delighted me to hear thee sing. 
 
 What comes o' thee ? 
 Wliare wilt thou cow'r thy cluttering wing, 
 An' close thy e'e ? 
 
 Ev'n you on murd'ring errands toil'd, 
 Lone from your savage homes exil'd, 
 The blood-stam'd roost, and sheep-cote spoil'd. 
 
 My heart forgets. 
 While pityless the tempest wild 
 
 Sore on you beats. 
 
 Now PhoRbe, in her midnight reign 
 Dark muffl'd, view'd the dreary plain , 
 Still crowding thoughts, a pensive tram, 
 
 Rose in my soul. 
 When on ray ear this plaintive .strain, 
 
 Slow, soleimi, stole — 
 
 " Blow, blow, 5'e winds, with heavier gust . 
 And freeze, thou bitter-biting frost I 
 Descend, ye chilly, smothering snows ! 
 Not all your rage, as now united, shows 
 
 More hard unkindness, unrelenting, 
 Vengeful malice, unrepenting, 
 Than heav'n illumin'd man on brother man be- 
 stows '. 
 See stern oppression's iron grip. 
 Or mad ambition's gory hand. 
 Sending, like blood-hounds from the slip, 
 
 Wo, want, and murder o'er a land ! 
 Ev'n in the peaceful rural vale. 
 Truth, weeping, tells the mournful tale, 
 How pamper'd luxury, flatt'ry by her side. 
 The parasite empoisonmg her ear. 
 With all the servile wretches in the rear, 
 Looks o'er proud property, extended wide ; 
 And eyes the simple rustic hind. 
 
 Whose toil upholds the ghttring show, 
 A creature of another kind. 
 Some coarser substance, unrefin'd. 
 Plac'd for her lordly use thus far, thus vile, bo- 
 low; 
 Where, where is love's fond, tender throe. 
 With lordly honour's lofty brow, 
 The pow'rs you proudly own? 
 Is there, beneath love's noble name. 
 Can harbour, dark, the selfish aim. 
 
 To bless himself alone ! 
 Mark maiden-innocence a prey 
 
 To love-pretending snares, 
 This boasted honour turns away 
 Shunning soft pity's rising sway, 
 Regardless of the tears, and unavailing pray'rs ! 
 Perhaps, this hour, in mis'ry's squalid nest. 
 She strains your infant to her joyless breast. 
 And with a mother's fears shrinks at the rock- 
 ing blast ! 
 
 Oh ye ! who sunk in beds of down. 
 Feel not a want but what yourselves create. 
 Think, for a moment, on his wretched fate. 
 Whom friends and fortune quite disown ! 
 
 Ill-satisfy 'd keen nature's clam'rous call, 
 Stretch'd on his straw he lays himself to 
 sleep. 
 
 While thro' the ragged roof and chinky wall, 
 Chdl o'er his slumbers piles the drifty heap ! 
 Think on the dungeon's grim confine, 
 Where guilt and poor misfortune pine '. 
 Guilt, erring man, relenting view ' 
 But shall thy lega rage pursue 
 The wretch, already crushed low 
 By cruel fortime's miderserved blow ? 
 
 Affliction's sons are brothers m distress, _ 
 
 A brother to relieve, how exquisite the bliss I 
 
 I heard nae mair, for Chanticleer 
 Shook off" tlie pouthery snaw, 
 
 And hail'd the morning with a cheer, 
 A cottage-rousing craw. 
 
 But deep this truth impress'd my mind- 
 
 Tlu-o' all his works abroad. 
 The heart, benevolent and kind, 
 
 The most resembles God. 
 
36 
 
 BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 EPISTLE TO DAVIE, 
 
 A BROTHEE POET.* 
 
 January- 
 
 While winds frae affBen Lomond blaw, 
 And bar the doors wi' driving snaw, 
 
 And hing us owre the ingle, 
 I set me down to pass the time, 
 And spin a verse or twa o' rliyme, 
 
 In hamely westlin jingle. 
 While frosty winds blaw in the drifl, 
 
 Ben to the chimla lug, 
 I grudge a wee the great folks' gift, 
 That live sae bien an' snug : 
 I tent less, and want less 
 Their roomy fire-side ; 
 But hanker and canker, 
 To see their cursed pride. 
 
 n. 
 
 It's hardly in a body's pow'r, 
 
 To keep, at times, frae being sour, 
 
 To see how things are shar'd ; 
 How best o' chiels are whiles in want, 
 Wliile coofs on countless thousands rant, 
 
 And ken na how to wair't : 
 But, Davie, lad, ne'er fash your head 
 
 Tho' we hae little gear. 
 We're fit to win our daily bread. 
 As lang's we're hale and fier : 
 " Mair spier na', nor fear na,"t 
 
 Auld age ne'er mind a feg, 
 The last o't, the warst o't, 
 Is only for to beg. 
 
 ni. 
 
 To lie in kilns and barns at e'en. 
 When banes are craz'd and bluid is thin. 
 
 Is, doubtless, great distress ! 
 Yet then content could make us blest ; 
 Ev'n then, sometimes we'd snatch a taste 
 
 Of truest happiness. 
 The honest heart that's free frae a' 
 
 Intended fraud or guile. 
 However fortune kick the ba'. 
 Has ay some cause to smile, 
 And mind still, you'll find still, 
 
 A comfort this nae sma' ; 
 Nae mair then, we'll care then, 
 Nae farther can we fa'. 
 
 *David Sillar, one of the club at Tarbolton, and 
 
 author of a volume of Poems in the Scottish dialect. E 
 
 t Ramsay. 
 
 IV. 
 
 What tho', like commoners of air, 
 We wander out, we know not where, 
 
 But either house or hall ? 
 Yet nature's charms, the hills and woods, 
 The sweeping vales, and foaming floods, 
 
 Are free ahke to all. 
 In days when daisies deck the ground, 
 
 And blackbirds whistle clear. 
 With honest joy our hearts will bound, 
 To see the coming year : 
 
 On braes when we please, then, 
 
 We'll sit an' sowth a tune ; 
 Syne rhyme till't, we'll time till't. 
 And sing 't when we hae done. 
 
 V. 
 
 It's no in titles nor in rank ; 
 
 It's no in wealth like Lon'on bank. 
 
 To purchase peace and rest ; 
 It's no in makin muckle mair : 
 It's no in books ; it's no in lear, 
 
 To make us truly blest : 
 If happiness hae not her seat 
 
 And centre in the breast. 
 We may be wise, or rich, or great, 
 But never can be blest ; 
 
 Nae treasures, nor pleasures. 
 
 Could make us happy lang ; 
 The Mart ay's the part ay, 
 That makes us right or wrang. 
 
 VI. 
 
 Think ye, that sic as you and I, 
 
 Wha drudge and drive thro' wet and dry, 
 
 Wi' never-ceasing toil ; 
 Thmk ye, are we less blest than they 
 Wha scarcely tent us in their way, 
 
 As hardly worth their while ? 
 
 Alas ! how aft in haughty mood, 
 
 God's creatures they oppress ! 
 
 Or else, neglecting a' that's guid, 
 
 They riot in excess I 
 
 Baith careless, and fearless 
 Of either heav'n or hell ' 
 Esteeming, and deeming 
 It's a' an idle tale 1 
 
 VII. 
 
 Then let us cheerfu' acquiesce ; 
 Nor make our scanty pleasures less, 
 
 By pining at our state ; 
 And, even should misfortunes come, 
 I, here wha sit, hae met wi' some, 
 
 An's thankfu' for them yet. 
 They gie the wit of age to youth ; 
 
 They let us ken oursel : 
 They make us see the naked truth, 
 
 The real guid and ill. 
 
BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 37 
 
 Tho' losses, and crosses, 
 
 Be lessons right severe, 
 There's wit there, ye'll get there, 
 
 Ye'll find nae other where. 
 
 vm. 
 
 But tent me Davie, ace o' hearts ! 
 
 (To say aught less wad wrang the cartes, 
 
 And flattVy I detest) 
 This life has joys for you and I ; 
 And joys that riches ne'er could buy ; 
 
 And joys the very best. 
 There's a' the pleasures o' the heart. 
 
 The lover an' the frien' ; 
 Ye hae your Meg, your dearest part, 
 And I my darling Jean ! 
 It warms me, it charms me, 
 
 To mention but her name : 
 It heats me, it beets me, 
 Ajid sets me a' on fiame ! 
 
 IX. 
 
 O' all ye pow'rs who rule above ! 
 O Thou, whose very self art love I 
 
 Thou know'st my words sincere ! 
 The life-blood streaming thro' my heart, 
 Or my more dear, immortal part. 
 
 Is not more fondly dear ! 
 When heart-corroding care aiid grief 
 
 Deprive my soul of rest. 
 Her dear idea brings relief 
 And solace to my breast. 
 Thou Being, All-seeing, 
 
 O hear my fervent pray'r ; 
 Still take her, and make her 
 Thy most peculiar care I 
 
 All hail, ye tender feelings dear ! 
 The smile of love, the friendly tear. 
 
 The sympathetic glow ; 
 Long since, this world's thorny ways 
 Had number'd out my weary days. 
 
 Had it not been for you ! 
 Fate still has bless'd me with a friend, 
 
 In every care and ill ; 
 And oft a more endearing band, 
 A tie more tender still. 
 It lightens, it brightens 
 The tenebrific scene. 
 To meet with, and greet with 
 My Davie or my Jean. 
 
 XI. 
 
 O, how that name inspires my style ! 
 The words come skelpin rank and file, 
 
 Amaist before I ken ! 
 The ready measure rins as fine. 
 As PhoBbus and the famous Nme 
 
 Were glowrin owre my pen. 
 
 My spaviet Pegasus will hmp, 
 
 Till ance he's fairly het ; 
 And then he'll hilch, and stilt, and jimp, 
 An' rin an mico fit : 
 
 But least then, tho beast then. 
 
 Should rue this hasty ride, 
 
 I'll light now, and dight now 
 
 His sweaty wizen'd hide. 
 
 THE LAMENT, 
 
 OCCASIONED BY THE UNFORTUNATE ISSUE 
 OF A FRIEND'S AMOUR. 
 
 Alas ! how oft does Goodness wound itself. 
 And sweet Affection prove the spring of wo ! 
 Home. 
 
 O THOU pale orb, that silent shines, 
 
 Wliile care-untroubled mortals sleep ! 
 Thou seest a wretch that inly pines, 
 
 And wanders hero to wail and weep ! 
 With wo I nightly vigils keep, 
 
 Beneath thy wan unwarming beam ; 
 And mourn, in lamentation deep, 
 
 How life and love are all a dream. 
 
 II. 
 
 I joyless view thy rays adorn 
 
 The faintly-marked distant liill : 
 I joyless view thy trembling horn. 
 
 Reflected in the gurgling rill : 
 My fondly-fluttering heart, be still ! 
 
 Thou busy pow'r. Remembrance cease ! 
 Ah ! must the agonizing thrill 
 
 For ever bar retummg peace ! 
 
 m. 
 
 No idly-feign'd poetic pains. 
 
 My sad, love-lorn lamentings claim'. 
 No shepherd's pipe — Arcadian strains ; 
 
 No fabled tortures, quaint and tame : 
 The phghted faith ; the mutual flame ; 
 
 The oft attested pow'rs above : 
 The promis-d Father's lender name : 
 
 These were tlae pledges of my love ! 
 
 IV. 
 
 Encircled in her claspmg arms. 
 
 How have the raptur'd moments flown 
 
 How have I wish'd for fortune's charms, 
 For her dear sake, and hers alone • 
 
BURNS' POEMS 
 
 Ana must I think it ! is she gone, 
 My secret heart's exulting boast ? 
 
 And does she heedless hear my groan ? 
 And is she ever, ever lost ? 
 
 Oh I can she bear so base a heart. 
 
 So lost to honour, lost to truth, 
 As from the fondest lover part. 
 
 The plighted husband of her youth ! 
 Alas ! hfe's path may be imsmooth 
 
 Her way lie thro' rough distress ! 
 Then who her pangs and pains will soothe, 
 
 Her sorrows share and make them less ? 
 
 VI. 
 
 Ye winged hours that o'er us past, 
 
 Enraptur'd more, the more enjoy'd, 
 Your dear remembrance in my breast, 
 
 My fondly-treasur'd thoughts employ'd. 
 That breast how dreary now, and void, 
 
 For her too scanty once of room I 
 Ev'n ev'ry ray of hope destroy'd. 
 
 And not a wish to gild the gloom ! 
 
 VII. 
 
 Tlie mom that warns tli' approaching day, 
 
 Awakes me up to toil and wo : ^ 
 I see the hours in long array, 
 
 That I must suffer, lingering, slow. 
 Full many a pang, and many a throe, 
 
 Keen recollection's direful train. 
 Must ^vring my soul, ere Phoebus, low, 
 
 Shall kiss the distant, western main. 
 
 vm. 
 
 And when my nightly couch I try, 
 
 Sore-harass'd out with care and grief. 
 My toil-beat nerves, and tear-worn eye, 
 
 Keep watchings with the nightly thief : 
 Or if I slumber, fancy, cliief. 
 
 Reigns haggard-wild, in sore affright : 
 Ev'n day, all-bitter, brings reUef, 
 
 From such a horror-breatliing night. 
 
 IX. 
 
 O ! thou bright queen who o'er th' expanse, 
 
 Now liighest reign'st, with boundless sway ! 
 Oft has thy silent-marking glance 
 
 Observ'd us, fondly-wand'ring, stray ! 
 The time, unlieeded, sped away, 
 
 Wliile love's luxurious pulse beat high, 
 Beneatli thy sUver-gleaming ray, 
 
 To mark the mutual kindling eye. 
 
 X. 
 
 Oh ! scenes in strong remembrance set ! 
 
 Scenes, never, never, to return I 
 Scenes, if in stupor I forget, 
 
 Again I feel, again I bum ! 
 From ev'ry joy and pleasure torn, 
 
 Life's weary vale I'll wander thro'' 
 And hopeless, comfortless, I'll mourn 
 
 A faithless woman's broken vow. 
 
 DESPONDENCY, 
 
 AN ODE. 
 
 Oppress'd with grief, oppress'd with care 
 A burden more than I can bear- 
 
 I sit me down and sigh : 
 O life ! thou art a galUng load. 
 Along a rough, a weary road. 
 
 To ^Tetches such as I ! 
 Dim backward as I cast my \aew. 
 What sick'ning scene^ appear ! 
 What sorrows yel may pierce me thro', 
 Too justly I niay fear ! 
 Still caring, despaning. 
 
 Must be my bitter doom ; 
 
 M3- woes Iiere shall close ne'er. 
 
 But with tlie closing- tomb 1 
 
 II. 
 
 Happy, y^ sons of busy life. 
 Who equal, to the bustling strife. 
 
 No other view regard ! 
 Ev'n when the wished end 's deny'd. 
 Yet while the busy means are ply'd. 
 
 They bring their own reward": 
 Whilst 1, a hope-abandon'd wight. 
 
 Unfitted with an nlm. 
 Meet ev'ry sad returning night. 
 And joyless morn the same ; 
 You, bustling, and justling. 
 
 Forget each grief and pain ; 
 I, hstless, yet restless. 
 Find every prospect vaiu. 
 
 III. 
 
 How blest the Solitary's lot, 
 ^Vho, all-forgetting all-forgot, 
 
 Withm his humble cell. 
 The cavern wild with tangling roots, 
 Sits o'er his ncwly-gather'd fruits. 
 
 Beside his crystal well ! 
 Or, haply, to his ev'ning thought. 
 
 By unfrequented stream, 
 
 « 
 
BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 39 
 
 The ways of men are distant brought, I 
 
 A faint collected dream : ' 
 
 While praising, and raising 
 
 His thoughts to heav'n on high, 
 As wand'ring, meand'iing, 
 He views the eolemn sky. 
 
 n. 
 
 IV. 
 
 Than I, no lonely hermit plac'd 
 Where never human footstep trac'd, 
 
 Less fit to play the part ; 
 The lucky moment to improve, 
 And just to stop, and just to move, 
 
 With self-respecting art : 
 But all 1 those pleasures, loves, and joys 
 
 Wliich I too keenly taste, 
 The Solitary can despise. 
 Can want, and yet be blest ! 
 He needs not, he heeds not, 
 
 Or human love or hate. 
 Whilst I here must cry here. 
 At perfidy ingrate ! 
 
 V. 
 
 Oh ! enviable, early days. 
 
 When dancuig thoughtless pleasure's maze, 
 
 To care, to guilt unknown ! 
 How ill exchang'd for riper times. 
 To feel the follies, or the crimes, 
 
 Of others, or my own ! 
 Ye tiny elves that guiltless sport, 
 
 Like linnets in the bush, 
 Ye little know the ills ye court. 
 When manhood is your wish ! 
 The losses, the crosses. 
 
 That active man engage ! 
 The fears all, the tears all. 
 Of dim-declining age 
 
 WINTER. 
 
 A DIRGE. 
 
 I. 
 
 The wintry west extends his blast. 
 
 And hail and rain does blaw ; 
 Or, the stormy north sends driving forth 
 
 The blinding sleet and snaw : 
 Wliile tumbling brown, the burn comes 
 down. 
 
 And roars frac bank to brae ; 
 And bird and beast in covert rest 
 
 And pass the heartless day. 
 
 " The sweeping blast, the sky o'ercast,"* 
 
 The joyless winter-day. 
 Let others fear, to me more dear 
 
 Than all the pride of May : 
 The tempest's howl, it soothes my soul, 
 
 My griefs it seems to join. 
 The leafless trees my fancy please. 
 
 Their fate resembles mine 
 
 m. 
 
 Thou Poxv'r Supreme, whose mighty scheme 
 
 These woes of mine fulfil. 
 Here, firm, I rest, they viust be best. 
 
 Because they are Thy Will ! 
 Then all I want (O, do thou grant 
 
 This one request of mine !) 
 
 Since to enjoy thou dost deny 
 
 me to resign. 
 
 THE 
 
 COTTER'S SATURDAY NIGHT 
 
 INSCRIBED TO R. A****, ESa- 
 
 Let not ambition mock their useful toil, 
 Tlieir homely joys, and destiny obscure ; 
 
 Nor grandeur hear, with a disdainful smile, 
 The short but simple annals of the poor. 
 
 Gray. 
 
 .^Y 
 
 lov'd, my honour'd, much respected 
 friend ! 
 JVo mercenary bard his homage pays ; 
 With honest pride I scorn each selfish end ; 
 My dearest meed, a friend's esteem and 
 praise : 
 To you I sing, in simple Scottish lays, 
 
 The lowly train in life's sequester'd scene ; 
 
 The native feelings strong, the guileless 
 
 wavs : 
 
 What A"**** in a cottage would have been; 
 
 Ah ! tho' his worth unknown, far happier there, 
 
 I ween. 
 
 n. 
 
 November chill blaws loud wi' angry sugh ; 
 
 The short'ning winter-day is near a close ; 
 The miry beasts retreating frae the pleugh , 
 
 The black'ning trains o' craws to their re- 
 pose: 
 
 Dr. Young. 
 
40 
 
 BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 The toil-worn Cotter frae his labour goes, 
 This night his weeldy moU is at an end, 
 Collects liis spades, his mattocks, and his 
 hoes, 
 Hoping the morn in ease and rest to spend, 
 And weary, o'er the moor, his course does 
 hameward bend. 
 
 m. 
 
 At length his lonely cot appears in view, 
 
 Beneath the shelter of an aged tree ; 
 Th' expectant wee-things^ toddlin, stacher 
 thro' 
 To meet tlieir Dad, wi' flichterin noise an' 
 glee. 
 His wee bit ingle, blinkin bonnily, 
 
 His clean hearth-stane, his thriftie wifie's 
 smile. 
 The lisping infant prattling on his knee. 
 Does a' his weary, carking cares beguile, 
 An' makes him quite forget his labour an' IiLj 
 toil. 
 
 IV. 
 
 Belyve the elder bairns come drapping in, 
 
 At service out, amang the farmers roun'; 
 Some ca' the pleugh, some herd, some tentie 
 rin 
 A cannie errend to a neebor town : 
 . Their eldest hope, their Jenny^ woman 
 grown, 
 In youthfu' bloom, love sparkling in her 
 e'e, 
 Comes hame, perhaps, to show a braw new 
 gown. 
 Or deposit her sair-won penny-fee, 
 To help her parents dear, if they in hardship be. 
 
 V. 
 
 Wi' joy unfeign'd brothers and sisters meet, 
 
 An' each for other's weelfare kindly spiers : 
 
 The social hours, swift-wing'd unnotic'd 
 
 fleet ; 
 
 Each tells the uncos that he sees or hears ; 
 
 The parents, partial, eye their hopeful years ; 
 
 Anticipation forward points the view. 
 The mother, wi' her needle an' her sheers, 
 Gars auld claes look amaist as weel's the 
 new; 
 The father mixes a' wi' admonition due. 
 
 vn. 
 
 Their master's an' their mistress's commano. 
 The younkers a' are warned to obey ; 
 
 " An' mind their labours wi' and cydent hand. 
 An' ne'er, tho' out o' sight, to jauk or play ; 
 
 An' O I be sure to fear the Lord alway! 
 
 An' mind your duly, duly, mom an' night ! 
 Lest in temptation's path ye gang astray, 
 Implore his counsel and assisting might : 
 They never sought in vain that sought the 
 Lord aright 1" 
 
 vn 
 
 But hark ! a rap comes gently to the door ; 
 
 Jenny, wha kens the meaning o' the same, 
 Tells how a neebor lad cam o'er the moor. 
 
 To do some errands, and convoy iier hame. 
 The wily mother sees the conscious flame 
 
 Sparkle in Jenny''s e'e, and flush her cheek ; 
 With heart-struck, anxious care, inquires his 
 name. 
 While Jenny hafflins is affraid to speak ; 
 Weel pleas 'd tlie mother hears, it's nae wild, 
 worthless rake. 
 
 VIIL 
 
 Wi' kindly welcome Jenny brings him ben ; 
 A strappan youth ; he taks the mother's 
 eye; 
 Blythe Jenny sees the visit's no ill ta'en ; 
 Tlie father cracks of horses, pleughs, and 
 kye. 
 The youngster's artless heart o'erflows wi' 
 joy- 
 But blate and laithfu', scarce can weel 
 behave ; 
 The mother, wi' a woman's wiles, can spy 
 What makes the youth sae bashfu' an sae 
 grave ; 
 Weel pleas'd to think her bairn's respected 
 like the lave. 
 
 IX. 
 
 O happy love ! where love like this is found ! 
 O heart-felt raptures ! bliss beyond com- 
 pare! 
 I've paced much this weary mortal round^ 
 
 And sage experience bids me this declare — 
 " If Heaven a draught of heavenly pleasure 
 spare, 
 One cordial in this melancholy vale, 
 'Tis when a youthful, loving, modest pair. 
 In otliers arms breathe out the tender tale. 
 Beneath the milk-white thorn that scents the 
 ev'ning gale." 
 
 X. 
 
 Is there, in human form, that bears a heart — ■ 
 A wretch! a villain! lost to love and 
 truth ! 
 
 That can, with studied, sly, ensnaring art. 
 Betray sweet Jenny'' s unsuspecting vo"*h? 
 
Curse on his perjur'd arts 
 smooth ! 
 
 Are honour, virtue, conscience, all exil'd ? 
 Is there no pity, no relenting ruth. 
 
 Points to the parents fondling o'er their 
 child ? 
 Then pamts the ruin'd maid, and their dis- 
 traction wild? 
 
 XI. 
 
 But now the supper crowns their simple 
 board. 
 The halesome parritch, chief o' Scotia's 
 food : 
 The soupe their only Hawkie does afford. 
 That 'yont the hallan snugly chows her 
 cood : 
 The dame brings forth in complimental 
 mood, 
 To grace the lad, her weel-hain'd kebbuck, 
 fell, 
 An' afl he's prest, an' aft he ca's it guid ; 
 The frugal wifie, garrulous, will tell, 
 How 'twas a towmond auld, sin' lint was i' the 
 bell. 
 
 XII. 
 
 The cheerfu' supper done, wi' serious face, 
 
 They round the ingle, form a circle wide ; 
 The sire turns o'er, wi' patriarchal grace. 
 
 The big fui'-Bilile, ance his father's pride : 
 His bonnet rev'rently is laid aside. 
 
 His lyart haffets wearing thin an' bare ; 
 Those strains that once did sweet in Zion 
 glide. 
 He wales a portion with judicious care ; 
 And "Z,e< us Korship God !" he says, with 
 solemn air. 
 
 xni. 
 
 They chant their artless notes in simple 
 guise ; 
 They tmio their hearts, by far the noblest 
 aim : 
 Perhaps Dundee's wild warbling measures 
 rise. 
 Or plaintive Martyrs, worthy of tlie name : 
 Or noble Elgin beets the heav'nward flame. 
 
 The sweetest far of Scotia s holy lays : 
 Compar'd v/ith these, Italian trills are tame ; 
 The tickl'd ears no "heart-felt raptures 
 raise ; 
 Nao unison hae they with our Creator's praise. 
 
 XIV. 
 
 The priest-like father reads the sacred page, 
 How Abram was the friend of God on 
 high ; 
 Or, Moses bade eternal warfare wage 
 With Jlmalek^s ungracious progeny ; 
 02 
 
 BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 dissembling 
 
 Or how tno royal hard did groaning he 
 Beneath the stroke of Heaven's avenging 
 ire; 
 Or, Job's pathetic plaint, and waihng cry ; 
 Or rapt IsaiaKs wild, serapliic fire ; 
 Or other holy seers that tune the sacred lyre. 
 
 XV. 
 
 Perhaps the Christian volume is the theme, 
 How guiltless blood for guilty man was 
 shed ; 
 How He, who bore in Heaven the second 
 name; 
 Had not on earth whereon to lay his head : 
 How his first followers and servalits sped ; 
 The precepts sage they wrote to many a 
 land : 
 How he, who lone in Patmos banished, 
 Saw in the sun a mighty angel stand ; 
 And heard great Babloris doom pronounc'd 
 by Heav'n's command. 
 
 XVI. 
 
 Then kneeling down, to Heaven's Eternal 
 King, 
 The saint, the father, and the husband 
 prays : 
 Hope " springs exulting on triumphant 
 wing,"* 
 That thus they all shall meet in fliture 
 days : 
 There ever bask in uncreated rays. 
 
 No more to sigh, or shed the bitter tear, 
 Together hyinniug their Creator's praise. 
 In such society, yet still more dear ; 
 While circling time moves round in an eternal 
 sphere. 
 
 XVII. 
 
 Compar'd with this, how poor Religion's 
 pride. 
 In all the pomp of method, and of art. 
 When men display to congregations wide. 
 Devotion's ev'ry grace, except the heart ! 
 The Poiv'r, incens'd,the pageant wUl desert, 
 The pompous strain, the sacerdotal stole ; 
 But haply, in some cottage far apart. 
 
 May hear, well pleas'd, the language of 
 the soul ; 
 And in his book of life the inmates poor enrol. 
 
 xvm. 
 
 Then homeward all take off their sev'ral 
 way; 
 The yougling cottagers retire to rest : 
 The parent-pair their secret homage pay, 
 And proffer up to Heaven the warm re- 
 quest 
 
 * Pope's Windsor Forest. 
 
BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 That He who stills the raven's clam'rous 
 nest, 
 And decks the lily fair in flow'ry pride, 
 Would, in the way his wisdom sees the best, 
 For them and for their little ones provide ; 
 But chiefly, in their hearts with s^race divine 
 preside. 
 
 XIX. 
 
 From scenes like these old Scotia's grandeur 
 springs. 
 That makes her lov'd at home, rever'd 
 abroad : 
 Princes and lords are but the breath of kings, 
 " An honest man's the noblest work of 
 God:" 
 And certes, in fair virtue's heavenly road, 
 
 The cottage leaves the palace far behind ; 
 What is a lordling's pomp ! a cumbrous load, 
 Disguising oft the wretch of human kind. 
 Studied in arts of hell, in wickedness refin'd ! 
 
 XX. 
 
 O Scotia .' my aear, my native soil ! 
 
 For whom my warmest wish to Heaven is 
 sent ! 
 Long may thy hardy sons of rustic toil, 
 Be bless'd with health, and peace, and 
 sweet content I 
 And, O ! may Heaven their simple lives pre- 
 vent 
 From luxury's contagion, weak and vile ! 
 Then, howe'er croivns and coronets be rent, 
 A virtuous fopulace may rise the while. 
 And stand a wall of fire around their much- 
 lov'd Isle. 
 
 XXI. 
 
 O Thou .' who pour'd the patriotic tide 
 That stream'd tliro' Wallace^s undaunted 
 heart ; 
 Who dar'd to nobly stem tyrannic pride, 
 Or nobly die, the second glorious part, 
 (The patriot's God^ pecuharly thou art, 
 His friend, inspirer, guardian, and re- 
 ward !) 
 O never, never, Sco/ia's realm desert : 
 But still the patriot, and the patriot bard, 
 Li bright succession raise, her ornament and 
 guard I 
 
 MAN WAS MADE TO MOURN. 
 
 When chill Novcmlier's surly blast 
 Made fields and forests bare. 
 
 One ev'ning, as I wander'd forth 
 
 Along the banks o?Ayr, 
 I spy'd a man, whose aged step 
 
 Seem'd weary, worn with csu-e ; 
 His face was furrow 'd o'er with years, 
 
 And hoary was liis hair. 
 
 II. 
 
 " Young stranger, whither wand'rest tliou ?' 
 
 Began the reverend sage ; 
 " Does tliirst of wealth thy step constrain, 
 
 Or youthful pleasure's rage ; 
 Or haply, press'd with cares and woes, 
 
 Too soon thou hast began 
 To wander forth, with me, to mourn 
 
 The miseries of man I 
 
 m. 
 
 " The sun that overhangs yon moors, 
 
 Out-spreading far and wide. 
 Where hundreds labom to support 
 
 A haughty lordling's pride ; 
 I've seen yon weary winter-sun 
 
 Twice forty times return ; 
 And ev'ry time has added proofs, 
 
 That man was made to mourn. 
 
 IV. 
 
 " O man ! while in thy early years, 
 
 How prodigal of time ! 
 Mispending all thy precious hours, 
 
 Thy glorious youthful prime 1 
 Alternate foUies take the sway ; 
 
 Licentious passions bum ; 
 Which tenfold force gives nature's law, 
 
 That man was made to mourn. 
 
 " Look not alone on youthful prime, 
 
 Or manhood's active might ; 
 Man then is useful to his kind. 
 
 Supported is his right : 
 But see him on the edge of life. 
 
 With cares and sorrows worn. 
 Then age and want. Oh ! ill match'd pair, 
 
 Show man was made to mourn. 
 
 VI. 
 
 " A few seem favourites of fate, 
 
 In pleasure's lap carest ; 
 Yet, think, not all the rich and great 
 
 Are likewise truly blest. 
 But, Oh ! what crowds in ev'ry land, 
 
 Are wretched and forlorn ; 
 Thro' weary life tliis lesson learn. 
 
 That man was made to mourn. 
 
BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 43 
 
 VIL 
 
 " Many and sharp the num'rous ills 
 
 Inwoven with our frame ! 
 More pointed still we make ourselves, 
 
 Regret, remorse, and shame ! 
 And man, whose heaven-erected face 
 
 The smiles of love adorn, 
 Man's inhumanity to man 
 
 Makes countless thousands mourn I 
 
 vin 
 
 " See yonder poor, o'erlabour'd wight, 
 
 So abject, mean, and vile. 
 Who begs a brother of the earth 
 
 To give him leave to toil ; 
 And see his lordly fellow-worm 
 
 The poor petition spurn. 
 Unmindful, tho' a weeping wife 
 
 And helpless offspring mourn. 
 
 IX. 
 
 " If I'm design'd yon lordUng's slave, — 
 
 By nature's law design'd. 
 Why was an independent wish 
 
 E'er planted in my mind ? 
 If not, why am I subject to 
 
 His cruelty or scorn i 
 Or why has man the will and pow'r 
 
 To make his fellow mourn ? 
 
 " Yet, let not this, too much, my son, 
 
 Disturb thy youthful breast : 
 This partial view of human-kind 
 
 Is surely not the last I 
 The poor, oppressed, honest man. 
 
 Had never, sure, been born. 
 Had there not been some recompense 
 
 To comfort those that mourn ! 
 
 XL 
 
 " O death ! tlie poor man's dearest friend, 
 
 The kindest and the best ! 
 Welcome the hour my aged limbs 
 
 Are laid with thee at rest ! 
 The great, the wealthy, fear thy blow, 
 
 From pomp and pleasure torn ; 
 But, Oh ! a bless 'd relief to those 
 
 That weary-laden mourn !" 
 
 PRAYER IN THE PROSPECT 
 OP 
 
 DEATH. 
 
 I. 
 
 O THOU unlinown. Almighty Cause 
 
 Of all my hope and fear ! 
 In whose dread presence, ere an hour, 
 
 Perhaps I must appear ! 
 
 II. 
 
 If I have wander'd in those paths 
 
 Of hfe I ought to shun ; 
 As something, loudly, in my breast. 
 
 Remonstrates I have done ; 
 
 m. 
 
 Thou know'st that thou hast formed me 
 With passions wild and strong ; 
 
 And hst'ning to their witching voice 
 Has often led me wrong. 
 
 IV. 
 
 'WTiere human weakness has come short. 
 
 Or frailty stept aside, 
 Do thou All-Good ! for such thou art, 
 
 In shades of darkness hide. 
 
 V. 
 
 Where with intention I have err'd. 
 
 No other plea I have. 
 But, Tliou art good ; and goodness still 
 
 Dehghteth to forgive. 
 
 STANZAS 
 
 ON THE SAME OCCASION. 
 
 Why am I loath to leave this earthly scene r 
 Have I so found it full of pleasing charms r 
 Some drops of joy with draughts of ill be- 
 tween : 
 Some gleams of sunsliine 'mid renewing 
 storms : 
 Is it departing pangs my soul alarms ? 
 
 Or death's unlovely, dreary, dark abode ? 
 For guilt, for guilt, my terrors aie in arms ; 
 I tremble to approacli an angry God, 
 And justly smart benealli his sin-avenging rod. 
 
44 
 
 BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 Fain would I say,"ForgIve my foul offence!" 
 
 Fain promise never more to disobey ; 
 But, should my Author health again dis- 
 pense, 
 Again I miglit desert fair virtue's way ; 
 Again in folly's path might go astray : 
 
 Again exalt the brute and sink the man ; 
 Then how should I for heavenly mercy pray, 
 Who act so counter heavenly mercy's 
 plan ? 
 Who sm so oft have mourn'd, yet to tempta- 
 tion ran ? 
 
 O thou, great Governor of all below 1 
 If I may dare a lifted eye to Thee, 
 Thy nod can make the tempest cease to 
 blow, 
 Or still the tumult of the raging sea: 
 With what controlling pow'r assist cv'n me, 
 Those headlong furious passions to con 
 fine; 
 For all unfit I feel my pow'rs to be, 
 
 To rule their torrent in th' allowed line ; 
 O, aid me with thy help. Omnipotence Divine ! 
 
 LYING AT A REVENENU FRIEND'S HOUSE 
 ONE NIGHT, THE AUTHOR LEFT 
 
 THE FOLLOWING VERSES 
 
 IN THE ROOM WHERE HE SLEPT. 
 
 V. 
 
 I. 
 
 O THOU dread Pow'r, who reign'st above ! 
 
 I know thou wilt me hear : 
 When for tliis scene of peace and love, 
 
 I make my pray'r sincere. 
 
 II. 
 
 The hoary sire — the mortal stroke, 
 Long, long, be pleas'd to spare J 
 
 To bless his little filial flock, 
 And show what good men are. 
 
 III. 
 
 She, who her lovely offspring eyes 
 
 With tender hopes and fears, 
 O, bless her with a mother's joys, 
 
 But spare a mother's tears 1 
 
 VI. 
 
 Their hope, their btay, their darhng youth. 
 In manhood's dawning blush ; 
 
 Bless him, thou ( iod of love and truth, 
 Up to a paruiifb witih 1 
 
 The beauteous^ seraph sister-band 
 
 With earnest tears I pray, 
 Thou know'stthe snares on ev'ryhand, 
 Guide thou their steps alway 1 
 
 VI. 
 
 When soon or late they reach that coast, 
 O'er life's rough ocean driv'n, 
 
 May they rejoice, no wand'rer lost, 
 A family in Heav'n 1 
 
 THE FIRST PSALM. 
 
 The man, in life wherever plac'd. 
 
 Hath happiness in store, 
 Who walks not in the wicked's way, 
 
 Nor learns their guilty lore ! 
 
 Nor from the seat of scornful pride 
 Casts forth liis eyes abroad, 
 
 But with humility and awe 
 Still walks before his God. 
 
 That man shall flourish like thetreea 
 Which by the streamlets grow ; 
 
 The fruitful top is spread on Iiigh, 
 And firm the root below. 
 
 But he whose blossom buds in guilt 
 Shall to the ground be cast. 
 
 And like the rootless stubble, tost 
 Before the sweeping blast. 
 
 For why ? that God the good adore 
 Hath giv'n them peace and rest, 
 
 But hath decreed that wicked men 
 Shall ne'er be truly blest. 
 
 A PRAYER, 
 
 UNDER THE PRESSURE OF VIOLENT ANGUISH. 
 
 O THOU Great Being I what thou art 
 
 Surpasses me to know : 
 Yet sure I am, that known to theo 
 
 Are all thy works below. 
 
 Thy creature here before thee stands, 
 
 All wretched and distrest ; 
 Yet sure those ills that wring my soul 
 
 Obey thy high behest. 
 
 Sure thou, Almiglity, canst not act 
 
 From cruelty or wrath ! 
 O, free my weary eyes from tears, 
 
 Or close them fast in death ! 
 
 But if I must afflicted be. 
 
 To suit some wild design ; 
 Then man my soul with firm rcsolvCiJ 
 
 To bear and not repine I 
 
BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 45 
 
 FIRST SIX VERSES OF THE NINETIETH 
 PSALM. 
 
 O THmj, the first, the greatest friend 
 
 Of all the human race ! 
 Whose strong right hand has ever been 
 
 Their stay and dwelling place t 
 
 Before the mountains heav'd their heads 
 
 Beneath thy forming hand, 
 Before this pond'rous globe itself, 
 
 Arose at thy command : 
 
 That pow'r which rais'd and still upholds 
 
 This universal frame, 
 From countless, unbegiiming time 
 
 Was ever still the same. 
 
 Those mighty periods of years 
 
 Which seem to us so vast, 
 Appear no more before thy sight 
 
 Than yesterday that's past. 
 
 Thou giv'st the word : Thy creature, man, 
 
 Is to existence brought : 
 Again thou say'st, " Ye sons of men, 
 
 Return ye into nought 1" 
 
 Thou layest them, with all their cares. 
 
 In everlasting sleep ; 
 As with a flood thou tak'st them off 
 
 With overwhelming sweep. 
 
 They flourish like the morning flow'r. 
 
 In beauty's pride array'd ; 
 But long ere night cut dovm it lies 
 
 All wither'd and decay'd. 
 
 TO A MOUNTAIN DAISY, 
 
 ON TURNING ONE DOWN WITH THE PLOUGH 
 IN APRIL 1786. 
 
 Wee, modest, crimson-tipped flow'r, 
 Thou's met me in an evil hour ; 
 For I maun crush araang the stoure 
 
 Thy slender stem; 
 To spare thee now is past my pow'r, 
 
 Thou bonnie gem. 
 
 Alas ! it's no thy neebor sweet. 
 The bonnie Lark, companion meet ! 
 Bending thee 'mang the dewy weet ! 
 
 Wi' spreckled breast. 
 When upward-springing, blythe to greet 
 
 The purpling east. 
 
 Cauld blew the bitter-biting north 
 Upon thy early, humble birth ; 
 Yet cheerfully thou glinted forth 
 
 Amid the storm. 
 Scarce rear'd above the parent earth 
 
 Thy tender form. 
 
 The flaunting flow'rs our gardens yield, 
 High shelt'ring woods and wa's maun shield. 
 But thou beneath the random bield 
 
 O' clod or stane, 
 Adorns the histie siibble-Jield, 
 
 Unseen, alane. 
 
 There, in thy scanty mantle clad, 
 Thy snawy bosom sun-ward spread, 
 Thou lifts thy unassuming head 
 
 In humble guise ; 
 But now the share uptears thy bed. 
 
 And low thou lies ! 
 
 Such is the fate of artless Maid, 
 Sweet_/?oio're/ of the rural shade J 
 By love's simplicity betray'd. 
 
 And guileless tri 
 Till she, like thee, all soil'd is laid 
 
 Low i' the dust. 
 
 Such is the fate of simple Bard, 
 On life's rough ocean luckless starr'd ! 
 Unskilful he to note the card 
 
 0£ prudent lore, 
 TiU billows rage, and gales blow hard. 
 
 And whelm him o'er ! 
 
 Such fate o£ suffering worth isgiv'n, 
 Who long with wants and woes has striv'n, 
 By human pride or cunning driv'n. 
 
 To mis'ry's brink, 
 Till wrench'd of ev'ry stay but Heaven, 
 
 He, ruin'd, sink ! 
 
 E'vn thou who moum'st the, Daisy's fate 
 Tliatfate is thine — no distant date ; 
 Stem Ruin's plough-share drives, elate. 
 
 Full on thy bloom, 
 
 Till crush'd beneath the furrow's weight. 
 
 Shall be thy doom I 
 
 TO RUIN. 
 
 All hail ! mexorable lord ! 
 
 At whose destruction-breathing word, 
 
 The mightiest empires fall ! 
 Thy cruel wo-dehghted train, 
 The ministers of grief and pain, 
 
 A sullen welcome, all '. 
 
46 
 
 With stem-rcsolvVl, despairing eye, 
 
 I sec each aimed dart ; 
 For one has cut my dearest tie. 
 And quivers in my heart. 
 Then low'ring, and pouring, 
 
 The sfmin no more I dread ; 
 Tho' thickening and black'ning, 
 Round my devoted head. 
 
 n. 
 
 And, thou grim pow'r, by Ufe abhorr'd, 
 Wliile hfe a pleasure can afford. 
 
 Oh ! liear a wretch's pray'r ! 
 No more I shrink appall'd, afraid ; 
 I court, I beg thy friendly aid. 
 To close this scene of care ! 
 When shall my soul in silent peace, 
 
 Resign Me^s joyless day; 
 My weary heart its throbbing cease, 
 Cold mould'ring in the clay ? 
 No fear more, no tear more, 
 To stain my lifeless face ; 
 Enclasped, and grasped 
 Within thy cold embrace I 
 
 TO MISS L— , 
 
 WITH BEATTIE'S POEMS AS A NEW YEAR'I 
 GIFT, JANUARY 1, 1787. 
 
 Again the silent wheels of time 
 Their annual round have driv'n. 
 
 And you, tiio' scarce m maiden prime, 
 Are so much nearer Heav'n. 
 
 No gifts have I from Indian coasts 
 
 The infant year to hail ; 
 I send you more than India boasts, 
 
 In Edwiri's simple tale. 
 
 Our sex with guile and faithless love 
 
 Is charg'd, perliaps, too true ; 
 But may, dear maid, each lover prove 
 
 An Edwin still to you ! 
 
 EPISTLE TO A YOUNG FRIEND. 
 
 MAY-1786. 
 I. 
 
 I LANG hae thought, my youthfu' friend, 
 A something to have sent you, 
 
 Tho' it should serve nae other end 
 Than just a kind memento ; 
 
 BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 But how the eubject-theme may gang 
 Let time and chance determine ; 
 
 Perhaps it may turn out a sang 
 Perhaps turn out a sermon. 
 
 n. 
 
 Ye'll try the world soon, my lad, 
 
 And, Andrew dear, believe me, 
 Ye'll find mankind an imco squad, 
 
 And muckle they may grieve ye . 
 For care and trouble set your thought, 
 
 Ev'n when your end's attained ; 
 And a' your views may come to nought, 
 
 Where ev'ry nerve is strained. 
 
 m. 
 
 I'll no say, men are villains a'; 
 
 The real, harden'd wicked, 
 Wha hae nae check but human law, 
 
 Are to a few restricked : 
 But och I mankind are unco weak. 
 
 An' little to be trusted ; 
 If 5e//"the wavering balance shake. 
 
 It's rarely right adjusted ! 
 
 IV. 
 
 Yet they wha fa' in fortune's strife. 
 
 Their fate we should nae i 
 For still th' important end of life. 
 
 They equally may answer ; 
 A man may hae an honest heart, 
 
 Tho' poortith hourly stare him; 
 A man may tak a neebor's part. 
 
 Yet hae nae cash to spare liim. 
 
 V. 
 
 Ay free, afF han' your story tell. 
 
 When wi' a bosom crony ; 
 But still keep something to yourscl 
 
 Ye scarcely tell to ony. 
 Conceal yoursel as weel's ye can 
 
 Frae critical dissection ; 
 But keek thro' ev'ry other man, 
 
 Wi' sharpen'd, slee inspection. 
 
 VI. 
 
 The sacred lowe o' weel-plac'd love, 
 
 Luxuriantly indulge it ; 
 But never tempt th' illicit rove, 
 
 Tho' naething should divulge it : 
 I wave the quantum o' the sin, 
 
 The hazard of concealing ; 
 But och ! it hardens a' within. 
 
 And petrifies tlie feeling ! 
 
BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 47 
 
 VII. 
 
 To catch dame Fortune's golden smile. 
 
 Assiduous wait upon l>8r ; 
 And gather gear by ev'ry wile 
 
 Tliat's justified by honour ; 
 Not for to liide it in a hedge, 
 
 Not for a train-attendant ; 
 But for tlie glorious privilege 
 
 Of being independent. 
 
 VIII. 
 
 The fear o' hell's a hangman's whip, 
 
 To baud the wretch in order ; 
 But where ye feel your Itonour grip. 
 
 Let that ay be your border ; 
 Its sliglitcst touches, instant pause — • 
 
 Debar a' side pretences ; 
 And resolutely keep its laws 
 
 Uncaring consequences. 
 
 IX. 
 
 The great Creator to revere, 
 
 Must sure become the creature ; 
 But still the preaching cant forbear, 
 
 And ev'n the rigid feature : 
 Yet ne'er with wits profane to range. 
 
 Be comi)laisance extended ; 
 An Atheist's laugh's a poor exchange 
 
 For Deity offended 1 
 
 When ranting round in pleasure's ring, 
 
 Religion may be blinded ; 
 Or if siie gie a random sting, 
 
 It may be little minded ; 
 But when on life we're tempest-driv'n, 
 
 A conscience but a canker — 
 A correspondence fix'd wi' Heav'n, 
 
 is sure a noble anchor ! 
 
 XL 
 
 Adieu, dear, amiable youth ! 
 
 Your lieart can ne'er be wanting : 
 May prudence, fortitude, and truth, 
 
 Erect your brow undaunting 1 
 In plouglniian phrase, " God send you speed, 
 
 Still daily to grow wiser : 
 And may you better reck the rede. 
 
 Than ever did th' adviser 1 
 
 ON A SCOTCH BARD 
 
 GONE TO THE WEST INDIES. 
 
 A' YE wha live by soups o' drink, 
 A' yc wha live by crambo-clink. 
 
 A' ye wha live and never think, 
 
 Come mourn wi' me ! 
 Our billie 's gien us a' a jink, 
 
 An' owre the sea. 
 
 Lament him a' ye ran tin core, 
 Wha dearly like a random-splore, 
 Nae mair he'll johi tlie merry-roar. 
 
 In social key ; 
 For now he's ta'en anither shore, 
 
 An' owre the sea. 
 
 The bonnie lasses wcel may wiss him, 
 And in their dear petitions place him : 
 The widows, wives, an' a' may bless him, 
 
 Wi' tearfu' e'e ; 
 For weel I wat they'll sairly miss hin 
 
 That's owre the sea. 
 
 O Fortune, they hae room to grumble 1 
 Hadst thou ta'en aff some drowsy bummle, 
 Wha can do nought but fyke an' fumble, 
 
 'Twad been nae plea ; 
 But ho was gleg as ony wumble. 
 
 That's owre the sea. 
 
 Auld, cantie Kyle may weepers wear, 
 An' stain them wi' the saut, saut tear ; 
 'Twill mak her poor auld heart I fear, 
 
 In fhnders flee ; 
 He was her laureate monie a year. 
 
 That's owre the 6ea. 
 
 He saw misfortune's cauld nor-west 
 Lang mustering up a bitter blast ; 
 A jillet brak his heart at last, 
 
 111 may she be I 
 So, took a birth afore the mast. 
 
 An' owre the sea. 
 
 To tremble under Fortune's cummock, 
 On scarce a bellyfu' o' drummock, 
 Wi' his proud, independent stomach, 
 
 Could ill agree ; 
 So, row't his hurdies in a hammock. 
 
 An' owre the sea 
 
 He ne'er was gien to great misguiding. 
 Yet coin his pouches wad na bide in ; 
 Wi' him it neer was under hiding ; 
 
 He dealt it free : 
 The muse was a' that he took pride in, 
 That's owre the sea. 
 
 Jamaica bodies, use him weel. 
 An' hap him in a cozie biel : 
 Ye'U find him ay a dainty chiel. 
 
 And fou' o' glee ; 
 He wad na wrang'd tlae vara deil, 
 
 That's owre the sea. 
 
BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 Farewcel, my rhyme.-composing billie ! 
 Your native soil was right ill-willie ; 
 But may ye flourish like a lily, 
 
 Now bonnilie ! 
 I'll toast yo in my hindmost gillie, 
 
 Tho' owre the sea. 
 
 TO A HAGGIS. 
 
 Fair fa' your honest, sonsie face, 
 Great chieftain o' tho puddin-race ! 
 Aboon them a' ye tak your place, 
 
 Painch, tripe, or thairm ; 
 VVeel are ye wordy of a grace 
 
 As lang's my arm. 
 
 The groaning trencher there ye fill, 
 Your hurdies like a distant hill, 
 Your^ira wad help to mend a mill 
 
 In time o' need. 
 While thro' your pores the dews distil 
 
 Like amber bead. 
 
 His knife see rustic labour dight, 
 An' cut you up with ready slight. 
 Trenching your gushing entrails bright 
 
 Like onie ditch ; 
 And then, O what a glorious sight, 
 
 Warm-reekin, rich ! 
 
 Then horn for horn tliey stretch an' strive, 
 Deil tak the hindmost, on they drive, 
 Till a' their weel-swall'd kytes belyve 
 
 Are bent like drums ; 
 Then auld guidman, maist hke to ryve, 
 
 Bethankit hums. 
 
 Is there that o'er his French ragout. 
 Or olio that wad staw a sow. 
 Or fricassee wad mak her spew 
 
 Wi' perfect sconncr, 
 Looks down wi' sneering, scomfu' view 
 
 On sic a dinner ? 
 
 Poor devil ! see him owre his trash. 
 As feckless as a wither'd rash. 
 His spindle shank a guid whip lash. 
 
 His nieve a nit ; 
 Thro' bloody flood or field to dash, 
 O how unfit ! 
 
 But mark tlie rustic, haggis-fed, 
 The trembling earth resounds his tread. 
 Clap m his walie nieve a blade. 
 
 He'll mak it whissle ; 
 An' legs, an' arms, an' heads will sned. 
 
 Like taps o' thrisslc. 
 
 Ye pow'rg, wha mak manjuna your care, 
 And dish them out their bill o' fare, 
 Auld Scotland wants nae skinking ware 
 
 That jaups in luggies ; 
 But, if ye wish her gratefu' pray'r, 
 
 Gie her a Haggis ! 
 
 A DEDICATION 
 
 TO GAVIN HAMILTON, ESQ. 
 
 Expect na, Sir, in this narration, 
 A fleechin, fleth'rin dedication, 
 To roose you up, an' ca' you guid, 
 An' sprung o' great an' noble bluid, 
 Because ye're surnam'd like his grace. 
 Perhaps related to the race ; 
 Tlien when I'm tir'd — and sae are^e, 
 Wi' mony a fulsome, sinfu' lie, 
 Set up a face, how I stop short, 
 For fear your modesty be hurt. 
 
 This may do — ^maun do. Sir, wi' them wha 
 Maun please the great folk for a wamefou; 
 For me ! sae laigh I needna bow. 
 For, Lord be thankit, / can plough ; 
 And when I downa yoke a naig. 
 Then, Lord, be thankit, / can beg ; 
 Sae I shall say, an' that's nae flatt'rin, 
 It's just sic poet, an' sic patron. 
 
 The Poet, some guid angel help him, 
 Or else, I fear some ill ane skelp him, 
 He may do weel for a' he's done yet, 
 But only he's no just begun yet. 
 
 The Patron, (Sir, ye maun forgie me, 
 I winna lie, come what will o' me) 
 On ev'ry hand it will allow'd be. 
 He's just — nae better than he should be. 
 
 I readily and freely grant, 
 He downa see a poor man want ; 
 What's no his ain he winna tak it, 
 What ance he says he winna break it ; 
 Ought he can lend he'll no refus't. 
 Till aft his guidness is abus'd : 
 And rascals whylcs that do him wrang, 
 Ev'n that, he does na mind it lang : 
 As master, landlord, husband, father. 
 He does na fail his part in either. 
 
 But then, na thanks to him for a' thati 
 Nae godly symptom ye can ca' that ; 
 It's naetlung but a milder feature, 
 Of our poor, sinfu,' corrupt nature • 
 Ye'll get the best o' moral works, 
 'Mang black Gentoos and pagan Turks, 
 
BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 40 
 
 Or hunters wild on Ponotnan, 
 
 Wha never heard of orthodoxy. 
 Tliat he's the poor man's friend in need, 
 The gentleman in word and deed, 
 It's no thro' terror of d-mn-tion ; 
 It's just a carnal inclination. 
 
 Morality, thou deadly bane, 
 Tliy tens o' thousands thou hast slain ! 
 Vain is his hope, whose stay and trust is 
 In moral mercy, truth, and justice ! 
 
 No — stretch a point to catch a plack ; 
 Abuse a brother to his back ; 
 Sl.(;a! thro' a winnock frae a wh-re, 
 I?ut point the rake that taks the door : 
 Be to the poor like onie whunstane. 
 And liaud their noses to the grunstane, 
 Ply every art o' legal thieving ; 
 No matter, stick to sound believing. 
 
 Learn three-mile pray'rs, and half-mile 
 graces, 
 Wi' weel-spread looves, an' lang wry faces ; 
 Grunt up a solemn, lengthen'd groan, 
 And damn a' parties but your own ; 
 I'll warrant then, ye're nae deceiver, 
 A steady, sturdy, staunch believer. 
 
 O ye wha leave the springs of C-fo-n, 
 For gumliedubs of your ain delvui ! 
 Ye sons of heresy and error, 
 Yc'll some day squeel in quaking terror ! 
 When vengeance draws the sword in wrath, 
 And in the fire throws the sheath ; 
 When Ruin, with his sweeping besom, 
 Just frets till Heav'n commission gies liim : 
 While o'er the harp pale mis'ry moans. 
 And strikes the ever deep'ning tones. 
 Still louder shrieks, and heavier groans ! 
 
 Your pardon, Sir, for this digression, 
 I maist forgat my dedication ; 
 But when divinity comes cross me. 
 My readers still are sure to lose me. 
 
 So, Sir, ye see 'twas nae daft vapour, 
 But I maturely thought it proper. 
 When a' my work I did review. 
 To dedicate them, Sir, to You : 
 Because (ye need na tak it ill) 
 I thought them something Uke yoursel. 
 
 Then patronise them wi' your favour, 
 And your petitioner shall ever— 
 I had amaist said, ever pray, 
 But that's a word I need na say : 
 For prayinlhae little skill ol; 
 I'm baith dead-sweer, an' wretched ill o t; 
 But I'se repeat each poor man's nm.v'r, 
 That kens or hears about you. Sir— 
 
 E 
 
 " May ne'er mlsrortune's gowling bark, 
 Howl thro' the dwelling o' the Clerk ! 
 May ne'er his gen'rous, honest heart, 
 For that same gen'rous spirit smart ! 
 May K******'s far honour'd name 
 Lang beet his hymeneal flame. 
 Till H**'*****'s, at least a dizen. 
 Are frae their nuptial labours risen : 
 Five bonnie lasses round their table. 
 And seven braw fellows, stout an' able 
 To serve tlieir king and country weel, 
 By word, or pen, or pointed steel ! 
 May health and peace, with mutual rays, 
 Shine on the evening o' his days; 
 Till his wee curlie John's ier-oe. 
 When ebbing life nae mair shall flow, 
 The last, sad, mournful rites bestow 1" 
 
 I will not wind a lang conclusion, 
 Wi' complimentary effusion : 
 But whilst your wishes and endeavours 
 Are blest with Fortune's smiles and favoun, 
 I am, dear Sir, with zeal most fervent. 
 Your much indebted, humble servant. 
 
 But if (which Pow'rs above prevent !) 
 That iron-hearted carl, Want, 
 Attended in his grim advances. 
 By sad mistakes, and black mischances. 
 While hopes, and joys, and pleasures fly him. 
 Make you as poor a dog as I am. 
 Your humble seruant then no more ; 
 For who would humbly serve the poor ! 
 But by a poor man's hopes in Heav'n! 
 AVhile recollection's pow'r is given, 
 If, ill the vale of humble life. 
 The victim sad of fortune's strife, 
 I, tliro' the tender gushing tear. 
 Should recognize my master dear. 
 If friendless, low, we meet together, 
 Then, Sir, your hand — my friend and brother ! 
 
 TO A LOUSE. 
 
 ON SEEING ONE ON A LADY'S BONNET 
 AT CHURCH. 
 
 Ha ! whare yegaun, ye crowlin ferlie! 
 Your impudence protects you sairly : 
 I canna say but ye strunt rarely, 
 
 Owre gauze and lacc ; 
 Tho' faith, I fear ye dine but sparely 
 On sic a place. 
 
 Ye ugly, creepin, blastit wonner. 
 Detested, shunn'd by saunt an' sinner, 
 
50 
 
 BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 How dare yc set your fit upon her, 
 
 Sae line a lady ! 
 
 Gae somewhere else and seek your dinner 
 On some poor body. 
 
 Swith, in somo beggar's haffet squattle ; 
 Where ye may creep, and sprawl, and sprattle 
 Wi' ilher kindred, jumpin cattle, 
 
 In shoals and nations ; 
 Whare horn or bane ne'er dare unsettle 
 
 Your tliick plantations. 
 
 Now haud ye there, ye're out o' sight, 
 Below the fatt'rils, snug an' tight ; 
 Na, faith ye yet ! ye'U no be right 
 
 Till ye've got on it, 
 The vera tapmost, tow'ring height 
 
 O' Miss's bonnet. 
 
 My sooth ! right bauld ye set your nose out, 
 As plump and gray as onie grozet ; 
 O for some rank, mercurial rozet. 
 
 Or fell, red smeddum, 
 I'd gie you sic u^earty doze o't. 
 
 Wad dress your droddum ! 
 
 I wad na been surpris'd to spy 
 You on an auld wife's flainen toy ; 
 Or aiblins some bit duddie boy, 
 
 On's wyhecoat ; 
 But Miss's fine Lunardi ! fie. 
 
 How dare ye d'ot ! 
 
 O Jenny ^ dinna toss your head, 
 An' set your beauties a' abread ! 
 Ye httle ken what cursed speed 
 
 The blastie's makin ! 
 Thae winlis axidjinger-ends, I dread. 
 
 Are notice takui ! 
 
 O wad some pow'r the giftie gie ub 
 7h see oursels as others see us ! 
 It wad frae monie a blunder free us 
 
 And foolish notion : 
 What airs in dress an' gait wad lea'e us. 
 
 And ev'n Devotion ! 
 
 ADDRESS TO EDINBURGH. 
 
 Edina! Scoita'j darling seat ! 
 
 All hail thy palaces and tow'rs. 
 Where once beneatli a monarch's feet 
 
 Sat legislation's sov'reign pow'rs 1 
 
 From marking wildly-scattcr'd flow'w, 
 As on the banks of Ayr 1 stray'd. 
 
 And singing, lone, the Img'ring hours, 
 I shelter m thy honour'd shade. 
 
 II. 
 
 Here wealth still swells the golden tide, 
 
 As busy trade his labours phes ; 
 There architecture's noble pride 
 
 Bids elegance and splendor rise ; 
 Here justice, from her native skies. 
 
 High wields her balance and her rod ; 
 There learning, with his eagle eyes, 
 
 Seeks science in her coy abode. 
 
 IIL . 
 
 Thy Sons, Edina, social, kind, 
 
 With open arms the stranger hail ; 
 Their views enlarg'd, their lib'ral miiKL 
 
 Above the narrow, rural vale ; 
 Attentive still to sorrow's wail. 
 
 Or modest merit's silent claim ; 
 And never may their sources fail ! 
 
 And never envy blot their name ! 
 
 IV. 
 
 Thy daughters bright thy walks adorn ! 
 
 Gay as the gilded summer sky, 
 Sweet as the dewy milk-white thorn, 
 
 Dear as the raptur'd thrill of joy 1 
 Fair B-^-^ strikes th' adoring eye, 
 
 Heav'n's beauties on my fancy shine ; 
 I see the sire of love on high. 
 
 And own his work indeed divine ! 
 
 V. 
 
 There, watching high the least alarms, 
 
 Thy rough, rude fortress gleams afar ; 
 Like some bold vet'ran, gray in arms. 
 
 And mark'd with many a seamy scar : 
 The pond'rous walls and massy bar. 
 
 Grim-rising o'er the ragged rock ; 
 Have oft withstood assailing war, 
 
 And oft repell'd the invader's shock. 
 
 With awe-struck thougnt, and pitying tea*; 
 
 I view that noble, stately dome, 
 ^Vhe^e Scotia's kings of other years, 
 
 Fani'd heroes I had their royal home : 
 Alas ! liow cliang'd tlie times to come ! 
 
 Tiicir royal name low in the dust! 
 Their hapless race wild-wand'ring roam ! 
 
 Tho' rigid law cries out, 'twas just ! 
 
BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 51 
 
 vn. 
 
 Wild beats my heart to trace your steps, 
 
 Whose ancestors, m days of yore, 
 Thro' hostile ranks and ruin'd gaps 
 
 Old Scotia''s bloody lion bore : 
 Ev'n / who sing in rustic lore. 
 
 Haply my sires have left their shed. 
 And fac'd grim danger's loudest roar, 
 
 Bold-following wnere your fathers led ! 
 
 VIII. 
 
 Edina ! Scotia's darling seat ! 
 
 All hail thy palaces and tow'rs, 
 Where once beneath a monarch's feet 
 
 Sat legislation's sov'reigji pow'rs ! 
 From marking wildly-scatter'd flow'rs, 
 
 As on the banks of .4;yr I stray'd. 
 And singing, lone, the ling'ring hours, 
 
 I shelter in tliy honour'd shade. 
 
 EPISTLE TO J. LAPRAIK, 
 
 AN OLD SCOTTISH BARD. 
 
 APRIL 1st, 1785. 
 
 While briers and woodbines budding green. 
 An' paitricks scraichin loud at e'en. 
 An' morning poussie whiddin seen. 
 
 Inspire my muse, 
 This freedom in an laiknoum frien', 
 
 I pray excuse. 
 
 On fasten-een we had a rockin, 
 To ca' the crack and weave our stockin ; 
 And there was muckle fun an' jokin, 
 
 Ye need na doubt ; 
 At length we had a hearty yokin 
 
 At sang about. 
 
 There was ae sang, amang the rest, 
 Aboon them a' it pleased me tiest. 
 That some kind husband had addrest 
 
 To some sweet wife : 
 It thirl'd the heart-strings thro' the breast, 
 A' to the life. 
 
 I've scarce heard ought describes sae weel, 
 What gen'rous, manly bosoms feel ; 
 Thought I, " Can this be Pope, or Steele, 
 
 Or Beattie's wark '' 
 They tald me 'twas an odd kind chiel 
 
 About Muirkirk. 
 
 It pat me fidgin-fain to hear't, 
 And sae about him there I spier't 
 
 Then a' that ken't him'round declar'd 
 He had ingine. 
 
 That nane excell'd it, few cam near't, 
 It was sae fine. 
 
 That set him to a pint of ale. 
 An' either douce or merry tale. 
 Or rhymes an' sangs he'd made himsel, 
 
 Or witty catches, 
 'Tween Inverness and Tiviotdale, 
 
 He had few matches. 
 
 Then up I gat, an' swoor an' aith, 
 Tho' I should pawn my pleugh and graith, 
 Or die a cadger pownie's death. 
 
 At some dyke-back, 
 A pint an' gill I'd gie them baith 
 
 To hear your crack. 
 
 But, first an' foremost, I should tell, 
 Amaist as soon as I could spell, 
 I to the crambo-jingle fell, 
 
 Tho' rude an' rough, 
 Yet crooning to a body's sel. 
 
 Does well eneugh. 
 
 I am nae poet, in a sense, 
 But just a rhymer, like, by chance, 
 An' hae to leammg nae pretence, 
 
 Yet, what the matter ? 
 Whene'er my muse does on me glance, 
 
 I jingle at her. 
 
 Your critic-folk may cock their nose, - 
 And say, " How can you e'er propose. 
 You wha ken hardly verse frae prose. 
 
 To mak a sang ? 
 But, by your leaves, my learned foes, 
 
 Ye're maybe wrang. 
 
 What's a' your jargon o' your schools. 
 Your Latin names for horns an' stools ; 
 If honest nature made you fools. 
 
 What sairs your grammars ; 
 Ye'd better ta'en up spades and shools, 
 
 Or knappin hammers. 
 
 A set o' dull conceited hashes. 
 Confuse their brains in college classes ! 
 They gang in stirks, and come out asses, 
 
 Plain truth to speak \ 
 An' syne they think to climb Parnassus 
 
 By dint o' Greek ' 
 
 Gie me ae spark o' Nature's fire. 
 That's a' the learning I desire ; 
 Then tho' I drudge tlu-o' dab an' mire 
 
 At plough or cart. 
 My muse, tho' hamely in attire. 
 
 May touch the heart 
 
52 
 
 O for a spunk o"' Allan's glee, 
 Or Ftrgussuii's^ the bauld and slee, 
 Or bright Lapraik-s my friend to be, 
 
 If I can hit it ! 
 That would be lear eneugh for me, 
 
 If 1 could 'et it. 
 
 Now, Sir, if ye hae friends enow, 
 Tho' real friends, I b'lieve, are few, 
 Yet, if your catalogue be fou, 
 
 I'se no insist. 
 But gif ye want ae friend that's true, 
 I'm on your list. 
 
 BURNS' POEMb'. 
 
 But to conclude my lang epistle, 
 As my auld pen's worn to the grissle 
 Twa lines frae you wad gar me fissle, 
 
 Who am, most fervent, 
 Wliile I can either sing or whissfe. 
 
 Your friend and servant. 
 
 TO THE SAME. 
 
 I winna blaw about mysel ; 
 As ill I like my fauts to tell ; 
 But friends, cind folk that wish me well, 
 They sometimes roc 
 Tho' I maun own, as monie still 
 
 As far abuse me. 
 
 There's ae weefaut they whyles lay to me, 
 I like the lasses — Gude forgie me ! 
 For monie a plack they wheedle frae me, 
 
 At dance or fair ; 
 May be some ither thing they gie me 
 
 They weel can spare. 
 
 But Mauchline race, or Mauchline fair, 
 T should be proud to meet you there ; 
 We'se gie ae night's discharge to care, 
 
 If we forgather, 
 An' hae a swap o' rhymin-ware 
 
 Wi' ane anither. 
 
 The four-gill chap, we'se gar him clatter, 
 An' kirscn him wi' reekin water ; 
 Syne we'll sit down an' tak our whitter, 
 
 To cheer our heart ; 
 An' faith we'se be acquainted better 
 13efore we part. 
 
 Awa, ye selfish warly race, 
 Wha think that bavins, sense, an' grace, 
 Ev'n love an' friendship, should give place 
 
 To cafck-lhe-plack I 
 I diima like to see your face. 
 
 Nor hear you crack. 
 
 But ye whom social pleasure charms. 
 Whose heart the tide of kindness warms. 
 Who hold your being on the terms, 
 
 Eacli aid the others', 
 Come to my bowl, come to my arms. 
 
 My friends, n>'- brothers ! 
 
 APRIL 21st, 1785 
 
 While new-ca'd kye rout at the stake, 
 An' pownies reek in pleugh or braik, 
 Tliis hour on e'enin's edge I take, 
 
 To own I'm debtor 
 To honest-hearted, auld Lapraik^ 
 
 For his kind letter. 
 
 Forjesket sair, with weary legs, 
 Rattlin' the com out-owre the rigs. 
 Or dealing thro' amang the naigs 
 
 Their ten- hours' bite. 
 My awkart muse^sair pleads and begs 
 
 I would na write. 
 
 The tapetless ramfeezl'd hizzie. 
 She's saft at best, and somethuig lazy. 
 Quo' she, "Ye ken, we've been sae busy, 
 
 This month an' mair, 
 That trouth my head is grown right dizzie 
 
 An' something sair." 
 
 Her dowff excuses pat mc mad ; 
 " Conscience," says I, " ye thowless jad ! 
 I'll write, an' that a hearty blaud. 
 
 This vera night ; 
 So dinna ve affront your trade. 
 
 But rhyme it right. 
 
 " Shall bauld Lapraik, the king o' hearts, 
 Tho' mankind were a pack o' cartes, 
 Roose you sae weel for your deserts. 
 
 In terms so friendly 
 Yet ye'U neglect to shaw your parts, 
 
 An' thank him kindly ! 
 
 Sae I gat paper in a blink. 
 An' down gaed stumpie in the ink : 
 Quoth I, " Before I sleep a wink, 
 
 I vow ril close it; 
 An' if ye winna mak it clink. 
 
 By Jove I'll prose it ! 
 
 ':ii^ 
 
BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 Sae I've begun to scrawl, ut whether 
 In rhyme or prose, or baith thegither. 
 Or some hotch-potch that's rightly neither, 
 Let time mak' proof; 
 But I shall scribble down some blether 
 Just clean aiF-loof. 
 
 My worthy friend, ne'er grudge an' carp, 
 Tho' fortune use you hard an' sharp ; 
 Come, kittle up your moorlaTid harp 
 
 Wi' gleesome touch ! 
 Ne'er mind how fortune waft an' warp : 
 
 She's but a b-tch. 
 
 She's gien me monie a jirt an' fleg. 
 Sin' I could striddle owre a rig ; 
 But, by the L— d, tho' I should beg 
 
 Wi' lyart pow, 
 I'll laugh, an' sing, an' shake my leg, 
 As lang's I dow ! 
 
 Now comes the sax an' twentieth simmer 
 I've seen the bud upo' the timmer, 
 Still persecuted by the limmer 
 
 Frae year to year ; 
 But yet, despite the kittle kimmer, 
 /, iJo6, am here. 
 
 Do ye envy the city Gent, 
 Behint a kist to he and sklent, 
 Or purse-proud, big wi' cent, per cent. 
 
 And muckle wame, 
 In some bit brugh to represent 
 
 A Bailie's name ? 
 
 Or is't the paughty feudal Thane, 
 Wi' ruffl'd sark an' glancin' cane, 
 Wha thinks himsel nae sheep shank bane, 
 
 But lordly stalks. 
 While caps and bonnets aff are ta'en, 
 
 As by he walks ? 
 
 " O Thou wha gies us each guid gift ! 
 Gie me o' wit an' sense a lift. 
 Then turn me, if Thou please, adrift, 
 
 Thro' Scotland wide ; 
 Wi' cits nor lairds I wadna shift. 
 
 In a' their pride I" 
 
 Were this the charter of out state, 
 " On pain o' hell be rich an' great," 
 Damnation then would be our fate, 
 
 Beyond remead ; 
 But, thanks to Heav'n ! that's no the gate 
 
 We learn our creed. 
 
 For thus tne roya\ mandate ran. 
 When first the human race began, 
 " The social, friendly, honest man, 
 Whate'er he be, 
 'Tis he fulfils great JVature''s plan. 
 
 An' none but he .'" 
 
 O mandate glorious and divine ! 
 The raggei. followers of the Nine, 
 Poor, thoughtless devils ! yet may shine 
 
 In glorious light, 
 While sordid sons of Manmion's line 
 
 Are dark as night. 
 
 Tho' here they scrape, an' squeeze, an' growl, 
 Their worthless nievefu' of a soul 
 May in some future carcase howl. 
 
 The forest's fright; 
 Or in some day-detesting owl 
 
 May shun the light. 
 
 Then may Lapraik and Bums arise. 
 To reach their native, kindred skies, 
 And sing their pleasures, hopes, an' joys, 
 
 In some mild sphere, 
 Still closer knit in friendship's tie 
 
 Each passing year. 
 
 TO W. S * * * -^ * N, 
 OCHILTREE. 
 
 May, 1785. 
 
 I GAT your letter, winsome JVillie ; 
 Wi' gratefu' heart I thank you brawUe ; 
 Tho' I maun say't, I wad be silly. 
 
 An' unco vain. 
 Should I believe my coaxin' billie, 
 
 Your flatterin strain. 
 
 But I'se believe ye kindly meant it, 
 I sud be laith to think ye hinted 
 Ironic satire, sidelin's sklented 
 
 On my poor Musie ; 
 Tho' in sic phrasin' terms ye've penn'd it 
 I scarce excuse ye. 
 
 My senses wad be in a creel 
 Should I but dare a hope to speel 
 Wi' Allan, or wi' Gilbertfield, 
 
 The braes o' fame ; 
 Or Fergusson; the writer-chiel 
 
 A deathless name. 
 
54 
 
 BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 (O Fergitsson ! thy glorious parts 
 HI suited law's dry, musty arts ! 
 My curse upon your whunstane hearts, 
 
 Ye Enbrugh Gentry ! 
 The tythe o' what ye waste at cartes, 
 
 Wad stow'd liis pantry !) 
 
 Yet when a tale comete i' my head. 
 Or lasses gie my heart a screed, 
 As whyles they're like to be my deed, 
 
 (O sad disease !) 
 I kittle up my rustic reed ; 
 
 It gies me ease. 
 
 Auld Coila now may fidge fu' fain, 
 She's gotten Poets o' her ain, 
 Chiels wha their chanters winna hain, 
 But tune their lays, 
 Till echoes a' resound again 
 
 Her weel-sung praise 
 
 Nae poet thought her worth his while. 
 To set her name in measur'd style ; 
 She lay like some unkenn'd-of isle 
 
 Beside iKeiv Holland, 
 Or whare wild-meeting oceans boil 
 
 Besouth Magellan. 
 
 Ramsay an' famous Fergnsson 
 Gied Forth an' Tay a lift aboon ; 
 Yarroiv an' Tweed to monie a tune, 
 
 Owre Scotland rings. 
 While Irwin, Lugar, Ayr, an' Doon, 
 
 Nae body sings. 
 
 Th' Illissus, Tiber, Thames, an' Seine, 
 Glide sweet in monie a tunefu' hue I 
 But, Willie, set your fit to mine. 
 
 An cock your crest, 
 We'll gar our streams and burnies shine 
 
 Up wi' the best. 
 
 We'll sing auld Coila^s pla s an' fells, 
 Her moors red-brown wi' heather bells, 
 Her banks an' braes, her dens and dells. 
 
 Where glorious Wallace 
 Aft bure the gree, as story tells, 
 
 Frae southron billies. 
 
 At Wallace'' name what Scottish blood 
 But boils up in a spring-tide flood ! 
 Oft have our fearless fathers strode 
 
 By Wallace'' side, 
 Still pressing onward, red-wat-shod. 
 
 Or glorious dy'd. 
 
 O, Sweet are Coila^s haughs an' woods, 
 When lintwhites chant amang the buds. 
 And jinkin hares, in amorous whids. 
 
 Their loves enjoy, 
 While tluro' the braes the cushat croods 
 
 With wailfu' cry ! 
 
 Ev'n winter bleak has charms for me 
 When winds rave thro' the naked tree ; 
 Or frosts on hills of Ochiltree 
 
 Are hoary gray ; 
 Or blinding drifts wild-furious flee, 
 
 Dark'ning the day ! 
 
 O Nature ! a' thy shows an' forms 
 To feeling, pensive hearts liae charms ! 
 Whether the simmer kindly warms, 
 Wi' hfe an' light. 
 Or winter howls, in gusty storms. 
 
 The lang, dark night ! 
 
 The Muse, nae poet ever fand her. 
 
 Till by himsel, he learn'd to wander, 
 
 Adown some trotting burn's meander, 
 
 An' no tliink lang ; 
 
 O sweet ! to stray, an' pensive ponder 
 
 A heart-felt sang 1 
 
 The warly race may drudge an' drive, 
 Hog-shouther, jundie, stretch, an' strive, 
 Let me fair Nature's face descrive. 
 
 And I, wi' pleasure. 
 Shall let the busy, grumbling liive 
 
 Bum owre their treasure. 
 
 Fareweel, " my rliyme-composing brither ! 
 We've been owre lang unkenn'd to ither : 
 Now let us lay our heads thegither, 
 
 In love fraternal : 
 May Envy wallop in a tether, 
 
 Black fiend, infernal I 
 
 While highlandmen hate tolls and taxes ; 
 While moorlan' herds like 'guid fat braxies : 
 While terra firma, on her axis 
 
 Diurnal turns. 
 Count on a friend, in faith an' practice. 
 
 In Robert Burns. 
 
 POSTSCRIPT. 
 
 My memory's no worth a preen ; 
 I had amaist forgotten clean, 
 Ye bade me write you what they mean 
 
 By this New-Light,* 
 'Bout wliich OUT herds sae aft hae been 
 
 Maist like to fight. 
 
 • See MOte, page 18. 
 
BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 In days when mankind were but callans 
 At grammar, logic, an' sic talents, 
 They took nae pains their speech to balance, 
 
 Or rules to gie, 
 But spak their thoughts in plain, braid lallans, 
 Like you or rae. 
 
 In thae auld times, they thought the moon, 
 Just like a sark, or pair o' shoon. 
 Wore by degrees, till lier last roon, 
 
 Gaed past their viewing. 
 An' shortly after she was done. 
 
 They gat a new one. 
 
 This past for certain, undisputed ; 
 It ne'er cam i' their heads to doubt it, 
 Till cliiels gat up an' wad confute it, 
 
 An' ca'd it wrang ; 
 An' muckle din there was about it, 
 
 Baith loud and lang. 
 
 Some herds, weel learn'd upo' the beuk. 
 Wad threap auld folk the thing misteuk ; 
 For 'twas the auld moon tum'd a neuk, 
 An' out o' sight, 
 An' backlins-comin, to the leuk, 
 
 She grew mair bright. 
 
 This was deny'd, it was affirm'd ; 
 Th« herds an' hissels were alarm'd : 
 The rev'rend gray-beards rav'd an' storm'd. 
 
 That beardless laddies 
 Should thuik they better were inform'd 
 
 Than their auld daddies. 
 
 Frae less to mair it gaed to sticks ; 
 Frae words an' aiths to clours an' nicks ; 
 An' monie a fallow gat his Ucks, 
 
 Wi' hearty crunt ; 
 An' some, to learn them for their tricks. 
 
 Were hang'd an' burnt. 
 
 This game was play'd in monie lands, 
 
 An' auld-light caddies bure sic hands, 
 
 That fejth the youngsters took the sands 
 
 Wi' nimble shanks, 
 
 The lairds forbade, by strict commands, 
 
 Sic bluidy pranks. 
 
 But new-light herds gat sic a cowe. 
 Folk thought them ruin'd stick-an'-stowe. 
 Till now amaist on ev'ry knowe, 
 
 Ye'll find ane plac'd ; 
 An' some, theur neia-light fair avow. 
 
 Just quite barefac'd. 
 
 Nae doubt the auld-light flocks are bleatin 
 Their zealous herds are vex'd an' sweatin ; 
 Mysel, I've even seen them greetin 
 
 Wi' girnin spite. 
 To hear the moon sac sadly lic'd on 
 
 By word an' write. 
 
 But shortly they will cowe the louns ! 
 Some auld-light herds in neebor towns 
 Are mind't, in things they ca' balloons. 
 
 To tak a flight, 
 An' stay a month amang the moons 
 
 An' see them right. 
 
 Guid observation they will gie them ; 
 An' when the auld moons gaun to lea'c them. 
 The hindmost shaird, they'll fetch it wi' them. 
 
 Just i' their pouch. 
 An' when the new-light billies see tliem, 
 
 I think they'll crouch I 
 
 Sae, ye observe that a' this clatter 
 Is naetliing but a " moonshine matter ;" 
 But tho' dull prose-folk Latin splatter 
 
 In logic tulzie, 
 I hope, we bardies ken some better 
 
 Than mind sic brulzie. 
 
 EPISTLE TO J. R******. 
 
 ENCLOSING SOME POEMS. 
 
 O ROUGH, rude, ready-witted R******, 
 The wale o' cocks for fun an' drinkin '. 
 There's raony godly folks are thuikin, 
 
 Your dreams* an' tricks 
 Will send you, Korah-like, a-sinkin, 
 
 Strauglit to auld Nick's, 
 
 Ye hae sae monie cracks an' cants, 
 And in your wicked drucken rants, 
 Ye mak a devil o' the saunts, 
 
 An' fill them fou ; 
 And then their failings, flaws, an' wants, 
 Are a' seen thro'. 
 
 Hypocrisy, in mercy spare it ! 
 That holy robe, O dinna tear it ! 
 Spare 't for their sakcs wlia aften wear it. 
 
 The lads in WacA; / 
 But your curst wit, when it comes near it. 
 Hives 't aff their back. 
 
 Think, wicked smncr, wha ye're skaithing. 
 Its just the blue-gown badge an' claithing 
 O' samits ; tak that, ye lea'e them naefhing 
 
 To ken them by, 
 Frae ony unregenerate heathen 
 
 Like you or I. 
 
 • A certain liunion)us dream of his was then making 
 a noise in the country-side. 
 
56 
 
 BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 I're sent you home Bome rhyming ware, 
 A' that I bargain'd for an' mair ; 
 Sae, when ye hae an hour to spare, 
 
 I will expect 
 Yon sang,* ye'll sen't wi' cannie care, 
 
 And no neglect. 
 
 Tho' faith, sma' heart hae I to sing ! 
 My muse dow scarcely spread her wing ! 
 I've play'd mysel a bonnie spring, 
 
 An' danc'd my fill 
 I'd better gane an' sair'd the king, 
 
 At Bunker's Hill. 
 
 'Twas ae night lately in my fun, 
 I gaed a roving wi' the gun, 
 An' brought a paitrick to the grun, 
 
 A bonnie hen, 
 And, as the twilight was begun. 
 
 Thought nane wad ken. 
 
 The poor wee thing was little hurt ; 
 I straikit it a wee for sport. 
 Ne'er thinkin they wad fash me for't ; 
 
 But, deil-ma-care ! 
 Somebody tells the poacher-court 
 
 The hale affair. 
 
 Some auld us'd hands had ta'en a note, 
 That sic a hen had got a shot ; 
 I was suspected for the plot ; 
 
 I scorn'd to he ; 
 So gat the whissle o' my groat. 
 
 An' pay't the/ce. 
 
 But, by my gun, o' gims the wale, 
 An' by my pouther an' my hail. 
 An' by my hen, an' by her tail, 
 
 I vow an' swear ! 
 The game shall pay o'er moor an' dale. 
 
 For this, niest year. 
 
 As soon's the clockin-time is by, 
 An' the wee pouts begun to cry, 
 L — d, I'cie hae sportin by an' by. 
 
 For my gowd guinea : 
 Tho' I should herd the buckskin kye 
 
 For't in Virginia, v 
 
 Trowth, they had rauckle for to blame ! 
 'Twas neither broken wing nor limb, 
 But twa-three draps about tlie wame 
 
 Scarce tluo' the feathers ; 
 An' baith a yellow George to claim. 
 
 An' thole their blethers ! 
 
 It pita me ay as mad's a hare ; 
 So I can rhyme nor write nae mair ; 
 
 * A tong h« had promiBed the Author. 
 
 But pennyworths again is fair. 
 
 When time's expedient i 
 Meanwhile I am, respected Sir, 
 
 Your most obedient. 
 
 JOHN BARLEYCORN * 
 
 A BALLAD. 
 I. 
 
 There were three kings into the east. 
 Three kings both great and liigh. 
 
 An' they hae sworn a solemn oath 
 John Barleycorn should die. 
 
 II. 
 
 They took a plough and plough'd him down, 
 
 Put clods upon his head. 
 And they hae sworn a solemn oath 
 
 Jolm Barleycorn was dead. 
 
 III. 
 
 But the cheerfu] spring came kindly on 
 
 And showr's began to fall ; 
 John Barleycorn got up again. 
 
 And sore surprised them all. 
 
 IV. 
 
 The sidtry suns of summer came. 
 
 And he grew thick and stroni^, 
 His head weel arm'd wi' pointed spears, 
 
 That no one should him wronof. 
 
 The sober autumn enter'd mild 
 Wlien he grew wan and pale ; 
 
 His bendmg joints and drooping head 
 Show'd he began to fail. 
 
 VI. 
 
 His colour sicken'd more and more, 
 
 He faded into age ; 
 And then Ms enemies began 
 
 To show tlieir deadly rage. 
 
 vn. 
 
 They've ta'en a weapon long and sharp, 
 
 And cut him by the knee ; 
 Then ty'd him fast upon a cart, 
 
 Like a rogue for forgerie. 
 
 • This is partly composed on the plan of an old son^} 
 known by the isine name, 
 
BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 57 
 
 vni. 
 
 They laid liim down upon his back, 
 And cudgeird him full sore ; 
 
 They hung him up before the storm, 
 And turn'd him o'er and o'er. 
 
 IX. 
 
 They filled up a darksome pit 
 With water to the brim, 
 
 They heaved in John Barleycorn, 
 There let him sink or swim. 
 
 X. 
 
 They laid him out upon the floor. 
 To work him farther wo, 
 
 And still, as signs of life appear'd, 
 They toss'd him to and fro. 
 
 XL 
 
 They wasted, o'er a scorcliing flame. 
 
 The marrow of his bones ; 
 But a miller us'd him worst of all. 
 
 For he crush'd him between two stones. 
 
 XII. 
 
 And they hae ta'en his very heart's blood. 
 And drank it round and round ; 
 
 And still the more and more they drank, 
 Their joy did more abound. 
 
 XIII. 
 
 John Barleycorn was a hero bold, 
 
 Of noble enterprise. 
 For if you do but taste his blood, 
 
 'Twill make your courage rise. 
 
 XIV. 
 
 'Twill make a man forget his wo ; 
 
 'Twill heighten all his joy : 
 'Twill make the widow's heart to sing, 
 
 Tho' the tear were in her eye. 
 
 XV. 
 
 Then let us toast John Barleycorn, 
 Each man a glass in hand ; 
 
 And may his great posterity 
 Ne'er fail in old Scotland 1 
 E2 
 
 A FRAGMENT. 
 
 Tune—" Gillicrankie." 
 
 When Guilford good our pilot stood, 
 
 And did our helm thraw, man, 
 Ae night, at tea, began a plea. 
 
 Within America, man : 
 Then up they gat the maskin-pat, 
 
 And in the sea did jaw, man ; 
 An' did nae less, in full congress. 
 
 Than quite refuse our law, man. 
 
 II. 
 
 Then thro' the lakes Montgomery takes, 
 
 I wat he was na slaw, man ; 
 Down Loivries burn he took a turn, 
 
 And Carleton did ca', man : 
 But yet, what reck, he, at Quebec, 
 
 Montgomery-like did fa', man, 
 Wi' sword in hand, before his band, 
 
 Amang his en'mies a', man. 
 
 m. 
 
 Poor Tammy Gage, within a cage 
 
 Was kept at Boston ha, man ; 
 Till Willk Howe took o'er the knowe 
 
 For Philaddphia, man : 
 Wi' sword an' gun he thought a sin 
 
 Guid christian blood to draw, man ; 
 But at Kew-Yorh, wi' knife an' fork. 
 
 Sir-loin he hacked sma', man. 
 
 IV. 
 
 Burgoyne gaed up, like r-pur an' whip, 
 
 Till Frascr brave did fa', man ; 
 Then lost his way, ae misty day. 
 
 In Saratoga shaw, man. 
 CornwalHs fought as lang's he dought. 
 
 An' did the buckskins claw, man ; 
 But Clintons glaive frae rust to save, 
 
 He hung it to the wa', man, 
 
 Then Montague, an' Guilford too. 
 
 Began to fear a fa', man ; 
 And Sackvitle doure, wlia stood the stoure, 
 
 The German chief to thraw, man : 
 For Paddy Burke, like ony Turk, 
 
 Nae mercy had at a', man ; 
 And Charlie Fox threw by the box, 
 
 An' lows'd his tinkler jaw man. 
 
58 
 
 BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 VI. 
 
 Then Rockingham took up the game ; 
 
 Till death did on him ca', man ; 
 When Shelbume meek held up his cheek, 
 
 Conform to gospel law, man ; 
 Saint Stephen's boys, wi' jarring noise, 
 
 They did his measures thraw, man, 
 For Xorih an' Fox united stocks, 
 
 An' bore hun to the wa', man. 
 
 vn. 
 
 Then clubs an' hearts were Charlie's cartes, 
 
 He swept the stakes awa', man, 
 Till the diamond's ace, of Indian race, 
 
 Led him a sah faux pas, man : 
 The Saxon lads, wi' loud placads, 
 
 On Chatharn's boy did ca', man ; 
 An' Scotland drew her pipe an' blew, 
 
 " Up, Willie, waur them a', man !" 
 
 VIII. 
 
 Behind the throne then Grenville's gone, 
 
 A secret word or twa, man ; 
 While slee Dundas arous'd the class 
 
 Be-north the Roman wa', man : 
 An' Chatham's wraith, in heavenly graith, 
 
 (Inspired bardies saw, man) 
 Wi' kindling eyes cry'd, " JVillie, rise I 
 
 Would I hae fear'd them a', man ?" 
 
 IX. 
 
 But, word an' blow, J^orth, Fox, and Co. 
 
 GowfF'd Willie like a ba,' man. 
 Till Suthron raise, and coost their claise 
 
 Behind Mm in a raw, man ; 
 An' Caledon threw by the drone, 
 
 An' did her whittle draw, man ; 
 An' swoor fii' rude, thro' dirt an' blood 
 
 To make it guid in law man. 
 
 SONG. 
 
 Tune — ^" Corn rigs are bonnie." 
 I. 
 
 It was upon a Lammas night. 
 
 When corn rigs are bonnie, 
 Beneath the moon's unclouded light, 
 
 I held awa to Annie : 
 The time flew by wi' tentless heed. 
 
 Till 'tween the late and early ; 
 Wi' siiia' persuasion she agreed. 
 
 To see me tliro' the barley. 
 
 IL 
 
 The sky was blue, the wind was still, 
 
 The moon was shining clearly ; 
 I set her down, wi' right good will, 
 
 Amang the rigs o' barley : 
 I kenn't her heart was a' my ain ; 
 
 I lov'd her most sincerely ; 
 I kiss'd her owre aiid owre again 
 
 Amang the rigs o' barley. 
 
 ra. 
 
 I lock'd her in my fond embrace ; 
 
 Her heart was beating rarely : 
 My blessuigs on that happy place, 
 
 Amang the rigs o' barley ! 
 But by the moon and stars so bright, 
 
 That shone that hour so clearly 
 She ay shall bless that happy night, 
 
 Amang the rigs o' barley. 
 
 VI. 
 
 I hae been blythe wi' comrades dear; 
 
 I hae been merry drinkin ; 
 I hae been joyfu' gathrin gear ; 
 
 I hae been happy thinkm : 
 But a' the pleasures e'er I saw, 
 
 Tho' three times doubled fairly. 
 That happy night was worth them a', 
 _ Amang the rigs o' barley. 
 
 Corn ngs, an' barley -rigs. 
 An' com rigs are Bonnie : 
 
 I'll ne'er forget that happy night, 
 Amang the rigs wi' Annie. 
 
 'song. 
 
 COMPOSED IN AUGUST. 
 
 TuNK — " I had a horse I had nae mair." 
 
 I. 
 
 Now westlin winds, and slaught'ring guns 
 
 Bring autumn's pleasant weather ; 
 The moorcock sprmgs, on whirring wings, 
 
 Amang the blooming heather ; 
 Now waving grain, wide o'er the plain, 
 
 DeUghts the weary farmer ; [night. 
 
 And the moon shines bright, when I rove at 
 
 To muse upon my charmer. 
 
 II. 
 
 The partridge loves the fruitful fells ; 
 
 The plover loves the mountains ; 
 Tlie woodcock haunts the lonely dells ; 
 
 The soaring hern the fountains : 
 
BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 59 
 
 Thro' lofty groves the cushat roves, 
 The path of man to shun it ; 
 
 The hazel bush o'erhangs the thrush, 
 The spreading thorn the linnet. 
 
 III. 
 
 Thus ev'ry kind their pleasure find. 
 
 The savage and the tender ; 
 Some social join, and leagues combine; 
 
 Some solitary wander : 
 Avaunt, away ! the cruel sway, 
 
 Tyrannic man's dominion ; 
 The sportsman's joy, the murd'ring cry, 
 
 The flutt'ring, gory pinion ! 
 
 IV. 
 
 But Peggy dear, the ev'ning's clear, 
 
 Thick flies the skimming swallow ; 
 The sky is blue, the fields in view. 
 
 All fading-green and yellow : 
 Come let us stray our gladsome way, 
 
 And view the charms of nature ; 
 The rustling corn, the fruited thorn. 
 
 And every happy creature. 
 
 We'll gently walk, and sweetly talk, 
 
 Till the silent moon shine clearly ; 
 I'll grasp thy waist, and, fondly prest, 
 
 Swear how I love thee dearly : 
 Not vernal show'rs to budding flow'rs. 
 
 Not autum to the farmer, 
 So dear can be as thou to me. 
 
 My fair, my lovely charmer.' 
 
 SONG. 
 
 Tune—" My Nannie, O." 
 
 Behind yon hills where Lugar* flows, 
 'Mang moors and mosses many, O, 
 
 The wintry sun the day has clos'd. 
 And I'll awa to Nannie, O. 
 
 n. 
 
 The westlin wind blaws loud an' shill ; 
 
 The night's baith mirk an' rainy, O ; 
 But rn get my plaid, an' out I'll steal, 
 
 An' owre the liills to Nannie, O. 
 
 • Origiiianj', Slinchar 
 
 III. 
 
 My Nannie's charming, sweet, an' young ; 
 
 Nae artfa' wiles to win ye, O : 
 May ill befa' the flattering tongue 
 
 That wad beguile my Nannie, O. 
 
 IV. 
 
 Her face is fair, her heart is true. 
 As spotless as she's bonnie, O : 
 
 The op'ning gowan, wet wi' dew, 
 Nae purer is than Nannie, O. 
 
 V. 
 
 A coimtry lad is my degree. 
 
 An' few there be that ken me, O ; 
 
 But what care I how ievr they be, 
 I'm welcome ay to Narmie, O. 
 
 VI. 
 
 My riches a' 's my penny-fee. 
 An' I maun guide it cannio, O ; 
 
 But v^arl's gear ne'er troubles me, 
 My thoughts are a' my Nannie, O. 
 
 vn. 
 
 Our auld Guidman delights to view 
 His sheep an' kye thrive bonnie, O ; 
 
 But I'm as blythe that hands liis pie ugh, 
 An' has nae care but Nanrtie, O. 
 
 VIII. 
 
 Come weel, come wo, I care na by, 
 I'll tak what Heav'n will sen' me, O ; 
 
 Nae ither care in life have I, 
 
 But live, an' love my Nannie, O. 
 
 GREEN GROW THE RASHES. 
 
 A FRAGMENT. 
 
 Green grow /he rashe,^^ O .' 
 Green grow the rashes, O ! 
 
 The sweetest hours that e'er I spend. 
 Art spent amang (he lasses, O .' 
 
 I. 
 
 There's nought but care on ev'ry han'. 
 
 In ev'ry hour that passes, O ; 
 What signifies the lifco' man. 
 
 An' 'twere na for the lasses, O. 
 
 Green grail, tc. 
 
60 
 
 BURNS' POEMS 
 
 II. 
 
 The warly race may riches chase, 
 An' riches still may fly them, O ; 
 
 An' tho' at last they catch them fast, 
 Their hearts can ne'er enjoy them, O. 
 
 Green grow, Sec. 
 
 III. 
 
 But gie me a canny hour at e'en, 
 
 My arms about my dearie, O ; 
 An' warly cares, an' warly men. 
 
 May a' gae tapsalteerie, O ! 
 
 Green scrow., &c. 
 
 IV 
 
 For you sae douse, ye sneer at this, 
 Ye'er nought but senseless asses, O : 
 
 The wisest man the warl' e'er saw. 
 He dearly lov'd the lasses, O. 
 
 Green grou\ &c. 
 
 Auld Nature swears, the lovely dears 
 Her noblest work she classes, O : 
 
 Her 'prentice han' she try'd on man. 
 An' then she made the lasses, O. 
 
 Gree7i grow, &c 
 
 SONG. 
 
 Tune—" Jockey's Grey Brecks.= 
 
 Again rejoicing nature sees 
 
 Her robe assume its vernal hues, 
 
 Her leafy locks wave in the breeze, 
 All freshly steep'd in mornmg dews. 
 
 CHORUS.* 
 
 And maun 1 still on Menief doat, 
 And bear the scorn thafs in her tt? 
 
 For it's jet, jet black, an' it's hke a hawk. 
 An' it winna let a body be .' 
 
 In vain to me the cowslips blaw. 
 
 In vain to me the vi'lets sprmg; 
 In vain to me, in glen or shaw. 
 
 The mavis and the lintwhite sing. 
 
 And maun I still. See. 
 
 • This chorus IS p:. rt of a s..np composed by a gentleman 
 in Edinbiirch, a particular friend of the author's, 
 t Mriiu is ihi' I .'iiimon alilir<;vialiou o{ .Mariamnc, 
 
 in. 
 
 The merry ploughboy cheers his team^ 
 Wi' joy the tentie seedsman stalks, 
 
 But life to me 's a weary dream, 
 A dream of ane-that never wauks. 
 
 And maun I still. Sec. 
 
 IV. 
 
 The wanton coot the water skims, 
 Amang the reeds the ducklmgs cry, 
 
 The stately swan majestic swims, 
 And every thing is blest but I. 
 
 And maun I still, Sec 
 
 The sheep-herd steeks his faulding slap, 
 And owre the moorlands whistles shUl, 
 
 Wi' wild, unequal, wand'ring step 
 I met him on the dewy hill. 
 
 And maun I still, &e , 
 
 VI. 
 
 And when the lark, 'tween light and dark, 
 Blythe waukens by the daisy's side. 
 
 And mounts and sings on flittering wings, 
 A wo-worn ghaist I hameward glide. 
 
 And maun I still. Sec. 
 
 vn. 
 
 Come, Wmter, with thine angry howl. 
 And raging bend the naked tree ; 
 
 Thy gloom will soothe my cheerless soul. 
 When nature all is sad like me I 
 
 Aiid maun I still on Menie doat. 
 
 And bear the scorn that's in her e'e ? 
 
 For it's jet, jet black, an' it's like a hawk. 
 An' it winna let a body be.* 
 
 SONG 
 
 Tone—" Roslin .Castle." 
 
 I. 
 
 The gloomy night is gath'ring fast, 
 Loud roars the wild inconstant blast, 
 Yon murky cloud is foul with rain, 
 I see it driving o'er the plain ; 
 
 "•We cannot presume to alter any of the poems of 
 our bard, and more especially those priated under his 
 own direction ; yet it is to be regretted that this chorus, 
 which is not of bis own composition, should be at- 
 tached to these fine stanzas, as it perpetually interrupts 
 the train of sentiment which they excite. E. 
 
BURNS' I'OEMS. 
 
 The hunter now has left the moor, 
 The scatter'd coveys meet secure, 
 While here I wander, prest with care. 
 Along the lonely banks of Ayr. 
 
 II. 
 
 The Autumn mourns her rip'ning corn 
 By early Winter's ravage torn ; 
 Across her placid, azure sky, 
 She sees the scowling tempest fly ; 
 Chill runs my blood to hear it rave, 
 I think upon the stormy wave, 
 Where many a danger I must dare, 
 Far from the bonnie banks of A'lfr. 
 
 III. 
 
 'Tis not the surging billow's roar, 
 'Tis not that fatal deadly shore ; 
 Tho' death in every shape appear, 
 Tlie wretched have no more to fear : 
 IJut round my heart the ties are bound, 
 That heart transpierc'd with many a wound ; 
 Tliese bleed afresh, those ties I tear, 
 To leave the bonnie banks of Ayr. 
 
 IV. 
 
 Farewell, old Coila's hills and dales. 
 Her heathy moors and winding vales ; 
 The scenes where wretched fancy roves, 
 Pursuing past, unhappy loves ! 
 I'arewell, my friends ! Farewell, my foes ! 
 My peace with these, my love with those — 
 The bursting tears my heart declare, 
 I'arevvell the bonnie banks of Ayr. 
 
 SONP. 
 
 Tune — " Guilderoy," 
 I. 
 
 From thee, Eliza, I must go. 
 
 And from my native shore ; 
 The cruel fates between us throw 
 
 A boundless ocean's roar : 
 But boundless oceans, roaruig wide. 
 
 Between my love and me, 
 They never, never can divide 
 
 My heart and soul from thee. 
 
 II. 
 
 Farewell, farewell, Eliza dear, 
 
 The maid that I adore ! 
 A boding voice is in mine ear. 
 
 We part to meet no more I 
 
 But the last throb that leaves my heart, 
 While death stands victor by, 
 
 That throb, Eliza, is thy part, 
 And thine the latest sigh ! 
 
 THE FAREWELL 
 
 BRETHREN OF ST. JAMES'S LODGE, 
 
 TARBOLTON. 
 
 Tone—" Good night and joy be wi' you a' 
 
 Adieu ! a heart-warm, fond adieu ! 
 
 Dear brothers of the mystic tye .' 
 Ye favour'd, ye enlighten'd few. 
 
 Companions of my social joy ! 
 Tho' I to foreign lands must lue, 
 
 Pursuing Fdttune's slidd'ry ba', 
 With meltmg heart, and brimful eye, 
 
 I'll mind you still, tho' far awa.' 
 
 n. 
 
 Oft have I met your social band, 
 
 And spent the cheerful, festive night ; 
 Oft, honour'd with supreme command, 
 
 Presided o'er the sons of light : 
 And by that hieroglyphic bright. 
 
 Which none but craftsmen ever saw ! 
 Strong mem'ry on my heart shall write 
 
 Those happy scenes when far awa.' 
 
 in. 
 
 May freedom, harmony, and love, 
 
 Unite us in the grand design. 
 Beneath th' omniscient eye above. 
 
 The glorious architect divine ! 
 That you may keep th' unerring line. 
 
 Still rising by the plummet' s law, 
 Till order bright completely shine. 
 
 Shall be my pray'r when far awa'. 
 
 IV. 
 
 And you farewell ! whose merits claim, 
 
 Justly, that highest badge to wear ! 
 Heav'n bless your honour'd, noble name, 
 
 To Masonry and Scotia dear I 
 A last request permit me here, 
 
 When yearly ye assemble a'. 
 One round, I ask it with a tear. 
 
 To liim, the Bard that's far awa\ 
 
6i 
 
 BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 SONG. 
 
 TuNK — " Prepare, my dear brethren, to the 
 Tavern let's fly." 
 
 I. 
 
 No churchman am I for to rail and to write, 
 No statesman nor soldier to plot or to fight, 
 No sly man of business contriving a snare. 
 For a big-belly 'd bottle's the whole of my care. 
 
 II. 
 
 The peer I don't envy, I give him his bow ; 
 I scorn not the peasant, though ever so low ; 
 But a club of good fellows, hke those that are 
 
 here. 
 And a bottle like this, are my glory and care. 
 
 lU. 
 
 Here passes the squire on his brother — his 
 
 horse ; 
 There centum per centum, the cit, with his 
 
 purse; 
 But see you the Crown how it waves in the air, 
 There, a big-belly 'd bottle still ceases my care. 
 
 IV. 
 
 The wife of my bosom, alas ! she did die ; 
 For sweet consolation to church I did fly ; 
 I found that old Solomon proved it fair, j 
 
 That a big-belly'd bottle's a cure for all care. * 
 
 V. 
 
 I once was persuaded a venture to make ; 
 A letter inform'd me that all was to wreck ; — 
 But the pursy old landlord just waddled up 
 
 stairs. 
 With a glorious bottle that ended my cares. 
 
 VI. 
 
 * Life's cares they are comforts,"* — a maxim 
 
 laid down 
 By the bard, what d'ye call him that wore the 
 
 black gown ; 
 And faith I agree with th' old prig to a hair ; 
 For a big-belly'd bottle's a heav'n of care. 
 
 A Stanza added in a Mason Lodge. 
 
 Then fill up a bumper and make it o'erflow, 
 And honours masonic prepare for to tlu'ow ; 
 May every true brother of the compass and 
 
 square 
 Have a big-belly'd bottle when harass'd with 
 
 care. 
 
 • Young's Night Thoughts. 
 
 WRITTEN ; 
 
 FRIARS-CARSE HERMITAGE, 
 
 ON NITH-SIDE. 
 
 Thou whom chance may hither leady— 
 Be thou clad in russet weed, 
 Be thou deckt in silken stole. 
 Grave these counsels on thy soul. 
 
 Life is but a day at most, 
 Sprung from night, in darkness lost ; 
 Hope not sunshine ev'ry hour. 
 Fear not clouds will always lower. 
 
 As youth and love with sprightly daticet 
 Beneath thy morning star advance, 
 Pleasure with her siren air 
 May delude the thoughtless pair ; 
 Let prudence bless enjoyment's cup, 
 Then raptur'd sip, and sip it up. 
 
 As thy day grows warm and high, 
 Life's meridian flaming nigh. 
 Dost thou spurn the humble vale ? 
 Life's proud summit wouldst thou scale ? 
 Check thy climbing step, elate, 
 Evils lurk in felon wait : 
 Dangers, eagle-pinion'd, bold, 
 Soar around each cliffy hold. 
 While cheerful peace, with linnet song, 
 Chants the lowly dells among. 
 
 As the shades of ev'ning close, 
 Beck'ning thee to long repose ; 
 As life itself becomes disease, 
 Seek the chimney-neuk of ease. 
 There ruminate with sober thought. 
 On all thou'st seen, and heard, and wrought ; 
 And teach the sportive younkers round. 
 Saws of experience, sage and sound. 
 Say, man's true, genuine estimate, 
 The grand criterion of liis fate. 
 Is not, Art thou so high or low .•" 
 Did thy fortime ebb or flow ? 
 Did many talents gild thy span? 
 Or frugal nature grudge thee one ? 
 Tell them, and press it on their mind, 
 As thou thyself must shortly find. 
 The smile or frown of awful Heav' 
 To virtue or to vice is giv'n. 
 Say, to be just, and kind, and wise. 
 There solid self-enjoyment hes ; 
 That foolish, selfish, faithless ways, 
 Lead to the \vretched, vile, and base. 
 
 Thus resign'd and quiet, creep 
 To the bed of lasting sleep ; 
 Sleep, whence thou shalt ne'er awake, 
 Night, where dawn shall never break. 
 
BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 63 
 
 Till future life, future no more, 
 To light and joy the good restore. 
 To light and joy unknown before. 
 
 Stranger, go ! Heav'n be thy guide ! 
 Quod the beadsman of Nith-side. 
 
 ODE, 
 
 SACRED TO THE MEMORY OP 
 
 MRS. 
 
 OF 
 
 Dweller in yon dungeon dark, 
 Hangman of creation ! mark 
 Who in widow-weeds appears. 
 Laden with unhonour'd years. 
 Noosing with care a bursting purse, 
 Baited with many a deadly curse I 
 
 View the wither'd beldam's face — 
 Can thy keen inspection trace 
 Aught of "humanity's sweet, melting grace ! 
 Note that eye, 'tis rheum o'erflows, 
 Pity's floodthere never rose. 
 See those hands, ne'er stretch'd to save, 
 Hands that took — but never gave. 
 . Keeper of Mammon's iron chest, 
 Lo, there she goes, unpitied and unblest 
 She goes, but not to realms of everlasting rest I 
 
 ANTISTROPHE. 
 
 Plunderer of armies, lift thine eyes, 
 (A while forbear, ye tort'ring fiends,) 
 Seest thou whose step unwilling hither bends 
 
 No fallen angel, hurl'd from upper skies; 
 'Tis thy trusty quondam male, 
 Doom'd to share tiiy fiery fate. 
 
 She, tardy, hell-ward plies. 
 
 And are they of no more avail. 
 Ten thousand glitt'ring pounds a year ? 
 
 In other worlds can Mammon foil. 
 Omnipotent as he is here ? 
 O, bitter mock'ry of the pompmis bier. 
 While down the wretched vital part is driv'n ! 
 
 The cave-lodg'd beggar, with a conscience 
 clear. 
 Expires in rags unknown, and goes to 
 Heav'n. 
 
 ELEGY 
 
 CAPT. MATTHEW HENDERSON 
 
 A GENTLEMAN WHO HELD THE PATENT FOR HIS 
 HONOURS IMMEDIATELY FROM ALMIGHTY GOD. 
 
 But now his radiant course is run, 
 For Matthew's course was bright ; 
 
 His soul was like the glorious sun, 
 A matchless, Heav'nly Light ! 
 
 O DEATH ! thou tyrant fell and bloody ! 
 The meikle devil wi' a woodie 
 Haurl thee hame to his black smiddie, 
 
 O'er hurcheon hides, 
 And like stock-fish come o'er his studdie 
 Wi'f^y auld sides ! 
 
 He's gane, he's gane ! he's frae us torn, 
 The ae best fellow e'er was bom ! 
 Thee, Matthew, Nature's sel shall mourn 
 
 By wood and wild, 
 Where, haply, pity strays forlorn, • 
 
 Frae man exil'd. 
 
 Ye hills, near neebors o' the stams. 
 That proudly cock your cresting cairns ! 
 Ye cliiFs, the haunts of sailing yearns. 
 
 Where echo slumbers ! 
 Come join, ye Nature's sturdiest bairns. 
 My wailing numbers ! 
 
 Mourn, ilk a grove the cushat kens I 
 Ye haz'lly shaws and briery dens ! 
 Ye bumies, whimplin down your glens, 
 
 Wi' toddlin din. 
 Or foaming strang, wi, hasty stens, 
 Frae lin to lin. 
 
 Mourn little harebells o'er tlie lee ; 
 Ye stately foxgloves fair to see ; 
 Ye woodbines hanging bonnilie. 
 
 In scented bow'rs ; 
 Ye roses on your thorny tree, 
 
 The first o' flow'rs. 
 
 At dawn, when ev'ry grassy blade 
 Droops with a diamond at his head. 
 At ev'n, when beans their fragrance shed, 
 
 I' th' rustling gale, 
 Ye maukins whiddin tliro' the glade. 
 Come join my wail-. 
 
 Mourn, ye wee songsters o' the wood ; 
 Ye grouse that crap the heather bud ; 
 Ye curlews calling thro' a clud ; 
 
 Ye whistUng plover ; 
 And mourn, ye whirring paitrick brood ; 
 He's gane for ever I 
 
64 
 
 BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 Mourn, sooty coots, and speckled teals, 
 Ye fisher herons, watching eels ; 
 Ye duck and drake, wi' airy wheels 
 
 Circling the lake ; 
 Ye bitterns, till the quagmire reels, 
 
 Rair for his sake. 
 
 Mourn, clam'ring craiks at close o' day, 
 'Mang fields o' flowr'ing clover gay ; 
 And when ye wing your annual way 
 
 Frae our cauld shore, 
 Tell thae far warlds, wha lies in clay, 
 Wham we deplore. 
 
 Ye houlets, frae your ivy bow'r. 
 In some auld tree, or eldritch tow'r, 
 What time the moon, vvi' silent glow'r, 
 
 Sets up her horn, 
 Wail thro' the dreary midnight hour 
 
 Till waukrife morn ! 
 
 O rivers, forests, hills, and plains ! 
 
 Oft have ye heard my canty strains : 
 
 But now, what else for me remains 
 
 But tales of wo ; 
 
 Aiidfrae my een the drapping rains 
 
 ip Maun ever flow. 
 
 Mourn, spring, thou darling of the year i 
 nk cowslip cup shall kep a tear : 
 Thou, simmer, while each corny spear 
 Shoots up its head. 
 Thy gay, green, flow'ry tresses shear, 
 
 For him that's dead ! 
 
 Thou, autumn, wi' thy yellow hair, 
 In grief thy sallow mantle tear ! 
 Thou, winter, hurling thro' the air 
 
 The roaring blast, 
 Wide o'er the naked world declare 
 
 The worth we've lost I 
 
 Mourn him, thou sun, great source of light ! 
 Mourn, empress of tlie silent night ! 
 And you, ye twinkling starnies, bright, 
 
 My Matthew mourn ! 
 For tliro' your orbs he's ta'en his flight, 
 
 Ne'er to return. 
 
 O Henderson ; the man ! the brother ! 
 And art thou gone, and gone for ever ! 
 And hast thou crost that unknown river. 
 Life's dreary bound I 
 Like thee, where shall I find another, 
 The world around ! 
 
 Go to your sculptur'd tombs, ye Great, 
 In a' the tinsel trash o' state '. 
 
 But by the honest turf I'll wait, 
 
 Thou man of worth ! 
 
 And weep the ae best fellow's fate 
 E'er lay in earth. 
 
 THE EPITAPH. 
 
 Stop, passenger ! my story's brief; 
 
 And truth I shall relate, man ; 
 I tell nae common tale o' grief, 
 
 For Matthew was a great man. 
 
 If thou uncommon merit hast. 
 
 Yet spurn'd at fortune's door, man ; 
 
 A look of pity hither cast, 
 
 For Matthew was a poor man. 
 
 If thou a noble sodger art. 
 
 That passest by this grave, man. 
 
 There moulders iiere a gallant heart; 
 For Matthew was a brave man. 
 
 If thou on men, their works and ways, 
 Canst throw uncommon light, man ; 
 
 Here lies wha weel had won thy praise. 
 For Matthew was a bright man. 
 
 if thou at friendship's sacred ca' 
 Wad life itself resign, man ; 
 
 Thy sympathetic tear maun fa,' 
 For Matthew was a kind man I 
 
 If thou art staunch without a stain, 
 Like the unchanging blue, man ; 
 
 This was a kinsman o' thy ain. 
 For Matthew was a true man. 
 
 If thou hast wit, and fun, and fire, 
 And ne'er guid wine did fear, man ; 
 
 This was thy billie, dam, and sire, 
 For Matthew was a queer man. 
 
 If ony whiggish whingin sot, 
 
 To blame poor Matthew dare, man ; 
 
 May dool and sorrow be his lot, 
 For Matthew was a rare man. 
 
 LAMENT 
 
 OP 
 
 MARY, QUEEN OF SCOTS, 
 
 ON THE APPROACH OF SPRING. 
 
 Now nature hangs her mantle green 
 On every blooming tree, 
 
BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 65 
 
 And spreads her sheets o daisies white 
 
 Out o'er the grassy lea : 
 Now Phoebus cheers the crystal streams, 
 
 And glads the azure skies ; 
 But nought can glad the weary wight 
 
 That fast in durance hes. 
 
 Now lav'rocks wake the merry mom, 
 
 Aloft on dewy wing ; 
 The merle, in his noontide bow'r, 
 
 Makes woodland echoes ring ; 
 The mavis mild, wi' many a note, 
 
 Sings drowsy day to rest : 
 In love and freedom they rejoice, 
 
 Wi' care nor tlirall opprest. 
 
 Now blooms the lily by the bank. 
 
 The primrose down the brae ; 
 The hawthorn 's budding in the glen, 
 
 And milk-white is the slae : 
 The meanest hind in fair Scotland 
 
 May rove their sweets amang ; 
 Rut I, the Queen of a' Scotland, 
 
 Maon lie in prison Strang. 
 
 I was the Queen o' bonnie France, 
 
 Where happy I hae been ; 
 Fu' hghtly raise I in the mom. 
 
 As blythe lay down at e'en : 
 And I'm the sovereign of Scotland, 
 
 And mony a traitor there ; 
 Yet here I lie in foreign 
 
 And never ending carie. 
 
 But as for thee, thou false woman. 
 
 My sister and my fae. 
 Grim vengeance, yet shall whet a sword 
 
 That thro' thy soul shall gae : 
 The weeping blood in woman's breast 
 
 Was never known to thee ; 
 Nor th' balm that draps on wounds of wo 
 
 Frae woman's pitying e'e. 
 
 My son ! my son ! may kinder stars 
 
 Upon thy fortune shine ; 
 And may those pleasures gild thy reign. 
 
 That ne'er wad blink on mine ! 
 God keep tliee frae thy mother's faes, 
 
 Or turn their hearts to thee : 
 And where thou meet'st thy mother's friend. 
 
 Remember hun for me I 
 
 O ! soon, to me, may summer-suns 
 
 Nae mair light up the morn I 
 Nae mair, to me, the autumn winds 
 
 Wave o'er the yellow corn ! 
 And in the narrow house o' death 
 
 Let winter round me rave ; 
 And the next flow'rs that deck the spring. 
 
 Bloom on my peaceful grave ! 
 
 TO ROBERT GRAHAM, Esq.., 
 
 Late crippl'd of an arm, and now a leg, 
 About to beg a pass for leave to beg ; 
 Dull, hstless, teas'd, dejected, and deprest, 
 (Nature is adverse to a cripple's rest :) 
 Will generous Graliam list to his Poet's wail ? 
 (It soothes poor misery, heark'ning to her tale,) 
 And hear him curse the light he first survey 'd. 
 And doubly curse the luckless rhyming trade .' 
 
 Thou, Nature, partial Nature, I arraign ; 
 Of thy caprice maternal I complain. 
 The lion and the bull thy care have found. 
 One shakes the forests, and one spurns the 
 
 ground : 
 Thou giv'st the ass his hide, the snail his shell, 
 Th' envenom'd wasp, victorious guards his 
 
 ceU.— 
 Thy minions, kings, defend, control, devour, 
 In all th' omnipotence of rule and power. — 
 Foxes and statesmen, subtile wiles ensure ; 
 The cit and polecat stink, and are secure. 
 Toads with their poison, doctors with their 
 
 drug. 
 The priest and hedgehog in their robes are 
 
 snug. 
 Ev'n silly woman has her warhke arts. 
 Her tongue and eyes, her dreaded spear and 
 
 darts. 
 
 But Oh ! thou bitter sfep-mother and hard, 
 To thy poor, fenceless, naked child — the Bard ! 
 A thing unteachable in world's skill, 
 And half an idiot too, more helpless still. 
 No heels to bear him from the op'ning dun; 
 No claws to dig, his hated sight to shun ; 
 No horns, but those by luckless H}rmen worn. 
 And those, alas ! not Anialthea's horn ; 
 No nerves olfact'ry, Mammon's trusty cur, 
 Clad in rich dulness' comfortable fur. 
 In naked feeling, and in aching pride, 
 ffe bears th' unbroken blayt from ev'ry side : 
 Varnpyre booksellers drain him to the heart, 
 And scorpion critics careless venom dart 
 
 Tritics — appall 'd T venture on the name, 
 Those cut-throat bandits in the paths of fame : 
 Bloody dissectors, worse than ten Monroes ; 
 He hacks to teach, they mangle to expose. 
 
 ITis h?art by causeless, wanton malice wrung, 
 By blockheads' daring into madness stung ; 
 His well-won bays, than life itself more dear. 
 By miscreants torn, who ne'er one sprig must 
 
 wear : 
 Fnil'd, bleeding, tortur'd, in the imequal strife 
 The hapless poet flounders on thro' life. 
 
66 
 
 DURNS' POEMS- 
 
 'I'ill fled each hope that once his bosom firVi, 
 And fled each inase that glorious once inspir'd, 
 Low Slink in squalid, unprotected age, 
 Dead, even resentment, for liis injur'd page. 
 He heeds or feels no more the rutliless critic's 
 rage ! 
 
 So, by some hedge, the generous steed dc- 
 ceas'd, 
 For half-starv"d snarling curs a dainty feast ; 
 By toil and famine wore to skin and bone. 
 Lies senseless of each tugging bitch's son. 
 
 dulness ! portion of the truly blest ! 
 Calm shelter'd haven of eternal rest ! 
 
 Thy sons ne'er madden in the fierce extremes 
 Of fortune's polar frost, or torrid beams. 
 If niantliiitr hifh she fills the golden cup, 
 With soIxT selfish ease they sip it up : 
 Conscious the bounteous liieed they weU de- 
 serve. 
 They only wonder " some folks" do not starve. 
 The grave, sage hern thus easy picks his frog, 
 And thinks the mallard a sad, worthless dog. 
 When disappointment snaps the clue of hope, 
 And thro' disastrous night they darkling grope, 
 With deaf endurance sluggishly they bear, 
 And just conclude that " fools are fortune's 
 
 care." 
 So, heavy, passive to the tempest's shocks. 
 Strong on the sign-post stands the stupid ox. 
 
 Not so the idle invises' mad-cap train, 
 Not such the workings of their moon-struck 
 
 brain ; 
 In equanimity they never dwell. 
 By turns in soaring heav'n, or vaulted hell. 
 
 1 dread thee, fate, relentless and severe, 
 With all a poet's, husband's, father's fear I 
 Already one strong hold of hope is lost, 
 Glencairn, the truly noble, lies in dust ; 
 (Fled, like the sun eclips'd as noon appears. 
 And left us darkling in a world of tears :) 
 
 O ! hear my ardent, grateful, selfish pray'r ! 
 Finira, my other stay, long bless and spare ! 
 Thro' a long life his hopes and wishes crown ; 
 And bright in cloudless skies his sun go down ! 
 May bliss donieslir smooth his ]>rivate path ; 
 Give enerify to life ; and soothe his latest 
 
 breath. 
 With many a filial tear circling the bed of 
 
 death ! 
 
 LAMENT 
 
 JAMES, EARL OF GLENCATRN. 
 
 The wind blew hol'ow frae the hills, 
 By fits the sun's departing beam 
 
 I-ook"d on the fading yellow woods 
 
 That wav'd o'er Lngar's windiiig stream 
 
 Beneath a craigy steep, a bard, 
 Laden with years and meikle^pain. 
 
 In loud lament hewail'd his lord, 
 Whom death had all untimely ta'en. 
 
 He lean'd him to an ancient aik, 
 
 Whose trunk was mould'ring down Mritli 
 years ; 
 His locks were bleached white wi' time ! 
 
 His hoary cheek was wet wi' tears ! 
 And as he touch'd his trembling harp, 
 
 And as he tun'd his doleful sang, 
 The winds, lamenting tliro' their caves, 
 
 To echo bore the notes aJang. 
 
 " Ye scatter'd birds that faintly sing, 
 
 The reliques of the vernal quire ! 
 Ye woods that shed on a' the winds 
 
 The honours of the aged year ! 
 A few short months, and glad and gay, 
 
 Again ye'll charm the ear and e'c ; 
 But notcht in all revolving time 
 
 Can gladness bring again to me. 
 
 " I am a bending aged tree. 
 
 That long has stood the wind and rain : 
 But now has come a cruel blast. 
 
 And my last hald of earth is gane : 
 Nae leaf o' mine shall greet the spring, 
 
 Nae simmer sun exalt my bloom ; 
 But I maun lie before the storm. 
 
 And ithers plant them in my room. 
 
 " I've seen sae mony changefu' years, 
 
 On earth I am a stranger grown ; 
 I wander in the ways of men. 
 
 Alike unknowing and unknown : 
 Unheard, unpitied, unreliev'd, 
 
 I bear alane my lade o' care, 
 For silent, low, on beds of dust. 
 
 Lie a' that would my sorrows share. 
 
 " And last (the sum of a' my griefs !) 
 My noble master lies in clay ; 
 
 The flow'r amang our barons bold. 
 
 His country's pride, his country's stay ; 
 
 In weary being now I pine. 
 For a' the life of life is dead, 
 
 And hope has left my aged ken, 
 . On forward wing for ever fled. 
 
 " Awake thy last sad voice, my harp ! 
 
 The voice of wo and wild despair ; 
 Awake, resound tliy latest lay, 
 
 Then sleep in silence evermair ! 
 And thou, my last, best, only friend. 
 
 That fiUest an untimely tomb, 
 AccejJt this tribute f^om the bard 
 
 Thou brouffiit from fortune's mirkest glooir 
 
BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 '* In poverty's low, barren vale, 
 
 Thick mists, obscure, involv'd me round ; 
 Though oft I turn'd the wistful eye, 
 
 Nae ray of fame was to be found : 
 Thou found'st me, like the morning sun 
 
 That melts the fogs in limpid air, 
 The friendless bard and rustic song, 
 
 Became alike thy fostering care. 
 
 " O ! why has worth so short a date .'' 
 
 While villains ripen gray with time ! 
 Must thou, the noble, gen'rous, great, 
 
 Fall in bold maiiliood's hardy prime ! 
 Why did I live to see that day ? 
 
 A da}' to me so full of wo I 
 O ! had I met the mortal shaft 
 
 Which laid my benefactor low I 
 
 " The bridegroom may forget the bride 
 
 Was made his wedded wife yestreen ; 
 The monarch may forget the crown 
 
 That on his head an hour has been ; 
 The mother may forget the child 
 
 That smiles sae sweetly on her knee ; 
 But I'll remember thee, Glencaim, 
 
 And a' that thou hast done for me I" 
 
 LINES 
 
 SENT TO SIR JOHN WHITEFOORD, 
 OF WHITEFOORD, BART., 
 WITH THE FOREGOING POEM. 
 
 Thou, who thy honour as thy God rever'st, 
 Who, save thy miruTs reproach, nought earthly 
 
 fear'st. 
 To thee this votive offering I impart, 
 The tearful tribute of a broken heart. 
 The friend thou valued'st, I the patron lov'd; 
 His worth, his honour, all the world approved. 
 We'll mourn till we too go as he has gone. 
 And tread the dreary path to that dark world 
 
 unknown. 
 
 TAM O' SHANTER. 
 A TALE. 
 
 Of Brownyis and of Bogilis full is this Buke. 
 Gawin Douglas. 
 
 When chapman billies leave the street, 
 And drouthy ncebors, neebors meet. 
 As market-days are wearing late. 
 An' folk beoiii to tak the gate ; 
 
 While we sit bousing at the nappj, 
 An' gettin fou and unco happy, 
 We think na on the lang Scots miles, 
 The mosses, waters, slaps, and stiles, 
 That lie between us and our hame, 
 Whare sits our sulky sullen dame, 
 Gathering her brows like gathering storm. 
 Nursing her wrath to keep it warm. 
 
 This truth fand honest Tarn o' Shunter, 
 As he frae Ayr, ae night did canter, 
 (Auld Ayr whom ne'er a town surpasses. 
 For honest men and bonny lasses.) 
 
 O Tarn ! had'st thou but been sae wise, 
 As ta'en thy ain wife Kate's advice ! 
 She tauld thee weel thou was a skellum, 
 A blethering, blustering, drunken blellum ; 
 That frae November till October, 
 Ae market-day thou was nae sober. 
 That ilka melder, wi' the miller, 
 Thou sat as lang as thou had siller ; 
 That ev'ry naig was ca'd a shoe on, 
 The smith and thee gat roaring fou on. 
 That at the L — d's house, ev'n on Sunday, 
 Thou drank wi' Kirton Jean till Monday. 
 She prophesy 'd, that late or soon, 
 Thou would be found deep drown 'd in Doon; 
 Or catch'd wi' warlocks in the mirk. 
 By Alloimy's auld haimted kirk. 
 
 Ah, gentle dames ! it gars me greet) 
 To think how mony counsels sweet, 
 How mony lengthen 'd sage advices. 
 The husband frae the wife despises ! 
 
 But to our tale : Ae market night, 
 Tarn had got planted unco right ; 
 Fast by an ingle, bleezing finely, 
 Wi' reaming swats, that drank divinely ; 
 And at his elbow, souter Johnny, 
 His ancient, trusty, drouthy crony ; 
 Tam lo'ed him like a vera brither ; 
 They had been fou for weeks thegither. 
 The night drave on wi' sangs an' clatter; 
 And ay the ale was growing better : 
 The landlady and Tam grew gracious ; 
 Wi' favours, secret, sweet, and precious : 
 The souter tauld liis queerest stories ; 
 The landlord's laugh was ready chorus: 
 The storm without might rair and rustle, 
 Tam did na mind tlie storm a whistle. 
 
 Care, mad to see a man sae happy. 
 E'en drown'd himself amang the nappy ; 
 As bees flee hamc wi' lades o' treasure, 
 The minutes wing'd their way wi' pleasure ; 
 Kings may be blest, but Tam w as plorious 
 O'er a' the ills o" life victorious. 
 
68 
 
 BURNS POEMS. 
 
 Rut ploasnrps are like poppies spread, 
 Yon seize the flow'r, its bloom is shod ; 
 Or like the snow-falls in the river, 
 A moment white — then melts for ever ; 
 Or like the borealis race. 
 That Hit ere you can point their place ; 
 Or like the rainbow's lovely form 
 Evanishing amid the storm. — 
 Nae man can tether time or tide ; 
 The hour approaches Tarn maun ride ; 
 That hour, o' night's black arch the key-stanc. 
 That dreary hour he mounts his beast in ; 
 And sic a night he taks the road in, 
 As ne'er poor sinner was abroad in. 
 
 The wind blew as 'twad blawn its last ; 
 The rattling show'rs rose on the blast ; 
 The speedy gleams the darkness swallowed ; 
 Loud, deep, and lang, the thunder bellow'd : 
 That night, a child might understand. 
 The deil had business on his hand. 
 
 Weel mounted on his gray mare, Meg^ 
 A better never lifted leg, 
 Tarn skeljjit on thro' dub and mire, 
 Despising wmd, and rain, and fire ; 
 Whiles holding fast his guid blue bonnet: 
 Whiles crooning o'er some auld Scots sonnet ; 
 Whiles glow'ring round wi' prudent cares, 
 Lest bogles catch him unawares ; 
 Kirk-AUovay was drawing nigh, 
 Whare ghaists and houlets nightly cry. — 
 
 By this time he was cross the ford, 
 Whare in the snaw the chapman smoor'd ; 
 And past the birks and meikle stane, 
 Whare drunken Charlie brak's neck-bane ; 
 And thro' the whins, and by the cairn, 
 Whare hunters fand themurder'd bairn; 
 And near the thorn, aboon the well, 
 'Where Mvngo''s mither hang'd hersel. — 
 Before him Dnon pours all his floods ; 
 The doubling storm roars thro' the woo 1.; 
 The lightnings flash from pole to polo ; 
 N«ar and more near the thunders roll ; 
 When, glimmering thro' the groaning treo 
 Kirk-Alloway seem'd in a bleeze ; 
 Thro' ilka bore the beams were glancing ; 
 And loud resounded mirth and dancinsr. — 
 
 Inspiring bold John Barlcyrorn ! 
 What dangers thou canst make us scorn ! 
 Wi' tippenny, we fear nae evil ; 
 Wi' usquabae we'll fare the devil ! — 
 The swats sae ream'd in Tammie's noddle. 
 Fair play, he car'd na deils a boddle. 
 But Maggie stood right sair astonish'd, 
 Till, by the heel and hand admonish'd, 
 She ventur'd forward on the light ; 
 And, vow ! Tarn saw an unco sight ! 
 
 Warlocks and witches in a dance ; 
 Nae cotillon brent new frae France, 
 But hornpipes, jigs, strathspeys, and reels, 
 Put life and mettle in their heels. 
 A winnock-bunker in the east, 
 There sat auld Nick, in shape o' beast ; 
 A towzie tyke, black, grim, and large, 
 To gie them music was his charge : 
 He screw'd the pipes and gart them skirl. 
 Till roof and rafters a' did dirl. — 
 Coffins stood round like open presses, 
 That shaw'd the dead in their last dresses ; 
 And by some devilish cantraip slight. 
 Each in its cauld hand held a light, — 
 By which heroic Tain was able 
 To note upon the haly table, 
 A murderer's banes in gibbet aims ; 
 Twa span-lang, wee, unchristen'd bairns ; 
 A thief, new cuttod frae a rapes 
 Wi' his last gasp his gab did gape; 
 Five tomahawks, wi' bluid red-rusted ; 
 Five scimitars, wi' murder crusted ; 
 A garter, which a babe had strangled; 
 A knife, a father's tlu-oat had mangled, 
 Whom his ain son o' life bereft, 
 The gray hairs yet stack to the heft ; 
 Wi' mair o' horrible and awfti'. 
 Which ev'n to name wad be unlawfu'. 
 
 As Tammie glowr'd, amaz'd, and curious, 
 The mirth and fun grew fast and furious : 
 The piper loud and louder blew ; 
 The dancers quick and quicker flew; 
 They reel'd, they set, they cross'd, they cleekit, 
 Till ilka carlin swat and reekit. 
 And coost her duddies to the wark. 
 And linket at it in her sark ! 
 
 Now Tarn, O Tarn ! had thej; been queans 
 A' plump and strapping, in their teens; 
 Their sarks, instead o' creesliie flannen. 
 Been snaw-white seventeen hunder linen ! 
 Thir breeks o' mine, my only pair, 
 That ance were plush, o' guid blue hair, 
 I wad hae gi'en them aff" my hurdies. 
 For ae blink o' the bonnie burdies ! 
 
 But wither'd beldams, auld and droll, 
 Rigwoodie haafs wad spean a foal, 
 Lowping an' flinging on a crummock, 
 I wonder didna turn thy stomach. 
 
 But Tarn kcnn'd what was what fu' brawlie. 
 There was ae winsome wench and walie. 
 That night inlisted in the core, 
 (Lang after koMn'd on Carrick shore ! 
 For mony a beast to dead she shot, 
 i /iud perish'd mony a bonnie boat, 
 I And shook baith meikle com and bear, 
 ; And kept the country-side in fear.) 
 
BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 69 
 
 Here cuttie sark, o' Paisley harn, 
 That while a lassie she had worn, 
 In longitude tho'isorely scanty, 
 Itfwas her best, and she was vauntie. — 
 Ah ! little kenn'd thy reverend grannie, 
 That sark she coft for her wee J^annie, 
 Wi' twa pund Scots ('twas a' her riches,) 
 Wad ever grac'd a dance of witches ! 
 
 But here my muse her wing maun cour ; 
 Sic flights are far beyond her pow'r; 
 To sing how J^annie lap and flang, 
 (A souple jade she was and Strang) 
 And how Tam stood, like ane bewitch'd, 
 And thought his very e'en enrich'd ; 
 Even Satan glowr'd, and fidg'd fu' fain, 
 And hotch'd and blew wi' might and main ; 
 Till first ae caper, syne anither, 
 Tam tint his reason a' thegither. 
 And roars out, " Weel done, Cutty-sark I" 
 And in an instant all was dark : 
 And scarcely had he Maggie ralhed, 
 When out the helUsh legion sallied. 
 
 As bees bizz out wi' angry fyke, 
 When plundering herds assail their byke ; 
 As open pussie's mortal foes, 
 When, pop 1 she starts before their nose ; 
 As eager runs the market-crowd, 
 When, " Catch the thief I" resounds aloud ; 
 So Maggie runs, the witches follow, 
 Wi' mony an eldritch skreech and hollow. 
 
 Ah, Tam ! ah, Tam ! thou'U get thy fairin I 
 In hell they'll roast thee Uke a herrin I 
 In vain thy Kate awaits thy comin ! 
 Kate soon will be a wofu' woman ! 
 Now, do thy speedy utmost, Meg, 
 And win the key-stane* of the brig ; 
 There at them thou thy tail may toss, 
 A nmning stream they dare na cross. 
 But ere the key-stane she could make, 
 The iient a tail she had to shake 1 
 For JVannie, far before the rest, 
 Hard upon noble Maggie prest, 
 And flew at Tam wi' furious ettle ; 
 But little wist she Maggie's mettle — 
 Ae spring brought off her master hale, 
 But left behind her ain gray tail : 
 The carlin claught her by the rump, 
 And left poor Maggie scarce a stump. 
 
 Now, wha this tale o' truth shall read, 
 Ilk man and mother's son, tak heed: 
 
 • It is a well-known fact that witchea, or any evil 
 spirits, iiave no power to follow a [loor wiglit any far- 
 ther than 4he middle of the next running stream.— It 
 may be proper likewise to mention to the benighted 
 traveller, that when he falls in with bogles, whatever 
 danger may be in his going forward, there is much 
 inoK hazard it: turnin" back 
 
 Whene'er to druik you are inclin'd, 
 Or cutty-sarks run in your mind, 
 Tliink, ye may buy the joys o'er dear, 
 Remember Tam o' S'iuiiter''s mare. 
 
 ON SEEING A WOUNDED HARE 
 LIMP BY ME, 
 
 WHICH A FELLOW HAD JUST SHOT AT. 
 
 Inhuman man ! curse on thy barb'rous art, 
 And blasted be thy murder-aiming eye : 
 May never pity soothe thee with a sigh, 
 
 Nor ever pleasure glad thy cruel heart 1 
 
 Go live, poor wanderer of the wood and field, 
 The bitter little that of life rcjnains : 
 No more the thickening brakes and verdant 
 plains. 
 
 To thee shall home, or food, or pastune yield. 
 
 Seek, mangled wretch, some place of wonted 
 rest. 
 No more of rest, but now thy dying bed ! 
 The sheltering rushes whistlmg o'er thy 
 head, 
 The cold earth with thy bloody bosom prest, 
 
 Oft as by winding Nith, I, musing, wait 
 The sober eve, or hail the cheerful dawn, 
 ril miss thee sporting o'er the dewy lawn, 
 
 And curse the ruflian^ aim, and mourn thy 
 hapless fate. 
 
 ADDRESS 
 
 TO THE SHADE OF THOMSON, 
 
 ON CROWNING HIS BUST AT BDNAM, ROXBURGH- 
 SHIRE, WITH BAYS. 
 
 While virgin Spring, by Eden's flood, 
 Unfolds her tender mantle green, 
 
 Or pranks the sod in frolic mood 
 Or tunes Eolian strains between : 
 
 While Simimer with a matron grace 
 Retreats to Dryburgh's cooling shade, 
 
 Yet oft, delighted, stops, to trace 
 The progress of the spiky blade : 
 
 While Autumn, benefactor kind. 
 
 By Tweed erects his aged liuad. 
 And sees, with self-approving mind, 
 
 Eacli cicaturo on his bounty fed : 
 
to 
 
 BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 While maniac Winter rages o'er 
 The hills whence classic Yarrow flows, 
 
 Rousing the turbid torrent's roar, 
 Or sweeping, wild, a waste of snows ; 
 
 So long, sweet Poet of the year, 
 
 Shall bloom that wreath thou well hast won ; 
 While Scotia, with exulting tear. 
 
 Proclaims that Thomson was her son. 
 
 EPITAPHS, 
 
 ON A CELEBRATED RULING ELDER. 
 
 Here souter * * * * in death does sleep ; 
 
 To h-11, if he's gane thitlier, 
 Satan, gie him thy gfear to keep, 
 
 He'll haud it weel theijither. 
 
 j^ UN A NOISY POLEMIC 
 
 Below thir stanes lie Jamie's banes : 
 
 O death, it's my opinion. 
 Thou ne'er took such a bleth'rin b-tch 
 
 Into thy dark dominion I 
 
 ON WEE JOHNIE. 
 
 Hie jacet wee Johnie- 
 
 Whoe'er thou art, O reader, know, 
 That death has murder'd Johiiie ! 
 
 An' here his body lies fu' low 
 
 For said he ne'er had ony 
 
 FOR THE AUTHOR'S FATHE 
 
 O TE, whose check tlie tear of pitj' stains 
 
 Draw near v/ith pious rev'rence and attend ! 
 Here lie the loving husband's dear remains. 
 
 The tender father, and the gen'rous friend. 
 The pitymg heart that ielt for human wo ; 
 
 The dauntless heart that fear'd no human 
 pride : 
 The friend of man, to vice alone a foe ; 
 
 ** For ev'n his failings lean'd to virtue's 
 side."* 
 
 • eoldsmith. 
 
 FOR R. A. Esq. 
 
 Know thou, O stranger to the fame 
 Of this much lov'd, much honour'd name ; 
 (For none that knew him need be told) 
 A warmer heart death ne'er made cold. 
 
 FOR G. H. Esq 
 
 The poor man weeps — here G n sleeps. 
 
 Whom canting wretches blam'd : 
 
 But with such as he, where'er he be, 
 May I be sav'd. or danvi'd ! 
 
 A BARD'S EPITAPH. 
 
 Is there a whim-inspired fool, 
 Owre fast for thougjit, owre hot for rule, 
 Owre blate to seek, owre proud to snool, 
 
 Let him draw near ; 
 .\nd owre tliis grassy heap sing dool, 
 
 And drap a tear. 
 
 Is there a bard of rustic song. 
 Who, noteless, steals the crowds among. 
 That weekly this area throng, 
 
 O, pass not by I 
 But with a frater-feeliiig strong. 
 
 Here, heave a sigh. 
 
 Is there a man, whose judgment clear, 
 Can others teach the course to steer, 
 Yet runs, himself, life's mad career. 
 
 Wild as the wave ; 
 Here pause — and, thro' the starting tear, 
 Survey this grave. 
 
 Tliis poor inhabitant below -W^ 
 
 Was quick to learn and wise to know; 
 And keenly felt the friendly glow. 
 
 And softer flame. 
 But thoughtless folUeslaid him low, 
 
 And Btain'd his name 1 
 
 Reader, attend — whether thy soul 
 Soars fancy's flights beyond the pole, 
 Or darkling grubs this earthly hole, 
 
 In low pursuit ; 
 Know, prudent, cautious, self-centrol, 
 Is wisdom'« root. 
 
BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 71 
 
 ON THB LATE 
 
 CAPT. GROSE'S PEREGRINATIONS 
 THROUGH SCOTLAND 
 
 COLLECTING THE ANTiaUITIES OF THAT 
 KINGDOM. 
 
 Hear, Land o' Cakes, and brither Scots, 
 Frae Maidenkirk to Johnie Groat's ; 
 Iftliere's a hole in a' your coats, 
 
 I rede you tent it : 
 A chield's amang you taking notes, 
 
 And, faith, he'll prent it. 
 
 If in your bounds ye chance to light 
 Upon a fine, fat, fodgel wight, 
 O' stature short, but genius bright, 
 
 That's he, mark weel — 
 And vow ! he has an unco slight 
 
 O' cauk and keel. 
 
 Bjr some auld, houlet-haunted biggin,* 
 Or kirk deserted by its riggin. 
 It's ten to ane ye'll find him snug in 
 
 Some eldritch part, 
 Wi' deils, they say, L — d save's ! colleagui 
 
 At some black art. — 
 
 Ilk ghaist that haunts auld ha' or chamer, 
 Ye gipsy-gang that deal in glamor, 
 And you deep read in hell's black grammar. 
 
 Warlocks and witches ; 
 Ye'll quake at his conjuring hammer. 
 
 Ye midnight b es. 
 
 It's tauld he was a sodger bred. 
 And ane wad rather fa'n than fled ; 
 But now he's quat the spurtle blade. 
 
 And dog-skin wallet, 
 And ta'en the — Anliquarian trade, 
 
 I think they call it. 
 
 He has a fouth o' auld nick-nackets : 
 Rusty aim caps and jinglin jackets,t 
 Wad haud the Lothians three in tackets, 
 
 A towmont guid ; 
 And parritch-pats, and auld saut-backets, 
 
 Before the Flood. 
 
 Of Eve's first fire he has a cinder ; 
 Auld Tubal Cain's fire-shool and fender ; 
 That which distinguished the gender 
 
 O' Balaam's ass ; 
 A broom-stick o' the witch of Endor, 
 
 Weel shod wi' brass. 
 
 • Vide his Antiquities of Scotland. 
 
 t Vide his Treatise on Ancient Armour and 
 Weapont. 
 
 Forbye, he'll snape you aft", fu' gleg. 
 The cut of Adam's philibeg ; 
 The knife that nicket Abel's craig 
 
 He'll prove you fully. 
 It was a faulding jocteleg, 
 
 Or lang-kai! gullie. — 
 
 But wad ye see him in his glee. 
 For nieikle glee and fun has he, 
 Then set him down, and twa or three 
 
 Guid fellows wi' him ; 
 And port, O port ! sliuie thou a wee, 
 
 And then ye'll see iiiin 1 
 
 Now, by the pow'rs o' verse and^rose I 
 Thou art a dahity chield, O Grose ! — 
 Whae'er o' thee shall ill suppose, 
 
 They sair misca' thee ; 
 I'd take the rascal by the nose. 
 
 Wad say, Shamefa' thea. 
 
 TO MISS CRUrk'SHANKS, 
 
 A VERY YOUNG LADY. 
 
 WRITTEN ON THE BLANK LEAK OF A BOOK, PRB- 
 SENTED TO HER BY THE AUTHOR. 
 
 Beauteous rose-bud, young and gay, 
 Blooming on thy early May, 
 Never may'st thou, lovely flow'r, 
 Clailly shrink in sleety show'r ! 
 Never Boreas' hoary path, 
 Never Eurus' pois'nous breath. 
 Never baleful stellar hghts, 
 Taint thee with untimely blights ! 
 Never, never reptile thief 
 Riot on thy virgin leaf ! 
 Nor even Sol too fiercely view 
 Thy bosom, blushing still with dew ! 
 
 May'st thou long, sweet crimson gem, 
 Richly deck thy native stem ; 
 Till some ev'ning, sober, calm. 
 Dropping dows, and breathing balm. 
 While all around the woodland rings, 
 And ev'ry bird thy requiem singe ; 
 Thou, amid the dirgeful sound, 
 ^hed thy dying honours round, 
 And resign to parent earth 
 The loveliest form she e'er gave birth. 
 
 SONG. 
 
 Anna, thy charms my bosom fire, 
 And waste my soul with care ; 
 
BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 But ah '. how bootless to admire, 
 Wlien fated to despair ! 
 
 Yet in thy presence, lovely Fair, 
 To hope may be forgiv'n ; 
 
 For sure 'twere impious to despair, 
 So much in sight of Heav'n. 
 
 ON READING, IN A NEWSPAPER, 
 
 THE DEATH OF JOHN M'LEOD, Esq 
 
 BROTHER TO A YOUNG LADY, A PARTICULAR 
 FRIEND OF THE AUTHOR's. 
 
 Sad thy tale, thou idle page, 
 
 And rueful thy alarms : 
 Death tears the brother of her love 
 
 From Isabella's arms. 
 
 Sweetly deckt with pearly dew 
 The morning rose may blow 
 
 But cold successive noontide 
 May lay its beauties lowl 
 
 Fair on Isabella's morn 
 
 The sun pro])itious smil'd ; 
 
 But, long ere noon, succeeding clouds 
 Succeeding hopes beguil'd. 
 
 Fate oft tears the bosom chords 
 That nature finest strung : 
 
 So Isabella's heart was form'd^ 
 And so that heart was wrung. 
 
 Dread Omnipotence, alone, 
 Can heal the wound he gave ; 
 
 Can point the brimful grief-worn eyes 
 To scenes beyond the grave. 
 
 Virtue's blossoms there shall blow 
 And fear no withering blast ; 
 
 There Isabella's spotless worth 
 Shall happy be at last. 
 
 THE 
 
 HUMBLE PETITION 
 
 OF 
 
 BRUAR WATER* 
 
 TO 
 THE NOBLE DUKE OF ATHOI,E. 
 
 My Lord, I know, j^our noble ear 
 Wo ne'er assails in vain ; 
 
 •Bruar Falls in Atliole are exceedingly picturesque 
 and beautiful ; but theii cHect is much impaired by the 
 •wit of trees and s)irubs. 
 
 Embolden'd thus, I beg you'll hear 
 Your humble Slave complain. 
 
 How saucy Phoebus' scorching beams, 
 In flaming summer-pride. 
 
 Dry-withering, waste ray foamy streams, 
 And drmk my crystal tide. 
 
 The lightly-jumping glowrin trouts. 
 
 That thro' my waters play. 
 If, in their random, wanton spouts, 
 
 They near the margin stray ; 
 If, hapless chance ! they linger lang, 
 
 I'm scorching up to shallow. 
 They're left the wliitening stanes amang, 
 
 In gasping death to wallow. 
 
 Last day I grat wi' spite and teen. 
 
 As Poet B**** came by. 
 That to a Bard I should be seen 
 
 Wi' half my channel dry : 
 A panegyric rhyme, I ween. 
 
 Even as I was he shor'd me ; 
 But had I in my glory been. 
 
 He, kneeling, wad ador'd me. 
 
 Here, foaming down the shelvy rocks, 
 
 In twisting strength I rin ; 
 There, high my boiling torrent smokes, 
 
 Wild-roaring o'er a linn : 
 Enjoying large each spring and well 
 
 As nature gave them me, 
 I am, altho' I say'tmysel. 
 
 Worth gaun a mile to see. 
 
 Would then my noble master please 
 
 To grant my highest wishes. 
 He'll shade my banks wi' tow'ring trees. 
 
 And bonnie spreading bushes ; 
 Delighted doubly then., my Lord, 
 
 You'll wander on my banks, 
 And listen mony a grateful bird 
 
 Return you tuneful thanks. 
 
 The sober laverock, warbling wild. 
 
 Shall to the skies aspire ; 
 The gowdspink, music's gayest child, 
 
 Shall sweetly join the choir : 
 The blackbird strong, the lintwhite clear, 
 
 The mavis mild and mellow ; 
 The robin pensive autumn cheer, 
 
 In all her locks of yellow : 
 
 Tliis too, a covert shall ensure. 
 
 To shield them from the storm ; 
 And coward maukin sleep secure, 
 
 Low in her grassy form : 
 Here shall the shepherd make his seat. 
 
 To weave his crown of flow'rs ; 
 Or find a sheltering safe retreat. 
 
 From prone descending show'rs. 
 
BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 And liore, by sweet endearing stealth, 
 
 Shall meet tlie loving pair, 
 Despising worlds with all their wealth 
 
 As empty, idle care : 
 The flovv''rs shall vie in all their charms 
 
 The hour of heav 'n to grace, 
 And birks extend their fragrant arms, 
 
 To screen the dear embrace. 
 
 Here, haply too, at vernal dawn, 
 
 Some musing bard may stray, 
 \nd eye the smoking, dewy lawn, 
 
 And misty mountain, gray ; 
 Or, by the reaper's nightly beam, 
 
 Mild-chequering thro' the trees. 
 Rave to my darkly dashing stream, 
 
 Hoarse-swelling on the breeza 
 
 Let lofty firs, and ashes cool. 
 
 My lowly banks o'erspread. 
 And view, deep-pending in the pool. 
 
 Their shadows' wat'ry bed I 
 Let fragrant birks in woodbines drest 
 
 My craggy cliffs adorn ; 
 And, for the Uttle songster's nest, 
 
 The close embow'ring thorn. 
 
 So may, old Scotia's darling hope. 
 
 Your little angel band, 
 Spring, like their fathers, up to prop 
 
 Their honour'd native land 1 
 So may thro' Albion's farthest ken, 
 
 The social flowing glasses, 
 To grace be — " Athole's honest men. 
 
 And Athole's bonnie lasses 1" 
 
 ON SCARING SOME WATER FOWL 
 IN LOCH-TURIT. 
 
 A WILD SCENE AMONG THE HILLS OF 
 OUGHTERTYRE. 
 
 WiSY, ye tenants of the lake. 
 For iMe your wat'ry haunt forsake .' 
 Tell me, fellow-creatures, why 
 At my presence thus you fly ? 
 Why disturb your social joys, 
 Parent, filial, kindred ties ? — 
 Common friend to you and me. 
 Nature's gifts to all are free : 
 Peaceful keep your dimpling wave, 
 Busy feed, or wanton lave ; 
 Or beneath the sheltering rock. 
 Bide the surging billow's shock. 
 
 Conscious, blushing for our race, 
 Soon, too soon, your fears I trace. 
 
 Man, your proud usurping foo, 
 Would be lord of all below : 
 Plumes himself in Freedom's pride, 
 Tyrant stern to all beside. 
 
 The eagle, from the cliffy brow, 
 Marking you his prey below. 
 In his breast no pity dwells, 
 Strong necessity compels. 
 But, man, to whom alone is giv'n 
 A ray direct from pitying Heav'n, 
 Glories in his heart humane — 
 And creatures for his pleasure slaiii. 
 
 In these savage, liquid plains, 
 Only known to wand'ring swains. 
 Where the mossy riv'let strays. 
 Far from human haunts and ways ; 
 All on Nature you depend. 
 And life's poor season peaceful spend. 
 
 Or, if man's superior might. 
 Dare invade your native right. 
 On the lofty ether borne, 
 Man with all his pow'rs you scorn ; 
 Swiftly seek, on clanging wings. 
 Other lakes and other springs ; 
 And the foe you cannot brave, 
 Scorn at least to be liis slave. 
 
 WRITTEN WITH A PENCIL 
 
 OVER THE CHIMNEY-PIECE, 
 
 IN THE PARLOUR OF THE INN AT KENMORK, 
 TAYMOUTH. 
 
 Admiring Nature in her wildest grace, 
 These northern scenes with weary feet I trace ; 
 O'er many a winding dale and painful steep, 
 Th' abodes of covey'd grouse and timid sheep, 
 My savage journey, curious, I pursue, 
 Till fam'd Breadalbane opens to my view. 
 The meeting cliffs each deep-sunk glen divides, 
 The woods, wild scatter'd, clothe their ample 
 
 sides ; 
 Th' outstretching lake, embosom'd 'mono- the 
 
 hills, 
 The eye with wonder and amazement fills ; 
 The Tay meand'ring sweet in infant pride. 
 The palace rising on his verdant side ; 
 The lawns wood-fring'd in Nature's native 
 
 taste ; 
 The hillocks dropt in Nature's careless haste ; 
 The arches striding o'er the new-born stream ; 
 The village, glittering in the moontide beam — 
 
 j Poetic ardours in my bosom swell, 
 
 I Lone wand'ring by the hermit's naoasy col 
 
74 
 
 BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 The sweeping theatre of hanging woods ; 
 Th' incessant roar of headlong tumbling 
 floods — 
 
 Here poesy might wake her heav'n-taught 
 
 lyre, 
 And look through nature with creative fire ; 
 Here, to the wrongs of fate half reconciled, 
 Misfortune's lightened steps might wander 
 
 wild ; 
 And Disappointment, in these lonely bounds, 
 F'ind balm to soothe her bitter rankling wounds; 
 Here heart-struck Grief might heav'n-ward 
 
 stretch her scan. 
 And injur'd Worth forget and pardon man. 
 
 WRITTEN WITH A PENCIL, 
 
 STANDING BT THE FALL OF FYERS, NEAR 
 LOCH-NESS. 
 
 Among the heathy hills and ragged woods 
 The roaring Fyers pours his mossy floods ; 
 Till full he dashes on the rocky mounds. 
 Where, through a shapeless breach, liis stream 
 
 resounds. 
 As high in air the bursting torrents flow, 
 As deep recoiling surges foam below. 
 Prone down the rock the whitening sheet de- 
 
 Aud viewless echo's ear, astonish'd, rends, 
 Dim-seen, through rising mists and ceaseles 
 
 show'rs. 
 The hoary cavern, wide-surroimding low'rs. 
 Still thro' the gap the struggling river toils, 
 And still belo w the horrid caldron boils — 
 
 ON THE BIRTH 
 OF A 
 
 POSTHUMOUS CHILD, 
 
 BORN IN PECULIAR CIRCUMSTANCES OF 
 FAMILY DISTRESS. 
 
 Sweet FlowVet, pledge o' meikle love. 
 
 And ward o' monv a pray'r. 
 What heart o' stane wad thou na move, 
 
 Sae helpless, sweet, and fair '. 
 
 November hirples o'er the lea, 
 
 Chill, on thy lovely form ; 
 And gane, alas ! the sheltVing tree, 
 
 Should shield thee frae the storm. 
 
 May He who gives the rain to pour, 
 And wings the blast to blaw, 
 
 Protect thee frae the driving show'r, 
 The bitter frost and snaw ! 
 
 May He, the friend of wo and want, 
 Who heals life's various stounds, 
 
 Protect and guard the mother plant, 
 And heal her cruel wounds I 
 
 But late she flourish'd, rooted fast, 
 Fair on the summer morn : 
 
 Now feebly bends she m the blast, 
 Unshelter'd and forlorn. 
 
 Blest be thy bloom, thou lovely gem, 
 Unscath d by ruffian hand ! 
 
 And from thee many a parent stem 
 Arise to deck our land 1 
 
 THE WHISTLE, 
 
 A BALLAD. 
 
 B the authentic yrose history of the Whistle is curi 
 ous, I shall here give it. — In the train of Anne of Den 
 mark, when she came to Scotland, with our James the 
 Si.Tth, there came over also a Danish gentleman of gi 
 gantic stature and great prowess, and a matchless cham- 
 pion of Bacchus. He had a little ebony Whistle, which 
 at the commencement of the orgies he laid on the ta- 
 ble, and whoever was last able to blow it, every body 
 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, Mos- 
 cow, Warsaw, and several of the petty courts in Ger- 
 many ; and challenged the Scots Bacchanalians to the 
 alternative of trying his prowess, or else of acknowledg- 
 ing their inferiority.— After many overthrows on the 
 part of the Scots, the Dane was encountered by Sir Ro- 
 bert Lawrie of Maxwelton, ancestor of the present wor- 
 thy baronet of that name ; who, after three days' and 
 three nighu' hard contest, left the Scandinavian under 
 the table. 
 
 And blew on the Whistle his requium shrill. 
 Sir Walter, son to Sir Robert before mentioned, after 
 wards lost the Whistle to Walter Riddel of Glenrid- 
 del, 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 Lawrie of Maxwel- 
 ton ; Robert Riddel, Esq. of Gienriddel, lineal descend- 
 ant 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 las', gentle 
 man carried off the hard- won honours of the field. 
 
 I SING of a WhislAe, a Whistle of wortli, 
 I sing of a Whistle, the pride of tha North, 
 
BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 Was brought to the court of our good Scottish 
 
 75 
 
 )Ught ti 
 king, 
 
 And long with this Whistle all Scotland shall 
 ring. 
 
 Old Loda,* still rueing the arm of Fingal, 
 Thn god of the bottle sends down from his hall — 
 "This Whistle's your challenge to Scotland 
 
 get o'er, 
 And drink them to hell, Sir ! or ne'er see me 
 
 more !" 
 
 Old poets have sung, and old chronicles tell. 
 What champions ventur'd, what champions fell; 
 The son of great Loda was conqueror still. 
 And blew on the whistle his requimn shrill. 
 
 Till Robert, the lord of the Cairn and the 
 Scaur, 
 Unmatch'd at the bottle, unconquer'd in war, 
 He drank his poor god-ship as deep as the sea, 
 No tide of the Baltic e'er drunker than he. 
 
 Thus Robert, victorious, the trophy has 
 
 gain'd ; 
 Which now in his house has for ages remain'd ; 
 Till three noble chieftains and all of his 
 
 blood, 
 The jovial contest again have renew'd. 
 
 Three joyous good fellows with hearts Ciear 
 
 of flaw ; 
 Craigdarrocii, so famous for wit, worth and 
 
 law; 
 And trusty Glenriddel, so skill'd in old coins ; 
 And gallant Sir Robert, deep read in old wines. 
 
 Craigdarrooh began, with a tongue smooth 
 
 as oil. 
 Desiring Glenriddel to yield up the spoil ; 
 Or else he would muster tlie heads of the clan. 
 And once more, ui claret, try which was the 
 
 man. 
 
 " By the gods of the ancients !" Glenriddel 
 
 rephes, 
 Before I surrender so glorious a prize, 
 I'll conjure the ghost of the great Rorie More,t 
 And bumper his horn with lum twenty times 
 
 o'er." 
 
 Sir Robert, a soldier, no speecli would pre- 
 tend. 
 
 But he ne'er turn'd his back on his foe — or his 
 friend. 
 
 Said, toss down the Whistle, the prize of the 
 field, 
 
 And knee-deep in claret, he'd die or he'd yield. 
 
 * See Oesian's Carrie tliura 
 t See Johnson's Tour to the Hebrides. 
 
 To the board of Glenridde. our heroes repair, 
 So noted for drowning of sorrow and care ; 
 But for wine and for welcome not more known 
 
 to fame, 
 Than the sense, wit, and taste, of a sweet, 
 lovely dame. 
 
 A bard was selected to witness the fray. 
 And tell future ages the feats of the day ; 
 A bard who detested all sadness and spleen, 
 And wish'd that Parnassus a vineyard had 
 been. 
 
 The dinner being over, the claret they ply, 
 And every new cork is a new spring of joy ; 
 In the bands of old fi-iendship and kindred so 
 
 set. 
 And tlie bands grew the tighter the more they 
 
 were wet. 
 
 Gay pleasure ran riot as bumpers rarf o'er ; 
 Bright Phoebus ne'er witness'd so joyous a core. 
 And vow'd that to leave them he was quite 
 
 foi-lorn. 
 Till Cynthia hinted he'd see them next morn. 
 
 Six bottles a-piece had well wore out the 
 
 night, 
 When gallant Sir Robert to finish the fight, 
 Turn'd o'er in one bumper a bottle of red. 
 And swore 'twas the way that their ancestors 
 
 did. 
 
 Then worthy Glenriddel, so cautious and 
 sage," 
 No longer the warfare, ungodly, would wage 
 A high ruling Elder to wallow in wine ! 
 He left the foul business to folks less divine. 
 
 The gallant Sir Robert fought hard to the 
 end ; 
 
 But who can with fate and quart bumpers con- 
 tend? 
 
 Though fate said — a hero should perish in 
 light; 
 
 So uprose brioht Phoebus — and down fell the 
 knight. 
 
 Next uprose our bard, hke a prophet in 
 drink : — 
 " Craigdairoch, thou'lt soar when creation 
 
 .^'lall sink ! 
 But if thou would flourish immortal in rhyme. 
 Come — one bottle more — and have at the sub- 
 lime I 
 
 " Thy line, that have struggled for Freedom 
 
 with Bruce, 
 Shall heroes and ])atriots ever produce : 
 So thine be the laurel, and mine be the bay;! 
 The field thou hast won, by yon bright god of 
 
 day ;" 
 
MISCELLANEOUS PIECES OF POETRY, 
 
 EXTRACTED 
 
 FROM THE CORRESPONDENCE OF BURNS; 
 
 ^@lf©0^ 
 
 COMPOSED FOR THE MUSICAL PUBLICATIONS OF MF.SSR3. THOMSON AND JOHNSON; 
 
 WITH ADDITIONAL PIECES. 
 
 SECOND EPISTLE TO DAVIE, 
 Jl BROTHER POET* 
 
 AULD NEEBOR 
 
 I'm three times doubly o'er your debtor, 
 For your auld-farrant, frien'ly letter ; 
 Tho' I maun say't, I doubt ye flatter. 
 
 Ye speak sae fair ; 
 For my puir, silly, rhymin' clatter. 
 
 Some less maun sair. 
 
 Hale be your heart, hale be your fiddle ; 
 Lang may your elbuck jink an' diddle. 
 To cheer you thro' the weary widdle 
 
 O' war'ly cares. 
 Till bairns' bairns kindly cuddle 
 
 Your auld, gray hairs. 
 
 But, Davie, lad, I'm red ye're glaikit ; 
 I'm tauld the Muse ye hae negleckit ; 
 An' gif it's sae, ye sud be licket 
 
 Until ye fyke ; 
 Sic hauns as you sud ne'er be faikit, 
 
 Be hain't wha like. 
 
 For me, I'm on Parnassus' brink, 
 
 Rivin the words to gar them clink ; 
 
 Whyles dais't wi' love, whyles dais't wi' drink, 
 
 Wi' jads or masons ; 
 An' whyles, but ay owre late, 1 think 
 
 Braw sober lessons. 
 
 • This is prefixed to tlie poems of UaviJ Sillar, pub- 
 lished at Kihuarnock, 1789. 
 
 Of a' the thoughtless sons o' man, 
 Commen' me to the Bardie clan; 
 Except it be some idle plan 
 
 O' rhymin' clink, 
 The devil-haet, that I sud ban, 
 
 They ever think. 
 
 Nae thought, nae view, nae scheme o' livin', 
 Nae cares to gie us joy or grievin' : 
 But just the pouchie put the nieve in. 
 
 An' while ought's there, 
 Then, hiltie, skiltie, we gae scrievin', 
 
 An' fash nae mair. 
 
 Leeze me on rhyme I it's aye a treasure, 
 My chief, amaist my only pleasure, 
 At hame, a-fiel', at wark or leisure. 
 
 The Muse, poor hizziet 
 Tho' rotigh an' raploch be her measure. 
 
 She's seldom lazy. 
 
 Hand to the Muse, my dainty Davie ; 
 The warl' may play you monie a shavie ; 
 But for the Muse, she'll never leave ye, 
 
 Tho' e'er sae puir, 
 Na, even tho' limpin wi' tiie spavie 
 
 Frae door to door 
 
 THE LASS O' BALLOCHMYLE. 
 
 'Twas even — the dewy fields were green, 
 On cv'ry blade the jicarls hang ; 
 
 The Zephyr wantoned round llie bean. 
 And bore its fragrant sweets alang : 
 
BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 77 
 
 In every glen the mavis sang, 
 
 All nature listening seemed the while, 
 Except where green-wood echoes rang, 
 
 Aniang the braes o' Ballochinyle. 
 
 With careless step I onward strayed, 
 
 My heart rejoiced in nature's joy, 
 When musing in a lonely glade, 
 
 A maiden fair I chanced to spy ; 
 Her look was like the morning's eye, 
 
 Her air like nature's vernal smile. 
 Perfection whispered passing by, 
 
 Behold the lass o' Ballochmyle ! 
 
 Fair is the morn in flowery May, 
 
 And sweet is night in Autumn mild ; 
 When roving thro' the garden gay, 
 
 Or wandering in the lonely wild: 
 But woman, nature's darling child I 
 
 There all her charms she does compile ; 
 Even tiiere her other works are foil'd 
 
 By the bonny lass o' Ballochmyle. 
 
 O, had she been a country maid, 
 
 And I the happy country swain, 
 Tho' sheltered in the lowest shed 
 
 That ever rose in Scotland's plain ! 
 Thro' weary winter's wind and rain 
 
 With joy, with rapture, I would toil ; 
 And niohtly to my bosom strain 
 
 The bonny lass o' Ballochmyle. 
 
 Then pride might climb the slipp'ry steep, 
 
 Wiiere fame and honours lofty shine ; 
 And tjiirst of gold might tempt the deep, 
 
 Or dow-iward seek the Indian mine ; 
 Give me the cot below the pine, 
 
 To tend the flocks or till the soil, 
 And every day have joys divine, 
 
 With the bonny lass o' Ballochmyle. 
 
 TO MARY IN HEAVEN. 
 
 Tjiou lingering star, with less'ning ray, 
 
 That lov'st to greet the early morn,' 
 Again thou usher'st in the day 
 
 My Mary from my soul was torn. 
 O Mary ! dear departed shade ! 
 
 Where is t!iy place of blissful rest? 
 See'st thou thy lover lowly laid ? 
 
 Hear'st thou the groans that rend his breast! 
 That sacred hour can I forget. 
 
 Can I forget the hallowed grove, 
 Where by tlie winding Ayr we met. 
 
 To live one day of parting love I 
 
 Eternity will not efi'ace, 
 
 Those records dear of transports past; 
 Thy image at our last embrace ; 
 
 Ah ! little thought we 'twas our last 1 
 Ayr gurgling kissed his pebbled shore, 
 
 O'erhung with wild woods, tliick'ning, 
 green ; 
 The fragrant birch and hawthorn hoar, 
 
 Twin'd amorous round the raptured scene. 
 The ilowers sprang wanton to be prest. 
 
 The birds sang love on every spray. 
 Till too, too soon, tlie glowing west, 
 
 Proclaimed the speed of winged day. 
 Still o'er these scenes my mem'ry wakes, 
 
 And fondly broods with miser care ! 
 Time but the impression deeper makes, 
 
 As streams their channels deeper wear 
 My Mary dear departed shade ! 
 
 Where is thy blissful place of rest? 
 See'st thou thy lover lowly laid ? 
 
 Hear'st thou the groans that rend his breast? 
 
 LINES ON 
 
 AN INTERVIEW WITH LORD DAER. 
 
 This wot ye all whom it concerns, 
 I Rhymer Robin, alias Burns, 
 
 October twenty-third, 
 A ne'er to be forgotten day, 
 Sae far I spraclded up the brae, 
 
 I dinner'd wi' a Lord. 
 
 I've been at druken writers' feasts. 
 Nay, been bitch-fou 'mang godly priests, 
 
 Wi' rev'rence be it spoken ; 
 I've even join'd the honour'd jorum. 
 When mighty Squireships of the quorum, 
 
 Their hydra drouth did sloken. 
 
 But wi' a Lord — stand out my shin, 
 A Lord — a Peer — an Earl's son, 
 
 Up higher yet my b'innet ; 
 An' sic a Lord — lang Scotch ells twa, 
 Our Pperage he o'erlooks them a'„ 
 
 As I look o'er my sonnet. 
 
 But oh for rfogarth's magic pow'r . 
 To show Sir Bardy's willyart glowr, 
 
 And how he star'd and stammer'd.. 
 When goavan, as if led wi' branks, 
 An' stuinpan' on his ploughman shanks, 
 
 He m the parlour hammer'd. 
 
78 
 
 I sidling: shelter'd in a nook, 
 An' at his Lordship steal't a look 
 
 Like some portentous omen ; 
 Except good-sense and social glee, 
 An' (what surprised me) modesty, 
 
 I marked nought uncominon. 
 
 I watch'd the symptoms o' the Great, 
 The gentle pride, the lordly state, 
 
 The arrogant assuming ; 
 The feint a pride, nae pride had he. 
 Nor sauce, nor state that I could see, 
 
 Mair than an honest ploughman. 
 
 Then from his Lordship I shall learn. 
 Henceforth to meet with unconcern 
 
 One rank as well's another ; 
 Nae honest worthy man need care. 
 To meet with noble, youthful Daer, 
 
 For he but meets a brother. 
 
 ON A YOUNG LADY, 
 
 Residing on the banks of the small river Devon, in 
 Clackmannanshire, but whoes infant years were 
 spent in Ayrshire 
 
 How pleasant the banks of the clear-winding 
 Devon, 
 With green-spreading bushes, and flowers 
 blooming fair ; 
 But the bonniest flower on the banks of the 
 Devon, 
 Was once a sweet bud on the braes of the 
 Ayr. 
 
 Mild be tbe ^un pn this sweet blushing flower, 
 In the gayrd^morn as it bathes in the dew 1 
 
 And gentle the fajil of the soft vernal rhower. 
 That steals on the evening each leaf to re- 
 
 O, spare the dear blossom, ye orient breezes, 
 
 With, chill hoary wing as' ye usher the dawn ! 
 And far be thou distant, thou reptile that 
 seizes 
 The verdure and pride of the garden and 
 lawn! 
 
 Let Bourbon exult in liis gay gilded lilies. 
 And England triumphant display lier proud 
 rose ; 
 A fairer than either adorns the green valleys 
 Where Devon, sweet Devon, meandering 
 flowB. 
 
 BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 CASTLE GORDON. 
 
 Streams that glide in orient plains, 
 Never bound by winter's chains ; 
 Glowmg here on golden sands. 
 There commix'd with foulest stains 
 From tj'ranny"s empurpled bands : 
 These, their richly-gleaming waves, 
 I leave to tyrants and their slaves ; 
 Give me the stream that sweetly laves 
 The banks, by Castle Gordon. 
 
 IL 
 
 Spicy forests, ever gay, 
 shading frorn the burning ray 
 Hapless wretches sold to toO, 
 Or the ruthless native's way, 
 Bent on slaughter, blood, and spoil : 
 Woods that ever verdant wave, 
 I leave the tyrant and the slave, 
 Give me the groves that lofty brave 
 The storms, by Castle Gordon. 
 
 in. 
 
 Wildly here without control, 
 Nature reigns and rules the whole ; 
 In that sober pensive mood, 
 Dearest to the feeling soul. 
 She plants the forest, pours the flood ; 
 Life's poor day I'll musing rave. 
 And find at night a sheltering cave, 
 Where waters flow and wild woods wave, 
 By bonnie Castle Gordon.* 
 
 NAE-BODY. 
 
 I HAE a wife o' my ain, 
 ril partake wi' nae-body; 
 
 I'll tak cuckold frae nane, 
 I'll gie cuckold to nae-body. 
 
 I hae a penny to spend. 
 
 There — thanks to nae-body ; 
 I hae naething to lend, 
 
 I'll borrow frae nae-body. 
 
 I am nae-body's lord, 
 I'll be slave to nae-body ; 
 
 I hae a guid braid sword, 
 I'll tak dunts frae nae-body. 
 
 * These verses our Poet composed to be sung fo Mo 
 rag, a Highland air, of which he was extremely fond. 
 
 fell 
 
BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 I'U be merry and free, 
 I'll be sad for nae-body 
 
 If,nae-body care for me, 
 ril'care for nae-body. 
 
 79 
 
 ON THE DEATH OF A LAP-DOG, 
 NAMED ECHO. 
 
 In wood and wild, ye warbling throng, 
 
 Your heavy loss deplore ; 
 Now half-extinct your powers of song, 
 
 Sweet Echo is no more. 
 
 Ye jarring screeching things around. 
 
 Scream your discordant joys ; 
 Now half your din of tuneless sound 
 
 With Echo silent lies. 
 
 SONG.* 
 
 Tune — " I am a man unmarried." 
 
 O, ONCE I lov'd a bonnie lass, 
 
 Ay, and I love her still, 
 And whilst that virtue warms my breast 
 
 ril love my handsome Nell. 
 
 Tal lal de ral, &c. 
 
 As bonnie lasses I hae seen. 
 
 And mony full as braw, 
 But for a modest gracefu' mien 
 
 The like I never saw. 
 
 A bonnie lass, I will confess, 
 
 Is pleasant to the e'e. 
 But without some better qualities 
 
 She's no a lass for me. 
 
 But Nelly's looks are blithe and sweet. 
 
 And what is best of a'. 
 Her reputation is complete, 
 
 And fair without a flaw. 
 
 She dresses ay sae clean and neat, 
 
 Both decent and genteel ; 
 And then there's somethmg in her gait 
 
 Gars ony dress look weel. 
 
 A gaudy dress and gentle air 
 
 May slightly touch the heart, 
 But it's irmocence and modesty 
 . That polishes the dart. 
 
 • This was our Poet's first attempt 
 
 'Tis this in Nelly pleases me, 
 'Tis this enchants my soul ; 
 
 For absolutely in my breast 
 She reigns without control. 
 
 Tal lal de rnl, Sec. 
 
 INSCRIPTION 
 TO THE MEMORY OF FERGUSSON. 
 
 HERE LIES ROBERT FERGUSSON, POET. 
 Bom September 5a, 1751— TJierf, IGth October, 1774. 
 
 No sculptur'd marble here, nor pompous lay 
 "No storied urn nor animated bust," 
 
 This simple stone directs pale Scotia's way 
 To pour her sorrows o'er her poet's dust. 
 
 THE CHEVALIER'S LAMENT. 
 
 The small birds rejoice in tire green leaves re- 
 turning. 
 The murmurmg streamlet winds clear thro' 
 the vale ; 
 The hawthorn trees blow in the dews of the 
 morning. 
 And wild scatter'd cowslips bedeck the green 
 dale: 
 
 But what can give pleasure, or what can seem 
 
 fair. 
 While the lingering moments are number'd by 
 
 care .' [smging. 
 
 No flowers gaily springing, nor birds sweetly 
 Can soothe the sad bosom of joyless despair. 
 
 The deed that I dar'd could it merit their malice, 
 
 A king and a father to place on his throne ? 
 
 His right are these hills, and his. right are 
 
 these valleys, 
 
 AVhere the wild beasts find shelter, but I can 
 
 find none. 
 
 But 'tis not my suflTerings thus wretched, for- 
 lorn, 
 
 My brave gallant friends, 'tis your ruin I 
 
 mourn : [trial. 
 
 Your deeds prov'd so, loyal in hot bloody 
 
 Alas ! can I make you no sweeter retiurn ! 
 
 EPISTLE TO R. GRAHAM, Esq. 
 
 When Nature her great master-piece design 'd. 
 And fram'd her last bcs* work the human 
 mind, 
 
80 
 
 EURNS' POEMS. 
 
 H>.'r eye intent on all the nia/y plan, 
 
 She Ibrni'd of various parts the various man. 
 
 Then first she calls the useful many forth ; 
 Plain plodding industry and sober worth : 
 Thence peasants, farmers, native sons of earth, 
 And merchandise' whole genus take their 
 
 birth : 
 Each prudent cit a warm existence finds, 
 And all mechanics' many apron'd kinds. 
 Some other rarer sorts are wanted yet, 
 The lead and buoy are needful to the net ; 
 The caput mortuum of gross desires 
 Makes a material for mere knights and 
 
 squires ; 
 The martial phosphorus is taught to flow. 
 She kneads the lumpish philosophic dough. 
 Then marks th' unyielding mass with grave 
 
 designs, 
 Law, physics,'politics, and deep divines : 
 Last, she sublimes th' Aurora of the poles, 
 The flashing elements of female souls. 
 
 The order'd system fair before her stood. 
 Nature, well-pleas'd, pronounced it very good ; 
 But e'er she gave creating labour o'er, 
 Half jest, she try'd one curious labour more. 
 Some spumy, fiery, ignis fatuus matter ; 
 Such as the slightest breath of air might scat- 
 ter ; 
 With arch-alacrity and conscious glee 
 (Nature may have her whim as well as we, 
 Her Hogarth-art perhaps she meant to sliow it) 
 She forms the thing, and christens it — a poet. 
 Creature, tho' oft the prey of care and sorrow. 
 When blest to-day unmindful of to-morrow. 
 A being form'd t' amuse his graver friends, 
 Admir'd and prais'd — and there the homage 
 
 ends : 
 A mortal quite unfit for Fortune's strife. 
 Yet oft the sport of all the ills of life ; 
 Prone to enjoy each pleasure riches give, 
 Yet haply wanting wherewithal to live : 
 Longing to wipe each tear, to heal each groan. 
 Yet frequent all unlieeded in his own. 
 
 But honest nature is not quite a Turk, 
 She laugh'd at first, then felt for her poor 
 
 work. 
 Pitying the propless climber of mankind. 
 She cast about a standard tree to find ; 
 And, to support his helpless woodbine state, 
 Attach'd him to the generous truly g,reat, 
 A title, and the only one I claim, 
 To lay strong hold for help on bounteous 
 Graham. 
 
 Pity the tuneflil muses' hapless train. 
 Weak, timid landmen on life's stormy main ! 
 Their hearts no selfish stem absorbent stuti, 
 That never gives — ^tho' humbly takes enough 
 
 The little fate allows, they share as soon, 
 Uidike sage, proverb 'd Wisdom's hard-\vnmg 
 
 boon. 
 The world were blest did bless on them de- 
 pend, 
 Ah, that " the friendly e'er should want a 
 
 friend !" 
 Let prudence number o'er each sturdy son, 
 Who life and wisdom at one race begim, 
 Who feel by reason, and who give by rule, 
 (Instinct 's a brute, and sentiment a fool !) 
 Who make poor will do wait upon / should — 
 We own they're prudent, but who feels they're 
 
 good .'' 
 Ye wise ones, hence ! ye hurt the social eye ! 
 God's image rudely etch'd on base alloy 1 
 But come ye who the godlike pleasure know. 
 Heaven's attribute distinguish'd — to bestow ! 
 Whose arms of love would grasp the human 
 
 race : 
 Come thou who giv'st with all a courtier's 
 
 grace ; 
 Friend of my life, true patron of my rhymes ! 
 Prop of my dearest hopes for future times. 
 Wliy shrinks my soul half blushing, half 
 
 afraid. 
 Backward, abash'd to ask thy friendly aid ? 
 I know my need, I know thy giving hand, 
 I crave thy friendship at thy kind command ; 
 But there are such who court the timeful 
 
 nine — 
 Heavens ! should the branded character be 
 
 mine! 
 Whose verse in manhood's pride sublimely 
 
 flows. 
 Yet vilest reptiles in t^^ begging prose. 
 Mark, how their lofty independent spirit 
 Soars on the spurning wing of injur'd merit ! 
 Seek not the proofs in private life to find ; 
 Pity the best of words should be but wind ! 
 So, to heaven's gates the lark's shrill song 
 
 ascends, 
 But grovelling on the earth the carol ends. 
 In all the clam'rous cry of starving want. 
 They dun benevolence with shameless front ; 
 Oblige them, patronise their tinsel lays. 
 They persecute you all your future days ! 
 Ere my poor soul such deep damnation stain, 
 My horny fist assumes the plough again ; 
 The piebald jacket let me patch once more ; 
 On eighteen-pence a week, I've liv'd before. 
 Though, thanks to Heaven, I dare even that 
 
 last shift, 
 I trust meantime my boon is in thy gift : 
 That plac'd by thee upon the wish'd-for height, 
 Where, man and nature fairer in her sight, 
 My muse may imp her wmg for some sublim- 
 
 er flight.* 
 
 * This is our Poet's first epistle to Graham of Fin- i 
 try. It is not equal to the second ; but it contains too 
 much of the characteristic vigour of its author to be sup- 
 pressed. A little more knowledge of natural history, 
 or of chemistry, was wanted to enable him to execute 
 the original conception correctly. 
 
BURNS' POEMS, 
 
 81 
 
 FRAGMENT, 
 
 INSCRIBED TO THE RIGHT HON. C. J. FOX. 
 
 How wisdom and folly meet, mix, and unite ; 
 
 How virtue and vice blend their black and their 
 white ; 
 
 How a:enius, the illustrious father of fiction, 
 
 Confounds rule and law, reconciles contra- 
 diction — 
 
 I sing : If these mortals, the critics, should 
 bustle, 
 
 I care not, not I, let the critics go whistle. 
 
 But now for a Patron, whose name and 
 whose ^lory 
 At once may illustrate and honour my story. 
 
 Thon first of our orators, first of our wits ; 
 Yef whose parts and acquirements seem mere 
 
 lucky hits ; 
 With knowledge so vast, and with judgment so 
 
 strong, 
 No man with the half of 'em e'er went far 
 
 wrong ; 
 With passions so potent, and fancies so bright, 
 No man with the half of 'em e'er went quite 
 
 right ; 
 A sorry, poor misbegot son of the Muses, 
 For using thy name offers fifty excuses. 
 
 Good L — d, what is man ! for as simple he 
 
 looks. 
 Do but try to develop his hooks and his 
 
 crooks ; 
 With his depths and his shallows, his good and 
 
 his evil. 
 All in all he's a problem must puzzle the devil. 
 
 On his one ruling passion Sir Pope hugely 
 
 labours. 
 That, like th' old Hebrew walking-switch, eats 
 
 up its neighbours : 
 Mankind are his show-box — a friend, would 
 
 you know him? 
 Pull the string, ruling passion the picture will 
 
 show him. 
 What pity, in rearing so beauteous a system. 
 One trifling particular, truth, should have 
 
 miss'd him ; 
 For, spite of his fine theoretic positions. 
 Mankind is a science defies definitions. 
 
 Some sort all our qualities each to its tribe, 
 And think human nature they truly describe; 
 Have you found this, or t'other? there's more 
 
 in the wind, 
 As bv one drunken fellow his comrades voull 
 '^ find. 
 
 G 
 
 But such is the flaw, or the depth of the plan, 
 In the make of that wonderful creature, call'd 
 
 Man, 
 No two virtues, whatever relation they claim. 
 Nor even two different shades of the same. 
 Though like as was ever twin brother to bro- 
 ther. 
 Possessing the one shall imply you've the 
 other. 
 
 TO DR. BLACKLOCK. 
 
 Ellisland, 21st Oct. 178f>. 
 
 Wov/, but your letter made me vauntie ! 
 And are ye hale, and weel, and cantie .' 
 I kenn'd it still your wee bit jauntie 
 
 Wad bring ye to : 
 Lord send you ay as weel's I want ye, 
 
 And then ye'll do. 
 
 The ill-tWef blaw the Heron south ! 
 And never drink be near his drouth ! 
 He tald myself by word o' mouth, 
 
 He'd tak my letter; 
 I lippen'd to the cliiol in trouth. 
 
 And bade nae better. 
 
 But aiblins lioncst Master Heron 
 Had at the time some dainty fair one, 
 To ware his theologic care on. 
 
 Arid holy study ; 
 And tir'd o' sauls to waste his lear on. 
 
 E'en tried the body.* 
 
 But what (Vye think, my trusty fier, 
 Fm turn'd a ganger — Peace be here ! 
 Parnassian queens, I fear, I fear 
 
 Ye'll now disdain me. 
 And then my fiifly pounds a year 
 
 Will Uttle gain me. 
 
 Ye glaikit, gleesome, daintie damies, 
 Wha by Castalia's wimplin streamies, 
 Lowp, sing, and lave your pretty limbifli, 
 
 Ye ken, ye ken, 
 That Strang necessity supreme is 
 
 'Mang sons o' men. 
 
 I hae a wife and twa wee laddies, 
 
 They- maun hae brose and brats o' duddies : 
 
 • Mr. Heron, author of the Hittory of Scotlond, 
 of Torlous other workt. 
 
85 
 
 Ye ken yoursels my heart right proud is, 
 I need na vaunt, 
 
 But I'll sned besoms — thraw saugh v 
 Before they want, 
 
 Lord help me thro' this warld o' care ! 
 I'm weary sick o't late and air ! 
 Not but I hae a richer share 
 
 Than mony ithers; 
 But why should ae man better fare, 
 
 And a' men brithers ? 
 
 Come, Firm Resolve, take thou the van, 
 Thou stalk o' carl-hemp in man ! 
 Andjet us mind, faint heart ne'er wan 
 
 A lady fair ; 
 Wha does the utmost that he can, 
 
 Will whyles do mair. 
 
 But to conclude my silly rhyme, 
 (I'm scant o' verse, and scant o' time} 
 To make a happy fire-side clime 
 
 To weans and wife, 
 That's the true pathos and sublime 
 
 Of human life. 
 
 My compliments to sister Beckie ; 
 And eke the same to honest Lucky, 
 I wat she is a dainty chuckie. 
 
 As e'er tread clay ! 
 And gratefully, my guid auld cockle, 
 
 I'm yours for ay. 
 
 Robert Burns. 
 
 BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 PROLOGUE, 
 
 AT THE THEATRE ELLISLAND, ON 
 NEW-VEAR-DAY EVENING. 
 
 No song nor dance I bring from yon great 
 
 city 
 That" queens it o'er our taste — the more 's the 
 
 pity: 
 Tho', by the by, abroad why will you roam ? 
 Good sense and taste are natives here at home : 
 But not for panegyric I appear, 
 I come to wisli you all a good new year ! 
 Old Father Time deputes me here before ye. 
 Not for to preach, but tell his simple story : 
 The sage grave ancient coughM, and bade me 
 
 say, 
 " You're one year older this important day," 
 If wiser too — he hinted some suggestion, 
 But 'twould be rude, you know, to ask the 
 
 question ; 
 And with a would-be-roguish leer and wink. 
 He bade me on you press this one word — 
 
 " think '. 
 
 Ye sprightly youths, quite flush with hope 
 
 and spirit. 
 Who think to storm the world by dint of merit, 
 To you the dotard has a deal to say. 
 In his sly, dry, sententious, proverb way I 
 He bids you mind, amid your thoughtless 
 
 rattle. 
 That the first blow is ever half the battle ; 
 That tho' some by the skirt may try to snatch 
 
 him ; 
 Yet by the forelock is the hold to catch him ; 
 That whether doing, suffering, or forbearing 
 You may do miracles by persevering. 
 
 Last, tho' not least in love, ye youthful fair, 
 Angehc forms, high Heaven's pecuhar care ! 
 To you old Bald-pate smooths his wrinkled 
 
 brow. 
 And humbly begs you'll mind the important — 
 
 now! 
 To crown your happiness he asks your leave, 
 And offers, bhss to give and to receive. 
 
 For our sincere, tho' haply weak endeavours. 
 With grateful pride we own your many 
 
 favours ; 
 And howsoe'er our tongues may ill reveal it, 
 Believe our glowing bosoms truly feel it. 
 
 ELEGY 
 
 ON THE LATE MISS BURNET 
 
 OF MONBODDO. 
 
 Life ne'er exulted in so rich a prize, 
 As Burnet, lovely from her native skies ; 
 Nor envious death so triumph'd in a blow, 
 As that which laid the accomplish'd Burnet 
 low. 
 
 Thy fonn and mind, sweet maid, can I forgot ? 
 In richest ore the brightest jewel set ! 
 In thee, high Heaven above was truest shown 
 As by his noble work the Godhead best is 
 known. 
 
 In vain ye flaunt in summer's pride, }'e groves ; 
 
 Thou crystal streamlet with thy flowery shore, 
 Ye woodland choir that chant your idle loves, 
 
 Ye cease to charm — ^Eliza is nO more ! 
 
 Ye heathy wastes, immix'd with reedy fens ; 
 
 Ye mossy streams, with sedge and rush 
 stor'd ; 
 Ye rugged cliffs, o'erhanging dreary glens, 
 
 To you I fly, ye with any soul accord. 
 
BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 83 
 
 Princes, whose cumb'rous pride was all their 
 worth, 
 
 Shall venal lays their pompous exit hail ? 
 And thou, sweet excellence ! forsake our earth, 
 
 And not a muse in honest grief bewail ? 
 
 We saw thee shine in youth and beauty's pride, 
 And virtue's light, that beams beyond the 
 spheres ; 
 
 But like the sun edips'd at morning tide. 
 Thou left'st us darlding in a world of tears. 
 
 The parent's heart that nestled fond in thee. 
 That heart how sunk, a prey to grief and 
 care ! 
 
 So deckt the woodbine sweet yon aged tree. 
 So from it ravish'd, leaves it bleak and bare. 
 
 IMITATION 
 
 OF AN OLD JACOBITE SONG. 
 
 By yon castle wa', at the close of the day, 
 I heard a man sing, tho' his head it was gray ; 
 And as he was singing, the tears fast down 
 
 came — 
 There'll never be peace till Jamie comes hame. 
 
 The church is in ruins, the state is in jars. 
 Delusions, oppressions, and murderous wars ; 
 We dare na weel say 't, but we ken vjjp's to 
 
 blame — 
 There '11 never be peace till Jamie comes hame. 
 
 My seven braw sons for Jamie drew sword. 
 And now I greet round their green beds in the 
 
 ye: " 
 It brak the sweet heart o' mv faithfu' auld 
 
 3rd: 
 
 ) SW( 
 
 dame — 
 
 sweet heart o' my faithfu' 
 me — 
 There '11 never be peace till Jamie comes hame. 
 
 Now life is a burden that bows me down. 
 Sin' I tint my bairns, and he tint his crown ; 
 But till my last moment my words are the 
 
 same — 
 There '11 never be peace till Jamie comes hame. 
 
 SONG OF DEATH. 
 
 Scene — a field of battle ; time of the day — evening ; the 
 teo'inded and dying of the victorious army are sup- 
 posed to join in thefoUotcing Sang. 
 
 Farewell, thou fair day, thou green earth, 
 and ye skies, 
 Now gay with the bright setting sun ! 
 Farewell, loves and friendships, ye dear ten- 
 der ties. 
 Our race of existence is nm ! 
 
 Thou grirn king of terrors, thou hfe'a gloomy 
 foe. 
 Go, frighten the coward and slave ; 
 Go, teach them to tremble, fell tyrant ! bfk 
 know. 
 No terrors hast thou to the brave ! 
 
 Thou strik'st the dull peasant — he sinks in the 
 dark, 
 
 Nor saves e'en the wreck of a name ; 
 Thou strik'st the young hero — a glorious mark ! 
 
 He falls in the blaze of his fame ! 
 
 In the field of proud honour — our swords in 
 
 our hands. 
 Our King and our country to save — 
 "While victory shines on life's last ebbing sanda, 
 O who would not rest with the brave ! 
 
 THE RIGHTS OF WOMAN. 
 
 y}n Occasional .address spoken by Miss FontenelU «% 
 her Benefit- JVight. 
 
 While Europe's eye is fix'd on mighty things, 
 The fate of empires and the fall of kings ; 
 While quacks of state must each produce his 
 
 plan, 
 And even children lisp the Rights of Man ; 
 Amid this mighty fuss, just let me mention. 
 The Rights of fVoman merit some attention. 
 
 First, in the sexes' intermix'd connection, 
 One sacred Right of Woman is prolectio'ji. — 
 The tender flower that lifts its head, elate. 
 Helpless, must fall before the blasts of fate. 
 Sunk on the earth, defac'd its lovely fonn, 
 Unless your shelter ward th' impending storm.— 
 
 Our second Right — but needless here is 
 caution. 
 To keep that right inviolate's the fashion, 
 Each man of sense has it so full before him, 
 He'd die before iie'd wrong it — 'tis decorum. — 
 There was, indeed, in far less pohsh'd days, 
 A time, when rough rude man had naughty 
 
 ways ; 
 Would swagger, swear, get drunk, kick up a 
 
 riot ; 
 Nay, even thus invade a lady's quiet — 
 Now, thank our stars ! these Gothic times are 
 
 fled; 
 Now, well-bred men — and you are all well- 
 bred — 
 Most justly think (and we are much the 
 
 gainers) 
 Such conduct neitlier spirit, wit, nor manners. 
 
 For Right the third, our last, our best, om 
 dearest, 
 That right to fluttering female hearts tlic 
 cearest. 
 
84 
 
 Wliich even the Rights of Kings in low pros- 
 tration 
 Most humbly own — 'tis dear, dear admiration .' 
 m that blest sphere alone we live and move ; 
 There taste that life of life — immortal love. — 
 Smiles, glances, sighs, tears, fits, flirtations, 
 
 airs, 
 'Gainst such an host what flinty savage dares — 
 When awful Beauty joins with all her charms, 
 Who is so rash as rise in rebel arms ? 
 
 But truce with kings, and truce with consti- 
 tutions. 
 With bloody armaments and revolutions ; 
 Let majesty our first attention summon, 
 J^h ! ca ira .' the Majesty of Woman ! 
 
 BURNS' POEMS 
 
 ADDRESS, 
 
 Spoken by Miss Fontenelle, on her benefit-night, Decem- 
 ber 4, 1795, at the Theatre, Dumfries. 
 
 Still anxious to secure your partial favour, 
 And not less anxious, sure, this night, than 
 
 ever, 
 A Prologue, Epilogue, or some such matter, 
 'Twould vamp my bill, said I, if nothing bet 
 
 ter ; 
 So, sought a Poet, roosted near the skies ; 
 Told him I came to feast my curious eyes ; 
 Said, nothing like his works was ever printed ; 
 And last, my Prologue-business slily hinted. 
 " Ma'am, let me tell you," quoth my man of 
 
 rhymes, 
 " I know your bent — these are no laughing 
 
 times : 
 Can you — but Miss, I own I have my fears, 
 Dissolve in pause — and sentimental tears — 
 With laden sighs, and solemn-rounded sen- 
 tence. 
 Rouse from his sluggish slumbers, fell Repen- 
 tance ; 
 Taint Vengeance as he takes his horrid stand, 
 Waving on liigh the desolating brand, 
 Galling the storms to bear him o'er a guilty 
 land?" 
 
 I could no more — askance the creature eye- 
 
 D'ye think, said I, this face was made for 
 
 crying .'' 
 Ill laugh, that's poz — nay more, the world 
 
 shall know it ; 
 And so, your servant \ gloomy Master Poet '. 
 
 Finn as my creed, Sirs, 'tis my fix'd belief. 
 That Misery s another word for Grief: 
 
 I also think — so may I b^ a bride ! 
 
 That so much laughter, so much life enjoy'd. 
 
 Thou man of crazy care and ceaseless sigh, 
 Still under bleak Misfortune's blasting eye ; 
 Doom'd to that sorest task of man alive — 
 To make tliree guineas do the work of five : 
 Laugh in Misfortune's face — the beldam witch '. 
 Say, you'll be merry, though you can't be rich. 
 
 Thou otlier man of care, the wretch in love. 
 Who long with jiltish arts and airs hast strove ; 
 Who, as the boughs all temptingly project, 
 Measur'st in desperate thought — a rope — thy 
 
 neck — 
 Or, where the beetling cliff* o'erhangs the 
 
 deep, 
 Peerest to meditate the healing leap ; 
 Wouldst thou be cur'd, thou silly, moping elf, 
 Laugh at her follies — laugh e'en at thyself : 
 Learn to despise those frowns now so terrific. 
 And love a kinder — that's your grand specific 
 
 To sum up all, bo merry, I advise ; 
 And as we're merry, may we still be wise. 
 
 SONGS. 
 
 THE LEA-RIG. 
 
 When o'er the hill the eastern star. 
 
 Tells bughtin-time is near, my jo ; 
 And owsen frae the furrow'd field. 
 
 Return sae dowf and weary, O ; 
 Down by the burn, where scented birks, 
 
 Wi' dew are hanging clear, my jo, 
 ril meet thee on the lea-rig. 
 
 My ain kind dearie, O. 
 
 In mirkest glen, at midnight hour, 
 
 I'd rove and ne'er be eerie, O, 
 If tlu-o' that glen, I gaed to thee, 
 
 My ain kind dearie, O. 
 Altho' the night were ne'er sae wild. 
 
 And I were ne'er sae wearie, O, 
 I'd meet thee on the lea-rig, 
 
 My ain kind dearie, O. 
 
 The hunter lo'es the morning sun. 
 To rouse the mountain deer, my jo, 
 
 At noon the fisher seeks the glen. 
 Along the burn to steer, my jo ; 
 
BURNS' TOEMS. 
 
 85 
 
 Gie me the hour o' gloamin gray? 
 
 It maks my heart sae cheery, O, 
 To meet thee on the lea-rig, 
 
 My ain kind dearie, O. 
 
 TO MARY. 
 
 Tune— "Ewe-bughts, Marion." 
 
 Will ye go to the Indies, my Mary, 
 And leave auld Scotia's shore ? 
 
 Will ye go to the Indies my Mary, 
 Across th' Atlantic's roar ? 
 
 sweet grows the lime and the orange. 
 And the apple on the pine ; 
 
 But a' the charms o' the Indies, 
 Can never equal thine.. 
 
 1 hae sworn by the Heavens to my Mary, 
 
 I hae sworn by the Heavens to be true ; 
 And sae may the Heavens forget me. 
 When I forget my vow ! 
 
 O phght me your faith, my Mary, 
 And plight me your lily-white hand ; 
 
 O plight me your faith, my Mary, 
 IJefore I leave Scotia's strand. 
 
 Wo hae plighted our troth, my Mary, 
 
 In mutual affection to join, 
 And curst be the cause that shall part us I 
 
 The hour, and the moment o' time !* 
 
 MY WIFE'S A WINSOME WEE THING. 
 
 She is a winsome wee thing, 
 She is a handsome wee thing. 
 She is a bonnie wee thing. 
 Tins sweet wee wife o' mine. 
 
 I never saw a fairer, 
 
 I never lo'ed a dearer. 
 
 And niest myheart I'll wear her, 
 
 For fear m^jfe^el tine. 
 
 She is a winsome wee thing. 
 She is a handsome wee thing. 
 She is a bonnie wee thing, 
 This sweet wee wife o' mine. 
 
 The warld's wrack we share o't, 
 The warstle and the care o't ; 
 Wi' her I'll blithly bear it, 
 And think my lot divine. 
 
 •This Song Mr. Thomson hqp not adopted in hia 
 collection- It deserve.', however, to be preserved. E. 
 
 BONNIE LESLEY. 
 
 O SAW ye bonnie Lesley 
 
 As she gaed o'er the border ? 
 
 She's gane, like Alexander, 
 
 To spread her conquests farther. 
 
 To see her is to love her, 
 And love but her for ever ; 
 
 For Nature made her what she is, 
 And ne'er made sic anither 1 
 
 Thou art a queen, fair Lesley, 
 Thy subjects wc, before thee ; 
 
 Thou art divine, fair Lesley, 
 The hearts o' men adore thee. 
 
 The Deil he could na scaith thee. 
 Or aught that wad belang thee ; 
 
 He'd look into thy bonnie face. 
 And say, " I canna wrang thee." 
 
 The Powers aboon will tent thee ; 
 
 Misfortune sha'na steer thee ; 
 Thou'rt like themselves sae lovely 
 
 That ill they'll ne'er let near thee. 
 
 Return again, fair Lesley, 
 
 Return to Caledonie ! 
 That we may brag, we hae a las3 
 
 There's nane again sae bonnie. 
 
 HIGHLAND MARY 
 
 Tune — " Catharine Ogie." 
 
 Ye bauKs, and braes, and streams around, 
 
 The castle o' Montgomery, 
 Green be your woods, and fair your flowers, 
 
 Your waters never drumlie ! 
 There simmer first unfauld her robes. 
 
 And there the langest tarry ; 
 For there I took the last fareweel 
 
 O' my sweet Highland Mary. 
 
 How sweetly bloom'd the gay green birk, 
 
 How rich the hawthorn's blossom ; 
 As underneath their fragrant shade 
 
 I clasp'd her to my bosom ! 
 The golden hours on angel wings. 
 
 Flew o'er me and my dearie ; 
 For dear to me, as light and life. 
 
 Was my sweet Highland Mary. 
 
 Wi' mony a vow, and lock'd embrace, 
 
 Our parting was fu' tender ; 
 And pledging aft to meet again, 
 
 We tore oursels asunder ; 
 
5« 
 
 BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 But Oh ! fell death's untimely frost, 
 That nipt my flower sae early ! 
 
 Now green's the sod, and cauld's the clay, 
 That wraps my Highland Mary ! 
 
 O pale, pale now, those rosy lips, 
 
 I aft hae kiss'd sae fondly 1 
 And closed for ay, the sparkling glance, 
 
 That dwelt on me sae kiydly 1 
 And mouldering now in silent dust, 
 
 That heart that lo'ed me dearly ! 
 But still within my bosom's core. 
 
 Shall jive my Higliland Mary. 
 
 AULD ROB MORRIS. 
 
 There's auld Roh Morris that wons in yon 
 
 glen. 
 He's the king o' guid fellows and wale of auld 
 
 men; 
 He has gowd in his coffers, he has owsen and 
 
 kine. 
 And ae bonnie lassie, his darting and mme. 
 
 She's fresh as the morning, the fairest in May ; 
 She's sweet as the ev'ning amang the new hay ; 
 As bhthe and as artless as the lambs on the lea, 
 And dear to my heart as the light to my e'e. 
 
 But Oh ! she's an heiress, auld Robin's a laird. 
 And my daddie has nought but a cot-house 
 
 and yard ; 
 A wooer hke me mannna hope to com§ speed, 
 The wounds I must hide that will soop be my 
 dead. 
 
 The day comes to me, but delight brings me 
 
 nane; 
 The night comes to me, but my rest it is gane : 
 I wander my lane like a night-troubled ghaist, 
 And I sigh as my heart it would burst in my 
 
 breast. 
 
 O, had she been but of lower degree, 
 
 I then might hae hop'd she wad smil'd upon 
 
 me I 
 O, how past descriving had then been my 
 
 bliss, 
 A " "^ow my distraction no words can express ! 
 
 DUNCAN GRAY. 
 
 Duncan Gray came here to woo, 
 Ha, ha, the vwoing o't. 
 
 On blytlie yule night when we were fou. 
 Ha, ha, the wooing o't. 
 
 Maggie coost her head fu' high, 
 Look'd asklent and unco skeigh, 
 Gart poor Duncan stand abeigh ; 
 Fla, ha, the wooing o't. 
 
 Duncan fleech'd, and Duncan pray'd ; 
 
 Ha, ha. Sec. 
 Meg was deaf as Ailsa Craig, 
 
 Ha, ha, &:c. 
 Duncan sigh'd baith out and in, 
 Grat his een baith bleer't and blin', 
 Spak o' lowpm owre a linn ; 
 
 Ha, ha, &c. 
 
 Time and chance are but a tide, 
 
 Ha, ha. Sec. 
 Slighted love is sair to bide, 
 
 Ha, ha, Sec. 
 Shall I, like a fool, quoth he, 
 For a haughty hizzie die ? 
 She may gae to — France for me ! 
 
 Ha, ha, Sec. 
 
 Hov/ it comes let doctors tell, 
 
 Hn, ha, kc. 
 Meg grew sick — as he grew heal, 
 
 Ha, ha, &:c. 
 Something in her bosom wrings, 
 For relief a sigh she brings ; 
 And O, her een, they spak sic things ] 
 
 Ha, ha. Sec. 
 
 Dmican was a lad o' grace, 
 
 Ha, ha. Lc. 
 Maggie's was a piteous case. 
 
 Ha, Jul, Sec. 
 Duncan coi#d na be her death. 
 Swelling pity smoor'd his wrath ; 
 Now they're crouse and canty baith. 
 
 Ha, ha, ^:c. 
 
 sol 
 
 Tune — " I had a horse." 
 
 O pooRTiTH cauld, and restless love, 
 
 Ye wreck my peace between ye ; 
 Yet poortith a' I could forgive, 
 
 An' 'twere na for my Jeanie. 
 O why should fate sic pleasure have. 
 
 Life's dearest bands untwining? 
 Or why sae sweet a flower as love 
 
 Depend on Fortune's shining? 
 
BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 Thia warld'8 wealth when I think on, 
 Its pride, and a' the lave o't ; 
 
 Fie, fie on silly coward man, 
 That he should be the slave o't. 
 O why, kc. 
 
 Her een sae bonnie blue betray, 
 How she repays my passion ; 
 
 But prudence is her o'erword ay, 
 She talks of rank and fashion. 
 O why. Sec. 
 
 O wha can prudence tliink upon, 
 
 And sic a lassie by him ? 
 O wha can prudence think upon, 
 
 And sae in love as I am ? 
 O why, &c. 
 
 How blest the humble cotter's fate ! 
 
 He wooes his simple dearie ; 
 The sillie bogles, wealth and state. 
 
 Can never make them eerie. 
 O why sliould fate sic pleasure have, 
 
 Life's dearest bands untwining ? 
 Or why sae sweet a flower as love, 
 
 Depend on Fortune's shining ? 
 
 GALLA WATER. 
 
 Therk's braw, braw lads on Yarrow braes, 
 That wander thro' the blooming heather j 
 
 But Yarrow braes, nor Ettric shaws, 
 Can match the lads o' Galla water. 
 
 But there is ane, a secret ane, 
 Aboon them a' I lo'e him better ; 
 
 And I'll be his, and he'll be mine, 
 The bonnie lad o' Galla water. 
 
 Altho' his dad die was nae laird. 
 And tho' I hae nae meikle tocher ; 
 
 Yet rich in kindest, truest love, 
 We'U tent our flocks by Galla water. 
 
 It ne'er was wealth, it ne'er was wealth. 
 That coft contentment, peace, or pleasure, 
 
 The bands and bhss o' mutual love, 
 O that's the chiefest warld's treasure 1 
 
 l^ORD GREGORY. 
 
 O MIRK, mirk is this midnight hour, 
 And loud the tempest's roar ; 
 
 A waefu' wanderer seeks thy tow'r. 
 Lord Gregory, ope thy door. 
 
 An exile frae her father's hu.'. 
 And a' for loving thee ; 
 
 At least some pity on me shaw, 
 If /oye it may na be. 
 
 Lord Gregory, mind'st thou not tho gicve, 
 
 By bonnie Irwine side, 
 Where first I own'd that virgm-love 
 
 I lang, lang had denied. 
 
 How afteri didst thou pledge and vow, 
 Thou wad for ay be mine '. 
 
 And my fond heart, itsel sae true, 
 It ne'er mistrusted thine. 
 
 Hard is thy heart. Lord Gregory, 
 
 And flinty is thy breast : 
 Thou dart of heaven that flashest by, 
 
 O wUt thou give me rest ' 
 
 Ye mustering thunders from above, 
 
 Your willing victim see ! 
 But spare, and pardon my fause love. 
 
 His wrongs to heaven and me ! 
 
 MARY MORISON 
 
 Tune — "Bide ye yet." 
 
 O Mary, at thy window be. 
 
 It is the wish'd, the trysted hour I 
 Those smiles and glances let me see, 
 
 That make the miser's treasure poor ; 
 How blithly wad I bide the stoure, 
 
 A weary slave frae sun to sim'; 
 Could I the rich reward secure, 
 
 The lovely Mary Morison. 
 
 Yestreen when to the trembling string, 
 
 Tlie dance gaed thro' the lighted ha', 
 To thee my iancy took its wing, 
 
 I sat, but neilher'heard or saw : 
 Tho' this was fair, and that was braw. 
 
 And yon the toast of a' the town, 
 I sigh'd, and said amang them a', 
 
 " Ye are na Mary Morison." 
 
 O Mary, canst thou wreck his peace, 
 
 Wha for thy sake wad glpily die.' 
 Or canst thou break that heart of liis, 
 
 Whase only fault is loving thee? 
 If love for love thou wilt na gie. 
 
 At least be pity to me shown ! 
 A tliought ungentle canna be 
 
 The UiouglTt o' Mary Moriaon. 
 
BURNS' POEMS 
 WANDERING WILLIE. 
 
 Here awa, there awa, wandering Willie, 
 Now tired with wandering, haud awa hame ; 
 
 Come to my bosom my ae only dearie, 
 
 And tell me thou bring'st me my Willie the 
 
 Loud blew the cauld winter winds at our part- 
 ing; 
 It was na the blast brought the tear to my 
 e'e : 
 Now welcome the simmer, and welcome my 
 Willie, 
 The simmer to nature, my Willie to me. 
 
 Ye hurricanes, rest in the cave o' your slum- 
 bers, 
 O how your wild horrors a lover alarms ! 
 Awaken ye breezes, row gently ye billows. 
 And waft my dear laddie ance mair to my 
 arms. 
 
 But if he's forgotten his faithfullest Namiie, 
 O still flow between us, thou wide roaring 
 maui ; 
 
 May I never see it, may I never trow it, 
 But dying believe that my Willie's my ain ! 
 
 THE SAME, 
 
 As altered by Mr. Kiskine and Mr. Tlioinsoii. 
 
 Here awa, there awa, wandering Willie, 
 Here awa, tliere awa, haud awa hame. 
 
 Come to my bosom ray ain only dearie, 
 
 Tell me thou bring'st me my Willie the 
 
 Winler-ioinds blew loud and caul at our part- 
 • ing. 
 Fear.'' ^-ir my Willie brought tears in my e'e, 
 WelcoiiiO now simmer, and welcome my Wil- 
 he. 
 As simmer lo nature, so WilUe to me. 
 
 Rest, ye wild storms, in the cave o' your slum- 
 bers. 
 How your dread howling a lover alarms I 
 Blow soft ye breezes 1 roll gently ye billows 1 
 , And waft my dear laddie ance mair to my 
 arms. 
 
 But oh, if he's faithless, aiuiminds na\nsl:ia.nme^ 
 Flow still bet\/eeu us thou dark-fieaving 
 main 1 
 
 May I ne^er see it, may I never trow it, 
 
 fy/iile dying I lhi7ik that my Willie's my ain. 
 
 Our Poet, with his usual judgment, aiopted tome of 
 these alterations, and rejected others. The last edi- 
 tion is as follows : 
 
 Here awa, there awa, wandering Willie, 
 Here awa, there awa, haud awa hame ; 
 
 Come to my bosom my ain only dearie, 
 Tell me thou bring'st me my Willie the same. 
 
 Winter winds blew loud and cauld at our part- 
 ing. 
 Fears for my Willie brought tears in my e'e, 
 Welcome now simmer, and welcome my Wil- 
 Ue, 
 The simmer to nature, my WiUie to me. 
 
 Rest, ye wild storms in the cave of your slum* 
 bers, 
 How your dread howling a lover alarms ! 
 Wauken ye breezes, row gently ye billows. 
 And waft my dear laddie ance mair to my 
 arms. 
 
 But oh ! if he's faitliless, and minds na his 
 Nannie, 
 Flow still between us thou wide-roaring 
 main ; 
 May I never see it, may I never trow it, 
 But, dying, believe that my Willie's my 
 ain. 
 
 OPEN THE DOOR TO ME, OH 
 
 WITH ALTERATIONS. 
 
 Oh, open the door, some pity to show. 
 
 Oh, open the door to me, Oh ! 
 Tho' thou hast been false, I'll ever prove true, 
 
 Oh, open the door to me, Oh ! 
 
 Cauld is the blast upon my pale cheek, 
 But caulder thy love for me. Oh ! 
 
 The frost that freezes the life at my heart. 
 Is nought to my pams frae thee. Oh ! 
 
 The wan moon is setting behind the while 
 wave, * 
 
 And time is setting with me. Oh ! 
 False friends, false love, farewell ! for mair 
 
 I'll ne'er trouble them, nor thee. Oh I 
 
 She has open'd the door, she has open'd it 
 wide; 
 She sees his pale corse on the plain, Oh ! 
 My true love, she cried, and sank down by 
 his side. 
 Never to rise again. Oh I — 
 
BURNS' rOBMS. 
 
 &r. 
 
 JESSIE. 
 
 Tone— "Bonny Dundee." 
 
 True hearted was he, the sad swain o' the 
 Yarrow, 
 And fair are the maids on tlie banks o' the 
 Ayr, 
 But by the sweet side o' the Nith's winding 
 river, 
 Are lovers as faithful, and maidens as fair : 
 To equal young- Jessie seek Scotland all over ; 
 
 To equal young Jessie you seek it in vain ; 
 Grace, beauty, and elegance fetter her lover, 
 And maidenly modesty fixes the chain. 
 
 O, fresh is the rose in the gay, dewy morning. 
 
 And sweet is the lily at evening close ; 
 But in the fair presence o' lovely young Jessie, 
 
 Unseen is the lily, unheeded the rose. 
 Love sits in her smile, a wizard ensnaring ; 
 
 Enthron'd in her een he delivers his law ; 
 And still to her charms she alone is a stranger ! 
 
 Her modest demeanour's the jewel of a'. 
 
 Wi' alter'd voice, quoth I, sweet lass, 
 
 Sweet as yon hawthorn's blossom, 
 O ! happy, happy may he be, 
 
 That's dearest to thy bosom 1 
 My purse is light, I've far to gang. 
 
 And fain wad be thy lodger ; 
 I've serv'd my kmg and country lang, 
 
 Take pity on a sodger. 
 
 Sae wistfully she gaz'd on me, 
 
 And lovelier was than ever : 
 Quo' she, a sodger ance I lo'ed, 
 
 Forget him shall I never : 
 Our humble cot, and hamely fare, 
 
 Ye freely shall partake it, 
 That gallant badge, the dear cockade, 
 
 Ye're welcome for the sake o't. 
 
 She gaz'd — she redden'd like a 
 
 Syne pale like ony lily ; 
 She sank within my arms, and cried, 
 
 Art thou my ain dear Willie ? 
 By him who made yon sun and skv — 
 
 By whom true love's regarded, 
 I am the man ; and thus may still 
 
 True lovers be rewarded. 
 
 WHEN WILD WAR'S DEADLY BLAST 
 WAS BLAWN. 
 
 Air—" The Mill MiU O." 
 
 When wild war's deadly blast was blawn, 
 
 And gentle peace returning, 
 Wi' mony a sweet babe fartherless, 
 
 And mony a widow mourning, 
 I left the lines and tented field. 
 
 Where lang I'd been a lodger. 
 My humble knapsack a' my wealth, 
 
 A poor and honest sodger. 
 
 A leal, light heart was in my breast, 
 
 My hand unstain'd wi' plunder ; 
 And for fair Scotia's hame again, 
 
 I cheery on did wander, 
 I thought upon the banks o' Coil, 
 
 I thought upon my Nancy, 
 '■ thought upon the witcliing smile 
 
 That caught my youthful fancy. 
 
 At length I reach'd the bonnie glen. 
 
 Where early hfe I sported ; 
 I pass'd the mill, and trysting thom. 
 
 Where Nancy aft I courted : 
 Wha spied I but my ain dear maid, 
 
 Down by her mother's dweUing I 
 And tum'd me round to hide the flood 
 
 That m ray een was swelling, 
 G 2 
 
 The wars are o'er, and I'm come hame. 
 
 And find thee still true-hearted ; 
 Tho' poor in gear, we're rich in love, 
 
 And mair we'se ne'er be parted. 
 Quo' she, my grandsire left me gowd, 
 
 A maUen plenish'd fairly ; 
 And come, my faithfu' sodger lad, 
 
 Thou'rt welcome to it dearly I 
 
 For gold the merchant ,'^loughs the main. 
 
 The farmer ploughs ♦-'ne manor; 
 But glory is the sodger'sprize ; 
 
 The sodger's wealth is honour ; 
 The brave poor sodger ne'er despise, 
 
 Nor count him as a stranger. 
 Remember he's his country's stay 
 
 In day and hour of danger. 
 
 MEG O' THE MILL. 
 
 Air — " O bonny lass, will you lie in a Barrack? 
 
 O KEN ye what Meg o' the Mill has gotten. 
 An' ken ye what Meg o' the Mill has gotten i" 
 She has gotten a coof wi' a claut o' siller, 
 And broken the heart o' the barley Millor. 
 
 The Miller was strappin, the Miller was ruddj- 
 A heart like a lord, and a hue like a lady : 
 The laird was a widdiefu', bicerit knurl : — 
 She's left the guid follow and ta'en the churl. 
 
90 
 
 BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 Thu miller ne .lecht her heart leal and lovmg : 
 The Laird did address her wi' matter mair 
 
 moving, 
 A fine pacing horse wV a clear chained bridle, 
 A whip by her side, and a bonnie side-saddle. 
 
 O wae on the siller, it is sae prevailing ; 
 And wae on the love that is fix'd on a mailen ! 
 A tocner's nae word in a true lover's parle. 
 But, gie me my love, and a fig for the warl I 
 
 SONG. 
 
 Tune — " Liggeram Cosh." 
 
 BuTHE hae I been on yon hill, 
 
 As the lambs before me ; 
 Careless ilka thought and free. 
 
 As the breeze flew o'er me : 
 Now nae longer sport and play, 
 
 Mirth or sang can please me ; 
 Lesley is sae fair and coy. 
 
 Care and anguish seize me. 
 
 Heavy, heavy, is the task. 
 
 Hopeless love declaring : 
 Trembling, I dow nocht but glow'r, 
 
 Sighing, dumb, despairing ! 
 If she winna ease the thraws. 
 
 In my bosom swelling ; 
 Underneath the grass green-sod, 
 
 Soon maun be my dwelling. 
 
 SONG. 
 
 Tune — ^" Logan Water." 
 
 . (,) Logan, sweetly didst thou glide, 
 That day I was my Willie's bride ; 
 And years sinsyne has o'er us run, 
 Like Logan to the simmer sun. 
 But now thy flow'ry banks appear 
 Like drumlie winter, dark and drear. 
 While my dear lad maun face his faes. 
 Far, far frae me and Logan braes. 
 
 Agam the merry month o' May, 
 
 Has made our hills and valleys gay ; 
 
 The birds rejoice m leafy bow'rs. 
 
 The bees hum round the breatliing flow'rs : 
 
 Blithe, morning lifts his rosy eye. 
 
 And ev'ning's tears are tears of joy : 
 
 My soul, delighUfess. a' surveys, 
 
 While WiUie's far frae Logan braes. 
 
 Within von milk-white hawthorn bush. 
 Amang her nestlings sits the thrush; 
 
 Her faithfu' mate will share her toil, 
 Or wi' his song her cares beguile. 
 But I wi' my sweet nurslings here, 
 Nae mate to help, nae mate to cheer. 
 Pass widow'd nights and joyless days, 
 While Willie's far frae Logan braes I 
 
 O wae upon you, men o' state, 
 That brethren rouse to deadly hate ! 
 As ye make mony a fond heart mourn 
 Sae may it on your heads return t 
 How can your flinty hearts enjoy. 
 The widow's tears, the orphan's cry? 
 But soon may peace bring happy days, 
 And Wilhe, hame to Logan braes ! 
 
 FRAGMENT, 
 
 WITHERSPOOJ^'S COLLECTION 
 
 SCOTS SONGS. 
 
 Air — " Hughie Graham." 
 
 " O GIN my love were yon red rose, 
 That grows upon the castle wa', 
 
 And I mysel a drop o' dew, 
 Into her bonnie breast to fa' 1 
 
 " Oh, there beyond expression blest, 
 I'd feast on beauty a' the night ; 
 
 Seal'd on her silk-saft faulds to rest. 
 Till fiey'd awa' by Phoebus' light." 
 
 * O were my love yon hlac fair, 
 Wi' purple blossoms to the spring; 
 
 And I, a bird to shelter there, 
 
 When wearied on my little wing : 
 
 How I wad mourn, when it was torn 
 By autumn wild, and winter rude ! 
 
 But I wad sing on wanton wing. 
 
 When youthfu' May its bloom renew'd.* 
 
 BONNIE JEAN. 
 
 There was a lass, and she was fair, 
 At kirk and market to be seen. 
 
 When a' the fairest maids were met, 
 The fairest maid was bonnie Jean. 
 
 Thwe sianiix 
 
 ! added hy Butni. 
 
And ay she wrought her mammie's wark 
 And ay she sang sae merrilie : 
 
 The blithest bird upon the bush 
 Had ne'er a hghter heart than she. 
 
 But hawks will rob the tender joys 
 That bless the little lintwhite's nest ; 
 
 And frost will blight the fairest flowVs, 
 And love will break the soundest rest. 
 
 Young Robie was the brawest lad. 
 The flower and pride o' a' the glen ; 
 
 And he had owsen, sheep and kye, 
 And wanton naigies nine or ten. 
 
 He gaed wi' Jeanie to the tryste, 
 He dancM wi' Jeanie on the down ; 
 
 And lang ere witless Jeanie wist, 
 Her heart was tint, her peace was stown. 
 
 As in the bosom o' the stream, 
 The moon beam dwells at dewy e'en ; 
 
 So trembling, pure, was tender love, 
 Within the breast o' bonnie Jean. 
 
 And now she works her mammie's wark, 
 And ay she sighs wi' care and pain ; 
 
 Ye wist na what her ail might be, 
 Or what wad mak her weel again. 
 
 But did na Jeanie's heart loup light, 
 
 And did na joy blink in her e'e. 
 As Robie tauld a tale o' love, 
 Ae e'enin on the lily lea ? 
 
 The sun was sinking in the west. 
 The birds sang sweet ui ilka grove ; 
 
 His cheek to hers he fondly prest. 
 And wliispord thus his tale o' love ; 
 
 O Jeanie fair, I lo'e thee dear ; 
 
 O Ciinst thou think to fancy me I 
 Or wilt thou leave thy mammie's cot, 
 
 And learn to tent the farms wi' me ? 
 
 At barn or byre thou shalt na drudge. 
 Or naething else to trouble thee ;" 
 
 But stray amang the heather-bells. 
 And tent the waving corn wi' me. 
 
 Now what coidd artless Jeanie do ? 
 
 She had nae will to say him na: 
 At length she blush 'd a sweet consent. 
 
 And love was ay between them twa. 
 
 BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 PHILLIS THE FAIR. 
 
 Tune — " Robin Adair." 
 
 While larks with little wing, 
 
 Fann'd the pure air. 
 Tasting the breathing spring. 
 
 Forth I did fare : 
 Gay the sun's golden eye, 
 Peep'd o'er the mountains high ; 
 Such thy morn . did I cry, 
 
 Philhs the fair 
 
 In each bird's careless song. 
 
 Glad did I share ; 
 While yon wild flow'rs among, 
 
 Chance led me there : 
 Sweet to the opening day, 
 Rosebuds bent the dewy spray ; 
 Such thy bloom I did I say, 
 
 Philhs the fah. 
 
 Down in a shady walk, 
 
 Doves cooing were, 
 I mark'd the cruel hawk 
 
 Caught in a snare : 
 So kind may fortune be, 
 Such make his destiny. 
 He who would injure thee, 
 Philhs the fair. 
 
 SONG. 
 
 To the same Tune. 
 
 Had I a cave on some wild, distant shore, 
 Where the winds howl to the waves' dashing 
 There would I weep my woes, [roar : 
 
 There seek my last repose, 
 Till grief my eyes should close, 
 Ne'er to wake more. 
 
 Falsest of womankind, canst thou declare, 
 All thy fond plighted vows — fleetmg as air I 
 To thy new lover hie. 
 Laugh o'er thy perjury, 
 Then in* thy bosom try. 
 
 What peace is there ! 
 
 SONG. 
 
 Tune—" Allan Water." 
 
 By Allan stream I chanc'd to rove, 
 
 Wliile Phcebus sank beyond Benleddi ;* 
 
 * A mountain west of Strath Allan. 3,(»09 feet his^n 
 
92 
 
 BURNS' POtiMS. 
 
 The winds were whispering thro' the grove, 
 The yellow corn was waving ready : 
 
 I listened to a lover's sang, 
 And thought on youthfu' pleasures mony ; 
 
 And ay the wild-wood echoes rang — 
 O, dearly do I love thee, Annie I 
 
 O, happy be the woodbine bower, 
 
 Nae nightly bogle make it eerie ; 
 Nor ever sorrow stain the hour. 
 
 The place and time I met my dearie I 
 Her head upon my throbbing breast. 
 
 She, sinking, said, " I'm thine for ever '." 
 While mony a kiss the seal imprest. 
 
 The sacred vow, we ne'er should sever. 
 
 The haunt o' sprmg's the primrose brae, 
 
 The simmer joys the flocks to follow ; 
 How cheery thro' her shortening day. 
 
 Is autumn, in her weeds o' yellow ; 
 But can they melt the glowing heart. 
 
 Or chain the soul in speechless pleasure. 
 Or thro' each nerve the rapture dart. 
 
 Like meeting her, our bosom's treasure ? 
 
 WHISTLE, AND I'LL COME TO YOU, 
 MY LAD. 
 
 O WHISTLE, and I'll come to you, my lad : 
 O whistle, and I'll come to you, my lad : 
 Tho' father and mither and a' should gae mad, 
 O whistle, and I'll come to you, my lad. 
 
 But warily tent, when ye come to court me. 
 And come na unless the back-yett be a-jee ; 
 Syne up the back-stile, and let nae body see. 
 And come as ye were na comin to me. 
 And come, fee. 
 
 O whistle, &c. 
 
 At kirk, or at market, whene'er ye meet me. 
 Gang by me as tho' that ye car'd na a flie : 
 But steal me a blink o' your bonnie black e'e, 
 Yet look as ye were na looking at me. 
 Yet look, kc. 
 
 whistle, kc. 
 
 Ay vow and protest that ye care na for me, 
 And whiles ye may lightly my beauty a wee ; 
 But court na anither, tho' jokin ye be. 
 For fear that she wyle your fancy frae me. 
 For fear, &c. 
 
 O whistle, kc. 
 
 SONG. 
 
 XuNE — '■' The rauckmg o' Gcordie's byre." 
 
 Adown winding Nith I did wander, 
 
 To mark the sweet flowers as they sprmg ; 
 
 Adown wmding Nith I did wander. 
 Of Phillis to muse and to sing. 
 
 Awa wi' your belles and your beauties. 
 They meter wi'' her can compare : 
 
 Whaever has met wi'' my Phillis, 
 Has met wi' the queen o' the fair. 
 
 The daisy amus'd my fond fancy. 
 So artless, so simple, so wild ; 
 
 Thou emblem, said I, o' my Phillis, 
 For she is simpUcity's child. 
 Awa, kc. 
 
 The rose-bud 's the blush o' my charmer. 
 Her sweet balmy hp when 'tis prest : 
 
 How fair and how pure is the lily, 
 But fairer and purer her breast. 
 Awa, kc. 
 
 Yon knot of gay flowers in the arbour, 
 They ne'er wi' my Phillis can vie : 
 
 Her breath is the breath o' the woodbine 
 Its dew-drop o' diamond, her eye. 
 Awa, kc. 
 
 Her voice is the song of the morning 
 
 That wakes thro' the green-spreading grove, 
 
 When Phoebus peeps over the mountains. 
 On music, and pleasure, and love. 
 Awa, kc. 
 
 But beauty how frail and how fleeting. 
 The bloom of a fine summer's day 1 
 
 While worth in the mind o' my Philhs 
 Will flourish without a decay. 
 Awa, kc 
 
 SONG. 
 
 AiK— « Cauld Kail." 
 
 Come, let me take thee to my breast, 
 And pledge we ne'er shall sunder ; 
 
 \nd I shall spurn as vilest dust 
 Tho warld's wealth and grandeur. 
 
BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 And do 1 hear my Jeanie own, 
 That equal transports move her ? 
 
 [ ask for dearest Ufe alone 
 That I may live to love her. 
 
 Thus in my arms, wi' all thy charms, 
 
 I clasp my countless treasure ; 
 I'll seek nae mair o' heaven to share ; 
 
 Than sic a moment's pleasure : 
 And by thy een, sae bonnie blue, 
 
 I swear I'm thine for ever ! 
 And on thy lips I seal my vow. 
 
 And break it shall I never. 
 
 DAINTY DAVIE. 
 
 Now rosy May comes in wi' flowers, 
 To deck her gay, green spreading bowers ; 
 And now comes in my happy hours, 
 To wander wi' my Davie. 
 
 Meet me on the warlock knowe. 
 Dainty Davie, dainty Davie, 
 
 There I ''II spend the day wi'you. 
 My ain dear dainty Davie. 
 
 The crystal waters round us fa', 
 The merry birds are lovers a'. 
 The scented breezes round us blaw, 
 A wandering wi' my Davie. 
 Meet me, kc. 
 
 When purple morning starts the hare 
 To steal upon her early fare. 
 Then thro' the dews I will repair. 
 To meet my faithfu' Davie. 
 Meet me. Sec. 
 
 When day, expiring in the west, 
 The curtain draws o' nature's rest, 
 I flee to his arms I lo'e best, 
 
 And that s my ain dear Davie. 
 
 Meet me on the warlock knoive, 
 Bo7mie Davie, dainty Davie, 
 
 There I ''II spend the day wV you, 
 My ain dear dainty Davie. 
 
 SONG 
 
 Tune—" Oran Gaoil." 
 
 Behold the hour, the boat arrive ; 
 
 Thou goest, thou darling of my heart 
 Sever'd from tliee can I survive ? 
 
 But fate has will'd and we must part. 
 
 m often greet this surging swell, 
 Yon distant isle will often hail : 
 
 " E'en here I took the last farewell ; 
 There latest mark'd her vanish'd sail." 
 
 Along the solitary shore, 
 
 While flitting sea-fowl round me cry, 
 Across the rolling, dashing roar 
 
 I'll westward turn my wistful eye : 
 Happy, thou Indian grove, I'll say. 
 
 Where now my Nancy's path may be '. 
 While thro' thy sweets she loves to stray, 
 
 O tell me, does she muse on me ! 
 
 SONG. 
 
 Tune— "Fee him Father." 
 
 Thou hast left me ever, Jamie, Thou hast left 
 
 me ever. 
 Thou hast left me ever, Jamie, Thou hast left 
 
 me ever. 
 Aflen hast thou vow'd that death, Only should 
 
 us sever. 
 Now thou'st left thy lass for av — I maun see 
 
 thee never, Jamie, 
 I'll see thee never. 
 
 Thou hast me forsaken, Jamie, Thou hast me 
 
 forsaken. 
 Thou hast me forsaken, Jamie, Thou hast me 
 
 forsaken. 
 Thou canst love anither jo. While my heart is 
 
 breaking. 
 Soon my weary een I'll close — Never mair to 
 
 waken, Jamie, 
 Ne'er mair to waken. 
 
 AULD LANG SYNE. 
 
 Should auld acquaintance be forgot, 
 And never brought to min' ? 
 
 Should auld acquaintance be forgot. 
 And days o' lang syne .'' 
 
 CHORUS. 
 
 For auld lung syne, my dear. 
 
 For auld lang syne, 
 TVeVl tak a cup o' kindness yet, 
 
 For auld lang syiit. 
 
 We twa hae ran about the braes, 
 
 And pu't the gowans fine ; 
 But we've wandered mony a weaiy foot, 
 
 Sin auld lang syne. 
 For aidd, kc. 
 
94 
 
 BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 We twa hae paidl't i' the bum, 
 
 Frae mornin sun till dine : 
 But seas between us braid hae roar'd, 
 
 Sin auld lang S3'ne. 
 For auld, &c. 
 
 And here's a hand, my trusty fier, 
 
 And gie's a hand o' thine ; 
 And we'll tak a right guid-willie waught, 
 
 For auld lang syne. 
 For auld, &c. 
 
 And surely ye'U be your pint-stowp, 
 
 And surely Til be mine ; 
 And we'll tak a cup o' kindness yet, 
 
 For auld lang syne. 
 For auld, &c. 
 
 BANNOCK-BURN 
 
 ROBERT BRUCE'S ADDRESS TO HIS ARMY. 
 
 Scots, wha hae wi' Wallace bled, 
 Scots, wham Bruce has aften led, 
 Welcome to your gory bed, 
 Or to glorious victory. 
 
 Now's the day, and now's the hour ; 
 See the front o' battle lower ; 
 See approach proud Edward's power 
 Edward ! chains and slavery ! 
 
 "Wha will be a traitor knave ? 
 'Wha can fill a coward's grave ? 
 Wha sae base as be a slave ? 
 
 Traitor ! coward 1 turn and flee I 
 
 Wha for Scotland's king and law 
 Freedom's sword will strongly draw, 
 Free-man stand, or free-man fa', 
 Caledonian ! on wi' me 1 
 
 By oppression's woes and pains ! 
 By yoiu- sons in servile chains ! 
 We will drain our diarest veins. 
 But they shall be— shall be free ! 
 
 No more a- winding the course of yon rivw, 
 And marking sweet flow'rets so fair : 
 
 No more I trace the light footsteps of pleasure, 
 But sorrow and sad sighmg care. 
 
 Is it that summer's forsaken our valleys, 
 
 And grim, surly winter is near ? 
 No, no, the bees humming round the gay roses, 
 
 Proclaim it the pride of the year. 
 
 Fain would I hide what I fear to discover, 
 Yet long, long too well have I known : 
 
 AJl that has caused this wreck in my bosom. 
 Is Jenny, fair Jenny alone. 
 
 Time cannot aid me, my griefs are immortal, 
 Nor hope dare a comfort bestow : 
 
 Come then, enamour'd and fond of my anguish. 
 Enjoyment Til seek in my wo. 
 
 SONG. 
 
 Tone—" The CoUier's Dochter." 
 
 Deluded swain, the pleasure 
 The fickle Fair can give thee, 
 
 Is but a fairy treasure. 
 
 Thy hopes will soon deceive thee. 
 
 The billows on the ocean, 
 The breezes idly roaming, . 
 
 The clouds' uncertain motion. 
 They are but types of woman. 
 
 O art thou not ashamed. 
 To dote upon a feature ? 
 
 If man thou wouldst be named, 
 Despise the silly creature. 
 
 Go, find an honest fellow ; 
 
 Good claret set before thee : 
 Hold on till thou art mellow. 
 
 And then to bed in glory. 
 
 Lay the proud usurpers low I 
 Tyrants fall in every foe ! 
 Liberty's in every blow '. 
 Forward ! let us do, or die ! 
 
 FAIR JENNY. 
 Tune—" Saw ye my father ?" 
 
 Where are the joys I have met in the morning, 
 That danc'd to the lark's early song ? 
 
 Where is the peace that awaited my wand nng, 
 At evening the wild woods among ? 
 
 SONG. 
 
 Tune—" The Quaker's wife." 
 
 Thine am I, my faithful fair, 
 Thine, my lovely Nancy ; 
 
 Ev'ry pulse along my veins, 
 Ev'ry roving fancy. 
 
 To thy bosom lay my heart, 
 There to throb and languish 
 
 Tho' despaur had wrung its core, 
 That would heal ita anguish. 
 
BURNy- POEMH. 
 
 Take away these rosy lips, 
 Rich with balni}' treasure : 
 
 Turn away thine eyes of love, 
 Lest I die with pleasure. 
 
 What is life when wanting love ? 
 
 Night without a morning : 
 Love°s the cloudless summer sun, 
 
 Nature gay adorning. 
 
 SONG, 
 
 Tune—" Jo Janet.'' 
 
 Husband, husband, cease your strife, 
 Nor longer idly rave. Sir ; 
 
 Tho' I am your wedded wife, 
 Yet I am not your slave, Sir. 
 
 " One of two must still obey, 
 
 Nancy, Nancy ; 
 Is it man or woman, say, 
 
 My spouse, Nancy ?' 
 
 If 'tis still the lordly word, 
 Service and obedience ; 
 
 I'll desert my sov'reign lord, 
 And so, good b'ye allegianc 
 
 " Sad will I be, so bereft, 
 
 Nancy, Nancy ; 
 Yet ril try to iifake a shift, 
 
 My spouse, Nancy.'' 
 
 My poor heart tlien break it must, 
 
 My last hour I'm near it : 
 When you lay me in the dust 
 
 Think, think how you will bear it. 
 
 " I will hope and trust in Heaven, 
 
 Nancy, Nancy ; 
 Strength to bear it will be given, 
 
 My spouse, Nancy." 
 
 Well, Sir. from the silent dead 
 Still ril try to daunt you ; 
 
 Ever round your midiiiglit bed 
 Horrid sprites shall haunt you. 
 
 " 111 wed another, like my dear 
 ■'■ Nancy, Nancy ; 
 
 Then all hell will fly for fear, 
 My spouse. Nancy." 
 
 SONG. 
 
 Am—" The Sutor's Dochter," 
 
 Wilt thou be my dearie ? 
 
 When sorrow wrings thy gentle heart. 
 
 Wilt thou let me cheer thee .-' 
 
 By the treasure of my soul, 
 
 That's the love I bear thee ! 
 
 I swear and vow that only thou 
 
 Shall ever be my dearie. 
 
 Only thou, I swear and vow. 
 
 Shall ever be my dearie. 
 
 Lassie, say thou lo'es me ; 
 Or if thou wilt na be my ain. 
 Say na thou'lt refuse me : 
 If it winna, canna be, 
 Thou, for thine may choose me. 
 Let me, lassie, quickly die. 
 Trusting tliat thou lo'es me. 
 Lassie, let me quickly die. 
 Trusting that thou lo'es me. 
 
 BANKS OF CREE. 
 
 Here is the glen, and here the bower. 
 All underneath the birchen shade , 
 
 The village-bell has toll'd the hour, 
 O what can stay my lovely maid ? 
 
 'Tis not Maria's whispering call ; 
 
 'Tis but the balmy-breathing gale ; 
 Mixt with some warbler's dying fall 
 
 The dewy star of eve to hail. 
 
 It is Maria's voice I hear ! 
 
 So calls the woodlark in the grove. 
 His little faithful mate to cheer. 
 
 At once 'tis music — and 'tis love. 
 
 And art tliou come ! and art thou true ! 
 
 O welcome dear to love and me ! 
 And let us all our vows renew. 
 
 Along the flowery banks of Cree. 
 
 VERSES TO A YOUNG LADY, 
 
 A PRESENT OF SONGS. 
 
 Here, where the Scottish inuse immortal lives, 
 • In sacred strains and tuneful numbers join'd, 
 Accept the' gift ; tho' humble he who gives, 
 Rich is the tribute of the grateful mind. 
 
96 
 
 BURNS' POEMS- 
 
 So may no ruffian-fcoling in thy breast, 
 Discordant jar tliy bosom-chords among ; 
 
 But peace attune thy gentle soul to rest, 
 Or love ecstatic wake his serapli song. 
 
 Or pity's notes, in luxury of tears, 
 
 As modest want the talc of wo reveals ; 
 
 While conscious virtue all the strain endears, 
 And heaven-born piety her sanction seals. 
 
 ON THE SEAS AND FAR AWAY. 
 
 Tune — " O'er the Hills," &c. 
 
 How can my poor heart be glad, 
 When absent from my sailor lad ? 
 How can I the thought forego, 
 He's on the seas to meet the foe ? 
 Let me wander, let me rove ; 
 Still my heart is with my love ; 
 Nightly dreams and thoughts by da.y 
 Are with him that's far away. 
 
 On the seas and far auatf. 
 On slormii seas and far away : 
 Mghtlj/ dreanis and thoughts by day 
 Art ay icilh him that's far away. 
 
 When in summer's noon I faint. 
 As weary flocks around me pant. 
 Haply in this scorching sun 
 My sailors thund'ring at his gun : 
 Bullets, spare my only joy ! 
 Bullets, spare my darling boy ! 
 Fate do with me what you may 
 Spare but him that's far away I 
 On the seas, &c. 
 
 At the starless midnight hour, 
 Wlien whiter rules v/ith boundless pow'r ; 
 As the storms the forests tear, 
 And thvmders rend the howling air, 
 Listening to the doubling roar. 
 Surging on the rocky shore, 
 AH 1 can— I weep and pray. 
 For his weal that's far away 
 On the seas, &c. 
 
 Peace, thy olive wand extend. 
 And bid wild war his ravage end, 
 Man with brother man to meet. 
 And as a brother kindly greet : 
 Then may heaven with prosp'rous gales, 
 F.iU my sailor's welcome sails, 
 To my arms their charge convey, 
 My dear lad that's far away. 
 On the seas &c. 
 
 SONG. 
 
 I 
 
 Tune—" Ca' the Yowes to the Knowes." 
 
 Cfl' the yowes to the knowes, 
 Ca' them whare the heather grows, 
 Ca' them whare the bumie rows. 
 My bonnie dearie. 
 
 Hark, the mavis' evening sang 
 I Sounding Clouden's woods amang ; 
 
 Then a-faulding let us gang, 
 j My bonnie dearie. 
 
 Ca' the, kc. 
 
 We'll gae down by Clouden side, 
 Thro' the hazels spreading wide, 
 O'er the waves, that sweetly glide 
 To the moon sac clearly. 
 Ca' the. Sec. 
 
 Yonder Clouden's silent towers, 
 Where at moonshine midnight hours. 
 O'er the dewy bending flowers. 
 Fairies dance sae cheery. 
 Ca' the, &c. 
 
 Gliaist nor bogle shalt thou fear ; 
 Thou'rt to love and lieav'n sae dear, 
 Nocht of ill may come thee near. 
 My bonnie dearie. 
 Ca' the. Sec. 
 
 Fair and lovely as thou art, 
 Thou hast stown my very heart ; 
 I can die — but canna part, 
 My bonnie dearie. 
 Ca' the, kc. 
 
 SHE SAYS SHE LO'ES ME BEST 
 
 OF A'. 
 
 Tune— ""Onagh's Water-fall." 
 
 Sae flaxen were her ringlets, , 
 
 Her eyebrows of a darker hue, 
 Bewitchingly o'er- arching 
 
 Twa laughing een o' bonme blue. 
 Her smiling sae wylmg. 
 
 Wad make a wretch forget his wo ; 
 AVhat pleasure,Wfhat treasure, 
 
 Unto these rosy lips to grow ! 
 Such was my Chloris' bonnie face. 
 
 When first her bonnie face I saw ; 
 And ay my Chloris' dearest charm. 
 
 She says she lo'es me best of a . 
 
BURNS POEMS, 
 
 Like harmony her motion ; 
 
 Her pretty ancle is a spy 
 Betraying fair proportion, 
 
 Wad mak a saint forget the sky. 
 Sae warming, sae charming, 
 
 Her faultless form, and gracefu' air . 
 Ilk feature — auld nature 
 
 Declar'd that she could do nae mair : 
 Hers are tlie willing chains o' love, 
 
 By conquering beauty's sovereign law ; 
 And ay my Chloris' dearest charm, 
 
 She says she lo'es me best of a'. 
 
 Let others love the city. 
 
 And gaudy show at sunny noon ; 
 Gie me the lonely valley. 
 
 The dewy eve, and rising moon ; 
 Fair beaming, and streaming. 
 
 Her silver light the boughs aniang ; 
 While falling, recalling. 
 
 The amorous thrush concludes her sang 
 There, dearest Ciiloris, wilt thou rove 
 
 By wimpling burn and leafy shaw, 
 And hear my vows o' truth and love, 
 
 And say thou lo'es me best of a' 1 
 
 SAW YE MY PHELY. 
 
 (Quasi dicat Phillis.) 
 
 Tune — " When she cam ben she bobbit." 
 
 O SAW ye my dear, my Phely? ■ 
 saw ye my dear, my Phely .'' 
 She's down i' the grove, she's wi' a new love, 
 She winna come hame to her Willy. 
 
 What says she, my dearest, my Phely ? 
 What says she, my dearest, my Phely ? 
 She lets thee to wit that she has thee forgot, 
 And for ever disowns thee her Willy. 
 
 O had I ne'er seen tfiee, my Phely ! 
 O had I ne'er seen thee, my Phely ! 
 As light as the air, and fause as thou's fair, 
 Thou's broken the heart o' thy Willy. 
 
 SONG. 
 
 Tune—" Cauld Kail in Aberdeen. 
 
 How long and dreary is the night. 
 When I am frae my dearie ; 
 
 I restless lie frae e'en to mom, 
 Tho' I were ne'er sae wearw 
 H 
 
 For oh, her landy nights are lang 
 And oh, her dreams are eerie ; 
 
 And oh, her widowed heart is sair, 
 Thafs absent frae her dearie. 
 
 When I think on the lightsome days 
 I spent wi' thee my dearie ; 
 
 And now what seas between us roar, 
 How can I be but eerie ? 
 For oh, kc. 
 
 How slow ye move, ye heavy hours ; 
 
 The joyless day how dreary ! 
 It was na sae ye glinted by. 
 
 When I was wi' my dearie. 
 For oh. Sec. 
 
 SONG. 
 Tune — " Duncan Gray." 
 
 Let not woman e'er complain, 
 
 Of inconstancy in love ; 
 Let not woman e'er complain, 
 
 Fickle man is apt to rove : 
 
 Look abroad through Nature's range, 
 Nature's mighty law is change ; 
 
 Ladies, would it not be strange, 
 Man should then a monster prove ? 
 
 Mark the wmds, and mark the skies ; 
 
 Ocean's ebb, and ocean's flow : 
 Sun and moon but set to rise. 
 
 Round and round the seasons go. 
 
 Why then ask of silly man. 
 
 To oppose great Nature's plan ? 
 
 We'll be constant while we can — 
 You can be no more, you know. 
 
 THE LOVER'S MORNING SALUTE 
 TO HIS MISTRESS. 
 
 Tune—" Deil tak the Wars." 
 
 Sleep'st thou, or wak'st thou, fairest crea. 
 
 Rosy mom now lifts his eye, [tura 
 
 Numbering ilka bud which Nature 
 
 Waters wi' the tears o' joy : 
 
 Now thro' the leafy woods, 
 
 And by the reeking floods, 
 Wild Nature's tenants, freely, gladly stray ; 
 
 The lintwJiite in his bower 
 
 Chants o'er the breathing floTver ; 
 
 The lav'rock to the sky 
 
 Ascends wi' sangs o' joy, [day. 
 
 While the sun and thou arise to Wees the 
 
68 
 
 BURiNS- POEMS. 
 
 Phoebus gilding the brow o" moming, 
 
 Banishes ilk darksome shade, 
 Nature gladdening and adorning ; 
 
 Such to me my lovely maid. 
 
 When absent frae my fair, 
 
 The murky shades o' care 
 With starless gloom o'ercast my sullen Bky ; 
 
 But when, in beauty's light, 
 
 She meets my ravish'd sight, 
 
 When through my very heart 
 
 Her beaming glories dart ; 
 Tie then I WE^e to life, to light, and joy. 
 
 THE AULD MAN. 
 
 But lately seen in gladsome green 
 
 The woods rejoic'd the day, 
 Thro' gentle showers the laughing flowers 
 
 In double pride were gay : 
 But now our joys are fled. 
 
 On winter blasts awa I 
 Yet maiden May, in rich array, 
 
 Again shall bring them a'. 
 
 But my white pow, nae kindly thowo 
 
 Shall melt the snaws of age ; 
 My trunk of eild, but buss or bield, 
 
 Sinks in time's wintry rage. 
 Oh, age has weary days, 
 
 And nights o' sleepless pain '. 
 Thou golden time o' youthfu' prime, 
 
 Why com'st thou not again ! 
 
 SONG. 
 
 ToKE — ^" My Lodging is on the cold ground. 
 
 My Chloris, mark how green the groves, 
 The primrose banks how fair : 
 
 The balmy gales awake the flowers. 
 And wave thy flaxen hair. 
 
 The lav'rock shuns the palace gay, 
 And o'er the cottage sings : 
 
 For nature smiles as sweet I ween, 
 To shepherds as to kings. 
 
 Let minstrels sweep the skilfu' string 
 
 In lordly Ughted ha' : 
 The shepherd stops his simple reed, 
 
 BUthe, in the birken shaw. 
 
 The princely revel may survey 
 Our rustic dance wi' scorn ; 
 
 But are their hearts as light as ours 
 Beneath the milk-white thorn ? 
 
 The shepherd, in the flowery glen, 
 In shepherd's phrase will woo : 
 
 The courtier tells a finer tale, 
 But is his heart as true ? 
 
 These wild-wood flowers I've pu'd, to deck 
 
 That spotless breast o' thine : 
 The courtiers' gems may witness love — 
 
 But 'tiij na love like mine. 
 
 SONG, 
 
 ALTERED FROM AN OLD ENGLISH ONE. 
 
 It was the charming month of May, 
 When all the flow'rs were fresh and gay. 
 One morning, by the break of day, 
 The youthful, charming Chloe ; 
 
 From peaceful slumber she arose. 
 Girt on her mantle and her hose. 
 And o'er the flowery mead she goes, 
 The youthful, charming Chloe. 
 
 Lmely'was she by the daron, 
 
 Youthful Chloe, charming Chloe, 
 
 Tripping o^er the pearly lawn., 
 The youthful, charming Chloe. 
 
 The feather'd people, you might see 
 Perch'd all around on every tree. 
 In notes of sweetest melody, 
 They hail the charming Chloe ; 
 
 Till, painting gay the eastern skies, 
 The glorious sun began to rise, 
 Out-rivall'd by the radfant eyes 
 Of youthful, charming Chloe 
 Loi^ely was she. See. 
 
 LASSIE WP THE LINT-WHl TE LOCKS 
 
 Tune — " Rothemurchie's Rant." 
 
 ' the lint-white locks, 
 Bonnie lassie, artless kme. 
 Wilt thmi. in me tent the fiockt. 
 Wilt thou he my dtarir.. O f 
 
BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 Now nature deeds the flowery lea, 
 And a' is young and sweet like thee ; 
 O wilt thou share its joys wi' me, 
 And say thou'lt be my dearie, O.' 
 Lassie wi\ Sec. 
 
 And when the welcome simmer-shower, 
 Has cheer'd ilk drooping little flower, 
 We'll to the breathing woodbine bower 
 At sultry noon, my dearie, O. 
 Lassie wi\ &:c. 
 
 When Cynthia lights, wi' silver ray. 
 The weary shearer's hameward way ; 
 Thro' yellow waving fields we'll stray, 
 And talk o' love, my dearie, O. 
 Lassie wi\ kc. 
 
 And when the howli 
 Disturbs my lassie's 
 
 ing wintry blast 
 
 Disturbs my lassie's midnight rest; 
 Enclasped to my faithfu' breast, 
 I'll comfort thee, my dearie, O. 
 
 Lassie wf the linf-vkite loch, 
 Bonnie lassie, artless lassie, 
 
 O wilt thou wP me tent the flocks. 
 Wilt thou be my dearie, ? 
 
 SONG. 
 
 Tune — " Nancy's to the Greenwood," fee. 
 
 Farewell thou stream that winding flows 
 Around Eliza's dwelling ! 
 
 mem'ry 1 spare the cruel throes 
 Within my bosom swelling : 
 
 Condemn'd to drag a hopeless chain. 
 
 And yet in secret languish. 
 To feel a fire in ev'ry vein. 
 
 Nor dare disclose my anguish. 
 
 Love's veriest wretch, unseen, unknown, 
 
 I fain my griefs would cover : 
 The bursting sigh, th' unweeting groan, 
 
 Betray the hapless lover. 
 
 1 know thou doom'st me to despair, 
 
 Nor wilt, nor canst relieve me ; 
 But oh, Eliza, hear one prayer. 
 For pity's sake forgive me. 
 
 The music of thy voice I heard. 
 
 Nor wist while it enslav'd me ; 
 I saw thine eyes, yet nothing fear'd. 
 
 Till fears no more had sav'd me : 
 Th' unwary sailor thus aghast. 
 
 The wheeling torrent viewing ; 
 'Mid circling horrors sinks at last 
 
 In overwhelming ruin. 
 
 DUET. 
 
 Tune— "The Sow's Tail." 
 
 -O Philly, happy be that day 
 When roving through the gather'd hay. 
 My youthfu' heart was stown away, 
 And by thy charms, my Philly. 
 
 SHE — O Willy, ay I bless the grove 
 
 Where first I own'd my maiden love, 
 Whilst thou did pledge the Powen 
 above 
 To be my ain dear Willy. 
 
 HE — As songsters of the early year 
 Are ilka day mair sweet to hear, 
 So ilka day to me mair dear 
 And charming is my Philly. 
 
 SHE — As on the brier the budding rose 
 
 Still richer breathes, and fairer blow* 
 So in my tender bosom grows 
 The love I bear my Willy. 
 
 HE — The milder sun and bluer sky. 
 
 That crown my harvest cares wi' joy, 
 Were ne'er sae welcome to my eye 
 As is a sight o' Philly. 
 
 SHE — The little swallow's wanton wing, 
 
 Tho' wafting o'er the flowery spring, 
 Did ne'er to me sic tidings bring. 
 As meeting o' my Willy. 
 
 -The bee that thro' the sunny hour 
 Sips nectar in the opening flower, 
 Compar'd wi' my delight is poor, 
 Upon the lips o' Phflly. 
 
 SHE — ^The woodbine in the dewy weet 
 
 When evening shades in silence meet. 
 Is nocht sae fragrant or sae sweet 
 As is a kiss o' Willy. 
 
 -Let fortune's wheel at random rin, 
 And fools may tine, and knaves may 
 
 win ; 
 My thoughts are a' bound up in ane, 
 And that's my ain dear Philly. 
 
 SHE What's a' the joys that gowd can gio! 
 
 I care nae wealth a single flie ; 
 The lad I love's the lad for mo. 
 And that's my ain dear WUly, 
 
100 
 
 BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 SONG. 
 
 Tune — " Lumps o' Pudding. 
 
 CoNTKNTEn wi' little, and cantie wi' mair, 
 Whene'er 1 for^rather vvi' sorrow and care, 
 I a-ie them a skclp, as they're creepin alang, 
 Wi' a cog o' guid swats, and an auld Scottish 
 sang. 
 
 I whyles claw the elbow o' troublesome 
 
 Thought ; 
 But man is a soger, and life is a faught : 
 My mirth and guid humour are coin in my 
 
 poucli. 
 And my Freedom's my lairdship nae monarch 
 
 dare touch. 
 
 A towmond o' trouble, should that bo my fa', 
 A night o' guid fellowship sowthers it a' : 
 When at the blithe en<l o' our journey at last, 
 Wha the deil ever thinks o' the road he has 
 past ? 
 
 Blind chance, let her snapper and stoyte on her 
 
 way ; 
 Be't to me, be't frae me, e'en let the jade gae : 
 Come ease, or come travail ; come pleasure, 
 
 or pain. 
 My warst word is — ^ Welcome, and welcome 
 
 again !" 
 
 CANST THOU LEAVE ME THUS, MY 
 KATY? 
 
 Tune — ^" Roy's wife." 
 
 Canst Ihou leave me thus, mi/ Katy ? 
 Canst thou leave me thus, my Knty? 
 Well thou know''st my aching heart, 
 4nd canst thou leave me thus for pity ? 
 
 Is this thy plighted, fond regard, 
 Thus cruelly to part, my Katy ? 
 
 Is this thy faithful swam's reward — 
 An aching, broken heart, my Katy ? 
 Catist thou. Sec. 
 
 Farewell ! and ne'er such sorrows tear 
 That fickle heart of thine, my Katy ! 
 
 Thou may'st find those will love thee dear- 
 But not a love like mine, my Katy, 
 Canst Ihou, 8cc. 
 
 MY NANNIE'S AWA. 
 
 Tune — " There'll never be peace." &c. 
 
 Now in her green mantle blithe nature arrays 
 And listens the lambkms that bleat o'er th« 
 braes, [shaw 
 
 While birds warble welcome in ilka green 
 But to me it's delightless— my Nannie's awa. 
 
 The snaw-drap and primrose our woodlands 
 
 adorn. 
 And violets bathe in the weot o' the mom ; 
 They pain my sad bosom sae sweetly thej 
 
 blaw. 
 They mind me o' Nannie — and Nannie's awa. 
 
 Thou lav'rock that springs frae the dews of thf 
 
 lawn, 
 The shepherd to warn o' the gray-breaking 
 
 dawn, 
 And thou mellow mavis that hails the night-fa' 
 Give over for pity — my Nannie's awa. 
 
 Come, autumn, sae pensive, in yellow anf 
 
 gray, 
 And sooth me wi' tiding o' nature s decay : 
 The dark, dreary winter, and wild-driving 
 
 snaw, 
 Alane can delight me — now Nannie's awa. 
 
 FOR A' THAT AND A' THAT 
 
 Is there, for honest poverty, 
 
 That hangs his head, and a' that ; 
 The coward-slave, we pass him by, 
 
 We dare be poor for a' that ! 
 For a' that, and a' that, 
 
 Our toil's obscure, and a' that, 
 The rank is but the guinea's stamp. 
 
 The man's the gowd for a' that. 
 
 What tho' on hamely fare we dine, 
 
 Wear hoddin gray, and a' tliat ; 
 Gie fools their silks, and knaves tlieirwine 
 
 A man's a man for a' that; 
 For a' that, and a' that. 
 
 Their tinsel show, and a' that ; 
 The honest man, though o'er sae poor, 
 
 Is king o' men for a' that 
 
 Ye see yon birkie, ca'd a lord, 
 
 Wha struts, and stares, and a' that ; 
 
 Tho' hundreds worship at his word. 
 He's but a coof for a' that : 
 
BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 For a' that, and a that, 
 
 His riband, star, and a' that, 
 
 The man of independent mind, 
 He looks and laughs at a' that. 
 
 A prince can vrk& belted knight, 
 
 A marquis, ^i. r.e, and a' that ; 
 But an lionest rrn n's aboon his might, 
 
 Guid faitli he mamia fa' that 1 
 For a' that, and a' that, 
 
 Their dignities, and a' that, 
 The pith o' sense, and pride o' worth, 
 
 Are higher ranks tlian a' that. 
 
 Then let us pray that come it may. 
 
 As come it will for a' that, 
 That sense and worth, o'er a' the earth. 
 
 May bear the gree, and a' that. 
 For a^^that, and a' that, 
 
 It's coming yet, for a' that. 
 That man to man, tlie warld o'er. 
 
 Shall brothers be for a' that. 
 
 SONG. 
 
 Tune— ^Craigie-bum-wood. 
 
 Sweet fa's the eve on Craigie-burn, 
 And blithe awakes the morrow. 
 
 But a' the pride o' spring's return 
 Can yield me nocht but sorrow. 
 
 I see the flowers and spreading trees, 
 I hear the wild birds singing : 
 
 But what a weary wight can please. 
 And care his bosom wringing ? 
 
 Fain, fain would I my griefs impart, 
 
 Yet dare na for your anger ; 
 But secret love -will break my heart. 
 
 If I conceal it langer. 
 
 If thou refuse to pity me. 
 
 If thou shalt love anither. 
 When yon green leaves fade frae the tree. 
 
 Around my grave they'll wither. 
 
 SONG. 
 
 Tone — ^" Let me in this ae night.' 
 
 O LASSIE, art thou sleeping yet ? 
 Or art thou wakin, I would wit ? 
 For love has bound me hand and foot, 
 And 1 would fain be in, jo. 
 
 O let me in this ae night. 
 
 This ae, ae, ae night ; 
 
 For pili/^s sake this ae night, 
 
 O rise and let me in, jo. 
 
 Thou hears't tlie winter wind and weet, 
 Nae star bhnks thro' the driving sleet ; 
 Tak pity on my weary feet. 
 And shield me frae tlie ram, jo. 
 O let me in, &c. 
 
 The bitter blast that round me blaws 
 Unheeded howls, unheeded fa's ; 
 The cauldness o' thy heart's the cause 
 Of a' my grief and pain, jo. 
 O let me in, Sec 
 
 HER ANSWER. 
 
 O TELL na me o' wind and rain. 
 Upbraid na me wi' cauld disdam ! 
 Gae back the gate ye cam again, 
 I winna let you in, jo. 
 
 / tell you now this ae night. 
 
 This ae, ae, ae night ; 
 And anccfor a' this ae night, 
 
 I winna let you in, jo. 
 
 The snellest blast, at mirkest hours. 
 That round the pathless wandVer pours, 
 Is nocht to what poor she endures. 
 That's trusted faitidess man, jo. 
 / tell you now. Sec. 
 
 The sweetest flower that deck'd the mead, 
 Now trodden like the vilest weed ; 
 Let simple maid the lesson read. 
 The weird may be her ain, jo, 
 1 tell you now, Sec. 
 
 The bird that charm'd his summer-day, 
 Is now the cruel fowler's prey ; 
 Let witless, trusting woman say 
 How aft her fate's the same, jo, 
 / tell you now. Sec. 
 
 ADDRESS TO THE WOOD-LARK. 
 
 Tune—" Where'll bonnie Ann lie." Or, « Loch- 
 Eroch Side." 
 
 O STAY, sweet warbling wood-lark stay, 
 Nor quit for niu the trembluig spray, 
 
108 
 
 BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 A hapless lover courts thy lay, 
 Thy soothing, fond complaining. 
 
 Again, again that tender part, 
 That I may catch thy melting art ; 
 For surely that wad touch her heart, 
 Wha ^Is me wi' disdaining. 
 
 Say, was thy little mate unkind, 
 And heard thee as the careless wind ? 
 Oh, nocht but love and sorrow join'd. 
 Sic notes o' wo could wauken. 
 
 Thou tells o' never-ending care ; 
 O' speechless grief, and dark despair ; 
 For pity's sake, sweet bird, nae mair '. 
 Or my poor heart is broken 1 
 
 ON CHLORIS BEING ILI 
 
 TwNE— " Ay wakin O." 
 
 CHORUS. 
 
 Lo7ig, long the night. 
 Heavy comes the morrow. 
 
 While my souVs delight, 
 Is on her bed ofsorraic. 
 
 Can I cease to care ? 
 
 Can I cease to languish. 
 While my darling fair 
 
 Is on the couch of anguish? 
 Long, Sec. 
 
 Every hope is fled. 
 
 Every fear is terror ; 
 Slumber even I dread. 
 
 Every dream is horror. 
 Long, Sec. 
 
 Hear me, Powr's di^^ne ! 
 
 Oh, in pity hear me ! 
 Talce aught else of mine. 
 
 But my Chloris spare me ! 
 Long, Sec. 
 
 Far dearer to me are yon humble broom bowers, 
 
 Where the blue-bell and gowan lurk lowly 
 
 unseen : [flowers. 
 
 For there, lightly tripping amang the wild 
 A-hstening the linnet, aft wanders my Jean. 
 
 Tho' rich is the breeze in their gay sunny val- 
 leys. 
 And cauld Caledonia's blast on the wave^ 
 Their sweet-scented woodlands that skirt the 
 proud palace, [slave '. 
 
 What are they i" I'he haunt of the tyrant and 
 
 The slave's spicy forests, and gold-bubbUng 
 fountains, 
 The brave Caledonian views wi' disdain ; 
 He wanders as free as the winds of his moun- 
 tains. 
 Save love's willing fetters, the chams o' liis 
 Jean. 
 
 SONG. 
 
 Tune — " Laddie, he near me." 
 
 'TwAs na her bonnie blue e'e was my ruin ; 
 Fair tho' she be, that was ne'er my undoing : 
 'Twas the dear smile when naebody did mind 
 
 us, 
 'Twas the bewitching, sweet, stown glance o' 
 
 kindness. 
 
 Sair do I fear that to hope is aenied me, 
 Sair do I fear Uiat despair maun abide me ; 
 But tho' fell fortune should fate us to sever, 
 Queen shall she be in my bosom for ever. 
 
 Mary, I'm thine wi' a passion sincerest. 
 And" thou hast plighted me love o' the dearest, 
 And thou'rt the angel that never can alter. 
 Sooner the sun in his motion would falter. 
 
 SONG. 
 
 Tune — " Humours of Glen." 
 
 Their groves o' sweet mjrrtle let foreign lands 
 
 reckon, " [perfume, 
 
 Where bright-beaming summers exalt the 
 
 Far dearer to me yon lone glen o' green breckan, 
 
 Wi' the burn stealing under the lang yellow 
 
 broom. 
 
 ALTERED FROM AN OLD ENGLISH 
 SONG. 
 
 Tune — " Jolui Anderson my jo." 
 
 How cruel are the parents 
 
 Who riches only prize. 
 And to the wealthy booby. 
 
 Poor woman sacrifice. 
 Meanwhile the hapless daugnter 
 
 Has but a choice of strife ; 
 To shun a tyrant father's hate. 
 
 Become a wretched wife. 
 
 The ravening hawk pursuing, 
 The trembling dove thus flies, 
 
 To shun impelluig ruin 
 A wliile her pinions tries, 
 
BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 103 
 
 Till of escape despairing, 
 
 No shelter or retreat, 
 She trusts the ruthless falconer, 
 
 And drops beneath his feet. 
 
 SONG. 
 
 TuNK— " Deil tak the Wars.' 
 
 Mark yonder pomp of costly fashion, 
 
 Round the wealthy, titled bride : 
 But when compar'd with real passion, 
 Poor is all that princely pride. 
 What are the showy treasures ? 
 What are the noisy pleasures ? 
 
 The gay, gaudy glare of vanity and art ; 
 The polish'd jewel's blaze 
 May draw the wond'ring gaze. 
 And courtly grandeur bright 
 The fancy may delight, 
 
 But never, never can come near the heart. 
 
 But did you see my dearest Chloris, 
 
 In simplicity's array ; 
 Lovely as yonder sweet opening flower is, 
 Shrinking from the gaze of day. 
 O then, the heart alarming. 
 And all resistless charming, 
 In Love's dehghtful fetters she chains the 
 willing soul ! 
 Ambition would disown 
 The world's imperial crown 
 Even Avarice would deny 
 His worshippM deity. 
 And feel thro' every vein Love's raptures roll. 
 
 SONG. 
 
 ^If 
 
 Tone — This is no my ain House. 
 
 this ii no my ain lassie. 
 Fair Iho' the lassie be ; 
 
 O weel ken I my ain lassie. 
 Kind love is in her e'e. 
 
 1 SEE a form, I see a face. 
 Ye weel may wi' the fairest place : 
 It wants, to me, the witching grace, 
 The kind love that's in her e'e. 
 O this is no. Sec. 
 
 She's bonnie, blooming, straight, and tall 
 And lang has had mylieart in thrall ; 
 And ay it charms my very saul. 
 The kind love that's in her e'e. 
 O this is no. Sec. 
 
 A thief sae pawkie is my Jean, 
 To steal a bhnk, by a' unseen ; 
 But gleg as light are lovers' een, 
 When kind love is in the e'e, 
 O this is no. Sec. 
 
 I may escape the courtly sparks. 
 It may escape the learned clerks ; 
 But weel the watching lover marks 
 The kind love that's in her e'e. 
 O this is no. Sec. 
 
 TO MR. CUNNINGHAM. 
 
 SCOTTISH SONO. 
 
 Now spring has clad the groves in green, 
 
 And strew'd the lea wi' flowers ; 
 The I'urrow'd, waving corn is seen 
 
 Rejoice in fostering showers ; 
 While ilka thing in nature join 
 
 Their sorrows to forego, 
 O why thus all alone are mine 
 
 The weary steps of wo ! 
 
 The trout witliin yon wimplb burn 
 
 Glides swift, a silver dart, 
 And safe beneath the shady thorn 
 
 Defies tiie angler's art : 
 My life was ance that careless stream, 
 
 That wanton trout was I ; 
 But love, wi' unrelenting beam. 
 
 Has scorch'd my fountains dry. 
 
 The little flow'ret's peaceful lot, 
 
 In yonder cliff" that grows. 
 Which, save tlie linnet's flight, I wot, 
 
 Nae ruder visit knows. 
 Was mine ; till love has o'er me past. 
 
 And blighted a' my bloom. 
 And now beneath the withering blast 
 
 My youth and joys consume. 
 
 The waken'd lav'rock warbling springs, 
 
 And climbs the early sky, 
 Winnowing blithe her dewy wings 
 
 In morning's rosy eye ; 
 As little reckt I sorrow's power. 
 
 Until the flowery snare 
 O' witching love, in luckless hour, 
 
 Made me the thrall o' care. 
 
104 
 
 BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 O'hadmjr fate been Greenland snows, 
 
 Or Afric's burning zone, 
 Wi' man and nature leagu'd my foes, 
 
 So Feggy ne'er Fd known ? . 
 The wretch whase doom is, " hope nao mair, 
 
 What tongue his woes can tell ! 
 Within whase bosom, save despair, 
 
 Nae kinder spirits dwell. 
 
 SCOTTISH SONG. 
 
 O BONNIE was yon rosy brier. 
 
 That blooms sae far frae haunt o' man ; 
 And bonnie she, and ah, how dear ! 
 
 It shaded frae the e'enin sun. 
 
 Yo'i rosebuds in the morning dew, 
 
 How pure amang the leaves sae green ; 
 
 But purer was the lover's vow 
 
 They witness'd in their shade yestreen. 
 
 AH in its rude and prickly bower. 
 
 That crimson rose, how sweet and fair ! 
 
 But love is far a sweeter flower 
 Amid hfe's thorny path o' care. 
 
 The pathless wild, and wimpling burn, 
 Wi' Chloris in my arms, be mme ; 
 
 And I, the world, nor wish, nor scorn, 
 Its joys and griefs alike resign. 
 
 WRITTEN m a blank leaf of a copy of hh 
 Poems presented to q Lady, whom he had often 
 celebrated under the name of Chloris. 
 
 Tis Friendship's pledge, my young, fair Friend, 
 
 Nor thou the gift refuse, 
 Nor with unwilling ear attend 
 
 The moralizing muse. 
 
 Since, thou, in all thy youth and charms, 
 
 Must bid the world adieu, 
 (A world 'gainst peace in constant arms) 
 
 To join the friendly few. 
 
 Since thy gay morn of life o'ercast. 
 Chill came the tempest's lower : 
 
 (And ne'er misfortune's eastern blast 
 Did nip a fairer^flower.) 
 
 Since life's gay scenes must charm no more. 
 
 Still much is left behind ; 
 Still nobler wealth hast thou m store, 
 
 The comforts of the mind ! 
 
 Thine is the self-approving glow, 
 On conscious honour's part ; 
 
 And, dearest gift of heaven below 
 Thine friendship's truest heart. 
 
 'he joys 
 
 With every muse to rove ■. 
 
 And doubly were the poet blest 
 
 These joys could he improve. 
 
 ENGLISH SONG. 
 
 Tune—" Let roe in this ae night.'* 
 
 Forlorn, my love, no comfort near, 
 Far, far from thee, I wander here 
 Far, far from thee, the fate severe 
 At which I most repine, love. 
 
 O ^cert thou, love, but near me. 
 But near, near, near me ; 
 How kindly thou wouldst cheer me, 
 jijid mingle sighs with mine, love. 
 
 Around me scowls a wintry sky. 
 That blasts each bud of hope and joy ; 
 And shelter, shade, nor home have 1, 
 Save in those arms of thine, love. 
 O wert, kc. 
 
 Cold, alter'd friendship's cruel part, 
 
 To poison fortune's ruthless dart — 
 
 Let me not break thy faithful heart. 
 
 And say that fate is mine, love. 
 
 O wert. Sec. 
 
 But dreary tho' the moments fleet 
 O let me think we yet shall meet ! 
 That only ray of solace sweet 
 Can on thy Chloris shine, love. 
 O wert. Sec. 
 
 SCOTTISH BALLAD. 
 
 Tune "The Lothian Lassie." 
 
 Last May a braw wooer cam down the lang 
 glen, 
 And sair wi' his love he did deave me ; 
 I said there was naelhing I hated Idee men. 
 The deuce gae wi'm, to beheve me, believe 
 
 mc. 
 The deuce gac wi'ui, to beheve me. 
 
BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 105 
 
 He spak o' the darts in my bonnie black e'en, 
 And vow'd for my love he was dying ; 
 
 I said he might die when he liked, for Jean, 
 The Lord forgie me for lying, for lying, 
 The Lord forgie me for lying ! 
 
 A wecl-stocked mailen, himsel for the laird, 
 And marriage aff-hand, were his proiFers : 
 
 I never loot on that I kenn'd it, or car'd, 
 But thought I might hae waur oiFers, waur 
 
 But thaught I might hae waur offers. 
 
 But what wad ye think ? in a fortnight or less. 
 The deil tak Iiis taste to gae ngSr her ! 
 
 He up the lang loan to my black cousin Bess, 
 Guess ye how, the jad ! I could bear her, 
 
 could bear her. 
 Guess ye how, the jad ! I could bear her. 
 
 But a' the niest week as I fretted wi' care, 
 I gaed to the tryste o' Dalgarnock, 
 
 And wha but my fine fickle lover was there, 
 I glowr'd as Td seen a warlock, a warlock, 
 I glowr'd as I'd seen a warlock. 
 
 But owre my left shouther I gae him a blink, 
 Lest neebors might say I was saucy ; 
 
 My wooer he caper'd as he'd been in drink. 
 And vow'd I was his dear lassie, dear lassie, 
 And vow'd I was his dear lassie. 
 
 I spier'd for my cousin fu' couthy and sweet, 
 
 Gin she had recover'd her hearin. 
 And how her new shoon fit her auld shachl't 
 feet. 
 But, heavens ! how he fell a swearin, a 
 
 swearin. 
 But heavens ! how he fell a swearin. 
 
 He begged, for Gudesake ! I wad be his wife, 
 Or else I wad kill him wi' sorrow : 
 
 So e'en to preserve the poor body in life, 
 I think I maun wed him to-morrow, to-mor- 
 row, 
 I tliink I maun wed him to-morrow. 
 
 FRAGMENT. 
 
 Tune—"- The Caledonian Hunt's Dehght.'' 
 
 Why, why tell thy lover. 
 
 Bliss he never must enjoy ! 
 Why, why undeceive him. 
 
 And give all his hopes the lie ? 
 
 ^— ..--^ 
 
 O why, while fancy, raptur^^wunberB, 
 Chloris, Chloris all the them?; 
 
 Why, why wouldst thou cruel. 
 Wake thy lover from his dream ? 
 H2 
 
 HEY FOR A LASS WP A TOCHER. 
 
 TuNK — " Balinamona ora." 
 
 AwA wi' your witchcraft o' beauty's alarms. 
 The slender bit beauty you grasp in your 
 
 arms: 
 O, gie me the lass that has acres o' charms, 
 O, gie me the lass wi' the weel-stockit farms. 
 
 Then hey, for a lass wi' a tocher, then hey for 
 
 a lass wV a tocher, 
 Then hey, for a lass wi' a tocher ; tfie nice 
 
 yellow guineas for me. 
 
 Your beauty's a flower, in the morning that 
 
 blows. 
 And withers the faster, the fkst^r it grows ; 
 But the rapturous charm o' the bonnie green 
 
 knowes, 
 nk spring they're new deckit wi' bonnie while 
 
 yowes. 
 Then hey, &c. 
 
 And e'en when tliis beauty your bosom has 
 blest, [sest ; 
 
 The brightest o' beauty may cloy, when pos- 
 
 But the sweet yellow darlings wi' Geordie im- 
 prest. 
 
 The longer ye hae them — the man- they're 
 carest. 
 Then hey, &c. 
 
 SONG. 
 
 Tune — ^" Here's a health to them that's awa, 
 hiney." 
 
 Here''s a heallli to ane I We dear. 
 
 Here's a health to ane I lo^e dear 
 
 Tlwu art sweet as the smile when fond lovers meet, 
 
 And soft as their parting tear — Jessy I 
 
 Altho' thou maun never be mine, 
 
 Altiio' even hope is denied ; 
 'Tis sweeter for thee despairing. 
 
 Than aught in the world beside — Jessy ! 
 Here^s a health, &c. 
 
 .> 
 
 I mourn thro' the gay, gaudy day. 
 As, hopeless, I muse on thy charms ; 
 
 But welcome the dream o' sweet slumber. 
 For then I am lockt in thy arms — Jessy I 
 Here^s a health, Sec. 
 
106 
 
 BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 I guess by the dear angel smile, 
 I guess by the love-rolling e'e ; 
 
 But why urge the tender confession 
 
 'Gainst fortune's fell cruel decree — Jessy '. 
 Here's a health. Sec. 
 
 SONG. 
 Tune — " Rothennurchies's Rant." 
 
 Fairest maid on Devon banks. 
 Crystal Devon, winding Devon, 
 
 Wilt thou lay that frown aside, 
 And smile as thou were wont to do? 
 
 Full well thou know'st I love thee dear, 
 Couldst thou to malice lend an ear I 
 O, did not love exclaim, " Forbear, 
 Nor use a faithful lover so ?" 
 Fairest maid. Sec. 
 
 Then come, thou fairest of the fair, 
 Those wonted smiles, O, let me share ; 
 And by thy beauteous self I swear, 
 No love but thine my heart shall know. 
 Fairest maid, Sec. 
 
 Let fortune's gifts at random flee, 
 They ne'er shall draw a wish frae me, 
 Supremely blest wi' love and thee, 
 In the Birks of Aberfeldy. 
 Bonnie lassie, Sec. 
 
 STAY, MY CHARMER, CAN YOU 
 LEAVE ME ? 
 
 Tune — ^" An Gille dubh ciar-dhubh." 
 
 Stay, myicharmer, can you leave me ? 
 
 Cruel, cruel to deceive me 1 
 
 Well you know how much you grieve me ; 
 
 Cruel charmer, can you go ? 
 
 Cruel charmer, can you go ? 
 
 By my love so ill requited ; 
 
 By the faith you fondly plighted ; 
 
 By the pangs of lovers slighted ; 
 
 Do not, do not leave me so ! 
 
 Do not, do not leave me so '. i 
 
 THE BIRKS OF ABERFELDY. 
 
 Bonnie lassie, will ye go, will ye go,wUl ye go, 
 Bonnie lassie, mllye go to the birks of Aberfeldy ? | 
 
 Now simmer blinks on flowery braes, 
 And o'er the crystal streamlet plays. 
 Come let us spend the lightsome days, 
 In the Birks of Aberfeldy. 
 
 Bonnie lassie. Sec. 
 
 While o'er their heads the hazels hing. 
 The little birdies blythly sing. 
 Or lightly flit on wanton wing 
 In the Birks of Aberfeldy. 
 
 Bonnie lassie. Sec. 
 
 The braes ascend hke lofty wa's, 
 The foaming stream deep-roaring fa's, 
 O'er-hung wi' fragrant spreading shaws, 
 The Birks of Aberfeldy. 
 
 Bonnie lassie, Sec. 
 
 The hoary cliifs are crown'd wi' flowers, 
 White o'er the hnns the bumie pours, 
 And rising, weets wi' misty showers 
 The Birks, of Aberfeldy. 
 
 Bonnie lassie, kc. 
 
 STRATHALLAN'S LAMENT. 
 
 Thickest night o'erhang my dwelling I 
 Howling tempests o'er me ravel 
 
 Turbid torrents, wintry swelling. 
 Still surround my lonely cave ! 
 
 Crystal streamlets, gently flowing 
 Busy haunts of base mankind. 
 
 Western breezes, softly blowing, 
 Suit not my distracted mind. 
 
 In the cause of right engaged. 
 Wrongs injurious to redress, 
 
 Honour's war we strongly waged, 
 But the lieavens deny'd success. 
 
 Ruin's wheel has driven o'er us, 
 Not a hope that dare attend, 
 
 The wide world is all before us — 
 But a world without a friend ! 
 
 THE YOUNG HIGHLAND RO 
 
 Tune—" Morag." 
 
 Loud blaw the frosty breezes, 
 Th^isnaws the mountains covbf ; 
 
 Like winter on me seizes, 
 
 Since my young Higliland Rover 
 Far wanders nations over. 
 
BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 107 
 
 Where'er he go, where'er he stray, 
 May Heaven be his warden : 
 
 Return liim safe to fair Strathspey, 
 And bonniu Castle- Gordon ! 
 
 The trees now naked groanintr, 
 Shall soon wi' leaves be hinging, 
 
 The birdies dowie moaning, 
 Shall a' be blithly singing, 
 And every flower be springing. 
 
 Sae ril rejoice the lee-lang day, 
 When by his mighty warden 
 
 My youth's returned to fair Strathspey, 
 And bonnie Castle-Gordon. 
 
 RAVLNG WINDS AROUND HER 
 BLOWING. 
 
 Tune—" M'Grigor of Ruaro's Lament." 
 
 Raving winds around her blowing, 
 Yellow leaves the woodlands strowing, 
 By a river hoarsely roaring, 
 Isabella stray'd deploring. 
 " Farewell, hours that late did measure 
 Sunshine days of joy and pleasure ; 
 Hail, thou gloomy night of sorrow, 
 Cheerless night that knows no morrow. 
 
 " O'er the past too fondly wandering, 
 On the hopeless future pondering; 
 Chilly grief my life-blood freezes, 
 Fell despair my fancy seizes, 
 Life, thou soul of every blessing. 
 Load to misery most distressing, 
 O how gladly Td resign thee. 
 And to dark oblivion joui thee !" 
 
 MUSLVG ON THE ROARING OCEAN. 
 
 Tune — " Druimion dubh. 
 
 Musing on the roaring ocean, 
 Which divides my love and me ; 
 
 Wearying Heaven in warm devotion, 
 For liis weal where'er he be. 
 
 t 
 
 Hope and fear"s alternate billow 
 Yielding late to nature's law ; 
 
 Whisp'ring spirits round iny pillow 
 Talk of liim that's far aw a. 
 
 Ye whom sorrow never wounded, 
 Ye who never shed a tear. 
 
 Care-untroubled, joy-surrounded, 
 Gaudy day to you is dear. 
 
 Gentle night, do thou befriend me ; 
 
 Downy sleep, the curtain draw ; 
 Spirits kind, again attend me. 
 
 Talk of him that's far awa I 
 
 BLITHE WAS SHE. 
 
 Blithe, bMie and merry was she. 
 Blithe teas she but and ben : 
 
 Blithe by the banks o/Ern, 
 And blithe in Glenturit glen. 
 
 Bv Oughtertyre grows the aik, 
 
 On Yarrow banks, the birken shaw : 
 
 But Phemie was a bonnier lass 
 Than braes o' Yarrow ever saw. 
 Blithe, Sec. 
 
 Her looks were like a flower in May, 
 Her smile was like asiimner morn : 
 
 She tripped by the banks of Em, 
 As light's a bird upon a thorn. 
 Blithe, Sec. 
 
 Her bonnie face it was as meea 
 
 As ony lamb upon a lee ; 
 The evening sun was ne'er sae sweet 
 
 As was the blink o' Phemie 's e'e. 
 Blithe, &c. 
 
 The Highland hills I've wander'd wide. 
 And o'er the Lowlands I hae been ; 
 
 But Phemie was the blithest lass 
 That ever trod the dewy green. 
 Blithe, Sec. 
 
 A ROSE-BUD BY MY EARLY WALK. 
 
 A ROSE-BUD by my early walk, 
 Adown a corn-enclosed hawk, 
 Sae gently bent its thorny stalk 
 Ail on a dewy morning. 
 
 Ere twice the shades o' dawn are fled. 
 In a' its crimson glory spread. 
 And drooping rich the dewy head, 
 It scents the early morning. 
 
 Within the bush, her covert nest 
 A little linnet fondly prest. 
 Tho dew sat chilly on her breast 
 Sae eavly in the morning. 
 
BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 She soon shall see her tender brood, 
 The pride, the pleasure o' the wood, 
 Amang the fresh green leaves bedew'd, 
 Awake the early morning. 
 
 So thou, dear bird, young Jeany fair, 
 On trembling string or vocal air, 
 Shall sweetly pay the tender care 
 That tents thy early morning. 
 
 So thou, sweet rose-bud, young and gay, 
 Slialt beauteous blaze upon the day. 
 And bless the parent's evening ray 
 That watch'd thy early mornmg. 
 
 WHERE BRAVING ANGRY WINTER'S 
 STORMS. 
 
 TUNE- 
 
 •N. Gow's Lamentation for 
 Abercaimy." 
 
 Whkre braving angry wmter's storms, 
 
 The lofty Ochils rise, 
 Far in their shade ray Peggy's charms 
 
 First blest my wondering eyes. 
 As one by whom some savage stream, 
 
 A lonely gem surveys, 
 Astonish'd, doubly marks its beam, 
 
 With art's most polish'd blaze. 
 
 Blest be the wild, sequester'd shade, 
 
 And blest the day and hour. 
 Where Peggy's charms I first survey'd. 
 
 When first I felt their pow'r 1 
 The tyrant death with grim control 
 
 May seize my fleeting breath ; 
 But tearing Peggy from my soul 
 
 Must be a stronger death. 
 
 TIBBIE, I HAE SEEN THE DAY. 
 Tune — " Invercald's Reel." 
 
 O Tibbie, I hue seen the day. 
 Ye would nae been sue sky ; 
 
 For laik o' gear ye lightly me. 
 But, trowth, I care na by. 
 
 Yestreen I met you on the moor. 
 Ye spak na, but gaed by like stoure : 
 Ye geek at me because I'm poor, 
 But feint a hair care I. 
 O Tibbie, I hue. Sec. 
 
 I doubt na, lass, but ye may think. 
 Because ye liae the name o' clijik. 
 
 That ye can please me at a wink, 
 Whene'er ye like to try. 
 O Tibbie, I hoe, Sec. 
 
 But sorrow tak him that's sae mean, 
 Altho' his pouch o' coin were clean, 
 vVha follows ony saucy quean 
 That looks sae proud and high. 
 O Tibbie, I hae, kc. 
 
 Altho' a lad were e'er sae sinart 
 If that he want the yellow dirt, 
 Ye'll cast your head anither airt. 
 And answer him fu' dry. 
 O Tibbie, I hae, kc. 
 
 But if he hae the name o' gear, 
 Ye'll fasten to him like a brier, 
 f ho' hardly he for sense or lear. 
 Be better than the kye. 
 O Tibbie, I hae, kc. 
 
 But, Tibbie, lass, tak my advice, 
 Your daddie's gear maks you sae mce ; 
 The deil a ane wad spier your price, 
 Were ye as poor as I. 
 O Tibbie, I hae, kc. 
 
 There Uves a lass in yonder park, 
 I would na gie her in her sark,. 
 For thee wi' a' thy thousand majk : 
 Ye need na look sae high. 
 Tibbie, I hae, &c. 
 
 CLARINDA. 
 
 Clarinda, mistress of my souU 
 The measur'd time is nm ! 
 
 The wretch beneath the dreary polo. 
 So marks his latest sun. 
 
 To what dark cave of frozen night 
 Shall poor Sylvander hie ; 
 
 Depriv'd of thee, his life and light, 
 The Sim of all his joy. 
 
 We part— but by these precious diops 
 
 That fill thy lovely eyes ! 
 No other light shall guide my steps 
 
 Till thy bright beams arise. 
 
 She, the fair sun of all her sex. 
 Has blest my glorious day : 
 
 And shall a glirninpring- planet fix 
 My worship to lis toy 1 
 
 W^ 
 
liUKNS' POEMS 
 
 109 
 
 THE DAY RETURNS, MY BOSOM 
 BURNS. 
 
 Tune — ^" Seventh of November." 
 
 The day returns, my bosom burns, 
 
 The bhssful day we twa did meet, 
 Tho' winter wild in tempest toil'd. 
 
 Ne'er summer-sim was half sae sweet. 
 Than a' the pride that loads the tide, 
 
 And crosses o'er the sultry line ; 
 Than kingly robes, than crowns and globes. 
 
 Heaven gave me more — it made thee mine. 
 
 While day and night can bring deUght, 
 
 Or nature aught of pleasure give ; 
 While joys above, my mind can move. 
 
 For thee, and thee alone, I live ! 
 When that grim foe of life below 
 
 Comes in between to make us part ; 
 The iron hand that breaks our band. 
 
 It breaks my bliss, — it breaks my heart. 
 
 m 
 
 THE LAZY MIST. 
 
 The lazy mist hangs from the brow of the hill. 
 
 Concealing the course of the dark winding rill ; 
 
 How languid the scenes, late so sprightly, ap- 
 pear 
 
 As autumn to winter resigns the pale year ! 
 
 The forests are leafless, the meadows are 
 brown, 
 
 And all the gay foppery of summer is flown ; 
 
 Apart let me wander, apart let me muse. 
 
 How quick time is flying, how keen fate pur- 
 sues ; 
 
 How long I have liv'd — but how much Uv'd 
 in vain : 
 
 1 low little of hfe's scanty span may remain : 
 
 Wiiat aspects, old Time, in his progress, has 
 worn; 
 
 ^Vhat ties, cruel fate in my bosom has torn. 
 
 How foolish, or worse, till our summit is 
 gain'd ! 
 
 And downward, how weaken'd, how darken'd, 
 how pain'd '. 
 
 Tliis life's not worth having with all it c£.n 
 give. 
 
 For something beyond it ooor man sure must 
 live. 
 
 O, "WERE I ON PARNASSUS' HILL ! 
 
 Tune—" My love is lost to me." 
 
 O, WERK I on Parnassus' hill ! 
 Or had of Helicon my fill ; 
 
 That I might catrh poetic skill. 
 To sing iiow dear I love thee. 
 
 But Nith maun be my muse's well, 
 
 My muse maun be thV bonnie sel ; 
 
 On Corsincon I'll glowr and spell. 
 And write how dear I love thee. 
 
 Then come, sweet muse, inspire my lay ! 
 For a' the Ice-lang simmer's day, 
 I coudna sing, I coudna say, 
 
 How much, how dear I love thee. 
 I see thee dancing o'er the green. 
 Thy waist sae jimp, thy limbs sae clean, 
 Thy temptmg lips, thy roguish een — 
 
 By heaven and earth I love thee 1 
 
 By night, by day, arfield, at hame. 
 The thoughts o' thee my breast inflame ; 
 And ay I muse and sing thy name, 
 
 I only hve to love thee. 
 Tho' I were doom'd to wander on. 
 Beyond the sea, beyond the sun, 
 TiU my last weary sand was run ; 
 
 Till then— and then I love thee. 
 
 I LOVE MY JEAN. 
 
 Tune— "Miss Admiral Gordon's Strathspey .»» 
 
 Of a', the airts the wind can blaw, 
 
 I dearly hke the west. 
 For there the bonnie lassie lives^ 
 
 The lassie I lo'e best : 
 There wild woods grow, and rivers row, 
 
 And mony a hill between ; 
 But day and night my fancy's flight 
 
 Is ever wi' my Jean. 
 
 I see her in the dewy flowers, 
 
 I see her sweet and fair : 
 I hear her in the tunefu' birds, 
 
 I hear her charm the air : 
 There's not a bonnie flower that springs, 
 
 By fountain, shaw, or green, 
 There's not a bonnie bird that sings, 
 
 But minds me o' my Jean. 
 
 THE BRAES O' BALLOCHMYLE. 
 
 The Catrine woods were yellow seen. 
 The flowers decay'd on Catrine lee, 
 
 Nae lav 'rock sang on hillock green, 
 But nature sicken'd on the e'e. 
 
no 
 
 Tliro' faded grov Maria sang, 
 
 I Inrsel in beauty's bloom the while, 
 'And ay the wild-wood echoes rang, 
 Farcwcellhc braes o' Ballochmyie. 
 
 Low in your wintry beds, ye flowers, 
 
 Again yc'll flourish fresh and fair; 
 Ye birdies dumb, in with'ring bowers, 
 
 Again yc'll charm the vocal air. 
 But here, alas ! for me nac mair 
 
 Shall birdie charm, or floweret smilo ; 
 Fareweel the bonnie banks of Ayr, 
 
 Fareweel, fareweel 1 sweet Ballochmyie. 
 
 WILLIE BREW'D A PECK O' MAUT. 
 
 O, WILLIE brew'd a peck o' maut, 
 And Rob and Allan came to see ; 
 
 Three blither hearts, that lee-lang night, 
 Ye wad na find in Christendie. 
 
 We are nafou, xve're na thatfou, 
 But just a drappie in our e'e; 
 
 The cock may cratv, the day may daw 
 And ay we'll taste the barley bree. 
 
 Here are we met, three merry boys. 
 Three merry boys I trow are we ; 
 
 And mony a night we've merry been, 
 And mony niae we hope to be ! 
 We are nafou, kc. 
 
 It is the moon, I ken her horn. 
 That's blinkin in the lift sae hie ; 
 
 She shines sae bright to wyle us hame 
 But, by my sooth, she'll wait a wee ! 
 We are naefou, kc. 
 
 Wha first shall rise to gang awa, 
 A cuckold, coward loon is he ! 
 
 Wha last beside his chair shall fa'. 
 He is the king amang us three I 
 We are nafou, kc. 
 
 THE BLUE-EYED LASSIE. 
 
 I GAED a waefu' gate, yestreen, 
 
 A gate, I fear, I'll dearly rue ; 
 I gat my death frae twa sweet een, 
 
 Twa lovely een o' bonnie blue. 
 'Twasnot her golden ringlets bright; 
 
 Her lips like roses wat wi' dew. 
 Her heaving bosom, lily-white ; — 
 
 It was her een sae bonnie blue. 
 
 BURNS- POEMSL 
 
 She talk'd, she smil'd, my fieoit 8!ic wyl'd, 
 
 She charm'd my soul I wist na how ; 
 And ay the stound, the deadly wound, 
 
 Cam frae her eon sae bonnie blue. 
 But spare to speak, and spare to speed ; 
 
 She'll aiblins listen to my vow : 
 Should she refuse, I'll lay my dead 
 
 To her twa een sae bonnie blue. 
 
 THE BANKS OF NITH. 
 
 Tune—" Robie Dona Gorach." 
 
 The Thames flows proudly to tlie sea, 
 
 Where royal cities stately stand ; 
 But sweeter flows the Nitli toinc. 
 
 Where Commins ance had high command: 
 When shall I see that honour'd land. 
 
 That winding stream I love so dear I 
 Must wayward fortune's adverse hand 
 
 For ever, ever keep me lierc ? 
 
 How lovely, Nith, thy fruitful vales. 
 
 Where spreading hawthorns gay ly bloom; 
 How sweetly wind thy slojiing dales, 
 
 Where lambkins wanton thro' the broom ! 
 Tho' wandering, now, must be my doom, 
 
 Far from thy bonnie banks and braes. 
 May there my latest liours consume, 
 
 Amang the friends of early days I 
 
 JOHN ANDERSON MY JO. 
 
 When we were first acquent ; 
 Your locks were like the raven, 
 
 Your bonnie brow was brent ; 
 But now your brow is held, John, 
 
 Your locks are like the snaw ; 
 But blessings on your frosty pow, 
 
 John Anderson my jo. 
 
 John Anderson my jo, John, 
 
 We clamb the hill thegither; 
 And mony a canty day, John, 
 
 We've had wi' ane anither : 
 Now we maun totter down, John 
 
 But hand eind hand we'll go, 
 And sleep thegither at the foot, 
 
 John Anderson my jo. 
 
 » 
 
 TAM GLEN. 
 
 My heart is a-breaking, dear Tittio, 
 Some counsel unto me come len', 
 
 To anger them a' is a pity ; 
 But what will I do wi' Tarn Gl«n ? 
 
BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 Ill 
 
 I'm thinkin, wi' sic a braw fellow, 
 In poortith I might mak a fen' ; 
 
 What care I in riches to wallow, 
 If I maunna marry Tam Glen i 
 
 There's Lowrie the laird o' Drummeller, 
 " Guid day to you, brute," he comes ben : 
 
 He brags and he blaws o' his siller, 
 But when will ho dance like Tam Glen ? 
 
 My minnie does constantly deave me, 
 And bids me beware o' young men ; 
 
 They flatter, she says, to deceive me ; 
 But wha can think sae o' Tam Glen : 
 
 My daddie says, gin I'll forsake him, 
 Hell gie me guid hunder marks ten ; 
 
 But, if it's ordain'd I maun tak him, 
 O wlia will I get but Tam Glen ? 
 
 Yestreen at the Valentine's dealing, 
 My heart to my mou gied a sten ; 
 
 For thrice I drew ane without failing. 
 And thrice it was written, Tam Glen 
 
 The last Halloween I was waukin 
 My droukit sark-sleevo, as ye ken 
 
 His likeness cam up the house staukin. 
 And the very gray breeks o' Tam Glen ! 
 
 Come counsel, dear Tittie, don't tarry ; 
 
 I'll gie you my bonnie black hen, 
 Gif ye will advise me to marry 
 
 The lad I lo'e dearly, Tam Glen 
 
 MY TOCHER'S THE JEWEL. 
 
 O MEiKi-E thinks my luve o' my beauty. 
 
 And meikle thinks my luve o' my kin ; 
 But little thinks my luve I ken brawlie, 
 
 My Tocher's the jewel has charms for hun. 
 It's a' for the apple he'll nourish the tree ; 
 
 It's a' for the hiney he'll cherish the bee ; 
 My laddie's sae meikle in luve wi' the siller, 
 
 He canna hae luve to spare for me. 
 
 Your proffer o' luve's an airl-penny. 
 
 My Tocher's the bargain ye wad buy ; 
 But an ye be crafty, I am cunnin, 
 
 "ae ye wi' anither your fortune may try. 
 Ye're like to the trimmer o' yon rotten wood, 
 
 Ye're Uke to the bark o' yon rotten tree, 
 Ye'll slip frae me like a knotless thread. 
 
 And yell crack your credit wi' mae nor me. 
 
 THEN GUIDWIFE COUNT THE 
 LA-WIN, 
 
 Gane is the day, and mirk's the night. 
 But we'll ne'er stray for faute o' light. 
 For ale and brandy's stars and moon. 
 And bluid-red wine's the rysin sun. 
 
 Then guidwife count the laivin, the launn, the 
 
 lawin. 
 Then guidwife count the laivin, and bring a 
 
 coggie mair. 
 
 There's wealth and ease for gentlemen, 
 And semple-folk maun fecht and fen' ; 
 But here we're a' in ae accord. 
 For ilka man that's drunk's a lord. 
 
 Then gudetoife count, &c. 
 
 My coggie is a haly pool. 
 
 That heals the wounds o' care and dool ; 
 
 And pleasure is a wanton trout, 
 
 An' ye drink it a' ye'll find him out. 
 
 Then guidwife count, ice.. 
 
 WHAT CAN A YOUNG LASSIE DO 
 WI' AN AULD MAN? 
 
 What can a young lassie, what shall a young 
 lassie. 
 What can a yoimg lassie do wi' an auld 
 man ? 
 Bad luck on the pennie that tempted my 
 minnie 
 To sell her poor Jenny for siller an' Ian' ! 
 Bad luck on the pennie, &c. 
 
 He's always compleenin frac momin to e'enin, 
 He hosts and he hirples the weary day lang ; 
 
 He's doylt and he's dozen, his bluid it is fro- 
 frozen, 
 O, deary's the night wi' a crazy auld man ! 
 
 He hums and he hankers, he frets and he can- 
 kers, 
 I never can please him, do a' that I can ; 
 He's peevish and jealous of a' the young fel- 
 lows : 
 O, dool on the day I met wi' an auld man I 
 
 My auld auntie Katie upon me taks pity, 
 
 I'll do my endeavour to follow her plan ; 
 I'll cross him, and wrack him, xmtil I heart- 
 break him, 
 And then his auld brass will buy me a new 
 pan. 
 
BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 THE BONiNIE WEE THING. 
 
 Bonnie wee thing, cannie wee thing, 
 Lovely wee thing, wast thou mine, 
 
 I wad wear thee in my bosom, 
 Lest my jewel I should tine. 
 
 Wishfully I look and languish 
 In that bonnie face o' thine ; 
 
 And my heart it stoimds wi' anguish, 
 Lest my wee tiling be na mine. 
 
 Wit, and g'race, and love, and beauty, 
 
 In ae constellation shine ; 
 To adore thee is my duty. 
 
 Goddess o' this soul o' mine ! 
 Bonnie we«, i-c 
 
 O, FOR ANE AND TWENTY, TAM ! 
 Tune—" The Moudiewort." 
 
 jin O,for one and twenty. Tarn ! 
 
 An hey, sweet ane and twenty, Tarn 1 
 ril learn my kin a rattlin sang. 
 
 An I saw ane and twenty. Tarn. 
 
 They snool me sair, and baud me down. 
 And gar me look like bluntie, Tam ! 
 
 But three short years will soon wheel roun'. 
 And then comes ane and twenty, Tam ! 
 An 0,for ane. Sec. 
 
 A gleib o' Ian', a claut o' gear. 
 Was left me by my amitie, Tam ; 
 
 At kith or kin I needna spier, 
 An I saw ane and twenty, Tam \ 
 An O,for mie, &:c. 
 
 They'll hae me wed a wealthy coof, 
 Tho' I mysel' hae plenty, Tam ; 
 
 But hear'st thou, laddie, there's my loof, 
 
 I'm thine at ane and twenty, Tam ! 
 
 An 0, for ane, &c. 
 
 BESS AND HER SPINNING WHEEL. 
 
 O LEEZE me on my spinning wheel, 
 O leeze me on my rock and reel ; 
 Frae tap to tae that deeds me bien. 
 And haps me fiel and warm at e'en ! 
 I'll set me down and sing and spin, 
 While laigh descends the simmer sun. 
 Blest wi' content, and milk and meal — 
 O leeze me on my spinninc wheel. 
 
 On ilka hand the bumies trot 
 And meet below my theekit cut ; 
 The scented birk and hawthorn white 
 Across the pool their arms unite, 
 Alike to screen the birdie's nest, 
 And little fishes' caller rest : 
 The sun blinks kindly in the biel', 
 Where blithe I turn my spinning whee , 
 
 On lofty aiks the cushats wail, 
 And echo cons thee doolfu'tale ; 
 The lintwhites in the haze! braes, 
 Delighted, rival ither's lays : 
 The craik amang the claver hay, 
 The paitrick whirrin o'er the ley. 
 The swallow jinkin round my shiel, 
 Amuse me at my spinning wheel. 
 
 Wi' sma' to sell, and less to buy, 
 Aboon distress, below envy, 
 O wha wad leave this humble state, 
 For a' the pride of a' the great ? 
 Amid their flaring, idle toys. 
 Amid their cumbrous, dinsome joyp. 
 Can they the peace and pleasure feel 
 Of Bessy at her spinning wheel ? 
 
 COUNTRY LASSIE. 
 
 In simmer when the hay was mawn, 
 
 And com wav'd green m ilka field. 
 While claver blooms white o'er the lea. 
 
 And roses blaw in ilka bield ; 
 Blithe Bessie in the milking shiel, 
 
 Says, I'll be wed, come o't what wiU ; 
 Out spak a dame Ln wrinkled eild, 
 
 " O' guid advisement comes nae ill. 
 
 " It's ye hae wooers mony ane, 
 
 And lassie, ye 're but young ye ken 
 Then wait a wee, and cannie wale, 
 
 A routhie but, a routhie ben : 
 There's Johnie o' the Buskie-glen, 
 
 Fu' is his bam, fu' is his byre ; 
 Tak this frae me, my bonnie hen, 
 
 It's plenty beets the luver's fire." 
 
 For Johnie o' the Buskie-glen, 
 
 I dinna care a single flie ; 
 He lo'es sae well his craps and kye, 
 
 He has nae luve to spare for me : 
 But blithe's the blink o' Robie's e'e, 
 
 And weel I wat he lo'es me dear : 
 Ae blink o' him I wad na gie 
 
 For Buskie-glen and a' nis gear. 
 
 # 
 
BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 113 
 
 " O thoughtless lassie, life's a faught ; 
 
 The canniest gate, the strife is sair ; 
 But ay fu' han't is feciitin best, 
 
 A liungry care's an unco care : 
 But some will spend, a«id some will spare, 
 
 An' wilfu' folk maun hae their will ; 
 Syne as ye brew, my maiden fair, 
 
 Keep mind that ye maun drink the yill.' 
 
 O, gear will buy me rigs o' land, 
 
 And gear will buy me sheep and kye ; 
 But the tender heart o' leesome luve, 
 
 The gowd and siller cauna buy : 
 We may be poor — Robie and I, 
 
 LigJit is the burden luve lays on ; 
 Content and luve brings peace and joy, 
 
 What mair hae queens upon a throne ? 
 
 FAIR ELIZA. 
 
 A GAELIC AIR. 
 
 Turn again, thou fair Eliza, 
 
 Ae kind blink before we part, 
 Rew on thy despairing lover ! 
 
 Canst thou break his faithfu' heart? 
 Turn again, thou fair*Eliza; 
 
 If to love thy heart denies, 
 For pity liide the cruel sentence 
 
 Under friendship's kind disguise 
 
 Thee, dear maid, hae I offended? 
 
 The offence is loving thee : 
 Canst thou wreck his peace for ever, 
 
 Wha for tlnne wad gladly die? 
 While the life beats in my bosom. 
 
 Thou shalt mix in ilka throe : 
 Turn again, thou lovely maiden, 
 
 Ae sweet smile on me bestow. 
 
 Not the bee upon the blossom, 
 
 In the pride o' sinny noon ; 
 Not the little sporting fairy. 
 
 All beneath the simmer moon ; 
 Not the poet in the moment 
 
 Fancy lightens on his e'e, 
 Kens the pleasure, feels the rapture, 
 
 That thv Dresence gies to me. 
 
 THE POSIE. 
 
 O LCTK will venture in, where it daur na weel 
 
 be seen, 
 O luve will venture in, where wisdom ance 
 
 has been ; 
 I 
 
 But I will down yon river rove, amang the 
 wood sae green. 
 And a' to pu' a posie to my ain dear May. ' 
 
 The primrose I will pu', the firstling o' the 
 
 year. 
 And I will pu' the pink, the emblem o' my 
 
 dear, 
 For she's the pink o' womankind, and blooms 
 
 without a peer ; 
 And a' to be a posie to my ain dear May. 
 
 I'll pu' the budding rose when Phcsbus peeps 
 in view, 
 
 For it's like a baumy kiss o' her sweet bonnie 
 mou; 
 
 The hyacinth 's for constancy wi' its unchang- 
 ing blue. 
 And a' to be a posie to my ain dear May. 
 
 The lily it is pure, and the lily it is fair, 
 
 And in her lovely bosom I'll place tiie lily 
 
 there ; 
 The daisy 's for simplicity and unaffected air 
 And a' to be a posie to my ain dear May. 
 
 The hawthorn I will pu', wi' its locks o' siller 
 
 gray, 
 Wliere, like an aged man, it stands at break o' 
 
 day. 
 But the songster's nest within the bush I win- 
 
 na tak away ; 
 And a' to be a posie to my ain dear May. 
 
 The woodbine I will pu' when the e'ening star 
 
 is near, 
 And the diamond-draps o' dew shall be her 
 
 een sae clear : 
 The violet 's for modesty wliich weel she fa's 
 
 to wear. 
 And a' to be a posie to my ain dear May, 
 
 I'll tie the posie round wi' the silken band of 
 
 luve, 
 And I'll place it in her breast, and I'll swear by 
 
 a' above. 
 That to my latest draught o' Ufe the band shall 
 
 ne'er remuve. 
 And this will be a posie to my ain dear May, 
 
 THE BANKS O' DOON. 
 
 Ye banks and braes o' bonnie Doon, 
 
 How can ye bloom sae fresh and fair ; 
 How can ye chant, ye little birds, 
 
 And I sae weary, fu' o' care ! 
 Thou'lt break my heart, thou warbling birdi 
 
 That wantons thro' the flowering thorn : 
 Thou minds me o' departed joys. 
 
 Departed never to return. 
 
114 
 
 BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 Oft hae I rov'd by bonnie Doon, 
 
 To see the rose and woodbine twine ; 
 And ilka bird sang o' its luve, 
 
 And fondly sae did 1 o' mine. 
 Wi' lightsome heart I pu'd a rose, 
 
 Fu' sweet upon its thorny tree : 
 But my faubs luver stole my rose, 
 
 But ah ! he left the thorn wi' me. 
 
 SONG. 
 
 Tune — ^" Catharine Ogie." 
 
 Yb flowery banks o' bonnie Doon, v> 
 
 How can ye blume sae fair, 
 JJow can ye chant, ye little birds. 
 
 And I sae fu' o'care! 
 
 T^ou'll break my heart, thou bonnie bird 
 
 That sings upon the bough ; 
 Thou minds me o' the happy days 
 
 When my fause luve was true. 
 
 Thou'll break my heart, thou bonnie bird 
 
 That sings beside thy mate ; 
 For sae I sat, and sae 1 sang, 
 
 And wist na o' my fate. 
 
 Aft hae I rovJd by bonnie Doon, 
 
 To see the wood-bine twine, 
 And ilka bird sang o' its love. 
 
 And pae did I o mine. 
 
 Wi' lightsome heart I pu'd a rose, 
 
 Frae aff its thorny tree, 
 And my fause luver staw the rose. 
 
 But left the thorn wi' me. 
 
 SIC A WIFE AS WILLIE HAD. 
 
 Willie Wastle dwalt on Tweed, 
 
 The spot they ca'd it Linkumdoddie, , 
 
 WiUie was a wabster guid, 
 
 Cou'd stown a clue wi' ony bodie ; 
 
 He had a wife was dour and din, 
 O Tinkler Madgie was her raither ; 
 
 Sic a wife as Willie had, 
 
 J wad na gie a button for her. 
 
 She has an e'e, she has but anc, 
 The cat has twa the very colour; 
 
 Five rusty teeth, forbye a stump, 
 
 A clapper tongue wad deave a miller ; 
 
 A wliisken beard about her mou, - 
 Her nose and chin they threaten ither ; 
 
 She's bow-hough'd, she's hein-shinn'd, 
 Ae limpin leg a hand-breed shorter ; 
 
 She 's twisted right, she 's twisted left, 
 To balance fair in ilka quarter : 
 
 She has a hump upon her breast. 
 The twin o' that upon her shouther ; 
 Sk a wife, Sec, 
 
 Auld baudrans by the ingle sits, 
 An' wi' her loof her face a-washin; 
 
 But Willie's wife is nae sae trig. 
 
 She dights her grunzie wi' a hushion j 
 
 Her walie nieves like midden-creels, 
 Her face wad fyle the Logan-Water •■ 
 
 Sic a wife as Willie had, 
 I wad na gie a button for her. 
 
 GLOOMY DECEMBER. 
 
 Ance mair I hail thee, thou gloomy December ! 
 
 Ance mair I hail thee wi' sorrow and care ; 
 Sad was the parting thou makes me remember, 
 
 Parting wi' Nancy, Oh ! ne'er to meet mair. 
 Fond lovers' parting is sweet painful pleasure, 
 
 Hope beaming mild on the soft parting hour ; 
 But the dire feeling,' 0/araceW /or ever. 
 
 Is anguish unmingled and agony pure. 
 
 Wild as the winter now tearing the forest, 
 Till the last leaf o' the summer is flown, 
 
 Such is the tempest has shaken my bosom, 
 Since my last hope and last comfort is gone ; 
 
 Still as I hail thee, thou gloomy December, 
 Still shall I hail thee wi' sorrow and care; 
 
 For sad was the parting thou makes me re- 
 member. 
 
 Parting wi' Nancy, Oh, ne'er to meet mair. 
 
 WILT THOU BE MY DEARIE? 
 
 m 
 
 Wilt thou be my dearie ? 
 
 When sorrow wrings thy gentle heart, 
 O wilt thou let me cheer thee ? 
 
 By the treasure of my soul. 
 And that 's the love I bear thee ! 
 
 I swear and vow, that only thou 
 Shall ever be my dearie. 
 
 Only thou, I swear and vow, 
 
 Shall ever be mv dearie. 
 
 Lassie, say thou lo'es me ; 
 
 Or if thou wilt na be my ain. 
 Say na thou'lt refuse me : 
 
 If it wixma, caima be, 
 
BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 115 
 
 Thou for thine may choose me ; 
 Let me, lassie, quickly die, 
 
 Trusting that thou lo'es me. 
 Lassie, let me quickly die. 
 Trusting that thou lo'es me. 
 
 SHE'S FAIR AND FAUSE. 
 
 She's fair and fause that causes my smart, 
 
 I lo'ed her meikle and lang- ; 
 She's broken her vow, she's broken my heart, 
 
 And I may e'en gae hang. 
 A coof cam in wi' rowth o' gear. 
 And 1 hae tmt my dearest dear. 
 But woman is but warld's gear, 
 
 Sae let the bonnie lass gang. 
 
 VVhae'er ye be that woman love, 
 
 To this be never blind, 
 Nae ferlie 'tis tho' fickle she prove, 
 
 A woman has't by kind : 
 O woman lovely, woman fair ! 
 An angel's form 's faun to thy share, 
 'Twad been o'er meikle to gien thee mair, 
 
 I mean an angel mind. 
 
 AFTON WATER. 
 
 Flow gently, sweet Afton, among thy green 
 
 braes, 
 Flow gently, I'll sing thee a song in thy praise ; 
 My Mary's asleep by thj' murmuring stream, 
 Floftr gently, sweet Aflon, disturb not her 
 
 dream. 
 
 Thou stock-dove whose echo resounds .tlu'o' 
 
 the glen. 
 Ye wild whistling blackbirds in yon thorny 
 
 den, 
 Thou green-crested lap-wing, thy screaming 
 
 forbear, 
 I charge you disturb not my slumbering fair. 
 
 How_ lofty, sweet Afton, thy neighbouring 
 " hills, 
 
 rk'd wi' the courses of clear, winding 
 
 L rills; 
 
 There daily I wander as noon rises high. 
 
 My flocks and my Mary's sweet cot in my eye. 
 
 How pleasant thy banks and green valleys 
 
 " - below. 
 Where wild in the woodlands the primroses 
 
 blow ; 
 There, oft, as mild evening weeps over the lea. 
 The sweet-scented birk shades my Mary and 
 
 me. 
 
 Thy crystal stream, Afton, how iofty it glides. 
 And wmds by the cot where my Mary resides ; 
 How wantort thy waters her snowy ieet lave, 
 As gathering sweet flowerets she stems thy 
 dear wave. 
 
 Flow gently, sweet Afton, among thy green 
 
 braes, 
 Flow gently, sweet river, the theme of ray lays ; ' 
 My Mary 's asleep by thy murmuring stream. 
 Flow gently, sweet Afton, disturb not her 
 
 dream. 
 
 BONNIE BELL. 
 
 The smiling spring comes in rejoicing, 
 
 And surly winter grimly flies : 
 Now crystal clear are the falling waters, 
 
 And bonnie blue are the sunny skies ; 
 Fresh o'er the mountains breaks forth the 
 morning. 
 
 The ev'ning gUds the ocean's swell ; 
 All creatures joy in the sun's returning 
 
 And I rejoice in my bonnie Bell. 
 
 The flowery spring leads simny summer, 
 
 And yellow autumn presses near, 
 Then in his turn comes gloomy winter. 
 
 Till smiling spring again appear. 
 Thus seasons dancing, life advancing. 
 
 Old Time and nature their changes tell, 
 But never ranging, still unchanging 
 
 I adore my bonnie Bell. 
 
 THE GALLANT 'WEAVER. 
 
 Whkue Cart rins rowin to the sea. 
 By mony a flow'r, and spreading tree, 
 There lives a lad, the lad for me. 
 He is a gallant weaver. 
 
 Oh I had wooers aught or nme, 
 They gied me rings and ribbons fine ; 
 And I was fear'd my heart would tine, 
 And I gied it to the weaver. 
 
 My daddie sign'd my tocher-band 
 To gio the lad that has the land ; 
 But to my heart I'U add my hand, 
 And gie it to the weaver. 
 
 While birds rejoice in leafy bowers ; 
 While bees rejoice in opening flowem ; 
 While corn grows green in simmer ihow*!*! 
 I'll love my gallant weaver. 
 
116 
 
 BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 LOUIS WHAT RECK I BY THEE 
 
 Louis, what reck I by thee, 
 Or Geordie on his ocean ? 
 
 Dyvor, beggar louns to me, 
 I reign in Jeanie's bosom. 
 
 Let her crown my love her law, 
 And in her breast enthrone me ; 
 
 Kings and nations, swith awa ! 
 Reif randies, I disown ye 1 
 
 FOR THE SAKE OF SOMEBODY. 
 
 My heart is sair, I dare na tell. 
 
 My heart is sair for somebody ; 
 I could wake a winter night 
 For the sake o' somebody. 
 Oh-hon I for somebody ! 
 Oh-hey ! for somebody ! 
 I could range the world around, 
 For the sake o' somebody. 
 
 Ye powers that smile on virtuous love, 
 
 O, sweetly smile on somebody ! 
 Frae ilka danger keep him free, 
 And send me safe my somebody. 
 Oh-hon ! for somebody ! 
 Oh-hey ! for somebody ! 
 I wad do — what wad I not ? 
 For the sake of somebody ! 
 
 THE LOVELY LASS OF INVERNESS. 
 
 The lovely lass o' Inverness, 
 
 Nae joy nor pleasure can she see ; 
 For e'en and mom she cries, alas I 
 
 And ay the saut tear Wins her e'e : 
 Drumossie moor, Drumossie day, 
 
 A waefu' day it was to me ; 
 For there I lost my father dear, 
 
 My father dear, and brethren three. 
 
 Their winding sheet the bluidy clay. 
 
 Their graves are growing green to see ; 
 And by them lies the dearest lad 
 
 That ever blest a woman's e'e ! 
 Now wae to thee, thou cruel lord, 
 
 A bluidy man I trow thou be ; 
 For mony a heart thou hast made sair, 
 
 That ne'er did wrong to thine or thee. 
 
 A MOTHER'S LAMENT FOR THE 
 DEATH OF HER SON. 
 
 Tune — "■ Finlayston House." 
 
 Fate gave the word, the arrow sped. 
 
 And pierc'd my darling's heart : 
 And with him all the joys are fled 
 
 Life can to me impart. 
 By cruel hands the sapling drops, 
 
 In dust dishonour 'd laid : 
 So fell the pride of all my hopes. 
 
 My age's future shade. 
 
 The mother-linnet in the brake 
 
 Bewails her ravish'd young ; 
 So I, for my lost darling's sake, 
 
 Lament the live-day long. 
 Death, oft I've fear'd thy fatal blow, 
 
 Now fond I bare my breast, 
 O, do thou kindly lay me low 
 
 With him I lovo, at rest ! 
 
 O MAY, THY MORN. 
 
 O May, thy mom was ne'er sae sweet, 
 As the mirk night o' December ; 
 
 For sparkling was the rosy wine, 
 And private was the chamber : 
 
 And dear was she I dare na name, 
 But I will ay remember. 
 Jlnd dear, &c. 
 
 And here's to them, that, like oursel. 
 Can push about the jorum ; 
 
 And here's to them that wish us weel. 
 May a' that's guid watch o'er them ; 
 
 And here's to them, we dare na tell, 
 The dearest o' the quorum. 
 And hert^s to, &e. 
 
 O, WAT YE WHA'S IN YON TOWN? 
 
 O, WAT ye wlia'fi in yon town, 
 
 Ye see the e'enin sun upon .' 
 The fairest dame 's in yon town, 
 
 That e'enin sun is sliining on. 
 
 Now haply down yon gay green shaw, 
 She wanders by yon spreading tree : 
 
 How blest ye flow'rs that round her blaw, 
 Ye catch tlie glances o' her e'e I 
 
BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 How blest ye birds that round her sing, 
 And welcome in the blooming year 1 
 
 And doubly welcome be the spring, 
 The season to my Lucy dear. 
 
 The sun blinks blithe on yon town, 
 And on yon bonnie braes of Ayr ; 
 
 But my delight in yon town, 
 And dearest bliss, is Lucy fair. 
 
 Without my love, not a' the charms 
 O' Paradise could yield me joy ; 
 
 But gie me Lucy in my arms, 
 And welcome Lapland's dreary sky. 
 
 My cave wad be a lover's bower, 
 Tho' raging winter rent the air ; 
 
 And she a lovely little flower. 
 That I wad tent and shelter there. 
 
 O, sweet is she in yon town. 
 Yon sinkin sun's gane down upon ! 
 
 A fairer than's in yon town. 
 
 His setting beam ne'er shone upon. 
 
 If angry fate is sworn my foe. 
 
 And suffering I am doom'd to bear ; 
 
 I careless quit aught else below. 
 But spare me, spare me Lucy dear. 
 
 For while life's dearest blood is warm, 
 Ae thought frae her shall ne'er depart, 
 
 And she — as fairest is her form I 
 She has the truest, kindest heart. 
 
 i. ^ 
 
 A RED, RED ROSE. 
 
 O, MY luve's like a red, red rose. 
 That's newly sprung in Jime : 
 
 O, my luve's like the melodie 
 That's sweetly play'd in tune. 
 
 As fair art thou, my bonnie lass. 
 
 So deep in luve am I : 
 And I will luve thee still, my dear. 
 
 Till a' the seas gang dry. 
 
 Till a' the seas gang dry, my dear, 
 And the rocks melt wi' the sun : 
 
 I will luve thee still, my dear, 
 While the sands o' life shall run. 
 
 And fare thee weel, my only luve ! 
 
 And fare thee weel a while ! 
 And I will come again, my luve, 
 
 Tho' it were ten tliousand mile. 
 
 A VISION. 
 
 As I stood by yon roofless tower. 
 
 Where the wa'-ilower scents the dewy air, 
 Where the howlet mourns in her ivy bower, 
 
 And tells the midnight moon her care. 
 
 The winds were laid, the air was still. 
 The stars they shot alang the sky ; 
 
 The fox was howling on the hill. 
 And the distant-echoing glens reply 
 
 The stream, adown its hazelly path, 
 Was rushing by the ruin'd wa's, ' 
 
 Hasting to join the sweeping Nith, 
 Whase distant roaring swells and fa's. 
 
 The cauld blue north was streaming forth 
 Her lights, wi' hissing, eerie din ; 
 
 Athort the lift they start and shift. 
 Like fortune's favours, tint as win. 
 
 By heedless chance I tum'd mme eyes. 
 And by the moon-beam, shook, to see 
 
 A stern and stalwart ghaist arise, 
 Attir'd as minstrels wont to be. 
 
 Had I a statue been o' stane, 
 His darin look had daunted me : 
 
 And on his bonnet grav'd was plain, 
 The sacred posy — Libertie ! 
 
 And frae his harp sic strains did flow, 
 Might rous'd the slumberuig dead to hear ; 
 
 But oh, it was a tain of wo. 
 As ever met a Briton's ear ! 
 
 He sang wi] joy his former day. 
 He weeping wail'd his latter times; 
 
 But what he said it was nae play, 
 I winna ventur't in my rhymes. 
 
 my rhymes. 
 
 COPY 
 
 OF A POETICAL ADDRESS 
 
 TO MR. WILLIAM TYTLER, 
 
 With the present of the Bard's Picture. 
 
 Revered defender of beauteous Stuart, 
 Of Stuart, a name once respected, 
 
 A name, which to love was the mark of a true 
 heai t. 
 But now 'tis desoised and neglected. 
 
118 BURNS' 
 
 Tho' something like moisture conglobes in my 
 eye, 
 Let no one misdeem me disloyal ; 
 A poor friendless wand'rer may well claim a 
 sigh, 
 Still more, if that wand'rer were royal. 
 
 My fathers that name have rever'd on a 
 throne ; 
 My fathers have fallen to right it ; 
 Those fathers would spurn their degenerate 
 son. 
 That name should he scofhngly sUght it. 
 
 Still in prayers for K — G — I most heartily 
 join, 
 The Q, — , and the rest of the gentry, 
 Be they wise, be they fooUsh, is nothing of 
 mine; 
 Their title's avow'd by my country. 
 
 But why of this epocha make such a fuss, 
 ***** 
 
 * * * * 
 ***** 
 
 But loyalty truce . we're on dangerous ground, 
 Who knows how the fashions may alter? 
 
 The doctrine, to-day, that is loyalty sound, 
 To-morrow may bring us a halter. 
 
 I send you a trifle, a head of a bard, 
 A trifle scarce worthy your care ; 
 
 But accept it, good Sir, as a mark of regard. 
 Sincere as a saint's dying prayer. 
 
 Now Ufe's chilly evening dim shades on your 
 eye, 
 And ushers the long dreary night ; 
 But you, like the star that athwart gilds the 
 sky. 
 Your course to the latest is bright. 
 
 CALEDONIA. 
 
 Tone — " Caledonian Hunt's Delight." 
 
 There was once a day, but old Time then was 
 young. 
 That brave Caledonia, the chief of her Hne, 
 From some of your northern deities s))rung, 
 (Who knows not that brave Caledonia's 
 divine .') 
 From Tweed to the Orcades was her domain. 
 To hunt, or to pasture, or do what she 
 would : 
 Her heavenly relations there fixed her reign. 
 And pledg'd her their godlieads to warrant 
 it good. 
 
 POEMS. 
 
 , A lambkin in peace, but a lion in war. 
 
 The pride of her kindred tho heroine grew : 
 Her grandsire, old Odin, triumphantly swore, 
 " Whoe'er shall provoke thee, th' encounter 
 shall rue !" 
 With tillage or pasture at times she would 
 sport. 
 To feed her fair flocks by her green rust- 
 ling corn .' 
 But chiefly the woods were her fav'rite resort, 
 Her darling amusement, the hounds and the 
 horn. 
 
 Long quiet she reign'd ; till thitherward steers 
 
 A flight of bold eagles from Adria's strand : 
 Repeated, successive, for many long years, I 
 
 They darken'd the air, and they plunder'd 
 the land : 
 Their pounces were murder, and terror their 
 cry. 
 
 They'd conquer'd and ruin'd a world beside ; ^ 
 
 She took to her hills, and her arrows let fly. 
 
 The darmg invaders they fled or they died. 
 
 The fell Harpy-raven took wing from the 
 north. 
 The scourgo of the seas, and the dread of the 
 shore ; 
 The wild Scandinavian boar issu'd forth 
 
 To wanton in carnage and wallow in gore : 
 O'er countries and kingdoms the fury pre- 
 vaild, 
 No arts coald appease them, no arras could 
 repel ; 
 But brave Caledonia in vain they assail'd. 
 As Laro-s well can witness, and Loncartie 
 
 Toll. 
 
 The Chameleon-savage disturb 'd her repoj^e, 
 
 With tumult, disquiet, rebellion and stiite , 
 Provok'd beyond bearing, at last slie arose, 
 
 And robb'd him at once of his hopen and liis 
 life: 
 The Anglian lion, the terror of France, 
 
 Oft prowling, ensanguin'd tJie Tweed's sil- 
 ver fl(K)d ; 
 But, taught by the bright Caledonian lance. 
 
 He learned to fear in his owji native wc 
 
 fh^^i^ 
 
 Thus bold, independent, unconquer'd, 
 
 Her bright course of glory for ever s 
 For brave Caledonia immortal must f 
 
 ril prove it from Euclid as clear as the sun ; 
 Rectangle-triangle, the figure we'll choose. 
 
 The upright is Chance, and old Time is the 
 base ; 
 But brave Caledonia's the hypotenuse ; 
 
 Then ergo, she'll match tliem, and match 
 them always. 
 
BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 119 
 
 THE foUomng Poem was written to a Gentle 
 man, who had sent him a JVewspaper, and 
 offered to continue it free of Expense. 
 
 Kind Sir, I've read your paper through, 
 
 And faith, to me, 'twas really new ! 
 
 How guessed ye. Sir, what maist I wanted ? 
 
 This mony a day I've giain'd and gaunted. 
 
 To ken what French mischief was brewin ; 
 
 Or what the drumlie Dutch were doin ; 
 
 That vile doup-skelper, Emperor Joseph, 
 
 If Venus yet had got his nose off ; 
 
 Or how the coHieshangie works 
 
 Atween the Russians and the Turks ; 
 
 Or if the Swede, before he halt, 
 
 Would play anither Charles the twalt : 
 
 If Denmark, any body spak o't ; 
 
 Or Poland, wha had now the tack o't ; 
 
 How cut-throat Prussian blades were hingin, 
 
 How libbet Italy was singin ; 
 
 If Spaniard, Portuguese, or Swiss, 
 
 Were sayin or takin aught amiss : 
 
 Or how our merry lads at hame. 
 
 In Britain's court kept up the game : 
 
 How Royal George, the Lord leuk o'er him ! 
 
 Was managing St. Stephen's quorum ; 
 
 If sleekit Chatham Will was hvm. 
 
 Or glaikit Charlie got his nieve in ; 
 
 How daddie Burke the plea was cookin. 
 
 If Warren Hastings' neck was yeukin ; 
 
 How cesses, stents, and fees were rax'd, 
 
 Or if bare a — s yet were tax'd ; 
 
 The news o' princes, dukes, and earls. 
 
 Pimps, sharpers, bawds, and opera-girls ; 
 
 If that daft buckie, Geordie W***s, 
 
 Was threshin still at hizzies' tails. 
 
 Or if he was grown oughtlins douser, 
 
 And no a perfect kintra cooser, 
 
 A' tliis and mair I never lieard of ; 
 
 And but for you I might despaired of. 
 
 So gratefu', back your news I send you, 
 
 And pray, a' guid things may attend you. 
 
 EUisland, Monday Morning, 1790. 
 
 POEM ON PASTORAL POETRY. 
 
 Hail, Poesie ! thou Nymph reserv'd ! 
 
 In chase o' thee, what crowds hae swerv'd 
 
 Frae common sense, or sunk enerv'd 
 
 'Mang heaps o' clavers ; 
 And och ! o'er aft thy joes hae starv'd. 
 
 Mid a' thy favours ! 
 
 Say, Lassie, why thy train amang. 
 While loud the trump's heroic clang, 
 
 And sock or buskin skelp alang 
 
 To death or marriage ; 
 Scarce ane has tried the shepherd-sang 
 
 But wi' miscarriage ? 
 
 In Homer's craft Jock Milton thrives 
 Eschylus'pen Will Shakspeare drives ; 
 Wee Pope, the knurlin, till him rives 
 
 Horatian fame ; 
 In thy sweet sang, Barbauld, survives 
 
 Even Sappho's flame. 
 
 But thee, Theocritus, wha matches ? 
 They're no herd's ballats, Maro's catches : 
 Squire Pope but busks his skinklin patches 
 
 O' heathen tatlers : 
 I pass by hunders, nameless wretches. 
 
 That ape their betters. 
 
 In this braw age o' wit and lear, 
 Will nane the Shepherd's whistle mair 
 Blaw sweetly, in its native air 
 
 And rural grace ; 
 And wi' the far-fam"d Grecian, share 
 
 A rival place i 
 
 Yes ! there is ane — a Scottish callan ! 
 There's ane ; come forrit, honest Allan ! 
 Thou needna jouk behint the hallan, 
 
 A chiel sae clever ; 
 The teeth o' Time may gnaw Tamtallan, 
 
 But thou 's for ever. 
 
 Thou paints auld nature to the nines, 
 
 In thy sweet Caledonian lines; 
 
 Nae gowden stream thro' myrtles twines, 
 
 Where Philomel, 
 While nightly breezes sweep the vines. 
 
 Her griefs will tell ! 
 
 In gowany glens thy burnie strays, 
 Where bonnie lasses bleach their claes ; 
 Or trots by hazelly shaws and braes, 
 
 Wi' hawthorns gray, 
 Where blackbirds join the shepherd's lays 
 
 At close o' day. 
 
 Thy rural loves are nature's sel ; 
 
 Nae bombast spates o" nonsense swell ; 
 
 Nae snap conceits, but that sweet spell 
 
 O' witchin love. 
 That charm that can the strongest quell ; 
 
 The sternest move. 
 
120 
 
 BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 ON THE 
 
 BATTLE OF SHERIFF-MUIR, 
 Between the Duke of Argyle and the Earl of Mar. 
 
 " O CAM ye here the fight to shun, 
 Or herd the sheep wi' me, man ? 
 Or were yfe at the sherra-muir, 
 
 And did the battle see, man ?" 
 I saw the battle, sair and tough. 
 And reekin-red ran mony a sheugh. 
 My heart, for fear, gae sough for sough, 
 To hear the thuds, and see the duds, 
 O' clans frae woods, in tartan duds, 
 Wha glaura'd at kingdoms tluee, man. 
 
 The red-coat lads wi' black cockades 
 To meet them were na slaw, man ; 
 
 They rush'd and push'd, and blude outgush'd, 
 And mony a bouk did fa', man : 
 
 The great Argyle led on his files, 
 
 I wat they glanced twenty miles : 
 
 They hack'd and hash'd, while broad swords 
 clash'd, 
 
 And thro' they dash'd, and hew'd and smash'd. 
 Till fey-men died awa, man. 
 
 But had you seen the philibegs. 
 And skyrin tartan trews, man. 
 When in the teeth they dar'd our whigs, 
 
 And covenant true blues, man ; 
 In lines extended lang and large. 
 When bayonets oppos'd the targe, 
 And thousands hasten'd to the charge, 
 Wi' Highland wrath, they frae the sheath 
 Dreyv blades o' death, till, out o' breath. 
 They fled hke frighted doos, man. 
 
 " O how deil. Tarn, can that be true ? 
 
 The f-hase gaed frae the north, man : 
 I saw myself, they did pursue 
 
 The horsemen back to Forth, man ; 
 And at Dumblane, in ray ain sight. 
 They took the brig wi' a' their might, 
 And stratf^ht to Stirling winii^'d their flight : 
 But, cursed lot ! the gates were shut. 
 And mony a huntit, poor red-coat. 
 
 For fear ainaist did swarf, man." 
 
 My sister Kate cam up the gate 
 
 Wi' crowdie unto me, man ; 
 She swore she saw some rebels run 
 
 Frae Perth unto Dundee, man : 
 Their left-hand general had nae skill. 
 The Angus lads had nae good will 
 That day their neebors' blood to spill ; 
 
 For fear, by foes, that they should lose 
 Their cogs o' brose ; all crying woes, 
 And so it goea you see, man. 
 
 They've lost some gallant gentlemen, 
 
 Amang the Highland clans, man ; 
 I fear my lord Panmure is slain. 
 
 Or fallen in whiggish hands, man : 
 Now wad ye sing this double fight. 
 Seme fell for wrang, and some for right j 
 But mony bade the world guid-night ; 
 Then ye may tell, how pell and mell. 
 By red claymores, and muskets' knell, 
 
 VV dying yell, the tories fell, 
 And whigs to hell did flee, i 
 
 SKETCH.— NEW-YEAR'S DAY. 
 
 TO MRS. DUNLOP. 
 
 This day. Time winds th' exhausted chain, 
 To run the twelvemonth's length again : 
 I see the old, bald-pated fellow. 
 With ardent eyes, complexion sallow. 
 Adjust the unimpair'd machine. 
 To wheel the equal, dull routhic 
 
 The absent lover, minor heir. 
 In vain assail him witii their prayer. 
 Deaf as my friend, he sees them press. 
 Nor makes the hour one moment less. 
 Will you (the Major's with the hounds 
 The happy tenants .sliare his rounds ; 
 Coila 's fair Rachel's care to-day, 
 And blooming Keith's engaged with Gray) 
 From housewife cares a minute borrow — 
 — That grandchild's cap will do to-morrow^ 
 And join with me a-moralizing. 
 This day's propitious to be wise in. 
 Pirst, what did yesternight deliver .■' 
 ■' Another year is gone for ever." 
 And what is this day's strong suggestion .-* 
 " The passing moment 's all we rest on !" 
 Rest on — for what .'' what do we here i" 
 Or why regard the passing year .'' 
 Will Time, amus'd with proverb'd lore, 
 ^dd to our date one minute more ? 
 A few days may — a few years must— 
 Repose us in the silent dust. 
 Then is it wise to damp our bliss ? 
 Yes — all such reasonings are amiss ! 
 The voice of nature loudly cries. 
 And many a message from the skies, 
 That something in us never dies : 
 That on this frail, uncertain state, 
 Hai-ij.^ niatters of eternal weight ; 
 That i\itiire lifr in worlds unknown 
 Must take its hue from tliis alone ; 
 
BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 ISl 
 
 Whether as heavenly glory bright,^ 
 Or dark as misery's woful night. — ' 
 SinLC then, my honour'd, first of friends, 
 On this poor being all depends ; 
 Let us th' important now employ, 
 And live as those that never die. 
 Tho" you, with day and honours crown'd. 
 Witness that filial circle round, 
 (A sight life's sorrows to repulse, 
 A sight pale envy to convulse,) 
 Others now claim your chief regard : 
 Yourself, you wait your bright reward. 
 
 EXTEMPORE, on the late Mr. William Smel- 
 lie. Author of the Philosophy ofJVatural His- 
 tory, and Member of the Antiquarian and 
 Royal Societies of Edinburgh. 
 
 To Crochallan came 
 The old cock'd hat, the gray surtout, the same; 
 His bristling beard just rising in its might, 
 'Twas four long nights and days to shaving- 
 night, 
 His uncombed grizzly locks wild staring, 
 
 thatch'd, 
 A head for thought profound and clear, un- 
 
 match'd ; 
 Yet tho' his caustic wit was biting, rude. 
 His heart was warm, benevolent, and good. 
 
 How can ye charm, ye flowVa with all your 
 
 dyes ? 
 Ye blow upon the sod that wraps my friend ; 
 How can I to the tuneful strain attend .'' 
 That strain flows round th' untimely tomb 
 
 where Riddel lies. 
 
 Yes, pour, ye warblers, pour the notes of wo. 
 And soothe tlie Virtues weeping on this bier : 
 The Man of Worth, and has not left his peer, 
 
 Is in his " narrow house" for ever darkly low. 
 
 Thee, Sprmg, again with joy shall others 
 
 greet ; 
 Me, mem'ry of my loss will only meet. 
 
 I 
 
 POETICAL mSCRir^'IOJ^for an Altar to\ 
 
 Independence, at Kerroughtry, the Seat of Mr. I 
 
 Heroni wrUten in summer, 1795. ' 
 
 Thou of an independent mind, I 
 
 With soul resolv'd, with soul resign'd ; 
 Prepar'd Power's proudest frown to brave, 
 AVho wilt not be, nor have a slave ; I 
 
 Virtue alone who dost revere, 
 Thy own reproach alone dost fear. 
 Approach this shrine, and worship here. 
 
 ^ 
 
 SONNET, 
 
 ON THE 
 
 ATII OF ROBERT RIDDEL, Esa. 
 
 OF GLEN RIDDEL, APRIL, 1794. 
 
 No more, ye warblers of the wood, no more, 
 NfH- pour your descant, grating on my soul ; 
 Thou young-eyed Spring, gay in thy ver- 
 dant stole. 
 More welcome were to nic grim Winter's 
 wildest roar. 
 
 1 2 
 
 MONODY 
 
 LADY FAMED FOR HER CAPRICE. 
 
 How cold is that bosom which folly once fir'd, 
 
 How pale is that cheek where the rouge 
 
 lately ghsten'd ! 
 
 How silent that tongue which the echoes oft 
 
 tir'd. 
 
 How dull is that ear which to flattery so Us- 
 
 If sorrow and anguish their exit await. 
 
 From friendship and dearest afiection re- 
 mov'd ; 
 
 How doubly severer, EUza, thy fate, 
 
 Thou diedst unwept as thou livedst unlov'd, 
 
 Loves, Graces, and Virtues, I call not on you ; 
 
 So shy, grave, and distant, ye shed not a 
 tear: 
 But come, all ye offspring of folly so true, 
 
 And flowers let us cull for Eliza's cold bier. 
 
 We'll search thro' the garden for each silly 
 flower, 
 We'll roam thro' the forest for each idle 
 weed; 
 But chiefly the nettle, so typical, shower, 
 For none e'er approach'd her but ru'd the 
 rash deed. 
 
 We'll sculpture the marble, we'll measure the 
 lay; 
 Here Vanity strums on her idiot lyre ; 
 There keen Indignation shall dart on her prey, 
 Vv^hich spurning Contempt shall redeem from 
 hiB ire. 
 
122 
 
 BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 THE EPITAPH. 
 
 Here lies, now a prey to insulting neglect, 
 What once was a butterfly, gay in life's 
 beam : 
 
 Want only of wjsdom denied her respect, 
 Want only of goodness denied her esteem. 
 
 AJ^SWER to a Mandate sent by the Surveyor 
 of the Windows, Carriages, &c. to each Far- 
 mer, ordering him to send a signed List of his 
 Horses, Servants, Wheel-Carriages, Sec, and 
 whether he was a married Man or a Bachelor, 
 and ichat Children they had. 
 
 Sir, as your mandate did request, 
 I send you here a faithfu' list. 
 My horses, servants, carts, and graith 
 To which I'm free to tak my aith. 
 
 Imprimis, then, for carriage cattle, 
 I hae four brutes o' g.allant mettle, 
 As ever drew before a pettle. 
 My hand afore, a giiid auld has-been. 
 And wight and wilfu' a' his days seen ; 
 My fiarid a hin, a guid brown filly, 
 Wha aft hae borne me safe frae Killie, 
 And your old borough mony a time, 
 In days when riding was nae crime : 
 My/ur ft hin, a guid gray beast, 
 As e'er in tug or tow was trac"d : 
 The fourth, a Highland Donald hasty, 
 A d-mn"d red-wud, Kilburnie blastie, 
 For-by a cowt, of cowts the wale. 
 As ever ran before a tail ; 
 An' he be spar'd to be a beast, 
 He'll draw me fifteen ound at least. 
 
 Wheel carriages I liae but^Aw', 
 Three carts, and twa are ^racl)' new ; 
 An auld wheol-barrow, mair for token, 
 Ac leg and bailh the trams are broken ; 
 I made a poker o' the spindle. 
 And my auld mither brunt tlie trundle. 
 For men, I've three iniscliievous boys, 
 Run-deils for rantin and for noise ; 
 A o-adsrnan ane, a thrasher t'other. 
 Wee Davoc liauds the nowtp in fother. 
 I rule them, as I oueht, discreetly. 
 And often labour them completely. 
 And ay on Sundays duly nightly, 
 I on the questions tairge them tightly. 
 Till faith wee Davoc's grown sae gleg, 
 (Tiio' scarcely lansrer than my leg,) 
 He'll screed you ot^ eJI'ectiiril calli7ig. 
 As fast as oriy in tlie dwalling. 
 
 I've nane in female servant station, 
 Lord keep me ay frae a' temptation ! 
 I hae nao wife, and that my bliss is, 
 And ye hae laid nao tax on misses ; 
 For weans I'm mair than well contented. 
 Heaven sent me ane mair than I wanted ; 
 My sonsie, smirking, dear-bought Bess, 
 She stares the daddie in her face, 
 Enough of ought ye like but grace. 
 But lier, my bonnie, sweet, wee lady 
 I've said enough for her already, 
 And if ye tax her or her mither, 
 By tlie L — d ye'se get them a' thegither ! 
 
 And now, remember, Mr. Aiken, 
 
 Nae kind of license out I'm taking. 
 
 Thro' dirt and dub for hfe I'll paidle. 
 
 Ere I sae dear pay for a saddle ; 
 
 I've sturdy stumps, the Lord be thanked ! 
 
 And a' my gates on foot I'll shank it. 
 
 This list wi' my ain hand I've wrote it. 
 The day and date is under noted ; 
 Then know all ye whom it concerns, 
 Subscripsi huic 
 
 Robert Burns. 
 
 Mossgiel, 22(i, Feb. 1786. 
 
 SONG. 
 
 Nae gentle dames, tho' e'er sae fair. 
 Shall ever be my muse's care ; 
 Their titles a' are empty show ; 
 Gie me my liighland lassie, O. 
 
 Within the glen sae bushy, O, 
 Aboon the plain sae rushy, O, 
 I set me down wV rigid good will; 
 To sing my highlaruL lassie, O. 
 
 Oh, were yon hills and valleys mine. 
 Yon palace and yon gardens fine ! 
 The world then the love should know 
 I bear my liighland lassie, O. 
 Within the gle7i. Sec. 
 
 But fickle fortune frowns on me, 
 And I maun cross the raging sea ; 
 But while my crimson currents flow 
 I love my highland lassie, O. 
 Within the glen. Sec. 
 
 Altho' thro' foreign climes I range, 
 I know hor heart will never change, 
 For her bosom burns with honour's glow 
 My faithful higliland lassie, O. 
 Within the slen. Sec. 
 
BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 1S3 
 
 For her I'll dare the billow's roar, 
 For her Fll trace a distant shore, 
 That Indian wealth may lustre throw 
 Around my highland lassie, O. 
 Jf-'U/iin the glen, kc. 
 
 She has my heart, she has my hand. 
 By sacred truth and honour's band ! 
 Till the mortal stroke shall lay me low, 
 Fm thine, my highland lassie, O. 
 
 Farexvell (he glen sae bushy, O 1 
 Farewell the plain sae rushy, O ! 
 To other lands I now must go. 
 To sing my highland lassie, O ! 
 
 IMPROMPTU, 
 ON MRS. 's BIRTH-DAY, 
 
 NOVEMBER 4, 1793. 
 
 Old Winter with his frosty beard, 
 Thus once to Jove his prayer preferred ; 
 What have I done of all the year, 
 To bear this hated doom severe ? 
 My cheerless suns no pleasure know ; 
 Night's horrid car drags, dreary, slow ; 
 My dismal months no joys are crowning. 
 But spleeny English, hanging, drowning. 
 
 Now, Jove, fc r once be mighty civil. 
 
 To counterbalance all this evil ; 
 
 Give me, and I've no more to say. 
 
 Give me Maria's natal day 1 
 
 That brilliant gift will so enrich me. 
 
 Spring, summer, autumn, cannot match me, 
 
 'Tis done ! says Jove ; so ends my story, 
 
 Aiid Winter once rejoic'd in glory. 
 
 ADDRESS TO A LADY. 
 
 Oh, wort thou in the cauld blast. 
 
 On yonder lea, on yonder lea ; 
 My phiidie to the angry airt, 
 
 Fll ^^lielter thee, Fd shelter thee : 
 Or did misfortune's bitter storms 
 
 Around thee blaw, around thee blaw, 
 Tiiy bield should be my bosom. 
 
 To share it a' to share it a'. 
 
 Or were I in the wildest waste, 
 
 Sae black and bare, sae black and bar 
 
 The dcsart were a paradise. 
 
 If thou wert there, if thou wert there. 
 
 Or were I monarch o' the globe, 
 Wi' thee to reign, wi' thee to reign ; 
 
 The brightest jewel in my crown. 
 Wad be my queen, wad be my queen. 
 
 TO A YOUNG LADY, 
 
 With Books which the Bard f resented her. 
 
 Thine be the volumes, Jessy fair. 
 And with them take the poet's prayer ; 
 That fate may in her fairest page, 
 With every kindhest, best presage 
 Of future bliss, enrol thy name : 
 With native worth and spotless fama, 
 And wakeful caution still aware 
 Of ill — but chief, man's felon snare ; 
 All blameless joys on earth we find, 
 And all the treasures of the mind — 
 These be thy guardian and reward ; 
 So prays thy faithful friend, tht Bard. 
 
 SOJ^J^ET,writtenon the 25th of January, 1793, 
 I the Birth-day of the Author, on hearing a 
 Thrush sing in a morning Walk. 
 
 Sing on, sweet thrush, upon the leafless bough ; 
 Sing'on, sweet bird, I listen to thy strain : 
 See aged Winter, 'mid his surly reign. 
 
 At thy blythe carol clears his furrow'd brow. 
 
 So in lone Poverty's dominion drear. 
 Sits meek Content with light unanxious 
 heart, [part, 
 
 Welcomes the rauid moments, bids them 
 
 Nor asks if they oring aught to hoe or fear. 
 
 I thank thee. Author of this opening day . 
 
 Thou whose bright sun now gilds yon orien", 
 skies ! 
 
 Riches denied, thy boon was purer joys. 
 What wealth could never give nor take away ' 
 
 Yet come, thou child of poverty and care ; 
 The mite higli Heaven bestowed, that mif^ 
 with thee Fll share. 
 
 EXTEMPORE, to Mr. S**E,on refmuv, to 
 dine ivith him, after having been promised the 
 Jirst of Company, and thejirsl of Cookeri, , 
 17th December, 1795. 
 
 No more of your gucste, be they titled or not. 
 And cook'ry the first in the nation ; 
 
 Who is proof to thy personal converse and wit, 
 Is proof to all other teniptaliou 
 
134 
 
 BURNS' POEMS 
 
 To Mr. S**E, %cith a Pre-tent of a Dozen of 
 Porter. 
 
 O, HAD the malt thy strength of mind, 
 Or hops the flavour of thy wit, 
 
 'Twere drink for first of human kind, 
 A gift that e'en for S * * e were fit. 
 
 Jerusalem Tavern, Dumfries. 
 
 THE DUMFRIES VOLUNTEERS. 
 
 Tune — " Push about the Jorum." 
 
 April, 1795. 
 
 Does haughty Gaul invasion threat? 
 
 Then let the loons beware, Sir, 
 There's wooden walls upon our seas, 
 
 And volunteers on shore. Sir. 
 The Nith shall run to Corsincon, 
 
 And Criffel sink in Solway, 
 Ere we permit a foreign foe 
 
 On British ground to rally ! 
 
 Fallde rail, &c 
 
 O let us not like snarling tykes 
 
 In wrangling be divided ; 
 Till slap come in an unco loon 
 
 And wi' a rung decide it. 
 Be Britain still to Britain true, 
 
 Amang oursels united ; 
 For never but by British hands 
 
 Maun British wrangs be righted 
 Fall de rail, 8cc. 
 
 The kettle o' the kirk and state. 
 
 Perhaps a claut may fail in't ; 
 But deil a foreign tinkler loun 
 
 Shall ever ca' a nail in't. 
 Our fathers' bluid the kettle bought, 
 
 And wha wad dare to spoU it i 
 By heaven the sacrilegious dog 
 
 Shall fuel be to boil it. 
 
 Fall de rail, &c. 
 
 The wretch that wad a tyrant own. 
 
 And the wretch his true-born brot'vs> 
 Who would set the mob aboon the throne, 
 
 May they be damn'd together 1 
 Who will not sing, " God save the King," 
 
 Shall hang as Jiigh'^the steeple ; 
 But while we sing/' God save the King," 
 
 We'll ne'er forget the People. 
 
 POEM, 
 
 ADDRESSED TO MR. MITCHELL, COLLECTOR OF 
 EXCISE, DUMFRIES, 1796. 
 
 Friend of the Poet, tried and leal, 
 Wha wanting thee, might beg or steal ; 
 Alake, alake, the meikle deil 
 
 Wi' a' his witches 
 Are at it, skelpin ; jig and reel. 
 
 In my poor pouches. 
 
 I modestly fu' fain wad hint it. 
 That one pound one, I sairly want it : 
 If wi' the hizzie down ye sent it. 
 
 It would be kind ; 
 And while my heart wi' life-blood dunted, 
 
 I'd bear 't in mind. 
 
 So may the auld year gang out moaning 
 To see the new come laden, groaning, 
 Wir" double plenty o'er the loanin 
 
 To thee and thine ; 
 Domestic peace and comforts crowning 
 
 The hale design. 
 
 POSTSCRIPT. 
 
 YeVe heard this while how I've been licket, 
 And by fell death was nearly nicket : 
 Grim loun ! he gat me by the fecket. 
 
 And sair me sheuk ; 
 But by guid luck I lap a wicket, 
 
 And tum'd a neuk. 
 
 But bv thai n/^alth I ve got a share o't, 
 j And by tnat .ue, Pm promis'd mair o't, 
 My hale and weel I'll take a care o't 
 A tentier way ; 
 I Then farewell folly, hide and hair o't, 
 
 For ance and aye. 
 
 Sent to a Gentleman whom he had offended. 
 
 The friend whom wild from wisdom's way. 
 The fumes of wine infuriate send ; 
 
 (Not moony madness more astray) 
 Wlio but deplores that hapless friend ? 
 
 Mine was th' insensate frenzied part. 
 Ah why should I such scenes outlive ! 
 
 Scenes so abhorrent to my heart I 
 'Tis tliine to pity and forgive. 
 
BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 125 
 
 POEM ON LIFE. 
 
 ADDRESSED TO COLONEL DE PEYSTER, 
 DUMFRIES, 1796. 
 
 Mt honour'd colonel, deep I feel 
 Your interest in the Poet's weal ; 
 All ! now sma' heart hae I to speel 
 
 The steep Parnassus, 
 Surrounded thus by bolus pill, 
 
 And potion glasses. 
 
 O what a canty warld were it. 
 
 Would pain and care, and sickness spare it ; 
 
 And fortune favour worth and merit. 
 
 As they deserve : 
 (And aye a rowth, roast beef and claret ; 
 
 Syne wha wad starve ?) 
 
 Dame Life, tho' fiction out may trick her, 
 y\TKl in paste gems and frippery deck her ; 
 Oh ! flickering, feeble, and unsicker 
 
 Pve found her still, 
 Ay wavering like the willow wicker, 
 
 'Tween good and ill. 
 
 Then that curst carmagnole, auld Satan, 
 Watches, like baudrans by a rattan, 
 Our sinfu' saul to get a claut on 
 
 Wi' felon ire ; 
 Syne, whip ! his tail ye'll ne'er cast saut on, 
 
 He's off like fire. 
 
 Ah Nick ! ah Nick ! it is na fair, 
 V'lTst showing us the tempting ware, 
 Bright wines and bonnie lasses rare. 
 
 To put us daft; 
 Syne weave, unseen, thy spider snare 
 
 O' hell's damn'd waft. 
 
 Poor man, the flie, aft bizzes by. 
 
 And aft as chance he comes thee nigh, 
 
 Tliy auld damn'd elbow yeuks wi' joy. 
 
 And hellish pleasure ; 
 Already in thy fancy's eye. 
 
 Thy sicker treasure. 
 
 Soon, lieels o'er gowdie ! in he gangs, 
 And hke a sheep-head on a tangs, 
 Thy girning laugh enjoys liis pangs 
 
 And murdering wrestle, 
 As dangling in the wind, he hangs 
 
 A gibbet's tassel. 
 
 But lest you thmk 1 am uncivil. 
 
 To plague you with this draunting drivel, 
 
 Abjuring a' intentions evil, 
 
 I quat my pen : 
 The Lord preserve us frae the devil ! 
 
 Amen ! amen 1 
 
 ADDP^ESS TO THE TOOTH-ACH. 
 
 My curse upon thy venom'd stang. 
 That shoots my tortur'd gums alang ; 
 And tliro' my lugs gies mony a twang, 
 
 Wi' gnawing vengeance ; 
 Tearing my nerves wi' bitter pang, 
 
 Like racking engines ! 
 
 When fevers burn, or ague freezes, 
 Rheumatics gnaw, or cholic squeezes ; 
 Our neighbour's sympathy may ease us, 
 
 Wi' pitying moan ; 
 ut thee- 'thou hell o' a' diseases, 
 
 Ay mocks our groan 1 
 
 Adown my beard the slavers trickle ! 
 I throw the wee stools o'er the mickle, 
 As round the fire the giglets keckle. 
 
 To see me loup ; 
 While raving mad, I wish a heckle 
 
 Were in theii doup. 
 
 O' a' the numerous human dools, 
 111 har'sts, daft bargains, cully-stools. 
 Or worthy friends rak'd i' the mools, 
 
 Sad sight to see I 
 The tricks o' knaves, or fash o' fools. 
 
 Thou bear'st the gree. 
 
 Wliere'er that place be priests ca' hell. 
 Whence a' the tones o' mis'ry yell. 
 And ranked plagues their numbers tell, 
 
 In dreadfu' raw. 
 Thou, Tooth-ach, surely bear'st the bell 
 
 Amang them a' 1 
 
 O thou grim, mischief-making chiel. 
 That ears the notes of discord squeel, 
 Tdl daft mankind aft dance a reel 
 
 In gore a shoe-thick ; — 
 Gie a' the faes o' Scotland's weal 
 
 A towmoad's Tooth-ach ! 
 
 SONG. 
 
 Tune — "Morag." 
 
 O WHA is she that lo'es me, 
 And has my heart a-keeping ? 
 
 O sweet is she that lo'es me, 
 As dews o' simmer weeping. 
 In tears the rose-buds steeping. 
 
126 
 
 BURNS POEMS. 
 
 that's (he lassie o' my heart, 
 
 My lassie ever dearer ; 
 O that's the queen o' womankind. 
 
 And ne'er a ane to peer her. 
 
 If thou shalt meet a lassie, 
 
 In grace and beauty charming, 
 
 That e'en thy chosen lassie, 
 
 Ere while thy breast sae warming, 
 Had ne'er sic powers alarming;, 
 O thaCs, kc. 
 
 If thou hadst heard her talking, 
 And thy attentions plighted 
 
 That ilka body talking. 
 But her by thee is slighted 
 And thou art all delighted. 
 O thaCs, kc. 
 
 If thou hast met this fair one ; 
 When frae her thou hast parted, 
 
 If every other fair one. 
 
 But her thou hast deserted, 
 And thou art broken-hearted. — 
 O that's, &c. 
 
 SONG. 
 
 Jockky's ta'en the parting kiss. 
 O'er the mountains he is gane ; 
 
 And with him is a' my bliss, 
 
 Nought but griefs with me remain. 
 
 Spare my luve, ye winds that blaw. 
 Flashy sleets and beating rain ! 
 
 Spare my luve, thou feathery snaw, 
 Drifting o'er the .frozen plain. 
 
 When the shades of evening creep 
 O'er the day's fair, gladsome e'e, 
 
 Sound and safely may he sleep. 
 Sweetly blithe his waukening be ! 
 
 He will think on her he loves. 
 Fondly he'll repeat her name ; 
 
 For where'er he distant roves, 
 Jockey's heart is still at haaie. 
 
 SONG. 
 
 My Peggy's face, my Peggys form. 
 The frost of hermit age might warm ; 
 My Peggy's worth, my Peggy's mind. 
 Might charm the first of human kind. 
 
 I love my Peggy's angel air, 
 Her face so truly, heavenly fair, 
 Her native grace so void of art, 
 But I adore my Peggy's heart. 
 
 The lily's hue, the rose's dye. 
 The kindling lustre of an eye ; 
 Who but owns their magic sway. 
 Who but knows they all decay ! 
 The tender thrill, the pitying tear, 
 The generous purpose, nobly dear, 
 The gentle look, that rage disarms, 
 These are all immortal charms. 
 
 WRIT TEN in a Wrapper enclosing a Letter 
 to Capt. Grose, to be left with Mr. Cardonnel^ 
 Antiquarian. 
 
 Tune — " Sir John Malcolm." 
 
 Ken ye ought o' Captain Grose? 
 
 Igo, 8c ago, 
 If he's amang his friends or foes ? 
 
 Iram, coram, dago. 
 
 Is he South, or is he North? 
 
 Igo, ic ago. 
 Or drowned in the river Forth ? 
 
 Iram, coram, dago. 
 
 Is he slain by Highland bodies ? 
 
 Igo, & ago, 
 And eaten like a weather-haggis 
 
 Iram, coram, dago. 
 
 Is he to Abram's bosom gane ? 
 
 Igo, & ago. 
 Or haudin Sarah by the wame? 
 
 Iram, coram, dago. 
 
 Where'er he be, the Lord be near him ! 
 
 Igo, & ago. 
 As for the deil, he daur na steer hun. 
 
 Iram, coram, dago. 
 
 But please transmit th' enclosed letter, 
 
 Igo, k ago. 
 Which will oblige your humble debtor. 
 
 Iram, coram, dago. 
 
 So may ye hae auld stanes in store, 
 
 Igo, k ago. 
 The very stanes that Adam bore. 
 
 Iram, coram, dago. 
 
 So may ye get in glad pos8ession« 
 
 • Igo, & ago. 
 The corns o' Satan's coronation? 
 Iram, forom, dagtr. 
 
BURNS' rOKMS. 
 TO ROBERT GRAHAM, Esq., | 
 
 1?7 
 
 OF FINTRY, 
 
 ON RECEIVINO A FAVOUR. 
 
 I CALL no goddess to inspire my strains, 
 A fabled Muse may suit a bard tliat feigns ; 
 Friend of my life ! my ardent spirit bums, 
 And all the tribute of my heart returns, 
 For boons accorded, goodness ever new. 
 The gift still dearer, as the giver you. 
 
 Thou orb of day ! thou other paler light ! 
 And all ye many sparkling stars of night; 
 If aught that giver from my mind cftace; 
 If I that giver's bounty e'er disgrace ; 
 Then roll to me, along your wandering spheres. 
 Only to number out a villain's years ! 
 
 EPITAPH ON A FRIEND. 
 
 An honest man here lies at rest. 
 As e'er God with his image blest ; 
 The friend of man, the friend of truth : 
 The friend of age, and guide of youth : 
 Few hearts like his, with virtue warm'd, 
 Few heads with knowledge so inform'd : 
 If there's another world, he lives in bliss ; 
 If tliere is none, he made the best of this. 
 
 A GRACE BEFORE DINNER. 
 
 O THOU, who kindly dost provide 
 
 For every creature's want ! 
 We bless thee, God of Nature wide, 
 
 For all thy goodness lent : 
 And, if it please thee. Heavenly Guide, 
 
 May never worse be sent ; 
 But whether granted, or denied, 
 
 Lord, bless us with content ! 
 Amen ! 
 
 7b my dear and much honoured Friend, 
 Mrs. Dunlop, of Dunlop. 
 
 ON SENSIBILITY. 
 
 j Sensibility, how charming, 
 
 I Thou, my friend, canst truly tell; 
 
 But distress with horrors arming, 
 i Thouhast also known too well.' 
 
 Fairest flower, beliold the lily. 
 Blooming in the sunny ray : 
 
 Let the blast sweep o'er the valley, 
 See it prostrate on the clay. 
 
 Hear the wood-lark charm the forest, 
 
 Telling o'er his little joys ; 
 Hapless bird I a prey the surest, 
 
 To each pirate of the skies. 
 
 Dearly bought the hidden treasure, 
 Finer feelings can bestow ; 
 
 Chords^that vibrate sweetest pleasure, 
 Tlirill the deepest notes of wo. 
 
 ! VERSE composed and repeated by Bums to 
 the Master of the House, on taking leave at a 
 Place in the Highlands, where he had been 
 hospitably entertained. 
 
 When death's dark stream I ferry o'er, 
 A time that surely shall come ; 
 
 In Heaven itself, I'll ask no more. 
 Than just a Highland welcome. 
 
 FAREWELL TO AYRSHIRE. 
 
 Scenes of wo and scenes of pleasure. 
 Scenes that former thoughts renew, 
 
 Scenes of wo and scenes of pleasure. 
 Now a sad and last adieu ! 
 
 Bonny Doon, sae sweet at gloamin, 
 Fare thee weel before I gang ! 
 
 Bonny Doon, whare early roaming, 
 First I weav'd the rustic sang I 
 
 Bowers, adieu, whare Love, decoying, 
 First inthrall'd this heart o' mine, 
 
 There the safest sweets enjoying, — 
 Sweets that Mem'ry ne'er shall tyne ! 
 
 Friends, so near my bosom ever. 
 Ye hae render'd moments dear ; 
 
 But, alas ! when forc'd to sever. 
 Then the stroke, O, how severe ! 
 
 Friends ! that parting tear reserve it, 
 
 Tho' 'tis doubly dear to me ! 
 Could I think I did deserve it. 
 
 How much happier would I be ! 
 
 Scenes of wo and scenes of pleasure. 
 Scenes that former thoughts renew 
 
 Scenes of wo and scenes of pleasure, 
 Now a sad and last adieu '. 
 
MISCELLANEOUS POETRY, 
 
 SELECTED FROM 
 
 OF 
 
 ROBERT BTTRITS 
 
 FIRST PUBLISHED BY R. H. CROMEK. 
 
 VERSES WRITTEN AT SELKIRK. 
 
 AuLD chuckie Reekie's* sair distrest, 
 Down droops her ance weel burnisht crest, 
 Nae joy her bonnie busket nest 
 
 Can yield ava, 
 Her darling bird that she lo'es best, 
 Willie's awa ! 
 
 II. 
 
 O Willie was a witty wight, 
 And had o' things an unco slight ; 
 Auld Reekie ay he keepit tight, 
 
 And trig an' braw : 
 But now they'll busk her like a fright, 
 Willie's awa I 
 
 m. 
 
 The stiflest o' them a' he bow'd. 
 The bauldest o' them a' he cow'd ; 
 They durst nae mair than he allow'd, 
 
 That was a law : 
 We've lost a birkie weel worth gowd, 
 Willie's awa '. 
 
 IV. 
 
 Now gawkies, tawpies, gowks and fools, 
 Frae colleges and boarding schools. 
 
 May sprout like simmer puddock-stoola, 
 
 In glen or shaw ; 
 He wha could brush tnem down to mools, 
 Willie's awa. 
 
 V. 
 
 The brethren o' the Commerce-Chaumer* 
 May mourn their loss wi' doolfu' clamour; 
 He was a dictionar and grammar 
 
 Amang them a' ; 
 I fear they'll now mak mony a stammer, 
 Willie's awa ! 
 
 VI. 
 
 Nae mair we see his levee door 
 Philosophers and Poets pour,t 
 And toothy critics by the score, 
 
 In bloody raw ! 
 The adjutant o' a' the core, 
 
 Willie's awa ! 
 
 vn. 
 
 Now worthy G*****y's latin face, 
 T=r***r's and G*********'s modest grace; 
 ]VI'K****e, S****t, such a brace 
 
 As Rome ne'er saw ; 
 They a' maun meet some ither place, 
 Willie's awa ! 
 
 * The Chamber of Commerce of Edinburgh, of which 
 Mr. C. was Secretary. 
 
 t Many literary gentlemen were accustomed to meet 
 at Mr. C— '8 house at breakfast* 
 
BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 129 
 
 VIII. 
 
 Poor Bums — e'en Scotch drink canna quicken, 
 He cheeps like some, bewilder'd chicken, 
 Scar'd frae its minnie and the cleckin 
 
 By hoodie-craw ; 
 
 Grief's gien his heart an unco kickin, 
 
 Willie's awa '. 
 
 IX. 
 
 Now ev'ry sour-mou'd girnin' blelhim, 
 And Calvin's fock are fit to fell him ; 
 And self-conceited critic skellum 
 
 His quill may draw ; 
 He wha could brawlie ward their helium, 
 Willie's awa 1 
 
 Up wimpling stately Tweed I've sped, 
 And Eden scenes on crystal Jed, 
 And Ettrick banks now roaring red. 
 
 While tempests blaw ; 
 But every joy and pleasure's fled, 
 
 WiUie's awa I 
 
 XI. 
 
 May I be slander's common speech ; 
 A text for infamy to preach ; 
 And lastly, streekit out to bleach 
 
 In winter snaw ; 
 When I forget thee I Willie Creech, 
 Tho' far awa ! 
 
 XII. 
 
 May never wicked fortune touzle him ! 
 May never wicked men bamboozle him ! 
 Until a pow as auld's Methusalem ! 
 
 He canty claw ! 
 Then to the blessed, New .Terusalem, 
 
 Fleet wing awa I 
 
 LIBERTY. 
 
 A FRAGMENT. 
 
 Thee, Caledonia, thy wild heaths among. 
 Thee, famed for martial deed and sacred song. 
 
 To thee I turn with swimming eyes ; 
 Where is that soul of freedom fled ? 
 Immingled with the mighty dead ! 
 
 Beneath that hallowed turf where Wallace 
 lies I 
 Hear it not, Wallace, in thy bed of death ! 
 Ye babbling winds in silence sweep; 
 ' -Disturb not ye the hero's sleep. 
 Nor give the coward secret breith — 
 K 
 
 Is this the power in freedom s war 
 
 That wont to bid the battle rage .' 
 Behold that eye which shot immortal hate, 
 
 Criiiihing the despot's proudest bearing, 
 That arm which, nerved with thundering fate, 
 
 Braved usurpation's boldest daring 1 
 One quench'd m darkness like the sinlihig 
 
 star. 
 And one the palsied arm of tottering, power- 
 less age. 
 
 ELEGY 
 
 ON THE DEATH OF ROBERT RUISSEAUX.* 
 
 Now Robin lies in his last lair. 
 
 He'll gabble rhyme, nor sing nae mair, 
 
 Cauld povert}', wi' hungry stare, 
 
 Nae mair shall fear him ; 
 Nor anxious fear, nor cankert care 
 
 E'er mair come near him. 
 
 To tell the truth, they seldom fasht him ; 
 Except the moment that they crusht him ; 
 For sune as chance or fate had husht 'era 
 
 Tho' e'er sae short, 
 Then wi' a r'nyme or song he lasht 'em, 
 
 And thought it sport. — 
 
 Tho' he was bred to kintra wark. 
 
 And counted was baith wight and stark. 
 
 Yet that was never Robin's mark 
 
 To mak a man ; 
 But tell him, he was learn'd and dark, 
 
 Ye roos'd him then I 
 
 COanN THRO' THE RYE. 
 
 CoMiN thro' the rye, poor body, 
 
 Comin thro' the rye. 
 She draigl't a' her petticoatia 
 Comin thro' the rye. 
 
 Oh Jenny's a' weet, poor body. 
 
 Jenny's seldom dry : 
 She draigl't a' her petticoatia 
 Comin thro' the rj'e. 
 
 Gin a body meet a body 
 
 Comin thro' the rye, 
 Gin a body kiss a body, 
 
 Need a body cry. 
 
 Oh Jenny's a' weet, &c. 
 
 -a play en tiis own nun* 
 
130 
 
 BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 Gin a body meet a body 
 
 Comin thro' tlie glen ; 
 Gin a body kiss a body, 
 
 Need the warld ken, 
 
 Oh Jenny's a' weet, Sic. 
 
 THE LOYAL NATIVES' VERSES* 
 
 Ye sons of sedition, give ear to my song, 
 Let Syme, Burns, and Maxwell, pervade every 
 
 throng. 
 With Craken, the attorney, and Mundell the 
 
 quack. 
 Send Willie the monger to hell with a smack. 
 
 BURf^S— Extempore. 
 
 Yb true " Loyal Natives," attend to my song, 
 In uproar and riot rejoice the nigiit long ; 
 From envy and hatred your corps is exempt ; 
 But where is your shield from the dart of 
 contempt? 
 
 TO J. LAPRi*IK. 
 
 Sept. Uth, 1785. 
 Gum speed an' furder to you Johnie, 
 Guid health, hale ban's, and weather bonnie ; 
 Now when ye're nickan down fu' cannie 
 
 The staff o' bread. 
 May ye ne'er want a stoup o' brandy 
 
 To clear your iiea'd. 
 
 May Boreas never thresh your rigs, 
 Nor kick your rickles aff their legs, 
 Sendin the stuff o'er muirs an' haggs 
 
 Like drivin wrack ; 
 But may the tapmast grain that wags 
 
 Come to the sack. 
 
 I'm bizzie too, an' skelpin at it, 
 
 But bitter, daudin showers hae wat it, 
 
 • At this period of our Poet's lift; when political ani- 
 mosity was made the ground of private quarrel, the 
 Above foolish verses were sent as an attack on Burns 
 and his friends for their political opinions. They were 
 written by some member of a club styling themselves 
 the Loyal J\ratives of Dumfries, or rather by the united 
 genius of that club, which was more distinguiBlied for 
 drunken loyalty, than either for respectability or poeti- 
 CBl talent. The verses were handed over the table to 
 Burns at a convivial meeting, and he instantly endorsed 
 the subjoined reply. Religues, p. 168. 
 
 Sae my old stumpie pen I gat it 
 
 Wi' muckle work, 
 
 An' took my jocteleg an' whatt it. 
 
 Like ony clerk. 
 
 It's now twa month that I'm your debtor, 
 For your braw, nameless, dateless letter, 
 Abusin me for harsh ill nature 
 
 On holy men, 
 While diel a hair yoursel ye're better, 
 
 But mair profane. 
 
 But let the kirk-folk ring their bells. 
 Let's sing about our noble sels ; 
 We'll cry nae jads frae heathen hills 
 
 To help, or roose us. 
 But browster wives and whiskie stills, 
 
 They are tiie muses. 
 
 Your friendship, Sir, I winna quat it. 
 
 An' if ye mak objections at it, 
 
 Then han' in nieve some day we'll knot it, 
 
 An' witness take, 
 An' when wi' usquebae we've wat it 
 
 It winna break. 
 
 But if the beast and branks be spar'd 
 Till kye be gaun without the herd. 
 An' a' the vittel ui the yard, 
 
 An' theckit right, 
 I mean your inglc-sido to guard 
 
 Ae winter night. 
 
 Then muse-inspiring aqua-vitfie 
 
 Shall make us baith sae blithe an' witty, 
 
 Till ye forget ye're auld an' galty, 
 
 An' be as canty 
 As ye were nine years less than threlty, 
 
 Sweet aae an' twenty ! 
 
 But stooks are cowpet wi' the blast, 
 An' now the sun keeks in the west, 
 Then I maun rin amang the rest 
 
 An' quat my chanter 
 Sae I subscribe mysel in haste, 
 
 Yovu-s, Rab the Ranter. 
 
 TO THE REV. JOHN M'MATH. 
 
 ENCLOSING A COPY OF HOLY WILLIe's rRAYER, 
 WHICH HE HAD REQUESTED. 
 
 Sfipt. mil, 1785. 
 
 While at the stook the shearers cow'r 
 To shun tlie bitter blaudin sliow'r. 
 Or in gulravage riruiin scow'r 
 
 To pass the time, 
 To you I dedicate the hour 
 
 In idle rhyme. 
 
BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 131 
 
 My musie, tir'd wl' mony a sonnet 
 
 On gown, an' ban', an' douse black bonnet, 
 
 Is grown right eerie now she's done it, 
 
 Lest they should blame her 
 An' roust) their holy thunder on it 
 
 And anathem her. 
 
 I own 'twas rash, an' rather hardy, 
 That I, a simple, kintra bardie, 
 Should meddle wi' a pack sae sturdy, 
 
 Wha, if they ken me. 
 
 Can easy, wi' a single wordie, 
 Lovvi 
 
 se h-U upon mc. 
 
 But I gae mad at their grimaces. 
 
 Their sighan, cautan, grace-prood faces, 
 
 Their three mile prayers, an' hauf-mile graces, 
 
 Their raxan conscience, 
 Whase greed, revenge, an' pride disgraces 
 
 Waur nor their nonsense. 
 
 There's Gnun^* miska't wanr than a beast, 
 Wha has mair honour in his breast. 
 Than mony scores as guid's the priest 
 
 Wha sae abus't him ; 
 An' may a bard no crack his jest [him. 
 
 What way they've use't 
 
 See him+ the poor man's friend in need, 
 The gentleman in word an' deed. 
 An' shall his fame an' honour bleed 
 
 By worthless skellums. 
 An' not a muse erect her head 
 
 To cowe the blellums? 
 
 O Pope, had I thy satire's darta 
 To gie the rascals their deserts, 
 I'd rip their rotten, hollow hearts, 
 
 An' tell aloud 
 Their jugghn hocus-pocus arts 
 
 To cheat the crowd. 
 
 God knows, I'm no the tiling I sliould be. 
 Nor am I even the thing I could be. 
 But twenty times, I rather would be, 
 
 An' atlieist clean, 
 Than under gospel colours hid be. 
 
 Just for a screen. 
 
 An honest man may like a glass, 
 An honest man may like a lasjp, 
 
 •Gftvin Hamilton, Esq. 
 
 t The poet has introduced the two first lines of the 
 ftanzainlo iliedeJicaiiuii uf hit vvorkuto Mr. Hamilton. 
 
 But mean revenge, an' malice fausc, 
 He'll still disdain, 
 
 An' then cry zeal for gospel laws, 
 
 Like some wo ken. 
 
 TJiey take religion in their mouth ; 
 They talk o' mercy, grace an' truth, 
 For what ? to gie their malice skouth 
 
 On some puir wight, 
 An' hunt him down, o'er right an' ruth, 
 
 To ruin streight. 
 
 All hail, Religion ! maid divine ! 
 Pardon a muse sae mean as mine, 
 Who in her rough imperfect line 
 
 Thus daurs to name thee ; 
 To stigmatize false friends of thine 
 
 Can ne'er defame tliee. 
 
 Tho' blotcht an' foul wi' mony a stain, 
 
 An' far unworthy of thy train. 
 
 With trembling voice 1 tune my strain 
 
 To join with those, 
 Who boldly dare thy cause maintain 
 
 In spite of foes: 
 
 In spite o' crowds, in spite o' mobs, 
 In spite of undermining jobs. 
 In spite o' dark banditti stabs 
 
 At worth an' merit. 
 By scoundrels, even wi' holy robes. 
 
 But hellish spirit. 
 
 O Ayr, my dear, my native ground, 
 Within thy presbytereal bound 
 A candid lib'ral band is found 
 
 Of public teachers, 
 As men, as christians too ronown'd, 
 
 An' manly jjroacher 
 
 Sir, in that circle you are nam'd ; 
 Sir, in that circle you are fam'd ; 
 An' some, by whom your doctrine's blam'd 
 
 (Which gies you honour) 
 Even, Sir, by them your heart's esteem'd, 
 
 An' winning manner. 
 
 Pardon this freedom I have ta'en, 
 
 An' if impertinent I've been. 
 
 Impute it not, good Sir, in ane [yo, 
 
 V.'luiie heart ne'er wrang'd 
 But to his utmost would liefriend 
 
 Ought that bclang'd yc 
 
132 
 
 BURNS' POEMS 
 
 TO GAVIN HAMILTON, Esa, 
 
 MAUCHLINB. 
 
 (recommending a boy.) 
 
 MosgavUle, May, 3, 1786. 
 
 I HOLD it, Sir, my bounden duty 
 
 To warn you how that Master Tootie, 
 
 Alias, Laird M'Gaun,* 
 Was here to hire yon lad away 
 'Bout whom ye spak the tither day, 
 
 An' wad hae don't aff han' : 
 But lest he learn the callan tricks. 
 
 As faith 1 muckle doubt him, 
 Like scrapin eut auld crummie's nicks. 
 An' tellin hes about them ; 
 As lieve then I'd have then. 
 
 Your clerkship he should sair, 
 If sae be, ye may be 
 Not fitted otherwhere. 
 
 Altho' I say't, he's gleg enough. 
 
 An' bout a house that's rude an rough, 
 
 The boy might learn to swear ; 
 But then wi' you, he'll be sae taught, 
 An' get sic fair example straught, 
 
 I hae na ony fear. 
 Ye'll catechize him every quirk. 
 
 An' shore him well wi' hell ; 
 
 An' gar him follow to the kirk • 
 
 — Ay when ye gang yoursel. 
 If ye then, maun be then 
 
 Frae hame this comin Friday, 
 Then please, Sir, to lea'e, Sir, 
 The orders wi' your lady. 
 
 My word of honour I hae gicn. 
 
 In Paisley John's, that night at e'en, 
 
 To meet the fVarld's worm ; 
 To try to get the twa to gree. 
 An' name the airles an' the fee, 
 
 In legal mode an' form : 
 I ken he weel a Snick can draw. 
 
 When simple bodies let him ; 
 An' if a Deinl be at a'. 
 
 In faith he's sure to get him. 
 To phrase you an' praise you. 
 Ye ken your Laureat scorns : 
 The prayer still, you share still. 
 Of grateful Minstrel Burns. 
 
 • Master Tootie then lived in Maiichline ; a dealer 
 In Cows. It was his common practice to cut the nicks 
 or markings from ihe horr.s of cattle, to disguise their 
 age.— He was an artful trick contriving character; 
 hence he is called a Snick-drawer. In the Poet s ''Ad- 
 dress to the Deil," he styles that august personage an 
 auld, snick-drawiitg dog ! Relique), p. 397. 
 
 TO MR. M'ADAM 
 
 OF CRAIGEN-GILLAN, 
 
 In armeer to an obliging Letter he sent in tk« 
 commencement of my Poetic Career. 
 
 Sir, o'er a gill I gat your card, 
 
 I trow it made me proud ; 
 See wha taks notice o' the bard I 
 
 I lap and cry'd fu' loud. 
 
 Now deil-ma-care about their jaw. 
 The senseless, gawky million ; 
 
 111 cock my nose aboon them a', 
 I'm roos'd by Craigen-Gillan I " 
 
 'Twas noble. Sir ; 'twas like youTBel, 
 To grant your high protection : 
 
 A great man's smile ye ken fu' well, 
 Is ay a blest infection. 
 
 Tho', by his banes wha in a tub 
 Match'd Macedonian bandy! 
 
 On my ain legs thro' dirt an' dub, 
 I independent stand ay. — 
 
 And when those legs to guid, warm kail, 
 Wi' welcome canna bear me ; 
 
 A lee dyke-side, a sybow-tail, 
 And barley-scone shall cheer me. 
 
 Heaven spare you lang to kiss the breath 
 
 O' mony flow'ry simmers ! 
 And bless your bonnie lasses baith, 
 
 I'm tald the're loosome kimmers '. 
 
 And God bless young Dunaskm's laird. 
 
 The blossom of our gentry'. 
 And may he wear an auld man's beard 
 
 A credit to his country. 
 
 TO CAPTAIN RIDDEL, 
 i GLEN RIDDEL. 
 
 {Extempore Lines on returning a Newspaper.) 
 
 eXlisland, Monday Evening. 
 
 Your news and review, Sir, I've read through 
 and through, Sir, 
 
 With little admiring or blaming ; 
 The papers are barren of liome-news or foreign, 
 
 No murders or rapes worth the naming. 
 
 Our friends the reviewers, those chippers and 
 hewers. 
 Are judges of mortar and stone. Sir ; 
 
BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 I3S 
 
 But of meet, or unmeet, in a/abrick complete, 
 I'll boldly pronounce they are none, Sir. 
 
 My goose-quill too rude is, to tell all your 
 goodness 
 BestowM on your servant, the Poet ; 
 Would to God I had one like a beam of the 
 sun. 
 And then aJl the world, Sir, should know it ! 
 
 TERRAUGHTY," 
 
 ON HIS BIRTH-DAY. 
 
 Health to the Maxwells' vet 'ran Chie*"' 
 Health, ay unsour'd by care or grief: 
 Inspired, I turn'd Fate's sibyl leaf, 
 
 I'his natal mom, 
 I see thy life is stulF o' prief. 
 
 Scarce quite half worn.- 
 
 This day thou metes threescore eleven. 
 And I can tell that bounteous Heaven 
 (The second sight, ye ken, is given 
 
 To ilka Poet) 
 On thee a tack o' seven times seven 
 
 Will yet bestow it. 
 
 If envious buckles view wi' sorrow. 
 
 Thy lengthen'd days on this blest morrow, 
 
 May desolation's lang-teeth'd harrow. 
 
 Nine miles an hour. 
 Rake them, hke Sodom and Gomorrah, 
 
 In brunstane stoure — 
 
 But for thy friends, and they are mony, 
 Baith honest men and lasses bonnie, 
 May couthie fortune, kind and cannie. 
 
 In social glee, 
 Wi' mornings blithe and e'enings funny 
 
 Bless them and thee I 
 
 Fareweel, auld birkie ! Lord be near ye, 
 And then the Deil he daur na steer ye : 
 Tour friends ay love, your faes ay fear ye, 
 
 For me, shame fa' me. 
 If neist my heart I dinna wear ye. 
 
 While Burns they ca' me. 
 
 TO A LADY. 
 
 With a Present of a Pair of Drinking-GUuses. 
 
 Fair Empress of the Poet's soul, 
 And Queen of Poetesses ; 
 
 * Mr. Maxwell, ui' Terrauglity, near Dumfries 
 
 Clarinda, take this little boon, 
 This humble pair of glasses. 
 
 And fill them high with generous juice. 
 As generous as your mind ; 
 
 And pledge me in the generous toast— 
 " The whole of human kind .'" 
 
 " 7b those who love lu .'"—second fill ; 
 
 But not to those whom we love ; 
 Lest we love those who love not us ! 
 
 A third — " to thee and me, love I" 
 
 THE VOWELS. 
 
 'TwAS where the birch and sounding thong arc 
 
 plied 
 The noisy domicile of pedant pride ; 
 Where ignorance her darkening vapour throws, 
 And cruelty directs the thickening blows ; 
 Upon a time. Sir Abece the great, 
 In all his pedagogic powers elate 
 His awful chair of state resolves to mount, 
 And call the trembling vowels to account. 
 
 First enter'd A, a grave, broad, solemn wight. 
 But, ah ! deform 'd, dishonest to the sight ! 
 His twisted head look'd backward on his way. 
 And flagrant from the scourge, he grunted, ai! 
 
 Reluctant, E stalk'd in ; with piteous grace 
 The justling tears ran down his honest face ! 
 That name, that well-worn name, and all his 
 
 own. 
 Pale he surrenders at the tyrant's throne ! 
 The pedant stifles keen the Roman sound 
 Not all his mongrel diphthongs can compound ; 
 And next the title following close behind. 
 He to the nameless, ghastly wretch assign 'd. 
 
 The cobweb'd gothic dome resounded, T ! 
 In sullen vengeance, I, disdain'd, reply : 
 The pedant swung his felon cudgel round, 
 And knock'd the groaning vowel to the 
 ground I 
 
 In ruoful apprehension enter'd O, 
 The wailing minstrel of despairing wo ; 
 Th' Inquisitor of Spain the most expert. 
 Might there have learnt new mysteries of hu 
 
 art: 
 So grim, deform 'd, with horrors entering U, 
 His dearest friend and brother scarcely knew ! 
 
 As trembling U stood staring all aghast. 
 The pedant m his left hand clutch 'd him fast, 
 In helpless infant's tears he dipp'd bis right, 
 Baptis'd him eu, and kick'd him from ht« eight. 
 
134 
 
 BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 SKETCH.* 
 
 A LITTLE, upright, pert, tart, tripping wight, 
 And still liis precious self his dear dehght ; 
 Who loves his own smart shadow in the streets, 
 Better than e'er the fairest she he meets, 
 A man of fashion too, he made his tour, 
 Learn'd vive la bagaleUe^ el vive Vamour ; 
 So travell'd monkeys their grimace improve, 
 Pohsh their grin, nay, sigh for ladies' love. 
 Much specious lore, but little understood ; 
 Veneering oft outshines the solid wood : 
 His solid sense — by inches you must tell. 
 But mete his cunning by the old Scots ell ; 
 His meddling vanity, a busy fiend, 
 Still making work his selfish craft must mend, 
 
 SCOTS PROLOGUE, 
 
 For Mr. Sutherland's Benefit Mght, Dumfries. 
 
 What needs this din about the town o' Lon'on, 
 How this new play an' that new sang is 
 
 comin ? 
 Why is outlandish stuff sae meikle courted ? 
 Does nonsense mend like whisky, when im- 
 ported? 
 Is there nae poet, burning keen for fame, 
 Will try to gie us sangs and plays at hanic ? 
 For comedy abroad he need na toil, 
 A fool and knave are plants of every soil ; 
 Nor need he hunt as far as Room and Greece 
 To gather matter for a serious piece ; 
 There's themes enough in Caledonian story, 
 Would show tiie tragic muse in a' her glory. — 
 
 Is there no daring bard will rise, and tell 
 How glorious Wallace stood, how, hapless, 
 
 fell? 
 Where are the muses fled that could produce 
 A drama worthy o' the name o' Bruce ; 
 How here, even here, he first unsheath'd the 
 
 sword 
 'Gainst mighty England and her guilty lord ; 
 
 ♦This sketch seems to be one of a Series, intended for 
 a projected work, under the title of " The PoeVs Pro- 
 gress." Tliis character was sent as a specimen, ac- 
 companied by a letter io Professor Vvgald Stewart, in 
 which it is thus noticed- "Tlie fragment beginning .^ 
 little, upright, pert, tart, &c. I have not shown to 
 any man living, till I now send it to 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 
 Hght3. This particular part I send you merely as a 
 «ample of my hand at portrait sketching." 
 
 And after, mony a bloody, deathless doing, 
 Wrench'd* his dear country from the jaws of 
 
 ruin ? 
 O for a Shakspeare or an Otway scene. 
 To draw the lovely, hapless Scottish Queen ! 
 Vain all th' omnipotence of female charms 
 'Gainst headlong, rutldess, mad Rebellion's 
 
 arms. 
 She fell, but fell with spirit truly Roman, 
 To glut the vengeance of a rival woman : 
 A woman, tho' the phrase may seem uncivil. 
 As able and as cruel as the Devil ! 
 One Douglas lives in Home's immortal page, 
 But Douglases were heroes every age : 
 And tho' your fathers, prodigal of life, 
 A Douglas followed to the martial strife. 
 Perhaps if bowls row right, and Right succeeds, 
 Ye yet may follow where a Douglas leads I 
 
 As ye hae generous done, if a' the land 
 Would take the muses' servants by the hand ; 
 Not only hear, but patronise, befriend them. 
 And wliere ye justly can commend, commend 
 
 them 
 And aiblins when they winna stand the test. 
 Wink hard and say, the folks hae done their 
 
 best! 
 Would a' the land do this, then I'll be caution 
 Ye'll soon hae poets o' the Scottish nation. 
 Will gar fame blaw until her trumpet crack. 
 And warsle time an' lay him on his back \ 
 
 For us and for our stage should ony spier, 
 " Whose aught thae chiels maks a' this bustle 
 
 here ?" 
 My best leg foremost, I'll set up my brow. 
 We have the honour to belong to you ! 
 We're your own bairns, e'en guide us as ye like, 
 But hke good mithers, shore before ye strike, — 
 And gratefu' still I hope ye,;^ ever find us. 
 For a' the patronage and nMkle kindness . 
 We've got frae a' professions, sets and ranks : 
 God help us ! we're but poor — ye'se get but 
 thanks. 
 
 EXTEMPORANEOUS EFFUSION 
 
 ON BEING 
 
 APPOINTED TO THE EXCISE. 
 
 Searching auld wives' barrels 
 
 Och, ho ! the day ! 
 That clarty barm should stain my laurels 
 
 But — ;what '11 ye say I 
 These muvin' things ca'd wives and weans 
 Wad muve the very hearts o' stanes ' 
 
BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 13& 
 
 On seeing the beautiful Seal of Lord G. 
 
 What dost thou in that meuision fair 1 
 
 Flit, G , and find 
 
 Some narrow, dirty, dungeon cave, 
 
 The picture of tliy mind I 
 
 On the Same. 
 
 No Stewart art thou G , 
 
 The Stewarts all were brave ; 
 
 Besides, the Stewarts were but /oofo, 
 Not one of them a knave. 
 
 On the Same. 
 
 Bright ran thy line, O G— ^ — , 
 Thro' many a far-fam'd sire ! 
 
 So ran the far-fam'd Roman way, 
 So ended in a mire. 
 
 To the Same, on the Author being threatened 
 vfith his Resentment. 
 
 Spare me thy vengeance, G , 
 
 In quiet let me Uve : 
 I ask no kindness at thy hand, 
 
 For thou hast none to give. 
 
 THE DEAN OF FACULTY. 
 
 A NEW BALLAD. 
 
 TtTNE— " The Dragon of Wantley." 
 
 Dire was the hate at old Harlaw, 
 
 That Scot to Scot did carry ; 
 And dire the discord Langside saw, 
 
 For beauteous, hapless Mary : 
 But Scot with Scot ne'er met so hot. 
 
 Or were more in fury seen, Sir, 
 Than 'twixt Hnl and Bob for the famous job— 
 
 Who should be Facul/y's Dean, Sir. — 
 
 This Hal for genius, wit, and lore. 
 
 Among the first was numbered ; 
 But pious Bob, 'mid learning s store. 
 
 Commandment tenth remember'd. — 
 Yet simple Bob the victory got. 
 
 And won his heart's desire ; 
 Which shows that heaven can boil the pot, 
 
 Though the devil p — s in the fire. — 
 
 Squire Hal, besides, had in this case, 
 
 Pretensions rather brassy. 
 For talents to deserve a place 
 
 Are qualifications saucy ; 
 So their worships of the Faculty, 
 
 Quite sick of merit's rudeness. 
 Chose one who should owe it all, d'ye s& 
 
 To their gratis grace and goodiiess. — 
 
 As once on Pisgan purg'd was the sight 
 
 Of a son of Circumcision, 
 So may be, on this Pisgah height, 
 
 RoVs purbUnd, mental vision : 
 Nay, Bobby's mouth may be open'dyet, 
 
 Till for eloquence you hail him. 
 And swear he has the Angel met 
 
 That met the Ass of Beuaam. — 
 
 EXTEMPORE IN THE COURT OF 
 
 SESSION. 
 
 Tune—" Gillicrankie." 
 
 He clench'd his pamphlets in his fist, 
 
 He quoted and he hinted, 
 Till in a declamation-mist, 
 
 His argument he tint it : 
 He gaped for 't, he graped for 't, 
 
 He fand it was awa, man ; 
 But what his common sense came short. 
 
 He eked out wi' law, man. 
 
 MR. ER — NE. 
 
 Collected Harry stood awee, 
 
 Then open'd out his arm, man ; 
 His lordship sat wi' ruefu' e'e. 
 
 And ey'd the gathering storm, man ; 
 Like wind-driv'n hail it did assail. 
 
 Or torrents owre a lin, man ; 
 The Be^wh sae wise lift up their eyos 
 
 Half-wauken'd wi' the din, man. 
 
13$ 
 
 VERSES TO J. 
 
 BURNS' POEMS 
 RANKEN. 
 
 [The Person to whom his Poem on shooting the 
 Partridge is addressed, while Ranken occupied 
 the Farm o/AdamhUl, in Ayrshire.l 
 
 Ae day, as Death, that gruesome carl, 
 Was driving to the tither warl 
 A mixtie-maxtie motley squad. 
 And mony a guilt-bespotted lad ; 
 Black gowns of each denomination. 
 And thieves of every rank and station, 
 From him that wears the star and garter. 
 To him that wintles* in a halter : 
 Asham'd himself to see the wretches. 
 He mutters, glow'rin at the bitches, 
 " By G-d I'll not be seen behint them, 
 Nor 'mang the sp'ritual core present them. 
 Without, at least ae honest man, 
 
 To grace this d d infernal clan." 
 
 By Adamhill a glance he threvv, 
 " L — d G-d !" quoth he, " I have it now 
 There's just the man I want, in faith," 
 And quickly stoppit Ranken's breath. 
 
 On hearing that there %vas Falsehood \ 
 Dr. B 's very Looks. 
 
 That there is falsehood in his looks 
 
 I must and will deny : 
 They say their master is a knave — 
 
 Aiid sure they do not lie. 
 
 the Rev. 
 
 On a Sehoolmaster in Cleish Parish, Fifeshire. 
 
 Here lie Willie M — hie's banes, 
 
 O Satan, when ye tak him, 
 Gie him the schulin of your weans ; 
 
 For clever Deils he'll mak em ! 
 
 ADDRESS TO GENERAL DUMOURIER. 
 
 (a parody on robin ADAIR.) 
 
 You're welcome to Despots, Dumourier ; 
 You're welcome to Despots, Dumourier. — 
 How does Dampiere do ? 
 Ay, and Bournonville too ? [ourier ? 
 
 ^hy did they not come along with you, Dum- 
 
 W^h 
 
 * The word JVintlc, denotes sudden and involuntary 
 motion. In the ludicrous sense in which it is here ap- 
 plied, it may be admirably translated by the vulgar 
 London expression of Dancing upon nothing. 
 
 I will fight France vi >h you, Dumourier. — 
 I will fight France v th you, Dumourier : — 
 I will fight France w h. you. 
 
 with you, Dum- 
 
 I will take my cham i with j'ou 
 By my soul I'll dan^o a dance v 
 
 Then let us fight about, Dumourier ; 
 
 Then let us fight about, Dumourier ; 
 
 Then let us fight about. 
 
 Till freedom's spark is out, 
 
 Then we'll be d-mned no doubt — Dumourier. 
 
 ELEGY ON THE YEAR 1788. 
 
 A SKETCH. 
 
 For Lords or Kings I diana mourn, 
 E'en let them die — for that they're born ; 
 But oh I prodigious to reflec' ! 
 A Towmont, Sirs, is gane to wreck ! 
 O Eighty-eight, in thy sma' space 
 What dire events hae taken place ! 
 Of what enjoyments thou hast reft us ! 
 In what a pickle thou hast left us I 
 
 The Spanish empire 's tint a head. 
 An' my auld teethless Bawtie's dead ; 
 The tulzie 's teugh 'tweeu Pitt an' Fox, 
 And 'tween our Maggie's twa wee cocks ; 
 The tane is game, a bluidie devil, 
 But to the hen-birds unco civil ; 
 The tither's something dour o' treadin, 
 But better stuff" ne'er claw'd a midden — 
 
 Ye ministers, come mount the poupet, 
 An' cry till ye be liaerse an' roupit, 
 For Eighty-eight, he wish"d you weel. 
 An' gied you a' baitb gear an' meal ; 
 E'en mony a plack, and mony a peck, 
 Ye ken yoursels, for little feck ! 
 
 Ye bonnie lasses, dight your een. 
 For some o' you hae tint a frien' ; 
 In Eighty-eight, ye ken, was ta'en 
 What ye'll ne'er hae to gie again, 
 
 Ob6cr\-e the very nowt an' sheep. 
 How dowf and dowie now they creep j 
 Nay, even the jnrth itsel does cry. 
 For E'nbrugh wells are grutten dry. 
 
 O Eighty-nine, thou's but a bairn. 
 An' no o'er auld, I hope, to learn ! 
 Thou beardless boy, I pray tak care. 
 Thou now has got thy Daddy's chair. 
 
BURNS' ?OEMS. 
 
 «3T 
 
 Nae hand-cuff'd, mizzl'd, hap-shackl'd Regent, 
 But, like himsel, a full free agent. 
 Be sure ye follow out the plan 
 Nae waur than he did, honest man ; 
 As muckle better as you can. 
 
 January 1, 1789. 
 
 VERSES 
 
 Written under the Portrait of Fergusson, the 
 Poet, in a copy of that authors works presented 
 to a young Lady in Edinburgh, March 19, 
 1787. 
 
 Curse on ungrateful man, that can be pleas'd, 
 And yet can starve the author of the pleasure 1 
 O thou my elder brother in misfortune, 
 By far my elder brother in the muses, 
 With tears I pity thy unhappy fate ! 
 Why is the bard unpitied by the world. 
 Yet has so keen a relish of its pleasures ? 
 
 SONGS. 
 
 UP IN THE MORNING EARLY.* 
 
 Up in the moming''s no for me. 
 
 Up in the morning early ; 
 When a' the hills are covered wV snaw, 
 
 Vm sure Ws winter fairly. 
 
 Cold blaws the wind frae east to west. 
 
 The drift is driving sairly ; 
 Sae loud and shrill's 1 hear the blast, 
 
 I'm sure it's winter fairly .- 
 
 The birds sit chittering in the thorn, 
 
 A' day they fare but sparely ; 
 And lang's the niglit frae e'en to morn, 
 
 I'm sure it's winter fairly. 
 
 Up in the morning, &c. 
 
 SONG. 
 
 I DREAM'D I LAY WHERE FLOWERS 
 WERE SPRINGING.t 
 
 1 dream'd I lay where flowers were springing, 
 Gadly in the sunny beam ; 
 
 * The chorus is old. 
 t These two stanzas I composed when T was seven- 
 teen, and are among the oldest of my printed pieces. 
 Bums' ReUqucs, p. 242. 
 K2 
 
 List'ning to the wild birds singing, 
 
 By a falling, crystal stream ; 
 Straight the sky grew black and daring ; 
 
 Thro' the woods the whirlwinds rave ; 
 Trees with aged arms.were warring 
 
 O'er the swelling, drumlie wave. 
 
 Such was my life's deceitful morning, 
 
 Such the pleasures I enjoy'd ; 
 But lang or noon, loiid tempests storming 
 
 A' my flow'ry bliss destroy'd. 
 Tho' fickle fortune has deceived me. 
 
 She promis'd fair, and perform'd but ill ; 
 Of mony a joy and hope bereav'd me, 
 
 I bear a heart shall support me still. 
 
 SONG.* 
 
 BEWARE O' BONNIE ANN. 
 
 Ye gallants bright I red you right, 
 
 Beware o' bonnie Ann ; 
 Her comely face sae fu' o' grace, 
 
 Your heart she will trepan. 
 Her een sae bright, like stars by night, 
 
 Her skin is liike the swan ; 
 Sae junply lac'd her genty waist, 
 
 That sweetly ye might span. 
 
 Youth, grace, and love, attendant move, 
 
 And pleasure leads the van : 
 In a' their charms, and conquering arms, 
 
 They wait on bonnie Ann. 
 The captive bands may chain the hands. 
 
 But love enslaves the man ; 
 Ye gallants braw, I red ye a', 
 
 Beware o' bonnie Aim. 
 
 SONG. 
 
 MY BONNIE MARY.t 
 
 Go fetcli to me a pint o' wine, 
 
 An' fill it in a silver tassie ; 
 That I may drink before I go, 
 
 A sen'ice to my boimie lassie ; 
 The boat rocks at the pier o' Leith ; 
 
 Fu' loud the wind blaws frae the ferry ; 
 The ship rides by the Berwick-law, 
 
 And I maun lea'e my bonnie Marj". 
 
 *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. Bums' Religues, p. 266. 
 
 t This air is Oswald's ; the first half-stanza of tlie 
 song is old. 
 
V 
 
 136 
 
 BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 The trumpets sound, the banners fly, 
 
 The glittering spears are ranked ready ; 
 The shouts o' war are heard afar, 
 
 The battle closes thick and bloody ; 
 But it's not the roar, o' sea or shore 
 
 Wad make me langer wish to tarry ; 
 Nor shouts o' war that's heard afar, 
 
 It's leaving thee, my bonnie Mary. 
 
 SONG. 
 
 THERE'S A YOUTH IN THIS CITY.* 
 
 There's a youth in this city, it were a great 
 pity 
 That he from our lasses should wander awa ; 
 For he's bonnie and braw, weel-favour'd 
 with a', 
 And his hair has a natural buckle and a'. 
 His coat is the hue of his bonnet sae blue ; 
 
 His fecket is white as the new-driven snaw ; 
 His hose they are blae, and his shoon like the 
 slae, 
 And his clear siller buckles they dazzle us a'. 
 His coat is the hue, &;c. 
 
 For beauty and fortune the laddie's been 
 courtin ; 
 Weel-featur'd, weel-tocher'd, weel-mounted 
 and braw ; 
 But chiefly the siller, that gars him gang till 
 her. 
 The pennie's the jewel that beautifies a'. — 
 There's Meg wi' the mailen, that fain wad a 
 haen him, 
 And Susy whase daddy was Laird o' the ha' ; 
 There's lang-tocher'd Nancy maist fetters his 
 fancy, 
 — But the laddie's dear sel he lo'es dearest 
 of a'. 
 
 SONG. 
 
 MY HEART'S IN THE HIGHLANDS.t 
 
 My heart's in the Highlands, my heart is not 
 
 here; 
 My heart's in the Highlands, a-chasing the 
 
 deer; 
 Chasing the wild deer, and following the roe, 
 My heart's m the Highlands wherever I go. 
 
 ♦This air is claimed by Niel Gow, who calls it his 
 lament for his brother. The first half-stanza of the 
 song is old. 
 
 t The first half-slanza is old. 
 
 Farewell to the Highlands, farewell to the 
 
 North 
 The birth-place of valour, the country of 
 
 worth ; 
 Wlierever I wander, wherever I rove. 
 The liills of the Highlands for ever I love. 
 
 Farewell to the mountains high covered with 
 snow ; 
 
 Farewell to the straths and green valleys be- 
 low : 
 
 Farewell to the forests and wild-hanging 4 
 woods ; I 
 
 Farewell to the torrents and loud pourmg f 
 
 My heart's in the Highlands, my heart is not 
 
 here. 
 My heart's in the Highlands a-chasing the 
 
 deer: 
 Chasing the wild deer, and following the roe, 
 My heart's in the Highlands, wherever I go. 
 
 SONG.* 
 
 THE RANTIN DOG THE DADDIE O'T. 
 
 O WHA. my babie-clouts will buy ? 
 Wha will tent me when I cry ? 
 Wha will kiss me whare I lie ? 
 The rantin dog the daddie o't. — 
 
 Wha will own he did the faut ? 
 Wha will buy my groanin-maut ? 
 Wha will tell me how to ca't ? 
 The rantin dog the daddie o't.- - 
 
 When I mount the creepie-chair, 
 Wha will sit beside me there .' 
 Gie me Rob, I seek nae mair. 
 The rantin dog the daddie o't. — 
 
 Wha will crack to me my lane ? 
 Wha will mak me fidgin fain ? 
 Wha will kiss me o'er again ? 
 The rantin dog the daddie o't. — 
 
 SONG. 
 
 I DO CONFESS THOU ART SAE 
 FAIR.t 
 
 I DO confess thou art sae fair, 
 I wad been o'er the lugs in luve ; 
 
 * 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. r 
 
 Bums' Reliijues, p. 278. 
 
 tThis song is altered from a poem by Sir Robert Ay ion 
 
BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 139 
 
 Had I na found the slightest prayer 
 
 That lips could speak, thy heart could 
 muve. 
 
 I do confess thee sweet, but find 
 
 Thou art sae thriftless o' thy sweets, 
 
 Thy favours are the silly wind 
 That kisses ilka thing it meets. 
 
 See yonder rose-bud, rich in dew, 
 
 Amang its native briers sae coy 
 How sune it tines its scent and hue 
 
 When pu'd and worn a common toy I 
 
 Sic fate ere lang shall thee betide, 
 Tho' thou may gayly bloom a while ; 
 
 Yet sune thou shalt be thrown aside. 
 Like ony conimon weed and vile. 
 
 SONG.* 
 
 Tune — " Craigie-burn Wood."+ 
 
 Beyond thee, dearie, beyond thee, dearie, 
 And O to be lying beyond thee, 
 
 sweetly, soundly, iceel may he sleep. 
 That's laid in the bed beyond thee. 
 
 Sweet closes the evening on Craigie-burn- 
 wood. 
 And blithly awakens the morrow ; 
 But the pride of the spruig in the Craigie- 
 bum-wood 
 Can yield to me nothing but sorrow. 
 Beyond thee, &c. 
 
 ng 1 
 
 1 hear the wild birds singing ; 
 But pleasure they hae nane for me, 
 
 While care my heart is wringing. 
 Beyond thee, kc. 
 
 private secretary to Mary and Anne, queens of Scotland. 
 — Thp pnem is to tp, found in James Watson's Collec- 
 tion of Scots Poems, tlie earliest collection printed in 
 Scotland. — I thinlj that 1 have improved the simplicity 
 of the sentiments, by giving them a Scots dress. 
 
 Bums'' Reliques, p. 292. 
 
 • It is remarkable of this place 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 ran lo- 
 calize it) has been composed. From Craigie-burn, near 
 Moffat, until one reaches the West Highlands, we have 
 scarcely one slow air of any antiquity. 
 
 The song whs composed on a passion which a Mr. 
 Gillespie, a particular friend of mine, had for a Miss 
 Lorimer, afterwards a Mrs. Whelpdale. The young 
 lady was bora at Craigie-burn-wood.— The chorus is 
 part of an old foolish ballad. 
 
 Burns' Reliques, p. 284. 
 
 t The chorus is old.— Another copy of this will be 
 found, ante, p. 101 
 
 I canna tell, I maunna tell, 
 I dare na for your anger ; 
 
 But secret love will break my heart, 
 If I conceal it langer. 
 
 Beyond thee, Sec. 
 
 I see thee gracefu', straight and tall, 
 I see thee sweet and bonnie, 
 
 But oh, what will my torments be. 
 If thou refuse thy Johnie I 
 Beyond thee. Sec. 
 
 To see thee in anither's arms, 
 In love to lie and languish, 
 
 'Twad be my dead, that will be seen, 
 My heart wad burst wi' anguish. 
 Beyond thee. Sec. 
 
 But Jeanie, say thou wilt be mine, 
 Say, tliou lo'es nane before me ; 
 
 And a' my days o' life to come 
 ril gratefully adore thee. 
 
 Beyond thee, &.c. 
 
 SONG. 
 
 YON WILD MOSSY MOUNTAINS. 
 
 Yon wild mossy mountains sae lofty and wide, 
 That nurse in their bosom the youth o' the 
 
 Clyde, 
 Where the grouse lead their coveys thro' the 
 
 heather to feed. 
 And the shepherd tents liis flock as he pipes on 
 
 his reed. 
 
 Where tfie grouse. Sec. 
 
 Not GowTie's rich valley, nor Forth's sunny 
 
 shores, 
 To me hae tlie charms o' yon wild, mossy 
 
 moors ; 
 For there, by a lanely, and sequester'd stream, 
 Resides a sweet lassie, my thought and my 
 
 dream. 
 
 Amang thae wild mountains shall still be my 
 
 path. 
 Ilk stream foaming down its ain green, narrow 
 
 strath ; 
 For there, wi' my lassie, the day lang I rove. 
 While o'er us vmheeded fly the swift hours o' 
 
 love. 
 
 She is not the fairest, altho' she is fair ; 
 O' nice education but sma' is her share : 
 Her parentage liumble as humble can be ; 
 But I lo'e the dear lassie because she lo'ea 
 me. 
 
140 
 
 BURNS' POEMS 
 
 To boaii^y what man but maun yield him a 
 
 prize, 
 In her amour of glances, and blushes, and 
 
 sighs ; 
 And when wit and refinement hae poUshed 
 
 her darts. 
 They dazzle our een, as they flie to our hearts. 
 
 But kindness, sweet kindness, in the fond 
 
 sparkling c'e. 
 Has lustre outshining the diamond to me ; 
 And the heart-beating love, as I'm clasp'd in 
 
 her Jirms, 
 O, these are my lassie's all-conquering charms ! 
 
 SONG. 
 
 WHA IS THAT AT MY BOWER 
 DOOR? 
 
 Wha is that at my bower door ? 
 
 O wha is it but Findlay ; 
 Then gae your gate ye'se nae be here I 
 
 Indeed maun I, quo' Findlay. 
 What mak ye sae like a thief? 
 
 O come and see, quo' Findlay ; 
 Before the mom ye'll work mischief; 
 
 Indeed will I, quo' Findlay. 
 
 Gif I rise and let you in ? 
 
 Let me in, quo' Findlay ; 
 Ye'll keep me waukin wi' your din ; 
 
 Indeed will I, quo' Findlay. 
 In my bower if ye should stay ? 
 
 Let me stay, quo' Findlay ; 
 I fear ye'll bide till break o' day ; 
 
 Indeed will I, quo' Findlay. 
 
 Here this night if ye remain, 
 
 I'll remain, quo' B'indlay ; 
 I dread ye'll learn the gate again ; 
 
 Indeed will I, quo' Findlay ; 
 What may pass within this bower. 
 
 Let it pass, quo' Findlay ; 
 Ye maun conceal till your last hour ; 
 
 Indeed will I, quo' Findlay ! 
 
 SONG.^ 
 Tune—" The Weaver and his Shuttle, O." 
 
 My Father was a Farmer upon the Carrick 
 
 border, O 
 And carefully lie bred me in decency and 
 
 order, O 
 
 • This song is wild rhapsody, miserably deficient] in 
 versification, but as the sentiments are the genuine feel- 
 ings of my heart, for that reason I have a particular 
 pleasure in conning it over. Burns' Rcliguet, p. 339. 
 
 He bade me act a manly part, though I had 
 
 ne'er a farthing, O 
 For without an honest manly heart, no man 
 
 was worth regarding, O. 
 
 Then out into the world my course I did deter- 
 mine, O 
 
 Tho' to be rich was not my wish, yet to be 
 great was charming, O 
 
 My talents they were not the worst ; nor yet 
 my education ; O 
 
 Resolv'd was I, at leeist to try, to mend my situ- 
 ation, O. 
 
 In many a way, and vain essay, I courted for- 
 tune s favour ; O 
 
 Some cause unseen, still stept between, to frus- 
 trate each endeavour ; O 
 
 Sometimes by foes I was o'erpower'd ; some- 
 times by friends forsaken ; O 
 
 And when my hope was at the top, I still was 
 wosrt mistaken, O. 
 
 Then sore harassed, and tir'd at last, with for- 
 
 time's vain delusion ; O 
 I dropt my schemes, like idle dreams, and 
 
 came to this conclusion ; O 
 The past was bad, and the future hid ; it« 
 
 good or ill untried ; O 
 But the present hour was in my pow'r, and «o 
 
 I would enjoy it, O. 
 
 No help, nor hope, nor view had I ; nor person 
 to befriend me ; O 
 
 So I must toil, and sweat and broil, and labour 
 to sustain me O, 
 
 To plough and sow, to reap and mow, my fa- 
 ther bred me early ; O 
 
 For one, he said, to labour bred, was a matcli 
 for fortune fairly, O. 
 
 Thus all obscure, unknown, and poor, thro' 
 life I'm doom'd to wander, O 
 
 Till down my weary bones I lay in everlasting 
 slumber: O 
 
 No view nor care, but shun whate'er might 
 breed me pain or sorrow ; O 
 
 I live to-day, as well's I may, regardless of to- 
 morrow, O. 
 
 But cheerful still, I am as well, as a monarch 
 
 in a palace, O 
 Tho' fortune's frown still hunts me down, with 
 
 all her wonted malice ; O 
 I make mdeed, my daily bread, but ne'er can 
 
 make it farther ; O 
 But as daily bread is all I need, I do not much 
 
 regard her, O. 
 
BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 When sometimes by my labour I earn a little 
 
 money, O 
 Some unforeseen misfortune comes generally 
 
 upon me ; O 
 Mischance, mistake, or by neglect, or my good- 
 
 natur'd folly ; O 
 But come what will, I've sworn it still, I'll 
 
 ne'er be melancholy, O. 
 
 All you who follow wealth and power with 
 
 unremitting ardour, O 
 The more in this you look for bliss, you leave 
 
 your view the farther ; O 
 Had you the wealth Potosi boasts, or nations 
 
 to adore you, O 
 A cheerful honest-hearted clown I will prefer 
 
 before you, O. 
 
 SONG. 
 
 Tiio' cruel fate should bid us part, 
 
 As fer's the pole and hne ; 
 Her dear idea round my heart 
 
 Should tenderly entwine. 
 
 Tho' motmtains frown and deserts howl, 
 
 And oceans roar between ; 
 Yet, dearer than my deathless soul, 
 
 I still \vouId love my Jean. 
 
 SONG. 
 
 Ae fond kiss and then we sever ; 
 Ae fareweel, alas, for ever ! 
 Deep in heart-wrung tears I'll pledge thee, 
 Warring sighs and groans I'll wage thee. 
 Who shall say that fortune grieves him 
 While the star of hope she leaves him ? 
 Me, nae cheerfu' twinkle lights me ; 
 Dark despair around benights me. 
 
 I'll ne'er blame my partial fancy, 
 Naething could resist my Nancy : 
 But to see her, was to love her ; 
 Love but her, and love for ever. 
 Had we never lov'd sae kindly. 
 Had we never lov'd sae blindly, 
 Never met — or never parted, 
 We had ne'er been broken-hearted. 
 
 Fare thee weel, thou first and fairest ! 
 Fare thee weel, thou best and dearest ! 
 Thine be ilka joy and treasure. 
 Peace, enjoyment, love and pleasure ! 
 
 Ae fond kiss, and then we sever ; 
 
 Ae fareweel, alas, for ever ! 
 
 Deep in heart-wrung tears I pledge thee, 
 
 Warring sighs and groans I'll wage thee. 
 
 SONG. 
 
 NOW BANK AN' BRAE ARE 
 CLMTH'D IN GREEN. 
 
 Now bank anj brae are claith'd in green 
 
 An' scatter'd cowslips sweetly spring. 
 By Girvan's fairy haunted stream 
 
 The birdies flit on wanton wing. 
 To Cassallis' banks when e'ening fa's. 
 
 There wi' my Mary let me flee. 
 There catch her ilka glance of love, 
 
 The bonnie blink o' Mary's e'e ! 
 
 The child wha boasts o' warld's wealtn. 
 
 Is aften laird o' meikle care ; 
 But Mary she is a' my ain, 
 
 Ah, fortime canna gie me mair ! 
 Then let me range by Cassillis' banks, 
 
 Wi' her the lassie dear to me. 
 And catch her ilka glance o' love. 
 
 The bonnie blink o' Mary's e'e ! 
 
 SONG. 
 
 THE BONNIE LAD THAT'S FAR 
 AWA. 
 
 O HOW can I be blithe and glad. 
 Or how can I gang brisk and braw. 
 
 When the bomiie lad that I lo'e best 
 Is o'er the hills and far awa? 
 
 It's no the frosty winter wind, 
 
 It's no the driving drift and snaw ; 
 
 But ay the tear comes in my e'e. 
 To think on him that 's far awa. 
 
 My father pat me frae his door. 
 
 My friends they hae disown'd me a', 
 
 But I hae ane will tak my part. 
 The bonnie lad that 's far awa. 
 
 A pair o' gloves he gave to me, 
 
 And silken snoods he gave me twa ; 
 
 And I will wear them for his sake, 
 The bonnie lad that 's far awa. 
 
142 
 
 The weary winter soon will pass, 
 
 And spring will deed the birken-shaw ; 
 
 And my sweet babie will be born, 
 And he'll come hame that's far awa. 
 
 SONG. 
 
 Out over the Forth I look to the north, 
 
 But what is the north and its Highlands to 
 me ? 
 
 The south nor the east gie ease to my breast. 
 The far foreign land, or the wild rolling sea. 
 
 But I look to the west, when I gae to rest, 
 That happy my dreams and my slumbers 
 may be ; 
 
 For far in the west lives he I lo'e best. 
 The lad that is dear to my babie and me. 
 
 BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 SONG. 
 
 I'LL AY CA' IN BY YON TOWN. 
 
 I'll ay ca' in by yon town, 
 
 And by yon garden green, again ; 
 
 I'll ay ca' in by yon town. 
 
 And see my bonhie Jean again. 
 
 There's nane sail ken, there's nane sail guess. 
 What brings me back the gate again, 
 
 But she, my fairest faithfu' lass. 
 And stowlins we sail meet again. 
 
 Shell wander by the aiken tree, 
 
 When trystin-time* draws near again ; 
 
 And when her lovely form I see, 
 Ohaith, she's doubly dear again ! 
 
 SONG. 
 WHISTLE O'ER THE LAVE O'T. 
 
 First when Maggy was my care, 
 Heav'n, I thought, was in her air ; 
 Now we're married — spier nae niair — 
 
 Whistle o'er the lave o't. — 
 Meg was meek, and Meg was mild, 
 Bonnie Meg was nature's child — 
 — Wiser men than me's beguil'd : 
 
 Whistle o'er the lave o't. 
 
 • Th-ystm-timt—TUe time of appointment. 
 
 How we live, my Meg and me, 
 How we love and how we 'gree, 
 I care na by how few may see ; 
 
 Whistle o'er the lave o't. — 
 What I wish were maggot's meat, 
 Dish'd up in her winding sheet, 
 I could write — but Meg maun see't— • 
 
 Whistle o'er the lave o't. — 
 
 SONG. 
 YOUNG JOCKEY. 
 
 YouNQ Jockey was the blithest lad 
 
 In a' our town or here awa ; 
 Fu' blithe he whistled at the gaud, 
 
 Fu' lightly danc'd he in the ha' ! 
 He roos'd my e'en sae bonnie blue, 
 
 He roos'd my waist sae gently sma ; 
 An' ay my heart came to my mou. 
 
 When ne'er a body heard or saw. 
 
 My Jockey toils upon the plain. 
 
 Thro' wind and weet, thro' frost and snaw; 
 And o'er the lee I leuk fu' fain 
 
 When Jockey's owsen hameward ca', 
 An' ay the night comes round again, 
 
 When in his arms he taks me a' : 
 And ay he vows he'll be my ain 
 
 As lang's he has a breath to draw. . 
 
 SONG. 
 
 M'PHERSON'S FAREWELL. 
 
 Tune — " M'Pherson's Lament." 
 
 Farewell ye dungeons dark and strong. 
 
 The wretches destinie ! 
 M'Pherson's time will not be long, 
 
 On yonder gallows tree. 
 
 Sae rantingly^ sae wantonly, 
 
 Sae dauntingly gaed he ; 
 He playd a spring and danc'd it round. 
 
 Below the gallows tree. 
 
 Oh, what is death but parting breath ? — 
 
 On mony a bloody plain 
 I've dar'd his face, and in this place 
 
 I scorn him yet again I 
 Sae rantingly. Sec. 
 
 Untie these bands from off my hands, 
 And bring to me my sword ; 
 
BARNS' POEMib. 
 
 143 
 
 And there's no a .nan in ' (Scotland, 
 But ril brave liim at a \ord. 
 Sae rantingly, kr. 
 
 I've liv'd a life of sturt and strife ; 
 
 I die by treacherie : 
 It burns my heart I must depart 
 
 And not avenged be, 
 Sae rantingly, Sec. 
 
 Now farewell light, thou sunsliine bright, 
 
 And all beneath the sky ! 
 May coward shame distain his name, 
 
 The wretch that dares not die I 
 Sae rantingly^ kc. 
 
 SONG, 
 
 Here's a bottle and an honest friend! 
 
 What wad ye wish for mair, man .-' 
 Wha kens, before his life may end, 
 
 What his sliare may be of care, man ? 
 Then catch the moments as they fly, 
 
 And use them as ye ought, man : — 
 Believe me, happiness is shy. 
 
 And comes not ay when sought, man. 
 
 SONG. 
 
 Tune—" Braes o' Balquhidder. 
 
 ni kiss thee yet, yet, 
 
 An! ril kiss the o'er again. 
 
 An' ril kiss thee yet, yet, 
 My bonnie Peggy Alison ! 
 
 Ilk care and fear, when thou art near, 
 
 I ever mair defy them, O ; 
 Young kings upon their hansel throne 
 
 Are no sae blest as I am, O ! 
 ni kiss thee. Sec. 
 
 When in my arms, wi' a thy charms, 
 I clasp my countless treasure, O ; 
 
 I seek nae mau o' Heaven to share, 
 Than sic a moment's pleasure, O : 
 ru kiss thee, &c. 
 
 And by thy een, sae bonnie blue, 
 I swear I'm thine for ever, O ; 
 
 And on thy lips I seal my vow, 
 And break it shall I never, O ! 
 ra kiss thee. Sec. 
 
 SONG. 
 
 Tune— '* If he be a Butcher neat and trim," 
 
 On Cessnock banks there lives a lass, 
 Could I describe her shape and mien ; 
 
 The graces of her weelfar'd face. 
 And the glancin of her sparklin een. 
 
 She's fresher than the morning dawn 
 When rising Phoebus first is seen, 
 
 When dew-drops twinkle o'er the lawn ; 
 An' she's twa glancin sparklin een. 
 
 She's stately Uke yon youthful ash. 
 That grows the cowslip braes between. 
 
 And shoots its head above each bush ; 
 An' she's twa glancin sparklin een. 
 
 She's spotless as the flow'ring thorn 
 With ilow'rs so white and leaves so greeiii 
 
 When purest in the dewy morn ; 
 An' she's twa glancin sparklin een. 
 
 Her looks are like the sportive Iamb, 
 When flow'ry May adorns the scene, 
 
 That wantons round its bleating dam ; 
 An' she's twa glancin sparklin een. 
 
 Her hair is like the curling mist 
 That shades the mountain-side at e'en, 
 
 When flow'r-reviving rains are past; 
 An' she's twa glancin sparkliu een. 
 
 Her forehead 's like the show'ry bow, 
 When shining sunbeams intervene 
 
 And gild the distant mountain's brow ; 
 An' she's twa glancin sparklin een. 
 
 Her voice is like the ev'ning thrush 
 That sings in Cessnock banks unseen, 
 
 While his mate sits nestling in the bush; 
 An' she's twa glancin sparklin een. 
 
 Her lips are like the cherries ripe. 
 That sunny walls from Boreas screen. 
 
 They tempt the taste and charm the sight ; 
 An' she's twa glancin sparklin een. 
 
 Her teeth are like a flock of sheep. 
 With fleeces newly washen clean. 
 
 That slowly mount the rising steep ; 
 An' she's twa glancin sparklin een. 
 
 Her breath is like the fragrant breeze 
 That gently stirs the blossom'd bean. 
 
 When Phosbus sinks behind the seas ; 
 An' she's twa glancin sparklin een. 
 
144 
 
 But it's not her air, her form, her face, 
 Tho' matcliing beauty's fabled queen, 
 
 But the mind that sliines in ev'ry grace, 
 An' chiefly in her sparkhn een. 
 
 BURNS' POE&S. 
 
 WAE IS MV HEART. 
 
 Wae is my heart, and the tear's in my e'e ; 
 Lan^, lang joy's been a stranger to me : 
 Forsaken and frienillesH my burden I bear, 
 And the sweet voice o' pity ne'er sounds in my 
 ear. 
 
 Love, thou hast pleasure ; and deep hae I 
 
 loved ; 
 Love, thou hast sorrows ; and sair hae I proved : 
 But this bruised heart that now bleeds in my 
 
 breast, 
 I can feel by its th robbings will soon be at rest. 
 
 O if I were, where happy I hae been ; 
 
 Down by yon stream and yon bonnie castle 
 
 ffreen : 
 For there lie is wand'ring and musing on me, 
 Wha wad soon dry the tear frae Phillis's e'e. 
 
 SONG 
 
 Tune — " Banks of Banna." 
 
 YEStREEN I had a pint o' wine, 
 
 A place where body saw na' ; 
 Yestreen lay on this breast o' mine 
 
 The gowden locks of Anna. 
 The hungry Jew in wilderness 
 
 Rejoicing o'er his manna, 
 Was naething to my hiney bliss 
 
 Upon the lips of Anna. 
 
 Ye monarchs, tak the east and west, 
 
 Frae Indus to Savannn ! 
 Gie me witliiu my straining grasp 
 
 The melting form of Anna. 
 There I'll despise iui])erial charms. 
 
 An Empress or Sultana, 
 "While dying raptures in her arms 
 
 I give and take with Anna ! 
 
 Awa tliou flaunting god o' day ! 
 
 Awa tliou pale Diana ! 
 Ilk star gae hide thy twinkling ray 
 
 When I'm to meet my Anna. 
 
 Come, in thy raven plumage, night, 
 Sun, moon, and stars withdrawn a' 
 
 And bring an angel pen to write 
 My transports wi' my Anna I 
 
 SONG.* 
 
 TnE-Deil cam fiddling thro' the town. 
 And danc'd awa wi' the exciseman; 
 
 And ilka wife cry'd, " Auld Mahoun, 
 Wo wish you luck o' the prize man. 
 
 " JVe''ll mak our mau(, and breioour drink^ 
 We'll dance and sing and rejoice man ; 
 
 And monij thanks to the muckle black Deil, 
 That dunc''d awa ivC the Exciseman. 
 
 " There's threesome reels, and foursome reels, 
 There's hornpi])es and strathspeys, man; 
 
 But the ae best dance e'er cam to our Ian', 
 Was — the Deil's awa wi' the Exciseman. 
 We''ll mak our maut, &c." 
 
 SONG. 
 
 Powers celestial, whose protection 
 
 Ever guards the virtuous fair. 
 While in distant climes I wander, 
 
 Let my Mary be your care : 
 Let her form sae fair and faultless, 
 
 Fair and faultless as your own ; 
 Let uiy Mary's kindred spirit. 
 
 Draw your choicest influence down. 
 
 Make the gales you waft around her, 
 
 Sof and peaceful as her breast; 
 Breathing in the bieeze that fans her 
 
 Sooth her bosom into rest : 
 Guardian angels, O protect her, 
 
 Wlien in distant lands I roam ; 
 To realms unknown wliile fate exiles me. 
 
 Make her bosom still my homo.t 
 
 HUNTING SONG. 
 
 I RED YOU BEWARE AT THE HUNTING. 
 
 The heather was blooming, the meadows were 
 
 mawn. 
 Our lads gaed a-hunting, ae day at the dawn, 
 
 * At a meeting of his brother Excisemen in Dumfries, 
 Burns, being called upon for a Song handed these versea 
 extempore to the President written on the back of • 
 letter. 
 
 t Piohably writtnn on Hiphland Mary, on the evs of 
 the Poet's departure to the VVett Indlet. 
 
BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 US 
 
 O'er moors and o'er mosses and mony a glen, 
 At length they discovered a bonnie moor-hen 
 
 / red you beivare at (he hunting, young men ; 
 J red you beware at the hunting, young men ; 
 Tak some on the wing, and some as they spring, 
 But cannily steal on the bonnie moor-hen. 
 
 Sweet brushing the dew from the brown hea- 
 ther bells, 
 Her colours betray'd her on yon mossy fells ; 
 Her plumage outlustred the pride o' the spring. 
 And O ! aa she wantoned gay on the wing. 
 I red. Sec. 
 
 Auld Phoebus himsel, as he peep'd o'er the 
 
 hill; 
 In spite at her plumage he tried liis skill ; 
 He Icvell'd his rays where she bask'd on the 
 
 brae — 
 His rays were outshone, and but mark'd where 
 
 she lay. 
 
 J red, ice. 
 
 They hunted the valley, they hunted the hill ; 
 The best of our lads wi' the best o' their skill ; 
 But still as the fairest she sat in their sight. 
 Then, whirr ! she was over, a mile at a flight. — 
 / red. See. 
 
 YOUNG PEGGY. 
 
 TouNO Peggy blooms our bonniest lass, 
 
 Her blush is like the morning. 
 The rosy dawn, the springing grass. 
 
 With early gems adoinin£r : 
 Her eyes outshine the radiant boams 
 
 That gild the passing shower. 
 And glitter o'er the crystal strfams. 
 
 And cheer each fresh'niiifi- flower. 
 
 Her lips more than the cherries bright, 
 
 A richer die has grac'd them. 
 They charm th' admiring gazer's sighf. 
 
 And sweetly tempt to taste them : 
 Her smile is as the ev'ning mild. 
 
 When feather'd pairs are courting, 
 And httle lambkms wanton wild, 
 
 In playful bands disporting. 
 
 Were Fortune lovely Peggy's foe. 
 Such sweetness would relent her, 
 
 Ae blooming Spring unbends the brow 
 Of surly, savage Winter. 
 
 Detraction's eyes no aim can gam 
 Her winning powers to lessen : 
 
 And fretful envy,grins in vain, 
 The poison'd tooth to fasten. 
 
 Ye pow'rs of Honour, Love, and Tnitb, 
 
 From ev'ry ill defend her ; 
 Inspire the highly favour'd youth 
 
 The destinies intend her ; 
 Still fan the sweet connubial flame 
 
 Responsive in each bosom ; 
 And bless the dear parental name 
 
 With many a filial blossom.* 
 
 SONG. 
 
 Tune—" The King of France, ho rade a Race ' 
 
 Amang the trees where humming bees 
 
 At buds and flowers were hanging, O 
 Auld Caledon drew out her drone, 
 
 And to her pipe was singing ; O 
 'Twas pibroch, sang, strathspey, or reels, 
 
 She dirl'd them aff, fu' clearly, O 
 When there cam a yell o' foreign squeels, 
 
 That dang her tapsalteerie, O— 
 
 Their capon craws and queer ha ha's, 
 
 They made our lugs grow eerie, O 
 The hungry bike did scrape an pike 
 
 Till we were wae and weary ; O — 
 But a royal ghaist wha ance was cas'd 
 
 A prisoner aughteen year awa. 
 He fir'd a fiddler in the .\orth 
 
 That dang them tapsalteerie, O 
 
 SONG. 
 
 Tune — " John Andei son my J©.' 
 
 One night as I did wander. 
 
 When com begins to shoot, 
 I sat me down to ponder, 
 
 Upon an auld tree root : 
 Auld Aire ran by before me, 
 
 And bicker'd to the seas ; 
 A cushat crowded o'er me 
 
 That echoed thro' the braes. 
 
 • This waa one of the Poet's earliesl compoeitiont. 
 It is copied from a MS book, wblchhe bad bvfMahli 
 
 drst pubUcsilon. 
 
BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 SONG. 
 
 Tune — " Daintie Davie." 
 
 Thfbk was a lad was born at Kyle,* 
 But what na day o' what na style 
 1 doubt it's hardly worth the while 
 To be sae nice wi' Robin. 
 
 Robin was a ravin'' Boy, 
 
 Ranli7i' rovin\ rantin'' rovin' , 
 
 Robin tvas a rovin'' Boy, 
 Rantin rovin' Robin. 
 
 Our monarch's hindmost year but ane 
 Was five and twenty days begun, 
 Twas then a blast o' Janwar Win' 
 Blew hansel in on Robin. 
 
 The gossip keekit in his loof, 
 Quo' scho wha lives will see the proof, 
 This waly boy will be nae coof, 
 I think we'll ca' liim Robin. 
 
 He'll hae misfortunes great and sma'. 
 But ay a heart aboon them a' ; 
 He'll be a credit till us a', 
 We'll a' be proud o' Robin. 
 
 But sure as tliree times three mak nine, 
 I see by ilka score and line, 
 This ciiap will dearly like our kin', 
 * So leeze mc on thee, Robin. 
 
 Guid faith quo' scho I doubt you. Sir, 
 Ye gar the lasses =***='= 
 But twenty fauts ye may hae waur 
 So blessin's on thee, Robin .' 
 
 Robin was n rovin Boy, 
 
 Rantin' rofvin\ ranVaC rovin' ; 
 Robin' was a rovin' Boy, 
 
 Rantin' roviji' Robin. 
 
 SONG. 
 
 Tune — " I had a Horse and I had nae mair." 
 
 When first I came to Stewart Kyle, 
 
 My mind it was nae steady, 
 Where'er I gaed, whare'cr 1 rade 
 
 A mistress still I had ay : 
 
 * Kylt—a. district of Ayrshire. 
 
 But when I came roun' by Maucbhne town, 
 
 iSot dreadin' any body. 
 My heart was caught before 1 thought. 
 
 And by a Mauchline lady. 
 
 SONG. 
 
 Tune—" Galla Water." 
 
 Altho' my bed were in yon muir, 
 Amang the heather, in my plaidie, 
 
 Yet happy, happy would I be 
 
 Had I my dear Montgomerie's Peggy. — 
 
 When o'er the hill beat surly storms. 
 And winter nights were dark and rainy ; 
 
 I'll seek some dell, and in my arras 
 I'd shelter dear Montgomerie's Peggy. — 
 
 Were I a Baron proud and high. 
 And horse and servants waiting ready, 
 
 Then a' 'twad gie o' joy to me. 
 
 The sharin't with Montgomerie's Peggy .- 
 
 SONG. 
 
 O RAGING fortune's withering blast 
 
 Has laid my leaf fiill low ! O 
 O raging fortune's withering blast 
 
 Has laid my leaf full low ! O. 
 My stem was fair, my bud was green 
 
 My blossom sweet did blow ; O 
 The dew fell fresh, the sun rose mild. 
 
 And made my branches grow ; O. 
 But luckless fortune's northern storms 
 
 Laid a' my blossoms low, O 
 But luckless fortune's northern storms 
 
 Laid a' my blossoms low, O. 
 
 SONG. 
 
 VATKlOTlC—7inJinishcd. 
 
 Here's a health to them lliat's awa. 
 Here's a health to them that's awa ; 
 And wha winna wish ifuid luck to our cause, 
 May never j^uid luck be their fa'. 
 
BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 147 
 
 It's guid to be merry and wise, 
 It's guid to be honest and true, 
 It's guid to support Caledonia's cause. 
 And bide by the buff and the blue. 
 
 Here's a liealth to them that's awa, 
 
 Here's a liealth to them that's awa ; 
 
 Here's a health to Charlie * the chief o' the clan, 
 
 Altho' that his hand be but sma'. 
 
 May liberty meet wi' success ! ♦ 
 
 May prudence protect her frae evil ! 
 
 May tyrants and tyranny tine in the mist, 
 
 And wander their way to the devil ! 
 
 Here's a health to them that's awa. 
 
 Here's a health to them that's awa, 
 
 Here's a health to Tammie,t the Norland lad- 
 
 That lives at the lug o' the law ! [die, 
 
 Here's freedom to him that wad read, 
 
 Here's freedom to him that wad write ! 
 
 There's nane ever fear'd tliat the truth should 
 
 be heard. 
 But they wham the truth wad indict. 
 
 Here's a health to them that's awa. 
 Here's a health to them that's awa. 
 Here's Chieftain M'Leod, a Cliieftain worth 
 
 gowd, 
 Tho' bred amang mountains o' snaw I 
 
 SONG. 
 
 THE PLOUGHMAN. 
 
 As I was a-wand'ring ae morning in sprmg, 
 I heard, a young Ploughman sae sweetly to 
 
 sing, 
 And as he was singin' thir words he did say. 
 There's nae life like the Ploughman in the 
 
 month o' sweet May — 
 
 The lav'rock in the morning she'll rise frae her 
 nest, [breast, 
 
 And mount to the air wi' the dew on her 
 
 And wi' the merry Ploughman she'll whistle 
 and sing. 
 
 And at night she'll return to her nest back 
 again. 
 
 SONG. 
 
 Her flowing locks, the raven's wing, 
 Adown her neck and bosom hing ; 
 
 How sweet unto that breast to cling, 
 And round that neck entwine her ! 
 
 t Lord Erukiiie. 
 
 Her Ups are roses wat wi' dew, 
 O, what a feast, her bonnie mou ! 
 
 Her cheeks a mair celestial hue, 
 A crimson still diviner. 
 
 BALLAD. 
 
 To thee, lov'd Nith, thy gladsome plains, 
 Wkere late wi' careless thought I ran^'d, 
 
 Though prest wi' care and sunk in wo, ° 
 To thee I bring a heart unchang'd. 
 
 I love thee, Nith, thy banks and braes, 
 Tho' mem'ry there my bosom tear ; 
 
 For there he rov'd that brake my heart. 
 Yet to that heart, ah, still how dear ! 
 
 SONG. 
 
 The winter it is past, and the simmer comes at 
 last. 
 
 And the small birds sing on every tree ; 
 Now every thmg is glad, while I am very sad, 
 
 Since my true love is parted from me. 
 
 The rose upon the brier by the waters running 
 clear. 
 May have charms for the linnet or the bee ; 
 Their little loves are blest, and their Uttle hearts 
 at rest. 
 But my true love is parted from me. 
 
 GUIDWIFE OF WAUCHOPE-HOUSE 
 
 ROBF.KT BURN3. 
 
 February, 1787. 
 
 My ranty, witty, rhyming ploughman, 
 1 hafflins doubt, it is na true man, 
 That ye between the stilts were bred, 
 Wi' piouglimen Rchool'd, wi' ploughmen fed. 
 I doubt it sair, yeVo drawn your knowledge 
 Either trae gramniar-scJiool, or college. 
 Guid troth, your saul and body baith 
 War' better fed, I'd gie my aith. 
 Than llieirs, who sup sour-milk and parritch, 
 An' bummil thro' the single caritch, 
 Wha pver heard the ploughman speak, 
 Could tell gif Homer was a Greek ? 
 
IIURNS' POEMS. 
 
 He'd rtee as soon upon a cudgel, 
 
 As get a single line of Virgil. 
 
 An' then sae slee ye crack your jokes 
 
 O' Willie P— t and Charlie F— x. 
 
 Our great men a' sae weel descrive, 
 
 An' how to gar the nation thrive, 
 
 Ane maist wad swear ye dwalt aniangthem, 
 
 An' as ye saw them, sae ye sang them. 
 
 But be ye ploughman, be ye peer, 
 
 Ye are a funny blade, I swear ; 
 
 An' though the cauld I ill can bide, 
 
 Yet twenty miles, an' mair, I'd nde, 
 
 O'er moss, an' muir, an' never grumble, 
 
 Tho' my auld yad shou'd gie a stumble, 
 
 To crack a winter-night wi' thee, 
 
 And hear thy sangs and sonnets slee. 
 
 A guid saut herring, an' a cake, 
 
 Wi' sic a chiel, a feast wad make, 
 
 I'd rather scour your reaming yill. 
 
 Or eat o' cheese and bread my fill, 
 
 Than wi' dull lairds on turtle dine, 
 
 An' ferlie at their wit and wine. 
 
 O, gif I kenn'd but whare ye baide, 
 
 Pd send to you a marled plaid ; 
 
 'Twad baud your shoulders warm and braw, 
 
 An' douse at kirk, or market shaw. 
 
 For south, as weel as north, my lad, 
 
 A' honest Scotchmen lo'e the maud, 
 
 Right wae that we're sae far frae ither : 
 
 Yet proud I am to ca' ye brither. 
 
 Your moBt obedt. 
 
 E.S. 
 
 THE ANSWER. 
 
 GUIDWIFE, 
 
 I MIND it weel, in early date. 
 
 When i was beardless young, and blate. 
 
 An' first could thresh the bam ; 
 Or haud a yokin at the pleugh, 
 An' tho' forfoughten sair eneugh. 
 
 Yet unco proud to learn ; 
 When first amang the yellow corn 
 
 A man I reckon'd was. 
 And wi' the lave ilk merry morn 
 Could rank my rig and lass. 
 Still shearing, and clearing 
 The tither stooked raw, 
 Wi' claivers, an' haivers. 
 Wearing the day awa, — 
 
 E'n tlien a wish, (I mind its power) 
 A wish: that to my latest hour 
 Shall strongly heave my breast ; 
 
 That I for poor auld Scotland's sake, 
 Some usefu' plan, or book could make, 
 
 Or sing a sang at least. 
 The rough bur-thistle, spreading wide 
 
 Among the bearded bear, 
 I turn'd my weeding-heuk aside, 
 An' spar'd the symbol dear ; 
 No nation, no station. 
 
 My envy e'er could raise, 
 A Scot still, but blot still, 
 I knew nae higher praise. 
 
 But still the elements o' sang 
 
 In formless jumble, right an' wrang, 
 
 Wild floated in my brain : 
 Till on that har'st I said before, 
 My partner in the merry core, _ 
 
 She rous'd the forming strain 
 I see her yet, the sonsie quean, 
 
 That lighted up her jingle. 
 Her witching smile, her pauky e'en 
 That gart my heart-strings tingle ; 
 I fired, inspired. 
 
 At ev'ry kindlmg keek. 
 But basiling, and dashing, 
 I feared ay to speak. 
 
 Hale to the set, each guid chiel says, 
 Wi' merry dance in winter-days. 
 An' we to share in common : 
 The gust o' joy, the balm of wo, 
 The saul o' life, the heav'n below, 
 
 Is rapture-giving woman. 
 Ye surly sumphs, who hate the name. 
 
 Be niindfu' o' your mither : 
 She, honest woman, maythink shame 
 That ye're connected with her. 
 Ye're wae men, ye're nae men. 
 That slight the lovely dears ; 
 To shame ye, disclaim yc, 
 Ilk honest birkie swears. 
 
 For you, na bred to barn and byre, 
 Wha sweetly tune the Scottish lyre, 
 
 Thanks to you for your line. 
 The marled plaid ye kindly spare, 
 By me should gratefully he ware ; 
 
 "'Twad please nie, to the Nine. 
 I'd be mair vauntic o' my hap. 
 
 Douse hiugin o'or my curple. 
 Than ony ermme ever lap. 
 Or proud imperial purple. 
 
 Farcwcol tlien, lang hale then, 
 
 An' plenty be your fa : 
 May losses and crosses 
 
 lay losses 
 Ne'er at 
 
 J\raicfi, 1787. 
 
 your hallan ca\ 
 
 Robert Burn<% 
 
SONG. 
 
 BURKS' PUEMS. 149 
 
 THERE WAS A BONNIE LASS. 
 
 Tone — " The tither morn, as I forlorn.' 
 
 Yon wand'ring rill, that marks the hill, 
 And glances o'er the brae, Sir : 
 
 Slides by a bower where mony a flower, 
 Shades fragrance on the day. Sir. 
 
 There Damon lay, with Sylvia gay : 
 To love they thought nae crime, Sir ; 
 
 The wild-birds sang, the echoes rang. 
 While Damon's heart beat time, Sir. 
 
 SONG. 
 
 As I cam in by our gate-end, 
 As day was waxen weary ; i-' . 
 
 O wha cam tripping down the street, . 
 But bonnie Peg, my dearie. 
 
 Her air sae sweet, and shape complete, 
 Wi' nae proportion wanting ; 
 
 The queen of love, did never move, 
 Wi' motion mair enchanting. 
 
 Wi' linked hands, wo took the sands, 
 
 Adown yon winding river. 
 And, Oh ! that hour, an' broomy bower 
 
 Can I forget it ever ? 
 
 POLLY STEWART. 
 Tone — ^" Ye're welcome Chariie Stewart." 
 
 O Lovely Polly Stewart, 
 
 O charming Polly Stewart, 
 There's ne'er a flower that blooms in May, 
 
 That's half so fair as thou art. 
 
 The flower it blaws, it fades, it fa's, 
 
 And art can ne'er renew it ; 
 But worth and truth eternal youth 
 
 Will gie to Polly Stewart. 
 
 May he, whase arms shall fauld thy charms, 
 
 Possess a leal and true lieart ; 
 To him be given to ken tlie heaven 
 
 He grasps in Polly Stewart! 
 O lordy, ice 
 
 There was a bonnie lass, and a bonnie, bonnio 
 lass, 
 And she lo'ed her bonnie laddie dear ; 
 Till war's loud alarms tore her laddie frao hor 
 arms, 
 Wi' mony a sigh and a tear. 
 Over sea, over shore, where the caimons loudly 
 roar, 
 He still was a stranger to fear ; 
 And nocht could him quell, or his bosom assail, 
 But the bomiie lass he lo'ed sao dear. 
 
 TIBBIE DUNBAR. 
 
 Tune— " Johimy M'Gill. 
 
 O WILT thou go wi' me, sweet Tibbie Dun- 
 bar ; 
 
 wilt thou go wi' me, sweet Tibbie Dunbar ; 
 Wilt thou ride on a horse, or be drawn in a 
 
 car, 
 Or walk by my side, O sweet Tibbie Dunbar? 
 
 1 carena thy daddie, his lands and his money, 
 I carena thy kin, sae high and sae lordly : 
 But say thou wilt hae me for better for waur, 
 And come in thy coatie, sweet Tibbie Dun- 
 bar. 
 
 ROBIN SHURE IN HAIRST. 
 
 Robin shure in hairst 
 
 I shure wi' him, 
 Fient a heuk had I, 
 
 Yet I stack by him. 
 
 I gaed up to Dunse, 
 
 To warp a wab o' plaiden, 
 At his daddie 's yett, 
 
 Wha met me but Robin. 
 
 Was na Robin bauld, 
 
 Tho' I was a cotter, 
 Play'd me sic a trick 
 
 And me the eller's dochter i 
 Robin shure, Sec. 
 
 Robin promis'd me 
 
 A' my winter vittle ; 
 Fient haet he had but three 
 
 Goose feathers and a whittl«> 
 Robin ihure, See. 
 
150 
 
 BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 MY LADY'S GOWN THERE'S GAIRS 
 UPON'T. 
 
 My lady's gown there's gairs upon't. 
 And gowden flowers sae rare upon't 
 But Jenny's jimps and jirkiuet, 
 My lord thinks uiuckle mair upon't. 
 
 My lord a-hunting he is gane, 
 But hounds or hawks wi' him are naiie, 
 By Colin's cottage lies his game, 
 li'Colin's Jenny be at haine. 
 Jtfy ladys goivii, &cc. 
 
 My lady's wliite, my lady's red. 
 And kith and kin o' CassiUis' blude. 
 But her ten-pund lands o' tocher gnid 
 Were a' the charms his lordship lo eJ. 
 Mj/ ladi/'s gow7i, Sec. 
 
 Out o'er yon moor, out o'er yon moss. 
 Whare gor-cocks thro* the heatlicr pass, 
 There wons auld Colin's bonnie lass, 
 A lily in a wilderness. 
 My ladys goivn, Sec. 
 
 Sae sweetly move her gcnty limbs, 
 Like music notes o' lover's hymns : 
 The diamond dew in her een sae bine, 
 Where laughing love sac wanton swims. 
 My lady's gown, Sec. 
 
 My lady's dink, my lady's drest. 
 The flower and fancy o' the west ; 
 But the lassie tliat a man lo'es best, 
 O that's the lass to make him blest. 
 My lady's gown. Sec. 
 
 WEE WILLIE GRAY 
 
 Wee WiUie Gray, and his leather wallet; 
 Peel a willow-wand to be him boots and 
 
 jacket : 
 The rose upon the brier will be him Irouse and 
 
 doublet, 
 The rose upon the brier will be him trouae and 
 
 doublet. 
 
 Wee Willie Gray, and his leather wallet ; 
 Twice a lily flower will be in him sark and 
 
 cravat : 
 Feathers of a fle'e wad feather uj) his bonnet, 
 Feathers of a flee wad feather up his bonnet. 
 
 THE NORTHERN LASS. 
 
 Tho' cruel fate should bid us part. 
 
 Far as the pole and line ; 
 Her dear idea round my heart 
 
 Should tenderly entwine. 
 Tho' mountains rise, and deserts howl, 
 
 And oceans roar between ; 
 Yet dearer than my deathless soul, 
 
 1 still would love my Jean. 
 
 COULD AUGHT OF SONG. 
 
 ( ouLD aught of song declare my pains, 
 
 Could artful numbers move thee, 
 The muse should tell, in labour'd strains, 
 
 O Mary, how I love tliee. 
 They who but, feign a wounded heart, 
 
 May teach the lyre to languish ; 
 But what avails the pride of art. 
 
 When wastes tiie soul with anguish.' 
 
 Then let the sudden bursting sigh 
 
 The heart-felt pang discover ; 
 And in the keen, yet tender eye, 
 
 O read th' imploring lover. 
 For well I know th}' gentle mind 
 
 Disdains art's gay disguising ; 
 Beyond wdiat fancy e'er refin'd 
 
 The voice of nature prizing. 
 
 O GUID ALE COMES. 
 
 GUID ale comes, and guid ale goes, 
 Gnid ale gats me sell my hose. 
 
 Sell mv hose, and pawn my shoon, 
 Guid ale keeps my heart aboon. 
 
 1 had sax ow"sen in a pleugh, 
 They drew a' weel enough. 
 
 I sell'd them a' just ane by ane ; 
 Guid ale keeps my heart aboon. 
 
 Guid ale hands me bare and busy, 
 Gars me moop wi' the servant hizzie, 
 Stand i' the stool when I hae done, 
 Guid ale keeps my heart aboon. 
 O guid ale comes," and gude ale goes, 
 Guid ale gars me sell my hose. 
 Sell my hose, and pawn my shoon ; 
 Guid ale keeps my heart aboon. 
 
BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 151 
 
 O LEAVE NOVELS. 
 
 O LEAVE novels, ye Mauchline belles, 
 
 Ye're safer at your spinning'-wheel ; 
 Such witching books, are baited hooks 
 
 For rakiwh rooks, like Rob Mossgiel. 
 Your fine Tom Jones and Grandisons, 
 
 They make your youthful fancies ree , 
 They heat your brains, and fire your veins, 
 
 And then you're prey for Rob Mossgiel. 
 
 Beware a tongue that's smoothly hung : 
 
 A heart that warmly seems to feel ; 
 That feeling heart but acts a part, 
 
 'Tis rakish art in Rob Mossgiel. 
 The frank address, the soft caress. 
 
 Are worse than poisoned darts of steel. 
 The frank address, and politesse. 
 
 Are all finesse in Rob Mossgiel. 
 
 O AY MY WIFE SHE DANG ME. 
 
 O AY my wife she dang me. 
 An' aft my wife she bang'd me ; 
 If ye gie a woman a' her will, 
 Guid faith she'll soon o'ergang ye. 
 
 On peace and rest my mind was bent, 
 
 And fool I was I marry'd ; 
 But never honest man's intent 
 
 As cursedly miscarry'd. 
 
 Some sairie comfort still at last, 
 When a' thir days are done, man, 
 
 My pains o' hell on earth is past, 
 I'm sure o' bliss aboon, man. 
 O ay my wife, kc. 
 
 THE DEUKS DANG O'ER MY DADDIE. 
 
 The bairns gat out wi' an unco shout. 
 
 The deuks dang o'er my daddie, O ! 
 The fient ma care, quo' the feirie auld wife, 
 
 He was but a paidlin body, O ! 
 He paidles out, and he paidles in. 
 
 An' he paidles late and earlie, O ; 
 This seven lang years I hae lien by his side, 
 
 An' he is but a fusionless earlie, O. 
 
 O had your tongue, my feirie auld wife, 
 O had your tongue now, Nansie, O : 
 
 I've seen the day, and sae hae ye, 
 Ye wadna been Hae donsie, O : 
 
 I've seen the day ye butter'd my brose, 
 And cuddl'd mo lato and earlie, O ; 
 
 But downa do's come o'er me now, 
 And, Oh, I find it sairly, O ! 
 
 DELIA. 
 
 Fair the face of orient day. 
 Fair the tints of op'ning rose ; 
 But fairer still my Delia dawns, 
 More lovely far her beauty blows. 
 
 Sweet the lark's wild-warblod lay. 
 Sweet the tinkling rill to hear; 
 But, Delia, more delightful still. 
 Steal thine accents on mine ear. 
 
 The flower-enamour 'd busy bee 
 The rosy banquet loves to sip ; 
 Sweet the streamlet's limpid lapse 
 To the sun-brown'd Arab's lip ; 
 
 But, Delia, on thy balmy lips 
 
 Let me, no vagrant insect, rove ! 
 
 O let me steal one liquid kiss, 
 
 For Oh I my soul is parch'd with love ! 
 
 ON A BANK OF FLOWERS. 
 
 On a bank of flowers one summer's day. 
 
 For summer lightly dress'd. 
 The youthful, blooming Nelly lay, 
 
 With love and sleep oppress'd ; 
 When Willy, wand'ring thro' the wood, 
 
 Who for her favour oft had su'd, 
 He gaz'd, he wish'd, he fear'd, he blush'd. 
 
 And trembled where he stood. 
 
 Her closed eyes, like weapons sheath'd, 
 
 Were seal'd in soft repose, 
 Her lips still as they fragrant breath'd, 
 
 It richer dy'd the rose. 
 The sprmging lilies sweetly press 'd. 
 
 Wild wanton kiss'd her rival breast ; 
 He gaz'd, he wish'd, he feard, he blush'd 
 
 His bosom ill at rest. 
 
 Her ro'bes, light waving in the breeze, 
 
 Her tender limbs embrace. 
 Her lovely form, her native ease. 
 
 All harmony and grace. 
 Tumultuous tides his pulses roll, 
 
 A flattering ardent kiss he stole : 
 He gaz'd, he wish'd, he fear'd, he blush'd, 
 
 And sigh'd hu very soul 
 
152 
 
 BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 As flies the partridge from the brake, 
 
 On fear inspired wings ; 
 So Nelly startling, half' awake, 
 
 Away affrighted springs. 
 But Willy follow'd as he should, 
 
 He overtook her m the wood, 
 He vow'd, he pray'd, he found the maid 
 
 Forgiving all and good. 
 
 EVAN BANKS. 
 
 Slow spreads the gloom my soul desires, 
 The sun from India's shore retires ; 
 To Evan banks with temperate ray 
 Home of pay youth, it leads the day. 
 Oh ! banks to me for ever dear ! 
 Oh ! stream whose murmurs still I hear ! 
 All, all my hopes of bliss reside, 
 Where Evan mingles with the Clyde. 
 
 And she, in simple beauty drest, 
 Whose image lives within my breast ; 
 ■Who trembling heard my parting sigh. 
 And long pursued me with her eye ! 
 Does she with heart unchang'd as mine, 
 Oft in thy vocal bosvers recline ? 
 Or where yon grot o'erhangs the tide, 
 Muse wliile the Evan seeks the Clyde. 
 
 Ye lofty banks that Evan bound ! 
 Ye lavish woods that wave around. 
 And o'er the stream your shadows throw, 
 Which sweetly winds so far below ; 
 What secret charm to mem'ry brings. 
 All that on Evan's border springs ? 
 Sweet banks 1 ye bloom by Mary's side : 
 Blest stream I she views thee haste to Clyde. 
 
 Can all the wealth of India's coast 
 Atone for years in absence lost ; 
 Return, ye moments of delight, 
 With richer treasure bless my sight ! 
 Swift from this desert let me part. 
 And fi y to meet a kindred heart ! 
 Nor more may aught my steps divide 
 Fromthat dear stream which flows to Clyde. 
 
 THE FIVE CARLINS. 
 
 AN ELECTION BALLAD. 
 
 Tune— "Chevy Chace." 
 
 There were five Carlins in the south, 
 
 They fell upon a scheme, 
 To send a lad to Lon'on town 
 
 To bring us tidings hame. 
 
 Not only bring us tidings hame, 
 
 But do our errands there. 
 And aiblins gowd and honour baith 
 
 Might be that laddie's share. 
 
 There was Maggie by the banks o' Nith.* 
 
 A dame wi' pride enough ; 
 And Marjorie o' the monie Loch,t 
 
 A Carlin auld an' teugh. 
 
 And blinkin Bess o' Annandale,:]: 
 That dwells near Solway side, 
 
 And whisky Jean that took her gill} 
 In Galloway so wide. 
 
 And auld black Joan frae Creighton peel, 
 
 O' gipsy kith an' kin. 
 Five weightier CarUns were na found 
 
 The south kintra witliin. 
 
 To send a lad to Lon'on town 
 
 They met upon a day, 
 And monie a Knight and monie a Laird 
 
 That errand fain would gae. 
 
 O I monie a Knight and monie a Laird, 
 
 This errand fain would gae ; 
 But nae ane could their fancy please, 
 
 O ! ne'er a ane but twae. 
 
 The first ane was a belted Knight, 
 
 Bred o' a border band. 
 An' he wad gae to Lon'on town. 
 
 Might nae man him withstand. 
 
 And lie wad do their errands weel, 
 
 And meikle lie wad say, 
 And ilka ane at Lon'on court 
 
 Wad bid to him 'guid day. 
 
 Then niest caine in a sodger youth, 
 
 And spak wi' modest grace, 
 An' he wad gae to Lon'on town. 
 
 If sae their pleasure was. 
 
 He wad na hecht them courtly gift, 
 
 Nor meikle speech pretend ; 
 But he wad hecht an honest heart 
 
 Wad ne'er desert his friend. 
 
 Now whom to choose and whom refuse ; 
 
 To strife thae Cailms fell ; 
 For some had gentle folk to please, 
 
 And some wad please themsel. 
 
 Then out spak mim-mou'd Meg o' Nith, 
 
 An' she spak out wi' pride, 
 An' she wad send the sodger youth 
 
 Whatever might betide. 
 
 ♦Dumfries. tLocbmaben. t Annan 
 
 5 Kirkcudbright. Sanquhar. 
 
BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 For the auld guidman o' Lon'on court 
 
 She did not care a pin, 
 But she wad send the sodger youth 
 
 To greet liis eldest son.° 
 
 Then up sprang Bess o' Annandale : 
 
 A deadly aith she's ta'en. 
 That she wad vote the border Knjght, 
 
 Tho' she should vote her lane. 
 
 For far off fowls hae feathers fair, 
 
 An' fools o' change are fain : 
 But I hae tried the border Knight, 
 
 I'll try him yet again. 
 
 Says auld black Joan frae Creighton peel, 
 
 A Carlin stout and grim, 
 The auld guidman or young guidman: 
 
 For me may sink or swim ! 
 
 For fools may prate o' right and wrang. 
 While knaves laugh them to scorn ; 
 
 But the Sodger's friends hae blawn the best 
 Sae he shall bear the horn. 
 
 Then whisky Jean spak o'er her drink, 
 
 Ye weel ken kimmers a', 
 The auld guidman o' Lon'on court, 
 
 His back's been at the wa'. 
 
 And monie a friend that kiss'd his caup, 
 
 Is now a frammit wight ; 
 But it's n'eer sae wi' whisky Jean, 
 
 We'll send the border Knight. 
 
 Then slow raise Majorie o' the Lochs, 
 
 And wrinkled was her brow ; 
 Her ancient weed was russet gray. 
 
 Her auld Scots heart was true. 
 
 There's some great folks set light by me, 
 
 I set as light by them ; 
 But I will send to Lon'on town 
 
 Wha Ilo'e best at hame. 
 
 So how this weighty plea will end, 
 
 Nae mortal wight can tell ; 
 G-d grant the King and ilka man 
 
 May look weel to himsel. 
 
 THE LASS THAT MADE THE BED 
 TO ME. 
 
 When January winds were blawing cauld 
 As to the north I bent my way, ' 
 
 The mirksome night did me enfauld, 
 I kcnn'd na whare to lod</e till dav • 
 L 3 ° ^' 
 
 By my guid luck a lass I met, 
 Just in the middle of my care, 
 
 And kindly she did me invite. 
 To walk into a chamber fair. 
 
 1 bow'd fu' low unto this maid. 
 
 And thank'd her for her courtesie ; 
 I bow'd fu' low imto this maid, 
 
 And bade her make a bed for me : 
 She made the bed both large and wide, 
 
 Wi' twa white hands she spread it down ; 
 She put the cup to her rosy lips. 
 
 And drank, "Young man, now sleep ye 
 sound." 
 
 She snatch'd the candle in her hand. 
 
 And frae my chamber went wi' speed : 
 But I call'd her quickly back again. 
 
 To lay some mair below my head ; 
 A cod she laid below my head, 
 
 And served me with due respect; 
 And to salute her with a kiss, 
 
 I put my arms about her neck. 
 
 " Hand affyour hands, young man," says she, 
 
 " And dinna sae uncivil be ; 
 Gif ye hae ony love for me, 
 
 O wrang na my virginity I" 
 Her hair was like the links o' gowd, 
 
 Her teeth were like the ivory. 
 Her cheeks like lilies dipt in wine. 
 
 The lass that made the bed for me. 
 
 Her bosom was the driven snaw, 
 
 Twa drifted heaps sae fair to see; 
 Her limbs the polish'd marble stane, 
 
 The lass that made the bed to me. 
 I kiss'd her owre and owre again. 
 
 And ay she wistna what to say ; 
 I laid her 'tween me and the wa' ; 
 
 The lassie thought na lang till day. 
 
 Upon the morrow, when we rg,ise, 
 
 I thank'd her for her courtesie ; 
 But ay she blush 'd, and ay she sigh'd. 
 
 And said, "Alas ! ye've ruin'd me." 
 I clasp'd her waist, and kiss'd her syne. 
 
 While the tear stood twinkling in her e'e 
 I said, "my lassie, dinna cry. 
 
 For ye ay shall mak the bed to me." 
 
 She took her mither's Holland sheets. 
 And made them a' in sarks to me ; 
 
 Blythe and merry may she be, 
 The lass that made the bed to me. 
 
 The bonnie lass made the bed to me, 
 ^ The braw lass made the bed to me ; 
 
 I'll ne'er forget, fill the day that I die, 
 The lass that made the bed to mc. 
 
154 BURNS' POEMS 
 
 THE KIRK'S ALARM* 
 
 Orthodox, Orthodox, wha believe in John 
 Knox, 
 Let me sound an alarm to your conscience ; 
 rhere's a heretic blast, has been blawn in the 
 wast, 
 That what is no sense must be nonsense. 
 
 Dr. Mac,t Dr. Mac, you should stretch on a 
 rack, 
 
 To strike evil doers wi' terror ; 
 To join faith and sense upon ony pretence. 
 
 Is heretic, damnable error. 
 
 Town of Ayr, town of Ayr, it was mad I de- 
 clare, 
 
 To meddle wi' miscliief a-brewing ; 
 Provost John is still deaf to the church's relief, 
 
 And orator Bob :|: is it's ruin. 
 
 D'rymple mild, 5 D'rymplc mild, tho' your 
 
 heart's like a child. 
 
 And your life like the new driven snaw, 
 
 Yet that winna save ye, auld Satan must have 
 
 ye. 
 
 For preaching that three's ane and twa. 
 
 Rumble John, || Rumble John, mount the steps 
 wi' a groan. 
 Cry the book is wi' heresy cramm'd ; 
 Then lug out your ladle, deal brimstone like 
 addle^ 
 And roar every note of the damn'd. 
 
 Simper James,ir Simper James, leave the fair 
 Killie dames. 
 There's a holier chase in your view ; 
 I'll lay on your head, that tlie pack ye'U soon 
 lead. 
 For puppies Uke you there's but few. 
 
 Smget Sawney,** Singet Sawney, are ye herd- 
 ing the penny. 
 
 Unconscious what evils await ? 
 Wi' a jump, yell, and howl, alarm every soul, 
 
 For the foul thief is just at your gate. 
 
 Daddy Auld,tt Daddy Auld, there's a tod in 
 the fauld, 
 A tod meikle waur than the Clerk ; 
 Tho' ye can do little skaith, ye'll be in at the 
 death, 
 And gif ye canna bite, ye may bark. 
 
 • This Poem was written a short limn after the pub- 
 lication of Dr. M'Gill's Kssay. 
 
 t Dr. M'Gill. t V- -t A— k— n. 5 Mr. D— m— le. 
 
 II Mr. R-ss-ll. IT Mr. M'K-y. ♦♦ Mr. M y. 
 
 tt Mr. A -d. 
 
 Davie Bluster,* Davie Bluster, if for a saint ye 
 do muster. 
 The corps is no nice of recruits : 
 Yet to worth let's be just, royal blood ye might 
 boast, 
 Ff the ass was the kmg of the brutes. 
 
 Jamie Groose,+ Jamie Goose, ye hae made but 
 toom roose, 
 In hunting the wicked Lieutenant; 
 But the Doctor's your mark, for the L — d's 
 lialy ark. 
 He has cooper'd and caw'd a wrang pin in't. 
 
 Poet Willie,J Poet Willie, gie the Doctor a 
 volley, 
 
 Wi' your liberty's chain and your wit ; 
 O'er Pegasus's side ye neer laid a stride, 
 
 Ye but smelt, man, the place where he s— t, 
 
 Andro Gouk,5 Andro Gouk, ye may slander 
 
 the book, 
 
 And the book nane the waur let me tell ye ! 
 
 Ye are rich, and look big, but lay by hat and 
 
 wig. 
 
 And ye'll hae a calf's head o' sma' value. 
 
 Barr Steenie, 11 Barr Steenie, what mean ye.^ 
 what mean ye ? 
 
 If ye'll meddle nae mair wi' the matter, 
 Ye may hae some pretence to havins and sense, 
 
 Wi' the people wha ken ye nae better. 
 
 Irvine Side,ir Irvine Side, wi' your turkey-cock 
 
 pride. 
 
 Of manhood but sma' is your share ; 
 
 Ye've the figure, 'tis true, even your faes will 
 
 allow, [mair. 
 
 And your friends they dare grant you nae 
 
 Muirland Jock,** Muirland Jock, when tho 
 L — d makes a rock 
 
 To crush common sense for her sins, [fit 
 If ill manners were wit, there's no mortal so 
 
 To confound the poor Doctor at ance. 
 
 Holy Will,tt Holy Will, there was wit i' your 
 skull, 
 
 When ye pilfer'd the alms o' the poor ; 
 The timmer is scant, when ye're ta'en for a s 
 
 Wlia sliould swing in a rape for an hour, 
 
 1 
 
 Calvin's sons, Calvin's sons, seize your sp'ritual 
 guns, 
 
 Anmiunition you never can need ; [enough, 
 Your hearts are the stuff, will be powther 
 
 And your skulls are storehouses o' lead 
 
 . M r. G 1 of O-l-e. t Mr. Y-g of C-n-t- 
 
 tMr. P— b— sof A— r. 5 Dr A. M— II. 
 
 i II Mr. S n Y g of B r- II Mr. S h 
 
 of G n. *♦ Mr. S d tt An Elder in M • 
 
BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 Poet bums, Poet Burns, wi' your priest-skelp- 
 
 ing turns, 
 _ Why desert ye your auld native shire ? 
 Your muse is a gipsie, e'en the' she were tipsie, 
 She cou'd ca' us nae waur than we are. 
 
 THE TWA HERDS. 
 
 O a' ye pious godly flocks, 
 Well fed on pastures orthodox, 
 Wha now will keep you frae the fox, 
 
 Or worrying tykes, 
 Or wha will tent the waifs and crocks, 
 About the dykes ? 
 
 The twa best herds in a' the wast. 
 That e'er gae gospel horn a blast. 
 These five and twenty summers past, 
 
 O ! dool to tell, 
 Hae had a bitter black out-cast, 
 
 Atween themsel. 
 
 O, M y, man, and wordy R II, 
 
 How could you raise so vile a bustle. 
 
 Ye '11 see how new-light herds will whistle, 
 
 And think it fine ! 
 The Lord's cause ne'er gat sic a twistle, 
 
 Sin' I hae min'. 
 
 O, Sirs ! whae'er wad hae expeckit. 
 Your duty ye wad sae negleckit, 
 Ye wha were ne'er by lairds respeckit. 
 
 To wear the plaid, 
 But by the brutes themselves eleckit, 
 
 To be their guide. 
 
 What flock wi' M y's flock could rank, 
 
 Sae hale and hearty every shank, 
 Nae poison'd soor Arminian stank. 
 
 He let tliein taste, 
 Frae Calvin's well, ay clear they drank, 
 O sic a feast ! 
 
 The thummart, wil'-cat, brock and tod, 
 Weel kenn'd his voice thro' a' the wood, 
 He smell'd their ilka hole and road, 
 
 Baith out and in, 
 And weel he lik'd to shed their bluid. 
 
 And sell their skin. 
 
 What herd like R 11 toll'd his tale ? 
 
 His voice was heard tliro' muir and dale. 
 He kenn'd the Lord's sheep ilka tail, 
 O'er a' the height. 
 And saw gm they wore sick or hale. 
 At the first sicrht 
 
 He fine a mangy eheep could scrub, 
 Or nobly fling the gospel club. 
 And new-light herds could nicely drub. 
 
 Or pay theii skin. 
 Could shake them o'er the burning dub ; 
 
 Or heave them in. 
 
 Sic twa — O ! do I live to see't — 
 Sic famous twa should disagreet. 
 An' names, like villain, hypocrite, 
 
 Ilk ither gi'en. 
 While new-light herds wi' laughin spite, 
 
 Say neither's lien' ! 
 
 A' ye wha tent the gospel fauld, 
 
 There's D n, deep, and P s, shaul, 
 
 But chiefly thou, apostle A — d. 
 
 We trust m thee, 
 That thou wilt work them, hot and cauld, 
 Till they agree. 
 
 Consider, Sirs, how we're beset, 
 There's scarce a new herd that we get, 
 But comes frae 'mang that cursed set, 
 
 I winna name, 
 I hope frae heav'n to see them yet 
 
 In fiery flame. 
 
 D e has been lang our fae, 
 
 M' 11 has wrought us meikle wae. 
 
 And that curs'd rascal ca'd M' e. 
 
 And baith the S 
 
 That aft hae made us black and blae, 
 
 Wi' vengefu' paws. 
 
 Auld W w lang has hatch'd miscliief. 
 
 We thought ay death wad bring relief. 
 But he has gotten, to our grief, 
 
 Ane to succeed him, 
 A chiel wha'll soundly bufl" our beef ; 
 I meikle dread him. 
 
 And mony a ane that I could tell, 
 Wha fain would operJy rebel, 
 Forby turn-coats amang oursel. 
 
 There S h for ane, 
 
 I doubt he's but a gray nick quill. 
 
 And that ye'll fin'. 
 
 O ! a' ye flocks, o'er a' the hills, 
 By mosses, meadows, moors and fells, 
 Come join your counsel and your skills. 
 
 To cowe the lairds, 
 And get the brutes the power themselves. 
 
 To choose their herds. 
 
 Then Orthodoxy yet may prance, 
 And Learnmg in a woody dance. 
 
156 
 
 BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 And that fell cur ca'd Common Sense, 
 Sphat bites sae sair, 
 
 Be banish'd o'er the sea to France : 
 
 Let him bark there. 
 
 Then Shaw's and DVympIe's eloquence, 
 M' Il's close nervous excellence, 
 M'Q 's pathetic manly sense, 
 
 And guid M' h 
 
 Wi' S th, wha thro' the heart can glance, 
 
 May a' pack afF. 
 
 EPISTLE FROM A TAYLOR 
 
 TO 
 
 ROBERT BURNS. 
 
 What waefu' news is this I hear, 
 Frae greeting I can scarce forbear. 
 Folks tell me, yeVe gawn aft" this year, 
 
 Out o'er the sea. 
 And lasses wham ye lo'e sae dear 
 
 Will greet for thee. 
 
 Weel wad I like war ye to stay 
 But, Robin, since ye will away, 
 I hae a word yet mair to say, 
 
 And maybe twa ; 
 May he protect us night an' day. 
 
 That made us a'. 
 
 Whaur thou art gaun, keep mind frae me, 
 Seek him to bear thee companie. 
 And, Robin, whan ye come to die. 
 
 Ye '11 won aboon, 
 An' live at peace an' unity 
 
 Ayont the moon. 
 
 Some tell me, Rab, ye dinna fear 
 To get a wean, an' curse an' swear, 
 I'm unco wae, my lad, to hear 
 
 C sic a trade, 
 Cou'd I persuade j'e to forbear, 
 
 I wad be srlad. 
 
 Fu' weel ye ken ye'll gang to hdl. 
 Gin ye persist in doing ill' — ■ 
 Waes me : ye're hurlin down the hill 
 
 Withoutcn dread. 
 An' ye'll got leave to swear your fill 
 
 After ye're dead. 
 
 There waltn o' womon yp'W get near. 
 But gettin weans ye will forbear. 
 
 Ye'll never eay, my bonnie dear 
 
 Come, gie's a 1 
 
 Nae kissing there — ^ye'll grin an' sneer. 
 An' ither hiss. 
 
 O Rab ! lay by thy foolish tricks, 
 An' steer nae mair the female sex, 
 Or some day ye'll come through the pricks, 
 
 An' that ye'll see ; 
 Ye'll find hard living wi' Auld Nicks ; 
 
 I'm wae for thee. 
 
 But what's this comes wi' sic a knell, 
 Amaist as loud as ony bell? 
 While it does mak my conscience tell 
 
 Me what is true, 
 I'm but a ragget cowt mysel, 
 
 Owre sib to you ! 
 
 We're owre like those wha think it fit, 
 To stuff their noddles fu' o' wit, 
 An' yet content in darkness sit, 
 
 Wha shun the hght, 
 To let them see down to the pit, 
 
 That lang, dark night. 
 
 But farewell, Rab, I maun awa'. 
 May he that made us keep us a'. 
 For that would be a dreadfu' fa' 
 
 And hurt us sair, 
 Lad, ye wad never mend ava, 
 
 Sae, Rab, tak care. 
 
 THE ANSWER. 
 
 h. 
 
 What ails ye now, ye lousy b- 
 To thresh my back at sic a pitch ? 
 Losh man ! hae mercy wi' your natch, 
 
 Your bodkin's bauld, 
 I did na suffer lia'f sae much 
 
 Fra Daddie Auld. 
 
 What tho' at tunes when I grow crouse, 
 1 gie their wames a random pouse, 
 Is that enough for you to souse 
 
 Your servant sae ? 
 Gae mind your seam, ye prick the louse, 
 
 An' jag the flae. 
 
 King David o' poetic brief. 
 Wrought 'mang the lasses sic mischief 
 As till'd his after hfe wi' grief 
 
 An' bloody rant«. 
 An' yet he's rank'd amang the chief 
 
 O' lang syne saunts. 
 
BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 157 
 
 And maybe, Tam, for a' my cants, 
 My wicked rhymes, an' dnicken rants, 
 I'll gie auld cloven Clouty's haunts, 
 
 An unco slip yet, 
 An' snugly sit amang the saunts 
 
 At Davie's hip yet. 
 
 But fegs, the Session eays I maun 
 Gae fa' upo' anither plan, 
 Than garran lassies cowp the cran 
 
 Clean heels owre body. 
 And sairly tholo their mither's ban. 
 
 Afore the howdy. 
 
 This leads me on, to tell for sport, 
 How I did with the Session sort — 
 Auld Clinkum at the Inner port 
 
 Cry'd three times, " Robin 
 Come hither lad, an answer fort't, 
 
 Ye're blam'd for jobbin." 
 
 Wi' pinch I put a Sunday's face on, 
 An' snoov'd awa' before the Session — 
 I made an open, fair confession, 
 
 I scom'd to lie : 
 An' sjme Mess John, beyond expression. 
 
 Fell foul o' me. 
 
 A fornicator lown he cali'd mo. 
 Ad' said my fau't frae bliss cxpell'd me ; 
 I own'd the tale was true he tell'd me, 
 
 " But what the matter r 
 Quo' 1, " I fear unless ye geld me, 
 
 I'll ne'er be better.'' 
 
 " Geld you," quo' he, " and what for no ! 
 If that your right hand, leg or toe, 
 Should ever prove your sp 'ritual foe, 
 
 You shou'd remember 
 To cut it aff, an' what for no 
 
 Your dearest member .'" 
 
 " Na, na," quo' I, " I'm no for that. 
 Gelding's nae better than 'tis ca't, 
 I'd rather suffer for my fau't, 
 
 A hearty flewit, 
 As sair owre hip as ye can draw't ! 
 
 Tho' I should rue it. 
 
 Or <jin ye like to end the bother. 
 To please i:^ a', I've just ae ither. 
 When next wi' yon lass I forgather 
 
 Whate'er betide it, 
 I'll frankly gie her't a' thegither. 
 
 An' let her guide it. 
 
 But, Sir, this pleas'd them war.^t ava. 
 An' therefore, Tam, when that I saw. 
 
 I said, " Quid night," and cam awa', 
 
 And left the Session ; 
 
 I saw they were resolved a' 
 
 On my oppression. 
 
 LETTER TO JOHN GOUDIE, 
 
 KILMARNOCK, 
 ON THE PUBLICATION OF HIS ESSAYS. 
 
 O GonniE ! terror o' the Whigs, 
 Dread o' black coats and rev'rend wigs, 
 Soor Bigotry, on her last legs, 
 
 Gimin looks back, 
 Wishin the ten Egyptian plagues 
 
 Wad seize you quick. 
 
 Poor gapin, glowrin Superstion, 
 Waes me I she's in a sad condition ; 
 Fy, bring Black Jock, her state physician, 
 
 To see her w~ter ; 
 Alas ! tliere's ground o' great suspicion 
 
 She'll ne'er get better. 
 
 Auld Orthodoxy lang did grapple 
 But now she's got an unco ripple. 
 Haste, gie her name up i' the chapel, 
 
 Nigh unto death ; 
 See how she fetches at the thrapple. 
 
 An' gasps for breath. 
 
 Enthusiasm 's past redemption, 
 Gaen in a galloping consumption. 
 Not a' the quacks wi' a' their gumption. 
 Will ever mend her. 
 Her feeble pulse gies strong presumption. 
 
 Death soon will end her. 
 
 'Tis you and Taylor* are the chief, 
 Wha are to blame for this mischief; 
 But gin the L — d's ain folks gat leave, 
 A toom tar barrel 
 And twa red peats wad send relief, 
 
 An' ond the quarrel. 
 
 LETTER TO J — S T T GL— NO— R. 
 
 AtJLD comrade dear and brither sinner, 
 How 's a' the folk about Gl — nc — r ; 
 How do you this blae eastlin wind. 
 That 's like to blaw a body blind : 
 For me my faculties are frozen. 
 My dearest member nearly dozen'd : 
 
 • Dr. Taylor of Norwich. 
 
15& 
 
 BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 I've sent you here by Johnie Simpson, 
 Twa sa^e philosophers to ghmpse on ; 
 Smith, wi' liis sympathetic feehng. 
 An' Reid, to common sense appeahng, 
 Philosophers have fought an' wrangled, 
 An' meikle Greek an' Latin mangled. 
 Till wi' their logic jargon tir'd, 
 An' in the depth of science mir'd. 
 To common sense they now appeal, 
 What wives an' wabsters see an' feel ; 
 But, hark ye, friend, I charge you strictly, 
 Peruse them an' return them quickly ; 
 For now I'm grown sae cursed douse, 
 I pray an' ponder butt the house. 
 My shins, my lane, I there sit roastin. 
 Perusing Bunyan, Brown, and Boston ; 
 Till by an' by, if I baud on, 
 I'll grunt a real Gospel groan : 
 Already I begin to try it. 
 To cast my een up like a pyet. 
 When by the gun she tumbles o'er, 
 Flutt'ring an' gasping in her gore ; 
 Sae shortly you shall see me bright, 
 A burning an' a shining light. 
 
 My heart-warm love to guid auld Glen, 
 The ace an' wale of honest men ; 
 When bending down with auld gray hairs, 
 Beneath the load of years and cares, 
 May he who made him still support him. 
 An' views beyond the grave comfort him. 
 His worthy fam'ly far and near, 
 God bless them a' wi' grace and gear. 
 
 ON THE DEATH OF 
 
 SIR JAMES HUNTER BLAIR. 
 
 The lamp of day with ill-presaging glare, 
 Dim, cloudy, sunk beneath the western 
 wave ; [air, 
 
 Th' inconstant blast howl'd thro' the darkening 
 And hollow whistled in the rocky cave. 
 
 Lone as I wander'd by each cliff and dell. 
 Once the lov'd haunts of Scotia's royal 
 train ;* [well,t 
 
 Or mus'd where limpid streams, once hallow'd, 
 Or mould'ring ruins mark the sacred fane.^ 
 
 •The King's Park, at Holy rood- house. 
 
 t St. Anthony's Well. t St. Anthony's Chspel. 
 
 Th' increasing blast roar'd round the beetling 
 
 rocks, [sky» 
 
 The clouds swift-wing'd flew o'er the starry 
 
 The groaning trees untimely shed their locks. 
 
 And shooting meteors caught the startling 
 
 eye. 
 
 The paly moon rose in the livid east, 
 
 And 'mong the cliffs disclos'd a stately form. 
 
 In weeds of wo that frantic beat her breast. 
 And mix'd her wailings with the raving 
 storm. 
 
 Wild to my heart the filial pulses glow, 
 
 'Twas Caledonia's trophied shield I view'd : 
 
 Her form majestic droop'd in pensive wo, 
 The lightning of her eye in tears imbued. 
 
 Revers'd that spear, redoubtable in war ; 
 
 Reclin'd that banner, erst in fields unfurl'd, 
 That like a deathful meteor gleam'd afar. 
 
 And brav'd the mighty monarchs of the 
 world. — 
 
 " My patriot son fills an untimely grave !" 
 
 With accents wild and lifted arms she cried ; 
 " Low lies the hand that oft was stretch'd to 
 save. 
 Low lies the heart that swell'd with honest 
 pride ! 
 
 " A weeping country joins a widow's tears. 
 The helpless poor mix with the orphan's cry ; 
 
 The drooping arts surround their patron's bier, 
 And grateful science heaves the heartfelt 
 sigh. — 
 
 " I saw my sons resume their ancient fire ; 
 
 I saw fair Freedom's blossoms richly blow ; 
 But ah ! how hope is born but to expire ! 
 
 Relentless fate has laid this guardian low. — 
 
 " My patriot falls, but shall he lie unsung, 
 Wliile empty gi-eatness saves a worthless 
 name ! 
 
 No ; every muse shall joui her tuneful tongue, 
 And future ages hear his growing fame. 
 
 " And I will join a mother's tender cares, 
 Tluo' future times to make his virtues last. 
 
 That distant years may boast of other Blairs"— 
 She said, and vanish'd with the sweeping 
 blast. 
 
Twrn m^tri mm(^^A'm^. 
 
 A CANTATA. 
 
 RECITATIVO. 
 
 When lyart leaves bestrew the yird, 
 Or, waverincr like the bauekie'' bird, 
 
 Bedim cauld Boreas' blast : 
 When hailstaiics drive wi' bitter skyte, 
 And infant frosts begin to bite, 
 
 In hoary cranreugli drest ; 
 A(! night at e'en, a merry core 
 
 O' randie gangrel bodies, 
 In Poosic-Nansie's held the splore, 
 To drink their ora duddies : 
 Wr quaffing and laugliing, 
 
 They ranted and they sang ; 
 Wi' jumping and thumping 
 The vera girdle rang. 
 
 First, niest the fire, in auld red rags, 
 Ane sat, vi^eel brac'd wi' mealy bags, 
 
 And knapsack a' in order; 
 His doxy lay within lois arm, 
 Wi' usquebae and blankets warm, 
 
 She blinket on her sodger; 
 And aye he gles the tousie drab 
 
 The tither skelpin kiss, 
 While she held up her greedy gab, 
 Just like an a'nious dish ; 
 
 Ilk sniaok still, did crack still, 
 
 Just like a cadger's whup, 
 Then staggering, and swas'gering, 
 . He roar'd this ditty up— 
 
 Tune—" Soldier's Joy." 
 
 I AM a son of Mars, who have been in many 
 
 wars, 
 \nd show my cuts and scars wherever I come ; 
 This here was for a wench, and that other iri 
 
 a trench, 
 When welcoming the French at the sound of 
 
 the drum. Lai de daudle. Sec. 
 
 • The old Scottish name for the Bat. 
 
 My 'prentlceship Ipast where my leader breath 'd 
 
 his last,. 
 Wlien the bloody die was cast on the heights 
 
 of Abram ; 
 I serv'd out my trade when the gallant game 
 
 was play'd. 
 And the Moro low was laid at the sound of the 
 
 drum. Lai de dandle, Sec. 
 
 I lastly was with Curtis, among the floating 
 batt'ries, [limb : 
 
 And there I left for witness an arm and a 
 
 Yet let my country need me, with Elliot to 
 head me, 
 
 I'd clatter on my stumps at the sound of the 
 drum. Lai de dandle. Sec. 
 
 And now, tho' I must beg, with a wooden arm 
 
 and leg. 
 And many a tatter'd rag hanging over my bum, 
 I'm as happy with my wallet, my bottle, and 
 
 my callet, 
 As when I us'd in scarlet to follow the drum. 
 Lai de dandle. Sec. 
 
 What tho' with hoary locks, I must stand the 
 
 windy shocks. 
 Beneath the woods and rocks, oftentimes for 
 
 a home ; 
 When the tother bag I sell, and the tother 
 
 bottle tell, 
 I could meet a troop of h-11 at the sound of 
 
 the drum. 
 
 RECITATIVO. 
 
 He ended ; and the kebars sheuk 
 
 Aboon the chorus roar ; 
 While frighted rattans backward leuk. 
 
 And seek the benmost bore : 
 
 A fairy fiddler frae the neuk. 
 
 He skirl'd out encore ! 
 But up arose the martial's chuck, 
 
 And laid the loud uproar. 
 
 Tune—" Soldier Laddie." 
 
 I ONCE was a maid, tho' I cannot tell when, 
 I And still my delight is in proper voung men ; 
 
160 
 
 BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 Some one of a troop of Jragoons was my dad- 
 die, 
 No wonder Vm fond of a sodger laod.e. 
 
 Sins:, Lai de lal, &c. 
 
 The first of my lovers was a swag-gering blade, 
 To rattle the thundering drum was his trade ; 
 His leg was so tight, and his cheek was so 
 
 ruddy, 
 Transported I was with my sodger laddie. 
 Sirtg, Lal de lal, &cc. 
 
 But the goodly old chaplain left him in the 
 
 lurch, 
 So the sword I forsook for the sake of the 
 
 church. 
 He ventur'd the soul, I risked the body, 
 'Twas then I prov'd false to my sodger laddie. 
 Si7ig, Lal de lal^ kc. 
 
 Full soon I grew sick of the sanctified sot, 
 The regiment at large for a husband I got ; 
 From the gilded spontoon to the fife I was 
 
 ready, 
 I asked no more but a sodger laddie. 
 
 Sing, Lal, de lal, i-c. 
 
 But the peace it reduced me to beg in despair, 
 Till I met my old boy at a Cunningham fair, 
 His rags regimental they fluttered sae gaudy, 
 My heart it rejoic'd at my sodger laddie. 
 
 Sing, Lal de lal. See. 
 
 And now I have liv'd — I know not how long, 
 
 And still I can join in a cup or a song ; 
 
 But whilst with both hands I can hold the 
 
 glass steady. 
 Here's to thee, my hero, my sodger laddie. 
 Sing, Lal, de lal. Sec. 
 
 RECITATIVO. 
 
 Poor Merry Andrew, in the neuk, 
 
 Sat guzzling wi' a tinkler hizzie ; 
 They mind't na what the chorus took, 
 
 Between themselves they ,vere sae bizzy ; 
 At length, wi' drink and courting dizzy, 
 
 He stoiter'd up and made a face ; 
 Then turn'd and laid a smack on Grizzy, 
 
 Syne tun'd his pipes wi' grave grimace. 
 
 Tune — ^" Auld Sir Symon. 
 
 Sir Wisdom's a fool when he's fou, 
 Sir Knave is a fool in a session ; 
 
 He's there but a 'prentice I trow. 
 But 1 am a fool by profession. 
 
 My grannie she bought me a beuk, 
 And I held awa to the school ; 
 
 I fear I my talent misteuk ; 
 
 But what will ye hae of a fool? 
 
 For drink I would venture my neck ; 
 
 A hizzie'sthe half o' my craft; 
 But what could ye otlier expect 
 
 Of ane that's avowedly daft. 
 
 I ance was ty'd up like a stirk. 
 
 For civilly swearing and quaffing ; 
 
 I ance was abus'd i' the kirk. 
 For towzling a lass i' my daffin. 
 
 J*oor Andrew that tumbles for sport, 
 Let naebody name wi' a jeer ; 
 
 There's ev'n I'm tauld i' the court, 
 A tumbler ca'd the Premier. 
 
 Observ'd ye, yon reverend lad 
 Maks faces to tickle the mob ; 
 
 He rails at our mountebank squad, 
 It 's rivalship just i' the job. 
 
 And now my conclusion I'll tell, 
 For faith I'm confoundedly dry. 
 
 The chiel that 's a fool for himsel', 
 Gude L — d, is far dafter than I. 
 
 RECITATIVO. 
 
 Then niest outspak a raucle carlin, 
 Wha kent fu' weel to deck the sterlin. 
 For monie a pursie she had hooked, 
 And had in monie a well been ducket; 
 Her dove had been a Highland laddie, 
 But weary fa' the waefu' woodie ! 
 Wi' sighs and sabs, she thus began 
 To wail her braw John Highlandman. 
 
 Tune — ^" Oan' ye were dead guidmon 
 
 A HIGHLAND lad my love was bom, 
 The Lawlan' laws he held in scorn ; 
 But he still was faithfu' to his clan, 
 My gallant, braw John Higlilandman. 
 
 Sins;, hry, my hraw.Tohn Highlandman, 
 Sing, ho, my hrair John Highlandman ; 
 There's not n lad in all the Ian" 
 Was match for my John Highlandman. 
 
 With his philibeg and tartan plaid. 
 And guid claymore down by his side. 
 The ladies' hearts he did trepan, 
 My gallant, braw John Highlandman. 
 
 " Sing, hey, ice. 
 
BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 161 
 
 We ranged a' from Tweed to Spey, 
 And liv'd like lords and ladies gay ; 
 For a Lallan face he feared nanc, 
 My gallant, braw John Highlandman 
 
 i't/i^"-, key, kc. 
 
 They banish'd him beyond the sea, 
 But ere the bud was on the tree, 
 Adown my cheeks the pearls ran, 
 Eiubrachig my John Highlandman. 
 
 Sin^, hei/, kc. 
 
 But oh ! they catch 'd him at the last, 
 And bound him in a dungeon fast ; 
 My curse upon them every one. 
 They've hang'd my braw John Iliglilandrnan. 
 Sing, liey, kc. 
 
 And now a widow, I must mourn 
 The pleasures that will ne'er return ; 
 No comfort but a hearty can. 
 When I think on John Highlandman. 
 
 Sing, hey, kc. 
 
 RECITATIVO. 
 
 A pigmy Scraper wi' his fiddle, 
 
 Wha us'd at trysts and fairs to driddle, 
 
 Her strappin limb and gaucy middle 
 
 (He reached nae higher,) 
 Had hol't his heartie like a riddle. 
 
 And blawn't on fire. 
 
 Wi' hand on haunch, and upward e'e. 
 He croon'd his gamut ane, twa, three. 
 Then, in an Arioso key. 
 
 The wee Apollo 
 Set aff, wi' Allegretto glee. 
 
 His giga solo. 
 
 Tune — " Whistle o'er the lave o't. 
 
 Let me ryke up to dight that tear. 
 And go wi' me and be my dear. 
 And then your every care and fear 
 May wliistle o'er the lave o't. 
 
 / am a fiddler to my trade. 
 And a' the tunes that e'er I played 
 The sweetht still to wife or maid. 
 Was whistle o^cr the lave oH. 
 
 At kirns and weddings we'se be there, 
 And Oh I sae nicely 's we will fare ; 
 Well bouse about, till Daddie Care 
 Sings wliistle o'er the lave o't. 
 
 / am, Sec. 
 
 Sae merrily 's the banes well pyke, 
 And sun oursels about the dyke, 
 And at our leisure when we like, 
 We'll whistle o'er the lave o't, 
 
 / am, See. 
 
 But bless me wi' your heav'n o' charms, 
 And while I kittle hair on thairms, 
 Hunger, cauld, and a' sic harms, 
 May whistle o'er the lave o't. 
 
 lam, kc. 
 
 RECITATIVO. 
 
 Her charms had struck a sturdy Caird 
 
 As weel as poor Gut-scraper ; 
 He taks the fiddler by the beard. 
 
 And draws a roosty rapier — 
 He swoor, by a' was swearing worth, 
 
 To spit him like a pliver. 
 Unless he wad from that time forth 
 
 Relinquish her for ever. 
 
 Wi' ghastly e'e, poor tweedle-dco 
 
 Upon his hunkers bended. 
 And pray'd for grace, wi' ruefu' face, 
 
 And sae the quarrel ended. 
 But tho' his little heart did grieve 
 
 When round the tinkler prest her, 
 He feign'd to snirtle in his sleeve. 
 
 When thus the Caird address'd her ; 
 
 Tune — ^" Clout the Cauldron.' 
 
 My bonny lass, I work in brass, 
 
 A tinkler is my station ; 
 I've travell'd round all Christian ground 
 
 In this my occupation ; 
 I've taen the gold, I've been enroll'd 
 
 In many a noble squadron ; 
 But vain they search'd, when off" I march'd 
 
 To go and clout the cauldron. 
 
 Fve taen the gold, &c. 
 
 Despise that shrimp, that wither'd imp, 
 
 Wi' a' his noise and caprin, 
 And tak a share wi' tho.se that bear 
 
 The budget and the apron ; 
 And by that stowp, my faith and houp, 
 
 And by that dear Kilbadgie,* 
 If e'er ye want, or meet wi' scant, 
 
 May I ne'er wat my craigie. 
 
 And by that sloiip, kc. 
 
 * A peculiar sort of Whisky, so culkil ; a t;ie.it <i; 
 vouiite Willi Poosie Nansie's clubs. 
 
BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 RECITATIVO. 
 
 The Caird prevail'd — ih' unblushing fair 
 
 In his embraces sunk, 
 Partly wi' love o'ercome sae fair, 
 
 And jiartly she was drunk. 
 Sir Violii'.o, Villi an air 
 
 That show'd a man o' spunk, 
 Wish'd unison between the pair. 
 
 And made tlic bottle clunk 
 
 To their health that night. 
 
 But hurchin Cupid shot a shaft, 
 
 That play'd a dame a shavie, 
 The fiddler" rak'd her fore and aft, 
 
 Behint the cliicken cavie. 
 Her lord, a wight o' Homer's craft, 
 
 Tho' hmping wi' the spavie, 
 He hirpFd up, and lap like daft, 
 
 AJid shor'd them Dainty Davie 
 
 O boot that night. 
 
 He was a care-defying blade 
 
 As ever Bacchus listed, 
 Tho' Fortune sair upon him laid. 
 
 His heart she ever miss'd it. 
 He had nae wish, but — to be glad, 
 
 Nor want — but when he thirsted ; 
 He hated nouirht but — to be sad. 
 
 And thus the Muse suggested 
 
 His sang that night. 
 
 Tune — " For a' that, and a' that.' 
 
 I AM a bard of no regard, 
 Wi' gentlefolks, and a' that : 
 
 But Homer-like, the glowran byke, 
 Frae town to town I draw that. 
 
 For a' that, and a' that, 
 
 And twice as meikle''s a' that ; 
 
 Pre lost but ane, Pie twa behiTi', 
 Fve wife enough, for a' that. 
 
 I never drank the Muses' stank, 
 Castalia's burn, and a' that ; 
 
 But there it streams, and richly reams, 
 My Helicon 1 ca' that. 
 
 For rt' that, &c. 
 
 Great love I bear to a' the fair. 
 
 Their humble slave, and a' that ; 
 But lordly will, I hold it still 
 
 A mortal sin to thraw that. 
 
 For a' thai. Sec. 
 
 In raptures sweet, this hour we meet, 
 Wi' mutual love, and a' that ; 
 
 But for how lang the flie may stang, 
 Let inclination law that. 
 
 For o' that, S"- 
 
 Their tricks and craft hac put me daft, 
 I They've ta'en me in, and a' that ; 
 
 I But clear your decks, and " Here's the sex 
 i I like tlie jads for a' that. 
 
 For a' that, and a' that. 
 
 And twice as meikle''s a' that. 
 
 My dearest bluid, to do them guid, 
 They^re welcome tilVt,for a thai. 
 
 RECITATIVO. 
 
 So simg the bard — and Nansie's wa's 
 Shook with a thunder of applause, 
 
 Re-echo'd from each mouth ; 
 They toom'd their pocks, and pawn'd their 
 
 duds, 
 They scarcely left to co'er their fuds, 
 
 To quench their lowan drouth. 
 
 Then owre again, the jovial tlirang, 
 
 The poet did request. 
 To lowse his pack, and wale a sang, 
 A ballad o' the best ; 
 He, rising, rejoicing. 
 
 Between his twa Deborahs, 
 Looks round him, and found them 
 Impatient for the chorus. 
 
 Tune — " Jolly Mortals, fill your Glasses.' 
 
 See the smoking bowl before us, 
 Mark our jovial ragged ring ; 
 
 Round and round take up the chorus, 
 And in raptures let us sing : 
 
 Ji fig for those by law protected.' 
 
 ' Liber t-y^s a glorious feast .' 
 Courts for cou-ards were erected. 
 Churches built to please the priest. 
 
 What is title ? What is treasure ? 
 
 What is reputation's care i 
 If we lead a hfe of pleasure, 
 
 'Tis no matter, how or where ! 
 J fig, kc. 
 
 With the ready trick and fable. 
 Round we wander all the day; 
 
 And at night, in barn or stable, 
 Hug our doxies on the hay. 
 A fig, kc. 
 
 Does the train-attended carriage 
 Thro' the countrj- lighter rove? 
 
 Does the sober bed of marriage 
 Witness briffhter .scenes of love ? 
 A fig. S:c. 
 
BURNS' POEMS. 
 
 163 
 
 Life is all a vanorum, 
 
 We regard not how it goes ; 
 l^et them qant about decorum 
 
 Who have characters to lose. 
 A Jig, ke. 
 
 Here's to budgets, bags, and wallets 1 
 Here's to all the wandering train 1 
 
 Here's our raged brats and callets I 
 One and all crv out, Amen ! 
 
 EXTEMPORE. 
 
 •/ipriU 1782. 
 
 WHY tlie deuce should I repino, 
 And be an ill foreboder ? 
 
 I'm twenty three, and five feet nine — 
 I'll go and be a sodger. 
 
 1 gat some gear wi' meikle care, 
 
 I held it weel thegither ; 
 But now it's gane and something mair, 
 I'll go and be a sodger. 
 
 THE END 
 
%*: 
 
GLOSSARY. 
 
 The ch and gh have always the guttural sound. The sound of the English diphthong 
 00, is commonly spelled ow. The French «, a sound which often occurs in the 
 Scottish language, is marked oo, or ui. The a in genuine Scottish words, except 
 when forming a diphthong, or followed by an e mute after a single consonant, sounds 
 generally like the Broad English a in wall. The Scottish diphthong «b, always, 
 and ea, very often, sound like the French « masculine. The Scottish diphthong 
 ey, sounds like the Latin «. 
 
 A. 
 
 A\ All. 
 
 Aback, away, aloof. 
 
 Abeigh, at a shy distance. 
 
 Aboon, above, up. 
 
 Abread, abroad, in sight. 
 
 Abreed, in breadth. 
 
 Addle, putrid wa.tor, (fee. 
 
 Ae, one. 
 
 Aff, off; AJf lorf, unpremeditated. 
 
 Afore, before 
 
 A/l, oft. 
 
 Aflen, often. 
 
 Aghy, off the right line ; wrong. 
 
 Aiblins, perhaps. 
 
 Ain, own. 
 
 Airle-penny, Airles, earnest-money. 
 
 Aim, iron. 
 
 Aith, an oath. 
 
 Aits, oatf. 
 
 Aiver, an old horse. 
 
 Aizle, a hot cinder. 
 
 Alake, alas. 
 
 Ilane, alone. 
 
 ^kwart, awkward. 
 
 imaitt, almost. 
 
 imang, among. 
 An', and; if. 
 Ance, once. 
 Ane, one ; and. 
 Anent, over against. 
 Anither, another. 
 Ase, ashes. 
 
 Asklent, asquint; aslant. 
 Asteer, abroad ; stirring. 
 Athart, athwart. 
 Aught, possession ; as, in a' my aught, 
 
 in all my possession. 
 Auld lang $yne, olden time, days of 
 other years. 
 
 Atdd, old. 
 
 Auldfarrnn, or auld f arrant, sagacious, 
 
 cunning, prudent. 
 Ava, at all. 
 Awa', away. 
 Auifu', Bwful. 
 
 A'on, the beard of barley, oats, &.c. 
 Awnie, boarded. 
 Ayont, beyond. 
 
 B. 
 
 RA', Ball. 
 
 Bniketi, ash boards. 
 
 Backlim, coming ; coming back, return* 
 
 '.ng. 
 h'uk, returning. 
 Bid, did bid. 
 B'lide, endured, did stay. 
 n^xgie, the belly. 
 B'tinie, having large bones, stout. 
 Bairn, a child. 
 
 Bairntime,a.fsixmly of children, a broo<l 
 BaUh, both. 
 Bnn, to swear. 
 Bane, bone 
 
 Bang, to beat; to strive. 
 Bardie, diminutive of bard. 
 Barefit, barefooted. 
 Barmie, of, or like barm. 
 Batch, a crew, a gang. 
 Batts, hots. 
 Baudrons, a cat. 
 Bauld, bold. 
 Bawk, bank. 
 Baws'nl, having a white stripe down 
 
 the face. 
 Be, to let be ; to give over ; to ( 
 Bear, barley. 
 
 Beastie, diminutive of beast. 
 Beet, to add fuel to fire. 
 Beld, bald. 
 
GLOSSARY. 
 
 Belyve, by and by. 
 
 Ben, into the spence or parlour ; a 
 spence. 
 
 Benlomond, a noted mountain in Dum- 
 bartonshire. 
 
 Bethankit, grace after meat. 
 
 Beuk, a book. 
 
 Bicker, a kind of wooden dish ; a short 
 race. 
 
 Bie, or Bield, shelter. 
 
 Bien, wealthy, plentiful. 
 
 Big, to build. 
 
 Bigg'in, building ; a house. 
 
 Bigg^it, built. 
 
 Bill, a bull. 
 
 Billie, a brother ; a young fellow. 
 
 Bing, a heap of grain, potatoes, &.c. 
 
 Biric, birch. 
 
 Birken-shaw, Birchen-wood-shaw, a 
 small wood. 
 
 Birkie, a clever fellow. 
 
 Birring, the noise of partridges, &c 
 when they spring. 
 
 Bit, crisis, nick of time. 
 
 Bizz, a bustle, to buzz. 
 
 Blastie, a shrivelled dwarf; a term of 
 contempt. 
 
 Blastit, blasted. 
 
 Blatc, bashful, sheepish. 
 
 Blather, bladder. 
 
 Blaud, a flat piece of any thing; to slap. 
 
 Blaw, to blow, to boast. 
 
 Bleerit, bleared, sore with rheum. 
 
 Bleert and blin', bleared and blind. 
 
 Bleezing, blazing. 
 
 Blellum, an idle talking fellow. 
 
 Blether, to talk idly; nonsense. 
 
 BletlCrin, talking idly. 
 
 Blink, a little while ; a smiling look ; 
 to look kindly ; to shine by fits. 
 
 Blinker, a term of contempt. 
 
 Blinkin, smirking. 
 
 Blue-gown, one of those beggars who 
 g't annually, on the king's birth-day, 
 a blue cloak or gown, with a badge. 
 
 Bluid, blood. 
 
 Bluntie, a sniveller, a stupid person. 
 
 Blype, a shred, a large piece. 
 
 Bock, to vomit, to gush intermittently. 
 
 Backed, gushed, vomited. 
 
 Bodle, a small gold coin. 
 
 Bogles, spirits, hobgoblins. 
 
 Bonnie, or honnif, handsome, beautiful. 
 
 Bonnock, a kind of thick cake of bread, 
 a small jannock, or loaf made of oat- 
 meal. 
 
 Boord. a board. 
 
 Boortree, the shrub elder ; planted 
 much of old in hedges of barn-yards, 
 &c. 
 
 Boost, behoved, must needs. 
 
 Bore, a hole in the wall. 
 
 Botch, an angry tumour. 
 
 Bousing, drinking. 
 
 Bow-kail, cabbage. 
 
 Bowt, bended, crooked. 
 
 Brackens, fern. 
 
 Brae, a declivity ; a precipice ; the 
 slope of a hill. 
 
 Braid, broad. 
 
 Braindg't, reeled forward 
 
 Braik, a kind of harrow. 
 
 Braindge, to run rashly forward. 
 
 Brak, broke, made insolvent. 
 
 Branks, a kind of wooden curb for 
 horses. 
 
 Brash, a sudden illness. 
 
 Brats, coarse clothes, rags, &c. 
 
 Brattle, a short race ; hurry ; fury. 
 
 Braw, fine, handsome. 
 
 Brawly, or brawlie, very well ; finely ; 
 heartily. 
 
 Braxie, a morbid sheep. 
 
 Breastie, diminutive of breast. 
 
 Breastit, did spring up or forward. 
 
 Breckan, fern. 
 
 Breef, an invulnerable or irresistible 
 spell. 
 
 Breeks, breeches. 
 
 Brent, smooth. 
 
 Brewin, brewing. 
 
 Brie, juice, liquid. 
 
 Brig, a bridge. 
 
 Brunstane, brimstone. 
 
 Brisket, the breast, the oosom. 
 
 Brither, a brother. 
 
 Brock, a badger. 
 
 Brogue, a hum ; a trick. 
 
 Broo, broth ; liquid ; water. 
 
 Broose, broth ; a race at country wed- 
 dings, who shall first reach the bride- 
 groom's house on returning from 
 church. 
 
 Broir^sfer-wives, ale-house wives. 
 
 Brugh, a burgh. 
 
 Bruilzie, a broil, a combustion. 
 
 Brunt, did burn, burnt. 
 
 Brust, to burst ; burst. 
 
 Buchnn-bullers, the boiling of the spa 
 among the rocks on the coast of 
 Bnchan. 
 
 Burkskin, an inhabitant of Virginia. 
 
 B'ight, a pen. 
 
 Bu::hf in-time, the time of collecting the 
 shoop in the pens to be milked. 
 
 B'nrill/i, stout-made ; broad-made. 
 
 B'cm-r/ock,B. hvimming beetle that flies 
 in the summer evenings. 
 
 Bnm'nfng, humming as bees. 
 
 B'mm'r, to blunder. 
 
 Bummler, a blunderer. 
 
 Banker, a window-seat. 
 
GLOSSARY. 
 
 167 
 
 Burdies, diminutive of birds. 
 
 Bure, did bear. 
 
 Burn, water ; a rivulet. , 
 
 Burnewin, i. e. bum the wind, a black- 
 smith. 
 
 Burnie, diminutive of burn. 
 
 Buskie, bushy. 
 
 Buskit, dressed. 
 
 Busks, dresses. 
 
 Bussle, a bustle ; to bustle. 
 
 Buss, shelter. 
 
 But, hot, with ; without. 
 
 But an' ben, the country kitchen and 
 parlour. 
 
 Tii/himsel, lunntic, distracted. 
 
 Byke, a bee-hive. 
 
 Byre, a cow-stable ; a sheep-pen. 
 
 CA\ To call, to name ; to drive. 
 
 CaH, or ca'd, called, driven ; calved. 
 
 Cadger, a carrier. 
 
 Cadie, or caddie, a person ; a youiijj 
 fellow. 
 
 Cqf, chaff. 
 
 Caird, a tinker. 
 
 Cairn, a loose heap of stones. 
 
 Caff-ward, a small enclosure for calves. 
 
 Callan, a boy. 
 
 Caller, fresh ; sound ; refreshinji;. 
 
 Crtme,orcawme, ffentle,mi]d; dexteront^. 
 
 Cannilie, dexterously ; gently. 
 
 Cantie, or canty, cheerful, merry. 
 
 Cantraip, a charm, a spell. 
 
 Cap-stane, cope-stoue ; key-stone 
 
 Careerin, cheerfully. 
 
 Carl, an old man. 
 
 Carlin, a stout old woman. 
 
 Cartes, cards. 
 
 Caudron, a caldron. 
 
 Cauk and keel, chalk and red clay. 
 
 Cauld, cold. 
 
 Caup, a wooden drinking-vessel. 
 
 Cesses, taxes. 
 
 Chanter, a part of a bag-pipe. 
 
 Chap, a person, a fellow ; a blow. 
 
 Chaup, a stroke, a blow. 
 
 Cheekit, cheeked. 
 
 Cheep, a chirp ; to chirp. 
 
 Chiel, or cheel, a young fellow. 
 
 Chimla, or chimlie, a fire-grate, a fire- 
 place. 
 
 Chimla-lug, the fireside. 
 
 Chittering, shivering, trembling. 
 
 Chockin, chocking. 
 
 Choxp, to chew ; cheek for chow, side by 
 side. 
 
 Clmffie, fat-faced. 
 
 Clachan, a small village about a church ; ! 
 a hamlet. 
 
 Claise, or claes, clothes. 
 
 ClaUh, cloth. 
 
 Claithing, clothing. 
 
 Claivers, nonsense ; not speaking sense. 
 
 Clap, clapper of a mill. 
 
 Clarkit, wrote. 
 
 Clash, an idle tale, the story of the day 
 
 Clatter, to tell idle stories ; an idle story. 
 
 Claught, snatched at, laid hold of. 
 
 Claut, to clean ; to scrape. 
 
 Clauted, scraped. 
 
 Clavers, idle stories. 
 
 Claw, to scratch. 
 
 Cleed, to clothe. 
 
 Cleeds, clothes. 
 
 Cleekit, having caught. 
 
 CVmAv'n, jerking ; clinking 
 
 Clinkumbell, he who rings the church- 
 bell. 
 
 Clips, shears. 
 
 Clishmaclaver, idle conversation. 
 
 Clock, to hatch ; a beetle. 
 
 Clockin, hatching. 
 
 Clool, the hoof of a cow, sheep, &c. 
 
 Clootie, an old name for the Devil. 
 
 Clour, a bump or swelling after a blow. 
 
 Cluds, clouds. 
 
 Coaxin, vvheedling. 
 
 Coble, a fishing-boat. 
 
 Cockerwmy, a lock of hair tied upon a 
 girl's head ; a cap. 
 
 C(ft, bought. 
 
 Cog, a wooden dish. 
 
 Coggie, diminutive of cog. 
 
 Coila, from Kyle, a district of Ayrshire ; 
 so railed, saith tradition, from Coil, 
 or Coilus, a Pictish monarch. 
 
 Collie, a general, and sometimes a par- 
 ticular name for country curs. 
 
 Collieshangie, quarrelling, an uproar. 
 
 Commavn, command. 
 
 Cnod, the cud. 
 
 Coof, a blockhead ; a ninny. 
 
 Cookit, appeared, and disappeared by 
 fits. 
 
 Coast, did cast. 
 
 Coot, the ancle or foof. 
 
 Cootie, a wooden kitchen dish : — also, 
 those fowls whose legs are clad with 
 feathers, are said to be cootie. 
 
 Corbies, a species of the crow. 
 
 Core, corps ; party ; clan. 
 
 Corn't, fed with oats. 
 
 Cotter, the inhabitant of a cot-house, or 
 cottage. 
 
 Coiithie, kind, loving. 
 
 Cove, a cave. 
 
 Cowe, to terrify ; to keep under, to lop ; 
 a fright ; a branch of furze, broom, &c. 
 
 Covp, to barter; to tumble over; a 
 gang. 
 
16P, 
 
 GLOSSARY. 
 
 Cowpit, tumbled. 
 
 Cowrin, cowerin»T. 
 
 Coxct, a colt. 
 
 Cozie, snug. 
 
 Cozily, snugly. 
 
 Crabbit, crabbed, fretful. 
 
 Crack, conversation ; to converse. 
 
 Crackin, conversing. 
 
 Craft, or croft, a field near a house {in 
 old husbandry). 
 
 Craiks, cries or calls incessantly; a bird. 
 
 Crambo-clink, or crambo-jingle, rhymes, 
 doggrel verses. 
 
 Crank, the noise of an ungreased wheel. 
 
 Crankous, fretful, captious. 
 
 Cranreuch, the hoar frost. 
 
 Crap, a crop ; to crop. 
 
 Craw, a crow of a cock ; a rook. 
 
 Creel, a basket ; to have one's wits in a 
 creel, to be crazed; to be fascinated. 
 
 Creepie-stool, the same as cutty-stool. 
 
 Creeshie, greasy. 
 
 Crood, or croud, to coo as a dove. 
 
 Croon, a hollow and continued moan ; 
 to make a noise like the continued 
 roar of a bull ; to hum a tune. 
 
 Crooning-, humming. 
 
 Crmirhic, crook-backed. 
 
 Croiise, cheerful ; courageous. 
 
 Crousely, cheerfully ; courageously. 
 
 Crowdie, a composition of oat-meal and 
 boiled water, sometimes from the 
 broth of beef, mutton, &c. 
 
 Crowdie-time, breakfast time. 
 
 Crowlin, crawling. 
 
 Crummock, a cow with crooked horns. 
 
 Crump, hard and brittle ; spoken of bread. 
 
 Crunt, a blow on the head with a cudgel. 
 
 Cuif a blockhead, a ninny. 
 
 Cummock, a ehort staff with a crooked 
 head. 
 
 Curchie, a courtesy. 
 
 Curler, a player at a game on the ice, 
 pr;vctised in Scotland, called curling. 
 
 Curlie, curled, whose hair falls natu- 
 rally in ringlets. 
 
 Curling, a welt known game on the ice. 
 
 Curmurring, murmuring ; a slight rum- 
 bling noise. 
 
 Curpin, the crupper. 
 
 Cushat, the dove, or wood-pigeon. 
 
 Cutty, short ; a spoon broken in the 
 middle. 
 
 Cutty-stool, the stool of repentance. 
 
 /).^7)D/i;:, a father. 
 
 Dnffm, merriment ; foolishness 
 Daft, merry, giddy ; foolish. 
 
 Daimen, rare, now and then ; daimcn- 
 icker, an ear of corn now and then. 
 
 Dainty, pleasant, good humoured, 
 agreeable. 
 
 Daise, daez, to stupify. 
 
 Dales, plains, valleys. 
 
 Darklint, darkling. 
 
 Daud, to thrash, to abuse. 
 
 Daur, to dare. 
 
 Daurt, dared. 
 
 Daurg, or daurk, a day's labour. 
 
 Davoc, David. 
 
 Dated, a large piece. 
 
 Dawtit, or dawtet, fondled, caressed. 
 
 Dearies, diminutive of dears. 
 
 Dearthfu', dear. 
 
 Deave, to deafen. 
 
 Deil-ma-care ! no matter ! for all that ! 
 
 Deleerit, delirious. 
 
 Dcscrive, to describe. 
 
 Dight, to wipe ; to clean corn from 
 chaff. 
 
 Dight, cleaned from chaff. 
 
 Ding, to worst, to push. 
 
 Dink, neat, tidy, trfan. 
 
 Dinna, do not. 
 
 Dirl, a slight tremulous stroke or pain 
 
 Dizen, or dizz'n, a dozen. 
 
 Doited, stupified, hebetated. 
 
 Dolt, stupified, crazed. 
 
 Donsie, unlucky. 
 
 Dool, sorrow ; to sing dool, to lament, 
 to mourn. 
 
 Doos, doves. 
 
 Dorty, saucy, nice. 
 
 Douce, or douse, sober, wise, prudent. 
 
 Doucely, soberly, prudently. 
 
 Dought, was or were able. 
 
 Doup, backside. 
 
 Doup-skelper, one that strikes the tail. 
 
 Dour and din, sullen and sallow. 
 
 Doure, stout, durable ; sullen, stubborn. 
 
 Dow, am or are able, can. 
 
 Dowff, pithless, wanting force. 
 
 Dowie, worn with grief, fatigue, &.c. 
 half asleep. 
 
 Doiona, am or are not able, cannot. 
 
 Doylt, stupid. 
 
 Dozcn't, stupified, impotent. 
 
 Drap, a drop ; to drop. 
 
 Drnigle, to soil by trailing, to draggle 
 among wet, &c. 
 
 Drapping, dropping. 
 
 Draunting, drawling; of a elow enun- 
 ciation. 
 
 Dreep, to ooze, to drop. 
 
 Dreigh, tedious, long about it. 
 
 Drihble, diuziXmg; slaver. 
 
 Drift, a drove. 
 
 Droddum, the breech. 
 
GLOSSARY. 
 
 169 
 
 Drone, part of a bagpipe. 
 
 Droop-rumpl't, that drops at the crup- 
 per. 
 
 Droukit, wet. 
 
 Drounting, drawling. 
 
 Drouth, thirst, drought. 
 
 Drucken, drunken. 
 
 Drumly, muddy. 
 
 Drummock, meal and water mixed in a 
 raw state. 
 
 Drunt, pet, sour humour. 
 
 Dub, a small pond. 
 
 Duds, rags, clothes. 
 
 Duddie, ragged. 
 
 Dung, worsted ; pushed, driven. 
 
 Dunted, beaten, boxed. 
 
 Dush, to push as a ram, &c. 
 
 Dusht, pushed by a ram, ox, &c. 
 
 E'E, the eye. 
 
 Een, the eyes. 
 
 E'enin, evening. 
 
 Eerie, frighted, dreading spirits. 
 
 Eild, old age. 
 
 Elbuck, the elbow. 
 
 Eldrilck, ghastly, frightful. 
 
 Eller, an elder, or church officer 
 
 En', end. 
 
 Enbrugh, Edinburgh. 
 
 Eneugh, enough. 
 
 Especial, especially. 
 
 Ettle, to try, to attempt. 
 
 Eydent, diligent. 
 
 FA\ fall ; lot ; to fall. 
 
 Fa's, does fall ; water-falls. 
 
 Faddom't, fathomed. 
 
 Foe, a foe. 
 
 Faem, foam. 
 
 Faiket, unknown. 
 
 Fairin, a fairing ; a present. 
 
 Fallow, fellow. 
 
 Fand, did find. 
 
 Farl, a cake of oaten bread, &c. 
 
 Fash, trouble, care ; to trouble to care 
 
 for. 
 Fasht, troubled. 
 Fasteren e'en, Fasten's Even. 
 Fauld, a fold ; to fold 
 Faulding, folding. 
 Faut, fault. 
 Faute, want, lack. 
 Fawsont, decent, seemly. 
 Feal, a field ; smooth. 
 Fearfii', frightful. 
 Fear't, frighted. 
 Feal, n'^at, s})rtice. 
 
 M 2 
 
 Fecht, to fight. 
 
 Fechtin, fighting. 
 
 Feck, many, plenty. 
 
 Fecket, an under waistcoat with sleeves. 
 
 Feckfu', large, brawny, stout. 
 
 Feckleits, puny, weak, silly. 
 
 Feckly, weakly. 
 
 Feg, a fig. 
 
 Feide, feud, enmity. 
 
 Feirrie, stout, vigorous, healthy. 
 
 Fell, keen, biting; the flesh immediately 
 
 under the skin ; a field pretty level, 
 
 on the side or top of a hill. 
 Fen, successful struggle ; fight. 
 Fend, to live comfortably. 
 Ferlie, or ferley, to wonder ; a wonder ; 
 
 a term of contempt. 
 Fetch, to pull by fits. 
 Fetch't, pulled intermittently. 
 Fidge, to fidget. 
 Fiel, soft, smooth. 
 Fient, fiend, a petty oath. 
 Fier, sound, healthy ; a brother ; a friend. 
 Fissle, to make a rustling noise; to 
 
 fidget ; a bustle. 
 Fit, a foot. 
 
 Fittie-lan', the nearer horse of the hind- 
 most pair in the plough. 
 Fizz, to make a hissing noise like fer- 
 mentation. 
 Flainen, flannel. 
 Fleech, to supplicate in a flattering 
 
 manner. 
 Fleech'd, supplicated. 
 Fleechin, supplicating. 
 Fleesh, a fleece. 
 Fleg, a kick, a random. 
 Flether, to decoy by fair words. 
 FTetherin, flattering. 
 Fley, to scare, to frighten. 
 Flichter, to flutter, as young nestlings 
 
 when their dam approaches. 
 Flinders, shreds, broken pieces, epliri- 
 
 ters. 
 Flinging-tree, a piece of timber hung 
 
 by way of partition between two 
 
 horses in a stable ; a flail. 
 Flisk, to fret at the yoke. Fliskit, 
 
 fretted. 
 Flitter, to vibrate like the wings of 
 
 small birds. 
 Flittering, fluttering, vibrating. 
 Flunkie, a servant in livery. 
 Fodgel, squat and plump. 
 Foord, a ford. 
 Forbears, forefathers. 
 Forbye, besides. 
 
 For/aim, distressed; worn out, jaded- 
 Forfoughten, fatigued. 
 Forgather, to meet, to encounter with. 
 Forgie, to forgive. 
 
170 
 
 GLOSSARY. 
 
 Forjeaket, jaded with fatigue. 
 
 Father, foddef. 
 
 Fou, full ; drunk. 
 
 Foughten, troubled, harassed. 
 
 Fouth, plenty, enough, or more than 
 
 enough. 
 Foio, a bushel, &c. ; also a pitch-fork. 
 Frae, from ; oft'. 
 Frammit, strange, estranged from, at 
 
 enmity with. 
 Frea</!, froth. 
 Frien', friend. 
 Fu', full. 
 Fud, the scut, or tail of the hare, cony, 
 
 &c. 
 Fuf, to blow intermittently 
 F^t, did blow. 
 Funnie, full of merriment 
 Fur, a furrow. 
 Furm, a form, bench. 
 Fyke, trifling cares ; to puldlc, to be in 
 
 a fuss about trifles. 
 Fyle, to soil, to dirty 
 f^/fty soiled, dirtied. 
 
 OAB, the mouth ; to speak boldly, or 
 
 pertly. 
 Gaber-lunzie, an old man. 
 Gadaman, a ploughboy, the boy that 
 
 drives the horses in the plough. 
 Gae, to go ; gaed, went ; gaen, or gane, 
 
 gone ; gaun, going. 
 Gaet, or gate, way, manner ; road. 
 Gairs, triangular pieces of cloth sewed 
 
 on the bottom of a gown, &.c 
 Gang, to go, to walk. 
 Gar, to make, to force to. 
 Gar't, forced to. 
 Garten, a garter. 
 Gash, wise, sagacious ; talkative ; to 
 
 converse. 
 Gashin, conversing. 
 Gaucy, jolly, large. 
 Gaud, a plough. 
 Gear, riches ; goods of any kind 
 Geek, to toss the head in wantonness or 
 
 scorn. 
 Ged, a pike. 
 
 Gentles, great folks, goutry. 
 Genty. elegantly formed, neat. 
 Geordie. a guinea. 
 Get, a child, a young one. 
 Ghaist, a ghost. 
 
 Gj>, toffive; sied, gave; ^;>7J, given. 
 Giftie, diminutive of gift. 
 Gis:Iets, playful girls. 
 Gilfie, diminutive of gill. 
 Gifpey. « lin'f ijrown, halfinformedboy 
 
 or girl, a romping lad. a hoiden. 
 
 Gimmer, a ewe from one to two years 
 old. 
 
 Gin, if; against. 
 
 Gipsey, a young girl. 
 
 Girn, to grin, to twist the features in 
 rage, agony, &c. 
 
 Giming, grinning. 
 
 Gizz, a periwig. 
 
 Glaikit, inattentive, foolish. 
 
 Glaive, a sword. 
 
 Gawky, half-witted, foolish, romping. 
 
 Glaizie, glittering ; smooth like glass. 
 
 Glaum, to snatch greedily. 
 
 Glaum'd, aimed, snatched. 
 
 Gleck, sharp, ready. 
 
 Gleg, sharp, ready. 
 
 Gleib, glebe. 
 
 Glen, a dale, a deep valley. 
 
 Gley, a squint ; to squint ; a-gley, off 
 at a side, wrong. 
 
 Glib-gabbct, smooth and ready in speech. 
 
 Glint, to' peep. 
 
 Glinted, peeped. 
 
 Glintin, peeping. 
 
 Gloamin, the twilight. 
 
 Gloicr, to stare, to look ; a stare, a look. 
 
 Gloicred, looked, stared. 
 
 Glunsh, a frown, a sour look. 
 
 Goavan, looking round with a strange, 
 inquiring gaze ; staring stupidly. 
 
 Goican, the flower of the wild daisy, 
 hawk-weed, &c. 
 
 Gowany, daisied, abounding with dai- 
 sies. . 
 
 Goicd, gold. 
 
 Oawf, the game of Golf ; to strike as 
 the bat does the ball at golf. 
 
 Goirft'd, struck. 
 
 Goidc, a cuckoo ; a term of contempt. 
 
 Goicl, to howl. 
 
 Grane, or grain, a groan ; to groan. 
 
 Grain'd and grunted, groaned and 
 granted. 
 
 Graining, groaning. 
 
 Graip, a pronged instrument for clean- 
 ing stables. 
 
 Graith, accoutrements, furniture, dress, 
 gear. 
 
 Grannie, grandmother. 
 
 Grape, to grope. 
 
 Grapit, groped. 
 
 Grat, wept, shed tears. 
 
 Great, intimate, familiar. 
 
 Gree, to agree ; to hear the gree, to be 
 decidedly ^^ctor. 
 
 Greet, agreed. 
 
 Greet, to shed tears, to weep. 
 
 Greelin, crying, weeping. 
 
 Grip^prt, catched, seized. 
 
 Croat, to c't the whi.^flr of one's grnni 
 to play a losing game. 
 
GLOSSARY. 
 
 171 
 
 Gronsome, loathsomely, grim 
 
 Grozet, a gooseberry. 
 
 Grumph, a grunt ; to grunt. 
 
 Grumphie, a sow. 
 
 Grun', ground. 
 
 Grunstane, a grindstone. 
 
 Gruntle, the phiz ; a grunting noise. 
 
 Grunzie, mouth. 
 
 Grushie, tliick ; of iJiriving growth- 
 
 Chule, the Supreme Being ; good. 
 
 Guid, good. 
 
 Guid-moming, good morrow. 
 
 Guid-e'en, good evening. 
 
 Guidman and guidwife, the master and 
 mistress of the house ; young guid- 
 man, a man newly married. 
 
 Guid-willie, liberal ; cordial. 
 
 Guidfather, guidmother, father-in-law, 
 and mother-in-law. 
 
 Gully, or giUlie, a large knife. 
 
 Gumlie, muddy. 
 
 Gusty, tasteful. 
 
 H. 
 
 HA', hall. 
 
 Ha'-Bible, the great bible that lies in 
 
 the hall. 
 Hae, to have. 
 Haen, had, the participle 
 Haet,fient haet, a petty oath of nega- 
 tion; nothing. 
 Haffet, the temple, the side of the head. 
 Hafflins, nearly half, partly. 
 Hag, a scar, or gulf in mosses, and moors. 
 Haggis, a kind of pudding boiled in the 
 
 stomach of a cow or sheep. 
 Hain, to spare, to save. 
 Hain'd, spared. 
 Hairst, harvest. 
 Haith, a petty oath. 
 Haivers, nonsense, speaking without 
 
 thought. 
 Hal', or hald, an abiding place. 
 Hale, whole, tight, healthy. 
 Haly, holy. 
 Hame, home. 
 Hallan, a particular partition-wall in a 
 
 cottage, or more properly a seat of 
 
 turf at the outside. 
 Hallowmas, Hallow-eve, the 31 st of 
 
 October. 
 Hamely, homely, affable. 
 Han', or hann', hand. 
 Hap, an outer garment, mantle, plaid, 
 
 &.C. to wrap, to cover; to hop. 
 Happer, a hopper. 
 Happing, hopping. 
 Hap step an' loup, hop skip and leap. 
 Harkit, hearkened. 
 Hnrn, very coarse linen. 
 
 Hash, a fellow that neither knows how 
 
 to dress nor act with propriety. 
 
 Hastit, hastened. 
 
 Hand, to hold. 
 
 Haughs, low lying, rich lands ; valleys. 
 
 Haurl, to drag ; to peel. 
 
 Haurlin, peeling. 
 
 Haverel, a half-witted person ; half- 
 witted. 
 
 Havins, good-manners, decorum, good 
 sense. 
 
 Hawkie, a cow, properly one with a 
 white face. 
 
 Heapit, heaped. 
 
 Healsome, healthful, wholesome. 
 
 Hearse, hoarse. 
 
 Hear't, hear it. 
 
 Heather, heath. 
 
 Hech! oh! strange. 
 
 Hecht, promised ; to foretell something 
 that is to be got or given ; foretold ; 
 the thing foretold ; offered. 
 
 Heckle, a board, in which are fixed a 
 number of sharp pins, used in dress- 
 ing hemp, flax, &.c. 
 
 Heeze, to elevate, to raise. 
 
 Helm, the rudder or helm. 
 
 Herd, to tend flocks ; one who tends 
 flocks. 
 
 Herrin, a herring. 
 
 Herry, to plunder ; most properly to 
 plunder birds' nests. 
 
 Herryment, plundering, devastation 
 
 Hersel, herself; also a herd of cattle, 
 of any sort. 
 
 Het, hot. 
 
 Heugh, a crag, a coalpit. 
 
 Hilch, a hobble ; to halt. 
 
 Hilchin, halting. 
 
 Himsel, himself. 
 
 Hiney, honey. 
 
 Hing, to hang. 
 
 Hirple, to walk crazily, to creep. 
 
 Hiss el, so many cattle as one peroon 
 can attend. 
 
 Histie, dry ; chapped ; barren. 
 
 Hitch, a loop, a knot. 
 
 Hizzie, a hussy, a young girl. 
 
 Hoddin, the motion of a sage country- 
 man riding on a cart-horse ; humble. 
 
 Hog-score, a kind of distance line, in 
 curling, drawn across the rink. 
 
 Hog-shouther, a kind of horse play, by 
 JHstling with the shoulder ; to justle. 
 
 Hool, outer skin or case, a nut-ohell ; 
 a peas-cod. 
 
 Huolie, slowly, leisurely. 
 
 Hooliel take leisure, slop. 
 
 Ilnord, a hoard ; to hoard. 
 
 Jloordit, horded. 
 
 Horn, a spoon made of horn. 
 
172 
 
 GLOSSAIIV. 
 
 Horniey one of the many names of the 
 devil. 
 
 Host, or hoast, to cough ; a cough. 
 
 Hostin, coughing. 
 
 Hosts, coughs. 
 
 Hotch'd, turned topsyturvy ; blended, 
 mixed. 
 
 Houghmagandie^ fornication 
 
 Houlet, an ovi^l. 
 
 Housie, diminutive of housa 
 
 Hove, to heave, to swell. 
 
 Hov'd, heaved, swelled. 
 
 Howdie, a midwife. 
 
 Howe, hollow ; a hollow or dell. 
 
 Howebackit, sunk in the back, spoken 
 of a horse, &c. 
 
 Howff, a tippling house ; a house of re- 
 sort. 
 
 Howk, to dig. 
 
 Howkit, digged. 
 
 Hotokin, digging. 
 
 Howlet, an owl. 
 
 Hoy, to urge. 
 
 Hoy't, urged. 
 
 Hoyse, to pull upwards. 
 
 Hoyte, to amble crazily. 
 
 Hughoc, diminutive of Hugh. 
 
 Hurcheon, a hedgehog. 
 
 Hurdies, the loins ; the crupper. 
 
 Hushion, a cushion. 
 
 I. 
 
 r, in. 
 
 Icker, an ear of corn. 
 Jer-oe, a great-grandchild. 
 Ilk, or Ilka, each, every. 
 Ill-willie, ill-natured, malicious, nig- 
 gardly. 
 Ingine, genius, ingenuity 
 Ingle, fire ; fire-place. 
 Jse, I shall or will. 
 Ither, other : one another. 
 
 J. 
 
 JAD, jade ; also a familiar term among 
 country folks for a giddy young girl. 
 
 Jauk, to dally, to trifle. 
 
 Jaukin, trifling, dallying. 
 
 Jaup, a jerk of water; to jerk as agi- 
 tated water. 
 
 Jaw, coarse raillery ; to pour out ; to 
 shut, to jerk as water. 
 
 Terkinet, a jerkin, or short gown. 
 lillet, a jilt, a giddy girl. 
 
 Jimp, to jump; slender in the waist; 
 handsome. 
 
 Jimps, easy stays. 
 
 Jink, to dodge, to turn a corner ; a 
 sudden turnin? ; a corner. 
 
 Jinker, that turns quickly ; a gay, 
 
 sprightly girl ; a wag. 
 Jinkin, dodging. 
 Jirk, a jerk. 
 Jocteleg, a kind of knife. 
 Jouk, to stoop, to bow the head. 
 Jow, to jaw, a verb which includes both 
 
 the swinging motion and pealing 
 
 sound of a large bell. 
 Jtmdie, to justle. 
 
 KAE, a daw. 
 
 Kail, colewort ; a kind of broth. 
 
 Kail-runt, the stem of colewort. 
 
 Kai7i, fowls, &c. paid as rent by a far- 
 mer. 
 
 Kebbuck, a cheese. 
 
 Keckle, to giggle ; to titter. 
 
 Keek, a peep, to peep. 
 
 Kelpies, a sort of mischievous spirits, 
 said to haunt fords and ferries at night, 
 especially in storms. 
 
 Ken, to know ; kend or kenn'd knew. 
 
 Kennin, a small matter. 
 
 Kenapeckle, well known, easily known. 
 
 Ket, matted, hairy; a fleece of wool. 
 
 Kilt, to truss up the clothes. 
 
 Kimmer, a young girl, a gossip. 
 
 Kin, kindred ; Arm', kind, adj. 
 
 King's-fiood, a certain part of the en- 
 trails of an ox, &c. 
 
 Kintra, country. 
 
 Kintra Cooser, country stallion. 
 
 Kirn, the harvest supper ; a churn. 
 
 Kirsen, to christen, or baptize. 
 
 Ki»t, a chest ; a shop counter. 
 
 Kitchen, any thing that eats with bread ; 
 to serve for soup, gravy, &,c. 
 
 Kith, kindred. 
 
 Kittle, to tickle ; ticklish ; lively, apt. 
 
 Kittlin, a young cat. 
 
 Kiuttle, to cuddle. 
 
 Kiuttlin, cuddling. 
 
 Knaggie, like knags, or points of rocks. 
 
 Knap, to strike smartly, a smart blow. 
 
 Knappin-hammer, a hammer for break- 
 ing stones. 
 
 Knowe, a small round hillock. 
 
 Knurl, a dwarf. 
 
 Kye, cows. 
 
 Kyle, a district in Ayrshire. 
 
 Kyte, the belly. 
 
 Kythe, to discover ; to show one's self. 
 
 L. 
 
 LADDIE, dimmutive of lad. 
 Laggen, the angle between the side and 
 bottom of a wooden dish. 
 
GLOSSARY. 
 
 173 
 
 Laigh, low. 
 
 Lairing, wading, and sinking in snow, 
 mud, &c. 
 
 Laith, loath. 
 
 Lailhfa', bashful, sheepish. 
 
 Lallans, the Scottish dialect of the 
 English language. 
 
 Lambie, diminutive of lamb. 
 
 Lampit, a kind of shell-fish, a limpit. 
 
 Lan', land ; estate. 
 
 Lane, lone ; my lane, thy lane, Sfc. my- 
 self alone, &c. 
 
 Lanely, lonely. 
 
 Lang, long ; to think lang, to long, to 
 weary. 
 
 Lap, did leap. 
 
 Lave, the rest, the remainder, the others. 
 
 Laverock, the lark. 
 
 Lawin, shot, reckoning, bill. 
 
 Lawlan, lowland. 
 
 Lea'e, to leave. 
 
 Leal, loyal, true, faithful. 
 
 Lea-rig, grassy ridge. 
 
 Lear, (pronounce lare,) learning. 
 
 Lee-lang, live-long. 
 
 Leesome, pleasant. 
 
 Leeze-me, a phrase of congratulatory 
 endearment ; I am happy in thee, or 
 proud of thee. 
 
 Leister, a three pronged dart for strik- 
 ing fish. 
 
 Leugh, did laugh 
 
 Leuk, a look ; to look 
 
 Lihhet, gelded. 
 
 Lift, the sky. 
 
 Lightly, sneeringly ; to sneer at 
 
 LiU, a ballad ; a tune ; to sing. 
 
 Limmer, a kept mistress, a strumpet. 
 
 Limp't, limped, hobbled 
 
 Link, to trip along 
 
 Linkin, tripping. 
 
 Linn, a water-fall ; a precipice. 
 
 Lint, flax ; lint i' the bell, flax in flower. 
 
 Lintwhite, a linnet. 
 
 Loan, or loanin, the place of milking. 
 
 Loaf, the palm of the banc' 
 
 Loot, did let. 
 
 Looves, plural o/"loof. 
 
 Loim, a fellow, a ragamuffin ; a woman 
 of easy virtue. 
 
 Loup, jump, lean 
 
 Lowe, a flame. 
 
 Lowin, flaming. 
 
 Lowrie, abbreviation of Lawrence 
 
 Lowse, to loose. 
 
 Lows'd, loosed. 
 
 Liig, the ear ; a handle. 
 
 Lugget, having a handle. 
 
 Luggie, a small wooden dish with a 
 handle. 
 
 Z.MTO, the chimney. 
 
 Lunch, a large piece of cheese, flesh, &c. 
 Lunl, a coliunn of smoke; to smoke. 
 Luntin, smoking. 
 Lyart, of a mixed colour, gray. 
 
 M. 
 
 MAE, more. 
 
 Mair, more. 
 
 Maist, most, almost. 
 
 Maistly, mostly. 
 
 Mak, to make. 
 
 Makin, making. 
 
 Mailen, a farm. 
 
 Mallie, Molly. 
 
 Mang, among. 
 
 Manse, the parsonage house, where the 
 minister lives. 
 
 Manteele, a mantle. 
 
 Mark, marks, {This and several other 
 nouns which in English require an s, 
 to form the plural, are in Scotch, like 
 the words sheep, deer, the same in 
 both numbers.) 
 
 Marled, variegated ; spotted. 
 
 Mar's year, the year 1715. 
 
 Mashlum, meslin, mixed corn. 
 
 Mask, to mash, as malt, &c. 
 
 Maskin-pat, a tea-pot. 
 
 Maud, maad, a plaid worn by shep- 
 herds, &c. 
 
 Maukin, a hare. 
 
 Maun, must. 
 
 Mavis, the thrush 
 
 Maw, to mow. 
 
 Mnwin, mowing. 
 
 Meere, a mare. 
 
 Meikle, meickle, much. 
 
 Mehincholious, mournful 
 
 Melder, corn, or grain of any kind, sent 
 to the mill to be ground. 
 
 Mell, to meddle. Also a mallet for 
 pounding barley in a stone trough. 
 
 Mflvie, to soil with meal. 
 
 Men', to mend. 
 
 Mense, good manners, decorum. 
 
 Menseless, ill-bred, rude, impudent 
 
 Messin, a small dog. 
 
 Midden, a dunghill. 
 
 Midden-hole, a gutter at the bottom of 
 a dunghill. 
 
 Mim, prim, affectedly meek. 
 
 Min', mind ; resemblance. 
 
 Mind't, mind it ; resolved, intending. 
 
 Minnie, mother, dam. 
 
 Mirk, mirkest, dark, darkest. 
 
 Misca', to abuse, to call names. 
 
 Misca'd, abused. 
 
 Mislear'd, mischievous, unmannerly. 
 
 Misteuk, mistook. 
 
 Mither, a mother. 
 
174 
 
 GLOSSARY. 
 
 Mixtie-maxtie, confuBedly mixed. 
 
 J^oistify, to moisten. 
 
 Jilony, or 7nonie, many. 
 
 Jlooh, dust, earth, the earth of the 
 
 grave. To rake i' the moots ; to lay 
 
 in the dust. 
 Jdoop, to nibble as a sheep. 
 Moorlan\ of or belonging to moors. 
 Mom, the'next day, to-morrow. 
 Mou, the mouth. 
 JVfoudiwort, a mole. 
 Jitousie, diminutive of mouse. 
 Muckle, or mickle, great, big, much. 
 Mtisie, diminutive of muse. 
 Muslin-kail, broth, composed simply of 
 
 water, shelled-barley, and greens. 
 Mutchkin, an English pint. 
 Mysel, myself. 
 
 N. 
 
 JVlfl, no, not, nor. 
 
 Jfae, no, not any. 
 
 JVadhing, or naithing, nothing. 
 
 Jfaig, a horse. 
 
 Jfane, none. 
 
 J^appy, ale ; to be tipsy. 
 
 J^egleckit, neglected. 
 
 J^euk, a nook. 
 
 J^iest, next. 
 
 JVIferc, the fist. 
 
 JVievefu\ handful. 
 
 J^ffer, an exchange ; to exchange, to 
 
 barter. 
 J^iger, a negro. 
 
 J^ne-taiV d-cat, a hangman's whip. 
 JViY, a nut. 
 
 Jforland, of or belonging' tn the nortK 
 J^otic't, noticed. 
 Ji'owte, black cattle. 
 
 0\ of. 
 
 Ochels, name of monntams. 
 
 O haith, O faith ! an oath. 
 
 Ony, or onie, any. 
 
 Or, is often used for ere, before 
 
 Ora, or orra, supernumerary, that "an 
 
 be spared. 
 O't, of it. 
 
 Otirie, shivering ; drooping. 
 Oursel, or oursels, ourselves. 
 (hitlers, cattle not housed. 
 Ower, over ; too. 
 Ower-hip, a way of fetching a blow 
 
 with the hammer over the arm. 
 
 P. 
 
 PACK, intimate, familiar ; twelve 
 alone of wool. 
 
 Painch, paunch. 
 Paitrick, a partridge. 
 Pang, to cram. 
 Parle, speech. 
 
 Parritch, oatmeal pudding, a well- 
 known Scotch dish. 
 
 Pat, did put ; a pot. 
 
 Pattle, or pdtle, a plough-staff. 
 
 Paughiy, proud, haughty. 
 
 Pauky, or paickie, cunning, sly. 
 
 Pay't, paid ; beat. 
 
 Peck, to fetch the breath short, as in 
 an asthma. 
 
 Pechan, the crop the stomach. 
 
 Peelin, peeling, the rind of fruit. 
 
 Pet, a domesticated sheep, &c. 
 
 Pettle, to cherish ; a plough-staff. ' 
 
 Philibegs, short petticoats worn by the " 
 Highlandmen. 
 
 Phraise, fair speeches, tlattery ; to flat- 
 ter. 
 
 Phraisin, flattery. 
 
 Pibroch, Highland war music adapted 
 to the bagpipe. 
 
 Pickle, a small quantity. 
 
 Pine, pain, uneasiness. 
 
 Pit, to put. 
 
 Placad, a pubhc proclamation. 
 
 Plack, an old Scotch coin, the third 
 part of a Scotch penny, twelve of 
 which make an English penny. 
 
 Plackless, pennyless, without money 
 
 Plaiie, diminutive of plate. 
 
 Plew, or pleugh, a plough. 
 
 Pliskic, a trick. 
 
 Poind, to seize cattle or goods for rent, 
 as the laws of Scotland allow. 
 
 Poortith, poverty. 
 
 Pcyn, to pull. 
 
 Poxik, to pluck. 
 
 Poussie, a hare, or cat. 
 
 Pout, a poult, a chick. 
 
 Pou't, did pull. 
 
 Poxcthery, like powder. 
 
 Pow, the head, the skull, 
 
 Pownie, a little horse. 
 
 Powther, or pouther, powder. 
 
 Preen, a pin. 
 
 Prent, to print ; print. 
 
 Prie, to taste. 
 
 Prie'd, tasted. 
 
 Prief, proof. 
 
 Pris, to cheapen ; to dispute. 
 
 Priggin, cheapening. 
 
 Primsie, demure, precise. 
 
 Propone, to lay down, to propose. 
 
 Provoses, provosts. 
 
 Puddock-stool, a mushroom, fungus. 
 
 Putid, pound ; pounds. 
 
 Pyle, — a pyle o' cajff, a girigle grain of 
 chaft'. 
 
(iLUSSARV. 
 
 175 
 
 Q. 
 
 QUAT, to quit. 
 Quak, to quake. 
 Quey, a cow from one to two years old. 
 
 R 
 
 RAGWEED, the herb ragwort. 
 
 Raihle, to rattle nonsense. 
 
 Rair, to roar. 
 
 Raize, to madden, to inflame. 
 
 Ram-fcezl'd, fatigued ; overspread. 
 
 Ram-nttim, thoughtless, forward. 
 
 R'iploch, (properly) a coarse cloth ; but 
 
 used as an adnounfor coarse. 
 Rarely, excellently, very well. 
 Rash, a rush ; rash-buss, a bush of rushes. 
 Rattan, a rat. 
 
 Ruucle, rash ; stout ; fearless. 
 Raught, reached. 
 Rav), a row. 
 Rax, to stretch. 
 Ream, cream ; to cream. 
 Reamin;^, brimful, frothing. 
 Jteave, rove. 
 Reck, to heed. 
 Rede, counsel ; to counsel. 
 Red-wat-shod, walking in blood over 
 
 the shoe-tops. 
 Red-wud, stark mad. 
 Ree, half-drunk, fuddled. 
 Reek, smoke. 
 Reekin, smoking. 
 Reekit, smoked ; smoky. 
 Rimead, remedy. 
 Requite, requited. 
 w Rest, to stand restive. 
 
 Restit, stood restive ; stunted ; withered. 
 
 Restricked, restricted. 
 
 Rew, to repent to compassionate. 
 
 Ricf, reef, plenty. 
 
 Rirf randies, sturdy beggars. 
 
 Rig, a ridge. 
 
 Rigwiddie, rigwoodie, the rope or chain 
 
 that crosses the saddle of a horse to 
 
 support the spokes of a cart ; spare, 
 
 withered, sapless. 
 Rin, to run, to melt ; rinnin, running. 
 Rink, the course of the stones ; a term 
 
 in curling on ice. 
 Rip, a handful of unthreshed corn. 
 Riskit, made a noise like the tearing of 
 
 roots. 
 Rockin, spinning on the rock or distaff. 
 Rood, stands likewise for the plural 
 
 roods. 
 Roon, a shred, a border or selvage. 
 Roose, to praise, to commend. 
 Roosty, rusty. 
 
 Rmm', round, in the circle of neigh- 
 bourhood. 
 
 Roupet, lioarse. as with a cold. 
 
 Roidhie, plentiful. 
 
 Roio, to roll, to wrap. 
 
 Row't, rolled, wrapped. 
 
 Rowte, to low, to bellow. 
 
 Ruwth, or routh, plenty. 
 
 Routin, lowing. 
 
 Rozet, rosin. 
 
 Rung, a cudgel. 
 
 Runkled, wrinkled. 
 
 Runt, the stem of cole wort or cabbage. 
 
 Ruth, a woman's name ; the book bo 
 called ; sorrow. 
 
 Ryke, to reach. 
 
 S. 
 
 SAE, so. 
 
 Sa/l, soft. 
 
 Sair, to serve ; a sore. 
 
 Sairly, or sairlie, sorely. 
 
 Sair't, served. 
 
 Sark, a shirt ; a shift. 
 
 Sarkit, provided in shirts. 
 
 Saugh, the willow. 
 
 Saul, soul. 
 
 Saumont, salmon. 
 
 Saunt, a saint. 
 
 Saut, salt, adj. salt. 
 
 Saw, to sow. 
 
 Sawin, sowing. 
 
 Sax, six 
 
 Scaith, to damage, to injure ; injury 
 
 Scar, a cliff. 
 
 Scaud, to scald. 
 
 Scauld, to scold. 
 
 Scaur, apt to be scared. 
 
 Scawl, a scold ; a termigant. 
 
 Scon, a cake of bread. 
 
 Scanner, a loathing ; to loathe. 
 
 Scratch, to scream as a hen, partridge, 
 
 &c. 
 Screed, to tear ; a rent. 
 Scrieve, to glide swiftly along. 
 Scricvin, gleesomely ; swiftly. 
 Scrimp, to scant. 
 Scrimpef, did scant ; scanty. 
 See'd, did see. 
 Seizin, seizing. 
 
 Sel, self; a body's tel, one's self alone. 
 Seirt, did sell. 
 Sen', to send. 
 
 Sen't, I, &c. sent, or did send it ; send it 
 Servan', servant. 
 Settlin, settling ; to get a setllin, to be 
 
 frighted into quietness. 
 Sets, sets off, goes away. 
 Shackled, distorted ; shapeless. 
 Shaird, a shred, a shard. 
 
176 
 
 GLOSSARY. 
 
 Shangan, a stick cleft at one end for 
 putting the tail of a dog, &c. into, 
 by way of mischief, or to frighten 
 him away. 
 Shaver, a humorous wag ; a barber. 
 Shaw, to show ; a small wood in a hol- 
 low. 
 Sheen, bright, shining. 
 Sheep-shank ; to think one's self nae 
 
 sheepshank, to be conceited. 
 Sherra-moor, sherifF-moor, the famous 
 battle fought in the rebellion, A. D. 
 1715. 
 Sheugh, a ditch, a trench, a sluice. 
 Shiel, a shed. 
 Shill, shrill. 
 
 Shog, a shock ; a push off at one side 
 Shool, a shovel. 
 Shoon, shoes. 
 
 Shore, to offer, to threaten. 
 Shored, offered. 
 Shouther, the shoulder. 
 Shure, did shear, shore. 
 Sic, such. 
 
 Sicker, sure, steady. 
 Sidelins, sidelong, slanting 
 Siller, silver ; money. 
 Simmer, summer. 
 Sin, a son. 
 Sin', since. 
 Skaith, see scaitk 
 Skellum, a worthless fellow. 
 Skelp, to strike, to slap ; to walk with 
 a smart tripping step ; a smart stroke. 
 Skelpie-limmer, a reproachful term in 
 
 female scolding. 
 Skelpin, stepping, walking. 
 Skiegh, or skeigh, proud, nice, high- 
 mettled. 
 Skinklin, a small portion. 
 Skirl, to shriek, to cry shriUy. 
 Skirling, shrieking, crying. 
 Skirl't, shrieked. 
 Sklent, slant ; to run aslant, to deviate 
 
 from truth. 
 Sklented, ran, or hit, in an oblique di 
 
 rection. 
 Skouth, freedom to converse withou 
 
 restraint ; range, scope. 
 Skriegh, a scream ; to scream. 
 Skyrin, shining ; making a great show 
 Skyte, force, very forcible motion. 
 Slae, a sloe. 
 Slade, did slide. 
 
 Slap, a gate ; a breach in a fence. 
 Slaver, saliva ; to emit saliva. 
 Slaw, slow. 
 She, sly ; sleest, sliest. 
 Sleekit, sleek; sly. 
 Sliddery, slippery. 
 
 Slype, to fall over, as a wet furrow 
 from the plough. 
 
 Slypet, fell. 
 
 Sma\ small. 
 
 Smeddum, dust, powder ; mettle, sense. 
 
 Smiddy, a smithy. 
 
 Smoor, to smother. 
 
 Smoor'd, smothered. 
 
 Smoutie, smutty, obscene, ugly. 
 
 Smytrie, a numerous collection of small 
 individuals. 
 
 Snapper, to stumble, a stumble. 
 
 Snash, abuse, Billingsgate. 
 
 Snaw, snow ; to snow. 
 
 Snaw-broo, melted snow. 
 
 Snawie, snowy. 
 
 Sneck, snick, the latch of a door. 
 
 Sned, to lop, to cut off. 
 
 Sneeshin, snuff. 
 
 Sneeshin-mill, a snuff-box. 
 
 Snell, bitter, biting. 
 
 Snick-drawing, trick-contriving, crafty. 
 
 Snirtle, to laugh restrainedly. 
 
 Snood, a ribbon for binding the hair. 
 
 Snool, one whose spirit is broken with 
 oppressive slavery ; to submit tamely, 
 to sneak. 
 
 Snoove, to go smoothly and constantly , 
 to sneak. 
 
 Snowk, to scent or snuff, as a dog, &c. 
 
 Snowkit, scented, snuffed. 
 
 Sonsie, having sweet engaging looks ; 
 
 lucky, jolly. 
 Soom, to swim. 
 Sooth, truth, a petty oath. 
 Sough, a heavy sigh, a sound dying on 
 
 the ear. 
 Souple, flexible ; swift. 
 Souter, a shoemaker. 
 Sowens, a dish made of oatmeal ; the 
 seeds of oa'nioal soured, &c. flum- 
 mery. 
 Sowp, a spoonful, a small quantity of 
 
 any thing liquid. 
 Sowth, to try over a tune with a low 
 
 whistle. 
 Sowther, solder ; to solder, to cement. 
 Spae, to prophesy, to divine. 
 Spaul, a limb. 
 
 Spairge, to dash, to soil, as with mire. 
 Spaviet, having the spavin. 
 Spean, spane, to wean. 
 Speat, or spate, a sweeping torrent, after 
 
 rain or thaw. 
 Sped, to climb. 
 Spence, the country parlour. 
 Spier, to ask, to inquire. 
 Spier't, inquired. 
 Splatter, a splutter, to splutter. 
 Spleughan, a tobacco-pouch. 
 
GLOSSARY. 
 
 177 
 
 Splore, a frolic ; a noise, riot. 
 
 Sprackle, sprachle, to clamber. 
 
 Spratt/e, to scramble. 
 
 Spretklrd, spotted, speckled. 
 
 Spring, a quick air in music ; a Scot- 
 tish reel. 
 
 Sprite a tough-rooted plant, something 
 like rushes. 
 
 SpriUif., full of sprit. 
 
 Spunk, fire, mettle ; wit. 
 
 Spunkie, mettlesome, fiery ; will-o'-wisp, 
 or iffnisfatmts, 
 
 Spurtle, a stick used in making oatmeal 
 pudding or porridge. 
 
 Squad, a crew, a party. 
 
 Squatter, to flutter in water, as a wild 
 duck, &c. 
 
 Squattle, to sprawl. 
 
 Squeel, a scream, a screech ; to scream. 
 
 Stacker, to stagger. 
 
 Stark, a rick of corn, hay, &c. 
 
 Staggie, the diminutive of stag. 
 
 Stalwart, strong stout. 
 
 Stnnt, to stand ; slant, did stand. 
 
 Stane, a stone. 
 
 Startff, an acute pain ; a twinge ; to 
 sting. 
 
 Stank, did stink ; a pool of standing 
 water. 
 
 Stnp, stop. 
 
 Stark, stout. 
 
 Startle, to run as cattle stung by the 
 gad-fly. 
 
 Staumrel, a blockhead ; half-witted. 
 
 Staw, did steal ; to surfeit 
 
 Stech, to cram the belly. 
 
 Stechin cramming. 
 
 Steek, to shut ; a stitch. 
 
 Steer, to molest ; to stir. 
 
 Steeve, firm, compacted. 
 
 Stell, a still. 
 
 Sten, to rear as a Iiorse. 
 
 Sten't, reared. 
 
 Stentft, tribute; dues of any kind. 
 
 Stey, steep ; sfeyes^, steepest. 
 
 Stibble, stubble ; aUhhle-rig, the reappr 
 in harvest who takes the lead. 
 
 Stick an' stow, totally, altogether. 
 
 Stile, a crutch ; to halt, to li^np. 
 
 Stimpart, the eighth part of a Winches- 
 ter bushel. 
 
 Stirk, a cow or bullock a year old. 
 
 S^ck, a plant or root of colewort, cab- 
 bage, &c. 
 
 Storkin, a stocking; throwing ^he stockin, 
 when the bride and bridegroom are 
 put into bed, and the candle out, the 
 former throws a stocking at random 
 among the company, and the person 
 whom it strikes is the next that will 
 be married. 
 
 N 
 
 Stoiter, to stagger, to stammer. 
 
 Stonkcd, made up in shocks as corn. 
 
 Stoor, sounding hollow, strong, and 
 hoarse. 
 
 Stot, an ox. 
 
 Stoup, or stowp, a kind of jug or dish 
 with a handle. 
 
 Sloitre, dust, more particularly dust in 
 motion. 
 
 Stowlins, by stealth. 
 
 Stotvn, stolen. 
 
 Stoyte, to stumble. ■ 
 
 Sti-ack, did strike. 
 
 Strae, straw ; to die a fair strn^ death, 
 to die in bed. 
 
 Strnik, did strike. 
 
 Straikit, stroked. 
 
 Strappan, tall and handsom". 
 
 Straught, straight, to straighten. 
 
 Streek, stretched, tight; to stretch. 
 
 Striddle, to straddle. 
 
 Stroan, to spout, to piss. 
 
 Sfuddie, an anvil. 
 
 Sfumpie, diminutive of stump. 
 
 Strunt, spirituous liquor of any kind ; 
 to walk sturdily ; huff", Fiillrnness. 
 
 Stuff, corn or pulse of any kind. 
 
 Sturt, trouble ; to molest. 
 
 Sturtin, frighted. 
 
 Sucker, sugar. 
 
 Sud, should. 
 
 Sugh, the continued ruf iilng noise of 
 wind or water. 
 
 Svthron, southern ; an old name for the 
 English' nation. 
 
 Svmird, sward. 
 
 SwalVd, swelled. 
 
 Swank, stately, jolly. 
 
 Swankie, or swanker, atiglit f^trnpping 
 young fellow or girl. 
 
 Sirap, an exchange; to bnrfer. 
 
 Stvarf, to swoon ; a swoon. 
 
 Suiat, did sweat. 
 
 Sv^atch, a sample. 
 
 Sirata, drink : good ale. 
 
 Sveaten, sweating. 
 
 Swrer, lazy, averso ; dcuJ-ncfer, ex- 
 tremely averse. 
 
 Swoor, swore, did "wenr. 
 
 Swinge, to beat ; to whip. 
 
 Sicir/, a curve; an eddying blast, or 
 pool ; a knot in wood. 
 
 Sinrlie, knaggie, full of knot?. 
 
 Svjith, get away. 
 
 Swither, to hesitate in rhoif o ; an ir- 
 resolute wavering in choice. 
 
 Syne, since, ago ; then. 
 
 T. 
 
 T.flCKETS, a kind of nails for driving 
 into the heels of shoes. 
 
 |L^. 
 
178 
 
 GLOSSARY. 
 
 Ta/i, a toe; thrte-tai'd, having three 
 prongs. 
 
 Tairs^e, a targt^t. 
 
 Tak, to take; tnkin, tnkincf. 
 
 Tamtallan, the narin; of a mountain. 
 
 Tangle, a sea-weed. 
 
 Ttfp, the top. 
 
 Tapetless, heedless, foolish. 
 
 Tnrrow, to murmur at one's a lOwance. 
 
 Tarrow't, murmured. 
 
 Tiirry-breeks, a sailor. 
 
 I'auld, or tald, told. 
 
 Tauple, a foolish, thoughtless young 
 person. 
 
 Tavtcd, or tautie, matted together ; spo- 
 ken of hair or wool. 
 
 Tawie, t hat allows itself peaceably to be 
 handled ; spoken of a horse, cow, tSz-c. 
 
 Teal, a small quantity. 
 
 Teen, to povoke ; provocation. 
 
 Tedding, spreading after the mower. 
 
 Ten-hours bite, a slight feed for the 
 horses while in the yoke, in the fore- 
 noon. 
 
 Tent, a field-pulpit ; heed, caution ; to 
 take heed ; to tend or herd cattle. 
 
 Tentie, heedful, -o„t:,v'- 
 
 Tentless, heedlo 
 
 Teugh, tough. 
 
 TViacA, thatch; thacknn' rn/)e, clothing, 
 necessaries. 
 
 Thae, these. 
 
 Thalrms, small guts ; fiddle-strings. 
 
 Thankit, thanked. 
 
 Theekit, thatched. 
 
 Thegither, tngcther. 
 
 Themsel, themselves. 
 
 Thick, intimate, familiar. 
 
 Thieveless, cold, dry, spited ; spoken of 
 a persons demeanour. 
 
 Thir, these. 
 
 Thirl, to thrill. 
 
 Thirled, thrilled, vibrated. 
 
 Thole, to suffer, to endure. 
 
 TTioioe, a thaw ; to thaw. 
 
 Thowless, slack, lazy. 
 
 Thrang, throng ; a crowd. 
 
 Thrapple, throat, windpipe. 
 
 Ttirave, twenty-four sheaves or two 
 ehocks of corn ; a considerable num- 
 ber. 
 
 Thraw, to sprain, to twist ; to contradict. 
 
 Thrawin, twisting, &c. 
 
 Thrawn, sprained, twisted, contradict- 
 ed. 
 
 Threap,\.o maintain by dint of assertion. 
 
 Threshin, thrashing. 
 
 Threteen, thirteen. 
 
 Thrislle, thistle. 
 
 Through, to go on with ; to make out. 
 
 TTinnither, pell-mell, confusHidlj. 
 
 Thud, to make a loud intermittent noise. 
 
 Thumpit, thumped' 
 
 Thysel, thyself. 
 
 Tiirt, to it. 
 
 Timmer, timber. 
 
 Tine, to lose ; tint, lost. 
 
 Tinkler, a tinker. 
 
 Ti7it the gate, lost the vay. 
 
 Tip, a ram. 
 
 Tippence, twopence. 
 
 Tirl, to make a slight noise ; to uncover. 
 
 Tirlin, uncovering. 
 
 Tither, the other. 
 
 Tittle, to whisper. 
 
 Tittlin, whispering. 
 
 Tocher, marriage portion. 
 
 Tod, a fox. 
 
 Toddle, to totter, like the walk of a child. 
 
 Toddlin, tottering. 
 
 Toom, empty, to empty. 
 
 Tuop, a ram. 
 
 Toun, a hamlet ; a farm-house. 
 
 Tout, the blast of a horn or trumpet ; to 
 
 blow a horn, &c. 
 Tow, a rope. 
 
 Towmond, a twelvemonth. 
 Towzie, rough, shaggy. 
 Toy, a very old fashion of female head- 
 
 Toyte, to totter like old age. 
 
 Transmugrify'd, transmigrated, meta- 
 morphosed. 
 
 Trashtrie, trash. 
 
 Trews, trowsers. 
 
 Trickie, full of tricks. 
 
 Trig, spruce, neat. 
 
 Trimly, excellently. 
 
 Troic, to believe. 
 
 Troicth, truth, a petty oath. 
 
 Tryste, an appointment ; a fair. 
 
 Trysted, appointed ; to trytte, to make 
 an appointment. 
 
 Try't, tried. 
 
 Tug, raw hide, of which in old times 
 plough-traces were frequently made. 
 
 Tulzie, a quarrel ; to quarrel, to fight. 
 
 Twa, two. 
 
 Twa-three, a few. 
 
 'Twad, it would. 
 
 Twal, twelve ; twal-pennie worth, a 
 small quantity, a penny-worth. 
 
 N. B. One penny English it \2d Scotch. 
 
 Twin, to part. 
 
 Tyke, a dog. 
 
 U. 
 
 UJ^CO, strange, uncouth ; very, very 
 
 great, prodigious. 
 Uncog, news. 
 I'nkennUl unknown. 
 
GLOSSARY. 
 
 17» 
 
 Unsicker, unsure, unsteaoy. 
 Unsknith'd, undamaged, unhurt. 
 Unioeeting, unwittingly, unknowingly. 
 Upo\ upon. 
 L/rchin, a hedge-hog. 
 
 V. 
 
 VJiP'RIJf, vapouring. 
 
 Vera, very. 
 
 Virl, a ring round a column, &c. 
 
 Fittle, corn of all kinds, food. 
 
 W. 
 
 fFA', wall ; wa'n, walls. 
 
 TVahster, a weaver. 
 
 Wad, would ; to bet ; a bet, a pledge. 
 
 Wadna, would not. 
 
 Wae, wo ; sorrowful. 
 
 Wae/u', woful, sorrowful, wailing. 
 
 Waesucks ! or waes-me ! alas ! O the 
 
 pity. 
 Waft, the cross thread that goes from 
 
 the shuttle through the web ; woof. 
 Wair, to lay out, to expend. 
 Wale, choice ; to choose. 
 Wal'd, chose, chosen. 
 fFa/ie, ample, large, jolly; also an in- 
 terjection of distress. 
 Wame, the belly. 
 Wamefu', a belly-full. 
 Wanchanrie, unlucky. 
 Wanrestfu\ restless. 
 Wark, work. 
 
 Wark-lume, a tool to work with. 
 Warl, or warld, world. 
 Warlock, a wizard. 
 Warly, worldly, eager on amassing 
 
 wealth. 
 Warran, a warrant ; to warrant. 
 Worst, worst. 
 
 Warstl'd, or warsl'd, wrestled. 
 Wastrie, prodigality. 
 Wat, wet ; / wat, I wot, I know. 
 Water-brose, brose made of meal and 
 
 water simply, without the addition of 
 
 milk, butter, &c. 
 Wattle, a twig, a wand. 
 Wauhle, to swing, to reel. 
 Waught, a draught. 
 Wavkit, thickened as fullers do cloth. 
 Waukrife, not apt to sleep. 
 Waur, worse ; to worst. 
 Waur't, worsted. 
 Wean, or weanie, a child. 
 Wearie, or weary ; many a weary body, 
 
 many a different person. 
 Weason, weasand. 
 Weaving the stocking. See, Stocking, 
 
 V. 177. 
 
 Wee, little ; wee things, little ones ; wee 
 
 bit, a small matter. 
 Weel, well ; weelfare, welfare. 
 Weet, rain, wetness. 
 Weird, fate. 
 We'se, we shall. 
 Wha, who. 
 Whaizle, to wheeze 
 Whalpit, whelped. 
 
 Whang, a leathern string ; a piece of 
 cheese, bread, &,c. to give the strap- 
 pado. 
 Whare, where ; wherever, wherever. 
 Wheep, to fly nimbly, to jerk ; peruii/' 
 
 whcep, small beer. 
 Whase, whose. 
 Whatreck, nevertheless. 
 Whid, the motion of a hare, running but 
 
 not frighted ; a lie. 
 Whidden, running as a hare or cony. 
 Whigmeleeries, whims, fancies, crotch 
 
 ets. 
 Whingin, crying, complaining, fretting. 
 Whirligigums, useless ornaments, tri- 
 fling appendages. 
 Whissle, a whistle ; to whistle. 
 Whisht, silence ; to hold one's wkuht, to 
 
 be silent. 
 Whisk, to sweep, to lash. 
 Whiskit, lashed. 
 
 Whitter, a hearty draught of liquor. 
 Whun-stane, a whin-stone. 
 Whylfs, whiles, sometimes, 
 WV, with. 
 
 Wicht, wight, powerful, strong ; inven- 
 tive ; of a superior genius. 
 Wick, to strike a stone in an oblique 
 
 direction ; a term in cuiling. 
 Wicker, willow (the smaller sort.) 
 Wiel, a small whirlpool. 
 Wife, a diminutive or endearing term 
 
 for wife. 
 Wilyart, bashful and reserved ; avoid- 
 ing society or appearing awkward in 
 it ; wild, strange, timid. 
 Wimple, to meander. 
 Wimpl't, meandered. 
 Wimplin, waving, meandering. 
 Win, to win, to winnow. 
 Win't, winded as a bottom of vam. 
 Win\ wind ; win's, winds. 
 Winna, will not. 
 Winnock, a window. 
 Winsome, hearty, vaunted, gay. 
 Wintle, a staggerincf motion ; to itag* 
 
 ger, to reel. 
 Winze, an oath. 
 Wiss, to wish. 
 Withoutten, without. 
 Wizen'd, hide-bound, dried, shrunk. 
 
ISO 
 
 GLOSSARY. 
 
 Wanner, a wonder; a conternotuouH 
 appellation. 
 
 Wotis, dwells. 
 
 Woo\ wool. 
 
 JFoo, to court, to make love to. 
 
 Woodie, a rope, niore properly one 
 made of withes or willows. 
 
 Wooer-bnb, tlie garter knotted below 
 the knee with a couple of loops. 
 
 Wordy, worthy. 
 
 Worset, worsted. 
 
 Wow, an exclamation of pleasure or 
 wonder. 
 
 Wrack, to teaze, to vex. 
 
 Wraith, a spirit, or g-hopt ; an appari- 
 tion exactly like a livingperson, whose 
 appearance is said to forebode the 
 person's aj>proa«hing^ death. 
 
 Wrang, wronp ; to wrong. 
 
 Wr.'tth, a drilled in^ap .♦fsnow. 
 
 iruil-mad, difitraeted. 
 
 Wum1,le. a wimble. 
 
 M'ljlc, to beguile. 
 
 Wi;lit'C<nt4, a llamiel vept. 
 
 /r^/^f, blame ; to blo-i»e. 
 
 Y. • 
 
 YAD, an old mare ; a worn out horse. 
 
 Ye ; this pronoun is/requently uaed J or 
 thou. 
 
 Yearns, longs much. 
 
 Warlings, born in the same year, co- 
 evals. 
 
 Year is used both/or singular and plu 
 ral, years. 
 
 Yearn, earn, an eagle, an ospray. 
 
 Yell, barren, that gives no milk. 
 
 Yerk, to laeh, to jerk. 
 
 Yerkit, jerked, lashed. 
 
 Yestreen, yesternight. 
 
 Yttt, a gate, such as is usually at the 
 entrance into a farm-yard or field. 
 
 Y;II, ale. 
 
 Yird, earth. 
 
 Yokin, yoking; a bout. 
 
 Ytmt, beyond. 
 
 Yniirsel, yourself. 
 
 Yowe, a ewe. 
 
 Ymrie, diminutive of yowe. 
 
 Yule, Christmas. 
 
WITH 
 
 HIS GENERAL CORRESPONDENCE; 
 
 ALSO 
 
 CliinCJSM O^ HIS WRITI^rOS, 
 
 AND 
 
 OBSERVATIONS ON THE SCOTTISH PEASANTRY 
 BY DR. CURRIE. 
 
DR. OiraRXB*S DBDZOATIOMT. 
 
 OF THE ROYAL NAVY 
 
 "Whew you were stationed on our coast 
 about twelve years ago, you first recom- 
 mended to my particular notice the poems 
 of the Ayrshire ploughman, whose works, 
 published for the benefit of his widow and 
 children, I now present to you. In a 
 distant region of the world, whither the 
 service of your country has carried you, 
 you will, I know, rpceive with kindness 
 this proof of my regard; not perhaps 
 without some surprise on finding that I 
 have been engaged in editing these vo- 
 lumes, nor without some curiosity to know 
 how I was qualified for such an undertak- 
 ing. These points I will briefly explain. 
 
 Having occasion to make an excursion 
 to the county of Dumfries, in the sum- 
 mer of 1792," I had there an opportunity 
 of seeing and conversing with Burns. It 
 has been my fortune to know some men 
 of high reputation in literature, as well as 
 in public life ; but never to meet any one 
 who, in the course of a single interview, 
 communicated to me so strong an impres- 
 eion of the force and versatility of his ta- 
 lents. After this I read tlje poems then 
 published with greater interest and atten- 
 tion, and with a full conviction that, ex- 
 traordinary as they are, they afford but 
 an inadequate proof of the powers of their 
 unfortunate author. 
 
 Four years afterwards. Burns termi- 
 nated his career. Among those whom 
 the charms of his genius had attached to 
 him, was one with wiiom I have been 
 bound in the ties of friendship from earlv 
 ]ife_Mr. .Tohn Syme of Ryedale. This 
 gentleman, after the death of Burns, pro- 
 moted with the utmost zeal a subscription 
 for the support of the widow and children, 
 to which their relief from immediate dis- 
 tress is to be ascribed ; and in conjunc- 
 tion with other friends of this virtuous 
 and destitute family he projected the pub- 
 lication of these volumes for their benefit, 
 by which the return of want might be pre- 
 vented or prolonged. 
 
 To this last undertaking an editor and 
 biographer was wanting, and Mr. Syme's 
 modesty opposed a barrier to his assum- 
 ing an office, for which he was in other 
 respects peculiarly qualified. On this 
 subject he consulted me ! and with the 
 hope of surmounting his objections, I of- 
 fered him my assistance, but in vain. 
 Endeavours were used to procure an edi- 
 tor in other quarters without effect. The 
 task was beset with considerable difficul- 
 ties, and men of established reputation 
 naturally declined an undertaking to the 
 performance of which, it was scarcely to 
 be hoped that general approbation could 
 be obtained by any exertion of judgment 
 or temper. 
 
 To such an office, my place of residence, 
 my accustomed studies, and my occupa- 
 tions, were certainly little suited ; but 
 tlie partiality of Mr. Syme thought me in 
 other respects not unqualified; and his 
 solicitations, joined to those of our excel- 
 lent friend and relation, Mrs. Dun]op,and 
 of other friends of the family of the poet, 
 I have not been able to resist. To re 
 move difficulties which would otherwisi-- 
 have been insurmountable, Mr. Syme an J 
 Mr. Gilbert Burns made a journey to 
 Liverpool, where they explained and ar- 
 ranged the manuscripts, and selected such 
 as seemed worthy of the press. From 
 this visit I derived a degree of pleasure 
 which has compensated much of my la- 
 bour. I had the satisfaction of renewing 
 my personal intercourse with a much 
 valued friend, and of forming an acquaint- 
 ance with a man, closely allied to Burns 
 in talents as well as in blood, in whose 
 future fortunes the friends of virtue will 
 not, I trust, be uninterested. 
 
 The publication of these volumes has 
 been delayed by obstacles which these 
 gentlemen could neither remove nor fore- 
 see, and which it would be tedious to 
 enumerate. At length the task is finish- 
 ed. If the part which I have taken shall 
 
DEDICATION. 
 
 eerve the interest of tlie family, and re- 
 ceive the approbation of good men, 1 shall 
 have my recompense. The errors into 
 which I have fallen are not, I hope, very 
 important, and they will be easily ac- 
 counted for by those who know the cir- 
 cumstances under which this undertaking 
 has been performed. Generous minds 
 will receive the posthumous works of 
 Burns with candour, and even partiality, 
 as the remains of an unfortunate man of 
 genius, published for tlie benefit of his 
 family — as the stay of the widow and the 
 hope of the fatherless. 
 
 To secure the suffrages of such minds, 
 all topics are omitted in the writings, and 
 avoided in the life of Burns, that have a 
 tendency to awaken the animosity of party. 
 In perusing the following volumes no of- 
 fence will be received, except by those to 
 whom even the natural erect aspect of 
 genius is offensive ; characters that will 
 scarcely be found among those who are 
 educated to the profession of arms. Such 
 men do not court situations of danger, or 
 tread in the paths of glory. They will 
 not be found in your service, which, in 
 our own days, emulates on another ele- 
 ment the superior fame of the Macedonian 
 
 phalanx, or of the Roman legion, and 
 which has, lately made the shores of Eu- 
 rope and of Africa resound with the shouts 
 of victory, from the Texel to the Tagus, 
 and from the Tagus to the Nile ! 
 
 The works of Burns will be received 
 favourably by one who stands in the fore- 
 most rank of this noble service, and who 
 deserves his station. On the land or on 
 the sea, I know no man more capable of 
 judging of the character or of the writ- 
 ings of this original genius. Homer, and 
 Shakspeare, and Ossian, cannot always 
 occupy your leisure. These volumes 
 may sometimes engage your attention, 
 while the steady breezes of the tropic 
 swell your sails, and in another quarter 
 of the earth charm you with the strains 
 of nature, or awake in your memory the 
 scenes of your early days. Suffer me to 
 hope that they may sometimes recall to 
 your mind tlie friend who addresses you, 
 and who bids you — most affectionately-r- 
 adieu ! 
 
 J. CURRIE. 
 
 Liverpool, ^st May, 11 
 
(OQHi^sni*^ 
 
 GENERAL. CORRESPONDENCE. &c. 
 
 PREFATORY REMARKS. 
 
 ON THE CHARACTER AND CONDITION OF THE 
 SCOTTISH PEASANTRY. 
 
 Effects of the legal establishment of parochial 
 schools, 1. — Of the church estabhshinent, 3. 
 — Of the absence of poor laws, ib. — Of the 
 Scottish music and national songs, 4. — Of 
 the laws respecting- marriage and inconti- 
 nence, 6. — Oiiservations on the domestic and 
 national attachments of tiie Scots, Page 6 
 
 LIFE OF BURNS. 
 
 Narrative of his infancy and youth, by him- 
 self, 10. — Narrative on the same subject, by 
 his b/other, and by Mr. Murdoch of Lon- 
 don, his teacher, 16. — Other particulars of 
 Bums while resident in Ayrshire, 27. — His- 
 tory of Bums while resident in Edinburgrh, 
 including Letters to the Editor from Mr. 
 Stewart and Dr. Adair, 35. — History of 
 Bums while on the farm of Elhsland, in 
 Dumfries-shire 5L — History of Burns while 
 resident at Dumfries 54. — His last Illness, 
 Death and Character, with general Reflec- 
 tions, . . . . . 58 
 Memoir respecting Burns, by a Lady, 67 
 Criticism on the Writings of Burns, includ- 
 . ing observations on poetry in the Scottish 
 dialect, and some remarks on Scottish Ut- 
 trature, . ' . . . 70 
 
 GENERAL CORRESPONDENCE. 
 
 LETTERS. 
 
 Ho. Pagf' 
 
 1. To Mr. John MaRDOcii, Bums's form- ' 
 er teacher; giving an account of his 
 present studies, and tamper of mind, 91 
 Extracts from MSS. UbserA'ations on 
 various subiects, . 92 
 
 Page. 
 
 To Mr. Aiken. Written under difitress 
 of mind, . . .95 
 
 To Mrs. Dunlop. Thanks for her no- 
 tice. Praise of her ancestor, Sir 
 William Wallace, . . 96 
 
 To Mrs. Stewart of Stair. Enclosing 
 a poem on Miss A , . . ib. 
 
 Proclamation in the Name of the 
 Muses, . . . .97 
 
 Dr. Blacklock to the Rev. G. Lowrie. 
 Encouraging the bard to visit Edin- 
 burgh and print a new edition of his 
 poems there, . . . ib. 
 
 From the Rev. Mr. Lowrie. Advice 
 to the Bard how to conduct Iiimself 
 in Edinburgh, . . .98 
 
 To Mr. Chalmers. Praise of Miss 
 Burnet of Monboddo, . . ib. 
 
 To the Earl of Eglinton. Thanks for 
 his patronage, . . ' . 99 
 
 To Mrs. Dunlop. Account of his sit- 
 uation in Edinburgh, . _ . ib. 
 
 To Dr. Moore. Grateful acknowledg- 
 ments of Dr. M.'s notice of him in 
 his letters to Mrs. Dunlop, . 100 
 
 From Dr. Moore. In answer to the 
 foregoing, and enclosmg a sonnet on 
 the Bard by Miss WiUiams, . ib. 
 
 To the Rev. G. Lowrie. Thanks for 
 advice— reflections on his situation — 
 
 compliments paid to Miss L , by 
 
 Mr. Mackenzie, . . . lOL 
 
 To Dr. Moore, . . .102 
 
 From Dr. Moore. Sends the Bard a 
 present of liis " View of Society and 
 Manners," &c. . . . ib. 
 
 To the Earl of Glencaim. Grateful 
 acknowledgments of kindness. 
 
 To the fearl of Buchan. In reply to a 
 letter of advice, . 
 
 Extract concerning the monument 
 erected for Fergusson by our Poet, 
 
 To . Accompanying the foregoing, 104 
 
 Extract from . Good advice, 105 
 
 To Mrs. Dunlop. Respcctmg his pros- 
 pects on ieavuig Edinburgli, . 106 
 
 103 
 
 104 
 
 N2 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 ib. 
 
 ib. 
 
 108 
 
 109 
 
 110 
 
 111 
 
 113 
 
 114 
 
 No. Page. 
 
 23. To the eame. On the same subject, 106 
 
 24. To Dr. Moore. On the same subject, 107 
 
 25. Extract to Mrs. Dunlop. Reply to 
 
 Criticisms, 
 
 26. To the Rev. Dr. Blair. Written on 
 
 leaving Edinburgh. Thanks for his 
 kindness, 
 
 27. From Dr. Blair. In reply to the pre- 
 
 ceding, .... 
 
 28. From Dr. Moore. Criticism and good 
 
 advice, .... 
 
 29. To Mr. Walker, at Blair of Athole. 
 
 Enclosing the Humble Petition of 
 Bruar water to the Duke of Athole, 
 
 30. To Mr. G. Bums. Account of his 
 
 Tour through the Highlands, 
 
 31. From Mr. Ramsay of Ochtertyre. 
 
 Enclosing Latm Inscriptions with 
 Translations, and the Tale of Ome- 
 ron Cameron, 
 
 32. Mr. Ramsay to the Rev. W. Young. 
 
 Introducing our Poet, 
 
 33. Mr. Ramsay to Dr. Blacklock. Anec- 
 
 dotes of Scottish Songs for our 
 Poet, 
 
 34. From Mr. John Murdoch in London. 
 
 In answer to No. I. 
 
 35. From Mr. , Gordon Castle. 
 
 Acknowledging a song sent to Lady 
 Charlotte Gordon, 
 
 36. From the Rev. J. Skinner. Some Ac- 
 
 count of Scottish Poems, . 
 
 37. From Mrs. Rose. Enclosing Gaelic 
 
 Songs, with the music, . 
 
 38. To the Earl of Glencairn. Requests 
 
 his assistance in getting into the Ex- 
 cise, . . . • 
 
 39. To , Dalryniple,Esq. Congratula- 
 
 tion on his becoming a poet. Praise 
 of Lord Glencairn, 
 
 40. ToSirJohnWhitefoord. Thanks for 
 
 friendship. Reflections on the po- 
 etical character, . 
 
 41. To Mrs. Dunlop. Written on recov- 
 
 ery from sickness, 
 
 42. Extract to the Same. Defence of him- 
 
 self, .... 
 
 43. To the Same— who had heard that he 
 
 had ridiculed her, 
 
 44. To Mr. Clegliorn. Mentioning his_ 
 
 having coniposed the first stanza of 
 the Chevalier's Lament, . 
 
 45. From Mr. Cleghom. In reply to the 
 
 above. The Chevalier's Lament in 
 full, in a note, 
 
 46. To Mrs. Dunlop. Giving an account 
 
 of his prospects, . 
 
 47. From the Rev. J. Skinner. Enclos- 
 
 ing two songs, one by himself, the 
 other by a Buchan ploughman : the 
 songs printed at large, 
 
 48. To Professor D. Stuart. Thanks for 
 
 his friendship, . 
 
 49. Extract to Mrs. Dunlop. Remarks 
 
 on Drydeiis Virgil, and Pope's 
 Odyssey, 
 
 115 
 
 116 
 
 117 
 
 118 
 
 119 
 
 No. Page- 
 
 50. To the same. General Reflections, 122 
 
 51. To the Same, at" Mr. Dunlop's, Had- 
 
 dington. Account of his marriage, 123 
 
 52. To Mr. 'P. Hill. With a present of 
 
 cheese, . . . . ib. 
 
 53. To Mrs. Dunlop. With Imes on a her- 
 
 mitage, .... 124 
 
 54. To the Same. Farther account of his 
 
 marriage, 
 55. To the Same, 
 life, 
 
 Reflections on human 
 
 125 
 
 126 
 
 120 
 
 122 
 
 56. To R. Graham, Esq. of Fintry . A pe- 
 
 tition in verse for a situation in the 
 Excise, .... 
 
 57. To Mr. P. Hill. Criticism on a poem, 
 
 entitled, 'An address to Loch-Lo- 
 mond,' .... 
 
 58. To Mrs. Dunlop, at Moreham Mains, 
 
 59. To ****. Defence of the Family of 
 
 the Stuarts. Baseness of insulting 
 fallen greatness, . 
 
 60. To Mrs. Dunlop. With the soldier's 
 
 song — " Go fetch to me a pint of 
 wine," 
 
 61. To Miss Davies, a young Lady, who 
 
 had heard he had been making a bal- 
 lad on her, enclosing that ballad, 
 
 62. From Mr. G. Burns. Reflections sug- 
 
 gested by New Year's Day, 
 
 63. To Mrs. Dunlop. Reflections suggest- 
 
 ed by New Year's Day, . 
 
 64. To Dr. Moore. Accomit of his situ- 
 
 ation and prospects, 
 
 65. To Professor D. Stewart, Enclosing 
 
 poems for his criticism, . 
 
 66. To Bishop Geddes. Account of his si- 
 
 tuation and prospects, 
 
 67. From the Rev. P. Carfrae. Request- 
 
 ing advice as to the publisliing Mr. 
 Mylne's poems, . 
 
 68. To Mrs. Dunlop. Reflections after a 
 
 visit to Edinburgh, 
 
 69. To the Rev. P. Carfrae. In answer to 
 
 No. 67 
 
 70. To Dr. Moore. Enclosing a poem, 
 
 71. To Mr. Hill. Apostrophe to Fru- 
 
 gality, 
 
 72. To Mrs. Dunlop. With a sketch of 
 
 an epistle in verse to the Right Hon. 
 C.J. Fox, 
 
 73. To Mr. Cunningham. With the first 
 
 draught of the poem on a wounded 
 Hare, .... 
 
 74. From Dr. Gregory. Criticism of the 
 
 poem on a wounded Hare, 
 
 75. To Mr. M'Auley of Dumbarton. Ac- 
 
 count of his situation, 
 
 76. To Mrs. Dunlop. Reflections on Re- 
 
 ligion, 
 
 77. From Dr. Moore. Good advice, 
 
 78. From Miss J. Little. A poetess in 
 
 humble life, with a poem in praise 
 of our Bard, 
 
 79. From Mr. ******. Some account of 
 
 Fergusson, . . • 143 
 
 1 80. To m. ******. In answer, . 144 
 
 127 
 
 128 
 129 
 
 ib. 
 
 131 
 
 ib. 
 132 
 
 ib. 
 133 
 
 134 
 
 ib. 
 
 135 
 
 136 
 
 ib. 
 137 
 
 138 
 
 139 
 
 ib. 
 
 140 
 ib. 
 
 141 
 ib. 
 
 142 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 87. 
 
 100. 
 101. 
 
 102. 
 
 104. 
 105. 
 106. 
 107. 
 108. 
 
 109. 
 110. 
 
 Page. 
 
 To Miss Williams. Enclosing a criti - 
 cisra on a poem of hers, . . 144 
 
 From Miss W. In replj to the fore- 
 going, .... 145 
 
 To Mrs. Dunlop. Praise of Zeluco, ib. 
 
 From Dr. Blacklock. An epistle in 
 verso, .... 146 
 
 To Dr. Biacklock. Poetical reply to 
 the above, . . . ib. 
 
 To R. Graham, Esq. Enclosing 
 some electioneering ballads, . ib. 
 
 To Mrs. Dimlop. Serious and inter- 
 esting reflections, . . 147 
 
 To Sir John Sinclair. Account of a 
 book society among the farmers in 
 Nithsdale, . . .148 
 
 To Charles Sharpe, Esq. of Hoddam. 
 Under a fictitious signature, enclos- 
 ing a ballad, . . . 149 
 
 To Mr. G. Bums. With a prologue, 
 spoken on the Dumfries Theatre, 150 
 
 To Mrs. Dunlop. Some accoimt of 
 Falconer, author of the Ship- 
 wreck, . . . ib. 
 
 From Mr. Cunnmgham. Inquiries 
 after our Bard, . . 152 
 
 To Mr. Cunningham. In reply to the 
 above, . . . ib. 
 
 To Mr. Hill. Orders for books, 153 
 
 To Mrs. Dunlop. Remarks on the 
 Lounger, and on the writings of 
 Mr. Mackenzie, . . 154 
 
 From Mr. Cunningham. Account of 
 the death of Miss Burnet of Mon- 
 boddo, . . . .155 
 
 To Dr. Moore. Thanks for a present 
 of Zeluco, . . . 156 
 
 To Mrs. Dunlop. Written under 
 wounded pride, . . ib. 
 
 To Mr. Cunningham. Aspirations 
 after independence, . . 157 
 
 From Dr. Biacklock. Poetical let- 
 ter of friendship, . , ib. 
 
 Extract from Mr. Cunnmgham. 
 Suggesting subjects for our Poet's 
 muse, . . . .158 
 
 To Mrs. Dunlop. Congratulations 
 on the birth of her grandson, ib. 
 
 To Mr. Cunningham. With an 
 elegy ' on Miss Burnet, of Mon- 
 boddo, . . .159 
 
 To Mr. Hill. Indignant apostro- 
 phe to Poverty, . . ib. 
 
 From A. F. Tytler, Esq. Criticism 
 on Tam o'Shanter, . . 160 
 
 To A. F. Tytler, Esq. In reply 
 to the above, . . ib. 
 
 To Mrs. Dunlop. Enclosing his 
 elegy on Miss Burnet, . Ifil 
 
 To Lady W. M. Constable. Ac- 
 knowledgmg a present of a snufF 
 box, . . . . ib. 
 
 To Mrs. Graham of Fintry. Enclos- 
 ing ' Queen Mary's Lament,' Igo 
 
 From the Rev. G. Baird. Request- 
 ing assistance in publishing the 
 poems of Michael Bruce, . ib. 
 
 No. Paok. 
 
 111. To the Rev. G. Baird. In reply to 
 
 the above, . . .163 
 
 112. To Dr. Moore. Enclosing Tam o' 
 
 Shanter, &c. . . , ib. 
 
 113. From Dr. Moore. With Remarks 
 
 on Tam o' Shanter, &c. . 164 
 
 114. To the Rev. A. Alison. Acknow- 
 
 ledging his present of the ' Essays 
 on the Principles of Taste,' with 
 remarks on the book, . 165 
 
 115. To Mr. Cunningham. With a Ja- 
 
 cobite song, &c., . , 166 
 
 116. To. Mrs. Dunlop. Comparison be- 
 
 tween female attractions in high 
 and humble life, . . jb. 
 
 117. To Mr. . Reflections on his own 
 
 indolence, . , . 167 
 
 118. To Mr. Cimningham. Requesting 
 
 his interest for an oppressed friend, ib. 
 
 119. From the Earl of Buchan. Inviting 
 
 over our bard to the Coronation of 
 the Bust of Thomson on Ednam 
 HUl 168 
 
 120. To the Earl of Buchan. la reply, ib. 
 
 121. From the Earl of Buchan. Propos- 
 
 ing a subject for our poet's muse, 
 
 122. To Lady E. Cunningham. Enclos- 
 
 ing ' The Lament for James, Earl 
 of Glencaim,' 
 
 123. To Mr. Ainshe. State of his mmd 
 
 after inebriation, 
 
 124. From Sir John Whitefoord. Thanks 
 
 for ' The Lament for James, Earl 
 of Glencairn,' 
 
 125. From A. F. Tytler, Esq. Criticism 
 
 on the Whistle and the Lament, 
 
 126. To Miss Davies. Apology for ne- 
 
 glecting her commands — moral re- 
 flections, 
 
 127. To Mrs. Dunlop. Enclosing ' The 
 
 Song of Death,' , .172 
 
 128. To Mrs. Dunlop. Acknowledging 
 
 the present of a cup, . 173 
 
 1^9. To Mr. William Smellie. Introduc- 
 ing Mrs. Riddel, . . ib. 
 
 130. To Mr. W. Nicol. Ironical thanks 
 
 for advice, . . . 174 
 
 131. To Mr. Cunningham. Commissions 
 
 his arms to be cut on a seal — moral 
 reflections, . , . ib. 
 
 132. To, Mrs. Dunlop. Account of his 
 
 meeting with Miss L B— - — 
 
 and enclosing a song on her, 175 
 
 133. To Mr. Cunnmgham. Wild apos- 
 
 trophe to a Spirit! . . 176 
 
 134. To Mrs. Dunlop. Account of his 
 
 family, . . .178 
 
 135. To Mrs. Dunlop. Letter of condo- 
 
 lence under affliction, . 179 
 
 136. To Mrs. Dunlop. With a poem, 
 
 entitled ' The Rights of Woman,' ib. 
 
 137. To Miss B of York. Letter of 
 
 fVieudship, . . .180 
 
 138. To Miss C . Character and tem- 
 
 perament of a poet, . , ih. 
 
 139. To John M'Murdo, Esq. Repay- 
 
 ing money, . . . ]^i 
 
 169 
 
 ib 
 
 170 
 ib. 
 
 171 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 No. Pack. 
 
 140. To Mrs. R ^. Advising her what 
 
 play to bespeak at the Dumfries 
 Theatre, . . .181 
 
 41. To a Lady, in favour of a Player's 
 
 Benefit, . . .182 
 
 ^42. Extract to Mr. . On his pros- 
 pects in tlie Excise. . . ib. 
 
 143. To Mrs. R , . . ib. 
 
 144. To the Same. Describing his melan- 
 
 choly feelings, . . . 183 
 
 145. To the Same. Lending Werter, ib. 
 
 146. To the same. On a return of inter- . 
 
 rupted friendship, . . ib. 
 
 147. To the Same. On a temporary 
 
 estrangement, . . . ib. 
 
 148. To John Syme, Esq. Reflections on 
 
 the happiness of Mr. O , . 184 
 
 149. To Miss . Requesting the re- 
 
 turn of MSS. lent to a deceased 
 friend, . . . ib. 
 
 150. To Mr. Cunningham. Melancholy 
 
 reflections — cheering prospects of 
 
 a happier world, . . 185 
 
 151. To Mrs. R . Supposed to be 
 
 written from ' The dead to the liv- 
 ing,' . . . .186 
 
 152. To Mrs. Dunlop. Reflections on 
 
 the situation of his family if he 
 should die — praise of the poem en- 
 titled ' The Task,' . .187 
 
 153. To the Same, in London, . ib. 
 
 154. To Mrs. R . Thanks for the 
 
 Travels of Anacharsis, . . 188 
 
 155. To Mrs. Dunlop. Account of the 
 
 Death of his Daughter, and of his 
 own ill health, . . .189 
 
 156. To Mrs. R . Apology for not 
 
 going to the birth-night assembly, ib. 
 
 157. To Mr. Cunningham. Account of 
 
 his illness and of his poverty — an- 
 ticipation of his death, . . ib. 
 
 158. To Mrs. Burns. Sea-bathing af- 
 
 fords little relief, . .190 
 
 159. To Mrs. Dunlop. Last farewell, ib. 
 
 CORRESPO.NDENCE BETWEEN MR. THOMSON 
 AND MR. BURNS. 
 
 1. Mr. Thomson, to Mr. Burns. De- 
 
 siring the bard to fiurnish verses 
 for some of the Scottish airs, and to 
 revise former songs, . .191 
 
 2. Mr. B. to. Mr. T. Promising as- 
 
 sistance, .... 192 
 
 3. Mr. T. to Mr. B. Sending some 
 
 tunes, .... 193 
 
 4. Mr. B. to Mr. T. With 'The Lea 
 
 Rig,' and ' Will ye go to the Indies 
 my Mary,' . . . ib. 
 
 5. Mr. B. To Mr. T. With 'My wife's a 
 
 winsome wee thing,' and 'O saw 
 
 ve bonnie Leslie,' . . 195 
 
 No. Paok. 
 
 6." Mr. B. to Mr. T. With • Highland 
 
 Mary,' . . . .196 
 
 7. Mr. T. to Mr. B. Thanks and critical 
 
 observations, . . . ib 
 
 8. Mr. B. to Mr. T. With an addi- 
 
 tional stanza to ' ThoCea Rig,' J96 
 
 9. Mr. B. to Mr. T. With ' Auld Rob 
 
 Morris,' and ' Duncan Gray, . 197 
 
 10. Mr. B. to Mr. T. With ' O Poortith 
 
 Cauld,' &c. and "GaOa Water,' ib. 
 
 11. Mr. T. to Mr. B. Desiring anecdotes 
 
 on the origin of particular songs. 
 Tytler of Woodhouselee — Pleyle — 
 sends P. Pindar's 'Lord Gregory.' 
 — Postscript from the Honourable 
 A. Erskine, . . . ib. 
 
 12. Mr. B. to Mr. T. Has Mr. Tytler's 
 
 anecdotes, and means to give his 
 own — Sends his own 'LordGregory, 198 
 
 13. Mr. B. to Mr. T. With 'Mary 
 
 Morrison,' . . .199 
 
 14. Mr. B. to Mr. T. With ' Wandering 
 
 WiUie,' . . . ib. 
 
 15. Mr. B. to Mr. T. With 'Open the 
 
 door to me, oh !' . . 200 
 
 16. Mr. B. to Mr. T. With ' Jessy,' ib. 
 
 17. Mr. T. to Mr. B. With a list of songs, 
 
 and ' Wandering Wilhe' altered, ib. 
 
 18. Mr. B. to Mr. T. ' When wild war's 
 
 deadly blast was blawn,' and ' Meg 
 
 o' the Mill,' . . . ib. 
 
 19. Mr. B. to Mr. T. Voice of Coila— Cri- 
 
 ticism — Origin of ' The Lass o' 
 Patie's Mill,^ . . .201 
 
 20. Mr. T. to Mr. B. . . .202 
 
 21. Mr. B. to Mr. T. Simplicity requisite 
 
 in a song — One poet should not 
 mangle the works of another, . ib. 
 
 22. Mr. B. to Mr. T. 'Farewell thou 
 
 stream that winding flows.' — Wishes 
 that the national music may preserve 
 its native features, . . 203 
 
 23. Mr. T. to Mr. B. Thanks and obser- 
 
 vations, .... 204 
 
 24. Mr. B. to Mr. T. With ' BUthe hae I 
 
 been on yon hill,' . . " ib. 
 
 25. Mr. B. to Mr. T. With 'O Logan 
 
 sweetly didst thou glide,' ' O. gin 
 my love were yon red rose,' &c. 205 
 
 26. Mr. T. to Mr. B. Enclosing a note- 
 
 Thanks, . . . ib. 
 
 27. Mr. B. to Mr. T. With ' There was a 
 
 lass and she was fair,' . , 206 
 
 28. Mr. B. to Mr. T. Hurt at the idea of 
 
 pecuniary recompense — Remarks 
 
 on songs, . . . ib. 
 
 29. Mr. T. to Mr. B. Musical expression, 207 
 
 30. Mr. B. to Mr. T. For Mr. Clarke, ib. 
 
 31. Mr. B. to Mr. T. With ' PhiUis the 
 
 Fair,' . . . . ib. 
 
 32. Mr. T. to Mr. B. Mr. Allan— draw- 
 
 ing from ' John Anderson my Jo,' 208 
 
 33. Mr. B. to Mr. T. With 'Had I a 
 
 cave,' &.C. — Some airs common to 
 Scotland and Ireland, . . ib 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 Page. 
 
 Mr. B. To. Mr. T. With 'By Allan 
 stream I chanced to rove,' 
 
 Mr. B. to Mr. T. With ' Wliistle and 
 ril come to you my lad,' and • Awa 
 wi' your belles and your beauties,' 
 
 Mr. B. to Mr. T. Witlr ' Come let 
 me take thee to my breast,' 
 
 Mr. B. to Mr. T. ' Dainty Davie,' 
 
 Mr. T. to Mr. B. Deligliled with the 
 productions of Burns 's muse, 
 
 Mr. B. to Mr. T. With ' Bruce to his 
 troops at Bannockburn,' 
 
 Mr. B. to Mr. T. With ' Behold the 
 hour, the boat arrive,' 
 
 Mr. T. to Mr. B. Observations on 
 '• Bruce to lus troops,' 
 
 Mr. B. to Mr. T. Remarks on sonijs 
 in Mr. T's. list — His own metiiod of 
 forming a song — ' Thou hast left me 
 ever, Jamie' — ' Where are the joys I 
 hae met in the morning,' ' Auld laiig 
 
 S3'ne , . 
 Mr. B. to Mr. T. With a variation of 
 
 212 
 
 214 
 
 Gl. 
 
 ib. 
 
 224 
 
 ' Bannockbuni,' . 
 
 Mr. T. to Mr. B. Thanks and obser- 
 vations, . . . . ib. 
 
 Mr. B. to Mr. T. On ' Bunnockburn' 
 — sends ' Fair Jenny,' . .215 
 
 Mr. B. to Mr. T. With ' Deluded 
 swain, the pleasure' — Piemarks. 21G 
 
 Mr. B. to Mr. T. AVith ' Thine am 1, 
 my faithful fair,' — ' O condeseciid 
 dear charming maid' — ' The Nii^lit- 
 ingale' — ' Laura' — (the three last bv 
 G. Turnbull) . . . ' ib. 
 
 48. Mr. T. to Mr. B. Apprehensions — 
 
 Thanks, .... 218 
 
 49. Mr. B. to Mr. T. With 'Husband, 
 
 husband, cease your strife !' and 
 
 ' Wilt thou be my dearie .-" . ib. 
 
 50. Mr. T. to Mr. B. Melancholy com- 
 
 parison between Burns and Carlini 
 
 Mr. Allan has bc<)-un a sketch 
 
 from the Cotter's Saturday Night, ib. 
 51-. Mr. B. to Mr. T. Praise of Mr. Al- 
 lan — ' Banks of Cree,' . . ib. 
 
 52. Mr.^. to Mr. T. Pleyel in France 
 
 — ' Ilcre, where tlie Scottish muse 
 immortal lives,' presented tb Miss 
 Graham of Fintry, with a copy of 
 Mr. Thomson's Collection, . 210 
 
 53. Mr. T. to Mr. B. Does not expect 
 
 to hear from Pleyel soon, but desires 
 
 to be prepared with the poetr}- . ib. 
 
 54. Mr. B. to Mr. T. With ■• On tlic seas 
 
 and far away,' . . . ib. 
 
 55. Mr. T. to Mr. B. Criticism. . 22(1 
 
 56. Mr. B. to Mr. T. With 'Ca'tho 
 
 yowes to the knowos," . . ib. 
 
 57. Mr. B. to Mr. T. With ' She says she 
 
 lo'es me best of a',' — ' O let mc in,' 
 &i\— SI anza to Dr. Maxwell. • ib. 
 
 5P Mr. T. to Mr. P.. Advisinir liiui to write 
 
 a Mnsica! Drama, " . .221 
 
 50. Mr. T. to All-. F>. Has been ejj- 
 an^ini ..' S. ..Ii:.b ronectin„.-_Rit- 
 snri- - Dii'ii-ult !o obtain u.i.;iL-nl luc- 
 lodii's in ihcii oriiiiiial state . 222 
 
 ib. 
 
 Page, 
 
 Mr. B. to Mr. T. Recipe for pro- 
 ducino- a love-song—' Saw ye my 
 Phcly^ — Remarks and anecdotes — 
 ' How long and dreary is the night' 
 — ' Let not wonsan e'er complain 
 — ' The Lover's morning Salute to 
 his Mistress" — ' The Auld man' — 
 ' Keen blows the wind o'er Donocht- 
 head.' in a note, . 
 Mr. T. to Mr. B. Wishes he knew 
 the inspiring fair one — Ritson's His- 
 torical Essay not interesting — Allan 
 — ^Maggie Lawder, 
 
 Mr. B. to. Mr. T. Has begun his 
 Anecdotes, &c. ' My Chloris mark 
 how green the groves' — Love — ' It 
 was tiie charming mouth of May' — 
 'Lassie wi' the lint-white locks'- — 
 History of the air ' Ye Banks and 
 braes o' bonnie Doon' — James Mil- 
 ler—Clarke—The black keys— In- 
 stances of the difficulty of tracing 
 the origin of ancient airs, . 223 
 
 Mr. T. to Mr. B. With three copies 
 of the Scottish airs, . . 227 
 
 Mr. B. to Mr. T. With ' O Philly 
 happy be that day' — Starting note 
 — ' ('ontcnted wi' little and cantie 
 wi' mair" — ' Canst thou h-ave me 
 thus, my KaLy T— (The Reply,' Stay 
 m V AViilic, yet believe me,' in a note) 
 —Stock and horn, 
 
 Mr. T. to Mr. B. Praise — Desires 
 more songs of the humorous cast — 
 Moans to liave k picture from ' The 
 Soldier's return,' . . 229 
 
 Mr. B. to Mr. T. With 'My Nan- 
 nie's awa,' . . . 230 
 
 Mr. B. to Mr. T. With ' For a' 
 that an' a' that' and 'Sweet fa's 
 the eve on Craigie-burn,' . ib. 
 
 Mr. T. to Mr. B. Thanks, . ib. 
 
 Mr. B. to Mr. T. ' O lassie, art thou 
 sleei>iiig vet .^' and the Answer, 231 
 
 Mr. B. to Mr. T. Dispraise of 
 Ecolcfechan, . . . ib. 
 
 Mr. T. to Mr. B. Thanks, . ib. 
 
 Mr. R. to Mr. T. 'Address to the 
 Woodlark' — ' On Chloris' being ill' 
 — '• Tlicir groves o' sweet myrtle,' 
 fcc. — ' "Twas na her bonnie blue e'e,' 
 &(■ ib. 
 
 Mr. T. to Mr. B. WitJi Allan's de- 
 sign from 'Tiie Cotter's Saturday 
 Njglit,' . . . .'232 
 
 Mr. B. to ]\Ir. T. With ' How cruel 
 arc thf^ paroiits,' and ' JNIark yonder 
 l)om]jof cost) v fashion.' . . ib. 
 
 Mr. R. to Mr.'T. Thanks for Al- 
 lan's desions, . . . ib, 
 
 Mr. 'I', to ^.<■. n. Coniilu'ieiit, . 233 
 
 Mr. n. to Mr. T. V\ !th an miprove- 
 niciit hi ■ V-hisilf aiid lil cume to 
 yoi my bid,'—' O this is no my ain 
 ]as.-;i(','— ' Now s])rit:g has ciad tlie 
 rjrovc in green' — ' f> boimie was 
 yon rosy brier' — "■ Tis F.ieiidsJiip's 
 1 ledge iiiy young. Tair rrioiid,' . ib. 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 No. Page. 
 
 78. Mr. T. to Mr. B, Introducing Dr. 
 
 Brianton, . . .234 
 
 79. Mr. B. to Mr. T. 'Forlorn my 
 
 love, no comfort near,' . 
 
 80. Mr. B. to Mr. T. ' Last May a braw 
 
 wooer cam down the lang glen' — 
 ' Why, why tell thy lover,' a frag- 
 ment, . . . , ib. 
 
 81. Mr. T. to Mr. B 235 
 
 82. Mr. T. to Mr. B. After an awful 
 
 pause, .... 
 
 83. Mr. B. to Mr. T. Thanks for P. Pin- 
 
 dar, &c. — ' Hey for a lass wi" a to- 
 cher,' 
 
 84. Mr. T. to Mr. B. Allan has designed 
 
 some plates for an octavo edition, 
 
 85. Mr. B. to Mr. T. Afflicted by sick- 
 
 ness, but pleased with Mr. Allan's 
 etchings, .... 
 
 86. Mr. T. to Mr. B. Sympathy, en- 
 
 couragement, . . . ib. 
 
 87. Mr. B. to Mr. T. With 'Here's a 
 
 health to ane I lo'e dear,' • ib. 
 
 88. Mr. B. to Mr. T. Introducing Mr. 
 
 jewars — Has taken a fancy to re- 
 iew his songs — Hopes to recover, 237 
 
 ib. 
 
 ib. 
 
 ib. 
 
 ib. 
 
 236 
 
 No. PAca. 
 
 89. Mr, B. to Mr. T. Dreading the hor- 
 
 rors of a jail, solicits the advance of 
 five pounds, and encloses 'Fairest 
 Maid on Devon banks,' . . iU 
 
 90. Mr. T. to Mr. B. Sympathy— Ad 
 
 vises a volume of poetry to be pub 
 lished by subscription — Pope pub- 
 lished the Iliad so, . . ib 
 
 Letter containing some particulars of the 
 History of the foregoing Poems, bv 
 Gilbert Burns, . . 238 
 
 Letter to Captain Grose, . 242 
 
 APPENDIX. 
 
 No. I ,245 
 
 No. II. Including an extract of a Poem 
 
 addressed to Bums by Mr. Telford, :248 
 
 No. III. Letter from Mr. Gilbert Bums to 
 the Editor, approving of his Life of his 
 Brother ; with observations on the ef- 
 fects of refinement of taste on the la- 
 bouring classes of men, . • 259 
 
TO THE LIFE 
 
 OF 
 
 ROBERT BURNS. 
 
 Though the dialect in which many of 
 the happiest effusions of Robert Burns 
 are composed be peculiar to Scotland, yet 
 his reputation has extended itself beyond 
 the limits of that country, and his poetry 
 has been admired as the offspring of origi- 
 nal genius, by persons of taste in every 
 part of the sister islands. The interest 
 excited by his early death, and the dis- 
 tress of his infant family, have been felt in 
 a remarkable maimer wherever his writ- 
 ings have been known : and these posthu- 
 mous volumes, which give to the world his 
 works complete, and which, it is hoped, 
 may raise his widow and children from 
 penury, are printed and published in Eng- 
 land. It seems proper, therefore, to write 
 the memoirs of his life, not with the view 
 of their being Tead by Scotchmen only, 
 but also by natives of England, and of 
 other countries where the English lan- 
 guage is spoken or understood. 
 
 Robert Burns was, in reality, what he 
 has been represented 'to be, a Scottish pea- 
 sant. To render the incidents of his hum- 
 ble story generally intelligible, it seems, 
 therefore, advisable to prefix some obser- 
 vations on the character and situation of 
 the order to which he belonged — a class 
 of men distinguished by many peculiari- 
 ties : by this means we shall form a more 
 correct notion of the advantages with 
 which he started, and of the obstacles 
 which he surmounted. A few observa- 
 tions on the Scottish peasantry will not, 
 perhaps, be found unworthy of attention 
 in other respects ; and the subject is, in a 
 great measure, new. Scotland has pro- 
 duced persons of high distinction in every 
 branch of philosophy and literature ; and 
 her history, while a separate and inde- 
 f^endent nation, has been successfully ex- 
 
 plored. But the present character of the 
 people was not then formed ; the nation 
 then presented features similar to those 
 which the feudal system and tlie catholic 
 religion had diffused over Europe, modi- 
 fied, indeed, by the pecuUar nature of her 
 territory and climate. The Reformation, 
 by which such important changes were 
 produced on the national character, was 
 speedily followed by the accession of the 
 Scottish monarchs to the English throne ; 
 and the period which elapsed from that 
 accession to the Union, has been render- 
 ed memorable, chiefly, by those bloody 
 convulsions m which both divisions of the 
 island were involved, and which, in a con- 
 siderable degree, concealed from the eye 
 of the historian the domestic history of 
 the people, and the gradual variations in 
 their condition and manners. Since the 
 Union, Scotland, though the seat of two 
 unsuccessful attempts to restore the 
 House of Stuart to the throne, has en- 
 joyed a comparative tranquillity; and it 
 is since this period that the present cha- 
 racter of her peasantry has been in a 
 great measure formed, though the politi- 
 cal causes affecting it are to be traced to 
 the previous acts of her separate legisla- 
 ture. 
 
 A slight acquaintance with the pea- 
 santry of Scotland will serve to convince 
 an unprejudiced observer, that they pos- 
 sess a degree of intelligence not general- 
 ly found among the same class of men in 
 the other countries of Europe. In the 
 very humblest condition of the Scottish 
 peasants, every one can read, and most 
 persons are more or less skilled in writ- 
 ing and arithmetic ; and, under the dis- 
 guise of their uncouth appearance, and of 
 their peculiar manners and dialect, a 
 
PREFATORY REMARKS. 
 
 stranger will discover that they possess a 
 curiosity, and have obtained a degree of 
 information, corresponding to these ac- 
 quirements. 
 
 These advantages they owe to the le- 
 gal provision made by the parliament of 
 Scotland in 1646, for the establishment of 
 a school in every parish throughout the 
 kingdom, for the express purpose of edu- 
 cating the poor: a law which may chal- 
 lenge comparison with any act of legisla- 
 tion to be found-in the records of history, 
 whether we consider the wisdom of the 
 ends in view, the simplicity of the means 
 employed, or the provisions made to ren- 
 der these means effectual to their pur- 
 pose. This excellent statute was repeal- 
 ed on the accession of Charles II. in 
 1660, together with all the other laws 
 passed during the commonwealth, as not 
 being sanctioned by the royal assent. It 
 slept during the reigns of Charles and 
 James, but was re-enacted, precisely in 
 the same terms, by the Scottish parlia- 
 ment after the revolution, in 1696; and 
 this is the last provision on the subject. 
 Its effects on the national character may 
 be considered to have commenced about 
 the period of the Union; and doubtless it 
 co-operated with the peace and security 
 arising from that happy event, in produ- 
 cing the extraordinary change in favour 
 of industry and good morals, which the 
 character of the common people of Scot- 
 land has since undergone.* 
 
 The church-.establishment of Scotland 
 happily coincides with the institution just 
 mentioned, which may be called its school 
 establishment. The clergyman being ev- 
 ery where resident in his particular par- 
 ish, becomes the natural patron and super- 
 intendent of the parish school, and is en- 
 abled in various ways to promote the com- 
 fort of the teacher, and the proficiency of 
 the scholars. The teacher himself is 
 often a candidate for lioly orders, who, 
 during the long course of study and pro- 
 bation required in the Scottish church, 
 renders the time which can be spared from 
 his professional studies, useful to others 
 as well as to himself, by assuming the re- 
 spectable character of a schoolmaster. It 
 is common for the established schools, 
 even in the country parishes of Scotland, 
 to enjoy the means of classical instruc- 
 tion ; and many of the farmers, and some 
 even of the cottagers, submit to much 
 
 * See .\)ipci!(li\. No. I. Note A. 
 
 privation, that they may obtain, for one 
 of their sons at least, the precarious ad- 
 vantage of a learned education. Tlie dif- 
 ficulty to be surmounted arises, indeed, 
 not from the expense of instructing their 
 children, but from the charge of support- 
 ing them. In the country parish schools, 
 the English language, writing, and ac- 
 counts, are generally taught at the rate 
 of six shillings, and Latin at the rate of 
 ten or twelve shillings per annum. In 
 the towns the prices are somewliat higher. 
 
 It W'Ould be improper in this place to 
 inquire minutely into the degree of in- 
 struction received at these seminaries, or 
 to attempt any precise estimate of its ef- 
 fects, either on the individuals who are 
 the subjects of this instruction, or on the 
 community to which they belong. That 
 it is on the whole favourable to industry 
 and morals, though doubtless with some 
 individual exceptions, seems to be proved 
 by the most striking and decisive appear- 
 ance ; and it is equally clear, that it is 
 the cause of that spirit of emigration and 
 of adventure so prevalent among the 
 Scotch. Knowledge has, by Lord Veru- 
 1am, been denominated power ; by others 
 it has with less propriety been denomina- 
 ted virtue or happiness: we may with 
 <;onfidence consider it as motion. A hu- 
 man being, in proportion as he is inform- 
 ed, has his wishes enlarged, as well as 
 the means of gratifying those wishes. 
 He may be considered as taking within 
 the sphere of his vision a large portion of 
 the globe on which we tread, and disco- 
 vering advantage at a greater distance 
 on its surface. His desires or ambition, 
 once excited, are stimulated by his ima- 
 gination ; and distant and uncertain ob- 
 jects, gixing freer scope to the operation 
 of this faculty, often acquire, in the mind 
 of the youthful adventurer, an attraction 
 from their very distance and uncertainty. 
 If, therefore, a greater degree of instruc- 
 tion be given to the peasantry of a coun- 
 try comparatively poor, in the neighbour- 
 hood of other countries rich in .natural 
 and acquired advantages ; and if the bar- 
 riers be removed that kept them separate, 
 emigration from the former to the latter 
 will take place to a certain extent, by 
 laws nearly as uniform as those by which 
 heat diffuses itself among surrounding 
 bodies, or water finds its level when letl 
 to its natural course. By the articles of 
 the Union, the barrier was broken down 
 which divided the two British nations, 
 and knowledge and poverty poured the 
 
PREFATORY REMARKS. 
 
 advputurous natives of the north over thn 
 fertile plains of England; and more espe- 
 cially, over the colonies which she had 
 settled in the east and west. The stream 
 of population continues to flow from the 
 north to the south ; for the causes that 
 originally impelled it continue to operate; 
 and the richer country is constantly in- 
 vigorated by the accession of an informed 
 and hardy race of men, educated in po- 
 verty, and prepared for hardship and dan- 
 f[er ; patient of labour, and prodigal of 
 , ife.* 
 
 The preachers of the Reformation in 
 Sc:otland were disciples of Calvin, and 
 brought with them the temper as well as 
 the tenets of that celebrated heresiarch. 
 The presbyterian form of worship and of 
 church government was endeared to the 
 people, from its being established by 
 themselves. It was endeared to them, 
 also, by the struggle it had to maintain 
 Avith the Catholic and the Protestant epis- 
 copal churches; over both of which, after 
 a hundred years of fierce and sometimes 
 bloody contention, it finally triumphed, 
 receiving the countenance of government, 
 and the sanction of law. During this 
 long period of contention and of suffering, 
 the temper of the people became more 
 and more obstinate and bigoted : and the 
 nation received that deep tinge of fanati- 
 cism which coloured their public transac- 
 tions, as well as their private virtues, 
 and of which evident traces may be found 
 in our own times. When the public 
 schools were established, the instruction 
 communicated in them partook of the re- 
 ligious character of the people. The 
 Catechism of the Westminster Divines- 
 was the universal school-book, and wa.« 
 put into the hands of the yonng peasant 
 as soon as he had acquired a knowledgo 
 of his alphabet ; and his first exercise in 
 the art of reading introduced him to the 
 most mysterious doctrines of the Chris- 
 tian faith. This practice is continued in 
 our own times. After the Assembly's 
 Catechism, the Proverbs of Solomon, and 
 ine New and Old Testament, follow in 
 ^gular succession ; and the scholar de- 
 parts, gifted with the knowledge of the 
 sacred writings, and receiving their doc- 
 trines according to the interpretation of 
 the Westminster Confession of Faith. 
 Thus, with the instruction of infancy in 
 the schools of Scotland are blended the 
 dogmas of the national church ; and hence 
 
 , ♦ See Appendix, No I, Note B. 
 
 o 
 
 the first and most constant exercise of 
 ingenuity among the peasantry of Scot- 
 land is displayed in religious disputation. 
 With a strong attachment to the na- 
 tional creed, is conjoined a bigoted pre- 
 ference of certain forms of worship ; the 
 source of which could be often altogether 
 obscure, if we did not recollect that the 
 ceremonies of the Scottish Church were 
 framed in direct opposition, in every 
 point, to those of the church of Rome. 
 
 The eccentricities of conduct, and sin- 
 gularities of opinion and manners, which 
 characterized the English sectaries in the 
 last century, afforded a subject for the 
 comic muse of Butler, whose pictures lose 
 their interest, since their archetypes are 
 lost. Some of the peculiarities common 
 among the more rigid disciples of Cal- 
 vinism in Scotland, in the present times, 
 have given scope to the ridicule of Bums, 
 whose humour is equal to Butler's, and 
 whose drawings from living manners are 
 singularly expressive and exact. Unfor- 
 tunately the correctness of his taste did 
 not always correspond with the strength 
 of his genius ; and hence some of the 
 most exquisite of his comic productions 
 are rendered unfit for the light.* 
 
 The information and the religious edu- 
 cation of the peasantry of Scotland, pro- 
 mote sedateness of conduct, and habits 
 of thought and reflection. — These good 
 qualities are not counteracted, by the es- 
 tablishment of poor laws, which while 
 they reflect credit on the benevolence, 
 detract from the wisdom of the English 
 legislature. To make a legal provision 
 for the inevitable distresses of the poor, 
 who by age or disease are rendered inca- 
 pable of labour, may indeed seem an in- 
 dispensable duty of society ; and if, in 
 the execution of a plan for this purpose, 
 a distinction could be introduced, so as 
 to exclude from its benefits those whose 
 sufferings are produced by idleness or 
 profligacy, such an institution would per- 
 haps be as rational as humane. But to 
 lay a general tax on property for the sup- 
 port of poverty, from whatever cause pro- 
 ceeding, is a measure full of danger. It 
 must operate in a considerable degree as 
 an incitement to idleness, and a discour- 
 agement to industry. It takes away from 
 vice and indolence the prospect of their 
 
 * Holy Willie's Prayer ; Rob the Rhymer's Wel- 
 come to his Bastard Child ; Epistle to J. Gowdie ; the 
 Holy Tulzie, &c. 
 
PREFATORY REMARKS. 
 
 most dreaded consequences, and from 
 virtue and industry their peculiar sanc- 
 tions. In many cases it must render the 
 rise in the price of labour, not a blessing, 
 but a curse to the labourer ; who, if there 
 be an excess in what he earns beyond his 
 immediate necessities, may be expected 
 to devote this excess to his present grati- 
 fication ; trusting to the provision made 
 by law for his own and his family's sup- 
 port, should disease suspend, or death 
 terminate his labours. Happily, in Scot- 
 land, the same legislature which estab- 
 lished a system of instruction for the 
 ])oor, resisted the introduction of a legal 
 provision for the support of poverty; the 
 establishment of the first, and the rejec- 
 tion of the last, were equally favourable 
 to industry and good morals ; and hence 
 it will not appear surprising, if the Scot- 
 tish peasantry have a more than usual 
 share of prudence and reflection, if they 
 approach nearer than persons of their 
 order usually do, to the definition of a 
 man, that of " a being that looks before 
 and after." These observations must in- 
 deed be taken with many exceptions : 
 the favourable operation of the causes 
 just mentioned is counteracted by others 
 of an opposite tendency ; and the subject, 
 if fully examined, would lead to discus- 
 Bions of great extent. 
 
 When the Reformation was establish- 
 ed in Scotland, instrumental music was 
 banished from the churches, as savouring 
 too much of " profane minstrelsy." In- 
 stead of being regulated by an instru- 
 ment, the voices of the congregation are 
 led and directed by a person under the 
 name of a precentor ; and the people are 
 all expected to join in the tune which he 
 chooses for the psalm which is to be sung. 
 Church-music is therefore a part of the 
 education of the peasantry of Scotland, 
 in which they are usually instructed in 
 the long winter nights by the parish 
 schoolmaster, who is generally the pre- 
 centor, or by itinerant teachers more 
 celebrated for their powers of voice. 
 This branch of education had, in the last 
 reign fallen into some neglect, but was 
 revived about thirty or forty years ago, 
 when the music itself was reformed and 
 improved. The Scottish system of psal- 
 mody is, however, radically bad. Desti- 
 tute of taste or harmony, it forms a strik- 
 ing contrast with the delicacy and pathos 
 of the profane airs. Our poet, it will be 
 found, was taught church-music, in which, 
 however, he made little proficiency. 
 
 That dancing should also be very gene- 
 rally a part of the education of the Scot- 
 tish peasantry, will surprise those who 
 have only seen this description of men : 
 and still more those who reflect on the 
 rigid spirit of Calvinism with which the 
 nation is so deeply affected, and to which 
 this recreation is so strongly abhorrent. 
 The winter is also the season v/hen they 
 acquire dancing, and indeed almost all 
 their other instruction. They are taught 
 to dance by persons generally of their 
 own number, many of whom work at dai- 
 ly labour during the summer months. 
 The school is usually a barn, and the 
 arena for the performers is generally a 
 clay floor. The dome is lighted by can- 
 dles stuck in one end of a cloven stick, 
 the other end of which is thrust into the 
 wall. Reels, strathspeys, country-dan- 
 ces, and horn-pipes, are here practised. 
 The jig so much in favour among the 
 English peasantry, has no place among 
 them. The attachment of the people 
 of Scotland of every rank, and particu- 
 larly of the peasantry, to this amusement, 
 is very great. After the labours of the 
 day are over, young men and women 
 walk many miles, in the cold and dreary 
 nights of winter, to these country dan- 
 cing-schools ; and the instant that the 
 violin sounds a Scottish air, fatigue seems 
 to vanish, the toil-bent rustic becomes 
 erect, his features brighten with sympa- 
 thy ; every nerve seems to thrill with 
 sensation, and every artery to vibrate 
 with life. These rustic performers are 
 indeed less to be admired for grace, than 
 for agility and animation, and their accu- 
 rate observance of time. Their modes 
 of dancing, as well as their tunes, are 
 common to every rank in Scotland, and 
 are now generaUy known. In our own 
 day they have penetrated into England, 
 and have established themselves even in 
 the circle of royalty. In another gene- 
 ration they will be naturalized in every 
 part of the island. 
 
 The prevalence of this taste, or rather 
 passion for dancing, among a people so 
 deeply tinctured with the spirit and doc- 
 trines of Calvin, is one of those contra- 
 dictions which the philosophic observer 
 so often finds in national character and 
 manners. It is probably to be ascribed 
 to the Scottish music, which throughout 
 all its varieties, is so full of sensibility ; 
 and which, in its livelier strains, awakes 
 those vivid emotions that find in dancing 
 tlieir natural solace and relief. 
 
PREFATORY REMARKS. 
 
 This triumph of the music of Scotland 
 over the spirit of the establi|he'cl religion, 
 has not, however, been obtained without 
 long continued and obstinate straggles. 
 The numerous sectaries who dissent from 
 the establishment on account of the re- 
 laxation which they perceive, or think 
 they perceive, in the church, from her 
 original doctrines and discipline, univer- 
 sally condemn the practice of dancin"-, 
 and the schools where it is taught ; and 
 the more elderly and serious part of the 
 people, of every persuasion, tolerate 
 rather than approve these meetings of 
 the young of both sexes, where dancing 
 is practised to their spirit-stirring music, 
 where care is dispelled, toil is forgotten, 
 and prudence itself is sometimes lulled to 
 sleep. 
 
 The Reformation, which proved fatal 
 to the rise of the other fine arts in Scot- 
 land, probably impeded, but could not ob- 
 struct the progress of its music : a cir- 
 cumstance that will convince the impar- 
 tial inquirer, that this music not only 
 existed previously to that sera, but had 
 taken a firm hold of the nation ; thus af- 
 fording a proof of its antiquity, stronger 
 than any produced by the researches of 
 our antiquaries. 
 
 The impression which the Scottish 
 music has made on the people, is deepen- 
 ed by its union with the national songs, 
 of which various collections of unequal 
 merit are before the public. These songs, 
 like those of other nations, are many of 
 them humorous ; but they chiefly treat of 
 love, war, and drinking. Love is the 
 subject of the greater proportion. With- 
 out displaying the higher powers of the 
 imagination, they exhibit a perfect know- 
 ledge of the human heart, and breathe a 
 spirit of affection, and sometimes of deli- 
 cate and romantic tenderness, not to be 
 surpassed in modern poetry, and which 
 the more polished strains of antiquity 
 have seldom possessed. 
 
 The origin of this amnt'^ry character 
 in the rustic muse of Scotland, or of tlio 
 greater number of these love-songs them- 
 selves, it would be difiicult to trace ; 
 they have accumulated in the silent lapse 
 of time, and it is now perhaps impossible 
 to give an arrangement of them in the 
 order of their date, valuable as such a 
 record of taste and manners would be. 
 Their present influence on the character 
 of the nation is, iiowevcr, great and strik- 
 
 ing. To them v.-e must attribute, in a 
 great measure, the romantic passion 
 which so often characterizes the attach- 
 ments of the humblest of the people of 
 Scotland, to a degree, that if we mistake 
 not, is seldom found in the same rank of 
 society in other countries. The pictures 
 of love and happiness exhibited in their 
 rural songs, are early impressed on the 
 mind of the peasant, and are rendered 
 more attractive from the music with 
 which they are united. They associate 
 themselves with his own youthful emo- 
 tions ; they elevate the object as well as 
 the nature of his attachment ; and give 
 to the impressions of sense the beautiful 
 colours of imagination. Hence in the 
 course of his passion, a Scottish peasant 
 often exerts a spirit of adventure, of 
 which a Spanish cavalier need not be 
 ashamed. After the labours of the day 
 are over, he sets out for the habitation of 
 his mistress, perhaps at many miles dis- 
 tance, regardless of the length or the 
 dreariness of the way. He approaches 
 her in secresy, under the disguise of night. 
 A signal at the door or window, perhaps 
 agreed on, and understood by none but 
 her, gives information of his arrival ; and 
 sometimes it is repeated again and again, 
 before the capricious fair one will obey 
 the summons. But if she favours his ad- 
 dresses, she escapes unobserved, and re- 
 ceives the vows of her lover under the 
 gloom of twilight, or the deeper shade of 
 night. Interviews of this kind are the sub- 
 jects of many of the Scottish songs, some 
 of the most beautiful of which Burns has 
 imitated or improved. In the art which 
 they celebrate he was perfectly skilled ; 
 he knew and had practised all its myste- 
 ries. Intercourse of this sort is indeed 
 universal even in the humblest condition 
 of man in every region of the earth. But 
 it is not unnatural to suppose that it may 
 exist in a greater degree, and in a more 
 romantic form, among the peasantry of a 
 country who are supposed to be more 
 than commonly instructed ; who find in 
 their rural songs expressions for their 
 youthful emotions : and in whom the em- 
 bers of passion are continually fanned by 
 tlie breathings of a music full of tender- 
 ness and sensibility. The direct influ- 
 ence of physical causes on the attachment 
 between the sexes is comparatively small, 
 but it is modified by moral causes beyond 
 any other affection of the mind. Of these, 
 music and poetry are the chief. Among 
 the snows of Lapland, and under the 
 burning- sun of Angola, the savage is seen 
 
1' R K F A'rO K V R V. M A R K S. 
 
 dastoning to Ins mistress. anil«>\»'ry \vlior»' 
 he beguiles the weariness of his journey 
 with poetry and song.* 
 
 In appreciatinfj the happiness and vir- 
 tue ot" a community, there is perhaps no 
 sinijle criterion on which so much depen- 
 dence may be placed, as the state of the 
 intercourse between the sexes. Where 
 this displays ardour of attachment, ac- 
 companied by purity of conduct, the cha- 
 r.Tcter and the influence of women rise 
 ill society, our imperfect nature mounts 
 in the scale of moral excellence; and, 
 from the source of this single affec- 
 tion, a stream of felicity descends, whicli 
 brnuohes into a thousand rivulets that 
 enrich and adorn the ticltl of life. Where 
 the attachment between the sexes sinks 
 into an appetite, the heritajje ol'our spe 
 cies is comparatively poor, and man ap- 
 proaches the condition of the briitet Dial 
 perish. " If we could with satety indu.gc 
 the pleasiniT supposition that Fingral lived 
 and that Ossian sunjr,"! Scotland, judjr- 
 in£r from this criterion, might be consi- 
 dered as ranking hiorli in happiness and 
 virtue in very remote ages. To appre- 
 ciate her situation by the same criterion 
 in our own times, would be a delicate 
 and a ditlicvdt undertaking. After con- 
 sidering the probable influence of her 
 popular songs and her national music, and 
 examining how fur the etVects to be ex- 
 pected from these are supported by facts, 
 the inquirer would also have to examine 
 the intluence of other causes, and parti- 
 cularly of her civil and ecclesiastical insti- 
 ti tio:i's,by which the character,and even 
 the manners of a people, though silently 
 and slowlv. are often powerfully controll- 
 ed. In the point of view in which we 
 are considering the subject, the ecclesi- 
 astical establishments of Scotland may 
 be supposed peculiarly favourable to pu- 
 rity of conduct. The dissoluteness of 
 manners among the catholic clergy, which 
 preceded, and in some measure prod'iced 
 the Reformation, led to an extraordinary 
 strictness on the part of the reformers, 
 and especially in that particular in which 
 the licentiousness of the clergy had been 
 carried to its greatest height— the inter- 
 course between the sexes. On this point, 
 as on all others connected with austerity 
 
 • The North Amoricau Indian!', among nhom the 
 attuchment between the si>ti-s is sai>l to be weak, and 
 love, iu the purer sciisp of the word, unknown, sieni 
 ntnily unHtiiuainieJ with the cliarins of potlrj- and 
 mu.»ic. Sf« HcUi Tour. 
 
 t Gibbon. 
 
 1 of manners, the disciples of Calvin as- 
 sumed a greater severity llian those of 
 the Protest(!nt episcopal church. The 
 punishment of illicit connexion between 
 the sexes, was throughout all Europe, a 
 province which the clergy assumed to 
 themselves; and the church of Scotland, 
 which at the Reformation renounced so 
 
 j many powers and privileges, at that pe- 
 riod took this crime under her more es- 
 pecial jurisdiction.* Where pregnancy 
 takes phice without marriage, the condi- 
 tion of the female causes the discovery, 
 and it is on her, therefore, in the first in- 
 stance, that the clergy and elders of the 
 church exercise their zeal. After exanii- 
 nation before the kirk-session, touching 
 the circumstances of her guilt, she must 
 endure a public penance, and sustain a 
 public rebuke from the pulpit, for three 
 Sabbaths successively, in the face of the 
 congregation to which she belongs, and 
 thus have her weakness exposed, and her 
 shame blazoned. The sentence is the 
 same with respect to the male ; but how 
 much lighter the punishment ! It is well 
 known that this dreadful law, worthy of 
 the iron minds of Calvin and of Knox, has 
 often led to consequences, at the very 
 mention of which human nature recoils. 
 
 While the punishment of incontinence 
 .prescribed by the institutions of Scotland 
 is severe, the culprits have an obvious 
 method of avoiding it afforded them by 
 the law respecting marriage, the validity 
 of which requires neither the ceremonies 
 of the church, nor any other ceremonies, 
 but simply the deliberate acknowledg- 
 ment of each other as husband and wife, 
 made by the parties before witnesses, or 
 in any other way that gives legal evidence 
 of such an acknowledgment having taken 
 place. And as the parties themselves 
 fix the date of their marriage, an oppor- 
 tunity is thus given to avoid the punish- 
 ment', and repair the consequences of il- 
 licit gratification. Such a degree of laxi- 
 tv respecting so serious a contract might 
 produce much confusion in the descent of 
 property, without a still farther indul- 
 gence; but the law of Scotland legiti- 
 mating all children born before wedlock, 
 on the subsequent marriage of their pa- 
 rents, renders the actual date of the mar- 
 riage itself of little consetiuence.f Mar- 
 riages contracted in Scotland without the 
 ceremonies of the church, are considered 
 
 » See Appendix, No. I. NotcC. 
 t See .Appendix, No. I. Note D. 
 
PREFATORY REMARKS. 
 
 as irregular, and the parties usually sub- 
 mit to a rebuke for their conduct, in the 
 face of their respective congregations, 
 which Ih not hownver necessary to render 
 the marriagr; valid. Burns, whose mar- 
 riage, it will appear, was irregular, does 
 not seem to have undergone this part of 
 the discipline of the church. 
 
 Thus, though the institutions of Scot- 
 land are in many particulars favourable 
 to a conduct among th^ peasantry found- 
 ed on foresight and reflection, on the sub- 
 ject of marriage Ihe reverse of this is 
 true. Irregular marriages, it may be 
 naturally supposed, are often improvident 
 ones, in whatever rank of society they 
 occur. The cliildren of such marriages, 
 poorly endowed by their parents, find a 
 certain degree of in.struction of easy ac- 
 quisition ; but the comforts of life, and 
 the gratifications of ambition, they find 
 of more difficult attainment in their na- 
 tive soil ; and thus the marriage laws of 
 Scotland conspire with other circumstan- 
 ces, to produce that habit of emigration, 
 and spirit of adventorp, for which the 
 people are so remarkable. 
 
 The manners and appearance of the 
 Scottish peasantry do not bespeak to a 
 stranger the degree of their cultiv.-Ltion. 
 In their own country, their industry is 
 inferior to that of the same description of 
 men in the southern division of the island. 
 Industry and the useful arts reached Scot- 
 land later than England ; and though 
 their advance has been rapid there, 
 the eflfecta produced are as yet far inferior 
 both in reality and in appearance. The 
 Scottish farmers have in gejieral neither 
 the opulence nor the comfortd of those of 
 England, neither vest the same capital 
 in the soil, nor receive from it the same 
 return. Their clothing, their food, and 
 their habitations, are almost every where 
 inferior.* Their appearance in these 
 respects corresponds with the appearance 
 of their country; and under the operation 
 of patient industry, both are improving. 
 Industry and the useful arts came later 
 into Scotland than into England, because 
 the security of property came later. With 
 causes of internal agitation and warfare, 
 similar to those which occured to the 
 more southern nation, the people of Scot- 
 
 * These remarkHare confin<;d to the claiss of farmers ; 
 the game corresponding inferiority will not be found in 
 the condition of the cottagers and laboiirera, at least 
 in the article of food, as those who examine this sub- 
 ject Impart! ally will Mom ducover. 
 
 land were exposed to more imminent ha- 
 zards, and more extensive and destruc- 
 tive spoliation, from external war. Oc- 
 cupied in the maintenance of their inde- 
 pendence against their more powerful 
 neighbours, to this were necessarily sa- 
 crificed the arts of peace, and at certain 
 periods, the flower of their population. 
 And when the union of the crowns pro- 
 duced a security from national wars with 
 England, for the century succeeding, the 
 civil wars common to both divisions of the 
 island, and the dependence, perhaps the 
 necessary dependence of the Scottish 
 councils on those of the more powerful 
 kingdom, counteracted this disadvantage. 
 Even the union of the British nations was 
 not, from obvious causes, immediately 
 followed by all the benefits which it was 
 ultimately destined to produce. At length, 
 however, these benefits are distinctly felt, 
 and generally acknowledged. Property 
 is secure ; manufactures and commerce 
 increasing; and agriculture is rapidly 
 improving in Scotland. As yet, indeed, 
 the farmers are not, in general, enabled 
 to make improvements out'of their own 
 capitals, as in England; but the landhold- 
 ers, who have seen and felt the advan- 
 tages resulting from them, contribute 
 towards them with a liberal hand. Hence 
 property, as well as population, is accu- 
 mulating rapidly on the Scottish soil ; and 
 the nation, enjoying a great part of the 
 blessings of Finglishraen, and retaining 
 several of their own happy institutions, 
 might be considered, if confidence could 
 be placed in human foresight, to be as 
 yet only in an early stage of their pro- 
 gress. Yet there are obstructions in their 
 way. To the f-ultivation of the soil are 
 opposed the extent and the strictness of 
 the entails; to the improvement of the 
 people, the rapidly increasing use of spi- 
 rituous liquors,* a detestable practice, 
 which includes in its consequences al- 
 most every evil, physical and moral. The 
 peculiarly social disposition of the Scot- 
 tish peasantry exposes them to this prac- 
 tice. This disposition, which is fostered 
 by their national songs and rnusic, is per- 
 haps characteristic of the nation at large. 
 Though the source of many pleasures, it 
 counteracts by its consequences the ef- 
 
 * The amount of the duty on spirits distilled in Scot- 
 land is now upwards of 250,000/. annually. In 1777, it 
 did not reach 8,000i. The rate of the duty baa indeed 
 been raised, but making every allowance, the Increase 
 of consumption must be enormous. This is Indepen- 
 dent of the duty on malt, tc. malt liquor, imported 
 spirits, and wine 
 
t'ects of their patience, industry, and fru- 
 gality, both at home and abroad, of which 
 those especially who have witnessed the 
 progress of Scotchmen in other coun- 
 tries, must have known many striking in- 
 stances. 
 
 Since the Union, the manners and lan- 
 guage of the people of Scotland have no 
 longer a standard among themselves, but 
 are tried by the standard of the nation to 
 which they are united. Though their 
 habits are far from being flexible, yet it 
 is evident that their manners and dialect 
 are undergoing a rapid change. Even 
 the farmers of the present day appear to 
 have less of the peculiarities of their coun- 
 try in their speech, than the men of let- 
 ters of the last generation. Burns, who 
 never left the island, nor penetrated far- 
 ther into England than Carlisle on the 
 one hand, or Newcastle on the other, had 
 less of the Scottish dialect than Hume, 
 who lived for many years in the best so- 
 ciety of England and France: or perhaps 
 than Robertson, -who wrote the English 
 knguage in a style of such purity ; and if 
 he had been in other respects fitted to 
 take a lead in the British House of Com- 
 mons, his pronunciation would neither 
 have fettered his eloquence, nor deprived 
 it of its due effect. 
 
 A striking particular in the charac- 
 ter of the Scottish peasantry, is one 
 which it is hoped will not be lost — the 
 strength of their domestic attachments. 
 The privation to which many parents 
 submit for the good of their children, and 
 particularly to obtain for them instruc- 
 tion, which they consider as the chief 
 good, has already bsen noticed. If their 
 children live and prosper, they have their 
 certain reward, not merely as witnessing, 
 but as sharing of thoir prosperity. Even 
 in the humblest ranks of the peasantry, 
 the earnings of the children may gene- 
 rally be considered as at the disposal of 
 their parents ; perliips in no country is so 
 large a portion of the wages of labour 
 applied to the support and comfort of 
 those whose days of labour are past. A 
 similar strength of attachment extends 
 through all the domestic relations. 
 
 Our poet partook largely of this amia- 
 ble characteristic of his humble compeers ; 
 he was also strongly tinctured with ano- 
 ther striking feature which belongs to 
 them, a partiality for his native country, 
 of which many proofs may be found in his 
 
 PREFATORY REMARKS. 
 
 writings. This, it must be confessed, is a 
 very strong and general sentiment among 
 the natives of Scotland, differing, how- 
 ever, in its character, according to the 
 character of the different minds in which 
 it is found ; in some appearing a selfish 
 prejudice, in others, a generous affection. 
 
 An attachment to the land of their birth 
 is, indeed, common to all men. It is found 
 among the inhabitants of every region of 
 the earth, from the arctic to the antarctic 
 circle, in all the vast variety of climate, 
 of surface, and of civilization. To analyze 
 this general sentiment, to trace it through 
 the mazes of association up to the prima 
 ry affection in which it has its source, 
 would neither be a difficult nor an un- 
 pleasing labour. On the first considera- 
 tion of the subject, we should perhaps 
 expect to find this attachment strong m 
 proportion to the physical advantages of 
 the soil ; but inquiry, far from confirming 
 this supposition, seems rather to lead to 
 an opposite conclusion. — In those fertile 
 regions where beneficent nature yields 
 almost spontaneously whatever is neces- 
 sary to human wants, patriotism, as well 
 as every other generous sentiment, seems 
 weak and languid. In countries less rich- 
 ly endowed, where the comforts, and even 
 necessaries of life must be purchased by 
 patient toil, the affections of the mind, as 
 well as the faculties of the understanding, 
 improve under exertion, and patriotism 
 flourishes amidst its kindred virtues. 
 Where it is necessary to combine for mu- 
 tual defence, as well as for the supply of 
 common wants, mutual good-will springs 
 from mutual difficulties and labours, the 
 social affections unfold themselves, and 
 extend from the men with whom we live, 
 to the soil on which we tread. It will per- 
 haps be found indeed, that our affections 
 cannot be originally called forth, but by 
 objects capable, or supposed capable, of 
 feeling our sentiments, and of returning 
 them \ but when once excited they are 
 strengthened by exercise, they are ex- 
 panded by the powers of unagination, and 
 seize more especially on those inanimate 
 parts of creation, which form the theatre 
 on which we have first felt the alternations 
 of joy, and sorrow, and first tasted the 
 sweets of sympathy and regard. If this 
 reasoning be just, the love of our country, 
 although modified, and even extinguished 
 in individuals by the chances and changes 
 of life, may be presumed, in our general 
 reasonings, to be strong among a people 
 in proportion to their social, and more 
 
PREFATORY REMARKS. 
 
 especially to their domestic affections. In 
 free governments it is found more active 
 than in despotic ones, because as the in- 
 dividual becomes of more consequence in 
 the community, the community becomes 
 of more consequence to him. In small 
 states it is generally more active than in 
 large ones, for tlie ^ime reason, and also 
 because the independence of a small com- 
 munity being maintained with difficulty, 
 and frequently endangered, sentiments of 
 patriotism are more frequently excited. 
 In mountainous countries it is generally 
 found more active than in plains, because 
 there the necessities of life often require 
 a closer union of the inhabitants ; and 
 more especially, because in such coun- 
 tries, though less populous than plains, 
 the inhabitants, instead-of being scattered 
 equally over the whole are usually divid- 
 ed into small communities on the sides of 
 their separate valleys, and on the banks 
 of their respective streams; situations 
 well calculated to call forth and, to con- 
 centrate the social affections, amidst sce- 
 nery that acts most powerfully on the 
 sight, and makes a lasting impression on 
 the memory. It may also be remarked, 
 that mountainous countries are often pe- 
 culiarly calculated to nourish sentiments 
 of national pride and independence, from 
 the influence of history on the affections 
 of the mind. In such countries from their 
 natural strength, inferior nations have 
 maintained their independence against 
 their more powerful neighbours, and va- 
 lour, in all ages, has made its most success- 
 ful efforts against oppression. Such coun- 
 tries present the fields of battle, where 
 the tide of invasion was rolled back, and 
 where the ashes of those rest, who have 
 died in defence of their nation. 
 
 The operation of the various causes we 
 have mentioned is doubtless more general 
 and more permanent, where the scenery 
 
 of a country, the pecuhar manners of its 
 inhabitants, and the martial achieve- 
 ments of their ancestors are embodied in 
 national songs, and united to national 
 music. By this combination, the ties 
 that attach men to the land of their birth 
 are multiplied and strengthened : and the 
 images of infancy, strongly associating 
 with the generous affections, resist the 
 influence of time, and of new impressious ; 
 they oflen survive in countries far distant, 
 and amidst far different scenes, to the 
 latest periods of life, to sooth the heart 
 with the pleasures of memory, when 
 those of hope die away. 
 
 If this reasoning bajust, it will explain 
 to us why, among the natives of Scot- 
 land, even of cultivated minds, we so 
 generally find a partial attachment to the 
 land of their birth, and why this is so 
 strongly discoverable in the writings of 
 Burns, who joined to the higher powers of 
 the understanding the most ardent affec- 
 tions. Let not men of reflection think 
 it a superfluous labour to trace the rise 
 and progress of a character like his. 
 Born in the condition of a peasant, he 
 rose by the force of his mind into distinc- 
 tion and influence, and in his works has 
 exhibited what are so rarely found, the 
 cliarms of original genius. With a deep 
 insight into the human heart, his poetry 
 exhibits high powers of imagination — it 
 displays, and as it were embalms, the pe- 
 culiar manners of his country ; and it may 
 be considered as a monument, not to his 
 own name only, but to the expiring geni- 
 us of an ancient and once independent 
 nation. In relating the incidents of his 
 life, candour will prevent us from dwell- 
 ing invidiously on tliose failings which 
 justice forbids us to conceal; we will 
 tread lightly over his yet warm ashes, 
 and respect the laurels that shelter his 
 untimely grave. 
 
THE JLEFE 
 
 ism^ nwmno/ 
 
 B7 DR. OURRXZ:. 
 
 Robert Burns was, as is well known, 
 the son of a farmer in Ayrshire, and af- 
 terwards himself a farmer there; but, 
 naving been unsuccessful, he was about 
 to emigrate to Jamaica. He had previ- 
 ously, however, attracted some notice by 
 his poetical talents in the vicinity where 
 he lived ; and having published a small 
 volume of his poems at Kilmarnock, this 
 drew upon him more general attention. 
 In consequence of the encouragement lie 
 received, he repaired to Edinburgli, and 
 there published by subscription, an im- 
 proved and enlarged edition of his poems, 
 which met with extraordinary success. 
 By the protits arising from the sale of this 
 edition, he was enabled to enter on a 
 farm in Dumfries-shire : and having mar- 
 ried a person to whom he had been long 
 attached, he retired to devote the remain- 
 der of his life to agriculture. He was 
 attain, however, unsuccessful ; and, aban- 
 doning his farm, he removed into the 
 town of Dumfries, where he filled an in- 
 ferior office in the excise, and where he 
 terminated his life, in July 1796, in his 
 thirty-eighth year. 
 
 The strength and originality of his ge- 
 nius procured him the notice of many 
 persons distinguished in the republic of 
 letters, and, among others, that of Dr. 
 Moore, well known for his Views of Soci- 
 ety and .Mnnners on the Continent of Eu- 
 rope, Zeluro, and various other works. 
 To this gentleman our poet addressed a 
 letter, after his first visit to Edinburgh, 
 giving a history of his life, up to the pe- 
 riod of his writing. In a composition 
 never intended to see the light, elegance, 
 or perfect correctness of composition will 
 not be expected. These, however, will 
 be compensated by the opportunity of 
 seeing our poet, as he gives the incidents 
 
 of his life, unfold the peculiarities of his 
 character with all the careless vigour and 
 open sincerity of his mind. 
 
 Sir, 
 
 Mauchline, 2d August, 1787. 
 
 " 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 mise 
 rable 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 Solo- 
 mon, whose character, excepting in the 
 trifling affair of wisdom, I sometimes think 
 I resemble — I have, I say, like him, turn- 
 ed 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 imper- 
 tinent, I only beg leave to tell you, that 
 the poor author wrote them imder some 
 twitching qualms of conscience, arising 
 from suspicion that he was doing what 
 he ought not to do : a predicament he has 
 more than once been in before. 
 
 " 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 
 
THE LIFE OF BURNS. 
 
 11 
 
 of honours, I tliere found almost every 
 name in the kingdom ; but for me, 
 
 '• My ancient but ignoble blood 
 Has crept thro' scoundrels ever since the flood." 
 
 Gules, Purpure, Argent, &c. quite dis- 
 owned me. 
 
 " My father was of the north of Scot- 
 land, 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 man- 
 ners, and their ways, equal to him ; but 
 stubborn, ungainly integrity, and head- 
 long, ungovernable irascibility, are dis- 
 qualifying circumstances ; consequently I 
 was born a very poor man's son. For the 
 first six or seven years of my life, my fa- 
 ther 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 be- 
 tween good and evil ; so with the assist- 
 ance of his generous- master, my father 
 ventured on a small farm on his estate. 
 At those years I was by no means a fa- 
 vourite with any body. I was a good 
 deal noted for a retentive memory, a stub- 
 born, sturdy something in my disposition, 
 and an enthusiastic ideot* piety. I say 
 ideot piety, because I was then but a 
 child. Though it cost the schoolmaster 
 some thrashings, I made an excellent 
 English scholar ; and by the time T 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, cre- 
 dulity and superstition. Slie had, I sup- 
 pose, the largest collection in the cotmtry 
 of tales and songs, concerning devil s, 
 ghosts, fairies, brownies, witches, war- 
 locks, spunkies, kelpies, elf-candles, dead- 
 lights, wraiths, apparitions, cantraips, gi- 
 ants, enchanted towers, dragons, and 
 other trumpery. This cultivated the la- 
 tent seeds of poetry ; but had so strong an 
 effect on my imagination, that to this hour, 
 in my nocturnal rambles, T sometimes keep 
 a sharp look-out in suspicious places: and 
 
 •Idiot for idiotic 
 02 
 
 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 TAe Vi- 
 sion 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 — 
 
 *' For though on dreadful whirls we hung 
 High on the broken wave — " 
 
 I met with these pieces in Mason's Eng- 
 lish Collection, one of my school-books. 
 The two first books I ever read in private, 
 and which gave me more pleasure than 
 any two books I ever read since, were 
 TTie 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. 
 
 " Polemical divinity about this time was 
 putting the country half-mad ; and I, am- 
 bitious of shining in conversation parties 
 on Sundays, between sermons, at fune- 
 rals, &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 ceas- 
 ed to this hour. 
 
 " My vicinity to Ayr was of some ad- 
 vantage 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 im- 
 mense distance between them and their 
 ragged play-fellows. It takes a few 
 dashes into the world, to give the young 
 great man that proper, decent, unnoticing 
 disregard for the poor, insignificant, stu- 
 pid devils, the mechanics and peasantry 
 around him, who were perhaps born in 
 the same village. My young superiors 
 never insulted the clouterly appearance of 
 
12 
 
 THE LIFE OP BURNS. 
 
 my ploughboy carcass, the two extremes 
 of which were often exposed to all the in- 
 clemencies of all tiie seasons. They would 
 give me stray volumes of books ; among 
 them, even then, I could pick up some ob- 
 servations ; 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 mis- 
 fortune, we fell into the hands of a factor, 
 who sat for the picture I have drawn of 
 one in my Tale of 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 plough- 
 man, 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 s 1 factor's insolent threat- 
 ening letters, which used to set us all in 
 tears. 
 
 " 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 coupling a man 
 and woman together as partners in the 
 labours of harvest. In my fifteenth au- 
 tumn my partner was a bewitching crea- 
 ture, 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 
 honnie, noeet, sonsie lass. In short, she 
 altogether, unwittingly to herself, initia- 
 ted me in that delicious passion, which in 
 spite of acid disappointment, gin-horse 
 prudence, and book-worm 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 yEolian 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 rhyme. I was not so presump- 
 tuous 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 com- 
 posed 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, ex- 
 cepting that he could smear sheep, and 
 cast peats, his father living in the moor- 
 lands, he had no more scholar-craft than 
 myself.* 
 
 " 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 iie entered on a larger 
 farm, about ten miles farther in.the coun- 
 try. The nature of the bargain he made 
 was such as to throw a little ready mo- 
 ney into his hands at the commencement 
 of his lease, otherwise the aflTair would 
 have been impracticable. For four years 
 we lived comfortably here ; but a differ- 
 ence commencing between him and his 
 landlord as to terms, after three years 
 tossing and whirling in the vortex of liti- 
 
 fation, my father was just saved from the 
 errors 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 the weary 
 are at rest. 
 
 •' 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, awk- 
 ward boy in the parish — no solitaire was 
 less acquainted with the ways of the 
 world. What I knew of ancient story 
 was gathered from Salmon's and Gu- 
 thrie's geographical grammars ; and tha 
 
 • See Appendix, No. II. Note A. 
 
THE LIFE OF BURNS 
 
 13 
 
 Heas! I had formed of modern manners, of 
 literature, and criticism, I got froiu the 
 Spectator. These with Pope's Works, 
 some plays of Shakspeare, Tull and, ifick- 
 son on Agriculture, The Pantheon, Locke's 
 Essay on the Human Understanding, Stack- 
 house's History of the Bible, Justice's Brit- 
 ish Gardener's Directory, Bayle's Lec- 
 tures, Allan Ramsay's Works, Taylor's 
 Scripture Doctrine oj" Original Sin, A Se- 
 lect Collection of English Songs, and Her- 
 vey's Meditations, had formed the whole 
 of my reading. The collection of Songs 
 was my vade mecum. I pored over them 
 driving my cart, or walking to labour, 
 song by song, verse by verse : carefully 
 noting the true tender, or sublime, frum 
 affectation and fustian. I am convinced 
 I owe to this practice much of my critic 
 craft, such as it is. 
 
 " In my seventeenth year, to give my 
 manners a brush, I went to a country 
 dancing school. My father had an unac- 
 countable antipathy against these meet- 
 ings ; 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 in- 
 stance of disobedience in me he took a 
 sort of dislike to me, which I believe was 
 one cause of the dissipation which mark- 
 ed my succeeding years. I say dissipa- 
 tion, comparatively with the strictness 
 and sobriety, and regularity of presbyte- 
 rian country life ; for though the Will o' 
 Wisp meteors of thoughtless whim were 
 almost the sole lights of my path, yet CfH-- 
 ly 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 Cy- 
 clop round the walls of his cave. I saw 
 my father's situation entailed on me per- 
 petual labour. The only two openings bv 
 which I could enter the temnle of For- 
 tune, was the gate of niggardly economy, 
 or the path of little chicaning bargain- 
 making. The first is so contracted an 
 aperture, I never could sqrieeze 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 app.etite for sociability, as 
 well from native hilarity as from a pride 
 of observation and remark ; a constitu- 
 tional melancholy or hypochondriasm that 
 made me fly from solitude ; add to these 
 incentives to social life, my reputation for 
 
 bookish knowledge, a certain wild logi- 
 cal 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 to- 
 gether, there was I among them. But far 
 beyond all other impulses of my heart, 
 was un penchant a I'adorable moitie du 
 genre humain. 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 morti- 
 fied with a repulse. At the plough, scythe, 
 or reaping hook, I feared no competitor, 
 and thus I set absolnt'^ want at defiance ; 
 and as I never cared farther for my la- 
 bours 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 favour- 
 ite theme of my song : and is with diffi- 
 culty 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, bap- 
 tize these things by the name of Follies. 
 To the sons and daughters of labour and 
 poverty, they are matters of the most se- 
 rious nature ; to them, the ardent hope, 
 the stolen interview, the tender farewell, 
 are the greatest and most delicious parts 
 of their enjoyments. 
 
 " Another circumstance in my life which 
 made some alterations 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 v/hich I made a pretty good pro- 
 gress. But I made a greater progress in 
 the knowledge of mankind. The con- 
 traband trade was at that time very suc- 
 cessful, and it sometimes happened to me 
 to fall in with those who carried it on. 
 Scenes of swaggering, riot and roaring 
 
14 
 
 THE LIFE OP BURNS. 
 
 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 /ie«e who lived 
 next door to the school, overset my tri- 
 gonometry, and set me off at a tangent 
 from the sphere of my studies. I, how- 
 ever, struggled on with my tdnes and co- 
 nnes for a few days more ; but stepping 
 into the garden one charming noon to 
 take the sun's altitude, there I met my 
 angel, 
 
 " Like Proserpine gathering flowers, 
 Herself a fairer flower- " 
 
 " It was in vain to think of doing any 
 more good at school. The remaining 
 week I staid, 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. 
 
 " 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 hu- 
 man nature in a new phasis ; and I en- 
 faged several of my school-fellows to 
 eep 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 pleas- 
 ed me ; and a comparison between them 
 and the composition of most of my corres- 
 pondents, flattered my vanity. I carried 
 this whim so far, that though I had 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 day-book and ledger. 
 
 " My life flowed on much in the same 
 course till my twenty-third year. Vive 
 V amour, et vim la hagatdle, were my 
 sole principles of action. The addition 
 of two more authors to my library gave 
 me great pleasure ; Sterne and J^I'-Kenzie 
 — Tristram Shandy and The Man of Feel- 
 ing — were my bosom favourites. Poesy 
 Wjfts still a darling walk for my mind ; but 
 it was only indulged in accoraing 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 moment- 
 ary tone of the mind, and dismissed the 
 work as it bordered on fatigue. My pas- 
 sions, 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, ex- 
 cept Winter, a Dirge, the eldest of my 
 printed pieces; The Death of Poor Mai- 
 lie, John Barleycorn, and songs first, se- 
 cond, and third. Song second was the 
 ebullition of that passion which ended the 
 forementioned school-business. 
 
 " My twenty-third year was to me an 
 important era. Partly through whim, and 
 partly that I wished to set about doing 
 something in life, I joined a flax-dresser 
 in a neighbouring 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 ash- 
 es ; and I was left like a true poet, not 
 worth a sixpence. 
 
 " 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 helle file whom I adored, 
 and who had pledged her soul to meet 
 me in the field of matrimony, jilted me, 
 with peculiar circumstances of mortifica- 
 tion. The finishing evU that brought up 
 the rear of this infernal file, was my con- 
 stitutional melancholy, being increased to 
 such a degree, that for three months I 
 was in a state of mind scarcely to be en- 
 vied by the hopeless wretches who have 
 got their mittimus — Depart from me, ye 
 accursed ! 
 
 " From this adventure I learned some- 
 thing 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 sim- 
 ple mechanic; but a great man in the 
 neighbourhood taking him under his pa- 
 tronage, 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, 
 
THE LIFE OF BURNS. 
 
 15 
 
 he had been set on shore by an Amern-an 
 privateer, on the wild coast ofConnanght, 
 stripped of every thing. I cannot quit tliis 
 poor fellow's story without adding, tliat 
 he is at this time master of a large West- 
 Indiaman belonging to the Thames. 
 
 " His mind was fraught with indepen- 
 dence, magnanimity, and every manly 
 virtue. I loved and admired him to a de- 
 gree of enthusiasm, and of course strove 
 to imitate him. In some measure I suc- 
 ceeded ; I had pride before, but he taught 
 it to flow in proper channels. His know- 
 ledge 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 hor- 
 ror. Here his friendship did me a mis- 
 chief: and the consequence-was that soon 
 after I resumed the plough, I wrote the 
 Poet's Welcome.* My reading only in- 
 creased, 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 Ferguson's Scottish Po- 
 ems, I strung anew my wUdly sounding 
 Jyre with emulating vigour. When my 
 father died, his all went among the hell- 
 hounds that prowl in the kennel of justice ; 
 but we made a shift to collect a little mo- 
 ney 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 quali- 
 fication, he was far my superior. 
 
 " I entered on this farm with a full re- 
 solution. Come, go to, 1 will be wise ! I 
 read farming books ; I calculated crops : 
 I attended markets ; and, in short, in spite 
 oithe devil, and the world, and thejlesh, I 
 believe I should have been a wise man ; 
 .but the first year, from unfortunately buy- 
 ing bad seed, the second, from a late har- 
 vest, we lost half our crops. This over- 
 set all my wisdom, and I returned, like 
 the dog to his vomit, and the sorv that was 
 washed, to her wallowing in the mire.f 
 
 I now began to be known in the neigh- 
 
 * Rob the Rhjmer's Welcome to his Bastard Child, 
 t See Appendix, No. n. Note B. 
 
 bourhood us a maker of rhymes. The 
 first of my poetic offspring that saw the 
 light, was a burlesque 'amentation on a 
 quarrel between two reverend Calvinists, 
 both of them dramatis personoB in my 
 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 descrip- 
 tion of the clergy, as well as laity, it met 
 with a roar of applause. Holy Willie'r 
 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. Tliis is the un- 
 fortunate story that gave rise to my print- 
 ed poem, T7ie 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 vic- 
 tim to that inhospitable clime, and gone 
 to the world of spirits ! I can truly say, 
 that pauvre inconnu as I then was, I had 
 pretty nearly as high an idea of myself 
 and of my.works as I have at this mo- 
 ment, 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 watch- 
 ed every means of information, to see how 
 much groimd I occupied as a man and as 
 a poet ; I studied assiduously Nature's 
 design in my formation — where the lights 
 
 * An explanation of tltis will be found hereafter. 
 
THE LIFE OP BURNS. 
 
 and Bhades in my character were intend- 
 ed. I waa 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 no- 
 velty 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 recep- 
 tion I met with from the public ; and be- 
 sides I pocketed, all expenses deducted, 
 nearly twenty pounds. This sum came 
 very seasonably, as I was thinking of in- 
 denting myself, for want of money to pro- 
 cure my passage. As soon as I was mas- 
 ter 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, 
 
 " Hungry ruin had me in the wind.' 
 
 "I had been for some days skulking 
 from covert to covert, under all the ter- 
 rors of a jail; as some ill-advised people 
 had uncoupled the merciless pack of the 
 law at my heels. I had taken the fare- 
 well of my few friends ; my chest was on 
 the road to Greenock ; I had composed 
 tTie last" song I should ever measure in 
 Caledonia, The gloomij 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 sin- 
 gle letter of introduction. The baneful 
 star which had so long shed its blasting 
 influence in my zenith, for once made a 
 revolution to the nadir ; and p. kind Pro- 
 vidence placed me under the patronage 
 of one of the noblest of men, the Earl of 
 Glencairn. Onblie mot, Grand Dieu, si 
 jamais je Voublie .' 
 
 " I need relate no farther. At Edin- 
 burgh 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 pro- 
 fited, time will show. 
 
 •' My most respectful compliments to 
 
 Miss W. Her very elegant and friendly 
 letter I cannot answer at present, as my 
 presence is requisite in Edinburgh, and I 
 set out to-morrow."* 
 
 At the period of our poet's death, his 
 brother, Gilbert Burns, was ignorant that 
 he had himself written the foregoing nar- 
 rative of his hfe while in Ayrshire ; and 
 having been applied to by Mrs. Dunlop 
 for some memoirs of his brother, he com- 
 plied with her request in a letter, from 
 v/hich the following narrative is chiefly 
 extracted. When Gilbert Burns after- 
 wards saw the letter of our poet to Dr. 
 Moore, he made some annotations upon 
 it, which shall be noticed as we proceed. 
 
 Robert Burns was born on the 25th day 
 of January, 1759, in a small house about 
 two miles from the town of Ayr, and with- 
 in a few hundred yards of Alloway church, 
 which his poem of Tarn o' Shanter has 
 rendered immortal. f The name which 
 the poet and his brother modernized into 
 Burns, was originally Burnes, or Burness. 
 Their father, William Burnes, was the 
 son of a farmer in Kincardineshire, and 
 had received the education common in 
 Scotland to persons in his condition of life ; 
 he could read and write, and had some 
 knowledge of arithmetic. His family 
 having fallen into reduced circumstances, 
 he was compelled to leave his home in his 
 nineteenth year, and turned his steps to- 
 wards the south in quest of a livelihood. 
 The same necessity attended his elder 
 brother Robert. " I have often heard 
 my father," says Gilbert Burns, in his 
 letter to Mrs. Dunlop, " describe the an- 
 guish of mind he felt when they parted 
 on the top of a hill on the confines of their 
 native place, each going off his several 
 way in search of new adventures, and 
 scarcely knowing whither he went. My 
 father undertook to act as a gardener, 
 
 * There arfi various copies of this letter in the au- 
 thor's hand-writing; and one of these, evidently cor-, 
 rected, is in the book in whicli he had copied several 
 of liis letters. Tliis has been used for the press, with 
 some omissions, and one slight alteration suggested by 
 Gilbert Burns. 
 
 t This house is on the right-hand side of the road 
 from Ayr to Maybole, which forms a part of the road 
 from Glasgow to Port-Patriclc. When the poet's fa- 
 ther afterwards removed to Tarbolton parish, he sold 
 his leasehold right in this house, and a few acres of 
 land adjoining, to the corporation of shoemakers in Ayr, 
 It is now a country ale-houue. 
 
THE LIFE OP BURNS 
 
 17 
 
 and shaped his course to Edinburgh, 
 where he wrought hard when he couhlget 
 work, passing through a variety of diffi- 
 culties. Still, however, he endeavoured 
 to spare something for the support of his 
 aged parents : and I recollect hearing 
 him mention his having sent a bank-note 
 for this purpose, when money of that kind 
 was so scarce in Kincardineshire, that 
 they scarcely knew how to employ it 
 when it arrived." From Edinburgh, 
 William Burnes passed westward into 
 tlie county of Ayr, where he engaged 
 himself as a gardener to the laird of Fairly, 
 with whom he lived two years ; then 
 changing his service for that of Crawford 
 of Doonside. At length, being desirous 
 of settling in life, he took a perpetual 
 lease of seven acres of land from Dr. 
 Campbell, physician in Ayr, with the 
 view of commencing nurseryman and 
 public gardener ; and having built a house 
 upon it with his own hands, married, in 
 December 1757, Agnes Brown, the mo- 
 ther of our poet, who still survives. The 
 first fruit of this marriage was Robert, 
 the subject of these memoirs, born on the 
 25th of January, 1759, as has already 
 been mentioned. Before William Burnes 
 had made much progress in preparing his 
 nursery, he was withdrawn from that un- 
 dertaking by Mr. Ferguson, who pur- 
 chased the estate of Doonholm, in the 
 immediate neighbourhood, and engaged 
 him as his gardener and overseer; and 
 this was his situation when our poet 
 was born. Though in the service of Mr. 
 Ferguson, he lived in his own house, his 
 wife managing her family and her little 
 dairy, which consisted sometimes of two, 
 sometimes of three milch cows ; and this 
 state of unambitious content continued 
 till the year 1766. His son Robert was 
 sent by him in his sixth year, to a school 
 at Alloway Miln, about a mile distant, 
 taught by a person of the name of Camp- 
 bell; but this teacher being in a few 
 months appointed master of the work- 
 house at Ayr, William Burnes, in con- 
 junction with some other heads of fami- 
 lies, engaged John Murdoch in his stead. 
 The education of our poet, and of his 
 brother Gilbert, was in common ; and of 
 their proficiency under Mr. Murdoch, we 
 have the following account : " With him 
 we learnt to read English tolerably well,* 
 and to write a little. He taught us, too, 
 the English grammar. I was too young 
 to profit much from his lessons in gram- 
 
 * Letter ft-om Gilbert Burns to Mrs. Dunlop. 
 
 mar; but Robert made some proficiency 
 in it — a circumstance of considerable 
 weight in the unfolding of his genius and 
 character; as he soon became remarkable 
 for the fluency and correctness of his ex- 
 pression, and read the few books that 
 came in his way with much pleasure and 
 improvement; for even then he was a 
 reader when he could get a book. Mur- 
 doch, whose library at that time had no 
 great variety in it, lent him The Life of 
 Hannibal, wliich was the first book he 
 read (the schoolbook excepted,) and al- 
 most the only one he had an opportunity 
 of reading while he was at school : for 
 The Life of Wallace, which he classes 
 with it in one of his letters to you, he did 
 not see for some years afterwards, when 
 he borrowed it fi'om the blacksmith who 
 shod our horses." 
 
 It appears that William Burnes ap- 
 proved himself greatly in the service of 
 Mr. Ferguson, by his intelligence, indus- 
 try, and integrity. In consequence of 
 this with a view of promoting his inter- 
 est, Mr. Ferguson leased him a farm, of 
 which we have the following account : 
 
 " The farm was upwards of seventy 
 acres* (between eighty and ninety English 
 statute measure,) the rent of which was to 
 be forty pounds annually for the first six 
 years, and afterwards forty-five pounds. 
 My father endeavoured to sell his lease- 
 hold property, for the purpose of stocking 
 this farm, but at that time was unable, 
 and Mr. Ferguson lent him a hundred 
 pounds for that purpose. He removed to- 
 his new situation at Whitsuntide, 1766. 
 It was, I think, not above two years after 
 this, that Murdoch, our tutor and friend, 
 left this part of the country ; and there 
 being no school near us, and our little 
 services being useful on the farm, my 
 father undertook to teach us arithmetic 
 in the winter evenings by candle-light ; 
 and in this way my two eldest sisters got 
 all the education they received. I remem- 
 ber a circumstance that happened at this 
 time, which, though trifling in itself, is 
 fresh in my memory, and rnay serve to 
 illustrate the early character of my bro- 
 ther. Murdoch came to spend a night 
 with us. and to take his leave when he 
 was about to go into Carrick. He 
 brought us, as a present and memorial of 
 him, a small compendium of English 
 
 * Letter of Gi'hert Burns to Mrs. Dunlnp. The 
 name of tiiis farm i3 .Mouut Oliphant, in Ayr parish. 
 
18 
 
 Grammar, and the tragedy of Titus An- 
 dronicus, and by way of passing the 
 evening, he began to read the play aloud. 
 We were all attention for some time, till 
 presently the whole party was dissolved 
 in tears. A female in the play (I have 
 but a confused remembrance of it) had 
 her hands chopt off, and her tongue cut 
 out, and then was insultingly desired to call 
 for water to wash her hands. At this, in 
 an agony of distress, we with one voice de- 
 sired he would read no more. My father 
 observed, that if we would not hear it out, 
 it would be needless to leave the play with 
 us. Robert replied, that if it was left he 
 would burn it. My father was going to 
 chide him for this ungrateful return to 
 his tutor's kindness ; but Murdoch inter- 
 fered, declaring that he liked to see so 
 much sensibility ; and he left The School 
 for Love, a comedy (translated I think 
 from the French,) in its place."* 
 
 " Nothing," continues Gilbert Burns, 
 *' could be more retired than our general 
 manner of living at Mount Oliphant ; we 
 rarely saw any body but the members of 
 our own family. There were no boys of 
 our own age, or near it, in the neigh- 
 bourhood. Indeed the greatest part of 
 the land in the vicinity was at that time 
 possessed by shopkeepers, and people of 
 that stamp, who had retired from busi- 
 ness, or who kept their farm in the coun- 
 try, at the same time that they followed 
 business in town. My father was for 
 gome time almost the only companion we 
 had. He conversed familiarly on all sub- 
 jects with us, as if we had been men; and 
 was at great pains, while we accompanied 
 hira in the labours of the farm, to lead 
 
 ♦ It is to be remembered that the poet was only nine 
 years of age and the relator of this incident under eight, 
 at the time it happened. The effect was very natural 
 in children of sensibility at their age. At a more ma- 
 ture period of the judgment, such absurd representa- 
 tions are calculated rather to produce disgust or laugh- 
 ter, than tears. The scene to which Gilbert Burns al- 
 ludes, opens thus : 
 
 Titus Andr aniens, Act II. Scene 5. 
 
 fitter Demetrius and Chiron, viith Iiavinia ravished, 
 her hands cut off, and her tongue cut out. 
 
 Why is this silly play still printed as Shakespeare's, 
 against the opinion of all the best critics "? The bard of 
 Avon was guilty of many extravagances, but he al- 
 ways performed what he intended to perform. That 
 he ever excited in a British mind (for the French cri- 
 tics must be set aside) disgust or ridicule, where he 
 ni«ant to have awakened pity or horror, Is what will 
 act be imputed to that master of the passions. 
 
 THE LIFE OP BURNS. 
 
 the conversation to such eubjects as might 
 tend to increase our knowledge, or con- 
 firm us in virtuous habits. He Ijorrowed 
 Salmon's Geographical Grammar for us, 
 and endeavoured to make us acquainted 
 with the situation and history of the dif- 
 ferent countries in the world ; while from 
 a book-society in Ayr, he procured for us 
 the reading of Derham's Physico and 
 Astro-Theology, and Ray's Wisdom of God 
 in the Creation, to give us some idea of 
 astronomy and natural history. Robert 
 read all these books with an avidity and 
 industry, scarcely to be equalled. My 
 father had been a subscriber to Stack- 
 liouse's History of the Bible then lately 
 published by James Meuross in Kilmar- ' 
 nock : from this Robert collected a com- 
 petent knowledge of history ; for no book 
 was so voluminous as to slacken his in- 
 dustry, or so antiquated as to damp his 
 researches. A brother of my mother, 
 who had lived with us some time, and 
 had learnt some arithmetic by winter 
 evening's candle, went into a bookseller's 
 shop in Ayr, to purchase The Ready Rec- 
 koner or Tradesman's sure Guide, and a 
 book to teach him to write letters. Luck- 
 ily, in place oi The Complete Letter-Wri- 
 ter, he got by mistake a small collection 
 of letters by the most eminent writers, 
 with a few sensible directions for attain- 
 ing an easy epistolary style. This book 
 was to Robert of the greatest conse- 
 quence. It inspired him with a strong 
 desire to excel in letter-writing, while it 
 furnished him with models by some of 
 the first writers in our language. 
 
 " My brother was about thirteen or 
 fourteen, when my father, regretting that 
 we wrote so ill, sent us, week about, 
 during a summer quarter, to the parish 
 school of Dalrymple, which, though be- 
 tween two and three miles distant, was 
 the nearest to us, that we might have an 
 opportunity of remedying this defect. 
 About this time a bookish acquaintance 
 of my father's procured us a reading of 
 two volumes of Richardson's Pamela, 
 which was the first novel we read, and 
 the only part of Richardson's works my 
 brother was acquainted with till towards 
 the period of his commencing author. 
 Till that time too he remained unac- 
 quainted with Fielding, with Smollet, 
 (two volumes of Ferdinand Count Fathom, 
 and two volumes oi Peregrine Pickle ex- 
 cepted,) with Hume, with Robertson, and 
 almost all our authors of eminence of 
 the later times. I recollect indeed my 
 
THE LIFB OF BURNS. 
 
 TO 
 
 father borrowed a vohime of English his- 
 tory from Mr. Hamilton of Bourtreehill's 
 gardener. It treated of the reign of 
 James the First, and his unfortunate son, 
 Charles, but I do not know who was the 
 author ; all that I remember of it is some- 
 thing of Charles's conversation with his 
 children. About this time Murdoch, our 
 former teacher, after having been in difter- 
 ent places in the country , and having taught 
 a school some time in Dumfries, came to be 
 the established teacher of the English lan- 
 guage in Ayr, a circumstance of considera- 
 ble consequence to us. The remembrance 
 of my father's former friendship, and his 
 attachment to my brother, made him do 
 every thing in his power for our improve- 
 ment. He sent us Pope's works, and 
 some other poetry, the first that we had 
 an opportunity of reading, excepting 
 what is contained in The English. Collec- 
 tion, and in the volume of Tke Edinburgh 
 Magazi7ie for 1772; excepting also fAo^e 
 excellent new snng.i that are hawked about 
 the country in baskets, or exposed on 
 stalls in the streets. 
 
 " The summer after we had been at 
 Dalrymple school, my father sent Robert 
 to Ayr, to revise his English grammar, 
 with his former teacher. He had been 
 there only one week, when he was obliged 
 to return to assist at the harvest. When 
 the harvest was over, he went back to 
 Kcliool, whore he remained two weeks ; 
 and this completes the account of his 
 school education, excepting one summer 
 quarter, some time afterwards, that he 
 attended the parish school of Kirk-Os- 
 wald, (where he lived with a brother of 
 my mother's,) to learn surveying. 
 
 " During the two last weeks that he 
 was with Murdoch, he himself was en- 
 gaged in learning French, and he com- 
 municated the instructions he received to 
 my brother, who, when he returned, 
 brought home with him a French diction- 
 ary and grammar, and the Adventures nf 
 Telemachus in the original. In a little 
 while, by the assistance of these books, 
 he had acquired such a knowledge of the 
 language, as to read and understand any 
 French author in prose. This was con- 
 sidered as a sort of prodigy, and thro\igh 
 the medium of Murdoch, procured him 
 the acquaintance of several lads in Ayr, 
 who were at that time gabbling French, 
 and the notice of some families, particu- 
 larly that of Dr. Malcolm, where a know- 
 ledo-e of Ficuch was a recommendation, 
 F 
 
 " Observing the facility with which he 
 had acquired the French language, Mr. 
 Robinson the established writing-master 
 in Ayr, and Mr. Murdoch's particular 
 friend, having himself acquired a consi- 
 derable knowledge of the Latin language 
 by his own industry, without ever having 
 learnt it at school, advised Robert to 
 niake the same attempt, promising him 
 every assistance in his power. Agreea- 
 bly to this advice, he purchased The Ru- 
 diments of the Latin Tongue, but finding 
 this study dry and uninteresting, it was 
 quickly laid aside. He frequently re- 
 turned to his Rudiments on any little cha- 
 grin or disappointment, particularly in 
 hi.s love afl^airs ; but the Latin seldom 
 predominated more than a day or two 
 at a time, or a week at most. Observ- 
 ing himself tlie ridicule that would at- 
 tach to tliis sort of conduct if it were 
 known, he made two or three humorous 
 stanzas on the subject, which I cannot 
 now recollect, but they all ended, 
 
 " So I'll to my Latin again." 
 
 " Thus you see Mr. Murdoch was a 
 principal means of my brother's improve- 
 ment. Worthy man ; though foreign to 
 my present purpose, I cannot take leave 
 of him without tracing his future history. 
 He continued for some years a respected 
 and useful teacher at Ayr, till one even- 
 ing that he had been overtaken in liquor, 
 he happened to speak somewhat disre- 
 spectfully of Dr. Dalrymple, the parish 
 minister," who had not paid him that at- 
 tention to which he thought himself en- 
 titled. In Ayr he might as well have 
 spoken blasphemy. He found it proper 
 to give up his appointment. He went to 
 London, where he still lives, a private 
 teacher of French. He has been a con- 
 siderable time married, and keeps a shop 
 of stationary wares. 
 
 " The father of Dr. Patterson, now 
 physician at Ayr, was, I believe a native 
 of Aberdeenshire, and was one of the es-' 
 tablished teachers in Ayr, when my fa- 
 ther settled in the neighbourhood. He ear- 
 ly recognized my father as a fellow native of 
 the north of Scotland, and a certain de- 
 gree of intimacy subsisted between them 
 daring Mr. Patterson's life. After his 
 dea,th, his widow, who is a very genteel 
 woman, and of great worth, delighted in 
 doing what she thought her husband 
 would have wished to have done, and as- 
 siduously kept up her attentions to all his 
 
THE LIFE OF BURNS. 
 
 acquaintance. She kept alive the inti- 
 macy with onr family, by frequently in- 
 viting my father and mother to her house 
 on Sundayp, when she met them at church. 
 
 " When she came to know my bro- 
 ther's paasion for books, she kindly offer- 
 ed us the use of hor husband's library, 
 and from hor wo sTot the Spedtitor, Pope's 
 Trans/ (if ion of Homer, and several other 
 books that were of use to us. Mount 
 Oliphant, the .farm my father possessed 
 in the parish of Ayr, is almost the very 
 poorest soil I know of in a state of culti- 
 vation. A stronger proof of this I can- 
 not give, than that, notwithstanding the 
 extraordinary rise in the value of lands in 
 Scotland, it was after a considerable sum 
 laid out in improving it by the proprietor, 
 let a few years ago five pounds per an- 
 num lower than the rent paid for it by 
 my father thirty years ago. My father, I 
 in consequence of this, soon came into | 
 difficulties, which were increased by the I 
 loss of several of his cattle by accidents i 
 and disease. — To the buffetings of mis- . 
 fortune, we could only oppose hard la- 
 bour, and the most rigid economy. We 
 lived very sparing. For several years 
 butcher's moat was a stranger in the 
 house, while all the members of the fami- 
 ly exerted tliemselves to the utmost of 
 their strength, and rather beyond it, in 
 the labours of the farm. My brother, at 
 the age of thirteen, assisted in thrashing 
 tlie crop of corn, and at fifteen was the 
 principal labourer on the farm, for we had 
 no hired servant, male or female. The an- 
 guish of mind we felt at our tender years, 
 under these straits and dilficulties, was 
 very great. To think of our father grow- 
 ing old (for he was now above fifty,) bro- 
 ken down with the long continued fatigues 
 of his life, with a wife and five other chil- 
 dren, and in a declining state of circum- 
 stances, these reflections produced in my 
 brother's mind and mine sensations of the 
 deepest distress. I doubt not but tlie hard 
 labour and sorrow of this period of liis 
 life, was in a great measure the cause of 
 that depression of spirits with which Ro- 
 bert was so often afflicted through his 
 whole life afterwards. At this time he 
 was almost constantly afflictedinthe even- 
 ings with a dull head-ache, which at a fu- 
 ture period of his life, was exchanged for 
 a palpitation of the lieart, and a threat- 
 ening of fainting and suftbcation in his 
 bed in the night-time. 
 
 " !Ry a stipulation in my father's leas8, 
 
 he had a right to throw it up, if he thought 
 proper, at the end of every sixth year. 
 He attempted to fix himself in a better 
 farm at the end of the first six years, but 
 failing in that attempt, he continued 
 where he was for six years more. He 
 then took the farm of Lochlea, of 130 
 acres, at the rent of twenty shillings an 
 acre, in the parish of Tarbolton, of Mr. 
 
 , then a merchant in Ayr, and now 
 
 ( 1 797,) a merchant in Liverpool. He re 
 moved to this farm on Whitsunday, 1777, 
 and possessed it only seven years. No 
 writing had .ever been made out of the 
 conditions of the lease ; a misunderstand- 
 ing took place respecting them ; the sub 
 jects in dispute were submitted to arbi- 
 tration, and the decision involved my fa- 
 ther's affairs in ruin. He lived to know 
 of this decision, but not to see any exe- 
 cution in consequence of it. He died on 
 the ISthofFebr.iary, 1784. 
 
 " The seven years we lived in Tarbol- 
 ton parish (extending from the seven- 
 teenth to the twenty-fourth of my bro- 
 ther's age,) were not marked by much 
 literary improvement ; but, during this 
 time, the foundation was laid of certain 
 habits in my brother's character, which 
 afterwards became but too prominent, 
 and which malice and envy have taken 
 delight to enlarge on. Though when 
 young he was bashful and awkward in his 
 intercourse with women, yet when he 
 approached manhood, his attachment to 
 their society became very strong, and he 
 was constantly the victim of some fair 
 enslaver. The symptoms of his passion 
 were often such as nearly to equal those 
 of the celebrated Sappho. I never indeed 
 knew that he fainted, sunk, and died away; 
 but the agitations of his mind and body 
 exceeded any thing of the kind I ever 
 knew in real life. He had always a par- 
 ticular jealousy of people who were richer 
 than himself, or who had more conse- 
 quence in life. His love, therefore, rare- 
 Iv settled on persons of this description. 
 When he selected any one out of the 
 sovereignty of his good pleasure, to whora 
 he should pav his particular attention, she 
 was instantly invested with a sufficient 
 stock of charms, out of a plentiful store 
 of his own imagination ; and there was 
 often a great dissimilitude between hia 
 fair captivator, as she appeared to others, 
 and as she seemed when invested with 
 the attributes he gave her. One gene- 
 rally reigned paramount in his affectiona 
 biri as Yorick's affections flowed out to- 
 
THE LIFE OF BURNS. 
 
 tl 
 
 ward Madam de L — at the remise door, 
 while the eternal vows of Eliza were 
 upon him, so Robert was frequently en- 
 countering other attractions, which form- 
 ed so many underplots in the drama of 
 his love. As these connexions were go- 
 verned by the strictest rules of virtue and 
 modesty (from which he never deviated 
 till he reached his 23d year,) he became 
 anxious to be in a situation to marry. 
 This was not likely to be soon the case 
 wiiilf" he remained a farmer, as the stock- 
 ing of a farm required a sum of money 
 h" Jiad no probability of being master of 
 for a great while. He began, therefore, 
 to think of trying some other line of life. 
 •He and I had for several years taken land 
 of my father for the purpose of raising 
 flax on our own account. In the course 
 of selling it, Robert began to think of 
 turning dax-dresser, both as being suita- 
 ble to his grand view of settling in life, 
 and as subservient to the fiax raising. He 
 accordingly wrought at the business of a 
 flax-dresser in Irvine for six months, but 
 abandoned it at that period, as neither 
 agreeing with his health nor inclination. 
 In Irvine he had contracted some acquaint- 
 ance of a freer manner of thinking and 
 living than he had been used to, whose 
 society prepared him for overleaping the 
 bounds of rigid virtue which had hitherto 
 restrained him. Towards the. end of the 
 period under review (in his 24th year,) 
 and soon after his father's death, he was 
 furnished with the subject of his epistle 
 to John Ranklin. During this period 
 also he became a freemason, which was 
 his first introduction to the life of a boon I 
 companion. Yet, notwithstanding these 
 circumstances, and the praise he has be- 
 stowed on Scotch drink (which seems to 
 have misled his historians,) I do not re- 
 collect, during these seven years, nor till 
 towards the end of his commencing au- 
 thor (when his growing celebrity occa- 
 sioned his being often in company,) to 
 have ever seen him intoxicated ; nor was | 
 he at all given to drinking. A stronger 
 proof of the general sobriety of his con- 
 duct need not be required than what I am 
 about to give. During the whole of the 
 time we lived in the farm of Lochlea with 
 my father, he allowed my brother and 
 me such wages for our labour as he gave 
 to other labourers, as a part of which, 
 every article of our clothing manufactured 
 in the family was regularly accounted for. 
 When my father's affairs drew near a 
 crisis, Robert and I took the farm of 
 Mospofiel. consisting of 118 acres, at the 
 
 rent of 00/. per annum (the farm on wlxich 
 I live at present,) from Mr. Gavin Ham. 
 ilton, as an asylum for tlie family m case 
 of the worst. It was stocked by the pro- 
 perty and individual savuigs of the wliole 
 family, and was a joint concern among 
 us. Every member of the family was 
 allowed ordinary wages fur the labour he 
 performed on the farm. My brother's 
 allowance and mine was seven pounds 
 per annum each. And during the whole 
 time this family concern lasted, which 
 was for four years, as well as during the 
 preceding period at Lochlea, his expenses 
 never in any one year exceeded his slen- 
 der income. As I was entrusted with the 
 keeping of the family accounts, it is not 
 possible that there can be any fallacy in 
 this statement in my brother's favour. 
 His temperance and frugality were every 
 thing that could be wished. 
 
 " The farm of Mossgiel lies very high, 
 and mostly on a cold wet bottom. The 
 first four years that we were on the farm 
 were very frosty, and the spring was very 
 late. Our crops in consequence were 
 very tuiprofitable ; and, notwithstanding 
 our utmost diligence and economy, we 
 found ourselves obliged to give up our 
 bargain, with the loss of a considerable 
 part of our original stock. It was during 
 these four years that Robert formed his 
 connexion with Jean Armour, afterwards 
 Mrs. Burns. This connexion tow/d no Zora^-er 
 1)6 conroalod, about the time we came 
 to a final determination to quit the farm. 
 Robert durst not engage with his family 
 in his poor unsettled state, but was anx- 
 ious to shield his partner, by every means 
 in his power, from the consequence of 
 their imprudence. It was agreed there- 
 fore between them, that they should make 
 a I'gal acknowledgment of an irregular 
 and private marriage ; that he should go 
 to Jamaica to push his fortune! and that 
 she should remain with her father till it 
 might please Providence to put the meana 
 of supporting a family in his power. 
 
 " Mrs. Burns was a great favourite of 
 her father's. The intimation of a mar- 
 riage was the first suggestion he received 
 of her real situation. He was in the 
 greatest distress, and fainted away. The 
 marriage did not appear to him to make 
 the matter better. A husband in Jamai- 
 ca appeared to him and his wife little bet- 
 ter than none, and an effectual bar to any 
 other prospects of a settlement in life 
 I hat their daughter might have. They 
 
THE LIFE OP BURNS. 
 
 therefore expressed a wish to hor, that 
 the written papers which respected the 
 marriage sliould be cancelled, and thus 
 the marriage rendered void. In her me- 
 lancholy state she felt the deepest re- 
 morse at having brought such heavy af- 
 fliction on parents that loved her so ten- 
 derly, and submitted to their entreaties. 
 Their wish was mentioned to Robert. 
 He felt 'the deepest anguish of mind. He 
 offered to stay at home and provide for 
 his wife and family in the best manner 
 that his daily labours could provide for 
 them ; that being the only means in his 
 power. Even this offer they did not ap- 
 prove of; for humble as Miss Armour's 
 station was, and great though her impru- 
 dence had been, she still, in the eyes of 
 her partial parents, might look to a better 
 connexion than that with my friendless 
 and unhappy brother, at that time without 
 house or biding place. Robert at length 
 consented to their wishes ; but his feelings 
 on this occasion were of the most dis- 
 tracting nature : and the impression of 
 sorrow was not effaced, till by a regular 
 marriage they were indissolubly united. 
 In the state of mind which this separa- 
 tion produced, he wished to leave the 
 country as soon as possible, and agreed 
 with Dr. Douglas to go out to Jamaica 
 as an assistant overseer ; or, as I believe 
 it is called, a book-keeper, on his estate. 
 As he had not sufficient money to pay his 
 passage, and the vessel in which Dr. 
 Douglas was to procure a passage for him 
 was not expected to yaW for some time, 
 Mr. Hamilton advised him to publish his 
 poems in the mean time by subscription, 
 as a likely way of getting a little money, 
 to provide him more liberally in necessa- 
 ries for Jamaica. Agreeably to this ad- 
 vice, subscription bills were printed im- 
 mediately, and the printing was com- 
 menced at Kilmarnock, his preparations 
 going on at the same time for his voy- 
 age. The reception, however, which his 
 poems met with in the world, and the 
 friends they procured him, made him 
 chanjje his resolution of going to Jamai- 
 ca, and he was advised to go to Edin- 
 burgh to publish a second edition. On 
 his return, in happier circumstances, he 
 renewed his connexion with Mrs. Burns, 
 and rendered it permanent by a union for 
 life. 
 
 " Thus, Madam, have I endeavoured 
 to give you a simple narrative of the lead- 
 ing circumstances in my brother's early 
 life. The remaining part he spent in 
 
 Edinburgh, or in Dumfriesshire, and its 
 incidents are as well known to you as to 
 me. His genius having procured him 
 your patronage and friendship, this gave 
 rise to the correspondence between you, 
 in which, I beheve, his sentiments were 
 delivered with the most respectful, but 
 most unreserved confidence, and which 
 only terminated with the last days of his 
 life." 
 
 This narrative of Gilbert Burns may 
 serve as a commentary on the preceding 
 sketch of our poet's life by himself. It 
 will be seen that the distraction of mind 
 which he mentions [p. 16.) arose from the 
 distress and sorrow in which he had in- 
 volved his future wife. — The whole cir- 
 cumstances attending this connexion are 
 certainly of a very singular nature.* 
 
 The reader will perceive, from the 
 foregoing narrative, how much the chil 
 dren of William Burnes were indebted to 
 their father, who was certainly a man of 
 uncommon talents; though it does not 
 appear that he possessed any portion of 
 that vivid imagination for which the sub- 
 ject of these memoirs was distinguished 
 In page 13, it is observed by our poet, 
 that his father had an unaccountable an- 
 tipathy to dancing-schools, and that his 
 attending one of these brought on him his 
 displeasure, and even dislike. On this 
 observation Gilbert has made the follow- 
 ing remark, which seems entitled to im- 
 plicit credit : — " I wonder how Robert 
 could attribute to our father that lasting 
 resentment of his going to a dancing- 
 school against his will, of which he was 
 incapable. I believe the truth was, that 
 he, about this time began to see the dan- 
 gerous impetuosity of my brother's pas- 
 sions, as well as his not being amenable 
 to counsel, which often irritated my fa- 
 ther ; and which he would naturally think 
 a dancing-school was not likely to correct. 
 But he was proud of Robert's genius, 
 which he bestowed more expense in cul- 
 tivating than on the rest of the family, in 
 the instances of sending him to Ayr and 
 Kirk-Oswald schools; and he was greatly 
 delighted with his warmth of heart, and 
 
 * In page 16, the poet mentions his — " skalking from 
 covert to covert, under the terror of a jail." The 
 "rack of the law" was " uncoiiplefl at his heels," to 
 oblige him to find securily for the jnaintenance of his 
 twin children, whom he was not permitted to legiti- 
 mate by a maiTiag? with their mother. 
 
THE LIFE 
 
 his conversational powers. He had in- 
 deed that dislike of dancing-schools which 
 Robert mentions; but so far overcame it 
 during Robert's first month of attendance, 
 that he allowed all the rest of the family 
 that were fit for it to accompany him du- 
 ' ring the second month. Robert excelled 
 in dancing, and was for some time dis- 
 tractedly fond of it." 
 
 In the original letter to Dr. Moore, our 
 poet described his ancestors as " renting 
 landsof the noble Keiths of Marischal, and 
 as having had the honour of sharing their 
 fate." "I do not," continues he, " use 
 the word honour with any reference to 
 political principles ; loyal and disloyal, I 
 take to be merely relative terms, in that 
 ancient and formidable court, known in 
 this country by the name of Club-law, 
 where the right is always with the strong- 
 est. But those who dare welcome ruin, 
 and shake hands with infamy, for what 
 they sincerely believe to be the cause of 
 their God, or their king, are, as Mark 
 Antony says in Shakespeare of Brutus and 
 Cassius, honourable men. I mention this 
 circumstance because it threw my father 
 on the world at large." 
 
 This paragraph has been omitted in 
 printing the letter, at the desire of Gil- 
 bert Burns ; and it would have been un- 
 necessary to have noticed it on the pre- 
 sent occasion, had not several manuscript 
 copies of that letter been in circulation. 
 " I do not know," observes Gilbert Burns, 
 *' how my brother could be misled in the 
 account he has given of the .Tacobitism of 
 his ancestors. — I believe the carl Maris- 
 chal forfeited his title and estate in 1715, 
 before my fatlier was born ; and among 
 a collection of parish certificates in his 
 possession, I have read one, stating that 
 the bearer had no concern in the latr 
 wicked rebellion.'' On the information of 
 one, who knew William Burnes soon af- 
 ter he arrived in the county of Ayr, it 
 may be mentioned, that a report did pre- 
 vail, that he had taken the field with the 
 young Chevalier ; a report which the cer- 
 tificate mentioned by his son was, perhaps, 
 intended to counteract. Strangers from 
 the nartli, settling in the low country of 
 Scotlaud,were in those days liable to sus- 
 picions of having been, in the familiar 
 phrase of the coimtry, '" Out in the forty- 
 five, " (1715) especially when they had 
 any statelincss or reserve about them, as 
 was thucase with William Burnes. It 
 may easily be conceived^ that our poet 
 
 OF BURNS. 23 
 
 would cherish the belief of his father's 
 having been engaged in the daring enter- 
 prise of Prince Charles Edward. The 
 generous attachment, the heroic valour, 
 and the final misfortunes of the adherents 
 of the house of Stewart, touched with 
 sympathy his youthful and ardent mind, 
 and influenced his original political opi- 
 
 The father of our poet is described by 
 one who knew him towards the latter end 
 of his life, as above the common stature, 
 thin, and bent with labour. His counte- 
 nance was serious and expressive, and 
 the scanty locks on his head were gray. 
 He was of a religious turn of mind, and, 
 as is usual among the Scottish peasantry, 
 a good deal conversant in speculative 
 theology. There is in Gilbert's hands a 
 little manual of religious belief, in the 
 form of a dialogue between a father and 
 his son, composed by him for the use of 
 his children, in which the benevolence of 
 Iiis heart seems to have led him to soften 
 the rigid Calvinism of the Scottish 
 Church, into something approaching to 
 Arminianism. He was a devout man, and 
 in the practice of calling his family toge- 
 ther to join in prayer. It is known that 
 tile exquisite picture, drawn in stanzas 
 
 * Then; i^ aiinllier observation of Gilbert Burns on 
 Ills hnitlier's iianative, in which some persons will be 
 iiileiesleil. It refers to where the poet speaks of hip 
 yoiuliful friends. " My brother," says Gilbert Burns, 
 " seems to set off his early companions in too conse- 
 quential a manner. The principal acqiiainta'nces we 
 liad in Ayr, while boys, were four sons of Mr. Andrew 
 iM'Ciilloch, a distant relation of my mother's, wlio kept 
 a tea shop, and had made a little money in the contra- 
 band trade very common at that lime. He died while 
 the boys were young, and my father was nominated 
 one of the tutors. The two eldest were bred up shop- 
 keepers, the third a surgeon, and the youngest, the 
 only surviving one, was bred in a counting-house in 
 Glasgow, where he is now a respectable merchant. I 
 believe all these boys went to the West Indies. Then 
 there were two sons of Dr. Malcolm, whom I liave 
 mentioned in my letter to Mrs. Dunlop. The eldest, 
 a very worthy young man, went to the East Indies, 
 where lie had a commission in the army ; he is the 
 person whose heart my brother says the Muny Begun 
 scenes could not corrupt. The other by the interest 
 of Lady Wallace, got an ensigncy in a regiment raised 
 by the Duke of Hamilton, during the American war. 
 I believe neither of them are now (1797) alive. We 
 also knew the present Dr. I'atcrson of Ayr, and a 
 younger brother of his now in Jamaica, wlio were 
 much younger than us. I had ahnost forgot to mention 
 Dr. Charles of Ayr, who was a liule older than' my 
 brother, and with wliom we had a longer and closer 
 intimacy than wiili any of the others, which did not, 
 howevw, conlinuB In aft«r life." 
 
THE LIFE OF BURNS. 
 
 xii. xiii. XIV. XV. XVI. Rud xviii. of tlie Cot- 
 ter's 5fi/i/r(/(ii/ .'Vfc'''. roprosents \\'illiam 
 TJnrnos nnd his family at their evoning 
 devotions. 
 
 Of a family i'o inlcrestinir as that which 
 inhabit oil tho cottajro of William Burnes, 
 nnd particularly of tin- fatlu>r of the fnnii- 
 Iv, the reader will perhaps be williniT to 
 listen to some fartlier account. \V hat 
 fidlows is griven by one already mentioned 
 with so much honour in the narrative of 
 Ciilbert Hums. JMr. iMurdoch, the precep- 
 tor of our poet, who, in a letter to Joseph 
 Tooper Walker, Esq. of Dublin, author 
 of the Historical Jlimoirs of the Irish 
 Jia'ils, and the Historical Memoirs of' the 
 Jtaliitn Trai::e(h/, thus expresses himself: 
 
 ''Sir, — 1 was lately favoured with a 
 letter from our worthy friend, the Rev. 
 Wm. .\dair. in which he reqnested me to 
 communicate to you whatever particulars 
 I could recollect concerninnf Robert Rums, 
 the Avrshire poet. My business beinsf at 
 present uuiltifarions and harassinir, my 
 attention is consequently so much divided, 
 nnd I am so little in tho habit of express- 
 ing my thouohts on paper, that at this 
 dista-.ice of time T can give but a very im- 
 perfect sketch of the early part of the life 
 of that extraordinary genius, with which 
 alone I am acquainted. 
 
 " William Bnrnes, the father of the po- 
 et, was born in the shire of Kincardine, 
 nnd bred n gardener. He had been set- 
 tled in Avr«hii-e ten or twelve years be- 
 fore 1 knew h;n, nnd had been in the ser- 
 vice of Mr. Crawford, of Doonside. lie 
 was atUTwards employed as a gardener 
 and overseer by Provost Ferguson of 
 Doonhohn.in the parisl^of Alloway.which 
 is now united with that of Ayr. In this 
 parish, on the road side, a Scotch mile 
 and a half from the town of Ayr, and half 
 n mile from the bridge of Doon, William 
 Burnes took a piece of land, consisting of 
 about seven acres: part of which he laid 
 out in garden ground, and part of which 
 he kept to graze a cow, «S:c. still continu- 
 ing in the employ of Provost Ferguson. 
 Upon this little farm was erected an hum- 
 ble dwelling, of .which William Bnrnes 
 was th« architect. It was, with tlie'ex- 
 ception of a little straw, literally a taber- 
 nacle of clay. In this mean cottage, of 
 which I myself was at times an inhabitant. 
 1 reallv believe there dwelt a larger por- 
 tion of content than in any palace in Eu- 
 rope. The Ci>tlrr's Saturdai/ Xig'it will 
 
 give some idea of the temper and man- 
 ners that prevailed there. 
 
 " In 176:>. about tlie middle of March. 
 Mr. W. Rurnes cnnio to Ayr, and sent to 
 the school where I was improving in wri- 
 ting, under my good friend Mr. Robinson, 
 desiring that I would come and speak to 
 him at a certain inn, and bring my writ- 
 ing-book with me. This was inunediately 
 complied with. Having examined my 
 writinix, he was pleased with it — (you will 
 readily allow he was not dithcult,) and 
 told mo that he had received very satis- 
 factory information of Mr. Tennant, the 
 master of the English schotd, concerning 
 my improvement in English, and his me- 
 thod of teaching. In the mon»h uf May 
 following, T was engaged by Mr. Rurnes, 
 and four of his neighbours, to teach, and 
 accordingly began to teach the little 
 school at Alloway, which was situated a 
 tew yards from the argillaceous I'abric 
 above-mentioned. My five employers im- 
 dertook to board me by t\irns, and to make 
 up a certain salary, at the end of the year, 
 providiul my quarterly payments from the 
 ditierent pupils did not amount to tiiat 
 sum. 
 
 " ^ly pupil, Robert Burns, was then 
 between six and seven years of age ; iiis 
 preceptor about eighteen. Robert, and 
 hi> younger brother, Gilbert, had been 
 grounded a little in English before tliey 
 Were put under my care. Tliey both 
 made a rapid progress in reading, and a 
 tolerable progress in writing. In read- 
 ing, dividing words into syllables by rule, 
 spidling without book, parsing sentences, 
 & c. Robert and Gilbert were generally at 
 the u])per end of the class, even when 
 ranged with boys by far their seniors. 
 The books most commonly used in the 
 sc!i.>o] were the >^tn'l^in!r Boofr, the .Vew 
 7V.' ' ,!fn;, the Bible, jMason's Collection 
 of prose and verse, and Fisher's Ens:lish 
 Gmtiimar. They committed to memory 
 the hynms, and other poems of that col- 
 lection, with uncomnion facility- This 
 facility was partly owing to the method 
 pursued by t heir father and me in instruct- 
 ing them, which was, to make them tho 
 ronghlv acquainted with the meaning of 
 everv word in each sentence that was to 
 be committed to memory. By the by, 
 this may be easier done, and at an earlier 
 period t^han is generally thought. As soon 
 as thev were capable of it. 1 taught them 
 to t'lrn verse into its natural prose order ; 
 sometimes to substitute svnonvmous ex- 
 
THE LIFE OF BURNS. 
 
 pressiona for poetical words, and to sup- 
 ply all the ellipses. These, you know, 
 are the means of knowing that the pupil 
 understands his author. These are ex- 
 cellent helps to the arrangement of words 
 in sentences, as well as to a variety of 
 expression. 
 
 " Gilbert always appeared to me to 
 possess a more lively imagination, and to 
 be more of the wit than Robert. I at- 
 tempted to teach them a little church- 
 music : here they were left far behind by 
 all the rest of the school. Robert's ear, 
 in particular, was remarkably dull, and 
 his voice unt unable. It wa? long before 
 T could get them to distinguish one tune 
 from another. Robert's countenance was 
 generally grave, and expressive of a se- 
 rio\is, contemplative, and thoughtful mind, 
 (jilbert's face said, J\Tirth, witk thre [mean 
 to live; and certainlv, if nny person ".'ho 
 knew the two hoys, had b^en asked which 
 of them was mopt likely to court the 
 muses, he would surely nr-ver havij guess- 
 ed tliat Robert had a propensity of that 
 kind. 
 
 " In the year 1760, Mr. Burnes quitted 
 nis mud edifice, and took possession of a 
 farm (Mount Oliphant) of hie own im- 
 proving, while in the service of Provost 
 Ferguson. This farm being at a consider- 
 able distance from the school, the boys 
 could not attend rpgiiJnrly; and some 
 changes taking pbre among the other 
 supporters of the school, I left it. having 
 continued to conduct it for nearly two 
 years and a half. 
 
 " In the year 1 7T2, T was appointed 
 (being one of five candidates who were 
 examined) to teach the English school at 
 Ayr; and in 1773. Robert Burns came to 
 board and lodge with me, for the purpose 
 of revising the English grammar, &c. that 
 .le might be better qualified to instruct 
 his brothers and sisters at home. He 
 was now with me day and night in school, 
 at all meals, and in all my walks. At the 
 end of one week, I told "him, that as he 
 was now pretty much master of the parts 
 of speech, &c. I should like to teach him 
 something of French pronunciation ; that 
 whp.n he should meet with the name of a 
 French town, ship, officer, or the like, in 
 the newspapers, he might be able to pro- 
 nounce it something like a French word. 
 Robert was glad to hear this proposal, 
 and immediately we attacked tiie French 
 with great courage. 
 
 " Now therewas little else to be heard 
 but the declension of nouns, the conjuga- 
 ticjn of verbs, &c. When walking toge- 
 ther, and even at meals, I was constantly 
 telling him the names of different objects, 
 as they presented themselves, in French; 
 so that he was hourly laying in a stock of 
 words, and sometimes little phrases. In 
 short, he took such pleasure in learning, 
 and I in teaching, that it was diflicult to 
 say which of the two was most zealous 
 in the business; and about the end of the 
 second week of our study of the French, 
 we began to read a little of the Adveiu 
 lures of Telemaehus, in Fenelon's owa 
 words. 
 
 " But now the plains of Mount Oliphant 
 began to whiten, and Robert was sum- 
 moned to relinquish the pleasing scenes 
 that surrounded the grotto of Calypso ; 
 and, armed with a sickle, to seek glory 
 by signalizing himself in the fields of Ce- 
 re.s — and so he did ; for although but 
 about fifteen, I was told that he perform- 
 ed the work of a man. 
 
 " Thus was I deprived of my very apt 
 pupil, and consequently agreeable com- 
 panion, at the end of three weeks, one of 
 which was spent entirely in the study of 
 English, and the other two chiefly in that 
 of French. I did not, however, lose sight 
 of him ; but was a frequent visitant at his 
 fnther's house, when I had my half-holi- 
 dfty : and very often went, accompanied 
 with one or two persons more intelligent 
 than rnysclf, that good William Eurnes 
 might enjoy a mental feast. Then the 
 labouring oar was shifted to some other 
 band. "The father and the son sat down 
 with us. when we enjoyed a conversation, 
 wherein solid reasoning, sensible remark, 
 and a moderate seasoning of jocularity, 
 were so nicely blended- as to render it pa- 
 latable to all parties. Robert had a hun- 
 dred questions to ask me about the French, 
 &c. ; and the father, who had always ra- 
 tional information in view, had still some 
 question to propose to my more learned 
 friends, upon moral or natural philosophy, 
 or some such interesting subject. Mrs. 
 Burnes too was of the party as much af 
 possible ; 
 
 ' But still thi? hoii».' afTairo would diaw her theoce, 
 Wliicli ever ai she coi'Id tvjih ha»t«> dt-spateh, 
 Shf'd come .i?ain, and with a greedy ear, 
 Devour up their digconrFe." — 
 
 and particularly that of her husband. At 
 all timfg. and m all compsaie*, «he livten- 
 
THE LIFE OF BURNS. 
 
 ed to him with a more marked attention 
 than to any body else. When under the 
 necessity of being absent while he was 
 speakinw, she seemed to regret, as a real 
 loss, that slie liad missed what the good 
 man had said. This worthy woman, Ag- 
 nes Brown, had the most thorough esteem 
 for her husband of any woman I ever 
 knew. I can by no means wonder that 
 she highly esteemed him ; for I myself 
 have always considered William Burnes 
 as by far the best of tlie human race that 
 ever I had the pleasure of being acquaint- 
 ed with — and many a worthy character I 
 have known. I can cheerfully join with 
 Robert, in the last line of his epitaph (bor- 
 rowed from Goldsmith,) 
 
 " And even hi? failinss lean'd to virtue's side." 
 
 " He was an excellent husband, if I 
 may judge from his assiduous attention 
 to the ease and comfort of his worthy 
 partner, and from her affectionate be- 
 haviour to him, as well as her unwearied 
 attention to the duties of a mother. 
 
 " He was a tender and affectionate 
 father ; ho took pleasure in leading his 
 children in the path of virtue ; not in 
 driving them as some parents do, to the 
 performance of duties to which they them- 
 selves are averse. He took care to find 
 fault but very seldom ; and therefore, 
 when he did rebuke, he was listened to 
 with a kind of reverential awe. A' look 
 of disapprobation was felt ; a reproof was 
 severely so ; and a stripe with the taioz, 
 even on the skirt of the coat, gave heart- 
 felt pain, produced a loud lamentation, 
 and brought forth a flood of tears. 
 
 " He had the art of gaining the esteem 
 and good-will of those that were labour- 
 ers under him. 1 think I never saw him 
 angry but twice ; the one time it was 
 with the foreman of the band, for not 
 reaping the field as he was desired ; and 
 the other time, it was with an old man, 
 for using smutty inuendoes and double 
 enfnulres. Were every foul mouthed old 
 man to receive a seasonable check in 
 this way, it would be to the advantage 
 of the rising generation. As he was at 
 no time overbearing to inferiors, he was 
 equally incapable of^ that passive, pitiful, 
 paltry spirit, that induces some people to 
 keep booing and booing in the presence of 
 a great man. He always treated supe- 
 riors with a becoming respect : but he 
 never gave the smallest encouragement 
 
 to aristocratical arrogance. But I must 
 not pretend to give you a description of 
 all the manly qualities, the rational and 
 Christian virtues, of the venerable Wil- 
 liam Burnes. Time would fail me. I 
 shall only add, that he carefully practised 
 every known duty, and avoided every 
 thing that was criminal ; or, in the apos- 
 tle's words, Herein did he exercise him- 
 self in living a life void of offence towards 
 God and towards men. O for a world of 
 men of such dispositions ! We should 
 then have no wars. I have often wished, 
 for the good of mankind, that it were as 
 customary to honour and perpetuate the 
 memory of those who excel in moral rec- 
 titude, as it is to extol what are called 
 heroic actions : then would the mausoleum 
 of the friend of my youth overtop and sur- 
 pass most of the monuments I see in 
 Westminster Abbey. 
 
 " Although I cannot do justice to the 
 character of this worthy man, yet you 
 will perceive from these few particulars, 
 what kind of person had the principal 
 hand in the education of our poet. He 
 spoke the English language with more 
 propriety (both with respect to diction 
 and pronunciation,) than any man I ever 
 know with no greater advantages. This 
 had a very good effect on the boys, who 
 began to talk, and reason like men, much 
 sooner than their neighbours. I do not 
 recollect any of their contemporaries, at 
 my little seminary, who afterwards made 
 any great figure, as literary characters, 
 except Dr. Tennant, who was chaplain 
 to Colonel Fullarton's regiment, and who 
 is now in the East Indies. He is a man 
 of genius and learning ; yet affable, and 
 free from pedantry. 
 
 " Mr. Burnes, in a short time, found 
 that he had over-rated Mount Oliphant 
 and that he could not rear his numerous 
 family upon it. After being there some 
 years, he removed to Lochlea, in the 
 parish of Tarbolton, where, I believe, Ro- 
 bert wrote most of his poems. 
 
 " But here. Sir, you will permit me to 
 pause. I can tell you but little more rela- 
 tive to our poet. I shall, however, in my 
 next, send you a copy of one of his letters 
 to me, about the year 1 783, I received 
 one since, but it is mislaid. Please re- 
 member me, in the best maimer, to my 
 worthy friend Mr. Adair, when you see 
 him, or write to him. 
 
 " Hart-itreet, Bloomsbury-Square, 
 London, Feb. 22, 1799." 
 
THE LIFE OF BURNS. 
 
 As the narrative of Gilbert Burns was 
 writtefl at a time when he was ignorant 
 of the existence of the preceding narra- 
 tive of liis brother, so this letter of Mr. 
 Murdocli was written withont his having 
 any knowledge that either of his pupils 
 had been employed on the same subject. 
 The three relations serve, therefore, not 
 merely to illustrate, but to authenticate 
 each other. Though the information 
 they convey might have been presented 
 within a shorter compass, by reducing the 
 whole into one unbroken narrative, it is 
 scarcely to be doubted, that the intelli- 
 gent reader will be far more gratified by 
 a sight of these original documents them- 
 selves. 
 
 Under the humble roof of his parents, 
 it appears indeed that our poet had great 
 advantages ; but his opportunities of in- 
 formation at school were more limited as 
 to time than they usually are among his 
 countrymen in his condition of life ; and 
 the acquisitions wliich he made, and the 
 poetical talent which he exerted, under 
 the pressure of early and incessant toil, 
 and of inferior, and perhaps scanty nutri- 
 ment, testify at once the extraordinary 
 force and activity of his mind. In his 
 frame of body he rose nearly to five feet 
 ten inches, and assumed the proportions 
 that indicate agility as well as strength. 
 In the various labours of the farm he ex- 
 celled all his competitors. Gilbert Burns 
 declares that in mowing, the exercise that 
 tries all the muscles most severely, Ro- 
 bert was the only man, that at the end of 
 a summer's day he was ever obliged to 
 acknowledge as his master. But though 
 our poet gave the powers of his body to 
 the abours of the farm, he refused to be- 
 Btow on them his thoughts or his cares. 
 While the ploughshare under his guidance 
 passed through the sward, or the grass 
 fell under the sweep of his scythe, he was 
 humming the songs of his country, musing 
 on the deeds of ancient valour, or wrapt 
 in t' e allusions of Fancy, as her enchant- 
 ments rose on his view. Happily the 
 Sunday is yet a sabbath, on which man 
 and beast rest from their labours. On 
 this day, therefore, Burns could indulge 
 in a free intercourse with t e charms of 
 nature. It was his delight to wander 
 alone on the banks of the Ayr, whose 
 stream is now immortal, and to listen to 
 the song of the blackbird at the close of 
 the summer's day. But still greater was 
 his pleasure, as he himself informs us, in 
 walking on the sheltered side of a wood, 
 
 in a cloudy wmter day, and hearing the 
 storm rave among the trees ; and more 
 elevated still his delight, to ascend some 
 eminence during the agitations of nature ; 
 to stride along its summit, while the 
 lightning flashed around him ; and amidst 
 the bowlings of the tempest, to apostro- 
 phize the spirit of the storm. Such situ- 
 ations he declares most favourable to de- 
 votion. — " Rapt in enthusiasm, I seem 
 to ascend towards Him who walks on the 
 wings of the winds!" If other proofs were 
 wanting of the character of his genius, 
 this might determine it. The heart of 
 the poet is peculiarly awake to every im- 
 pression of beauty and sublimity ; but, 
 with the higher order of poets, the beau- 
 tiful is less attractive than the sublime. 
 
 The gayety of many of Burns's writings, 
 and the lively, and even cheerful colour- 
 ing with which he has portrayed his own 
 character, may lead some persons to sup- 
 pose, that the melancholy which hung 
 over him towards the end of his days was 
 not an original part of his constitution. 
 It is not to be doubted, indeed, that this 
 melancholy acquired a darker hue in the 
 progress of his life ; but, independent of 
 his own and of his brother's testimony, 
 evidence is to be found among his papers, 
 that he was subject very early to those 
 depressions of mind, which are perhaps 
 not wholly separate from the sensibility 
 of genius, but which in him rose to an 
 uncommon degree. The following letter, 
 addressed to his father, will serve as a 
 proof of this observation. It was written 
 at the time when he was learning the 
 business of a flax-dresser, and is dated, 
 
 Irvine, December 27, 1781. 
 " HoNOTTRKn Sir — 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 soimder ; and, on the whole, I am 
 rather better than otherwise, though I 
 mend by very slow degrees. The weak- 
 ness 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, in- 
 deed, when for an hour or two my spirits 
 
J8 
 
 THE LIFE OF BURNS. 
 
 are a little lightened, 1 glimmer into futu- 
 rity ; but my principal, and indeed my 
 only pk-asurable employment, is looking 
 backwards and forwards in a moral and 
 religious way. I am t^anp^ortod at the 
 thought, that ere long, 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 my- 
 self,! could contentedly and gladly resignit, 
 
 •The soul, uneasy, and confiii'ilat home, 
 Rests ami expatiates in a life to come.' 
 
 «' 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 otfer.* 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. I am in 
 some measure prepared, and daily pre- 
 paring 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, wliich were too much 
 neglected at the time of giving them, but 
 which, I hop.?, have been remembered 
 ere it is yet too late. Present my dutiful 
 respects to my mother, and my compli- 
 ments 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, 
 
 " Robert Burns." 
 
 *' P. S. My meal is nearly out ; but I 
 am going to Ijorrow, till I get more." 
 
 This letter, written several years before 
 the publication of his poems, when his 
 name was as obscure as his condition was 
 
 * The verses of Scripture, here olhiried to, are as fol- 
 lows : 
 
 15. Therefore are tht!y before the throne of God, 
 and serre him dnij and niirhl iv his temple : and he that 
 titteth oil the throne shall dtceU anioH^ Ihcm. 
 
 16. Thsil shall hmifser no mure, nfilher thirst any 
 more ; neither shall the sun light an them,, nor any 
 heat. 
 
 17. For the I.nrxh, vihiek in in the midst of the 
 throtu. shnll feed them, an-' shall I'-nd thtm vvto tiring 
 /oKnfaiiM of rrolern: and God shall vipe away all 
 teert from their eyes. 
 
 humble, displays the philosophic melan- 
 choly which so generally forms the po- 
 etical temperament, and that buoyant and 
 ambitious spirit which indicates a mini 
 conscious of its strength. At Irvine, 
 Burns at this time possessed a single room 
 for his lodging, rented perhaps at the rate 
 of a shilling a week. He passed his days 
 in constant labour as a flax-dresser, and 
 his food consisted chiefly of oatmeal, sent 
 to him from his fatlier's family. The 
 store of this humble, though wholesome 
 nutriment, it appears was nearly exhaust- 
 ed, and he was about to borrow till he 
 should obtain a supply. Yet even in this 
 situation, his active imagination had form- 
 ed to itself pictures of eminence and dis- 
 tinction. His despair of making a figure 
 in the world, showr, how ardently he 
 wished for honourable fame ; and his con- 
 tempt of life founded on this despair, is 
 the genuine expression of a youthful and 
 generous mind. In such a state of re- 
 flection, and of suffering, the imagination 
 of Burns, naturally passed the dark boun- 
 daries of our earthly horizon, and rested 
 on those beautiful representations of a 
 better world, where there is neither thirst, 
 nor hynger, nor sorrow ; and where hap- 
 piness shall be in proportion to the capa- 
 city of happiness. 
 
 Such a disposition is far from being at 
 variance with social enjoyments. Those 
 who have studied the affinities of mind, 
 know that a melancholy of this descrip- 
 tion, after a while, seeks relief in the 
 endearments of society, and that it has no 
 distant connexion with the flow of cheer- 
 fulness, or even the extravagance of mirtii. 
 It was a few days after the writing of 
 this letter that our poet, " in giving a 
 welcome carousal to the new year, with 
 his gay companions," suffered his flax to 
 catch fire, and his shop to be consumed 
 to ashes. 
 
 The energy of Burns's mind was not ex- 
 hausted by his daily labours, the effusion 
 of his muse, his social pleasures, or his 
 solitary meditations. Some time previ- 
 ous to his engagement as a flax-dresser, 
 having heard tliat a debating-club had 
 been established in Ayr, he resolved to 
 try how such a meeting would succeed in 
 the village of Tarbolton. About the end 
 of the year 17R0, our poet, his brother, 
 and five other young peasants of the 
 neighbourhood, formed themselves into n 
 Fociety of this sort, the declared nbjpcts 
 of which were to relax themselves atler 
 
THE LIFE OF BURNS. 
 
 foil, to promote sociality and frieml.ship, 
 and to improve the mind. The laws and 
 regnlatioiw were furnished by Burns. 
 The members were to meet after the 
 labours of the day were over, once a 
 week, in a small public-house in the vil- 
 lage ; where each should offer his opinion 
 on a given question or subject, supporting- 
 it by such arguments as he thought pro- 
 per. The debate was to be conducted 
 with order and decorum ; and after it 
 was finished, the members were to choose 
 a subject for discussion at the ensuing 
 meeting. The sum expended by each 
 was not to exceed threepence ; and, with 
 the humble potation that this could pro- 
 cure, they were to toast their mistresses, 
 and to cultivate friendsliip with each 
 other. This society continued its meet- 
 ings regularly for some time ; and in the 
 autumn of 1 782, wishing to preserve some 
 account of their proceedings, they pur- 
 chased a book into which their laws and 
 regulations were copied, with a pream- 
 ble, containing a short history of their 
 transactions down to that period. This 
 curious document, which is evidently the 
 work of our poet, has been discovered, 
 and it deserves a place in his memoirs. 
 
 " History of the Rise, Proeefdinpa, and Regulations 
 of the Bachelor's Club. 
 
 " Of birth or blood we do not boast, 
 Nor gentry does our cUib afford ; 
 
 But ploughmen and mechanics we 
 In Nature's simple dress record." 
 
 *' As the great end of human society is 
 to become wiser and better, this ought 
 therefore to be the principal view of every 
 man in every station of life. But as ex- 
 perience has taught us, that such studies 
 as inform the head and mend the heart, 
 when long continued, are apt to exha'a.'^t 
 the faculties of the mind, it has be^n 
 found proper to relieve and unbend the 
 mind by ,some emplovTnent or another. 
 that may be agreeable enough to keep ils 
 powers in exercise, but at the same time 
 not so serious as to exhaust them. But 
 superadded to this, by far the greater 
 part of mankind are under the nece^-si^^y 
 of earning the sustenance of hvmnn life f.r/ 
 the labours of their bodies, whereby, not 
 only the faculties of the mind, but the 
 nerves and sinews of the body, are so 
 fatigued, that it is absolutely necessary to 
 have recourse to some amusement or di- 
 version, to relieve the wearied man, worn 
 down with the necessary labours of life. 
 
 " As the best of things, however, lipve 
 been perverted to the worst of purposes, 
 so, under the pretence of amusement and 
 diversion, men have plunged into all the 
 madness of riot and dissipation ; and, in- 
 stead of attending to the grand design of 
 human life, they have begun with ex- 
 trnvagance and folly, and ended with 
 guilt and wretchedness. Impressed with 
 these considerations, we, the following 
 lads in the parish of Tarbolton,Wa-. Hugh 
 Reid, Robert Burns, Gilbert Burns, Alex- 
 ander Brown, Walter Mitchell, Thomas 
 Wright, and William M' Gavin, resolved, 
 for our mutual entertainment, to unite 
 ourselves into, a club, or society, under 
 such rules and regulations, that while we 
 should forget our cares and labours in 
 mirth and diversion, we might not trans- 
 gress the bounds of innocence and deco- 
 rum ; and after agreeing on these, and 
 some other regulations, we held our first 
 meeting at Tarbolton, in the house of 
 John Richard, upon the evening of the 
 11th of November, 1780, commonly called 
 Hallowe'en, and after choosing Robert 
 Burns president for the night, we proceed- 
 ed to debate on this question — Suppose a 
 young man., bred a farmer., but without any 
 fortune, has it in his power to marry either 
 of two women, theoneagirlof large fortune, 
 but neither handsome in person, nor agree- 
 able in conversation, hut 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 : whirhofthem shall he 
 choose ? Finding ourselves very happy in 
 our society, we resolved to continue to meet 
 once a month in the same house, in the 
 way and manner proposed, and shortly 
 thereafter we chose Robert Ritchie for 
 another member. In May 1781, we 
 brought in David Sillar,* and in .Tune, 
 Adam .Tamaison, as members. About the 
 beginning of the year 1782, we admitted 
 Matthew Patterson, and John Orr, and in 
 June following v.-e chose James Patterson 
 as a proper brother for such a society. 
 The club being thus increased, we re- 
 solved to meet at Tarbolton on the race- 
 night, the July following, and have a 
 dance in honour of our society. Accord- 
 ingly we did meet, each one with a part- 
 ner, and spent the evening in such inno- 
 cence and merriment, such cheerfulness 
 and good humour, that every brother will 
 
 * The person to whom Burns addressed his EpittU 
 to Davie, a brother poet. 
 
30 
 
 THE LIFE OP BURNS. 
 
 long remember it with pleasure, and de- 
 light." To this preamble are subjoined 
 the rules and regulations.* 
 
 The philosophical mind will dwell with 
 interest and pleasure, on an institution 
 that combined so skilfully the means of 
 instruction and of happiness, and if gran- 
 deur look down with a smile on these 
 simple annals, let us trust that it will be a 
 smile of benevolence and approbation. It 
 is with regret that the sequel of the his- 
 tory of the Bachelor's Club of Tarbolton 
 must be told. It survived several years 
 after our poet removed from Ayrshire, 
 but no longer sustained by his talents, or 
 cemented by his social affections, its meet- 
 ings lost much of their attraction ; and at 
 length, in an evil hour, dissention arising 
 amongst its members, the institution was 
 given up, and the records committed to 
 the flames. Happily the preamble and 
 the regulations were spared ; and as mat- 
 ter of instruction and of example, they 
 are transmitted to posterity. 
 
 After the family of our bard removed 
 from Tarbolton to the neighbourhood of 
 Mauchline, he and his brother were re- 
 quested to assist in forming a similar in- 
 stitution there. The regulations of the 
 club at Mauchline were nearly the same 
 as those of the club at Tarbolton: but one 
 laudable alteration was made. The fines 
 for non-attendance had at Tarbolton been 
 spent in enlarging their scanty potations ; 
 at Mauchline it was fixed, that the money 
 so arising, should be set apart for the pur- 
 chase of books, and the first work pro- 
 cured in this manner was the Mirror, the 
 separate numbers of which were at that 
 time recently collected and published in 
 volumes. After it, followed a number of 
 other works, chiefly of the same nature 
 and among these the Lounger. The so- 
 ciety of Mauchline still subsists, and ap- 
 peared in the list of subscribers to the 
 first edition of the works of its celebrated 
 associate. 
 
 The members of these two societies 
 were originally all young men from the 
 country, and chiefly sons of farmers ; a 
 description of persons, in the opinion of 
 our poet, more agreeable in their man- 
 ners, more virtuous in their conduct, and 
 more susceptible of improvement, than 
 the self-sufficient mechanics of country- 
 towns. With deference to the convcr- 
 
 *Fer which rec .Ippcndtx, .Vo II. jYote C 
 
 sation society of Mauchline, it may be 
 doubted, whether the books which they 
 purchased were of a kind best adapted to 
 promote the interest and happiness of 
 persons in this situation of life. The 
 Mirror and the Lounger, though works 
 of great merit, may be said, on a general 
 view of their contents, to be less calcu- 
 lated to increase the knowledge, than to 
 refine the taste of those who read them; 
 and to this last object, their morality it- 
 self, which is however always perfectly 
 pure, may be considered as subordinate. 
 As works of taste, they deserve great 
 praise. They are, indeed, refined to a 
 high degree of delicacy ; and to this cir- 
 cumstance it is perhaps owing, that they 
 exhibit little or nothing of the peculiar 
 manners of the age or country in which 
 they were produced. But delicacy of 
 taste, though the source of many plea- 
 sures, is not without some disadvantages ; 
 and to render it desirable, the possessor 
 should perhaps in all cases be raised above 
 the necessity of bodily labour, unless in- 
 deed we should include under this term 
 the exercise of the imitative arts, over 
 which taste immediately presides. Deli- 
 cacy of taste may be a blessing to him 
 who has the disposal of his own time, and 
 who can choose what book he shall read, 
 of what diversion he shall partake, and 
 what company he shall keep. To men 
 so situated, the cultivation of taste affords 
 a grateful occupation in itself, and opens 
 a path to many other gratifications. To 
 men of genius, in the possession of opu- 
 lence and leisure, the cultivation of the 
 taste may be said to be essential ; since 
 it affords employment to those faculties, 
 which without employment would destroy 
 the happiness of the possessor, and cor- 
 rects that morbid sensibility, or, to use 
 the expressions of Mr. Hume, that deli- 
 cacy of passion, which is the bane of the 
 temperament of genius. Happy had it 
 been for our bard, after he emerged from 
 the condition of a peasant, had the deli- 
 cacy of his taste equalled the sensibility 
 of his passions, regulating all the effusions 
 of his muse, and presiding over all his so- 
 cial enjoyments. But to the thousands 
 who share the original condition of Burns, 
 and who are doomed to pass their lives in 
 the station in which they were born, de- 
 licacy of taste, were it even of easy attain- 
 ment, would, if not a positive evil, be at 
 least a doubtful blessing. Delicacy of 
 taste may make many necessary labours 
 irksome or disgusting ; and should it ren- 
 der the cultivator of the soil unhappy iu 
 
THE LIFE OF BURiNS. 
 
 31 
 
 his situation, it presents no means by which 
 that situation may be improved. Taste 
 and literature, which diffuse so many 
 charms throughout society, which some- 
 times secure to their votaries distinction 
 while living, and which still more fre- 
 quently obtain for them posthumous fame, 
 seldom procure opulence, or even inde- 
 pendence, when cultivated with the ut- 
 most attention ; and can scarcely be pur- 
 sued with advantage by the peasant in the 
 short intervals of leisure which his occu- 
 pations allow. Those who raise them- 
 selves from the condition of daily labour, 
 are usually men who excel in the practice 
 of some useful art, or who join habits of 
 industry and sobriety to an acquaintance 
 with some of the more common branches 
 of knowledge. The penmanship of But- 
 terworth, and the arithmetic of Cocker, 
 may be studied by men in the humblest 
 walks of life ; and they will assist the 
 peasant more in the pursuit of indepen- 
 dence, than the study of Homer or of 
 Shakspeare, though he could comprehend, 
 and even imitate the beauties of those im- 
 mortal bards. 
 
 These observations are not offered with- 
 out some portion of doubt and hesitation. 
 The subject has many relations, and would 
 j ustify an ample discussion. It may be ob- 
 served, on the other hand, that the first 
 step to improvement is to awaken the de- 
 sire of improvement, and that this will be 
 most effectually done by such reading as 
 interests the heart and excites the imagi- 
 nation. The greater part of the sacred 
 writings themselves, wh'ich in Scotland 
 are more especially the manual of the 
 poor, come under this description. It 
 may be farther observed, that every hu- 
 man being, is the proper judge of his own 
 happiness, and within the path of inno- 
 cence, ought to be permitted to pursue it. 
 Since it is the taste of the Scottish pea- 
 santry to give a preference to works of 
 taste and of fancy,* it may be presumed 
 they find a superior gratification in the 
 perusal of such works ; and it may be 
 added, that it is of more consequence they 
 should be made happy in their original 
 condition, than furnished with the means, 
 or with the desire of rising above it. Such 
 considerations are doubtless of much 
 weight ; nevertheless, the previous reflec- 
 
 In several lists of bnok-societies among the poorer 
 Classes in Scotland wliich the eilitor has seen, works of 
 this description form a great part. These societies are 
 by no means general, and it is not supposal that they 
 are increasing at present. 
 
 tions may deserve to be examined, and 
 here we shall leave the subject. 
 
 Though the records of the society at 
 Tarbolton are lost, and those of the soci- 
 ety at Mauchline have not been transmit- 
 ted, yet we may safely affirm, that our 
 poet was a distinguished member of both 
 these associations, which were well cal- 
 culated to excite and to develop the pow- 
 ers of his mind. From seven to twelve 
 persons constituted the society of Tarbol- 
 ton, and such a number is best suited to 
 the purposes of information. Where this 
 is the object of these societies, the num- 
 ber should be such, that each person may 
 have an opportunity of imparting his sen- 
 timents, as well as of receiving those of 
 others ; and the powers of private con- 
 versation are to be employed, not those of 
 public debate. A limited society of this 
 kind, where the subject of conversation is 
 fixed beforehand, so that each member 
 may revolve it previously in his mind, is 
 perhaps one of the happiest contrivances 
 hitherto discovered for shortening the ac- 
 quisition of knowledge, and hastening the 
 evolution of talents. Such an association 
 requires indeed somewhat more of regu- 
 lation than the rules of politeness estab- 
 lish in common conversation ; or rather, 
 perhaps, it requires that the rules of po- 
 liteness, which in animated conversation 
 are liable to perpetual violation, should 
 be vigorously enforced. The order of 
 speech established in the club at Tarbol- 
 ton, appears to have been more regular 
 than was required in so small a society;* 
 where all that is necessary seems to be 
 the fixing on a member to whom every 
 speaker shall address himself, and who 
 shall in return secure the speaker from in- 
 terruption. Conversation, which among' 
 men whom intimacy and friendship have 
 relieved from reserve and restraint, is li- 
 able, when left to itself, to so many in- 
 equalities, and which, as it becomes ra- 
 pid, so often diverges into separate and 
 collateral branches, in which it is dissi- 
 pated and lost, being kept within its chan- 
 nel by a simple limitation of this kind, 
 which practice renders easy and familiar, 
 flows along in one full stream, and be- 
 comes smoother, and clearer, and deeper, 
 as it flows. It may also be observed, that 
 in this way the acquisition of knowledge 
 becomes more pleasant and more easy, 
 from the gradual improvement of the fa- 
 culty employed to convey it. Though 
 
 * Sec Appendix, No- H. Note C. 
 
32 
 
 THE LIFE OF BURNS. 
 
 BOine attention has been paid to the elo- 
 quence of the senate and tlie bar, which 
 in this, as in all other free governments, 
 is productive of so nnich intiuence to the 
 few who excel in it, yet little regard has 
 been paid to the humbler exercise of 
 speech in private conversation ; an art 
 that is of consequence to every descrip- 
 tion of persons under every form of go- 
 vernment, and on which eloquence of eve- 
 ry kind ought perhaps to be founded. 
 
 The first requisite of every kind of elo- 
 cution, a distinct utterance, is -he off- 
 spring of much time and of long prac- 
 tice. Children are always defective 
 in clear articulation, and so are young 
 people, though in a less degree. What 
 is called slurring in speech, prevails with 
 some persons through life, especially in 
 those who are taciturn. Articulation 
 does not seem to reach its utmost degree 
 of distinctness in men before the age of 
 twenty, or upwards ; in women it reaches 
 this point somewhat earlier. Female oc- 
 cupations require much use of speech be- 
 cause they are duties in detail. Besides, 
 their occupations being generally seden- 
 tary, the respiration is left at liberty. 
 Their nerves being more delicate, their 
 sensibility as well as fancy is more hve- 
 ly ; the natural consequence of which is, 
 a more frequent utterance of thought, a 
 greater fluency of speech, and a distinct 
 articulation at an earlier age. But in men 
 who have not mingled early and familiar- 
 ly with the world, though rich perhaps in 
 knowledge, and clear in apprehension, it 
 is often painful to observe the difficulty" 
 with which their ideas are communicated 
 by speech, through the want of those ha- 
 bits that connect thoughts, words, and 
 sounds together ; which, when establish- 
 ed, seem as if they had arisen spontane- 
 ously, but which, in truth, are the result 
 of long and painful practice ; and when 
 analyzed, exhibit the phenomena of most 
 curious and complicated association. 
 
 Societies then, such as we have been 
 describing, while they may be said to put 
 each member in possession of the know- 
 ledge of all the rest, improve the powers 
 of utterance ; and by the collision of opi- 
 nion, excite the faculties of reason and 
 reflection. To those who wish to improve 
 their minds in sucli intervals of labour as 
 the condition of a peasant allows, this 
 method of abbreviating instruction, may, 
 under proper regulations, be highly use- 
 ful. To the sfudent, whose opinions, 
 
 springing out of solitary observation and 
 meditation, are seldom in the first in- 
 stance correct, and which have, notwith- 
 standing, while confined to himself, an 
 increasing tendency to assume in his own 
 eye the character of demonstrations, an 
 association of this kind, where they may 
 be examined as they arise, is of the ut- 
 most importance ; since it may prevent 
 those illusions of imagination, by which 
 genius being bewildered, science is often 
 debased, and error propagated through 
 successive generations. And to men who 
 have cultivated letters, or general science 
 in the course of their education, but who 
 are engaged in the active occupations of 
 life, and no longer able to devote to study 
 or to books the time requisite for improv- 
 ing or preserving their acquisitions, asso- 
 ciations of this kind, where the mind may 
 unbend from its usual cares in discussions 
 of literature or science, afibrd the most 
 pleasing, the most useful, and the most 
 rational of gratifications.* 
 
 Whether in the humble societies of 
 which he was a member, Burns acquired 
 much direct information, may perhaps be 
 questioned. It cannot however be doubt- 
 ed, that by collision, the faculties of his 
 mind would be excited ; that by practice 
 his habits of enunciation would be es- 
 tablished ; and thus we have some expla- 
 nation of that early command of words 
 and of expression which enabled him to 
 pour forth his thoughts in language not 
 unworthy of his genius, and which, of all 
 his endowments, seemed, on his appear- 
 ance in Edinburgh, the most extraordi- 
 nary.! For associations of a literary na- 
 
 * When letters and philosophy were cultivated in 
 ancient Greece, the press had not multiplied the tablets 
 of learning and science, and necessity produced the 
 habit of studying as it were in common. Poets .were 
 found reciting their own verses in public assemblies ; 
 in public schools only philosophers delivered their spe- 
 culations- The taste of the hearers, the ingenuity of 
 the scholars, were employed in appreciating and exa- 
 mining the works of fancy and of speculation submit- 
 ted to their consideration, and the irrevocable words 
 were not given to the world before the composition, aa 
 well as the sentiments, were again and again retouched 
 and improved. Death alone put the last seal on the 
 labours of genius. Hence, perhaps, may be in part ex- 
 plained the extraordinary art and skill with which the 
 monuments of Grecian literature that remains to us, 
 appear to have been constructed. 
 
 t It appears that our Poet made more preparation 
 than might be supposed, for the discussion of the socie- 
 ty of Tarbolton. There were found some detached 
 memoranda, evidently prepared for these meetings: 
 and, amongst others, ih« headd of a soeech on the qucs- 
 
THE LIFE OF BURNS. 
 
 33 
 
 ture, our poet acquired a considerable re- 
 lish ; and happy had it been for hirn, af- 
 ter he emerged from the condition of a 
 peasant, if fortune had permitted him to 
 enjoy them in the deg^ree of which he was 
 capable, so as to have fortified his princi- 
 ples of virtue by the purification of his 
 taste ; and given to the energies of his 
 mind habits of exertion that might have 
 excluded other associations, in which it 
 must be acknowledged they were too of- 
 ten wasted, as well as debased. 
 
 The whole course of the Ayr is fine ; 
 but the banks of that river, as it bends to 
 the eastward above Mauchline, are sin- 
 gularly beautiful, and they were frequent- 
 ed, as may be imagined, by our poet in 
 his solitary walks. Here the muse often 
 visited him. In one of these wanderings, 
 he met among the woods a celebrated 
 beauty of the west of Scotland : a lady, 
 of whom it is said, that the charms of her 
 person correspond with the character of 
 her mind. This incident gave rise, as 
 might be expected, to a poem, of which 
 an account will be found in the following 
 letter, in which he inclosed it to the ob- 
 ject of his inspiration : 
 
 To Miss 
 
 jyiossgiel, IQth J^Tovember, 1786. 
 
 " Madam, — Poets are such outre be- 
 ings, 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 liber- 
 ties that a nameless stranger has taken 
 with you in the inclosed poem, which he 
 begs leave to present you with. Whe- 
 ther 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 
 
 tlon mentioned in p- 29, in which, as might be expected, 
 lie takes the impntdent side of the question. The fol 
 lowing: may serve as a farther specimen of the ques- 
 tions debated in the society at Tarbolton :— Whether do 
 tee derive more happiness from love or friendship 7 
 
 fVhether between friends, who have no reason to doiibt 
 each other's friendship, there should be any reserve ? 
 
 IVhether is the savage man, or the peasant of a civilized 
 tountrii, in the most happy situation! — Whether is a 
 younff man of the lower ranks of life likeliest to be hap- 
 py. Kho has irot a good education, and his mind well in- 
 fnrmed or he who has just the education and informa- 
 tion of those around him » 
 
 be a superior grace, it is equally eincei« 
 as fervent. 
 
 " 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 di- 
 rected, 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, pour- 
 ing their harmony on every hand, with a 
 congenial kindred regard, and frequently 
 turned out of my path, lest I should dis- 
 turb their little songs, or frighten them 
 to another station. Surely, said I to my- 
 self, he must be a wretch indeed, who, 
 regardless of your harmonious endea- 
 vours 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 haw- 
 thorn 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 pros- 
 pect, 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 aerial beings ! Had Ca- 
 lumny and Villany taken my walk, they 
 had at that moment sworn eternal peace 
 with such an object. 
 
 " What an hour of inspiration for a 
 poet ! It would have raised plain, dull, 
 historic prose into metaphor and mea- 
 sure. 
 
 " 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. 
 
 I have the honour to be, Madam, 
 Your most obedient, y' 
 
 and very humble servant, 
 " Robert Burns." ■'' 
 / 
 ► The Bong entitled the Lass of Ballocbmyta. 
 
34 
 
 THK LIFE OP BURNS. 
 
 In the manuscript book in which our 
 poet has recounted this incident, and into 
 which the letter and poem are copied, he 
 complains that the lady made no reply to 
 his effusions, and this appears to have 
 wounded his self-love. It is not, how- 
 ever, difhcTilt to find an excuse for her 
 silence. Burns was at that time little 
 known ; and where known at all, noted 
 rather for the wild strength of his humour, 
 than for those strains of tenderness in 
 which he afterwards so much excelled. 
 To the lady herself his name had perhaps 
 never been mentioned, and of such a poem 
 she might not consider herself as the proper 
 judge. Her modesty might prevent her 
 from perceiving that the muse of Tibul- 
 lusbreathed in this nameless poet, and that 
 her beauty was awakening strains des- 
 tined to immortality, on the bank of the 
 Ayr. It may be conceived, also, that sup- 
 posing the verse duly appreciated, delica- 
 cy might find it difiicult to express its ac- 
 knowledgments. The fervent imagina- 
 tion of the rustic bard possessed more of 
 tenderness than of respect. Instead of 
 raising himself to the condition of the ob- 
 ject of his admiration, he presumed to re- 
 duce her to his own, and to strain this 
 high-born beauty to his daring bosom. 
 It is true, Burns might have found pre- 
 cedents for such freedom among the poets 
 of Greece and Rome, and indeed of every 
 country. And it is not to be denied, that 
 lovely women have generally submitted 
 to this sort of profanation with patience, 
 and even with good humour. To what 
 purpose is it to repine at a misfortune 
 which is the necessary consequence of 
 their own charms, or to remonstrate with 
 a description of men who are incapable of 
 control ? 
 
 " The lunatic, the lover, and the poet, 
 Are of imagination all compact." 
 
 It may be easily presumed, that the 
 beautiful nymph of Ballochmyle, whoever 
 she may have been, did not reject with 
 scorn the adorations of our poet, though 
 she received them with silent modesty 
 and dignified reserve. 
 
 The sensibility of our bard's temper, 
 and the force of his imagination, exposed 
 him in a particular manner to the impres- 
 sions of beauty ; and these qualities, unit- 
 ed to his impassioned eloquence, gave in 
 turn a powerful influence over the female 
 heart. The Banks of the Ayr formed the 
 scene of youthful passions of a still ten- 
 
 derer nature, the history of which it 
 would be improper to reveal, were it oven 
 in our power ; and the traces of which 
 will soon be discoverable only in those 
 strains of nature and sensibility to which 
 they gave birth. The song entitled 
 Highland Mary, is known to relate to 
 one of these attachments. " It was vn-it- 
 ten," says our bard, " on one of the most 
 interesting passages of my youthful days." 
 The object of this passion died early in 
 life, and the impression left on the mind 
 of Burns seems to have been deep and 
 lasting. Several years afterwards, when 
 he was removed to Nithsdale, he gave 
 vent to the sensibility of his recollections 
 in that impassioned poem, which is ad- 
 dressed To Mary, in Heaven ! 
 
 To the delineations of the poet by him- 
 self, by his brother, and by his tutor, these 
 additions arc necessary, in order that the 
 reader may see his character in its vari- 
 ous aspects, and may have an opportunity 
 of forming a just notion of the variety, as 
 well as of the power of his original ge- 
 nius.* 
 
 * The history of the poems formerly printed, will be 
 found in the Appendix to this volume. It is inserted 
 in the words of Gilbert Burns, who, in a letter address- 
 ed to the Editor, has given the following account of 
 the friends which Robert's talents procured him before 
 he left Ayrshire, or attracted the notice of the world. 
 
 " The farm of Mossgiel, at the lime of our coming to 
 it, (Martinmas, 1783,) was the property of the Earl of 
 Loudon, but was held in tack by Mr. Gavin Hamilton, 
 writer in Mauchline, from whom we had our bargain ; 
 who had thus an opportunity of knowing, and showinj; 
 a sincere regard for my brother, before he knew that 
 he was a poet. The poet's estimation of him, and the 
 strong outlines of his character, may be collected from 
 the dedication to this gentleman. When the publi- 
 cation was begun, Mr. H. entered very warmly into its 
 interests, and promoted the subscription very exten- 
 sively. Mr. Robert Aiken, writer in Ayr, is a man of 
 worth and taste, of warm affections, and connected 
 with a most respectable circle of friends and relation* 
 It is to this gentleman The Cotter's Saturday JVigkt if 
 inscribed. The poems of my brother which I have for- 
 merly mentioned, no sooner came into his hands, than 
 they were quickly known, and well received in the ex- 
 tensive circle of Mr. Aiken's friends, which gave them 
 a sort of currency, necessary in this wise world, even 
 for the good reception of things valuable in themselves. 
 But Mr. Aiken not only admired the poet ; as soon as 
 he became acquainted with him, he showed the warm- 
 est regard for the man, and did every thing in his pow- 
 er to forward his interest and respectability. Th» 
 Epistle to a Young Friend was addressed to this gen 
 tlenian's son, Mr. A. H. Aiken, now of Liverpool. He 
 ^"as the oldest of a young family, who were taught to 
 receive my brother with respect, as a man of feuiu^ 
 and their father's friend. 
 
THE LIFE OP BURNS. 
 
 We have dwelt the longer on the early 
 part of his life,because it is the least known ; 
 and because, as has already been men- 
 tioned, this part of his history is connect- 
 ed with some views of the condition and 
 manners of the humblest ranks of society, 
 liitherto little observed, and which will 
 perhaps be found neither useless nor un- 
 interesting. 
 
 About the time of his leaving his native 
 county, his correspondence commences ; 
 and in the series of letters now given to 
 the world, the chief incidents of the re- 
 maining part of his life will be found. 
 This authentic, though melancholy record, 
 will supersede in future the necessity of 
 any extended narrative. 
 
 " The Bngs of Ayr is inscribed to John Ballentine 
 Esq. banker m Ayr; one of tliose gentlemen to whom 
 my brother was introduced by Mr. Aiken. He inter- 
 ested himself very warmly in my brother's concerns, 
 and constantly showed the greatest friendship and at- 
 tachment to him. When the Kilmarnock edition was 
 all sold off, and a considerable demand pointed out the 
 propriety of publishing a second edition, Mr. Wilson, 
 who had printed the first, was asked if he would print 
 the second, and take his chance of being paid from the 
 first sale. This he declined, and when this came to 
 Mr. Ballentine's knowledge, he generously offered to 
 accommodate Robert with what money he might need 
 for that purpose; but advised him to go to Edinburgh, 
 as the fittest place for publishing. When he did go to 
 lOdinburgh, his friends advised him to publish again 
 by subscription, so that he did not need to accept this 
 offer. Mr. William Parker, merchant in Kihnarnock 
 was a subscriber for thirty five copies of the Kilmarnock 
 edition. This may perhaps appear not deserving of 
 notice here; but if the comparative obscurity of the 
 poet, at this period, be taken into consideration, it ap- 
 pears to me a greater effort of generosity, than many 
 things which appear more brilliant in my brother's fu- 
 ture history. 
 
 " Mr. Robert Muir, merchant in Kihnarnock, was 
 one of those friends Robert's poetry had procured him, 
 and one who was dear to his heart. This gentleman 
 had no very great fortune, or long line of dignified an- 
 cestry; but what Robert says, of Captain Matthew 
 Henderson, might be said of him with great propriety, 
 that he held the patent of his honours immediately fr om 
 Almighty God. Nature had indeed marked him a gentle- 
 man in the most legible characters He died while 
 yet a young man, soon after the publication of my bro- 
 ther's first Edinburgh edition. Sir William Cunning- 
 ham of Robertland, paid a very flattering attention, 
 and showed a good deal of friendship for the poet. 
 Before his going to Edinburgh, as well as after, Robert 
 seemed peculiarly pleased with Pvolessor Stewart's 
 Irie^Hlship and conversation. 
 
 " But of all the friendships which Robert acquired in 
 Ayrshire and elsewhere, none seemed more agreeable 
 to him than that of Mrs. Dnnlop, of Dunlop ; nor any 
 which has been more unifornilvand constantly exerted in 
 
 Q 
 
 Burns set out for Edinburgh in the 
 month of November, 1786. He was fur- 
 nished with a letter of introduction to 
 Dr. Blacklock, from the gentleman to 
 whom the Doctor had addressed the let 
 ter which is represented by our bard as 
 the immediate cause of his visiting the 
 Scottish metropolis. He was acquainted 
 with Mr. Stewart, Professor of Moral 
 Philosophy in the university ; and had 
 been entertained by that gentleman at 
 Catrine, his estate in Ayrshire. He had 
 been introduced by Mr. Alexander Dalzel 
 to the earl of Glencairn, who had ex- 
 pressed his high approbation of his poeti- 
 cal talents. He had friends therefore 
 who could introduce him into the circles 
 of literature as well as of fashion, and his 
 
 behalf of him and his family, of which, were it proper, 
 I could give many instances. Robert was on the point 
 of setting out for Edinburgh before Mrs. Dunlop had 
 heard of him. About the time of my brother's pub- 
 lishing in Kilmarnock, she had been afflicted with a 
 long and severe illness, which had reduced her mind ' 
 to the most distressing state of depression. In this situ- 
 atiim, a copy of the printed poems was laid on her 
 table by a friend ; and happening to open on The Cot- 
 ter's Saturday JVight, she read it over with the great- 
 est pleasure and surprise ; the poet's description of the 
 simple cottagers, operating on her mind like the charm 
 of a powerful exorcist, expelling the demon ennui, and 
 restoring her to her wonted inward harmony and satis- 
 faction. Mrs. Dunlop sent off a person express to Mosa- 
 giel, distant fifteen or sixteen miles, with a very oblig- 
 ing letter to my brother, desiring him to send her half a 
 dozen copies of his poems, if he had them to spare, and 
 begging he would do her the pleasure of calling at 
 Dunlop House as soon as convenient. This was the 
 beginning of a correspondence which ended only with 
 the poet's life. The last use he made of his pen was 
 writing a short letter to this lady a few days befoie his 
 death. 
 
 " Colonel Fullarton, who afterwards paid a very par- 
 ticular attention to the poet, was not in the country at 
 the time of his first commencing author. At this dis- 
 tance of time, and in the hurry of a wet day, suatch- 
 ed from laborious occupations, I may have forgot 
 some persons who ought to have been mentioned or> 
 this occasion ; for which, if it come to my knowledge, 
 I shall be lieartily sorry." 
 
 The friendship of Mrs. Dunlop was of particular 
 value to Burns. This lady, daughter and sole heiress 
 to Sir Thomas Wallace of Craigi«, and lineal descend- 
 ant of the illustrious Wallace, the first of Scottish war- 
 riors, possesses the qualities of mind suited to her high 
 lineage. Preserving, in the decline of life, the gene- 
 rous affections of youth ; her admiration of the poet was 
 soon accompanied by a sincere friendship for the man ; 
 which pursued liini in after-life through good and evil 
 report ; in poverty, in sickne.ss, and in sorrow ; and 
 which is continued to his infant family, now deprived 
 of their parent. ' 
 
3« 
 
 THE LIFE OF BURNS. 
 
 own manners and appearance exceeding 
 every expectation that could have been 
 formed of them, he soon became an object 
 of general curiosity and admiration. The 
 followinor circumstance contributed to 
 this in a considerable degree. — At the 
 time when Burns arrived in Edinburgh, 
 the periodical paper, entitled The Loun- 
 ger, was publishing, every Saturday pro- 
 ducing a successive number. His poems 
 had attracted the notice of the gentlemen 
 engaged in that undertaking, and the 
 ninety-seventh number of those unequal, 
 though frequently beautiful essays, is de- 
 voted to An Account of Robert Burns, the 
 Ayrshire Ploughman, with extracts from 
 his Poems, written by the elegant pen of 
 Mr. Mackenzie.* The Lounger had an 
 extensive circulation among persons of 
 taste and literature, not in Scotland only, 
 but in various parts of England, to whose 
 acquaintance therefore our bard was im- 
 mediately introduced. The paper of Mr. 
 Mackenzie was calculated to introduce 
 him advantageously. The extracts are 
 well selected ; the criticisms and reflec- 
 tions are judicious as well as generous ; 
 and in the style and sentiments there is 
 that happy delicacy, by which the writings 
 of the author, are so eminently distin- 
 guished. The extracts from Burns's 
 poems in the ninetj'-seventh number of 
 The Lounger were copied into the Lon- 
 don as well as into many of the provin- 
 cial papers, and the fame of our bard 
 spread throughout the island. Of tlie 
 manners, character, and conduct of Burns 
 at this period, the following account has 
 been given by Mr. Stewart, Professor of* 
 Moral Philosophy in the university of 
 Edinburgh, in a letter to the editor, 
 which he is particularly happy to have 
 obtained permission to insert in these 
 memoirs. 
 
 " The first time I saw Robert Burns 
 was on the 23d of October, 1786, when 
 he d'.ned at my house in Ayrshire, to- 
 gether with our common friend Mr. John 
 Mackenzie, surgeon, in Mauchline, to 
 whom I am indebted for the pleasure of 
 his acquaintance. I am enabled to men- 
 tion the date particularly, by some verses 
 which Burns wrote after he returned 
 home, and in which the day of our meet- 
 ing is recorded. — My excellent and much 
 
 • This paper has been attributed, but impropei ly, to 
 Lord Craig, one of the Scottish jiidsfs, author of thf> 
 veryinterpstiiigaccountoJ Michael Bruce in the 3fiih 
 O'lUlbcr o!' The Mirrar. 
 
 lamented friend, the late Basil, Lord 
 Daer, happened to arrive at Catrine the 
 same day, and by the kindness and frank- 
 ness of his manners, left an impression on 
 the mind of the poet, which never was 
 effaced. The verses I allude to are 
 among the most imperfect of his pieces ; 
 but a few stanzas may perhaps be an ob- 
 ject of curiosity to you, both on account 
 of the character to which they relate, and 
 of the light which they throw on the situ- 
 ation and feelings of the writer, before 
 his name was known to the public* 
 
 " I cannot positively say at this dis- 
 tance of time, whether at the period of 
 our first acquaintance, the Kilmarnock 
 edition of his poems had been just pub- 
 lished, or was yet in the press. I suspect 
 that the latter was the case, as I have 
 still in my possession copies in his own 
 hand writing, of some of his favourite 
 performances ; particularly of his ver- 
 ses " on turning up a Mouse with his 
 plough ;" — " on the Mountain Daisy ;" 
 and "the Lament." On my return to 
 Edinburgh, I showed the volume, and 
 mentioned what I knew of the author's 
 history to several of my friends : and, 
 among others, to Mr. Henry Mackenzie, 
 who first recommended him to public no- 
 tice in the 97th number of The Lounger. 
 
 " At this time Burns's prospects in life 
 were so extremely gloomy, that he had 
 seriously formed a plan of going out to 
 .Tamaica in a very humble situation, not 
 however without lamenting that his want 
 of patronage should force him to think of 
 a project so repugnant to his feelings, 
 when his ambition aimed at no higher an 
 object than the station of an exciseman 
 or ganger in his own country. 
 
 " His manners were then, as they con- 
 tinued ever afterwards, simple, manly, 
 and independent ; strongly expressive of 
 conscious genius and worth ; but without, 
 any thing that indicated forwardness, ar- 
 rogance, or vanity. He took his share in 
 conversation, but not more than belonged 
 to him ; and listened with apparent atten- 
 tion and deference on subjects where hi? 
 want of education deprived him of the 
 means of information. If there had been 
 a little morp gentleness and accommoda- 
 tion in his temper, he would, I think, 
 have been still more interesting; but be 
 
 * See the poem entitled " Line* on an Interview wjtl. 
 Lord Uaer"— Poems, p. 77. 
 
THE LIFE OF BURNS. 
 
 S7 
 
 had been accustomed to give law in the 
 circle of his ordinary acquaintance ; and 
 his dread of any thing approaching to 
 in anness or servility, rendered his man- 
 ner somewhat decided and hard. No- 
 thing, perhaps, was more remarkable 
 among his various attainments, than the 
 fluency, and precision, and originality of 
 his language, when he spoke in company; 
 rnore particularly as he aimed at purity 
 in his turn of expression, and avoided 
 more successfully than most Scotchmen, 
 the peculiarities of Scottish phraseology. 
 
 " He came to Edinburgh early in the 
 winter following, and remained there for 
 several months. By whose advice he 
 took this step, I am unable to say. Per- 
 haps it was suggested only by his own 
 curiosity to see a little more of the world; 
 but, I confess, I dreaded the consequen- 
 ces from the first, and always wished that 
 his pursuits and habits should continue 
 the same as in the former part of life ; 
 with the addition of, what I considered 
 as then completely within his reach, a 
 good farm on moderate terms, in a part 
 of the country agreeable to his taste. 
 
 " The attentions he received during his 
 stay in town, from all ranks and descrip- 
 tions of persons, were such as would have 
 turned any head but his own. 1 cannot 
 say that I could perceive any unfavoura- 
 ble effect which they left on his mind. 
 He retained the same simplicity of man- 
 ners and appearance which had struck 
 me so forcibly when I first saw him in the 
 country ; nor did he seem to feel any ad- 
 ditional self-importance from the number 
 and rank of his new acquaintance. His 
 dress was perfectly suited to his station, 
 plain, and unpretending, with a sufficient 
 attention to neatness.' If I recollect right 
 he always wore boots : and, when on 
 more than usual ceremony, buck-skin 
 breeches. 
 
 " The variety of his engagements, while 
 in Edinburgh, prevented me from seeing 
 him so often as I could have wished. In 
 the course of the spring he called on me 
 once or twice, at my request, early in the 
 morning, and walked with me to Braid- j 
 Hills, in the neighbourhood of the town, j 
 when he charmed me still more by his \ 
 private conversation, than he had ever ; 
 done in comoany. He was passionately 
 fond of the beauties of nature ; and I re- ! 
 collect once he told me when I was ad- i 
 miring a distant prospect in one ^*' f>ur ' 
 
 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 himselt", the hap- 
 piness and the worth which they con- 
 tained. 
 
 "In his political principles he was then 
 a Jacobite ; which was perhaps owing 
 partly to this, that his father was original- 
 ly from the estate of Lord Mareschall. 
 Indeed he did not appear to have thought 
 much on such subjects, nor very consis- 
 tently. He had a very strong sense of 
 religion, and expressed deep regret at the 
 levity with which he had heard it treated 
 occasionallv in some convivial meetings 
 which he frequented. I speak of him as 
 he was in the winter of 1786-7 ; for after- 
 wards we met but seldom, and our con- 
 versations turned chiefly on his literary 
 projects, or his private affairs. 
 
 " I do not recollect whether it appears 
 or not from any of your letters to me, 
 that you had ever seen Burns.* If you 
 have, it is superfluous for me to add, that 
 the idea which his conversation conveyed 
 of the powers of his mind, exceeded, if possi- 
 ble, that which is siiggestedby his writings. 
 Among the poets whom I have happened 
 to know, I have been struck in more than 
 one instance, with the unaccountable dis- 
 parity between their general talents, and 
 the occasional inspirations of their more 
 favourable moments. But all the faculties 
 of Burns's mind were, as far I could judge, 
 equally vigorous : and his predilection 
 for poetry was rather the result of his 
 own enthusiastic and impassioned temper, 
 than of a genius exclusively adapted to 
 that species of composition. From his 
 conversation I should have pronounced 
 him to be fitted to excel in whatever walk 
 of ambition he had chosen to exert his 
 abilities. 
 
 " Among the subjects on which he was 
 accustomed to dwell, the characters of 
 the individuals with whom he happened 
 to meet, was plainly a favourite one. 
 The remarks he made on them were al- 
 ways shrewd and pointed, though fre- 
 quently inclining too much to sarcasm. 
 His praise of those he loved was some- 
 times indiscriminate and extravagant ; 
 but this, I suspect, proceeded rather from 
 the caprice and humour of the moment, 
 than from the efiects of attachment in 
 
 ♦ The Edii-.r hzs B«en and c.iuvtrgpil with Bum*. 
 
38 
 
 THE LIFE OF BURNS. 
 
 blinding his judgment. His wit was 
 ready, and always impressed with the 
 marks of a vigorous understanding ; but 
 to my taste, not often pleasing or happy. 
 His attempts at epigram, in his printed 
 works, are the only performances, per- 
 haps, that he has produced, totally un- 
 worthy of his genius. 
 
 "In summer, 1787, I passed some 
 weeks in Ayrshire, and saw Burns occa- 
 sionally. I think that he made a pretty 
 long excursion that season to the High- 
 lands, and that he also visited what Beat- 
 tie calls the Arcadian ground of Scot- 
 land, upon the banks of the Tiviot and 
 the Tweed. 
 
 " I should have mentioned before, that 
 notwithstanding various reports I heard 
 during the preceding winter, of B'jrns's 
 predilection for convivial, and not very 
 select society, I should have concluded 
 in favour of his habits of sobriety, from 
 all of him that ever fell under my own 
 obscivVki ion. He told me indeed himself, 
 that the weakness of his stomach was such 
 as to deprive him entirely of any merit in 
 his temperance. I was however somewhat 
 alarmed about the effect of his now compa- 
 ratively sedentary and luxurious life, when 
 he confessed to me, the first night he spent 
 in my house after his winter's campaign 
 in town, that he had been much disturbed 
 when in bed, by a palpitation of his heart, 
 which, he said, was a complaint to which 
 he had of late become subject. 
 
 " In the course of the same season I 
 was led by curiosity to attend for an hour 
 or two a Mason-Lodge in Mauchline, 
 where Burns presided. He had occasion 
 to make some short unpremeditated com- 
 pliments to different individuals from 
 whom he had no reason to expect a visit, 
 and every thing he said was happily con- 
 ceived, and forcibly as well as fluently 
 expressed. If I am not mistaken, he told 
 me that in that village, before going to Ed- 
 inburgh, he had belonged to a small club 
 of such of the inhabitants as had a taste 
 for books, when they used to converse 
 and debate on any interesting questions 
 that occurred to them in the course of 
 their reading. His manner of speaking 
 in public had evidently the marks of some 
 practice in extempore elocution. 
 
 " I must not omit to mention, what I 
 have always considered as characteristical 
 in a high degree of true genius, the ex- 
 
 treme facility and good-nature of his 
 taste in judging of the compositions of 
 others, where there was any real ground 
 for praise. I repeated to him many pas- 
 sages of English poetry with which he 
 was unacquainted, and have more than 
 once witnessed the tears of admiration 
 and rapture with which he heard them. 
 The collection of songs by Dr. Aikin, 
 which I first put into his hands, he read 
 with unmixed delight, notwithstanding 
 his former efforts in that very difllicult 
 species of writing ; and I have little doubt 
 that it had some effect in polishing his > 
 subsequent compositions. 
 
 " In judging of prose, I do not think 
 his taste was equally sound. I once read 
 to him a passage or two in Franklin's 
 Works, which I thought very happily ex- 
 etruied, upon ilie model of Addison ; but 
 he did not appear to relish, or to perceive 
 the beauty which they derived from their 
 exquisite simplicity, and spoke of them 
 with indifference, when compared with 
 the point, and antithesis, and quaintness 
 of Junius. The influence of this taste is 
 very perceptible in his own prose com- 
 positions, although their great and vari- 
 ous excellences render some of them 
 scarcely less objects of wonder than his 
 poetical performances. The late Dr. 
 Robertson used to say, that considering 
 his education, the former seemed to him 
 the more extraordinary of the two. 
 
 " His memory was uncommonly reten- 
 tive, at least for poetry, of which he re- 
 cited to me frequently long compositions 
 with the most minute accuracy. They 
 were chiefly ballads, and other pieces in 
 our Scottish dialect ; great part of them 
 (he told me) he had learned in his child- 
 hood from his mother, who delighted in 
 such recitations, and whose poetical taste, 
 rude, as it probably was, gave, it is pre- 
 sumable, the first direction to her son's 
 genius. 
 
 " Of the more polished verses which 
 accidentally fell into his hands in his early 
 years, he mentioned particularly the re- 
 commendatory poems, by different au- 
 thors, prefixed to Hervei/s Meditations ; 
 a book which has always had a very wide 
 circulation among such of the country 
 people of Scotland, as affect to unite 
 some degree of taste with their religious 
 studies. And these poems (although they 
 are certainly below mediocrity) he con- 
 tin""^ to read with a dogi-oe of rapture 
 
THE LIFE OP BURNS 
 
 39 
 
 beyond expression. He took notice of 
 this fact himself, as a proof how much 
 the taste is liable to be influenced by acci- 
 dental circumstances. 
 
 " His father appeared to me, from the 
 account he gave of him, to have been a 
 respectable and worthy character, pos- 
 sessed of a mind superior to what might 
 have been expected from his station in 
 life. He ascribed much of his own prin- 
 ciples and feelings to the early impres- 
 sions he had received from his instruction 
 and example. I recollect that he once 
 applied to him (and he added, that the 
 passage was a literal statement of fact) 
 the two last lines of the folio whig passage 
 in the Minstrel : the whole of which he 
 repeated with great enthusiasm : 
 
 Shall I be left forgotten in the dust, 
 
 When fate, relenting, lets the flower revive t 
 Shall nature's voice, to man alone unjust, 
 
 Bid him, though doom'd to perish, hope to live'? 
 Is it for this fair virtue oft must strive, 
 
 With disappointrtient, penury, and pain? 
 No ! Heaven's immortal spring shall yet arrive ; 
 
 And man's majestiobcauty bloom again, 
 Bright thro' the eternal year of love's triiunohant 
 reign. 
 
 This truth sublime, his simple sire had taught : 
 In sooth, 'twas almost all the shepherd kruiw. 
 
 " With respect to Burns's early educa- 
 tion, I cannot say any thing with certain- 
 ty. He always spoke with respect and 
 gratitude of the schoolmaster who had 
 taught him to read English; and who, 
 finding in his scholar a more than ordina- 
 ry ardour for knowledge, had been at 
 pains to instruct him in the grammatical 
 principles of the language. He began the 
 study of Latin, and dropt it before he had 
 finished the verbs. I have sometimes 
 heard him quote a few Latin words, such 
 as omnia vincit amor, &c. but they seem- 
 ed to be such as he had caught from con- 
 versation, and which he repeated by rote. 
 I think he had a project, after he came to 
 Edinburgh, of prosecuting the study un- 
 der his intimate friend, the late Mr. Nicol, 
 one of the masters of the grammar-school 
 here ; but I do not know that he ever pro- 
 ceeded so far as to make the attempt. 
 
 " He certainly possessed a smattering 
 of French ; and, if he had an alFectation 
 in any thing, it was in introducing occa- 
 sionally a word or phrase from that lan- 
 guage. It is possible that his knowledge 
 in this respect might be more extensive 
 than I suppose it to be ; but this you can 
 
 learn from his more intimate acquaint- 
 ance. It would be worth while to inquire, 
 whether he was able to read the French 
 authors with such facility as to receive 
 from them any improvement to his taste. 
 For my own part, I doubt it much ; nor 
 would I beheve it, but on very strong and 
 pointed evidence. 
 
 *' If my memory does not fail me, he 
 was well instructed in arithmetic, and 
 knew something of practical geometry, 
 particularly of surveying — All his other 
 attainments were entirely his own. 
 
 *' The last time I saw him was during 
 the winter, 1788-89,* when he passed an 
 evening with me at Drumseugh, in the 
 neighbourhood of Edinburgh, where I was 
 then living. My friend, Mr. Alison, was 
 the only other person in company. I never 
 saw him more agreeable or interesting. 
 A present which Mr. Alison sent him af- 
 terwards of his Essays on Taste, drew 
 from Burns a letter of acknowledgment 
 which I remember to have read with some 
 degree of surprise at the distinct concep- 
 tion he appeared from it to have formed 
 of the general principles of the doctrine 
 of association. When I saw Mr. Alison 
 in Shropshire last autumn, I forgot to in- 
 quire if the letter be still in existence. If 
 it is, you may easily procure it, by means 
 of our friend Mr. Houlbrooke."f 
 
 The scene that opened on our bard in 
 Edinburgh was altogether new, and in a 
 variety of other respects highly interest- 
 ing, especially to one of his disposition of 
 mind. To use an expression of his own. 
 he found himself, " suddenly translatiii 
 from the veriest shades of life," into thf 
 presence, and, indeed, into the society of 
 a number of persons, previously known tc 
 him by report as of the highest distinc- 
 tion in his country, and whose characters 
 it was natural for him to examine with no 
 common curiosity. 
 
 From the men of letters, in general, his 
 reception was particularly flattering. The 
 
 * Or rather 1789-90. I cannot speak with confi- 
 dence with respect to the particular year. Some of 
 my other dates may possibly require correction, as I 
 keep no journal of such occurrences. 
 
 + Tliis letter is No. CXIV. 
 
THE LIFE OF BURNS. 
 
 late Dr. Robertson, Dr. Blair, Dr. Gre- 
 gory, Mr. Stewart, Mr. Mackenzie, and 
 Mr. Frazer Tytler, may be mentioned in 
 the list of those who perceived his un- 
 common talents, who acknowledged more 
 especially his powers in conversation, and 
 who interested themselves in the cultiva- 
 tion of his genius. In Edinburgh, litera- 
 ry and fashionable society are a good deal 
 mixed. Our bard was an acceptable guest 
 in the gayest and most elevated circles, 
 and frequently received from female beau- 
 ty and elegance, those attentions above 
 all others most grateful to him. At 
 the table of Lord Monboddo he was a 
 frequent guest ; and wliile he enjoyed the 
 society, and partook of the hospitalities of 
 the venerable judge, he experienced the 
 kindness and condescension of his lovely 
 and accomplished daughter. The singu- 
 lar beauty of this young lady was illumi- 
 nated by that happy expression of coun- 
 tenance which results from the union of 
 cultivated taste and superior understand- 
 ing, with the finest affections of the mind. 
 The influence of such attractions was not 
 unfeU by our poet. " There has not been 
 any thing like Miss Burnet, (said he in a 
 letter to a friend,) in all the combina- 
 tion of beauty, grace, and goodness the 
 Creator htis formed, since Milton's Eve, 
 on the first day of her existence." In his 
 Address to Edinburgh, she is celebrated 
 in a strain of still greater elevation : 
 
 " Fair Uurnet strikes ill' artnring eye, 
 Heavon's beauties on my fancy sliine ! 
 
 I see the Sire of T-ove on liisih, 
 And own his woric indeed divine !" 
 
 This lovely woman died a few years af- 
 terwards in the flower of youth. Our 
 bard expressed his sensibility on that oc- 
 casion, in verses addressed to her memory. 
 
 Among the men of rank and fashion, 
 Burns was particularly distinguished by 
 James, Earl of Glencairn. On the mo- 
 tion of this nobleman, the Caledonian 
 Hunt, an association of the principal of 
 the nobility and gentry of Scotland, ex- 
 tended their patronage to our bard, and 
 admitted him to their gay orgies. He re- 
 paid their notice by a dedication of the 
 enlarged and improved edition of his po- 
 ems, in which he has celebrated their pa- 
 triotism and independence in very ani- 
 mated terms. 
 
 " I congratulate my country that the 
 blnod of her ancient heroes runs uncon- 
 taminated ; and that, from vour courage, 
 
 knowledge, and public spirit, she may eX 
 pect protection, wealth, and liberty. ***♦ 
 May corruption shrink at your kindling 
 indignant glance ; and may tyranny in the 
 Ruler, and licentiousness in the People, 
 equally find in you an inexorable foe I"* 
 
 It is to be presumed that these gene- 
 rous sentiments, uttered at an era singu- 
 larly propitious to independence of cha- 
 racter and conduct, were favourably re- 
 ceived by the persons to whom they were 
 addressed, and that they were echoed 
 from every bosom, as well as from that 
 of the Earl of Glencairn. This accom- 
 plished nobleman, a scholar, a man of taste 
 and sensibility, died soon afterwards. Had 
 he lived, and had his power equalled his 
 wishes, Scotland might still have exulted 
 in the genius, instead of lamenting the 
 early fate of her favourite bard. 
 
 A 'taste for letters is not always con- 
 joined with habits of temperance and re- 
 gularity; and Edinburgh, at the period of 
 which we speak, contained perhaps an un- 
 common proportion of men of consider- 
 able talents, devoted to social excesses, in 
 which their talents were wasted and de- 
 based. 
 
 Burns entered into several parties of this 
 description, with the usual vehemence of 
 his character. His generous affections, 
 his ardent eloquence, his brilliant and 
 daring imagination, fitted him to be the 
 idol of such associations ; and accustom- 
 ing himself to conversation of unlimited 
 range, and to festive indulgences that 
 scorned restraint, he gradually lost some 
 portion of his relish for the more pure, but 
 less poignant pleasures, to be found in the 
 circles of taste, elegance, and literature. 
 The sudden alteration in his habits of life 
 operated on him physically as well as 
 morally. The humble fare of an Ayr- 
 shire peasant he had exchanged for the 
 luxuries of the Scottish metropolis, and 
 ! the effects of this change on his ardent 
 I constitution could not be inconsiderable. 
 } But whatever influence might be pro- 
 duced on his conduct, his excellent under- 
 ! standing suffered no corresponding de- 
 I basement. He estitarf^ed his friends and 
 I associates of every description at their 
 I proper value, and appreciated his own 
 I conduct with a precision that might give 
 
 * See Dedication prefixed to tlie Poeim. 
 
THE LIFE OF BURNS. 
 
 scope to much curious and melancholy 
 reflection. He saw his danger, and at 
 times formed resolutions to guard against 
 it ; but he had embarked on the tide of dis- 
 sipation, and was borne along its stream. 
 
 ' Of the state of his mind at this time, an 
 authentic, though imperfect document re- 
 mains, in a book which he procured in the 
 spring of 1787, for the purpose, as he him- 
 self informs us, of recording in it what- 
 ever seemed worthy of observation. The 
 following extracts may serve as a speci- 
 men: 
 
 Edinhurgh, April 9, 1 787. 
 " As I have seen a good deal of human 
 life in Edinburgh, a great many charac- 
 ters which are new to one bred up in the 
 shades of life as I have been, I am deter- 
 mined to take down my remarks on the 
 spot. Gray observes, m a letter to Mr. 
 Palgrave, that ' half a word fixed upon, 
 or near the spot, is worth a cart load of 
 recollection'. 1 don't know how it is 
 with the world in general, but with me, 
 making my remarks is by no means a 
 solitary pleasure. I want some one to 
 laugh with me, some one to be grave with 
 me, some one to please me and helo my 
 discrimination, with his or her own re- 
 mark, and at times, no doubt, to admire 
 my acutenessand penetration. The world 
 are so busied with selfish pursuits, ambi- 
 tion, vanity, interest, or pleasure, that 
 very few think it worth their while to 
 make any observation on what passes 
 around them, except where that observa- 
 tion is a sucker, or branch of the darling 
 plant they are rearing in their fancy. 
 Nor am I sure, notwithstanding all the 
 sentimental flights of novel-writers, and 
 the sage philosophy of moralists, whether 
 we are capable of so intimate and cor- 
 dial a coalition of friendship, as that one 
 man may pour out his bosom, his every 
 thought and floating fancy, his very in- 
 most soul, with unreserved confidence to 
 another, without hazard of losing part of 
 that respect which man deserves from 
 man ; or, from the unavoidable imperfec- 
 tions attending human nature, of one day 
 repenting his confidence. 
 
 " For these reasons I am determined to 
 make these pages my confidant, I will 
 sketch every character that any way strikes 
 me, to the best of my power, with un- 
 shrinking justice. I will fnsert anecdotes, 
 and take down remarks in the old law 
 phrase, without feud or favour. — Where 
 
 I hit on any thing clever, my own ap- 
 plause will, in some measure, feast ray 
 vanity ; and, begging Patroclus' and 
 Achates' pardon, I think a lock and key 
 a security, at least equal to the bosom of 
 any friend whatever. 
 
 " My own private story likewise, my 
 love adventures, my rambles ; the frowns 
 and smiles of fortune on my hardship ; 
 my poems and fragments, that must nevei 
 see the light, shall be occasionally insert- 
 ed. — In short, never did four shillings 
 purchase so much friendship, since confi- 
 dence went first to market, or honesty 
 was set up to sale. 
 
 " To these seemingly invidious, but too 
 just ideas of human friendship, I vi'ould 
 cheerfully make one exception — the con- 
 nexion between two persons of diflferent 
 sexes, when their interests are united and 
 absorbed by the tie of love — 
 
 When tliought meets thought, ere from the lipsitpsrt. 
 And each wiirm wish springs mutual from the heart. 
 
 There confidence, confidence that exalts 
 them the more in one another's opinion, 
 that endears them the more to each other's 
 hearts, unreservedly " reigns and revels." 
 But this is not my lot ; and, in my situa- 
 tion, if I- am wise, (which, by the by, I 
 have no great chance of being.) my fate 
 should be cast with the Psalmist's spar- 
 row, " to watch alone on the house-tops." 
 — Oh 1 the pity ! 
 
 " There are few of the sore evils under 
 the sun give me more uneasiness and cha- 
 grin than the comparison how a man of 
 genius, nay, of avowed worth, is received 
 every where, with the reception which a 
 mere ordinary character, decorated with 
 the trappings and futile distinctions of 
 fortune meets. I imagine a man of abili- 
 ties, his breast glowing with honest pride, 
 conscious that men are born equal, still 
 giving honour to whom honour is due ; he 
 meets at a great man's table, a Squire 
 something, or a Sir somebody ; he knows 
 the nohle landlord, at heart, gives the bard, 
 or whatever he is, a share of his good 
 wishes, beyond, perhaps, anyone at table; 
 yet how will it mortify him to see a fel- 
 low, whose abilities would scarcely have 
 made an eight-penny tailor, and whose 
 heart is not worth three farthings, meet 
 with attention and notice, that are with- 
 held from the son of genius and poverty? 
 
4'2 
 
 THE LIFE OP BURNS. 
 
 " The noble Glencairn has wounded 
 me to the soul here, because I dearly es- 
 teem, respect, and love him. He showed 
 so much attention, engrossing attention 
 one day, to the only blockhead at table 
 (the whole company consisted of his lord- 
 ship, dunderpate, and myself,) that I was 
 within half a point of throwing down my 
 gage of contemptuos defiance ; but he 
 shook my hand, and looked so benevolent- 
 ly good at parting. God bless him! 
 though I should never see him more, I 
 shall love him until my dying day ! T am 
 pleased to think I am so capable of the 
 throes of gratitude, as I am miserably 
 deficient in some other virtues. 
 
 " With Dr. Blair I am more at my 
 ease. I never respect him with humble 
 veneration ; but when he kindly interests 
 himself in my welfare, or still more, when 
 he descends from his pinnacle, and meets 
 me on equal ground in conversation, my 
 heart overflows with what is called liking. 
 When he neglects me for the mere car- 
 cass of greatness, or when his eye mea- 
 sures the difference of oar points of ele- 
 vation, I say to myself, with scarcely any 
 emotion, what do I care for him or his 
 pomp either ?" 
 
 The intentions of the poet in procuring 
 this book, so fully described by himself, 
 were very imperfectly executed. He has 
 inserted in it few or no incidents, but 
 several observations and reflections, of 
 which the greater part that are proper 
 for the public eye, will be found inter- 
 woven in his letters. The most curious 
 particulars in the book are the delinea- 
 tions of the charact^s he met with. 
 These are not numerous ; but they are 
 chiefly of persons of distinction in the re- 
 public of letters, and nothing but the de- 
 licacy and respect due to living charac- 
 ters prevents us from committing them to 
 the press. Though it appears that in 
 his conversation he was sometimes dis- 
 posed to sarcastic remarks on the men 
 with whom he lived, nothing of this kind 
 is discoverable in these more deliberate 
 efforts of his understanding, which, while 
 they exhibit great clearness of discrimi- 
 nation, manifest also the wish, as well as 
 the power, to bestow high and generous 
 praise. 
 
 As a specimen of these delineations, 
 we give in this edition, the character of 
 
 Dr. Blair, who has now paid the debt of 
 nature, in the full confidence that this 
 freedom will not be found inconsistent 
 with the respect and veneration due to 
 that excellent man, the last star in the 
 literary constellation, by which the me- 
 tropolis of Scotland was, in the earlier 
 part of the present reign, so beautifully 
 illuminated. 
 
 " It is not' easy forming an exact judg- 
 ment of any one ; but, in my opinion. Dr. 
 Blair is merely an astonishingproof of what 
 industry and application can do. Natu- 
 ral parts like his are frequently to be met 
 with; his vanity is proverbially known 
 among his acquaintance ; but he is justly 
 at the head of what may be called fine 
 writing ; and a critic of the first, the very 
 first rank in prose ; even in poetry, a bard 
 of Nature's making can only take the pas 
 of him. He has a heart, not of the very 
 finest water, but far from being an ordi- 
 nary one. In short, he is truly a worthy, 
 and most respectable character." 
 
 By the new edition of his poems. Burns 
 acquired a sum of money that enabled 
 him not only to partake of the pleasures 
 of Edinburgh, but to gratify a desire he 
 had long entertained, of visiting those 
 parts of his native country, most attrac- 
 tive by their beauty or their grandeur ; a 
 desire which the return of summer natu- 
 rally revived. The scenery on the banks 
 of the Tweed, and of its tributary streams, 
 strongly interested his fancy; and ac- 
 cordingly he left Edinburgh on the 6th 
 of May, 1787, on a tour through a coun- 
 try so much celebrated in the rural songs 
 of Scotland. He travelled on horseback, 
 and was accompanied, during some part 
 of his journey, by Mr. AinsHe, now wri- 
 ter to the signet, a gentleman who en- 
 joyed much of his friendship and of his 
 confidence. Of this tour a journal re- 
 mains, which, however, contains only oc- 
 casional remarks on the scenery, and 
 which is chiefly occupied with an account 
 of the author's different stages, and with 
 his observations on the various characters 
 to whom he was introduced. In the 
 course of this tour he visited Mr. Ainslie 
 of Berry well, the father of his companion ; 
 Mr. Brydone, the celebrated traveller, to 
 whom he carried a letter of introduction 
 from Mr. Mackenzie ; the Rev. Dr. Som- 
 merville of Jedburgh, the historian ; Mr. 
 and Mrs. Scott of Wauchope ; Dr. Elliot, 
 
THE LIFE OF BURNS. 
 
 a. physician, retired to a romantic spot on 
 the banks of the Roole ; Sir Alexander 
 Don ; Sir James Hall, of Dunglass ; and 
 a great variety of other respectable cha- 
 racters. Every where the fame of the 
 poet had spread before him, and every 
 where he received the most hospitable 
 and flattering attentions. At Jedburgh 
 he continued several days, and was ho- 
 noured by the magistrates w;ith the free- 
 dom of their borough. The following 
 may serve as a specimen of this tour, 
 which the perpetual reference to living 
 characters prevents our giving a.t large. 
 
 " Saturday, May 6th. Left Edinburgh 
 • — Lammer-muir-hills, miserably dreary 
 In general, but at times very picturesque. 
 
 " Lanson-edge, a glorious view of the 
 Merse. Reach Berrywell * * * The 
 family-meeting with my compagnon de 
 voyage, very charming ; particularly the 
 sister. * * 
 
 " Sunday. Went to church at Dunse. 
 Heard Dr. Bowmaker. * * * 
 
 *' Monday. Coldstream — glorious ri- 
 ver Tweed — clear and majestic — fine 
 bridge — dine at Coldstream with Mr. 
 Ainslie and Mr. Foreman. Beat Mr. 
 Foreman in a dispute about Voltaire. 
 Drink tea at Lenel-House with Mr. and 
 Mrs. Brydone. * * * Reception extreme- 
 ly flattering. Sleep at Coldstream. 
 
 " Tuesday. Breakfast at Kelso — 
 charming situation of the town— fine 
 bridge over the Tweed. Enchanting 
 views and prospects on both sides of the 
 river, especially on the Scotch side. * * 
 Visit Roxburgh Palace — fine situation of 
 it. Ruins of Roxburgh Castle — a holly- 
 bush growing where James II. was acci- 
 dentally killed by the bursting of a can- 
 non. A small old religious ruin, and a 
 fine old garden planted by the religious, 
 rooted cut and destroyed by a Hottentot, 
 a maitre d'hotel of the Duke's — Climate 
 and soil of Berwickshire and even Rox- 
 burghshire, superior to Ayrshire — bad 
 roads — turnip and sheep husbandry, their 
 great improvements. * * * Low mar- 
 kets, consequently low lands — magni- 
 ficecne of farmers and farm-houses. Come 
 up the Tiviot, and up the Jed to Jedburgh 
 to lie, and so wish myself good-night. 
 
 " Wednesday. Breakfast with Mr. 
 Fair. * * * Charming romantic situa- 
 Q2 
 
 43 
 
 tion of Jedburgh, with gardens and or- 
 chards, intermingled among the houses 
 and the ruins of a once magnificent cathe- 
 dral. All the towns here have the ap- 
 pearance of old rude grandeur, but ex- 
 tremely idle. — Jed, a fine romantic little 
 river. Dined with Capt. Rutherford, 
 * * * return to Jedburgh. Walk up the 
 Jed with some ladies to be shown Love- 
 lane, and Blackburn, two fairy-scenes. 
 Introduced to Mr. Potts, writer, and to 
 Mr. Sommerville, the clergyman of the 
 parish, a man, and a gentleman, but sadly 
 addicted to punning. 
 
 " Jedburgh, Saturday. Was presented 
 by the magistrates with the freedom of 
 the town. 
 
 " Took farewell of Jedburgh with 
 some melancholy sensations. 
 
 " Monday, May 1 4th, Kelso. Dine 
 with the farmer's club — all gentlemen 
 talking of high matters — each of them 
 keeps a hunter from 301. to 50/. value, 
 and attends the fox-hunting club in the 
 country. Go out with Mr. Ker, one of the 
 dub, and a friend of Mr. Ainslie's, to sleep. 
 In his mind and manners, Mr. Ker is aston- 
 ishingly like my dear old friend Robert 
 Muir — every thing in his house elegant. 
 He offers to accompany me in my EngUsh 
 tour. 
 
 " Tuesday. Dine with Sir Alexander 
 Don : a very wet day. * * * Sleep at 
 Mr. Ker's again, and set out next day for 
 Melross — visit Dryburgh, a fine old ruined 
 abbey, by the way. Cross the Leader, 
 and come up the Tweed to Melross. Dine 
 there, and visit that far-famed glorious 
 ruin — Come to Selkirk up the banks of 
 Ettrick. The whole country hereabouts, 
 both on Tweed and Ettrick, remarkably 
 stony." 
 
 Having spent three weeks in exploring 
 this interesting scenery. Burns crossed 
 over into Northumberland. Mr. Ker, 
 and Mr. Hood, two gentlemen with whom 
 he had become acquainted in the course 
 of his tour, accompanied him. He visited 
 Alnwick-Castle, the princely seat of the 
 Duke of Northumberland ; the hermitage 
 and old ca.--ule of Warksworth; Morpeth, 
 and Newcastle. — In this last town he 
 
44 
 
 THE LIFE OF BURNS. 
 
 spent two days, and then proceeded to the 
 south-west by Hexham and Wardrue, to 
 Carlisle. — After spending a day at Car- 
 lisle with his friend Mr. Mitchell, he re- 
 turned into Scotland, and at Annan his 
 journal terminates abruptly. 
 
 Of the various persons with whom he 
 became acquainted in the course of this 
 journey, he has, in general, given some 
 account ; and almost always a favourable 
 one. That on the banks of the Tweed, 
 and of the Tiviot, our bard should find 
 nymphs that were beautiful, is what might 
 be confidently presumed. Two of these 
 are particularly described in his journal. 
 But it does not appear that the scenery, 
 or its Inhabitants, produced any effort of 
 his muse, as was to have Been wished and 
 expected. From Annan, Burns proceed- 
 ed to Dumfries, and thence through San- 
 quliar, to Mossgiel, near Mauchline, in 
 Ayrshire, where he arrived about the 8th 
 of June, 1787, after a long absence of six 
 busy and eventful months. It will easily 
 be conceived with what pleasure and 
 pride he was received by his mother, his 
 brothers, and sisters. He had left them 
 poor, and comparatively friendless : lie 
 returned to them high in public estima- 
 tion, and easy in his circumstances. He 
 returned to them unchanged in his ardent 
 affections, and ready to share with them 
 to the uttermost farthing, the pittance 
 that fortune had bestowed. 
 
 Having remained with them a few days, 
 he proceeded again to Edinburgh, and 
 immediately set out on a journey to the 
 Highlands. Of this tour no particulars 
 have been found among his manuscripts. 
 A letter to his friend Mr. Ainslie, dated 
 Arrachas, near Crochnirhns, hy Lochleari/, 
 June 28, 1787, commences as follows : 
 
 " I write you this on my tour throusrh 
 a country where savage streams tumble 
 over savage mountains, thinly overspread 
 with savage flocks, which starvingly sup- 
 port as savage inhabitants. Mv last stage 
 was Inverary — to-morrow night's stage, 
 Dumbarton. I onsfht sooner to have an- 
 swered your kind letter, but you know I 
 am a man of many sins. 
 
 Part of a letter from our Bard to a 
 friend, giving some account of his journey, 
 has been communicated to the ■ Editor 
 since the publication of the last edition. 
 The reader will be amused with the fol- 
 lowing extract 
 
 " On our return, at a Highland gentle- 
 man's hospitable mansion, we fell in with 
 a merry party, and danced till the ladies 
 lefl us, at tiiree in the morning. Our 
 dancing was none of the French or Eng- 
 lish insipid formal movements; the ladies 
 sung Scotch songs like angels, at inter- 
 vals ; then we flew at Bab at the Brow- 
 ster, TuUochgorum, 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 
 tis we ranged round the bowl till the 
 good-fellow hour of six : except a few 
 minutes that we went out to pay our de- 
 votions to the glorious lamp of day peer- 
 ing 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 Loch- 
 lomond, and reached Dumbarton in the 
 evening. We dined at another goodfel- 
 low'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 High- 
 landman, so off we started, whip and 
 spur. My companions, though seemingly 
 gayly mounted, fell sadly astern ; but my 
 old mare, .Tenny Geddes, one of the Rosi- 
 nante family, she strained past the High- 
 landman in spite of all his efforts, with 
 the hair-halter : just as I was passing 
 liim, 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 dipt hedge ; 
 and down came Jenny Geddes over all, 
 and mv hardship between her and the 
 Highlandman's horse. Jenny Geddes 
 trode over me with such cautious reve- 
 rence, that matters were not so bad as 
 might well have been expected ; so I 
 came oft' with a few cuts and bruises, and 
 a thorough resolution to be a pattern of 
 sobriety for the future. 
 
 " I have yet fixed on nothing with re- 
 spect to the serious business of life. I 
 am, just as usual, a rhyming, mason-m&- 
 
 • Scotch tutiM. 
 
THE LIFE OF BURNS. 
 
 45 
 
 king, raking, aimless, laie fellow. How- 
 ever 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 fami- 
 lies, I may intrigue, if I choose to run all 
 risks, but must not marry. 
 
 " I am afraid I have almost ruined one 
 source, the principal one indeed, of my 
 former happiness ; that eternal propen- 
 sity I always had to fall in love. My 
 heart no more glows with feverish rap- 
 ture. I have no paradisical evening in- 
 terviews 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. T do hke 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 interme- 
 diate 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 tan- 
 gent of female dignity and reserve, like 
 a mountain-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 tower- 
 ings, pop down at my foot like corporal 
 Trim's hat. 
 
 " 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 Lmlithgow, in the chronicles of your 
 memory, by 
 
 " Robert Burns." 
 
 From this journey Burns returned to 
 his f -lends in Ayrshire, with whom he 
 spent the month of July, renewing his 
 friendshios and extendinor his acruaint- 
 
 ance throughout the country, where he 
 was now very generally known and ad- 
 mired. In August he again visited Edin- 
 burgh, whence he undertook another jour- 
 ney towards the middle of this month, in 
 company with Mr. M. Adair, now Dr. 
 Adair, of Harrowgate, of which this gen- 
 tleman has favoured us with the follow- 
 ing account. 
 
 " Burns and T left Edinburgh togetner 
 in August, 1787. We rode by Linlith- 
 gow and Carron, to Stirling. We visited 
 the iron-works at Carron, with which the 
 poet was forcibly struck. The resem- 
 blance between that place, and its inha- 
 bitants, to the cave of Cyclops, which 
 must have occurred to every classical 
 reader, presented itself to Burns. At 
 Stirling the prospects from the castle 
 btrongly interested him ; in a former visit 
 to which, his national feelings had been 
 powerfully excited by the ruinous and 
 roofless state of the hall in which the 
 Scottish parliaments had been held. His 
 indignation had vented itself in some im- 
 prudent, but not unpoetical lines, which 
 had given much offence, and which he 
 took this opportunity of erasing, by break- 
 ing the pane of the window at the inn on 
 which they were written. 
 
 " At Stirling we met with a company of 
 travellers from Edinburgh, among whom 
 was a character in many respects conge- 
 nial with that of Burns. This was Nicol, 
 one of the teachers of the High Grammar- 
 School at Edinburgh — the same wit and 
 power of conversation ; the same fondness 
 for convivial society, and thoughtlessness 
 of to-morrow, characterized both. Jaco- 
 bitical principles in politics were common 
 to both of them ; and these have been sus- 
 pected, since the revolution of France, to 
 have given place in each, to opinions ap- 
 parently opposite. I regret that I have 
 preserved no memorahilia of then conver- 
 sation, either on this" or on other occa- 
 sions, when I happened to meet them to- 
 gether. Many songs were sung, which I 
 mention for the sake of observing, that 
 when Burns was called on in his turn, he 
 was accustomed, instead of singing, to re- 
 cite one or other of his own shorter po- 
 ems, with a tone and emphasis, which, 
 though not correct or harmonious, were 
 impressive and pathetic. This he did on 
 the present occasion 
 
 " From Stirling we went next mornmg 
 through the romantic and fertile vale of 
 
46 
 
 THE LIFE OF BURNS. 
 
 Devon to Harvieston in Clackmannan- 
 shire, then inhabited by Mrs. Hamilton, 
 with the younger part of whose family 
 Burns had been previously acquainted. 
 He introduced me to the family, and there 
 was formed my first acquaintance with 
 Mrs. Hamilton's eldest daughter, to whom 
 I have been married for nine years. Thus 
 was I indebted to Burns for a connexion 
 from which I have derived, and expect 
 further to derive much happiness. 
 
 " During a residence of about ten days 
 at Harvieston, we made excursions to vi- 
 sit various parts of the surrounding sce- 
 nery, inferior to none in Scotland, in beau- 
 ty, sublimity, and romantic interest ; par- 
 ticularly Castle Campbell, the ancient 
 seat of the family of Argyle ; and the fa- 
 mous Cataract of the Devon, called the 
 Caldron Linn ; and the Rumhlins: Bridge^ 
 a single broad arch, thrown by the Devil, 
 if tradition is to be believed, across the 
 river, at about the height of a hundred 
 feet above its bed. I am surprised that 
 none of these scenes should have called 
 forth an exertion of Burns's muse. But 
 I doubt if he had much taste for the pic- 
 turesque. I well remember, that the la- 
 dies at Harvieston, who accompanied us 
 on this jaunt, expressed their disappoint- 
 ment at his not expressing in more glow- 
 ing and fervid language, his impressions 
 of the Caldron Linn scene, certainly high- 
 ly sublime, and somewhat horrible. 
 
 " A visit to Mrs. Bruce, of Clackman- 
 nan, a lady above ninety, the lineal de- 
 scendant of that race which gave the 
 Scottish throne its brightest ornament, 
 interested his feelings more powerfully. 
 This venerable dame, with characteristic- 
 al dignity, informed me on my observing 
 that I believed she was descended from the 
 family of Robert Bruce, that Robert Bruce 
 was sprung from her family. Though al- 
 most deprived of speech by a paralytic af- 
 fection, she preserved her hospitality and 
 urbanity. She was in possession of the 
 hero's helmet and two-handed sword, with 
 which she conferred on Burns and myself 
 the honour of knighthood, remarking, 
 that she had a better right to confer that 
 title than somp people. * * You will of 
 course conclude that the old lady's politi- 
 cal tenets were as Jacobitical as the po- 
 et's, a conformity which contributed not 
 a little to the cordialitv of our reception 
 and entertainment. — She gave us as her 
 first toast after dinner, Awa' Uncos, or 
 Away with the Strangers. — Who these 
 
 strangers were, you will readily under- 
 stand. Mrs. A. corrects me by saying it 
 should be Hooi, or Hooi uncQg, a sound 
 used by shepherds to direct their dogs to 
 drive away the sheep. 
 
 " We returned to Edinburgh by Kin- 
 ross (on the shore of Lochleven) and 
 Queen's-ferry. I am inclined to think 
 Burns knew nothing of poor Michael 
 Bruce, who was then alive at Kinross, or 
 had died there a short while before. A 
 meeting between the bards, or a visit to 
 the deserted cottage and early grave of 
 poor Bruce, would have been highly in- 
 teresting.* 
 
 " At Dunfermline we visited the ruin- 
 ed abbey and the abbey church, now con- 
 secrated to Presbyterian worship. Here 
 I mounted the cutty stool, or stool of re- 
 pentance, assuming the character of a 
 penitent for fornication; while Burns from 
 the pulpit addressed to me a ludicrous re- 
 proof and exhortation, parodied from that 
 which had been delivered to himself in 
 Ayrshire, where he had, as he assured 
 me, once been one of seven who mounted 
 the seat of shame together. 
 
 " In the church-yard two broad flag- 
 stones marked the grave of Robert Bruce, 
 for whose memory Burns had more than 
 common veneration. He knelt and kiss- 
 ed the stone with sacred fervour, and 
 heartily {suus ut mos erat) execrated the 
 worse than Gothic neglect of the first o*" 
 Scottish heroes."t 
 
 The surprise expressed by Dr. Adair, 
 in his excellent letter, that the romantic 
 scenery of the Devon should have failed 
 to call forth any exertion of the poet's 
 muse, is not in its nature singular ; and 
 the disappointment felt at his not express- 
 ing in more glowing language his emo- 
 tions on the sight of the famous cataract 
 of that river, is similar to what was felt 
 by the friends of Burns on other occa- 
 sions of the same nature. Yet the infer- 
 ence that Dr. Adair seems inclined to 
 draw from it, that he had little taste for 
 the picturesque, might be questioned, 
 even if it stood uncontroverted by other 
 evidence. The muse of Bums wsm m a 
 high degree capricious ; she came ui^call- 
 
 • Bruce died some years before. E. 
 t Extracted from a letter of Dr. Adair to the Editor. 
 
THE LIFE OP BURNS. 
 
 47 
 
 ed, and often refused to attend at his bid- 
 ding. Of all the numerous subjects sug- 
 gested to him by his friends and corres- 
 pondents, there is scarcely one that he 
 adopted. The very expectation that a 
 particular occasion would excite the en- 
 ergies of fancy, if communicated to Burns, 
 seemed in him as in other poets, destruc- 
 tive of the effect expected. Hence per- 
 haps may be explained, why the banks of 
 the Devon and of the Tweed form no part 
 of the subjects of his song. 
 
 A similar train of reasoning may per- 
 haps explain the want of emotion with 
 which he viewed the Caldron Linn. Cer- 
 tainly there are no affections of the mind 
 more deadened by the influence of pre- 
 vious expectation, than those arising from 
 the sight of natural objects, and more 
 especially of objects of grandeur. Minute 
 descriptions of scenes, of a sublime na- 
 ture, should never be given to those who 
 are about to view them, particularly if 
 they are persons of great strength and 
 sensibility of imagination. Language sel- 
 dom or never conveys an adequate idea of 
 such objects, but in the mind of a great 
 poet t may excite a picture that far tran- 
 scends them. The imagination of Burns 
 might form a cataract, in comparison with 
 which the Caldron Linn should seem the 
 purling of a rill, and even the mighty falls 
 of Niagara, an humble cascade.* 
 
 Whether these suggestions may assist 
 in explaining our Bard's deficiency of im- 
 pression on the occasion referred to, or 
 whether it ought rather to be imputed to 
 some pre-occupation, or indisposition of 
 mind, we presume not to decide; but that 
 he was in general feelingly alive to the 
 beautiful or sublime in scenery, may be 
 supported by irresistible evidence. It is 
 
 * This reasoning might be extended, with some mo- 
 difications, to objects of sight of every liind. To have 
 formed before-hand a distinct picture in the mind, of 
 any interesting person or thing, generally lessens the 
 pleasure of the first meeting with them. Though this 
 picture be not superior, or even equal to the realty, still 
 it can never be expected to be an exact resemblance ; 
 and the disappointment felt at finding the object some- 
 thing different from what was expected, interrupts and 
 diminishes the emotions that would otherwise be pro' 
 ducf:d. In such cases the second or third interview 
 gives more pleasure than the first. — See ike Elements 
 of the Philosophy of the Bum an Mind, by Mr. Stew- 
 art, p. 434. Such publications as The Guide to the 
 Lakes, where eveiy scene is described in the most mi 
 nute manner, and sometimes with con.-iderable exag- 
 geration of language, are in this point of view objec- 
 tibnable. 
 
 true this pleasure was greatly heighten- 
 ed in his mind, as might be expected, 
 when combined with moral emotions of a 
 kind with which it happily unites. That 
 under this association Burns contemplated 
 the scenery of the Devon with the eye of 
 a genuine poet, some lines which he wrote 
 at this very pferiod, may bear witness.* 
 
 The different journeys already men- 
 tioned did not satisfy the curiosity of 
 Burns. About the beginning of Septem- 
 ber, he again set out from Edinburgh on 
 a more extended tour to the Highlands, 
 in company with Mr. Nicol, with whom 
 he had now contracted a particular inti- 
 macy, which lasted during the remainder 
 of his life. Mr. Nicol was of Dumfries- 
 shire, of a descent equally humble with 
 our poet. Like him he rose by the 
 strength of his talents, and fell by the 
 strength of his passions. He died in the 
 summer of 1 797. Having received the 
 elements of a classical instruction at his 
 parish-school, Mr. Nicol made a very ra- 
 pid and singular proficiency ; and by early 
 undertaking the office of an instructor 
 himself, he acquired the means of enter- 
 ing himself at the University of Edin- 
 burgh. There he was first a student of 
 theology, then a student of medicine, and 
 was afterwards employed in the assist- 
 ance arid instruction of graduates in me- 
 dicine, in those parts of their exercises in 
 which the Latin language is employed. 
 In this situation he was the contempora- 
 ry and rival of the celebrated Dr. Brown, 
 whom he resembled in the particulars of 
 his history, as well as in the leading fea- 
 tures of his character. The office of as- 
 sistant-teacher in the High-school being 
 vacant, it was, as usual, filled up by com- 
 petition ; and in the face of some preju- 
 dices, and, perhaps, of some well-founded 
 objections, Mr. Nicol, by superior learn- 
 ing, carried it from all the other candi- 
 dates. This office he filled at the period 
 of which we speak. 
 
 It is to be lamented that an acquaint- 
 ance with the writers of Greece and Rome 
 does not always supply an original want 
 of taste and correctness in manners and 
 conduct ; and where it fails of this effect, 
 it sometimes inflames the native pride of 
 temper, which treats with disdain those 
 delicacies in which it has not learned to 
 
 • See the song beginning, 
 " How pleasant the banks of the clear winding Devon-" 
 Poems, page 78. 
 
THE LIFE OF BURNS. 
 
 excel. It was thup with the fellow-tra- 
 veller of Burns. Formed by nature in a 
 model of great strength, neither his per- 
 son nor his manners had any tincture of 
 taste or elegance ; and his coarseness was 
 not compensated by that romantic sensi- 
 bility, and those towering flights of ima- 
 gina ion which distinguished the conver- 
 sation of Burns, in the blaze of whose ge- 
 nius all the deficiencies of his manners 
 were absorbed and disappeared. 
 
 Mr. Nicol and our poet travelled in a 
 postchaise, which they engaged for the 
 journey, and passing through the heart 
 of the Highlands, stre ■ hed northwards, 
 about ten miles beyond Inverness. There 
 they bent their course eastward, across 
 the island, and returned by the shore of 
 the German sea to Edinburgh. In the 
 course of this tour, some particulars of 
 which will be found in a letter of our bard. 
 No. XXX. they visited a number of re- 
 markable scenes, and the imagination of 
 Burns was constantly excited by the wild 
 and sublime scenery through which he 
 passed. Of this several proofs may be 
 found in the poems formerly printed.* 
 Of the history of one of these poems. The 
 Humble Petition of Bruar Water, and of 
 the bard's visit to Athole House, some 
 particulars will be found in No. XXIX ; 
 and by the favour of Mr. Walker of Perth, 
 then residing in the family of the Duke 
 of Athole, we are enabled to give the fol- 
 lowing additional account : 
 
 " On reaching Blair, he sent me notice 
 of his arrival (as I had been previously 
 acquainted with him,) and I hastened to 
 meet him at the inn. The Duke to whom 
 he brought a letter of introduction, was 
 from home ; but the Dutchess, being in- 
 formed of his arrival, gave him an invita- 
 tion to sup and sleep at Athole House. 
 He accepted the invitation ; but as the 
 hour of supper was at some distance, 
 begged I would in the interval be his 
 guide through the grounds. It was al- 
 ready growing dark ; yet the softened 
 though faint and uncertain view of their 
 beauties, which the moonlight afforded us, 
 seemed exactly suited to the state of his 
 feelings at the time. I had often, like 
 others, experienced the pleasures which 
 
 • See " Lines on scaring some waterfowl in Loch- 
 Tnrit, a wild scene among the hills of Ochtertyre."' 
 •' Lines written with ■» Pencil over the Cliimney-piece, 
 in the Inn at Kenmore, Taymouth " " Lines written 
 with a pencil standing by the fall of Fycre, near Loch- 
 
 arise from the sublime or elegant land- 
 scape, but I never saw those feelings so 
 intense as in Burns. When we reached 
 a rustic hut on the river Tilt, where it is 
 overhung by a woody precipice, from 
 which there is a noble water-fall, he 
 threw himself on the heathy seat, and 
 gave himself up to a tender, abstracted, 
 and voluptuous enthusiasm of imagina- 
 tion. I cannot help thinking it might have 
 been here that he conceived the idea of 
 the following lines, which he afterwards 
 introduced into his poem on Bruar Wa- 
 ter, when only fancying such a combina- 
 tion of objects as were now present to 
 his eye. 
 
 Or, by the reaper's nightly beam, 
 
 Mild, chequering through the trees, 
 Rave to my darkly-dashing stream, 
 
 Hoarse-swelling on the breeze. 
 
 " It was with much difBculty I prevail- 
 ed on him to quit this spot, and to be in- 
 troduced in proper time to supper. 
 
 " My curiosity was great to see how 
 he would conduct himself in company so j. 
 different from what he had been accus- ^^ 
 tomed to.* His manner was unembar- 
 rassed, plain, and firm. He appeared to 
 have complete reliance on his own native 
 good sense for directing his behaviour. 
 He seemed at once to perceive and to ap- 
 preciate what was due to the company 
 and to himself, and never to forget a pro- 
 per respect for the separate species of 
 dignity belonging to each. He did not 
 arrogate conversation, but, when led into 
 it, he spoke with ease, propriety, and 
 manliness. He tried to exert his abilities, 
 because he knew it was ability alone gave 
 him a title to be there. The Duke's fine 
 young family attracted much of his admi- 
 ration; he drank their healths as honest 
 men and honny lasses, an idea which was 
 much applauded by the company, and 
 with which he very felicitously closed his 
 poem.f 
 
 " Next day I took a ride with him 
 through some of the most romantic parts 
 of that neighbourhood, and was highly 
 gratified by his conversation. As a spe- 
 cimen of his happiness of conception and 
 strength of expression, I will meation a 
 
 * In the preceding winter, Burns had been in com- 
 pany of the highest rank in Edinlurgii ; but this de- 
 scription of his raannors' is perfectly applicable to his - 
 first appearance in such society. 
 
 t See The Humbl* Petition of Bruai VVatw. 
 
THE LIFE OF BURNS. 
 
 49 
 
 remark which he made on his fellow-tra- 
 veller, who was walking at the time a few 
 paces before us. lie was a man of a ro- 
 bust but clumsy person ; and while Burns 
 was expressiiig to me the value he enter- 
 tained for him on account of his vigorous 
 talents, although they were clouded at 
 times by coarseness of manners ; ' in 
 short,' he added, ' his mind is like his 
 body, he has a confounded strong, in- 
 kneed sort of a soul.' 
 
 ,^"Much attention was paid to Burns 
 both before and after the Duke's return, 
 of which he was perfectly sensible, with- 
 out being vain ; and at his departure I 
 recommended to him, as the most appro- 
 priate return he could make, to write 
 some descriptive verses on any of the 
 scenes with which he had been so much 
 delighted. After leaving Blair, he, by 
 the Duke's advice, visited the Falls of 
 Bruar, and in a few days I received a 
 letter from Inverness, with the verses en- 
 closed."* 
 
 It appears that the impression made by 
 our poet on the noble family of Athole, 
 was in a high degree favourable ; it is 
 certain he was charmed with the recep- 
 ..lon he received from them, and he often 
 mentioned the two days he spent at Athole 
 House as amongst the happiest of his life. 
 He was warmly invited to prolong his 
 stay, but sacrificed his inclinations to his 
 engagement with Mr. Nicol ; which is 
 the more to be regretted, as he would 
 otherwise have been introduced to Mr. 
 Dundas (then daily expected on a visit to 
 the Duke,) a circumstance which might 
 have had a favourable influence on Burns's 
 future fortunes. At Athole House he 
 met, for the first time, Mr. Graham of 
 Fintry, to whom he was afterwards in- 
 debted for his office in the Excise. ' 
 
 The letters and poems which he ad- 
 dressed to Mr. Graham, bear testimony 
 of his sensibility, and justify the supposi- 
 tion, that he would not have been defi- 
 cient in gratitude had he been elevated 
 to a situation better suited to his disposi- 
 tion and to his talents. f 
 
 A few days after leaving Blair of Athole, 
 our p«et and his fellow-traveller arrived 
 
 • Extract of a letter from Mr. Walker to Mr. Cun- 
 ningham. See Letter, No. XXIX. 
 
 t See the first Epistle to Mr- Graham, Folirifing an 
 employment in the E.xcise, Ijetter No. LVl. and his 
 •econd Epistle, Poems p. 65. 
 
 at Fochabers. In the course of the pre 
 ceding winter Burns had been introduced 
 to the Ducthess of Gordon at Edinburgh, 
 and presuming on this acquaintance, he 
 proceeded to Gordon- Castle, leaving Mr. 
 Nicol at the inn in the village. At the 
 castle our poet was received with the ut- 
 most hospitality and kindness, and tlie 
 family being about to sit down to dinner, 
 he was invited to take his place at table 
 as a matter of course. This invitation 
 he accepted, and after drinking a few 
 glasses of wine, he rose up, and proposed 
 to withdraw. On being pressed to stay, 
 he mentioned for the first time, his en- 
 gagemeht with his fellow-traveller : and 
 his noble host offering to send a servant 
 to conduct Mr. Nicol to the castle. Burns 
 insisted on undertaking that office him- 
 self. He was, however, accompanied by 
 a gentleman, a particular acquaintance of 
 the Duke, by whom the invitation was 
 delivered in all the forms of politeness. 
 The invitation came too late ; the pride 
 of Nicol was inflamed into a high degree 
 of passion, by the neglect which he had 
 already suffered. He had ordered the 
 horses to be put to the carriage, being 
 determined to proceed on his journey 
 alone ; and they found him parading the 
 streets of Fochabers, before the door of 
 the inn, venting his anger on the postil- 
 lion, for the slowness with which he obey- 
 ed his commands. As no explanation nor 
 entreaty could change the purpose of his 
 fellow-traveller, our poet was reduced to 
 the necessity of separating from him en- 
 tirely, or of instantly proceeding with 
 him on their journey. He chose the last 
 of these alternatives ; and seating him- 
 self beside Nicol in the post-chaise with 
 mortification and regret, he turned his 
 back on Gordon Castle where he had 
 promised himself some happy days. Sen- 
 sible, however, of the great kindness of 
 the noble family, he made the best return 
 in his power, by the poem beginning, 
 
 " Stream* that glide in orient plains."* 
 
 Burns remained at Edinburgh during 
 the greater part of the winter, 1787-8, 
 £ind again entered into the society and 
 dissipation of that metropolis. It appears 
 that on the 3 1st day of December, he at- 
 tended a meeting to celeb«»te the birth- 
 day of the lineal descendant of the Scot- 
 tish race of kings, the late unfortunate 
 Prince Cliarles Edward. Whatever 
 
 * This information is extracted from a letter of D». 
 Coiiper (if Fochabers, to the EJilor. 
 
so 
 
 THE LIFE OF BURNS. 
 
 might have been the wish or purpose of 
 the original institutors of this annual 
 meeting, there is no reason to suppose 
 that the gentlemen of whom it was at 
 this time composed, were not perfectly 
 loyal to the King on the throne. It is 
 not to be conceived that they entertained 
 any hope of, any wish for, the restoration 
 of the House of Stuart ; but, over their 
 sparkling wine, they indulged the gene- 
 rous feelings which the recollection of 
 fallen greatness is calculated to inspire ; 
 and commemorated the heroic valour 
 which strove to sustain it in vain — valour 
 worthy of a nobler cause, and a happier 
 fortune. On this occasion our bard took 
 upon himself the office of poet-laureate, 
 and produced an ode, which though de- 
 ficient in the complicated rhythm and 
 polished versification that such composi- 
 tions require, might on a fair competition, 
 where energy of feelings and of expression 
 were alone in question, have won the 
 butt of Malmsey from the real laureate 
 of that day. 
 
 The following extracts may serve as a 
 specimen : 
 
 False flatterer, Hope, away! 
 Nor think to lure us as in days of yore • 
 
 We solemnize this sorrowing natal day, 
 To prove our loyal truth— we can no more : 
 
 And, owning Heaven's mysterious sway, 
 Submissive, low, adore. 
 
 Ye honoured, mighty dead ! 
 Who nobly perished in th*- glorious cause, 
 Your King, your country, and her laws! 
 
 From great Dundee, who smiling victory led, 
 And fell a mariyr in her arms, 
 (What breast of northern ice but warms ?) 
 
 To bold Balmerino's undying name, 
 
 WhosRsoul of fire, lighted at Heaven'shigh flame. 
 Deserves the proudest wreath departed heroes claim.* 
 
 Nor unrevenged your fate shall be. 
 
 It only lags the fatal hour ; 
 Your blood shall with incessant cry 
 
 Awake at last the unsparing power. 
 As from the cliff, with thundering-course. 
 
 The snowy ruin smokes along, 
 With doubling speed and gathering force, 
 Till deep it crashing whelms the cottage in the vale ! 
 So Vengeance * * * 
 
 * In the first part of this ode there is some beautiful 
 Imagery, which the poet afterwards interwove in a 
 happier manner in the Chevalier' sLament. (See Letter, 
 No. LXV.) But if there were no other reasons for 
 omitting to print the entire poem, the want of originali- 
 ty would be suflicicnt. A considerable part of it is a 
 
 In relating the incidents of our poef^s 
 life in Edinburgh, we ought to have men- 
 tioned the sentiments of respect and sym- 
 pathy with which he traced out the grave 
 of his predecessor Ferguson, over whose 
 ashes in the Canongate church-yard, he 
 obtained leave to erect an humble monu- 
 ment, which will be viewed by reflecting 
 minds with no common interest, and 
 which will awake in the bosom of kindred 
 genius, many a high emotion.* Neither 
 should we pass over the continued friend- 
 ship he experienced frcm a poet then liv- 
 ing, the amiable and accomplished Black- 
 lock. — To his encouraging advice it was 
 owing (as has already appeared) that 
 Burns instead of emigrating to the West 
 Indies, repaired to Edinburgh. He re- 
 ceived him there with all the ardour of 
 affectionate admiration ; he eagerly in- 
 troduced him to the respectable circle of 
 his friends ; he consulted his interest ; 
 he blazoned his fame ; he lavished upon 
 him all the kindness of a generous and 
 feeling heart, into which nothing selfish 
 or envious ever found admittance. Among 
 the friends to whom he introduced Burns 
 was Mr. Ramsay of Ochtertyre, to whom 
 our poet pai4 a visit in the Autumn of 
 1787, at his delightful retirement in the 
 neighbourhood of Stirling, and on the 
 banks of the Teith. Of this visit we have 
 the following particulars : 
 
 " I have been in the company of many 
 men of genius," says Mr. Ramsay, " some 
 of them poets; but never witnessed such 
 flashes of intellectual brightness as from 
 him, the impulse of the moment, sparks 
 of celestial fire ! I never was more de- 
 lighted, therefore, than with his company 
 for two days, tete-a-tete. In a mixed 
 company I should have made little of him ; 
 for, in the gamester's phrase, he did not 
 always know when to play off" and when 
 to play on. * * * I not only proposed to 
 him the writing of a play similar to the 
 Gentle Shepherd, qualem decet esse soro- 
 rem, but Scottish Georges a subject which 
 Thomson has by no means exhausted in 
 his Seasons. What beautiful landscapes 
 of rural life and manners might not have 
 been expected from a pencil so faithful 
 and forcible as his, which could have ex- 
 hibited scenes as familiar and interesting 
 as those in the Gentle Shepherd, which 
 
 kind of rant, for which indeed precedent may be cited 
 in various othrr birth-day, odes, but with which it is 
 impoi!sible to go along. 
 
 * See Letters No. XIX. and XX. where the Epitapb 
 will be found, &c 
 
THE LIFE OF BURNS. 
 
 51 
 
 every one who knows our swains in their 
 unadulterated state, instantly recognises 
 as true to nature. But to have executed 
 either of these plans, steadiness and ab- 
 straction frora company were wanting, 
 not talents. When I asked him whether 
 the Edinburgh Literati had mended his 
 poems by their criticisms, ' Sir,' said he, 
 ' these gentlemen remind me of some spin- 
 sters in my country, who spin their thread 
 so fine tliat it is neither fit for wetl nor 
 wovof.' He said he had not changed a 
 word except one to please Dr. Blair."* 
 
 Having settled with his publisher, Mr. 
 Creecl\, in February, 1788, Burns found 
 liiinself master of nearly five hundred 
 pounds, after discharging all his expenses. 
 T\vo hundred pounds he immediately ad- 
 vanced to his brother Gilbert, who had 
 taken upon himself the support of their 
 aged mother, and was struggling with 
 ni:vny difficulties in the farm of Mossgiel. 
 With the remainder of this sum, and 
 some farther eventful profits from his 
 po^ms, he determined on settling him- 
 p;-if for life in the occupation of agricul- 
 ture, and took from Mr. Miller, of Dal- 
 swinton, the farm of Ellisland, on the 
 bnnks of the river Nith, six miles above 
 D imfries, on which he entered at Whit- 
 su.nday, 1788. Having been previously 
 recommended to the Board of Excise, his 
 name had been put on the list of candi- 
 dates for the humble office of a ganger or 
 exciseman ; and he immediately applied 
 to acquiring the information necessary 
 for filling that office, when the honoura- 
 ble Board might judge it proper to employ 
 him. He expected to be called into ser- 
 vice in the district in which his farm was 
 situated, and vainly hoped to unite with 
 success the labours of the farmer with tiie 
 ijties of the exciseman. 
 
 When Burns had in this manner ar- 
 ranged his plans for futurity, his generous 
 heart turned to the object of his most ar- 
 dent attachment, and listening to no con- 
 siderations but those of honour and affec- 
 tion, he joined with her in a public decla- 
 ration of marriage, thus legalizing their 
 union, and lendering it permanent for 
 life. 
 
 ^Extract of a letter Jrom Mr. Ramsmj lo tn.e Eaitor- 
 This incorrigibility of Burns extended, however, only 
 to his poems printed before lie arrived in Edinburgti; 
 for in regard to his unpul)lished poc ms, he was amena- 
 hle to criticism, of whicii nuinv proofs might be given. 
 Sea some remark!) on lliiii?Mbjcr't, In the Jlppaidix. 
 
 R 
 
 Before Burns was known in Edinburgh, 
 a specimen of his poetry had recommend- 
 ed him to Mr. Miller of Dalswinton. Un- 
 derstanding that he intended to resume 
 the life of a farmer, Mr. Miller had in- 
 vited him, in the spring of 1787, to view 
 his estate in Nithsdale, offering him at 
 the same time the choice of any of his 
 farms out of lease, at such a rent as Burns 
 and his friends might judge proper. It 
 was not in the nature of Burns to take an 
 undue advantage of the liberdity of Mr. 
 Miller. He proceeded in this business, 
 however, with more than usual delibera- 
 tion. Having made choice of the farm of 
 EUisland, he employed tAvo of his friends, 
 skiiied in the value of land, to examine it, 
 and with their approbation offered a rent 
 to Mr. Miller, which was immediately 
 accepted. It was not convenient for Mrs. 
 Burns to remove immediately from Ayr- 
 shire, and our poet therefore took up his 
 residence alone at Ellisland, to prepare 
 for the reception of his wife and children, 
 who joined him towards the end of the 
 year. 
 
 The situation in which Burns now 
 found himself was calculated to awaken 
 reflection. The different steps he had of 
 late taken were in their nature highly im- 
 portant, and might be said to have in some 
 measure, fixed his destiny. He had be- 
 come a husband and a father; he had en- 
 gaged in the management of a considera- 
 ble farm, a difficult and laborious under- 
 taking ; in his success the happiness of 
 his family was involved ; it was time, 
 therefore, to abandon the gayety and d.s- 
 sipation of which he had been too much 
 enamoured ; to ponder seriously on the 
 past, and to form virtuous resolutions re- 
 specting the future. That such was ac- 
 tually the state of his mind, the following 
 extract from his common-place book may 
 bear witness : 
 
 Ellisland, Sunday, 14th June, 1788. 
 " This is novv the third day that I have 
 been in this country. ' Lord, what is 
 man!' What a bustling little bimdle of 
 passions, appetites, ideas, and fancies ! 
 and what a capricious kind of existence 
 he has here ; * * * There is indeed an 
 elsewhere, where, as Thomson says, vir- 
 tue sole survives. 
 
 ' Tell us ye dead 
 Will none of you in pity disclose the secret 
 What 'tis you are, and we must shortly be ? 
 
 A liftlf ffmp 
 
 Will inaJitt us w Uc a* vou ;ii«, aiid as etoiie.' 
 
32 
 
 THE LIFE OF BURNS. 
 
 " I am such a coward in life, so tired of 
 the service, that I would almost at any 
 time, with Milton's Adam, ' gladly lay mo 
 in my mother's lap, and be at peace.' 
 
 " But a wife and children bind me to 
 struggle with the stream, till some sud- 
 den squall shall overset the silly vessel ; 
 or in t,he listless return of years, its own 
 craziness reduce it to a wreck. Farewell 
 now to those giddy follies, those varnish- 
 ed vices, which, though half-sanctified by 
 the bewitching levity of wit and humour, 
 are at best but thriftless idling with the 
 precious current of existence; nay, often 
 poisoning the whole, that, like the plains 
 of Jericho, the water is nought, and the 
 ground barren, and nothing short of a 
 supernaturally gifted Elisha can ever af- 
 ter heal the evils. 
 
 " Wedlock, the circumstance that buc- 
 kles me hardest to care, if virtue and re- 
 ligion were to be any thing with me but 
 names, was what in a few seasons I must 
 have resolved on ; in my present situation 
 it was absolutely necessary. Hvimanity, 
 generosity, honest pride of character, jus- 
 tice to my own happmess for after-life, so 
 far as it could depend (which it surely will 
 a great deal) on internal peace; all these 
 joined their warmest suffrages, their most 
 powerful solicitations, with a rooted at- 
 tachment, to urge the step I have taken. 
 Nor have I any reason on her part to re- 
 pent it. I can fancy how, but have never 
 seen where, I could have made a better 
 choice. Come, then, let me act up to my 
 favourite motto, that glorious passage in 
 Young — 
 
 " On reason build resolve, 
 That column of true majesty in man !" 
 
 Under the impulse of these reflections, 
 Burns immediately engaged in rebuilding 
 the dweir.ng-house on his farm, which, in 
 the state he found it, was inadequate to 
 the accommodation of his family. On this 
 occasion, he himself resumed at times the 
 occupation of a labourer, and found nei- 
 ther his strength nor his skill impaired. 
 Pleased with surveying the grounds he 
 was about to cultivate, and with the rear- 
 ing of a building that should give shelter 
 to his wife and children, and, as he fond- 
 ly hoped, to his own gray hairs, senti- 
 ments of independence buoyed up his 
 mind, pictures of domestic content and 
 peace rose on his imagination ; and a few 
 days passed away, as he himself informs 
 
 us, the most tranquil, if not the happiest, 
 which he had ever experienced.* 
 
 It is to be lamented that at this critical 
 period of his life, our poet was without 
 the society of his wife and children. A 
 great change had taken place in his situa- 
 tion ; his old habits were broken ; and 
 the new circumstances in which he was 
 placed were calculated to give a new di- 
 rection to his thoughts and conduct. f But 
 his application to the cares and labours 
 of his farm was interrupted by several 
 visits to his family in Ayrshire ; and as 
 the distance was too great for a single j 
 day's journey, he generally spent a night ' 
 at an inn on the road. On such occasions 
 I he sometimes fell into company, and for- 
 got the resolutions he had formed. In a 
 little while temptation assailed him nearer 
 home. 
 
 His fame naturally drew upon him the 
 attention of his neighbours, and he soon 
 formed a general acquaintance in the dis- 
 trict in which he lived. The public voice 
 had now pronounced on the subject of his 
 talents ; the reception he had met with in 
 Edinburgh had given him the currency 
 which fashion bestows, he had surmount- 
 ed the prejudices arising from his humble 
 birth, and he was received at the table of 
 the gentlemen of Nithsdale with welcome, 
 with kindness, and even with respect. 
 Their social parties too often seduced him 
 from his rustic labour and his rustic fare, 
 overthrew the unsteady fabric of his reso- 
 lutions, and inflamed those propensities 
 which temperance might have weakened, 
 and prudence ultimately suppressed.}: It 
 was not long, therefore, before Burns be- 
 gan to view his farm with dislike and des- 
 pondence, if not with disgust. 
 
 Unfortunately he had for several years 
 looked to an office in the Excise as a cer- 
 tain means of livelihood, should his other 
 
 * Animated sentiments of any kind, almost alwa3ra 
 fjave lisp in our poet to some production of his muie. 
 His sentiments on this occasion were in part expressed 
 by the vigorous and characteristic, though not very 
 delicate song, beginning, 
 
 " I hae a wife o' my ain, 
 I'll partake wi' nae body ;* 
 t Mrs. Burns was about to be confined in child bedi 
 and the house at EUisland was rebuilding. 
 
 i The poem of The Wdstle (Poem, p. 74 ) celebrates 
 
 a Bacchanalian contest among three gentlemen of 
 
 I Nithsdale, where Burns appears as umpire. Mr. Rid- 
 
 1 dell died before our Bard, and some elegiac verses to 
 
 j his memory will be found entitled, H.innci oh Uu dtatk 
 
THE LIFE OF BURNS. 
 
 expectations fail. As lias already been 
 mentioned, he had been recommended to 
 the Board of Excise, and had received the 
 instructions necessaryfor such a situation. 
 He now applied to be employed ; and by 
 the interest of Mr. Graham ofFintry; was 
 appointed exciseman, or, as it is vulgarly 
 called, ganger, of the district in which he 
 lived. His farm was after this, in a great 
 iricp.sure abandoned to servants, while he 
 bcTook himself to the duties of his new 
 appointment. 
 
 He might, indeed, still be seen in the 
 spring, directing his plough, a labour in 
 which he excelled ; or with a white sheet, 
 containing his seed-corn, slung across his 
 shoulders, striding with measured steps 
 along his turned up furrows, and scatter- 
 ing the grain in the earth. But his farm 
 no longer occupied the principal part of 
 his care or his thoughts. It was not at 
 Ellisland that he was now in general to be 
 found. Mounted on horseback, this high- 
 minded poet was pursuing the defaulters 
 of the revenue, among the hills and vales 
 of Nithsdale, his roving eye wandering 
 over the charms of nature, and mnftering 
 his vmy ward fancies as he moved along. 
 
 . " I had an adventure with him in the 
 year 1790," says Mr. Ramsay, of Ochter- 
 tyre, in a letter to the editor, " when pass- 
 ing through Dumfriesshire, on a tour to 
 the South, with Dr. Stewart of Luss. See- 
 ing him pass quickly, near Closcburn, I 
 said to my companion, ' that is Burns.' 
 On coming to the inn, the hostler told us 
 he would be back in a few hours to grant 
 permits ; that where he met with any 
 thing seizable, he was no better than any 
 other gauger; in every thing else, that 
 he was perfectly a gentleman. After 
 leaving a note to be delivered to hini 
 on his return, I proceed"d to his house, 
 being curious to s^e his Jean, &c. I was 
 much pleased with his uxor Sahina quaJts, 
 and the poet's modest mansion, so unlike 
 the habitation of ordinary rustics. In the 
 evening he suiddenly bounced in upon us, 
 and said, as he entered, I come, to use the 
 words of Shakspeare, stewed in haste. In 
 fact he had ridden incredibly fast after 
 
 of Robert Riidell. From liim, and from all the mem- 
 bers of his family, Burns received not kindness oidy, 
 but friendship; and the suciety he met in general at 
 Fri t's Carse was calculated to improve his habils as 
 well as his manners. Mr Fergusson oi Craigdarroch, 
 so well known for his eloquence and social talents, 
 died soon after our poet. Sir Robert I. auili', the third 
 person in the drama, survives, and has since been en- I 
 ga<2cd in a contest of a Woodier nature. Long may he | 
 liv« to fight Che battles of lilii countrv ! (1799.; 
 
 receiving my note. We fell into conver- 
 sation directly, and soon got into the mare 
 magnum of poetry. He told me that he 
 had now gotten a story for aDrama,%vhich 
 he was to call Roh Jlacgurchan's Elshon, 
 from a popular story of Robert Bruce be- 
 ing defeated on the water of Caern, when 
 the heel of his boot having loosened in his 
 flight, he applied to Robert Macquechan 
 to fit it ; who, to make sure, ran his awl 
 nine inches up the king's heel. We were 
 now going on at a great rate, when Mr. 
 
 S popped in his head, which put a 
 
 stop to our discourse, which had become 
 very interesting. Yet in a little while it 
 was resumed : and such was the force and 
 versatility of the bard's genius, that he 
 
 made the tears run down Mr. S 's 
 
 cheeks, albeit unused to the poetic strain. 
 :f= f: * From that time we met no more, 
 and I was grieved at the reports of him 
 afterwards. Poor Burns ! we shall hardly 
 ever see his like again. He was, in truth, 
 a sort of comet in literature, irregular in its 
 motions, which did not do good propor- 
 tioned to the blaze of light it display-ed." 
 
 Tri the summer of 1791, two English 
 gentlemen, who had before met with him 
 in Edinburgh, paid a visit to him at Ellis- 
 land. On calling at the house they were 
 informed that he had walked out on the 
 banks of the river; and dismounting from 
 their horses, they proceeded in search of 
 him. On a rock that projected into the 
 stream, they saw a man employed in ang- 
 ling, of a singular appearance. He had a 
 rap made of a fox's skin on his head, a 
 loose great coat fixed round him by a belt, 
 from which depended an enormous Hi/'h- 
 land broad-sword. It was Burns. He re- 
 ceived them with great cordiality, and 
 asked them to share his humble dinner — 
 an invitation which they accepted. On 
 the table they found' boiled beef, with ve- 
 ffctables, and barley-broth, after the man- 
 ner of Scotland, of which they partook 
 heartily. After dinner, the bard told them 
 ingenuously that he had no wine to offer 
 them, nothing better than Highland whis- 
 key, a bottle of which Mrs. Burns set on 
 the board. He produced at the same time 
 his punch-bowl made of Inverary marble ; 
 and, mixing the spirit with water and su- 
 gar, filled their glasses, and invited them 
 to drink.* The travellers were in haste, 
 and besides, the flavour of the whiskey to 
 their southron palates was scarcely tolera- 
 
 * This bowl was made of the lapis ollaria, the stone 
 of which Inverary-house is built, ihi- uiaiision of tho 
 family of Argyle 
 
THE lAVE OF BURNS. 
 
 ble ; but the generous poet offered tliein 
 his best, and his ardent hospitality they 
 found it impossible to resist. Burns was 
 in his happiest mood, and the charms of 
 his conversation were altog^ether fascina- 
 ting. He ranged over a great variety of 
 topics, illuminating whatever he touched. 
 He related the tales of his infancy and of 
 his youth; he recited some of the gayest 
 and some of the tenderest of his poems ; 
 in the wildest of his strains of mirth, he 
 threw in some touches of melancholy, and 
 spread around him the electric emotions 
 of his powerful mind. The Highland 
 whiskey improved in its flavour ; the mar- 
 ble bowl was again and again emptied and 
 replenished ; the guests of our poet for- 
 got the flight of time, and the dictates of 
 prudence : at the hour of midnight they 
 lost their way in returning to Dumfries, 
 and could scarcely distinguish it when as- i 
 sisted by the morning's dawn.* | 
 
 I 
 Besides his duties in the excise and his 
 social pleasures, other circumstances in- 
 terfered with the attention of Burns to 
 his farm. He engaged in the formation 
 of a society for purchasing and circulat- 
 ing books among the farmers of his neigh- 
 bourhood, of wl'.ich he undertook the 
 management ;f and he occupied himself 
 occasionally in composing songs for the 
 musical work of Mr. Johnson, then in the 
 course of publication. These engage- 
 ments, useful and honourable in them- 
 selv.es, contributed, no ^donbt, to the ab- 
 straction of his thoughts from the busi- 
 ness of agriculture. 
 
 The consequences may be easily ima- 
 gined. Notwithstanding the uniform 
 prudence and good management of Mrs. 
 Burns, and though his rent was moder- 
 ate and reasonable, our poet found it con- 
 venient, if not necessary, to resign his 
 farm to Mr. Miller ; after having occu- 
 pied it three years and a half His office 
 in the excise had originally produced 
 about fifty pounds per annum. Having 
 acquitted himself to the satisfaction of the 
 board, he had been appointed to a new dis- 
 trict, the emoluments of which rose to 
 about seventy pounds per annum. Hoping 
 to support himself and his family on this 
 humble income till promotion should reach 
 him, he disposed of his stock and of his 
 crop on Ellis! and by public auction, and 
 removed to a small house which he had 
 
 • Given from the informatioD of one of the party. 
 t Bm No, LXXXVIU. 
 
 taken in Dumfries, about the «nd of the 
 
 year 1791. 
 
 Hitherto Burns, though addicted to 
 excess in social parties, had abstained 
 from the habitual use of strong liquors, 
 and his constitution had not suffered any 
 permanent injury from the irregularities 
 of his conduct. In Dumfries, temptations 
 to the sin that so easily beset him, continu- 
 ally presented themselves ; and his irregu- 
 larities grew by degrees into habits. 
 These temptations unhappily occurred 
 during his engagements in the business 
 of his ofiice, as well as during his hours 
 of relaxation ; and though he clearly fore- 
 saw the consequences of yielding to them, 
 his appetites and sensations, which could 
 not prevent the dictates of his judgment, 
 finally triumphed over the powers of his 
 will. Yet this victory was not obtained 
 without many obstinate struggles, and at 
 times temperance and virtue seemed to 
 have obtained the mastery. Besides his 
 engagements in the excise, and the so- 
 ciety into which they led, many circum- 
 stances contributed to the melancholy 
 fate of Burns. His great celebrity made 
 him an object of interest and curiosity to 
 strangers, and few persons of cultivated 
 minds passed through Dumfries without 
 attempting to see our poet, and to enjoy 
 the pleasure of his conversation. As he 
 could not receive them under his own . 
 humble roof, these interviews passed at 
 the inns of the town, and often terminated 
 in those excesses which Burns sometimes 
 provoked, and was seldom able to resist. 
 And among the inhabitants of Dumfries 
 and its vicinity, there were never want- 
 ing persons to share his social pleasures ; 
 to lead or accompany him to the tavern ; 
 to partake in the wildest sallies of his wit ; 
 to witness the strength and the degrada- 
 tion of his genius. 
 
 Still, however, he cultivated the society 
 of persons of taste and of respectability, ' 
 and in their company could impose on him- 
 self the restraints of temperance and deco- . 
 rum. Nor was his muse dormant. In 
 the four years which he lived in Dumfries, 
 he produced many of his beautiful lyrics, 
 though it does not appear that he at- 
 tempted any poem of considerable length. 
 Duruig this time he made several excur- 
 sions into the neighbouring country, of 
 one of which, through Galloway, an ac- 
 count is preserved in a letter of Mr. Sj-me, 
 written soon after ; which, as it gives an 
 • animated picture of him l\ a correct and 
 
THE LIFE OF BURNS. 55 
 
 masterly hand, we shall present to the lady he would try. Here is what he pro- 
 reader, duced 
 
 "I got Burns a gray Highland shelty 
 to ride on. We dined the first day, !iJ7th 
 July, 1793, at Glendenwynes of Parton ! a 
 beautiful situation on the banks of the Dee. 
 In the evening we walked out, and ascend- 
 ed a gentle eminence, from which we had 
 as fine a view of Alpine scenery as can well 
 be imagined. A delightful soft evening 
 showed all its wilder as well as its grander 
 graces. Immediately opposite, and with- 
 in" a mile of us, we saw Airds, a charming 
 romantic place, where dwelt Low, the 
 author of Mary weep no more for me.* 
 This was classical ground for Burns. He 
 viewed •' the highest hill wliich rises o'er 
 the source of Dee ;" and would have staid 
 till "the passing spirit," had appeared, 
 had we not resolved to reach Kenmore 
 that night. We arrived as Mr. and Mrs. 
 Gordon were sitting down to supper. 
 
 " Here is a genuine baron's seat. The 
 castle, an old building, stands on a large 
 natural moat. In front, tlie river Ken 
 winds for several miles through the most 
 fertile and beautiful holm,\ till it expands 
 into a lake twelve miles long, the banks 
 of which, on the south, present a fine and 
 soft landscape of green knolls, natural 
 wood, and here and there a gray rock. 
 On the north, the aspect is great, wild, 
 and, I may say, tremendous. In short, I 
 can scarcely conceive a scene more ter- 
 ribly romantic than the castle of Ken- 
 more. Burns thinks so highly of it, that 
 he meditates a description of it in poetry. 
 Indeed, I believe he has begun the work. 
 We spent three daj's with Mr. Gordon, 
 whose polished hospitality is of an origi- 
 nal and endearing kind. Mrs. Gordon's 
 lap-dog, Echo, was dead. She would 
 have an epitaph for him. Several had 
 been made. Burns was asked for one. 
 This was setting Hercules to his distaff. 
 He disliked the subject ; but to please tlie 
 
 * A beautiful and well-known ballad, which begins 
 tbui— 
 
 " The moon had climbed the hi^'hest hill, 
 Which rises o'er the source of Dee, 
 
 And, from the eastern summit, shed 
 [is silver light on tower and tree. 
 
 t The level low ground on the banks of a river or 
 Hream. This word should be adopted from the Scot- 
 tish, as, indeed ought several others of the same na- 
 ture That dialect is singularly copioua and wart lu 
 the dvniiiuiuatiuiM t>r natiira! nbjectii. F. 
 
 " In wood and wild, yo warbling throng, 
 
 Yiuir heavy loss deplore ! 
 Now half extinct your powers of lonjc, 
 
 Sweet Echo ii no more. 
 
 Ve jarring screeching things aroud, 
 
 Scream your discordant joys ! 
 Now half your din of tuneless gong 
 With Echo silent lies." 
 
 " We left Kenmore, and went to Gate- 
 house, I took him the moor-road, where 
 savage and desolate regions extended 
 wide around. The sky was sympathetic 
 with the wretchedness of the soil ; it be- 
 came lowering and dark. The hollow 
 winds sighed, the lightnings gleamed, the 
 thunder rolled. The poet enjoyed the 
 awful pcene — he spoke not a word, but 
 seemed wrapt in meditation. In a little 
 while the rain began to fall ; it poured 
 in floods upon us. For three hours did the 
 wild elements rumble their belly full upon 
 our defenceless heads. Oh ! Oh ! 'tiocu 
 foul. We got utterly wet ; and to re- 
 venge ourselves Burns insisted at Gate- 
 house on our getting utterly drunk. 
 
 " From Gatehouse, we went next day 
 to Kirkcudbright, through a fine country. 
 But here I must tell you that Burns had 
 got a pair of jemm?/ boots for the journey, 
 which had been thoroughly wet, and which 
 had been dried in such manner that it 
 was not possible to get them on again. 
 The brawny poet tried force, and tore 
 them to shreds. A whiflling ve.xation of 
 this sort is more trying to the temper than 
 a serious calamity. We were going to St. 
 Mary's Isle, the seat of the Earl of Selkirk, 
 and the forlorn Burns was discomfited at 
 the thought of his ruined boots. A sick 
 stomach, and a head-ache, lent their aid, 
 and the man of verse was quite accable. 
 I attempted to reason with him. Mercy 
 on us I how he did fume with rage ! No- 
 thing could reinstate him in temper. I 
 tried various expedients, and at last hit 
 on one that succeeded. I showed him 
 the house of * * *, across the bay ol 
 Wigton. Against * * '^S with whom 
 he was offended, he expectorated his 
 spleen, and regained a most agreeable 
 temper. He was in a most epigrammatic 
 humour indeed ! He afterwards fell on 
 humbler game. There is one * * * 
 whom he dops not hn-e. lie had n ptla^- 
 ing blow a' iiim 
 
66 
 
 THE LIFE OF DURNS. 
 
 " Wlicn , deceased, to the devil went down, 
 
 'Twas nothing would serve him but Satan's own 
 
 crown : 
 Thy fool's head, quoth Satan, that crown shall wear 
 
 never, 
 I grant tbou'n as wiclfed, but not quite so clever." 
 
 " Well, I am to bring you to Kirkcud- 
 bright along with our poet, without boots. 
 1 carried the torn ruins across my saddle 
 iu spite of his fulminations, and in con- 
 tt'uipt of appearances ; and what is more, 
 Lord Selkirk carried them in his coach 
 to Dumfries. He insisted they were 
 worth mending. 
 
 " We reached Kirkcudbright about one 
 o'clock. I had promised that we should 
 dine with one of the first men in our 
 country, J. Dalzcll. But Burns was in a 
 v/ild obstreperous humour, and swore he 
 would not dine where he should be under 
 tlie smallest restraint. We prevailed, 
 therefore, on Mr. Dalzell to dine with us 
 in the inn, and had a very agreeable party. 
 Li the evening we set out for St. Mary's 
 Isle. Robert had not absolutely regained 
 tlie milkiness of good temper, and it oc- 
 curred once or twice to him, as he rode 
 along, that St. Mary's Isle was the seat 
 of a Lord ; yet that Lord was not an aris- 
 tocrat, at least in the sense of the word. 
 We arrived about eight o'clock, as the 
 family were at tea and coffee. St. Ma- 
 ry's Isle is one of the most delightful 
 places that can, in my opinion, be formed 
 by the assemblage of every soft, but not 
 tame object which constitutes natural and 
 cultivated beauty. But not to dwell on 
 its external graces, let me tell you that 
 we found all the ladies of the family (all 
 beautiful) at home, and some strangers ; 
 and among others who but Urbani ! The 
 Italian sung us many Scottish songs, ac- 
 companied with instrumental music. The 
 two young ladies of Selkirk sung also. 
 We had the song of Lord Gregory, which 
 I asked for. to have an opportunity of 
 calling on Burns to recite his ballad to 
 that tune. He did recite it ; and such 
 was the effect that a dead silence ensued. 
 It was such a silence as a mind of feel- 
 ing naturally preserves when it is touched 
 with that enthusiasm which banishes 
 every other thought but the contempla- 
 tion and indulgence of the sympathy pro- 
 duced. Burns's Lord Gregory is, in my 
 opinion, a most beautiful and affecting 
 ballad. The fastidious critic may per- 
 haps say some of the sentiments and im- 
 agery are of to«, elevated a kind for such 
 a style of compositien ; for instance, 
 
 " Thou bolt of heaven that passest by ;" 
 and " Ye, mustering thunder," &c. ; but 
 this is a cold-blooded objection, which 
 will be said rather thanye/<. 
 
 " We enjoyed a most happy evening at 
 Lord Selkirk's. We had, in every sense 
 of the word, a feast, in which our minds 
 and our senses were equally gratified. 
 The poet was delighted with his company, 
 and acquitted himself to admiration. The 
 lion that had raged so violently in the 
 morning, was now as mild and gentle as 
 a lamb. Next day we returned to Dum- 
 fries, and so ends our peregrination. I 
 told you, that in the midst of the storm, 
 on the wilds of Kenmore, Burns was rapt 
 in meditation. What do you think he 
 was about ? He was charging the Eng- 
 lish army along with Bruce, at Bannock- 
 burn." He was engaged in the same man- 
 ner on our ride home from St. Mary's 
 Isle, and I did not disturb him. Next 
 day he produced me the following address 
 of Bruce to his troops, and gave me a 
 copy for Dalzell." 
 
 " Scots wha hae wi' Wallace bled," &c 
 
 Burns had entertained hopes of pro- 
 motion in the excise ; but circumstances 
 occurred which retarded their fulfilment, 
 and which in his own mind, destroyed all 
 expectation of their being ever fulfilled. 
 The extraordinary events which ushered 
 in the revolution of France, interested 
 the feelings, and excited the hopes of 
 men in every corner of Europe. Preju- 
 dice and tyranny seemed about to disap- 
 pear from among men, and the day-star 
 of reason to rise upon a benighted world. 
 In the dawn of this beautiful morning, 
 the genius of French freedom appeared 
 on our southern horizon with the coun- 
 tenance of an angel, but speedily assum- 
 ed the features of a demon, and vanished 
 in a shower of blood. 
 
 Though previously a Jacobite and a 
 cavalier, Burns had shared in the original 
 hopes entertained of this astonishing re- 
 volution, by ardent and benevolent minds. 
 The novelty and the hazard of the at- 
 tempt meditated by the First, or Con- 
 stituent Assembly, served rather, it is 
 probable, to recommend it to his daring 
 temper ; and the unfettered scope pro- 
 posed to be given to every kind of talents, 
 was doubtless gratifying to the feelings of 
 ronsciouH but indignant genius. Burns 
 foresaw not the mighty ruin that was to 
 
THE LIFE OF BURNS. 
 
 57 
 
 be the immediate consequence of an enter- 
 prise, which on its commencement, pro- 
 mised so much happiness to the human 
 race. And even after the career of guilt 
 and of blood commenced, he could not 
 immediately, it may be presumed, with- 
 draw his partial gaze from a people who 
 had so lately breathed the sentiments of 
 universal peace and benignity ; or oblite- 
 rate in his bosom the pictures of hope and 
 of happiness to which those sentiments 
 had given birth. Under these impres- 
 sions, he did not always conduct himself 
 with the circumspection and prudence 
 which his dependant situation seemed to 
 demand. He engaged indeed in no popu- 
 lar associations, so common at the time 
 of which we speak : but in company he 
 did not conceal his opinions of public 
 measures, or of the reforms required in 
 the practice of our government ; and 
 sometimes in his social and unguarded 
 moments, he uttered them with a wild 
 and unjustifiable vehemence. Informa- 
 tion of this was given to the Board of 
 Excise, with the exaggerations so gene- 
 ral in such cases. A superior officer in 
 that department was authorised to inquire 
 into his conduct. Burns defended him- 
 self in a letter addressed to one of the 
 Board, written with great independence 
 of spirit, and with more than his accus- 
 tomed eloquence. The officer appointed to 
 inquire into his conduct gave a favourable 
 report. His steady friend, Mr. Graham of 
 Fintry, interposed his good offices in his be- 
 half ; and the imprudent ganger was suf- 
 fered to retain his situation, but given to un- 
 derstand that his promotion was deferred, 
 and must depend on his future behaviour. 
 
 " This circumstance made a deep im- 
 pression on the mind of Burns. Fame 
 exaggerated liis misconduct, and repre- 
 sented him as actually dismissed from his 
 office ; and this report induced a gentle- 
 man of much respectability to propose a 
 subscription in his favour. The offer 
 was refused by our poet in a letter of 
 great elevation of sentiment, in which he 
 gives an account of the whole of this 
 transaction, and defends himself from the 
 imputation of disloyal sentiments on the 
 one hand, and on the other, from the 
 charge of having made submissions for 
 the sake of his office, unworthy of his 
 character. 
 
 " The partiality of my countrymen," he 
 ODserveg, *' has broneht me forward as a 
 man of genms, and haa given me a cha- 
 
 racter to support. In the poet 1 have 
 avowed manly and independent senti- 
 ments, which I hope have been found in 
 the man. Reasons of no less weight than 
 the support of a wife and children, have 
 pointed out my present occupation as the 
 only eligible line of life within my reach. 
 Still my honest fame is my dearest con- 
 cern, and a thousand times have I trem- 
 bled at the idea of the degrading epithets 
 that malice or misrepresentation may affix 
 to my name. Often in blasting anticipa- 
 tion have I listened to some future hack- 
 ney scribbler, with the heavy malice of 
 savage stupidity, exultingly asserting thai 
 Burns, notwithstanding the Fanfaronnade 
 of independence to be found in his works, 
 and after having been held up to public 
 view, and to public estimation, as a man 
 of some genius, yet, quite destitute of re- 
 sources within himself to support his bor- 
 rowed dignity, dwindled into a paltry ex- 
 ciseman, and slunk out the rest of his in- 
 significant existence in the meanest of 
 pursuits, and among the lowest of mankind. 
 
 " In your illustrious hands, Sir, permit 
 me to lodge my strong disavowal and de- 
 fiance of such slanderous falsehoods. 
 Burns was a poor man from his birth, and 
 an exciseman by necessity ; but — I will 
 say it ! the sterling of his honest worth 
 poverty could not debase, and his inde- 
 pendent British spirit, oppression might 
 bend, but could not subdue." 
 
 It was one of the last acts of his life to 
 copy this letter into his book of manu- 
 scripts accompanied by some additional 
 remarks on the same subject. It is not 
 surprising, that at a season of universal 
 alarm for the safety of the constikition, the 
 indiscreet expressions of a man so power- 
 ful as Burns, should have attracted notice. 
 The times certainly required extraordina- 
 ry vigilance in those intrusted with the ad- 
 ministration of the government, and to 
 ensiire the safety of the constitution was 
 doubtless their first duty. Yet generous 
 minds will lament that tlieir measures of 
 precaution should have robbed the ima- 
 gination of our poet of the last prop on 
 which his hopes of independence rested ; 
 and by embittering his peace, have aggra- 
 vated those excesses which were soon to 
 conduct him to an untimely grave. 
 
 Though the vehemence of Burns's tem- 
 per, increased as it often was by stimu- 
 lating liquor?, niiirlit l"-a<l him into many 
 improper and unguarded expr^Mions, 
 
58 
 
 THE LIFP. OF BURNS. 
 
 there seeiits no reason to doubt of his at- 
 tachment to our mixed form of govern- 
 ment. In his conunoa-place book, where 
 he could have no temptation to disguise, 
 are the following sentiments. — " What- 
 ever might be my sentiments of republics, 
 ancient or modern, as to Britain, I ever 
 abjured the ide^, A constitution, which 
 iii its original principles, experience has 
 proved to be every way fitted for our hap- 
 {)iness, it would be insanity to abandon 
 for an untried visionary theory." In con- 
 formity to these sentiments, when the 
 pressing nature of public affairs called, in 
 1795, for a general arming of the people. 
 Burns appeared in the ranks of the Dum- 
 fries volunteers, and employed his poetical 
 talents in stimulating their patriotism ;* 
 and at this season of alarm, he brought 
 forward a hymn,f worthy of the Grecian 
 muse, when Greece was most conspicuous 
 for genius and valour. 
 
 Though by nature of an athletic form. 
 Burns had in his constitution the peculi- 
 arities and delicacies that belong to the 
 temperament of genius. He was liable, 
 from a very early period of life, to that in- 
 terruption in the process of digestion, which 
 arises from deep and anxious thought, and 
 which is sometimes the effect and some- 
 times the cause of depression of spirits. 
 Connected with this disorder of the sto- 
 mach, there was a disposition to head- 
 ache, affecting more especially the tem- 
 ples and eye-balls, and frequently accom- 
 panied by violent and irregular movements 
 of the heart. Endowed by nature with 
 great sensibility of nerves. Burns was, in 
 his corporeal, as well as in his mental sys- 
 tem, liable to inordinate impressions; to 
 fever of body as well as of mind. This 
 predisposition to disease, which strict 
 temperi'uce in diet, regular exercise, and 
 sound sleep, might have subdued, habits 
 of a very different nature strengthened 
 and inflamed. Perpetually stimulated by 
 alcohol in one or other of its various forms, 
 the inordinate actions of the circulating 
 
 * See Poem entitled The Dumfries Volunteers. 
 
 t Thi- Song of Death, Poems, p. S3 This poem was 
 written in 1791 It was printed in Johnson's Musical 
 JUuscum. The poet had an intention, in the latter part 
 of his life, of printing it separately, set to music, but 
 was advised against it, of at least discouraged from it. 
 The martial ardour which rose so high afterwards, on 
 the threatened invasinn, had not then acquired the 
 tone necessary to give popularity to tliis noble poem; 
 which to the Editor, seems more calculated to invigo- 
 rate the spirit of defence, in a season of real and press- 
 ing danger, than any production of modern timet. 
 
 system became at length habitual; the 
 process of nutrition was unable to sup- 
 ply the waste, and the powers of life be- 
 gan to fail. Upwards of a year before his 
 death, there was an evident decline in our 
 poet's personal appearance, and though 
 his appetite continued unimpaired, he \v&s 
 himself sensible that his constitution was 
 sinking. In his moments of thought he 
 reflected with the deepest regret on his 
 fatal progress, clearly foreseeing the goal 
 towards which he was hastening, without 
 the strength of mind necessary to stop, or 
 even to slacken his course. His temper 
 now became more irritable and gloomy ; 
 he fled from himself into society, often of 
 the lowest kind. And in such company, 
 that part of the convivial scene, in which 
 wine increases sensibility and excites be- 
 nevolence, was hurried over, to reach the 
 succeeding part, over which uncontrolled 
 passion generally presided. He who suf- 
 fers the pollution of inebriation, how shall 
 he escape other pollution ? But let us re- 
 frain from the mention of errors over 
 which delicacy and humanity draw the 
 veil. 
 
 In the midst of all his wanderings. Burns 
 met nothing in his domestic circle but 
 gentleness and forgiveness, except in the 
 gnawings of his own remorse. He ac- 
 knowledged his transgressions to the wife 
 of his bosom, promised amendment, and 
 again and again received pardon for his 
 offences. But as the strength of his body 
 decayed, his resolution became feebler,and 
 habit acquired predominating strength. 
 
 From October, 1795, to the January 
 following, an accidental complaint con- 
 fined uim to the house. A few days af- 
 ter he began to go abroad, he dined at a 
 tavern, and returned home about three 
 o'clock in a very cold morning, benumbed 
 and intoxicated. This was followed by 
 an attack of rheumatism, which confined 
 him about a week. His appetite now 
 began to fail ; his hand shook, and his 
 voice faltered on any exertion or emo- 
 tion. His pulse became weakpr and more 
 rapid, and pain in the larger joints, and in 
 the hands and feet, deprived him of the 
 enjoyment of refreshing sleep. Too much 
 dejected in his spirits, and too well aware 
 of his real situation to entertain hopes of 
 recovery, he was ever musing on the ap- 
 proarliing desolation of his famJly, and 
 his spirits sunk into a uniform gloom. 
 
 Tt was hoped bv some of his friends, 
 
THE LIFE OF KITRNS. 
 
 that if he could live through the months 
 of spring, the succeeding season might 
 restore him. But they were disappointed. 
 The genial beams of the sun infused no 
 vigour into his languid frame : the sum- 
 mer wind blew upon him, but produced 
 no refreshment. About the latter end of 
 .lune he was advised to go into the coun- 
 try, and impatient of medical advice, as 
 well as of every species of control, he de- 
 termined for himself to try the effects of 
 bathing in the sea. For this purpose he 
 took up his residence at Brow, in Annan- 
 dale, about ten miles east of Dumfries, on 
 the shore of the Solway-Firth. 
 
 It happened that at that time a lady 
 with whom he had been connected in 
 friendship by the sympathies of kindred 
 genius, was residing in the immediate 
 neighbourhood.* Being informed of his 
 arrival, she invited him to dinner, and 
 sent her carriage for him to the cottage 
 where he lodged, as he was unable to 
 walk. — " I was struck," says this lady (in 
 a confidential letter to a friend written 
 soon after,) " with his appearance on en- 
 tering the room. The stamp of death was 
 imprinted on his features. He seemed 
 already touching the brink of eternity. 
 His first salutation was, ' Well, Madam, 
 have you any commands for the other 
 world ?' I replied, that it seemed a doubt- 
 ful case which of us should be there soon- 
 est, and that I hoped he would yet live to 
 write my epitaph. (I was then in a bad 
 state of health.) He looked in my face 
 with an air of great kindness, and express- 
 ed his concern at seeing me look so ill, 
 with his accustomed sensibility. At table 
 he ate little or nothing, and he complain- 
 ed of having entirely lost the tone of his 
 stomach. We had a long and serious 
 , conversation about his present situation, 
 and the approaching termination of all 
 his earthly prospects. He spoke of his 
 death without any of the ostentation of 
 philosophy, but with firmness as well as 
 feeling, as an event likely to happen very 
 soon ; and which gave him concern chiefly 
 from leaving hi,-> four children so young 
 and unprotected, and his wife in so inter- 
 esting a situation — in hourly expectation j 
 of lying in of a fifth. He mentioned, with 
 seeming pride and satisfaction, the promis- 
 ing genius o:"his eldest son, and the flat- j 
 tering marks of approbation he had re- 
 ceived from his teachers, and dwelt par- I 
 ticularly on his hopes of that boy's future I 
 
 •For a character of thi= ladv, jpe letter, No. CXXIX. j 
 R2 
 
 conduct and merit. His anxiety for his 
 
 family seemed to hang heavy upon him, 
 and the more perhaps from the reflection 
 that he had not done them all the justice 
 he was so well qualified to do. Passing 
 from this subject, he showed great con- 
 cern about the care of 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 in- 
 jury of his future reputation; that letters 
 and verses written with unguarded and 
 improper freedom, and which he earnestly 
 wished to have buried in oblivion, would 
 be lianded about by idle vanity or malevo- 
 lence, when no dread of his resentment 
 would restrain them, or prevent the cen- 
 sures of shrill-tongued malice, or the in- 
 sidious sarcasms of envy, from pouring 
 forth all their venom to blast his fame. 
 
 " He lamented that he had written many 
 epigrams on persons against whom he en- 
 tertained no enmity, and whose characters 
 he should be sorry to wound ; and many 
 indifferent poetical pieces, which he fear- 
 ed would now, with all their imperfections 
 on their head, be thrust upon the world. 
 On this account he deeply regretted hav- 
 ing deferred to put his papers in a state 
 of arrangement, as he was now quite in- 
 capable of the exertion." — The lady goes 
 on to mention many other topics of a pri- 
 vate nature on which he spoke. — " The 
 conversation," she adds, " was kept up 
 with great evenness and animation on his 
 side. I had seldom seen his mind greater 
 or more collected. There was frequently 
 a considerable degree of vivacity in his 
 sallies, and they would probably have had 
 a greater share, had not the concern and 
 dejection I could not disguise, damped the 
 spirit of pleasantry he seemed not unwil- 
 ling to indulge. 
 
 " We parted about sunset on the even- 
 ing of that day (the 5th July, 1796 ;) the 
 next day I saw him again, and we parted 
 to meet no more !" 
 
 At first Burns imagined bathing in the 
 sea had been of benefit to him : the pains 
 in his limbs were relieved ; but this w^as 
 immediately followed by a new attack of 
 fever. When brought back to his own 
 house in Dumfries, on the 18th of .Tulv, 
 he was no longer able to stand upright. 
 At this time a tremor pervaded his frame: 
 hia tongue was parched, and his mind 
 
60 
 
 THE LIFE OF BURNS. 
 
 sunk Into deliriun, ^hert not roused by 
 conversation. On the second and third 
 day the fever increased, and his strength 
 diminished. On the fourth, the sufferings 
 of this great but ill-fated genius, were' 
 terminated ; and a life was closed in which 
 virtue and passion had been at perpetual 
 variance.* 
 
 The death of Burns made a strong and 
 general impression on all who had inter- 
 ested themselves in his character, and es- 
 pecially on the inhabitants of the town 
 and county in which he had spent the 
 latter years of his life. Flagrant as his 
 follies and errors bad been, they had not 
 deprived him of the respect and regard 
 entertained for the extraordinary powers 
 of his genius, and the generous qualities 
 of his heart. The Gentlemen-Volunteers 
 of Dumfries determined to bury their il- 
 lustrious associate with military honours, 
 and every preparation was made to ren- 
 der this last service solemn and impres- 
 sive. The Fencible Infantry of Angus- 
 ehire, and the regiment of cavalry of the 
 Cinque Ports, at that time quartered in 
 Dumfries, offered their assistance on this 
 occasion ; the principal inhabitants of the 
 town and neighbourhood determined to 
 walk in the funeral procession ; and a vast 
 concourse of persons assembled, some of 
 them from a considerable distance, to wit- 
 ness the obsequies of the Scottish Bard. 
 On the evening of the 25th of July, the 
 remains of Burns were removed from his 
 house to the Town-Hall, and the funeral 
 took place on the succeeding day. A 
 party of the volunteers, selected to per- 
 form the military duty in the church-yard, 
 stationed themselves in the front of the pro, 
 cession, with their arms reversed ; the main 
 body of the corps surrounded and support- 
 ed the coffin, on which were placed the 
 hat and sword of their friend and fellow- 
 soldier ; the numerous body of attendants 
 ranged themselves in the rear ; while the 
 Fencible regiments of infantry and caval- 
 ry lined the streets from the Town-Hall 
 to the burial ground in the Southern 
 church-yard, a distance of more than half 
 a mile. The whole procession moved for- 
 ward to that sublime and affecting strain 
 of music, the Dc^td March in Saul ; and 
 three volleys fired over his grave, marked 
 the return of Burns to his parent earth ! 
 The spectacle was in a high degree grand 
 
 * The particulars respecting the illness and death of 
 Burns were oblidncK fMrni^hed by Dr. Maxwell, the 
 physician who attended him. 
 
 and solemn, and accorded with the gene- 
 ral sentiments of sympathy and sorrow 
 which the occasion had called forth. 
 
 It was an affecting circumstance, that, 
 on the morning of the day of her hus- 
 band's funeral, Mrs. Burns was undergo- 
 ing the pains of labour ; and that during 
 the solemn service we have just been de- 
 scribing, the posthumous son of our poet 
 was born. This infant boy, v/ho received 
 the name of Maxwell, was not destined 
 to a long life. He has already become an 
 inhabitant of the same grave with his 
 celebrated father. The four other chil- 
 dren of our poet, all sons, (the eldest at 
 that time about ten years of age) yet sur- 
 vive, and give every promise of prudence 
 and virtue that can be expected from their 
 tender years. They remain under the 
 care of their affectionate mother in Dum- 
 fries, and are enjoying the means of edu- 
 cation which the excellent schools of that 
 town afford ; the teachers of which, in 
 their conduct to the children of Burns, do 
 themselves great honour. On this occa- 
 sion the name of Mr. Whyte deserves to 
 be particularly mentioned, himself a poet, 
 as well as a man of science.* 
 
 Burns died in great poverty ; but the 
 independence of his spirit and the exem- 
 plary prudence of his wife, had preserved 
 him from debt. He had received from 
 his poems a clear profit of about nine hun- 
 dred pounds. Of this sum, the part ex- 
 pended on his library (which was far from 
 extensive) and in the humble furniture of 
 his house, remained ; and obligations 
 were found for two hundred pounds ad- 
 vanced by him to the assistance of those 
 to whom he was united by the ties of 
 blood, and still more by those of esteem and 
 affection. When it is considered, that his 
 expenses in Edinburgh, and on his various 
 journeys, could not be inconsiderable ; that 
 his agricultural undertaking was unsuc- 
 cessful; that his income from the excise was 
 for some time as low as fifly, and never 
 rose to above seventy pounds a-year i 
 that his family was large, and his spirit 
 liberal — no one will be surprised that 
 his circumstances were so poor, or that, 
 as his health decayed his proud and feel- 
 ing heart sunk under the secret con- 
 sciousness of indigence, and the apprehen- 
 sions of absolute want. Yet poverty 
 never bent the spirit of Burns to any pe- 
 
 * Authi^- nf "St. GtierdonV Wi»ll," a poani; and a< 
 A TiibutG Lo the Memory of Bum*." 
 
THE LIFE OF BURNS. 
 
 fit 
 
 cuniary meanness. Neither chicanery 
 nor sordidness ever appeared in his con- 
 duct. He carried his disregard of mo- 
 ney to a blameable excess. Even in the 
 midst of distress he bore himself loftily 
 to the world, and received with r-. ; -"alous 
 reluctance every offer of friendly assis- 
 tance. His printed poems had procured 
 him great celebrity, and a just and fair 
 recompense for the latter offsprings of his 
 pen might have produced him considera- 
 ble emolument. In the year 1795, the 
 Editor of a London newspaper, high in its 
 character for literature, and independence 
 of sentiment, made a proposal to him that 
 he should furnish them, once a week, 
 with an article for their poetical depart- 
 ment, and receive from them a recom- 
 pense of fifty-two guineas per annum ; 
 an offer which the pride of genius disdain- 
 ed to accept. Yet he had for several 
 years furnished, and was at that time fur- 
 nishing, the Museum of Johnson with his 
 beautiful lyrics, without fee or reward, 
 and was obstinately refusing all recom- 
 pense for his assistance to the greater 
 work of Mr. Thomson, which the jus- 
 tice and generosity of that gentleman was 
 pressing upon him. 
 
 The sense of his poverty, and of the ap- 
 proaching distress of his infant family, 
 pressed heavily on Burns as he lay on the 
 bed of death. Yet he alluded to his in- 
 digence, at times with something ap- 
 proaching to his wonted gayety. — " What 
 business," said he to Dr. Maxwell, who 
 attended him with the utmost zeal, " has 
 a physician to waste his time on me ? I 
 am a poor pigeon, not worth plucking. 
 Alas ! I have not feathers enough upon 
 me to carry me to my grave." And when 
 his reason was lost in delirium his ideas 
 ran in the same melancholy train ; the 
 horrors of a jail were continually present 
 to his troubled imagination, and produced 
 the most affecting exclamations. 
 
 As for some months previous to his 
 death he had been incapable of the duties 
 of his office. Burns dreaded that his salary 
 should be reduced one half as is usual in 
 such cases. His full emoluments were, 
 however, continued to him by the kind- 
 ness of Mr. Stobbie, a young expectant 
 in the Excise, who performed the duties 
 of his office without fee or reward : and 
 Mr. Graham of Fintry, hearing of his ill- 
 ness, though unacquainted with its dan- 
 gerous nature, made nn offer of his assis- 
 tance towards procuring him the means 
 
 of preserving hia health. Whatever 
 might be the fasilts of Burns, ingratitude 
 was not of the number. — Amongst his 
 manuscripts, various proofs are found of 
 the sense he entertained of Mr. Graham's 
 friendship, which delicacy towards that 
 gentleman has induced us to suppress ; 
 and on this last occasion there is no doubt 
 that his heart overflowed towards him, 
 though he had no longer the power of 
 expressing his feelings.* 
 
 On the death of Burns the inhabitants 
 of Dumfries and its neighbourhood opened 
 a subscription for the support of his wife 
 and family ; and Mr. Miller, Mr. M'Mur- 
 do, Dr. Maxwell, Mr. Syme, and Mr. 
 Cunningham, gentlemen of the first re- 
 spectability, became trustees for the ap- 
 plication of the money to its proper ob- 
 jects. The subscription was extended to 
 other parts of Scotland, and of England 
 also, particularly London and Liverpool. 
 By this means a sum was raised amount- 
 ing to seven hundred pounds ; and thus 
 the widow and children were rescued from 
 immediate distress, and the most melan- 
 choly of the forebodings of Burns happily 
 disappointed. It is true, this sum, though 
 equal to their present support, is insuffi- 
 cient to secure them from future penury 
 Their hope in regard to futurity depends 
 on the favourable reception of these vo- 
 lumes from the public at large, in the 
 promoting of which the candour and hu- 
 manity of the reader may induce him to 
 lend his assistance- 
 Burns, as has already been mentioned, 
 was nearly five feet ten inches in height, 
 and of a form that indicated agility as well 
 as strength. His well-raised forehead, 
 shaded with black curling hair, indicated 
 extensive capacity. His eyes were large, 
 dark, full of ardour and intelligence. His 
 face was well formed ; and his comite- 
 nance uncommonly interesting and ex- 
 pressive. His mode of dressing, which 
 was oflen slovenly, and a certain fulness 
 and bend i i his shoulders, characteristic 
 of his original profession, disguised in 
 some degree the natural symmetry and 
 elegance of his form. The external ap- 
 pearance of Burns was most strikingly in- 
 dicative of the character of lijp mind. On 
 a first view, his physiognomy had a cer- 
 tain air of coarseness, mingled, however, 
 
 * The letter of Mr. Graliam, alluded to above, is 
 dated on the 13th of July, and probably arrived on tha 
 I5th. Burns became delirious on the 17th or Itlih, 
 and died on th« 2l8t' 
 
6t 
 
 TUB Lira of buriss 
 
 with an expression of deep penetration, 
 and of calm thoughtfulness, approaching 
 to melancholy. There appeared in his 
 first manner and address, perfect ease 
 and self-possession, but a stern and almost 
 supercilious elevation, not, indeed, incom- 
 patible with openness and affability, which, 
 however, bespoke a mind conscious of su- 
 perior talents. Strangers that supposed 
 themselves approaching an Ayrshire pea- 
 Bant who could make rhymes, and to whom 
 their notice was an honour, found them- 
 selves speedily overawed by the presence 
 of a man who bore himself with dignity, 
 and who possessed a singular power of 
 correcting forwardness, and of repelling 
 intrusion. But though jealous of the re- 
 spect due to himself. Burns never enforced 
 it where he saw it was willingly paid ; 
 and, though inaccessible to the approach- 
 es of pride, he was open to every advance 
 of kindness and of benevolence. His dark 
 and haughty countenance easily relaxed 
 into a look of good-will, of pity, or of ten- 
 derness ; and, as the various emotions 
 succeeded each other in his mind, assumed 
 with equal ease the expression of the 
 broadest humour, of the most extravagant 
 mirth, of the deepest melancholy, or of 
 the most sublime emotion. The tones of 
 his voice happily corresponded with the 
 expression of his features, and with the 
 feelings of his mind. When to these en- 
 dowments are added a rapid and distinct 
 apprehension, a most powerful under- 
 standing, and a happy command of lan- 
 guage — of strength as well as brilliancy 
 of expression — we shall be able to ac- 
 count for the extraordinary attractions of 
 liis conversation — for the sorcery which 
 in his social parties he seemed to exert 
 on all around him. In the company of 
 women this sorcery was more especially 
 apparent. Their presence charmed the 
 fiend of melancholy in his bosom, and 
 awoke his happiest feelings; it excited 
 the powers of his fancy, as -well as the 
 tenderness of his heart ; and, by restrain- 
 ing the vehemence and the exuberance 
 /of his language, at time? gave to his man- 
 ners the impression of taste, and even of 
 elegance, which in the company of men | 
 they seldom possessed. This influence 
 was doubtless reciprocal. A Scottish 
 Lady, acc#tomed to the best society, de- 
 clared with charncteristic naivete, that no 
 man's conversation ever carried her so j 
 compfetf^y off her f'et as that of Burns ; I 
 and an English Lady, familiarly acquaint- I 
 ed with several of tlip most r'i^^'inrr'iiidi'^d : 
 charswters of the present times, assurer! ' 
 
 the Editor, that in the happiest of his so- 
 cial hours, there was a charm about Burns 
 which she had never seen equalled. This 
 charm arose not more from the power than 
 the versatility of his genius. No languor 
 could be felt in the society of a man who 
 passed at pleasure from grave to gat/, from 
 the ludicrous to the pathetic, from the sim- 
 ple to the sublime ; who wielded all his 
 faculties with equal strength and ease, 
 and never failed to impress the offspring 
 of his fancy with the stamp of his under 
 standing. 
 
 This indeed, is to represent Burns in his 
 happiest phasis. In large and mixed par- 
 ties he was often silent and dark, some- 
 times fierce and overbearing; he was 
 jealous of the proud man's scorn, jealous 
 to an extreme of the insolfence of wealth, 
 and prone to avenge, even on its innocent 
 possessor, the partiality of fortune. By 
 nature kind, brave, sincere, and in a sin- 
 gular degree compassionate, he was on 
 the other hand proud, irascible, and vin- 
 dictive. His virtues and his failings had 
 their origin in the extraordinary sensi- 
 bility of his mind, and equally partook of 
 the chills and glows of sentiment. His 
 friendships were liable to interruption 
 from jealousy or disgust, and his enmities 
 died away under the influence of pity or 
 self-accusation. His understanding was 
 equal to the other powers of his mind, 
 and his deliberate opinions were singular- 
 ly candid and just ; but, like other men of 
 great and irregular genius, the opinions 
 which he delivered in conversation were 
 often the offspring of temporary feelings, 
 and widely different from the calm deci- 
 sions of iiis judgment. This was not 
 merely true respecting the characters of 
 others, but in regard to some of the most 
 important points of human speculation. 
 
 On no subject did he give a more strik- 
 ing proof of the strength of his under- 
 standing, than in the correct estimate he 
 formed of himself. He knew his own 
 failings ; he predicted their consequence ; 
 the melancholy foreboding was never long 
 absent from liis mind ; yet his passions 
 carried him dowm the stream of error, 
 and swept him over the precipice he saw 
 directly iji his course. The fatal defect 
 in his character lay in the comparative 
 weakness of his volition, that superior 
 faculty of the mind, which governing the 
 conduct according to *hp dictates of the 
 understanding, alon" "ntitlos it to be dp- 
 nominated rational ; u hich ia the parent 
 
THK TJF(3l OF BURNS. 
 
 of fortitude, patience, and self-denial ; 
 which, by reofulaHng and combining hu- 
 man exertions, mny bo said to have ef- 
 fected all that is great in the. works of 
 man, in literature, in science, or on the 
 face of nature. The occupations of a 
 poet are not calculated to strengthen the 
 governing powers of the mind, or to weak- 
 en that sensibility which requires per- 
 petual control, since it gives birth to the 
 vehemence of passion as well as to the 
 higher powers of imagination. Unfortu- 
 nately the favourite occupations of genius 
 are calculated to increase all its peculi- 
 arities ; to nourish that lofty pride which 
 disdains the littleness of prudence, and 
 the restrictions of order : and by indul- 
 gence, to increase that sensibility which, 
 in the present form of our existence, is 
 scarcely compatible with peace or happi- 
 ness-, even when accompanied with the 
 choicest gifts of fortune ! 
 
 It is observed by one who was a friend 
 and associate of Burns,* and who has 
 contemplated and explained the system of 
 animated nature, that no sentient being 
 with mental powers greatly superior to 
 those of men, could possibly live and be 
 happy in this world — " If such.a being 
 really existed," continues he, " his ftiisery 
 "would be extreme. With senses more 
 delicate and refined ; with perceptions 
 more acute and penetrating; with a taste 
 90 exquisite that the objects around him j 
 would by no means gratify it ; obliged to 
 feed on nourishment too gross for his 
 frame ; he must be born only to be mis- 
 erable ; and the continuation of his exis- 
 tence would be utterly impossible. Even 
 in our present condition, the sameness 
 and the insipidity of objects and pursuits, 
 the futility of pleasure, and the infinite 
 sources of excruciating pain, are support- 
 ed with great difficulty by cultivated and 
 refined minds. Increase our sensibilities, 
 continue the same objects and situation, 
 and no man could bear to live." 
 
 Thus it appears, that our powers of 
 sensation as well as all our other powers, 
 are adapted to the scene of our existence ; 
 that they are limited in mercy, as well as 
 in wisdom. 
 
 The speculations of Mr. Smellie are 
 not to be considered as the dreams of a 
 theorist ; they were probably founded on 
 sad experience. The being he supposes, 
 
 • Smellie — Se« bit "Philosophy of Natural History." 
 
 " with senses more delicate and refined, 
 with perceptions more acute and pene- 
 trating," is to be found in real life. He 
 is of the temperament of genius, and per- 
 haps a poet. Is there, then, no remedy 
 for this inordinate sensibility ? Are there 
 no means by which the happiness of one 
 so constituted by nature may be consult- 
 ed ? Perhaps it will be found, that regular 
 and constant occupation, irksome though 
 it may at first be, is the true remedy 
 Occupation in which the powers of the 
 understanding are exercised, will dimin- 
 ish the force of external impressions, an 
 keep the imagination under restraint. 
 
 That the bent of every man's mind 
 should be followed in his education and 
 in his destination in life, is a maxim which 
 has been often repeated, but which can- 
 not be admitted, without many restric- 
 tions. It may be generally true when 
 applied to weak minds, which being capa- 
 ble of little, must be encouraged and 
 strengthened in the feeble impulses by 
 which that little is produced. But where 
 indulgent nature has bestowed her gifts 
 with a liberal hand, the very reverse of this 
 maxim ought frequently to be the rule of 
 conduct. In minds of a higher order, the 
 object of instruction and of discipline is 
 very often to restrain, rather than to im- 
 pel ; to curb the impulses of imagina- 
 tion, so that the passions also may be 
 kept under control.* 
 
 Hencie the advantages, even in a moraj 
 point of view, of studies of a severer na- 
 ture, which while they inform the under- 
 standing, employ the voHtion,*that regu- 
 lating power of the mind, which, like all 
 our other faculties, is strengthened by ex- 
 ercise, and on the superiority of which, 
 virtue, happiness, and hgnourable fame, 
 are wholly dependant. Hence also the 
 advantage of regular and constant appli- 
 
 * Quinctilian discusses the impnrtnnt question, whe- 
 ther the bent of the individual's genius should be fol- 
 lowed in his education (on secundum siii quisque v, 
 genii docendus sit naturam,) chiefly, indeed, with ». 
 reference to the orator, but in a way that admits of 
 very general wpplication. His conclusions coincide 
 very much with thnss of the text. " An vero Isocrates 
 cum de Ephorn atqnn Thenpninpo sic judicaret, ut al- 
 teri freiiis, alteri calr rribus :>pus esse diceret ; aut in 
 illo lentlore tarditatem, aut in illo pene prsecipiti con- 
 cilationem adjuvandiim di}cendoexistimavit?cum alte- 
 rum alterius natuiamiscendum arhitrarctur. Itnbecillis 
 tameti ingeniis sane sic obsequendum, sit, ut tantum in 
 id quo vocat natura, ducaatur. Ita enim, quod solum 
 possunt. melius effieienu" 
 
 Inst. Orator, lib. ii a 
 
d4 
 
 THE LIFE OF BURNS. 
 
 cation, which aids the voluntary power by 
 the production of habits so necessary to 
 the support of oi'der and virtue, and so 
 difficult to be formed in the temperament 
 of genius. 
 
 The man who is so endowed and so re- 
 gulated, may pursue his course with con- 
 fidence in almost any of the various walks 
 of life which choice or accident shall open 
 to him ; and, provided he employs the ta- 
 lents he has cultivated, may hope for such 
 imperfect happiness, and such limited suc- 
 cess, as are reasonably to be expected from 
 human exertions. 
 
 The pre-eminence among men, which 
 procures personal respect, and which ter- 
 minates in lasting reputation, is seldom 
 or never obtained by the excellence of a 
 single faculty of mind. Experience teach- 
 es us, that it has been acquired by those 
 only who have possessed the comprehen- 
 sion and the energy of general talents, 
 and who have regulated their application, 
 in the line which choice, or perhaps ac- 
 cident, may have determined, by the dic- 
 tates of their judgment. Imagination is 
 supposed, and with justice, to be the lead- 
 ing faculty of the poet. But what poet 
 has stood the test of time by the force of 
 this single faculty ? Who does not see 
 that Homer and Shakspeare excelled the 
 rest of their species in understanding as 
 well as in imagination ; that they were 
 pre-eminent in the highest species of 
 knowledge — the knowledge of the nature 
 and character of man? On the other 
 hand, the talent of ratiocination is more 
 especiallyrequisite to the orator; but no 
 man ever obtained the palm of oratory, 
 even by the highest excellence in this 
 single talent. Who does not perceive 
 that Demosthenes and Cicero were not 
 more happy in their addresses to the rea- 
 son, than in their appeals to the passions? 
 They knew, that to excite, to agitate, 
 and to delight, are among the most po- 
 tent arts af persuasion ; and they enforced 
 their impression on the understanding, by 
 their command of all the sympathies of 
 the heart. These observations might be 
 extended to other walks of life. He wh.) 
 has the faculties fitted to excel in poetry, 
 has the faculties which, duly governed, 
 and differently directed, might lead to pre- 
 eminence in other, and, as far as respects 
 himself, perhaps in happier destinations. 
 The talents necessary to the construction 
 of an Iliad, under different discipline and 
 application, might have led armies to vic- 
 
 tory, or kingdoms to prosperity; might 
 have wielded the thunder of eloquence, or 
 discovered and enlarged the sciences that 
 constitute the power and improve the con- 
 dition of our sptcies.* Such talents are, 
 
 * The reader must not suppose it is contendf-d that 
 the same individual could have excelled in all these di- 
 rections. A certain degree of instruction and practice 
 is necessary to excellence in every one, and life is too 
 short to admit of one man, however great his talents, 
 acquiring this in all of them. It is only asserted, that 
 the same talents, differently applied, might have suc- 
 ceeded in anyonr, though perhaps, not equally well in 
 each. And, after all, this position requires certain li- 
 mitations, which the readnr's candour and judgment 
 will supply. In supposing that a great poet might have 
 made a great orator, the physical qualties necessary to 
 oratory are pre-supposed. In supposing that a great 
 orator might have made a great poet, it is a necessary 
 condition, that he should have devoted himself to poe- 
 try, and tiiat he should have acquired a proficiency in 
 metrical numbers, which by patience and attention 
 may be acquired, though the want of it has embarrass- 
 ed and chilled many of the first efforts of true poetical 
 genius. In supposing that Homer might have led armies 
 to victory, more indeed is assumed than the physical 
 qualities of a general. To these must be added that har- 
 dihood of mind, that coolness in the midst of difficulty 
 and danger, which great poets and orators are found 
 sometimes, but not always to possess. The nature of 
 the institutions of Greece and Rome produced more 
 itistances,of single individuals who excelled in various 
 departments of active and speculative life, than occur 
 in modern Europe, where the employments of men are 
 more subdivided. Many of the greatest warriors of 
 antiquity excelled in literature and in oratory. That 
 they had the viitids of great poets also, will be admitted, 
 when the qualities are justly appreciated which are 
 necessary to excite, combine, and command the active 
 energies of a great body of men, to rouse that enthusi- 
 asm which sustains fatigue, hunger, and the inclemen- 
 cies of the elements, and which triumphs over the fear 
 of death, the most powerful instinct of our nature. 
 
 The authority of Cicero may be appealed to in favour 
 of the close connexion between the poet and the orator. 
 Est enim finitimus orntori pneta, numeris adstrictior 
 paulo, verborum avtem licevtia liberior, Src. De Ora- 
 tore, Lib. i. c. 16. See also Lib. iii. c. 7. — It is true 
 the example of Cicero may be quoted against his opi- 
 nion. Hi.< attempts in verse, which are praised by Plu- 
 tarch, do not seem to hav8 met the approbation of Ju- 
 venal, or of some others. Cicero probably did not take 
 sufficient time to learn the art of the poet : hut that he 
 had the afflaUis necessary to poetical excellence, may 
 be abundantly proved from his compositions in prose. 
 On the other hand, nothing is more clear, than that, in 
 the character of a great poet, all the mental qualities of 
 nn orator are included. It is said by Quinctilian, of 
 Homer, Omnibus eloqventhe partibvs exemplvm et or- 
 turn dedit Lib. i. 47. The study of Homer is therefore 
 recommended to the orator, as of the first importance. 
 Of the two sublime poets in our own language, who are 
 hardly inferior to Homer, Shakspeare and Milion, a 
 similar recommendation may be given. It is scarcely 
 necessary to mention how much an acquaintance wiilj 
 them has availed the great oiatot who is now the priUd 
 
THE LIFE OF BURNS. 
 
 65 
 
 •indeed, rare among the productions of na- 
 ture, and occasions of bringing them into 
 full exertion are rarer still. But safe and 
 salutary occupations may be found for men 
 of genius in every direction, while the 
 useful and ornamental arts remain to be 
 cultivated, while the sciences remain to 
 be studied and to be extended, and prin- 
 ciples of science to be applied to the cor- 
 rection and improvement of art. In the 
 temperament of sensibility, which is in 
 truth the temperament of general talents, 
 the principal object of discipline and in- 
 struction is, as has already been mention- 
 ed, to strengthen the self-command ; and 
 this may be promoted by the direction of 
 the studies, more effectually perhaps than 
 has been generally understood. 
 
 If these observations be founded in truth, 
 they may lead to practical consequences of 
 some importance. It has been too much 
 the custom to consider the possession of 
 poetical talents as excluding the possibili- 
 ty of application to the severer branches 
 of study, and as in some degree incapaci- 
 tating the possessor from attaining those 
 habits, and from bestowing that attention, 
 which are necessary to success in the de- 
 tails of business, and in the engagements 
 of active life. It has been common for 
 persons conscious of such talents, to look 
 v.'ith a sort of disdain on other kinds of 
 intellectual excellence, and to consider 
 themselves as in some degree absolved 
 from those rules of prudence by which 
 humbler minds are restricted. They are 
 
 and oniament of the English bar, a character that may 
 be appealnd to with singular propriety, when we are 
 contending for the universality of genius. 
 
 The identity, or at least the great similarity, of the 
 talents necessary to excellence in poetry, oratory, paint- 
 ing, and war, will be admitted by some, who will be in- 
 clined to dispute the extension of the position to science 
 or natural knowledge. On this occasion I may quote 
 the following observations of Sir William Jones, whose 
 own example will however far exceed in weight the 
 authority of his precepts. " Abul Ola had so flourish- 
 ing a reputation, that several persons of uncommon 
 genius were ambitious of learning the art of poetry 
 from so able an instructor. His most illustrious scholars 
 were Feleki and Khakani, who were no lessemiucnt 
 for their Persian compositions, than for their f^^ftill in 
 every branch of pure and mixed matheraaticv, and par- 
 ticularly in astrcnomy ; a striking proof that a sublime 
 poet may become master of any kind of learning which 
 he chooses to profess ; since a fine imagination, a lively 
 wit, an easy and copious style, cannot possibly oh 
 struct the acquisition of any science whatever ; but 
 must necessatily.'assist him in his studies, and shorten 
 his labour " Sir William Jones' s Works, vol. ii.p.317. 
 
 too much disposed to aban{ion themselves 
 to their own sensations, and to suffer life 
 to pass away without regular exertion or 
 settled purpose. 
 
 But though men of genius are generally- 
 prone to indolence, with them indolence 
 and unhappiness are in a more especial 
 manner allied. The unbidden splendours 
 of imagination may indeed at times irra- 
 diate the gloom which inactivity produces ; 
 but such visions, though bright, are tran- 
 sient, and serve to cast the realities of 
 life into deeper shade. In bestowing great 
 talents. Nature seems ,very generally to 
 have imposed on the possessor the neces- 
 sity of exertion, if he would escape wretch- 
 edness. Better for him than sloth, toils 
 the most painful, or adventures the most 
 hazardous. Happier to him than idleness, 
 were the condition of the peasant, earn- 
 ing with incessant labour his scanty food ; 
 or that of the sailor, though hanging on 
 the yard-arm, and wrestling with the hur- 
 
 These observations might be amply il- 
 lustrated by the biography of men of ge- 
 nius of every denomination, and more es- 
 pecially by the biography of the poets. 
 Of this last description of men, few seera 
 to have enjoyed the usual portion of hap- 
 piness that falls to the lot of humanity, 
 those excepted who have cultivated poe- 
 try as an elegant amusement in the hours 
 of relaxation from other occupations, or 
 the small number who have engaged with 
 success in the greater or more arduous 
 attempts of the muse, in which all the 
 faculties of the mind have been fully and 
 permanently employed. Even taste, vir- 
 tue, and comparative independence, do 
 not seem capable of bestowing on men of 
 genius, peace and tranquillity, without 
 such occupation as may give regular and 
 healthful exercise to the faculties of body 
 and mind. The amiable Shenstone has 
 left us the records of his imprudence, of 
 his indolence, and of his unhappiness, 
 amidst the shades of the Leasowes;* and 
 the virtues, the learning, and the genius 
 of Gray, equal to the loftiest attempts of 
 the epic muse, failed to procuje him in 
 the academic bowers of Cambridge, that 
 tranquillity and that respect which less 
 fastidiousneps of taste, and greater con- 
 stancv and vigour of exertion, would have 
 doubtless obtained. 
 
 *See his Letters, which, as a display of the effecta of 
 poetical idleness, are highly insirucuv*. 
 
M 
 
 THE LIFE OF BURNS. 
 
 It is more necessary that men of genius 
 should be aware of the importance of self- 
 command, and of exertion, because their 
 indolence is peculiarly exposed, not mere- 
 ly to unhappiness, but to diseases of mind, 
 and to errors of conduct, which are gene- 
 rally fatal. This interesting subject de- 
 serves a particular investigation ; but we 
 must content ourselves with one or two 
 cursory remarks. Relief is sometimes 
 sought from the melancholy of indolence 
 in practices, which for a time sooth and 
 gratify the sensations, but which in the 
 end involve the sutferer iu darker gloom. 
 To command the external circumstances 
 by which happiness is affected, is not in 
 human power ; but there are various sub- 
 stances in nature which operate on the 
 system of the nerves, so as to give a fic- 
 titious gayety to the ideas of imagination, 
 and to alter the etfect of the external im- 
 pressions which we receive. Opium is 
 chiefly employed for this purpose by the 
 disciples of Mahomet and the inhabitants 
 of Asia; but alcohol, the principle of in- 
 toxication in vinous and spirituous liquors, 
 is preferred in Europe, and is universally 
 used in the Christian world.* Under the 
 various wounds to which indolent sensi- 
 bility is exposed, and imder the gloomy 
 apprehensions respecting futurity to which 
 
 * Tliere are a great number of other substances, 
 which may be considered under this point of view. 
 Tobacco, tea, and colfee, are of the number. These sub- 
 stances essentially differ from each other in their quali- 
 ties ; and an inquiry into the particular effects of each 
 on the health, morals, and happiness of those who use 
 them, wou'd be curious and useful. The effects of 
 wine and of opium on the temperament of sensibility, 
 the Editor intended to have dis ussed in this place at 
 some length ; but he found the subject too extensive and 
 too professional to be introduced with propriety. The 
 difficulty of abandoning any of these narcotics (if we 
 may so term them,) when inclination is strengthened by 
 habit, is well known. Johnson, in his distresses, had 
 experienced the cheering but treacherous influence of 
 wine, and by a powerful effort, abandoned it. He was 
 obliged, however, to use tea as a subsdtute, and this 
 was the solace to which he constantly had recourse 
 under his habitual melanchol}'. The praises of wine 
 form many of the most beautiful lyrics of the poets of 
 Greece and Rome, and of modern Europe. Whether 
 opium, which produces visions still more ecstatic has 
 been the theme of the eastern poems, I do not know. 
 
 Wine is drunk in small quantities at a time, in com- 
 pany, where, for a tiinf, it promotes harmony and so- 
 cial affection. Opium is swallowed by the Asiatics in 
 full doses at once and the inebriate retiies to the soli- 
 tary indulgence of his delirious imaginations. Hence 
 the wine drinker appear* in ? superior !ig!it to the im- 
 biber of opium, a distinction which he owes more to 
 thtfarm tiian to the quality of liis liquor 
 
 it is SO often a prey, how strong is the 
 temptation to liave recourse to an anti- 
 dote by which the pain of these wounds 
 is suspended, by w-hich the heart is exhi- 
 larated, visions of happiness are excited in 
 the mind, and the forms of external na- 
 ture clothed with new beauty ! 
 
 " Elysium opens round, 
 A pleasing frenzy buoys the lighten'd soul, 
 And sanguine hopes dispel your fleeting care ; 
 And what was difficult, and what was dire, 
 Yields to your prowess, and superior stars: 
 The happiest you of all that e'er were mad, 
 Or are, or shall be, could this folly last. 
 But soon your heaven is gone ; a heavier gloom 
 Shuts o'er your head 
 
 jMorning comes; your cares return 
 
 Withten fold rage. An anxious stomach well 
 May be endured ; so may the throbbing head : 
 But such a dim delirium ; such a dream 
 Involves you; such a dastardly despair 
 Unmans your soul, as madd'ning Pentheus felt, 
 When, baited round Citli^ron's cruel sides, 
 He saw two suns and double Thebes ascend." 
 
 Jirmstrong' s Art of Preserving Health- 
 
 Such are the pleasures and the pains 
 of intoxication, as they occur in the tem- 
 perament of sensibility, described by a 
 genuine poet, with a degree of truth 
 and energy which nothing but experience 
 could have dictated. There are, indeed, 
 some individuals of this temperament on 
 whom wine produces no cheering influ- 
 ence. On some, even in very moderate 
 quantities, its effects are painfully irri- 
 tating : in large draughts it excites dark 
 ajid melancholy ideas ; and in draughts 
 still larger, the fierceness of insanity it- 
 self. Such men are happily exempted 
 from a temptation, to which experience 
 teaches us the fiilest dispositions often 
 yield, and the influence of which, when 
 strengthened by habit, it is a humiliating 
 truth, that the most powerful minds have 
 not been able to resist. 
 
 It is the more necessary for men of 
 genius to be on their guard against the 
 habitual use of wine, because it is apt to 
 steal on them insensibly ; and because 
 the temptation to excess usually presents 
 itself to them in their social hours, when 
 they aye alive only to warm and generous 
 emotions, and when prudence and mode- 
 ration are often contemned as selfishness 
 and timidity. 
 
 It is the more necessary for them to 
 guard against excess in the use of wine, 
 
THE LIFE OF BURNS. 
 
 67 
 
 because on them its effects are. physically 
 and morally, in an especial manner inju- 
 rious. In proportion to its stimulating 
 influence on the system (on which the 
 pleasurable sensations depend,) is the de- 
 bility that ensues ; a debility that destroys 
 digestion, and terminates in habitual fe- 
 ver, dropsy, jaundice, paralysis, or insani- 
 ty. As the strength of the body decays, 
 the volition fails ; in proportion as the 
 sensations are soothed and gratified, the 
 sensibility increases ; and morbid sensi- 
 bility is the parent of indolence, because, 
 M'hile it impairs the regulating power of 
 the mind, it exaggerates all the obstacles 
 to exertion. Activity, perseverance, and 
 self-command, become more and more 
 difficult, and the great purposes of utility, 
 patriotism, or of honourable ambition, 
 which had occupied the imagination, die 
 away in fruitless resolutions, or in feeble 
 eiforts. 
 
 To apply these observations to the sub- 
 ject of our memoirs, would be a useless as 
 well as a painful task. It is, indeed, a 
 duty we owe to the living, not to allow 
 our admiration of great genius, or even 
 our pity for its unhappy destiny, to con- 
 ceal or disguise its errors. But there are 
 sentiments of respect, and even of tender- 
 ne.-s, with which this duty should be per- 
 formed ; there is an awful sanctity which 
 invests the mansions of the dead ; and let 
 those who moralise over the graves of 
 their contemporaries, reflect with humili- 
 ty on their ovvn errors, nor forget how 
 soon they may themselves require the 
 candour and the sympathy they are called 
 upon to bestow. 
 
 Soon after the death of Burns, the fol- 
 lowing article appeared in the Dumfries 
 Journal, from which it was copied into 
 the Edinburgh newspapers, and into vari- 
 ous other periodical publications. It is 
 from the elegant pen of a lady already 
 alluded to in the course of these memoirs,* 
 whose exertions for the family of our bard, 
 in the circles of literature and fashion in 
 which she moves, have done her so much 
 honour. 
 
 " The attention of the public seems to 
 be much occupied at present with the loss 
 it has recently sustained in the death of 
 the Caledonian poet, Robert Burns ; a 
 
 j loss calculated to be severely felt through- 
 out the literary world, as well as lamented 
 in the narrower sphere of private friend- 
 ship. It was not, therefore, probable, that 
 such an event should be long unattended 
 with the accustomed profusion of posthu- 
 mous anecdotes and memoirs which are 
 usually circulated immediately after the 
 death of every rare and celebrated person- 
 age : I had, however, conceived no inten- 
 tion of appropriating to myself the privi- 
 lege of criticising Burns's writings and 
 character, or of anticipating on the pro- 
 vince of a biographer. 
 
 "Conscious, indeed, of my own ina- 
 bility to do justice to such a subject, I 
 should have continued wholly silent, 
 had misrepresentation and calumny been 
 less industrious; but a regard to truth, 
 no less than affection for the memory of 
 a friend, must now justify my offering to 
 the public a few at least of those obser- 
 vations which an intimate acquaintance 
 with Burns, and the frequent opportuni- 
 ties I have had of observing equally his 
 happy qualities and his failings for seve- 
 ral years past, have enabled me to com- 
 municate. 
 
 " It will actually be an injustice done 
 to Burns's character, not only by future 
 generations and foreign countries, but 
 even by his native Scotland, and perhaps 
 a number of his contemporaries, that he 
 is generally talked of, and considered, 
 with reference to his poetical talents onln: 
 for the fact is, even allowing his great 
 and original genius its due tribute of ad- 
 miration, that poetry (I appeal to all who 
 have had the advantage of being person- 
 ally acquainted with him) was actually 
 not h\s forte. Many others, perhaps, may 
 have ascended to prouder heights in the 
 region of Parnassus, but none certainly 
 ever outshone Burns in the charms — the 
 sorcery, I would almost call it, of fasci- 
 nating conversation, the spontaneous elo- 
 quence of social argument, or the unstu- 
 died poignancy of brilliant repartee ; nor 
 was any man, I beheve, ever gifted with 
 a larger portion of the ' vivitia vis animi.' 
 His personal endowments were perfectly 
 correspondent to the qualifications of his 
 mind ; his form was manly ; his action, 
 energy itself; devoid in a great measure 
 perhaps of those graces, of that polish, 
 acquired only in the refinement of soci- 
 eties where in early life he could have no 
 opportunities of mixing : but where such 
 was the irresistible power of attraction 
 
68 
 
 THE LIFE OP BURNS. 
 
 that, encircled him, thwigrh his appearance 
 and manners were always peculiar, he 
 never tailed to delight and to excel. His 
 figure seemed to bear testimony to his 
 earlier destination and employments. It 
 seemed rather moulded by nature for the 
 roujfh exercises of agriculture, than the 
 gentler cultivation of the Belles Lettres. 
 His features were stamped with the hardy 
 character ofindopendenccandtue firmness 
 of conscious, though not arrogant, pre- 
 eminence ; the animated expressions of 
 countenance were almost peculiar to him- 
 self ; the rapid lightnings of his eye were 
 always the harbingers of some flash of 
 genius, whether they darted the fiery 
 glances of insulted and indignant superi- 
 ority, or beamed with the impassioned 
 sentiment of fervent and impetuous afl^ec- 
 tions. His voice alone could improve 
 upon the magic of his eye : sonorous, re- 
 plete with the finest modulations, it al- 
 ternately captivated the ear with the 
 melody of poetic numbers, the perspicuity 
 of nervous reasoning, or the ardent sal- 
 lies of enthusiastic patriotism. The keen- 
 ness of satire was, I am almost at a loss 
 whether to say, his forte or his foible; for 
 though nature had endowed him with a 
 portion of the most pointed excellence in 
 that dangerous talent, he suffered it too 
 often to be the vehicle of personal, and 
 sometimes unfounded animosities. It 
 was not always that sportiveness of hu- 
 mour, that ' unwary pleasantry,' which 
 Sterne has depicted with touches so con- 
 ciliatory, but the darts of ridicule were 
 frequently directed as the caprice of the 
 instant suggested, or as the altercations of 
 parties and of persons happened to kindle 
 the restlessness of his spirit into interest 
 or aversion. This, however, was not in- 
 variably the cnse : his wit (which is no 
 unusual matter indeed) had always the 
 start of his judgment, and would lead hin: 
 to the indulgence of raillery uniformly 
 acute but often unaccompanied with the 
 least desire to wound. The suppression 
 of an arch and full-pointed bon-mot, from 
 the dread of otTonding its object, the sage 
 of Zurich very properly classes as a vir- 
 tue only to he sought for in the Calendar 
 of Saints : if so, Burns must not be too 
 severely dealt with <V)r being rather de- 
 ficient in it. He paid for his mischievous 
 wit as dearly as any one could do. ' 'Twas 
 no extravagrant arithmetic,' to say of hirn, 
 as was said of Yorick, that ' for every ten 
 jokes he got a hundred enemies:' but 
 much allowance will be made by a candid 
 mind for the splenetic warmth of a spirit 
 
 whom ' distress had spited with the world,' 
 and which, unbounded in its intellectual 
 sallies and pursuits, continually experi- 
 enced the curbs imposed by the wayward- 
 ness of his fortune. The vivacity of his 
 wishes and temper was indeed checked 
 by almost habitual disappointments, which 
 sat heavy on a heart that acknowledged 
 the ruling passion of independence, with- 
 out ever having been placed beyond the 
 grasp of penury. His soul was never 
 languid or inactive, and his genius was 
 extinguished only with the last spark of 
 retreating life. His passions rendered 
 him, according as they disclosed them- 
 selves in affection or antipathy, an object 
 of enthusiastic attachment, or of decided 
 enmity ; for he possessed none of that 
 negative insipidity of character, whose 
 love might be regarded with indifference, 
 or whose resentment could be considered 
 with contempt. In this, it should seem, 
 the temper of his associates took the tinc- 
 ture from his own ; for he acknowledged 
 in the universe but two classes of objects, 
 those of adoration the most fervent, or of 
 aversion the most uncontrollable ; and it 
 has been frequently a reproach to him, 
 that, unsusceptible of indifference, often 
 hating where he ought only to have de- 
 spised, he alternately. opened his heart and 
 poured forth the treasures of his under- 
 standing to such as were incapable of ap- 
 preciating the homage ; and elevated to 
 the privileges of an adversary some who 
 were unqualified in all respects for the 
 honour of a contest so distinguished. 
 
 " It is said that the celebrated Dr. John- 
 son professed to ' love a good hater,' — a 
 temperament that would have singularly 
 adapted him to cherish a prepossession in 
 favour of our bard, who perhaps fell but 
 little short even of the surly Doctor in 
 this qualification, as long as the disposi- 
 tion to ill-will continued ; but the warmth 
 of his passions was fortunately corrected 
 by their versatility. He was seldom, in- 
 deed never, implacable in his resentments, 
 and sometimes, it has been alleged, not 
 inviolably faithful in his engagements oi 
 friendship. Much, indeed, has been said 
 about his inconstancy and caprice ; but I 
 am inclined to believe that they origina- 
 ted less in a levity of sentiment, than from 
 an extreme impetuosity of feeling, which 
 rendered him prompt to take umbrage ; 
 and his sensations of pique, where he fan- 
 cied he had discovered the traces of ne- 
 glect, scorn, or unkindness, took their 
 measure of asperity from the overflowings 
 
THE LIFE 
 
 of the opposite sentiment which preceded 
 them, and which seldom failed to regain 
 its ascendency in iiis bosom on the return 
 of calmer reflection. He was candid and 
 manly in the avowal of his errors, and his 
 avowal was a reparation. His native^? r<c 
 never forsaking him for a moment, the 
 Talue of a frank acknowledgment was en- 
 Jianced tenfold towards a generous mind, 
 from its never being attended with ser- 
 vility. His mind, organized onlji for the 
 stronger and more acute operations of the 
 passions, was impracticable to the efforts 
 of superciliousness that would have de- 
 pressed it into humility, and equally su- 
 perior to the encroachments of venal sug- 
 gestions that might have led him into the 
 mazes of hypocrisy. 
 
 " It has been observed, that he was far 
 from averse to the incense of flattery, and 
 could receive it tempered with less deli- 
 cacy than might have been expected, as 
 he seldom transgressed extravagantly in 
 that way himself; where he paid a com- 
 pliment, it might indeed claim the power 
 of intoxication, as approbation from him 
 was always an honest tribute from the 
 warmth and sincerity of his heart. It has 
 been sometimes represented by those who 
 it should seem, had a view to depreciate, 
 though they could not hope wholly to ob- 
 scure tJiat native brilliancy, which the pow- 
 ers of this extraorclmary man had invari- 
 ably bestowed on every thing that came 
 froin his lips or pen, tliat the history of the 
 Ayrshire plough-boy was an ingenious 
 fiction, fabricated for the purposes of ob- 
 taining the interests of the great, and en- 
 hancing the merits of what required no 
 foil. The Cotter's Saturday JSTi^ht, Tarn 
 o'Shanter, and The JShmntain Daisy, be- 
 sides a number of later productions, where 
 the maturity of his genius will be readily 
 traced, and which will be given to the 
 public as soon as his friends have collect- 
 ed and arranged them, speak sufficiently 
 for themselves ; and had they fallen from 
 a hand more dignified in the ranks of so- 
 ciety than that of a peasant, they had, 
 perhaps, bestowed as unusual a grace 
 there, as even in tlie humbler sliade of 
 rustic inspiration from whence they real- 
 _ ly sprung. 
 
 " To the obscure scene of Burns's edu- 
 cation, and to the laborious, thougli ho- 
 nourable station of rural industry, in 
 which his parentage enrolled him, almost 
 every inhabitant of the south o^Scotland 
 can give testiitionv. His only survivingr 
 
 OF BURNS. 69 
 
 brother, Gilbert Burns, now guides the 
 ploughshare of his forefathers in Ayrshire, 
 at a farm near Mauchline ;* and our poet's 
 eldest son (a lad of nine years of age, 
 whose early dispositions already prove 
 him to be in some measure the inheritor 
 of his father's talents as well as indigence) 
 has been destined by his family to tha 
 humble employment of the loom.f 
 
 " That Burns had received no classical 
 education, and was acquainted with the 
 Greek and Roman authors only through 
 the medium of translations, is a fact of 
 which all who were in the habits of con- 
 versing with him might readily be con- 
 vinced. I have, indeed, seldom observed 
 him to be at a loss in conversation, unless 
 where the dead languages and their wri- 
 ters have been the subjects of discussion. 
 When I have pressed him to tell me why 
 he never applied himself to acquire the 
 Latin, in particular, a language which his 
 happy memory would have so soon ena- 
 bled him to be master of, he used only to 
 reply with a smile, that he had already 
 learned all the Latin he desired to know, 
 and tiiat was omnia vincit amor ; a sen- 
 tence, that from his writings and most fa- 
 vourite pursuits, it should undoubtedly 
 seem that he was most thoroughly versed 
 in : but I really believe his classic erudi- 
 tion exleuded little, if any, further. 
 
 " The penchant Binns had uniformly 
 acknowledged for the festive pleasures of 
 the table, and towards the fairer and soft- 
 er objects of nature's creation, has been 
 the rallying point from whence the at- 
 tacks of his censors have been uniformly 
 directed : and to these, it must be con- 
 fessed, he showed himself no stoic. His 
 poetical pieces blend with alternate hap- 
 piness of description, the frolic spirit of 
 the flowing bowl, or melt the heart to the 
 tender and impassioned sentiments in 
 which beauty always taught him to pour 
 forth his own. But who would wish to 
 reprove the feelings he has consecrated 
 with such lively touches of nature ? And 
 where is the rugged moralist who will 
 persuade us so far to ' chill the genial 
 current of the soul,' as to regret that Ovid 
 ever celebrated his Corinna, or that An- 
 acreon sung beneath hia vine ? 
 
 * Thig very respectable and very superior man Is now 
 romovod to Dumfriesshire. He rents lands on the 
 estate of Closehurn, and is n tenant of the venerable 
 P-- Monteith, flPOO.) E. 
 
 t This dettlnatinn is now altered. '1800.) B 
 
70 
 
 THE LIFE OP BURNS. 
 
 *• 1 will not, however, undertake, to be 
 the apologist of the irregularities even of 
 a man of genius, though 1 believe it is as 
 certain that genius never was free from 
 irregularities, as that their absolution 
 may, in a great measure, be justly claim- 
 ed, since it is perfectly evident that the 
 world had continued very stationary in its 
 intellectual acquirements, had it never 
 given birth to any but men of plain sense. 
 Evenness of conduct, and a due regard to 
 the decorums of the world, have been so 
 rarely seen to move hand in hand with 
 genius, that some have gone as far as to 
 say, though there I cannot wholly acqui- 
 esce, that they are even incompatible, be- 
 sides the frailties that cast their shade 
 over the splendour of superior merit, are 
 more conspicuously glaring than where 
 they are the attendants of mere mediocri- 
 ty. It is only on the gem we are disturb- 
 ed to see the dust : the pebble may be 
 soiled, and we never regard it. The ec- 
 centric intuitions of genius too often yie^d 
 the soul to the wild effervescence of de- 
 sires, always unbounded, and sometimes 
 equally dangerous to the repose of others 
 as fatal to its own. No wonder, then, if vir- 
 tue herself be sometimes lost in the blaze 
 of kindling animation, or that the calm mo- 
 nitions of reason are not invariably found 
 sufficient to fetter an imagination, which 
 scorns the narrow limits and restrictions 
 that would chain it to the level of ordina- 
 ry minds. The child of nature, the child 
 of sensibility, unschooled in the rigid pre^ 
 cepts of philosophy, too often imable to 
 control the passions which proved a source 
 of frequent errors and misfortunes to him. 
 Burns made his own artless apology in 
 language more impressive than all the 
 argumentatory vindications in the world 
 could do, in one of his own poems, where 
 he delineates the gradual expansion of his 
 mind to th^ lessons of the ' tutelary muse,' 
 who concludes an address to her pupil, al- 
 most unique for simplicity and beautiful 
 poetry, with these lines : 
 
 " I saw Ihy pulse's madd'iiing play 
 Wild send thee pleasure's devious way, 
 Misled by fancy's meteor ray 
 
 By passion driven; 
 But yet the lisht that led astray 
 
 Was light from heaven "♦ 
 
 " I have already transgressed beyond 
 the bounds I had proposed to myself, on 
 first committing this sketch to paper, 
 which comprehends what at least I have 
 
 • Vide the Vision— Duan ad. 
 
 been led to deem the leading features of 
 Burns's mind and character : a literary 
 critique I do not aim at ; mine is wholly 
 fulfilled, if in these pages I have been 
 able to delineate 9,ny of those strong traits, 
 that distinguished him, of those talents 
 which raised him from the plough, where 
 he passed the bleak morning of his life, 
 weaving his rude wreaths of poesy with | 
 the wild field-flowers that sprang around 
 his cottage, to that enviable eminence of 
 literary fame, where Scotland will long 
 clierish his memory with delight and gra- 
 titude ; and proudly remember, that be- 
 neath her cold sky a genius was ripened, 
 without care or culture, that would have 
 done honoiir to climes more favourable to 
 those luxuriances — that warmth of co- 
 louring and fancy in which he so emi- 
 nently excelled. 
 
 " From several paragraphs I have no- 
 ticed in the public prints, ever since the 
 idea of sending this sketch to some one 
 of them was formed I find private ani- 
 mosities have not yet subsisded, and that 
 envy has not exhausted all her shafts. I 
 still trust, however, that honest fame will 
 be permanently affixed to Burns's charac- 
 ter, which I think it will be found he hag 
 merited by the candid and impartial among 
 his countrymen. And where a recollec- 
 tion of the imprudence that sullied his 
 brighter qualifications interpose, let the 
 imperfections of all human excellence be 
 remembered at the same time, leaving 
 those inconsistencies, which alternately 
 exalted his nature into the seraph, and 
 sunk it again into the man, to the tribu- 
 nal which nlnne can investigate the laby- 
 rinths of the human heart — 
 
 ' Whf>re they alikp in tremhlnie hope repose, 
 — The bosom of his father and his God.' 
 
 Gkay's Elegy. 
 
 .9nnnndnU .3«; 
 
 After this account of the life and per- 
 sonal character of Burns, it may be ex- 
 pected that some inquiry should be made 
 into his literary merits. It will not, how- 
 ever, be necessarv to enter very minutely 
 into this investigation. If fiction be, as 
 some suppose, the soul of poetry, no one 
 had ever less pretensions to the name 
 of poet than Burns. Though he has dis- 
 played great powers of imagination, yet 
 the subjects on which he hps written, are 
 seldom, if ever, imaginary : his poems, as 
 well as his letters, may be considered as 
 the effusions of his sensibility, and the 
 
THE LIFE OF BURNS. 
 
 transcript of his own musings on the real 
 incidents of his humble life. If we add, 
 that they also contain most happy deline- 
 ations of the characters, manners, and 
 scenery that presented themselves to his 
 observation, we shall include almost all 
 the subjects of his muse. His writings 
 may, therefore, b» regarded as affording 
 a great part of the data on which our ac- 
 count of his personal character has been 
 founded ; and most of the observations we 
 have applied to the man, are applicable, 
 with little variation, to the poet. 
 
 The impression of his birth, and of his 
 original station in life, was not more evi- 
 dent on his form and manners, than on 
 his poetical productions. The incidents 
 which form the subjegts of his poems, 
 though some of them highly interesting, 
 and susceptible of poetical imagery, are 
 incidents in the life of a peasaat who takes 
 no pains to disguise the lowliness of his 
 condition, or to throw into shade the cir- 
 cumstances attending it, which more fee- 
 ble or more artificial minds would have 
 endeavoured to conceal. The same rude- 
 ness and inattention appears in the for- 
 mation of his rhymes, which are frequent- 
 ly incorrect, while the measure in which 
 many of the poems are written, has little 
 of the pomp or harmony of modern versi- 
 fication, and is indeed to an English ear, 
 strange and lincouth. The greater part 
 of his earlier poems are written in the di- 
 alect of his country, which is obscure, if 
 not unintelligible to Englishmen ; and 
 which, though it still adheres more or less 
 to the speech of almost every Scotchman, 
 all the polite and the ambitious are now 
 endeavouring to banish from their tongues 
 as well as their writings. The use of it 
 in composition naturally therefore calls 
 up ideas of vulgarity in the mind. These 
 singularities are increased by the charac- 
 ter of the poet, who delights to express 
 himself with a simplicity that approaches 
 to nakedness, and with an unmeasured 
 energy that often alarms delicacy, and 
 pometimes offends taste. Hence, in ap- 
 proaching hira, the first impression is per- 
 haps repulsive : there is an air of coarse- 
 ness about him which is difficultly recon- 
 ciled with our established notions of po- 
 etical excellence. 
 
 As the reader however becomes better 
 acquainted with the poet, the effects of 
 his peculiaritips lessen. He perceives in 
 his poRms, even on the lowest subjects, 
 expressions of-sentiment, and delineations 
 
 of manners, which are highly interesting. 
 The scenery he describes is evidently ta- 
 ken from real life ; the cliaracters he in- 
 troduces, and the incidents he relates, 
 have the impression of nature and truth. 
 His humour, though wild and unbridled, 
 is irresistibly amusing, and is sometimes 
 heightened in its effects by the introduc- 
 tion of emotions of tenderness, with which 
 genuine humour so happily unites. Nor 
 is this the extent of his power. The rea- 
 der, as he examines farther, discovers 
 that the poet is not confined to the de- 
 scriptive, the humorous, or the pathetic ; 
 he is found, as occasion offers, to rise with 
 ease into the terrible and the sublime. 
 Every where he appears devoid of arti- 
 fice performing what he attempts with 
 little apparent effort ; and impressing on 
 the offspring of his fancy the stamp of his 
 understanding. The reader, capable of 
 forming a just estimate of poetical talents, 
 discovers in these circumstances marks 
 of uncommon genius, and is willing to in- 
 vestigate more minutely its nature and its 
 claims to originality. This last point we 
 shall examine first. 
 
 That Burns had not the advantages of 
 a classsical education, or of any degree of 
 acquaintance with the Greek or Roman 
 writers in their original dress, has appear- 
 ed in the history of his life. He acquired 
 indeed some knowledge of the PVench lan- 
 guage, but it does not appear that he was 
 ever much conversant in French litera- 
 ture, nor is there any evidence of his 
 having derived any of his poetical stores 
 from that source. Witli the English clas- 
 sics he became well acquainted in the 
 course of his life, and the effects of this 
 acquaintance are observable in his latter 
 productions ; but the character and style 
 of his poetrv were formed very early, 
 and the model which he followed, in as 
 far as he can be said to have had one, is 
 to be sought for in the works of the po- 
 ets who have written in the Scottish dia- 
 lect — in the works of such of them more 
 especially, as are familiar to the peasantry 
 of Scotland. Some observations on these 
 may form a proper introduction to a more 
 particular examination of the poetry of 
 Burns. The studies of the Editor in this 
 direction are indeed very recent and very- 
 imperfect. It would have been impru- 
 dent for him to have entered on this sub- 
 ject at all, but for tlie kindness of Mr. 
 Ramsay of Ochtertyre, whose assistance 
 he is proud to acknowledge, and to whom 
 the reader must ascribe whatever \» of 
 
72 
 
 THE LIFE OF BURNS. 
 
 any value in the following imperfect 
 sketch of literary compositions in the 
 Scottish idiom. 
 
 It is a circumstance not a little curious, 
 and which does not seem to be satisfac- 
 torily explained, that in the thirteenth 
 century, the language of the two British 
 nations, if at all different, differed only in 
 the dialect, the Gaelic in the one, like 
 the Welsh and Armoric in the other, be- 
 ing confined to the mountainous districts.* 
 The English under the Edwards, and the 
 Scots under Wallace and Bruce, spoke 
 the same language. We may observe 
 also, that in Scotland the history of poetry 
 ascends to a period nearly as remote as 
 in England. Barbour, and Blind Harry, 
 James the First, Dunbar, Douglas and 
 Lindsay, who lived in the fourteenth, fif- 
 teenth, and sixteenth centuries, were co- 
 eval with the fathers of poetry in Eng- 
 land ; and in the opinion of Mr. Whar- 
 ton, not inferior to them in genius or in 
 composition. Though the language of 
 the two countries gradually deviated 
 from each other during this period, yet 
 the difference on the whole was not con- 
 siderable ; not perhaps greater than be- 
 tween the different dialects of the differ- 
 ent parts of England in our own time. 
 
 At the death of James the Fifth, in 
 1542, the language of Scotland w'as in a 
 flourishing condition, wanting only wri- 
 ters in prose equal to those in verse. 
 Two circumstances, propitious on the 
 whole, operated to prevent this. The 
 first was the passion of the Scots for com- 
 position in Latin ; and the second, the 
 accession of James the Sixth to the Eng- 
 lish throne. It may easily be imagined, 
 that if Buchanan had devoted his admi- 
 rable taljnts, even in part, to the culti- 
 vations of his native tongue, as was done 
 by the revivers of letters in Italy, he 
 would have left compositions in that lan- 
 guage which might have incited other 
 men of genius to have followed his exam- 
 ple,! and given dura^tion to the language 
 itself. The union of the two crowns in the 
 person of James, overthrew all reasonable 
 expectation of this kind. That monarch, 
 seated on the English throne, would no 
 longer suffer himself to be addressed in 
 the rude dialect in which the Scottish 
 
 ♦Historical Essay on Scottish Song, ;i. 20, by M. 
 Bitson. 
 
 f e g. The Authors of tlie Dclicite Foetarum Scoto 
 itm,d-e 
 
 clergy had so often insulted nis dignity.' 
 He encouraged Latin or English only, 
 both of which he prided himself on wri- 
 ting with purity, though he himself never 
 could acquire the English pronunciation, 
 but spoke with a Scottish idiom and into- 
 nation to the last. — Scotsmen of talents 
 declined writing in thei^ native language, 
 which they knew was not acceptable to 
 their learned and pedantic monarch ; and 
 at a time when national prejudice and 
 enmity prevailed to a great degree, they 
 disdained to study the niceties of the Eng- 
 lish tongue, though of so much easier ac- 
 quisition than a dead language. Lord 
 Stirling and Drummond of Hawthornden, 
 the only Scotsmen who wrote poetry in 
 those times, were exceptions. They 
 studied the language of England and com- 
 posed in it with precision and elegance. 
 They were however the last of their 
 countrymen who deserved to be consider- 
 ed as poets in that century. The muses 
 of Scotland sunk into silence, and did not 
 again raise their voices for a period of 
 eighty years. 
 
 To what causes are we to attribute this 
 extreme depression among a people com- 
 paratively learned, enterprising, and in- 
 genious ? Shall we impute it to the fa- 
 naticism of the covenanters, or to the ty- 
 ranny of the house of Stuart, after their 
 restoration to the throne ? Doubtless 
 these causes operated, but they seem un- 
 equal to account for the effect. In Eng- 
 land, similar distractions and oppression 
 took place, yet poetry flourished there in 
 a remarkable degree. During this period, 
 Cowley, and Waller, and Dryden sung, 
 and Milton raised his strain of unparallel- 
 ed grandeur. To the causes already men- 
 tioned, another must be added, in ac- 
 counting for the torpor of Scottish htera- 
 ture — tiie want of a proper vehicle for 
 men of genius to employ. The civil wars 
 had frightened away the Latin Muses, and 
 no standard had been established of the 
 Scottish tongue, which was deviating still 
 farther from the pure English idiom. 
 
 The revival of literature in Scotland 
 may be dated from the establishment of 
 the union, or rather from the extinction 
 of the rebellion in 1715. The nations be- 
 I ing finally incorporated, it was clearly 
 seen that their tongues must in the end 
 incorporate also; or rather indeed that 
 the Scottish language must degenerate 
 into a provincial idiom, to be avoided by 
 those who would aim at distinction in 
 
THE LIFE OF BURNS. 
 
 73 
 
 letters, or rise to eminence in the united 
 legislature. 
 
 Soon after this, a band of men of genius 
 appeared, who studied the English clas- 
 sics, and imitated their beauties, in the 
 same manner as they studied the classics 
 of Greece and Rome. They had admi- 
 rable models of composition lately pre- 
 sented to them by the writers of the reign 
 of Queen Anne ; particularly in the peri- 
 odical papers published by Steele, Addi- 
 son, and their associated friends, which 
 circulated widely through Scotland, and 
 diffused every where a taste for purity of 
 style and sentiment, and for critical "dis- 
 quisition. At length the Scottish writers 
 succeeded in English composition, and a 
 union was formed of the literary talents, 
 as well as of the legislatures of the two 
 nations. On this occasion the poets took 
 the lead. Wliile Henry Home,* Dr. Wal- 
 lace, and their learned associates, were 
 only laying in their intellectual stores, 
 and studying to clear themselves of their 
 Scottish idioms, Thomson, Mallet, and 
 Hamilton of Bangour had made their ap- 
 pearance before the public, and been en- 
 rolled on the list of English poets. The 
 writers in prose followed a numerous and 
 powerful band, and poured their ample 
 stores into the general stream of British 
 literature. Scotland possessed her four 
 universities before the accession of James 
 to the English throne. Immediately be- 
 fore the union, she acquired her parochial 
 schools. These establishments combining 
 happily together, made the elements of 
 knowledge of easy acquisition, and pre- 
 sented a direct path, by which the ardent 
 student might be carried along into the 
 ri>cpsses of science or learning. As civil 
 broils ceased, and faction and prejudice 
 gradually died away, a wider field was 
 opened to literary ambition, and the in- 
 fluence of the Scottish institutions for in- 
 struction, on the productions of the press, 
 became more and more apparent. 
 
 It seems indeed probable, that the es- 
 tnblishment of the parochial schools pro- 
 duced effects on the rural muse of Scot- 
 land also, which have not hitherto been 
 suspected, and which, though less splen- 
 did in their nature, are not however to be 
 regarded as trivial, whether we consider 
 the happiness or the morals of the people. 
 
 There is some reason to believe, that 
 
 • Iiord Kalmcs. 
 
 the original inhabitants of the British isles 
 possessed a peculiar and interesting spe- 
 cies of music, which being banished from 
 the plains by the successive invasions of 
 the Saxons, Danes, and Normans, was 
 preserved with the native race, in the 
 wilds of Ireland and in the mountains of 
 Scotland and Wales. The Irish, the Scot- 
 tish, and the Welsh music differ, indeed, 
 from each other, but the difference may 
 be considered as in dialect only, and pro- 
 bably produced by the influence of time, 
 and like the different dialects of their 
 common language. If this conjecture be 
 true, the Scottish music must be more 
 immediately of a Highland origin, and 
 the Lowland tunes, tliough now ofa cha- 
 racter somewhat distinct, must have de- 
 scejided from the mountains in remote 
 ages. Whatever credit may be given to 
 conjectures, evidently involved in great 
 uncertainty, there can be no doubt that 
 the Scottish peasantry have been long in 
 possession of a number of songs and bal- 
 lads composed in their native dialect, and 
 sung to their native music. The subjects 
 of these compositions were such as most 
 interested the simple inhabitants, and in 
 the succession of time varied probably as 
 the condition of society varied. During 
 the separation and the hostility of the two 
 naiions, these songs and ballads, as far as 
 our imperfect documents enable us to 
 judge, were chiefly warlike; such as the 
 Huntis of Cheviot, and the Battle of Har- 
 low. After the union of the two crowns, 
 when a certain degree of peace and of 
 tranquillity took place, the rural muse of 
 Scotland breathed in softer accents. "In 
 the want of real evidence respecting the 
 history of our songs," says Mr. Ramsay of 
 Ochtertyre, " recourse may be had to 
 conjecture. One would be disposed to 
 think that the most beautiful of the Scot- 
 tish tunes were clothed with new words 
 after tiie union of the crowns. The in- 
 liabitants of the borders, who had former- 
 ly been warriors from choice, and hus- 
 bandmen from necessity, either quitted 
 the country, or were transformed nto ■ 
 real shepherds, easy in their circumstan- i 
 ces, and satisfied witli their lot. Some 
 sparks of that spirit of chivalry for which ' 
 they are celebrated by Froissart, remain- 
 ed, sufficient to inspire elovatinn of senti- 
 ment and gallantry towards the fair sex. 
 The familiarity and kindness which had 
 long subsisted between the gentry and 
 the peasantry, could not all at once be 
 obliterated, and this connexion tended to 
 sweeten rural life. In this state of inno- 
 
THE LIFE OF EURNS. 
 
 cence, ease and tranquillity of mind, the 
 love of poetry and music would still n;iain- 
 tain its ground, though it would natural- 
 ly assume a form congenial to the more 
 peaceful state of society. The minstrels, 
 whose metrical tales used once to rouse 
 the borderers like the trumpet's sound, 
 had been by an order of the legislature 
 (in 1579,) classed with rogues and vaga- 
 bonds, and attempted to be suppressed. 
 Knox and his disciples influenced the 
 Scottish parliament, but contended in 
 vain with her rural muse. Amidst our 
 Arcadian vales, probably on the banks of 
 the Tweed, or some of its tributary 
 streams, one or more original geniuses 
 may have arisen, who were destined to 
 give a new turn to the taste of their coun- 
 trymen. They would see that the events 
 and pursuits v/hich chequer private life 
 were the proper subjects for popu- 
 lar poetry. Love, which had formerly 
 hold a divided sway with glory and am- 
 bition, became now the master passion of 
 the soul. To portray in lively and deli- 
 cate colours, though with a hasty hand, 
 the hopes and fears that agitate the breast 
 of the love-sick swain, or forlorn maiden, 
 affords ample scope to the rural poet. 
 Love-songs of which TibuUus himself 
 would not have been ashamed, might be 
 composed by an imeducated rustic with a 
 slight tincture of letters ; or if in these 
 songs, the character of the rustic be some- 
 times assumed, the truth of character, and 
 the language of nature, are preserved. 
 With imaffect^d sim])licity and tender- 
 n !ss, topics are urged, most likely to sof- 
 ten the hoart of a cruel and coy mistress, 
 or to regain a fickle lover. Even in such 
 as are of a melancholv east, a ray of hope 
 breaks through, and dispels the deep and 
 settled gloom which characterizes the 
 sweetest: of the Highland luinags, or vo- 
 cal airs. Nor are these songs all plain- 
 tive ; many of them are lively and humor- 
 ous, and some appear to us coarse and in- 
 delicate. They seem, however, genuine 
 descriptions of the manners of an ener- 
 getic and sequestered people in their hours 
 of mirth and festivity, though in their por- 
 traits some objects are brought into open 
 view,which more fastidious painters would 
 have thrown into shade. 
 
 •' As those rural poets sun? for amuse- 
 ment, not for gain, their effusions seldom 
 exceeded a love-song, or a ballad of sa- 
 tire or humour, which, like the works of 
 the elder minstrels, were seldom commit- 
 ted to writing, but treasured up in the 
 
 memory of their friends and neighbours 
 Neither known to the learned, nor patro- 
 nised by the great, these rustic bards liv- 
 ed and died in obscurity ; and by a strange 
 fatality, their story, and even their very 
 names have been forgotten.* When pro- 
 pf!r models for pastoral songs were pro- 
 duced, there would be no want of imita- 
 tors. To succeed in this species of com- 
 position, soundness of understanding, and 
 sensibility of heart were mere requisite 
 than flights of im.agination or pomp of 
 numbers. Great changes have certainly 
 taken place in Scottish song-writing, 
 though we cannot trace the steps of this 
 change ; and few of the pieces admired 
 in Queen Mary's time are now to be dis- 
 covered in modern collections. It is pos- 
 sible, though not probable, that the music 
 may have remained nearly the same, 
 though the words to the tunes were en- 
 tirely new-modelled, "f 
 
 These conjectures are highly ingenious. 
 It cannot however, be presumed, that the 
 state of ease and tranquillity described by 
 Mr. Ramsay, took place among the Scot- 
 tish peasantry immediately on the union 
 of the crowns, or indeed during the great- 
 er part of the seventeenth century. 
 The Scottish nation, through all its ranks, 
 was deeply agitated by the civil wars, and 
 the religious persecutions which succeed- 
 ed each other m that disastrous period ; 
 it was not till after the revolution in 
 ICS", and the subsequent establishment 
 of their beloved form of church govern- 
 ment, that the peasantry of the Lowlands 
 enjoyed comparative repose ; and it is 
 since that period, that a great number of 
 the most admired Scottish songs have 
 been produced, though the tunes to which. 
 they are sung, are in general of much 
 greater antiquity. It is not unreasona- 
 ble to suppose that the peace and securi- 
 tv derived from the Revolution and the 
 Union, produced a favourable change on 
 the rustic poetry of Scotland ; and it can 
 scarcely be doubted, that the institution 
 of parish-schools in 1696, by which a cer- 
 tain degree of instruction was diffused 
 
 * III the Pepys Collection, there are a few Scottish 
 songs of the last century, but the names of the authors 
 are not preserved. 
 
 t Extract of a leUer from Mr Ramsay of Ochtertyre 
 to the Editor, Sept. 11, 1799— In the Bee, vol. ii. is a 
 communication to Mr Ramsay, under the signature of 
 J. Uuiicole, which enters into this subject somewhat 
 more at largn. In that paper he gives his reasons for 
 <|iiestioniiia the antiquity of many of the most celebrated 
 Scottish songa. 
 
THE LIFE OF BURNS. 
 
 IS 
 
 univer3ally among the peasantry, contri- 
 buted to this happy effect. 
 
 Soon after this appeared Allan Ram- 
 say, the Scottish Theocritus. He was 
 born on the high mountains that divide 
 Clydesdale and Annandale, in a small 
 hamlet by the banks of Glangonar, a 
 stream which descends into the Clyde. 
 The ruins of this hamlet are still shown 
 to the inquiring traveller.* He was the 
 son of a peasant, and probably received 
 such, instruction as his parish-school be- 
 stowed, and the poverty of his parents 
 admitted. f Ramsay made his appearance 
 in Edinburgh in the beginning of the pre- 
 sent century, in the humble character of 
 an apprentice to a barber, or peruke-ma- 
 ker ; he was then fourteen or fifteen 
 years of age. By degrees he acquired 
 notice for his social disposition, and his 
 talent for the composition of verses in the 
 Scottish idiom ; and, changing his pro- 
 fession for that of a bookseller, he be- 
 came intimate with many of the literary, 
 as well as of the gay and fashionable cha- 
 racters of his time. I Having published 
 a volume of poems of his own in 1721, 
 M^hich was favourably received, he un- 
 dertook to make a collection of ancient 
 Scottish poems, under the title of the Ever- 
 Green, and was afterwards encouraged to 
 present to the world a collection of Scot- 
 tish songs. " From what sources he pro- 
 cured them," says Mr. Ramsay of Och- 
 tertyre, " whether from tradition or ma- 
 nuscript, is uncertain. As in the Ever- 
 Green he made some rash attempts to 
 improve on the originals of his ancient 
 poems, he probably used still greater free- 
 dom with the soiigs and ballads. The 
 truth cannot, however, be known on this 
 point, till manuscripts of the songs printed 
 by him, more ancient than the present 
 century, shall be produced ; or access be 
 
 ♦SeeCampbell'sHistory of Poetry inScotland, p. IH.'i. 
 
 tTlie father of Ramsay was, it is said, a workman 
 In the lead-mines of the Earl of Hopeion, at Lead-hills. 
 The workmen in those mines at present are of a very 
 superior character to miners in general. They have 
 only sis hours of labour in the day, and have time for 
 reading. They have a common library, supported by 
 contribution, containing several thousand volumes. 
 When this was instituted I have not learnud. These 
 miners are said to be of a very sober and moral cha- 
 racter: Allan Ramsay, when very young:, is supposed 
 to have been a washer of ore In these mines. 
 
 .i " He was coeval with Joseph Mitchell, and his club 
 of small wits, who about 1719, published a very poor 
 miscellany, to which Dr. Young, the author of the 
 JVi^At Thoughts prefixed a copy of verses." Ex- 
 tract of a letter from Mr. Ramtay of Ochtertyre to 
 the Editor 
 
 S 2 
 
 obtained to his own papers, if they are 
 still in existence. To several tunes which 
 either wanted words, or had words that 
 were improper or imperfect, he, or his 
 friends, adapted verses worthy of the me- 
 lodies they accompanied, worthy indeed 
 of the golden age. These verses were 
 perfectly intelligible to every rustic, yet 
 justly admired by persons of taste, who 
 regarded them as the genuine offspring 
 of the pastoral muse. In some respects 
 Ramsay hat^ advantages not possessed 
 by poets writing in the Scottish dialect 
 in our days. Songs in the dialect of 
 Cumberland or Lancashire could never 
 be popular, because these dialects have 
 never been spoken by persons of fashion. 
 But till the middle of the present century, 
 every Scotsman from the peer to the pea- 
 sant, spoke a truly Doric language. It 
 is true the English moralists and poets 
 were by this time read by every person 
 of condition, and considered as the stan- 
 dards for polite composition. But, as na- 
 tional prejudices were still strong, the 
 busy, the learned, the gay, and the fair, 
 continued to speak their native dialect, 
 and that with an elegance and poignancy, 
 of which Scotsmen of the present day can 
 have no just notion. I am old enough to 
 have conversed with Mr. Spittal, of Leu- 
 chat, a scholar and a man of fashion, who 
 survived all the members of the Union 
 Parliament, in wliich he had a seat. His 
 pronunciation and phraseology di^ered 
 as much from the common dialect, as the 
 language of St. .James's from that of 
 Thames-street. Had we retained a court 
 and parliament of our own, the tongues 
 of the two sLster-kingdoms would indeed 
 have differed like the Castilian and Por- 
 tuguese ; but each would have had its 
 own classics, not in a single branch, but 
 in the whole circle of literature. 
 
 " Ramsay associated with the men of 
 wit and fashion of his day, and several of 
 them attempted to write poetry in his 
 manner. Persons too idle or too dissipa- 
 ted to think of compositions that required 
 much exertion, succeeded very happily in 
 making tender sonnets to favourite tunes 
 in compliment to their mistresses, and, 
 transforming themselves into impassion- 
 ed shepherds, caught the language of the 
 characters they assumed. Thus, about 
 the year 1731 , Robert Crawford of Auchi- 
 names, wrote the modern song of Tweed 
 Side,* which Jias been so much admired. 
 
 • Beginning, " What beauties does Flora disclose!" 
 
76 
 
 THE LIFE OF BURNS. 
 
 In 1743, Sir Gilbert Elliot, the first of 
 our lawyers who both spoke and wrote 
 Bnglish elegantly, composed, in the cha- 
 racter of a love-sick swain, a beautiful 
 song, beginning, My sheep I neglected, I 
 lost my sheep-hook, on the marriage of his 
 mistress, Miss Forbes, with Ronald Craw- 
 ford. And about twelve years after- 
 wards, the sister of Sir Gilbert wrote the 
 ancient words to the tune of the Flowers 
 of the Forest,* and supposed to allude to 
 the battle of Flowden. In spite of the 
 double rhyme, it is a sweet, and though 
 in some parts allegorical, a natural ex- 
 pression of national sorrow. The more 
 ^modern words to the same tune, beginning, 
 1 have seen the smiling- of fortune beguiling, 
 •were written long before by Mrs. Cock- 
 "burn, a woman of great wit, who outlived 
 all the first group of literati of the pre- 
 sent century, all of whom were very fond 
 of her. I was delighted with her -"om- 
 pany, though, when I saw her, she was 
 very old. Much did she know that is 
 now lost." 
 
 In addition to these instances of Scot- 
 tish songs produced in the earlier part of 
 the present century, may be mentioned 
 the ballad of Hardiknute, by Lady Ward- 
 law ; the ballad of William and Marga- 
 ret ; and the song entitled The Birks <f 
 Endermay, by Mallet ; the love-song, be- 
 ginning, For ever. Fortune, wilt thou prove, 
 produced by the youthful muse of Thom- 
 son ; and the exquisite pathetic ballad. 
 The Braes of Yarrow, by Hamilton of Ban- 
 gour. On the revival of letters in Scot- 
 land, subsequent to the Union, a very 
 general taste seems to have prevailed for 
 the national songs and music. " For 
 many years," says Mr. Ramsay, " the 
 singing of songs was the great delight of 
 the higher and middle order of the people, 
 as weTl as of the peasantry ; and though 
 a taste for Italian music has interfered 
 with this amusement, it is still very pre- 
 valent. Between forty and fifty years 
 ago, the common people were not only 
 exceedingly fond of songs and ballads, 
 but of metrical history. Often have I, in 
 my cheerful morn of youth, listened to 
 them with delight, when reading or re- 
 citing the exploits of Wallace and Bruce 
 against the Southrons. Lord Hailes was 
 wont to call Blind Harry their Bible, he 
 being their great Tavourite next the Scrip- 
 tures. When, therefore, one in the vale 
 
 ♦ Ftpffinnins, "I havp heard a lilting atourewes- 
 wilking ■• 
 
 of life, felt the first emotions of genius, 
 
 he wanted not models sid generis. But 
 tliougli the seeds of poetry were scatter- 
 ed with a pkntrful hand among the Scot- 
 tish peasantry, the product was probably 
 like that of pears and apples — of a thou- 
 sand that spring up, nine hundred and 
 fifty are so bad as to set the teeth on 
 edge ; forty-five or more are passable and 
 useful ; and the rest of an exquisite fla- 
 vour. Allan Ramsay and JJurns are 
 wildings of this last description. They 
 had the example of the elder Scottish po- 
 ets ; tliey were not without the aid of the 
 best English writers ; and what was of 
 still more importance, they were no stran- 
 gers to the book of nature, and the book 
 of God." 
 
 From this general view, it is apparent 
 that Allan Ramsay may be considered as 
 in a great measure the reviver of the ru- 
 ral poetry of his country. His collection 
 of ancient Scottish poems, under the 
 name of The Ever-Green, his collection 
 of Scottish songs, and his own poems, the 
 principal of which is the Gentle Shepherd, 
 have been universally read among the 
 peasantry of his country, and have in 
 some degree superseded the adventures 
 of Bruce and Wallace, as recorded by 
 Barbour and Blind Harry. Burns was 
 well acquainted with all these. He had 
 also before him the poems of Fergusson 
 in the Scottish dialect, which have been 
 produced in our own times, and of which 
 it will be necessary to give a short ac- 
 count. 
 
 Fergusson was born of parents who had 
 it in their power to procure him a liberal 
 education, a circumstance, however, which 
 in Scotland implies no very high rank in 
 society. From a well written and appa- 
 rently authentic account of his life,* we 
 learn that he spent six years at the schools 
 of Edinburgh and Dundee, and several 
 years at the universities of Edinburgh and 
 St. Andrews. It appears that he was at 
 one time destined for the Scottish church; 
 but as he advanced towards manhood, he 
 renounced that intention, and at Edin- 
 burgh entered the office of a writer to the 
 signet, a title which designates a separate 
 and higher order of Scottish attorneys. 
 Fergusson had sensibility of mind, a warnj 
 and generous heart, and talents for socIq- 
 
 * In the gupptenient to the " Encyclopedia Britan- 
 iiica." Frpn'so, " CawpieH'sInlrnductioii to the His- 
 tory if "Poeliy in Scotland," p. 298. 
 
THE LIFE OF BURNS. 
 
 77 
 
 ty of the most attractive kind. To such 
 a man no situation could be more danger- 
 ous than that in which he was placed. 
 The excesses into which he was lod, im- 
 paired his feeble constitution, and he sunk 
 imder them in the month of October, 1 774, 
 in his 23d or 24th year. Burns was not 
 acquainted with the poems of this youth- 
 ful genius when he himself began to write 
 poetry ; and when he first saw them he 
 had renounced the muses. But while he 
 resided in the town of Irvine, meeting 
 with Fergusson's Scottish Poems, he in- 
 forms us that he " strung his lyre anew 
 with emulating vigour."* Touched by 
 the sympathy originating in kindred ge- 
 nius, and in the forebodings of similar for- 
 tune, Burns regarded Fergusson with a 
 partial and an affectionate admiration. 
 Over his grave he erected a monument, 
 as has already been mentioned ; and his 
 pt)ems he has, in several instances, made 
 the subjects of his imitation. 
 
 From this account of the Scottish po- 
 ems known to Burns, those who are ac- 
 quainted with them will see that they are 
 chiefly humorous or pathetic ; and under 
 one or other of these descriptions most of 
 his own poems will class. Let us com- 
 pare him with his predecessors under each 
 of these points of view, and close our ex- 
 amination with a few general observa- 
 tions. 
 
 It has frequently been observed, that 
 Scotland has produced, comparatively 
 speaking, few writers who have excelled 
 in humour. But this observation is true 
 only when applied to those who have con- 
 tinued to reside in their own country, and 
 have confined themselves to composition 
 in pure English ; and in these circum- 
 stances it admits of an easy explanation. 
 The Scottish poets, who have written in 
 the dialect of Scotland, have been at all 
 times remarkable for dwelling on subjects 
 of humour, in which indeed many of them 
 have excelled. It would be easy to show, 
 that the dialect of Scotland having be- 
 come provincial, is now scarcely suited to 
 the more elevated kinds of poetry. If we 
 may believe that the poem of Christis 
 Kirk of the Grene was written by James 
 the First of Scotland,! this accomplished 
 
 * See p. 15- 
 
 t Notwithstanding the evidence produced on tliis snb- 
 
 }eet by Mr. Tytler, the Editor acknowledges his bein^ 
 
 ■omewhat of a sceptic on this point- Sir David Dal- 
 
 rymple inclines to the opinion that it was written by 
 
 monarch, who had received an EnglisJi 
 education under the direction of Henry 
 the Fourth, and who bore arms under his 
 gallant successor, gave the model on which 
 the greater part of the humorous produc- 
 tions of the rustic muse of Scotland has 
 been formed. Christis Kirk of the Grene 
 was reprinted by Ramsay, somewhat mo- 
 dernized in the orthography, and two can- 
 toes were added by him, in which he at- 
 tempts to carry on the design. Hence the 
 poem of King James is usually printed in 
 Ramsay's works. The royal bard de- 
 scribes, in the first canto, a rustic dance, 
 and afterwards a contention in archery, 
 ending in an affray. Ramsay relates the 
 restoration of concord, and the renewal 
 of the rural sports, with the humours of a 
 country wedding. Though each of the 
 poets describes the manners of his respec- 
 tive age, yet in the whole piece there is 
 a very sufficient uniformity; a striking 
 proof of the identity of character in the 
 Scottish peasantry at the two periods, dis- 
 tant from each other three hundred years 
 It is an honourable distinction to this bo- 
 dy of men, that their character and man- 
 ners, very little embellished, have been 
 found to be susceptible of an amusing and 
 interesting species of poetry ; and it must 
 appear not a little curious, that the single 
 nation of modern Europe, which possess- 
 es an orioinal rural poetry, should have 
 received the model, followed by their rus- 
 tic bards, from the monarch on the throne. 
 
 The two additional cantoes to Christis 
 Kirk of the Grene, written by Ramsay, 
 though objectionable in point of delicacy, 
 are among the happiest of his productions. 
 His chief excellence, iifdeed, lay in the 
 description of rural characters, incidents> 
 and scenery ; for he did not possess any 
 very high powers either of imagination or 
 of understanding. He was well acquaint- 
 ed with the peasantry of Scotland, their 
 lives and opinions. The subject was in a 
 great measure new ; his talents were equal 
 to the subject ; and he has shown that it 
 may be happily adapted to pastoral poe- 
 try. In his Gentle Shepherd the charac- 
 ters are delineations from nature, the de- 
 scriptive parts are in the genuine style of 
 beautiful simplicity, the passions and af- 
 fections of rural life are finely portrayed, 
 and the heart is pleasingly interested in 
 
 his successor, James the Fifth. There are difficultiea 
 attending this supposition also. But on the subject of 
 Scottish Antiquities, the Editor is an incompetent 
 judg< 
 
19 
 
 THE LIFE OF BURNS. 
 
 the happiness that is bestowed on inno- 
 cence and virtue. Throughout the whole 
 there is an air of reality which the most 
 careless reader cannot but perceive ; and 
 in fact no poem ever perhaps acquired so 
 high a reputation, in which truth received 
 so little embellishment from the imagina- 
 tion. In his pastoral songs, and in his 
 rural tales, Ramsay appears to less ad- 
 vantage indeed, but still with considera- 
 ble attraction. The story of the Monk 
 and the Jliller's Wife, though somewhat 
 licentious, may rank with the happiest 
 productions of Prior or La Fontaine. But 
 when he attempts subjects from higher 
 life, and aims at pure English composition, 
 he is feeble and uninteresting, and seldom 
 ever reaches mediocrity.* Neither are 
 his familiar epistles and elegies in the 
 Scottish dialect entitled to much approba- 
 tion. Though Fergusson had higher pow- 
 ers of imagination than Ramsay, his ge- 
 nius was not of the highest order ; nor did 
 his learning, which was considerable, im- 
 prove his genius. His poems written in 
 pure English, in which he often follows 
 classical models, though superior to the 
 English posms of Ramsay, seldom rise 
 above mediocrity ; but in those composed 
 in the Scottish dialect he is often very 
 successful. He was in general, however, 
 less happy than Ramsay in the subjects of 
 his muse. As he spent the greater part 
 of his life in Edinburgh, and wrote for his 
 amusement in the intervals of business or 
 dissipation, his Scottish poems are chiefly 
 founded on the incidents of a town life, 
 which, though they are susceptible of hu- 
 mour, do not admit of those delineations 
 of scenery and manners, which vivify the 
 rural poetry of Ramsay, and which so 
 agreeably amuse the fancy and interest 
 the heart. The town-eclogues of Fer- 
 gusson, if we may so denominate them, 
 are however faithful to nature, and often 
 distinguistied by a very happy vein of hu- 
 mour. His poems entitled, The Daft 
 Days, The Kind's Birth-day in Edin- 
 burs:h, Leith Rares, and The Hallow Fair, 
 will justify this character. In these, par- 
 ticularly in the last, he imitated Christis 
 Kirk of the Grene, as Ramsay had done 
 before him. His Jddress to the Tronkirk 
 Bell is an exquisite piece of humour, 
 which Burns has scarcely excelled. In 
 appreciating the genius of Fergusson, it 
 ought to be recollected, that his poems 
 are the careless effusions of an irregular, 
 though amiable young man, who wrote 
 
 • Sea " The .Vorning Interview," &c. 
 
 for the periodical papers of the day, and 
 who died in early youth. Had his life 
 been prolonged under happier circum- 
 stances of fortune, he would probably have 
 risen to much higher reputation. He might 
 have excelled in rui-al poetry ; for though 
 his professed pastorals on the established 
 SiciUan model, are stale and uninterest- 
 ing. The Farmer's Li'zle* which may be 
 considered as a Scottish pastoral, is the 
 happiest of all his productions, and cer- 
 tainly was the archetype of the Cotter's 
 Saturday JVight. Fergusson, and more 
 especially Burns, have shown that the 
 character and manners of the peasantry of 
 Scotland of the present times, are as well 
 adapted to poetry, as in the days of Ram- 
 say, or of the author of Christis Kirk of 
 the Grene. 
 
 The humour of Burns is of a richer vem 
 than that of Ramsay or Fergusson, both 
 of whom, as he himself informs us, he had 
 " frequently in his eye, but rather with a 
 view to kindle at their flame, than to ser- 
 vile imitation."! His descriptive powers, 
 whether the objects on which they are 
 employed be comic or serious, animate or 
 inanimate, are of the highest order. A 
 superiority of this kind is essential to 
 every species of poetical excellence. In 
 one of his earlier poems, his plan seems 
 to be to inculcate a lesson of contentment 
 in the lower classes of society, by showing 
 that their superiors are neither much bet- 
 ter nor happier than themselves ; and 
 this he chooses to execute in a form of a 
 dialogue between two dogs. He intro- 
 duces this dialogue by an account of the 
 persons and characters of the speakers. 
 The first, whom he has named Ccesar, is 
 a dog of condition : 
 
 " His locked, letter'd, braw bras? collar, 
 Sliovv'd him the gentleman and seholar." 
 
 High-bred though he is, he is however 
 full of condescension : 
 
 " At kirk or market, mill or smiddie, 
 Nae tawtpd tyke, iho, e'er sae duddin, 
 But he wad itawn't. as glad to see him, 
 Mnd stroan't on ttanes an' hillocks wi' kirn." 
 
 The other, Luath, is a " ploughman's col- 
 lie, but a cur of a good heart and a sound 
 understanding. 
 
 •' His honest, sonsie, baws'in fare, 
 Ay gal him friends in ilka place; 
 
 The farmci's fir* stde 
 
 0«« AjiptnUn 
 
THE LIFE OF BURNS. 
 
 His breait wa» white, his towsie back 
 Weel clad wi' coat o' fr'ossy black. 
 His g-aiooie tail, icV upward curl, 
 Hung- o'er uin hurdies wt' a sicurl." 
 
 Never were twa dogs so exquisitely de- 
 lineated. Their gambols before they sit 
 down to moralize, are described with an 
 equal degree of happiness ; and through 
 the whole dialogue, the character, as well 
 as the different condition of the two speak- 
 ers, is kept in view. The speech o^Luath, 
 in which he enumerates the comforts of 
 the poor, gives the following account of 
 their merriment on the first day of the 
 year ; 
 
 ' That merry day the yeSr begins, 
 Tliey bar the door on frosty winds ; 
 The nappy reeks wi' mantling ream, 
 And sheds a heart inspiring steam ; 
 The luntin pipe, and sneeshin mill, 
 Are handed round wi' richtguidwill 
 The cantie auld folks crackin crouse, 
 The young anes rantin thro' the house, 
 My heart has been sae fain to see them, 
 
 That I for joy hoe barkit wi' them." 
 
 Of all the animals who have moralized 
 on human affairs since the days of ^Esop, 
 the dog seems best entitled to this privi- 
 lege, as well from his superior sagacity, as 
 from his being more than any other, the 
 friend and associate of man. The dogs 
 of Burns, excepting in their talent for 
 moralizing, are downright dogs ; and not 
 like the horses of Swift, or the Hind and 
 Panther of Dryden, men in the shape of 
 brutes. It is this circumstance that 
 heightens the humour of the dialogue. 
 The " twa dogs" are constantly kept be- 
 fore our eyes, and the contrast between 
 their form and character as dogs, and the 
 sagacity of their conversation, heightens 
 the humour and deepens the impression 
 of the poets, satire. Though in this poem 
 the chief excellence may be considered as 
 humour, yet great talents are displayed 
 in its composition ; the happiest powers 
 of description and the deepest insight in- 
 to the human heart.* It is seldom, how- 
 
 * When this poem first appeared, it was thought by 
 tiome very surprising that a peasant, who- had not au 
 opportunity of associating even with a simple gentle- 
 man, should have been able to portray the character of 
 high-life with such accuracy. And when it was recol- 
 lected that he had probably been at the races of Ayr, 
 where nobility as well as gentry are to be seen, it was 
 concluded that the race-ground had been the field of his 
 oJ'jeervation. This was sagacious en-ugii ; but it did 
 not requirL- such instruction to inform Purns, that hu- 
 man nature is essentially the same in the high and the 
 low ; and a genius which comprehends the human 
 mind, easily comprehends the accidental varieties in- 
 troduced by situation. 
 
 ever, that the humour of Burns appears 
 in so simple a form. The liveliness of 
 !iis sensibility frequently impels him to 
 introduce into subjects of humour, emo- 
 tions of tenderness or of pity ; and where 
 occasion admits, he is sometimes carried 
 on to exert the higher powers of imagi- 
 nation. In such instances he leaves the 
 society of Ramsay and of Fergusson, and 
 associates himself with the masters of 
 English poetry, whose language he fre- 
 quently assumes. 
 
 Of the union of tenderness and humour, 
 examples may be found in Tke Death and 
 Dying Words of poor Mailie, in The Auld 
 Farmer's JVew- Year's Morning Salutation 
 to his Mare Maggie, and in many of his 
 other poems. The praise of whiskey is 
 a favourite subject with Burns. To this 
 he dedicates his poem of Scotch Drink. 
 After mentioning its cheering influence 
 in a variety of situations, he describes, 
 with singular liveliness and power of fan- 
 cy, its stimulating effects on the black- 
 smith working at his forge : 
 
 " Nae mercy, then, for aim or steel ; 
 The brawnie, bainie, ploughman chiel, 
 Brings hard owruhip, wi' sturdy wheel, 
 
 The strong fore hammer, 
 Till block an' studdie ring an' reel 
 
 Wi' diasome clamour." 
 
 On another occasion,* choosing to exalt 
 whiskey above wine, he introduces a com- 
 parison between the natives of more ge- 
 nial climes, to whom the vine furnishes 
 their beverage, and his own countrymen 
 who drink the spirit of malt. The de- 
 scription of the Scotsmen is humorous: 
 
 " But bring a Scotsman frae his hill, 
 Clap in his cheek a' Highland gill, 
 Say such is Royal George's will, 
 
 An' there's the foe, 
 He has nae thought but how to kill 
 
 Twa at a blow." 
 
 Here the notion of danger rouses the 
 imagination of the poet. He goes on thus : 
 
 " Nae cauld, faint-hearted doubtings teajc him ; 
 Death comes, wi' fearless eye he sees him ; 
 Wi' b:uidy hand a welcome gies him 
 
 An' when he fa's, 
 His latest draught o'breathing lea'es him 
 
 In faint huzzas." 
 
 Again, nowever, he sinks into humour, 
 and concludes the poem with the follow- 
 
 *"The Author's Rarne.st Cry and Prayer to lb* 
 Scotah Representativei in Purliameni." 
 
80 
 
 THE LIFE OP BURNS. 
 
 ing most laughable, but most irreverent 
 apostrophe : 
 
 " Scotland, my auld respected Mitlierl 
 
 Tho' whiles ye moistify your leather, 
 
 • Till whare yo sit, on ciaps o' heather, 
 
 Ye tine your dam : 
 Freedom and whiskey gang thegither, 
 
 Tak oir your dram ! 
 
 Of this union of humour with the high- 
 er powers of imagination, instances may 
 be found in the poem entitled Death and 
 Dr. Hurnbook, and in almost every stan- 
 za of the Address to the Deil, one of the 
 happiest of his productions. After re- 
 proaching this terrible being with all his 
 " doings" and misdeeds, in the course of 
 which he passes through a series of Scot- 
 tish superstitions, and rises at times into 
 a high strain of poetry ; he concludes this 
 address, delivered in a tone of great fa- 
 miliarity, not altogether unmixed with 
 apprehension, in the following words : 
 
 *' But, fare ye weel, auld Nickie ben! 
 O wad you tak a thought an' men' ! 
 Ye aiblins might— I dinna ken — 
 
 Still hae a stake — 
 I'm wae to think upo' yon den 
 
 E'en for your sake 1" 
 
 Humour and tenderness are here so 
 happily intermixed, that it is impossible 
 to say which preponderates. 
 
 Fergusson wrote a dialogue between 
 the Causeway and the Plamstones* of Ed- 
 inburgh. This probably suggested to 
 Burns his dialogue between the Old and 
 the New bridge over the river Ayr.f 
 The nature of such subjects requires that 
 they shall be treated humorously, and 
 Fergusson has attempted nothing beyond 
 this. Though the Causeway and the 
 Plainstones talk together, no attempt is 
 made to personify the speakers. A "ca- 
 die"t heard the conversation and report- 
 ed it to the poet. 
 
 In the dialogue between the Briscs of 
 Ayr, Burns himself is the auditor, and the 
 time and occasion on which it occurred is 
 related with great circumstantiality. The 
 poet, " pressed by care," or " inspired by 
 whim," had left his bed in the town of 
 Ayr, and wandered out alone in the dark- 
 ness and solitude of a winter night, to the 
 mouth of the river, where the stillness 
 
 • The middle of the street, and the side-way. 
 
 t The Rrigs of Ayr, Po«ii>s, p. 13. t A inesswecr. 
 
 was interrupted only by the rushing sound 
 of the influx of the tide. It was after 
 midnight. The Dungeon-clock* had 
 struck two, and the soimd had been re- 
 peated by Wallace-Tower.* All else 
 was hushed. The moon shone brightly, 
 and 
 
 " The chilly frost, beneath the silver beam, 
 Crept, gently crusting, o'er the glittering stream." — 
 
 In this situation the listening bard hears 
 the " clanging sugh" of wings moving 
 through the air, and speedily he perceives 
 two beings, reared the one on the Old, the 
 other on the New Bridge, whose form 
 and attire he describes, and whose con- 
 versation with each other lie rehearses. 
 These genii enter into a comparison of 
 the respective edifices over which they 
 preside, and afterwards, as is usual be- 
 tween the old and young, compare mo- 
 dern characters and manners with those 
 of past times. They differ, as may be ex- 
 pected, and taunt and scold each other 
 in Broad Scotch. This conversation, 
 which is certainly humorous, may be con- 
 sidered as the proper business of the po- 
 em. As the debate runs high, and threat- 
 ens serious consequences, all at once it is 
 interrupted by a new scene of wonders : 
 
 -all before their sight 
 
 A fairy train appeard in order bright ; 
 Adown the glittering stream they featly danc'd ; 
 Bright to the moon their various dresses glanc'd ; 
 They footed o'er the vvatry glass so neat, 
 The infant ice scarce bent beneath their feet; 
 While arts of Minstrelsy among them rung, 
 And soul-ennobling Barda heroic ditties sung." 
 
 " The Genius of the Stream in front appears — 
 A venerable chief, advanc'd in years ; 
 His hoary head with water-lilies crown'd, 
 His manly leg with garter-tangle bound." 
 
 Next follow a number of other allego- 
 rical beings, among whom are the four 
 seasons. Rural Joy, Plenty, Hospitality, 
 and Courage 
 
 " Benevolence, with mild benignant air, 
 A female form, came from the tow'rs of Stair ; 
 Learning and VV'ealth in equal measures trode, 
 From simple Catrine, their long-lov'd abode ; 
 Last, white-robed Peace, crown'd with a hazel- 
 wreath. 
 To rustic Agriculture did bequeath 
 The broken iron instrument of Death ; 
 At sight of whom our sprites forgat their kindling 
 wrath." 
 
 ' The two steeples of Ayr. 
 
THE LIFE OF BURNS. 
 
 CI 
 
 This poem, irregular and imperfect as 
 it is, displays various and powerful ta- 
 lents, and may serve to illustrate the ge- 
 nius of Burns. In particular, it affords a 
 striking instance of his being carried be- 
 yond his original purpose by the powers 
 of imagination. 
 
 In Fergusson's poems, the Plainstones 
 and Causeway contrast the characters of 
 the different persons who walked upon 
 them. Burns probably conceived, that, 
 by a dialogue between the Old and New 
 Bridge, he might form a humorous 
 contrast between ancient and modern 
 manners in the town of Ayr. Such a 
 dialogue could only be supposed to pass 
 in the stillness of night ; and this led our 
 poet into a description of a midnight 
 scene, which excited in a high degree the 
 powers of his imagination. During the 
 whole dialogue the scenery is present to 
 his fancy, and at length it suggests to him 
 a fairy dance of aerial beings, under the 
 beams of the moon, by which the wrath 
 of the Genii of the Brigs of Ayr is ap- 
 peased. 
 
 Incongruous as the different parts of 
 this poem are, it is not an incongruity 
 that displeases ; and we have only to re- 
 gret that the poet did not bestow a little 
 pains in making the figures more correct, 
 and in smoothing the versification. 
 
 The epistles of Burns, in which may be 
 mcluded his Dedication to G. H. Esq. 
 discover, like his other writings, the pow- 
 ers of a superior understanding. They 
 display deep insight into human nature, 
 a gay and happy strain of reflection, great 
 independence of sentiment, and generosi- 
 ty of heart. It is to be regretted, that, 
 in his Holy Fair., and in some of his other 
 poems, his humour degenerates into per- 
 sonal satire, and that it is not sufficiently 
 guarded in other respects. The Hallow- 
 een of Burns is free from every objection 
 of this sort. It is interesting, not merely 
 from its humorous description of manners, 
 but as it records the spells and charms 
 used on the celebration of a festival, now, 
 even in Scotland, falling into neglect, but 
 whicli was once observed over the great- 
 er part of Britain and Ireland.* These 
 charms are supposed to afford an insight 
 into futurity, especially on the subject of 
 marriage, the most interesting event of 
 
 rural life. In the Halloween, a female in 
 performing one of the spells, has occasion 
 to go out by moonlight to dip her shift- 
 sleeve into a stream running- toicards the 
 South:* It was not necessary for Burns to 
 give a description of this stream. But it 
 was the character of his ardent mind to 
 pour forth not merely what the occasion 
 required, but what it admitted ; and the 
 temptation to describe so beautiful a natu- 
 ral object by moonlight, was not to be 
 resisted. 
 
 " Whyles owre a linn the burnie plays 
 
 As Ihro' the glen it wimpl't ; 
 Wliyles round a rocky ecar it strays ; 
 
 Whyles in a wiel it dimpl't ; 
 Whyles glitter'd to the nightly rays, 
 
 Wi' bickering, dancing dazzle ; 
 Whyles cookit underneath the braes, 
 
 Below the spreading hazel, 
 
 Unseen that night." 
 
 Those who understand the Scottish di- 
 alect will allow this to be one of the finest 
 instances of description which the records 
 of poetry afford. Though of a very dif- 
 ferent nature, it may be compared in point 
 of excellence with Thomson's description 
 of a river swollen by the rains of winter, 
 bursting through the straights that con- 
 fine its torrent, " boiling, wheeling, foam- 
 ing, and thundering along."f 
 
 In pastoral, or, to speak more correct- 
 ly, in rural poetry of a serious nature, 
 Burns excelled equally as in that of a hu- 
 morous kind ; and, using less of the Scot- 
 tish dialect in his serious poems, he be- 
 comes more generally intelligible. It is 
 difficult to decide whether the Address to a 
 Mouse, whose nest was turned up with the 
 plough, should be considered as serious or 
 comic. Be this as it may, the poem is 
 one of the happiest and most finished of 
 his productions. If we smile at the " bick- 
 ering battle" of this little flying animal, 
 it is a smile of tenderness and pity. The 
 descriptive part is admirable ; the moral 
 reflections beautiful, and arising directly 
 out of the occasion ; and in the conclu- 
 sion there is a deep melancholy, a senti- 
 ment of doubt and dread, that rises to the 
 sublime. The Address to a Mountain 
 Daisy, turned down with the plough, is a 
 poem of the same nature, though some- 
 what inferior in point of originality, as 
 well as in the interest produced. To ex- 
 tract out of incidents so common, and 
 
 ' In Ireland it is 
 UM in Wales. 
 
 celebrated. It is not quite i 
 
 Halloween," Stanzas ixiv. and Mv. 
 t See Thomson's iVijUer. 
 
83 
 
 THE LIFE OF BURNS. 
 
 seemingly so trivial as these, so fine a 
 train of sentiment and imagery, is the 
 surest proof, as well as the most brilliant 
 triumph, of original genius. The Vision, 
 in two cantoes, from which a beautiful 
 extract is taken by Mr. Mackenzie, in the 
 97th number of The Lounger, is a poem 
 of great and various excellence. The 
 opening, in which the poet describes his 
 own state of mind, retiring in the even- 
 ing, wearied from the labours of the day, 
 to moralize on his conduct and prospects, 
 is truly interesting. The chamber, if we 
 may so term it, in which he sits down to 
 muse, is an exquisite painting : 
 
 " There, lanely, by the ingle-cheek 
 I sat and ey'd the spewing reek, 
 That fill'd, wi' hoast-provoking smeek. 
 
 The auld clay biggin ; 
 An' heard the restless rations squeak 
 
 About the riggin." 
 
 To reconcile to our imagination the en- 
 trance of an aerial being into a mansion 
 of this kind, required the powers of Burns 
 — he however succeeds. Coila enters, and 
 her countenance, attitude, and dress, un- 
 like those of other spiritual beings, are 
 distinctly portrayed. Ttfet'he painting, on 
 her mantle, on which is depicted the most 
 striking scenery, as well as the most dis- 
 tinguished characters, of his native coun- 
 try, some exceptions may be made. The 
 mantle of Coila, like the cup of Thyrsis,* 
 and the shield of Achilles, is too, much 
 crowded with figures, and some of the 
 objects represented upon it are scarcely 
 admissible, according to the principles of 
 design. The generous temperament of 
 Burns led him into these exuberances. In 
 his second edition he enlarged the num- 
 ber of figures originally introduced, that 
 he might include objects to which he was 
 attached by sentiments of affection, gra- 
 titude, or patriotism. The second Diian, 
 or canto of this poem, in which Coila de- 
 scribes her own nature and occupations, 
 particularly her superintendence of his 
 infant genius, and in which she reconciles 
 him to the character of a bard, is an ele- 
 vated and solemn strain of poetry, ranking 
 in all respects, excepting the harmony of 
 numbers, with the higher productions of 
 the English muse. The concluding stan- 
 za, compared with that already quoted, 
 will show to what a height Burns rises in 
 this poem, from the point at which he set 
 out: — 
 
 * See th« ftrtt JdiiUium of Theocritus 
 
 " .and wear thou thii — she solemn sntd, 
 And, bound the Holly round my head : 
 Tiie polish'd leaves, and berries red, 
 
 Did rustling play ; 
 And, like a passing thought, she tied 
 
 In light away." 
 
 In various poems. Burns has exhibited 
 the picture of a mind under the deep im- 
 pressions of real sorrow. The Lament, 
 the Ode to Ruin, Despondency, and Win- 
 ter, a Dirge, are of this character. In 
 the first of these poems, the 8th stanza, 
 which describes a sleepless night from 
 anguish of mind, is particularly striking. 
 Burns often indulged in those melancholy 
 views of the nature and condition of man, 
 which are so congenial to the tempera- 
 ment of sensibility. The poem entitled 
 Man was made to Mourn, affords an in- 
 stance of this kind, and The Winter Might 
 is of the same description. The last is 
 highly characteristic, both of the temper 
 of mind, and of the condition of Burns. It 
 begins with a description of a dreadful 
 storm on a night in winter. The poet re- 
 presents himself as lying in bed, and lis- 
 tening to its howling. In this situation he 
 naturally turns his thoughts to the owrie 
 Cattle and the silhj Sheep, exposed to all 
 the violence of the tempest. Having la 
 raented their fate, he proceeds in the fol 
 lowing manner : 
 
 " Ilk happing bird— wee, helpless thing! 
 That, in the merry months o' spring, 
 Delighted )ne to hear the* sing, 
 
 What comes o' thee t 
 Whare wilt thou cow'r thy chittering wing, 
 
 An' close thy e'e ?" 
 
 Other reflections of the same nature 
 occur to his mind ; and as the midnight 
 moon " mutHed with clouds" casts her 
 dreary light on his window, thoughts of a 
 darker and more melancholy nature crowd 
 upon him. In this state of mind, he hears 
 a voice pouring through the gloom a so- 
 lemn and plaintive strain of reflection. 
 The mourner compares the fury of the 
 elements with that of man to his brother 
 man, and finds the former light in the ba- 
 lance. 
 
 " See stern oppression's iron grip, 
 
 Or mad ambition's gory hand. 
 Sending, like blood-hounds from the slip. 
 
 Wo, want, and murder, o'er a land I" 
 
 He pursues this train of reflection 
 through a variety of particulars, in the 
 course of which he introduces the follow 
 ing animated apostrophe : 
 
THE LIFE OF BURiNS. 
 
 83 
 
 " Oh ye ! who, sunk in beds of down, 
 Feel not a want but what yourselves create, 
 
 Think, for a moment, on his wretched fate, 
 Whom friends and fortune quite disown ! 
 
 Ill-satisfy'd keen Nature's clam'roiis call, 
 Stretch'd on his straw he lays himself to sleep, 
 
 While thro' the ragged roof and chinky wall. 
 Chill o'er his slumbers piles the drilly heapf 
 
 The strain of sentiment which rims 
 tfiroiigh the poem is noble, though the 
 execution is unequal, and the versification 
 , IS defective. 
 
 Among the serious poems of Burns, The 
 Cotter's Saturday JCight is perhaps entitled 
 to the first rank. The Farmer's Ingle of 
 Fergusson evidently suggested the plan of 
 this poem, as has been already mentioned ; 
 but after the plan was formed. Burns trust- 
 ed entirely to his own powers for the ex- 
 ecution. Fergusson's poem is certainly 
 very beautiful. It has all the charms 
 which depend on rural characters and 
 manners happily portrayed, and exhibited 
 under circumstances highly grateful to the 
 imagination. The Farmer's Ingle begins 
 with describing the return of evening. 
 The toils of the day are over, and the far- 
 mer retires to his comfortable fire-side. 
 The reception which he and his men-ser- 
 vants receive from the careful housewife, 
 is pleasingly described. After their sup- 
 per is over, they begin to talk on the ru- 
 ral events of the day. 
 
 " Bout kirk and market eke their tales gae on, 
 How Jock wooed Jenny here to be his bride ; 
 
 And there how Marion for a bastard son, 
 Upo' the cutty-stool was forced to ride, 
 
 The waefu' scauld o' our Mess John to bide." 
 
 The " Guidame" is next introduced as 
 forming a circle round the fire, in the 
 midst of her grand-children, and while 
 she spins from the rock, and the spindle 
 plays on her " russet lap," she is relating 
 to the young ones tales of witches and 
 ghosts. The poet exclaims : 
 
 " O mock na this, my friends ! but rather mourn. 
 Ye in life's brawest spring wi' reason clear, 
 
 Wi' eild our idle fancies a' return, 
 And dim our dolefu' days wi' bairnly fear ; 
 
 The mind's aye cradled when the grave is near." 
 
 In the mean time the farmer, wearied 
 with the fatigues of the day, stretches 
 himself at length on the Settle, a sort of 
 rustic couch, which extends on one side 
 of the fire, and the cat and house-dog 
 leap upon it to receive his caresses. Here 
 T 
 
 resting at his ease, he gives his directions 
 to his men-servants for the succeeding 
 day. The housewife follows his exam- 
 pie, and gives her orders to the maidens. 
 By degrees the oil in the cruise begins to 
 fail ; the fire runs low ; sleep steals on this 
 rustic group; and they move off to enjoy 
 their peaceful slumbers. The poet con- 
 cludes by bestowing his blessings on the 
 " husbandman and all his tribe." 
 
 This is an original and truW interesting 
 pastoral. It possesses every thing re- 
 quired in this species of composition. We 
 might have perhaps said every thing that 
 it admits, had not Burns written hij Cot- 
 ter's Saturday JVight. 
 
 The cottager returning from his la- 
 bours, has no servants to accompany him, 
 to partake of his fare, or to receive his 
 instructions. The circle which he joins, 
 is composed of his wife and children only ; 
 and if it admits of less variety, it affords 
 an opportunity for representing scenes that 
 more strongly interest the affections. The 
 younger children running to meet him, 
 and clambering round his knee ; the elder, 
 returning from their weekly labours with 
 the neighbouring farmers, dutifully de- 
 positing their little gains with their pa- 
 rents, and receiving their father's blessing 
 and instructions; the incidents of the 
 courtship of Jenny, their eldest daughter, 
 " woman grown ;" are circumstances of 
 the most interesting kind, which are most 
 happily delineated ; and after their frugal 
 supper, the representation of these hum- 
 ble cottagers forming a wider circle 
 round their hearth, and uniting in the 
 worship of God, is a picture the most 
 deeply affecting of any which the rural 
 muse has ever presented to the view. 
 Burns was admirubly adapted to this de- 
 lineation. Like all men of genius, he 
 was of the temperament of devotion, and 
 the powers of memory co-operated in 
 this instance with the sensibility of his 
 heart, and the fervour of his imagina 
 tion.* The Cotter's Saturday Mght is 
 tender and moral, it is solemn and devo- 
 tional, and rises at length into a strain of 
 grandeur and sublimity, which modern 
 poetry has not surpassed. The noble 
 sentiments of patriotism with which it 
 concludes, corre.-^ppnd with the rest of 
 the poem, in no age or country have 
 the pastora' muses breathed such ele- 
 vated accenih-, if the Messiah of Pope be 
 
 ♦Thereaderw Ml ixollect that the Cotter WMBuim'* 
 father. See p ;;4 
 
THE LIFE OF BURNS. 
 
 excepted, which is indeed a pastoral in 
 form only. It is to be regretted that 
 Burns did not employ his genius on other 
 Bubjects of the same nature, which the 
 manners and customs of the Scottish pea- 
 santry would have amply supplied. Such 
 poetry is not to be estimated by the de- 
 gree "of pleasure which it bestows ; it 
 sinks deeply into the heart, and is calcu- 
 lated far beyond any other human means, 
 for giving permanence to the scenes and 
 characters it so exquisitely describes.* 
 
 Before we conclude, it will be proper to 
 offer a few observations on the lyric pro- 
 ductions of Burns. His compositions of 
 this kind are chiefly songs, generally in 
 the Scottish dialect, and always after the 
 model of the Scottish songs, on the gene- 
 ral c'haracterandmoral influence of which, 
 some observations have already been of- 
 fered.f We may hazard a few more par- 
 ticular remarks. 
 
 Of the historic or heroic ballads of 
 Scotland, it is unnecessary to speak. 
 Burns has nowhere imitated them, a cir- 
 cumstance to be regrotted, since in this 
 species of composition, from its admitting 
 the more terrible as well as the softer 
 graces of poetry, he was eminently quali- 
 fied to have excelled. The Scottish songs 
 which served as a model to Burns, are al- 
 most without exception pastoral, or rather 
 rural. Such of th^jm as are comic, fre- 
 quently treai: of a rustic courtship or a 
 country vveddincr -. or thev describe the 
 diflferences of opinion which ari«e m mar- 
 ried life. Burns has imitated this species, 
 and surpassed his models. The song, b-^;- 
 ginning. " Hu?;band, husband, cease your 
 strife,"! may be cited in support of this 
 observation.^ His o^her comic songs are 
 of equal merit. In the rural songs of 
 Scotland, whether humorous or tender, 
 the sentiments are given to particular 
 characters, and very generally, the inci- 
 dents are referred to particular scenery. 
 This last circumsfance may be consider- 
 
 ♦ See Appendix, No II. Note D. 
 
 tSeep. 6. 
 
 X Sec Poems, p. 95. 
 
 § The (iialogiies between hiisbanils and their wives, 
 which form tt)e siibicct? of tlie Scottish sonjrs, are 
 almost all ludicro<is and satirical, and in these contests 
 the lady is generally victorious From the coUectiniip 
 of Mr. Piiikerton we find tiiat the comic muse of Scot- 
 land delighted in such representations from very early 
 tjmes. in her rude dramatic efforts, as well as in her 
 fUAtic sonp. 
 
 ed as the distinguished feature of the 
 Scottish songs, and on it a considerable 
 part of their attraction depends. On all 
 occasions the sentiments, of whatever na- 
 ture, are delivered in the character of the 
 person principally interested. If love be 
 described, it is not as it is observed, but 
 fts it is felt ; and the passion is delineated 
 under a particular aspect. Neither is it 
 the fiercer impulses of desire that are ex- 
 pressed, as in the celebrated ode of Sappho, 
 the model of so many modern songs, but 
 those gentler emotions of tenderness and 
 affection, which do not entirely absorb 
 the lover ; but permit him to associate his 
 emotions with the charms of external na- 
 ture, and breathe the accents of purity 
 and innocence, as well as of love. In 
 these respects the love-songs of Scotland 
 are honourably distinguished from the 
 most admired classical compositions of 
 the same kind : and by such associations, 
 a variety, as well as liveliness, is given to 
 the representation of this passion, which 
 are not to Be found in the poetry of Greece 
 or Rome, or perhaps of any other nation. 
 Many of the love-songs of Scotland de- 
 scribe scenes of rural courtship ; many 
 may be considered as invocations from 
 lovers to their mistresses. On such oc- 
 casions a degree of interest and reality is 
 given to the sentiments, by the spot des- 
 tined to these happy interviews being 
 particularized. The lovers perhaps meet 
 at the Bush aboon Traquair, or on the 
 Banirs ofEttrick : the nymphs are invoked 
 to wander among th^ wilds of Roslin, or 
 th" wonds of Invfirm^y. Nor is the spot 
 merely pointed out ; the scenery is often 
 described as well as the characters, so as 
 to present a complete picture to the fan- 
 cy.* Thus the maxim of Horace ut pic- 
 
 * One or two examples may illustrate this observa- 
 tion. A Scottish sons, written about a hundred yearg 
 ago, begins thus : 
 
 " On Ettrich banks, on a summer's night, 
 
 At gloaming, when the sheep drove hame, 
 I met my lassie, braw and tight, 
 
 Come wading barefoot a' her lane ; 
 My heart grew lisht, I ran, I flang 
 
 My arms about her lily neck. 
 And kiss'd and clapped there fu' lang, 
 
 My word..i they were na mony feck.*** 
 
 The lover, who is a Higlilaiider, goes on to relate the 
 language he employed with his Lowland maid to win 
 her heart, ai •! to persuade her to fly with him to the 
 Highland hills, there to share his fortune. The senti- 
 ments are in themselves beautiful. But we feel them 
 with doable force, while we conceive that they w«r« 
 
 Monet) feck, not very many. 
 
THE LIFE OF BURNS. 
 
 tura poetii, is faithfully observed by these 
 rustic bards, who are guided by the same 
 impulse of nature and sensibility which 
 influenced the father of epic poetry, on 
 whose example the precept of the Roman 
 poet was perhaps founded. By this 
 means the imag^ination is employed to in- 
 •terest the feelings. When we do not 
 ' conceive distinctly we do not simpathyze 
 deeply in any human affeclion ; and we 
 conceive nothing in the abstract. Ab- 
 straction, so useful in morals, and so es- 
 sential in science, must be abandoned 
 when the heart is to be subdued by the 
 
 Eowers of poetry or of eloquence. The 
 ards of a ruder condition of society paint 
 individual objects ; and hence, among 
 other causes, the easy access they obtain 
 to the heart. Generalization is the vice 
 of poets whose learning overpowers their 
 genius ; of poets of a refined and scien- 
 tific age. 
 
 The dramatic style which prevails so 
 mnch in the Scottish songs, while it con- 
 tributes greatly to the interest they ex- 
 cite, also shows that they have originated 
 among a people in the earlier stages of 
 society. Where this form of composition 
 appears in songs of a modern date, it in- 
 dicates that they have been written after 
 the ancient model.* 
 
 addrf>ssed by a lover to his mistress, whom he met all 
 alnne, on a summer's evening, by the banks of a beau- 
 tiful stream, which some of us have actually seen, and 
 which all of us ran paint to our imagination- Let us 
 take another example. It is now a nymph that spealu. 
 Hear how she expresses herself— 
 
 "How blythe each morn was I to see 
 
 My swain come o'er the hill ! 
 He skipt the burn, and dew to me, 
 
 I met him with guid will." 
 
 Here is another picture drawn by the pencil of Na- 
 ture. We see a shepherdess standing by the side of a 
 brook, watching her lover as he descends the opposite 
 hill. He bounds lightly along ; he approaches nearer 
 and nearer; he leaps the brook, and flies into her 
 arms. In the recollection of these circum:;tances, the 
 •urrounding scenery becomes endeared to the fair 
 mourner, and she bursts into the following excla- 
 mation : 
 
 1 " O the broom, the bonnie, bonnie broom, 
 The broom of the Cowden-Knowes! 
 I wish T were with my dear swain, 
 With his pipe and my ew»s." 
 
 Thns the individual spot of this happy Interview is 
 pointed out, and the picture is completed 
 
 * That the dramatic form of writing characterize! 
 the prodjctions of an early, or what amounts to the 
 
 The Scottish songs are of a very une- 
 qual poetical merit'! and this inequality 
 often extends to the diflerrnt parts of the 
 same song. Those that are humorous, 
 or characteristic of manners, have in ge- 
 neral the merit of copying nature ; those 
 that are serions, are tender, and often 
 sweetly interesting, but seldom exhibit 
 high powers of imagination, which indeed 
 do not easily tind a place in this species 
 of composition. The alliance of the 
 i words of the Scottit^h songs with the mu- 
 1 sic, has in some instances given to the 
 former a popularity, which olherwise they 
 would not have obtained. 
 
 The association of. the w ords and the 
 music of these songs, with the more beau- 
 tiful parts of the scenery of Scotland, con- 
 tributes to the same effect. It has given 
 them not merely popularity, but perma- 
 nence : it has imparted to the works of 
 man some portion of thr durability of the 
 works of nature. If, from our imperfect ex- 
 perience of the past, we may judge with 
 any confidence respecting the future, 
 songs of this description nre of all others 
 least likely to die. In the changes of Ian- 
 same thing, of a rude stage of society, may be illus- 
 trated by a reference to the most nncif-ni compositions 
 that we know of, the Hebrew scriptures, and the wri' 
 tings of Homer. Thefoim of dialogue is adopted in the 
 old Scottish ballads even in narration, whenever iha 
 situations described become interesting. This some, 
 times produces a very striking effect, of which an in- 
 stance may be given from the ballad of Edom o' Gordon^ 
 a composition apparently of the sixteenth century. 
 The story of the ballad is shortly this.— The castle of 
 Rhodes, in the absence of its lord, is attarkeri by tho 
 robber Edom o' Gordon. The lady stands on her de- 
 fence, beats off the assailants, and wounds Gordon, 
 who, in his rage, orders the castle to be set on fire 
 That his orders are carried into effrct, we learn from 
 the expostulation of the lady, who is represented ai 
 standing on the battlements, and rtmoastrating on tliis 
 barbarity. She is interrupted— 
 
 "O then bespake her little son, 
 
 Sate on his nourice knee : 
 Says, ' mither dear, gi' owe tht» house, 
 
 For the reek it smithers me.' 
 ' I wad gle a' my gowd, my childe, 
 
 Sae wad I a' my fee. 
 For ae blast o' the weslin wind, 
 
 To blaw the reek frae thee." ' 
 
 The circumstantiality of the Scottish love songs, and 
 the dramatic form which prevails so generally in them, 
 probably arises from their being the descendants and 
 successors of the ancient ballads. In the beautiful 
 modem song of Mam of Castle- Cary, the dramaticform 
 has a very happy effect. The same may be said oil 
 Donald and Flora-, and Come ■under my plaidie. by tb« 
 same auibor, Mr Macnici. 
 
THE LIFE OF BURNS. 
 
 gaage they may no doubt suffer change ; 
 but the associated strain of sentiment and 
 of music will perhaps survive, while the 
 clear stream sweeps down the vale of 
 Yarrow, or the yellow broom waves on 
 Cowden-Knowes. 
 
 The first attempts of Burns in song- 
 writing were not very successful. His 
 habitual inattention to the exactness of 
 rhvmes, and to the harmony of numbers, 
 arising probably from the models on which 
 his versification was formed, were faults 
 likely to appear to more disadvantage in 
 this species of composition, than in any 
 other ; and we iT»ay also remark, that the 
 strength of his imagination, and the ex- 
 uberance of his sensibility, were with dif- 
 ficulty restrained within the limits of gen- 
 tleness, delicacy, and tenderness, wljich 
 seemed to be assigned to the love-songs 
 of his nation. Burns was better adapted 
 by nature for following, in such composi- 
 tions, the model of the Grecian, than that 
 of the Scottish muse. By study and prac- 
 tice he however surmounted all these ob- 
 stacles. In his earlier songs, there is 
 some ruggedness ; but this gradually dis- 
 appears in his successive efforts ; and some 
 of his later compositions of this kind may 
 be compared, in polished delicacy, with 
 the finest songs in our language, while in 
 the eloquence of sensibility they surpass 
 them all. 
 
 The songs of Burns, like the models he 
 followed and excelled, are often dramatic, 
 and for the greater part amatory ; and the 
 beauties of rural nature are every where 
 associated with the passions and emotions 
 of the mind. Disdaining to copy the works 
 of others, he has not, like some poets of 
 great name, admitted into his descriptions 
 exotic imagery. The landscapes he has 
 painted, and the objects with which they 
 are embellished, are, in every single in- 
 stance, such as are to be found in his own 
 country. In a mountainous region, es- 
 pecially when it is comparatively rude 
 and naked, and the most beautiful scene- 
 ry will always be found in the valleys, 
 and on the banks of the wooded streams. 
 Such scenery is peculiarly interesting at 
 the close of a summer-day. As we ad- 
 vance northwards, the number of the days 
 of summer, indeed, diminishes ; but from 
 this cause, as well as from the mildness of 
 the temperature, the attraction of the sea- 
 son increases, and tiie summer-night be- 
 comes still more beautiiul. The greater 
 obliquity of the sun's path on the ecliptic 
 
 prolongs the grateful season of twilight 
 to the midnight hours: and the shades 
 of the evening seem to mingle with the 
 morning's dawn. The rural poets of 
 Scotland, as may be expected, associate 
 in their songs the expressions of passion, 
 with the most beautiful of their scenery, 
 in the fairest season of the year, and ge- 
 nerally in those hours of the evening when 
 the beauties of nature are most interest- 
 ing.* 
 
 To all these adventitious circumstan- 
 ces, on which so much of the effect of po- 
 etry depends, great attention is paid by 
 Burns. There is scarcely a single song 
 of his, in which particular scenery is not 
 described, or allusions made to natural 
 objects, remarkable for beauty or inter- 
 est : and though his descriptions are not 
 so full as are sometimes met with in the 
 older Scottish songs, they are in the high- 
 est degree appropriate and interesting. 
 Instances in proof of this might be quoted 
 from the Lea Rig, Highland Mary, The 
 Soldier's Return, Logan Water ; from 
 that beautiful pastoral Bonny Jean, and a 
 great number of others. Occasionally 
 the force of his genius carries him beyond 
 the usual boundaries of Scottish song, 
 and the natural objects introduced have 
 more of the character of sublimity. An 
 instance of this kind is noticed by Mr. 
 
 * A lady, of whose genius the editor entertains high 
 admiration (Mrs. Barbauld,) h»s fallen into an error 
 in this respect. In her prefatory address to the works 
 nf Collins, speaking of the natural objects that may b« 
 employed to give interest to the descriptions of passion, 
 she observes, " they present an inexhaustible variety, 
 from the Song of Solomon, breathing of cassia, myrrh, 
 and cinnamon, to the Gentle Shepherd of Ramsay, 
 whose damsels carry their milking-pails through the 
 frosts and snows of their less genial, but not less pasto- 
 ral country." The damsels of Ramsay do not walk in 
 the midst of frost and snow. Almost all the scenes of 
 the Gentle Shepherd are laid in the open air, amidst 
 beautiful natural objects, and at the most genial season 
 of the year. Ramsay introduces all his acts with a 
 prefatory description to assure us of this. The faultof 
 the climate of Britain is not, that it does not afford ut 
 the beauties of summer, but that the season of such 
 beauties is comparatively short, and even uncertain 
 There are days and nights, even in the northern divl^ 
 sion of the island, which equal, or perhapss surpasf, 
 what are to be found in the latitude of Sicily, or of 
 Greece. Buchanan, when he wrote his exquisite Od« 
 to May, felt the charm as well as the transientneo of 
 these happy days ; 
 
 Salve fugacis gloria seculi, 
 Salve secunda digna dies nota 
 Salve vetust* vitffi imago, 
 Kt specimen venientis jEvi. 
 
Syme,* and many others might be ad- 
 duced : 
 
 " Had I a cave on some wild, distant shore, 
 Where the winds howl to the waves' dashing roar : 
 
 There would I weep my woes, 
 
 There seek my last repose, 
 
 Till grief my eyes should close 
 Ne'er to wake more." 
 
 In one song, the scene of which is laid 
 in a winter-night, the " wan moon" is de- 
 scribed as " setting behind the white 
 waves;" in another, the "storms" are 
 apostrophized, and commanded to " rest 
 in the cave of their shimbers," on several 
 occasions the genius of Burns loses siglit 
 entirely of his archetypes, and rises into 
 a strain of uniform sublimity. Instances 
 of this kind appear in Lihertie, a Vision; 
 and in his two war-songs, Bruce to his 
 Troops, and the Song of Death. These 
 last are of a description of wliich we have 
 no other in our language. The martial 
 songs of our nation are not military, but 
 naval. If we were to seek a comparison 
 of these songs of Burns with others of a 
 similar nature, we must have recourse to 
 the poetry of ancient Greece, or of mo- 
 dern Gaul. 
 
 Burns has made an important addition 
 to the songs of Scotland. In his compo- 
 sitions, the poetry equals and sometimes 
 surpasses the music. He has enlarged 
 the poetical scenery of his country. Ma- 
 ny of her rivers and mountains, formerly 
 unknown to the muse, are now conse- 
 crated by his immortal verse. The Doon, 
 the Lugar, the Ayr, the Nith, and the 
 Cluden, will in future, like the Yarrow, 
 the Tweed, and the Tay, be considered 
 as classic streams, and their borders will 
 be trodden with new and superior emo- 
 tions. 
 
 The greater part of the songs of Burns 
 were written after he removed into the 
 county of Dumfries. Influenced, perhaps, 
 by habits formed in early life, he usually 
 composed while walking in the open air. 
 When engaged in writing these songs, his 
 favourite walks were on the banks of the 
 Nith, or of the Cluden, particularly near 
 the ruins of Lincluden Abbey ; and this 
 beautiful scenery he has very happily de- 
 scribed under various aspects, as it ap- 
 pears during the softness and serenity of 
 evening, and during the stillness and so- 
 lemnity of the moon-light night.f 
 
 * See pp. 55, 56. 
 15«« Poems, p. 96 ; t the Vision, p. 117. 
 
 THE LIFE OF BURNS. 81 
 
 There is no species of poetry, the pro- 
 ductions of the drama not excepted, so 
 much calculated to influence the morals, 
 as well as the happiness of a people, as 
 those popular verses which are associated 
 with national airs ; and which being learn- 
 ed in the years of infancy, make a deep 
 impression on the heart before the evolu- 
 tion of the powers of the understanding. 
 The compositions of Burns of this kind, 
 now presented in a collected form to the 
 world, make a most important addition 
 to the popular songs of his nation. Like 
 all his other writings, they exhibit inde- 
 pendence of sentiment ; they are peculi- 
 arly calculated to increase those ties which 
 bind generous hearts to their native soil, 
 and to the domestic circle of their infan- 
 cy ; and to cherish those sensibilities 
 which, under due restriction, form the 
 purest happiness of our nature. If in his 
 unguarded moments he composed some 
 songs on which this praise cannot be be- 
 stowed, let us hope that they will speedi- 
 ly be forgotten. In several instances-, 
 wliere Scottish airs were allied to words 
 object ionable in poiut of delicacy. Burns 
 has substituted others of a purer charac- 
 ter. On such occasions, without chang 
 ing the subject, he has changed the sen- 
 timents. A proof of this may be seen in 
 the air of John Anderson my Joe, which 
 is now united to words that breathe a 
 strain of conjugal tenderness, that is aa 
 highly moral as it is exquisitely affecting. 
 
 Fpw circumstances could afford a more 
 striking proof of the strength of Burns's 
 genius, than the general circulation of his 
 pofms in England, notwithstanding the 
 dialect in which the greater part are writ 
 ten. and which might be supposed to ren- 
 der them here uncouth or obscure. In 
 some instances he has used this dialect 
 on subjects of a sublime nature; but in 
 general he confines it to sentiments or 
 descriptions of a tender or humorous kind ; 
 and where he rises into elevation of 
 thought, he assumes a purer English style. 
 The singular faculty he possessed of ming- 
 ling in the same poem, humorous senti- 
 ments an^ descriptions, with imagery of 
 a sublime and terrific nature, enabled him 
 to use this variety of dialect on some oc- 
 casions with striking effect. His poem of 
 Tarn o' Shunter affords an instance of this. 
 There he passes from a scene of the low- 
 est humour, to situations of the most aw« 
 ful and terrible kind. He is a musician 
 that runs from the lowest to the highest 
 of his keys ; and the use of the Scottish 
 
r>8 
 
 THE LIFE OF BURNS. 
 
 dialect enables him to add two additional 
 notes to the bottom of his scale. 
 
 Great efforts have been made by the 
 inhabitants of Scotland, of the superior 
 ranks, to approximate in their speech to 
 the pure English standard ; and this has 
 made it difficult to write in the Scottish 
 dialect, without exciting in them some 
 feelings of disgust, which in England are 
 scarcely felt. An Englishman who un- 
 derstands the meaning of the Scottish 
 words, is not offended, nay, on certain 
 subjects, Jhe is perhaps, pleased with the 
 rustic dialect, as he may be with the Do- 
 ric Greek of Theocritus. 
 
 But a Scotchman inhabiting his own 
 country, if a man of education, and more 
 especially if a literary character, has ba- 
 nished such words from his writings, and 
 has attempted to banish them from his 
 speech : and being accustomed to hear 
 them from the vulgar, daily, does not 
 easily admit of their use in poetry, which 
 requires a style elevated and ornamental. 
 A dislike of this kuid is, however, acci- 
 dental, not natural. It is one of the spe- 
 cies of disg .St which we feel at seeing a 
 female of high birth in the dress of a rus- 
 tic ; which, if she be really young and 
 beautiful, a little habit will enable us to 
 overcome. A lady who assumes such a 
 dress, puts her beauty, indeed, to a se- 
 verer trial. She rejects — she, indeed, op- 
 poses the influence of fashion ; she possi- 
 bly abandons the grace of elegant and 
 flowing drapery : but her native charms 
 remain the more striking, perhaps, be- 
 cause the less adorned ; and to these she 
 trusts for fixing her empire on those af- 
 fections over which fashion has no sway. 
 If she succeeds, a new association arises. 
 The drees of the beautiful rustic becomes 
 itself beautiful, and establishes a new 
 fashion for the young and the gay. And 
 when in after ages, the contemplative ob- 
 server shall view her picture in the gal- 
 lery that contains the portraits of the 
 beauties of successive centuries, each in 
 the dress of her respective day, her dra- 
 pery will not deviate, more than that of 
 her rivals, from the standard of his taste, 
 and he will give the palm to her who ex- 
 cels in the lineaments of nature. 
 
 Burns wrote professedly for the pea- 
 santry of his country, and by them their 
 native dialect is universally relished. To 
 a numerous class of the natives of Scot- 
 land of another description, it may also be 
 
 considered as attractive in a different 
 point of view. Estranged from their na- 
 tive soil, and spread over foreign lands, 
 the idiom of their country unites with the 
 sentiments and the descriptions on which 
 it is employed, to recal to their minds the 
 interesting scenes of infancy and youth — 
 to awaken many pleasing, many tender 
 recollections. Literary men, residing at 
 Edinburgh or Aberdeen, cannot judge on 
 this point for one hundred and fifty thou- 
 sand of their expatriated countrymen.* 
 
 To the use of the Scottish dialect in 
 one species of poetry, the composition of 
 songs, the taste of the public has been for 
 some time reconciled. The dialect in 
 question excels, as has already been ob- 
 served, in the copiousness and exactness 
 of its terms for natural objects ; and in 
 pastoral or nural songs, it gives a Doric 
 simplicity, which is very generally ap- 
 proved. Neither does the regret seem 
 well founded which some persons of taste 
 have expressed, that Burns used this 
 dialect in so many other of his compo- 
 sitions. His declared purpose was to 
 paint the manners of rustic life among his 
 " humble compeers," and it is not easy 
 to conceive, that this could have been 
 done witJi equal humour and effect, if he 
 had not adopted their idiom. There are 
 some, indeed, who will think the subject 
 too low for poetry. Pen-ons of this sick- 
 ly taste will find their delicacies consulted 
 in many a polite and learned author : let 
 them not seek for gratification in the 
 rough and vigorous lines, in the unbridled 
 humour, or in the overpowering sensi- 
 bility of this bard of nature. 
 
 To determine the comparative merit 
 of Burns would be no easy task. Many 
 persons, afterwards distinguished in lite- 
 rature, have been born in as humble a 
 situation of life ; but it would be difficult 
 to find any other who. while earning his 
 subsistence by daily labour, has written 
 
 * These obsrrvatioii? are excited by some remarks of 
 respi'ctable rorrtspimdents ol'the description alluded to. 
 This calciilatiim of the niimber of Scotchmen livinf! out 
 of Scotland is not altosirtlier arbitrary, and it is proba- 
 bly below the triiih. ft is, in some dejrrep, founded on 
 the proportion betwee.nthe number of the sexes rn Scot- 
 land, as it appears from the invaluable Statistics of Sir 
 John Sinclair. For Scotchmen of this description, more 
 particularly. Burns seems to have written his .'song, be- 
 ginning, Their gropes u' sweet myrtle, a beautiful strain, 
 which, it m:iy be confidently predirtad, will be sung 
 with equal or superior interest on the banks of th» 
 Ganges or of the Mississippi, as on thoae of the Tty o» 
 the Tweed 
 
THE LIFE OF BURNS. 
 
 Hi 
 
 verses wmcn nave attracted and retained 
 iHiiversal attention, and which are likely 
 to give the author a permanent and dis- 
 tinguished place among the followers of 
 the muses. If he is deficient in grace, 
 he is distinguished for ease as well as 
 energy ; and these are indications of the 
 higher order of genius. The father of 
 epic poetry exhibits one of his heroes as 
 excelling in strength, another in swift- 
 ness — to form his perfect warrior, these 
 attributes are combined. Every species 
 of intellectual superiority admits perhaps 
 of a similar arrangement. One writer 
 excels in force — another in ease ; he is 
 superior to them both, in whom both 
 these qualities are united. Of Homer 
 himself it may be said, that, like his own 
 Achilles, he surpasses his competitors in 
 nobility as well as strength. 
 
 The force of Burns lay in the powers 
 of his understanding, and in the sensibili- 
 ty of his heart ; and these will be found 
 to infuse the living principle into all the 
 
 works of genius which seem destined to 
 immortality. His sensibility had an an- 
 common range. He was alive to every 
 species of emotion. He is one of the few 
 poets that can be mentioned, who have 
 at once excelled in humour, in tenderness, 
 and in sublimity ; a praise unknown to 
 the ancients, and which in modern times 
 is only due to Ariosto, to Shakspeare, and 
 perhaps to Voltaire. To compare the 
 writings of the Scottish peasant with the 
 works of these giants in literature, might 
 appear presumptuous ; yet it may be as- 
 serted that he has displayed the foot rf 
 Hercules. How near he might have ap- 
 proached them by proper culture, with 
 lengthened years, and under happier au« 
 spices, it is not for us to calculate. But 
 while we run over the melancholy story 
 of his life, it is impossible not to heave a 
 sigh at the asperity of his fortune ; and 
 as we survey the records of his mind, it 
 is easy to see, that out of such materials 
 have been reared the fairest and the most 
 durable of the monuments of genius. 
 
90 
 TO 
 
 BR. CU&RIZI'S 
 
 EDITION OF THE CORRESPONDENCE. 
 
 It is iinpoiisihle t<j dismiss this volume* 
 of the CorrespoiKieucc of our Bard, with- 
 out some anxiety as to the reception it 
 may meet with. Tlie experiment we are 
 making lias not often been tried ; perhaps 
 on no occasion has so large a portion of 
 the recent and unpremeditated effusions 
 of a man of genius been committed to the 
 press. 
 
 Of the following letters of Burns, a con- 
 siderable number were transmitted for 
 publication, by the individuals to whom 
 they were addressed ; but very few have 
 been printed entire. It will easily be be- 
 lieved, that in a seiyes of letters written 
 without the least view to publication, va- 
 rious passages were found unfit for the 
 press, from different considerations. It 
 will also be readily supposed, that our po- 
 et, writing nearly at the same time, and 
 under the same feelings to different indi- 
 viduals, would sometimes fall into the 
 same train of sentiment and forms of ex- 
 pression. To avoid, therefore, the tedi- 
 ousness of such repetitions, it has been 
 found necessary to qiutilate many of the 
 individual letters, and sometimes to ex- 
 scind parts of great delicacy — the unbri- 
 dled effusions of panegyric and regard. 
 But though many of the letters are print- 
 ed from originals furnished by the persons 
 to whom thev were addressed, others are 
 printed from first draughts, or sketches, 
 found among tlip pajiers of our Bard. 
 Though in general no man committed his 
 thoughts to his correspondents with less 
 consideration or effort than Burns, yet it 
 appears that in some instances lie was 
 dissatisfied with his first essays, and wrote 
 out his communications in a fairer charac- 
 ter, or perhaps in more studied language. 
 In the chaos of his manuscripts, some of 
 the original sketches were found ; and as 
 these sketches, though less perfect, are 
 fairly to be considered as the offspring of 
 his mind, where they have seemed in them- 
 
 * Dr. Carrie's edition of Burus's Works was origi- 
 nally publiFhed in four volumes, of which the follow- 
 ing Correspondence formed the second. 
 
 selves worthy of a place in this volume, 
 we have not hesitated to insert them, 
 though they may not always correspond 
 exactly with the letters transmitted,which 
 have been lost or withheld. 
 
 Our author appears at one time to have 
 formed an intention of making a collec- 
 tion of his letters for the amusement of a 
 friend. Accordingly he copied an incon- 
 siderable number of them into a book, 
 which he presented to Robert Riddel, of 
 Glenriddel, Esq. Among these was the 
 account of his life, addressed to Doctor 
 Moore, and printed in the first volume.* 
 In copying from his imperfect sketches, 
 (it does not appear that he had the letters 
 actually sent to his correspondents before 
 him,) he seems to have occasionally en- 
 larged his observations, and altered his 
 expressions. In such instances his emen- 
 dations have been adopted ; but in truth 
 there are but five of the letters thus se- 
 lected by the poet, to be found in the 
 present volume, the rest being thought of 
 inferior merit, or otherwise unfit for the 
 public eye. 
 
 In printing this volume, the editor has 
 found some corrections of grammar neces- 
 sary ; but these have been very few, and 
 such as may be supposed to occur in the 
 careless effusions, even of literary charac- 
 ters, who have not been in the habit of 
 carrying tho'n compositions to the press. 
 These corrections have never been ex- 
 tended t'j any habitual modes of expres- 
 sion of thp poet, even where his phrase- 
 ology may seem to violate the delicacies 
 of taste: or the idiom of our language, 
 which he wrote in general with great ac- 
 curacy. Some difference will indeed be 
 found in this respect in his earlier and in 
 his later compositions ; and this volume 
 will exhibit the progress of his style, as 
 well as the history of his mind. In the 
 fourth edition, several new letters were 
 introduced, and some of inferior impor- 
 tance were omitted. 
 
 • Occupying from page 9 to page 16 of this Edition. 
 
GENERAL. CORRESPONDENCE 
 
 md^^KM* ^wmar^. 
 
 liETTEBS, &C. 
 
 No. I. 
 TO MR. JOHN MURDOCH, 
 
 SCHOOLMASTER, 
 STAPLES INN BUILDINGS, LONDON. 
 Lochlee, 1 5th January, 1783. 
 
 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 tliat I have not for- 
 gotten nor ever will forget, the many ob- 
 ligations I lie under to your kindness and 
 friendship. 
 
 I do not doubt, Sir, but you will wish 
 to know what lias 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 un homme des affaires, T 
 might have been what the world calls a 
 pushing, active fellow ; but, to tell you 
 the truth. Sir, there is hardly any thing 
 more my reverse. I seem to be one sent 
 into the world to see, and observe ; and 
 I very easily compound with the knave 
 T 2 
 
 who tricks me of my money, if there be 
 any thing original about him which shows 
 me human nature in a different light from 
 any thing I have seen before. In short, 
 the joy of my heart is to "study men, 
 their manners, and their ways ;" and for 
 this darling object, 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 any 
 thing further. Even the last worthy 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 sanc- 
 tified by a hoary head, would procure me 
 so much esteem, that even then — I would 
 learn to be happy.* However, I am un- 
 der no apprehensions about that ; for, 
 though indolent, yet, so far as an extreme- 
 ly delicate constitution permits, I am not 
 lazy ; and in many things, especially in 
 tavern-matters, I am a strict economist; 
 not indeed for the sake of the money, but 
 one of the principal parts in my composi- 
 tion is a kind of pride of stomach, and I 
 scorn to fear the face of any man living ; 
 above every thing, I abhor, as hell, the 
 idea of sneaking in a corner to avoid a 
 dun — possibly some pitiful, sordid wretch, 
 whom in my heart I despise and detest. 
 'Tis this, and this alone, that endears 
 economv to me. In the matter of books, 
 indeed. I am V(!ry profuse. My favourite 
 authors are of the sentimental kind, such 
 
 * The last shift alluded to here, must be the coiiditioo 
 of an itinerant beggar. 
 
92 
 
 LETTERS. 
 
 as Shenttone, particularly his Elegies ; 
 Thomson ; Man of Feeling, a book I prize 
 next to the Bible ; Man of the World ; 
 Sterne, especially his SentimentalJourney ; 
 M'Pherson's Ossian, &c. These are the 
 glorious models after which I endeavour 
 to form my conduct ; and 'tis incongru- 
 ous, 'tis absurd, to suppose that the man 
 whose mind glows with the 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 terraefilial 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 incumbrance 
 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 wishes for her welfare ; 
 and accept of the same for yourself from, 
 Dear Sir, Your's, &c. 
 
 No. II. 
 
 Tlie following is taken from the MS. Prose pre- 
 sented by our Bard to Mr. Riddel 
 
 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. T had meant that the 
 book should have lain by me, in the fond 
 hope that, some time or other, even after 
 T was no more, my thoughts would fall 
 into the hands of somebody capable of ap- 
 preciating their value. It sets off thus : 
 
 Observations, Hints, Songs, Scraps of 
 Poetry, S^c hy R. B.— 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 tn sr-hol8.stic education, 
 and bred at a plough-tail, his performan- 
 
 ces must be strongly tinctured with his 
 unpolished rustic way of hfe ; 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 aUke, I believe, 
 on all the species. 
 
 " 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 obser- 
 vations, and allowing them the same im- 
 portance, which they do to those which 
 appear in print." — Shenstone. 
 
 " Pleasing, when youth is longexpir'd, to trace 
 The forms our pencil or our pen designed ! 
 
 Such was our youthful air, and shape, and face, 
 Such the soft image of our youthful mind." — Ibid' 
 
 April, 1 783. 
 Notwithstanding all that has been said 
 against love, respecting the folly and 
 weakness it leads a young inexperienced 
 mind into ; still I think it in a great mea- 
 sure deserves the highest encomiums 
 that have been passed upon it. If any 
 thing on earth deserves the name of rap- 
 ture 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. 
 
 August. 
 There is certainly some connexion be- 
 tween love, and music, and poetry ; and 
 therefore I have always thought a fine 
 touch of nature, that passage in a modern 
 love composition : 
 
 " As tow'rd her cot he jogg'd along, 
 Her name was frequent in his song." 
 
 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. 
 
 September. 
 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 im- 
 bitter i^°. human bosom. Any ordinary 
 
LETTERS. 
 
 93 
 
 pitch of fortitude may bear up tolerably 
 well under those calamities, in the pro- 
 curement 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 firm- 
 ness, and at the same time have a proper 
 penetential sp.nse of our misconduct, is a 
 glorious effort of self command. 
 
 " Of all the numerous ills that hurt our peace, 
 That press the soul, or wring tiie mind with anguish, 
 Beyond comparison the worst are those 
 That to our folly or our guilt we owe. 
 n every other circumstance the mind 
 Has this to say — ' It was no deed of mine ;' 
 But when to all the evils of misfortune 
 This sting is added — ' Blame thy foolish self!* 
 Or worser far, the pangs of keen remorse ; 
 The torturing, gnawing consciousness of guilt — 
 Of guilt, perhaps, where we've involved others; 
 The young, the innocent, who foniUy lov'd us, 
 Nay, more, that very love iheir cause of ruin! 
 O burning hell I in all thy store of torments, 
 There's not a keener lasii ! 
 Lives there a man so firm, vrho, while his heart 
 Feels all the bitter horrors of his crinit;, 
 Can reason down its agonizing throbs ; 
 And, after proper purpose of amendment, 
 C;ni firmly force hisjarring thoughts to peace T 
 O happy! happy ! enviable man ! 
 O glorious magnanimity of soul!" 
 
 Marrh, 1784. 
 I have oftiin observed, in the course of 
 my experience of human life-, that every 
 man. even the worst, has something' wood 
 about him; thoug'h very often nothing else 
 than a happy temperament of constitution 
 inclining him to this or that virtue. For 
 this reason, no man can sav in what de- 
 gree any other person, besides himself, 
 can be, with strict justice, called wicked. 
 Let any of the strictest character for re- 
 gularity of conduct among us, examine 
 impartially how many vices lie has never 
 been guilty of not from anv care or vigi- 
 lance, but for want of opportunity, or 
 Bome accidental circumstance intervening; 
 how many of the weakn^-sses 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 anv man who 
 can thus think, will scan the failings, nav. 
 the faults and crimes, of mankind around 
 him, with a brother's ej'e. 
 
 I havs often courted the acquaintance 
 
 of that part of mankmd 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 head- 
 strong passions have been driven to ruin. 
 Though disgraced by follies, nay, some- 
 times " stained with guilt, * * * * 
 * *," I have yet found among them, in 
 not a few instances, some of the noblest 
 virtues, magnanimity, generosity, disin- 
 terested friendship, and even modesty 
 
 April. 
 
 As I am what the men of the world, if 
 they knew such a man, would call a whim- 
 sical 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 per- 
 son. Such is the peculiar pleasure I take 
 in the season of winter, more than the 
 rest of the year. This, I believe, maybe 
 partly owing to my misfortunes giving 
 my mind a melancholy cast ; but there is 
 something even in the 
 
 " Mighty tempest, ^nd the hoarj' waste 
 
 Abrupt and deep, stretch'd o'er the buried cartli," — 
 
 which raises the mind to a serious subli- 
 mity, favourable to every thing great and 
 noble. There is scarcely any earthly ob- 
 ject gives me more — 1 do not know if I 
 should call it pleasure — but something 
 which exalts me, something which en- 
 raptures me — than to walk in the shel- 
 tered side of a wood, or high plantation, 
 in a cloudy winter-day. and hf^ar the 
 .stormy wind howling among the ti es and 
 raving ovi'r the plain, it is my best sea- 
 son for devotion ; my mind is rapt 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, T composed the following : 
 
 The wintry wpsi exKMids his blast, &c- — Poems, p. 39. 
 
 Shenstone finely observes, that love- 
 verses writ without any real passion, are 
 the most nauseous of all conceits ; and I 
 have ottfii 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 
 weaknessos and folhes by it, for that tea- 
 
94 
 
 LETTERS. 
 
 son I put the more confidence in my cri- 
 tical 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. 
 
 Behind yon hilU, &c. See Poems, p. 59. 
 
 1 think the whole species of young men 
 may be naturally enough divided into two 
 grand classes, which I shall call the grave 
 and the merry ; though, by the by, these 
 terms do not with propriety enough ex- 
 press 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, with- 
 out much deliberation follow the strong 
 impulses of nature : the thoughtless, the 
 careless, the indolent — in particular he, 
 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 as are, generally, those 
 whose heads are capable of all the tower- 
 ings of genius, and whose hearts are 
 warmed with all the delicacy of feeling. 
 
 As the grand end of human life is to 
 cultivate an intercourse with that Bemg 
 to whom we owe our life, with every en- 
 joyment that can render life delightful ; 
 and to maintain an integritive conduct 
 towards our fellow-creatnres ; 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 ; T do not see that the turn of mind 
 and pursuits of any son of poverty and 
 obscurity, are in the least more inimical 
 to the sacred interests of piety and vir- 
 tue, than the, even lawful, bustling and 
 straining after the world's riches and 1)0- 
 nours • and I do not see but that 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 bespatter- 
 ing all about him, gains some of life's little 
 eminences ; where, after all, he can only 
 see, and be seen, a little more conspicu- 
 ously than what, in the pride of his heart, 
 he is apt to term the poor indolent devil 
 he has left behind him. 
 
 There is a noble sublimity, a heart- 
 melting tenderness, in some of our an- 
 cient 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." 
 
 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 your path, and with trem- 
 bling 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 ! 
 
 This is all worth quoting in my MSS 
 and more than all. 
 
 R. B 
 
LETTERS. 
 
 95 
 
 No. III. 
 TO MR. AIKIN. 
 
 The Gentleman to whom the Ckitter's Saturday jVigkt 
 is addressed. 
 
 Sir, 
 
 Aymhire, 1786. 
 
 was with Wilson, my printer, t'other 
 (lay, and settled all our by-gone matters 
 between us. After I had paid him all 
 demands, I made him the ofi'er of the se- 
 cond edition, on the hazard of being paid 
 out of the Jirst and readiest, which he de- 
 clines. By his account, the paper of a 
 thousand copies would cost about twenty- 
 seven pounds, and the printing about fif- 
 teen 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 edi- 
 tion till I grow richer ! an epocha, which, 
 I think, will arrive at the payment of the 
 British national debt. 
 
 There is scarcely any thing hurts me 
 so much in being disappointed of my se- 
 cond edition, as not having it in my power 
 to show my gratitude to Mr. Ballantyne, 
 by publishing my poem of TTi,e Brigs of 
 Ayr. I would detest myself as a wretch, 
 if I thought T 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 
 wiUi myself in my grateful 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 a heart 
 too inattentive to allow worldly maxims 
 and views to settle into selfish habits. 
 
 I have been feeling all the various ro- 
 tations and movements within, respecting 
 the excise. There are many things plead 
 strongly against it, the uncertainty of get- 
 ting 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 wanderir"» 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 vaga- 
 ries 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 iiave only one answer — the 
 feelings of a father. This, in the present 
 mood I am in, overbalances every thing^ 
 that can be laid in the scale against it. 
 
 You may perhaps think it an extrava- 
 gant 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 stint- 
 ed bourn 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 re- 
 proaches of those who stand to me in the 
 dear relation of children, whom I desert- 
 ed 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 
 
 Since I wrote the foregoing sheet, I 
 have seen something of the storm of mis- 
 chief thickening over my folly-devoted 
 head. Should you, my friends, my bene- 
 factors, be successful in your applications 
 for me, perhaps it may not be in my pow- 
 er 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 in- 
 imical circumstances forbid me closing 
 with your kind offer, or, enjoying it, only 
 threaten to entail farther misery — 
 
 To tell the truth, I have little reason 
 for complaint, as the world, in general, 
 has been kind to me, fully up to my de- 
 serts. I was, for some time past, fast 
 getting into the pining, distrustful snarl 
 of the misanthrope. Tsaw myself alone, 
 unfit for the struggle of life, shrinking at 
 every rising cloud in the chance-directed 
 atmosphere of fortune, while, all defence- 
 less, 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 des- 
 
LETTERS. 
 
 lined for a progressive struggle; and that 
 however I might pcdsess 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 he 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 stri- 
 ding off with eager hope and earnest in- 
 tention some one or other of the many 
 paths of busy life, I was standing ' idle in 
 the market-place,' or only left the cliase 
 of the butterfly from flower to flower, to 
 hunt fancy from whim to whim. 
 
 You see, Sir, that if to knmo one's er- 
 rors 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.* 
 
 NO. IV. 
 TO MRS. DUNLOP OF DUNLOP. 
 Jlyrshire, 17b6. 
 
 MADAM, 
 
 I AM truly sorry I was not at home 
 yesterday when I was so much honoured 
 with your order for my copies, and incom- 
 parably more by the handsome compli- 
 ments 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 con- 
 ceive how the heart of the poor bard dan- 
 ces with rapture, when those whose cha- 
 racter in life gives them a right to be po- 
 lite judges, honour him with their appro- 
 bation. Had you been thoroughly ac- 
 quainted 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. 
 
 " Great patriot-hero! ill-requued chief 1" 
 
 •This letter was evidently written under the dis- 
 teess of mind occaaioned bv our Poet's separation from 
 lln. Bum. £ 
 
 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 WilHam Wallnre ; for se 
 veral of my earlier years! had few other 
 authors ; and many a solitary hour have I 
 stole out, after the Jabonous vocations of 
 the day, to shed a tear over their glori- 
 ous but unfortunate stories. In thosii 
 boyish days I remember in particular be- 
 ing struck with that part of Wallace's 
 story where these lines occur — 
 
 " Synt to the Leglen wood, when it was late, 
 To make a silent and a safe retreat." 
 
 I chose a fine summer Sunday, the only 
 day my line of life allowed, and walked 
 half a dozen of miles to pay my respects 
 to the Leglen wood, with as much devout 
 enthusiasm as ever pilgrim did to Lorei- 
 to ; and, as 1 explored, every den and dell 
 where I could suppose my heroic country- 
 man to have lodged, I recollect (for even 
 then I was a rhymer) that my heart glow- 
 ed with a wish to be able to make a song 
 on him in some measure equal to hia 
 merits 
 
 NO. V. 
 TO MRS. STEWART, OF STAIR 
 
 1786. 
 
 MADAM, 
 
 The hurry of my preparations for go- 
 ing abroad has hindered me from perform- 
 ing 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, 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 any thing of, an amiable, beau- 
 tiful young woman ;* but I have no com- 
 mon friend to procure me that permis- 
 sion, without which I wouM not dare to 
 spread the copy. 
 
 ♦ The song enclosed is the one beginning, 
 
 'Twa* even — the dewv fields were green, te 
 
 SetPotvUfP- n 
 
LETTERS. 
 
 I aiu quite aware, Madaiii, what task 
 the world would assign me in tliis lettt^r. 
 The obscure bard, when any of the great 
 condescend to take notice of him, should 
 heap the altar with the incense of flatte- 
 ry. 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 your real character 
 is to be found — the company of your com- 
 peers ; and more, I am afraid that even 
 the most refined adulation is by no means 
 the road to your good opinion. 
 
 One feature of your character I shall 
 ever with grateful pleasure remember — 
 the reception I got when 1 had the ho- 
 nour of waiting on you at Stair. I am 
 little acquainted with politeness; but I 
 know a good deal of benevolence of tem- 
 per and goodness of heart. Surely, did 
 those in exalted stations know how hap- 
 py they could make some classes of their 
 inferiors by condescension and affability, 
 they would never stand so high, measur- 
 ing out with every look the height of 
 their elevation, but condescend as sweet- 
 ly as did Mrs. Stewart of Stair. 
 
 No. VI. 
 
 IN THK NAME OF THF, NINE. AmEN. 
 
 Wk Robert Burns, by virtue of a War- 
 rant from Natt're, bearing date the 
 Twenty-fifth day of .January, Anno Do- 
 mini one thousand seven hundred and fif- 
 ty-nine,*' Poet-Laureat and Bard in 
 Ciir.:F in and over the Districts and 
 Countries of Kyle, Cunktngham, and 
 CARRrcK, of old extent. To our trusty 
 and well-beloved Willtam Chalmers 
 and John M'Adam, Students and Prac- 
 titioners in the ancient and mysterious 
 Science of Confounding Right and 
 Wrong. 
 
 Right Tritsty, 
 
 Be it known unto you. That whereas, 
 in the course of our care and watchings 
 over the Order and Police of all and sun- 
 dry the M.iNUFACTURERS, RETAINERS, 
 
 and Venders of Poesy ; Bards, Poets, 
 Poetasters, Rhymers, Jinglers, Songsters, 
 Ballad-singers, &c., &,c., &-c., &c., &c., 
 
 • His birth-da) . 
 
 male and female — We have discovered a 
 ceriaiu " * *, nefarious, abominable, and 
 Wicked Sung, or Ballad, a copy where- 
 oi' 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 nickname of 
 The Deil's Yell 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 mer- 
 ciless hands the said copy of the said ne- 
 farious and wicked Song^to be consumed 
 by fire in the presence of all Beholders, 
 in abhorrence of, andterrorum to all such 
 Compositions and Composers. And this 
 in no wise leave ye undone, but have it 
 executed in every point as this Our Man- 
 date bears before the twenty-fourth cur- 
 rent, when in person We hope to ap- 
 plaud your faithfulness and zeal. 
 
 Given at Mauchline, this twentieth 
 day of November, Anno Domini one thou- 
 sand seven hundred and eighty-six. f 
 God save the bard ! 
 
 No. VII. 
 
 DR. BLACKLOCK 
 
 TO THE REVEREND MR. G. 
 
 LOWRIE. 
 
 REVEREND AND DEAR SIR, 
 
 I OUGHT to have acknowledged your 
 favour long ago, not only as a testimony 
 of your kind remembrance, but as it gave 
 me an opportunity of sharing one of the 
 finest, and, perhaps, one of the most genu- 
 ine entertainments, of which the human 
 mind is su<!ceptible. A number of avoca- 
 tions retarded my progress in reading the 
 poems; at last, however, I have finished 
 that pleasing perusal. Many instances 
 have I seen of Nature's force and benefi- 
 cence exerted under numerous and formi- 
 dable disadvantages; but none equal to 
 that with which you have been kind enough 
 to present me. There is a pathos and deli- 
 cacy in his serious poems, a vein of wit and 
 humour in those of a more festive turn, 
 which cannot betoomuchadmired, nor too 
 warmly approved ; and I think I shall never 
 
 t Enclosed was the ballad, probably Holy Wtliit $ 
 Prayer. E. 
 
LETTERS 
 
 open the book without feeling my aston- 
 ishment renewed and increased. It was 
 my wish to have expressed my approba- 
 tion in verse ; but whether from declining 
 life, or a temporary depression of spirits, 
 it is at present out of my power to accom- 
 plish that agreeable intention. 
 
 Mr. Stewart, Professor of Morals in 
 this University, had formerly read me 
 three of the poems, and I had desired him 
 to get my name inserted among the sub- 
 scribers ; but whether this was done, or 
 not, I never could learn. T have little 
 intercourse with Dr. Blair, but will take 
 care to have the poems communicated to 
 him by the intervention of some mutual 
 friend. It has been told me by a Gentle- 
 man, to whom I showed the performances, 
 and who sought a copy with diligence and 
 ardour, that the whole impression is al- 
 ready exhausted. It were, therefore, 
 much to be wished, for the sake of the 
 young man, that a second edition, more 
 numerous than the former, could imme- 
 diately be printed : as it appears certain 
 that its intrinsic merit and the exertion of 
 the author's friends, might give it a more 
 universal circulation than any thing of 
 the kind which has been published within 
 mv memory.* 
 
 No. vm. 
 
 PjlOM THE REVEREND MR. 
 LOWRIE. 
 
 ^U December, 1786. 
 
 I LAST week received a letter from 
 Dr. Blacklock, in which he expresses a 
 desire of seeing you, I write this to you, 
 that you may lose no time in waiting 
 upon him, should you not yet have seen 
 hira. 
 
 I rejoice to hear, from all corners, of your 
 
 * The reader will perceive that this is the letter which 
 produced the deterininatlon of our Bard to give up his 
 •cheme of going to the West Indies, and to try the fate 
 of a new Edition of his Poems in Edinburgh. A copy 
 of this letter was sent by Mr. Lowrie to Mr. G. Hamil- 
 ton, and by him communicated to Bums, among whose 
 papers it was found. 
 
 For an account of Mr. Lowrie and his family, see the 
 I«ter of Gilbert Bums lo the Editor. 
 
 rising fame, and I wish and expect it may 
 tower still higher by the new publication. 
 But, as a friend, I warn you to prepare to 
 meet with your share of detraction and 
 envy — a tials that always accompany 
 great men. For your comfort T am in 
 great hopes that the number of your 
 friends and admirers will increase, and 
 that you have some chance of ministerial, 
 or even ***** patronage. Now, my 
 friend, such rapid success is very uncom- 
 mon : and do you think yourself in no 
 danger of suffering by applause and a full 
 purse .'' Remember Solomon's advice, 
 which he spoke from experience, " stron- 
 ger is he that conquers," &c. Keep fast 
 hold of your rural simplicity and purity, 
 like Telcmachus, by Mentor's aid, in 
 Calypso's isle, or even in that of Cyprus. 
 T hope you have also Minerva with you. 
 I need not tell you how much a modest 
 diffidence and invincible temperance adorn 
 the most .shining talents, and elevate the 
 mind, and exalt and refine the imagina- 
 tion, even of a poet. 
 
 I hope you will not imagine I speak 
 from suspicion or evil report. I assure 
 you I speak from love and good report, 
 and good opinion, and a strong desire to 
 see you shine as much in the sunshine as 
 you have done in the shade ; and in the 
 practice, as you do in the theory of vir- 
 tue. This is my prayer, in return for 
 your elegant composition in verse. All 
 here join in compliments and good wishes 
 for your further prosperity. 
 
 No. IX. 
 TO MR. CHALMERS. 
 
 Edinburgh, 21th Dec. 1786. 
 
 MY DEAR FRIEND, 
 
 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 send you an entertaining let- 
 ter ; and by all the plodding stupid pow- 
 ers that in nodding conceited majesty pre- 
 side 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 Revelations. 
 
LETTERS. 
 
 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 passed Glen- 
 buck. One blank in the address to Edin- 
 burgh, " Fair B ," is the heavenly 
 
 Miss Burnet, daughter to Lord Monbod- 
 do, at whose house I had the honour to be 
 more than once. There has not been 
 any thing nearly like her, in all the com- 
 r.nations of beauty, grace, and goodness, 
 the great Creator has formed, since Mil- 
 ton's Eve on the tirst day of lier existence. 
 
 I have sent you a parcel of subscription- 
 bills ; and have written to Mr. Ballantyne 
 and Mr. Aiken, to call on you for some of 
 them, if they want them. My direction 
 is — care of Andrew Bruce, Merchant, 
 Bridge-street. 
 
 No. X. 
 TO THE EARL OF EGLINTON. 
 
 Edinburgh, January, 1787. 
 
 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 be- 
 lieve, grow peculiarly strong in the breast 
 of a Scotchman. There is scarcely any 
 thing to which I am so feelingly alive ; 
 as the honour and welfare of my country; 
 and, as a poet, I have no higher enjoy- 
 ment than singing her sons and daugh- 
 ters. Fate had cast my station in the 
 veriest shades of lifo ; 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 counte- 
 nance and approbation of one of my coun- 
 try's most illustrious sons, when Mr. 
 Wauchope called on me yesterday on the 
 Dart of your Lordship. Your munificence, 
 my Lord, certainly deserves my very 
 grateful acknowledgments ; but your pat- 
 ronage 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 troub- 
 ling 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 incapa- 
 ble of ; and mercenary servility, I trust I 
 shall ever have so much honest pride as 
 to detest 
 
 U 
 
 No. XI 
 TO MRS. DUNLOP. 
 Edinburgh, lUth January, 1787. 
 
 Yours ofthe 9th current, which I am 
 this monvent honoured with, is a deep re- 
 proach to me for ungrateful neglect. I 
 will tell you the real truth, for I am mise- 
 rably awkward at a fib ; I wished to have 
 written to -Dr. Moore before I wrote to 
 you; but though, every day since I re- 
 ceived yours of December 30th, the idea, 
 the wish to write to him, has constantly 
 pressed on my thoughts, yet T 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 mat- 
 ter-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 runa 
 cold at the thought. I shall try, how- 
 ever, to write to him to-morrow or next 
 day. His kind interposition in my behalf 
 I have already experienced, as a gentle- 
 man waited on me the other day on the 
 part of Lord Eglington, with ten guineas, 
 by way of subscription for two copies of 
 my next edition. 
 
 The word you object to in the mention 
 I have made of my glorious countr-yman 
 and your immortal ancestor, is indeed bor- 
 rowed from Thomson ; but it does not 
 strike me as an improper epithet. I dis- 
 trusted 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 any 
 thing on the great Wallace, except what 
 you have seen in print, and the inclosed, 
 which I will print in this edition.* Yoa 
 will see I have mentioned some others of 
 the name. When I composed my Vision 
 long ago, I 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, ofthe Saviour of hit 
 Country, which, sooner or later, I shall al 
 least attempt. 
 
 * Stanzas In the J^ision, bet'!" niiin " Ily stately tnwM 
 or palare fair " and ending \wU the first Dnan. B. 
 
10ft 
 
 LETTER*. 
 
 You are afraid I f\m\] 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 deserved some notice ; but in a 
 most enlightened, informed age and na- 
 tion, when poetry is and has been the 
 study of men of the first natural genius, 
 aided with all the powers of polite learn- 
 ino-, 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 
 end crude unpolished ideas on my head — 
 I assure you, Madam, I do not dissemble 
 whfn I tell you I tremble for the conse- 
 quences. The novelty of a poet in tny 
 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 no- 
 tice, which has borne me to a height where 
 I am absolutely, feelingly certain my abi- 
 lities are inadequate to support me ; and 
 too surely do I see that time when the 
 s^me tide will leave me, and recede, per- 
 haps, as far below the mark of truth. I 
 do not say this in the ridiculous affecta- 
 tion 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 mv own opinion in 
 silent resolve, with all the tenaciousness | men and manners in a different phasis 
 
 No. XII. 
 TO DR. MOORE. 
 
 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 
 solicitude of authorship, can only know 
 what pleasure it gives to be noticed in 
 such a manner by judges of the first cha- 
 racter. Your criticisms, Sir, I receive 
 with reverence ; only I am sorry they 
 mostly came too late ; a peccant passage 
 or two, that I would certainly have alter- 
 ed, were gone to the press. 
 
 The hope to be admired for ages is, in 
 by far the greater part of those even who 
 were 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 lang-uage 
 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 political, are intimately acquainted 
 with the classes of mankind among whom 
 I have chiefly mingled, I may have seen 
 
 of property. I mention this to you, once 
 for all, to disburden my mind, and I do 
 not wish to hear or say more about it. — 
 But 
 
 " When proud fortune's ebbing tido recfdos," 
 
 you will bear me witness, that, when my 
 bubble of fame was at th? highest, I stood, 
 imintoxicated, 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 venge- 
 ful triumph. 
 
 Your patronising 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 pat- 
 rona,ge of the descendant of the immortal 
 Wallace ? 
 
 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 
 Seattle have painted the landscape, and 
 Lyttleton and Collins described the heart, 
 I am not vain enough to hope for distin- 
 guished poetic fame. 
 
 No. XIII. 
 FROM DR. MOORE. 
 Clifford-street, Januarxj 23rf, 1787. 
 
 SIR, 
 
 I HAVE just received your letter, by 
 which I find I have reason to complain of 
 my friend Mrs. Dunlop, for transmitting 
 to you extracts from my letters to her, 
 by much too freely and too carelessly 
 
LETTERS. 
 
 written for your perusal. I must forgive 
 her, however, in consideration of her good 
 intention, as you will forgive me, I hope, 
 for the freedom I use with certain expres- 
 sions, in consideration of my admiration 
 of the poems in general. If I may judge 
 of the author's disposition from his works, 
 with all the good qualities of a poet, he 
 has not the irritable temper ascribed to 
 that race of men by one of their own 
 number, whom you have the happiness to 
 resemble in ease and rurious felicity of 
 expression. Indeed the poetical beauties, 
 however original and brilliant, and lavish- 
 ly scattered, are not all I admire in your 
 works ; the love of your native country, 
 that feeling sensibility to all the objects 
 of humanity, and the independent spirit 
 which breathes through the whole, give 
 me a most favourable impression of the 
 poet, and have made me often regret that 
 I did not see the poems, the certain effect 
 of which would have been my seeing the 
 author last summer, when I was longer 
 in Scotland than I have been for many 
 years. 
 
 I rejoice very smcerely at the encou- 
 ragem^ent you receive at Edinburgh, and 
 I think you peculiarly fortunate in the 
 patronage of Dr. Blair, who I nm inform- 
 ed interests himself very much for you. 
 1 beg to be remembered to him : nobody 
 can have a warmer regard for that gen- 
 tleman than I have, which, independent 
 of the worth of his character, would be 
 kept alive by the memory of our common 
 friend, the late Mr. George B e. 
 
 Before I received your letter, I sent in- 
 closed in a letter to , a sonnet by 
 
 Miss Williams a young poetical lady, 
 which she wrote on reading your Moun- 
 tain-Daisy ; perhaps it may not displease 
 you.* 
 
 I have been trying to add to the num- 
 
 ' • The Sonnet is as follows: 
 
 While soon " the garden's flaunting flow'rs" decay 
 
 And scatler'd on the earth neglected lie, 
 The " Mountain-Daisy," cherish'd by the ray 
 
 A poet drew from heaven, shall never die. 
 Ah ! like the lonely flower the poet rose ! 
 
 • Mid penury's bare soil and bitter gale : 
 He felt each storm that on the mountain blows. 
 
 Nor ever knew the shelter of the vale. 
 By genius in her native vigour nursed, 
 
 On nature with impassion'd look he gazed, 
 Then through the cloud of adverse fortune burw 
 
 Indignant, and in light unborrow'd blazed 
 Scotia '. from rude afflictions shield thy bard, 
 nis heaven-taught numbers Fame hereelf wlU guard. 
 
 her of your subscribers, but find many of 
 my acquaintance are already among them. 
 I have only to add, that with every sen- 
 timent of esteem and the most cordial 
 good wishes, 
 I am. 
 
 Your obedient, humble serva.nt, 
 J. MOORE. 
 
 No. XIV. 
 
 TO THE REV. 
 NEW-MILLS, 
 NOCK. 
 
 G. LOWRIE, OP 
 NEAR KILMAR- 
 
 Edinburgh, 5th Feb. 1787. 
 
 REVEREND AND DEAR SIR, 
 
 When I look at the date of your 
 kind letter, my heart reproaches me se- 
 verely with ingratitude in neglecting so 
 long to answer it. I will not trouble you 
 wTith 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 re- 
 spect. I feel, and ever shall feel, for you, 
 the mingled sentiments of esteem for a 
 friend, and reverence for a father. 
 
 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 newspa- 
 per 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 man- 
 kind awhile ; to it I owe my present eclat ; 
 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 es- 
 timate of my intellectual powers, before 
 I came here ; I have not added, since I 
 came to Edinburgh, any thing to the 
 account ; and I trust I shall take every 
 atom of it back to my shades, the coverts 
 of my unnoticed, early years. 
 
 In Dr. Blacklock, whom I see very of- 
 ten, I have found, what I would have ex- 
 pected in our friend, a clear head and an 
 excellent heart 
 
102 
 
 LETTERS. 
 
 By far ihe most agreeable hours I epend 
 in Edinburgh must be placed to the ac- 
 count of Miss Lowrie and her piano-forte. 
 I cannot help repeating to you and Mrs. 
 Lowrie a compliment that Mr. Macken- 
 zie, the celebrated " Man of Feeling," 
 paid to Miss Lowrie, the other night, at 
 the concert. I had come in at the inter- 
 lude, and sat down by him, till I saw Miss 
 Lowrie in a seat not very far 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 countrj'-girl." 
 
 My compliments to all the happy in- 
 mates of Saint Margarets. 
 
 I am, dear Sir, 
 
 Yours most gratefully, 
 
 ROBT. BURNS. 
 
 No. XV. 
 TO DR. MOORE. 
 Edinburgh, 1 5th February, 1787. 
 
 Pardon my spemin? neglect in de- 
 laying 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 follow- 
 ing the plough, nor could boast any thing 
 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 learn- 
 ing, and at its proper poiut of elevation in 
 the eye of the world, this of late I fre- 
 quently meet with, and tremble at its 
 approach. I scorn the affectation of seem- 
 ing 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 country- 
 men, have borne me to a height altoge- 
 ther untenable to mv abilities. 
 
 For the honour Miss W. 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 po- 
 ems, which, for several reasons, some be- 
 longing to the head, and others the off- 
 spring of the heart, gave me a great deal 
 of pleasure. I have little pretensions to 
 critic lore : there are, I think, two cha- 
 racteristic features in her poetry — the un- 
 fettered wild flight of native genius, and 
 the querulous, sombre tenderness of time- 
 settled sorrow. 
 
 I only know what pleases me, often 
 without being able to tell why. 
 
 No. XVL 
 FROM DR. MOORE. 
 
 Clifford-Street, 28th February, 1787. 
 
 Your letter of the 15th gave me a 
 great deal of pleasure. It is not surpri- 
 sing that you improve in correctness and 
 taste, considering where you have been 
 for some time past. And I dare swear 
 there is no danger of your admitting any 
 polish which might weaken the vigour of 
 your native powers. 
 
 I am glad to perceive that you disdain 
 the nauseous affectation of decrying your 
 own merit as a poet, an affectation which 
 is displayed with most ostentation by those 
 who have the greatest share of self-con- 
 ceit, and which only adds undeceiving 
 fiilsehood to disgusting vanity. For you 
 to deny the merit of your poems, would 
 be arraigning the fixed opinion of the 
 public. 
 
 As the new edition of my View of' So- 
 ciety is not yet ready, I have sent you the 
 former edition, which I beg you will ac- 
 cept as a small mark of my esteem. It is 
 sent by sea to the care of Mr. Creech ; 
 and along with these four volumes for 
 yourself, I have also sent my Medical 
 Sketches, in one volume, for my friend 
 Mrs. Dunlop, of Dunlop : this you will 
 be so obliging as to transmit, or, if you 
 chance to pass Boon by Dunlop, to give 
 to her. 
 
LETTERS. 
 
 103 
 
 I am happy to hear that your subscrip- 
 tion is so ample, and shall rejoice at eve- 
 ry piece of good fortune that befalls you, 
 for you are a very great favourite in my 
 family ; and this is a higher compliment 
 than, perhaps, you are aware of. It in- 
 cludes almost all the professions, and, of 
 course, is a proof that your w^ritings are 
 adapted to various tastes and situations. 
 My youngest son, vi^ho is at Winchester 
 School, writes to me that he is translating 
 some stanzas of your Hallow E'en into 
 Latin verse, for the benefit of his com- 
 rades. This union of taste partly pro- 
 ceeds, no doubt, from the cement of Scot- 
 tish partiality, with which they are all 
 somewhat tinctured. Even your transla- 
 tor, who left Scotland too early in life for 
 recollection, is not without it. 
 
 I remain, with great sincerity, 
 Four obedient servant, 
 
 J. MOORE. 
 
 NO. xvn. 
 
 TO THE EARL OF GLENCAIRN. 
 
 Edinburgh, 1787. 
 
 MY LORD, 
 
 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 any thing of a likeness. 
 
 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 benefac- 
 tor. 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 magnani- 
 mous mind, do not deny me this petition.* 
 I ovm much to your Lordship ; and, what 
 
 * It dopB not appeu that the Earl granted this request, 
 nor have the verses alluded to been found imong the 
 
 M8S. E. 
 
 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 Lord- 
 ship'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. 
 
 Almost every poet has celebrated his pa- 
 trons, particularly when they were name* 
 dear to fame, and illustrious in their coun- 
 try ; 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, 
 Your Lordship's highly indebted, 
 and ever grateful humble servant. 
 
 No. XVIIL 
 TO THE EARL OP BUCHAN. 
 
 MY LORD, 
 
 The honour your Lordship has done 
 me, by your notice and advice in yours of 
 the 1st instant, I shall ever gratefully re- 
 member : 
 
 " Praise from thy lips 'tis mine with joy to boast, 
 Tiiey best can give it who deserve it most." 
 
 Your Lordship touches the darling 
 chord of my heart, when you advise me 
 to fire my muse at Scottish story and 
 Scottish 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 in- 
 spiration, to pour the deathless names in 
 song. But, my Lord, in the midst of 
 these enthusiastic reveries, a long-visa- 
 ged, dry, moral-looking phantom strides 
 across my imagination, and pronounces 
 these emphatic words : 
 
 " I wisdom, dwell with prudence. 
 Friend I do not come to open the ill-clos- 
 ed wounds ofyour follies and misfortunes, 
 merely to give you pain ; I wish through 
 these wounds to imprint a lasting lesson 
 
104 
 
 LETTERS. 
 
 on your heart. I will not mention how 
 fliany of ray salutary advices you have de- 
 spised ; 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 zig-zagged 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 misfor- 
 tune. 
 
 " Now that your dear-loved Scotia pats 
 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 inef- 
 fectual, 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 
 grip of ruthless oppression : you know 
 how you bear the galling sneer of con- 
 tumelious greatness. I hold you out the 
 conveniences, the comforts of life, inde- 
 pendence and character, on the one hand: 
 I tender you servility, dependence, and 
 wretchedness, on the other, I will not in- 
 sult your understanding by bidding you 
 make a choice."* 
 
 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, grati- 
 tude to that dear loved country in which 
 I boast iny birth, and gratitude to those 
 her distinguished sons, who have honour- 
 ed me so much with their patronage and 
 approbation, shall while stealing through 
 my humble shades, ever distend my bo- 
 som, and at times, as now, draw forth the 
 Bwelling tear. 
 
 No. XIX. 
 
 Ext. Property in favour of Mr. Robert Bums, to erect 
 and keep up a Headstone in memory of Poet Fer- 
 guEson, 1787. 
 
 Sesswn-nouie within the Kirk of Ca- 
 nongate, the twenty-second day of 
 February, one thousand seven hun- 
 dred and eighty-seven years. 
 
 SEDERUNT OF THE MANAGERS OF THE KIRK 
 AND KIRK- YARD FUNDS OF CANONGATE. 
 
 Which day, the treasurer to the said 
 funds produced a letter from Mr. Robert 
 Burns, of date the sixth current, which 
 was read, and appointed to be engrossed 
 in their sederunt-book, and of which letter 
 the tenor follows : " To the Honourable 
 Bailies of Canongate, Edinburgh. Gen- 
 tlemen, I am sorry to be told, that the re- 
 mains of Robert Fergusson, the so justly 
 celebrated poet, a man whose talents, for 
 ages to come, will do honour to our Ca- 
 ledonian name, lie in your church-yard, 
 among the ignoble dead, unnoticed and 
 unknown. 
 
 " 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 me- 
 mory ; a tribute I wish to have the ho- 
 nour of paying. 
 
 " I petition you, then, gentlemen, to 
 permit me to lay a simple stone over his 
 revered ashes, to remain an unalienable 
 property to his decthless fame. I have 
 the honour to be, Gentlemen, your very 
 humble servant, [sic svbscribitur,) 
 
 " Robert Burns." 
 
 Thereafter the said managers, in con- 
 sideration of the laudable and disinterest- 
 ed motion of Mr. Burns, and the propriety 
 of his request, did and hereby do, unani- 
 mously, grant power and liberty to the 
 said Robert Burns to erect a headstone 
 at the grave of the said Robert Fergus- 
 son, and to keep up and preserve the 
 same to his memory in all time coming. 
 Extracted forth of the records of the ma- 
 nagers, by 
 
 WiLLtAM Sprot, Clerk 
 
 No. XX. 
 
 To 
 
 MY DEAR SIR, 
 
 •Copied from the Bee, vol. ii. p. 319 «id compared I You may think, and too justly, that 
 
 with the AuUior's MS. * I am a Selfish, ungrateful fellow, having 
 
LETTERS. 
 
 105 
 
 received bo many reneated instances of 
 kindness from you, and yet never putting 
 pen to paper to say — thank you ; but if you 
 knevi' what a devil of a life my conscience 
 has led me on that account, your good 
 heart would think yourself too much 
 lavenged. By the by, there is nothing in 
 •the whole frame of man which seems to 
 'me so unaccountable as that thing called 
 (conscience. Had the troublesome, yelp- 
 ing cur powers efficient to prevent a mis- 
 Ichief, he might be of use ; but at the be- 
 jginning of the business, his feeble efforts 
 are to the workings of passion as the in- 
 fant 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 i 
 bitter native consequences of folly in the 
 very vortex of our horrors, up starts con- 
 science, and harrows us with the feelings 
 of the d*****. 
 
 I have enclosed you, by way of expia- 
 tion, 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. Sprot 
 sent it me. 
 
 The Inscription of the stone U at follows : 
 
 HERE LIRS 
 
 ROBERT FERGUSSON, POET, 
 
 Born, September 5tli, 1751— Died, 16th October, 1774. 
 
 Nosculptiir'd Marble here, nor pompous lay, 
 
 '• No stoi led urn nor animated bust ;" 
 This simple stone directs pale Scotia's way 
 
 To pour her sorrows o'er her Poet's dust. 
 
 On the other side of the Stone is as follows: 
 
 "By special grant of the Managers to 
 Robert Burns, who erected this stone, 
 this burial place is to remain for ever sa- 
 cred to the memory of Robert Fergusson." 
 
 No. XXI. 
 Extract of a Letter from . 
 
 mh March, 1787. 
 
 AM truly happy to know that you 
 have found a friend in ***** ; 
 his patronage of you does him great ho- 
 nour. He is truly a good man ; by far 
 the best I ever knew, or, perhaps, ever 
 
 shall know, in this world. But I muat 
 not speak all I think of him, lest 1 should 
 be thought partial. 
 
 So you have obtained liberty from tha 
 magistrates to erect a stone over Fer- 
 gusson's grave ? I do not doubt it ; such 
 things have been, as Shakspeare eayB, 
 " in the olden time :" 
 
 " The poet's fate is here in emblem shown, 
 He ask'd for bread, and he receiv'd a stone." 
 
 It is, I believe, upon poor Butler's tomb 
 that this is written. But how many bro- 
 thers of Parnassus, as well as poor But- 
 ler and poor Fergusson, have asked for 
 bread, and been served the same sauce ! 
 
 The magistrates gave you liberty, did 
 they? O generous magistrates! * * * ♦ 
 * * * celebrated over the three king- 
 doms for his public spirit, gives a poor 
 poet liberty to raise a tomb to a poor poet's 
 memory ! most generous \ * * * * once 
 upon a time gave that same poet the 
 mighty sum of eighteen pence for a copy 
 of his works. But then it must be con- 
 sidered that the poet was at this time ab- 
 solutely starving, and besought his aid 
 with all the earnestness of hunger ; and 
 over and above, he received a * * * * 
 worth, at least one third of the value, in 
 exchange, but which, I believe, the poet 
 afterwards very ungratefully expunged. 
 
 Next week I hope to have the pleasure 
 of seeing you in Edinburgh ; and as my 
 stay will be for eight or ten days, I wish 
 vou or ' 
 
 would take a snug well- 
 aired bed-room for me, where I may have 
 the pleasure of seeing you over a morning 
 cup of tea. But, by all accounts, it will be a 
 matter of some dilHculty to see you at all, 
 unless your company is bespoke a week 
 before-hand. There is a great rumour 
 here concerning your great intimacy with 
 
 the Dutchess of , and other ladiea 
 
 of distinction. I am really told that 
 " cards to invite fly by thousands each 
 night;" and, if you had one, I suppose 
 there would also be " bribes to your old 
 secretary." It seems you are resolved to 
 make hay while the sun shines, and avoid, 
 if possible, the fate of poor Fergusson, 
 * * * * * Qucerenda pecunia priinum est, 
 virtus post nummos, is a good maxim to 
 thrive by ; you seemed to despise it while 
 in this country; but probably some phi- 
 losopher in Edinburgfh hag taug^ht you 
 better semie. 
 
106 
 
 LETTERS. 
 
 Pray, are you yet engraving ns well as 
 printing ? — Are you yet seized 
 
 " With itch of picture in the front, 
 With bays and wicked rhyme upon'f?" 
 
 But I must give up this trifling, and at- 
 tend to matters that more concern myself; 
 60, as the Aberdeen wit says, adieu dryly, 
 we *al drink phan voe meet,* 
 
 NO. XXI . 
 TO MRS. DUNLOP. 
 Edinburgh, March 22, 1787. 
 
 .■JADAM, 
 
 I READ yonr letter with watery eyes. 
 A little, very little while ago, / had scarce 
 a friend hut the stubborn pride of my own 
 bosom ; now I am distinguished, patronis- 
 ed, befriended by you. Your friendly ad- 
 vices, 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 hore, but with them I 
 sometimes find it necessary to claim the 
 privilege of thinking for myself The 
 noble Earl of Glencairn, to whom I owe 
 more than to any man, does me the ho- 
 nour of giving me his strictures ; his 
 hints, with respect to impropriety or in- 
 delicacy, I follow implicitly. 
 
 You kindly interest yourself in my fu- 
 ture views and prospects : there T can 
 give you no light : — it is all 
 
 "Dark as was chaos, ere the infant sun 
 Was roll'd togetlier, or had try'd his beams 
 Athwart the glonni profound." 
 
 The appellation of a Scottish bard is by 
 far my highest pride ; to continue to de- 
 serve 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^ 
 
 • The above extract is from a letter of one of the 
 ablest of ourPoet's correspondents, which containssome 
 Interesting anecdotes of Fergusson, that we should have 
 been happy to have inserted, if they could Jiave been 
 authenticated. The writer is mistaken in supposing 
 the magistrates of Edinburgh had any share in the 
 transaction respecting the monument erected for Fer- 
 gnsson by our bard ; this, u is evident, passed between 
 Burns and the Kirk-Session of the Canongate. Neither 
 at Edinburgh nor any where eloe, do magistrates usu- 
 ally trouble themselves to inquire how the house of a 
 poor poet is furnished, or how hid grave M adorned. E. 
 
 for whicn, heaven knows ! I am unfit 
 enough, to make leisurely pilgrimages 
 through Caledonia ; to sit on the fields 
 of her battles ; to wander on the roman- 
 tic banks of her rivers ; and to muse by 
 the stately towers or venerable ruins, 
 once the honoured abodes of her heroes. 
 
 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 thoughtless- 
 ness, indolence, or folly, he may be ex- 
 cusable ; 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 oth- 
 ers 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. 
 
 I guess that I shall clear between two 
 and three hundred pounds by my author- 
 ship : with that sum I intend, so far as I 
 may be said to have any intention, to re- 
 turn 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 employment. If my practice 
 second my resolution, T shall have princi- 
 pally at heart the serious business of life ; 
 but, while following my plough, or build- 
 ing up my shocks, I shall cast a leisure 
 glance to that dear, that only feature of 
 my character, which jrave me the notice 
 of my country, and the patronage of a 
 Wallace. 
 
 Thus, honoured Madam, I have given 
 you the bard, his situation, and his views, 
 native as they are in his own bosom. 
 
 No. XXIII. 
 TO THE SAME. 
 Edinburgh, 15</i April, 1787. 
 
 MADAM, 
 
 There 
 
 an affectation of gratitude 
 which I dislike. The periods of Johnson 
 
LETTERS. 
 
 107 
 
 and the pausea of Sterne, may hide a self- 
 ish 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 
 
 " Rude am I in speech, 
 And therefore little can I grace my cause 
 In speaking for myself — 
 
 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. 
 
 I come abroad in print for certain on 
 Wednesday. Your orders I shall punc- 
 tually attend to ; only, by the way, I 
 must tell you that I was paid before for 
 Dr. Moore's and Miss W.'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. 
 
 Dr. Smith* was just gone to London 
 the morning before I received your letter 
 to him. 
 
 No. XXIV. 
 TO DR. MOORE. 
 
 Edinburgh, 23d April, 1787. 
 
 RECEivF.D the books, and sent the one 
 you mentioned to Mrs. Dunlop. I am ill- 
 skilled in beating the coverts of imagina- 
 tion 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 vo- 
 lumes as 'a mark of the author's friendly 
 esteem, is a still more supreme gratifi- 
 cation. 
 
 I leave Edinburgh in the course of ten 
 days or a fortnight ; and, after a few pil- 
 grimages over some of the classic ground 
 of Caledonia, Cowdtn Knowes, Banks of 
 Yarrow, Tweed, tSfc. 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 con- 
 struction to bear carriage a hundred and 
 fifty miles. To the rich, the great, the 
 
 * Adam Smith. 
 U 2 
 
 fashionable, the polite, I have no equiva- 
 lent to otter ; 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 ge- 
 nius and literature. 
 
 My most respectful compliments to 
 Miss W. 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 het 
 poetic compliment in kind. 
 
 No. XXV. 
 
 EXTRACT OF A LETTER TO 
 MRS. DUNLOP. 
 Edinburgh, 20th April, 1787. 
 
 Your criticisms. Madam, I un- 
 derstand very well, and could have wish- 
 ed 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 
 wealtli and power that I am determined 
 to flatter no created being either in prose 
 or verse. 
 
 I set as little by princes, lords, clergy, 
 critics, &c. as all these respective gentry 
 do by my hardship. I know what I may 
 expect from the world by and by — illiberal 
 abuse, and perhaps contemptuous neglect. 
 
 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. 
 
 No. XXVI. 
 TO THE REV. DR. HUGH BLAIR. 
 
 Lawn-Market, Edinburgh, 2d May, 1787. 
 
 REVKREND AND MUCH-RESPECTED SIR, 
 
 I LEAVE Edinburgh to-morrow morn- 
 ing, but could not go without troubling 
 you with half a line sincerely to thank 
 
10ft 
 
 LETTERS. 
 
 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 illustri- 
 ous 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 at- 
 tract notice, and honour me with the ac- 
 quaintance of the permanent lights of 
 genius and literature, those who are tru 
 ly benefactors of the immortal nature of 
 man; I knew very well that my utmost 
 merit was far unequal to the task of pre- 
 serving 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. 
 
 I have sent you a proof impression of 
 Beugo's work for me, done on Indian pa- 
 per, as a trifling but sincere testimony 
 with what heart-warm gratitude I am,&.c. 
 
 No. XXVII. 
 FROM DR. BLAIR. 
 
 Argyle-Square, Edinburgh, ith May, 
 
 DEAR SIR, 
 
 I WAS favoured this forenoon with 
 your very obliging letter, together with 
 an impression of your portrait, for which 
 I return you my best thanks. The suc- 
 cess you have met with I do not think 
 was beyond your merits ; and if I have 
 had any small hand in contributing to it, 
 it gives me great pleasure. I know no 
 way in which literary persons, who are 
 advanced in years, can do more service 
 to the world, than in forwarding the ef- 
 forts of rising genius, or bringing forth 
 unknown merit from obscurity. I was 
 the first person who brought out to the 
 notice of the world, the poems of Ossian: 
 first, by the Fragments of Ancient Poetry 
 which I published, and afterwards by my 
 setting on foot the undertaking for col- 
 lecting and publishing the Works of Os- 
 sian ; and I have always considered this 
 as a meritorious action of my life. 
 
 Your situation, as you say, was indeed 
 very singular ; and, in being brought out 
 
 all at once fVom the (shades of deepest 
 privacy, to so great a share of public no- 
 tice and observation, you had to stand a se- 
 vere trial. I am happy that 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 and behaviour. 
 
 You are now, I presume, to retire to a 
 more private walk of life ; and, I trust, 
 will conduct yourself there, with indus- 
 try, prudence, and honour. You have 
 laid the foundation for just public esteem. 
 In the midst of those employments, which 
 your situation will render proper, you will 
 not, I hope, neglect to promote that es- 
 teem, by cultivating your genius, and at- 
 tending to such productions of it as may 
 raise your character still higher. At the 
 same time, be not in too great a haste to 
 come forward. Take time and leisure to 
 improve and mature your talents ; for on 
 any second production you give the world, 
 your fate, as a poet, will very much de- 
 pend. There is, no doubt, a gloss of no- 
 velty which time wears off. As you very 
 properly hint yourself, you are not to be 
 surprised, if, in your rural retreat, you do 
 not find yourself surrounded with that 
 glare of notice and applause which here 
 shone upon you. No man can be a good 
 poet, without being somewhat of a philo- 
 sopher. He must lay his account, that 
 any one, who exposes himself to public 
 observation, will occasionally meet with 
 the attacks of illiberal censure, which it 
 is always best to overlook and despise. 
 He will be inclined sometimes to court 
 retreat, and to disappear from public 
 view. He will not afiect to shine always, 
 that he may at proper seasons come forth 
 with more advantage and energy. He 
 will not think himself neglected, if he be 
 not always praised. I have taken the 
 liberty, you see, of an old man, to give 
 advice and make reflections which your 
 own good sense will, I dare say, render 
 unnecessary. 
 
 As you mention your being just about 
 to leave town, you are going, I should 
 suppose, to Dumfries-shire, to look at 
 some of Mr. Miller's farms. I heartily 
 wish the oflfers to be made you there may 
 answer, as I am persuaded you will not 
 easily find a more generous and better- 
 hearted proprietor to live under, than Mr. 
 Miller. When you return, if you come 
 this way, I will be happy to see you, and 
 to know concerning your future plans of 
 
LETTERS. 
 
 109 
 
 life. You will find me by the 22d of this 
 month, not in my house in Argyle-square, 
 but at a country-house at Restalrig, about 
 a mile east from Edinburgh, near the 
 Musselburgh road. Wishing you all suc- 
 cess and prosperity, I am, with real re- 
 gard and esteem, 
 
 Dear Sir, 
 
 Yours sincerely, 
 HUGH BLAIR. 
 
 No. XXVHL 
 FROM DR. MOORE. 
 
 Clifford-Street, May, 23, 1787. 
 
 I HAD the pleasure of your letter by 
 Mr. Creech, and soon after he sent me 
 the new edition of your poems. You seem 
 to think It incumbent on you to send to 
 each subscriber a number of copies pro- 
 portionate to his subscription-money ; but 
 you may depend upon it, few subscribers 
 expect more than one copy, whatever they 
 subscribed. I must inform you, however, 
 that I took twelve copies "for those sub- 
 scribers for whose money yon were so 
 accurate as to send me a receipt ; and 
 Lord Eglinton told me he had sent for 
 six copies for himself, as he wished to 
 give five of them as presents. 
 
 Some of the poems you have added in 
 this last edition are very beautiful, par- 
 ticularly the Winter Jfi'gkt, the .Address 
 to Edinbuy-sch, Green groir the Rnshe.i, 
 and the two songs immediately following; 
 the latter of which is exquisite. By the 
 way, I imagine yon have a peculiar talent 
 for such compositions, which you ought 
 to indulge.* No kind of poetry demands 
 more delicacy or higher polishing. Ho- 
 race is more admired on account of his 
 Odes than all his other writings. But no- 
 thing now added is equal to your Tlsion, 
 and Cotter's Snfurdny JSTight. In these 
 are united fine imagery, natural and pa- 
 thetic description, with sublimity of lan- 
 guage and thought. It is evident that 
 you already possess a great variety of ex- 
 pression and command of the JEnglish 
 language, you ought, therefore to deal 
 more sparingly for the future in the pro- 
 vincial dialect : why should you, by using 
 
 • The poems mibsequenUy conipospd will bear tnsti- 
 monr to the accnraev of Dr. Moore!3 judgment. E. 
 
 that, limit the number of your admirers to 
 those who understand the Scottish, when 
 you can extend it to all persons of taste 
 who understand the English language? 
 In my opinion you should plan some larger 
 work than any you have as yet attempt- 
 ed. I mean, reflect upon some proper 
 subject, and arrange the plan in your 
 mind, without beginning to execute any 
 part of it till you have studied most of the 
 best English poets, and read a little more 
 of history. The Greek and Roman sto- 
 ries you can read in some abridgment, 
 and soon become master of the most bril- 
 liant facts, which must highly delight a 
 poetical mind. You should also, and very 
 soon may, become master of the heathen 
 mythology, to which there are everlasting 
 allusions in all the poets, and which in it- 
 self is charmingly fanciful. What will 
 require to be studied with more attention, 
 is modern history ; that is, the history of 
 France and Great Britain, from the be- 
 ginning of Henry the Seventh's reign. I 
 know very well you have a mind capable 
 of attaining knowledge by a shorter pro- 
 cess than is commonly used, and I am cer- 
 tain you are capable of making a better 
 use of it, when attained, than is general- 
 ly done. 
 
 I beg you will not give yourself the 
 trouble of writing to me when it is incon- 
 venient, and make no apology when you 
 do write, for having postponed it ; be as- 
 sured of this, however, that I shall always 
 be happy to hear from you. I think my 
 
 friend, Mr. told me that you had 
 
 some poems in manuscript by you, of a 
 satirical and humorous nature (in which, 
 by the way, I think you very strong,) 
 which your prudent friends prevailed on 
 you to omit ; particularly one called Some- 
 body's Confession ; if you will intrust me 
 with a sight of any of these, I will pawn 
 my word to give no copies, and will be 
 obliged to you for a perusal of them. 
 
 I understand you intend to take a farm, 
 and make the useful and respectable busi- 
 ness of husbandry your chief occupation ; 
 this, I hope, will not prevent your making 
 occasional addresses to the nine ladies 
 who have shown you such favour, one of 
 whom visited you in the auld clay bigs:in. 
 Virgil, before you, proved to the world, 
 that there is nothing in the business of 
 husbandry inimical to poetry ; and I sin- 
 cerelv hope that you may afford an ex- 
 ample of a good poet being a successful 
 farmer. I fear it will not be in my power 
 
no 
 
 LETTERS. 
 
 to visit Scotland this season ; when I do, 
 I'll endeavour to find you out, for I hear- 
 tily wish to see and converse with you. 
 If ever your occasions call you to this 
 place, I make no doubt of your paying me 
 a visit, and you may depend on a very 
 cordial welcome from this family. 
 
 I am, dear Sir, 
 
 Your friend and obedient servant, 
 
 J. MOORE. 
 
 No. XXIX. 
 
 TO MR. WALKER, 
 
 BLAIR OF ATHOLK. 
 
 Inverness, 5th September, 1 787. 
 
 MY DEAR SIR, 
 
 I HAVE just time to write the forego- 
 ing,* and to tell you that it was (at least 
 most part of it,) the effusion of a 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. N 's chat, 
 
 and the jogging of the chaise, would al- 
 low. 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 Athole, 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. 
 
 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 Dutchess, with 
 her smiling little seraph in her lap, at the 
 head of the table ; the lovely "olive plants," 
 as tho 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 hos- 
 pitality — markedly kind indeed ! Mr. G. 
 of F — 's charms of conversation — Sir W. 
 M 's friendship. In short the recol- 
 lection of all that polite, agreeable com- 
 pany, raises an honest glow in my bosom. 
 
 • The humble Pktition of Bruar- Wate- to *ho Duke 
 of Atbole. See Poems, p 72. 
 
 No. XXX. 
 
 TO MR. GILBERT BURNS. 
 
 Edinburgh, 11th Sept. 1787. 
 
 My DEAR BROTHER, 
 
 I ARRIVED here safe yesterday even- 
 ing, after a tour of twenty-two days, and 
 travelling near six hundred miles, wind- 
 ings 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 the 
 Lord Breadalbane, down the Tay, among 
 cascades and Druidical circles of stones, 
 to Dunkeld, a seat of the Duke of Athole ; 
 thence cross Tay, and up one of his tri- 
 butary streams to Blair of Athole, ano- 
 ther 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 Caw- 
 dor, the ancient seat of Macbeth ; there 
 I saw the identical bed in which, tradi- 
 tion says. King Duncan was murdered ; 
 lastly, from Fort George to Inverness. 
 
 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, stiU 
 alive, and hale old women. John Caird, 
 though born the same year with our fa- 
 ther, 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 fertUe carses? I 
 slept at the famous Brodie of Brodie's 
 one night, and dined at Gordon Castle 
 next day with the Duke, Dutchess, and 
 family. I am thinking to cause my old 
 mare to meet me, by means of John Ro- 
 nald, at Glasgow : but you shall hear far- 
 ther from rae before I leave Edinburgh 
 My duty, and many compliments, frota 
 
LETTERS, 
 
 in 
 
 the north, to my mother, and my brotherly 
 compliments to the rest. I have been 
 trying for a birth for William, but am not 
 likely to be successful. — Farewell ! 
 
 No. XXXI. 
 FROM MR. R*****. 
 
 Ochtertyre, 22d October, 1 787. 
 
 'Twas only yesterday I got Colonel 
 Edmondstoune's answer, that neither the 
 words of Down the Burn Davie, nor Dain- 
 I'te Davie, (I forgot which you mentioned,) 
 were written by Colonel G. Crawford. 
 Next time I meet him, I will inquire 
 about his cousin's poetical talents. 
 
 Enclosed are the inscriptions you re- 
 quested, and a letter to Mr. Young, whose 
 company and musical talents will, I am 
 persuaded, be a feast to you.* Nobody 
 
 • These Inscriptions, so much admired by Burns, are 
 as Tollows: 
 
 WRITTEN IN 1768. 
 
 FOR THE SALICTUM* AT OCHTEBTISB. 
 
 Salubritatis voiuptatisque causa, 
 
 Hoc Salictum, 
 
 Paludem olim infidam, 
 
 Milii meisque desicco et exorr.o. 
 
 Hie, procul negotiis strepiluque, 
 
 Innocuis deliciis 
 
 Silvulas inter nascentes reptandi, 
 
 Apiumque labores suspiciendi, 
 
 Fruor. 
 
 Hie, si faxit Deus opt- max. 
 
 Prope liunc fonte)n pellucidum. 
 
 Cum quodam juventutis amico superstite, 
 
 Saepe conquiescam, senex, 
 
 Contentus modicis, meoque lalus ! 
 
 Sin aliter — 
 
 /Evique paululum supersit, 
 
 Vos silvulae, et amici, 
 
 Cffiteraque amoena, 
 
 Valete, diuque lataminl! 
 
 ENGLISHED. 
 
 To improve both air and soil, 
 
 I drain and decorate this plantation of willows, 
 
 Which was lately an unprofitable morass. 
 
 Here, far from noise and strife, 
 
 1 love to wander, 
 
 Now fondly marking the progress of my tree», 
 
 Wow studying the bee, its arts and manners. 
 
 Here, if it pleases Almighty God, 
 
 May I often rest in the evening of life, 
 
 Near that transparent fountain. 
 
 With some surviving friend of my youth ; 
 
 • «ai»«eu7n— Grove of Willows. Willow-grouml. 
 
 I ran give you better hints, as to your pre- 
 I sent plan than he. Receive also Ome- 
 ron Cameron, which seemed to make 
 such a deep impression on your imagina- 
 tion, that I am not without hopes it will 
 beget something to delight the public in 
 due timo : and, no doubt, the circumstan- 
 ces of this little tale might be varied or 
 extended, so as to make part of a pasto- 
 ral comedy. Age oi wounds might have 
 kept Omeron at home, whilst his coun- 
 trymen were in the field. His station 
 may be somewhat varied, without losing 
 his simplicity and kindness. * * * a 
 group of characters, male and female, con- 
 nected with the plot, might be formed 
 from his family or some neighbouring one 
 of rank. It is not indispensable that the 
 guest should be a man of high station ; 
 nor is the political quarrel in which he 
 is engaged, of much importance, unless 
 to call forth the exercise of generosity 
 and faithfulness, grafted on patriarchal 
 hospitality. To introduce state-affairs, 
 would raise the style above comedy; 
 though a small spice of them would sea- 
 son the converse of swains. Upon this 
 head I cannot say more than to recom- 
 mend the study of the character of Eu- 
 maBus in the Odyssey, which, in Mr. Pope's 
 translation, is an exquisite and invaluable 
 drawing from nature, that would suit 
 some of our country Elders of the pre- 
 sent day. 
 
 There must be love in the plot, and a 
 happy discovery ; and peace and pardon 
 may be the reward of hospitality, and ho- 
 
 Conlented with a competency, 
 
 And happy with my lot. 
 \\ vain these humble wishes, 
 And life draws near a close, 
 
 Ye trees and friends, 
 
 And whatever else is dear. 
 
 Farewell ! and long may ye flourish 
 
 ABOVE THE DOOR OF THE HOHSI. 
 
 WRITTEN IN 1775. 
 
 Mihi meisque utinam conting 
 
 Prope Taichi marginem, 
 
 Avito inAgello, 
 
 Bene vivere fausteque mori ! 
 
 ENGLISHED. 
 
 On the banks of the Teith, 
 
 In the small but sweet inheritanc* 
 
 Of my fathers, 
 
 May I and mine live in peace, 
 
 And die in joyful hope '. 
 
 These Inscriptions, and the translations, are ta i 
 hand writing of Mr. Ramsay. 
 
LETTERS. 
 
 nest attarhment to misguided principles. 
 When you have once thought of a plot, 
 and brought tlie story into form, Doctor 
 Blaoklock, or Mr. H. Mackenzie, may be 
 useful in dividing it into acts and scenes ; 
 for in these matters one must pay some 
 attention to certain rules of the drama. 
 These you could afterwards fill up at your 
 leisure. But, whilst I presume to give a 
 few well-meant hints, let me advise you 
 to study the spirit of my namesake's dia- 
 logue,* which is natural without being 
 low; and, under the trammels of verse, is 
 Buch as country-people, in these situa- 
 tions, speak every day. You have only 
 to bring down your strain a very little. A 
 great plan, such as tl)is, would concentre 
 all your ideas, which facilitates the execu- 
 tion, and makes it a part of one's pleasure. 
 
 I approve of your plan of retiring from 
 din and dissipation to a farm of very mo- 
 derate size, sufficient to find exercise for 
 mind and body, but not so great as to ab- 
 sorb better things. And if some intellec- 
 tual pursuit be well chosen and steadily 
 pursued, it will be more lucrative than 
 most farms, in this age of rapid improve- 
 ment. 
 
 Upon this subject, as your well-wisher 
 and admirer, permit me to go a step fur- 
 ther. Let those bright talents which the 
 Almighty has bestowed on you, be hence- 
 forth employed to the noble purpose of 
 supporting the cause of truth and virtue. 
 An imagination so varied and forcible as 
 yours, may do this in many different 
 modes : nor is it necessary to be always, 
 serious, which you have to good purpose ; 
 good morals may be recommended in a 
 comedy, or even in a song. Great allow- 
 ances are due to the 'heat and inexperi- 
 ence of youth ; — and few poets can boast, 
 like Thomson, of never having written a 
 line, which, dying, they would wish to 
 blot. In particular I wish you to keep 
 clear of the thorny walks of satire, which 
 makes a man a hundred enemies for one 
 friend, and is doubly dangerous when one 
 is supposed to extend the slips and weak- 
 nesses of individuals to their sect or par- 
 ty. About modes of faith, serious and 
 excellent men have always differed ; and 
 there are certain curious questions, which 
 may afford scope to men of metaphysical 
 heads, but seldom mend the heart or tem- 
 per. Whilst these points arc beyond hu- 
 man ken, it is sufficient that all our sects 
 / 
 
 • Al)«n Rnmsay, In tlia Gentle Shepherd. R. 
 
 concur in their views of morals. You 
 
 will forgive me for these hints. 
 
 Well ! what think you of good lady 
 Clackmannan ?* It is a pity she is so 
 deaf, and speaks so indistinctly. Her 
 house is a specimen of the mansions of 
 our gentry of the last age, when hospi- 
 tality and elevation of mmd were conspi- 
 cuous amidst plain fare and plain furni- 
 ture. I shall be glad to hear from you at 
 times, if it were no more than to show 
 that you take the efllisions of an obscure 
 man like me in good part. I beg my best 
 respects to Dr. and Mrs. Blacklock.f 
 
 And am, Sir, 
 Your most obedient, humble servant, 
 J. RAMSAY. 
 
 » Mrs. Rruce of Clackmannan. E. 
 t TALE OF OMERON CAMERON. 
 Ill one of the wars betwixt the crown of Scotland 
 and the Lords of the Isles, Alexander Stewart, Earl of 
 Mar (a distinguished character in the fifteenth centu- 
 ry,) and Donald Stewart, Earl of Caithness, hart tha 
 command of the royal army. They marched into 
 Lochaber, wiih a view of attacking a body of the 
 M'Doiialds, commanded by Donald Ballocli, and posted 
 upon an arm of the sea which intersects that country. 
 II avinf.' timely intelligence of their approach, the insur- 
 gents got off precipitately to the opposite shore in their 
 curra^tis, or boats covered with skins. The king's 
 troops encamped in full security ; but the M'Donalds, 
 returning about midnight, surprised them, killed the 
 Earl of Caithness, and destroyed or dispersed tne whole 
 army. 
 
 The Earl of Mar escaped in the dark, without any 
 attendants, and made for the more hilly part of the 
 country. In the course of his Might he came to the house 
 of a poor man, whose name was Omeron Cameron. 
 The landlord welcomed his guest with the utmost kind- 
 ness ; but, as there was no meat in the house, he told 
 his wife he would directly kill Maol Adhar* to feed the 
 stranger. " Kill our only cow !" said she, "our own and 
 nur little children's principal support!" More attentive, 
 however, to the present call for hospitality than to the 
 remonstrances of hii wife, or the future exigencies of 
 his family, he killed the cow. The best and tenderest 
 parts were immediately roasted before the fire, and 
 plenty of innirich, or Highland soup, prepared to con- 
 clude their meal. The whole family, and their guest 
 ate heartily, and the evening was spent, as usual, in 
 telling tales and singing songs beside a cheerful fire. 
 Bed-time came ; Omeron brushed the hearth, spread the 
 cow-hide upon it, and desired the stranger to lie down. 
 The earl wrapped his plaid about him, and slept sound- 
 ly on the hide, whilst the family betook themselves to 
 rest in a corner of the same room. 
 
 Next morning they had a plentiful breakfast, and at 
 hia departure his guest asked Cameron, if he knew 
 whom he had entertained 7 " You may probably," 
 answered he, " be one of the king's officers ; but who- 
 ever you are, you came here in distress, and bere i\ 
 
 * Maol Odhsr, >. «. the brown, hoaiiiiiloow. 
 
LETTERS. 
 
 IIS 
 
 No. XXXII. 
 FROM MR. J. RAMSAY, 
 
 TO THE 
 
 REVEREND W. YOUNG, AT 
 
 ERSKINE. 
 
 Ochtertyre, 22d October, 1787. 
 
 DEAR SIR, 
 
 Allow me to introduce Mr. Burns, 
 whose poems, I dare say, have given you 
 much pleasure. Upon a personal ac- 
 quaintance, I doubt not, you will relish I 
 the man as much as his works, in which 
 there is a rich vein of intellectual ore. 
 He has heard some of our Higiiland Lu- 
 inags or songs played, which delighted 
 him so much that he has made words to 
 one or two of them, which will render 
 these more popular. As he has thought 
 of being in your quarter, I am persuaded 
 you will not think it labour lost to indulge 
 the poet of nature with a sample of those 
 sweet, artless melodies, which only want 
 to be married (in Milton's phrase) to con- 
 genial words. I wish we could con- 
 jure up the ghost of Joseph M'D. to in- 
 fuse into our bard a portion of his enthu- 
 siasm for those neglected airs, which do 
 not suit the fastidious musicians of the 
 present hour. But if it be true that Co- 
 was my duty to protect you- To what my cottage af- 
 loided you was most welcome." " Your guest, then," 
 replied the Jther, " is the Earl of Mar ; and if hereafter 
 you fall into any mislortune, fail not to come to the 
 custir of Kildrummie." " My blessing be with you ! 
 noble stranger," said Omeron ; " If I am ever in dis- 
 tress you shall soon see me." 
 
 Tiie Royal army was soon after re-asisembled, and 
 the insurgents finding themselves unable to make head 
 against it, dispersed. The M'Donalds, however, got 
 notice that Omeron had been the Earl' s host, and forced 
 him to fly the country. He came with his wife and 
 children to the gate of Kildrummie castle, and required 
 admittance with o confidence which hardly correspond- 
 ed with his habit and appearance. The porter told him 
 rudely, his lordship was at dinner, and must not be dis- 
 turbed. He became noisy and importunate : at last his 
 name was announced. Upon hearing that it was Omeron 
 Cameron, the Earl started from his seat, and is said to 
 have exclaimed in a kind of poetical stanza, '■ I was a 
 night in hishouse, and fared moat plentifully ; but naked 
 of clothes was my bed. Omeron from Breugach is an 
 excellent fellow." He was introduced into the great 
 hall, and received with the welcome he deserved. 
 Upon hearing how he had been treated, the Earl gave 
 him a four merk land near the castle ; and it is said 
 there are still a number of Camerons descended of this 
 Highland Euraicus. 
 
 relli (whom T looked on as the Homer of 
 
 music) is out of date, it is no proof of their 
 tasto ; — this, however, is going out of my 
 province. YoU can show Mr. Burns the 
 manner of singing the same Luinags ; 
 and, if he can humour it in words, I do 
 not despair of seeing one of them sung 
 upon the stage, in the original style, 
 round a napkin. 
 
 I am very sorry we are likely to meet 
 so seldom in this neighbourhood. It is one 
 of the greatest drawbacks that attends 
 obscurity, that one has so few opportu- 
 nities of cultivating acquaintances at a 
 distance. I hope, however, some time 
 or other to have the pleasure of beating 
 up your quarters at Erskine, and of haul- 
 ing you away to Paisley, &c. ; meanwhile 
 I beg to be remembered to Messrs. Boog 
 and Mylne. 
 
 If Mr. B. goes by , give him a bil- 
 let on our friend Mr. Stuart, who, I pre- 
 sume, does not dread the frowns of 'his 
 diocesan. 
 
 I am, Dear Sir, 
 
 Your most obedient, humble servant. 
 J. RAMSAY. 
 
 No. xxxni. 
 
 FROM MR. RAMSAY 
 
 TO DR. BLACKLOCK. 
 Ochtertyre, October 27, 1787. 
 
 DEAR SIR, 
 
 I RECEIVED yours by Mr. Burns, and 
 give you many thanks for giving me an 
 opportunity of conversing with a man of 
 his calibre. He will, I doubt not, let you 
 know what passed between us on the sub- 
 ject of my hints, to which I have made 
 additions in a letter I sent him t'other 
 day to your care. 
 
 You may tell Mr. Burns, when you see 
 him, that Colonel Edmondstoune told me 
 t'other day, that his cousin. Colonel 
 George Crawford, was no poet, but a 
 great singer of songs; but that his eldest 
 brother Robert (by a former marriage) 
 had a great turn that way, having writ- 
 ten the words of The Bush ahoon Tra- 
 qunir and Ttveedsid^. That the Mary to 
 
tI4 
 
 LETTERS. 
 
 whom it was addressed was Mary Stew- 
 art, of the Uastlemilk family, afterwards 
 wife of Mr. John Relches. The Colonel 
 never saw Robert Crawford, though he 
 was at his burial fifty-five years ago. 
 }Te was a pretty young man, and had 
 lived long in France. Lady Ankerville 
 is his niece, and may know more of his 
 poetical vein. An epitaph-monger like 
 me might moralize upon the vanity of 
 life, and the vanity of those sweet effu- 
 Bions. But I have hardly room to oflfer 
 my best compliments to Mrs. Blacklock, 
 and am, 
 
 Dear Doctor, 
 Your most obedient, humble servant, 
 J. RAMSAY. 
 
 No. XXXIV. 
 FROM MR. JOHN MURDOCH. 
 
 London, 2Stk October, 1787. 
 
 MT DEAR SIR, 
 
 As my friend, Mr Brown is going 
 from this place to your neighbourhood, I 
 embrace the opportunity of telling you 
 that I am yet alive, tolerably well, and al- 
 ways in expectation of being better. By 
 the much-valued letters before me, I see 
 that it was my duty to have given you 
 this intelligence about three years and 
 nine months ago : and have nothing to al- 
 lege as an excuse, but that we poor, busy, 
 bustling bodies in London, are so much 
 taken up with the various pursuits in 
 which we are here engaged, that we sel- 
 dom think of any person, creature, place, 
 or thing that is absent. But this is not 
 altogether the case with me ; for I often 
 think of you, and Hornie and Russel, and 
 an unfathomed depth, and lowan hrunstane, 
 all in the same minute, although you and 
 they are (as I suppose) at a considerable 
 distance. I flatter myself, however, with 
 the pleasing thought, that you and I shall 
 meet some time or other either in Scot- 
 land or England. If ever you come hither, 
 you will have the satisfaction of seeing 
 your poems relished hy the Caledonians 
 in London, full as much as they can be 
 by those of Edinburgh. We frequently 
 repeat some of your verses in our Cale- 
 donian society ; and you may believe. 
 that I am not a little vain that I have had 
 some share in cultivating such a genius. 
 I was not absolutely certain that you were 
 
 the author, till a few days ago, when I 
 made a visit to Mrs. Hill, Dr. M' Comb's 
 eldest daughter, who lives in town, and 
 who told me that she was informed of it 
 by a letter from her sister in Edinburgh, 
 with whom you had been in company 
 when in that capital. 
 
 Pray let me know if you have any in- 
 tention of visiting this huge, overgrown 
 metropolis? It would afford matter for a 
 large poem. Here you would have an op- 
 portunity of indulging your vein in the 
 study of mankind, perhaps to a greater 
 degree than in any city upon the face of , 
 the globe ; for the inhabitants of London, 
 as you know, are a collection of all na- 
 tions, kindreds, and tongues, who make 
 it, as it were, the centre of their com- 
 merce. 
 
 "Present m-f respectful compliments to 
 Mrsi Burns, to my dear friend Gilbert, 
 and all the rest of her amiable children. 
 May the Father of the universe bless you 
 all with those principles and dispositions 
 that the best of parents took such uncom- 
 mon pains to instil into your minds from 
 your earliest infancy ! May you live as 
 he did ! if you do, you can never be un 
 happy. I feel myself grown serious all 
 at once, and afl^ected in a manner I can- 
 not describe. I shall only add, that it is 
 one of the greatest pleasures I promise 
 myself before I die, that of seeing the 
 family of a man whose memory I revere 
 more than that of any person that ever 1 
 was acquainted with. 
 
 I am, my dear Friend, 
 Yours sincerely, 
 
 JOHN MURDOCH 
 
 No. XXXV. 
 
 FROM MR. 
 
 Gordon Castle, ^\st Oct. 1787. 
 
 SIR, 
 
 If you were not sensible of your faii , 
 as well as of your loss in leaving this place 
 so suddenly, I should condemn you to 
 starve upon cauld kail for ae towmont 
 at least ! and as for Dick Latine,* your 
 travelling companion, without banning 
 him wi' a' the curses contained in your 
 
LETTERS. 
 
 116 
 
 letter (which he'll no value a hawhee,) I 
 s»hould give hiin nought but Stra'bogie 
 castocks to chew for sax auks, or ay until 
 he was as sensible of his error as you seem 
 to be of yours. 
 
 Your song I showed without producing 
 the author; and it was judged by the 
 Dutchess to be the production of Dr. 
 Seattle. I sent a copy of it, by her Grace's 
 desire, to a Mrs. M'Pherson in Badenoch, 
 who sings Morag and all other Gaelic 
 songs in great perfection. I have record- 
 ed it likewise, by Lady Charlotte's de- 
 sire, in a book belonging to her ladyship, 
 where it is in company with a great ma- 
 ny other poems and verses, some of the 
 writers of which are no less eminent for 
 their political than for their poetical abili- 
 ties. When the Dutchess was informed 
 that you were the author, she wished you 
 had written the verses in Scotch. 
 
 Any letter directed to me here will 
 come to hand safely, and, if sent under 
 the Duke's cover, it will likewise come 
 free; tliat is, as long as the Duke is in 
 this country. 
 
 I am, Sir, yours sincerely. 
 
 No. XXXVL 
 
 FROM THE 
 
 REVEREND JOHN SKINNER. 
 
 Linsheart, I4th J^ovemher, 1787. 
 
 SIR, 
 
 Your kind return without date, but 
 of post mark October 25th, came to my 
 hand only this day ; and, to testify my 
 punctuahty to my poetic engagement, I 
 sit down immediately to answer it in kind. 
 Your acknowledgment of my poor but just 
 encomiums on your surprising genius, and 
 your opinion of my rhyming excursions, 
 are both, I think, by far too high. The 
 difference between our two tracks of edu- 
 cation and ways of life is entirely in your 
 favour, and gives you the preference eve- 
 ry manner of way. I know a classical 
 education will not create a versifying 
 taste, but it mightily improves and assis'ts 
 it ; and though, where both these meet, 
 there may sometimes be ground for ap- 
 probation, vet where taste appears single 
 W ' 
 
 as it were, and neither cramped nor sup- 
 ported by acquisition, I will always sus- 
 tain the justice of its prior claim of ap- 
 plause. A small portion of taste, this 
 way, I have had almost from childhood, 
 especially in the old Scottish dialect ; and it 
 is as old a thing as I remember, my fondness 
 for Chrisl-kirk o' the Green, which I had by 
 heart, ere I was twelve years of age, and 
 which, some years ago, I attempted to 
 turn into Latin verse. While I was young, 
 I dabbled a good deal in these things ; but, 
 on getting the black gown, I gave it pret- 
 ty much over, till my daughters grew up, 
 who, being all good singers, plagued me 
 for words to some of their favourite tunes, 
 and so extorted these effusions, which 
 have made a public appearance beyond my 
 expectations, and contrary to my inten- 
 tions, at the same time that I hope there 
 is nothing to be found in them uncharac- 
 teristic, or unbecoming the cloth which I 
 would always wish to see respected. 
 
 As to the assistance you purpose from 
 me in the undertaking you are engaged 
 in,* I am sorry I cannot give it so far as 
 I could wish, and you perhaps expect. 
 My daughters, who were my only intelli- 
 gencers, are all foris-familiate, and the 
 old woman their mother has lost that 
 taste. There are two from my own pen, 
 which I might give you, if worth the 
 while. One to the old Scotch tune of 
 Dumbarton's Drums. 
 
 The other perhaps you have met with, 
 as j'our noble friend the Dutchess has, I 
 am told, heard of it. It was squeezed out 
 of me by a brother parson in her neigh- 
 bourhood, to accommodate a new High- 
 land reel for the Marquis's birth-day, to 
 the stanza of 
 
 " Tune your fiddles, tune them sweetly," &;c. 
 
 If this last answer your purpose, you 
 may have it from a brother of mine, Mr. 
 James Skinner, waiter in Edinburgh, who, 
 I believe, can give the music too. 
 
 There is another humorous thing I have 
 heard, said to be done by the Catholic 
 priest Geddes, and which hit my taste 
 much: 
 
 " There was a wee wifeikie, was coming frae the fair, 
 Had gotten a little draplkie which bred her meiklecara, 
 It took upo' the wifie's heart, and she began to spew, 
 And CO' the wee wifeikie, I wish I binna fou, 
 
 / Kish, ($-c. <t-fti 
 
 * A plan of publishing a complete cotlection of Scot- 
 tish Songs, &c 
 
116 
 
 LETTERS. 
 
 I liave heard of another new composi- 
 tion, by a young ploughman of my ac- 
 quaintance, that fam vastly pleased with, 
 to the tune of The Humours of Glen, 
 which I fear wont do, as the music, I am 
 told, is of Irish original. I have mention- 
 ed these, such as they are, to show my 
 readiness to oblige you, and to contribute 
 my mite, if I could, to the patriotic work 
 you have in hand, and which I wish all 
 success to. You have only to notify your 
 mind, and what you want of the above 
 shall be sent you. 
 
 Mean time, while you are thus publicly, 
 I may say, employed, do not sheath your 
 own proper and piercing weapon. From 
 what I have seen of yours already, I am 
 inclined to hope for much good. One 
 lesson of virtue and morality delivered in 
 your amusing style, and from such as you, 
 will operate more than dozens would do 
 from such as me, who shall be told it is 
 our employment, and be never more mind- 
 ed : whereas, from a pen like yours, as 
 being one of the many, what comes will 
 be admired. Admiration will produce re- 
 gard, and regard will leave an impression, 
 especially when example goes along. 
 
 Now binna saying I'm ill bred, 
 Rise, by my irotli, I'll not be glad, 
 For cadgers, ye have heard it said, 
 
 And sir like fry, 
 Maun ay be harland in their trade, 
 
 And !<'Je maim I. 
 
 Wishing you, from my poet-pen, all 
 success, and, in my other character, all 
 happiness and heavenly direction, 
 I remain, with esteem. 
 
 Your sincere friend, 
 
 JOHN SKINNER. 
 
 No. XXXVII. 
 FROM xMRS. ROSE. 
 Kilravock Crtstlp, llOlk JV<n'. 1787. 
 
 I HOPE you will do me the justice to 
 believe, that it was no defect in gratitude 
 for your punctual performance of your 
 parting promise, that has made me so long 
 in acknowledging it, but mprelv the diffi- 
 cult)' I had in getting the Hi,ghland songs 
 von wished to have, accurately noted; 
 they are at last enclosed : but how shall I 
 
 convey along with them those graces they 
 acquired from the melodious voice of one 
 of the fair spirits of the Hill of Kildrum- 
 mie ! These I must leave to your imagi- 
 nation to supply. It has powers sufficient 
 to transport you to her side, to recall her 
 accents, and to make them still vibrate in 
 the ears of memory. To her I am in- 
 debted for getting the enclosed notes. 
 They are clothed with " thoughts that 
 breathe, and words that burn." These, 
 however, being in an unknown tongue to 
 you, you must again have recourse to that 
 same fertile imagination of yours to inter- 
 pret them, and suppose alover's description 
 of the beauties of an adored mistress — 
 Why did I say unknown ? the language 
 of love is a universal one, that seems to 
 have escaped the confusion of Babel, and 
 to be understood by all nations. 
 
 I rejoice to find that you were pleased 
 with so many things, persons, and places, 
 in your northern tour, because it leads 
 me to hope you may be induced to revisit 
 them again. That the old castle of Kil- 
 ravock, and its inhabitants were amongst 
 these, adds to my satisfaction. I am even 
 vain enough to admit your very flattering 
 application of the line of Addison's ; at 
 any rate, allow me to believe, that " friend- 
 ship will maintain the ground she has 
 occupied in both our hearts," in spite of 
 absence, and that when we do meet, it 
 will be as acquaintance of a score years' 
 standing; and on this footing consider 
 me as interested in the future course of 
 your fame so splendidly commenced. Any 
 communications of the progress of your 
 muse will be received with great grati- 
 tude, and the fire of your genius will have 
 power to warm even us, frozen sisters of 
 the north. 
 
 The fire-sides of Kilravock and Kil- 
 drummie unite in cordial regards to 
 you. When you incline to figure either 
 in your idea, suppose some of us reading 
 your poems, and some of us singing your 
 songs, and my little Hugh looking at your 
 picture, and you'll seldom be wrong. We 
 remember Mr. Nicol with as much good 
 will as we can do any body who hurried 
 Mr. Burns from us. 
 
 Farpvvell, Sir: I can only contribute 
 the ioidow's mite, to the esteem and admi- 
 ration excited by your merits and genius ; 
 but this I give, as she did, with all my 
 heart — being sincerely yours. 
 
 EL. ROSE. 
 
LETTERS, 
 
 IfT 
 
 No. XXXVITI. 
 TO THE EARL OF GLENCAIRN- 
 
 MY LORD, 
 
 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 f\illy fix- 
 [ ed to my scheme, if I can possibly etFec- 
 jtiiate 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 pa- 
 tronage and goodness, which have already 
 rescued me from obscurity, wretchedness, 
 and exile, embolden me to ask that inter- 
 est. 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 tlie 
 highest gratitude. 
 
 My brother's farm is but a wretched 
 lease: but T think he will |)robably wea- 
 ther out the remaining seven years of it; 
 and, after the assistance which I have 
 given, and will give him, to keep the fa- 
 mily together, I think, by my guess, I 
 shall have rather better than two hun- 
 dred 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, except- 
 ing only the calls of uncommon distress 
 or necessitous old age ; * * * * 
 
 These, My Lord, are my views ; T have 
 resolved from the maturest deliberation ; 
 and now I am fixed, I shall leave no stone 
 unturned to carry my resolve into execu- 
 tion. Your Lordship's patronage is the 
 strength of my hopes ; nor have I yet ap- 
 plied to any body else. Tndeed my heart 
 ijinks within me at the idea of applying to 
 any other of the Great who have honour- 
 ed me with their countenance. T 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 
 Qonour, the comfort, but the pleasure of 
 being 
 
 Yon- Lordship's much obliged, 
 
 *• n ' d ^eolv indebted humble servant. 
 
 TO 
 
 No. XXXLX. 
 — DALRYMPLE, Esq. 
 
 )F ORANGEFIELD. 
 
 Edinburgh, 1787. 
 
 DEAR SIR, 
 
 I SUPPOSE the devil is so elated with 
 his success with you, that he is determin- 
 ed, by a cou-p de main, 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 1 
 saw at the bottom a name I shall ever 
 value with grateful respect, " I gapit wide 
 but naething spak." I was nearly as 
 much struck as the friends of .Tob, of af- 
 fliction-bearing memory, when they sat 
 down with him seven days and seven 
 nights, and spake not a word. 
 
 T am naturally of a superstitious cast, 
 and as soon as my wonder-scared imagi- 
 n;itio:i regained its consciousness, and 
 resumed its functions, T 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. 
 Tlie downfall of the conclave, or the 
 crushing of the cork rumps; a ducal co- 
 ronet to Lord George G , and the 
 
 protestant interest, or St. Peter's keys, 
 to * * * * 
 
 You want to know how I come on. I 
 am just in statu quo, or, not to insult a 
 gentleman with my Latin, in " auld use 
 and wont." The noble Earl of Glencairu 
 took me by the hand to-day, and interest- 
 ed himself in my concerns, with a good- 
 ness like that benevolent Being whose 
 image he so richly bears. He is a stron- 
 ger 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 no- 
 thing. At best, they are but ill -digested 
 lumps of chaos, only one of them strongly 
 tinged with bituminous particles and sul- 
 phureous effluvia. But my noble patron, 
 eternal as the heroic swell of magnani- 
 mity, find the generous throb of beuevo 
 
LETTERS. 
 
 lence, shftU look on with prinoply eye at 
 " the war of elements, the wreck of mat- 
 ter, and the crush of worlds." 
 
 No. XL. 
 TO SIR JOHN WHITEFOORD. 
 
 December, 1787. 
 am, 
 
 Mr. M'Kenzie, in Mauchline, my 
 very warm and worthy friend, has inform- 
 ed me how much you are pleased to in- 
 terest 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 patronised by those 
 of your character in life, when I was in- 
 troduced to their notice by ***** * 
 friends to them, and honoured acquain- 
 tance to me; but you are the first gentle- 
 man in the country whose benevolence 
 and goodness of heart have interested 
 him 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 be- 
 lieve this letter is not the manoeuvre of 
 the needy, sharping author, fastemng 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, palli- 
 ate that prostitution of art 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 inatten- 
 tion to economy, is almost inseparable 
 from it : then there must be, in the heart 
 of every bard of Nature's making, a cer- 
 tain 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 impu- 
 dence and footlicking 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 poli- 
 teste of life — yet is as poor as I am. 
 
 For my part, I thank Heaven my star 
 has been kinder; learning never elevated 
 •nv idfsas above tne peasant's shade, and 
 
 I have an independent fortune at the 
 plough-tail. 
 
 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 fel- 
 low 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 ! 
 
 No. XLI 
 TO MRS. DUNLOP. 
 Edinburgh, 21st January, 1788. 
 
 ArTKH six weeks' confinement, I am 
 begining to walk across the room. They 
 have been six horrible weeks, anguish 
 and low ejiirita made me unfit to read, 
 write, or think. 
 
 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. 
 liately I was a sixpenny private, and, 
 God knows, a miserable soldier enough : 
 now I march to the campaign, a starv- 
 ing cadet ; a little more conspicuously 
 wretched. 
 
 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. 
 
 As soon as I can bear the journey, 
 which will be, I suppose, about the mid- 
 dle of next week, I leave Edinburgh, and 
 soon after I shall pay my grateful duty at 
 Dunlop-House. 
 
LETTERS. 
 
 119 
 
 No. XLII. 
 
 EXTRACT OF A LETTER 
 
 TO THE SAME. 
 
 Edinburgh, \2th February, 1788. 
 Some things in your late letters hurt 
 me : not that you say them, but that you 
 mistake me. Religion, my honoured Ma- 
 dam, has not only been all my life ray 
 chief dependence, but my dearest enjoy- 
 ment. I have indeed been the luckless 
 victim of wayward follies : but, alas ; I 
 have ever been " more fool than knave." 
 A matliematician without religion is a 
 probable character ; and on irreligious 
 poet is a monster. 
 
 No. XLIII. 
 TO MRS. DUNLOP. 
 
 Moss^el, 1th March, 1788. 
 
 MADAM, 
 
 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 describes him ; and though 
 T 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 pro- 
 fession, if we stand not for fame there, 
 we sink unsupported ! 
 
 I am highly flattered by the news you 
 tell me of Coila.* I may say to th? fair 
 painter who does me so much honour, as 
 Dr. Beattie says to Ross the poet of his 
 muse Scota, from which, by the by, I took 
 the ideaof Coila : ('Tis a poemof Beattie's 
 in the Scots dialect, which perhaps you 
 have never seen.) 
 
 * A lady (daughter of Mrs. Dunlop) was maktog a 
 pictuie from the deecripdon of Coila in the Vision E 
 
 " Ye sbak your head, but o' my fegs, 
 Ve'vp set auld Scota on her legs : 
 Lang bad she hen wi' butfe and flegs, 
 
 Bomhaz'd and dizzie, 
 Her fiddle wanted strings and pegs, 
 
 Waet me, poor hlzrla!' 
 
 No. XLIV. 
 TO MR. ROBERT CLEGHORN. 
 
 Mauchline, 3]st March, 1788. 
 Yesterday, my dear Sir, as I was 
 riding through a track of melancholy, joy- 
 less muirs, between Galloway and Ayr- 
 shire, it being Sunday, I turned my 
 thoughts to psalms, and hymns, and spiri- 
 tual songs : and your favourite air Captain 
 Okean, coming at length in my head, I 
 tried these words to it. You will see 
 that the first part of the tune must be re- 
 peated.* 
 
 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. 
 
 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 trou- 
 ble 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 in me. 
 
 My very best compliments and good 
 wishes to Mrs. Cleghom. 
 
 No. XLV. 
 FROM MR. ROBERT CLEGHORN 
 Saughton Mills, 21th April, 1788. 
 
 MY DEAR BROTHER FARMER, 
 
 I WAS favoured with your very kind 
 letter of the 31st ult.,and consider myself 
 greatly obliged to you for your attention 
 in sending me the songf to my favourite 
 air, Captain Okean. The words delight 
 
 • Here the Bard gives the first tttnia of th« " Ch»»«- 
 her's Lament." 
 t The Chevalier's Lament 
 
120 
 
 LETTERS. 
 
 me much, they fit the tune to a hair. I 
 wish you would send me a verse or two 
 more : and if you have no objection, I 
 would have it in the Jacobite style. Sup- 
 pose it should be sung after the fatal field 
 of Culloden by the unfortunate Charles. 
 Tenducci personates the lovely Mary 
 Stuart in the song, Queen Mary's La- 
 mentation. Why may not I sing in the 
 person of hei great-great-great-grand- 
 son ?* 
 
 Any skill I have in country business 
 you may truly command. Situation, soil, 
 customs of countries, may vary from eacli 
 other, but Farmer Attention is a good far- 
 mer in every place. I beg to hear from 
 you soon. Mrs. Cleghorn joins me in 
 best compliments. 
 
 I am, in the most comprehensive sense 
 of the word, your very sincere friend, 
 
 ROBERT CLEGHORN. 
 
 No. XLVI. 
 TO MRS. DUNLOP. 
 
 Muuchline, 28th April, 1788. 
 
 MADAM, 
 
 Your powers of reiirehension 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 Whitsunday, 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 ; 
 as it costs me only six months' attendance 
 for instructions to entitle me to a com- 
 mission, which commission lies by me, 
 and at any future period, on my simple 
 petition, can be resumed : I thought five- 
 and-thirty pounds a-year was no bad der- 
 nier resort 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. 
 
 For this reason, I am at present attend- 
 ing these instructions, to have them com- 
 ?leted before Whitsunday. Still, Madam, 
 prepared, with the sincerest pleasure, 
 to meet you at the Mount, and came to 
 my brother's on Saturday night, to set 
 
 • Our Poet took this advice. The whole of this beau- 
 tiful song, as it wa« afterwards finished, is inserted in 
 the Poems, p. 79, 
 
 out on Sunday ; but for some nights pre- 
 ceding, I had slept in an apartment where 
 the force of the winds and rains was only 
 mitigated by being sifted through num- 
 berless 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 ef- 
 fects of a violent cold. 
 
 You see, Madam, the truth of the French 
 maxim Le vrai n'est pas toujours le vrai- 
 semblable. Your last was so full of ex- 
 postulation, and was something so like the 
 language of an offended friend, that I be- 
 gan to tremble for a correspondence which 
 I had with grateful pleasure set down as 
 one of the greatest enjoyments of my fu- 
 ture life. 
 
 Your books have delighted me : Virgil, 
 Dryden, and Tasso, were all equally stran- 
 gers to me : but of this more at large in 
 my next. 
 
 NO. XLVn. 
 FROM THE REV. JOHN SKINNER. 
 
 Linsheart, 2nth April, 1788. 
 
 DEAR SIR, 
 
 I RECEtvF.D your last with the curious 
 present you have favoured me with, and 
 would have made proper acknowledgments 
 before now, but that I have been neces- 
 sarily engaged in matters of a different 
 complexion. And now, that I have got 
 a little respite, I make use of it to thank 
 you for this valuable instance of your good- 
 will, and to assure you that, with the sin- 
 cere heart of a true Scotsman, I highly 
 esteem both the gift and the giver ; as a 
 small testimony of which I have herewith 
 ?ent you for your amusement (and in a 
 form which I hope you will excuse for sa- 
 ving postage) the two songs I wrote about 
 to you already. Charming Jfancy is the 
 real production of genius in a ploughman 
 of twenty years of age at the time of its 
 appearing, with no more education than 
 what he picked up at an old farmer-grand- 
 father's fire-side, though now by the 
 strength of natural parts, he is clerk to a 
 thriving bleach-field in the neighbour- 
 hood. And I doubt not but you will find 
 in it a simplicity and delicacy, with some 
 turns of humour, that will please one of 
 
LETTERS. 
 
 121 
 
 your taste ; at least it pleased me when I 
 first saw it, if that can be any recommen- 
 dation to it. The other is entirely de- 
 scriptive of my own sentiments : and you 
 may make use of one or both as you shall 
 see good.* 
 
 * CHARMING NANCY. 
 
 A SONG BT A BUCHAN PLOUGHMAN. 
 
 Tune 
 
 Humours of Glen." 
 
 Some sing of sweet Mally, some sing of fair Nelly, 
 
 And some call sweet Susie the cause of their pain ; 
 Some love to be jolly, some love melancholy, 
 
 A lid some lo -e to sing of the Humours of Glen. 
 But my only fancy is my pretty Nancy, 
 
 In venting my passion I'll strive to be plain ; 
 I'll ask no more treasure, I'll seek no more pleasure. 
 
 But thee, my dear Nancy, gin thou wert my ain. 
 
 Her beauty delights me, her kindness invites me. 
 
 Her pleasant behaviour is free from all stain. 
 Therefore, my sweet jewel, O do not prove cruel ; 
 
 Consent, my dear Nancy, and come, be my ain. 
 Her carriage is comely, her language is homely, 
 
 Her dress is quite decent when ta'en in the main ; 
 She's blooming in feature, she's handsome in stature, 
 
 My charming dear Nancy, O wert thou my ain '. 
 
 Like Phoebus adorning the fair ruddy morning. 
 
 Her bright eyes arc sparkling, her brows are serene, 
 Her yellow locks shining, in beauty combining, 
 
 My charming sweet Nancy, wilt thou be my ain? 
 The whole of her face is with maidenly graces 
 
 Array'd like the gowans that grow in yon glen ; 
 Bhe's well shap'd and slender, true-hearted and tender, 
 
 My charming sweet Nancy, O wert thou my ain ! 
 
 I'll seek thro' the nation for some habitation, 
 
 To shelter my jewel from cold, snow, and rain, 
 With songs to my deary, I'll keep her ay cheery. 
 
 My charming sweet Nancy, gin thou wert my ain. 
 I'll work at my calling to furnish thy dwelling, 
 
 With ev'ry thing needful thy life to sustain ; 
 Thou Shalt not sit single, but by a clear ingle, 
 
 I'll marrow tliee, Nancy, when thou art my aiu. 
 
 I'll make true affection the constant direction 
 
 Of loving my Nancy, while life doth remain ; 
 Tho' youth will be wasting, true love shall be lasting, 
 
 My charming sweet Nancy, gin thou wert my ain. 
 But what if ray Nancy should alter her fancy, 
 
 To favour another be forward and fain, 
 I will not compel her, but plainly I'll tell her, 
 
 Begone, thou false Nancy, thou'se ne'er be my ain. 
 
 THE OLD MAN'S SONG. 
 
 By THK REVEREND 3. SKINNER. 
 
 Tunc — " Dumbarton Drums." 
 
 O '. why should old age so much wound us t O, 
 There is nothing in't all to confound ui, O, 
 
 For how happy now am I, 
 
 With my old wife sitting by, 
 And out bairns and our ovs all around us. O. 
 
 You will oblige me by present mg my 
 respects to 3'our host, Mr. Cruickshank, 
 who has given such high approbation to 
 my poor Lnlinity ; you may let him know, 
 that as I have likewise been a dabbler in 
 Latin poetry, I have two things that I 
 would, if he desires it, submit, not to his 
 judgment, but to his amusement ; the 
 one, a translation of Christ's Kirk 0' the 
 Green, printed at Aberdeen some years 
 ago ; the other, Batrachomyomachia Ho- 
 meri latinis vestita cum additamentis, given 
 in lately to Chalmers, to print if he pleas- 
 es. Mr. C. will know Seria non semper 
 
 We began in the world wi' naething, O, 
 And we've jogg'd on and toil'd for the ae thing, O, 
 We made use of what we had. 
 And our thankful hearts were glad, 
 When we got the bit meat and the claethlng, O. 
 
 We have liv'd all our life-time contented, O, 
 Since the day we became first acquainted, O, 
 
 It's true we've been but poor, 
 
 And we are so to this hour. 
 Yet we never yet repined nor lamented, O 
 
 We ne'er thought of schemes to be wealthy, O, 
 By ways that were cunning or stealthy, O, 
 But we always had the bliss. 
 And what further could we wles. 
 To be pleas'd wi' ourselves, and be healthy, O. 
 
 What tho' we canna boast of our guineaii, O, 
 We have plenty of Jockies and Jeanies, O, 
 
 And these I'm certain, are 
 
 More desirable by far, 
 Than a pocket full of poor yellow gle«nie«, O. 
 
 We have seen many wonder and ferlie, O, 
 Of changes that almost are 5'early, O, 
 
 Among rich folks up and down. 
 
 Both in country and in town, 
 Who now live but scrimply and barely, O. 
 
 Then why should people brag of prosperity, O, 
 A straitened life we see is no rarity, O, 
 
 Indeed we've been in want, 
 
 ,\nd our living been but scant. 
 Yet we never were reduced to need charity, O 
 
 In this bouse we first came together, O, 
 
 Where we've long been a Father and a Mttber, O, 
 
 And, tho' not of stone and lime. 
 
 It will last us a' our time, 
 And, I hope, we shall never need anither, O. 
 
 And when we leave this habitation, O, 
 We'll depart with a good commendation, O. 
 
 We'll go hand in hand I wiss. 
 
 To a better house tlian this, 
 To make room for the next generation, O. 
 
 Then why should old age so much wound «• t O, 
 There's nothing in't all to confound us, O, 
 
 For how happy now am I, 
 
 With my old wife sitting by, 
 And out bairnH and our oys all around us, O. 
 
122 
 
 LETTERS. 
 
 detectant, nonjoca temper. Semper delec- 
 tant seria mixta jocia. 
 
 I have just room to repeat compliments 
 and good wishes from, 
 
 Sir, your humble servant, 
 JOHN SKINNER. 
 
 No. XLVIII. 
 TO PROFESSOR DUGALD STEWART. 
 
 Mauchline, 3d May, 1 788. 
 
 SIR, 
 
 I ENCLOSE you one or two more of my 
 bagatelles. If the fervent wishes of ho- 
 nest gratitude have any influence with 
 that great unknown Being, who frames 
 the chain of causes and events, prosperi- 
 ty and happiness will attend your visit to 
 the Continent, and return you safe to 
 your native shore. 
 
 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 T could say it with truth, that 
 next to my little fame, and the having it 
 in my power to make life more comforta- 
 ble to those whom nature has made dear 
 to me, I shgll ever regard your counte- 
 nance, your patronage, your friendly good 
 offices, as the most valued consequence of 
 my late success in life. 
 
 No. XLIX. 
 
 EXTB.1CT OF A LETTER 
 
 TO MRS. DUNLOP. 
 
 MiurhViic^ ith JJajj, 1788. 
 
 Dryden's Virgil has delighted me. 
 I do not know whether the critics will 
 agree with me, but the Gcnrgirs are to 
 mo by far the best of Virgil. It is, in- 
 deed, a species of vvriting entirely new to 
 me, and has filled my head with a thou- 
 sand fancies of emulation : but, alas ! 
 when I read the Georg-ic.t and then sur- 
 vey 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 disappomted m the 
 Mneid. Faultless correctness may please, 
 and does highlyplease 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 ser- 
 vile copier of Homer. If I had the Odys- 
 sey by me, I could parallel many passages 
 where Virgil has evidently copied, but by 
 no means improved Homer. Nor can I 
 think there is any thing of this owing to 
 the translators ; for, from every thing I 
 have seen of Dryden, I think him, in ge- 
 nius and fluency of language, Pope's mas- 
 ter. 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 learn- 
 ing most. 
 
 No. L. 
 
 TO THE SAME. 
 
 MADAM, 
 
 '2.1th May, 1788. 
 
 I HAVE been torturing my philosophy 
 to no purpose to account for that kind 
 partiality of yours, which, unhke * * 
 * has followed me in my return to the 
 shade of life, wit l assiduous benevolence. 
 Often did I regret, in the fleeting hours of 
 my 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 mo- 
 mentary acquaintance with wealth and 
 splendour put me so much out of conceit 
 with the sworn companions of my road 
 through life, insiguificance and poverty. 
 
 There are few circumstances relating 
 to the unequal distribution of the good 
 I things of this life, that give me more vex- 
 ation ' I mean in what I see around me,) 
 ! than the importance the opulent bestow 
 i on their trifling family aflairs, compared 
 i with the very same things on the con- 
 I tracted scale of a cottage. Last after- 
 noon I had the honour to spend an hour 
 or two at a good woman's fire-side, where 
 the planks that composed the floor were 
 flpcorated with a splendid carpet, and the 
 
LETTERS. 
 
 123 
 
 pay tables sparkled with silver and china. 
 "I'is 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 na- 
 ture with Madame, are from time to time, 
 tlieir 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 ne- 
 cessities, the conveniences, but the ca- 
 prices of the important few.* We talked 
 of the insignificant creatures ; nay, not- 
 withstanding their general stupidity and 
 rascality, did some of the poor devils the 
 honour to commend them. But hght be 
 the turf upon his breast who taught — 
 " Reverence thyself." We looked down 
 on the unpolished wretches, their imper- 
 tinent 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 rambles, or tosses 
 in the air in the wantonness of his pride. 
 
 No. LI. 
 TO THE SAME. 
 
 AT MR. DUNLOP'S, HADDINGTON. 
 
 Ellisland, VMh June, 1788. 
 
 " Where'er I roam, whatever realms I see, 
 My heart, untravell'd, fondly turns to thee, 
 Still to my friend turns with ceaseless pain. 
 And dra£;s at each remove a lengthen'd chain." 
 Goldsjmth. 
 
 This is the second day, my honoured 
 friend, that I have been on my farm. A 
 solitary inmate of an old smoky Spence ; 
 far from every object I. love, or by whom 
 I am beloved ; nor any acquaintance old- 
 er than yesterday, except Jenny Geddcs, 
 the old mare I ride on; while uncouth 
 cares and novel plans hourly insult my 
 awkward ignorance and bashful inexperi- 
 ence. There is a foggy atmospliere na- 
 tive to my soul in the hour of care, conse- 
 quently the dreary objects seem larger 
 than the life. Extreme sensibility, irri- 
 tated and prejudiced on the gloomy side 
 by a series of misfortunes and disappoint- 
 
 * Servants, In Scotland, are hired from term to term ; 
 « «. from Whitsunday to Martinmas, &c. 
 W 2 
 
 ments, 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. 
 
 " The valiant, in himself, what can he luffert 
 Or what need he regard his single woes 1" &c. 
 
 Your surmise. Madam, is just; I am in- 
 deed a husband. 
 
 I found a once much-loved and still 
 much-loved female, literally and truly 
 cast out to the mercy of the naked ele- 
 ments ; but I enabled her to purchase a 
 shelter ; and there is no sporting with a 
 fellow-creature's happiness or misery. 
 
 The most placid good-nature and sweet- 
 ness of disposition ; a warm heart, grate- 
 fully devoted with all its powers to love 
 me ; vigorous health and sprightly cheer- 
 fulness, 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 Jfew Testament, nor have danced in a 
 brighter assembly than a penny-pay wed- 
 ding. 
 
 No. LIL 
 TO MR. P. HILL. 
 
 MY DEAR HILL, 
 
 I SHALL say nothing at all to your 
 mad present — you have long and often 
 been of important service to me, and I 
 suppose you mean to go on conferring ob- 
 ligations until I shall not be able to lift up 
 my face before you. In the mean time, 
 as Sir Roger de Coverly, because it hap- 
 pened 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. 
 
 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 
 
124 
 
 LETTERS. 
 
 to loathing at the noise and nonsense of 
 self-important folly. When the hollow- 
 hearted wretch takes me by the hand, the 
 feehng spoils my dinner ; the proud man's 
 wine so offends my palate that it chokes 
 me in the gullet ; and the pulvilised, fea- 
 thered, pert coxcomb, is so disgustful in 
 my nostril, that my stomach turns. 
 
 If ever you have any of these disagree- 
 able 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 great- 
 est 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 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. 
 
 C h, 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 superabundant modes- 
 ty, you would do well to give it him. 
 
 David,* with his Courant, 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 pil- 
 lory it does not at all improve his figure, 
 not to mention the irreparable loss of the 
 egg- 
 
 My facetious friend, D r, 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 Crocliallan corps. + 
 
 Among our common friends, 1 must not 
 
 • Printer of the Edinburgh Evening Courant 
 t A club of choice spirit!. 
 
 forget one of tne dearest of them, Cim- 
 ningham. 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 any thing that will make him a little 
 easier on that score, it will be very obli- 
 ging. 
 
 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. 
 
 Though I have mentioned so many men 
 of law, I shall have nothing to do with 
 them professedly. — The faculty are be- 
 yond my prescription. As to their clients, 
 that is another thing : God knows they 
 have much to digest ! 
 
 The clergy I pass by ; their profundity 
 of erudition, and their liberality of senti- 
 ment ; their total want of pride, and their 
 detestation of hypocrisy, are so proverbi- 
 ally notorious as to place them far, far 
 above either my praise or censure. 
 
 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 con- 
 duct. 
 
 I have just this moment an opportuni- 
 ty of a private hand to Edinburgh, as per- 
 haps you would not digest double post- 
 age. 
 
 No. LIIL 
 TO MRS. DUNLOP. 
 JUauchline, 2d Au^iut, 1788. 
 
 HONOURED MADAM, 
 
 Your kind letter welcomed me, yes- 
 ternight, to Ayrshire. I am indeed seri- 
 ously angry with you at the quantum oC 
 your luck-penny . but, vexed and hurt as 
 
LETTERS. 
 
 125 
 
 T was, I could not help laughing very 
 heartily at the noble Lord's apology for 
 the missed napkin. 
 
 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 m it my- 
 self, and, as yet, have little acquaintance 
 in the neighbourhood. Besides, I am now 
 very busy on my farm, building a dwell- 
 ing-house ; as at present T am almost an 
 evangelical man in Nithsdale, for I have 
 scarce " where to lay my head." 
 
 There are some passages in your last 
 that brought tears in my eyes. " The 
 heart knoweth its own sorrows, and a 
 istranger intermeddleth not therewith." 
 The repository of these " sorrows of the 
 heart," is a kind of sanctum sanrtorum ; 
 and 'tis only a chosen friend, and that too 
 at particular sacred time-i, who dares en- 
 ter into them. 
 
 " Heaven oft tears the bosom chords 
 That nature finest strung." 
 
 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 Niths- 
 dale neighbourhood. They are almost 
 the only favours the muses have confer- 
 red on me in that country.* 
 
 Since I am in the way of transcribing, 
 the following were the production of yes- 
 terday, 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 Fi'ntry, one of the wor- 
 thiest 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 " unhouseled, 
 unanointed, unannealed." 
 
 Pity the tuneful niuses' helpless train : 
 Weak, timid landsmen on life's stormy main : 
 The world were bless'd, did bliss on them depend; 
 Ah: that "the friendly e'er should wantafriend !" 
 The little fate bestows they share as soon ; 
 Unlike sage, proverb'd wisdom's hard-wrung boon- 
 
 * Thfs lines transcribed were those written in Friars- 
 Cars* Hermitage. See Poems p. 62. 
 
 Let prudence number o'er each sturdy son 
 Who life and wisdom at one race begun ; 
 Who feel by reason, and who give by rule ; 
 (Instinct's a brute, and sentiment a fool !) 
 Who make poor will do wait upon I should; 
 We own they're prudent, but who owns they'ro 
 good 7 
 
 Ye wise ones, hence ! ye hurt the social eye ! 
 God's image rudely etch'd on base alloy ! 
 But come 
 
 Here the muse left me. I am astonish- 
 ed at what you tell me of Anthony's wri- 
 ting me. I never received it. Poor fellow! 
 you vex me much by telling me that be 
 is unfortunate. I shall be in Ayrshire 
 ten days from this date. I have just room 
 for an old Roman farewell ! 
 
 No. LIV. 
 TO THE SAME. 
 
 J\Iauchli7ie, lOth August, 1788 
 
 MY MUCH HONOURKD FRIEND, 
 
 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 
 
 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 per- 
 haps be guilty of neglecting some of your 
 kind inquiries ; but not, from your very 
 odd 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. 
 
 Mrs. Burns, Madam, is the identical 
 woman 
 
 When she 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 pa- 
 rents got the hint : and not only forbade 
 me her company and the house, but, on 
 my rumoured West-Indian voyage, got a 
 
126 
 
 LETTERS. 
 
 warrant to put me in jail till I should find 
 security in my about-to-be paternal rela- 
 tion. You know my lucky reverse of for- 
 tune. On my eclatant return to Mauch- 
 line, 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 
 deposite ? 
 
 I can easily fancy a more agreeable 
 companion for my journey of life, but, 
 upon my honour, I have never seen the 
 individual instance 
 
 Circumstanced as I am, I could never 
 have got a female partner for life, who 
 could have entered into my favourite stu- 
 dies, relished my favourite authors, &c. 
 without probably entailing on me, at the 
 same time, expensive living, fantastic ca- 
 price, perhaps apish affectation, with all 
 the other blessed boarding-school acquire- 
 ments, which [pardonnez rnoi, Madame,) 
 are sometimes, to be found among females 
 of the upper ranks, but almost univer- 
 sally pervade the misses of the would-be- 
 gentry. 
 
 I like your way in your church-yard 
 lucubrations. Thoughts that are the 
 spontaneous result of accidental situations, 
 either respecting health, place, or compa- 
 ny, 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 pros:ression, 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 pa- 
 per of this kind, is my pruriency of wri- 
 ting to you at large. A page of post is on 
 such a dissocial nrrrow-minded scale that 
 I cannot abide it ; and double letters, at 
 least in my miscellaneons revert' manner, 
 are a monstrous tax in a close correspon- 
 dence. 
 
 No. LV. 
 
 TO THE SAME. 
 
 Ellisland, I6th, August, 1788. 
 I AM in a fine disposition, my honour- 
 ed friend, to send you an elegiac epistle ; 
 and want only genius to make it quite 
 ShenstoniaUs 
 
 " Why droops my heart with fancied woes forlorn 1 
 Why iinks my soul beneatli each wint'ry sky 1" 
 
 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 mis- 
 fortune 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. 
 
 To counterwork these baneful feelings, 
 I have sat down to write to you ; as I de- 
 clare upon my soul, I always find that 
 the most sovereign balm for my wounded 
 spirit. 
 
 I was yesterday at Mr. 's to din- 
 ner 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, impromptu. She 
 repeated one or two to the admiration of 
 all present. My suffrage as a professional 
 man, was expected : I for once went ago- 
 nizing 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 harp- 
 sichord, beginning, 
 
 " Raving winds around her blowing."* 
 
 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 pro- 
 verb says well, " king's caff" is better than 
 ither folk's corn." I was going to make 
 a New Testament quotation about " cast- 
 ing pearls;" but that would be too viru- 
 
 * See Poemg, p. 107. 
 
lent, for tlie laily is actually 
 sense and taste. 
 
 LETTERS 
 woman ol 
 
 127 
 
 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 ; 
 wliose souls are turned to jrladness, amid 
 riches and honours, and prudence and wis- 
 dom. I speak of the neglected many, 
 whose nerves, whose sinews, whose days, 
 are sold to the minions of fortune. 
 
 If I thought you had never seen it, I 
 would transcribe for you a stanza of an 
 old Scottish ballad, called The Life and 
 Ag-e of Man ; beginning thus : 
 
 " 'Twas in the sixteenth hunder year 
 
 or God and fifty-three, 
 Frae Christ was born, that bought us dear, 
 
 As writings testilie." 
 
 I had an old grand-uncle, with whom 
 my mother lived a while 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 JAfe and 
 J\gc of J^lnn. 
 
 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 tlie heated imagination of enthu- 
 siasm, 
 
 " Wliat truth on earth so precious as tlie lie?" 
 
 My idle reasonings sometimes make 
 me a little sceptical, but the necessities 
 of my heart always give the cold philoso- 
 phizings the lie. Who looks for the heart 
 weaned from earth ; the soul affianced to 
 her God ; the correspondence fixed with 
 heaven ; the pious supplication and de- 
 vout thanksgiving, constant as the vicis- 
 situdes 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 di- 
 vine efficacy, we must search among the 
 obscure recesses of disappointment, afflic- 
 tion, poverty, and distress. 
 
 letters. I return to Ayrshire middle of 
 next week ; and it quickens my pace to 
 think that there will be a letter from you 
 wiiiting me there. I must be here again 
 very soon for my harvest 
 
 No. LVI. 
 
 TO R. GRAHAM, ESQ. OF FINTRY. 
 
 When I had the honour of being in- 
 troduced to you at Athole-house, I did not 
 think so soon of asking a favour of you. 
 When Lear, in Shakspeare, asks old Kent 
 why he wishes to be in his service, he an- 
 swers, " Because you have tliat in your 
 face which I could like to call master." 
 For some such reason, Sir, do I now so- 
 licit 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 1 
 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 patronising friend. Pro- 
 priety of conduct as a man, and fidelity 
 and attention as an officer, I dare engage 
 for : but with any thing like business, 
 except manual labour, I am totally unac- 
 quainted. 
 
 I had intended to have closed my late 
 appearance on the stage of life in the 
 cliaracter 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. 
 
 1 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 
 afl^air, till I be appointed to a division, 
 where, by the liely* 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.* 
 
 lam sure, dear Madam, yon are now * Here followed the poetical pan of the Epistle, given 
 more than pleased with the lenscth of my '" the Poems, p. 79. 
 
128 
 
 No. LVII. 
 TO MR. PETER HILL 
 
 LETTERS. 
 
 .J at once harmonious and poetic, 
 readers ideas must sweep the 
 
 Mauchline, 1«i October, 1788. 
 I HAVE been here in this country 
 about three days, and all that time my 
 chief readinof has been the " Address to 
 Loch-Lomond," you were so obliging as 
 to send to me. Were I empannelled one 
 of the author's jury to determine his cri- 
 minality 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 be- 
 lieve every poet does, to place some fa- 
 vourite classic author, in his own walk of 
 study and composition, before him as a 
 model. Though your author had not 
 mentioned the name I could have, at half 
 a glance, sruessed his model to be Thom- 
 son. Will my brother-poet forgive me, 
 if I venture to hint, that his imitation of 
 that immortal bard is, in two or three pla- 
 ces, rather more servile than such a ge- 
 nius as his required — e. g. 
 
 To sooth the madding passions all to peace. 
 
 ADDRESS. 
 
 To sooth the throbbing passions into peace. 
 
 THOMSON. 
 
 I think the Address is, in simplicity, 
 harmony, and elegance of versification, 
 fully equal to the Seasons. Like Thom- 
 son, too, he has looked into nature for 
 himself; you meet with no copied de- 
 scription. 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 Na- 
 ture's making, kindles in his course. His 
 beginning is simple and modest, as if dis- 
 trustful of the strength of his pinion; 
 only, I do not altogether like — 
 
 " Truth, 
 The soul of every song that's nobly great " 
 
 Fiction is the soul of many a song that 
 is nobly great. Perhaps I am wrong : 
 this may be but a prose-criticism. Ts 
 not the plirase, in line 7, page 6. " Great 
 Lake," too much vulgarized by every-day 
 language, for so sublime a poem .'' 
 
 "Great iiiaas of waters, theme for nobler song," 
 
 is perhaps no emendation. His enume- 
 ration of a comparison with other lakes 
 
 Every 
 
 Winding margin of an hundred miles.' 
 
 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 : 
 
 "The gloom 
 Deep-seam'd with frequent streaks of moving fire." 
 
 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 
 
 " Silver mist 
 Beneath tlie beaming sun," 
 
 is well described : and here he has con- 
 trived 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 ideaofthe 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 Loch-Lomond's " hospitable 
 flood;" their wheeling round, their light- 
 ing, mixing, diving, &c. ; and the glo- 
 rious description of the sportsman. This 
 last is equal to any thing in the Seasons. 
 The idea of " the floating tribes distant 
 seen, far glistering to the moon," provok- 
 ing 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. 
 
 I forget that, while I am thus holding 
 forth, with the heedless warmth of an en- 
 thusiast, 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 compliments I 
 have ever seen. I must likewise notice 
 that beautiful paragraph, beginning, 
 '■ The gleaming lake," &c. I dare not 
 
LETTERS. 
 
 129 
 
 go into the partirular beauties of the two 
 last paragraphs, but they are admirably 
 fine, and truly Ossianic. 
 
 1 mupt beg your pardon for this length- 
 ened scrawl. I had no idea of it when I 
 began — 1 should like to know who the au- 
 thor is ; but, whoever he be, please pre- 
 sent him with my grateful thanks for the 
 entertainment he has afforded me.* 
 
 A friend of mine desired me to commis- 
 sion for him two books, Letters on the Re- 
 ligion estential 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. 
 
 No. LVIII. 
 
 TO MRS. DUNLOP, AT MOREHAM 
 
 MAINS. 
 
 Mauchline, I3th JVovember, 1788. 
 
 MADAM, 
 
 I HAD the very great pleasure of di- 
 ning at Dunlop yesterday. Men are said 
 to liatter 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 com- 
 pliments, 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 innuendoes 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 per- 
 son of no small consequence. I dare not 
 say one word how much I was charmed 
 with the Major's friendly welcome, ele- 
 gant manner, and acute remark, lest I 
 should be thought to balance my oriental- 
 isms of applause over against the finest 
 
 * The poem, entitled, j?n .Iddress to Loch- Lomond, 
 is said to be written by a g'-ntleman, now one of the 
 Masters of the High-school at Edinburgh ; and the 
 same who translated the beautiful slory of the Paria, as 
 published in the Bwof Dr Anderson. E 
 
 quey* in Ayrshire, which he made me a 
 present of to help and adorn my farm- 
 stock. As it was on Hallowday, I am de- 
 termined annually, as that day returns, to 
 decorate her horns with an ode of grati- 
 tude to the family of Dunlop. 
 
 So soon as I know of your arrival at 
 Dtmlop, 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 be soon 
 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." 
 
 NO. LIX. 
 
 •po * * * * 
 
 Jfovember 8, 1788. 
 
 Notwithstanding the opprobrious 
 epithets with which some of our philoso- 
 phers and gloomy sectaries have brand- 
 ed 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 in- 
 solence to the fallen, are held by all man- 
 kind, 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. 
 
 I went, last Wednesday to my parish- 
 church, most cordially to join in grateful 
 acknowledgments to the Author of all 
 Good, 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 administra- 
 tion have ever been mildness to the sub- 
 ject, and tenderness of his rights. 
 
130 
 
 LETTERS. 
 
 Bred and educated in revolution prin- 
 ciples, the principles of reason and com- 
 mon sense, it could not be any silly politi- 
 cal 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'tejoice sufficiently in our dehverance 
 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. 
 
 " 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 time ? 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 ? 
 
 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. 
 
 The Stewarts only contended for pre- 
 rogatives which they knew their prede- 
 cessors enjoyed, and which they saw their 
 contemporaries enjoying; but these pre- 
 rogatives were inimical to the happiness 
 of a nation and the rights of subjects. 
 
 In this contest between prince and peo- 
 ple, the consequence of that light of sci- 
 ence which had lately dawned over Eu- 
 rope, the monarch of France, for exam- 
 ple, was victorious over the struggling 
 liberties of his people ; with us, luckily, 
 the monarch failed, and his unwarranta- 
 ble 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 an- 
 
 other branch of the family, who, as they 
 owed the throne solely to the call of a 
 free people, could claim nothing inconsis- 
 tent with the covenanted terms which 
 placed them there. 
 
 The Stewarts have been condemned 
 and laughed at for the folly and impracti- 
 cability of their attempts in 1715 and 
 1 745. That they failed, I bless God ; 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 circumstan- 
 ces, which exalt us as heroes, or brand us 
 as madmen, just as they are for or against 
 
 us .'' 
 
 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 in- 
 dignation 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 favourite advisers, 
 but against our WHOLE legislative body, 
 for similar oppression, and almost in the 
 very same terms, as our forefathers did of 
 the House of Stewart ! I will not, I can- 
 not 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 deliver- 
 ance from us, as duly and sincerely as we 
 do ours from the oppressive measures of 
 the wrong-headed House of Stewart. 
 
 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 fore- 
 fathers.* 
 
 * This letter was sent to the publisher of some news- 
 paper, probably the publisher of the Edinburgh £vtir- 
 ing Courant. 
 
LETTERS. 
 
 131 
 
 No. LX. 
 TO MRS. DUNLOP. 
 
 EUisland, Mth Dec. 1788. 
 
 MY DEAR, HONOURED FRIEND, 
 
 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 
 and strongly entwisted itself among the 
 dearest cordsof my bosom ; and I tremble 
 at the omens of your late and present ail- 
 ing habits and shattered health. You 
 miscalculate matters widely, when you 
 forbid my waiting on you, lest it should 
 hurt my wordly 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 considera- 
 tions for which I live : if miry ridges and 
 dirty dunghills are to engross the best 
 part of the functions of my soul immor- 
 tnl, I had better been a rook or a mag- 
 pie at once, and then T should not have 
 been plagued with any ideas superior to 
 breaking of clods, and picking up grubs : 
 not to mention barn-door cocks or mal- 
 lards, creatures with which I could al- 
 most 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 threat en- 
 ings ffood. I am to be at the new-year- 
 day fair of Ayr, and by all that is sacred 
 in the word Friend ! I will come and see 
 you. 
 
 Your meeting, which you so well de- 
 scribe, with your old school-fellow 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 expres- 
 sive? There is an old song and tune which 
 has often thrilled thr.- 'o-ji my soul. You 
 X 
 
 know I am an enthusiast in old Scotch 
 songs : I shall give you the verses on the 
 other sheet, as I suppose Mr. Kerr will 
 save you the postage.* 
 
 Light be the turf on the breast of the 
 Heaven-inspired poet who composed this 
 glorious fragment ! There is more of the 
 tire of native genius in it than half a do- 
 zen of modern English Bacchanalians. 
 Now I am on my hobby-horse, I cannot 
 help inserting two other stanzas which 
 please me mightily. f 
 
 No. LXL 
 TO MISS DAVIES. 
 
 A young lady who had heiird he had been making a 
 Ballad on her, enclosing that Ballad. 
 
 December, 1788. 
 
 MADAM, 
 
 I UNDERSTAND my Very worthy neigh- 
 bour, Mr. Riddle, has informed you that I 
 have made you the subject of some verses. 
 There is something so provoking in the 
 idea of being the burden 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, as he said, as a nota bene 
 to point out the agreeable recollection to 
 his memory. What this gentleman's pen- 
 cil was to him, is my muse to me : and 
 the verses I do myself the honour to send 
 you are a memento exactly of the same 
 kind that he indulged in. 
 
 It may be more owing to the fastidious- 
 ness of my caprice, than the delicacy of 
 
 * Here follows tlie song of ^uW lavg syne, as printed 
 in the poems. E 
 
 t Here followed ilie snnj, Mij Doinir Miri/. PcwM 
 p. 37, 
 
13« 
 
 LETTERS. 
 
 rny taste, but I am so often tired, disgust- 
 ed, and hurt, with the insipidity, affecta- 
 tion, and pride of mankind, that when I 
 meet with a person " after my own heart," 
 I positively feel what an orthodox pro- 
 ant would call a species of idolatry, 
 UM ii acts on my fancy like inspiration ; 
 n.nd I can no more desist rhyming on the 
 impulse, than an Eolian 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 hea- 
 vens ! though I had lived threescore years 
 a married man, and threescore years be- 
 fore I was a married man, my imagination 
 would hallow the very idea ; and I am 
 truly sorry that the enclosed stanzas have 
 done such poor justice to such a subject. 
 
 No. LXII. 
 FROM MR. G. BURNS. 
 
 Mossgiel, l$t Jan. 1789. 
 
 DEAR BROTHER, 
 
 I HAVE just finished my new-year's- 
 day breakfast in the usual form, which 
 naturally makes me call to mind the days 
 of former years, and the society in which 
 we used to begin them : and when I look 
 at our family vicissitudes, " thro' the dark 
 postern of time long elapsed," I cannot 
 help remarking to you, my dear brother, 
 how good the God of Seasons is to us, 
 and that, however some clouds may seem 
 to lower over the portion of time before 
 us, we have great reason to hope that all 
 will turn out well. 
 
 Your mother and sisters, with Robert 
 the second, join me in the compliments of 
 the season to you and Mrs. Burns, and 
 beg you will remember us in the same 
 manner to William, the first time you 
 see him. 
 
 I am, dear brother, yours, 
 
 GILBERT BURNS. 
 
 No. LXIII. 
 
 TO MRS. DUNLOP. 
 
 Ellisland, Jfew- Year-Day Morning. 
 
 This, dear Madam, is a morning of 
 
 wishes ; and would to God that I came 
 
 under the apostle James's description ! — 
 the prayer of a righteous man availeth 
 much. In that case, Madam, you should 
 welcome in a year full of blessings : every 
 thing that obstructs or disturbs tranquilli- 
 ty 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 ordi- 
 nary acts of devotion, for breaking in on 
 that habituated 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. 
 
 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. 
 
 I believe I owe this to that glorious pa- 
 per 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 fifth day of the moon, which, accord- 
 ing to the custom of my forefathers, I 
 always keep holy, after having washed 
 myself, and offered up my morning devo- 
 tions, I ascended the high hill of Bagdat, 
 in order to pass the rest of the day in me- 
 ditation and prayer." 
 
 We know nothing, or next to nothing, 
 of the substance or structure of our souls, 
 so cannot account for those seeming ca- 
 prices in them, that one should be par- 
 ticularly 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 heard the 
 loud solitary whistle of the curlew in a 
 summer noon, or the wild mixing cadence 
 of a troop of gray plover 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 Eolian harp, 
 passive, takes the impression of the pass- 
 
LETTERS. 
 
 133 
 
 in^ accment ? Or do these workings 
 argue something within us above the trod- 
 den clod ? I own myself partial to such 
 proofs of those awful and important re- 
 alities — a God that made all things — 
 man's immaterial and immortal nature — 
 and a world of weal or wo beyond death 
 and the grave. 
 
 No. LXIV. 
 TO DR. MOORE. 
 
 Ellisland, near Dumfries, 4th Jan. 1789. 
 
 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 mis- 
 carries somewhere between purpose and 
 resolve. I have, at last, got some busi- 
 ness with you, and business-letters are 
 written by the style-book. I say my busi- 
 ness is with you, Sir, for you never had 
 any with me, except the business that be- 
 nevolence has in the mansion of poverty. 
 
 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 singu- 
 larity of my situation, and the honest pre- 
 judice 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 apti- 
 tude 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 excellence 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. Ano- 
 ther 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 profes- 
 sion, the talents of shining in every spe- 
 cies of composition. I shall try (for imtil 
 trial it is impossible to know) whether she 
 hns qualified me to shine in any one. 
 
 Tlie worst of it is, by the time one has 
 finished a piece, it has been so often view- 
 ed 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 
 T, 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 Gra- 
 ham, of Fintry, Esq. a gentleman of un- 
 common worth, to whom I lie under very 
 great obligations. The story of the po- 
 em, 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— 
 
 I believe I shall, in whole, lOOZ. copy- 
 right included, clear about 4001. some 
 little odds; and even part of this de 
 pends upon what the gentleman has yet 
 to settle with me. I give you this in- 
 formation, because you did me the ho- 
 nour to interest yourself much in my wel 
 fare. 
 
 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 bro- 
 ther, and three sisters, in a farm. On my 
 last return from Edinburgh, it cost me 
 about 180Z. to save them from ruin. Not 
 that I have lost so much — I only interpo- 
 sed between my brother and his impend- 
 ing 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 fra- 
 ternal affection, into the scale in my fa- 
 vour, miglit help to "smooth matters at the 
 grand rcrhoning. Tlirre it: still one thing 
 
n4 
 
 .ETTKRS. 
 
 would make my circnmstances quite easy : 
 I have an excise-officer's commission, and 
 I live in the midst of a coimtry division. 
 My request to Mr. Graham, who is -^ne 
 of the commissioners of excise, was, if in 
 his power, to procure me that division. 
 If I were very sanguine, I might hope 
 that some of my great patrons might pro- 
 cure me a treasury warrant for supervi- 
 sor, surveyor-general, &.c. 
 
 Thus secure of a livelihood, " to thee, 
 sweet poetry, delightful maid!" I would 
 consecrate my future days. 
 
 No. XLV. 
 
 TO PROFESSOR D. STEWART. 
 
 Ellisland, near Dumfries, 20th Jan. 1789. 
 
 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 
 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 
 Fintry, accompanying a request for his 
 assistance in a matter, to ino, 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 de- 
 sign succeeds, are but a small part of the 
 intended whole. I propose it shall be the \ 
 work of my utmost exertions ripened by i 
 years : of course I do not wish it much I 
 known. The fragment, beginning " A I 
 little, upright, pert, tart," &c. I have not ' 
 shown to man living, till now I 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 
 let it be for your single, sole inspection. 
 
 Need I make any apology for this trou- 
 ble to a gentleman who has treated me 
 with such marked benevolence and pecu- 
 liar 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 
 to me are 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 distinguish- 
 ed champions of genius and learning, I 
 shall be ever ambitious of being known. 
 The native genius and accurate discern- 
 ment in Mr. Stewart's critical strictures ; 
 the justness (iron justice, for he has no 
 bowels of compassion for a poor poetic 
 sinner) of Dr. Gregory's remarks, and the 
 delicacy of Professor Dalzel's taste, I 
 shall ever revere. I shall be in Edinburgh 
 some time next month. 
 
 I have the honour to be. Sir, 
 Your highly obliged. 
 
 And very humble servant, 
 ROBERT BURNS 
 
 No. LXVI. 
 
 TO BISHOP GEDDES. 
 
 Ellisland, near Dumfriet, 3d Feb. 1789 
 
 VENERABLE FATHER, 
 
 As I am conscious, that wherever I 
 am, you do me the honour to interest 
 yourself in my welfare, it gives me plea- 
 sure 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 ? 
 
 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 en- 
 cumbrances, which a species of prudence 
 would bid him shun ; but when the alter- 
 native was, being at eternal warfare with 
 mvself, on account of habitual follies to 
 give them no wore name, which no gene- 
 ral example, no licentious wit, no sophis- 
 tical infidelity, would to me, ever justify, 
 
LETTERS. 
 
 13f 
 
 I must have been a fool to have hesita- 
 ted, and a madman to have made another 
 choice. 
 
 In the affair of a livelihood, I think my- 
 self tolerably secure : I have good hopes 
 of my farm ; but should they fail, I have 
 an excise commission, which on my sim- 
 ple 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 intend to borrow honour from any 
 profession ; and though the salary be com- 
 paratively small, it is great to any thing 
 that the first twenty-five years of my life 
 taught me to expect. 
 
 Thus, with a rational aim and method 
 in life, you may easily guess, my reverend 
 and much-honoured friend, that my cha- 
 racteristical trade is not forgotten. T am, 
 if possible, more than ever an enthusiast 
 to the Muses. I am determined to study 
 man, and nature, and in that view inces- 
 santly ; and to try if the ripening and cor- 
 rections of years can enable me to pro- 
 duce something worth preserving. 
 
 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 largo 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. 
 
 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, 
 T cannot lose the patronizing notice of the 
 learned and good, without the bitterest 
 regret. 
 
 No. LXVII. 
 FROM THE REV. P. CARFRAE. 
 2d Jan. 1789. 
 
 SIR, 
 
 Tf you have lately seen Mrs. Dunlop, 
 )f Dunlop, yuii have certainly heard of 
 
 the author of the verses which accompa- 
 ny this letter. He was a man highly re- 
 spectable for every accomplishment and 
 virtue which adorns the character of a 
 man or a christian. To a great degree 
 of literature, of taste, and poetic genius, 
 was added an invincible modesty of tem- 
 per, which prevented in a great degree, 
 his figuring in life, and confined the per- 
 fect knowledge of his character and ta- 
 lents to the small circle of his chosen 
 friends. He Vvas untimely taken from us, 
 a few weeks ago, by an inflammatory fe- 
 ver, in the prime of life — beloved by all 
 who enjoyed his acquaintance, and lament- 
 ed by all who have any regard for virtue 
 and genius. There is a wo pronounced 
 in Scripture against the person whom all 
 men speak well of; if ever that wo fell 
 upon the head of mortal man, it fell upon 
 him. He has left behind him a consider- 
 able number of compositions, chiefly po- 
 etical, sufficient, I imagine, to make a 
 large octavo volume. In particular, two 
 complete and regular tragedies, a farce 
 of three acts, and some smaller poems on 
 different subjects. It falls to my share, 
 who have livod in the most intimate and 
 uninterrupted friendship with him from 
 my youth upwards, to transmit to you the 
 verses he wrote on the publication of your 
 incomparable poems. It is probable they 
 were his last, as they were found in his 
 scrutoire, folded up with the form of a let- 
 ter addressed to you, and, I imagine were 
 only prevented from being sent by him- 
 self, by that melancholy dispensation 
 which we still bemoan. The verses them- 
 selves I will not pretend to criticise when 
 writing to a gentleman whom I consider 
 as entirely qualified to judge of their me- 
 rit. They are the only verses he seems 
 to have attempted in the Scottish style ; 
 and I hesitate not to say, in general, that 
 they will bring no dishonour on the Scot- 
 tish muse ; — and allow me to add, that, 
 if it is your opinion they are not unwor- 
 thy of the author, and will be no discre- 
 dit to you, it is the inclination of Mr. 
 Mylne's friends that they should be im- 
 mediately published in some periodical 
 work, to give the world a specimen of 
 what may be expected from his perform- 
 ances in the poetic line, which, perhaps, 
 will be afterwards published for the ad- 
 vantage of his family. 
 
 I must beg- the favour of a letter from 
 you, aekaovrledginj; ths receipt of thi«; 
 
136 
 
 LETTERS. 
 
 and to be allowed to subscribe myself, 
 with great regard, 
 
 Sir, your most obedient servant, 
 P. CARFRAE. 
 
 No. LXVIII 
 
 TO MRS. DUNLOP. 
 
 Ellisland, 4th March, 1789. 
 Here am I, my honoured friend, re- 
 turned safe from the capital. To a man 
 who has a home, however humble or re- 
 mote — if that home is like mine, the scene 
 of domestic comfort — the bustle of Edin- 
 burgh will soon be a business of sicken- 
 ing disgust. 
 
 " Vain pomp and glory of this world, I hate you." 
 
 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 mo- 
 narch (in Spain I think it was,) who was 
 so out of humour with the Ptolemean sys- 
 tem of astronomy, that he said, had he 
 been of the Creator's council, he could 
 have saved him a great deal of labour and 
 absurdity. I will not defend this blas- 
 phemous speech; but often, as I have 
 glided with humble stealth through the 
 pomp of Prince's street, it has suggested 
 itself to me, as an improvement on the 
 present human figure, that a man, in pro- 
 portion to his own conceit of his conse- 
 quence in the world, could have pushed 
 out tke longitude of his common size, as 
 a snail pushes out his horns, or as we 
 draw out a perspective. This trifling al- 
 teration, 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 
 tossingthc head and tiptoe-strutting,would 
 evidently turn out a vast advantage, in 
 enabling us at once to adjust the ceremo- 
 nials in making a bow, or making way to 
 a great man, and that too within a second 
 of the precipe spherical angle of reverence, 
 or an inch of the particular point of re- 
 Bpeclful distance, which the important 
 
 creature itself requires ; as a measuring 
 glance at its towering altitude would de 
 termine the affair like instinct. 
 
 Your are right. Madam, in your idea 
 of poor Mylne's poem, which he has ad- 
 dressed 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 bor- 
 ders 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 re- 
 quested a perusal of all Mylne's poetic 
 performances ; and would have offered 
 his friends my assistance in either select- 
 ing or correcting what would be proper 
 for the press. What it is that occupies 
 me so much, and perhaps a little oppress- 
 es my present spirits, shall fill up a pa- 
 ragraph 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. 
 
 Like the fair plant that from our touch withdraw«, 
 Shrinlt, mildly fearful, even from applause. 
 Be all a mother's fondest hope can dream, 
 And all you are, my charming * * * ♦, seem, 
 Straight as the foi-glove, ere her bells disclose, 
 Mild as the maiden -blushing hawthorn blows, 
 Fair as the fairest of each lovely kind, , 
 
 Your form shall be the image of your mind ; 
 Your manners shall so true your soul express, 
 That all shall long to know the worth they guew ; 
 Congenial hearts shall greet with kindred love, 
 And even sick'ning envy must approve.* 
 
 No. LXIX. 
 TO THE REV. P. CARFRAE. 
 1789 
 
 REVEREND SIR, 
 
 I DO not recollect that I have ever 
 felt a severer pang of shame, than on 
 looking at the dateof your obliging letter 
 which accompanied Mr. Mylne's poem. 
 
 • These beautiful lines, we have reason to believe, 
 are the pruductiou of the lady to whom this letter is ad- 
 dressed. E. 
 
LETTERS. 
 
 137 
 
 I am much to blame : the honour Mr. 
 Mylne has done me, greatly enhanced in 
 its value by the endearinjr though me- 
 lancholy circumstance of its being the 
 last production of his muse, deserved a 
 better return. 
 
 I have, as you hint, thought of sending 
 a copy of the poem to some ppriodical 
 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. Subscrip- 
 tion 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 mngazine, &c. 
 be at all prudent, in my opinion, it cer- 
 tainly 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 rela- 
 tions are most justly entitled to that ho- 
 nest harvest which fate has denied him- 
 self 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, be- 
 fore the world knows any thing about 
 him, would risk his name and charac- 
 ter being classed with the fools of the 
 times. 
 
 I have. Sir, some experience of pub- 
 lishing, and the way in which I would 
 proceed with Mr. Mylne's poems is this : 
 I would publish in two or three English 
 and Scottish public papers, anyone 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 numeroiis family : — not in pity to 
 that family, but in justice to what his 
 friends think the poetic merits of the de- 
 ceased ; and to secure, in the most eflTec- 
 tual manner, to those tender connexions, 
 whose right it is, the pecuniary reward 
 of those merits. 
 
 No. LXX. 
 TO DR. MOORE 
 
 Ellisland, 23d March, 1789. 
 
 The gentleman who will deliver you 
 this is a Mr. Nielsen, a worthy clergy- 
 man 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 
 yot can effectually serve him : — Mr. Niel- 
 sen 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 tra- 
 velling, &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 re- 
 commendation to you, and that to have it 
 in your power to eerve such a character 
 gives you much pleasure. 
 
 The enclosed ode is a compliment to the 
 memory of the late Mrs. *****, of ****** 
 **. You, probably, knew her personally, 
 an honour of which I cannot boast ; but 
 I spent my early years in her neighbour-, 
 hood, and among her servants and tenaf^S,. 
 I know that she was detested with the. 
 most heartfelt cordiality. However, in 
 the particular part of her conduct wihich 
 roused my poetic wrath, she was much 
 less blameable. In January last, on my 
 road to Ayrshire, I had put up at .Bailie 
 Whigham's in Sanquhar, the only toler- 
 able inn in the place. The frost wvcj 
 keen, and the grim evening and howling 
 wind were ushering in a night of snow aA'<^.^^^- 
 drift. My horse and I were both umcl ' 
 tigued with the labours of the day ; 
 just as my friend the Bailie and 
 bidding defiance to the storm, over a 
 smoking bowl, in wheels the funeral pa- 
 geantry of the late great Mrs. ******, 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 
 bills of Ayrshire, to New Cumnock, the 
 
138 
 
 LETTERS. 
 
 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.* 
 
 T 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. 
 
 No. LXXT. 
 
 TO MR. HILL. 
 
 ElUsland, 2d April, 1789. 
 I wiT.L make no excuses, my dear 
 Bibliopolus (God forgive me for murder- 
 ing language,) that I have sat down to 
 write you on this vile paper. 
 
 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 sybil, my 
 sage conductress, usher me into the re- 
 fulgent, adored presence I — 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 ab- 
 jure the god, by the scenes of his infant 
 years, no longer to repulse me as a stran- 
 ger, or an alien, but to favour me with 
 his peculiar countenance and protection ! 
 He daily bestows his greatest kindnesses 
 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 Lu- 
 cre I will do any thing — be any thing — 
 but the horse-leech of private oppression, 
 or the vulture of public robbery! 
 
 It is economy. Sir ; it is that cardinal vir- 
 tue, prudence ; so I beg you will sit down, 
 and either compose or borrow a panegy- 
 ric. If you are going to borrow, apply to 
 
 to compose, or rather to compound some- 
 thing very clever on my remarkable fru- 
 gality ; that I write to one of my most 
 esteemed friends on this wretched paper, 
 which was originally intended for the ve- 
 nal fist of some drunken exciseman, to 
 take dirty notes in a miserable vault of 
 an ale-cellar. 
 
 O Frugality ! thou mother of ten thou- 
 sand 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 m<^, in thy clutching, palsied fist, up 
 t hose heights, and througli those thickets, 
 '• fhorto i;!acco=sible- and impervious to 
 1 \V anxions, weary feet; — not those Par- 
 nassian crag?, bleak and barren, where 
 the hungry worshippers of fame are breath- 
 less, olarabermg, hansring between heaven 
 and holl ; but those glittering cliffs of Po- 
 tosi. ^vhore the all-sufficient, all-powerful 
 deity. Wealth, holds his immediate court 
 
 * Tiie Odu enclosed is that printed in Foetns, p. 63. E. 
 
 But to descend from heroics, 
 
 I want a Shakspeare ; I want likewise an 
 English Dictionary — Johnson's I suppose 
 is best. In these and all my prose com- 
 missions, the cheapest is always the 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 any thing you 
 have to sell, and place it to my account. 
 
 The library scheme that I mentioned 
 to you is already begun, under the direc- 
 tion of Captain Riddel. There is ano- 
 ther in emulation of it going on at Close- 
 burn, under the auspices of Mr. Monteith 
 of Closeburn, which will be on a greater 
 scale than ours. Capt. R. gave his in- 
 fant 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 communication for " The Monk- 
 laud Friendly Society," — a copy of The 
 Spectator, Mirror, and Lounger ; Man of 
 Feeling, Man of the World, Guthrie's 
 Geographical Grammar, with some reli- 
 gious pieces, will likewise be our first 
 order. 
 
 When I grow richer I will write to you 
 
LETTERS. 
 
 ir9 
 
 on gilt, post, to make amends for this sheet. 
 At present every guinea has a five guinea 
 errand with, 
 
 My dear Sir, 
 Your faithful, poor, but honest friend. 
 R. B. 
 
 No. LXXII. 
 TO MRS. DUNLOP. 
 
 Ellitland, 4th April, 1789. 
 
 I NO sooner hit on any poetic plan or 
 ancy, 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. 
 
 I have a poetic whim in my head, which 
 I at present dedicate, or rather inscribe, 
 to the Right Hon. C. J. Fox : but how 
 long that fancy may hold, I cannot say. 
 A few of the first lines I have just rough- 
 sketched, as follows.* 
 
 On the 20th current I hope to have the 
 honour of assuring you, in person, how 
 sincerely I am — 
 
 No. LXXIII. 
 TO MR. CUNNINGHAM. 
 
 Ellisland, Ath May, 1789. 
 
 MT DEAR SIR, 
 
 Your duty-free 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 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. A letter informed with the 
 soul of friendship is such an honouf to 
 human nature, that they should order it 
 free ingress and egress to and from their 
 
 * Herp wai» copied the Fragment intcribed to C- J. 
 Foi. See Poems, p. 81. 
 
 X2 
 
 bags and mails, as an encouragement and 
 mark of distinction to supereminent virtue. 
 
 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 pre- 
 sently a poor little wounded hare came 
 crippling by me. You will guess my in- 
 dignation at the inhuman fellow who could 
 shoot a hare at this season, when they all 
 of them have young ones. Indeed there 
 is something in that business of destroy- 
 ing, for our sport, individuals in the ani 
 mal creation that do not injure us mate- 
 rially, which 1 could never reconcile to 
 my ideas of virtue. 
 
 On seeing a Felloxo wound a Hare with a 
 Shot, April, 1789. 
 
 Inhuman man" curse on thy barb' rous art, 
 And blasted be thy murder- aiming eye : 
 May never pity sooth thee with a sigh, 
 
 Nor ever pleasure glad thy cruel heart ! 
 
 Go live, poor wanderer of the wood and field 
 The bitter little that of life remains : 
 No more the thickening brakes or verdant plains, 
 
 To then a home, or food, or paslime yield. 
 
 Seek, mangled innocent, some wonted form, 
 Tiiat wonted form, alas ! thy dying bed, 
 The sheltering rushes whistling o'er thy head. 
 
 The cold earth with thy blood-stained bosom warm. 
 
 Perhaps a mother's anguish adds its wo; 
 
 The playful pair crowd fondly by thy tide ; 
 
 Ah ! helpless nurslings, who will now provide 
 That life a mother only can bestow. 
 
 Oft as by winding Nith, I, musing, wait 
 The sober eve, or hail the cheerful dawn, 
 I'll mis? thee sporting o'er the dewy lawn, 
 
 And curse the. ruthless wretch, and mourn thy hup- 
 less fate. 
 
 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. 
 
 C is a glorious production of the 
 
 Author of man. You, he, and the noble 
 Colonel of the C F are to me 
 
 " Dear as the ruddy drops which warm my breast.'.' 
 I have a good mind to make verses on you 
 all, to the tune of " Three guid fe'dovit 
 ayoni the glen^" 
 
140 
 
 LETTERS. 
 
 NO. LXXIV. 
 
 The poem in the preceding letter had also been sent by 
 our Bard to Dr Gregory for hiH criticism. The fol- 
 lowing ii that gentleman's reply. 
 
 FROM DR. GREGORY. 
 
 Edinburgh, 2d June, 1789. 
 
 I TAKE the first leisure hour I could 
 command, to thank you for your letter, 
 and the copy of verses enclosed in it. As 
 there is real poetic merit, I mean both 
 fancy and tenderness, and some happy ex- 
 pressions in them, I think they well de- 
 serve that you should revise them care- 
 fully and polish them to the utmost. This 
 I am sure you can do if you please, for 
 you have great command both of expres- 
 sion and of rhymes : and you may judge 
 from the two last pieces of Mrs. Hunter's 
 poetry, that I gave you, how much cor- 
 rectness and high polish enhance the va- 
 lue of such compositions. As you desire 
 it, I shall, with great freedom, give you 
 my most rig-orow* criticisms on your verses. 
 I wish you would give me another edition 
 of them, much amended, and I will send 
 it to Mrs. Hunter, who I am sure will have 
 much pleasure in reading it. Pray give 
 me likewise for myself, and her too, a copy 
 (as much amended as you please) of the 
 Water Fowl on Loch Turit. 
 
 The Wounded Hare is a pretty good 
 subject; but the measure or stanza you 
 have chosen for it, is not a good one ; it | 
 does not Jloio well; and the rhyme of the 
 fourth line is almost lost by its distance 
 from the first, and the two interposed, 
 close rhymes. If I were you, I would put 
 it into a different stanza yet. 
 
 Stanza 1. The execrations in the first 
 two lines are too strong or coarse ; but 
 they may pass. " Murder-aiming" is a 
 bad compound epithet, and not very in- 
 telligible. " Blood-stained," in stanza iii. 
 line 4. has the same fault : Bleeding bo- 
 som is infinitely better. You have ac- 
 customed yourself tu such epithets and 
 have no notion how stiff" and quaint they 
 appear to others, and how incongruous 
 with poetic fancy and tender sentiments. 
 Suppose Pope had written, " Why that 
 blood-stained bosom gored," how would 
 you have liked it ? Fo7-m is neither a po- 
 etic, nor a dignified, nor a plain common 
 word : it is a mere sportsman's word ; un- 
 suitable to pathetic or serious poetry. 
 
 " Mangled" is a coarse word. " Inno- 
 cent," in this sense, is a nursery word, 
 but both may pass. 
 
 Stanza 4. '* Who will now provide that 
 life a mother only can bestow ?" will not 
 do at all : it is not grammar — it is not in- 
 telligible. Do you mean, " provide for 
 that life which the mother had bestowed 
 and used to provide for?" 
 
 There was a ridiculous slip of the pen, 
 " Feeling" (I suppose) for " Fellow," in 
 the title of your copy of verses ; but even 
 fellow would be wrong; it is but a collo- 
 quial and vulgar word, unsuitable to your 
 sentiments. " Shot" is improper too. — On 
 seeing a person (or a sportsman) wound a 
 hare; it is needless to add with what 
 weapon; but if-you think otherwise, you 
 should say, with a fowling piece. 
 
 Let me see you when you come to town, 
 and I will show you some more of Mrs 
 Hunter's poems.* 
 
 No. LXXV. 
 TO MR. M'AULEY, OF DUMBARTON. 
 Atk June, 1789. 
 
 DEAR SIR, 
 
 Though I am not without my fears 
 respecting my fate, at that grand, univer- 
 sal inquest of right and wrong, commonly 
 called The Last Day, 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 ingra- 
 titude. 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 
 
 * It must be admitted, that this criticism is not more 
 distinguished by its good sense, than by its freedom 
 from ceremony. It is impoasible not to smile at the 
 manner in which the poet may be supposed to have re- 
 ceived it. la fact, it appears, as the sailors say, to have 
 thrown him quite aback. In a letter which he wrote 
 
 soon after, he says, " Dr. G is a good man, but he 
 
 crucifies me."— And again, " I believe in the iron jus- 
 tice of Dr. G ;" but, like the devils, " I believe and 
 
 tremble." However, he profited by these criticisms, as 
 the reader will find by comparing the first edition of 
 this piece with that published in p. 60 of the Poems. 
 
LETTERS. 
 
 141 
 
 are, in immortal Allan's language, " Hale 
 and weel, and living ;" and that your 
 cliarming 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. 
 
 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 health of my 
 dairy ; and at times sauntering by the de- 
 lightful windings of the Nith, on the mar- 
 gin of which I have built my humble do- 
 micile, 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 re- 
 peat 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 
 proscription. In my family devotion, 
 which, like a good presbyterian, I occa- 
 sionally give to my household folks, I am 
 extremely fond of the psalm, " Let not the 
 errors of my youth," &c. and that other, 
 " Lo, children are God's heritage," &.c. ; 
 in which last, Mrs. Burns, wlio, by the 
 by, has a glorious " wood-note wild" at 
 either old song or psalmody, joins me with 
 the pathos of Handel's Messiah. 
 
 No. LXXVI. 
 
 TO MRS. DUNLOP. 
 
 ElUsland, 2Ut June, 1789. 
 
 DEAR MADAM, 
 
 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 imagina- 
 tions and gloomy presages. 
 
 Monday Evening. 
 I have just heard * * * * give a 
 sermon. He is a man famous for his be- 
 nevolence, and I revere him; but from 
 such ideas of my Creator, good Lord, de- 
 liver 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 
 incomprehensibly 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 distinc- 
 tion between virtue and vice, and conse- 
 quently, that I am an accountable crea- 
 ture ; that from the seeming nature of the 
 human mind, as well as from the evident 
 imperfection, nay, positive injustice, in 
 the administration of aflfairs, both in the 
 natural and moral worlds, there must be 
 a retributive scene of existence b*eyond 
 the grave — must, I think, be allowed by 
 every one who will give himself a mo- 
 ment'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 wis- 
 dom and learning of many preceding ages, 
 though, to appearance, he himself was the 
 obscurest, and most illiterate of our spe- 
 cies; therefore Jesus Christ was from 
 God. 
 
 Whatever mitigates the woes, or in- 
 creases the happiness of others, this is my 
 criterion of goodness ; and whatever in- 
 jures society at large, or any individual 
 in it, this is my measure of iniquity. 
 
 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 appro 
 bation of my own mind. 
 
 No. Lxxvn. 
 
 FROM DR. MOORE. 
 Clifford Street, WthJune, 1789. 
 
 DEAR SIR, 
 
 I THANK you for the different com 
 muiiications you have made me of youi 
 
142 
 
 LETTERS. 
 
 occasional productions in manuscript, all 
 of whicli have merit, and some oi" them 
 merit of a different kind from what ap- 
 pears in the poems you have published. 
 You ought carefully to preserve all your 
 occasional productions, to correct and im- 
 prove them at your leisure ; and when 
 you can select as many of these as will 
 make a volume, publish it either at Edin- 
 burgh or London, by subscription: on 
 such an occasion, it may be in my power, 
 as it is very much in my inclination, to be 
 of service to you. 
 
 If I were to offer an opinion, it would 
 be, that, in your future productions, you 
 should abandon the Scottish stanza and 
 dialect, and adopt the measure and lan- 
 guage of modern English poetry. 
 
 The stanza which you use in imitation 
 of Christ kirk on the Green, with the tire- 
 some repetition of " that day," is fatiguing 
 to English ears, and I should think not 
 very agreeable to Scottish. 
 
 All the fine satire and humour of your 
 Holy Fair is lost on the English ; yet, 
 without more trouble to yourself, you 
 could have conveyed the whole to them. 
 The same is true of some of your other 
 
 poems. In your Epistle to J. S. , 
 
 the stanzas, from that beginning with this 
 line, " This life, so far's I understand,' 
 to that which ends with — " Short while 
 it grieves," are easy, flowing, gayly phi- 
 losophical, and of Horatian elegance — 
 the language is English, with a, few Scot- 
 tish words, and some of those so harmo- 
 nious as to add to the beauty ; for what 
 poet would not prefer gloaming to twi- 
 light? 
 
 I imagine, that by carefully keeping, 
 and occasionally polishing and correcting 
 those verses, which the Muse dictates, 
 you will, within a year or two, have ano- 
 ther volume as large as tlie first, ready 
 for the press : and this without diverting 
 you from every proper attention to the 
 study and practice of husbandry, in which 
 I understand you are very learned, and 
 which I fancy you will choose to adhere 
 to as a wife, while poetry amuses you 
 from time to time as a mistress. The 
 former, like a prudent wife, must not show 
 ill-humour, although you retain a sneak- 
 ing kindness to this agreeable gipsy, and 
 pay her occasional visits, which in no 
 manner alienates your heart from your 
 lawful spouse, but tends on the contrary, 
 to promote her interest. 
 
 I desired Mr. Cadell to write to Mr. 
 Creech to send you a copy of Zeluco. 
 This performance has had great success 
 here ; but I shall be glad to have your 
 opinion of it, because I value your opinion, 
 and because I know you are above sav- 
 ing what you do not think. 
 
 I beg you will offer my best wishes to 
 my very good friend, Mrs. Hamilton, who 
 I understand is your neighbour. If she 
 is as happy as I wish her, she is happy 
 enough. Make my compliments also to 
 Mrs. Burns : and believe me to be, with 
 sincere esteem, 
 
 Dear Sir, yours, &c. 
 
 No. LXXVIII. 
 FROM MISS J. LITTLE. 
 Loudon House, \2th July, 1789. 
 
 SIR, 
 
 Though I have not the happiness of 
 being personally acquainted with you, yet, 
 amongst the number of those who have 
 read and admired your publications, may 
 I be permitted to trouble you with this. 
 You must know, Sir, I am somewhat in 
 love with the Muses, though I cannot 
 boast of any favours they have deigned to 
 confer upon me as yet ; my situation in 
 life has been very much against me as to 
 that. I have spent some years in and 
 about Eccelefechan (where my parents re- 
 side,) in the station of a servant, and am 
 now come to Loudon House, at present 
 possessed by Mrs. H : she is daugh- 
 ter to Mrs. Dunlop of Dunlop, whom I un- 
 derstand you are particularly acquainted 
 with. As I had the pleasure of perusing 
 your poems, I felt a partiality for the au- 
 thor, which I should not have experienced 
 had you been in a more dignified station. 
 I wrote a few verses of address to you 
 which I did not then think of ever pre- 
 senting ; but as fortune seems to have fa- 
 voured me in this, by bringing me into a 
 family, by whom you are well known and 
 much esteemed, and where perhaps I may 
 have an opportunity of seeing you, I shall, 
 in hopes of your future friendship, take 
 the liberty to transcribe them. 
 
 Fair fa' the honest rustic swain 
 The pride o' a' our Seottiih plain, 
 
LETTERS. 
 
 1-<3 
 
 Thou ^ie'a ua jny to hear th7 strain, 
 
 And notes sae sweet : 
 Old Ramsay's sliade reviv'd again 
 In tliee we greet. 
 
 Iiov'd Thalia, that delightful muse, 
 Seem'd lang shut up as a recluse ; 
 To all she did her aid refuse. 
 
 Since Allan's day ; 
 Till Burns arose, then did she chuso 
 
 To grace his lay. 
 
 To hear thy sang all ranks desire, 
 Sap weel you strike the dormant lyre ; 
 Apollo with poetic fire 
 
 Thy breast does warm ; 
 And critics silently admire 
 
 Thy art to charm. 
 
 Caesar and Luath weel can speak, 
 'Tis pity e'er their gabs should steek, 
 But into human nature keek. 
 
 And knots unravel: 
 To hear their lectures once a week, 
 
 Nine miles I'd travel. 
 
 Thy dedication to G. H. 
 
 An unco bonnie hatnespnn speech, 
 
 Wi' winsome glee the heart can teach 
 
 A better lesson, 
 Than servile bards, who fawn and fleech 
 
 Like beggar's messon. 
 
 When slighted love becomes your theme, 
 And women's faithless vows you blame; 
 With so much pathos you exclaim, 
 
 In your Lament; 
 But glanc'd by the most frigid dame, 
 
 She would relent. 
 
 The daisy too, ye sing wi' skill ; 
 And weel ye praise the whisky gill ; 
 In vain I blunt my feckless quill. 
 
 Your fame to raise ; 
 While echo sounds from ilka hill, 
 
 To Burns's praise. 
 
 Did Addison or Pope but hear. 
 Or Sam, that critic most severe, 
 A ploughboy sing with throat sae clear 
 
 They, in a rage. 
 Their works would a' in pieces tear. 
 
 And curse your pnge. 
 
 Sure Milton's eloquence were faint, 
 The beauties of your verse to paint ; 
 My rude unpolish'd strokes but taint 
 
 Their brilliancy ; 
 Th' attempt would doubtless vex a saint, 
 
 And weel may thee. 
 
 The task I'll drop — with heart sincere 
 To Heaven present my huniblt pray'r, 
 That all the blessings mortals share. 
 
 May be by turns 
 DispeBs'd by an indulgent care, 
 
 To Robert Burns ! 
 
 Sir, I hope you will pardon my boldness 
 in this, my hand trembles while I write 
 to you, conscious of my unworthiness of 
 what I would most earnestly solicit, viz. 
 your favour and friendship ; yet hoping 
 you will show yourself possessed of as 
 much generosity and good nature as will 
 prevent your exposing what may justly 
 be found liable to censure in this mea- 
 sure, I shall take the liberty to subscribe 
 myself, 
 
 Sir, 
 Your most obedient, humble servant, 
 JANET LITTLE. 
 
 P. S. If you would condescend to ho- 
 nour me with a few lines from your hand, 
 I would take it as a particular favour ; 
 and direct to me at Loudon House, near 
 Galston. 
 
 No. LXXIX. 
 FROM MR. ******. 
 
 London, 5th August, 1789. 
 
 MY DEAR SIR, 
 
 Excuse me when I say, that the un- 
 common abilities which you possess must 
 render your correspondence very accept- 
 able to any one. I can assure you I am 
 particularly proud of your partiality, and 
 shall endeavour, by every method in my 
 power to merit a continuance of your po- 
 liteness. 
 
 When you can spare a few moments, I 
 should be proud of a letter from you, di- 
 rected for me, Gerard-street, Soho. 
 
 I cannot express my happiness suffi- 
 ciently at the instance of your attachment 
 to my late inestimable friend, Bob Fer- 
 gusson,* who was particularly intimate 
 with myself and relations. While I re- 
 collect with pleasure his extraordinary 
 talents, and many amiable qualities, it af- 
 fords me the greatest consolation that I 
 am honoured with the correspondence of 
 his successor in national simphcity and 
 genius. That Mr. Burns has refined in 
 the art of poetry, must readily be admit- 
 
 The erection of a monument lo hiw. 
 
144 
 
 LETTERS. 
 
 led ; but notwithstanding many favoura- 
 ble representations, I am yet to learn that 
 he inherits his convivial povi^ers. 
 
 There was such a richness of conver- 
 sation, such a plenitude of fancy and at- 
 traction in him, that when I call the hap- 
 py period of our intercourse to my memo- 
 ry, I feel myself in a state of delirium. I 
 was then younger than him by eight or 
 ten years, but his manner was so felici- 
 tous, that he enraptured every person 
 around him, and infused into the hearts 
 of the young and the old the spirit and 
 animation which operated on his own 
 mind. 
 
 I am. Dear Sir, yours, &c. 
 
 No. LXXX. 
 
 TO MR. *****. 
 
 In answer to the foregoing. 
 
 The hurry of a farmer in this parti- 
 cular 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. 
 
 Tliat you have done well in quitting 
 your laborious concern in **** I do not 
 doubt : the weighty reasons you mention 
 were, I hope, very, deservedly, indeed, 
 weighty ones, and your health is a mat- 
 ter 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, exhi- 
 bited 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 proprie- 
 tors have lost. 
 
 When I received your letter, I was 
 transcribing for ****, my letter to the ma- 
 gistrates of the Canongate, Edinburgh, 
 begging their permission to place a tomb- 
 stone over poor Pergusson, and their edict, 
 in consequence of my petition bat 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 distinc- 
 tion in the man ; where riches, deprived 
 of all their pleasure-purchasing powers- 
 return to their native sordid matter : 
 where titles and honour are the disre 
 garded reveries of an idle dream ; a*^ 
 where that heavy virtue, which is the ne- 
 gative consequence of steady dulness, and 
 those thoughtless, though often destruc- 
 tive follies, which are the unavoidable 
 aberations of frail human nature, will be 
 thrown into equal oblivion as if they had 
 never been. 
 
 Adieu, my dear Sir ! So soon as your 
 present views and schemea are concen- 
 tred in an aim, I shall be glad to hear 
 from you ; as your welfare and happiness 
 is bv no means a subject indifferent to 
 
 Yours, &.C. 
 
 No. LXXXI. 
 TO MISS WILLIAMS. 
 
 1789. 
 
 Of the many problems in the nature 
 of that wonderful creature, Man, this ia 
 one of the most extraordinary, that he 
 shall go on from day to day, from week to 
 week, from month to moiith, or perhaps 
 from year to year, suffering a hundred 
 times more in an hour from the impotent 
 consciousness of neglecting what we 
 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 po- 
 em 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 acknow- 
 ledgment of the obligation, until you must 
 indeed be the very angel I take you for, 
 if you can forgive me. 
 
 Your poem I have read with the high- 
 est pleasure. I have a way, whenever I 
 
 * See Miss Piiiith's Sonnet, page 101.— nol« 
 
LETTERS. 
 
 145 
 
 Tead 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 pe- 
 ruse along. I will make no apology for 
 presenting you with a few unconnected 
 thoughts that occurred to me in my re- 
 peated perusals of your peem. 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. 
 
 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. 
 
 Wishing you all success in your pro- 
 gress in tiie path of fame ; and that you 
 may equally escape the danger of stum- 
 bling through incautious speed, or losing 
 ground through loitering neglect. 
 
 I have the honour to be, &c. 
 
 No. LXXXII. 
 FROM MISS WILLIAMS. 
 
 pth August, 1789. 
 
 I DO not lose a moment yi returning 
 you my sincere acknowledgments for your 
 letter, and your criticism on my poem, 
 which is a very flattering proof that you 
 have read it with attention. I think your 
 objections are perfectly just, except in 
 one instance. 
 
 You have indeed been very profuse of 
 panegyric on my little performance. A 
 much less portion of applause from you 
 would have been gratifying to me ; since 
 I think its value depends entirely upon 
 the source from whence it proceeds — the 
 incense of praise, like other incense, is 
 more grateful from the quality than the 
 quantity of the odour. 
 
 I hope you still cultivate the pleasures 
 
 of poetry, which are precious, even inde- 
 pendent of the rewards of fame. Perhaps 
 the most valuable property of poetry is 
 its power of disengaging the mind from 
 worldly cares, and leading the imagina- 
 tion to the richest springs of intellectual 
 enjoyment; since, however frequently life 
 may be chequered with gloomy scenes, 
 those who truly love the Muse can always 
 find one little path adorned with flowers 
 and cheered by sunshine. 
 
 No. LXXXIII. 
 
 TO MRS. DUNLOP. 
 
 .Ellisland,ethSept. 1789. 
 
 DEAR MADAM, 
 
 I HAVE mentioned, in my last, my 
 appointment to the Excise, and the birth 
 of little Frank, who, by the by, I trust 
 will be no discredit to the honourable 
 name of Wallace, as he has a fiine 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. 
 
 I had some time ago an epistle, part 
 poetic, and part prosaic, from your poet- 
 ess, Mrs. J. Little, a very ingenious but 
 modest composition. I should have writ- 
 ten her, as she requested, but for the hur- 
 ry of this new business. I have heard of 
 her and her compositions in this country ; 
 and I am happy to add, always to the ho- 
 nour 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, in- 
 spired 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. 
 
 Some parts of your letter of the 20th 
 August struck me with the most melan- 
 choly concern for the state of your mind 
 at present. 
 
14(J 
 
 LETTERS. 
 
 Would I could write you a letter of 
 comfort ! I would sit down to it with as 
 much plea«urp as I would to write an 
 Epic poem of my own composition that 
 should equal the Iliad. Religion, my 
 dear friend, is the true comfort. A strong 
 persuasion in a future state of existence ; 
 a proposition so obviously probable, that, 
 settino- revelation aside, every nation and 
 people, so far as investigation has reached, 
 for at least near four thousand years, have 
 ,n 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 faca of all human belief, 
 la all ages, I was shocked at my own con- 
 duct. 
 
 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 fa- 
 vourite quotations, which I keep con- 
 stantly by me in my progress through 
 life, in the language of the book of Job, 
 " Against tbe day of battle and of war"— 
 
 spoken of religion. 
 
 " 'Tis this, my friend, that streaks our morning bright, 
 
 •Tis this that gilds the horror of our night. 
 
 When wealtli forsakes us, and when friends are few; 
 
 When friends are faithless, or when foes pursue ; 
 
 'Tis this that wards the blow, or stills the smart, 
 
 Disarms affliction, or repels his dart ; 
 
 Within the breast bids purest raptures rise, 
 
 Bids smiling conscience spread her cloudless skies." 
 
 I have been very busy with Zeluco. 
 The Doctor is so obliging as to request 
 mv opinion of it ; and I have been revolv- 
 inir in my mind some kind of criticisms 
 on^novel-writing, but it is a depth beyond 
 my research. I shall, however, digest 
 rav thoughts on the subject as well as I 
 can. Zeluco is a most sterling perform- 
 ance. 
 
 Farewell ! 
 commende ! 
 
 Dieu, le bon Diev,Je vous 
 
 No. LXXXIV. 
 FROM DR. BLACKLOCK. 
 
 Edinburgh, 2Ath August, 1789. 
 Dk AR Burns, thou brother of my heart. 
 Both for thy virtues and thy a rt ; 
 
 If art it may be call'd in thee, 
 
 Which nature's bounty, large and free» 
 
 With pleasure on thy breast difiuses, 
 
 And warms thy soul with all the Muses. 
 
 Whether to laugh with easy grace, 
 
 Thy numbers move the sage's face, 
 
 Or bid the softer passion rise. 
 
 And ruthless souls with grief surprise, 
 
 'Tis nature's voice distinctly felt, 
 
 Through thee her organ, thus to melt. 
 
 Most anxiously I wish to know, 
 With thee of late how matters go ; 
 How keeps thy much-loved Jean her 
 
 health ? 
 What promises thy farm of wealth ? 
 Whether the muse persists to smile, 
 And all thy anxious cares beguile .'' 
 Whether bright fancy keeps alive ? 
 And how thy darling infants thrive ? 
 
 For me, with grief and sickness spent, 
 Since I my journey homeward bent, 
 Spirits depress'd no more I mourn, 
 But vigour, life, and health return, 
 No more to gloomy thoughts a prey, 
 I sleep all night, and live all day ; 
 By turns my book and friend enjoy. 
 And thus my circling hours employ ! 
 Happy while yet these hours remain 
 If Burns could join the cheerful train. 
 With wonted zeal, sincere and fervent, 
 Salute once more his humble servant, 
 THO. BLACKLOCK. 
 
 No. LXXXV. 
 
 TO DR. BLACKLOCK.- 
 p. 81. 
 
 -See Poems, 
 
 No. LXXXVI. 
 TO R. GRAHAM, ESQ. OF FINTRY. 
 
 9th December, 1789. 
 
 I HAVE a good while had a wish to 
 trouble you with a letter, and had cer- 
 tainly done it ere now — but for a humi- 
 liating 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 every thing m 
 your power to keep alive and cherish." 
 
LETTERS. 
 
 Now though since God has thoug-ht pro- 
 per 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 ho- 
 nourable, yet, Sir, allow me to flatter 
 myself, that as a poet and an honest man, 
 you first interested yourself in ray wel- 
 fare, and principally as such still, you per- 
 mit me to approach you. 
 
 I have found the excise-business go on 
 a great deal smoother with me than I ex- 
 pected ; owing a good deal to the gene- 
 rous friendship of Mr. Mitchell, my col- 
 lector, 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. 
 T take the liberty to enclose you a few 
 bagatelles, all of. them the productions 
 of my leisure thoughts in my excise 
 rides. 
 
 If you know or have ever s»pn Captain 
 Grose the antiquarian, you will enter into 
 any humour that is in the verses oir him. 
 Perhaps }^ou have seen them before, as 
 I sent them to a London newspaper. 
 Though I dare say you have none of th^ 
 solemn-league-and-covenant fire, which 
 shone so conspicuous in Lard Georpe 
 Gordon and the Kilmarnnck weavers, ypt 
 T think you must have heard nfDr. M'Gill. 
 one of the clergymen of Ayr, and his he- 
 retical book. God help him, poor man I 
 Though he is one of the worthiest, as well 
 as one of the ablest of ih^ whole priest- 
 hood of the Kirk of Scotland, in every 
 
 be sucn a hard-run match 
 general election.* 
 
 14T 
 the whole 
 
 I am too little a man to have any po- 
 litical 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 a country, and who * * * * 
 is a character that one cannot speak of 
 with patience. 
 
 Sir J. J. does " what man can do ;' 
 yet I doubt his fate. 
 
 but 
 
 No. Lxxxvn. 
 
 TO MRS. DUNLOP. 
 
 Ellisland, 13th December, 1789. 
 
 Many thanks, dear Madam, for your 
 sheetful of rhvmes. Though at pre'sent 
 I am below the veriest prose, yet from 
 you every thing 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 hccn so ill with the 
 nervous head-ache, that I have been oblig- 
 ed to give up for a time my excise-book^, 
 being scarcely able to lift my head, much 
 less to ride once a week over ten muir 
 parishes. What is man ? To-day in tht^ 
 luxuriance of health, exulting in the en- 
 joyment of existence ; in a few days, per- 
 haps in a few hours, loaded with conscious 
 painful being, counting the tardy pace of 
 the lingering moments by the repercus- 
 ions of anguish, and refusing or denied a 
 
 sense of that ambiguous term, yet the | comforter, day follows night, and nigh 
 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 con- 
 fess, too lofal, but I laughed myself at 
 some conceits in it, though I am convin- 
 ced in my conscience that there are a 
 good many heavy stanzas in it too. 
 
 The election ballad, as you will see, 
 alludes to the present canvass in our strinor 
 of boroughs. I do not believe there will 
 
 comes after day, only to curse him with 
 life which gives him no pleasure : and yet 
 the awful, dark termination of that life is 
 a something at which he recoils. 
 
 " Tell U8, ye dead ; wlU none of you In pity 
 
 Disclose the secret 
 
 fVhat 'tia you are, and tee must shortly bt ! 
 
 A little time will make us learn'd ai you arc. 
 
 • Thi^alludea tothe contnet fur the borough of Dum- 
 frlei, between the Duke of Queensberry'* interest and 
 
 liiatof S^, Jaioef Jolindotit;. C. 
 
148 
 
 LETTERS. 
 
 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 re- 
 signed 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 en- 
 joyed? Ye venerable sages, and holy 
 flamens, is there probability in your con- 
 jectures, 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 every thing generous, 
 manly and noble ; and if ever emanation 
 from the All-good Being animated a hu- 
 man form, it is thine ! — There should I, 
 with speechless agony of rapture, again 
 recognise my lost, my ever dear Mary ! 
 whose bosom was fraught with truth, ho- 
 nour, constancy, and love. 
 
 My Mary, dear departed shade ! 
 
 Where is thy place of heavenly rest ^ 
 Seest thou thy lover lowly laid ; 
 
 Hear'st thou the groans that rend his breast 1 
 
 Jesus Christ, thou amiablest of charac- 
 ters '. 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 trtist 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 ex- 
 istence, shall be, far beyond our present j 
 conceptions, more endearing. j 
 
 I am a good deal inclined to think with j 
 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 ven- 
 ture to write any thing above an order to 
 a cobbler. You have felt too much of the 
 ills of life not to sympathize with a dis- 
 eased wretch, who is impaired more than 
 half of any faculties he possessed. Your 
 goodness will excuse this distractetl 
 scrawl, which the writer dare scarcely 
 read, and which he would throw into the 
 fire were he able to write any thing bet- 
 ter, or indeed any thing at all. 
 
 Rumour told me something of a son of 
 yours who was returned from the East or 
 West-Indies. If you have gotten news 
 of 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 any thing could give me so 
 much pleasure as to hear of any good 
 thing befalling my honoured friend. 
 
 If you have a minute's leisure, take up 
 your pen in pity to le pauvre miserable. 
 R. B. 
 
 No. LXXXVIII. 
 
 TO SIR JOHN SINCLAIR. 
 
 The following circumstance has, 1 
 believe, been omitted in the statistical ac- 
 count 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. 
 
 To store the minds of the lower classes 
 with useful knowledge is certainly of very 
 great importance, both to them as indi- 
 viduals, and to society at large. Giving 
 them a turn for reading and reflection, is 
 giving them a source of innocent and laud- 
 able 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 
 coimtry ; and so useful a;: to r!r;Trve the 
 notice of every country gentleman, wiio 
 
LETTERS. 
 
 thinks the improvement of that part of his 
 own species, whom chance has thrown in- 
 to the humble walks of the peasant and 
 the arti^ar, a matter worthy of his atten- 
 tion. 
 
 Mt. Riddel got a number of his own 
 tenants, and farming neighbours, 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 of death. Each member, at 
 his entry, paid five shillings ; and at each 
 of their rheetings, 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 au- 
 thors they were to purchase, was always 
 decided by the majority. At every meet- 
 ing, 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 af- 
 ter 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 wliole three years. 
 At the expiration of the engagement, the 
 books were sold by auction, but only 
 among the members themselves ; and each 
 man had share of the common stock, in 
 money or in books, as he chose to be g 
 purchaser or not. 
 
 At the breaking up of this little socif^- 
 ty, 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, 
 Blair's Sermons, Rohertson\t History of 
 Scotland, Hume's History of the Stuarts, 
 The Spectator, Idler, Adventurer, Mirror, 
 Louno-er, Observer, J\Ian of Feeling, Man 
 of the World, Chrysal, Don Quixoffe, Jo- 
 seph Andrews, &c. A peasant who can 
 read and enjoy such books, is certainly a 
 much superior being to his neighbour, who 
 DerhapH stalks I'l-idr- hi- teaui, vtiy little I 
 
 removed, except in shape, from the brutes 
 he drives.* 
 
 Wishing your patriotic exertions their 
 so much-merited success, 
 
 I am, Sir, your humble servant, 
 
 A PEASANT. 
 
 No. LXXXIX. 
 
 TO CHARLES SHARPS, 
 OF HODDAM. 
 
 ESQ. 
 
 Under a fictitious Signature, enclosing a 
 ballad, 1790, or 1791. 
 
 It is true. Sir, you are a.gentleman 
 of rank and fortune, and I am a poor de- 
 vil ; you are a feather in the cap of soci 
 ety, and I am a very hobnail in his 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 sus- 
 pect that I am going to claim affinity with 
 the ancient and honourable house of Kil- 
 patrick : No, no. Sir : I cannot indeed be 
 properly said to belong to any house, or 
 even any province or kingdom, as my mo- 
 ther, who for many years was spouse to a 
 marching regiment, gave me into this bad 
 world, aboard the packet boat, somewhere 
 between Donaghadee andPortpatrick. By 
 our common family, I mean. Sir, the fa- 
 mily of the Muses. I am a fiddler and a 
 poet ; and you, I am told, play an exqui- 
 
 * This letter is extracted from the third volume of 
 Sir,fohn Sinclair's Statisticg, p. 598.— It was enclosed 
 to ?>ir .Inhn by Mr. Riddel himself, in the following let 
 ter, also primed there. 
 
 " Sir John, T enclose you a letter, written by Mr 
 Ruriis, as an addition to the account of Dunscore parish. 
 It cnnlains an account of a small library which lie was 
 sii frood (at my desire) as to set on foot, in the barony 
 of Monkland, or Friar's Carse, in this parish. As its 
 utility has been felt, particularly among the youngfr 
 class of people, I think, that if a similar plan were es- 
 tablished in the difleient parishes of Scotland, it would 
 tend greatly to the speedy improvement of the tenant- 
 ry, tradespeople, and work-people. Mr. Burns was so 
 good as to take the whole charge of this small concern. 
 He wa? treasurer, librarian, and censor, to this little 
 society, who will long have a grateful sense of his pub- 
 lic spirit and exertions for their improvement and in- 
 formation. 
 
 I have the honour to be, Sir John, 
 Vours, most sincerely. 
 
 ROBrRT RIDDEL." 
 
 To «<r '-^n SinclAtr of UUltr, Unit. 
 
150 
 
 LETTERS. 
 
 site violin, and have a standard taste in 
 the Belles Lettres. The other day, a 
 brother cata^ut gave me a. charming Scots 
 air of your composition. If I was pleased 
 with the time, I was in raptures with the 
 title you have given it ; and, taking up 
 the idea, I have, spun it into 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 unburden my 
 heart by saying — " Sir, 1 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 imapproachable. 
 It is true, the Muses baptized me in Cas- 
 talian streams, but the thoughtless gip- 
 sies forgot to give me a Name. As the 
 sex have served many a good fellow, the 
 Nine have given me a great deal of plea- 
 sure, but bewitching jades! they have 
 beggared me. Would they but spare me 
 a little of their cast hnen ! were it only 
 to put it in my power to say that I have 
 a shirt on mvback! But the idle wenches, 
 like Solomon's lilies, " they toil not nei- 
 ther do they spin;" So I must e'en cijj^- 
 tinue 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 yuur 
 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 ev'il of the dead. It 
 would be equally unhandsome and un- 
 grateful 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 lite- 
 rally 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 
 picked up a good many scraps of learning, 
 particularly in some branches of the ma- 
 thematics. Whenever I feel inclined to 
 rest myself on my way, T take my seat 
 under a hpdge, laying my poetic wallet 
 on my one side, and my fiddle-case on the 
 other, and placing my hat between my 
 logs, I can by means of its brim, or ra- 
 ther brims, go through the whole doctrine 
 of the Conic Sections. 
 
 However, Sir. don't let me mislead you. 
 
 as if I would interest your pily. Fortune 
 has so much forsaken me, that she hag 
 taught me to live without her ; and, amid 
 all my rags and poverty, I am as inde- 
 pendent, 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 unquali- 
 fied contempt ; and can regard an honest 
 scavenger with sincere respect. As you, 
 Sir, go through your roll with such dis- 
 tinguished merit, permit me to make one 
 in the chorus of universal applause, and 
 assure you that, with the highest respect, 
 I have the honour to be, &c 
 
 No. XC. 
 TO MR. GILBERT BURNS. 
 Ellisland, llth January, 1790. 
 
 DEAR BROTHER, 
 
 I ME AN to take advantage of the frank, 
 though I have not, in my present frame of 
 mind, much appetite for exertion in wri- 
 ting. My nerves are. in a **** state. I 
 feel that horrid hypocondria pervading 
 every atom of both body and soul. Thia 
 farm has undone my enjoyment of myself. 
 It is a ruinous affair on all hands. But 
 let it go to****! I'll fight it out and be off 
 with it. 
 
 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 pro- 
 logue,* which he spouted to his audience 
 with applause — 
 
 I can no more. — If once I was clear of 
 this **** farm, I should respire more at 
 
 No. XCI. 
 
 TO MRS. DUNLOP. 
 
 Ellisland, 25th Jamutry, 1790. 
 It has been owing to unremitting 
 hurry of business that I have not written 
 
 * ThiB prologue is Drinl»>d in ;h* Pr-eiT«. p. SC. 
 
LETTERS. 
 
 Ul 
 
 to you, Madam, long ere now. My health 
 is' greatly better, and I now begin once 
 more to share in satisfaction and enjoy- 
 ment with the rest of my fellow-creatures. 
 
 Many thanks, my much esteemed friend, 
 for your kind letters ; but why will you 
 make me run the risk of being contemp- 
 tible and mercenary in my own eyes .' 
 When I pique myself on my independent 
 spirit, I »iope 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 can- 
 not without pain, and a degree of morti- 
 fication, be reminded of the real inequali- 
 ty between our situations. 
 
 Most sincerely do I rejoice with you, 
 dear Madam, in the good news of Antho- 
 ny. Not only your anxiety about his fate, 
 but my own esteem for such a noble, 
 ' warm-hearted, manly young fellow, in the 
 j little T had of his acquaintance, has inter- 
 ested me deeply in his fortunes. 
 
 Falconer, the unfortunate author of the 
 ShipwreLk, which you so much admire, is 
 no more. After witnessing the dreadf\il 
 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 ! 1 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 
 
 * Falconer was in early life a sea boy, to use a word 
 of Sbakspeare, on board a man-of-war, in which ca- 
 pacity he attracted the notice of Campbell, the author 
 of the satire on Dr. Johnson, entitled I^ezip/ianes, then 
 purser of the sliip. Campbell took him as his servant, 
 and delighted in giving him instruction ; and when 
 Falconer afterwards acquired celebrity, boasted of him 
 »s his scholar. The Editor had this information from 
 a surgeon of a man-of-war, in 1777, who knew both 
 Catiipbell and Falconer, and who Iiimself perished aoon 
 after by shipwreck on the coast of America. 
 
 Though' the death of Falconer happened go lately as 
 1770 ur 1771, yel in tlie biography prefixed by I)r. An- 
 derson to his works, in the complete edition of the Poetx 
 of Great Britain , it is said—" Of the family, birth- 
 place, and education of William Falconer, there are 
 no memorials." On the authority already given, it 
 may be mentioned, that be was a nauve of one of the 
 towns on the coast of File : and that his parents who 
 had suffered some misfortunes, removed to one of the 
 sea-ports of England, wliere they both died soon after, 
 of an e|iideHiic fever, leaving poor Falconer, then a 
 boy, forlorn and destitute. In consequence of which 
 he entered on board a man-of-war. TheM lail rir 
 »wm»taD<--^ aic. hov»nfr ls» pct'»!H. B- 
 
 daring adventurous spirits which Scotland, 
 beyond any other country, is remarkable 
 for producing. Little does the fond mo- 
 ther 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 : 
 
 " Little did my mother think, 
 
 That day she cradled me. 
 What land I was to travel in. 
 
 Or what death I should die '.' 
 
 Old Scottish songs 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 : 
 
 " O that my father had ne'er on me smil'd ; 
 
 O that my mothtr had ne'er to me sung! 
 O that my cradle had never been rock'd ; 
 
 But that I had died when I was young ! 
 
 C that the grave it were my bed ; 
 
 My blankets were my winding sheet ; 
 The clocks and the worms my bedfellowi a' ; 
 
 AiidiP sae sound as I should sleep '." 
 
 I do not remember in all my reading to 
 have met with any thing 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. 
 
 I am every day expecting the doctor to 
 give your little godson* the small-pox. 
 They are rife in the country, and I trem- 
 ble for his fate. By the way I cannot 
 help congratulating you on his looks and 
 spirit. Every person who sees him ac- 
 knowledges him to be the finest, hand- 
 somest child he has ever seen. I am my- 
 self delighted with the manly swell of his 
 little chest, and a certain miniature dig- 
 nity in the carriage of his head, and the 
 glance of his fine black eye, which pro- 
 mise the undaunted gallantry of an inde- 
 pendent mind. 
 
 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. 
 
 * Tb« bard'fweond ten, Fraaei*. I, 
 
Ib2 
 
 LETTERS. 
 
 No. XCII. 
 
 FROM MR. CUNNINGHAM. 
 
 2Bth January, 1790. 
 
 In some instances it is reckoned un- 
 pardonable to quote any one's own words; 
 but the value I have for your friendship, 
 nothing can more truly or more elegantly 
 express than 
 
 ' Time but the impression stronger makes, 
 As streams tiieir channels deeper wear." 
 
 Having written to you twice without 
 having heard from you, I am apt to think 
 my letters have miscarried. My conjec- 
 ture is only framed upon the chapter of 
 accidents turning up against me, as it too 
 often does, in the trivial, and, I may with 
 truth add, the more important affairs of 
 life ; but I shall continue occasionally to 
 inform yon what is going on among the 
 circle of your friends in these parts. In 
 these days of merriment, T have frequent- 
 ly heard yonr name proclaimed at the jo- 
 vial board — under the roof of our hospi- 
 table friend at Stenhouse-mills ; there 
 were no 
 
 " Lingering moments numbered with care." 
 
 I saw your Address to the J^ew Year, 
 m the Dumfries Journal. Of your pro- 
 ductions I shall say nothing ; but my ac- 
 quaintance allege that when your name 
 is mentioned, which every man of celebri- 
 ty must know often happens, I am the 
 champion, the Mendoza, against all snarl- 
 ing critics and narrow-minded reptiles, of 
 whom a few on this planet do crawl. 
 
 With best compliments to your wife, 
 and her black-eyed sister, I remain 
 Yours, &c. 
 
 No. XCIII. 
 
 TO MR. CUNNINGHAM. 
 
 Ellisland, I3th February, 1790. 
 
 I BEG your pardon, my dear and much 
 valued friend, for writing to you on this 
 very unfashionable, unsightly sheet — 
 
 " My povert" but not my wili consents." 
 
 But to make amends, emce oi modish 
 post I have none, except one poor widow» 
 ed half-sheet of gilt, which lies in my 
 drawer among my plebeian foolscap pages, 
 like the widow of a man of fashion, whom 
 that unpolite scoundrel. Necessity, has 
 driven from Burgundy and Pine-apple, to 
 a dish of Bohea, with the scandal-bearing 
 help-mate of a village-priest ; or a glass 
 of whisky-toddy, with the ruby-nosed 
 yoke-fellow of a foot-padding exciseman 
 — I make a vow to enclose this sheet-full 
 of epistolary fragments in that ray only 
 scrap of gilt paper. 
 
 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 mo- 
 ment. It is not. that I will not write to 
 you ; Miss Burnet is not more dear to her 
 guardian angel, nor his grace the Duke 
 of********* to the powers of ***** than 
 my friend Cunningham lo me. It is not 
 that I cannot 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 antithe- 
 size sentiment, and circumvolute periods, 
 as well as any coiner of phrase in the re- 
 gions of philology. 
 
 December, 1789. 
 
 MY DEAR CUNWI^GHA-vr, 
 
 Where are you f 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 ? 
 
 What strange beings we are ! Since we 
 have a portion of conscious existence, 
 ecjually capable of enjoying pleasure, hap- 
 piness, 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 , whe- 
 ther method, economy, and fertility of ex- 
 pedients, be not applicable to enjoyment; 
 and whether there be not a want of dex- 
 terity in pleasure which renders our little 
 scantling of happiness still less; and a 
 profuseness and intoxication in bliss, 
 which leads to satiety, disgust, and self 
 abhorrence. There is not a doubt but 
 that health, talents, character, decent 
 competency, resoectable friends, are real 
 
LETTERS. 
 
 153 
 
 Bubstantial blessings ; and yet do we not 
 daily see those who enjoy many or all of 
 these good things, contrive, notwith- 
 standing, to be as unhappy as others to 
 whose lot few of them have fallen : I be- 
 lieve 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. 
 
 Sunday, I4th February, 1790. 
 
 God help me ! I am now obliged to 
 join 
 
 " Night to day, and Sunday to the week." 
 
 If there be any truth in the orthodox faith 
 of these churches, I am ***** past redemp- 
 tion, and what is worse, ***** to all eter- 
 nity. I am deeply read in Boston's Four- 
 fold State, Marshal on Sandification, Gu- 
 thrie's Trial of a Savins: 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." 
 
 J. uesday, 1 6th. 
 
 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 cares are of this world : if there is 
 another, an honest man has nothing to 
 fear from ii. I hate a man that wishes to 
 be a Deist ; but, I fear every fair, unpre- 
 judiced 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 too good news 
 to he true. That we are to enter into a 
 new scene of existence, where exempt 
 from want and pain, we shall enjoy our- 
 selves and our friends without satiety or 
 separation — how much should I be in- 
 debted to any one who could fullv assure 
 me that this was certain. 
 
 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. — I think we should be * 
 
 Finally, brethren, farewell ! Whatso- 
 ever things are lovely, whatsoever things 
 are gentle, whatsoever things are chari- 
 table, whatsoever things are kind, think 
 on these things, and think on 
 
 ROBERT BURNS. 
 
 No. xcn' 
 
 TO MR. HILL. 
 
 Ellisland, 2d March, 1790. 
 
 At a late meeting of the Monkland 
 Fri/'udly Society, it was resolved to aug- 
 ment their library by the following books, 
 which you are to send iis as soon as pos- 
 sible : — The Mirror, The Lounger, Mat 
 of Feding, Man of the World, (these, fof 
 my own sake, I wish to have by the first 
 carrier,) Knox's History of the Refor- 
 mation ; Rae's History of the Rebellion in 
 1715 ; any good History of the Rebellion 
 in 1745 ; a Display cf the Secession Act 
 and Testimony, by Mr. Gibb ; Hervey'a 
 Meditations ; Beveridge's Thoughts; and 
 another copy of Watson's Body of Divi- 
 nity. 
 
 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 nor other of 
 you. 
 
 In addition to the books I commission- 
 ed in my last, I want very much. An In- 
 dex 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 bet- 
 ter, but second-handed, for he does not 
 
I&4 
 
 LETTERS. 
 
 choose to give above tea shillings for the 
 book. I want likewise for myself as you 
 can pick thetn up, second-handed or cheap, 
 copies of Otway's Dramatic Works, Ben 
 Jonson's, Dryden's, Coiigreve's, Wycher- 
 ley's, T'anburgh's, Cibber's, or any Dra- 
 matic Works of the more modern, Mack- 
 lin, Garrick, Foote, Coleman, 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 Kol- 
 taire 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. 
 
 And now to quit the dry walk of busi- 
 ness, how do you do, my dear friend ? and 
 how is Mrs. Hill ? I trust, if now and then 
 not so elegantly handsome, at least as ami- 
 able, and sings as divinely as ever. My 
 good wife, too, has a charming " wood- 
 note wild ;" now could we four 
 
 I am out of all patience with this vile 
 world for one thing. Mankind are by na- 
 ture 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 mucfi nakedness, and 
 hunger, and poverty, and want, that we 
 are under a cursed necessity of studying 
 selfishness, in order that we may exist ! 
 Still there are, in every age, a few souls, 
 that all the wants and woes of this life 
 cannot aebase to selfishness, or even to 
 the necessary alloy of caution and pru- 
 dence. 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 Ivxve a whole host 
 of follies and sins 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. 
 Adieu [ 
 
 No. XCV. 
 
 TO MRS. DUNLOP. 
 
 Ellisland, \^th April, 1790. 
 
 1 HAVE just now, my ever-honoured 
 fr'ipnd. enjoyed a verv high luxury, in 
 reading a paper of the Lounger. You 
 
 know my national prejudices. I had of- 
 ten read and admired the Spectator, Ad- 
 venturer, 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 coun- 
 try reaps from the union, that can coun- 
 terbalance the annihilation of. her inde- 
 pendence, and even her very name ! I of- 
 ten repeat that couplet of my favourite 
 poet, Goldsmith — 
 
 " States of native liberty posspss'd, 
 Tlio' very poor may yet be very bless'd." 
 
 Nothing can reconcile me to the com- 
 mon terms " English ambassador, Eng- 
 lish court," &c. And I am out of all pa- 
 tience to see that 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. 
 T believe these, among your men of the 
 world, men who in fact guide for the most 
 part and govern our world, are looked on 
 as so many modifications of wronghead- 
 edness. They know the use of baAvling 
 out such terms, to rouse or lead the rab- 
 KiF. : but for their own private use ; with 
 a'most all the able statesmen that ever ex- 
 isted, 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 ought, but what they 
 dare. For the truth of this I shall not 
 ransack the history of nations, but appeal 
 J to one of the ablest judges of men, and 
 himself one of the ablest men that ever 
 lived— the celebrated Earl of Chester- 
 field. In fact, a man who could thorough- 
 ly control his vices whenever they inter- 
 fered with his interests, and who could 
 completely put on the appearance of every 
 virtue as often as it suited his purposes, 
 is, on the Stanhopian plan, the perfect 
 man ; a man to lead nations. But are 
 great abilities, complete without a flaw, 
 and polished without a blemish, the stand- 
 ard of human excellence ? This is cer- 
 tainly the staunch opinion of men of the 
 worfd ; but I call on honour, virtue, and 
 worth to give the stygian doctrine a loud 
 negati vp ! However, this must be allowed, 
 that, if you abstract from man the idea of 
 existence beyond the grave, then the true 
 measnrp of human conduct is proper and 
 improper : Virtue and vice, as disoositioni 
 
LETTERS. 
 
 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 pos- 
 sessor an ecstacy unknown to the coarser 
 organs of the herd, yet, considering the 
 haish gratings and inharmonic jars, in 
 this ill-timed state of being, it is odds but 
 tlie individual would be as happy, and cer- 
 tainly 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. 
 
 You must know I have just met with 
 the Mirror and Loung-er for the first time, 
 and I am quite ia 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 any thing I have read 
 of a long time. M'Kenzie has been call- 
 ed 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 pathetic. His Man 
 of Feelings (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 ? 
 
 Still, with all my admiration of M'Ken- 
 zie'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 
 I 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, 
 I in some degree, absolutely disqualifying 
 for the truly important business of mak- 
 ing a man's way into life. If I am not 
 much mistaken, my gallant young friend, 
 A***** is very much under these disquali- ! 
 fications ; and for the young females of a i 
 family I could mention, well may they 
 excite parental solicitude; for I, a com- 1 
 mon ncquaintance, or, as my vanity will 1 
 have it, an humble frii'n 1, have often trem- | 
 Y i 
 
 bled for a turn of mhjd whica may render 
 them eminently happy — or peculiarly mi- 
 serable ! 
 
 I have been manufacturing some verses 
 lately ; but as I have got the most hurried 
 season of excise-business over, I hope to 
 have more leisure to transcribe any thing 
 that may show how much I have the ho- 
 nour to be, Madam, yours, &.c. 
 
 No. XCVI. 
 FROM MR. CUNNINGHAM. 
 
 Edinburgh^ 25th May ^ 1789. 
 
 Mr DEAR BURNS, 
 
 I AM much indebted to you for your 
 last friendly, elegant epistle, and it shall 
 make a part of the vanity of my com- 
 position, to retain your correspondence 
 through life. It was remarkable your in- 
 troducing the name of Miss Burnet, at a 
 time when she was in such ill health : and 
 I am sure it will grieve your gentle heart, 
 to hear of her being in the last stage of a 
 consumption. Alas ! that so much beauty, 
 innocence, and virtue, should be nipped 
 in the bud. Hers was the smile of cheer- 
 fulness — of sensibility, not of allurement ; 
 and- her elegance of manners correspond- 
 ed with the purity and elevation of her 
 mind. 
 
 How does your friendly muse ? I am 
 sure she still retains her affection for you, 
 and that you have many of her favours in 
 your possession, which I have not seen. 
 I weary much to hear from you. 
 
 I beseech you do not forget m 
 
 T most sincerely hope all your concerns 
 in life prosper, and that your roof-tree en- 
 joys the blessing of good health. All 
 your friends here are well, among whom, 
 and not the le(tst, is your acquaintance, 
 Cleghorn. As for myself, I am well, as 
 far as ******* will let a man be, but with 
 these I am happy. 
 
 When you meet with my very agreea 
 
15G LETTERS. 
 
 ble friend, J. Syme, give him for me a i or a character eketclied wuh uncommon 
 bearty squeeze, and bid God bless him. precision. 
 
 Is there any probability of your being 
 Boon in Edinburgh ? 
 
 No. XCVII. 
 TO DR. MOORE. 
 Dumfrie$, Excise-office, I ith July, 1790. 
 
 Coming into town this morning, to 
 attend my duty in this office, it being col- 
 lection-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 lei- 
 sure through the day, amid our horrid busi- 
 ness 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 Douglass 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, consider- 
 ing circumstances, you will forgive it ; 
 and, as it will put you to no expense of 
 postage, I shall have the less reflection 
 about it. - ' 
 
 I am sadly ungrateful in not returning 
 you thanks for your most valuable present, 
 Zeiuco. 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 compa- 
 rative view of you. Fielding, Richardson, 
 and Smollet, 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 ; 
 but 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 with- 
 out 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 remarkably well turned oeriod 
 
 Though I shall hardly think of fairly 
 writing out my " Comparative View," I 
 shall certainly trouble you with my re- 
 marks, such as they are. 
 
 I have just received from my gentle- 
 man, that horrid summons in the book 
 of Revelation — " That time shall be no 
 
 The little collection of sonnets have 
 some charming poetry in them. If indeed 
 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 excel- 
 lence 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 
 feeling as an author, doing as I would be 
 done by. 
 
 No. XCVIII. 
 TO MRS. DUNLOP. 
 
 mh Aug. 1790. 
 
 DEAR MADAM, 
 
 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 any thing — but for- 
 getfulness of la plus amiable de son sexe. 
 By the by, 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 com- 
 pliments of these grinning, bowing, scrap- 
 ing times. 
 
 Well, I hope writing to you 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 danger- 
 ously ere it cure. He has wounded my 
 pride ! 
 
LETTERS. 
 
 No. XCIX. 
 TO MR. CUNNINGHAM. 
 
 Ellisland, Sth August, 1790. 
 
 Forgive me^ my once dear, and ever 
 dear friend, my seeming negligence. 
 Yini cannot sit down and fancy the busy 
 life 1 lead. 
 
 I laid down my goose feather to beat 
 my brains for an apt simile, and had some 
 thoughts of a country grannum at a fa- 
 mily christening; a bride on the mar- 
 ket day before her marriage ! * * 
 
 * * * *:« * * * 
 
 * * * a' tavern-keepfrr at an 
 election dinner ; &c. &c. — but the re- 
 semblance that hits my fancy best, is that 
 blackguard miscreant, Satan, who roams 
 about like a roaring lion, seeking, search- 
 ing 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 foun- 
 dation 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 " con- 
 smnmation devoutly to be wished ?" 
 
 "Thy spirit, Independence, let nie share; 
 
 Lord of the lion-heart, and eagle-eye! 
 Thy steps I follow with my bosoiri bare, 
 
 Nor heed the storm that howls along the sky ! 
 
 Are not these noble verses ? They are 
 the introduction of Smollet's Ode to Inde- 
 pendence : 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 tin- 
 sel glitter and stately hmdeur is but a 
 creature, formed as thou art — and per- 
 ,haps not so well formed as thou art — came 
 unto the world a puling infant as thou didst, 
 and must go out of it as all men must, a 
 •naked corse.* 
 
 • The preceding letter explains the feelings under 
 which this was written. The strain of indignant in 
 veetive goes on some time longer in the style which our 
 Rnrd was too apt to indulge, and of which the reader 
 hae already «een so much. E. 
 
 No. C. 
 FROM DR. BLACKLOCK. 
 
 Edinburgh, 1«< September, 1790. 
 How does my dear friend, much I languish 
 
 to hear. 
 His fortune, relations, and all that are dear! 
 With love of the Muses so strongly stiU 
 
 smitten, 
 I meant this epistle in verse to have writ- 
 ten. 
 But from age and infirmity indolence flows. 
 And this, much I fear will restore me to 
 
 prose. 
 Anon to my business I wish to proceed, 
 Dr. Anderson guides and provokes me to 
 
 speed, 
 A man of integrity, genius, and worth, 
 Who soon a performance intends to set 
 
 forth : 
 A work miscellaneous, extensive, and free. 
 Which will weekly appear by the name 
 
 of the Bee, 
 Of this from himself I enclose you a plan, 
 And hope you will give what assistance 
 
 you can. 
 Entangled with business, and haunted 
 
 with care. 
 In which more or less human nature must 
 
 share, 
 Some moments of leisure the Muses will 
 
 claim, 
 A sacrifice due to amusement and fame. 
 The Bee, which sucks, honey from every 
 
 gay bloom. 
 With sonie rays of your genius her work 
 
 may illume, 
 Whilst the flower whence her honey spon- 
 taneously flows, 
 As fragrantly smells, and as vig'rously 
 
 grows. 
 
 Now with kind gratulations 'tis time to 
 , conclude. 
 
 And add, your promotion is here under- 
 stood ; 
 
 Thus free from the servile employ of ex- 
 cise. Sir, 
 
 We hope soon to hear you commence Su- 
 pervisor ; 
 
 You then more at leisure, and free from 
 control, 
 
 May indulge the strong passion that reigns 
 in your soul ; 
 
 But I, feeble I, must to nature give way, 
 
 Devoted cold death's, and longevity's prey. 
 
 From verses though languid my thoughts 
 must unbend, 
 
 Though still I remain your affectionate 
 friend, 
 
 THO. BLACKLOCK. 
 
15S 
 
 LETTERS. 
 
 No. CI. 
 
 EXTRACT OF A LETTER 
 
 FROM MR. CUNNINGHAM. 
 Edinburgh, \4th October, 1790. 
 
 I LATELY received a letter from our 
 friend B*********, — what a charming fel- 
 low lost to society — born to great expec- 
 tations — with superior abilities, a pure 
 heart, and untainted morals, his fate in 
 life has been hard indeed — still I am per- 
 suaded he is happy: not like the gallant, 
 the gay Lothario, but in the simplicity of 
 rural enjoyment, unmixed with regret at 
 the remembrance of " the days of other 
 years,"* 
 
 I saw Mr. Dunbar put under the cover 
 of your newspaper Mr. Wood's poem on 
 Thomson. This poem has suggested an 
 idea to me which you alone are capable 
 to execute — a song adapted to each season 
 of the year. The task is difficult, but the 
 theme is charming : should you succeed, 
 I will undertake to get new music worthy 
 of the subject. What a fine field for 
 your imagination ! and who ie there alive 
 can draw so many beauties from Nature 
 and pastoral imagery as yourself? It is, 
 by the way, surprising, that there does 
 not exist, so far as I know, a proper song 
 for each season. We have songs on hunt- 
 ing, fishing, skating, and one autumnal 
 eong, Harvent Home. As your Muse is 
 neither spavined nor rusty, you may mount 
 the hill of Parna,sf;as, and return with a 
 eonnet hi your pocket for every season. 
 For my suggestions, if I be rude, correct 
 me ; if impertinent, chastise me ; if pre- 
 suming, despise me. But if you blend all 
 my weaknesses, and pound out one grain 
 of insincerity, then I am not thy 
 
 Faithful Friend, &c. 
 
 No. CII. 
 
 TO MRS. DUNLOP. 
 
 November, 1790. 
 
 « As cold waters to a thirsty soul, so is 
 good news from a far country." 
 
 • The pprson hfire alludfia to is Mr. S. who engaged 
 the Editor in tiiUunrfcrtakiuj. Sp« tliw D»die«l»«n. K. 
 
 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 tlie 
 apostle — "Rejoice with them that do re- 
 joice," — for me to sing for joy, is no new 
 thing; but to preach for joy, as I have 
 done in the commencement of this epis- 
 tle, is a pitch of extravagant rapture to 
 which I never rose before. 
 
 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 fridnd ? 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 skipped 
 I among the broomy banks of Nith, to 
 muse over my joy by retail. To keep 
 within the bounds of prose was impossi- 
 ble. Mrs. Little's is a more elegant, but 
 not a more sincere compliment, to the 
 sweet little fellow, than I, extempore, al- 
 most, poured out to him in the following 
 verses. See Poems, p. 74 — On the Birth 
 of a Posthumous Child, 
 
 I am much flattered by your approba- 
 tion of my Tarn o'Shanter, which you ex- 
 press in your former letter ; though, by 
 the by, you load me in that said letter 
 with accusations heavy and many ; to all 
 which I plead not guilty ! 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 pro- 
 perly : as to the punctuation, the j^rinters 
 do that themselves. 
 
 T have a copy of Tam 6'Shanter readj 
 to send you by the first opportunity : it il 
 too heavy to send by post. 
 
 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 ths 
 voung gflntleman doing well 
 
LETTERS. 
 
 15f 
 
 Jo. cm. 
 
 TO MR. CUNNINGHAM. 
 
 Ellislcmd, 33rf January, 1791. 
 
 Many happy returns of the season to 
 you, my dear friend ! As many of the 
 good things of this life as is consistent 
 with the usual mixture of good and evil 
 in the cup of being! 
 
 I have just flnished a poem, which you 
 will receive enclosed. It is my first es- 
 say in the way of tales. 
 
 I have for these several months been 
 hammering at an elegy on the amiable 
 and accomplished Miss Burnet. I have 
 gat, and can get no farther than the fol- 
 lowing fragment, on which please give 
 me your strictures. In all kinds of poetic 
 composition I set great store by your opi- 
 nion : 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. 
 
 I mean the introductory couplets as 
 text verses.* 
 
 Let me hear from you soon. Adieu ! 
 
 No. CIV. 
 TO MR. PETER HILL. 
 
 nth January, 1791. 
 
 Take these two guineas, and place 
 tnem over against that ****** 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 ma- 
 king 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 busi- 
 ness, such an ******** task ! Poverty ! 
 thou half-sisterof death, thou cousin-ger- 
 
 • Immediately after this were «opiM the first six 
 «l»nzas of the Elegy given in p. 82. of the Popm». 
 
 man of hell ! where shall I find force of 
 execration equal to the amplitude of thy 
 demerits ? Oppressed by thee, the vene- 
 rable ancient, grown hoary in the prac- 
 tice 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 ap- 
 plause. Nor is it only the family of worth 
 that have reason to complain of thee, the 
 children of folly and vice, though in com- 
 mon 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 shun- 
 ned 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. His 
 early follies and extravagance are spirit 
 and fire ; his consequent wants are the 
 embarrassments of an honest fellow ; and 
 when, to remedy the matter, he has gain- 
 ed 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 ****** and a lord. 
 Nay, worst of all, alas, for helpless wo- 
 man ! the needy prostitute, who has shi- 
 vered 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 Rip, 
 hurrying on to the guilty assignation ; she 
 who without the same necessities to plead, 
 riots nightly in the same guilty trade. 
 
 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 theiv 
 rpsperfive evacuationa 
 
160 
 
 LETTERS. 
 
 No. CV. 
 PROM A. F. TYTLER, ESQ. 
 
 Edinburgh, \2th March, 1791. 
 
 Mr. Hitr. yesterday put into my 
 hands a sheet of Grose's Antiquities, con- 
 taining a poem of yours entitled, Turn 
 o'Shajifer, a tale. Tlie very high plea- 
 sure I have received from the perusal of 
 this admirable piece, I feel, demands the 
 warmest acknowledgments. Hill tells me 
 he is to send off a packet for you this day ; 
 I cannot resist, therefore, putting on pa- 
 per what I most have told you in person, 
 had I met with you after the recent peru- 
 sal of your tale, which is, that I feel I owe 
 you a debt, which, if undischarged, \yould 
 reproach me with ingratitude. I have 
 seldom in my life tasted of higher enjoy- 
 ment from any work of genius, than I 
 have received from this composition : and 
 I am much mistaken, if this poem alone, 
 had you never written another syllable, 
 would not have been sufficient to have 
 transmitted your name down to posterity 
 with high reputation. In the introducto- 
 ry part, where you pamt the character of 
 your hero, and exhibit him at the ale- 
 house in^le, with his tippling cronies, you 
 have delineated nature with a humour and 
 naivete that would do honour to Matthew 
 Prior ; but when you describe the infer- 
 nal orgies of the witches' sabbath, and 
 the hellish scenery in which they are ex- 
 hibited, you display a power of imagina- 
 tion that Shakspeare himself could not 
 have exceeded. I know not that I have 
 ever met with a picture of more horrible 
 fancy than the following : 
 
 " Coffins stood round like open presses, 
 That sliaw'd the dead in their last dressei ; 
 And by some devilish cantrip slight, 
 Each in his cauid hand held a light." 
 
 But when I came to the succeeding lines, 
 my blood r^in cold within me : 
 
 " A knife, a father's throat had mangled, 
 Whom his ain son of life hereft ; 
 The gray hairs yet stack to the heft." 
 
 And here, after the two following lines, 
 " Wi' mair o' horrible and awfu'," &c. the 
 descriptive part might perhaps have been 
 better closed, than the four lines which 
 succeed, which, though good in them- 
 
 selves, yet as they derive all their merit 
 from tlie satire they contain, are here ra- 
 ther misplaced among the circumstances 
 of pure horror.* The initiation of the 
 young witch, is. most happily described — 
 the etfect of her charms exhibited in the 
 dance on Satan himself-— the apostrophe, 
 " Ah ! little thought thy reverend grau- 
 nie!" — the transport of Tam, who for- 
 gets his situation, and enters completely 
 into the spirit of the scene, are all fea- 
 tures of high merit in this excellent coK'-- 
 position. The only fault that it possess- 
 es, is, that the winding up, or conolusion 
 of the story, is not commensurate to the 
 interest which is excited by the descrip- 
 tive and characteristic painting of the 
 preceding parts. The preparation is fine, 
 but the result is not adequate. But for 
 this, perhaps, you have a good apology — 
 you stick to the popular tale. 
 
 And now that I have got out my mind, 
 and feel a little relieved of the weight ol 
 that debt T owed you, let me end this de- 
 sultory scroll, by an advice : you have 
 proved your talent for a species of com- 
 position in which but a very few of oui 
 own poets have succeeded — Go on — write 
 more tales in the same style — you wiL 
 eclipse Prior and La Fontaine ; for with 
 equal wit, equal power of numbers, and 
 equal naivete of expression, you have a 
 bolder, and more vigorous imagination. 
 I am, dear Sir, with much esteem, 
 Yours, &c 
 
 No. CVL 
 TO A. P. TYTLER, ESQ. 
 
 Nothing less than the unfortunate 
 accident I have met with could have pre- 
 vented my grateful acknowledgments for 
 your letter. His own favourite poem, 
 and that an essay in a walk of the muses 
 entirely new to him, where consequently 
 his hopes and fpars were on the most 
 anxious alarm for his success in the at- 
 tempt: to have that poem so much ap- 
 plauded by one of the first judges, wis 
 the most delicious vibration that ever 
 
 • Our Bard profiled by Mr Tytler's ciitlci^mt, and 
 !xpunged the foui lines iucurdingiy 
 
LETTERS. 
 
 16i 
 
 trilled 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 misfor- 
 tune. A day or two after I received your 
 letter, my horse came down with me and 
 broke ray right arm. As this is the first 
 service my arm has done me since its dis- 
 aster, I find myself unable to do more than 
 just in general terms to thank you for this 
 additional instance of your patronage and 
 friendship. As to the faults you detected 
 m 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 ad- 
 duce, it cannot easily be remedied. Your 
 approbation. Sir, has given me such ad- 
 ditional spirits to persevere in this species 
 of poetic composition, that I am already 
 revolving two or three stories in my fan- 
 cy. If I can bring these floating ideas to 
 bear any kind of embodied. form, it will 
 give me an additional opportunity of as- 
 suring you how much I have the honour 
 to be, &-C. 
 
 No. CVII. 
 TO MRS. DUNLOP. 
 
 Ellisland, 1th February, 1791. 
 
 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 wri- 
 tmg, you will allow that it is too good an 
 apology for my seemingly ungrateful si- 
 lence. 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. 
 
 T do not remember if ever I mentioned 
 to you my having an idea of composing an 
 elegy oji the late Miss Burnet of Mon- 
 boddo. I had the honour of being pretty 
 well acquainted with her, and have sel- 
 dom felt so much at the loss of an ac- 
 quaintance, as when I heard that so ami- 
 able and accomplished a piece of God's 
 works 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 asubiectso much 
 
 exhausted, that any new idea on the busi- 
 ness 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 
 will judge from what follows : 
 
 [Herefollowed the Elegy, as given in the 
 Poems, p, 82, with this additional verse .-) 
 
 TJie parent's heart (hat nestled fond in thee, 
 That heart how sunk, a prey to grief and care : 
 
 So deck'd the woodbine sweet yon nged tree, 
 So from it ravish'd, leaves it bleak and bare 
 
 I have proceeded no further. 
 
 Your kind letter, with your kind remem- 
 brante 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 of a 
 long time seen. He is now seventeen 
 months old, has the small-pox and measles 
 over, has cut several teeth, and yet never 
 had a grain of doctor's drugs in his bow- 
 els. 
 
 I am truly happy to hear that the " lit- 
 tle floweret" is blooming so fresh and fair, 
 and that the "mother plant" is rather re- 
 covering her drooping head. Soon and 
 well may her " cruel wounds" be healed I 
 I have written thus far with a good deal 
 of diSiculty. When I get a little abler, 
 you shall hear farther from. 
 
 Madam, yours, &c. 
 
 No. cvni. 
 
 TO LADY W. M. CONSTABLE, 
 
 Acknowledging a present of a valuable 
 Smiff-box, with a fine picture of Mary, 
 Queen of Scots, on the Lid. 
 
 MT LADY, 
 
 Nothing less than the unlucky ac- 
 cident of having lately broken my right 
 arm, could have prevented me, the mo- 
 ment I received your Ladyship's elegant 
 present by Mrs. Miller, from returning 
 you my warmest and most .grateful ac- 
 knowledgments. I assure your Ladyship 
 I shall set it apart ; the symbols of religion 
 shall only be more sacred. In the mo- 
 ment of poetic composition, the box shall 
 be my inspiring genius. When I would 
 breathe the comprehensive wish of bene- 
 
lfi« 
 
 LETTERS, 
 
 volence for the happiness of others, I shall 
 recollect your Ladyship : when I would 
 interest my fancy in the distresses inci- 
 dent to humanity, I shall remember the 
 unfortunate Mary. 
 
 No. CIX. 
 TO MRS. GRAHAM, 
 
 OF FINTRT. 
 MADAM, 
 
 Whether it is that the story of our 
 Mary, Queen of Scots, has a peculiar ef- 
 fect ou 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 past; 
 on that account I enclose it particularly 
 to you. It is true, the purity of my mo- 
 tives may be suspected. I am already 
 
 deeply indebted to Mr. G 's goodness ; 
 
 and what, in the usual ways of men, 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 mu?t be 
 no ordinary cravmg of the latter shall 
 ever make me do any thing injurious to 
 the honest fame of the former. What- 
 ever may be my failings, for failings are a 
 part of human nature, may they ever be 
 those of a generous heart and an inde- 
 pendent mind ! It is no fault of mine that 
 I was born to dependence ; nor is it Mr. 
 G 's chiefest praise that he can com- 
 mand influence ; but it is his merit to be- 
 stow, not only with the kindness of a bro- 
 ther, but with the politeness of a gentle- 
 man ; and I trust it shall be mine to re- 
 ceive with thankfulness, and remember 
 with undiminished gratitude. 
 
 No. ex. 
 PROM THE REV. G. BAIRD. 
 
 London, Qth February, 1791. 
 
 SIR, 
 
 I TROUBLE you With this letter to in- 
 form you that I am in hopes of being able 
 
 very soon to bring to the press, a new 
 edition (long since talked ofj of jyikhael 
 Bruce" s Poems. The profits 6f the edition 
 are to go to his mother — a woman of eigh- 
 ty years of age — poor and helpless. The 
 poems are to be published by subscription; 
 and it may be possible, I think, to make 
 out a 2s. 6d. or 3s. volume, with the as- 
 sistance of a few hitherto unpublishec' 
 verses, which I have got from the mother 
 of the poet. 
 
 But the design I have in view in wri- 
 ting to you, is not merely to inform you 
 of these facts, it is to solicit the aid of your 
 name and pen, in support of the scheme. 
 The reputation of Bruce is already high 
 with every reader of classical taste, and 
 I shall be anxious to guard against tar- 
 nishing his character, by allowing any 
 new poems to appear that may lower it. 
 For this purpose the MSS. I am in pos- 
 session of, have been submitted to the re- 
 vision of some whose critical talents I can 
 trust to, and I mean still to submit them 
 to others. 
 
 May I beg to know, therefore, if you 
 will take the trouble of perusing the MSS. 
 — :of giving your opinion, and suggesting 
 what curtailments, alterations, or amend- 
 ments, occur to you as advisable ? And 
 will you allow us to let it be known, that 
 a few lines by you will be added to the 
 volume '' 
 
 I know the extent of this request. It 
 is bold to make it. But I have this con- 
 solation, that though you see it proper to 
 refuse it, you will not blame me for hav- 
 ing made it ; you will see my apology in 
 the motive. 
 
 May I just add, that Michael Bruce is 
 one in whose company, from his past ap- 
 pearance, you would not, I am convinced, 
 blush to be found ; and as I would submit 
 every line of his that should now be pub- 
 lished, to your own criticisms, you would 
 be assured that nothing derogatory, either 
 to him or you, would be admitted in that 
 appearance he may make in future. 
 
 You have already paid an honourable 
 tribute to kindred genius, in Fergusson ; 
 I fondly hope that the mother of Bruce 
 will experience your patronage. 
 
 T wish to have the subscription-papers 
 circulated by the 14th of March, Brtice's 
 birthday, which T understand some frionds 
 in Scotiand talk Hue year of obssiving — 
 
LETTERS. 
 
 163 
 
 n\ that time it wi]l be resolved, T imagine, • pose of clearing a little the vista of retro- 
 
 to place a plain humble stone, over his 
 grave. This at least T trust you will 
 agree to do — to furnish, in a few couplets, 
 an inscription for it. 
 
 On these points may I solicit an answer 
 as early as possible ? a short delay might 
 disappoint us in procuring that relief to 
 the mother, which is the object of the 
 whole. 
 
 You will be pleased to address for me 
 .under cover to the Duke of Athole, Lon- 
 don. 
 
 P. S. Have you ever seen an engrav- 
 ing published here some time ago, from 
 one of your poems, " O thou pale Orb;" 
 If you have not, I shall have the pleasure 
 of sending it to you. 
 
 No. CXL 
 TO THE REV. G. BAIRD. 
 
 In answer to the foregoing. 
 
 Why did yon, my dear Sir, write to 
 me in such a hesitating style, on the busi- 
 ness 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 mo- 
 ment) 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 sur- 
 mise, or malice to insinuate, that I clubbed 
 a share in the work for mercenary motives. 
 Nor need you give me credit for any re- 
 markable generosity in my part of the 
 business. I have such a host of pecca- 
 dilloes, failings, follies, and backslidings 
 (any body but myself might perhaps give 
 some of them a worse appellation,) that 
 by way of some balance, however trifling, 
 m the account, I am fain to do any good 
 that occurs in my very limited power to a 
 fellow-creature, just for the selfish pur- 
 Z 
 
 spection. 
 
 No. cxn. 
 
 TO DR. MOORE. 
 
 Ellisland, 28th February, 1791. 
 
 I DO not know, Sir, whether you are 
 a subscriber to Grose's Antiquities of Scot- 
 land. If you are, the enclosed poem will 
 not be altogether new to you. Captaiii 
 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 
 vou have been pleased to commend and 
 patronize, are still employed in the way 
 you wit^h. 
 
 The Elerif on Captain Henderson is a 
 tribute to the memory of a man I loved 
 much. Poets have in this the same ad- 
 vantage as Roman Catholics ; they can 
 be of service to their friends after they 
 have past that bourn where all other kind- 
 ness ceases to be of any avail. Whe- 
 ther, 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 receiv- 
 ed and enjoyed by his creatures with 
 thankful delight. As almost all my re- 
 ligious tenets originate from my heart, I 
 am wonderfully pleased with the idea, 
 that I can still keep up a tender inter- 
 course with the dearly beloved friend, or 
 still more dearly beloved mistress, who is 
 gone to the world of spirits. 
 
 The ballad on Queen Mary was begun 
 while I was busy with Percy's lieliques 
 of English Poetry. By the way, how 
 much is every honest heart, which has a 
 tincture of Caledonian prejudice, obliged 
 to you for your glorious story of Bucha- 
 nan aril Targe! Twas an unequivocal 
 
164 
 
 LETTERS. 
 
 proof of your loyal gallantry of soul, giv- 
 ing Targe the victory. I should have been 
 mortified to the ground if you had not. 
 
 I have just read over, once more of 
 many times, your Zeluco. 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 tlie 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. Richard- 
 son indeed might perhaps be excepted ; 
 but unhappily, his dramatis personce are 
 beings of some other world ; and however 
 they may captivate the inexperienced ro- 
 mantic fancy of a boy or girl, they will 
 ever, in proportion as we have made hu- 
 man nature our study, dissatisfy our riper 
 minds. 
 
 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 ?apervisor I am not yet employed as 
 such, but in a few years I shall fall into 
 the file of supcrvisor:?hip by seniority. I 
 have had an immense loss in the death of 
 the Earl of Glencairn, the patron from 
 whom all my fame and good fortune took 
 its rise. Independent of my grateful at- 
 tachment to him, which was indeed so 
 strong that it pervaded my very soul, and 
 was entwined with the thread of my ex- 
 istence ; 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 busi- 
 ness than otherwise it will be. Thougli 
 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 wliich have been treasured up by 
 our Scottish ancestors, this is one of the 
 best, BrfUr he the head o" the commonalty 
 as t!ie tail o' the gentry. 
 
 But I am got on a subject, which, how- 
 ever 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 yours, &c. 
 
 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 The Roaehud. See 
 Poems, p. 71. 
 
 No. CXIII. 
 FROM DR. MOORE. 
 
 London, 29th March, 1791. 
 
 DEAR SIR, 
 
 Your letter of the 28th of February 
 I received only two days ago, and this 
 day I had the pleasure of waiting on the 
 Rev. Mr. Baird, at the Duke of Athole's, 
 who had been so obliging as to transmit 
 it to me, with the printed verses on Alloa 
 Church, the Elegy on Captain Henderson, 
 and the Epitaph. There are many poeti- 
 cal beauties in the former; what I par- 
 ticularly admire, are the three striking 
 similes from — 
 
 " Or like the snow-falls in the river," 
 
 and the eight lines which begm with 
 
 " By this time he wag cross the ford,' 
 
 SO exquisitely expressive of the supersti 
 tious impressions of the country. And 
 the twenty-two lines from 
 
 " Coffins stood round like open presses,"' 
 
 which, in my opinion, are equal to the in- 
 gredients of Shakspeare's cauldron in 
 Macbeth. 
 
 As for the Elegy, the chief merit of it 
 consists in the very graphical description 
 of the objects belonging to the country in 
 which the poet writes, and which none 
 but a Scottish poet could have described, 
 and none but a real poet, and a close ob- 
 server of Nature could have so descrbed. 
 
LETTERS. 
 
 There is something original, and to me 
 wonderfully pleasing in the Epitaph. 
 
 I remember you once hinted before, 
 what you repeat in your last, that you 
 had made some remarks on Zeluco on the 
 margin. I should be very glad to see 
 them, and regret you did not send them 
 before the last edition, which is just pub- 
 lished. Pray transcribe them for me ; I 
 sincerely value your opinion very highly, 
 and pray do not suppress one of those in 
 which you censure the sentiment or expres- 
 sion. Trust me it will break no squares 
 between us — I am not akin to the bishop 
 of Grenada. 
 
 I must now mention what has been on 
 my mind for some time : I cannot help 
 thinking you imprudent, in scattering 
 abroad so many copies of your verses. It 
 is most natural to give a few to confiden- 
 tial friends, particularly to those who are 
 connected with the subject, or who are 
 perhaps themselves the subject; but this 
 ought to be done under promise not to 
 give other copies. Of the poem you sent 
 me on Queen Mary, I refused every so- 
 licitation for copies, but I lately saw it in 
 a newspaper. My motive for cautioning 
 you on this subject, is, that I wish to en- 
 gage you to collect all your fugitive pieces, 
 not already printed ; and, after they have 
 been re-considered, and polished to the 
 utmost of your power, I would have you 
 publish them by another subscription : in 
 promoting of which I will exert myself 
 with pleasure. 
 
 In your future compositions I wish you 
 would use the modern English. You have 
 shown your powers in Scottish sufficient- 
 ly. Although in certain subjects it gives 
 additional zest to the humour, yet it is 
 lost to the English ; and why should you 
 write only for a part of the island, when 
 you can command the admiration of the 
 whole ! 
 
 If you chance to write to my friend 
 Mrs. Dunlop of Dunlop, I beg to be affec- 
 tionately remembered to her. She must 
 not judge of the warmth of my sentiments 
 respecting her by the number of my let- 
 ters ; I hardly ever write a line but on 
 business ; and I do not know that T should 
 have scribbled all this to you, but for the 
 business part, that is, to instigate you to 
 a new publication ; and to tell you, that 
 when you have a sufficient number to 
 make a volume, you should set your 
 
 friends on getting subscriptions. I wish 
 I could have a few hours' conversation 
 with you — I have many things to say 
 which I cannot write. If ever I go to 
 Scotland, I will let you know, that you 
 may meet me at your own house, or my 
 friend Mrs. Hamilton, or both. 
 
 Adieu, my dear Sir, &.0 
 
 No. CXIV. 
 TO THE REV. ARCH. ALISON. 
 
 Ellidand, near Dumfries, lith Feb. 1791. 
 
 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 ac- 
 knowledged the receipt of it. The fact 
 is, you yourself are to blame for it. Flat- 
 tered 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 sing 
 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 stric- 
 tures, 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 clangor of a trumpet had some- 
 thing 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 in- 
 finitely more beautiful and elegant than 
 the upright stub of a burdock ; and that 
 from something innate and independent 
 of all association 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 unra- 
 vel by my father's fire-side, in the winter 
 evenings of the first season I held the 
 plough, I never read a book which gav.e 
 me such a quantum of information, and 
 added so much to my stock of ideas, as 
 your " Exsays on the Principlrs of Taste." 
 One thing, Sir, you must forgive my men- 
 
ICC 
 
 tioning 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. 
 
 I enclose you some poetic bagatelles of 
 my late composition. The one in print is 
 my first essay in the way of telling a tale. 
 I am, Sir, &c. 
 
 No. CXV. 
 
 Extract of a Letter 
 
 TO MR. CUNNINGHAM. 
 
 I2th March, 1791. 
 
 If the foregoing piece be worth your 
 strictures, let mfe have them. For my own> 
 part, a thing that I have just composed al- 
 ways 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 unfre- 
 quently dissipates and fumes away like 
 other intoxication, and leaves the poor 
 patient, as usual, with an aching heart. 
 A striking instance of this might be ad- 
 duced in the revolution of many a hyme- 
 neal honey-moon. 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 ive 
 you another song of my late composition, 
 which will appear, perhaps, in Johnson's 
 work, as well as the former. 
 
 You must know a beautiful Jacobite air, 
 There'll never be peace till Jamie comes 
 hame. When political combustion ceases 
 to be the object of princes and patriots, it 
 then, you know becomes the lawful prey 
 of historians and poets.* 
 
 If you like the air, and if the stanzas 
 hit your fancy, you cannot imagine, my 
 dear friend, how much you would oblisre 
 me, if, by the charms of your delightful 
 voice, you would give my honest effusion 
 to " the memory of joys that are past !" 
 
 * Here followed a eopy of the Song printed in p. 83 
 of UiK Poems, " By yon castle wa'," Sec. 
 
 I.KTTERS. 
 
 to the few friends whom you indulge in 
 that pleasure. But I have scribbled on 
 'till I hear the clock has intimated ths 
 near approach of 
 
 " That hour, o' night's black arch the key-stane." 
 
 So, good night to you! sound be your 
 sleep, and delectable your dreams ! A-pro- 
 pos, how do you like this thought in a bal- 
 lad I have just now on the tapis ? 
 
 I look to the west when I gae to rest, 
 That happy my dreams and my slumbers may be j 
 
 For far in the west is he I lo'e best, 
 The lad that is dear to my babie and me ! 
 
 Good night, once more, and God bless 
 you: 
 
 No. CXVI. 
 
 TO MRS. DUNLOP. 
 
 Ellisland, Uth April, 1791. 
 
 I AM once more able, my honoured 
 friend, to return you, with ray 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 timq of life. Indeed I look on your 
 littl namesake to be my chef d'ceuvre in 
 th t species of manufacture, as I look on 
 Tarn o' Shunter to be my standard perform- 
 ance in the poetical line. 'Tis 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 
 excellin'g. 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 hay and heather. 
 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 be- 
 witching charm in the famous cestus of 
 
LETTERS. 
 
 ISI 
 
 Venus. It is, indeed, such an inestima- 
 ble 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 cheap- 
 ly purchased at the expense of every other 
 earthly good ! But as this angelic crea- 
 ture is, I am afraid, extremely rare in any 
 station and rank of life, and totally denied 
 to such an 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 produfce as any rank of 
 life whatever ; rustic, native grace ; un- 
 affected 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 glow- 
 ing 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. 
 
 This is the greatest effort my broken 
 arm has yet made. Do let me hear, by 
 first post, how cher petit Monsieur comes 
 on with his small-pox. May Almighty 
 goodness preserve and restore him ! 
 
 No. CXVII. 
 TO 
 
 DEAR SIR, 
 
 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 support- 
 ers shall be two sloths, my crest a slow- 
 worm, and the motto, " Deil tak the fore- 
 most!" So much by way of apology for 
 not thanking you sooner for your kind 
 execution of my commission. 
 
 I would have sent you the poem : but 
 Bomehow or other it found its way into 
 
 the public papers, where you must have 
 
 seen it. 
 
 am ever, dear Sir, yours Bincerely, 
 ROBERT BURNS. 
 
 No. CXVIII. 
 TO MR. CUNNINGHAM. 
 
 WthJune, 1791. 
 
 Let me interest you, my dear Cun- 
 ningham, in behalf of the gentleman who 
 waits on you with this. He is a Mr. 
 Clarke, of MoflTat, principal school-mas- 
 ter I here, and is at present suffering se- 
 verely under the ****** of one or two 
 povvcrful individuals of his employers. 
 He is accused of harshness to * * * * that 
 were placed under his care. God help 
 the teacher, if a man of sensibility and 
 genius, and such as 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 
 skuil 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 block- 
 head in the book of fate, at the Almighty 
 fiat of his Creator. 
 
 The patrons of Moffat school are tne 
 ministers, magistrates, arud town-council 
 of Edinburgh; and as the business cornea 
 now before them, let me beg my dearest 
 friend to do every thing in his power to 
 serve the interests of a man of genius and 
 worth, and a man whom I particularly re- 
 spect 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 re- 
 lated, 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 ne- 
 phew's influence, that Mr. Clarke is a 
 gentleman who will not disgrace even his 
 patronage. I know the merits of the 
 
 * Dr. RobertBon waa ancle to Mr. Cwnntnghem. B, 
 
LETTERS. 
 
 cause thoroughly, and say it, that my 
 friend is falling a sacrifice to prejudiced 
 ignorance, and ******. God help the 
 children of dependence ! Hated and per- 
 secuted by their enemies, and too often, 
 alas I almost unexceptionably, received 
 by their friends with disrespect and re- 
 proach, 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 civi- 
 lized life ; helplessly to tremble for a sub- 
 sistence, precarious as the caprice of a 
 fellow-creature ! Every man has his vir- 
 tues, 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 apportionmg them 
 their share in procuring my present dis- 
 tress. 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 in- 
 genuous 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 consequences of those 
 errars ! I do not want to be independent 
 that I may sin, but I want to be indepen- 
 dent in my sinning 
 
 To return, in this rambling letter, to 
 the subject I set out with, let me recom- 
 mend my friend, Mr. Clarke, to your ac- 
 quaintance and good offices ; his worth 
 entitles him to the one, and his gratitude 
 will merit the other. I long much to hear 
 from you — Adieu ! 
 
 No. CXIX. 
 FROM THE EARL OF BUCHAN. 
 
 Dryburgh Abbey, \lth June, 1791. 
 
 Lord BncHAN has the pleasure to in- 
 vite Mr. Burns to make one at the coro- 
 nation of the bust of Thomson, on Ed- 
 man Hill, on the ''"Zd of September; for 
 which day, perhaps, his muse mav 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 ot 
 Thomson's pure parent stream, catch in- 
 spiration on the devious walk, till he finds 
 Lord Buchan sitting on the ruins of Dry- 
 burgh. There the commendator will give 
 him a hearty welcome, and try to light 
 his lamp at the pure flame of native ge- 
 nius upon the altar of Caledonian virtue. 
 This poetical perambulation of the Tweed, 
 is a tlrcught of the late Sir Gilbert Elliot's 
 and of Lord Minto's, followed out by his 
 accomplished grandson, the present Sir 
 Gilbert, who having been with Lord Bu- 
 chan lately, the project was renewed, and 
 will, they hope, be executed in the man 
 ner proposed. 
 
 No. CXX. 
 
 TO THE EARL OF BUCHAN. 
 
 Language sinks under the ardour of 
 my feelings when I would thank your 
 Lordship for the honour you have done 
 mo in inviting me to make one at the co 
 ronation of the bust of Thomson. In my 
 first enthusiasm in reading the card you 
 did me the honour to write to me, I over- 
 looked 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 
 mirldic of my harvest is what I much doubt 
 I dare not venture on 
 
 Your Lordship hints at an ode for the 
 occasion : but who could write after Col- 
 lins ? I read over his verses to the me- 
 mory 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 
 T 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. 
 
LETTERS. 
 
 169 
 
 No. CXXI. 
 FROM THE SAME. 
 
 Dryburgh Abbey, \6th September, 1791- 
 
 YouR address to the shade of Thom- 
 son has been well received by the public; 
 and though I should disapprove of your 
 allowing Pegasus to ride with you off the 
 field of your honourable and usefi:! pro- 
 fession, yet I cannot resist an impulse 
 which I feel at this moment to suggest to 
 your Muse, Harvest Home, as an excel- 
 lent subject for her grateful song, in which 
 the pecuHar aspect and manners of our 
 country might furnish an excellent por- 
 trait and landscape of Scotland, for the 
 employment of happy moments of leisure 
 and recess from your more important oc- 
 cupations. 
 
 Your Halloween, and Saturday JVight, 
 will remain to distant posterity as inter- 
 esting pictures of rural imiocence and hap- 
 piness in your native country, and were 
 happily written in the dialect of the peo- 
 ple ; but Harvest Home, being suited to 
 descriptive poetry, except, where collo- 
 quial, may escape the disguise of a dia- 
 lect which admits of no elegance or dig- 
 nity of expression. Without the assist- 
 ance of any god or goddess, and without 
 the invocation of any foreign Muse, you 
 may convey in epistolary form the de- 
 scription of a scene so gladdening and 
 picturesque, with all the concomitant lo- 
 cal position, landscape and costume ; con- 
 trasting the peace, improvement, and hap- 
 piness of the borders of the once hostile 
 nations of Britain, with their former op- 
 pression and misery ; and showing, in 
 lively and beautiful colours, the beauties 
 and joys of a rural life. And as the un- 
 vitiated heart is naturally disposed to 
 overflow with gratitude in the moment of 
 prosperity, such a subject would furnish 
 you with an amiable opportunity of per- 
 petuating the names of Glencairn, Miller, 
 and your other eminent benefactors ; 
 which, from what I know of your spirit, 
 and have seen of your poems and letters, 
 will not deviate from the chastity of praise 
 that is so uniformly united to true taste 
 and genius, 
 
 I am Sir, &c. 
 
 No. CXXII. 
 TO LADY E. CUNNINGHAM. 
 
 Mr LADT, 
 
 I WOULD, as usual, have availed my- 
 self of the privilege your goodness has al- 
 lowed me, of sending you any thing 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 deter- 
 mined 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 Lady- 
 ship's feet. As all the world knows my 
 obligations to the Earl of Glencairn, I 
 would wish to show as openly that my 
 heart glows, and shall ever glow with the 
 most grateful sense and remembrance of 
 his Lordship's goodness. The sables I 
 did myself the honour to wear to his Lord- 
 ship's memory, were not the " mockery of 
 wo. " 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 ! 
 
 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.* 
 
 No. cxxin. 
 
 TO MR. AINSLIE. 
 
 MY DEAR AINSLIE, 
 
 Can you minister to a mind diseased ? 
 Can you, amid the horrors of penitence, 
 regret, remorse, headache, 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 ? 
 
 • The poem enclosed (s pubHshed,— Sec "The La 
 nient for Jaiias Earl of Gipiicalrn." Posmif, p. (K 
 
170 
 
 LETTERS. 
 
 Miserable perdu that I am ! I have tried 
 every thing 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 check of 
 the clock as it slowly— slowly, numbers 
 over these lazy scoundrels of hours, who 
 
 d d them, are ranked up before me, 
 
 every one at his neighbour's backside, and 
 every one with a burden 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 fel- 
 low. — When I tell you even * * * has 
 lost its power to please, you will guess 
 something of my hell within, and all 
 around me. — I began EUbankn and Eli- 
 braes, 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 plea- 
 surable existence. — Well — I begin to 
 breathe a little, since I began to write 
 you. How are you ? and w^hat are you 
 doing ? How goes Law ? A propos, 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 by to act as one : but at present I 
 am a simple ganger, though t'other day 
 I got an appointment to an excise division 
 of £25 per ann. better than the rest. 
 IMy present income, down money, is £70 
 per ann. 
 
 I have one or two good fellows here 
 whom you would be glad to know. 
 
 No. CXXIV. 
 FROM SIR JOHN WHITEFOORD. 
 
 mar Mayboh,16th October, 1791. 
 
 Accept of my thanks for your favour, 
 with the Lament on the death of my much- 
 esteemed friend, and your worthy patron, 
 the perusal of which pleased and affected 
 
 me much. The lines addressed to me 
 are very flattering. 
 
 I have always thought it most natural 
 to suppose (and a strong argument in fa- 
 vour of a future existence) that when we 
 see an honourable and virtuous man la- 
 bouring under bodily infirmities, and op- 
 pressed by the frowns of fortune in this 
 world, that there was a happier state be- 
 yond the grave ; where that worth and 
 honour, which were neglected here, would 
 meet with their just reward ; and where 
 temporal misfortunes would receive an 
 eternal recompense. Let us cherish this 
 hope for our departed friend, and mode- 
 rate our grief for that loss we have sus- 
 tained, kriowing that he cannot return to 
 us, but we may go to him. 
 
 Remember me to your wife ; and with 
 every good -wish for the prosperity of 
 you and your family, believe me at all 
 times, 
 
 Your most sincere friend, 
 
 JOHN WHITEFOORD. 
 
 No. CXXV. 
 
 FROM A. F. TYTLER, ESQ. 
 Edinburgh, 21th J^ovember, 1791. 
 
 DBAR SIR, 
 
 You have much reason to blame me 
 for neglecting till ncyw to acknowledge 
 the receipt of a most agreeable packet, 
 containing The Whistle, a ballad : and 
 The Lament^ which reached me about 
 six weeks ago in London, from w^hence I 
 am just retlirned. Your letter was for- 
 warded to me there from Edinburgh, 
 where, as I observed by the date, it had 
 lain for some days. This was an addi- 
 tional reason for me to have answered it 
 immediately on receiving it ; but the truth 
 was, the bustle of business, engagements, 
 and confusion of one kind or another, in 
 which I found myself immersed all the 
 time I was in London, absolutely put it 
 out of my power. But to have done with 
 apologies, let me now endeavour to prove 
 myself in some degree deserving of the 
 very flattering compliment you pay me, 
 by giving you at least a frank and candid, 
 if it should not be a judicious, criticism on 
 the poems vou sent me. 
 
LETTERS. 
 
 I't 
 
 The ballad of The Whistle is, in my 
 opinion truly excellent. The old tradi- 
 tion vvliicii you have taken up is the best 
 adapted tor a Bacchanalian composition 
 of any I ever met with, and you have done 
 it full justice. In the tirst place, the 
 strokes of wit arise naturally from the 
 subject, and are uncommonly happy. For 
 example, 
 
 •' The bands gre-.v Ihe tighter the more they were wet, 
 " Cynthia hinted he'd find them next morn." 
 " Tho' Fate said — a hero should perish in hght ; 
 So up rose bright Phoebus,— and down fell the knight." 
 
 In the next place, you are singularly hap- 
 py in the discrimination of your heroes, 
 and in giving each the sentiments and lan- 
 guage suitable to his character. And, 
 lastly, you have much merit in the deli- 
 cacy of the panegyric which you have 
 contrived to throw on each of the dt^a- 
 inatis personcB, perfectly appropriate to his 
 character. The compliment to Sir Ro- 
 bert, tfie blunt soldier, is peculiarly fine. 
 In short, this composition, in my opinion, 
 does you great honour, and I see not a 
 line or word in it which I could wish to 
 be altered. 
 
 As to the Lament, I suspect from some 
 expressions in your letter to me that you 
 are more doifbtful with respect to the 
 merits of this piece than of the other ; 
 and I own I think you have reason ; for 
 although it contains some beautiful stan- 
 zas, as the first, " The wind blew hollow," 
 &.C. ; the fifth, " Yescatter'd birds;" the 
 thirteenth, " Awake thy last sad voice," 
 &,c. ; yet it appears to ms faulty as a 
 whole, and inferior to several of those 
 you have already published in th'e same 
 strain. My principal objection lies against 
 the plan of the piece. I think it was un- 
 necessary and improper to put the lamen- 
 tation in the mouth of a fictitious charac- 
 ter, an aged bard. — It had been much bet- 
 ter to have lamented your patron in your 
 own person, to have expressed yonr ge- 
 nuine feekngs for the loss, and to have 
 spoken the language of nature, rather 
 than that of fiction, on the subject. Com- 
 pare this with your poem of the same title 
 in your printed volume, which begins, O 
 thou pale Orb ; and observe what it is that 
 forms the charm of that composition. It 
 is that it speaks the language o^ truth and 
 o? nature. The change is, in my opinion 
 injudicious too in this respect, that an 
 aged bard has much less need nf a natron 
 and a orotector than a -■loung one. I have 
 Z 2 
 
 thus given you, with much freedom, my 
 opinion of both the pieces. I should 
 have made a very ill return to the com- 
 pliment you paid me, if I had given you 
 any other than my genuine sentiments. 
 
 It will give me great pleasure to hear 
 from you when you find leisure ; and I 
 beg you will believe me ever, dear Sir, 
 yours, &LC. 
 
 No. CXXVI. 
 
 TO MISS DAVIES. 
 
 I It is impossible, IMadam, that the gene- 
 rous warmth and angelic purity of your 
 youthful mind can have any idea of that 
 moral disease under which I unhappily 
 nlust rank as the chief of sinners ; I mean 
 a turpitude 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 tor- 
 por 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 com- 
 mands. Indeed I had one apology — the 
 bagatelle was not worth presenting. 
 Besides, so strongly am I interested in 
 Miss D 's fate and welfare in the se- 
 rious 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 imper- 
 tinent jest to a dying friend. 
 
 Gracious Heaven ! why this disparity 
 between our wishes and our powers.' 
 Why is the most generous wish to make^ 
 others blessed, iyipotent and ineffectual — 
 as the idle breeze that crosses the path- 
 less desert .' In my walks of life I haf e 
 met with a few people to whom how glad- 
 ly would I have said — '' Go be happy !'' 
 I know that your hearts have been wound- 
 ed by the scorn of the proud, whom ac- 
 cident has placed above you — or worse 
 still, in whose hands are, perhaps, placed 
 manv of the comforts of your life. But 
 there ! ascend that rock, Independence, 
 and look justly down on their littlimess of 
 soul. Make the worthless tremble under 
 vour indignation, and the foolish sink be- 
 fore your contempt ; and largely impart 
 that happiness to others which I am ccr- 
 
172 
 
 LETTERS. 
 
 tain, will give yourselves so much plea- 
 sure to bestow." 
 
 Why, dear Madam, must I wake from 
 this delightful reverie, and find it all a 
 dream ? Why, amid my generous enthu- 
 Biasm, must I find myself poor and power- 
 less, 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 adminis- 
 tered 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 misbe- 
 gotten chance has perked them up, and 
 through life should they skulk, ever haunt- 
 ed 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. 
 
 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. 
 
 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 
 fhe rude, capricious distinctions of for- 
 tune. 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 ori- 
 ginal comuonent feature of my mind. 
 
 No. CXXVII. 
 TO MRS. DUNLOP. 
 
 Ellisland, 11 th December, 1791. 
 
 "If ANY thanks to you, Madam, for yo!ir 
 good news respecting the little floweret 
 and the mother-plant. I hope my poetic 
 prayers have been heard, and will be an- 
 swered up to thfi warmest sincerity of 
 
 their fullest extent ; and then Mrs. Henri 
 wiU find her little darling the representa- 
 tive of his late parent, in every thing but 
 his abridged existence. 
 
 I have just finished the following song, 
 which, to a lady the descendant of Wal- 
 lace, and many heroes of his truly illustri- 
 ous line, and herself the mother of seve- 
 ral soldiers, needs neither preface nor 
 apology. 
 
 Scene — A Field of Battle — Time' of the 
 Day, Evening — the wounded and dying 
 of the victorious Army are fupposed to 
 join in the following 
 
 SONG OF DEATH 
 
 Farewell thou fair day, thou green earth, and ye skies 
 
 Now gay with the broad setting sun ! 
 Farewell loves and friendships ; ye dear, tender tie», 
 
 Our race of existence is run ! 
 
 Thou grim king of terrors, thou life's gloomy foe, 
 
 Go frighten the coward and slave ; 
 Go, teach them to tremble, fell tyratit ! but know, 
 
 No terrors hast thou to the brave ! 
 
 Thou strik'st the poor peasant— he sinki In the dark, 
 
 Nor saves e'en the wreck of a name ; 
 Thou strik'st the young hero— a glorious mark, 
 
 He falls in the blaze of bis fame ! 
 
 In the field of proud honour — our awords in our hands, 
 
 Our king and our country to save — 
 While victory shines on life's last ebbii^ sands — 
 
 O, who would not die with the braTC ?* 
 
 The circumstance that gave rise to the 
 foregoing verses, was looking over, with 
 a musical friend, M'Donald's collection o» 
 Highland airs, I was struck with one, an 
 Isle of Skye tune, entitled Oran an Aoig, 
 or, The Song of Death, to the measure of 
 which I have adapted my stanzas. I havte 
 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 peep- 
 ing forth at dewy dawn, I shall find an 
 hour to transcribe for you. A Dieu je 
 vous commende ! 
 
 * This is alittle altered from the one given In p. 83. 
 of the Foemji. 
 
LETTERS. 
 
 No. CXXVIII. 
 
 TO MRS. DUNLOP. 
 
 SthJamianj, 1792. 
 You see my hurried life, Madam : I 
 can only command starts of time : how- 
 ever, 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. 
 
 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 cnarities and all the 
 virtues, between one class of human be- 
 ings and another ! For instance, the ami- 
 able circle I so lately mixed with in the 
 
 hospitable hall of D , their generous 
 
 hearts — their uncontaminated, dignified 
 minds — their informed and polished un- 
 derstandings — what a contrast, when com- 
 pared — if such comparing were not down- 
 right sacrilege — with the soul of the mis- 
 creant who can deliberately plot the de- 
 struction of an honest man that never 
 offended him, and with a grin of satisfac- 
 tion see the unfortunate being, his faith- 
 ful wife and prattling innocents, turned 
 over to beggary and ruin ! 
 
 Your cup, my dear Madam, arrived safe. 
 I had two worthy fellows dining with me 
 the other day, when I with great formali- 
 ty, produced my whigmeleerie cup, and 
 told them that it had been a family-piece 
 among the descendants of Sir William 
 Wallace. This roused such an enthusi- 
 asm, that they insisted on bumpering the 
 punch round in it ; and, by and by, never 
 did your great ancestor lay a Suthron more 
 completely to rest, than for a time did 
 your cup my two friends. A-propos ! 
 this is the season of wishing. May God 
 bless you, my dear friend I and bless me, 
 the humblest and sincerest of your friends, 
 by granting you yet many returns of the 
 
 173 
 
 May all good things attend you 
 and yours wherever they are scattered 
 over the earth ! 
 
 No. CXXIX. 
 TO MR. WILLIAM SMELLIE, 
 
 PRINTER. 
 
 Dumfries, 22d January, 1792. 
 
 I SIT down, my dear Sir, to introduce 
 a young lady to you, and a lady in the 
 first rank 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, as an idiot painter that seems in- 
 dustrious to place staring fools and un- 
 principled knaves in the foreground of his 
 picture, while men of sense and honesty 
 are too often thrown in the dimmest 
 shades. Mrs. Riddle, 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 acquain- 
 tance. The lady too is a votary of thr 
 muses; and as I think myself somewhat ot 
 a judge in my own trade, I assure you that 
 her verses, always correct, and often ele- 
 gant, are much beyond the common r'ln 
 of the lady poetesses of the day. She i.- a 
 great admirer of your book : and, hearino 
 me say that I was acqrainted with you, 
 she begged to be know ito you, as she is 
 just going to pay her first visit to our Ca- 
 ledonian 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 indulg- 
 ing in it : and a failing that you will as 
 easily pardon, as it is a sin which very 
 much besets yourself; — where she dis- 
 likes or despises, she is apt to mako no 
 more a secret of it, than where sne es- 
 teems and respects. 
 
174 
 
 LETTERS. 
 
 I will not present you with the unmean- 
 ing compliments of the season, but I will 
 Bend 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 ! 
 
 No. CXXX. 
 
 TO MR. W. NICOL. 
 
 20th Fehruar^j, 1792. 
 
 O THOU, wisest among the wise, me- 
 ridian blaze of prudence, full moon of dis- 
 cretion, and chief of many counsellors ! 
 How infinitely is thy puddled-headed, rat- 
 tle-headed, wrong-headed, round-headed 
 slave indebted to thy supereminent good- 
 ness, 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 mys- 
 teries 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 mag- 
 net among the sages, the wise and witty 
 Willie Nicol 1 Amen ! Amen I Yea, so 
 be it I 
 
 For me ! I am a bea^t, a reptile, and 
 know nothing I From the cave of my ig- 
 norance, amid the fogs of my dulness, 
 and pestilential fumes of my political he- 
 resies, I look up to tliee, as doth a toad 
 through the iron-barred lucerne of a pes- 
 tiferous 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 god- 
 ly, 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. 
 
 Thou mirror of purity, when shall the 
 elfine lamp of my gUmerous understand 
 ing, 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 plea- 
 sures of darkness, pollute the sacred 
 flame of thy sky-descended and heaven- 
 bound desires : never did the vapours ot 
 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.* 
 
 No. CXXXI. 
 TO MR. CUNNINGHAM. 
 
 3c; March, 1792. 
 
 Since I wrote you the last lugubrioug 
 sheet, I have not had time to write you 
 farther. When I say that I had not time, 
 that, as usual, means, that the three de- 
 mons, 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. 
 
 Thank heaven, I feel my spirits buoy- 
 ing upwards with the renovating year. 
 Now I shall in good earnest take up 
 Thomson's songs. I dare say he thinks 1 
 have used him unkindly, and I must own 
 with too much appearance of truth. A- 
 propos .' Do you know the much admired 
 old Highland air, called The Sutor's Doch- 
 ter ? It is a first-rate favourite of mine, 
 
 * This strain of irony was excited by a letter of Mr. 
 Nicol, containing good advice 
 
LETTERS. 
 
 m 
 
 and I have written what I reckon one of 
 my best songs lu it. I will send it to you 
 as it was sung with great applause in some 
 fashionable circles by Major Robertson of 
 Lude, who was here with his corps. 
 
 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. 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 ? 
 T do not know that my name is matricu- 
 lated, 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. T am 
 a bit of a herald, and shall give you, se- 
 cundum nrtcm, my arms. On a field, azure, 
 a holy 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 mot- 
 toes : round the top of the crest. Wood 
 notes wild ; at the bottom of the shield, in 
 the usual place. Better a wee bush than nae 
 hi eld. By the shepherd's pipe and crook 
 I do not mean the nonsense of painters of 
 Arcadia, but a Stock and Horn, and a 
 ('lull, such as yon see at the head of Al- 
 lan Ramsay, in Allan's quarto edition of 
 the Gentle Shepherd. By the by, 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 ? T once, and but once, 
 got a glance of that noble edition of that 
 noblest pastoral in the world ; and dear as 
 it was, I mean, dear as to my pocket, I 
 would have bought it ; but I was told that 
 it was printed and engraved for subscri- 
 bers only. He is the only artist who has 
 hit genuine pastoral costume. What, my 
 dear Cunningham, is there in riches, tliat 
 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 
 ccmclude that wealth imparts a bird-lime 
 
 quality to the possessor, at which the 
 man, in his native poverty would have re- 
 volted. What has led me to this, is the 
 idea of such merit as Mr. Allan possesses, 
 and such riches as a nabob or government 
 contractor possesses, and why they do not 
 form a mutual league. Let wealth shfew 
 ter and cherish unprotected merit, and 
 the gratitude and celebrity of that merit 
 will richly repay it. 
 
 No. CXXXIL 
 TO MRS. DUNLOP. 
 
 Annan Water Foot, 22d Aug. 1792. 
 
 Do not blame me for it Madam — my 
 own conscience, hackneyed and weather- 
 beaten as it is, in watcJaing and reproving 
 my vagaries, follies, indolence, &c. has 
 continued to blame and punish me suffi- 
 ciently. 
 
 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, 
 pleasurable 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-k)ved friend and her wide-scattered 
 connexions, and to beg of them to be as 
 kind to you and yours as they possibly 
 can ? 
 
 A-propos ! (though how it is a-propos, 
 I have not leisure to explain) Do you 
 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 intermingledoms of the good 
 and the bad, the pure and the impure, 
 in this world, bning 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 
 
178 
 
 LETTERS. 
 
 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, vi^ere the emotion 
 of my soul on meeting the other day with 
 
 Miss L — B — , your neighbour, at M . 
 
 Mr. B. with his two daughters accompa- 
 nied 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 post- 
 age. You must know that there is an old 
 ballad beginning with — 
 
 " My bonnie Lizie Bailie, 
 I'll rowe thee in roy plaidie" 
 
 So I parodied it as follows, which is lite- 
 rally t' - ^--' " ■-- ' 
 
 neal'd 
 
 bo 1 parodied it as lollows, which 
 
 rally the first copy, " unanointed, unan- 
 
 as Hamlet 
 
 says 
 
 " O saw ye bonnie Lesley," &c. 
 
 So much for ballads. I regret that you 
 are gone to the cast country, as I am to 
 be in Ayrshire in about a fortnight. This 
 world of ours, notwithstanding it has ma- 
 ny 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 excep- 
 tion, always so placed as never to meet 
 but once or twice a-year, which, consider- 
 ing 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 !" 
 
 " Tell us ye dead, 
 Will none of you in pity disclose the secret 
 Wliat 'lis you are, and we must shoitly be 7" 
 
 A thousand times have I made this apos- 
 trophe to the departed sons of men, but 
 not one of them has ever thought fit to 
 
 answer the question. " O that some conr- 
 teous ghost would blab it out !" but it can- 
 not be ; you and I, my friend, must make 
 the experiment by ourselves, and for our- 
 selves. However, I am so convinced that 
 an unshaken faith in the doctrines of re 
 ligion is not only necessary, by making 
 us better men, but also by making us hap- 
 pier men, that I shall take every care that 
 your little godson, and every little crea- 
 ture that shall call me father, shall be 
 taught them. 
 
 So ends this heterogeneous letter, writ- 
 ten at this wild place of the world, in the 
 intervals of my labour of discharging a 
 vessel of rum from Antigua. 
 
 No. cxxxni. 
 
 TO MR. CUNNINGHAM. 
 
 Dumfries, 10th September, 1792. 
 
 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 dif- 
 ferent publications, still, still I might have 
 stolen five minutes to dedicate to one of 
 the first of my friends and fellow-crea- 
 tures. I might have done, as I do at 
 presoht, snatched an hour near " witch- 
 ing 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 is 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. 
 
 But what shall I write to you f " The 
 voice said. Cry ! and I said. What shall I 
 cry ?" — O, thou spirit ! whatever thou art, 
 or wherever thou inakest thyself visible ! 
 be thou a bogle by the eerie side of an anld 
 thorn, in the dreary glen through which 
 the herd callan maun bicker in his gloa 
 
LETTERS. 
 
 177 
 
 min route frae the faulde! Be thou a 
 brownie, set, at dead of night, to thy task 
 by the blazing ingle, or in tlie solitary 
 barn, where the repercussions of thy iron 
 flail half affright thyself as thou perform- 
 est 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 founder- 
 ing horse, or in the tumbling boat ! — Or, 
 lastly, be thou a ghost, paying thy noc- 
 turnal 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, portraying 
 on his dreaming fancy, pictures, dreadful 
 as the horrors of unveiled hell, and terri- 
 ble as the wrath of incensed Deity ! — 
 Come, thou spirit ! but not in these hor- 
 rid forms : come with the milder, gentle, 
 easy inspirations which thou breathest 
 round the wig of a prating advocate, or 
 the tete of a tea-sipping gossip, while 
 their tongues run at the light-horse gal- 
 lop of clish-maclaver 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, infor- 
 mation, or remark, worth putting pen to 
 paper for. 
 
 I feel, I feel the presence of supernatu- 
 ral assistance ! circled in the embrace of 
 my elbow-chair, my breast labours like 
 the bloated Sibyl on her three-footed stool, 
 and like her too, labours with Nonsense. 
 Nonsense, auspicious name! Tutor, friend, 
 and finger-post in the mystic mazes of law; 
 the cadaverous paths of physic ; and par- 
 ticularly in the sightless soarings of school 
 DiviNiTY,who leaving Common Sense con- 
 founded 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 
 oflTered her scorned alliance to the wizard 
 power of Thpologic Vision — raves abroad 
 on all the winds. " On earth, Discord ! 
 a gloomy Heaven above opening her jea- 
 lous gates to the nineteen thousandth part 
 of the tithe of mankind ! and below, an in- 
 escapable and inexorable Hell, expanding 
 
 its leviathan jaws for the vast residue of 
 mortals ! ! !" O doctrine ! comfortable and 
 healing to the weary, woimded soul of 
 man ! Ye sons and daughters of affliction, 
 ye pauvres miserables, to whom day brings 
 no pleasure, and night yields no rest, be 
 comforted ! " 'Tis but one to nineteen 
 hundred thousand that your situation will 
 mend in this world;" so, alas ! the expe- 
 rience of the poor and the needy too often 
 affirms ; and, 'tis nineteen hundred thou- 
 sand to one, by the dogmas of ********, 
 that you will be damned eternally in the 
 world to come ! 
 
 But of all Nonsense, Religious Non- 
 sense 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 tusn 
 of mind has always a tendency to narrow 
 and illiberalize the heart ? They are or- 
 derly: they may be just; nay, I have 
 known them merciful ; but still your chil- 
 dren of sanctity move among their fellow- 
 creatures, with a nostril-snuffing putres- 
 cence, 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, dis- 
 play when they accidentally mix among 
 the many-aproned sons of mechanicallife. 
 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 godly woman may be a * * * * * • — But 
 hold — Here's t'ye again — this rum is ge- 
 nerous Antigua, so a very unfit menstru- 
 um for scandal. 
 
 A-propos; How do you like, I mean 
 really, like the married life ? Ah ! my 
 friend matrimony is quite a different thing 
 from what your love-sick youths and sigh- 
 ing girls take it to be I But marriage, we 
 are told, is appointed by God, and t shall 
 never quarrel with any of his institutions. 
 I am a husband of older standing than you, 
 and shall give you my ideas of the conju- 
 gal state (era passant, you know I am no 
 Latinist : is not ronfmical derived from ju- 
 gum, a yoke ?) Well, then the scale of 
 good wifcship 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 soon spoiled you know,) all these, 
 one ; as for the other qualities belonging 
 
LETTERS. 
 
 to, or attonJIn^ on, a wife, r'v.rh ?)9 For- 
 tune, Cofinexions, Education, (i muan 
 education extraordinary,) Family Blood, 
 «Sic., divide the two remaining degrees 
 among them as you please ; only remem- 
 ber that all these minor properties raust 
 be expressed hy ^fractions, for there is not 
 any one of them in the aforesaid scale, en- 
 titled to the dignity of an integer. 
 
 As for the rest of my fancies and 
 reveries — how I lately met with Miss 
 
 L B , 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 
 made a part — 
 
 Tliou, bonnle L , art a queen, 
 
 Tliy subjects we before thee ; 
 Thou, bonnie L , art divine, 
 
 Tlie hearts o' men adore thee. 
 
 The very Deil he could na scathe 
 
 Whatever wad belaiig thee ! 
 He'd look into thy bonnie face, 
 
 And say, " I canna wrang tliee !" 
 
 — Behold all these tbings 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. 
 
 Now, to thee, and to thy before de- 
 signed hosom-compa.mon, 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 hfe, and by 
 the tree of life, for ever and ever ! 
 Amen ' 
 
 No. C XXXIV. 
 TO 'MRS. DUNLOP. 
 
 Dumfries, 2ith September, 1792. 
 
 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 's situation. Good (jrod ! 
 
 a heart-wounded, helpless young woman 
 — in a strange, foreign land, and that land 
 convulsed with every horror that can har- 
 row 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 !* 
 
 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 pay- 
 ing a dearj unconscionable rent, a cursed 
 life ! As to a laird farming his own pro- 
 perty; 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! 
 
 Well, your kind wishes will be grati- 
 fied, 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. How- 
 ever, if Heaven will be so obliging as to 
 let me have them in proportion of three 
 boys to one girl, f shall be so much the 
 more pleased. I hope, if I am spared 
 with them, to show a 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 al- 
 ways have a fortune. — A-propos ; your 
 little godson is thriving charmingly, but 
 is a very devil. He, though two years 
 younger, lias completely mastered his 
 hrotiisr. Robert is indeed the mildest, 
 g. utlest creature I ever saw. He has a 
 most s.;rprising memory, and is quite the 
 pride of his schoolmaster. 
 
 Yon know how readily we get into 
 prattle upon a subject dear to our heart : 
 You can excuse it. God bless you and 
 yours ! 
 
 * This much lamented lady was gone to the south of 
 France with her infant son, where ^he died soon after 
 
LETTERS. 
 
 No. CXXXV. 
 
 TO MRS. DUNLOP. 
 
 Supposed to have been written on the Death 
 of Mrs. H , her daughter. 
 
 I HAD been from home, and did not re- 
 ceive 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 re- 
 ligion holds out to the children of afflic- 
 tion — Children of affliction ! — how just 
 the expression ! and like every other fa- 
 mily, 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 
 no^ el occurrence. 
 
 Alas, Madam ! who would wish for 
 many years ? What is it but to drag ex- 
 istence until our joys gradually expire, 
 and leave us in a night of misery ; hke 
 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 howl- 
 ing waste ! 
 
 I am interrupted, and must leave off. 
 You shall soon hear from me again. 
 
 No. CXXXVI. 
 TO MRS. DUNLOP. 
 Dumfries, 6th December, 1792. 
 
 I SHALL be in Ayrshire, I think next 
 week ; and, if at all possible, I shall cer- 
 tainly, my much-esteemed friend, have 
 the pleasure of visiting at Dunlop-PIouse. 
 
 Alas, Madam ! how seldom do we meet 
 In this world that we have reason to con- 
 gratulate ourselves on accessions of hap- 
 piness ! I have not passed half the ordi- 
 nary term of an old man's life, and yet I 
 scarcely look over the obituary of a news- 
 paper, that I do not see some names that 
 1 have known, and which I and other ac- 
 quamtances, little thought to meet with 
 Aa ' 
 
 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 apprehen- 
 sion for our own fate. But of how diflt'r- 
 ent an importance are the lives of different 
 mdividuals? Nay, of what importance is 
 one period of the same Hfe more tlian ano- 
 ther? A few years ago, I could have lam 
 down in the dust, " careless of the voice 
 of the morning;" and now not a few 
 and these most helpless individuals, v/ould' 
 on losing me and my exertions, lose both 
 their " staff and shield." By the way, 
 these helpless ones have lately got an ad- 
 dition, Mrs. B having given me a 
 
 tme girl since J wrote you. There is a 
 charming passage in Thomson's Edward 
 and Eleanor a — 
 
 " The valiant in himself, wl,at can he suffer 1 
 Or what need he regard iiis sinsle woes ?" &c. 
 
 As I am got in the way of quotations, 
 1 shall give you another from the same 
 piece, peculiarly, alas ! too peculiarly ap- 
 posite, my dear Madam, to your present 
 frame of mind : 
 
 " Who so unworthy but may proudly deck him 
 With his fair-weather virtue, that e.xults 
 Glad o'er the summer main ? the tempest comes, 
 The rough winds rage aloud ; when from the helm 
 This virtue shrinks, and in a corner Meg 
 La<«jenting— Heavens ! if privileged from trial, 
 How cheap a thing were virtue !" 
 
 I do not remember to have hoard you 
 mention Thomson's dramas. 1 pick up 
 favourite quotations, and store them in 
 my mind as ready armour, offensive or 
 defensive, amid the struggle of this tur- 
 bulent existence. Of these is one, a very 
 favourite one, from his .;3Z/red.- 
 
 " Attach thee firmly to the virtuous deeds 
 
 And offices of life : to life itself, 
 
 With all its vain and transient joys, sit lorse" 
 
 Probably I have quoted some^f 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, m 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 com- 
 pass, 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. 
 
180 
 
 LETTERS. 
 
 The subject is religion — speaking of its 
 importance to mankind, the author says, 
 
 " 'Tis this, my friend, that streaks our morning bright, 
 
 •Tis this tlial gilds the horror of our night. 
 
 Wlien wealth lorsakes us, and when friends are few ; j 
 
 When liieiids are faithless, or wlien lots puisue ; 
 
 'Tis this that wards the blow, or atills the smart, 
 
 Disarms allliction, or repels his dart ; , 
 
 Within the breast bids purest rai)turfs rise, 
 
 Bids smiling conscience spread her cloudless skies." 
 
 I see you are in for a 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 re- 
 publican spirit, of your part of the king- 
 dom. Indeed, we are a good deal in com- 
 motion ourselves. For me, I am a flare- 
 man, you knovi^ : a very humble one in- 
 deed, Heaven knows, but still so much so 
 as to gag me. What ray private senti- 
 ments are, you will find out without an 
 interpreter. 
 
 I have taken up the subject in another 
 view, and the other day, for a pretty Ac- 
 tress's benefit-night, I wrote an Address, 
 which I will give on the other page, call- 
 ed The Rights of Woman.* 
 
 I shall hare i\\o. honour of receiving 
 your criticisms in person at Dunlop. 
 
 No. CXXXVIl. 
 TO MISS B*****, OF YORK. 
 
 2U£ March, 1792. 
 
 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 any body after their own 
 heart, they had a charuiing long prospect 
 of many, many happy meetings with them 
 in after-life. 
 
 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 pro- 
 
 • See Poems, p. 83. 
 
 babilities against you, that you shall never 
 meet with that valued character more. On 
 the other hand, brief as this miserable be- 
 ing is, it is none of the least of the mise 
 rics&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 eternal- 
 ly comes the wretch upon you, and will 
 not allow your indignation or contempt a 
 moment's repose. As I am a sturdy be- 
 liever 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 that he is perfectly acquainted 
 with my sentiments respecting Miss B — ; 
 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 plea- 
 sure of meeting with you again. 
 
 Miss H 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 opportuni- 
 ty of declaring with how much respeotful 
 esteem I have the honour to be, &c. 
 
 No. CXXXVIII. 
 TO MISS C****. 
 
 August, 1793. 
 
 MADAM, 
 
 Some rather tmlooked-for accidents 
 have prevented my doing myself the ho- 
 nour of a second visit to Arbeigland, as I 
 was so hospitably invited, and so positive- 
 ly meant to have done. — However, I still 
 hope to have that pleasure before the bu- 
 sy months of harvest begin. 
 
 I enclose yoti 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 possessionof Captain Rid- 
 del. To repay one with an old song, is a 
 proverb, whose force, you. Madam, I 
 know, will not allow. What is said of 
 illustrious descent is, I believe equahy 
 
LETTERS. 
 
 181 
 
 true of a talent for poetry, none ever de- 
 spised it who had pretensions to it. The 
 fates and characters of the rhyming tribe 
 often employ my thoughts when I am dis- 
 posed 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 sutfer, 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 ungovern- 
 able set of passions than are the usual lot 
 of man ; implant in him an irresistible im- 
 pulse to some idle vagary, such as ar- 
 ranging wild flowers in fantastical nose- 
 gays, 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 butter- 
 flies — 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 j^ou. 
 Madam, I need not recount the fairy plea- 
 sures the muse bestows to counterbalance 
 this catalogue of evils. Bewitching poe- 
 try ij like bewitching woman; she has in 
 all ages been accused of misleading man- 
 kind from the councils of wisdom and the 
 paths of prudence, involving them in diffi- 
 culties, baiting them with poverty, brand- 
 ing them with infamy, and plunging them 
 in the whirhng vortex of ruin ; yet where 
 is the man but must own that all our hap- 
 piness on earth is not worthy the name — 
 that even the holy hermit's solitary pros- 
 pect of paradisaical bliss is but the glitter 
 of a northern sun rising over a frozen re- 
 gion, compared with the many pleasures, 
 the nameless raptures that we owe to the 
 lovely Queen of the heart of Man! 
 
 No. CXXXIX. 
 TO JOHN M'MURDO, ESQ. 
 
 December, 1793. 
 
 SIR, 
 
 It is said that we take the greatest 
 lil)erties witl^our greatest friends, and I 
 
 pay myself a very high compliment in the 
 manner in which 1 am going to apply, the 
 remark. I have owed you money lunger 
 than ever I owed to any man. Here is 
 Kf^r's account, and here are six guineas ; 
 and now, I don't owe a shilling to man — 
 or woman either. But for these damned 
 dirty, dog's-eared little pages,* 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. 
 
 I think I once mentioned something of 
 a collection of Scots songs I have 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. A very 
 few of them are my own. 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. 
 
 No. CXL. 
 TO MRS. R*****^ 
 
 Who was to bespeak a Play one Evening at 
 the Dumfries Theatre. 
 
 I AM thinking to send my Address to 
 some periodical publication, but it has not 
 got your sanction, so pray look over it. 
 
 As to the Tuesday's play, let mo beg of 
 you, my dear Madam, to give us. The 
 Wonder, a Woman keeps a Secret! to 
 which please add. The Spoilt Child — yoa 
 will highly oblige me by so doing. 
 
 Ah ! what an enviable creature you 
 are ! There now, this cursed gloomy blue- 
 devil day, you are going to a party of choice 
 spirits — 
 
 * Rcoitiah Bauk Notes. 
 
LETTERS. 
 
 " To play the shapes 
 or frolic fancy, ami inccssaut form, 
 Tliose rapid pictures, that assembled train 
 • Of fluet ideas, never joiu'd before, 
 
 Whore lively trit excites to gay surprise ; 
 Or folly-painting humour, grave himself. 
 Calls laughter forth, deep-shaking every nerve." 
 
 But as you rejoice with them that do 
 rejoice, do" also remember to weep with 
 them that weep, and pity your melancholy 
 t'rieiul. 
 
 No. CXLI. 
 
 To a Lady, in favour of a Plaijer's Benefit . 
 
 MADAM, 
 
 You were so very good as to promise 
 me to honour my friend with your pre- 
 sence 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 ac- 
 knowledged. He has genius and worth 
 which would do honour to patronage; he 
 is a poor and modest man : claims which 
 from their very silence 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 otlen does brazen- 
 fronted importunity snatch that boon, the 
 rightful due of retiring, humble want ! 
 Of all the qualities we assign to tiie au- 
 thor 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 mausoleums, with hardly 
 the consciousness of having made one 
 poor lionest heart happy ! 
 
 But 1 crave your pardon, Madam, I 
 came to beg, not to preach. 
 
 No. CXLII. 
 
 EXTRACT OF A LETTER 
 
 TO MR. . 
 
 1794. 
 I AM extremely obliged to you for 
 your kind mention of my interests, in a 
 
 letter which Mr. S*** showed me. At 
 present, my situation in life must be in a 
 great measure stationary, at 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 of course — then, a 
 Friend might be of service to me in get- 
 ting me into a place of the kingdom which 
 I would hke. A supervisor's income va- 
 ries 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 rou- 
 tine, I may be nominated on the Col- 
 lector's list ; and this is always a business 
 purely of political patronage. A collec- 
 torship varies much from better than two 
 hundred a-year to near a thousand. Tliey 
 also come forward by precedency on the 
 list, and have, besides a handsome income, 
 a life of complete leisure. A hfe of htc- 
 rary leisure, with a decent competence, 
 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 de- 
 pendent situation on your benevolence. 
 If, in my progress in life, an opening 
 should occur where the good offices of a 
 gentleman of your public character and 
 political consequence might bring me for- 
 ward, I will petition your goodness with 
 the same frankness and sincerity as I now 
 do myself the honour to subscribe my- 
 self, &c. 
 
 No. CXLIII. 
 
 TO MRS. R***** 
 
 DEAR MADAM, 
 
 I MEA>T to have called on you yes- 
 ternight ; but as I edged up to your box- 
 door,"the first object which greeted my 
 view was one of those lobster-coated pup- 
 pies, sitting like another dragon, guarding 
 the Hesperian fruit. On the conditions 
 and capitulations yon so obligingly offer, 
 1 shall certainly make my weather-beaten 
 rustic phiz a part of your boit-furniture 
 
LETTERS. 
 
 183 
 
 on Tuesday, when we may arrange the 
 business of the visit. 
 
 Among the profusion of idle compli- 
 ments, which insidious craft, or unmean- 
 ing 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 tri- 
 bute 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. 
 
 No. CXLIV. 
 
 TO THE SAME. 
 
 I WILL wait on you, my ever-va ucd 
 friend, but whether in the morning I am 
 not sure. Sunday closes a period of our 
 cursed revenue business, and may pro- 
 bably keep me employed with my pen un- 
 til noon. Fine employment for a poet's 
 pen : There is a species of the human 
 genus that I call the gin-horse class : what 
 enviable dogs they are ! Round, and round, 
 and round they go — Mundell's ox, that 
 drives his cotton-mill, is their exact pro- 
 totype — without an idea or wish beyond 
 their circle; fat, sleek, stupid, patient, 
 quiet, and contented : while here I sit, 
 
 altogether Novemberish, a d melange 
 
 of fretf ulness 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 tene- 
 ment, 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 what- 
 soever this man doth set his heart, it shall 
 not prosper !" If my resentment is awak- 
 ened, it is sure to be where it dare not 
 squeak ; and if— 
 
 Pray that wisdom and bliss be more 
 frequent visitors of 
 
 R. B. 
 
 No. CXLV. 
 
 TO THE SAME. 
 
 I HAVE this moment got the song from 
 S***, 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 any thing again. 
 
 I have sent you Werter, truly happy to 
 have any, the smallest opportunity of 
 obliging you. 
 
 'Tis true, Madam, I saw you once since 
 
 I was at W ; and that once froze the 
 
 very life-blood of my heart. Your re- 
 ception of me was such, that a wretch 
 meeting the eye of his judge, about to 
 pronounce the sentence of death on him, 
 could only have envied my feelings and 
 situation. But I hate the theme, and 
 never more shall write or speak on it. 
 
 One thing I shall proudly say, that I 
 can pay Mrs. a higher tribute of es- 
 teem, and appreciate her amiable worth 
 more truly, than any man whom I have 
 seen approach her. 
 
 No. CLXVI. 
 TO THE SAME. 
 
 I HAVE often told you, my dear friend, 
 
 that you had a spice of caprice in your 
 composition, and you have as often disa- 
 vowed it: even, perhaps, while your opi- 
 nions were, at the moment, irrefragably 
 proving it. Could any thing estrange me 
 from a friend such as you ? — No ! To- 
 morrow I shall have the honour of wait- 
 ing on you. 
 
 Farewell thou first of friends, and most 
 accomplished of women: even with all 
 thy little caprices ! 
 
 No. CXLVII. 
 TO THE SAME. 
 
 I RETURN your common-place book ; 
 I liave perused it with much pleasure, 
 
184 LETTERS. 
 
 and would have continued my criticisms ; 
 but as it seems the critic has forfeited 
 your esteem, his strictures must lose their 
 value. 
 
 If it is true that " offences come only 
 from the heart," before you I am guilt- 
 less. 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. 
 
 In a face where I used to meet the kind 
 complacency of friendly confidence, now 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, that while de haut-en-bas rigour 
 may depress an unoffending wretch to the 
 groimd, it has a tendency to rouse a stub- 
 born something in his bosom,which,though 
 it cannot heal the wounds of his soul, is at 
 least an opiate to blunt their poignancy. 
 
 With the profoundest respect for your 
 abilities ; the most sincere esteem and ar- 
 dent regard for your gentle heart and ami- 
 able manners ; and the most fervent wish- 
 and prayer for your welfare, peace, and 
 bliss, I have the honour to be, Madain, 
 your most devoted, humble servant. 
 
 this, such a woman! — but of her I shall 
 say nothing at all, in despair of saying any 
 thing adequate. In my song, I have en- 
 deavoured 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 perform- 
 ance, I in my first fervour, thought of 
 
 sending it to Mrs. O ; but on second 
 
 thoughts, perhaps what I offer as the ho- 
 nest incense of genuine respect, might, 
 from the well-knowncharacter of poverty 
 and poetry, be construed into some modi- 
 fication or other of that servility which 
 my soul abhors.* 
 
 No. CXLIX. 
 TO MISS 
 
 No. CXLVIII. 
 
 TO JOHN SYME, ESQ. 
 
 You know that, among other high dig- 
 nities, you have the honour to be my su- 
 preme 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 
 O***---* family, there is nothing charms me 
 more than Mr. O's. unconcealable attach- 
 ment 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 fel- 
 lows of his rank and fortune : and to all 
 
 Nothing short of a kind of absoluta 
 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 T put pen to paper to you, is 
 painful- The scenes I have passed with 
 the friend of my soul and his amiable con- 
 nexions ! 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 reflec- 
 tion of all that I had most unfortunately, 
 though most undeservedly, lost the confi- 
 dence of that soul of worth, ere it took 
 its flight ! 
 
 These, Madam, are sensations of no 
 ordinary anguish. — However, you also 
 may be offended with some imputed im- 
 proprieties of mine; sensibility you know 
 I possess, and sincerity none will deny 
 me. 
 
 To oppose those prejudices which have 
 been raised against me, is not the busi 
 ness of this letter. Indeed it is a war 
 fare I know not how to wage. The pow- 
 ers of positive vice I can in some degree 
 calculate, and against direct malevolence 
 I can be on my guard ; but who can esti- 
 
 * The song enclosed was that, given in Poems, page 
 116 beginning, 
 
 beginning 
 
 wat ye toha.' 
 
 I yon town 1 
 
LETTERS. 
 
 185 
 
 mate the fatuity of giddy caprice, or ward 
 off the unthinking uiischief of precipitate 
 folly? 
 
 I have a favour to request of you, Ma- 
 dam ; 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. There 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 acci- 
 dent has made my superiors, will, with 
 themselves, be gone to the regions of ob- 
 livion ; 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 circum- 
 stance indeed was all their merit. Most 
 unhappily for me, that merit they no 
 longer possess; and I hope that Mrs. 
 
 's goodness, which T well know, and 
 
 ever will revere, will not refuse this fa- 
 vour to a man whom she once held in 
 some degree of estimation. 
 
 With the sincerest esteem, 1 have the 
 honour to be, Madam, &.c. 
 
 No. CL. 
 TO MR. CUNNINGHAM. 
 
 25th February, 1794. 
 
 Canst thou minister to a mind dis- 
 ' eased ? Canst thou speak peace and rest 
 to a soul tossed on a sea of troubles, with- 
 out 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 ? 
 
 For these two months, I have not been 
 able to lift a pen. My constitution and 
 
 frame were ah ongine, 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 * * * 
 * * times ; losses which, though trifling, 
 were yet what I could ill bear, have so ir- 
 ritated mo, that my feelings at times could 
 only be envied by a reprobate spirit lis- 
 tening to the sentence that dooms it to 
 perdition. 
 
 Are you deep in the language of conso- 
 lation ? I have exhausted in reflection 
 every topic of comfort. A heart at ease 
 would have been charmed with my senti- 
 ments 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. 
 
 Still there are two great pillars that 
 bear us up, amid the wreck of misfortune 
 and misijry. The one is composed of the 
 different modifications of a certain noble, 
 stubborn something in man, known by the 
 names of courage, fortitude, magnanimi- 
 ty. The OTHER is made up of those feel- 
 ings and sentiments, which, however the 
 sceptic may deny them, or the enthusiast 
 disfigure them, are j'et, I am convinced, 
 original and component parts of the hu- 
 man soul : those senses of the mind, if I 
 may be allowed the expression, which 
 connect us with, and link us to, those aw- 
 ful 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. 
 
 I do not remember, my dear Cunning- 
 ham, that you and I ever talked on tlie 
 subject of religion at all. I know some 
 who laugh at it, as the trick of the craftv 
 FEW, to lead the undiscerning manv ; or 
 at most as an uncertain obscurity, which 
 mankind can never know any thing of, 
 and with which they are fools if they give 
 themselves much to do. Nor would T 
 quarrel with a man for his irreligion any 
 more than I would for his want of a mu- 
 sical ear. I would regret that he was shut 
 out from what, to me and to othors, were 
 such superlative sources of enjoyment. It 
 is in this point of view, and for this rea- 
 son, that I will deeply imbue the mind < f 
 every child uf mine with religion. If my 
 
LETTERS. 
 
 Bon 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 en- 
 joy the growing luxuriance of the 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 in- 
 to the glorious enthusiasm of Thomson, 
 
 " These, as they change, Almighty Father, these 
 Are but the varied God- — The rolling year 
 l3 full of thee." 
 
 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 de- 
 lights among the sons of men are superior, 
 not to say equal, to them? And they 
 have this precious, vast addition, that con- 
 scious virtue stamps them for her own ; 
 and lays hold on them to bring herself in- 
 to the presence of a witnessing, judging, 
 and approving God. 
 
 No. CLL 
 
 TO MRS. R****. 
 
 Supposes himself to be writing from the 
 Dead to the Living. 
 
 I DARK say 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 
 manner of my leaving your earth I do not 
 exactly know, as I took my departure in 
 the heat of a fever of intoxication, con- 
 tracted 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 tho 
 space of ninety-nine years, eleven months, 
 and twenty-nine days, and all on account 
 of the impropriety of my conduct yester- 
 night under your roof. Here am I, laid 
 on a bed, of pitiless furze, with my aching 
 head rechned on a pillow of ever-piercing 
 thorn ; while an infernal tormentor, wrink- 
 led, and old, and cruel, his name I think 
 is Recollection, with a whip of scorpions, 
 forbids peace or rest to approach me, and 
 keeps anguish eternally awake. Still, 
 Madam, if T could in any measure be re- 
 instated in the good opinion of the fair 
 circle whom my conduct last night so 
 much injured, I think it would be an al- 
 leviation to my torments. Tor this rea- 
 sen I trouble you with this letter. To the 
 men of the company I will make no apo- 
 logy. — Your husband, who insisted on my 
 drinking more than I chose, has no right 
 to blame me ; and the other gentlemen 
 were partakers of mv guilt. But to you, 
 Madam, I have much to apologize. Your 
 good opinion 1 valued as one of the great- 
 est acquisitions I '^'kA 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 d 
 
 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 out- 
 raged her beyond all forgiveness. — To all 
 the other ladies please present my hum- 
 blest contrition for my conduct, and my 
 petition for their gracious pardon. O, all 
 ye powers of decency and decorum ! whis- 
 per to them, that my errors, though great, 
 were involuntary — that an intoxicated 
 man is the vilest of beasts — that it was 
 not my nature to be brutal to any one 
 — that to be rude to a woman, when 
 in my senses, was impossible with me- 
 but— 
 
 Regret ! Remorse ! Shame ! ye three 
 hell-hounds that ever dog my steps and 
 bay at my heels, spare me ! spare me ! 
 
 Forgive the offences, and pity the per- 
 dition of. 
 
 Madam, 
 Your humblfi slave. 
 
LETTERS. 
 
 187 
 
 No. CLII. 
 
 TO MRS. DUNLOP. 
 
 5th December, 1795. 
 
 MY DEAR FRIEND, 
 
 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, be- 
 cause 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 termi- 
 nate 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 desciibe to you the anxious, sleep- 
 less 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 wo 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 ! 
 
 To leave talking of the matter so grave- 
 ly, I shall sing with the old Scots ballad — 
 
 " O that I had ne'er been married 
 
 I would never had nae care ; 
 Now I've gotten wife and bairns, 
 
 Tliey cry crowdie ! evermair. 
 
 Crowdie ! ance ! crowdie twice ; 
 
 Crowdie ! three times in a day : 
 An ye crowdie ony mair, 
 
 Ye' 11 crowdie a' my meal away." 
 
 December 2Ath. 
 
 We have had a brilliant theatre here 
 this season ; only, as all other business 
 has, it experiences a stagnation of trade 
 A a 2 
 
 from the epidemical complaint of the 
 country, want of cash. I mention our the- 
 atre merely to lug in an occasional Ad- 
 dress which I wrote for the benefit night 
 of one of the actresses, and which is aa 
 follows.* 
 
 25th, Christmat Morning. 
 
 This my much-loved friend is a morn- 
 ing of wishes ; accept mine — so heaven 
 hear me as they are sincere ! that bless- 
 ings 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 !" 
 
 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 hke 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. 
 
 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 look- 
 ing 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 can- 
 not find a single scroll to you, except one, 
 about the commencement of our acquaint- 
 ance. If there were any possible con- 
 veyance, I would send you a perusal of 
 my book. 
 
 No. CLIII. 
 
 TO MRS. DUNLOP, IN LONDON. 
 
 Dumfries, 20th December, 1 795. 
 
 I HAVE been prodigiously disappoint- 
 ed in this Lond«n journey of yours. In 
 
 ' The Address is given in p. 1C4, of the Poems 
 
188 
 
 LETTERS. 
 
 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. 
 
 As I hope to get a frank from my friend 
 Captain Miller, I shall every leisure hour, 
 take up the pen, and gossip away what- 
 ever comes first, prose or poesy, sermon or 
 song. In this last article I hav8 abound- 
 ed of late. I have often mentioned to 
 you a superb publication of Scottish songs 
 which is making its appearance in your 
 great metropoUs, and where I have the 
 honour to preside over the Scottish verse 
 as no less a personage than Peter Pindar 
 does over the EngUsh. I wrote the fol- 
 lowing for a favourite air. See the Song 
 entitled, Lord Gregory, Poems, p. 87. 
 
 December 29th. 
 Since I began this letter, I have been 
 appointed to act in the capacity of super- 
 visor 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 incum- 
 bent ; but I look forward to an early pe- 
 riod when I shall be appointed in full 
 form ; a consummation devoutly to be 
 wished ! My political sins seem to be for- 
 given me. 
 
 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 busi- 
 ness 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 commg fast 
 o'er my fraiiae. With all my follies of 
 youth, and, I fear, a few vices oi maii- 
 hood, still I congratulate myself on hav- 
 
 ing had, in early days, religion strongly im- 
 pressed on my mind. I have nothing to 
 say to any one as to which sect he be- 
 longs to, or what creed he believes ; but 
 I look on the man, who is firmly persuad- 
 ed of infinite Wisdom and Goodness :?u- 
 perintending and directing every circum- 
 stance that can happen in his lot — I feli- 
 citate such a man as having a solid foun- 
 dation for his mental enjoyment ; a firm 
 prop and sure stay in the hour of difficul- 
 ty, trouble, and distress : and a never- 
 faihng anchor of hope, when he looks be- 
 yond the grave. 
 
 January I'ith. 
 
 You will have seen our worthy and in- 
 genious friend the Doctor, long ere this. 
 I hope he is well, and beg to be remem- 
 bered to him. I have just been reading 
 over again, I dare say for the hundred 
 and fiftieth time, his View of Society and 
 Manners ; 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 any body but Dr. 
 Moore. By the by, you have deprived 
 me of Zeluco ; remember that, when you 
 are disposed to rake up the sins of my 
 neglect from among the ashes of my lazi- 
 ness. 
 
 He has paid me a pretty compliment, 
 by quoting me in his last publication.* 
 
 *No. CLIV. 
 TO MRS. R*****. 
 
 20th January, 1796 
 
 I CANNOT express my gratitude to you 
 for allowing me a longer perusal of Ana- 
 charsis. 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 socie- 
 ty ; as Anacharsis is an indispensable de- 
 sideratum to a son of the Muses. 
 
 Tiie health you wished me in your 
 morning's card, is I think, flown from me 
 for ever. I have not been able to leave 
 my bed to-day till about an hour ago. 
 
LETTERS. 
 
 189 
 
 These wickedly unlucky advertisements 
 I lent (I did wrong) to a friend, and I am 
 ill able to go in quest of him. 
 
 The Muses have not quite forsaken me. 
 The following detached stanzas I intend 
 to interweave in some disastrous tale of a 
 shepherd. 
 
 No. CLV. 
 TO MRS. DUNLOP. 
 
 3\st January, 1796. 
 
 These many months you have been 
 two packets in my debt — what sin of ig- 
 norance 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 of the cup of af- 
 fliction. 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 fe- 
 ver, and long the die spun doubtful ; un- 
 til, after many weeks of a sick bed, it 
 seems to have turned up life, and I am be- 
 ginning to crawl across my room, and 
 once indeed have been before my own 
 door in the street. 
 
 ing, 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 circumstaji- 
 ces, copy you out a love song ? 
 
 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 he unhappy together — 
 do if you can, and oblige le pauvre mise- 
 rable, 
 
 R. B. 
 
 No. CLVII. 
 
 TQ MR. CUNNINGHAM. 
 
 Brow, Sea-bathing Quarters, llh July, 
 1796. 
 
 When pleasure fascinates the mental Bight, 
 
 Affliction purifies the visual ray, 
 Religion hails the drear, the untried niglit. 
 
 And shuts, for ever shuts, life's doubtful day ! 
 
 No. CLVI. 
 
 TO MRS. R*****, 
 
 Who had desired him to go to Ike Birth- 
 Day Assembly on that day to show 
 his loyalty, 
 
 4th June, 1796. 
 T AM in such miserable health as to be 
 utterly incapable of showing my loyalty 
 in any way. Racked as I am with rheu- 
 matisms, I meet everv face with a grect- 
 
 MT DEAR CUNNINGHAM, 
 
 I RECEIVED yours here this moment, 
 and am indeed highly flattered with the 
 approbation of the literary circle you men- 
 tion ; 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 
 I 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 flod ! fled ! — but I 
 can no more on the subject — only the 
 medical folks tell me that my last and 
 only chance is bathing, and country quar- 
 ters, and riding. — The deuce of the mat- 
 ter is this ; when an exciseman is off" duty, 
 his salary is reduced to £35 instead of 
 £.50. — 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 mention 
 this, because I had intended to beg your 
 utmost interest, and that of all the friends 
 you can muster, to move our Commission-* 
 ers of Excise to grant me the full salary 
 — I dare say you know them all person- 
 ally. If they do not grant it me, I must 
 lay my account with ua exit tiC}[ ivi f o-:i-% 
 
ito 
 
 LETTERS. 
 
 if I die not of disease, I must perish with 
 hunger. 
 
 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 to you. 
 — A-propos 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 intro- 
 duced to the world by the respectable 
 designation of Alexander Cunningham 
 Bu7-ns. My last was James Glencairn, 
 60 you can have no objection to the com- 
 pany of nobility. Farewell ! 
 
 No. CLVIII. 
 TO MRS. BURNS. 
 
 Brow, Thursday. 
 
 MY DEAREST LOVE, 
 
 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 
 Btill ^extremely bad. No flesh nor fish 
 can I swallow ; porridge and milk are the 
 only thing 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 chil- 
 dren. I will see you on Sunday. Your 
 affectionate husband. 
 
 R. B. 
 
 No. CLIX. 
 TO MRS. DUNLOP 
 
 Brow, 12thJuly,n96 
 
 I HAVE written you so often without 
 receiving any answer, that I would not 
 trouble you again, but for the circum- 
 stances in which I am. An illness which 
 has long hung about me, in all probability 
 will speedily send me beyond that bourn 
 whence no traveller returns. Your friend- 
 ship, with which for many years you ho- 
 noured me was a friendship dearest to 
 my soul. Your conversation, and espe- 
 cially 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 ! ! !* 
 
 R. B. 
 
 • The above is supposed to be the last production of 
 Robert Burns, who died on tlie 21st of the month, ninn 
 days afterwards. He had, however, the pleasure of 
 receiving a satisfactory eiplanation of his friend's si- 
 lence, and an assurance of the continuance of her friend- 
 ship to his widow and children ; an assurance that has 
 been amply fulfilled. 
 
 It is probable that the greater part of her letters to 
 him were destroyed by our Bard about the time that thia 
 last was written. He did not foresee that his own let- 
 ters to her were to appear in print, nor conceive the 
 disappointment that will be felt, that a few of this ex 
 cellent lady's have :)ot served to enilch and adorn tlie 
 collection. K. 
 
191 
 
 CORRESPONDENCE 
 
 MM^ ©ffi®m(^® ^M^ffi^(©a 
 
 PREFikCZ:. 
 
 The remaining part of this Volume, consists principally of the Correspondence 
 between Mr. Burns and Mr. Thomson, on the subject of the beautiful Work pro- 
 jected and executed by the latter, the nature of which is explained in the first num- 
 ber of the following series.* The undertaking of Mr. Thomson, is one in which 
 the Public may be congratulated in various points of view ; not merely as having 
 collected the finest of the Scottish songs and airs of past times, but as having givea 
 occasion to a number of original songs of our Bard, which equal or surpass the for- 
 mer efforts of the pastoral muses of Scotland, and which, if we mistake not, may bo 
 safely compared with the lyric poetry of any age or country. The letters of Mr. 
 Burns to Mr. Thomson include the songs he presented to him, some of which appear 
 in different stages of their progress ; and these letters will be found to exhibit occa- 
 sionally his notions of song-writing, and his opinions on various subjects of taste and 
 criticism. These opinions, it will 'be observed, were called forth by the observstions 
 of his correspondent, Mr. Thomson ; and without the letters of this gentleman, those 
 of Burns would have been often unintelligible. He has therefore yielded to the 
 earnest request of the Trustees of the family of the poet, to suffer them to appear 
 in their natural order ; and, independently of the illustration they give to the letters 
 of our Bard, it is not to be doubted that their intrinsic merit will ensure them a re- 
 ception from the public, far beyond what Mr. Thomson's modesty would permit him 
 to suppose. The whole of this correspondence was arranged for the press by Mr. 
 Thomson, and has been printed with little addition or variation. 
 
 To avoid increasing the bulk of the work unnecessarily, we have in general re- 
 ferred the reader for the Song to the page in the Poems where it occurs ; and have 
 given the verses entire, only when they differ in some respects from the adopt- 
 ed set. 
 
 No. I. 
 MR. THOMSON TO MR. BURNS. 
 Edinburgh, September, 1792. 
 
 SIR, 
 
 For some years past, I have with a 
 friend or two, employed many leisure 
 hours in selecting and collating the most 
 
 • Thi* work ii entitled, " A Select Collection of original Scottish Airs for the Voice: to which are added 
 Introductory and Concluding Symphonies and Accompaniments for the Piano Forte and Violin by Pleyel ouj 
 Kozeluch: With select and characteristic Verses, by the most admiie<l Scottish Poets," &c. 
 
 favourite of our national melodies for pub- 
 lication. We have engaged Pleyel, the 
 most agreeable composer living, to put 
 accompaniments to these, and also to 
 compose an instrumental prelude and con- 
 clusion to each air, the better to fit them 
 for concerts, both public and private. 
 To render this work perfect, we are 
 desirous to have the poetry improved; 
 wherever it seems unworthy of the music. 
 
192 
 
 LETTERS. 
 
 and that is so in many instances, is allow- 
 ed by every one conversant with our mu- 
 sical collections. The editors of these 
 seem in general to have depejided on the 
 music proving an excuse for the varses : 
 and hence, some charming melodies are 
 united to mere nonsense and doggerel, 
 while others are accommodated with 
 rhymes so loose and indelicate, as cannot 
 be sung in decent company. To remove 
 this reproach would be an easy task to 
 the author of The Colter's Saturday JSlght ; 
 and, for the honour of Caledonia, I would 
 fain hope he may be induced to take up 
 the pen. If so, we shall be enabled to 
 present the public with a collection infi- 
 nitely more interesting than any that has 
 yet appeared, and acceptable to all per- 
 sons of taste, whether they wish for cor- 
 rect melodies, delicate accompaniments, 
 or characteristic verses. — We will esteem 
 your poetical assistance a particular fa- 
 vour, besides paying any reasonable price 
 you shall please to demand for it. Profit 
 is quite a secondary consideration with us, 
 and we are resolved to spare neither pains 
 nor expense on the publication. Tell me 
 frankly, then, whether you will devote 
 your leisure to wntmg twenty or twenty- 
 five songs, suited to the particular melo- 
 dies which I am prepared to send you. 
 A few songs, exceptionable only in some 
 of their verses, I will likewise submit to 
 your consideration ; leaving it to you, 
 either to mend these, or make new songs 
 in their stead. It is superfluous to assure 
 you that I have no intention to displace 
 any of the sterling old songs: those only 
 will be removed, which appear quite silly, 
 or absolutely indecent. Even these shall 
 all be examined by Mr. Burns, and if he 
 is of opinion that any of them are deserv- 
 ing of the music, in such cases no divorce 
 «hall take place. 
 
 Relying on the letter accompanying 
 this, to be forgiven for the liberty I have 
 taken in addressing you, I am, with great 
 esteem, Sir, your most obedient humble 
 servant, 
 
 G. THOMSON.- 
 
 No. II. 
 MR. BbRNS TO MR. THOMSON. 
 
 Dumfries, \Qth Septemher, 1792. 
 
 SIR, 
 
 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 ot 
 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 cri cle 
 guerre of my muse. Will you, as I am 
 inferior to iione of you in enthusiastic at- 
 tachment 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, 
 witji 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 pub- 
 lishers, to approve, or reject, at your 
 pleasure, for your own pulilication. A- 
 propos .' 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. En- 
 glish verses, particularly the works of 
 Scotsmen, that have merit, are certainly 
 very eligible. Ttoeedside — Jih, the poor 
 shepherd's mournful fate — Ah, Chloris 
 could I now hut sit, &.c. you cannot mend ; 
 but such insipid stuff as, To Fanny fair 
 could I impart, &c. usually set to The 
 Mill Mill O, is a disgrace to the collec- 
 tion 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 farther prosecu- 
 tion 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. 
 
 As to any remuneration, you may think 
 my songs either above or below price ; 
 for they shall 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 songs that I compose or 
 amend, I shall receive as a favour. In 
 the rustic phrase of the season, " Gude 
 speed the wark!" 
 
 I am, Sir, your very humble servant, 
 R. BURNS. 
 
 P. S. I have some particular reasons 
 for wishing ray interference to be known 
 as little aa possible. 
 
LETTERS. 
 
 193 
 
 No. III. 
 
 MR. THOMSON TO MR. BURNS. 
 Edinburgh, I2th October, 1792. 
 
 DEAR SIR, 
 
 I RECEIVED, with much satisfaction, 
 your pleasant and obliging letter, and I 
 return my warmest acknowledgments for 
 the enthusiasm with which you have en- 
 tered into our undertaking. We have 
 now no doubt of being able to produce a 
 collection highly deserving of public at- 
 tention in all respects. 
 
 I agree with you in thinking English 
 verses that have merit, very eligible, 
 wherever new verses are necessary ; be- 
 cause the English becomes every year 
 more and more the language of Scotland; 
 but if you mean that no English verses, 
 except those by Scottish authors, ought 
 to be admitted, I am half inclined to differ 
 from you. I should consider it unpardon- 
 able to sacrifice one good song in the 
 Scottish dialect, to make room for Eng- 
 lish verses ; but if we can select a few 
 excellent ones suited to the unprovided 
 or ill-provided airs, would it not be the 
 very bigotry of literary patriotism to re- 
 ject such, merely because the authors 
 were born south of the Tweed ? Our 
 sweet air, My J^annie O, which in the 
 collections is joined to the poorest stuff 
 that Allan Ramsay ever wrote, beginning, 
 WTiile some for pleasure pawn their health, 
 answers so finely to Dr. Percy's beautiful 
 song, O, J^ancy wilt thoit go with me, that 
 one would think he wrote it on purpose 
 for the air. However, it is not at all our 
 wish to confine you to English verses ; 
 you shall freely be allowed a sprinkling of 
 your native tongue, as you elegantly ex- 
 press it : and moreover, we will patiently 
 wait your own time. One thing only I beg, 
 which is, that however gay and sportive 
 the muse may be, she may always be de- 
 cent. Let her not write what beauty would 
 blush to speak, nor wound that charming 
 delicacy which forms the most precious 
 dowry of our daughters. I do not con- 
 ceive the song to be the most proper ve- 
 hicle for witty and brilliant conceits ; 
 simplicity, I believe, should be its pro- 
 minent feature ; but, in some of our songs, 
 the writers have confounded simplicity 
 with coarseness and vulgarity ; although 
 between the one and the other, as Dr. 
 Beattie well observes, there is as great a 
 difference as between a plain suit of clothes 
 
 and a bundle of rags. The humorous 
 ballad, or pathetic complaint, is best suit- 
 ed to our artless melodies ; and more in- 
 teresting, indeed, in all songs, than the 
 most pointed wit, dazzling descriptions, 
 and flowery fancies. 
 
 With these trite observations, I send 
 you eleven of the songs, for which it is 
 my wish to substitute others of your wri- 
 ting. I shall soon transmit the rest, and, 
 at the same time, a prospectus of the 
 whole collection : and you may believe 
 we will receive any hints that you are so 
 kind as to give for improving the work, 
 with the greatest pleasure and thankful- 
 ness. 
 
 I remain, dear Sir, &c. 
 
 No. IV. 
 MR. BURNS TO MR. THOMSON. 
 
 MT DEAR SIR, 
 
 Let me tell you, that you are too 
 fastidious in your ideas of songs and bal- 
 lads. 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 try- 
 ing my hand on it, and, after all, I could 
 make nothing more of it than the fol- 
 lowing, which, Heaven knows is poor 
 enough : 
 
 When o'er the hill the eastern star. 
 
 Tells bughtin time is near my jo ; 
 And owsen frae the furrow'd field, 
 
 Return sae dowf and weary O ; 
 Down by the burn, where scented birks* 
 
 Wi' dew are hanging clear, my jo, 
 I'll meet thee on the lea-rig, 
 
 My ain kind dearie O. 
 
 In mirkest glen, at midnight hour, 
 
 I'd rove, and ne'er be eerie O, 
 If thro' that glen I gaed to thee, 
 
 My ain kind dearie O. 
 Altho' the night were ne'er sae wild.f 
 
 And I were ne'er sae wearie O, 
 I'd meet thee on the lea-rig. 
 
 My ain kind dearie O. 
 
 ♦ For "scented birks," in some copies, "birken 
 buds." E. 
 t In the copy transmiued to Mr Thomgon, initcad 
 
LETTERS. 
 
 Your observation as to the aptitude of 
 Dr. Percy's ballad to the air J^Taniiic O, 
 is just. It is besides, perhaps, the most 
 beautiful ballad in tlie English language. 
 But let me remark to you, that, in the 
 sentiment and style of our Scottish airs, 
 tlicre is a pastoral simplicity, a something 
 that one may call the Doric style and dia- 
 lect of vocal music, to which a dash of 
 our native tongue and manners is parti- 
 cularly, nay peculiarly apposite. For 
 this reason, and, upon ray 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 JVann/e O, might, per- , 
 haps, do for one s(rt 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 busi- 
 ness of authorship ; and have nothing to 
 be pleased or ot!ended at, in your adop- 
 tion or rejection of my verses. Though 
 you should reject one half of what I give 
 you, T shall be pleased with your adopting 
 the other half, and shall continue to serve 
 you with the same assiduity. 
 
 In the printed copy of my Xamiie O, 
 the name of the river is horridly prosaic. 
 I will alter it, 
 
 ' Behind yon hills where Lugar flows.' 
 
 Girvan is the name of the river that 
 suits the idea of the stanza best, but Lu-^ 
 gar is the most agreeable modulation of 
 syllables. 
 
 of wild, was inserted uet. But in one of tlip, manu- 
 scripts, probably written afterwards, wet was changed 
 into wild ; evidently a great improvement. The lovers 
 might meet on tlie lea-rig, " Ulhough the night were 
 ne'er so tfiW," that is, although the summer-wind blew, 
 the sky lowered, and the thunder murmured ; such cir- 
 cumstances might render their meeting still more inte- 
 resting. But if the night were actually wet, why should 
 they meet on the lea-iig ? On a wet night the imagina- 
 tion cannot contemplate their siluatiou there with any 
 complacency. — TibuUus, and, after him, Hammond, 
 has conceived a happier situation for lovers on a wet 
 night.. Probably Burns had in his mind the verse of an 
 old Scottish Song, in which wet and weary are natu- 
 rally enough conjoined. 
 
 " When my ploughman comes hamc at ev'n 
 
 He's often wet jmd wear>' ; 
 Cast off the wet, put on the dry, 
 
 And gae to bed my deary." 
 
 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, Good be 
 wi' ye, &-C. 
 
 Friday night 
 
 Saturday morning. 
 
 As I find I have still an hour to spare 
 this morning before my conveyance goes 
 away, I will give you J^annie O, at length. 
 See Poems, p. 56. 
 
 Your remarks on Ewe-hughts, Marion, 
 are just: still it has obtained a place 
 among our more classical Scottish Songs 
 and wbat with many beauties in its com- 
 position, and more prejudices in its fa- 
 vour, you will not find it easy to sup- 
 plant it. 
 
 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 Eice-hughfs ; 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 after-times 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 faith- 
 fully inscribed on them. Their uncouth 
 simplicity was, as they say of wines, their 
 
 Wii.r. ye go to the Indies, my Mary, 
 And leave auld Scotia's shore ? 
 
 See Poems, p. 85. 
 
 Galla Water, and Auld Rob Morris, I 
 think, will most probably be the next sub- 
 ject 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 optnjo/refe, 
 but cordially to join issue with you in the 
 furtherance of the work. 
 
LETTERS. 
 
 195 
 
 No. V. 
 
 MR. BURNS TO MR. THOMSON. 
 
 JVovember 8th, 1792. 
 
 Ik you mean, my dear Sir, that all the 
 soiiirs 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 rhyth- 
 mus in many of our airs, and a necessity 
 of advpting syllables to the emi)hasis, or 
 what I would call tlm feature notes of the 
 tunc, that cramp the poet, and lay him 
 under almost insuperable difficulties. For 
 instance, in the air, ./!% viife's a wanton j 
 wee tkin^, if a few lines smooth and pretty 
 can be adapted to it, it is all you can ex- 
 pect. The following were made extem- 
 pore to it, and though, on further study, 
 I might give you something more pro- 
 found, yet it might not suit the light-horse 
 pallop of the ai- so well as this random 
 clink. 
 
 No. V] 
 
 MY WIFE'S A WINSOME WEE j 
 THING. 
 
 She is a winsome wee thing, i 
 
 She is a handsome wee thing, I 
 
 -See Popms, p. 05, 
 
 I have just been looking over the Cof- I 
 tier's bonnie Dochffr ; and if *^heToIlovving 
 rhapsody, whicli I composed the olheri 
 day, on a charming Ayrshire girl, Miss 
 
 , as she passed through this place to ! 
 
 England, will suit your taste better than j 
 the Collier Laxsie, fall on and welcome. 
 
 O SAW ye bonnie Lesley 
 
 As she gaed o'er the border : 
 See Poems, p. 
 
 I have hitherto deferred the sublimer, 
 more pathetic airs, until more leisure, as 
 they will take, and deserve, a greater ef- 
 fort. However, they are all* put into 
 your hands, as clay into the hands of the 
 potter, to mnkoo7ie vessel to honour, and 
 another to dishonour. Farewell. &c. 
 B b 
 
 MR. BURNS TO MR. THOMSON. 
 
 Inclosing the Song on Highland Mary. 
 See Poems^p. 85. 
 
 \^th Jfovember, 1792. 
 
 MY DEAR SIR, 
 
 I AGREE with you that the song, Ka- 
 tharine Ogie, is very poor stuff, and un- 
 worthy, altogether unworthy, of so beau- 
 tiful an air. I tried to mend it, but the 
 awkward sound Ogie recurring so often 
 in the rhyme, spoils every attempt at in- 
 troducing sentiment into the piece. The 
 foregoing song pleases myself; I think it 
 is 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 in- 
 teresting 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. 
 
 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 bonnnt-lug ; 
 and do you, sans ceremonie, make what 
 use you choose of the productions. 
 Adieu ! &,c. 
 
 No. VII 
 MR. THOMSON TO MR. BURNS. 
 
 Edinburgh, J\''ovemher, 1 792. 
 
 I WAS just going to write to you thai 
 on meeting with your J^annie I had fallen 
 violently in love with her. I thank you, 
 therefore for sending the charming rustic 
 to me, in the dress you wish her to appear 
 before the public. She does you great 
 credit, and will soon be admitted into the 
 best company. 
 
 I regret that your song for the Lea-rtg, 
 is so short ; the air is easy, soon eung. 
 
198 
 
 LETTERS. 
 
 and very pleasing ; so that, if the singer ] ter than the fohowing : qo you mend it. 
 
 stops at the end of two stanzas, it 
 pleasure lost ere it is well possessed. 
 
 Although a dash of our native tongue 
 and manners is doubtless peculiarly con- 
 genial and appropriate to our melodies, 
 )'et I shall be able to present a consider- 
 able number of the very Flowers of Eng- 
 lish Song, well adapted' to those melodies, 
 which in England at least will be the 
 means of recommending them to still 
 greater attention than they have procured 
 there. But you will observe, my plan is, 
 that e^ ery air shall, in the first place, have 
 verses wholly by Scottish poets : and that 
 those of English writers shall follow as 
 additional songs, for the choice of the 
 singer. 
 
 What you say of the Ewe-bughts is just; 
 I admire it and never meant to supplant 
 it. All I requested was, that you would 
 try your hand on some of the inferior 
 stanzas, which are apparently no part of 
 the original song : but this I do not urge, 
 because the song is of sufficient length 
 though those inferior stanzas be omitted, 
 as they will be by the singer of taste. 
 You must not think T expect aZ/ the songs 
 to be of superlative merit ; that were an 
 unreasonable expectation. I am sensible 
 that no poet can sit down doggedly to pen 
 verses, and succeed well at all times. 
 
 I am highly pleased with your humour 
 ous and amorous rhapsody on Bonnie Lex- \ 
 lie; it is a thousand times better than the I 
 Collier's Lassie. " The deil he could na I 
 Bcaith thee," &.c. is an eccentric and hap- I 
 py thought. Do you not think, however, 
 that the names of such old heroes as Alex- 
 ander, sound rather queer, unless in pom- 
 pous or mere burlesque verse ? Instead 
 of the line " And never made another," 
 I would humbly suggest, " And ne'er 
 made sic anither ;" and I would fain have 
 you substitute some other line for " Re- 
 turn to Caledonia," iu the last verse, be- 
 cause I think this alteration of thf ortho- 
 graphy, and of the sound of Caledonia, 
 disfigures the word, and renders it Hudi- 
 brastic. 
 
 Of the other sonsr, .'Vfy »of/c'» nwimn7ve 
 wee thing, I think the first eight lines v<^ry 
 good, but I do no!: admire the other eio-ht, 
 because four of trt?m are a bare repetition 
 oft! e first verse. T have been trying to 
 spiQ i stanza, but :ould make nothing bet- 
 
 os, as Yorick did with the love-letter, 
 whip it up in your own way. 
 
 O leeze me on my wee thing; 
 My bonnie blythsome wee thing ; 
 Sae lang's I hae my wee thing, 
 I'll think my lot divine. 
 
 Tho' warld's care we share o't, 
 And may see meickle mair o't ; 
 Wi' her I'll blithely bear it, 
 And ne'er a word repine. 
 
 You perceive my dear Sir, I avail my- 
 self of the liberty which you condescend 
 to allow me, by speaking freely what I 
 think. Be assured it is not my disposi- 
 tion to pick out the faults of any poem or 
 picture I see : my first and chief object is 
 to discover and be delighted with the 
 beauties of the piece. If I sit down to ex- 
 amine critically, and at leisure, what per- 
 haps you have written in haste, I may 
 happen to observe careless lines, the re- 
 perusal of which might lead you to im- 
 prove them. The wren will often see 
 what has been overlooked by the eagle. 
 I remain yours faithfully, &c. 
 
 P. S. Your verses upon Highland Mary 
 are just come to hand : they breathe the 
 genuine spirit of poetry, and, like the mu- 
 sic, will last for ever. Such verses united 
 to such an air, with the delicate harmony 
 of Pleyel superadded, might form a treat 
 worthy of being presented to Apollo him- 
 self. I have heard the sad story of your 
 Mary : vou always seem inspired when 
 you write of her. 
 
 No. VIII. 
 
 MR. BURNS TO MR. THOMSON. 
 
 DiimfHes, \st December, 1792. 
 
 Yox-R alterations of my J^annie O are 
 perfectly right. So are those of My 
 %r)f'e\i n wanton wee thing. Your altera- 
 tion of the second stanza is a positive im- 
 provement. Now, my dear Sir, with the 
 freedom which characterizes our corres- 
 pondence, I must not, cannot, alter Bon- 
 nie Leslie. You are right, the word, 
 " Alexander" makes the line a little un- 
 couth, but I think the thought is pretty. 
 Of Alexander, beyond all other heroes, it 
 
LETTERS. 
 
 may be said in the sublime language of 
 Scripture, that "he went tbrth conquer- 
 ing and to conquer." 
 
 For Nature made her what she is, 
 
 ' uever made anither." (Such a person as she is ) 
 
 This is in my opinion more poetical 
 than " Ne'er made sic anither." How- 
 ever, 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. 
 
 The Lea-rig is as follows. [Here the 
 poet gives the two first stanzas, as before, 
 p. 193, with the following in addition.) 
 
 The hunter lo'es the morning sun, 
 
 To rouse the mountain deer, my jo : 
 At noon the fisher seeks the glen. 
 
 Along the burn to steer, my jo : 
 Gie utQ the hour o' gloamin gray. 
 
 It maks my heart sae cheery O, 
 To meet thee on the lea-rig, 
 
 My ain kind dearie, O. 
 
 No, X 
 
 r am mterrupted. 
 
 Yours, &c. 
 
 No. IX. 
 MR. BURNS TO MR. THOMSON. 
 
 Inclosing Auld Rob Morris, and Duncan 
 Gray. See Poems, p. 86. 
 
 4//;. Drcewhcr, 1792. 
 The foregoing [Auld Rob Morris and 
 Duncan Gray,) I submit, my doar Sir, to 
 your better judgment. Acquit them, or 
 condemn them as soemeth good in your 
 sight. Duncan Gray is that kind of light- 
 horse gallop of an air, which precludes 
 sentiment. TJie ludicrous is its rulino- 
 feature. 
 
 * Mr. Thomson has decided on .Vc'er made sic ani- 
 
 MR. BURNS TO MR. THOMSON. 
 
 With Poortith Cauld and Galla Water. 
 See Poems, pp. 86, 87. 
 
 January, 1793. 
 Many returns of the season to you, 
 my dear Sir. How comes on your pub- 
 lication ? will these two foregoing be of 
 any service to you ? I should like to know 
 what songs you print to each tune be- 
 sides the verses to which it is set. In 
 short, I would wish to give you my opi- 
 nion 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. 
 
 If you meet with my dear and much- 
 valued C. greet him in my name, with the 
 compliments of the season. 
 
 Yours, &c. 
 
 No. XI. 
 MR. THOMSON TO MR. BURNS. 
 
 Edinburgh, January 20, 1 793. 
 
 You make me happy my dear Sir, and 
 thousands will be happy to see the charm- 
 ing songs you have sent me. Many mer- 
 '■ ry returns of the season to you, and may 
 , you long continue, among the sons and 
 I daughters of Caledonia, to delight them 
 I and to honour yourself. 
 
 I The four last songs with which you fa- 
 j vnured me, viz. Auld Rob Morris, Dun- 
 I can Gray, Gnlhi Water, and Cauld Kail, 
 ! are admirable. Duncan is indeed a lad of 
 I grace, and his humour will endear him to 
 I every body 
 
 j The distracted lover in Auld Rob, and 
 I the happy Shepherdess in Galla Water, 
 j exhibit an excellent contrast : they speak 
 1 from genuine feeling, and powerfully touch 
 I the heart. 
 
 I The number of songs which I had ori- 
 ginally in viow was limiiec ; fcvl I now 
 resolve to inclacc everv Sc^'iXr ».'» tnd 
 
LETTERS. 
 
 song worth singing, leaving none behind 
 but mere gleanings, to which the publish- 
 ers of omnegntherum are welcome. I 
 would rather be the editor of a collection 
 from which nothing could betaken away, 
 than of one to which nothing could be 
 added. We intend presenting the sub- 
 scribers with two beautiful stroke en- 
 gravings ; the one characteristic of the 
 plaintive, and the other of the lively siongs; 
 and I have Dr. Beattie's promise of an 
 essay upon tiie subject of our national 
 music, if his health will permit him to 
 write it. As a number of our songs have 
 doubtless been called forth by particular 
 events, or by the charms of peerless dam- 
 sels, there must be many curious anec- 
 dotes relating to them. 
 
 The late Mr. Tytler of Woodhouselee, 
 I believe knew more of this than any body, 
 for he joined to the pursuits of an anti- 
 quary a taste for poetry, besides being a 
 man of the world, and possessing an en- 
 thusiasm for music beyond most of his 
 contemporaries. He was quite pleased 
 with this plan of mine, for I may say it 
 has been solely managed by me, and we 
 had several long conversations about it 
 when it was in embryo. If I could sim- 
 ply mention the name of the heroine of 
 each song, and the incident which occa- 
 sioned the verses, it would be gratifying. 
 Pray, will you send me any information 
 of this sort, as well with regard to your 
 own songs, as the old ones ' 
 
 To all the favourite songs of the plain- 
 tive or pastoral kind, will be joined the 
 delicate accompaniments, &c. of Pleyel. 
 To those of the comic and humorous class, 
 I think accompaniments scarcely neces- 
 sary ; they are chiefly fitted for the con- 
 viviality of the festive board, and a tune- 
 ful voice, with a proper delivery of the 
 words, renders them perfect. Neverthe- 
 less, to these I propose adding bass ac- 
 companiments, because then they are fit- 
 ted either for singing, or for instrumental 
 performance, when there happens to be 
 no singer. I mean to employ our right 
 trusty friend Mr. Clarke, to set the bass 
 to these, which he assures me he will do 
 con amove, and with much greater atten- 
 tion than he ever bestowed on any thing 
 of the kind. But for this last class of airs 
 I will not attempt to find more than one 
 set of verses. 
 
 That eccentric bard, Peter Pindar, has 
 started I know not how many difficulties 
 
 about writing fbr the airs I seat «• /iiin, 
 because of the peculiarity of their mea- 
 sure, and the trammels they impose on 
 his flying Pegasus. I subjoin for your 
 perusal the only one I have yet got from 
 him, being for the fine air " Lord Grego- 
 ry." The Scots verses printed with that 
 air, are taken from the middle of an old 
 ballad, called The Lass of Lochroyan, 
 which I do not admire. I have set down 
 the air therefore as a creditor of yours. 
 Many of the Jacobite songs are replete 
 with wit and humour, might not the best of 
 these be included in our volume of comic 
 songs ? 
 
 POSTSCRIPT. 
 FROM THE HON. A. ERSKINE. 
 
 Mr. Thomson has been so obliging aa 
 to give me a perusal of your songs. High- 
 land Mary is most enchantingly pathetic, 
 and Duncan Gray possesses native genu- 
 ine humour; "spak o' lowpin o'er a linn," 
 is a line of itself that should make you 
 immortal. I sometimes hear of you from 
 our mutual friend C. who is a most ex- 
 cellent fellow, and possesses, above all 
 men I know, the charm of a most oblig- 
 ing disposition. You kindly promised me, 
 about a year ago, a collection of your un- 
 published productions, religious and amo- 
 rous : I know from experience how irk- 
 some it is to copy. If you will get any 
 trusty person in Dumfries to write them 
 over fair, I will give Peter Hill whatever 
 money he asks for his trouble, and I cer- 
 tainly shall not betray your confidence. — 
 I am your hearty admirer, 
 
 ANDREW ERSKINE. 
 
 No. XII. 
 MR. BURNS TO MR. THOMSON. 
 
 26th January, 1 793. 
 
 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 tlie Doctor's 
 essay, containing my stock of anecdotes, 
 &c. of our Scots songs. All the late Mr. 
 Tytler's anecdotes I have bv me, taken 
 
LETTERS. 
 
 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 Scot- 
 land, I made a pilgrimage to the indivi 
 dual spot from which every song took its 
 rise ; Lochaber, and the Braes of Ballen- 
 den, 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. 
 
 I do not doubt but you might make a 
 very valuable collection of Jacobite songs ; 
 but would it give no offence * In the mean 
 time, 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 ? 
 
 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 naivete, 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 spright- 
 liness of our native music, than any Eng- 
 lish verses whatever. 
 
 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 sub- 
 ject, 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 mert, 
 has, I think, more of the ballad simplicity 
 in it.* 
 
 * For Burns's words, see Poems, p. 87. — The song 
 of Dr. Walcott, on the same subject, is as follows ; 
 
 Ah ! ope, Lord Gregoi-y, thy door! 
 
 A midnight wanderer sighs : 
 Hard rush the rains, the tempests roar, 
 
 And lightnings cleave the skies. 
 
 Who comes with wo at tliis drear night— 
 
 A pilgrim of the gloom 1 
 If she whose love did once delight, 
 
 My cot shall yield her room. 
 
 Alas ! thou heard'st a pilgrim mourn, 
 
 That once was prized by thee ; 
 Think of the ring by yonder burn 
 
 Thou gav'at to luve and me- 
 
 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. 
 
 No. XIII. 
 MR. BURNS TO MR. THOMSON 
 
 20th March, 17^3. 
 
 MT DEAR SIR, 
 
 The song prefixed is one of my ju- 
 venile works. f 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. 
 
 What is becomeof the list, &c. of your 
 songs .'' I shall be out of all temper with 
 you by and by. I have always looked 
 upon myself as the prince of indolent cor- 
 respondents, and valued myself accor- 
 dingly ; and I will not, cannot bear rival- 
 ship from you, nor any body else. 
 
 No. XIV. 
 MR. BURNS TO MR. THOMSON. 
 
 With the first copy of Wandering Willie. 
 See Poems, p. 88. 
 
 March, 1793. 
 
 I LEAVE it to you, my dear Sir, to de- 
 termine whether the above, or the old 
 Thro' the tang Muir, be the best. 
 
 But shouldst thou not poor Marian know, 
 
 I'll turn my feet and part: 
 And think tlie storms that round me blow. 
 
 Far kinder than thy lieart. 
 
 It is but doing justice to Dr. Walcott to mention, that 
 his song is the original. Mr- Burns saw it, liked it, 
 and imme<liately wrote the other on the same subject, 
 which is derived from an old Scottish ballad of uncer- 
 tain origin. E. 
 
 t Marv Moriaon, Poemn, p 8T 
 
soo 
 
 LETTERS. 
 
 No. XV. 
 
 MR. BUJINS TO MR. THOMSON. 
 
 OPEJf THE DOOR TO ME OH! 
 WITH ALTERATIONS. 
 
 Oh ! open the door, some pity to show, 
 Oh ! open the door to me. Oh !* 
 
 iSee Poems, p. 88. 
 
 I do not know whether this song be 
 really mended. 
 
 No. XVI. 
 MR. BURNS TO MR. THOMSON. 
 
 JESSIE. 
 'Fune — " Bonnie Dundee." 
 
 True hearted was he, the sad Swain o' 
 
 the Yarrow, 
 And fair are the maids on the banks o' 
 
 the Ayr ; 
 
 See Poems, p. 89. 
 
 No. xvn. 
 
 MR. THOMSON TO MR. BURNS. 
 
 Edinburgh, 2d April, 1793. 
 
 I wii.L not recognize the title you give 
 yourself, " the prince of indolent corres- 
 pondents ;" but if the adjective were 
 taken away, T think the title would then 
 fit you exactly. Tt gives me pleasure to 
 lind you can furnish anecdotes with re- 
 spect to most of the songs : these will be 
 a literary curiosity. 
 
 I now send you my list of the songs 
 which I believe will be found nearly com- 
 plete. T have put down the first lines of 
 all the English songs which I propose giv- 
 ing in addition to the Scotch verses. If 
 any others occur to you, better adapted 
 to the character of the airs, pray mention 
 them, when you favour me with your 
 
 • This seoml Une was originally, 
 
 l(hvi it may na be, O ! 
 
 strictures upon every thing else rclatmg 
 to the work. 
 
 Pleyel has lately sent me a number of 
 the songs, with his symphonies and ac- 
 companiments added to them. I wish 
 you were here, that I might serve up some 
 of them to you with your own verses, by 
 way of dessert after dinner. There is so 
 much dehghtful fancy in the symphonies, 
 and such a delicate simplicity in the ac- 
 companiments — they are indeed beyond 
 all praise. 
 
 I am very much pleased with the seve- 
 ral last productions of your muse : your 
 Lord Gregory, in my estimation, is more 
 interesting than Peter's, beautiful as his 
 is ! Your Here awa Willie must undergo 
 some alterations to suit the air. Mr. 
 Erskine and I have been conning it over; 
 he will suggest what is necessary to make 
 them a fit match.* 
 
 The gentleman I have mentioned, whose 
 fine taste you are no stranger to, is so 
 well pleased both with the musical and 
 poetical part of our work, that .he has 
 volunteered his assistance, and has al- 
 ready written four songs for it, which, 
 by his own desire, I send for your pe- 
 rusal. 
 
 No. XVIII. 
 MR. BURNS TO MR. THOMSON. 
 \v^^E^f wild wae's deadly blast was 
 
 BLAWN. 
 jlir—'' The Mill Mill O." 
 
 Wht-.n wild war's deadly blast was blawn. 
 And gentle peace returning. 
 
 See Poems, p. 89. 
 
 * S«e the altered copy of Wandering Willie, p. 88. 
 of the Poems. Several of the alterations seem to be of 
 litllp injportance in themselves, and were addpted, it 
 may be presumed, for the saKc of suiting the words 
 be;i(M- to the music. The Homeric epithet for the sea, 
 (lark-heaving, suggested by Mr. Erskine.is in itself more 
 beaiiiiful, as well perliaps as more sublime, than wild 
 roarivg-, which he has retained ; but as it is only ap 
 plicable to a placid state of the sea, or at most to the 
 swell left on its surface after the storm is over, itgivea 
 a picture of that element not so well adapted to the 
 ideas of eternal separation, which the fair mourner is 
 supposed to imprecate. From the original song of 
 Here awa IVillie, Burns has borrowed nothing but the 
 second line and part of the fir.'!'.. The superior excel 
 lenee of this beautiiul poem, will, it is hoped, justify 
 the different editions of it which we have given, E. 
 
LETTERS. 
 
 201 
 
 MEG O' THE MILL. 
 
 iir — " O bonnie lass will you lie in a barrack." 
 
 O KEN ye what Meg o' the Mill has got- 
 ten, 
 
 An' ken ye what Meg o' the Mill has got- 
 ten? 
 
 See Poems, p. 89. 
 
 No. XIX. 
 MR. BURNS TO MR. THOMSON. 
 1th April, 1793. 
 
 Thank you, my dear Sir, for your 
 packet. You cannot imagine how much 
 this business of composing for your publi- 
 cation has added to my enjoyments. 
 What with my early attachment to bal- 
 lads, your books, &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 hap- 
 py, 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 ofCoila* shall be, " Good night 
 and joy be wi' j'^ou a' !" So much for my 
 past words : now for a few present re- 
 marks, as they liavB occurred at random 
 on looking over your list. 
 
 The fir-t 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. For ever, Fortune, rcilt 
 thou prove, is a charming song ! but Lo- 
 gan burn and Lo^nn hraes, are sweetly 
 susceptible of rural imagery : I'll try that 
 likewise, and if I succeed, the other song 
 may class among the English ones. I re- 
 member 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. 
 
 • Burns here calls himself the yoiee of Coil a in imi- 
 tation of Ossian, who denominates himself the Voice 
 efCona. Sae merry as we a' hae been ; and Oood night 
 and joy be »>' you a', ara the namei of two Scottish 
 tunes. 
 
 " Now my dear lad maun face his faes, 
 Far, far frae me and Logan braes." 
 
 My Patie is a lover gay, is unequal. 
 " His mind is never muddy," is a muddy 
 expression indeed. 
 
 ' Then I'll resign and marry P 
 And syne my cockernony." — 
 
 Pate, 
 
 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 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 senti- 
 ment in it, which my much valued friend 
 Mr. Erskine will take into his critical con- 
 sideration. — In Sir J. Sinclair's Statisti- 
 cal 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. 
 
 Allan Ramsay was residing at Loudon- 
 castle with the then Earl, father to Earl 
 John ; and one forenoon, riding or walk- 
 ing 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 head- 
 ed on the green." My Lord observed to 
 Allan, that it would be a fine theme for a 
 song. Ramsay took the hint, and linger- 
 ing behind, he composed the first sketch 
 of it, which he produced at dinner. 
 
 One day I heard Mary say, 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 hut care 
 on every hand, is much superior to Poor- 
 tith cauld. The original song, The Mill 
 Mill O, 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, 
 
 " And tvreetlf Iht nightingals sunii from the trM." 
 
202 
 
 LETTERS. 
 
 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. If I could 
 hit on another stanza, equal to The small 
 birds rejoice, &lc. I do myself honestly 
 avow, that I think it a superior song.* 
 John Anderson my jo — the song to this 
 tune in Johnson's Museum, is my compo- 
 sition, and I think it not my worst : 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 pre- 
 servation ? There is also one sentimen- 
 tal 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 Scot- 
 tish songs. He is quite an enthusiast 
 about it : and I would take his taste in 
 Scottish music against the taste of most 
 connoisseurs. 
 
 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 j 
 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 is not quite a lady's song. 
 I enclose an altered, not amended copy 
 for you, if you choose to-set the tune to 
 it, and let the Irish verses follow. f 
 
 Mr. Erskine's songs are all pretty, but 
 his Lone Vale, is divine. 
 
 Yours, &c. 
 
 liet me know just how you like these 
 random hints. 
 
 * It will bfi found, in the course of thU correspon- 
 dence, that tliR Bard produced a second stanza of The 
 Chevalier's Lament (to which lie here alludes) worthy 
 of the first E. 
 
 t Mr. Thomson, it appears, did not approve of this 
 song, even in its altered state. It does not appear rn 
 the correspondence ; but it is probably one to be found 
 In his MSS. beginning, 
 
 " Yestreen I got a pint of wine, 
 A place wlierc body saw na; 
 
 No. XX. 
 
 MR. THOMSON TO MR. BURNS.' 
 
 Edinburgh, April, 1793. 
 
 I REJOICE to find, my dear Sir, that 
 ballad-making continues to be your hobby- 
 horse. Great pity 'twould be were it 
 otherwise. I hope you will amble it away 
 for many a year, and " witch the world 
 with your horsemanship." 
 
 I know there are a good many lively 
 songs of merit that I have not put down 
 in the list sent you ; but I have them all 
 in my eye. J\Iy Patie is a lover gay, 
 though a little unequal, is a natural and 
 very pleasing song, and I humbly think 
 we ought not to displace or alter it, ex 
 cept the last stanza.* 
 
 No. XXI 
 
 MR. BURNS TO MR. THOMSON. 
 
 April, 1793. 
 
 I HAVE yours, my dear Sir, this mo- 
 ment. I shall answer it and your former 
 letter, in my desultory way of saying 
 whatever comes uppermost. 
 
 The business of many of our tunes want- 
 ing, at the beginning, what fiddlers call 
 a starting-note, is often a rub to us poor 
 rhymers. 
 
 " There's braw, braw lads on Yarrow 
 braes. 
 
 That wander through the blooming hea- 
 ther," 
 
 you may alter to 
 
 " Braw, braw lads on Yarrow braes, 
 Ye wander," &c. 
 
 Yestreen lay on this breast of mine, 
 The gowden locks of Anna." 
 
 It is highly characteristic of our Bard, but the strain 
 of sentiment does not correspond with the air to which 
 he proposes it should be allied. E. 
 
 * The original letter from Mr. Thomson contains 
 many observations on the Scottish songs, and on the 
 manner of adapting the words to the music, which, at 
 his desire, are suppressed. The subsequent letter of 
 Mr. Burns refers to several of these obseivalioni. E 
 
LETTERS. 
 
 S03 
 
 My song, Here awa, there awa, as 
 amended by Mr. Erskine, I entirely ap- 
 prove of, and return you.* 
 
 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, 
 1 mean simplicity: now, if I mistake not, 
 this last feature you are a little apt to 
 sacrifice to the foregoing. 
 
 Ramsay, as every other poet, has not 
 been always equally happy in his pieces; 
 still I cannot approve of taking such li- 
 berties with an author as Mr. W. pro- 
 poses doing with The la.it time I came o'er 
 the moor. Let a poet, if he chooses, 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 ver- 
 sion is an improvement : but I know Mr. 
 W. well, and esteem him much ; let him 
 mend the song, as the Highlander mend- 
 ed his gun — he gave it a new stock, a 
 new lock, and a new barrel. 
 
 I do not bv this object to leaving out 
 improper stanzas, where that can be done 
 without spoiling the wholft. One stanza 
 in The Lass of Patie's ,M>U, must be left 
 out : the song will be nothmg worse for 
 it. I am not sure if we can take the same 
 liberty with Corn ri°-s are bonnic. Per- 
 haps it might want the last stanza, and be 
 the better for it. Cauld kaU in Jiherdeen 
 you must leave with me yet a wliile. I 
 have vowed to have a song to that air, on 
 the lady whom I attempted to celebrate 
 in the verses Poortith cdidd 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 pro- 
 gress of your song to celebrity. Your 
 book will be the standard of Scots songs 
 for the future: let this idea ever keep 
 vour judgment on the alarm. 
 
 I send a song, on a celebrated toast in 
 
 * The reader lias already seen that Burns did not 
 finally adopt all of Mr. Erakine's alteratioiia. E. 
 
 Bb2 
 
 this country, to suit Bonnie Dundee. I 
 send you also a ballad to the Jlill Mill O.* 
 
 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 seve- 
 ral MS. Scots airs by me which I have 
 picked up, mostly from the singing of 
 country lasses. They please me vastly ; 
 but your learned lugs 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 La- 
 ment ? I have a song of considerable me- 
 rit to that air. I'll enclose you both the 
 song and tune, as I had them ready to 
 send to Johnson's Museum. f I send you 
 likewise, to me, a very beautiful little air, 
 which T had taken down from viva voce.\ 
 Adieu ! 
 
 No. XXII 
 MR. BURNS TO MR. THOMSON 
 April, 1793. 
 
 MY DEAR SIR, 
 
 I HAD scarcely put my last letter into 
 the post-office, when I took up the sub- 
 ject of The last time I came o'er the moor, 
 and, ere I slept, drew the outlines of the 
 foregoing.} How far I have succeeded, 
 I leave on this, as on every other occa- 
 sion, 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 often told you, I 
 do not in a single instance wish you, out 
 of compliment to me, to insert any thing 
 of mine. One hint let me give you — 
 
 * The song to the tune of Bonnie Dundee, is that 
 given ill the Poems, p 89. The ballad to the Mill Mill 
 U, is lliat beginning, 
 
 " When wild war's deadly blast was blawn." 
 
 t The song here mentioned is that given in the 
 Poems, p. 89. O lien ye what Meg o' the Mill has got- 
 ten? Tills song is surely Mr. Burns's own writing, 
 though hi; does not generally praise his own songs so 
 much. 
 
 JVote by Mr. Thomson. 
 
 t The air here menlioncd is that for which he wrote 
 the ballad o{ Bonnie Jean, given in p. 90 of the Poems 
 i See Poems, page 145 — Toung Peggy. 
 
204 LETTERS. 
 
 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, per- 
 haps, depends a great part of their effect. 
 
 No. XXIIT. 
 
 MR. THOMSON TO MR. BURNS. 
 
 Edinburgh, 2Gth April, 1793. 
 I HEARTILY thank you, my dear Sir, 
 for your last two letters, and the songs 
 which accompanied them. I am always 
 both instructed and entertained by obser- 
 vations ; and the frankness with which 
 you speak out your mind, is to me highly 
 agreeable. It is very possible I may not 
 have the true idea of simpUcity in com- 
 position. I confess there, are several 
 songs, of Allan Ramsay's for example, 
 that I think silly enough, which another 
 person, more conversant than I have been 
 with country people, would perhaps call 
 simple and natural. But the lowest 
 scenes of simple nature will not please 
 generally, if copied precisely as they are. 
 The poet, like the painter, must select 
 what will form an agreeable as well as a 
 natural picture. On this subject it were 
 easy to enlarge ; but at present suffice it 
 to say, that 1 consider simplicity, rightly 
 understood, as a most essential quality in 
 composition, and the ground-work of beau- 
 ty in all the arts. I will gladly appro- 
 priate your most interesting new ballad, 
 ffhen wild war's deadly blast. Sic. to the 
 Mill Mill O, as well as the two other 
 Bongs to their respective airs ; but the 
 third and fourth lines of the first verse 
 must undergo some little alteration in or- 
 der to suit "the music. Pleyel does not 
 alter a single note of the songs. That 
 would be absurd indeed ! With the airs 
 which he introduces into the sonatas, I 
 allow him to take such liberties as he 
 pleases ; but that has nothing to do with 
 the songs. 
 
 P. S. I wish you would do as you pro- 
 posed with your i2'>s of Barley. If the 
 loose sentiments are threshed out of it, I 
 will find an air for it : but as to this there 
 is no hurrv. 
 
 No. XXIV. 
 
 MR. BURNS TO MR. THOMSON. 
 
 June, 1793. 
 When I tell you, my dear Sir, that a 
 friend of mine, m whom I am much in- 
 terested, 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 pecuni- 
 ary matters, is trifling ; but the total ruin 
 of a much-loved friend, is a loss indeed. 
 Pardon my seeming inattention to your 
 last commande. 
 
 I cannot alter the disputed lines in the 
 Mill Mill O.* What you think a defect 
 I esteem as a positive beauty ; so yon see 
 how doctors differ. I shall now with as 
 much alacrity as I can muster, go on with 
 your commands. 
 
 You know Frazer, the hautboy-player 
 in Edinburgh — he is here, instructing a 
 band of music for a fencible corps quar- 
 tered in this country. Among many of 
 his airs that please me, there is one, well 
 known as a reel, by the name of The Qua- 
 ker'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 hear subjoin ; 
 and enclose Frazer's set of the tune. If 
 they hit your fancy, they are at your ser- 
 vice ; if not, return me the tune, and I will 
 put it -n Johnson's Museum. I think the 
 song is not in my worst manner. 
 
 Bltthe hae I been on yon hill, 
 As the lambs before me ; 
 
 See Poems, p. 90. 
 
 * The lines were ihe third and fourth. See Poems, 
 p. 98. 
 
 " Wi' mony a sweet babe fatherless, 
 And mony a widow mourning." 
 
 As our poet bad maintained a long silence, and the 
 first number of Mr. Thomson's Musical Work was in 
 the press, this gentleman ventured by Mr. Ersklne's 
 advice, to substitute for them in that publication, 
 
 " And eyes again with pleasure beara'd 
 That had bnen blear'd with mourning." 
 
 Though better suited to the music, thepe lines are Infe- 
 rior to the original. This U the only alteration adopted 
 by Mr. Thomson, which Burns did not approve, or aC 
 least assent to. 
 
LETTERS. 
 
 205 
 
 should wish to near now this pleases | 
 
 you. 
 
 No. XXV. 
 MR. BURNS TO MR. THOMSON. 
 
 25th June, 11 93. 
 
 Have you ever, my dear Sir, felt your 
 bosom ready to burst with indignation on 
 reading of those mighty villains who di- 
 vide kingdom against kingdom, 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 ori- 
 gin from the plaintive indignation of some 
 swelling, suffering heart, fired at the ty- 
 rannic strides of some public destroyer ; 
 and overwhelmed with private distress, 
 the consequence of a country's ruin. If 
 I have done any thing at all like justice 
 to my feehngs, the following song, com- 
 posed in three quarters of an hour's me- 
 ditation in my elbow chair, ought to have 
 eome merit 
 
 O Logan, sweetly didst thou glide, 
 That day I was my Willie's bride ; 
 See Poemx. p. 90. 
 
 Do you know the following beautiful 
 little fragment in Witherspoon"s Collec- | 
 tioQ of Scots Songs ? 
 
 " O gin my love were yon red rose, 
 
 That grows upon the castle wa' ;" 
 
 See Poems, p. 90. 
 
 This thought is inexpressibly beautiful : 
 and quite, so far as I know, original. It 
 is too short for a song, else I would for- 
 swear you altogether, unless you gave it I 
 a place. I have often tried to eke a stan- 
 za to it, but m vain. After balancing 
 myself for a musing five mumtes. on the 
 hind legs of my elbow chair, I produced 
 the following. 
 
 The verses are far inferior to the fore- 
 going, I frankly confess ; but if worthy of 
 insertion at all, they might be first in 
 place ; as every poet, who knows any 
 thing of his trade, will husband his best 
 thoughts for a concluding stroke. 
 
 O, were my love yon lilach fair, 
 Wi' purple blossoms to the spring ; 
 See Poems, p. 90. 
 
 No. XXVI. 
 MR. THOMSON TO MR. BURNS. 
 
 Monday, 1st July, 1793. 
 
 I AM extremely sorry, my good Sir, 
 that any thing should happen to unhinge 
 you. The times are terribly out of tune ; 
 and when harmony will be restored, Hea- 
 ven knows. 
 
 The first book of songs, just published, 
 will be despatched to you along with this. 
 Let me be favoured with your opinion of 
 it frankly and freely. 
 
 I shall certainly give a place to the 
 song you have written for the Quaker's 
 Wife; it is quite enchanting. Pray will 
 you return the list of songs with such airs 
 added to it as you think ought to be in- 
 cluded. The business now rests entirely 
 on myself, the gentlemen who originally 
 agreed to join the speculation having re- 
 quested to be off". No matter, a loser I 
 cannot be. The superior excellence of 
 the work will create a general demand 
 for it as soon as it is properly known. 
 And were the sale even slower than it 
 promises to be, I should be somewhat 
 compensated for my labour, by the plea- 
 sure T shall receive from the music. I 
 cannot express how much I am obliged 
 to you for the exquisite new songs you 
 are sending me ; but thanks, my friend, 
 are a poor return for what you have done: 
 as I shall be benefited by the publication, 
 you must suffer me to enclose a small 
 mark of my gratitude,* and to repeat it 
 afterwards when I find it convenient. 
 Do not return it, for, by Heaven, if you 
 do, our correspondence is at an end : and 
 though this would be no loss to you, it 
 would mar the publication, which under 
 your auspices cannot fail to be respecta 
 ble and interesting. 
 
 Wednesday Jiforning. 
 I thank you for your delicate additional 
 verses to the old fragment, and for your 
 
206 
 
 LETTERS. 
 
 exceuent song to Logan Water ; Thom- 
 son's truly elegant one will follow, for the 
 English singer. Your apostrophe to 
 statesmen is admirable : but I am not 
 sure if it is quite suitable to the supposed 
 gentle character of the fair mourner who 
 speaks it. 
 
 No. XXVII. 
 MR. BURNS TO MR. THOMSON. 
 
 July 2d, 1793. 
 
 U7 DEAR SIR, 
 
 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 remem- 
 ber it. 
 
 There was a lass, and she was fair, 
 At kirk and market to be seen ; 
 
 See Poems, p. 90 and 91. 
 
 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. 
 
 The heroine of the foregoing is Miss 
 M. daughter to Mr. M. of D. 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. 
 
 No. XXVIIT. 
 MR. BURNS TO MR. THOMSON. 
 
 July, 1793. 
 
 I ASSURE you, my dear Sir, that you 
 truly hurt me with your pecuniary parcel. 
 It degrades me in my own eyes. Tlowever 
 to return it would savour of afiVctafion : 
 but as to any more traffic of that debtor 
 
 and creditor kind, I swear by that Honour 
 which crowns the upright statue of Ro- 
 bert Burns's Integrity — on the least 
 motion of it, I will indignantly spurn the 
 by-past transaction, and from that mo- 
 ment commence entire stranger to you ! 
 Burns's character for generosity of sen- 
 timent and independence of mind, will, I 
 trust, long out-live any of his wants which 
 the cold unfeeling ore can supply : at least, 
 I will take care that such a character he 
 shall deserve. 
 
 Thank you for my copy of your publi- 
 cation. Never did my eyes behold, in 
 any musical work, such elegance and cor- 
 rectness. 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. 
 
 The Flotcers of 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, 
 
 " I bae seen the smiling o' fortune beguiling," 
 
 are worthy of a place, were it but to im- 
 mortalize 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. What a charm- 
 ing apostrophe is 
 
 " O fiekle fortune, why this cruel sporting, 
 Why, why torment us— yoor sons of a day !" 
 
 The old ballad, / 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, for- 
 geries) has the best set. It is fuU of his 
 own interpolations, but no matter. 
 
 In my next I will suggest to your con- 
 sideration a few songs which may hive 
 
 * There is a copy of this ballad given in the account 
 of the Parish of Kirkpatrick-Fleeming (which cntafais 
 the tomb of fair Helen Irviae,) in the Statistics of Sir 
 John Sinclair, vol. xiii. p. 275, to which tbia character 
 13 certainly not applicable. 
 
escaped your hurried notice, 
 mean time, 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 Sons and Daugh- 
 ters of Taste — all whom poesy can 
 please, or music charm. 
 
 Being a bard of nature, I have some 
 pretensions to second sight ; and I am 
 warranted by the spirit to foretell and af- 
 firm, 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." 
 
 No. XXIX. 
 MR. THOMSON TO MR. BURNS. 
 
 LETTERS. 
 In the 
 
 207 
 
 Edinburgh, lat August, 1793. 
 
 T HAD the pleasure of receiving .your 
 last two letters, and am happy to find you 
 are quite pleased with the appearance of 
 the first book. When you come to hear 
 the songs sung and accompanied, you wUl 
 be charmed with them. 
 
 The bonnie bracket Lassie, certainly de- 
 serves better verses, and I hope you will 
 match her. Could Kail in Aberdeen — 
 Let me in this ae night, and several of the 
 livelier airs, wait the muse's leisure : 
 these are peculiarly worthy of her choice 
 gifts : besides, you'll notice, that in airs 
 of this sort, the singer can always do 
 greater justice to the poet, than in the 
 slower airs of The Bush aboon Traquair, 
 Lord Gregory, and the like ; for in the 
 manner the latter are frequently sung, 
 you must be contented with the sound, 
 without the sense. Indeed both the airs 
 and words are disguised by the very slo.w, 
 languid, psalm-singing style in which they 
 are too often performed, they lose anima- 
 tion and expression altogether ; and in- 
 stead of speaking to the mind, or touching 
 the heart, they cloy upon the ear, and set 
 us a yawning ! 
 
 Your ballad, There was a lass and she 
 xDOs.fair, is simple and beautiful, and shall 
 undoubtedly grace mv collection. 
 
 No. XXX. 
 
 MR. BURNS TO MR. THOMSON. 
 
 August, 1793. 
 
 MY DEAR THOMSON, 
 
 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 fs rather out of tune ; so 
 until he rectify that matter, he cannot 
 stoop to terrestrial affairs. 
 
 He sends you six of the Rondeau sub- 
 jects, and if more are wanted, he says you 
 shall have them. 
 
 Confound your long stairs ! 
 
 S. CLARKE 
 
 No. XXXI. 
 
 MR. BURNS TO MR. THOMSON 
 
 August, 1793. 
 
 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 pas- 
 sage you object to, does not appear in the 
 same light to me. 
 
 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 any thing better to it. 
 
 PHILLIS THE FAIR. 
 
 While larks with little wing, 
 Fann'd the pure air. 
 
 See Poems, p. 91. 
 
 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. 
 
 I have just put the last hand to the song 
 I meant for Cauld Kail in Aberdeen. If 
 it suits you to msert it, I shall be pleased, 
 as the herome is a favourite of mine ; if 
 not, I shall also be pleased; because I 
 
LETTERS. 
 
 wish, and will be glad, to see you act de- 
 cidedly on the business.* 'Tis a tribute 
 as a man of taste, and as an editor, which 
 you owe yourself. 
 
 No. XXXII. 
 MR, THOMSON TO MR. BURNS. 
 
 August, 1793. 
 
 MY GOOD SIR, 
 
 I CONSIDER it one of the most agree- 
 able circumstances attending this publi- 
 cation of mine, that it has procured me 
 so many of your much valued epistles. 
 Pray make my acknowledgments to St. 
 Stephen for the tunes : tell him I admit 
 the justness of his complaint on ray stair- 
 case, conveyed in his laconic postscript 
 to your jew d' esprit, which I perused more 
 than once, without discovering exactly 
 whether your discussion was music, as- 
 tronomy, or politics : though a sagacious 
 friend, acquainted with the convivial ha- 
 bits of the poet and the musician, offered 
 me a bet of two to one, you were just 
 drowning care together ; that an empty 
 bowl was the only thing that would deeply 
 aifect you, and the only matter vou could 
 then studj' how to remedy ! 
 
 I shall be glad to see you give Robin 
 Mair a Scottish dress. Peter is furnish- 
 ing him with anEnglis^hsuitfor a change, 
 and you are well matched together. Ro- 
 bin's air is excellent, though he certainly 
 has an ont of the way measure as ever 
 Poor Parnassian wight was plagued with. 
 I wish you would invoke the muse for a 
 ginffle elegant stanza* to be substituted 
 for^he concluding objectionable verses of 
 Down the Burn Dai'ie, so that this most 
 exquisite song may no longer be excluded 
 from good company. 
 
 Mr. Allan has made an inimitable draw- 
 ing from your John Anderson my Jo, 
 which I am to have engraved as a fron- 
 tispiece to the humourous class of songs: 
 you will be quite charmed with it I pro. 
 inise you. The old couple are seated by 
 the fireside. Mrs. Anderson, in great 
 good humour, is clapping John's shoul- 
 ders, while he smiles, and looks at her 
 
 * The song herewilli sent, is lliai in o. 92, of Uic 
 
 with sucn giee, as to show that he fully 
 recollects the pleasant days and nights 
 when they •were first acquent. The draw- 
 ing would do honour to the pencil of 
 Teniers. 
 
 No. XXXIII. 
 MR. BURNS TO MR. THOMSON 
 
 August, 1793. 
 
 That crinkum-crankum tune Robin 
 Adair, has run so in my head, and I suc- 
 ceeded so ill in my last attempt, that I 
 have ventured in this morning's walk, one 
 essay more. You, my dear Sir, will re- 
 member an unfortunate part of our worthy 
 friend C.'s story, which happened about 
 three years ago. That struck my fancy, 
 and I endeavoured to do the idea justice 
 as follows : 
 
 SONG. 
 
 Had I a cave on some wild distant shore, 
 Where the winds howl to the waves' dash- 
 ing roar •. 
 
 See Poems, p. 91. 
 
 By the way, I have met with a musical 
 Highlander in Bredalbane's Fencibles. 
 which are quartered here, who assures 
 me that he well remembers his mother's 
 singing Gaelic songs to both Robin Adair 
 and Gramachree. They certainly have 
 more of the Scotch than Irish taste in 
 them. 
 
 This man comes from the vicinity of 
 Inverness ; so it could not be any inter- 
 course with Ireland that could bring them; 
 — except, what I shrewdly suspect to be 
 the case, the wandering minstrels, har- 
 pers, and pipers, used to go frequently 
 errant through the wilds both of Scotland 
 and Ireland, and so some favourite airs 
 miglit be common to both. A case in 
 in point — They have lately in Ireland, 
 published an Irish air as they say ; called 
 Criun du delhh. The fact is, in a publi- 
 cation 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 
 nau)e there, I think, is Oran Gnnll, and 
 a fine air it is. Do ask honest Allan, or 
 the Rrv. Gaelic Parson, about these 
 matters. 
 
LETTERS. 
 
 209 
 
 No. XXXIV. 
 MR. BURNS TO MR. THOMSON. 
 
 August, 1793. 
 
 MY DEAR SIR, 
 
 Let me in this ae night, I will consider. 
 I am glad that you are pleased with my 
 song, Had J a cave, &c., as I liked it my- 
 self. 
 
 T walked out yesterday evening with a 
 volume of the Museum in my hand ; when 
 turning up Allan Water, " What num- 
 bers 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 intro- 
 duced the line in its place which I pre- 
 sume it formerly occupied ; though I like- 
 wise give you a chusing line, if it should 
 not hit the cut of your fancy. 
 
 By Allan stream I chanced to rove, 
 While Phoebus sank beyond Benleddi,* 
 See Poems, p. 91. 
 
 Bravo! say I: it is a good song. Should 
 you think so too (ncJt 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. 
 
 God bless you ! 
 
 No. XXXV. 
 
 MR. BURNS TO MR. THOMSON. 
 
 August, 1793. 
 Is Whistle, and Til come to you, my 
 lad, one of your airs ; I admire it much ; 
 
 • A mountain, west of Strath- A 11 an, 3,009 feet high. 
 
 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. How- 
 ever, if the song does not suit your taste, 
 I may possibly send it him. The set 
 of tlie air which I had in my eye is in 
 Johnson's Museum. 
 
 O WHISTLE, and I'll come to you, my lad,* 
 O whistle, and I'll come to you, my lad ; 
 See Poems, p. 92. 
 
 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 en- 
 deavoured to supply as follows : 
 
 Adown winding Nith I did wander,f 
 To mark the sweet flowers as they spring : 
 See Poems, p. 92. 
 
 Mr. Clarke begs you to give Miss Phil- 
 lis a corner in your book, as she is a par- 
 ticular flame of his. She is a Miss P. M. 
 sister to Bonnie Jean. They are both pu- 
 pils of his. You shall hear from me the 
 very first grist I get from my rhyming- 
 mill. 
 
 No. XXXVI. 
 
 MR. BURNS TO MR. THOMSON. 
 
 August, 1793. 
 That tune, Cauld Kail, is such a fa- 
 vourite of yours, that I once more roved 
 out yesterday for a gloamin-shot at the 
 muses ; J when the muse that presides o'er 
 the shores of Nith, or rather my old in- 
 
 ♦ In some of the MSS. the four first lines run thus : 
 O whistle, and I'll come to thee, my jo, 
 O whistle, and I'll come to the«, my jo; 
 Tho' father and mother, and a' should say no, 
 O whistle and I'll eome to thee, my jo. 
 
 See also Letter, No. LXXVII. 
 t This song, certainly beautiful, would appear to 
 more advantage without the chorus ; as is indeed tho 
 case with several other songs of our author. E. 
 
 t Gloamin— twilight ; probably from glooming. A 
 beautiful poetical word which ought to be adopted iu 
 England. ^ gloamin shot, a twilight interview. 
 
210 
 
 LETTERS. 
 
 spiring, dearest nymph, Coila, whispered 
 me the following. I have two reasons for 
 thinking that it was my early, sweet, sim- 
 ple inspirer that was by my elbow, " smooth 
 gliding without step," and pouring the 
 song on my glowing fancy. In the iirst 
 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 sus- 
 pect that she has followed me hither, or 
 at least makes me occasional visits : se- 
 condly, 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. 
 
 Come, let me take thee to my breast. 
 And pledge we ne'er shall sunder ; 
 
 See Poems, p. 92. 
 
 If' you think the above will suit your 
 idea of your favourite air, I shall be highly 
 pleased. The last time I came o'er the 
 moor, I cannot meddle with, as to mend- 
 ing 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. 
 
 No. XXXVII. 
 MR. BURNS TO MR. THOMSON. 
 
 August 1793. 
 DAINTY DAVIE."" 
 
 Now rosy May comes in wi' flowers, 
 To deck her gay, green spreading bow- 
 ers; 
 
 See Poems, p. 93. 
 
 So much for Davie. The chorus, yon 
 know, IS to the low part of the tune. See 
 Clarke's set of it in the Museum. 
 
 N. B. In the Museum they have drawl- 
 ed out the tune to twelve lines of poetry, 
 which is **** nonsense. Four lines of 
 Bong, and four of chorus, is the way. 
 
 * Dainty Davie is the title of an old Pcotcli song, 
 from which Burns liaa falcen nothing but the title and 
 the measure. B. 
 
 No. XXXVIII. 
 
 MR. THOMSON TO MR. BURNS 
 
 Edinburgh, 1st Sept. 1793- 
 
 MY DEAR SIR, 
 
 Since writing you last, I have re- 
 ceived half a dozen songs, with which I 
 am delighted beyond expression. The 
 humour and fancy of Whistle, and I'll 
 come to you, my lad, will render it nearly 
 as great a favourite as Duncan Gray. 
 Come, let me take thee to my breast — Adown 
 winding Jfith, and By Allan stream, &lc., 
 are full of imagination and feeling, and 
 sweetly suit the airs for which they are 
 intended. Had I a cave on some wild dis^ 
 tant shore, is a striking and affecting com- 
 position. Our friend, to whose story it 
 refers, read it with a swelling heart, I 
 assure you. The union we are now form- 
 ing, I think, can never be broken ; these 
 songs of yours will descend with the mu- 
 sic to the latest posterity, and will be 
 fondly cherished so long as genius, taste 
 and sensibility exist in our island. 
 
 While the muse seems so propitious, I 
 think it right to enclose a list of all the 
 favours I have to ask of her, no fewer 
 than twenty and three ! I have burdened 
 the pleasant Peter with as many as it is 
 probable he will attend to : most of the 
 remaining airs would puzzle the English 
 poet not a little ; they are of that pecu- 
 liar measure and rhythm, that they must 
 be familiar to him who writes for them. 
 
 No. XXXIX. 
 MR. BURNS TO MR. THOMSON. 
 
 Sept. 1793. 
 
 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 Pin- 
 dar 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. 
 
 You know that my pretensions to mu- 
 sical taste are merely a few of nature's 
 instincts, untaught and untutored by art. 
 For this reason, many musical compogi- 
 
LETTERS. 
 
 211 
 
 tions, particularly where much of the me- 
 rit lies in counterpoint, however they may 
 transport and ravish the ears of you con- 
 noisseurs, affect my simple lug no other- 
 wise 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 tatlie tailtie may rank among this 
 number : but well I know that, with Fra- 
 zer's hautboy, it has often filled my eyes 
 with tears. There is a tradition, which 
 1 have met with in many places of Scot- 
 land, that it was Robert Bruce's march 
 at the battle of Bannockburn. This 
 thought, in my solitary wanderings, warm- 
 ed me to a pitch of enthusiasm on the 
 themeof Libortyand Independence, which 
 1 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 that eventful morn- 
 ing.* 
 
 So may God ever defend the cause of 
 truth and Liberty, as He did that day! — 
 Amen. 
 
 P. S. T 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 thit glorious strtiggle for freedom 
 
 cal beast enough, lias yet this blessed 
 headstrong property, that when once it 
 has fairly made off with a hapless wight, 
 it gets so enainjured with the tinkle-gin- 
 gle, tinkle-gingle, of its own bells, that it 
 is sure to run poor pilgarlic, the bedlam- 
 jockey, quite beyond any useful point or 
 post in the common race of man. 
 
 The following song I have composed 
 for Oron Grtoil, the Highland air that you 
 tell me in your last, you have resolved to 
 give a place to in your book. I have this 
 I moment finished the song, so you have it 
 njowing from the mint. If it suit you, 
 well ! — if not, 'tis also well ! 
 
 Behold the hour, the boat arrive ; 
 Thou goest, thou darling of my heart! 
 See Poems, p. 93. 
 
 No. XLI. 
 MR. THOMSON TO MR. BURNS. 
 
 Edinburgh, 5th September, 1793. 
 
 I BELIEVE it is generally allowed that 
 the greatest modesty is the sure attend- 
 ant of the greatest merit. While you are 
 sociated with the glowing ideas of some I sending me verses that even Shakspeare 
 other struggles of the same nature, not I might be proud to own, you speak of them 
 quite so ancient, roused my rhyming ma- i as if they were ordinary productions ! 
 nia. Clarke's set of the tune, with his | Your heroic ode is to me the noblest com- 
 bass, you will find in the Museum ; though | position of the kind in the Scottish lan- 
 I am afraid that the air is not what will i giiagc. I happened to dine yesterday 
 entitle it to a place in your elegant selec- with a party of our friends, to whom I 
 tion. I read it. They were all charmed with it ; 
 
 I intreated me to find out a suitable air 
 — * — I for it, and reprobated the idea of giving 
 
 it a tune so totally devoid of interest or 
 grandeur as He'/ futtie tnitttc. Assuredly 
 your partiality for this tune must arise 
 from the ideas associated in your mind by 
 the tradition concerning it ; for I never 
 heard any person, and I have conversed 
 again and again, with the greatest enthu- 
 siasts for Scottish airs, I say I never 
 heard any one speak of it as worthy of 
 notice. 
 
 No. XL 
 
 MR. BURNS TO MR,. THOMSON. 
 
 September, 1793. 
 I DARE say, mv dear Sir. that you will 
 begin to think my correspondoucT is per- 
 secution. No matter, I can't liolpit; a 
 ballad is my hobby-horse : which' though 
 otherwise a simple sort of harmless idioti- 
 
 • Here Wlovyed Bruce's address as given in the 
 Poems, !> 81. 
 
 This nnble strain was conceived by our poet during 
 a slorni arming tin; wilds of Glen-Kcn in Galloway. 
 
 Co 
 
 I have been running over the whole 
 hundred, airs, of which I lately sent you 
 the list ; and I think Lewie Gordon, is 
 most happily adapted to your ode : at least 
 with a very slight variation of the fourth 
 
112 
 
 LETTERS. 
 
 line, ivhich I shall presently submit to 
 you. There is in Letvie Gordon more of 
 the grand than the plaintive, particularly 
 when it is sung with a degree of spirit 
 which your words would oblige the singer 
 to give it. I would have no scruple about 
 Bubstituting your ode in the room of Lewie 
 Gordon, which has neither the interest, 
 the grandeur, nor the poetry that cha- 
 racterize your verses. Now the varia- 
 tion I have to suggest upon the last line 
 of each verse, the only line too short for 
 the air, is as follows : 
 
 Ferse 1st, Or to glorious victorie. 
 
 2d, Chains — chains and slaverie. 
 3d, Let hini, let him turn and fiie. 
 4th, Let hitn bravely follow me. 
 5th, But they shnll, they shall be free. 
 6th, Let us, let us do nr die ! 
 
 If you connect each line with its own 
 verse, I do not think you will find that 
 either the sentiment or the expression 
 loses any of its energy. The only line 
 which I dislike in the whole of the song 
 is, " Welcome to your gory bed." Would 
 not another wo rd be preferable to wf/rome? 
 In your next I will expect to be informed 
 whether yon agree to what I have pro- 
 posed. Tlie little alterations I submit 
 with the greatest deference. 
 
 The beauty of the verses you have made 
 for Oran Gaoil will ensure celebrity to 
 the air. 
 
 No. XLII. 
 MR. BURNS TO MR. THOMSON. 
 
 September, 1793. 
 
 I HAVE received your list, my dear Sir, 
 and here go my observations on it.* 
 
 Down the hitrn Dav>p. I have this mo- 
 ment tried an alteration, leaving out the 
 last half of the third stanza, and the first 
 half of the last stanza, thus : 
 
 As down the burn they took their way 
 
 And thro' the flowery dale ; 
 His cheek to hers he aft did lay, 
 
 And love was ay the tale. 
 
 • Mr. Thomson's list of sonss for his puWicntion. 
 In his remarks, the bard pro, eeds in order, and goes 
 through the wliolc ; but on many of tlie-ni he merely sig- 
 mfies his approbation. Ail his remarks of any impor- 
 tance are -iresented to the reader. 
 
 With " Mary, when shall we return, 
 
 Sic pleasure to renew .'"' 
 Quoth Mary, " Love, I like the bum, 
 
 And ay shall follow you."* 
 
 Thro' the wood Laddie — I am decidedly 
 of opinion that both in this, and There'll 
 never he peace till Jamie comes hame, the 
 second or high part of the tune, being a re- 
 petition of the first part an octave higher, 
 is only for instrumental music, one would 
 be much better omitted in singing. 
 
 Cowden-knowes. Remember in your 
 index that the song in pure English to this 
 tune, beginning. 
 
 When summer c 
 
 I the Bwains on Tweed.' 
 
 is the production of Crawford. Robert 
 was his Christian name. 
 
 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 in nature around me that are 
 in unison and harmony with the cogita- 
 tions 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 effiisions 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. 
 
 What cursed egotism ! 
 
 Gill 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 lii=t. For instance, Cragie- 
 hum-wood and Roy's Wife. The first, 
 beside its intrinsic merit, has novelty ; 
 and the last has high merit, as well aa 
 
 * This alteration Mr. Thomson has adopted (or at 
 le.ist i':tenr1ed to adopt,) instead of the lost stania of 
 the oiiginal song, which is objectionable, in r"'n' of 
 delicacy. E. 
 
LETTERS. 
 
 S13 
 
 great celebrity. I have the original words 
 of a song for the last air, in the hand- 
 writing of the lady who composed it ; and 
 they are superior to any edition of the 
 song which the public has yet seen.* 
 
 Highland Laddie. The old set will 
 please a mere Scotch ear best ; and the 
 new an Italianized one. There is a third, 
 and what Oswald calls the old Highland 
 Laddie^ which pleases more than either 
 of them. It is sometimes called Ginglan 
 Johnnie ; it being the air of an old hu- 
 morous tawdry song of that name. You 
 will find it in the Museum, / hae been at 
 Crookieden, &c. I would advise you in 
 this musical quandary, to offer up your 
 prayers to the muses for inspiring direc- 
 tion ; and in the mean time, waiting for 
 this direction bestow a libation to BaCchus ; 
 and there is not a doubt but you will hit 
 on a judicious choice. Probatum Est, 
 
 Auld Sir Simon, I must beg you to leave 
 out, and put in its place The Quaker's 
 Wife. 
 
 Blithe hae I been o'er the hill, 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 wo- 
 man in the world. As I purpose giviing 
 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 uar/d in your col- 
 lection. 
 
 Daintie Davie, T have heard sung, nine- 
 teen thousand nine hundrpd 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 fol- 
 low. 
 
 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 im- 
 provement. Were it possible, in singing 
 to give it half the pathos which Frazer 
 gives it in playing, it would make an ad- 
 mirably pathetic song. I do not give 
 
 * This song, bo much admired by our bard, will be 
 found al the bottom of p. 229. E. 
 
 these versses 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 lea-side of a bowl 
 of punch, which had overset every mortal 
 in company, except the hautbois and the 
 muse. 
 
 Thou hast left me ever, Jamie, Thou hast 
 
 left me ever. 
 Thou hast left me ever, Jamie, Thou hast 
 
 left me ever. 
 
 See Poems, p. 93. 
 
 Jockey and Jennie I would discard, and 
 in its place would put There's nae luck 
 about the house, which has a very pleasant 
 air, and which is positively the finest love 
 ballad in that style in the Scottish or per-, 
 haps any other language. When she came 
 ben she bohbit, as an air, is more beautiful 
 than either, and in the andante way, would 
 unite with a charming sentimental ballad. 
 
 Saw ye my Father ? is one of my great- 
 est 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 burst 
 at once into the pathos. Every country 
 girl sings — Saw ye my father, &,c. 
 
 My song is but j ust begun ; and I should 
 like, before I proceeded, to know your 
 opinion of it. I have sprinkled it with 
 the Scottish dialect, but it may easily be 
 turned into correct English.* 
 
 Todlin hame. Urbani mentioned an 
 idea of his, which has long been mine ; 
 that this air is highly susceptible of pa- 
 thos ; accordingly, you will soon hear him 
 at your concert fry it to a song of mine in 
 the Museum ; Ye banks and braes o' bon- 
 nie Doon. One song more and I have 
 done : Au'd long 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 manu- 
 script, until I took it down from an old 
 man's singing, is enough to recommend 
 any air.f 
 
 * This song begins, 
 
 ' Where are the joys 1 hae met in the morning.* B. 
 
 t This S0112 of the olden lime is excellent. It is wor 
 
 thy of our bard. 
 
fl4 
 
 LETTERS. 
 
 AUI-D LAKG SYNE. 
 
 Should auld acquaintance be forgot, 
 And never brought to min' ? 
 
 See Poems, p. 93. 
 
 Now, I suppose I have tired your pa- 
 tience fairly. You must, after all is over 
 have a number of ballads, properly so 
 called. Gill Jlorice, Tranent J)Iuir, J>/'- 
 Pherson's farewell, Battle of Sheriff J\Iuir, 
 or We ran and they ran, (I know the au- 
 thor of this charming ballad, and his his- 
 tory), 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. 
 It was then called The Banks a' 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. 
 
 No. XLIII. 
 
 MR. BURNS TO MR. THOMSON. 
 
 September, 1793. 
 1 AM happy, my dear Sir, that my ode 
 pleases you so much. . Your idea " ho- 
 nour's bed," is, though a beautiful, a hack- 
 neyed idea; so, if you please, we will let 
 the line stand as it is. I have altered the 
 song as follows : 
 
 BANNOCK-BURN. 
 
 ROBERT BRUCE's ADDRESS TO HIS ARMY. 
 
 Scots, wha hae wi' WAr.T,AcK bled, 
 Scots, wham Bruce has often led ; 
 
 .See Foem«, p. 94. 
 
 JV*. B. I have borrowed the last stanza 
 from the common stall edition of Wallace. 
 
 " A f^Ise usurper sinks in everj' foe, 
 And liberty returns with pverj- blow." 
 
 A couplet worthy of Homer. Yester- 
 dnv you had enough of my correspondence. 
 The post goes, and my head aches mise- 
 
 rably. 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. 
 
 No. XLIV. 
 
 MR. THOMSON TO MR. BURNS. 
 
 nth September, 1793. 
 A THOUSAND thanks to you, my dear 
 Sir, for your observations on the list of 
 my songs. I am happy to find your ideas 
 so much in unison with my own, respect- 
 ing the generality of the airs, as well as 
 the verses. About some of them we differ, 
 but there ia no disputing about hobby- 
 horses. I shall not fail to profit by the 
 remarks you make; and to re-consider 
 the whole with attention. 
 
 Dainty Davy, must be sung two stanzas 
 together, and then the chorus : 'tis the 
 proper way. I agree with you that there 
 may be something of pathos, or tender- 
 ness at least, in the air of Fee him Father, 
 when performed with feeling : but a ten- 
 der cast may be given almost to any lively 
 air, if you sing it very slowly, expressively, 
 and with serious words. I am, however, 
 clearly and invariably for retaining the 
 cheerful tunes joined to their own humo- 
 rous verses, wherever the verses are pass- 
 able. But the sweet song for Fee him 
 Father, which you began about the back 
 of midnight, I will publish as an additional 
 one. Mr. James Balfour, the king of 
 good fellows, and the best singer of the 
 lively Scottish ballads that ever existed, 
 has charmed thousands of companies with 
 Fee him Father, and with Todlin hame 
 also, to the old words, which never should 
 be disunited from either of these airs — 
 Some Bacchanals I would wish to discard. 
 Fy, lets ffl' to the Bridal, for instance, is so 
 coarse and vulgar, that I think it fit only 
 to be sung in a company of drunken col- 
 liers; ?L\\ASaxnyp my Father? appears to 
 me both indelicate and silly. 
 
 One word more with regard to your 
 heroic ode. I think, with great defer- 
 ence to the poet, that a prudent general 
 would avoid saying any thing to his sol- 
 diers which would tend to make death 
 more frightful than it is. Gory presents 
 a disagreeable image to tlie mind, and to 
 tell them " Welcome tn yotir gory bed ' 
 
LETTERS. 
 
 lis 
 
 seems rather a discouraging address, not- 
 withstanding the alternative which fol- 
 lows. I have shown the song to three 
 friends of excellent taste, and each of 
 them objected to this line, which embol- 
 dens me to use the freedom of bringing it 
 again under your notice. I would sug- 
 gest, 
 
 " Now prepare for honour's bed, 
 Or for glorious victorie." 
 
 No. XLV. 
 
 MR. BURNS TO MR. THOMSON. 
 
 September, 1793. 
 
 " Who shall decide when doctors dis- 
 agree?" 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 rpconsidering it ; as I 
 think I have much improved it. Instead 
 of " soger ! hero !" I will have it " Cale- 
 donian! on wi' me !" 
 
 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 in- 
 tention of adopting Logan's verses.* 
 
 • Mr. Thomson has very properly adopted this song 
 (if it may be so called,) as the bard presented it to him. 
 Hft has attached it to the air of Lewie Gordon-, and per- 
 haps among the existing airs he could not find abetter; 
 but the poeiryis suited to a much higher strain of mu- 
 sic, a'ld may employ the genius of some Scoitish Han- 
 del, if any such should in future arise. The reader 
 will have observed, that Burns adopted the alterations 
 proposed by his friend and correspondent in former in- 
 stances, with great readiness: perhaps, indeed, on all 
 indifferent occasions. In the present instance, how- 
 ever, he rejected them, though rppeafedly urged, with 
 determined resolution- With every respect for the 
 judgment of Mr. Thomson and his friends, we may he 
 satisfied thrt he did so. Tie, who in preparing for an 
 engagement, attempts to withdraw his imagination 
 from images of death, will prnbably have but imperfect 
 •uccess, and is not fitted to stand in the ranks ofbaule, 
 where the liberties of a kingdom are at issue. Of such 
 men the conquerors of Rannockburn were not compos- 
 »d Briice's troops were inured to war, and familiar 
 with alt its sufTerings and dangers. On the eve of that 
 memorable day, theirspirits were, without doubt, wound 
 up to a pitch of enthusiasm, suited to the occasion : a 
 pitch of enthusiasm, at which danger becomes attrac- 
 tive, and the most terrific forms of death are no longer 
 terrible. Such a stiain of seutimenl, this heroic " wel- 
 
 I have finished my song to Saw ye my 
 Father? and in English, as you will sec. 
 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 crochet into a crochet and a qua- 
 ver, is not a great matter ; however, in 
 that I have no pretensions to cope in 
 judgment with you. Of the poetry I speak 
 with confidence ; but the music is a busi- 
 ness where I hint my ideas with the ut- 
 most diffidence. 
 
 The old verses have merit, though un- 
 equal, and are popular : my advice is, to 
 set the air to the old words, and let mine 
 follow as English verses. Here they 
 are — 
 
 FAIR JENNY. 
 
 Seep. 213. 
 
 Tunc—'' Saw ye my Father ?" 
 
 Where are the joys I have met in the 
 
 : lark's early song; 
 See Poems, p. 94. 
 
 morning. 
 That danc'd to the lark's early song? 
 
 AiUpu, my dear Sir ! the post goes, so 
 I shall defer some other remarks until 
 more leisure. 
 
 come" may be supposed well calculated to elevate — to 
 raise their hearts high above fear, and to nerve their 
 arms to the utmost pitch of mortal exertion. These 
 observations might be illustrated and supported by a 
 reference to that martial poetry of all nations, from the 
 spirit-stirring strains of Tyrta;us, to the war-song of 
 General Wolle Mr. Thomson's observation, that 
 " Welcome to your gory bed, is adiscouragingaddress," 
 seems not sufficienlly considered. Perhaps, indeed, it 
 may be admitted, that the term gory is somewhat ob- 
 jectionable, not on account of its presenting a frightful, 
 buta disagreeable image to the mind. But a great poet, 
 uttering his conceptions on an interesting occasion, 
 seeks always to present a pic'ure that is vivid, and is 
 uniformly disposed to sacrifice the delicacies of taste on 
 the altar of the imagination. And it is the privilege of 
 superior genius, by producing a new association, to ele- 
 vate expressions that were originally low, and thus to 
 triumph over the dnficiencies of language. In how 
 many instances might this be exemplified from the 
 works of our immortal Shakspeare : 
 
 " Who would fardels bear, 
 To groan and sireat under a weary life ;— 
 When he himself might his quietus make 
 With a bare bodkin .'" 
 
 It were easy to enlarge, but to suggert such reflec- 
 tions is probably sufficlenl. 
 
■¥ 
 
 tl9 
 
 LETTERS. 
 
 No. XLVI 
 
 MR. BURNS TO MR. THOMSON. 
 
 September, 1793. 
 
 I HAVE been turning over some vo- 
 lumes of songs, to find verses whose mea- 
 eures w^ould suit the airs, for which you 
 have allotted me to find English songs. 
 
 For Muirland Willie, you have, in Ram- 
 say's Tea-table, an excellent song, begin- 
 ning, " Ah ! why those tears in Nelly's 
 eyes ?" As for The Collier's Dochter, take 
 the following old Bacchanal. 
 
 Deludkd swain, the pleasure 
 The fickle Fair can give thee, 
 •See Poems, p. 94. 
 
 The faulty line in Logan-Water, I mend 
 thus: 
 
 " How can your flinty hearts enjoy, 
 The widow's tears, tiie orplian"s cry T' 
 
 The song otherwise will pass. As to 
 M'Gres^oira Rua Ruth, you will see a 
 Bong of mine to it, with a set of the air 
 superior to yours, in the Museum, Vol. ii. 
 p. 181. The song begins, 
 
 " Raving winds around her blowing." 
 
 Your Irish airs are pretty, but they are 
 downright Irish. If they were like the 
 Banks of Bunnn, 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 T assure you 
 that you would find it the most saleable 
 of the whole. If you do not approve of 
 Roy's Wife, foT the music's sake, we shall 
 not insert it. Deil take the wars, is a 
 charming song ; so is. Saw ye my Pescsy ? 
 There's na link about the house, well de- 
 serves a place. I cannot say that, O'er 
 the hills and far awa, strikes me as equal 
 to your selection. This is no mine 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 / hae laid, a Her- 
 rinin savot? I like it much. Your Jaco- 
 bite 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 Fie, let us a' to the bridal, 
 to any other words than its own. 
 
 What pleases me, as simple and naive, 
 disgusts you as ludicrous and low. For 
 this reason. Fie, gie me my cogie, sirs — 
 Fie, let us 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." 
 
 No. XLVII 
 MR. BURNS TO MR. THOMSON. 
 
 October, 1793. 
 
 Your last letter, my dear Thomson, 
 was indeed laden with heavy news. Alas, 
 poor Erskine !* The recollection that he 
 was a coadjutor in your publication, has 
 till now scared me from writing to you, 
 or turning my thoughts on composing for 
 
 I am pleased that you are reconciled to 
 the air of the Quaker's Wife; though, by 
 the by, an old Highland gentleman, and 
 a deep antiquarian, tells me it is a Gaelic 
 air, and known by the name of Leiger 'm 
 rhoss. The following verses, I hope, will 
 please you as an English song to the air 
 
 Think am I, my faithful fair, 
 Thine, my lovely Nancy ; 
 
 See Poems, p. 94. 
 
 Your objection to the English song I 
 proposed for Jo^n Anderson my jo, is cer 
 tainly 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 col 
 lection contains, it certainly has so much 
 the more merit. 
 
 * The Honourable A. Erskine, brother to Lord Kelly, 
 whose melanrholy death Mr. Thomson had communi 
 cated in an excellent letter, which he has suppressed. 
 
LETTERS. 
 
 AT 
 
 SONG. 
 
 BY GAVIN TURIVBULL. 
 
 O, CONDESCEND, dear charming maid, 
 My wretched state to view ; 
 
 A tender swain to love betray'd, 
 And sad despair, by you. 
 
 While here, all melancholy, 
 
 My passion I deplore, 
 Yet, urged by stern resistless fate, 
 
 I love thee more and more. 
 
 I heard of love, and with disdain, 
 The urchin's power denied ; 
 
 I laugh'd at every lover's pain. 
 
 And mock'd them when they sigh'd. 
 
 But how my state is alter'd ! 
 
 Those happy days are o'er ; 
 For all thy unrelenting hate, 
 
 I love thee more and more. 
 
 O, yield, illustrious beauty, yield. 
 
 No longer let me mourn ; 
 And though victorious in the field, 
 
 Thy captive do not scorn. 
 
 Let generous pity warm thee. 
 
 My wonted peace restore ; 
 And, grateful, I shall bless thee still. 
 
 And love thee more and more. 
 
 The following address of TurnbuU's to 
 'he Nightingale, will suit as an English 
 ?ong to the air, There was a lass and she 
 was fair. By the by, TurnbuU has a 
 great many songs in MS. which I can com- 
 mand, 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. 
 
 THE NIGHTINGALE. 
 
 BY G. TURNBULL. 
 
 Thou sweetest minstrel of the grove, 
 That ever tried the plaintive strain. 
 
 Awake thy tender tale of love. 
 And soothe a poor forsaken swain. 
 
 For though the muses deign to aid, 
 And teach him smoothly to complain ; 
 
 Yet Delia, charming, cruel maid. 
 Is deaf to her forsaken swain. 
 
 All day, with fashion's gaudy sons, 
 In sport she wanders o'er tlie plain : 
 
 Their tales approves, and still she shuna 
 The notes of her forsaken swain. 
 
 When evening shades obscure the sky. 
 And bring the solemn hours again, 
 
 Begin, sweet bird, thy melody, 
 And soothe a poor forsaken swain. 
 
 I shall just transcribe another of Turn- 
 bull's wiiich would go charmingly to 
 Lewie Gordon. 
 
 LAURA. 
 
 BY G. TURNBULL. 
 
 Lkt me M'ander where I will. 
 By shady wood or winding rill ; 
 Where the sweetest May-born flowers 
 Paint the meadows, deck the bowers; 
 Where the linnet's early song 
 Echoes sweet the woods among : 
 Let me wander where I will, 
 Laura haunts my fancy still. 
 
 If at rosy dawn I chuse, 
 
 To indulge the smiling muse ; 
 
 If I court some cool retreat, 
 
 To avoid the noon-tide heat ; 
 
 If beneath the moon's pale ray, 
 
 Through unfrequented wilds I stray, 
 
 Let me wander where I will, 
 
 Laura haunts my fancy still. 
 
 When at night the drowsy god 
 Waves his sleep-compelling rod, 
 And to fancy's wakeful eyes 
 Bids celestial visions rise ; 
 While with boundless joy I rove, 
 Thro' the fairy-land of love; 
 Let me wander where I will, 
 Laura haunts my fancy still. 
 
 The rest of your letter I shall answer 
 at Bome other oppor unity. 
 
SIB 
 
 LETTERS. 
 
 No. XLVIII. 
 MR. THOMSON TO MR. BURNS. 
 
 1th Jfavember, 1793. 
 
 BIT GOOD SIR, 
 
 After so long a silence, it gave me 
 peculiar pleasure to recognize your well- 
 known hand, for I had begun to be ap- 
 prehensive that all was not well with you. 
 I am happy to find, however, that your 
 silence did not proceed from that cause, 
 and that you have got among the ballads 
 once more. 
 
 I have to thank you for your English 
 Bong to Leiger 'to choss, which I think 
 extremely good, although the colouring 
 is warm. Your friend Mr. TnrnbuH's 
 songs have, doubtless considerable merit; 
 and as you have the command of his 
 manuscripts, I hope you will find out some 
 that will answer, as English songs, to the 
 eirs yet unprovided. 
 
 No. XLIX. 
 
 MR. BURNS TO MR. THOMSON. 
 
 December, 1793. 
 Tell me how you like the following 
 verses to the tune of Jo Janet. 
 
 Husband, h\isband, cease your strife, 
 Nor longer idly rave. Sir ; 
 
 See Poems, p. 95. 
 
 Wilt thou be my dearie ? 
 
 When sorrow wrings thy gentle heart, 
 
 Wilt thou let me cheer thee ? 
 
 See Poems, p. 114. 
 
 No. L. 
 MR. THOMSON TO MR. BURNS. 
 
 Edinburgh, Mth April, 1794. 
 
 MY DEAR SIR, 
 
 OwiNCr to the distress of our friend for 
 thelnss of his child , nt the time of his receiv- 
 mg your admirable but melancholy letter, 
 
 I had not an opportunity, till lately, of pe- 
 rusing it.* How sorry I am to find Burns 
 saying, " Canst thou not minister to a 
 mind diseased?" while he is delighting 
 otliers from one end of the island to the 
 other. Like the hypochondriac who went 
 to consult a physician upon his case — Go, 
 says the doctor, and see the famous Car- 
 lini, who keeps all Paris in good humour. 
 Alas ! Sir, replied the patient, I am that 
 unhappy Carlini! 
 
 Your plan for our meeting together 
 pleases me greatly, and I trust that by 
 some means or other it will soon take 
 place ; but your Bacchanalian challenge 
 almost frightens me, for I am a miserable 
 weak drinker ! 
 
 Allan is much gratified by your good 
 opinion of his talents. He has just be- 
 gun a sketch from your Cotter's Saturday 
 jYight, and if it pleases himself in the de- 
 sign, he will probably etch or engrave it. 
 In subjects of the pastoral and humoroua 
 kind, he is perhaps unrivalled by any art- 
 ist living. He fails a little in giving 
 beauty and grace to his females, and hie 
 colouring is sombre, otherwise his paint- 
 ings and drawings would be in greater 
 request. 
 
 I like the music of the Sutor's Dochter, 
 and will consider whether it shall be ad- 
 ded to the last volume; your verses to it 
 are pretty : but your humorous English 
 song, to suit Jo Janet, is inimitable. 
 What think you of the air. Within a mile 
 of Edinburgh ? It has always struck me 
 as a modern imitation, but it is said to be 
 Oswald's, and is so much liked, that I be- 
 lieve I must include it. The verses are 
 little better than nambij pamby. Do you 
 consider it worth a stanza or two •■ 
 
 No. LI. 
 MR. BURNS TO MR. THOMSON. 
 J\tay, 1794 
 
 MY DEAR SIR, 
 
 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 
 
 * A letter to Mr. Cunningham, No. CL. of the Ge- 
 neral Correspondence. 
 
LETTERS. 
 
 219 
 
 his hands. A friend of mine, who is po- 
 sitively the ablest judge on the subject I 
 have ever met with, and thoug:h an un- 
 known, is yet a superior artist with the 
 Burin, is quite charmed with Allan's man- 
 ner. I got him a peep of the Gentle Shep- 
 herd ; and he pronounces Allan a most 
 original artist of great excellence. 
 
 For my part, I look on Mr. Allan's 
 chusing my favourite poem for his subject, 
 to be one of the highest compliments I 
 have ever received. 
 
 I am quite vexed at Pleyel's being 
 cooped up in France, as it will put an en- 
 tire stop to our work. Now, and for six 
 or seven months, / shall be quite in song, 
 as you shall see by and by. I got an air, 
 pretty enough, composed h^ Lady Eliza- 
 beth Heron, of Heron, which slie calls 
 7^1? Banks of Cree. Cree is a beautiful 
 romantic stream ; and as her Ladyship is 
 a particuiar friend of mine, I have written 
 the following song to it. 
 
 BANKS OF CREE. 
 
 Here is the glen, and here the bower; 
 All underneath the birchen shade ; 
 
 See Poems, p. 95. 
 
 No. LTL 
 MR. BURNS TO MR. THOMSON. 
 
 July, 1794. 
 
 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 
 fVom the savage thraldom of democratic 
 discords ? Alas the day ! And wo is me ! 
 That auspicious period pregnant with the 
 happiness of millions.* — ****** 
 
 I have presented a copy of your songs 
 to the daughter of a much-valued and 
 much-honoured friend of mine, Mr. Gra- 
 ham, of Fintry. I wrote on the blank 
 side of the title-page the following address 
 to the young lady. 
 
 Here, where the Scottish muse immortal 
 lives 
 
 In sacred strains and tuneful numbers 
 join'd, 
 
 See Poems, p. 95. 
 
 No. LHI. 
 MR. THOMSON TO MR. BURNS. 
 Edinburgh, 10£/t August, 1794. 
 
 MY DEAR SIR, 
 
 I OWE you an apology for having so 
 long delayed to acknowledge the favour 
 of your last. I fear it will be as you say, 
 I shall have no more songs from Pleyel 
 till France and we are friends ; but never- 
 theless, I am very desirous to be prepared 
 with the poetry : and as the season ap- 
 proaches in which your muse of Coila 
 visits you, I trust I shall, as formerly, be 
 frequently gratified with the result of 
 your amorous and tender interviews ! 
 
 No. LIV. 
 MR. BURNS TO MR. THOMSON. 
 
 20th August, 1794. 
 
 The last evening, as I was straying 
 out, and thinking of, O'er the hills andfar 
 away, I spun the following stanzas 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. 
 
 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 pre- 
 sent recollect, they are mostly the effu- 
 sions of the jovial sailor, not the wailings 
 of his love-lorn mistress. I must here 
 make one sweet exception — Siveet Annie 
 frae the sea-beach came. Now for the song. 
 
 ON THE SEAS AND TAR AWAY. 
 
 Kow can my poor heart be glad, 
 When absent from my sailor lad ? 
 See Poems, p. 96. 
 
 • A portion of this l«tter has been left out for rea- I give you leave to abuse this song, but 
 eons Uiat will easily be imacined. do it in the spirit of Christian meekness. 
 
 Cc2 
 
iio 
 
 LETTERS. 
 
 No. LV. 
 
 MR. THOMSON TO MR. BURNS. 
 Edinburgh, \&th September, 1794. 
 
 MY DEAR SIR, 
 
 You have anticipated my opinion of 
 On the seas and far away ; I do not think 
 it one of your very happy productions, 
 though it certainly contains stanzas that 
 are worthy of all acceptation. 
 
 The second is the least to my liking, 
 particularly "Bullets, spare my only joy !" 
 Confound the bullets ! It might, per- 
 haps, be objected to the third verse, "At 
 the starless midnight hour," that it has 
 too much grandeur of imagery, and that 
 greater simplicity of thought would have 
 better suited the character of a sailor's 
 sweetheart. The tune, it must be re- 
 membered, is of the brisk, cheerful kind. 
 Upon the whole, therefore, in my humble 
 opinion, the song would be better adapted 
 to the tune, if it consisted only of the first 
 and last verses with the choruses. 
 
 No. LVI. 
 MR. BURNS TO MR. THOMSON. 
 
 September, 1794. 
 
 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. 
 
 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 fel- 
 low of a clergyman, a Mr. Clunie, who 
 sung it charmingly ; and, at my request, 
 Iilr. Clarke took it down from his singing. 
 When I gave it to Johnson, I added some 
 
 • This Virgilian order of the poet should. I think, be 
 disobeyed with respect to the son? in quf sfion, the se- 
 cond stanza excepted. J^nte hy Mr. Thomson. 
 
 Doctors differ. The objection to the second stanza 
 toe* not iitTike tbe Editor. E. 
 
 stanzas to the song and mended others, 
 but still it will not do for you. In a soli- 
 tary 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 
 preseffve. Here it is, with all its crudi- 
 ties and imperfections on its head. 
 
 Ca' the yowes to the knowes, 
 
 Ca' them where the heather growt 
 
 See Poems, p. 96. 
 
 I shall give you my opinion of your 
 other newly adopted songs my first scrib- 
 bling fit. 
 
 No. LVII. 
 
 MR. BURNS TO MR. THOMSON 
 
 September, 1794. 
 
 Do you know a blackguard Irish song 
 called Onagh's Water-faU ? The air is 
 charming, and I have often regretted tne 
 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 Mu- 
 sical Museum ; and as that publication is 
 at its last volume, I intend the following 
 song to the air above-mentioned, for that 
 work. 
 
 If it does not suit you as an editor, you 
 may be pleased to have verses to it that 
 you can sing before ladies. 
 
 SHE SATS SHE LO'ES ME BEST OF A*. 
 
 Sae flaxen were her ringlets, 
 Her eye-brows of a darker hue, 
 See Poems, p. 96 
 
 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 dpcried, and al- 
 ways without any hypocrisy confessed his 
 admiration. I am sensible that my taste 
 
LETTERS. 
 
 221 
 
 m imiPic must dp mrjepant and viiijrar, 
 because people of undisputed and culti- 
 vated taste can find no merit in my fa- 
 vourite tunes. Still, because 1 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 
 ofhar jadges would probably be showing 
 disgust. For instance, I am just now 
 making verses for Rothiemurchie's Rant, 
 an air which puts me in raptures ; and, in 
 fact, unless I be pleased with the tune, 1 
 Ke.ver can make verses to it. Here I have 
 Clarke on my side who is a judge tiiat I 
 will pit against any of you. Rothietnur- 
 chie, he says, is an air both original and 
 beautiful; and on b's 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* 
 
 I have begun anew. Let mr in thys ae 
 night. Do you think that we ought to 
 retain the old chorus? T think we must 
 retain both the old chor-us and the first 
 stanza of the old song. I do not al- 
 together like the third line of the first 
 Btanza, but cannot alter it to please my- 
 self. I am just three stanzas deep in it. 
 Would you have the (hiioumfnt to be suc- 
 cessful or otherwise ? should she " let 
 him in," or not ? 
 
 Did you not once propose The Sow's 
 Tail to Geordie, as an air for your work ? 
 I am quite diverted with it ; but I ac- 
 knowledge that is no mark of its real ex- 
 cellence. I once set about verses for it, 
 which I meant to be in the alternate way 
 of a lover and his mistress chanting to- 
 gether. I have not the pleasure of know- 
 ing 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. 
 
 How do you like the following epi- 
 gram, 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. 
 
 • Tn the oricrinal, follow Imrc two stanzas of a song, 
 beginning '' Laijsie wi' the lint-white locits." 
 
 TO DR. MAXWELL, 
 On Miss Jessy Staig's Recovert. 
 
 JJaxwell, if merit here you crave, 
 
 That merit I deny : 
 You save fair Jessy from the grave ^ — 
 
 An angel could not die. 
 
 God grant you patience with this stu- 
 pid epistle ! 
 
 No. LVIIL 
 
 MR. THOMSON TO MR. BURNS. 
 
 I PERCEIVE the sprightly muse is now 
 attendant upon her favourite poet, whose 
 icuod-notes wild are becoming as enchant- 
 ing as ever. She says she lo'cs me best of 
 a], is one of the pleasantest table-songs I 
 have seen, and henceforth shall be mine 
 vvht-n the song is going round. I'll give 
 Cunningham a copy ; he can more pow- 
 erfully proclaim its merit. I am far from 
 undervaluing your taste for the strath- 
 spey music : on the contrary, I think it 
 liig!;ly animating and agreeable, and 
 that some of the strathspeys, when gra- 
 ced with such verses as yours, will make 
 very pleasing songs in the same way that 
 rough Christians are tempered and soft- 
 ened by lovely woman ; without whom, 
 you know, they had been brutes. 
 
 I am clear for having the Sow's Tail, 
 particularly as your proposed verses to it 
 are so extremely promising. Geordie, as 
 you observe, i^ a name only fit for bur- 
 lesque composition. Mrs. Thomson's 
 name (Katherine) is not at all poetical. 
 Retain Jeanie therefore, and make the 
 other .Tainie, or any other that sounds 
 agreeably. 
 
 Your Ca' the ewes is a precious little 
 morcenu. Indeed, I am perfectly aston- 
 ished and charmed with the endless vari- 
 ety of your fancy. Here let me ask you, 
 whether you never seriously turned your 
 thoughts upon dramatic writing ? That is 
 a field worthy of your genius, in which 
 it might shine forth in ail its splendor 
 One or two successful pieces upon the 
 London stage would make your fortunt 
 The rage at present is for musical dra- 
 mas : few or none of those which have 
 appeared since the Dttenna, possess much 
 poetical merit : there is little in the con 
 
222 
 
 LETTERS. 
 
 duct of the fable, or in the dialogue, to 
 interest the audience. They are chiefly 
 vehicles for music and pageantry. I think 
 you might produce a comic opera in three 
 acts, which would live by the poetry, at 
 the same time that it would be proper to 
 take every assistance from her tuneful 
 sister. Part of the songs, of course, 
 would be to our favourite Scottish airs ; 
 the rest might be left to the London com- 
 poser — Storace for Drury-lane, or Shield 
 for Co vent-garden : both of them very 
 able and popular musicians. I believe 
 that interest and moncEuvring are often 
 necessary to have a drama brought on ; 
 so it may be with the namby pamby tribe 
 of flowery scribblers ; but were you to ad- 
 dress Mr. Sheridan himself by letter, and 
 send him a dramatic piece, I am persuad- 
 ed he would, for the honour of genius, 
 give it a fair and candid trial. Excuse 
 me for obtruding these hints upon your 
 consideration.* 
 
 . No. LIX. 
 MR. THOMSON TO MR. BURNS. 
 
 Edinburgh, Uth October, 1794. 
 
 The last eight days have been devoted 
 to there-examination of the Scottish col- 
 lections. I have read, and sung, and 
 fiddled, and considered, till I am half 
 blind and wholly stupid. The few airs I 
 have added are enclosed. 
 
 Peter Pindar has at length sent me all 
 the songs I expected from him, which are 
 m general elegant and beautiful. Have 
 vou heard of a London collection of Scot- 
 tish airs and songs, just published by Mr. 
 Ritson, an Englishman ? I shall send you 
 a copy. His introductory essay on the 
 subject is curious and evinces great read- 
 inor and research, but does not decide the 
 question as to the origin of our melodies ; 
 though he shows clearly that Mr. Tytler, 
 in his ingenious dissertation, has adduced 
 no sort of proof of the hypothesis he wish- 
 ed to establish ; and that his classifica- 
 tion of the airs according to the eras, 
 when they were composed, fe mere fancy 
 and conjecture. On John Pinkerton, Esq. 
 he has no mercy ; but consigns him to 
 damnation '. He snarls at my publication, 
 
 * Our bard had before received tlie same ndvire, and 
 certainly took it so far into consideration, .as to have 
 cast about for a subject. li- 
 
 on the score of Pindar being engaged to 
 write some songs for it ; uncandidly and 
 unjustly leaving it to be inferred, that the 
 songs of Scottish writers had been sent a 
 packing to make room for Peter's ! Of 
 you he speaks with some respect, but 
 gives you a passing hit or two, for daring 
 to dress up a little, some old foolish songs 
 for the Museum. His sets of the Scottish 
 airs, are taken, he says, from the oldest col- 
 lections and best authorities : many of them, 
 however, have such a strange aspect, and 
 are so unlike the sets which are sung by 
 every person of taste, old or young, in 
 town or country, that we can scarcely 
 recognize the features of our favourites 
 By going to the oldest collections of our 
 music, it does not follow that we find the 
 melodies in their original state. These 
 melodies had been preserved, we know 
 not how long, by oral communication, be- 
 fore being c'ollected and printed ; and as 
 different persons sing the same air very 
 differently, according to their accurate or 
 confused recollections of it, so even sup- 
 posing the first collectors to have pos- 
 sessed the industry, the taste, and dis- 
 cernment to choose the best they could 
 hear (which is far from certain,) still it 
 must evidently be a chance, whether the 
 collections exhibit any of the melodies in 
 the state they were first composed. In 
 selecting the melodies for my own collec- 
 tion, I have been as much guided by the 
 living as by the dead. Where these dif- 
 fered, I preferred the sets that appeared 
 to me the most simple and beautiful, and 
 the most generafly approved : and with- 
 out meaning any compliment to my own 
 capability of choosing, or speaking of the 
 pains I have taken, I flatter myself that 
 my sets will be found equally freed from 
 Vulgar errors on the one hand, and aflFect- 
 ed graces on the other. 
 
 No. LX. 
 MR. BURNS TO MR. THOMSON. 
 
 lOth October, 1794. 
 
 Ml DEAR FRIEND, 
 
 Br 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 own town by to-day's fly, and I wish 
 you would call on him and take his opi- 
 nion in general : you know his taste is a 
 
LETTERS. 
 
 223 
 
 standard. He will return here again in 
 a week or two ; so, please do not miss 
 asking for him. One thing I hope lie 
 wOl do, persuade you to adopt my favour- 
 ite Cragie-burn-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 
 {entre nous) is in a manner to me, what 
 Sterne's EHza 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 clish-maclaver about 
 it among our acquaintances.) I assure 
 you that to my lovely friend you are in- 
 debted for many of your best songs of 
 mine. Do you think that tlie sober, gin- 
 horse routine of existencR. could inspire a 
 man with life, and love, and joy — could fire 
 him with enthusiasm, or melt him with 
 pathos, equal to the gpnius of your book ? 
 No ! no ! — Whenever I want to be more 
 than ordinary in sonor ; to be in some de- 
 gree equal to vour diviner aifs ; do you 
 imagine that T fast and pray for the ce- 
 lestial emanation? Tortt an contrarie ! I 
 have a glorious recipe ; the very one that 
 for his own use was invented by the di- 
 vinity of healing and poetry, whfti erst 
 he piped to the flocks of Admetus. I put 
 myself in a regimen of admiring a fine 
 woman ; and in proportion to the adora- 
 bility of her charms, in the proportion 
 you are delighted with my verses. The 
 lightning of Jier eye is the godhead of 
 Parnassus ; and the witchery of her smile, 
 the divinity of Helicon ! 
 
 To descend to business ; if you like my 
 idea of When she cam ben she bobhit, 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. 
 
 SAW YE MT PHELT. 
 
 O, saw ye my dear, my Phely ? 
 O, saw ye my dear, my Phely ? 
 
 See Poems, p. 97. 
 
 Now for a few miscellaneous remarks. 
 The Posie, (in the Museum) is my com- 
 position ; the air was taken down from 
 Mrs. Burns's voice.* It is well known 
 
 • T/ie Poii'e wil be found in the Poonis, p. 113. This, 
 and the other poems of which hespeal<s, had appeared 
 in Jolinson'8 Museum, and Mr.T. had innuired wheth- 
 er Uiey "'eT'-. our bard's 
 
 in the West Country, but the old words 
 are trash. By the by, take a look at the 
 tune again, and tell me if you do not think 
 it is the original from which Roslin CaS' 
 tie is composed. The second part in par- 
 ticular, for the first two or three bars, is 
 exactly the old air. Strathallen' s La- 
 ment 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 ap- 
 peared first in the Edinburgh Herald; 
 and came to the editor of that paper with 
 the Newcastle post-mark on it.* Whis- 
 tle o'er the lave o't is mine ; the music is 
 said to be by John Bruce, a celebrated 
 violin-player in Dumfries, about the be- 
 ginning of this century. This I know, 
 Bruce, who was an honest man, though a 
 redwud Highlandman, constantly claimed 
 it : and by all the oldest musical people 
 here, is beheved, to be the author of it 
 
 Andreio and his cutty Gun The song' 
 to which this is set in the Museum is 
 mine, and was composed on Miss Euphe- 
 
 * The reader will be curious to soe this poem, M 
 highly praised by Burns. Here it is. 
 
 Keen blaws the wind o'er Donocht-HeBd,t 
 
 The siiaw drives snelly thro' the dale ; 
 The Gaber-lunzie tirls my sneck, 
 
 And shivering, tells his waefu' tale: 
 " Cauld is the night, O let me in, 
 
 And dinna let your minstrel fa' ; 
 And dinna let his winding sheet 
 
 Be uaethitig but a wreath o' snaw. 
 
 " Full ninety winters hae I seen, 
 
 And piped where gor-cocks whirring flew ; 
 And mony a day I've danced, 1 ween, 
 
 To lilts whii:h Iron: my (irnne 1 blew." 
 My Eppie waked and soon she cried, 
 
 ' Gut up, guidniiin, and iet liiin in ; 
 For weel ye ken the winter night 
 
 Was short when he began his din.' 
 
 My Fppie's voice O wow it's sweet, 
 
 Even iho' she bans and scaulds a wee ; 
 But when it's tuned to sorrow's tale, 
 
 O, liaiih, it's doubly dear to me ; 
 Ciinie in, auld carl, I'l! steer my fire, 
 
 I'll make it bleeze a bonnie flame ; 
 Ynur bluid is thin, ye've tint the gate, 
 
 Ye should nae stray sae far frae ha)n«. 
 
 " Nae hame have I," the minstrel said, 
 " Sad party-strife o'erturn'd ray ha' ; 
 
 And weeping at the eve of life, 
 I wander thro' a wreath o' snaw." 
 
 This affecting poem is apparently incomplete. Tbt 
 author need not be ashamed to own himself. It iu 
 worthy of Burns, or of Macniel. K. 
 
 t A mountain in the North. 
 
524 
 
 LETTERS. 
 
 inia Murray, of Lintrose, commonly and 
 deservedly called the Flower of Strath- 
 more. 
 
 Hov) long and dreary is the nis^ht! 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 ar- 
 ranged it anew, as you wilLfind on the 
 other page. 
 
 iriow long and dreary is the night, 
 When 1 am frae my dearie ! 
 
 See Poems, p. 97. 
 
 Tell me how you like this. I differ 
 from your idea of the expression of tlie 
 tune. There is, to me, a great deal of 
 tenderness in it. You cannot, in my opi- 
 nion, dispense with a bass to your adden- 
 da airs. A lady of my acquaintance, a 
 noted performer, plays and sings at the 
 same time so charmingly, that I shall ne- 
 ver 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 collec 
 tion.* 
 
 These English songs gravel me to 
 death. I have not that command of the 
 language that I haveof my native tongue. 
 I have been at Duncan Gray, to dress it 
 in English, but all I can do is deplorably 
 Btupid. For instance ; 
 
 Lf,t not woman e'er complain 
 Of inconstancv in jnvo; 
 
 See Poems, 
 
 07. 
 
 Since the above, T have been out in the 
 country, taking a dinner with a friend, 
 where 1 met with the lady whom I men- 
 tioned in the second page in this odds- 
 and-ends of a letter. As usual T got info 
 sonsc: and returning home I composed the 
 following : 
 
 THE LOTEr's MORAINfJ SAT.UTE TO 
 HIS MISTRESS. 
 
 Slekp'pt thnu or wak'st thou, fairest 
 creature; 
 
 Rosy morn now lifts his eye,*f 
 
 See Poems ^ p. 86. 
 
 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 under- 
 stood. 
 
 I enclose you a musical curiosity, an 
 East Indian air, which you would swear 
 was a Scottish one. I know the authen- 
 ticity 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. Clarkfe 
 has set a bass to it, and I intend putting 
 it into the Musical Museum. Here fol- 
 low the verses I intend for it. 
 
 THE AULD MAN. 
 
 But lately seen in gladsome green, 
 The woods rejoic'd the day. 
 
 See Poems, p. 98. 
 
 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 
 hotchpotch epistle has not completely 
 tired you of my correspondence ? 
 
 No. LXI. 
 MR. THOMSON TO MR. BURNS. 
 
 Edmhvr:;h, 21 th October, 1794. 
 
 I A!M sensible, my (Jear friend, that a 
 genuine poet can no more exist without 
 
 * From the fifth to the eleventh line of this song 
 stood originally thus: 
 
 Now to the streaming fountain, 
 
 Or up the hoathy mountain, 
 The liart, hind, and roe, freely wildly-wanton stray ; 
 
 In twining hazel bowers 
 
 His lay the linnet pours ; 
 
 The lav'rock, &c 
 
 t The last eight lines stood originally thus: 
 
 When frae my Chloris parted, 
 
 Sad, cheerless, broken hearted. fmy sky. 
 The night's gloomy shades, cloudy, dark, a'ercast 
 
 But when she charms my sight, 
 
 In pride of beauty's light; 
 
 When thro' my very heart 
 
 Iter b'ooming glories dart • 
 'Tis ihcn. 'tis then I wake to life, and joy Bi. 
 
LETTERS. 
 
 his mistress than his meet. I wish I 
 knew the adorable she whose bright eyes 
 and witching smiles have so often enrap- 
 tured the Scottish bard ! that I might 
 drink her sweet health when the toast is 
 going round. Cragie-burn-wood, must 
 certainly be adopted into my family, since 
 she is the object of the song; but in the 
 name of decency I must beg a new cho- 
 rus-verse from you. O to be lying beyond 
 thee, dearie, is perhaps a consummation to 
 be wished, but will not do for singing in 
 the company of ladies. The songs in 
 your last will do you lasting credit, and 
 suit the respective airs charmingly. I 
 am perfectly of your opinion with respect 
 to the additional airs. The idea of send- 
 ing them into the world naked as they 
 were born was ungenerous. They must 
 all be clothed and made decent by our 
 friend Clarke. 
 
 T find I am anticipated by the friendly 
 Cunningham in sending you Ritson's 
 Scottish collection. Permit me, there- 
 fore, to present you with his English col- 
 lection, which you will receive by the 
 coach. I do not find his historical essay 
 on Scottish song interesting. Your anec- 
 dotes and miscellaneous remarks will, I 
 am sure, be much more so. Allan has 
 just sketched a charming design from 
 Maggie Lauder. She is dancing with 
 such soirit as to electrify the piper, who 
 seems Tilmost dancing too, while he is 
 playing with the most exquisite glee. I 
 am much inclined to get a small copy, 
 and to have it engraved in the style of 
 Ritson's prints. 
 
 P. S. Pray what do your anecdotes 
 say concerning Maggie Lauder? was 
 she a real personage, and of what rank ? 
 You would surely spier for her ifyouca'd 
 at Anstruther town. 
 
 No. Lxn. 
 
 MR. BURNS TO MR. THOMSON. 
 
 JVovember, 1794. 
 Many thanks to you, my dear Sir, for 
 your present. It is a book of the utmost 
 importance to me. I have yesterday be- 
 gun my anecdotes, &c. for your work. I 
 intend drawing it up in the form of a let- 
 ter to you, which will save me from the te- 
 dious, dull business of systematic arrange- 
 ment. Indeed, as all I have to say con- 
 
 sists of unconnected remarks, anecdotes, 
 scraps of old songs, &c., it would be im- 
 possible to give the work a beg-inning, a 
 middle, or 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 Jly Lodging ia 
 on the cold ground. On my visit the 
 other day to my fair Ghloris (that is the 
 poetic name of the lovely goddess of my 
 inspiration,) she suggested an idea, which 
 I, in my return from the visit, wrought 
 into the following song. 
 
 My Chloris, mark how green the groves, 
 The primrose banks how fair ; 
 
 See Poems, p. 98. 
 
 How do you like the simplicity and ten- 
 derness of this pastoral ? I think it pretty 
 well. 
 
 I like your entering so candidly and so 
 kindly into the story of Ma chere Amie. 
 I assure you I was never more in earnest 
 in my life, than in the account of that af- 
 fair which I sent you in my last. — Con- 
 jugal 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, 
 
 " Where love is liberty, and Nature law." 
 
 Musically speaking, the first is an instru- 
 ment of which the gamut is scanty and con- 
 fined, 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 enthu- 
 siasm 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 rap- 
 tures they would give me, yet, if they in- 
 terfere with that first principal, it is hav- 
 ing these pleasures at a dishonest price ; 
 and justice forbids, and generosity dis- 
 dains the purchase • * * * * 
 
 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 ia 
 something similar to what I want ; and, 
 with a little alteration, so as to suit the 
 
 * It 'does nol appear whetliev Burns completed tliese 
 aiiecdotc.--, &c. Something of the kind (pr<;bihJy the 
 rude draii!;lits,)wa8 found auinngst his putlt^rs, a^id ap- 
 pears in Ap|)eiidix Xo. U. ^Nolo U. 
 
226 
 
 LETTERS. 
 
 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, T think the 
 shift a fair one. A song, which, under 
 the same first verse, you will find in Ram- 
 say's Tea-Table Miscellany, I have cut 
 down for an English dress to your Dam- 
 tie Davie, as follows : 
 
 SONG 
 
 Altered from an old Englith one. 
 
 It was the charming month of May, 
 When all the flowers were fvesh and gay. 
 See Poems, p. Qii. 
 
 You may think meanly of this, but take 
 (L look at the bombast oiiginal, and you 
 will be surprised that I have made so much 
 of it. I have finished my song to Rothie- 
 murchie's Rant ; and you have Clarke to 
 consult as to the set of the air for singing. 
 
 LASSIE Wl' THE LINT-WHITE LOCKS.* 
 
 Lassie wi' the lint-white locks, 
 Bonnie lassie, artless lassie, 
 
 See Poems, p. 90. 
 
 This piece has at least the merit of be- 
 ing a regular pastoral : the vernal morn, 
 the summer noon, the autumnal evening, 
 and the winter night, are regularly round- 
 ed. If you like it, well : if not, I will in- 
 sert it in the Museum. 
 
 I am out of temper that you should set 
 flo sweet, so tender an air, as Deil tak the 
 •wars, to the foolish old verses. You talk 
 of the silliness of Smo ye my father ? by 
 heavens ! the odds is gold to brass ! Be- 
 sides, the old song, though now pretty 
 well modernized into the Scottish lan- 
 guage, is originally, and in the early edi- 
 tions, 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 songbv Sheridan, in the Duenna, 
 to this air, which is out of sight superior 
 to D'Urfey's. It begins, 
 
 * In some oftlwMSS. tli« last stanza of tliis song 
 runs thus: | 
 
 And should the howling wint'ry blast 
 Disturb my lassie's midr:ight rest, 
 I'll fauld jhee to my faithfu' breast, 
 Aad comfort Htw »!iy dearie O 
 
 " When sable night eacli droopiDg piant reetonng.' 
 
 The air, if I imderstand 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 as 
 follows.* 
 
 Now for my English song to Kancy's 
 to the greenwood, S^c 
 
 Farewell thou stream that windingflowa 
 Around Eliza's dwelling ! 
 
 See Poems, p. 99. 
 
 There is an air, The Caledonian Hunt's 
 Delight, to which I wrote a song that you 
 will find in Johnson 
 
 Te hanks and hraes o' bonnie Doon , 
 this air, I think, might find a place among 
 your hundred, as Lear says of his knights. 
 bo yon 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 Ays, 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 gentle- 
 man who affirmed he had heard it in Ire- 
 land 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 bal- 
 
 * See the s»ng in its first ai.d best dress in page 212. 
 
 '^ar oara remarltsupon it, " 1 could easily throw this 
 into an English mould ; bui, to my tasle, in the simple 
 and the tender of the pastoral song, a sprinkling of the 
 old Sccfttish had an inimitable effect." £ 
 
LETTERS. 
 
 227 
 
 lads 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. 
 
 I thank you for admitting Cragie-burn- 
 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 mo- 
 ment, I shall write a new Cragie-hurn- 
 wood altogether. My heart is much in 
 the theme. 
 
 T am' ashamed, my dear follow, to make 
 the request ; 'tis dunning your generosity; 
 hut 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 soonfas I have extracted the 
 necessary information out of them, I will 
 return you Ritson's volumes. 
 
 The lady is not a little proud that she 
 is to make so distinguished a tigure 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. 
 
 No. LXIIT. 
 
 MR. THOMSON TO MR. BURNS. 
 
 I3th November, 1794. 
 
 MY GOOD SIR, 
 
 Since receiving your last, I have had 
 another interview with Mr. Clarke, and 
 a long consultation. He thinks the Ca- 
 ledonian Hunt is more Bacchanalian than 
 amorous in its nature, and recommends it 
 to you to match the air accordingly. Pray 
 did it ever occur to you how peculiarly 
 well the Scottish airs are adapted for ver- 
 ses in the form of a dialogue? The first 
 part of the air is generally low, and suit- 
 ed for a man's voice, and the second part 
 in many instances cannot be sung, at con- 
 cert pitch, but by a female voice. A song 
 thus performed makes an agreeable va- 
 riety, but few of ours are written in this 
 D d 
 
 form : I wish you would think of it in 
 some of those that remain. The only 
 one of the kind you have sent me is ad- 
 mirable, and will be a universal favourite. 
 
 Your verses for Rothiemurchie are so 
 sweetly pastoral, and your serenade to 
 Chloris, for Die! tak the wars, so passion- 
 ately tender, that I have sung myself in- 
 to raptures with them. Your song for 
 Jly lodging is on the cold ground, is like- 
 wise a diamond of the first water ; and I 
 am quite dazzled and delighted by it. 
 Some of your Chlorises I suppose have 
 flaxen hair, from your partiality for this 
 colour; else we differ about it; for I 
 should scarcely conceive a woman to be 
 a- beauty, on reading that she had lint- 
 white locks. 
 
 Fa'mcellthou stream thai ivinding fimcs, 
 I think excellent, but it is much too .-se- 
 rious to come after JVancy ; at least it 
 would seem an incongruity to provide the 
 same air with merry Scottish and melan- 
 choly English verses I The more that the 
 two sets of verses resemble each other in 
 their general character, the better. Those 
 you have manufactured for Dainty Davie 
 will answer charmingly. I am happy to 
 find you have begun your anecdotes ! I 
 care not how long they be, for it is im- 
 possible that any thing from your pen can 
 be tedious. Let me beseech you not to 
 use ceremony in telling me when you 
 wish to present any of your friends with 
 the songs : the next carrier will bring 
 you three copies, and you are as welcome 
 to twenty as to a pinch of snuff". 
 
 No. LXIV. 
 
 MR. BURNS TO MR. THOMSON 
 
 19th Jfovember, 1794. 
 
 You- see, my dear Sir, what a punctual 
 correspondent lam ; though indeed you 
 may thank yourself for the tedium of my 
 letters, as you have so flattered me on 
 my horsemanship with my favourite hob- 
 by, and praised the grace of his ambling 
 so much, that I am scarcely ever oflf 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. Wheth- 
 er I have uniformly succeeded, I will not 
 say ; but here it is for you, though it is 
 not an hour old. 
 
LETTERS. 
 
 Philly, happy be that day 
 When roving through the gather'd hay, 
 
 See Poems, p. 99. 
 
 Tell me honestly how you like it ; and 
 ')oiut out whatever you think faulty. 
 
 1 am much pleased with your idea of 
 j?mging our thongs in alternate ^tanzas, 
 and reoret tliat you did not hint it to nie 
 sooner. In those that remain, I shall 
 have it in my eye. I remember your 
 objections to the name Philly ; but it is 
 tlie common abbreviation of Philhs. Sal- 
 ly, the only other name that suits, has to 
 inv ear a vulgarity about it, which unfits 
 it "for any thing except burlesque. The 
 legion of Scottish poetasters of the day, 
 whom your brother editor, Mr. Ritson, 
 ranks with me, as my coevals, have al- 
 ways mistaken vulgarity for simplicity : 
 whereas, sirnpl icity is as much eloignee from 
 vulgarity on the one hand, as from affected 
 point and puerile conceit on the other. 
 
 I agree with you as to the air, tragie- 
 hurn-wood, that a chorus would in some 
 degree spoil the effect; and shall certain- 
 ly have none in my projected song to it. 
 It is not however a case in point with Ro- 
 thiemurchie; there, asinRoy't WifeofAl- 
 divaloch, 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 
 , Rothiemurchie. In fact, in the first part 
 of both tunes, the rhythm is so peculiar 
 and irregular, and on that irregularity de- 
 pends so much of their beauty, that we 
 must e'en take them with all their wild- 
 ness, and humour the verses accordingly. 
 I-ieaving out the starting note, in both 
 times has, \ think, an effect that no re- 
 gularity could counterbalance the want of. 
 
 Try 
 
 O Roy's Wife of Aldivaloch. 
 
 O Lassie wi' the lint-white locks. 
 
 and compare with, 
 
 Roy's Wife of Aldivaloch. 
 Lassie wi' the lint-white locks. 
 
 Does not the tameness 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 : whernas in the first insipid method, 
 
 it is like the grating screw of the pins be- 
 fore the fiddle is brought into tune. Thid 
 is my taste ; if I am wrong, I beg pardon 
 of the cognoscenti. 
 
 The Caledonian Hunt is so charming' 
 that it would make any subject in a song 
 go down ; but pathos is certainly its na- 
 tive tongue. Scottish Bacchanalians we 
 certainly want, though the few. we have 
 are excellent. For instance, Todlin 
 Hume, is, for wit and humour, an un- 
 paralleled 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. A- 
 propos to Bacchanalian songs in Scottish; 
 I composed one yesterday, for an air I 
 like much — Lumps o' Pudding. 
 
 Contented wi' little, andranty wi' mair, 
 Whene'er I forgather wi' sorrow and care, 
 Sec Poems, p. 97. 
 
 If you do not relish this air, I will send 
 it to Johnson. 
 
 '■ Since yesterday's penmanship, I have 
 I 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. 
 
 CANST THOU LEAVE ME THUS, MX KATY ? 
 
 Canst thou leave me thus, my Katy ? 
 
 Canst thou leave me thus, my Katy ?* 
 
 See Poems p. 100. 
 
 * To this address, in thi; character of a forsaken io 
 ver, a reply was found on the part of the lady, among 
 the MSS. of our bard, evidently in a female hand-wri- 
 tnig ; which is doubtless that referred to in p. 213, let- 
 ter No. XLH. A''ate. The temptation to give it to the 
 public is irresistible ; and if, in so doing, olfence should 
 be given to the fair authoress, the beauty of her versca 
 must plead i 
 
 Tune—' Roy's Wife.' 
 CHORUS. 
 
 Stay, my Willie— yet believe me. 
 Stay, my Willie— yet believe me. 
 For, ah! thou kiww'st na every pan 
 Wad wring my bosom shouldst thou leavt iml 
 Tell me that thou yet art true, 
 
 ^nd a' wv wrongs shall be for<riv«n. 
 
LETTERS. 
 
 399 
 
 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 de- 
 termined to have my quantum of applause 
 from somebody. 
 
 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 sus- 
 pect 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 in- 
 strument. It is composed 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 High- 
 land 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 oat- 
 en 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 
 Ir.o'se in the sn^aller end of the stock 
 
 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 bro- 
 ther-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 cos- 
 tume in the world. 
 
 No. LXV 
 MR. THOMSON TO MR. BURNS. 
 
 2nth JS^'ovembcr, 1 794 
 
 I ACKNOWLEDGE, my dcar Sir, you are 
 not only the most punctual, but the most 
 delectable correspondent I ever met with. 
 To attempt flattering you, never entered 
 into my head ; the truth is, I look back 
 with surprise at my impudence, in so 
 frequently nibbling at lines and couplets 
 of your incomparable lyrics, for which, 
 perhaps, if you had served me right, you 
 would have sent me to the devil. On the 
 contrary, however, you have all along 
 while the stock, with the horn hanging on ! condescended to invite my criticism with 
 
 ■ ' " so much courtesy, that it ceases to be 
 
 wonderful, If I have sometimes given my- 
 self the airs of a reviewer. Your last 
 budget demands unqualified praise : all 
 the songs are charming, but the duet is a 
 rhrf (P (Ptivrp.. Lvmps o' Pudding shall 
 certainly make one of my family dishes } 
 you have cooked it f30 capitally, that it 
 will please all palates. Do give us a few 
 more of this cast when you find yourself 
 in goods pirits ; these convivial songs are 
 more wanted than those of the amorous 
 kind, of which, we have great choice. 
 Besides, one does not often meet with 
 a singer capable of giving the proper 
 effect to the latter, while the former 
 are easily sung, and acceptable to every 
 body. I participate in your regret that 
 the authors of some of our best songs are 
 imknown ; it is provoking to every ad- 
 mirer of genius. 
 
 its larger end, is held by the hands in play 
 ing. The stock has six or seven venti- 
 ges on the upper sides, and one back ven- 
 tige, like the common flute. This of 
 mine was made by a man from the braes 
 of Athole, and is exactly what the shep- 
 herds wont to use in that country. 
 
 However^ either it is not quite proper- 
 ly bored in the holes, or else we have 
 not the art of blowing it rightly ; for we 
 
 And when this heart proves faiise to thee, 
 
 Yon sun shall cease its course In heaven. 
 Stay my fVillie, 4-c. 
 
 But to think I was betray'd, 
 Tliat falsehood e'er our iovcs should sunder '. 
 
 To take the flow'ret to my breast, 
 And find the guilefu' serpent under ! 
 
 Stay my Willie, ^c. 
 Could I hopo thou'dst ne'er deceive, 
 
 Celi'stial pleasures, might I choose 'em, 
 rd slight, nor seek in other spheres 
 
 That heaven I'd find within thy bo«om. 
 
 Stay my Willie, Src. 
 
 Jt may amuse the reader to be told, that on this oc- 
 .asion the gentleman and the lady have exchanged the 
 4ialectH of their respective countries. The Scottish 
 (Brd makes his addresc in pure English : the reply on 
 lie part of the lady, in the Scottish dialect, is, if we 
 mitiake not, by a young and beautitui Engliihwo- 
 
 I mean to have a picture painted from 
 your beautiful ballad, Tlie Soldier's Re- 
 turn, to be engraved for one of my fron 
 tispieces. The most interesting point of 
 time appears to me, when she first recog- 
 nizes her ain dear Willy, " She gaz'd, she 
 redden'd like a rose." The three linea 
 immediately following are no doubt more 
 impreaeive on the reader's feelings ; but 
 
wo 
 
 LETTKRS. 
 
 were the painter to fix on these, then 
 you'll observe the animation and anxiety 
 of her countenance is gone, and he could 
 only represent her fainting in the soldier's 
 arms. But I submit the matter to }'ou, 
 and beg your opinion. 
 
 Allan desires me to thank you for your 
 accurate description of the stock and horn, 
 and for the very gratifying compliment 
 you pay him in considering him worthy of* 
 standing in a niche by the side of Burns 
 in the Scottish Pantheon. He has seen 
 the rude instrument you describe, so does 
 not want vou to send it ; but wishes to 
 know w hether you believe it to have ever 
 been generally used as a musical pipe by the 
 Scottish shepherds, and when, and in what 
 part of the country chiefly. I doubt much 
 if it was capable of any thing but routing 
 and roaring. A friend of mine says he re- 
 members to have heard one in his younger 
 days made of wood instead of your bone, 
 and that the sound was abominable. 
 
 Do not. I beseech you, return any books. 
 
 No. LXVI. 
 MR. BURNS TO MR. THOMSON 
 
 December, 1794. 
 It is, I assure you, the pride of my 
 heart, to do any thing 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 he peace till 
 Jamie comes hame, would not so well con- 
 sort with Peter Pindar's excellent love- 
 Bong to that air, I have just framed for 
 you the following : 
 
 MY NANNIE S AWA. 
 
 Now in her green mantle blithe nature 
 arrays, 
 istens the 
 the braes 
 
 arrays, 
 And listens the lambkins that bleat o'er 
 
 See Poems, p. 100. 
 
 How dofis 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. 
 
 No. LXVII. 
 MR. BURNS TO MR. THOMSON 
 
 January, 1795. 
 
 I FEAR for my songs ; however a few 
 may please, yet originality is a coy fea- 
 ture in composition, and in a multiplicity 
 of'eiforts in the same style, disappears 
 altogether. For these three thousand 
 years, we poetic folks, have been describ- 
 ing 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. 
 
 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. 
 
 FOR a' THAT AND A' THAT. 
 
 Is there, for honest poverty, 
 That hangs his head and a' that ; 
 
 See Poems. 1). 100. 
 
 I do not give you the»foregoing song 
 for your book, but merely by way of vive 
 la bagatelle; for the piece is not really 
 poetry. How will the following do for 
 Craigie-burn-wood?* 
 
 . Sweet fa's the eve on Cragie-burn, 
 And blithe awakes the morrow ; 
 See Poems, p. 101. 
 
 Farev/ell ! God bless you. 
 
 No. LXVIII. 
 MR. THOMSON TO MR. BURNS. 
 Edinburgh, 30th January, 1795. 
 
 MT DEAR SIR, 
 
 I THANK you heartily for J^annie't 
 awa, as well as for Craigie-burn, which 
 
 * Craigie-burn-wood is situate.l on the banks of th« 
 river Moffat, and about three miles distant from the vil- 
 lage of that name, celebrated for its medicinal waters. 
 —The woods of Craigie-burn and of Dumcrief. were at 
 one time favourite haunts of our poet. It was there he 
 I met the " Lassie wi' the lint-white locks," and that he 
 1 conceived several of his beautiful lyrics. K 
 
LETTERS. 
 
 SSI 
 
 I think a very comely pair. Your obser- 
 vation on the difficulty of original writing 
 in a number of efforts, in the same style, 
 strikes me very forcibly : and it has again 
 and again excited my wonder to find you 
 continually surmounting this difficulty, in 
 the many delightful songs you have sent 
 me. Your vive la bagatelle song, For a' 
 that, shall undoubtedly, be included in my 
 list. 
 
 No. LXIX. 
 
 MR. BURNS TO MR. THOMSON. 
 
 February, 1795. 
 Here is another trial at your favour- 
 ite air. 
 
 O Lassie, art thou sleeping yet.' 
 Or art thou wakin, I would wit? 
 See Poems, p. 101. 
 
 HER ANSWER. 
 
 O tell na me o' wind and rain, 
 Upbraid me na wi' qauld disdain ! 
 
 I do not know whether it wUl do. 
 
 No. LXX. 
 MR. BURNS TO MR. THOMSON. 
 
 Ecdefechan, Ith Feb., 1795. 
 
 MY DEAR THOMSON, 
 
 You cannot have any idea of the pre- 
 dicament in which I write to you. In the 
 course of my duty as Supervisor (in which 
 capacity I have acted of late,) I came yes- 
 ternight to this unfortunate, wicked, little 
 village. I have gone forward, but snows 
 of ten feet deep have impeded my pro- 
 gress ; I have tried to " gae back the gait 
 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 ago- 
 nies 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 forp'et these miseries, or to hang my- 
 
 self 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 !* 
 
 I wrote to you yesterday from Dum- 
 fries. I had not time then to tell you all 
 I wanted to say ; and heaven knows, at 
 present I have not capacity. 
 
 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 de- 
 lighted with it ; and if you should think 
 it worthy of your attention, I have a fair 
 dame in mv eve to whom I would conse' 
 crate it. 
 
 As I am just going to bed, I wish you 
 a good night. 
 
 No. LXXI - 
 
 MR. THOMSON TO MR. BURNS 
 
 25fA February, 1 795. 
 I HAVE to thank you, my dear Sir, for 
 two epistles, one containing Let me in this 
 ae night ; and the other from Ecdefechan, 
 proving, that drunk or sober, your "mind 
 is never muddy." You have displayed 
 great address in the above song. Her 
 answer is excellent, and at the same time, 
 takes away the indelicacy that otherwise 
 would have attached to his entreaties. 
 I like the song as it now stands, very 
 much. 
 
 I had hopes you would be arrested 
 some days at Ecdefechan, and be obliged 
 to beguile the tedious forenoons by song- 
 making. It will give me pleasure to re- 
 ceive the verses you intend for O wat ye 
 wha's in yon town 7 
 
 No. LXXII. 
 MR. BURNS TO MR. THOMSON 
 
 May, 1795., 
 
 ADDRESS TO THE WOODLARK. 
 
 O STAY, sweet warbling woodlark, stay, 
 Nor quit for me the trembling spray. 
 See Poems, p. 102. 
 
 * The bard must have been tipsv Indeed, to abuM 
 sweet Ecclefechun at thi« rate G 
 
232 
 
 LETTERvS. 
 
 Let me know, your very first leisure, 
 how you like this song. 
 
 ON CHLORrS BEING ILL. 
 
 (jiioaus. 
 
 Long, long the night, 
 
 Heavy comes the morrow, 
 
 See Poems, p. 102. 
 
 How do yen like the foi-jegoing ? The 
 Irish air, Humours of Glen, is a great fa- 
 vourite 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 : 
 
 i?ONG. 
 
 Their groves o' s\yeet myrtle let foreign 
 lands reckon, 
 Where brigdt-beaming summers exalt 
 the perfume ; 
 
 See Poems, p. 102. 
 
 SONG. 
 
 'Twas na her bonnie blue e'e was my 
 ruin; 
 
 Fair tho' she be, that was ne'er my undo- 
 ing; 
 
 See Poems, p. 102. 
 
 Let me hear from you. 
 
 No. LXXin. 
 
 MR. THOMSON TO MR. BURNS. 
 
 You must not think, my good Sir, that 
 I have any intention to enhance the value 
 of my gift, when I say, in justice to the 
 ingenious and worthy artist, that the de- 
 sign and execution of the Cotter's S^ur- 
 day Night is, in my opinion, one of the 
 happiest prodactions of Allan's pencil. I 
 shall be grievously disappointed if you 
 are not quite pleased with it. 
 
 The figure intended for your portrait, 
 I think strikingly like you, as far as I can 
 remember your phiz. This should make 
 the piece interesting to your family every 
 way. — Tell me whether Mrs. Burns finds 
 you out among the figures. 
 
 I cannot express the feeling of admira- 
 tion with which I have read your pathetic 
 
 Address to the Wood-Lark, your elegant 
 Panegyric on Caledonia, and your affect- 
 ing verses on Chloris's illness. Every 
 repeated perusal of these give? new de- 
 light. The other song to " Laddie, lie 
 near me," though not equal to these, is 
 very pleasing. 
 
 No. LXXIV 
 MR. BURNS TO MR. THOMSON 
 
 How cruel are the parents, 
 Who riches only prize ; 
 
 See Poems, p. 102. 
 
 SONG. 
 
 Mark yonder pomp of costly fashion, 
 Round the wealthy, titled bride ; 
 
 See Poems, p. 103. 
 
 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 portion of your 
 applause, it will raise your humble ser- 
 vant's frenzy to any height you want. I 
 am at this moment " holding high con- 
 verse" with the Muses, and have not a 
 word to throw away on such a prosaic 
 dog as you are. 
 
 No. LXXV. 
 MR. BURNS TO MR. THOMSON. 
 
 May, 1795. 
 
 Ten thousand thanks for your elegan* 
 present : though I am ashamed of the va- 
 I lue of it being bestowed on a man who 
 has not by any means merited such an in- 
 ttauce of kindness. I have shown it to 
 two or three judges of the first abilities 
 here, and they all agree with me in class- 
 ing it as a first rate production. My 
 phis is sae ken-speckle, 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 muse so much with 
 his masterly nencil. One strangfe coin- 
 
LETTERS. 
 
 233 
 
 cidence is, that the little one who is ma- 
 king the felonious attempt on the cat's 
 tail, is the most striking likeness of an 
 ill-deedie, d — n'd, wee, rumble-gairie, ur- 
 chin of mine, whom, from that propensity 
 to witty wickedness, and manfu' mischief, 
 which even at two 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. 
 
 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. 
 
 You do not tell me how you liked my 
 two last songs. Are they condemned ? 
 
 No. LXXVT. 
 MR. THOMSON TO MR. BURNS. 
 
 \3thJ\Iay, 1795. 
 
 It gives me great pleasure to find that 
 you are so well satisfied with Mr. Allan's 
 production. The chance resemblance of 
 your little fellow, whose promising dispo- 
 sition appeared so very early, and sug- 
 gested whom he should be named after, 
 is curious enougli. I am acquainted with 
 that person, who is a prodigy of learning 
 and genius, and a pleasant fellow, though 
 no saint. 
 
 You really make me blush when you 
 tell me you have not merited the drawing 
 from me. I do not think I can ever re- 
 pay you, or sufficiently esteem and re- 
 spect you for the liberal and kind man- 
 ner in which you have entered into the 
 spirit of my undertaking, which could not 
 have been perfected without you. So I 
 beg you would not make a fool of me 
 again, by speaking of obligation. 
 
 I like your two last songs very much, 
 and am happy to find you are in such a 
 high fit of poetizing. Long may it last I 
 Clarke has made a fine pathetic air to 
 Mallet's superlative ballad of William 
 and Margaret, and is to give it me to be 
 enrolled among the elect. 
 
 No. LXXVIL 
 
 MR. BURNS TO MR. THOMSON. 
 
 In Whistle, and Pll come to you, my lad, 
 the iteration of that line is tiresome to my 
 ear. Here goes what I think is an im- 
 provement. 
 
 O whistle, and I'll come to ye, my la& 
 O whistle, and I'll come to ye, my lad ; 
 Tho' father and mother and a' should gae 
 
 mad, 
 Thy Jeany will venture wi' ye my lad. 
 
 In fact, a fair dame at whose shrine, I 
 the Priest of the Nine, offer up the in- 
 cense of Parnassus ; a dame, whom the 
 Graces have attired in witchcraft, and 
 whom the loves have armed with light- 
 ning, a Fair One, herself the heroine of 
 the song, insists on the amendment : and 
 dispute her commands if you dare ! 
 
 SONG. 
 
 O this is no my am lassie. 
 Fair tho' the lassie be ; 
 
 See Poems, p. 103. 
 
 Do you know that you have roused the 
 torpidity of Clarke at last ? He has re- 
 quested me to write three or four songs 
 for him, which he is to set to music him- 
 self The enclosed sheet contains two 
 songs for him, which please to present to 
 my valued friend Cunningham. 
 
 I enclose the sheet open, both for your 
 inspection, and that you may copy the 
 song, O bonnie was yon rosy brier. I do 
 not know whether t am right ; but that 
 song pleases me, and as it is extremely 
 probable that Clarke's newly roused ce- 
 lestial spark will be soon smothered in 
 the fogs of hidolence, if you like the song, 
 it may go as Scottish verses, to the air of 
 / wish my love was in a mire ; and poor 
 Erskme's English lines may follow. 
 
 I enclose you, a For «' that and a' thai, 
 which was never in print ; it is a much 
 superior song to mine. I have been told 
 that it was composed by a lady. 
 
 Now spring has clad the grove in green. 
 And strew'd the lea wi' flowers .- 
 
 Se« Poem#, p. 1 03 
 
2t:4 
 
 LETTERS. 
 
 O BONNIE was yon rosy brier 
 
 That blooms sae far frae haunt o' man; 
 See Poem*, p.- 104. 
 
 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 ar- 
 dent sentiments of real friendship, I have 
 PC often sung under the name of Chloris. 
 
 Tis Friendship's pledge, my young, fair 
 friend, 
 Nor thou the gift refuse, 
 
 See Poems, p. 104. 
 
 Coil A. 
 
 Une bigattUe de /' amitle. 
 
 No. LXXVIII. 
 
 MR. THOMSON TO MR. BURNS. 
 
 Edinburgh, 3rf Aug. 1795. 
 
 MT DEAR SIR, 
 
 This will be delivered to you by a 
 Dr Brianton, who has read your works, 
 and pants for the honour of your acquain- 
 tance I do not know the gentleman, but 
 his friend, who apphed to me for this in- 
 troduction, being an excellent young man, 
 I have no doubt he is worthy of all accep- 
 tation 
 
 My eyes have just been gladdened, and 
 my mind feasted, with your last packet — 
 full of pleasant things indeed. What an 
 imagination is yourn ! It is superfluous to 
 tell you that I am delighted with all the 
 thiee bongs, as well as with your elegant 
 and tender verses to Chloris. 
 
 I am sorry you should be induced to al- 
 ter O whistle, and III come to ye, my lad, 
 to the prosaic line. Thy Jeany xoill ven- 
 ture wi' ye my lad. I must be permitted 
 to say, that I do not think the latter either 
 reads or sings so well as the former. I 
 wish, therefore, you would, in my name 
 petition the charming Jeany whoever she 
 be, to let the line remain unaltered.* 
 
 I should be happy to see Mr. Clarke 
 
 • The editor, who has heard the heroine of this sons 
 sing it herself in the very ppiritof arch simplicity that 
 it requires, thinks M. Thomson's petition unreasona- 
 ble It" we mistake not, this is tlie same lady who pro- 
 duced the lines to the tunc of Roy's Wife, ante, p. 228. 
 
 produce a few aire to be joined to your 
 verses. Every body regrets his writing 
 so very little, as every body acknowledges 
 his ability to write well. Pray was the 
 resolution formed cooly before dinner, or 
 was it a midnight vow, made over a bowl 
 of punch with the bard } 
 
 I shall not fail to give Mr. Cunning- 
 ham what you have sent him. 
 
 P. S. Thte lady's For o' that and a' thai, 
 is sensible enough, but no more to be com- 
 pared to yours than I to Hercules. 
 
 No. LXXIX. 
 
 MR. BURNS TO MR. THOMSON. 
 
 Forlorn, my love, no comfort near, 
 Far, far from thee, I wander here ; 
 See Poems, p. ] 04. 
 
 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 ? 
 
 No. LXXX. 
 
 MR. BURNS TO MR. THOMSON 
 
 Last May a braw wooer cam down tne 
 lang glen. 
 And sair wi' his love did he deave me ;* 
 See Poems, v. 104. 
 
 Why, why tell thy lover. 
 Bliss he never must enjoy ? 
 
 See Poems, p. 105. 
 
 * In the original MS. the tlnrd line of the fourth verse 
 runs, " He up the Gatcslack to my black cousin Boss." 
 Mr. Thomson objected to this word, as well as to the 
 v.ord, Dalgarnock in the next verse. Mr. Burns re- 
 plies as follows : 
 
 " Gateslack is the name of a particular place, a kind 
 of passage up among the Lawther hills, on the confines 
 of this county. Dalgarnock is also the name of a ro- 
 mantic spot near the Nith, where are still a ruined 
 church and burial-ground. However, let tlie first nin, 
 He up the lang loan,''' &c. 
 
 It is always a pity to throw out any thing that gives 
 locality to our poet's verses. Ei 
 
LETTERS- 
 
 235 
 
 Such is the peculiarity of the rhythm 
 of this air, that I find it impossible to make 
 another stanza to suit it. 
 
 I am at present quite occupied with the 
 charming sensations of the tooth-ach, so 
 have not a word to spare. 
 
 No. LXXXI. 
 MR. THOMSON TO MR. BURNS. 
 2d June, 1795. 
 
 Mr DEAR SIR, 
 
 Your English verses to Let me in 
 this ae night, are tender and beautiful ; 
 and your ballad to the " Lothian Lassie," 
 IS a masterpiece for its humour and nai- 
 vete. The fragment for the Caledonian 
 Hunt is quite suited to the original mea- 
 sure of the air, and, as it plagues you so, 
 the fragment must content it. I would 
 rather, as I said before, have had Bac- 
 chanalian words, had it so pleased the 
 poet ; but, nevertheless, for what we have 
 received. Lord make us thankful ! 
 
 No. LXXXIL 
 MR. THOMSON TO MR. BURNS. 
 5th Feb. 1796. 
 
 O Robby Burns, are ye sleeping yet ? 
 Or are ye wauking, I would wit? 
 
 The patise you have made, my dear 
 Sir, is awful ! Am I never to hear from 
 you again ? I know and I lament how 
 much you have been afflicted of late, but 
 I trust that returning health and spirits 
 will now enable you to resume the pen, 
 and delight us with your musings. I have 
 still about a dozen Scotch and Irish airs 
 that I wish "married to immortal verse." 
 We have several true born Irishmen on 
 the Scottish list ; but they are now na- 
 turalized, and reckoned our own good 
 Bubjects. Indeed we have none better. 
 T believe I before told you that I have 
 been much urged by some friends to pub- 
 lish a collection of all our favourite airs 
 and songs in octavo, embellished with a 
 number of etchingsby our ingenious friend 
 Allan ; — what is your opinion of this ? 
 Dd2 
 
 No. LXXXHL 
 
 MR. BURNS TO MR. THOMSON. 
 
 February, 1796. 
 Many thanks, my dear Sir, for yowr 
 
 handsome elegant present, to Mrs. B , 
 
 and for my remaining vol. of P. Pindar. — 
 Peter is a delightful fellow, and a first fa- 
 vourite of mine. I am much pleased with 
 your idea of publishing a collection of our 
 songs in octavo, with etchings, I am ex- 
 tremely willing to lend every assistance 
 in my power. The Irish airs I shall 
 cheerfully undertake the task of finding 
 verses for. 
 
 I have already, you know, equipped 
 three with words, and the other day I 
 strung up a kind of rhapsody to another 
 Hibernian melody, which I admire muclu 
 
 HEr FOR A LASS Wl' A TOCHER. 
 
 AwA wi' your witchcraft o' beauty's 
 
 alarms, ■ 
 The slender bit beauty you grasp in your 
 
 arms; 
 
 See Poems, p. 105. 
 
 If this will do, you have now four of 
 my Irish engagement. Tn my by-past 
 songs I dislike one thing ; the name of 
 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 pro- 
 pose. — What you once mentioned of 
 " flaxen locks" is just ; they cannot enter 
 into an elegant d'?scription of beauty. Of 
 this also again — God bless you !* 
 
 No. LXXXIV. 
 
 MR. THOMSON TO MR. BURNS. 
 
 Your Hey for a lass ici' a tocher, is a 
 most excellent song, and with you the 
 subject is something new indeed. It is 
 the first time I have seen you debasing 
 the god of soft desire, into an amateur of 
 acres and guineas — 
 
 I am happy to find you approve of n;y 
 
 * Our Poet never explained what name lie tjouia 
 have substituted for Chlorib. 
 
 JVotebyMr. TJtomscm. 
 
23« 
 
 LETTERS. 
 
 proposed octavo edition. Allan has de- 
 signed and etched about twenty plates, 
 and I am to have my choice of them for 
 that work. Independently of the Ho- 
 garthian humor with which they abound, 
 they exhibit the character and costumeof 
 theScottish peasantry with inimitable feli- 
 city. In this respect, he himself says they 
 will far exceed the aquatinta plates he did 
 for the Gentle Shepherd, because in the 
 etching he sees clearly what he is doing, 
 but not so with the aquatinta, which he 
 could not manage to his mind. 
 
 The Dutch boors of Ostade are scarce- 
 ly more characteristic and natural than 
 the Scottish figures in those etchings. 
 
 No. LXXXV. 
 
 MR. BURNS TO MR. THOMSON. 
 
 April, 1796. 
 
 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 pres- 
 sure 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 — 
 
 " Say, wherefore has an all-indulgent Heaven 
 Light to the comfortless and wretched given 1 
 
 This will be delivered to you by a Mrs. 
 Hyslop, landlady of the Globe Tavern 
 here, which for these many years has 
 been my howff, and where our friend 
 Clarke and I have had many a merry 
 squeeze. I am highly delighted with Mr. 
 Allan's etchings. Woo'd and married 
 an' a', is admirable. The grouping is be-' 
 yond all praise. The expression of the 
 figures conformable to the story in the 
 ballad, is absolutely faultless perfection. 
 I next admire, Turn-hn-spike. What I 
 like least is Jennij said to Jockey. Be- 
 sides the female being in her apppear- 
 ance v * * * * jf you take her 
 stooping into the account, she is at least 
 two inchea taJler than her lover. Poor 
 Cleghorn : 1 smcerely sympathize with 
 him! Happy I am to think that he has 
 
 yet a well grounded hope of health and 
 enjoyment in this world. As for rne — 
 but that is a * * * * * eubject ! 
 
 No. LXXXVI 
 
 MR. THOMSON TO MR. BURNS. 
 
 4th May, 1796. 
 
 I NEED not tell you. my good Sir, what 
 concern the receipt of your last gave me, 
 and how much I sympathize in your suf- 
 ferings. But do not I beseech you, give 
 yourself up to despondency, nor speak 
 the language of despair. The vigour of 
 your constitution, I trust, will soon set 
 you on your feet again ; and then it is to 
 be hoped you will sea the wisdom and the 
 necessity of taking due care of a life so 
 valuable to your family, to your friends, 
 and to the world. 
 
 Trusting that your next will bring 
 agreeable accounts of your convales- 
 cence, and returning good spirits, I re- 
 main, with sincere regard, yours. 
 
 P. S. Mrs. Hyslop, I doubt not, deli- 
 vered the gold seal to you in good condi- 
 tion. 
 
 No. LXXXVII. 
 
 MR. BURNS TO MR. THOMSON. 
 
 MY DEAR SIR, 
 
 I ONCE mentioned to you an air which 
 I have long admired — Here's a health to 
 them that's awa, hinnie, 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 at- 
 tention once more. I have only begun it. 
 
 Here's a health to ane I lo'e dear, 
 Here's a health, to ane I lo'e dear ;* 
 See Poems, p. 105. 
 
 * In the letter to Mr. Thomson, the three first stan- 
 zas only are given, and Mr. Thomson supposed our po- 
 et had never gone farther. Among his MSS. was, 
 however, found the fourth stanza, which completes thl« 
 exquisite song, the last finished ofTsprine of his muse. 
 
LETTERS. 
 
 No. LXXXVIII. 
 
 MR. BURNS TO MR. THOMSON. 
 
 This will be delivered by a Mr. Le- 
 wars, a young- fellow of uncommon merit. 
 Ad 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 lialf 
 hour to spend with him, I shall place 
 your khidness 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 co- 
 pies.* I had rather be the author of five 
 well-written songs, than often otherwise. 
 I have great hopes that the genial influ- 
 ence 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. 
 
 Do let me know how Cleghorn is, and 
 remember me to him. 
 
 This should have been delivered to you 
 a month ago. I am still very poorly, but 
 should like much to hear from you. 
 
 No. LXXXIX. 
 
 MR. BURNS TO MR. THOMSON. 
 Brow, ontheSolway Frith, \2tkJuly, 1796. 
 
 After all my boasted independence, 
 cursed necessity compels me to implore 
 you for five pounds. A cruel * * * * 
 of a haberdasher, to whom T owe an ac- 
 count, 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 re- 
 turn of post. Forgive me this earnest- 
 ness, 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 genivis you have seen. 
 I tried my hand on Rotkiemurchie this 
 morning. The measure is so difficult, 
 that it is impossible to infuse much geni- 
 us into the lines ; they are on the other 
 side. Forgive, forgive me ! 
 
 * It is needlesa to say that this revisal Bums did 
 not live to perform. E. 
 
 SONG. 
 
 Fairest maid on Devon banks, 
 
 Chrystal Devon, winding Devon,* 
 See Poems, p. 106 
 
 No. XC. 
 MR. THOMSON TO MR. BURNS. 
 lAthJuly, 1796. 
 
 MY DEAR SIR, 
 
 Ever since I received your melan- 
 choly letter by Mrs. Hyslop, I have been 
 ruminating in what manner I could en- 
 deavour to alleviate your euffferings. 
 Again and again I thought of a pecunia- 
 ry offfer, but the recollection of one of 
 your letters on this subject, and the fear 
 of offending your independent spirit, 
 checked my resolution. I thank you 
 heartily therefore for the frankness of 
 your letter of the 12th, and with great 
 pleasure enclose a draft for the very sum 
 I proposed sending. Would I were 
 Chancellor of the Exchequer but for one 
 day for your sake ! 
 
 Pray, my good Sir, is it not 
 for you to muster a volume of poetry .' If 
 too much trouble to you in the present 
 state of your health; some literary friend 
 might be found here, who would select 
 and arrange from your manuscripts, and 
 take upon him the task of Editor. In the 
 mean time it could be advertised to be 
 published by subscription. Do not shun 
 this mode of obtaining the value of your 
 labour: remember Pope published the 
 Iliad by subscription. Think of this, my 
 dear Burns, and do not reckon me intru- 
 sive with my advice. You are too well 
 convinced of the respect and friendship I 
 bear you to impute any thing I say to an 
 unworthy motive. Yours faithfully. 
 
 The verses to Rotkiemurchie will an- 
 swer finely. I am happy to see you can 
 still tune your lyre. 
 
 • Thia song, and the letter enclosing It, are written 
 in a character that marks the very feeble stale of 
 Buriis's bodily strength. Mr. Syme is of opinion that 
 he could not have been in any danjer of a jail at Dura- 
 frii s, where- certainly he had many firm friends ; nor un- 
 dcranysiich n-ccessily of imploring aid from Edinbnrj.;lj. 
 Rut nbout this timi! his reason be?an to be at times un- 
 aettlpd, and the horrors of a jail perpetually haunttid 
 his imagination. He died on the 21st of this month. E. 
 
238 
 
 LETTERS. 
 
 EXTRACT OP A LETTER, 
 
 FROM GILBERT BURNS TO DR. CURRIE. 
 
 It may gratify curiosity to know some par- 
 ticulars of the history of the preceding 
 Poems,* on which the celebrity of our 
 Bard has been hitherto founded; and 
 with this view the following extract is 
 made from a letter of Gilbert Burns, the 
 brother of our poet, and his friend and 
 confidant from his earliest years. 
 
 Mossgill, 2d April, 1798. 
 
 Your letter of the 14th of March I 
 received in due course, but from the hurry 
 of the season have been hitherto hindered 
 from answering it. I vi'ill now try to give 
 you what satisfaction I can, in regajd to 
 the particulars you mention. I cannot 
 pretend to be very accurate in respect to 
 the dates of the poems, but none of them, 
 except Winter a Dirge, (which was a ju- 
 venile production,) The Death and Dying 
 Words of Poor Maillie, and some of the 
 Bongs, were composed before the year 
 1784. The circumstances of the poor 
 sheep were pretty much as he has de- 
 scribed them. He had partly by way of 
 frolic, bought a ewe and two lambs from 
 a neighbour, and she was tethered in a 
 field adjoining the house at Lochlie. He 
 and I were going out, with our teams, and 
 our two younger brothers to drive for us, 
 at mid-day ; when Hugh Wilson, a curi- 
 ous looking awkward boy, clad in plaid- 
 ing, came to us with much anxiety in his 
 face, with the information that the ewe 
 had entangled herself in the tether, and 
 was lying in the ditch. Robert was much 
 tickled with Huoc's appearance and pos- 
 tures on the occasion. Poor Maillie was 
 set to rights, and when we returned from 
 the plough in the evening, he repeated to 
 me her Death and Dying Words, pretty 
 much in the way they now stand. 
 
 Among the earliest of his poems was 
 the Epistle to Davie, Robert often com- 
 posed without any regular plan. When 
 any thing made a strong impression on his 
 mind, so as to rouse it to poetic exertion, 
 he would give way to the impulse, and 
 
 • This refers to the pieces inserted before page 76 of 
 th« Poems 
 
 embody the thought in rhyme. If he hit 
 on two or three stanzas to please him, he 
 would then think of proper introductory, 
 connecting, and concluding stanzas ; hence 
 the middle of a poem was often first pro- 
 duced. It was, I think, in summer 1784, 
 when in the interval of harder labour, he 
 and I were weeding in the garden (kail- 
 yard,) that he repeated to me the princi- 
 pal part of this epistle. I believe the first 
 idea of Robert becoming an author was 
 started on this occasion. I was much 
 pleased with the epistle, and said to him 
 I was of opinion it would bear being print- 
 ed, and that it would be well received by 
 people of taste; that I thought it at least 
 equal if not superior to many of Allan 
 Ramsay's epistles ; and that the merit of 
 these, and much other Scotch poetry, 
 seemed to consist principally in the knack 
 of the expression, but here, there Avas a 
 train of interesting sentiment, and the 
 Scoticism of the language scarcely seemed 
 affected, but appeared to be the natural 
 language of the poet; that, besides, there 
 was certainly some novelty in a poet point- 
 ing out the consolations that were in store 
 for him when he should go a-begging. 
 Robert seemed very well pleased with 
 my criticism, and we talked of sending it 
 to some magazine, but as this plan afford- 
 ed no opportunity of knowing how it 
 would take, the idea was dropped. 
 
 It was, I think, in the winter following, 
 as we were going together with carts for 
 coal to the family fire (and I could yet point 
 out the particular spot,) that the author 
 first repeated to me the Address to the Deil. 
 The curious idea of such an address was 
 suggested to' him by running over in his 
 mind the many ludicrous accounts and re- 
 presentations we have, from various quar- 
 ters, of this august personage. Death 
 and Doctor Hornbook, though not pub- 
 lished in the Kilmarnock edition, was 
 produced early in the year 1785. The 
 Schoolmaster of Tarbolton parish, to eke 
 up the scanty subsistence allowed to that 
 useful class of men, had set up a shop of 
 grocery goods. Having accidentally fall- 
 en in with some medical books, and be- 
 come most hobby-horsically attached to 
 the study of medicine, he had added t'he 
 sale of a few medicines to his little trade. 
 He had got a shop-bill printed, at the bot- 
 tom of which, overlooking his own inca- 
 pacity, he had advertised, that Advice 
 would be given in " common disorders at 
 the shop gratis." Robert was at a ma- 
 son meet'-ng in Tarbolton, when the Do- 
 
LETTERS. 
 
 239 
 
 mime unfortunately maile too ostentatious 
 a display of his medical skill. As he 
 parted in the evening from this mixture 
 of pedantry and physic, at the place where 
 he describes his meeting with Death, one 
 of those floating ideas of apparition he 
 mentions in his letter to Dr. Moore, 
 crossed his mind : this set him to work 
 for the rest of the way home. These cir- 
 cumstances he related when he reneated 
 the verses to me next afternoon, as I was 
 holding the plough, and he was letting 
 the water off the field beside me. The 
 Epistle to John Lapraik was produced 
 exactly on the occasion described by the 
 author. He says in that poem, On fast- 
 en-e'en, we had a rockin. I believe he has 
 omitted the word rocking in the glossary. 
 It is a term derived from those primitive 
 times, when the countrywomen employed 
 their spare hours in spinning on the rack, 
 or distaff. This simple implement is a 
 very portable one, and well fitted to the 
 social inclination of meeting in a neigh- 
 bour's house ; hence the phrase oi going 
 a-rocking, or with the rock. As the con- 
 nexion the phrase had with the implement 
 was forgotten, when the rock gave place 
 to the spinning-wheel, the phrase came 
 to be used by both sexes on social occa- 
 sions, and men talk of going with their 
 rocks as well as women. 
 
 It was at one of these rockings at our 
 house when we had twelve or fifteen young 
 people with their rocks, that Lapraik's 
 song beginning — " When I upon thy bo- 
 som lean," was sung, and we were in- 
 formed who was the author. Upon this, 
 Robert wrote his first epistle to Lapraik; 
 and his second in reply to his answer. 
 The verses to the Mouse and Mountain 
 Daisy were composed on the occasions 
 mentioned, and while the author was hold- 
 ing the plough ; I could point out the par- 
 ticular spot where each was composed. 
 Holding the plough was a favourite situ- 
 ation with Robert for poetic composition, 
 and some of his best verses were produced 
 while he was at that exercise. Several 
 of the poems were produced for the pur- 
 pose of bringing forward some favourite 
 sentiment of the author. He used to re- 
 mark to me, tliat he could not well con- 
 ceive, a more mortifying picture of human 
 life, than a man seeking work. In cast- 
 ing about in his mind how this sentiment 
 might be brought forward, the elegy Jl/ara 
 was made to mourn, was composed. Ro- 
 bert had frequently remarked to me that 
 he thoup-ht there was s^methinff peculiar- 
 
 ly venerable in tlie phrase, " Let us wor- 
 ship 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 JVight. 
 The hint of the plan, and title of the poem, 
 were talcen from Fergusson's Farmer's 
 Ingle. When Robert had not some plea- 
 sure in view, in which I was not thought 
 fit to participate, we used frequently to 
 walk together, when the weather was fa- 
 vourable, on the Sunday afternoons (those 
 precious breathing times to the labouring 
 part of the community,) and enjoyed such 
 Sundays as would make one regret to see 
 their number abridged. It was in one of 
 these walks, that I first had the pleasure 
 of hearing the author repeat the Cotter's 
 Saturday JVight. I do not recollect to 
 have heard or read any thing by which I 
 was more highly e/etir//if(/. The fifth and 
 sixth stanzas, and the eighteenth, thrilled 
 with peculiar pcstacy through my soul. 
 I mention this to you, that you may see 
 what flit the taste of unlettered criticism. 
 I should be glad to know if the enlighten- 
 ed mind and refined taste of Mr. Roscoe, 
 who has borne such honourable testimony 
 to this poem, agrees with me in the selec- 
 tion. Fergusson, in his Hallow Fair of 
 Edinburgh, I believe, likewise furnished 
 a hint of the title and plan of the Holy- 
 Fair. The farcical scene the poet there 
 describes was often a favourite field of his 
 observation, and the most of the incidents 
 he mentions had actually passed before 
 his eyes. It is scarcely necessary to men- 
 tion that the Lament was composed on 
 that unfortunate passage in his matrimo- 
 nial history, which I have mentioned in 
 my letter to Mrs. Dunlop, after the first 
 distraction of his feelings had a little sub- 
 sided. The Tale of Twa Dogs was com- 
 posed after the resolution of publishing 
 was nearly taken. Robert had had a dog, 
 which he called Luath, that was a great 
 favourite. The dog had been killed by 
 the wanton cruelty of some person the 
 night before my father's death. Robert 
 said to me, that he should like to confer 
 such immortality as he could bestow upon 
 his old friend Luath, and that he had a 
 great mind to introduce something into 
 the book, under the title of Stanzas to the 
 Memory of a quadruped Friend ; but this 
 plan was given up for the Tale as it now 
 stands. Ccesar was merely the creature 
 of the poet's imagination, created for the 
 purpose of holding chat with his favourite 
 Luath. The first time Robert heaid the 
 sninnet olaved upon was at the house <vf 
 
LETTERS 
 
 Dr. Lawrie, then minister of the parish of 
 Loudon, now in Glasgow, having given 
 up the parish in favour of his son. Dr. 
 Lawrie has several daughters r one of 
 them played; the father and mother led 
 down the dance ; the rest of th§ sisters, 
 the brother, the poet, and the other 
 guests, mixed in it. It was a delightful 
 family scene for our poet, then lately in- 
 troduced to the world. His mind was 
 roused to a poetic enthusiasm, and the 
 stanzas p. 44. of the Poems, were left in 
 the room where he slept. It was to 
 Dr. Lawrie that Dr. Blacklock's letter 
 was addressed, which my brother, in his 
 letter to Dr. Moore, mentions as the rea- 
 son of his going to Edinburgh. 
 
 When my ??d\\er feiied his little proper- 
 ty near Alloway-Kirk, the wall of the 
 church-yard had gone to ruin, and cattle 
 had free liberty of pasturing in it. My 
 father, with two or three other neigh- 
 bours, joined in an application to the 
 town council of Ayr, who were superiors 
 of the adjoining land, for liberty to re- 
 build it, and raised by subscription a sum 
 for enclosing this ancient cemetery with 
 a wall ; hence he came to consider it as 
 his burial-place, and we learned that re- 
 verence for it people generally have for 
 the burial-place of their ancestors. My 
 brother was living in Ellisland, when 
 Captain Grose, on his peregrinations 
 through Scotland, staid some .time at 
 Carsehouse, in the neighbourhood, with 
 Captain Robert Riddel, of Glen-Riddel, 
 a particular friend of my brother's. The 
 Antiquarian and the poet were " Unco 
 pack and thick thegither." Robert re- 
 quested of Captain Grose, when he should 
 come to Ayrshire, that he would make a 
 drawing of Alloway-Kirk, as it was the 
 burial-place of his father, and where he 
 himself had a sort of claim to lay down 
 his bones when they should be no lunger 
 Bsrviceable to him ; and added by way of 
 encouragement, that it was the scene of 
 many a good story of witches and appari- 
 tions, of which he knew the Captain was 
 very fond. The Captain agreed to the 
 request, provided the poet would furnish 
 a witch-story, to be printed along with it. 
 Tarn o' Shanter was produced on this oc- 
 casion, and was first published in Grose's 
 Antiquities of Scotland. 
 
 The poem is founded on a traditional 
 story. The leading circumstances of a 
 man riding home very late from Ayr, in 
 a stormy night, his seeing a light in Al- 
 
 loway-Kirk, .us havmg the curiosity to 
 look in, his seeing a dance of witches, 
 with the devil playing on the bagpipe to 
 them, the scanty covering of one of the 
 witches, which made him so far forget 
 himself, as to cry Weel loupen, short 
 sark ! — with the melancholy catastrophe 
 of the piece is all a true story, that can 
 be well attested by many respectable old 
 people in that neighbourhood. 
 
 I do not at present recollect any cir 
 cumstances respecting the other poems 
 that could be at all interesting ; eveii 
 some of those I have mentioned, I am 
 afraid, may appear trifling enough, but 
 you will only make use of what aDpea'<;fc 
 to you of consequence. 
 
 The following Poejns in the first Edin 
 burgh edition, were not in that published 
 in Kilmarnock. Death and Dr. Horn 
 book; the Brigs nf Ayr; the Calf; (the 
 poet had been with Mr. Gavin Hamilton 
 in the morning, who said jocularly to him 
 when he was going to church, in allusioi. 
 to -the injunction of some parents to theii 
 children, that he must be sure to bring 
 him a note of the sermon at mid-day 
 this address to the Reverend Gentleman 
 on his text was accordingly produced.) 
 The Ordination ; The Address to the Uncc 
 Guid ; Tarn Samson's Elegy; A Wintet 
 J^ight ; Stanzas on the same Occasion a» 
 the preceding Prayer; Verses left at a 
 Reverend Friend's House; The First 
 Psalm ; Prayer under the Pressure of vi- 
 olent Anguish; the First Six Verses oj 
 the JVinetieth Psalm; Verses to Mis» 
 Logan, with Beattie's Poems ; To a Hag 
 gis ; Address to Edinburgh; John Bar- 
 leycorn; When Guilford Guid; Behind 
 yon hills where Stinchar flows ; Green 
 grow the Rashes ; Again rejoicing Jfature 
 sees ; The gloomy JVIght ; JVo Chiirchman 
 I am. 
 
 If you have never seen the first edition, 
 it will, perhaps, not be amiss to transcribe 
 the preface, that you may see the man- 
 ner in which the Poet made his first awe- 
 struck approach to the bar of public judg- 
 ment. 
 
 [Here followed the Preface as given in 
 the first page of the Poems. 
 
 I am, dear Sir, 
 Your most obedient humble Servant, 
 GILBERT BURNS 
 PB. CVRRIE, Liverpool, 
 
LETTERS. 
 
 241 
 
 To this history of the poems which are 
 contained in this volume, it may be added, 
 that our author appears to have made lit- 
 tle alteration in them after their oria^inal 
 composition, except in some few instan- 
 ces where considerable additions have 
 been introduced. After he had attracted 
 the notice of the public by his first edi- 
 tion, various criticisms were offered him 
 on the peculiarities of his style, as well as 
 of his sentiments; and some of these, 
 wliich remain among his manuscripts, are 
 by persons of great taste and judgment. 
 Some tew of these criticisms he adopted, 
 but the far greater part he rejected ; and, 
 though something has by this means been 
 lost in point of delicacy and correctness, 
 vet a deeper impression is left of the 
 strength and originality of his genius. 
 The firmness of our poet's character, 
 arising from a just confidence in his own 
 powers, may, in part, explain his tena- 
 ciousness of his peculiar expressions ; but 
 it may be in some degree accounted for 
 also, by the circumstances under which 
 the poems were composed. Burns did 
 not, like men of genius born under hap- 
 pier auspices, retire, in the moment of in- 
 spiration, to the silence and solitude of 
 his study, and commit his verses to paper 
 as they arranged themselves in his mind. 
 Forttme did not afford him this indulgence. 
 It was during the toils of daily labour 
 that his fancy exerted itself; the muse, 
 as he himself informs us, found him at the 
 plough. In this situation, it was neces- 
 sary to fix his verses on his memory, and 
 it was often many days, nay weeks, after 
 a poem was finished, before it was writ- 
 .en down. During all this time, by fre- 
 quent repetition, the association between 
 ■.he thought and the expression was con- 
 firmed, and the impartiality of taste with 
 which written language is reviewed and 
 retouched after it has faded on the me- 
 mory, could not in such instances be 
 exerted. The original manuscripts of 
 many of his poems are preserved, and 
 ,liey differ in nothing material from the 
 last printed edition — Some few varia- 
 tions may be noticed. 
 
 1. In 77ie Author's earnest Cry and 
 Prayer after the stanza beginning, 
 
 F.rskine, a spunkie, Borland Billie, 
 
 there appears, in his book of manuscripts, 
 the following : 
 
 Thee, Sodger Hugli, my watchman stented, 
 If Bardies e'er are represeated ; 
 
 I ken if thai your bwoid were wanted 
 Ye'd lend your hand ; 
 
 But wliru tliere's ought to say anent it, 
 Ye're at a stand. 
 
 Sndger Hugh, is evidently the present 
 Earl of Eglintoun, then 'Colonel Montgo- 
 mery of Coilsfield, and representing in 
 parliament the county of Ayr. Why this 
 was left out in printing does not appear. 
 The noble earl will not be sorry to see 
 this notice of him, familiar though it be, 
 by a bard whose genius he admired, and 
 whose fate he lamented. 
 
 2. In The Address to the Deil, the se- 
 cond stanza ran originally thus : 
 
 Lang syne in E/ien's happy scene, 
 When strappin Adam's days was green, 
 And Eve was like my bonnio Jean, 
 
 My dearest part, 
 A daiicin, sweet, young, handsome quean, 
 
 Wi' guiltless heart. 
 
 3. In The Elegy on poor Maillie, the 
 stanza beginning, 
 
 She was nac get o' moorland tips, 
 
 was, at first, as follows : 
 
 She was na get o' runted rams, 
 
 Wi' woo' like goats, and legs like tramv j 
 
 She was the flower o' Fairlce lambs, 
 
 A famous breed ; 
 Now Robin, greetin, chows the hams 
 O' Maillie dead. 
 
 It were a pity that the Fairlee Iambs 
 should lose the honor once intended them. 
 
 4. But the chief variations are found 
 in the poems introduced for the first time, 
 in the edition of two volumes, small octavo, 
 published in 1 792. Of the poem written in 
 Friar' s-Carse Hermitage, there are seve- 
 ral editions, and one of these has nothing 
 in common with the printed poem but the 
 first four lines. The poem that is pub- 
 lished, which was his second effort on the 
 subject, received considerable alterations 
 in printing. 
 
 Instead of the six lines beginning, 
 
 Say, man's true, genuine estimate, 
 
 in manuscript the following are inserted? 
 
 Say, the criterion of their fate, 
 Tti' important query of their state, 
 Ts not, art thou high or low ? 
 Did thy fortune ebb or flow 1 
 
U2 
 
 LETTERS. 
 
 Wert thou cottager or Mng * 
 Prince or peasant 7— no such thing. 
 
 5. The Epistle to R, G. Esq. of F, 
 that is, to R. Graham, Esq. of Fintra, 
 also urderwent considerable alterations, 
 a.s may be collected from the General 
 Correspondence. The style of poetry 
 was new to our poet, and, though he was 
 fitted to excel in it, it cost him more 
 trouble than his Scottish poetry. On 
 the contrary, Tarn o' Shanter seems to 
 have issued perfect from the author's 
 brain. The only considerable alteration 
 made on reflection, is the omission of four 
 lines, which had been inserted after the 
 poem was finished, at the end of the 
 dreadful catalogue of the articles found 
 on the " haly table," and Which appeared 
 in the first edition of the poem, printed 
 separately — They came after the line, 
 
 Which even to name would be unlaw/ a', 
 
 and are as follows, 
 
 Three Jawyers' tongues turri'd inside out, 
 Wi' lies seam'd like a beggar's clout, 
 And priests' heart, rotten, black as muck, 
 Lay, stinking vile, in every neuk. 
 
 These lines which, independent of other 
 objections, interrupt and destroy the emo- 
 tions of terror which the preceding de- 
 scription had excited, were very properly 
 left out of the printed collection, by the 
 advice of Mr. Fraser Tytler; to which 
 Burns seems to have paid much defe- 
 rence.* 
 
 6. The Address to the shade of Thorn- 
 ton, began in the first manuscript copy in 
 the following manner : 
 
 While cold-eye'd Spring, a virgin coy, 
 
 Unfolds her verdant mantle sweet ; 
 Or pranks the sod in frolic joy, 
 
 A carpet for her youthful feet ; 
 While Summer, with a matron's grace, 
 
 Walks stately in the cooling shade ; 
 And, oft delighted, loves to trace 
 
 The progress of the spiky blade ; 
 Wliile Autumn, benefactor kind, 
 
 With age's hoary honours clad, 
 Burveys with self-approving mind, 
 
 Each creature on his bounty fed, &c. 
 
 • These four lines have been inadvertently replaced 
 In the copy of Tam o' Shunter, published in the first 
 volume of the "Poetry, Original and Selected," of 
 Brash and Reid, of Glasgow ; and to this circumstance 
 is owing their being noticed here. As our poet delibe- 
 rately rejected them, it is hoped that no future printer 
 will insert them. 
 
 By the alteration in the printed poem, it 
 may be questioned whether the poetry is 
 much improved ; the poet however has 
 found means to introduce the shades of 
 Dryburgh, the residence of the Earl of 
 Buchan, at whose request .these verses 
 were written. 
 
 These observations might be extended, 
 but what are already offered will satisfy 
 curiosity, and there is nothing of any im- 
 portance that could be added. 
 
 THE FOLLOWING LETTER 
 
 Of Burns, which contains some hints rela- 
 tive to the origin of his celebrated tale of 
 " Tam o' Shanter," the Publishers trust, 
 will be found interesting to every reader 
 of his works. There appears no -r-eason 
 to doubt of its being genuine, though it 
 has not been inserted in his correspon- 
 dence published by Dr. Currie. 
 
 TO FRANCIS GROSE, ESQ. F. A. S.* 
 
 Among the many witch stories I have 
 heard relating to Alloway kirk, I distinctly 
 remember only two or three. 
 
 Upon a stormy night, amid whistling 
 squalls of wind, and bitter blasts of hail ; 
 in short on such a night as the devil would 
 chuse to take the air in ; a farmer or far- 
 mer's servant was plodding and plashiiigr 
 homeward with his plough-irons on his 
 shoulder, having been getting some re- 
 pairs 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 
 
 * Tfiis Letter was first published in the Censura Li- 
 ter«W«, 1786, and was communicated to the Editor of 
 that work by Mr. Gilchrist of Stamford, accompanied 
 With the following remark. 
 
 " In a collection of miscellaneous papers of the Anti- 
 quary Grose, which I purchased a few years since, I 
 found the following letter written to him by Burns.when 
 the former was collecting the Antiquities of Scotland: 
 When I premise it was on the second tradition that he 
 afterwards formed the Inimitable tale of ' Tam o' Shan 
 ter,' Icannot doubt of its being read with great interest. 
 It were ' burning day light' to point out to a reader (and 
 who is not a reader of Bums ?) the thoughte he after- 
 
LETTERS. 
 
 243 
 
 a favourite haunt of the devil and the de- 
 vil'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 sus- 
 pect 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 good luck would have 
 it his temerity came off unpunished. 
 
 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 unchristen- 
 ed children, limbs of executed malefac- 
 tors, &c. for the business of the night. — 
 It was in for a penny, in for a pound, with 
 the honest ploughman : so without cere- 
 mony he unhooked the caldron from off 
 the fire, and pouring out the damnable in- 
 gredients, 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. 
 
 Another story which T can prove to be 
 equally authentic, was as follows : 
 
 On a market day in the town of Ayr, a 
 farmer from Carrick, and consequently 
 whose way laid by the very gate of Allo- 
 way 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. 
 
 Though he was terrified with a blaze 
 streaming from the kirk, yet as it is a well- 
 known fact that to turn back on these oc- 
 casions 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 en- 
 tertained, 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 
 E e 
 
 all alive with the power of his bagpipe. 
 The farmer stopping his horse to observe 
 them a little, could plainly descry the 
 faces of many old women of his acquain- 
 tance and neighbourhood. How the gen- 
 tlemen was dressed, tradition does not say ; 
 but 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 purposes 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 uni- 
 versally 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 his 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 im- 
 mediately gave way at her infernal grip, 
 as if blasted by a stroke of lightning ; but 
 the farmer was beyond her reach. Hovi?- 
 ever, the unsightly, tailless condition of 
 the vigorous steed was, to the last hour of 
 the noble creature's life, an awful warn- 
 ing to the Carrick farmers, not to stay 
 too late in Ayr markets. 
 
 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 Al- 
 loway, I shall relate it. 
 
 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 fanner in the imme- 
 diate neighbourhood of Alloway kirk, had 
 just folded his charge, and was returning 
 home. As he passed the khrk, in the ad- 
 joining field, he fell in with a crew of men 
 and women who were busypuiling sterna 
 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 ri-' 
 
I.BTTERS. 
 
 der. The foolish boy hkewise 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 stopped was a mer- 
 chant's wine cellar in Bourdeaux, 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 
 ligiit on the matter, and frightened them 
 from their carousals. 
 
 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. Sorfle- 
 body that understood Scotch, asking him. 
 what he was, he said he was 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. 
 
 I am, &.C. &c. 
 
 fiNP OV THC LETTERS. 
 
A^3FMir®2^* 
 
 No. I.— cTVofe A. See Life, p. 2. 
 
 The importance of the national estab- 
 lishment of parish-schools in Scotland will 
 justify a short account of the legislative 
 provisions respecting it, especially as the 
 subject has escaped the notice of all the 
 historians. 
 
 By an act of the king (James Vlth) 
 and privy council of the 10th of Decem- 
 ber, 1616, it was recommended to his 
 bishops to decile and travel wilh tl)e lieri- 
 tors (land proprietors,) and the inhabitants 
 of the respective parishes in their respec- 
 tive dioceses, towards the fixing upon 
 " some certain, polid, and sure course" 
 for settling and nnrertaining a school in 
 each parish. T.his was ratified by a sta- 
 tute of Charles I. (the act 1633, chap. 5.) 
 which empowered the bishop, with the 
 consent of the heritors of a parish, or of 
 a majority of tlie inhabitants, if the heri- 
 tors refused to attend the meeting, to as- 
 sess every plougli of land (that is, every 
 farm, in proportion to the number of 
 ploughs upon it) with a certain sum for 
 establishing a school. This was an inef- 
 fectual provision, as depending on the 
 consent and pl(>asure of the heritors and 
 •inhabitants. Therefore a new order of 
 things was introduced by Stat. 1646, chrfp. 
 .7, which obliges the heritors and minis- 
 ter of each parish to meet and assess the 
 several heritors with the requisite sum for 
 building a sciioolhouse, and to elect a 
 school-master, and modify a salary for him 
 in all time to come. The salary is order- 
 ed not to bo under one hundred, nor above 
 two hundr(>d merks, that is, in our pre- 
 sent sterling money, not under £5 lis. 
 l4d. nor above £11 2s. 3d. and the as- 
 jori y of ihom, should fail to discharge 
 
 sessment is to be laid on the land in the 
 same proportion as it is rated for the 
 support of the clergy, and as it regulates 
 the payment of the land-tax. But in case 
 the heritors of any parish, or the ma- 
 this duty, then the persons forming what 
 is called the Commiftep. of Supply of the 
 county (consisting of the principal \B.nA~ 
 holders,) or any Jive of f hem, are autho- 
 rized by the statute to impose the asses.s. 
 ment instead of them, on the representa- 
 tion of the presbytery in which the parish 
 is situated. To secure the choice of a 
 proper teacher, the right of election by 
 the heritors, by a statute passed in 1693, 
 chap. 22, is made subject to the review and 
 control of the presbytery of the district, 
 who have the examination of the person 
 proposed committed to them, both as to his 
 qualifications as a teacher, and as to his 
 proper deportment in the office when set- 
 tled in it. The election of the heritors 
 is therefore only a presentment of a per- 
 son for the approbation of the presbyt€>- 
 ry ; who, if they find liim unfit, may de» 
 clare his incapacity, and thus oblige thera 
 to elect anew. So far is stated on un- 
 questionable authority.* 
 
 The legal salary of the schoolmaster 
 was not inconsiderable at the time it w&a 
 fixed ; but by the decrease in the value of 
 money, it is now certainly inadequate to 
 its object; and it is painful to observe, 
 that the landholders of Scotland resisted 
 the humble application uf the schoolmas- 
 ters to the legislature for its increase, a 
 few years ago. The nuniber of parishes 
 in Scotland is 877 ; and if we allow the 
 salary of a schoolmaster in each to be on 
 
 ♦ The authority of A. Frazer T) tier, and Pavld 
 Hume, Esqrs 
 
246 
 
 PPENDIX, NO. 1. 
 
 an average, seven pounds sterling, the 
 amount of the legal provision will be 
 j66, 139 sterling. If we suppose the wa- 
 ges paid by the scholars to amount to 
 twice the sum, which is probably beyond 
 the truth, the total of the expenses 
 among 1,526,492 persons (the whole po- 
 pulation of Scotland,) of this most im- 
 portant establishment, will be £18, 417. 
 But on this, as well as on other subjects re- 
 specting Scotland, accurate information 
 may soon be expected from Sir John 
 Sinclair's Analysis of his Statistics, which 
 will complete the immortal monument he 
 has reared to his patriotism. 
 
 The benefit arising in Scotland from 
 the instruction of the poor, was soon felt ; 
 and by an act of the British parliament, 
 4 Geo. 1. chap. 6, it is enacted, " that of 
 the moneys arising from the sale of the 
 Scottish estates forfeited in the rebellion 
 of 1715, £2,000 sterling shall be convert- 
 ed into a capital stock, the interest of 
 which shall be laid out in erecting and 
 maintaining schools in the Highlands. 
 The Society for propagating Christian 
 Knowledge, incorporated in 1709, have 
 applied a large part of their fund for the 
 same purpose. By theineport, 1st May, 
 1795, the annual sum employed by them, 
 in supporting their schools in the High- 
 lands and Islands, was £3,913 19s. lOd., 
 in which are taught the English language, 
 reading and writing, and the principles of 
 religion. The schools of the society are 
 additional to the legal schools, which 
 from the great extent of many of the 
 Highland parishes, were fgund insuffi- 
 cient. Besides these established schools, 
 the lower classes of people in Scotland, 
 where the parishes are large, often com- 
 bine together, and estabhsh private schools 
 of their own, at one of which it was that 
 Burns received the principal part of his 
 education. So convinced indeed are the 
 poor people of Scotland, by experience, 
 of the benefit of instruction, to their chil- 
 dren, that, though they may often find it 
 difficult to feed and clothe them, some 
 kind of school-instruction they almost al- 
 ways procure them. 
 
 The influence of the school-establish- 
 ment of Scotland on the peasantry of that 
 country, seems to have decided by expe- 
 rience a question of legislation of the ut- 
 most importance — whether a system of 
 national instruction for the poor be fa- 
 vourable to morals and good government. 
 Tn the year 1698, Fletcher of Salton d 
 
 clared as follows : " These are at this day 
 in Scotland, two hundred thousand people 
 begging from door to door. And though 
 the number of them be perhaps double to 
 what it was formerly, by reason of this 
 present great distress (a famine then pre 
 vailed,) yet in all times there have been 
 about one hundred thousand of those va 
 gabonds, who have lived without any re 
 gard or subjedtion either to the laws of 
 the land, or even those of God and Na 
 ture ; fathers incestuously accompanying 
 with their own daughters, the son with 
 the mother, and the brother with the sis- 
 ter." He goes on to say; that no magis- 
 trate ever could discover that they had 
 ever been baptized, or in what way one 
 in a hundred went out of the world. He 
 accuses them as frequently guilty of rob- 
 bery, and sometimes of murder : " In 
 years of plenty," says he, " many thou- 
 sands of men meet together in the moun- 
 tains, where they feast and riot for many 
 days ; and at country weddings, markets, 
 burials, and other public occasions, they 
 are to be seen, both men and women, 
 perpetually drunk, cursing, blaspheming, 
 and fighting together."* This high- 
 minded statesman, of whom it is said by 
 a contemporary " that he would lose his 
 life readily to save his country, and would 
 not do abase thing to serve it," thought the 
 evil so great that he proposed as a reme- 
 dy, the revival of domestic slavery, ac- 
 cording to the practice of his adored re- 
 pubhcs in the classic ages I A better re- 
 medy has been found, which in the silent 
 lapse of a century has proved effectual. 
 The statute of 1696, the noble legacy ot 
 the Scottish Parliament to their country, 
 began soon after this to operate ; and 
 happily, as the minds of the poor received 
 instruction, the Union opened new chan- 
 nels of industry, and new fields of action 
 to their view. 
 
 At the present day there is perhaps no 
 country in Europe, in which, in propor- 
 tion to its population, so small a number 
 of crimes fall under the chastisement ol 
 the criminal law, as Scotland. We have 
 the best authority for asserting, that on 
 an average of thirty years, preceding the 
 year 1797, the executions in that division 
 of the island did not amount to six annu- 
 ally ; and one quarter-sessions for the 
 town of Manchester only, has sent, ac- 
 cording to Mr. Hume, more felons to the 
 plantatiians, than all the judges of Scot- 
 
 * Political Works of Andrew Fletcher, octavo Lon- 
 73" 144 
 
LETTERS, 
 
 land usually do in the space oi a year.* 
 It might appear invidious to attempt a cal- 
 culation of the many thousand individu- 
 als in Manchester and its vicinity who 
 can neither read nor write. A majority 
 of those who can suffer the punishment of 
 death for their crimes in every part of 
 England are, it is believed, in this mise- 
 rable state of ignorance. 
 
 There is now a legal provision for pa- 
 rochial schools, or rather for a school in 
 each of the different townships into which 
 the country is divided, in several of the 
 northern states of North America. They 
 are, however, of recent origin there, ex- 
 cepting in New England, where they 
 were established in the last century, pro- 
 bably about the same time as in Scotland, 
 and by the same religious sect. In the 
 Protestant Cantons of Switzerland, tlie 
 peasantry have the advantage of similar 
 schools, though established and endowed 
 in a different manner. This is also the 
 case in certain districts in England, par- 
 ticularly, in the northern parts of York- 
 shire and of Lancasliire, and in the coun- 
 ties of Westmoreland and Cumberland. 
 
 A law, providing for the instruction of 
 the poor, was passed by the Parliament 
 of Ireland ; but the fund was diverted 
 from its purpose, and the measure was 
 entirely frustrated. Prok Pudor .' 
 
 The similarity of character between 
 the Swiss and the Scotch, and between 
 the Scotch and the people of New Eng- 
 land, can scarcely be overlooked. That 
 it arises in a great measure from the si- 
 milarity of their institutions for instruc- 
 tion, cannot be questioned. It is no doubt 
 increased by physical causes. With a 
 superior degree of instruction, each of 
 these nations possesses a country that 
 may be said to be sterile, in the neigh- 
 bourhood of countries comparatively rich. 
 Hence emigrations and the other effects 
 on conduct and character which such cir- 
 cumstances naturally produce. This sub- 
 ject is in a high degree curious. The 
 points of dissimilarity between these na- 
 tions might be traced to their causes also, 
 and the whole investigation would per- 
 haps admit of an approach to certainty in 
 our conclusions, to which such inquiries 
 seldom lead. How much superior in mo- 
 rals, in intellect, and in happiness, the 
 
 * Hume's Commentarie^on the Laws of Scotland, 
 Introduction, p. 50- 
 
 peasantry of those parts of England are 
 who have opportunities of instruction, to 
 the same class in other situations, those 
 who inquire into the subject will speedily 
 discover. The peasantry of Westmore- 
 land, and of the other districts mentioned 
 above, if their physical and moral quali- 
 ties be taken together, are, in the opinion 
 of the Editor, superior to the peasantry 
 of any part of the island. 
 
 JVbfe B. See p. 3. 
 
 It has been supposed that Scotland is 
 less populous and less improved on ac- 
 count of this emigration ; but such 'con- 
 clusions are doubtful, if not wholly falla- 
 cious. The principle of population acts 
 in no country to the full extent of its pow- 
 er : marriage is every where retarded be- 
 yond the period pointed out by nature, 
 by the difficulty of supporting a family; 
 and this obstacle is greatest in long-set- 
 tled communities. The emigration of a 
 part of a people facilitates the marriage 
 of the rest, by producing a relative in- 
 crease in the means of subsistence. The 
 arguments of Adam Smith, for a free ex- 
 port of corn, are perhaps applicable with 
 less exception to the free export of peo- 
 ple. The more certain the vent, the 
 greater the cultivation of the soil. This 
 subject has been well investigated by Sir 
 .lames Stewart, whose principles have 
 been expanded and farther illustrated in 
 a late truly philosophical Essay on Popu- 
 lalion. In fact, Scotland has increased 
 in the number of its inhabitants in the 
 last forty years, as the Statistics of Sir 
 .Tohn Sinclair clearly prove, but not in the 
 ratio thqt some had supposed. The ex- 
 tent of the emigration of the Scots may 
 be calculated with some degree of confi- 
 dence from the proportionate number of 
 the two sexes in Scotland ; a point that 
 may be established pretty exactly by an 
 examination of the invaluable Statistics 
 already mentioned. If we suppose that 
 there is an equal number of male and fe- 
 male natives of Scotland, alive somewhere 
 or other, the excess by which the females 
 exceed the males in their own country, 
 may be considered to be equal to the 
 number of Scotchmen living out of Scot- 
 land. But though the males born in 
 Scotland be admitted to be as 13 to 12, 
 and though some of the females emigrate 
 as well as the males, this mode of calcu- 
 lating would probably make the number 
 of expatriated Scotchmen, at euiy one time 
 
248 
 
 alive, greater than the truth. The un- 
 healthy climates into which they emi- 
 grate, the liazaruous services in which so 
 many of them eng'age, render the mean 
 lite of those who leave Scotland (to speak 
 in the language of calculators) not per- 
 haps of half the value of the mean life of 
 those who remain. 
 
 wVo/e C. See p. 6. 
 
 In the punishment of this offence the 
 Church employed formerly the arm of the 
 civil power. During the reign of .Tames 
 the Vlth (James the First of England.) cri- 
 minal connexion between unmarried per- 
 sons was made the subject of a particular 
 statute (See Hume's Commentaries on the 
 Laws of Scotland, Vol. ii. p. 33-2.) which, 
 from its rigour, was never much enforced, 
 and which has long fallen into disuse. 
 When in the middle of the last century, 
 the Puritans succeeded in the overthrow 
 of the monarchy in both division^! of the 
 island, fornication was a crime against 
 which they directed their utmost zeal. 
 It was made punishable v,"ith death in the 
 second instance, [See Blacksfone, b. iv. 
 chap. 4. J\o. IT.) Happily this sanguina- 
 ry statute was swept away along with the 
 other acts of the Commonwealth, on the 
 restoration of Charles IL to whose tem- 
 per and manners it must have been pecu- 
 liarly abhorrent. And after the Revolu- 
 tion, when several salutary acts passed 
 during the suspension of the monarchy, 
 were re-enacted by the Scottish Parlia- 
 ment, particularly that for the establish- 
 ment of parish-scliools, the statute pun- 
 ishing fornication with death, was suffer- 
 ed to sleep in the grave of the stern fana- 
 tics who had given it birth. 
 
 J\rute D. See p. 6. 
 
 The legitimation of children, by subse- 
 quent marriage became the Roman law 
 under the Christian emperors. It was 
 the cannon law of modern Europe, and 
 has been established in Scotland from a 
 very remote period. Thus a child born a 
 bastard, if his parents afterwards marry, 
 enjoys all the privileges of seniority, over 
 his brothers afterwards born in wedlock. 
 In the Parliament of Merton, in the reign 
 of Henry HI. the English clergy made a 
 vigorous attempt to introduce this article 
 into the law of England, and it was on 
 this occasion that the Barons made the 
 noted answer, since so often appealed to ; 
 Quod nolnnl lej^'s /:'' glim mutare ; qucE 
 
 APPENDIX, ^O. 2. 
 
 hue usque usUatoe sunt approbate. With 
 regard to what constitutes a marriage, 
 the law of Scotland, as explained, p. 6, 
 differs from the Roman law, which re- 
 quired the ceremony to be performed in 
 facie ecclesice. 
 
 No. n. 
 
 J^ote A. Seep. 12 
 
 It may interest some pei-sons to peruse 
 the first poetical production of our Bard, 
 and it is therefore extracted from a kind 
 of common place book, which he seems 
 to have begun in his twentieth year; and 
 which he entitled, " Observations, Hints, 
 Songs, Scraps of Poetry, S^-c. by Robert 
 Burness, 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 un- 
 bounded good will to every creature, ra- 
 tional or irrational. As he was but little 
 indebted to a scholastic education, and 
 bred at a plough-tail, his- performances 
 must be strongly tinctured with.his unpol- 
 ished 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 ot 
 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, 
 in all the species." 
 
 " Pleasing when youth Is long expired to trace, 
 The forms our pencil or our pen design'd, 
 
 Such was our youthful air, and shape, and face, 
 Such the soft image of the youthful mind." 
 
 Shenstone 
 
 This MS. book, to which our poet pre- 
 fixed this account of himself, and of his 
 intention in preparing it, contains several 
 of his earlier poems, some as they were 
 printed, and others in their embryo state. 
 The song alluded to is that beginning, 
 
 O once I lov'd abonnie lass, 
 Ay, and I love her still, 
 
 See Poems, p. TO. 
 
 It must be confessed that this song 
 gives no indication of the future genius 
 of Burns ; but he himself seems to have 
 been fond of it, probably from the recol- 
 lections it excited. 
 
APPENDIX, NO. 2. 
 
 J^ote B. Seep. 15. 
 
 At the time that our poet took the re- 
 Bolution of becoming wise, he procured a 
 little book of blank paper, with the pur- 
 pose (expressed on the first page) ofma- 
 king farming memorandums upon it. 
 These farming memorandums are curious 
 enough ; many of them have been writ- 
 ten with a pencil, and are now oblite- 
 rated, or at least illegible. A considera- 
 ble number are however legible, and a 
 specimen may gratify the reader. It 
 must be premised, that the poet kept 
 the book by him several years — that he 
 wrote upon it, here and there, with the 
 utmost irregularity, and that on the same 
 page are notations very distant from each 
 other as to time and place. 
 
 EXTEMPORE. Jlpril, 1782. 
 
 O why the deuce should I repine, 
 
 And be an il'i foreboder ; 
 
 See PotiM, p. 163. 
 
 FRAGMENT. Tuns— ' Donald Blue.' 
 
 O leave novels, ye Mauchiine belles, 
 Ye're safer at your spinning wheel ; 
 
 See Poema, p. 151. 
 
 For he's far aboon Dunkel the night 
 Maun white the stick and a' that. 
 
 Mem. To get for Mr. Johnson these 
 two Songs : — ' Molly, Molly, my dear 
 honey.' — ' The cock and the hen, the deer 
 in her den,' SfC. 
 
 Ah ! Chris ! Sir Peter Halket, of Pit- 
 ferran, the author. — jYota, he married 
 her — the heiress of Pitferran. 
 
 Colonel George Crawford, the author 
 of Down the burn Davy. 
 
 Pinky-house, by J. Mitchell. 
 
 My apron Deary! and Amynta, by 
 SiB G. Elliot 
 
 Willie was a wanton Wag, was made 
 on Walkinshaw, of Walkinshaw, near 
 Paisley. 
 
 / loe na a laddie but ane, Mr. Clunzee. 
 
 TTie bonnie vee thing — beautiful — Lun- 
 die's Dream — very beautiful. 
 
 He liirt and /the tiWt — assez bien. 
 
 Armstrong's Farewell — fine. 
 
 The author of the Highland Q^ieen was 
 a Mr. M'lver, Purser of the Solhoy. 
 
 Fife an' a' the land about tt, R. Fergus- 
 son. 
 
 The author of The bush aboon Tra- 
 quair, was a Dr. Stewart. 
 
 Polwart on the Green, composed by 
 Captain John Drummond M'Grigor of 
 Bochaldie. 
 
 Mem. To inquire if Mrs. Cockburn 
 was the author of / hae seen the smiling, 
 &c. 
 
 The above may serve as a Bpecimen. 
 All the notes on farming are ahliterated. 
 
 JVb<«. C. Seep. 30, 31. 
 
 Rules and regulations to he observed tfi 
 the Bachelors' Club. 
 
 1st. The club shall meet at Tarbolton 
 every fourth Monday night, when a ques- 
 tion on any subject shall be proposed, 
 disputed points of religion, only excepted, 
 in the manner hereafter directed ; which 
 question is to be debated in the club, 
 each member taking whatever side he 
 thinks proper. 
 
 2d. When the club is met, the presi- 
 dent, or, he failing, some one of the mem- 
 bers, till he come, shall take his seat; 
 then the other members shall scat them- 
 selves : those who are for one side of the 
 question, on the president's right hand; 
 and those who are for the other side, on 
 his left ; which of them shall have the 
 right hand is to be determined by the 
 president. The president and four of the 
 members being present, shall have pow- 
 er to transact any ordinary part of the so- 
 ciety's business. 
 
 3d. The club met and seated, the pre- 
 sident shall read the question out of the 
 club's book of records, (which book ia 
 always to be kept by the president,) 
 then the two members nearest the presi- 
 dent shall cast lots who of them shall 
 speak first, and according as the lot shall 
 determine, the member nearest the pre- 
 sident on that side shall deliver his opin- 
 ion, and the member nearest on the other 
 side shall reply to him ; then the second 
 member of the side that spoke first ; then 
 the second member of the side that spoke 
 second ; and so on to the end of the com- 
 pany ; but if there be fewer members on 
 the one side than on the other, when &1I 
 the members o?^the least side have apo- 
 
250 
 
 APPENDIX, NO. 2. 
 
 ken accoramg to their places, any of 
 them, as they please among themselves, 
 may reply to the remaining members of 
 the opposite side : when both sides have 
 spoken, the president shall give his opin- 
 ion, after which they may go over it a se- 
 cond or more times, and so continue the 
 question. 
 
 4th. The club shall then proceed to 
 the choice of a question for the subject of 
 next night's meeting. The president 
 shall first propose one, and any other 
 member who chooses may propose more 
 questions ; and whatever one of them is 
 most agreeable to the majority of mem- 
 bers, shall be the subject of debate next 
 club-night. 
 
 5th. The club shall, lastly, elect a new 
 president for the next meeting : the pre- 
 sident shall first name one, then any of 
 the club may name another, and whoever 
 of them has the majority of votes shall 
 be duly elected ; allowing the president 
 the first vote, and the casting vote upon 
 a par, but none other. Then after a ge- 
 neral toast to mistresses of the club, they 
 shall dismiss. 
 
 6th. There shall be no private conver- 
 sation carried on during the time of de- 
 bate, nor shall any member interrupt 
 another while he is speaking, under the 
 penalty of a reprimand from the presi- 
 dent for the first fault, doubling his share 
 of the reckoning for the second, trebling 
 it for the third, and so on in proportion for 
 every other fault, provided alway, how- 
 ever, that any member may speak at any 
 time after leave asked, and given by the 
 president. All swearing and profane lan- 
 guage, and particularly all obscene and 
 indecent conversation, is strictly prohibit- 
 ed, under the same penalty as aforesaid 
 in the first clause of this article. 
 
 7th. No member, on any pretence 
 whatever, shall mention any of the club's 
 affairs to any other person but a brother 
 member, under the pain of being ex- 
 cluded ; and particularly if any member 
 shall reveal any of the speeches or affairs 
 of the club, with a view to ridicule or 
 laugh at any of the rest of the members, 
 he shall be for ever excommunicated from 
 the society ; and the rest of the members 
 are desired, as much as possible, to avoid, i 
 and have no communication with him as 
 8 friend or comrade 
 
 8th. Every member shall attend at the 
 meetings, without he can give a proper 
 excuse for not attending ; and it is de- 
 sired that every one who cannot attend, 
 will send his excuse with some other 
 member; and he who shall be absent 
 three meetings without sending such ex- 
 cuse, shall be summoned to the club-night, 
 when if he fail to appear, or send an ex- 
 cuse he shall be excluded. 
 
 9th. The club shall not consist of more 
 than sixteen members, all bachelors, be- 
 longing to the parish of Tarbolton : ex- 
 cept a brother member marry, and in that 
 case he may be continued, if the majority 
 of the club think proper. No person 
 shall be aidmitted a member of this soci- 
 ety, without the unanimous consent of 
 the club ; and any member may withdraw 
 from the club altogether, by giving a no- 
 lice to the president in writing of his de- 
 parture. 
 
 10th. Every man proper for a member 
 of this society, must have a frank, honest, 
 open heart ; above any thing dirty or 
 mean ; and must be a profest lover of one 
 or more of the female sex. No haughty, 
 self-conceited person, who looks upon 
 himself as superior to the rest of the club, 
 and especially no mean-spirited, worldly 
 mortal, whose only will is to heap up mo- 
 ney, shall upon any pretence whatever 
 be admitted. In short, the proper per- 
 son for this society is, a cheerful, honest 
 hearted lad, who, if he has a friend that 
 is true, and a mistress that is kind, and 
 as much wealth as genteelly to make both 
 ends meet — is just as happy as this world 
 can make him. 
 
 J^ole D. See p. 84. 
 
 A great number of manuscript poems 
 were found among the papers of Burns, 
 addressed to him by admirers of his ge- 
 nius, from different parts of Britain, as well 
 as from Ireland and America. Among 
 these was a poetical epistle from Mr. 
 Telford, of Shrewsbury, of superior.me- 
 rit. It is written in the dialect of Scot- 
 land (of which country Mr. Telford is a 
 native,) and in the versification general- 
 ly employed by our poet himself. Its ob- 
 ject is to recommend to him other sub- 
 jects of a serious nature, similar to that 
 of the Colter's Saturday J^'ischt ; and the 
 reader will find that the advice is happily 
 enforced by example. It would have 
 ^iven the editor pleasure to have insert- 
 
AITENDIX, NO. 2. 
 
 2&1 
 
 ed the whole of this poem, which he 
 hopes will one day see the light : he is 
 happy to have obtained, in the mean time, 
 his friend Mr. Telford's permission to in- 
 sert the following extracts : 
 
 How placed along the sacred board, 
 Their hoary pastor's looks adored, — 
 His voice with peace and blessing stored, 
 
 Sent from above ; 
 And faith, and hope, and joy afford, 
 
 And boundless love 
 
 O'er this, with warm seraphic glow. 
 Celestial beings, pleased bow ; 
 And, whisper'd, hear the holy vow, 
 
 'Mid grateful tears ; 
 And mark amid such scenes below, 
 
 Their future peers 
 
 Pursue, O Burns I thy happy style, 
 " Those manner-painting strains," that while 
 They bear me northward mony a mile, 
 
 Recall the days. 
 When tender joys, with pleasing smile, 
 
 Bless'd my young ways. 
 
 I see my fond companions rise, 
 I join the happy village joys, 
 I see our green hills touch the skies, 
 
 And through the woods, 
 I hear the river's rushing noise, 
 
 Its roaring floods.* 
 
 No distant Swiss with warmer glow, 
 E'er heard his native music flow. 
 Nor could his wishes stronger grow. 
 
 Than still have mine, 
 When up tliis ancient mountt I go. 
 
 With songs of thine. 
 
 O happy Bard ! thy gen'rous flame 
 
 Was given to raise thy country's fame ; 
 
 For this thy charming numbers came — 
 
 Thy matchless lays ; 
 
 Then sing, and save her virtuous name, 
 
 To latest days. 
 
 But mony a theme awaits thy muse. 
 Fine as thy Cotter's sacred views, 
 Then in such verse thy soul infuse, 
 
 With holy air; 
 And sing the course tlic pious choose. 
 
 With all thy care. 
 
 How with religious awe impressed. 
 They oi)en lay the guileless breast , 
 And youth and age with fears distress'd, 
 
 All due prepare. 
 The symbols of eternal rest 
 
 Devout to share.l 
 
 How down ilk lang withdrawing hill, 
 Successive crowds the valleys fill ; 
 While j)ure religious converse still 
 
 Beguiles the way. 
 And gives a cast to youthful will, 
 
 To suit the day. 
 
 * The banks of Esk, in Dumfries-shire, are liere al- 
 luded to. 
 
 t A beautiful little mount, which stands immediate- 
 ly before, or rather forms a part of Shrewsbury castle, 
 II seat of Sir William Pulteney, baronet. j ^ r^■,^^^^ ^,,^^^3 ,„ ^ superstition prevalent in Eskdale, 
 
 t The Sacrament, generally administered in tlie conn- j and Annandalc, that a light precedes in the night cve- 
 tiy parishes of Scotland in tli^ open ait K. I ry funeral, marking the precise path it ia to pass. K 
 
 E e 2 
 
 O mark the awful solemn scene !* 
 When hoary winter clothes the plain, 
 Along the snowy hills is seen 
 
 Approaching slow, 
 In mourning weeds, the village train, 
 
 In silent wo. 
 
 Some much respected brother's bier 
 (By turns the pious task they share) 
 With heavy hearts they forward bear 
 
 Along the path, 
 Where nei'bours saw in dusky air,t 
 
 The light of death. 
 
 And when they pass the rocky how. 
 Where binwood bushes o'er them flow, 
 And move aroimd tiie rising knowe, 
 
 Whera far away 
 The kirk-yard trees are seen to grow. 
 
 By th' water brae. 
 
 Assembled round the narrow grave. 
 While o'er them wintery tempests rave, 
 In the cold wind tlieir gray locks wave, 
 
 As low they lay 
 Their brother's body mongst the lave 
 
 Of parent clay. 
 
 Expressive looks from each declare 
 The griefs within, their bosoms bear; 
 One holy bow devout they share. 
 
 Then home return, 
 And think o'er all the virtues fair 
 
 Of him they mourn. 
 
 Say how by early lessons taught, 
 (Truth's pleasing air is willing caught) 
 Congenial to th' untainted thought, 
 
 The shepherd boy. 
 Who tends his flocks on lonely height. 
 
 Feels holy joy. 
 
 • A Scoth funeral. 
 
S&3 
 
 APPENDIX, NO. 3. 
 
 Is aught OB earth so lovely known, 
 On sabbath morn and far alone, 
 His guileless soul all naked shown 
 
 Before his God — 
 Such pray'rs must welcome reach the throne, 
 
 And bless'd abode. 
 
 O tell ! with what a heartfelt joy, 
 The parent eyes the virtuous boy ; 
 And all his constant, kind employ. 
 Is how to give 
 The best of lear he can enjoy, 
 
 As means to Uve. 
 
 The parish-school, its curious site, 
 The master who can clear indite, 
 And lead him on to count and write, 
 
 Demand thy care ; 
 Nor pass the ploughman's school at night 
 
 Without a share. 
 
 Nor yet the tenty curious lad, 
 Who o'er the ingle hings his head, 
 And begs of nei'bours books to read ; 
 
 For hence arise 
 Thy country's sons, who far are spread, 
 Baith bauld and wise. 
 
 The bonnie lasses, as they spin, 
 Perhaps with Allan's sangs begin. 
 How Tay and Tweed smooth flowmg rin 
 
 Through flowery hows ; 
 Where Shepherd lads their sweethearts win 
 
 With earnest vows. 
 
 Or may be. Bums, thy thrilling page 
 May a' their virtuous thoughts engage, . 
 While playful youth and placifl age 
 
 In concert join, 
 To bless the bard, who, gay or sage. 
 
 Improves the mind. 
 
 Long may their harmless, simple ways, 
 Nature's own pure emotions raise ; 
 May still the dear romantic blaze 
 
 Of purest love, 
 Their bosoms warm to latest days. 
 
 And ay improve. 
 
 May still fach fond attachment glow, 
 O'er woods, o'er streams, o'er hills of snow. 
 May rugged rocks still dearer grow ; 
 
 And may their souls 
 Even love tlie warlock glens which through 
 TJie tempest howls. 
 
 To eternize such themes as these. 
 And all their happy manners seize. 
 Will every virtuous bosom please ; 
 
 And high in fame 
 To future times wilt justly raise 
 
 Thy patriot name. 
 
 While all tlie venal tribes decay. 
 That bask in flattery's flaunting ray— 
 The noisome vermin of a day, 
 
 Thy works shall gain 
 O'er every mind a boundless sway, 
 A lasting reign. 
 
 When winter binds the hardened plains, 
 Around each hearth, the hoary swains 
 Still teach the rising youth thy strains ; 
 
 And anxious say, 
 Our blessing witli our sons remains, 
 
 And BuRNs'e Lay ! 
 
 No. III. 
 
 [First inserted in the Second Edition.) 
 
 The editor has particular pleasure in 
 presenting to the public the following let- 
 ter, to the due understanding of which a 
 few previous observations are necessary. 
 
 The Biographer of Burns vs^as natural- 
 ly desirous of hearing the opinion of the 
 friend and brother of the poet, on the 
 manner in which he had executed his 
 task, before a second edition should be 
 committ'ed to the press. He had the sa- 
 tisfaction of receiving this opinion, in a 
 letter dated the 24th of August, approving 
 of the Life in very obliging terms, and 
 offering one or two trivial corrections as 
 to names and dates chiefly, which are 
 made in this edition. One or two obser- 
 vations were offered of a different kind. 
 In the 319tJi page of the first volume, 
 first edition, a quotation is made from the 
 pastoral song, Ettrkk Banks, and an ex- 
 planation given of the phrase " mony 
 feck," which occurs in this quotation. 
 Supposing the sense to be complete after 
 "mony," the editor had considered " feck" 
 a rustic oath which confirmed the asser- 
 tion. The words were therefore sepa- 
 rated by a comma. Mr. Burns consider- 
 ed this an error. " Feck," he presumes, 
 is the Scottish word for quantity, and 
 " mony feck," to mean simply, very many. 
 The editor in yielding to this authority, 
 expressed some hesitation, and hinted 
 that the phrase " mony feck" was, in 
 Burns's sense, a pleonasm or barbarism 
 which deformed this beautiful song.* 
 
 * Tlie correction made by Gilbert Burns has also 
 been suggested by a writer in tlie Monthly MagaTJue, 
 under the signature of Mbion: who, for taking this 
 trouble, and for metitioning the author of the poem o^ 
 Donnocht-tuad dFvetves ihe Editor's (Hanks. 
 
PRNDIX, NO. 3. 
 
 «53 
 
 ply as follows ;>f — When my father bui^ 
 his " clay biggin," he put in two stone 
 jainbs, fs they are called, and a lintel, 
 carrying up a chimney in his clay gable. 
 The consequence was, that as the gable 
 subside^ the jambs, remaining firm, 
 threw il off its centre ; and, one very 
 stormy Horning, when my brother was 
 nine or fen years old, a little before day- 
 light a pirt of the gable fell out, and the 
 rest appeared so shattered, that my mo- 
 ther witi the young poet, had to be car- 
 ried through the storm to a neighbour's 
 house, vhere they remained a week till 
 their own dwelling was adjusted. That 
 you maj not think too meanly of this 
 tion, delicacy towards his very respecta- I house, ot my father's taste in building, 
 ble correspondent prevents him from ex- by suppo^ngthe poet's description in The 
 pressing his opinion. The original let- Vision (\\lhich is entirely a fancy picture) 
 ter is in the hands of Messrs. Caddell and - ■-• • - - 
 
 Davies. 
 
 His rnplv to this observation makes the 
 first clause of the following letter. 
 
 In the same communication he informed 
 me, that the Mirror and the -Counter were 
 proposed by him to the Conversation Club 
 of Mauchlme, and that he had thoughts 
 of giving me his sentiments on the re- 
 marks I had made respecting the fitness 
 of such works for such societies. The 
 observations of such a man on such a sub- 
 ject, the Editor conceived, would be re- 
 ceived with particular interest bv the 
 public ; and. having pressed earnestly for 
 them, they will be found in the following 
 letter. Of the value of this communica- 
 
 Dinning., Dumfries- shir p, 2Wi Oct. 1800, 
 
 YouKS of the 1 7th inst. came to my 
 hand yesterday, and I sit down this after- 
 noon to write you in return : but when I 
 shall be able to finish all I wish to say to 
 you, I cannot tell. I aui sorry your con- 
 viction is not complete respecting feck. 
 There^is no doubt, that if you take two 
 English words which appear synonymous 
 to mony feck, and judge by the rules of 
 English construction, it will appear a bar- 
 barism. I believe if you take this mode 
 of translating from any language, ^e ef- 
 fect will frequently be the same. 
 
 you take the expression 7nom, feck to | service out amangtne neebo 
 have, as 1 have stated it, the same mean- ^^^^"^ of our depositing our " 
 in with the hnghsh expression very many 
 (and such license every translator must 
 be allowed, especially when he translates 
 from a simple dialect which has never 
 been 
 
 precise meaning of words is of conse- 
 quence, not minutely attended to.) it will 
 be well enough. One thing I am certain 
 of, that ours is the sense unii'ersally un- 
 derstood in the country ; nnd I believe no 
 Scotsman, who has lived contented at 
 home, pleased with the simple manners, 
 the simple melodies, and the simple dia- 
 lect of his native countrv, unvitiated bv 
 
 applicable to it, allow me to take notice 
 to you, tliat the house consisted of a kit- 
 chen in oje end, and a room in the other, 
 with a fii^s place and chimney ; that my 
 father had constructed a concealed bed in 
 the kitchen, with a small closet at the 
 end, of the same materials with the house; 
 and, when altogether cast over, outside 
 and in, with lime, it had a neat comforta- 
 ble appearance, such as no family of the 
 same rank, in the present improved style 
 of living, would think themselves ill-lodg- 
 ed in. I wish likewise to take notice, in 
 passing, that although the " Cotter," in 
 the Saturday Night, is an exact copy of 
 my father in his manners, his family-de- 
 votion, and exhortations, yet the other 
 ps^t^Pbf the description do not apply to 
 "y^l\f\ our family. " None of us were ever " at 
 service out amang the neeboxs roun." In- 
 airwon pen- 
 ny fee" with our parents, my father la- 
 bourrrl hard, and lived with the most ri- 
 gid economy, that he might be able to 
 I kef-p liis children at home, thereby hav~ 
 
 subiected to rule, and where the I i°? ^" opportunity of watching the pro- 
 ' grp;:s of our young minds and forming in 
 them earlier habits of piety and virtue; 
 and from this motive alone did he engage 
 in farming, the source of all his difficul- 
 ties and distr€ 
 
 When I threatened you in my last with 
 a lonji' letter on the subject of the books. 
 I rpcommended to the Mauchline club, 
 
 foreign intercourse, ''whose soul proud and the effects of refinement of laste on 
 science never taught to strav," ever dis- I the labouring classes of men, I meant 
 covered barbarism in the song of Ettrick i merely, that I wished to write you on 
 Banks. \ 
 
 The storv vnu hn', 
 
 I * The Editor had Ii.-;ard a rrport tJi&t the poet w«k 
 hr>arn of the game bom in the midm of o siorm wliich blew down a part 
 
 of ray father's house falling d-wn, is sim- ) of the house. 
 
254 
 
 APPENDIX, NO. 3. 
 
 that subject with the view that, in eome 
 fiiture communication to the public, you 
 might take up the subject more at large ; 
 that, by means of your happy manner of 
 writing, the attention of people of power 
 and influence might be fixed on it. I had 
 little expectation, however, thai I should 
 evercome my indolence, and thedifiiculty 
 of arranging my thoughts so far as to 
 put my threat in execution; till some 
 time ago, before I had finished my har- 
 vest, having a call from Mr. Ewirt,* with 
 a message from you, pressing iie to the 
 performance of this task, I thoight my- 
 self no longer at liberty to decliie it, and 
 resolved to set about it with m^ first lei- 
 sure. I will now therefore enceavour to 
 lay before you what has occurred to my 
 mind, on a subject where peojie capable 
 of observation and of placing their re- 
 marks in a proper point of view, have sel- 
 dom an opportunity of making their re- 
 marks on real life. In doing this, I may 
 perhaps be led sometimes to vrite more 
 in the manner of a person communicating 
 information to you which you did not 
 know before, and at other tin.es more in 
 the style of egotism, than I would choose 
 to do to any person, in whose candour, 
 and even personal good will, I had less 
 confidence. 
 
 There are two several lines of study 
 that open to every man as he enters life : 
 the one, the general science of life, of du- 
 ty, and of happiness; the other, the par- 
 ticular arts of his employment or situa- 
 tion in society, and the several branches 
 of knowledge therewith connected. This 
 last is certainly indispensable, as nothing 
 can be more disgraceful than ignorance 
 in the way of one's own profession ; and 
 whatever a man's speculative knowledge 
 may be, if he is ill-informed there, he can 
 neither be a useful nor a respectable mem- 
 ber of society. It is nevertheless true, 
 that "the proper study of mankind is 
 man:" to consider what duties are in- 
 cumbent on him as a rational creature, 
 and a member of society ; how he may 
 increase or secure his happiness : and 
 how he may prevent or soften the many 
 miseries incident to human life. I think 
 the pursuit of happiness is too frequently 
 confined to the endeavour after the acqui- 
 sition of wealth. I do not wish to be con- 
 sidered as an idle declaimer against riches, 
 which, at'ter all that can be said against 
 
 • The Editor' .s friend Mr. Peter Ewart of Blanches 
 ter. E. 
 
 them, will still oe considered by men of 
 common sense as objects of importance ; 
 and poverty will be felt as a sore evil, af- 
 tMT all the fine things that can be said of 
 its advantages ; on the contrary I am of 
 opinion, that a great proportion of the 
 miseries of life arise from the want of eco- 
 nomy, and a prudent attention to money, 
 or the ill-directed or intemperate pursuit 
 of it. But however valuable riches ma 
 be as the means of comfort, independent, 
 and the pleasure of doing good to others, 
 yet I am of opinion, that they may be, and 
 frequently are, purchased at too great a 
 cost, and that sacrifices are made in the 
 pursuit, which the acquisition cannot 
 compensate. I remember hearing my 
 worthy teacher, Mr. Murdoch, relate an 
 anecdote to my father, which I think 
 sets this matter in a strong light, and per- 
 haps was the origin, or at least tended to 
 promote this way of thinking in me. 
 When Mr. Murdoch left Alloway, he 
 went to teach and reside in the family of 
 an opulent farmer who had a number of 
 sons. A neighbour coming on a visit, 
 in the course of conversation, asked the 
 father how he meant to dispose of his 
 sons. The father replied that he had not 
 determined. The visitor said, that were 
 he in his place he would give them all 
 good education and send them abroad, 
 without (perhaps) having a precise idea 
 where. The father objected, that many 
 young men lost their health in foreign 
 countries, and many their lives. True, 
 replied the visitor, but as you have a num- 
 ber of sons, it will be strange if someone 
 of them does not live and make a for- 
 tune. 
 
 Let any person who has the feelings of 
 a father, comment on this story ; but 
 though few will avow, even to themselves 
 that such views govern their conduct, 
 yet do we not daily see people shipping off 
 their sons (and who would do so by their 
 daughters also, if there were any demand 
 for them,) that they may be rich or perish ? 
 
 The education of the lower classes is 
 seldom considered in any other point of 
 view than as the means of raising them 
 from that station to which they were born, 
 and of making a fortune. I am ignorant 
 of the mysteries of the art of acquiring a 
 fortune without any thing to begin with ; 
 and cannot calculate, with any degree of 
 exactness, the difficulties to be surmount- 
 ed, the mortifications to be suffered, rnd 
 the degradation of character to be sub- 
 
APFliNDrX, NO. 3. 
 
 milted to, in lending' one's self to be ihe 
 minister of other people's vices, or in the 
 practice of rapine, fraud, oppression, or dis- 
 simulation, in the progress ; but even when 
 the wished for end is attained, it may be 
 questioned whether happiness be much 
 increased by the change. When I have 
 seen a fortunate adventurer of the lower 
 ranks of life returned from the East or 
 West Indies, with all the hauteur of a 
 vulgar mind accustomed to be served by 
 slaves ; assuming a character which, from 
 the early habits of life, he is ill-fitted to 
 support : displaying magnificence which 
 raises the envy of some, and the contempt 
 of others ; claiming an equality with the 
 great, which they are unwilling to allow ; 
 inly pining at the precedence of the he- 
 reditary gentry ; maddened uy the polish- 
 ed insolence of some of the unworthy part 
 of them; seeking pleasure in the soci.ety 
 of men who can condescend to flatter him, 
 and listen to his absurdity for the sake of 
 a good dinner and good wine : I cannot 
 avoid concluding, that his brother, or com- 
 panion, who, by a diligent application to 
 the labours of agriculture, or some useful 
 mechanic employment, and the careful hus- 
 banding of his gains, has acquired a com- 
 petence in his station, is a much happier, 
 and, in the eye of a person who can take 
 an enlarged view of mankind, a much 
 more respectable man. 
 
 But the votaries of wealth may be con- 
 sidered as a great number of candidates 
 striving for a few prizes : and whatever 
 addition the successful may make to their 
 pleasure or happiness, the disappointed 
 will always have more to sufi'er, I am 
 afraid, than those who abide contented 
 in the station to which they were born. 
 I wish, therefore, the education of the 
 lower classes to be promoted and direct- 
 ed to their improvement as men, as the 
 means of increasing their virtue, and 
 opening to them new and dignified sources 
 of pleasure and happiness. I have heard 
 some people object to the education of 
 the lower classes of men, as rendering 
 them less useful, by abstracting them 
 from their proper business; others, as 
 tending to make them saucy to their su- 
 periors, impatient of their condition, and 
 turbulent subjects ; while you, with more 
 humanity, have your fears alarmed, lest 
 the delicacy of mind, induced by that sort 
 of education and reading T recommend, 
 should render the evils of their situation 
 insupportable to them. I wish to ex- 
 amine the validity of each of these ob- 
 
 255 
 
 jections, beginning with the one jrou hare 
 
 mentioned. 
 
 I do not mean to controvert you* criti- 
 cism of my favourite books, the Mirror 
 and Lounger, although I understand 
 there are people who think themselves 
 judges, who do not agree with you. The 
 acquisition of knowledge, except what is 
 connected with human life and conduct, 
 or the particular business of his employ- 
 ment, does not appear to me to be the fit- 
 test pursuit for a peasant. I would say 
 with the poet, 
 
 " How empty learning, and how vain is art 
 Save where it guides the life, or mends the heart.* 
 
 There seems to be a considerable lati- 
 tude in the use of the word taste. I un- 
 derstand it to be the perception and re- 
 lish of beauty, order, or any thing, the 
 contemplation of which gives pleasure 
 and delight to the mind. I suppose it is 
 in this sense you wish it to be understood. 
 If I am right, the taste which these books 
 are calculated to cultivate (besides the 
 taste for fine writing, which many of the 
 papers tend to improve and to gratify,) is 
 what is proper, consistent, and becoming 
 in human character and conduct, as al- 
 most every paper relates to these sub- 
 jects. 
 
 I am sorry I have not these books by 
 me, that I might point out some instances. 
 I remember two ; one the beautiful story 
 of La Roch, where, beside the pleasure 
 one derives from a beautiful simple story, 
 told in M'Kenzie's happiest manner, the 
 mind is led to taste with heartfelt rap- 
 ture, the consolation to be derived in 
 deep affliction, from habitual devotion 
 and trust in Almighty God. The other, 
 
 the story of general W •, where the 
 
 reader is led to have a high relish for 
 that firmness of mind which disregards 
 appearances, the common forms and vani- 
 ties of life, for the sake of doing justice 
 in a case which was out of the reach of 
 human laws. 
 
 Allow me then to remark, that if the 
 morality of these books is subordinate to 
 the cultivation of taste ; that taste, that 
 refinement of mind and delicacy of.senti- 
 ment which they are intended to give, 
 are the strongest guard and surest foun- 
 dation of morality and virtue. — Other 
 moralists guard, as it were, the overt act; 
 these papers, by exalting duty into senti- 
 ment, ar« calculated to make flv<»ry de- 
 
?5C 
 
 APPENDIX, NO. 3. 
 
 viation from rectitude and propriety of 
 conduct, painful to the mind, 
 
 " Whose temper'd powers, 
 Refine at length, and every passion wears 
 A chaster, milder, more attractive mien." 
 
 I readily grant you, that the refinement 
 of mind which I contend for, inscreases 
 our sensibility to the evils of life ! but 
 what station of life is without its evils ! 
 There seems to be no such thing as per- 
 fect happiness in this world, and we must 
 balance the pleasure and the pain which 
 we derive from taste, before we can pro- 
 perly appreciate it in the case before us. 
 I apprehend that on a minute examina- 
 tion it will appear, that the evils peculiar 
 to the lower ranks of life, derive their 
 power to wound us, more from the sug- 
 gestions of false pride, and the " conta- 
 gion of luxury, weak and vile," than the 
 refinement of our taste. It was a favour- 
 ite remark of my brother's, that there was 
 no part of the constitution of our nature, to 
 which we were more indebted, than that 
 by which " Custom makes things familiar 
 and easy'" (a copy Mr. Murdoch used to 
 set us to write,) and there is little labour 
 which custom will not make easy to a 
 man in health, if he is not ashamed of his 
 employment, or does not begin to com- 
 pare his situation with those he may see 
 going about at their ease. 
 
 But the man of enlarged mind feels the 
 respect due to him as a man; he has 
 learned that no employment is dishonour- 
 able in itself; that while he performs 
 aright the duties of that station in which 
 God has placed him, he is as great as a king 
 in the eyes of Him whom he is principal- 
 ly desirous to please ; for the man of taste, 
 who is constantly obliged to labour, must 
 of necessity be religious. If you teach 
 him only to reason, you may make him 
 an atheist, a demagogue, or any vile thing; 
 but if you teach him to feel, his feelings 
 can only find their proper and natural re- 
 lief in devotion and religious resignation. 
 He knows that those people who are to 
 appearance at ease, are not without their 
 ehare of evils, and that even toil itself is 
 not destitute of advantages. He listens 
 to the words of his favourite poet : 
 
 " O mortal man that livest here by toil, 
 Cease to repine and grudge thy hard estate ! 
 
 That like an emmet thou must ever moil, 
 Is a sad sentence of an ancient date ; 
 
 And, certes, there is for it reason great ; 
 Although sometimes it makes thee weep «nd wail, 
 
 And curse thy star, and early drudge, and late ; 
 
 Wlthoiiten ihti would come an heavier btla. 
 Loose life, unruly passinas, and dlKen»« pate!" 
 
 And, vvhil'^ ho repeats the v.'ords, the 
 grateful rec(i!lrction comes ncross his 
 mind, how often lie has derived ineffable 
 pleasure from the sweet song of " Na- 
 ture's darling child." I can say, from my 
 own experience, that there is no sort of 
 farm-labour inconsistent with the most 
 refined and pleasurable state of the mind 
 that I am acquainted with, thrashing 
 alone excepted. That, indeed, I have 
 always considered as insupportable drudg- 
 ery, and think the ingenious mechanic 
 who invented the thrashing machine, 
 ought to have a statue among the bene- 
 factors of his country, and should be pla- 
 ced in the niche next to the person who 
 introduced the culture of potatoes into 
 this island. 
 
 Perhaps the thing of most importance 
 in the education of the common people is, 
 to prevent the intrusion of artificial wants. 
 I bless the memory of my worthy father 
 for almest every thing in the dispositions 
 of my mind, and my habits of life, which 
 I can approve of: and for none more than 
 the pains he took to impress my mind 
 with the sentiment, that nothing was 
 more unworthy the character of a man, 
 than that his happiness should in the 
 least depend on what he should eat or 
 drink. So early did he impress my mind 
 with this, that although I was as fond of 
 sweatineats as children generally are, yet 
 I seldom laid out any of the half-pence 
 which relations or neighbours gave me at 
 fairs, in the purchase of them ; and if I 
 did, every mouthful I swallowed was ac- 
 companied with shame and remorse; and 
 to this hour I never indulge in the use of 
 any delicacy, but I feel a considerable de- 
 gree of self-reproach and alarm for the de- 
 gradation of the human character. Such 
 a habit of thinking I consider as of great 
 consequence, both to the virtue and hap- 
 piness of men in the lower ranks of life. — 
 And thus. Sir, I am of opinion, that if 
 their minds are early and deeply impress- 
 ed with a sense of the dignity of man, as 
 §iich ; with the love of independence and 
 of industry, economy and temperance, as 
 the most obvious means of making them- 
 selves independent, and the virtues most 
 becoming their situation, and necessary 
 to their happiness; men in the lower 
 ranks of life may partake of the pleasures 
 to be derived from the perusal of books 
 calculated to improve the mind and re- 
 
APPENDIX, NO. 3. 
 
 fine *'';e taste, without any danger of be- 
 coming more unhappy iu their situation 
 or diecontented with it. Nor do I think 
 there is any danger of their becoming 
 less useful. There are some hours every 
 day that the most constant labourer is 
 neither at work nor asleep. These hours 
 are either appropriated to amusement or 
 to sloth. If a taste for employing these 
 hours in reading were cultivated, I do not 
 suppose that the return to labour would 
 be more difficult. Every one will allow, 
 that the attachment to idle amusements, 
 or even to sloth, has as powerful a ten- 
 dency to abstract men from their proper 
 business, as the Jittachment to books; 
 while the one dissipates the mind, and 
 the other tends to increase its powers of 
 self-government. To those who are 
 afraid that the improvement of the minds 
 of the couiuiun people might be danger- 
 ous to the state, or the established order 
 of society, I would remark, that turbu- 
 lence and commotion are certainly very 
 inimical to the feelings of a refined mind. 
 Let the matter be brought to the test of 
 experience and observation. Of what 
 description of people are mobs and insur- 
 rections composed ? Are they not univer- 
 sally owing to the want of enlargement 
 and improvement of mind among the com- 
 mon people ? Nay, let any one recollect 
 the characters of those who formed the 
 calmer and more deliberate associations, 
 which lately gave so much alarm to the 
 government of this countfy. I suppose 
 few of the common people who were to 
 be found in such societies, had the educa- 
 tion and turn of mind I have been en- 
 deavouring to recommend. Allow me to 
 suggest one reason for endeavouring to 
 enlighten the minds of the common peo- 
 ple. Their morals have hitherto been 
 guarded by a sort of dim religious awe, 
 which from a variety of causes, seems 
 wearing off. I think the alteration in 
 this respect considerable, in the short pe- 
 riod of my obseivation. I have already 
 given my opinion of the effects of refine- 
 ment, of mind on morals and virtue. 
 Whenever vulgar minds begin to shake 
 off the dogmas of the religion in which 
 they have been educated, the progress ie 
 quick and immediate to downright infi- 
 delity; and nothing but refinement of 
 mind can enable them to distinguish be- 
 tween the pure essence of religion, and 
 the gross systems which men have been 
 perpetually connecting it with. In addi- 
 tion to what has already been done for 
 the education of the common people of 
 
 I this country, in the establishment of par- 
 ish schools, I wish to see the salaries 
 augmented in some proportion to the 
 present expense of living, and the earn- 
 ings of people of similar rank, endow- 
 ments, and usefulness in society ; and I 
 hope that the liberality of the present 
 age will 'be no longer disgraced by re- 
 fusing, to so useful a class of men, such en- 
 couragement as may make parish schools 
 worth the attention of men fitted for the 
 important duties of that office. In filling 
 up the vacancies, I would have more at- 
 tention paid to the candidate's capacity 
 of reading the English language with 
 grace and propriety ; to his understand- 
 ing thoroughly, and having a high relish 
 for the beauties of English authors, both 
 in poetry and prose ; to that good sense 
 and knowledge of human nature which 
 would enable him to acquire some influ- 
 ence on the minds and affections of his 
 scholars ; to the general worth of his 
 character, and the love of his king and 
 his country, than to his proficiency in the 
 knowledge of Latin and Greek. I would 
 then have a sort of liigh English class es- 
 tablished, not only for the purpose of 
 teaching the pupils to read in.that grace- 
 ful and agreeable manner that might make 
 them fond of reading, but to make thera 
 understand what they read, and discover 
 the beauties of the author, in composition 
 and sentiment. I would have established 
 in every parish, a small circulating libra- 
 ry, consisting of the books which the 
 young people had read extracts from in the 
 collections they had read at school, and 
 any other books well calculated to refine 
 the mind, improve the moral feelings, re- 
 commend the practice of virtue, and com- 
 municate such knowledge as might be 
 useful and suitable to the labouring class- 
 es of men. I would have the schoolmas- 
 ter act as librarian, and in recommending 
 books to his young friends, formerly his 
 pupils, and letting in the light of them 
 upon their young minds, he should have 
 the assistance of the minister. If once 
 such education were become general, tho 
 low delights of the pubhc house, and 
 other scenes of riot and depravity, would 
 be contemned and neglected; while indus- 
 try, order, cleanliness, and every virtue 
 which taste and independence of mind 
 could recommend, would prevwil and 
 flourish. Thus possessed of a Virtuous 
 and enlightened populace, with high de- 
 light I should consider my native comi- 
 try as at the head of all the nations of the 
 earth, nncicnt or modern. 
 
258 
 
 APPENDIX, NO. 3. 
 
 Thus, Sir, have I executed my threat 
 to the fullest extent, in regard to the 
 length of my letter. If I had not pre- 
 Bumed on doing it more to my liking, I 
 should not have undertaken it; but I 
 have not time to attempt it anew ; nor, 
 if I would, am I certain that I should suc- 
 ceed any better. I have learned to have 
 leSs confidence in my capacity of writing 
 on such subjects. 
 
 I am much obliged by your kind inqui- 
 ries about my situation and prospects. I 
 am much pleased with the soil of this 
 farm, and with the terms on which I pos- 
 sess it. I receive great encouragement 
 likewise in building, enclosing, and other 
 conveniences, from my landlord, Mr. G. 
 S. Monteith, whose general character 
 and conduct, as a landlord and country 
 gentleman, I am highly pleased with. 
 But the land is in such a state as to 
 require a considerable immediate outlay 
 of money in the purchase of manure, the 
 _ grubbing of brush-wood, removing of 
 Btones, &.C. which twelve years' struggle 
 with a farm of a cold, ungrateful soil has 
 but ill prepared me for. If I can get 
 these things done, however, to my mind, 
 
 I think there is next to a certainty that 
 
 in five or six years I shall be in a hopeful 
 way of attaining a situation which I think 
 as eligible for happiness as any one I 
 know ; for I have always been of opinion, 
 that if a man bred to the habits of a farm- 
 ing life, who possesses a farm of good 
 soil, on such terms as enables him easily 
 to pay all demands, is not happy, he ought 
 to look somewhere else than to his situa- 
 tion for the causes of his uneasiness. 
 
 I beg you will present my most respect- 
 ful compliments to Mrs. Currie, and re- 
 member me to Mr. and Mrs. Roscoe, and 
 Mr. Roscoe, junior, whose kind atten- 
 tions to me, when in Liverpool, I shall 
 never forget. 
 
 I am, dear Sir, 
 
 Your most obedient, and 
 
 Much obliged, humble Servant, 
 
 GILBERT BURNS. 
 
 To James Curiiie, M. D. F. R. S. ) 
 Liverpool. ^ 
 
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