POEMS.
 
 jprintet) &t> 3fame0 Ballantpnc anti
 
 POEMS 
 
 JAMES GRAHAME. 
 
 IN TWO VOLUMES. 
 
 VOL. I. 
 
 CONTAINING 
 
 THE SABBATH, SABBATH WALKS, 
 RURAL CALENDAR, &c. 
 
 LONDON: 
 
 PRINTED FOR LONGMAN, HURST, REES, AND 
 
 ORME, PATERNOSTER-ROW; AND WILLIAM BLACKWOOD, 
 SOUTH BRIDGE-STREET, EDINBURGH. 
 
 1807.
 
 Stack 
 Annex 
 
 5" 
 0+3 
 
 THE 
 
 SABBATH: 
 
 A POEM. 
 
 Luce sacra requiescat humits, requiescat aratei 
 Et grave, suspenso vomere, cesset opus. 
 
 2018119
 
 THE 
 
 SABBATH. 
 
 How still the morning of the hallowed day 1 
 
 Mute is the voice of rural labour, hushed 
 
 The ploughboy's whistle, and the milkmaid's song. 
 
 The scythe lies glittering in the dewy wreath 
 
 Of tedded grass, mingled with fading flowers, 
 
 That yester-morn bloomed waving in the breeze : 
 
 Sounds the most faint attract the ear, the hum 
 
 Of early bee, the trickling of the dew, 
 
 The distant bleating, midway up the hill. 
 
 Calmness sits throned on yon unmoving cloud. 
 
 To him who wanders o'er the upland leas, 
 
 The blackbird's note comes mellower from the dale ', 
 
 And sweeter from the sky the gladsome lark
 
 4 THE SABBATH. 
 
 Warbles his heaven-tuned song; the lulling brook 
 Murmurs more gently down the deep-worn glen; 
 While from yon lowly roof, whose curling smoke 
 O'ermounts the mist, is heard, at intervals, 
 The voice of psalms, the simple song of praise. 
 
 With dove-like wings, Peace o'er yon village broods : 
 The dizzying mill-wheel rests; the anvil's din 
 Hath ceased; all, all around is quietness. 
 Less fearful on this day, the limping hare 
 Stops, and looks back, and stops, and looks on man, 
 Her deadliest foe. The toil-worn horse, set free, 
 Unheedful of the pasture, roams at large; 
 And, as his stiff unwieldy bulk he rolls, 
 His iron-armed hoofs gleam in the morning ray. 
 
 But chiefly Man the day of rest enjoys. 
 Hail, SABBATH ! thee I hail, the poor man's day. 
 On other days, the man of toil is doomed 
 To eat his joyless bread, lonely; the ground 
 Both seat and board; screened from the winter's cold, 
 And summer's heat, by neighbouring hedge or tree; 
 But on this day, embosomed in his home, 
 He shares the frugal meal with those he loves ; 
 With those he loves he shares the heart-felt joy 
 Of giving thanks to God, not thanks of form,
 
 THE SABBATH. 5 
 
 A word and a grimace, but reverently, 
 With covered face and upward earnest eye. 
 
 Hail, SABBATH ! thee I hail, the poor man's day : 
 The pale mechanic now has leave to breathe 
 The morning air, pure from the city's smoke, 
 While, wandering slowly up the river side, 
 He meditates on HIM, whose power he marks 
 In each green tree that proudly spreads the bough, 
 As in the tiny dew-bent flowers that bloom 
 Around its roots; and while he thus surveys, 
 With elevated joy, each rural charm, 
 He hopes, yet fears presumption in the hope, 
 That Heaven may be one SABBATH without end. 
 
 But now his steps a welcome sound recals : 
 Solemn the knell, from yonder ancient pile, 
 Fills all the air, inspiring joyful awe : 
 Slowly the throng moves o'er the tomb-paved ground : 
 The aged man, the bowed down, the blind 
 Led by the thoughtless boy, and he who breathes 
 With pain, and eyes the new-made grave, well pleased : 
 These, mingled with the young, the gay, approach 
 The house of God; these, spite of all their ills, 
 A glow of gladness feel ; with silent praise 
 They enter in. A placid stillness reigns,
 
 O THE SABBATH. 
 
 Until the man of God, worthy the name, 
 Arise, and read the anointed shepherd's lays. 
 His locks of snow, his brow serene, his look 
 Of love, it speaks, " Ye are my children all, 
 The gray-haired man, stooping upon his stafl 
 As well as he, the giddy child, whose eye 
 Pursues the swallow flitting thwart the dome." 
 Loud swells the song : O, how that simple song. 
 Though rudely chaunted, how it melts the heart. 
 Commingling soul with soul in one full tide 
 Of praise, of thankfulness, of humble trust ! 
 Next comes the unpremeditated prayer, 
 Breathed from the inmost heart, in accents low, 
 But earnest. Altered is the tone ; to man 
 Are now addressed the sacred speaker's words. 
 Instruction, admonition, comfort, peace, 
 Flow from his tongue : O chief let comfort flow ! 
 It is most wanted in this vale of tears : 
 Yes, make the widow's heart to sing for joy ; 
 The stranger to discern the Almighty's shield 
 Held o'er his friendless head ; the orphan child 
 Feel, mid his tears, I have a father still ! 
 Tis done. But hark that infant querulous voice ! 
 Plaint not discordant to a parent's ear : 
 And see the father raise the white-robed babe 
 In solemn dedication to the Lord :
 
 THE SABBATH. 7 
 
 The holy man sprinkles with forth-stretched hand 
 The face of innocence; then earnest turns, 
 And prays a blessing in the name of Him, 
 Who said, Let little children come to me ; 
 Forbid them not : * The infant is replaced 
 Among the happy band : they, smilingly, 
 In gay attire, wend to the house of mirth, 
 The poor man's festival, a jubilee day, 
 Remembered long. 
 
 Nor would I leave unsung 
 The lofty ritual of our sister land : 
 In vestment white, the minister of God 
 Opens the book, and reverentially 
 The stated portion reads. A pause ensues. 
 The organ breathes its distant thunder-notes, 
 Then swells into a diapason full : 
 The people rising, sing, With harp, with harp, 
 
 * " And they brought young children to him, that he should 
 touch them ; and his disciples rebuked those that brought them. 
 But when Jesus saw it he was much displeased, and said unto 
 them, suffer the little children to come unto me, and forbid, 
 them not ; for of such is the kingdom of God. Verily I say 
 unto you, Whosoever shall not receive the kingdom of God as 
 a little child, he shall not enter therein. And he took them 
 up in his arms, put his hands upon them, and blessed them." 
 MARK, x. 13, 14, 15, 16. 
 
 2
 
 THE SABBATH. 
 
 And voice of psalms; harmoniously attuned 
 The various voices blend ; the long-drawn aisles, 
 At every close, the lingering strain prolong. 
 And now the tubes a mellowed stop controuls, 
 In -softer harmony the people join, 
 While liquid whispers from yon orphan band 
 Recall the soul from adoration's trance, 
 And fill the eye with pity's gentle tears. 
 Again the organ-peal, loud-rolling, meets 
 The halleluiahs of the choir : Sublime, 
 A thousand notes symphoniously ascend, 
 As if the whole were one, suspended high 
 In air, soaring heavenward : afar they float, 
 Wafting glad tidings to the sick man's couch : 
 Raised on his arm, he lists the cadence close, 
 Yet thinks he hears it still : his heart is cheered ; 
 He smiles on death ; but, ah ! a wish will rise, 
 " Would I were now beneath that echoing roof! 
 No lukewarm accents from my lips should flow ; 
 My heart would sing ; and many a Sabbath-day 
 My steps should thither turn ; or, wandering far 
 In solitary paths, where wild flowers blow, 
 There would I bless His name who led me forth 
 From death's dark vale, to walk amid ^hose sweets j 
 Who gives the bloom of health once more to glow 
 Upon this cheek, and lights this languid eye."
 
 THE SABBATH. 9 
 
 It is not only in the sacred fane 
 That homage should be paid to the Most High ; 
 There is a temple, one not made with hands, 
 The vaulted firmament : Far in the woods, 
 Almost beyond the sound of city chime, 
 At intervals heard through the breezeless air; 
 When not the limberest leaf is seen to move, 
 Save where the linnet lights upon the spray ; 
 When not a floweret bends its little stalk, ' 
 Save where the bee alights upon the bloom ; 
 There, rapt in gratitude, in joy, and love, 
 The man of God will pass the Sabbath-noon ; 
 Silence his praise: his disembodied thoughts, 
 Loosed from the load of words, will high ascend 
 Beyond the empyrean. 
 Nor yet less pleasing at the heavenly throne, 
 The Sabbath-service of the shepherd-boy. 
 In some lone glen, where every sound is lulled 
 To slumber, save the tinkling of the rill, 
 Or bleat of lamb, or hovering falcon's cry, 
 Stretched on the sward, he reads of Jesse's son ; 
 Or sheds a tear o'er him to Egypt sold, 
 And wonders why he weeps ; the volume closed, 
 With thyme-sprig laid between the leaves, he sings 
 The sacred lays, his weekly lesson, conned 
 With meikle care beneath the lowly roof,
 
 10 THE SABBATH. 
 
 Where humble lore is learnt, where humble wortk 
 
 Pines unrewarded by a thankless state. 
 
 Thus reading, hymning, all alone, unseen, 
 
 The shepherd-boy the Sabbath holy keeps, 
 
 Till on the heights he marks the straggling bands 
 
 Returning homeward from the house of prayer. 
 
 In peace they home resort. O blissful day ! 
 
 When all men worship God as conscience wills. 
 
 Far other times our fathers' grandsires knew, 
 
 A virtuous race, to godliness devote. 
 
 What though the sceptic's scorn hath dared to soil 
 
 The record of their fame ! What though the men 
 
 Of worldly minds have dared to stigmatize 
 
 The sister-cause, Religion and the Law, 
 
 With Superstition's name ! yet, yet their deeds, 
 
 Their constancy in torture, and in death, 
 
 These on tradition's tongue still live, these shall 
 
 On history's honest page be pictured bright 
 
 To latest times. Perhaps some bard, whose muse 
 
 Disdains the servile strain of Fashion's quire, 
 
 May celebrate their unambitious names. 
 
 With them each day was holy, every hour 
 
 They stood prepared to die, a people doomed 
 
 To death : old men, and youths, and simple maids. 
 
 With them each day was holy ; but that morn 
 
 On which the angel said, See where the Lord
 
 THE SABBATH. 11 
 
 Was laid, joyous arose ; to die that day 
 
 Was bliss. Long ere the dawn, by devious ways, 
 
 O'er hills, thro' woods, o'er dreary wastes, they sought 
 
 The upland moors, where rivers, there but brooks, 
 
 Dispart to different seas : Fast by such brooks, 
 
 A little glen is sometimes scooped, a plat 
 
 With green sward gay, and flowers that strangers seem 
 
 Amid the heathery wild, that all around 
 
 Fatigues the eye : in solitudes like these 
 
 Thy persecuted children, SCOTIA, foiled 
 
 A tyrant's and a bigot's bloody laws : 
 
 There, leaning on his spear, (one of the array, 
 
 Whose gleam, in former days, had scathed the rose 
 
 On England's banner, and had powerless struck 
 
 The infatuate monarch and his wavering host,) 
 
 The lyart veteran heard the word of God 
 
 By Cameron thundered, or by Renwick poured 
 
 In gentle stream : then rose the song, the loud 
 
 Acclaim of praise ; the wheeling plover ceased 
 
 Her plaint ; the solitary place was glad, 
 
 And on the distant cairns, the watcher's ear * 
 
 Caught doubtfully at times the breeze-borne note. 
 
 But years more gloomy followed ; and no more 
 
 * Sentinels were placed on the surrounding hills, to gi^e 
 warning of the approach of the military.
 
 12 THE SABBATH. 
 
 The assembled people dared, in face of day, 
 To worship God, or even at the dead 
 Of night, save when the wintry storm raved fierce, 
 And thunder-peals compelled the men of blood 
 To couch within their dens; then dauntlessly 
 The scattered few would meet, in some deep dell 
 By rocks o'er-canopied, to hear the voice, 
 Their faithful pastor's voice : He by the gleam 
 Of sheeted lightning oped the sacred book, 
 Aud words of comfort spake : Over their souls 
 His accents soothing came, as to her young 
 The heathfowl's plumes, when, at the close of eve, 
 She gathers in, mournful, her brood dispersed 
 By murderous sport, and o'er the remnant spreads 
 Fondly her wings ; close nestling 'neath her breast, 
 They, cherished, cower amid the purple blooms. 
 
 But wood and wild, the mountain and the dale, 
 The house of prayer itself, no place inspires 
 Emotions more accordant with the day, 
 Than does the field of graves, the land of rest : 
 Oft at the close of evening-prayer, the toll, 
 The solemn funeral-toll, pausing, proclaims 
 The service of the tomb ; the homeward crowds 
 Divide on either hand ; the pomp draws near ; 
 The choir to meet the dead go forth, and sing,
 
 THE SABBATH. 13 
 
 / am the resurrection and the life. 
 Ah me ! these youthful bearers robed in white, 
 They tell a mournful tale ; some blooming friend 
 Is gone, dead in her prime of years : 'twas she, 
 The poor man's friend, who, when she could not give,. 
 With angel tongue pleaded to those who could ; 
 With angel tongue and mild beseeching eye, 
 That ne'er besought in vain, save when she prayed 
 For longer life, with heart resigned to die, 
 Rejoiced to die ; for happy visions blessed 
 Her voyage's last days, * and, hovering round, 
 Alighted on her soul, giving presage 
 
 That heaven was nigh : O what a burst 
 
 Of rapture from her lips ! what tears of joy 
 
 Her heaven ward eyes suffused ! Those eyes are closed! 
 
 But all her loveliness is not yet flown : 
 
 She smiled in death, and still her cold pale face 
 
 Retains that smile ; as when a waveless lake, 
 
 In which the wintry stars all bright appear, 
 
 * Towards the end of Coluinbus's voyage to the new world, 
 when he was already near, but not in sight of land, the droop- 
 ing hopes of his mariners (for his own confidence seems to have 
 remained unmoved) were revived by the appearance of birds, 
 at first hovering round the ship, and then lighting on the rig- 
 ging.
 
 14 THE SABBATH. 
 
 Is sheeted by a nightly frost with ice, 
 Still it reflects the face of heaven unchanged, 
 Unruffled by the breeze or sweeping blast. 
 Again that knell ! The slow procession stops : 
 The pall withdrawn, Death's altar, thick-embossed 
 With melancholy ornaments, (the name, 
 The record of her blossoming age) appears 
 Unveiled, and on it dust to dust is thrown, 
 The final rite. Oh ! hark that sullen sound ! 
 Upon the lowered bier the shovelled clay 
 Falls fast, and fills the void. 
 
 But who is he, 
 
 That stands aloof, with haggard wistful eye, 
 As if he coveted the closing grave ? 
 And he does covet it ; his wish is death : 
 The dread resolve is fixed ; his own right-hand 
 Is sworn to do the deed : The day of rest 
 No peace, no comfort, brings his woe-worn spirit; 
 Self cursed, the hallowed dome he dreads to enter ; 
 He dares not pray ; he dares not sigh a hope ; 
 Annihilation is his only heaven. 
 Loathsome the converse of his friends ! he shuns 
 The human face ; in every careless eye 
 Suspicion of his purpose seems to lurk. 
 Deep piny shades he loves, where no sweet note 
 Is warbled, where the rook unceasing caws :
 
 THE SABBATH. 15 
 
 Or far in moors, remote from house or hut, 
 
 Where animated nature seems extinct, 
 
 Where even the hum of wandering bee ne'er breaks 
 
 The quiet slumber of the level waste ; 
 
 Where vegetation's traces almost fail, 
 
 Save where the leafless cannachs wave their tufts 
 
 Of silky white, or massy oaken trunks 
 
 Half-buried lie, and tell where greenwoods grew, 
 
 There, on the heathless moss outstretched, he broods 
 
 O'er all his ever-changing plans of death : 
 
 The time, place, means, sweep, like a stormy rack, 
 
 In fleet succession, o'er his clouded soul, 
 
 The poignard, and the opium draught, that brings 
 
 Death by degrees, but leaves an awful chasm 
 
 Between the act and consequence, the flash 
 
 Sulphureous, fraught with instantaneous death ; 
 
 The ruined tower perched on some jutting rock, 
 
 So high that, 'tween the leap and dash below, 
 
 The breath might take its flight in midway air, 
 
 This pleases for a time; but on the brink, 
 
 Back from the toppling edge his fancy shrinks 
 
 In horror ; sleep at last his breast becalms, 
 
 He dreams 'tis done ; but starting- wild awakes, 
 
 Resigning to despair his dream of joy. 
 
 Then hope, faint hope, revives hope, that Despair 
 
 May to his aid let loose the Demon Frenzy,
 
 1(5 THE SABBATH. 
 
 To lead scared Conscience blindfold o'er the brink 
 
 Of self-destruction's cataract of blood. 
 
 Most miserable, most incongruous wretch ! 
 
 Dar'st thou to spurn thy life, the boon of God, 
 
 Yet dreadest to approach his holy place ! 
 
 O dare to enter in ! may be some word, 
 
 Or sweetly chaunted strain, will in thy heart 
 
 Awake a chord in unison with life. 
 
 What are thy fancied woes to his, whose fate 
 
 Is (sentence dire !) incurable disease, 
 
 The outcast of a lazar-house, homeless, 
 
 Or with a home where eyes do scowl on him ! 
 
 Yet he, even he, with feeble step draws near, 
 
 With trembling voice joins in the song of praise. 
 
 Patient he waits the hour of his release; 
 
 He knows he has a home beyond the grave. 
 
 Or turn thee to that house, with studded doors, 
 And iron-visor'd windows; even there 
 The Sabbath sheds a beam of bliss, tho' faint; 
 The debtor's friends (for still he has some friends) 
 Have time to visit him ; the blossoming pea, 
 That climbs the rust-worn bars, seems fresher tinged; 
 And on the little turf, this day renewed, 
 The lark, his prison mate, quivers the wing 
 With more than wonted joy. See, through the bars, 
 That pallid face retreating from the view,
 
 THE SABBATH. 17 
 
 That glittering eye following, with hopeless look, 
 
 The friends of former years, now passing by 
 
 In peaceful fellowship to worship God : 
 
 With them, in days of youthful years, he roamed 
 
 O'er hill and dale, o'er broomy knowe; and wist 
 
 As little as the blythest of the band 
 
 Of this his lot; condemned, condemned unheard, 
 
 The party for his judge : among the throng, 
 
 The Pharisaical hard-hearted man 
 
 He sees pass on, to join the heaven-taught prayer, 
 
 Forgive our debts, as we forgive our debtors : 
 
 From unforgiving lips most impious prayer ! 
 
 O happier far the victim, than the hand 
 
 That deals the legal stab ! The injured man 
 
 Enjoys internal, settled calm; to him 
 
 The Sabbath bell sounds peace ; he loves to meet. 
 
 His fellow-sufferers, to pray and praise : 
 
 And many a prayer, as pure as e'er was breathed 
 
 In holy fanes, is sighed in prison halls. 
 
 Ah me ! that clank of chains, as kneel and rise 
 
 The death-doomed row. But see, a smile illumes 
 
 The face of some ; perhaps they're guiltless : Oh ! 
 
 And must high-minded honesty endure 
 
 The ignominy of a felon's fate ! 
 
 No, 'tis not ignominious to be wronged ; 
 
 No; conscious exultation swells their hearts,
 
 18 THE SABBATH. 
 
 To think the day draws nigh, when in the view 
 Of angels, and of just men perfect made, 
 The mark which rashness branded on their names 
 Shall be effaced; when, wafted on life's storm, 
 Their souls shall reach the Sabbath of the skies ; 
 As birds, from bleak Norwegians wintry coast 
 Blown out to sea, strive to regain the shore, 
 But, vainly striving, yield them to the blast, 
 Swept o'er the deep to ALBION'S genial isle, 
 Amazed they light amid the bloomy sprays 
 Of some green vale, there to enjoy new loves, 
 And join in harmony unheard before. 
 
 The land is groaning 'neath the guilt of blood 
 Spilt wantonly : for every death-doomed man, 
 Who, in his boyhood, has been left untaught 
 That Wisdom's ways are ways of pleasantness, 
 And all her paths are peace, unjustly dies. 
 But ah ! how many are thus left untaught, 
 How many would be left, but for the band 
 United to keep holy to the Lord 
 A portion of His day, by teaching those 
 Whom Jesus loved with forth-stretched hand to bless. 
 Behold yon motly train, by two and two, 
 Each with a bible 'neath its little arm, 
 Approach, well-pleased as if they went to play, 
 The dome where simple lore is learnt uubought :
 
 THE SABBATH. 19 
 
 And mark the father 'mid the sideway throng ; 
 Well do I know him by his glistening eye 
 That follows stedfastly one of the line. 
 A dark seafaring man he looks to be ; 
 And much itglads his boding heart to think, 
 That when once more he sails the vallied deep, 
 His child shall still receive Instruction's boon. 
 But hark, a noise, a cry, a gleam of swords ! 
 Resistance is in vain, he's borne away, 
 Nor is allowed to clasp his weeping child. 
 
 My innocent, so helpless, yet so gay ! 
 How could I bear to be thus rudely torn 
 From thee; to see thee lift thy little arm 
 And impotently strike the ruffian man, 
 To hear thee bid him chidingly, begone ! 
 
 O ye, who live at home, and kiss each eve 
 Your sleeping infants ere ye go to rest, 
 And, 'wakened by their call, lift up your eyes 
 Upon their morning smile, think, think of those 
 Who, torn away without one farewell word 
 To wife, or children, sigh the day of life 
 In banishment from all that's dear to man, 
 O raise your voices, in one general peal 
 Remonstrant, for the opprest. And ye, who sit
 
 20 THE S A DEATH. 
 
 Month after month devising impost-laws, 
 
 Give some small portion of your midnight vigils, 
 
 To mitigate, if not remove the wrong. 
 
 Relentless justice ! with fate-furrowed brow ! 
 Wherefore to various crimes of various guilt, 
 One penalty, the most severe, allot ! 
 Why, palled in state, and mitred with a wreath 
 Of nightshade, dost thou sit portentously, 
 Beneath a cloudy canopy of sighs, 
 Of fears, of trembling hopes, of boding doubts ! 
 Death's dart thy mace ! Why are the laws of God, 
 Statutes promulged in characters of fire, * 
 Despised in deep concerns, where heavenly guidance 
 Is most required ! The murderer let him'die, 
 And him who lifts his arm against his parent, 
 His country, or his voice against his God. 
 Let crimes less heinous dooms less dreadful meet, 
 Than loss of life ! so said the law divine, 
 That law beneficent, which mildly stretched 
 To men forgotten and forlorn, the hand 
 
 " And it came to pass on the third day in the morning, 
 that there were thunders and lightnings, and a thick cloud up- 
 on the mount, and the voice of the trumpet exceeding loud ; 
 so that all the people that was in the camp trembled." 
 EXOD. xix. 16. 
 
 3
 
 THE SABBATH. 21 
 
 Of restitution : Yes, the trumpet's voice 
 
 The Sabbath of the jubilee * announced : 
 
 The freedom-freighted blast, through all the land 
 
 At once, in every city, echoing rings, 
 
 From Lebanon to Carmel's woody cliffs, 
 
 So loud, that far within the desart's verge 
 
 The couching lion starts, and glares around. 
 
 Free is the bondman now, each one returns 
 
 To his inheritance : The man, grown old 
 
 In servitude far from his native fields, 
 
 Hastes joyous on his way ; no hills are steep, 
 
 Smooth is each rugged path; his little ones 
 
 Sport as they go, while oft the mother chides 
 
 The lingering step, lured by the way-side flowers : 
 
 At length the hill, from which a farewell look, 
 
 * " And thou shalt number seven Sabbaths of years unto 
 thee, seven times seven years ; and the space of the seven Sab- 
 baths of years shall be unto thee forty and nine years. Then 
 shalt thou cause the trumpet of the jubilee to sound on the 
 tenth day of the seventh month, in the day of atonement shall 
 ye make the trumpet sound throughout all your land. And ye 
 shall hallow the fiftieth year, and proclaim liberty throughout 
 all the land unto all the inhabitants thereof: it shall be a ju- 
 bilee unto you; and ye shall'return every man unto his posses- 
 sion, and ye shall return every man unto his family." LEV. 
 xxv. 8. 9. 10.
 
 THE SABBATH. 
 
 And still another parting look, he cast 
 On his paternal vale, appears in view : 
 The summit gained, throbs hard his heart with joy 
 And sorrow blent, to see that vale once more : 
 Instant his eager eye darts to the roof 
 Where first he saw the light : his youngest born 
 He lifts, and, pointing to the much-loved spot, 
 Says," There thy fathers lived, and there they sleep." 
 Onward he wends ; near and more near he draws : 
 How sweet the tinkle of the palm-bowered brook ! 
 The sun-beam slanting thro' the cedar grove 
 How lovely, and how mild ! but lovelier still 
 The welcome in the eye of ancient friends, 
 Scarce known at first ! and dear the fig-tree shade, 
 'Neath which on Sabbath eve his father told * 
 Of Israel from the house of bondage freed, 
 Led through the desart to the promised land; 
 With eager arms the aged stem he clasps, 
 
 * " And these words which I command thee this day shall be 
 in thine heart : And thou shall teach them diligently unto thy 
 children, and shalt talk of them when thou sittest in thine 
 house, and when thou walkest by the way, and when thou liest 
 
 down, and when thou risest up. Thou shalt say unto thy 
 
 son, We were Pharaoh's bondmen in Egypt; and the Lord 
 brought us out of Egypt with a mighty hand." DEUT. vi. 6. 
 7.21.
 
 THE SABBATH. 
 
 And with his tears the furrowed bark bedews : 
 And still, at midnight-hour, he thinks he hears 
 The blissful sound that brake the bondman's chains, 
 The glorious peal of freedom and of joy ! 
 
 Did ever law of man a power like this 
 Display ? power marvellous as merciful, 
 Which, though in other ordinances still 
 Most plainly seen, is yet but little marked 
 For what it truly is, a miracle ! 
 Stupendous, ever new, performed at once 
 In every region, yea, on every sea 
 Which Europe's navies plow ; yes, in all lauds 
 From pole to pole, or civilized or rude, 
 People there are, to whom the Sabbath morn 
 Dawns, shedding dews into their drooping hearts : 
 Yes, far beyond the high-heaved western wave, 
 Amid COLUMBIA'S wildernesses vast, 
 The words which God in thunder from the mount 
 Of Sinai spake, are heard, and are obeyed. 
 Thy children, SCOTIA, in the desart land, 
 Driven from their homes by fell Monopoly, 
 Keep holy to the Lord the seventh day. 
 Assembled under loftiest canopy 
 Of trees primeval, soon to be laid low, 
 They sing, By Babel's streams we sat and wept.
 
 24 THE SABBATH. 
 
 What strong mysterious links enchain the heart 
 To regions where the morn of life was spent ! 
 In foreign lands, though happier be the clime, 
 Though round our board smile all the friends we love, 
 The face of nature wears a stranger's look. 
 Yea, though the valley which we loved be swept 
 Of its inhabitants, none left behind, 
 Not even the poor blind man who sought his bread 
 From door to door, still, still there is a want; 
 Yes, even he, round whom a night that knows 
 No dawn is ever spread, whose native vale 
 Presented to his closed eyes a blank, 
 Deplores its distance now. There well he knew 
 Each object, though unseen ; there could he wend 
 His way, guideless, through wilds and mazy woods ; 
 Each aged tree, spared when the forest fell, 
 Was his familiar friend, from the smooth birch, 
 With rind of silken touch, to the rough elm : 
 The three gray stones, that marked where heroes lay, 
 Mourned by the harp, mourned by the melting voice 
 Of Cona, oft his resting-place had been ; 
 Oft had they told him that his home was near : 
 The tinkle of the rill, the murmuring 
 So gentle of the brook, the torrent's rush, 
 The cataract's din, the ocean's distant roar, 
 The echo's answer to his foot or voice ;
 
 THE SABBATH. 25 
 
 All spoke a language which he understood, 
 All warned him of his way. But most he feels 
 Upon the hallowed morn, the saddening change : 
 No more he hears the gladsome village bell 
 Ring the blest summons to the house of God : 
 And, for the voice of psalms, loud, solemn, grand, 
 That cheered his darkling path, as, with slow step 
 And feeble, he toiled up the spire-topt hill, 
 A few faint notes ascend among the trees. 
 
 What though the clustered vine there hardly tempts 
 The traveller's hand; though birds of dazzling plume 
 Perch on the loaded boughs ; " Give me thy woods, 
 (Exclaims the banished man) thy barren woods, 
 Poor SCOTLAND ! sweeter there the reddening haw, 
 The sloe, or rowan's* bitter bunch, than here 
 The purple grape; dearer the redbreast's note, 
 That mourns the fading year in SCOTIA'S vales, 
 Than Philomel's, where spring is ever new; 
 More dear to me the redbreast's sober suit, 
 So like a withered leaflet, than the glare 
 Of gaudy wings, that make the Iris dim." 
 
 Nor is regret exclusive to the old : 
 The boy, whose birth was midway o'er the main, 
 
 * Mouutain-ash.
 
 26 THE SABBATH. 
 
 A ship his cradle, by the billows rocked, 
 " The nursling of the storm," although he claims 
 No native land, yet does he wistful hear 
 Of some far distant country, still called home, 
 Where lambs of whitest fleece sport on the hills j 
 Where gold-specked fishes wanton in the streams ; 
 Where little birds, when snow-flakes dim the air, 
 Light on the floor, and peck the table-crumbs, 
 And with their singing cheer the winter day. 
 
 But what the loss of country to the woes 
 Of banishment and solitude combined ! 
 Oh ! my heart bleeds to think there now may live 
 One hapless man, the remnant of a wreck, 
 Cast on some desart island of that main 
 Immense, which stretches from the Cochin shore 
 To Acapulco. Motionless he sits, 
 As is the rock his seat, gazing whole days, 
 With wandering eye, o'er all the watery waste ; 
 Now striving to believe the albatross 
 A sail appearing on the horizon's verge ; 
 Now vowing ne'er to cherish other hope 
 Than hope of death. Thus pass his weary hours, 
 Till welcome evening warn him that 'tis time 
 Upon the shell-notched calendar to mark
 
 THE SABBATH. 27 
 
 Another day, another dreary day, 
 Changeless, for in these regions of the sun, 
 The wholesome law that dooms mankind to toil, 
 Bestowing grateful interchange of rest 
 And labour, is annulled ; for there the trees, 
 Adorned at once with bud, and flower, and fruit. 
 Drop, as the breezes blow, a shower of bread 
 And blossoms on the ground : But yet by him, 
 The Hermit of the Deep, not unobserved 
 The Sabbath passes Tis his great delight. 
 Each seventh eve he marks the farewell ray, 
 And loves, and sighs to think, that setting sun 
 Is now empurpling SCOTLAND'S mountain-tops, 
 Or, higher risen, slants athwart her vales, 
 Tinting with yellow light the quivering throat 
 Of day-spring lark, while woodland birds below 
 Chaunt iu the dewy shade. Thus, all night long 
 He watches, while the rising moon describes 
 The progress of the day in happier lands. 
 And now he almost fancies that he hears 
 The chiming from his native village church : 
 And now he sings, and fondly hopes the strain 
 May be the same, that sweet ascends at home 
 In congregation full, where, not without a tear, 
 They are remembered who in ships behold
 
 28 THE SABBATH. 
 
 The wonders of the deep : * he sees the hand, 
 
 The widowed hand, that veils the eye suffused; 
 
 He sees his orphan'd boy look up, and strive 
 
 The widowed heart to sooth. His spirit leans 
 
 On God. Nor does he leave his weekly vigil, 
 
 Though tempests ride o'er welkin-lashing waves 
 
 On winds of cloudless wing ; f though lightnings burst 
 
 So vivid, that the stars are hid and seen 
 
 In awful alternation : Calm he views 
 
 The far-exploding firmament, and dares 
 
 To hope one bolt in mercy is reserved 
 
 For his release ; and yet he is resigned 
 
 To live : because full well he is assured, 
 
 Thy hand does lead him, thy right hand upholds. 
 
 And thy right hand does lead him. Lo ! at last, 
 One sacred eve, he hears, faint from the deep, 
 Music remote, swelling at intervals, 
 
 * " They that go down to the sea in ships, that do business 
 in great waters ; these see the works of ihe Lord, and his won- 
 ders in the deep." PSAL. cvii. 
 
 t In the tropical regions, the sky during storms is often with- 
 out a cloud. 
 
 $ " If I take the wings of the morning, and dwell in the ut- 
 termost parts of the sea, even there shall thy hand lead me, 
 and thy right hand shall hold inc." PSAL, cxxxix.
 
 THE SABBATH, 29 
 
 As if the embodied spirit of sweet sounds 
 
 Came slowly floating on the shoreward wave : 
 
 The cadence well he knows, a hymn of old, 
 
 Where sweetly is rehearsed the lowly state 
 
 Of Jesus, when his birth was first announced, 
 
 In midnight music, by an angel choir, 
 
 ToBethlehem's shepherds,* as they watch'd their flocks. 
 
 Breathless, the man forlorn listens, and thinks 
 
 It is a dream. Fuller the voices swell. 
 
 He looks, and starts to see, moving along, 
 
 A fiery wave, } (so seems it) crescent formed, 
 
 * " And there were in the same country shepherds abiding 
 in the field, keeping watch over their flocks by night. And, 
 lo ! the angel of the Lord came upon them, and the glory of 
 the Lord shone round about them, and they were sore afraid. 
 And the angel said unto them, Fear not, for, behold ! I bring 
 you good tidings of great joy, which shall be to all people. 
 For unto you is born this day, in the city of David, a Saviour, 
 who is Christ the Lord. And this shall be a sign unto you, 
 Ye shall find the babe wrapped in swaddling clothes, lying in 
 a maneer. And suddenly there was with the angel a multi- 
 tude of the heavenly host, praising God, and saying, Glory to 
 God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will toward 
 men." LUKE, ii. 8. 14. 
 
 + " In some seas, as particularly about the coast of Mala- 
 bar, as a ship floats along, it seems during the night to be sur- 
 rounded with fire, and to leave a long tract of light behind if.
 
 SO THE SABBATH. 
 
 Approaching to the land ; straightway he sees 
 
 A towering whiteness; 'tis the heaven-filled sails 
 
 That waft the missioned men, who have renounced 
 
 Their homes, their country, nay, almost the world, 
 
 Bearing glad tidings to the farthest isles 
 
 Of ocean, that the dead shall rise again. 
 
 porward the gleam-girt castle coastwise glides. 
 
 It seems as it would pass away. To cry 
 
 The wretched man in vain attempts, in vain, 
 
 Powerless his voice as in a fearful dream : 
 
 Not so his hand ; he strikes the flint, a blaze 
 
 Mounts from the ready heap of withered leaves : 
 
 The music ceases ; accents harsh succeed, 
 
 Harsh, but most grateful : downward drop the sails ; 
 
 Ingulphed the anchor sinks ; the boat is launched ; 
 
 But cautious lies aloof till morning dawn : 
 
 O then the transport of the man, unused 
 
 To other human voice beside his own, 
 
 His native tongue to hear ! he breathes at home, 
 
 Though eartn's diameter is interposed. 
 
 Of perils of the sea he has no dread, 
 
 Full well assured the missioned bark is safe, 
 
 Whenever the sea is gently agitated, it seeras converted ints 
 little stars; every drop as it breaks emits light, like bodicv 
 electrified in the dark." DARWIN.
 
 THE SABBATH. SI 
 
 Held in the hollow of the 'Almighty's hand. 
 (And signal thy deliverances have been 
 Of these thy messengers of peace and joy.) 
 From storms that loudly threaten to unfix 
 Islands rock-rooted in the ocean's bed, 
 Thou dost deliver them, and from the calm, 
 More dreadful than the storm, when motionless 
 Upon the purple deep the vessel lies 
 For days, for nights, illumed by phosphor lamps; 
 When sea-birds seem in nests of flame to float ; 
 When backward starts the boldest mariner 
 To see, while o'er the side he leans, his face 
 
 As if deep- tinged with blood 
 
 Let worldly men 
 
 The cause and combatants contemptuous scorn, 
 And call fanatics them, who hazard health 
 And life, in testifying of the truth, 
 Who joy and glory in the cross of Christ ! 
 What were the Galilean fishermen 
 But messengers, commissioned to announce 
 The resurrection, and the life to come ! 
 They too, though clothed with power of mighty works 
 Miraculous, were oft received with scorn ; 
 Oft did their words fall powerless, though enforced 
 By deeds that marked Omnipotence their friend : 
 But, when their efforts failed, unweariedly
 
 32 THE SABBATH. 
 
 They onward went, rejoicing in their course. 
 Like heiianthus, * borne on downy wings 
 To distant realms, they frequent fell on soils 
 Barren and thankless ; yet oft-times they saw 
 Their labours crowned with fruit an hundred fold, 
 Saw the new converts testify their faith 
 By works of love, the slave set free, the sick 
 Attended, prisoners visited, the poor 
 Received as brothers at the rich man's board. 
 Alas! how different now the deeds of men 
 Nursed in the faith of Christ! the free made slaves ! 
 Stolen from their country, borne across the deep, 
 Enchained, endungeoned, forced by stripes to live, 
 Doomed to behold their wives, their little ones, 
 Tremble beneath the white man's fiend-like frown ! 
 Yet even to scenes like these, the SABBATH brings 
 Alleviation of the enormous woe : 
 The oft-reiterated stroke is still ; 
 The clotted scourge hangs hardening in the shrouds. 
 But see, the demon man, whose trade is blood, 
 With dauntless front, convene his ruffian crew, 
 To hear the sacred service read. Accursed, 
 
 * Sun flower. " The seeds of many plants of this kind are 
 famished with a plume, by which admirable mechanism they 
 are disseminated far from their parent stem." DARWIN.
 
 THE SABBATH. 
 
 The wretch's bile-tinged lips profane the word 
 Of God : Accursed, he ventures to pronounce 
 The decalogue, nor faulters at that law, 
 Wherein 'tis written, Thou shalt do no murder ; 
 Perhaps, while yet the words are on his lips, 
 He hears a dying mother's parting groan ; 
 He hears her orphan'd child, with lisping plaint, 
 Attempt to rouse her from the sleep of death. 
 
 O England ! England ! wash thy purpled hands 
 Of this foul sin, and never dip them more 
 In guilt so damnable ! then lift them up 
 In supplication to that God, whose name 
 Is Mercy; then thou may'st, without the risk 
 Of drawing vengeance from the surcharged clouds, 
 Implore protection to thy menaced shores; 
 Then, God will blast the tyrant's arm that grasps 
 The thunderbolt of ruin o'er thy head ; 
 Then, will he turn the wolvish race to prey 
 Upon each other ; then, will he arrest 
 The lava torrent, causing it regorge 
 Back to its source with fiery desolation. 
 
 Of all the murderous trades by mortals plied, 
 'Tis War alone that never violates 
 The hallowed day by simulate respect, 
 By hypocritic rest : No, no, the work proceeds.
 
 34 THE SABBATH. 
 
 From sacred pinnacles are hung the flags,* 
 That give the sign to slip the leash from slaughter. 
 The bells, whose knoll a holy calmness poured 
 Into the good man's breast, whose sound solaced 
 The sick, the poor, the old perversion dire 
 Pealing with sulphurous tongue, speak death-fraught 
 
 words : 
 
 From morn to eve Destruction revels frenzied, 
 Till at the hour when peaceful vesper-chimes 
 Were wont to sooth the ear, the trumpet sounds 
 Pursuit and flight altern ; and for the song 
 Of larks, descending to their grass-bowered homes, 
 The croak of flesh-gorged ravens, as they slake 
 Their thirst in hoof-prints filled with gore, disturbs 
 The stupor of the dying man : while Death 
 Triumphantly sails down the ensanguined stream, 
 On corses throned, and crowned with shivered bough?, 
 That erst hung imaged in the crystal tide, f 
 
 And what the harvest of these bloody fields < 
 A double weight of fetters to the slave, 
 And chains on arms that wielded Freedom's sword. 
 Spirit of TELL ! and art thou doomed to see 
 
 * Church steeples are frequently used as signal-posts. 
 
 t After a heavy cannonade, the shivered branches of trees, 
 and the corpses of the killed, are seen floating together down 
 the rivers.
 
 THE SABBATH. 35 
 
 Thy mountains, that confessed no other chains 
 Than what the wintry elements had forged, 
 Thy vales, where Freedom, and her stern compeer, 
 Proud virtuous Poverty, their noble state 
 Maintained, amid surrounding threats of wealth, 
 
 Of superstition, and tyrannic sway 
 
 Spirit of TELL ! and art thou doomed to see 
 That land subdued by Slavery's basest slaves; 
 By men, whose lips pronounce the sacred name 
 Of Liberty, then kiss the despot's foot ? 
 HELVETIA ! hadst thou to thyself been true, . 
 Thy dying sons had triumphed as they fell : 
 But 'twas a glorious effort, though in vain. 
 Aloft thy Genius, 'mid the sweeping clouds, 
 The flag of Freedom spread ; bright in the storm 
 The streaming meteor waved, and far it gleamed ; 
 But, ah ! 'twas transient as the Iris' arch, 
 Glanced from Leviathan's ascending shower, 
 When mid the mountain waves heaving his head. 
 Already had the friendly-seeming foe 
 Possessed the snow-piled ramparts of the land ; 
 Down like an avalanche they rolled, they crushed 
 The temple, palace, cottage, every work 
 Of art and nature, in one common ruin. 
 The dreadful crush is o'er, and peace ensues, 
 The peace of desolation, gloomy, still : 
 Each day is hushed as Sabbath j but, alas !
 
 36 THE SABBATH. 
 
 No Sabbath-service glads the seventh day ! 
 
 No more the happy villagers are seen, 
 
 Winding adown the rock-hewn paths, that wont 
 
 To lead their footsteps to the house of prayer; 
 
 But, far apart, assembled in the depth 
 
 Of solitudes, perhaps a little groupe 
 
 Of aged men, and orphan boys, and maids 
 
 Bereft, list to the breathings of the holy man, 
 
 Who spurns an oath of fealty to the power 
 
 Of rulers chosen by a tyrant's nod. 
 
 No more, as dies the rustling of the breeze, 
 
 Is heard the distant vesper-hymn ; no more 
 
 At gloamin hour, the plaintive strain, that links 
 
 His country to the SWITZER'S heart, delights 
 
 The loosening team; or if some shepherd boy 
 
 Attempt the strain, his voice soon faultering stops; 
 
 He feels his country now a foreign laud. 
 
 O, Scotland ! canst thou for a moment brook 
 The mere imagination, that a fate 
 Like this should e'er be thine ! that o'er those hills, 
 And dear-bought vales, whence WALLACE, DOUGLAS, 
 
 BRUCE, 
 
 Repelled proud EDWARD'S multitudinous hordes, 
 A Gallic foe, that abject race, should rule ! 
 No, no ! let never hostile standard touch 
 Thy shore : rush, rush into the dashing brine,
 
 THE SABBATH. 37 
 
 And crest each wave with steel ; and should the stamp 
 Of Slavery's footstep violate the strand, 
 Let not the tardy tide eftace the mark; 
 Sweet off' the stigma with a sea of blood ! 
 
 Thrice happy he who, far in Scottish glen 
 Retired (yet ready at his country's call,) 
 Has left the restless emmet-hill of man ! 
 He never longs to read the saddening tale 
 Of endless wars; and seldom does he hear 
 The tale of woe ; and ere it reaches him, 
 Rumour, so loud when new, has died away 
 Into a whisper, on the memory borne 
 Of casual traveller; As on the deep, 
 Far from the sight of land, when all around 
 Is waveless calm, the sudden tremulous swell, 
 That gently heaves the ship, tells, as it rolls, 
 Of earthquakes dread, and cities overthrown. 
 
 O Scotland ! much I love thy tranquil dales ; 
 But most on Sabbath eve, when low the sun 
 Slants through the upland copse, 'tis my delight, 
 Wandering, and stopping oft, to hear the song 
 Of kindred praise arise from humble roofs ; 
 Or, when the simple service ends, to hear 
 The lifted latch, and mark the grey-haired man, 
 The father and the priest, walk forth alone
 
 38 THE SABBATH. 
 
 Into his garden-plat, or little field, 
 To commune with his God in secret prayer, 
 To bless the Lord, that in his downward years 
 His children are about him : Sweet, meantime, 
 The thrush, that sings upon the aged thorn, 
 Brings to his view the days of youthful years, 
 When that same aged thorn was but a bush. 
 Nor is the contrast between youth and age 
 To him a painful thought ; he joys to think 
 His journey near a close, heaven is his home. 
 More happy far that man, though bowed down, 
 Though feeble be his gait, and dim his eye, 
 Than they, the favourites of youth and health, 
 Of riches, and of fame, who have renounced 
 The glorious promise of the life to come, 
 Clinging to death. 
 
 Or mark that female face, 
 The faded picture of its former self, 
 The garments coarse, but clean ; frequent at church 
 I've noted such a one, feeble and pale, 
 Yet standing, with a look of mild content, 
 Till beckoned by some kindly hand to sit. 
 She has seen better days ; there was a time, 
 Her hands could earn her bread, and freely give 
 To those who were in want ; but now ojd age, 
 And lingering disease, have made her helpless. 
 Yet is she happy, aye, and she is wise,
 
 THE SABBATH. 39 
 
 (Philosophers may sneer, and pedants frown,) 
 
 Although her Bible is her only book; 
 
 And she is rich, although her ,only wealth 
 
 Is recollection of a well spent life 
 
 Is expectation of the life to come. 
 
 Examine here, explore the narrow path 
 
 In which she walks ; look not for virtuous deeds 
 
 In history's arena, where the prize 
 
 Of fame, or power, prompts to heroic acts. 
 
 Peruse the lives themselves of men obscure : 
 
 There charity, that robs itself to give ; 
 
 There fortitude in sickness, nursed by want; 
 
 There courage, that expects no tongue to praise ; 
 
 There virtue lurks, like purest gold deep hid, 
 
 With no alloy of selfish motive mixed. 
 
 The poor man's boon, that stints him of his bread, 
 
 Is prized more highly in the sight of Him, 
 
 Who sees the heart, than golden gifts from hands 
 
 That scarce can know their countless treasures less : * 
 
 Yea, the deep sigh that heaves the poor man's breast 
 
 To see distress, and feel his willing arm 
 
 * " And Jesus sat over against the treasury, and beheld 
 how the people cast money into the treasury ; and many that 
 were rich cast in much. And there came a certain poor widow, 
 and she threw in two mites, which make a farthing. And he 
 called unto him his disciples, and saith unto them, Verily I 
 say unto you, that this poor widow hath cast more in, than all
 
 40 THE SABBATH. 
 
 Palsied by penury, ascends to heaven ; 
 While ponderous bequests of lands and goods 
 Ne'er rise above their earthly origin. 
 
 And should all bounty, that is clothed with power, 
 Be deemed unworthy ? Far be such a thought ! 
 Even when the rich bestow, there are sure tests 
 Of genuine charity : Yes, yes, let wealth 
 Give other alms than silver or than gold, 
 Time, trouble, toil, attendance, watchfulness, 
 Exposure to disease ; yes, let the rich 
 Be often seen beneath the sick man's roof; 
 Or cheering, with inquiries from the heart, 
 And hopes of health, the melancholy range 
 Of couches in the public wards of woe : 
 There let them often bless the sick man's bed, 
 With kind assurances that all is well 
 At home ; that plenty smiles upon the board, 
 The while the hand, that earned the frugal meal, 
 Can hardly raise itself in sign of thanks. 
 Above all duties, let the rich man search 
 Into the cause he knoweth not, nor spurn 
 The suppliant wretch as guilty of a crime. 
 
 they which have cast into the treasury : For all they did cast 
 in of their abundance, but she of her want did cast in all that 
 she had, even all her living." MARK, xii. 41. 44. 
 5
 
 THE SABBATH. 41 
 
 Ye blessed with uxalth ! (another name for power 
 Of doing good) O would ye but devote 
 A little portion of each seventh day, 
 To acts of justice to your fellow men ! 
 The house of mourning silently invites : 
 Shun not the crowded alley ; prompt descend 
 Into the half- sunk cell, darksome and damp ; 
 Nor seem impatient to begone : Inquire, 
 Console, instruct, encourage, sooth, assist; 
 Read, pray, and sing a new song to the Lord; 
 Make tears of joy down grief-worn furrows flow. 
 
 O Health ! thou sun of life, without whose beam 
 The fairest scenes of nature seem involved 
 In darkness, shine upon my dreary path 
 Once more ; or, with thy faintest dawn, give hope, 
 That I may yet enjoy thy vital ray ! 
 Though transient be the hope, 'twill be most sweet, 
 Like midnight music, stealing on the ear, 
 Then gliding past, and dying slow away. 
 Music ! thou soothing power, thy charm is proved 
 Most vividly when clouds o'ercastthe soul; 
 So light its loveliest effect displays 
 In lowering skies, when through the murky rack 
 A slanting sun-beam shoots, and instant limns 
 The etherial curve of seven harmonious dyes, 
 Eliciting a splendour from the gloom :
 
 42 THE SABBATH. 
 
 O Music ! still vouchsafe to tranquillize 
 
 This breast perturbed ; thy voice, though mournful, 
 
 soothes ; 
 
 And mournful ay are thy most beauteous lays, 
 Like fall of blossoms from the orchard boughs, 
 The autumn of the spring. Enchanting power ! 
 Who, by thy airy spell, canst whirl the mind 
 Far from the busy haunts of men to vales 
 Where TWEED or YARROW flows ; or, spurning time, 
 Recall red FLODDEN field; or suddenly 
 Transport, with altered strain, the deafened ear 
 Te LINDEN'S plain ! But what the pastoral lay, 
 The melting dirge, the battle's trumpet-peal, 
 Compared to notes with sacred numbers linked 
 In union, solemn, grand ! O then the spirit, 
 Upborne on pinions of celestial sound, 
 Soars to the throne of God, and ravished hears 
 Ten thousand times ten thousand voices rise 
 In halleluias, voices, that erewhile 
 Were feebly tuned perhaps to low-breathed hymns 
 Of solace in the chambers of the poor, 
 The Sabbath worship of the friendless sick. 
 
 Blest be the female votaries, whose days 
 No Sabbath of their pious labours prove, 
 Whose lives are consecrated to the toil 
 Of ministering around the uncurtained couch
 
 THE SABBATH. 43 
 
 Of pain and poverty ! Blest be the hands, 
 
 The lovely hands, (for beauty, youth, and grace, 
 
 Are oft concealed by Pity's closest veil,) 
 
 That mix the cup medicinal, that bind 
 
 The wounds, which ruthless warfare and diseast 
 
 Have to the loathsome lazar-house consigned. 
 
 Fierce Superstition of the mitred king! 
 Almost I could forget thy torch and stake, 
 When I this blessed sisterhood survey, 
 Compassion's priestesses, disciples true 
 Of Him, whose touch was health, whose single word 
 Electrified with life the palsied arm, 
 Of him, who said, Take up thy bed, and walk, 
 Of him, who cried to Lazarus, Come forth. 
 
 And he who cried to Lazarus, Come forth, 
 Will, when the Sabbath of the tomb is past, 
 Call forth the dead, and re-unite the dust 
 (Transformed and purified) to angel souls. 
 Extatic hope ! belief ! conviction firm ! 
 How grateful 'tis to recollect the time 
 When hope arose to faith ! Faintly, at first, 
 The heavenly voice is heard : Then, by degrees, 
 Its music sounds perpetual in the heart. 
 Thus he, who all the gloomy winter long 
 Has dwelt in city-crowds, wandering afield
 
 44 THE SABBATH. 
 
 Betimes on Sabbath morn, ere yet the spring 
 Unfold the daisy's bud, delighted hears 
 The first lark's note, faint yet, and short the song, 
 Checked by the chill ungenial northern breeze; 
 But, as the sun ascends, another springs, 
 And still another soars on loftier wing, 
 Till all o'erhead, the joyous choir, unseen, 
 Poised welkin high, harmonious fills the air, 
 As if it were a link 'tween earth and heaven.
 
 SABBATH WALKS.
 
 SPRING SABBATH WALK. 
 
 MOST earnest was his voice ! most mild his look, 
 As with raised hands he blessed his parting flock. 
 He is a faithful pastor of the poor; 
 He thinks not of himself; his Master's words, 
 Feed, feed my sheep, * are ever at his heart, 
 The cross of CHRIST is ay before his eyes. 
 O, how I love, with melted soul, to leave 
 The house of prayer, and wander in the fields 
 Alone ! What tho' the opening spring be qhill ! 
 
 * " So when he had dined, Jesus saith to Simon Peter, Si- 
 mon, son of Jonas, lovest thou me more than these ? He saith 
 unto him, Yea, Lord, thou knowest that I love thee. He saith 
 unto him, Feed ray lambs. He saith to him again the second 
 time, Simon, son of Jonas, lovest thou me ? He saith unto him, 
 Yea, Lord, thou knowest that I love thee. He saith unto him, 
 Feed my sheep. He saith unto him the third time, Simon, son 
 of Jonas, lovest thou me ? Peter was grieved, because he said 
 unto him the third time, Lovest thou me ? And he said unto 
 him, Lord, thou knowest all things, thou knowest that I love 
 thee. Jesus saith unto him, Feed my sheep." Jouw, xxi. 
 
 15 17. 
 
 .7
 
 48 A SPRING SABBATH WALK. 
 
 Altho' the lark, checked in his airy path, 
 Eke out his son;*, perched on the tallow clod, 
 That still o'ertops the blade ! Altho' no branch 
 Have spread its foliage, save the willow wand, 
 That dips its pale leaves in the swollen stream ! 
 What tho' the clouds oft lower ! Their threats but end 
 In sunny showers, that scarcely fill the folds 
 Of moss-couched violet, or interrupt 
 The merle's dulcet pipe, melodious bird ! 
 He, hid behind the milk-white sloe-thorn spray, 
 (Whose early flowers anticipate the leaf,) 
 Welcomes the time of buds, the infant year. 
 
 Sweet is the sunny nook, to which my steps 
 Have brought me, hardly conscious where I roamed, 
 Unheeding where, so lovely all around, 
 The works of GOD, arrayed in vernal smile ! 
 
 Oft at this season, musing, I prolong 
 My devious range, till, sunk from view, the sun 
 Emblaze, with upward-slanting ray, the breast, 
 And wing unquivering of the wheeling lark, 
 Descending, vocal, from her latest flight, 
 While, disregardful of yon lonely star, 
 The harbinger of chill night's glittering host, 
 Sweet Redbreast, SCOTIA'S Philomela, chaunts, 
 In desultory strains, his evening hymn.
 
 A 
 
 SUMMER SABBATH WALK. 
 
 .DELIGHTFUL is this loneliness; it calms 
 
 My heart : pleasant the cool beneath these elms, 
 
 That throw across the stream a moveless shade. 
 
 Here nature in her midnoon whisper speaks : 
 
 How peaceful every sound ! the ring-dove's plaint, 
 
 Moaned from the twilight centre of the grove, 
 
 While every other woodland lay is mute, 
 
 Save when the wren flits from her down-coved nest, 
 
 And from the root-sprigs trills her ditty clear, 
 
 The grashopper's oft-pausing chirp, the buzz, 
 
 Angrily shrill, of moss-entangled bee, 
 
 That, soon as loosed, booms with full twang away, 
 
 The sudden rushing of the minnow shoal, 
 
 Scared from the shallows by my passing tread. 
 
 Dimpling the water glides, with here and there 
 
 A glossy fly, skimming in circlets gay
 
 50 A SUMMER SABBATH WALK. 
 
 The treacherous surface, while the quick-eyed trout 
 
 Watches his time to spring; or, from above, 
 
 Some feathered dam, purveying 'mong the boughs, 
 
 Darts from her perch, and to her plumeless brood 
 
 Bears off the prize : Sad emblem of man's lot ! 
 
 He, giddy insect, from his native leaf, 
 
 (Where safe and happily he might have lurked) 
 
 Elate upon ambition's gaudy wings, 
 
 Forgetful of his origin, and, worse, 
 
 Unthinking of his end, tlies to the stream ; 
 
 And if from hostile vigilance he 'scape, 
 
 Buoyant he flutters but a little while, 
 
 Mistakes the inverted image of the sky 
 
 For heaven itself, and, sinking, meets his fate. 
 
 Now, let me trace the stream up to its source 
 Among the hills ; its runnel by degrees 
 Diminishing, the murmur turns a tinkle. 
 Closer and closer still the banks approach, 
 Tangled so thick with pleaching bramble-shoots, 
 With brier, and hazel branch, and hawthorn spray. 
 That, fain to quit the dingle, glad I mount 
 Into the open air : Grateful the breeze 
 That fans my throbbing temples ! smiles the plain 
 Spread wide below : how sweet the placid view ! 
 But, O ! more sweet the thought, heart-soothing thought, 
 That thousands, and ten thousands of the sons
 
 A SUMMER SABBATH WALK. 51 
 
 Of toil, partake this day the common joy 
 Of rest, of peace, of viewing hill and dale, 
 Of breathing in the silence of the woods, 
 And blessing Him, who gave the Sabbath day. 
 Yes, my heart flutters with a freer throb, 
 To think that now the townsman wanders forth 
 Among the fields and meadows, to enjoy 
 The coolness of the day's decline ; to see 
 His children sport around, and simply pull 
 The flower and weed promiscuous, as a boon, 
 Which proudly in his breast they smiling fix. 
 
 Again I turn me to the hill, and trace 
 The wizard stream, now scarce to be discerned ; 
 Woodless its banks, but green with ferny leaves, 
 And thinly strewed with heath-bells up and down. 
 
 Now, when the downward sun has left the glens, 
 Each mountain's rugged lineaments are traced 
 Upon the adverse slope, where stalks gigantic 
 The shepherd's shadow thrown athwart the chasm, 
 As on the topmost ridge he homeward hies. t 
 How deep the hush ! the torrent's channel, dry, 
 Presents a stony steep, the echo's haunt. 
 But hark, a plaintive sound floating along ! 
 Tis from yon heath-roofed shielin ; now it dies 
 Away, now rises full j it is the song
 
 52 A SUMMER SABBATH WALK. 
 
 Which He, who listens to the halleluiahs 
 Of choiring Seraphim delights to hear; 
 It is the music of the heart, the voice 
 Of venerable age, of guileless youth, 
 In kindly circle seated on the ground 
 Before their wicker door : Behold the man ! 
 The grandsire and the saint ; his silvery locks 
 Beam in the parting ray; before him lies, 
 Upon the smooth-cropt sward, the open book, 
 His comfort, stay, and ever new-delight ; 
 While, heedless, at a side, the lisping boy 
 Fondles the lamb that nightly shares his couch.
 
 AN 
 
 AUTUMN SABBATH WALK. 
 
 \V HEN homeward bands their several ways disperse^ 
 
 I love to linger in the narrow field 
 
 Of rest, to wander round from tomb to tomb, 
 
 And think of some who silent sleep below. 
 
 Sad sighs the wind, that from these ancient elms 
 
 Shakes showers of leaves upon the withered grass : 
 
 The sere and yellow wreaths, with eddying sweep, 
 
 Fill up the furrows 'tween the hillocked graves. 
 
 But list that moan ! 'tis the poor blind man's dog, 
 
 His guide for many a day, now come 'to mourn 
 
 The master and the friend conjunction rare ! 
 
 A man, indeed, he was of gentle soul, 
 
 Though bred to brave the deep : the lightning's flash 
 
 Had dimmed, not closed, his mild, but sightless eyes. 
 
 He was a welcome guest through all his range j 
 
 (It was not wide :) no dog would bay at him : 
 
 Children would run to meet him on his way,
 
 54 AN AUTUMN SABBATH WALK. 
 
 And lead him to a sunny seat, and climb 
 His knee, and wonder at his oft-told tales. 
 Then would he teach the elfins how to plait 
 The rushy cap and crown, or sedgy ship : 
 And I have seen him lay his tremulous hand 
 Upon their heads, while silent moved his lips. 
 Peace to thy spirit ! that now looks on me, 
 Perhaps with greater pity than I felt 
 To see thee wandering darkling on thy way. 
 
 But let me quit this melancholy spot, 
 And roam where nature gives a parting smile. 
 As yet the blue-bells linger on the sod 
 That copes the sheepfold ring ; and in the woods 
 A second blow of many flowers appears, 
 Flowers faintly tinged, and breathing no perfume. 
 But fruits, not blossoms, form the woodland wreath, 
 That circles Autumn's brow : The ruddy haws 
 Now clothe the half-leaved thorn ; the bramble bends 
 Beneath its jetty load ; the hazel hangs 
 With auburn bunches, dipping in the stream 
 That sweeps along, and threatens to o'erflow 
 The leaf-strewn banks . Oft, statue-like, I gaze, 
 In vacancy of thought, upon that stream, 
 And chace, with dreaming eye, the eddying foam, 
 Or rowan's clustered branch, or harvest sheaf, 
 Borne rapidly adown the dizzying flood.
 
 A 
 
 WINTER SABBATH WALK. 
 
 How dazzling white the snowy scene ! deep, deep 
 The stillness of the winter Sabbath day, 
 Not even a foot-fall heard. Smooth are the fields, 
 Each hollow pathway level with the plain : 
 Hid are the bushes, save that here and there 
 Are seen the topmost shoots of brier or broom. 
 High-ridged, the whirled drift has almost reached 
 The powdered key-stone of the church-yard porch. 
 Mute hangs the hooded-bell ; the tombs lie buried ; 
 No step approaches to the house of prayer. 
 
 The flickering fall is o'er : the clouds disperse, 
 And shew the sun, hung o'er the welkin's verge, 
 Shooting a bright but ineffectual beam 
 On all the sparkling waste. Now is the time 
 To visit nature in her grand attire;
 
 56 A WINTER SABBATH WALK. 
 
 Though perilous the mountainous ascent. 
 A noble recompense the danger brings. 
 How beautiful the plain stretched far below ! 
 Unvaried though it be, save by yon stream 
 With azure windings, or the leafless wood. 
 But what the beauty of the plain, compared 
 To that sublimity which reigns enthroned. 
 Holding joint rule with solitude divine, 
 Among yon rocky fells, that bid defiance 
 To steps the most adventurously bold ! 
 There silence dwells profound ; or if the cry 
 Of high-poised eagle break at times the hush, 
 The mantled echoes no response return. 
 
 But let me now explore the deep sunk dell. 
 No foot-print, save the covey's or the flock's, 
 Is seen along the rill, where marshy springs 
 Still rear the grassy blade of vivid green. 
 Beware, ye shepherds, of these treacherous haunts, 
 Nor linger there too long : the wintry day 
 Soon closes ; and full oft a heavier fall, 
 Heaped by the blast, fills up the sheltered glen, 
 While, gurgling deep below, the buried rill 
 Mines for itself a snow-coved way. O, then, 
 Your helpless charge drive from the tempting spot, 
 And keep them on the bleak hill's stormy side, 
 Where night winds sweep the gathering drift away:
 
 A WINTER SABBATH WALK. 5? 
 
 So the great Shepherd leads the heavenly flock 
 From faithless pleasures, full into the storms 
 Of life, where long they bear the bitter blast, 
 Until at length the vernal sun looks forth, 
 Bedimmed with showers : Then to the pastures greea 
 He brings them, where the quiet waters glide, 
 The streams of life, the Siloah of the soul.
 
 BIBLICAL PICTURES.
 
 THE 
 
 FIRST SABBATH. 
 
 Six days the heavenly host, in circle vast, 
 Like that untouching cincture which enzones 
 The globe of Saturn, compassed wide this orb, 
 And with the forming mass floated along, 
 In rapid course, through yet untravelled space, 
 Beholding God's stupendous power, a world 
 Bursting from Chaos at the omnific will, 
 And perfect ere the sixth day's evening star 
 On Paradise arose. Blessed that eve ! 
 The Sabbath's harbinger, when, all complete, 
 In freshest beauty from Jehovah's hand. 
 Creation bloomed; when Eden's twilight face 
 Smiled like a sleeping babe : The voice divine 
 A holy calm breathed o'er the goodly work: 
 Mildly the sun, upon the loftiest trees, 
 Shed mellowly a sloping beam. Peace reigned,
 
 62 THE FIRST SABBATH. 
 
 And love, and gratitude : The human pair 
 
 Their orisons poured forth : love, concord, reigned : 
 
 The falcon, perched upon the blooming bough 
 
 With Philomela, listened to her lay; 
 
 Among the antlered herd the tiger couched, 
 
 Harmless; the lion's mane no terror spread 
 
 Among the careless ruminating flock. 
 
 Silence was o'er the deep ; the noiseless surge, 
 
 The last subsiding wave, of that dread tumult 
 
 Which raged, when Ocean, at the mute command, 
 
 Rushed furiously into his new-cleft bed, 
 
 Was gently rippling on the pebbled shore ; 
 
 While, on the swell, the sea-bird, with her head 
 
 Wing-veiled, slept tranquilly. The host of heaven, 
 
 Entranced in new delight, speechless adored ; 
 
 Nor stopped their fleet career, nor changed their form 
 
 Encircular, till on that hemisphere, 
 
 In which the blissful garden sweet exhaled 
 
 Its incense, odorous clouds, the Sabbath dawn 
 
 Arose; then wide the flying circle oped, 
 
 And soared, in semblance of a mighty rainbow : 
 
 Silent ascend the choirs of Seraphim; 
 
 No harp resounds, mute is each voice ; the burst 
 
 Of joy, and praise, reluctant they repress, 
 
 For love and concord all things so attuned 
 
 To harmony, that Earth must have received 
 
 The grand vibration, and to the centre shook :
 
 THE FIRST SABBATH. OVj 
 
 But soon as to the starry altitudes 
 They reached, then what a storm of sound, tremendous, 
 Swelled through the realms of space ! The morning stars 
 Together sang, and all the sons of God 
 Shouted for joy ! Loud was the peal ; so loud, 
 As would have quite o'erwhelmed the human sense; 
 But to the Earth it came a gentle strain, 
 Like softest fall breathed from ^Eolian lute, 
 When 'mid the chords the evening gale expires. 
 Day of the Lord ! creation's hallowed close ! 
 Day of the Lord ! (prophetical they sang) 
 Benignant mitigation of that doom, ^ *. 
 Which must, ere long, consign the fallen race, 
 Dwellers in yonder star, to toil and woe !
 
 THE 
 
 FINDING OF MOSES. 
 
 SLOW glides the Nile : amid the margin flags, 
 Closed in a bulrush ark, the babe is left, 
 Left by a mother's hand. His sister waits 
 Far off; and pale, 'tween hope and fear, beholds 
 The royal maid, surrounded by her train, 
 Approach the river bank : approach the spot 
 Where sleeps the innocent : She sees them stoop 
 With meeting plumes ; the rushy lid is oped, 
 And wakes the infant, smiling in his tears, 
 As when along a little mountain lake, 
 The summer south-wind breathes with gentle sigh, 
 And parts the reeds, unveiling, as they bend, 
 A water-lily floating on the wave.
 
 JACOB AND PHARAOH. 
 
 XHARAOH, upon a gorgeous throne of state 
 
 Was seated ; while around him,stood submiss 
 
 His servants, watchful of his lofty looks. 
 
 The Patriarch enters, leaning on the arm 
 
 Of Benjamin. Unmoved by all the glare 
 
 Of royalty, he scarcely throws a glance 
 
 Upon the pageant show; for from his youth 
 
 A shepherd's life he led, and viewed each night 
 
 The starry host ; and still where'er he went 
 
 He felt himself in presence of the Lord. 
 
 His eye is bent on Joseph, him pursues. 
 
 Sudden the king descends ; and, bending, kneels 
 
 Before the aged man, and supplicates 
 
 A blessing from his lips : the aged man 
 
 Lays on the ground his staff, and, stretching forth 
 
 His tremulous hand o'er Pharaoh's uncrowned head, 
 
 Prays that the Lord would bless him and his land,
 
 66 
 
 JEPHTHA'S VOW. 
 
 FROM conquest JEPHTHA came, with faultering step, 
 And troubled eye : His home appears in view; 
 He trembles at the sight. Sad he forebodes, 
 His vow will meet a victim in his child : 
 For well he knows, that, from her earliest years, 
 She still was first to meet his homeward steps : 
 Well he remembers, how, with tottering gait, 
 She ran, and clasped his knees, and lisped, and looked 
 Her joy ; and how, when garlanding with flowers 
 His helm, fearful, her infant hand would shrink 
 Back from the lion couched beneath the crest. 
 What sound is that, which, from the palm-tree grove, 
 Floats now with choral swell, now fainter falls 
 Upon the ear ? It is, it is the song 
 He loved to hear, -a song of thanks and praise, 
 Sung by the patriarch for his ransomed son.
 
 JEPHTHA'S vow. 67 
 
 Hope from the omen springs : O, blessed hope ! 
 It may not be her voice ! Fain would he think 
 'Twas not his daughter's voice, that still approached, 
 Bleut with the timbrel's note. Forth from the grove 
 She foremost glides of all the minstrel band : 
 Moveless he stands; then grasps his hilt, still red 
 With hostile gore, but, shuddering, quits the hold; 
 And clasps, in agony, his hands, and cries, 
 "Alas, my daughter! thou hast brought me low." 
 The timbrel at her rooted feet resounds.
 
 SAUL AND DAVID. 
 
 DEEP was the furrow in the royal brow, 
 
 When DAVID'S hand, lightly as vernal gales 
 
 Rippling the brook of Kedron, skimmed the lyre : 
 
 He sung of JACOB'S youngest born, the child 
 
 Of his old age, sold to the Ishmaelite; 
 
 His exaltation to the second power 
 
 In PHARAOH'S realm; his brethren thither sent; 
 
 Suppliant they stood before his face, well known, 
 
 Unknowing, till JOSEPH fell upon the neck 
 
 Of BENJAMIN, his mother's son, and wept. 
 
 Unconsciously the warlike shepherd paused ; 
 
 But when he saw, down the yet-quivering string, 
 
 The tear-drop trembling glide, abashed, he checked, 
 
 Indignant at himself, the bursting flood, 
 
 And, with a sweep impetuous, struck the chords : 
 
 From side to side his hands transversely glance,
 
 SAUL AND DAVID. 
 
 Like lightning thwart a stormy sea; his voice 
 Arises 'mid the clang, and straightway calms 
 The harmonious tempest, to a solemn swell 
 Majestical, triumphant; for he sings 
 Of Arad's mighty host by Israel's arm 
 Subdued ; of Israel through the desart led, 
 He sings ; of him who was their leader, called, 
 By God himself, from keeping JETHRO'S flock, 
 To be a ruler o'er the chosen race. 
 Kindles the eye of SAUL; his arm is poised; 
 Harmless the javelin quivers in the wall.
 
 70 
 
 ELIJAH FED BY RAVENS. 
 
 SORE was the famine throughout all the bounds 
 Of Israel, when ELIJAH, by command 
 Of GOD, journeyed to Cherith's failing brook. 
 No rain-drops fall, no dew-fraught cloud, at morn, 
 Or closing eve, creeps slowly up the vale j 
 The withering herbage dies ; among the pal ms, 
 The shrivelled leaves send to the summer gale 
 An Autumn rustle ; no sweet songster's lay 
 Is warbled from the branches ; scarce is heard 
 The rill's faint brawl. The prophet looks around, 
 And trusts in GOD, and lays his silvered head 
 Upon the flowerless bank ; serene he sleeps, 
 Nor wakes till dawning : Then, with hands enclasped, 
 And heavenward face, and eyelids closed, he prays 
 To Him who manna on the desart showered, 
 To Him who from the rock made fountains gush :
 
 ELIJAH FED BY RAVENS. 71 
 
 Entranced the man of God remains; till roused 
 By sound of wheeling wings, with grateful heart, 
 He sees the ravens fearless by his side 
 Alight, and leave the heaven-provided food.
 
 THE 
 
 BIRTH OF JESUS ANNOUNCED. 
 
 DEEP was the midnight silence in the fields 
 
 Of Bethlehem ; hushed the folds ; save that, at times 
 
 Was heard the lamb's faint bleat: the shepherds, 
 
 stretched 
 
 On the green sward, surveyed the starry vault : 
 The heavens declare the glory of the Lord, 
 The firmament shews forth thy handy ivork; 
 Thus they, their hearts attuned to the Most High; 
 When, suddenly, a splendid cloud appeared, 
 As if a portion of the milky way 
 Descended slowly in a spiral course. 
 Near, and more near it draws; then, hovering, floats, 
 High as the soar of eagle, shedding bright, 
 Upon the folded flocks, a heavenly radiance, 
 From whence was uttered loud, yet sweet, a voice,
 
 THE BIRTH OF JESUS. 75 
 
 Fear not, I bring good tidings of great joy ; 
 
 For unto you is born this day a Saviour! 
 
 And this shall be a sign to you, the babe, 
 
 Laid loiuly in a manger, ye shall find. 
 
 The angel spake ; when, lo ! upon the cloud, 
 
 A multitude of Seraphim, enthroned, 
 
 Sang praises, saying, Glory to the Lord 
 
 On high ; on earth be peace, good will to men. 
 
 With sweet response harmoniously they choired, 
 
 And while, with heavenly harmony, the song 
 
 Arose to God, more bright the buoyant throne 
 
 Illumed the land : The prowling lion stops, 
 
 Awe-struck, with mane upreared, and flattened head ; 
 
 And, without turning, backward on his steps 
 
 Recoils, aghast, into the desart gloom. 
 
 A trembling joy the astonished shepherds prove, 
 
 As heavenward re-ascends the vocal blaze 
 
 Triumphantly; while, by degrees, the strain 
 
 Dies on the ear, that self-deluded listens, 
 
 As if a sound so sweet could never die.
 
 74 
 
 BEHOLD 
 JtfY MOTHER AND MY BRETHREN. 
 
 Who is my mother, or my brethren ? 
 He spake, and looked on them \vho sat around, 
 With a meek smile, of pity blent with love, 
 More melting than e'er gleamed from human face, 
 As when a sun-beam, through a summer shower, 
 Shines mildly on a little hill-side flock ; 
 And with that look of love, he said, Behold 
 My mother, and my brethren : for I say. 
 That whosoe'er shall do the will of God, 
 He is my brother, sister, mother, all.
 
 BARTIMEUS 
 RESTORED TO SIGHT. 
 
 BLIND, poor, and helpless, BARTIMEUS sate, 
 
 Listening the foot of the wayfaring man, 
 
 Still hoping that the next, and still the next, 
 
 Would put an alms into his trembling hand. 
 
 He thinks he hears the coming breeze faint rustle 
 
 Among the sycamores ; it is the tread 
 
 Of thousand steps ; it is the hum of tongues 
 
 Innumerable : But when the sightless man 
 
 Heard that the Nazarene was passing by, 
 
 He cried, and said, " JESUS, thou son of David, 
 
 Have mercy upon me !" and, when rebuked, 
 
 He cried the more, " Have mercy upon me." 
 
 Thy faith hath made thee whole; so JESUS spake, 
 
 And straight the blind BEHELD THE FACE OF GOD.
 
 LITTLE CHILDREN 
 BROUGHT TO JESUS. 
 
 Suffer that little children come to me, 
 
 Forbid them not. Emboldened by his words, 
 
 The mothers onward press ; but, finding vain 
 
 The attempt to reach the Lord, they trust their babes 
 
 To strangers' hands: The innocents, alarmed 
 
 Amid the throng of faces all unknown, 
 
 Shrink, trembling, till their wandering eyes discern 
 
 The countenance of JESCS, beaming love 
 
 And pity ; eager then they stretch their arms, 
 
 And, cowring, lay their heads upon his breast.
 
 77 
 
 JESUS 
 
 CALMS THE TEMPEST. 
 
 J. HE roaring tumult of the billowed sea 
 Awakes him not : high on the crested surge, 
 Now heaved, his locks flow streaming in the blast; 
 And, now descending, 'tween the sheltering waves, 
 The falling tresses veil the face divine : 
 Meek though that veil a momentary gleam, 
 Benignant, shines ; he dreams that he beholds 
 The opening eyes, that long hopeless had rolled 
 In darkness, look around bedimmed with tears 
 Of joy; but, suddenly, the voice of fear 
 Dispelled the happy vision : Awful he rose, 
 Rebuked the wind, and said unto the sea, 
 Peace, be thou still! and straight there was a calm. 
 With terror-mingled gladness in their looks, 
 The mariners exclaim, What man is this, 
 That even the wind and sea obey his voice!
 
 78 
 
 JESUS WALKS ON THE SEA, 
 
 CALMS THE STORM. 
 
 -LouD blew the storm of night ; the thwarting surge 
 Dashed, boiling on the labouring bark : Dismay, 
 From face to face reflected, spread around : 
 When, lo ! upon a towering wave is seen 
 The semblance of a foamy wreath, upright, 
 Move onward to the ship : The helmsman starts, 
 And quits his hold; the voyagers, appalled, 
 Shrink from the fancied Spirit of the Flood : 
 But when the voice of JESUS, with the storm 
 Soft mingled, It is I, be not afraid, 
 Fear fled, and joy lightened from eye to eye. 
 Up he ascends, and, from the rolling side, 
 Surveys the tumult of the sea and sky
 
 JESUS WALKS ON THE SEA. 79 
 
 With transient look severe : The tempest, awed, 
 Sinks to a sudden calm; the clouds disperse; 
 The moon-beam trembles on the face divine, 
 Reflected mildly in the unruffled deep.
 
 80 
 
 THE DUMB CURED. 
 
 His eyes uplifted, and his hands close clasped, 
 The dumb man, with a supplicating look, 
 Turned, as the Lord passed by : JESUS beheld, 
 And on him bent a pitying look, and spake : 
 His moving lips are by the suppliant seen, 
 And the last accents of the healing sentence 
 Ring in that ear which never heard before. 
 Prostrate the man restored falls to the earth, 
 And uses first the gift, the gift sublime, 
 Of speech, in giving thanks to him, whose voice 
 Was never uttered but in doing good.
 
 81 
 
 ^ 
 
 THE 
 
 DEATH OF JESUS. 
 
 'Tis finished : he spake the words, and bowed 
 His head, and died. Beholding him far off, 
 They, who had ministered unto him, hope, 
 'Tis his last agony : The Temple's vail 
 Is rent ; revealing the most holy place, 
 Wherein the cherubims their wings extend, 
 O'ershadowing the mercy-seat of God. 
 Appalled, the leaning soldier feels the spear 
 Shake in his grasp ; the planted standard falls 
 Upon the heaving ground : The sun is dimmed, 
 And darkness shrouds the body of the Lord.
 
 82 
 
 THE 
 
 RESURRECTION. 
 
 JL HE setting orb of night her level ray 
 Shed o'er the land, and, on the dewy sward, 
 The lengthened shadows of the triple cross 
 Were laid far stretched, when in the east arose, 
 Last of the stars, day's harbinger : No sound 
 Was heard, save of the watching soldier's foot : 
 Within the rock-barred sepulchre, the gloom 
 Of deepest midnight brooded o'er the dead, 
 The holy one ; but, lo ! a radiance faint 
 Began to dawn around his sacred brow : 
 The linen vesture seemed a snowy weath, 
 Drifted by storms into a mountain cave : 
 Bright, and more bright, the circling halo beamed 
 Upon that face, clothed in a smile benign, 
 Though yet exanimate. Nor long the reign 
 Of death ; the eyes, that wept for human griefs,
 
 THE RESURRECTION. 83 
 
 Unclose, and look around with conscious joy : 
 Yes; with returning life, the first emotion 
 That glowed in JESUS' breast of love, was joy 
 At man's redemption, now complete ; at death 
 Disarmed; the grave transformed into the couch 
 Of faith ; the resurrection and the life. 
 Majestical he rose; trembled the earth; 
 The ponderous gate of stone was rolled away; 
 The keepers fell ; the angel, awe-struck, shrunk 
 Into invisibility, while forth 
 The Saviour of the World walked, and stood 
 Before the sepulchre, and viewed the clouds 
 Empurpled glorious by the rising sun.
 
 84 
 
 JESUS 
 APPEARS TO THE DISCIPLES. 
 
 THE evening of that day, which saw the Lord 
 
 Rise from the chambers of the dead, was come. 
 
 His faithful followers, assembled, sang 
 
 A hymn, low-breathed ; a hymn of sorrow, blent 
 
 With hope; when, in the midst, sudden he stood. 
 
 The awe-struck circle backward shrink; he looks 
 
 Around with a benignant smile of love, 
 
 And says, Peace be unto you: faith and joy 
 
 Spread o'er each face, amazed : as when the moon,. 
 
 Pavilioned in dark clouds, mildly comes forth, 
 
 Silvering a circlet in the fleecy rack.
 
 85 
 
 PAUL ACCUSED 
 
 BEFORE THE 
 
 TRIBUNAL OF THE AREOPAGUS. 
 
 LISTEN, that voice ! upon the hill of Mars, 
 Rolling in bolder thunders, than e'er pealed 
 From lips that shook the Macedonian throne; 
 Behold his dauntless outstretched arm, his face 
 Illumed of heaven : he knoweth not the fear 
 Of man, of principalities, of powers. 
 The Stoic's moveless frown ; the vacant stare 
 Of Epicurus' herd ; the scowl and gnash malign 
 Of Superstition, stopping both her ears ; 
 The Areopagite tribunal dread, 
 From whence the doom of SOCRATES was uttered ;- 
 This hostile throng dismays him not ; he seems,
 
 86 PAUL ACCUSED. 
 
 As if no worldly object could inspire 
 A terror in his soul ; as if the vision, 
 \Vhic h, when he journeyed to Damascus, shone 
 From heaven, still swam before his eyes, 
 Out-dazzling all things earthly ; as if the voice, 
 That spake from out the effulgence, ever rang 
 Within his ear, inspiring- him with words, 
 Burning, majestic, lofty, as his theme, 
 The resurrection, and the life to come.
 
 PAUL ACCUSED 
 
 BEFORE THE 
 
 ROMAN GOVERNOR OF JUDEA. 
 
 THE Judge ascended to the judgment-seat. 
 Amid a gleam of spears the Apostle stood. 
 Dauntless, he forward came ; and looked around, 
 And raised his voice, at first, in accents low, 
 Yet clear ; a whisper spread among the throng : 
 So when the thunder mutters, still the breeze 
 Is heard, at times, to sigh ; but when the peal, 
 Tremendous, louder rolls, a silence dead 
 Succeeds each pause, moveless the aspen leaf. 
 Thus fixed, and motionless, the listening band 
 Of soldiers forward leaned, as from the man, 
 Inspired of God, truth's awful thunders rolled. 
 No more he feels, upon his high raised arm,
 
 88 PAUL ACCUSED. 
 
 The ponderous chain, than doe* the playful child 
 
 The bracelet, formed of many a flowery link. 
 
 Heedless of self, forgetful that his life 
 
 Is now to be defended by his words, 
 
 He only thinks of doin good to them 
 
 Who seek his life; and, -while he reasons high 
 
 Of justice, temperance, and the life to come, 
 
 The Judge shrinks trembling at the prisoner's voice.
 
 THE 
 
 RURAL CALENDAR.
 
 JANUARY. 
 
 LONG ere the snow-veiled dawn, the bird of mom 
 His wings quick claps, and sounds his cheering call : 
 The cottage hinds the glimmering lantern trim, 
 And to the barn wade, sinking, in the drift; 
 The alternate flails bounce from the loosened sheaf. 
 Pleasant these sounds ! they sleep to slumber change ; 
 Pleasant to him, whom no laborious task 
 Whispers, arise! whom neither love of gain, 
 Nor love of power, nor hopes, nor fears, disturb. 
 
 Late daylight comes at last, and the strained eye 
 Shrinks from the dazzling brightness of the scene, 
 One wide expanse of whiteness uniform. 
 As yet no wandering footstep has defaced 
 The spotless plain, save where some wounded hare,
 
 92 JANUARY. 
 
 Wrenched from the springe, has left a blood-stained 
 
 track. 
 
 How smooth are all the fields ! sunk every fence ; 
 The furrow, here and there, heaped to a ridge, 
 O'er which the sidelong plough-shaft scarcely peers. 
 
 Cold blows the north-wind o'er the dreary waste. 
 O ye that shiver by your blazing fires, 
 Think of the inmates of yon hut, half sunk 
 Beneath the drift : from it no smoke ascends; 
 The broken straw-filled pane excludes the i.ght, 
 But ill excludes the blast : The redbreast there 
 For shelter seeks, but short, ah ! very short 
 His stay ; no crumbs, strewn careless on the floor, 
 Attract his wistful glance; to warmer roofs 
 He flies; a welcome, soon a fearless guest, 
 He cheers the winter day with summer songs. 
 
 Short is the reign of day, tedious the night. 
 The city's distant lights arrest my view, 
 And magic fancy whirls me to the scene. 
 There vice and folly run their giddy rounds ; 
 There eager crowds are hurrying to the sight 
 Of feigned distress, yet have not time to hear 
 The shivering orphan's prayer. The flaring lamp* 
 Of gilded chariots, like the meteor eyes 
 Of mighty giants, famed in legends old,
 
 JANUARY. 93 
 
 Illume the snowy street; the silent wheels 
 On heedless passenger steal unperceived, 
 Bearing the splendid fair to flutter round 
 Amid the flowery labyrinths of the dance. 
 But, hark ! the merry catch : good social souls 
 Sing on, and drown dull care in bumpers deep ; 
 The bell, snow-muffled, warns not of the hour ; 
 For scarce the sentenced felon's watchful ear 
 Can catch the softened knell, by which he sums 
 The hours he has to live. Poor hopeless wretch ! 
 His thoughts are horror, and his dreams despair; 
 And ever as he, on his strawy couch, 
 Turns heavily, his chains and fetters, grating, 
 Awake the inmates of some neighbouring cell, 
 Who bless their lot, that debt is all their crime.
 
 94 
 
 FEBRUARY. 
 
 THE treacherous fowler, in the drifted wreath, 
 The snare conceals, and strews the husky lure, 
 Tempting the famished fowls of heaven to light: 
 They light ; the captive strives in vain to fly, 
 Scattering around, with fluttering wing, the snow. 
 Amid the untrod snows, oft let me roam 
 Far up the lonely glen, and mark its change ; 
 The frozen rill's hoarse murmur scarce is heard ; 
 The rocky cleft, the fairy bourne smoothed up, 
 Repeat no more my solitary voice. 
 
 Now to the icy plain the city swarms. 
 In giddy circles, whirling variously, 
 The skater fleetly thrids the mazy throng, 
 While smaller wights the sliding pastime ply. 
 Unhappy he, of poverty the child !
 
 FEBRUARY. 95 
 
 Who, barefoot, standing, eyes his merry mates, 
 And, shivering, weeps, n&t for the biting cold, 
 But that he cannot join their slippery sport. 
 
 Trust not incautiously the smooth expanse ; 
 For oft a treacherous thaw, ere yet perceived, 
 Saps by degrees the solid-seeming mass : 
 At last the long piled mountain snows dissolve, 
 Bursting the roaring river's brittle bonds; 
 The shattered fragments down the cataract shoot, 
 And, sinking in the boiling deep below, 
 At distance re-appear, then sweep along, 
 Marking their height upon the half-sunk trees. 
 
 No more the ploughman hurls the sounding quoit; 
 The loosened glebe demands the rusted share, 
 And slow the toiling team plods o'er the field. 
 But oft, ere half the winding task be done, 
 Returning frost again usurps the year, 
 Fixing the ploughshare in the unfinished fur; 
 And still, at times, the flaky shower descends, 
 Whitening the plain, save where the wheaten blade 
 Peering, uplifts its green and hardy head, 
 As if just springing from a soil of snow. 
 
 While yet the night is long, and drear, and chill, 
 Soon as the slanting sun has sunk from view,
 
 96 FEBRUARY. 
 
 The sounding anvil cheerily invites 
 The weary hind to leave his twinkling fire, 
 And bask himself before the furnace glare ; 
 Where, blest with unbought mirth, the rustic ring, 
 Their faces tinted by the yellow blaze, 
 Beguile the hours, nor envy rooms of state.
 
 97 
 
 MARCH. 
 
 THE ravaged fields, waste, colourless, and bleak, 
 Retreating Winter leaves, with angry frown, 
 And lingering on the distant snow-streaked hills, 
 Displays the motley remnants of his reign. 
 
 With shouldered spade, the labourer to the field 
 Hies, joyful that the softened glebe gives leave 
 To toil ; no more his children cry for bread, 
 Or, shivering, crowd around the scanty fire ; 
 No more he's doomed, reluctant, to receive 
 The pittance, which the rich man proudly gives, 
 Who, when he gives, thinks heaven itself obliged. 
 Vain man ! think not there's merit in the boon, 
 If, quitting not one comfort, not one joy, 
 The sparkling wine still circles round thy board,
 
 98 MARCH. 
 
 Thy hearth still blazes, and the sounding strings, 
 Blent with the voice symphonious, charm thine ear. 
 
 The redbreast now, at morn, resumes his .song, 
 And larks, high soaring, wing their spiral flight, 
 While the light-hearted ploughboy singing, blythe, 
 The broom, the bonny broom of Covdenknous, 
 Fills with delight the wandering townsman's ear ; 
 May be, though carolled rude in artless guise, 
 Sad Flodden field, of Scotia's lays most sweet, 
 Most mournful, dims, with starting tear, his eye. 
 Nor silent are the upland leas; cheerily 
 The partridge now her tuneless call repeats, 
 Or, bursting unexpected from the brake, 
 Startles the milkmaid singing o'er the ridge. 
 Nor silent are the chilly leafless woods ; 
 The thrush's note is heard amid the grove, 
 Soon as the primrose, from the withered leaves 
 Smiling, looks out : Rash floweret ! oft betrayed, 
 By summer-seeming days, to venture forth 
 Thy tender form, the killing northern blast, 
 Will wrap thee lifeless in a, hoar-frost shroud.
 
 APRIL. 
 
 DESCEND, sweet April, from yon watery bow, 
 And, liberal, strew the ground with budding flowers, 
 With leafless crocus, leaf-veiled violet, 
 Auricula, with powdered cup, primrose 
 That loves to lurk below the hawthorn shade. 
 At thy approach health re-illumes the eye : 
 Even pale Consumption, from thy balmy breath, 
 Inhales delusive hope ; and, dreaming still 
 Of length of days, basks in some sunny plat, 
 And decks her half-foreboding breast with flowers, 
 With flowers, which else would have survived the hand 
 By which they're pulled. But they will bloom again : 
 The daisy, spreading on the greensward grave, 
 Fades, dies, and seems to perish, yet revives. 
 Shall man for ever sleep ? Cruel the tongue,
 
 100 APRIL. 
 
 That, with sophistic art, snatches from pain, 
 
 Disease, and grief, and want, that antidote, 
 
 Which makes the wretched smile, the hopeless hope. 
 
 Light now the western gale sweeps o'er the plain ; 
 Gently it waves the rivulet's cascade; 
 Gently it parts the lock on beauty's brow, 
 And lifts the tresses from the snowy neck, 
 And bends the flowers, and makes the lily stoop, 
 As if to kiss its image in the wave ; 
 Or curls, with softest breath, the glassy pool, 
 Aiding the treachery of the mimic fly ; 
 While, warily, behind the half-leaved bush, 
 The angler screened, with keenest eye intent, 
 Awaits the sudden rising of the trout : 
 Down dips the feathery lure ; the quivering rod 
 Bends low; in vain the cheated captive strives 
 To break the yielding line ; exhausted soon, 
 Ashore he's drawn, and, on the mossy bank 
 Weltering, he dyes the primrose with his blood.
 
 101 
 
 M A Y. 
 
 ON blythe May morning, when the lark's first note 
 Ascends, on viewless wing, veiled in the mist, 
 The village maids then hie them to the woods, 
 To kiss the fresh dew from the daisy's brim ; 
 Wandering in misty glades they lose their way, 
 And, ere aware, meet in their lovers' arms, 
 Like joining dew-drops on the blushing rose. 
 
 -Sweet month ! thy locks with bursting buds be- 
 decked, 
 
 With opening hyacinths, and hawthorn blooms, 
 Fair still thou art, though showers bedim thine eye ; 
 The cloud soon quits thy brow, and, mild, the sun 
 Looks out with watery beam, looks out, and smiles.
 
 102 MAY. 
 
 Now, from the wild flower bank, the little bird 
 Picks the soft moss, and to the thicket flies ; 
 And oft returns, and oft the work renews, 
 Till all the curious fabric hangs complete : 
 Alas ! but ill concealed from schoolboy's eye, 
 Who, heedless of the warbler's saddest plaint. 
 Tears from the bush the toil of many an hour; 
 Then, thoughtless wretch ! pursues the devious bee, 
 Buzzing from flower to flower : She wings her flight, 
 Far from his following eye, to walled parterres, 
 Where, undisturbed, she revels 'mid the beds 
 Of full-blown lilies, doomed to die unculled, 
 Save when the stooping fair (more beauteous flower !) 
 The bosom's rival brightness half betrays, 
 While chusing 'mong the gently bending stalks, 
 The snowy hand a sister blossom seems. 
 
 More sweet to me the lily's meekened grace 
 Than gaudy hues, brilliant as summer clouds 
 Around the sinking sun : to me more sweet 
 Than garish day, the twilight's softened grace, 
 When deepening shades obscure the dusky woods; 
 Then comes the silence of the dewy hour, 
 With songs of noontide birds, thrilling in fancy's ear, 
 While from yon elm, with water-kissing boughs, 
 Along the moveless winding of the brook,
 
 MAY. 103 
 
 The smooth expanse is calmness, stillness all, 
 Unless the springing trout, with quick replunge. 
 Arousing meditation's downward look, 
 Ruffle, with many a gently circling wave 
 On wave, the glassy surface undulating far.
 
 104 
 
 JUNE. 
 
 OHORT is the reign of night, and almost blends 
 The evening twilight with the morning dawn. 
 Mild hour of dawn ! thy wide-spread solitude, 
 And placid stillness, sooth even misery's sigh : 
 Deep the distress that cannot feel thy charm ! 
 As yet the thrush roosts on the bloomy spray, 
 With head beneath his dew-besprinkled wing, 
 When, roused by my lone tread, he lightly shakes 
 His ruffling plumes, and chaunts the untaught note, 
 Soon followed by the woodland choir, warbling 
 Melodiously the oft-repeated song, 
 Till noon-tide pour the torpor-shedding ray. 
 Then is the hour to seek the sylvan bank 
 Of lonely stream, remote from human haunt ; 
 To mark the wild bee voyaging, deep-toned,
 
 105 
 
 Low weighing down each floweret's tender stalk; 
 To list the grashopper's hoarse creaking chirp ; 
 And then to let excursive fancy fly 
 To scenes, where roaring cannon drown the straining 
 
 voice, 
 
 And fierce gesticulation takes the place 
 Of useless words. May be some Alpine brook, 
 That served to part two neighbouring shepherds' flocks, 
 Is now the limit of two hostile camps. 
 Weak limit ! to be filled, ere evening star, 
 With heaps of slain : Far down thy rocky course, 
 The midnight wolf, lapping the gore-stained flood, 
 Gluts his keen thirst, and oft, and oft returns, 
 Unsated, to the purple, tepid stream. 
 
 But let me fly such scenes, which, even when feigned, 
 Distress. To Scotia's peaceful glens I turn, 
 And rest my eyes upon her waving fields, 
 Where now the scythe lays low the mingled flowers. 
 Ah, spare, thou pitying swain! a ridge-breadth round 
 The partridge nest ; so shall no new-come lord 
 To ope a vista to some distant spire 
 Thy cottage raze ; but, when the toilsome day 
 Is done, still shall the turf-laid seat invite 
 Thy weary limbs ; there peace and health shall bless 
 Thy frugal fare, served by the unhired hand, 
 That seeks no wages save a parent's smile.
 
 10(5 JUNE. 
 
 Thus glides the eve, while round the strawy roof 
 Is heard the bat's wing in the deep-hushed air, 
 And from the little field the corncraik's harsh, 
 Yet not unpleasing note, the stillness breaks, 
 All the night long, till day-spring wake the lark.
 
 107 
 
 JULY. 
 
 SLOW move the sultry hours. O, for the shield 
 Of darkening boughs, or hollow rock grotesque ! 
 
 The pool transparent to its pebbly bed, 
 With here and there a slowly gliding trout, 
 Invites the throbbing, half reluctant, breast 
 To plunge : The dash re-echoes from the rocks, 
 And smooth, in sinuous course, the swimmer winds, 
 Now, with extended arms, rowing his way; 
 And now, with sunward face, he floating lies ; 
 Till, blinded by the dazzling beam, he turns, 
 Then to the bottom dives, emerging soon 
 With stone, as trophy, in his waving hand : 
 Blythe days of jocund youth, now almost flown ! 
 Meantime, far up the windings of the stream, 
 Where birken witchknots o'er the channel meet, 
 The sportive shriek, shrill, mingled with the laugh,
 
 308 JULY. 
 
 The bushes hung with beauty's white attire, 
 Tempt, yet forbid, the intrusive eye's approach. 
 
 Unhappy he, who, in this season, pent 
 Within the darksome gloom of city lane, 
 Pines for the flowery paths, and woody shades, 
 From which the love of lucre, or of power, 
 Enticed his youthful steps. In vain he turns 
 The rich descriptive page of THOMSON'S muse, 
 And strives to fancy that the lovely scenes 
 Are present : So the hand of childhood tries 
 To grasp the pictured bunch of fruit, or flowers, 
 But, disappointed, feels the canvas smooth : 
 So the caged lark, upon a withering turf, 
 Flutters from side to side, with quivering wings, 
 As if in act of mounting to the skies. 
 
 At noontide hour, from school, the little throng 
 Rush gaily, sporting o'er the enamelled mead. 
 Some strive to catch the bloom-perched butterfly j 
 And if they miss his mealy wings, the flower, 
 From which he flies, the disappointment sooths. 
 Others, so pale in look, in tattered garb, 
 Motley, with half-spun threads and cotton flakes, 
 Trudge, drooping, to the manv-storied pile, 
 Where thousand spindles whirling stun the ear, 
 Confused : There, prisoned close, they wretched moil. 
 5
 
 JULY. 109 
 
 Sweet age, perverted from its proper end ! 
 
 When childhood toils, the field should be the scene, 
 
 To tend the sheep, or homeward drive the herd 
 
 Or, from the corn-ridge, scare the pilfering rooks, 
 
 Or to the mowers bear the milky pail. 
 
 But, Commerce, Commerce, Manufactures, still 
 
 Weary the ear ; health, morals, all must yield 
 
 To pamper the monopolising few, 
 
 To make a wealthy, but a wretched state. 
 
 Blest be the generous band, that would restore 
 
 To honour due the long-neglected plough ! 
 
 From it expect peace, plenty, virtue, health: 
 
 Compare with it, Britannia, all thine isles 
 
 Beyond the Atlantic wave ! thy trade ! thy ships 
 
 Deep-fraught with blood ! 
 
 But let me quit such themes ! and, peaceful, roam 
 The winding glen, where now the wild-rose pale 
 And garish broom, strew, with their fading flowers, 
 The narrow greenwood path. To me more sweet 
 The greenwood path, half hid, 'neath brake and briar, 
 Than pebbled walks so trim ; more dear to me 
 The daisied plat, before the cottage door, 
 Than waveless sea of widely spreading lawn, 
 'Mid which some insulated mansion towers, 
 Spurning the humble dwellings from its proud domain.
 
 110 
 
 AUGUST. 
 
 FAREWELL, sweet summer, and thy fading flowers ! 
 Farewell, sweet summer, and thy woodland songs ! 
 No woodland note is heard, save where the hawk, 
 High from her eyry, skims in circling flight, 
 With all her clamorous young, first venturing forth 
 On untried wing : At distance far, the sound 
 Alarms the barn-door flock; the fearful dam 
 Calls in her brood beneath her ruffling plumes; 
 With crowding feet they stand, and frequent peep 
 Through the half-opened wing. The partridge quake* 
 Among the rustling corn. Ye gentle tribes, 
 Think not your deadliest foe is now at hand. 
 To man, bird, beast, man is the deadliest foe j 
 Tis he who wages universal war. 
 Soon as his murderous law gives leave to wound
 
 AUGUST. Ill 
 
 The heathfowl, dweller on the mountain wild, 
 The sportsman, anxious, watching for the dawn, 
 Lies turning, while his dog, in happy dreams, 
 With feeble bark anticipates the day. 
 Some, ere the dawn steals o'er the deep blue lake, 
 The hill ascend : vain is their eager haste, 
 The dog's quick breath is heard panting around, 
 But neither dog, nor springing game, is seen 
 Amid the floating mist; short interval 
 Of respite to the trembling dewy wing. 
 Ah, many a bleeding wing, ere mid-day hour. 
 Shall vainly flap the purple bending heath. 
 Fatigued, at noon, the spoiler seeks the shade 
 Of some lone oak, fast by the rocky stream, 
 The hunter's rest, in days of other years, 
 When sad the voice of Cona, in the gale, 
 Lamentingly the song of Selma sung. 
 
 How changeful, Caledonia, is thy clime ! 
 Where is the sun-beam that but now so bright 
 Played on the dimpling brook? Dark o'er the heath 
 A deepening gloom is hung ; from clouds, high piled 
 On clouds, glances the sudden flash ; the thunder. 
 Reverberated 'mong the cliffs, rolls far ; 
 Nor pause ; but ere the echo of one peal 
 Has ceased, another, louder still, the ear appals. 
 The sporting lamb hastes to its mother's side;
 
 !12 AUGUST. 
 
 The shepherd stoops into the mountain-cave, 
 At every momentary flash illumed 
 Back to its innermost recess, where gleams 
 The vaulted spar; the eagle, sudden smote, 
 Falls to the ground lifeless ; beneath the wave 
 The sea-fowl plunges; fast the rain descends; 
 The whitened streams, from every mountain side. 
 Rush to the valley, tinging far the lake.
 
 113 
 
 SEPTEMBER. 
 
 GRADUAL the woods their varied tints assume: 
 The hawthorn reddens, and the rowan-tree 
 Displays its ruby clusters, seeming sweet, 
 Yet harsh, disfiguring the fairest face. 
 
 At sultry hour of noon, the reaper band 
 Rest from their toil, and in the lusty stook 
 Their sickles hang. Around their simple fare, 
 Upon the stubble spread, blythesome they form 
 A circling groupe, while humbly waits behind 
 The wistful dog, and with expressive look, 
 And pawing foot, implores his little share. 
 
 The short repast, seasoned with simple mirth, 
 And not without the song, gives place to sleep.
 
 114 SEPTEMBER. 
 
 With sheaf beneath his head, the rustic youth 
 Enjoys sweet slumbers, while the maid he loves 
 Steals to his side, and screens him from the sun. 
 
 But not by day alone the reapers toil : 
 Oft in the moon's pale ray the sickle gleams, 
 And heaps the dewy sheaf; thy changeful sky, 
 Poor Scotland, warns to seize the hour serene. 
 
 The gleaners, wandering with the morning ray, 
 Spread o'er the new-reaped field. Tottering old age, 
 And lisping infancy, are there, and she 
 Who better days has seen. 
 
 No shelter now 
 
 The covey finds ; but, hark ! the murderous tube. 
 Exultingly the deep-mouthed spaniel bears 
 The fluttering victim to his master's foot : 
 Perhaps another, wounded, flying far, 
 Eludes the eager following eye, and drops 
 Among the lonely furze, to pine and die.
 
 115 
 
 OCTOBER. 
 
 vViTH hound and horn, o'er moor, and hill, and dale, 
 The chace sweeps on ; no obstacle they heed, 
 Nor hedge, nor ditch, nor wood, nor river wide. 
 The clamorous pack rush rapid down the vale, 
 Whilst o'er yon brushwood tops, at times, are seen 
 The moving branches of the victim stag : 
 Soon far beyond he stretches o'er the plain. 
 O, may he safe elude the savage rout, 
 And may the woods be left to peace again ! 
 
 Hushed are the faded woods ; no song is heard, 
 Save where the redbreast mourns the falling leaf. 
 At close of shortened day, the reaper, tired, 
 With sickle on his shoulder, homeward hies. 
 Night comes with threatening storm, first whispering 
 low,
 
 116 OCTOBER. 
 
 Sighing amid the boughs; then, by degrees, 
 
 With violence redoubled at each pause, 
 
 Furious it rages, scaring startled sleep. 
 
 The river roars. Long-wished, at last, the dawn, 
 
 Doubtful, peeps forth ; the winds are hushed, and sleep 
 
 Lights on the eyes unsullied with a tear; 
 
 Nor flies, but at the plough-boy's whistle gay, 
 
 Or hunter's horn, or sound of hedger's bill. 
 
 Placid the sun shoots through the half-stript grove ; 
 
 The grove's sere leaves float down the dusky flood. 
 
 The happy schoolboy, whom the swollen streams, 
 Perilous to wight so small, give holiday, 
 Forth roaming, now wild berries pulls, now paints, 
 Artless/ his rosy cheek with purple hue; 
 Now wonders that the nest, hung in the leafless thorn, 
 So full in view, escaped erewhile his search ; 
 On tiptoe raised, ah, disappointment dire ! 
 His eager hand finds nought but withered leaves. 
 
 Night comes again ; the cloudless canopy 
 Is one bright arch, myriads, myriads of stars. 
 To him who wanders 'mong the silent woods, 
 The twinkling orbs beam through the leafless boughs. 
 Which erst excluded the meridian ray.
 
 117 
 
 NOVEMBER. 
 
 J-/ANGUID the morning beam slants o'er the lea ; 
 The hoary grass, crisp, crackles 'neath the tread. 
 
 On the ha\v-clustered thorns, a motley flock 
 Of birds, of various plume, and various note, 
 Discordant chirp ; the linnet, and the thrush 
 With speckled breast, the blackbird yellow-beaked, 
 The goldfinch, fieldfare, with the sparrow, pert 
 And clamorous above his shivering mates, 
 While, on the house-top, faint the redbreast plains. 
 
 Where do ye lurk, ye houseless commoners, 
 When bleak November's sun is overcast; 
 When sweeps the blast fierce through the deepest 
 
 groves, 
 Driving the fallen leaves in whirling wreaths;
 
 118 NOVEMBER. 
 
 When scarce the raven keeps her bending perch j 
 When dashing cataracts are backward blown ? 
 
 A deluge pours ; loud comes the river down : 
 The margin trees now insulated seem, 
 As if they in the midway current grew. 
 Oft let me stand upon the giddy brink, 
 And chace, with following gaze, the whirling foam, 
 Or woodland wreck : Ah me, that broken branch, 
 Sweeping along, may tempt some heedless boy, 
 Sent by his needy parents to the woods 
 For brushwood gleanings for their evening fire, 
 To stretch too far his little arm ! he falls, 
 He sinks. Long is he looked for, oft he's called ; 
 His homeward whistle oft is fancied near : 
 His playmates find him on the oozy bank, 
 And, in his stiffened grasp, the fatal branch. 
 
 Short is the day ; dreary the boisterous night : 
 At intervals the moon gleams through the clouds, 
 And, now and then, a star is dimly seen. 
 
 When daylight breaks, the woodman leaves his hut, 
 And oft the axe's echoing stroke is heard ; 
 At last the yielding oak's loud crash resounds, 
 Crushing the humble hawthorn in its fall. 
 The husbandman slow plods from ridge to ridge, 
 Disheartened, and rebuilds his prostrate sheaves.
 
 119 
 
 DECEMBER. 
 
 WHERE late the wild flower bloomed, the brown leaf 
 
 lies; 
 
 Not even the snow-drop cheers the dreary plain : 
 The famished birds forsake each leafless spray, 
 And flock around the barn-yard's winnowing store. 
 
 Season of social mirth ! of fireside joys ! 
 I love thy shortened day, when, at its close, 
 The blazing tapers, on the jovial board, 
 Dispense o'er every care-forgetting face 
 Their cheering light, and harmless mirth abounds. 
 Now far be banished, from our social ring, 
 The party wrangle fierce, the argument 
 Deep, learned, metaphysical, and dull, 
 Oft dropt, as oft again renewed, endless :
 
 120 DECEMBER. 
 
 Rather I'd hear stories twice ten times told, 
 Or vapid joke, filched from Joe Miller's page, 
 Or tale of ghost, hobgoblin dire, or witch ; 
 Nor would I, with a proud fastidious frown, 
 Proscribe the laugh-provoking pun ; absurd 
 Although it be, and hard to be discerned, 
 It serves the purpose, if it shake our sides. 
 Now let the temperate cup inspire the song, 
 The catch, the glee ; or list ! the melting lays 
 Of Scotia's pastoral vales, they ever please. 
 
 Loud blows the blast; while, sheltered from its 
 
 rage, 
 
 The social circle feel their joys enhanced. 
 Ah, little think they of the storm-tossed ship, 
 Amid the uproar of the winds and waves, 
 The waves unseen, save by the lightning's glare, 
 Or cannon's flash, sad signal of distress. 
 The trembling crew each moment think they feel 
 The shock of sunken rock : at last they strike : 
 Borne on the blast, their dying voices reach, 
 Faintly, the sea-girt hamlet ; help is vain : 
 The morning light discloses to the view 
 The mast alternate seen and hid, as sinks 
 Or heaves the surge. The early village maid 
 Turns pale, like clouds when o'er the moon they glide ;
 
 DECEMBER. 121 
 
 She thinks of her true love, far, far at sea; 
 Mournful, the live long day she turns her wheel, 
 And ever and anon her head she bends, 
 While with the flax she dries the trickling tear,
 
 123 
 
 THE 
 
 WILD DUCK AND HER BROOD. 
 
 How calm that little lake ! no breath of wind 
 Sighs through the reeds ; a clear abyss it seems 
 Held in the concave of the inverted sky, 
 In which is seen the rook's dull flagging wing 
 Move o'er the silvery clouds. How peaceful sails 
 Yon little fleet, the wild duck and her brood ! 
 Fearless of harm, they row their easy way ; 
 The water-lily, 'neath the plumy prows, 
 Dips, re-appearing in their dimpled track. 
 Yet, even amid that scene of peace, the noise 
 Of war, unequal, dastard war, intrudes. 
 Yon revel rout of men, and boys, and dogs, 
 Boisterous approach ; the spaniel dashes in ; 
 Quick he descries the prey, and faster swims, 
 And eager barks : the harmless flock, dismayed,
 
 124 WILD DUCK AND HER BROOD. 
 
 Hasten to gain the thickest grove of reeds, 
 All but the parent pair; they, floating, wait 
 To lure the foe, and lead him from their young; 
 But soon themselves are forced to seek the shore. 
 Vain then the buoyant wing; the leaden storm 
 Arrests their flight ; they, fluttering, bleeding fall, 
 And tinge the troubled bosom of the lake.
 
 1*5 
 
 TO 
 
 A REDBREAST, 
 
 THAT FLEW IN AT MY WINDOW. 
 
 I ROM snowy plains, and icy sprays, 
 From moonless nights, and sunless days, 
 Welcome, poor bird ! I'll cherish thee j 
 I love thee, for thou trustest me. 
 Thrice welcome, helpless, panting guest ! 
 Fondly I'll warm thee in my breast : 
 How quick thy little heart is beating ! 
 As if its brother flutterer greeting. 
 Thou need'st not dread a captive's doom ; 
 No ! freely flutter round my room ; 
 Perch on my lute's remaining string, 
 And sweetly of sweet summer sing.
 
 126 TO A REDBREAST. 
 
 That note, that summer note, I know ; 
 It wakes, at once, and soothes my woe, 
 I see those woods, I see that stream, 
 I see, ah, still prolong the dream ! 
 Still, with thy song, those scenes renew, 
 Though through my tears they reach my view. 
 
 No more now, at my lonely meal, 
 While thou art by, alone I'll feel; 
 For soon, devoid of all distrust, 
 Thou'lt, nibbling, share my humble crust ; 
 Or on my finger, pert and spruce, 
 Thou'lt learn to sip the sparkling juice ; 
 And when (our short collation o'er) 
 Some favourite volume I explore, 
 Be't work of poet or of sage, 
 Safe thou shalt hop across the page ; 
 Unchecked, shalt flit o'er VIRGIL'S groves, 
 Or flutter 'mid TIBULLUS' loves. 
 Thus, heedless of the raving blast, 
 Thou'lt dwell with me till winter's past ; 
 And when the primrose tells 'tis spring, 
 And when the thrush begins to sing, 
 Soon as I hear the woodland song, 
 Freed, thou shalt join the vocal throng.
 
 127 
 
 EPITAPH 
 
 ON A BLACKBIRD, KILLED BY A HAWK. 
 
 WINTEB was o'er, and spring-flowers decked the glade; 
 
 The Blackbird's note among the wild woods rung : 
 Ah, short-lived note ! the songster now is laid 
 
 Beneath the bush, on which so sweet he sung. 
 
 Thy jetty plumes, by ruthless falcon rent, 
 
 Are now all soiled among the mouldering clay; 
 
 A primrosed turf is all thy monument, 
 And, for thy dirge, the Redbreast lends his lay.
 
 128 
 
 THE 
 
 POOR MAN'S FUNERAL. 
 
 YON motley, sable-suited throng, that wait 
 Around the poor man's door, announce a tale 
 Of woe ; the husband, parent, is no more. 
 Contending with disease, he laboured long, 
 By penury compelled ; yielding at last, 
 He laid him down to die ; but, lingering on 
 From day to day, he, from his sickbed, saw, 
 Heart-broken quite, his childrens' looks of want 
 Veiled in a clouded smile ; alas ! he heard 
 The elder, lispingly, attempt to still 
 The younger*s plaint, languid he raised 
 And thought he yet could toil, but sunk 
 Into the arms of death, the poor man's friend.
 
 THE POOR MAN'S FUNERAL. 12<J 
 
 The coffin is borne out ; the humble pomp 
 Moves slowly on ; the orphan mourner's hand 
 (Poor helpless child !) just reaches to the pall. 
 And now they pass into the field of graves, 
 And now around the narrow house they stand, 
 And view the plain black board sink from the sight. 
 Hollow the mansion of the dead resounds, 
 As falls each spadeful of the bone-mixed mould. 
 The turf is spread ; uncovered is each head, 
 A last farewell : all turn their several ways. 
 Woes me ! those tear-dimmed eyes, that sobbing 
 
 breast ! 
 
 Poor child ! thou thinkest of the kindly hand 
 That wont to lead thee home : no more that hand 
 Shall aid thy feeble gait, or gently stroke 
 Thy sun-bleached head, and downy cheek. 
 But go, a mother waits thy homeward steps; 
 In vain her eyes dwell on the sacred page, 
 Her thoughts are in the grave ; 'tis thou alone, 
 Her first-born child, canst rouse that statue gaze 
 Of woe profound. Haste to the widowed arms ; 
 Look with thy father's look, speak with his voice, 
 And melt a heart that else will break with grief*
 
 130 
 
 TO 
 
 ENGLAND, 
 
 ON 
 
 THE SLAVE TRADE. 
 
 OF all thy foreign crimes, from pole to pole, 
 None moves such indignation in my soul, 
 Such hate, such deep abhorrence, as thy trade 
 In human beings ! 
 
 Thy ignorance thou dar'st to plead no more ; 
 The proofs have thundered from the Afric shore. 
 Behold, behold, yon rows ranged over rows, 
 Of dead with dying linked in death's last throes. 
 Behold a single victim of despair, 
 Dragged upon deck to gasp the ocean air; 
 Devoid of fear, he hears the tempest rise, 
 The ship descending 'tween the waves, he eyes 
 With eager hope ; he thinks his woes shall end : 
 Sunk in despair he sees her still ascend.
 
 THE SLAVE TRADE. 131 
 
 What barbarous race are authors of his woe ? 
 With freights of fetters, who the vessel stow ? 
 Who forge the torture-irons, who plait the scourge ? 
 Whose navies shield the pirates o'er the surge ? 
 Who, from the mother's arms, the clinging child 
 Tears ? It is England, merciful and mild ! 
 Most impious race, who brave the watery realm 
 In blood-fraught barks, with Murder at the helm ! 
 Who trade in tortures, profit draw from pain, 
 And even whose mercy is but love of gain ! 
 Whose human cargoes carefully are packt, 
 By rule and square, according to the Act! 
 And is that gore-drenched flag by you unfurled, 
 Champions of right, knights-errant of the world ? 
 " Yes, yes/' your Commons said, " Let such things be, 
 " BOTHERS rob and murder, why not WE r" 
 In the smoothed speech, and in the upraised hand, 
 I hear the lash, I hear the fierce command ; 
 Each guilty nay ten thousand crimes decreed, 
 And English mercy said, Let millions bleed !
 
 132 
 
 SONG. 
 
 Tune Ettrick Banks. 
 
 O LASSIE, will ye gang wi r me, 
 And dwell amang yon hielan* hills; 
 
 Trim is my skiff, saft rows the sea, 
 
 The summer breeze the sail scarce fills. 
 
 The sea-bird on her white breast lights, 
 And, floating trig, her feathers laves; 
 
 Or on the wing, in \vheeling flight, 
 Darts at her image in the waves. 
 
 The hielan' hills, though bare and bleak, 
 Hae bonny glens and shaws between, 
 
 Whare blooms the wild-rose like thy cheek, 
 And bluebells like thy downcast een.
 
 SONG. 133 
 
 What though nae houses, bien and braw 
 Rise proudly on yon heathery braes, 
 
 A shielin is a lordly ha', 
 
 If there wi' thee I pass my days. 
 
 ANSWER. 
 Yes, laddie, I will gang wi' thee ; 
 
 Wi' thee I'll trust the faithless main j 
 Wi' thee I'll live, wi' thee I'll die, 
 
 I fear na ought, if thou'rt my ain. 
 
 On heathery bents I'll lay my head, 
 
 Hardship, whan thoJed for thee, has charms; 
 
 Wi' thee I'll ask nae other bed, 
 Nae other shielin than thy arms.
 
 134 
 
 SONG. 
 
 Tune If a, Body meet a Body. 
 
 U MARION is a bonny lass, 
 There's glawmry in her smile ; 
 
 And yet by a' it is confest, 
 That Marion's free frae guile. 
 
 Hk rising thought, before she speaks, 
 
 Ye maist wad think ye saw; 
 An' then her voice comes like the breeze 
 
 Blawn o'er the birken shaw. 
 
 Whane'er she sings, her artless notes 
 
 In sweetness far exceed 
 The echo, that, frae rock to rock, 
 
 Repeats the shepherd's reed :
 
 SONG. 135 
 
 An' a' the while a wavering blush 
 
 Her modest fears discloses, 
 Like a bonny bird that sings embowered 
 
 Amang a bush o' roses. 
 
 Whan coming frae the fair wi' her, 
 
 Though e'er sae late at een, 
 The gloom is light, an hour's a blink, 
 
 The muir's a foggy green. 
 
 But what I like the best of a', 
 
 She says whan I'm beside her, 
 Be't light, be't dark, she never thinks 
 
 That skaith can e'er betide her.
 
 136 
 SONG. 
 
 MAID A, OR THE BEGINNIN' O'T. 
 
 Tune 4 Rock and a Wee Pickle Tow. 
 
 AT Maida our Scotch lads gied Frenchmen a fleg, 
 
 Was na that a guid begin nin' o't ! 
 For numbers maist double they cared na a feg ; 
 That was na an ill beginnin' o't. 
 
 Puir Regnier drew up on the side o' a brae, 
 Wi' a bog an' a wood atween him and the fae ; 
 But for braes, bogs, and woods, Scotchmen cared 
 
 na a strae, 
 An' they wist but to see the beginnin' o't. 
 
 Up the hill, like a misty cloud after a shower, 
 
 Our lads breasted up to the winnin' o't; 
 Free the right to the left ilka face leukit doure, 
 An' wist but to hear the beginnin' o't. 
 
 Now the silence was dead, till mak ready ! was heard, 
 Syne click gied ilk lock ; level laigh was the word : 
 Here and there some French braggers lay flat op 
 
 the yird ; 
 Was na that a guid beginnin* o't !
 
 SONG. 137 
 
 But a' this was sport to the deeds o' the day, 
 
 For what was it but the beginnin' o't, 
 Till STUART cries charge ! then hey for the fae, 
 And our callans push on to the winniu' o't. 
 But at the first clash that the bagonets gie, 
 The Frenchmen they swither, they stoiter, they 
 
 flee: 
 
 In the race, as in fechtin', our lads bear the gree, 
 O that was a bonny rinnin' c/t !
 
 1S8 
 
 THE 
 
 COTTAR'S LAMENT. 
 
 AN' maun we leave our heartsome hame, 
 
 To wander far awa' ; 
 An* maun we leave the glen sae lown, 
 
 Below the birken shaw ; 
 
 An' maun our wee things nae mair wade, 
 
 An' paidle in the bum ; 
 An' maun we a', baith auld and young, 
 
 Learn, Man was made to mourn I 
 
 In some unhalesome, darksome town, 
 We'll, ablins, find a bield ; 
 
 An' whan we're sick, the house o' dool 
 Our helpless heads will shield :
 
 THE COTTAR'S LAMENT. 139 
 
 But nae kent faces there will sit 
 
 To watch the troubled hour ; 
 An' stranger's hands will turn the couch, 
 
 Wi' looks baith cauld and doure : 
 
 The bloom upon the infant cheeks, 
 That glint wi' thoughtless glee, 
 
 Will fade right fast ; and for the rose, 
 A sallow hue we'll see. 
 
 O then gif fok, wha hae the power, 
 This ae cot-house wad spare ! 
 
 Our wee things' hands, up wa' and roof, 
 Wad train the woodbine fair. 
 
 A sweetbrier hedge we'd plant a' round, 
 To scent the gloarain' hour; 
 
 And change a cottar's hamely hut 
 Into a bonny bower. 
 
 O gin the fok, wha hae the power, 
 Wad say the word remain; 
 
 What they in gowd and siller tint, 
 They wad in blessios gain :
 
 J40 THE COTTAR'S LAMENT. 
 
 Aye, nameless ways, by us unseen, 
 GOD weel or wae extends, 
 
 An' atten as the deed deserves, 
 Heaven's dew or blight descends,
 
 141 
 
 THANKSGIVING 
 OFF CAPE TRAFALGAR. 
 
 U PON the high, yet gently rolling wave, 
 The floating tomb that heaves above the brave, 
 Soft sighs the gale, that late tremendous roared, 
 Whelming the wretched remnants of the sword. 
 And now the cannon's peaceful summons calls 
 The victor bands, to mount their wooden walls, 
 And from the ramparts, where their comrades fell, 
 The mingled strain of joy and grief to swell: 
 Fast they ascend, from stem to stern they spread, 
 And crowd the engines whence the lightnings sped : 
 The white-robed Priest his upraised hands extends ; 
 Hushed is each voice, attention leaning bends ; 
 Then from each prow the grand hosannas rise, 
 Float o'er the deep, and hover to the skies.
 
 142 TRAFALGAK. 
 
 Heaven fills each heart ; yet Home will oft intrude, 
 And tears of love celestial joys exclude. 
 The wounded man, who hears the soaring strain, 
 Lifts his pale visage, and forgets his pain; 
 While parting spirits, mingling with the lay, 
 On halleluiahs wing their heavenward way.
 
 143 
 
 TO 
 
 MY SON. 
 
 TWICE has the sun commenced his annual round, 
 Since first thy footsteps tottered o'er the ground ; 
 Since first thy tongue was tuutd to bless mine ear, 
 By faultering out the name to fathers dear. 
 O ! nature's language, with her looks combined, 
 More precious far than periods thrice refined! 
 
 ! sportive looks of love, devoid of guile, 
 
 1 prize you more than beauty's magic smile ; 
 Yes, in that face, unconscious of its charm, 
 
 I gaze with bliss, unminpjled with alarm. 
 Ah, no ! full oft a boding horror flies 
 Athwart my fancy, uttering fateful cries. 
 Almighty Power ! his harmless life defend, 
 And if we part, 'gainst me the mandate send. 
 And yet a wish will rise, would I might live, 
 Till added years his memory firmness give !
 
 144 TO MY SON. 
 
 For O ! it would a joy in death impart, 
 
 To think, I still survived within his heart ; 
 
 To think, he'll cast, midway the vale of years, 
 
 A retrospective look, bedimmed with tears ; 
 
 And tell, regretful, how I looked and spoke ; 
 
 What walks I loved ; where grew my favourite oak ; 
 
 How gently I would lead him by the hand; 
 
 How gently use the accent of command ; 
 
 What lore I taught him, roaming wood and wild, 
 
 And how the man descended to the child ; 
 
 How well I loved with him, on Sabbath morn. 
 
 To hear the anthem of the vocal thorn j 
 
 To teach religion, unallied to strife, 
 
 And trace to him, the way, the truth, the life. 
 
 But, far and farther still my view I bend, 
 And now I see a child thy steps attend ; 
 To yonder churchyard- wall thou tak'st thy way, 
 While round thee, pleased, thou see'st the infant play j, 
 Then lifting him, while tears suffuse thine eyes, 
 Pointing, thou tell'st him, there thy grandsire lies* 
 
 JANUARY 1, 1807.
 
 NOTES,
 
 NOTES 
 
 THE SABBATH. 
 
 THAT the religious observance of one day in seven 
 was a point of main importance under the Jewish and 
 Christian dispensations, is evident, from the very strong 
 terms in which the law commanding its observance is 
 couched ; from the anxious repetitions of that law, the 
 judgments which the prophets denounced against its 
 violation, the fulfilment of those denunciations, the 
 strict observance of the Sabbath during the best times 
 of the Jewish polity; and its observance by Christ, the 
 apostles, and the primitive Christians. What is more 
 material, that the Sabbath was instituted, not as a 
 mere ritual observance, but as an essential article of 
 moral duty, is proved by this consideration, that one of 
 the objects of the institution was the amelioration of 
 the lot of the laborious part of the creation, animals as 
 well as men. But the spirit of this admirable institu-
 
 148 NOTES ON THE SABBATH. 
 
 tion will be best illustrated, by bringing into one view 
 some of those passages of scripture, whether preceptive, 
 prophetic, or historical, in which the SABBATH is men- 
 tioned. 
 
 " Keep the Sabbath day, to sanctify it, as the Lord 
 thy God hath commanded thec. Six days shalt thou 
 labour, and do all thy work. But the seventh day is the 
 Sabbath] of the Lord thy God : in it thou shalt not do 
 any work, thou, nor thy son, nor thy daughter, uor thy 
 man-servant, nor thy maid-servant, nor thine ox, nor 
 thine ass, nor any of thy cattle, nor the stranger that is 
 within thy gates; that thy man-strcant and thy maid- 
 servant may rest as well as thou. And remember that 
 thou wast a servant in the land of Egypt, and that the 
 Lord thy God brought thee out thence through a mighty 
 hand, and by an outstretched arm : therefore the Lord 
 thy God commanded thee to keep the Sabbath day." 
 DEUT. v. 12 15. 
 
 " Ye shall keep my Sabbaths, and reverence my sanc- 
 tuary : I am the Lord." LEV. xix. SO. 
 
 " Six days shall work be done ; but the seventh day 
 is the Sabbath of rest, an holy convocation : ye shall 
 do no work therein ; it is the Sabbath of the Lord in all 
 your dwellings." LEV. xxiii. 3. 
 
 " Six days shalt thou do thy work, and on the seventh 
 day thou shalt rest, that thine ox and thine ass may rest, 
 and the son of thy handmaid and the stranger may be 
 refreshed" EXOD. xxii. 12. 
 
 " Also the sons of the stranger that join themselves 
 to the Lord, to serve him, and to love the name of the
 
 NOTES ON THE SABBATH. 149 
 
 Lord, to be his servants, every one that keepeth the 
 Sabbath from polluting it, and taketh hold of my cove- 
 nant; even them will I bring to my holy mountain, 
 and make them joyful in my house of prayer : their 
 burnt-offerings and their sacrifices shall be accepted 
 upon mine altar; for mine house shall be called an 
 house of prayer for all people." ISA. Ivi. 6, 7. 
 
 " And he came to Nazareth, where he had been 
 brought up, and, as his custom was, he went into the 
 synagogue on the Sabbath day, and stood up for to 
 read. And there was delivered unto him the book of 
 the prophet Esaias ; and when he had opened the book, 
 he found the place where it was written, The Spirit of 
 the Lord is upon me, because he hath anointed me to 
 preach the gospel to the poor ; he hath sent me to heal 
 the broken-hearted, to preach deliverance to the captives, 
 and recovering of sight to the blind, to set at liberty 
 them that are bruised ; to preach the acceptable year 
 of the Lord." LUKE, iv. 1619. 
 
 " And that day was the preparation, and the Sabbath 
 drew on. And the women also which came with him 
 from Galilee, followed after, and beheld the sepulchre, 
 and how his body was laid. And they returned, and 
 prepared spices and ointments, and rested the Sabbath 
 day, according to the commandment." LUKE, xxiii. 
 5456. 
 
 " But when they departed from Perga, they came to 
 Antiocli in Pisidia, and went into the synagogue on the 
 Sabbath day, and sat down. And after the reading of 
 the law and the prophets, the rulers of the synagogue
 
 150 NOTES ON THE SABBATH. 
 
 sent unto them, saying. Ye men and brethren, if you 
 have any word of exhortation for the people, say on. 
 Then Paul stood up, and, beckoning with his hand, said, 
 Men of Israel, and ye that fear God, give audience." 
 " For they that dwell at Jerusalem, and their rulers, 
 because they knew him not, nor yet the voices of the 
 prophets, which are read every Sabbath day, they have 
 fulfilled them in condemning him." " And when the 
 Jews were gone out of the synagogue, the Gentiles be- 
 sought them that these words might be preached to 
 them the next Sabbath." ACTS, xiii. 14, 15, 16, 27, 42. 
 
 " Hear this, O ye that swallow up the needy, even to 
 make the poor of the land to fail, saying, When will the 
 new moon be gone, that we may sell corn ? and the 
 Sabbath, that we may set forth wheat, making the ephah 
 small and the shekel great, and falsifying the balances 
 by deceit ? That ye may buy the poor for silver, and the 
 needy for a pair of shoes; yea, and sell the refuse of 
 the wheat." AMOS, viii. 4, 5, 6. 
 
 " If thou turn away thy foot from the Sabbath, from 
 doing thy pleasure on my holy day, and call the Sab- 
 bath a delight, the holy of the Lord, honourable, and 
 shalt hon >ur him, not doing thine own ways, nor find- 
 ing thine own pleasures, nor speaking thine own words: 
 then shalt thou delight thyself in the Lord, and I will 
 cause thee to ride upon the high places of the earth, 
 and feed thee with the heritage of Jacob thy father; 
 for the mouth of the Lord hath spoken it." ISA. Ivii. 
 13, 14.
 
 HOTES ON THE SABBATH. 151 
 
 " In the end of the Sabbath, as it began to dawn to- 
 wards the first day of the week, came Mary Magdalene, 
 and the other Mary, to see the sepulchre. And, be- 
 hold, there was a great earthquake; for the angel of 
 the Lord descended from heaven, and came and rolled 
 back the stone, and sat upon it. His countenance was 
 like lightning, and his raiment white as snow. Ai:d for 
 fear of him the keepers did shake, and became as dead 
 men. And the angel answered, and said unto the 
 women, Fear not ye ; for I know that ye seek Jesus, 
 which was crucified. He is not here ; for he is risen, as 
 he said : Come see the place where the Lord lay." 
 MATTHEW, xxviii. 1. 6. 
 
 " And on the Sabbath, he went out of the city by a 
 river side, where prayer was wont to be made." ACTS, 
 xvi. 13. 
 
 " And upon the first day of the week, when the dis- 
 ciples came together to break bread, Paul preached un- 
 to them, ready to depart on the morrow, and continued 
 his speech until midnight." ACTS, xx. 7. 
 
 The toil-worn horse set free. P. 4. 1. 11. 
 "A Sabbath day's journey," says an able and faith- 
 ful labourer in the vineyard of the Lord, " was, among 
 the Jews, a proverbial expression for a very short one. 
 Among us it can have no such meaning affixed to it. 
 That day seems to be considered by too manv, as set 
 apart, by divine and human authority, for the purpose, 
 not of rest, but of its direct opposite, the labour of tra- 
 velling ; thus adding one day more of torment to those
 
 152 NOTES ON THE SABBATH. 
 
 generous, but wretched animals, whose services they 
 hire; and who, being generally strained beyond their 
 strength the other six days of the week, have, of all 
 creatures under heaven, the best and most equitable 
 claim to suspension of labour on the seventh. Consi- 
 derations such as these may perhaps appear to some 
 below the dignity of this place, and the solemnity of a 
 Christian assembly. But benevolence, even to the 
 brute creation, is, in its degree, a duty, no less than to 
 our own species ; and it is mentioned by Solomon as a 
 striking feature in the character of a righteous man, 
 that ' he is merciful even to his beast.' HE, without 
 whose permission ' not a sparrow falls to the ground, 
 and who feedeth the young ravens that call upon him,' 
 will not suffer even the meanest work of his hands to be 
 treated cruelly with impunity. He is the common Fa- 
 ther of the whole creation. He takes every part of it 
 under his protection. He has, in various passages of 
 scripture, expressed his concern even for irrational crea- 
 tures, and has declared more especially, in the most ex- 
 plicit terms, that the rest of the Sabbath was meant/or 
 our cattle and our servants, as well as for ourselves." 
 BISHOP PORTEUS. 
 
 Of giving thanks to God. P. 4. 1. 24. 
 Though this usage did not originate in positive insti- 
 tution, yet our Lord may be said to have enjoined it by 
 his example. Many are the instances that might be 
 quoted. Even after his resurrection, he brake bread, 
 and blessed it. " But they constrained him, saying,
 
 NOTES ON THE SABBATH. 153 
 
 Abide with us, for it is towards evening, and the day is 
 far spent; and he went in to tarry with them. And it 
 came to pass, as he sat at meat with them, he took bread, 
 and blessed it, and brake, and gave to them. And their 
 eyes were opened, and they knew him, and he vanished 
 out of their sight. And they said one to another, Did 
 not our hearts burn within us, while he talked with us 
 by the way, and while he opened to us the scriptures ? 
 And they rose up the same hour, and returned to Jeru- 
 salem, and found the eleven gathered together, and them 
 that were with them, saying, the Lord is risen indeed, 
 and hath appeared to Simon. And they told what things 
 were done in the way, and how he was known of them 
 in breaking of bread" LUKE, xxiv. 20. 35. 
 
 Their constancy in torture and in death. 
 
 P. 10. 1. 16. 
 
 The following passage from Bishop Burnet's History 
 of his Own Time, will give some notion of the kind, 
 though not of the extent, of that hideous persecution, 
 from which the people of Scotland were delivered by 
 the Revolution. " When any are to be struck in the 
 boots, it is done in the presence of the council ; and 
 upon that occasion almost all offer to run away. The 
 sight is so dreadful, that, without an order restraining 
 such a number to stay, the board would be forsaken. 
 But the duke, while he had been in Scotland, was so far 
 from withdrawing, that he looked on all the while with 
 an unmoved indifference, and with an attention, as if he 
 had been to look on some curious experiment. This gave
 
 154 NOTES ON THE SABBATrf. 
 
 a terrible idea of him to all that observed it, as of a man 
 that had no bowels nor humanity in him. Lord Perth 
 observing this, resolved to let him see how well quali- 
 fied he was to be an inquisitor-general. The rule about 
 the boots, in Scotland was, that upon one witness, and 
 presumptions, both together, the question might be given : 
 But it was never known to be twice given, or that any 
 other species of torture, besides the boots, might be used 
 at pleasure. In the courts of inquisition, they do, upon 
 Suspicion, or if a man refuses to answer upon oath as 
 he is required, give him the torture ; and repeat it, or 
 vary it, as often as they think fit ; and do not give over, 
 (ill they have got out of their mangled prisoners all that 
 they have a mind to know from them. 
 
 " This Lord Perth resolved now to make his pattern ; 
 and was a little too early in letting the world see what 
 a government we were to expect under the influence of 
 a prince of that religion. So, upon his going to Scot- 
 land, one Spence, who was a servant of Lord Argyle's, 
 and was taken up at London, only upon suspicion, and 
 sent down to Scotland, was required to take an oath to 
 answer all the questions that should be put to him. This 
 was done in a direct contradiction to an express law 
 against obliging men to swear, that they will answer 
 super inquirendis. Spence likewise said, that he himself 
 might be concerned in what he might know ; and it was 
 against a very universal law, that excused all men from 
 swearing against themselves, to force him to take such 
 an oath. So he was struck in the boots, and continued 
 firm in his refusal. Then a new species of torture was
 
 NOTES ON THfc SABBATH. 155 
 
 invented : he was kept from sleep eight or nine nights. 
 They grew weary of managing this ; so a third species 
 was invented : Little screws of steel were made use of, 
 that screwed the thumbs with so exquisite a torment, 
 that he sunk under this ; for Lord Perth told him, they 
 would screw every joint of his whole body, one after an- 
 other, till he took the oath. Yet such was the firmness 
 and fidelity of this poor man, that, even in that extre- 
 mity, he capitulated, that no new questions should be 
 put to him, hut those already agreed on ; and that he 
 should not be a witness against any person, and that he 
 himself should be pardoned : so all he could tell them 
 was, who were Lord Argyle's correspondents. The 
 chief of them was Holmes, at London, to whom Lord 
 Argyle writ in a cypher, that had a particular curiosity 
 in it. A double key was necessary : the one was, to 
 show the way of placing the words, or cypher, in an or- 
 der very different from that in which they lay on the pa- 
 per ; the other was, the key of the cyphers themselves, 
 which was found among Holmes's papers wli*>n he ab- 
 sconded. Spence knew only the first of these; but he 
 putting all in its true order, then by the other key they 
 were decyphered. In these, it appeared what Argyle 
 had demanded, and what he undertook to do upon the 
 granting his demands : but none of his letters spoke any 
 thing of any agreement then made. 
 
 " When the torture had this effect on Spence, they 
 offered the same oath to Carstairs : And, upon his refu- 
 sing to take it, they put his thumbs in the screws and 
 drew them so hard, that as they put him to extreme tor-
 
 156 NOTES ON THE SABBATH. 
 
 ture, so they could not unscrew them, till the smith that 
 made them was brought with his tools to take them off. 
 So he confessed all he knew, which amounted to little 
 more than some discourses of taking of the duke ; to 
 which he said that he answered, his principles could not 
 come up to that; yet in this he, who was a preacher 
 among them, was highly to blame for not revealing such 
 black propositions ; though it cannot be denied, but that 
 it is a hard thing to discover any thing that is said in 
 confidence. And therefore I saved myself out of those 
 difficulties, by saying to all my friends, that I would not 
 be involved in any such confidence ; for as long as I 
 thought our circumstances were such that resistance was 
 not lawful, I thought the concealing any design in order 
 to it was likewise unlawful : And by this means I had 
 preserved myself. But Carstairs had at this time some 
 secrets of great consequence from Holland, trusted to 
 him by Fagel, of which they had no suspicion ; and so 
 they asked him no questions about them. Yet Fagel saw 
 by that, as he himself told me, how faithful Carstairs 
 was, since he could have saved himself from torture, 
 and merited highly, if he had discovered them. And 
 this was the foundation of his favour with the Prince of 
 Orange, and of the great confidence he put in him to his 
 death. 
 
 " Upon what was thus screwed out of these two per- 
 sons, the Earl of Tarras, who had married the Duchess 
 of Monmouth's eldest sister, and six or seven gentlemen 
 of quality, were clapt up. The ministers of state were 
 till most earnestly set on Baillie's destruction, though he
 
 NOTES ON THE SABBATH. 15? 
 
 was now in so languishing a state, occasioned chiefly by 
 the bad usage he met with in prison, that if his death 
 would have satisfied the malice of the court, that seem- 
 ed to be very near. Baillie's illness increased daily ; and 
 his wife prayed for leave to attend on him ; and, if they 
 feared an escape, she was willing to be put in irons: but 
 that was denied. Nor would they suffer his daughter, a 
 child of twelve years old, to attend him, even when he 
 was so low, that it was not probable he could live many 
 weeks, his legs being much swelled. But, upon these 
 examinations, a new method in proceeding against him 
 was taken. An accusation was sent him, not in the 
 form of an indictment, nor grounded on any law, but on 
 a letter of the king's ; in which he charged him, not on- 
 ly for a conspiracy to raise rebellion, but for being en- 
 gaged in the Rye-plot; of all which he was now requir- 
 ed to purge himself by oath, otherwise the council would 
 hold him guilty of it, and proceed accordingly. He was 
 not, as they said, now in a criminal court upon his life, 
 but before the council, who did only fine and imprison. 
 It was to no purpose for him to say, that by no law, un- 
 less it was in a court of inquisition, a man could be re- 
 quired to swear against himself ; the temptation to per- 
 jury being so strong, when self-preservation was in the 
 case, that it seemed against all law and religion to lay 
 such a snare in a man's way. But, to answer all this, it 
 was pretended he was not now on his life, and that what- 
 soever he confessed was not to be made use of against 
 his life ; as if the ruin of his family, which consisted of 
 nine children, and perpetual imprisonment, were not
 
 158 NOTES ON THE SABBATH. 
 
 more terrible, especially to one so near his end as he 
 was, than death itself. But he had to do with an inex- 
 orable man ; so he was required to take his oath within 
 two days. And by that time, he not being able to ap- 
 pear before the council, a committee of council was sent 
 to tender him the oath, and to take his examination. He 
 told them he was not able to speak by reason of the low 
 state of his health, which appeared very evidently to 
 them ; for he had almost died while they were with him. 
 He in general protested his innocence, and his abhor- 
 rence of all designs against the king, or the duke's life. 
 For the other interrogatories, he desired they might be 
 left with him, and he would consider them. They per- 
 sisted to require him to take this oath ; but he as firmly 
 refused it. So, upon their report, the council construed 
 this refusal to be a confession ; and fined him L. 6000, 
 and ordered him to lie still in prison till it was paid. 
 After this it was thought that this matter was at an end, 
 and that this was a final sentence ; but he was still kept 
 shut up, and denied all attendance or assistance. He 
 seemed all the while so composed, and even so cheerful, 
 that his behaviour looked like the reviving of the spirit 
 of the noblest of the old Greeks or Romans, or rather 
 of the primitive Christians and first martyrs in those best 
 days of the church. But the duke was not satisfied with 
 all this. So the ministry applied their arts to Tarras, 
 and the other prisoners, threatening them with all the 
 extremities of misery, if they would not witness treason- 
 able matter against Baillie. They also practised on their 
 wives, and, frightening them, set them on their husbands.
 
 NOTES ON THE SAEBATH. 159 
 
 In conclusion, they gained what had been so much la- 
 boured : Tarras, and one Murray of Philiphaugh, did 
 depose some discourses that Baillie had with them be- 
 fore he went up to London, disposing them to a rebel- 
 lion. In these they swelled up the matter beyond the 
 truth. Yet all did not amount to a full proof; so the 
 ministers, being afraid that a jury might not be so easy as 
 they expected, ordered Carstairs' confession to be lead 
 in court ; not as an evidence, (for that had been promi- 
 sed him should not be done,) but as that which would 
 fully satisfy the jury, and dispose them to believe the 
 witnesses. So Baillie was hurried on to a trial. And 
 upon the evidence he was found guilty, and condemned 
 to be executed that same day ; so afraid they were lest 
 death should be too quick for them. He was very little 
 disturbed at all this; his languishing in so solitary a man- 
 ner made death a very acceptable deliverance to him. 
 He, in his last speech, shewed, that, in several particu- 
 lars, the witnesses had wronged him. He still denied all 
 knowledge of any design against the king's life, or the 
 duke's ; and denied any plot against the government. 
 He thought it was lawful for subjects, being under such 
 pressures, to try how they might be relieved from them ; 
 and their design never went further ; but he would enter 
 into no particulars. Thus a learned and worthy gentle- 
 man, after twenty months hard usage, was brought to 
 such a death, in a way so full, in all the steps of it, of 
 the spirit and practice of the courts of inquisition, that 
 one is tempted to think, that the methods taken in it 
 were suggested by one well studied, if not practised, in
 
 160 NOTES ON THE SABBATH. 
 
 them. The only excuse that was ever pretended for this 
 infamous persecution was, that they were sure he was 
 guilty ; and that the whole secret of the negociation be- 
 tween the two kingdoms was trusted to him ; and that, 
 since he would not discover it, all methods might be ta- 
 ken to destroy him : not considering what a precedent 
 they made on this occasion, by which, if men were once 
 possessed of an ill opinion of a man, they were to spare 
 neither artifice nor violence, but to hunt him down by 
 any means." It will surely be admitted, that the prac- 
 tice of torture, as a mode either of detection or convic- 
 tion, is the consummation of injustice and tyranny. 
 
 July 22. 1668. Anna Ker, relict of Mr James Dun- 
 can, was brought before the council. " The lords caused 
 bring in the boots before her, and gave her to five of 
 the clock to think upon it, apprizing her, if she would 
 not give her oath in the premises, she was to be tor- 
 tured. In the afternoon Mrs Duncan continued firm 
 to her purpose, and had certainly been put to torture, 
 had not Rothes interposed, and told the council, It was 
 not proper for gentlewomen to wear boots." WODROW, 
 Vol. I. p. 994. 
 
 " Some time after Bothwell, George Forbes, a trooper 
 in Captain Stewart's troop, then lying in Glasgow, came 
 out one morning with a party of soldiers to the village 
 of Langside, in the parish of Cathcart, not two miles 
 from that city, and by force broke open the doors of 
 John Mitchell, tenant there, his house, who, they al- 
 leged, had been at Bothwell. John was, that morning, 
 happily out of the way, whereupon they seized Anna
 
 NOTES ON THE SABBATH. l6l 
 
 Park, his wife, a singularly religious and sensible coun- 
 try woman, whose memory is yet savoury in that place, 
 and pressed her to tell where her husband was. The 
 good woman peremptorily refusing, they bound her, and 
 put kindled matches between her fingers, to extort a dis- 
 covery from her. Her torment was great ; but her God 
 strengthened her, and she endured, for some few hours, 
 all they could do, with admirable patience, and both 
 her hands were disabled for some time." WODROW, 
 Vol. II. p. 77. 
 
 A people doomed, $c. P. 10. 1.23. 
 By the tyrannous and sanguinary laws that were passed 
 between the year 1661, and the ever-memorable year of 
 the Revolution, the whole inhabitants of extensive dis- 
 tricts in the Lowlands of Scotland might be said to have 
 lived under sentence of death. 
 
 Old men, and youths, and simple maids. 
 
 P. 10. 1. 24. 
 
 " One morning, between five and six hours, John 
 Brown, having performed the worship of God in his fa- 
 mily, was going, with a spade in his hand, to make ready 
 some peat-ground. The mist being very dark, he knew 
 not until cruel and bloody Claverhouse compassed him 
 with three troops of horse, brought him to his house, 
 and there examined him ; who, though he was a man of 
 stammering speech, yet answered him distinctly and so- 
 lidly ; which made Claverhouse to examine those whom 
 he had taken to be his guide through the muirs, if they
 
 162 NOTES ON THE SABBATH. 
 
 had heard him preach ? They answered, ' No, no, he was 
 never a preacher.' He said, ' If he has never preached, 
 meikle he has prayed in his time.' He said to John, ' Go 
 to your prayers, for you shall immediately die.' When 
 he was praying, Claverhouse interrupted him three 
 times : one time that he stopped him, he was pleading 
 that the Lord would spare a remnant, and not make a 
 full end in the day of his anger. Claverhouse said, * I 
 gave you time to pray, and you are begun to preach ;' 
 he turned about upon his knees, and said, ' Sir, you 
 know neither the nature of praying nor preaching, that 
 calls this preaching ;' then continued, without confusion. 
 When ended, Claverhouse said, ' Take goodnight of your 
 wife and children.' His wife standing by with her child 
 in her arms that she had brought forth to him, and an- 
 other child of his first wife's, he came to her, and said, 
 ' Now, Marion, the day is come that I told you would 
 come, when I spake first to you of marrying me.' She 
 said, ' Indeed, John, I can willingly part with you.' 
 Then he said, ' This is all I desire, I have no more to 
 do but die." He kissed his wife and bairns, and wished 
 purchased and promised blessings to be multiplied upon 
 them, and his blessing. Claverhouse ordered six men to 
 shoot him : the most part of the bullets came upon his 
 head, which scattered his brains upon the ground. Cla- 
 verhouse said to his wife, ' What thinkest thou of thy 
 husband now, woman ?' She said, ' I thought ever much 
 of him, and now as much as ever.' He said, ' It were 
 justice to lay thee beside him.' She said, ' If ye were 
 permitted, I doubt not but your cruelty would go that- 
 3
 
 NOTES ON THE SABBATH. 163 
 
 length ; but how will you make answer for this morning's 
 work ?' He said, ' To man I can be answerable ; and for 
 God, I will take him in mine own hand.' Claverhouse 
 mounted his horse, and marched, and left her, with the 
 corpse of her dead husband lying there. She set the bairn 
 on the ground, and tied up his head, and straighted his 
 body, and covered him in her plaid, and sat down, and 
 wept over him. It being a very desart place, where ne- 
 ver victual grew, and far from neighbours, it was some 
 time before any friends came to her : the first that came 
 was a very fit hand, that old singular Christian woman 
 in the Cummerhead, named Elizabeth Menzies, three 
 miles distant, who had been tried with the violent death 
 of her husband at Pentland, afterwards of two worthy 
 sons, Thomas Weir, who was killed at Drumclog, and 
 David Steel, who was suddenly shot afterwards when 
 taken. The said Marion Weir, sitting upon her hus- 
 band's grave, told me, that, before that, she could see 
 no blood but she was in danger to faint, and yet she was 
 helped to be a witness to all this, without either fainting 
 or confusion ; except when the shots were let off, her 
 eyes dazzled. His corpse was buried at the end of his 
 house, where he was slain." PEDEN'S Life. 
 
 Claverhouse was rewarded by his master, James, with 
 the title of Viscount Dundee, and with the confiscated 
 lands and goods of the sufferers. A late memoir-writer, 
 the slanderer of Sydney and Russel, apostrophises this 
 dastardly murderer of the unarmed peasantry, as a ge- 
 nerous and heroic character. 
 
 James Stewart, a boy, " came in from the west coun-
 
 164 NOTES ON THE SABBATH. 
 
 try to see a relation of his in prison at Edinburgh. By 
 what means I know not, the other got out, and he was 
 found in the room whence the other escaped ; where- 
 upon he was brought before a committee of the council, 
 and soon ensnared by their questions. When he was si- 
 lent on some heads, and would not answer, some papers 
 before me bear, that Sir George M'Kenzie threatened 
 to take out his tongue with a pair of pincers. Precise- 
 ly on his answers, he was condemned, and in a few days 
 after he was taken with the rest, (six others,) and exe- 
 cuted at the Gallow-lee." WODROW, B. III. c. 5. 4. 
 year 1681. 
 
 " Marion Harvie, a young woman, not twenty years 
 of age, on her way to the place of execution, was inter- 
 rupted in her devotions; on which she turned to her 
 fellow-prisoner, Isabel Alison, and said, ' Come, Isabel, 
 let us sing the 23d psalm ;' which accordingly they did, 
 Marion repeating the psalm, line by line, without book. 
 Being come to the scaffold, after singing the 84th psalm, 
 and reading the 3d of Malachi, she said, ' I am come 
 here to-day for avowing Christ to be the Head of his 
 church, and King in Zion. They say, I would murder ; 
 but I declare, I am free of all matters of fact : I could 
 never take the life of a chicken but my heart shrinked. 
 But it is only for my judgment of things that I am 
 brought here. I leave my blood on the council and the 
 Duke of York.' At this, the soldiers interrupted her, 
 and would not allow her to speak any." Cloud of Wit-
 
 NOTES ON THE SABBATH. lf)5 
 
 But that morn. P. 10. 1. 25. 
 
 The resurrection happened on the morning of the first 
 day of the week, which is now observed as the Christian 
 Sabbath. 
 
 By Cameron thundered. P. 11. 1. 17. 
 
 " The last night of his life, he was in the house of 
 William Mitchell in Meadowhead, at the water of Ayr, 
 where about twenty-three horse and forty foot had con- 
 tinued with him that week. That morning, a woman 
 gave him water to wash his face and hands ; and having 
 washed, and dried them with a towel, he looked to his 
 hands, and laid them on his face, saying, ' This is their 
 last washing ; I have need to make them clean, for there 
 are many to see them.' At this the woman's mother 
 wept. He said, ' Weep not for me, but for yourself and 
 your's, and for the sins of a sinful land, for ye have me- 
 lancholy, sorrowful, and weary days before you.' 
 
 v The people who remained with him were in some 
 hesitation whether they should abide together for their 
 own defence, or disperse, and shift for themselves. But 
 that day, being the 22d of July, they were surprised by 
 Bruce of Earlshall ; who, having got the command of 
 Airly's troop and Strahan's dragoons, upon notice given 
 him by Sir John Cochran of Ochiltree, came furiously 
 upon them, about four o'clock in the afternoon, when 
 lying on the east end of Airs-moss. When they saw the 
 enemy approaching, and no possibility of escaping, they 
 all gathered round about him, while he prayed a short 
 word j wherein he repeated this expression thrice over,
 
 106 NOTES ON THE SABBATH. 
 
 ' Lord, spare the green, and take the ripe.' When end- 
 ed, he said to his brother, with great intrepidity, ' Come, 
 let us fight it out to the last ; for this is the day that I 
 have longed for, and the day that I have prayed for, to 
 die fighting against our Lord's avowed enemies : this is 
 the day that we will get the crown.' And to the rest, he 
 said, < Be encouraged, all of you, to fight it out valiant- 
 ly ; for all of you that shall fall this day, I see heaven's 
 gates open to receive you.' 
 
 " But the enemy approaching, they immediately drew 
 up eight horse, with him on the right, the rest, with va- 
 liant Hackston, on the left, and the foot in the middle ; 
 where they all behaved with much bravery, until over- 
 powered by a superior number. At last Hackston was 
 taken prisoner, and Mr Cameron was killed on the spot, 
 and his head and hands cut off by one Murray, and ta- 
 ken to Edinburgh. His father being in prison for the 
 same cause, they carried them to him, to add grief unto 
 his former sorrow, and inquired at him, if he knew them. 
 He took his son's hands and head, which were very fair, 
 being a man of a fair complexion, with his own hair, 
 and kissed them, and said, ' I know, I know them ; they 
 are my son's, my own dear son's ; it is the Lord, good is 
 the will of the Lord, who cannot wrong me nor mine, 
 but has made goodness and mercy to follow us all our 
 days.' After which, by order of the council, his head 
 was fixed upon the Nether-bow Port, and his hands 
 beside it, with the fingers upward." Cloud of Wit- 
 noses.
 
 NOTES ON THE SABBATH. 16? 
 
 Or by Renwick poured. P. 11. 1. 17. 
 " He was of stature somewhat low, of a fair com- 
 plexion, and, like another young David, of a ruddy and 
 beautiful countenance. Most men spoke well of him 
 after he was dead ; even his murderers, as well as others, 
 said they thought he went to heaven. Malignauts gene- 
 rally said, he died a Presbyterian. The Viscount of Tar- 
 bet, one of the counsellors, one day in company, when 
 speaking of him, said, ' That he was one of the stiffest 
 maintainers of his principles that ever came before them. 
 Others we used always to cause, one time or other, to 
 waver, but him we could never move. Where we left 
 him, there we found him. We could never make him 
 yield, or vary in the least" 
 
 The assembled people dared, in face of day. 
 
 P. 12. 1. 1. 
 
 " The father durst not receive his son, nor the wife 
 her husband ; the country was prohibited to harbour the 
 fugitives, and the ports were shut against their escape by 
 sea. When expelled from their homes, they resided in 
 caves, among morasses and mountains, or met by stealth, 
 or by night, for worship ; but whenever the mountain- 
 men, as they were styled, were discovered, the hue-and- 
 cry was ordered to be raised. They were pursued, and 
 frequently shot by the military, or sought with more in- 
 sidious diligence by the spies, informers, and officers of 
 justice ; and on some occasions, it appears, that the sa- 
 gacity of dogs was employed to track their footsteps,
 
 168 NOTES ON THE SABBATH. 
 
 and explore their lurking retreats." LAING'S History, 
 Vol. II. 
 
 The party for his judge. P. 17. 1. 8. 
 
 One most iniquitous article of our civil code, is that 
 which confers on creditors a jurisdiction over their debt- 
 ors, a jurisdiction extending to the power of inflictin 
 perpetual imprisonment. This power, too, is most ri- 
 gorously exercised on the least culpable of the offenders. 
 The poor mechanic, who owes a few pounds for a house 
 to shelter him, or for bread to eat, the wreck of whose 
 substance would be invisible in the abyss of chancery 
 proceedings, is left to starve, and to rot in a jail, while 
 the great, the wholesale bankrupt, who has staked a 
 swindled capital on the hazard table of speculation, is 
 sent forth with a judicial diploma, authorising him to 
 recommence the practice of his former art. If a man 
 be a fraudulent bankrupt, let him be punished ; but let 
 him first be tried, not by a disappointed and irritated 
 creditor, but by the tribunals before which other crimes 
 are tried. The present state of this branch of the law 
 offers one great incitement to dishonesty, the certainty 
 that innocence is not more safe than guilt All bank- 
 rupt debtors are, or may be, treated as if they were dis- 
 honest, that is, as if they refused, (for such is the idea of 
 the law,) though able, to pay. 
 
 When I speak of the law, I have in view the general 
 system of jurisprudence in the three united kingdoms. 
 In one of them, no doubt, the imprisoned debtor may 
 bring an action against all his creditors ; in which, if he
 
 NOTES ON THE SABBATH. 169 
 
 show that he has acted fairly and honestly, and has made, 
 or is ready to make, a full surrender of his property, he 
 is entitled to demand a warrant of liberation, and a de- 
 cree of immunity from personal execution. But, besides 
 that this action (cesxio bonorum) is peculiar to Scotland, 
 it is found in practice to be a very inadequate remedy. 
 The prisoner must prove his innocence. He must pro- 
 duce satisfactory accounts of the progress of his affairs, 
 and he must prove every disputed averment. Now, if 
 small dealers are unable, as they frequently are, to give 
 a distinct view of their affairs, as they stand at any one 
 period, how should it be expected that they should be 
 able to give a progressive account of their transactions 
 for a series of years ? According to the strict letter of 
 the law, the party accused is obliged to prove a nega- 
 tive, that is, he must prove that he has NOT been guilty 
 of fraud or extravagance; and though the severity of 
 this rule is very much mitigated by the lenient and libe- 
 ral manner in which it is administered, the relief intend- 
 ed by the law is not unfrequently denied to the honest, 
 but simple and ignorant debtor, while it is sometimes 
 extended to the artful and provident bankrupt. 
 
 It may be said, that imprisonment for debt is neces- 
 sary, not as a punishment for guilt, but as a security to 
 creditors. Now, what sort of security is this? it plainly 
 amounts to this, that a debtor, by the act of incurring 
 debt, grants a security, not only over his lands and his 
 chattels, but his person. Ought not such a bargain to 
 be reprobated, as contrary to every principle of justice 
 and expediency ? And what would follow, if the power
 
 170 NOTES ON THE SABBATH. 
 
 of giving and receiving corporal security were taken 
 away ? Only this, that, in proportion to the diminution 
 of the security, lenders and sellers would be more cir- 
 cumspect ip giving credit. And who will deny, that a 
 little more caution would be of infinite advantage to 
 creditors, as well as to debtors ? " But you strike (it 
 is said) at the very roots of trade, if you abrogate the 
 law of imprisonment." The answer is, That nobody 
 would propose to abrogate the law. But let this law be 
 applied, like other laws, by the judge, not by the party. 
 It is all, however, a mere gratuitous and rashly recei- 
 ved position, That the prosperity of trade depends, 
 in the slightest degree, on the law of imprisonment for 
 debt. 
 
 The mark which rashness branded on their names. 
 
 P. 18. 1.3. 
 
 I am convinced, that in England, and especially in 
 London, (such is the dispatch used in criminal proceed- 
 ings,) unwarranted verdicts are sometimes pronounced. 
 The mechanical notion of weighing evidence, seems to 
 have got an unfortunate hold of the minds of jurymen ; 
 and it thus happens, that if there be something like evi- 
 dence on the one side, and no evidence on the other, 
 the one scale (as it is called) of the judicial balance 
 sinks, and the proof is estimated, not by what it is i 
 itself, but by what it is in comparison of something else. 
 The law of England recognizes the evidence of one wit- 
 ness, as sufficient to warrant a capital conviction. The 
 law of God was different : " Whoso killeth any person,
 
 NOTES ON THE SABBATH. 1?1 
 
 the murderer shall he put to death by the mouth of wit- 
 nesses; but one witness shall not testify against any per- 
 son, to cause him to die." NUMB. xxxv. 50. 
 
 "At the mouth of two or three witnesses shall he, 
 that is worthy of death, be put to death ; but at the 
 mouth of one witness he shall not be put to death" 
 DEUT. xvii. 6. 
 
 I have observed, too, a petulant and contemptuous 
 disregard of character. Jurymen are not aware how 
 much this disregard tends to loosen the bands of socie- 
 ty. What has a poor man but his health and his charac- 
 ter? His character recommends him to employment, 
 aids him when he is in distress, and he looks to it as a 
 defence when he is accused. Take away its value in 
 this last point of view, and you weaken one of the 
 strongest incentives to moral conduct. In the Old Bai- 
 ley, a good name is found not to be better than riches. 
 Proof of alibi, likewise, is too little regarded by London 
 juries. In cases of highway robbery, committed under 
 cloud of night, I have observed the most incomprehen- 
 sible positlveness in the evidence of the prisoner's iden- 
 tity. Now, evidence of identity is the most fallacious 
 of all evidence, especially in a populous city, in which 
 (including a few miles of the neighbourhood) two mil- 
 lions of people are collected. Among such a prodigious 
 multitude, there must be many fac similes in person, in 
 dress, and in voice. Yet juries every day convict on 
 evidence of identity, though contradicted by evidence of 
 alibi. Nor, in such a city as London, can it be said, 
 that they decide in this manner from their knowledge
 
 172 NOTES ON THE SABBATH. 
 
 of the superior credibility of the one set of witnesses; 
 for it very seldom happens, that London jurymen fiave 
 ever seen the face of one of the witnesses. The disre- 
 gard paid to evidence of alibi is defended on the score 
 of the frequency of perjury. But this consideration 
 strikes both ways. There may be perjury against as 
 well as for the prisoner. It is not enough to say, that 
 the prosecutor has no interest to use unjustifiable means 
 for procuring a conviction. There may exist an inte- 
 rest to convict elsewhere than in the prosecutor. When 
 a crime is committed, the search for the criminal is 
 most effectually stopt by a trial and conviction. Sup- 
 pose, then, the real criminal hear, that a wrong person 
 is apprehended on suspicion ; how easy is it for him to 
 send some of his associates to appear as informers, and 
 then as witnesses against the prisoner ! Yes it may be 
 said but a few cross questions will destroy the fabric 
 of a false story. Now, is it not plain, that the same ob- 
 servation is applicable to false evidence, on whichever 
 side it is brought? But where is the remedy for all this? 
 Will legal regulations avail? No: Let truth be culti- 
 vated in private life ; let parents inculcate the love of 
 truth more than the love of gain ; let it be their perpe- 
 tual lesson to their children, that the possession of an 
 honest mind is a possession more valuable, both in re- 
 gard to themselves and the public, than all the wealth 
 and accomplishments which industry and study can be- 
 stow. Let them display a scrupulous regard to truth, 
 even in the most trivial matters. " The beginning of 
 zcrath," says Solomon, " is as the letting out of waters."
 
 NOTES ON THE SABBATH. 173 
 
 The observation may be extended to the beginning of 
 falsehood. Let every man consider this, that when, 
 either by example or tolerance, he weakens that reve- 
 rence in which truth ought to be held, he may perhaps 
 be sowing the seeds of perjury. Perhaps, if the minute 
 links of human events were discernible, a judicial mur- 
 der might sometimes be traced to an apparently harm- 
 less lie. But the fountain uf justice is polluted from 
 another quarter. the foul sink of revenue oaths. Many 
 mercantile houses keep what they call a swearing clerk. 
 Such a man makes fifty appeals to the Deity in the 
 course of a day. What he swears is sometimes consis- 
 tent with his knowledge, sometimes not. No matter; 
 he gains by it two or three hundred pounds a-year, that 
 is, he is paid at the rate of about sixpence per oath. 
 How unspeakably contemptible is that system of legisla- 
 tion, which acts on the supposition, that oaths are the 
 proper checks to fraud against the revenue ! 
 
 Each one returns to kis inheritance, P. 21. 1. 8. 
 Lycurgus's contrivance of iron money, as a preventive 
 of the corruption arising from the commercial system, 
 was clumsy and inefficient, compared with that part of 
 the Mosaic institution here alluded to. 
 
 Driven from their homes by fell monopoly, 
 
 P. 23. 1. 21. 
 
 The utility of all such agricultural improvements, as 
 diminish the quantum of human labour employed in the 
 cultivation of the soil, is very questionable. In the
 
 174 NOTES ON THE SABBATH. 
 
 Highlands of Scotland, black cattle were the produce 
 which in former times was cultivated. Afterwards it 
 was discovered, that the rearing of sheep was a mode 
 of farming which required a much smaller proportion, 
 of hands than the rearing of black cattle did : In other 
 words, the Highland proprietors discovered, that by the 
 substitution of sheep for black cattle, nine-tenths of 
 that fund, which formerly was consumed in the main- 
 tenance of a numerous tenantry, might be added to the 
 amount of their rent-rolls. The consequence has been, 
 that large districts of the Highlands have been nearly 
 depopulated. Make the supposition, that an improve- 
 ment, similar in its effects, should be made on the agri- 
 cultural system of the low country; suppose, for in- 
 stance, that a new kind of grain, or root, should be dis- 
 covered, the cultivation of which should require no more 
 than one-tenth part of the manual labour necessary for 
 the cultivation of our present crops; or suppose, that 
 there should be invented a machine for ti-rning up the 
 soil, as much superior to the plough as the plough is to 
 the spade ; and that the other implements of husbandry 
 should be improved on a proportional scale; the conse- 
 quence undoubtedly would be, that the peasantry of this 
 country would be nearly extirpated. It is true, that the 
 supposed improvements would not only increase the re- 
 venue of the landlord, but would add to the quantity of 
 agricultural produce, and that an increase of produce 
 would tend to an increase of population. I, however, 
 doubt very much, whether the increase of agricultural 
 produce is always attended with a proportional increase
 
 NOTES ON THE SABBATH. 175 
 
 of population. At any rate, the population that is in 
 this way acquired, must be added to the already over- 
 grown mass of manufacturing towns. No doubt the ap- 
 parent strength of the nation would be thus increased. 
 But a healthy and a virtuous populace constitute the 
 real power of a state; and it will not be said, that 
 crowded towns are favourable either to health or to mo- 
 rals. The country and the village inhabitants are, in 
 truth, the source of the national population ; and, if it 
 be drained, the towns themselves must of course decay ; 
 since the demand for live-supplies, consequent on the 
 consumpt of human life in towns, could no longer be 
 answered. But how are the evils arising from the 
 abridgment of agricultural labour to be counteracted ? 
 They may be partially counteracted by a limitation of 
 the extent of farms. If the arable districts were par- 
 celled out into possessions not exceeding a hundred 
 and fifty acres; and if every landlord and tenant were 
 bound, either to keep up a certain number of inhabited 
 cottages, in the proportion, let it be said, of one to each 
 thirty acres, or else, to pay triple land-tax and poor 
 rate, our crops would, perhaps, not be quite so abundant 
 as in process of time they may come to be, under the 
 present system of weeding out the small farmers and 
 cottagers ; but the nation would be richer in a more im- 
 portant kind of produce, a numerous peasantry ; and 
 even the landlords themselves would find more real 
 comfort and enjoyment in contemplating a populous and 
 happy neighbourhood, than in surveying large deserted 
 domains, teemiug with all the means of virtuous and
 
 176 NOTES ON THE SABBATH. 
 
 happy existence, but barren of inhabitants, to reap the 
 benefits so liberally spread out by the Father of mer- 
 cies. Perhaps another expedient to check rural depopu- 
 lation might be suggested, an equalization of the right 
 of succession. Commercial accumulation has, during the 
 last half century, gone far in re-uniting those enormous 
 estates which at one time commerce had disjoined. 
 Every great merchant and money-dealer wishes to be 
 the founder of what is called a family. Now, I would 
 indulge this vanity, by allowing such persons to found, 
 not one family, but a number of families, in proportion 
 to the number of their children. To the peerage, and 
 perhaps to families that have been long established in 
 their possessions, the law ought to be left as it now 
 stands. But if it be expedient to keep things as they 
 now are, to check the rapid progress of a hideous Oli- 
 garchy, the old law of inheritance, as it existed in Eng- 
 land prior to the Norman conquest, and as it now exists 
 in the county of Kent, ought to be made the general law 
 of the laud. 
 
 Enchained, endungeoned, forced by stripes to live. 
 
 P. 32. 1. 13. 
 
 " A child of about ten months old took sulk, and 
 would not eat The captain took up the child, and flog- 
 ged him with a cat. ' D n you,' said he, ' I'll make 
 you eat, or I'll kill you.' From this, and other ill treat- 
 ment, the child's legs swelled, and the captain ordered 
 some water to be made hot, for abating the swelling. 
 But even his tender mercies were cruel ; for the cook,
 
 NOTES ON THE SABBATH. 177 
 
 putting his hand into the water, said it was too hot. 
 ' D n him,' said the captain, ' put his feet in.' The 
 child was put into the water, and the nails and skin 
 came all off his feet. Oiled cloths were then put round 
 them. The child was then tied to a heavy log ; and two 
 or three days afterwards, the captain caught it up again, 
 and said, ' I will make you eat, or I will be the death of 
 you.' He immediately flogged the child again ; and in a 
 quarter of an hour, it died" Evidence before the House 
 of Commons. 
 
 O, England! England.' wash thy purpled hands. 
 P. 33. 1. 9. 
 
 I hold England literally and exclusively culpable in 
 regard to the slave-trade. The people of Scotland raised 
 their voice as one man against the monstrous iniquity. 
 In Parliament, indeed, their voice is but the repetition 
 of a whisper. 
 
 Not a single slave-ship sails from a Scottish port. 
 
 The slave-trade has been attempted to be defended 
 by appeals to the authority of the Old Testament The 
 existence of slavery appears, indeed, to have been tole- 
 rated among the Jews; but where is the authority for 
 any thing like the slave-trade ? Is it in the following ex- 
 press law ? " And he that stealeth a man, and selleth him, 
 or if he be found in his hand, he shall surely be put to 
 death," EXOD. xxi. 16.
 
 178 NOTES ON THE SABBATH. 
 
 Extracts from the Parliamentary Register (1791) of 
 the Debate on the Abolition of the Slave- Trade. 
 
 u There was another transaction that he (Mr Wil- 
 berforce) must distinctly state, not only on account of 
 its enormous magnitude, but also because it established, 
 beyond all controversy, the frequency of those acts of 
 rapine, which was the conclusion he had before refer- 
 red to. When General Rooke, a respectable member 
 of that House, was commanding in his Majesty's settle- 
 ment at Goree, some of the subjects of a neighbouring 
 king, with whom he was on terms of amity, had come 
 to pay him a friendly visit; there were from 100 to 150 
 oj them, men, women, and children; all was gaiety and 
 merriment; it was a scene to gladden the saddest, and 
 to soften the hardest heart : but a slave-captain, ever 
 faithful to the interests of his employers, is not so soon 
 thrown off his guard ; with what astonishment would 
 the Committee hear, that, in the midst of this festivity, 
 it was proposed to General Rooke, to seize the whole 
 of this unsuspecting multitude, hurry them on board 
 the ships, and carry them off to the West Indies ! Was 
 there ever a man bold enough to venture on such a pro- 
 posal ? Not only one, but three! three English slave- 
 captains preferred it as their joint request, alleging the 
 precedent cf a former governor.' If, in the annals of hu- 
 man wickedness, an instance of fouler treachery were 
 to be found, Mr Wilberforce was happy to be ignorant 
 of it. But it was not on account of its magnitude that 
 he wished to impress it on the Committee, so much as 
 because it was a pregnant proof of the frequency of the
 
 NOTES ON THE SABBATH. 179 
 
 acts of rapine he had before described ; for what must 
 be the habits of the slave-trade, what must have been 
 the familiarity with scenes of depredation produced on 
 the minds of slave-captains, when three of them durst 
 not only meditate within themselves, not only confer 
 one with another, but bring into the light of day, and 
 carry to a British officer of rank, a proposal, which one 
 would have thought too horrid to be allowed for a single 
 moment, even in the deepest retirement, in the darkest 
 recesses of the most depraved heart?" Mr WILBER- 
 FORCE'S Speech. 
 
 Mr Fox said, " There was one way, and an extreme- 
 ly good one, by which any man might come to a judge- 
 ment on these points Let him make the case his own. 
 What, said he, should any one of us, who are members 
 of this House, say, and how should we feel, if conquer- 
 ed, and carried away by a tribe as savage as our coun- 
 trymen on the coast of Africa show themselves to be ? 
 How should we brook the same indignities, or bear the 
 same treatment ourselves, which we do not scruple to 
 inflict ore them ?" Having made this appeal to the feel- 
 ings of the House, Mr Fox proceeded to observe, " that 
 great stress had been laid on the countenance that was 
 given to slavery by the Christian religion. So far was 
 this from being true, that he thought one of the most 
 splendid triumphs of Christianity was, its having caused 
 slavery to be so generally abolished, as soon as ever it 
 appeared in the world. One obvious ground on which 
 it did this, was, by teaching us, That in the sight of their 
 Maker all mankind are equal. The same effect might
 
 180 NOTES ON THE SABBATH. 
 
 be expected also from the general principles which ii 
 taught. Its powerful influence appeared to have done 
 more, in this respect, than all the ancient systems of phi- 
 losophy; though even in them, in point of theory, we 
 might trace great liberality and consideration for human 
 rights." Mr Fox's Speech. 
 
 " A gentleman, (Mr Ross, as appeared in evidence,) 
 while he was walking along, heard the shrieks of a fe- 
 male, issuing from a barn or out- ho use ; and as they 
 were much too violent to be excited by any ordinary pu- 
 nishment, he was prompted to go near, and see what 
 could be the matter. On looking in, he perceived a 
 young female, tied up to a beam by her wrists, entirely 
 naked, and in the act of involuntary writhing and swing- 
 ing, while the author of her torture was standing below 
 her, with a lighted torch in his hand, which he applied 
 to all the parts of her body, as it approached him. What 
 crime this miserable wretch had perpetrated, he knew 
 not ; but that was of little consequence, as the human 
 mind could not conceive a crime in any degree warran- 
 ting such a punishment." Mr Fox's Speech. 
 
 Mr Fox founded his argument on the grand basis of 
 justice Mr Pitt demonstrated the impolicy of the trade. 
 But if it was impolitic in the year 1791, it is doubly so 
 now. It is proved to be the slaughter-house of our ma- 
 riners. If, in other branches of foreign trade, there 
 were a proportional mortality among our seamen, it is 
 proved, that at the end of six years, we should look in 
 vain for a single mariner to mau our wooden walls. But
 
 NOTES ON THE SAEBATH. 181 
 
 the omnipotent fiat of Commerce hath said, Let there 
 be slavery. 
 
 The House of Commons took a fit of compunction 
 one year; they passed a resolution, that the slave-trade 
 should be abolished at or before the end of a few years. 
 Afterwards they threw out Mr Wilberforce's bill, and 
 passed a law for regulating the stowage of human car- 
 goes. The merchants had sworn, that this law would 
 be ruinous to their trade ; yet we still see their trade 
 flourishing in the face of their perjuries. We still see 
 80,000 men, women, children, and infants, year after 
 year, stolen, transported, sold, and dispersed, among the 
 West-India planters. Archdeacon Paley justly observes, 
 that " the slave-trade destroys more in a year, than the 
 inquisition does in a hundred, or perhaps hath done 
 since, its foundation." Such being the case, we may 
 talk of our public virtues, we may contrast them with 
 the crimes of the Corsican Bravo, we may compare 
 the erect spirit of a British Legislature with the vermi- 
 cular servility of what is called (strange prostitution of 
 language !) the Senate of France : But, alas ! when we 
 think of the slave-trade, our public virtue requires all 
 the deformity of the French foil to set it off. Bona- 
 parte deserves, no doubt, to be ranked among the most 
 atrocious class of murderers, since poison is sometimes 
 his instrument; witness Toussaint's fate. But, are we 
 much better ? Guinea-captains, heavy irons, apprentice- 
 surgeons, scourges, live-coals, thumb-screws, fetid air, 
 these are some of the instruments with which our com- 
 mercial executioners commit their regulated murders.
 
 182 NOTES ON THE SABBATH. 
 
 Most merciful guillotine ! how hast thou been calum- 
 niated ! calumniated, too, by the owners of those float- 
 ing scaffolds which traverse the ocean in quest of their 
 victims; those fiend-constructed arks, into which every 
 species of human misery is crowded. And who are 
 the owners of these tremendous engines ? Very honour- 
 able men ; men, who are thorough merchants ; men, who 
 buy a lot of character now and then when it is cheap, 
 and especially when it is sold by that species of auc- 
 tion called subscription; men, who, with one hand, put 
 a thousand pounds into their pocket (the moderate pro- 
 fits of a slaving trip), while, with the other, they sub- 
 scribe their fifty or their hundred guineas for an Infir- 
 mary, or a Bedlam. In this manner they compound 
 with public opinion ; and public opinion, when dazzled 
 by the splendour of wealth, is easily deceived. It thus 
 happens, that these calculating philosophers, who, by 
 a chemico-commercial process, convert the blood and 
 bones of the Africans into silver and gold, are very well 
 looked upon in society. They do not, with their own 
 hands, distribute alcohol and gun-powder for fomenting 
 the petty wars of the Africans : They do not stand by 
 at the mock-trials for witchcraft : They do not hold up 
 a purse in the face of the predetermined judge: They 
 are not the actual bidders at these judicial vendues : 
 They do not tear the son from the parent : No ; their 
 agents seize upon both, for the imputed crime of either: 
 They never have tossed the corded captives into the 
 bilge-water of the long-boat : They do not bolt the fet-
 
 NOTES ON THE SABBATH. 183 
 
 ters that couple the sable companions of despair : They 
 do not brandish the scourge, nor do they pickle the lace- 
 rated body of the obdurately resolved suicide. No, no ; 
 they only hear of such things; they only furnish the 
 means of carrying on the business; they only pocket the 
 profits when the business is done. 
 
 Let the retracting House of Commons think of these 
 things : 
 
 " And ye were now turned, and had done right in my 
 sight, in proclaiming every man liberty to his neighbour ; 
 and ye had made a covenant before me in the house 
 which is called by my name." 
 
 " But ye turned, and polluted my name, and caused 
 every man his servant, and every man his handmaid, 
 whom he had set at liberty at their pleasure, to return, 
 and brought them into subjection, to be unto you for ser- 
 vants and for handmaids." 
 
 " Therefore thus saith the Lord, Ye have not hearken- 
 ed unto me in proclaiming liberty every one to his bro- 
 ther, and every man to his neighbour : behold, I proclaim 
 a liberty for you, saith the Lord, to the sword, to the pes- 
 tilence, and to the famine.'' 
 
 " Behold, therefore, I have smitten mine hand at thy 
 dishonest gain which thou hast made." 
 
 " Can thine heart endure, or can thine hands be strong, 
 in the day that I shall deal with thee ?" 
 
 " The people of the land have used oppression, and 
 exercised robbery, and have vexed the poor and needy; 
 yea, they have oppressed the stranger wrongfully."
 
 184 NOTES ON THE SABBATH. 
 
 " Woe to him that buildeth a town with blood, and 
 stablisheth a city by iniquity."* 
 
 The tyrant's arm. P. 33. 1. 16. 
 
 The character of Bonaparte will furnish a specimen 
 of more monstrous moral deformity than was ever ex- 
 hibited in the historical museum. Possessing the power 
 of conferring on mankind a greater portion of happi- 
 ness than ever depended on the will of one man, he 
 has been the author of miseries incalculable. He could 
 hare given liberty to France ; he assumed absolute 
 power to himself. He could have emancipated Switzer- 
 land ; he rivetted the chains which the Directory had 
 forged. In St Domingo, his conduct was a complica- 
 tion of the most sottish impolicy, the most savage cruel- 
 ty, the most knavish perfidy, that ever disgraced the 
 annals of human nature. By this self-created monarch, 
 was Toussaint, the elected ruler of a free people, swin- 
 dled into a treaty, kidnapped during the peace that suc- 
 ceeded, torn from his wife and children, transported 
 in irons to France, immured in a dungeon, and, finally, 
 assassinated, (if uncontradicted accusation deserve any 
 credit.,) in a mode perfectly suitable to the commence- 
 ment and progress of the horrid history, poison, under 
 the disguise of medicine. Yet this masked murderer, 
 
 * The above note appeared in the first edition of the 
 Sabbath. The prospect of a final and total abolition of the 
 British slate-trade may now be hailed as a near one.
 
 NOTES ON THE SABBATH. 185 
 
 this druggist-assassin, presumes to exclaim against the 
 uplifted arm of an Arena, or a Georges. His effrontery 
 can only be surpassed by his hypocrisy. Compared to 
 him. Cromwell was a mere novice in the art. As to mi- 
 litary talents, how infinitely inferior is he to Moreau ! 
 Moreau saved, he sacrificed his soldiers. Moreau, des- 
 titute of resources, accomplished a retreat more splen- 
 did than the Corsican swindler's most celebrated victo- 
 ries. Moreau conduc'ed his soldiers to their homes: 
 the Corsicau deserted his in a distant, hostile, pestilen- 
 tial region. 
 
 Down like an avalanche. P. 35. 1. 22. 
 " After having descended about three hours, from the 
 time of our quitting Meysingen, we refreshed ourselves 
 and our horses in a delightful vale, strewed with ham- 
 lets; a sloping hill, adorned with variegated verdure 
 and wood, on one side ; on the other, the Rosenlavi 
 and Schartzwald glaciers, stretching between impending 
 rocks ; and before us the highest point of the Wetter- 
 horn lifting its pyramidical top, capped with eternal 
 snow. As we were taking our repast, we were suddenly 
 startled by a noise like the sound of thunder, occasion- 
 ed by a large body of snow falling from the top of the 
 mountain, which, in its precipitate descent, had the ap- 
 pearance of a torrent of water reduced almost into spray. 
 These avalanches (as they are called) are sometimes at- 
 tended with the most fatal consequences ; for when 
 they consist of enormous masses, they destroy every
 
 186 NOTES ON THE SABBATH. 
 
 thing in their course, and not (infrequently overwhelm 
 even a whole village." COXE. 
 
 The plaintive strain, that links, ffC.~P.36. 1. 13. 
 '* After dinner, some musicians of the country per- 
 formed the Renz de Vaches, that famous air which was 
 forbid to be played among the Swiss troops in the French 
 armies ; as it created in the soldiers such a longing re- 
 collection of their native country, that it produced in 
 them a settled melancholy, and occasioned frequent de- 
 sertion. The French call this sort of patriotic regret 
 maladie du pays. There is nothing peculiarly striking 
 in the tune; but, as it is composed of the most simple 
 notes, the powerful effect of its melody upon the Swiss 
 soldiers in a foreign land is the le^s remarkable. No- 
 thing, indeed, renews so lively a remembrance of former 
 scenes, as a piece of favourite music which we were ac- 
 customed to hear among our earliest and dearest con- 
 nections." COXE. 
 jf 
 
 Till beckoned by some kindly hand to sit. 
 
 P. 38. 1. 22. 
 
 It is most melancholy to see old respectable persons 
 Standing in the passages of a church. In former times, 
 the area of churches was common to all. The appro- 
 priation was certainly an encroachment. To brine mat- 
 ters back to their primitive state, would now be imprac- 
 ticable. But surely a very large portion of the house 
 of prayer ought to be allotted to the Lord's poor. Or 
 why should not free churches be established in all the
 
 NOTES ON THE SABBATH. 18? 
 
 considerable towns ? There are several in England. To 
 the hardship of exclusion from divine service, or of pre- 
 carious and mendicant admission, may be traced the dis- 
 sipated and idle habits of many originally well-disposed 
 persons. 
 
 Her hands could earn her bread, and freely give. 
 P. 38. 1. 24. 
 
 The character, here described, is well pourtrayed in 
 the following passage of Newton's Letters : " We have 
 lost another of the people here ; a person of much ex- 
 perience, eminent grace, wisdom, and usefulness. She 
 walked with God forty years. She was one of the 
 Lord's poor ; but her poverty was decent, sanctified, and 
 honourable. She lived respected, and her death is con- 
 sidered a public loss. It is a great loss to me : I shall 
 miss her advice and example, by which I have been of- 
 ten edified and animated. Almost the last words she 
 uttered, were, ' The Lord is my portion, saith my soul." 
 
 I have known many instances of such persons. The 
 character is, indeed, most highly respectable ; but it does 
 not obtain that respect and support which it so well me- 
 rits. In truth, wealth is so devoutly worshipped, that 
 virtuous poverty must, of necessity, be neglected, if not 
 despised. Every man is aspiring to the imaginary dig- 
 nity of the person who happens to be a little richer than 
 himself. The distinction of wealth is gradually absorb- 
 ing every other. I would prefer the aristocracy of pedi- 
 gree to that of riches. 5
 
 JS8 NOTES ON THE SABBATH. 
 
 There courage, that expects no tongue to praise. 
 
 P. 89. 1. 19. 
 
 To private soldiers and sailors the voice of praise very 
 seldom reaches; yet is their courage not less conspi- 
 cuous than that which their superiors in rank display. 
 Our military establishment, both at sea and on shore, 
 is, indeed, penurious in reward, while it is liberal in pu- 
 nishment. By extending the one, and restricting the 
 other, the regular army would be more expeditiously 
 recruited than by increase of bounties. Let the experi- 
 ment of less severe punishments be tried. The imme- 
 diate consequence would be, (to speak in mercantile 
 phrase,) a fall in the price of the article. But there is 
 still another, and a more effectual way of recruiting the 
 army. Follow the advice of that man, who, through 
 good report and through bad report, has stood the sted- 
 fast friend of justice and of freedom, to whose intui- 
 tive ken the most complicated subjects are simple, the 
 most opaque transparent. His advice (but. alas ! his 
 prescient advice is seldom regarded until the event ve- 
 rify the prediction) was, to restrict the term of service 
 to a moderate period, to five, six, or seven years. If 
 a man, engaging himself for half a year as a common ser- 
 vant, were asked, for what higher rate of wages he would 
 bind himself during life ? his answer would probably be, 
 that no reward would tempt him to bind himself for 
 life. Or, if he were to be so allured, would he not ask 
 An enormous hire ? To indent one's person for life, is a 
 tremendous engagement. But a limitation of the term 
 pf service would be highly expedient in another view.
 
 NOTES ON THE SABBATH. 189 
 
 .Reckoning the regular troops of Britain at 200,000, if 
 each man were to be discharged at the end of seven 
 years Irom the time of his enlistment, is it not obvious, 
 that we should have a yearly addition of about 27,000 
 thorough-bred soldiers, ready to fall into the ranks of 
 the strictly defensive department of our national arma- 
 ment? Say that the addition were to be only 20,000, 
 what an accession of real strength, of discipline, of expe- 
 rience, of confidence, would he the result ! In five years 
 there would be nearly 100,000 veterans (for a soldier, 
 who has served seven years, I would call a veteran) add- 
 ed to our home force. No one can form a probable 
 guess at the duration of the present war ; nor is it like- 
 ly, that many of the present generation will see the day, 
 when they may, with safety, turn their swords into 
 plough-shares, and their spears into pruning-hooks. We 
 must continue in the attitude of an armed nation. We 
 must labour with the one hand, and wield our weapons 
 with the other. f 
 
 Or cheering with inquiries from the heart. 
 
 P. 40. 1. 12. 
 In some hospitals, the patients are supposed to be 
 
 f The above note was inserted in the first edition of the 
 Sabbath. The just, the humane, the wise maxim of enlist- 
 ment for a limited time, has been since enacted into a law. 
 The tuck of the recruiting drum is now no longer a sound of 
 horror to the parent's ear.
 
 190 NOTES ON THE SABBATH. 
 
 treated with all due justice, if the bolus and the knife be 
 liberally administered. Nothing is done to amuse or to 
 console. 
 
 Blest be the female votaries. P.42. 1. 22. 
 The nuns, called Beguines, devote the whole of their 
 time to attendance on the sick, whether in hospitals or 
 in private houses. They are habited in black, and, wheu 
 going abroad, they wear deep black veils. 
 
 Call forth the dead, and re-unite the dust 
 (Transformed and purified) to angel souls. 
 
 P. 43. 1. 17. 18. 
 
 Every one has experienced how much contrast en- 
 hances pleasure, and aggravates pain. Perhaps in creat- 
 ed beings, perfect happiness is impossible, without the 
 contrast of recollected misery. This consideration af- 
 fords an answer to those persons, who censure the re- 
 surrection of the body as a provision unnecessary and 
 unwise, who say, that the joys of a blrssed spirit can- 
 not be increased by a union with a material budy, how- 
 ever excellent in form, structure, and powers. I would 
 ask, what other provision could possibly furnish the 
 pleasure derived from contrast, so vividly, so constant- 
 ly ? A celestial form, the habitation of that being, who 
 formerly dwelt in a body, frail, diseased, mortal ! To 
 the man who had been blind in his earthly abode, what 
 a change ! His sightless orbs transformed into eyes of 
 telescopic ken ! To the palsied ! That body which 
 could not move itself, endowed, perhaps, with electric
 
 NOTES ON THE SABBATH. 101 
 
 velocity ! that once feeble, faultering voice attuned to 
 the harmonies of the heavenly choirs, " who sing the 
 song of Moses, the servant of God, and the song of the 
 Lamb, saying, Great and marvellous are all thy works, 
 Lord God Almighty; just and true are thy ways, thou 
 King of saints : Alleluia, for the Lord God Omnipotent 
 reigneth !"
 
 NOTES 
 
 ON THE 
 
 SABBATH WALKS. 
 
 To think that now the townsman zeanders forth. 
 P. 51. 1. 6. 
 
 THERE cannot be a more pleasing or a more consola- 
 tory idea presented to the human mind, than that of one 
 universal pause of labour throughout the whole Chris- 
 tian world at the same moment of time ; diffusing rest, 
 comfort, and peace, through a large part of the habi- 
 table globe, and affording ease and refreshment, not on- 
 ly to the lowest part of our own species, but to their 
 fellow-labourers in the brute creation. Even these are 
 enabled to join in this silent act of adoration, this mute 
 kind of homage to the great Lord of all : and, although 
 they are incapable of any sentiments of religion, yet, by 
 this means, they become sharers in the blessings of it. 
 Every man, of the least sensibility, must see, must feel, 
 the beauty and utility of such an institution as this ; and
 
 NOTES ON SABBATH WALKS. 1Q3 
 
 must see, at the same time, the cruelty of invading this 
 most valuable privilege of the inferior class of mankind, 
 and breaking in upon that sacred repose, which God 
 himself has, in pity to their sufferings, given to those 
 that stand most in need of it. It was a point in which 
 it highly became the majesty and the goodness of heaven 
 itself to interpose. And happy was it for the world that 
 it did so. For, had man, unfeeling man, been left to 
 himself, with no other spur to compassion than na- 
 tural instinct, or unassisted reason, there is but too much 
 ground to apprehend, he would have been deaf to the 
 cries of his labouring brethren, would have harassed 
 and worn them out with incessant toil ; and when they 
 implored, by looks and signs of distress, some little 
 intermission, would perhaps have, answered them in 
 the language of Pharaoh's task-masters, " Ye are idle, 
 ye are idle. There shall not aught of your daily 
 tasks be diminished ; let more work be laid upon 
 them, that they may labour therein." Exod. v. 9, 11, 
 17. 
 
 " That this is no uncandid representation of the natu- 
 ral hardness of the human heart, till it is subdued and 
 softened by the influences of divine grace, we have but 
 too many unanswerable proofs, in the savage treatment 
 which the slaves of the ancients, even of the most civi- 
 lized and polished ancients, met with from their unre- 
 lenting masters. To them, alas ! there was no Sabbath, 
 no seventh day of rest ! The whole week, the whole 
 year, was, in general, with but few exceptions, one un-
 
 194 NOTES ON SABBATH WALKS. 
 
 interrupted round of labour, tyranny, and oppression." 
 BISHOP POKTEUS, 
 
 Your he/pleas charge drive from the tempting spot, 
 
 P. 56. 1.24. 
 
 During the winter season, there are many shepherds 
 lost in the snow. I have heard of ten being lost in one 
 parish. When life-boats, for the preservation of ship- 
 wrecked mariners, and institutions for the recovery of 
 drowned persons, obtain so much of the public atten- 
 tion and patronage, it is strange that no means are ever 
 thought of, for the preservation of the lives of shepherds 
 during snow-storms. I believe, that in nine instances 
 out of ten, the death of the unhappy persons who perish 
 in the snow, is owing to their losing their way. A proof 
 of this is, that very few are lost in the day-time. The 
 remedy, then, is both easy and obvious. Let means be 
 used for enabling the shepherd, in the darkest night, to 
 know precisely the spot at which he is, and the bearings 
 of the surrounding grounds. Snow-storms are almost 
 always accompanied with wind. Suppose a pole, fifteen 
 feet high, well fixed in the ground, with two cross spars 
 placed near the. bottom, to denote the airts, or points of 
 the compass; a bell hung at the top of this pole, with 
 a piece of flat wood attached to it, projecting upward, 
 would ring with the slightest breeze. For a few hun- 
 dred pounds, every square mile of the southern district 
 of Scotland might be supplied with such bells. As they 
 would be purposely made to have different tones, the 
 shepherd would soon be able to distinguish one from an-
 
 NOTES ON SABBATH WALKS. 195 
 
 ether. He could never be more than a mile distant 
 from one or other of them. On coming to the spot, he 
 would at once know the points of the compass, and of 
 course the direction in which his home lay.
 
 NOTES 
 
 BIBLICAL PICTURES. 
 
 Like that untouching cincture, which enzones 
 The globe of Saturn. P. 61. 1. 2.3. 
 " It is difficult (says Dr Paley) to bring the imagination 
 to conceive, (what yet, to judge tolerably of the matter, 
 it is necessary to conceive,) how loose, if we may so ex- 
 press it, the heavenly bodies are. Enormous globes, 
 held by nothing, confined by nothing, are turned into 
 free and boundless space, each to seek its course by the 
 virtue of an invisibje principle; but a principle, one, 
 common, and the same in all, and ascertainable. To 
 preserve such bodies from being lost, from running to- 
 gether in heaps, from hindering and distracting one an- 
 other's motions, in a degree inconsistent with any conti- 
 nuing order : t. e. to cause them to form planetary sys- 
 tems, systems that, when formed, can be upheld, and,
 
 NOTES ON BIBLICAL PICTURES. 197 
 
 most especially, systems accommodated to the organized 
 and sensitive natures, which the planets sustain, as we 
 know to be the case, where alone we can know what the 
 case is, upon our earth : All this requires an intelligent 
 interposition, because it can be demonstrated concern- 
 ing it, that it requires an adjustment of force, distance, 
 direction, and velocity, out of the reach of chance to 
 have produced ; an adjustment, in its view to utility, si- 
 milar to that which we see in ten thousand subjects of 
 nature which are nearer to us ; but in power, and in the 
 extent of space through which that power is exerted, 
 stupendous." Natural Theology, chap. xxii. 
 
 " Saturn, when viewed through a good telescope, 
 makes a more remarkable appearance than any of the 
 other planets. Galileo first discovered his uncommon 
 shape, which he thought to be like two small globes, one 
 on each side of a large one : and he published his disco- 
 very in a Latin sentence ; the meaning of which was, 
 that he had seen him appear with three bodies; though, 
 in order to keep the discovery a secret, the letters were 
 transposed. Having viewed him for two years, he was 
 surprised to see him become quite round without these 
 appendages, and then, alter some time, to assume them 
 as before. These adjoining globes were what are now 
 called the ansa of his ring, the true shape of which was 
 first discovered by Huygens, about forty years after Ga- 
 lileo, first with a telescope of twelve feet, and then with 
 one of twenty-three feet, which magnified objects an 
 hundred times. From the discoveries made by him and 
 ether astronomers, it appears, that this planet is sur-
 
 198 NOTES ON 
 
 rounded by a broad thin ring, the edge of which reflects 
 little or none of the sun's light to us, but the planes of 
 the ring reflect the light in the same manner that the 
 planet itself does; and if we suppose the diameter of 
 Saturn to be divided into three equal parts, the diame- 
 ter of the ring is about seven of these parts. The ring 
 is detached from the body of Saturn in such a manner, 
 that the distance between the innermost part of the ring 
 and the body is equal to its breadth. If we had a view 
 of the planet and his ring, with our eyes perpendicular 
 to one of the planes of the latter, we should see them as 
 in fig. 80. : but our eye is never so much elevated above 
 either plane as to have the visual ray stand at right 
 angles to it, nor indeed is it ever elevated more than 
 about thirty degrees above it ; so that the ring, being 
 commonly viewed at an oblique angle, appears of an oval 
 form, and, through very good telescopes, double, as re- 
 presented fig. 18. and 153. Both the outward and in- 
 ward rim is projected into an ellipsis, more or less ob- 
 long, according to the different degrees of obliquity with 
 which it is viewed. Sometimes our eye is in the plane 
 of the ring, and then it becomes invisible ; either be- 
 cause the outward edge is not fitted to reflect the sun's 
 light, or more probably because it is too thin to be seen 
 at such a distance. As the plane of this ring keeps al- 
 ways parallel to itself, that is, its situation in one part 
 of the orbit is always parallel to that in any other part, 
 it disappears twice in every revolution of the planet, 
 that is, about once in fifteen years ; and he sometimes 
 appears quite round for nine months together. At other
 
 BIBLICAL PICTURES. 1Q9 
 
 times, the distance betwixt the body of the planet and 
 the ring is very perceptible; insomuch, that Mr Whis- 
 ton tells us of Dr Clarke's father having seen a star 
 through the opening, and supposed him to have been the 
 only person who ever saw a sight so rare ; as the opening, 
 though certainly very large, appears very small to us. 
 When Saturn appears round, if our eye be in the plane 
 of the ring, it will appear as a dark line across the middle 
 of the planet's disk ; and if our eye be elevated above 
 the plane of the ring, a shadowy belt will be visible, 
 caused by the shadow of the ring, as well as by the in- 
 terposition of part of it betwixt the eye and the planet 
 The shadow of the ring is broadest when the sun is most 
 elevated, but its obscure parts appear broadest when our 
 eye is most elevated above the plane of it. When it ap- 
 pears double, the ring next the body of the planet ap- 
 pears brightest ; when the ring appears of an elliptical 
 form, the parts about the ends of the largest axis are 
 called the ansa, as has been already mentioned. Ency- 
 clopedia Britannica. 
 
 And with the forming mass floated along, 
 
 P. 61. 1. 4. 
 
 May we not suppose, that the mass of the earth, while 
 yet forming, received its progressive and rotatory mo- 
 tions ? 
 
 In rapid course.~-P.6l. 1 5. 
 
 " In astronomy, the great thing is, to raise the imagi- 
 nation to the subject, and that oitentimes in opposition
 
 200 NOTES ON 
 
 to the impression made upon the senses. An illusion, 
 for example, must be got over, arising from the distance 
 at which we view the heavenly bodies, viz. the apparent 
 slowness of their motions. The moon shall take some 
 hours in getting half a yard from a star which it touch- 
 ed. A motion so deliberate, we may think easily guid- 
 ed. But what is the fact ? The moon, in fact, is all this 
 while driving through the heavens at the rate of consi- 
 derably more than two thousand miles in an hour; 
 which is more than double of that with which a ball is 
 shot off from the mouth of a cannon. Yet is this pro- 
 digious rapidity as much under government, as if the 
 planet proceeded ever so slowly, or were conducted in 
 its course inch by inch." PALEY'S Natural Theology, 
 Chap. xxii. 
 
 And perfect, ere the sixth day's evening star 
 On Paradise arose.--?. 61. 1. 8. 9. 
 " And God saw every thing that he had made, and be- 
 hold it was very good. And the evening and the morn- 
 ing were the sixth day. 
 
 " Thus the heavens and the earth were finished, and 
 all the host of them." Genesis, c. i. v. 31. ; c. ii. v. 1. 
 
 Amid the margin flags, 
 Closed in a bulrush ark, the babe is left. 
 
 P. 64. 1. 1. 2. 
 
 " And when she could no longer hide him, she took 
 for him an ark of bulrushes, and daubed it with slime,
 
 BIBLICAL PICTURES. 2O1 
 
 and with pitch, and put the child therein ; and she laid 
 it in the flags by the river's brink." Exodus, c. ii. v. 3. 
 
 His sister waits 
 Fur off. P. 64. 1.3.4. 
 
 " And his sister stood afar off, to wit what would be 
 done to him." -V.4. 
 
 The royal maid, surrounded by her train. 
 
 P. 64. 1. 5. 
 
 " And the daughter of Pharaoh came down to wash 
 herself at the river, and her maidens walked along by 
 the river's side ; and when she saw the ark among th 
 flags, she sent her maid to fetch it." V. 5. 
 
 The rushy lid is oped, 
 And wakes the infant, smiling in his tears. 
 
 P. 64. 1.8.9. 
 
 " And when she had opened it, she saw the child ; and 
 behold the babe wept." V. 6. 
 
 Jephtha's vow. P. 65. 
 
 " And Jephtha vowed a vow unto the Lord, and said, 
 If thou shalt without fail deliver the children of Ammon 
 into mine hands, then it shall be, that whatsoever cometh 
 forth of the doors of my house to meet me, when I re- 
 turn in peace from the children of Ammon, shall surely 
 be the Lord's, and I will offer it up for a burnt offering." 
 Judges, c.xi. v.30. 31.
 
 202 NOTES ON 
 
 Forth from the grove 
 She foremost glides of all the minstrel band. 
 
 P. 67. I. 4. 5. 
 
 " And Jephtha came to Mizpeh unto his house, and, 
 behold, his daughter came out to meet him with tim- 
 brels, and with dances ; and she was his only child : be- 
 sides her he bad neither son nor daughter." V. 34. 
 
 " Alas, my daughter! thou hast brought me low" 
 
 P. 67. 1.9. 
 
 " And it came to pass, when he saw her, that he rent 
 his clothes, and said, ' Alas, my daughter ! thou hast 
 brought me very low, and thou art one of them that 
 trouble me : for I have opened my mouth unto the 
 Lord, and I cannot go back." V. 35. 
 
 Deep was the furrow in the royal brow, 
 When David's hand, 4-C.P. 68. 1. 1. 2. 
 " And it came to pass, when the evil spirit from God 
 was upon Saul, that David took an harp, and played 
 with his hand : so Saul was refreshed, and was well, and 
 the evil spirit departed from him." 1 Samuel, c. xvi. 
 v.23. 
 
 Kindles the eye of Saul; his arm is poised; 
 Harmless the javelin quivers in the wall. 
 
 P. 69. 1. 10. 11. 
 
 " And the evil spirit from the Lord was upon Saul, as 
 he sat in his house with the javelin in his hand : and Da- 
 yid played with his hand. And Saul sought to smite
 
 BIBLICAL PICTURES. 203 
 
 David even to the wall with the javelin ; but he slipped 
 away out of Saul's presence, and he smote the javelin 
 into the wall : and David fled, and escaped that night." 
 \ Samuel, c. xix. v. 9. 10. 
 
 Cowley has some curious lines on this subject : 
 
 " In treacherous haste he's sent for to the king, 
 And with him bid his charmful lyre to bring. 
 The king, they saw, lies raging in a fir, 
 Which does no cure, but sacred tunes, admit ; 
 And true it was soft music did appease 
 Th' obscure fantastic rage of Saul's disease." 
 
 After a dissertation on music, there follows the psalm 
 which David sung. The first stanza describes the pas- 
 sage through the Red Sea. The second proceeds thus: 
 
 Old Jordan's waters to their spring 
 Start back, with sudden fright ; 
 The spring, amazed at sight, 
 Asked, what news from sea they bring? 
 The mountains shook ; and, to the mountain's side/ 
 The little hills leapt round, themselves to hide. 
 
 As young affrighted lambs, 
 
 When they aught dreadful spy, 
 Run trembling to their helpless dams; 
 
 The mighty sea and river by, 
 Were glad, for their excuse, to see the hills to fly.
 
 04 NOTES ON 
 
 Thus sung the great musician to his lyre, 
 And Saul's black rage grew softly to retire ; 
 But envy's serpent still with him remained, 
 And the wise charmer's healthful voice disdained. 
 Th' unthankful king, cured truly of his fit, 
 Seems to be drowned, and buried still in it. 
 From his past madness draws this wicked use, 
 To sin dUguisedj and murder with excuse : 
 For whilst the fearless youth his cure pursues, 
 And the soft medicine, with art, renews, 
 The barbarous patient casts at him his spear, 
 (The usual sceptre that rough hand did bear,) 
 Casts it with violent strength ; but, into th' room, 
 An arm more sure and strong than his was come, 
 An angel, whose unseen and easy might, 
 Put by the weapon, and misled it right." 
 
 COWLEV'S Davideis, 
 
 When Elijah, by command 
 Of God, journeyed to Cherith'sfailing brook. 
 
 P. 70. 1. 2. S. 
 
 " So he went, and did according to tlie word of the 
 Lord : for he went and dwelt by the brook Cherith, thai 
 is before Jordan.* 1 1 Kingt, c.xvii. v. 5. 
 
 No raindrop falls. P. 70. 1. 4. 
 
 " And it came to pass after a while, that the brook 
 dried up, because there had been no rain in the land." 
 V.7.
 
 BIBLICAL PICTURES. 05 
 
 The shepherds, stretched 
 
 On the green sward, surveyed the starry vault. 
 P. 72. 1. 3. 4. 
 
 " And there were, in the same country, shepherds 
 abiding; in the field, keeping watch over their flock by 
 night." Luke, c.ii. v. 8. 
 
 Shedding bright, 
 Upon the folded flocks, a heavenly radiance. 
 
 P. 72. 1. 12 IS. 
 
 " And, lo, the angel of the Lord came upon them, and 
 the glory of the Lord shone round about them : and thev 
 were sore afraid." V. 9. 
 
 When, lo ! upon the cloud, 
 A. multitude of Seraphim, enthroned, 
 Sang praises, $c.P. 73. 1. 5. 6. 7. 
 " And, suddenly, there was with the angel a multitude 
 of the heavenly host, praising God, and saying, Glory to 
 God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will to- 
 wards men." V. IS. 14. 
 
 Who is my mother, or my brethren ? P. 74. 1. 1. 
 "And the multitude sat about him; and they said 
 unto him, Behold thy mother and thy brethren without 
 seek for thee. And he answered them, saying, Who is 
 my mother, or my brethren ? And he looked round about 
 on them which sat about him, and said, Behold, my mo- 
 ther and my brethren ! for whosoever shall do the will
 
 206 NOTES ON 
 
 of God, the same is my brother, and my sister, and mo- 
 ther." Mark, c. iii. v, 3235 . 
 
 Blind, poor, and help/ess, Bartimeus sate. 
 
 P. 75. 1. 1. 
 
 " And they came to Jericho : and as he went out of 
 Jericho with his disciples, and a great number of people, 
 blind Bartimeus, the son of Timeus, sat by the highway- 
 side, begging." Mark, c. x. v. 46. 
 
 Heard that the Nazarene teas passing by, 
 
 He cried, $c. P. 75. 1. 9. 10. 
 
 " And when he heard that it was Jesus of Nazareth, 
 he began to cry out, and say, Jesus, thou son of David, 
 have mercy on me. And many charged him that he 
 should hold his peace : but he cried the more a great 
 deal, Thou son of David, have mercy on me. And Jesus 
 stood still, and commanded him to be called. And they 
 call the blind man, saying unto him, Be of good com- 
 fort, rise ; he calleth thee. And he, casting away his 
 garment, rose, and came to Jesus. And Jesus answered, 
 and said unto him, What wilt thou that I should do un- 
 to thee? The blind man said unto him, Lord, that I 
 might receive my sight. And Jesus said unto him, Go 
 ihy way; thy faith hath made thee whole. And imme- 
 diately he received his sight, and followed Jesus in the 
 wa y."-_V.47 5.2.
 
 BIBLICAL PICTURES. 207 
 
 Suffer that little children come to me, 
 
 Forbid them not. P. 76. 1. 1. 2. 
 
 " And they brought young children to him, that he 
 should touch them ; and his disciples rebuked those that 
 brought them. But when Jesus saw it he was much dis- 
 pleased, and said unto them, Suffer the little children to 
 come unto me, and forbid them not : for of such is the 
 kingdom of God Verily I say unto you, whosoever 
 shall not receive the kingdom of God as a little child, he 
 shall not enter therein. And he took them up in his 
 arms, put his hands upon them, and blessed them." 
 V. 1316. 
 
 The roaring tumult of the billowed sea 
 Awakes him not.P 77. 1. 1. 2. 
 
 " And there arose a great storm of wind, and the 
 waves beat into the ship, so that it was now full. And 
 he was in the hinder part of the ship asleep on a pil- 
 low : and they awake him, and say unto him, Master, 
 carest thou not that we perish ?" C. iv. v. 37. 38. 
 
 Rebuked the wind, and said unto the sea, 
 Peace, be thou stilt.' P. 77. I. 12. 13. 
 " And he arose, and rebuked the wind ; and said un- 
 to the sea, Peace, be still. And the wind ceased, and 
 there was a great calm." V. 39.
 
 20S NOTES ON 
 
 Upon a towering wave is seen 
 The semblance of a foamy wreath upright. 
 
 P. 78. 1. 4. 5. 
 
 " And he saw them toiling in rowing : (for the wind 
 was contrary unto them :) and, about the fourth watch 
 of the night, he cometh unto them walking upon the sea, 
 and would have passed by them." C.vi. v. 48. 
 
 The voyagers appalled, 
 Shrink from the fancied Spirit of the Flood. 
 
 P. 78. 1. 7. 8. 
 
 u But, when they saw him walking upon the sea, they 
 supposed it had been a spirit, and cried out : (for they 
 all saw him, and were troubled :) and immediately he 
 talked with them, and saith unto them, Be of good cheer: 
 it is I ; be not afraid. V. 49. 50. 
 
 Up he ascends, $c. P. 78. 1. 12. 
 " And he went up unto them into the ship ; and the 
 wind ceased : and they were sore amazed in themselves 
 beyond measure, and wondered." V. 51. 
 
 The dumb cured. P. 80. 
 
 This miracle, the reality of which the Pharisees could 
 not deny, (Matth. c. ix. v. 34.) is one of a higher order 
 than those which consisted in healing diseases. Dumb- 
 ness implies, in general, not only a defect in the organs 
 of speech, or of hearing, or of both, but ignorance of 
 language. Here, then, was a miracle performed on the 
 mind.
 
 THE BIBLICAL PICTURES. 209 
 
 J Tis finished. P. 81. 1. 1. 
 
 " He said, it is finished ; and he bowed his head, and 
 gave up the ghost." John, c. xix. v. 30. 
 
 Beholding him far off", 
 They, who had ministered unto him. 
 
 P. 81. 1. 2. 3. 
 
 <( And many women were there (beholding afar off) 
 which followed Jesus from Galilee, ministering unto 
 him." Matthew, c. xxvii. v. 55. 
 
 The tempk's Veil 
 Is rent. P. 81. 1. 4. 5. 
 
 " And, behold, the veil of the temple was rent in 
 twain from the top to the bottom ; and the earth did 
 quake."V. 51. 
 
 Appalled, the leaning soldier feels the spear 
 Shake in his grasp; the planted standard falls 
 Upon the heaving ground. P. 81. 1. 8. 9. 10. 
 " Now when the centurion, and they that were with 
 him watching Jesus, saw the earth quake, and those 
 things that were done, they feared greatly, saying, Truly 
 this was the son of God." V. 54. 
 
 The sun is dimmed, 
 And darkness shrouds the body of the Lord. 
 
 P. 81. 1. 10. 11. 
 
 u Now, from the sixth hour, there was darkness over 
 all the land, unto the ninth hour." -V. 45. 
 o
 
 210 NOTES ON 
 
 No sound 
 
 Was heard, save of the notching soldier's foot. 
 P. 82. I. 5. 6. 
 
 " Pilate said unto them, Ye have a watch : go your 
 way ; make it as sure as you can. So they went, and 
 made the sepulchre sure ; sealing the stone, and setting 
 a watch." Matthew, c. xxvii. v. 65. 66. 
 
 Within the rock-barred sepulchre, <$ c.~P. 82. 1. 7. 
 " And he bought 'fine linen, and took him down, and 
 wrapped him in the linen, and laid him in a sepulchre 
 that was hewn out of a rock, and rolled a stone unto the 
 door of the sepulchre." Mark, c. xv. v. 46. 
 
 Trembled the earth; 
 The ponderous gate of stone was rolled away. 
 
 P. 83. 1. 7. 8. 
 
 " And, behold, there was a great earthquake ; for the 
 angel of the Lord descended from heaven, and came and 
 rolled back the stone from the door, and sat upon it." 
 Matthew, c. xxviii. v. 2. 
 
 His faithful followers, assembled, sang 
 A hymn, low-breathed, 4-c. P. 84. 1. 3.4. 
 u Then the same day at evening, being the first day of 
 the week, when the doors were shut where the disciples 
 were assembled, for fear of the Jews, came Jesus, and 
 stood in the midst, and saith unto them, Peace be unt 
 you." John, c. xx. v. 19. 
 
 2
 
 THE BIBLICAL PICTURES. 211 
 
 Listen that voice ! upon the hill of .Mars, 
 Rolling in bolder thunders, 4-0-- P. 85. 1. 1. 2. 
 " Then Paul stood in the midst of Mars-hill, and said, 
 
 Ye men of Athens, I perceive that in all things ye are 
 
 too superstitious." Acts, c. xvii. v. 22. 
 
 The Stoic's moveless frozen ; the vacant stare 
 Of Epicurus' herd, SfC.P. 85. 1. 7. 8. 
 " Then certain philosophers of the Epicureans and of 
 the Stoics encountered him : And some said, What will 
 this babbler say ? other some, He seemeth to be a setter 
 forth of strange gods ; because he preached unto them 
 Jesus, and the resurrection. And they took him, and 
 brought him unto Areopagus, saying, May we know what 
 this new doctrine, whereof thou speakest, is ? For thou 
 bringest strange things unto our ears : we would know, 
 therefore, what these things mean." Acts, c. xvii. v. IS- 
 SO. 
 
 The Areopagite tribunal dread, 
 
 From whence the doom of Socrates was uttered, 
 
 P. 85. 1. 10. 11. 
 
 The highest court of criminal jurisdiction in Athens. 
 It was held on the hill of Mars. By its sentence So- 
 crates was condemned to death, for attempting to sub- 
 stitute a pure and rational system of religion, for the 
 absurd and extravagant superstition which then prevail- 
 ed.
 
 212 NOTES. 
 
 The Judge ascended to the judgment-seat. 
 
 P. 87. 1. 1. 
 
 This representation of Paul I have not founded on the 
 circumstances of any one of his appearances before the 
 Roman governors. I have alluded to facts, which hap- 
 pened at his apprehension, as well as at his arraignments 
 before Felix, Festusj and Agrippa. 
 
 No more he feels, upon his high-raised arm, 
 
 The ponderous chain. P. 87. 1. 13. 
 u And Paul said, I would to God that not only thoir, 
 but all that hear me this day, were both, almost, and al- 
 together, such as I am, except these bonds. Acts, c. xxvi. 
 v.29. 
 
 And, while he reasons high 
 Of justice, temperance, and the life to come, 
 The Judge shrinks trembling at the prisoner's voice. 
 
 P. 88. 1. 6,7,8. 
 
 u And as he reasoned of righteousness, temperance, 
 and judgment to come, Felix trembled." Acts, c.xxiv. 
 r. 25. 
 
 Like joining deu--drops on the blushing rose. 
 
 P. 101. 1.7. 
 
 I have seen the same thought in a recent publication 
 of Mr Southey's ; but the above line was written by me 
 about ten years ago, and inserted, very soon after it was 
 written, in the Kelso Mail.
 
 NOTES. 213 
 
 Hove thee,for thou trustest me. 'P. 125. 1. 4. 
 In winter 1798-99 I had several birds for my guests, 
 a redbreast, a hedge-sparrow, and a female shilfa. The 
 redbreast remained three or four weeks with me ; the 
 other two only a few days, for the severity of the storm 
 relaxed very soon. 
 
 Who trade in tortures ? P. 131. 1. 9. 
 " Some refuse sustenance and die. In the ships of 
 Surgeons Falconbridge, Wilson, and Trotter, and of 
 Messrs Millar and Town, are instances of their starving 
 themselves to death. In all these they were compelled, 
 some by whipping, and others by the thumb-screw,* and 
 other means, to take their food ; but all punishment was 
 ineffectual, they were determined to die. In the very 
 act of chastisement, Mr Wilson says, they have looked 
 up at him, and said, with a smile, ' Presently we shall be 
 no more" Abridgement of the Evidence relative to the 
 Slave Trade, 13. 14. 
 
 * " To show the severity of this punishment, Mr Dove says, 
 that, while two slaves were thumb-screwed, the sweat ran 
 down their faces, and they trembled as under a violent ague 
 fit. Mr Ellison has known them to die, a mortification ha- 
 ving taken place in their thumbs, in consequence of these
 
 214 NOTES. 
 
 Whose human cargoes cart fully are packt, 
 By rule and square, according to the act ! 
 
 P. IS 1.1.11. 12. 
 
 The act of Parliament, by which a certain space is 
 allotted to each slave, has, no doubt, alleviated the mi- 
 series of what is called the middle passage. I doubt, 
 however, if the penalty of L. 30 for each slave, beyond 
 the complement, be a punishment sufficiently severe. 
 
 As to the present state of the slaves in the West In- 
 dies, and the spirit which pervades the Colonial Assem- 
 blies, a pretty accurate notion may be formed from the 
 following extracts of letters from the Governor of Bar- 
 badoes : 
 
 During the session of Parliament, 1804, the following 
 extract of a letter from Lord Seaforth, the governor of 
 Barbadoes, to Lord Ilobart, dated at Barbadoes, the 
 18th of March, 1802, was laid on the table of the House 
 of Commons. " Your Lordship will observe, in the last 
 day's proceedings of the Assembly, that the majority of 
 the House had taken considerable offence at a message of 
 mine, recommending an act to be passed, to make the 
 murder of a shire felony. At present, the fine for the 
 crime is only fifteen pounds currency , or ELEVEN POUKDS 
 TOUR SHILLINGS sterling." 
 
 On the 13th of November, 1801, his Lordship thus 
 writes to Earl Camden : " I inclose four papers, con- 
 taining, from different quarters, reports on the horrid 
 murders I mentioned in some former letters. They arc 
 selected from a great number, among which there is not 
 one in contradiction of the horrible facts, though several
 
 NOTES. 215 
 
 of the letters are very concise and defective. The truth 
 is, that nothing has given me more trouble than to get 
 at the bottom of these businesses, so horribly absurd are 
 the prejudices of the people. However, a great part of 
 my object is answered, by the alarm my interference has 
 excited, and the attention it has called to the business. 
 Bills are already prepared to make murder felony ; but 
 I fear they will be thrown out for the present in the As- 
 sembly. The Council are unanimous on the side of hu- 
 manity." 
 
 In a subsequent letter, dated the 7th of January, 1805, 
 Lord Seaforth thus writes : " I inclose the Attorney-Ge- 
 neral's letter to me on the subject of the negroes so most 
 wantonly murdered. I am sorry to say, SEVERAL OTHER 
 
 INSTANCES OF THE SAME BARBARITY have OCCUrred, 
 
 with which I have not troubled your Lordship, as I on- 
 ly zeished to make you acquainted with the subject in ge- 
 neral." 
 
 General Prevost, the governor of Dominica, states, 
 " That the legislature of the island of Dominica is dis- 
 tinguished by the laws it has passed for the encourage- 
 ment, protection, and government of slaves ;" but, he 
 adds, " I am sorry I cannot say, that they are as religi- 
 ously observed as you could zcish." 
 
 In a subsequent letter, dated the 17th of January, 
 1805, Governor Prevost thus writes : " The act of the 
 legislature, entitled, ' An Act for the Encouragement, 
 Protection, and better Government of Slaves,' appears to 
 have been considered, from the day it was passed until 
 this hour, AS A POLITICAL MEASURE, to avert the inter-
 
 216 NOTES. 
 
 Jerence of the mother-country in the management of 
 slaves. Having said this, your Lordship will not be sur- 
 prised to learn, that CLAUSE SEVENTH OF THAT BILL HAS 
 
 BEEN WHOLLY NEGLECTED." 
 
 Your COMMONS said, " let such things be." 
 
 P. 131. 1. 15. 
 
 These lines were written in the year 1795, soon after 
 the rejection of the bill introduced by Mr Wilberforce. 
 The late rejection was brought about by a manoeuvre of 
 the friends of the trade.
 
 GLOSSARY. 
 
 Auld, old. 
 
 Ablins, perhaps. 
 
 Ae, one. 
 
 Aften, often. 
 
 Bien and Braw ;bien, separately considered, signifies 
 
 snug and comfortable; but, in conjunction with 
 
 brow, it denotes the union of ornament, or finery, 
 
 with comfort. 
 Baith, both. 
 
 Bents, barren uplands, declivities. 
 Blawn, blown. 
 Birken, birchen. 
 Blink, a gleam; and hence a space of time as short as 
 
 a gleam. 
 Burn, rivulet. 
 
 Brae, side of a hill, declivity. 
 Bield. shelter, harbour, booth. 
 CalUtns, boys. 
 Cannach, a plant that grows on moorish and swampy 
 
 places, with a leafless stalk, and silky white tuft 
 
 at the top. 
 "Doure, stern, hard. 
 Dool, pain, sorrow House o' dool, Infirmary.
 
 218 GLOSSARY. 
 
 Fur, furrow. 
 
 Frae, from. 
 
 Foggy, mossy. 
 
 Fleg, a fright ; sometimes erroneously explained, as 
 
 signifying a kick, or sudden stroke. 
 Feg, fig. 
 Fae, foe. 
 Fechtin, fighting. 
 Fok, folk. 
 
 Glawmry, or Glammer, a spell. 
 Gang, to go. 
 Guid, good. 
 Gied, gave. 
 Glint, to shine. 
 Gif, Gin, if. 
 Gloamin, twilight. 
 Gowd, gold. 
 Gree, prize. 
 Hey, haste ! 
 Hoe, have. 
 Hamely, homely. 
 Heartsome, cheerful. 
 Ilka, each. 
 Kent, known. 
 Lyart, grey-haired. 
 Leukit, looked. 
 Laigh, low. ' '" 
 Loun, snugly sheltered. 
 Maist, almost. 
 Mak, make.
 
 GLOSSARY. 219 
 
 Maun, must. 
 
 Mair, more. 
 
 Nae, no 
 
 Paidle, to play in the water. 
 
 Sae, so. 
 
 Shows, copse woods. 
 
 Shielin, a hut, a booth. 
 
 Skaith, harm. 
 
 Strae, straw. 
 
 Switfier, to hesitate. 
 
 Stoiter, to stagger. 
 
 Siller, silver. 
 
 Tng, feat, smoothly, neat. 
 
 Thole, to endure, bear. 
 
 Tin?, lost. 
 
 Unhalesome, unwholesome. 
 
 Wad, would. 
 
 Wist, wished. 
 
 TFAare, when. 
 
 fFAa, who. 
 
 W, wall. 
 
 TTae, woe. 
 
 END OF THE FIRST VOLUME. 
 
 EDINBURGH : 
 Printed by James Ballantyne & C.
 
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