POLLY STEWART

"LOVELY Polly Stewart," who was the daughter of William Stewart, the factor of Closeburn Estate, with whom Burns contracted some intimacy during the period of his occupation of Ellisland, and to whom he indited also some verses, which he inscribed on a crystal tumbler, beginning— "Ye're welcome, Willie Stewart," was another of the poet's heroines, whose after career in life was of a chequered character. Born in 1775, she could not be more than about sixteen when Burns celebrated her in the following

verses :

LOVELY POLLY STEWART.

Chorus.

O lovely Polly Stewart,

O charming Polly Stewart,

There's ne'er a flower that blooms in May,

That's half as fair as thou art!

The flower it blaws, it fades, it fa's,
And art can ne'er renew it;
But worth and truth, eternal youth
Will gi'e to Polly Stewart.

O lovely Polly Stewart, etc.

May he whase arms shall fauld thy charms
Possess a leal and true heart!

To him be given to ken the heaven
He grasps in Polly Stewart.

O lovely Polly Stewart, etc.

Mr. R. M. F. Watson, in his intensely interesting local work, Closeburn-Reminescent, Historic, and Traditional, supplies Polly's story. She married first a cousin of her own-Ishmael Stewart-who turned out badly, committed some misdemeanour, fled the country-leaving her with a family of three sons--and died abroad. She married next -report says against her own inclination-George Welsh, a farmer in Morton Mains, a grand-uncle of Jane Welsh, the wife of Thomas Carlyle, and this union, no less than the first, proved an unhappy one, due, it has been alleged chiefly to Polly's love of gaiety, and her light-headedness. Welsh, anyway, by all accounts, was a most respectable man. But, be the cause what it may, they separated soon, and the lady returned to her father's house, now in Maxwelton, Dumfries. Eventually, she allied herself to a Swiss mercenary soldier named Fleitz, belonging to the French army, and at that time a prisoner of war in Dumfries. With this "sodger laddie" she went first to France, and thence to Switzerland, and, in 1847, ended her days in exile; dying, alas, in a lunatic asylum.

A number of letters from her, dated Lauffenberg, near Basle, are preserved, consisting for the most part of enquiries after her three sons-all of whom she survivedand evincing generally a mother's tender solicitude for her children, even although she had gone and left them behind her. Frail Polly!

JESSIE STAIG

WHEN our poet set his muse the task of evolving merely complimentary verses it was seldom, as we have been seeing on repeated occasions already, that the result was more than ordinary. His song of "Lovely Young Jessie," written in 1793, to celebrate Miss Jessie Staig, the daughter of the Provost of Dumfries, is a fair example. Jessie, doubtless, was an excellent girl, having grace and beauty, perhaps, of more than ordinary quality, but the recorder assumes not his favourite character of personal lover towards her, and hence, we are free to suppose, the lack of electric fire in the song.

LOVELY YOUNG JESSIE.

True hearted was he, the sad swain o' the Yarrow,
And fair are the maids on the banks o' the Ayr,
But by the sweet side o' the Nith's winding river,
Are lovers as faithful, and maidens as fair :
To equal young Jessie seek Scotland all over;
To equal young Jessie you seek it in vain ;
Grace, beauty, and elegance, fetter her lover,
And maidenly modesty fixes the chain.

Fresh is the rose in the gay, dewy morning,
And sweet is the lily at evening close;
But in the fair presence o' lovely young Jessie,
Unseen is the lily, unheeded the rose.
Love sits in her smile, a wizard ensnaring,

Enthron'd in her een he delivers his law;
But still to her charms she alone is a stranger;
Her modest demeanour's the jewel of a'.

He hit a happier note, eighteen months later, in his Epigram to Dr. Maxwell, "On Miss Jessie Staig's recovery

from a fever

:

Maxwell, if here you merit crave,

That merit I deny ;

You save fair Jessie from the grave !—

An Angel could not die!

Jessie married Major William Miller, the son of Miller of Dalswinton, the poet's landlord when in Ellisland, and died-alas! confounding the epigram-in 1801, at the untimely age of twenty-six.

DEBORAH DAVIES

"THE BONNIE WEE THING."

WE emerge into a better atmosphere with our poet when he comes to celebrate the " Charming, lovely Davies.”

This lady, Miss Deborah Davies by name, was of English birth, and a relative of the Glenriddell family. Burns became acquainted with her during the last year of his residence at Ellisland, and, besides making her the subject of two songs and an epigram, each of which has been much admired, he addressed certain letters to her, two of which appear in his published correspondence.

Allan Cunningham gives some interesting particulars of the private history of Miss Davies, which he obtained from her nephew. She was of small stature, but of exquisite form and beauty, and possessed more than an average share of mental graces. A Captain Delany had made himself agreeable to her by his attentions, and by writing verses to, and concerning, her. At length they became engaged; but delays ensued, and coldness, on his part, in course of time became manifest. He joined his regiment abroad, and, with the exception of one formal letter, she never heard from him again. From some expressions in Burns's letters to her, it may be gathered that he had been made acquainted with this part of the little lady's story. Her professed lover's treatment broke her heart, and she did not long survive his cruel neglect.