"I have forgot the cantata you allude to, as I kept no copy, and indeed did not know of its existence. However, I remember that none of the songs pleased myself, except the last, something about' Courts for cowards were erected.'" We find that the poet presented Richmond with a portion of the MSS. (not containing "The Ballad of the Drum," however,) and the following year, 1786, gave the balance of the MSS. to a Mr. David Woodburn. The latter gave it to a Mr. McLimont, who in turn gave it to a Mr. Smith, of Greenock, and it finally reached the hands of Mr. Stewart, of Glasgow, who, in conjunction with a Mr. Meikle, printed it in 1799. John Richmond subsequently turned his portion of MSS. over to Stewart, and the entire "Cantata " was finally published. The MSS. was advertised for sale in the newspapers of Glasgow in 1853, price fifty guineas, or about $262, and was purchased by Gilbert Burns, nephew of the poet, and was in his possession in 1881, when information as to its whereabouts was obtained for the biography of the poet, published in Kilmarnock in that year. The poet considered "Tam O'Shanter" as his masterpiece. John Gibson Lockhart, son-in-law of Scott, who, besides giving us the best life of Scott, has given us one of the best biographies of Burns, and many others competent to judge, are of opinion that the poet's works would suffer more by leaving out" The Cottar's Saturday Night" than if any other single piece were omitted. It is only within the present generation that the complete works of Burns have been given to the public. The manuscripts have been nearly all traced and examined, and the correct language of the poet ascertained. The six-volume edition published in Philadelphia in 1886, by George Gebbie, is acknowledged by not only publishers but by Burns authorities throughout the world, to be the finest and most complete yet issued. The writer has handled many of Burns's MSS., and possesses one of the largest collections of Burnsiana in America. A curious little volume of Scottish and English songs which I have, published in London, in 1763 (when Burns was four years old), contains a cantata entitled "The Beggar's Wedding," which I believe had something to do with "The Jolly Beggars" production. The poet admits having taken, as a sample, one song which appears in this book, and it is reasonable to suppose he was ac quainted with "The Beggar's Wedding." Any one who has studied Burns, and Scottish song prior to his time, can point out where he has taken the inferior, and often vulgar, songs of that period and turned them into gems. Yours respectfully, JAMES W. R. COLLINS. Mr. Collins will permit me to add to his most interesting criticism, Carlyle's estimate of the poem from which the Drum Song is taken. Carlyle writes: Perhaps we may venture to say that the most strictly poetical of all his poems is one which does not appear in Currie's edition, but has often been printed before and since under the humble title of "The Jolly Beggars." The subject truly is among the lowest in nature; but it only the more shows the poet's gift in reducing it to the domain of art. To our minds this piece seems thoroughly compacted, melted together, refined, and poured forth in one flood of true liquid harmony. It is light, airy, and soft of movement, yet sharp and precise in its details; every face is a portrait ; that rauck Carlin, that wee Apollo, that Son of Mars, are Scottish yet ideal, the scene is at once a dream, and the very Ragcastle of Poosie Nansie. Farther, it seems in a considerable degree complete; a real self-supporting whole, which is the highest merit in a poem. The blanket of the night is drawn asunder for a moment; in full ruddy, flaming light, these rough tattardemalions are seen in their boisterous revel; for the strong pulse of life vindicates its right to gladness even here, and when the curtain closes, we prolong the action, without effort; the next day is the last our Caird and our Balladmonger are singing and soliciting, their brats and collets are hawking, begging, cheating, and some other night in new combinations they will wring from fate another hour of wassail and good cheer. Apart from the universal sympathy with man which this again bespeaks in Burns, a genuine inspiration and no inconsiderable technical talent are manifested here. There is the fidelity, humor, warm life and accurate painting and grouping of some Terriers, for whom hostlers and carousing peasants are not without significance. It would be strange, doubtless, to call this the best of Burns's writings; we mean to say only that it seems to us the most perfect of its kind, as a piece of poetical composition, strictly so called. In The Beggar's Opera, The Beggar's Bush, as other critics have already remarked, there is nothing which in real poetic vigor equals this cantata; nothing as we think which comes within many degrees of it. The verses to which Burns refers as what he himself preferred in "The Jolly Beggars," occur at the end. I quote the two concluding stanzas and chorus, in order, as far as possible to make this little story complete. I do not see much in it even to have won the author's commendation. It has the lilt and go, I am afraid, the lawlessness of a drinking song, no more: Life is all a variorum We regard not how it goes; Here's to budgets, bags and wallets, A fig for those by law protected, A VISIT TO THE BURNS COTTAGE. A FRIEND recently paid a visit to the Land of Burns, and in writing of it says:-The room in which Burns was born, and which had to serve the general uses of the family, it being the residence in toto during the occupation of his father and for years afterwards, is only 16 feet by 12, and 7 feet high. I found it to contain three or four deeplyinteresting memorials of the family, namely, the old wallbedstead on which the poet was brought into existence, as well as the old family clock, cupboard and dresser. In Burns's time, he being eight years old when his father removed from the cottage, or rather mud hut, to Mount Oliphant, a distance of some two miles, what must have been then this miserable hovel had but one small window of four panes, this window being less than two feet square in dimensions. An addition was made a few years subsequent to Old William Burnes entering on the Mount Oliphant farm, while later still (in 1847) a spacious hall was erected, this being 36 feet by 20, and of corresponding altitude. Dinner parties avail themselves of it, and in it clubs hold their meetings. Mr. Morley, the present lessee of the cottage and of the inn annexed, I found to be an Englishman, and one of the Gallant Six Hundred who rode into "the valley of death" in the Charge of the Light Brigade at Baaclava. He was a sergeant in the 17th Lancers, and was subsequently a captain and cavalry inspector in the North American army during the war that took place in the United States, and in one of the great battles of which he was severely wounded. Latterly, he has been sergeant-major of the Ayrshire Yeomanry Cavalry. I found Mr. Morley to be a courteous gentleman, a native of Nottingham, while his good wife belongs to Derby. Scrupulous cleanliness prevails throughout the cottage proper and its adjuncts, and such is the sacred regard entertained on the premises for the memory of the ever-to-be-lamented Bard that even the proverbially-innocent glass of beer is not allowed to be consumed in the apartment in which poor Burns first saw that light that beamed on him so brilliantly, and yet alas so unfortunately! I may remark that there are no memorials of the Burns's family at Mount Oliphant and that the old schoolhouse in the village of Dalrymple, which Burns attended after his father left Alloway, has disappeared, its site being now occupied by a neat-looking Free Church. Dalrymple is one of the most charming villages I have ever put foot in, being thoroughly cleanly throughout, and most romantically situated. The silvery Doon flows at its southern end, and within a "" 99 short mile of it rise Casillis Downans, where the glowing imagination of Burns makes the fairies hold high revel on Hallowe'en Night. Leaving the cottage and proceeding in a southerly direction, a walk of some five minutes or so brought me to Alloway Kirk, the scene of many of the important events sketched in the glorious poem of " Tam O'Shanter." I expected to find the old kirk very much longer and broader than it turned out to be, for its proportions seemed to me to be exceedingly circumscribed indeed. On entering the burial ground by the steps in front, I found the last sleeping-place of the Bard's father, mother, and sister, Mrs. Begg, challenging my notice, though I have since been informed that the ashes of his mother repose elsewhere. The old ruin is now pretty well covered with ivy. The roof has succumbed, I presume to the desolating influences of time, but I observed that the old bell still remains in its place. The graves, monuments, and walks seem to be very nicely kept, and the deil-famed" winnock bunker in the east" is discernible from the southern aspect of the ruin. What was once the interior of the kirk is now a place of vaults, and over the iron gate or doorway of one of the entrances on the south side I found the figures "1516"-presumably, I suppose, the date of the erection of the old kirk. It is a pleasant little graveyard, that is, if such a place, involving so many thoughts of what we ourselves shall all be some day, can really be pleasant under any circumstances! I found tombstones, horizontal as well as upright, bearing remote dates. Within some four or five hundred yards of the old kirk, I found the "Auld Brig o' Doon," where Tam O'Shanter's good mare Maggie so treacherously lost her tail. This is really a grand old bridge, of one arch span, and standing many yards above the bed of the river. I found innumerable initials and dates more or less rudely cut into the stones of the projecting walls on either side, and I was successful in knocking off a piece from one of the most venerable-looking fellows I could see in one of these parapets— this, of course, to be retained no less as a memento of my own visit than of that triumphant genius whose fadeless creative flashes had won me to make such a pilgrimage. This old bridge furnishes every evidence of antiquity. Between Alloway Kirk and the "Auld Brig of Doon," Burns's Monument stands. Its existence, is mainly due to the enterprise of the late Sir Alexander Boswell, an ardent admirer of the Bard. The monument is upward of 60 feet high, and cost about £2,000. Here I found many relics of Burns, including, amongst others, the Kilmarnock edition of his poems, 1786; a letter in his own handwriting to the Honorable Henry Erskine; three rings-one containing a lock of Burns's own hair, another the hair of his daughter, the third being the wedding ring of his wife, Jean Armour, better known by the more familiar soubriquet of “ Bonnie Jean"; two drinking glasses, presented by Burns to |