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his fault that he was forced to seek them where alone he could find them.

The fate of Burns may excite compassion; but to a person who has at all mingled with that elevated class to whom he looked for patronage, it can excite no surprise. Was it at all likely that a man would be encouraged by his superiors in wealth, who had the honesty to tell them that he was bred to the plough, and whether they chose to patronize him or not, he was independent of them? He was too much in the habit of calling things by their right names, to bask long in the smiles of the rich and powerful. Burns knew the secret of winding himself into the favour of the great, as well as any man, but he both contemned and abhorred it. He knew that to flatter their vices, to laugh at their political prostitutions, and, in short, to strive to make them think most favourably of themselves, was his path to temporal comfort and substantial patronage. Honesty and fair fame lay in quite a different road; and he unhesitatingly chose it, beset as it was with difficulties and terrors.

It certainly is highly creditable to the Nobles and Sages of the "Modern Athens," that now the Bard is quietly entombed, and can ask nothing

further at their hands, these worthies are putting statues up to him as if they thought his poetry would not be so lasting as their memorials, or as if they imagined this tardy recognition of his wondrous powers was an "amende honorable" for the neglect and contempt to which he was consigned while living. The sculptor who gains by their generosity, and the menials who may be employed to keep them clean, may thank them for erecting these monuments; but the majority of Burns's countrymen will not. His poetry lives in their hearts-will live as long as time itself shall last; and ages hence, Scotia will rejoice in the poetic glory of her honest and highly-gifted Ploughman, as universally as she does at the present moment.

SIR WALTER SCOTT.

It is related of Sir Walter Scott, that, not long before his " Lay of the Last Minstrel" made its appearance, while crossing the Frith of Forth in a ferry-boat, with a friend, they proposed to beguile the time, by writing a number of verses on a given subject; and at the end of an hour's poring and hard study, the product of Sir Walter's (then Mr. Scott) fertile brain, adding thereto the labours of his friend, was six lines. "It is plain," said Scott, to his fellowlabourer, then unconscious of his great powers, "that you and I need never think of getting our living by writing poetry."

HENRY TEONGE.

AMONG our English Song-writers, we must not forget to notice the name of this jolly Divine, which, although of some antiquity, has never been inscribed upon the list until the commencement of the present year, when the publication of his "Diary" first made his pretensions known to the world. The character of our worthy Chaplain may easily be collected from this publication-the only memorial of him

VOL. III.

F

which remains, and which is well worthy of the attentive perusal of those who delight to contemplate the manners of the "olden time," of which, especially as relates to "life at sea," it presents a striking picture.

Writing as he did, without any sort of disguise, he exhibits himself, not, indeed, as possessing any very constant sense of religious obligation, but, considering the laxity of the morals of the period in which he lived, and the society in which he moved, as affording a very respectable specimen of a sea-chaplain of that era. He enjoys his punch and his claret, and he revels in the most luxurious description of the good cheer by which he was occasionally surrounded; but he appears to have been constant in the observance of the offices of his calling. His mind appears to have been remarkably acute and vigorous. He diligently observes whatever is new and curious, and brings to the subject a considerable share of book-learning, sometimes, indeed, inaccurate and ill-digested, and frequently mixed up with a very singular portion of superstition, but altogether affording abundant evidence of his talents and acquirements.

His poetical compositions are often very far above those of "the mob of gentlemen who write with ease;" and some of his ballads, making allowance for the bad taste of his age,-the Chlorises and the Amyntas, the Phyllises and the Amaryllises, are in some respects worthy of taking their place amongst the standard compositions of this description.

In support of this observation, we need only adduce the following specimen, the beauty and feeling of which, our readers cannot fail justly to appreciate.

cr A SONNET,

Composed October the First, over against the East Part of Candia.

O! Ginnee was a bony lasse,

Which maks the world to woonder

How ever it should com to passe

That wee did part a sunder.

The driven snow, the rose so rare,
The glorious sunn above thee,
Can not with my Ginnee compare,
Shee was so woonderous lovely.

Her merry lookes, her forhead high,
Her hayre like golden-wyer,
Her hand and foote, her lipe or eye,
Would set a saint on fyre.

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