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titude who accompanied Burns to the grave, went step by step," says Cunningham, " with the chief mourners. They might amount to ten or twelve thousand. Not a word was heard. . . . It was an impressive and mournful sight to see men of all ranks and persuasions and opinions mingling as brothers, and stepping side by side down the streets of Dumfries, with the remains of him who had sung of their loves and joys and domestic endearments, with a truth and a tenderness which none perhaps have since equalled. I could, indeed, have wished the military part of the procession away. The scarlet and gold-the banners displayed—the measured step, and the military array-with the sounds of martial instruments of music, had no share in increasing the solemnity of the burial scene; and had no connexion with the poet. I looked on it then, and I consider it now, as an idle ostentation, a piece of superfluous state which might have been spared, more especially as his neglected and traduced and insulted spirit had experienced no kindness in the body from those lofty people who are now proud of being numbered as his coevals and countrymen. I found myself at the brink of the poet's grave, into which he was about to descend for ever. There was a pause among the mourners, as if loath to part with his remains; and when he was at last lowered, and the first shovelful of earth sounded on his coffin lid, I looked up and saw tears on many cheeks where tears were not usual. The volunteers justified the fears of their comrade, by three ragged and straggling volleys. The earth was heaped up, the green sod laid over him, and the multitude stood gazing on the grave for some minutes' space, and then melted silently away. The day was a fine one, the sun

was almost without a cloud, and not a drop of rain fell from dawn to twilight. I notice this, not from any concurrence in the common superstition, that happy is the corpse which the rain rains on,' but to confute the pious fraud of a religious Magazine, which made heaven express its wrath, at the interment of a profane poet, in thunder, in lightning, and in rain."

During the funeral solemnity, Mrs Burns was seized with the pains of labour, and gave birth to a posthumous son, who quickly followed his father to the grave. Mr Cunningham describes the appearance of the family, when they at last emerged from their home of sorrow :- "A weeping widow and four helpless sons; they came into the streets in their mournings, and public sympathy was awakened afresh. I shall never forget the looks of his boys, and the compassion which they excited. The poet's life had not been without errors, and such errors, too, as a wife is slow in forgiving; but he was honoured then, and is honoured now, by the unalienable affection of his wife, and the world repays her prudence and her love by its regard and esteem."

There was much talk at the time of a subscription for a monument; but Mrs Burns beginning, ere long, to suspect that the business was to end in talk, covered the grave at her own expense with a plain tombstone, inscribed simply with the name and age of the poet. In 1813, however, a public meeting was held at Dumfries, General Dunlop, son to Burns's friend and patroness, being in the chair; a subscription was opened, and contributions flowing in rapidly from all quarters, a costly mausoleum was at length erected on the most elevated site which the churchyard presented. Thither

the remains of the poet were solemnly transferred * on the 5th June 1815; and the spot continues to be visited every year by many hundreds of travellers. The structure, which is perhaps more gaudy than might have been wished, bears this inscription:

IN AETERNUM HONOREM
ROBERTI BURNS

POETARUM CALEDONIAE SUI AEVI LONGE PRINCIPIS
CUJUS CARMINA EXIMIA PATRIO SERMONE SCRIPTA
ANIMI MAGIS ARDENTIS VIQUE INGENII
QUAM ARTE VEL CULTU CONSPICUA

FACETIIS JUCUNDITATE LEPORE AFFLUENTIA OMNIBUS LITTERARUM CULTORIBUS SATIS NOTA CIVES SUI NECNON PLERIQUE OMNES MUSARUM AMANTISSIMI MEMORIAMQUE VIRI ARTE POETICA TAM PRAECLARI FOVENTES HOC MAUSOLEUM

SUPER RELIQUIAS POETAE MORTALES
EXTRUENDUM CURAVERE

PRIMUM HUJUS AEDIFICII LAPIDEM
GULIELMUS MILLER ARMIGER

REIPUBLICAE ARCHITECTONICAE APUD SCOTOS
IN REGIONE AUSTRALI CURIO MAXIMUS PROVINCIALIS
GEORGIO TERTIO REGNANTE

GEORGIO WALLIARUM PRINCIPE

SUMMAM IMPERII PRO PATRE TENENTE JOSEPHO GASS ARMIGERO DUMFRISIAE PRAEFECTO THOMA F. HUNT LONDINENSI ARCHITECTO POSUIT

NONIS JUNIIS ANNO LUCIS VMDCCCXV
SALUTIS HUMANAE MDCCCXV.

Immediately after the poet's death, a subscription was opened for the benefit of his family; Mr

The original tombstone of Burns was sunk under the pavement of the mausoleum; and the grave which first received his remains is now occupied, according to her own dying request, by a daughter of Mrs Dunlop.

Miller of Dalswinton, Dr Maxwell, Mr Syme, Mr Cunningham, and Mr M'Murdo, becoming trustees for the application of the money. Many names from other parts of Scotland appeared in the lists, and not a few from England, especially London and Liverpool. Seven hundred pounds were in this way collected; an additional sum was forwarded from India; and the profits of Dr Currie's Life and Edition of Burns were also considerable. The result has been, that the sons of the poet received an excellent education, and that Mrs Burns has continued to reside, enjoying a decent independence, in the house where the poet died, situated in what is now, by the authority of the Dumfries Magistracy, called Burns' Street.

"Of the (four surviving) sons of the poet," says their uncle Gilbert in 1820, "Robert, the eldest, is placed as a clerk in the Stamp Office, London," (Mr Burns still remains in that establishment,) Francis Wallace, the second, died in 1803; William Nicoll, the third, went to Madras in 1811; and James Glencairn, the youngest, to Bengal in 1812, both as cadets in the Honourable Company's service." These young gentlemen have all, it is believed, conducted themselves through life in a manner highly honourable to themselves, and to the name which they bear. One of them, (James,) as soon as his circumstances permitted, settled a liberal annuity on his estimable mother, which she still survives to enjoy

Gilbert Burns, the admirable brother of the poet, survived till the 27th of April 1827. He removed from Mossgiel, shortly after the death of the poet, to a farm in Dumfries-shire, carrying with him his aged mother, who died under his

roof. At a later period he became factor to the noble family of Blantyre, on their estates in East Lothian. The pecuniary succours which the poet afforded Gilbert Burns, and still more the interest excited in his behalf by the account of his personal character contained in Currie's Memoir, proved of high advantage to him. He trained up a large family, six sons and five daughters, and bestowed on all his boys what is called a classical education. The untimely death of one of these, a young man of very promising talents, when on the eve of being admitted to holy orders, is supposed to have hastened the departure of the venerable parent. It should not be omitted, that, on the publication of his edition of his brother's works, in 1819, Gilbert repaid, with interest, the sum which the poet advanced to him in 1788. Through life, and in death, he maintained and justified the promise of his virtuous youth, and seems in all respects to have resembled his father, of whom Murdoch, long after he was no more, wrote in language honourable to his own heart: "O for a world of men of such dispositions! I have often wished, for the good of mankind, that it were as customary to honour and perpetuate the memory of those who excel in moral rectitude as it is to extol what are called heroic actions: then would the mausoleum of the friend of my youth overtop and surpass most of those we see in Westminster Abbey !"*

It is pleasing to trace, in all these details, the happy influence which our poet's genius has ex

These particulars are taken from an article which appeared, soon after Mr Burns's death, in the Dumfries Courier.

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