I owe an account, taking it into his head that I am dying, has commenced a process, and will infallibly put me into jail. Do, for God's sake, send me that sum, and that by return of post. Forgive me this earnestness; but the horrors of a jail have made me half-distracted." To render this very modest request more acceptable, the Poet, ill as he was, tried his hand on the air of Rothemurche; and, allowing his mind to wander to scenes of former happiness, and to one whom he had loved, composed the last song he was to measure in this world, beginning, "Fairest maid on Devon banks." It is written in a character indicating the feeble state of his bodily strength. Thomson instantly complied with the request of Burns: he borrowed a five-pound note from Cunningham, and sent it, saying he had made up his mind to enclose the identical sum the Poet had asked for when he received his letter. For this he has been sharply censured; and his defence is that he was afraid of sending more, lest he should offend the pride of the Poet, who was uncommonly sensitive in pecuniary matters. A better defence is Thomson's own poverty; only one volume of his splendid work was then published; his outlay had been beyond his means, and very small sums of money had come in to cover his large expenditure. Had he been richer, his defence would have been a difficult matter. When Burns made the stipulation, his hopes were high, and the dread of hunger, or of the jail, was far from his thoughts; he imagined that it became genius to refuse money in a work of national importance. But his situation grew gloomier as he wrote; he had lost nearly his all in Ellisland, and was obliged to borrow small sums, which he found a difficulty in repaying. That he was in poor circumstances was well known to the world; and, had money been at Thomson's disposal, a way might have been found of doing the Poet good by stealth; he sent five pounds, because he could not send ten; and it would have saved him from some sarcastic remarks, and some pangs of heart, had he said so at once. 1796. again but for the circumstances in which I am. An illness which has long hung about me, in all probability will speedily send me beyond that 'bourne whence no traveller returns.' Your friendship, with which for many years you honoured me, was a friendship dearest to my soul; your conversation, and especially your correspondence, were at once highly entertaining and instructive. With what pleasure did I use to break up the seal! The remembrance yet adds one pulse more to my poor palpitating heart. Farewell." The Poet's cousin instantly sent the ten pounds, though at that time far from rich: he afterwards sent five pounds more, and generously offered to take Robert and educate and bring him up like one of his own sons: Mrs. Dunlop also wrote; and, alarmed with the despondency of the Poet's last letter, assured him of her undiminished esteem, and that his family might depend on her friendship: it is needless so say how amply this was fulfilled. These are supposed, by some, to be the last words which he wrote: there are yet later, and of higher import and meaning. As the day of life darkened down, Burns began to prepare for the change: he remembered that he had written many matters, both in verse and prose, of a nature licentious as well as witty. He sought to reclaim them, and in some instances succeeded; he had, when his increasing difficulties were rumoured about, received aa offer for them from a bookseller; but he spurned at fifty pounds in comparison with his fair fame, and refused to sell or sanction them. That such things were scattered abroad troubled him greatly; he reflected that the mean and the malignant might rake them together; and, quoting them against him, triumph over his fame, and trample on his dust. Perhaps he felt some consolation in believing that his other works transcended these so far in talent and in number that the grosser would be weighed down, cast aside, and forgotten. What troubled him most was the imputations of disloyalty to his country which had been thrown upon his character he trembled lest he should be repre- | On the same day that Burns wrote to Thomsented as one who desired to purchase republison he also wrote to Mrs. Dunlop, and to his cousin, James Burness, of Montrose. To the latter he said, "A rascal of a haberdasher, to whom I owe a considerable bill, believes that I am dying, and will infallibly put my emaciated body into jail. Will you be so good as to accommodate me, and that by return of post, with ten pounds? O, James! did you know the pride of my heart, you would feel doubly for me! Alas! I am not used to beg! O, do not disappoint me!-save me from the horrors of a jail!" To Mrs. Dunlop he said, "I have written to you so often without receiving any answer that I would not trouble you * [It appears from the inventory of Burns's effects that can license at the price of foreign invasion. Burns thus gave it was a Banker's draft which was sent by Mr. Thomson.] the head and heart of the Poet-such as should and defiance of these slanderous falsehoods. live in the bosom of every Briton. Burns was a poor man by birth, and an exciseman by necessity; but I will say it-the sterling of his honest worth no poverty could debase, and his independent British mind oppression might bend, but could not subdue." These sentiments need no comment: in them we hear the voice of Burns speaking from the grave, desiring justice rather than mercy. Sea-bathing relieved for awhile the pains in the Poet's limbs; but his appetite failed; he was oppressed with melancholy; he looked ruefully forward, and saw misery and ruin ready to swallow his helpless household up. He grew feverish on the 14th of July; felt himself sinking, and longed to be at home. He returned on the 18th in a small spring cart; the ascent to his house was steep, and the cart stopped at the foot of the Mill-hole-brae; when he alighted he shook much, and stood with difficulty; he seemed unable to stand upright. He stooped, as if in pain, and walked tottering towards his own door; his looks were hollow and ghastly, and those who saw him then never expected to see him in life again. "You have been misinformed," says Burns, "as to my final dismission from the Excise-I am still in the service. Indeed, but for the exertions of Mr. Graham of Fintray, who has ever been my warm and generous friend, I had, without so much as a hearing, or the slightest previous intimation, been turned adrift, with my helpless family, to all the horrors of want. In my defence to their accusations, I said that, whatever might be my sentiments of republics, ancient or modern, as to Britain I abjured the idea; that a constitution, which, in its original principles, experience had proved to be every way fitted for our happiness in society, it would be insanity to sacrifice to an untried visionary theory;—that, in consideration of my being situated in a department, however humble, immediately in the hands of people in power, I had forborne taking any active part, either personally or as an author, in the present business of reform; but that, where I must declare my sentiments, I would say there existed a system of corruption between the executive power and the representative part of the legislature, which It was soon spread through Dumfries that boded no good to our glorious constitution, and Burns had returned from The Brow much worse which every patriotic Briton must wish to see that when he went away, and it was added that amended. My last remark gave great offence, he was dying. The anxiety of the people, and Mr. Corbet was instructed to inquire on high and low, was very great. I was present the spot, and to document me-"That my busi- and saw it. Wherever two or three were toness was to act, not to think.' A nobleman gether their talk was of Burns, and of him connected with the Pitt administration, to whom alone. They spoke of his history, of his perI repeated these last words, smiled bitterly and son, and of his works-of his witty sayings said "They are as absurd as they are cruel." and sarcastic replies, and of his too early fate, Having removed the veil of mystery which with much enthusiasm, and sometimes with hung too long over this transaction, and esta- deep feeling. All that he had done, and all blished himself as a lover of his country with that they had hoped he would accomplish, were all who know what patriotism is, Burns pro- talked of: half-a-dozen of them stopped Dr. ceeds to discuss his hopes of fame, and his cha- Maxwell in the street, and said, "How is racter as a man and a poet.-"The partiality Burns, Sir?" He shook his head, saying, “he of my countrymen," he observes, "has brought cannot be worse," and passed on to be subjected me forward as a man of genius, and has given to similar inquiries farther up the way. I heard me a character to support. In the Poet I one of a group inquire, with much simplicity, have avowed manly and independent sentiments "Who do you think will be our poet now?" which, I trust, will be found in the man. Though Burns now knew he was dying, his honest fame is my dearest concern, and a thou-good humour was unruffled, and his wit never sand times I have trembled at the idea of those forsook him. When he looked up and saw degrading epithets that malice or misrepresen- Dr. Maxwell at his bed-side,-Alas!" he tation may affix to my name. I have often, in | said, "what has brought you here? I am but blasting anticipation, listened to some future a poor crow, and not worth plucking." He hackney scribbler, with the heavy malice of sav-pointed to his pistols, those already mentioned, age stupidity exulting in his hireling paragraphs Burns, notwithstanding the fanfaronade of independence to be found in his works, and after having been held forth to public view, and to public estimation, as a man of some genius, yet, quite destitute of resources within himself to support his borrowed dignity, he dwindled into a paltry exciseman, and slunk out the rest of his insignificant existence in the meanest of pursuits, and among the vilest of mankind.'-In your hands, sir, permit me to lodge my disavowal My the gift of their maker, Blair of Birmingham, and desired that Maxwell would accept of them, saying they could not be in worthier keeping, and he should never more have need of them. This relieved his proud heart from a sense of obligation. Soon afterwards he saw Gibson, one of his brother-volunteers, by the bed-side, with tears in his eyes. He smiled and said," John, don't let the awkward squad fire over me!' His household presented a melancholy spec tacle the Poet dying; his wife in hourly expectation of being confined: four helpless children wandering from room to room, gazing on their miserable parents, and but too little of food or cordial kind to pacify the whole or soothe the sick. To Jessie Lewars, all who are charmed with the Poet's works are much indebted she acted with the prudence of a sister and the tenderness of a daughter, and kept desolation away, though she could not keep disease." A tremor,' says Maxwell, "pervaded his frame; his tongue, though often refreshed, became parched; and his mind, when not roused by conversation, sunk into delirium. On the second and third day after his return from The Brow, the fever increased and his strength diminished. On the fourth day, when his attendant, James Maclure, held a cordial to his lips, he swallowed it eagerly— rose almost wholly up-spread out his handssprang forward nearly the whole length of the bed-fell on his face and expired.* He was thirty-seven years and seven months old, and of a form and strength which promised long life; but the great and inspired are often cut down in youth, while "Villains ripen gray with time." leading men of the town and neighbourhood appeared as mourners; the streets were lined by the Angus-shire Fencibles, and the Cinque Ports Cavalry, and his body was borne by the Volunteers, to the old kirk-yard, with military honours. The multitude who followed amounted to many thousands. It was an impressive and a mournful sight; all was orderly and decorous. The measured steps, the military array, the colours displayed, and the muffled drum-I thought then, and think now-had no connexion with a Pastoral Bard. I mingled with the mourners. On reaching the grave into which the Poet's body was about to descend, there was a pause among them, as if loth to part with his remains; and when the first shovel-full of earth sounded on the coffin-lid, I looked up, and saw tears on many cheeks where tears were not usual. The Volunteers justified the surmise of Burns by three ragged and straggling volleys: the earth was heaped up, the green sod laid over him, and the vast multitude 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 pours on,' but to confute the pious fraud of a religious writer, who inti- ·' mated that Heaven expressed its wrath at the ¦ interment of a profane poet, in thunder, in lightning, and in rain. I went to see him laid out for the grave; several elder people were with me. He lay in a plain unadorned coffin, with a linen sheet drawn over his face; and on the bed and around the body, herbs and flowers were thickly strewn, according to the usage of the country. He was wasted somewhat by long illness; but death had not increased the swarthy hue of his face, which was uncommonly dark and deeply marked-his broad and open brow was pale and serene, and around it his sable hair lay in masses, slightly touched with grey. The room where he lay was plain and neat, and the simplicity of the Poet's humble dwelling pressed the presence of death more closely on the heart than if his bier had been embellished by vanity and covered with the blazonry of high ancestry and rank. We stood and gazed on him in silence for the space of several minutes-we-and threw her inspiring mantle over me.' went, and others succeeded us--not a whisper was heard. The body of Burns was not, however, to remain long in its place. To suit the plan of a rather showy mausoleum, his remains were removed into a more commodious spot of the same kirk - yard, on the 5th of June, 1815. The coffin was partly dissolved away; but the dark curling locks of the Poet were as glossy, and seemed as fresh, as on the day of his death. In the interior of the structure stands a marble monument, embodying, with little skill or grace, that well-known passage in the dedication to the gentlemen of the Caledonian Hunt:-"The poetic Genius of my country found me, as the prophetic bard Elijah did Elisha-at the plough The Poet's dust has been a second time dis- to stigmatize them in verses that would burn for ever would be a gratification for which he might think it worth while to be thus brought again upon earth." All mankind have heard of the malediction which Shakspeare utters from his monument, and of the dread which came upon the boors of Stratford-on-Avon, as they presumed to gaze on his dust: no such fears, however, fell upon the craniologists of Dumfries: the clock struck one as they touched the dread relic: they tried their hats upon the head, and found them all too little; and, having made a mould, they deposited the skull in a leaden box, " carefully lined with the softest materials," and returned it once more to the hallowed ground! Here, as to a shrine, flock annually vast numbers of pilgrims; many, very many, are from America; not a few from France and Germany; and the list-book contains the names of the most eminent men of England, Scotland, and Ireland. probable that such an event should be long unattended with the accustomed profusion of posthumous anecdotes and memoirs which are usually circulated immediately after the death of every rare and celebrated personage. I had, however, conceived no intention of appropriating to myself the privilege of criticising Burns's writings and character, or of anticipating on the province of a biographer. "Conscious, indeed, of my own inability to do justice to such a subject, I should have continued wholly silent, had misrepresentation and calumny been less industrious; but a regard to truth, no less than affection for the memory of a friend, must now justify my offering to the public a few at least of those observations which an intimate acquaintance with Burns, and the frequent opportunities I have had of observing equally his happy qualities and his failings for several years past, have enabled me to commu nicate. "It will actually be an injustice done to Burns's character, not only by future generations and foreign countries, but even by his native Scotland, and perhaps a number of his contemporaries, that he is generally talked of, and considered, with reference to his poetical talents only: for the fact is, even allowing his great and ori Though Burns died poor, the generous activity of his friends and admirers, among whom Syme, Maxwell, and Macmurdo, were active and liberal, placed his young widow and helpless children beyond the reach of want. Currie, the chief benefactor of all, wrote the Poet's life, and edited his works: Lord Sidmouth placed his eldest son Robert in the Stamp-office:ginal genius its due tribute of admiration, that Lord Panmure sent fifty pounds annually to his poetry (I appeal to all who have had the advanwidow, till her sons were able to interpose and tage of being personally acquainted with him) take the pious duty on themselves; and William was actually not his forte. Many others, perNicol and James Glencairn went out to India on haps, may have ascended to prouder heights in cadetships, one of which was bestowed by the the region of Parnassus, but none certainly ever generous Sir James Shaw. Francis Wallace outshone Burns in the charms, the sorcery, I died young, so did Maxwell: the street in would almost call it, of fascinating conversation, which the Poet died was named Burns-street: the spontaneous eloquence of social argument, the walks in which he mused were remembered or the unstudied poignancy of brilliant repartee; and respected, and his widow lived and died in nor was any man, I believe, ever gifted with a the house which he had occupied. She had larger portion of the ‘vivida vis animis.' His peracted, throughout her long life, with equal pru-sonal endowments were perfectly correspondent dence and propriety; lived in comfort, and, aided by the counsel and advice of her younger brother, a London merchant of great respectability, preserved her affairs in excellent order, and was enabled to save a small sum out of her annual income. [Soon after the death of Burns, the following article appeared in the Dumfries Journal. It is from the elegant pen of a lady already alluded to in the course of these memoirs, whose exertions for the family of our Bard, in the circles of literature and fashion in which she moves, have done her so much honour. "The attention of the public seems to be much occupied at present with the loss it has recently sustained in the death of the Caledonian Poet, Robert Burns-a loss calculated to be severely felt throughout the literary world, as well as lamented in the narrower sphere of private friendship. It was not, therefore, [* Mrs. Riddel of Woodlee-Park.] to the qualifications of his mind-his form was manly his action, energy itself— devoid in a great measure perhaps of those graces, of that polish, acquired only in the refinement of societies where in early life he could have no opportunities of mixing; but where such was the irresistible power of attraction that encircled him, though his appearance and manners were always peculiar, he never failed to delight and to excel. His figure seemed to bear testimony to his earlier destination and employments. It seemed rather moulded by nature for the rough exercises of agriculture than the gentler cultivation of the Belles Lettres. His features were stamped with the hardy character of independence, and the firmness of conscious, though not arrogant, pre-eminence; the animated expressions of countenance were almost peculiar to himself; the rapid lightnings of his eye were always the harbingers of some flash of genius, whether they darted the fiery glances of insulted and indignant superiority, or beamed with the im only to have despised, he alternately opened his heart, and poured forth the treasures of his understanding to such as were incapable of appreciating the homage; and elevated to the privileges of an adversary some who were un- | qualified in all respects for the honour of a contest so distinguished. "It is said that the celebrated Dr. Johnson professed to love a good hater '-a temperament that would have singularly adapted him to cherish a prepossession in favour of our Bard, who perhaps fell but little short even of the surly doctor in this qualification, as long as the disposition to ill-will continued; but the warmth of his passions was fortunately corrected by their versatility. He was seldom, indeed never, implacable in his resentments, and sometimes, it has been alleged, not inviolably faithful in his en been said about his inconstancy and caprice; but I am inclined to believe that they originated less in a levity of sentiment than from an extreme impetuosity of feeling, which rendered him prompt to take umbrage; and his sensations of pique, where he fancied he had discovered the traces of neglect, scorn, or unkindness, took their measure of asperity from the over-flowings of the opposite sentiment which preceded them, and which seldom failed to regain its ascendancy in his bosom on the return of calmer reflection. He was candid and manly in the avowal of his errors, and his avowal was a reparation. His native fierté never forsaking him for a moment, the value of a frank acknowledgment was enhanced tenfold towards a generous mind, from its never being attended with servility. His mind, organized only for the stronger and more acute operations of the passions, was impracticable to the efforts of superciliousness that would have depressed it into humility, and equally superior to the encroachments of venal suggestions that might have led him into the mazes of hypocrisy. passioned sentiment of fervent and impetuous affections. His voice alone improved upon the magic of his eye: sonorous, replete with the finest modulations, it alternately captivated the ear with the melody of poetic numbers, the perspicuity of nervous reasoning, or the ardent sallies of enthusiastic patriotism. The keenness of satire was, I am almost at a loss whether to say his forte or his foible; for though nature had endowed him with a portion of the most pointed excellence in that dangerous talent, he suffered it too often to be the vehicle of personal and sometimes unfounded animosities. It was not always that sportiveness of humour, that 'unwary pleasantry,' which Sterne has depicted with touches so conciliatory, but the darts of ridicule were frequently directed as the caprice of the instant suggested, or as the altercations of parties and of persons happened to kindle the rest-gagements of friendship. Much, indeed, has lessness of his spirit into interest or aversion. This, however, was not invariably the case: his wit (which was no unusual matter indeed) had always the start of his judgment, and would lead him to the indulgence of raillery uniformly acute, but often unaccompanied with the least desire to wound. The suppression of an arch and full pointed bon-mot, from a dread of offending its object, the sage of Zurich very properly classes as a virtue only to be sought for in the calendar of saints; if so, Burns must not be too severely dealt with for being rather deficient in it. He paid for his mischievous wit as dearly as any one could do. ""Twas no extravagant arithmetic,' to say of him, as was said of Yorick, that for every ten jokes he got a hundred enemies;' but much allowance will be made by a candid mind for the splenetic warmth of a spirit whom distress had spited with the world,' and which, unbounded in its intellectual sallies and pursuits, continually experienced the curbs imposed by the waywardness of his fortune. The vivacity of his wishes and temper was indeed checked by almost habitual disappointments, which sat heavy on a heart that acknowledged the ruling passion of indepen-averse to the incense of flattery, and could redence, without having ever been placed beyond the grasp of penury. His soul was never languid or inactive, and his genius was extinguished only with the last spark of retreating life. His passions rendered him, according as they disclosed themselves in affection or antipathy, an object of enthusiastic attachment, or of decided eumity; for he possessed none of that negative insipidity of character whose love might be regarded with indifference, or whose resentment could be considered with contempt. In this, it should seem, the temper of his associates took the tincture from his own; for he acknowledged in the universe but two classes of objects, those of adoration the most fervent, or of aversion the most uncontrollable; and it has been frequently a reproach to him that, unsusceptible of indifference, often hating where he ought "It has been observed that he was far from ceive it tempered with less delicacy than might have been expected, as he seldom transgressed extravagantly in that way himself: where he paid a compliment, it might indeed claim the power of intoxication, as approbation from him was always an honest tribute from the warmth and sincerity of his heart. It has been sometimes represented by those who, it should seem, had a view to depreciate, though they could not hope wholly to obscure, that native brilliancy which the powers of this extraordinary man had invariably bestowed on every thing that came from his lips or pen, that the history of the Ayr-shire plough-boy was an ingenious fiction, fabricated for the purposes of obtaining the interests of the great, and enhancing the merits of what in reality required no foil. "The Cotter's Saturday Night,” “Tam o' |