I'll conjure the ghost of the great Rorie More,* And bumper his horn with him twenty times o'er.' Sir Robert, a soldier, no speech would pretend, To the board of Glenriddel our heroes repair, fame, Than the sense, wit, and taste of a sweet lovely dame. A bard was selected to witness the fray, 40 The dinner being over, the claret they ply, were wet. Gay Pleasure ran riot as bumpers ran o'er; Six bottles a-piece had well wore out the night, * See Johnson's Tour to the Hebrides. R. B. Turn'd o'er in one bumper a bottle of red, And swore 'twas the way that their ancestors did. Then worthy Glenriddel, so cautious and sage, 60 The gallant Sir Robert fought hard to the end; But who can with Fate and quart bumpers contend? Though Fate said, a hero should perish in light; So uprose bright Phoebus-and down fell the knight. Next up rose our bard, like a prophet in drink :'Craigdarroch, thou'lt soar when creation shall sink! : But if thou would flourish immortal in rhyme, 'Come-one bottle more-and have at the sublime! 6 Thy line, that have struggled for freedom with Bruce, 'Shall heroes and patriots ever produce: 'So thine be the laurel, and mine be the bay ; The field thou hast won, by yon bright god of day!' 70 VOL. II. 18 SKETCH INSCRIBED TO THE RIGHT HON. C. J. FOX. BURNS in his letter to Mrs. Dunlop from Ellisland, 4th April, 1789, says, "I no sooner hit on any poetic plan or fancy, but I wish to send it to you; and if knowing and reading these give half the pleasure to you that communicating them to you gives to me, am satisfied. "I have a poetic whim in my head, which I at present dedicate, or rather inscribe, to the Right Hon. C. J. Fox; but how long that fancy may hold, I cannot say. A few of the first lines I have just rough-sketched, as follows:" This "Sketch" was not printed in any edition of the Poet's works revised by himself. OW Wisdom and Folly meet, mix, and unite; How Virtue and Vice blend their black and their white; How Genius, th' illustrious father of fiction, Confounds rule and law, reconciles contradiction, I sing; If these mortals, the Critics, should bustle, I care not, not I,-let the Critics go whistle! But now for a Patron, whose name and whose glory, At once may illustrate and honour my story. Thou, first of our orators, first of our wits, hits; 10 With knowledge so vast, and with judgement so strong, No man, with the half of 'em, e'er went far wrong; With passions so potent, and fancies so bright, For using thy name offers fifty excuses. Good Lord, what is man! for as simple he looks, Do but try to develope his hooks and his crooks, With his depths and his shadows, his good and his evil, All in all, he's a problem must puzzle the devil. 20 On his one ruling Passion Sir Pope hugely1 labours, That, like th' old Hebrew walking switch, eats up its neighbours: Mankind are his show-box-a3 friend, would you know him? Pull the string, Ruling Passion, the picture will show him. What pity, in rearing so beauteous a system, For, spite of his fine theoretic positions, Some sort all our qualities each to its tribe, As by one drunken fellow his comrades you'll find. 1 VAR. ' warmly. MS. in Burns' writing. 2 Human nature's. MS. 3 your. MS. Nor even two different shades of the same, Though like as was ever twin-brother to brother, Possessing the one shall imply you've the other. *But truce with abstraction, and truce with a muse, Whose rhymes you'll perhaps, Sir, ne'er deign to peruse: 40 Will you leave your justings, your jars, and your quarrels, Contending with Billy for proud-nodding laurels. My much-honor'd Patron, believe your poor Poet, Your courage much more than your prudence you show it, In vain with Squire Billy for laurels you struggle, He'll have them by fair trade, if not, he will smuggle; Net cabinets even of kings would conceal 'em, He'd up the back-stairs, and by G— he would steal 'em. Then feats like Squire Billy's you ne'er can atchieve 'em, 49 It is not, outdo him,-the task is, out-thieve him. VAR. 4 must. MS. *The following twelve lines first appeared in the Aldine edition of Burns [1839], and were printed from a MS. in the Poet's own writing, in the possession of the late Mr. Pickering. |