Her feeble pulse gies strong presumption,
Death soon will end her.

"Tis you and Taylor* are the chief,
Wha are to blame for this mischief;

But gin the Lord's ain focks gat leave,
A toom tar-barrel

An' twa red peats wad send relief,

An' end the quarrel.

30

LETTER TO JAMES TAIT, GLENCONNOR.†

ULD comrade dear and brither sinner,
How's a' the folk about Glenconnor;
How do you this blae eastlin wind,
That's like to blaw a body blind?

For me, my faculties are frozen,
My dearest member nearly dozen'd.
I've sent you here by Johnie Simson,
Twa sage philosophers to glimpse on;
Smith, wi' his sympathetic feeling,
An' Reid, to common sense appealing.
Philosophers have fought an' wrangled,
An' meikle Greek an' Latin mangled,
Till wi' their logic-jargon tir'd,
An' in the depth of Science mir'd,

* Dr. Taylor of Norwich.

10

James Tait of Glenconnor is described by Burns as "Old Glenconnor"-" My old friend,"-and as 66 a worthy intelligent farmer, my father's friend, and my own," in letters written early in 1788, acquainting his correspondents that he had consulted him respecting the farm of Ellisland.

To common sense they now appeal,
What wives an' wabsters see an' feel.

But, hark ye, friend, I charge you strictly,
Peruse them, an' return them quickly,
For now I'm grown sae cursed douse,
I pray an' ponder butt the house,
My shins, my lane, I there sit roastin',
Perusing Bunyan, Brown, an' Boston;
Till by an' by, if I haud on,
I'll grunt a real Gospel-groan:
Already I begin to try it,
To cast my een up like a pyet,
When by the gun she tumbles o'er,
Flutt'ring an' gaspin in her gore :
Sae shortly you shall see me bright,
A burning an' a shining light.

My heart-warm love to guid auld Glen,
The ace an' wale of honest men :
When bending down wi' auld grey hairs,
Beneath the load of years and cares,
May He who made him still support him,
An' views beyond the grave comfort him.
His worthy fam❜ly far and near,
God bless them a' wi' grace and gear!

My auld school-fellow, Preacher Willie
The manly tar, my mason Billie,
An' Auchenbay, I wish him joy;
If he's a parent, lass or boy,

May he be dad, and Meg the mither,
Just five-and-forty years thegither!
An' no forgetting wabster Charlie,
I'm tauld he offers very fairly.
An' Lord, remember singing Sannock,

Wi' hale-breeks, saxpence, an' a bannock.
An' next, my auld acquaintance, Nancy,
Since she is fitted to her fancy;

An' her kind stars hae airted till her
A good chiel wi' a pickle siller.
My kindest, best respects I sen' it,
To cousin Kate an' sister Janet;

Tell them frae me, wi' chiels be cautious,
For, faith, they'll aiblins fin' them fashous:
To grant a heart is fairly civil,

But to grant a maidenhead's the devil.-
An' lastly, Jamie, for yoursel,

May guardian angels tak a spell,

An' steer you seven miles south o' hell:
But first, before you see heav'n's glory,
May ye get monie a merry story,
Monie a laugh, and monie a drink,
An' aye eneugh o' neefu' clink.

Now fare ye weel, an' joy be wi' you,
For my sake this I beg it o' you,
Assist poor Simson a' ye can,
Ye'll fin' him just an honest man;
Sae I conclude and quat my chanter,
Your's, saint or sinner,

ROB THE RANTER.*

* For a note on this signature, see p. 68, ante.

50

60

70

EPISTLE FROM ESOPUS* TO MARIA.

ROM those drear solitudes and frowzy

cells,

Where infamy with sad repentance

dwells;

Where turnkeys make the jealous portal fast,
And deal from iron hands the spare repast;
Where truant 'prentices, yet young in sin,
Blush at the curious stranger peeping in ;
Where strumpets, relics of the drunken roar,
Resolve to drink, nay half to whore, no more;
Where tiny thieves not destin'd yet to swing,
Beat hemp for others, riper for the string:
From these dire scenes my wretched lines I date,
To tell Maria her Esopus' fate.

'Alas! I feel I am no actor here!'
"Tis real hangmen, real scourges bear!
Prepare, Maria, for a horrid tale

Will turn thy very rouge to deadly pale;
Will make thy hair, tho' erst from gipsy poll'd,
By barber woven, and by barber sold,

Though twisted smooth with Harry's nicest care,
Like hoary bristles to erect and stare.
The hero of the mimic scene, no more

10

20

"The Esopus of this strange epistle," which was printed by Mr. Allan Cunningham from Burns' own manuscript, was, he says, "Williamson the actor, and the Maria to whom it was addressed was Mrs. Riddel," so often mentioned. Neither the subject nor the style of this parody on the beginning of Pope's version of Eloise's Epistle to Abelard appear, however, to be peculiarly suited for a lady's perusal.

I start in Hamlet, in Othello roar ;

30

Or haughty Chieftain, 'mid the din of arms,
In Highland bonnet woo Malvina's charms;
While sans culottes stoop up the mountain high,
And steal from me Maria's prying eye.
Bless'd Highland bonnet! Once my proudest dress,
Now prouder still, Maria's temples press.
I see her wave thy towering plumes afar,
And call each coxcomb to the wordy war.
I see her face the first of Ireland's sons,
And even out-Irish his Hibernian bronze;
The crafty colonel leaves the tartan'd lines,
For other wars, where he a hero shines:
The hopeful youth, in Scottish senate bred,
Who owns a Bushby's heart without the head;
Comes 'mid a string of coxcombs to display,
That veni, vidi, vici, is his way;

39

The shrinking bard adown an alley skulks,
And dreads a meeting worse than Woolwich hulks;
Though there his heresies in church and state
Might well award him Muir and Palmer's fate :
Still she undaunted reels and rattles on,

And dares the public like a noontide sun.
(What scandal called Maria's jaunty stagger,
The ricket reeling of a crooked swagger?

Whose spleen e'en worse than Burns's venom when
He dips in gall unmix'd his eager pen,—
And pours his vengeance in the burning line,
Who christen'd thus Maria's lyre divine;
The idiot strum of vanity bemused,
And even th' abuse of poesy abused!

Who call'd her verse, a parish workhouse, made
For motley, foundling fancies, stolen or stray'd?)

50