BURNS-AFTER DEATH.

T is not so surprising that Burns died poor and almost indigent as that he left so comparatively trifling an amount of debt.* The money realised by his Poems appears to have been expended by the time he left Ellisland: he obtained nothing more from that source except the small sum thrust upon him by Thomson. He had lived four and a half years in Dumfries on an ascertained income which probably never rose above £90 a year, † with a family of seven or eight persons to support, and this at a time when the necessaries of life were unusually dear; and yet he had exercised so much prudence and self-denial that only a few pounds stood

*It has been repeatedly stated that Burns died free of debt. This, even by his own confession (letter to his brother, July 10, 1796), is not strictly true. He owed small sums to various tradesmen, as well as a balance of rent to his landlord, Captain Hamilton. Probably, however, the total amount of his debts did not much exceed thirty pounds. The following letter from Gilbert Burns to Mr Wallace, writer in Dumfries, throws some light on the subject, while still further confirming the fact that Mr James Clarke, the schoolmaster, was a debtor of Burns:

MOSSGIEL, 1st Jan. 1797.

MR WALLACE.-Sir-I intended to have been in Dumfries about this time, to have paid off my brother's debts; but I find much difficulty in sparing as much money. I think of offering Captain Hamilton and Mr Williamson the half of their accts, and begging a little time to pay the other half. If Mr Clark pay up his bill, I hope to be able to pay off the smaller accts. I beg you will write me your opinion immediately on this subject. Will you have the goodness to mention this to them, which will save me some uneasiness when I come to Dumfries, which I think will be in two or three weeks, unless I have occasion to delay it till Dumfries fair? I beg that you will smooth the way to me in this business as much as you can. I do feel much hurt at it; but, as I suppose the delay can be no great inconvenience to the gentlemen, I hope they will be indulgent to me.-I am, sir, your most obedt humble sert, GILBERT BURNS.

at his debit when he died. On the other side of the account we find the £180 which he had advanced from the profits of his Poems to his brother, books to the value of about £90, and his household furniture. The draft for £10 sent by Mr Burness, and that for £5 sent by Mr Thomson, lay unrealised in the widow's possession, and formed the subject of a legal writ issued by the Commissary of Dumfries on the ensuing 6th of October, confirming to her, 'executrix qua relict to the umquhile Robert Burns,' the use of the sums which they represented.

While Burns lay dead in his house, his friend Lewars wrote to Mr Burness of Montrose informing him of the melancholy event, and apologising for the delay in answering his late kind communication, on the ground that, at the time it was received, 'Mr Burns was totally unable either to write or dictate a letter.' Mr Burness immediately sent a letter of the kindest condolence to the widow. He was not a rich man, and he had a family of his own to provide for; yet, apparently as a simple matter of course, he offered to relieve the widow of the charge of her eldest son, and to educate him with his own children; and he enclosed an additional sum of £5, to relieve her immediate necessities. Adverting, further, to what the poet had told him of his brother Gilbert's debt, he advised her, as far as circumstances permitted, to use lenity in settling with him.' Mrs Burns replied in grateful terms, but declined, in the meantime, to part with any of her children she heartily concurred in Mr Burness's suggestion about Gilbert's debt. The latter, who had long struggled under great difficulties at Mossgiel, made up his mind at his brother's death to sell off all he possessed in order to discharge the debt he owed to the destitute Dumfries family. But the poet's widow, forgetful of her own pressing need, resolutely forbade this step. The money was not paid up till twenty-four years after, and even then without interest. It must be remembered, however, that, during the whole time of its currency, Gilbert had maintained his mother, receiving, so far as is known, no contribution from Robert for that purpose, and that he had also taken charge of the poet's eldest son for several years.

Immediately after the death of Burns, his friend Syme began to exert himself with the greatest zeal to arouse public sympathy

for the widow and children. With him was associated in his task Dr William Maxwell, the poet's medical attendant, a man in political opinions and sociability decidedly after his own heart.

Alexander Cunningham, Burns's principal Edinburgh friend, associated himself with Syme and Maxwell. One or other of the three was, in all probability, the author of the newspaper announcement which has been quoted.*

Syme had an old college friend in practice as a physician at Liverpool, a man of literary talent, whom affinity of taste had brought into intimacy with the well-known author, Mr William Roscoe of that town. This was Dr James Currie, who had hitherto enjoyed only a dubious fame as the supposed author of Jasper Wilson's Letter to Mr Pitt, a pamphlet in which the war had been deprecated with an energy far from pleasing to the administration. Currie, who was the son of a Scottish clergyman, and a native of Annan, had read with avidity Burns's Poems on their first appearance, and had had a casual interview with the poet at Dumfries in 1792. On hearing of the death of Burns, he expressed to Syme a strong interest in the intended subscription and also in the preparation of a 'Life' and an edition of the posthumous works of the poet. Within a month he collected forty or fifty guineas for the family. At the same time he wrote about the proposed publication in such terms as amounted to an offer of his own literary assistance to any extent that might be desired. There was some uncertainty at first as to the selection of an editor and biographer. Professor Dugald Stewart was thought of. So was Mrs Walter Riddel. Dr Currie pressed Syme to take the matter up. But it was finally settled, in September, that the duty should devolve upon Dr Currie himself.

Meanwhile the subscription went on, but not very rapidly. In Dumfriesshire a sum of somewhat more than £100 was contributed within the first three months. In Liverpool Dr Currie secured seventy guineas. The Edinburgh total had not by the end of the year risen much above the latter sum, though Burns had there had many admirers and not a few friends. It does not appear, however, that any efforts were made in Scotland beyond the publication of advertisements in the newspapers. In London more

* See p. 280.

was done, and the entire sum realised was £700, including donations of £100 each by Sir Francis Burdett and Mr James Shaw (afterwards Sir James, and Chamberlain of London), who took upon himself the whole trouble connected with the London subscription. The total was subsequently raised by Mr Shaw's exertions to £1200, with which stock was purchased and handed over to the provost and bailies of Ayr, £800 to be appropriated to the use of Mrs Burns and her three sons, and £400 to the use of the poet's two natural daughters, each of whom received £200 on marriage.

During the latter part of 1796 Syme was busy collecting Burns's letters and fugitive poems, and met with considerable success. Mrs Dunlop gave up her letters in exchange for her own to Burns. Clarinda kept hers, but promised to transcribe and forward a few passages from them, provided her own letters to Burns were returned.* Robert Aiken had gathered together many of the poet's communications: but the bundle was stolen by an unfaithful clerk, and, it is feared, destroyed, to prevent detection. The mass collected by Syme was transmitted to Dr Currie in February 1797. 'I received,' says Currie, the complete sweepings of his drawers and of his desk-as it appeared to me-even to the copy-book on which his little boy had been practising his writing.'

George Thomson readily gave up the sixty songs Burns had sent him for the Melodies of Scotland, and even the valuable series of letters which the poet had addressed to him regarding Scottish songs; and in order that this new matter might be quite fresh in Currie's edition-only six of the songs had already appeared in the Melodies-he kept back his own work for a con

In a letter to Mr Syme, written at this time, Mrs M'Lehose says: 'What can have impressed such an idea upon you, as that I ever conceived the most distant intention to destroy these precious memorials of an acquaintance, the recollection of which would influence me were I to live till fourscore. Be assured, I never will suffer one of them to perish. This I give you my solemn word of honour upon; nay, more, on condition that you send me my letters, I will select such passages from our dear Bard's letters as will do honour to his memory, and cannot hurt my own fame even with the most rigid.'

In another letter of the 9th January 1797, to the same correspondent, she says: 'It rejoices me to hear so large a sum is to come from other places—and [I] join you in reprobating Caledonia's capital for her shabby donation. But there are few souls anywhere who understood or could enter into the relish of such a character as B.'s. There was an electricity about him, which could only touch or pervade a few, cast in nature's finest mould.'

siderable time. His conduct was fully appreciated by the Burns family.*

Of the 180 songs sent in Burns's own handwriting to Johnson's Scots Musical Museum, only forty-seven were finally pronounced by Dr Currie to be wholly and solely Burns's. The poet himself, though the magnitude of Johnson's collection seems to have disposed him to regard it as 'the text-book and standard of Scottish song and music,' felt ashamed of much that he had contributed to it. 'Here, once for all,' said he, in a letter to Mr Thomson, 'let me apologise for the many silly compositions of mine in this work. Many beautiful airs wanted words, and in the hurry of other avocations, if I could string a parcel of rhymes together, anything near tolerable, I was fain to let them pass!' On the other hand, a considerable number of his contributions to Johnson were equal

* Gilbert Burns wrote Thomson as follows, on receiving the present of a volume of his collection of songs:

TO MR GEORGE THOMSON, TRUSTEES' OFFICE, EDINBURGH.

DINNING, 14th March 1800.

SIR-I received your very acceptable present of your songs, which calls for my warmest thanks. If ever I come to Edinburgh, I will certainly avail myself of your invitation, to call on a person whose handsome conduct to my brother's family has secured my esteem, and confirmed to me the opinion, that musical taste and talents have a close connection with the harmony of the moral feelings. I am unwilling indeed to believe that the motions of every one's heart are dark as Erebus to whom Dame Nature has denied a good ear and musical capacity, as her ladyship has been pleased to endow myself but scantily in these particulars; but 'happy the swain who possesses it, happy his cot, and happy the sharer of it. To the sharer of yours, I beg you will present my most cordial congratulations. My sister-in-law begs me to present her best thanks to you for her copy, and to assure you that, however little she may have expressed it, she has a proper sense of the kind attention you have so kindly shewn her.-I am, dear sir, with the highest esteem, your most obedient humble servant, GILBERT BURNS.

Thomson's work extended to five volumes, of which an octavo edition was subsequently published, and, after a long interval, he added a sixth volume in 1841, the work having thus occupied in its preparation and publication not much less than half a century. Thomson retired from the principal clerkship of the Trustees' Office in 1839, after having filled it for fifty-eight years. On the 3d of March 1847, a silver vase, purchased by one hundred gentlemen of Edinburgh, was presented to him, as a mark of their respect and esteem. On that occasion Lord Cockburn spoke of the protracted life which had been devoted, in one course of unchanging gentleness, to public and private duty. In his official capacity, 'in everything that related to the advancement of the useful and the elegant arts, he was an instructor and a guide; and if there was a single young man who had the promise of merit united with a humble disposition, it was to Mr Thomson he looked for counsel, and it was his house that was always ready to receive him.' As to the imputations in connection with the history of Burns [to the effect that Thomson had treated the poet shabbily in his pecuniary dealings], Lord Cockburn said that he had long ago studied the matter with as much candour as any man could apply to any subject in which he was not personally interested; and his 'clear conviction was, not only that all these imputations were groundless, but that, if placed now in the same situation in which he was then, nothing different or better could be done.'