Fareweel, auld birkie! Lord be near ye, And then the Deil he daur na steer ye: Your friends aye love, your faes aye fear ye; For me, shame fa' me, If neist my heart I dinna wear ye While BURNS they ca' me! DUMFRIES, 18 Feb. 1792. CXXXI. THE RIGHTS OF WOMAN. AN OCCASIONAL ADDRESS SPOKEN BY MISS FONTENELLE ON HER BENEFIT NIGHT, Nov. 26, 1792. [Miss Fontenelle was one of the actresses whom Williamson, the manager, brought for several seasons to Dumfries: she was young and pretty, indulged in little levities of speech, and rumour added, perhaps maliciously, levities of action. The Rights of Man had been advocated by Paine, the Rights of Woman by Mary Wollstonecraft, and nought was talked of, but the moral and political regeneration of the world. The line, "But truce with kings and truce with constitutions," got an uncivil twist in recitation, from some of the audience. The words were eagerly caught up, and had some hisses bestowed on them.] WHILE Europe's eye is fix'd on mighty things, First on the sexes' intermix'd connexion, Our second Right-but needless here is caution, ways; Would swagger, swear, get drunk, kick up a riot, Nay even thus invade a lady's quiet. Now thank our stars! these Gothic times are fled; Now, well-bred men and you are all wellbred Most justly think (and we are much the gainers) Such conduct neither spirit, wit, nor manners. For Right the third, our last, our best, our dearest, That right to fluttering female hearts the nearest, Which even the Rights of Kings in low prostra tion Most humbly own-'tis dear, dear admiration! In that blest sphere alone we live and move; There taste that life of life-immortal love.Smiles, glances, sighs, tears, fits, flirtations, airs, 'Gainst such an host what flinty savage dares— When awful Beauty joins with all her charms, Who is so rash as rise in rebel arms? But truce with kings and truce with constitutions, With bloody armaments and revolutions, CXXXII. MONODY, ON A LADY FAMED FOR HER CAPRICE. 66 [The heroine of this rough lampoon was Mrs. Riddel of Woodleigh Park; a lady, young and gay, much of a wit, and something of a poetess, and till the hour of his death the friend of Burns himself. She pulled his displeasure on her, it is said, by smiling more sweetly than he liked on some epauletted coxcombs," for so he sometimes designated commissioned officers: the lady soon laughed him out of his mood. We owe to her pen an account of her last interview with the poet, written with great beauty and feeling.] How cold is that bosom which folly once fired, How pale is that cheek where the rouge lately glisten'd! How silent that tongue which the echoes oft tired, How dull is that ear which to flattery so lis ten'd! It sorrow and anguish their exit await, From friendship and dearest affection remov'd; How doubly severer, Maria, thy fate, Thou diest unwept as thou livedst unlov'd. Loves, Graces, and Virtues, I call not on you; So shy, grave, and distant, ye shed not a tear: But come, all ye offspring of Folly so true, And flowers let us cull for Maria's cold bier. We'll search through the garden for each silly flower, We'll roam through the forest for each idle weed; But chiefly the nettle, so typical, shower, For none e'er approach'd her but rued the rash deed. We'll sculpture the marble, we'll measure the lay; Here Vanity strums on her idiot lyre; There keen Indignation shall dart on her prey, Which spurning Contempt shall redeem from his ire. THE EPITAPH. Here lies, now a prey to insulting neglect, CXXXIII. FROM ESOPUS TO MARIA. [Williamson, the actor, Colonel Macdouall, Captain Gillespie, and Mrs. Riddel are the characters which pass over the stage in this strange composition: it is printed from the Poet's own manuscript, and seems a sort of outpouring of wrath and contempt, on persons who, in his eyes, gave themselves airs beyond their condition, or their merits. The verse of the lady is held up to contempt and laughter: the satirist celebrates her "Motley foundling fancies, stolen or strayed;" and has a passing hit at her "Still matchless tongue that conquers all reply."] FROM those drear solitudes and frowsy 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; VOL. II. Where tiny thieves not destin'd yet to swing, "Alas! I feel I am no actor here!" Will turn thy very rouge to deadly pale; Though twisted smooth with Harry's nicest care, I start in Hamlet, in Othello roar; Or haughty Chieftain, 'mid the dim of arms, The shrinking bard adown the alley skulks, hulks; Though there, his heresies in church and state when He dips in gall unmix'd his eager pen,— Why, Lonsdale, thus thy wrath on vagrants pour, Must earth no rascal save thyself endure? Thou know'st, the virtues cannot hate thee worse, Maria, send me too thy griefs and cares; Who says, that fool alone is not thy due, CXXXIV. POEM ON PASTORAL POETRY. [Though Gilbert Burns says there is some doubt of this Poem being by his brother, and though Robert Chambers declares that he "has scarcely a doubt that it is not by the Ayrshire Bard," I must print it as his, for I have no doubt on the subject. It was found among the papers of the poet, in his own hand-writing: the second, the fourth, and the concluding verses bear the Burns' stamp, which no one has been successful in counterfeiting: they resemble the verses of Beattie to which Chambers has compared them as little as the cry of the eagle resembles the chirp of the wren.] HAIL Poesie! thou Nymph reserv'd! Say, Lassie, why thy train amang, While loud the trump's heroic clang, And sock or buskin skelp alang, To death or marriage; Scarce ane has tried the shepherd-sang But wi' miscarriage? CXXXV. SONNET, WRITTEN ON THE TWENTY-FIFTH OF JANUARY, 1793, THE BIRTHDAY OF THE AUTHOR, ON HEARING A THRUSH SING IN A MORNING WALK. [Burns was fond of a saunter in a leafless wood, when the winter storm howled among the branches. These characteristic lines were composed on the morning of his birthday, with the Nith at his feet, and the ruins of Lincluden at his side: he is willing to accept the unlooked-for song of the thrush as a fortunate omen.] SING on, sweet thrush, upon the leafless bough, So in lone Poverty's dominion drear, Sits meek Content with light unanxious heart, Welcomes the rapid moments, bids them part, Nor asks if they bring aught to hope or fear. I thank Thee, Author of this opening day! Thou whose bright sun now gilds yon orient skies! Riches denied, Thy boon was purer joys, What wealth could never give nor take away! Yet come, thou child of poverty and care, The mite high Heaven bestowed, that mite with thee I'll share. CXXXVI. SONNET ON THE DEATH OF ROBERT RIDDEL, ESQ., [The death of Glencairn, who was his patron, and the death of Glenriddel, who was his friend, and had, while he lived at Ellisland, been his neighbour, weighed hard on the mind of Burns, who, about this time, began to regard his own future fortune with more of dismay than of hope. Riddel united antiquarian pursuits with those of literature, and experienced all the vulgar prejudices entertained by the peasantry against those who indulge in such researches. His collection of what the rustics of the vale called queer quairns and swine-troughs," is now scattered or neglected: I have heard a competent judge say, that they threw light on both the public and domestic history of Scotland.] 66 No more, ye warblers of the wood-no more! Nor pour your descant, grating, on my soul; Thou young-eyed Spring, gay in thy verdant stole, More welcome were to me grim Winter's wildest roar. How can ye charm, ye flow'rs, with all your dyes? Ye blow upon the sod that wraps my friend: How can I to the tuneful strain attend? That strain flows round th' untimely tomb where Riddel lies. Yes, pour, ye warblers, pour the notes of woe! And soothe the Virtues weeping on this bier: The Man of Worth, who has not left his peer, Is in his "narrow house" for ever darkly low. Thee, Spring, again with joy shall others greet, Me, mem'ry of my loss will only meet. CXXXVII. ON MRS. RS BIRTHDAY. [By compliments such as these lines contain, Burns soothed the smart which his verses "On a lady famea for her caprice," inflicted on the accomplished Mrs. Riddel.] OLD Winter, with his frosty beard, Thus once to Jove his prayer preferr'd,- Now, Jove, for once be mighty civil, THEE, Caledonia, thy wild heaths among, Beneath the hallow'd turf where Wallace lies. Is this the power in freedom's war, CXXXIX. VERSES TO A YOUNG LADY. [This young lady was the daughter of the poet's friend, Graham of Fintry; and the gift alluded to was a copy of George Thomson's Select Scottish Songs: a work which owes many attractions to the lyric genius of Burns.] HERE, where the Scottish muse immortal lives, In sacred strains and tuneful numbers join'd, Accept the gift ;-tho' humble he who gives, Rich is the tribute of the grateful mind. So may no ruffian-feeling in thy breast, Or pity's notes in luxury of tears, As modest want the tale of woe reveals; While conscious virtue all the strain endears, And heaven-born piety her sanction seals. [Burns admired genius adorned by learning; but mere learning without genius he always regarded as pedantry. Those critics who scrupled too much about words he called eunuchs of literature, and to one, who taxed him with writing obscure language in questionable grammar, he said, "Thou art but a Gretna-green match-maker between vowels and consonants!" "TWAS where the birch and sounding thong are ply'd, The noisy domicile of pedant pride; His awful chair of state resolves to mount, First enter'd A, a grave, broad, solemn wight, Reluctant, E stalk'd in; with piteous race own, Pale he surrenders at the tyrant's throne! The cobweb'd Gothic dome resounded Y! In rueful apprehension enter'd O, As trembling U stood staring all aghast, |