What tho' their Phoebus kinder warms, Their gun's a burden on their shouther; Till skelp-a shot-they're aff, a' throwther (1) A worthy old hostess of the author's in Mauchline where he sometimes studies politics over a glass of guid auld Scotch drink. VOL. IL XXXIX. ADDRESS TO THE UNCO GUID, OR THE RIGIDLY RIGHTEOUS. "My son, these maxims make a rule, And lump them aye thegither; The Rigid Righteous is a fool, The Rigid Wise anither; The cleanest corn that e'er was dight May hae some pyles o' caff in ; So ne'er a fellow-creature slight SOLOMON.-Eccles. ch. vii. ver. 16. ["Burns," says Hogg, in a note on this Poem, "has written more from his own heart and his own feelings than any other poet. External nature had few charms for him; the sublime shades and hues of heaven and earth never excited his enthusiasm: but with the secret fountains of passion in the human soul he was well acquainted." Burns, indeed, was not what is called a descriptive poet: yet with what exquisite snatches of description are some of his poems adorned, and in what fragrant and romantic scenes he enshrines the heroes and heroines of many of his finest songs! Who the high, exalted, virtuous dames were, to whom the Poem refers, we are not told. How much men stand indebted to want of opportunity to sin, and how much of their good name they owe to the ignorance of the world, were inquiries in which the poet found pleasure.] H Think, when your castigated pulse That still eternal gallop: Wi' wind and tide fair i' your tail, V. See social life and glee sit down, All joyous and unthinking, Till, quite transmugrify'd, they're grown O would they stay to calculate Or your more dreaded hell to state, VI. Ye high, exalted, virtuous dames, XL. TAM SAMSON'S ELEGY.' "An honest man's the noblest work of God." Pore. [Tam Samson was a west country seedsman and sportsman, who loved a good song, a social glass, and relished a shot so well that he expressed a wish to die and be buried in the moors. On this hint Barns wrote the Elegy: when Tam heard of this he waited on the poet, caused him to recite it, and expressed displeasure at being numbered with the dead: the author, whose wit was as ready as his rhymes, added the Per Contra in a moment, much to the delight of his friend. At his death the four lines of Epitaph were cut on his gravestone. "This poem has always,” says Hogg, "been a great country favourite: it abounds with happy expressions. 'In vain the burns cam' down like waters, What a picture of a flooded burn! any other poet would have given us a long description: Burns dashes it down at once in a style so graphic no one can mistake it. 'Perhaps upon his mouldering breast Some spitefu' moorfowl bigs her nest.' Match that sentence who can."] (1) When this worthy old sportsman went out last muirfowl season, he supposed it was to be, in Ossian's phrase, "the last of his fields." PER CONTRA. Go, Fame, an' canter like a filly To cease his grievin', For yet, unskaith'd by death's gleg gullie, Tam Samson's livin'. XLI. LAMENT, OCCASIONED BY THE UNFORTUNATE ISSUE OF A FRIEND'S AMOUR. "Alas! how oft does goodness wound itself! And sweet affection prove the spring of woe." HOME. [The hero and heroine of this little mournful poem were Robert Burns and Jean Armour. "This was a most melancholy affair," says the poet in his letter to Moore," which I cannot yet bear to reflect on, and had very nearly given me one or two of the principal qualifications for a place among those who have lost the chart and mistaken the reckoning of rationality." Hogg and Motherwell, with an ignorance which is easier to laugh at than account for, say this Poem was "written on the occasion of Alexander Cunningham's darling sweetheart slighting him and marrying another:-she acted a wise part." With I what care they had read the great poet whom they jointly edited it is needless to say: and how they could read the last two lines of the third verse, and commend the lady's wisdom for slighting her lover, seems a problem which defies definition. This mistake was pointed out by a friend, and corrected in a second issue of the volume.] I. O THOU pale orb, that silent shines, II. I joyless view thy rays adorn The faintly marked distant hill; I joyless view thy trembling horn Reflected in the gurgling rill: My fondly-fluttering heart, be still! Thou busy pow'r, remembrance, cease! Ah! must the agonizing thrill For ever bar returning peace! III. No idly-feign'd poetic pains, My sad, love-lorn lamentings claim; No shepherd's pipe-Arcadian strains; No fabled tortures, quaint and tame: The plighted faith; the mutual flame; The oft-attested Pow'rs above; The promis'd father's tender name; These were the pledges of my love! IV. Encircled in her clasping arms, How have the raptur'd moments flown! How have I wish'd for fortune's charins, For her dear sake, and hers alone! And must I think it!-is she gone, My secret heart's exulting boast? And does she heedless hear my groar? And is she ever, ever lost? V. Oh! can she bear so base a heart, The plighted husband of her youth! Her way may lie thro' rough distress! Then, who her pangs and pains will soothe, Her sorrows share, and make them less? VI. Ye winged hours that o'er us past, Enraptur'd more the more enjoy'd, Your dear remembrance in my breast, My fondly-treasur'd thoughts employ'd. That breast, how dreary now, and void, For her too scanty once of room! Ev'n ev'ry ray of hope destroy'd, And not a wish to gild the gloom! VII. The morn that warns th' approaching day, Awakes me up to toil and woe: I see the hours in long array, That I must suffer, lingering, slow. Full many a pang, and many a throe, Keen recollection's direful train, Must wring my soul, ere Phoebus, low, Shall kiss the distant, western main. VIII. And when my nightly couch I try, Reigns haggard-wild, in sore affright: Ev'n day, all-bitter, brings relief, From such a horror-breathing night. |