EPIGRAMS ON MISS LEWARS. Dr. Currie says, "The sense of his poverty, and of the approaching distress of his infant family, pressed heavily on Burns as he lay on the bed of death; yet he alluded to his indigence, at times, with something approaching to his wonted gayety. What business,' said he to Dr. Maxwell, who attended him with the utmost zeal, has a physician to waste his time on me? I am a poor pigeon not worth plucking. Alas! I have not feathers enough upon me to carry me to my grave.'” In even a gayer spirit, he would sometimes scribble verses of compliment to sweet young Jessy Lewars, as she tripped about on her missions of gentle charity from hall to kitchen and from kitchen to hall. His surgeon, Mr. Brown, one day brought in a long sheet, containing the particulars of a menagerie of wild beasts which he had just been visiting. As Mr. Brown was handing the sheet to Miss Lewars, Burns seized it, and wrote upon it a couple of verses with red chalk; after which he handed it to Miss Lewars, saying that it was now fit to be presented to a lady. TALK not to me of savages From Afric's burning sun; No savage e'er could rend my heart, But Jessy's lovely hand in mine, Not even to view the heavenly choir On another occasion, while Miss Lewars was wait. ing upon him in his sick-chamber, he took up a crystal goblet containing wine and water, and after writing upon it the following verses, in the character of a Toast, presented it to her. Give the poet's darling flame, At this time of trouble, on Miss Lewars complaining of indisposition, he said, to provide for the worst, he would write her epitaph. He accordingly inscribed the following on another goblet, saying, "That will be a companion to the Toast." Say, sages, what's the charm on earth Can turn Death's dart aside? On Miss Lewars recovering a little, the poet said "There is a poetic reason for it,” and wrote the fol lowing. But rarely seen since Nature's birth, Yet still one seraph's left on earth,- FAIREST MAID ON DEVON BANKS. TUNE Rothemurchie. - At this crisis a sad stroke fell upon Burns in the form of a letter from a Dumfries solicitor, urging payment of an account (now ascertained to have amounted to £7 4s.) due, or overdue, to a draper for his volunteer uniform. It was generally believed of this tradesman by his contemporaries, that he would never have harassed the poor poet for the debt. In Scotland, however, a letter from a writer is generally regarded as a menacing step on the part of a creditor; and so did it appear on the present occasion to Burns, whose mind was too gloomy and excitable to take calm views on any such matter. Under these circumstances, Burns thus wrote to Mr. Thomson: 1 The amiable Jessy Lewars, by marriage Mrs. James Thomson, spent the whole of her life in Dumfries, and died there in May, 1855. "After all my boasted independence, curst Necessity compels me to implore you for five pounds. A cruel scoundrel of a haberdasher, to whom I owe an account, taking it into his head that I am dying, has commenced a process, and will infallibly put me into jail. Do, for God's sake, send me that sum, and that by return of post. Forgive me this earnestness; but the horrors of a jail have made me half distracted. I do not ask all this gratuitously; for, upon returning health, I hereby promise and engage to furnish you with five pounds' worth of the neatest songgenius you have seen. I tried my hand on Rothemurchie this morning. The measure is so difficult, that it is impossible to infuse much genius into the lines." - 12th July, 1796. To think of Burns composing love-verses in these circumstances! It was to happy days spent on the banks of the Devon, during the short blaze of his fame, and to Charlotte Hamilton and her youthful loveliness, that his mind reverted at this gloomy time. CHORUS. FAIREST maid on Devon banks: Wilt thou lay that frown aside, And smile as thou wert wont to do? Full well thou know'st I love thee dear: Nor use a faithful lover so?" |