Happiness is but a name,

Make content and ease thy aim

Ambition is a meteor gleam;

Fame an idle restless dream:

Pleasures, insects on the wing

Those that sip the dew alone,
Make the butterflies thy town;

Those that would the bloom devour,
Crush the locusts-save the flower.
For the future be prepar'd,
Guard whatever thou can'st guard;
But thy utmost duly § done,
Welcome what thou can'st not shun.
Follies past give thou to air,
Make their consequence thy care:
Keep the name of man in mind,
And dishonour not thy kind.
Reverence, with lowly heart,
Him whose wondrous work thou art;
Keep His goodness still in view,
Thy Trust—and thy Example, too.

Stranger, go! Heaven be thy guide;
Quoth the Beadsman on Nithside.

† VAR.-Peace, the tenderest flower of Spring; Pleasures, insects on the wing.-MS. VAR. Their.-MS. VAR. Duty.-MS. ["The hermitage in which these elegant lines were written was the property of Captain Riddel, a distinguished antiquarian, who lived in Friars-Carse some mile or so above Ellisland. A small door admitted the Poet, at his own pleasure, into the wood where the Hermitage was built; there he found such seclusion as he loved; flowers and shrubs were thickly planted round the place, and in the interior were chairs and a table for the accommodation of visiters. The first six lines of the poem were inscribed with a diamond, which Burns ever carried about with him, on a pane of glass in the window. While Riddel lived, and even during the life of Burns, the verses were respected; the proprietor, however, at length removed them and had them secured in a frame. Friars-Carse is altogether one of the loveliest spots in the Nith the natural beaut of the place was much improved by the taste of the antiquarian. He formed pictu

Dangers, eagle-pinion'd, bold,"
Soar around each cliffy hold,

While cheerful Peace, with linnet song,
Chants the lowly dells among.

As the shades of ev'ning close,
Beck'ning thee to long repose;
As Life itself becomes disease,
Seek the chimney-neuk of ease,
There, ruminate with sober thought;
On all thou'st seen, and heard, and wrought;
And teach the sportive younkers round,
Saws of experience, sage and sound.
Say, man's true, genuine estimate, ¶
The grand criterion of his fate,
Is not-Art thou high or low?
Did thy fortune ebb or flow?
Wast ** thou cottager or king?
Peer ++ or peasant?-no such thing!
Did many talents gild thy span?
Or frugal nature grudge thee one?
Tell them, and press it on their mind,
As thou thyself must shortly find,
The smile or frown of awful Heav'n,
To Virtue or to Vice is giv'n.
Say, "To be just, and kind, and wise,
There solid Self-enjoyment lies;
That foolish, selfish, faithless ways,
Lead to the wretched, vile, and base."

resque lines of road; planted elegant shrubberies; raised a rude Druidic temple on the summit of a rough precipitous hill, which over-towers the Nith, and in all the chief walks of his grounds he placed many rare and valuable reliques of Scotland's elder day: such as sculptured troughs, ornamented crosses, and inscribed altars, which he had collected at much outlay from all parts of Scotland-"I shall transcribe for you," says Burns to Mrs. Dunlop, "a few lines I wrote in a hermitage, belonging to a gentleman in my Nithsdale neighbourhood. They are almost the only favours the muses have conferred on me in this country;" and to Miss Chalmers, he writes, in September, 1788, "One day in a Hermitage, on the banks of the Nith, belonging to a gentleman in my neighbourhood, who is so good as to give me a key at pleasure, I wrote the above, supposing myself the sequestered venerable inhabitant of the lonely mansion."] VAR.-Say, the criterion of their fate, The important query of their state. ** Wert.-MS. tt Prince.-MS.

To Captain Riddel,

OF GLENEIDDEL.

EXTEMPORE LINES ON RETURNING A NEWSPAPER.

Ellisland, Monday Evening.

YOUR news &review,* Sir, I've read through &
With little admiring or blaming ; [through, Sir,
The papers are barren of home-news or foreign,
No murders or rapes worth the naming.
Our friends, the reviewers, those chippers and
Are judges of mortar and stone, Sir; [hewers,
But of meet or unmeet in a fabric complete,

I boldly pronounce they are none, Sir.
My goose-quill too rude is to tell all your good-
Bestow'd on your servant, the Poet; [ness
Would to God I had one like a beam of the sun,
And then all the world, Sir, should know it!

A Mother's Lament,†

FOR THE DEATH OF HER SON.

FATE gave the word, the arrow sped,

And pierc'd my darling's heart;
And with him all the joys are fled
Life can to me impart.
By cruel hands the sapling drops,
In dust dishonour'd laid:
So fell the pride of all my hopes,
My age's future shade.

The mother-linnet in the brake
Bewails her ravish'd young;
So I, for my lost darling's sake,
Lament the live-day long.
Death, oft I've fear'd thy fatal blow,
Now, fond, I bare my breast,
O, do thou kindly lay me low

With him I love, at rest!

* ["The review which Captain Riddel sent to the Bard contained sharp strictures on his poetry. Burns estimated at once the right value of all such criticisms; he felt that true genius had nothing to dread, and that dulness and stupidity would sink, from their own weight, without the aid of satire. In another place, when speaking of the chippers and hewers,' he questions their jurisdiction, and claims to be tried by His peers could not easily be found; so the Poet was safe. Burns was a frequent guest at the board of Glenriddel, and, as he returned to Ellisland, he loved to linger on Nithside,

his peers.

'Delighted with the dashing roar,'

when the river, swollen, perhaps, with rains on the mountains, was rough and raging, and

'Chaf'd against the scaur's red side,'

on the summit of which he had built his abode."-ALLAN CUNNINGHAM.]

["The Mother's Lament," says the Poet, in one copy of the poem, "was composed partly with a view to Mrs. Fergusson of Craigdarrock, and partly to the worthy patroness of my early unknown muse, Mrs. Stewart, of Afton." It was also inserted in the Musical Museum to the tune of Finlayston House."-See Burns's Remarks on Scottish Song, under this title.]

[Robert Graham, Esq.. of Fintray, was one of the Commissioners of Excise, and having met the Poet at the Duke of Athole's, he became interested in his behalf, and shewed him many kindnesses. In August, 1788, Burns sent Mrs. Dunlop fourteen lines of this Epistle, beginning with :

First Epistle to R. Graham, Esq.
OF FINTRAY. Į

And fram'd her last, best work, the human mind,
WHEN Nature her great master-piece design'd,
Her eye intent on all the mazy plan,
She form'd of various parts the various man.

Then first she calls the useful many forth;
Plain plodding industry, and sober worth:
Thence peasants, farmers, native sons of earth,
And merchandise' whole genus take their birth:
Each prudent cit a warm existence finds,
And all mechanics' many-apron'd kinds.
Some other rarer sorts are wanted yet,
The lead and buoy are needful to the net;
The caput mortuum of gross desires
Makes a material for mere knights and squires;
The martial phosphorus is taught to flow,
She kneads the lumpish philosophic dough,
Then marks th' unyielding mass with grave de-
Law, physic, politics, and deep divines: [signs,
Last, she sublimes th' Aurora of the poles,
The flashing elements of female souls.

The order'd system fair before her stood, Nature, well pleas'd, pronounc'd it very good; But ere she gave creating labour o'er, Half-jest, she try'd one curious labour more. Some spumy, fiery, ignis fatuus matter, Such as the slightest breath of air might scatter; With arch alacrity and conscious glee (Nature may have her whim as well as we, Her Hogarth-art perhaps she meant to show it) She forms the thing, and christens it—a poet, Creature, tho' oft the prey of care and sorrow, When blest to-day, unmindful of to-morrow. A being form'd t' amuse his graver friends, Admir'd and prais'd-and there the homage ends:

"Pity the tuneful muses' helpless train,”

saying, "Since I am in the way of transcribing, the following lines were the production of yesterday, as I jogged through the wild hills of New Cumnock. I intend inserting them, or something like them, in an Epistle, which I am going to depend, Mr. Graham, of Fintray, one of the worthiest and write to the gentleman on whose friendship my Excise hopes most accomplished gentlemen, not only of this country, but, writes, in January, 1789:-"I enclose you an Essay of mine, I will dare to say, of this age." To Dr. Moore, the Poet thus in a walk of poesy to me entirely new. I mean the Epistle addressed to Robert Graham, Esq., of Fintray, a gentleman of uncommon worth, to whom I lie under very great obligations. This story of the Poem, like most of my Poems, is connected with my own story, and to give you the one, I must give you something of the other."]

I.

[To Professor Stewart, he said, a few weeks afterwards :This Poem is a species of composition new to me; but I do not intend it shall be my last essay of the kind, as you will see by the "Poet's Progress." These fragments, if my design succeeds, are but a small part of the intended whole. propose it shall be the work of my utmost exertions, ripened by years. On a subsequent occasion, the Poet wrote to Mrs. Graham, sending her the Lament of Mary, Queen of Scots," and expressing the warmest gratitude to her husband. It is singular that the Poet did not insert this Address to Mr. Graham in the last two editions of the Poems, published during his life-time. The manuscript of the poem is united with the "Lines on the Hermitage," and the "Lament of Mary," and endorsed thus:-"The three foregoing poems are the favour of the Nithsdale muses."]

A mortal quite unfit for fortune's strife,
Yet oft the sport of all the ills of life;
Prone to enjoy each pleasure riches give,
Yet haply wanting wherewithal to live;'
Longing to wipe each tear, to heal each groan,
Yet frequent all unheeded in his own.

But honest Nature is not quite a Turk, She laugh'd at first, then felt for her poor work. Pitying the propless climber of mankind, She cast about a standard tree to find; And, to support his helpless woodbine state, Attach'd him to the generous truly great, A title, and the only one I claim, [ham. To lay strong hold for help on bounteous Gra

Pity the tuneful muses' hapless train,
Weak, timid landsmen on life's stormy main!
Their hearts no selfish stern absorbent stuff,
That never gives-tho' humbly takes enough;
The little fate allows,† they share as soon,
Unlike sage, proverb'd, wisdom's hard-wrung
boon.

The world were blest did bliss on them depend,
Ah, that "the friendly e'er should want a friend!"
Let prudence number o'er each sturdy son,
Who life and wisdom at one race begun,
Who feel by reason and who give by rule,
(Instinct's a brute, and sentiment a fool!)
Who make poor will do wait upon I should-
We own they're prudent, but who feels they're
good?

Ye wise ones, hence! ye hurt the social eye!
God's image rudely etch'd on base alloy!
But come ye, who the godlike pleasure know,
Heaven's attribute distinguished-to bestow!
Whose arms of love would grasp the human race:
Come thou who giv'st with all a courtier's grace;
Friend of my life, true patron of my rhymes!
Prop of my dearest hopes for future times.
Why shrinks my soul half blushing, half afraid,
Backward, abash'd to ask thy friendly aid?
I know my need, I know thy giving hand,
I crave thy friendship at thy kind command;
But there are such who court the tuneful nine-
Heavens! should the branded character be mine!
Whose verse in manhood's pride sublimely flows,
Yet vilest reptiles in their begging prose.
Mark, how their lofty independent spirit
Soars on the spurning wing of injur'd merit!
Seek not the proofs in private life to find;
Pity the best of words should be but wind!
So to heav'n's gates the lark's shrill song ascends,
But grovelling on the earth the carol ends.

VAR.-Helpless.-MS.

+ VAR.-Bestows.-MS.

[In one of the Poet's memorandum-books these verses were written with a pencil: he intimated that he had just composed them, and noted them down lest they should esepe from his memory. They were admitted into the first Liverpool edition, but excluded from others; they are now placed among the works of Burns. Sir James Hunter Blair was born at Ayr in 1741, and died July 1, 1787, in the

In all the clam'rous cry of starving want,
They dun benevolence with shameless front;
Oblige them, patronize their tinsel lays,
They persecute you all your future days!
Ere my poor soul such deep damnation stain,
My horny fist assume the plough again ;
The pie-bald jacket let me patch once more;
On eighteen-pence a week I've liv'd before.
Tho' thanks to Heaven, I dare even that last shift!
I trust, meantime, my boon is in thy gift:
That, plac'd by thee upon the wish'd-for height,
Where, man and nature fairer in her sight,
My muse may imp her wing for some sublimer
flight.

ON THE DEATH OF

Sir James Hunter Blair. 1

THE lamp of day, with ill-presaging glare,
Dim, cloudy, sunk beneath the western wave;
Th'inconstant blast howl'd thro' the dark'ning air,
And hollow whistl'd in the rocky cave.

Lone as I wander'd by each cliff and dell,

Once the lov'd haunts of Scotia's royal train ; || Or mus'd where limpid streams, once hallow'd, well, ¶

Or mould'ring ruins mark the sacred Fane.** Th' increasing blast roar'd round the beetling rocks, [sky,

The groaning trees untimely shed their locks, The clouds, swift-wing'd, flew o'er the starry And shooting meteors caught the startled eye.

The paly moon rose in the livid east,

And 'mong the cliffs disclos'd a stately form, In weeds of woe, that frantic beat her breast, And mix'd her wailings with the raving storm. Wild to my heart the filial pulses glow, 'Twas Caledonia's trophied shield I view'd: Her form majestic droop'd in pensive woe, The lightning of her eye in tears imbued.

Revers'd that spear, redoubtable in war,

Reclined that banner, erst in fields unfurl'd, That like a deathful meteor gleam'd afar, And brav'd the mighty monarchs of the world.

"My patriot son fills an untimely grave!"

With accents wild and lifted arms she cried; "Low lies the hand that oft was stretch'd to save, [pride!

Low lies the heart that swell'd with honest++

"A weeping country joins a widow's tear,

The helpless poor mix with the orphan's cry; The drooping arts surround their patron's bier, And grateful science heaves the heart-felt sigh!

"I saw my sons resume their ancient fire; I saw fair freedom's blossoms richly blow: But ah! how hope is born but to expire!

Relentless fate has laid their guardian low. "My patriot falls, but shall he lie unsung, While empty greatness saves a worthless name? No; every muse shall join her tuneful tongue, And future ages hear his growing fame.

" And I will join a mother's tender cares,

Thro' future times to make his virtues last; That distant years may boast of other Blairs!". She said, and vanish'd with the sweeping

blast.

Epistle to Hugh Parker.*

In this strange land, this uncouth clime,
A land unknown to prose or rhyme;
Where words ne'er crost the muse's heckles,
Nor limpet in poetic shackles ;

A land that prose did never view it,
Except when drunk he stacher't thro' it;
Here, ambush'd by the chimla cheek,
Hid in an atmosphere of reek,
I hear a wheel thrum i' the neuk,
I hear it for in vain I leuk.-
The red peat gleams, a fiery kernel,
Enhusked by a fog infernal:
Here, for my wonted rhyming raptures,
I sit and count my sins by chapters;
For life and spunk like ither Christians,
I'm dwindled down to mere existence;
Wi' nae converse but Gallowa' bodies,
Wi' nae kenn'd face but Jenny Geddes.†
Jenny, my Pegasean pride!

Dowie she saunters down Nithside,
And aye a westlin leuk she throws,
While tears hap o'er her auld brown nose!
Was it for this, wi' canny care,
Thou bure the Bard through many a shire?
At howes or hillocks never stumbled,
And late or early never grumbled ?—
O, had I power like inclination,
I'd heeze thee up a constellation,
To canter with the Sagitarre,
Or loup the ecliptic like a bar;
Or turn the pole like any arrow;
Or, when auld Phoebus bids good-morrow,
Down the zodiac urge the race,

And cast dirt on his godship's face;
For I could lay my bread and kail
He'd ne'er cast saut upo' thy tail.-
Wi' a' this care and a' this grief,
And sma', sma' prospect of relief,
And nought but peat-reek i' my head,
How can I write what ye can read?—
Tarbolton, twenty-fourth o' June,
Ye'll find me in a better tune;
But till we meet and weet our whistle,
Tak this excuse for nae epistle.

ROBERT BURNS.

ELEGY

On the Year 1788.

A SKETCH.

E'en let them die-for that they're born!
FOR Lords or Kings I dinna mourn,
But oh! prodigious to reflec' !
A Towmont, Sirs, is gane to wreck !
O Eighty-eight, in thy sma' space
What dire events ha'e taken place!
Of what enjoyments thou hast reft us!
In what a pickle thou hast left us!

The Spanish empire's tint a-head,
An' my auld teethless Bawtie's dead;
The Tulzie's sair 'tween Pitt an' Fox,
And our guid wife's wee birdie cocks;
The tane is game, a bluidie devil,
But to the hen-birds unco civil:
The tither's something dour o' treadin', §
But better stuff ne'er claw'd a midden.

Ye ministers, come mount the pu'pit,
An' cry till ye be hearse an' roupit,
For Eighty-eight he wish'd you weel,
An' gied you a' baith gear an meal;
E'en mony a plack, and mony a peck,
Ye ken yoursels, for little feck!-
Ye bonnie lasses, dight your een,
For some o' you ha'e tint a frien';
In Eighty-eight, ye ken, was ta'en,
What ye'll ne'er ha'e to gie again.

Observe the very nowte an' sheep,
How dowff and dowie now they creep;
Nay, even the yirth itsel' does cry,
For Embrugh wells are grutten dry.

O Eighty-nine, thou's but a hairn,
An' no owre auld, I hope, to learn!
Thou beardless boy, I pray tak' care,
Thou now hast got thy daddy's chair,
Nae hand-cuff'd, muzzl'd, half-shackl❜d Regent,

VAR.-An' 'tween our Maggie's twa wee cocks.-MS. [Truly has the ploughman Bard described the natures of those illustrious rivals, Fox and Pitt, under the similitude of the "birdie cocks." Nor will the allusion to the "handcuffed, muzzled, half-shackled Regent" be lost on those who remember the alarm into which the nation was thrown by the King's illness.-CUNNINGHAM.]

VAR. The tither's dour has nae sic breedin'.

But, like himsel', a full, free agent.
Be sure ye follow out the plan
Nae waur than he did, honest man!
As muckle better as you can.

January 1, 1789.

Address to the Tooth-ache,*

WRITTEN WHEN THE AUTHOR WAS GRIEVOUSLY TOR

MENTED BY THAT DISORDER.

My curse upon thy venom'd stang,
That shoots my tortur'd gums alang;
And thro' my lugs gies mony a twang,
Wi' gnawing vengeance;
Tearing my nerves wi' bitter pang,
Like racking engines!

When fevers burn, or ague freezes,
Rheumatics gnaw, or cholic squeezes ;
Our neighbours' sympathy may ease us,
Wi' pitying moan;

But thee-thou hell o' a' diseases,
Aye mocks our groan!
Adown my beard the slavers trickle!
I kick the wee stools o'er the mickle,
As round the fire the giglets keckle,
To see me loup;
While, raving mad, I wish a heckle
Were in their doup.

O' a' the num'rous human dools,
Ill har'sts, daft bargains, cutty-stools,
Or worthy friends rak'd i' the mools,
Sad sight to see!

The tricks o' knaves, or fash o' fools,
Thou bear'st the gree.
Where'er that place be priests ca' hell,
Whence a' the tones o' mis'ry yell,
And ranked plagues their numbers tell,
In dreadfu' raw,
Thou, Tooth-ache, surely bear'st the bell,
Amang them a'!

O thou grim mischief-making chiel,
That gars the notes of discord squeel,
"Till daft mankind aft dance a reel
In gore a shoe-thick ;—
Gie a' the faes o' Scotland's weal

A towmond's Tooth-ache!

* [The tooth-ache attacked Burns soon after he took up his abode at Ellisland: like other sufferers, he was any thing but patient under it. In a letter from Ellisland, in May 1789, he complains of "an Omnipotent tooth-ache engrossing all his inner man."]

[The origin of this bitter effusion is thus related by the Poet to Dr. Moore :-Ellisland, March 23d, 1789.-"The enclosed Ode is a compliment to the memory of the late Mrs. [Oswald], of [Auchincruive]. You, probably, knew her personally, an honour which I cannot boast, but I spent my early years in her neighbourhood, and among her servants and tenants. I know that she was detested with the most heartfelt cordiality. However, in the particular part of her conduct which roused my poetic wrath, she was much less blamable. In January last, on my road to Ayr-shire, I had to put up at Bailie Whigham's, in Sanquhar, the only tolerable inn in the place. The frost was keen, and the grim

evening and howling wind were ushering in a night of snow and drift. My horse and I were both much fatigued with the labours of the day; and just as my friend the bailie and I were bidding defiance to the storm, over a smoking bowl, in wheels the funeral pageantry of the late Mrs. Oswald; and poor I am forced to brave all the terrors of the tempestuous night, and jade my horse-my young favourite horse, whom I had just christened Pegasus, further on, through the wildest hills and moors of Ayr-shire, to New Cumnock, the next inn! The powers of poesy and prose sink

under me when I would describe what I felt. Suffice it to say that, when a good fire, at New Cumnock, had so far recovered my frozen sinews, I sat down and wrote the enclosed ode." The Poet lived to think more favourably of the name; one of his finest lyrics, "O wat ye wha's in yon town," was written in honour of the beauty of the succeeding Mrs. Oswald.