Smith, in his
excellent Theory of Moral Sentiments, that remorse is the most painful
sentiment that can embitter the human bosom.
excellent Theory of Moral Sentiments, that remorse is the most painful
sentiment that can embitter the human bosom.
Robert Burns-
27, 1781.
_
HONOURED SIR,
I have purposely delayed writing in the hope that I should have the
pleasure of seeing you on New-Year's day; but work comes so hard upon
us, that I do not choose to be absent on that account, as well as for
some other little reasons which I shall tell you at meeting. My health
is nearly the same as when you were here, only my sleep is a little
sounder, and on the whole I am rather better than otherwise, though I
mend by very slow degrees. The weakness of my nerves has so
debilitated my mind, that I dare neither review past wants, nor look
forward into futurity; for the least anxiety or perturbation in my
breast produces most unhappy effects on my whole frame. Sometimes,
indeed, when for an hour or two my spirits are alightened, I glimmer a
little into futurity; but my principal, and indeed my only pleasurable
employment is looking backwards and forwards in a moral and religious
way; I am quite transported at the thought, that ere long, perhaps
very soon, I shall bid an eternal adieu to all the pains, and
uneasiness, and disquietudes of this weary life: for I assure you I am
heartily tired of it; and if I do not very much deceive myself, I
could contentedly and gladly resign it.
"The soul, uneasy, and confined at home,
Rests and expatiates in a life to come. "[141]
It is for this reason I am more pleased with the 15th, 16th, and 17th
verses of the 7th chapter of Revelations, than with any ten times as
many verses in the whole Bible, and would not exchange the noble
enthusiasm with which they inspire me for all that this world has to
offer. As for this world, I despair of ever making a figure in it. I
am not formed for the bustle of the busy, nor the flutter of the gay.
I shall never again be capable of entering into such scenes. Indeed I
am altogether unconcerned at the thoughts of this life. I foresee that
poverty and obscurity probably await me, and I am in some measure
prepared, and daily preparing to meet them. I have but just time and
paper to return you my grateful thanks for the lessons of virtue and
piety you have given me, which were too much neglected at the time of
giving them, but which I hope have been remembered ere it is yet too
late. Present my dutiful respects to my mother, and my compliments to
Mr. and Mrs. Muir; and with wishing you a merry New-Year's day, I
shall conclude. I am, honoured sir, your dutiful son,
ROBERT BURNESS.
P. S. My meal is nearly out, but I am going to borrow till I get more.
FOOTNOTES:
[Footnote 141: Pope. _Essay on Man_]
* * * * *
II.
TO MR. JOHN MURDOCH,
SCHOOLMASTER,
STABLES-INN BUILDINGS, LONDON.
[John Murdoch, one of the poet's early teachers, removed from the west
of Scotland to London, where he lived to a good old age, and loved to
talk of the pious William Burness and his eminent son. ]
_Lochlea, 15th January, 1783. _
DEAR SIR,
As I have an opportunity of sending you a letter without putting you
to that expense which any production of mine would but ill repay, I
embrace it with pleasure, to tell you that I have not forgotten, nor
ever will forget, the many obligations I lie under to your kindness
and friendship.
I do not doubt, Sir, but you will wish to know what has been the
result of all the pains of an indulgent father, and a masterly
teacher; and I wish I could gratify your curiosity with such a recital
as you would be pleased with; but that is what I am afraid will not be
the case. I have, indeed, kept pretty clear of vicious habits; and, in
this respect, I hope, my conduct will not disgrace the education I
have gotten; but, as a man of the world, I am most miserably
deficient. One would have thought that, bred as I have been, under a
father, who has figured pretty well as _un homme des affaires_, I
might have been, what the world calls, a pushing, active fellow; but
to tell you the truth, Sir, there is hardly anything more my reverse.
I seem to be one sent into the world to see and observe; and I very
easily compound with the knave who tricks me of my money, if there be
anything original about him, which shows me human nature in a
different light from anything I have seen before. In short, the joy of
my heart is to "study men, their manners, and their ways;" and for
this darling subject, I cheerfully sacrifice every other
consideration. I am quite indolent about those great concerns that set
the bustling, busy sons of care agog; and if I have to answer for the
present hour, I am very easy with regard to anything further. Even the
last, worst shift of the unfortunate and the wretched, does not much
terrify me: I know that even then, my talent for what country folks
call a "sensible crack," when once it is sanctified by a hoary head,
would procure me so much esteem, that even then--I would learn to be
happy. [142] However, I am under no apprehensions about that; for though
indolent, yet so far as an extremely delicate constitution permits, I
am not lazy; and in many things, expecially in tavern matters, I am a
strict economist; not, indeed, for the sake of the money; but one of
the principal parts in my composition is a kind of pride of stomach;
and I scorn to fear the face of any man living: above everything, I
abhor as hell, the idea of sneaking in a corner to avoid a
dun--possibly some pitiful, sordid wretch, who in my heart I despise
and detest. 'Tis this, and this alone, that endears economy to me. In
the matter of books, indeed, I am very profuse. My favourite authors
are of the sentimental kind, such as Shenstone, particularly his
"Elegies;" Thomson; "Man of Feeling"--a book I prize next to the
Bible; "Man of the World;" Sterne, especially his "Sentimental
Journey;" Macpherson's "Ossian," &c. ; these are the glorious models
after which I endeavour to form my conduct, and 'tis incongruous, 'tis
absurd to suppose that the man whose mind glows with sentiments
lighted up at their sacred flame--the man whose heart distends with
benevolence to all the human race--he "who can soar above this little
scene of things"--can he descend to mind the paltry concerns about
which the terraefilial race fret, and fume, and vex themselves! O how
the glorious triumph swells my heart! I forget that I am a poor,
insignificant devil, unnoticed and unknown, stalking up and down fairs
and markets, when I happen to be in them, reading a page or two of
mankind, and "catching the manners living as they rise," whilst the
men of business jostle me on every side, as an idle encumbrance in
their way. --But I dare say I have by this time tired your patience; so
I shall conclude with begging you to give Mrs. Murdoch--not my
compliments, for that is a mere common-place story; but my warmest,
kindest wishes for her welfare; and accept of the same for yourself,
from,
Dear Sir, yours. --R. B.
FOOTNOTES:
[Footnote 142: The last shift alluded to here must be the condition of
an itinerant beggar. --CURRIE]
* * * * *
III.
TO MR. JAMES BURNESS,
WRITER, MONTROSE. [143]
[James Burness, son of the poet's uncle, lives at Montrose, and, as
may be surmised, is now very old: fame has come to his house through
his eminent cousin Robert, and dearer still through his own grandson,
Sir Alexander Burnes, with whose talents and intrepidity the world is
well acquainted. ]
_Lochlea_, 21_st June_, 1783.
DEAR SIR,
My father received your favour of the 10th current, and as he has been
for some months very poorly in health, and is in his own opinion (and
indeed, in almost everybody's else) in a dying condition, he has only,
with great difficulty, written a few farewell lines to each of his
brothers-in-law. For this melancholy reason, I now hold the pen for
him to thank you for your kind letter, and to assure you, Sir, that it
shall not be my fault if my father's correspondence in the north die
with him. My brother writes to John Caird, and to him I must refer you
for the news of our family.
I shall only trouble you with a few particulars relative to the
wretched state of this country. Our markets are exceedingly high;
oatmeal 17d. and 18d. per peck, and not to be gotten even at that
price. We have indeed been pretty well supplied with quantities of
white peas from England and elsewhere, but that resource is likely to
fail us, and what will become of us then, particularly the very
poorest sort, Heaven only knows. This country, till of late, was
flourishing incredibly in the manufacture of silk, lawn, and
carpet-weaving; and we are still carrying on a good deal in that way,
but much reduced from what it was. We had also a fine trade in the
shoe way, but now entirely ruined, and hundreds driven to a starving
condition on account of it. Farming is also at a very low ebb with us.
Our lands, generally speaking, are mountainous and barren; and our
landholders, full of ideas of farming gathered from the English and
the Lothians, and other rich soils in Scotland, make no allowance for
the odds of the quality of land, and consequently stretch us much
beyond what in the event we will be found able to pay. We are also
much at a loss for want of proper methods in our improvements of
farming. Necessity compels us to leave our old schemes, and few of us
have opportunities of being well informed in new ones. In short, my
dear Sir, since the unfortunate beginning of this American war, and
its as unfortunate conclusion, this country has been, and still is,
decaying very fast. Even in higher life, a couple of our Ayrshire
noblemen, and the major part of our knights and squires, are all
insolvent. A miserable job of a Douglas, Heron, and Co. 's bank, which
no doubt you heard of, has undone numbers of them; and imitating
English and French, and other foreign luxuries and fopperies, has
ruined as many more. There is a great trade of smuggling carried on
along our coasts, which, however destructive to the interests of the
kingdom at large, certainly enriches this corner of it, but too often
at the expense of our morals. However, it enables individuals to make,
at least for a time, a splendid appearance; but Fortune, as is usual
with her when she is uncommonly lavish of her favours, is generally
even with them at the last; and happy were it for numbers of them if
she would leave them no worse than when she found them.
My mother sends you a small present of a cheese, 'tis but a very
little one, as our last year's stock is sold off; but if you could fix
on any correspondent in Edinburgh or Glasgow, we would send you a
proper one in the season. Mrs. Black promises to take the cheese under
her care so far, and then to send it to you by the Stirling carrier.
I shall conclude this long letter with assuring you that I shall be
very happy to hear from you, or any of our friends in your country,
when opportunity serves.
My father sends you, probably for the last time in this world, his
warmest wishes for your welfare and happiness; and my mother and the
rest of the family desire to enclose their kind compliments to you,
Mrs. Burness, and the rest of your family, along with those of,
Dear Sir,
Your affectionate Cousin,
R. B.
FOOTNOTES:
[Footnote 143: This gentleman (the son of an elder brother of my
father's), when he was very young, lost his father, and having
discovered in his father's repositories some of my father's letters, he
requested that the correspondence might be renewed. My father continued
till the last year of his life to correspond with his nephew, and it was
afterwards kept up by my brother. Extracts from some of my brother's
letters to his cousin are introduced, for the purpose of exhibiting the
poet before he had attracted the notice of the public, and in his
domestic family relations afterwards. --GILBERT BURNS. ]
* * * * *
IV.
TO MISS E.
[The name of the lady to whom this and the three succeeding letters
were addressed, seems to have been known to Dr. Currie, who introduced
them in his first edition, but excluded them from his second. They
were restored by Gilbert Burns, without naming the lady. ]
_Lochlea_, 1783.
I verily believe, my dear E. , that the pure, genuine feelings of love
are as rare in the world as the pure genuine principles of virtue and
piety. This I hope will account for the uncommon style of all my
letters to you. By uncommon, I mean their being written in such a
serious manner, which, to tell you the truth, has made me often afraid
lest you should take me for some zealous bigot, who conversed with his
mistress as he would converse with his minister. I don't know how it
is, my dear, for though, except your company, there is nothing on
earth gives me much pleasure as writing to you, yet it never gives me
those giddy raptures so much talked of among lovers. I have often
thought that if a well-grounded affection be not really a part of
virtue, 'tis something extremely akin to it. Whenever the thought of
my E. warms my heart, every feeling of humanity, every principle of
generosity kindles in my breast. It extinguishes every dirty spark of
malice and envy which are but too apt to infest me. I grasp every
creature in the arms of universal benevolence, and equally participate
in the pleasures of the happy, and sympathize with the miseries of the
unfortunate. I assure you, my dear, I often look up to the Divine
Disposer of events with an eye of gratitude for the blessing which I
hope he intends to bestow on me in bestowing you. I sincerely wish
that he may bless my endeavors to make your life as comfortable and
happy as possible, both in sweetening the rougher parts of my natural
temper, and bettering the unkindly circumstances of my fortune. This,
my dear, is a passion, at least in my view, worthy of a man, and I
will add worthy of a Christian. The sordid earth-worm may profess love
to a woman's person, whilst in reality his affection is centred in her
pocket; and the slavish drudge may go a-wooing as he goes to the
horse-market to choose one who is stout and firm, and as we may say of
an old horse, one who will be a good drudge and draw kindly. I disdain
their dirty, puny ideas. I would be heartily out of humour with myself
if I thought I were capable of having so poor a notion of the sex,
which were designed to crown the pleasures of society. Poor devils! I
don't envy them their happiness who have such notions. For my part, I
propose quite other pleasures with my dear partner.
R. B.
* * * * *
V.
TO MISS E.
_Lochlea_, 1783.
MY DEAR E. :
I do not remember, in the course of your acquaintance and mine, ever
to have heard your opinion on the ordinary way of falling in love,
amongst people of our station of life: I do not mean the persons who
proceed in the way of bargain, but those whose affection is really
placed on the person.
Though I be, as you know very well, but a very awkward lover myself,
yet as I have some opportunities of observing the conduct of others
who are much better skilled in the affair of courtship than I am, I
often think it is owing to lucky chance more than to good management,
that there are not more unhappy marriages than usually are.
It is natural for a young fellow to like the acquaintance of the
females, and customary for him to keep them company when occasion
serves: some one of them is more agreeable to him than the rest; there
is something, he knows not what, pleases him, he knows not how, in her
company. This I take to be what is called love with the greater part
of us; and I must own, dear E. , it is a hard game, such a one as you
have to play when you meet with such a lover. You cannot refuse but he
is sincere, and yet though you use him ever so favourably, perhaps in
a few months, or at farthest in a year or two, the same unaccountable
fancy may make him as distractedly fond of another, whilst you are
quite forgot. I am aware that perhaps the next time I have the
pleasure of seeing you, you may bid me take my own lesson home, and
tell me that the passion I have professed for you is perhaps one of
those transient flashes I have been describing; but I hope, my dear
E. , you will do me the justice to believe me, when I assure you that
the love I have for you is founded on the sacred principles of virtue
and honour, and by consequence so long as you continue possessed of
those amiable qualities which first inspired my passion for you, so
long must I continue to love you. Believe me, my dear, it is love like
this alone which can render the marriage state happy. People may talk
of flames and raptures as long as they please, and a warm fancy, with
a flow of youthful spirits, may make them feel something like what
they describe; but sure I am the nobler faculties of the mind, with
kindred feelings of the heart, can only be the foundation of
friendship, and it has always been my opinion that the married life
was only friendship in a more exalted degree. If you will be so good
as to grant my wishes, and it should please Providence to spare us to
the latest periods of life, I can look forward and see that even then,
though bent down with wrinkled age; even then, when all other worldly
circumstances will be indifferent to me, I will regard my E. with the
tenderest affection, and for this plain reason, because she is still
possessed of those noble qualities, improved to a much higher degree,
which first inspired my affection for her.
"O! happy state when souls each other draw,
When love is liberty and nature law. "[144]
I know were I to speak in such a style to many a girl, who thinks
herself possessed of no small share of sense, she would think it
ridiculous; but the language of the heart is, my dear E. , the only
courtship I shall ever use to you.
When I look over what I have written, I am sensible it is vastly
different from the ordinary style of courtship, but I shall make no
apology--I know your good nature will excuse what your goody sense may
see amiss.
R. B.
FOOTNOTES:
[Footnote 144: Pope. _Eloisa to Abelard. _]
* * * * *
VI.
TO MISS E.
_Lochlea_, 1783.
I have often thought it a peculiarly unlucky circumstance in love,
that though in every other situation in life, telling the truth is not
only the safest, but actually by far the easiest way of proceeding, a
lover is never under greater difficulty in acting, or more puzzled for
expression, than when his passion is sincere, and his intentions are
honourable. I do not think that it is very difficult for a person of
ordinary capacity to talk of love and fondness, which are not felt,
and to make vows of constancy and fidelity, which are never intended
to be performed, if he be villain enough to practise such detestable
conduct: but to a man whose heart glows with the principles of
integrity and truth, and who sincerely loves a woman of amiable
person, uncommon refinement of sentiment and purity of manners--to
such an one, in such circumstances, I can assure you, my dear, from my
own feelings at this present moment, courtship is a task indeed. There
is such a number of foreboding fears and distrustful anxieties crowd
into my mind when I am in your company, or when I sit down to write to
you, that what to speak, or what to write, I am altogether at a loss.
There is one rule which I have hitherto practised, and which I shall
invariably keep with you, and that is honestly to tell you the plain
truth. There is something so mean and unmanly in the arts of
dissimulation and falsehood, that I am surprised they can be acted by
any one in so noble, so generous a passion, as virtuous love. No, my
dear E. , I shall never endeavour to gain your favour by such
detestable practices. If you will be so good and so generous as to
admit me for your partner, your companion, your bosom friend through
life, there is nothing on this side of eternity shall give me greater
transport; but I shall never think of purchasing your hand by any arts
unworthy of a man, and I will add of a Christian. There is one thing,
my dear, which I earnestly request of you, and it is this; that you
would soon either put an end to my hopes by a peremptory refusal, or
cure me of my fears by a generous consent.
It would oblige me much if you would send me a line or two when
convenient. I shall only add further that, if a behaviour regulated
(though perhaps but very imperfectly) by the rules of honour and
virtue, if a heart devoted to love and esteem you, and an earnest
endeavour to promote your happiness; if these are qualities you would
wish in a friend, in a husband, I hope you shall ever find them in
your real friend, and sincere lover.
R. B.
* * * * *
VII.
TO MISS E.
_Lochlea_, 1783.
I ought, in good manners, to have acknowledged the receipt of your
letter before this time, but my heart was so shocked, with the
contents of it, that I can scarcely yet collect my thoughts so as to
write you on the subject. I will not attempt to describe what I felt
on receiving your letter. I read it over and over, again and again,
and though it was in the politest language of refusal, still it was
peremptory; "you were sorry you could not make me a return, but you
wish me," what without you I never can obtain, "you wish me all kind
of happiness. " It would be weak and unmanly to say that, without you I
never can be happy; but sure I am, that sharing life with you would
have given it a relish, that, wanting you, I can never taste.
Your uncommon personal advantages, and your superior good sense, do
not so much strike me; these, possibly, in a few instances may be met
with in others; but that amiable goodness, that tender feminine
softness, that endearing sweetness of disposition, with all the
charming offspring of a warm feeling heart--these I never again expect
to meet with, in such a degree, in this world. All these charming
qualities, heightened by an education much beyond anything I have ever
met in any woman I ever dared to approach, have made an impression on
my heart that I do not think the world can ever efface. My imagination
had fondly flattered myself with a wish, I dare not say it ever
reached a hope, that possibly I might one day call you mine. I had
formed the most delightful images, and my fancy fondly brooded over
them; but now I am wretched for the loss of what I really had no right
to expect. I must now think no more of you as a mistress; still I
presume to ask to be admitted as a friend. As such I wish to be
allowed to wait on you, and as I expect to remove in a few days a
little further off, and you, I suppose, will perhaps soon leave this
place, I wish to see or hear from you soon; and if an expression
should perhaps escape me, rather too warm for friendship, I hope you
will pardon it in, my dear Miss--(pardon me the dear expression for
once) * * * *
R. B
* * * * *
VIII.
TO ROBERT RIDDEL, ESQ.
OF GLENRIDDEL
[These memoranda throw much light on the early days of Burns, and on
the history of his mind and compositions. Robert Riddel, of the
Friars-Carse, to whom these fragments were sent, was a good man as
well as a distinguished antiquary. ]
MY DEAR SIR,
On rummaging over some old papers I lighted on a MS. of my early
years, in which I had determined to write myself out; as I was placed
by fortune among a class of men to whom my ideas would have been
nonsense. I had meant that the book should have lain by me, in the
fond hope that some time or other, even after I was no more, my
thoughts would fall into the hands of somebody capable of appreciating
their value. It sets off thus:--
"OBSERVATIONS, HINTS, SONGS, SCRAPS OF POETRY, &c. , by
ROBERT BURNESS: a man who had little art in making money, and
still less in keeping it; but was, however, a man of some sense, a
great deal of honesty, and unbounded good-will to every creature,
rational and irrational. --As he was but little indebted to scholastic
education, and bred at a plough-tail, his performances must be
strongly tinctured with his unpolished, rustic way of life; but as I
believe they are really his own, it may be some entertainment to a
curious observer of human nature to see how a ploughman thinks, and
feels, under the pressure of love, ambition, anxiety, grief, with the
like cares and passions, which, however diversified by the modes and
manners of life, operate pretty much alike, I believe, on all the
species. "
"There are numbers in the world who do not want sense to
make a figure, so much as an opinion of their own abilities
to put them upon recording their observations, and allowing
them the same importance which they do to those which appear
in print. "--SHENSTONE.
"Pleasing, when youth is long expired, to trace
The forms our pencil, or our pen designed!
Such was our youthful air, and shape, and face,
Such the soft image of our youthful mind. "--_Ibid. _
* * * * *
_April_, 1783.
Notwithstanding all that has been said against love, respecting the
folly and weakness it lends a young inexperienced mind into; still I
think it in a great measure deserves the highest encomiums that have
been passed upon it. If anything on earth deserves the name of rapture
or transport, it is the feelings of green eighteen in the company of
the mistress of his heart, when she repays him with an equal return of
affection.
* * * * *
_August. _
There is certainly some connexion between love and music, and poetry;
and therefore, I have always thought it a fine touch of nature, that
passage in a modern love-composition:
"As towards her cot she jogged along,
Her name was frequent in his song. "
For my own part I never had the least thought or inclination of
turning poet till I got once heartily in love, and then rhyme and song
were in a manner the spontaneous language of my heart. The following
composition was the first of my performances, and done at an early
period of life, when my heart glowed with honest warm simplicity;
unacquainted and uncorrupted with the ways of a wicked world. The
performance is indeed, very puerile and silly; but I am always pleased
with it, as it recalls to my mind those happy days when my heart was
yet honest, and my tongue was sincere. The subject of it was a young
girl who really deserved all the praises I have bestowed on her. I not
only had this opinion of her then--but I actually think so still, now
that the spell is long since broken, and the enchantment at an end.
O once I lov'd a bonnie lass. [145]
Lest my works should be thought below criticism: or meet with a
critic, who, perhaps, will not look on them with so candid and
favourable an eye, I am determined to criticise them myself.
The first distich of the first stanza is quite too much in the flimsy
strain of our ordinary street ballads: and, on the other hand, the
second distich is too much in the other extreme. The expression is a
little awkward, and the sentiment too serious. Stanza the second I am
well pleased with; and I think it conveys a fine idea of that amiable
part of the sex--the agreeables; or what in our Scotch dialect we call
a sweet sonsie lass. The third stanza has a little of the flimsy turn
in it; and the third line has rather too serious a cast. The fourth
stanza is a very indifferent one; the first line, is, indeed, all in
the strain of the second stanza, but the rest is most expletive. The
thoughts in the fifth stanza come finely up to my favourite idea--a
sweet sonsie lass: the last line, however, halts a little. The same
sentiments are kept up with equal spirit and tenderness in the sixth
stanza, but the second and fourth lines ending with short syllables
hurt the whole. The seventh stanza has several minute faults; but I
remember I composed it in a wild enthusiasm of passion, and to this
hour I never recollect it but my heart melts, my blood sallies, at the
remembrance.
* * * * *
_September. _
I entirely agree with that judicious philosopher, Mr.
Smith, in his
excellent Theory of Moral Sentiments, that remorse is the most painful
sentiment that can embitter the human bosom. Any ordinary pitch of
fortitude may bear up tolerably well under those calamities, in the
procurement of which we ourselves have had no hand; but when our own
follies, or crimes, have made us miserable and wretched, to bear up
with manly firmness, and at the same time have a proper penitent sense
of our misconduct, is a glorious effort of self-command.
Of all the numerous ills that hurt our peace,
That press the soul, or wring the mind with anguish,
Beyond comparison the worst are those
That to our folly or our guilt we owe.
In every other circumstance, the mind
Has this to say, 'It was no deed of mine;'
But when to all the evil of misfortune
This sting is added--'Blame thy foolish self! '
Or worser far, the pangs of keen remorse;
The torturing, gnawing consciousness of guilt--
Of guilt, perhaps, where we've involved others;
The young, the innocent, who fondly lov'd us,
Nay, more, that every love their cause of ruin!
O burning hell; in all thy store of torments,
There's not a keener lash!
Lives there a man so firm, who, while his heart
Feels all the bitter horrors of his crime,
Can reason down its agonizing throbs;
And, after proper purpose of amendment,
Can firmly force his jarring thoughts to peace?
O, happy! happy! enviable man!
O glorious magnanimity of soul!
* * * * *
_March_, 1784.
I have often observed, in the course of my experience of human life,
that every man, even the worst, has something good about him; though
very often nothing else than a happy temperament of constitution
inclining him to this or that virtue. For this reason no man can say
in what degree any other person, besides himself, can be, with strict
justice, called wicked. Let any, of the strictest character for
regularity of conduct among us, examine impartially how many vices he
has never been guilty of, not from any care or vigilance, but for want
of opportunity, or some accidental circumstance intervening; how many
of the weaknesses of mankind he has escaped, because he was out of the
line of such temptation; and, what often, if not always, weighs more
than all the rest, how much he is indebted to the world's good
opinion, because the world does not know all: I say, any man who can
thus think, will scan the failings, nay, the faults and crimes, of
mankind around him, with a brother's eye.
I have often courted the acquaintance of that part of mankind,
commonly known by the ordinary phrase of blackguards, sometimes
farther than was consistent with the safety of my character; those who
by thoughtless prodigality or headstrong passions, have been driven to
ruin. Though disgraced by follies, nay sometimes, stained with guilt,
I have yet found among them, in not a few instances, some of the
noblest virtues, magnanimity, generosity, disinterested friendship,
and even modesty.
* * * * *
_April. _
As I am what the men of the world, if they knew such a man, would call
a whimsical mortal, I have various sources of pleasure and enjoyment,
which are, in a manner, peculiar to myself, or some here and there
such other out-of-the-way person. Such is the peculiar pleasure I take
in the season of winter, more than the rest of the year. This, I
believe, may be partly owing to my misfortunes giving my mind a
melancholy cast: but there is something even in the--
"Mighty tempest, and the hoary waste
Abrupt and deep, stretch'd o'er the buried earth,"--
which raises the mind to a serious sublimity, favourable to everything
great and noble. There is scarcely any earthly object gives me more--I
do not know if I should call it pleasure--but something which exalts
me, something which enraptures me--than to walk in the sheltered side
of a wood, or high plantation, in a cloudy winter-day, and hear the
stormy wind howling among the trees, and raving over the plain. It is
my best season for devotion: my mind is wrapt up in a kind of
enthusiasm to Him, who, in the pompous language of the Hebrew bard,
"walks on the wings of the wind. " In one of these seasons, just after
a train of misfortunes, I composed the following:--
The wintry west extends his blast. [146]
Shenstone finely observes, that love-verses, writ without any real
passion, are the most nauseous of all conceits; and I have often
thought that no man can be a proper critic of love-composition, except
he himself, in one or more instances, have been a warm votary of this
passion. As I have been all along a miserable dupe to love, and have
been led into a thousand weaknesses and follies by it, for that reason
I put the more confidence in my critical skill, in distinguishing
foppery and conceit from real passion and nature. Whether the
following song will stand the test, I will not pretend to say, because
it is my own; only I can say it was, at the time, genuine from the heart:--
Behind yon hills, where Lugar flows. [147]
* * * * *
_March_, 1784.
There was a certain period of my life that my spirit was broke by
repeated losses and disasters which threatened, and indeed effected,
the utter ruin of my fortune. My body, too, was attacked by that most
dreadful distemper, a hypochondria, or confirmed melancholy. In this
wretched state, the recollection of which makes me shudder, I hung my
harp on the willow trees, except in some lucid intervals, in one of
which I composed the following:--
O thou Great Being! what Thou art. [148]
* * * * *
_April. _
The following song is a wild rhapsody, miserably deficient in
versification; but as the sentiments are the genuine feelings of my
heart, for that reason I have a particular pleasure in conning it
over.
My father was a farmer
Upon the Carrick border, O. [149]
* * * * *
_April. _
I think the whole species of young men may be naturally enough divided
into two grand classes, which I shall call the _grave_ and the
_merry_; though, by the by, these terms do not with propriety enough
express my ideas. The grave I shall cast into the usual division of
those who are goaded on by the love of money, and those whose darling
wish is to make a figure in the world. The merry are the men of
pleasure of all denominations; the jovial lads, who have too much fire
and spirit to have any settled rule of action; but, without much
deliberation, follow the strong impulses of nature: the thoughtless,
the careless, the indolent--in particular _he_ who, with a happy
sweetness of natural temper, and a cheerful vacancy of thought, steals
through life--generally, indeed, in poverty and obscurity; but poverty
and obscurity are only evils to him who can sit gravely down and make
a repining comparison between his own situation and that of others;
and lastly, to grace the quorum, such are, generally, those whose
heads are capable of all the towerings of genius, and whose hearts are
warmed with all the delicacy of feeling.
* * * * *
_August. _
The foregoing was to have been an elaborate dissertation on the
various species of men; but as I cannot please myself in the
arrangement of my ideas, I must wait till farther experience and nicer
observation throw more light on the subject. --In the mean time I shall
set down the following fragment, which, as it is the genuine language
of my heart, will enable anybody to determine which of the classes I
belong to:
There's nought but care on ev'ry han',
In ev'ry hour that passes, O. [150]
As the grand end of human life is to cultivate an intercourse with
that BEING to whom we owe life, with every enjoyment that
renders life delightful; and to maintain an integritive conduct
towards our fellow-creatures; that so, by forming piety and virtue
into habit, we may be fit members for that society of the pious and
the good, which reason and revelation teach us to expect beyond the
grave, I do not see that the turn of mind, and pursuits of such a one
as the above verses describe--one who spends the hours and thoughts
which the vocations of the day can spare with Ossian, Shakspeare,
Thomson, Shenstone, Sterne, &c. ; or, as the maggot takes him, a gun, a
fiddle, or a song to make or mend; and at all times some heart's-dear
bonnie lass in view--I say I do not see that the turn of mind and
pursuits of such an one are in the least more inimical to the sacred
interests of piety and virtue, than the even lawful, bustling and
straining after the world's riches and honours: and I do not see but
he may gain heaven as well--which, by the by, is no mean
consideration--who steals through the vale of life, amusing himself
with every little flower that fortune throws in his way, as he, who
straining straight forward, and perhaps spattering all about him,
gains some of life's little eminencies, where, after all, he can only
see and be seen a little more conspicuously than what, in the pride of
his heart, he is apt to term the poor, indolent devil he has left
behind him.
* * * * *
_August. _
A Prayer, when fainting fits, and other alarming symptoms of a
pleurisy or some other dangerous disorder, which indeed still
threatens me, first put nature on the alarm:--
O thou unknown, Almighty Cause
Of all my hope and fear! [151]
* * * * *
_August. _
Misgivings in the hour of _despondency_ and prospect of death:--
Why am I loth to leave this earthly scene. [152]
* * * * *
EGOTISMS FROM MY OWN SENSATIONS.
_May. _
I don't well know what is the reason of it, but somehow or other,
though I am when I have a mind pretty generally beloved, yet I never
could get the art of commanding respect. --I imagine it is owing to my
being deficient in what Sterne calls "that understrapping virtue of
discretion. "--I am so apt to a _lapsus linguae_, that I sometimes think
the character of a certain great man I have read of somewhere is very
much _apropos_ to myself--that he was a compound of great talents and
great folly. --N. B. To try if I can discover the causes of this
wretched infirmity, and, if possible, to mend it.
* * * * *
_August. _
However I am pleased with the works of our Scotch poets, particularly
the excellent Ramsay, and the still more excellent Fergusson, yet I am
hurt to see other places of Scotland, their towns, rivers, woods,
haughs, &c. , immortalized in such celebrated performances, while my dear
native country, the ancient bailieries of Carrick, Kyle, and Cunningham,
famous both in ancient and modern times for a gallant and warlike race
of inhabitants; a country where civil, and particularly religious
liberty have ever found their first support, and their last asylum; a
country, the birth-place of many famous philosophers, soldiers,
statesman, and the scene of many important events recorded in Scottish
history, particularly a great many of the actions of the glorious
WALLACE, the SAVIOUR of his country; yet, we have never had one Scotch
poet of any eminence, to make the fertile banks of Irvine, the romantic
woodlands and sequestered scenes on Ayr, and the healthy mountainous
source and winding sweep of DOON, emulate Tay, Forth, Ettrick, Tweed,
&c. This is a complaint I would gladly remedy, but, alas! I am far
unequal to the task, both in native genius and education. Obscure I am,
and obscure I must be, though no young poet, nor young soldier's heart,
ever beat more fondly for fame than mine--
"And if there is no other scene of being
Where my insatiate wish may have its fill,--
This something at my heart that heaves for room,
My best, my dearest part, was made in vain. "
* * * * *
_September. _
There is a great irregularity in the old Scotch songs, a redundancy of
syllables with respect to that exactness of accent and measure that
the English poetry requires, but which glides in, most melodiously,
with the respective tunes to which they are set. For instance, the
fine old song of "The Mill, Mill, O,"[153] to give it a plain prosaic
reading, it halts prodigiously out of measure; on the other hand, the
song set to the same tune in Bremner's collection of Scotch songs,
which begins "To Fanny fair could I impart," &c. , it is most exact
measure, and yet, let them both be sung before a real critic, one
above the biases of prejudice, but a thorough judge of nature,--how
flat and spiritless will the last appear, how trite, and lamely
methodical, compared with the wild warbling cadence, the heart-moving
melody of the first! --This is particularly the case with all those
airs which end with a hypermetrical syllable. There is a degree of
wild irregularity in many of the compositions and fragments which are
daily sung to them by my compeers, the common people--a certain happy
arrangement of old Scotch syllables, and yet, very frequently,
nothing, not even like rhyme or sameness of jingle, at the ends of the
lines. This has made me sometimes imagine that perhaps it might be
possible for a Scotch poet, with a nice judicious ear, to set
compositions to many of our most favourite airs, particularly that
class of them mentioned above, independent of rhyme altogether.
* * * * *
There is a noble sublimity, a heart-melting tenderness, in some of our
ancient ballads, which show them to be the work of a masterly hand:
and it has often given me many a heart-ache to reflect that such
glorious old bards--bards who very probably owed all their talents to
native genius, yet have described the exploits of heroes, the pangs of
disappointment, and the meltings of love, with such fine strokes of
nature--that their very names (O how mortifying to a bard's vanity! )
are now "buried among the wreck of things which were. "
O ye illustrious names unknown! who could feel so strongly and
describe so well: the last, the meanest of the muses' train--one who,
though far inferior to your flights, yet eyes your path, and with
trembling wing would sometimes soar after you--a poor rustic bard
unknown, pays this sympathetic pang to your memory! Some of you tell
us, with all the charms of verse, that you have been unfortunate in
the world--unfortunate in love: he, too, has felt the loss of his
little fortune, the loss of friends, and, worse than all, the loss of
the woman he adored. Like you, all his consolation was his muse: she
taught him in rustic measures to complain. Happy could he have done it
with your strength of imagination and flow of verse! May the turf lie
lightly on your bones! and may you now enjoy that solace and rest
which this world rarely gives to the heart tuned to all the feelings
of poesy and love!
* * * * *
_September. _
The following fragment is done something in imitation of the manner of
a noble old Scottish piece, called M'Millan's Peggy, and sings to the
tune of Galla Water. --My Montgomery's Peggy was my deity for six or
eight months. She had been bred (though, as the world says, without
any just pretence for it) in a style of life rather elegant; but, as
Vanbrugh says in one of his comedies, my "d----d star found me out"
there too: for though I began the affair merely in a _gaitie de
coeur_, or, to tell the truth, which will scarcely be believed, a
vanity of showing my parts in courtship, particularly my abilities at
a _billet-doux_, which I always piqued myself upon, made me lay siege
to her; and when, as I always do in my foolish gallantries, I had
fettered myself into a very warm affection for her, she told me one
day, in a flag of truce, that her fortress had been for some time
before the rightful property of another; but, with the greatest
friendship and politeness, she offered me every allegiance except
actual possession. I found out afterwards that what she told me of a
pre-engagement was really true; but it cost me some heart-aches to get
rid of the affair.
I have even tried to imitate in this extempore thing that irregularity
in the rhymes, which, when judiciously done, has such a fine effect on
the ear.
"Altho' my bed were in yon muir. "[154]
* * * * *
_September. _
There is another fragment in imitation of an old Scotch song, well
known among the country ingle-sides. --I cannot tell the name, neither
of the song nor the tune, but they are in fine unison with one
another. --By the way, these old Scottish airs are so nobly
sentimental, that when one would compose to them, to "south the tune,"
as our Scotch phrase is, over and over, is the readiest way to catch
the inspiration, and raise the bard into that glorious enthusiasm so
strongly characteristic of our old Scotch poetry. I shall here set
down one verse of the piece mentioned above, both to mark the song and
tune I mean, and likewise as a debt I owe to the author, as the
repeating of that verse has lighted up my flame a thousand times:--
When clouds in skies do come together
To hide the brightness of the sun,
There will surely be some pleasant weather
When a' their storms are past and gone. [155]
Though fickle fortune has deceived me,
She promis'd fair and perform'd but ill;
Of mistress, friends, and wealth bereav'd me,
Yet I bear a heart shall support me still.
I'll act with prudence as far as I'm able,
But if success I must never find,
Then come misfortune, I bid thee welcome,
I'll meet thee with an undaunted mind.
The above was an extempore, under the pressure of a heavy train of
misfortunes, which, indeed, threatened to undo me altogether. It was
just at the close of that dreadful period mentioned already, and
though the weather has brightened up a little with me, yet there has
always been since a tempest brewing round me in the grim sky of
futurity, which I pretty plainly see will some time or other, perhaps
ere long, overwhelm me, and drive me into some doleful dell, to pine
in solitary, squalid wretchedness. --However, as I hope my poor country
muse, who, all rustic, awkward, and unpolished as she is, has more
charms for me than any other of the pleasures of life beside--as I
hope she will not then desert me, I may even then learn to be, if not
happy, at least easy, and south a sang to soothe my misery.
'Twas at the same time I set about composing an air in the old Scotch
style. --I am not musical scholar enough to prick down my tune
properly, so it can never see the light, and perhaps 'tis no great
matter; but the following were the verses I composed to suit it:--
O raging fortune's withering blast
Has laid my leaf full low, O! [156]
The tune consisted of three parts, so that the above verses just went
through the whole air.
* * * * *
_October_, 1785.
If ever any young man, in the vestibule of the world, chance to throw
his eye over these pages, let him pay a warm attention to the
following observations, as I assure him they are the fruit of a poor
devil's dear-bought experience. --I have literally, like that great
poet and great gallant, and by consequence, that great fool, Solomon,
"turned my eyes to behold madness and folly. " Nay, I have, with all
the ardour of a lively, fanciful, and whimsical imagination,
accompanied with a warm, feeling, poetic heart, shaken hands with
their intoxicating friendship.
In the first place, let my pupil, as he tenders his own peace, keep up
a regular, warm intercourse with the Deity. * * * *
This is all worth quoting in my MSS. , and more than all.
R. B.
FOOTNOTES:
[Footnote 145: See Songs and Ballads, No. I. ]
[Footnote 146: See Winter. A Dirge. Poem I. ]
[Footnote 147: Song XIV. ]
[Footnote 148: Poem IX. ]
[Footnote 149: Song V]
[Footnote 150: Song XVII. ]
[Footnote 151: Poem X. ]
[Footnote 152: Poem XI. ]
[Footnote 153: "The Mill, Mill, O," is by Allan Ramsay. ]
[Footnote 154: Song VIII. ]
[Footnote 155: Alluding to the misfortunes he feelingly laments before
this verse. (This is the author's note. )]
[Footnote 156: Song II. ]
* * * * *
IX.
TO MR. JAMES BURNESS,
MONTROSE.
[The elder Burns, whose death this letter intimates, lies buried in
the kirk-yard of Alloway, with a tombstone recording his worth. ]
_Lochlea_, 17_th Feb. _ 1784.
DEAR COUSIN,
I would have returned you my thanks for your kind favour of the 13th
of December sooner, had it not been that I waited to give you an
account of that melancholy event, which, for some time past, we have
from day to day expected.
On the 13th current I lost the best of fathers. Though, to be sure, we
have had long warning of the impending stroke; still the feelings of
nature claim their part, and I cannot recollect the tender endearments
and parental lessons of the best of friends and ablest of instructors,
without feeling what perhaps the calmer dictates of reason would
partly condemn.
I hope my father's friends in your country will not let their
connexion in this place die with him. For my part I shall ever with
pleasure--with pride, acknowledge my connexion with those who were
allied by the ties of blood and friendship to a man whose memory I
shall ever honour and revere.
I expect, therefore, my dear Sir, you will not neglect any opportunity
of letting me hear from you, which will very much oblige,
My dear Cousin, yours sincerely,
R. B.
* * * * *
X.
TO JAMES BURNESS,
MONTROSE.
[Mrs. Buchan, the forerunner in extravagance and absurdity of Joanna
Southcote, after attempting to fix her tent among the hills of the
west and the vales of the Nith, finally set up her staff at
Auchengibbert-Hill, in Galloway, where she lectured her followers, and
held out hopes of their reaching the stars, even in this life. She
died early: one or two of her people, as she called them, survived
till within these half-dozen years. ]
_Mossgiel, August_, 1784.
We have been surprised with one of the most extraordinary phenomena in
the moral world which, I dare say, had happened in the course of this
half century. We have had a party of Presbytery relief, as they call
themselves, for some time in this country. A pretty thriving society
of them has been in the burgh of Irvine for some years past, till
about two years ago, a Mrs. Buchan from Glasgow came among them, and
began to spread some fanatical notions of religion among them, and, in
a short time, made many converts; and, among others, their preacher,
Mr. Whyte, who, upon that account, has been suspended and formally
deposed by his brethren. He continued, however, to preach in private
to his party, and was supported, both he and their spiritual mother,
as they affect to call old Buchan, by the contributions of the rest,
several of whom were in good circumstances; till, in spring last, the
populace rose and mobbed Mrs. Buchan, and put her out of the town; on
which all her followers voluntarily quitted the place likewise, and
with such precipitation, that many of them never shut their doors
behind them; one left a washing on the green, another a cow bellowing
at the crib without food, or anybody to mind her, and after several
stages, they are fixed at present in the neighbourhood of Dumfries.
Their tenets are a strange jumble of enthusiastic jargon; among
others, she pretends to give them the Holy Ghost by breathing on them,
which she does with postures and practices that are scandalously
indecent; they have likewise disposed of all their effects, and hold a
community of goods, and live nearly an idle life, carrying on a great
farce of pretended devotion in barns and woods, where they lodge and
lie all together, and hold likewise a community of women, as it is
another of their tenets that they can commit no mortal sin. I am
personally acquainted with most of them, and I can assure you the
above mentioned are facts.
This, my dear Sir, is one of the many instances of the folly of
leaving the guidance of sound reason and common sense in matters of
religion.
Whenever we neglect or despise these sacred monitors, the whimsical
notions of a perturbated brain are taken for the immediate influences
of the Deity, and the wildest fanaticism, and the most inconstant
absurdities, will meet with abettors and converts. Nay, I have often
thought, that the more out-of-the-way and ridiculous the fancies are,
if once they are sanctified under the sacred name of religion, the
unhappy mistaken votaries are the more firmly glued to them.
R. B.
* * * * *
XI.
TO MISS ----.
[This has generally been printed among the early letters of Burns.
Cromek thinks that the person addressed was the "Peggy" of the
Common-place Book. This is questioned by Robert Chambers, who,
however, leaves both name and date unsettled. ]
MY DEAR COUNTRYWOMAN,
I am so impatient to show you that I am once more at peace with you,
that I send you the book I mentioned directly, rather than wait the
uncertain time of my seeing you. I am afraid I have mislaid or lost
Collins' Poems, which I promised to Miss Irvin. If I can find them, I
will forward them by you; if not, you must apologize for me.
I know you will laugh at it when I tell you that your piano and you
together have played the deuce somehow about my heart. My breast has
been widowed these many months, and I thought myself proof against the
fascinating witchcraft; but I am afraid you will "feelingly convince
me what I am. " I say, I am afraid, because I am not sure what is the
matter with me. I have one miserable bad symptom; when you whisper, or
look kindly to another, it gives me a draught of damnation. I have a
kind of wayward wish to be with you ten minutes by yourself, though
what I would say, Heaven above knows, for I am sure I know not. I have
no formed design in all this; but just, in the nakedness of my heart,
write you down a mere matter-of-fact story. You may perhaps give
yourself airs of distance on this, and that will completely cure me;
but I wish you would not: just let us meet, if you please, in the old
beaten way of friendship.
I will not subscribe myself your humble servant, for that is a phrase,
I think at least fifty miles off from the heart; but I will conclude
with sincerely wishing that the Great Protector of innocence may
shield you from the barbed dart of calumny, and hand you by the covert
snare of deceit.
R. B.
* * * * *
XII.
TO MR. JOHN RICHMOND,
OF EDINBURGH.
[John Richmond, writer, one of the poet's Mauchline friends, to whom
we are indebted for much valuable information concerning Burns and his
productions--Connel was the Mauchline carrier. ]
_Mossgiel, Feb. _ 17, 1786.
MY DEAR SIR,
I have not time at present to upbraid you for your silence and
neglect; I shall only say I received yours with great pleasure. I have
enclosed you a piece of rhyming ware for your perusal. I have been
very busy with the muses since I saw you, and have composed, among
several others, "The Ordination," a poem on Mr. M'Kinlay's being
called to Kilmarnock; "Scotch Drink," a poem; "The Cotter's Saturday
Night;" "An Address to the Devil," &c. I have likewise completed my
poem on the "Dogs," but have not shown it to the world. My chief
patron now is Mr. Aiken, in Ayr, who is pleased to express great
approbation of my works. Be so good as send me Fergusson, by Connel,
and I will remit you the money. I have no news to acquaint you with
about Mauchline, they are just going on in the old way. I have some
very important news with respect to myself, not the most
agreeable--news that I am sure you cannot guess, but I shall give you
the particulars another time. I am extremely happy with Smith; he is
the only friend I have now in Mauchline. I can scarcely forgive your
long neglect of me, and I beg you will let me hear from you regularly
by Connel. If you would act your part as a friend, I am sure neither
good nor bad fortune should strange of alter me. Excuse haste, as I
got yours but yesterday.
I am, my dear Sir,
Yours,
R. B.
* * * * *
XIII.
TO MR. JOHN KENNEDY,
DUMFRIES HOUSE.
[Who the John Kennedy was to whom Burns addressed this note, enclosing
"The Cotter's Saturday night," it is now, perhaps, vain to inquire:
the Kennedy to whom Mr. Cobbett introduces us was a Thomas--perhaps a
relation. ]
_Mossgiel, 3d March_, 1786.
HONOURED SIR,
I have purposely delayed writing in the hope that I should have the
pleasure of seeing you on New-Year's day; but work comes so hard upon
us, that I do not choose to be absent on that account, as well as for
some other little reasons which I shall tell you at meeting. My health
is nearly the same as when you were here, only my sleep is a little
sounder, and on the whole I am rather better than otherwise, though I
mend by very slow degrees. The weakness of my nerves has so
debilitated my mind, that I dare neither review past wants, nor look
forward into futurity; for the least anxiety or perturbation in my
breast produces most unhappy effects on my whole frame. Sometimes,
indeed, when for an hour or two my spirits are alightened, I glimmer a
little into futurity; but my principal, and indeed my only pleasurable
employment is looking backwards and forwards in a moral and religious
way; I am quite transported at the thought, that ere long, perhaps
very soon, I shall bid an eternal adieu to all the pains, and
uneasiness, and disquietudes of this weary life: for I assure you I am
heartily tired of it; and if I do not very much deceive myself, I
could contentedly and gladly resign it.
"The soul, uneasy, and confined at home,
Rests and expatiates in a life to come. "[141]
It is for this reason I am more pleased with the 15th, 16th, and 17th
verses of the 7th chapter of Revelations, than with any ten times as
many verses in the whole Bible, and would not exchange the noble
enthusiasm with which they inspire me for all that this world has to
offer. As for this world, I despair of ever making a figure in it. I
am not formed for the bustle of the busy, nor the flutter of the gay.
I shall never again be capable of entering into such scenes. Indeed I
am altogether unconcerned at the thoughts of this life. I foresee that
poverty and obscurity probably await me, and I am in some measure
prepared, and daily preparing to meet them. I have but just time and
paper to return you my grateful thanks for the lessons of virtue and
piety you have given me, which were too much neglected at the time of
giving them, but which I hope have been remembered ere it is yet too
late. Present my dutiful respects to my mother, and my compliments to
Mr. and Mrs. Muir; and with wishing you a merry New-Year's day, I
shall conclude. I am, honoured sir, your dutiful son,
ROBERT BURNESS.
P. S. My meal is nearly out, but I am going to borrow till I get more.
FOOTNOTES:
[Footnote 141: Pope. _Essay on Man_]
* * * * *
II.
TO MR. JOHN MURDOCH,
SCHOOLMASTER,
STABLES-INN BUILDINGS, LONDON.
[John Murdoch, one of the poet's early teachers, removed from the west
of Scotland to London, where he lived to a good old age, and loved to
talk of the pious William Burness and his eminent son. ]
_Lochlea, 15th January, 1783. _
DEAR SIR,
As I have an opportunity of sending you a letter without putting you
to that expense which any production of mine would but ill repay, I
embrace it with pleasure, to tell you that I have not forgotten, nor
ever will forget, the many obligations I lie under to your kindness
and friendship.
I do not doubt, Sir, but you will wish to know what has been the
result of all the pains of an indulgent father, and a masterly
teacher; and I wish I could gratify your curiosity with such a recital
as you would be pleased with; but that is what I am afraid will not be
the case. I have, indeed, kept pretty clear of vicious habits; and, in
this respect, I hope, my conduct will not disgrace the education I
have gotten; but, as a man of the world, I am most miserably
deficient. One would have thought that, bred as I have been, under a
father, who has figured pretty well as _un homme des affaires_, I
might have been, what the world calls, a pushing, active fellow; but
to tell you the truth, Sir, there is hardly anything more my reverse.
I seem to be one sent into the world to see and observe; and I very
easily compound with the knave who tricks me of my money, if there be
anything original about him, which shows me human nature in a
different light from anything I have seen before. In short, the joy of
my heart is to "study men, their manners, and their ways;" and for
this darling subject, I cheerfully sacrifice every other
consideration. I am quite indolent about those great concerns that set
the bustling, busy sons of care agog; and if I have to answer for the
present hour, I am very easy with regard to anything further. Even the
last, worst shift of the unfortunate and the wretched, does not much
terrify me: I know that even then, my talent for what country folks
call a "sensible crack," when once it is sanctified by a hoary head,
would procure me so much esteem, that even then--I would learn to be
happy. [142] However, I am under no apprehensions about that; for though
indolent, yet so far as an extremely delicate constitution permits, I
am not lazy; and in many things, expecially in tavern matters, I am a
strict economist; not, indeed, for the sake of the money; but one of
the principal parts in my composition is a kind of pride of stomach;
and I scorn to fear the face of any man living: above everything, I
abhor as hell, the idea of sneaking in a corner to avoid a
dun--possibly some pitiful, sordid wretch, who in my heart I despise
and detest. 'Tis this, and this alone, that endears economy to me. In
the matter of books, indeed, I am very profuse. My favourite authors
are of the sentimental kind, such as Shenstone, particularly his
"Elegies;" Thomson; "Man of Feeling"--a book I prize next to the
Bible; "Man of the World;" Sterne, especially his "Sentimental
Journey;" Macpherson's "Ossian," &c. ; these are the glorious models
after which I endeavour to form my conduct, and 'tis incongruous, 'tis
absurd to suppose that the man whose mind glows with sentiments
lighted up at their sacred flame--the man whose heart distends with
benevolence to all the human race--he "who can soar above this little
scene of things"--can he descend to mind the paltry concerns about
which the terraefilial race fret, and fume, and vex themselves! O how
the glorious triumph swells my heart! I forget that I am a poor,
insignificant devil, unnoticed and unknown, stalking up and down fairs
and markets, when I happen to be in them, reading a page or two of
mankind, and "catching the manners living as they rise," whilst the
men of business jostle me on every side, as an idle encumbrance in
their way. --But I dare say I have by this time tired your patience; so
I shall conclude with begging you to give Mrs. Murdoch--not my
compliments, for that is a mere common-place story; but my warmest,
kindest wishes for her welfare; and accept of the same for yourself,
from,
Dear Sir, yours. --R. B.
FOOTNOTES:
[Footnote 142: The last shift alluded to here must be the condition of
an itinerant beggar. --CURRIE]
* * * * *
III.
TO MR. JAMES BURNESS,
WRITER, MONTROSE. [143]
[James Burness, son of the poet's uncle, lives at Montrose, and, as
may be surmised, is now very old: fame has come to his house through
his eminent cousin Robert, and dearer still through his own grandson,
Sir Alexander Burnes, with whose talents and intrepidity the world is
well acquainted. ]
_Lochlea_, 21_st June_, 1783.
DEAR SIR,
My father received your favour of the 10th current, and as he has been
for some months very poorly in health, and is in his own opinion (and
indeed, in almost everybody's else) in a dying condition, he has only,
with great difficulty, written a few farewell lines to each of his
brothers-in-law. For this melancholy reason, I now hold the pen for
him to thank you for your kind letter, and to assure you, Sir, that it
shall not be my fault if my father's correspondence in the north die
with him. My brother writes to John Caird, and to him I must refer you
for the news of our family.
I shall only trouble you with a few particulars relative to the
wretched state of this country. Our markets are exceedingly high;
oatmeal 17d. and 18d. per peck, and not to be gotten even at that
price. We have indeed been pretty well supplied with quantities of
white peas from England and elsewhere, but that resource is likely to
fail us, and what will become of us then, particularly the very
poorest sort, Heaven only knows. This country, till of late, was
flourishing incredibly in the manufacture of silk, lawn, and
carpet-weaving; and we are still carrying on a good deal in that way,
but much reduced from what it was. We had also a fine trade in the
shoe way, but now entirely ruined, and hundreds driven to a starving
condition on account of it. Farming is also at a very low ebb with us.
Our lands, generally speaking, are mountainous and barren; and our
landholders, full of ideas of farming gathered from the English and
the Lothians, and other rich soils in Scotland, make no allowance for
the odds of the quality of land, and consequently stretch us much
beyond what in the event we will be found able to pay. We are also
much at a loss for want of proper methods in our improvements of
farming. Necessity compels us to leave our old schemes, and few of us
have opportunities of being well informed in new ones. In short, my
dear Sir, since the unfortunate beginning of this American war, and
its as unfortunate conclusion, this country has been, and still is,
decaying very fast. Even in higher life, a couple of our Ayrshire
noblemen, and the major part of our knights and squires, are all
insolvent. A miserable job of a Douglas, Heron, and Co. 's bank, which
no doubt you heard of, has undone numbers of them; and imitating
English and French, and other foreign luxuries and fopperies, has
ruined as many more. There is a great trade of smuggling carried on
along our coasts, which, however destructive to the interests of the
kingdom at large, certainly enriches this corner of it, but too often
at the expense of our morals. However, it enables individuals to make,
at least for a time, a splendid appearance; but Fortune, as is usual
with her when she is uncommonly lavish of her favours, is generally
even with them at the last; and happy were it for numbers of them if
she would leave them no worse than when she found them.
My mother sends you a small present of a cheese, 'tis but a very
little one, as our last year's stock is sold off; but if you could fix
on any correspondent in Edinburgh or Glasgow, we would send you a
proper one in the season. Mrs. Black promises to take the cheese under
her care so far, and then to send it to you by the Stirling carrier.
I shall conclude this long letter with assuring you that I shall be
very happy to hear from you, or any of our friends in your country,
when opportunity serves.
My father sends you, probably for the last time in this world, his
warmest wishes for your welfare and happiness; and my mother and the
rest of the family desire to enclose their kind compliments to you,
Mrs. Burness, and the rest of your family, along with those of,
Dear Sir,
Your affectionate Cousin,
R. B.
FOOTNOTES:
[Footnote 143: This gentleman (the son of an elder brother of my
father's), when he was very young, lost his father, and having
discovered in his father's repositories some of my father's letters, he
requested that the correspondence might be renewed. My father continued
till the last year of his life to correspond with his nephew, and it was
afterwards kept up by my brother. Extracts from some of my brother's
letters to his cousin are introduced, for the purpose of exhibiting the
poet before he had attracted the notice of the public, and in his
domestic family relations afterwards. --GILBERT BURNS. ]
* * * * *
IV.
TO MISS E.
[The name of the lady to whom this and the three succeeding letters
were addressed, seems to have been known to Dr. Currie, who introduced
them in his first edition, but excluded them from his second. They
were restored by Gilbert Burns, without naming the lady. ]
_Lochlea_, 1783.
I verily believe, my dear E. , that the pure, genuine feelings of love
are as rare in the world as the pure genuine principles of virtue and
piety. This I hope will account for the uncommon style of all my
letters to you. By uncommon, I mean their being written in such a
serious manner, which, to tell you the truth, has made me often afraid
lest you should take me for some zealous bigot, who conversed with his
mistress as he would converse with his minister. I don't know how it
is, my dear, for though, except your company, there is nothing on
earth gives me much pleasure as writing to you, yet it never gives me
those giddy raptures so much talked of among lovers. I have often
thought that if a well-grounded affection be not really a part of
virtue, 'tis something extremely akin to it. Whenever the thought of
my E. warms my heart, every feeling of humanity, every principle of
generosity kindles in my breast. It extinguishes every dirty spark of
malice and envy which are but too apt to infest me. I grasp every
creature in the arms of universal benevolence, and equally participate
in the pleasures of the happy, and sympathize with the miseries of the
unfortunate. I assure you, my dear, I often look up to the Divine
Disposer of events with an eye of gratitude for the blessing which I
hope he intends to bestow on me in bestowing you. I sincerely wish
that he may bless my endeavors to make your life as comfortable and
happy as possible, both in sweetening the rougher parts of my natural
temper, and bettering the unkindly circumstances of my fortune. This,
my dear, is a passion, at least in my view, worthy of a man, and I
will add worthy of a Christian. The sordid earth-worm may profess love
to a woman's person, whilst in reality his affection is centred in her
pocket; and the slavish drudge may go a-wooing as he goes to the
horse-market to choose one who is stout and firm, and as we may say of
an old horse, one who will be a good drudge and draw kindly. I disdain
their dirty, puny ideas. I would be heartily out of humour with myself
if I thought I were capable of having so poor a notion of the sex,
which were designed to crown the pleasures of society. Poor devils! I
don't envy them their happiness who have such notions. For my part, I
propose quite other pleasures with my dear partner.
R. B.
* * * * *
V.
TO MISS E.
_Lochlea_, 1783.
MY DEAR E. :
I do not remember, in the course of your acquaintance and mine, ever
to have heard your opinion on the ordinary way of falling in love,
amongst people of our station of life: I do not mean the persons who
proceed in the way of bargain, but those whose affection is really
placed on the person.
Though I be, as you know very well, but a very awkward lover myself,
yet as I have some opportunities of observing the conduct of others
who are much better skilled in the affair of courtship than I am, I
often think it is owing to lucky chance more than to good management,
that there are not more unhappy marriages than usually are.
It is natural for a young fellow to like the acquaintance of the
females, and customary for him to keep them company when occasion
serves: some one of them is more agreeable to him than the rest; there
is something, he knows not what, pleases him, he knows not how, in her
company. This I take to be what is called love with the greater part
of us; and I must own, dear E. , it is a hard game, such a one as you
have to play when you meet with such a lover. You cannot refuse but he
is sincere, and yet though you use him ever so favourably, perhaps in
a few months, or at farthest in a year or two, the same unaccountable
fancy may make him as distractedly fond of another, whilst you are
quite forgot. I am aware that perhaps the next time I have the
pleasure of seeing you, you may bid me take my own lesson home, and
tell me that the passion I have professed for you is perhaps one of
those transient flashes I have been describing; but I hope, my dear
E. , you will do me the justice to believe me, when I assure you that
the love I have for you is founded on the sacred principles of virtue
and honour, and by consequence so long as you continue possessed of
those amiable qualities which first inspired my passion for you, so
long must I continue to love you. Believe me, my dear, it is love like
this alone which can render the marriage state happy. People may talk
of flames and raptures as long as they please, and a warm fancy, with
a flow of youthful spirits, may make them feel something like what
they describe; but sure I am the nobler faculties of the mind, with
kindred feelings of the heart, can only be the foundation of
friendship, and it has always been my opinion that the married life
was only friendship in a more exalted degree. If you will be so good
as to grant my wishes, and it should please Providence to spare us to
the latest periods of life, I can look forward and see that even then,
though bent down with wrinkled age; even then, when all other worldly
circumstances will be indifferent to me, I will regard my E. with the
tenderest affection, and for this plain reason, because she is still
possessed of those noble qualities, improved to a much higher degree,
which first inspired my affection for her.
"O! happy state when souls each other draw,
When love is liberty and nature law. "[144]
I know were I to speak in such a style to many a girl, who thinks
herself possessed of no small share of sense, she would think it
ridiculous; but the language of the heart is, my dear E. , the only
courtship I shall ever use to you.
When I look over what I have written, I am sensible it is vastly
different from the ordinary style of courtship, but I shall make no
apology--I know your good nature will excuse what your goody sense may
see amiss.
R. B.
FOOTNOTES:
[Footnote 144: Pope. _Eloisa to Abelard. _]
* * * * *
VI.
TO MISS E.
_Lochlea_, 1783.
I have often thought it a peculiarly unlucky circumstance in love,
that though in every other situation in life, telling the truth is not
only the safest, but actually by far the easiest way of proceeding, a
lover is never under greater difficulty in acting, or more puzzled for
expression, than when his passion is sincere, and his intentions are
honourable. I do not think that it is very difficult for a person of
ordinary capacity to talk of love and fondness, which are not felt,
and to make vows of constancy and fidelity, which are never intended
to be performed, if he be villain enough to practise such detestable
conduct: but to a man whose heart glows with the principles of
integrity and truth, and who sincerely loves a woman of amiable
person, uncommon refinement of sentiment and purity of manners--to
such an one, in such circumstances, I can assure you, my dear, from my
own feelings at this present moment, courtship is a task indeed. There
is such a number of foreboding fears and distrustful anxieties crowd
into my mind when I am in your company, or when I sit down to write to
you, that what to speak, or what to write, I am altogether at a loss.
There is one rule which I have hitherto practised, and which I shall
invariably keep with you, and that is honestly to tell you the plain
truth. There is something so mean and unmanly in the arts of
dissimulation and falsehood, that I am surprised they can be acted by
any one in so noble, so generous a passion, as virtuous love. No, my
dear E. , I shall never endeavour to gain your favour by such
detestable practices. If you will be so good and so generous as to
admit me for your partner, your companion, your bosom friend through
life, there is nothing on this side of eternity shall give me greater
transport; but I shall never think of purchasing your hand by any arts
unworthy of a man, and I will add of a Christian. There is one thing,
my dear, which I earnestly request of you, and it is this; that you
would soon either put an end to my hopes by a peremptory refusal, or
cure me of my fears by a generous consent.
It would oblige me much if you would send me a line or two when
convenient. I shall only add further that, if a behaviour regulated
(though perhaps but very imperfectly) by the rules of honour and
virtue, if a heart devoted to love and esteem you, and an earnest
endeavour to promote your happiness; if these are qualities you would
wish in a friend, in a husband, I hope you shall ever find them in
your real friend, and sincere lover.
R. B.
* * * * *
VII.
TO MISS E.
_Lochlea_, 1783.
I ought, in good manners, to have acknowledged the receipt of your
letter before this time, but my heart was so shocked, with the
contents of it, that I can scarcely yet collect my thoughts so as to
write you on the subject. I will not attempt to describe what I felt
on receiving your letter. I read it over and over, again and again,
and though it was in the politest language of refusal, still it was
peremptory; "you were sorry you could not make me a return, but you
wish me," what without you I never can obtain, "you wish me all kind
of happiness. " It would be weak and unmanly to say that, without you I
never can be happy; but sure I am, that sharing life with you would
have given it a relish, that, wanting you, I can never taste.
Your uncommon personal advantages, and your superior good sense, do
not so much strike me; these, possibly, in a few instances may be met
with in others; but that amiable goodness, that tender feminine
softness, that endearing sweetness of disposition, with all the
charming offspring of a warm feeling heart--these I never again expect
to meet with, in such a degree, in this world. All these charming
qualities, heightened by an education much beyond anything I have ever
met in any woman I ever dared to approach, have made an impression on
my heart that I do not think the world can ever efface. My imagination
had fondly flattered myself with a wish, I dare not say it ever
reached a hope, that possibly I might one day call you mine. I had
formed the most delightful images, and my fancy fondly brooded over
them; but now I am wretched for the loss of what I really had no right
to expect. I must now think no more of you as a mistress; still I
presume to ask to be admitted as a friend. As such I wish to be
allowed to wait on you, and as I expect to remove in a few days a
little further off, and you, I suppose, will perhaps soon leave this
place, I wish to see or hear from you soon; and if an expression
should perhaps escape me, rather too warm for friendship, I hope you
will pardon it in, my dear Miss--(pardon me the dear expression for
once) * * * *
R. B
* * * * *
VIII.
TO ROBERT RIDDEL, ESQ.
OF GLENRIDDEL
[These memoranda throw much light on the early days of Burns, and on
the history of his mind and compositions. Robert Riddel, of the
Friars-Carse, to whom these fragments were sent, was a good man as
well as a distinguished antiquary. ]
MY DEAR SIR,
On rummaging over some old papers I lighted on a MS. of my early
years, in which I had determined to write myself out; as I was placed
by fortune among a class of men to whom my ideas would have been
nonsense. I had meant that the book should have lain by me, in the
fond hope that some time or other, even after I was no more, my
thoughts would fall into the hands of somebody capable of appreciating
their value. It sets off thus:--
"OBSERVATIONS, HINTS, SONGS, SCRAPS OF POETRY, &c. , by
ROBERT BURNESS: a man who had little art in making money, and
still less in keeping it; but was, however, a man of some sense, a
great deal of honesty, and unbounded good-will to every creature,
rational and irrational. --As he was but little indebted to scholastic
education, and bred at a plough-tail, his performances must be
strongly tinctured with his unpolished, rustic way of life; but as I
believe they are really his own, it may be some entertainment to a
curious observer of human nature to see how a ploughman thinks, and
feels, under the pressure of love, ambition, anxiety, grief, with the
like cares and passions, which, however diversified by the modes and
manners of life, operate pretty much alike, I believe, on all the
species. "
"There are numbers in the world who do not want sense to
make a figure, so much as an opinion of their own abilities
to put them upon recording their observations, and allowing
them the same importance which they do to those which appear
in print. "--SHENSTONE.
"Pleasing, when youth is long expired, to trace
The forms our pencil, or our pen designed!
Such was our youthful air, and shape, and face,
Such the soft image of our youthful mind. "--_Ibid. _
* * * * *
_April_, 1783.
Notwithstanding all that has been said against love, respecting the
folly and weakness it lends a young inexperienced mind into; still I
think it in a great measure deserves the highest encomiums that have
been passed upon it. If anything on earth deserves the name of rapture
or transport, it is the feelings of green eighteen in the company of
the mistress of his heart, when she repays him with an equal return of
affection.
* * * * *
_August. _
There is certainly some connexion between love and music, and poetry;
and therefore, I have always thought it a fine touch of nature, that
passage in a modern love-composition:
"As towards her cot she jogged along,
Her name was frequent in his song. "
For my own part I never had the least thought or inclination of
turning poet till I got once heartily in love, and then rhyme and song
were in a manner the spontaneous language of my heart. The following
composition was the first of my performances, and done at an early
period of life, when my heart glowed with honest warm simplicity;
unacquainted and uncorrupted with the ways of a wicked world. The
performance is indeed, very puerile and silly; but I am always pleased
with it, as it recalls to my mind those happy days when my heart was
yet honest, and my tongue was sincere. The subject of it was a young
girl who really deserved all the praises I have bestowed on her. I not
only had this opinion of her then--but I actually think so still, now
that the spell is long since broken, and the enchantment at an end.
O once I lov'd a bonnie lass. [145]
Lest my works should be thought below criticism: or meet with a
critic, who, perhaps, will not look on them with so candid and
favourable an eye, I am determined to criticise them myself.
The first distich of the first stanza is quite too much in the flimsy
strain of our ordinary street ballads: and, on the other hand, the
second distich is too much in the other extreme. The expression is a
little awkward, and the sentiment too serious. Stanza the second I am
well pleased with; and I think it conveys a fine idea of that amiable
part of the sex--the agreeables; or what in our Scotch dialect we call
a sweet sonsie lass. The third stanza has a little of the flimsy turn
in it; and the third line has rather too serious a cast. The fourth
stanza is a very indifferent one; the first line, is, indeed, all in
the strain of the second stanza, but the rest is most expletive. The
thoughts in the fifth stanza come finely up to my favourite idea--a
sweet sonsie lass: the last line, however, halts a little. The same
sentiments are kept up with equal spirit and tenderness in the sixth
stanza, but the second and fourth lines ending with short syllables
hurt the whole. The seventh stanza has several minute faults; but I
remember I composed it in a wild enthusiasm of passion, and to this
hour I never recollect it but my heart melts, my blood sallies, at the
remembrance.
* * * * *
_September. _
I entirely agree with that judicious philosopher, Mr.
Smith, in his
excellent Theory of Moral Sentiments, that remorse is the most painful
sentiment that can embitter the human bosom. Any ordinary pitch of
fortitude may bear up tolerably well under those calamities, in the
procurement of which we ourselves have had no hand; but when our own
follies, or crimes, have made us miserable and wretched, to bear up
with manly firmness, and at the same time have a proper penitent sense
of our misconduct, is a glorious effort of self-command.
Of all the numerous ills that hurt our peace,
That press the soul, or wring the mind with anguish,
Beyond comparison the worst are those
That to our folly or our guilt we owe.
In every other circumstance, the mind
Has this to say, 'It was no deed of mine;'
But when to all the evil of misfortune
This sting is added--'Blame thy foolish self! '
Or worser far, the pangs of keen remorse;
The torturing, gnawing consciousness of guilt--
Of guilt, perhaps, where we've involved others;
The young, the innocent, who fondly lov'd us,
Nay, more, that every love their cause of ruin!
O burning hell; in all thy store of torments,
There's not a keener lash!
Lives there a man so firm, who, while his heart
Feels all the bitter horrors of his crime,
Can reason down its agonizing throbs;
And, after proper purpose of amendment,
Can firmly force his jarring thoughts to peace?
O, happy! happy! enviable man!
O glorious magnanimity of soul!
* * * * *
_March_, 1784.
I have often observed, in the course of my experience of human life,
that every man, even the worst, has something good about him; though
very often nothing else than a happy temperament of constitution
inclining him to this or that virtue. For this reason no man can say
in what degree any other person, besides himself, can be, with strict
justice, called wicked. Let any, of the strictest character for
regularity of conduct among us, examine impartially how many vices he
has never been guilty of, not from any care or vigilance, but for want
of opportunity, or some accidental circumstance intervening; how many
of the weaknesses of mankind he has escaped, because he was out of the
line of such temptation; and, what often, if not always, weighs more
than all the rest, how much he is indebted to the world's good
opinion, because the world does not know all: I say, any man who can
thus think, will scan the failings, nay, the faults and crimes, of
mankind around him, with a brother's eye.
I have often courted the acquaintance of that part of mankind,
commonly known by the ordinary phrase of blackguards, sometimes
farther than was consistent with the safety of my character; those who
by thoughtless prodigality or headstrong passions, have been driven to
ruin. Though disgraced by follies, nay sometimes, stained with guilt,
I have yet found among them, in not a few instances, some of the
noblest virtues, magnanimity, generosity, disinterested friendship,
and even modesty.
* * * * *
_April. _
As I am what the men of the world, if they knew such a man, would call
a whimsical mortal, I have various sources of pleasure and enjoyment,
which are, in a manner, peculiar to myself, or some here and there
such other out-of-the-way person. Such is the peculiar pleasure I take
in the season of winter, more than the rest of the year. This, I
believe, may be partly owing to my misfortunes giving my mind a
melancholy cast: but there is something even in the--
"Mighty tempest, and the hoary waste
Abrupt and deep, stretch'd o'er the buried earth,"--
which raises the mind to a serious sublimity, favourable to everything
great and noble. There is scarcely any earthly object gives me more--I
do not know if I should call it pleasure--but something which exalts
me, something which enraptures me--than to walk in the sheltered side
of a wood, or high plantation, in a cloudy winter-day, and hear the
stormy wind howling among the trees, and raving over the plain. It is
my best season for devotion: my mind is wrapt up in a kind of
enthusiasm to Him, who, in the pompous language of the Hebrew bard,
"walks on the wings of the wind. " In one of these seasons, just after
a train of misfortunes, I composed the following:--
The wintry west extends his blast. [146]
Shenstone finely observes, that love-verses, writ without any real
passion, are the most nauseous of all conceits; and I have often
thought that no man can be a proper critic of love-composition, except
he himself, in one or more instances, have been a warm votary of this
passion. As I have been all along a miserable dupe to love, and have
been led into a thousand weaknesses and follies by it, for that reason
I put the more confidence in my critical skill, in distinguishing
foppery and conceit from real passion and nature. Whether the
following song will stand the test, I will not pretend to say, because
it is my own; only I can say it was, at the time, genuine from the heart:--
Behind yon hills, where Lugar flows. [147]
* * * * *
_March_, 1784.
There was a certain period of my life that my spirit was broke by
repeated losses and disasters which threatened, and indeed effected,
the utter ruin of my fortune. My body, too, was attacked by that most
dreadful distemper, a hypochondria, or confirmed melancholy. In this
wretched state, the recollection of which makes me shudder, I hung my
harp on the willow trees, except in some lucid intervals, in one of
which I composed the following:--
O thou Great Being! what Thou art. [148]
* * * * *
_April. _
The following song is a wild rhapsody, miserably deficient in
versification; but as the sentiments are the genuine feelings of my
heart, for that reason I have a particular pleasure in conning it
over.
My father was a farmer
Upon the Carrick border, O. [149]
* * * * *
_April. _
I think the whole species of young men may be naturally enough divided
into two grand classes, which I shall call the _grave_ and the
_merry_; though, by the by, these terms do not with propriety enough
express my ideas. The grave I shall cast into the usual division of
those who are goaded on by the love of money, and those whose darling
wish is to make a figure in the world. The merry are the men of
pleasure of all denominations; the jovial lads, who have too much fire
and spirit to have any settled rule of action; but, without much
deliberation, follow the strong impulses of nature: the thoughtless,
the careless, the indolent--in particular _he_ who, with a happy
sweetness of natural temper, and a cheerful vacancy of thought, steals
through life--generally, indeed, in poverty and obscurity; but poverty
and obscurity are only evils to him who can sit gravely down and make
a repining comparison between his own situation and that of others;
and lastly, to grace the quorum, such are, generally, those whose
heads are capable of all the towerings of genius, and whose hearts are
warmed with all the delicacy of feeling.
* * * * *
_August. _
The foregoing was to have been an elaborate dissertation on the
various species of men; but as I cannot please myself in the
arrangement of my ideas, I must wait till farther experience and nicer
observation throw more light on the subject. --In the mean time I shall
set down the following fragment, which, as it is the genuine language
of my heart, will enable anybody to determine which of the classes I
belong to:
There's nought but care on ev'ry han',
In ev'ry hour that passes, O. [150]
As the grand end of human life is to cultivate an intercourse with
that BEING to whom we owe life, with every enjoyment that
renders life delightful; and to maintain an integritive conduct
towards our fellow-creatures; that so, by forming piety and virtue
into habit, we may be fit members for that society of the pious and
the good, which reason and revelation teach us to expect beyond the
grave, I do not see that the turn of mind, and pursuits of such a one
as the above verses describe--one who spends the hours and thoughts
which the vocations of the day can spare with Ossian, Shakspeare,
Thomson, Shenstone, Sterne, &c. ; or, as the maggot takes him, a gun, a
fiddle, or a song to make or mend; and at all times some heart's-dear
bonnie lass in view--I say I do not see that the turn of mind and
pursuits of such an one are in the least more inimical to the sacred
interests of piety and virtue, than the even lawful, bustling and
straining after the world's riches and honours: and I do not see but
he may gain heaven as well--which, by the by, is no mean
consideration--who steals through the vale of life, amusing himself
with every little flower that fortune throws in his way, as he, who
straining straight forward, and perhaps spattering all about him,
gains some of life's little eminencies, where, after all, he can only
see and be seen a little more conspicuously than what, in the pride of
his heart, he is apt to term the poor, indolent devil he has left
behind him.
* * * * *
_August. _
A Prayer, when fainting fits, and other alarming symptoms of a
pleurisy or some other dangerous disorder, which indeed still
threatens me, first put nature on the alarm:--
O thou unknown, Almighty Cause
Of all my hope and fear! [151]
* * * * *
_August. _
Misgivings in the hour of _despondency_ and prospect of death:--
Why am I loth to leave this earthly scene. [152]
* * * * *
EGOTISMS FROM MY OWN SENSATIONS.
_May. _
I don't well know what is the reason of it, but somehow or other,
though I am when I have a mind pretty generally beloved, yet I never
could get the art of commanding respect. --I imagine it is owing to my
being deficient in what Sterne calls "that understrapping virtue of
discretion. "--I am so apt to a _lapsus linguae_, that I sometimes think
the character of a certain great man I have read of somewhere is very
much _apropos_ to myself--that he was a compound of great talents and
great folly. --N. B. To try if I can discover the causes of this
wretched infirmity, and, if possible, to mend it.
* * * * *
_August. _
However I am pleased with the works of our Scotch poets, particularly
the excellent Ramsay, and the still more excellent Fergusson, yet I am
hurt to see other places of Scotland, their towns, rivers, woods,
haughs, &c. , immortalized in such celebrated performances, while my dear
native country, the ancient bailieries of Carrick, Kyle, and Cunningham,
famous both in ancient and modern times for a gallant and warlike race
of inhabitants; a country where civil, and particularly religious
liberty have ever found their first support, and their last asylum; a
country, the birth-place of many famous philosophers, soldiers,
statesman, and the scene of many important events recorded in Scottish
history, particularly a great many of the actions of the glorious
WALLACE, the SAVIOUR of his country; yet, we have never had one Scotch
poet of any eminence, to make the fertile banks of Irvine, the romantic
woodlands and sequestered scenes on Ayr, and the healthy mountainous
source and winding sweep of DOON, emulate Tay, Forth, Ettrick, Tweed,
&c. This is a complaint I would gladly remedy, but, alas! I am far
unequal to the task, both in native genius and education. Obscure I am,
and obscure I must be, though no young poet, nor young soldier's heart,
ever beat more fondly for fame than mine--
"And if there is no other scene of being
Where my insatiate wish may have its fill,--
This something at my heart that heaves for room,
My best, my dearest part, was made in vain. "
* * * * *
_September. _
There is a great irregularity in the old Scotch songs, a redundancy of
syllables with respect to that exactness of accent and measure that
the English poetry requires, but which glides in, most melodiously,
with the respective tunes to which they are set. For instance, the
fine old song of "The Mill, Mill, O,"[153] to give it a plain prosaic
reading, it halts prodigiously out of measure; on the other hand, the
song set to the same tune in Bremner's collection of Scotch songs,
which begins "To Fanny fair could I impart," &c. , it is most exact
measure, and yet, let them both be sung before a real critic, one
above the biases of prejudice, but a thorough judge of nature,--how
flat and spiritless will the last appear, how trite, and lamely
methodical, compared with the wild warbling cadence, the heart-moving
melody of the first! --This is particularly the case with all those
airs which end with a hypermetrical syllable. There is a degree of
wild irregularity in many of the compositions and fragments which are
daily sung to them by my compeers, the common people--a certain happy
arrangement of old Scotch syllables, and yet, very frequently,
nothing, not even like rhyme or sameness of jingle, at the ends of the
lines. This has made me sometimes imagine that perhaps it might be
possible for a Scotch poet, with a nice judicious ear, to set
compositions to many of our most favourite airs, particularly that
class of them mentioned above, independent of rhyme altogether.
* * * * *
There is a noble sublimity, a heart-melting tenderness, in some of our
ancient ballads, which show them to be the work of a masterly hand:
and it has often given me many a heart-ache to reflect that such
glorious old bards--bards who very probably owed all their talents to
native genius, yet have described the exploits of heroes, the pangs of
disappointment, and the meltings of love, with such fine strokes of
nature--that their very names (O how mortifying to a bard's vanity! )
are now "buried among the wreck of things which were. "
O ye illustrious names unknown! who could feel so strongly and
describe so well: the last, the meanest of the muses' train--one who,
though far inferior to your flights, yet eyes your path, and with
trembling wing would sometimes soar after you--a poor rustic bard
unknown, pays this sympathetic pang to your memory! Some of you tell
us, with all the charms of verse, that you have been unfortunate in
the world--unfortunate in love: he, too, has felt the loss of his
little fortune, the loss of friends, and, worse than all, the loss of
the woman he adored. Like you, all his consolation was his muse: she
taught him in rustic measures to complain. Happy could he have done it
with your strength of imagination and flow of verse! May the turf lie
lightly on your bones! and may you now enjoy that solace and rest
which this world rarely gives to the heart tuned to all the feelings
of poesy and love!
* * * * *
_September. _
The following fragment is done something in imitation of the manner of
a noble old Scottish piece, called M'Millan's Peggy, and sings to the
tune of Galla Water. --My Montgomery's Peggy was my deity for six or
eight months. She had been bred (though, as the world says, without
any just pretence for it) in a style of life rather elegant; but, as
Vanbrugh says in one of his comedies, my "d----d star found me out"
there too: for though I began the affair merely in a _gaitie de
coeur_, or, to tell the truth, which will scarcely be believed, a
vanity of showing my parts in courtship, particularly my abilities at
a _billet-doux_, which I always piqued myself upon, made me lay siege
to her; and when, as I always do in my foolish gallantries, I had
fettered myself into a very warm affection for her, she told me one
day, in a flag of truce, that her fortress had been for some time
before the rightful property of another; but, with the greatest
friendship and politeness, she offered me every allegiance except
actual possession. I found out afterwards that what she told me of a
pre-engagement was really true; but it cost me some heart-aches to get
rid of the affair.
I have even tried to imitate in this extempore thing that irregularity
in the rhymes, which, when judiciously done, has such a fine effect on
the ear.
"Altho' my bed were in yon muir. "[154]
* * * * *
_September. _
There is another fragment in imitation of an old Scotch song, well
known among the country ingle-sides. --I cannot tell the name, neither
of the song nor the tune, but they are in fine unison with one
another. --By the way, these old Scottish airs are so nobly
sentimental, that when one would compose to them, to "south the tune,"
as our Scotch phrase is, over and over, is the readiest way to catch
the inspiration, and raise the bard into that glorious enthusiasm so
strongly characteristic of our old Scotch poetry. I shall here set
down one verse of the piece mentioned above, both to mark the song and
tune I mean, and likewise as a debt I owe to the author, as the
repeating of that verse has lighted up my flame a thousand times:--
When clouds in skies do come together
To hide the brightness of the sun,
There will surely be some pleasant weather
When a' their storms are past and gone. [155]
Though fickle fortune has deceived me,
She promis'd fair and perform'd but ill;
Of mistress, friends, and wealth bereav'd me,
Yet I bear a heart shall support me still.
I'll act with prudence as far as I'm able,
But if success I must never find,
Then come misfortune, I bid thee welcome,
I'll meet thee with an undaunted mind.
The above was an extempore, under the pressure of a heavy train of
misfortunes, which, indeed, threatened to undo me altogether. It was
just at the close of that dreadful period mentioned already, and
though the weather has brightened up a little with me, yet there has
always been since a tempest brewing round me in the grim sky of
futurity, which I pretty plainly see will some time or other, perhaps
ere long, overwhelm me, and drive me into some doleful dell, to pine
in solitary, squalid wretchedness. --However, as I hope my poor country
muse, who, all rustic, awkward, and unpolished as she is, has more
charms for me than any other of the pleasures of life beside--as I
hope she will not then desert me, I may even then learn to be, if not
happy, at least easy, and south a sang to soothe my misery.
'Twas at the same time I set about composing an air in the old Scotch
style. --I am not musical scholar enough to prick down my tune
properly, so it can never see the light, and perhaps 'tis no great
matter; but the following were the verses I composed to suit it:--
O raging fortune's withering blast
Has laid my leaf full low, O! [156]
The tune consisted of three parts, so that the above verses just went
through the whole air.
* * * * *
_October_, 1785.
If ever any young man, in the vestibule of the world, chance to throw
his eye over these pages, let him pay a warm attention to the
following observations, as I assure him they are the fruit of a poor
devil's dear-bought experience. --I have literally, like that great
poet and great gallant, and by consequence, that great fool, Solomon,
"turned my eyes to behold madness and folly. " Nay, I have, with all
the ardour of a lively, fanciful, and whimsical imagination,
accompanied with a warm, feeling, poetic heart, shaken hands with
their intoxicating friendship.
In the first place, let my pupil, as he tenders his own peace, keep up
a regular, warm intercourse with the Deity. * * * *
This is all worth quoting in my MSS. , and more than all.
R. B.
FOOTNOTES:
[Footnote 145: See Songs and Ballads, No. I. ]
[Footnote 146: See Winter. A Dirge. Poem I. ]
[Footnote 147: Song XIV. ]
[Footnote 148: Poem IX. ]
[Footnote 149: Song V]
[Footnote 150: Song XVII. ]
[Footnote 151: Poem X. ]
[Footnote 152: Poem XI. ]
[Footnote 153: "The Mill, Mill, O," is by Allan Ramsay. ]
[Footnote 154: Song VIII. ]
[Footnote 155: Alluding to the misfortunes he feelingly laments before
this verse. (This is the author's note. )]
[Footnote 156: Song II. ]
* * * * *
IX.
TO MR. JAMES BURNESS,
MONTROSE.
[The elder Burns, whose death this letter intimates, lies buried in
the kirk-yard of Alloway, with a tombstone recording his worth. ]
_Lochlea_, 17_th Feb. _ 1784.
DEAR COUSIN,
I would have returned you my thanks for your kind favour of the 13th
of December sooner, had it not been that I waited to give you an
account of that melancholy event, which, for some time past, we have
from day to day expected.
On the 13th current I lost the best of fathers. Though, to be sure, we
have had long warning of the impending stroke; still the feelings of
nature claim their part, and I cannot recollect the tender endearments
and parental lessons of the best of friends and ablest of instructors,
without feeling what perhaps the calmer dictates of reason would
partly condemn.
I hope my father's friends in your country will not let their
connexion in this place die with him. For my part I shall ever with
pleasure--with pride, acknowledge my connexion with those who were
allied by the ties of blood and friendship to a man whose memory I
shall ever honour and revere.
I expect, therefore, my dear Sir, you will not neglect any opportunity
of letting me hear from you, which will very much oblige,
My dear Cousin, yours sincerely,
R. B.
* * * * *
X.
TO JAMES BURNESS,
MONTROSE.
[Mrs. Buchan, the forerunner in extravagance and absurdity of Joanna
Southcote, after attempting to fix her tent among the hills of the
west and the vales of the Nith, finally set up her staff at
Auchengibbert-Hill, in Galloway, where she lectured her followers, and
held out hopes of their reaching the stars, even in this life. She
died early: one or two of her people, as she called them, survived
till within these half-dozen years. ]
_Mossgiel, August_, 1784.
We have been surprised with one of the most extraordinary phenomena in
the moral world which, I dare say, had happened in the course of this
half century. We have had a party of Presbytery relief, as they call
themselves, for some time in this country. A pretty thriving society
of them has been in the burgh of Irvine for some years past, till
about two years ago, a Mrs. Buchan from Glasgow came among them, and
began to spread some fanatical notions of religion among them, and, in
a short time, made many converts; and, among others, their preacher,
Mr. Whyte, who, upon that account, has been suspended and formally
deposed by his brethren. He continued, however, to preach in private
to his party, and was supported, both he and their spiritual mother,
as they affect to call old Buchan, by the contributions of the rest,
several of whom were in good circumstances; till, in spring last, the
populace rose and mobbed Mrs. Buchan, and put her out of the town; on
which all her followers voluntarily quitted the place likewise, and
with such precipitation, that many of them never shut their doors
behind them; one left a washing on the green, another a cow bellowing
at the crib without food, or anybody to mind her, and after several
stages, they are fixed at present in the neighbourhood of Dumfries.
Their tenets are a strange jumble of enthusiastic jargon; among
others, she pretends to give them the Holy Ghost by breathing on them,
which she does with postures and practices that are scandalously
indecent; they have likewise disposed of all their effects, and hold a
community of goods, and live nearly an idle life, carrying on a great
farce of pretended devotion in barns and woods, where they lodge and
lie all together, and hold likewise a community of women, as it is
another of their tenets that they can commit no mortal sin. I am
personally acquainted with most of them, and I can assure you the
above mentioned are facts.
This, my dear Sir, is one of the many instances of the folly of
leaving the guidance of sound reason and common sense in matters of
religion.
Whenever we neglect or despise these sacred monitors, the whimsical
notions of a perturbated brain are taken for the immediate influences
of the Deity, and the wildest fanaticism, and the most inconstant
absurdities, will meet with abettors and converts. Nay, I have often
thought, that the more out-of-the-way and ridiculous the fancies are,
if once they are sanctified under the sacred name of religion, the
unhappy mistaken votaries are the more firmly glued to them.
R. B.
* * * * *
XI.
TO MISS ----.
[This has generally been printed among the early letters of Burns.
Cromek thinks that the person addressed was the "Peggy" of the
Common-place Book. This is questioned by Robert Chambers, who,
however, leaves both name and date unsettled. ]
MY DEAR COUNTRYWOMAN,
I am so impatient to show you that I am once more at peace with you,
that I send you the book I mentioned directly, rather than wait the
uncertain time of my seeing you. I am afraid I have mislaid or lost
Collins' Poems, which I promised to Miss Irvin. If I can find them, I
will forward them by you; if not, you must apologize for me.
I know you will laugh at it when I tell you that your piano and you
together have played the deuce somehow about my heart. My breast has
been widowed these many months, and I thought myself proof against the
fascinating witchcraft; but I am afraid you will "feelingly convince
me what I am. " I say, I am afraid, because I am not sure what is the
matter with me. I have one miserable bad symptom; when you whisper, or
look kindly to another, it gives me a draught of damnation. I have a
kind of wayward wish to be with you ten minutes by yourself, though
what I would say, Heaven above knows, for I am sure I know not. I have
no formed design in all this; but just, in the nakedness of my heart,
write you down a mere matter-of-fact story. You may perhaps give
yourself airs of distance on this, and that will completely cure me;
but I wish you would not: just let us meet, if you please, in the old
beaten way of friendship.
I will not subscribe myself your humble servant, for that is a phrase,
I think at least fifty miles off from the heart; but I will conclude
with sincerely wishing that the Great Protector of innocence may
shield you from the barbed dart of calumny, and hand you by the covert
snare of deceit.
R. B.
* * * * *
XII.
TO MR. JOHN RICHMOND,
OF EDINBURGH.
[John Richmond, writer, one of the poet's Mauchline friends, to whom
we are indebted for much valuable information concerning Burns and his
productions--Connel was the Mauchline carrier. ]
_Mossgiel, Feb. _ 17, 1786.
MY DEAR SIR,
I have not time at present to upbraid you for your silence and
neglect; I shall only say I received yours with great pleasure. I have
enclosed you a piece of rhyming ware for your perusal. I have been
very busy with the muses since I saw you, and have composed, among
several others, "The Ordination," a poem on Mr. M'Kinlay's being
called to Kilmarnock; "Scotch Drink," a poem; "The Cotter's Saturday
Night;" "An Address to the Devil," &c. I have likewise completed my
poem on the "Dogs," but have not shown it to the world. My chief
patron now is Mr. Aiken, in Ayr, who is pleased to express great
approbation of my works. Be so good as send me Fergusson, by Connel,
and I will remit you the money. I have no news to acquaint you with
about Mauchline, they are just going on in the old way. I have some
very important news with respect to myself, not the most
agreeable--news that I am sure you cannot guess, but I shall give you
the particulars another time. I am extremely happy with Smith; he is
the only friend I have now in Mauchline. I can scarcely forgive your
long neglect of me, and I beg you will let me hear from you regularly
by Connel. If you would act your part as a friend, I am sure neither
good nor bad fortune should strange of alter me. Excuse haste, as I
got yours but yesterday.
I am, my dear Sir,
Yours,
R. B.
* * * * *
XIII.
TO MR. JOHN KENNEDY,
DUMFRIES HOUSE.
[Who the John Kennedy was to whom Burns addressed this note, enclosing
"The Cotter's Saturday night," it is now, perhaps, vain to inquire:
the Kennedy to whom Mr. Cobbett introduces us was a Thomas--perhaps a
relation. ]
_Mossgiel, 3d March_, 1786.
