I feel
impotent
as a child
to the ardour of my wishes!
to the ardour of my wishes!
Robert Burns-
" Tell me, my
friend, is this weak prejudice? I believe in my conscience such ideas as
"my country; her independence; her honour; the illustrious names that
mark the history of my native land;" &c. --I believe these, among your
_men of the world_, men who in fact guide for the most part and govern
our world, are looked on as so many modifications of wrongheadedness.
They know the use of bawling out such terms, to rouse or lead THE
RABBLE; but for their own private use, with almost all the _able
statesmen_ that ever existed, or now exist, when they talk of right and
wrong, they only mean proper and improper; and their measure of conduct
is, not what they OUGHT, but what they DARE. For the truth of this I
shall not ransack the history of nations, but appeal to one of the
ablest judges of men that ever lived--the celebrated Earl of
Chesterfield. In fact, a man who could thoroughly control his vices
whenever they interfered with his interests, and who could completely
put on the appearance of every virtue as often as it suited his
purposes, is, on the Stanhopean plan, the _perfect man_; a man to lead
nations. But are great abilities, complete without a flaw, and polished
without a blemish, the standard of human excellence? This is certainly
the staunch opinion of _men of the world_; but I call on honour, virtue,
and worth, to give the stygian doctrine a loud negative! However, this
must be allowed, that, if you abstract from man the idea of an existence
beyond the grave, _then_ the true measure of human conduct is, _proper_
and _improper_: virtue and vice, as dispositions of the heart, are, in
that case, of scarcely the same import and value to the world at large,
as harmony and discord in the modifications of sound; and a delicate
sense of honour, like a nice ear for music, though it may sometimes give
the possessor an ecstasy unknown to the coarser organs of the herd, yet,
considering the harsh gratings, and inharmonic jars, in this ill-tuned
state of being, it is odds but the individual would be as happy, and
certainly would be as much respected by the true judges of society as it
would then stand, without either a good ear or a good heart.
You must know I have just met with the Mirror and Lounger for the
first time, and I am quite in raptures with them; I should be glad to
have your opinion of some of the papers. The one I have just read,
Lounger, No. 61, has cost me more honest tears than anything I have
read of a long time. Mackenzie has been called the Addison of the
Scots, and in my opinion, Addison would not be hurt at the comparison.
If he has not Addison's exquisite humour, he as certainly outdoes him
in the tender and the pathetic. His Man of Feeling (but I am not
counsel learned in the laws of criticism) I estimate as the first
performance in its kind I ever saw. From what book, moral or even
pious, will the susceptible young mind receive impressions more
congenial to humanity and kindness, generosity and benevolence; in
short, more of all that ennobles the soul to herself, or endears her
to others--than from the simple affecting tale of poor Harley?
Still, with all my admiration of Mackenzie's writings, I do not know
if they are the fittest reading for a young man who is about to set
out, as the phrase is, to make his way into life. Do not you think,
Madam, that among the few favoured of heaven in the structure of their
minds (for such there certainly are) there may be a purity, a
tenderness, a dignity, an elegance of soul, which are of no use, nay,
in some degree, absolutely disqualifying for the truly important
business of making a man's way into life? If I am not much mistaken,
my gallant young friend, A * * * * * *, is very much under these
disqualifications; and for the young females of a family I could
mention, well may they excite parental solicitude, for I, a common
acquaintance, or as my vanity will have it, an humble friend, have
often trembled for a turn of mind which may render them eminently
happy--or peculiarly miserable!
I have been manufacturing some verses lately; but when I have got the
most hurried season of excise business over, I hope to have more
leisure to transcribe anything that may show how much I have the
honour to be, Madam,
Yours, &c.
R. B.
* * * * *
CXCI.
TO COLLECTOR MITCHELL.
[Collector Mitchell was a kind and considerate gentle man: to his
grandson, Mr. John Campbell, surgeon, in Aberdeen, I owe this
characteristic letter. ]
_Ellisland, 1790. _
SIR,
I shall not fail to wait on Captain Riddel to-night--I wish and pray
that the goddess of justice herself would appear to-morrow among our
hon. gentlemen, merely to give them a word in their ear that mercy to
the thief is injustice to the honest man. For my part I have galloped
over my ten parishes these four days, until this moment that I am just
alighted, or rather, that my poor jackass-skeleton of a horse has let
me down; for the miserable devil has been on his knees half a score of
times within the last twenty miles, telling me in his own way,
'Behold, am not I thy faithful jade of a horse, on which thou hast
ridden these many years! '
In short, Sir, I have broke my horse's wind, and almost broke my own
neck, besides some injuries in a part that shall be nameless, owing to
a hard-hearted stone for a saddle. I find that every offender has so
many great men to espouse his cause, that I shall not be surprised if
I am committed to the strong hold of the law to-morrow for insolence
to the dear friends of the gentlemen of the country.
I have the honour to be, Sir,
Your obliged and obedient humble
R. B.
* * * * *
CXCII.
TO DR. MOORE.
[The sonnets alluded to by Burns were those of Charlotte Smith: the
poet's copy is now before me, with a few marks of his pen on the
margins. ]
_Dumfries, Excise-Office, 14th July, 1790. _
SIR,
Coming into town this morning, to attend my duty in this office, it
being collection-day, I met with a gentleman who tells me he is on his
way to London; so I take the opportunity of writing to you, as
franking is at present under a temporary death. I shall have some
snatches of leisure through the day, amid our horrid business and
bustle, and I shall improve them as well as I can; but let my letter
be as stupid as * * * * * * * * *, as miscellaneous as a newspaper, as
short as a hungry grace-before-meat, or as long as a law-paper in the
Douglas cause; as ill-spelt as country John's billet-doux, or as
unsightly a scrawl as Betty Byre-Mucker's answer to it; I hope,
considering circumstances, you will forgive it; and as it will put you
to no expense of postage, I shall have the less reflection about it.
I am sadly ungrateful in not returning you my thanks for your most
valuable present, _Zeluco. _ In fact, you are in some degree blameable
for my neglect. You were pleased to express a wish for my opinion of
the work, which so flattered me, that nothing less would serve my
overweening fancy, than a formal criticism on the book. In fact, I
have gravely planned a comparative view of you, Fielding, Richardson,
and Smollett, in your different qualities and merits as novel-writers.
This, I own, betrays my ridiculous vanity, and I may probably never
bring the business to bear; and I am fond of the spirit young Elihu
shows in the book of Job--"And I said, I will also declare my
opinion," I have quite disfigured my copy of the book with my
annotations. I never take it up without at the same time taking my
pencil, and marking with asterisms, parentheses, &c. , wherever I meet
with an original thought, a nervous remark on life and manners, a
remarkable well-turned period, or a character sketched with uncommon
precision.
Though I should hardly think of fairly writing out my "Comparative
View," I shall certainly trouble you with my remarks, such as they
are.
I have just received from my gentleman that horrid summons in the book
of Revelations--"That time shall be no more! "
The little collection of sonnets have some charming poetry in them. If
_indeed_ I am indebted to the fair author for the book, and not, as I
rather suspect, to a celebrated author of the other sex, I should
certainly have written to the lady, with my grateful acknowledgments,
and my own ideas of the comparative excellence of her pieces. I would
do this last, not from any vanity of thinking that my remarks could be
of much consequence to Mrs. Smith, but merely from my own feelings as
an author, doing as I would be done by.
R. B.
* * * * *
CXCIII.
TO MR. MURDOCH,
TEACHER OF FRENCH, LONDON.
[The account of himself, promised to Murdoch by Burns, was never
written. ]
_Ellisland, July 16, 1790. _
MY DEAR SIR,
I received a letter from you a long time ago, but unfortunately, as
it was in the time of my peregrinations and journeyings through
Scotland, I mislaid or lost it, and by consequence your direction
along with it. Luckily my good star brought me acquainted with Mr.
Kennedy, who, I understand, is an acquaintance of yours: and by his
means and mediation I hope to replace that link which my unfortunate
negligence had so unluckily broke in the chain of our correspondence.
I was the more vexed at the vile accident, as my brother William, a
journeyman saddler, has been for some time in London; and wished above
all things for your direction, that he might have paid his respects to
his father's friend.
His last address he sent me was, "Wm. Burns, at Mr. Barber's, saddler,
No. 181, Strand. " I writ him by Mr. Kennedy, but neglected to ask him
for your address; so, if you find a spare half-minute, please let my
brother know by a card where and when he will find you, and the poor
fellow will joyfully wait on you, as one of the few surviving friends
of the man whose name, and Christian name too, he has the honour to
bear.
The next letter I write you shall be a long one. I have much to tell
you of "hair-breadth 'scapes in th' imminent deadly breach," with all
the eventful history of a life, the early years of which owed so much
to your kind tutorage; but this at an hour of leisure. My kindest
compliments to Mrs. Murdoch and family.
I am ever, my dear Sir,
Your obliged friend,
R. B.
* * * * *
CXCIV.
TO MR. M'MURDO.
[This hasty note was accompanied by the splendid elegy on Matthew
Henderson, and no one could better feel than M'Murdo, to whom it is
addressed, the difference between the music of verse and the clangour
of politics. ]
_Ellisland, 2d August, 1790. _
SIR,
Now that you are over with the sirens of Flattery, the harpies of
Corruption, and the furies of Ambition, these infernal deities, that
on all sides, and in all parties, preside over the villanous business
of politics, permit a rustic muse of your acquaintance to do her best
to soothe you with a song. --
You knew Henderson--I have not flattered his memory.
I have the honour to be, Sir,
Your obliged humble servant,
R. B.
* * * * *
CXCV.
TO MRS. DUNLOP.
[Inquiries have been made in vain after the name of Burns's ci-devant
friend, who had so deeply wounded his feelings. ]
_8th August, 1790. _
DEAR MADAM,
After a long day's toil, plague, and care, I sit down to write to you.
Ask me not why I have delayed it so long! It was owing to hurry,
indolence, and fifty other things; in short to anything--but
forgetfulness of _la plus aimable de son sexe. _ By the bye, you are
indebted your best courtesy to me for this last compliment; as I pay
it from my sincere conviction of its truth--a quality rather rare in
compliments of these grinning, bowing, scraping times.
Well, I hope writing to _you_ will ease a little my troubled soul.
Sorely has it been bruised to-day! A ci-devant friend of mine, and an
intimate acquaintance of yours, has given my feelings a wound that I
perceive will gangrene dangerously ere it cure. He has wounded my
pride!
R. B.
* * * * *
CXCVI.
TO MR. CUNNINGHAM.
["The strain of invective," says the judicious Currie, of this letter,
"goes on some time longer in the style in which our bard was too apt
to indulge, and of which the reader has already seen so much. "]
_Ellisland, 8th August, 1790. _
Forgive me, my once dear, and ever dear friend, my seeming negligence.
You cannot sit down and fancy the busy life I lead.
I laid down my goose-feather to beat my brains for an apt simile, and
had some thoughts of a country grannum at a family christening; a
bride on the market-day before her marriage; or a tavern-keeper at an
election-dinner; but the resemblance that hits my fancy best is, that
blackguard miscreant, Satan, who roams about like a roaring lion,
seeking, _searching_ whom he may devour. However, tossed about as I
am, if I choose (and who would not choose) to bind down with the
crampets of attention the brazen foundation of integrity, I may rear
up the superstructure of Independence, and from its daring turrets bid
defiance to the storms of fate. And is not this a "consummation
devoutly to be wished? "
"Thy spirit, Independence, let me share;
Lord of the lion-heart, and eagle-eye!
Thy steps I follow with my bosom bare,
Nor heed the storm that howls along the sky! "
Are not these noble verses? They are the introduction of Smollett's
Ode to Independence: if you have not seen the poem, I will send it to
you. --How wretched is the man that hangs on by the favours of the
great! To shrink from every dignity of man, at the approach of a
lordly piece of self-consequence, who, amid all his tinsel glitter,
and stately hauteur, is but a creature formed as thou art--and perhaps
not so well formed as thou art--came into the world a puling infant as
thou didst, and must go out of it, as all men must, a naked corse.
R. B.
* * * * *
CXCVII.
TO DR. ANDERSON.
[The gentleman to whom this imperfect note is addressed was Dr. James
Anderson, a well-known agricultural and miscellaneous writer, and the
editor of a weekly miscellany called the Bee. ]
SIR,
I am much indebted to my worthy friend, Dr. Blacklock, for introducing
me to a gentleman of Dr. Anderson's celebrity; but when you do me the
honour to ask my assistance in your proposed publication, alas, Sir!
you might as well think to cheapen a little honesty at the sign of an
advocate's wig, or humility under the Geneva band. I am a miserable
hurried devil, worn to the marrow in the friction of holding the noses
of the poor publicans to the grindstone of the excise! and, like
Milton's Satan, for private reasons, am forced
"To do what yet though damn'd I would abhor. "
--and, except a couplet or two of honest execration * * * *
R. B.
* * * * *
CXCVIII.
TO WILLIAM TYTLER, ESQ. ,
OF WOODHOUSELEE.
[William Tytler was the "revered defender of the beauteous Stuart"--a
man of genius and a gentleman. ]
_Lawn Market, August, 1790. _
SIR,
Enclosed I have sent you a sample of the old pieces that are still to
be found among our peasantry in the west. I had once a great many of
these fragments, and some of these here, entire; but as I had no idea
then that anybody cared for them, I have forgotten them. I invariably
hold it sacrilege to add anything of my own to help out with the
shattered wrecks of these venerable old compositions; but they have
many various readings. If you have not seen these before, I know they
will flatter your true old-style Caledonian feelings; at any rate I am
truly happy to have an opportunity of assuring you how sincerely I am,
revered Sir,
Your gratefully indebted humble servant,
R. B.
* * * * *
CXCIX.
TO CRAUFORD TAIT, ESQ. ,
EDINBURGH.
[Margaret Chalmers had now, it appears by this letter, become Mrs.
Lewis Hay: her friend, Charlotte Hamilton, had been for some time Mrs.
Adair, of Scarborough: Miss Nimmo was the lady who introduced Burns to
the far-famed Clarinda. ]
_Ellisland_, 15th _October, 1790. _
DEAR SIR,
Allow me to introduce to your acquaintance the bearer, Mr. Wm. Duncan,
a friend of mine, whom I have long known and long loved. His father,
whose only son he is, has a decent little property in Ayrshire, and
has bred the young man to the law, in which department he comes up an
adventurer to your good town. I shall give you my friend's character
in two words: as to his head, he has talents enough, and more than
enough for common life; as to his heart, when nature had kneaded the
kindly clay that composes it, she said, "I can no more. "
You, my good Sir, were born under kinder stars; but your fraternal
sympathy, I well know can enter into the feelings of the young man,
who goes into life with the laudable ambition to _do_ something, and
to _be_ something among his fellow-creatures; but whom the
consciousness of friendless obscurity presses to the earth, and wounds
to the soul!
Even the fairest of his virtues are against him. That independent
spirit, and that ingenuous modesty, qualities inseparable from a noble
mind, are, with the million, circumstances not a little disqualifying.
What pleasure is in the power of the fortunate and the happy, by their
notice and patronage, to brighten the countenance and glad the heart
of such depressed youth! I am not so angry with mankind for their deaf
economy of the purse:--the goods of this world cannot be divided
without being lessened--but why be a niggard of that which bestows
bliss on a fellow-creature, yet takes nothing from our own means of
enjoyment? We wrap ourselves up in the cloak of our own better
fortune, and turn away our eyes, lest the wants and woes of our
brother-mortals should disturb the selfish apathy of our souls!
I am the worst hand in the world at asking a favour. That indirect
address, that insinuating implication, which, without any positive
request, plainly expresses your wish, is a talent not to be acquired
at a plough-tail. Tell me then, for you can, in what periphrasis of
language, in what circumvolution of phrase, I shall envelope, yet not
conceal this plain story. --"My dear Mr. Tait, my friend Mr. Duncan,
whom I have the pleasure of introducing to you, is a young lad of your
own profession, and a gentleman of much modesty, and great worth.
Perhaps it may be in your power to assist him in the, to him,
important consideration of getting a place; but at all events, your
notice and acquaintance will be a very great acquisition to him; and I
dare pledge myself that he will never disgrace your favour. "
You may possibly be surprised, Sir, at such a letter from me; 'tis, I
own, in the usual way of calculating these matters, more than our
acquaintance entitles me to; but my answer is short:--Of all the men
at your time of life, whom I knew in Edinburgh, you are the most
accessible on the side on which I have assailed you. You are very much
altered indeed from what you were when I knew you, if generosity point
the path you will not tread, or humanity call to you in vain.
As to myself, a being to whose interest I believe you are still a
well-wisher; I am here, breathing at all times, thinking sometimes,
and rhyming now and then. Every situation has its share of the cares
and pains of life, and my situation I am persuaded has a full ordinary
allowance of its pleasures and enjoyments.
My best compliments to your father and Miss Tait. If you have an
opportunity, please remember me in the solemn league and covenant of
friendship to Mrs. Lewis Hay. I am a wretch for not writing her; but I
am so hackneyed with self-accusation in that way, that my conscience
lies in my bosom with scarce the sensibility of an oyster in its
shell. Where is Lady M'Kenzie? wherever she is, God bless her! I
likewise beg leave to trouble you with compliments to Mr. Wm.
Hamilton; Mrs. Hamilton and family; and Mrs. Chalmers, when you are in
that country. Should you meet with Miss Nimmo, please remember me
kindly to her.
R. B.
* * * * *
CC.
TO ----.
[This letter contained the Kirk's Alarm, a satire written to help the
cause of Dr. M'Gill, who recanted his heresy rather than be removed
from his kirk. ]
_Ellisland, 1790. _
DEAR SIR,
Whether in the way of my trade I can be of any service to the Rev.
Doctor, is I fear very doubtful. Ajax's shield consisted, I think, of
seven bull-hides and a plate of brass, which altogether set Hector's
utmost force at defiance. Alas! I am not a Hector, and the worthy
Doctor's foes are as securely armed as Ajax was. Ignorance,
superstition, bigotry, stupidity, malevolence, self-conceit, envy--all
strongly bound in a massy frame of brazen impudence. Good God, Sir! to
such a shield, humour is the peck of a sparrow, and satire the pop-gun
of a school-boy. Creation-disgracing scelerats such as they, God only
can mend, and the devil only can punish. In the comprehending way of
Caligula, I wish they all had but one neck.
I feel impotent as a child
to the ardour of my wishes! O for a withering curse to blast the
germins of their wicked machinations! O for a poisonous tornado,
winged from the torrid zone of Tartarus, to sweep the spreading crop
of their villainous contrivances to the lowest hell!
R. B.
* * * * *
CCI.
TO MRS. DUNLOP.
[The poet wrote out several copies of Tam o' Shanter and sent them to
his friends, requesting their criticisms: he wrote few poems so
universally applauded. ]
_Ellisland, November, 1790. _
"As cold waters to a thirsty soul, so is good news from a far
country. "
Fate has long owed me a letter of good news from you, in return for
the many tidings of sorrow which I have received. In this instance I
most cordially obey the apostle--"Rejoice with them that do
rejoice"--for me, _to sing_ for joy, is no new thing; but _to preach_
for joy, as I have done in the commencement of this epistle, is a
pitch of extravagant rapture to which I never rose before.
I read your letter--I literally jumped for joy--How could such a
mercurial creature as a poet lumpishly keep his seat on the receipt of
the best news from his best friend. I seized my gilt-headed Wangee
rod, an instrument indispensably necessary in my left hand, in the
moment of inspiration and rapture; and stride, stride--quick and
quicker--out skipt I among the broomy banks of Nith to muse over my
joy by retail. To keep within the bounds of prose was impossible. Mrs.
Little's is a more elegant, but not a more sincere compliment to the
sweet little fellow, than I, extempore almost, poured out to him in
the following verses:--
Sweet flow'ret, pledge o' meikle love
And ward o' mony a prayer,
What heart o' stane wad thou na move,
Sae helpless, sweet, an' fair.
November hirples o'er the lea
Chill on thy lovely form;
But gane, alas! the shelt'ring tree
Should shield thee frae the storm.
I am much flattered by your approbation of my _Tam o' Shanter_, which
you express in your former letter; though, by the bye, you load me in
that said letter with accusations heavy and many; to all which I
plead, _not guilty_! Your book is, I hear, on the road to reach me. As
to printing of poetry, when you prepare it for the press, you have
only to spell it right, and place the capital letters properly: as to
the punctuation, the printers do that themselves.
I have a copy of _Tam o' Shanter_ ready to send you by the first
opportunity: it is too heavy to send by post.
I heard of Mr. Corbet lately. He, in consequence of your
recommendation, is most zealous to serve me. Please favour me soon
with an account of your good folks; if Mrs. H. is recovering, and the
young gentleman doing well.
R. B.
* * * * *
CCII.
TO LADY W. M. CONSTABLE.
[The present alluded to was a gold snuff-box, with a portrait of Queen
Mary on the lid. ]
_Ellisland, 11th January, 1791. _
MY LADY,
Nothing less than the unlucky accident of having lately broken my
right arm, could have prevented me, the moment I received your
ladyship's elegant present by Mrs. Miller, from returning you my
warmest and most grateful acknowledgments. I assure your ladyship, I
shall set it apart--the symbols of religion shall only be more sacred.
In the moment of poetic composition, the box shall be my inspiring
genius. When I would breathe the comprehensive wish of benevolence for
the happiness of others, I shall recollect your ladyship; when I would
interest my fancy in the distresses incident to humanity, I shall
remember the unfortunate Mary.
R. B.
* * * * *
CCIII.
TO WILLIAM DUNBAR, W. S.
[This letter was in answer to one from Dunbar, in which the witty
colonel of the Crochallan Fencibles supposed the poet had been
translated to Elysium to sing to the immortals, as his voice had not
been beard of late on earth. ]
_Ellisland, 17th January, 1791. _
I am not gone to Elysium, most noble colonel, but am still here in
this sublunary world, serving my God, by propagating his image, and
honouring my king by begetting him loyal subjects.
Many happy returns of the season await my friend. May the thorns of
care never beset his path! May peace be an inmate of his bosom, and
rapture a frequent visitor of his soul! May the blood-hounds of
misfortune never track his steps, nor the screech-owl of sorrow alarm
his dwelling! May enjoyment tell thy hours, and pleasure number thy
days, thou friend of the bard! "Blessed be he that blesseth thee, and
cursed be he that curseth thee! ! ! "
As a further proof that I am still in the land of existence, I send
you a poem, the latest I have composed. I have a particular reason for
wishing you only to show it to select friends, should you think it
worthy a friend's perusal; but if, at your first leisure hour, you
will favour me with your opinion of, and strictures on the
performance, it will be an additional obligation on, dear Sir, your
deeply indebted humble servant,
R. B.
* * * * *
CCIV.
TO MR. PETER HILL.
[The poet's eloquent apostrophe to poverty has no little feeling in
it: he beheld the money which his poems brought melt silently away,
and he looked to the future with more fear than hope. ]
_Ellisland, 17th January, 1791. _
Take these two guineas, and place them over against that d--mned
account of yours! which has gagged my mouth these five or six months!
I can as little write good things as apologies to the man I owe money
to. O the supreme curse of making three guineas do the business of
five! Not all the labours of Hercules; not all the Hebrews' three
centuries of Egyptian bondage, were such an insuperable business, such
an infernal task! ! Poverty! thou half-sister of death, thou
cousin-german of hell: where shall I find force of execration equal to
the amplitude of thy demerits? Oppressed by thee, the venerable
ancient, grown hoary in the practice of every virtue, laden with years
and wretchedness, implores a little--little aid to support his
existence, from a stony-hearted son of Mammon, whose sun of prosperity
never knew a cloud; and is by him denied and insulted. Oppressed by
thee, the man of sentiment, whose heart glows with independence, and
melts with sensibility, inly pines under the neglect, or writhes in
bitterness of soul, under the contumely of arrogant, unfeeling wealth.
Oppressed by thee, the son of genius, whose ill-starred ambition
plants him at the tables of the fashionable and polite, must see in
suffering silence, his remark neglected, and his person despised,
while shallow greatness in his idiot attempts at wit, shall meet with
countenance and applause. Nor is it only the family of worth that have
reason to complain of thee: the children of folly and vice, though in
common with thee the offspring of evil, smart equally under thy rod.
Owing to thee, the man of unfortunate disposition and neglected
education, is condemned as a fool for his dissipation, despised and
shunned as a needy wretch, when his follies as usual bring him to
want; and when his unprincipled necessities drive him to dishonest
practices, he is abhorred as a miscreant, and perishes by the justice
of his country. But far otherwise is the lot of the man of family and
fortune. _His_ early follies and extravagance, are spirit and fire;
_his_ consequent wants are the embarrassments of an honest fellow; and
when, to remedy the matter, he has gained a legal commission to
plunder distant provinces, or massacre peaceful nations, he returns,
perhaps, laden with the spoils of rapine and murder; lives wicked and
respected, and dies a scoundrel and a lord. --Nay, worst of all, alas
for helpless woman! the needy prostitute, who has shivered at the
corner of the street, waiting to earn the wages of casual
prostitution, is left neglected and insulted, ridden down by the
chariot wheels of the coroneted RIP, hurrying on to the
guilty assignation; she who without the same necessities to plead,
riots nightly in the same guilty trade.
Well! divines may say of it what they please; but execration is to the
mind what phlebotomy is to the body: the vital sluices of both are
wonderfully relieved by their respective evacuations.
R. B.
* * * * *
CCV.
TO MR. CUNNINGHAM.
[To Alexander Cunningham the poet generally communicated his favourite
compositions. ]
_Ellisland, 23d January, 1791. _
Many happy returns of the season to you, my dear friend! As many of
the good things of this life, as is consistent with the usual mixture
of good and evil in the cup of being!
I have just finished a poem (Tam o' Shanter) which you will receive
enclosed. It is my first essay in the way of tales.
I have these several months been hammering at an elegy on the amiable
and accomplished Miss Burnet. I have got, and can get, no farther than
the following fragment, on which please give me your strictures. In
all kinds of poetic composition, I set great store by your opinion;
but in sentimental verses, in the poetry of the heart, no Roman
Catholic ever set more value on the infallibility of the Holy Father
than I do on yours.
I mean the introductory couplets as text verses.
ELEGY
ON THE LATE MISS BURNET, OF MONBODDO.
Life ne'er exulted in so rich a prize
As Burnet lovely from her native skies;
Nor envious death so triumph'd in a blow,
As that which laid th' accomplish'd Burnet low.
Let me hear from you soon.
Adieu!
R. B.
* * * * *
CCVI.
TO A. F. TYTLER, ESQ.
["I have seldom in my life," says Lord Woodhouselee, "tasted a higher
enjoyment from any work of genius than I received from Tam o'
Shanter. "]
_Ellisland, February, 1791. _
SIR,
Nothing less than the unfortunate accident I have met with, could have
prevented my grateful acknowledgments for your letter. His own
favourite poem, and that an essay in the walk of the muses entirely
new to him, where consequently his hopes and fears were on the most
anxious alarm for his success in the attempt; to have that poem so
much applauded by one of the first judges, was the most delicious
vibration that ever thrilled along the heart-strings of a poor poet.
However, Providence, to keep up the proper proportion of evil with the
good, which it seems is necessary in this sublunary state, thought
proper to check my exultation by a very serious misfortune. A day or
two after I received your letter, my horse came down with me and broke
my right arm. As this is the first service my arm has done me since
its disaster, I find myself unable to do more than just in general
terms thank you for this additional instance of your patronage and
friendship. As to the faults you detected in the piece, they are truly
there: one of them, the hit at the lawyer and priest, I shall cut out;
as to the falling off in the catastrophe, for the reason you justly
adduce, it cannot easily be remedied. Your approbation, Sir, has given
me such additional spirits to persevere in this species of poetic
composition, that I am already revolving two or three stories in my
fancy. If I can bring these floating ideas to bear any kind of
embodied form, it will give me additional opportunity of assuring you
how much I have the honour to be, &c.
R. B.
* * * * *
CCVII.
TO MRS. DUNLOP.
[The elegy on the beautiful Miss Burnet, of Monboddo, was laboured
zealously by Burns, but it never reached the excellence of some of his
other compositions. ]
_Ellisland, 7th Feb. 1791. _
When I tell you, Madam, that by a fall, not from my horse, but with my
horse, I have been a cripple some time, and that this is the first day
my arm and hand have been able to serve me in writing; you will allow
that it is too good an apology for my seemingly ungrateful silence. I
am now getting better, and am able to rhyme a little, which implies
some tolerable ease, as I cannot think that the most poetic genius is
able to compose on the rack.
I do not remember if ever I mentioned to you my having an idea of
composing an elegy on the late Miss Burnet, of Monboddo. I had the
honour of being pretty well acquainted with her, and have seldom felt
so much at the loss of an acquaintance, as when I heard that so
amiable and accomplished a piece of God's work was no more. I have, as
yet, gone no farther than the following fragment, of which please let
me have your opinion. You know that elegy is a subject so much
exhausted, that any new idea on the business is not to be expected:
'tis well if we can place an old idea in a new light. How far I have
succeeded as to this last, you will judge from what follows. I have
proceeded no further.
Your kind letter, with your kind _remembrance_ of your godson, came
safe. This last, Madam, is scarcely what my pride can bear. As to the
little fellow, he is, partiality apart, the finest boy I have for a
long time seen. He is now seventeen months old, has the small-pox and
measles over, has cut several teeth, and never had a grain of doctor's
drugs in his bowels.
I am truly happy to hear that the "little floweret" is blooming so
fresh and fair, and that the "mother plant" is rather recovering her
drooping head. Soon and well may her "cruel wounds" be healed. I have
written thus far with a good deal of difficulty. When I get a little
abler you shall hear farther from,
Madam, yours,
R. B.
* * * * *
CCVIII.
TO THE REV. ARCH. ALISON.
[Alison was much gratified it is said, with this recognition of the
principles laid down in his ingenious and popular work. ]
_Ellisland, near Dumfries, 14th Feb. 1791. _
SIR,
You must by this time have set me down as one of the most ungrateful
of men. You did me the honour to present me with a book, which does
honour to science and the intellectual powers of man, and I have not
even so much as acknowledged the receipt of it. The fact is, you
yourself are to blame for it. Flattered as I was by your telling me
that you wished to have my opinion of the work, the old spiritual
enemy of mankind, who knows well that vanity is one of the sins that
most easily beset me, put it into my head to ponder over the
performance with the look-out of a critic, and to draw up forsooth a
deep learned digest of strictures on a composition, of which, in fact,
until I read the book, I did not even know the first principles. I
own, Sir, that at first glance, several of your propositions startled
me as paradoxical. That the martial clangour of a trumpet had
something in it vastly more grand, heroic, and sublime, than the
twingle twangle of a jew's-harp: that the delicate flexure of a
rose-twig, when the half-blown flower is heavy with the tears of the
dawn, was infinitely more beautiful and elegant than the upright stub
of a burdock; and that from something innate and independent of all
associations of ideas;--these I had set down as irrefragable, orthodox
truths, until perusing your book shook my faith. --In short, Sir,
except Euclid's Elements of Geometry, which I made a shift to unravel
by my father's fire-side, in the winter evening of the first season I
held the plough, I never read a book which gave me such a quantum of
information, and added so much to my stock of ideas, as your "Essays
on the Principles of Taste. " One thing, Sir, you must forgive my
mentioning as an uncommon merit in the work, I mean the language. To
clothe abstract philosophy in elegance of style, sounds something like
a contradiction in terms; but you have convinced me that they are
quite compatible.
I enclose you some poetic bagatelles of my late composition. The one
in print[198] is my first essay in the way of telling a tale.
I am, Sir, &c.
R. B.
FOOTNOTES:
[Footnote 198: Tam O' Shanter]
* * * * *
[Illustration: A NAVAL BATTLE. ]
CCIX.
TO DR. MOORE.
[Moore admired but moderately the beautiful ballad on Queen Mary, and
the Elegy on Captain Matthew Henderson: Tam o' Shanter he thought full
of poetical beauties. --He again regrets that he writes in the language
of Scotland. ]
_Ellisland, 20th February, 1791. _
I do not know, Sir, whether you are a subscriber to _Grose's
Antiquities of Scotland. _ If you are, the enclosed poem will not be
altogether new to you. Captain Grose did me the favour to send me a
dozen copies of the proof sheet, of which this is one. Should you have
read the piece before, still this will answer the principal end I have
in view: it will give me another opportunity of thanking you for all
your goodness to the rustic bard; and also of showing you, that the
abilities you have been pleased to commend and patronize are still
employed in the way you wish.
The _Elegy on Captain Henderson_, is a tribute to the memory of a man
I loved much. Poets have in this the same advantage as Roman
Catholics; they can be of service to their friends after they have
passed that bourne where all other kindness ceases to be of avail.
Whether, after all, either the one or the other be of any real service
to the dead, is, I fear, very problematical; but I am sure they are
highly gratifying to the living: and as a very orthodox text, I forget
where in scripture, says, "whatsoever is not of faith is sin;" so say
I, whatsoever is not detrimental to society, and is of positive
enjoyment, is of God, the giver of all good things, and ought to be
received and enjoyed by his creatures with thankful delight. As almost
all my religious tenets originate from my heart, I am wonderfully
pleased with the idea, that I can still keep up a tender intercourse
with the dearly beloved friend, or still more dearly beloved mistress,
who is gone to the world of spirits.
The ballad on Queen Mary was begun while I was busy with _Percy's
Reliques of English Poetry. _ By the way, how much is every honest
heart, which has a tincture of Caledonian prejudice, obliged to you
for your glorious story of Buchanan and Targe! 'Twas an unequivocal
proof of your loyal gallantry of soul, giving Targe the victory. I
should have been mortified to the ground if you had not.
I have just read over, once more of many times, your _Zeluco. _ I
marked with my pencil, as I went along, every passage that pleased me
particularly above the rest; and one or two, I think, which with
humble deference, I am disposed to think unequal to the merits of the
book. I have sometimes thought to transcribe these marked passages, or
at least so much of them as to point where they are, and send them to
you. Original strokes that strongly depict the human heart, is your
and Fielding's province beyond any other novelist I have ever perused.
Richardson indeed might perhaps be excepted; but unhappily, _dramatis
personae_ are beings of another world; and however they may captivate
the unexperienced, romantic fancy of a boy or a girl, they will ever,
in proportion as we have made human nature our study, dissatisfy our
riper years.
As to my private concerns, I am going on, a mighty tax-gatherer before
the Lord, and have lately had the interest to get myself ranked on the
list of excise as a supervisor. I am not yet employed as such, but in
a few years I shall fall into the file of supervisorship by seniority.
I have had an immense loss in the death of the Earl of Glencairn; the
patron from whom all my fame and fortune took its rise. Independent of
my grateful attachment to him, which was indeed so strong that it
pervaded my very soul, and was entwined with the thread of my
existence: so soon as the prince's friends had got in (and every dog
you know has his day), my getting forward in the excise would have
been an easier business than otherwise it will be. Though this was a
consummation devoutly to be wished, yet, thank Heaven, I can live and
rhyme as I am: and as to my boys, poor little fellows! if I cannot
place them on as high an elevation in life, as I could wish, I shall,
if I am favoured so much of the Disposer of events as to see that
period, fix them on as broad and independent a basis as possible.
Among the many wise adages which have been treasured up by our
Scottish ancestors, this is one of the best, _Better be the head o'
the commonalty, than the tail o' the gentry. _
But I am got on a subject, which however interesting to me, is of no
manner of consequence to you; so I shall give you a short poem on the
other page, and close this with assuring you how sincerely I have the
honour to be,
Yours, &c.
R. B.
friend, is this weak prejudice? I believe in my conscience such ideas as
"my country; her independence; her honour; the illustrious names that
mark the history of my native land;" &c. --I believe these, among your
_men of the world_, men who in fact guide for the most part and govern
our world, are looked on as so many modifications of wrongheadedness.
They know the use of bawling out such terms, to rouse or lead THE
RABBLE; but for their own private use, with almost all the _able
statesmen_ that ever existed, or now exist, when they talk of right and
wrong, they only mean proper and improper; and their measure of conduct
is, not what they OUGHT, but what they DARE. For the truth of this I
shall not ransack the history of nations, but appeal to one of the
ablest judges of men that ever lived--the celebrated Earl of
Chesterfield. In fact, a man who could thoroughly control his vices
whenever they interfered with his interests, and who could completely
put on the appearance of every virtue as often as it suited his
purposes, is, on the Stanhopean plan, the _perfect man_; a man to lead
nations. But are great abilities, complete without a flaw, and polished
without a blemish, the standard of human excellence? This is certainly
the staunch opinion of _men of the world_; but I call on honour, virtue,
and worth, to give the stygian doctrine a loud negative! However, this
must be allowed, that, if you abstract from man the idea of an existence
beyond the grave, _then_ the true measure of human conduct is, _proper_
and _improper_: virtue and vice, as dispositions of the heart, are, in
that case, of scarcely the same import and value to the world at large,
as harmony and discord in the modifications of sound; and a delicate
sense of honour, like a nice ear for music, though it may sometimes give
the possessor an ecstasy unknown to the coarser organs of the herd, yet,
considering the harsh gratings, and inharmonic jars, in this ill-tuned
state of being, it is odds but the individual would be as happy, and
certainly would be as much respected by the true judges of society as it
would then stand, without either a good ear or a good heart.
You must know I have just met with the Mirror and Lounger for the
first time, and I am quite in raptures with them; I should be glad to
have your opinion of some of the papers. The one I have just read,
Lounger, No. 61, has cost me more honest tears than anything I have
read of a long time. Mackenzie has been called the Addison of the
Scots, and in my opinion, Addison would not be hurt at the comparison.
If he has not Addison's exquisite humour, he as certainly outdoes him
in the tender and the pathetic. His Man of Feeling (but I am not
counsel learned in the laws of criticism) I estimate as the first
performance in its kind I ever saw. From what book, moral or even
pious, will the susceptible young mind receive impressions more
congenial to humanity and kindness, generosity and benevolence; in
short, more of all that ennobles the soul to herself, or endears her
to others--than from the simple affecting tale of poor Harley?
Still, with all my admiration of Mackenzie's writings, I do not know
if they are the fittest reading for a young man who is about to set
out, as the phrase is, to make his way into life. Do not you think,
Madam, that among the few favoured of heaven in the structure of their
minds (for such there certainly are) there may be a purity, a
tenderness, a dignity, an elegance of soul, which are of no use, nay,
in some degree, absolutely disqualifying for the truly important
business of making a man's way into life? If I am not much mistaken,
my gallant young friend, A * * * * * *, is very much under these
disqualifications; and for the young females of a family I could
mention, well may they excite parental solicitude, for I, a common
acquaintance, or as my vanity will have it, an humble friend, have
often trembled for a turn of mind which may render them eminently
happy--or peculiarly miserable!
I have been manufacturing some verses lately; but when I have got the
most hurried season of excise business over, I hope to have more
leisure to transcribe anything that may show how much I have the
honour to be, Madam,
Yours, &c.
R. B.
* * * * *
CXCI.
TO COLLECTOR MITCHELL.
[Collector Mitchell was a kind and considerate gentle man: to his
grandson, Mr. John Campbell, surgeon, in Aberdeen, I owe this
characteristic letter. ]
_Ellisland, 1790. _
SIR,
I shall not fail to wait on Captain Riddel to-night--I wish and pray
that the goddess of justice herself would appear to-morrow among our
hon. gentlemen, merely to give them a word in their ear that mercy to
the thief is injustice to the honest man. For my part I have galloped
over my ten parishes these four days, until this moment that I am just
alighted, or rather, that my poor jackass-skeleton of a horse has let
me down; for the miserable devil has been on his knees half a score of
times within the last twenty miles, telling me in his own way,
'Behold, am not I thy faithful jade of a horse, on which thou hast
ridden these many years! '
In short, Sir, I have broke my horse's wind, and almost broke my own
neck, besides some injuries in a part that shall be nameless, owing to
a hard-hearted stone for a saddle. I find that every offender has so
many great men to espouse his cause, that I shall not be surprised if
I am committed to the strong hold of the law to-morrow for insolence
to the dear friends of the gentlemen of the country.
I have the honour to be, Sir,
Your obliged and obedient humble
R. B.
* * * * *
CXCII.
TO DR. MOORE.
[The sonnets alluded to by Burns were those of Charlotte Smith: the
poet's copy is now before me, with a few marks of his pen on the
margins. ]
_Dumfries, Excise-Office, 14th July, 1790. _
SIR,
Coming into town this morning, to attend my duty in this office, it
being collection-day, I met with a gentleman who tells me he is on his
way to London; so I take the opportunity of writing to you, as
franking is at present under a temporary death. I shall have some
snatches of leisure through the day, amid our horrid business and
bustle, and I shall improve them as well as I can; but let my letter
be as stupid as * * * * * * * * *, as miscellaneous as a newspaper, as
short as a hungry grace-before-meat, or as long as a law-paper in the
Douglas cause; as ill-spelt as country John's billet-doux, or as
unsightly a scrawl as Betty Byre-Mucker's answer to it; I hope,
considering circumstances, you will forgive it; and as it will put you
to no expense of postage, I shall have the less reflection about it.
I am sadly ungrateful in not returning you my thanks for your most
valuable present, _Zeluco. _ In fact, you are in some degree blameable
for my neglect. You were pleased to express a wish for my opinion of
the work, which so flattered me, that nothing less would serve my
overweening fancy, than a formal criticism on the book. In fact, I
have gravely planned a comparative view of you, Fielding, Richardson,
and Smollett, in your different qualities and merits as novel-writers.
This, I own, betrays my ridiculous vanity, and I may probably never
bring the business to bear; and I am fond of the spirit young Elihu
shows in the book of Job--"And I said, I will also declare my
opinion," I have quite disfigured my copy of the book with my
annotations. I never take it up without at the same time taking my
pencil, and marking with asterisms, parentheses, &c. , wherever I meet
with an original thought, a nervous remark on life and manners, a
remarkable well-turned period, or a character sketched with uncommon
precision.
Though I should hardly think of fairly writing out my "Comparative
View," I shall certainly trouble you with my remarks, such as they
are.
I have just received from my gentleman that horrid summons in the book
of Revelations--"That time shall be no more! "
The little collection of sonnets have some charming poetry in them. If
_indeed_ I am indebted to the fair author for the book, and not, as I
rather suspect, to a celebrated author of the other sex, I should
certainly have written to the lady, with my grateful acknowledgments,
and my own ideas of the comparative excellence of her pieces. I would
do this last, not from any vanity of thinking that my remarks could be
of much consequence to Mrs. Smith, but merely from my own feelings as
an author, doing as I would be done by.
R. B.
* * * * *
CXCIII.
TO MR. MURDOCH,
TEACHER OF FRENCH, LONDON.
[The account of himself, promised to Murdoch by Burns, was never
written. ]
_Ellisland, July 16, 1790. _
MY DEAR SIR,
I received a letter from you a long time ago, but unfortunately, as
it was in the time of my peregrinations and journeyings through
Scotland, I mislaid or lost it, and by consequence your direction
along with it. Luckily my good star brought me acquainted with Mr.
Kennedy, who, I understand, is an acquaintance of yours: and by his
means and mediation I hope to replace that link which my unfortunate
negligence had so unluckily broke in the chain of our correspondence.
I was the more vexed at the vile accident, as my brother William, a
journeyman saddler, has been for some time in London; and wished above
all things for your direction, that he might have paid his respects to
his father's friend.
His last address he sent me was, "Wm. Burns, at Mr. Barber's, saddler,
No. 181, Strand. " I writ him by Mr. Kennedy, but neglected to ask him
for your address; so, if you find a spare half-minute, please let my
brother know by a card where and when he will find you, and the poor
fellow will joyfully wait on you, as one of the few surviving friends
of the man whose name, and Christian name too, he has the honour to
bear.
The next letter I write you shall be a long one. I have much to tell
you of "hair-breadth 'scapes in th' imminent deadly breach," with all
the eventful history of a life, the early years of which owed so much
to your kind tutorage; but this at an hour of leisure. My kindest
compliments to Mrs. Murdoch and family.
I am ever, my dear Sir,
Your obliged friend,
R. B.
* * * * *
CXCIV.
TO MR. M'MURDO.
[This hasty note was accompanied by the splendid elegy on Matthew
Henderson, and no one could better feel than M'Murdo, to whom it is
addressed, the difference between the music of verse and the clangour
of politics. ]
_Ellisland, 2d August, 1790. _
SIR,
Now that you are over with the sirens of Flattery, the harpies of
Corruption, and the furies of Ambition, these infernal deities, that
on all sides, and in all parties, preside over the villanous business
of politics, permit a rustic muse of your acquaintance to do her best
to soothe you with a song. --
You knew Henderson--I have not flattered his memory.
I have the honour to be, Sir,
Your obliged humble servant,
R. B.
* * * * *
CXCV.
TO MRS. DUNLOP.
[Inquiries have been made in vain after the name of Burns's ci-devant
friend, who had so deeply wounded his feelings. ]
_8th August, 1790. _
DEAR MADAM,
After a long day's toil, plague, and care, I sit down to write to you.
Ask me not why I have delayed it so long! It was owing to hurry,
indolence, and fifty other things; in short to anything--but
forgetfulness of _la plus aimable de son sexe. _ By the bye, you are
indebted your best courtesy to me for this last compliment; as I pay
it from my sincere conviction of its truth--a quality rather rare in
compliments of these grinning, bowing, scraping times.
Well, I hope writing to _you_ will ease a little my troubled soul.
Sorely has it been bruised to-day! A ci-devant friend of mine, and an
intimate acquaintance of yours, has given my feelings a wound that I
perceive will gangrene dangerously ere it cure. He has wounded my
pride!
R. B.
* * * * *
CXCVI.
TO MR. CUNNINGHAM.
["The strain of invective," says the judicious Currie, of this letter,
"goes on some time longer in the style in which our bard was too apt
to indulge, and of which the reader has already seen so much. "]
_Ellisland, 8th August, 1790. _
Forgive me, my once dear, and ever dear friend, my seeming negligence.
You cannot sit down and fancy the busy life I lead.
I laid down my goose-feather to beat my brains for an apt simile, and
had some thoughts of a country grannum at a family christening; a
bride on the market-day before her marriage; or a tavern-keeper at an
election-dinner; but the resemblance that hits my fancy best is, that
blackguard miscreant, Satan, who roams about like a roaring lion,
seeking, _searching_ whom he may devour. However, tossed about as I
am, if I choose (and who would not choose) to bind down with the
crampets of attention the brazen foundation of integrity, I may rear
up the superstructure of Independence, and from its daring turrets bid
defiance to the storms of fate. And is not this a "consummation
devoutly to be wished? "
"Thy spirit, Independence, let me share;
Lord of the lion-heart, and eagle-eye!
Thy steps I follow with my bosom bare,
Nor heed the storm that howls along the sky! "
Are not these noble verses? They are the introduction of Smollett's
Ode to Independence: if you have not seen the poem, I will send it to
you. --How wretched is the man that hangs on by the favours of the
great! To shrink from every dignity of man, at the approach of a
lordly piece of self-consequence, who, amid all his tinsel glitter,
and stately hauteur, is but a creature formed as thou art--and perhaps
not so well formed as thou art--came into the world a puling infant as
thou didst, and must go out of it, as all men must, a naked corse.
R. B.
* * * * *
CXCVII.
TO DR. ANDERSON.
[The gentleman to whom this imperfect note is addressed was Dr. James
Anderson, a well-known agricultural and miscellaneous writer, and the
editor of a weekly miscellany called the Bee. ]
SIR,
I am much indebted to my worthy friend, Dr. Blacklock, for introducing
me to a gentleman of Dr. Anderson's celebrity; but when you do me the
honour to ask my assistance in your proposed publication, alas, Sir!
you might as well think to cheapen a little honesty at the sign of an
advocate's wig, or humility under the Geneva band. I am a miserable
hurried devil, worn to the marrow in the friction of holding the noses
of the poor publicans to the grindstone of the excise! and, like
Milton's Satan, for private reasons, am forced
"To do what yet though damn'd I would abhor. "
--and, except a couplet or two of honest execration * * * *
R. B.
* * * * *
CXCVIII.
TO WILLIAM TYTLER, ESQ. ,
OF WOODHOUSELEE.
[William Tytler was the "revered defender of the beauteous Stuart"--a
man of genius and a gentleman. ]
_Lawn Market, August, 1790. _
SIR,
Enclosed I have sent you a sample of the old pieces that are still to
be found among our peasantry in the west. I had once a great many of
these fragments, and some of these here, entire; but as I had no idea
then that anybody cared for them, I have forgotten them. I invariably
hold it sacrilege to add anything of my own to help out with the
shattered wrecks of these venerable old compositions; but they have
many various readings. If you have not seen these before, I know they
will flatter your true old-style Caledonian feelings; at any rate I am
truly happy to have an opportunity of assuring you how sincerely I am,
revered Sir,
Your gratefully indebted humble servant,
R. B.
* * * * *
CXCIX.
TO CRAUFORD TAIT, ESQ. ,
EDINBURGH.
[Margaret Chalmers had now, it appears by this letter, become Mrs.
Lewis Hay: her friend, Charlotte Hamilton, had been for some time Mrs.
Adair, of Scarborough: Miss Nimmo was the lady who introduced Burns to
the far-famed Clarinda. ]
_Ellisland_, 15th _October, 1790. _
DEAR SIR,
Allow me to introduce to your acquaintance the bearer, Mr. Wm. Duncan,
a friend of mine, whom I have long known and long loved. His father,
whose only son he is, has a decent little property in Ayrshire, and
has bred the young man to the law, in which department he comes up an
adventurer to your good town. I shall give you my friend's character
in two words: as to his head, he has talents enough, and more than
enough for common life; as to his heart, when nature had kneaded the
kindly clay that composes it, she said, "I can no more. "
You, my good Sir, were born under kinder stars; but your fraternal
sympathy, I well know can enter into the feelings of the young man,
who goes into life with the laudable ambition to _do_ something, and
to _be_ something among his fellow-creatures; but whom the
consciousness of friendless obscurity presses to the earth, and wounds
to the soul!
Even the fairest of his virtues are against him. That independent
spirit, and that ingenuous modesty, qualities inseparable from a noble
mind, are, with the million, circumstances not a little disqualifying.
What pleasure is in the power of the fortunate and the happy, by their
notice and patronage, to brighten the countenance and glad the heart
of such depressed youth! I am not so angry with mankind for their deaf
economy of the purse:--the goods of this world cannot be divided
without being lessened--but why be a niggard of that which bestows
bliss on a fellow-creature, yet takes nothing from our own means of
enjoyment? We wrap ourselves up in the cloak of our own better
fortune, and turn away our eyes, lest the wants and woes of our
brother-mortals should disturb the selfish apathy of our souls!
I am the worst hand in the world at asking a favour. That indirect
address, that insinuating implication, which, without any positive
request, plainly expresses your wish, is a talent not to be acquired
at a plough-tail. Tell me then, for you can, in what periphrasis of
language, in what circumvolution of phrase, I shall envelope, yet not
conceal this plain story. --"My dear Mr. Tait, my friend Mr. Duncan,
whom I have the pleasure of introducing to you, is a young lad of your
own profession, and a gentleman of much modesty, and great worth.
Perhaps it may be in your power to assist him in the, to him,
important consideration of getting a place; but at all events, your
notice and acquaintance will be a very great acquisition to him; and I
dare pledge myself that he will never disgrace your favour. "
You may possibly be surprised, Sir, at such a letter from me; 'tis, I
own, in the usual way of calculating these matters, more than our
acquaintance entitles me to; but my answer is short:--Of all the men
at your time of life, whom I knew in Edinburgh, you are the most
accessible on the side on which I have assailed you. You are very much
altered indeed from what you were when I knew you, if generosity point
the path you will not tread, or humanity call to you in vain.
As to myself, a being to whose interest I believe you are still a
well-wisher; I am here, breathing at all times, thinking sometimes,
and rhyming now and then. Every situation has its share of the cares
and pains of life, and my situation I am persuaded has a full ordinary
allowance of its pleasures and enjoyments.
My best compliments to your father and Miss Tait. If you have an
opportunity, please remember me in the solemn league and covenant of
friendship to Mrs. Lewis Hay. I am a wretch for not writing her; but I
am so hackneyed with self-accusation in that way, that my conscience
lies in my bosom with scarce the sensibility of an oyster in its
shell. Where is Lady M'Kenzie? wherever she is, God bless her! I
likewise beg leave to trouble you with compliments to Mr. Wm.
Hamilton; Mrs. Hamilton and family; and Mrs. Chalmers, when you are in
that country. Should you meet with Miss Nimmo, please remember me
kindly to her.
R. B.
* * * * *
CC.
TO ----.
[This letter contained the Kirk's Alarm, a satire written to help the
cause of Dr. M'Gill, who recanted his heresy rather than be removed
from his kirk. ]
_Ellisland, 1790. _
DEAR SIR,
Whether in the way of my trade I can be of any service to the Rev.
Doctor, is I fear very doubtful. Ajax's shield consisted, I think, of
seven bull-hides and a plate of brass, which altogether set Hector's
utmost force at defiance. Alas! I am not a Hector, and the worthy
Doctor's foes are as securely armed as Ajax was. Ignorance,
superstition, bigotry, stupidity, malevolence, self-conceit, envy--all
strongly bound in a massy frame of brazen impudence. Good God, Sir! to
such a shield, humour is the peck of a sparrow, and satire the pop-gun
of a school-boy. Creation-disgracing scelerats such as they, God only
can mend, and the devil only can punish. In the comprehending way of
Caligula, I wish they all had but one neck.
I feel impotent as a child
to the ardour of my wishes! O for a withering curse to blast the
germins of their wicked machinations! O for a poisonous tornado,
winged from the torrid zone of Tartarus, to sweep the spreading crop
of their villainous contrivances to the lowest hell!
R. B.
* * * * *
CCI.
TO MRS. DUNLOP.
[The poet wrote out several copies of Tam o' Shanter and sent them to
his friends, requesting their criticisms: he wrote few poems so
universally applauded. ]
_Ellisland, November, 1790. _
"As cold waters to a thirsty soul, so is good news from a far
country. "
Fate has long owed me a letter of good news from you, in return for
the many tidings of sorrow which I have received. In this instance I
most cordially obey the apostle--"Rejoice with them that do
rejoice"--for me, _to sing_ for joy, is no new thing; but _to preach_
for joy, as I have done in the commencement of this epistle, is a
pitch of extravagant rapture to which I never rose before.
I read your letter--I literally jumped for joy--How could such a
mercurial creature as a poet lumpishly keep his seat on the receipt of
the best news from his best friend. I seized my gilt-headed Wangee
rod, an instrument indispensably necessary in my left hand, in the
moment of inspiration and rapture; and stride, stride--quick and
quicker--out skipt I among the broomy banks of Nith to muse over my
joy by retail. To keep within the bounds of prose was impossible. Mrs.
Little's is a more elegant, but not a more sincere compliment to the
sweet little fellow, than I, extempore almost, poured out to him in
the following verses:--
Sweet flow'ret, pledge o' meikle love
And ward o' mony a prayer,
What heart o' stane wad thou na move,
Sae helpless, sweet, an' fair.
November hirples o'er the lea
Chill on thy lovely form;
But gane, alas! the shelt'ring tree
Should shield thee frae the storm.
I am much flattered by your approbation of my _Tam o' Shanter_, which
you express in your former letter; though, by the bye, you load me in
that said letter with accusations heavy and many; to all which I
plead, _not guilty_! Your book is, I hear, on the road to reach me. As
to printing of poetry, when you prepare it for the press, you have
only to spell it right, and place the capital letters properly: as to
the punctuation, the printers do that themselves.
I have a copy of _Tam o' Shanter_ ready to send you by the first
opportunity: it is too heavy to send by post.
I heard of Mr. Corbet lately. He, in consequence of your
recommendation, is most zealous to serve me. Please favour me soon
with an account of your good folks; if Mrs. H. is recovering, and the
young gentleman doing well.
R. B.
* * * * *
CCII.
TO LADY W. M. CONSTABLE.
[The present alluded to was a gold snuff-box, with a portrait of Queen
Mary on the lid. ]
_Ellisland, 11th January, 1791. _
MY LADY,
Nothing less than the unlucky accident of having lately broken my
right arm, could have prevented me, the moment I received your
ladyship's elegant present by Mrs. Miller, from returning you my
warmest and most grateful acknowledgments. I assure your ladyship, I
shall set it apart--the symbols of religion shall only be more sacred.
In the moment of poetic composition, the box shall be my inspiring
genius. When I would breathe the comprehensive wish of benevolence for
the happiness of others, I shall recollect your ladyship; when I would
interest my fancy in the distresses incident to humanity, I shall
remember the unfortunate Mary.
R. B.
* * * * *
CCIII.
TO WILLIAM DUNBAR, W. S.
[This letter was in answer to one from Dunbar, in which the witty
colonel of the Crochallan Fencibles supposed the poet had been
translated to Elysium to sing to the immortals, as his voice had not
been beard of late on earth. ]
_Ellisland, 17th January, 1791. _
I am not gone to Elysium, most noble colonel, but am still here in
this sublunary world, serving my God, by propagating his image, and
honouring my king by begetting him loyal subjects.
Many happy returns of the season await my friend. May the thorns of
care never beset his path! May peace be an inmate of his bosom, and
rapture a frequent visitor of his soul! May the blood-hounds of
misfortune never track his steps, nor the screech-owl of sorrow alarm
his dwelling! May enjoyment tell thy hours, and pleasure number thy
days, thou friend of the bard! "Blessed be he that blesseth thee, and
cursed be he that curseth thee! ! ! "
As a further proof that I am still in the land of existence, I send
you a poem, the latest I have composed. I have a particular reason for
wishing you only to show it to select friends, should you think it
worthy a friend's perusal; but if, at your first leisure hour, you
will favour me with your opinion of, and strictures on the
performance, it will be an additional obligation on, dear Sir, your
deeply indebted humble servant,
R. B.
* * * * *
CCIV.
TO MR. PETER HILL.
[The poet's eloquent apostrophe to poverty has no little feeling in
it: he beheld the money which his poems brought melt silently away,
and he looked to the future with more fear than hope. ]
_Ellisland, 17th January, 1791. _
Take these two guineas, and place them over against that d--mned
account of yours! which has gagged my mouth these five or six months!
I can as little write good things as apologies to the man I owe money
to. O the supreme curse of making three guineas do the business of
five! Not all the labours of Hercules; not all the Hebrews' three
centuries of Egyptian bondage, were such an insuperable business, such
an infernal task! ! Poverty! thou half-sister of death, thou
cousin-german of hell: where shall I find force of execration equal to
the amplitude of thy demerits? Oppressed by thee, the venerable
ancient, grown hoary in the practice of every virtue, laden with years
and wretchedness, implores a little--little aid to support his
existence, from a stony-hearted son of Mammon, whose sun of prosperity
never knew a cloud; and is by him denied and insulted. Oppressed by
thee, the man of sentiment, whose heart glows with independence, and
melts with sensibility, inly pines under the neglect, or writhes in
bitterness of soul, under the contumely of arrogant, unfeeling wealth.
Oppressed by thee, the son of genius, whose ill-starred ambition
plants him at the tables of the fashionable and polite, must see in
suffering silence, his remark neglected, and his person despised,
while shallow greatness in his idiot attempts at wit, shall meet with
countenance and applause. Nor is it only the family of worth that have
reason to complain of thee: the children of folly and vice, though in
common with thee the offspring of evil, smart equally under thy rod.
Owing to thee, the man of unfortunate disposition and neglected
education, is condemned as a fool for his dissipation, despised and
shunned as a needy wretch, when his follies as usual bring him to
want; and when his unprincipled necessities drive him to dishonest
practices, he is abhorred as a miscreant, and perishes by the justice
of his country. But far otherwise is the lot of the man of family and
fortune. _His_ early follies and extravagance, are spirit and fire;
_his_ consequent wants are the embarrassments of an honest fellow; and
when, to remedy the matter, he has gained a legal commission to
plunder distant provinces, or massacre peaceful nations, he returns,
perhaps, laden with the spoils of rapine and murder; lives wicked and
respected, and dies a scoundrel and a lord. --Nay, worst of all, alas
for helpless woman! the needy prostitute, who has shivered at the
corner of the street, waiting to earn the wages of casual
prostitution, is left neglected and insulted, ridden down by the
chariot wheels of the coroneted RIP, hurrying on to the
guilty assignation; she who without the same necessities to plead,
riots nightly in the same guilty trade.
Well! divines may say of it what they please; but execration is to the
mind what phlebotomy is to the body: the vital sluices of both are
wonderfully relieved by their respective evacuations.
R. B.
* * * * *
CCV.
TO MR. CUNNINGHAM.
[To Alexander Cunningham the poet generally communicated his favourite
compositions. ]
_Ellisland, 23d January, 1791. _
Many happy returns of the season to you, my dear friend! As many of
the good things of this life, as is consistent with the usual mixture
of good and evil in the cup of being!
I have just finished a poem (Tam o' Shanter) which you will receive
enclosed. It is my first essay in the way of tales.
I have these several months been hammering at an elegy on the amiable
and accomplished Miss Burnet. I have got, and can get, no farther than
the following fragment, on which please give me your strictures. In
all kinds of poetic composition, I set great store by your opinion;
but in sentimental verses, in the poetry of the heart, no Roman
Catholic ever set more value on the infallibility of the Holy Father
than I do on yours.
I mean the introductory couplets as text verses.
ELEGY
ON THE LATE MISS BURNET, OF MONBODDO.
Life ne'er exulted in so rich a prize
As Burnet lovely from her native skies;
Nor envious death so triumph'd in a blow,
As that which laid th' accomplish'd Burnet low.
Let me hear from you soon.
Adieu!
R. B.
* * * * *
CCVI.
TO A. F. TYTLER, ESQ.
["I have seldom in my life," says Lord Woodhouselee, "tasted a higher
enjoyment from any work of genius than I received from Tam o'
Shanter. "]
_Ellisland, February, 1791. _
SIR,
Nothing less than the unfortunate accident I have met with, could have
prevented my grateful acknowledgments for your letter. His own
favourite poem, and that an essay in the walk of the muses entirely
new to him, where consequently his hopes and fears were on the most
anxious alarm for his success in the attempt; to have that poem so
much applauded by one of the first judges, was the most delicious
vibration that ever thrilled along the heart-strings of a poor poet.
However, Providence, to keep up the proper proportion of evil with the
good, which it seems is necessary in this sublunary state, thought
proper to check my exultation by a very serious misfortune. A day or
two after I received your letter, my horse came down with me and broke
my right arm. As this is the first service my arm has done me since
its disaster, I find myself unable to do more than just in general
terms thank you for this additional instance of your patronage and
friendship. As to the faults you detected in the piece, they are truly
there: one of them, the hit at the lawyer and priest, I shall cut out;
as to the falling off in the catastrophe, for the reason you justly
adduce, it cannot easily be remedied. Your approbation, Sir, has given
me such additional spirits to persevere in this species of poetic
composition, that I am already revolving two or three stories in my
fancy. If I can bring these floating ideas to bear any kind of
embodied form, it will give me additional opportunity of assuring you
how much I have the honour to be, &c.
R. B.
* * * * *
CCVII.
TO MRS. DUNLOP.
[The elegy on the beautiful Miss Burnet, of Monboddo, was laboured
zealously by Burns, but it never reached the excellence of some of his
other compositions. ]
_Ellisland, 7th Feb. 1791. _
When I tell you, Madam, that by a fall, not from my horse, but with my
horse, I have been a cripple some time, and that this is the first day
my arm and hand have been able to serve me in writing; you will allow
that it is too good an apology for my seemingly ungrateful silence. I
am now getting better, and am able to rhyme a little, which implies
some tolerable ease, as I cannot think that the most poetic genius is
able to compose on the rack.
I do not remember if ever I mentioned to you my having an idea of
composing an elegy on the late Miss Burnet, of Monboddo. I had the
honour of being pretty well acquainted with her, and have seldom felt
so much at the loss of an acquaintance, as when I heard that so
amiable and accomplished a piece of God's work was no more. I have, as
yet, gone no farther than the following fragment, of which please let
me have your opinion. You know that elegy is a subject so much
exhausted, that any new idea on the business is not to be expected:
'tis well if we can place an old idea in a new light. How far I have
succeeded as to this last, you will judge from what follows. I have
proceeded no further.
Your kind letter, with your kind _remembrance_ of your godson, came
safe. This last, Madam, is scarcely what my pride can bear. As to the
little fellow, he is, partiality apart, the finest boy I have for a
long time seen. He is now seventeen months old, has the small-pox and
measles over, has cut several teeth, and never had a grain of doctor's
drugs in his bowels.
I am truly happy to hear that the "little floweret" is blooming so
fresh and fair, and that the "mother plant" is rather recovering her
drooping head. Soon and well may her "cruel wounds" be healed. I have
written thus far with a good deal of difficulty. When I get a little
abler you shall hear farther from,
Madam, yours,
R. B.
* * * * *
CCVIII.
TO THE REV. ARCH. ALISON.
[Alison was much gratified it is said, with this recognition of the
principles laid down in his ingenious and popular work. ]
_Ellisland, near Dumfries, 14th Feb. 1791. _
SIR,
You must by this time have set me down as one of the most ungrateful
of men. You did me the honour to present me with a book, which does
honour to science and the intellectual powers of man, and I have not
even so much as acknowledged the receipt of it. The fact is, you
yourself are to blame for it. Flattered as I was by your telling me
that you wished to have my opinion of the work, the old spiritual
enemy of mankind, who knows well that vanity is one of the sins that
most easily beset me, put it into my head to ponder over the
performance with the look-out of a critic, and to draw up forsooth a
deep learned digest of strictures on a composition, of which, in fact,
until I read the book, I did not even know the first principles. I
own, Sir, that at first glance, several of your propositions startled
me as paradoxical. That the martial clangour of a trumpet had
something in it vastly more grand, heroic, and sublime, than the
twingle twangle of a jew's-harp: that the delicate flexure of a
rose-twig, when the half-blown flower is heavy with the tears of the
dawn, was infinitely more beautiful and elegant than the upright stub
of a burdock; and that from something innate and independent of all
associations of ideas;--these I had set down as irrefragable, orthodox
truths, until perusing your book shook my faith. --In short, Sir,
except Euclid's Elements of Geometry, which I made a shift to unravel
by my father's fire-side, in the winter evening of the first season I
held the plough, I never read a book which gave me such a quantum of
information, and added so much to my stock of ideas, as your "Essays
on the Principles of Taste. " One thing, Sir, you must forgive my
mentioning as an uncommon merit in the work, I mean the language. To
clothe abstract philosophy in elegance of style, sounds something like
a contradiction in terms; but you have convinced me that they are
quite compatible.
I enclose you some poetic bagatelles of my late composition. The one
in print[198] is my first essay in the way of telling a tale.
I am, Sir, &c.
R. B.
FOOTNOTES:
[Footnote 198: Tam O' Shanter]
* * * * *
[Illustration: A NAVAL BATTLE. ]
CCIX.
TO DR. MOORE.
[Moore admired but moderately the beautiful ballad on Queen Mary, and
the Elegy on Captain Matthew Henderson: Tam o' Shanter he thought full
of poetical beauties. --He again regrets that he writes in the language
of Scotland. ]
_Ellisland, 20th February, 1791. _
I do not know, Sir, whether you are a subscriber to _Grose's
Antiquities of Scotland. _ If you are, the enclosed poem will not be
altogether new to you. Captain Grose did me the favour to send me a
dozen copies of the proof sheet, of which this is one. Should you have
read the piece before, still this will answer the principal end I have
in view: it will give me another opportunity of thanking you for all
your goodness to the rustic bard; and also of showing you, that the
abilities you have been pleased to commend and patronize are still
employed in the way you wish.
The _Elegy on Captain Henderson_, is a tribute to the memory of a man
I loved much. Poets have in this the same advantage as Roman
Catholics; they can be of service to their friends after they have
passed that bourne where all other kindness ceases to be of avail.
Whether, after all, either the one or the other be of any real service
to the dead, is, I fear, very problematical; but I am sure they are
highly gratifying to the living: and as a very orthodox text, I forget
where in scripture, says, "whatsoever is not of faith is sin;" so say
I, whatsoever is not detrimental to society, and is of positive
enjoyment, is of God, the giver of all good things, and ought to be
received and enjoyed by his creatures with thankful delight. As almost
all my religious tenets originate from my heart, I am wonderfully
pleased with the idea, that I can still keep up a tender intercourse
with the dearly beloved friend, or still more dearly beloved mistress,
who is gone to the world of spirits.
The ballad on Queen Mary was begun while I was busy with _Percy's
Reliques of English Poetry. _ By the way, how much is every honest
heart, which has a tincture of Caledonian prejudice, obliged to you
for your glorious story of Buchanan and Targe! 'Twas an unequivocal
proof of your loyal gallantry of soul, giving Targe the victory. I
should have been mortified to the ground if you had not.
I have just read over, once more of many times, your _Zeluco. _ I
marked with my pencil, as I went along, every passage that pleased me
particularly above the rest; and one or two, I think, which with
humble deference, I am disposed to think unequal to the merits of the
book. I have sometimes thought to transcribe these marked passages, or
at least so much of them as to point where they are, and send them to
you. Original strokes that strongly depict the human heart, is your
and Fielding's province beyond any other novelist I have ever perused.
Richardson indeed might perhaps be excepted; but unhappily, _dramatis
personae_ are beings of another world; and however they may captivate
the unexperienced, romantic fancy of a boy or a girl, they will ever,
in proportion as we have made human nature our study, dissatisfy our
riper years.
As to my private concerns, I am going on, a mighty tax-gatherer before
the Lord, and have lately had the interest to get myself ranked on the
list of excise as a supervisor. I am not yet employed as such, but in
a few years I shall fall into the file of supervisorship by seniority.
I have had an immense loss in the death of the Earl of Glencairn; the
patron from whom all my fame and fortune took its rise. Independent of
my grateful attachment to him, which was indeed so strong that it
pervaded my very soul, and was entwined with the thread of my
existence: so soon as the prince's friends had got in (and every dog
you know has his day), my getting forward in the excise would have
been an easier business than otherwise it will be. Though this was a
consummation devoutly to be wished, yet, thank Heaven, I can live and
rhyme as I am: and as to my boys, poor little fellows! if I cannot
place them on as high an elevation in life, as I could wish, I shall,
if I am favoured so much of the Disposer of events as to see that
period, fix them on as broad and independent a basis as possible.
Among the many wise adages which have been treasured up by our
Scottish ancestors, this is one of the best, _Better be the head o'
the commonalty, than the tail o' the gentry. _
But I am got on a subject, which however interesting to me, is of no
manner of consequence to you; so I shall give you a short poem on the
other page, and close this with assuring you how sincerely I have the
honour to be,
Yours, &c.
R. B.
