--This assertion, however the hasty
conclusions of superficial observation may doubt of it, or the raw
inexperience of youth may deny it, those who make the fatal experiment
we have done, will feel.
conclusions of superficial observation may doubt of it, or the raw
inexperience of youth may deny it, those who make the fatal experiment
we have done, will feel.
Robert Burns
_
[Ill health, poverty, a sense of dependence, with the much he had
deserved of his country, and the little he had obtained, were all at
this time pressing on the mind of Burns, and inducing him to forget
what was due to himself as well as to the courtesies of life. ]
MADAM,
I dare say that this is the first epistle you ever received from this
nether world. I write you from the regions of Hell, amid the horrors
of the damned. The time and the manner of my leaving your earth I do
not exactly know, as I took my departure in the heat of a fever of
intoxication contracted at your too hospitable mansion; but, on my
arrival here, I was fairly tried, and sentenced to endure the
purgatorial tortures of this infernal confine for the space of
ninety-nine years, eleven months, and twenty-nine days, and all on
account of the impropriety of my conduct yesternight under your roof.
Here am I, laid on a bed of pitiless furze, with my aching head
reclined on a pillow of ever-piercing thorn, while an infernal
tormentor, wrinkled, and old, and cruel, his name I think is
_Recollection_, with a whip of scorpions, forbids peace or rest to
approach me, and keeps anguish eternally awake. Still, Madam, if I
could in any measure be reinstated in the good opinion of the fair
circle whom my conduct last night so much injured, I think it would
be an alleviation to my torments. For this reason I trouble you with
this letter. To the men of the company I will make no apology. --Your
husband, who insisted on my drinking more than I chose, has no right
to blame me; and the other gentlemen were partakers of my guilt. But
to you, Madam, I have much to apologize. Your good opinion I valued as
one of the greatest acquisitions I had made on earth, and I was truly
a beast to forfeit it. There was a Miss I----, too, a woman of fine
sense, gentle and unassuming manners--do make on my part, a miserable
d--mned wretch's best apology to her. A Mrs. G----, a charming woman,
did me the honour to be prejudiced in my favour; this makes me hope
that I have not outraged her beyond all forgiveness. --To all the other
ladies please present my humblest contrition for my conduct, and my
petition for their gracious pardon. O all ye powers of decency and
decorum! whisper to them that my errors, though great, were
involuntary--that an intoxicated man is the vilest of beasts--that it
was not in my nature to be brutal to any one--that to be rude to a
woman, when in my senses, was impossible with me--but--
* * * * *
Regret! Remorse! Shame! ye three hell-hounds that ever dog my steps
and bay at my heels, spare me! spare me!
Forgive the offences, and pity the perdition of, Madam, your humble
slave.
R. B.
* * * * *
CCCXIX.
TO MRS. RIDDEL.
[Mrs. Riddel, it is said, possessed many more of the poet's letters
than are printed--she sometimes read them to friends who could feel
their wit, and, like herself, make allowance for their freedom. ]
_Dumfries, 1795. _
Mr. Burns's compliments to Mrs. Riddel--is much obliged to her for her
polite attention in sending him the book. Owing to Mr. B. 's being at
present acting as supervisor of excise, a department that occupies his
every hour of the day, he has not that time to spare which is
necessary for any belle-lettre pursuit; but, as he will, in a week or
two, again return to his wonted leisure, he will then pay that
attention to Mrs. R. 's beautiful song, "To thee, loved Nith"--which it
so well deserves. When "Anacharsis' Travels" come to hand, which Mrs.
Riddel mentioned as her gift to the public library, Mr. B. will thank
her for a reading of it previous to her sending it to the library, as
it is a book Mr. B. has never seen: he wishes to have a longer perusal
of them than the regulations of the library allow.
_Friday Eve. _
P. S. Mr. Burns will be much obliged to Mrs. Riddel if she will favour
him with a perusal of any of her poetical pieces which he may not have
seen.
R. B.
* * * * *
CCCXX.
TO MISS LOUISA FONTENELLE.
[That Miss Fontenelle, as an actress, did not deserve the high praise
which Burns bestows may be guessed: the lines to which he alludes were
recited by the lady on her benefit-night, and are printed among his
Poems. ]
_Dumfries, December, 1795. _
MADAM,
In such a bad world as ours, those who add to the scanty sum of our
pleasures, are positively our benefactors. To you, Madam, on our
humble Dumfries boards, I have been more indebted for entertainment
than ever I was in prouder theatres. Your charms as a woman would
insure applause to the most indifferent actress, and your theatrical
talents would insure admiration to the plainest figure. This, Madam,
is not the unmeaning or insidious compliment of the frivolous or
interested; I pay it from the same honest impulse that the sublime of
nature excites my admiration, or her beauties give me delight.
Will the foregoing lines be of any service to you in your approaching
benefit-night? If they will I shall be prouder of my muse than ever.
They are nearly extempore: I know they have no great merit; but though
they should add but little to the entertainment of the evening, they
give me the happiness of an opportunity to declare how much I have the
honour to be, &c.
R. B.
* * * * *
CCCXXI.
TO MRS. DUNLOP.
[Of the sweet girl to whom Burns alludes in this letter he was
deprived during this year: her death pressed sorely on him. ]
_15th December, 1795. _
MY DEAR FRIEND,
As I am in a complete Decemberish humour, gloomy, sullen, stupid as
even the Deity of Dulness herself could wish, I shall not drawl out a
heavy letter with a number of heavier apologies for my late silence.
Only one I shall mention, because I know you will sympathize in it:
these four months, a sweet little girl, my youngest child, has been so
ill, that every day, a week or less, threatened to terminate her
existence. There had much need be many pleasures annexed to the states
of husband and father, for, God knows, they have many peculiar cares.
I cannot describe to you the anxious, sleepless hours these ties
frequently give me. I see a train of helpless little folks; me and my
exertions all their stay: and on what a brittle thread does the life
of man hang! If I am nipt off at the command of fate! even in all the
vigour of manhood as I am--such things happen every day--gracious God!
what would become of my little flock! 'Tis here that I envy your
people of fortune. --A father on his death-bed, taking an everlasting
leave of his children, has indeed woe enough; but the man of competent
fortune leaves his sons and daughters independency and friends; while
I--but I shall run distracted if I think any longer on the subject!
To leave talking of the matter so gravely, I shall sing with the old
Scots ballad--
"O that I had ne'er been married,
I would never had nae care;
Now I've gotten wife and bairns,
They cry crowdie! evermair.
Crowdie! ance; crowdie! twice;
Crowdie! three times in a day;
An ye crowdie! ony mair,
Ye'll crowdie! a' my meal away. "--
* * * * *
_December 24th. _
We have had a brilliant theatre here this season; only, as all other
business does, it experiences a stagnation of trade from the
epidemical complaint of the country, _want of cash. _ I mentioned our
theatre merely to lug in an occasional Address which I wrote for the
benefit-night of one of the actresses, and which is as follows:--
ADDRESS,
SPOKEN BY MISS FONTENELLE ON HER BENEFIT-NIGHT, DEC. 4, 1795, AT
THE THEATRE, DUMFRIES.
Still anxious to secure your partial favour, &c.
_25th, Christmas-Morning. _
This, my much-loved friend, is a morning of wishes--accept mine--so
heaven hear me as they are sincere! that blessings may attend your
steps, and affliction know you not! In the charming words of my
favourite author, "The Man of Feeling," "May the Great Spirit bear up
the weight of thy gray hairs, and blunt the arrow that brings them
rest! "
Now that I talk of authors, how do you like Cowper? Is not the "Task"
a glorious poem? The religion of the "Task," bating a few scraps of
Calvinistic divinity, is the religion of God and nature; the religion
that exalts, that ennobles man. Were not you to send me your "Zeluco,"
in return for mine? Tell me how you like my marks and notes through
the book. I would not give a farthing for a book, unless I were at
liberty to blot it with my criticisms.
I have lately collected, for a friend's perusal, all my letters; I
mean those which I first sketched, in a rough draught, and afterwards
wrote out fair. On looking over some old musty papers, which, from
time to time, I had parcelled by, as trash that were scarce worth
preserving, and which yet at the same time I did not care to destroy;
I discovered many of these rude sketches, and have written, and am
writing them out, in a bound MS. for my friend's library. As I wrote
always to you the rhapsody of the moment, I cannot find a single
scroll to you, except one about the commencement of our acquaintance.
If there were any possible conveyance, I would send you a perusal of
my book.
R. B.
* * * * *
CCCXXII.
TO MR. ALEXANDER FINDLATER,
SUPERVISOR OF EXCISE, DUMFRIES.
[The person to whom this letter is addressed, is the same who lately
denied that Burns was harshly used by the Board of Excise: but those,
and they are many, who believe what the poet wrote to Erskine, of Mar,
cannot agree with Mr. Findlater. ]
SIR,
Enclosed are the two schemes. I would not have troubled you with the
collector's one, but for suspicion lest it be not right. Mr. Erskine
promised me to make it right, if you will have the goodness to show him
how. As I have no copy of the scheme for myself, and the alterations
being very considerable from what it was formerly, I hope that I shall
have access to this scheme I send you, when I come to face up my new
books. _So much for schemes. _--And that no scheme to betray a FRIEND, or
mislead a STRANGER; to seduce a YOUNG GIRL, or rob a HEN-ROOST; to
subvert LIBERTY, or bribe an EXCISEMAN; to disturb the GENERAL ASSEMBLY,
or annoy a GOSSIPPING; to overthrow the credit of ORTHODOXY, or the
authority of OLD SONGS; to oppose _your wishes_, or frustrate _my
hopes_--MAY PROSPER--is the sincere wish and prayer of
R. B.
* * * * *
CCCXXIII.
TO THE EDITOR OF THE MORNING CHRONICLE.
[Cromek says, when a neighbour complained that his copy of the Morning
Chronicle was not regularly delivered to him from the post-office, the
poet wrote the following indignant letter to Perry on a leaf of his
excise-book, but before it went to the post he reflected and recalled
it. ]
_Dumfries, 1795. _
SIR,
You will see by your subscribers' list, that I have been about nine
months of that number.
I am sorry to inform you, that in that time, seven or eight of your
papers either have never been sent to me, or else have never reached me.
To be deprived of any one number of the first newspaper in Great Britain
for information, ability, and independence, is what I can ill brook and
bear; but to be deprived of that most admirable oration of the Marquis
of Lansdowne, when he made the great though ineffectual attempt (in the
language of the poet, I fear too true), "to save a SINKING STATE"--this
was a loss that I neither can nor will forgive you. --That paper, Sir,
never reached me; but I demand it of you. I am a BRITON; and must be
interested in the cause of LIBERTY:--I am a MAN; and the RIGHTS of HUMAN
NATURE cannot be indifferent to me. However, do not let me mislead you:
I am not a man in that situation of life, which, as your subscriber, can
be of any consequence to you, in the eyes of those to whom SITUATION OF
LIFE ALONE is the criterion of MAN. --I am but a plain tradesman, in this
distant, obscure country town: but that humble domicile in which I
shelter my wife and children is the CASTELLUM of a BRITON; and that
scanty, hard-earned income which supports them is as truly my property,
as the most magnificent fortune, of the most PUISSANT MEMBER of your
HOUSE of NOBLES.
These, Sir, are my sentiments; and to them I subscribe my name: and
were I a man of ability and consequence enough to address the PUBLIC,
with that name should they appear.
I am, &c.
* * * * *
CCCXXIV.
TO MR. HERON,
OF HERON.
[Of Patrick Heron, of Kerroughtree, something has been said in the
notes on the Ballads which bear his name. ]
_Dumfries, 1794,_ or _1795. _
SIR,
I enclose you some copies of a couple of political ballads; one of
which, I believe, you have never seen. Would to Heaven I could make
you master of as many votes in the Stewartry--but--
"Who does the utmost that he can,
Does well, acts nobly, angels could no more. "
In order to bring my humble efforts to bear with more effect on the
foe, I have privately printed a good many copies of both ballads, and
have sent them among friends all about the country.
To pillory on Parnassus the rank reprobation of character, the utter
dereliction of all principle, in a profligate junto which has not only
outraged virtue, but violated common decency; which, spurning even
hypocrisy as paltry iniquity below their daring;--to unmask their
flagitiousness to the broadest day--to deliver such over to their
merited fate, is surely not merely innocent, but laudable; is not only
propriety, but virtue. You have already, as your auxiliary, the sober
detestation of mankind on the heads or your opponents; and I swear by
the lyre of Thalia to muster on your side all the votaries of honest
laughter, and fair, candid ridicule!
I am extremely obliged to you for your kind mention of my interests in
a letter which Mr. Syme showed me. At present my situation in life
must be in a great measure stationary, at least for two or three
years. The statement is this--I am on the supervisors' list, and as we
come on there by precedency, in two or three years I shall be at the
head of that list, and be appointed _of course. _ _Then_, a
FRIEND might be of service to me in getting me into a place
of the kingdom which I would like. A supervisor's income varies from
about a hundred and twenty to two hundred a year; but the business is
an incessant drudgery, and would be nearly a complete bar to every
species of literary pursuit. The moment I am appointed supervisor, in
the common routine, I may be nominated on the collector's list; and
this is always a business purely of political patronage. A
collector-ship varies much, from better than two hundred a year to
near a thousand. They also come forward by precedency on the list; and
have, besides a handsome income, a life of complete leisure. A life of
literary leisure with a decent competency, is the summit of my wishes.
It would be the prudish affectation of silly pride in me to say that I
do not need, or would not be indebted to a political friend; at the
same time, Sir, I by no means lay my affairs before you thus, to hook
my dependent situation on your benevolence. If, in my progress of
life, an opening should occur where the good offices of a gentleman of
your public character and political consequence might bring me
forward, I shall petition your goodness with the same frankness as I
now do myself the honour to subscribe myself
R. B.
* * * * *
CCCXXV.
TO MRS. DUNLOP,
IN LONDON.
[In the correspondence of the poet with Mrs. Dunlop he rarely mentions
Thomson's Collection of Songs, though his heart was set much upon it:
in the Dunlop library there are many letters from the poet, it is
said, which have not been published. ]
_Dumfries, 20th December, 1795. _
I have been prodigiously disappointed in this London journey of yours.
In the first place, when your last to me reached Dumfries, I was in
the country, and did not return until too late to answer your letter;
in the next place, I thought you would certainly take this route; and
now I know not what is become of you, or whether this may reach you at
all. God grant that it may find you and yours in prospering health and
good spirits! Do let me hear from you the soonest possible.
As I hope to get a frank from my friend Captain Miller, I shall every
leisure hour, take up the pen, and gossip away whatever comes first,
prose or poetry, sermon or song. In this last article I have abounded
of late. I have often mentioned to you a superb publication of
Scottish songs which is making its appearance in your great
metropolis, and where I have the honour to preside over the Scottish
verse, as no less a personage than Peter Pindar does over the English.
_December 29th. _
Since I began this letter, I have been appointed to act in the
capacity of supervisor here, and I assure you, what with the load of
business, and what with that business being new to me, I could
scarcely have commanded ten minutes to have spoken to you, had you
been in town, much less to have written you an epistle. This
appointment is only temporary, and during the illness of the present
incumbent; but I look forward to an early period when I shall be
appointed in full form: a consummation devoutly to be wished! My
political sins seem to be forgiven me.
This is the season (New-year's-day is now my date) of wishing; and
mine are most fervently offered up for you! May life to you be a
positive blessing while it lasts, for your own sake; and that it may
yet be greatly prolonged, is my wish for my own sake, and for the sake
of the rest of your friends! What a transient business is life! Very
lately I was a boy; but t'other day I was a young man; and I already
begin to feel the rigid fibre and stiffening joints of old age coming
fast o'er my frame. With all my follies of youth, and I fear, a few
vices of manhood, still I congratulate myself on having had in early
days religion strongly impressed on my mind. I have nothing to say to
any one as to which sect he belongs to, or what creed he believes: but
I look on the man, who is firmly persuaded of infinite wisdom and
goodness, superintending and directing every circumstance that can
happen in his lot--I felicitate such a man as having a solid
foundation for his mental enjoyment; a firm prop and sure stay, in the
hour of difficulty, trouble, and distress; and a never-failing anchor
of hope, when he looks beyond the grave.
_January 12th. _
You will have seen our worthy and ingenious friend, the Doctor, long
ere this. I hope he is well, and beg to be remembered to him. I have
just been reading over again, I dare say for the hundred and fiftieth
time, his _View of Society and Manners_; and still I read it with
delight. His humour is perfectly original--it is neither the humour of
Addison, nor Swift, nor Sterne, nor of anybody but Dr. Moore. By the
bye, you have deprived me of _Zeluco_, remember that, when you are
disposed to rake up the sins of my neglect from among the ashes of my
laziness.
He has paid me a pretty compliment, by quoting me in his last
publication. [287]
* * * * *
R. B.
FOOTNOTES:
[Footnote 287: Edward. ]
* * * * *
CCCXXVI.
ADDRESS OF THE SCOTCH DISTILLERS
TO THE RIGHT HON. WILLIAM PITT.
[This ironical letter to the prime minister was found among the papers
of Burns. ]
SIR,
While pursy burgesses crowd your gate, sweating under the weight of
heavy addresses, permit us, the quondam distillers in that part of
Great Britain called Scotland, to approach you, not with venal
approbation, but with fraternal condolence; not as what you are just
now, or for some time have been; but as what, in all probability, you
will shortly be. --We shall have the merit of not deserting our friends
in the day of their calamity, and you will have the satisfaction of
perusing at least one honest address. You are well acquainted with the
dissection of human nature; nor do you need the assistance of a
fellow-creature's bosom to inform you, that man is always a selfish,
often a perfidious being.
--This assertion, however the hasty
conclusions of superficial observation may doubt of it, or the raw
inexperience of youth may deny it, those who make the fatal experiment
we have done, will feel. --You are a statesman, and consequently are
not ignorant of the traffic of these corporation compliments--The
little great man who drives the borough to market, and the very great
man who buys the borough in that market, they two do the whole
business; and you well know they, likewise, have their price. With
that sullen disdain which you can so well assume, rise, illustrious
Sir, and spurn these hireling efforts of venal stupidity. At best they
are the compliments of a man's friends on the morning of his
execution: they take a decent farewell, resign you to your fate, and
hurry away from your approaching hour.
If fame say true, and omens be not very much mistaken, you are about
to make your exit from that world where the sun of gladness gilds the
paths of prosperous man: permit us, great Sir, with the sympathy of
fellow-feeling to hail your passage to the realms of ruin.
Whether the sentiment proceed from the selfishness or cowardice of
mankind is immaterial; but to point out to a child of misfortune those
who are still more unhappy, is to give him some degree of positive
enjoyment. In this light, Sir, our downfall may be again useful to
you:--though not exactly in the same way, it is not perhaps the first
time it has gratified your feelings. It is true, the triumph of your
evil star is exceedingly despiteful. --At an age when others are the
votaries of pleasure, or underlings in business, you had attained the
highest wish of a British statesman; and with the ordinary date of
human life, what a prospect was before you! Deeply rooted in _Royal
favour_, you overshadowed the land. The birds of passage, which follow
ministerial sunshine through every clime of political faith and
manners, flocked to your branches; and the beasts of the field (the
lordly possessors of hills and valleys) crowded under your shade. "But
behold a watcher, a holy one, came down from heaven, and cried aloud,
and said thus: Hew down the tree, and cut off his branches; shake off
his leaves, and scatter his fruit; let the beasts get away from under
it, and the fowls from his branches! " A blow from an unthought-of
quarter, one of those terrible accidents which peculiarly mark the
hand of Omnipotence, overset your career, and laid all your fancied
honours in the dust. But turn your eyes, Sir, to the tragic scenes of
our fate:--an ancient nation, that for many ages had gallantly
maintained the unequal struggle for independence with her much more
powerful neighbour, at last agrees to a union which should ever after
make them one people. In consideration of certain circumstances, it
was covenanted that the former should enjoy a stipulated alleviation
in her share of the public burdens, particularly in that branch of
the revenue called the Excise. This just privilege has of late given
great umbrage to some interested, powerful individuals of the more
potent part of the empire, and they have spared no wicked pains, under
insidious pretexts, to subvert what they dared not openly to attack,
from the dread which they yet entertained of the spirit of their
ancient enemies.
In this conspiracy we fell; nor did we alone suffer, our country was
deeply wounded. A number of (we will say) respectable individuals,
largely engaged in trade, where we were not only useful, but
absolutely necessary to our country in her dearest interests; we, with
all that was near and dear to us, were sacrificed without remorse, to
the infernal deity of political expediency! We fell to gratify the
wishes of dark envy, and the views of unprincipled ambition! Your
foes, Sir, were avowed; were too brave to take an ungenerous
advantage; _you_ fell in the face of day. --On the contrary, our
enemies, to complete our overthrow, contrived to make their guilt
appear the villany of a nation. --Your downfall only drags with you
your private friends and partisans: in our misery are more or less
involved the most numerous and most valuable part of the
community--all those who immediately depend on the cultivation of the
soil, from the landlord of a province, down to his lowest hind.
Allow us, Sir, yet further, just to hint at another rich vein of
comfort in the dreary regions of adversity;--the gratulations of an
approving conscience. In a certain great assembly, of which you are a
distinguished member, panegyrics on your private virtues have so often
wounded your delicacy, that we shall not distress you with anything on
the subject. There is, however, one part of your public conduct which
our feelings will not permit us to pass in silence: our gratitude must
trespass on your modesty; we mean, worthy Sir, your whole behaviour to
the Scots Distillers. --In evil hours, when obtrusive recollection
presses bitterly on the sense, let that, Sir, come like an healing
angel, and speak the peace to your soul which the world can neither
give nor take away.
We have the honour to be,
Sir,
Your sympathizing fellow-sufferers,
And grateful humble servants,
JOHN BARLEYCORN--Praeses.
* * * * *
CCCXXVII.
TO THE HON. PROVOST, BAILIES, AND
TOWN COUNCIL OF DUMFRIES.
[The Provost and Bailies complied at once with the modest request of
the poet: both Jackson and Staig, who were heads of the town by turns,
were men of taste and feeling. ]
GENTLEMEN,
The literary taste and liberal spirit of your good town has so ably
filled the various departments of your schools, as to make it a very
great object for a parent to have his children educated in them.
Still, to me, a stranger, with my large family, and very stinted
income, to give my young ones that education I wish, at the high fees
which a stranger pays, will bear hard upon me.
Some years ago your good town did me the honour of making me an
honorary burgess. --Will you allow me to request that this mark of
distinction may extend so far, as to put me on a footing of a real
freeman of the town, in the schools?
If you are so very kind as to grant my request, it will certainly be a
constant incentive to me to strain every nerve where I can officially
serve you; and will, if possible, increase that grateful respect with
which I have the honour to be,
Gentlemen,
Your devoted humble servant,
R. B.
* * * * *
CCCXXVIII.
TO MRS. RIDDEL.
[Mrs. Riddel was, like Burns, a well-wisher to the great cause of
human liberty, and lamented with him the excesses of the French
Revolution. ]
_Dumfries, 20th January, 1796. _
I cannot express my gratitude to you, for allowing me a longer perusal
of "Anacharsis. " In fact, I never met with a book that bewitched me so
much; and I, as a member of the library, must warmly feel the
obligation you have laid us under. Indeed to me the obligation is
stronger than to any other individual of our society; as "Anacharsis"
is an indispensable desideratum to a son of the muses.
The health you wished me in your morning's card, is, I think, flown
from me for ever. I have not been able to leave my bed to-day till
about an hour ago. These wickedly unlucky advertisements I lent (I did
wrong) to a friend, and I am ill able to go in quest of him.
The muses have not quite forsaken me. The following detached stanza I
intend to interweave in some disastrous tale of a shepherd.
R. B.
* * * * *
CCCXXIX.
TO MRS. DUNLOP.
[It seems that Mrs. Dunlop regarded the conduct of Burns, for some
months, with displeasure, and withheld or delayed her usual kind and
charming communications. ]
_Dumfries, 31st January, 1796. _
These many months you have been two packets in my debt--what sin of
ignorance I have committed against so highly-valued a friend I am
utterly at a loss to guess. Alas! Madam, ill can I afford, at this
time, to be deprived of any of the small remnant of my pleasures. I
have lately drunk deep in the cup of affliction. The autumn robbed me
of my only daughter and darling child, and that at a distance too, and
so rapidly, as to put it out of my power to pay the last duties to
her. I had scarcely begun to recover from that shock, when I became
myself the victim of a most severe rheumatic fever, and long the die
spun doubtful; until, after many weeks of a sick bed, it seems to have
turned up life, and I am beginning to crawl across my room, and once
indeed have been before my own door in the street.
"When pleasure fascinates the mental sight,
Affliction purifies the visual ray,
Religion hails the drear, the untried night,
And shuts, for ever shuts! life's doubtful day. "
R. B.
* * * * *
CCCXXX.
TO MR. THOMSON.
[Cromek informed me, on the authority of Mrs. Burns, that the
"handsome, elegant present" mentioned in this letter, was a common
worsted shawl. ]
_February, 1796. _
Many thanks, my dear Sir, for your handsome, elegant present to Mrs.
Burns, and for my remaining volume of P. Pindar. Peter is a delightful
fellow, and a first favourite of mine. I am much pleased with your
idea of publishing a collection of our songs in octavo, with etchings.
I am extremely willing to lend every assistance in my power. The Irish
airs I shall cheerfully undertake the task of finding verses for.
I have already, you know, equipt three with words, and the other day I
strung up a kind of rhapsody to another Hibernian melody, which I
admire much.
Awa' wi' your witchcraft o' beauty's alarms. [288]
If this will do, you have now four of my Irish engagement. In my
by-past songs I dislike one thing, the name Chloris--I meant it as the
fictitious name of a certain lady: but, on second thoughts, it is a
high incongruity to have a Greek appellation to a Scottish pastoral
ballad. Of this, and some things else, in my next: I have more
amendments to propose. What you once mentioned of "flaxen locks" is
just: they cannot enter into an elegant description of beauty. Of this
also again--God bless you! [289]
R. B.
FOOTNOTES:
[Footnote 288: Song CCLXVI. ]
[Footnote 289: Our poet never explained what name he would have
substituted for Chloris. --Mr. Thomson. ]
* * * * *
CCCXXXI.
TO MR. THOMSON.
[It is seldom that painting speaks in the spirit of poetry Burns
perceived some of the blemishes of Allan's illustrations: but at that
time little nature and less elegance entered into the embellishments
of books. ]
_April, 1796. _
Alas! my dear Thomson, I fear it will be some time ere I tune my lyre
again! "By Babel streams I have sat and wept" almost ever since I
wrote you last; I have only known existence by the pressure of the
heavy hand of sickness, and have counted time by the repercussions of
pain! Rheumatism, cold, and fever have formed to me a terrible
combination. I close my eyes in misery, and open them without hope. I
look on the vernal day, and say with poor Fergusson,
"Say, wherefore has an all-indulgent heaven
Light to the comfortless and wretched given? "
This will be delivered to you by Mrs. Hyslop, landlady of the Globe
Tavern here, which for these many years has been my howff, and where
our friend Clarke and I have had many a merry squeeze. I am highly
delighted with Mr. Allan's etchings. "Woo'd an' married an' a'," is
admirable! The grouping is beyond all praise. The expression of the
figures, conformable to the story in the ballad, is absolutely
faultless perfection. I next admire "Turnim-spike. " What I like least
is "Jenny said to Jockey. " Besides the female being in her appearance
* * * *, if you take her stooping into the account, she is at least two
inches taller than her lover. Poor Cleghorn! I sincerely sympathize
with him. Happy I am to think that he yet has a well-grounded hope of
health and enjoyment in this world. As for me--but that is a sad
subject.
R. B.
* * * * *
CCCXXXII.
TO MR. THOMSON.
[The genius of the poet triumphed over pain and want,--his last songs
are as tender and as true as any of his early compositions. ]
MY DEAR SIR,
I once mentioned to you an air which I have long admired--"Here's a
health to them that's awa, hiney," but I forget if you took any notice
of it. I have just been trying to suit it with verses, and I beg leave
to recommend the air to your attention once more. I have only begun
it.
[Here follow the first three stanzas of the song, beginning,
Here's a health to ane I loe dear;[290]
the fourth was found among the poet's MSS. after his death. ]
R. B.
FOOTNOTES:
[Footnote 290: Song CCLXVII. ]
* * * * *
CCCXXXIII.
TO MR. THOMSON.
[John Lewars, whom the poet introduces to Thomson, was a brother
gauger, and a kind, warm-hearted gentleman; Jessie Lewars was his
sister, and at this time but in her teens. ]
This will be delivered by Mr. Lewars, a young fellow of uncommon
merit. As he will be a day or two in town, you will have leisure, if
you choose, to write me by him: and if you have a spare half-hour to
spend with him, I shall place your kindness to my account. I have no
copies of the songs I have sent you, and I have taken a fancy to
review them all, and possibly may mend some of them; so when you have
complete leisure, I will thank you for either the originals or
copies. [291] I had rather be the author of five well-written songs than
of ten otherwise. I have great hopes that the genial influence of the
approaching summer will set me to rights, but as yet I cannot boast of
returning health. I have now reason to believe that my complaint is a
flying gout--a sad business!
Do let me know how Cleghorn is, and remember me to him.
This should have been delivered to you a month ago. I am still very
poorly, but should like much to hear from you.
R. B.
FOOTNOTES:
[Footnote 291: "It is needless to say that this revisal Burns did not
live to perform. "--Currie. ]
* * * * *
CCCXXXIV.
TO MRS. RIDDEL,
_Who had desired him to go to the Birth-Day Assembly on that day to
show his loyalty. _
[This is the last letter which the poet wrote to this accomplished
lady. ]
_Dumfries, 4th June, 1796. _
I am in such miserable health as to be utterly incapable of showing my
loyalty in any way. Rackt as I am with rheumatisms, I meet every face
with a greeting like that of Balak to Balaam--"Come, curse me Jacob;
and come, defy me Israel! " So say I--Come, curse me that east wind;
and come, defy me the north! Would you have me in such circumstances
copy you out a love-song?
I may perhaps see you on Saturday, but I will not be at the ball. --Why
should I? "man delights not me, nor woman either! " Can you supply me
with the song, "Let us all be unhappy together? "--do if you can, and
oblige, _le pauvre miserable_
R. B.
* * * * *
CCCXXXV.
TO MR. CLARKE,
SCHOOLMASTER, FORFAR.
[Who will say, after reading the following distressing letter, lately
come to light, that Burns did not die in great poverty. ]
_Dumfries, 26th June, 1796. _
MY DEAR CLARKE,
Still, still the victim of affliction! Were you to see the emaciated
figure who now holds the pen to you, you would not know your old
friend. Whether I shall ever get about again, is only known to Him,
the Great Unknown, whose creature I am. Alas, Clarke! I begin to fear
the worst.
As to my individual self, I am tranquil, and would despise myself, if
I were not; but Burns's poor widow, and half-a-dozen of his dear
little ones--helpless orphans! --_there_ I am weak as a woman's tear.
Enough of this! 'Tis half of my disease.
I duly received your last, enclosing the note. It came extremely in
time, and I am much obliged by your punctuality. Again I must request
you to do me the same kindness. Be so very good, as, by return of
post, to enclose me _another_ note. I trust you can do it without
inconvenience, and it will seriously oblige me. If I must go, I shall
leave a few friends behind me, whom I shall regret while consciousness
remains. I know I shall live in their remembrance. Adieu, dear Clarke.
That I shall ever see you again, is, I am afraid, highly improbable.
R. B.
* * * * *
CCCXXXVI.
TO MR. JAMES JOHNSON,
EDINBURGH.
["In this humble and delicate manner did poor Burns ask for a copy of
a work of which he was principally the founder, and to which he had
contributed _gratuitously_ not less than one hundred and eighty-four
_original, altered, and collected_ songs! The editor has seen one
hundred and eighty transcribed by his own hand, for the
'Museum. '"--CROMEK. Will it be believed that this "humble
request" of Burns was not complied with! The work was intended as a
present to Jessie Lewars. ]
_Dumfries, 4th July, 1796.
[Ill health, poverty, a sense of dependence, with the much he had
deserved of his country, and the little he had obtained, were all at
this time pressing on the mind of Burns, and inducing him to forget
what was due to himself as well as to the courtesies of life. ]
MADAM,
I dare say that this is the first epistle you ever received from this
nether world. I write you from the regions of Hell, amid the horrors
of the damned. The time and the manner of my leaving your earth I do
not exactly know, as I took my departure in the heat of a fever of
intoxication contracted at your too hospitable mansion; but, on my
arrival here, I was fairly tried, and sentenced to endure the
purgatorial tortures of this infernal confine for the space of
ninety-nine years, eleven months, and twenty-nine days, and all on
account of the impropriety of my conduct yesternight under your roof.
Here am I, laid on a bed of pitiless furze, with my aching head
reclined on a pillow of ever-piercing thorn, while an infernal
tormentor, wrinkled, and old, and cruel, his name I think is
_Recollection_, with a whip of scorpions, forbids peace or rest to
approach me, and keeps anguish eternally awake. Still, Madam, if I
could in any measure be reinstated in the good opinion of the fair
circle whom my conduct last night so much injured, I think it would
be an alleviation to my torments. For this reason I trouble you with
this letter. To the men of the company I will make no apology. --Your
husband, who insisted on my drinking more than I chose, has no right
to blame me; and the other gentlemen were partakers of my guilt. But
to you, Madam, I have much to apologize. Your good opinion I valued as
one of the greatest acquisitions I had made on earth, and I was truly
a beast to forfeit it. There was a Miss I----, too, a woman of fine
sense, gentle and unassuming manners--do make on my part, a miserable
d--mned wretch's best apology to her. A Mrs. G----, a charming woman,
did me the honour to be prejudiced in my favour; this makes me hope
that I have not outraged her beyond all forgiveness. --To all the other
ladies please present my humblest contrition for my conduct, and my
petition for their gracious pardon. O all ye powers of decency and
decorum! whisper to them that my errors, though great, were
involuntary--that an intoxicated man is the vilest of beasts--that it
was not in my nature to be brutal to any one--that to be rude to a
woman, when in my senses, was impossible with me--but--
* * * * *
Regret! Remorse! Shame! ye three hell-hounds that ever dog my steps
and bay at my heels, spare me! spare me!
Forgive the offences, and pity the perdition of, Madam, your humble
slave.
R. B.
* * * * *
CCCXIX.
TO MRS. RIDDEL.
[Mrs. Riddel, it is said, possessed many more of the poet's letters
than are printed--she sometimes read them to friends who could feel
their wit, and, like herself, make allowance for their freedom. ]
_Dumfries, 1795. _
Mr. Burns's compliments to Mrs. Riddel--is much obliged to her for her
polite attention in sending him the book. Owing to Mr. B. 's being at
present acting as supervisor of excise, a department that occupies his
every hour of the day, he has not that time to spare which is
necessary for any belle-lettre pursuit; but, as he will, in a week or
two, again return to his wonted leisure, he will then pay that
attention to Mrs. R. 's beautiful song, "To thee, loved Nith"--which it
so well deserves. When "Anacharsis' Travels" come to hand, which Mrs.
Riddel mentioned as her gift to the public library, Mr. B. will thank
her for a reading of it previous to her sending it to the library, as
it is a book Mr. B. has never seen: he wishes to have a longer perusal
of them than the regulations of the library allow.
_Friday Eve. _
P. S. Mr. Burns will be much obliged to Mrs. Riddel if she will favour
him with a perusal of any of her poetical pieces which he may not have
seen.
R. B.
* * * * *
CCCXX.
TO MISS LOUISA FONTENELLE.
[That Miss Fontenelle, as an actress, did not deserve the high praise
which Burns bestows may be guessed: the lines to which he alludes were
recited by the lady on her benefit-night, and are printed among his
Poems. ]
_Dumfries, December, 1795. _
MADAM,
In such a bad world as ours, those who add to the scanty sum of our
pleasures, are positively our benefactors. To you, Madam, on our
humble Dumfries boards, I have been more indebted for entertainment
than ever I was in prouder theatres. Your charms as a woman would
insure applause to the most indifferent actress, and your theatrical
talents would insure admiration to the plainest figure. This, Madam,
is not the unmeaning or insidious compliment of the frivolous or
interested; I pay it from the same honest impulse that the sublime of
nature excites my admiration, or her beauties give me delight.
Will the foregoing lines be of any service to you in your approaching
benefit-night? If they will I shall be prouder of my muse than ever.
They are nearly extempore: I know they have no great merit; but though
they should add but little to the entertainment of the evening, they
give me the happiness of an opportunity to declare how much I have the
honour to be, &c.
R. B.
* * * * *
CCCXXI.
TO MRS. DUNLOP.
[Of the sweet girl to whom Burns alludes in this letter he was
deprived during this year: her death pressed sorely on him. ]
_15th December, 1795. _
MY DEAR FRIEND,
As I am in a complete Decemberish humour, gloomy, sullen, stupid as
even the Deity of Dulness herself could wish, I shall not drawl out a
heavy letter with a number of heavier apologies for my late silence.
Only one I shall mention, because I know you will sympathize in it:
these four months, a sweet little girl, my youngest child, has been so
ill, that every day, a week or less, threatened to terminate her
existence. There had much need be many pleasures annexed to the states
of husband and father, for, God knows, they have many peculiar cares.
I cannot describe to you the anxious, sleepless hours these ties
frequently give me. I see a train of helpless little folks; me and my
exertions all their stay: and on what a brittle thread does the life
of man hang! If I am nipt off at the command of fate! even in all the
vigour of manhood as I am--such things happen every day--gracious God!
what would become of my little flock! 'Tis here that I envy your
people of fortune. --A father on his death-bed, taking an everlasting
leave of his children, has indeed woe enough; but the man of competent
fortune leaves his sons and daughters independency and friends; while
I--but I shall run distracted if I think any longer on the subject!
To leave talking of the matter so gravely, I shall sing with the old
Scots ballad--
"O that I had ne'er been married,
I would never had nae care;
Now I've gotten wife and bairns,
They cry crowdie! evermair.
Crowdie! ance; crowdie! twice;
Crowdie! three times in a day;
An ye crowdie! ony mair,
Ye'll crowdie! a' my meal away. "--
* * * * *
_December 24th. _
We have had a brilliant theatre here this season; only, as all other
business does, it experiences a stagnation of trade from the
epidemical complaint of the country, _want of cash. _ I mentioned our
theatre merely to lug in an occasional Address which I wrote for the
benefit-night of one of the actresses, and which is as follows:--
ADDRESS,
SPOKEN BY MISS FONTENELLE ON HER BENEFIT-NIGHT, DEC. 4, 1795, AT
THE THEATRE, DUMFRIES.
Still anxious to secure your partial favour, &c.
_25th, Christmas-Morning. _
This, my much-loved friend, is a morning of wishes--accept mine--so
heaven hear me as they are sincere! that blessings may attend your
steps, and affliction know you not! In the charming words of my
favourite author, "The Man of Feeling," "May the Great Spirit bear up
the weight of thy gray hairs, and blunt the arrow that brings them
rest! "
Now that I talk of authors, how do you like Cowper? Is not the "Task"
a glorious poem? The religion of the "Task," bating a few scraps of
Calvinistic divinity, is the religion of God and nature; the religion
that exalts, that ennobles man. Were not you to send me your "Zeluco,"
in return for mine? Tell me how you like my marks and notes through
the book. I would not give a farthing for a book, unless I were at
liberty to blot it with my criticisms.
I have lately collected, for a friend's perusal, all my letters; I
mean those which I first sketched, in a rough draught, and afterwards
wrote out fair. On looking over some old musty papers, which, from
time to time, I had parcelled by, as trash that were scarce worth
preserving, and which yet at the same time I did not care to destroy;
I discovered many of these rude sketches, and have written, and am
writing them out, in a bound MS. for my friend's library. As I wrote
always to you the rhapsody of the moment, I cannot find a single
scroll to you, except one about the commencement of our acquaintance.
If there were any possible conveyance, I would send you a perusal of
my book.
R. B.
* * * * *
CCCXXII.
TO MR. ALEXANDER FINDLATER,
SUPERVISOR OF EXCISE, DUMFRIES.
[The person to whom this letter is addressed, is the same who lately
denied that Burns was harshly used by the Board of Excise: but those,
and they are many, who believe what the poet wrote to Erskine, of Mar,
cannot agree with Mr. Findlater. ]
SIR,
Enclosed are the two schemes. I would not have troubled you with the
collector's one, but for suspicion lest it be not right. Mr. Erskine
promised me to make it right, if you will have the goodness to show him
how. As I have no copy of the scheme for myself, and the alterations
being very considerable from what it was formerly, I hope that I shall
have access to this scheme I send you, when I come to face up my new
books. _So much for schemes. _--And that no scheme to betray a FRIEND, or
mislead a STRANGER; to seduce a YOUNG GIRL, or rob a HEN-ROOST; to
subvert LIBERTY, or bribe an EXCISEMAN; to disturb the GENERAL ASSEMBLY,
or annoy a GOSSIPPING; to overthrow the credit of ORTHODOXY, or the
authority of OLD SONGS; to oppose _your wishes_, or frustrate _my
hopes_--MAY PROSPER--is the sincere wish and prayer of
R. B.
* * * * *
CCCXXIII.
TO THE EDITOR OF THE MORNING CHRONICLE.
[Cromek says, when a neighbour complained that his copy of the Morning
Chronicle was not regularly delivered to him from the post-office, the
poet wrote the following indignant letter to Perry on a leaf of his
excise-book, but before it went to the post he reflected and recalled
it. ]
_Dumfries, 1795. _
SIR,
You will see by your subscribers' list, that I have been about nine
months of that number.
I am sorry to inform you, that in that time, seven or eight of your
papers either have never been sent to me, or else have never reached me.
To be deprived of any one number of the first newspaper in Great Britain
for information, ability, and independence, is what I can ill brook and
bear; but to be deprived of that most admirable oration of the Marquis
of Lansdowne, when he made the great though ineffectual attempt (in the
language of the poet, I fear too true), "to save a SINKING STATE"--this
was a loss that I neither can nor will forgive you. --That paper, Sir,
never reached me; but I demand it of you. I am a BRITON; and must be
interested in the cause of LIBERTY:--I am a MAN; and the RIGHTS of HUMAN
NATURE cannot be indifferent to me. However, do not let me mislead you:
I am not a man in that situation of life, which, as your subscriber, can
be of any consequence to you, in the eyes of those to whom SITUATION OF
LIFE ALONE is the criterion of MAN. --I am but a plain tradesman, in this
distant, obscure country town: but that humble domicile in which I
shelter my wife and children is the CASTELLUM of a BRITON; and that
scanty, hard-earned income which supports them is as truly my property,
as the most magnificent fortune, of the most PUISSANT MEMBER of your
HOUSE of NOBLES.
These, Sir, are my sentiments; and to them I subscribe my name: and
were I a man of ability and consequence enough to address the PUBLIC,
with that name should they appear.
I am, &c.
* * * * *
CCCXXIV.
TO MR. HERON,
OF HERON.
[Of Patrick Heron, of Kerroughtree, something has been said in the
notes on the Ballads which bear his name. ]
_Dumfries, 1794,_ or _1795. _
SIR,
I enclose you some copies of a couple of political ballads; one of
which, I believe, you have never seen. Would to Heaven I could make
you master of as many votes in the Stewartry--but--
"Who does the utmost that he can,
Does well, acts nobly, angels could no more. "
In order to bring my humble efforts to bear with more effect on the
foe, I have privately printed a good many copies of both ballads, and
have sent them among friends all about the country.
To pillory on Parnassus the rank reprobation of character, the utter
dereliction of all principle, in a profligate junto which has not only
outraged virtue, but violated common decency; which, spurning even
hypocrisy as paltry iniquity below their daring;--to unmask their
flagitiousness to the broadest day--to deliver such over to their
merited fate, is surely not merely innocent, but laudable; is not only
propriety, but virtue. You have already, as your auxiliary, the sober
detestation of mankind on the heads or your opponents; and I swear by
the lyre of Thalia to muster on your side all the votaries of honest
laughter, and fair, candid ridicule!
I am extremely obliged to you for your kind mention of my interests in
a letter which Mr. Syme showed me. At present my situation in life
must be in a great measure stationary, at least for two or three
years. The statement is this--I am on the supervisors' list, and as we
come on there by precedency, in two or three years I shall be at the
head of that list, and be appointed _of course. _ _Then_, a
FRIEND might be of service to me in getting me into a place
of the kingdom which I would like. A supervisor's income varies from
about a hundred and twenty to two hundred a year; but the business is
an incessant drudgery, and would be nearly a complete bar to every
species of literary pursuit. The moment I am appointed supervisor, in
the common routine, I may be nominated on the collector's list; and
this is always a business purely of political patronage. A
collector-ship varies much, from better than two hundred a year to
near a thousand. They also come forward by precedency on the list; and
have, besides a handsome income, a life of complete leisure. A life of
literary leisure with a decent competency, is the summit of my wishes.
It would be the prudish affectation of silly pride in me to say that I
do not need, or would not be indebted to a political friend; at the
same time, Sir, I by no means lay my affairs before you thus, to hook
my dependent situation on your benevolence. If, in my progress of
life, an opening should occur where the good offices of a gentleman of
your public character and political consequence might bring me
forward, I shall petition your goodness with the same frankness as I
now do myself the honour to subscribe myself
R. B.
* * * * *
CCCXXV.
TO MRS. DUNLOP,
IN LONDON.
[In the correspondence of the poet with Mrs. Dunlop he rarely mentions
Thomson's Collection of Songs, though his heart was set much upon it:
in the Dunlop library there are many letters from the poet, it is
said, which have not been published. ]
_Dumfries, 20th December, 1795. _
I have been prodigiously disappointed in this London journey of yours.
In the first place, when your last to me reached Dumfries, I was in
the country, and did not return until too late to answer your letter;
in the next place, I thought you would certainly take this route; and
now I know not what is become of you, or whether this may reach you at
all. God grant that it may find you and yours in prospering health and
good spirits! Do let me hear from you the soonest possible.
As I hope to get a frank from my friend Captain Miller, I shall every
leisure hour, take up the pen, and gossip away whatever comes first,
prose or poetry, sermon or song. In this last article I have abounded
of late. I have often mentioned to you a superb publication of
Scottish songs which is making its appearance in your great
metropolis, and where I have the honour to preside over the Scottish
verse, as no less a personage than Peter Pindar does over the English.
_December 29th. _
Since I began this letter, I have been appointed to act in the
capacity of supervisor here, and I assure you, what with the load of
business, and what with that business being new to me, I could
scarcely have commanded ten minutes to have spoken to you, had you
been in town, much less to have written you an epistle. This
appointment is only temporary, and during the illness of the present
incumbent; but I look forward to an early period when I shall be
appointed in full form: a consummation devoutly to be wished! My
political sins seem to be forgiven me.
This is the season (New-year's-day is now my date) of wishing; and
mine are most fervently offered up for you! May life to you be a
positive blessing while it lasts, for your own sake; and that it may
yet be greatly prolonged, is my wish for my own sake, and for the sake
of the rest of your friends! What a transient business is life! Very
lately I was a boy; but t'other day I was a young man; and I already
begin to feel the rigid fibre and stiffening joints of old age coming
fast o'er my frame. With all my follies of youth, and I fear, a few
vices of manhood, still I congratulate myself on having had in early
days religion strongly impressed on my mind. I have nothing to say to
any one as to which sect he belongs to, or what creed he believes: but
I look on the man, who is firmly persuaded of infinite wisdom and
goodness, superintending and directing every circumstance that can
happen in his lot--I felicitate such a man as having a solid
foundation for his mental enjoyment; a firm prop and sure stay, in the
hour of difficulty, trouble, and distress; and a never-failing anchor
of hope, when he looks beyond the grave.
_January 12th. _
You will have seen our worthy and ingenious friend, the Doctor, long
ere this. I hope he is well, and beg to be remembered to him. I have
just been reading over again, I dare say for the hundred and fiftieth
time, his _View of Society and Manners_; and still I read it with
delight. His humour is perfectly original--it is neither the humour of
Addison, nor Swift, nor Sterne, nor of anybody but Dr. Moore. By the
bye, you have deprived me of _Zeluco_, remember that, when you are
disposed to rake up the sins of my neglect from among the ashes of my
laziness.
He has paid me a pretty compliment, by quoting me in his last
publication. [287]
* * * * *
R. B.
FOOTNOTES:
[Footnote 287: Edward. ]
* * * * *
CCCXXVI.
ADDRESS OF THE SCOTCH DISTILLERS
TO THE RIGHT HON. WILLIAM PITT.
[This ironical letter to the prime minister was found among the papers
of Burns. ]
SIR,
While pursy burgesses crowd your gate, sweating under the weight of
heavy addresses, permit us, the quondam distillers in that part of
Great Britain called Scotland, to approach you, not with venal
approbation, but with fraternal condolence; not as what you are just
now, or for some time have been; but as what, in all probability, you
will shortly be. --We shall have the merit of not deserting our friends
in the day of their calamity, and you will have the satisfaction of
perusing at least one honest address. You are well acquainted with the
dissection of human nature; nor do you need the assistance of a
fellow-creature's bosom to inform you, that man is always a selfish,
often a perfidious being.
--This assertion, however the hasty
conclusions of superficial observation may doubt of it, or the raw
inexperience of youth may deny it, those who make the fatal experiment
we have done, will feel. --You are a statesman, and consequently are
not ignorant of the traffic of these corporation compliments--The
little great man who drives the borough to market, and the very great
man who buys the borough in that market, they two do the whole
business; and you well know they, likewise, have their price. With
that sullen disdain which you can so well assume, rise, illustrious
Sir, and spurn these hireling efforts of venal stupidity. At best they
are the compliments of a man's friends on the morning of his
execution: they take a decent farewell, resign you to your fate, and
hurry away from your approaching hour.
If fame say true, and omens be not very much mistaken, you are about
to make your exit from that world where the sun of gladness gilds the
paths of prosperous man: permit us, great Sir, with the sympathy of
fellow-feeling to hail your passage to the realms of ruin.
Whether the sentiment proceed from the selfishness or cowardice of
mankind is immaterial; but to point out to a child of misfortune those
who are still more unhappy, is to give him some degree of positive
enjoyment. In this light, Sir, our downfall may be again useful to
you:--though not exactly in the same way, it is not perhaps the first
time it has gratified your feelings. It is true, the triumph of your
evil star is exceedingly despiteful. --At an age when others are the
votaries of pleasure, or underlings in business, you had attained the
highest wish of a British statesman; and with the ordinary date of
human life, what a prospect was before you! Deeply rooted in _Royal
favour_, you overshadowed the land. The birds of passage, which follow
ministerial sunshine through every clime of political faith and
manners, flocked to your branches; and the beasts of the field (the
lordly possessors of hills and valleys) crowded under your shade. "But
behold a watcher, a holy one, came down from heaven, and cried aloud,
and said thus: Hew down the tree, and cut off his branches; shake off
his leaves, and scatter his fruit; let the beasts get away from under
it, and the fowls from his branches! " A blow from an unthought-of
quarter, one of those terrible accidents which peculiarly mark the
hand of Omnipotence, overset your career, and laid all your fancied
honours in the dust. But turn your eyes, Sir, to the tragic scenes of
our fate:--an ancient nation, that for many ages had gallantly
maintained the unequal struggle for independence with her much more
powerful neighbour, at last agrees to a union which should ever after
make them one people. In consideration of certain circumstances, it
was covenanted that the former should enjoy a stipulated alleviation
in her share of the public burdens, particularly in that branch of
the revenue called the Excise. This just privilege has of late given
great umbrage to some interested, powerful individuals of the more
potent part of the empire, and they have spared no wicked pains, under
insidious pretexts, to subvert what they dared not openly to attack,
from the dread which they yet entertained of the spirit of their
ancient enemies.
In this conspiracy we fell; nor did we alone suffer, our country was
deeply wounded. A number of (we will say) respectable individuals,
largely engaged in trade, where we were not only useful, but
absolutely necessary to our country in her dearest interests; we, with
all that was near and dear to us, were sacrificed without remorse, to
the infernal deity of political expediency! We fell to gratify the
wishes of dark envy, and the views of unprincipled ambition! Your
foes, Sir, were avowed; were too brave to take an ungenerous
advantage; _you_ fell in the face of day. --On the contrary, our
enemies, to complete our overthrow, contrived to make their guilt
appear the villany of a nation. --Your downfall only drags with you
your private friends and partisans: in our misery are more or less
involved the most numerous and most valuable part of the
community--all those who immediately depend on the cultivation of the
soil, from the landlord of a province, down to his lowest hind.
Allow us, Sir, yet further, just to hint at another rich vein of
comfort in the dreary regions of adversity;--the gratulations of an
approving conscience. In a certain great assembly, of which you are a
distinguished member, panegyrics on your private virtues have so often
wounded your delicacy, that we shall not distress you with anything on
the subject. There is, however, one part of your public conduct which
our feelings will not permit us to pass in silence: our gratitude must
trespass on your modesty; we mean, worthy Sir, your whole behaviour to
the Scots Distillers. --In evil hours, when obtrusive recollection
presses bitterly on the sense, let that, Sir, come like an healing
angel, and speak the peace to your soul which the world can neither
give nor take away.
We have the honour to be,
Sir,
Your sympathizing fellow-sufferers,
And grateful humble servants,
JOHN BARLEYCORN--Praeses.
* * * * *
CCCXXVII.
TO THE HON. PROVOST, BAILIES, AND
TOWN COUNCIL OF DUMFRIES.
[The Provost and Bailies complied at once with the modest request of
the poet: both Jackson and Staig, who were heads of the town by turns,
were men of taste and feeling. ]
GENTLEMEN,
The literary taste and liberal spirit of your good town has so ably
filled the various departments of your schools, as to make it a very
great object for a parent to have his children educated in them.
Still, to me, a stranger, with my large family, and very stinted
income, to give my young ones that education I wish, at the high fees
which a stranger pays, will bear hard upon me.
Some years ago your good town did me the honour of making me an
honorary burgess. --Will you allow me to request that this mark of
distinction may extend so far, as to put me on a footing of a real
freeman of the town, in the schools?
If you are so very kind as to grant my request, it will certainly be a
constant incentive to me to strain every nerve where I can officially
serve you; and will, if possible, increase that grateful respect with
which I have the honour to be,
Gentlemen,
Your devoted humble servant,
R. B.
* * * * *
CCCXXVIII.
TO MRS. RIDDEL.
[Mrs. Riddel was, like Burns, a well-wisher to the great cause of
human liberty, and lamented with him the excesses of the French
Revolution. ]
_Dumfries, 20th January, 1796. _
I cannot express my gratitude to you, for allowing me a longer perusal
of "Anacharsis. " In fact, I never met with a book that bewitched me so
much; and I, as a member of the library, must warmly feel the
obligation you have laid us under. Indeed to me the obligation is
stronger than to any other individual of our society; as "Anacharsis"
is an indispensable desideratum to a son of the muses.
The health you wished me in your morning's card, is, I think, flown
from me for ever. I have not been able to leave my bed to-day till
about an hour ago. These wickedly unlucky advertisements I lent (I did
wrong) to a friend, and I am ill able to go in quest of him.
The muses have not quite forsaken me. The following detached stanza I
intend to interweave in some disastrous tale of a shepherd.
R. B.
* * * * *
CCCXXIX.
TO MRS. DUNLOP.
[It seems that Mrs. Dunlop regarded the conduct of Burns, for some
months, with displeasure, and withheld or delayed her usual kind and
charming communications. ]
_Dumfries, 31st January, 1796. _
These many months you have been two packets in my debt--what sin of
ignorance I have committed against so highly-valued a friend I am
utterly at a loss to guess. Alas! Madam, ill can I afford, at this
time, to be deprived of any of the small remnant of my pleasures. I
have lately drunk deep in the cup of affliction. The autumn robbed me
of my only daughter and darling child, and that at a distance too, and
so rapidly, as to put it out of my power to pay the last duties to
her. I had scarcely begun to recover from that shock, when I became
myself the victim of a most severe rheumatic fever, and long the die
spun doubtful; until, after many weeks of a sick bed, it seems to have
turned up life, and I am beginning to crawl across my room, and once
indeed have been before my own door in the street.
"When pleasure fascinates the mental sight,
Affliction purifies the visual ray,
Religion hails the drear, the untried night,
And shuts, for ever shuts! life's doubtful day. "
R. B.
* * * * *
CCCXXX.
TO MR. THOMSON.
[Cromek informed me, on the authority of Mrs. Burns, that the
"handsome, elegant present" mentioned in this letter, was a common
worsted shawl. ]
_February, 1796. _
Many thanks, my dear Sir, for your handsome, elegant present to Mrs.
Burns, and for my remaining volume of P. Pindar. Peter is a delightful
fellow, and a first favourite of mine. I am much pleased with your
idea of publishing a collection of our songs in octavo, with etchings.
I am extremely willing to lend every assistance in my power. The Irish
airs I shall cheerfully undertake the task of finding verses for.
I have already, you know, equipt three with words, and the other day I
strung up a kind of rhapsody to another Hibernian melody, which I
admire much.
Awa' wi' your witchcraft o' beauty's alarms. [288]
If this will do, you have now four of my Irish engagement. In my
by-past songs I dislike one thing, the name Chloris--I meant it as the
fictitious name of a certain lady: but, on second thoughts, it is a
high incongruity to have a Greek appellation to a Scottish pastoral
ballad. Of this, and some things else, in my next: I have more
amendments to propose. What you once mentioned of "flaxen locks" is
just: they cannot enter into an elegant description of beauty. Of this
also again--God bless you! [289]
R. B.
FOOTNOTES:
[Footnote 288: Song CCLXVI. ]
[Footnote 289: Our poet never explained what name he would have
substituted for Chloris. --Mr. Thomson. ]
* * * * *
CCCXXXI.
TO MR. THOMSON.
[It is seldom that painting speaks in the spirit of poetry Burns
perceived some of the blemishes of Allan's illustrations: but at that
time little nature and less elegance entered into the embellishments
of books. ]
_April, 1796. _
Alas! my dear Thomson, I fear it will be some time ere I tune my lyre
again! "By Babel streams I have sat and wept" almost ever since I
wrote you last; I have only known existence by the pressure of the
heavy hand of sickness, and have counted time by the repercussions of
pain! Rheumatism, cold, and fever have formed to me a terrible
combination. I close my eyes in misery, and open them without hope. I
look on the vernal day, and say with poor Fergusson,
"Say, wherefore has an all-indulgent heaven
Light to the comfortless and wretched given? "
This will be delivered to you by Mrs. Hyslop, landlady of the Globe
Tavern here, which for these many years has been my howff, and where
our friend Clarke and I have had many a merry squeeze. I am highly
delighted with Mr. Allan's etchings. "Woo'd an' married an' a'," is
admirable! The grouping is beyond all praise. The expression of the
figures, conformable to the story in the ballad, is absolutely
faultless perfection. I next admire "Turnim-spike. " What I like least
is "Jenny said to Jockey. " Besides the female being in her appearance
* * * *, if you take her stooping into the account, she is at least two
inches taller than her lover. Poor Cleghorn! I sincerely sympathize
with him. Happy I am to think that he yet has a well-grounded hope of
health and enjoyment in this world. As for me--but that is a sad
subject.
R. B.
* * * * *
CCCXXXII.
TO MR. THOMSON.
[The genius of the poet triumphed over pain and want,--his last songs
are as tender and as true as any of his early compositions. ]
MY DEAR SIR,
I once mentioned to you an air which I have long admired--"Here's a
health to them that's awa, hiney," but I forget if you took any notice
of it. I have just been trying to suit it with verses, and I beg leave
to recommend the air to your attention once more. I have only begun
it.
[Here follow the first three stanzas of the song, beginning,
Here's a health to ane I loe dear;[290]
the fourth was found among the poet's MSS. after his death. ]
R. B.
FOOTNOTES:
[Footnote 290: Song CCLXVII. ]
* * * * *
CCCXXXIII.
TO MR. THOMSON.
[John Lewars, whom the poet introduces to Thomson, was a brother
gauger, and a kind, warm-hearted gentleman; Jessie Lewars was his
sister, and at this time but in her teens. ]
This will be delivered by Mr. Lewars, a young fellow of uncommon
merit. As he will be a day or two in town, you will have leisure, if
you choose, to write me by him: and if you have a spare half-hour to
spend with him, I shall place your kindness to my account. I have no
copies of the songs I have sent you, and I have taken a fancy to
review them all, and possibly may mend some of them; so when you have
complete leisure, I will thank you for either the originals or
copies. [291] I had rather be the author of five well-written songs than
of ten otherwise. I have great hopes that the genial influence of the
approaching summer will set me to rights, but as yet I cannot boast of
returning health. I have now reason to believe that my complaint is a
flying gout--a sad business!
Do let me know how Cleghorn is, and remember me to him.
This should have been delivered to you a month ago. I am still very
poorly, but should like much to hear from you.
R. B.
FOOTNOTES:
[Footnote 291: "It is needless to say that this revisal Burns did not
live to perform. "--Currie. ]
* * * * *
CCCXXXIV.
TO MRS. RIDDEL,
_Who had desired him to go to the Birth-Day Assembly on that day to
show his loyalty. _
[This is the last letter which the poet wrote to this accomplished
lady. ]
_Dumfries, 4th June, 1796. _
I am in such miserable health as to be utterly incapable of showing my
loyalty in any way. Rackt as I am with rheumatisms, I meet every face
with a greeting like that of Balak to Balaam--"Come, curse me Jacob;
and come, defy me Israel! " So say I--Come, curse me that east wind;
and come, defy me the north! Would you have me in such circumstances
copy you out a love-song?
I may perhaps see you on Saturday, but I will not be at the ball. --Why
should I? "man delights not me, nor woman either! " Can you supply me
with the song, "Let us all be unhappy together? "--do if you can, and
oblige, _le pauvre miserable_
R. B.
* * * * *
CCCXXXV.
TO MR. CLARKE,
SCHOOLMASTER, FORFAR.
[Who will say, after reading the following distressing letter, lately
come to light, that Burns did not die in great poverty. ]
_Dumfries, 26th June, 1796. _
MY DEAR CLARKE,
Still, still the victim of affliction! Were you to see the emaciated
figure who now holds the pen to you, you would not know your old
friend. Whether I shall ever get about again, is only known to Him,
the Great Unknown, whose creature I am. Alas, Clarke! I begin to fear
the worst.
As to my individual self, I am tranquil, and would despise myself, if
I were not; but Burns's poor widow, and half-a-dozen of his dear
little ones--helpless orphans! --_there_ I am weak as a woman's tear.
Enough of this! 'Tis half of my disease.
I duly received your last, enclosing the note. It came extremely in
time, and I am much obliged by your punctuality. Again I must request
you to do me the same kindness. Be so very good, as, by return of
post, to enclose me _another_ note. I trust you can do it without
inconvenience, and it will seriously oblige me. If I must go, I shall
leave a few friends behind me, whom I shall regret while consciousness
remains. I know I shall live in their remembrance. Adieu, dear Clarke.
That I shall ever see you again, is, I am afraid, highly improbable.
R. B.
* * * * *
CCCXXXVI.
TO MR. JAMES JOHNSON,
EDINBURGH.
["In this humble and delicate manner did poor Burns ask for a copy of
a work of which he was principally the founder, and to which he had
contributed _gratuitously_ not less than one hundred and eighty-four
_original, altered, and collected_ songs! The editor has seen one
hundred and eighty transcribed by his own hand, for the
'Museum. '"--CROMEK. Will it be believed that this "humble
request" of Burns was not complied with! The work was intended as a
present to Jessie Lewars. ]
_Dumfries, 4th July, 1796.
