Thou canst not learn, nor can I show,
To paint with Thomson's landscape-glow;
Or wake the bosom-melting throe

With Shenstone's art;

Or pour, with Gray, the moving flow
Warm on the heart.

Yet all beneath th' unrivall'd rose
The lowly daisy sweetly blows;
Tho' large the forest's monarch throws
His army shade,

Yet green the juicy hawthorn grows
Adown the glade.

Then never murmur or repine;
Strive in thy humble sphere to shine:
And trust me, not Potosi's mine,

Nor kings' regard,

Can give a bliss o'ermatching thine,-
A rustic Bard.

To give my counsels all in one, —
Thy tuneful flame still careful fan;
Preserve the Dignity of Man,
With soul erect;

And trust, the Universal Plan

Will all protect.

And wear thou this," she solemn said,
And bound the holly round my head:
The polish'd leaves, and berries red,
Did rustling play;

And, like a passing thought, she fled
In light away.

ON PASTORAL POETRY.

HAIL, Poesie! thou nymph reserved!
In chase o' thee, what crowds hae swerved

Frae common sense, or sunk enerved

'Mang heaps o' clavers!

And, och! o'er aft thy joes hae starved, 'Mid a' thy favours!

Say, Lassie, why thy train amang,
While loud the trump's heroic clang,
And sock or buskin 3 skelp alang

To death or marriage;

Scarce ane has tried the shepherd-sang, But wi' miscarriage?

In Homer's craft Jock Milton thrives; Eschylus' pen Will Shakespeare drives;

3 The sock and the buskin are the ancient symbols, respectively, of comedy and tragedy.

Wee Pope, the knurlin, till him rives Horatian fame;

In thy sweet sang, Barbauld, survives
Even Sappho's flame.

But thee, Theocritus, wha matches?
They're no herd's ballats, Maro's catches;
Squire Pope but busks his skinklin
O' heathen tatters: [patches

I pass by hunders, nameless wretches,
That ape their betters.

In this braw age o' wit and lear,
Will nane the Shepherd's whistle mair
Blaw sweetly in its native air

And rural grace;

And, wi' the far-famed Grecian, share
A rival place?

Yes! there is ane: a Scottish callan,-
There's ane: come forrit, honest Allan fo
Thou need na jouk behint the hallan,
A chiel sae cleyer;

The teeth o' Time may gnaw Tantallan,
But thou's for ever.

Thou paints auld Nature to the nines,
In thy sweet Caledonian lines;
Nae gowden stream thro' myrtles twines,
Where Philomel,

While nightly breezes sweep the vines,
Her griefs will tell!

In gowany glens thy burnie strays, Where bonnie lasses bleach their claes; Or trots by hazelly shaws and braes, Wi' hawthorns grey,

Where black birds join the shepherd's lays
At close o' day.

Thy rural loves are Nature's sel';
Nae bombast spates o' nonsense swell;
Nae snap conceits, but that sweet spell
O' witchin' love,

That charm that can the strongest quell,
The sternest move.

4 See page 154, note 4.

5 A native of Syracuse, and the father of bucolic poetry as a branch of Greek literature. He lived in the latter part of the third century before the Christian era. His bucolic idyls are still held by many to be the best ever written. - Maro is one of Virgil's names.

6 Allan Ramsay, author of the Gentle Shepherd.

7 Hallan is a partition wall in a cottage, or more properly a seat of turf outside. - Tantallan is the name of a moun.

tain.

TO A MOUSE.

WEE, sleekit, cowerin', timorous beastie,
O, what a panic's in thy breastie!
Thou needna start awa' sae hasty,

Wi' bickering brattle!

I wad be laith to rin and chase thee,
Wi' murdering pattle!

I'm truly sorry man's dominion
Has broken nature's social union,
An' justifies that ill opinion

Which mak's thee startle

At me, thy poor earth-born companion, And fellow-mortal!

I doubt na, whyles, but thou may thieve; What then? poor beastie, thou maun live!

A daimen icker in a thrave

'S a sma' request:

I'll get a blessin' wi' the lave,
And never miss't!

Thy wee bit housie, too, in ruin!
Its silly wa's the win's are strewin'!
An' naething now to big a new ane,
O' foggage green!

An' bleak December's winds ensuin',
Baith snell and keen!

Thou saw the fields laid bare an' waste,
An' weary Winter comin' fast,
An' cozie here, beneath the blast
Thou thought to dwell,

Till, crash the cruel coulter past
Out through thy cell.

That wee bit heap o' leaves and stibble
Has cost thee mony a weary nibble!
Now thou's turn'd out for a' thy trouble,
But house or hauld,

To thole the Winter's sleety dribble,
An' cranreuch cauld!

But, Mousie, thou art no thy lane
In proving foresight may be vain!
The best-laid schemes o' mice and men
Gang aft a-gley,

An' lea'e us nought but grief and pain

For promised joy.

8 A farm servant was driving the plough which Burns held, when a mouse ran before them. The man would have killed it, but was restrained by the poet. Hence originated this gem of song.

9 Ancar of corn in twenty-four sheaves; that is, in a thrave.

1 But is here equivalent to without. The usage is not peculiar to Scotland. Shakespeare has it repeatedly.

THE HUMBLE PETITION OF BRUAR WATER.2

TO THE NOBLE DUKE OF ATHOLE.
MY LORD, I know your noble ear
Woe ne'er assails in vain;
Embolden'd thus, I beg you'll hear
Your humble slave complain,
How saucy Phoebus' scorching beams,
In flaming summer pride,
Dry-withering, waste my foamy streams,
And drink my crystal tide.

The lightly-jumpin', glowerin' trouts,
That through my waters play,
If, in their random, wanton spouts,
They near the margin stray;
If, hapless chance! they linger lang,
I'm scorching up so shallow,
They're left the whitening stanes amang,
In gasping death to wallow.

Last day I grat wi' spite and teen,

As Poet Burns came by,
That, to a bard, I should be seen
Wi' half my channel dry:
A panegyric rhyme, I ween,
Ev'n as I was he shored me;
But had I in my glory been,

He, kneeling, wad adored me.

Here, foaming down the shelvy rocks,
In twisting strength I rin;
There, high my boiling torrent smokes,
Wild-roaring o'er a linn:
Enjoying large each spring and well,
As Nature gave them me,

I am, although I say't mysel',
Worth gaun a mile to see.

Would then my noble master please
To grant my highest wishes,
He'll shade my banks wi' towering trees,
And bonnie spreading bushes.

2 Bruar Falls, in Athole, are exceed. ingly picturesque and beautiful; but their effect is much impaired by the want of trees and shrubs.-BURNS.

Delighted doubly then, my Lord,
You'll wander on my banks,
And listen mony a grateful bird
Return you tuneful thanks.

The sober laverock,3 warbling wild,
Shall to the skies aspire;

The gowdspink, music's gayest child,
Shall sweetly join the choir:

The blackbird strong, the lint white clear,
The mavis mild and mellow;
The robin pensive Autumn cheer,
In all her locks of yellow.

This, too, a covert shall ensure,

To shield them from the storms;
And coward maukins sleep secure,
Low in her grassy forms:

The shepherd here shall make his seat,
To weave his crown of flowers;
Or find a sheltering safe retreat,
From prone-descending showers.

And here, by sweet endearing stealth,
Shall meet the loving pair,
Despising worlds, with all their wealth,
As empty idle care:

The flowers shall vie in all their charms
The hour of heaven to grace,
And birks extend their fragrant arms
To screen the dear embrace.

Here haply too, at vernal dawn,

Some musing bard may stray, And eye the smoking, dewy lawn,

And misty mountain grey; Or, by the reaper's nightly beam, Mild-chequering through the trees, Rave to my darkly-dashing stream, Hoarse-swelling on the breeze.

Let lofty firs, and ashes cool,

My lowly banks o'erspread, And view, deep-bending in the pool, Their shadows' watery bed!

Let fragrant birks in woodbines drest
My craggy cliffs adorn;

And, for the little songster's nest,
The close embowering thorn.

So may old Scotia's darling hope,
Your little angel band,
Spring, like their fathers, up to prop
Their honour'd native land!

3 Laverock is lark; gowdspink, goldfinch; lintwhite, linnet; mavis, thrush.

So may through Albion's farthest ken, To social flowing glasses,

The grace be-"Athole's honest men, And Athole's bonnie lasses!"4

CASTLE-GORDON.

STREAMS that glide in orient plains,
Never bound by Winter's chains!

Glowing here on golden sands,
There commix'd with foulest stains

From tyranny's empurpled bands:
These, their richly-gleaming waves,
I leave to tyrants and their slaves;
Give me the stream that sweetly laves
The banks by Castle-Gordon.

Spicy forests, ever gay,
Shading from the burning ray
Hapless wretches, sold to toil,
Or the ruthless native's way,

Bent on slaughter, blood, and spoil:
Woods that ever verdant wave

I leave the tyrant and the slave;
Give me the groves that lofty brave

The storms, by Castle-Gordon.

Wildly here, without control,
Nature reigns and rules the whole;
In that sober pensive mood,
Dearest to the feeling soul,

She plants the forest, pours the flood:
Life's poor day I'll musing rave,
And find at night a sheltering cave,
Where waters flow and wild woods wave,

By bonny Castle-Gordon."

4 It seems that this poem had the desired effect. So we learn from Chambers: "Trees have been thickly planted along the chasm, and are now far advanced to maturity. Throughout this young forest a walk has been cut, and a number of fantastic little grottoes erected for the convenience of those who visit the spot.”—Professor Walker, also, notes upon the poem as follows: "Burns passed two or three days with the Duke of Athole, and was highly delighted by the attention he received. By the Duke's advice he visit ed the Falls of Bruar; and in a few days I received a letter from Inverness, with the above verses inclosed."

5 Burns conceived the idea of these verses during a brief visit to Gordon Cas tle in 1784; wrote them down as he hur ried south, and inclosed them to James Hay, the Duke's librarian. The Duchess guessed them to be written by Beattie, and, when told they were written by Burns, wished they had been in the Scot

tish dialect.

TO MISS CRUIKSHANKS,

A VERY YOUNG LADY."

(Written on the blank leaf of a book presented to her by the Author.)

BEAUTEOUS rose-bud, young and gay,
Blooming on thy early May,
Never mayst thou, lovely flower,
Chilly shrink in sleety shower!
Never Boreas' hoary path,
Never Eurus' poisonous breath,
Never baleful stellar lights,
Taint thee with untimely blights!
Never, never reptile thief
Riot on thy virgin leaf!

Nor even Sol too fiercely view
Thy bosom blushing still with dew!

Mayst thou long, sweet crimson gem,
Richly deck thy native stem;
Till some evening, sober, calm,
Dropping dews, and breathing balm,
While all around the woodland rings,
And every bird thy requiem sings;
Thou, amid the dirgeful sound,
Shed thy dying honours round,
And resign to parent earth

The loveliest form she e'er gave birth."

POOR MAILIE'S ELEGY."

LAMENT in rhyme, lament in prose,
Wi' saut tears trickling down your nose;
Our bardie's fate is at a close,

Past a' remead;

The last sad cape-stane of his woes;
Poor Mailie's dead!

It's no the loss o' warl's gear,
That could sae bitter draw the tear,
Or mak' our bardie, dowie, wear
The mourning weed:

He's lost a friend and neebor dear

In Mailie dead.

6 The young lady who inspired these beautiful lines was then only twelve years old.

7 Burns often intimated his friendships or attachments-in verse or prose, on the blank leaf of a favorite book, and then presented the volume to the object of his regard. He was mostly attached to ladies whose voices were sweet and harmonious, or who excelled in music.-WALKER. 8 The sheep, whose death occasioned this strain of laughing grief, or weeping mirth, is described as "the author's only pet yowe."

Thro' a' the toun she trotted by him;
A lang half-mile she could descry him;
Wi' kindly bleat, when she did spy him,
She ran wi' speed:

A friend mair faithful ne'er cam nigh him
Than Mailie dead.

I wat she was a sheep o' sense,
An' could behave hersel' wi' mense:
I'll say't, she never brak a fence
Through thievish greed.

Our bardie, lanely, keeps the spence
Sin' Mailie's dead.

Or, if he wanders up the howe,
Her living image, in her yowe,1
Comes bleating to him, owre the knowe,
For bits o' bread;

An' down the briny pearls rowe
For Mailie dead.

She was nae get o' moorland tips,
Wi' tawted ket, an' hairy hips;
For her forbears were brought in ships
Frae 'yont the Tweed:
A bonnier fleesh ne'er cross'd the clips
Than Mailie dead.

Wae worth the man wha first did shape
That vile, wanchancie thing,—a rape!
It mak's guid fellows girn and gape,
Wi' chokin' dread;

An' Robin's bonnet wave wi' crape
For Mailie dead.

O, a' ye bards on bonnie Doon!
An' wha on Ayr your chanters tune!
Come, join the melancholious croon
O' Robin's reed!

His heart will never get aboon
His Mailie dead.

1 Mailic's ewe lamb, or "yowie," that she had been nursing.

2 Poor Mailie was tethered in a field near the poet's house at Lochlea. She got entangled in the rope, and was thrown into a ditch; hence her death.

3 The principle of love, which is the great characteristic of Burus, often mani fests itself in the shape of humour. Ev. erywhere, in his sunny mood, a full buoy. ant flood of mirth runs through his mind: he rises to the high and stoops to the low, and is brother and playmate to all Nat ure. He has a bold and irresistible fac ulty of caricature; this is drollery rather than humour. A much tenderer sportful ness dwells in him than this, and comes forth here and there in evanescent and beautiful touches; as in his Address to a

THE AULD FARMER'S NEW-YEAR MORNING SALUTATION TO HIS

AULD MARE MAGGIE,

ON GIVING HER THE ACCUSTOMED RIPP OF CORN TO HANSEL IN THE NEW YEAR. A GUID New Year I wish thee, Maggie! Hae, there's a ripp to thy auld baggie: Tho' thou's howe-backit now an' knaggie, I've seen the day

Thou could hae gaen like ony staggie

Out-owre the lay.

Tho' now thou's dowie, stiff, an' crazy, An' thy auld hide's as white's a daisy, I've seen thee dappl't, sleek, and glalzie, A bonny grey:

He should been tight that daur't to raize Ance in a day. [thee

Thou ance was i' the foremost rank, A filly buirdly, steeve, an' swank, An' set weel down a shapely shank As e'er tread yird;

An' could hae flown out-owre a stank Like onie bird.

It's now some nine-an'-twenty year
Sin' thou was my guid father's meere:
He gied me thee, o' tocher clear,
An' fifty mark;

Tho' it was sma', 'twas weel-won gear,
An' thou was stark.

When first I gaed to woo my Jenny,
Ye then was trottin' wi' your minnie:
Though ye was trickie, slee, an' funnie,.
Ye ne'er was donsie;

But hamely, tawie, quiet an' cannie,
An' unco sonsie.

That day ye pranced wi muckle pride, When ye bure hame my bonnie bride: An' sweet an' gracefu' she did ride, Wi' maiden air!

Kyle Stewart I could hae bragged wide, For sic a pair.

Tho' now ye dow but hoyte an' hoble,
An' wintle like a saumont-coble,
That day ye was a jinker noble,
For heels an' win'!

An' ran them till they a' did wauble, Far, far behin'.

When thou an' I were young an' skeigh,
An' stable-meals at fairs were dreigh,
How thou wad prance, an' snore, an'
An' tak' the road! [skreigh,
Town's bodies ran, an' stood abeigh,
An' ca't thee mad.

When thou was corn't an' I was mellow,
We took the road aye like a swallow:
At brooses thou had ne'er a fellow
For pith and speed;

But every tail thou pay't them hollow,
Whare'er thou gaed.

The sma', droop-rumpl't, hunter cattle
Might aiblins waur't thee for a brattle;
But sax Scotch miles thou try't their
An' gar't them whaizle: [mettle,
Nae whip nor spur, but just a wattle
O' sough or hazle.

Thou was a noble fittie-lan',4

As e'er in tug or tow was drawn!
Aft thee an' I, in aught hours gaun,
In guid March weather,

Hae turn'd sax rood beside our han',
For days thegither.

Thou never braindg't, an' fech't, an' fliskit,
But thy auld tail thou wad hae whiskit,
An' spread abreed thy weel-fill'd briskit,
Wi' pith and power,

Till spritty knowes would rair't and
An' slypet owre,
[risket,

When frosts lay lang an' snaws were deep,
An' threaten'd labour back to keep,
I gied thy cog a wee bit heap
Aboon the timmer;

I kenn'd my Maggie wad na sleep
For that, or Simmer.

In cart or car thou never reestit;
The steyest brae thou wad hae fac't it;
Thou never lap, an' sten't, an' breastit,
Then stood to blaw;

But just thy step a wee thing hastit,
Thou snoov't awa'.

4 The near horse of the hindmost pair at the plough. That is the post of honour in a plough-team.

5 Hillocks with tough-rooted plants in them.- Risket is a noise like the tearing of roots.

6 Never leaped, and reared, and started forward.