will have left Scotland before this reaches you, otherwise I would send you "Holy Willie" with all my heart. I was so hurried that I absolutely forgot several things I ought to have minded, among the rest, sending books to Mr. Cowan : but any order of yours will be answered at Creech's shop. You will please remember that non-subscribers pay six shillings, this is Creech's profit ; but those who have subscribed, though their names have been neglected in the printed list, which is very incorrect, are supplied at subscription price. I was not at Glasgow, nor do I intend for London; and I think Mrs. Fame is very idle to tell so many lies on a poor poet. When you or Mr. Cowan write for copies, if you should want any, direct to Mr. Hill, at Mr. Creech's shop; and I write to Mr. Hill by this post, to answer either of your orders. Hill is Mr. Creech's first clerk, and Creech himself is presently in London. I suppose I shall have the pleasure, against your return to Paisley, of assuring you how much I am, dear sir, your obliged humble servant, R. B. XIV. TO MR. JAMES SMITH, AT MILLER AND SMITH'S OFFICE, LINLITHGOW. [Burns, it seems by this letter, had still a belief that he would be obliged to try his fortune in the West Indies: he soon saw how hollow all the hopes were, which had been formed by his friends of "pension, post or place," in his native land.] MY EVER DEAr Sir, Mauchline, 11th June, 1787. I DATE this from Mauchline, where I arrived on Friday even last. I slept at John Dow's, and called for my daughter. Mr. Hamilton and family; your mother, sister, and brother; my quondam Eliza, &c., all well. If any thing had been wanting to disgust me completely at Armour's family, their mean, servile compliance would have done it. Give me a spirit like my favorite hero, Milton's Satan : Hail, horrors! hail, Infernal world! and thou profoundest hell, I cannot settle to my mind.-Farming, the only thing of which I know any thing, and heaven above knows, but little do I understand of that, I cannot, dare not risk on farms as they are. If I do not fix, I will go for JamaiShould I stay in an unsettled state at home, I would only dissipate my little fortune, and ruin what I intend shall compensate my little ones for the stigma I have brought on their names. ca. I shall write you more at large soon; as this letter costs you no postage, if it be worth reading you cannot complain of your penny-worth. I am ever, my dear Sir, Yours, R. B. P. S. The cloot has unfortunately broke, but I have provided a fine buffalo-horn, on which I am going to affix the same cypher which you will remember was on the lid of the cloot. XV. TO ROBERT AINSLIE, Esq. [This letter, were proof wanting, shows the friendly and familiar footing on which Burns stood with the Ainslies, and more particularly with the author of that popular work, the "Reasons for the Hope that is in us."] MY DEAR AINSLIE, Mauchline, 23rd July, 1787. THERE is one thing for which I set great store by you as a friend, and it is this, that I have not a friend upon earth, besides yourself, to whom I can talk nonsense without forfeiting some degree of his esteem. Now, to one like me, who never cares for speaking any thing else but nonsense, such a friend as you is an unvaluable treasure. I was never a rogue, but have been a fool all my life; and, in spite of all my endeavors, I see now plainly that I shall never be wise. Now it rejoices my heart to have met with such a fellow as you, who, though you are not just such a hopeless fool as I, yet I trust you will never listen so much to the temptations of the devil as to grow so very wise that you will in the least disrespect an honest fellow because he is a fool. In short, I have set you down as the staff of my old age, when the whole list of my friends will, after a decent share of pity, have forgot me. Though in the morn comes sturt and strife, Yet joy may come at noon; And I hope to live a merry, merry life When a' thir days are done. Write me soon, were it but a few lines just to tell me how that good sagacious man your father is-that kind dainty body your mother-that strapping chiel your brother Douglas and my friend Rachel, who is as far before Rachel of old, as she was before her blear-eyed sister Leah. XVI. TO ROBERT AINSLIE, Esq. BERRYWELL DUNSE. R. B. [This characteristic letter was first published by Sir Harris Nicolas; others, still more characteristic, addressed to the same gentleman, are abroad; how they escaped from private keeping is a sort of riddle.] Edinburgh, 23rd August, 1787. "As I gaed up to Dunsie To warp a pickle yarn, Robin, silly body, He gat me wi' bairn." FROM henceforth, my dear sir, I am determined to set off with my letters like the periodical writers, viz., prefix a kind of text, quoted from some classic of undoubted authority, such as the author of the immortal piece, of which my text is a part. What I have to say on my text is exhausted in a letter which I wrote to you the other day, before I had the pleasure of receiving yours from Inverkeithing; and sure never was any thing more lucky, as I have but the time to write this, that Mr. Nicol, on the opposite side of the table, takes to correct a proof sheet of a thesis. They are gabbling Latin so loud that I cannot hear what my own soul is saying in my own skull, so I must just give you a matter-of-fact sentence or two, and end, if time permit, with a verse de rei generatione. To-morrow I leave Edinburgh in a chaise; Nicol thinks it more comfortable than horse-back, to which I say, Amen; so Jenny Geddes goes home to Ayrshire, to use a phrase of my mother's, wi' her finger in her mouth. Now for a modest verse of classical authority: The cats like kitchen; The dogs like broo; The lasses like the lads weel, And th' auld wives too. CHORUS. And we're a' noddin, Nid, nid, noddin, We're a' noddin fou at e'en. If this does not please you, let me hear from you; if you write any time before the 1st of September, direct to Inverness, to be left at the post-office till called for; the next week at Aberdeen, the next at Edinburgh. The sheet is done, and I shall just conclude with assuring you that I ever am, and with pride shall be, My dear sir, &c. R. B. Call the boy what you think proper, only interject Burns. What do you say to a Scripture name? Zimri Burns Ainslie, or Architophel, &c. look your Bible for these two heroes, if you do this, I will repay the compliment. |