Is there in human form that bears a heart, A wretch, a villain, lost to love and truth, That can, with studied, sly, ensnaring art, Betray sweet Jenny's unsuspecting youth? Curse on his perjured arts! dissembling smooth! Are honour, virtue, conscience, all exiled? Is there no pity, no relenting ruth, Points to the parents fondling o'er their child— Then paints the ruined maid, and their distraction wild? But now the supper crowns their simple board: The halesome parritch, chief o' Scotia's food; The soup their only hawkie does afford, That 'yont the hallan snugly chows her cud; The dame brings forth, in complimental mood, To grace the lad, her weel-hained kebbuck fell, An' aft he's pressed, an' aft he ca's it good; The frugal wifie, garrulous, will tell How 'twas a towmond auld, sin' lint was i' the bell. The cheerfu' supper done, wi' serious face The big Ha'-Bible, ance his father's pride: His bonnet rev'rently is laid aside, His lyart haffets wearin' thin and bare; Those strains that once did sweet in Zion glide, He wales a portion with judicious care; Then kneeling down to Heaven's eternal King, The saint, the father, and the husband prays: Hope "springs exulting on triumphant wing," That thus they all shall meet in future days; There ever bask in uncreated rays, No more to sigh, or shed the bitter tear- Compared with this, how poor religion's pride, Devotion's every grace except the heart! The Power, incensed, the pageant will desert, The pompous strain, the sacerdotal stole; But haply, in some cottage far apart, May hear, well pleased, the language of the soul, And in His book of life the inmates poor enrol. Then homeward all take off their sev'ral way; And "Let us worship God," he says with Would, in the way His wisdom sees the best, solemn air. They chant their artless notes in simple guise; The tickled ear no heartfelt raptures raise- The priest-like father reads the sacred page: How Abraham was the friend of God on high; Or Moses bade eternal warfare wage With Amalek's ungracious progeny; Or how the royal bard did groaning lie Beneath the stroke of Heaven's avenging ire; Or Job's pathetic plaint, and wailing cry; Or rapt Isaiah's wild, seraphic fire; Or other holy seers that tune the sacred lyre. Perhaps the Christian volume is the theme: How guiltless blood for guilty man was shed; How He, who bore in heaven the second name, Had not on earth whereon to lay His head; How his first followers and servants spedThe precepts sage they wrote to many a land; How he, who, lone in Patmos banished, Saw in the sun a mighty angel stand, And heard great Bab'lon's doom pronounced by Heaven's command. For them and for their little ones provide-But chiefly in their hearts with grace divine preside. From scenes like these old Scotia's grandeur springs, That makes her loved at home, revered abroad, Princes and lords are but the breath of kings "An honest man's the noblest work of God;" And, certes, in fair virtue's heavenly road, The cottage leaves the palace far behind. What is a lordling's pomp? a cumbrous load, Disguising oft the wretch of human kind, Studied in arts of hell, in wickedness refined! O Scotia! my dear, my native soil! For whom my warmest wish to Heaven is sent! Long may thy hardy sons of rustic toil Be blest with health, and peace, and sweet content! And, O may Heaven their simple lives prevent O Thou! who poured the patriotic tide That streamed through Wallace's undaunted heart Who dared to nobly stem tyrannic pride, Or nobly die, the second glorious part— (The patriot's God peculiarly Thou art-His friend, inspirer, guardian, and reward!) O never, never Scotia's realm desert; But still the patriot and the patriot bard In bright succession raise, her ornament and guard! TAM O' SHANTER.1 "Of Brownyis and of Bogilis full is this Buke." When chapman billies leave the street, We think na on the lang Scots miles, This truth fand honest Tam' o' Shanter, As he, frae Ayr, ae night did canter (Auld Ayr, wham ne'er a town surpasses For honest men and bonnie lassies). O Tam! hadst thou but been sae wise Thou would be found deep drown'd in Doon, "In the inimitable tale of Tam o' Shanter' he has left us sufficient evidence of his ability to combine the Iudicrous with the awful, and even horrible. No poet, with the exception of Shakspere, ever possessed the power of exciting the most varied and discordant emotions with such rapid transitions."-Sir Walter Scott, "To the last Burns was of opinion that 'Tam o' Shanter' was the best of all his productions; and although it does not always happen that poet and public come to the same conclusion on such points, I believe the decision in question has been all but unanimously approved of." -John Gibson Lockhart. Ah, gentle dames! it gars me greet To think how monie counsels sweet, How monie lengthened sage advices, The husband frae the wife despises! But to our tale: ae market night Tam had got planted unco right, Fast by an ingle, bleezing finely, Wi' reaming swats that drank divinely; And at his elbow souter Johnny, His ancient, trusty, drouthy cronyTam lo'ed him like a vera brither— They had been fou for weeks thegither. The night drave on wi' sangs and clatter; And ay the ale was growing better. The landlady and Tam grew gracious, Wi' favours secret, sweet, and precious; The souter tauld his queerest stories; The landlord's laugh was ready chorus: The storm without might rair and rustle, Tam didna mind the storm a whistle. Care, mad to see a man sae happy, E'en drowned himself amang the nappy; As bees flee hame wi' lades o' treasure, The minutes winged their way wi' pleasure; Kings may be blest, but Tam was glorious, O'er a' the ills o' life victorious. But pleasures are like poppies spread, A moment white-then melts for ever; That flit ere you can point their place; Nae man can tether time or tide; The hour approaches Tam maun ride— That hour o' night's black arch the key-stane, That dreary hour he mounts his beast in; As ne'er poor sinner was abroad in. The wind blew as 'twad blaw its last; Weel mountit on his gray mare, Meg Whyles holding fast his guid blue bonnet, Kirk-Alloway was drawing nigh, By this time he was cross the ford, Thro' ilka bore the beams were glancing, Inspiring bold John Barleycorn! What dangers thou canst make us scorn! Wi' tippenny we fear nae evil; Wi' usquebae we'll face the devil!The swats sae ream'd in Tammie's noddle, Fair play, he car'd na deils a bodle. But Maggie stood right sair astonish'd, Till, by the heel and hand admonish'd, She ventured forward on the light; And, vow! Tam saw an unco sightWarlocks and witches in a dance: Nae cotillion brent new frae France, But hornpipes, jigs, strathspeys, and reels Put life and mettle in their heels. A winnock-bunker in the east, There sat auld Nick, in shape o' beastA towzie tyke, black, grim, and largeTo gie them music was his charge; He screw'd the pipes and gart them skirl, Till roof and rafters a' did dirl. Coffins stood round like open presses, That shaw'd the dead in their last dresses; And by some devilish cantrip sleight Each in its cauld hand held a lightBy which heroic Tam was able To note upon the haly table, A murderer's banes in gibbet airns; Twa span-lang, wee, unchristen'd bairns; As Tammie glower'd, amazed, and curious, The mirth and fun grew fast and furious; The piper loud and louder blew; The dancers quick and quicker flew; They reeled, they set, they crossed, they cleek it, Till ilka carlin swat and reekit, And coost her duddies to the wark, And linkit at it in her sark. Now Tam, O Tam! had they been queans A' plump and strapping in their teens: Their sarks, instead o' creeshie flannen, Been snaw-white seventeen-hunder linen; Thir breeks o' mine, my only pair, That ance were plush o' guid blue hair, I wad hae gi'en them aff my hurdies, For ae blink o' the bonnie burdies! But withered beldams auld and droll, Rigwoodie hags wad spean a foal, Louping an' flinging on a cruminockI wonder didna turn thy stomach. But Tam kenn'd what was what fu' brawlie. There was ae winsome wench and walie, That night enlisted in the core, (Lang after kenn'd on Carrick shore: For monie a beast to dead she shot, And perish'd monie a bonnie boat, And shook baith meikle corn and bere, And kept the country-side in fear), Her cutty-sark o' Paisley harn, That while a lassie she had wornIn longitude tho' sorely scanty, It was her best, and she was vauntie. Ah! little kenn'd thy reverend grannie That sark she coft for her wee Nannie, Wi' twa pund Scots ('twas a' her riches), Wad ever grac'd a dance o' witches! But here my muse her wing maun cow'r, As bees bizz out wi' angry fyke, When pop! she starts before their nose; As eager runs the market crowd, Ah, Tam ah, Tam! thou'lt get thy fairin'! Now, wha this tale o' truth shall read, THE VISION. DUAN FIRST. 2 The sun had closed the winter day, While faithless snaws ilk step betray The thresher's weary flingin'-tree Ben i' the spence right pensivelie 1 It is a well-known fact that witches, or any evil spirits, have no power to follow a poor wight any farther than the middle of the next running stream. It may be proper likewise to mention to the benighted traveller, that when he falls in with bogles, whatever danger there may be in his going forward, there is much more hazard in turning back. of Mac 2 Duan, a term of Ossian's for the different divisions of a digressive poem. See his "Cath-Loda" pherson's translation. Here rivers in the sea were lost; There distant shone art's lofty boast, Here Doon poured down his far-fetched floods; And many a lesser torrent scuds, Low, in a sandy valley spread, There, where a sceptered Pictish shade Bold, soldier-featured, undismayed, Through many a wild romantic grove, An aged judge, I saw him rove, With deep-struck reverential awe 5 Brydone's brave wards I well could spy Where many a patriot name on high, DUAN SECOND. With musing deep, astonished stare, I viewed the heavenly-seeming fair; A whispering throb did witness bear Of kindred sweet, When, with an elder sister's air, "All hail! my own inspired bard, I come to give thee such reward "Know the great genius of this land Has many a light aerial band, Who, all beneath his high command, Harmoniously, conduct and intrepid valour of the gallant laird of Craigie, who died of his wounds after the action. 5 Coilus, king of the Picts, from whom the district of Kyle is said to take its name, lies buried, as tradition says, near the family seat of the Montgomeries of Coilsfield, where his burial place is still shown. 6 Barskimming and its proprietor Thomas Miller, lord justice-clerk, were here in the poet's eye. - ED. Dr. Matthew Stewart the mathematician, and his son Dugald Stewart the metaphysician, are here meant. -ED. 8 Colonel Fullarton, |