I always remember Mrs Hamilton and Miss Kennedy in my poetic prayers, but you both in prose and verse. May cauld ne'er catch you but a hap, Nor hunger but in plenty's lap! Amen! R. B. No. XXXVI. TO JOHN BALLANTINE, Esq., BANKER, AYR. MY HONOURED Friend, no more. EDINBURGH, 13th Dec. 1786. I WOULD not write you till I could have it in my power to give you some account of myself and my matters, which by the bye is often no easy task.-I arrived here on Tuesday was se'nnight, and have suffered ever since I came to town with a miserable head-ache and stomach complaint, but am now a good deal better.—I have found a worthy warm friend in Mr Dalrymple of Orangefield, who introduced me to Lord Glencairn, a man whose worth and brotherly kindness to me, I shall remember when time shall be -By his interest it is passed in the "Caledonian Hunt," and entered in their books, that they are to take each a copy of the second edition, for which they are to pay one guinea.—I have been introduced to a good many of the noblesse, but my avowed patrons and patronesses are, the Duchess of Gordon-the Countess of Glencairn, with my Lord, and Lady Betty*-the Dean of Faculty-Sir John Whitefoord.-I have likewise warm friends among the literati; Professors Stewart, Blair, and Mr Mackenzie -the Man of Feeling.-An unknown hand left ten guineas for the Ayrshire bard with Mr Sibbald, which I got. I since have discovered my generous unknown friend to be Patrick Miller, Esq., brother to the Justice Clerk; and Lady Betty Cunningham. drank a glass of claret with him by invitation at his own house yesternight. I am nearly agreed with Creech to print my book, and I suppose I will begin on Monday, I will send a subscription bill or two, next post; when I intend writing my first kind patron, Mr Aikin. I saw his son today, and he is very well. Dugald Stewart, and some of my learned friends, put me in the periodical paper called the Lounger,* a copy of which I here inclose you.-I was, Sir, when I was first honoured with your notice, too obscure; now I tremble lest I should be ruined by being dragged too suddenly into the glare of polite and learned observation. I shall certainly, my ever honoured patron, write you an account of my every step; and better health and more spirits may enable me to make it something better than this stupid matter-of-fact epistle. I have the honour to be, Good Sir, Your ever grateful humble servant, R. B. If any of my friends write me, my direction is, care of Mr Creech, bookseller. No. XXXVII. TO MR ROBERT MUIR. MY DEAR FRIEND, EDINBURGH, Dec. 20th, 1786. I HAVE just time for the carrier, to tell you that I received your letter ; of which I shall say no more but what a lass of my acquaintance said of her bastard wean; she said she "didna ken wha was the father exactly, but she The paper here alluded to was written by Mr Mackenzie, the celebrated author of "The Man of Feeling." suspected it was some o' thae bonny blackguard smugglers, for it was like them." So I only say, your obliging epistle was like you. I inclose you a parcel of subscription bills. Your affair of sixty copies is also like you; but it would not be like me to comply. Your friend's notion of my life has put a crotchet in my head of sketching it in some future epistle to you. My compliments to Charles and Mr Parker. R. B. No. XXXVIII. TO MR WILLIAM CHALMERS, WRITER, AYR. MY DEAR FRIEND, EDINBURGH, Dec. 27th, 1786. I CONFESS I have sinned the sin for which there is hardly any forgiveness-ingratitude to friendship-in not writing you sooner; but of all men living, I had intended to have sent you an entertaining letter; and by all the plodding, stupid powers, that in nodding conceited majesty, preside over the dull routine of business—a heavily-solemn oath this! I am and have been, ever since I came to Edinburgh, as unfit to write a letter of humour, as to write a commentary on the Revelation of St John the Divine, who was banished to the Isle of Patmos, by the cruel and bloody Domitian, son to Vespasian and brother to Titus, both emperors of Rome, and who was himself an emperor, and raised the second or third persecution, I forget which, against the Christians, and after throwing the said Apostle John, brother to the Apostle James, commonly called James the Greater, to distinguish him from another James, who was on some account or other, known by the name of James the Less-after throwing him into a caldron of boiling oil, from which he was miraculously preserved, he banished the poor son of Zebedee to a desert island in the Archipelago, where he was gifted with the second sight, and saw as many wild beasts as I have seen since I came to Edinburgh; which, a circumstance not very uncommon in story-telling, brings me back to where I set out. To make you some amends for what, before you reach this paragraph, you will have suffered, I inclose you two poems I have carded and spun since I passed Glenbuck. One blank in the address to Edinburgh—“ Fair B—————,” is heavenly Miss Burnet, daughter to Lord Monboddo, at whose house I have had the honour to be more than once. There has not been anything nearly like her in all the combinations of beauty, grace, and goodness the great Creator has formed, since Milton's Eve on the first day of her existence. My direction is-care of Andrew Bruce, merchant, Bridge Street. No. XXXIX. TO THE EARL OF EGLINTON. MY LORD, R. B. EDINBURGH, January, 1787. As I have but slender pretensions to philosophy, I cannot rise to the exalted ideas of a citizen of the world, but have all those national prejudices, which I believe glow peculiarly strong in the breast of a Scotchman. There is scarcely any thing to which I am so feelingly alive as the honour and welfare of my country and as a poet, I have no higher enjoyment than singing her sons and daughters. Fate had cast my station in the veriest shades of life; but never did a heart pant more ardently than mine to be distinguished; though till very lately I looked in vain on every side for a ray of light. It is easy then to guess how much I was gratified with the countenance and approbation of one of my country's most illustrious sons, when Mr Wauchope called on me yesterday on the part of your lordship. Your munificence, my lord, certainly deserves my very grateful acknowledgments; but your patronage is a bounty peculiarly suited to my feelings. I am not master enough of the etiquette of life to know, whether there be not some impropriety in troubling your lordship with my thanks, but my heart whispered me to do it. From the emotions of my inmost soul I do it. Selfish ingratitude I hope I am incapable of; and mercenary servility, I trust, I shall ever have so much honest pride as to detest. R. B. No. XL. TO JOHN BALLANTINE, ESQ.* MY HONOURED FRIEND, EDINBURGH, Jan. 14th, 1787. It gives me a secret comfort to observe in myself that I am not yet so far gone as Willie Gaw's Skate, “past redemption;" for I have still this favourable symptom of grace, that when my conscience, as in the case of this letter, tells me I am leaving something undone that I ought to do, it teazes me eternally till I do it. I am still "dark as was Chaos" in respect to futurity My generous friend, Mr Patrick Miller, has been talking with me about a lease of some farm or other in an estate called Dalswinton, which he has lately bought near Dumfries. Some life-rented embittering recollections whisper This letter was first published in Cromek's Reliques of Burns, to which work we are also indebted for the one immediately following.-M. This is one of a great number of old saws that Burns, when a lad, had picked up from his mother, of which the good old woman had a vast collection. |