You are quite right in inserting the last five in your list, though they are certainly Irish. Shepherds, I have lost my love!' is to me a heavenly air-what would you think of a set of Scottish verses to it? I have made one to it a good while ago, but in its original state it is not quite a lady's song. I inclose an altered, not amended copy for you, if you choose to set the tune to it, and let the Irish verses follow.* Mr Erskine's songs are all pretty, but his Lone Vale' is divine. Yours, &c. Let me know just how you like these random hints. No. XX. MR THOMSON TO BURNS. EDINBURGH, April, 1793. I REJOICE to find, my dear Sir, that ballad-making continues to be your hobby-horse. Great pity 'twould be were it otherwise. I hope you will amble it away for many a year, and "witch the world with your horsemanship." I know there are a good many lively songs of merit that I have not put down in the list sent you; but I have them all in my eye. My Patie is a lover gay,' though a little * Mr Thomson, it appears, did not approve of this song, even in its altered state. It does not appear in the correspondence; but it is probably one to be found in his MSS. beginning, "Yestreen I got a pint of wine, A place where body saw na; It is highly characteristic of our Bard, but the strain of sentiment does not correspond with the air to which he proposes it should be allied.-Curric. unequal, is a natural and very pleasing song, and I humbly think we ought not to displace or alter it, except the last stanza.* No. XXI. BURNS TO MR THOMSON. April, 1793. I HAVE yours, my dear Sir, this moment. I shall answer it and your former letter, in my desultory way of saying whatever comes uppermost. The business of many of our tunes wanting, at the beginning, what fiddlers call a starting-note, is often a rub to us poor rhymers. "There's braw, braw lads on Yarrow braes, you may alter to "Braw, braw lads on Yarrow braes, Ye wander, &c." My song, 'Here awa, there awa,' as amended by Mr Erskine, I entirely approve of, and return you.† Give me leave to criticise your taste in the only thing in which it is, in my opinion, reprehensible. You know I ought to know something of my own trade. Of pathos, sentiment, and point, you are a complete judge; but there is a quality more necessary than either in a song, and which is the very essence of a ballad, I mean simplicity : * The original letter from Mr Thomson contains many observations on the Scottish songs, and on the manner of adapting the words to the music, which, at his desire, are suppressed. The subsequent letter of Mr Burns refers to several of these observations. Currie. The reader has already seen that Burns did not finally adopt all of Mr Erskine's alterations.- Currie. now, if I mistake not, this last feature you are a little apt to sacrifice to the foregoing. Ramsay, as every other poet, has not been always equally happy in his pieces; still I cannot approve of taking such liberties with an author as Mr W. proposes doing with The last time I came o'er the moor.' Let a poet, if he chooses, take up the idea of another, and work it into a piece of his own; but to mangle the works of the poor bard, whose tuneful tongue is now mute for ever, in the dark and narrow house,-by Heaven, 'twould be sacrilege! I grant that Mr W.'s version is an improvement; but I know Mr W. well, and esteem him much; let him mend the song, as the Highlander mended his gun; he gave it a new stock, a new lock, and a new barrel. I do not, by this, object to leaving out improper stanzas, where that can be done without spoiling the whole. One stanza in 'The lass o' Patie's Mill,' must be left out: the song will be nothing worse for it. I am not sure if we can take the same liberty with Corn rigs are bonnie.' Perhaps it might want the last stanza, and be the better for it. · Cauld kail in Aberdeen,' you must leave with me yet a while. I have vowed to have a song to that air, on the lady whom I attempted to celebrate in the verses, 'Poortith cauld and restless love.' At any rate my other song, 'Green grow the rashes,' will never suit. That song is current in Scotland under the old title, and to the merry old tune of that name, which, of course, would mar the progress of your song to celebrity. Your book will be the standard of Scots songs for the future : let this idea ever keep your judgment on the alarm. I send a song on a celebrated toast in this country, to suit Bonnie Dundee.' I send you also a ballad to the Mill, Mill, O.'* * The song to the tune of Bonnie Dundee,' is that in No. XVI. The ballad to the Mill, Mill, O,' is that beginning, "When wild war's deadly blasts are blawn." Currie. The last time I came o'er the moor,' I would fain attempt to make a Scots song for, and let Ramsay's be the English set. You shall hear from me soon. When you go to London on this business, can you come by Dumfries? I have still several MS. Scots airs by me, which I have picked up, mostly from the singing of country lasses. They please me vastly; but your learned lugs* would perhaps be displeased with the very feature for which I like them. I call them simple; you would pronounce them silly. Do you know a fine air called' Jackie Hume's Lament ?' I have a song of considerable merit to that air. I'll inclose you both the song and tune, as I had them ready to send to Johnson's Museum.+ I send you likewise, to me, a beautiful little air, which I had taken down from viva voce.‡ Adieu. No. XXII. BURNS TO MR THOMSON. MY DEAR SIR, April, 1793. I HAD scarcely put my last letter into the post office, when I took up the subject of The last time I came o'er the moor,' and ere I slept drew the outlines of the foregoing. How far I have succeeded, I leave on this, as on every other occasion, to you to decide. I own my vanity is flattered, when you give my songs a place in your elegant and superb work; but to be of service to the work is my first wish. As I have often told you, I do not in a • Ears. The song here mentioned is that given in No. XVIII. O ken ye what Meg o' the mill has gotten?' This song is surely Mr Burns's own writing, though he does not generally praise his own songs so much.-Note by Mr Thomson. The air here mentioned is that for which he wrote the ballad of Bonnie Jean.' See No. XXVII. single instance wish you, out of compliment to me, to insert any thing of mine. One hint let me give you-what ever Mr Pleyel does, let him not alter one iota of the original Scottish airs: I mean in the song department; but let our national music preserve its native features. They are, I own, frequently wild and irreducible to the more modern rules; but on that very eccentricity, perhaps, depends a great part of their effect. No. XXIII. MR THOMSON TO BURNS. EDINBURGH, 26th April, 1793. I HEARTILY thank you, my dear Sir, for your.last two letters, and the songs which accompanied them. I am always both instructed and entertained by your observations; and the frankness with which you speak out your mind, is to me highly agreeable. It is very possible I may not have the true idea of simplicity in composition. I confess there are several songs, of Allan Ramsay's for example, that I think silly enough, which another person, more conversant than I have been with country people, would perhaps call simple and natural. But the lowest scenes of simple nature will not please generally, if copied precisely as they are. The poet, like the painter, must select what will form an agreeable as well as a natural picture. On this subject it were easy to enlarge; but, at present, suffice it to say, that I consider simplicity, rightly understood, as a most essential quality in composition, and the groundwork of beauty in all the arts. I will gladly appropriate your most interesting new ballad, When wild war's deadly blast,' &c. to the Mill, Mill, O,' as well as the two other songs to their respective airs; but the third and fourth lines of the first verse must undergo some little al |