personal degradation resulting from the vice they encourage : "O gude ale comes, and gude ale goes; Sell my hose, and pawn my shoon; I had sax owsen in a pleuch, And they drew teuch and weel eneuch : The remainder of this old song, which took some touches from the hand of Burns, describes a lower stage of degradation, which does not admit of being cited. An equal transgression of the limits of all legitimate license may be charged against the old song, Cauld Kail in Aberdeen, in callously making light of those who suffer most directly by the excess which it praises : "Johnnie Smith has got a wife, Wha scrimps him o' his cogie; "Twa three toddlin weans they hae, "For I maun hae my cogie, Sirs, With the unhappy exception of these drinking songs, the lyrics of Scotland, which are expressive of general social affection, may well evoke a gratitude similar to that which is due to the songs of domestic love. Many of them are written by authors of limited fame, and most of them give us glimpses of homes brightened by none of the elegances or luxuries, and even by few of the comforts, of earthly existence; but nearly all express, in cheery rhythm, the same deep consciousness of the. absolute worth of human love, the same hearty, jeering contempt of riches without that love, the same generous regard for true worth of character even when concealed behind a lowly external appearance, the same manful self-respect in the midst of "honest poverty,"—in a word, the same clear insight into "the real guid and ill" of human life, which bursts into unrestrained utterance in every verse of the domestic songs. The Scotch have been blamed—and not altogether without justice—for an absence of genial warmth in the outward expression of their affections; yet it is probably in the Scotch Auld lang syne, as revised by Burns, that we must seek the most universally recognised hymn of friendship, and of the splendour with which friendship lights up all our memories of "the days that are no more." And well is 1 This is one of the older versions of Cauld Kail in Aberdeen. song-writers have tried their hand at the theme. Several it for the people who possess, in language of which all can feel the pith, and adapted to a simple melody which all can appreciate, an expression of courageous reliance on moral worth, whose fervour carries away the soul, like A Man's a Man for a' that. "Is there, for honest poverty, That hangs his head, and a' that? Our toils obscure, and a' that; "What though on hamely fare we dine, Gie fools their silks, and knaves their wine, For a' that and a' that, Their tinsel show, and a' that; "Ye see yon birkie, ca'd a lord, Wha struts, and stares, and a' that; For a' that, and a' that, His ribbon, star, and a' that ; "A prince can mak a belted knight, But an honest man's aboon his might, Their dignities and a' that; The pith o' sense, and pride o' worth, Are higher rank than a' that. "Then let us pray that come it may, As come it will for a' that; That sense and worth, o'er a' the earth, It's coming yet for a' that, That man to man, the warld o'er, Shall brothers be for a' that." CHAPTER III. ROMANTIC BALLADS AND SONGS. "What resounds, In fable or romance, of Uther's son Paradise Lost, Book I. THE poems included under this title are based on events which, if not wholly ideal, are at least incapable of being certainly identified with any known historical transactions. This limitation of the term Romantic does not claim to be an adequate definition of it for all purposes; but it expresses a prominent characteristic of Romance, and it would be difficult to find an equally suitable term. This definition, it will be observed, does not exclude some of the poems on which remarks have been made in the previous chapters. All the legendary ballads, for example, must, as a rule, be considered romantic, in this sense of the term; and many of the social ballads and songs are evidently founded on unreal or uncertain |