Old Loda', still rueing the arm of Fingal,

The god of the bottle sends down from his hallThis Whistle's your challenge, in Scotland get

6

o'er,

And drink them to hell, sir, or ne'er see me more!'
Old poets have sung, and old chronicles tell,
What champions ventur'd, what champions fell;
The son of great Loda was conqueror still,
And blew on the Whistle his requiem shrill.
Till Robert, the lord of the Cairn and the Scaur,
Unmatch'd at the bottle, unconquer'd in war,
He drank his poor god-ship as deep as the sea,
No tide of the Baltic e'er drunker than he.

Thus Robert, victorious, the trophy has gain'd,
Which now in his house has for ages remain'd;
Till three noble chieftains, and all of his blood,
The joyial contest again have renew'd.
Three joyous good fellows, with hearts clear of
flaw;

Craigdarroch, so famous for wit, worth, and law;
And trusty Glenriddel, so skill'd in old coins;
And gallant Sir Robert, deep read in old wines.
Craigdarroch began, with a tongue smooth as oil,
Desiring Glenriddel to yield up the spoil;

Or else he would muster the heads of the clan, And once more, in claret, try which was the man.

By the gods of the ancients!' Glenriddel replies, Before I surrender so glorious a prize,

I'll conjure the ghost of the great Rorie More2, And bumper his horn with him twenty times o'er.'

1 See Ossian's Caric-thura.

2 See Johnson's Tour to the Hebrides.

Sir Robert, a soldier, no speech would pretend, But he ne'er turn'd his back on his foe- or his friend,

Said, toss down the Whistle, the prize of the field, And knee-deep in claret, he'd die ere he'd yield.

To the board of Glenriddel our heroes repair,
So noted for drowning of sorrow and care;
But for wine and for welcome not more known to
fame,
[dame.
Than the sense, wit, and taste, of a sweet lovely

A bard was selected to witness the fray,
And tell future ages the feats of the day;
A bard who detested all sadness and spleen,
And wish'd that Parnassus a vineyard had been.
The dinner being over, the claret they ply,
And ev'ry new cork is a new spring of joy;
In the bands of old friendship and kindred so set,
And the bands grew the tighter the more they

were wet.

Gay pleasure ran riot as bumpers ran o'er;
Bright Phoebus ne'er witness'd so joyous a core,
And vow'd that to leave them he was quite forlorn,
Till Cynthia hinted he'd see them next morn.

Six bottles a-piece had well wore out the night,
When gallant Sir Robert, to finish the fight,
Turn'd o'er in one bumper a bottle of red,
And swore 'twas the way that their ancestors did.
Then worthy Glenriddel, so cautious and sage,
No longer the warfare, ungodly, would wage;
A high-ruling Elder to wallow in wine!
He left the foul business to folks less divine.

The gallant Sir Robert fought hard to the end; But who can with fate and quart bumpers contend? Though fate said—a hero should perish in light; So uprose bright Phoebus-and down fell the knight.

Next uprose our bard, like a prophet in drink; Craigdarrock, thou'lt soar when creation shall sink!

But if thou would flourish immortal in rhyme, Come-one bottle more-and have at the sublime!

Thy line, that have struggled for freedom with Bruce,

Shall heroes and patriots ever produce:

So thine be the laurel, and mine be the bay;
The field thou hast won, by yon bright god of day!'

FRAGMENT,

Inscribed to the Right Hon. C. I. Fox.

How wisdom and folly meet, mix, and unite; How virtue and vice blend their black and their

white;

How genius, the' illustrious father of fiction, Confounds rule and law, reconciles contradiction

I sing: If these mortals, the critics, should bustle, I care not, not I, let the critics go whistle.

But now for a Patron, whose name and whose glory

At once may illustrate and honour my story.

Thou first of our orators, first of our wits; Yet whose parts and acquirements seem mere lucky hits; [strong, With knowledge so vast, and with judgment so No man with the half of 'em e'er went far wrong; With passions so potent, and fancies so bright, No man with the half of 'em e'er went quite right; A sorry, poor, misbegot son of the Muses, For using thy name offers fifty excuses.

Good L-d,what is man! for as simple he looks, Do but try to develop his hooks and his crooks: With his depths and his shallows, his good and his evil,

All in all he's a problem must puzzle the devil. On his one ruling passion sir Pope hugely labours, That, like th' old Hebrew walking-switch, eats up its neighbours:

Mankind are his show-box-a friend, would you know him?

Pull the string, ruling passion the picture will show him.

What pity, in rearing so beauteous a system, One trifling particular, truth, should have miss'd him;

For, spite of his fine theoretic positions,
Mankind is a science defies definitions.

Some sort all our qualities each to its tribe, And think human nature they truly describe; Have you found this, or t' other, there's more in the wind,

As by one drunken fellow his comrades you'll find.
But such is the flaw, or the depth of the plan,
In the make of the wonderful creature, call'd Man,

No two virtues, whatever relation they claim, Nor even two different shades of the same, Though like as was ever twin brother to brother, Possessing the one shall imply you've the other.

Wow, but

TO DR. BLACKLOCK.

Ellisland, 21st Oct. 1789.

your letter made me vauntie!
And are ye hale, and weel, and cantie?
I kenn'd it still your wee bit jauntie
Wad bring ye to:

Lord send you aye as weel's I want ye,
And then ye'll do.

The ill-thief blaw the Heron south!
And never drink be near his drouth!
He tald mysel by word o' mouth,

He'd tak my letter;

I lippen'd to the chiel in trouth,

And bade nae better.

But aiblins honest Master Heron
Had at the time some dainty fair one,

To ware his theologic care on,

And holy study;

And tir'd o' sauls to waste his lear on,

E'en tried the body'.

Mr. Heron, author of the History of Scotland, and of various other works.