I will fight France with you, Dumourier; I will fight France with you, Dumourier; I will take my chance with you; By my soul, I'll dance a dance with you, Du mourier. Ther. let us fight about, Dumourier; Then let us fight about, Till freedom's spark is out, Then we'll be damned, no doubt - Dumourier. THE LAST TIME I CAME O'ER THE MOOR. The sentiments expressed in this song are not pleas ing. They hint at a discreditable passion, in which no pure mind could possibly sympathize; therefore they must be held as unfitted for song. It can scarcely be doubted that they were suggested by some roving sen sations of the bard towards the too-witching Mrs. Riddel, though that these bore no great proportion to the emissary of the Convention, so much his friend that he had similar hopes of him, which, however, were disappointed. The latter person lived to figure in the crisis of the Restora tion in 1814. mere métier of the artist aiming at a certain literary effect is equally probable. It will be found that Burns afterwards made considerable alterations in the song. THE last time I came o'er the moor, And left Maria's dwelling, What throes, what tortures passing cure, To feel a fire in every vein, Love's veriest wretch, despairing, I I know my doom must be despair, Thou wilt nor canst relieve me; But, O Maria, hear my prayer, The music of thy tongue I heard, The wheeling torrent viewing, April, 1793. BLITHE HAE I BEEN ON YON HILL. TUNE-Liggeram Cosh. BLITHE hae I been on yon hill, Lesley is sae fair and coy, Heavy, heavy is the task, Hopeless love declaring; Trembling, I dow nocht but glower, can-stare Sighing, dumb, despairing! If she winna ease the thraws In my bosom swelling, Underneath the grass-green sod, Soon maun be my dwelling. throes June, 1793. LOGAN BRAES. TUNE-Logan Water.1 "Have you ever, my dear sir, felt your bosom ready to burst with indignation, on reading of those mighty villains who divide kingdom against kingdom, desolate provinces, and lay nations waste, out of the wantonness of ambition, or often from still more ignoble passions? In a mood of this kind to-day I recollected the air of Logan Water, and it occurred to me that its querulous melody probably had its origin from the plaintive indignation of some swelling, suffering heart, fired at the tyrannic strides of some public destroyer, and overwhelmed with private distress, the consequence of a country's ruin. If I have done anything 1 The air of Logan Water is old, and there are several old songs to it. Immediately before the rise of Burns, Mr. John Mayne, who afterwards became known for a poem, entitled the Siller Gun, wrote a very agreeable song to the air, beginning, "By Logan's streams, that rin sae deep." It was published in the Star newspaper, May 23, 1789. Burns having heard that song, and supposing it to be an old composition, adopted into the above a couplet from it, which he admired "While my dear lad maun face his faes, VOL. III. 5 at all like justice to my feelings, the following song, composed in three quarters of an hour's meditation in my elbow-chair, ought to have some merit."-Burns to Mr. Thomson, 25th June, 1793. since O LOGAN, Sweetly didst thou glide Far, far frae me and Logan braes. Again the merry month o' May The bees hum round the breathing flowers; And Evening's tears are tears of joy: Within yon milk white hawthorn-bush, |