assured that it would be a great mistake to attribute it wholly, or in any considerable part, to a mere jarring between the sensitive spirit of the poet and the rude contact of the worldly scene into which he was plunged. Burns did not want for a certain worldly wisdom and hardiness. His poetical powers had not in themselves exposed him to any serious evils. On the contrary, he was indebted to them for any advance in the social scene which he ever made, and even for such endowments of fortune as had befallen him. Neither was Burns so unworthily regarded by either high or low in his own day and place, as to have much occasion for complaint on that score. On the contrary, he had obtained the respectful regard of many of the very choicest men and women of his country. Whenever he appeared in aristocratic circles, his acknowledged genius, and the charms of his conversation, gave him a distinction not always readily yielded to mere wealth and rank. No: we have to look elsewhere for an explanation of the mystery. It seems to have mainly lain in the reckless violence of some of his passions, by the consequences of which he was every now and then exposed to humiliations galling to his pride. It was a refuge to his wounded feelings, to suppose that these passions were essentially connected with his poetical character. [Summer, 1791.] LATE crippled of an arm, and now a leg, Will generous Graham list to his Poet's wail? (It soothes poor Misery, hearkening to her tale) And hear him curse the light he first surveyed, And doubly curse the luckless rhyming trade? Thou, Nature, partial Nature! I arraign; The lion and the bull thy care have found, ground: Thou giv❜st the ass his hide, the snail his shell, The envenomed wasp, victorious, guards his cell; Thy minions, kings, defend, control, devour, drug, The priest and hedgehog in their robes are snug; Ev'n silly woman has her warlike arts, Her tongue and eyes, her dreaded spear and darts. But, oh! thou bitter stepmother and hard, No horns, but those by luckless Hymen worn, Critics! appalled I venture on the name, Those cut-throat bandits in the paths of fame; Bloody dissectors, worse than ten Monroes!1 He hacks to teach, they mangle to expose. His heart by causeless wanton malice wrung, wear; Foiled, bleeding, tortured, in the unequal strife, 1 Alluding to the eminent anatomist, Professor Alexander Monro, of the Edinburgh University. So, by some hedge, the generous steed deceased, Thy sons ne'er madden in the fierce extremes serve, They only wonder "some folks" do not starve. Not such the workings of their moon-struck brain; In equanimity they never dwell, By turns in soaring heaven or vaulted hell. I dread thee, Fate, relentless and severe, Glencairn, the truly noble, lies in dust; ADDRESS TO THE SHADE OF THOMSON, ON CROWNING HIS BUST AT EDNAM, ROXBURGHSHIRE, WITH BAYS. Written at the suggestion of the Earl of Buchan, for the inauguration of a temple built to Thomson on Ednam Hill. WHILE virgin Spring, by Eden's flood, Unfolds her tender mantle green, Or pranks the sod in frolic mood, While Summer with a matron grace |