TOOTH- a' diseases'; but he probably suffered from it at dif- TO THE ferent periods. The chief difficulty in accepting an early date for the Address is its exclusion from his own Editions. "Tis just possible, however, that his Edinburgh advisers boggled at some of its expressions. STANZA I. LINE I. My curse on your envenom'd stang,' Brash and Reid, etc. 3. 'An' thro' my lug gies sic a twang,' MS.; 'bang,' Brash and Reid, etc. 5. Tearing my nerves wi' bitter twang,' Brash and Reid, etc. STANZA II. and III. are arranged in the text in the order in Brash and Reid, etc., which is better than Currie's. STANZA II. LINE I. 'Adown my beard the slavers trickle,' Currie. 2. 'I cast the wee stools o'er the mickle,' Brash and Reid, etc.; kick,' adopted by Cunningham, is presumably Cunningham's own. 3. While round the fire the hav'rels keckle,' Brash and Reid, etc.; ‘As' for 'While,' Currie. 4. 'I curse an' ban, an' wish a heckle,' Brash and Reid, etc.; 'While,' Currie. 5. 'Were in' their doup,' Currie. STANZA III. LINE 1. When fevers burn, or agues freeze us,' MS., Brash and Reid, etc; also in 2, 'colics squeeze us.' 3. 'Our neighbour's sympathy may ease us,' Currie; ' does' for may,' MS. 5. But thou-the Hell o' a' diseases,' MS., Brash and Reid, etc. 6. Ay mocks our groan,' Currie. STANZA IV. LINE I. In a' the num'rous human dools, MS. 2. 'Cutty-stools':-cutty-short or small. Some derive the use of the word in 'cutty-stools' from 'cutty' or 'kitty,' occasionally employed to signify a loose woman, as in the delightful ballad of Robin Red-Breast (Herd, 1769):— 'Then Robin turned him round about, E'en like a little king : "Go, pack ye out at my chamber door, It is very commonly applied to a mischievous ungrown girl; it is also a nickname for a hare; it likewise signifies the threelegged milking-stool. The present reference is, of course, to the stool of repentance. This was conspicuously placed in front of the pulpit, and the penitent, the opening prayer being done, was conducted to it by the beadle; sat on it through the ACHE TO THE service-in the olden time clothed in sackcloth (Scotticé, 'a TOOTH- harn gown'); and at the close arose from it to receive the rebuke. There were two kinds of stools, a high and a low, the high being known as the 'pillar.' Cf. the original Upstairs, Downstairs, or As I Came by Fisherraw, preserved in Herd (1769):: 'Now ye maun mount the cutty-stool, And I maun mount the pillar; And that's the way that poor folks does, Because they hae nae siller'; repeated, with variations, by Allan Ramsay in his set-(Tea Table Miscellany, 1729)—of the same song (see post, pp. 362, 363, Notes to Reply to a Trimming Epistle). 3. Or worthy friends rak'd i' the mools,' Currie. 6. Thou bears the gree,' Ms. STANZA V. LINE 2. Whence a' the tones o' mis'ry yell,' Currie. 3-4 in Brash and Reid, etc., read thus :— 'An' plagues in rankèd number tell In deadly raw.' 5. Thou, Toothache, surely bears the bell,' Ms. STANZA VI. LINE 3. 'Till daft mankind aft dance a reel,' MS. and Currie. LAMENT FOR THE ABSENCE OF WILLIAM CREECH ENCLOSED in a letter to 'William Creech, Esq., London,' dated 13th May 1787:-'My Honored Friend-the enclosed I have just wrote, nearly extempore, in a solitary Inn in Selkirk, after a miserable, wet day's riding.' The son of the Rev. William Creech, minister of Newbattle, in Midlothian, Creech was born 21st April 1745. He completed the Arts course at the University of Edinburgh; attended some medical lectures; was apprenticed to the publishers Kincaid and Bell; in 1770 accompanied Lord Kilmaurs, afterwards the Earl of Glencairn (and the patron of Burns) on a Continental tour; be WILLIE'S AWA By permission of Rev. Charles Watson, D.D., Northfield, Largs Selkirk 13th May 1787 Auld chuchie Reekie's fair diftinst But now |