FOR came partner with Kincaid in 1771 and the firm itself in LAMENT 1773: when his shop, standing to the north of St. Giles', was soon, in Cockburn's phrase, 'the natural resort of wILLIAM lawyers, authors, and all sorts of literary allies.' In his CREECH house, too, he held literary gatherings, which came to be called 'Creech's levees.' To his social qualities and his ascendancy in literary and municipal Edinburgh the Lament bears witness. Another trait in his charactera combination of bad business habits with a certain keenness over money-revealed itself in so unpleasant a fashion to Burns, in connexion with the settlement over the Poems, that the men's relations were strained and distant ever after: Burns from this time forth addressing Creech as 'Sir,' and in a fragment (see p. 235), meant for part of a Poet's Progress, describing him as 'A little, upright, pert, tart, tripping wight, And still his precious self his dear delight.' Before this, and before writing the Lament, Burns had mastered all Creech's peculiarities; and in his Second Common Place Book (in the possession of Mr. Macmillan) he gives a portrait which must be regarded as corrective of eulogy and satire alike:-'My worthy bookseller, Mr. Creech, is a strange, multiform character. His ruling passions of the left-hand kind areextreme vanity, and something of the more harmless modifications of selfishness. The one, mixed as it often is with great goodness of heart, makes him rush into all public matters, and take every instance of unprotected merit by the hand, provided it is in his power to hand it into public notice; the other quality makes him, amid all the embarass in which his vanity entangles him, now and then to cast half a squint at his own interest. His parts as a man, his deportment as a gentleman, and his abilities as a scholar, are much above mediocrity. Of all the Edinburgh literati and wits he writes the most like a gentleman. He does not awe you with the pro LAMENT foundness of the philosopher, or strike your eye with FOR the soarings of genius; but he pleases you with the handWILLIAM some turn of his expression, and the polite ease of his CREECH paragraph. His social demeanour and powers, particu larly at his own table, are the most engaging I have ever met with.' Creech was publisher of The Mirror, The Lounger, and the works of the chief Scots authors of his day. He contributed a number of Essays to The Edinburgh Courant, which he reprinted in a volume under the title Fugitive Pieces, 1791 (a second edition, published posthumously, with an account of his life, appeared in 1815). His Account of the Manners and Customs in Scotland between 1763 and 1783, originally contributed to the Courant, was brought down to 1793 and published in the Statistical Account of Scotland. He was also the author of An Account of the Trial of Wm. Brodie and George Smith (1789), having sat on the jury by which the famous Deacon was tried. He was a founder of the Speculative Society and the Edinburgh Chamber of Commerce. In 1811-13 he was Lord Provost. He died 14th January 1815. The Lament was published by Cromek. For the use of the original мs. sent to Creech, we are indebted to the Rev. Charles Watson, D.D., Northfield, Largs. STANZA I. LINE I. 'Auld chuckie Reekie':— 'Auld Reekie' = Edinburgh; not because Edinburgh is abnormally smoky, but because her smoke is visible from many heights. STANZA II. LINE I. 'Willie was an unco wight,' deleted reading in the MS. 5. 'I fear they'll busk her like a fright,' deleted reading in the MS. STANZA IV. LINE I. 'Gawkies' and 'tawpies' are here the diminutives or feminines of 'gowks' and 'fools.' 'Gawkie'— (Cf. the song Bess the Gawkie)-is derived from Gowk (the cuckoo, a giddy-pated bird), which is Scots, as 'cuckoo' is Shakespearian English-(Cf. First Henry IV., II. iv. 344:'O'horseback, ye cuckoo')—for a daft or stupid person. STANZA VII. LINE 1. Now worthy Greg'ry's Latin face': -James Gregory (b. 1753, d. 1821), the famous Professor LAMENT of Medicine, was a great hand at Latin quotations, and is said FOR by Cockburn to have had a strikingly powerful countenance.' WILLIAM For Gregory's stringent criticism of The Wounded Hare, see CREECH Vol. i. p. 442. 2. Tytler's and Greenfield's modest grace': -Not William Tytler the historian, then an old man, but his son, A. F. Tytler, (b. 1747, d. 1813), afterwards Lord Woodhouselee, at this time Professor of Civil History, who wrote a Life of Lord Kames (1807), an Historical and Critical Essay on the Life of Petrarch (1810), and a sensible essay on The Genius and Writings of Allan Ramsay (1800). He sat on that 'jury of literati' to which Burns submitted the new material for the First Edinburgh, and assisted him in revising the proofs for a later Edition. William Greenfield was minister of St. Andrew's parish and Professor of Rhetoric, but in 1798, being charged with a nameless offence, he demitted his offices and left Scotland. In his Second Common Place Book Burns extols 'his good sense, his joyous hilarity, his sweetness of manners and modesty.' 3. 'M'Kenzie, Stewart, such a brace' :-Henry Mackenzie, author of The Man of Feeling, who had written an appreciation of Burns's Poems in The Lounger for December 1736; and Dugald Stewart, described in the Second Common Place Book as 'the most perfect character I ever saw.' VERSES WRITTEN IN FRIARS CARSE June 1788 THIS is the first version of the Hermitage verses (see Vol. i. p. 258): that which was actually inscribed on the Friars Carse window-pane-now in the Observatory Museum, Dumfries-мs. (A). It was also inscribed in the Second Common Place Book-мs. (B). The other мss. on which our text is based are those in the Edinburgh University Library -MS. (C); the Glenriddell Book-мs. (D); the Afton Lodge Book-мs. (E); the Ms. sent to William Dunbar-мs. (F); and a мs. in the possession of Mr. A. C. Lamb, Dundee -MS. (G). The verses were published in Currie (1800). WRITTEN LINE 6. After this line the following couplet-also in some IN FRIARS MSS. of the second version-appears in Cunningham (1834); but it does not occur in the Geddes Ms., from which Cunningham took the verses (Ms. Note in an interleaved copy in the British Museum):: CARSE 'Day, how rapid in its flight! Day, how few must see the night.' 12. In this 8. Fear not clouds will ever lour,' MS. (C). 'Peace, the tend'rest flow'r of Spring, but this reading is deleted in MS. (B) for the much better 18. ELEGY ON THE DEPARTED YEAR, 1788 SENT by Burns to The Courant, where it appeared on 10th January 1789, above the signature Thomas A. Linn. Printed, too, anonymously in Lloyd's Evening Post of January 12-14, headed For the Evening Post.' It was first republished in No. 1 Tract, Printed by David Willison, Craig's Close, for George Gray, Bookseller, No. 3 North Bridge, Edinburgh'; and was included in Oliver (Edinburgh 1801), and in Stewart's Poems Ascribed to Robert Burns (Glasgow 1801). The common source of these reprints was the copy sent by Burns to The Courant; but a second and inferior set was published in Cromek's Reliques (1808). LINE II. The Tulzie's sair 'tween Pitt and Fox,' Cromek. 12. 'An' 'tween our Maggie's twa wee cocks,' Cromek. 15. 'The tither's something dour o' treadin,' Cromek. 18. 'Roupet:' -See Vol. i. p. 324, Note to The Author's Earnest Cry and Prayer, STANZA II. LINE I. 20. 'Meal':-Even yet the clergymen of the Church of Scotland are paid in kind-their stipend being reckoned in chalders. 28. How dowff an' ON THE YEAR dowie now they creep,' Courant, etc. 30. For Embro' wells DEPARTED are grutten dry':-During December 1788 there was the coldest weather in Scotland, and the Edinburgh wells were all frozen. 35. Nae handcuff'd mizl'd hap-shackl'd Regent,' Cromek :See post, p. 389, Prefatory Note to Ode to the Departed Regency Bill. CASTLE GORDON BURNS was introduced to the Duchess of Gordon in Edinburgh (1786-7). And during his northern tour in 1787 he called at Gordon Castle on 7th September, as recorded in his Journal:- Cross the Spey to Fochabers -fine palace, worthy of the noble, the polite, the generous proprietor. Dine. Company:-Duke and Duchess, Ladies Charlotte and Madeline; Colonel Abercrombie and Lady, Mr. Gordon, and Mr. -, a clergyman, a venerable, aged figure, and Mr. Hoy, a clergyman too, I suppose― pleasant open manner. The Duke makes me happier than ever great man did-noble, princely, yet mild, condescending and affable, gay and kind; the Duchess charming, witty and sensible. God bless them.' The piece was suggested by this visit. Burns sent it to Mr. Hoy, the Duke's librarian, who wrote to him that the Duchess wished he had written in Scotch. It was published by Currie (1800), who states that it was composed for the tune Morag. This is confirmed by the Second Common Place Book-мs. (A)—where it is inscribed as 'intended to be sung to the tune Morag.' In a Ms. — MS. (B)-belonging to the Earl of Rosebery, it is described as wrote at Castle Gordon,' and 'intended to be sung to the tune Castle Gordon.' As matter of fact, Burns did not adapt it to any air. If he meant it for Morag, he must have been ill acquainted with Morag, which it does not fit. It may be that, finding this to be the case, he wrote The Young Highland Rover (see Vol. iii.). It is worth recalling how the Duchess told Sir Walter |