let me remark to you, that in the sentiment and style of our Scottish airs there is a pastoral simplicity, a something that one may call the Doric style and dialect of vocal music, to which a dash of our native tongue and manners is particularly, nay peculiarly, apposite. For this reason, and, upon my honour, for this reason alone, I am of opinion (but, as I told you before, my opinion is yours, freely yours, to approve or reject, as you please) that my ballad of " Nannie, O!" might perhaps do for one set of verses to the tune. Now don't let it enter into your head, that you are under any necessity of taking my verses. I have long ago made up my mind as to my own reputation in the business of authorship, and have nothing to be pleased or offended at in your adoption or rejection of my verses. Though you should reject one half of what I give you, I shall be pleased with your adopting the other half, and shall continue to serve you with the same assiduity.

In the printed copy of my " Nannie, O!" the name of the river is horribly prosaic. I will alter it :

"Behind yon hills where Lugar flows."

Girvan is the name of the river that suits the idea of the stanza best, but Lugar is the most agreeable modulation of syllables.

I will soon give you a great many more remarks on this business; but I have just now an opportunity of conveying you this scrawl free of postage, an expense that it is ill able to pay: so, with my best compliments to honest Allan, Gude be wi' ye, &c.

Saturday Morning.

IN my very early years, when I was thinking of going to the West Indies, I took the following farewell of a dear girl. It is quite trifling, and has nothing of the merits of "Ewe-bughts;" but it will fill up this page. You must know that all my earlier love-songs were the breathings of ardent passion; and though it might have been easy in after-times to have given them a polish, yet that polish, to me, whose they were, and who perhaps alone cared for them, would have defaced the legend of my heart, which was so faithfully inscribed on them. Their uncouth simplicity was, as they say of wines, their race.

[Here are inserted the verses to Mary Campbell.]

No. CCLI.

TO MRS. DUNLOP.

[Supposed to have been written on the death of Mrs. Henri, her daughter.]

[October, 1792.]

I HAD been from home, and did not receive your letter until my return the other day. What shall I say to comfort you, my much-valued, muchafflicted friend! I can but grieve with you; consolation I have none to offer, except that which religion holds out to the children of affliction.

Children of affliction! — how just the expression! and like every other family, they have matters among them which they hear, see, and feel in a serious, all-important manner, of which the world has not, nor cares to have, any idea. The world looks indifferently on, makes the passing remark, and proceeds to the next novel occurrence.

Alas, Madam! who would wish for many years? What is it but to drag existence until our joys gradually expire, and leave us in a night of misery like the gloom which blots out the stars one by one from the face of night, and leaves us, without a ray of comfort, in the howling

waste!

I am interrupted, and must leave off. You shall soon hear from me again.-R. B.

No. CCLII.

TO MRS. DUNLOP.

DUMFRIES, 6th December, 1792.

I SHALL be in Ayrshire, I think, next week; and, if at all possible, I shall certainly, my much esteemed friend, have the pleasure of visiting at Dunlop House.

Alas, Madam! how seldom do we meet in this world, that we have reason to congratulate ourselves on accessions of happiness! I have not passed half the ordinary term of an old man's life, and yet I scarcely look over the obituary of a newspaper that I do not see some names that I have known, and which I, and other acquaintances, little thought to meet with there so soon. Every other instance of the mortality of our kind makes us cast an anxious look into the dreadful abyss of uncertainty, and shudder with apprehension for our own fate. But of how different an importance are the lives of different individuals! Nay, of what importance is one period of the same life, more than another! A few years ago I could have laid down in the dust, "careless of the voice of the morning ;" and now not a few, and these most helpless individuals, would, on losing me and my exertions, lose both their "staff and shield." By the way, these helpless ones have lately got an addition; Mrs. B. having given me a fine girl since I wrote you. There is a charming passage in Thomson's "Edward and Eleanora :"—

"The valiant, in himself, what can he suffer?
Or what need he regard his single woes ?"-&c.

As I am got in the way of quotations, I shall give you another from the same piece, peculiarly-alas! too peculiarly-apposite, my dear Madam, your present frame of mind :

"Who so unworthy but may proudly deck him
With his fair-weather virtue, that exults
Glad o'er the summer main? the tempest comes;
The rough winds rage aloud; when from the helm
This virtue shrinks, and in a corner lies
Lamenting.-Heavens! if privileged from trial
How cheap a thing were virtue !"

L L

I do not remember to have heard you mention Thomson's dramas. I pick up favourite quotations, and store them in my mind as ready armour, offensive or defensive, amid the struggle of this turbulent existence. Of these is one, a very favourite one, from his " Alfred : ”—

"Attach thee firmly to the virtuous deeds

And offices of life; to life itself,

With all its vain and transient joys, sit loose."

Probably I have quoted some of these to you formerly, as indeed, when I write from the heart, I am apt to be guilty of such repetitions. The compass of the heart, in the musical style of expression, is much more bounded than that of the imagination; so the notes of the former are extremely apt to run into one another; but in return for the paucity of its compass, its few notes are much more sweet. I must still give you another quotation, which I am almost sure I have given you before, but I cannot resist the temptation. The subject is religion: speaking of its importance to mankind, the author says,

"'Tis this, my friend, that streaks our morning bright."

I see you are in for double postage, so I shall e'en scribble out t'other sheet. We in this country here have many alarms of the reforming, or rather the republican, spirit of your part of the kingdom. Indeed, we are a good deal in commotion ourselves. For me, I am a placeman, you know; a very humble one indeed, Heaven knows, but still so much as to gag me. What my private sentiments are, you will find out without an interpreter.

I have taken up the subject, and the other day, for a pretty actress's benefit-night, I wrote an address, which I will give on the other page, called "The Rights of Woman :"

"While Europe's eye is fixed on mighty things."

I shall have the honour of receiving your criticisms in person at Dunlop.-R. B.

No. CCLIII.

TO G. THOMSON.

November 8th, 1792.

IF you mean, my dear Sir, that all the songs in your collection shall be poetry of the first merit, I am afraid you will find more difficulty in the undertaking than you are aware of. There is a peculiar rhythmus in many of our airs, and a necessity of adapting syllables to the emphasis, or what I would call the feature-notes of the tune, that cramp the poet, and lay him under almost insuperable difficulties. For instance, in the air, "My wife's a wanton wee thing," if a few lines smooth and pretty can be adapted to it, it is all you can expect. The following were made extempore to it; and though, on farther study, I might give you some

thing more profound, yet it might not suit the light-horse gallop of the air so well as this random clink :

MY DEAR SIR,

["The Winsome Wee Thing."]

No. CCLIV.

TO G. THOMSON.

14th November, 1792.

I agree with you that the song, "Katharine Ogie," is very poor stuff, and unworthy, altogether unworthy, of so beautiful an air. I tried to mend it; but the awkward sound, Ogie, recurring so often in the rhyme, spoils every attempt at introducing sentiment into the piece. The foregoing song [" Highland Mary"] pleases myself; I think it is in my happiest manner: you will see at first glance that it suits the air. The subject of the song is one of the most interesting passages of my youthful days; and I own that I should be much flattered to see the verses set to an air which would ensure celebrity. Perhaps, after all, 'tis the still glowing prejudice of my heart that throws a borrowed lustre over the merits of the composition.

I have partly taken your idea of " Auld Rob Morris." I have adopted the two first verses, and am going on with the song on a new plan, which promises pretty well. I take up one or another, just as the bee of the moment buzzes in my bonnet-lug; and do you, sans cérémonie, make what use you choose of the productions.-Adieu, &c.-R. B.

No. CCLV.

TO MISS FONTENELLE.

[Burns was very fond of the theatre, and had, as we have seen, some notion of trying his hand at dramatic writing. Miss Fontenelle was a youthful member of the company which at stated seasons visited Dumfries, playing such parts as "Little Pickle:" she was very sprightly and petite in figure.]

MADAM,

In such a bad world as ours, those who add to the scanty sum of our pleasures are positively our benefactors. To you, Madam, on our humble Dumfries boards, I have been more indebted for entertainment than ever I was in prouder theatres. Your charms as a woman would ensure applause to the most indifferent actress, and your theatrical talents would ensure admiration to the plainest figure. This, Madam, is not the unmeaning or insidious compliment of the frivolous or the interested: I pay it from the same honest impulse that the sublime in nature excites my admiration, or her beauties give me delight.

Will the foregoing lines ["The Rights of Woman: An Address"] be of any service to you in your approaching benefit-night? If they will, I shall

be prouder of my muse than ever. They are nearly extempore: I know they have no great merit; but though they should add but little to the entertainment of the evening, they give me the happiness of an opportunity to declare how much I have the honour to be, &c.-R. B.

MADAM,

No. CCLVI.

TO A LADY,

IN FAVOUR OF A PLAYER'S BENEFIT.

DUMFRIES.

You were so very good as to promise me to honour my friend with your presence on his benefit-night. That night is fixed for Friday first: the play a most interesting one, "The Way to keep Him." I have the pleasure to know Mr. G. well. His merit as an actor is generally acknowledged. He has genius and worth which would do honour to patronage : he is a poor and modest man; claims which from their very silence have the more forcible power on the generous heart. Alas, for pity! that from the indolence of those who have the good things of this life in their gift, too often does brazen-fronted importunity snatch that boon, the rightful due of retiring, humble want! Of all the qualities we assign to the Author and Director of Nature, by far the most enviable is to be able "to wipe away all tears from all eyes." O what insignificant, sordid wretches are they, however chance may have loaded them with wealth, who go to their graves, to their magnificent mausoleums, with hardly the consciousness of having made one poor honest heart happy!

But I crave your pardon, Madam; I came to beg, not to preach.—R. B.

No. CCLVII.

TO MRS. RIDDEL.

I WILL wait on you, my ever valued friend, but whether in the morning I am not sure. Sunday closes a period of our curst revenue business, and may probably keep me employed with my pen until noon. Fine employment for a poet's pen! There is a species of human genius that I call the gin-house class: what enviable dogs they are! Round and round and round they go. Mundell's ox, that drives his cotton-mill,* is their exact prototype-without an idea or wish beyond their circle-fat, sleek, stupid, patient, quiet, and contented; while here I sit, altogether Novemberish, a d―d mélange of fretfulness and melancholy; not enough of the one to rouse me to passion, nor of the other to repose me in torpor; my soul flouncing and fluttering round his tenement like a wild-finch, caught among the horrors of winter, and newly thrust into a cage. Well, I am persuaded that it was of me the Hebrew sage prophesied when he fore

* This was a primitive cotton-mill near Dumfries.