" MADAM, Mossgiel, 18th Nov. 1786. "POETS are such outre beings, so much the children of wayward fancy and capricious whim, that I believe the world generally allows them a larger latitude in the laws of propriety, than the sober sons of judgment and prudence. I mention this as an apology for the liberties that a nameless stranger has taken with you in the enclosed poem, which he begs leave to present you with. Whether it has poetical merit any way worthy of the theme, I am not the proper judge; but it is the best my abilities can produce; and what to a good heart will perhaps be a superior grace, it is equally sincere as fervent. "The scenery was nearly taken from real life, though I dare say, Madam, you do not recollect it, as I believe you scarcely noticed the poetic reveur as he wandered by you. I had roved out as chance directed in the favourite haunts of my muse, on the banks of the Ayr, to view nature in all the gaiety of the vernal year. The evening sun was flaming over the distant western hills; not a breath stirred the crimson opening blossom, or the verdant spreading leaf. It was a golden moment for a poetic heart. I listened to the feathered warblers, pouring their harmony on every han with a congenial kindred regard, and frequently turned out of my pat lest I should disturb their little songs, or frighten them to another stati Surely, said I to myself, he must be a wretch indeed, who, regardless of your harmonious endeavour to please him, can eye your elusive flights to discover your secret recesses, and to rob you of all the property nature gives you, your dearest comforts, your helpless nestlings. Even the hoary hawthorn-twig that shot across the way, what heart at such a time but must have been interested in its welfare, and wished it preserved from the rudely-browsing cattle, or the withering eastern blast? Such was the scene, and such the hour, when in a corner of my prospect, I spied one of the fairest pieces of Nature's workmanship that ever crowned a poetic landscape, or met a poet's eye, those visionary bards excepted who hold commerce with aërial beings! Had Calumny and Villany taken my walk, they had at that moment sworn eternal peace with such an object. "What an hour of inspiration for a poet! It would have raised plain, dull, historic prose into metaphor and measure. "The enclosed song was the work of my return home; and perhaps it but poorly answers what might be expected from such a scene. "I have the honour to be," &c. ""Twas even-the dwey fields were green, On every blade the pearls hang; All nature listening seemed the while, With careless step I onward strayed, A maiden fair I chanc'd to spy; • Hang, Scotticism for hung. Perfection whispered passing by, Fair is the morn in flowery May, And sweet is night in autumn mild; O had she been a country maid, The bonny lass o' Ballochmyle. Then pride might climb the slippery steep, To tend the flocks or till the soil, With the bonny lass o' Ballochmyle. The autumn of this eventful year was now drawing to a close, and Burns, no had already lingered three months in the hope, which he now considered vain, of an excise appointment, perceived that another year must be ost altogether, unless he made up his mind, and secured his passage to the West Indies. The Kilmarnock edition of his poems was, however, nearly exhausted; and his friends encouraged him to produce another at the same place, with the view of equipping himself the better for the necessities of his voyage. But the printer at Kilmarnock would not undertake the new impression unless Burns advanced the price of the paper required for it; and with this demand the poet had no means of complying. Mr. Ballantyne, the chief magistrate of Ayr, (the same gentleman to whom the poem on the Twa Brigs of Ayr was afterwards inscribed), offered to furnish the money; and probably this kind offer would have been accepted. But, ere this matter could be arranged, the prospects of the poet were, in a very unexpected manner, altered and improved. Burns went to pay a parting visit to Dr. Laurie, minister of Loudoun, a gentleman from whom, and his accomplished family, he had previously received many kind attentions. After taking farewell of this benevolent circle, the poet proceeded, as the night was setting in, "to convey his chest," as he 66 says, so far on the road to Greenock, where he was to embark in a few days for America." And it was under these circumstances that he composed the song already referred to, which he meant as his farewell dirge to his native land, and which ends thus : "Farewell, old Coila's hills and dales, • Variation. The lily's hue and rose's dye Farewell, my friends! farewell, my foes! Dr. Laurie had given Burns much good counsel, and what comfort he could, at parting; but prudently said nothing of an effort which he had previously made in his behalf. He had sent a copy of the poems, with a sketch of the author's history, to his friend Dr. Thomas Blacklock of Edinburgh, with a request that he would introduce both to the notice of those persons whose opinions were at the time most listened to in regard to literary productions in Scotland, in the hope that, by their intervention, Burns might yet be rescued from the necessity of expatriating himself. Dr. Blacklock's answer reached Dr. Laurie a day or two after Burns had made his visit, and composed his dirge; and it was not yet too late. Laurie forwarded it immediately to Mr. Gavin Hamilton, who carried it to Burns. It is as follows: "I ought to have acknowledged your favour long ago, not only as a testimony of your kind remembrance, but as it gave me an opportunity of sharing one of the finest, and perhaps one of the most genuine entertainments of which the human mind is susceptible. A number of avocations retarded my progress in reading the poems; at last, however, I have finished that pleasing perusal. Many instances have I seen of Nature's force or beneficence exerted under numerous and formidable disadvantages; but none equal to that with which you have been kind enough to present me. There is a pathos and delicacy in his serious poems, a vein of wit and humour in those of a more festive turn, which cannot be too much admired, nor too warmly approved; and I think I shall never open the book without feeling my astonishment renewed and increased. It was my wish to have expressed my approbation in verse; but whether from declining life, or a temporary depression of spirits, it is at present out of my power to accomplish that agreeable intention. "Mr. Stewart, Professor of Morals in this University, had formerly read me three of the poems, and I had desired him to get my name inserted among the subscribers; but whether this was done or not, I never could learn. I have little intercourse with Dr. Blair, but will take care to have the poems communicated to him by the intervention of some mutual friend. It has been told me by a gentleman, to whom I showed the performances, and who sought a copy with diligence and ardour, that the whole impression is already exhausted. It were, therefore, much to be wished, for the sake of the young man, that a second edition, more numerous than the former, could immediately be printed; as it appears certain that its intrinsic merit, and the exertions of the author's friends, might give it a more universal circulation than any thing of the kind which has been published in my memory." We have already seen with what surprise and delight Burns read this generous letter. Although he had ere this conversed with more than one person of established literary reputation, and received from them attentions, for which he was ever after grateful,—the despondency of his spirit appears to have remained as dark as ever, up to the very hour when his landlord produced Dr. Blacklock's letter." There was never," Heron says, "perhaps, one among all mankind whom you might more truly have called an angel upon earth than Dr. Blacklock. He was guileless and innocent as a child, yet endowed with manly sagacity and penetration. His heart was a perpetual spring of benignity. His feelings were all tremblingly alive to the sense of the sublime, the beautiful, the tender, the pious, the virtuous. Poetry was to him the dear solace of perpetual blindness." Th was not the man to act as Walpole did to Chatterton; to discourage witt feeble praise, and in order to shift off the trouble of future patronage, to bid the poet relinquish poetry and mind his plough.-" Dr. Blacklock," says Burns himself, "belonged to a set of critics, for whose applause I had not dared to hope. His opinion that I would meet with encouragement in Edinburgh, fired me so much, that away I posted for that city, without a single acquaintance, or a single letter of introduction. The baneful star that had so long shed its blasting influence on my zenith, for once made a revolution to the nadir." CHAPTER V. CONTENTS.-The Poet winters in Edinburgh, 1786-7—By his advent, the condition of that city, Literary, Legal, Philosophical, Patrician, and Pedantic, is lighted up, as by a meteor -He is in the full tide of his fame there, and for a while caressed by the fashionable— What happens to him generally in that new world, and his behaviour under the varying and very trying circumstances-The tavern life then greatly followed-The Poet tempted beyond all former experience by bacchanals of every degree-His conversational talent universally admitted, as not the least of his talents- The Ladies like to be carried off their feet by it, while the philosophers hardly keep theirs-Edition of 1500 copies by Creech, which yields much money to the Poet-Resolves to visit the classic scenes of his own country-Assailed with thick-coming visions of a reflux to bear him back to the region of poverty and seclusion. "Edina! Scotia's darling seat! All hail thy palaces and tow'rs, BURNS found several of his old Ayrshire acquaintances established in Edinburgh, and, I suppose, felt himself constrained to give himself up for a brief space to their society. He printed, however, without delay, a prospectus of a second edition of his poems, and being introduced by Mr. Dalrymple of Orangefield to the Earl of Glencairn, that amiable nobleman easily persuaded Creech, then the chief bookseller in Edinburgh, to undertake the publication. The Honourable Henry Erskine, Dean of the Faculty of Advocates, the most agreeable of companions, and the most benignant of wits, took him also, as the poet expresses it, "under his wing." The kind Blacklock received him with all the warmth of paternal affection, and introduced him to Dr. Blair, and other eminent literati; his subscription lists were soon filled; Lord Glencairn made interest with the Caledonian Hunt, (an association of the most distinguished members of the northern aristocracy), to accept the dedication of the forthcoming edition, and to subscribe individually for copies. Several noblemen, especially of the west of Scotland, came forward with subscription-moneys considerably beyond the usual rate. In so small a capital, where every body knows every body, that which becomes a favourite topic in one leading circle of society, soon excites an universal interest; and before Burns had been a fortnight in Edinburgh, we find him writing to his earliest patron, Gavin Hamilton, in these terms :-" For my own affairs, I am in a fair way of becoming as eminent as Thomas a Kempis or John Bunyan; and you may expect henceforth to see my birth-day incribed among the wonderful events in the Poor Robin and Aberdeen Almanacks, along with the Black Monday, and the Battle of Bothwell Bridge." |