ROBERT BURNS.

(1759-1796.)

"THE Task" was published in 1785. It disclosed to the world that the commonest things could be made poetic, if but the poetic eye could be brought to see them, that in a sofa, a tea-urn, a kitchen garden, a rumbling cart, or a peasant girl, there were beauties which, to the common mind, are hidden and unknown until the true poet reveals them. That all around us we may find the objects of poetry if we only bring to them the eyes to see with.

It was the most prosaic age England had known since the revival of letters, but it began to arouse. Nature never works by halves. When something is to be done, she provides ample, and more than ample, means for its performance. And so it happened that the year after "The Task" appeared, there was published in an obscure village in Scotland a small volume of poems, among which were "The Twa Dogs," "The Holy Fair," "Halloween," "The Cottar's

Saturday Night," " Man Was Made to Mourn," "To a Mountain Daisy," and some thirty pieces on similar subjects. They were the work of a Scotch peasant, and completed the revolution that Cowper had begun. They are of a far higher order of poetry than anything Cowper has written, and time has pronounced them imperishable. The chains that bound genius to form were at last shattered, never again to be welded anew. The mind, too, revolted, and manhood asserted itself. It was the seething time of nations, when liberty burst over the bounds of established order and made new channels, which ever since have borne on their bosoms freedom and progress for humanity. To this the timorous Cowper in part contributed, but the fearless and aspiring Burns much more. He looked upon the world around him, and upon man, and he saw that the world was fair and goodly, and that equality was the birthright of man.

A prince can make a belted knight,
A marquis, duke and a' that;
But an honest man's aboon his might,

Guid faith he mauna fa' that.

For a' that, and a' that,

Their dignities, and a' that ;

The pith o' sense, and pride o' worth,
Are higher rank than a' that.

Never was genius united to more misery than in the case of Burns. He was born January 25, 1759, in a clay cottage built by his father, who was a poor farmer of Ayrshire. One end of the cottage fell in a few days after his birth, and in the midst of the storm the mother and child were obliged to seek refuge in the house of a neighbor. Poverty was upon the family, and it is not easy for arms, however willing and industrious, to compel a living from the ungenerous soil of Scotland. High rents absorbed the best of the profits, and the extremest parsimony was necessary to keep the family from starvation. Rare indeed was it for Robert Burns, in his boyhood, to have a taste of meat. Such education as he could acquire in a local school, and his father could give him, he obtained, but he went bareheaded and barefooted until his fifteenth year, at which time he became the principal laborer on the farm. He worked like a galley slave chained to the oar. His shoulders were bent, melancholy took possession of his mind, and his anguish was almost greater than he could bear. The father grew old, his tall figure was bent with care and grief and toil, and he was only saved from imprisonment for debt by the kindly hand of consumption which stepped in and carried him off. With the pittance saved

from the wreck, Robert and his brother took another farm, only to encounter renewed troubles. One year it was bad seed and another it was a late harvest that brought ruin to their door. Meanwhile his genius commenced to sing, and as he followed the plow or wielded the sickle, or studied by night, his mind teemed with new thoughts and aspirations, and the poet in him asserted itself. He had the consciousness of genius, and as he afterwards said: "Unknown as I then was, I had pretty nearly as high an opinion of myself and my works as I have at this moment, when the public has decided in my favor." favor." At At every step of his rise, what a contest he had, and how class distinction against which he was so rebellious kept him down! His poetry is full of these natural outbursts against the State, the Church and the fixed forms of society. He knew and felt that "The rank is but the guinea's stamp, the man's the gowd for a' that," and that a peasant was as good as a lord.

of

See yonder poor o'erlabored wight,

So abject, mean and vile,

Who begs a brother of the earth

To give him leave to toil;
And see his lordly fellow-worm
The poor petition spurn,
Unmindful though a weeping wife
And helpless offspring mourn.

And so he worked and wrought to win from the unwilling soil a mere livelihood, poesy raging within him all the while, up to his twenty-seventh year. Then he collected the verses into a little volume and had them published at the provincial press of Kilmarnock. They were received with wonder and delight by the poet's neighbors and friends. Here were poems written in a homely phraseology and all understood, on topics with which all were familiar. The imagery and sentiments were such as all men feel, though only he who possesses the magical gift of poetry can express them. them. Every one, young and old, grave and gay, learned and unlearned, who picked up the volume were alike transported. The poet's fame rapidly spread, and soon a few copies of the poems reached Edinburgh. There they were received with surprise and wonder and the village admiration was more than re-echoed back from the stately mansions of the Scotch Capital. The poet was invited to the great city, the Mecca of all his hopes and aspirations. There he was feasted, caressed and flattered, by all. The best society opened its doors and grand dames vied with each other in patronizing the rustic poet. For several months he was the hero of the hour, the boast of Scotland. A new edition of his