Now, do thy speedy utmost, Meg, And win the key-stane of the brig; The Auld Brig o' Doon There at them thou thy tail may toss, LC A PILGRIMAGE TO THE LAND OF BURNS; CONTAINING Anecdotes of the Bard, AND OF THE CHARACTERS HE IMMORTALIZED, WITH NUMEROUS PIECES OF POETRY, Original and collected. We have no dearer aim than to make, leisurely, Pil- DEPTFORD: PRINTED FOR THE AUTHOR, BY AND SOLD BY SHERWOOD, neeĻy, and JONES, PATER- PILGRIMAGE. There were three carles in the east, They went not forth like cadgers, But frae the sta' they've ta'en a steed, And they've bun him to a whisk, Syne awa' they flew, like the great Jehu, In presenting the public with a Pilgrimage to the Land of Burns, we feel sufficiently assured that no apology is required for the subject. It were well if as little might serve for its matter and execution. Without, how B ever, attempting any, we beg leave briefly to state the motives that led to, and what was proposed by, such an undertaking. Although in the poems of Robert Burns, the humour, pathos, and passion are all of the first order of excellence, yet it is unquestionably owing to his admirable talent at catching 'the manners living as they rise;' of overhauling character, and the boldness and freedom with which he ranges through the human breast, which give to his writings that sort of electricity, which makes every bosom feel the shock, and every spirit a conductor; which sent them through his native land like lightening, and established them therein as the necessaries of life. It is this universal charm that makes his pages glitter in the library of the lord, and lie in the winnock bunker of the labourer; even more honourably thumbed than his venerable co-mates Boston and Bunyan. It is moreover no less owing to this, and to the closeness of his observation and the truth with which he delineated, that makes the vi |