The times are terribly out of tune, and when harmony will be restored, Heaven knows. The first book of songs, just published, will be dispatched to you along with this. Let me be favoured with your opinion of it, frankly and freely. I shall certainly give a place to the song you have written for the "Quaker's Wife it is quite enchanting. Pray, will you return the list of songs, with such airs added to it as you think ought to be included? The business now rests entirely on myself, the gentlemen who originally agreed to join the speculation having requested to be off. No matter, a loser I cannot be. The superior excellence of the work will create a general demand for it, as soon as it is properly known; and were the sale even slower than it promises to be, I should be somewhat compensated for my labour, by the pleasure I shall receive from the music. I cannot express how much I am obliged to you for the exquisite new songs you are sending me; but thanks, my friend, are a poor return for what you have done as I shall be benefited by the publication, you must suffer me to enclose a small mark of my gratitude (166), and to repeat it afterwards when I find it convenient. Do not return it, for, by Heaven! if you do, our correspondence is at an end; and though this would be no loss to you, it would mar the publication, which, under your auspices, cannot fail to be respectable and interesting. Wednesday Morning. I thank you for your delicate additional verses to the old fragment, and for your excellent song to "Logan Water :"-Thomson's truly elegant one will follow for the English singer. Your apostrophe to statesmen is admirable, but I am not sure if it is quite suitable to the supposed gentle character of the fair mourner who speaks it. NO. CCLXXV. BURNS TO MR. THOMSON. MY DEAR SIR-I have just finished the following ballad, and, as I do think it in my best style, I send it you. Mr. Clarke, who wrote down the air from Mrs. Burns's wood-note wild, is very fond of it, and has given it a celebrity by teaching it to some young ladies of the first fashion here. If you do not like the air enough to give it a place in your collection, please return it. The song you may keep, as I remember it. [Here follows the song of" Bonnie Jean."] I have some thoughts of inserting in your index, or in my notes, the names of the fair ones, the themes of my songs. I do not mean the name at full; but dashes or asterisks, so as ingenuity may find them out. The heroine of the foregoing is Miss M., daughter to Mr. M., of D., one of your subscribers. I have not painted her in the rank which she holds in life, but in the dress and character of a cottager. NO. CCLXXVI. BURNS TO MR. THOMSON. truly hurt me with your pecuniary parcel. I ASSURE you, my dear Sir, that you It degrades me in my own eyes. However, to return it would savour of affectation; but, as to any more traffic of that debtor and creditor kind, I swear, by that HONOUR BURNS'S INTEGRITY-on the least motion which crowns the upright statue of ROBERT of it, I will indignantly spurn the bypast transaction, and from that moment commence entire stranger to you! BURNS'S character for generosity of sentiment and independence of mind, will, I trust, long outlive any of his wants which the cold unfeeling ore can supply:—at least, I will take care that such a character he shall deserve. Thank you for my copy of your publication. Never did my eyes behold in any musical work such elegance and correctness. Your preface, too, is admirably written, only your partiality to me has made you say too much: however, it will bind me down to double every effort in the future progress of the work. The following are a few remarks on the songs in the list you sent me. I never copy what I write to you, so I may be often tautological, or perhaps contradictory. "The Flowers o' the Forest," is charming as a poem, and should be, and must be, set to the notes; but, though out of your rule, the three stanzas beginning, "I have seen the smiling o' fortune beguiling," "Oh fickle fortune, why this cruel sporting, Why, why torment us, poor sons of a day!" The old ballad, "I wish I were where Helen lies," is silly, to contemptibility. My alteration of it, in Johnson's, is not much better. Mr. Pinkerton, in his, what he calls, ancient ballads (many of them notorions, though beautiful enough, forgeries), has the best set. It is full of his own interpolations -but no matter. In my next, I will suggest to your consideration a few songs which may have escaped your hurried notice. In the meantime, allow me to congratulate you now, as a brother of the quill. You have committed your character and fame, which will now be tried, for ages to come, by the illustrious jury of the SONS AND DAUGHTERS OF TASTE-all whom poesy can please, or music charm. Being a bard of nature, I have some pretensions to second sight; and I am warranted by the spirit to fortell and affirm, that your great-grand-child will hold up your volumes, and say, with honest pride, "This so much admired selection was the work of my ancestor! like; for, in the manner the latter were frequently sung, you must be contented with the sound, without the sense. Indeed, both the airs and words are disguised by the very slow, languid, psalm-singing style in which they are too often performed; they lose animation and expression altogether, and, instead of speaking to the mind, or touching the heart, they cloy upon the ear, and set us a-yawning! Your ballad, "There was a Lass, and she was fair," is simple and beautiful, and shall, undoubtedly grace my collection. NO. CCLXXVIII. BURNS TO MR. THOMSON. MY DEAR THOMSON-I hold the pen for our friend Clarke, who at present is studying the music of the spheres at my elbow. The Georgium Sidus he thinks is rather out of tune; so, until he rectify that matter, he cannot stoop to terrestrial affairs. He sends you six of the rondeau subjects, and if more are wanted, he says you shall have them. R. B. Confound your long stairs! S. CLARKE. NO. CCLXXVII. Edinburgh, August 1st, 1793. DEAR SIR-I had the pleasure of receiving your last two letters, and am happy to find you are quite pleased with the appearance of the first book. When you come to hear the songs sung and accompanied, you will be charmed with them. "The bonnie brucket lassie" certainly deserves better verses, and I hope you will match her. "Cauld kail in Aberdeen," "Let me in this ane night," and several of the livelier airs, wait the muse's leisure; these are peculiarly worthy of her choice gifts; besides, you'll notice, that in airs of this sort the singer can always do greater justice to the poet, than in the slower airs of "The bush aboon Traquair," "Lord Gregory," and the NO. CCLXXIX. BURNS TO MR. THOMSON. August, 1793. YOUR objection, my dear Sir, to the pas sages in my song of Logan Water," is right in one instance; but it is difficult to mend it: if I can, I will. The other passage you object to does not appear in the same light to me. I have tried my hand on "Robin Adair," and, you will probably think, with little success; but it is such a cursed, cramp, outof-the-way measure, that I despair of doing anything better to it. it suits you to insert it, I shall be pleased, as the heroine is a favourite of mine; if not, I shall also be pleased; because I wish, and will be glad to see you act decidedly in the business. "Tis a tribute as a man of taste, and as an editor, which you owe yourself. NO. CCLXXX. MR. THOMSON TO BURNS. August, 1793. My GOOD SIR-I consider it one of the most agreeable circumstances attending this publication of mine, that it has procured me so many of your much-valued epistles. Pray make my acknowledgements to St. Stephen for the tunes; tell him I admit the justness of his complaint on my staircase, conveyed in his laconic postscript to your jeu d'esprit, which I perused more than once, without discovering exactly whether your discussion was music, astronomy, or politics! though a sagacious friend, acquainted with the convivial habits of the poet and the musician, offered me a bet of two to one you were just drowning care together; that an empty bowl was the only thing that would deeply affect you, and the only matter you could then study how to remedy! I shall be glad to see you give "Robin Adair" a Scottish dress. Peter is furnishing him with an English suit for a change, and you are well matched together. Robin's air is excellent, though he certainly has an outof-the-way measure as ever poor Parnassian wight was plagued with. I wish you would invoke the muse for a single elegant stanza to be substituted for the concluding objectionable verses of "Down the Burn Davie,” so that this most exquisite song may no longer be excluded from good company. Mr. Allan has made an inimitable drawing from your "John Anderson, my jo," which I am to have engraved as a frontispiece to the humorous class of songs; you will be quite charmed with it, I promise you. The old couple are seated by the fireside. Mrs. Anderson, in great good humour, is clapping John's shoulders, while he smiles and looks at her with such glee, as to show that he fully recollects the pleasant days and nights when they were "first acquent." The drawing would do honour to the pencil of Teniers. NO. CCLXXXI. BURNS TO MR. THOMSON. August, 1793. THAT crinkum-crankum tune, "Robin Adair," has run so in my head, and I súcceeded so ill in my last attempt, that I have ventured, in this morning's walk, one essay more. You, my dear Sir, will remember an unfortunate part of our worthy friend Cunningham's story, which happened about three years ago. That struck my fancy, and I endeavoured to do the idea justice as follows: [Here follows "Had I a Cave."] By the way, I have met with a musical Highlander in Breadalbane's Fencibles, which are quartered here, who assures me that he well remembers his mother singing Gaelic songs to both "Robin Adair" and "Gramachree." They certainly have more of the Scotch than Irish taste in them. This man comes from the vicinity of Inverness: so it could not be any intercourse with Ireland that could bring them; except, what I shrewdly suspect to be the case, the wandering minstrels, harpers and pipers, used to go frequently errant through the wilds both of Scotland and Ireland, and so some favourite airs might be common to both. A case in point-they have lately, in Ireland, published an Irish air, as they say, called "Caun du delis." The fact is, in a publication of Corri's, a great while ago, you will find the same air, called a Highland one, with a Gaelic song set to it. Its name there, I think, is "Oran Gaoil," and a fine air it is. Do ask honest Allan, or the Rev. Gaelie parson, about these matters. NO. CCLXXXII. BURNS TO MR. THOMSON. MY DEAR SIR-"Let me in this ane night," I will reconsider. I am glad that you are pleased with my song, "Had I a Cave," &c., as I liked it myself. I walked out yesterday evening with a volume of the Museum in my hand, when, turning up "Allan Water," "What numbers shall the muse repeat," &c., as the words. appeared to me rather unworthy of so fine an air, and recollecting that it is on your list, I sat and raved under the shade of an old thorn, till I wrote one to suit the measure. I may be wrong; but I think it is not in my worst style. You must know, that in Ramsay's Tea-table, where the modern song first appeared, the ancient name of the tune, Allan says, is "Allan Water," or " My love Annie's very bonnie." This last has certainly been a line of the original song; so I took up the idea, and, as you will see, have introduced the line in its place, which I presume it formerly occupied; though I likewise give you a choosing line, if it should not hit the cut of your fancy: [Here follows" By Allan stream I chanc'd to rove."] Bravo! say I; it is a good song. Should you think so too (not else), you can set the music to it, and let the other follow as English verses. Autumn is my propitious season. I make more verses in it than all the year else. God bless you! NO. CCLXXXIII. BURNS TO MR. THOMSON. August, 1793. Is "Whistle and I'll come to you, my lad," one of your airs? I admire it much; and yesterday I set the following verses to it. Urbani, whom I have met with here, begged them of me, as he admires the air much; but as I understand that he looks with rather an evil eye on your work, I did not choose to comply. However, if the song does not suit your taste, I may possibly send it him. The set of the air which I had in my eye is in Johnson's Museum. [Here follows "Oh whistle, and I'll come to you."] Another favourite air of mine is, "The muckin' o' Geordie's byre." When sung slow, with expression, I have wished that it had had better poetry; that I have endeavoured to supply as follows: [Here he gives the song "Adown winding Nith."] Mr. Clarke begs you to give Miss Phillis a corner in your book, as she is a particular flame of his. She is a Miss Phillis M'Murdo, sister to "Bonnie Jean." They are both pupils of his. You shall hear from me, the NO. CCLXXXIV. BURNS TO MR. THOMSON. August, 1793. THAT tune," Cauld kail," is such a favorite of yours, that I once more roved out yesterday for gloamin-shot at the muses (168); when the muse that presides o'er the shores of Nith, or rather my old inspiring dearest nymph, Coila, whispered me the following. I have two reasons for thinking that it was my early, sweet, simple inspirer that was by my elbow, "smooth gliding without step," and pouring the song on my glowing fancy;— In the first place, since I left Coila's native haunts, not a fragment of a poet has arisen to cheer her solitary musings, by catching inspiration from her, so I more than suspect that she has followed me hither, or, at least, makes me occasional visits; secondly, the last stanza of this song I send you, is in the very words that Coila taught me many years ago, and which I set to an old Scots reel in Johnson's Museum. [Here follows" Come, let me take thee."] If you think the above will suit your idea of your favourite air, I shall be highly pleased. "The last time I came o'er the moor" I cannot meddle with, as to mending it; and the musical world have been so long accustomed to Ramsay's words, that a different song, though positively superior, would not be so well received. I am not fond of choruses to songs, so I have not made one for the foregoing. NO. CCLXXXV. BURNS TO MR. THOMSON. (169) August, 1793. So much for Davie. The chorus, you know, is to the low part of the tune. See Clarke's set of it in the Museum. N.B. In the Museum they have drawled out the tune to twelve lines of poetry, which is nonsense. Four lines of song, and four of chorus, is the way. NO. CCLXXXVI. TO MISS CRAIK. (170) Dumfries, August, 1793. MADAM-Some rather unlooked-for acci very first grist I get from my rhyming-mill. I dents have prevented my doing myself the honour of a second visit to Arbigland, as I was so hospitably invited, and so positively meant to have done. However, I still hope to have that that pleasure before the busy months of harvest begin. I enclose you two of my late pieces, as some kind of return for the pleasure I have received in perusing a certain MS. volume of poems in the possession of Captain Riddel. To repay one with an old song, is a proverb, whose force, you, Madam. I know, will not allow. What is said of illustrious descent is, I believe, equally true of a talent for poetry-none ever despised it who had pretensions to it. The fates and characters of the rhyming tribe often employ my thoughts when I am disposed to be melancholy. There is not, among all the martyrologies that ever were penned, so rueful a narrative as the lives of the poets. In the comparative view of wretches, the criterion is not what they are doomed to suffer, but how they are formed to bear. Take a being of our kind, give him a stronger imagination and a more delicate sensibility, which between them will ever engender a more ungovernable set of passions than are the usual lot of man; implant in him an irresistible impulse to some idle vagary, such as arranging wild flowers in fantastical nosegays, tracing the grasshopper to his haunt by his chirping song, watching the frisks of the little minnows in the sunny pool, or hunting after the intrigues of butterflies-in short, send him adrift after some pursuit which shall eternally mislead him from the paths of lucre, and yet curse him with a keener relish than any man living for the pleasures that lucre can purchase; lastly, fill up the measure of his woes by bestowing on him a spurning sense of his own dignity-and you have created a wight nearly as miserable as a poet. To you, Madam, I need not recount the fairy pleasures the muse bestows, to counterbalance this catalogue of evils. Bewitching poetry is like bewitching woman: she has, in all ages, been accused of misleading mankind from the councils of wisdom and the paths of prudence, involving them in difficulties, baiting them with poverty, branding them with infamy, and plunging them in the whirling vortex of ruin; yet, where is the man but must own that all our happiness on earth is not worthy the name— that even the holy hermit's solitary prospect of paradisiacal bliss is but the glitter of a northern sun rising over a frozen region, compared with the many pleasures, the nameless raptures, that we owe to the lovely queen of the heart of man! R. B. | NO. CCLXXXVII. TO LADY GLENCAIRN (171). MY LADY-The honour you have done your poor poet, in writing him so very obliging a letter, and the pleasure the enclosed beautiful verses have given him, came very seasonably to his aid, amid the cheerless gloom and sinking despondency of diseased nerves and December weather. As to forgetting the family of Glencairn, Heaven is my witness with what sincerity I could use those old verses, which please me more in their rude simplicity than the most elegant lines I ever saw. "If thee, Jerusalem, I forget, Skill part from my right hand. My chief joy do not set." When I am tempted to do anything improper, I dare not, because I look on myself as accountable to your ladyship and family. Now and then, when I have the honour to be called to the tables of the great, if I happen to meet with any mortification from the stately stupidity of self-sufficient squires, or the luxurious insolence of upstart nabobs, I get above the creatures by calling to remembrance that I am patronised by the noble house of Glencairn; and at gala-times, such as New-year's day, a christening, or the kirnnight, when my punch-bowl is brought from its dusty corner, and filled up in honour of the occasion, I begin with-The Countess of Glencairn! My good woman, with the enthusiasm of a grateful heart, next cries, My Lord! and so the toast goes on until I end with Lady Harriet's little angel! (172) whose epithalamium I have pledged myself to write. When I received your ladyship's letter, I was just in the act of transcribing for you some verses I have lately composed; and meant to have sent them my first leisure hour, and acquainted you with my late change of life. I mentioned to my lord my fears concerning my farm. Those fears were indeed too true; it is a bargain would have ruined me, but for the lucky circumstance of my having an Excise commission. People may talk as they please of the ignominy of the Excise; £50 a year will support my wife and children, and keep me independent of the world; and I would much rather have it said that my profession borrowed credit from me, than that I borrowed credit from my profession. Another |