humanity, glance a slight wound, may never reach your _heart_--that
the snares of villany may never beset you in the road of life--that
INNOCENCE may hand you by the path of honour to the dwelling
of PEACE, is the sincere wish of him who has the honour to
be, &c.
R. B.
* * * * *
CCLVIII.
TO MR. THOMSON.
[The name of the friend who fell a sacrifice to those changeable
times, has not been mentioned: it is believed he was of the west
country.]
_June, 1793._
When I tell you, my dear Sir, that a friend of mine in whom I am much
interested, has fallen a sacrifice to these accursed times, you will
easily allow that it might unhinge me for doing any good among
ballads. My own loss as to pecuniary matters is trifling; but the
total ruin of a much-loved friend is a loss indeed. Pardon my seeming
inattention to your last commands.
I cannot alter the disputed lines in the "Mill Mill, O!"[222] What you
think a defect, I esteem as a positive beauty; so you see how doctors
differ. I shall now, with as much alacrity as I can muster, go on with
your commands.
You know Frazer, the hautboy-player in Edinburgh--he is here,
instructing a band of music for a fencible corps quartered in this
county. Among many of his airs that please me, there is one, well
known as a reel, by the name of "The Quaker's Wife;" and which, I
remember, a grand-aunt of mine used to sing, by the name of "Liggeram
Cosh, my bonnie wee lass." Mr. Frazer plays it slow, and with an
expression that quite charms me. I became such an enthusiast about it,
that I made a song for it, which I here subjoin, and enclose Frazer's
set of the tune. If they hit your fancy, they are at your service; if
not, return me the tune, and I will put it in Johnson's Museum. I
think the song is not in my worst manner.
Blythe hae I been on yon hill.[223]
I should wish to hear how this pleases you.
R. B.
FOOTNOTES:
[Footnote 222: "The lines were the third and fourth:
'Wi' mony a sweet babe fatherless,
And mony a widow mourning.'
As our poet had maintained a long silence, and the first number of Mr.
Thomson's musical work was in the press, this gentleman ventured, by
Mr. Erskine's advice, to substitute for them, in that publication.
'And eyes again with pleasure beam'd
That had been blear'd with mourning.'
Though better suited to the music, these lines are inferior to the
original."--CURRIE.]
[Footnote 223: Song CXV.]
* * * * *
CCLIX.
TO MR. THOMSON.
[Against the mighty oppressors of the earth the poet was ever ready to
set the sharpest shafts of his wrath: the times in which he wrote were
sadly out of sorts.]
_June 25th, 1793._
Have you ever, my dear Sir, felt your bosom ready to burst with
indignation, on reading of those mighty villains who divide kingdoms,
desolate provinces, and lay nations waste, out of the wantonness of
ambition, or often from still more ignoble passions? In a mood of this
kind to-day I recollected the air of "Logan Water," and it occurred to
me that its querulous melody probably had its origin from the
plaintive indignation of some swelling, suffering heart, fired at the
tyrannic strides of some public destroyer, and overwhelmed with
private distress, the consequence of a country's ruin. If I have done
anything at all like justice to my feelings, the following song,
composed in three-quarters of an hour's meditation in my elbow-chair,
ought to have some merit:--
O Logan, sweetly didst thou glide.[224]
Do you know the following beautiful little fragment, in Wotherspoon's
collection of Scots songs?[225]
Air--"_Hughie Graham._"
"Oh gin my love were yon red rose,
That grows upon the castle wa';
And I mysel' a drap o' dew,
Into her bonnie breast to fa'!
"Oh there, beyond expression blest,
I'd feast on beauty a' the night,
Seal'd on her silk-saft faulds to rest,
Till fley'd awa by Phoebus light!"
This thought is inexpressibly beautiful; and quite, so far as I know,
original. It is too short for a song, else I would forswear you
altogether unless you gave it a place. I have often tried to eke a
stanza to it, but in vain. After balancing myself for a musing five
minutes, on the hind legs of my elbow-chair, I produced the following.
The verses are far inferior to the foregoing, I frankly confess: but
if worthy of insertion at all, they might be first in place; as every
poet who knows anything of his trade, will husband his best thoughts
for a concluding stroke.
Oh were my love yon lilac fair,
Wi' purple blossoms to the spring;
And I a bird to shelter there,
When wearied on my little wing!
How I wad mourn, when it was torn
By autumn wild and winter rude!
But I wad sing on wanton wing,
When youthfu' May its bloom renewed.[226]
R. B.
FOOTNOTES:
[Footnote 224: Song CXCVI.]
[Footnote 225: Better known as Herd's. Wotherspoon was one of the
publishers.]
[Footnote 226: See Song CXCVII.]
* * * * *
CCLX.
TO MR. THOMSON.
[Thomson, in his reply to the preceding letter, laments that anything
should untune the feelings of the poet, and begs his acceptance of
five pounds, as a small mark of his gratitude for his beautiful
songs.]
_July 2d, 1793._
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.
There was a lass, and she was fair.[227]
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 asterisms, so as ingenuity may find them out.
The heroine of the foregoing is Miss M'Murdo, daughter to Mr. M'Murdo,
of Drumlanrig, 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.
R. B.
FOOTNOTES:
[Footnote 227: Song CXCVIII.]
* * * * *
CCLXI.
TO MR. THOMSON.
[Burns in this letter speaks of the pecuniary present which Thomson
sent him, in a lofty and angry mood: he who published poems by
subscription might surely have accepted, without any impropriety,
payment for his songs.]
_July, 1793._
I assure you, my dear Sir, that you truly hurt me with your pecuniary
parcel. 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 which crowns the upright statue of
ROBERT BURNS'S INTEGRITY--on the least motion of it, I will indignantly
spurn the by-past 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've seen the smiling of fortune beguiling,"
are worthy of a place, were it but to immortalize the author of them,
who is an old lady of my acquaintance, and at this moment living in
Edinburgh. She is a Mrs. Cockburn, I forget of what place, but from
Roxburghshire.[228] What a charming apostrophe is
"O fickle fortune, why this cruel sporting,
Why thus perplex 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 notorious, 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 foretell 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!"
R. B.
FOOTNOTES:
[Footnote 228: Miss Rutherford, of Fernilee in Selkirkshire, by marriage
Mrs. Patrick Cockburn, of Ormiston. She died in 1794, at an advanced
age.]
* * * * *
CCLXII.
TO MR. THOMSON.
[Stephen Clarke, whose name is at this strange note, was a musician
and composer; he was a clever man, and had a high opinion of his own
powers.]
_August_, 1793.
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.
* * * * *
Confound your long stairs!
S. CLARKE.
* * * * *
CCLXIII.
TO MR. THOMSON.
["Phillis the Fair" endured much at the hands of both Burns and
Clarke. The young lady had reason to complain, when the poet
volunteered to sing the imaginary love of that fantastic fiddler.]
_August_, 1793.
Your objection, my dear Sir, to the passages 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, out-of-the-way
measure, that I despair of doing anything better to it.
While larks with little wing.[229]
So much for namby-pamby. I may, after all, try my hand on it in Scots
verse. There I always find myself most at home.
I have just put the last hand to the song I meant for "Cauld kail in
Aberdeen." If 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 on the
business. 'Tis a tribute as a man of taste, and as an editor, which
you owe yourself.
R. B.
FOOTNOTES:
[Footnote 229: Song CXCIX.]
* * * * *
CCLXIV.
TO MR. THOMSON.
[The infusion of Highland airs and north country subjects into the
music and songs of Scotland, has invigorated both: Burns, who had a
fine ear as well as a fine taste, was familiar with all, either
Highland or Lowland.]
_August_, 1793.
That crinkum-crankum tune, "Robin Adair," has run so in my head, and I
succeeded 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:
Had I a cave on some wild distant shore.[230]
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
"Grammachree." 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 delish." 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. Gaelic parson, about these matters.
R. B.
FOOTNOTES:
[Footnote 230: Song CC.]
* * * * *
CCLXV.
TO MR. THOMSON.
[While Burns composed songs, Thomson got some of the happiest embodied
by David Allan, the painter, whose illustrations of the Gentle
Shepherd had been favourably received. But save when an old man was
admitted to the scene, his designs may be regarded as failures: his
maidens were coarse and his old wives rigwiddie carlins.]
_August_, 1793.
MY DEAR SIR,
"Let me in this ae 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 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:
By Allan stream I chanced to rove.[231]
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!
R. B.
FOOTNOTES:
[Footnote 231: Song CCI.]
* * * * *
CCLXVI.
TO MR. THOMSON.
[Phillis, or Philadelphia M'Murdo, in whose honour Burns composed the
song beginning "Adown winding Nith I did wander," and several others,
died September 5th, 1825.]
_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.
O whistle, and I'll come to you, my lad.[232]
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:
Adown winding Nith I did wander.[233]
Mr. Clarke begs you to give Miss Phillis a corner in your book, as she
is a particular flame of his, and out of compliment to him I have made
the song. She is a Miss Phillis M'Murdo, sister to "Bonnie Jean." They
are both pupils of his. You shall hear from me, the very first grist I
get from my rhyming-mill.
R. B.
FOOTNOTES:
[Footnote 232: Song CCII.]
[Footnote 233: Song CCIII.]
* * * * *
CCLXVII.
TO MR. THOMSON.
[Burns was fond of expressive words: "Gloaming, the twilight," says
Currie, "is a beautiful poetic word, which ought to be adopted in
England." Burns and Scott have made the Scottish language popular over
the world.]
_August_, 1793.
That tune, "Cauld kail," is such a favourite of yours, that I once
more roved out yesterday for a gloamin-shot at the muses; 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 the very words
that Coila taught me many years ago, and which I set to an old Scots
reel in Johnson's Museum.
Come, let me take thee to my breast.[234]
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.
R. B.
FOOTNOTES:
[Footnote 234: Song CCIV.]
* * * * *
CCLXVIII.
TO MR. THOMSON.
["Cauld kail in Aberdeen, and castocks in Strabogie," are words which
have no connexion with the sentiment of the song which Burns wrote for
the air.]
_August_, 1793.
SONG.
Now rosy May comes in wi' flowers.[235]
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.[236]
FOOTNOTES:
[Footnote 235: Song CCV.]
[Footnote 236: See Song LXVII.]
* * * * *
CCLXIX.
TO MISS CRAIK.
[Miss Helen Craik of Arbigland, had merit both as a poetess and
novelist: her ballads may be compared with those of Hector M'Neil: her
novels had a seasoning of satire in them.]
_Dumfries, August_, 1793.
MADAM,
Some rather unlooked-for accidents 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 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.
* * * * *
CCLXX.
TO LADY GLENCAIRN.
[Burns, as the concluding paragraph of this letter proves, continued
to the last years of his life to think of the composition of a
Scottish drama, which Sir Walter Scott laments he did not write,
instead of pouring out multitudes of lyrics for Johnson and Thomson.]
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 tongue to my mouth's roof let cleave,
If I do thee forget,
Jerusalem, and thee above
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
patronized by the noble house of Glencairn; and at gala-times, such as
new-year's day, a christening, or the kirn-night, 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!_
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_l._
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 advantage I have in this business, is the
knowledge it gives me of the various shades of human character,
consequently assisting me vastly in my poetic pursuits. I had the most
ardent enthusiasm for the muses when nobody knew me, but myself, and
that ardour is by no means cooled now that my lord Glencairn's
goodness has introduced me to all the world. Not that I am in haste
for the press. I have no idea of publishing, else I certainly had
consulted my noble generous patron; but after acting the part of an
honest man, and supporting my family, my whole wishes and views are
directed to poetic pursuits. I am aware that though I were to give
performances to the world superior to my former works, still if they
were of the same kind with those, the comparative reception they would
meet with would mortify me. I have turned my thoughts on the drama. I
do not mean the stately buskin of the tragic muse.
* * * * *
Does not your ladyship think that an Edinburgh theatre would be more
amused with affectation, folly, and whim of true Scottish growth, than
manners which by far the greatest part of the audience can only know
at second hand?
I have the honour to be,
Your ladyship's ever devoted
And grateful humble servant,
R. B.
* * * * *
CCLXXI.
TO MR. THOMSON.