Jeffrey, that we should dine with him at an early hour, for that purpose, and both were good-natured enough to accompany me to the theatre. Having found, in a volume * sent to me by some anonymous correspondent, a more circumstantial account of the scene of that evening than Sir Walter has given in his Diary, I shall here avail myself of its graphic and (with one exception) accurate details. After adverting to the sensation produced by the appearance of the late Duchess of St. Albans in one of the boxes, the writer thus proceeds: "There was a general buzz and stare, for a few seconds; the audience then turned their backs to the lady, and their attention to the stage, to wait till the first piece should be over ere they intended staring again. Just as it terminated, another party quietly glided into a box near that filled by the Duchess. One pleasing female was with the three male comers. ute the cry ran round: Eh, yon's Sir Walter, wi' Lockhart an' his wife,† and wha's the wee bit bodie wi' the pawkie een? Wow, but it's Tam Moore, just-Scott, Scott! Moore, Moore!' with shouts, cheers, bravos, and applause. But Scott would not rise to appropriate these tributes. One could see that he urged Moore to do so; and he, though modestly reluctant, at last yielded, and bowed hand on heart, with much animation. The cry for Scott was then

* Written by Mr. Benson Hill.

In a min

The writer was here mistaken. There was one lady of ou party but neither Mr. nor Mrs. Lockhart was present.

redoubled. He gathered himself up, and, with a benevolent bend, acknowledged this deserved welThe orchestra played alternately Scotch and Irish Melodies."

come.

Among the choicest of my recollections of that flying visit to Edinburgh, are the few days I passed with Lord Jeffrey at his agreeable retreat, Craig Crook. I had then recently written the words and music of a glee contained in this volume, "Ship ahoy!" which there won its first honours. So often indeed, was I called upon to repeat it, that the upland echoes of Craig Crook ought long to have had its burden by heart.

Having thus got on Scottish ground, I find myself awakened to the remembrance of a name which, whenever song-writing is the theme, ought to rank second to none in that sphere of poetical fame Robert Burns was wholly unskilled in music; yet the rare art of adapting words successfully to notes. of wedding verse in congenial union with melody, which, were it not for his example, I should say none but a poet versed in the sister-art ought to attempt, has yet, by him, with the aid of a music, to which my own country's strains are alone comparable, been exercised with so workmanly a hand, as well as with so rich a variety of passion, playfulness, and power, as no song-writer, perhaps, but himself, has ever yet displayed.

That Burns, however untaught, was yet, in ear

and feeling, a musician,* is clear from the skill with which he adapts his verse to the structure and character of each different strain. Still more strikingly did he prove his fitness for this peculiar task, by the sort of instinct with which, in more than one instance, he discerned the real and innate sentiment which an air was calculated to convey, though always before associated with words expressing a totally different feeling. Thus the air of a ludicrous old song, "Fee him, father, fee him," has been made the medium of one of Burns's most pathetic effusions; while, still more marvellously, "Hey tuttie tattie" has been elevated by him into that heroic strain, "Scots, wha hae wi' Wallace bled; a song which, in a great national crisis, would be of more avail than all the eloquence of a Demosthenes.†

It was impossible that the example of Burns, ir these his higher inspirations, should not materially

It appears certain, notwithstanding, that he was, in his youth, wholly insensible to music. In speaking of him and his brother, Mr. Murdoch, their preceptor, says, "Robert's ear, in particular, was remarkably dull and his voice untunable. It was long before I could get him to distinguish one tune from another "

I know not whether it has ever been before remarked, that the well-known lines in one of Burns's most spirited songs,

"The title's but the guinea's stamp,

The man's the gold for a' that,"

may possibly have been suggested by the folowing passage in Wycherley's play, the "Country Wife: "-"I weigh the man not his title; 't is not the King's stamp can make the metal bet

ter."

contribute to elevate the character of English songwriting, and even to lead to a re-union of the gifts which it requires, if not, as of old, in the same individual, yet in that perfect sympathy between poet and musician which almost amounts to identity, and of which we have seen, in our own times, so interesting an example in the few songs bearing the united names of those two sister muses, Mrs. Arkwright and the late Mrs. Hemans.

Very different was the state of the song-department of English poesy at the time when first I tried my novice hand at the lyre. The divorce between Bong and sense had then reached its utmost range; and to all verses connected with music, from a Birthday-Ode down to the libretto of the last new opera, might fairly be applied the solution Figaro gives of the quality of the words of songs, in general, "Ce qui ne vaut pas la peine d'être dit, on le chante."

It may here be suggested that the convivial lyrics of Captain Morris present an exception to the general character I have given of the songs of this period; and, assuredly, had Morris written much that at all approached the following verses of his "Reasons for Drinking," (which I quote from recollection,) few would have equalled him either in fancy, or in that lighter kind of pathos, which comes, as in this instance, like a few melancholy notes in the middle of a gay air, throwing a soft and passing shade over mirth:

"My muse, too, when her wings are dry,
No frolic flights will take;

But round a bowl she 'll dip and fly,
Like swallows round a lake.

If then the nymph must have her share
Before she 'll bless her swain,

Why, that I think 's a reason fair
To fill my glass again.

"Then, many a lad I lik'd is dead,
And many a lass grown old;
And, as the lesson strikes my head,
My weary heart grows cold.
But wine awhile holds off despair,
Nay, bids a hope remain;

And that I think 's a reason fair

To fill my glass again."

How far my own labours in this field

if indeed,

the gathering of such idle flowers may be so designated -have helped to advance, or even kept pace with the progressive improvement I have here described, it is not for me to presume to decide. I only know that in a strong and inborn feeling for music lies the source of whatever talent I may have shown for poetical composition; and that it was the effort to translate into language the emotions and passions which music appeared to me to express, that first led to my writing any poetry at all deserving of the name. Dryden has happily described music as being "inarticulate poetry;" and I have always felt, in adapting words to an expressive air, that I was but bestowing upon it the gift of articulation, and thus enabling it to speak to others all that was conveyed, in its wordless eloquence, to myself. Owing to the space I was led to devote to my