Ev'n in the peaceful rural vale, Truth, weeping, tells the mournful tale, With all the servile wretches in the rear, 'Looks o'er proud property, extended wide; And eyes the simple rustic hind, Whose toil upholds the glitt'ring show, 'A creature of another kind, Some coarser substance, unrefin'd, • Plac'd for her lordly use thus far, thus vile below Where, where is love's fond, tender throe, With lordly honour's lofty brow, ઃ The pow'rs you proudly own? This boasted honour turns away, Regardless of the tears, and unavailing pray'rs! Perhaps, this hour, in mis'ry's squalid nest, She strains your infant to her joyless breast, And with a mother's fears shrinks at the rocking blast! 'Oh ye! who, sunk in beds of down, Feel not a want but what yourselves create, Stretch'd on his straw he lays himself to sleep, While thro' the ragged roof and chinky wall, The wretch, already crushed low By cruel fortune's undeserved blow? "Affliction's son's are brothers in distress, A brother to relieve, how exquisite the bliss!" I heard nae mair, for Chanticleer Shook off the pouthery snaw, And hail'd the morning with a cheer, But deep this truth impress'd my mind- The heart benevolent and kind, The most resembles Gon. EPISTLE TO DAVIE, A BROTHER POET.* January WHILE winds frae aff Ben-Lomond blaw, And bar the doors wi' driving snaw, And hing us owre the ingle, I set me down to pass the time, While frosty winds blaw in the drift, I grudge a wee the great folks' gift, I tent less, and want less But hanker and canker, To see their cursed pride. II. It's hardly in a body's pow'r, To keep, at times, frae being sour, To see how things are shar'd; While coofs on countless thousands rant, And ken na how to wair't: * David Sillar, one of the club at Tarbolton, and author of a Volume of Poems in the Scottish dialect. E. But, Davie, lad, ne'er fash your head, We're fit to win our daily bread, Mair spier na, nò fear na,'* Auld age ne'er mind a feg, III. To lie in kilns and barns at e'en When banes are craz'd, and bluid is thin, Is, doubtless, great distress! Yet then content could make us blest; Ev'n then, sometimes we'd snatch a taste Of truest happiness. The honest heart that's free frae a' Intended fraud or guile, However fortune kick the ba', Has ay some cause to smile, Nae farther can we fa'. IV. What tho', like commoners of air, We wander out, we know not where, But either house or hal'? Yet nature's charms, the hills and woods, The sweeping vales and foaming floods, Are free alike to all. * Ramsay. In days when daisies deck the ground, With honest joy our hearts will bound, On braes when we please, then, V. It's no in titles nor in rank; It's no in wealth like Lon'on bank, Nae treasures, nor pleasures, The heart ay's the part ay, That makes us right or wrang. Wha drudge and drive thro' wet an' dry, Wi' never-ceasing toil; Think ye, are we less blest than they, Wha scarcely tent us in their way, As hardly worth their while? |