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"THOUGH FICKLE FORTUNE.” 1
THOUGH fickle Fortune has deceiv'd me,

She promis'd fair and perform'd but ill;
Of mistress, friends, and wealth bereav'd me,
Yet I bear a heart shall support me still.--

I'll act with prudence as far's I'm able,
But if success I must never find,

Then come, Misfortune, I bid thee welcome,
I'll meet thee with an undaunted mind.

"I BURN, I BURN." 2

"I BURN, I burn, as when thro' ripen'd corn,
By driving winds the crackling flames are borne,"
Now maddening, wild, I curse that fatal night;
Now bless the hour which charm'd my guilty sight.
In vain the laws their feeble force oppose:
Chain'd at his feet they groan, Love's vanquish'd foes;
In vain Religion meets my sinking eye;

I dare not combat-but I turn and fly;
Conscience in vain upbraids th' unhallowed fire;
Love grasps his scorpions-stifled they expire!
Reason drops headlong from his sacred throne,
Your dear idea reigns and reigns alone :
Each thought intoxicated homage yields,
And riots wanton in forbidden fields!

By all on high adoring mortals know!
By all the conscious villain fears below!
By your dear self!-the last great oath I swear;
Nor life nor soul were ever half so dear!

1 The above was an extempore, under the pressure of a heavy train of misfortunes, which, indeed, threatened to undo me altogether. It was just at the close of that dreadful period before mentioned (March, 1784); and though the weather has brightened up a little with me since, yet there has always been a tempest brewing round me in the grim sky of futurity, which I pretty plainly see will some time or other, perhaps ere long, overwhelm me, and drive me into some doleful dell, to pine in solitary, squalid wretchedness. However, as I hope my poor country Muse, who, all rustic, awkward, and unpolished as she is, has more charms for me than any other of the pleasures of life beside-as I hope she will not then desert me, I may even then learn to be, if not happy, at least easy, and sowth a sang to soothe my misery.-R. B.

2 To Clarinda.

TAM THE CHAPMAN.1

As Tam, the Chapman, on a day
Wi' Death forgather'd by the way,

Weel pleas'd, he greets a wight sae famous,
And Death was nae less pleased wi' Thomas,
Wha cheerfully lays down the pack,
And there blaws up a hearty crack;
His social, friendly, honest heart,
Sae tickled Death they could na part:
Sae after viewing knives and garters,

Death takes him hame to gie him quarters.

TO DR. MAXWELL, ON MISS JESSY STAIG'S RECOVERY.

MAXWELL, if merit here you crave,
That merit I deny :

You save fair Jessy from the grave!
An Angel could not die.

ON A SICK CHILD.

Now health forsakes that angel face,
Nae mair my Dearie smiles;
Pale sickness withers ilka grace,
And a' my hopes beguiles.

The cruel Powers reject the prayer
I hourly mak for thee;

Ye Heavens, how great is my despair,
How can I see him die!

TO THE OWL.

BY JOHN M'CREDDIE.2

SAD Bird of Night, what sorrow calls thee forth,
To vent thy plaints thus in the midnight hour;
Is it some blast that gathers in the north,

Threat'ning to nip the verdure of thy bow'r?

1 Mr. Kennedy, who is styled "Chapman," in allusion to his connexion with a mercantile house, as agent.

2 Mr. M'Creddie is supposed to be a mythical personage, the verses having been found in the hand-writing of Burns.

Is it, sad Owl, that Autumn strips the shade,
And leaves thee here, unshelter'd and forlorn?
Or fear that Winter will thy nest invade?

Or friendly Melancholy bids thee mourn?
Shut out, lone Bird, from all the feather'd train,
To tell thy sorrows to th' unheeding gloom;
No friend to pity when thou dost complain,
Grief all thy thought, and solitude thy home.
Sing on, sad mourner! I will bless thy strain,
And pleased in sorrow listen to thy song:
Sing on, sad mourner! to the night complain,
While the lone echo wafts thy notes along.

Is beauty less, when down the glowing cheek
Sad piteous tears in native sorrows fall?
Less kind the heart, when Sorrow bids it break?
Less happy he who lists to Pity's call?

Ah no, sad Owl! nor is thy voice less sweet,

That Sadness tunes it, and that Grief is there; That Spring's gay notes, unskill'd, thou canst repeat; And Sorrow bids thee to the gloom repair.

Nor that the treble songsters of the day,

Are quite estranged, sad Bird of night! from thee;
Nor that the thrush deserts the evening spray,
When darkness calls thee from thy reverie.

From some old tower, thy melancholy dome,
While the grey walls and desert solitudes
Return each note, responsive, to the gloom
Of ivied coverts and surrounding woods;

There hooting, I will list more pleased to thee,
Than ever lover to the nightingale;
Or drooping wretch, oppress'd with misery,
Lending his ear to some condoling tale.

"WAS E'ER PUIR POET."1

"WAS e'er puir Poet sae befitted,

The maister drunk-the horse committed:
Puir harmless beast! tak thee nae care,

Thou'lt be a horse, when he's nae mair (mayor)."

1 Burns once visited Carlisle; and while he was in the condition which his verses describe, the Mayor put his horse, which had trespassed on a corporation meadow, into the "pound."

THERE'S NAETHING LIKE THE HONEST NAPPY.
THERE'S naething like the honest nappy!
Whaur 'll ye e'er see men sae happy,
Or women sonsie, saft, an' sappy,

"Tween morn and morn,

As them wha like to taste the drappie
In glass or horn.

I've seen me daez't upon a time;

1

I scarce could wink or see a styme;
Just ae hauf muchkin2 does me prime,
Ought less is little ;

Then back I rattle on the rhyme

As gleg 's a whittle!

TO THE RUINS OF LINCLUDEN ABBEY.3
YE holy walls, that still sublime
Resist the crumbling touch of Time,
How strongly still your form displays
The piety of ancient days.

grey

As through your ruins, hoar and
Ruins, yet beauteous in decay-
The silvery moonbeams trembling fly,
The forms of ages long gone by
Crowd thick on Fancy's wond'ring eye,
And wake the soul to musings high.
Ev'n now, as lost in thought profound,
I view the solemn scene around,
And pensive gaze with wistful eyes,
The past returns, the present flies;
Again the dome, in pristine pride,
Lifts high its roof, and arches wide,
That, knit with curious tracery
Each Gothic ornament display;
The high-arched windows, painted fair,
Show many a saint and martyr there;
As on their slender forms I gaze,
Methinks they brighten to a blaze;
With noiseless step and taper bright,
What are yon forms that meet my sight?
Slowly they move, while every eye
Is heavenward raised in ecstasy :-

1 Glimmer.

2 Half-a-pint.

3 On the banks of the river Cluden, near Dumfries.

The verses were ascribed to Burns by an anonymous writer, and are included in later editions of his works.

'Tis the fair, spotless, vestal train,
That seeks in prayer the midnight fane.
And hark! what more than mortal sound
Of music breathes the pile around?
'Tis the soft-chaunted choral song,
Whose tones the echoing aisles prolong:
Till thence return'd they softly stray
O'er Cluden's wave with fond delay;
Now on the rising gale swell high,
And now in fainting murmurs die:
The boatmen on Nith's gentle stream,
That glistens in the pale moon's beam,
Suspend their dashing oars to hear
The holy anthem, loud and clear;
Each worldly thought awhile forbear,
And mutter forth a half-formed prayer.

But as I gaze, the vision fails,

Like frost-work touch'd by southern gales;
The altar sinks, the tapers fade,

And all the splendid scene's decay'd.

In window fair the painted pane

No longer glows with holy stain,

But, through the broken glass, the gale
Blows chilly from the misty vale.
The bird of eve flits sullen by,

Her home, these aisles and arches high:
The choral hymn, that erst so clear
Broke softly sweet on Fancy's ear,
Is drown'd amid the mournful scream,
That breaks the magic of my dream:
Roused by the sound, I start and see
The ruin'd, sad reality.

1

PROLOGUE, SPOKEN BY MR. WOODS, ON HIS BENEFIT
NIGHT, MONDAY, APRIL 16, 1787.

WHEN by a generous Public's kind acclaim,
That dearest meed is granted-honest fame :
When here your favour is the actor's lot,
Nor even the man in private life forgot;
What breast, so dead to heav'nly virtue's glow,
But heaves impassion'd with the grateful throe?
Poor is the task to please a barb'rous throng,
It needs no Siddons' power in Southern's song:

1 Ascribed to Burns on very slight evidence.

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