Happiness is but a name,
Make content and ease thy aim.
Ambition is a meteor-gleam;

Fame, an idle restless dream :

Peace, the tenderest flow'r of spring;
Pleasures, insects on the wing.

Those that sip the dew alone,
Make the butterflies thy own;

Those that would the bloom devour,
Crush the locusts, save the flower.
For the future be prepar'd,

Guard wherever thou canst guard ;

But thy utmost duly done,

Welcome what thou canst not shun.

Follies past give thou to air,

Make their consequence thy care:
Keep the name of man in mind,
And dishonour not thy kind.
Reverence with lowly heart

Him whose wond'rous work thou art;
Keep his goodness still in view,
Thy trust and thy example too..
Stranger, go! heaven be thy guide!

Quod the Beadsman of Nith-side.

Since I am in the way of transcribing, the following were the production of yesterday as I jogged through the wild hills of New Cumnock. I intend inserting them, or something like them, in an epistle I am going to write to the gentleman on whose friendship my excisehopes depend, Mr. Graham of Fintry, one of

the

the worthiest and most accomplished gentlemen, not only of this country, but, I will dare to say it, of this age. The following are just the first crude thoughts "unhousel'd, unanointed, unanneal'd."

* * *

Pity the tuneful muses' helpless train;

Weak, timid landsmen on Life's stormy main:
The world were blest, did bliss on them depend;
Ah, that "the friendly e'er should want a friend!"
The little Fate bestows they share as soon;
Unlike sage, proverb'd, Wisdom's hard-wrung boon.
Let Prudence number o'er each sturdy son
Who life and wisdom at one race begun;
Who feel by reason, and who give by rule;
Instinct's a brute, and sentiment a fool!
Who make poor will do wait upon I should;
We own they're prudent, but who owns they're good.

Ye wise ones, hence! ye hurt the social eye;
God's image rudely etch'd on base alloy !

But come

Here the muse left me. I am astonished at what you tell me of Anthony's writing me. I never received it. Poor fellow! you vex me much by telling me that he is unfortunate. I shall be in Ayrshire ten days from this date. I have just room for an old Roman farewell!

No. LIV.

TO THE SAME.

Mauchline, 10th August, 1788.

MY MUCH HONOURED FRIEND,

YOURS of the 24th June is before me.

I found it, as well as another valued friendmy wife, waiting to welcome me to Ayrshire: I met both with the sincerest pleasure.

When I write you, Madam, I do not sit down to answer every paragraph of yours, by echoing every sentiment, like the faithful commons of Great Britain in Parliament assembled, answering a speech from the best of kings! I express myself in the fulness of my heart, and may perhaps be guilty of neglecting some of your kind inquiries; but not from your very odd reason that I do not read your letters. All your epistles for several months have cost me

nothing,

nothing, except a swelling throb of gratitude, or a deep-felt sentiment of veneration.

Mrs. Burns, Madam, is the identical woman

* * * *

*

**

When she first found herself "as women wish to be who love their lords," as I loved her nearly to distraction, we took steps for a private marriage. Her parents got the hint; and not only forbade me her company and the house, but, on my rumoured West-Indian voyage, got a warrant to put me in jail till I should find security in my about-to-be paternal relation. You know my lucky reverse of fortune. On my eclatant return to Mauchline, I was made very welcome to visit my girl. The usual consequences began to betray her; and as I was at that time laid up a cripple in Edinburgh, she was turned, literally turned out of doors and I wrote to a friend to shelter her till my return, when our marriage was declared. Her happiness or misery were in my hands; and who could trifle with such a deposit?

* *

I can easily fancy a more agreeable companion for my journey of life, but, upon my honour, I have never seen the individual instance.

*** **

Circumstanced

Circumstanced as I am, I could never have got a female partner for life, who could have entered into my favourite studies, relished my favourite authors, &c. without probably entailing on me, at the same time, expensive living, fantastic caprice, perhaps apish affectation, with all the other blessed boarding-school acquirements, which (pardonnez moi, Madame) are sometimes to be found among females of the upper ranks, but almost universally pervade the misses of the would-be gentry,

I like your way in your church-yard lucubrations. Thoughts that are the spontaneous result of accidental situations, either respecting health, place, or company, have often a strength, and always an originality, that would in vain be looked for in fancied circumstances and studied paragraphs. For me, I have often thought of keeping a letter, in progression, by me, to send you when the sheet was written out. Now I talk of sheets, I must tell you, my reason for writing to you on paper of this kind, is my pruriency of writing to you at large. A page post is on such a dis-social, narrow-minded scale, that I cannot abide it; and double letters, at least in my miscellaneous reverie manner, are a monstrous tax in a close correspond

ence.

of