A VISION.

As I stood by yon roofless tower,

Where the wa'-flower scents the dewy air, Where th' howlet mourns in her ivy bower, And tells the midnight moon her care.

The winds were laid, the air was still,
The stars they shot alang the sky;
The fox was howling on the hill,

And the distant-echoing glens reply.

The stream, adown its hazelly path,
Was rushing by the ruin'd wa's,
*Hasting to join the sweeping Nith,
Whase distant roaring swells and fa's.

The

* Variation. To join yon river on the Strath.

The cauld blue north was streaming forth
Her lights, wi' hissing eerie din;
Athort the lift they start and shift,
Like fortune's favours, tint as win.

*By heedless chance I turn'd mine eyes, And, by the moon-beam, shook, to see A stern and stalwart ghaist arise,

Attir'd as minstrels wont to be.

Had I a statue been o' stane,

His darin look had daunted me; And on his bonnet grav'd was plain, The sacred posy-Libertie!

And frae his harp sic strains did flow,

Might rous'd the slumb'ring dead to hear; But oh, it was a tale of woe,

As ever met a Briton's ear;

* Variation. Now looking over firth and fauld,
Her horn the pale-fac'd Cynthia rear'd;
When, lo, in form of minstrel auld,
A stern and stalwart ghaist appear'd.

He

He

sang

wi' joy the former day,

He weeping wail'd his latter times; But what he said it was nae play,

I winna ventur't in my rhymes.*

* This poem, an imperfect copy of which was printed in Johnson's Museum, is here given from the poet's MS. with his last corrections. The scenery, so finely described, is taken from nature. The poet is supposed to be musing by night on the banks of the river Cluden, or Clouden, and by the ruins of Lincluden-Abbey, founded in the twelfth century, in the reign of Malcolm IV., of whose present situation the reader may find some account in Pennant's tour in Scotland, or Grose's Antiquities of that division of the island. Such a time and such a place are well fitted for holding converse with aerial beings. Though this poem has a political bias, yet it may be presumed that no reader of taste, whatever his opinions may be, would forgive its being omitted. Our poet's prudence suppressed the song of Libertie, perhaps fortunately for his reputation. It may be questioned whether, even in the resources of his genius, a strain of poetry could have been found worthy of the grandeur and solemnity of this preparation.

E.

Copy

Copy of a Poetical Address to Mr. William Tytler, with the Present of the Bard's Picture.

REVERED defender of beauteous Stuart,
Of Stuart, a name once respected,

A name, which to love was the mark of a true heart,

But now 'tis despised and neglected:

Tho' something like moisture conglobes in my

eye,

Let no one misdeem me disloyal;

A poor friendless wand'rer may well claim a sigh,

Still more, if that wand'rer were royal.

My fathers, that name have rever'd on a throne; My fathers have fallen to right it;

Those fathers would spurn their degenerate

son,

That name should he scoffingly slight it.

Still in prayers for K- G- I most heartily *: join,

The Q-, and the rest of the gentry,

Be they wise, be they foolish, is nothing of mine;

Their title's avow'd by my country.

But why of that epocha make such a fuss,

*

But loyalty truce! we're on dangerous ground,
Who knows how the fashions may alter?
The doctrine, to-day, that is loyalty sound,
To-morrow may bring us a halter.

I send you a trifle, a head of a bard,
A trifle scarce worthy your care;

But accept it, good Sir, as a mark of regard,
Sincere as a saint's dying prayer.

Now life's chilly evening dim shades on your

eye,

And ushers the long dreary night;

But you like the star that athwart glides the

sky,

Your course to the latest is bright.

VOL. III.

Z

My