There's naething here but Highland pride,
And Highland scab and hunger;
If Providence has sent me here,
'Twas surely in an anger.

COMPOSED ON LEAVING A PLACE IN THE HIGHLANDS WHERE HE HAD BEEN KINDLY ENTERTAINED.

WHEN Death's dark stream I ferry o'er –
A time that surely shall come
In Heaven itself I'll ask no more,
Than just a Highland welcome!

ON READING IN A NEWSPAPER

THE DEATH OF JOHN M'LEOD, Esq.,

BROTHER TO A YOUNG LADY, A PARTICULAR FRIEND OF THE AUTHOR'S.

SAD thy tale, thou idle page,

And rueful thy alarms:

Death tears the brother of her love

From Isabella's arms.

Sweetly decked with pearly dew
The morning rose may blow,
But cold successive noontide blasts
May lay its beauties low.

Fair on Isabella's morn

The sun propitious smiled,

But, long ere noon, succeeding clouds. Succeeding hopes beguiled.

Fate oft tears the bosom cords
That nature finest strung;
So Isabella's heart was formed,
And so that heart was wrung.

Were it in the poet's power,
Strong as he shares the grief
That pierces Isabella's heart,
To give that heart relief!

Dread Omnipotence alone.

Can heal the wound he gave, Can point the brimful grief-worn eyes To scenes beyond the grave.

Virtue's blossoms there shall blow,

And fear no withering blast; There Isabella's spotless worth Shall happy be at last.

ON THE DEATH OF SIR JAMES HUNTER BLAIR.

Sir James was an Ayrshire squire, and a member of the banking-house of Sir William Forbes and Company; a public-spirited citizen and magistrate of Edinburgh, and an amiable man. He had been one of Burns's kindest patrons when the poet first came to town, feeling, doubtless, a particular interest in his fortunes on account of his Ayrshire nativity.

THE lamp of day, with ill-presaging glare,

Dim, cloudy, sank beneath the western wave; The inconstant blast howled through the darkening air,

And hollow whistled in the rocky cave.

Lone as I wandered by each cliff and dell, Once the loved haunts of Scotia's royal train;1 Or mused where limpid streams once hallowed well,2

Or mouldering ruins mark the sacred fane; 3

The increasing blast roared round the beetling rocks,

The clouds, swift-winged, flew o'er the starry

sky,

1 The King's Park, at Holyrood House.

2 St. Anthony's Well.

3 St. Anthony's Chapel.

The groaning trees untimely shed their locks, And shooting-meteors caught the startled eye.

The paly moon rose in the livid east,

And 'mong the cliffs disclosed a stately form, In weeds of wo that frantic beat her breast, And mixed her wailings with the raving storm.

Wild to my heart the filial pulses glow,

'Twas Caledonia's trophied shield I viewed: Her form majestic drooped in pensive wo, The lightning of her eye in tears imbued.

Reversed that spear, redoubtable in war,

Reclined that banner, erst in fields unfurled, That like a deathful meteor gleamed afar, And braved the mighty monarchs of the world.

"My patriot son fills an untimely grave!"

With accents wild and lifted arms she cried: "Low lies the hand that oft was stretched to

save,

Low lies the heart that swelled with honest

pride.

"A weeping country joins a widow's tear;

The helpless poor mix with the orphan's cry; The drooping arts surround their patron's bier ; And grateful science heaves the heartfelt

sigh!

"I saw my sons resume their ancient fire;
I saw fair Freedom's blossoms richly blow;
But ah! how hope is born but to expire!
Relentless fate has laid their guardian low.

:

"My patriot falls but shall he lie unsung, While empty greatness saves a worthless name? No: every Muse shall join her tuneful tongue, And future ages hear his growing fame.

"And I will join a mother's tender cares, Through future times to make his virtue last; That distant years may boast of other Blairs!".. She said, and vanished with the sweeping blast.

TO MISS FERRIER,1

ENCLOSING THE ELEGY ON SIR J. H. BLAIR.

NAE heathen name shall I prefix

Frae Pindus or Parnassus ;

Auld Reekie dings them a' to sticks, beats
For rhyme-inspiring lasses.

Jove's tunefu' dochters three times three
Made Homer deep their debtor;

1 Author of The Inheritance, etc.