Sonnet on the death of Robert Riddel, Esq. of Glen Rid Verses on the death of Sir James Hunter Blair Address to the Shade of Thomson on crowning his Bust, Verses on seeing a wounded Hare limp by me, which a fel- Lines on scaring some Water-fowl in Loch Turit, a wild scene among the Hills of Oughtertyre To a Mouse, on turning her up in her nest, with the Lines, written with a pencil, over the Chimney-piece in the parlour of the inn at Kenmore, Taymouth ·To Miss L, with Beattie's Poems as a New Year's To Miss Cruickshanks, a very young lady, written on the blank leaf of a book presented to her by the author to a young lady, with a present of songs ib. THE LIFE OF ROBERT BURNS. THERE is no poet of the present age more deservedly popular than Burns. Though born in an humble station in life, he raised himself, by the mere exertions of his mind, to the highest pitch of intellectual greatness. The originality of his genius, the energy of his language, and the richness of his imagination, merited the gratitude as well as the admiration of his countrymen. But his highest efforts, in which the tide of human feeling seemed to flow in deep and exhaustless channels, failed to soften the avarice of a mean and selfish aristocracy. Like his native and lonely hills, he was subject to every blast, and exposed naked and bare to every tempest. No refreshing showers came to rest upon his head, or to pour fertility into his bosom. He was an elevated point, round which the storm clung and gathered; a prominent rock condemned by nature as it were to endure the buffetings of the surge. Yet his rude splendour remained uninjured. Amidst the bitter waters |