Just much about it wi' your scanty sense.
Will your poor, narrow footpath of a street-
Whare twa wheel-barrows tremble when they

Your ruined, formless bulk o' stane and lime, Compare wi' bonny brigs o' modern time? There's men o' taste would tak the Ducat

Stream,1

Though they should cast the very sark

and swim,

shirt

Ere they would grate their feelings wi' the view Of sic an ugly Gothic hulk as you.

As yet ye little ken about the matter,
But twa-three winters will inform ye better.
When heavy, dark, continued, a'-day rains,
Wi' deepening deluges o'erflow the plains.

1 A noted ford just above the Auld Brig. — B.

When from the hills where springs the brawl

ing Coil,

Or stately Lugar's mossy fountains boil,

Or where the Greenock winds his moorland

course,

1

Or haunted Garpal draws his feeble source, Aroused by blustering winds and spotting

thowes,

thaws

In monie a torrent down his snaw-broo rowes; 2 While crashing ice, borne on the roaring

flood

speat, Sweeps dams, and mills, and brigs, a' to the

gate;

way

And from Glenpuck down to the Ratton-key

Auld Ayr is just one lengthened tumbling sea
Then down ye'll hurl, deil nor ye never rise!
And dash the gumlie jaups up to the muddy waves
pouring skies:

A lesson sadly teaching, to your cost,
That Architecture's noble art is lost!

NEW BRIG.

Fine Architecture, trowth, I needs must say't o't!

1 The banks of Garpal Water is one of the few places in the west of Scotland where those fancy-scaring beings, known by the name of ghaists, still continue pertinaciously to inhabit.-B.

2 (Snow-broth) melting snow-rolls.

8 The source of the river Ayr.-B.

A small landing-place above the largo key. — B.

The L be thankit that we've tint the Jost

gate o't!

Gaunt, ghastly, ghaist-alluring edifices,

Hanging with threatening jut, like precipices;
O'erarching, mouldy, gloom-inspiring coves,
Supporting roofs fantastic, stony groves:
Windows, and doors in nameless sculpture drest,
With order, symmetry, or taste unblest;
Forms like some bedlam statuary's dream,
The crazed creations of misguided whim;
Forms might be worshipped on the bended

knee,.

And still the second dread command be free, Their likeness is not found on earth, in air, or

sea.

Mansions that would disgrace the building taste Of any mason reptile, bird or beast;

Fit only for a doited monkish race,

doting

Or frosty maids forsworn the dear embrace;
Or cuifs of latter times, wha held the

notion

fools

That sullen gloom was sterling true devotion; Fancies that our good Brugh denies protection!! And soon may they expire, unblest with res urrection!

AULD BRIG.

Oh ye, my dear remembered ancient

yealings,

1 An allusion to the moderatism of the Ayr clergy.

coeval

Were ye but here to share my wounded feck ings!

Ye worthy Proveses, and monie a Bailie,
Wha in the paths o' righteousness did toil aye;
Ye dainty Deacons and ye douce Conveeners, grave
To whom our moderns are but causey-cleaners ;
Ye godly Councils wha hae blest this town;
Ye godly brethren o' the sacred gown,
Wha meekly ga'e your hurdies to the smiters;
And (what would now be strange) ye godly

writers;

1

A' ye douce folk I've borne aboon the broo, water
Were ye but here, what would ye say or do!
How would your spirits groan in deep vexation,
To see each melancholy alteration;
And agonising, curse the time and place
When ye begat the base degenerate race!
Nae langer reverend men, their country's glory,
In plain braid Scots hold forth a plain braid
story!

Nae langer thrifty citizens and douce,

Meet owre a pint, or in the council-house; But staumrel, corky-headed, graceless half-witted gentry,

The herryment and ruin of the country; plunder Men three parts made by tailors and by barbers, Wha waste your weel-hained gear on

d

new brigs and harbours!

well-saved

A sly hint at the easy professions of the Ayr writers of lawyers now known to Burns.

NEW BRIG.

Now haud you there, for faith you've said enough,

And muckle mair than ye can mak to make through.1

good

As for your Priesthood I shall say but little,
Corbies and Clergy are a shot right kittle: ticklish
But, under favour o' your langer beard,
Abuse o' magistrates might weel be spared.
To liken them to your auld-warld squad,
I must needs say comparisons are odd.
In Ayr, wag-wits nae mair can hae a handle
To mouth "a citizen," a term o' scandal;
Nae mair the Council waddles down the street,
In all the pomp of ignorant conceit.2

Men wha grew wise priggin' owre hops haggling and raisins,

Or gathered liberal views in bonds and seisins
If haply Knowledge, on a random tramp,
Had shored them with a glimmer of his

lamp,

1 Inserted in MS. copy:

offered

"That's aye a string auld doited Graybeards harp on, A topic for their peevishness to carp on."

2 Variation in MS.:

"Nae mair down street the Council quorum waddles,
With wigs like mainsails on their logger noddles;

No difference but bulkiest or tallest,

With comfortable dulness in for ballast:

Nor shoals nor currents need a pilot's caution,

For regularly slow, they only witness mction."