THE AULD FARMER'S NEW-YEAR-MORNING SALUTATION TO HIS AULD MARE, MAGGIE,

ON GIVING HER THE ACCUSTOMED RIPP OF CORN

TO HANSEL IN THE NEW-YEAR.

[What a delightful piece of auto-biography the good old man recites to his auld mare, as he gives her the usual New-Year-Morning hansel! The whole poem is in the Author's best manner, and ranks with Poor Mailie in its happy combination of humour and tenderness. A celebrated panegyrist of the poet declares that to his certain knowledge, the reading of it has "humanized the heart of a Gilmerton carter!"]

A Guid New-year I wish you Maggie!
Hae, there's a ripp to thy auld baggie:
Tho' thou's howe-backet, now, an' knaggie,
I've seen the day,

Thou could hae gaen like ony staggie
Out owre the lay.

Tho' now thou's dowie, stiff an' crazy,
An' thy auld hide as white's a daisie,
I've seen thee dappl't, sleek an' glaizie,
A bonie gray:

He should been tight that daur't to raize thee,
Ance in a day.

Thou ance was i' the foremost rank,
A filly buirdly, steeve an' swank,

An' set weel down a shapely shank,

As e'er tread yird;

An' could hae flown out owre a stank,
Like onie bird.

It's now some nine-an'-twenty-year,
Sin' thou was my Guidfather's Meere;
He gied me thee, o' tocher clear,

An' fifty mark;

Tho' it was sma', 'twas weel-won gear,

An' thou was stark.

When first I gaed to woo my Jenny, Ye then was trottan wi' your Minnie: Tho' ye was trickie, slee an' funnie,

Ye ne'er was donsie ;

But hamely, tawie, quiet an' cannie,
An' unco sonsie.

That day, ye pranc'd wi' muckle pride,
When ye bure hame my bonie Bride:
An' sweet an' gracefu' she did ride
Wi' maiden air!

KYLE-STEWART I could bragged wide,
For sic a pair.

Tho' now ye dow but hoyte and hoble, An' wintle like a saumont-coble,

That day, ye was a jinker noble,

For heels an' win'!

An' ran them till they a' did wauble,
Far, far behin'!

When thou an' I were young an' skiegh,
An' Stable-meals at Fairs were driegh,
How thou wad prance, an' snore, an' scriegh,
An' tak the road!

Towns-bodies ran an' stood abiegh,

An' ca't thee mad.

When thou was corn't, an' I was mellow, We took the road ay like a Swallow: At Brooses thou had ne'er a fellow,

For pith an' speed;

But ev'ry tail thou pay't them hollow,
Whare'er thou gaed.

-The sma', droot-rumpl't, hunter cattle,
Might aiblins waur't thee for a brattle;
But sax Scotch mile, *thou try't their mettle,
An' gart them whaizle:

Nae whip nor spur, but just a wattle

O' saugh or hazle.

Altered, in 1787, to "miles."

Thou was a noble Fittie-lan',
As e'er in tug or tow was drawn!
Aft thee an' I, in aught hours gaun,

On guid March-weather,

Hae turn'd sax rood beside our han',

For days thegither.

Thou never braing't, an' fetch't, an' flisket,
But thy auld tail thou wad hae whisket,
An' spread abreed thy weel-fill'd brisket,
Wi' pith an' pow'r,

Till sprittie knowes wad rair't an' risket,
An' slypet owre.

When frosts lay lang, an' snaws were deep, An' threaten'd labor back to keep,

I gied thy cog a wee-bit heap

Aboon the timmer;

I ken'd my Maggie wad na sleep

For that, or Simmer.

In cart or car thou never reestet;
The steyest brae thou wad hae fac't it;
Thou never lap, an' sten't, an' breastet,
Then stood to blaw;

But just thy step a wee thing hastet,
Thou snoov't awa.

My Pleugh is now thy bairn-time a’ Four gallant brutes, as e'er did draw; Forby sax mae, I've sell❜t awa,

;

That thou hast nurst:

They drew me thretteen pund an' twa,

The vera warst.

Monie a sair daurk we twa hae wrought,

An' wi' the weary warl' fought!

An' monie an anxious day, I thought

We wad be beat!

Yet here to crazy Age we're brought,
Wi' something yet.

An' think na, my auld, trusty Servan', That now perhaps thou's less deservin, An' thy auld days may end in starvin', For my last fow,

A heapet Stimpart, I'll reserve ane
Laid by for you.

We've worn to crazy years thegither; We'll toyte about wi' ane anither; Wi' tentie care I'll flit thy tether,

To some hain'd rig,

Whare ye may nobly rax your leather,

Wi' sma' fatigue.

THE COTTER'S SATURDAY NIGHT.

INSCRIBED TO R. A****, Esq.*

Let not Ambition mock their useful toil,
Their homely joys, and destiny obscure;
Nor Grandeur hear, with a disdainful smile,
The short and simple annals of the Poor.

GRAY.

[The spirit of Poetry is akin to that of Religion, and the union of the two is, in no human composition, more powerful than in the present production. The two concluding stanzas of this noble poem, the first being a patriotic apostrophe to Scotland, and the last a grand address to the Deity in her behalf, were fervently recited by the bard, with head uncovered, and kneeling on English soil with his face towards Scotland, immediately after crossing the Tweed for the first time into the sister kingdom, on the morning of Monday, 8th May, 1787, while on his Border tour with Ainslie. The grand reference to Sir William Wallace in the last stanza, and another noble verse or two on the same hero, in the Epistle to W S, Ochiltree, will recall to the reader the poet's observation in his autobiography, when speaking of the books perused by him during his early boyhood:-"The story of Wallace poured a tide of Scottish prejudice into my veins, which will boil along there till the floodgates of life shut in eternal rest."

The fine religious tone of this whole poem, together with the noble tributes to Wallace, above referred to, procured for the bard the friendship of Mrs. Dunlop of Dunlop, a lineal descendent of that patriot's brother. She, however, could not be reconciled to the epithet "great, unhappy Wallace" adopted by the poet, and she urged him to alter the phrase in his first Edinburgh Edition. In his letter to her of 15th January, 1787, he says, "The word you object to, borrowed from Thomson, does not strike me as being an improper epithet. I distrusted my own judgement on your finding fault with it, and applied for the opinion of some literati here, who honour me with their critical strictures, and they all allow it to be proper." Accordingly it was left in that edition precisely as in the text; but Mrs. Dunlop would not yield her point, and the poet was, in 1793, prevailed on to alter the line as indicated in our relative foot-note. Many readers will think the change is for the better.

Burns is indebted to the "Farmer's Ingle" of Fergusson for suggesting the title and structure of the poem before us, and all the world knows that William Burns the poet's father, supplied the model of "the Saint, the Father, and the Husband," therein depicted in colours that shall never fade.]

My lov'd, my honor'd, much respected friend,
No mercenary Bard his homage pays;
With honest pride I scorn each selfish end,
My dearest meed, a friend's esteem and praise:

To you I sing, in simple Scottish lays,

The lowly train in life's sequester'd scene; The native feelings strong, the guileless ways, What A**** in a Cottage would have been;

Ah! tho' his worth unknown, far happier there I ween!

* Robert Aiken, writer in Ayr, one of the poet's early friends and patrons.