The shepherd, in the flowery glen, These wild-wood flowers I've pu'd, to deck The courtier's gems may witness love- 1 How do you like the simplicity and tenderness of this pastoral? I think it pretty well. I like you for entering so candidly and so kindly into the story of Ma chere Amie. I assure you, I was never more in earnest in my life, than in the account of that affair which I sent you in my last.Conjugal love is a passion which I deeply feel, and highly venerate; but, somehow, it does not make such a figure in poesy as that other species of the passion, "Where Love is liberty, and Nature law." Musically speaking, the first is an instrument of which the gamut is scanty and confined, but the tones inexpressibly sweet; while the last, has powers equal equal to all the intellectual modulations of the human soul. Still, I am a very poet in my enthusiasm of the passion. The welfare and happiness of the beloved object, is the first and inviolate sentiment that pervades my soul; and whatever pleasures I might wish for, or whatever might be the raptures they would give me, yet, if they interfere with that first principle, it is having these pleasures at a dishonest price; and justice forbids, and generosity disdains the purchase! * Despairing of my own powers to give you variety enough in English songs, I have been turning over old collections, to pick out songs of which the measure is something similar to what I want; and, with a little alteration, so as to suit the rhythm of the air exactly, to give you them for your work. Where the songs have hitherto been but little noticed, nor have ever been set to music, I think the shift a fair one. A song, which, under the same first verse, you will find in Ramsay's Tea-table Miscellany, I' have cut down for an English dress to your, " Daintie Davie," as follows. SONG, SONG, Altered from an old English one. It was the charming month of May, From peaceful slumber she arose, CHORUS. Lovely was she by the dawn, The feather'd people, you might see They hail the charming Chloe; 'Till, painting gay the eastern skies, gay, You You may think meanly of this, but take a look at the bombast original, and you will be surprised that I have made so much of it. I have finished my song to, Rothemurche's Rant; and you have Clarke to consult, as to the set of the air for singing. LASSIE WI' THE LINT-WHITE LOCKS. Tune-" ROTHEMURCHE'S RANT." CHORUS. Lassie wi' the lint-white locks, Bonie lassie, artless lassie, Now nature cleeds the flowery lea, And when the welcome simmer-shower Lassie wi', &c. When When Cynthia lights, wi' silver ray, And when the howling wintry blast I'll comfort thee, my dearie O.* Lassie wi' the lint-white locks, This piece has at least the merit of being a regular pastoral: the vernal morn, the summer noon, *In some of the MSS this stanza runs thus: And should the howling wintry blast the E. |