Betray sweet Jenny's unsuspecting youth? Curse on his perjur'd arts! dissembling smooth! Are honor, virtue, conscience, all exil'd? Is there no pity, no relenting ruth, Points to the parents fondling o'er their child, Then paints the ruin'd maid, and their distraction wild? 11 But now the supper crowns their simple board, The halesome parritch,21 chief of Scotia's food; The sowpe22 their only hawkie23 does afford, That yont 24 the hallan 25 snugly chows her cud. The dame brings forth, in complimental mood, To grace the lad, her weel-hain'd 26 kebbuck fell,27 An' aft 28 he's prest, an' aft he ca's it guid; The frugal wifie, garrulous, will tell, How 'twas a towmond 29 auld, sin' lint 30 was i' the bell. Or Moses bade eternal warfare wage Or Job's pathetic plaint, and wailing Or rapt Isaiah's wild, seraphic fire; Or other holy seers that tune the sacred lyre. 15 Perhaps the Christian volume is the theme, How guiltless blood for guilty man was shed; How He, who bore in heav'n the second name, Had not on earth whereon to lay His head: How His first followers and servants sped; The precepts sage they wrote to many a land; How he, who lone in Patmos banished, Saw in the sun a mighty angel stand, And heard great Bab'lon's doom pronounced by Heav'n's command. 16 Then kneeling down to Heaven's Eternal King, The saint, the father, and the husband prays: 35 incites, kindles From scenes like these old Scotia's grandeur springs, That makes her lov'd at home, rever'd abroad: What is a lordling's pomp? a cumbrous load, Disguising oft the wretch of human kind, Studied in arts of hell, in wickedness refin'd! 20 O Scotia! my dear, my native soil! For whom my warmest wish to Heaven is sent! Long may thy hardy sons of rustic toil Be blest with health, and peace, and sweet content! And, oh! may Heaven their simple lives prevent From luxury's contagion, weak and vile! Then, howe'er crowns and coronets be rent, A virtuous populace may rise the while, And stand a wall of fire around their muchlov'd isle. 21 O Thou! who pour'd the patriotic tide That stream'd thro' Wallace's undaunted heart, Who dar'd to nobly stem tyrannic pride, Or nobly die, the second glorious part, (The patriot's God peculiarly thou art, His friend, inspirer, guardian, and reward!) O never, never Scotia's realm desert, But still the patriot, and the patriot-bard, In bright succession raise, her ornament and guard! A WINTER NIGHT ROBERT BURNS Poor naked wretches, wheresoe'er you are, When biting Boreas, fell and doure,1 Princes and lords are but the breath of Dim-dark'ning through the flaky show'r, kings, "An honest man's the noblest work of God": And certes, in fair Virtue's heavenly road, The cottage leaves the palace far behind: |