CVI. TO RICHARD BROWN. [Richard Brown, it is said, fell off in his liking for Earns when he found that he had made free with his name in his epistle to Moore.] Mauchline, 7th March, 1788. I HAVE been out of the country, my dear friend, and have not had an opportunity of writing till now, when I am afraid you will be gone out of the country too. I have been looking at farms, and, after all, perhaps I may settle in the character of a farmer. I have got so vicious a bent to idleness, and have ever been so little a man of business, that it will take no ordinary effort to bring my mind properly into the routine: but you will say a "great effort is worthy of you." I say so myself; and butter up my vanity with all the stimulating compliments I can think of. Men of grave, geometrical minds, the sons of "which was to be demonstrated," may cry up reason as much as they please; but I have always found an honest passion, or native instinct, the truest auxiliary in the warfare of this world. Reason almost always comes to me like an unlucky wife to a poor devil of a husband, just in sufficient time to add her reproaches to his other grievances. I am gratified with your kind inquiries after Jean; as, after all, I may say with Othello :— "Excellent wretch! Perdition catch my soul, but I do love thee !" CVII. Yours,-R. B. TO MR. MUIR. [The change which Burns says in this letter took place in his ideas, refers, it is said, to his West India voyage, on which, it appears by one of his letters to Smith, he meditated for some time after his debut in Edinburgh.] Mossgiel, 7th March, 1788. DEAR SIR, I HAVE partly changed my ideas, my dear friend, since I saw you. I took old Glenconner with me to Mr. Miller's farm, and he was so pleased with it, that I have wrote an offer to Mr. Miller, which, if he accepts, I shall sit down a plain farmer, the happiest of lives when a man can live by it. In this case I shall not stay in Edinburgh above a week. I set out on Monday, and would have come by Kilmarnock, but there are several small sums owing me for my first edition about Galston and Newmills, and I shall set off so early as to dispatch my business, and reach Glasgow by night. When I return, I shall devote a forenoon or two to make some kind of acknowledgment for all the kindness I owe your friendship. Now that I hope to settle with some credit and comfort at home, there was not any friendship or friendly correspondence that promised me more pleasure than yours; I hope I will not be disappointed. trust the spring will renew your shattered frame, and make your friends happy. You and I have often agreed that life is no great blessing on the whole. The close of life, indeed, to a reasoning eye, is, "Dark as was chaos, ere the infant sun Was roll'd together, or had try'd his beams Athwart the gloom profound."'1 I But an honest man has nothing to fear. If we lie down in the grave, the whole man a piece of broken machinery, to moulder with the clods of the valley, be it so; at least there is an end of pain, care, woes, and wants: if that part of us called mind does survive the apparent destruction of the man-away with old-wife prejudices and tales! Every age and every nation has had a different set of stories; and as the many are always weak, of consequence, they have often, perhaps always, been deceived; a man conscious of having acted an honest part among his fellowcreatures-even granting that he may have been the sport at times of passions and instincts —he goes to a great unknown Being, who could have no other end in giving him existence but to make him happy, who gave him those passions and instincts, and well knows their force. These, my worthy friend, are my ideas; and I know they are not far different from yours. It becomes a man of sense to think for himself, particularly in a case where all men are equally interested, and where, indeed, all men are equally in the dark. Adieu, my dear Sir; God send us a cheerful R. B. meeting! 1 Blair's Grave. CVIII. TO MRS. DUNLOP. [One of the daughters of Mrs. Dunlop painted a sketch of Coila from Burns's poem of the Vision: it is still in existence, and is said to have merit.] MADAM, Mossgiel, 17th March, 1788. THE last paragraph in yours of the 30th February affected me most, so I shall begin my answer where you ended your letter. That I am often a sinner with any little wit I have, I do confess but I have taxed my recollection to no purpose, to find out when it was employed against you. I hate an ungenerous sarcasm a great deal worse than I do the devil; at least as Milton describes him; and though I may be rascally enough to be sometimes guilty of it myself, I cannot endure it in others. You, my honoured friend, who cannot appear in any light but you are sure of being respectable-you can afford to pass by an occasion to display your wit, because you may depend for fame on your sense; or, if you choose to be silent, you know you can rely on the gratitude of many, and the esteem of all; but, God help us, who are wits or witlings by profession, if we stand not for fame there, we sink unsupported! I am highly flattered by the news you tell me of Coila. I may say to the fair painter who does me so much honour, as Dr. Beattie says to Ross the poet of his muse Scota, from which, by the bye, I took the idea of Coila ('tis a poem of Beattie's in the Scottish dialect, which perhaps you have never seen :)— "Ye shak your heads, but o' my fegs, CIX. TO MISS CHALMERS. completed a bargain with Mr. Miller, of Dalswinton, for the farm of Ellisland, on the banks of the Nith, between five and six miles above Dumfries. I begin at Whit-Sunday to build a house, drive lime, &c.; and heaven be my help! for it will take a strong effort to bring my mind into the routine of business. I have discharged all the army of my former pursuits, fancies, and pleasures; a motley host! and have literally and strictly retained only the ideas of a few friends, which I have incorporated into a lifeguard. I trust in Dr. Johnson's observation, "Where much is attempted, something is done." Firmness, both in sufferance and exertion, is a character I would wish to be thought to possess and have always despised the whining yelp of complaint, and the cowardly, feeble resolve. Poor Miss K. is ailing a good deal this winter, and begged me to remember her to you the first time I wrote to you. Surely woman, amiable woman, is often made in vain. Too delicately formed for the rougher pursuits of ambition; too noble for the dirt of avarice, and even too gentle for the rage of pleasure; formed indeed for, and highly susceptible of enjoyment and rapture; but that enjoyment, alas! almost wholly at the mercy of the caprice, malevolence, stupidity, or wickedness of an animal at all times comparatively unfeeling, and often brutal. R. B. CX. TO RICHARD BROWN. [The excitement referred to in this letter arose from the dilatory and reluctant movements of Creech, who was so slow in settling his accounts that the poet suspected his solvency.] Glasgow, 26th March, 1788. I AM monstrously to blame, my dear Sir, in not writing to you, and sending you the Directory. I have been getting my tack extended, as I have taken a farm; and I have been racking shop accounts with Mr. Creech, both of [The uncouth cares of which the poet complains in which, together with watching, fatigue, and a this letter were the construction of a common farmhouse, with barn, byre, and stable to suit.] Edinburgh, March 14, 1788. I KNOW, my ever dear friend, that you will be pleased with the news when I tell you, I have at last taken a lease of a farm. Yesternight I load of care almost too heavy for my shoulders, have in some degree actually fevered me. I really forgot the Directory yesterday, which vexed me; but I was convulsed with rage a great part of the day. I have to thank you for the ingenious, friendly, and elegant epistle from your friend Mr. Crawford. I shall certainly CXI. Yours,-R. B. TO MR. ROBERT CLEGHORN. [Cleghorn was a farmer, a social man, and much of a musician. The poet wrote the Chevalier's Lament to please the jacobitical taste of his friend; and the musician gave him advice in farming which he neglected to follow :—“ Farmer Attention,” says Cleghorn, "is a good farmer everywhere."] Mauchline, 31st March, 1788. YESTERDAY, my dear Sir, as I was riding through a track of melancholy, joyless muirs, between Galloway and Ayrshire, it being Sunday, I turned my thoughts to psalms, and hymns, and spiritual songs; and your favourite air, Captain O'Kean," coming at length into my head, I tried these words to it. You will see that the first part of the tune must be repeated. CXII. TO MR. WILLIAM DUNBAR, EDINBURGH. ['This letter was printed for the first time by Robert Chambers, in his "People's Edition" of Burns.] Mauchline, 7th April, 1788. I HAVE not delayed so long to write you, my much respected friend, because I thought no farther of my promise. I have long since give up that kind of formal correspondence, where one sits down irksomely to write a letter, because we think we are in duty bound so to do. I have been roving over the country, as the farm I have taken is forty miles from this place, hiring servants and preparing matters; but most of all I am earnestly busy to bring about a revolution in my own mind. As, till within these eighteen months, I never was the wealthy master of ten guineas, my knowledge of business is to learn; add to this my late scenes of idleness and dissipation have enervated my mind to an alarming degree. Skill in the sober science of life is my most serious and hourly study. I have dropt all conversation and all reading (prose reading) but what tends in some way or other to my serious aim. Except one worthy young fellow, I have not one single correspondent in Edinburgh. You correspondent in Edinburgh. You have indeed kindly made me an offer of that kind. The world of wits, and gens comme il faut which I lately left, and with whom I never again will intimately mix-from that port, Sir, I expect your Gazette: what les beaux esprits are saying, what they are doing, and what they are singing. Any sober intelligence from my sequestered walks of life; any droll original; any passing reward, important forsooth, because it is mine; any little poetic effort, however embryoth; these, my dear Sir, are all you have When I talk of poetic to expect from me. efforts, I must have it always understood, that I appeal from your wit and taste to your friendThe first would be my ship and good nature. favourite tribunal, where I defied censure; but the last, where I declined justice. I am tolerably pleased with these verses, but as I have only a sketch of the tune, I leave it with you to try if they suit the measure of the music. I am so harassed with care and anxiety, about this farming project of mine, that my muse has degenerated into the veriest prose-wench that ever picked cinders, or followed a tinker. When I am fairly got into the routine of business, I shall trouble you with a longer epistle; perhaps with some queries respecting farming; at present, the world sits such a load on my mind, that it has effaced almost every trace of the poet in me. My very best compliments and good wishes to Mrs. Cleghorn. R. B. I have scarcely made a single distich since I saw you. When I meet with an old Scots air that has any facetious idea in its name, I have a peculiar pleasure in following out that idea for a verse or two. I trust that this will find you in better health than I did last time I called for you. A few lines from you, directed to me at Mauchline, were it but to let me know how you are, will set my mind a good deal [at rest.] Now, never shun the idea of writing me because perhaps you may be out of humour or spirits. I could give you a hundred good consequences attending a dull letter; one, for example, and the remaining ninety-nine some other time-it will always serve to keep in countenance, my much respected Sir, your obliged friend and humble servant, CXIII. TO MISS CHALMERS. R. B. unfortunate fool! The sport, the miserable victim of rebellious pride, hypochondriac imagination, agonizing sensibility, and bedlam passions? "I wish that I were dead, but I'm no like to die!" I had lately "a hairbreadth 'scape in th' imminent deadly breach" of love too. Thank my stars, I got off heart-whole, "waur fleyd than hurt."-Interruption. I have this moment got a hint: I fear I am something like- undone-but I hope for the best. Come, stubborn pride and unshrinking resolution; accompany me through this, to me, miserable world! You must not desert me! Your friendship I think I can count on, though I should date my letters from a marching regiment. Early in life, and all my life I reckoned on a [The sacrifice referred to by the poet, was his resolu- recruiting drum as my forlorn hope. Seriously tion to unite his fortune with Jean Armour.] Mauchline, 7th April, 1788. I AM indebted to you and Miss Nimmo for letting me know Miss Kennedy. Strange! how apt we are to indulge prejudices in our judgments of one another! Even I, who pique myself on my skill in marking characters-because I am too proud of my character as a man, to be dazzled in my judgment for glaring wealth; and too proud of my situation as a poor man to be biassed against squalid poverty-I was unacquainted with Miss K.'s very uncommon worth. I am going on a good deal progressive in mon grand bût, the sober science of life. I have lately made some sacrifices, for which, were I vivâ voce with you to paint the situation and recount the circumstances, you should applaud me. CXIV. R. B. TO MISS CHALMERS. [The hint alluded to, was a whisper of the insolvency of Creech; but the bailie was firm as the Bass.] No date. Now for that wayward, unfortunate thing, myself. I have broke measures with Creech, and last week I wrote him a frosty, keen letter. He replied in terms of chastisement, and promised me upon his honour that I should have the account on Monday; but this is Tuesday, and yet I have not heard a word from him. God have mercy on me! a poor d--mned, incautious, duped, though, life at present presents me with but a melancholy path: but--my limb will soon be sound, and I shall struggle on. CXV. TO MISS CHALMERS. R. B. [Although Burns gladly grasped at a situation in the Excise, he wrote many apologies to his friends, for the acceptance of a place, which, though humble enough, was the only one that offered.] Edinburgh, Sunday. TO-MORROW, my dear madam, I leave Edinburgh. I have altered all my plans of future life. A farm that I could live in, I could not find; and, indeed, after the necessary support my brother and the rest of the family required, I could not venture on farming in that style suitable to my feelings. You will condemn me for the next step I have taken. I have entered into the Excise. I stay in the west about three weeks, and then return to Edinburgh, for six weeks' instructions: afterwards, for I get employ instantly, I go où il plait à Dieu,—et mon Roi. I have chosen this, my dear friend, after mature deliberation. The question is not at what door of fortune's palace shall we enter in; but what doors does she open to us? I was not likely to get anything to do. I wanted un bût, which is a dangerous, an unhappy situation. I got this without any hanging on, or mortifying solicitation; it is immediate bread, and though poor in comparison of the last eighteen months of my existence, 'tis luxury in com parison of all my preceding life: besides, the commissioners are some of them my acquaintances, and all of them my firm friends. Your books have delighted me: Virgil, Dryden, and Tasso were all equally strangers to me; but of this more at large in my next. R. B. R. B. CXVI. TO MRS. DUNLOP. [The Tasso, with the perusal of which Mrs. Dunlop indulged the poet, was not the fine version of Fairfax, but the translation of Hoole-a far inferior performance.] Mauchline, 28th April, 1788. MADAM, Your powers of reprehension must be great indeed, as I assure you they made my heart ache with penitential pangs, even though I was really not guilty. As I commence farmer at Whit-Sunday, you will easily guess I must be pretty busy; but that is not all. As I got the offer of the Excise business without solicitation, and as it costs me only six months' attendance for instructions, to entitle me to a commission -which commission lies by me, and at any future period, on my simple petition, can be resumed-I thought five-and-thirty pounds a-year was no bad dernier ressort for a poor poet, if fortune in her jade tricks should kick him down from the little eminence to which she has lately helped him up. CXVII. TO MR. JAMES SMITH, AVON PRINTFIELD, LINLITHGOW. [James Smith, as this letter intimates, had moved from Mauchline to try to mend his fortunes at Avon Printfield, near Linlithgow.] Mauchline, April 28, 1788. BEWARE of your Strasburgh, my good Sir! Look on this as the opening of a correspondence, like the opening of a twenty-four gun battery! There is no understanding a man properly, without knowing something of his previous ideas (that is to say, if the man has any ideas; for I know many who, in the animal-muster, pass for men, that are the scanty masters of only one idea on any given subject, and by far the greatest part of your acquaintances and mine can barely boast of ideas, 1.25-1.5-1.75 or some such fractional matter;) so to let you a little into the secrets of my pericranium, there handsome, bewitching young hussy of your acis, you must know, a certain clean-limbed, quaintance, to whom I have lately and privately given a matrimonial title to my corpus. "Bode a robe and wear it, Bode a pock and bear it," For this reason, I am at present attending these instructions, to have them completed before Whit-sunday. Still, Madam, I prepared with the sincerest pleasure to meet you at the says the wise old Scots adage! I hate to preMount, and came to my brother's on Saturday sage ill-luck; and as my girl has been doubly night, to set out on Sunday; but for some nights kinder to me than even the best of women preceding I had slept in an apartment, where usually are to their partners of our sex, in the force of the winds and rains was only miti- | similar circumstances, I reckon on twelve times gated by being sifted through numberless aper- a brace of children against I celebrate my tures in the windows, walls, &c. In consequence I was on Sunday, Monday, and part of Tuesday, unable to stir out of bed, with all the miserable effects of a violent cold. You see, Madam, the truth of the French maxim, le vrai n'est pas toujours le vraisemblable; your last was so full of expostulation, and was something so like the language of an offended friend, that I began to tremble for a correspondence, which I had with grateful pleasure set down as one of the greatest enjoyments of my future life. twelfth wedding-day: these twenty-four will give me twenty-four gossipings, twenty-four christenings (I mean one equal to two), and I hope, by the blessing of the God of my fathers, to make them twenty-four dutiful children to their parents, twenty-four useful members of society, and twenty-four approved servants of their God! * * * 'Light's heartsome," quo' the wife when she was stealing sheep. You see what a lamp I have hung up to lighten your paths, when you are idle enough to explore the combinations and |