The Complete Works of Robert Burns: Containing his Poems, Songs, and Correspondence. With a New Life of the Poet, and Notices, Critical and Biographical by Allan Cunningham

Now for a few miscellaneous remarks. "The Posie" (in the Museum) is my composition; the air was taken down from Mrs. Burns's voice. It is well known in the west country, but the...

I intended to have written you long ere now, and as I told you, I had gotten three stanzas and a half on my way in a poetic epistle to you; but that old enemy of all _good works...

The elder Burns was a well-informed, silent, austere man, who endured no idle gaiety, nor indecorous language: while he relaxed somewhat the hard, stern creed of the Covenanting...

Accompanied by this charming dame, he visited an old lady, Mrs. Bruce, of Clackmannan, who, in the belief that she had the blood of the royal Bruce in her veins, received the po...

That d--mned mare of yours is dead. I would freely have given her price to have saved her; she has vexed me beyond description. Indebted as I was to your goodness beyond what I...

Mr. Clarke begs you to give Miss Phillis a corner in your book, as she is a particular flame of his, and out of compliment to him I have made the song. She is a Miss Phillis M'M...

As my friend Mr. Graham goes for your good town to-morrow, I cannot resist the temptation to send you a few lines, and as I have nothing to say I have chosen this sheet of fools...

The second volume of the songs I mentioned to you in my last is published to-day. I send you a copy which I beg you will accept as a mark of the veneration I have long had, and...

The circumstances under which his principal poems were composed, have been related: the "Lament of Mailie" found its origin in the catastrophe of a pet ewe; the "Epistle to Sill...

So soon as I know of your arrival at Dunlop, I will take the first conveniency to dedicate a day, or perhaps two, to you and friendship, under the guarantee of the Major's hospi...

Awa wi' your witchcraft o' beauty's alarms, The slender bit beauty you grasp in your arms: O, gie me the lass that has acres o' charms, O, gie me the lass wi' the weel-stockit f...

I wish the farmer great joy of his new acquisition to his family. * * * * * I cannot say that I give him joy of his life as a farmer. 'Tis, as a farmer paying a dear, unconscion...

I am afraid I have almost ruined one source, the principal one, indeed, of my former happiness; that eternal propensity I always had to fall in love. My heart no more glows with...

You must by this time have set me down as one of the most ungrateful of men. You did me the honour to present me with a book, which does honour to science and the intellectual p...

[Of this letter, Dr. Currie writes "the poet must have been tipsy indeed to abuse sweet Ecclefechan at this rate;" it is one of the prettiest of our Annandale villages, and the...

Since I wrote to you the last lugubrious sheet, I have not had time to write you further. When I say that I had not time, that as usual means, that the three demons, indolence,...

You may perhaps think it an extravagant fancy, but it is a sentiment which strikes home to my very soul: though sceptical in some points of our current belief, yet, I think, I h...

I never spent an afternoon among great folks with half that pleasure as when, in company with you, I had the honour of paying my devoirs to the plain, honest, worthy man, the pr...

I returned home very considerably improved. My reading was enlarged with the very important addition of Thomson's and Shenstone's works; I had seen human nature in a new phasis;...

There is another fragment in imitation of an old Scotch song, well known among the country ingle-sides.--I cannot tell the name, neither of the song nor the tune, but they are i...

Now, Sir, to the business in which I would more immediately interest you. The partiality of my COUNTRYMEN has brought me forward as a man of genius, and has given me a character...

[Lord Buchan printed this letter in his Essay on the Life of Thomson, in 1792. His lordship invited Burns to leave his corn unreaped, walk from Ellisland to Dryburgh, and help h...

Produced by Marilynda Fraser-Cunliffe, Sankar Viswanathan, and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was made using scans of public domain w...

[In the correspondence of the poet with Mrs. Dunlop he rarely mentions Thomson's Collection of Songs, though his heart was set much upon it: in the Dunlop library there are many...

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...

I have taken tooth and nail to the Bible, and am got through the five books of Moses, and half way in Joshua. It is really a glorious book. I sent for my bookbinder to-day, and...

I have a favour to request of you, Madam, and of your sister Mrs. ----, through your means. You know that, at the wish of my late friend, I made a collection of all my trifles i...

The song otherwise will pass. As to "M'Gregoira Rua-Ruth," you will see a song of mine to it, with a set of the air superior to yours, in the Museum, vol. ii. p. 181. The song b...

I send Charlotte the first number of the songs; I would not wait for the second number; I hate delays in little marks of friendship, as I hate dissimulation in the language of t...

Now that you are over with the sirens of Flattery, the harpies of Corruption, and the furies of Ambition, these infernal deities, that on all sides, and in all parties, preside...

Upon a stormy night, amid whistling squalls of wind, and bitter blasts of hail; in short, on such a night as the devil would choose to take the air in; a farmer or farmer's serv...

There is a great degree of folly in talking unnecessarily of one's private affairs. I have just now been interrupted by one of my new neighbours, who has made himself absolutely...

[Alexander Geddes was a controversialist and poet, and a bishop of the broken remnant of the Catholic Church of Scotland: he is known as the author of a very humorous ballad cal...

It would oblige me much if you would send me a line or two when convenient. I shall only add further that, if a behaviour regulated (though perhaps but very imperfectly) by the...

I have finished the piece which had the happy fortune to be honoured with your approbation; and never did little miss with more sparkling pleasure show her applauded sampler to...

I will send you the "Fortunate Shepherdess" as soon as I return to Ayrshire, for there I keep it with other precious treasure. I shall send it by a careful hand, as I would not...

From attacking others, the poet was--in the interval between penning these election lampoons--called on to defend himself: for this he seems to have been quite unprepared, thoug...

I received yours here this moment, and am indeed highly flattered with the approbation of the literary circle you mention; a literary circle inferior to none in the two kingdoms...

By far the most agreeable hours I spend in Edinburgh must be placed to the account of Miss Laurie and her piano-forte. I cannot help repeating to you and Mrs. Laurie a complimen...

[The command which the Comyns held on the Nith was lost to the Douglasses: the Nithsdale power, on the downfall of that proud name, was divided; part went to the Charteris's and...

Of his modes of study he has himself informed us, as well as of the seasons and the places in which he loved to muse. He composed while he strolled along the secluded banks of t...

["Do you know a fine air," Burns asks Thomson, April, 1973, "called 'Jackie Hume's Lament?' I have a song of considerable merit to that air: I'll enclose you both song and tune,...

Awa, thou flaunting god o' day! Awa, thou pale Diana! Ilk star gae hide thy twinkling ray, When I'm to meet my Anna. Come, in thy raven plumage, night! Sun, moon, and stars with...

She has an e'e--she has but ane, The cat has twa the very colour; Five rusty teeth, forbye a stump, A clapper-tongue wad deave a miller: A whiskin' beard about her mou', Her nos...

"Now Tam! O, Tum! had thae been queans, A' plump and strapping in their teens, Their sacks, instead o' creeshie flannen, Been snaw-white seventeen hunder linen! Thir breeks o' m...

Go fetch to me a pint o' wine, An' fill it in a silver tassie; That I may drink, before I go, A service to my bonnie lassie; The boat rocks at the pier o' Leith; Fu' loud the wi...

But I look to the west, when I gae to rest, That happy my dreams and my slumbers may be; For far in the west lives he I Io'e best, The lad that is dear to my babie and me.

I leave Edinburgh to-morrow morning, but could not go without troubling you with half a line, sincerely to thank you for the kindness, patronage, and friendship you have shown m...

He hums and he hankers, he frets and he cankers, I never can please him, do a' that I can; He's peevish and jealous of a' the young fellows: O, dool on the day I met wi' an auld...

Even with the tales which he related of rustic love and adventure his own story mingled; and ladies of rank heard, for the first time, that in all that was romantic in the passi...

In Ramsay's Tea-table Miscellany, he tells us that about thirty of the songs in that publication were the works of some young gentlemen of his acquaintance; which songs are mark...

["Is not the Scotch phrase," Burns writes to Mrs. Dunlop, "Auld lang syne, exceedingly expressive? There is an old song and tune which has often thrilled through my soul: I shal...

[The thoughts of Burns, it is said, wandered to the fair Mrs. Riddel, of Woodleigh Park, while he composed this song for Thomson. The idea is taken from an old lyric, of more sp...

Sleep'st thou, or wak'st thou, fairest creature? Rosy Morn now lifts his eye, Numbering ilka bud which nature Waters wi' the tears o' joy: Now through the leafy woods, And by th...

Robert Burns, the chief of the peasant poets of Scotland, was born in a little mud-walled cottage on the banks of Doon, near "Alloway's auld haunted kirk," in the shire of Ayr,...

These were composed by the late Dr. Austin, physician at Edinburgh.--He had courted a lady, to whom he was shortly to have been married; but the Duke of Athole having seen her,...

Till Robert, the Lord of the Cairn and the Scaur, Unmatch'd at the bottle, unconquer'd in war, He drank his poor godship as deep as the sea, No tide of the Baltic e'er drunker t...

But wad ye see him in his glee, For meikle glee and fun has he, Then set him down, and twa or three Guid fellows wi' him; And port, O port! shine thou a wee, And then ye'll see...

["The Highland Lassie" was Mary Campbell, whose too early death the poet sung in strains that will endure while the language lasts. "She was," says Burns, "a warm-hearted, charm...

The mind of Burns took now a wider range: he had sung of the maidens of Kyle in strains not likely soon to die, and though not weary of the softnesses of love, he desired to try...

But, Duncan, gin ye'll keep your aith-- Ha, ha, the girdin o't! I'se bless you wi' my hindmost breath-- Ha, ha, the girdin o't! Duncan, gin ye'll keep your aith, The beast again...

Talk not to me of savages From Afric's burning sun, No savage e'er could rend my heart As, Jessy, thou hast done. But Jessy's lovely hand in mine, A mutual faith to plight, Not...

["The Mother's Lament," says the poet, in a copy of the verses now before me, "was composed partly with a view to Mrs. Fergusson of Craigdarroch, and partly to the worthy patron...

Powers celestial! whose protection Ever guards the virtuous fair, While in distant climes I wander, Let my Mary be your care: Let her form sae fair and faultless, Fair and fault...

But aiblins honest Master Heron, Had at the time some dainty fair one, To ware his theologic care on, And holy study; And tir'd o' sauls to waste his lear on E'en tried the body.

Conceited gowk! puff'd up wi' windy pride!-- This mony a year I've stood the flood an' tide; And tho' wi' crazy eild I'm sair forfairn, I'll be a Brig, when ye're a shapeless ca...

Ha! whare ye gaun, ye crowlin ferlie! Your impudence protects you sairly: I canna say by ye strunt rarely, Owre gauze and lace; Tho' faith, I fear, ye dine but sparely On sic a...

Our second Right--but needless here is caution, To keep that right inviolate's the fashion, Each man of sense has it so full before him, He'd die before he'd wrong it--'tis deco...

Beauteous rose-bud, young and gay, Blooming in thy early May, Never may'st thou, lovely flow'r, Chilly shrink in sleety show'r! Never Boreas' hoary path, Never Eurus' poisonous...

This first of songs, is the master-piece of my old friend Skinner. He was passing the day, at the town of Cullen, I think it was, in a friend's house whose name was Montgomery....

Frae morn to e'en its nought but toiling, At baking, roasting, frying, boiling; An' though the gentry first are stechin, Yet even the ha' folk fill their pechan Wi' sauce, ragou...

Kelso. Dine with the farmers' club--all gentlemen, talking of high matters--each of them keeps a hunter from thirty to fifty pounds value, and attends the fox-huntings in the co...

"Blow, blow, ye winds, with heavier gust! And freeze, thou bitter-biting frost: Descend, ye chilly, smothering snows! Not all your rage, as now united, shows More hard unkindnes...

Happy, ye sons of busy life, Who, equal to the bustling strife, No other view regard! Ev'n when the wished end's deny'd, Yet while the busy means are ply'd, They bring their own...

Shrewd Willie Smellie to Crochallan came, The old cock'd hat, the gray surtout, the same; His bristling beard just rising in its might, 'Twas four long nights and days to shavin...

A little, upright, pert, tart, tripping wight, And still his precious self his dear delight; Who loves his own smart shadow in the streets Better than e'er the fairest she he me...

[Chloris was a Nithsdale beauty. Love and sorrow were strongly mingled in her early history: that she did not look so lovely in other eyes as she did in those of Burns is well k...

"See, here's a scythe, and there's a dart, They hae pierc'd mony a gallant heart; But Doctor Hornbook, wi' his art And cursed skill, Has made them baith no worth a f----t, Damn'...

Here, rivers in the sea were lost; There, mountains to the skies were tost: Here, tumbling billows mark'd the coast, With surging foam; There, distant shone Art's lofty boast, T...

[Footnote 40: Take an opportunity of going unnoticed, to a bean stack, and fathom it three times round. The last fathom of the last time, you will catch in your arms the appeara...

Davie Bluster, Davie Bluster, For a saunt if ye muster, It's a sign they're no nice o' recruits, Yet to worth let's be just, Royal blood ye might boast, If the ass were the king...

But tent me, Davie, ace o' hearts! (To say aught less wad wrang the cartes, And flatt'ry I detest,) This life has joys for you and I; And joys that riches ne'er could buy: And j...

["This Poem was written," says Burns, "before the act anent the Scottish distilleries, of session 1786, for which Scotland and the author return their most grateful thanks." Bef...

Hear how he clears the points o' faith Wi' ratlin' an' wi' thumpin'! Now meekly calm, now wild in wrath, He's stampin an' he's jumpin'! His lengthen'd chin, his turn'd-up snout,...

Auld Coila, now, may fidge fu' fain, She's gotten poets o' her ain, Chiels wha their chanters winna hain, But tune their lays, Till echoes a' resound again Her weel-sung praise.

_Saturday Morning._--Leave Perth--come up Strathearn to Endermay--fine, fruitful, cultivated Strath--the scene of "Bessy Bell, and Mary Gray," near Perth--fine scenery on the ba...

_Rockin'_, a denomination for a friendly visit. In former times young women met with their distaffs during the winter evenings, to sing, and spin, and be merry; these were calle...