Poems and Songs of Robert Burns
Miller brought up th’ artillery ranks,
The many-pounders of the Banks,
Resistless desolation!
While Maxwelton, that baron bold,
’Mid Lawson’s port entrench’d his hold,
And threaten’d worse damnation.
To these what Tory hosts oppos’d
With these what Tory warriors clos’d
Surpasses my descriving;
Squadrons, extended long and large,
With furious speed rush to the charge,
Like furious devils driving.
What verse can sing, what prose narrate,
The butcher deeds of bloody Fate,
Amid this mighty tulyie!
Grim Horror girn’d, pale Terror roar’d,
As Murder at his thrapple shor’d,
And Hell mix’d in the brulyie.
As Highland craigs by thunder cleft,
When lightnings fire the stormy lift,
Hurl down with crashing rattle;
As flames among a hundred woods,
As headlong foam from a hundred floods,
Such is the rage of Battle.
The stubborn Tories dare to die;
As soon the rooted oaks would fly
Before th’ approaching fellers:
The Whigs come on like Ocean’s roar,
When all his wintry billows pour
Against the Buchan Bullers.
Lo, from the shades of Death’s deep night,
Departed Whigs enjoy the fight,
And think on former daring:
The muffled murtherer of Charles
The Magna Charter flag unfurls,
All deadly gules its bearing.
Nor wanting ghosts of Tory fame;
Bold Scrimgeour follows gallant Graham;
Auld Covenanters shiver—
Forgive! forgive! much-wrong’d Montrose!
Now Death and Hell engulph thy foes,
Thou liv’st on high for ever.
Still o’er the field the combat burns,
The Tories, Whigs, give way by turns;
But Fate the word has spoken:
For woman’s wit and strength o’man,
Alas! can do but what they can;
The Tory ranks are broken.
O that my een were flowing burns!
My voice, a lioness that mourns
Her darling cubs’ undoing!
That I might greet, that I might cry,
While Tories fall, while Tories fly,
And furious Whigs pursuing!
What Whig but melts for good Sir James,
Dear to his country, by the names,
Friend, Patron, Benefactor!
Not Pulteney’s wealth can Pulteney save;
And Hopetoun falls, the generous, brave;
And Stewart, bold as Hector.
Thou, Pitt, shalt rue this overthrow,
And Thurlow growl a curse of woe,
And Melville melt in wailing:
Now Fox and Sheridan rejoice,
And Burke shall sing, “O Prince, arise!
Thy power is all-prevailing!”
For your poor friend, the Bard, afar
He only hears and sees the war,
A cool spectator purely!
So, when the storm the forest rends,
The robin in the hedge descends,
And sober chirps securely.
Now, for my friends’ and brethren’s sakes,
And for my dear-lov’d Land o’ Cakes,
I pray with holy fire:
Lord, send a rough-shod troop o’ Hell
O’er a’ wad Scotland buy or sell,
To grind them in the mire!
Elegy On Captain Matthew Henderson
A Gentleman who held the Patent for his Honours immediately from
Almighty God.
Should the poor be flattered?—Shakespeare.
O Death! thou tyrant fell and bloody!
The meikle devil wi’ a woodie
Haurl thee hame to his black smiddie,
O’er hurcheon hides,
And like stock-fish come o’er his studdie
Wi’ thy auld sides!
He’s gane, he’s gane! he’s frae us torn,
The ae best fellow e’er was born!
Thee, Matthew, Nature’s sel’ shall mourn,
By wood and wild,
Where haply, Pity strays forlorn,
Frae man exil’d.
Ye hills, near neighbours o’ the starns,
That proudly cock your cresting cairns!
Ye cliffs, the haunts of sailing earns,
Where Echo slumbers!
Come join, ye Nature’s sturdiest bairns,
My wailing numbers!
Mourn, ilka grove the cushat kens!
Ye haz’ly shaws and briery dens!
Ye burnies, wimplin’ down your glens,
Wi’ toddlin din,
Or foaming, strang, wi’ hasty stens,
Frae lin to lin.
Mourn, little harebells o’er the lea;
Ye stately foxgloves, fair to see;
Ye woodbines hanging bonilie,
In scented bow’rs;
Ye roses on your thorny tree,
The first o’ flow’rs.
At dawn, when ev’ry grassy blade
Droops with a diamond at his head,
At ev’n, when beans their fragrance shed,
I’ th’ rustling gale,
Ye maukins, whiddin thro’ the glade,
Come join my wail.
Mourn, ye wee songsters o’ the wood;
Ye grouse that crap the heather bud;
Ye curlews, calling thro’ a clud;
Ye whistling plover;
And mourn, we whirring paitrick brood;
He’s gane for ever!
Mourn, sooty coots, and speckled teals;
Ye fisher herons, watching eels;
Ye duck and drake, wi’ airy wheels
Circling the lake;
Ye bitterns, till the quagmire reels,
Rair for his sake.
Mourn, clam’ring craiks at close o’ day,
’Mang fields o’ flow’ring clover gay;
And when ye wing your annual way
Frae our claud shore,
Tell thae far warlds wha lies in clay,
Wham we deplore.
Ye houlets, frae your ivy bow’r
In some auld tree, or eldritch tow’r,
What time the moon, wi’ silent glow’r,
Sets up her horn,
Wail thro’ the dreary midnight hour,
Till waukrife morn!
O rivers, forests, hills, and plains!
Oft have ye heard my canty strains;
But now, what else for me remains
But tales of woe;
And frae my een the drapping rains
Maun ever flow.
Mourn, Spring, thou darling of the year!
Ilk cowslip cup shall kep a tear:
Thou, Simmer, while each corny spear
Shoots up its head,
Thy gay, green, flow’ry tresses shear,
For him that’s dead!
Thou, Autumn, wi’ thy yellow hair,
In grief thy sallow mantle tear!
Thou, Winter, hurling thro’ the air
The roaring blast,
Wide o’er the naked world declare
The worth we’ve lost!
Mourn him, thou Sun, great source of light!
Mourn, Empress of the silent night!
And you, ye twinkling starnies bright,
My Matthew mourn!
For through your orbs he’s ta’en his flight,
Ne’er to return.
O Henderson! the man! the brother!
And art thou gone, and gone for ever!
And hast thou crost that unknown river,
Life’s dreary bound!
Like thee, where shall I find another,
The world around!
Go to your sculptur’d tombs, ye Great,
In a’ the tinsel trash o’ state!
But by thy honest turf I’ll wait,
Thou man of worth!
And weep the ae best fellow’s fate
E’er lay in earth.
The Epitaph
Stop, passenger! my story’s brief,
And truth I shall relate, man;
I tell nae common tale o’ grief,
For Matthew was a great man.
If thou uncommon merit hast,
Yet spurn’d at Fortune’s door, man;
A look of pity hither cast,
For Matthew was a poor man.
If thou a noble sodger art,
That passest by this grave, man;
There moulders here a gallant heart,
For Matthew was a brave man.
If thou on men, their works and ways,
Canst throw uncommon light, man;
Here lies wha weel had won thy praise,
For Matthew was a bright man.
If thou, at Friendship’s sacred ca’,
Wad life itself resign, man:
Thy sympathetic tear maun fa’,
For Matthew was a kind man.
If thou art staunch, without a stain,
Like the unchanging blue, man;
This was a kinsman o’ thy ain,
For Matthew was a true man.
If thou hast wit, and fun, and fire,
And ne’er guid wine did fear, man;
This was thy billie, dam, and sire,
For Matthew was a queer man.
If ony whiggish, whingin’ sot,
To blame poor Matthew dare, man;
May dool and sorrow be his lot,
For Matthew was a rare man.
But now, his radiant course is run,
For Matthew’s was a bright one!
His soul was like the glorious sun,
A matchless, Heavenly light, man.
Verses On Captain Grose
Written on an Envelope, enclosing a Letter to Him.
Ken ye aught o’ Captain Grose?—Igo, and ago,
If he’s amang his friends or foes?—Iram, coram, dago.
Is he to Abra’m’s bosom gane?—Igo, and ago,
Or haudin Sarah by the wame?—Iram, coram dago.
Is he south or is he north?—Igo, and ago,
Or drowned in the river Forth?—Iram, coram dago.
Is he slain by Hielan’ bodies?—Igo, and ago,
And eaten like a wether haggis?—Iram, coram, dago.
Where’er he be, the Lord be near him!—Igo, and ago,
As for the deil, he daur na steer him.—Iram, coram, dago.
But please transmit th’ enclosed letter,—Igo, and ago,
Which will oblige your humble debtor.—Iram, coram, dago.
So may ye hae auld stanes in store,—Igo, and ago,
The very stanes that Adam bore.—Iram, coram, dago,
So may ye get in glad possession,—Igo, and ago,
The coins o’ Satan’s coronation!—Iram coram dago.
Tam O’ Shanter
A Tale.
“Of Brownyis and of Bogillis full is this Buke.”
Gawin Douglas.
When chapman billies leave the street,
And drouthy neibors, neibors, meet;
As market days are wearing late,
And folk begin to tak the gate,
While we sit bousing at the nappy,
An’ getting fou and unco happy,
We think na on the lang Scots miles,
The mosses, waters, slaps and stiles,
That lie between us and our hame,
Where sits our sulky, sullen dame,
Gathering her brows like gathering storm,
Nursing her wrath to keep it warm.
This truth fand honest Tam o’ Shanter,
As he frae Ayr ae night did canter:
(Auld Ayr, wham ne’er a town surpasses,
For honest men and bonie lasses).
O Tam! had’st thou but been sae wise,
As taen thy ain wife Kate’s advice!
She tauld thee weel thou was a skellum,
A blethering, blustering, drunken blellum;
That frae November till October,
Ae market-day thou was na sober;
That ilka melder wi’ the Miller,
Thou sat as lang as thou had siller;
That ev’ry naig was ca’d a shoe on
The Smith and thee gat roarin’ fou on;
That at the Lord’s house, ev’n on Sunday,
Thou drank wi’ Kirkton Jean till Monday,
She prophesied that late or soon,
Thou wad be found, deep drown’d in Doon,
Or catch’d wi’ warlocks in the mirk,
By Alloway’s auld, haunted kirk.
Ah, gentle dames! it gars me greet,
To think how mony counsels sweet,
How mony lengthen’d, sage advices,
The husband frae the wife despises!
But to our tale: Ae market night,
Tam had got planted unco right,
Fast by an ingle, bleezing finely,
Wi reaming saats, that drank divinely;
And at his elbow, Souter Johnie,
His ancient, trusty, drougthy crony:
Tam lo’ed him like a very brither;
They had been fou for weeks thegither.
The night drave on wi’ sangs an’ clatter;
And aye the ale was growing better:
The Landlady and Tam grew gracious,
Wi’ favours secret, sweet, and precious:
The Souter tauld his queerest stories;
The Landlord’s laugh was ready chorus:
The storm without might rair and rustle,
Tam did na mind the storm a whistle.
Care, mad to see a man sae happy,
E’en drown’d himsel amang the nappy.
As bees flee hame wi’ lades o’ treasure,
The minutes wing’d their way wi’ pleasure:
Kings may be blest, but Tam was glorious,
O’er a’ the ills o’ life victorious!
But pleasures are like poppies spread,