.

13th, 1785.

      Guid speed an’ furder to you, Johnny,

      Guid health, hale han’s, an’ weather bonny;

      Now when ye’re nickan down fu’ canny

      The staff o’ bread,

      May ye ne’er want a stoup o’ bran’y

      To clear your head.

      May Boreas never thresh your rigs,

      Nor kick your rickles aff their legs,

      Sendin’ the stuff o’er muirs an’ haggs

      Like drivin’ wrack;

      But may the tapmast grain that wags

      Come to the sack.

      I’m bizzie too, an’ skelpin’ at it,

      But bitter, daudin’ showers hae wat it,

      Sae my auld stumpie pen I gat it

      Wi’ muckle wark,

      An’ took my jocteleg an’ whatt it,

      Like ony clark.

      It’s now twa month that I’m your debtor

      For your braw, nameless, dateless letter,

      Abusin’ me for harsh ill nature

      On holy men,

      While deil a hair yoursel’ ye’re better,

      But mair profane.

      But let the kirk-folk ring their bells,

      Let’s sing about our noble sel’s;

      We’ll cry nae jads frae heathen hills

      To help, or roose us,

      But browster wives an’ whiskey stills,

      They are the muses.

      Your friendship, Sir, I winna quat it

      An’ if ye mak’ objections at it,

      Then han’ in nieve some day we’ll knot it,

      An’ witness take,

      An’ when wi’ Usquabae we’ve wat it

      It winna break.

      But if the beast and branks be spar’d

      Till kye be gaun without the herd,

      An’ a’ the vittel in the yard,

      An’ theekit right,

      I mean your ingle-side to guard

      Ae winter night.

      Then muse-inspirin’ aqua-vitæ

      Shall make us baith sae blythe an’ witty,

      Till ye forget ye’re auld an’ gatty,

      An’ be as canty,

      As ye were nine year less than thretty,

      Sweet ane an’ twenty!

      But stooks are cowpet wi’ the blast,

      An’ now the sin keeks in the west,

      Then I maun rin amang the rest

      An’ quat my chanter;

      Sae I subscribe myself in haste,

      Yours, Rab the Ranter.

      XXXII. TO WILLIAM SIMPSON, OCHILTREE

      [The person to whom this epistle is addressed, was schoolmaster of Ochiltree, and afterwards of New Lanark: he was a writer of verses too, like many more of the poet’s comrades;—of verses which rose not above the barren level of mediocrity: “one of his poems,” says Chambers, “was a laughable elegy on the death of the Emperor Paul.” In his verses to Burns, under the name of a Tailor, there is nothing to laugh at, though they are intended to be laughable as well as monitory.]

      May, 1785.

      I gat your letter, winsome Willie;

      Wi’ gratefu’ heart I thank you brawlie;

      Tho’ I maun say’t, I wad be silly,

      An’ unco vain,

      Should I believe, my coaxin’ billie,

      Your flatterin’ strain.

      But I’se believe ye kindly meant it,

      I sud be laith to think ye hinted

      Ironic satire, sidelins sklented

      On my poor Musie;

      Tho’ in sic phraisin’ terms ye’ve penn’d it,

      I scarce excuse ye.

      My senses wad be in a creel,

      Should I but dare a hope to speel,

      Wi’ Allan, or wi’ Gilbertfield,

      The braes o’ fame;

      Or Fergusson, the writer chiel,

      A deathless name.

      (O Fergusson! thy glorious parts

      Ill suited law’s dry, musty arts!

      My curse upon your whunstane hearts,

      Ye Enbrugh gentry!

      The tythe o’ what ye waste at cartes

      Wad stow’d his pantry!)

      Yet when a tale comes i’ my head,

      Or lasses gie my heart a screed,

      As whiles they’re like to be my dead

      (O sad disease!)

      I kittle up my rustic reed,

      It gies me ease.

      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.

      Nae poet thought her worth his while,

      To set her name in measur’d stile;

      She lay like some unkenn’d-of isle

      Beside New-Holland,

      Or whare wild-meeting oceans boil

      Besouth Magellan.

      Ramsay an’ famous Fergusson

      Gied Forth and Tay a lift aboon;

      Yarrow an’ Tweed, to monie a tune,

      Owre Scotland rings,

      While Irwin, Lugar, Ayr, an’ Doon,

      Nae body sings.

      Th’ Ilissus, Tiber, Thames, an’ Seine,

      Glide sweet in monie a tunefu’ line!

      But, Willie, set your fit to mine,

      An’ cock your crest,

      We’ll gar our streams an’ burnies shine

      Up wi’ the best.

      We’ll sing auld Coila’s plains an’ fells,

      Her moor’s red-brown wi’ heather bells,

      Her banks an’ braes, her dens an’ dells,

      Where glorious Wallace

      Aft bure the gree, as story tells,

      Frae southron billies.

      At Wallace’ name, what Scottish blood

      But boils up in a spring-tide flood!

      Oft have our fearless fathers strode

      By Wallace’ side,

      Still pressing onward, red-wat shod,

      Or glorious dy’d.

      O sweet are Coila’s haughs an’ woods,

      When lintwhites chant