The Burns Club of St. Louis is rich in Burnsiana. Among the relics which furnish the unique club room are a table which was owned by Burns when he lived at Dumfries, a table from the Tam O'Shanter inn, a third table made of wood from St. Michael's church at Dumfries, a little chair which was the favorite seat of Burns in his childhood, another chair from the cottage in Ayr and the old arm chair of Mrs. Tam O'Shanter, Where sits our sulky, sullen dame, Gathering her brows like gathering storm. The great chimney and fireplace at one end of the long club room provide the ingle-nook which is occupied by an old spinning wheel and reel of the Armour family. On the opposite side is the "dresser" or sideboard with an array of the Club's tableware-quaint bowls and plates and ashets. Upon the mantel, over the fireplace, are candlesticks of Burns' time, and near by hang "Bonnie Jean's" iron holder and the "girdle" on which the cakes were baked. "Bonnie Jean's" milking stool, a cupboard and table which belonged to a family where Burns visited much, a chair that was used often by the poet, and the eight-day clock one hundred and thirty years old give atmosphere to this home of the Burns Club of St. Louis. The walls of the chamber are hung with reminders of Burns. There are the original drawings made by John Burnet to illustrate Tam O'Shanter, an oil painting of the Burns Cottage at the World's Fair, facsimiles of many of the best known poems of Burns in his handwriting, prints and sketches of Scottish scenes made familiar by the poet. No St. Louis Night wi' Burns passes without additions to this priceless collection of Burnsiana. 33333 ST. LOUIS was the first city outside of the British Isles to dedicate a permanent memorial in marble to Robert Burns. On the 9th of June, 1866, a life size bust of Burns was unveiled with fitting ceremonies in the Mercantile Library. It was the work of the sculptor, William Brodie, R. S. A. The bust stands on a mahogany pedestal in which are panel scenes from The Cotter's Saturday Night, Tam O'Shanter and Auld Brig o' Doon. This memorial was presented to the Mercantile Library by the Caledonian Society of St. Louis. Fourteen years after St. Louis had paid tribute to Burns, a memorial was unveiled in New York City. Other American cities have since honored the poet in a similar manner. At the St. Louis World's Fair was erected the first replica of the cottage in which Burns was born. The cottage was taken to the Lewis and Clark Exposition at Portland. Prompted by the great interest shown in the "auld clay biggin'," other cities have erected reproductions of the Burns cottage. TO ROBERT BURNS By Orrick Johns Read at the meeting of the Burns Club of St. Louis, on the anniversary of the poet's birth, January 25, 1913 Burns, your name is on the tongue But the world you knew when young Like a painted hoyden, she Gives her love where gold is plenty; Since your years were two-and-twenty. Burns, from cot and hovel now, They will rhyme and love and labor Hate the Kirk and curse the neighbor, On the unco guid, and lordly- Streak of sacred human light! That's what you, man, long were doing Learning meanwhile what endures. Your good neighbors, maids and men, And you railed and scorned and scoffed Words that wing the heart aloft Like the lark at daybreak soaring, Ah, then, what the devil, Burns! Soon the word that's truly spoken Burns, shall we then try to change her, Damn it, man, the things that hurt you Healed you, for you bore them well; And if they found you short on virtue, Gad, you're singing sweet in Hell! Aye, we know you're singing sweetly Though the Devil be your themeFar from Doon and Kirk and Cotter, Lost in immemorial dream. BURNS, THE WORLD POET By William Marion Reedy, January 25, 1912 EVEN before presenting my apologies for my poor effort of this evening, I would express my sincere thanks to this assemblage for, not alone the honor of its invitation, but for having coerced me into the performance of a duty that should have been done any time these thirty years. Until I was told by Mr. Dick, who seems for some time to have adopted me as his King Charles' head, so far as concerns this address, that I would be expected to say something to the Burns Club, I had never read the poems of Robert Burns. About thirty years ago, at college, I essayed the task and abandoned it. The dialect was too much for me— as I doubt not it has been for better men. I remember cherishing a theory, which, several times, I advanced to one of your most estimable members, Mr. Lehmann, in "wee short hours ayon't the twal," to the effect that Burns possessed an advantage over all other poets in that in his writing, when he could not find a rhyme in one language he took it from another, and so achieved a purely adventitious felicity through the mixture of the familiar and the strange. I do not know why I tell you this, unless it is because I am affected by that psychic wave of confession which has swept the country, beginning with the McNamaras, in Los Angeles, ranging east to Massachusetts and overcoming the poisoner of Avis Linnell of Hyannis, ricocheting thence to Washington and prompting Henry Watterson to proclaim his sin that he had mistaken a schoolmaster for a statesman. Of course I read about Burns; one could not well help it if one maintained even that remote relation to |