TO GAVIN HAMILTON, ESQ. MAUCHLINE.

RECOMMENDING A BOY.

Mosgaville, May 3, 1786.

I HOLD it, Sir, my bounden duty,

To warn you how that Master Tootie,
Alias, Laird M'Gaun, †

Was here to lure the lad

away

'Bout whom ye spak the tither day,

An' wad hae don't aff han':

But lest he learn the callan tricks,

As faith I muckle doubt him,

Like scrapin' out auld Crummie's nicks,
An' tellin' lies about them;

As lieve then I'd have then,

Your clerkship he should sair,
If sae be, ye may be

Not fitted otherwhere.

Altho' I say't, he's gleg enough,

An' 'bout a house that's rude an' rough,
The boy might learn to swear;
But then wi' you, he'll be sae taught,

+ Cromek says, "Master Tootie then lived in Mauchline; a dealer in Cows. It was his common practice to cut the nicks or markings from the horns of cattle, to disguise their age. He was an artful trick-contriving character; hence he is called a Snick-drawer. Burns styles the Devil, in his address to that personage, "an auld, snick-drawing dog."

An' get sic fair example straught,
I hae na ony fear.

Ye'll catechize him every quirk,

An' shore him weel wi' hell; An' gar him follow to the kirk

Aye when ye gang yoursel.
If ye then, maun be then

Frae hame this comin' Friday,
Then please, Sir, to lea'e, Sir,
The orders wi' your lady.

My word of honour I hae gi'en,
In Paisley John's, that night at e'en,
To meet the Warld's worm:

To try to get the twa to gree,
An' name the airles1 an' the fee,
In legal mode an' form:
I ken he weel a snick can draw,
When simple bodies let him;

An' if a Devil be at a',

In faith he's sure to get him.
To phrase you an' praise you,

Ye ken your Laureat scorns:

The pray'r still, you share still,
Of grateful Minstrel

BURNS.

VAR. Earnest money.

EPISTLE TO MR. M'ADAM,

OF CRAIGEN-GILLAN, IN ANSWER TO AN OBLIGING

LETTER HE SENT IN THE COMMENCEMENT

OF MY POETIC CAREER.

SIR, o'er a gill I gat your card,
I trow it made me proud;
"See wha taks notice o' the Bard!"
I lap and cry'd fu' loud.

"Now deil-ma-care about their jaw, "The senseless, gawky million;

66

I'll cock my nose aboon them a’, "I'm roos'd by Craigen-Gillan !"

'Twas noble, Sir; 'twas like yoursel,
To grant your high protection:
A great man's smile, ye ken fu' weel,
Is aye a blest infection.

Tho', by his banes wha in a tub
Match'd Macedonian Sandy!
On my ain legs, thro' dirt and dub,
I independent stand ay.-

And when those legs to gude, warm kail,

Wi' welcome canna bear me;

A lee dyke-side, a sybow-tail,

And barley-scone shall cheer me.

Heaven spare you lang to kiss the breath
O' mony flow'ry simmers!

And bless your bonie lasses baith,

I'm tald they're loosome kimmers !

And God bless young Dunaskin's laird,
The blossom of our gentry!

And may he wear an auld man's beard,
A credit to his country.

TO CAPTAIN RIDDEL, GLENRIDDel.

EXTEMPORE LINES ON RETURNING A NEWSPAPER.*

Ellisland, Monday Evening.

YOUR News and Review, Sir, I've read through and through, Sir,

With little admiring or blaming;

The papers are barren of home-news or foreign, No murders or rapes worth the naming.

Our friends the Reviewers, those chippers and hewers,

Are judges of mortar and stone, Sir;

But of meet, or unmeet, in a fabrick complete, I'll boldly pronounce they are none, Sir.

My goose-quill too rude is to tell all your goodness Bestow'd on your servant, the Poet;

Would to God I had one like a beam of the sun, And then all the world, Sir, should know it!

The newspaper in question contained some severe remarks on Burns' Poetry.

TO TERRAUGHTY, ON HIS BIRTHDAY.

HEALTH to the Maxwells' vet'ran Chief!
Health, aye unsour'd by care or grief:
Inspir'd, I turn'd Fate's sibyl leaf

This natal morn,

I see thy life is stuff o' prief,

Scarce quite half worn.

This day thou metes threescore eleven,
And I can tell that bounteous Heaven
(The second-sight, ye ken, is given
To ilka Poet)

On thee a tack o' seven times seven

Will yet bestow it.

If envious buckies view wi' sorrow

Thy lengthen'd days on this blest morrow,
May desolation's lang-teeth'd harrow,
Nine miles an hour,

Rake them, like Sodom and Gomorrah,
In brunstane stoure-'

But for thy friends, and they are monie,
Baith honest men and lasses bonie,
May couthie fortune, kind and cannie,
In social glee,

Wi' mornings blithe and e'enings funny

Bless them and thee!

+ John Maxwell, of Terraughty and Munshes, near Dumfries, was then above seventy years of age, and survived Burns twenty years.