CHARACTER OF MARGARET CHALMERS. 167 This day will decide my affairs with Creech. Things are, like myself, not what they ought to be; yet better than what they appear to be. 'Heaven's Sovereign saves all beings but himself- Farewell! remember me to Charlotte. R. B. The character of Margaret Chalmers may be said to stand as a testimony in favour of that of Burns. Without a certain natural refinement of soul it was impossible that he could have induced such a woman to grant him her friendship. His letters to her have a tone of deference which mere rank could not extort from Burns: it was purely an homage to her personal excellences. The relative already quoted says of Miss Chalmers 'In early life, when her hazel eyes were large and bright, and her teeth white and regular, her face must have had a charm not always the result or the accompaniment of fine features. She was little; but her figure must have been perfect. . Her conversa tion was cheerful and intelligent. She rarely talked of books, yet greatly liked reading. She spoke readily and well, but greatly preferred listening to others. In short, the character given by M. de Grignan of Madame de Sevigné, in a letter announcing her death, would give a more exact idea of Margaret Chalmers than anything I can write. As with Madame de Sevigné, her religion not only supported her under affliction, but guided her whole conduct. She judged correctly of light literature; yet her general reading was serious and instructive. Her heart was warm, her tempér even, and her conversation lively. I have often been told that her gentleness and vivacity had a favourable influence on the manner of Burns, and that he appeared to advantage in her presence.' TO MR ROBERT AINSLIE, EDINBURGH. EDINBURGH, Sunday Morning, Nov. 23, 1787.1 I beg, my dear sir, you would not make any appointment to take us to Mr Ainslie's to-night. On looking over my engagements, constitution, present state of my health, some little vexatious soul concerns, &c., I find I can't sup abroad to-night. I shall be in to-day till one o'clock, if you have a leisure hour. You will think it romantic when I tell you, that I find the idea of your friendship almost necessary to my existence. You assume a proper length of face in my bitter hours of blue-devilism, and you 1 This date must be in some respect wrong, as the 23d November 1787 was a Friday. laugh fully up to my highest wishes at my good things. I don't know, upon the whole, if you are one of the first fellows in God's world, but you are so to me. I tell you this just now, in the conviction that some inequalities in my temper and manner may perhaps sometimes make you suspect that I am not so warmly as I ought to be your friend, R. B. Mr Ainslie at this time had a lodging on the north side of the same square, so that the two friends were very ready to each other's call. The young writer, as has been already mentioned, retained to the close of life a most kindly recollection of Burns and the many pleasant hours they had spent together. He used to relate an anecdote by way of proving that Burns was no Bacchanalian by his own choice. Though but an apprentice, he had already a cellar-certainly, however, not an extensive one, as it consisted simply of the recess under a bunker seat in one of the windows of his apartment; an arrangement long ago common in Scotland, but now only seen in old-fashioned houses. His stock of wine consisted of five bottles of port, all that remained of a dozen of excellent quality which he had got from a wine-merchant who held him in favour. On Burns calling for him one afternoon, Ainslie proposed that they should spend the afternoon over a bottle; but Burns said, 'No, my friend-we'll have no wine to-day-to sit dozing in the house on such a fine afternoon as this would be insufferable. Besides, you know that you and I don't require wine to sharpen our wit, nor its adventitious aid to make us happy. No; we'll take a ramble over Arthur's Seat, to admire the beauties of nature, and come in to a late tea.' The two friends adopted this plan; and Mr Ainslie used to declare that he had never known the poet's conversation so amusing, so instructive, and altogether delightful, as during the cheerful stroll they had over the hill, and during the sober tea-drinking which followed. 1 At this time, an artist named Miers was practising in Edinburgh, as a maker of silhouette portraits, which he professed to execute at a two-minutes' sitting. Their felicity as likenesses, and their cheapness, had brought many sitters, and among the rest Burns, who was glad of an opportunity of obtaining portraits of himself which he could distribute among his intimate friends. Having, in the course of his exertions for Johnson's Museum, formed the acquaintance of Mr William Tytler of Woodhouselee, he sent him one of Miers's portraits, along with the following Jacobitical verses: 1 They cost in frames from 6s. to 10s. 6d.-Newspaper advertisement. ADDRESS TO MR TYTLER. 169 ADDRESS TO MR WILLIAM TYTLER. Revered defender of beauteous Stuart,1 A name which to love was the mark of a true heart, Though something like moisture conglobes in my eye, A poor friendless wanderer may well claim a sigh, My fathers that name have revered on a throne; Those fathers would spurn their degenerate son, Still in prayers for King George I most heartily join, Be they wise, be they foolish, is nothing of mine, But why of that epocha make such a fuss, But loyalty, truce! we're on dangerous ground, I send you a trifle, a head of a bard, A trifle scarce worthy your care; But accept it, good sir, as a mark of regard, Now life's chilly evening dim shades on your eye, But you, like the star that athwart gilds the sky, My muse, he adds in prose, jilted me here, and turned a corner on me, and I have not got again into her good graces. Do me the justice to believe me sincere in my grateful remembrance of the many civilities you have honoured me with since I came to Edinburgh, and in assuring you that I have the honour to be, revered sir, your obliged and very humble servant, R. B. 1 Mr Tytler had published, in 1759, An Inquiry, Historical and Critical, into the Evidence against Mary Queen of Scots. There is an obscurity about the date of Burns's second visit to Dalswinton, and it is doubtful if he visited Ayrshire on that occasion, though probability is in favour of the affirmative. The excursion to Dumfriesshire, and the considerations connected with it, are alluded to in a dateless letter TO MISS CHALMERS. I have been at Dumfries, and at one visit more shall be decided about a farm in that county. I am rather hopeless in it; but as my brother is an excellent farmer, and is, besides, an exceedingly prudent, sober man (qualities which are only a younger brother's fortune in our family), I am determined, if my Dumfries business fail me, to remove into partnership with him, and at our leisure take another farm in the neighbourhood. I assure you I look for high compliments from you and Charlotte on this very sage instance of my unfathomable, incomprehensible wisdom. Talking of Charlotte, I must tell her that I have, to the best of my power, paid her a poetic compliment now completed. The air is admirable-true old Highland. It was the tune of a Gaelic song which an Inverness lady sang me when I was there; I was so charmed with it, that I begged her to write me a set of it from her singing, for it had never been set before. I am fixed that it shall go in Johnson's next number; so Charlotte and you need not spend your precious time in contradicting me. I wont say the poetry is first-rate, though I am convinced it is very well; and, what is not always the case with compliments to ladies-it is not only sincere, but just. R. B. The air here alluded to is a beautiful Highland one, well-known in connection with a song of Allaster Macdonald's, entitled Bhanarach dhonn a chruidh, or the Pretty Milkmaid. The song written to it by Burns is somewhat singular as a compliment to a handsome woman, in which he did not assume the character of a lover : ON A YOUNG LADY RESIDING ON THE BANKS OF THE SMALL RIVER How pleasant the banks of the clear-winding Devon, Mild be the sun on this sweet-blushing flower, That steals on the evening each leaf to renew. TO GAVIN HAMILTON, ON HIS ILLNESS. Oh spare the dear blossom, ye orient breezes, With chill hoary wing as ye usher the dawn! Let Bourbon exult in his gay-gilded lilies, And England triumphant display her proud rose; 171 TO MR GAVIN HAMILTON. [EDINBURGH, December 1787.] MY DEAR SIR-It is indeed with the highest pleasure that I congratulate you on the return of days of ease and nights of pleasure after the horrid hours of misery in which I saw you suffering existence when last in Ayrshire. I seldom pray for anybody'I'm baith dead-sweer and wretched ill o't;' but most fervently do I beseech the Power that directs the world, that you may live long and be happy, but live no longer than you are happy. It is needless for me to advise you to have a reverent care of your health. I know you will make it a point never at one time to drink more than a pint of wine (I mean an English pint), and that you will never be witness to more than one bowl of punch at a time, and that cold drams you will never more taste; and, above all things, I am convinced, that after drinking perhaps boiling punch, you will never mount your horse, and gallop home in a chill late hour. Above all things, as I understand you are in the habits of intimacy with that Boanerges of gospel powers, Father Auld, be earnest with him that he will wrestle in prayer for you, that you may see the vanity of vanities in trusting to, or even practising, the carnal moral works of charity, humanity, generosity, and forgiveness of things, which you practised so flagrantly, that it was evident you delighted in them, neglecting, or perhaps profanely despising, the wholesome doctrine of faith without works, the only [means] of salvation. A hymn of thanksgiving would, in my opinion, be highly becoming from you at present; and in my zeal for your wellbeing, I earnestly press on you to be diligent in chanting over the two enclosed pieces of sacred poesy. My best compliments to Mrs Hamilton and Miss Kennedy. Yours, &c. R. B. It is not difficult for one who has seen aught of the unpublished manuscripts of Burns, to imagine what sort of compositions he refers to as 'pieces of sacred poesy.' |