NOTES AND QUERIES. "IT IS NA, JEAN, THY BONNIE FACE -THE ENGLISH VERSION-A DISCOVERY. Burns's note to this song in Johnson's Museum is : These were originally English verses; I gave them their Scots dress." These original verses have eluded the search of every enquirer from the date of their publication down to the beginning of the present year, when a copy of them was unearthed by Mr Davidson Cook, Barnsley, who published them in the February issue of The Bookman, The verses are contained in a small volume of poems, by "John Armstrong, Student in the University of Edinburgh,” published by Peter Hill (Burns's correspondent): Edinburgh; 1789. Armstrong was an admirer of Burns, and the volume contains two pieces in Burns's honour, which he acknowledged in the following words, which will be found in a letter to Peter Hill, of date 2nd February, 1790: "Mr Armstrong, the young poet who does me the honour to mention me so kindly in his works, please give him my best thanks for the copy of his book. I shall write him my first leisure hour. I like his poetry much, but I think his style in prose quite astonishing." Anderson was just turned eighteen when the volume was published. He afterwards went to London, where he formed a lucrative connection with the newspaper press. His health, however, gave way, and he returned to Leith, his native place, where he died in 1797, at the early age of twenty-six years. Whether or not Burns redeemed his promise to write to him, there is nothing on the record to show. We give Anderson's version of the song, as Burns took it in hand for insertion in the Museum as a Scots song: If heav'n but happiness shall give] And as with thee I'd wish to live, For thee I'd bear to die." Our readers can compare this with Burns's version as an example of his methods in preparing material for Johnson. The little volume is very interesting. Besides Mr Cook's copy, another has been added to the collection of Mr A. J. Craig, Fixby, Corstorphine. [EDITOR.] NOTE ON THE RHYME OF " COTTAR'S SATURDAY NIGHT." The influence of Shenstone on Burns is the subject of a chapter of Furth in Field by Hugh Halliburton. In it he says: 66 If we turn to The Cottar's Saturday Night' and read it alongside of The Schoolmistress,' we shall find that in respect of measure, theme, and style of both treatment and language, it was modelled scarcely less after the manner of Shenstone than according to the pattern of Fergusson's Farmer's Ingle.' Unlike the latter, but like The Schoolmistress,' it maintains the perfect form of the Spenserian stanza." 66 Be it granted that passages which Hugh Halliburton points out in "The Schoolmistress " display a similarity to passages in "The Cottar's Saturday Night," it still requires an assurance not borne out by comparison of the texts to say that Burns was influenced more by Shenstone's poem than by Fergusson's Farmer's Ingle." In general, the similarity between Fergusson's “Farmer's Ingle" and Burns's "Cottar's Saturday Night is far more striking than when comparison is made with Shenstone's Schoolmistress." Even allowing for Burns sharing with Dodsley the mistake that "The Schoolmistress was a moral poem, and not, as originally intended by Shenstone, of an exquisitely humorous turn, we have still the assertion that Burns got his Spenserian stanza from Shenstone. In the Cambridge History of Shenstone, vol. XI., chap. 10, Mr T. F. Henderson says: Burns got the Spenserian stanza of The Cottar's Saturday Night' from Beat e, not from Spenser." While those two eminent Burns au Drities can be left to dispute the claims of Shenstone or Beattie (and could we not also suggest those of Thomson, who used the pure Spenserian stanza for his "Castle of Indolence," a poem that Burns would be familiar with), we find that Mrs Dunlop, on the 10th April, 1788, when she meditates returning a copy of Spenser's "Faery Queen to Burns, makes the following remark: I have your Faery Queen' here. I don't know how I shall contrive to get her returned; you must instruct me. I never read her with pleasure before. I think you have taught me to understand Spenser, and I thank you for that, and all the superior poetic pleasures for which I am your debtor. One therefore may be excused for a preference of belief that Burns got his rhyme for the "Cottar's Saturday Night "direct from Spenser. To anyone who is aware that one of the attributes to Burns's genius was accuracy in all things," it seems a waste of time to seek the source of Burns's inspiration in other places than the fountain head. A. J. CRAIG. Corstorphine. I think I made a find yesterday in Edinburgh. I got a book called Poems by William Taylor. Taylor seems to have originally hailed from Banffshire, and must have been resident sometime in Currie, Midlothian, just at the foot of the Pentlands. I enclose copy of some lines on Burns, which must be one of the first printed poetical effusions on the Bard. There are also poems on Dr Blair, Fergusson, &c. The poetry is not up to much, but the ideas are good, and there are some uncommon Scotch words in them. There is one called Jack Ass' Song," which is evidently to the tune of 'Green grow the Rashes, O." The first verse and the refrain runs thus : "There's nought but cross on ilka back, Whilk ilka hour amasses, O; The life o' Jack's nae worth a plack, Gin 'twere na for, the Asses, O. Sair, Birkies, thrash us 0, Sair, Birkies, thrash us 0, Nae hour ligs Jack in pleasure's lap, Unless amang the Asses, O.“ And there is a poem on Fergusson, Ramsay, &c., but Burns is not mentioned in this one. A. J. CRAIG, Printed in (From Scots Poems, by William Taylor. Edinburgh M,DCC,LXXXVII.) : ON READING MR BURNS'S POEMS. Whan Scotia, clad in wae, bemoan'd The God o' Verse, heegh, heegh enthron'd, Than thus his Peers o' State address'd : Peers! wha shall wawk the Scottish lyre? Whare written was, Tho' Rob be dead, 66 For Robie Burns shall blaw the whistle." The God a genius quickly sent T' inspire the Ayrshire Ploughman Billie ; For modesty wou'd gar him blush,† Gin we wou'd sing his just applause; Corstorphine. *The Author is a Banffshire Man. ,, A. J. CRAIG. †Witness Mr Burns's Answer to W. S--n, Ochiltree. "BURNS COTTAGE COLLECTION." In November-December, 1918, there was exhibited in London what was described as "The Burns Cottage Collection, comprising the Furniture of the Cottage in which the Poet, Robert Burns, was born, on January 25th, 1759." The claim advanced on behalf of the Collection was refuted by Mr J. C. Ewing, in an article in the Glasgow Herald of 7th December, 1918. Lack of space pre vents the reprinting, in this number of the Chronicle, of that article and of two subsequent letters on the subject, from the President of the Burns Federation and Mr Thomas Killin, Hon. Treasurer of the National Burns Memorial and Cottage Homes at Mauchline; but it is proposed to reprint them in our next issue. ROLL OF HONOUR. Cover the wound in his forehead pale, IN FRANCE. Where his soul sped in the gloaming. Carry him slowly, carry him low, And carefully choose your going : Narrow the trenches, and deep the snow, And the snipers watch your showing! No costly cerements to wrap him round-- A small, rude cross, a number, a name, A soldier who fought for Britain's fame Back to the trenches, over the snow, The following names have been sent to the Secretary to be adde 1 to the List of Members and Members' Sons already published who have given their lives for their King and Country. |