THE BANKS OF AYR AND HIGHLAND MARY.

Of all the soul-stirring lyrics which Scotland's chief minstrel has written, those of the pure-minded Highland lassie excel all others by an immense distance. We have heard them sung in infancy, and love to hear them in our old age. They, when put together, form a tale of pity so melting that we may safely say the man whose heart is not touched, his passions not softened, and a loftier view of human nature not taken, is lost to the ennobling influence of poetry and song. And if he is to any extent an admirer of Robert Burns, he will feel that the poet has left us a heritage of goodness that redeems him from much of that frailty that he wept over himself, and which we sorrowfully lament.

In writing of the song scenery of our native land we are attracted to the scenery of which so much has been written so feelingly. The banks of the Ayr round about the Castle of Montgomery are pretty-it would be well to say lovelyand we wend our way, to us, the dearest spot on its banks. Yet it is not the earliest tourist district to reach. There are as yet no special trains to carry their thousands of noisy occupants to the sacred resort where the bard and Mary met to spend one parting day and dedicate themselves to each other for life. Let us go by ourselves, Sandy and I. The day is beautiful; we had parted with the minister of Mauchline, and were just in that fine flow of spirits which arises from contact with the good and kindly. The road improves as we journey on. The ingathering of the crops is cheerily going on. Before us a smart lass is driving home a

well-laden cart of corn.

"Ah," says Sandy, "that's one of Burns's Ayrshire lasses; we will make up to her and hae a chat just to see if the memory of Rabbie still lives among the young anes of the country." We do make up to her, and it is needless to say get a surprise. Like well-bred men as we pretend to be, one glance, and we pass to the usual salutations of the day. We tell her where we are going, and our object in going to Coilsfield. She was a blythe woman and a hearty one; entered into our projects heartily; chatted away so freely that before we parted we felt quite at ease in letting her know we were disappointed in not finding her a young lass. I wish some of the Clydebank bachelors had heard her hearty laugh, and then her outburst of "I am fifty; but mind, don't forget to find Heelan' Mary's thorn." Yes, the memory of the bard is still a strength in this part of Ayrshire. Soon we reach the point where the river touches the highway between Mauchline and Ayr, and here it is joined by the little water of Faile. This small stream sweeps past the mansion of Coilsfield, which is rather a Grecian edifice than a baronial castle of the olden time. The bard has taken the poet's license here to a little extent. It lies a short distance from the farm of Mossgiel, and midway between Mauchliné and Tarbolton. giel it will be seen that Burns was in dangerous proximity to more than one of his enslavers. There is little to rest upon to enable us to form a thoroughly correct view of the poet's relation to the object of such fervid, and, let me say, lasting attachment. Be it what it may, we would not for all he has written otherwise have missed the songs he has written on Mary Campbell. Mary was dairymaid at Coilsfield. After he had been discarded by the Armour family he renewed an acquaintance he had formed with

At Moss

She went home to

Mary, and they agreed to be married. arrange for the wedding, caught a fever, and died at Greenock, to the lasting sorrow of Burns. The solemnity of the meeting, and the disappointment following completely upset the poet, and had it not been that, amidst the gloom of that time, a break took place in the clouds hovering above and around him, the career of Scotia's most gifted singer would have been different than it was. He had already written :

Will ye go to the Indies, my Mary,

And leave auld Scotia's shore ;
Will ye go to the Indies, my Mary,

Across the Atlantic's roar?

It is very many years, we were quite boys, when the story of Burns's Bible (given to Mary at parting) were still in the hands of Mary's relatives, but they were in Canada, whither they had been taken long ago. But the far-distant relative with a zeal and patriotism worthy of the highest praise, agreed to restore them to Scotland, where the admirers of the lovers will have looked upon them with touching interest as they rest in the monument on the banks of the Doon. Of all the relics of the poet they are the most precious left to us, containing as they do the evidence of ardent, fond affection, rent asunder by an inscrutable providence. There is the little stream, the Faile, and where it joins the Ayr the scene is one of those pretty ones so often met with in Scotland. But when burthened with thoughts of the past-of what is, and what might have been-one seeks privacy, and even the presence of an intimate is felt to be an intrusion. Standing on the banks of the river on the fine autumn day we feel like the poet,

"Here simmer first unfaulds her robes,

And there they longest tarry;
For there I took my last farewell

Of my sweet Highland Mary."

After a
A

But let us do more-let us put on record the mind of the
poet himself on this matter. To his publisher he writes :-
66 This song
is founded on a passage of my youthful days,
and I own that I would be much flattered by seeing the
verses set to an air that would ensure celebrity," true again
to the memory of his Highland Mary. Sitting down by the
banks of the Ayr, rapt in meditation, I see my companion
strolling away by the side of the river musing doubtless, on
the time and last occasion of the lovers' meeting.
time we leave the sacred grove and make for the house.
gentleman, whom we accosted, said—“The gate into Coils-
field is open; no one will hinder you just go in.' So did
we find, and we entered. No challenge nor interruption,
we pass the front of the house, and make for Tarbolton,
where is the house that formed the "howf
" of the poet,
and the Masonic Club he so finely celebrated when he took
his "Farewell of the brethren." This was the hour before
the dawn of his brilliant, though oft-clouded, life. To these
much sorrowing strains, arising from the contemplated
exile, we owe much of his saddening poetry. Saddening
but tender, as we read we feel that this contemplated exile
has shown us the bard in his loftiest strain.

"Farewell auld Scotia's bleak domains,
Far dearer than the torrid plains
Where rich ananas blow.
Farewell a mother's blessing dear,
A brother's sigh, a sister's tear,

My Jean's heart-rending throe !"

As we leave the village of Tarbolton the shades of evening are falling around us, and we are reminded of the words

"Adieu! a heart-warm fond adieu!
Dear brothers of the mystic tie,
Ye favoured, ye enlightened few,
Companions of my social joy.

Though I to foreign lands must hie,
Pursuing fortune's sliddery ba',
With melting heart and brimful eye
I'll mind ye still, though far awa'."

When the tourist visits this locality, he will, as we did, find Tarbolton is not of itself an attractive village, but all round it is made dear to the admirer of the poet, for he will be touching on Willie's Mill, and look over to Lochlea; he will be walking by the farm of Mossgiel, and the neighbours will be ready to tell him that in the field he is passing the poet turned up 66 the Wee Moosie." He will find, in fact, that Scotia's most gifted bard is still the favourite of the people whose virtues he has adorned, and of whose failings he himself was an unfortunate illustration. We left the banks of the Ayr, the Castle o' Montgomery, and many other scenes with the full determination that our visit would not be the last to the sacred spot, where, as he says—

66

Ayr, gurgling, kiss'd his pebbly shore

O'erhung with wild woods, thick'ning green,

The fragrant birch and hawthorn hoar

Twined amorous 'round the raptured scene."