step-bewitching blaze in the idly-gazing eyes of the poor heedless bard, till pop, he falls, like Lucifer, never to hope again.' God grant this may be an unreal picture with respect to me! but should it not, I have very little dependence on mankind.... The many ties of acquaintance and friendship which I have, or think, I have, in life, I have felt along the lines, and d- −n them, they are almost all of them of such frail contexture that I am sure they would not stand the breath of the least adverse breeze of fortune."

["Among those," says Lockhart, "who having formerly 'eyed him askance,' now appeared sufficiently ready to court his society, were the family of Jean Armour. Burns's affection for the beautiful young woman had outlived his resentment of her compliance with her father's commands in the preceding summer; and, from the time of this reconciliation, it is probable he always looked forward to a perma

nent union with the mother of his children.

"Burns at least fancied himself to be busy with serious plans for his future establishment; and was very naturally disposed to avail himself, as far as he could, of the opportunities of travel and observation, which an interval of leisure, destined probably to be a short one, might present. Moreover, in spite of his gloomy language, a specimen of which has just been quoted, we are not to doubt that he derived much pleasure from witnessing the extensive popularity of his writings, and from the flattering homage he was sure to receive in his own person, in the various districts of his native country; nor can any one wonder that, after the state of high excitement in which he had spent the winter and spring, he, fond as he was of his family, and eager to make them partakers in all his good fortune, should have, just at this time, found himself incapable of sitting down contentedly, for any considerable period together, in so humble and quiet a circle as that of Mossgiel."]

In this mood he left Mauchline, and hurried to Edinburgh.

In some of the doings of Burns during the latter half of the year 1787, we see a mind "unfitted with an aim;" he moved much about without any visible purpose in his motions. We have now to follow him northward in three successive and hurried excursions, in which he passed into the Western Highlands, examined Stirling-shire, and penetrated eastward as far as Inverness. In his first tour he was mounted on Jenny Geddes, named after the devout virago who threw a stool at the Dean of Edinburgh's head-perhaps the lady celebrated in song:

"Jenny Geddes was the gossip

Put the gown upon the Bishop."

59

He then proceeded to Stirling. The Poet was an intense lover of his country and her glory: the displeasure with which the people of Scotland regarded the Union, which had removed all visible symbols of power and independence, was not in those days subsided; and, when he looked on the Hall, where princes once ruled and Scottish parliaments assembled, and reflected that it was laid in ruins by a prince of the house of Hanover, he gave vent to his proper indignation in the following lines:

"Here Stuarts once in glory reigned,

And laws for Scotland's weal ordained;
But now unroof'd their palace stands,
Their sceptre's sway'a by other hands;
The injur'd Stuart line is gone,

A race outlandish fills the throne."

Two other lines followed, forming the bitter point to the epigram-they were remembered in after-days to the poet's injury. He seems not to have been very sensible at that time of his imprudence ;-for some one said, "Burns, this will do you no good."-"I shall reprove myself," he said; and wrote these aggravating words:

"Rash mortal, and slanderous poet, thy name

Shall no longer appear in the records of fame;
Does not know that old Mansfield, who writes like the Bible,
Says, the more 'tis a truth, Sir, the more 'tis a libel?"

Such satire was not likely to pass without remonstrance; Hamilton, of Gladsmuir, wrote a reply, wherein he lamented that a mind,

"Where Genius lights her brightest fires," should disdain truth, and law, and justice;

"And, skulking with a villain's aim,
Thus basely stab his monarch's fame."

There are few who will not concur in the propriety of this rebuke. This writer, however, resolved to be prophet, as well as poet and priest:

"Yes, Burns, 'tis o'er-thy race is run,
And shades receive thy setting sun:
These few rash lines shall damn thy name,
And blast thy hopes of future fame."

Poetic sarcasms on ruling powers may keep a man from rising in the church where princes are

ascent up Parnassus: of this no one was more aware than Burns, nor was he long at a loss for an answer to the minister of Gladsmuir,

"Like Esop's lion, Burns says, sore I feel

All others scorn-but damn that ass's heel."

After leaving Stirling, we hear no more of Burns till, having traversed a portion of the Western Highlands, passed through Inverary, and made his appearance at Arrochar, he thus addresses Ainslie: "I write you this on my tour through a country where savage streams tumble over savage mountains; thinly overspread with savage flocks, which starvingly support as savage inhabitants. My last stage was Inverary-to-morrow night's stage Dumbarton. I ought sooner to have answered your kind letter, but you know I am a man of many sins." This was on the 28th of June. At Inverary, he found the principal inn filled by a visiting party to the Duke of Argyle, who engrossed all the attention of the landlord; and the poor Bard, mounted on a sorry mare, without friend or lackey, was neglected. He avenged himself with unmerited bitterness :

"Whoe'er he be who sojourns here,

I pity much his case,
Unless he's come to wait upon

The lord their god, his Grace;
There's naething here but Highland pride,
But Highland cauld and hunger;
If Providence has sent me here
'Twas surely in his anger."

If the Poet wrote these lines on the window of the inn, he must have administered the spur at his departure with little mercy to the sides of Jenny Geddes; for Highland wrath is as hot as Highland hospitality.

Burns recovered his composure of mind before reaching Dumbarton; he had, moreover, fallen into very pleasant company. Having dined with a hospitable Highland gentleman, he was introduced to a merry party, and danced till the ladies left them, at three in the morning."Our dancing," says the Bard, "was none of the French or English insipid formal movements. The ladies sung Scotch songs like Angels; then we flew at Bab at the bowster,' "Tulloch - gorum,' 'Loch- Erroch side,' &c., like midges sporting in the mottie sun, or craws prognosticating a storm in a hairst day. When the dear lasses left us, we ranged round the bowl till the good-fellow hour of six; except a few minutes that we went out to pay our devotions to the glorious lamp of day peering over the towering top of Benlomond. We all kneeled. Our worthy landlord's son held the bowl, each man a full glass in his hand, and I, as priest, repeated some rhyming nonsense: like Thomas the Rhymer's prophecies, I suppose."

These Highland high-jinks were not yet concluded. After a few hours' sleep they dined

at another good fellow's house, and consequently pushed the bottle; Burns then mounted his mare, and, accompanied by two friends, rode along Lochlomond side on his way to Dumbarton." We found ourselves," he says, "no very fou, but gayly yet,' and I rode soberly, till by came a Highlandman at the gallop, on a tolerably good horse, but which had never known the ornaments of iron or leather. We scorned to be out-galloped by a Highlandman, so off we started, whip-and-spur. My companions fell sadly a-stern; but my old mare, Jenny Geddes, one of the Rosinante family, strained past the Highlandman, in spite of all his efforts with the hair halter. Just as I was passing him, Donald wheeled his horse, as if to cross before me to mar my progress, when down came his horse, and threw his rider's breekless bottom into a clipt hedge, and down came Jenny Geddes over all, and my bardship between her and the Highlandman's horse. Jenny trode over me with such cautious_re- ||| verence that matters were not so bad as might well have been expected; so I came off with a few cuts and bruises, and a thorough resolution to be a pattern of sobriety for the future. As for the rest of my acts and my wars, and all my wise sayings, and why my mare was called Jenny Geddes, they shall be recorded, in a few weeks hence at Linlithgow, in the chronicles of your memory."

Burns returned to Mauchline by the way of Glasgow, and remained with his mother during the latter part of the month of July. He renewed his intercourse with the family of the Armours. Jean's heart still beat tenderly towards "the plighted husband of her youth;" and Burns, much as his pride was wounded, could not help regarding her with affection. He had, as yet, no very defined notion of what he should do in the world: he trusted to time and chance. "I have yet fixed," he thus writes to a friend, "on nothing with respect to the serious business of life. I am just as usual -a rhyming, mason-making, raking, aimless fellow. However, I shall somewhere have a farm soon-I was going to say a wife, too; but that must never be my blessed lot. am afraid I have almost ruined one source, the principal one indeed, of my former happiness-that eternal propensity I always had to fall in love. My heart no more glows with feverish rapture. I have no paradisiacal evening interviews, stolen from the restless cares and prying inhabitants of this weary world. I have only ****. This last is one of your distant acquaintances, has a fine figure, and elegant manners; and, in the train of some great folks whom you know, has seen the politest quarters in Europe. I do like her a good deal; but what piques me is her conduct at the commencement of our acquaintance. I frequently visited her when I was in

I

and after passing regularly the intermediate degrees between the distant formal bow and the familiar grasp round the waist, I ventured, in my careless way, to talk of friendship in rather ambiguous terms; and after her return to

I wrote to her in the same style. Miss, construing my words farther, I suppose, than even I intended, flew off in a tangent of female dignity and reserve, like a mounting lark in an April morning; and wrote me an answer which measured me out very completely what an immense way I had to travel before I could reach the climate of her favour. But I am an old hawk at the sport, and wrote her such a cool, deliberate, prudent reply as brought my bird from her aerial towerings, pop, down at my foot, like Corporal Trim's hat." The young lady to whom the poet alludes in this letter was very beautiful and very proud-it is said she gave his bardship such a specimen of both her pride and temper as

"Made poor Robin stand abeigh."

“I am but a younger son of the house of Parnassus; and, like other younger sons of great families, I may intrigue, if I choose to run all risks, but must not marry."

It is plain that Burns regarded the burning of his marriage lines as not only destroying all evidence of his engagements with Jean Armour, but as a deliberate revocation of vows, on her part, which released him from the responsibilities of wedlock. Nay, this seems to have been the notion of graver men; for the Poet thus writes to David Bryce, July 17th, 1786:— "Poor Jean is come back to Mauchline. I went to call for her, but her mother forbade me the house. I have already appeared publicly in church, and was indulged in the liberty of standing in my own seat. I do this to get a certificate as a bachelor, which Mr. Auld has promised me." In this I see the anxiety of Mr. Armour to obliterate all traces of the marriage, and the concurrence, at least, of the Poet in the proceeding. Robert Burns and Jean Armour might permit their friends to regard them as unmarried, and, if such was their own pleasure, call themselves single; but their children were not, I apprehend, affected in their claims to legitimacy by this disavowal on the part of their parents; the law would, I think, enforce their rights for them in spite of the disclamation of both father and mother. Nay, I suspect, the law refuses to recognize any other dissolution of wedlock than what is effected by civil or ecclesiastical authority. However this may be, the Poet affected all the freedom of speech and action which custom concedes to bachelors, and seemed oftener than once on the point of unwittingly agitating the question, whether an Ayr-shire lass or an Edinburgh lady should plead a property in his hand.

The second excursion of Burns towards the north was made in the company of Dr. Adair, of Harrow - gate, whom chance made into a comrade, and who fortunately retained the particulars of the journey in his memory. He set out early in August from Edinburgh, passed through Linlithgow, and made his appearance again at the gates of Carron Foundry-they were opened with an apology for former rudeness, which mollified the bard; and he beheld in their tremendous furnaces and broiling labours a resemblance to the cavern of the Cyclops. A resemblance of a less classical kind had before occurred to him. From Carron he hurried to Stirling, that he might break and replace the pane of glass in the inn window, on which he had written those rash and injurious lines already alluded to; and then he proceeded to visit Ramsay of Ochtertyre, whose romantic residence on the Teith he admired greatly, and whose conversation, rife as it was with knowledge of Scottish literature, was altogether after his own heart. This visit was brief, but full of interest. The laird of Ochtertyre had a memory filled with old traditions and old songs. He had written some ingenious essays on the olden poetry, displaying feeling and taste; and moreover, the walls of his house were hung with long Latin inscriptions, much to the wonder of the unlearned Bard of Kyle.

They discussed fit topics for the muse-a rustic drama, and Scottish Georgics. "What beautiful landscapes of rural life and manners,' says Ramsay, "might not have been expected from a pencil so faithful and forcible as his, which could have exhibited scenes as familiar and interesting as those in the Gentle Shepherd, which every one who knows our swains, in their unadulterated state, instantly recognizes as true to nature. But to have executed either of these plans, steadiness and abstraction from company were wanted, not genius." Of Burns' power of conversation, he says, “I have been in the company of many men of genius, some of them poets, but never witnessed such flashes of intellectual brightness as from him-the impulse of the moment-sparks of celestial fire." It is painful to think that the celestial sayings of the Poet have vanished from men's memories, while the less mental and grosser things remain. He continued two days on the Teith, and then proceeded to Harvieston, where he was received with much respect and kindness by Mrs. Hamilton and her daughters. Here he saw Charlotte Hamilton for the first time." She is not only beautiful," he thus wrote to her brother Gavin, of Mauchline, "but lovely. Her form is elegant, her features not regular, but they have the smile of sweetness, and the settled complacency of good nature in the highest degree; and her complexion, now that she has happily recovered her wonted health, is equal to Miss Burnet's. After the exercise

'Her pure and eloquent blood

Spoke in her cheeks, and so distinctly wrought,
That one would almost say her body thought.'

Her eyes are fascinating; at once expressive of good sense, tenderness, and a noble mind."

:

The account of Dr. Adair supplies some circumstances which Burns has omitted:"At Stirling we met with a company of travellers from Edinburgh, among whom was a character in many respects congenial with that of Burns. This was Nicol, one of the teachers of the High Grammar School at Edinburgh the same wit and power of conversation; the same fondness for convivial society, and thoughtlessness of to-morrow characterised both. Jacobitical principles in politics were also common to both of them; and these have been suspected, since the Revolution of France, to have given place in each to opinions apparently opposite. I regret that I have preserved no memorabilia of their conversation. Many songs were sung, which I mention for the sake of observing that, when Burns was called upon in his turn, he was accustomed, instead of singing, to recite one or other of his own shorter poems, with tone and emphasis which, though not correct or harmonious, were impressive and pathethic.

"From Stirling we went next morning through the romantic and fertile vale of Devon to Harvieston, in Clackmannanshire, then inhabited by Mrs. Hamilton, with the younger part of whose family Burns had been previously acquainted. He introduced me to the family; and there was formed my first acquaintance with Mrs. Hamilton's eldest daughter, to whom I have been married for many years. Thus was I indebted to Burns for a connexion from which I have derived, and expect further to derive, much happiness.

During a residence of about ten days at Harvieston, we made excursions to various parts of the surrounding scenery, particularly CastleCampbell, the ancient seat of the family of Argyle; and the famous cataract of the Devon, called the Cauldron-Linn; and the RumblingBridge, a single broad arch, thrown by the devil, if tradition is to be believed, across the river, at about the height of a hundred feet above its bed. I am surprised that none of these scenes should have called forth an exertion

taste for the picturesque. I well remember that the ladies at Harvieston, who accompanied us on the jaunt, expressed their disappointment at his not expressing in more glowing and fervid language his impressions of the CauldronLinn scene certainly highly sublime, and somewhat horrible. A visit to Mrs. Bruce, of Clackmannan, a lady above ninety, the lineal descendant of that race which gave the Scottish throne its brightest ornament, interested his feelings powerfully. This venerable dame, with characteristic dignity, informed me, on my observing that I believed she was descended from the family of Robert Bruce, that Robert Bruce was sprung from her family. She was :: in possession of the hero's helmet and twohanded sword, with which she conferred on Burns and myself the honour of knighthood. observing that she had a better right to confer that title than some people. Her political tenets were as Jacobitical as the Poet's, a conformity which contributed not a little to the cordiality of our reception. She gave us as her first toast after dinner, Awa uncos,' or away with the strangers ;-who these strangers were you will readily understand.

"Mrs. Adair corrects me by saying it should be 'Hoohi uncos'-a sound used by the shepherds in directing their dogs to drive away the sheep.

"At Dunfermline, we visited the ruined abbey, and the abbey - church, now consecrated to Presbyterian worship. Here I mounted the cutty-stool, or stool of repentance, assuming the character of a penitent for fornication; while Burns, in the character of priest, admonished me from the pulpit on the enormity of my transgression, and the frequency of its occurrence. The ludicrous reproof and exhortation which he addressed to me were, of course, parodied from what had been delivered to himself in Ayrshire, were he assured me he had once been one of seven who mounted the seat of shame together.

"In the churchyard, Burns knelt down, and kissed with much fervour the broad flag-stone which covered the grave of the great restorer of Scottish independence, Robert Bruce, and execrated the want of respect shewn by the local authorities to the dust of the first of Scottish heroes. They returned to Edinburgh by the way of Kinross and Queensferry.

And he debowelled was cleanly,
And also balmed syne full richly;
And the worthy Lord of Douglas,
His heart as it forsaken was,
Received as in great dewtie,

With fair and great solemnitie.'

The neglect so much execrated by Burns has been since repaired. When the new parish church of Dunfermline was erected in 1818, it was made to enclose the burial place of the kings, and on this occasion the tomb of the Bruce was opened. The body of the hero was found reduced to a skeleton. The lead in which it had been wrapped was still entire, and even some of a fine linen cloth, embroidered with