[This forms one of the briefest, and yet one of I scorn not the peasant, though ever so the tenderest, protestations by Burns of his undying love for Jean Armour.] Tune-"The Northern Lass." THOUGH cruel Fate should bid us part, Far as the Pole and Line, Her dear idea round my heart Should tenderly entwine. Though mountains rise, and deserts howl, And oceans roar between, THE CURE FOR ALL CARE. [A roystering bacchanalian, acceptable enough, no doubt, to the Poet's brother masons at Tarbolton, in their moments of wilder conviviality. "Life's cares they are comforts," at the beginning of the sixth stanza, is from the "Night Thoughts" of Edward Young; while the concluding stanza was added by Burns in a masonic lodge, the anti low; But a club of good fellows, like those that are here, And a bottle like this, are my glory and care. Here passes the squire on his brotherhis horse; There Centum-per-centum, the cit with his purse; But see you the Crown, how it waves in the air? There a big-bellied bottle still eases my care. The wife of my bosom, alas! she did die; For sweet consolation to church I did fly; I found that old Solomon provèd it fair, That a big-bellied bottle's a cure for all care. I once was persuaded a venture to make; A letter informed me that all was to wreck ; But the pursy old landlord just waddled up stairs, penultimate word in it being altered by him in With a glorious bottle that ended my 1793 from "pressed " to "harassed."] cares. "Life's cares they are comforts "-a Farewell, farewell, Eliza dear, By the bard-what d' ye call him?-that A boding voice is in my ear, care. STANZA ADDED IN A MASONIC LODGE. Then fill up a bumper and make it o'erflow, And honours masonic prepare for to throw; May every true brother of the compass and square Have a big-bellied bottle when harassed with care! ELIZA. THE SONS OF OLD KILLIE. ["Willie" was Major William Parker of Assloss, Kilmarnock, the following lines being addressed to the brethren of St. John's Lodge, No. 22. Major Parker at the time (i.e., in 1786) was Right Worshipful Grand Master; and the records of No. 22 show that on the 26th of October, 1786, Robert Burns was there affiliated as a Freemason. The original manuscript of this song was given by the Poet to Major Parker. from whom it passed into the possession of one Gabriel Neil, of Glasgow.] Who formed this frame with beneficent The merry ploughboy cheers his team; dark, snatch, it is satisfactory to know, was not the And when the lark, 'tween light and Poet's, but was written by some unknown person at Edinburgh. The lines themselves express profound despondency, and were penned by Burns at the time when he produced "The Lament" and "The Ode to Ruin." In the fifth stanza there is a reminiscence of Gray's "Elegy," and in the sixth, of the Scotch bard's own apostrophe to the "Mountain Daisy."] Tune-" Jockey's grey breeks." Her robe assume her vernal hues, [And maun I still on Menie doat, For it 's jet, jet black, an' it's like a hawk, An' it winna let a body be !] In vain to me the cowslips blaw; Blithe waukens by the daisy's side, And mounts and sings on flittering wings, A woe-worn ghaist I hameward glide. [And maun I still, &c.] Come, Winter, with thine angry howl, And, raging, bend the naked tree; Thy gloom will soothe my cheerless soul, When Nature all is sad like me! [And maun I still on Menie doat, And bear the scorn that's in her e'e? For it's jet, jet black, an' it's like a hawk, An' it winna let a body be.] [William Wallace, some time Sheriff of Ayrshire, is the Grand Master referred to in the concluding stanza, that namesake of the darling hero of Scotland having, when these lines were written, just breathed his last, on the 28th of November, 1786. A little more than five years previously, on the 4th of July, 1781, Burns had first of all been enrolled as a Freemason. Farewell to the Lodge at Tarbolton was written when his maiden volume was published at Kilmarnock, to enable him to obtain the £9 requisite to pay his passage out to Jamaica. The closing quatrain of the last stanza is said to have touched his brother masons profoundly.] His Tune-"Good night, and joy be wi' you a'!" 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 slidd'ry ba', With melting heart, and brimful eye, I'll mind you still, though far awa.' Oft have I met your social band, And spent the cheerful, festive night; Oft honoured with supreme command, Presided o'er the sons of light: And by that hieroglyphic bright, Which none but craftsmen ever saw ! Strong mem'ry on my heart shall write Those happy scenes when far awa'. May freedom, harmony, and love, Unite you in the grand design, Beneath th' Omniscient Eye above, The glorious Architect divine! That you may keep th' unerring line, Still rising by the plummet's law, Till order bright completely shine, Shall be my prayer when far awa'. And you farewell! whose merits claim, Justly, that highest badge to wear! Heaven bless your honoured, noble name, To Masonry and Scotia dear! When yearly ye assemble a', THE LASS OF CESSNOCK BANKS. A SONG OF SIMILES. [Ellison Begbie, the heroine of these lines, was, in 1781, at a distance of about two miles from Lochlea, servant in a family living on the banks of the Cessnock Water. Her father was a small farmer at Galston. Her features were in no way, strictly speaking, beautiful, but her whole manner had about it a nameless charm and witchery. It was her refusal to marry him that caused the Poet's profound sadness while sojourning at Irvine as a flaxdresser. The song, as here given, was published for the first time, in its integrity, in 1839, by Pickering, in his Aldine edition of Burns, from a manuscript in the Poet's handwriting. Ellison Begbie, it should be added, was, some years later on, married; but to whom, is not now remembered.] She's stately, like yon youthful ash, That grows the cowslip braes between, And drinks the stream with vigour fresh; An' she's twa sparkling, roguish een. She's spotless, like the flowering thorn, With flowers so white and leaves so green, When purest in the dewy morn; An' she's twa sparkling, roguish een. Her looks are like the vernal May, Her hair is like the curling mist That climbs the mountain-sides at e'en, When flower-reviving rains are past; An' she's twa sparkling, roguish een. Her forehead 's like the showery bow, When gleaming sunbeams intervene, And gild the distant mountain's brow; An' she's twa sparkling, roguish een. Her cheeks are like yon crimson gem, The pride of all the flowery scene, Just opening on its thorny stem; An' she's twa sparkling, roguish een. Her lips are like yon cherries ripe, That sunny walls from Boreas screen; They tempt the taste and charm the sight; An' she's twa sparkling, roguish een. Her teeth are like the nightly snow,' When pale the morning rises keen, While hid the murm'ring streamlets flow; An' she's twa sparkling, roguish een. Her breath is like the fragrant breeze, That gently stirs the blossomed bean, When Phoebus sinks behind the seas; An' she's twa sparkling, roguish een. Her voice is like the evening thrush, That sings on Cessnock banks unseen, While his mate sits nestling in the bush; An' she's twa sparkling, roguish een. But it's not her air, her form, her face, Though matching Beauty's fabled queen; 'Tis the mind that shines in every grace, An' chiefly in her roguish een. THE ORAL VERSION GIVEN IN THE "RELIQUES." [Years before the discovery of the original manuscript of "The Lass of Cessnock Banks," Cromek had published a curiously close, and all but exact, version of the song, taken down by him from the lips of a lady in Glasgow, who had, until then, tenderly treasured up the words in her recollection. The eighth and twelfth quatrains, as given later on in the Aldine edition, had evidently slipped her memory, while the diction in the first and fifth shows a rather odd variation. On the whole, however, as the record of a song which had been no more than orally preserved, the version alluded to was singularly accurate. It is here given as a matter of curiosity and for purposes of comparison.] ON Cessnock banks there lives a lass,Could I describe her shape and mien; The graces of her weel-faured face, And the glancin' of her sparklin' een! She's fresher than the morning dawn, When rising Phoebus first is seen, When dewdrops twinkle o'er the lawn; An' she's twa glancin', sparklin' een. She's stately, like yon youthful ash, That grows the cowslip braes between, And shoots its head above each bush; An' she's twa glancin', sparklin' een. |