SPOKEN EXTEMPORE ON BEING APPOINTED TO THE EXCISE.
SEARCHING auld wives' barrels,
Och, hon the day!
That clarty barm should stain my laurels ;
But-what'll ye say?
These movin' things, ca'd wives and weans
Wad move the very hearts o' stanes !
THE HENPECKED HUSBAND
CURSED be the man, the poorest wretch in life
The crouching vassal to the tyrant wife!
Who has no will but by her high permission;
Who has not sixpence but in her possession;
Who must to her his dear friend's secret tell;
Who dreads a curtain-lecture worse than hell!
Were such the wife had fallen to my part,
I'd break her spirit, or I'd break her heart;
I'd charm her with the magic of a switch,
I'd kiss her maids, and kick the perverse bitch.
ON ANDREW TURNER.
IN se'enteen hundred and forty-nine,
Satan took stuff to mak a swine,
And cuist it in a corner;
But wilily he changed his plan,
And shaped it something like a man,
And ca'd it Andrew Turner.
WRITTEN UNDER THE PORTRAIT OF FERGUSSON THE POET,
IN A COPY OF THAT AUTHOR'S WORKS PRESENTED TO
A YOUNG LADY IN EDINBURGH, MARCH 17, 1787.
CURSE on ungrateful man, that can be pleased,
And yet can starve the author of the pleasure!
O thou, my elder brother in misfortune,
By far my elder brother in the Muses,
With tears I pity thy unhappy fate!
Why is the bard unpitied by the world,
Yet has so keen a relish of its pleasures?
WRITTEN ON A WINDOW OF THE GLOBE TAVERN, DUMFRIES.
THE greybeard, old Wisdom, may boast of his treasures,
Give me with gay Folly to live;
I grant him calm-blooded, time-settled pleasures,
But Folly has raptures to give.
ONE Queen Artemisia, as old stories tell,
When deprived of her husband she loved so well,
In respect for the love and affection he'd show'd her,
She reduced him to dust, and she drank up the powder.
But Queen Netherplace, of a different complexion,
When call'd on to order the funeral direction,
Would have eat her dead lord, on a slender pretence,
Not to show her respect, but--to save the expense!
INSCRIPTION ON A GOBLET.
THERE's death in the cup-sae beware!
Nay, more-there is danger in touching;
But wha can avoid the fell snare?
The man and his wine's sae bewitching!
INSTEAD of a song, boys, I'll give you a toastHere's the memory of those on the twelfth that we
lost![found; That we lost, did I say? nay, by Heaven, that we For their fame it shall last while the world goes round.
The next in succession, I'll give you-The King!
Whoe'er would betray him, on high may he swing!
And here's the grand fabric, our free Constitution,
As built on the base of the great Revolution.
And longer with politics not to be cramm'd,
Be Anarchy cursed, and be Tyranny damn'd;
And who would to Liberty e'er prove disloyal
May his son be a hangman, and he his first trial!
THE TRUE LOYAL NATIVES.
YE true"Loyal Natives," attend to my song,
In uproar and riot rejoice the night long;
From envy and hatred your corps is exempt:
But where is your shield from the darts of contempt ?
ON RECEIVING A WORK OF HANNAH MORE'S.
THOU flattering mark of friendship kind,
Still may thy pages call to mind
The dear, the beauteous donor!
Though sweetly female every part,
Yet such a head, and more the heart,
Does both the sexes honour.
She show'd her taste refined and just
When she selected thee,
Yet deviating, own I must,
For so approving me.
But kind still, I mind still
The giver in the gift;
I'll bless her, and wiss her
A Friend above the lift.
TO DR. MAXWELL,
ON MISS JESSIE STAIG'S RECOVERY.
MAXWELL, if merit here you crave,
That merit I deny :
You save fair Jessie from the grave !—
An angel could not die.
No more of your titled acquaintances boast,
And in what lordly circles you've been;
An insect is still but an insect at most,
Though it crawl on the head of a queen!
A GRACE BEFORE DINNER.
O THOU, who kindly dost provide
For every creature's want!
We bless thee, God of Nature wide,
For all thy goodness lent;
And, if it please thee, heavenly Guide,
May never worse be sent ;
But, whether granted or denied,
Lord, bless us with content !-Amen.
ON SEEING THE BEAUTIFUL SEAT OF LORD GALLOWAY.
WHAT dost thou in that mansion fair ?—
Flit, Galloway, and find
Some narrow, dirty, dungeon cave,
The picture of thy mind!
No Stewart art thou, Galioway,
The Stewarts all were brave;
Besides, the Stewarts were but fools,
Not one of them a knave.
ON THE SAME.
BRIGHT ran thy line, O Galloway,
Through many a far-famed sire!
So ran the far-famed Roman way,
So ended-in a mire!
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