WRITTEN WITH A PENCIL, STANDING BY THE FALL OF FYERS, NEAR LOCH-NESS. AMONG the heathy hills and ragged woods Where, through a shapeless breach, his stream resounds. As high in air the bursting torrents flow, As deep recoiling surges foam below, Prone down the rock the whitening sheet descends, And viewless echo's ear, astonish'd, rends. Dim-seen, through rising mists and ceaseless show'rs, The hoary cavern, wide-surrounding, low'rs. ON THE BIRTH OF A POSTHUMOUS CHILD, BORN IN PECULIAR CIRCUMSTANCES OF FAMILY DISTRESS. SWEET Flow'ret, pledge o' meikle love, What heart o' stane wad thou na move, November hirples o'er the lea, May He who gives the rain to pour, May He, the friend of woe and want, But late she flourish'd, rooted fast, Blest be thy bloom, thou lovely gem, Unscath'd by ruffian hand! And from thee many a parent stem Arise to deck our land! THE WHISTLE, A BALLAD. As the authentic prose history of the Whistle is curious, I shall here give it.-In the train of Anne of Denmark, when she came to Scotland with our James the Sixth, there came over also a Danish gentleman of gigantic stature and great prowess, and a matchless champion of Bacchus. He had a little ebony whistle, which at the commencement of the orgies he laid on the table, and whoever was last able to blow it, every body else being disabled by the potency of the bottle, was to carry off the Whistle as a trophy of victory. The Dane produced credentials of his victories, without a single defeat, at the courts of Copenhagen, Stockholm, Moscow, Warsaw, and several of the petty courts in Germany; and challenged the Scots Bacchanalians to the alternative of trying his prowess, or else of acknowledging their inferiority.-After many overthrows on the part of the Scots, the Dane was encountered by Sir Robert L. wrie of Maxwelton, ancestor of the present worthy baronet of that name; who, after three days and three nights hard contest, left the Scandinavian under the table, And blew on the Whistle his requiem shrill. Sir Walter, son to Sir Robert before mentioned, afterwards lost the Whistle to Walter Riddel of Glenriddel, who had married a sister of Sir Walter's. -On Friday, the 16th of October, 1790, at FriarsCarse, the Whistle was once more contended for, as related in the ballad, by the present Sir Robert Lawrie of Maxwelton; Robert Riddel, Esq. of Glenriddel, lineal descendant and representative of Walter Riddel, who won the whistle, and in whose family it had continued; and Alexander Ferguson, Esq. of Craigdarroch, likewise descended of the great Sir Robert; which last gentleman carried off the hard-won honours of the field. THE WHISTLE. I SING of a Whistle, a Whistle of worth, Old Loda,* still rueing the arm of Fingal, The god of the bottle sends down from his hallThis Whistle's your challenge, to Scotland get [more!' And drink them to hell, Sir! or ne'er see me o'er, Old poets have sung, and old chronicles tell, *See Ossian's Caric-thura. |