(What scandal called Maria's jaunty stagger, The ricket reeling of a crooked swagger? Whose spleen e'en worse than Burns's venom when He dips in gall unmixed his eager pen, And even the abuse of poesy abused? Who called her verse a parish workhouse, made For motley, foundling fancies, stolen or strayed?) A workhouse! ah, that sound awakes my woes, yore, And vermined gipsies littered heretofore! Why Lonsdale thus, thy wrath on vagrants pour? Must earth no rascal save thyself endure? Must thou alone in guilt immortal swell, And make a vast monopoly of hell? Thou know'st the virtues cannot hate thes worse; The vices also, must they club their curse? Or must no tiny sin to others fall, Because thy guilt's supreme enough for all? In all of thee sure thy Esopus shares. As thou at all mankind the flag unfurls, And thy still matchless tongue that conquers all reply? THE LOVELY LASS OF INVERNESS.1 TUNE-Lass of Inverness. The first half-stanza of this song is from an older composition, which Burns here improved upon. THE lovely lass o' Inverness, Nae joy nor pleasure can she see; 1 The songs wholly, or almost wholly, by Burns, furnished for the fifth volume of Johnson's Museum, now follow, as far as p. 112. For e'en and morn she cries, Alas! And aye the saut tear blin's her e'e. My father dear, and brethren three. Their winding-sheet the bluidy clay, For monie a heart thou hast made sair, A RED, RED ROSE. TUNE-Graham's Strathspey. O MY luve's like a red, red rose, O my luve's like the melodie, As fair art thou, my bonny lass, So deep in luve am I; And I will luve thee still, my dear, Till a' the seas gang dry, my dear, While the sands o' life shall run. Though it were ten thousand mile.1 1 This song was written by Burns as an improvement upon a street ditty, which Mr. Peter Buchan says was composed by a Lieutenant Hinches, as a farewell to his sweetheart, when on the eve of parting. Various versions of the original song are given in Hogg and Motherwell's edition of Burns, including one from a stall sheet containing six excellent new songs, which Mr. Motherwell conjectures to have been printed about 1770, and of which his copy bore these words on its title, in a childish scrawl believed to be that of the Ayrshire bard, "Robine Burns aught this buik and no other." A version more elegant than any of these was communicated to me by the late Mr. Robert Hogg in 1823: O fare-thee-well, my own true love, O fare-thee-well a while; But I'll come back and see thee, love, Ten thousand mile is a long, long way, You leave me here to lament and sigh, Though all our friends should never be pleased - I never will break the vows I have made, Till the stars fall from the sky, my love, I'll aye prove true to thee, my love, Do you not see yon turtle-dove It is making its moan for the loss of its love, As I shall do for thee. Now fare-thee-well, my dearest love, Till I return on shore; Though it were for evermore. It is worth while thus to preserve one or two of the original songs on which Burns improved, if only to mark the vastness of the improvement. |