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Blithe Jenny sees the visit 's no ill-ta'en;

The father cracks of horses, pleughs, and kye. The youngster's artless heart o'erflows wi' joy, But blate and laithfu', scarce can weel behave; The mother, wi' a woman's wiles, can spy What makes the youth sae bashfu' and sae grave; Weel pleased to think her bairn 's respected like the lave.

Oh, happy love! where love like this is found!
Oh, heartfelt raptures! bliss beyond compare!
I've paced much this weary, mortal round,

And sage experience bids me this declare:-
If Heaven a draught of heavenly pleasure spare,
One cordial in this melancholy vale,

'Tis when a youthful, loving, modest pair In other's arms breathe out the tender tale, Beneath the milk-white thorn that scents the evening

gale.

Is there, in human form, that bears a heart,
A wretch, a villain, lost to love and truth,
That can, with studied, sly, ensnaring art,

Betray sweet Jenny's unsuspecting youth?
Curse on his perjur'd arts! dissembling
smooth!

Are honor, virtue, conscience, all exiled?

Is there no pity, no relenting ruth,

67. cracks, talks; kye, cows.

69. blate, shamefaced; laithfu', bashful.

71. sae, so.

72. lave, rest.

80, 81. Compare with the lines from Milton's L'Allegro :·

"And every shepherd tells his tale

Under the hawthorn in the dale."

Points to the parents fondling o'er their child? 90 Then paints the ruined maid, and their distraction

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wild!

But now the supper crowns their simple board, —
The healsome parritch, chief o' Scotia's food;
The soupe their only hawkie does afford,

That 'yont the hallan snugly chows her cood:
The dame brings forth, in complimental mood,
To grace the lad, her weel-hain'd kebbuck, fell,
And aft he's prest, and aft he ca's it guid;
The frugal wifie, garrulous, will tell,

How 't was a towmont auld, sin' lint was i' the bell.

The cheerfu' supper done, wi' serious face,
They, round the ingle, form a circle wide;
The sire turns o'er, with patriarchal grace,
The big ha' Bible, ance his father's pride;
His bonnet rev'rently is laid aside,

His lyart haffets wearing thin and bare;

Those strains that once did sweet in Zion glide,
He wales a portion with judicious care,

And "Let us worship GOD!" he says, with solemn air.

92. healsome, wholesome; parritch, porridge.

93. soupe, limited supply; hawkie, cow.

94. 'yont, beyond; hallan, partition wall; chows, chews: cood, cud.

96. well-hain'd kebbuck, carefully saved cheese; fell, biting. 97. aft, often; guid, good.

99. towmont, twelvemonth; sin' lint was i' the bell, since flax I was in the flower.

103. ha', hall; ance, once.

105. lyart haffets, gray temples.

107. wales, chooses.

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They chant their artless notes in simple guise;
They tune their hearts, by far the noblest
aim;

Perhaps Dundee's wild-warbling measures rise,
Or plaintive Martyrs, worthy of the name,
Or noble Elgin beets the heavenward flame,
The sweetest far of Scotia's holy lays:

Compared with these, Italian trills are tame;
The tickled ears no heartfelt raptures raise ;
Nae unison hae they with our Creator's praise.

The priest-like father reads the sacred page -
How Abram was the friend of GOD on high;
Or Moses bade eternal warfare wage

With Amalek's ungracious progeny;
Or how the royal bard did groaning lie
Beneath the stroke of Heaven's avenging ire;

Or Job's pathetic plaint, and wailing cry ;
Or rapt Isaiah's wild, seraphic fire;
Or other holy seers that tune the sacred lyre.

Perhaps the Christian volume is the theme

How guiltless blood for guilty man was shed:
How HE, who bore in heaven the second name,
Had not on earth whereon to lay His head;
How His first followers and servants sped;
The precepts sage they wrote to many a land:
How he, who lone in Patmos banished.

111-113. Dundee, Martyrs, and Elgin are the names of old hymn-tunes found in many books. The adjectives applied to each are peculiarly fitting.

113. beets, feeds, adds fuel to.

117. hae, have.

133. Saint John.

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Saw in the sun a mighty angel stand,

135 And heard great Bab'lon's doom pronounced by Heaven's command.

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Then kneeling down, to HEAVEN'S ETERNAL
KING,

The saint, the father, and the husband prays:
Hope "springs exulting on triumphant wing,"
That thus they all shall meet in future days:
There ever bask in uncreated rays,

No more to sigh, or shed the bitter tear,

Together hymning their Creator's praise,
In such society, yet still more dear;

While circling Time moves round in an eternal sphere.

Compared with this, how poor Religion's pride,
In all the pomp of method and of art,
When men display to congregations wide
Devotion's every grace, except the heart!
The Power, incensed, the pageant will desert,
The pompous strain, the sacerdotal stole ;

But haply, in some cottage far apart,

May hear, well pleased, the language of the soul; And in His book of life the inmates poor enrol.

Then homeward all take off their several way;
The youngling cottagers retire to rest:
The parent-pair their secret homage pay,

And proffer up to Heaven the warm request,
That He who stills the raven's clamorous nest,

And decks the lily fair in flowery pride,

Would, in the way His wisdom sees the best,

138. Quoted from Pope's Windsor Forest.

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For them and for their little ones provide;

But chiefly, in their hearts with grace divine preside.

From scenes like these old Scotia's grandeur
springs,

That makes her loved at home, revered abroad:
Princes and lords are but the breath of kings,
"An honest man's the noblest work of God; "
And certes, in fair Virtue's heavenly road,
The cottage leaves the palace far behind:

What is a lordling's pomp? - a cumbrous
load,

Disguising oft the wretch of human kind, Studied in arts of hell, in wickedness refined!

O Scotia! my dear, my native soil!

For whom my warmest wish to Heaven is sent, Long may thy hardy sons of rustic toil

Be blest with health, and peace, and sweet content!

And oh! may Heaven their simple lives prevent
From luxury's contagion, weak and vile!

Then, howe'er crowns and coronets be rent,
A virtuous populace may rise the while,

180 And stand a wall of fire around their much-loved isle.

O Thou! who poured the patriotic tide,

That streamed through Wallace's undaunted heart,

166. Quoted from Pope's Essay on Man.

182. William Wallace, the peer of Robert Bruce among Scottish heroes.

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