() TO THE REV. WILLIAM MOODIE, EDIN BURGH.* (DOUGLAS 1877.) REV. AND DEAR SIR,-This will be presented to you by a particular friend of mine, a Mr. Clarke, schoolmaster in Moffat, who has lately become the unfortunate and undeserved subject of persecution from some of his employers. The ostensible and assigned reason on their part is some instances of severity to the boys under his care; but I have had the best means of knowing the merits of the cause, and I assure you, Sir, that he is falling a sacrifice to the weakness of the many, following in the cry of the villainy of the few. The business will now come before the patrons of the school, who are the ministers, magistrates, and town council of Edinburgh; and in that view I would interest your goodness in his behalf. 'Tis true, Sir, and I feel the full force of the observation, that a man in my powerless, humble situation very much mistakes himself, and very much mistakes the way of the world, when he dares presume to offer influence among so highly respectable a body as the patronage I have mentioned. On that -what could I do? A man of abilities, a man of genius, a man of worth, and my friend-before I would stand quietly and silently by, and see him perish thus, I would go down on my knees to the rocks and mountains, and implore them to fall on his persecutors and crush their malice and them in deserved destruction. Believe me, Sir, he is a greatly injured man. *This clergyman was translated from Kirkcaldy to St. Andrew's Church, Edinburgh, in 1787, while Burns resided in the city and became acquainted with him. In 1793, he was appointed Professor of Hebrew and the Eastern languages. He died in 1812, and was succeeded in the Professorship by the celebrated Dr. Murray. The humblest individual, though, alas, he cannot so redress the wrong, may yet as ably attest the fact as a lord might do. Mr. Moodie's goodness I well know, and that acquaintance with him that I have the honor to boast of will forgive my addressing him thus in favor of a gentleman whom, if he knew as well, he would esteem as I do. R. B. LETTER DICTATED FOR CLARKE, AD- (DOUGLAS,* 1877.) MY LORD, -It may be deemed presumption in a man obscure and unknown as I am, and entire stranger to your Lordship, to trouble you in this manner; but when I inform you that the subject on which I address you is of the last importance to me, and is so far connected with you, that on your determination, in a great measure, my fate must depend, I rely on your Lordship's goodness that you will think any farther apology unnecessary. I have been for nearly five years Schoolmaster in Moffat, an appointment of which your Lordship will know, you, with the rest of the Magistracy and Town Council, together with the Clergy of Edinburgh, have the patronage. The trust with which these, my highly respectable patrons had honored me, I have endeavored to discharge with the utmost fidelity, and I hope with a good degree of success; but of late, one or two powerful individuals† of my employers This letter is inserted in the Glenriddell MS. volume at Liverpool, with a heading by our bard, thus :-"The following letter, which was sent by Mr. Clarke to the Provost of Edinburgh, was of my writing." The "one or two powerful individuals" referred to seem to have enlisted the sympathies of the Earl of Hopetoun, who, as superior of the ground on which the school stood, or by some other influence, during the summer vacation, applied to the court for an interdict against Clarke's re-opening it. AT. 33.] LETTER DICTATED FOR CLARKE. 269 have been pleased to attack my reputation as a Teacher, have threatened no less than to expel me from the School, and are taking every method, some of them, I will say it, insidious and unfair to the last degree, to put their threats in execution. The fault of which I am accused is some instances of severity to the children under my care. Were I to tell your Lordship that I am innocent of the charge-that any shade of cruelty, particularly that very black one of cruelty to tender infancy, will be allowed by every unbiassed person who knows anything of me to be tints unknown in my disposition; you would certainly look on all this from me as words of course; so I shall trouble you with nothing on the merits of my cause, until I have a fair hearing before my R. Honble. Patrons. A fair hearing, my Lord, is what above all things I want, and what I greatly fear will be attempted to be denied me. It is to be insinuated that I have vacated my place, that I never was legally appointed, with I know not how many pretences more, to hinder the business from coming properly before your Lordship and the other Patrons of the Schoolall which I deny, and will insist on holding my appointment until the dignified characters who gave it me shall find me unworthy of it. In your Lordship's great acquaintance with human life, you must have known and seen many instances of Innocence, nay, of Merit, disguised and obscured, and sometimes for ever buried, by the dark machinations of unprincipled Malevolence, and envious Craft; and until the contrary be made to appear, 'tis at least equally probable that my case is in that unfortunate and undeserved predicament.-I have the honor to be, &c. (Signed) JAMES CLARKE. [MOFFAT, June 1791.] (TO JOHN MITCHELL, ESQ., COLLECTOR OF EXCISE, DUMFRIES. (DOUGLAS, 1877.)* [ELLISLAND, 16th June 1791.] SIR,-A very pressing occasion, no less than witnessing the wedding of an only brother, calls me to Ayrshire, for which I shall take your permission as granted, except I be countermanded before Sunday, the day I set out. I shall remember that three days are all that I can expect. The enclosed official paper came to my hand, and I take the liberty to lay it before you. I have the honor to be your obliged, humble servt. ROBT. BURNS. Mr. Gilbert Burns, farmer, then of Mossgiel, was married to Miss Jean Breckenridge at Kilmarnock on 21st June 1791. The eldest child of the marriage, William Burns, who was born at Mossgiel on 15th May 1792, is now (1878) alive at Portarlington in Ireland. A younger brother, Gilbert, long a member of the large dry goods house of Todd & Burns (1880) born in 1803, also survives in Dublin. A sister, Anne Burns, born in 1805 is also still alive; and these are all that remain of eleven children, the issue of the marriage referred to in the poet's letter. Gilbert, the poet's brother, died in April 1827, and his wife in September, 1841. (10) TO MR. PETER HILL, BOOKSELLER. MY DEAR FRIEND,-I take Glenriddell's kind offer of a corner for a postscript to you, though I have got *The poet's holograph of this short letter is in possession of D. Lyell, Esq., W S., Edinburgh, to whom we are indebted for its use. †The original letter preserved in Mr. Hill's family has no date in the poet's nothing particular to tell you. It is with the greatest pleasure I learn from all hands, and particularly from your warm friend and patron, the Laird here, that you are going on, spreading and thriving like a Palm tree that shades the fragrant vale in the Holy Land of the Prophet. May the richest juices from beneath, and the dews of heaven from above, foster your root and refresh your branches, until you be as conspicuous among your fellows as the stately Goliah towering over the little pigmy Philistines around him! Amen! so be it!!! ROBT. BURNS. () TO MISS DAVIES, ENCLOSING A BALLAD MADE UPON HER. (CHAMBERS, 1852.) [Aug. 1791.] MADAM,-I understand my very worthy neighbor, Mr. Riddell, has informed you that I have made you the subject of some verses. There is something [so provoking]* in the idea of being the burden of a ballad that I do not think Job or Moses, though such patterns of patience and meekness, could have resisted the curiosity to know what that ballad was; so my worthy friend (what I daresay he never intended) has done me a mischief, and reduced me to the unfortunate alternative of leaving your curiosity ungratified, or else disgusting you with foolish verses, the unfinished production of a random moment, and never meant to have met your ear. I have heard or read somewhere of a gentleman who had some genius, hand; it bears the Dumfries Post-mark "June," but the year is invisible. It is backed in Glenriddell's hand. *These two words, not in the original, have been inserted by former editors to help the author's meaning. |
