صور الصفحة
PDF
النشر الإلكتروني

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 rapt1 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,

Saw in the sun a mighty angel stand,

And heard great Babylon's doom pronounced by Heav'n's
command.

Then kneeling down to HEAVEN'S ETERNAL KING,
The saint, the father, and the husband prays:
Hope "springs exulting on triumphant wing,"2
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.

Then homeward all take off their sev'ral 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 clam'rous nest,
And decks the lily fair in flow'ry pride,
Would, in the way His wisdom sees the best,

For them and for their little ones provide;

But, chiefly, in their hearts with grace divine preside.3

FROM "EPISTLE TO DAVIE, A BROTHER POET."

[blocks in formation]

To lie in kilns and barns at e'en,

When banes are crazed and bluid is thin,

1 From Pope's

"Messiah."

2 From Pope's "Windsor Forest."

3 The "Cottar's Saturday Night" is founded on Fergusson's "Farmer's Ingle;" and is said to be a faithful picture of the household of Burns's father.

4 Bones.

Blood.

1 Ball. 4 Then.

Is, doubtless, great distress!
Yet then content could make us blest:
Ev'n then, sometimes, we'd snatch a taste
Of truest happiness.

The honest heart that's free frae a'

Intended fraud or guile,
However fortune kick the ba',1

Has aye some cause to smile;
And, mind still, you'll find still
A comfort this, nae sma';
Nae mair than we'll care then,
Nae farther can we fa'.

What though, like commoners of air,
We wander out, we know not where,
But either house or hall?

Yet nature's charms, the hills and woods,
The sweeping vales and foaming floods,
Are free alike to all.

In days when daisies deck the ground,
And blackbirds whistle clear,
With honest joy our hearts will bound
To see the coming year:

On braes when we please, then,
We'll sit and sowth3 a tune;
Syne rhyme till't, we'll time till't,
And sing't when we ha'e done.

It's no in titles nor in rank,
It's no in wealth, like Lon'on bank,
To purchase peace and rest:
It's no in makin' muckle mair,5
It's no in books, it's no in lear',
To make us truly blest:
If happiness ha'e not her seat
And centre in the breast,
We may be wise, or rich, or great,
But never can be blest;

Nae treasures or pleasures
Could make us happy lang;
The heart aye's the part aye
That mak's us right or wrang.

Then let us cheerfu' acquiesce,
Nor make our scanty pleasures less
By pining at our state;

And, even should misfortunes come,

2 Without.

In making much more.

Whistle in a low tone.

Learning.

I, here wha sit, ha'e met wi' some,
An's thankfu' for them yet.
They gi'e the wit of age to youth,
They let us ken oursel';

They make us see the naked truth,
The real guid and ill.

Though losses and crosses

Be lessons right severe,
There's wit there, ye'll get there,
Ye'll find nae other where.

OF A' THE AIRTS THE WIND CAN BLaw.

Of a' the airts the wind can blaw,
I dearly like the west,

For there the bonnie lassie lives,

The lassie I lo'e best :

There wild woods grow, and rivers row,
And mony a hill between;

But, day and night, my fancy's flight
Is ever wi' my Jean.

I see her in the dewy flowers,
I see her sweet and fair:

I hear her in the tunefu' birds,

I hear her charm the air:

There's not a bonnie flower that springs,
By fountain, shaw, or green;
There's not a bonnie bird that sings,
But minds me o' my Jean.

Oh blaw ye westlin' winds, blaw saft
Amang the leafy trees,

Wi' balmy gale, frae hill and dale,
Bring hame the laden bees;
And bring the lassie back to me
That's aye sae neat and clean,
Ae smile of her wad banish care,
Sae charming is my Jean.

What sighs and vows amang the knowes

Hae passed atween us twa!

How fond to meet, how wae to part,
That night she gaed awa'!
The powers aboon can only ken,

To whom the heart is seen,

That nane can be so dear to me

As my sweet lovely Jean!

[ocr errors]

THE BANKS O' DOON.

[Original version, which was afterwards altered to suit a particular tune.-Chambers.]

Ye flowery banks o' bonnie Doon,

How can ye bloom sae fair!
How can ye chant, ye little birds,

And I sae fu' o' care!

Thou'll break my heart, thou bonnie bird,

That sings upon the bough;

Thou minds me o' the happy days

When my fause luve was true.

Thou'll break my heart, thou bonnie bird,
That sings beside thy mate;

For sae I sat, and sae I sang,
And wistna' o' my fate.

Aft hae I rov'd by bonnie Doon,
To see the woodbine twine,
And ilka bird sang o' its love,
And sae did I o' mine.

Wi' lightsome heart I pu'd a rose,
Frae aff its thorny tree;

And my fause luver staw the rose,
But left the thorn wi' me.

[The poets from whose works we have still to quote may be considered (inclusive of Crabbe) to belong to our present century. The earliest publications of many of them appeared before the expiration of the century; some of these bards still survive among us in their honoured age; some have very recently departed. The farther we descend in the chronological line, the more numerous become the names that crowd the literary stage: and, of course, the greater becomes the number which our limited space compels us to abandon. Among the poets of the middle and of the latter half of the eighteenth century are, Dyer (Grongar Hill, The Fleece, &c.); Dr Samuel Johnson (Vanity of Human Wishes, &c.); Shenstone (The Schoolmistress, Pastorals, &c.); Meikle (the Translator of Camoen's Lusiad, and author of the ballad Cumnor Hall); Armstrong; Dr Jn. Langhorne: Dr Th. Percy; Churchill; Michael Bruce, and Jn. Logan; the two Wartons; Dr Blacklock; Glover. The tragic dramatists are Moore, Home, Mason, Glover, &c. A longer catalogue adorns the literature of comedy; of these Sheridan is the most distinguished name.]

[blocks in formation]

MR ROGERS still enjoys the rewards of a long, useful, and honourable life. His larger works are, "The Pleasures of Memory," "Human Life," "Columbus," and " Italy." His writings are remarkable for elegance of diction, purity of taste, and beauty of sentiment. His publications range from 1786 to 1822.

"6
FROM PLEASURES OF MEMORY."

POWER OF THE CHARM OF EARLY ASSOCIATIONS.

Ask not if courts or camps dissolve the charm:
Say why Vespasian1 lov'd his Sabine farm?

Why great Navarre, when France and freedom bled,
Sought the lone limits of a forest shed?
When Diocletian's3 self-corrected mind
The imperial farces of a world resigned;
Say why we trace the labours of his spade
In calm Salona's philosophic shade?

Say, when contentious Charles renounced a throne,
To muse with monks unlettered and unknown,
What from his soul the parting tribute drew,-
What claimed the sorrows of a last adieu ?
The still retreats that sooth'd his tranquil breast
Ere grandeur dazzled, and its cares oppressed.

A MOTHER'S LOVE.

Her, by her smile, how soon the stranger knows,5
How soon by his the glad discovery shows,

As to her lips she lifts the lovely boy,

What answering looks of sympathy and joy!
He walks, he speaks. In many a broken word,
His wants, his wishes, and his griefs are heard.

"This emperor, according to Suetonius, constantly passed the summer in a small villa near Reate, where he was born, and to which he would never add any embellishment; ne quid scilicet oculorum consuetudini deperiret."-Suet. in Vit. Vesp., c. ii.—See Author's note, where many other examples will be found.

2 Henry IV. of France made an excursion from his camp, during the siege of Laon, to dine at a house in the forest of Folambray, where he had often been regaled when a boy with fruit, milk, and new cheese."-Mém. de Sully.-Author's note.

3 The Roman emperor Diocletian retired into his native province (Dalmatia), and there amused himself with building, planting, and gardening. His answer to Maximian is deservedly celebrated. If," said he, "I could show him the cabbages which I have planted with my own hands at Salona, he would no longer solicit me to return to a throne."— Author's note.

4 Charles V., after his abdication, on his way to his Spanish monastery, stopped at Ghent, his birth-place, to indulge the feelings described in the text.-See Robertson, Book xii.

5 Virg., Eclog. iv.

« السابقةمتابعة »