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Art. II. Poems, chiefly in the Scottish Dialect, by Robert
Burns. 8vo. 5s. Wilson, Kilmarnoch. 1786.
 N an age that is satiated with literary pleasures, nothing
is so grateful to the public taste as novelty. This ingre-
dient will give a gust to very indifferent fare, and lend a
flavour to the produce of the home-brewed vintage. What-
ever excites the jaded appetite of an epicure will be prized;
and a red herring from Greenock of Dunbar will be reckoned
a delice. From this propensity to human nature, a musical
child, a rhyming milkwoman, a learned pig, or a Russian
poet, will “strut their hour upon the stage,” and gain the
applause of the moment. From this cause, and this alone,
Stephen Duck the threasher, and many other nameless names,
have glittered and disappeared like those bubbles of the atmo-
sphere which are called falling stars.
Robert Burns, the Ayrshire ploughman, whose Poems are
now before us, does not belong to this class of obscurorum
virorum. Although he is by no means such a poetical pro-
digy as some of his malicious friends have represented, he
has a genuine title to the attention and approbation of the
public, as a natural, though not a legitimate, son of the
muses.
The |
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The first poems in this collection are the humorous
and satirical kind; and in these our author appears to be
most at home. In his serious poems we can trace imitations
of almost every English author of celebrity*; but his hu-
mour is entirely his own. His address to the Deil (Devil),
The hoy fair (a country sacrament), and his Epistle, in
which he sidguises an amour under the veil of patridge-
shooting, are his masterpieces in this line; and happily in
these instances his humoure is neither local nor transient;
for the devil, the world, and the flesh, will always keep
their ground. “ The vision” is perhaps the most poetical
of all his performances. Revolving his obscure situation,
in which there was nothing to animate pursuit or gratify
ambition; comparing his humble lot with the more flou-
rishing condition of mercantile adventures; and vowing to
renounce the unprofitable trade of verse for ever; there ap-
peared to him a celestial figure; not one of the nine muses,
celebrated in fiction; but the real muse of every inspired
poet, the GENIUS of his native district and frequented
scenes. This is an elegant and happy imagination. The
form of Nature, that first met his enamoured eyes, is the
muse of the rural poet. The mountains, the forests, and
the streams, are the living volumes that impregnate his
fancy, and kindle the fire of genius. The address of this ru-
ral deity to him marks the character, and describes the feel-
ings of a poet.
* Robert Burns, though he has been represented as an ordinary
ploughman, was a farmer, or what they call a tenant in Scotland, and
rented land which he cultivated whith his own hands. He is better
acquainted with the English poets than most authors that have come
under our review.
Or |
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Or when the deep-green-mantl’d earth
Warm-cherish’d ev’ry flowret’s birth,
And joy and music pouring forth
I saw thee eye the gen’ral mirth
When ripen’d field and azure skies
Call’d forth the reaper’s rustling noise
I saw thee leave their ev’ning joys,
To vent thy bosom’s swelling rise
When youthful Love, warm blushing, strong,
Keen-shivering shot thy nerves along,
Those accents, grateful to thy tongue,
I taught thee how to pour in song,
I saw thy pulse’s madding play
Wild send thee Pleasure’s devious way,
Misled by Fancy’s meteor-ray,
But yet the light that led astray
“ Halloween,” or Even, gives a just and literal account
of the principal spells and charms that are practised, on
that anniversary, among the peasants of Scotland, from the
desire of prying into futurity, but it is not happily executed.
A mixture of the solemn and burlesque can never be agree-
able.
“The Cotter's (cottager's) Saturday Night,”" is, without
exception, the best poem in the collection. It is written in
the stanza of Spencer, which probably our bard acquired
from Thomson’s “ Castle of Indolence,” and Beattie’s
“ Minstrel.” It describes one of the happiest and most af-
fecting scenes to be found in a country life; and draws a
domestic picture of rustic simplicity, natural tenderness, and
innocent passiong, that must please every reader whose feelings
are not perverted.
The “ Odes to a Mouse on turning up her Nest,” and to a
“ Mountain Daisy,” are of a similar nature, and will strike
every reader for elegant fancy and the vein of sentimental
reflection that runs throught them. As the latter contains
few provincial phrases we shall present it to the reader.
‘ To |
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‘ To a MOUNTAIN-DAISY, on turning one down with the
‘ Wee, modest, crimson-tipped flow’r,
Thou’s met me in an evil hour;
For I maun crush amang the stoure
To spare thee now is past my pow’r,
Alas! it’s no thy neebor sweet
The bonie lark, companion meet!
Bending thee ’mang the dewy weet!
When upward-springing blythe to greet
Cauld blew the bitter-biting north
Upon thy early, humble birth;
Yet chearfully thou glinted forth
Scarce rear’d above the parent-earth
The flaunting flow’rs our gardens yield,
High sheltr’ing woods and wa’s maun shield,
But thou, beneath the random bield
Adorns the histie stibble-field,
There, in thy scanty mantle clad,
Thy snawie bosom sunward spread,
Thou lifts thy unassuming head
But now the share uptears thy bed,
Such is the fate of artless maid,
Sweet flow’ret of the rural shade!
By love’s simplicity betray’d
Till she, like thee, all foil’d, is laid
Such is the fate of simple bard,
On life’s rough ocean luckless starr’d!
Unskilful he to note the card
Till billow rage, and gales blow hard,
Such
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The stanza of Mr. Burns is generally ill-chosen, and his
provincial dialect confines his beauties to one half of the
island. but he possesses the genuine characteristics of a poet;
a vigorous mind, a lively fancy, a surpizing knowledge of
human nature, and an expression rich, various, and abun-
dant. In the plaintive or pathetic he does not excel; his
love-poems (though he confesses, or rather professes, a penchant
to the belle passion) are execrable; but in the midst of vul-
garity and common-place, which occupy one half of the vo-
lume, we meet with many striking beauties that make ample
compensation. One happy touch on the Eolian harp from
fairy fingers awakes emotions in the soul that makes us forget
the antecedent mediocrity or harshness of that natrual music.
The liberal patronage which Scotland has extended to this
self-taught bard reflects honour on the country. If Mr.
Burns has flourished in the shade of obscurity, his country
will form higher expectations from him when basking in
the sunshine of appluase. His situation, however, is criti-
cal. He seems to possess too great a facility of composition,
and is too easily satisfied with his own productions. Fame
may be procured by novelty, but it must be supported by
merit. We have thrown our these hints to our young and
ingenious author, because we discern faults in him, which, if
not corrected, like the fly in the apothecary‘s ointment, may
give an unfortunate tincture and colour to his future com-
positions. |