by Robert Burns
A Prayer,
Under the Pressure of Violent Anguish
First printed in the Edinburgh edition, 1787.
O Thou Great Being! what Thou art,
Surpasses me to know:
Yet sure I am, that known to Thee
Are all Thy works below.
5 Thy creature here before Thee stands,
All wretched and distrest;
Yet sure those ills that wring my soul
Obey Thy high behest.
Sure Thou, Almighty, canst not act
10 From cruelty or wrath!
O, free my weary eyes from tears,
Or close them fast in death!
But if I must afflicted be,
To suit some wise design;
15 Then, man my soul with firm resolves
To bear and not repine!
In the FCB, dated March 1784, the poet introduces this poem: ‘There was a certain period of my life that my spirit was broke by repeated losses and disasters, which threatened, and indeed effected the utter ruin of my fortune. My body too was attacked by that most dreadful distemper, a Hypochondria, or confirmed Melancholy: in this wretched state, the recollection of which makes me yet shudder, I hung my Harp on the Willow trees, except in some lucid intervals, in one of which I composed the following.’
The Ninetieth Psalm Paraphrased
First printed in the Edinburgh edition, 1787.
O Thou, the first, the greatest friend
Of all the human race!
Whose strong right hand has ever been
Their stay and dwelling-place!
5 Before the mountains heav’d their heads
Beneath Thy forming hand,
Before this ponderous globe itself
Arose at Thy command:
That Power which rais’d and still upholds
10 This universal frame,
From countless, unbeginning time
Was ever still the same.
Those mighty periods of years,
Which seem to us so vast,
15 Appear no more before Thy sight
Than yesterday that’s past.
Thou giv’st the word; Thy creature, man,
Is to existence brought;
Again Thou say’st, ‘Ye sons of men,
20 ‘Return ye into nought!’
Thou layest them with all their cares
In everlasting sleep;
As with a flood Thou tak’st them off
With overwhelming sweep.
25 They flourish like the morning flow’r,
In beauty’s pride array’d;
But long ere night, cut down, it lies
All wither’d and decay’d.
Yet another example of the poet’s versified religious inculcation. For all the critical attacks on Burns in Ayrshire by some elements of the clergy prior to his successful poetic career, works like this reveal his in-depth knowledge of Biblical subjects and his keen ability to interpret and paraphrase Biblical text. In the strict social stratification of 18th century society, members of the peasantry were meant to follow religious dictates, not question or debate them as Burns did. As the poet wryly recorded, ‘ambitious of shining in conversation parties on Sundays between sermons, funerals, &c. used in a few years more to puzzle Calvinism with so much heat and indiscretion that I raised a hue and cry of heresy against me which has not ceased to this hour’ (Letter 125).
To Miss Logan
With Beattie’s Poems
A New Year’s Gift January 1, 1787
First printed in the Edinburgh edition, 1787.
Again the silent wheels of time
Their annual round have driv’n,
And you, tho’ scarce in maiden prime,
Are so much nearer Heav’n
5 No gifts have I from Indian coasts
The infant year to hail;
I send you more than India boasts
In Edwin’s simple tale.
Our Sex with guile, and faithless love
10 Is charg’d, perhaps too true;
But may, dear Maid, each Lover prove
An Edwin still to you.
Miss Susan Logan was the younger sister of Major William Logan of Park, a friend of Mrs Dunlop and the recipient of a copy of Beattie’s Poems sent by Burns from Edinburgh.
Address to a Haggis
First printed in The Caledonian Mercury, 20th December 1786.
Fair fa’ your honest, sonsie face, good luck to, cheerful
Great Chieftain o’ the Puddin-race!
Aboon them a’ ye tak your place, above
Painch, tripe, or thairm: paunch, guts
5 Weel are ye wordy of a grace well
As lang ’s my arm. long as
The groaning trencher there ye fill,
Your hurdies like a distant hill, buttocks
Your pin wad help to mend a mill skewer would
10 In time o’ need,
While thro’ your pores the dews distil
Like amber bead.
His knife see Rustic-labour dight, wipe
An’ cut ye up wi’ ready slight, skill
15 Trenching your gushing entrails bright,
Like onie ditch; any
And then, O what a glorious sight,
Warm-reekin, rich! -steaming
Then, horn for horn, they stretch an’ strive: eating with a horn-spoon
20 Deil tak the hindmost, on they drive, devil take the slowest
Till a’ their weel-swall’d kytes belyve well-swollen stomachs eventually
Are bent like drums;
Then auld Guidman, maist like to rive, old, goodman, most, burst
Bethankit hums.
25 Is there that owre his French ragout, over
Or olio that wad staw a sow, would, fill up/bloat
Or fricassee wad mak her spew would make, throw up
Wi’ perfect sconner, disgust
Looks down wi’ sneering, scornfu’ view
30 On sic a dinner? such
Poor devil! see him owre his trash, over
As feckless as a wither’d rash, feeble, rush
His spindle shank a guid whip-lash, thin leg, good
His nieve a nit; fist, nut
35 Thro’ bluidy flood or field to dash, bloody
O how unfit!
But mark the Rustic, haggis-fed, country man
The trembling earth resounds his tread,
Clap in his walie nieve a blade, place, firm fist
40 He’ll make it whissle; whistle/cutting through air
An’ legs, an’ arms, an’ heads will sned cut off
Like taps o’ thrissle. tops of thistle
Ye Pow’rs wha mak mankind your care, who make
And dish them out their bill o’ fare,
45 Auld Scotland wants nae skinking ware, old, no watery
That jaups in luggies; splashes in bowls
But, if ye wish her gratefu’ prayer,
Gie her a Haggis! give
Subject to endless repetition as the indispensable Burns Supper party-piece, this poem has probably been heard far too often for its own good. It is, however, arguably more subtly knowing and dissident than first appears. The poem as we have it was completed in Edinburgh in December 1786. There is, however, evidence that the last verse was composed first in the house of John Morrison, a Mauchline cabinetmaker, and was used as a free-standing grace. This is the first-recorded version of the last stanza:
Ye Pow’rs wha gie us a’ that’s gude
Still bless auld Caledonia’s brood,
Wi’ great John Barleycorn’s heart’s bluid
In stoups or luggies;
And on our boards, that King o’ food
A gude Scotch Haggis.
Apeasant dish compounded of meat left-overs, oatmeal, spices, offal, all packed in a sheep’s stomach, the haggis is portrayed by Burns as causative of the virility of the Scottish common people. Literally virility as in ll. 7–9 the haggis’s vast buttock-like sh
ape culminated in a pronounced phallic-like pin. It did provoke in those who partook of it Breughel-like orgiastic appetites. It also gave stomach for battle with its echo from Fergusson’s The Farmer’s Ingle, ll. 37–45:
On sicken food has mony a doughty deed
By Caledonia’s ancestors been done;
By this did mony wight fu’ weirlike bleed
In brulzies, &c.
An enthusiast, albeit with certain well-defined parameters, for Burns as poet-recorder of Scottish peasant life, this poem caused Kinsley not a little unease: ‘But the Address is not merely a burlesque poem, or a piece of convivial genre-poetry like its antecedent, Fergusson’s Caller Oysters. Through it there runs an assertion, more than half-serious, of peasant virtue and strength, expressed in harsh, violent diction and in images of slaughter’. The nearest analogy to what Burns is doing here are ll. 85–102 of The Author’s Earnest Cry and Prayer.
Address to Edinburgh
First printed in the Edinburgh edition, 1787.
Edina! Scotia’s darling seat!
All hail thy palaces and tow’rs,
Where once beneath a Monarch’s feet,
Sat Legislation’s sov’reign pow’rs!
5 From marking wildly-scatt’red flow’rs,
As on the banks of Ayr I stray’d,
And singing, lone, the ling’ring hours,
I shelter in thy honor’d shade.
Here Wealth still swells the golden tide,
10 As busy Trade his labours plies;
There Architecture’s noble pride
Bids elegance and splendour rise;
Here Justice, from her native skies,
High wields her balance and her rod;
15 There Learning, with his eagle eyes,
Seeks Science in her coy abode.
Thy Sons, Edina, social, kind,
With open arms the Stranger hail;
Their views enlarg’d, their lib’ral mind,
20 Above the narrow, rural vale:
Attentive still to Sorrow’s wail,
Or modest Merit’s silent claim;
And never may their sources fail!
And never Envy blot their name!
25 Thy Daughters bright thy walks adorn,
Gay as the gilded summer sky,
Sweet as the dewy, milk-white thorn,
Dear as the raptur’d thrill of joy!
Fair Burnet strikes th’ adoring eye,
30 Heav’n’s beauties on my fancy shine;
I see the Sire of Love on high,
And own His work indeed divine!
There, watching high the least alarms,
Thy rough, rude Fortress gleams afar;
35 Like some bold Vet’ran, grey in arms,
And mark’d with many a seamy scar:
The pond’rous wall and massy bar
Grim-rising o’er the rugged rock,
Have oft withstood assailing War,
40 And oft repell’d th’ Invader’s shock.
With awe-struck thought, and pitying tears,
I view that noble, stately Dome,
Where Scotia’s kings of other years,
Fam’d heroes! had their royal home:
45 Alas, how chang’d the times to come!
Their royal Name low in the dust!
Their hapless Race wild-wand’ring roam!
Tho’ rigid Law cries out, ‘twas just!
Wild-beats my heart, to trace your steps,
50 Whose ancestors, in days of yore,
Thro’ hostile ranks and ruin’d gaps
Old Scotia’s bloody lion bore:
Ev’n I who sing in rustic lore,
Haply my Sires have left their shed,
55 And fac’d grim Danger’s loudest roar,
Bold-following where your Fathers led!
Edina! Scotia’s darling seat!
All hail thy palaces and tow’rs,
Where once, beneath a Monarch’s feet,
60 Sat Legislation’s sov’reign pow’rs!
From marking wildly-scatt’red flow’rs,
As on the banks of Ayr I stray’d,
And singing, lone, the ling’ring hours,
I shelter in thy honour’d shade.
The artificial English of this poem written not long after Burns’s arrival in Edinburgh late in 1786 has achieved a degree of notoriety not least stemming from David Daiches’ witty put-down:
The ‘Address to Edinburgh’ was a ‘duty’ poem, written in December as a more or less official expression of gratitude to the city which had received him so hospitably; it too was published in the Caledonian Mercury, so that the Edinburgh public could see he had done his duty by the city. It is a frigid, artificial poem in stilted neoclassic English. Edinburgh is hailed as ‘Edina! Scotia’s darling seat!’ and the firm of Edinburgh plumbers and sanitary engineers who in a later generation adopted the name ‘Edina’ for their version of a necessary but hardly poetic kind of seat were demonstrating, if somewhat crudely, a real critical insight (p. 215).
Certainly the Thomsonian theme and style of the burgeoning vision of wealth, architecture and culture fails to convince. Nor does the specific praise of Lord Monboddo’s daughter, Miss Burnett in l. 29 quite corroborate the epistolary fantasy version of this young lady, who actually bore a close resemblance to her physically unprepossessing father: ‘the heavenly Miss Burnett, daughter of Lord Monboddo, at whose house I have had the honour to more than once. – There has not been anything nearly like her, in all the combinations of Beauty, Grace and Goodness the Great Creator has formed, since Milton’s Eve on the first day of her existence’ (Letter 68). The ‘Sire of Love’ (l. 31) is Coelus, begetter of Venus and, indeed, Burns was in thrall to that sky-god during his Edinburgh sojourn with a sexual voracity bordering on erotomania. Recent evidence indicates an involvement with another working-class woman and another illegitimate child as well as with Jenny Clow. Simultaneously he was besieging Mrs McLehose (‘Clarinda’) with a sentimental campaign of pious eroticism and in communication with Margaret (Peggy) Chalmers whom he had notions of marrying and who appears, even more than Maria Riddell, capable of sympathetic comprehension, if not reciprocation, of the Bard’s deepest creative urges. The multiple, diverse, divisive nature of Burns’s sexual desires at this period must surely also correspond to similar tensions in his social and cultural life. Edinburgh, as Daiches suggests, was hospitable to him, but in divided and temporary ways. The cosseted ‘Stranger’ pays his thanks but (ll. 21–4) at the very least, questions the longevity of this charitable celebration. His erstwhile sentimental supporters of genteel Edinburgh, especially Henry Mackenzie, were, of course, to indulge in posthumous, envious character assassination.
The poem’s topographical reading of the city is also interesting. Before proceeding to a celebration of the splendours of the New Edinburgh, ll. 3–4 mark the physical disintegration of the Scottish court and parliament. While the Castle is seen (ll. 33–40) as a tangible bastion of self-defending, Scottish independence, the poem is much more concerned with the deserted Holyrood Palace as manifesting the fall of the Stuarts in whom Burns found both the public manifestation of a disintegrated Scotland and private expressions of his own sense of life as displaced, if not exiled, grief. Ll. 53–6 invoke his own family’s coming-out in the 1715. Indeed, while it will be subsequently far better expressed, the essence of Burns’s Jacobitism is to be found in this poem.
Thus a poem which apparently is a slight act of obeisance to Edinburgh actually obscures darker anxieties about the true state of the Scottish body politic. Indeed, utterly contradicting Walter Scott, it does not present a paradigm of burgeoning Scottish post-Union evolution but a sense of national loss at the heart of this city as symbol of the national spirit.
John Barleycorn: A Ballad 1
Tune: Lull Me Beyond Thee
First printed in the Edinburgh edition, 1787.
There was three kings into the east,
Three kings both great and
high,
And they hae sworn a solemn oath have
John Barleycorn should die.
5 They took a plough and plough’d him down,
Put clods upon his head, lumps of grassy soil/turf
And they hae sworn a solemn oath have
John Barleycorn was dead.
But the cheerful Spring came kindly on,
10 And show’rs began to fall;
John Barleycorn got up again,
And sore surpris’d them all.
The sultry suns of Summer came,
And he grew thick and strong,
15 His head weel arm’d wi’ pointed spears, with
That no one should him wrong.
The sober Autumn enter’d mild,
When he grew wan and pale;
His bending joints and drooping head
20 Show’d he began to fail.
His colour sicken’d more and more,
He faded into age;
And then his enemies began
To show their deadly rage.
25 They’ve taen a weapon long and sharp, taken
And cut him by the knee;
Then ty’d him fast upon a cart, tied
Like a rogue for forgerie.
They laid him down upon his back,
