by Robert Burns
And, after proper purpose of amendment,
20 Can firmly force his jarring thoughts to peace?
O happy, happy, enviable man!
O glorious magnanimity of soul!
This was composed after reading Adam Smith’s Theory of Moral Sentiments, a book of philosophical inquiry (1759). In the First Commonplace Book, the lines are dated for September 1783. The poet paraphrases his own verse: ‘I entirely agree with that judicious Philosopher Mr Smith in his excellent Theory of Moral Sentiments, that Remorse is the most painful sentiment that can embitter the human bosom … when our own follies or crimes, have made us miserable and wretched, to bear it up with manly firmness, and at the same time have a proper penitential sense of our misconduct, – is a glorious effort of Self-command’. It is clearly an experiment in Shakespearean blank verse, a poetic form the poet did not often employ and highly comparable, linguistically and formally, with the early, guilt-tormented Coleridge’s use of that form.
On James Grieve, Laird of Boghead, Tarbolton
A Sanctimonious Rascal of the First Water
First printed with Chambers–Wallace, 1896.
Here lies Boghead amang the dead, among
In hopes to get salvation;
But if such as he, in Heav’n may be,
Then welcome, hail! damnation. —
This was written on a Laird who lived near the Burns family at Lochlie. It is generally dated for 1783–4. In a 1787 edition of the poet’s work a holograph copy of the epigram has the subtitle as above, ‘A Sanctimonious Rascal of the First Water’.
On an Innkeeper in Tarbolton
First in Chambers–Wallace, 1896.
Here lies ‘mang ither useless matters, among other
A. Manson wi’ his endless clatters. — talk/chatter
In Chambers–Wallace this is titled On Thomas Kirkpatrick, Late Blacksmith in Stoop, with ‘A. Manson’ changed to ‘Auld Thomas’ in the last line. Kinsley has no remarks. Mackay records that a plaque marks the spot in Tarbolton where Andrew Manson had an Inn.
The Ruined Farmer
Tune: Go From My Window, Love, Do!
First printed with Chambers, 1838.
The sun he is sunk in the west;
All creatures retired to rest,
While here I sit, all sore beset,
With sorrow, grief, and woe:
5 And it’s O, fickle Fortune, O!
The prosperous man is asleep,
Nor hears how the whirlwinds sweep;
But Misery and I must watch
The surly tempests blow:
10 And it’s O, fickle Fortune, O!
There lies the dear Partner of my breast;
Her cares for a moment at rest:
Must I see thee, my youthful pride,
Thus brought so very low!
15 And it’s O, fickle Fortune, O!
There lie my sweet babies in her arms;
No anxious fear their little hearts alarms;
But for their sake my heart does ache,
With many a bitter throe:
20 And it’s O, fickle Fortune, O!
I once was by Fortune carest;
I once could relieve the distrest:
Now life’s poor support, hardly earn’d,
My fate will scarce bestow:
25 And it’s O, fickle Fortune, O!
No comfort, no comfort I have!
How welcome to me were the grave!
But then my wife and children dear —
O, whither would they go!
30 And it’s O, fickle Fortune, O!
O whither, O whither shall I turn!
All friendless, forsaken, forlorn!
For in this world, Rest or Peace
I never more shall know!
35 And it’s O, fickle Fortune, O!
Unpublished during the poet’s life, this song is written in the voice of a ruined farmer. There is a strong resonance of family biography relating to the poet’s father during 1783–4 when he fell into rent arrears and was taken to court. Burns wrote about this episode in 1787: ‘My indignation yet boils at the recollection of the scoundrel tyrant’s insolent, threatening epistles, which used to set us in tears’ (Letter 125). The song is included among the Stair manuscripts.
Lines on the Bachelor’s Club, Tarbolton
First published here as verse by Burns.
Of birth or blood we do not boast,
Nor gentry does our club afford;
But ploughmen and mechanics we
In Nature’s simple dress record.
This was written in the Autumn of 1782. Dr James Currie says of the Tarbolton Bachelor’s Club – essentially a debating society – that in the Autumn of 1782, a book was purchased into which the rules and regulations were copied by the poet, as President. Introducing the annotations, Currie prints four lines of poetry, stating that the entire text inscribed is from Burns (See Currie, 1800, p. xliv). If so, it is almost certain the lines of poetry are by Burns, although they have never previously been included in the canon. The lines may have merely been quoted from another author, but Burns is generally open about attribution. Currie records in a footnote that actual topics debated at Tarbolton included the following, ‘Whether do we derive more happiness from Love or Friendship? – Whether between friends who have no reason to doubt each other’s friendship, there should be any reserve? – Whether is the savage man, or the peasant of a civilised country, in the most happy situation? – Whether is a young man of the lower ranks of life likeliest to be happy, who has got a good education, and his mind well informed, or he who has just the education and information of those around him?’ (Currie, p. xlvii). Found in the hand of Burns, these lines are almost certainly his.
Mary Morison
Tune: Duncan Davison.
First published by Currie, 1800.
O Mary, at thy window be,
It is the wish’d, the trysted hour;
Those smiles and glances let me see,
That make the miser’s treasure poor:
How blythely wad I bide the stoure, would, abide, dust/struggle
A weary slave frae sun to sun; from
Could I the rich reward secure,
The lovely Mary Morison!
Yestreen when to the trembling string yesterday evening
The dance gaed thro’ the lighted ha’, went, hall
To thee my fancy took its wing,
I sat, but neither heard or saw:
Though this was fair, and that was braw, fine/good-looking
And yon the toast of a’ the town, an other, all
I sigh’d, and said amang them a’, among, all
‘Ye are na Mary Morison.’ you are not
O Mary, canst thou wreck his peace,
Wha for thy sake wad gladly die! who, would
Or canst thou break that heart of his,
Whase only faut is loving thee! fault
If love for love thou wilt na gie, will not give
At least be pity to me shown;
A thought ungentle canna be cannot be
The thought o’ Mary Morison.
This work was written somtime in the 1784–5 period. It is remarkable that Burns sent this song to George Thomson on 20th March, 1793 (Low has 1792) but he did not print it until 1818. Perhaps he was influenced by Burns’s self-deprecatory comment that the song prefixed was ‘one of my juvenile works. I leave it among your hands. I do not think it very remarkable, either for its merits, or demerits. It is impossible, at least I feel it in my stinted powers, to be always original, entertaining & witty’ (Letter 540). Hugh MacDiarmid, on the other hand, rightly saw the song as a pure manifestation of the Scottish poetic spirit: ‘The language of the Greeks is simple and concrete, without cliché s and rhetoric. But what Greek epigram has a more magical simplicity than Burns’s ‘Ye are na Mary Morison!’, or where shall a parallel be found for the terrific concision, the vertiginous speed of Tam o’ Shanter’ (See Albyn or The Future of Scotland).
Epitaph on My Own Friend, and My Father’s Friend, Wm Muir in Tarbolton Miln
First published in Currie, 1800.
An honest man here lies at rest
As e’er God with His image blest.
The friend of man, the friend of truth;
The friend of Age, and guide of Youth:
Few hearts like his with virtue warm’d,
Few heads with knowledge so inform’d:
If there’s another world, he lives in bliss;
If there is none, he made the best of this. —
A mock epitaph composed on a friend of the poet’s family, William Muir (1745–93), and entered in the poet’s First Commonplace Book, April 1784. Mackay errs by stating this epitaph was printed in the Kilmarnock edition (Mackay, p. 70).
The Ronalds of the Bennals
First printed by Robert Chambers 1851.
In Tarbolton, ye ken, there are proper young men, know
And proper young lasses and a’, man: all
But ken ye the Ronalds that live in the Bennals, know
They carry the gree frae them a’, man. come off best from
5 Their father’s a laird, and weel he can spare’t, well
Braid money to tocher them a’, man, broad, dower
To proper young men, he’ll clink in the hand chink
Gowd guineas a hunder or twa, man. gold, a hundred or two
There’s ane they ca’ Jean, I’ll warrant ye’ve seen one, call
10 As bonie a lass or as braw, man; well dressed
But for sense and guid taste she’ll vie wi’ the best, good
And a conduct that beautifies a’, man.
The charms o’ the min’, the langer they shine, mind
The mair admiration they draw, man; more
15 While peaches and cherries, and roses and lilies,
They fade and they wither awa, man. away
If ye be for Miss Jean, tak this frae a frien’, take, from a friend
A hint o’ a rival or twa, man, two
The Laird o’ Blackbyre wad gang through the fire, would go
20 If that wad entice her awa, man. would, away
The Laird o’ Braehead has been on his speed rushing about
For mair than a towmond or twa, man; more, twelve months, two
The Laird o’ the Ford will straught on a board, stretch
If he canna get her at a’, man. cannot
25 Then Anna comes in, the pride o’ her kin,
The boast of our bachelors a’, man:
Sae sonsy and sweet, sae fully complete, so pleasant
She steals our affections awa, man. away
If I should detail the pick and the wale choice, choicest
30 O’ lasses that live here awa, man, about
The faut wad be mine, if they didna shine fault would
The sweetest and best o’ them a’, man.
I lo’e her mysel, but darena weel tell, love, dare not well
My poverty keeps me in awe, man,
35 For making o’ rhymes, and working at times,
Does little or naething at a’, man. nothing
Yet I wadna choose to let her refuse, would not
Nor hae’t in her power to say na, man, have it, no
For though I be poor, unnoticed, obscure,
40 My stomach’s as proud as them a’, man.
Though I canna ride in well-booted pride, cannot
And flee o’er the hills like a craw, man. fly, crow
I can haud up my head wi’ the best o’ the breed, hold
Though fluttering ever so braw, man. fine
45 My coat and my vest, they are Scotch o’ the best;
O’ pairs o’ guid breeks I hae twa, man: good trousers, have two
And stockings and pumps to put on my stumps,
And ne’er a wrang steek in them a’, man. wrong stitch
My sarks they are few, but five o’ them new, shirts
50 Twal’-hundred, as white as the snaw, man, snow
A ten-shillings hat, a Holland cravat; a linen neck-tie
There are no monie Poets sae braw, man. many, so well dressed
I never had frien’s weel stockit in means, friends well stocked, goods
To leave me a hundred or twa, man, two
55 Nae weel-tocher’d aunts, to wait on their drants no well dowered, sulks
And wish them in hell for it a’, man.
I never was cannie for hoarding o’ money, careful
Or claughtin’t together at a’, man, grasping
I’ve little to spend and naething to lend, nothing
60 But devil a shilling I awe, man. owe
This is a light jocular poem on a theme which in his work and life was to become increasingly, obsessively darker; that is Burns’s need for not so much the materialism as the culture of women of a higher class. Mrs McLehose, Margaret Chalmers and Maria Riddell are the most prominent examples. The Ronalds of the Bennals here mentioned were the prosperous William Ronald and his two daughters Jean and Anna. Burns sends up their suitors and ends on a note of personal defiance as to his own appearance and worth but the uncrossable line of class (ll. 33–4) hurts all the same. De Lancey Ferguson suggests that the prospective wife mentioned in Letter 18 is, in fact, Anna Ronald. Whether she is or not, that letter does present the earliest manifestation of desire in Burns for matrimonial security relevant to this particular poem:
We talk of air & manner, of beauty & wit, and lord knows what unmeaning nonsense; but – there – is solid charms for you. – Who would not be in raptures with a woman that will make him £300 richer. – And then to have a woman to lye with when one pleases, without running any risk of the cursed expence of bastards and all other concomitants of that species of Smuggling. —These are solid views of matrimony.— (Letter 18)
Kinsley and Low note that William Ronald went bankrupt in 1789. Burns mentions this in a letter: ‘The only Ayrshire news that I remember, in which I think you will be interested is, that Mr Ronald is bankrupt. You will easily guess that from his insolent vanity in his sunshine of life, he will now feel a little retaliation from those who thought themselves eclipsed by him, for, poor fellow! I do not think he ever intentionally injured any one’ (Letter 372).
The Tarbolton Lasses
First printed by Chambers in 1851.
If ye gae up to yon hill-tap, yonder
Ye’ll there see bonie Peggy: pretty
She kens her father is a laird, knows
And she forsooth’s a leddy. lady
5 There’s Sophy tight, a lassie bright,
Besides a handsome fortune:
Wha canna win her in a night who cannot
Has little art in courtin.
Gae down by Faile, and taste the ale, go
10 And tak a look o’ Mysie; take
She’s dour and din, a deil within, stubborn; dirty complexion
But aiblins she may please ye. maybe/perhaps
If she be shy, her sister try,
Ye’ll may be fancy Jenny:
15 If ye’ll dispense wi’ want o’ sense with
She kens hersel she’s bonie. knows herself
As ye gae up by yon hillside, go
Spier in for bonie Bessy: call
She’ll gie ye a beck, and bid ye light, give, curtsy
20 And handsomely address ye.
There’s few sae bonie, nane sae guid so, none so good
In a’ King George’ dominion;
If ye should doubt the truth of this —
It’s Bessy’s ain opinion. own
Written about the same period as The Ronalds of the Bennals, in 1784. Faile, in Tarbolton parish, would have been little more than a few houses at this time. This jovial song is like a young man’s tourist guide to the available young ladies of the area. For two main reasons it was unpublished until the mid-19th century. First, it is a slight work. Second, the young ladies were too easily identified at the time of writing.
The Bel
les of Mauchline
Tune: Bonie Dundee
First printed by Currie in 1800.
In Mauchline there dwells six proper young Belles,
The pride of the place and its neighbourhood a’,
Their carriage and dress a stranger would guess,
In Lon’on or Paris they’d gotten it a’.
Miss Millar is fine, Miss Murkland’s divine,
Miss Smith she has wit, and Miss Betty is braw;
There’s beauty and fortune to get wi’ Miss Morton,
But ARMOUR’S the jewel for me o’ them a’. —
This was composed probably just after the previous work, in late 1784 or early 1785. Robert Chambers furnished subsequent editors with the names of all six Mauchline lassies: Helen and Betty Miller, Jean Markland, Jean Smith, Christina Morton and the poet’s subsequent wife, Jean Armour.
O Leave Novels
Tune: Ye Mauchline Belles
First printed in Currie, 1800.
O leave novels, ye Mauchline belles,
Ye’re safer at your spinning wheel;
Such witching books, are baited hooks
For rakish rooks like Rob Mossgiel.
Your fine Tom Jones and Grandisons
They make your youthful fancies reel;
They heat your brains, and fire your veins,
And then you’re prey for Rob Mossgiel.
Beware a tongue that’s smoothly hung;
