The Modern Scottish Minstrel Volume Iv Part 1

The Modern Scottish Minstrel.

Volume IV.

by Various.

THE INFLUENCE OF BURNS

ON

SCOTTISH POETRY AND SONG:

An Essay.

BY THE REV. GEORGE GILFILLAN.

It is exceedingly difficult to settle the exact place of, as well as to compute the varied influences wielded by, a great original genius. Every such mind borrows so much from his age and from the past, as well as communicates so much from his own native stores, that it is difficult to determine whether he be more the creature or the creator of his period.

But, ere determining the influence exerted by Burns on Scottish song and poetry, it is necessary first to inquire what he owed to his predecessors in the art, as well as to the general Scottish atmosphere of thought, feeling, scenery and manners.

First of all, Burns felt, in common with his _forbears_ in the genealogy of Scottish song, the inspiring influences breathing from our mountain-land, and from the peculiar habits and customs of a "people dwelling alone, and not reckoned among the nations." He was not born in a district peculiarly distinguished for romantic beauty--we mean, in comparison with some other regions of Scotland. The whole course of the Ayr, as Currie remarks, is beautiful; and beautiful exceedingly the Brig of Doon, especially as it now s.h.i.+nes through the magic of the Master's poetry. But it yields to many other parts of Scotland, some of which Burns indeed afterwards saw, although his matured genius was not much profited by the sight. Ayrs.h.i.+re--even with the peaks of Arran bounding the view seaward--cannot vie with the scenery around Edinburgh; with Stirling--its links and blue mountains; with "Gowrie's Ca.r.s.e, beloved of Ceres, and Clydesdale to Pomona dear;" with Straths Tay and Earn, with their two fine rivers flowing from finer lakes, through corn-fields, woods, and rocks, to melt into each other's arms in music, near the fair city of Perth; with the wilder and stormier courses of the Spey, the Findhorn, and the Dee; with the romantic and song-consecrated precincts of the Border; with the "bonnie hills o' Gallowa" and Dumfriess.h.i.+re; or with that transcendent mountain region stretching up along Lochs Linnhe, Etive, and Leven--between the wild, torn ridges of Morven and Appin--uniting Ben Cruachan to Ben Nevis, and including in its sweep the lonely and magnificent Glencoe--a region unparalleled in wide Britain for its quant.i.ty and variety of desolate grandeur, where every shape is bold, every shape blasted, but all blasted at such different angles as to produce endless diversity, and yet where the whole seems twisted into a certain terrible harmony; not to speak of the glorious isles

"Placed far amid the melancholy main,"

Iona, which, being interpreted, means the "Island of the Waves," the rocky cradle of Scotland's Christianity; Staffa with gra.s.s growing above the unspeakable grandeur which lurks in the cathedral-cave below, and cows peacefully feeding over the tumultuous surge which forms the organ of the eternal service; and Skye, with its Loch Coriskin, piercing like a bright arrow the black breast of the s.h.a.ggy hills of Cuchullin. Burns had around him only the features of ordinary Scottish scenery, but from these he drank in no common draught of inspiration; and how admirably has he reproduced such simple objects as the "burn stealing under the lang yellow broom," and the "milk-white thorn that scents the evening gale," the "burnie wimplin' in its glen," and the

"Rough bur-thistle spreadin' wide Amang the bearded bear."

These objects const.i.tuted the poetry of his own fields; they were linked with his own joys, loves, memories, and sorrows, and these he felt impelled to enshrine in song. It may, indeed, be doubted if his cast of mind would have led him to sympathise with bold and savage scenery. In proof of this, we remember that, although he often had seen the gigantic ridges of Arran looming through the purple evening air, or with the "morning suddenly spread" upon their summer summits, or with premature snow tinging their autumnal tops, he never once alludes to them, so far as we remember, either in his poetry or prose; and that although he spent a part of his youth on the wild smuggling coast of Carrick, he has borrowed little of his imagery from the sea--none, we think, except the two lines in the "Vision"--

"I saw thee seek the sounding sh.o.r.e, Delighted with the das.h.i.+ng roar."

His descriptions are almost all of inland scenery. Yet, that there was a strong sense of the sublime in his mind is manifest from the lines succeeding the above--

"And when the North his fleecy store Drove through the sky, I saw grim Nature's visage h.o.a.r Struck thy young eye;"

as well as from the delight he expresses in walking beside a planting in a windy day, and listening to the blast howling through the trees and raving over the plain. Perhaps his mind was most alive to the sublimity of _motion_, of agitation, of tumultuous energy, as exhibited in a snow-storm, or in the "torrent rapture" of winds and waters, because they seemed to sympathise with his own tempestuous pa.s.sions, even as the fierce Zanga, in the "Revenge," during a storm, exclaims---

"I like this rocking of the battlements.

Rage on, ye winds; burst clouds, and waters roar!

You bear a just resemblance of my fortune, And suit the gloomy habit of my soul."

Probably Burns felt little admiration of the calm, colossal grandeur of mountain-scenery, where there are indeed vestiges of convulsion and agony, but where age has softened the storm into stillness, and where the memory of former strife and upheaving only serves to deepen the feeling of repose--vestiges which, like the wrinkles on the stern brow of the Corsair,

"Speak of pa.s.sion, but of pa.s.sion past."

With these records of bygone "majestic pains," on the other hand, the genius of Milton and Wordsworth seemed made to sympathise; and the former is never greater than standing on Niphates Mount with Satan, or upon the "hill of Paradise the highest" with Michael, or upon the "Specular Mount" with the Tempter and the Saviour; and the latter is always most himself beside Skiddaw or Helvellyn. Byron professes vast admiration for Lochnagar and the Alps; but the former is seen through the enchanting medium of distance and childish memory; and among the latter, his rhapsodies on Mont Blanc, and the cold "thrones of eternity"

around him, are nothing to his pictures of torrents, cataracts, thunderstorms; in short, of all objects where unrest--the leading feeling in _his_ bosom--const.i.tutes the princ.i.p.al element in _their_ grandeur. It is curious, by the way, how few good descriptions there exist in poetry of views _from_ mountains. Milton has, indeed, some incomparable ones, but all imaginary--such, at least, as no actual mountain on earth can command; but, in other poets, we at this moment remember no good one. They seem always looking up _to_, not down from, mountains. Wordsworth has given us, for example, no description of the view from Skiddaw; and there does not exist, in any Scottish poetical author, a first-rate picture of the view either from Ben Lomond, Schehallion, Ben Cruachan, or Ben Nevis.

After all, Burns was more influenced by some other characteristics of Scotland than he was by its scenery. There was, first, its romantic history. _That_ had not then been separated, as it has since been, from the mists of fable, but lay exactly in that twilight point of view best adapted for arousing the imagination. To the eye of Burns, as it glared back into the past, the history of his country seemed intensely poetical--including the line of early kings who pa.s.s over the stage of Boece' and Buchanan's story as their brethren over the magic gla.s.s of Macbeth's witches--equally fantastic and equally false--the dark tragedy of that terrible thane of Glammis and Cawdor--the deeds of Wallace and Bruce--the battle of Flodden--and the sad fate of Queen Mary; and from most of these themes he drew an inspiration which could scarcely have been conceived to reside even in them. On Wallace, Bruce, and Queen Mary, his mind seems to have brooded with peculiar intensity--on the two former, because they were patriots; and on the latter, because she was a beautiful woman; and his allusions to them rank with the finest parts in his or any poetry. He seemed especially adapted to be the poet-laureate of Wallace--a modern edition, somewhat improved, of the broad, brawny, ragged bard who actually, it is probable, attended in the train of Scotland's patriot hero, and whose constant occupation it was to change the gold of his achievements into the silver of song. Scottish manners, too, as well as history, exerted a powerful influence on Scotland's peasant-poet. They were then far more peculiar than now, and had only been faintly or partially represented by previous poets. Thus, the christening of the _wean_, with all its ceremony and all its mirth--Hallowe'en, with its "rude awe and laughter"--the "Rockin'"--the "Brooze"--the Bridal--and a hundred other intensely Scottish and very old customs, were all ripe and ready for the poet, and many of them he has treated, accordingly, with consummate felicity and genius. It seems almost as if the _final cause_ of their long-continued existence were connected with the appearance, in due time, of one who was to extract their finest essence, and to embalm them for ever in his own form of ideal representation.

Burns, too, doubtless derived much from previous poets. This is a common case, as we have before hinted, with even the most original. Had not Shakspeare and Milton been "celestial thieves," their writings would have been far less rich and brilliant than they are; although, had they not possessed true originality, they would not have taken their present lofty position in the world of letters. So, to say that Burns was much indebted to his predecessors, and that he often imitated Ramsay and Fergusson, and borrowed liberally from the old ballads, is by no means to derogate from his genius. If he took, he gave with interest. The most commonplace songs, after they had, as he said, "got a brus.h.i.+ng" from his hands, a.s.sumed a totally different aspect. Each ballad was merely a piece of canvas, on which he inscribed his inimitable paintings.

Sometimes even by a single word he proclaimed the presence of the master-poet, and by a single stroke exalted a daub into a picture. His imitations of Ramsay and Fergusson far surpa.s.s the originals, and remind you of Landseer's dogs, which seem better than the models from which he drew. When a king accepts a fas.h.i.+on from a subject, he glorifies it, and renders it the rage. It was in this royal style that Burns treated the inferior writers who had gone before him; and although he highly admired and warmly praised them, he must have felt a secret sense of his own vast superiority.

We come now shortly to speak of the influence he has exerted on Scottish poetry. This was manifold. In the first place, a number were encouraged by his success to collect and publish their poems, although few of them possessed much merit; and he complained that some were a wretched "sp.a.w.n" of mediocrity, which the suns.h.i.+ne of his fame had warmed and brought forth prematurely. Lapraik, for instance, was induced by the praise of Burns to print an edition of his poems, which turned out a total failure. There was only one good piece in it all, and _that_ was pilfered from an old magazine. Secondly, Burns exerted an inspiring influence on some men of real genius, who, we verily believe, would, but for Burns, have never written, or, at least, written so well--such as Alexander Wilson, Tannahill, Macneil, Hogg, and the numerous members of the "Whistle-Binkie" school. In all these writers we trace the influence of the large "lingering star" of the genius of Burns. "Wattie and Meg,"

by Wilson, when it first appeared anonymously, was attributed to Burns.

Tannahill is, in much of his poetry, an echo of Burns, although in song-writing he is a real original. Macneil was roused by Burns' praises of whisky to give a _per contra_, in his "Scotland's Scaith; or, the History of Will and Jean." And although the most of Hogg's poetry is entirely original, we find the influence of Burns distinctly marked in some of his songs--such as the "Kye come Hame."

But there is a wider and more important light in which to regard the influence of our great national Bard. He first fully revealed the interest and the beauty which lie in the simpler forms of Scottish scenery, he darted light upon the peculiarities of Scottish manners, and he opened the warm heart of his native land. Scotland, previous to Burns' poetry, was a spring shut up and a fountain sealed.

"She lay like some unkenned-of isle Ayont New Holland."

The glories of her lakes, her glens, her streams, her mountains, the hardy courage, the burning patriotism, the trusty attachments, the loves, the games, the superst.i.tions, and the devotion of her inhabitants, were all unknown and unsuspected as themes for song till Burns took them up, and less added glory than shewed the glory that was in them, and shewed also that they opened up a field nearly inexhaustible. Writers of a very high order were thus attracted to Scotland, not merely as their native country, but as a theme for poetry; and, while disdaining to imitate Burns' poetry slavishly, and some of them not writing in verse at all, they found in Scottish subjects ample scope for the exercise of their genius; and in some measure to his influence we may attribute the fictions of Mrs Hamilton and Miss Ferrier, Scott's poems and novels, Galt's, Lockhart's, Wilson's, Delta's, and Aird's tales and poetry, and much of the poetry of Campbell, who, although he never writes in Scotch, has embalmed, in his "Lochiel's Warning," "Glenara," "Lord Ullin's Daughter," some interesting subjects connected with Scotland, and has, in "Gertrude of Wyoming," and in the "Pilgrim of Glencoe," made striking allusions to Scottish scenery. That the progress of civilisation, apart from Burns, would have ultimately directed the attention of cultivated men to a country so peculiar and poetical as Scotland cannot be doubted; but the rise of Burns hastened the result, as being itself a main element in propelling civilisation and diffusing genuine taste. His dazzling success, too, excited emulation in the b.r.e.a.s.t.s of our men of genius, as well as tended to exalt in their eyes a country which had produced such a stalwart and gifted son. We may, indeed, apply to the feeling of pride which animates Scotchmen, and particularly Scotchmen in other lands, at the thought of Burns being their countryman, the famous lines of Dryden--

"Men met each other with erected look, The steps were higher that they took; Each to congratulate his friends made haste, And long inveterate foes saluted as they pa.s.s'd."

The poor man, says Wilson, as he speaks of Burns, always holds up his head and regards you with an elated look. Scotland has become more venerable, more beautiful, more glorious in the eyes of her children, and a fitter theme for poetry, since the feet of Burns rested on her fields, and since his ardent eyes glowed with enthusiasm as he saw her scenery, and as he sung her praise; while to many in foreign parts she is chiefly interesting as being (what a portion of her has long been called) the Land of Burns.

The real successors of Burns, it is thus manifest, were not Tannahill or Macneil, but Sir Walter Scott, Campbell, Aird, Delta, Galt, Allan Cunningham, and Professor Wilson. To all of these, Burns, along with Nature, united in teaching the lessons of simplicity, of brawny strength, of clear common sense, and of the propriety of staying at home instead of gadding abroad in search of inspiration. All of these have been, like Burns, more or less intensely Scottish in their subjects and in their spirit.

That Burns' errors as a man have exerted a pernicious influence on many since, is, we fear, undeniable. He had been taught, by the lives of the "wits," to consider aberration, eccentricity, and "devil-may-careism" as prime badges of genius, and he proceeded accordingly to astonish the natives, many of whom, in their turn, set themselves to copy his faults.

But when we subtract some half-dozen pieces, either coa.r.s.e in language or equivocal in purpose, the influence of his poetry may be considered good. (We of course say nothing here of the volume called the "Merry Muses," still extant to disgrace his memory.) It is doubtful if his "Willie brew'd a peck o' Maut" ever made a drunkard, but it is certain that his "Cottar's Sat.u.r.day Night" has converted sinners, edified the G.o.dly, and made some erect family altars. It has been worth a thousand homilies. And, taking his songs as a whole, they have done much to stir the flames of pure love, of patriotism, of genuine sentiment, and of a taste for the beauties of nature. And it is remarkable that all his followers and imitators have, almost without exception, avoided his faults while emulating his beauties; and there is not a sentence in Scott, or Campbell, or Aird, or Delta, and not many in Wilson or Galt, that can be charged with indelicacy, or even coa.r.s.eness. So that, on the whole, we may a.s.sert that, whatever evil he did by the example of his life, he has done very little--but, on the contrary, much good, both artistically and morally, by the influence of his poetry.

CONTENTS.

PAGE HENRY SCOTT RIDDELL, 1 The wild glen sae green, 49 Scotia's thistle, 50 The land of gallant hearts, 51 The yellow locks o' Charlie, 52 We 'll meet yet again, 53 Our ain native land, 54 The Grecian war-song, 56 Flora's lament, 57 When the glen all is still, 58 Scotland yet, 58 The minstrel's grave, 60 My own land and loved one, 61 The bower of the wild, 62 The crook and plaid, 63 The minstrel's bower, 65 When the star of the morning, 66 Though all fair was that bosom, 67 Would that I were where wild-woods wave, 68 O tell me what sound, 69 Our Mary, 70

MRS MARGARET M. INGLIS, 73 Sweet bard of Ettrick's Glen, 75 Young Jamie, 76 Charlie's bonnet's down, laddie, 77 Heard ye the bagpipe? 78 Bruce's address, 79 Removed from vain fas.h.i.+on, 80 When shall we meet again? 81

JAMES KING, 83 The lake is at rest, 85 Life 's like the dew, 86

ISOBEL PAGAN, 88 Ca' the yowes to the knowes, 89

JOHN MITCh.e.l.l, 90 Beauty, 91 To the evening star, 92 O waft me to the fairy clime, 92 The love-sick maid, 93

ALEXANDER JAMIESON, 95 The maid who wove, 96 A sigh and a smile, 97

JOHN GOLDIE, 98 And can thy bosom, 100 Sweet 's the dew, 101

ROBERT POLLOK, 103 The African maid, 105

J. C. DENOVAN, 106 Oh! Dermot, dear loved one, 107

JOHN IMLAH, 108 Kathleen, 109 Hielan' heather, 110 Farewell to Scotland, 111 The rose of Seaton Vale, 112 Katherine and Donald, 113 Guid nicht, and joy be wi' you a', 114 The gathering, 115 Mary, 116 Oh! gin I were where Gadie rins, 117

JOHN TWEEDIE, 120 Saw ye my Annie? 121