The Complete Works of Robert Burns Part 83

TO THE SAME,

ON THE AUTHOR BEING THREATENED WITH HIS

RESENTMENT.

Spare me thy vengeance, Galloway, In quiet let me live: I ask no kindness at thy hand, For thou hast none to give.

LXII.

ON A COUNTRY LAIRD.

[Mr. Maxwell, of Cardoness, afterwards Sir David, exposed himself to the rhyming wrath of Burns, by his activity in the contested elections of Heron.]

Bless Jesus Christ, O Cardoness, With grateful lifted eyes, Who said that not the soul alone But body too, must rise: For had he said, "the soul alone From death I will deliver;"

Alas! alas! O Cardoness, Then thou hadst slept for ever.

LXIII.

ON JOHN BUSHBY.

[Burns, in his harshest lampoons, always admitted the talents of Bushby: the peasantry, who hate all clever attorneys, loved to handle his character with unsparing severity.]

Here lies John Bushby, honest man!

Cheat him, Devil, gin ye can.

LXIV.

THE TRUE LOYAL NATIVES.

[At a dinner-party, where politics ran high, lines signed by men who called themselves the true loyal natives of Dumfries, were handed to Burns: he took a pencil, and at once wrote this reply.]

Ye true "Loyal Natives," attend to my song, In uproar and riot rejoice the night long; From envy or hatred your corps is exempt, But where is your s.h.i.+eld from the darts of contempt?

LXV.

ON A SUICIDE.

[Burns was observed by my friend, Dr. Copland Hutchinson, to fix, one morning, a bit of paper on the grave of a person who had committed suicide: on the paper these lines were pencilled.]

Earth'd up here lies an imp o' h.e.l.l, Planted by Satan's dibble-- Poor silly wretch, he's d.a.m.n'd himsel'

To save the Lord the trouble.

LXVI.

EXTEMPORE

PINNED ON A LADY'S COUCH.

["Printed," says Sir Harris Nicolas, "from a copy in Burns's handwriting," a slight alteration in the last line is made from an oral version.]

If you rattle along like your mistress's tongue, Your speed will outrival the dart: But, a fly for your load, you'll break down on the road If your stuff has the rot, like her heart.

LXVII.

LINES

TO JOHN RANKINE.

[These lines were said to have been written by the poet to Rankine, of Adamhill, with orders to forward them when he died.]

He who of Rankine sang lies stiff and dead, And a green gra.s.sy hillock hides his head; Alas! alas! a devilish change indeed.