Sir, No. XXXIX. To SIR JOHN WHITEFOORD. December, 1787. Mr. M'Kenzie, in Mauchline, my very warm and worthy friend, has informed me how much you are pleased to interest yourself in my fate as a man, and (what to me is incomparably dearer) my fame as a poet. I have, sir, in one or two instanees, been patronized by those of your character in life, when I was introduced to their notice by ****** friends to them, and honoured acquaintances to me; but you are the first gentleman in the country whose benevolence and goodness of heart has interested him for me, unsolici ted and unknown. I am not master enough of the etiquette of these matters to know, nor did I stay to inquire, whether formal duty bade, or cold propriety disallowed, my thanking you in this manner, as I am convinced, from the light in which you kindly view me, that you will do me the justice to believe this letter is not the manoeuvre of the needy, sharping author, fastening on those in upper life, who honour him with a little notice of him or his works. Indeed the situation of poets is generally such, to a proverb, as may, in some measure, palliate that prostitution of heart and talents they have at times been guilty of. I do not think prodigality is, by any means, a necessary concomitant of a poetic turn, but I believe a careless, indolent inattention to economy, is almost inseparable from it; then there must be in the heart of every bard of Nature's making, a certain modest sensibility, mixed with a kind of pride, that will ever keep him out of the way of those windfalls of for tune, which frequently light on hardy impudence and root-licking servility. It is not easy to imagine a more helpless state than his, whose poetic fancy unfits him for the world, and whose character as a scholar gives him some pretensions to the politesse of life-yet is as poor as I am. For my part, I thank heaven, my star has been kinder; learning never elevated my ideas above the peasant's shed, and I have an independent fortune at the plough-tail. I was surprised to hear that any one, who pretended in the least to the manners of the gentleman, should be so foolish, or worse, as to stoop to traduce the morals of such an one as I am, and so inhumanly cruel, too, as to meddle with that late most unfortunate, unhappy part of my story. With a tear of gratitude I thank you, sir, for the warmth with which you interposed in behalf of my conduct. I am, I acknowledge, too frequently the sport of whim, caprice, and passion-but reverence to God, and integrity to my fellow-creatures, I hope I shall ever preserve. I have no return, sir, to make you for your goodness but one-a return which, I am persuaded, will not be unacceptablethe honest, warm wishes of a grateful heart for your happiness, and every one of that lovely flock, who stand to you in a filial relation. If ever calumny aim the poisoned shaft at them, may friend. ship be by to ward the blow! No. XL. To Mrs. DUNLOP. Edinburgh, 21st January, 1788. After six weeks confinement, I am beginning to walk across the room. They have been six horrible weeks; anguish and low spirits made me unfit to read, write, or think. I have a hundred times wished that one could resign life as an officer resigns a commission: for I would not take in any poor, ignorant wretch, by selling out. Lately I was a sixpenny private; and, God knows, a miserable soldier enough; now I march to the campaign, a starving cadet: a little more conspicuously wretched. I am ashamed of all this; for though I do want bravery for the warfare of life, I could wish, like some other soldiers, to have as much fortitude or cunning as to dissemble or conceal my cowardice. As soon as I can bear the journey, which will be, I suppose, about the middle of next week, I leave Edinburgh, and soon after I shall pay my grateful duty at Dunlop-house. No. XLI. EXTRACT OF A LETTER, TO THE SAME. Re Edinburgh, 12th February, 1788. Some things in your late letters hurt me: not that you say them, but that you mistake me. ligion, my honoured madam, has not only been all my life my chief dependence, but my dearest enjoyment. I have indeed been the luckless victim of wayward follies; but, alas! I have ever been more fool than knave," A mathematician without religion, is a probable character; an irreligieus poet, is a monster. Madam, No. XLII. To Mrs. DUNLOP. Mossgiel, 7th March, 1788. The last paragraph in yours of the 30th February, affected me most, so I shall begin my answer where you ended your letter. That I am often a sinner with any little wit I have, I do confess, but I have taxed my recollection to no purpose, to find out when it was employed against you. I hate an ungenerous sarcasm, a great deal worse than I do the devil; at least as Milton describes bim; and though I may be rascally enough to be sometimes guilty of it myself, I cannot endure it in others. You, my honoured friend, who cannot ap pear in any light, but you are sure of being respectable-you can afford to pass by an occasion to display your wit, because you may depend for fame on your sense; or, if you choose to be silent, you know you can rely on the gratitude of many and the esteem of all; but God help us who are wits or witlings by profession, if we stand not for fame there, we sink unsupported! I am highly flattered by the news you tell me of Coila". I may say to the fair painter who does me so much honour, as Dr. Beattie says to Ross, the poet, of his muse Scota, from which, by the bye, I took the idea of Coila: ('tis a poem of Beattie's in the Scottish dialect, which perhaps you have never seen.) "Ye shak your head, but o' my fegs, Her fiddle wanted strings and pegs, Waes me, poor hizzie!" No. XLIII. To Mr. ROBERT CLEGHORN. Mauchline, 31st March, 1788. Yesterday, my dear sir, as I was riding through a track of melancholy, joyless muirs, between Gal * A lady (daugher of Mrs. Dunlop) was making a picture from the description of Coila in the l'ision. E. loway and Ayrshire; it being Sunday, I turned my thoughts to psalms, and hymns, and spiritual songs; and your favourite air, captain Okean, coming at length in my head, I tried these words to it. You will see that the first part of the tune must be repeated*. I am tolerably pleased with these verses, but as I have only a sketch of the tune, I leave it with you to try if they suit the measure of the music. I am so harassed with care and anxiety, about this farming project of mine, that my muse has degenerated into the veriest prose-wench, that ever picked cinders, or followed a tinker. When I am fairly got into the routine of business, I shall trouble you with a longer epistle; perhaps with some queries respecting farming; at present, the world sits such a load on my mind, that it has effaced almost every trace of the in me. My very best compliments, and good wishes to Mrs. Cleghorn. No. XLIV. From Mr. ROBERT CLEGHORN. Saughton Mills, 27th April, 1788. My dear brother farmer, I was favoured with your very kind letter of the 31st ult. and consider myself greatly obliged to you, for your attention in sending me the song to my favourite air, Captain Okean. The words delight me much, they fit the tune to a hair. I wish you would send me a verse or two more; and if you have no objection, I would have it in the Jacobite stile. Suppose it should be sung after the fatal field of Culloden by the unfortunate Charles. Tenducci personates the lovely Mary Stewart in Here the bard gives the first stanza of the Chevalier's Lament. |