No More Learning

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 174: Johnson, the publisher and proprietor of the Musical
Museum. ]

* * * * *




LXVII.


TO ROBERT AINSLIE, ESQ.

["Burns had a memory stored with the finest poetical passages, which
he was in the habit of quoting most aptly in his correspondence with
his friends: and he delighted also in repeating them in the company of
those friends who enjoyed them. " These are the words of Ainslie, of
Berrywell, to whom this letter in addressed. ]

_Arracher_, 28_th June_, 1787.

MY DEAR SIR,

I write on my tour through a country where savage streams tumble over
savage mountains, thinly overspread with savage flocks, which
sparingly support as savage inhabitants. My last stage was
Inverary--to-morrow night's stage Dumbarton. I ought sooner to have
answered your kind letter, but you know I am a man of many sins.

R. B.

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LXVIII.


TO WILLIAM NICOL, ESQ.

[This visit to Auchtertyre produced that sweet lyric, beginning
"Blythe, blythe and merry was she;" and the lady who inspired it was
at his side, when he wrote this letter. ]

_Auchtertyre, Monday, June, 1787.
_

MY DEAR SIR,

I find myself very comfortable here, neither oppressed by ceremony nor
mortified by neglect. Lady Augusta is a most engaging woman, and very
happy in her family, which makes one's outgoings and incomings very
agreeable. I called at Mr. Ramsay's of Auchtertyre as I came up the
country, and am so delighted with him that I shall certainly accept of
his invitation to spend a day or two with him as I return. I leave
this place on Wednesday or Thursday.

Make my kind compliments to Mr. and Mrs. Cruikshank and Mrs. Nicol, if
she is returned.

I am ever, dear Sir,

Your deeply indebted,

R. B.

* * * * *




LXIX.


TO WILLIAM CRUIKSHANK, ESQ.

ST. JAMES'S SQUARE, EDINBURGH.

[At the house of William Cruikshank, one of the masters of the High
School, in Edinburgh, Burns passed many agreeable hours.